‘Well, at any rate,’ said Frank, ‘it means that in eight days it will all be over.’
Owen laughed heartily at the remark.
‘It means,’ said he, ‘that in eight days we must promise that at some future date we will begin to make preparations for something to happen in the future. That is about the meaning of it. All you can do now is to be perfectly philosophic, and leave the rest to me.’
But how is a man with a capital of fifty pounds going to be philosophic when he is fighting an opponent whose assets, as a certain hoarding near Clapham Junction told him every morning, exceeded three millions of pounds. He treated it lightly to Maude, and she to him, but each suffered horribly, and each was well aware of the other’s real feelings. Sometimes there was a lull, and they could almost believe that the whole thing was over. And then the old machine gave a creak, and the rusty cog-wheels took one more turn, and they both felt the horrid thing which held them.
First of all, they had to enter appearances, which meant that they would dispute the action. Then the other side had to make an affidavit verifying their claim. Then a Master had to pronounce whether the action should be treated offhand, or whether he would listen to what they had to say about it. He decided to listen to what was to be said. Then each side claimed to see the other’s documents, ‘discovery’ they called it, as if the documents were concealed, and they had to hunt for them stealthily with lanterns. Then each made remarks about the other’s documents, and claimed to see the remarks so made. Then the lawyers of the Company made a statement of their claim, and when she read it Maude burst into tears, and said that it was all over, and they must make the best of it, and she should never forgive herself for that new dress in the spring. And then Frank’s lawyer drew up a defence, and when Frank heard it, he said, ‘Why, what a silly business it seems! They have not got a leg to stand upon.’ And so, after all these flourishes and prancings, the two parties did actually begin to show signs of coming to a hearing after all, and a day was fixed for the trial. By a coincidence it was Frank’s birthday. ‘There’s a good omen!’ cried Maude.
The first herald of the approaching conflict was a seedy person, who thrust a paper into Frank’s hand as he emerged from The Lindens in the morning. It was another letter from Her Majesty, in which sub pœnâ (Her Majesty has not a gracious way of putting things in these documents), Mr. Frank Crosse had ‘to attend at the Royal Courts of Justice, Strand, at the sittings of the Queen’s Bench Division of our High Court of Justice, to give evidence on behalf of the Hotspur Company.’
This seemed to Frank to be a most unexpected and fearsome stroke, but Owen simply laughed.
‘That is mere bluff,’ said he. ‘It makes me think that they are weakening. They want to frighten you.’
‘They did,’ said Frank.
‘Two can play at that game. We must keep a bold front.’
‘What do you mean to do?’
‘To subpœna all their crowd.’
‘Capital!’ cried Frank. So a clerk was sent across to the Hotspur office with a whole bundle of subpœnas, and served them liberally out. And in two days’ time was the day of battle.
Asthe day fixed for the hearing drew near, Ruin lived with them by day and slept with them by night. Its dark shadow covered their lives, and they moved in the gloom of its presence. If the trial went against them, and Owen in his most hopeful moods did not disguise from them that it might, they would have to pay the double costs as well as the original claim. All that they possessed would not cover it. On the other hand, if they won, this rich Company might carry the matter to a higher Appeal Court, and so involve them in a fresh succession of anxieties and expenses. Do what they would, there was always danger. Frank said little, and he slept little also.
One night, just before the trial, Wingfield, the accountant of the Society, came down to Woking. He had managed the case all through for the directors. His visit was a sort of ultimatum.
‘We are still ready to pay our own law-costs,’ said he, ‘if you will allow the original claim.’
‘I can’t do that,’ said Frank doggedly.
‘The costs are piling up at a furious rate, and some one will have to pay them.’
‘I hope that it will be you.’
‘Well, don’t say afterwards that I did not warn you. My dear Crosse, I assure you that you are being misled, and that you have not really got a leg to stand upon.’
‘That’s what the trial is about,’ said Frank.
He kept a bold face to the enemy, but after Wingfield’s departure, Maude saw that his confidence was greatly shaken.
‘He seemed very sure of their case,’ said he. ‘He would not speak like that if he did not know.’
But Maude took quite another view.
‘If they know that they can recover their money in court, why should they send Mr. Wingfield down in this way.’
‘He is such a good chap—he wants to save us expense.’
Maude was less trusting.
‘He is doing the best for his own side,’ said she. ‘It is his duty, and we can’t blame him. But if he thought it best to get behind his own lawyers and come down here, then he must have some doubts about going into court. Perhaps he would be willing to consider some compromise.’
But Frank only shook his head.
‘We have drawn the cork, and we must drink the wine,’ said he. ‘We have gone too far to stop. Any compromise which they would accept would be as much out of our power to pay as the whole sum would be, and so we may just as well see it through.’ But for once Maude did not take his opinion as final, but lay awake all night and thought it over. She had determined to begin acting upon her own account, and she was so eager to try what she could do that she lay longing for the morning to break. When she came down to breakfast, her plan of campaign was formed.
‘I am coming up to town with you, Frank.’
‘Delighted to hear it, dear.’ When she had shopping to do, she frequently went up with him, so it did not surprise him. What would have surprised him was to know that she had despatched three telegrams, by means of Jemima, before he was up.
