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A Man Of Means
By
P. G. Wodehouse
And
C. H. Bovill
Contents
THE
EPISODE OF THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTER.
THE
EPISODE OF THE FINANCIAL NAPOLEON..
THE
EPISODE OF THE THEATRICAL VENTURE.
THE
EPISODE OF THE LIVE WEEKLY
THE
DIVERTING EPISODE OF THE EXILED MONARCH..
First of a Series of Six Stories [First publis=
hed
in Pictorial Review, May 1916]
=
When a
seed-merchant of cautious disposition and an eye to the main chance receives
from an eminent firm of jam-manufacturers an extremely large order for
clover-seed, his emotions are mixed. Joy may be said to predominate, but wi=
th
the joy comes also uncertainty. Are these people, he asks himself, proposin=
g to
set up as farmers of a large scale, or do they merely want the seed to give
verisimilitude to their otherwise bald and unconvincing raspberry jam? On t=
he
solution of this problem depends the important matter of price, for, obviou=
sly,
you can charge a fraudulent jam disseminator in a manner which an honest fa=
rmer
would resent.
This was the problem which was furrowing the b=
row
of Mr. Julian Fineberg, of Bury St. Edwards, one sunny morning when Roland
Bleke knocked at his door; and such was its difficulty that only at the nin=
eteenth
knock did Mr. Fineberg raise his head.
"Come in--that dashed woodpecker out
there!" he shouted, for it was his habit to express himself with a
generous strength towards the junior members of his staff.
The young man who entered looked exactly like a
second clerk in a provincial seed-merchant's office--which, strangely enoug=
h,
he chanced to be. His chief characteristic was an intense ordinariness. He =
was
a young man; and when you had said that of him you had said everything. The=
re
was nothing which you would have noticed about him, except the fact that th=
ere
was nothing to notice. His age was twenty-two and his name was Roland Bleke=
.
"Please, sir, it's about my salary."=
Mr. Fineberg, at the word, drew himself togeth=
er
much as a British square at Waterloo must have drawn itself together at the
sight of a squadron of cuirassiers.
"Salary?" he cried. "What about=
it?
What's the matter with it? You get it, don't you?"
"Yes, sir, but----"
"Well? Don't stand there like an idiot. W=
hat
is it?"
"It's too much."
Mr. Fineberg's brain reeled. It was improbable
that the millennium could have arrived with a jerk; on the other hand, he h=
ad
distinctly heard one of his clerks complain that his salary was too large. =
He
pinched himself.
"Say that again," he said.
"If you could see your way to reduce it,
sir----"
It occurred to Mr. Fineberg for one instant th=
at
his subordinate was endeavoring to be humorous, but a glance at Roland's fa=
ce
dispelled that idea.
"Why do you want it reduced?"
"Please, sir, I'm going to be married.&qu=
ot;
"What the deuce do you mean?"
"When my salary reaches a hundred and fif=
ty,
sir. And it's a hundred and forty now, so if you could see your way to knoc=
king
off ten pounds----"
Mr. Fineberg saw light. He was a married man
himself.
"My boy," he said genially, "I
quite understand. But I can do you better than that. It's no use doing this
sort of thing in a small way. From now on your salary is a hundred and ten.=
No,
no, don't thank me. You're an excellent clerk, and it's a pleasure to me to
reward merit when I find it. Close the door after you."
And Mr. Fineberg returned with a lighter heart=
to
the great clover-seed problem.
The circumstances which had led Roland to appr=
oach
his employer may be briefly recounted. Since joining the staff of Mr. Fineb=
erg,
he had lodged at the house of a Mr. Coppin, in honorable employment as port=
er at
the local railway-station. The Coppin family, excluding domestic pets,
consisted of Mr. Coppin, a kindly and garrulous gentleman of sixty, Mrs.
Coppin, a somewhat negative personality, most of whose life was devoted to
cooking and washing up in her underground lair, Brothers Frank and Percy,
gentleman of leisure, popularly supposed to be engaged in the mysterious
occupation known as "lookin' about for somethin'," and, lastly,
Muriel.
For some months after his arrival, Muriel had =
been
to Roland Bleke a mere automaton, a something outside himself that was made
only for neatly-laid breakfast tables and silent removal of plates at dinne=
r. Gradually,
however, when his natural shyness was soothed by use sufficiently to enable=
him
to look at her when she came into the room, he discovered that she was a
strikingly pretty girl, bounded to the North by a mass of auburn hair and to
the South by small and shapely feet. She also possessed what, we are
informed--we are children in these matters ourselves--is known as the R. S.=
V.
P. eye. This eye had met Roland's one evening, as he chumped his chop, and
before he knew what he was doing he had remarked that it had been a fine da=
y.
From that wonderful moment matters had develop=
ed
at an incredible speed. Roland had a nice sense of the social proprieties, =
and
he could not bring himself to ignore a girl with whom he had once exchanged
easy conversation about the weather. Whenever she came to lay his table, he=
felt
bound to say something. Not being an experienced gagger, he found it more a=
nd
more difficult each evening to hit on something bright, until finally, from
sheer lack of inspiration, he kissed her.
If matters had progressed rapidly before, they
went like lightning then. It was as if he had touched a spring or pressed a
button, setting vast machinery in motion. Even as he reeled back stunned at=
his
audacity, the room became suddenly full of Coppins of every variety known to
science. Through a mist he was aware of Mrs. Coppin crying in a corner, of =
Mr.
Coppin drinking his health in the remains of sparkling limado, of Brothers
Frank and Percy, one on each side trying to borrow simultaneously half-crow=
ns,
and of Muriel, flushed but demure, making bread-pellets and throwing them i=
n an
abstracted way, one by one, at the Coppin cat, which had wandered in on the
chance of fish.
Out of the chaos, as he stood looking at them =
with
his mouth open, came the word "bans," and smote him like a blast =
of
East wind.
It is not necessary to trace in detail Roland's
mental processes from that moment till the day when he applied to Mr. Fineb=
erg
for a reduction of salary. It is enough to say that for quite a month he wa=
s extraordinarily
happy. To a man who has had nothing to do with women, to be engaged is an
intoxicating experience, and at first life was one long golden glow to Rola=
nd.
Secretly, like all mild men, he had always nourished a desire to be esteeme=
d a
nut by his fellow men; and his engagement satisfied that desire. It was
pleasant to hear Brothers Frank and Percy cough knowingly when he came in. =
It
was pleasant to walk abroad with a girl like Muriel in the capacity of the
accepted wooer. Above all, it was pleasant to sit holding Muriel's hand and
watching the ill-concealed efforts of Mr. Albert Potter to hide his
mortification. Albert was a mechanic in the motor-works round the corner, a=
nd
hitherto Roland had always felt something of a worm in his presence. Albert=
was
so infernally strong and silent and efficient. He could dissect a car and p=
ut
it together again. He could drive through the thickest traffic. He could sit
silent in company without having his silence attributed to shyness or
imbecility. But--he could not get engaged to Muriel Coppin. That was reserv=
ed
for Roland Bleke, the nut, the dasher, the young man of affairs. It was all
very well being able to tell a spark-plug from a commutator at sight, but w=
hen
it came to a contest in an affair of the heart with a man like Roland, Albe=
rt
was in his proper place, third at the pole.
Probably, if he could have gone on merely being
engaged, Roland would never have wearied of the experience. But the word
marriage began to creep more and more into the family conversation, and
suddenly panic descended upon Roland Bleke.
All his life he had had a horror of definite
appointments. An invitation to tea a week ahead had been enough to poison l=
ife
for him. He was one of those young men whose souls revolt at the thought of
planning out any definite step. He could do things on the spur of the momen=
t,
but plans made him lose his nerve.
By the end of the month his whole being was cr=
ying
out to him in agonized tones: "Get me out of this. Do anything you lik=
e,
but get me out of this frightful marriage business."
If anything had been needed to emphasize his
desire for freedom, the attitude of Frank and Percy would have supplied it.=
Every
day they made it clearer that the man who married Muriel would be no strang=
er
to them. It would be his pleasing task to support them, too, in the style t=
o which
they had become accustomed. They conveyed the idea that they went with Muri=
el
as a sort of bonus.
*
The Coppin family were at high tea when Roland
reached home. There was a general stir of interest as he entered the room, =
for
it was known that he had left that morning with the intention of approachin=
g Mr.
Fineberg on the important matter of a rise in salary. Mr. Coppin removed hi=
s saucer
of tea from his lips. Frank brushed the tail of a sardine from the corner of
his mouth. Percy ate his haddock in an undertone. Albert Potter, who was
present, glowered silently.
Roland shook his head with the nearest approac=
h to
gloom which his rejoicing heart would permit.
"I'm afraid I've bad news."
Mrs. Coppin burst into tears, her invariable
practise in any crisis. Albert Potter's face relaxed into something resembl=
ing
a smile.
"He won't give you your raise?"
Roland sighed.
"He's reduced me."
"Reduced you!"
"Yes. Times are bad just at present, so he
has had to lower me to a hundred and ten."
The collected jaws of the family fell as one j=
aw.
Muriel herself seemed to be bearing the blow with fortitude, but the rest w=
ere
stunned. Frank and Percy might have been posing for a picture of men who had
lost their fountain pens.
Beneath the table the hand of Albert Potter fo=
und
the hand of Muriel Coppin, and held it; and Muriel, we regret to add, turned
and bestowed upon Albert a half-smile of tender understanding.
"I suppose," said Roland, "we
couldn't get married on a hundred and ten?"
"No," said Percy.
"No," said Frank.
"No," said Albert Potter.
They all spoke decidedly, but Albert the most
decidedly of the three.
"Then," said Roland regretfully,
"I'm afraid we must wait."
It seemed to be the general verdict that they =
must
wait. Muriel said she thought they must wait. Albert Potter, whose opinion =
no
one had asked, was quite certain that they must wait. Mrs. Coppin, between
sobs, moaned that it would be best to wait. Frank and Percy, morosely devou=
ring
bread and jam, said they supposed they would have to wait. And, to end a pa=
inful
scene, Roland drifted silently from the room, and went up-stairs to his own
quarters.
There was a telegram on the mantel.
"Some fellows," he soliloquized happ=
ily,
as he opened it, "wouldn't have been able to manage a little thing like
that. They would have given themselves away. They would----"
The contents of the telegram demanded his
attention.
For some time they conveyed nothing to him. The
thing might have been written in Hindustani.
It would have been quite appropriate if it had
been, for it was from the promoters of the Calcutta Sweep, and it informed =
him
that, as the holder of ticket number 108,694, he had drawn Gelatine, and in
recognition of this fact a check for five hundred pounds would be forwarded=
to
him in due course.
*
Roland's first feeling was one of pure
bewilderment. As far as he could recollect, he had never had any dealings
whatsoever with these open-handed gentlemen. Then memory opened her flood-g=
ates
and swept him back to a morning ages ago, so it seemed to him, when Mr. Fin=
eberg's
eldest son Ralph, passing through the office on his way to borrow money from
his father, had offered him for ten shillings down a piece of cardboard, at=
the
same time saying something about a sweep. Partly from a vague desire to kee=
p in
with the Fineberg clan, but principally because it struck him as rather a
doggish thing to do, Roland had passed over the ten shillings; and there, as
far as he had known, the matter had ended.
And now, after all this time, that simple acti=
on
had borne fruit in the shape of Gelatine and a check for five hundred pound=
s.
Roland's next emotion was triumph. The sudden
entry of checks for five hundred pounds into a man's life is apt to produce
this result.
For the space of some minutes he gloated; and =
then
reaction set in. Five hundred pounds meant marriage with Muriel.
His brain worked quickly. He must conceal this
thing. With trembling fingers he felt for his match-box, struck a match, and
burnt the telegram to ashes. Then, feeling a little better, he sat down to =
think
the whole matter over. His meditations brought a certain amount of balm. Af=
ter
all, he felt, the thing could quite easily be kept a secret. He would recei=
ve
the check in due course, as stated, and he would bicycle over to the
neighboring town of Lexingham and start a bank-account with it. Nobody would
know, and life would go on as before.
He went to bed, and slept peacefully.
*
It was about a week after this that he was rou=
sed
out of a deep sleep at eight o'clock in the morning to find his room full of
Coppins. Mr. Coppin was there in a nightshirt and his official trousers. Mr=
s. Coppin
was there, weeping softly in a brown dressing-gown. Modesty had apparently =
kept
Muriel from the gathering, but brothers Frank and Percy stood at his bedsid=
e,
shaking him by the shoulders and shouting. Mr. Coppin thrust a newspaper at
him, as he sat up blinking.
These epic moments are best related swiftly.
Roland took the paper, and the first thing that met his sleepy eye and effe=
ctually
drove the sleep from it was this head-line:
ROMANCE OF THE CALCUTTA SWEEPSTAKES
And beneath it another in type almost as large=
as
the first:
POOR CLERK WINS L40,000
His own name leaped at him from the printed pa=
ge,
and with it that of the faithful Gelatine.
Flight! That was the master-word which rang in
Roland's brain as day followed day. The wild desire of the trapped animal t=
o be
anywhere except just where he was had come upon him. He was past the stage =
when
conscience could have kept him to his obligations. He had ceased to think of
anything or any one but himself. All he asked of Fate was to remove him from
Bury St. Edwards on any terms.
It may be that some inkling of his state of mi=
nd
was wafted telepathically to Frank and Percy, for it can not be denied that
their behavior at this juncture was more than a little reminiscent of the p=
olice
force. Perhaps it was simply their natural anxiety to keep an eye on what t=
hey
already considered their own private gold-mine that made them so adhesive.
Certainly there was no hour of the day when one or the other was not in
Roland's immediate neighborhood. Their vigilance even extended to the night
hours, and once, when Roland, having tossed sleeplessly on his bed, got up =
at
two in the morning, with the wild idea of stealing out of the house and wal=
king
to London, a door opened as he reached the top of the stairs, and a voice a=
sked
him what he thought he was doing. The statement that he was walking in his
sleep was accepted, but coldly.
It was shortly after this that, having by dint=
of
extraordinary strategy eluded the brothers and reached the railway-station,
Roland, with his ticket to London in his pocket and the express already
entering the station, was engaged in conversation by old Mr. Coppin, who
appeared from nowhere to denounce the high cost of living in a speech that
lasted until the tail-lights of the train had vanished and Brothers Frank a=
nd Percy
arrived, panting.
A man has only a certain capacity for battling
with Fate. After this last episode Roland gave in. Not even the exquisite a=
gony
of hearing himself described in church as a bachelor of this parish, with t=
he
grim addition that this was for the second time of asking, could stir him t=
o a
fresh dash for liberty.
Altho the shadow of the future occupied Roland=
's
mind almost to the exclusion of everything else, he was still capable of
suffering a certain amount of additional torment from the present; and one =
of
the things which made the present a source of misery to him was the fact th=
at
he was expected to behave more like a mad millionaire than a sober young man
with a knowledge of the value of money. His mind, trained from infancy to a
decent respect for the pence, had not yet adjusted itself to the possession=
of
large means; and the open-handed role forced upon him by the family appalled
him.
When the Coppins wanted anything, they asked f=
or
it; and it seemed to Roland that they wanted pretty nearly everything. If M=
r.
Coppin had reached his present age without the assistance of a gold watch, =
he
might surely have struggled along to the end on gun-metal. In any case, a m=
an of
his years should have been thinking of higher things than mere gauds and
trinkets. A like criticism applied to Mrs. Coppin's demand for a silk
petticoat, which struck Roland as simply indecent. Frank and Percy took the=
irs
mostly in specie. It was Muriel who struck the worst blow by insisting on a
hired motor-car.
Roland hated motor-cars, especially when they =
were
driven by Albert Potter, as this one was. Albert, that strong, silent man, =
had
but one way of expressing his emotions, namely to open the throttle and sha=
ve the
paint off trolley-cars. Disappointed love was giving Albert a good deal of
discomfort at this time, and he found it made him feel better to go round c=
orners
on two wheels. As Muriel sat next to him on these expeditions, Roland squas=
hing
into the tonneau with Frank and Percy, his torments were subtle. He was not
given a chance to forget, and the only way in which he could obtain a momen=
tary
diminution of the agony was to increase the speed to sixty miles an hour.
It was in this fashion that they journeyed to =
the
neighboring town of Lexingham to see M. Etienne Feriaud perform his feat of
looping the loop in his aeroplane.
It was Brother Frank's idea that they should m=
ake
up a party to go and see M. Feriaud. Frank's was one of those generous,
unspoiled natures which never grow blase at the sight of a fellow human tak=
ing
a sporting chance at hara-kiri. He was a well-known figure at every wild an=
imal
exhibition within a radius of fifty miles, and M. Feriaud drew him like a
magnet.
"The blighter goes up," he explained=
, as
he conducted the party into the arena, "and then he stands on his head=
and
goes round in circles. I've seen pictures of it."
It appeared that M. Feriaud did even more than
this. Posters round the ground advertised the fact that, on receipt of five
pounds, he would take up a passenger with him. To date, however, there appe=
ared
to have been no rush on the part of the canny inhabitants of Lexingham to a=
vail
themselves of this chance of a breath of fresh air. M. Feriaud, a small man
with a chubby and amiable face, wandered about signing picture cards and
smoking a lighted cigaret, looking a little disappointed.
Albert Potter was scornful.
