Then the Angel came in sight of the forge, where Sandy Bright's brother was shoeing a horse for the carter from Upmorton. Two hobbledehoys were standing by the forge staring in a bovine way at the proceedings. As the Angel approached these two and then the carter turned slowly through an angle of thirty degrees and watched his approach, staring quietly and steadily at him. The expression on their faces was one of abstract interest.
The Angel became self-conscious for the first time in his life. He drew nearer, trying to maintain an amiable expression on his face, an expression that beat in vain against their granitic stare. His hands were behind him. He smiled pleasantly, looking curiously at the (to him) incomprehensible employment of the smith. But the battery of eyes seemed to angle for his regard. Trying to meet the three pairs at once, the Angellost his alertness and stumbled over a stone. One of the yokels gave a sarcastic cough, and was immediately covered with confusion at the Angel's enquiring gaze, nudging his companion with his elbow to cover his disorder. None spoke, and the Angel did not speak.
So soon as the Angel had passed, one of the three hummed this tune in an aggressive tone.
Music
Then all three of them laughed. One tried to sing something and found his throat contained phlegm. The Angel proceeded on his way.
"Who'sethen?" said the second hobbledehoy.
"Ping, ping, ping," went the blacksmith's hammer.
"Spose he's one of these here foweners," said the carter from Upmorton. "Däamned silly fool he do look to be sure."
"Tas the way with them foweners," said the first hobbledehoy sagely.
"Got something very like the 'ump," said the carter from Upmorton. "Dää-ä-ämned if 'E ent."
Then the silence healed again, and they resumed their quiet expressionless consideration of the Angel's retreating figure.
"Very like the 'ump et is," said the carter after an enormous pause.
The Angel went on through the village, finding it all wonderful enough. "They begin, and just a little while and then they end," he said to himself in a puzzled voice. "But what are they doing meanwhile?" Once he heard some invisible mouth chant inaudible words to the tune the man at the forge had hummed.
"That's the poor creature the Vicar shot with that great gun of his," said Sarah Glue (of 1, Church Cottages) peering over the blind.
"He looks Frenchified," said Susan Hopper, peering through the interstices of that convenient veil on curiosity.
"He has sweet eyes," said Sarah Glue, who had met them for a moment.
The Angel sauntered on. The postman passed him and touched his hat to him; further down was a dog asleep in the sun. He went on and saw Mendham, who nodded distantly and hurriedpast. (The Curate did not care to be seen talking to an angel in the village, until more was known about him). There came from one of the houses the sound of a child screaming in a passion, that brought a puzzled look to the angelic face. Then the Angel reached the bridge below the last of the houses, and stood leaning over the parapet watching the glittering little cascade from the mill.
"They begin, and just a little while, and then they end," said the weir from the mill. The water raced under the bridge, green and dark, and streaked with foam.
Beyond the mill rose the square tower of the church, with the churchyard behind it, a spray of tombstones and wooden headboards splashed up the hillside. A half dozen of beech trees framed the picture.
Then the Angel heard a shuffling of feet and the gride of wheels behind him, and turning his head saw a man dressed in dirty brown rags and a felt hat grey with dust, who was standing with a slight swaying motion and fixedly regarding the Angelic back. Beyond him was anotheralmost equally dirty, pushing a knife grinder's barrow over the bridge.
"Mornin'," said the first person smiling weakly. "Goomorn'." He arrested an escaping hiccough.
The Angel stared at him. He had never seen a really fatuous smile before. "Who are you?" said the Angel.
The fatuous smile faded. "No your business whoaaam. Wishergoomorn."
"Carm on:" said the man with the grindstone, passing on his way.
"Wishergoomorn," said the dirty man, in a tone of extreme aggravation. "Carncher Answerme?"
"Carmonyou fool!" said the man with the grindstone—receding.
"I don't understand," said the Angel.
"Donunderstan'. Sim'l enough. Wishergoomorn'. Willyanswerme? Wontchr? gemwishergem goomorn. Cusom answer goomorn. No gem. Haverteachyer."
The Angel was puzzled. The drunken man stood swaying for a moment, then he made an unsteady snatch at his hat and threw it down atthe Angel's feet. "Ver well," he said, as one who decides great issues.
"Carmon!" said the voice of the man with the grindstone—stopping perhaps twenty yards off.
"Youwanfight, you ——" the Angel failed to catch the word. "I'll show yer, not answer gem's goomorn."
He began to struggle with his jacket. "Think I'm drun," he said, "I show yer." The man with the grindstone sat down on the shaft to watch. "Carm on," he said. The jacket was intricate, and the drunken man began to struggle about the road, in his attempts to extricate himself, breathing threatenings and slaughter. Slowly the Angel began to suspect, remotely enough, that these demonstrations were hostile. "Mur wun know yer when I done wi' yer," said the drunken man, coat almost over his head.
At last the garment lay on the ground, and through the frequent interstices of his reminiscences of a waistcoat, the drunken tinker displayed a fine hairy and muscular body to the Angel's observant eyes. He squared up in masterly fashion.
"Take the paint off yer," he remarked, advancing and receding, fists up and elbows out.
"Carm on," floated down the road.
The Angel's attention was concentrated on two huge hairy black fists, that swayed and advanced and retreated. "Come on d'yer say? I'll show yer," said the gentleman in rags, and then with extraordinary ferocity; "My crikey! I'll show yer."
Suddenly he lurched forward, and with a newborn instinct and raising a defensive arm as he did so, the Angel stepped aside to avoid him. The fist missed the Angelic shoulder by a hairsbreadth, and the tinker collapsed in a heap with his face against the parapet of the bridge. The Angel hesitated over the writhing dusty heap of blasphemy for a moment, and then turned towards the man's companion up the road. "Lemmeget up," said the man on the bridge: "Lemmeget up, you swine. I'll show yer."
A strange disgust, a quivering repulsion came upon the Angel. He walked slowly away from the drunkard towards the man with the grindstone.
"What does it all mean?" said the Angel. "I don't understand it."
"Dam fool!... say's it's 'is silver weddin'," answered the man with the grindstone, evidently much annoyed; and then, in a tone of growing impatience, he called down the road once more; "Carm on!"
"Silver wedding!" said the Angel. "What is a silver wedding?"
"Jest is rot," said the man on the barrow. "But 'E's always avin' some 'scuse like that. Fair sickenin it is. Lars week it wus 'is bloomin' birthday, andthen'e ad'nt ardly got sober orf a comlimentary drunk to my noo barrer. (Carmon, you fool.)"
