CHAPTER IX
ROUGH WORK AT A DINNER TABLE
Sec. 1
After the first shock of astonishment, Sam Marlowe had listened to hisfather's harangue with a growing indignation which, towards the end ofthe speech, had assumed proportions of a cold fury. If there is onething the which your high-spirited young man resents, it is being thetoy of Fate. He chafes at the idea that Fate had got it all mapped outfor him. Fate, thought Sam, had constructed a cheap, mushy, sentimental,five-reel film scenario, and without consulting him had had the coolcheek to cast him for one of the puppets. He seemed to see Fate as athin female with a soppy expression and pince-nez, sniffing a little asshe worked the thing out. He could picture her glutinous satisfaction asshe re-read her scenario and gloated over its sure-fire qualities. Therewas not a flaw in the construction. It started off splendidly with aromantic meeting, had 'em guessing half-way through when the hero andheroine quarrelled and parted--apparently for ever, and now the stagewas all set for the reconciliation and the slow fade-out on the embrace.To bring this last scene about, Fate had had to permit herself a slightcoincidence, but she did not jib at that. What we call coincidences aremerely the occasions when Fate gets stuck in a plot and has to inventthe next situation in a hurry.
Sam Marlowe felt sulky and defiant. This girl had treated him shamefullyand he wanted to have nothing more to do with her. If he had had hiswish, he would never have met her again. Fate, in her interfering way,had forced this meeting on him and was now complacently looking to himto behave in a suitable manner. Well, he would show her! In a fewseconds now, Billie and he would be meeting. He would be distant andpolite. He would be cold and aloof. He would chill her to the bone, andrip a hole in the scenario six feet wide.
The door opened, and the room became full of Bennetts and Mortimers.
Sec. 2
Billie, looking, as Marlowe could not but admit, particularly pretty,headed the procession. Following her came a large red-faced man whosebuttons seemed to creak beneath the strain of their duties. After himtrotted a small, thin, pale, semi-bald individual who wore glasses andcarried his nose raised and puckered as though some faintly unpleasantsmell were troubling his nostrils. The fourth member of the party wasdear old Bream.
There was a confused noise of mutual greetings and introductions, andthen Bream got a good sight of Sam and napped forward with his rightwing outstretched.
"Why, hello!" said Bream.
"How are you, Mortimer?" said Sam coldly.
"What, do you know my son?" exclaimed Sir Mallaby.
"Came over in the boat together," said Bream.
"Capital!" said Sir Mallaby. "Old friends, eh? Miss Bennett," he turnedto Billie, who had been staring wide-eyed at her late fiance, "let mepresent my son, Sam. Sam, this is Miss Bennett."
"How do you do?" said Sam.
"How do you do?" said Billie.
"Bennett, you've never met my son, I think?"
Mr. Bennett peered at Sam with protruding eyes which gave him theappearance of a rather unusually stout prawn.
"How _are_ you?" he asked, with such intensity that Sam unconsciouslyfound himself replying to a question which does not as a rule call forany answer.
"Very well, thanks."
Mr. Bennett shook his head moodily. "You are lucky to be able to say so!Very few of us can assert as much. I can truthfully say that in the lastfifteen years I have not known what it is to enjoy sound health for asingle day. Marlowe," he proceeded, swinging ponderously round on SirMallaby like a liner turning in the river, "I assure you that attwenty-five minutes past four this afternoon I was very nearly convincedthat I should have to call you up on the 'phone and cancel this dinnerengagement. When I took my temperature at twenty minutes to six...." Atthis point the butler appeared at the door announcing that dinner wasserved.
Sir Mallaby Marlowe's dinner table, which, like most of the furniture inthe house had belonged to his deceased father and had been built at aperiod when people liked things big and solid, was a good deal toospacious to be really ideal for a small party. A white sea of linenseparated each diner from the diner opposite and created a forcedintimacy with the person seated next to him. Billie Bennett and SamMarlowe, as a consequence, found themselves, if not exactly in asolitude of their own, at least sufficiently cut off from their kind tomake silence between them impossible. Westward, Mr. Mortimer had engagedSir Mallaby in a discussion on the recent case of Ouseley _v._ Ouseley,Figg, Mountjoy, Moseby-Smith and others, which though too complicated toexplain here, presented points of considerable interest to the legalmind. To the east, Mr. Bennett was relating to Bream the more strikingof his recent symptoms. Billie felt constrained to make at least anattempt at conversation.