"Lot of rabbits," he said. "Whe=
re's
their pluck? And I suppose they call themselves Englishmen. I'd go up preci=
ous
quick if I had a five-pound note. Disgrace, I call it, letting a Frenchman =
have
the laugh of us."
It was a long speech for Mr. Potter, and it dr=
ew a
look of respectful tenderness from Muriel. "You're so brave, Mr.
Potter," she said.
Whether it was the slight emphasis which she p=
ut
on the first word, or whether it was sheer generosity that impelled him, one
can not say; but Roland produced the required sum even while she spoke. He
offered it to his rival.
Mr. Potter started, turned a little pale, then
drew himself up and waved the note aside.
"I take no favors," he said with
dignity.
There was a pause.
"Why don't you do it." said Albert,
nastily. "Five pounds is nothing to you."
"Why should I?"
"Ah! Why should you?"
It would be useless to assert that Mr. Potter's
tone was friendly. It stung Roland. It seemed to him that Muriel was lookin=
g at
him in an unpleasantly contemptuous manner.
In some curious fashion, without doing anythin=
g to
merit it, he had apparently become an object of scorn and derision to the
party.
"All right, then, I will," he said
suddenly.
"Easy enough to talk," said Albert.<= o:p>
Roland strode with a pale but determined face =
to the
spot where M. Feriaud, beaming politely, was signing a picture post-card.
Some feeling of compunction appeared to come to
Muriel at the eleventh hour.
"Don't let him," she cried.
But Brother Frank was made of sterner stuff. T=
his
was precisely the sort of thing which, in his opinion, made for a jolly
afternoon.
For years he had been waiting for something of
this kind. He was experiencing that pleasant thrill which comes to a certain
type of person when the victim of a murder in the morning paper is an acqua=
intance
of theirs.
"What are you talking about?" he sai= d. "There's no danger. At least, not much. He might easily come down all right. Besides, he wants to. What do you want to go interfering for?"<= o:p>
Roland returned. The negotiations with the bir=
d-man
had lasted a little longer than one would have expected. But then, of cours=
e,
M. Feriaud was a foreigner, and Roland's French was not fluent.
He took Muriel's hand.
"Good-by," he said.
He shook hands with the rest of the party, even
with Albert Potter. It struck Frank that he was making too much fuss over a
trifle--and, worse, delaying the start of the proceedings.
"What's it all about?" he demanded.
"You go on as if we were never going to see you again."
"You never know."
"It's as safe as being in bed."
"But still, in case we never meet
again----"
"Oh, well," said Brother Frank, and =
took
the outstretched hand.
*
The little party stood and watched as the
aeroplane moved swiftly along the ground, rose, and soared into the air. Hi=
gher
and higher it rose, till the features of the two occupants were almost
invisible.
"Now," said Brother Frank. "Now
watch. Now he's going to loop the loop."
But the wheels of the aeroplane still pointed =
to
the ground. It grew smaller and smaller. It was a mere speck.
"What the dickens?"
Far away to the West something showed up again=
st
the blue of the sky--something that might have been a bird, a toy kite, or =
an
aeroplane traveling rapidly into the sunset.
Four pairs of eyes followed it in rapt silence=
.
Second of a Series of Six Stories [First publi=
shed
in Pictorial Review, June 1916]
=
Seated
with his wife at breakfast on the veranda which overlooked the rolling lawns
and leafy woods of his charming Sussex home, Geoffrey Windlebird, the great
financier, was enjoying the morning sun to the full. His chubby features we=
re
relaxed in a smile of lazy contentment; and his wife, who liked to act
sometimes as his secretary, found it difficult to get him to pay any attent=
ion
to his morning's mail.
"There's a column in to-day's Financial
Argus," she said, "of which you really must take notice. It's most
abusive. It's about the Wildcat Reef. They assert that there never was any =
gold
in the mine, and that you knew it when you floated the company."
"They will have their little joke."<= o:p>
"But you had the usual mining-expert's
report."
"Of course we had. And a capital report it
was. I remember thinking at the time what a neat turn of phrase the fellow =
had.
I admit he depended rather on his fine optimism than on any examination of =
the
mine. As a matter of fact, he never went near it. And why should he? It's d=
own
in South America somewhere. Awful climate--snakes, mosquitoes, revolutions,=
fever."
Mr. Windlebird spoke drowsily. His eyes closed=
.
"Well, the Argus people say that they have
sent a man of their own out there to make inquiries, a well-known expert, a=
nd
the report will be in within the next fortnight. They say they will publish=
it
in their next number but one. What are you going to do about it?"
Mr. Windlebird yawned.
"Not to put too fine a point on it, deare=
st,
the game is up. The Napoleon of Finance is about to meet his Waterloo. And =
all
for twenty thousand pounds. That is the really bitter part of it. To-morrow=
we
sail for the Argentine. I've got the tickets."
"You're joking, Geoffrey. You must be abl=
e to
raise twenty thousand. It's a flea-bite."
"On paper--in the form of shares, script,
bonds, promissory notes, it is a flea-bite. But when it has to be produced =
in
the raw, in flat, hard lumps of gold or in crackling bank-notes, it's more =
like
a bite from a hippopotamus. I can't raise it, and that's all about it. So--=
St.
Helena for Napoleon."
Altho Geoffrey Windlebird described himself as=
a
Napoleon of Finance, a Cinquevalli or Chung Ling Soo of Finance would have =
been
a more accurate title. As a juggler with other people's money he was at the
head of his class. And yet, when one came to examine it, his method was
delightfully simple. Say, for instance, that the Home-grown Tobacco Trust,
founded by Geoffrey in a moment of ennui, failed to yield those profits whi=
ch
the glowing prospectus had led the public to expect. Geoffrey would appease=
the
excited shareholders by giving them Preference Shares (interest guaranteed)=
in
the Sea-gold Extraction Company, hastily floated to meet the emergency. When
the interest became due, it would, as likely as not, be paid out of the cap=
ital
just subscribed for the King Solomon's Mines Exploitation Association, the =
little
deficiency in the latter being replaced in its turn, when absolutely necess=
ary
and not a moment before, by the transfer of some portion of the capital just
raised for yet another company. And so on, ad infinitum. There were moments
when it seemed to Mr. Windlebird that he had solved the problem of Perpetua=
l Promotion.
The only thing that can stop a triumphal progr=
ess
like Mr. Windlebird's is when some coarse person refuses to play to the rul=
es,
and demands ready money instead of shares in the next venture. This had
happened now, and it had flattened Mr. Windlebird like an avalanche.
He was a philosopher, but he could not help
feeling a little galled that the demand which had destroyed him had been so
trivial. He had handled millions--on paper, it was true, but still
millions--and here he was knocked out of time by a paltry twenty thousand
pounds.
"Are you absolutely sure that nothing can=
be
done?" persisted Mrs. Windlebird. "Have you tried every one?"=
;
"Every one, dear moon-of-my-delight--the
probables, the possibles, the highly unlikelies, and the impossibles. Never=
an
echo to the minstrel's wooing song. No, my dear, we have got to take to the
boats this time. Unless, of course, some one possessed at one and the same =
time
of twenty thousand pounds and a very confiding nature happens to drop from =
the clouds."
As he spoke, an aeroplane came sailing over the
tops of the trees beyond the tennis-lawn. Gracefully as a bird it settled on
the smooth turf, not twenty yards from where he was seated.
* * *
Roland Bleke stepped stiffly out onto the
tennis-lawn. His progress rather resembled that of a landsman getting out o=
f an
open boat in which he has spent a long and perilous night at sea. He was
feeling more wretched than he had ever felt in his life. He had a severe co=
ld.
He had a splitting headache. His hands and feet were frozen. His eyes smart=
ed. He
was hungry. He was thirsty. He hated cheerful M. Feriaud, who had hopped out
and was now busy tinkering the engine, a gay Provencal air upon his lips, a=
s he
had rarely hated any one, even Muriel Coppin's brother Frank.
So absorbed was he in his troubles that he was=
not
aware of Mr. Windlebird's approach until that pleasant, portly man's shadow
fell on the turf before him.
"Not had an accident, I hope, Mr.
Bleke?"
Roland was too far gone in misery to speculate=
as
to how this genial stranger came to know his name. As a matter of fact, Mrs.
Windlebird, keen student of the illustrated press, had recognized Roland by=
his
photograph in the Daily Mirror. In the course of the twenty yards' walk from
house to tennis-lawn she had put her husband into possession of the more
salient points in Roland's history. It was when Mr. Windlebird heard that
Roland had forty thousand pounds in the bank that he sat up and took notice=
.
"Lead me to him," he said simply.
Roland sneezed.
"Doe accident, thag you," he replied
miserably. "Somethig's gone wrong with the worgs, but it's nothing
serious, worse luck."
M. Feriaud, having by this time adjusted the
defect in his engine, rose to his feet, and bowed.
"Excuse if we come down on your lawn. But=
not
long do we trespass. See, mon ami," he said radiantly to Roland, "=
;all
now O. K. We go on."
"No," said Roland decidedly.
"No? What you mean--no?"
A shade of alarm fell on M. Feriaud's
weather-beaten features. The eminent bird-man did not wish to part from Rol=
and.
Toward Roland he felt like a brother, for Roland had notions about payment =
for
little aeroplane rides which bordered upon the princely.
"But you say--take me to France with
you----"
"I know. But it's all off. I'm not feeling
well."
"But it's all wrong." M. Feriaud
gesticulated to drive home his point. "You give me one hundred pounds =
to
take you away from Lexingham. Good. It is here." He slapped his breast
pocket. "But the other two hundred pounds which also you promise me to=
pay
me when I place you safe in France, where is that, my friend?"
"I will give you two hundred and fifty,&q=
uot;
said Roland earnestly, "to leave me here, and go right away, and never=
let
me see your beastly machine again."
A smile of brotherly forgiveness lit up M.
Feriaud's face. The generous Gallic nature asserted itself. He held out his
arms affectionately to Roland.
"Ah, now you talk. Now you say
something," he cried in his impetuous way. "Embrace me. You are a=
ll
right."
Roland heaved a sigh of relief when, five minu=
tes
later, the aeroplane disappeared over the brow of the hill. Then he began to
sneeze again.
"You're not well, you know," said Mr.
Windlebird.
"I've caught cold. We've been flying about
all night--that French ass lost his bearings--and my suit is thin. Can you
direct me to a hotel?"
"Hotel? Nonsense." Mr. Windlebird sp=
oke
in the bluff, breezy voice which at many a stricken board-meeting had calmed
frantic shareholders as if by magic. "You're coming right into my house
and up to bed this instant."
It was not till he was between the sheets with=
a
hot-water bottle at his toes and a huge breakfast inside him that Roland
learned the name of his good Samaritan. When he did, his first impulse was =
to
struggle out of bed and make his escape. Geoffrey Windlebird's was a name w=
hich
he had learned, in the course of his mercantile career, to hold in somethin=
g approaching
reverence as that of one of the mightiest business brains of the age.
To have to meet so eminent a man in the capaci=
ty
of invalid, a nuisance about the house, was almost too much for Roland's
shrinking nature. The kindness of the Windlebirds--and there seemed to be
nothing that they were not ready to do for him--distressed him beyond measu=
re.
To have a really great man like Geoffrey Windlebird sprawling genially over=
his
bed, chatting away as if he were an ordinary friend, was almost horrible. S=
uch
condescension was too much.
Gradually, as he became convalescent, Roland f=
ound
this feeling replaced by something more comfortable. They were such a genui=
ne,
simple, kindly couple, these Windlebirds, that he lost awe and retained only
gratitude. He loved them both. He opened his heart to them. It was not long
before he had told them the history of his career, skipping the earlier yea=
rs and
beginning with the entry of wealth into his life.
"It makes you feel funny," he confid=
ed
to Mr. Windlebird's sympathetic ear, "suddenly coming into a pot of mo=
ney
like that. You don't seem hardly able to realize it. I don't know what to do
with it."
Mr. Windlebird smiled paternally.
"The advice of an older man who has had, = if I may say so, some little experience of finance, might be useful to you there. Perhaps if you would allow me to recommend some sound investment----"<= o:p>
Roland glowed with gratitude.
"There's just one thing I'd like to do be=
fore
I start putting my money into anything. It's like this."
He briefly related the story of his unfortunate
affair with Muriel Coppin. Within an hour of his departure in the aeroplane,
his conscience had begun to trouble him on this point. He felt that he had =
not
acted well toward Muriel. True, he was practically certain that she didn't =
care
a bit about him and was in love with Albert, the silent mechanic, but there=
was
just the chance that she was mourning over his loss; and, anyhow, his
conscience was sore.
"I'd like to give her something," he
said. "How much do you think?"
Mr. Windlebird perpended.
"I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll send my=
own
lawyer to her with--say, a thousand pounds--not a check, you understand, but
one thousand golden sovereigns that he can show her--roll about on the tabl=
e in
front of her eyes. That'll console her. It's wonderful, the effect money in=
the
raw has on people."
"I'd rather make it two thousand," s=
aid
Roland. He had never really loved Muriel, and the idea of marrying her had =
been
a nightmare to him; but he wanted to retreat with honor.
"Very well, make it two thousand, if you
like. Tho I don't quite know how old Harrison is going to carry all that
money."
As a matter of fact, old Harrison never had to
try. On thinking it over, after he had cashed Roland's check, Mr. Windlebird
came to the conclusion that seven hundred pounds would be quite as much mon=
ey
as it would be good for Miss Coppin to have all at once.
Mr. Windlebird's knowledge of human nature was=
not
at fault. Muriel jumped at the money, and a letter in her handwriting infor=
med
Roland next morning that his slate was clean. His gratitude to Mr. Windlebi=
rd redoubled.
"And now," said Mr. Windlebird genia=
lly,
"we can talk about that money of yours, and the best way of investing =
it.
What you want is something which, without being in any way what is called
speculative, nevertheless returns a fair and reasonable amount of interest.
What you want is something sound, something solid, yet something with a bit=
of
a kick to it, something which can't go down and may go soaring like a
rocket."
Roland quietly announced that was just what he=
did
want, and lit another cigar.
"Now, look here, Bleke, my boy, as a gene=
ral
rule I don't give tips--But I've taken a great fancy to you, Bleke, and I'm
going to break my rule. Put your money--" he sank his voice to a
compelling whisper, "put every penny you can afford into Wildcat
Reefs."
He leaned back with the benign air of the
Alchemist who has just imparted to a favorite disciple the recently discove=
red
secret of the philosopher's stone.
"Thank you very much, Mr. Windlebird,&quo=
t;
said Roland gratefully. "I will."
The Napoleonic features were lightened by that
rare, indulgent smile.
"Not so fast, young man," laughed Mr.
Windlebird. "Getting into Wildcat Reefs isn't quite so easy as you see=
m to
think. Shall we say that you propose to invest thirty thousand pounds? Yes?
Very well, then. Thirty thousand pounds! Why, if it got about that you were
going to buy Wildcat Reefs on that scale the market would be convulsed.&quo=
t;
Which was perfectly true. If it had got about =
that
any one was going to invest thirty thousand pounds--or pence--in Wildcat Re=
efs,
the market would certainly have been convulsed. The House would have rocked
with laughter. Wildcat Reefs were a standing joke--except to the unfortunat=
e few
who still held any of the shares.
"The thing will have to be done very
cautiously. No one must know. But I think--I say I think--I can manage it f=
or
you."
"You're awfully kind, Mr. Windlebird.&quo=
t;
"Not at all, my dear boy, not at all. As a
matter of fact, I shall be doing a very good turn to another pal of mine at=
the
same time." He filled his glass. "This--" he paused to
sip--"this pal of mine has a large holding of Wildcats. He wants to
realize in order to put the money into something else, in which he is more
personally interested." Mr. Windlebird paused. His mind dwelt for a mo=
ment
on his overdrawn current account at the bank. "In which he is more
personally interested," he repeated dreamily. "But of course you
couldn't unload thirty pounds' worth of Wildcats in the public market."=
;
"I quite see that," assented Roland.=
"It might, however, be done by private
negotiation," he said. "I must act very cautiously. Give me your
check for the thirty thousand to-night, and I will run up to town to-morrow
morning, and see what I can do."
*
He did it. What hidden strings he pulled, what
levers he used, Roland did not know. All Roland knew was that somehow, by s=
ome
subtle means, Mr. Windlebird brought it off. Two days later his host handed=
him
twenty thousand one-pound shares in the Wildcat Reef Gold-mine.
"There, my boy," he said.
"It's awfully kind of you, Mr.
Windlebird."
"My dear boy, don't mention it. If you're
satisfied, I'm sure I am."
Mr. Windlebird always spoke the truth when he
could. He spoke it now.
It seemed to Roland, as the days went by, that
nothing could mar the pleasant, easy course of life at the Windlebirds. The
fine weather, the beautiful garden, the pleasant company--all these things
combined to make this sojourn an epoch in his life.
He discovered his mistake one lovely afternoon=
as
he sat smoking idly on the terrace. Mrs. Windlebird came to him, and a glan=
ce
was enough to show Roland that something was seriously wrong. Her face was
drawn and tired.
A moment before, Roland had been thinking life
perfect. The only crumpled rose-leaf had been the absence of an evening pap=
er.
Mr. Windlebird would bring one back with him when he returned from the city=
, but
Roland wanted one now. He was a great follower of county cricket, and he wa=
nted
to know how Surrey was faring against Yorkshire. But even this crumpled
rose-leaf had been smoothed out, for Johnson, the groom, who happened to be
riding into the nearest town on an errand, had promised to bring one back w=
ith
him. He might appear at any moment now.