"But I don't understand," said the Angel. "Why does he sway about so? Why does he keep on trying to pick up his hat like that—and missing it?"
"Why!" said the tinker. "Well thisisa blasted innocent country!Why!Because 'E's blind! Wot else? (Carm on—Damyer). Because 'E's just as full as 'E can 'old. That'swhy!"
The Angel noticing the tone of the second tinker's voice, judged it wiser not to question him further. But he stood by the grindstone and continued to watch the mysterious evolutions on the bridge.
"Carm on! I shall 'ave to go and pick up that 'at I suppose.... 'E's always at it. I ne'er 'ad such a blooming pard before.Alwaysat it, 'e is."
The man with the barrow meditated. "Taint as if 'e was a gentleman and 'adnt no livin' to get. An' 'e's such a reckless fool when 'e gets a bit on. Goes offerin out everyone 'e meets. (Thereyou go!) I'm blessed if 'e didn't offer out a 'ole bloomin' Salvation Army. No judgment in it. (Oh!Carmon!Carmon!). 'Ave to go and pick this bloomin' 'at up now I s'pose. 'E don't care,wottrouble 'e gives."
The Angel watched the second tinker walk back, and, with affectionate blasphemy, assist the first to his hat and his coat. Then he turned, absolutely mystified, towards the village again.
After that incident the Angel walked along past the mill and round behind the church, to examine the tombstones.
"This seems to be the place where they put the broken pieces," said the Angel—reading the inscriptions. "Curious word—relict! Resurgam! Then they are not done with quite. What a huge pile it requires to keep her down.... It is spirited of her."
"Hawkins?" said the Angel softly,.... "Hawkins?The name is strange to me.... He did not die then.... It is plain enough,—Joined the Angelic Hosts, May 17, 1863. He must have felt as much out of place as I do down here. But I wonder why they put that little pot thing on the top of this monument. Curious! There are several others about—little stone pots with a rag of stiff stone drapery over them."
Just then the boys came pouring out of the National School, and first one and then severalstopped agape at the Angel's crooked black figure among the white tombs. "Ent 'e gart a bääk on en!" remarked one critic.
"'E's got 'air like a girl!" said another.
The Angel turned towards them. He was struck by the queer little heads sticking up over the lichenous wall. He smiled faintly at their staring faces, and then turned to marvel at the iron railings that enclosed the Fitz-Jarvis tomb. "A queer air of uncertainty," he said. "Slabs, piles of stone, these railings.... Are they afraid?... Do these Dead ever try and get up again? There's an air of repression—fortification——"
"Gét yer'aircut, Gét yer'aircut," sang three little boys together.
"Curious these Human Beings are!" said the Angel. "That man yesterday wanted to cut off my wings, now these little creatures want me to cut off my hair! And the man on the bridge offered to take the 'paint' off me. They will leave nothing of me soon."
"Where did you get that'at?" sang another little boy. "Where did you get them clo'es?"
"They ask questions that they evidently do not want answered," said the Angel. "I can tell from the tone." He looked thoughtfully at the little boys. "I don't understand the methods of Human intercourse. These are probably friendly advances, a kind of ritual. But I don't know the responses. I think I will go back to the little fat man in black, with the gold chain across his stomach, and ask him to explain. It is difficult."
He turned towards the lych gate. "Oh!" said one of the little boys, in a shrill falsetto, and threw a beech-nut husk. It came bounding across the churchyard path. The Angel stopped in surprise.
This made all the little boys laugh. A second imitating the first, said "Oh!" and hit the Angel. His astonishment was really delicious. They all began crying "Oh!" and throwing beechnut husks. One hit the Angel's hand, another stung him smartly by the ear. The Angel made ungainly movements towards them. He spluttered some expostulation and made for the roadway. The little boys were amazed and shocked at his discomfiture and cowardice. Such sawneybehaviour could not be encouraged. The pelting grew vigorously. You may perhaps be able to imagine those vivid moments, daring small boys running in close and delivering shots, milder small boys rushing round behind with flying discharges. Milton Screever's mongrel dog was roused to yelping ecstacy at the sight, and danced (full of wild imaginings) nearer and nearer to the angelic legs.
"Hi, hi!" said a vigorous voice. "I never did! Where's Mr Jarvis? Manners, manners! you young rascals."
The youngsters scattered right and left, some over the wall into the playground, some down the street.
"Frightful pest these boys are getting!" said Crump, coming up. "I'm sorry they have been annoying you."
The Angel seemed quite upset. "I don't understand," he said. "These Human ways...."
"Yes, of course. Unusual to you. How's your excrescence?"
"My what?" said the Angel.
"Bifid limb, you know. How is it? Nowyou're down this way, come in. Come in and let me have a look at it again. You young roughs! And meanwhile these little louts of ours will be getting off home. They're all alike in these villages.Can'tunderstand anything abnormal. See an odd-looking stranger. Chuck a stone. No imagination beyond the parish.... (I'll give you physic if I catch you annoying strangers again.) ... I suppose it's what one might expect.... Come along this way."
So the Angel, horribly perplexed still, was hurried into the surgery to have his wound re-dressed.
In Siddermorton Park is Siddermorton House, where old Lady Hammergallow lives, chiefly upon Burgundy and the little scandals of the village, a dear old lady with a ropy neck, a ruddled countenance and spasmodic gusts of odd temper, whose three remedies for all human trouble among her dependents are, a bottle of gin, a pair of charity blankets, or a new crown piece. The House is a mile-and-a-half out of Siddermorton. Almost all the village is hers, saving a fringe to the south which belongs to Sir John Gotch, and she rules it with an autocratic rule, refreshing in these days of divided government. She orders and forbids marriages, drives objectionable people out of the village by the simple expedient of raising their rent, dismisses labourers, obliges heretics to go to church, and made SusanDangett, who wanted to call her little girl 'Euphemia,' have the infant christened 'Mary-Anne.' She is a sturdy Broad Protestant and disapproves of the Vicar's going bald like a tonsure. She is on the Village Council, which obsequiously trudges up the hill and over the moor to her, and (as she is a trifle deaf) speaks all its speeches into her speaking trumpet instead of a rostrum. She takes no interest now in politics, but until last year she was an active enemy of "that Gladstone." She has parlour maids instead of footmen to do her waiting, because of Hockley, the American stockbroker, and his four Titans in plush.