‘To John Selby, 53 Fenchurch Street, E.C. Will call eleven o’clock. Important business.—Maude.’‘To Lieutenant Selby, the Depôt, Canterbury. Please come up next train, meet me Fenchurch Street, eleven thirty. Important.—Maude.’‘To Owen, 14 Shirley Lane, E.C. Will call twelve o’clock. Important.—mrs. Crosse.’
‘To John Selby, 53 Fenchurch Street, E.C. Will call eleven o’clock. Important business.—
Maude.’
‘To Lieutenant Selby, the Depôt, Canterbury. Please come up next train, meet me Fenchurch Street, eleven thirty. Important.—Maude.’
‘To Owen, 14 Shirley Lane, E.C. Will call twelve o’clock. Important.—mrs. Crosse.’
So she had opened her campaign.
‘By the way, Frank,’ said she, as they travelled up together, ‘to-morrow is your birthday.’
‘Yes, dear, it is,’ he answered lugubriously.
‘Dear me! What shall I give my boy for a birthday present? Nothing you particularly want?’
‘I have all I want,’ said he, looking at her.
‘Oh, but I think I could find something. I must look round when I am in town.’
She began her looking round by a visit to her father in Fenchurch Street. It was something new for him to get telegrams from Maude upon business, and he was very much surprised.
‘Looking remarkably well, my dear. Your appearance is a certificate of character to your husband. Well, and how is all at Woking? I hope the second cook proved to be a success.’
But Maude was not there for small talk. ‘Dear dad,’ said she, ‘I want you to stand by me, for I am in trouble. Now, my dear good dad, please see things from my point of view, and don’t make objections, and do exactly what I ask you.’ She threw her arms round his neck and gave him a hearty squeeze.
‘Now I call that exerting undue pressure,’ said he, extricating his white head. ‘If this sort of thing is allowed in the city of London, there is an end of all business.’ However, his eyes twinkled and looked as if he liked it. ‘Now madame, what can I do for you?’
‘I’m going to be perfectly business-like,’ said she, and gave him another squeeze before sitting down. ‘Look here, dad. You give me an income of fifty pounds a year, don’t you?’
‘My dear girl, I can’t raise it. Jack’s expenses in the Hussars—’
‘I don’t want you to raise it.’
‘What do you want?’
‘I seem to remember, dad, that you told me that this fifty pounds was the interest on a thousand pounds which was invested for me.’
‘So it is—five per cent. debentures.’
‘Well, dad, if I were content with an income of twenty-five pounds a year instead of fifty pounds, then I could take five hundred pounds out of my money, and nobody would be the worse.’
‘Except yourself.’
Maude laughed at that.
‘I want the use of the money just for one day. I certainly won’t need it all. I just want to feel that I have as much as that in case I need it. Now, my dear old daddy, do please not ask any questions, but be very nice and good, and tell me how I can get these five hundred pounds.’
‘And you won’t tell me why you want them?’
‘I had rather not—but I will if you insist.’
Old Selby looked into the brave, clear eyes of his daughter, and he did not insist.
‘Look here! You’ve got your own little banking account, have you not?’
‘Yes, dad.’
‘That’s right. Never mix it up with your husband’s.’ He scribbled a cheque. ‘Pay that in! It is for five hundred pounds. I will sell half your debentures and charge you with brokerage. I believe in strict business between relatives. When you pay back the five hundred pounds, your allowance will be fifty a year once more.’
Maude then and there endorsed the cheque and posted it to her bank. Then with a final embrace to her father, she hastened out to further victories. Jack Selby was smoking a cigarette upon the doorstep.
‘Hullo, Maude! Calling up the reserves? What’s the matter? Jolly lucky it wasn’t my day on duty. You girls think a soldier has nothing to do. It was so once, but we are all scientific blokes now. No, thank you, I won’t see the dad! He’d think I had come for money, and it would upset him for the day.’
Maude took her brother in the cab with her, and told him the whole story of Frank’s misfortune, with some account of her own intentions. Jack was vastly interested.
‘What did dad say about it?’
‘I didn’t tell him. I thought Frank would rather not.’
‘Quite right. He won’t mind me. He knows I’m a bit of a business man myself. Only signed a paper once in my life, and quite a small paper too, and I haven’t heard the last of it yet. The thing wasn’t much bigger than a postcard, but the fuss those people made afterwards! I suppose they’ve been worrying Frank.’
‘We have had no peace for months.’
‘Worry is bad for the young. But he should not mind. He should go on fizzing like I did. Now we’ll put this thing through together, Maude. I see your line, and I’ll ride it with you.’
They found Mr. Owen at home, and Maude did the talking.
‘I am convinced, Mr. Owen, that they don’t want to go into court. Mr. Wingfield coming down like that proves it. My husband is too proud to bargain with them, but I have no scruples. Don’t you think that I might go to Mr. Wingfield myself, and pay the three hundred and forty pounds, and so have done with the worry for ever?’
‘Speaking as a lawyer,’ said Owen, ‘I think that it is very irregular. Speaking as a man, I think no harm could come of it. But I should not like you to offer the whole sum. Simply say that you are prepared for a reasonable compromise, and ask them to suggest what is the lowest sum which the office would accept to close the business.’