The sight of his hostess drove all thoughts of
sport out of his mind. She was looking terribly troubled.
It flashed across Roland that both his host and
hostess had been unusually silent at dinner the night before; and later,
passing Mr. Windlebird's room on his way to bed, he had heard their voices,=
low
and agitated. Could they have had some bad news?
"Mr. Bleke, I want to speak to you."=
Roland moved like a sympathetic cow, and waite=
d to
hear more.
"You were not up when my husband left for=
the
city this morning, or he would have told you himself. Mr. Bleke, I hardly k=
now
how to break it to you."
"Break it to me!"
"My husband advised you to put a very lar=
ge
sum of money in a mine called Wildcat Reefs."
"Yes. Thirty thousand pounds."
"As much as that! Oh, Mr. Bleke!"
She began to cry softly. She pressed his hand.
Roland gaped at her.
"Mr. Bleke, there has been a terrible slu=
mp
in Wildcat Reefs. To-day, they may be absolutely worthless."
Roland felt as if a cold hand had been laid on=
his
spine.
"Wor-worthless!" he stammered.
Mrs. Windlebird looked at him with moist eyes.=
"You can imagine how my husband feels abo=
ut
this. It was on his advice that you invested your money. He holds himself
directly responsible. He is in a terrible state of mind. He is frantic. He =
has
grown so fond of you, Mr. Bleke, that he can hardly face the thought that he
has been the innocent instrument of your trouble."
*
Roland felt that it was an admirable compariso=
n.
His sensations were precisely those of a leading actor in an earthquake. The
solid earth seemed to melt under him.
"We talked it over last night after you h=
ad
gone to bed, and we came to the conclusion that there was only one honorable
step to take. We must make good your losses. We must buy back those
shares."
A ray of hope began to steal over Roland's
horizon.
"But----" he began.
"There are no buts, really, Mr. Bleke. We
should neither of us know a minute's peace if we didn't do it. Now, you paid
thirty thousand pounds for the shares, you said? Well"--she held out a
pink slip of paper to him--"this will make everything all right."=
Roland looked at the check.
"But--but this is signed by you," he
said.
"Yes. You see, if Geoffrey had to sign a
check for that amount, it would mean selling out some of his stock, and in =
his
position, with every movement watched by enemies, he can not afford to do i=
t.
It might ruin the plans of years. But I have some money of my own. My selli=
ng
out stock doesn't matter, you see. I have post-dated the check a week, to g=
ive
me time to realize on the securities in which my money is invested."
Roland's whole nature rose in revolt at this
sacrifice. If it had been his host who had made this offer, he would have
accepted it. But chivalry forbade his taking this money from a woman. A glo=
w of
self-sacrifice warmed him. After all, what was this money of his? He had ne=
ver
had any fun out of it. He had had so little acquaintance with it that for a=
ll
practical purposes it might never have been his.
With a gesture which had once impressed him ve=
ry
favorably when exhibited on the stage by the hero of the number two company=
of
"The Price of Honor," which had paid a six days' visit to Bury St.
Edwards a few months before, he tore the check into little pieces.
"I couldn't accept it, Mrs. Windlebird,&q=
uot;
he said. "I can't tell you how deeply I appreciate your wonderful
kindness, but I really couldn't. I bought the shares with my eyes open. The
whole thing is nobody's fault, and I can't let you suffer for it. After the=
way
you have treated me here, it would be impossible. I can't take your money. =
It's
noble and generous of you in the extreme, but I can't accept it. I've still=
got
a little money left, and I've always been used to working for my living, an=
yway,
so--so it's all right."
"Mr. Bleke, I implore you."
Roland was hideously embarrassed. He looked ri=
ght
and left for a way of escape. He could hardly take to his heels, and yet th=
ere
seemed no other way of ending the interview. Then, with a start of relief, =
he
perceived Johnson the groom coming toward him with the evening paper.
"Johnson said he was going into the
town," said Roland apologetically, "so I asked him to get me an
evening paper. I wanted to see the lunch scores."
If he had been looking at his hostess then, an
action which he was strenuously avoiding, he might have seen a curious spasm
pass over her face. Mrs. Windlebird turned very pale and sat down suddenly =
in
the chair which Roland had vacated at the beginning of their conversation. =
She
lay back in it with her eyes closed. She looked tired and defeated.
Roland took the paper mechanically. He wanted =
it
as a diversion to the conversation merely, for his interest in the doings of
Surrey and Yorkshire had waned to the point of complete indifference in
competition with Mrs. Windlebird's news.
Equally mechanically he unfolded it and glance=
d at
front page; and, as he did do, a flaring explosion of headlines smote his e=
ye.
Out of the explosion emerged the word
"WILD-CATS".
"Why!" he exclaimed. "There's
columns about Wild-cats on the front page here!"
"Yes?" Mrs. Windlebird's voice sound=
ed
strangely dull and toneless. Her eyes were still closed.
Roland took in the headlines with starting eye=
s.
THE
WILD-CAT REEF GOLD-MINE
=
ANOTHER KLONDIKE
&=
nbsp;
FRENZIED SCENES ON THE STOCK EXCHANGE
BROKERS FIGHT FOR SHARES
=
RECORD BOOM
UNPRECEDEN=
TED
RISE IN PRICES
Shorn of all superfluous adjectives and general
journalistic exuberance, what the paper had to announce to its readers was
this:
=
The "special
commissioner" sent out by The Financial Argus to make an exhaustive
examination of the Wild-cat Reef Mine--with the amiable view,=
no
doubt, of exploding Mr. Geoffrey Windlebird once and for all =
with
the confiding British public--has found, to his unbounded
astonishment, that there are vast quantities of gold in the mine.=
&=
nbsp;
The discovery of the new reef, the largest and richest, it is stated, since the
famous Mount Morgan, occurred with dramatic appropriateness o=
n the
very day of his arrival. We need scarcely remind our readers
that, until that moment, Wild-cat Reef shares had reached a ver=
y low
figure, and only a few optimists retained their faith in the
mine. As the largest holder, Mr. Windlebird is to be heartily congratulat=
ed on
this new addition to his fortune.
&=
nbsp;
The publication of the expert's report in The Financial Argus has resulted in a boo=
m in
Wild-cats, the like of which can seldom have been seen on the =
Stock
Exchange. From something like one shilling and sixpence per =
bundle
the one pound shares have gone up to nearly ten pounds a shar=
e, and
even at this latter figure people were literally fightin=
g to
secure them.
The world swam about Roland. He was stupefied =
and
even terrified. The very atmosphere seemed foggy. So far as his reeling bra=
in
was capable of thought, he figured that he was now worth about two hundred
thousand pounds.
"Oh, Mrs. Windlebird," he cried,
"It's all right after all."
Mrs. Windlebird sat back in her chair without
answering.
"It's all right for every one," scre=
amed
Roland joyfully. "Why, if I've made a couple of hundred thousand, what
must Mr. Windlebird have netted. It says here that he is the largest holder=
. He
must have pulled off the biggest thing of his life."
He thought for a moment.
"The chap I'm sorry for," he said
meditatively, "is Mr. Windlebird's pal. You know. The fellow whom Mr.
Windlebird persuaded to sell all his shares to me."
A faint moan escaped from his hostess's pale l=
ips.
Roland did not hear it. He was reading the cricket news.
Third of a Series of Six Stories [First publis=
hed
in Pictorial Review, July 1916]
=
It was
one of those hard, nubbly rolls. The best restaurants charge you sixpence f=
or
having the good sense not to eat them. It hit Roland Bleke with considerable
vehemence on the bridge of the nose. For the moment Roland fancied that the
roof of the Regent Grill-room must have fallen in; and, as this would
automatically put an end to the party, he was not altogether sorry. He had
never been to a theatrical supper-party before, and within five minutes of =
his
arrival at the present one he had become afflicted with an intense desire n=
ever
to go to a theatrical supper-party again. To be a success at these gay
gatherings one must possess dash; and Roland, whatever his other sterling
qualities, was a little short of dash.
The young man on the other side of the table w=
as
quite nice about it. While not actually apologizing, he went so far as to
explain that it was "old Gerry" whom he had had in his mind when =
he
started the roll on its course. After a glance at old Gerry--a chinless chi=
ld
of about nineteen--Roland felt that it would be churlish to be angry with a
young man whose intentions had been so wholly admirable. Old Gerry had one =
of those
faces in which any alteration, even the comparatively limited one which a r=
oll
would be capable of producing, was bound to be for the better. He smiled a
sickly smile and said that it didn't matter.
The charming creature who sat on his assailant=
's
left, however, took a more serious view of the situation.
"Sidney, you make me tired," she said
severely. "If I had thought you didn't know how to act like a gentlema=
n I
wouldn't have come here with you. Go away somewhere and throw bread at
yourself, and ask Mr. Bleke to come and sit by me. I want to talk to him.&q=
uot;
That was Roland's first introduction to Miss B=
illy
Verepoint.
"I've been wanting to have a chat with you
all the evening, Mr. Bleke," she said, as Roland blushingly sank into =
the
empty chair. "I've heard such a lot about you."
What Miss Verepoint had heard about Roland was
that he had two hundred thousand pounds and apparently did not know what to=
do
with it.
"In fact, if I hadn't been told that you
would be here, I shouldn't have come to this party. Can't stand these
gatherings of nuts in May as a general rule. They bore me stiff."
Roland hastily revised his first estimate of t=
he
theatrical profession. Shallow, empty-headed creatures some of them might b=
e,
no doubt, but there were exceptions. Here was a girl of real discernment--a
thoughtful student of character--a girl who understood that a man might sit=
at
a supper-party without uttering a word and might still be a man of parts.
"I'm afraid you'll think me very
outspoken--but that's me all over. All my friends say, 'Billy Verepoint's a
funny girl: if she likes any one she just tells them so straight out; and if
she doesn't like any one she tells them straight out, too.'"
"And a very admirable trait," said
Roland, enthusiastically.
Miss Verepoint sighed. "P'raps it is,&quo=
t;
she said pensively, "but I'm afraid it's what has kept me back in my
profession. Managers don't like it: they think girls should be seen and not
heard."
Roland's blood boiled. Managers were plainly a
dastardly crew.
"But what's the good of worrying," w=
ent
on Miss Verepoint, with a brave but hollow laugh. "Of course, it's
wearing, having to wait when one has got as much ambition as I have; but th=
ey
all tell me that my chance is bound to come some day."
The intense mournfulness of Miss Verepoint's
expression seemed to indicate that she anticipated the arrival of the desir=
ed
day not less than sixty years hence. Roland was profoundly moved. His
chivalrous nature was up in arms. He fell to wondering if he could do anyth=
ing
to help this victim of managerial unfairness. "You don't mind my going=
on about
my troubles, do you?" asked Miss Verepoint, solicitously. "One so=
seldom
meets anybody really sympathetic."
Roland babbled fervent assurances, and she pre=
ssed
his hand gratefully.
"I wonder if you would care to come to tea
one afternoon," she said.
"Oh, rather!" said Roland. He would =
have
liked to put it in a more polished way but he was almost beyond speech.
"Of course, I know what a busy man you
are----"
"No, no!"
"Well, I should be in to-morrow afternoon=
, if
you cared to look in."
Roland bleated gratefully.
"I'll write down the address for you,&quo=
t;
said Miss Verepoint, suddenly businesslike.
*
Exactly when he committed himself to the purch=
ase
of the Windsor Theater, Roland could never say. The idea seemed to come into
existence fully-grown, without preliminary discussion. One moment it was
not--the next it was. His recollections of the afternoon which he spent
drinking lukewarm tea and punctuating Miss Verepoint's flow of speech with =
"yes's"
and "no's" were always so thoroughly confused that he never knew =
even
whose suggestion it was.
The purchase of a West-end theater, when one h= as the necessary cash, is not nearly such a complicated business as the layman might imagine. Roland was staggered by the rapidity with which the transact= ion was carried through. The theater was his before he had time to realize that= he had never meant to buy the thing at all. He had gone into the offices of Mr. Montague with the intention of making an offer for the lease for, say, six months; and that wizard, in the space of less than an hour, had not only induced him to sign mysterious documents which made him sole proprietor of = the house, but had left him with the feeling that he had done an extremely acute stroke of business. Mr. Montague had dabbled in many professions in his tim= e, from street peddling upward, but what he was really best at was hypnotism.<= o:p>
Altho he felt, after the spell of Mr. Montague=
's
magnetism was withdrawn, rather like a nervous man who has been given a lar=
ge
baby to hold by a strange woman who has promptly vanished round the corner,=
Roland
was to some extent consoled by the praise bestowed upon him by Miss Verepoi=
nt.
She said it was much better to buy a theater than to rent it, because then =
you
escaped the heavy rent. It was specious, but Roland had a dim feeling that
there was a flaw somewhere in the reasoning; and it was from this point tha=
t a
shadow may be said to have fallen upon the brightness of the venture.
He would have been even less self-congratulato=
ry
if he had known the Windsor Theater's reputation. Being a comparative stran=
ger
in the metropolis, he was unaware that its nickname in theatrical circles w=
as
"The Mugs' Graveyard"--a title which had been bestowed upon it no=
t without
reason. Built originally by a slightly insane old gentleman, whose principal
delusion was that the public was pining for a constant supply of the Higher
Drama, and more especially those specimens of the Higher Drama which flowed
practically without cessation from the restless pen of the insane old gentl=
eman
himself, the Windsor Theater had passed from hand to hand with the agility =
of a
gold watch in a gathering of race-course thieves. The one anxiety of the
unhappy man who found himself, by some accident, in possession of the Winds=
or
Theater, was to pass it on to somebody else. The only really permanent tena=
nt
it ever had was the representative of the Official Receiver.
Various causes were assigned for the phenomenal
ill-luck of the theater, but undoubtedly the vital objection to it as a Tem=
ple
of Drama lay in the fact that nobody could ever find the place where it was
hidden. Cabmen shook their heads on the rare occasions when they were asked=
to take
a fare there. Explorers to whom a stroll through the Australian bush was
child's-play, had been known to spend an hour on its trail and finish up at=
the
point where they had started.
It was precisely this quality of elusiveness w=
hich
had first attracted Mr. Montague. He was a far-seeing man, and to him the
topographical advantages of the theater were enormous. It was further from =
a fire-station
than any other building of the same insurance value in London, even without
having regard to the mystery which enveloped its whereabouts. Often after a
good dinner he would lean comfortably back in his chair and see in the smok=
e of
his cigar a vision of the Windsor Theater blazing merrily, while distracted
firemen galloped madly all over London, vainly endeavoring to get some one =
to
direct them to the scene of the conflagration. So Mr. Montague bought the
theater for a mere song, and prepared to get busy.
Unluckily for him, the representatives of the
various fire offices with which he had effected his policies got busy first.
The generous fellows insisted upon taking off his shoulders the burden of
maintaining the fireman whose permanent presence in a theater is required by
law. Nothing would satisfy them but to install firemen of their own and pay=
their
salaries. This, to a man in whom the instincts of the phoenix were so stron=
gly
developed as they were in Mr. Montague, was distinctly disconcerting. He saw
himself making no profit on the deal--a thing which had never happened to h=
im
before.
And then Roland Bleke occurred, and Mr. Montag=
ue's
belief that his race was really chosen was restored. He sold the Windsor
Theater to Roland for twenty-five thousand pounds. It was fifteen thousand
pounds more than he himself had given for it, and this very satisfactory pr=
ofit
mitigated the slight regret which he felt when it came to transferring to
Roland the insurance policies. To have effected policies amounting to rather
more than seventy thousand pounds on a building so notoriously valueless as=
the
Windsor Theater had been an achievement of which Mr. Montague was justly pr=
oud,
and it seemed sad to him that so much earnest endeavor should be thrown awa=
y.
*
Over the little lunch with which she kindly
allowed Roland to entertain her, to celebrate the purchase of the theater, =
Miss
Verepoint outlined her policy.
"What we must put up at that theater,&quo=
t;
she announced, "is a revue. A revue," repeated Miss Verepoint,
making, as she spoke, little calculations on the back of the menu, "we
could run for about fifteen hundred a week--or, say, two thousand."
Saying two thousand, thought Roland to himself=
, is
not quite the same as paying two thousand, so why should she stint herself?=
"I know two boys who could write us a top=
ping
revue," said Miss Verepoint. "They'd spread themselves, too, if it
was for me. They're in love with me--both of them. We'd better get in touch
with them at once."
To Roland, there seemed to be something just t=
he
least bit sinister about the sound of that word "touch," but he s=
aid
nothing.
"Why, there they are--lunching over
there!" cried Miss Verepoint, pointing to a neighboring table. "N=
ow,
isn't that lucky?"
To Roland the luck was not quite so apparent, =
but
he made no demur to Miss Verepoint's suggestion that they should be brought
over to their table.
The two boys, as to whose capabilities to writ=
e a
topping revue Miss Verepoint had formed so optimistic an estimate, proved t=
o be
well-grown lads of about forty-five and forty, respectively. Of the two, Ro=
land
thought that perhaps R. P. de Parys was a shade the more obnoxious, but a
closer inspection left him with the feeling that these fine distinctions we=
re a
little unfair with men of such equal talents. Bromham Rhodes ran his friend=
so
close that it was practically a dead heat. They were both fat and somewhat
bulgy-eyed. This was due to the fact that what revue-writing exacts from its
exponents is the constant assimilation of food and drink. Bromham Rhodes had
the largest appetite in London; but, on the other hand, R. P. de Parys was a
better drinker.
