Mrs. Eames was perfectly right in saying that her husband had locked himself in. But Sir Evelyn's inference was wrong. Mr. Eames was not engaged in devotional exercises. He was reading the works of the philosopher Epictetus—avery wise choice of literature, for no writer, ancient or modern, has more comfort to offer to those who suffer from the worries and minor ills of life. Nervous irritability, impotent anger and such afflictions of temper are almost invariably soothed by a study of the excellent teaching of Epictetus. Mr. Eames read the philosopher in Greek, which is the best way to read him, for no one can read Greek very fast, and the necessity of going slowly in order to understand the words gives time for the digestion of the matter behind them.
There is nothing irreverent or even improper about reading Epictetus in church. He was a pagan, but so nearly a Christian that the mediæval monks mistook him for one of the fathers of the church and treated his works as books of devotion. If the monks of the sainted Middle Ages took this view of Epictetus a twentieth century English vicar who reads him in church cannot be regarded as profane.
Mr. Eames, owing to the unrestored condition of his church, was able to make himself fairly comfortable while reading. Hailey Compton parish church was built originally inthe Early English style, and was refurnished every hundred years or so in accordance with the taste of each period. The Victorian churchwardens, when their turn came, filled it with large high-backed square pews, put thick cushions on the seats and provided footstools for the convenience of worshippers with short legs. There were fireplaces in some of the pews and occasionally there were arm-chairs. To avoid draughts and secure privacy red curtains were hung round the principal pews. The leading idea was the physical comfort of the worshippers, and the churchwardens seemed to have held with Bishop Blougram that soul was at its best when "body gets its sop and holds its noise." No one need be ashamed of being a disciple of Bishop Blougram, who was a most successful ecclesiastic, on the way to become a Cardinal or perhaps a Pope.
It was in one of these great square pews that Mr. Eames settled down with his Epictetus. He shut the door. He drew the curtains. He sat at ease in an arm-chair with his outstretched feet on a stool. A thick, though dirty carpet covered the floor. A man mighthave a worse study if he were content to read without smoking. When Mr. Eames felt that a full appreciation of Epictetus required tobacco he went out and smoked a pipe, sitting on a tombstone.
This pew, the largest and best furnished in the church, had its place in the chancel, close to the altar rails. It had been dedicated a century or so before to the use of the lord of the manor. But for many years there had been no lord of the manor or resident squire in Hailey Compton. The pew was therefore unused except by the vicar when he retired for a while from the turmoil of his wife's activities.
It is a depressing fact and something of a disgrace to human nature that the efforts of those who try to benefit their neighbours are seldom appreciated. Our most active benefactors are generally unpopular. Reformers of a serious kind, those who try to rid the world of beer, tobacco and the opportunity of betting, no doubt expect to be detested, and reckon thedislike they incur as part of the reward of their virtue. At all events they richly deserve all they get in the way of unpopularity. But it is hard on those much less culpable people who merely insist on others amusing themselves in unaccustomed ways that their efforts should earn no gratitude.
Mrs. Eames, for instance, had no objection to beer, often smoked cigarettes and might have bet small sums if the temptation had come her way. She did nothing worse in the village than stir up young men and maidens to act plays; which they ought to have liked doing but did not. She was not herself unpopular, but her plays were, and the announcement that a fresh one was to be started, was received year after year with groans from those likely to be implicated, and from the whole community with a stolid passive resistance, which only energy as unfailing as Mrs. Eames's could possibly have overcome.
She knew all this and fully expected that the pageant prospect would be received by the village people with mutterings of revolt. It was. Mrs. Eames, who believed in what shecalled personal influence, made a rapid visitation of the village, explained the glories and delights of pageants, and was met almost everywhere with gloomy hostility. Only James Hinton of the Anchor Inn gave her the least encouragement, and even his reception of the project would scarcely have been called encouraging except by contrast to the hostility elsewhere. Hinton, at least, did not condemn the pageant without hearing what it was to be. He questioned Mrs. Eames about it and finally promised to think the matter over carefully.
Mrs. Eames summoned a public meeting to consider the pageant and to make the necessary arrangements.
This was always her way of proceeding. She liked public meetings because they gave her opportunities for making speeches, and she believed, like most English people, that a meeting is as necessary to an undertaking of any kind as trousers are to a man. There would be something indecent about a scheme which came into the world not clothed in a resolution of approval, duly passed, notadorned with a properly appointed treasurer and secretary.
A Tuesday ten days after Sir Evelyn's visit was fixed for the meeting and the schoolroom was chosen as the place of assembly.
Mrs. Eames did not expect a large audience. While discussing the meeting beforehand with her husband she was able to predict with complete confidence who would be there.
"James Hinton, of course," she said. "He's your churchwarden."
"I suppose he's more or less bound to be there," said the vicar, "to represent me. I'm certainly not going."
"Of course not, darling. Everyone knows you hate meetings and you wouldn't be any use if you did go. I'm sure the school teachers will be there. They always come to all meetings."
The schoolmaster and his two assistant damsels attended Mrs. Eames's meetings regularly. The schoolmaster liked proposing resolutions. His assistants took it in turns to second anything he proposed.
"And Mrs. Mudge," Mrs. Eames went on, "and Mrs. Purly and——"
She named half a dozen old women, all of them widows, all of them mildly pious, with a vague feeling that attendance at any meeting summoned by Mrs. Eames was a religious act.
"And some of the schoolboys."
"They only go because they're allowed to shout," said the vicar. "All boys love shouting anywhere, and it's particularly pleasant to be able to yell in the schoolroom where they generally have to sit quiet."
"Of course they love shouting, poor dears," said Mrs. Eames, "and I love to hear them. Besides, Timothy, darling, a meeting is so dull if nobody cheers. A speaker does want a little encouragement. Of course it wouldn't do—I know quite well it wouldn't do—but all the same I often think that most sermons would be better—not yours, Timothy—they couldn't be nicer than they are—but most other sermons would be far better if the choir boys were allowed to cheer occasionally. They'd like it and you can't think how it would encourage the preacher."
"If nobody else goes to your meeting," said the vicar, "and I'm sure nobody else will, Idon't see what good it is to hold a meeting at all."
A surprise, staggering in its unexpectedness, waited for Mrs. Eames when she went to her meeting.
The schoolroom was full to its utmost capacity. Indeed it had evidently been more than full at some time shortly before the beginning of the meeting. The schoolboys had been turned out to make room for their elders. Smarting under a sense of injustice they tried to avenge themselves by marching round the building and uttering howls of a lamentable kind outside every window in turn. The schoolmaster, though he deplored their action, refused to interfere, saying that he had no authority outside school hours. Others were less scrupulous about their legal position. Tommy Whittle, a burly fisherman, went out with a stick and was using an argument which the boys thoroughly understood when Mrs. Eames arrived. Fortunately for the success of the meeting Tommy Whittle had made his meaning perfectly plain to the leading boys before he followed Mrs. Eames into the room.
