6
Lord Dawlish sat in the New York flat which had been lent him byhis friend Gates. The hour was half-past ten in the evening; theday, the second day after the exodus of Nutty Boyd from the farm.Before him on the table lay a letter. He was smoking pensively.
Lord Dawlish had found New York enjoyable, but a trifle fatiguing.There was much to be seen in the city, and he had made the mistakeof trying to see it all at once. It had been his intention, whenhe came home after dinner that night, to try to restore thebalance of things by going to bed early. He had sat up longer thanhe had intended, because he had been thinking about this letter.
Immediately upon his arrival in America, Bill had sought out alawyer and instructed him to write to Elizabeth Boyd, offering herone-half of the late Ira Nutcombe's money. He had had time duringthe voyage to think the whole matter over, and this seemed to himthe only possible course. He could not keep it all. He would feellike the despoiler of the widow and the orphan. Nor would it befair to Claire to give it all up. If he halved the legacyeverybody would be satisfied.
That at least had been his view until Elizabeth's reply hadarrived. It was this reply that lay on the table--a brief, formalnote, setting forth Miss Boyd's absolute refusal to accept anyportion of the money. This was a development which Bill had notforeseen, and he was feeling baffled. What was the next step? Hehad smoked many pipes in the endeavour to find an answer to thisproblem, and was lighting another when the door-bell rang.
He opened the door and found himself confronting an extraordinarilytall and thin young man in evening-dress.
Lord Dawlish was a little startled. He had taken it for granted,when the bell rang, that his visitor was Tom, the liftman fromdownstairs, a friendly soul who hailed from London and had beendropping in at intervals during the past two days to acquire thelatest news from his native land. He stared at this changelinginquiringly. The solution of the mystery came with the stranger'sfirst words--
'Is Gates in?'
He spoke eagerly, as if Gates were extremely necessary to hiswell-being. It distressed Lord Dawlish to disappoint him, butthere was nothing else to be done.
'Gates is in London,' he said.
'What! When did he go there?'
'About four months ago.'
'May I come in a minute?'
'Yes, rather, do.'
He led the way into the sitting-room. The stranger gave abruptlyin the middle, as if he were being folded up by some invisibleagency, and in this attitude sank into a chair, where he lay backlooking at Bill over his knees, like a sorrowful sheep peeringover a sharp-pointed fence.
'You're from England, aren't you?'
'Yes.'
'Been in New York long?'
'Only a couple of days.'
The stranger folded himself up another foot or so until his kneeswere higher than his head, and lit a cigarette.
'The curse of New York,' he said, mournfully, 'is the wayeverything changes in it. You can't take your eyes off it for aminute. The population's always shifting. It's like a railwaystation. You go away for a bit and come back and try to find yourold pals, and they're all gone: Ike's in Arizona, Mike's in asanatorium, Spike's in jail, and nobody seems to know where therest of them have got to. I came up from the country two days ago,expecting to find the old gang along Broadway the same as ever,and I'm dashed if I've been able to put my hands on one of them!Not a single, solitary one of them! And it's only six months sinceI was here last.'
Lord Dawlish made sympathetic noises.
'Of course,' proceeded the other, 'the time of year may havesomething to do with it. Living down in the country you lose countof time, and I forgot that it was July, when people go out of thecity. I guess that must be what happened. I used to know all sortsof fellows, actors and fellows like that, and they're all awaysomewhere. I tell you,' he said, with pathos, 'I never knew Icould be so infernally lonesome as I have been these last twodays. If I had known what a rotten time I was going to have Iwould never have left Brookport.'
'Brookport!'
'It's a place down on Long Island.'
Bill was not by nature a plotter, but the mere fact of travellingunder an assumed name had developed a streak of wariness in him.He checked himself just as he was about to ask his companion if hehappened to know a Miss Elizabeth Boyd, who also lived atBrookport. It occurred to him that the question would invite acounter-question as to his own knowledge of Miss Boyd, and he knewthat he would not be able to invent a satisfactory answer to thatoffhand.
'This evening,' said the thin young man, resuming his dirge, 'Iwas sweating my brain to try to think of somebody I could hunt upin this ghastly, deserted city. It isn't so easy, you know, tothink of fellows' names and addresses. I can get the names allright, but unless the fellow's in the telephone-book, I'm done.Well, I was trying to think of some of my pals who might still bearound the place, and I remembered Gates. Remembered his address,too, by a miracle. You're a pal of his, of course?'
'Yes, I knew him in London.'
'Oh, I see. And when you came over here he lent you his flat? Bythe way, I didn't get your name?'
'My name's Chalmers.'
'Well, as I say, I remembered Gates and came down here to look himup. We used to have a lot of good times together a year ago. Andnow he's gone too!'
