'How do you two manage, living ail alone with nobody to look after you? Or have you a cook?'
Freddie laughed hackingly.
'You mean a chef? On our starvation wages? No, we have no chef, no butler, no first and second footmen, no head and under housemaids, and no groom of the chambers. George does the cooking, and pretty ghastly it is. But I mustn't bore you with my troubles.'
'Oh, Freddie, you aren't.'
'Well, I shall if I go on any longer. Change the subject, what? How do you get along with Leila Yorke?'
'Oh, splendidly. She's the top.'
'In what respect?'
'In every respect.'
'Not in her literary output. You must admit that she writes the most awful bilge.'
'No longer.'
'How do you mean, no longer?'
'She's giving up doing that sentimental stuff of hers.'
'You're kidding. No more slush?'
'So she says.'
'But it sells like hot cakes.'
'I know.'
'Then why? What's she going to do? Retire?' 'No, she's planning to write one of those stark, strong novels…you know, about the grey underworld.’
'Lord love a duck! This'll be a blow to Cornelius.'
'Who's he?'
'Fellow I know. He reads everything she writes.'
‘I wonder if he'll read her next one.'
'How's it coming?'
'It hasn't started yet. She feels the surroundings at Claines Hall aren't right. She says she can't get into the mood. She wants to move somewhere where she can soak in the grey atmosphere and really get going. What's the matter?'
'Nothing.'
'You sort of jumped.'
'Oh, that? Touch of cramp. Has she found a place to go to yet?'
'No, she's still thinking it over.'
'Ah!'
'Ah what?'
'Just Ah. Weil, here we are at the old front door. What's the procedure? Do I charge in?'
'You'd better wait. I'll tell her you're here.'
Sally crossed the hall, knocked on a door, went in and came out again.
'She wants you to go in.'
There was a pause.
'Well, Freddie,' said Sally.
'Well, Sally,' said Freddie.
‘I suppose this is the last time we shall meet.'
'You never know.'
‘I think it is.'
'You wouldn't care to dash in and have lunch with me one of these days?'
'Oh, Freddie, what's the use?'
‘I see what you mean. Well, in that case Bung-ho about sums it up, what?'
'Yes. Goodbye, Freddie.'
'Goodbye.'
'Better not keep Miss Yorke waiting. She's been a little edgy since she made her great decision,' said Sally, and went off to the potting shed by the kitchen garden to have a good cry. She knew she had done the sensible thing, but that did not prevent her feeling that her heart was being torn in small pieces by a platoon of muscular wild cats, than which few experiences are less agreeable.
4
FREDDIE”S first sight of Mr. Cornelius's favourite novelist, author of For True Love Only, Heather of the Hills, Sweet Jennie Dean and other works, had something of the effect on him of a blow between the eyes with a wet fish, causing him to rock back on his heels and blink. Going by the form book, he had expected to see a frail little spectacled wisp of a thing with a shy smile and a general suggestion of lavender and old lace. From this picture Leila Yorke in the flesh deviated quite a good deal. She was a large, hearty-looking woman in the early forties, built on the lines of Catherine of Russia, and her eyes, which were blue and bright and piercing, were obviously in no need of glasses.
'Hullo there,' she said in a voice which recalled to him that of the drill sergeant at his preparatory school, a man who could crack windows with a single ' 'Shun!'. 'You Widgeon?'
'That's right.'
'Shoesmith phoned me that you were bringing those papers. I'll bet you left them in the train.'
'No, I have them here.'
'Then let's sign the things and get it over.'
She scribbled her signature with the flowing pen of a woman accustomed to recording her name in autograph albums, and disposed herself for conversation.
'Widgeon?' she said. 'That's odd. I used to know a Rodney Widgeon once. Know him still, as a matter of fact, only he goes around under an alias these days. Calls himself Lord Blicester. Any relation?'
'My uncle.'
'You don't say? You don't look like him.'
'No,' said Freddie, who would have hated to. There was nothing in the appearance of his uncle Rodney that appealed to his aesthetic sense.
'Do you brim over with a nephew's love for him?'
'I wouldn't say "brim over" exactly.'