"How strange meeting you here," she said.
Sam, who had been crumbling bread in an easy and debonair manner, lookedup and met her eye. Its expression was one of cheerful friendliness. Hecould not see his own eye, but he imagined and hoped that it was coldand forbidding, like the surface of some bottomless mountain tarn.
"I beg your pardon?"
"I said, how strange meeting you here. I never dreamed Sir Mallaby wasyour father."
"I knew it all along," said Sam, and there was an interval caused by themaid insinuating herself between them and collecting his soup plate. Hesipped sherry and felt a sombre self-satisfaction. He had, heconsidered, given the conversation the right tone from the start. Cooland distant. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Billie bite her lip. Heturned to her again. Now that he had definitely established the factthat he and she were strangers, meeting by chance at a dinner-party, hewas in a position to go on talking.
"And how do you like England, Miss Bennett?"
Billie's eye had lost its cheerful friendliness. A somewhat felineexpression had taken its place.
"Pretty well," she replied.
"You don't like it?"
"Well, the way I look at it is this. It's no use grumbling. One has gotto realise that in England one is in a savage country, and one shouldsimply be thankful one isn't eaten by the natives."
"What makes you call England a savage country?" demanded Sam, a staunchpatriot, deeply stung.
"What would you call a country where you can't get ice, central heating,corn-on-the-cob, or bathrooms? My father and Mr. Mortimer have justtaken a house down on the coast and there's just one niggly littlebathroom in the place."
"Is that your only reason for condemning England?"
"Oh no, it has other drawbacks."
"Such as?"
"Well, Englishmen, for instance. Young Englishmen in particular. Englishyoung men are awful! Idle, rude, conceited, and ridiculous."
Marlowe refused hock with a bitter intensity which nearly startled theold retainer, who had just offered it to him, into dropping thedecanter.
"How many English young men have you met?"
Billie met his eye squarely and steadily. "Well, now that I come tothink of it, not many. In fact, very few. As a matter of fact, only...."
"Only?"
"Well, very few," said Billie. "Yes," she said meditatively, "I supposeI really have been rather unjust. I should not have condemned a classsimply because ... I mean, I suppose there _are_ young Englishmen whoare not rude and ridiculous?"
"I suppose there are American girls who have hearts."
"Oh, plenty."
"I'll believe that when I meet one."
Sam paused. Cold aloofness was all very well, but this conversation wasdeveloping into a vulgar brawl. The ghosts of dead and gone Marlowes,all noted for their courtesy to the sex, seemed to stand beside hischair, eyeing him reprovingly. His work, they seemed to whisper, wasbecoming raw. It was time to jerk the interchange of thought back intothe realm of distant civility.
"Are you making a long stay in London, Miss Bennett?"
"No, not long. We are going down to the country almost immediately. Itold you my father and Mr. Mortimer had taken a house there."
"You will enjoy that."
"I'm sure I shall. Mr. Mortimer's son Bream will be there. That will benice."
"Why?" said Sam, backsliding.
There was a pause.
"_He_ isn't rude and ridiculous, eh?" said Sam gruffly.
"Oh, no. His manners are perfect, and he has such a natural dignity,"she went on, looking affectionately across the table at the heir of theMortimers, who, finding Mr. Bennett's medical confidences a triflefatiguing, was yawning broadly, and absently balancing his wine glass ona fork.
"Besides," said Billie in a soft and dreamy voice, "we are engaged to bemarried!"
Sec. 3
Sam didn't care, of course. We, who have had the privilege of a glimpseinto his iron soul, know that. He was not in the least upset by thenews--just surprised. He happened to be raising his glass at the moment,and he registered a certain amount of restrained emotion by snapping thestem in half and shooting the contents over the tablecloth: but that wasall.
"Good heavens, Sam!" ejaculated Sir Mallaby, aghast. His wine glasseswere an old and valued set.
Sam blushed as red as the stain on the cloth.
"Awfully sorry, father! Don't know how it happened."