She was obliged to push her way through the door, though everyone tried to make way for her. Those who could not find seats were crowded together at the bottom of the room, and it was almost impossible for them to pack any closer even in order to let Mrs. Eames pass. Once well into the room she made a triumphal progress towards the platform amidst bursts of cheers, stamping of feet and clapping of hands. On the platform, waiting to receive her, were James Hinton and the schoolmaster, whom she expected, and, an astonishing sight, Jack Bunce, one of the oldest and most influential men in the village, fellow churchwarden with James Hinton. He had hitherto been obstinately opposed to all Mrs. Eames's activities. All three stood bowing low as she advanced towards them.
James Hinton, holding up his hand for silence, proposed that Mrs. Eames should take the chair.
This was quite unnecessary. She took it of her own accord, and as a matter of accustomed right, as soon as she reached the platform.
Jack Bunce was seen—but owing to thecheering, not heard—to be making a short speech. It is likely that he was seconding Hinton's proposition, very superfluously indeed, but he may have been saying something else. No one ever knew.
The size of the audience and the warmth of her reception amazed Mrs. Eames. Never before had she seen the people of Hailey Compton stirred to the smallest interest in anything, but there was no doubt about their excited enthusiasm over the pageant. When she began to speak they cheered every sentence.
"In times past," she said, "we have made several efforts to revive drama in our village."
"Three cheers for drama," shouted Tommy Whittle, waving the stick with which he had beaten the boys, and the cheers were given.
"Shakespeare——" said Mrs. Eames.
"Three cheers for Shakespeare," said old Jack Bunce, who had always hated the plays.
"Shakespeare——" said Mrs. Eames, when the shouting subsided.
"Ladies and gentlemen," said Hinton, interrupting her, "before we go further I think that the name of the immortal Shakespeareshould be received by all standing, in respectful silence."
Only the boys outside broke the silence. They had not been able to hear what Hinton said.
Mrs. Eames, despairing perhaps of ever getting any further with that part of her speech, dropped Shakespeare abruptly and went on to speak of village art in general terms. The applause was loud. She repeated one after another things that she had said hundreds of times and always to people who neither would nor could understand what she meant. She was perhaps no better understood at this wonderful meeting, but what she said was certainly approved.
Her eyes gleamed with delight. Her face was flushed with excitement. She could feel her heart beating in rapid throbs. But she began to get a little hoarse from the effort to make herself heard during the cheering. When she had been talking for half an hour, about art, song and dance, all of the "folk" or superior kind, the audience began to show signs of impatience. Instead of simply cheering,the younger men at the back of the room took to shouting "Pageant! Pageant!" They pronounced the first syllable as if it rhymed with rage, but there was no doubt about what they meant. They wanted to get on, past art of all kinds, to the proper business of the meeting.
There was a good deal to say about the pageant. And Mrs. Eames had matter enough, if properly spun out, to keep her speech going for another hour. She would have enjoyed making an oration of that length and no doubt would have done it if her voice had held out. Unfortunately for her it failed. Few, if any, human voices would have done any better. The contest between a single speaker and a cheering crowd is unequal and can only have one end. Mrs. Eames sat down at last. Her final words, muttered hoarsely, were, "Smugglers"—"old days"—"Hailey Compton"—"hardy breed of seadogs."
The cheers rose in a fine crescendo to a noise which would have made a German orchestra playing Wagner's music sound restrained and soothing. The people were no doubt very gladthat Mrs. Eames had reached the end of her speech, but there must have been something more than simple relief behind their cheering. The ancestors of these fishermen, their grandfathers and great grandfathers a century or so before, had been noted smugglers, famous even in an age when everyone in the south of England smuggled. The deadening tyranny of a hundred years of law and order had tamed and cowed the Bunces and Whittles of to-day, but deep down in them was the old spirit. Mrs. Eames had appealed to sub-conscious selves with atavistic memories.
The surprises of the evening were not at an end. When Mrs. Eames sat down James Hinton rose. He held in his hand a large piece of paper and an observer in the audience might have supposed that he intended to read a speech. But Hinton had a spirit above manuscript and it was very soon evident that the paper contained something far more interesting and more amazing than the notes of any speech.
"A pageant," he said gravely and with quiet dignity, "a great pageant, a pageant displaying one of the most glorious epochs of our nationalstory——" Cheers from such of the audience as had any voices left stopped him for a moment. "Such a pageant as we contemplate cannot be run without the expenditure of considerable sums in preliminary expenses."
At this point of the speech—a point which must be reached in a speech made by someone at every meeting convened for a good purpose—the audience usually becomes uncomfortable and often begins to melt away. But the Hailey Compton people were apparently prepared to face even a subscription list. They cheered again. The reason of this confidence was apparent almost at once. The subscription list had been handed round days before and was already complete.
"I have therefore much pleasure, madam," Hinton went on, bowing low to Mrs. Eames, "in presenting to you a guarantee for the sum of £51 2s. 6d. together with a list of the names of the guarantors of what I may, perhaps, call the Pageant Fund."
Mrs. Eames gasped. In all her experience of Hailey Compton—perhaps in all the experience of all vicars and vicars' wives of all countryparishes—no such thing as this had ever happened. With the utmost difficulty she had managed to extract sixpences and threepences from unwilling people for the expenses of "Macbeth" and "Othello." For "Hamlet" she expected to have to pay entirely out of her own pocket. Yet here, unasked for and unsought, was more than fifty pounds offered to her.
She rose to her feet, tried to find words to express at once gratitude and amazement. She choked, swallowed hard, felt slightly faint and sat down again abruptly. The emotion of the evening had been too much for her. Never before in her whole life had Mrs. Eames been unable to express herself in fluent and ready speech. But then she had never before come face to face with a miracle.
The people cheered again, hoarsely, but as fervently as ever. This time they felt that they were cheering themselves. The £1 2s. 6d. represented the subscription of the fishermen to the fund. The fifty pounds came from Hinton.
The meeting in the schoolroom lasted far longer than any meeting in Hailey Compton had ever lasted before. After all possible speeches had been made and votes of thanks proposed to everyone who could be supposed to deserve such a compliment and to a good many people who could not, there remained the business of enrolling the performers for the pageant. This was difficult, for almost everyone present wanted to take part, and the boys, successfully kept out until the speeches were over, managed after that to force their way in and added greatly to the confusion.
