Mulliner Nights (19 page)
Then,
desperate, he did what he should, of course, have done at the very outset.
Grabbing the table-cloth, he edged round with extraordinary stealth till he was
in the cat’s immediate rear, and dropped it over him just as he was tensing his
muscles for another leap. Then, flinging himself on the mixture of cat and
table-cloth, he wound them up into a single convenient parcel.
Exceedingly
pleased with himself Eustace felt at this point. It seemed to him that he had
shown resource, intelligence, and an agility highly creditable in one who had
not played Rugby football for years. A good deal of bitter criticism was
filtering through the cloth, but he overlooked it. Francis, he knew, when he
came to think the thing over calmly, would realize that he -deserved all he was
getting. He had always found Francis a fair-minded cat, when the cold sobriety
of his judgment was not warped by the sight of canaries.
He was about
to murmur a word or two to this effect, in the hope of inducing the animal to
behave less like a gyroscope, when, looking round, he perceived that he was not
alone.
Standing
grouped about the doorway were his Aunt Georgiana, the girl, Marcella
Tyrrwhitt, and the well-remembered figure of Orlando Wotherspoon.
‘Lady
Beazley-Beazley, Miss Tyrrwhitt, Mr Orlando Wotherspoon,’ announced Blenkinsop.
‘Tea is served, sir.’
A wordless cry
broke from Eustace’s lips. The table-cloth fell from his nerveless fingers. And
the cat, Francis, falling on his head on the carpet, shot straight up the side
of the wall and entrenched himself on top of the curtains.
There was a
pause. Eustace did not know quite what to say. He felt embarrassed.
It was Orlando
Wotherspoon who broke the silence.
‘So!’ said
Orlando Wotherspoon. At your old games, Mulliner, I perceive.
Eustace’s Aunt
Georgiana was pointing dramatically.
‘He threw
cucumber sandwiches at my cat!’
‘So I observe,’
said Wotherspoon. He spoke in ‘an unpleasant, quiet voice, and he was looking
not unlike a high priest of one of the rougher religions who runs his eye over
the human sacrifice preparatory to asking his caddy for the niblick. ‘Also, if
I mistake not, sultana cake and muffins.’
‘Would you
require fresh muffins, sir?’ asked Blenkinsop.
‘The case, in
short, would appear to be on all fours,’ proceeded Wotherspoon, ‘with that of J.
B. Stokes, of 9, Mangles-bury Mansions, West Kensington.’
‘Listen!’ said
Eustace, backing towards the window. ‘I can explain everything.’
‘There is no
need of explanations, Mulliner,’ said ‘Orlando Wotherspoon. He had rolled up
the left sleeve of his coat and was beginning to roll up the right. He twitched
his biceps to limber it up. ‘The matter explains itself.’
Eustace’s Aunt
Georgiana, who had been standing under the curtain making chirruping noises,
came back to the group in no agreeable frame of mind. Overwrought by what had
occurred, Francis had cut her dead, and she was feeling it a good deal.
‘If I may use
your telephone, Eustace,’ she said quietly, ‘I would like to ring up my lawyer
and disinherit you. But first,’ she added to Wotherspoon, who was now inhaling
and expelling the breath from his nostrils in rather a disturbing manner, ‘would
you oblige me by thrashing him within an inch of his life?’
‘I was about
to do so, madam,’ replied Wotherspoon courteously. ‘If this young lady will
kindly stand a little to one side-’
‘Shall I
prepare some more cucumber sandwiches, sir?’ asked Blenkinsop.
‘Wait!’ cried
Marcella Tyrrwhitt, who hitherto had not spoken.
Orlando
Wotherspoon shook his head gently.
‘If,
deprecating scenes of violence, it is your intention, Miss Tyrrwhitt—Any
relation of my old friend, Major-General George Tyrrwhitt of the Buffs, by the
way?’
‘My uncle.’
‘Well, well! I
was dining with him only last night.’
‘It’s a small
world, after all,’ said Lady Beazley-Beazley.
‘It is,
indeed,’ said Orlando Wotherspoon. ‘So small that I feel there is scarcely room
in it for both Mulliner the cat-slosher and myself. I shall, therefore, do my
humble best to eliminate him. And, as I was about to say, if, deprecating
scenes of violence, you were about to plead for the young man, it will, I fear,
‘be useless. I can listen to no intercession. The regulations of Our Dumb Chums’
League are very strict.’
Marcella
Tyrrwhitt uttered a hard, rasping laugh.
‘Intercession?’
she said. ‘What do you mean — intercession? I wasn’t going to intercede for
this wambling misfit. I was going to ask if I could have first whack.’