"Well, dear old thing!" said Bromham
Rhodes.
"Well, old child!" said R. P. de Par=
ys.
Both these remarks were addressed to Miss Verepoint. The talented pair appeared to be unaware of Roland's existence.<= o:p>
Miss Verepoint struck the business note. "=
;Now
you stop, boys," she said. "Tie weights to yourselves and sink do=
wn
into those chairs. I want you two lads to write a revue for me."
"Delighted!" said Bromham Rhodes;
"but----"
"There is the trifling point to be raised
first----" said R. P. de Parys.
"Where is the money coming from?" sa=
id
Bromham Rhodes.
"My friend, Mr. Bleke, is putting up the
money," said Miss Verepoint, with dignity. "He has taken the Wind=
sor
Theater."
The interest of the two authors in their host,
till then languid, increased with a jerk. "Has he? By Jove!" they
cried. "We must get together and talk this over."
It was Roland's first experience of a theatric=
al
talking-over, and he never forgot it. Two such talkers-over as Bromham Rhod=
es
and R. P. de Parys were scarcely to be found in the length and breadth of
theatrical London. Nothing, it seemed, could the gifted pair even begin to
think of doing without first discussing the proposition in all its aspects.=
The
amount of food which Roland found himself compelled to absorb during the co=
urse
of these debates was appalling. Discussions which began at lunch would be
continued until it was time to order dinner; and then, as likely as not, th=
ey
would have to sit there till supper-time in order to thrash the question
thoroughly out.
*
The collection of a cast was a matter even more
complicated than the actual composition of the revue. There was the almost
insuperable difficulty that Miss Verepoint firmly vetoed every name suggest=
ed.
It seemed practically impossible to find any man or woman in all England or
America whose peculiar gifts or lack of them would not interfere with Miss
Verepoint's giving a satisfactory performance of the principal role. It was=
all
very perplexing to Roland; but as Miss Verepoint was an expert in theatrical
matters, he scarcely felt entitled to question her views.
It was about this time that Roland proposed to
Miss Verepoint. The passage of time and the strain of talking over the revue
had to a certain extent moderated his original fervor. He had shaded off fr=
om a
passionate devotion, through various diminishing tints of regard for her, i=
nto
a sort of pale sunset glow of affection. His principal reason for proposing=
was
that it seemed to him to be in the natural order of events. Her air towards=
him
had become distinctly proprietorial. She now called him "Roly-poly&quo=
t;
in public--a proceeding which left him with mixed feelings. Also, she had t=
aken
to ordering him about, which, as everybody knows, is an unmistakable sign of
affection among ladies of the theatrical profession. Finally, in his chival=
rous
way, Roland had begun to feel a little apprehensive lest he might be
compromising Miss Verepoint. Everybody knew that he was putting up the money
for the revue in which she was to appear; they were constantly seen togethe=
r at
restaurants; people looked arch when they spoke to him about her. He had to=
ask
himself: was he behaving like a perfect gentleman? The answer was in the
negative. He took a cab to her flat and proposed before he could repent of =
his
decision.
She accepted him. He was not certain for a mom=
ent
whether he was glad or sorry. "But I don't want to get married," =
she
went on, "until I have justified my choice of a profession. You will h=
ave
to wait until I have made a success in this revue."
Roland was shocked to find himself hugely reli=
eved
at this concession.
The revue took shape. There did apparently exi=
st a
handful of artistes to whom Miss Verepoint had no objection, and these--a
scrubby but confident lot--were promptly engaged. Sallow Americans sprang f=
rom nowhere
with songs, dances, and ideas for effects. Tousled-haired scenic artists
wandered in with model scenes under their arms. A great cloud of chorus-lad=
ies
settled upon the theater like flies. Even Bromham Rhodes and R. P. de
Parys--those human pythons--showed signs of activity. They cornered Roland =
one
day near Swan and Edgar's, steered him into the Piccadilly Grill-room and, =
over
a hearty lunch, read him extracts from a brown-paper-covered manuscript whi=
ch,
they informed him, was the first act.
It looked a battered sort of manuscript and,
indeed, it had every right to be. Under various titles and at various times,
Bromham Rhodes' and R. P. de Parys' first act had been refused by practical=
ly
every responsible manager in London. As "Oh! What a Life!" it had
failed to satisfy the directors of the Empire. Re-christened
"Wow-Wow!" it had been rejected by the Alhambra. The Hippodrome h=
ad
refused to consider it, even under the name of "Hullo, Cellar-Flap!&qu=
ot;
It was now called, "Pass Along, Please!" and, according to its
authors, was a real revue.
Roland was to learn, as the days went on, that=
in
the world in which he was moving everything was real revue that was not a s=
tunt
or a corking effect. He floundered in a sea of real revue, stunts, and cork=
ing effects.
As far as he could gather, the main difference between these things was that
real revue was something which had been stolen from some previous English
production, whereas a stunt or a corking effect was something which had been
looted from New York. A judicious blend of these, he was given to understan=
d,
constituted the sort of thing the public wanted.
Rehearsals began before, in Roland's opinion, =
his
little army was properly supplied with ammunition. True, they had the first
act, but even the authors agreed that it wanted bringing up-to-date in part=
s. They
explained that it was, in a manner of speaking, their life-work, that they =
had
actually started it about ten years ago when they were careless lads.
Inevitably, it was spotted here and there with smart topical hits of the ea=
rly
years of the century; but that, they said, would be all right. They could
freshen it up in a couple of evenings; it was simply a matter of deleting
allusions to pro-Boers and substituting lines about Marconi shares and
mangel-wurzels. "It'll be all right," they assured Roland; "=
this
is real revue."
In times of trouble there is always a point at
which one may say, "Here is the beginning of the end." This point
came with Roland at the commencement of the rehearsals. Till then he had not
fully realized the terrible nature of the production for which he had made
himself responsible. Moreover, it was rehearsals which gave him his first c=
lear
insight into the character of Miss Verepoint.
Miss Verepoint was not at her best at rehearsa=
ls.
For the first time, as he watched her, Roland found himself feeling that th=
ere
was a case to be made out for the managers who had so consistently kept her=
in
the background. Miss Verepoint, to use the technical term, threw her weight=
about.
There were not many good lines in the script of act one of "Pass Along,
Please!" but such as there were she reached out for and grabbed away f=
rom
their owners, who retired into corners, scowling and muttering, like dogs
robbed of bones. She snubbed everybody, Roland included.
*
Roland sat in the cold darkness of the stalls =
and
watched her, panic-stricken. Like an icy wave, it had swept over him what
marriage with this girl would mean. He suddenly realised how essentially
domestic his instincts really were. Life with Miss Verepoint would mean
perpetual dinners at restaurants, bread-throwing suppers,
motor-rides--everything that he hated most. Yet, as a man of honor, he was =
tied
to her. If the revue was a success, she would marry him--and revues, he kne=
w,
were always successes. At that very moment there were six "best revues=
in London,"
running at various theaters. He shuddered at the thought that in a few weeks
there would be seven.
He felt a longing for rural solitude. He wante=
d to
be alone by himself for a day or two in a place where there were no papers =
with
advertisements of revues, no grill-rooms, and, above all, no Miss Billy Ver=
epoint.
That night he stole away to a Norfolk village, where, in happier days, he h=
ad
once spent a Summer holiday--a peaceful, primitive place where the inhabita=
nts
could not have told real revue from a corking effect.
Here, for the space of a week, Roland lay in
hiding, while his quivering nerves gradually recovered tone. He returned to
London happier, but a little apprehensive. Beyond a brief telegram of farew=
ell,
he had not communicated with Miss Verepoint for seven days, and experience =
had made
him aware that she was a lady who demanded an adequate amount of attention.=
That his nervous system was not wholly restore=
d to
health was borne in upon him as he walked along Piccadilly on his way to his
flat; for, when somebody suddenly slapped him hard between the shoulder-bla=
des,
he uttered a stifled yell and leaped in the air.
Turning to face his assailant, he found himself
meeting the genial gaze of Mr. Montague, his predecessor in the ownership of
the Windsor Theater.
Mr. Montague was effusively friendly, and, for
some mysterious reason, congratulatory.
"You've done it, have you? You pulled it =
off,
did you? And in the first month--by George! And I took you for the plain,
ordinary mug of commerce! My boy, you're as deep as they make 'em. Who'd ha=
ve
thought it, to look at you? It was the greatest idea any one ever had and s=
taring
me in the face all the time and I never saw it! But I don't grudge it to
you--you deserve it my boy! You're a nut!"
"I really don't know what you mean."=
"Quite right, my boy!" chuckled Mr.
Montague. "You're quite right to keep it up, even among friends. It do=
n't
do to risk anything, and the least said soonest mended."
He went on his way, leaving Roland completely
mystified.
Voices from his sitting-room, among which he
recognized the high note of Miss Verepoint, reminded him of the ordeal befo=
re
him. He entered with what he hoped was a careless ease of manner, but his h=
eart
was beating fast. Since the opening of rehearsals he had acquired a wholeso=
me respect
for Miss Verepoint's tongue. She was sitting in his favorite chair. There w=
ere
also present Bromham Rhodes and R. P. de Parys, who had made themselves
completely at home with a couple of his cigars and whisky from the oldest b=
in.
"So here you are at last!" said Miss
Verepoint, querulously. "The valet told us you were expected back this
morning, so we waited. Where on earth have you been to, running away like t=
his,
without a word?"
"I only went----"
"Well, it doesn't matter where you went. =
The
main point is, what are you going to do about it?"
"We thought we'd better come along and ta=
lk
it over," said R. P. de Parys.
"Talk what over?" said Roland: "=
;the
revue?"
"Oh, don't try and be funny, for goodness'
sake!" snapped Miss Verepoint. "It doesn't suit you. You haven't =
the
right shape of head. What do you suppose we want to talk over? The theater,=
of
course."
"What about the theater?"
Miss Verepoint looked searchingly at him.
"Don't you ever read the papers?"
"I haven't seen a paper since I went
away."
"Well, better have it quick and not waste
time breaking it gently," said Miss Verepoint. "The theater's been
burned down--that's what's happened."
"Burned down?"
"Burned down!" repeated Roland.
"That's what I said, didn't I? The
suffragettes did it. They left copies of 'Votes for Women' about the place.=
The
silly asses set fire to two other theaters as well, but they happened to be=
in
main thoroughfares and the fire-brigade got them under control at once. I
suppose they couldn't find the Windsor. Anyhow, it's burned to the ground a=
nd
what we want to know is what are you going to do about it?"
Roland was much too busy blessing the good ang=
els
of Kingsway to reply at once. R. P. de Parys, sympathetic soul, placed a wr=
ong
construction on his silence.
"Poor old Roly!" he said. "It's
quite broken him up. The best thing we can do is all to go off and talk it =
over
at the Savoy, over a bit of lunch."
"Well," said Miss Verepoint, "w=
hat
are you going to do--rebuild the Windsor or try and get another theater?&qu=
ot;
*
The authors were all for rebuilding the Windso=
r.
True, it would take time, but it would be more satisfactory in every way.
Besides, at this time of the year it would be no easy matter to secure anot=
her
theater at a moment's notice.
To R. P. de Parys and Bromham Rhodes the
destruction of the Windsor Theater had appeared less in the light of a disa=
ster
than as a direct intervention on the part of Providence. The completion of =
that
tiresome second act, which had brooded over their lives like an ugly cloud,
could now be postponed indefinitely.
"Of course," said R. P. de Parys,
thoughtfully, "our contract with you makes it obligatory on you to pro=
duce
our revue by a certain date--but I dare say, Bromham, we could meet Roly th=
ere,
couldn't we?"
"Sure!" said Rhodes. "Something
nominal, say a further five hundred on account of fees would satisfy us. I
certainly think it would be better to rebuild the Windsor, don't you, R.
P.?"
"I do," agreed R. P. de Parys,
cordially. "You see, Roly, our revue has been written to fit the Winds=
or.
It would be very difficult to alter it for production at another theater. Y=
es,
I feel sure that rebuilding the Windsor would be your best course."
There was a pause.
"What do you think, Roly-poly?" aske=
d Miss
Verepoint, as Roland made no sign.
"Nothing would delight me more than to
rebuild the Windsor, or to take another theater, or do anything else to
oblige," he said, cheerfully. "Unfortunately, I have no more mone=
y to
burn."
It was as if a bomb had suddenly exploded in t=
he
room. A dreadful silence fell upon his hearers. For the moment no one spoke=
. R.
P. de Parys woke with a start out of a beautiful dream of prawn curry and B=
romham
Rhodes forgot that he had not tasted food for nearly two hours. Miss Verepo=
int
was the first to break the silence.
"Do you mean to say," she gasped,
"that you didn't insure the place?"
Roland shook his head. The particular form in
which Miss Verepoint had put the question entitled him, he felt, to make th=
is
answer.
"Why didn't you?" Miss Verepoint's t=
one
was almost menacing.
"Because it did not appear to me to be
necessary."
Nor was it necessary, said Roland to his
conscience. Mr. Montague had done all the insuring that was necessary--and a
bit over.
Miss Verepoint fought with her growing
indignation, and lost. "What about the salaries of the people who have
been rehearsing all this time?" she demanded.
"I'm sorry that they should be out of an
engagement, but it is scarcely my fault. However, I propose to give each of=
them
a month's salary. I can manage that, I think."
Miss Verepoint rose. "And what about me? =
What
about me, that's what I want to know. Where do I get off? If you think I'm
going to marry you without your getting a theater and putting up this revue
you're jolly well mistaken."
Roland made a gesture which was intended to co=
nvey
regret and resignation. He even contrived to sigh.
"Very well, then," said Miss Verepoi=
nt,
rightly interpreting this behavior as his final pronouncement on the situat=
ion.
"Then everything's jolly well off."
She swept out of the room, the two authors
following in her wake like porpoises behind a liner. Roland went to his bur=
eau,
unlocked it and took out a bundle of documents. He let his fingers stray
lovingly among the fire insurance policies which energetic Mr. Montague had
been at such pains to secure from so many companies.
"And so," he said softly to himself,
"am I."
Fourth of a Series of Six Stories [First publi=
shed
in Pictorial Review, August 1916]
=
It was
with a start that Roland Bleke realized that the girl at the other end of t=
he
bench was crying. For the last few minutes, as far as his preoccupation all=
owed
him to notice them at all, he had been attributing the subdued sniffs to a
summer cold, having just recovered from one himself.
He was embarrassed. He blamed the fate that had
led him to this particular bench, but he wished to give himself up to quiet
deliberation on the question of what on earth he was to do with two hundred=
and
fifty thousand pounds, to which figure his fortune had now risen.
The sniffs continued. Roland's discomfort
increased. Chivalry had always been his weakness. In the old days, on a hun=
dred
and forty pounds a year, he had had few opportunities of indulging himself =
in
this direction; but now it seemed to him sometimes that the whole world was=
crying
out for assistance.
Should he speak to her? He wanted to; but only=
a
few days ago his eyes had been caught by the placard of a weekly paper bear=
ing
the title of 'Squibs,' on which in large letters was the legend "Men W=
ho
Speak to Girls," and he had gathered that the accompanying article was=
a denunciation
rather than a eulogy of these individuals. On the other hand, she was obvio=
usly
in distress.
Another sniff decided him.
"I say, you know," he said.
The girl looked at him. She was small, and at =
the
present moment had that air of the floweret surprized while shrinking, which
adds a good thirty-three per cent. to a girl's attractions. Her nose, he no=
ted,
was delicately tip-tilted. A certain pallor added to her beauty. Roland's h=
eart
executed the opening steps of a buck-and-wing dance.
"Pardon me," he went on, "but y=
ou
appear to be in trouble. Is there anything I can do for you?"
She looked at him again--a keen look which see=
med
to get into Roland's soul and walk about it with a searchlight. Then, as if
satisfied by the inspection, she spoke.
"No, I don't think there is," she sa=
id.
"Unless you happen to be the proprietor of a weekly paper with a Woman=
's
Page, and need an editress for it."
"I don't understand."
"Well, that's all any one could do for me--give me back my work or give me something else of the same sort."<= o:p>
"Oh, have you lost your job?"
"I have. So would you mind going away,
because I want to go on crying, and I do it better alone. You won't mind my
turning you out, I hope, but I was here first, and there are heaps of other
benches."
"No, but wait a minute. I want to hear ab=
out
this. I might be able--what I mean is--think of something. Tell me all about
it."
There is no doubt that the possession of two
hundred and fifty thousand pounds tones down a diffident man's diffidence.
Roland began to feel almost masterful.
"Why should I?"
"Why shouldn't you?"
"There's something in that," said the
girl reflectively. "After all, you might know somebody. Well, as you w=
ant
to know, I have just been discharged from a paper called 'Squibs.' I used to
edit the Woman's Page."
"By Jove, did you write that article on '=
Men
Who Speak----'?"
The hard manner in which she had wrapped herse=
lf
as in a garment vanished instantly. Her eyes softened. She even blushed. Ju=
st a
becoming pink, you know!
"You don't mean to say you read it? I did=
n't
think that any one ever really read 'Squibs.'"