‘You leave it with me,’ said Jack, winking at the lawyer. ‘I am seeing her through. I’ll keep her on the rails. I am Number 1, Class A, at business. We’ll take ’em up one link in the curb if they try any games with us! Come on, Maude, and get it over.’
He was an excellent companion for her, for his buoyancy turned the whole thing into fun. She could not take it too seriously in his company. They called at the Hotspur office and asked to see Mr. Wingfield. He was engaged, but Mr. Waters, the secretary, a very fat, pompous man, came in to them.
‘I am very sorry,’ said he, ‘very sorry, indeed, Mrs. Crosse, but it is too late for any compromise of the sort. We have our costs to consider, and there is no alternative but for the case to go into court.’
Poor Maude nearly burst into tears.
‘But suppose that we were to offer—’
‘To give you an hour to think it over,’ cried Jack.
Mr. Waters shook, his head despondently.
‘I do not think that we should alter our decision. However, Mr. Wingfield will be here presently, and he will, of course, listen to any representations which you may have to make. In the meantime you must excuse me, as I have matters of importance to attend to.’
‘Why, Maude, you little Juggins,’ cried Jack, when the door was shut, ‘you were just going to offer to pay their costs. I only just headed you off in time.’
‘Well, I was going to inquire about it.’
‘Great Scot, it’s lucky you’ve got a business man at your elbow. I couldn’t stand that chap at any price. A bit too hairy in the fetlocks for my taste. Couldn’t you see that he was only bluffing?’
‘How do you know, Jack?’
‘It was shining all over him. Do you suppose a man has bought as many hairies as I have, and can’t tell when a dealer is bluffing? He was piling it on so that when the next Christmas-tree comes along, he may find a soft job waiting for him. I tell you you want a friendly native, like me, when you get into this kind of country. Now ride this one on the curb, and don’t let him have his head for a moment.’
Mr. Wingfield had entered, and his manner was very different to that of the secretary. He had great sympathy with the Crosses, and no desire to wash the Company’s dirty linen in public. He was, therefore, more anxious than he dared to show to come to some arrangement.
‘It is rather irregular for me to see you. I should refer you to our solicitors,’ said he.
‘Well, we saw you when you came to Woking,’ said Maude. ‘I believe that we are much more likely to come to an arrangement if we talk it over ourselves.’
‘I am sure I earnestly hope so,’ Wingfield answered. ‘I shall be delighted to listen to anything which you may suggest. Do you, in the first place, admit your liability?’
‘To some extent,’ said Maude, ‘if the Company will admit that they are in the wrong also.’
‘Well, we may go so far as to say that we wish the books had been inspected more often, and that we regret our misplaced confidence in our agent. That should satisfy you, Mrs. Crosse. And now that you admitsomeliability, that is a great step in advance. We have no desire to be unreasonable, but as long as no liability was admitted, we had no course open to us but litigation. We now come to the crucial point, which is, how much liability should fall upon you. My own idea is, that each should pay their own costs, and that you should, in addition, pay over to the Company—’
‘Forty pounds,’ said Jack firmly.
Maude expected Mr. Wingfield to rise up and leave the room. As he did not do so, nor show any signs of violence, she said, ‘Yes, forty pounds.’
He shook his head.
‘Dear me, Mrs. Crosse, this is a very small sum.’
‘Forty pounds is our offer,’ said Jack.
‘But on what is this offer based?’
‘We have worked it out,’ said Jack, ‘and we find that forty pounds is right.’
Mr. Wingfield rose from his chair.
‘Well,’ said he, ‘of course any offer is better than no offer. I cannot say what view the directors may take of this proposal, but they will hold a board meeting this afternoon, and I will lay it before them.’
‘And when shall we know?’
‘I could send you round a line by hand to your solicitor.’
‘No hurry about it! Quite at your own convenience!’ said Jack. When he got outside, in the privacy of their hansom, he was convulsed with the sense of his own achievements.
‘Class A, Number 1, and mentioned at the Agricultural Hall,’ he cried, hugging himself in his delight. His sister hugged him also, so he was a much-embraced young man. ‘Am I not a man of business, Maude? You can’t buy ’em—you must breed ’em. One shilling with the basket. I shook him in the first round, and he never rallied after.’
‘You are a dear good boy. You did splendidly.’
‘That’s the way to handle ’em. He saw that I was a real fizzer and full of blood. One business man can tell another at a glance.’
Maude laughed, for Jack, with his cavalry swagger and a white weal all round his sunburned face to show where his chin-strap hung, looked the most unbusiness-like of mortals.
‘Why did you offer forty pounds?’ she asked.
‘Well, you have to begin somewhere.’
‘But why forty?’
‘Because it is what we offer when we are buying the hairies—trooper’s chargers, you know. It’s a great thing to have a fixed rule in business. I never go higher than forty—rule one, section one, and no exceptions in the margin.’
They lunched together at the Holborn, and Jack took Maude afterwards to what he called ‘a real instructive show,’ which proved to be a horse-sale at Tattersall’s. They then drove back to the lawyer’s, and there they found a letter waiting addressed to Mrs. Crosse. Maude tore it open.
‘Dear Mrs. Crosse,’ said this delightful note, ‘I am happy to be able to inform you that the directors have decided to stop the legal proceedings, and to accept your offer of forty pounds in full satisfaction of all claims due against your husband.’
