CHAPTER XX
DEREK LOSES ONE BIRD AND SECURES ANOTHER
It is safest for the historian, if he values accuracy, to wait till athing has happened before writing about it. Otherwise he may commithimself to statements which are not borne out by the actual facts.Mrs. Peagrim, recording in advance the success of her party at theGotham Theatre, had done this. It is true that she was a "radiant andvivacious hostess," and it is possible, her standard not being veryhigh, that she had "never looked more charming." But, when she went onto say that all present were in agreement that they had never spent amore delightful evening, she deceived the public. Uncle Chris, forone; Otis Pilkington, for another, and Freddie Rooke, for a third,were so far from spending a delightful evening that they found it hardto mask their true emotions and keep a smiling face to the world.
Otis Pilkington, indeed, found it impossible, and, ceasing to try,left early. Just twenty minutes after the proceedings had begun, heseized his coat and hat, shot out into the night, made off blindly upBroadway, and walked twice round Central Park before his feet gave outand he allowed himself to be taken back to his apartment in a taxi.Jill had been very kind and very sweet and very regretful, but it wasonly too manifest that on the question of becoming Mrs. OtisPilkington her mind was made up. She was willing to like him, to be asister to him, to watch his future progress with considerableinterest, but she would not marry him.
One feels sorry for Otis Pilkington in his hour of travail. This wasthe fifth or sixth time that this sort of thing had happened to him,and he was getting tired of it. If he could have looked into thefuture--five years almost to a day from that evening--and seen himselfwalking blushfully down the aisle of St. Thomas' with Roland Trevis'sister Angela on his arm, his gloom might have been lightened. Moreprobably, however, it would have been increased. At the moment, RolandTrevis' sister Angela was fifteen, frivolous, and freckled and, exceptthat he rather disliked her and suspected her--correctly--of laughingat him, amounted to just _nil_ in Mr. Pilkington's life. The idea oflinking his lot with hers would have appalled him, enthusiasticallythough he was in favour of it five years later.
However, Mr. Pilkington was unable to look into the future, so hisreflections on this night of sorrow were not diverted from Jill. Hethought sadly of Jill till two-thirty, when he fell asleep in hischair and dreamed of her. At seven o'clock his Japanese valet, who hadbeen given the night off, returned home, found him, and gave himbreakfast. After which, Mr. Pilkington went to bed, played three gamesof solitaire, and slept till dinner-time, when he awoke to take up theburden of life again. He still brooded on the tragedy which hadshattered him. Indeed, it was only two weeks later, when at a dance hewas introduced to a red-haired girl from Detroit, that he really gotover it.
* * * * *
The news was conveyed to Freddie Rooke by Uncle Chris. Uncle Chris,with something of the emotions of a condemned man on the scaffoldwaiting for a reprieve, had watched Jill and Mr. Pilkington go offtogether into the dim solitude at the back of the orchestra chairs,and, after an all too brief interval, had observed the latter whizzingback, his every little movement having a meaning of its own--and thatmeaning one which convinced Uncle Chris that Freddie, in estimatingMr. Pilkington as a sixty to one chance, had not erred in his judgmentof form.
Uncle Chris found Freddie in one of the upper boxes, talking to NellyBryant. Dancing was going on down on the stage, but Freddie, thoughnormally a young man who shook a skilful shoe, was in no mood fordancing to-night. The return to the scenes of his former triumphs andthe meeting with the companions of happier days, severed from him by atwo-weeks' notice, had affected Freddie powerfully. Eyeing the happythrong below, he experienced the emotions of that Peri who, in thepoem, "at the gate of Eden stood disconsolate."
Excusing himself from Nelly and following Uncle Chris into thepassage-way outside the box, he heard the other's news listlessly. Itcame as no shock to Freddie. He had never thought Mr. Pilkingtonanything to write home about, and had never supposed that Jill wouldaccept him. He said as much. Sorry for the chap in a way, and allthat, but had never imagined for an instant that he would click.
"Where is Underhill?" asked Uncle Chris agitated.
"Derek? Oh, he isn't here yet."
"But why isn't he here? I understood that you were bringing him withyou."
"That was the scheme, but it seems he had promised some people he meton the boat to go to a theatre and have a bit of supper with themafterwards. I only heard about it when I got back this morning."
"Good God, boy! Didn't you tell him that Jill would be here to-night?"
"Oh, rather. And he's coming on directly he can get away from thesepeople. Ought to be here any moment now."
Uncle Chris plucked at his moustache gloomily. Freddie's detachmentdepressed him. He had looked for more animation and a greater sense ofthe importance of the issue.
"Well, pip-pip for the present," said Freddie, moving toward the box."Have to be getting back. See you later."
He disappeared, and Uncle Chris turned slowly to descend the stairs.As he reached the floor below, the door of the stage-box opened, andMrs. Peagrim came out.