It was long after ten o'clock when Mrs. Eames reached home. She hoped but scarcely expected to find her husband waiting for her. Mrs. Eames was a lady who delighted in talking over everything she did at great length, and she had no objection to sitting up until the early hours of the morning. Her husband knew this, as he knew most things about her after twelve years of married life. He disliked talking,which seemed to him a vain amusement, and hated sitting up late. His plan, on the occasions of evening meetings, was to go to bed about nine o'clock and then pretend to be asleep. On the evening of the pageant meeting he really was asleep before his wife came home. This did not altogether save him. Mrs. Eames woke him. It was absolutely necessary to her to discuss the astonishing events of the evening with someone.
"Dearest one," she said, shaking him gently.
He groaned, turned over and buried his face in the pillow.
"Darling Timothy," she said, "you must wake up for just one minute. I want to tell you what happened at the meeting this evening."
She shook him again, not so gently as at first, and he opened his eyes.
"The whole village," she said, "was wildly enthusiastic about the pageant, and James Hinton has promised fifty pounds."
The vicar heard her and was almost startled into complete wakefulness. But the mind, though it works erratically, does work during the interval of half consciousness betweenwaking and sleeping. What Mrs. Eames said was entirely incredible. The vicar took it for granted that she could not really have said it. He was, he supposed, dreaming a dream rather more absurd than most dreams are.
"Yes, yes," he murmured, "how nice."
This seemed to him, still reasoning confusedly, a very good answer to make to a dream statement of a particularly foolish kind. It was not an answer which satisfied Mrs. Eames. She repeated, in much louder tones, her news about the village people. She added details about the meeting and described the extraordinary enthusiasm of the audience. This time the vicar was almost convinced he was awake and tried to make up his mind to sit up and ask questions. But Mrs. Eames repeated the statement about James Hinton's fifty pounds and the vicar's reason reasserted itself. It could not be true that James Hinton had promised fifty pounds to a pageant. If he seemed to hear his wife saying such a thing it was plain that he was still asleep and dreaming. With a view to getting rid of what threatened to become a nightmare he murmured again:
"How nice! How very, very nice!"
Then he turned over again and shut his eyes firmly. Mrs. Eames gave him up after that and went down to the kitchen. Gladys, incompetent cook and unwilling housemaid, was not the listener she wanted. But Gladys would be better than no one, and would be obliged to listen to any story, however long, told by her mistress.
Here luck favoured Mrs. Eames. She found in the kitchen not only Gladys but the lady whom Gladys called "My auntie," the very lady who had made the pancakes for Sir Evelyn Dent. While Gladys fussed about and made tea for Mrs. Eames the "auntie" listened with real interest to the story of the evening. Her husband was one of those chosen to be a smuggler. Her eldest boy had done his full share of the shouting. Mrs. Eames was gratified at the interest with which she listened, but disappointed when she showed little or no surprise at what had happened.
While Mrs. Eames, having more or less exhausted her subject and herself, was drinking the tea which Gladys made for her, the "auntie"told a story of her own which helped to explain the amazing attitude of the villagers towards the pageant. Mrs. Eames was so much interested that she actually listened to what was said to her, a thing she very rarely did.
According to the "auntie," the village people had been at first just as strongly opposed to the pageant as to any of the plays. But James Hinton had talked long to several of the leading men, to Jack Bunce, his fellow churchwarden, to the elder Whitty and others. No one knew exactly what he said, for the conversations were held in private in Hinton's own sitting-room at hours when the bar was not open to the public. The result, whatever was said, was surprising. One after another the leading men of the village declared themselves in favour of the pageant. They told their sons and daughters and other dependents to do exactly what Mrs. Eames bade them, exactly as they were bidden and promptly. If there was any disobedience the consequences would be serious and unpleasant.
"But," said the "auntie," "young men aren't what they were when I was a girl. Nor the girls aren't either." Here she scowled atGladys. "And as likely as not the thing they're bidden to do is just what they won't do though they would have if they hadn't been bidden."
Fortunately there was another influence which could be and was brought to bear on the young men. James Hinton was admittedly the richest man in the village and wealth is power everywhere in the world. When he came to Hailey Compton and took over the inn from the executor of the previous owner, he had re-painted, re-decorated, and largely re-built the house. He had, moreover, paid cash without hesitation or grumbling for everything that was done. Never in living memory had so much money been spent in the village on building and furnishing. It therefore seemed possible, and indeed likely, that Hinton might spend more money and that made everyone anxious to be on good terms with him. He was also, from the point of view of the village men, a model landlord for their only inn. The beer and cider which he sold were good, of a much better quality than they had been before he came. He was willing to extend credit to those who, though thirsty, had no ready money.He seldom pressed for the payment of accounts, even when they were large and long overdue. He was willing to accept mortgages on cottages and gardens, even mortgages on future catches of fish, as satisfactory discharges of debts.
A man to whom half the community owes money, to whom the other half expects to owe money very soon, is in a strong position. If he chooses to support any cause there will be little opposition. When James Hinton, having persuaded the older men that the pageant was desirable, said the same thing without explanation to the young men and maidens, all real opposition vanished.
This was the "auntie's" account of what had happened. Mrs. Eames accepted it as an explanation of everything except James Hinton's attitude. That remained a mystery.
It was true, as the "auntie," a shrewd woman, suggested, that James Hinton might make a good deal of money out of the pageant, if it were a success.
"If there were a lot of people came to Hailey Compton in them there charabancs——"
"And there will be," said Mrs. Eames eagerly."Hundreds of people will come. Thousands. And they'll all have to go to the Anchor Inn for lunch and tea. There's nowhere else they can go."
"And James Hinton can charge what he pleases," said the "auntie."
"I see that," said Mrs. Eames. "He'll make money out of it. That's it."
To anyone with Mrs. Eames's faith in the ultimate success of the pageant, the explanation should have been completely satisfying. James Hinton had promised what he would never be called upon to pay, with the certainty that his promise secured him the opportunity of earning large sums. To anyone less enthusiastic than Mrs. Eames, Hinton's guarantee would have looked like a desperate speculation. If the pageant cost a good deal, as it would, and then failed to attract a large audience, he would have to pay and would stand no chance of recouping himself. Even to Mrs. Eames this view of Hinton's action presented itself all the more clearly because she knew the man and was firmly convinced that he would never allow himself to be swayed by altruism. Hisguarantee, in spite of the explanation offered, remained a puzzle.
"It's time," said the "auntie," "for me to be getting home along."
She had drunk her share of the tea. She had heard all that Mrs. Eames had to say, thereby providing herself with a store of authentic gossip which would make her an important person in the village next day.