"Read it!" cried Roland, recklessly
abandoning truth. "I should jolly well think so. I know it by heart. Do
you mean to say that, after an article like that, they actually sacked you?
Threw you out as a failure?"
"Oh, they didn't send me away for
incompetence. It was simply because they couldn't afford to keep me on. Mr.
Petheram was very nice about it."
"Who's Mr. Petheram?"
"Mr. Petheram's everything. He calls hims=
elf
the editor, but he's really everything except office-boy, and I expect he'l=
l be
that next week. When I started with the paper, there was quite a large staf=
f.
But it got whittled down by degrees till there was only Mr. Petheram and
myself. It was like the crew of the 'Nancy Bell.' They got eaten one by one,
till I was the only one left. And now I've gone. Mr. Petheram is doing the =
whole
paper now."
"How is it that he can't get anything bet=
ter
to do?" Roland said.
"He has done lots of better things. He us=
ed
to be at Carmelite House, but they thought he was too old."
Roland felt relieved. He conjured up a picture=
of
a white-haired elder with a fatherly manner.
"Oh, he's old, is he?"
"Twenty-four."
There was a brief silence. Something in the gi=
rl's
expression stung Roland. She wore a rapt look, as if she were dreaming of t=
he
absent Petheram, confound him. He would show her that Petheram was not the =
only
man worth looking rapt about.
He rose.
"Would you mind giving me your address?&q=
uot;
he said.
"Why?"
"In order," said Roland carefully,
"that I may offer you your former employment on 'Squibs.' I am going to
buy it."
After all, your man of dash and enterprise, yo=
ur
Napoleon, does have his moments. Without looking at her, he perceived that =
he
had bowled her over completely. Something told him that she was staring at =
him,
open-mouthed. Meanwhile, a voice within him was muttering anxiously, "=
I wonder
how much this is going to cost."
"You're going to buy 'Squibs!'"
Her voice had fallen away to an awestruck whis=
per.
"I am."
She gulped.
"Well, I think you're wonderful."
So did Roland.
"Where will a letter find you?" he
asked.
"My name is March. Bessie March. I'm livi=
ng
at twenty-seven Guildford Street."
"Twenty-seven. Thank you. Good morning. I
will communicate with you in due course."
He raised his hat and walked away. He had only
gone a few steps, when there was a patter of feet behind him. He turned.
"I--I just wanted to thank you," she
said.
"Not at all," said Roland. "Not=
at
all."
He went on his way, tingling with just triumph.
Petheram? Who was Petheram? Who, in the name of goodness, was Petheram? He =
had
put Petheram in his proper place, he rather fancied. Petheram, forsooth. La=
ughable.
A copy of the current number of 'Squibs,'
purchased at a book-stall, informed him, after a minute search to find the
editorial page, that the offices of the paper were in Fetter Lane. It was e=
vidence
of his exalted state of mind that he proceeded thither in a cab.
Fetter Lane is one of those streets in which r=
ooms
that have only just escaped being cupboards by a few feet achieve the digni=
ty
of offices. There might have been space to swing a cat in the editorial san=
ctum
of 'Squibs,' but it would have been a near thing. As for the outer office, =
in
which a vacant-faced lad of fifteen received Roland and instructed him to w=
ait
while he took his card in to Mr. Petheram, it was a mere box. Roland was af=
raid
to expand his chest for fear of bruising it.
The boy returned to say that Mr. Petheram would
see him.
Mr. Petheram was a young man with a mop of hai=
r,
and an air of almost painful restraint. He was in his shirt-sleeves, and the
table before him was heaped high with papers. Opposite him, evidently in the
act of taking his leave was a comfortable-looking man of middle age with a =
red
face and a short beard. He left as Roland entered and Roland was surprized =
to
see Mr. Petheram spring to his feet, shake his fist at the closing door, and
kick the wall with a vehemence which brought down several inches of discolo=
red
plaster.
"Take a seat," he said, when he had
finished this performance. "What can I do for you?"
Roland had always imagined that editors in the=
ir
private offices were less easily approached and, when approached, more brus=
k.
The fact was that Mr. Petheram, whose optimism nothing could quench, had
mistaken him for a prospective advertiser.
"I want to buy the paper," said Rola=
nd.
He was aware that this was an abrupt way of approaching the subject, but, a=
fter
all, he did want to buy the paper, so why not say so?
Mr. Petheram fizzed in his chair. He glowed wi=
th
excitement.
"Do you mean to tell me there's a single
book-stall in London which has sold out? Great Scott, perhaps they've all s=
old
out! How many did you try?"
"I mean buy the whole paper. Become
proprietor, you know."
Roland felt that he was blushing, and hated
himself for it. He ought to be carrying this thing through with an air. Mr.
Petheram looked at him blankly.
"Why?" he asked.
"Oh, I don't know," said Roland. He =
felt
the interview was going all wrong. It lacked a stateliness which this kind =
of
interview should have had.
"Honestly?" said Mr. Petheram. "=
;You
aren't pulling my leg?"
Roland nodded. Mr. Petheram appeared to strugg=
le
with his conscience, and finally to be worsted by it, for his next remarks =
were
limpidly honest.
"Don't you be an ass," he said.
"You don't know what you're letting yourself in for. Did you see that =
blighter
who went out just now? Do you know who he is? That's the fellow we've got to
pay five pounds a week to for life."
"Why?"
"We can't get rid of him. When the paper
started, the proprietors--not the present ones--thought it would give the t=
hing
a boom if they had a football competition with a first prize of a fiver a w=
eek
for life. Well, that's the man who won it. He's been handed down as a legacy
from proprietor to proprietor, till now we've got him. Ages ago they tried =
to
get him to compromise for a lump sum down, but he wouldn't. Said he would o=
nly
spend it, and preferred to get it by the week. Well, by the time we've paid
that vampire, there isn't much left out of our profits. That's why we are at
the present moment a little understaffed."
A frown clouded Mr. Petheram's brow. Roland
wondered if he was thinking of Bessie March.
"I know all about that," he said.
"And you still want to buy the thing?&quo=
t;
"Yes."
"But what on earth for? Mind you, I ought=
not
to be crabbing my own paper like this, but you seem a good chap, and I don't
want to see you landed. Why are you doing it?"
"Oh, just for fun."
"Ah, now you're talking. If you can afford
expensive amusements, go ahead."
He put his feet on the table, and lit a short
pipe. His gloomy views on the subject of 'Squibs' gave way to a wave of
optimism.
"You know," he said, "there's
really a lot of life in the old rag yet. If it were properly run. What has
hampered us has been lack of capital. We haven't been able to advertise. I'm
bursting with ideas for booming the paper, only naturally you can't do it f=
or
nothing. As for editing, what I don't know about editing--but perhaps you h=
ad
got somebody else in your mind?"
"No, no," said Roland, who would not
have known an editor from an office-boy. The thought of interviewing
prospective editors appalled him.
"Very well, then," resumed Mr. Pethe=
ram,
reassured, kicking over a heap of papers to give more room for his feet.
"Take it that I continue as editor. We can discuss terms later. Under =
the
present regime I have been doing all the work in exchange for a happy home.=
I
suppose you won't want to spoil the ship for a ha'porth of tar? In other wo=
rds,
you would sooner have a happy, well-fed editor running about the place than=
a broken-down
wreck who might swoon from starvation?"
"But one moment," said Roland. "=
;Are
you sure that the present proprietors will want to sell?"
"Want to sell," cried Mr. Petheram
enthusiastically. "Why, if they know you want to buy, you've as much
chance of getting away from them without the paper as--as--well, I can't th=
ink
of anything that has such a poor chance of anything. If you aren't quick on
your feet, they'll cry on your shoulder. Come along, and we'll round them up
now."
He struggled into his coat, and gave his hair =
an
impatient brush with a note-book.
"There's just one other thing," said
Roland. "I have been a regular reader of 'Squibs' for some time, and I
particularly admire the way in which the Woman's Page----"
"You mean you want to reengage the editre=
ss?
Rather. You couldn't do better. I was going to suggest it myself. Now, come
along quick before you change your mind or wake up."
Within a very few days of becoming sole propri=
etor
of 'Squibs,' Roland began to feel much as a man might who, a novice at the =
art
of steering cars, should find himself at the wheel of a runaway motor. Young
Mr. Petheram had spoken nothing less than the truth when he had said that he
was full of ideas for booming the paper. The infusion of capital into the
business acted on him like a powerful stimulant. He exuded ideas at every p=
ore.
Roland's first notion had been to engage a sta=
ff
of contributors. He was under the impression that contributors were the
life-blood of a weekly journal. Mr. Petheram corrected this view. He consen=
ted
to the purchase of a lurid serial story, but that was the last concession he
made. Nobody could accuse Mr. Petheram of lack of energy. He was willing, e=
ven anxious,
to write the whole paper himself, with the exception of the Woman's Page, n=
ow
brightly conducted once more by Miss March. What he wanted Roland to
concentrate himself upon was the supplying of capital for ingenious adverti=
sing
schemes.
"How would it be," he asked one
morning--he always began his remarks with, "How would it
be?"--"if we paid a man to walk down Piccadilly in white skin-tig=
hts
with the word 'Squibs' painted in red letters across his chest?"
Roland thought it would certainly not be.
"Good sound advertising stunt," urged
Mr. Petheram. "You don't like it? All right. You're the boss. Well, how
would it be to have a squad of men dressed as Zulus with white shields bear=
ing
the legend 'Squibs?' See what I mean? Have them sprinting along the Strand
shouting, 'Wah! Wah! Wah! Buy it! Buy it!' It would make people talk."=
Roland emerged from these interviews with his =
skin
crawling with modest apprehension. His was a retiring nature, and the thoug=
ht
of Zulus sprinting down the Strand shouting "Wah! Wah! Wah! Buy it! Buy
it!" with reference to his personal property appalled him.
He was beginning now heartily to regret having
bought the paper, as he generally regretted every definite step which he to=
ok.
The glow of romance which had sustained him during the preliminary negotiat=
ions
had faded entirely. A girl has to be possessed of unusual charm to continue=
to
captivate B, when she makes it plain daily that her heart is the exclusive
property of A; and Roland had long since ceased to cherish any delusion that
Bessie March was ever likely to feel anything but a mild liking for him. Yo=
ung
Mr. Petheram had obviously staked out an indisputable claim. Her attitude
toward him was that of an affectionate devotee toward a high priest. One
morning, entering the office unexpectedly, Roland found her kissing the top=
of
Mr. Petheram's head; and from that moment his interest in the fortunes of
'Squibs' sank to zero. It amazed him that he could ever have been idiot eno=
ugh
to have allowed himself to be entangled in this insane venture for the sake=
of
an insignificant-looking bit of a girl with a snub-nose and a poor complexi=
on.
What particularly galled him was the fact that=
he
was throwing away good cash for nothing. It was true that his capital was m=
ore
than equal to the, on the whole, modest demands of the paper, but that did =
not
alter the fact that he was wasting money. Mr. Petheram always talked buoyan=
tly about
turning the corner, but the corner always seemed just as far off.
The old idea of flight, to which he invariably=
had
recourse in any crisis, came upon Roland with irresistible force. He packed=
a
bag, and went to Paris. There, in the discomforts of life in a foreign coun=
try,
he contrived for a month to forget his white elephant.
He returned by the evening train which deposits
the traveler in London in time for dinner.
Strangely enough, nothing was farther from Rol=
and's
mind than his bright weekly paper, as he sat down to dine in a crowded
grill-room near Piccadilly Circus. Four weeks of acute torment in a city wh=
ere
nobody seemed to understand the simplest English sentence had driven 'Squib=
s' completely
from his mind for the time being.
The fact that such a paper existed was brought
home to him with the coffee. A note was placed upon his table by the attent=
ive
waiter.
"What's this?" he asked.
"The lady, sare," said the waiter
vaguely.
Roland looked round the room excitedly. The sp=
irit
of romance gripped him. There were many ladies present, for this particular
restaurant was a favorite with artistes who were permitted to "look
in" at their theaters as late as eight-thirty. None of them looked
particularly self-conscious, yet one of them had sent him this quite
unsolicited tribute. He tore open the envelope.
The message, written in a flowing feminine han=
d,
was brief, and Mrs. Grundy herself could have taken no exception to it.
"'Squibs,' one penny weekly, buy it,"=
; it
ran. All the mellowing effects of a good dinner passed away from Roland. He=
was
feverishly irritated. He paid his bill and left the place.
A visit to a neighboring music-hall occurred to
him as a suitable sedative. Hardly had his nerves ceased to quiver sufficie=
ntly
to allow him to begin to enjoy the performance, when, in the interval betwe=
en
two of the turns, a man rose in one of the side boxes.
"Is there a doctor in the house?"
There was a hush in the audience. All eyes were
directed toward the box. A man in the stalls rose, blushing, and cleared his
throat.
"My wife has fainted," continued the
speaker. "She has just discovered that she has lost her copy of
'Squibs.'"
The audience received the statement with the
bovine stolidity of an English audience in the presence of the unusual.
Not so Roland. Even as the purposeful-looking
chuckers-out wended their leopard-like steps toward the box, he was rushing=
out
into the street.
As he stood cooling his indignation in the
pleasant breeze which had sprung up, he was aware of a dense crowd proceedi=
ng
toward him. It was headed by an individual who shone out against the drab
background like a good deed in a naughty world. Nature hath framed strange
fellows in her time, and this was one of the strangest that Roland's bulging
eyes had ever rested upon. He was a large, stout man, comfortably clad in a
suit of white linen, relieved by a scarlet 'Squibs' across the bosom. His t=
op-hat,
at least four sizes larger than any top-hat worn out of a pantomime, flaunt=
ed
the same word in letters of flame. His umbrella, which, tho the weather was
fine, he carried open above his head, bore the device "One penny
weekly".
The arrest of this person by a vigilant police=
man
and Roland's dive into a taxicab occurred simultaneously. Roland was blushi=
ng
all over. His head was in a whirl. He took the evening paper handed in thro=
ugh the
window of the cab quite mechanically, and it was only the strong exhortatio=
ns
of the vendor which eventually induced him to pay for it. This he did with =
a sovereign,
and the cab drove off.
He was just thinking of going to bed several h=
ours
later, when it occurred to him that he had not read his paper. He glanced at
the first page. The middle column was devoted to a really capitally written=
account
of the proceedings at Bow Street consequent upon the arrest of six men who,=
it
was alleged, had caused a crowd to collect to the disturbance of the peace =
by
parading the Strand in the undress of Zulu warriors, shouting in unison the
words "Wah! Wah! Wah! Buy 'Squibs.'"
*
Young Mr. Petheram greeted Roland with a joyous
enthusiasm which the hound Argus, on the return of Ulysses, might have equa=
lled
but could scarcely have surpassed.
It seemed to be Mr. Petheram's considered opin=
ion
that God was in His Heaven and all was right with the world. Roland's attem=
pts
to correct this belief fell on deaf ears.
"Have I seen the advertisements?" he
cried, echoing his editor's first question. "I've seen nothing else.&q=
uot;
"There!" said Mr. Petheram proudly.<= o:p>
"It can't go on."
"Yes, it can. Don't you worry. I know the=
y're
arrested as fast as we send them out, but, bless you, the supply's endless.
Ever since the Revue boom started and actors were expected to do six differ=
ent
parts in seven minutes, there are platoons of music-hall 'pros' hanging abo=
ut the
Strand, ready to take on any sort of job you offer them. I have a special s=
taff
flushing the Bodegas. These fellows love it. It's meat and drink to them to=
be
right in the public eye like that. Makes them feel ten years younger. It's
wonderful the talent knocking about. Those Zulus used to have a steady job =
as
the Six Brothers Biff, Society Contortionists. The Revue craze killed them
professionally. They cried like children when we took them on.
"By the way, could you put through an
expenses cheque before you go? The fines mount up a bit. But don't you worry
about that either. We're coining money. I'll show you the returns in a minu=
te.
I told you we should turn the corner. Turned it! Blame me, we've whizzed ro=
und
it on two wheels. Have you had time to see the paper since you got back? No=
? Then
you haven't seen our new Scandal Page--'We Just Want to Know, You Know.' It=
's a
corker, and it's sent the circulation up like a rocket. Everybody reads 'Sq=
uibs'
now. I was hoping you would come back soon. I wanted to ask you about taking
new offices. We're a bit above this sort of thing now."
Roland, meanwhile, was reading with horrified =
eyes
the alleged corking Scandal Page. It seemed to him without exception the mo=
st
frightful production he had ever seen. It appalled him.
"This is awful," he moaned. "We
shall have a hundred libel actions."
"Oh, no, that's all right. It's all fake
stuff, tho the public doesn't know it. If you stuck to real scandals you wo=
uldn't
get a par. a week. A more moral set of blameless wasters than the blighters=
who
constitute modern society you never struck. But it reads all right, doesn't=
it?
Of course, every now and then one does hear something genuine, and then it =
goes
in. For instance, have you ever heard of Percy Pook, the bookie? I have got=
a
real ripe thing in about Percy this week, the absolute limpid truth. It will
make him sit up a bit. There, just under your thumb."
Roland removed his thumb, and, having read the
paragraph in question, started as if he had removed it from a snake.
"But this is bound to mean a libel
action!" he cried.
"Not a bit of it," said Mr. Petheram
comfortably. "You don't know Percy. I won't bore you with his
life-history, but take it from me he doesn't rush into a court of law from
sheer love of it. You're safe enough."