'No objection, then, to my calling him an old poop?'
'None whatever,' said Freddie, warming to the woman as he seldom warmed to one of the opposite sex over the age of twenty-five. There was no question in his mind that he and Leila Yorke were twin souls. 'As a matter of fact, your words are music to my ears. "Old poop" sums him up to a nicety.'
She blew a meditative smoke ring, her thoughts plainly back in the past.
'I was engaged to him once.'
'Really?'
'Broke it off, though, when he started to bulge at every seam. Couldn't keep that boy off the starchy foods. I don't mind a poop being a poop, but I draw the line at a poop who looks like two poops rolled into one.'
'Quite. Have you seen him lately?'
'Not for a year or so. Is he as fat as ever?'
'He came out top in the Fat Uncles contest at the Drones last summer.'
'I'm not surprised. Mark you, I'd have broken the engagement anyway, because soon after we plighted our troth Joe Bishop came along.'
'Joe Bishop?'
'Character I subsequently married. We split up later, and I've been kicking myself ever since. Silliest thing I ever did, to let him go. You married?'
'No.'
'What are you screwing up your face for?'
'Did I screw up my face?'
'I got that impression. As if in anguish.'
'I'm sorry.'
'Quite all right. It's your face. Well, well, it's strange to think that if Joe hadn't come into my life and your uncle had done bending and stretching exercises and learned the knack of laying off sweets, butter and potatoes, you might now be calling me Aunt Bessie.'
‘Leila, you mean.'
'No, I don't. Leila Yorke's my pen name. I was born Elizabeth Binns. You can't write books if you're a Binns. But let's go on roasting your uncle. You don't seem very fond of him.'
'Not at the moment. He has incurred my displeasure.’
'How was that?'
Freddie quivered a little. He always quivered when he thought of his Uncle Rodney's black act. 'He sold me down the river to Shoesmith.'
'Don't you like working for him?'
'No.'
'I wouldn't myself. How is Johnny Shoesmith these days?'
Hearing the Frankenstein's monster who employed him alluded to in this fashion shook Freddie to his depths. A vision of himself calling that eminent solicitor Johnny rose before his eyes, and he shuddered strongly. It was only after some moments that he was able to reply.
'Oh, he's fizzing along.'
'I've known him since we were both so high.'
'Really?'
'He once kissed me behind a rhododendron bush.'
Freddie started. 'Shoesmith did?'
'Yes.'
'You mean Shoesmith of Shoesmith, Shoesmith, Shoesmith and Shoesmith of Lincoln's Inn Fields?’
'That's right.'
'Well, I'll be a son of a…I mean, how very extraordinary!'
'Oh, he was a regular devil in those days. And look at him now. All dried up like a kippered herring and wouldn't kiss Helen of Troy if you brought her to him asleep in a chair with a sprig of mistletoe suspended over her. That's what comes of being a solicitor
, it saps the vital juices. Johnny doesn't even embezzle his clients' money, which I should have thought was about the only fun a solicitor can get out of life. How long have you been working for him?'
'Six months or so.'
'You haven't dried up yet.'
'No.'
'Well, be careful you don't. Exercise ceaseless vigilance. And talking of drying up, you're probably in need of a quick one after your journey. Care for something moist?'
'I'd love it.'
'I've only got whisky, brandy, gin, beer, sherry, port, curacao and champagne, but help yourself. Over there in the fridge in the corner.'
'Oh, thanks. You?'
'Why, yes, I think I might. I've been feeling a little nervous and fragile these last few days. Open a bottle of champagne.'
'Right,' said Freddie, doing so. 'Nervous and fragile?'
'Got a lot on my mind. Widgeon,' said Miss Yorke, 'I am standing at a woman's crossroads. Do you read my stuff?'
'Well – er - what with one thing and another…'
'No need to apologize. One can't read everything, and no doubt you're all tied up with your Proust and Kafka. Well, for your information, it's too sweet for words.'
'Really?'
'Pure treacle. Would you call me a sentimental woman?'
'Not offhand.'
'I'm not. In the ordinary give-and-take of life I'm as tough an egg as ever stepped out of the saucepan. Did my butler show you in when you arrived?'