Mrs. Eames chased the unwilling Gladys to bed, having very little hope that the girl would be up in time to light the kitchen fire next morning. Girls, especially girls with Gladys's disposition, are exceedingly sleepy at six o'clock in the morning if they have sat up till nearly midnight the night before.
Then Mrs. Eames went to bed herself and slept soundly, untroubled by the problem of James Hinton's support of the pageant. She had long learnt the folly of worrying over the "whys" of things, especially satisfactory things. James Hinton had done what she herself could never have done nearly so well. He had persuaded the whole village to take up the smuggling pageant with enthusiasm. That was afact of the most agreeable kind. Why poke into the reasons of it? James Hinton had promised fifty pounds, and, an almost more astonishing thing, had induced the village people to promise one pound two and sixpence. These also were facts. With them, as a sensible woman, she was more than content. It would, indeed, have been nice to know just why James Hinton had offered his money and how he expected to make anything substantial out of the business. But the problem was not one which could keep Mrs. Eames awake.
The next day was a busy one for Mrs. Eames.
It began with a demand from Gladys for a whole holiday. Her plea was that it was absolutely necessary for her to consult with her "auntie" on matters of grave family importance. She had spent a whole day the week before and two half-days in the course of a fortnight in the same way; and the "auntie" had been in the vicarage kitchen for several hours on all the other days. As an excuse forasking for another holiday the family consultation would not have impressed the simplest and most inexperienced mistress, and Mrs. Eames was no fool. She understood exactly what Gladys wanted her holiday for.
The whole village was seething with mild excitement over the meeting of the night before. Gossip of the most fascinating kind was flying from lip to ear at every cottage door. The most wild and improbable tales were being listened to with perfect belief. No girl would like to be shut up by herself in a kitchen while such joys were to be found outside. And Gladys, with her intimate knowledge of all that happened in the vicarage, would be welcome anywhere. She would be in a position to command the attention of thrilled audiences whatever she chose to say.
Mrs. Eames thoroughly understood this. Being a kind-hearted woman, full of sympathy with anyone who enjoyed excitement, she gave Gladys a holiday without a murmur.
This was not so difficult for her as it would have been for many mistresses. The vicar went off soon after breakfast with a package ofsandwiches in his pocket. There was therefore no cooking to be done for him. Mrs. Eames never cooked for herself when left alone. She did not even lay a table for herself or go to the trouble of getting out plates, knives or forks. Her plan, a very sensible one, was to eat whatever she could find whenever she felt hungry, generally without even sitting down. When Gladys walked off in a white skirt and a pink silk jumper, Mrs. Eames had to make the beds and wash up the breakfast things. Otherwise the want of a servant left her with little or no extra work.
She was washing up cups and plates when she caught sight through the pantry window of James Hinton. Many vicars' wives, obliged to keep up the difficult pretence that they live as ladies, would have been embarrassed at being discovered in an apron, with sleeves rolled up, over a pantry sink, by a visitor like Hinton. But Mrs. Eames was entirely free from any taint of snobbishness. She would have gone on ironing clothes in front of her drawing-room fire if a duchess had called on her while so occupied. She greeted Hintonthrough the window and invited him to walk straight into the pantry.
Hinton's manners were as good as hers. Instead of expressing surprise or contempt, instead of offering any kind of excuse or apology for Mrs. Eames's occupation, he took his place beside the sink, picked up a glass-cloth and dried the vessels which Mrs. Eames handed to him. He did not even allow it to appear by a glance or a sniff that he found the cloth he used disgustingly dirty, though it was, being one of those of which Gladys had charge. It was not in vain that Hinton had lived as footman and valet in some of the best houses in England. He had acquired the manners of a great gentleman.
While they worked together, Hinton explained the objects of his visit. It was, in his opinion, desirable to secure as many influential patrons as possible for the pageant.
"Of course," said Mrs. Eames, "we've got to advertise, and there are only two ways of doing that. Either we've got to spend a lot of money, which we haven't got—thoughyour guarantee was extremely generous. It quite took my breath away."
"A trifle, madam," said Hinton, drying a plate carefully, "a mere trifle."
"It wasn't a trifle at all," said Mrs. Eames, "but it won't run to a whole page advertisement in a daily paper. Luckily there's another way of advertising. My niece, Miss Appleby, told me about it. You know her, don't you?"
Hinton had never met Beth Appleby, but was quite prepared to listen to her views about advertising.
"The thing to do," said Mrs. Eames, brandishing a dripping cloth, "is to get names that advertise themselves."
Hinton took the fork from her gently and wiped it with Gladys's dirty cloth.
"Quite so, madam."
"If you get the proper names," said Mrs. Eames, "the newspapers will put in paragraphs about them without being paid. That's what my niece says."
"Having lived in many of the best houses in England," said Hinton, "I may say that I amaware of the advertisement value of our aristocracy."
"It's not only the aristocracy. Politicians are just as good. Actresses are probably better. Even authors—there are one or two authors——"
"I thought, madam," said Hinton, "that we might begin by securing the name of the bishop of the diocese."
Mrs. Eames sniffed. The bishop was a man of unblemished integrity, of kindly disposition, of respectable scholarship, but he did not strike her as having what Hinton described as "advertisement value." He had never denied the truth of any article in the Apostles' Creed. He did not preach in Methodist Chapels, or if he did made no public boast about it. He had never prosecuted any of his clergy for excessive devotion to catholicism. These are the only ways in which an ecclesiastic can attract public attention to himself, that is to say the only ways of acquiring "advertisement value."
"I don't see," said Mrs. Eames, "that the bishop would be much good to us."
Hinton bowed a submissive acquiescence in her opinion.
"I'm sure you know best, madam."
"My idea," said Mrs. Eames, "would be to start with Sir Evelyn Dent. He has promised to support us and I'm sure he'll have no objection to the use of his name as a patron. An ex-Cabinet Minister with a title! Don't forget the title, Hinton. And he has an honourable all of his own besides the knighthood."
"Sir Evelyn," said Hinton, "might perhaps secure the support of the present earl."
"Present earl? Oh, of course, his nephew, Lord Colavon. Yes. He would be quite good. An earl is an earl of course, but except for being an earl he's nothing particular, is he? I mean to say he's not well known."
"Not in political or literary circles, madam. The tastes of the present earl are understood to be sporting and dramatic."
"Dramatic!" Mrs. Eames became suddenly interested.
Hinton was drying the last saucer. Mrs. Eames, the task of washing up finished, was rubbing her dripping hands on her apron.
"Scarcely dramatic in the higher sense of the word," said Hinton. "The tastes of the presentearl are rather in the direction of comic opera."
"He won't do us any harm, I suppose," said Mrs. Eames, "and I dare say Sir Evelyn will get him for us. Now who else would you suggest?"
"Did I mention the bishop, madam?"