*
But it appeared that Mr. Pook, tho coy in the
matter of cleansing his scutcheon before a judge and jury, was not wholly
without weapons of defense and offense. Arriving at the office next day, Ro=
land
found a scene of desolation, in the middle of which, like Marius among the
ruins of Carthage, sat Jimmy, the vacant-faced office boy. Jimmy was readin=
g an
illustrated comic paper, and appeared undisturbed by his surroundings.
"He's gorn," he observed, looking up=
as
Roland entered.
"What do you mean?" Roland snapped at
him. "Who's gone and where did he go? And besides that, when you speak=
to
your superiors you will rise and stop chewing that infernal gum. It gets on=
my
nerves."
Jimmy neither rose nor relinquished his gum. He
took his time and answered.
"Mr. Petheram. A couple of fellers come in
and went through, and there was a uproar inside there, and presently out th=
ey
come running, and I went in, and there was Mr. Petheram on the floor knocked
silly and the furniture all broke, and now 'e's gorn to 'orspital. Those
fellers 'ad been putting 'im froo it proper," concluded Jimmy with moo=
dy
relish.
Roland sat down weakly. Jimmy, his tale told, =
resumed
the study of his illustrated paper. Silence reigned in the offices of 'Squi=
bs.'
It was broken by the arrival of Miss March. Her
exclamation of astonishment at the sight of the wrecked room led to a
repetition of Jimmy's story.
She vanished on hearing the name of the hospit=
al
to which the stricken editor had been removed, and returned an hour later w=
ith
flashing eyes and a set jaw.
"Aubrey," she said--it was news to
Roland that Mr. Petheram's name was Aubrey--"is very much knocked abou=
t,
but he is conscious and sitting up and taking nourishment."
"That's good."
"In a spoon only."
"Ah!" said Roland.
"The doctor says he will not be out for a
week. Aubrey is certain it was that horrible book-maker's men who did it, b=
ut
of course he can prove nothing. But his last words to me were, 'Slip it into
Percy again this week.' He has given me one or two things to mention. I don=
't
understand them, but Aubrey says they will make him wild."
Roland's flesh crept. The idea of making Mr. P=
ook
any wilder than he appeared to be at present horrified him. Panic gave him
strength, and he addressed Miss March, who was looking more like a modern J=
oan
of Arc than anything else on earth, firmly.
"Miss March," he said, "I reali=
ze
that this is a crisis, and that we must all do all that we can for the pape=
r,
and I am ready to do anything in reason--but I will not slip it into Percy.=
You
have seen the effects of slipping it into Percy. What he or his minions wil=
l do
if we repeat the process I do not care to think."
"You are afraid?"
"Yes," said Roland simply.
Miss March turned on her heel. It was plain th=
at
she regarded him as a worm. Roland did not like being thought a worm, but it
was infinitely better than being regarded as an interesting case by the
house-surgeon of a hospital. He belonged to the school of thought which hol=
ds
that it is better that people should say of you, "There he goes!"
than that they should say, "How peaceful he looks".
Stress of work prevented further conversation.=
It
was a revelation to Roland, the vigor and energy with which Miss March threw
herself into the breach. As a matter of fact, so tremendous had been the la=
bors
of the departed Mr. Petheram, that her work was more apparent than real. Th=
anks
to Mr. Petheram, there was a sufficient supply of material in hand to enable
'Squibs' to run a fortnight on its own momentum. Roland, however, did not k=
now
this, and with a view to doing what little he could to help, he informed Mi=
ss
March that he would write the Scandal Page. It must be added that the offer=
was
due quite as much to prudence as to chivalry. Roland simply did not dare to
trust her with the Scandal Page. In her present mood it was not safe. To sl=
ip
it into Percy would, he felt, be with her the work of a moment.
*
Literary composition had never been Roland's
forte. He sat and stared at the white paper and chewed the pencil which sho=
uld
have been marring its whiteness with stinging paragraphs. No sort of idea c=
ame
to him.
His brow grew damp. What sort of people--except
book-makers--did things you could write scandal about? As far as he could
ascertain, nobody.
He picked up the morning paper. The name
Windlebird [*] caught his eye. A kind of pleasant melancholy came over him =
as
he read the paragraph. How long ago it seemed since he had met that genial
financier. The paragraph was not particularly interesting. It gave a brief
account of some large deal which Mr. Windlebird was negotiating. Roland did=
not
understand a word of it, but it gave him an idea.
[*] He is a character in the Second Episode, a
fraudulent financier.
Mr. Windlebird's financial standing, he knew, =
was
above suspicion. Mr. Windlebird had made that clear to him during his visit.
There could be no possibility of offending Mr. Windlebird by a paragraph or=
two
about the manners and customs of financiers. Phrases which his kindly host =
had used
during his visit came back to him, and with them inspiration.
Within five minutes he had compiled the follow=
ing
&=
nbsp;
WE JUST WANT TO KNOW, YOU KNOW
WHO is the eminent financier =
at
present engaged upon one of his biggest deals?
&=
nbsp;
WHETHER the public would not be well-advised to look a little closer into it be=
fore
investing their money?
&=
nbsp;
IF it is not a fact that this gentleman has bought a first-class
&=
nbsp;
WHETHER he may not have to use it at any moment?
After that it was easy. Ideas came with a rush=
. By
the end of an hour he had completed a Scandal Page of which Mr. Petheram
himself might have been proud, without a suggestion of slipping it into Per=
cy.
He felt that he could go to Mr. Pook, and say, "Percy, on your honor a=
s a
British book-maker, have I slipped it into you in any way whatsoever?"=
And
Mr. Pook would be compelled to reply, "You have not."
Miss March read the proofs of the page, and
sniffed. But Miss March's blood was up, and she would have sniffed at anyth=
ing
not directly hostile to Mr. Pook.
*
A week later Roland sat in the office of 'Squi=
bs,'
reading a letter. It had been sent from No. 18-A Bream's Buildings, E.C., b=
ut,
from Roland's point of view, it might have come direct from heaven; for its
contents, signed by Harrison, Harrison, Harrison & Harrison, Solicitors,
were to the effect that a client of theirs had instructed them to approach =
him with
a view to purchasing the paper. He would not find their client disposed to
haggle over terms, so, hoped Messrs. Harrison, Harrison, Harrison &
Harrison, in the event of Roland being willing to sell, they could speedily
bring matters to a satisfactory conclusion.
Any conclusion which had left him free of 'Squ=
ibs'
without actual pecuniary loss would have been satisfactory to Roland. He had
conceived a loathing for his property which not even its steadily increasing
sales could mitigate. He was around at Messrs. Harrison's office as soon as=
a swift
taxi could take him there. The lawyers were for spinning the thing out with
guarded remarks and cautious preambles, but Roland's methods of doing busin=
ess
were always rapid.
"This chap," he said, "this fel=
low
who wants to buy 'Squibs,' what'll he give?"
"That," began one of the Harrisons
ponderously, "would, of course, largely depend----"
"I'll take five thousand. Lock, stock, and
barrel, including the present staff, an even five thousand. How's that?&quo=
t;
"Five thousand is a large----"
"Take it or leave it."
"My dear sir, you hold a pistol to our he=
ads.
However, I think that our client might consent to the sum you mention."=
;
"Good. Well, directly I get his check, the
thing's his. By the way, who is your client?"
Mr. Harrison coughed.
"His name," he said, "will be
familiar to you. He is the eminent financier, Mr. Geoffrey Windlebird."=
;
Fifth of a Series of Six Stories [First publis=
hed
in Pictorial Review, September 1916]
=
The
caoutchouc was drawing all London. Slightly more indecent than the Salome
dance, a shade less reticent than ragtime, it had driven the tango out of
existence. Nor, indeed, did anybody actually caoutchouc, for the national d=
ance
of Paranoya contained three hundred and fifteen recognized steps; but every=
body
tried to. A new revue, "Hullo, Caoutchouc," had been produced with
success. And the pioneer of the dance, the peerless Maraquita, a native
Paranoyan, still performed it nightly at the music-hall where she had first
broken loose.
The caoutchouc fascinated Roland Bleke. Maraqu=
ita
fascinated him more. Of all the women to whom he had lost his heart at first
sight, Maraquita had made the firmest impression upon him. She was what is
sometimes called a fine woman.
She had large, flashing eyes, the physique of a
Rugby International forward, and the agility of a cat on hot bricks.
There is a period of about fifty steps somewhe=
re
in the middle of the three hundred and fifteen where the patient, abandoning
the comparative decorum of the earlier movements, whizzes about till she lo=
oks
like a salmon-colored whirlwind.
That was the bit that hit Roland.
Night after night he sat in his stage-box,
goggling at Maraquita and applauding wildly.
One night an attendant came to his box.
"Excuse me, sir, but are you Mr. Roland
Bleke? The Senorita Maraquita wishes to speak to you."
He held open the door of the box. The possibil=
ity
of refusal did not appear to occur to him. Behind the scenes at that theate=
r,
it was generally recognized that when the Peerless One wanted a thing, she =
got it--quick.
They were alone.
With no protective footlights between himself =
and
her, Roland came to the conclusion that he had made a mistake. It was not t=
hat
she was any less beautiful at the very close quarters imposed by the limits=
of the
dressing-room; but he felt that in falling in love with her he had undertak=
en a
contract a little too large for one of his quiet, diffident nature. It cros=
sed
his mind that the sort of woman he really liked was the rather small, droop=
ing
type. Dynamite would not have made Maraquita droop.
For perhaps a minute and a half Maraquita fixed
her compelling eyes on his without uttering a word. Then she broke a painful
silence with this leading question:
"You love me, hein?"
Roland nodded feebly.
"When men make love to me, I send them
away--so."
She waved her hand toward the door, and Roland
began to feel almost cheerful again. He was to be dismissed with a caution,
after all. The woman had a fine, forgiving nature.
"But not you."
"Not me?"
"No, not you. You are the man I have been
waiting for. I read about you in the paper, Senor Bleke. I see your picture=
in
the 'Daily Mirror!' I say to myself, 'What a man!'"
"Those picture-paper photographs always m=
ake
one look rather weird," mumbled Roland.
"I see you night after night in your box.
Poof! I love you."
"Thanks awfully," bleated Roland.
"You would do anything for my sake, hein?=
I
knew you were that kind of man directly I see you. No," she added, as
Roland writhed uneasily in his chair, "do not embrace me. Later, yes, =
but
now, no. Not till the Great Day."
What the Great Day might be Roland could not e= ven faintly conjecture. He could only hope that it would also be a remote one.<= o:p>
"And now," said the Senorita, throwi=
ng a
cloak about her shoulders, "you come away with me to my house. My frie=
nds
are there awaiting us. They will be glad and proud to meet you."
* *
After his first inspection of the house and the
friends, Roland came to the conclusion that he preferred Maraquita's room to
her company. The former was large and airy, the latter, with one exception,
small and hairy.
The exception Maraquita addressed as Bombito. =
He
was a conspicuous figure. He was one of those out-size, hasty-looking men. =
One
suspected him of carrying lethal weapons.
Maraquita presented Roland to the company. The
native speech of Paranoya sounded like shorthand, with a blend of Spanish. =
An
expert could evidently squeeze a good deal of it into a minute. Its effect =
on
the company was good. They were manifestly soothed. Even Bombito.
Introductions in detail then took place. This
time, for Roland's benefit, Maraquita spoke in English, and he learned that
most of those present were marquises. Before him, so he gathered from
Maraquita, stood the very flower of Paranoya's aristocracy, driven from the=
ir
native land by the Infamy of 1905. Roland was too polite to inquire what on
earth the Infamy of 1905 might be, but its mention had a marked effect on t=
he company.
Some scowled, others uttered deep-throated oaths. Bombito did both. Before
supper, to which they presently sat down, was over, however, Roland knew a =
good
deal about Paranoya and its history. The conversation conducted by
Maraquita--to a ceaseless bouche pleine accompaniment from her friends--bore
exclusively upon the subject.
Paranoya had, it appeared, existed fairly
peacefully for centuries under the rule of the Alejandro dynasty. Then, in =
the
reign of Alejandro the Thirteenth, disaffection had begun to spread,
culminating in the Infamy of 1905, which, Roland had at last discovered, was
nothing less than the abolition of the monarchy and the installation of a
republic.
Since 1905 the one thing for which they had li=
ved,
besides the caoutchouc, was to see the monarchy restored and their beloved
Alejandro the Thirteenth back on his throne. Their efforts toward this end =
had
been untiring, and were at last showing signs of bearing fruit. Paranoya,
Maraquita assured Roland, was honeycombed with intrigue. The army was
disaffected, the people anxious for a return to the old order of things.
A more propitious moment for striking the deci=
sive
blow was never likely to arrive. The question was purely one of funds.
At the mention of the word "funds,"
Roland, who had become thoroughly bored with the lecture on Paranoyan histo=
ry,
sat up and took notice. He had an instinctive feeling that he was about to =
be
called upon for a subscription to the cause of the distressful country's
freedom. Especially by Bombito.
He was right. A moment later Maraquita began to
make a speech.
She spoke in Paranoyan, and Roland could not
follow her, but he gathered that it somehow had reference to himself.
As, at the end of it, the entire company rose =
to
their feet and extended their glasses toward him with a mighty shout, he
assumed that Maraquita had been proposing his health.
"They say 'To the liberator of
Paranoya!'" kindly translated the Peerless One. "You must
excuse," said Maraquita tolerantly, as a bevy of patriots surrounded
Roland and kissed him on the cheek. "They are so grateful to the savio=
r of
our country. I myself would kiss you, were it not that I have sworn that no
man's lips shall touch mine till the royal standard floats once more above =
the
palace of Paranoya. But that will be soon, very soon," she went on.
"With you on our side we can not fail."
What did the woman mean? Roland asked himself
wildly. Did she labor under the distressing delusion that he proposed to sh=
ed
his blood on behalf of a deposed monarch to whom he had never been introduc=
ed?
Maraquita's next remarks made the matter clear=
.
"I have told them," she said, "=
that
you love me, that you are willing to risk everything for my sake. I have
promised them that you, the rich Senor Bleke, will supply the funds for the
revolution. Once more, comrades. To the Savior of Paranoya!"
Roland tried his hardest to catch the infectio=
n of
this patriotic enthusiasm, but somehow he could not do it. Base, sordid,
mercenary speculations would intrude themselves. About how much was a good,=
well-furnished
revolution likely to cost? As delicately as he could, he put the question to
Maraquita.
She said, "Poof! The cost? La, la!"
Which was all very well, but hardly satisfactory as a business chat. Howeve=
r,
that was all Roland could get out of her.
*
The next few days passed for Roland in a sort =
of
dream. It was the kind of dream which it is not easy to distinguish from a
nightmare.
Maraquita's reticence at the supper-party on t=
he
subject of details connected with the financial side of revolutions entirely
disappeared. She now talked nothing but figures, and from the confused mass
which she presented to him Roland was able to gather that, in financing the
restoration of royalty in Paranoya, he would indeed be risking everything f=
or
her sake.
In the matter of revolutions Maraquita was no
niggard. She knew how the thing should be done--well, or not at all. There
would be so much for rifles, machine-guns, and what not: and there would be=
so
much for the expense of smuggling them into the country. Then there would b=
e so
much to be laid out in corrupting the republican army. Roland brightened a =
little
when they came to this item. As the standing army of Paranoya amounted to
twenty thousand men, and as it seemed possible to corrupt it thoroughly at a
cost of about thirty shillings a head, the obvious course, to Roland's way =
of
thinking was to concentrate on this side of the question and avoid unnecess=
ary
bloodshed.
It appeared, however, that Maraquita did not w=
ant
to avoid bloodshed, that she rather liked bloodshed, that the leaders of the
revolution would be disappointed if there were no bloodshed. Especially
Bombito. Unless, she pointed out, there was a certain amount of carnage,
looting, and so on, the revolution would not achieve a popular success. Tru=
e,
the beloved Alejandro might be restored; but he would sit upon a throne that
was insecure, unless the coronation festivities took a bloodthirsty turn. By
all means, said Maraquita, corrupt the army, but not at the risk of making =
the
affair tame and unpopular. Paranoya was an emotional country, and liked its
revolutions with a bit of zip to them.
It was about ten days after he had definitely =
cast
in his lot with the revolutionary party that Roland was made aware that the=
se
things were a little more complex than he had imagined. He had reconciled
himself to the financial outlay. It had been difficult, but he had done it.
That his person as well as his purse would be placed in peril he had not fo=
reseen.
The fact was borne in upon him at the end of t=
he
second week by the arrival of the deputation.
It blew in from the street just as he was enjo=
ying
his after-dinner cigar.
It consisted of three men, one long and suave,=
the
other two short, stout, and silent. They all had the sallow complexion and
undue hairiness which he had come by this time to associate with the native=
of Paranoya.
For a moment he mistook them for a drove of ex=
iled
noblemen whom he had not had the pleasure of meeting at the supper-party; a=
nd
he waited resignedly for them to make night hideous with the royal anthem. =
He poised
himself on his toes, the more readily to spring aside if they should try to
kiss him on the cheek.
"Mr. Bleke?" said the long man.
His companions drifted toward the cigar-box wh=
ich
stood open on the table, and looked at it wistfully.
"Long live the monarchy," said Roland
wearily. He had gathered in the course of his dealings with the exiled ones
that this remark generally went well.