'No. I came with your secretary, Miss Foster. I met her on the train. We – er - we know each other slightly.'
'Oh, yes, I remember it was Sally who told me you were here. Well, you ought to see my butler. Haughty? The haughtiest thing you ever met. I've seen strong publishers wilt beneath his eye. And yet that man, that haughty butler, curls up like a sheet of carbon paper if I look squiggle-eyed at him. That's the sort of woman I am when I haven't a pen in my hand, but give me a ball-pointed and what happens? Don't keep all that champagne to yourself.'
'Oh, sorry.'
'And don't spill it. The prudent man doesn't waste a drop.'
'It's good stuff.'
'It's excellent stuff. It's what Johnny Shoesmith needs to make him realize he isn't something dug out of Tutankhamen's tomb. Where was I?'
'You were saying what happens.'
'What happens when what?'
'When you get a ball-pointed pen in your hand.'
'Oh, yes. The moment my fingers clutch it, Widgeon, a great change comes over me. I descend to depths of goo which you with your pure mind wouldn't believe possible. I write about stalwart men, strong but oh so gentle, and girls with wide grey eyes and hair the colour of ripe wheat, who are always having misunderstandings and going to Africa. The men, that is. The girls stay at home and marry the wrong bimbos. But there's a happy ending. The bimbos break their necks in the hunting field and the men come back in the last chapter and they and the girls get together in the twilight, and all around is the scent of English flowers and birds singing their evensong in the shrubbery. Makes me shudder to think of it.'
'It sounds rather good to me. I wouldn't mind getting together with a girl in the twilight.'
'No, it's kind of you to try to cheer me up, Widgeon, but I know molasses when I see it. Or is it "them"? The critics call my stuff tripe.'
'No!'
'That's what they do, they call it tripe.'
'Monstrous!'
'And of course it is tripe. But I'm not going to have a bunch of inky pipsqueaks telling me so. And I'm fed to the teeth with all these smart alecks who do parodies of me, hoping to make me feel like a piece of cheese. The worm has turned, Widgeon. Do you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to write a novel that'll make their eyes pop out, What some call an important novel, and others significant. Keep that champagne circulating. Don't let it congeal.'
'But can you?'
'Can I what?'
'Write an important novel.'
'Of course I can. All you have to do is cut out the plot and shove in plenty of misery. I can do it on my head, once I get started. Only the trouble is that as long as I remain at Claines Hall, Loose Chippings, I can't get started. The atmosphere here is all wrong. Butlers and moats and things popping about all over the place. I've got to get away somewhere where there's a little, decent squalor.'
'That's exactly what Sally Foster was saying.'
'Oh, was she? Nice girl, that. She ought to marry somebody. Maybe she will before long. I think she's in love.'
'You do?'
'Yes, I've an idea there's someone for whom she feels sentiments deeper and warmer than those of ordinary friendship. Well, if so, I wish her luck. Love's all right. Makes the world go round, they say. I don't know if there's anything in it, Or if there's anything in that bottle. Is there?'
'Just a drop.'
'Let's have it. What were we talking about?'
'You were getting away somewhere where there was a spot of squalor.'
'That's right. I thought I'd be able to swing it here by going the round of the local pubs and having the peasantry bare their souls to me. Thomas Hardy stuff. Not a hope. At the end of a week all I had discovered about these sons of toil was that they were counting the days to the football season so that they could start in on their pools again. Makes one sick. No help to a woman. Why are you looking at me like a half-witted sheep?’
'Was I?'
'You were.'
'I'm sorry. It's just that when Sally Foster was telling me about this new binge you were contemplating, I had an idea. I believe I've got the very spot for you. Castlewood, Mulberry Grove, Valley Fields.'
'Where's that?'
'Just outside London. I doubt if you could find a greyer locality. The man who lives next door to me keeps rabbits.'
'Oh, you live in Valley Fields?'
'That's right. Castlewood's next door to me on the other side. And it's vacant at the moment and fully furnished. You could move in tomorrow. Shall I fix you up with the rabbit-fancier? He's the house agent.'
'H'm.'
'Don't say "H'm!"' 'I wonder.'