"Something must have given you a shock," suggested Billie kindly.
The old retainer rallied round with napkins, and Sir Mallaby, who wasjust about to dismiss the affair with the polished ease of a good host,suddenly became aware of the activities of Bream. That young man, onwhose dreamy calm the accident had made no impression whatever, hadsuccessfully established the equilibrium of the glass and the fork, andwas now cautiously inserting beneath the latter a section of a roll, thewhole forming a charming picture in still life.
"If that glass is in your way...." said Sir Mallaby as soon as he hadhitched up his drooping jaw sufficiently to enable him to speak. He wasbeginning to feel that he would be lucky if he came out of thisdinner-party with a mere remnant of his precious set.
"Oh, Sir Mallaby," said Billie, casting an adoring glance at thejuggler, "you needn't be afraid that Bream will drop it. _He_ isn'tclumsy! He is wonderful at that sort of thing, simply wonderful! I thinkit's so splendid," said Billie, "when men can do things like that. I'malways trying to get Bream to do some of his tricks for people, but he'sso modest, he won't."
"Refreshingly different," Sir Mallaby considered, "from the averagedrawing-room entertainer."
"Yes," said Billie emphatically. "I think the most terrible thing in theworld is a man who tries to entertain when he can't. Did I tell youabout the man on board ship, father, at the ship's concert? Oh, it wasthe most awful thing you ever saw. Everybody was talking about it!" Shebeamed round the table, and there was a note of fresh girlish gaiety inher voice. "This man got up to do an imitation of somebody--nobody knowsto this day who it was meant to be--and he came into the saloon anddirectly he saw the audience he got stage fright. He just stood theregurgling and not saying a word, and then suddenly his nerve failed himaltogether and he turned and tore out of the room like a rabbit. Heabsolutely ran! And he hadn't said a word! It was the most ridiculousexhibition I've ever seen!"
The anecdote went well. Of course there will always be a small minorityin any audience which does not appreciate a funny story, and there wasone in the present case. But the bulk of the company roared withlaughter.
"Do you mean," cried Sir Mallaby, choking, "the poor idiot just stoodthere dumb?"
"Well, he made a sort of yammering noise," said Billie, "but that onlymade him look sillier."
"Deuced good!" chuckled Sir Mallaby.
"Funniest thing I ever heard in my life!" gurgled Mr. Bennett,swallowing a digestive capsule.
"May have been half-witted," suggested Mr. Mortimer.
Sam leaned across the table with a stern set face. He meant to changethe conversation if he had to do it with a crowbar.
"I hear you have taken a house in the country, Mr. Mortimer," he said.
"Yes," said Mr. Mortimer. He turned to Sir Mallaby. "We have at lastsucceeded in persuading your sister, Mrs. Hignett, to let us rent herhouse for the summer."
Sir Mallaby gasped.
"Windles! You don't mean to tell me that my sister has let you haveWindles!"
Mr. Mortimer nodded triumphantly.
"Yes. I had completely resigned myself to the prospect of spending thesummer in some other house, when yesterday I happened to run into yournephew, young Eustace Hignett, on the street, and he said he was justcoming round to see me about that very thing. To cut a long story short,he said that it would be all right and that we could have the house."Mr. Mortimer took a sip of burgundy. "He's a curious boy, youngHignett. Very nervous in his manner."
"Chronic dyspepsia," said Mr. Bennett authoritatively, "I can tell it ata glance."
"Is Windles a very lovely place, Sir Mallaby?" asked Billie.
"Charming. Quite charming. Not large, of course, as country houses go.Not a castle, I mean, with hundreds of acres of park land. But nice andcompact and comfortable and very picturesque."
"We do not require a large place," said Mr. Mortimer. "We shall be quitea small party. Bennett and myself, Wilhelmina, Bream...."
"Don't forget," said Billie, "that you have promised to invite JaneHubbard down there."
"Ah, yes. Wilhelmina's friend, Miss Hubbard. She is coming. That will beall, except young Hignett himself."
"Hignett!" cried Mr. Bennett.
"Mr. Hignett!" exclaimed Billie.