Maude, Jack, and the good Owen performed a triumphantpas de trois.
‘You have done splendidly, Mrs. Crosse, splendidly!’ cried Owen. ‘I never heard a better day’s work in my life. Now, if you will give me your cheque and wait here, I will go over and settle everything.’
‘And please bring the bond back with you,’ said Maude.
So it was that Frank, coming down upon the morning of his birthday, perceived a pretty silver cigarette-box laid in front of his plate.
‘Is this for me, my darling?’
‘Yes, Frank, a wee present from your wife.’
‘How sweet of you! I never saw such a lovely case. Why, there’s something inside it.’
‘Cigarettes, I suppose.
‘No, it is a paper of some kind. “Hotspur Insurance Company.” Good Lord, I never seem for one instant to be able to shake that infernal thing off! How on earth did it get in there? What’s this?—“I hereby guarantee to you—” What’s this? Maude, Maude, what have you been doing?’
‘Dear old boy,’ she cried, as she put her arms round him. ‘Dear old boy! Oh, Idofeel so happy!’
Itall began by Mrs. Hunt Mortimer, the smart little up-to-date wife of the solicitor, saying to Mrs. Beecher, the young bride of the banker, that in a place like Woking it was very hard to get any mental friction, or to escape from the same eternal grooves of thought and conversation. The same idea, it seemed, had occurred to Mrs. Beecher, fortified by a remark from theLady’s Journalthat an internal intellectual life was the surest method by which a woman could preserve her youth. She turned up the article—for the conversation occurred in her drawing-room—and she read extracts from it. ‘Shakespeare as a Cosmetic’ was the title. Maude was very much struck, and before they separated they had formed themselves into a Literary Society which should meet and discuss classical authors every Wednesday afternoon at each other’s houses. That one hour of concentrated thought and lofty impulse should give a dignity and a tone to the whole dull provincial week.
What should they read? It was well that they should decide it before they separated, so as to start fair upon the next Wednesday. Maude suggested Shakespeare, but Mrs. Hunt Mortimer thought that a good deal of it was improper.
‘Does it matter?’ said Mrs. Beecher. ‘We are all married.’
‘Still I don’t think it would be quite nice,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. She belonged to the extreme right on matters of propriety.
‘But surely Mr. Bowdler made Shakespeare quite respectable,’ Mrs. Beecher argued.
‘He did his work very carelessly. He left in much that might be dispensed with, and he omitted a good deal which was quite innocent.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Because I once got two copies and read all the omissions.’
‘Why did you do that?’ asked Maude mischievously.
‘Because I wanted to make sure that theyhadbeen omitted,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer severely.
Mrs. Beecher stooped and picked an invisible hairpin out of the rug. Mrs. Hunt Mortimer continued.
‘There is Byron, of course. But he is so very suggestive. There are passages in his works—’
‘I could never see any harm in them,’ said Mrs. Beecher.
‘That is because you did not know where to look,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘If you have a copy in the house, Mrs. Beecher, I will undertake to make it abundantly clear to you that he is to be eschewed by those who wish to keep their thoughts unsullied. Not? I fancy that even quoting from memory I could convince you that it is better to avoid him.’
‘Pass Byron,’ said Mrs. Beecher, who was a very pretty little kittenish person, with no apparent need of any cosmetics, literary or otherwise. ‘How about Shelley?’
‘Frank raves about Shelley,’ observed Maude.
Mrs. Hunt Mortimer shook her head.
‘His work has some dreadful tendencies. He was, I am informed, either a theist or an atheist, I cannot for the moment recall which—I think that we should make our little course as improving as possible.’
‘Tennyson,’ Maude suggested.
‘I have been told that his meaning is too clear to entitle him to rank among the great thinkers of our race. The lofty thought is necessarily obscure. There is no merit in following a poem which is perfectly intelligible. Which leads us to—’
‘Browning!’ cried the other ladies.
‘Exactly. We might form a little Browning Society of our own.’
‘Charming! Charming!’
And so it was agreed.
There was only one other point to be settled at this their inaugural meeting, which was, to choose the other ladies who should be admitted into their literary circle. There were to be no men.
‘They do distract one so,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer.
The great thing was to admit no one save those earnest spirits who would aspire to get the full benefit from their studies. Mrs. Fortescue could not be thought of, she was much too talkative. And Mrs. Jones had such a frivolous mind. Mrs. Charles could think and talk of nothing but her servants. And Mrs. Patt-Beatson always wanted to lay down the law. Perhaps on the whole it would be better to start the society quietly among themselves, and then gradually to increase it. The first meeting should be next Wednesday, at Mrs. Crosse’s house, and Mrs. Hunt Mortimer would bring her complete two-volume edition with her. Mrs. Beecher thought that one volume would be enough just at first, but Mrs. Hunt Mortimer said that it was better to have a wide choice. Maude went home and told Frank in the evening. He was pleased, but rather sceptical.
‘You must begin with the simpler things first,’ said he. ‘I should recommendHervé RielandGold Hair.’
But Maude put on the charming air of displeasure which became her so well.
‘We are serious students, sir,’ said she. ‘We want the very hardest poem in the book. I assure you, Frank, that one of your little faults is that you always underrate a woman’s intelligence. Mrs. Hunt Mortimer says that though we may be less original than men, we are more assim— more assmun—’
‘Assimulative.’