She exercises what is almost a fascination upon the village. If in the bar-parlour of the Cat and Cornucopia you swear by God no one would be shocked, but if you swore by Lady Hammergallow they would probably be shocked enough to turn you out of the room. When she drives through Siddermorton she always calls upon Bessy Flump, the post-mistress, to hear all that has happened, and then upon Miss Finch, the dressmaker, to check back Bessy Flump.Sometimes she calls upon the Vicar, sometimes upon Mrs Mendham whom she snubs, and even sometimes on Crump. Her sparkling pair of greys almost ran over the Angel as he was walking down to the village.
"Sothat'sthe genius!" said Lady Hammergallow, and turned and looked at him through the gilt glasses on a stick that she always carried in her shrivelled and shaky hand. "Lunatic indeed! The poor creature has rather a pretty face. I'm sorry I've missed him."
But she went on to the vicarage nevertheless, and demanded news of it all. The conflicting accounts of Miss Flump, Miss Finch, Mrs Mendham, Crump, and Mrs Jehoram had puzzled her immensely. The Vicar, hard pressed, did all he could to say into her speaking trumpet what had really happened. He toned down the wings and the saffron robe. But he felt the case was hopeless. He spoke of his protégé as "Mr" Angel. He addressed pathetic asides to the kingfisher. The old lady noticed his confusion. Her queer old head went jerking backwards and forwards, now the speaking trumpet in his face when he hadnothing to say, then the shrunken eyes peering at him, oblivious of the explanation that was coming from his lips. A great many Ohs! and Ahs! She caught some fragments certainly.
"You have asked him to stop with you—indefinitely?" said Lady Hammergallow with a Great Idea taking shape rapidly in her mind.
"I did—perhaps inadvertently—make such—"
"And you don't know where he comes from?"
"Not at all."
"Nor who his father is, I suppose?" said Lady Hammergallow mysteriously.
"No," said the Vicar.
"Now!" said Lady Hammergallow archly, and keeping her glasses to her eye, she suddenly dug at his ribs with her trumpet.
"MydearLady Hammergallow!"
"I thought so. Don't thinkIwould blame you, Mr Hilyer." She gave a corrupt laugh that she delighted in. "The world is the world, and men are men. And the poor boy's a cripple, eh? A kind of judgment. In mourning, I noticed. It reminds me of theScarlet Letter. The mother's dead, I suppose. It's just as well. Really—I'm not anarrowwoman—Irespectyou for having him. Really I do."
"But,LadyHammergallow!"
"Don't spoil everything by denying it. It is so very, very plain, to a woman of the world. That Mrs Mendham! She amuses me with her suspicions. Such odd ideas! In a Curate's wife. But I hope it didn't happen when you were in orders."
"Lady Hammergallow, I protest. Upon my word."
"Mr Hilyer, I protest. Iknow. Not anything you can say will alter my opinion one jot. Don't try. I never suspected you were nearly such an interesting man."
"But this suspicion is unendurable!"
"We will help him together, Mr Hilyer. You may rely upon me. It is most romantic." She beamed benevolence.
"But, Lady Hammergallow, Imustspeak!"
She gripped her ear-trumpet resolutely, and held it before her and shook her head.
"He has quite a genius for music, Vicar, so I hear?"
"I can assure you most solemnly—"
"I thought so. And being a cripple—"
"You are under a most cruel—"
"I thought that if his gift is really what that Jehoram woman says."
"An unjustifiable suspicion that ever a man—"
("I don't think much of her judgment, of course.")
"Consider my position. Have I gainednocharacter?"
"It might be possible to do something for him as a performer."
"Have I—(Bother! It's no good!)"
"And so, dear Vicar, I propose to give him an opportunity of showing us what he can do. I have been thinking it all over as I drove here. On Tuesday next, I will invite just a few people of taste, and he shall bring his violin. Eigh? And if that goes well, I will see if I can get some introductions and reallypushhim."
"ButLady, Lady Hammergallow."
"Not another word!" said Lady Hammergallow, still resolutely holding her speaking trumpet before her and clutching her eyeglasses."I really must not leave those horses. Cutler is so annoyed if I keep them too long. He finds waiting tedious, poor man, unless there is a public-house near." She made for the door.
"Damn!" said the Vicar, under his breath. He had never used the word since he had taken orders. It shows you how an Angel's visit may disorganize a man.
He stood under the verandah watching the carriage drive away. The world seemed coming to pieces about him. Had he lived a virtuous celibate life for thirty odd years in vain? The things of which these people thought him capable! He stood and stared at the green cornfield opposite, and down at the straggling village. It seemed real enough. And yet for the first time in his life there was a queer doubt of its reality. He rubbed his chin, then turned and went slowly upstairs to his dressing-room, and sat for a long time staring at a garment of some yellow texture. "Know his father!" he said. "And he is immortal, and was fluttering about his heaven when my ancestors were marsupials.... I wish he was there now."
He got up and began to feel the robe.
"I wonder how they get such things," said the Vicar. Then he went and stared out of the window. "I suppose everything is wonderful, even the rising and setting of the sun. I suppose there is no adamantine ground for any belief. But one gets into a regular way of taking things. This disturbs it. I seem to be waking up to the Invisible. It is the strangest of uncertainties. I have not felt so stirred and unsettled since my adolescence."
"That's all right," said Crump when the bandaging was replaced. "It's a trick of memory, no doubt, but these excrescences of yours don't seem nearly so large as they did yesterday. I suppose they struck me rather forcibly. Stop and have lunch with me now you're down here. Midday meal, you know. The youngsters will be swallowed up by school again in the afternoon."
"I never saw anything heal so well in my life," he said, as they walked into the dining-room. "Your blood and flesh must be as clean and free from bacteria as they make 'em. Whatever stuff there is in your head," he addedsotto voce.
At lunch he watched the Angel narrowly, and talked to draw him out.
"Journey tire you yesterday?" he said suddenly.
"Journey!" said the Angel. "Oh! my wings felt a little stiff."
("Not to be had,") said Crump to himself. ("Suppose I must enter into it.")
"So you flew all the way, eigh? No conveyance?"
"There wasn't any way," explained the Angel, taking mustard. "I was flying up a symphony with some Griffins and Fiery Cherubim, and suddenly everything went dark and I was in this world of yours."
"Dear me!" said Crump. "And that's why you haven't any luggage." He drew his serviette across his mouth, and a smile flickered in his eyes.
"I suppose you know this world of ours pretty well? Watching us over the adamantine walls and all that kind of thing. Eigh?"