"Oh, Major Selby!" cried the radiant and vivacious hostess. "Icouldn't think where you had got to. I have been looking for youeverywhere."
Uncle Chris quivered slightly, but braced himself to do his duty.
"May I have the pleasure...?" he began, then broke off as he saw theman who had come out of the box behind his hostess. "Underhill!" Hegrasped his hand and shook it warmly. "My dear fellow! I had no notionthat you had arrived!"
"Sir Derek came just a moment ago," said Mrs. Peagrim.
"How are you, Major Selby?" said Derek. He was a little surprised atthe warmth of his reception. He had not anticipated this geniality.
"My dear fellow, I'm delighted to see you," cried Uncle Chris. "But,as I was saying, Mrs. Peagrim, may I have the pleasure of this dance?"
"I don't think I will dance this one," said Mrs. Peagrim surprisingly."I'm sure you two must have ever so much to talk about. Why don't youtake Sir Derek and give him a cup of coffee?"
"Capital idea!" said Uncle Chris. "Come this way, my dear fellow. AsMrs. Peagrim says, I have ever so much to talk about. Along thispassage, my boy. Be careful. There's a step. Well, well, well! It'sdelightful to see you again!" He massaged Derek's arm affectionately.Every time he had met Mrs. Peagrim that evening he had quailedinwardly at what lay before him, should some hitch occur to preventthe re-union of Derek and Jill: and now that the other was actuallyhere, handsomer than ever and more than ever the sort of man no girlcould resist, he declined to admit the possibility of a hitch. Hisspirits soared. "You haven't seen Jill yet, of course?"
"No." Derek hesitated. "Is Jill.... Does she.... I mean...."
Uncle Chris resumed his osteopathy. He kneaded his companion'scoat-sleeve with a jovial hand.
"My dear fellow, of course! I am sure that a word or two from you willput everything right. We all make mistakes. I have made them myself. Iam convinced that everything will be perfectly all right.... Ah, thereshe is. Jill, my dear, here is an old friend to see you!"
II
Since the hurried departure of Mr. Pilkington, Jill had been sittingin the auditorium, lazily listening to the music and watching thecouples dancing on the stage. She found herself drifting into a moodof gentle contentment, and was at a loss to account for this. She washappy--quietly and peacefully happy, when she was aware that she oughtto have been both agitated and apprehensive. When she had anticipatedthe recent interview with Otis Pilkington, which she had known wasbound to come sooner or later, it had been shrinkingly and withforeboding. She hated hurting people's feelings, and, though she readMr. Pilkington's character accurately enough to know that time wouldheal any anguish which she might cause him, she had had no doubt thatthe temperamental surface of that long young man, when he succeeded ingetting her alone, was going to be badly bruised. And it had fallenout just as she had expect
ed. Mr. Pilkington had said his say anddeparted, a pitiful figure, a spectacle which should have wrung herheart. It had not wrung her heart. Except for one fleeting instantwhen she was actually saying the fatal words, it had not interferedwith her happiness at all; and already she was beginning to forgetthat the incident had ever happened.
And, if the past should have depressed her, the future might have beenexpected to depress her even more. There was nothing in it, eitherimmediate or distant, which could account for her feeling gentlycontented. And yet, as she leaned back in her seat, her heart wasdancing in time to the dance-music of Mrs. Peagrim's hired orchestra.It puzzled Jill.
And then, quite suddenly, yet with no abruptness or sense ofdiscovery, just as if it were something which she had known all along,the truth came upon her. It was Wally, the thought of Wally, theknowledge that Wally existed, that made her happy. He was a solid,comforting, reassuring fact in a world of doubts and perplexities. Shedid not need to be with him to be fortified, it was enough just tothink of him. Present or absent, his personality heartened her likefine weather or music or a sea-breeze--or like that friendly, soothingnight-light which they used to leave in her nursery when she waslittle, to scare away the goblins and see her safely over the roadthat led to the gates of the city of dreams.
Suppose there were no Wally...?
Jill gave a sudden gasp, and sat up, tingling. She felt as she hadsometimes felt as a child, when, on the edge of sleep, she had dreamedthat she was stepping off a precipice and had woken, tense and alert,to find that there was no danger after all. But there was a differencebetween that feeling and this. She had woken, but to find that therewas danger. It was as though some inner voice was calling to her to becareful, to take thought. Suppose there were no Wally?... And whyshould there always be Wally? He had said confidently enough thatthere would never be another girl.... But there were thousands ofother girls, millions of other girls, and could she suppose that oneof them would not have the sense to snap up a treasure like Wally? Asense of blank desolation swept over Jill. Her quick imagination,leaping ahead, had made the vague possibility of a distant future anaccomplished fact. She felt, absurdly, a sense of overwhelming loss.