‘That’s what I say—assimulative. Now, you always talk as if—oh yes, you do! No, you mustn’t! How absurd you are, Frank! Whenever I try to speak seriously to you, you always do that and spoil everything. How would you like to discuss Browning if at the end of every sentence somebody came and kissed you? You wouldn’t mind! No, I dare say not. But you would feel that you were not being taken seriously. Wait till the next timeyouare in earnest about anything—you’ll see!’
The meeting was to be at three o’clock, and at ten minutes to the hour Mrs. Hunt Mortimer arrived with two large brown volumes under her arm. She had come early, she said, because there was to be a rehearsal of the amateur theatricals at the Dixons’ at a quarter-past four. Mrs. Beecher did not appear until five minutes after the hour. Her cook had quarrelled with the housemaid, and given instantaneous notice, with five people coming to dinner on Saturday. It had upset the lady very much, and she explained that she would not have come if she had not promised. It was so difficult to follow poetry when you were thinking about the entrée all the time.
‘Why the entrée?’ asked Mrs. Hunt Mortimer, looking up from the book which she held open in front of her.
‘My dear,’ said Mrs. Beecher, who had the art of saying the most simple things as if they were profoundly confidential secrets,—‘My dear, my parlourmaid is really an excellent cook, and I shall rely upon her if Martha really goes. But she is limited, very limited, and entrées and savouries are the two things in which I cannot entirely trust her. I must, therefore, find some dish which is well within her capacity.’
Mrs. Hunt Mortimer prided herself upon her housekeeping, so the problem interested her. Maude also began to feel the meeting less dull than she had expected.
‘Of course there are many things to be considered,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer, with the air of a Q.C. giving an opinion. ‘Oyster patties or oyster vol-au-vents—’
‘Oysters are out of season,’ said Maude.
‘I was about to say,’ Mrs. Hunt Mortimer continued, with admirable presence of mind, ‘that these entrées of oysters are inadmissible because they are out of season. Now curried prawns—’
‘My husband loathes them.’
‘Well, well! What do you say to sweetbreads en caisse? All you want are chopped mushrooms, shalots, parsley, nutmeg, pepper, salt, breadcrumb, bacon fat—’
‘No, no,’ cried Mrs. Beecher despairingly. ‘Anne would never remember all that.’
‘Cutlets à la Constance,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘I am sure that they are simple enough. Cutlets, butter, fowls’ livers, cocks’ combs, mushrooms—’
‘My dear, my dear, remember that she is only a parlourmaid. It is unreasonable.’
‘Ragout of fowl, chicken patties, croquettes of veal with a little browning—’
‘We’ve got back to Browning after all,’ cried Maude.
‘Dear me,’ said Mrs. Beecher, ‘it is all my fault, and I am so sorry. Now, Mrs. Hunt Mortimer, do please read us a little of that delightful poetry.’
‘You can always get small entrées sent down from the Stores,’ cried Maude, as a happy thought.
‘You dear, good girl, how sweet of you to think of it. Of course one can. That is really an admirable idea. There now, we may consider the entrée as being removed, so we proceed to—’
‘Thepièce de résistance,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer solemnly, glancing down the index of the first volume. ‘I confess that my acquaintance with the poet has up to now been rather superficial. Our ambition must be to so master him that he becomes from this time forward part and parcel of ourselves. I fancy that the difficulties in understanding him have been very much exaggerated, and that with goodwill and perseverance we shall manage to overcome them.’
It was a relief to Mrs. Beecher and to Maude to realise that Mrs. Hunt Mortimer knew no more about the matter than themselves. They both ventured upon a less diffident air now that it was clear that it might be done in safety. Maude frowned thoughtfully, and Mrs. Beecher cast up her pretty brown eyes at the curtain-rod, as if she were running over in her memory the whole long catalogue of the poet’s works.
‘I will tell you what we should do,’ said she. ‘We must make a vow that we shall never pass a line until we understand it. We will go over it again and again until we grasp its meaning.’
‘What an excellent idea!’ cried Maude, with one of her little bursts of enthusiasm. ‘Now that is really splendid, Mrs. Beecher.’
‘My friends always call me Nellie,’ said the little brunette.
‘How nice of you to say so! I should love to call you so, if you don’t mind. It is such a pretty name too. Only you must call me Maude.’
‘You look like a Maude,’ said Mrs. Beecher. ‘I always picture a Maude as bright and pretty and blonde. Isn’t it strange how names associate themselves with characters. Mary is always domestic, and Rose is a flirt, and Elizabeth is dutiful, and Evelyn is dashing, and Alice is colourless, and Helen is masterful—’
‘And Matilda is impatient,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer, laughing. ‘Matilda has reason to be, seated here with an index in front of her while you two are exchanging compliments.’
‘Why, we were waiting for you to begin,’ said Mrs. Beecher reproachfully. ‘Do let us have something, for really the time is slipping away.’
‘It would be a pity to begin at the beginning, because that represents his immature genius,’ remarked Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘I think that on this the opening day of the Society, we should have the poet at his best.’
‘How are we to know whichishis best?’ Maude asked.