"Not very well. We dream of it sometimes. In the moonlight, when the Nightmares have fanned us to sleep with their wings."
"Ah, yes—of course," said Crump. "Verypoetical way of putting it. Won't you take some Burgundy? It's just beside you."
"There's a persuasion in this world, you know, that Angels' Visits are by no means infrequent. Perhaps some of your—friends have travelled? They are supposed to come down to deserving persons in prisons, and do refined Nautches and that kind of thing. Faust business, you know."
"I've never heard of anything of the kind," said the Angel.
"Only the other day a lady whose baby was my patient for the time being—indigestion—assured me that certain facial contortions the little creature made indicated that it was Dreaming of Angels. In the novels of Mrs Henry Wood that is spoken of as an infallible symptom of an early departure. I suppose you can't throw any light on that obscure pathological manifestation?"
"I don't understand it at all," said the Angel, puzzled, and not clearly apprehending the Doctor's drift.
("Getting huffy,") said Crump to himself. ("Sees I'm poking fun at him.") "There'sone thing I'm curious about. Do the new arrivals complain much about their medical attendants? I've always fancied there must be a good deal of hydropathic talk just at first. I was looking at that picture in the Academy only this June...."
"New Arrivals!" said the Angel. "I really don't follow you."
The Doctor stared. "Don't they come?"
"Come!" said the Angel. "Who?"
"The people who die here."
"After they've gone to pieces here?"
"That's the general belief, you know."
"People, like the woman who screamed out of the door, and the blackfaced man and his volutations and the horrible little things that threw husks!—certainly not.Inever saw such creatures before I fell into this world."
"Oh! but come!" said the Doctor. "You'll tell me next your official robes are not white and that you can't play the harp."
"There's no such thing as white in the Angelic Land," said the Angel. "It's that queer blank colour you get by mixing up all the others."
"Why, my dear Sir!" said the doctor, suddenly altering his tone, "you positively know nothing about the Land you come from. White's the very essence of it."
The Angel stared at him. Was the man jesting? He looked perfectly serious.
"Look here," said Crump, and getting up, he went to the sideboard on which a copy of the Parish Magazine was lying. He brought it round to the Angel and opened it at the coloured supplement. "Here's somerealangels," he said. "You see it's not simply the wings make the Angel. White you see, with a curly whisp of robe, sailing up into the sky with their wings furled. Those are angels on the best authority. Hydroxyl kind of hair. One has a bit of a harp, you see, and the other is helping this wingless lady—kind of larval Angel, you know—upward."
"Oh! but really!" said the Angel, "those are not angels at all."
"But theyare," said Crump, putting the magazine back on the sideboard and resuming his seat with an air of intense satisfaction. "I can assure you I have thebestauthority...."
"I can assure you...."
Crump tucked in the corners of his mouth and shook his head from side to side even as he had done to the Vicar. "No good," he said, "can't alter our ideas just because an irresponsible visitor...."
"If these are angels," said the Angel, "then I have never been in the Angelic Land."
"Precisely," said Crump, ineffably self-satisfied; "that was just what I was getting at."
The Angel stared at him for a minute round-eyed, and then was seized for the second time by the human disorder of laughter.
"Ha, ha, ha!" said Crump, joining in. "Ithoughtyou were not quite so mad as you seemed. Ha, ha, ha!"
And for the rest of the lunch they were both very merry, for entirely different reasons, and Crump insisted upon treating the Angel as a "dorg" of the highest degree.
After the Angel had left Crump's house he went up the hill again towards the Vicarage. But—possibly moved by the desire to avoid Mrs Gustick—he turned aside at the stile and made a detour by the Lark's Field and Bradley's Farm.
He came upon the Respectable Tramp slumbering peacefully among the wild-flowers. He stopped to look, struck by the celestial tranquillity of that individual's face. And even as he did so the Respectable Tramp awoke with a start and sat up. He was a pallid creature, dressed in rusty black, with a broken-spirited crush hat cocked over one eye. "Good afternoon," he said affably. "How are you?"
"Very well, thank you," said the Angel, who had mastered the phrase.
The Respectable Tramp eyed the Angel critically. "Padding the Hoof, matey?" he said. "Like me."
The Angel was puzzled by him. "Why," asked the Angel, "do you sleep like this instead of sleeping up in the air on a Bed?"
"Well I'm blowed!" said the Respectable Tramp. "Why don't I sleep in a bed? Well, it's like this. Sandringham's got the painters in, there's the drains up in Windsor Castle, and I 'aven't no other 'ouse to go to. You 'aven't the price of a arf pint in your pocket, 'ave yer?"
"I have nothing in my pocket," said the Angel.
"Is this here village called Siddermorton?" said the Tramp, rising creakily to his feet and pointing to the clustering roofs down the hill.
"Yes," said the Angel, "they call it Siddermorton."
"I know it, I know it," said the Tramp. "And a very pretty little village it is too." He stretched and yawned, and stood regarding the place. "'Ouses," he said reflectively; "Projuce"—waving his hand at the cornfields and orchards. "Looks cosy, don't it?"
"It has a quaint beauty of its own," said the Angel.
"It'asa quaint beauty of its own—yes....Lord! I'd like to sack the blooming place.... I was born there."
"Dear me," said the Angel.
"Yes, I was born there. Ever heard of a pithed frog?"
"Pithed frog," said the Angel. "No!"
"It's a thing these here vivisectionists do. They takes a frog and they cuts out his brains and they shoves a bit of pith in the place of 'em. That's a pithed frog. Well—that there village is full of pithed human beings."
The Angel took it quite seriously. "Is that so?" he said.
"That's so—you take my word for it. Everyone of them 'as 'ad their brains cut out and chunks of rotten touchwood put in the place of it. And you see that little red place there?"
"That's called the national school," said the Angel.
"Yes—that's where they piths 'em," said the Tramp, quite in love with his conceit.
"Really! That's very interesting."
"It stands to reason," said the Tramp. "If they 'ad brains they'd 'ave ideas, and if they 'adideas they'd think for themselves. And you can go through that village from end to end and never meet anybody doing as much. Pithed human beings they are. I know that village. I was born there, and I might be there now, a toilin' for my betters, if I 'adnt struck against the pithin'."
"Is it a painful operation?" asked the Angel.