‘Indeed? Might
I enquire why?’
Marcella’s
eyes flashed. Eustace became convinced, he tells me, that she had Spanish blood
in her.
‘Would you
desire another sultana cake, sir?’ asked Blenkinsop.
‘I’ll tell you
why,’ cried Marcella. ‘Do you know what this man has done? I left my dog,
Reginald, in his care, and he swore to guard and cherish him. And what
occurred? My back was hardly turned when he went and gave him away as a
birthday present to some foul female of the, name of Beatrice Something.’
Eustace
uttered a strangled cry.
‘Let me
explain!’
‘I was in
Paris,’ proceeded Marcella, ‘walking along the Champs-Elysées, and I saw a girl
coming towards me with a, Peke, and I said to myself: “Hullo, that Peke looks
extraordinarily like my Reginald,” and then she came up and it was Reginald,
and I said: “Here! Hey! What are you doing with my Peke Reginald?” and this
girl said: “What do you mean, your Peke Reginald? It’s my Peke Percival, and it
was given to me as a birthday present by a friend of mine named Eustace
Mulliner.” And I bounded on to the next aeroplane and came over here to tear
him into little shreds. And what I say is, it’s a shame if I’m not to be
allowed a go at him after all the trouble and expense I’ve been put to.’
And, burying
her lovely face in her hands, she broke into uncontrollable sobs.
Orlando
Wotherspoon looked at Lady Beazley-Beazley. Lady Beazley-Beazley looked at
Orlando Wotherspoon. There was pity in their eyes.
‘There, there!’
said Lady Beazley-Beazley. ‘There, there, there, my dear!’
‘Believe me,
Miss Tyrrwhitt,’ said Orlando Wotherspoon, patting her shoulder paternally, ‘there
are few things I would not do for the niece of my old friend, Major-General
George Tyrrwhitt of the Buffs, but this is an occasion when, much as it may
distress me, I must be firm. I shall have to make my report at the annual
committee-meeting of Our Dumb Chums’ League, and how would I look, explaining
that I had stepped aside and allowed a delicately nurtured girl to act for me
in a matter so important as the one now on the agenda? Consider, Miss Tyrrwhitt!
Reflect!’
‘That’s all
very well,’ sobbed Marcella, ‘but all the way over, all during those long,
weary hours in the aeroplane, I was buoying myself up with the thought of what
I was going to do to Eustace Mulliner when we met. See! I picked out my
heaviest parasol.’
Orlando
Wotherspoon eyed the dainty weapon with an indulgent smile.
‘I fear that
would hardly meet such a case as this,’ he said. ‘You had far better leave the
conduct of this affair to me.’
‘Did you say
more muffins, sir?’ asked Blenkinsop.
‘I do not wish
to boast,’ said Wotherspoon, ‘but I have had considerable experience. I have
been formally thanked by my committee on several occasions.’
‘So you see,
dear,’ said Lady Beazley-Beazley soothingly, ‘it will be ever so much better
to—’
‘Any buttered
toast, fancy cakes, or macaroons?’ asked Blenkinsop.
‘— leave the
matter entirely in Mr Wotherspoon’s hands. I know just how you feel. I am
feeling the same myself. But even in these modern days, my dear, it is the
woman’s part to efface herself and—’
‘Oh, well!’
said Marcella moodily.
Lady
Beazley-Beazley folded her in her arms and over her shoulder nodded brightly at
Orlando Wotherspoon.
‘Please go on,
Mr Wotherspoon,’ she said.
Wotherspoon
bowed, with a formal word of thanks. And, turning, was just in time to see
Eustace disappearing through the window.
The fact is,
as this dialogue progressed, Eustace had found himself more and more attracted
by that open window. It had seemed to beckon to him. And at this juncture,
dodging lightly round Blenkinsop, who had now lost his grip entirely and was
suggesting things like watercress and fruit-salad, he precipitated himself into
the depths and, making a good landing, raced for the open spaces at an
excellent rate of speed.
That night,
heavily cloaked and disguised in a false moustache, ‘he called at my address,
clamouring for tickets to Switzerland. He arrived there some few days later,
and ever since has stuck to his duties with unremitting energy.
So much so
that, in that letter which you saw me reading, he informs me that he has just
been awarded the Order of the Crimson Edelweiss, Third Class, with crossed
cuckoo-clocks, carrying with it the right to yodel in the presence of the
Vice-President. A great honour for so young a
man.
