It seemed that one evening, about three weeks ago, a certain soldier on leave had been lounging against the counter, close to the glass screen. On the other side of the screen the apparatus was clicking merrily while Miss Yorke, the telegraph clerk, despatched a message. And all at once the soldier, who was well versed in the code, began to recite the message aloud. The postmaster peremptorily ordered him to stand away from the counter. An altercation ensued, and the soldier became so impudent that the postmaster threatened to put him outside the door. "Oh," said the soldier, "it'd take a many such as you to put me out."
"Did he say so? Really now!" And Mr. Ridgett looked at Dale critically. "I take it he was a heavyweight, eh?"
"He gave me my work," said Dale; "and I was all three minutes at it. But out he went."
"Really now!" and Mr. Ridgett smiled.
"I had stopped Miss Yorke from operating. And I started her again within four minutes. That was the time, and no more, the message was delayed. That was the time it took me to renew the service with the confidence and secrecy provided by Her Majesty's Regulations. And I ask you, how else could I have acted? Was I to allow a telegram consigned to my care to be blabbed out word for word to all the world?"
"Were there many people in the office just then?"
"Two. But that makes no difference. If it had been only one--or half a one--it couldn't be permitted."
"And was the message itself of a particularly private or important nature?"
"Not as it happens. But the principle was the same."
"Just so."
As it appeared from Dale's narration, the soldier was at first willing to accept his licking in a sportsmanlike spirit, was indeed quite ready to admit that he had been the offending party; but injudicious friends--secret enemies of Dale perhaps--had egged him on to take out a summons for assault. When, however, Dale appeared before the magistrates, the soldier had changed his mind again--he did not appear, he allowed the charge to fall to the ground. And there the matter might have ended, ought to have ended, but for the fact that the local Member of Parliament suddenly made a ridiculous fuss--said it was a monstrous and intolerable state of affairs that soldiers of the Queen should be knocked about by her civil servants--wrote letters to other Members of Parliament, to Government secretaries, to newspapers. Then the excitement that had been smoldering burst forth with explosive force, shaking the village, the county, the universe.