"In parts. Though it aint the heads gets hurt. And it lasts a long time. They take 'em young into that school, and they says to them, 'come in 'ere and we'll improve your minds,' they says, and in the little kiddies go as good as gold. And they begins shovin' it into them. Bit by bit and 'ard and dry, shovin' out the nice juicy brains. Dates and lists and things. Out they comes, no brains in their 'eads, and wound up nice and tight, ready to touch their 'ats to anyone who looks at them. Why! One touched 'is 'at to me yesterday. And they runs about spry and does all the dirty work, and feels thankful they're allowed to live. They take a positive pride in 'ard work for its own sake. Arter they bin pithed. See that chap ploughin'?"
"Yes," said the Angel; "ishepithed?"
"Rather. Else he'd be paddin' the hoof this pleasant weather—like me and the blessed Apostles."
"I begin to understand," said the Angel, rather dubiously.
"I knew you would," said the Philosophical Tramp. "I thought you was the right sort. But speaking serious, aint it ridiculous?—centuries and centuries of civilization, and look at that poor swine there, sweatin' 'isself empty and trudging up that 'ill-side. 'E's English, 'e is. 'E belongs to the top race in creation, 'e does. 'E's one of the rulers of Indjer. It's enough to make a nigger laugh. The flag that's braved a thousand years the battle an' the breeze—that's'isflag. There never was a country was as great and glorious as this. Never. And that's wot it makes of us. I'll tell you a little story about them parts as you seems to be a bit of a stranger. There's a chap called Gotch, Sir John Gotch they calls 'im, and when'ewas a young gent from Oxford, I was a little chap of eight and my sister was a girl of seventeen. Theirservant she was. But Lord! everybody's 'eard that story—it's common enough, of 'im or the likes of 'im."
"I haven't," said the Angel.
"All that's pretty and lively of the gals they chucks into the gutters, and all the men with a pennorth of spunk or adventure, all who won't drink what the Curate's wife sends 'em instead of beer, and touch their hats promiscous, and leave the rabbits and birds alone for their betters, gets drove out of the villages as rough characters. Patriotism! Talk about improvin' the race! Wot's left aint fit to look a nigger in the face, a Chinaman 'ud be ashamed of 'em...."
"But I don't understand," said the Angel. "I don't follow you."
At that the Philosophic Tramp became more explicit, and told the Angel the simple story of Sir John Gotch and the kitchen-maid. It's scarcely necessary to repeat it. You may understand that it left the Angel puzzled. It was full of words he did not understand, for the only vehicle of emotion the Tramp possessed was blasphemy. Yet, though their tongues differedso, he could still convey to the Angel some of his own (probably unfounded) persuasion of the injustice and cruelty of life, and of the utter detestableness of Sir John Gotch.
The last the Angel saw of him was his dusty black back receding down the lane towards Iping Hanger. A pheasant appeared by the roadside, and the Philosophical Tramp immediately caught up a stone and sent the bird clucking with a viciously accurate shot. Then he disappeared round the corner.
"I heard some one playing the fiddle in the Vicarage, as I came by," said Mrs Jehoram, taking her cup of tea from Mrs Mendham.
"The Vicar plays," said Mrs Mendham. "I have spoken to George about it, but it's no good. I do not think a Vicar should be allowed to do such things. It's so foreign. But there,he...."
"I know, dear," said Mrs Jehoram. "But I heard the Vicar once at the schoolroom. I don't think thiswasthe Vicar. It was quite clever, some of it, quite smart, you know. And new. I was telling dear Lady Hammergallow this morning. I fancy—"
"The lunatic! Very likely. These half-witted people.... My dear, I don't think I shall ever forget that dreadful encounter. Yesterday."
"Nor I."
"My poor girls! They are too shocked to say a word about it. I was telling dear Lady Ham——"
"Quite proper of them. It wasdreadful, dear. For them."
"And now, dear, I want you to tell me frankly—Do you really believe that creature was a man?"
"You should have heard the violin."
"I still more than half suspect, Jessie ——" Mrs Mendham leant forward as if to whisper.
Mrs Jehoram helped herself to cake. "I'm sure no woman could play the violin quite like I heard it played this morning."
"Of course, if you say so that settles the matter," said Mrs Mendham. Mrs Jehoram was the autocratic authority in Siddermorton upon all questions of art, music and belles-lettres. Her late husband had been a minor poet. Then Mrs Mendham added a judicial "Still—"
"Do you know," said Mrs Jehoram, "I'm half inclined to believe the dear Vicar's story."
"Howgoodof you, Jessie," said Mrs Mendham.
"But really, I don't think hecouldhave had any one in the Vicarage before that afternoon. Ifeel sure we should have heard of it. I don't see how a strange cat could come within four miles of Siddermorton without the report coming round to us. The people here gossip so...."
"I always distrust the Vicar," said Mrs Mendham. "I know him."
"Yes. But the story is plausible. If this Mr Angel were someone very clever and eccentric—"
"He would have to beveryeccentric to dress as he did. There are degrees and limits, dear."
"But kilts," said Mrs Jehoram.
"Are all very well in the Highlands...."
Mrs Jehoram's eyes had rested upon a black speck creeping slowly across a patch of yellowish-green up the hill.
"There he goes," said Mrs Jehoram, rising, "across the cornfield. I'm sure that's him. I can see the hump. Unless it's a man with a sack. Bless me, Minnie! here's an opera glass. How convenient for peeping at the Vicarage!... Yes, it's the man. He is a man. Withsucha sweet face."
Very unselfishly she allowed her hostess toshare the opera glass. For a minute there was a rustling silence.
"His dress," said Mrs Mendham, "isquiterespectable now."
"Quite," said Mrs Jehoram.
Pause.
"He looks cross!"
"And his coat is dusty."
"He walks steadily enough," said Mrs Mendham, "or one might think.... This hot weather...."
Another pause.
"You see, dear," said Mrs Jehoram, putting down the lorgnette. "What I was going to say was, that possibly he might be a genius in disguise."
"If you can call next door to nothing a disguise."
"No doubt it was eccentric. But I've seen children in little blouses, not at all unlike him. So many clever peoplearepeculiar in their dress and manners. A genius may steal a horse where a bank-clerk may not look over the hedge. Very possibly he's quite well known and laughingat our Arcadian simplicity. And really it wasn't so improper as some of these New Women bicycling costumes. I saw one in one of the Illustrated Papers only a few days ago—theNew BudgetI think—quite tights, you know, dear. No—I cling to the genius theory. Especially after the playing. I'm sure the creature is original. Perhaps very amusing. In fact, I intend to ask the Vicar to introduce me."
"My dear!" cried Mrs Mendham.
"I'm resolute," said Mrs Jehoram.