"You did. And I said I didn't see what use the bishop would be. In fact he'd be worse than no use. If the public sees the name of a bishop at the head of a list of patrons it naturally thinks that the show is going to be a Diocesan Conference or something of the sort and simply stays away."
Again Hinton gave way, or appeared to give way.
"It might be advantageous, madam," he said, "if we secured the name of some gentleman prominently connected with the customs and excise."
Hinton's ideas of suitable patrons were certainly odd. A custom house officer, though a useful and generally an active civil servant, is not the sort of man whose name often appears in the newspapers.
"The name of a custom house officer on ourlist of patrons," Hinton explained, "would convince the public that our pageant is entirelybona fide."
"But what else could it be? You don't mean to suggest that we should really smuggle things?"
"Of course not, madam, but the public is sometimes very unintelligent, and——"
"No public could possibly be as stupid as that."
The cups and plates were by this time restored to their shelves in the pantry. Hinton, having discovered a leather, was giving an unaccustomed polish to the spoons and forks.
"I only suggested a customs officer," he said, "because I thought that if he became interested he might arrange for some of his subordinates to take part in the pageant, as preventive officers, capturing the smugglers and the lugger. That's simply an idea. Of course the management of the dramatic side of the pageant is entirely in your hands."
"It's a jolly good idea. Real coastguards—but of course there aren't any now. Real preventive officers riding down the hill just in timeto—— Or coming in a revenue cutter and firing on the lugger. I wonder if we could get them. Oh, do stop polishing those spoons, Hinton. It fidgets me to see you. Come into the vicar's study and talk over this idea of yours."
"Perhaps," said Hinton as they left the room, "there are some other household duties of which I could relieve you. I think you may safely trust me. I have had considerable experience in some of the best houses in England."
"If you like to help me to make the vicar's bed," said Mrs. Eames, "I don't mind."
"I shall be most happy," said Hinton, "but I beg of you, madam, to leave it entirely to me. If you will await me in the study——"
He held the door open for her and when he had shown her into the room went upstairs. But Mrs. Eames was not a lady who could sit still for very long, especially with an exciting idea in her mind. The thought of securing real customs officers thrilled her. After wandering about the room for some minutes she followed Hinton upstairs. She found him brushing an old and dilapidated pair of the vicar's trousers.
"Do you happen to know any customs officers?" she asked.
Hinton folded the trousers with careful exactness and put them in a drawer.
"Not personally, madam. But no doubt I can find out who the local head of that service is."
"Then do," said Mrs. Eames. "I'll leave that in your hands."
"And the bishop?" said Hinton. "Perhaps it would be better if you or the vicar were to approach the bishop."
Hinton was stropping the vicar's razor with vigour and skill.
"How you do nag on about the bishop!" said Mrs. Eames. "Please leave that razor alone. The vicar cuts himself often enough as it is and if you go making it too sharp he may give himself a dangerous gash. Why on earth are you so keen on the bishop? I've no objection to bishops of course, and if there's any real reason—— It's no use expecting him to read the funeral service over a smuggler shot by a coastguard. I quite see that would be most effective but no bishop would do it."
"The idea in my mind——" said Hinton, who was arranging the vicar's toothbrush and sponge neatly on the washing stand.
He went on to give his reasons for wishing to secure the bishop as a patron.
Bishops, so he explained, inspire great confidence in the public, which is always a little afraid of being let in for something improper or a little dubious.
"If we were concerned only with the aristocracy, madam, it would be a different matter. If I may say so, speaking after many years' experience of the upper classes, there would be no objection whatever to a hint, a suggestion of the risqué."
"But, good gracious, Hinton, we're not going to do anything in the least risqué as you call it."
"Certainly not, madam. Most assuredly not. But the public—the general public apart from the aristocracy and outside of literary and artistic circles—the public which we wish to attract, is very suspicious."
Mrs. Eames did not believe that any public could possibly suspect her pageant of beingimproper. But Hinton insisted that he was right and that their only security lay in having at least one bishop among their patrons.
"Very well," she said at last, "I'll leave the list of patrons entirely to you, Hinton. Get that sporting earl of yours if you can. Get a few of his musical comedy actresses too. Get a bishop and a couple of custom house officers. Get the local police if you like."
"Thank you, madam. Will you approach the bishop or shall I see the vicar about it?"
"You'd better do it yourself. As a churchwarden you've a perfect right to tackle a bishop. And anyway I'm sure the vicar won't, though he ought to after the way you've folded his trousers for him and stropped his razor. All I ask is that if you have a committee meeting of your patrons——"
"There will not, I imagine, madam, be any necessity for that."
"Well, if there is," said Mrs. Eames, "you may take the chair at it yourself, for I won't."
Although Battersea is far from being a fashionable part of London there are pleasant little flats to be had there, overlooking the park, for those who are indifferent to the advantages of a smart address.
One of these is shared by Beth Appleby and her friend Mary Lambert. Beth Appleby makes an unsatisfying income by casual journalism, relying chiefly on the small but regular payments made by a syndicating agency for a weekly letter on London life. This is widely circulated in provincial papers. Miss Lambert dances fairly well and sings badly. She obtains engagements of uncertain duration in revues and musical comedies. There are times when she envies the steady weekly income paid to her friend by the syndicators. There are other times when Beth Appleby thinks that dancing is a better way of earning a living than writing. Pens may be mightier than swords, but legs are often more profitable than either.
The two girls were together in their flat onesunny morning at the end of May, just such a morning as makes young people long for pleasure and makes work of every kind extremely irksome, and, for most of us—though the thing seems self-contradictory—the want of work more irksome still.
Beth was at her writing-table, her pen in her hand, a sheet of paper in front of her. She had written the words "Lilith lisps" and then come to a dead stop. This was not surprising. Lilith had already lisped four times since breakfast. Beth lacked matter for a fifth and, like Rosalind's orator in a similar case, felt strongly inclined to spit.
Mary lay back in the most comfortable chair in the room with her feet on another. She had a cigarette between her fingers which she put to her lips occasionally but without much satisfaction. She was meditating disconsolately on the failure of the last show in which she had danced, a disaster which brought her face to face with the difficult task of getting another engagement.
"I wonder," said Beth irritably, "if there's anything in the world left for Lilith to lisp about."
"There's me," said Mary. "'Lilith lisps that Miss Lambert, the charming young danseuse who has won the hearts of London playgoers, is thinking of accepting a tempting offer to go to New York.'"
"I'd do that and more for you, Mary, dear," said Beth, "if I thought it would be the slightest use. But it wouldn't. Lilith's delightful lispings aren't read by anybody except the wives and daughters of greengrocers in Muddleborough and such places."