‘I should be inclined to choose something with a title which suggests profundity—“A Pretty Woman,” “Love in a Life,” “Any Wife to any Husband”—’
‘Oh, whatdidshe say to him?’ cried Maude.
‘Well, I was about to say that all these subjects rather suggested frivolity.’
‘Besides, it really is a very absurd title,’ remarked Mrs. Beecher, who was fond of generalising from her six months’ experience of matrimony. ‘Ahusband toawife’ would be intelligible, but how can you know whatanyhusband would say toanywife? No one can really foretell what a man will do. They really are such extraordinary creatures.’
But Mrs. Hunt Mortimer had been married for five years, and felt as competent to lay down the law about husbands as about entrées.
‘When you have had a larger experience of them, dear, you will find that there is usually a reason, or at least a primitive instinct of some sort, at the root of their actions. But, seriously, we must really concentrate our attention upon the poet, for my other engagement will call me away at four, which only leaves me ten minutes to reach Maybury.’
Mrs. Beecher and Maude settled down with anxious attention upon their faces.
‘Do please go on!’ they cried.
‘Here is “The Pied Piper of Hamelin.”’
‘Now that interests me more than I can tell,’ cried Maude, with her eyes shining with pleasure. ‘Do please read us everything there is about that dear piper.’
‘Why so?’ asked her two companions.
‘Well, the fact is,’ said Maude, ‘Frank—my husband, you know—came to a fancy-dress at St. Albans as the Pied Piper. I had no idea that it came from Browning.’
‘How did he dress for it?’ asked Mrs. Beecher. ‘We are invited to the Aston’s dress ball, and I want something suitable for George.’
‘It was a most charming dress. Red and black all over, something like Mephistopheles, you know, and a peaked hat with a bell at the top. Then he had a flute, of course, and a thin wire from his waist with a stuffed rat at the end of it.’
‘A rat! How horrid!’
‘Well, that was the story, you know. The rats all followed the Pied Piper, and so this rat followed Frank. He put it in his pocket when he danced, but once he forgot, and so it got stood upon, and the sawdust came out all over the floor.’
Mrs. Hunt Mortimer was also invited to the dress ball, and her thoughts flew away from the book in front of her.
‘How did you go, Mrs. Crosse?’ she asked.
‘I went as “Night.”’
‘What! you with your brown hair!’
‘Well, father said that I was not a very dark night. I was in black, you know, just my ordinary black silk dinner-dress. Then I had a silver half-moon over my head, and black veils round my hair, and stars all over my bodice and skirt, with a long comet right across the front. Father upset a cup of milk over me at supper, and said afterwards that it was the milky way.’
‘It is simply maddening how menwillmake jokes about the most important subjects,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘But I have no doubt, dear, that your dress was an exceedingly effective one. Now, for my own part, I had some idea of going as the “Duchess of Devonshire.”’
‘Charming!’ cried Mrs. Beecher and Maude.
‘It is not a very difficult costume, you know. I have some old Point d’Alençon lace which has been in the family for a century. I make it the starting-point of my costume. The gown need not be very elaborate—’
‘Silk?’ asked Mrs. Beecher.
‘Well, I thought that perhaps a white-flowered brocade—’
‘Oh yes, with pearl trimming.’
‘No, no, dear, with my lace for trimming.’
‘Of course. You said so.’
‘And then a muslin fichu coming over here.’
‘How perfectly sweet!’ cried Maude.
‘And the waist cut high, and ruffles at the sleeves. And, of course, a picture hat—you know what I mean—with a curling ostrich feather.’
‘Powdered hair, of course?’ said Mrs. Beecher.
‘Powdered in ringlets.’
‘It will suit you admirably—beautifully. You are tall enough to carry it off, and you have the figure also. How I wish I was equally certain about my own!’
‘What had you thought of, dear?’
‘Well, I had some idea about “Ophelia.” Do you think that it would do?’
‘Certainly. Had you worked it out at all?’
‘Well, my dear,’ said Mrs. Beecher, relapsing into her pleasant confidential manner. ‘I had some views, but, of course, I should be so glad to have your opinion about it. I only sawHamletonce, and the lady was dressed in white, with a gauzy light nun’s-veiling over it. I thought that with white pongee silk as an under-dress, and then some sort of delicate—’
‘Crepe de Chine,’ Maude suggested.
‘But in Ophelia’s day such a thing had never been heard of,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘A net of silver thread—’
‘Exactly,’ cried Mrs. Beecher, ‘with some sort of jewelling upon it. That was just what I had imagined. Of course it should be cut classically and draped—my dressmaker is such a treasure—and I should have a gold embroidery upon the white silk.’
‘Crewel work,’ said Maude.
‘Or a plain cross-stitch pattern. Then a tiara of pearls on the head. Shakespeare—’
At the name of the poet their three consciences pricked simultaneously. They looked at each other and then at the clock with dismay.
‘We must—we reallymustgo on with our reading,’ cried Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘How did we get talking about these dresses?’
‘It was my fault,’ said Mrs. Beecher, looking contrite.
‘No, dear, it was mine,’ said Maude. ‘You remember it all came from my saying that Frank had gone to the ball as the Pied Piper.’