Into her mind, never far distant from it, came the thought of Derek.And, suddenly, Jill made another discovery. She was thinking of Derek,and it was not hurting. She was thinking of him quite coolly andclearly and her heart was not aching.
She sat back and screwed her eyes tight, as she had always done whenpuzzled. Something had happened to her, but how it had happened andwhen it had happened and why it had happened she could not understand.She only knew that now for the first time she had been granted amoment of clear vision and was seeing things truly.
She wanted Wally. She wanted him in the sense that she could not dowithout him. She felt nothing of the fiery tumult which had come uponher when she first met Derek. She and Wally would come together with asmile and build their life on an enduring foundation of laughter andhappiness and good-fellowship. Wally had never shaken and never wouldshake her senses as Derek had done. If that was love, then she did notlove Wally. But her clear vision told her that it was not love. Itmight be the blazing and crackling of thorns, but it was not the fire.She wanted Wally. She needed him as she needed the air and thesunlight.
She opened her eyes and saw Uncle Chris coming down the aisle towardsher. There was a man with him, and, as they moved closer in the dimlight, Jill saw that it was Derek.
"Jill, my dear," said Uncle Chris, "here is an old friend to see you!"
And, having achieved their bringing together, he proceeded to withdrawdelicately whence he had come. It is pleasant to be able to recordthat he was immediately seized upon by Mrs. Peagrim, who had changedher mind about not dancing, and led off to be her partner in afox-trot, in the course of which she trod on his feet three times.
"Why, Derek!" said Jill cheerfully. Except for a mild wonder how hecame to be there, she found herself wholly unaffected by the sight ofhim. "Whatever are _you_ doing here?"
Derek sat down beside her. The cordiality of her tone had relieved,yet at the same time disconcerted him. Man seldom attains to perfectcontentment in this world, and Derek, while pleased that Jillapparently bore him no ill-will, seemed to miss something in hermanner which he would have been glad to find there.
"Jill!" he said huskily.
It seemed to Derek only decent to speak huskily. To his orderly mindthis situation could be handled only in one way. It was a plain,straight issue of the strong man humbling himself--not too much ofcourse, but sufficiently: and it called, in his opinion, for the lowvoice, the clenched hand, and the broken whisper. Speaking as he hadspoken, he had given the scene the right key from the start--or wouldhave done if she had not got in ahead of him and opened it on a noteof absurd cheeriness? Derek found himself resenting her cheeriness.Often as he had attempted during the voyage from England to visualizeto himself this first meeting, he had never pictured Jill smilingbrightly at him. It was a jolly smile, and made her look extremelypretty, but it jarred upon him. A moment before he had been halfrelieved, half disconcerted: now he was definitely disconcerted. Hesearched in his mind for a criticism of her attitude, and came to theconclusion that what was wrong with it was that it was too friendly.Friendliness is well enough in its way, but in what should have been atense clashing of strong emotions it did not seem to Derek fitting.
"Did you have a pleasant trip?" asked Jill. "Have you come over onbusiness?"
A feeling of bewilderment came upon Derek. It was wrong, it was allwrong. Of course, she might be speaking like this to cloak intensefeeling, but, if so, she had certainly succeeded. From her manner, heand she might be casual acquaintances. A pleasant trip! In anotherminute she would be asking him how he had come out on the sweepstakeon the ship's run. With a sense of putting his shoulder to some heavyweight and heaving at it, he sought to lift the conversation to ahigher plane.
"I came to find _you_!" he said; still huskily but not so huskily asbefore. There are degrees of huskiness, and Derek's was sharpened alittle by a touch of irritation.
"Yes?" said Jill.
Derek was now fermenting. What she ought to have said, he did notknow, but he knew that it was not "Yes?" "Yes?" in the circumstanceswas almost as bad as "Really?"
There was a pause. Jill was looking at him with a frank andunembarrassed gaze which somehow deepened his sense of annoyance. Hadshe looked at him coldly, he could have understood and evenappreciated it. He had been expecting coldness, and had braced himselfto combat it. He was still not quite sure in his mind whether he wasplaying the role of a penitent or a King Cophetua, but in eithercharacter he might have anticipated a little temporary coldness, whichit would have been his easy task to melt. But he had never expected tobe looked at as if he were a specimen in a museum, and that was how hewas feeling now. Jill was not looking at him--she was inspecting him,examining him, and he chafed under the process.
