Not According to the Code

"Not According to the Code" by Robert Barr is a gripping tale that intertwines themes of mystery and intrigue within the context of social norms and moral dilemmas. The story follows a protagonist who challenges established codes of conduct, leading to unexpected consequences and revelations. Barr's masterful storytelling and keen insight into human nature invite readers to reflect on the complexities of ethics and the choices that define us. This thought-provoking narrative explores the rebellion against conformity and the pursuit of personal truth in a world governed by unspoken rules.

• Short story

								
Even a stranger to the big town walking for the first time through
London, sees on the sides of the houses many names with which he has
long been familiar. His precognition has cost the firms those names
represent much money in advertising. The stranger has had the names
before him for years in newspapers and magazines, on the hoardings and
boards by the railway side, paying little heed to them at the time; yet
they have been indelibly impressed on his brain, and when he wishes
soap or pills his lips almost automatically frame the words most
familiar to them. Thus are the lavish sums spent in advertising
justified, and thus are many excellent publications made possible.

When you come to ponder over the matter, it seems strange that there
should ever be any real man behind the names so lavishly advertised;
that there should be a genuine Smith or Jones whose justly celebrated
medicines work such wonders, or whose soap will clean even a guilty
conscience. Granting the actual existence of these persons and probing
still further into the mystery, can any one imagine that the excellent
Smith to whom thousands of former sufferers send entirely unsolicited
testimonials, or the admirable Jones whom prima donnas love
because his soap preserves their dainty complexions--can any one credit
the fact that Smith and Jones have passions like other men, have
hatreds, likes and dislikes?

Such a condition of things, incredible as it may appear, exists in
London. There are men in the metropolis, utterly unknown personally,
whose names are more widely spread over the earth than the names of the
greatest novelists, living or dead, and these men have feeling and form
like unto ourselves.

There was the firm of Danby and Strong for instance. The name may mean
nothing to any reader of these pages, but there was a time when it was
well-known and widely advertised, not only in England but over the
greater part of the world as well. They did a great business, as every
firm that spends a fortune every year in advertising is bound to do. It
was in the old paper-collar days. There actually was a time when the
majority of men wore paper collars, and, when you come to think of it,
the wonder is that the paper-collar trade ever fell away as it did,
when you consider with what vile laundries London is and always has
been cursed. Take the Danby and Strong collars for instance, advertised
as being so similar to linen that only an expert could tell the
difference. That was Strong's invention. Before he invented the
Piccadilly collar so-called, paper collars had a brilliant glaze that
would not have deceived the most recent arrival from the most remote
shire in the country. Strong devised some method by which a slight
linen film was put on the paper, adding strength to the collar and
giving it the appearance of the genuine article. You bought a
pasteboard box containing a dozen of these collars for something like
the price you paid for the washing of half a dozen linen ones. The
Danby and Strong Piccadilly collar jumped at once into great
popularity, and the wonder is that the linen collar ever recovered from
the blow dealt it by this ingenious invention.

Curiously enough, during the time the firm was struggling to establish
itself, the two members of it were the best of friends, but when
prosperity came to them, causes of difference arose, and their
relations, as the papers say of warlike nations, became strained.
Whether the fault lay with John Danby or with William Strong no one has
ever been able to find out. They had mutual friends who claimed that
each one of them was a good fellow, but those friends always added that
Strong and Danby did not "hit it off."

Strong was a bitter man when aroused, and could generally be counted
upon to use harsh language. Danby was quieter, but there was a sullen
streak of stubbornness in him that did not tend to the making up of a
quarrel. They had been past the speaking point for more than a year,
when there came a crisis in their relations with each other, that ended
in disaster to the business carried on under the title of Danby and
Strong. Neither man would budge, and between them the business sunk to
ruin. Where competition is fierce no firm can stand against it if there
is internal dissension. Danby held his ground quietly but firmly,
Strong raged and cursed, but was equally steadfast in not yielding a
point. Each hated the other so bitterly that each was willing to lose
his own share in a profitable business, if by doing so he could bring
ruin on his partner.

We are all rather prone to be misled by appearances. As one walks down
Piccadilly, or the Strand, or Fleet Street and meets numerous
irreproachably dressed men with glossy tall hats and polished boots,
with affable manners and a courteous way of deporting themselves toward
their fellows, we are apt to fall into the fallacy of believing that
these gentlemen are civilised. We fail to realise that if you probe in
the right direction you will come upon possibilities of savagery that
would draw forth the warmest commendation from a Pawnee Indian. There
are reputable business men in London who would, if they dared, tie an
enemy to a stake and roast him over a slow fire, and these men have
succeeded so well, not only in deceiving their neighbours, but also
themselves, that they would actually be offended if you told them so.
If law were suspended in London for one day, during which time none of
us would be held answerable for any deed then done, how many of us
would be alive next morning? Most of us would go out to pot some
favourite enemy, and would doubtless be potted ourselves before we got
safely home again.

The law, however, is a great restrainer, and helps to keep the death-
rate from reaching excessive proportions. One department of the law
crushed out the remnant of the business of Messrs. Danby and Strong,
leaving the firm bankrupt, while another department of the law
prevented either of the partners taking the life of the other.

When Strong found himself penniless, he cursed, as was his habit, and
wrote to a friend in Texas asking if he could get anything to do over
there. He was tired of a country of law and order, he said, which was
not as complimentary to Texas as it might have been. But his remark
only goes to show what extraordinary ideas Englishmen have of foreign
parts. The friend's answer was not very encouraging, but, nevertheless,
Strong got himself out there somehow, and in course of time became a
cowboy. He grew reasonably expert with his revolver and rode a mustang
as well as could be expected, considering that he had never seen such
an animal in London, even at the Zoo. The life of a cowboy on a Texas
ranch leads to the forgetting of such things as linen shirts and paper
collars.

Strong's hatred of Danby never ceased, but he began to think of him
less often.

One day, when he least expected it, the subject was brought to his mind
in a manner that startled him. He was in Galveston ordering supplies

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