'I wouldn't. Strike while the iron's hot is my advice.'
But Miss Yorke insisted on relapsing into thought, and Freddie scanned her pensive face anxiously. On her decision so much depended. For he was convinced that if he could only get Sally on the other side of the garden fence that divided Peacehaven from Castlewood, he would soon be able to alter the present trend of her thoughts with the burning words and melting looks he knew he had at his disposal. He had lived in the suburbs long enough to be aware that the preliminaries of seventy per cent of the marriages that occurred there had been arranged over garden fences.
Leila Yorke came out of her reverie.
'I hadn't thought of the suburbs. What I had in mind was a bed-sitting-room in Bottleton East, where I could study the martyred proletariat and soak in squalor at every pore.'
Freddie yelped like a stepped-on puppy.
'Bottleton East? You're off your onion…I mean, you have an entirely erroneous conception of what Bottleton East is like. It's the cheeriest place in England. I sang at a Song Contest there once, so I know. The audience was the most rollicking set of blighters you ever saw. Never stopped throwing vegetables. No, Valley Fields is the spot for you.'
'Really grey, is it, this outpost of eternity?'
'Couldn't be greyer.'
'Squalor?'
'It wrote the words and music'
'Gissing!' exclaimed Miss Yorke, snapping her fingers. Freddie shook his head.
There's very little kissing done in Valley Fields. The aborigines are much too busy being grey.'
'I didn't say kissing. I said Gissing. George Gissing. He wrote about the suburbs, and it's just the George Gissing sort of book I'm aiming at.'
'Well, there you are. Didn't I tell you? You can't miss, if you string along with George Gissing. Ask anybody.'
'He was as grey as a stevedore's undervest.'
'Very stark. I've always s
aid so.'
'Widgeon, I think you've got something.'
'Me, too.'
'The telephone's in the hall. Ring up that rat-catching friend of yours, the house agent fellow, and book me in at this Castlewood hovel, starting tomorrow. And—correct me if I'm wrong—I think this calls for another half-bottle.'
'Me also.'
'Make a long arm,' said Leila Yorke.
5
IN the whole of London there is no interior more richly dignified—posh is perhaps the word—than the lobby of Barribault's Hotel in Clarges Street, that haunt of Texas millionaires and visiting maharajahs. Its chairs and settees are the softest that money can provide, its fighting dim and discreet, its carpets of so thick a nap that midgets would get lost in them and have to be rescued by dogs. It is the general opinion of London's elite that until you have seen the lobby of Barribault's Hotel, you have not seen anything.
Some forty hours after Freddie Widgeon's visit to Loose Chippings, the quiet splendour of this beauty spot was enhanced by the presence of a superbly upholstered man of middle age who looked as if he might be an American senator or something of that sort. He had a frank, open face, fine candid eyes and a lofty brow rather resembling Shakespeare's. His name was Thomas G. Molloy, and he was waiting for his wife, who was due that morning to leave Holloway gaol, where she had been serving a short sentence for shoplifting.
He looked at his wrist watch, a little thing his mate had picked up at a Bond Street jeweller's while doing her Christmas shopping. The hands pointed to one-fifteen, and he began to feel worried, for though he knew that she would be having a shampoo and a facial and possibly a perm after leaving her recent abode, he had expected her long before this. He was consulting the timepiece again some uneasy minutes later, when a voice behind him said: 'Hi, Soapy!' and he spun round. She was standing there, looking, it seemed to him, as if instead of in the deepest dungeon beneath Holloway gaol, she had been spending the last few weeks at some bracing seashore resort like Skegness.
Dolly Molloy unquestionably took the eye. She was a spectacular blonde of the type that is always getting murdered in its step-ins in mystery stories. Her hair was golden, her eyes hazel, her lips and cheeks aflame with colour, and she carried herself with a challenging jauntiness. Wolf-whistling is of course prohibited in the lobby of Barribault's Hotel, so none of those present attempted this form of homage, but quite a few of the visiting maharajahs looked as if they would have liked to, and it was plain that it was only by the exercise of the most iron self-restraint that the Texas millionaires were holding themselves in. You could see their lips puckering.