Jill, unconscious of the discomfort she was causing, continued togaze. She was trying to discover in just what respect he had changedfrom the god he had been. Certainly not in looks. He was as handsomeas ever--handsomer, indeed, for the sunshine and clean breezes of theAtlantic had given him an exceedingly becoming coat of tan. And yet hemust have changed, for now she could look upon him quitedispassionately and criticize him without a tremor. It was like seeinga copy of a great painting. Everything was there, except the one thingthat mattered, the magic and the glamour. It was like.... She suddenlyremembered a scene in the dressing-room when the company had been inBaltimore. Lois Denham, duly the recipient of the sunburst which herfriend Izzy had promised her, had unfortunately, in a spirit ofgirlish curiosity, taken it to a jeweller to be priced, and thejeweller had blasted her young life by declaring it a paste imitation.Jill recalled how the stricken girl--previous to calling Izzy on thelong distance and telling him a number of things which, while probablynot news to him, must have been painful hearing--had passed the vileobject round the dressing-room for insp
ection. The imitation wasperfect. It had been impossible for the girls to tell that the stoneswere not real diamonds. Yet the jeweller, with his sixth sense, hadseen through them in a trifle under ten seconds. Jill came to theconclusion that her newly-discovered love for Wally Mason had equippedher with a sixth sense, and that by its aid she was really for thefirst time seeing Derek as he was.
Derek had not the privilege of being able to read Jill's thoughts. Allhe could see was the outer Jill, and the outer Jill, as she had alwaysdone, was stirring his emotions. Her daintiness afflicted him. Not forthe first, the second, or the third time since they had come into eachother's lives, he was astounded at the strength of the appeal whichJill had for him when they were together, as contrasted with itsweakness when they were apart. He made another attempt to establishthe scene on a loftier plane.
"What a fool I was!" he sighed. "Jill! Can you ever forgive me?"
He tried to take her hand. Jill skilfully eluded him.
"Why, of course I've forgiven you, Derek, if there was, anything toforgive."
"Anything to forgive!" Derek began to get into his stride. These werethe lines on which he had desired the interview to develop. "I was abrute! A cad!"
"Oh, no!"
"I was. Oh, I have been through hell!"
Jill turned her head away. She did not want to hurt him, but nothingcould have kept her from smiling. She had been so sure that he wouldsay that sooner or later.
"Jill!" Derek had misinterpreted the cause of her movement, and hadattributed it to emotion. "Tell me that everything is as it wasbefore."
Jill turned.
"I'm afraid I can't say that, Derek."
"Of course not!" agreed Derek in a comfortable glow of manly remorse.He liked himself in the character of the strong man abashed. "It wouldbe too much to expect, I know. But, when we are married...."
"Do you really want to marry me?"
"Jill!"
"I wonder!"
"How can you doubt it?"
Jill looked at him.
"Have you thought what it would mean?"
"What it would mean?"
"Well, your mother...."
"Oh!" Derek dismissed Lady Underhill with a grand gesture.
"Yes," persisted Jill, "but, if she disapproved of your marrying mebefore, wouldn't she disapprove a good deal more now, when I haven't apenny in the world and am just in the chorus...."
A sort of strangled sound proceeded from Derek's throat.
"In the chorus!"
"Didn't you know? I thought Freddie must have told you."
"In the chorus!" Derek stammered. "I thought you were here as a guestof Mrs. Peagrim's."
"So I am--like all the rest of the company."
"But.... But...."
"You see, it would be bound to make everything a little difficult,"said Jill. Her face was grave, but her lips were twitching. "I mean,you are rather a prominent man, aren't you, and if you married achorus-girl...."
"Nobody would know," said Derek limply.
Jill opened her eyes.
"Nobody would _know_!" She laughed. "But, of course, you've never metour Press-agent. If you think that nobody would know that a girl inthe company had married a baronet who was a member of parliament andexpected to be in the Cabinet in a few years, you're wronging him! Thenews would be on the front page of all the papers the very nextday--columns of it, with photographs. There would be articles about itin the Sunday papers. Illustrated! And then it would be cabled toEngland and would appear in the papers there.... You see, you're avery important person, Derek."
Derek sat clutching the arms of his chair. His face was chalky. Thoughhe had never been inclined to underestimate his importance as a figurein the public eye, he had overlooked the disadvantages connected withsuch an eminence. He gurgled wordlessly. He had been prepared to braveLady Underhill's wrath and assert his right to marry whom he pleased,but this was different.
Jill watched him curiously and with a certain pity. It was so easy toread what was passing in his mind. She wondered what he would say, howhe would flounder out of his unfortunate position. She had noillusions about him now. She did not even contemplate the possibilityof chivalry winning the battle which was going on within him.
"It would be very awkward, wouldn't it?" she said.
And then pity had its way with Jill. He had treated her badly; for atime she had thought that he had crushed all the heart out of her: buthe was suffering, and she hated to see anybody suffer.
"Besides," she said, "I'm engaged to somebody else."
As a suffocating man, his lips to the tube of oxygen, gradually comesback to life, Derek revived--slowly as the meaning of her words sankinto his mind, then with a sudden abruptness.
"What?" he cried.
"I'm going to marry somebody else. A man named Wally Mason."
Derek swallowed. The chalky look died out of his face, and he flushedhotly. His eyes, half relieved, half indignant, glowed under theirpent-house of eyebrow. He sat for a moment in silence.