"I'm afraid you're rash," said Mrs Mendham. "Geniuses and people of that kind are all very well in London. But here—at the Vicarage."
"We are going to educate the folks. I love originality. At any rate I mean to see him."
"Take care you don't see too much of him," said Mrs Mendham. "I've heard the fashion is quite changing. I understand that some of the very best people have decided that genius is not to be encouraged any more. These recent scandals...."
"Only in literature, I can assure you, dear. In music...."
"Nothing you can say, my dear," said Mrs Mendham, going off at a tangent, "will convince me that that person's costume was not extremely suggestive and improper."
The Angel came thoughtfully by the hedge across the field towards the Vicarage. The rays of the setting sun shone on his shoulders, and touched the Vicarage with gold, and blazed like fire in all the windows. By the gate, bathed in the sunlight, stood little Delia, the waiting maid. She stood watching him under her hand. It suddenly came into the Angel's mind that she, at least, was beautiful, and not only beautiful but alive and warm.
She opened the gate for him and stood aside. She was sorry for him, for her elder sister was a cripple. He bowed to her, as he would have done to any woman, and for just one moment looked into her face. She looked back at him and something leapt within her.
The Angel made an irresolute movement."Your eyes are very beautiful," he said quietly, with a remote wonder in his voice.
"Oh, sir!" she said, starting back. The Angel's expression changed to perplexity. He went on up the pathway between the Vicar's flower-beds, and she stood with the gate held open in her hand, staring after him. Just under the rose-twined verandah he turned and looked at her.
She still stared at him for a moment, and then with a queer gesture turned round with her back to him, shutting the gate as she did so, and seemed to be looking down the valley towards the church tower.
At the dinner table the Angel told the Vicar the more striking of his day's adventures.
"The strange thing," said the Angel, "is the readiness of you Human Beings—the zest, with which you inflict pain. Those boys pelting me this morning——"
"Seemed to enjoy it," said the Vicar. "I know."
"Yet they don't like pain," said the Angel.
"No," said the Vicar; "theydon't like it."
"Then," said the Angel, "I saw some beautiful plants rising with a spike of leaves, two this way and two that, and when I caressed one it caused the most uncomfortable——"
"Stinging nettle!" said the Vicar.
"At any rate a new sort of pain. And anotherplant with a head like a coronet, and richly decorated leaves, spiked and jagged——"
"A thistle, possibly."
"And in your garden, the beautiful, sweet-smelling plant——"
"The sweet briar," said the Vicar. "I remember."
"And that pink flower that sprang out of the box——"
"Out of the box?" said the Vicar.
"Last night," said the Angel, "that went climbing up the curtains—— Flame!"
"Oh!—the matches and the candles! Yes," said the Vicar.
"Then the animals. A dog to-day behaved most disagreeably——. And these boys, and the way in which people speak——. Everyone seems anxious—willing at any rate—to give this Pain. Every one seems busy giving pain——"
"Or avoiding it," said the Vicar, pushing his dinner away before him. "Yes—of course. It's fighting everywhere. The whole living world is a battle-field—the whole world. We are drivenby Pain. Here. How it lies on the surface! This Angel sees it in a day!"
"But why does everyone—everything—want to give pain?" asked the Angel.
"It is not so in the Angelic Land?" said the Vicar.
"No," said the Angel. "Why is it so here?"
The Vicar wiped his lips with his napkin slowly. "Itisso," he said. "Pain," said he still more slowly, "is the warp and the woof of this life. Do you know," he said, after a pause, "it is almost impossible for me to imagine ... a world without pain.... And yet, as you played this morning——
"But this world is different. It is the very reverse of an Angelic world. Indeed, a number of people—excellent religious people—have been so impressed by the universality of pain that they think, after death, things will be even worse for a great many of us. It seems to me an excessive view. But it's a deep question. Almost beyond one's power of discussion——"
And incontinently the Vicar plumped into an impromptu dissertation upon "Necessity," howthings were so because they were so, how onehadto do this and that. "Even our food," said the Vicar. "What?" said the Angel. "Is not obtained without inflicting Pain," said the Vicar.
The Angel's face went so white that the Vicar checked himself suddenly. Or he was just on the very verge of a concise explanation of the antecedents of a leg of lamb. There was a pause.
"By-the-bye," said the Angel, suddenly. "Have you been pithed? Like the common people."
When Lady Hammergallow made up her mind, things happened as she resolved. And though the Vicar made a spasmodic protest, she carried out her purpose and got audience, Angel, and violin together, at Siddermorton House before the week was out. "A genius the Vicar has discovered," she said; so with eminent foresight putting any possibility of blame for a failure on the Vicar's shoulders. "The dear Vicar tells me," she would say, and proceed to marvellous anecdotes of the Angel's cleverness with his instrument. But she was quite in love with her idea—she had always had a secret desire to play the patroness to obscure talent. Hitherto it had not turned out to be talent when it came to the test.
"It would be such a good thing for him," shesaid. "His hair is long already, and with that high colour he would be beautiful, simply beautiful on a platform. The Vicar's clothes fitting him so badly makes him look quite like a fashionable pianist already. And the scandal of his birth—not told, of course, but whispered—would be—quite an Inducement——when he gets to London, that is."
The Vicar had the most horrible sensations as the day approached. He spent hours trying to explain the situation to the Angel, other hours trying to imagine what people would think, still worse hours trying to anticipate the Angel's behaviour. Hitherto the Angel had always played for his own satisfaction. The Vicar would startle him every now and then by rushing upon him with some new point of etiquette that had just occurred to him. As for instance: "It's very important where you put your hat, you know. Don't put it on a chair, whatever you do. Hold it until you get your tea, you know, and then—let me see—then put it down somewhere, you know." The journey to Siddermorton House wasaccomplished without misadventure, but at the moment of introduction the Vicar had a spasm of horrible misgivings. He had forgotten to explain introductions. The Angel's naïve amusement was evident, but nothing very terrible happened.
"Rummy looking greaser," said Mr Rathbone Slater, who devoted considerable attention to costume. "Wants grooming. No manners. Grinned when he saw me shaking hands. Did itchicenough, I thought."
One trivial misadventure occurred. When Lady Hammergallow welcomed the Angel she looked at him through her glasses. The apparent size of her eyes startled him. His surprise and his quick attempt to peer over the brims was only too evident. But the Vicar had warned him of the ear trumpet.