"A provincial engagement would be better than nothing."
"Besides," said Beth, "Lilith can't be always lisping about you. It's only a fortnight ago that I had you 'robed in a novel and daring creation' at a garden party given by Jimmy. He was rather stuffy about it afterwards. He said that if any of his aunts had seen the paragraph they'd have been down on him for not asking them to the party. I rather think he was afraid that if I wrote anything more of the kind he might be forced to give a garden party."
Jimmy—spoken of in this familiar way by both girls—is the Earl of Colavon, of whomJames Hinton said that his tastes were sporting and dramatic.
"Let's invent another new frock," said Mary. "Next to having one, which I can't, the most amusing thing would be to imagine what it would be like if I could. I'll give you the details. All you have to do is to say that you saw me in it at a reception in Lambeth Palace, given by the Bishop of London."
"It's the Archbishop of Canterbury who lives at Lambeth."
"All the better. It sounds far grander for poor little me and less likely to be contradicted. An archbishop can't possibly know who wears what at his receptions. And, anyhow, he'll never read anything you write, Beth, darling."
"I'll tell you what I'll do for you if you like," said Beth. "I'll make Lilith lisp that you're one of the patrons of Aunt Agatha's pageant. She's got a bishop, so you really might be asked to a reception in a palace. And she's got Sir Evelyn Dent. What she wants now are a few literary and artistic stars to brighten things up a bit."
"I'll do that all right for her, if she'll give me a decent contract and pay for rehearsals."
"I don't fancy Aunt Agatha can pay anybody for anything."
"Well, I'm not going into it for the love of art; but if you can put my name down as a patron it might be some use. Almost any kind of ad. pays, and it isn't every day I get the chance of appearing in print alongside of a bishop and a Prime Minister. Sir Evelyn Dent is Jimmy's uncle, isn't he? And he used to be Prime Minister."
"Not quite," said Beth, "but as near as doesn't matter."
"What's the thing about? English history, I suppose. If it's Fair Rosamund we might work in a dance. I could do something graceful in a long skirt which wouldn't shock the bishop, holding the cup of poison in my hand. Your aunt could be Queen Eleanor if she liked. I'd do it for ten pounds and exes."
"Nothing doing in that way, I'm afraid," said Beth. "It's about smugglers."
"Well, there's that Nautch Girl dance of mine. It's not bad at all. And if your aunt can't pay I dare say Jimmy could screw a tenner out of that uncle of his. It would be quiteworth it to the show. No feeling of stuffiness about that dance. I should think that pirates—you said pirates, didn't you?"
"Smugglers."
"Much the same thing. Smugglers or pirates are sure to be mixed up with nautch girls, whatever they are. Or at all events girls of some kind. I don't mind calling it a geisha dance if they like. I could borrow a kimono."
"'Lilith lisps,'" said Beth, taking her pen again, "'that among the patrons of the Hailey Compton Smuggling Pageant is Miss Mary Lambert, whose Nautch Girl dance has just delighted London. The wide appeal made by this pageant—the most magnificently staged show ever produced in England—will be understood when it is realised that among those interested, besides Miss Mary Lambert, are Sir Evelyn Dent, the Bishop of ...' remind me afterwards to find out what he's bishop of. 'And....' Now did Aunt Agatha mention anyone else? I can't remember. Anyhow, we'll put in Jimmy. He won't mind. 'The Earl of Colavon, whose name standsfacile princepsamong our sporting peers of the younger generation.' Thank heaven, there's another lisp. That makes five. If I'd three more I'd be through with the beastly things for this week, and I'd take you out on top of a bus to Kew or somewhere to get a breath of fresh air."
Fortune was kind to Beth Appleby. While she was still biting the end of her pen Lord Colavon came into the room. He brought with him an air of breezy cheerfulness, very like the weather outside, and a gaiety natural enough in one who was not compelled to write weekly "lispings" for his daily bread and ran no risk of losing his income through the failure of an apathetic public to appreciate a Nautch Girl dance.
"Jimmy," said Beth, "help me out."
"The precise thing I've come to do," said Jimmy. "New 8-cylinder Pallas Athene, sports model, guaranteed 70 miles an hour on the road, did over 100 at Brooklands, stands panting at the door. Dine at Oxford. Dine at York. Dine anywhere you like. Home by moonlight. Is there a moon? Must be a moon in May. 'The young May moon isbeaming, love.' The poet wouldn't have said that if there wasn't a moon in May. Dashed particular about facts, poets have to be."
"Oh, Jimmy," said Mary. "Just wait one minute till we get on our hats. Come, Beth."
But Beth Appleby had a conscience, or that fairly satisfactory substitute for a conscience, a sense of prudence. Lilith's Lispings had to be posted that night, or there would be no cheque at the end of the week. And Lilith had only achieved six poor lisps.
"Can't be done," she said, "simply can't. Unless you can help me out with Lilith, Jimmy."
Lord Colavon's tastes were sporting and dramatic, but he was not altogether ignorant of our current literature. Thanks to an intimacy of some years with Beth Appleby, he knew all about Lilith's lispings and had often suggested valuable ideas. He did not fail now.
"What about the Pallas Athene?" he said. "Absolutely the latest thing. Triumph of British engineering. Revelation of speed possibility of road travel. See company's catalogue, free on application."
"'Lilith lisps,'" Beth wrote rapidly, "'that thedernier criin motor luxury is the——' what did you call it, Jimmy?"
"Pallas Athene. Sports model."
Beth wrote down Pallas Athene and then went on:
"'The upholstery is of delicately tinted Russia leather, equally suited to the light fabric of a summer frock and the rich glow of winter furs.'"
"Hold on," said Jimmy. "There's no use misleading the good old public. It's an 8-cylinder sports model, not a bus for going out to dinner in at night."
"What I've got to do," said Beth, "is to write something that'll thrill my readers. Lilith doesn't get into motor garages, and isn't read by mechanics. She lisps in the chaste parlours of the ladies of the provincial middle classes. What they like to hear about is the upholstery. They don't care a rap about cylinders."
"Oh, well, say what you jolly well like about the car, but it will be awkward for me if one of my aunts, or good old Uncle Evie, who mightalmost as well be an aunt, went and bought the car expecting it to be the sort of gentle family pet which purrs when stroked."
"I suppose," said Beth, writing fast, "that you will have no objection to my saying that you were seen getting out of the car outside a club in St. James's?"
"None in the world," said Jimmy. "You can say any mortal thing you like about me, Beth, so long as you get through with that beastly writing of yours and come out for a spin."
"I've got you down already, along with Mary and Sir Evelyn and some bishop or other, as a patron of Aunt Agatha's pageant."