"I think you might have told me before!" he said huffily.
Jill laughed.
"Yes, I suppose I ought to have told you before."
"Leading me on...!"
Jill patted him on the arm.
"Never mind, Derek! It's all over now. And it was great fun, wasn'tit!"
"Fun!"
"Shall we go and dance? The music is just starting."
"I _won't_ dance!"
Jill got up.
"I must," she said. "I'm so happy I can't keep still. Well, good-bye,Derek, in case I don't see you again. It was nice meeting after allthis time. You haven't altered a bit!"
Derek watched her flit down the aisle, saw her jump up the littleladder on to the stage, watched her vanish into the swirl of thedance. He reached for a cigarette, opened his case, and found itempty. He uttered a mirthless, Byronic laugh. The thing seemed to himsymbolic.
III
Not having a cigarette of his own, Derek got up and went to look forthe only man he knew who could give him one: and after a search of afew minutes came upon Freddie all alone in a dark corner, apart fromthe throng. It was a very different Freddie from the moody youth whohad returned to the box after his conversation with Uncle Chris. Hewas leaning against a piece of scenery with his head tilted back and abeam of startled happiness on his face. So rapt was he in hisreflections that he did not become aware of Derek's approach until thelatter spoke.
"Got a cigarette, Freddie?"
Freddie withdrew his gaze from the roof.
"Hullo, old son! Cigarette? Certainly and by all means. Cigarettes?Where are the cigarettes? Mr. Rooke, forward! Show cigarettes." Heextended his case to Derek, who helped himself in sombre silence,finding his boyhood's friend's exuberance hard to bear. "I say, Derek,old scream, the most extraordinary thing has happened! You'll neverguess. To cut a long story short and come to the blow-out of thescenario, I'm engaged! Engaged, old crumpet! You know what Imean--engaged to be married!"
"Ugh!" said Derek gruffly, frowning over his cigarette.
"Don't wonder you're surprised," said Freddie, looking at him a littlewistfully, for his friend had scarcely been gushing, and he would havewelcomed a bit of enthusiasm. "Can hardly believe it myself."
Derek awoke to a sense of the conventions.
"Congratulate you," he said. "Do I know her?"
"Not yet, but you will soon. She's a girl in the company--in thechorus as a matter of fact. Girl named Nelly Bryant. An absolutecorker. I'll go further--a topper. You'll like her, old man."
Derek was looking at him, amazed.
"Good Heavens!" he said.
"Extraordinary how these things happen," proceeded Freddie. "Lookingback, I can see, of course, that I always thought her a topper, butthe idea of getting engaged--I don't know--sort of thing that doesn'toccur to a chappie, if you know what I mean. What I mean to say is, wehad always been the greatest of pals and all that, but it never struckme that she would think it much of a wheeze
getting hooked up for lifewith a chap like me. We just sort of drifted along and so forth. Allvery jolly and what not. And then this evening--I don't know. I had abit of a hump, what with one thing and another, and she was mostdashed sweet and patient and soothing and--and--well, and what not,don't you know, and suddenly--deuced rummy sensation--the jolly oldscales seemed to fall, if you follow me, from my good old eyes; Idon't know if you get the idea. I suddenly seemed to look myselfsquarely in the eyeball and say to myself, 'Freddie, old top, how dowe go? Are we not missing a good thing?' And, by Jove, thinking itover, I found that I was absolutely correct-o! You've no notion howdashed sympathetic she is, old man! I mean to say, I had this hump,you know, owing to one thing and another, and was feeling that lifewas more or less of a jolly old snare and delusion, and she bucked meup and all that, and suddenly I found myself kissing her and all thatsort of rot, and she was kissing me and so on and so forth, and she'sgot the most ripping eyes, and there was nobody about, and the longand the short of it was, old boy, that I said, 'Let's get married!'and she said, 'When?' and that was that, if you see what I mean. Thescheme now is to pop down to the City Hall and get a licence, which itappears you have to have if you want to bring this sort of binge offwith any success and vim, and then what ho for the padre! Looking atit from every angle, a bit of a good egg, what? Happiest man in theworld, and all that sort of thing."
At this point in his somewhat incoherent epic Freddie paused. It hadoccurred to him that he had perhaps laid himself open to a charge ofmonopolising the conversation.
"I say! You'll forgive my dwelling a bit on this thing, won't you?Never found a girl who would look twice at me before, and it's ratherunsettled the old bean. Just occurred to me that I may have beentalking about my own affairs a bit. Your turn now, old thing. Sitdown, as the blighters in the novels used to say, and tell me thestory of your life. You've seen Jill, of course?"
"Yes," said Derek shortly.
"And it's all right, eh? Fine! We'll make a double wedding of it,what? Not a bad idea, that! I mean to say, the man of God might make areduction for quantity and shade his fee a bit. Do the job halfprice!"