'Did you want to see him about anything important?'
'Well, it's important to me. I wanted him to come out to supper.You see, it's this way: I'm giving supper to-night to a girl who'sin that show at the Forty-ninth Street Theatre, a Miss Leonard,and she insists on bringing a pal. She says the pal is a goodsport, which sounds all right--' Bill admitted that it sounded allright. 'But it makes the party three. And of all the infernalthings a party of three is the ghastliest.'
Having delivered himself of this undeniable truth the strangerslid a little farther into his chair and paused. 'Look here, whatare you doing to-night?' he said.
'I was thinking of going to bed.'
'Going to bed!' The stranger's voice was shocked, as if he hadheard blasphemy. 'Going to bed at half-past ten in New York! Mydear chap, what you want is a bit of supper. Why don't you comealong?'
Amiability was, perhaps, the leading quality of Lord Dawlish'scharacter. He did not want to have to dress and go out to supper,but there was something almost pleading in the eyes that looked athim between the sharply-pointed knees.
'It's awfully good of you--' He hesitated.
'Not a bit; I wish you would. You would be a life-saver.'
Bill felt that he was in for it. He got up.
'You will?' said the other. 'Good boy! You go and get into someclothes and come along. I'm sorry, what did you say your namewas?'
'Chalmers.'
'Mine's Boyd--Nutcombe Boyd.'
'Boyd!' cried Bill.
Nutty took his astonishment, which was too great to be concealed,as a compliment. He chuckled.
'I thought you would know the name if you were a pal of Gates's. Iexpect he's always talking about me. You see, I was pretty wellknown in this old place before I had to leave it.'
Bill walked down the long passage to his bedroom with no trace ofthe sleepiness which had been weighing on him five minutes before.He was galvanized by a superstitious thrill. It was fate,Elizabeth Boyd's brother turning up like this and making friendlyovertures right on top of that letter from her. This astonishingthing could not have been better arranged if he had planned ithimself. From what little he had seen of Nutty he gathered thatthe latter was not hard to make friends with. It would be a simpletask to cultivate his acquaintance. And having done so, he couldrenew negotiations with Elizabeth. The desire to rid himself ofhalf the legacy had become a fixed idea with Bill. He had theimpression that he could not really feel clean again until he hadmade matters square with his conscience in this respect. He feltthat he was probably a fool to take that view of the thing, butthat was the way he was built and there was no getting away fromit.
This irruption of Nutty Boyd into his life was an ome
n. It meantthat all was not yet over. He was conscious of a mild surprisethat he had ever intended to go to bed. He felt now as if he neverwanted to go to bed again. He felt exhilarated.
In these days one cannot say that a supper-party is actually givenin any one place. Supping in New York has become a peripateticpastime. The supper-party arranged by Nutty Boyd was scheduled tostart at Reigelheimer's on Forty-second Street, and it was therethat the revellers assembled.
Nutty and Bill had been there a few minutes when Miss DaisyLeonard arrived with her friend. And from that moment Bill wasnever himself again.
The Good Sport was, so to speak, an outsize in Good Sports. Sheloomed up behind the small and demure Miss Leonard like a linertowed by a tug. She was big, blonde, skittish, and exuberant; shewore a dress like the sunset of a fine summer evening, and sheeffervesced with spacious good will to all men. She was one ofthose girls who splash into public places like stones into quietpools. Her form was large, her eyes were large, her teeth werelarge, and her voice was large. She overwhelmed Bill. She hit hisastounded consciousness like a shell. She gave him a buzzing inthe ears. She was not so much a Good Sport as some kind of anexplosion.
He was still reeling from the spiritual impact with this femaletidal wave when he became aware, as one who, coming out of aswoon, hears voices faintly, that he was being addressed by MissLeonard. To turn from Miss Leonard's friend to Miss Leonardherself was like hearing the falling of gentle rain after athunderstorm. For a moment he revelled in the sense of beingsoothed; then, as he realized what she was saying, he startedviolently. Miss Leonard was looking at him curiously.
'I beg your pardon?' said Bill.
'I'm sure I've met you before, Mr Chalmers.'
'Er--really?'
'But I can't think where.'
'I'm sure,' said the Good Sport, languishingly, like a sentimentalsiege-gun, 'that if I had ever met Mr Chalmers before I shouldn'thave forgotten him.'
'You're English, aren't you?' asked Miss Leonard.
'Yes.'
The Good Sport said she was crazy about Englishmen.
'I thought so from your voice.'
The Good Sport said that she was crazy about the English accent.
'It must have been in London that I met you. I was in the revue atthe Alhambra last year.'
'By George, I wish I had seen you!' interjected the infatuatedNutty.