On the present occasion it elicited no outburs=
t of
cheering. On the contrary, the long man frowned, and his two companions hel=
ped
themselves to a handful of cigars apiece with a marked moodiness.
"Death to the monarchy," corrected t=
he
long man coldly. "And," he added with a wealth of meaning in his
voice, "to all who meddle in the affairs of our beloved country and se=
ek
to do it harm."
"I don't know what you mean," said
Roland.
"Yes, Senor Bleke, you do know what I mea=
n. I
mean that you will be well advised to abandon the schemes which you are
hatching with the malcontents who would do my beloved land an injury."=
The conversation was growing awkward. Roland h=
ad
got so into the habit of taking it for granted that every Paranoyan he met =
must
of necessity be a devotee of the beloved Alejandro that it came as a shock =
to
him to realize that there were those who objected to his restoration to the
throne. Till now he had looked on the enemy as something in the abstract. It
had not struck him that the people for whose correction he was buying all t=
hese
rifles and machine-guns were individuals with a lively distaste for having
their blood shed.
"Senor Bleke," resumed the speaker,
frowning at one of his companions whose hand was hovering above the bottle =
of
liqueur brandy, "you are a man of sense. You know what is safe and wha=
t is
not safe. Believe me, this scheme of yours is not safe. You have been led a=
way,
but there is still time to withdraw. Do so, and all is well. Do not so, and
your blood be upon your own head."
"My blood!" gasped Roland.
The speaker bowed.
"That is all," he said. "We mer=
ely
came to give the warning. Ah, Senor Bleke, do not be rash. You think that h=
ere,
in this great London of yours, you are safe. You look at the policeman upon=
the
corner of the road, and you say to yourself 'I am safe.' Believe me, not at=
all
so is it, but much the opposite. We have ways by which it is of no account =
the policeman
on the corner of the road. That is all, Senor Bleke. We wish you a good
night."
The deputation withdrew.
Maraquita, informed of the incident, snapped h=
er
fingers, and said "Poof!" It sometimes struck Roland that she wou=
ld
be more real help in a difficult situation if she could get out of the habi=
t of
saying "Poof!"
"It is nothing," she said.
"No?" said Roland.
"We easily out-trick them, isn't it? You =
make
a will leaving your money to the Cause, and then where are they, hein?"=
;
It was one way of looking at it, but it brought
little balm to Roland. He said so. Maraquita scanned his face keenly.
"You are not weakening, Roland?" she
said. "You would not betray us now?"
"Well, of course, I don't know about
betraying, you know, but still----. What I mean is----"
Maraquita's eyes seemed to shoot forth two fla=
mes.
"Take care," she cried. "With m=
e it
is nothing, for I know that your heart is with Paranoya. But, if the others
once had cause to suspect that your resolve was failing--ah! If
Bombito----"
Roland took her point. He had forgotten Bombito
for the moment.
"For goodness' sake," he said hastil=
y,
"don't go saying anything to Bombito to give him the idea that I'm try=
ing
to back out. Of course you can rely on me, and all that. That's all
right."
Maraquita's gaze softened. She raised her
glass--they were lunching at the time--and put it to her lips.
"To the Savior of Paranoya!" she sai=
d.
"Beware!" whispered a voice in Rolan=
d's
ear.
He turned with a start. A waiter was standing
behind him, a small, dark, hairy man. He was looking into the middle distan=
ce
with the abstracted air which waiters cultivate.
Roland stared at him, but he did not move.
That evening, returning to his flat, Roland was
paralyzed by the sight of the word "Beware" scrawled across the
mirror in his bedroom. It had apparently been done with a diamond. He rang =
the
bell.
"Sir?" said the competent valet.
("Competent valets are in attendance at each of these flats."--Ad=
vt.)
"Has any one been here since I left?"=
;
"Yes, sir. A foreign-looking gentleman
called. He said he knew you, sir. I showed him into your room."
The same night, well on in the small hours, the
telephone rang. Roland dragged himself out of bed.
"Hullo?"
"Is that Senor Bleke?"
"Yes. What is it?"
"Beware!"
Things were becoming intolerable. Roland had a
certain amount of nerve, but not enough to enable him to bear up against th=
is
sinister persecution. Yet what could he do? Suppose he did beware to the ex=
tent
of withdrawing his support from the royalist movement, what then? Bombito. =
If
ever there was a toad under the harrow, he was that toad. And all because a
perfectly respectful admiration for the caoutchouc had led him to occupy a
stage-box several nights in succession at the theater where the peerless
Maraquita tied herself into knots.
*
There was an air of unusual excitement in
Maraquita's manner at their next meeting.
"We have been in communication with
Him," she whispered. "He will receive you. He will give an audien=
ce
to the Savior of Paranoya."
"Eh? Who will?"
"Our beloved Alejandro. He wishes to see =
his
faithful servant. We are to go to him at once."
"Where?"
"At his own house. He will receive you in
person."
Such was the quality of the emotions through w=
hich
he had been passing of late, that Roland felt but a faint interest at the
prospect of meeting face to face a genuine--if exiled--monarch. The thought=
did
flit through his mind that they would sit up a bit in old Fineberg's office=
if
they could hear of it, but it brought him little consolation.
The cab drew up at a gloomy-looking house in a
fashionable square. Roland rang the door-bell. There seemed a certain eleme=
nt
of the prosaic in the action. He wondered what he should say to the butler.=
There was, however, no need for words. The door
opened, and they were ushered in without parley. A butler and two footmen
showed them into a luxuriously furnished anteroom. Roland entered with two
thoughts running in his mind. The first was that the beloved Alejandro had =
got
an uncommonly snug crib; the second that this was exactly like going to see=
the
dentist.
Presently the squad of retainers returned, the
butler leading.
"His Majesty will receive Mr. Bleke."=
;
Roland followed him with tottering knees.
His Majesty, King Alejandro the Thirteenth, on=
the
retired list, was a genial-looking man of middle age, comfortably stout abo=
ut
the middle and a little bald as to the forehead. He might have been a
prosperous stock-broker. Roland felt more at his ease at the very sight of =
him.
"Sit down, Mr. Bleke," said His Maje=
sty,
as the door closed. "I have been wanting to see you for some time.&quo=
t;
Roland had nothing to say. He was regaining his
composure, but he had a long way to go yet before he could feel thoroughly =
at
home.
King Alejandro produced a cigaret-case, and
offered it to Roland, who shook his head speechlessly. The King lit a cigar=
et
and smoked thoughtfully for a while.
"You know, Mr. Bleke," he said at la=
st,
"this must stop. It really must. I mean your devoted efforts on my
behalf."
Roland gaped at him.
"You are a very young man. I had expected=
to
see some one much older. Your youth gives me the impression that you have g=
one
into this affair from a spirit of adventure. I can assure you that you have
nothing to gain commercially by interfering with my late kingdom. I hope, b=
efore
we part, that I can persuade you to abandon your idea of financing this mov=
ement
to restore me to the throne.
"I don't understand--er--your majesty.&qu=
ot;
"I will explain. Please treat what I shall
say as strictly confidential. You must know, Mr. Bleke, that these attempts=
to
re-establish me as a reigning monarch in Paranoya are, frankly, the curse o=
f an
otherwise very pleasant existence. You look surprized? My dear sir, do you =
know
Paranoya? Have you ever been there? Have you the remotest idea what sort of
life a King of Paranoya leads? I have tried it, and I can assure you that a
coal-heaver is happy by comparison. In the first place, the climate of the
country is abominable. I always had a cold in the head. Secondly, there is a
small but energetic section of the populace whose sole recreation it seems =
to
be to use their monarch as a target for bombs. They are not very good bombs=
, it
is true, but one in, say, ten explodes, and even an occasional bomb is
unpleasant if you are the target.
"Finally, I am much too fond of your
delightful country to wish to leave it. I was educated in England--I am a
Magdalene College man--and I have the greatest horror of ever being compell=
ed
to leave it. My present life suits me exactly. That is all I wished to say,=
Mr.
Bleke. For both our sakes, for the sake of my comfort and your purse, aband=
on
this scheme of yours."
*
Roland walked home thoughtfully. Maraquita had
left the royal residence long before he had finished the whisky-and-soda wh=
ich
the genial monarch had pressed upon him. As he walked, the futility of his
situation came home to him more and more. Whatever he did, he was bound to
displease somebody; and these Paranoyans were so confoundedly impulsive when
they were vexed.
For two days he avoided Maraquita. On the thir=
d,
with something of the instinct which draws the murderer to the spot where he
has buried the body, he called at her house.
She was not present, but otherwise there was a
full gathering. There were the marquises; there were the counts; there was
Bombito.
He looked unhappily round the crowd.
Somebody gave him a glass of champagne. He rai=
sed
it.
"To the revolution," he said
mechanically.
There was a silence--it seemed to Roland an
awkward silence. As if he had said something improper, the marquises and co=
unts
began to drift from the room, till only Bombito was left. Roland regarded h=
im
with some apprehension. He was looking larger and more unusual than ever.
But to-night, apparently, Bombito was in genial
mood. He came forward and slapped Roland on the shoulder. And then the
remarkable fact came to light that Bombito spoke English, or a sort of Engl=
ish.
"My old chap," he said. "I would
have a speech with you."
He slapped Roland again on the shoulder.
"The others they say, 'Break it with Senor
Bleke gently.' Maraquita say 'Break it with Senor Bleke gently.' So I break=
it
with you gently."
He dealt Roland a third stupendous punch. What=
ever
was to be broken gently, it was plain to Roland that it was not himself. And
suddenly there came to him a sort of intuition that told him that Bombito w=
as nervous.
"After all you have done for us, Senor Bl=
eke,
we shall seem to you ungrateful bounders, but what is it? Yes? No? I should=
n't
wonder, perhaps. The whole fact is that there has been political crisis in =
Paranoya.
Upset. Apple-cart. Yes? You follow? No? The Ministry have been--what do you
say?--put through it. Expelled. Broken up. No more ministry. New ministry
wanted. To conciliate royalist party, that is the cry. So deputation of lea=
ding
persons, mighty good chaps, prominent merchants and that sort of bounder, c=
all
upon us. They offer me to be President. See? No? Yes? That's right. I am
ambitious blighter, Senor Bleke. What about it, no? I accept. I am new
President of Paranoya. So no need for your kind assistance. Royalist revolu=
tion
up the spout. No more royalist revolution."
The wave of relief which swept over Roland ebb=
ed
sufficiently after an interval to enable him to think of some one but himse=
lf.
He was not fond of Maraquita, but he had a tender heart, and this, he felt,
would kill the poor girl.
"But Maraquita----?"
"That's all right, splendid old chap. No =
need
to worry about Maraquita, stout old boy. Where the husband goes, so does the
wife go. As you say, whither thou goes will I follow. No?"
"But I don't understand. Maraquita is not
your wife?"
"Why, certainly, good old heart. What
else?"
"Have you been married to her all the
time?"
"Why, certainly, good, dear boy."
The room swam before Roland's eyes. There was =
no
room in his mind for meditations on the perfidy of woman. He groped forward=
and
found Bombito's hand.
"By Jove," he said thickly, as he wr=
ung
it again and again, "I knew you were a good sort the first time I saw =
you.
Have a drink or something. Have a cigar or something. Have something, anywa=
y,
and sit down and tell me all about it."
THE EPISODE OF THE HIRED PAST
Final Story of the Series [First published in
Pictorial Review, October 1916]
=
"What
do you mean--you can't marry him after all? After all what? Why can't you m=
arry
him? You are perfectly childish."
Lord Evenwood's gentle voice, which had in its
time lulled the House of Peers to slumber more often than any voice ever he=
ard
in the Gilded Chamber, had in it a note of unwonted, but quite justifiable,=
irritation.
If there was one thing more than another that Lord Evenwood disliked, it was
any interference with arrangements already made.
"The man," he continued, "is not
unsightly. The man is not conspicuously vulgar. The man does not eat peas w=
ith
his knife. The man pronounces his aitches with meticulous care and accuracy.
The man, moreover, is worth rather more than a quarter of a million pounds.=
I
repeat, you are childish!"
"Yes, I know he's a very decent little ch=
ap,
Father," said Lady Eva. "It's not that at all."
"I should be gratified, then, to hear wha=
t,
in your opinion, it is."
"Well, do you think I could be happy with
him?"
Lady Kimbuck gave tongue. She was Lord Evenwoo=
d's
sister. She spent a very happy widowhood interfering in the affairs of the
various branches of her family.
"We're not asking you to be happy. You ha=
ve
such odd ideas of happiness. Your idea of happiness is to be married to your
cousin Gerry, whose only visible means of support, so far as I can gather, =
is
the four hundred a year which he draws as a member for a constituency which=
has
every intention of throwing him out at the next election."
Lady Eva blushed. Lady Kimbuck's faculty for
nosing out the secrets of her family had made her justly disliked from the
Hebrides to Southern Cornwall.
"Young O'Rion is not to be thought of,&qu=
ot;
said Lord Evenwood firmly. "Not for an instant. Apart from anything el=
se,
his politics are all wrong. Moreover, you are engaged to this Mr. Bleke. It=
is
a sacred responsibility not lightly to be evaded. You can not pledge your w=
ord
one day to enter upon the most solemn contract known to--ah--the civilized
world, and break it the next. It is not fair to the man. It is not fair to =
me.
You know that all I live for is to see you comfortably settled. If I could
myself do anything for you, the matter would be different. But these abomin=
able
land-taxes and Blowick--especially Blowick--no, no, it's out of the questio=
n.
You will be very sorry if you do anything foolish. I can assure you that Ro=
land
Blekes are not to be found--ah--on every bush. Men are extremely shy of
marrying nowadays."
"Especially," said Lady Kimbuck,
"into a family like ours. What with Blowick's scandal, and that shocki=
ng
business of your grandfather and the circus-woman, to say nothing of your p=
oor
father's trouble in '85----"
"Thank you, Sophia," interrupted Lord
Evenwood, hurriedly. "It is unnecessary to go into all that now. Suffi=
ce
it that there are adequate reasons, apart from all moral obligations, why E=
va
should not break her word to Mr. Bleke."
Lady Kimbuck's encyclopedic grip of the family
annals was a source of the utmost discomfort to her relatives. It was known
that more than one firm of publishers had made her tempting offers for her
reminiscences, and the family looked on like nervous spectators at a battle
while Cupidity fought its ceaseless fight with Laziness; for the Evenwood f=
amily
had at various times and in various ways stimulated the circulation of the
evening papers. Most of them were living down something, and it was Lady
Kimbuck's habit, when thwarted in her lightest whim, to retire to her boudo=
ir
and announce that she was not to be disturbed as she was at last making a s=
tart
on her book. Abject surrender followed on the instant.
At this point in the discussion she folded up =
her
crochet-work, and rose.
"It is absolutely necessary for you, my d=
ear,
to make a good match, or you will all be ruined. I, of course, can always
support my declining years with literary work, but----"
Lady Eva groaned. Against this last argument t=
here
was no appeal.
Lady Kimbuck patted her affectionately on the
shoulder.
"There, run along now," she said.
"I daresay you've got a headache or something that made you say a lot =
of
foolish things you didn't mean. Go down to the drawing-room. I expect Mr. B=
leke
is waiting there to say goodnight to you. I am sure he must be getting quite
impatient."
Down in the drawing-room, Roland Bleke was hop=
ing
against hope that Lady Eva's prolonged absence might be due to the fact that
she had gone to bed with a headache, and that he might escape the nightly
interview which he so dreaded.
Reviewing his career, as he sat there, Roland =
came
to the conclusion that women had the knack of affecting him with a form of
temporary insanity. They temporarily changed his whole nature. They made him
feel for a brief while that he was a dashing young man capable of the highe=
st
flights of love. It was only later that the reaction came and he realized t=
hat
he was nothing of the sort.
At heart he was afraid of women, and in the en=
tire
list of the women of whom he had been afraid, he could not find one who had
terrified him so much as Lady Eva Blyton.
Other women--notably Maraquita, now happily
helping to direct the destinies of Paranoya--had frightened him by their
individuality. Lady Eva frightened him both by her individuality and the
atmosphere of aristocratic exclusiveness which she conveyed. He had no idea
whatever of what was the proper procedure for a man engaged to the daughter=
of an
earl. Daughters of earls had been to him till now mere names in the society
columns of the morning paper. The very rules of the game were beyond him. He
felt like a confirmed Association footballer suddenly called upon to play i=
n an
International Rugby match.
All along, from the very moment when--to his
unbounded astonishment--she had accepted him, he had known that he was maki=
ng a
mistake; but he never realized it with such painful clearness as he did this
evening. He was filled with a sort of blind terror. He cursed the fate which
had taken him to the Charity-Bazaar at which he had first come under the no=
tice
of Lady Kimbuck. The fatuous snobbishness which had made him leap at her
invitation to spend a few days at Evenwood Towers he regretted; but for tha=
t he
blamed himself less. Further acquaintance with Lady Kimbuck had convinced h=
im
that if she had wanted him, she would have got him somehow, whether he had
accepted or refused.
What he really blamed himself for was his mad
proposal. There had been no need for it. True, Lady Eva had created a riot =
of
burning emotions in his breast from the moment they met; but he should have=
had
the sense to realize that she was not the right mate for him, even tho he m=
ight
have a quarter of a million tucked away in gilt-edged securities. Their liv=
es could
not possibly mix. He was a commonplace young man with a fondness for the
pleasures of the people. He liked cheap papers, picture-palaces, and
Association football. Merely to think of Association football in connection
with her was enough to make the folly of his conduct clear. He ought to have
been content to worship her from afar as some inaccessible goddess.