‘I am going to read the very first poem that I open,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer remorselessly. ‘I am afraid that it is almost time that I started, but we may still be able to skim over a few pages. Now then! There!Setebos! What a funny name!’
‘Whatdoesit mean?’ asked Maude.
‘We shall find out, no doubt, as we proceed,’ said Mrs. Hunt Mortimer. ‘We shall take it line by line and draw the full meaning from it. The first line is—
‘Will sprawl now that the heat of day is best—’
‘Will sprawl now that the heat of day is best—’
‘Who will?’ asked Mrs. Beecher.
‘I don’t know. That’s what it says.’
‘The next line will explain, no doubt.’
‘Flat on his—’
‘Flat on his—’
‘Dear me, I had no idea that Browning was like this!’
‘Do read it, dear.’
‘I couldn’t possibly think of doing so. With your permission we will pass on to the next paragraph.’
‘But we vowed not to skip.’
‘But why read what cannot instruct or elevate us. Let us begin this next stanza, and hope for something better. The first line is—I wonder if it really can be as it is written.’
‘Do please read it!’
‘Setebos and Setebos and Setebos.’
‘Setebos and Setebos and Setebos.’
The three students looked sadly at each other. ‘This is worse than anything I could have imagined,’ said the reader.
‘We mast skip that line.’
‘But we are skipping everything.’
‘It’s a person’s name,’ said Mrs. Beecher.
‘Or three persons.’
‘No, only one, I think.’
‘But why should he repeat it three times?’
‘For emphasis!’
‘Perhaps,’ said Mrs. Beecher, ‘it was Mr. Setebos, and Mrs. Setebos, and a little Setebos.’
‘Now, if you are going to make fun, I won’t read. But I think we were wrong to say that we would take it line by line. It would be easier sentence by sentence.’
‘Quite so.’
‘Then we will include the next line, which finishes the sentence. It is, “thinketh he dwelleth in the cold of the moon.”’
‘Then itwasonly one Setebos!’ cried Maude.
‘So it appears. It is easy to understand if one will only put it into ordinary language. This person Setebos was under the impression that his life was spent in the moonlight.’
‘But what nonsense it is!’ cried Mrs. Beecher. Mrs. Hunt Mortimer looked at her reproachfully. ‘It is very easy to call everything which we do not understand “nonsense,”’ said she. ‘I have no doubt that Browning had a profound meaning in this.’
‘What was it, then?’
Mrs. Hunt Mortimer looked at the clock.
‘I am very sorry to have to go,’ said she, ‘but really I have no choice in the matter. Just as we were getting on so nicely—it is really most vexatious. You’ll come to my house next Wednesday, Mrs. Crosse, won’t you? And you also, Mrs. Beecher. Good-bye, and thanks forsucha pleasant afternoon!’
But her skirts had hardly ceased to rustle in the passage before the Browning Society had been dissolved by a two-thirds’ vote of the total membership.
‘What is the use?’ cried Mrs. Beecher. ‘Two lines have positively made my head ache, and there are two volumes.’
‘We must change our poet.’
‘His verbosity!’ cried Mrs. Beecher.
‘His Setebosity!’ cried Maude.
‘And dear Mrs. Hunt Mortimer pretending to like him! Shall we propose Tennyson next week?’
‘It would be far better.’
‘But Tennyson is quite simple, is he not?’
‘Perfectly.’
‘Then why should we meet to discuss him if there is nothing to discuss?’
‘You mean that we might as well each read him for herself.’
‘I think it would be easier.’
‘Why, of course it would.’
And so after one hour of precarious life, Mrs. Hunt Mortimer’s Mutual Improvement Society for the elucidation of Browning came to an untimely end.
‘Iwantyour advice, Maude.’
She was looking very sweet and fresh in the morning sunlight. She wore a flowered, French print blouse—little sprigs of roses on a white background—and a lace frill round her pretty, white, smooth throat. The buckle of her brown leather belt just gleamed over the edge of the table-cloth. In front of her were a litter of correspondence, a white cup of coffee, and two empty eggshells—for she was a perfectly healthy young animal with an excellent appetite.
‘Well, dear, what is it?’
‘I shall take the later train. Then I need not hurry, and can walk down at my ease.’
‘How nice of you!’
‘I am not sure that Dinton will think so.’
‘Only one little hour of difference—what can it matter?’
‘They don’t run offices on those lines. An hour means a good deal in the City of London.’
‘Oh, I do hate the City of London! It is the only thing which ever comes between us.’
‘I suppose that it separates a good many loving couples every morning.’
He had come across and an egg-cup had been upset. Then he had been scolded, and they sat together laughing upon the sofa. When he had finished admiring her little, shining, patent-leather, Louis shoes and the two charming curves of open-work black stocking, she reminded him that he had asked for her advice.
‘Yes, dear, what was it?’ She knitted her brows and tried to look as her father did when he considered a matter of business. But then her father was not hampered by having a young man’s arm round his neck. It is so hard to be business-like when any one is curling one’s hair round his finger.
‘I have some money to invest.’
‘O Frank, how clever of you!’
‘It is only fifty pounds.’
‘Never mind, dear, it is a beginning.’
‘That is what I feel. It is the foundation-stone of our fortunes. And so I want Her Majesty to lay it—mustn’t wrinkle your brow though—that is not allowed.’