The Angel's incapacity to sit on anything but a music stool appeared to excite some interest among the ladies, but led to no remarks. They regarded it perhaps as the affectation of a budding professional. He was remiss with the teacups and scattered the crumbs of his cakeabroad. (You must remember he was quite an amateur at eating.) He crossed his legs. He fumbled over the hat business after vainly trying to catch the Vicar's eye. The eldest Miss Papaver tried to talk to him about continental watering places and cigarettes, and formed a low opinion of his intelligence.
The Angel was surprised by the production of an easel and several books of music, and a little unnerved at first by the sight of Lady Hammergallow sitting with her head on one side, watching him with those magnified eyes through her gilt glasses.
Mrs Jehoram came up to him before he began to play and asked him the Name of the Charming Piece he was playing the other afternoon. The Angel said it had no name, and Mrs Jehoram thought music ought never to have any names and wanted to know who it was by, and when the Angel told her he played it out of his head, she said he must be Quite a Genius and looked open (and indisputably fascinating) admiration at him. The Curate from Iping Hanger (who was professionally a Kelt and who played the piano andtalked colour and music with an air of racial superiority) watched him jealously.
The Vicar, who was presently captured and set down next to Lady Hammergallow, kept an anxious eye ever Angelward while she told him particulars of the incomes made by violinists—particulars which, for the most part, she invented as she went along. She had been a little ruffled by the incident of the glasses, but had decided that it came within the limits of permissible originality.
So figure to yourself the Green Saloon at Siddermorton Park; an Angel thinly disguised in clerical vestments and with a violin in his hands, standing by the grand piano, and a respectable gathering of quiet nice people, nicely dressed, grouped about the room. Anticipatory gabble—one hears scattered fragments of conversation.
"He isincog."; said the very eldest Miss Papaver to Mrs Pirbright. "Isn't it quaint and delicious. Jessica Jehoram says she saw him at Vienna, but she can't remember the name. The Vicar knows all about him, but he is so close——"
"How hot and uncomfortable the dear Vicar is looking," said Mrs Pirbright. "I've noticed it before when he sits next to Lady Hammergallow. She simply willnotrespect his cloth. She goes on——"
"His tie is all askew," said the very eldest Miss Papaver, "and his hair! It really hardly looks as though he had brushed it all day."
"Seems a foreign sort of chap. Affected. All very well in a drawing-room," said George Harringay, sitting apart with the younger Miss Pirbright. "But for my part give me a masculine man and a feminine woman. What do you think?"
"Oh!—I think so too," said the younger Miss Pirbright.
"Guineas and guineas," said Lady Hammergallow. "I've heard that some of them keep quite stylish establishments. You would scarcely credit it——"
"I love music, Mr Angel, I adore it. It stirs something in me. I can scarcely describe it," said Mrs Jehoram. "Who is it says that delicious antithesis: Life without music is brutality; musicwithout life is—— Dear me! perhaps you remember? Music without life——it's Ruskin I think?"
"I'm sorry that I do not," said the Angel. "I have read very few books."
"How charming of you!" said Mrs Jehoram. "I wish I didn't. I sympathise with you profoundly. I would do the same, only we poor women——I suppose it's originality we lack—— And down here one is driven to the most desperate proceedings——"
"He's certainly verypretty. But the ultimate test of a man is his strength," said George Harringay. "What do you think?"
"Oh!—I think so too," said the younger Miss Pirbright.
"It's the effeminate man who makes the masculine woman. When the glory of a man is his hair, what's a woman to do? And when men go running about with beautiful hectic dabs——"
"Oh George! You are so dreadfully satirical to-day," said the younger Miss Pirbright. "I'msureit isn't paint."
"I'm really not his guardian, my dear LadyHammergallow. Of course it's very kind indeed of you to take such an interest——"
"Are you really going to improvise?" said Mrs Jehoram in a state of cooing delight.
"SSsh!" said the curate from Iping Hanger.
Then the Angel began to play, looking straight before him as he did so, thinking of the wonderful things of the Angelic Land, and yet insensibly letting the sadness he was beginning to feel, steal over the fantasia he was playing. When he forgot his company the music was strange and sweet; when the sense of his surroundings floated into his mind the music grew capricious and grotesque. But so great was the hold of the Angelic music upon the Vicar that his anxieties fell from him at once, so soon as the Angel began to play. Mrs Jehoram sat and looked rapt and sympathetic as hard as she could (though the music was puzzling at times) and tried to catch the Angel's eye. He really had a wonderfully mobile face, and the tenderest shades of expression! And Mrs Jehoram was a judge. George Harringay looked bored, until the younger Miss Pirbright, who adored him, put out her mousylittle shoe to touch his manly boot, and then he turned his face to catch the feminine delicacy of her coquettish eye, and was comforted. The very eldest Miss Papaver and Mrs Pirbright sat quite still and looked churchy for nearly four minutes.
Then said the eldest Miss Papaver in a whisper, "I always Enjoy violin music so much." And Mrs Pirbright answered, "We get so little Nice music down here." And Miss Papaver said, "He plays Very nicely." And Mrs Pirbright, "Such a Delicate Touch!" And Miss Papaver, "Does Willie keep up his lessons?" and so to a whispered conversation.
The Curate from Iping Hanger sat (he felt) in full view of the company. He had one hand curled round his ear, and his eyes hard and staring fixedly at the pedestal of the Hammergallow Sèvres vase. He supplied, by the movements of his mouth, a kind of critical guide to any of the company who were disposed to avail themselves of it. It was a generous way he had. His aspect was severely judicial, tempered by starts of evident disapproval and guardedappreciation. The Vicar leaned back in his chair and stared at the Angel's face, and was presently rapt away in a wonderful dream. Lady Hammergallow, with quick jerky movements of the head and a low but insistent rustling, surveyed and tried to judge of the effect of the Angelic playing. Mr Rathbone-Slater stared very solemnly into his hat and looked very miserable, and Mrs Rathbone-Slater made mental memoranda of Mrs Jehoram's sleeves. And the air about them all was heavy with exquisite music—for all that had ears to hear.
"Scarcely affected enough," whispered Lady Hammergallow hoarsely, suddenly poking the Vicar in the ribs. The Vicar came out of Dreamland suddenly. "Eigh?" shouted the Vicar, startled, coming up with a jump. "Sssh!" said the Curate from Iping Hanger, and everyone looked shocked at the brutal insensibility of Hilyer. "So unusual of the Vicar," said the very eldest Miss Papaver, "to do things like that!" The Angel went on playing.
