The Perilous Outing of Benjamin Buckles

Chapter One: The Buckles

It was Mr. William Babblesquatz who first conceived the notion to wear the gold squares known as buckles upon his shoes in 1629. He had been resolved upon giving himself a new name, for Babblesquatz is an ugly name to read and an even uglier name to hear, and he was well aware of it. He wore them every day and began selling similar ones to people who were in want of them, which made him wealthy indeed. As he had anticipated, Mr. Babblesquatz soon became recognizable for his buckled shoes by everyone in London, so much so that it drew the attention of King James I, of whose court Sir William was a distinguished member. After purchasing some buckles of his own, the King decided that Babblesquatz was an unfitting surname for this gentleman, and therefore decided to grant him a better one: Buckles. This was how the great House of Buckles came into existence, and where our story begins.

Now, if you presume that this story's protagonist is the great and gaudy Mr. William Buckles, I am sorry to inform you that you are quite mistaken. He died in 1640, leaving his massive inheritance to his eldest son, Mr. Edward Buckles. Then he had children, and was succeeded by the eldest, and so on, for well over two centuries. As time progressed, their wealth accumulated, but their bloodline dwindled perilously. Each generation was hardly able to produce an heir, and when they did, the heir was cursed with a sickly constitution, and often died well before entering old age. Consequently, by the beginning of the nineteenth century, the fate of this noble family rested solely in the hands of Harold Buckles, the only surviving member. Orphaned at the age of four, Harold was a quiet, bookish boy who clung desperately to his volumes for comfort, and aspired to be the first in his family to attend the University of Oxford. He was admitted, as his intelligence was unanimously acknowledged by all the great scholars of the country, and completed his three years with a degree in English Literature and the highest marks of his class. No sooner had he returned home, however, than everybody around him prevailed upon him to marry, especially his three maternal aunts- the last of his living relations.

"Well, Harold, you must marry, at any rate," they would argue.

"Marry?" Harold would ask languidly, "With what purpose?"

"Why, to have a son," they would reply desperately.

"I have never liked children," he would retort. "I should be glad to live the remainder of my days in complete solitude, with my books to serve as companions."

"But you are the last member of the Buckles family," they would try again, "And you must have a son, lest your good name should die with you!"

They had him hold balls and make the acquaintances of countless ladies of all ranks and walks of life, and yet it was all done in vain; Harold could not be made to marry. Finally, when he was just twenty years of age, he attended the final ball of the season, which was held at Lockbridge Grove, the home of Mr. Francis Gillingham, Harold's former roommate at Oxford. After sulking for ten minutes at the loss of his scheduled reading time, he came upon the discovery of Miss Lucille Gillingham, Francis' nineteen-year-old sister, whose existence was previously unknown to him. Their families pushed the two together until they finally agreed to engage in conversation, and once they did, they realized they could not possibly have been more at variance with each other than they already were. They danced once and afterward returned to their respective families, who were waiting with baited breath to hear their sentiments on each other. Lucille told her mother that she did not care for Harold because he was dull, tedious, indifferent, and much too reserved. Harold informed his aunts that he did not care for Lucille because she was loquacious, energetic, flirtatious, and laughed too much- but worst of all, she had the audacity to declare that she hated books. Mrs. Gillingham induced Lucille to reconsider her hard yet accurate depiction by stating that Harold possessed a fortune of half a million pounds. Meanwhile, Harold's aunts promised that upon their marriage, Lucille's respectable dowry could be used to build a larger library in his house and fill it with thousands of new books, since he had read nearly all of his own.

This was enough to convince Harold and Lucille that they should marry, and so following a brief and unpleasant courtship, the young couple wed and became Mr. and Mrs. Buckles. They went to live in Harold's quaint home nestled in the tranquil countryside of Oxfordshire. "Quaint" was the word he used to describe it as to appear modest before his new wife. In reality, it was a thirty-five-bedroom mansion called Chesterlow Manor that sat on a 25,000-acre plot of land. Its imposing architecture, with its yellow stone exterior, immense measurements, and six great columns near the front entrance, gave it the appearance of a royal palace, and indeed, Mr. and Mrs. Buckles lived like royalty. They acquired a staff of fifty servants, a stable of thirty horses, thousands of acres of hunting grounds, and, in due time, an expanded library with an updated selection, which had been promised to Mr. Buckles by way of his wife's dowry. But then they recalled why they had married, and what they were in desperate want of: an heir. Just one son would secure the House of Buckles from eradicating; fortunate were Mr. and Mrs. Buckles, for on the first of May in the year 1805, nearly a year into their marriage, Mrs. Buckles bore a son.

What a relief it was! Harold's aunts were never without praise for their nephew and niece-in-law for having borne such a vigorous and handsome son, and the baby's parents could not feel more indifferent about their parenthood. They named him Benjamin Henry Buckles, after both of his parent's fathers, and found with time that he was a promising and precocious child. He retained his mother's golden tresses and pale blue eyes, and his father's fair complexion and studious disposition. He bore the resemblance of a heavenly angel, and consequently, everybody treated him as one. Benjamin was brought up the way any prince would be, with governesses raising him more than his own parents, and tutors instructing him in his lessons for hours at a stretch and sometimes leaving him to stroll languidly about the house and grounds without anyone to accompany him or anything to do. As the years passed, he adopted such virtues as intelligence and civility, and such vices as arrogance and greed. He was always to be given whatever he requested- so that he would not be tempted to whine and vex his parents- and was to be obeyed by his servants as though he were the master of Chesterlow Manor. This is the manner in which our young protagonist conducted himself, and he refused to do so in any other way.