There was an almost imperceptible pause before Mr. Mortimer spoke again,and for an instant the demon of embarrassment hovered, unseen butpresent, above the dinner table. Mr. Bennett looked sternly at Billie;Billie turned a shade pinker and gazed at the tablecloth; Bream startednervously. Even Mr. Mortimer seemed robbed for a moment of his legalcalm.
"I forgot to tell you that," he said. "Yes, one of the stipulations--towhich I personally was perfectly willing to agree--was that EustaceHignett was to remain on the premises during our tenancy. Such a clausein the agreement was, I am quite aware, unusual, and, had thecircumstances been other than they were, I would have had a good deal tosay about it. But we wanted the place, and we couldn't get it except byagreeing, so I agreed. I'm sure you will think that I acted rightly,Bennett, considering the peculiar circumstances."
"Well," said Mr. Bennett reluctantly, "I certainly did want thathouse...."
"And we couldn't have had it otherwise," said Mr. Mortimer, "so that isall there is to it."
"Well, it need make no difference to you," said Sir Mallaby. "I am sureyou will find my nephew Eustace most unobtrusive. He may even be anentertaining companion. I believe he has a nice singing voice. With thatand the juggling of our friend here and my sister's late husband'sorchestrion, you will have no difficulty in amusing yourselves duringthe evenings. You remember the orchestrion, Sam?" said Sir Mallaby, onwhom his son's silence had been weighing rather heavily for some time.
"Yes," said Sam, and returned to the silence once more.
"The late Mr. Hignett had it put in. He was very fond of music. It's athing you turn on by pressing a button in the wall," continued SirMallaby. "How you stop it, I don't know. When I was down there last itnever seemed to stop. You mustn't miss the orchestrion!"
"I certainly shall," said Mr. Bennett decidedly. "Music of thatdescription happens to be the one thing which jars unendurably on mynerves. My nervous system is thoroughly out of tune."
"So is the orchestrion," said Sir Mallaby. "I remember once when I wasdown there...."
"I hope you will come down there again, Sir Mallaby," said Mr. Mortimer,"during our occupancy of the house. And you, too," he said, addressingSam.
"I am afraid," said Sam frigidly, "that my time will be very muchoccupied for the next few months. Thank you very much," he added, aftera moment's pause.
"Sam's going to work," said Sir Mallaby.
"Yes," said Sam with dark determination. "Work is the only thing in lifethat matters!"
"Oh, come, Sam!" said Sir Mallaby. "At your age I used to think love wasfairly important,
too!"
"Love!" said Sam. He jabbed at his souffle with a spoon. You could seeby the scornful way he did it that he did not think much of love.
Sec. 4
Sir Mallaby, the last cigar of the night between his lips, broke asilence which had lasted a quarter of an hour. The guests had gone, andhe and Sam were alone together.
"Sam," he said, "do you know what I think?"
"No," said Sam.
Sir Mallaby removed his cigar and spoke impressively. "I've beenturning the whole thing over in my mind, and the conclusion I have cometo is that there is more in this Windles business than meets the eye.I've known your Aunt Adeline all my life, and I tell you it isn't inthat woman to change her infernal pig-headed mind, especially aboutletting her house. She is a monomaniac on that subject. If you want toknow my opinion, I am quite certain that your cousin Eustace has let theplace to these people without her knowledge, and intends to pocket thecheque and not say a word about it. What do you think?"
"Eh?" said Sam absently.
"I said, what do you think?"
"What do I think about what?"
"About Eustace Hignett and Windles."
"What about them?"
Sir Mallaby regarded him disprovingly. "I'm hanged if I know what's thematter with you to-night, Sam. You seem to have unhitched your brain andleft it in the umbrella stand. You hadn't a word to say for yourself allthrough dinner. You might have been a Trappist monk. And with thatdelightful girl Miss Bennett, there, too. She must have thought youinfernally dull."
"I'm sorry."
"It's no good being sorry now. The mischief's done. She has gone awaythinking you an idiot. Do you realise," said Sir Mallaby warmly, "thatwhen she told that extremely funny story about the man who made such afool of himself on board the ship, you were the only person at the tablewho was not amused? She must have thought you had no sense of humour!"
Sam rose. "I think I'll be going," he said. "Good night!"
A man can bear just so much.