The Good Sport said that she was crazy about London.
'I seem to remember,' went on Miss Leonard, 'meeting you out atsupper. Do you know a man named Delaney in the Coldstream Guards?'
Bill would have liked to deny all knowledge of Delaney, though thelatter was one of his best friends, but his natural honestyprevented him.
'I'm sure I met you at a supper he gave at Oddy's one Fridaynight. We all went on to Covent Garden. Don't you remember?'
'Talking of supper,' broke in Nutty, earning Bill's heartygratitude thereby, 'where's the dashed head-waiter? I want to findmy table.'
He surveyed the restaurant with a melancholy eye.
'Everything changed!' He spoke sadly, as Ulysses might have donewhen his boat put in at Ithaca. 'Every darned thing differentsince I was here last. New waiter, head-waiter I never saw beforein my life, different-coloured carpet--'
'Cheer up, Nutty, old thing!' said Miss Leonard. 'You'll feelbetter when you've had something to eat. I hope you had the senseto tip the head-waiter, or there won't be any table. Funny howthese places go up and down in New York. A year ago the wholemanagement would turn out and kiss you if you looked like spendinga couple of dollars here. Now it costs the earth to get in atall.'
'Why's that?' asked Nutty.
'Lady Pauline Wetherby, of course. Didn't you know this was whereshe danced?'
'Never heard of her,' said Nutty, in a sort of ecstasy of wistfulgloom. 'That will show you how long I've been away. Who is she?'
Miss Leonard invoked the name of Mike.
'Don't you ever get the papers in your village, Nutty?'
'I never read the papers. I don't suppose I've read a paper foryears. I can't stand 'em. Who is Lady Pauline Wetherby?'
'She does Greek dances--at least, I suppose they're Greek. Theyall are nowadays, unless they're Russian. She's an Englishpeeress.'
Miss Leonard's friend said she was crazy about these picturesqueold English families; and they went in to supper.
* * * * *
Looking back on the evening later and reviewing its leadingfeatures, Lord Dawlish came to the conclusion that he nevercompletely recovered from the first shock of the Good Sport. Hewas conscious all the time of a dream-like feeling, as if he werewatching himself from somewhere outside himself. From someconning-tower in this fourth dimension he perceived himself eatingbroiled lobster and drinking champagne and heard himself bearingan adequate part in the conversation but his movements werelargely automatic.
* * * * *
Time passed. It seemed to Lord Dawlish, watching from without,that things were livening up. He seemed to perceive a quickeningof the _tempo_ of the revels, an added abandon. Nutty wasgetting quite bright. He had the air of one who recalls the goodold days, of one who in familiar scenes re-enacts the joys of hisvanished youth. The chastened melancholy induced by many months offetching of pails of water, of scrubbing floors with a mop, and ofjumping like a firecracker to avoid excited bees had been purgedfrom him by the lights and the music and the wine. He was tellinga long anecdote, laughing at it, throwing a crust of bread at anadjacent waiter, and refilling his glass at the same time. It isnot easy to do all these things simultaneously, and the fact thatNutty did them with notable success was proof that he was pickingup.
Miss Daisy Leonard was still demure, but as she had just slipped apiece of ice down the back of Nutty's neck one may assume that shewas feeling at her ease and had overcome any diffidence or shynesswhich might have interfered with her complete enjoyment of thefestivities. As for the Good Sport, she was larger, blonder, andmore exuberant than ever and she was addressing someone as 'Bill'.
Perhaps the most remarkable phenomenon of the evening, as itadvanced, was the change it wrought in Lord Dawlish's attitudetoward this same Good Sport. He was not conscious of the beginningof the change; he awoke to the realization of it suddenly. At thebeginning of supper his views on her had been definite and clear.When they had first been introduced to each other he had had astunned feeling that this sort of thing ought not to be allowed atlarge, and his battered brain had instinctively recalled that lineof Tennyson: 'The curse is come upon me.' But now, warmed withfood and drink and smoking an excellent cigar, he found that agentler, more charitable mood had descended upon him.
He argued with himself in extenuation of the girl's peculiaridiosyncrasies. Was it, he asked himself, altogether her faultthat she was so massive and spoke as if she were addressing anopen-air meeting in a strong gale? Perhaps it was hereditary.Perhaps her father had been a circus giant and her mother thestrong woman of the troupe. And for the unrestraint of her mannerdefective training in early girlhood would account. He began toregard her with a quiet, kindly commiseration, which in its turnchanged into a sort of brotherly affection. He discovered that heliked her. He liked her very much. She was so big and jolly androbust, and spoke in such a clear, full voice. He was glad thatshe was patting his hand. He was glad that he had asked her tocall him Bill.