"I say, is that the thing Uncle Evie is so keen on? I'd a letter from him the other day, asking me if I knew of a lugger which could be hired by the week or bought cheap."
"Good," said Beth. "I'll make a paragraph about that. 'Apropos of the Hailey Compton Pageant, Lilith lisps that the harbours of England are being searched for a genuine eighteenth century lugger. Lord Colavon, who, besides being a keen motorist, is a distinguished yachtsman——'"
"But, I say, what's the old pageant about? That's what I want to know, and being a patron I think I've a right to ask."
"Smuggling," said Beth. "But for goodness' sake don't interrupt. If I'm to get these lispings done at all I simply must stick at it."
"I don't believe Uncle Evie is going to smuggle. He's not sportsman enough."
Mary Lambert, fully dressed for the motor run, slipped into the room in time to hear Jimmy's defence of his uncle's character.
"If he won't," she said, "I wish somebody else would. The price of silk stockings is scandalous, and unless something is done about it poor girls like me won't be able to live at all. It seems to me, Jimmy, that it's your plain duty to do a little smuggling in the interests of the profession. Other people may be able to get on without silk. We can't. It's a business necessity."
Jimmy sat silent for a minute or two, meditating on Mary's proposal. Then he suddenly addressed Beth.
"Nearly finished? For if you're not toobreathless to listen I've got a scheme to propose."
"Give me one more lisp," said Beth, "and I'm yours for a thousand miles in the Russia leather Pallas Athene, all mealsen routeprovided free."
"What I was just going to suggest," said Jimmy, "is that we should run down and dine with Uncle Evie, just to find out about this smuggling stunt of his."
"I should be terrified out of my life," said Mary. "I'm not accustomed to Cabinet Ministers, or for the matter of that to titled aristocrats, except you, Jimmy, and nobody would ever take you for an earl."
"You needn't be the least bit nervous," said Jimmy. "Uncle Evie is a bit boring at times, but he wouldn't frighten a ten-year-old orphan. We'll send him a wire to say we're coming."
"Jimmy," said Beth, "you're priceless! That's another lisp. Absolutely a topper. 'I had the good fortune to be present a few evenings ago at an informal littleal frescodinner given by Sir Evelyn Dent in his fascinating thirteenth century moated grange——'"
"There's no moat," said Jimmy, "and it's a Manor House."
"What does that matter?" said Beth. "It's old, I suppose. People like your uncle always live in old houses."
"It's old, all right," said Jimmy.
"Then moated grange is the proper thing to call it when writing the Lispings of Lilith, but if you really prefer it I don't mind calling it an historic pile. 'Sir Evelyn, a dignified and gracious——' What's the masculine of 'châtelaine,' Jimmy?"
"'Château,' I should think," said Jimmy, "but don't call poor old Uncle Evie that. He'd hate it."
"'Sir Evelyn,'" said Beth, writing as she spoke, "'who between ourselves——' I mean to say 'entre nousis something of agrand seigneur.'"
"I know I'll be petrified with terror," said Mary. "Agrand seigneurin a moated grange."
"'Among the guests,'" Beth went on, "'was the Earl of Colavon, who was wearing the famous diamond studs which have been in the family since Henry VIII gave them to AnneBoleyn, who was, as everybody knows, one of the ancestors of the Dents,'"
"Hang it all, Beth," said Jimmy, "I don't mind your making a fool of me in any ordinary way, but a fellow must draw the line somewhere. Why can't you say that Uncle Evie wore the diamond studs?"
"I'm putting him down for the Garter Ribbon," said Beth, "so you must have the diamond studs. Though I don't mind making them pearl if you'd rather. You simply must give the public what it wants if you go in for literature at all."
"Well, hurry up," said Jimmy. "It's all of 180 miles down to Uncle Evie's moated grange and I shall have to push the sports model along a bit if we're to get there for theal frescodinner."
"Five minutes more and I've finished," said Beth. "'The conversation after dinner turned on—— Now what do you think, belovedest? Politics? Wrong. Science? Wrong. Guess again. Well, if you won't, let us whisper: silk stockings. But you'd have guessed that, wouldn't you? if I'd mentioned that Miss Mary Lambert was one of the party.'"
"I won't have it," said Mary. "As if I'd dare to talk about silk stockings to agrand seigneur. Tell her not to, Jimmy."
"Not much use my telling Beth anything. Besides, we are going to talk about silk stockings, aren't we? I mean to say, that's the general idea of the party—smuggling and so forth."
"Thank Heaven, I've finished," said Beth. "I'll just run and change my frock, and then we'll see what the Pallas Athene can do along the roads."
"If anybody talks about silk stockings," said Mary when Beth had left the room, "it'll have to be you, Jimmy. I simply daren't to a man like your uncle."
"But that's what we're going to see Uncle Evie about. What I mean to say is this: we want to get all the particulars about this smuggling stunt of his, whether there's any chance of fitting in a little of the real thing. It all depends, you know. But if we could manage to get in a few dozen pairs of silk stockings under cover of the pageant it'd be all to the good for you and Beth, wouldn't it?"
"Jimmy," said Mary, "you're an angel!"
"I don't promise anything. It all depends on how Uncle Evie's working the thing. If he leaves the lugger part of the show in my hands—— Didn't Beth say there was a bishop in it? You can do pretty nearly anything if you're holding hands with a bishop. Nobody ever suspects you. Besides, he might be a sportsman himself—the bishop, I mean. Some are, I'm told. Anyhow, I don't suppose he'd have any objection to a case of champagne. If he didn't care to drink it himself he could give it away to poor parsons in the diocese."
For the first hundred and thirty miles or so of the journey the Pallas Athene did all that could be expected of an eight-cylinder sports model driven by a young man who did not shrink from paying an occasional fine. The needle of the speedometer often flickered past the sixty miles mark. The average speed fell little short of double that which our legislators—the same people who made the laws about beer—consider sufficient. Ilchester was reachedin less than four hours. Jimmy, slowing down slightly through the long narrow street of the village, congratulated himself and his passengers on the achievement.
"I call that a satisfactory record so far," he said, "and we haven't killed or maimed so much as a dog, which just shows the advantage of careful driving."
He congratulated himself too soon. The inhabitants of Ilchester, indeed, escaped with their lives. Three main roads unite to run through their village, so they have learnt to be exceedingly alert and active. Lord Colavon had not so much as a broken collar-bone on his conscience when he pressed his foot on the accelerator at the end of the village. But a few miles along the road the engine began to give trouble. Jimmy was perfectly sure that he knew what was the matter with it. He spent ten minutes in oily work with a spanner. After that, things became rapidly worse. Noises of the most terrifying kind became frequent, and it was no longer possible to persuade the Pallas Athene to do more than thirty miles an hour on a level stretch of road.
