_ CHAPTER FIFTEEN. TREATS OF MRS. DURBY'S LOST PARCEL IN PARTICULAR, AND OF LOST-LUGGAGE IN GENERAL.
We need scarcely say that Edwin Gurwood took a good deal of trouble to find poor Mrs Durby's lost parcel. Had he known what its contents were he might perhaps have done more. As she positively asserted that she had carried it into the cab with her and had not left it in the train, immediate application was not made at the station for it, but Edwin drove her in a cab to Scotland Yard, and there introduced her to the police officials whose duty it is to take charge of articles left in cabs. Here she was asked to describe the appearance of her parcel, which she did, by saying that it was a roundish one in brown paper, fastened with a piece of string, and having the name of Durby written on it in pencil, without any address.
Not feeling quite sure however of the fidelity of the nurse's memory, Edwin then went to the station and made inquiries there, but on application to the lost-luggage office no such parcel had been deposited there. The reader may perhaps be surprised at this, as it is well-known that every train is searched by the porters on its arrival at a terminus, and all forgotten articles are conveyed at once to the lost-luggage office. In the ordinary course of things Mrs Durby's parcel would have been found and restored to her on application, but it happened that a careless porter searched the "Flying Dutchman" that day, and had failed to observe the parcel which lay in a dark corner under the seat. When the carriage therefore was shunted the parcel was left to repose in it all night as well as all next day, which happened to be Sunday.
The parcel had a longish excursion on its own account after that. The carriage in which it lay happened to be a "through one," and belonged to another company, to whose line it was accordingly forwarded on the following Monday. It reached a remote station in the west of England that night and there the parcel was discovered. It lay all night there, and next day was forwarded to the lost-luggage office of that line. Here it was examined; the various pieces of paper were unrolled one by one and the doubled-up slipper was discovered; this was examined, and the little parcel found; the name of Durby having been noted and commented on, the covering of note-paper was removed, and the match-box revealed, from the inside of which was produced the pill-box, which, when opened, disclosed to the astonished gaze of the officials an antique gold ring set with diamonds! As the name "Mrs Durby" written in pencil did not furnish a clue to the owner, the ring was given into the charge of the custodier of the lost-luggage office, and a description of it with a note of all particulars regarding it, was forwarded to the Clearing-House in London.
The lost-luggage office, we may remark in passing, was a wonderful place--a place in which a moralist might find much material for mental mastication. Here, on an extensive series of shelves, were deposited in large quantities the evidences of man's defective memory; the sad proofs of human fallibility. There were caps and comforters and travelling-bags in great abundance. There were shawls and rugs, and umbrellas and parasols, and sticks and hat-boxes in such numbers as to suggest the idea that hundreds of travellers, smitten with irresistible feelings of gratitude, had left these articles as a trifling testimony of respect to the railway company. There were carpet-bags here not only in large numbers but in great variety of form and size. Smelling-bottles, pocket-handkerchiefs, flasks, pocket-books, gun-cases, portmanteaux, books, cigar cases, etcetera, enough to have stocked a gigantic curiosity shop, and there were several articles which one could not account for having been forgotten on any other supposition than that the owners were travelling maniacs. One gentleman had left behind him a pair of leathern hunting-breeches, a soldier had forgotten his knapsack, a cripple his crutches! a Scotchman his bagpipes; but the most amazing case of all was a church door! We do not jest, reader. It is a fact that such an article was forgotten, or left or lost, on a railway, and, more amazing still, it was never claimed, but after having been advertised, and having lain in the lost goods office the appointed time, it was sold by auction with other things. Many of the articles were powerfully suggestive of definite ideas. One could not look upon those delicate kid gloves without thinking of the young bride, whose agitated soul was incapable of extending a thought to such trifles. That Mrs Gamp-like umbrella raised to mental vision, as if by magic, the despair of the stout elderly female who, arriving unexpectedly and all unprepared at her journey's end, sought to collect her scattered thoughts and belongings and launch herself out on the platform, in the firm belief that a minute's delay would insure her being carried to unknown regions far beyond her destination, and it was impossible to look at that fur travelling-cap with ear-pieces cocked knowingly on a sable muff, without thinking of the bland bald-headed old gentleman who had worn it during a night journey, and had pulled it in all ways about his head and over his eyes, and had crushed it into the cushions of his carriage in a vain endeavour to sleep, and had let it fall off and temporarily lost it and trod upon it and unintentionally sat upon it, and had finally, in the great hurry of waking suddenly on arrival, and in the intense joy of meeting with his blooming girls, flung it off, seized his hat and bag and rug, left the carriage in a whirlwind of greeting, forgot it altogether, and so lost it for ever.