The Curate from Iping Hanger began making mesmeric movements with his index finger, andas the thing proceeded Mr Rathbone-Slater got amazingly limp. He solemnly turned his hat round and altered his view. The Vicar lapsed from an uneasy discomfort into dreamland again. Lady Hammergallow rustled a great deal, and presently found a way of making her chair creak. And at last the thing came to an end. Lady Hammergallow exclaimed "De—licious!" though she had never heard a note, and began clapping her hands. At that everyone clapped except Mr Rathbone-Slater, who rapped his hat brim instead. The Curate from Iping Hanger clapped with a judicial air.
"So I said (clap, clap, clap), if you cannot cook the food my way (clap, clap, clap) you mustgo," said Mrs Pirbright, clapping vigorously. "(This music is a delightful treat.)"
"(It is. I alwaysrevelin music,)" said the very eldest Miss Papaver. "And did she improve after that?"
"Not a bit of it," said Mrs Pirbright.
The Vicar woke up again and stared round the saloon. Did other people see these visions, or were they confined to him alone? Surely theymust all see ... and have a wonderful command of their feelings. It was incredible that such music should not affect them. "He's a triflegauche," said Lady Hammergallow, jumping upon the Vicar's attention. "He neither bows nor smiles. He must cultivate oddities like that. Every successful executant is more or lessgauche."
"Did you really make that up yourself?" said Mrs Jehoram, sparkling her eyes at him, "as you went along. Really, it iswonderful! Nothing less than wonderful."
"A little amateurish," said the Curate from Iping Hanger to Mr Rathbone-Slater. "A great gift, undoubtedly, but a certain lack of sustained training. There were one or two little things ... I would like to talk to him."
"His trousers look like concertinas," said Mr Rathbone-Slater. "He ought to be toldthat. It's scarcely decent."
"Can you do Imitations, Mr Angel?" said Lady Hammergallow.
"Ohdo, do some Imitations!" said Mrs Jehoram. "I adore Imitations."
"It was a fantastic thing," said the Curate of Iping Hanger to the Vicar of Siddermorton, waving his long indisputably musical hands as he spoke; "a little involved, to my mind. I have heard it before somewhere—I forget where. He has genius undoubtedly, but occasionally he is—loose. There is a certain deadly precision wanting. There are years of discipline yet."
"Idon'tadmire these complicated pieces of music," said George Harringay. "I have simple tastes, I'm afraid. There seems to me notunein it. There's nothing I like so much as simple music. Tune, simplicity is the need of the age, in my opinion. We are so over subtle. Everything is far-fetched. Home grown thoughts and 'Home, Sweet Home' for me. What do you think?"
"Oh! I think so—quite," said the younger Miss Pirbright.
"Well, Amy, chattering to George as usual?" said Mrs Pirbright, across the room.
"As usual, Ma!" said the younger Miss Pirbright, glancing round with a bright smile atMiss Papaver, and turning again so as not to lose the next utterance from George.
"I wonder if you and Mr Angel could manage a duet?" said Lady Hammergallow to the Curate from Iping Hanger, who was looking preternaturally gloomy.
"I'm sure I should be delighted," said the Curate from Iping Hanger, brightening up.
"Duets!" said the Angel; "the two of us. Then he can play. I understood—the Vicar told me—"
"Mr Wilmerdings is an accomplished pianist," interrupted the Vicar.
"But the Imitations?" said Mrs Jehoram, who detested Wilmerdings.
"Imitations!" said the Angel.
"A pig squeaking, a cock crowing, you know," said Mr Rathbone-Slater, and added lower, "Best fun you can get out of a fiddle—myopinion."
"I really don't understand," said the Angel. "A pig crowing!"
"You don't like Imitations," said Mrs Jehoram."Nor do I—really. I accept the snub. I think they degrade...."
"Perhaps afterwards Mr Angel will Relent," said Lady Hammergallow, when Mrs Pirbright had explained the matter to her. She could scarcely credit her ear-trumpet. When she asked for Imitations she was accustomed to get Imitations.
Mr Wilmerdings had seated himself at the piano, and had turned to a familiar pile of music in the recess. "What do you think of that Barcarole thing of Spohr's?" he said over his shoulder. "I suppose you know it?" The Angel looked bewildered.
He opened the folio before the Angel.
"What an odd kind of book!" said the Angel. "What do all those crazy dots mean?" (At that the Vicar's blood ran cold.)
"What dots?" said the Curate.
"There!" said the Angel with incriminating finger.
"Ohcome!" said the Curate.
There was one of those swift, short silences that mean so much in a social gathering.
Then the eldest Miss Papaver turned upon theVicar. "Does not Mr Angel play from ordinary.... Music—from the ordinary notation?"
"I have never heard," said the Vicar, getting red now after the first shock of horror. "I have really never seen...."
The Angel felt the situation was strained, though what was straining it he could not understand. He became aware of a doubtful, an unfriendly look upon the faces that regarded him. "Impossible!" he heard Mrs Pirbright say; "after thatbeautifulmusic." The eldest Miss Papaver went to Lady Hammergallow at once, and began to explain into her ear-trumpet that Mr Angel did not wish to play with Mr Wilmerdings, and alleged an ignorance of written music.
"He cannot play from Notes!" said Lady Hammergallow in a voice of measured horror. "Non—sense!"
"Notes!" said the Angel perplexed. "Are these notes?"
"It's carrying the joke too far—simply because he doesn't want to play with Wilmerdings," said Mr Rathbone-Slater to George Harringay.
There was an expectant pause. The Angelperceived he had to be ashamed of himself. He was ashamed of himself.
"Then," said Lady Hammergallow, throwing her head back and speaking with deliberate indignation, as she rustled forward, "if you cannot play with Mr Wilmerdings I am afraid I cannot ask you to play again." She made it sound like an ultimatum. Her glasses in her hand quivered violently with indignation. The Angel was now human enough to appreciate the fact that he was crushed.
"What is it?" said little Lucy Rustchuck in the further bay.
"He's refused to play with old Wilmerdings," said Tommy Rathbone-Slater. "What a lark! The old girl's purple. She thinks heaps of that ass, Wilmerdings."
"Perhaps, Mr Wilmerdings, you will favour us with that delicious Polonaise of Chopin's," said Lady Hammergallow. Everybody else was hushed. The indignation of Lady Hammergallow inspired much the same silence as a coming earthquake or an eclipse. Mr Wilmerdings perceived he would be doing a real social service to beginat once, and (be it entered to his credit now that his account draws near its settlement) he did.