Jimmy, less confident than he had been that he knew what was the matter, left his direct road and went to Taunton. There he sought help in a garage while the two girls had tea. The mechanic, an intelligent and competent man, shook his head over the Pallas Athene. He preferred a soberer and more reliable kind of car, even if it could not be driven very fast. In his opinion it would be folly to go on any farther, and he spoke vaguely of telegraphing to the makers of the car for some spare parts.
"Spare parts be damned," said Jimmy. "That means waiting here for the best part of a week."
The mechanic could not deny that the getting of spare parts is often a tedious business, especially—here he glanced with dislike at the Pallas Athene—"from the makers of cars like that."
"Can't you patch her up somehow," said Jimmy, "so that I can push on another forty or fifty miles? I haven't much more than that to do."
"I can patch her up," said the mechanic,"but there's no man living can tell how far she'll run afterwards."
Being a cautious man, experienced in the ways of motor-cars, he refused, even when pressed, to give any exact estimate of the distance which the patched Pallas Athene might run. The only thing he regarded as certain was that she would break down completely in the end.
"It might be two miles out of the town," he said, "or it might be a hundred."
"Do the best you can with her while I'm getting a cup of tea," said Jimmy. "Then fill up her tank and give her a pint of oil. I'll risk it."
The behaviour of the Pallas Athene after leaving Taunton was excellent. It may have been that the hour's rest in the garage revived her. More probably she was pleased by the attention she received from the mechanic. All women, even dignified Greek goddesses, like being fussed over and petted. Jimmy was moderate in his demands for speed and did not demand anything more than what he called "a funeral trot" of thirty-five miles an hour.Exeter was passed successfully, and the time came when the main road must be left for the last stage of the journey.
Jimmy, gaining confidence, ran at a fair speed up and down some abrupt hills on roads marked on the maps in inferior colours, occasionally not coloured at all. On a lonely open stretch of one of what the map makers describe as "other metalled roads, narrow," the breakdown, prophesied by the Taunton mechanic, came. Without so much as a warning shriek or a death rattle the Pallas Athene gasped and stopped.
Jimmy did all that a man could do. He lay on his back and screwed nuts. He lay on his side and screwed other nuts. He crawled on his stomach. He knelt, stooped, crouched, tapped and hammered. Like the good Samaritan, he poured in oil and would have poured in wine too if he had had any. Beth and Mary encouraged him and tried to help him. They spread a whole kit of tools out on a bank on the side of the road and very soon learned to distinguish between a double-ended spanner, a box spanner and an adjustable spanner, often handed theright weapon to Jimmy without giving him a wrong one more than a couple of times first.
"Well I'm damned if I know what's wrong," said Jimmy, after an hour's experimental effort. "If only the wretched thing had held out another quarter of an hour we'd have been there, we can't be more than seven or eight miles from Morriton St. James, and Uncle Evie's house is just outside."
"Couldn't Mary and I walk on," said Beth, "and send somebody back for you? There must be a car in the village?"
"Morriton St. James is a town, not a village," said Jimmy, "and there are lots of cars, but it would take you the best part of three hours to get there—if you ever got there at all. Look at Mary's shoes, and your own are no better."
Mary exhibited, for admiration or contempt, a delicate suède shoe, certainly not intended for long walks over rough roads.
"I'd go myself," said Jimmy, "but I hate leaving you two alone in a place like this. I never saw such a road in my life. Not a blessed thing has passed, going either way since the Pallas Athene lay down and died."
"I'll do a lisp next week," said Beth, "on the dangerously congested condition of our country roads."
"I don't suppose anything ever does pass or ever will," said Jimmy.
He had been too optimistic at Ilchester over the performances of the Pallas Athene. He was too pessimistic now about the traffic on the road to Morriton St. James. A moving object appeared far off. The sound of clanging metal reached their ears. A very old Ford car came rattling towards them at a steady, but apparently laborious, twenty miles an hour. At the steering wheel sat James Hinton of the Anchor Inn in Hailey Compton.
Jimmy was determined not to be passed by. There are a few motorists as indifferent to the calls of charity as if they were priests or Levites, who go their way without succouring those in distress on the roadside. The driver of the Ford might be such a man. Jimmy made sure that he would at least stop by standing with outstretched hands in the middle of the road. The Pallas Athene, her wheels against one bank, occupied about one third of the road,which was not very wide. Jimmy, half-way to the other bank, made passing impossible without homicide. He need not have taken such extreme measures. James Hinton pulled up and inquired politely what was the matter and whether he could be of any use.
"If you'll take these two ladies into Morriton St. James," said Jimmy, "and send someone back to tow this car I shall be greatly obliged, and——"
He felt in his pocket for a coin, looking hard at James Hinton, to discover, if possible, whether he was the sort of man to whom a tip should be offered. James Hinton, since he pulled up, had been looking hard at Jimmy. In spite of the smears of oily dust which were on his face and his generally dishevelled appearance, he was recognisable.
"Certainly, my lord," he said. "It will be nothing but a pleasure to oblige your lordship in any possible way. Would it be convenient if I was to take the two ladies straight to the Manor House. It occurs to me that your lordship may intend to pay a visit to Sir Evelyn Dent, your lordship's uncle."
"I say," said Jimmy. "You seem to know all about me, and I'm delighted to meet you again and all that; but—damned stupid of me, of course—I can't for the life of me recollect who you are."
"Your lordship wouldn't recollect me," said Hinton. "It's not to be expected that you would; but I was in the late earl's service as first footman, and I had the honour of valetting your lordship sometimes lately when you stayed with Lord Dollman without bringing your own man."
"Got you now," said Jimmy. "You're the fellow Dolly thought such a lot of. Said he never knew anyone with such a talent for spotting winners. Anyhow, Dolly used to make pots while he had you."
"Very kind of his lordship to say so," said Hinton. "It's always been my wish to give satisfaction."
"I suppose you don't happen to be out of a job now. If you cared to come to me—— What about it?"
"Very kind of your lordship," said Hinton, "but I've retired from gentlemen's service.But of course if I could be of any use to your lordship——"
"You can and shall," said Jimmy. "You shall take these two ladies to the Manor House."
"Jimmy, dear," said Mary, catching his arm, "I daren't, simply daren't face your uncle without you. I don't believe Beth would either. He wouldn't know who we were."
"It would be a bit awkward," said Beth. "I don't suppose Sir Evelyn has so much as heard our names."
She was wrong about that. Sir Evelyn had heard her name very often since the idea of the smuggling pageant occurred to Mrs. Eames. He had even read, with gratification, every lisp of Lilith's in which his name had been mentioned since Beth began her campaign of advertising the pageant.