Derek threw down the end of his cigarette, and crushed it with hisheel. A closer observer than Freddie would have detected long ere thisthe fact that his demeanour was not that of a happy and successfulwooer.
"Jill and I are not going to be married," he said.
A look of blank astonishment came into Freddie's cheerful face. Hecould hardly believe that he had heard correctly. It is true that, ingloomier mood, he had hazarded the theory to Uncle Chris that Jill'sindependence might lead her to refuse Derek, but he had not reallybelieved in the possibility of such a thing even at the time, and now,in the full flood of optimism consequent on his own engagement, itseemed even more incredible.
"Great Scott!" he cried. "Did she give you the raspberry?"
It is to be doubted whether the pride of the Underhills would havepermitted Derek to reply in the affirmative, even if Freddie hadphrased his question differently; but the brutal directness of thequery made such a course impossible for him. Nothing was dearer toDerek than his self-esteem, and, even at the expense of the truth, hewas resolved to shield it from injury. To face Freddie and confessthat any girl in the world had given him, Derek Underhill, what hecoarsely termed the raspberry was a task so revolting as to be utterlybeyond his powers.
"Nothing of the kind!" he snapped. "It was because we both saw thatthe thing would be impossible. Why didn't you tell me that Jill was inthe chorus of this damned piece?"
Freddie's mouth slowly opened. He was trying not to realize themeaning of what his friend was saying. His was a faithful soul, andfor years--to all intents and purposes for practically the whole ofhis life--he had looked up to Derek and reverenced him. He absolutelyrefused to believe that Derek was intending to convey what he seemedto be trying to convey; for, if he was, well ... by Jove ... it wastoo rotten and Algy Martyn had been right after all and the fellow wassimply....
"You don't mean, old man," said Freddie with an almost pleading notein his voice, "that you're going to back out of marrying Jill becauseshe's in the chorus?"
Derek looked away, and scowled. He was finding Freddie, in thecapacity of inquisitor, as trying as he had found him in the role ofexuberant fiance. It offended his pride to have to make explanationsto one whom he had always regarded with a patronizing tolerance as nota bad fellow in his way but in every essential respect negligible.
"I have to be sensible," he said, chafing as the indignity of hisposition intruded itself more and more. "You know what it wouldmean.... Paragraphs in all the papers.... photographs ... the newscabled to England ... everybody reading it and misunderstanding....I've got my career to think of.... It would cripple me...."
His voice trailed off, and there was silence for a moment. ThenFreddie burst into speech. His good-natured face was hard withunwonted scorn. Its cheerful vacuity had changed to stony contempt.For the second time in the evening the jolly old scales had fallenfrom Freddie's good old eyes, and, as Jill had done, he saw Derek ashe was.
"My sainted aunt!" he said slowly. "So that's it, what? Well, I'vealways thought a dashed lot of you, as you know. I've always looked upto you as a bit of a nib and wished I was like you. But, great Scott!if that's the sort of a chap you are, I'm deuced glad I'm not! I'mgoing to wake up in the middle of the night and think how unlike you Iam and pat myself on the back! Ronny Devereux was perfectly right. Atick's a tick, and that's all there is to say about it. Good old Ronnytold me what you were, and, like a silly ass, I wasted a lot of timetrying to make him believe you weren't that sort of chap at all. It'sno good standing there looking like your mother," said Freddie firmly."This is where we jolly well part brass-rags! If we ever meet again,I'll trouble you not to speak to me, because I've a reputation to keepup! So there you have it in a bally nutshell!"
Scarcely had Freddie ceased to administer it to his former friend in abally nutshell, when Uncle Chris, warm and dishevelled from the danceas interpreted by Mrs. Waddesleigh Peagrim, came bustling up, savingDerek the necessity of replying to the harangue.
"Well, Underhill, my dear fellow," began Uncle Chris affably,attaching himself to the other's arm, "what...?"
He broke off, for Derek, freeing his arm with a wrench, turned andwalked rapidly away. Derek had no desire to go over the whole thingagain with Uncle Chris. He wanted to be alone, to build up, painfullyand laboriously, the ruins of his self-esteem. The pride of theUnderhills had had a bad evening.
Uncle Chris turned to Freddie.
"What is the matter?" he asked blankly.
"I'll tell you what's the jolly old matter!" cried Freddie. "Theblighter isn't going to marry poor Jill after all! He's changed hisrotten mind! It's off!"
"Off?"
"Absolutely off!"
"Absolutely off?"
"Napoo!" said Freddie. "He's afraid of what will happen to his blastedcareer if he marries a girl who's been in the chorus."
"But, my dear boy!" Uncle Chris blinked. "But, my dear boy! This isridiculous.... Surely, if I were to speak a word...."
"You can if you like. _I_ wouldn't speak to the man again if you paidme! But it won't do any good, so what's the use?"