‘But it is a great responsibility, Frank.’
‘Yes, we must not lose it.’
‘No, dear, we must not lose it. Suppose we invest it in one of those modern fifty-guinea pianos. Our dear old Broadwood was an excellent piano when I was a girl, but it is getting so squeaky in the upper notes. Perhaps they would allow us something for it.’
He shook his head.
‘I know that we want one very badly, dear. And such a musician as you are should have the best instrument that money can buy. I promise you that when we have a little to turn round on, you shall have a beauty. But in the meantime we must not buy anything with this money—I mean nothing for ourselves—we must invest it. We cannot tell what might happen. I might fall ill. I might die.’
‘O Frank, how horrid you are this morning!’
‘Well, we have to be ready for anything. So I want to put this where we can get it on an emergency, and where in the meantime it will bring us some interest. Now what shall we buy?’
‘Papa always bought a house.’
‘But we have not enough.’
‘Not a little house?’
‘No, not the smallest.’
‘A mortgage, then?’
‘The sum is too small.’
‘Government stock, Frank—if you think it is safe.’
‘Oh, it is safe enough. But the interest is so low.’
‘How much should we get?’
‘Well, I suppose the fifty pounds would bring us in about thirty shillings a year.’
‘Thirty shillings! O Frank!’
‘Rather less than more.’
‘Fancy a great rich nation like ours taking our fifty pounds and treating us like that. Howmeanof them! Don’t let them have it, Frank.’
‘No, I won’t.’
‘If they want it, they can make us a fair offer for it.’
‘I think we’ll try something else.’
‘Well, they have only themselves to thank. But you have some plan in your head, Frank. What is it?’
He brought the morning paper over from the table. Then he folded it so as to bring the financial columns to the top.
‘I saw a fellow in the City yesterday who knows a great deal about gold-mining. I only had a few minutes’ talk, but he strongly advised me to have some shares in the El Dorado Proprietary Gold Mine.’
‘What a nice name! I wonder if they would let us have any?’
‘Oh yes, they are to be bought in the open market. It is like this, Maude. The mine was a very good one, and paid handsome dividends. Then it had some misfortunes. First, there was no water, and then there was too much water, and the workings were flooded. So, of course, the price of the shares fell. Now they are getting the mine all right again, but the shares are still low. It certainly seems a very good chance to pick a few of them up.’
‘Are they very dear, Frank?’
‘I looked them up in theMining Registerbefore I came home yesterday. The original price of each share was ten shillings, but as they have had these misfortunes, one would expect to find them rather lower.’
‘Ten shillings! It does not seem much to pay for a share in a thing with a name like that.’
‘Here it is,’ said he, pointing with a pencil to one name in a long printed list. ‘This one, between the Royal Bonanza and the Alabaster Consols. You see—El Dorado Proprietary! Then after it you have printed, 4¾—4⅞. I don’t profess to know much about these things, but that of course means the price.’
‘Yes, dear, it is printed at the top of the column—“Yesterday’s prices.”’
‘Quito so. Well, we know that the original price of each share was ten shillings, and of course they must have dropped with a flood in the mine, so that these figures must mean that the price yesterday was four shillings and nine-pence, or thereabouts.’
‘What a clear head for business you have, dear!’
‘I think we can’t do wrong in buying at that price. You see, with our fifty pounds we could buy two hundred of them, and then if they went up again we could sell, and take our profit.’
‘How delightful! But suppose they don’t go up.’
‘Well, they can’t go down. I should not think that a share at four shillings and ninepencecouldgo down very much. There is no room. But it may go up to any extent.’
‘Besides, your friend said that they would go up.’
‘Yes, he seemed quite confident about it. Well, what do you think, Maude? Is it good enough or not?’
‘O Frank, I hardly dare advise you. Just imagine if we were to lose it all. Do you think it would be wiser to get a hundred shares, and then we could buy twenty-five pounds’ worth of Royal Bonanza as well. It would be impossible for them both to go wrong.’
‘The Royal Bonanza shares are dear, and then we have had no information about it. I think we had better back our own opinion.’
‘All right, Frank.’
‘Then that is settled. I have a telegraph-form here.’
‘Could you not buy them yourself when you are in town?’
‘No, you can’t buy things yourself. You have to do it through a broker.’
‘I always thought a broker was a horrid man, who came and took your furniture away.’
‘Ah, that’s another kind of broker. He comes afterwards. I promised Harrison that he should have any business which I could put in his way, so here goes. How is that?’—
‘Harrison, 13a Throgmorton Street, E.C.—Buy two hundred El Dorado Proprietaries.‘Crosse, Woking.’
‘Harrison, 13a Throgmorton Street, E.C.—Buy two hundred El Dorado Proprietaries.
‘Crosse, Woking.’
‘Doesn’t it sound rather peremptory, Frank?’
‘No, no, that is mere business.’
‘I hope he won’t be offended.’
‘I think I can answer for that.’
‘You have not said the price.’
‘One cannot say the price because one does not know it. You see, it is always going up and down. By this time it may be a little higher or a little lower than yesterday. There cannot be much change, that is certain. Great Scot, Maude, it is ten-fifteen. Three and a half minutes for a quarter of a mile. Good-bye, darling! I just love you in that bodice. O Lord—good-bye!’