"Nay, not lost," we hear some one saying; "he would surely call at the lost-luggage office on discovering his loss and regain his property."
Probably he might, but certainly he would only act like many hundreds of travellers if he were to leave his property there and never call for it at all.
True, much that finds its way to the lost-luggage office is reclaimed and restored, but it is a fact that the quantity never reclaimed is so large on almost any railway that it forms sufficient to warrant an annual sale by auction which realises some hundreds of pounds. One year's sale of lost-luggage on the Grand National Trunk Railway amounted to 500 pounds! and this was not more than an average year's sale. Every possible effort is of course made to restore lost-luggage before such a sale takes place. In the first place, everything bearing a name and address is returned at once to the owner, but of course there are multitudes of small articles which have neither name nor address. Such of these as are locked or tied up are suffered to remain for a short time in an office, where they may be readily reclaimed; but if not claimed soon they are opened, and if addresses are found inside are sent to their owners. In the event of no addresses being found they are retained for a year, then advertised for sale by public auction, and the proceeds go to reduce that large sum--perhaps 16,000 poundss or more-- which the company has to pay annually as compensation for lost and damaged goods. On one railway where the lost-luggage was allowed to lie a considerable time before being examined a singular case occurred. A hat-box was opened and found to contain Bank of England notes to the amount of 65 pounds, with two letters, which led to its being restored to its owner after having lain for more than a year. The owner had been so positive that he had left the hat-box at a hotel that he had made no inquiry for it at the railway office.
A sale-catalogue of left and unclaimed property on one of our chief railways, which now lies before us, presents some curious "lots." Here are some of them: 70 walking-sticks, 30 silk umbrellas, and there are eleven similar lots, besides innumerable parasols--50 muffs and boas--a crate containing 140 billycocks and hats--24 looking-glasses--160 packets of cloth buttons--15 frying-pans and 18 ploughshares--3 butter machines--2 gas-meters, 2 shovels, and a pair of spectacles--a box of sanitary powder and a 15-horse power horizontal steam-engine! How some of these things, especially the last, could come to be lost at all, is a mystery which we have been quite unable to fathom. Of these lots the catalogue contains 404, and the sale was to occupy two days.
After having failed to obtain any information as to the missing brown paper parcel, Mrs Durby felt so overwhelmed with distress and shame that she took the whole matter into serious consideration, and, resolving to forego her visit to her brother, returned straight to Clatterby, where, in a burst of tears, she related her misadventures to Netta. It need scarcely be said that Netta did not blame her old and faithful nurse. Her disposition was of that mild sympathetic nature which induces one,--when an accident occurs, such as the breaking of a valuable piece of china,--to hasten to excuse rather than to abuse the unhappy breaker, who, in nine cases out of ten, is far more severely punished by his or her own conscience than the sin deserves! Instead, therefore, of blaming the nurse, Netta soothed her; said that it did not matter _much_; that the ring was valuable to her only as a gift from her father; that no doubt some other means of paying their debts would soon be devised; that it would have been an absolute miracle, if nurse had retained her self-possession, in the terrible circumstances, in which she had been placed, and in fact tried so earnestly and touchingly to comfort her, that she unintentionally heaped coals of intensest fire on the poor woman's head, and caused Mrs Durby not only to blame herself more than ever, but to throw her arms round Netta's neck, and all but fall down on her knees and worship her.
Thereafter the subject was dismissed, and in a short time almost forgotten. _