Slowly Uncle Chris adjusted his mind to the disaster.
"Then you mean...?"
"It's off!" said Freddie.
For a moment Uncle Chris stood motionless. Then, with a sudden jerk,he seemed to stiffen his backbone. His face was bleak, but he pulledat his moustache jauntily.
"_Morituri te salutant!_" he said. "Good-bye, Freddie, my boy."
He turned away, gallant and upright, the old soldier.
"Where are you going?" asked Freddie.
"Over the top!" said Uncle Chris.
"What do you mean?"
"I am going," said Uncle Chris steadily, "to find Mrs. Peagrim!"
"Good God!" cried Freddie. He followed him, protesting weakly, but theother gave no sign that he had heard. Freddie saw hi
m disappear intothe stage-box, and, turning, found Jill at his elbow.
"Where did Uncle Chris go?" asked Jill. "I want to speak to him."
"He's in the stage-box, with Mrs. Peagrim."
"With Mrs. Peagrim?"
"Proposing to her," said Freddie solemnly.
Jill stared.
"Proposing to Mrs. Peagrim? What do you mean?"
Freddie drew her aside, and began to explain.
IV
In the dimness of the stage-box, his eyes a little glassy and a dulldespair in his soul, Uncle Chris was wondering how to begin. In hishot youth he had been rather a devil of a fellow in between dances, acoo-er of soft phrases and a stealer of never very stoutly withheldkisses. He remembered one time in Bangalore ... but that had nothingto do with the case. The point was, how to begin with Mrs. Peagrim.The fact that twenty-five years ago he had crushed in his arms beneaththe shadows of the deodars a girl whose name he had forgotten, thoughhe remembered that she had worn a dress of some pink stuff, wasimmaterial and irrelevant. Was he to crush Mrs. Peagrim in his arms?Not, thought Uncle Chris to himself, on a bet. He contented himselffor the moment with bending an intense gaze upon her and asking if shewas tired.
"A little," panted Mrs. Peagrim, who, though she danced often andvigorously, was never in the best of condition, owing to her habit ofneutralizing the beneficent effects of exercise by surreptitiouscandy-eating. "I'm a little out of breath."
Uncle Chris had observed this for himself, and it had not helped himto face his task. Lovely woman loses something of her queenly dignitywhen she puffs. Inwardly, he was thinking how exactly his hostessresembled the third from the left of a troupe of performing sea-lionswhich he had seen some years ago on one of his rare visits to avaudeville house.
"You ought not to tire yourself," he said with a difficult tenderness.
"I _am_ so fond of dancing," pleaded Mrs. Peagrim. Recovering some ofher breath, she gazed at her companion with a sort of short-windedarchness. "You are always so sympathetic, Major Selby."
"Am I?" said Uncle Chris. "Am I?"
"You know you are!"
Uncle Chris swallowed quickly.
"I wonder if you have ever wondered," he began, and stopped. He feltthat he was not putting it as well as he might. "I wonder if it hasever struck you that there's a reason." He stopped again. He seemed toremember reading something like that in an advertisement in amagazine, and he did not want to talk like an advertisement. "I wonderif it has ever struck you, Mrs. Peagrim," he began again, "that anysympathy on my part might be due to some deeper emotion which.... Haveyou never suspected that you have never suspected...." Uncle Chrisbegan to feel that he must brace himself up. Usually a man of fluentspeech, he was not at his best to-night. He was just about to tryagain, when he caught his hostess' eye, and the soft gleam in it senthim cowering back into the silence as if he were taking cover from anenemy's shrapnel.
Mrs. Peagrim touched him on the arm.
"You were saying...?" she murmured encouragingly.
Uncle Chris shut his eyes. His fingers pressed desperately into thevelvet curtain beside him. He felt as he had felt when a rawlieutenant in India, during his first hill-campaign, when theetiquette of the service had compelled him to rise and walk up anddown in front of his men under a desultory shower of jezail-bullets.He seemed to hear the damned things _whop-whopping_ now ... and almostwished that he could really hear them. One or two good bullets justnow would be a welcome diversion.
"Yes?" said Mrs. Peagrim.--
"Have you never felt," babbled Uncle Chris, "that, feeling as I feel,I might have felt ... that is to say might be feeling a feeling...?"
There was a tap at the door of the box. Uncle Chris started violently.Jill came in.
"Oh, I beg your pardon," she said. "I wanted to speak...."
"You wanted to speak to me?" said Uncle Chris, bounding up."Certainly, certainly, certainly, of course. If you will excuse me fora moment?"
Mrs. Peagrim bowed coldly. The interruption had annoyed her. She hadno notion who Jill was, and she resented the intrusion at thisparticular juncture intensely. Not so Uncle Chris, who skipped outinto the passage like a young lamb.
"Am I in time?" asked Jill in a whisper.
"In time?"