A
sharp snort, plainly emanating from a soul in anguish, broke the serene silence
that brooded over the bar-parlour of the Angler’s Rest. And, looking up, we
perceived Miss Postlethwaite, our sensitive barmaid, dabbing at her eyes with
a dishcloth.
‘Sorry you
were troubled,’ said Miss Postlethwaite, in answer to our concerned gaze, ‘but
he’s just gone off to India, leaving her standing tight-lipped and dry-eyed in
the moonlight outside the old Manor. And her little dog has crawled up and
licked her hand, as if he understood and sympathized.’
We stared at
one another blankly. It was Mr Mulliner who, with his usual clear insight,
penetrated to the heart of the mystery.
‘Ah,’ said Mr
Mulliner, ‘you have been reading “Rue for Remembrance”, I see. How did you like
it?’
“Slovely,’
said Miss Postlethwaite. ‘It lays the soul of Woman bare as with a scalpel.’
‘You do not
consider that there is any falling off from the standard of its predecessors?
You find it as good as “Parted Ways”?’
‘Better.’
‘Oh!’ said a
Stout and Bitter, enlightened. ‘You’re reading a novel?’
‘The latest
work,’ said Mr Mulliner, ‘from the pen of the authoress of “Parted Ways”,
which, as no doubt you remember, made so profound a sensation some years ago. I
have a particular interest in this writer’s work, as she is my niece.’
‘Your niece?’
‘By marriage.
In private life she is Mrs Egbert Mulliner.’ He sipped his hot Scotch and
lemon, and mused a while.
‘I wonder,’ he
said, ‘if you would care to hear the story of my nephew Egbert and his bride?
It is a simple little story, just one of those poignant dramas of human
interest which are going on in our midst every day. If Miss Postlethwaite is
not too racked by emotion to replenish my glass, I shall be delighted to tell
it to you.
I will ask you
(said Mr Mulliner) to picture my nephew Egbert standing at the end of the pier
at the picturesque little resort of Burwash Bay one night in June, trying to
nerve himself to ask Evangeline Pembury the question that was so near his
heart. A hundred times he had tried to ask it, and a hundred times he had
lacked the courage. But to-night he was feeling in particularly good form, and
he cleared his throat and spoke.
‘There is
something,’ he said in a low, husky voice, ‘that I want to ask you.’
He paused. He
felt strangely breathless. The girl was looking out across the moonlit water.
The night was very still. From far away in the distance came the faint strains
of the town band, as it picked its way through the Star of Eve song from
Tannhäuser
—somewhat impeded by the second trombone, who had got his music-sheets
mixed and was playing ‘The Wedding of the Painted Doll’.’
‘Something,’
said Egbert, ‘that I want to ask you.’
‘Go on,’ she
whispered.
Again he
paused. He was afraid. Her answer meant so much to him.
Egbert
Mulliner had come to this quiet seaside village for a rest cure. By profession
he was an assistant editor, attached to the staff of
The Weekly Booklover,
and,
as every statistician knows, assistant editors of literary weeklies are ranked
high up among the Dangerous Trades. The strain of interviewing female novelists
takes toll of the physique of all but the very hardiest.
For six
months, week in and week out, Egbert Mulliner had been listening to female
novelists talking about Art and their Ideals. He had seen them in cosy corners
in their boudoirs, had watched them being kind to dogs and happiest when among
their flowers. And one morning the proprietor of
The Booklover,
finding
the young man sitting at his desk with little flecks of foam about his mouth
and muttering over and over again in a dull, toneless voice the words, Aurelia
McGoggin, she draws her inspiration from the scent of white lilies!’ had taken
him straight off to a specialist.
‘Yes,’ the
specialist had said, after listening at Egbert’s chest for a while through a
sort of telephone, ‘we are a little run down, are we not? We see floating
spots, do we not, and are inclined occasionally to bark like a seal from pure
depression of spirit? Precisely. What we need is to augment the red corpuscles
in our bloodstream.’
And this
augmentation of red corpuscles had been effected by his first sight of
Evangeline Pembury. They had met at a picnic. As Egbert rested for a moment
from the task of trying to dredge the sand from a plateful of chicken salad,
his eyes had fallen on a divine girl squashing a wasp with a
teaspoon.
And for the first time since he had tottered out of the offices of
The
Weekly Booklover
he had ceased to feel like something which a cat, having
dragged from an ash-can, has inspected and rejected with a shake of the head as
unfit for feline consumption. In an instant his interior had become a sort of
Jamboree of red corpuscles. Millions of them were splashing about and calling
gaily to other millions, still hesitating on the bank: ‘Come on in! The blood’s
fine!’