People were dancing now. It has been claimed by patriots thatAmerican dyspeptics lead the world. This supremacy, though partlydue, no doubt, to vast supplies of pie absorbed in youth, may beattributed to a certain extent also to the national habit ofdancing during meals. Lord Dawlish had that sturdy reverence forhis interior organism which is the birthright of every Briton. Andat the beginning of supper he had resolved that nothing shouldinduce him to court disaster in this fashion. But as the time wenton he began to waver.
The situation was awkward. Nutty and Miss Leonard were repeatedlyleaving the table to tread the measure,
and on these occasions theGood Sport's wistfulness was a haunting reproach. Nor was thespectacle of Nutty in action without its effect on Bill'sresolution. Nutty dancing was a sight to stir the most stolid.
Bill wavered. The music had started again now, one of thosetwentieth-century eruptions of sound that begin like a train goingthrough a tunnel and continue like audible electric shocks, thatset the feet tapping beneath the table and the spine thrillingwith an unaccustomed exhilaration. Every drop of blood in his bodycried to him 'Dance!' He could resist no longer.
'Shall we?' he said.
Bill should not have danced. He was an estimable young man,honest, amiable, with high ideals. He had played an excellent gameof football at the university; his golf handicap was plus two; andhe was no mean performer with the gloves. But we all of us haveour limitations, and Bill had his. He was not a good dancer. Hewas energetic, but he required more elbow room than the ordinarydancing floor provides. As a dancer, in fact, he closely resembleda Newfoundland puppy trying to run across a field.
It takes a good deal to daunt the New York dancing man, but theinvasion of the floor by Bill and the Good Sport undoubtedlycaused a profound and even painful sensation. Linked together theyformed a living projectile which might well have intimidated thebravest. Nutty was their first victim. They caught him inmid-step--one of those fancy steps which he was just beginning toexhume from the cobwebbed recesses of his memory--and swept himaway. After which they descended resistlessly upon a stoutgentleman of middle age, chiefly conspicuous for the glitteringdiamonds which he wore and the stoical manner in which he dancedto and fro on one spot of not more than a few inches in size inthe exact centre of the room. He had apparently staked out a claimto this small spot, a claim which the other dancers had decided torespect; but Bill and the Good Sport, coming up from behind, hadhim two yards away from it at the first impact. Then, scatteringapologies broadcast like a medieval monarch distributing largesse,Bill whirled his partner round by sheer muscular force and beganwhat he intended to be a movement toward the farther corner,skirting the edge of the floor. It was his simple belief thatthere was more safety there than in the middle.
He had not reckoned with Heinrich Joerg. Indeed, he was not awareof Heinrich Joerg's existence. Yet fate was shortly to bring themtogether, with far-reaching results. Heinrich Joerg had left theFatherland a good many years before with the prudent purpose ofescaping military service. After various vicissitudes in the landof his adoption--which it would be extremely interesting torelate, but which must wait for a more favourable opportunity--hehad secured a useful and not ill-recompensed situation as one ofthe staff of Reigelheimer's Restaurant. He was, in point of fact,a waiter, and he comes into the story at this point bearing a trayfull of glasses, knives, forks, and pats of butter on littleplates. He was setting a table for some new arrivals, and in orderto obtain more scope for that task he had left the crowded aislebeyond the table and come round to the edge of the dancing-floor.
He should not have come out on to the dancing-floor. In anothermoment he was admitting that himself. For just as he was loweringhis tray and bending over the table in the pursuance of hisprofessional duties, along came Bill at his customary high rateof speed, propelling his partner before him, and for the firsttime since he left home Heinrich was conscious of a regret that hehad done so. There are worse things than military service!
It was the table that saved Bill. He clutched at it and itsupported him. He was thus enabled to keep the Good Sport fromfalling and to assist Heinrich to rise from the morass of glasses,knives, and pats of butter in which he was wallowing. Then, thedance having been abandoned by mutual consent, he helped his nowsomewhat hysterical partner back to their table.
Remorse came upon Bill. He was sorry that he had danced; sorrythat he had upset Heinrich; sorry that he had subjected the GoodSport's nervous system to such a strain; sorry that so much glasshad been broken and so many pats of butter bruised beyond repair.But of one thing, even in that moment of bleak regrets, he wasdistinctly glad, and that was that all these things had takenplace three thousand miles away from Claire Fenwick. He had notbeen appearing at his best, and he was glad that Claire had notseen him.
As he sat and smoked the remains of his cigar, while renewing hisapologies and explanations to his partner and soothing the ruffledNutty with well-chosen condolences, he wondered idly what Clairewas doing at that moment.
Claire at that moment, having been an astonished eye-witness ofthe whole performance, was resuming her seat at a table at theother end of the room.