"You know what I mean. Uncle Chris, listen to me! You are not topropose to that awful woman. Do you understand?"
Uncle Chris shook his head.
"The die is cast!"
"The die isn't anything of the sort," said Jill. "Unless...." Shestopped, aghast. "You don't mean that you have done it already?"
"Well, no. To be perfectly accurate, no. But...."
"Then that's all right. I know why you were doing it, and it was verysweet of you, but you mustn't."
"But, Jill, you don't understand."
"I do understand."
"I have a motive...."
"I know your motive. Freddie told me. Don't you worry yourself aboutme, dear, because I am all right. I am going to be married."
A look of ecstatic relief came into Uncle Chris' face.
"Then Underhill...?"
"I am not marrying Derek. Somebody else. I don't think you know him,but I love him, and so will you." She pulled his face down and kissedhim. "Now you can go back."
Uncle Chris was almost too overcome to speak. He gulped a little.
"Jill," he said shakily, "this is a ... this is a great relief."
"I knew it would be."
"If you are really going to marry a rich man...."
"I didn't say he was rich."
The joy ebbed from Uncle Chris' face.
"If he is not rich, if he cannot give you everything of which I...."
"Oh, don't be absurd! Wally has all the money anybody needs. What'smoney?"
"What's money?" Uncle Chris stared. "Money, my dear child, is ... is ...well, you mustn't talk of it in that light way. But, if you think you willreally have enough...?"
"Of course we shall. Now you can go back. Mrs. Peagrim will bewondering what has become of you."
"Must I?" said Uncle Chris doubtfully.
"Of course. You must be polite."
"Very well," said Uncle Chris. "But it will be a little difficult tocontinue the conversation on what you might call general lines.However!"
* * * * *
Back in the box, Mrs. Peagrim was fanning herself with manifestimpatience.
"What did that girl want?" she demanded.
Uncle Chris seated himself with composure. The weakness had passed,and he was himself again.
"Oh, nothing, nothing. Some trivial difficulty, which I was able todispose of in a few words."
Mrs. Peagrim would have liked to continue her researches, but afeeling that it was wiser not to stray too long from the main pointrestrained her. She bent towards him.
"You were going to say something when that girl interrupted us."
Uncle Chris shot his cuffs with a debonair gesture.
"Was I? Was I? To be sure, yes. I was saying that you ought not to letyourself get tired. Deuce of a thing, getting tired. Plays the dickenswith the system."
Mrs. Peagrim was disconcerted. The atmosphere seemed to have changed,and she did not like it. She endeavoured to restore the tone of theconversation.
"You are so sympathetic," she sighed, feeling that she could not dobetter than to begin again at that point. The remark had producedgood results before and it might do so a second time.
"Yes," agreed Uncle Chris cheerily. "You see, I have seen something ofall this sort of thing, and I realize the importance of it. I knowwhat all this modern rush and strain of life is for a woman in yourposition. Parties every night ... dancing ... a thousand and one callson the vitality ... bound to have an effect sooner or later,unless--_unless_," said Uncle Chris solemnly, "one takes steps. Unlessone acts in time. I had a friend--" His voice sank--"I had a very dearfriend over in London, Lady Alice--but the name would conveynothing--the point is that she was in exactly the
same position asyou. On the rush all the time. Never stopped. The end was inevitable.She caught cold, hadn't sufficient vitality to throw it off, went to adance in mid-winter, contracted pneumonia...." Uncle Chris sighed."All over in three days," he said sadly. "Now at that time," heresumed, "I did not know what I know now. If I had heard of Nervinothen...." He shook his head. "It might have saved her life. It _would_have saved her life. I tell you, Mrs. Peagrim, that there is nothing,there is no lack of vitality which Nervino cannot set right. I am nophysician myself, I speak as a layman, but it acts on the redcorpuscles of the blood...."
Mrs. Peagrim's face was stony. She had not spoken before, because hehad given her no opportunity, but she spoke now in a hard voice.
"Major Selby!"
"Mrs. Peagrim?"
"I am not interested in patent medicines!"
"One can hardly call Nervino that," said Uncle Chris reproachfully."It is a sovereign specific. You can get it at any drug store. Itcomes in two sizes, the dollar-fifty--or large--size, and the...."
Mrs. Peagrim rose majestically.
"Major Selby, I am tired...."
"Precisely. And, as I say, Nervino...."
"Please," said Mrs. Peagrim coldly, "go to the stage-door and see ifyou can find my limousine. It should be waiting in the street."
"Certainly," said Uncle Chris. "Why, certainly, certainly,certainly."
He left the box and proceeded across the stage. He walked with alissom jauntiness. His eye was bright. One or two of those whom hepassed on his way had the idea that this fine-looking man was in pain.They fancied that he was moaning. But Uncle Chris was not moaning. Hewas humming a gay snatch from the lighter music of the 'nineties.