Mulliner Nights (25 page)

‘He is
referring,’ he explained, ‘to a tonic invented by my brother Wilfred, the
well-known analytical chemist. It is not often administered to human beings,
having been designed primarily to encourage elephants in India to conduct
themselves with an easy nonchalance during the tiger-hunts which are so popular
in that country. But occasionally human beings do partake of it, with
impressive results. I was telling the company here not long ago of the
remarkable effect it had on my nephew Augustine, the curate.’

‘It bucked him
up?’

‘It bucked him
up very considerably. It acted on his bishop, too, when he tried it, in a
similar manner. It is undoubtedly a most efficient tonic, strong and
invigorating.’

‘How is
Augustine, by the way?’ asked the Sherry and Bitters.’

‘Extremely
well. I received a letter from him only this morning. I am not sure if I told
you, but he is a vicar now, at Walsingford-below-Chiveney-on-Thames. A
delightful resort, mostly honeysuckle and apple-cheeked villagers.’

Anything been
happening to him lately?’

‘It is strange
that you should ask that,’ said Mr Mulliner, finishing his hot Scotch and lemon
and rapping gently on the table. ‘In this letter to which I allude he has quite
an interesting story to relate. It deals with the loves of Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne
and Hypatia Wace. Hypatia is a school-friend of my nephew’s wife. She has been
staying at the vicarage, nursing her through a sharp attack of mumps. She is
also the niece and ward of Augustine’s superior of the Cloth, the Bishop of
Stortford.’

‘Was that the
bishop who took the Buck-U-Uppo?’

‘The same,’
said Mr Mulliner. ‘As for Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne, he is a young man of
independent means who resides in the neighbourhood. He is, of course, one of
the Berkshire Bracy-Gascoignes.’

‘Ronald,’ said
a Lemonade and Angostura thoughtfully. ‘Now, there’s a name I never cared for.’

‘In that
respect,’ said Mr Mulliner, ‘you differ from Hypatia Wace. She thought it
swell. She loved Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne with all the fervour of a young girl’s
heart, and they were provisionally engaged to be married. Provisionally, I say,
because, before the firing-squad could actually be assembled, it was necessary
for the young couple to obtain the consent of the Bishop of Stortford. Mark
that, gentlemen. Their engagement was subject to the Bishop of Stortford’s
consent. This was the snag that protruded jaggedly from the middle of the
primrose path of their happiness, and for quite a while it seemed as if Cupid
must inevitably stub his toe on it.’

I will select
as the point at which to begin my tale (said Mr Mulliner), a lovely evening in
June, when all Nature seemed to smile and the rays of the setting sun fell like
molten gold upon the picturesque garden of the vicarage at
Walsingford-below-Chiveney-on-Thames. On a rustic bench beneath a spreading
elm, Hypatia Wace and Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne watched the shadows lengthening
across the smooth lawn: and to the girl there appeared something symbolical and
ominous about this creeping blackness. She shivered. To her, it was as if the
sunbathed lawn represented her happiness and the shadows the doom that was
creeping upon it.

‘Are you doing
anything at the moment, Ronnie?’ she asked.

‘Eh?’ said
Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne. ‘What? Doing anything? Oh, you mean doing anything?
No, I’m not doing anything.’

‘Then kiss me,’
cried Hypatia.

‘Right-ho,’
said the young man. ‘I see what you mean. Rather a scheme. I will.’

He did so: and
for some moments they clung together in a close embrace. Then Ronald, releasing
her gently, began to slap himself between the shoulder-blades.

‘Beetle or
something down my back,’ he explained. ‘Probably fell off the tree.’

‘Kiss me
again,’ whispered Hypatia.

‘In one
second, old girl,’ said Ronald. ‘The instant I’ve dealt with this beetle or
something. Would you mind just fetching me a whack on about the fourth knob of
the spine, reading from the top downwards. I fancy that would make it think a
bit.’

Hypatia
uttered a sharp exclamation.

‘Is this a
time,’ she cried passionately’, ‘to talk of beetles?’

‘Well, you
know, don’t you know,’ said Ronald, with a touch of apology in his voice, ‘they
seem rather to force themselves on your attention when they get down your back.
I daresay you’ve had the same experience yourself. I don’t suppose in the
ordinary way I mention beetles half a dozen times a year, but… I should say
the fifth knob would be about the spot now. A good, sharp slosh with plenty of
follow-through ought to do the trick.’

Hypatia
clenched her hands. She was seething with that febrile exasperation which,
since the days of Eve, has come upon women who find themselves linked to a
cloth-head.