A light step outside the door made his heart s=
top
beating.
"I've just looked in to say good night,
Mr.--er--Roland," she said, holding out her hand. "Do excuse me. =
I've
got such a headache."
"Oh, yes, rather; I'm awfully sorry."=
;
If there was one person in the world Roland
despised and hated at that moment, it was himself.
"Are you going out with the guns
to-morrow?" asked Lady Eva languidly.
"Oh, yes, rather! I mean, no. I'm afraid I
don't shoot."
The back of his neck began to glow. He had no
illusions about himself. He was the biggest ass in Christendom.
"Perhaps you'd like to play a round of go=
lf,
then?"
"Oh, yes, rather! I mean, no." There= it was again, that awful phrase. He was certain he had not intended to utter i= t. She must be thinking him a perfect lunatic. "I don't play golf."<= o:p>
They stood looking at each other for a moment.=
It
seemed to Roland that her gaze was partly contemptuous, partly pitying. He
longed to tell her that, tho she had happened to pick on his weak points in=
the
realm of sport, there were things he could do. An insane desire came upon h=
im to
babble about his school football team. Should he ask her to feel his quite
respectable biceps? No.
"Never mind," she said, kindly. &quo=
t;I
daresay we shall think of something to amuse you."
She held out her hand again. He took it in his=
for
the briefest possible instant, painfully conscious the while that his own h=
and
was clammy from the emotion through which he had been passing.
"Good night."
"Good night."
Thank Heaven, she was gone. That let him out f=
or
another twelve hours at least.
A quarter of an hour later found Roland still
sitting, where she had left him, his head in his hands. The groan of an
overwrought soul escaped him.
"I can't do it!"
He sprang to his feet.
"I won't do it."
A smooth voice from behind him spoke.
"I think you are quite right, sir--if I m=
ay
make the remark."
Roland had hardly ever been so startled in his
life. In the first place, he was not aware of having uttered his thoughts
aloud; in the second, he had imagined that he was alone in the room. And so=
, a
moment before, he had been.
But the owner of the voice possessed, among ot=
her
qualities, the cat-like faculty of entering a room perfectly noiselessly--a
fact which had won for him, in the course of a long career in the service of
the best families, the flattering position of star witness in a number of E=
ngland's
raciest divorce-cases.
Mr. Teal, the butler--for it was no less a
celebrity who had broken in on Roland's reverie--was a long, thin man of a
somewhat priestly cast of countenance. He lacked that air of reproving haut=
eur
which many butlers possess, and it was for this reason that Roland had felt
drawn to him during the black days of his stay at Evenwood Towers. Teal had
been uncommonly nice to him on the whole. He had seemed to Roland, stricken=
by
interviews with his host and Lady Kimbuck, the only human thing in the plac=
e.
He liked Teal. On the other hand, Teal was
certainly taking a liberty. He could, if he so pleased, tell Teal to go to =
the
deuce. Technically, he had the right to freeze Teal with a look.
He did neither of these things. He was feeling
very lonely and very forlorn in a strange and depressing world, and Teal's
voice and manner were soothing.
"Hearing you speak, and seeing nobody els=
e in
the room," went on the butler, "I thought for a moment that you w=
ere
addressing me."
This was not true, and Roland knew it was not
true. Instinct told him that Teal knew that he knew it was not true; but he=
did
not press the point.
"What do you mean--you think I am quite
right?" he said. "You don't know what I was thinking about."=
Teal smiled indulgently.
"On the contrary, sir. A child could have
guessed it. You have just come to the decision--in my opinion a thoroughly
sensible one--that your engagement to her ladyship can not be allowed to go=
on.
You are quite right, sir. It won't do."
Personal magnetism covers a multitude of sins.
Roland was perfectly well aware that he ought not to be standing here chatt=
ing
over his and Lady Eva's intimate affairs with a butler; but such was Teal's
magnetism that he was quite unable to do the right thing and tell him to mi=
nd
his own business. "Teal, you forget yourself!" would have covered=
the
situation. Roland, however, was physically incapable of saying "Teal, =
you
forget yourself!" The bird knows all the time that he ought not to sta=
nd talking
to the snake, but he is incapable of ending the conversation. Roland was
conscious of a momentary wish that he was the sort of man who could tell
butlers that they forgot themselves. But then that sort of man would never =
be
in this sort of trouble. The "Teal, you forget yourself" type of =
man
would be a first-class shot, a plus golfer, and would certainly consider
himself extremely lucky to be engaged to Lady Eva.
"The question is," went on Mr. Teal,
"how are we to break it off?"
Roland felt that, as he had sinned against all=
the
decencies in allowing the butler to discuss his affairs with him, he might =
just
as well go the whole hog and allow the discussion to run its course. And it=
was
an undeniable relief to talk about the infernal thing to some one.
He nodded gloomily, and committed himself. Tea=
l resumed
his remarks with the gusto of a fellow-conspirator.
"It's not an easy thing to do gracefully,
sir, believe me, it isn't. And it's got to be done gracefully, or not at al=
l.
You can't go to her ladyship and say 'It's all off, and so am I,' and catch=
the
next train for London. The rupture must be of her ladyship's making. If som=
e fact,
some disgraceful information concerning you were to come to her ladyship's
ears, that would be a simple way out of the difficulty."
He eyed Roland meditatively.
"If, for instance, you had ever been in j=
ail,
sir?"
"Well, I haven't."
"No offense intended, sir, I'm sure. I me=
rely
remembered that you had made a great deal of money very quickly. My experie=
nce
of gentlemen who have made a great deal of money very quickly is that they =
have
generally done their bit of time. But, of course, if you----. Let me think.=
Do
you drink, sir?"
"No."
Mr. Teal sighed. Roland could not help feeling
that he was disappointing the old man a good deal.
"You do not, I suppose, chance to have a
past?" asked Mr. Teal, not very hopefully. "I use the word in its
technical sense. A deserted wife? Some poor creature you have treated
shamefully?"
At the risk of sinking still further in the
butler's esteem, Roland was compelled to answer in the negative.
"I was afraid not," said Mr. Teal,
shaking his head. "Thinking it all over yesterday, I said to myself, '=
I'm
afraid he wouldn't have one.' You don't look like the sort of gentleman who=
had
done much with his time."
"Thinking it over?"
"Not on your account, sir," explained
Mr. Teal. "On the family's. I disapproved of this match from the first=
. A
man who has served a family as long as I have had the honor of serving his
lordship's, comes to entertain a high regard for the family prestige. And, =
with
no offense to yourself, sir, this would not have done."
"Well, it looks as if it would have to
do," said Roland, gloomily. "I can't see any way out of it."=
"I can, sir. My niece at Aldershot."=
Mr. Teal wagged his head at him with a kind of
priestly archness.
"You can not have forgotten my niece at
Aldershot?"
Roland stared at him dumbly. It was like a line
out of a melodrama. He feared, first for his own, then for the butler's san=
ity.
The latter was smiling gently, as one who sees light in a difficult situati=
on.
"I've never been at Aldershot in my
life."
"For our purposes you have, sir. But I'm
afraid I am puzzling you. Let me explain. I've got a niece over at Aldershot
who isn't much good. She's not very particular. I am sure she would do it f=
or a
consideration."
"Do what?"
"Be your 'Past,' sir. I don't mind telling
you that as a 'Past' she's had some experience; looks the part, too. She's a
barmaid, and you would guess it the first time you saw her. Dyed yellow hai=
r,
sir," he went on with enthusiasm, "done all frizzy. Just the sort=
of
young person that a young gentleman like yourself would have had a 'past' w=
ith.
You couldn't find a better if you tried for a twelvemonth."
"But, I say----!"
"I suppose a hundred wouldn't hurt you?&q=
uot;
"Well, no, I suppose not, but----"
"Then put the whole thing in my hands, si=
r.
I'll ask leave off to-morrow and pop over and see her. I'll arrange for her=
to
come here the day after to see you. Leave it all to me. To-night you must w=
rite
the letters."
"Letters?"
"Naturally, there would be letters, sir. =
It
is an inseparable feature of these cases."
"Do you mean that I have got to write to =
her?
But I shouldn't know what to say. I've never seen her."
"That will be quite all right, sir, if you
place yourself in my hands. I will come to your room after everybody's gone=
to
bed, and help you write those letters. You have some note-paper with your o=
wn
address on it? Then it will all be perfectly simple."
When, some hours later, he read over the ten or twelve exceedingly passionate epistles which, with the butler's assistance,= he had succeeded in writing to Miss Maud Chilvers, Roland came to the conclusi= on that there must have been a time when Mr. Teal was a good deal less respect= able than he appeared to be at present. Byronic was the only adjective applicabl= e to his collaborator's style of amatory composition. In every letter there were passages against which Roland had felt compelled to make a modest protest.<= o:p>
"'A thousand kisses on your lovely rosebu=
d of
a mouth.' Don't you think that is a little too warmly colored? And 'I am
languishing for the pressure of your ivory arms about my neck and the sweep=
of
your silken hair against my cheek!' What I mean is--well, what about it, you
know?"
"The phrases," said Mr. Teal, not
without a touch of displeasure, "to which you take exception, are taken
bodily from correspondence (which I happened to have the advantage of perus=
ing)
addressed by the late Lord Evenwood to Animalcula, Queen of the High Wire at
Astley's Circus. His lordship, I may add, was considered an authority in th=
ese
matters."
Roland criticized no more. He handed over the
letters, which, at Mr. Teal's direction, he had headed with various dates
covering roughly a period of about two months antecedent to his arrival at =
the
Towers.
"That," Mr. Teal explained, "wi=
ll
make your conduct definitely unpardonable. With this woman's kisses hot upon
your lips,"--Mr. Teal was still slightly aglow with the fire of
inspiration--"you have the effrontery to come here and offer yourself =
to her
ladyship."
With Roland's timid suggestion that it was per=
haps
a mistake to overdo the atmosphere, the butler found himself unable to agre=
e.
"You can't make yourself out too bad. If =
you
don't pitch it hot and strong, her ladyship might quite likely forgive you.
Then where would you be?"
Miss Maud Chilvers, of Aldershot, burst into
Roland's life like one of the shells of her native heath two days later at
about five in the afternoon.
It was an entrance of which any stage-manager
might have been proud of having arranged. The lighting, the grouping, the
lead-up--all were perfect. The family had just finished tea in the long
drawing-room. Lady Kimbuck was crocheting, Lord Evenwood dozing, Lady Eva
reading, and Roland thinking. A peaceful scene.
A soft, rippling murmur, scarcely to be reckon=
ed a
snore, had just proceeded from Lord Evenwood's parted lips, when the door
opened, and Teal announced, "Miss Chilvers."
Roland stiffened in his chair. Now that the
ghastly moment had come, he felt too petrified with fear even to act the li=
ttle
part in which he had been diligently rehearsed by the obliging Mr. Teal. He
simply sat and did nothing.
It was speedily made clear to him that Miss
Chilvers would do all the actual doing that was necessary. The butler had d=
rawn
no false picture of her personal appearance. Dyed yellow hair done all friz=
zy
was but one fact of her many-sided impossibilities. In the serene surroundi=
ngs
of the long drawing-room, she looked more unspeakably "not much good&q=
uot;
than Roland had ever imagined her. With such a leading lady, his drama could
not fail of success. He should have been pleased; he was merely appalled. T=
he
thing might have a happy ending, but while it lasted it was going to be
terrible.
She had a flatteringly attentive reception. No=
body
failed to notice her. Lord Evenwood woke with a start, and stared at her as=
if
she had been some ghost from his trouble of '85. Lady Eva's face expressed
sheer amazement. Lady Kimbuck, laying down her crochet-work, took one look =
at the
apparition, and instantly decided that one of her numerous erring relatives=
had
been at it again. Of all the persons in the room, she was possibly the only=
one
completely cheerful. She was used to these situations and enjoyed them. Her
mind, roaming into the past, recalled the night when her cousin Warminster =
had
been pinked by a stiletto in his own drawing-room by a lady from South Amer=
ica.
Happy days, happy days.
Lord Evenwood had, by this time, come to the
conclusion that the festive Blowick must be responsible for this visitation=
. He
rose with dignity.
"To what are we----?" he began.
Miss Chilvers, resolute young woman, had no
intention of standing there while other people talked. She shook her gleami=
ng
head and burst into speech.
"Oh, yes, I know I've no right to be comi=
ng
walking in here among a lot of perfect strangers at their teas, but what I =
say
is, 'Right's right and wrong's wrong all the world over,' and I may be poor,
but I have my feelings. No, thank you, I won't sit down. I've not come for =
the weekend.
I've come to say a few words, and when I've said them I'll go, and not befo=
re.
A lady friend of mine happened to be reading her Daily Sketch the other day,
and she said 'Hullo! hullo!' and passed it on to me with her thumb on a pic=
ture
which had under it that it was Lady Eva Blyton who was engaged to be marrie=
d to
Mr. Roland Bleke. And when I read that, I said 'Hullo! hullo!' too, I give =
you
my word. And not being able to travel at once, owing to being prostrated wi=
th
the shock, I came along to-day, just to have a look at Mr. Roland Blooming
Bleke, and ask him if he's forgotten that he happens to be engaged to me.
That's all. I know it's the sort of thing that might slip any gentleman's m=
ind,
but I thought it might be worth mentioning. So now!"
*
Roland, perspiring in the shadows at the far e=
nd
of the room, felt that Miss Chilvers was overdoing it. There was no earthly
need for all this sort of thing. Just a simple announcement of the engageme=
nt
would have been quite sufficient. It was too obvious to him that his ally w=
as thoroughly
enjoying herself. She had the center of the stage, and did not intend light=
ly
to relinquish it.
"My good girl," said Lady Kimbuck,
"talk less and prove more. When did Mr. Bleke promise to marry you?&qu=
ot;
"Oh, it's all right. I'm not expecting yo=
u to
believe my word. I've got all the proofs you'll want. Here's his letters.&q=
uot;
Lady Kimbuck's eyes gleamed. She took the pack=
age
eagerly. She never lost an opportunity of reading compromising letters. She
enjoyed them as literature, and there was never any knowing when they might
come in useful.
"Roland," said Lady Eva, quietly,
"haven't you anything to contribute to this conversation?"
Miss Chilvers clutched at her bodice. Cinema
palaces were a passion with her, and she was up in the correct business.
"Is he here? In this room?"
Roland slunk from the shadows.
"Mr. Bleke," said Lord Evenwood,
sternly, "who is this woman?"
Roland uttered a kind of strangled cough.
"Are these letters in your handwriting?&q=
uot;
asked Lady Kimbuck, almost cordially. She had seldom read better compromisi=
ng
letters in her life, and she was agreeably surprized that one whom she had
always imagined a colorless stick should have been capable of them.
Roland nodded.
"Well, it's lucky you're rich," said
Lady Kimbuck philosophically. "What are you asking for these?" she
enquired of Miss Chilvers.
"Exactly," said Lord Evenwood, relie=
ved.
"Precisely. Your sterling common sense is admirable, Sophia. You place=
the
whole matter at once on a businesslike footing."
"Do you imagine for a moment----?" b=
egan
Miss Chilvers slowly.
"Yes," said Lady Kimbuck. "How
much?"
Miss Chilvers sobbed.
"If I have lost him for ever----"
Lady Eva rose.
"But you haven't," she said pleasant=
ly.
"I wouldn't dream of standing in your way." She drew a ring from =
her
finger, placed it on the table, and walked to the door. "I am not enga=
ged
to Mr. Bleke," she said, as she reached it.
Roland never knew quite how he had got away fr=
om
The Towers. He had confused memories in which the principals of the
drawing-room scene figured in various ways, all unpleasant. It was a portio=
n of
his life on which he did not care to dwell. Safely back in his flat, howeve=
r,
he gradually recovered his normal spirits. Indeed, now that the tumult and =
the
shouting had, so to speak, died, and he was free to take a broad view of his
position, he felt distinctly happier than usual. That Lady Kimbuck had pass=
ed
for ever from his life was enough in itself to make for gaiety.
*
He was humming blithely one morning as he open=
ed
his letters; outside the sky was blue and the sun shining. It was good to be
alive. He opened the first letter. The sky was still blue, the sun still
shining.
&=
nbsp;
"Dear Sir," (it ran).
&=
nbsp;
"We have been instructed by our client, Miss Maud Chilvers, of =
the Goat and Compasse=
s,
Aldershot, to institute proceedings against you for Breach of
Promise of Marriage. In the event of your being desirous to avoid=
the
expense and publicity of litigation, we are instructed to say=
that
Miss Chilvers would be prepared to accept the sum of ten th=
ousand
pounds in settlement of her claim against you. We would fur=
ther
add that in support of her case our client has in her posses=
sion a
number of letters written by yourself to her, all of which=
bear
strong prima facie evidence of the alleged promise to marry:=
and
she will be able in addition to call as witnesses in supp=
ort of
her case the Earl of Evenwood, Lady Kimbuck, and Lady=
Eva
Blyton, in whose presence, at a recent date, you acknowl=
edged
that you had promised to marry our client.
&=
nbsp;
"Trusting that we hear from you in the course of post. =
We
are, dear Sir, =
Yo=
urs
faithfully, =
&nb=
sp; Harrison,
Harrison, Harrison, & Harrison."