‘You poor sap,’
she said tensely. ‘You keep babbling about beetles, and you don’t appear to
realize that, if you want to kiss me, you’d better cram in all the kissing you
can now, while the going is good. It doesn’t seem to have occurred to you that
after to-night you’re going to fade out of the picture.’

‘Oh, I say,
no! Why?’

‘My Uncle
Percy arrives this evening.’

‘The Bishop?’

‘Yes. And my
Aunt Priscilla.’

‘And you think
they won’t be any too frightfully keen on me?’

‘I know they
won’t. I wrote and told them we were engaged, and I had a letter this afternoon
saying you wouldn’t do.’

‘No, I say,
really? Oh, I say, dash it!’

‘“Out of the
question”, my uncle said. And underlined it.’

‘Not really?
Not absolutely underlined it?’

‘Yes. Twice.
In very black ink.’

A cloud
darkened the young man’s face. The beetle had begun to try out a few tentative
dance-steps on the small of his back, but he ignored it. A Tiller troupe of
beetles could not have engaged his attention now.

‘But what’s he
got against me?’

‘Well, for one
thing he has heard that you were sent down from Oxford.’

‘But all the
best men are. Look at What’s-his-name. Chap who wrote poems. Shellac, or some
such name.’

‘And then he
knows that you dance a lot.’

‘What’s wrong
with dancing? I’m not very well up in these things, but didn’t David dance
before Saul? Or am I thinking of a couple of other fellows? Anyway, I know that
somebody danced before somebody and was extremely highly thought of in
consequence.

‘David…’

‘I’m not
saying it
was
David, mind you. It may quite easily have been Samuel.’

‘David…’

‘Or even
Nimshi, the son of Bimshi, or somebody like that.’

‘David, or
Samuel, or Nimshi the son of Bimshi,’ said Hypatia, ‘did not dance at the Home
from Home.’

Her allusion
was to the latest of those frivolous night-clubs which spring up from time to
time on the reaches of the Thames which are within a comfortable distance from
London. This one stood some half a mile from the vicarage gates.

‘Is
that
what
the Bish is beefing about?’ demanded Ronald, genuinely astonished. ‘You don’t
mean to tell me he really objects to the Home from Home? Why, a
cathedral
couldn’t be more rigidly respectable. Does he realize that the place has only
been raided five times in the whole course of its existence? A few simple words
of explanation will put all this right. I’ll have a talk with the old boy.’

Hypatia shook
her head.

‘No,’ she
said. ‘It’s no use talking. He has made his mind up. One of the things he said
in his letter was that, rather than countenance my union to a worthless
worldling like you, he would gladly see me turned into a pillar of salt like
Lot’s wife, Genesis 19, 26. And nothing could be fairer than that, could it? So
what I would suggest is that you start in immediately to fold me in your arms
and cover my face with kisses. It’s the last chance you’ll get.’

The young man
was about to follow her advice, for he could see that there was much in what
she said: but at this moment there came from the direction of the house the
sound of a manly voice trolling the Psalm for the Second Sunday after Septuagesima.
And an instant later their host, the Rev. Augustine Mulliner, appeared in
sight. He saw them and came hurrying across the garden, leaping over the
flower-beds with extraordinary lissomness.

‘Amazing
elasticity that bird has, both physical and mental,’ said Ronald
Bracy-Gascoigne, eyeing Augustine, as he approached, with a gloomy envy. ‘How
does he get that way?’

‘He was
telling me last night,’ said Hypatia. ‘He has a tonic which he takes regularly.
It is called Mulliner’s Buck-U-Uppo, and acts directly upon the red corpuscles.’’I
wish he would give the Bish a swig of it,’ said Ronald moodily. A sudden light
of hope came into his eyes. ‘I say, Hyp, old girl,’ he exclaimed. ‘That’s
rather a notion. Don’t you think it’s rather a notion? It looks to me like
something of an idea. If the Bish were to dip his beak into the stuff, it might
make him take a brighter view of me.’

Hypatia, like
all girls who intend to be good wives, made it a practice to look on any
suggestions thrown out by her future lord and master as fatuous and futile.

‘I never heard
anything so silly,’ she said.

‘Well, I wish
you would try it. No harm in trying it, what?’

‘Of course I
shall do nothing of the kind.’

‘Well, I do
think you might try it,’ said Ronald. ‘I mean, try it, don’t you know.’

He could speak
no further on the matter, for now they were no longer alone. Augustine had come
up. His kindly face looked grave.

‘I say,
Ronnie, old bloke,’ said Augustine, ‘I don’t want to hurry you, but I think I
ought to inform you that the Bishes, male and female, are even now on their way
up from the station. I should be popping, if I were you. The prudent man
looketh well to his going. Proverbs, 14, 15.’

‘All right,’
said Ronald sombrely. ‘I suppose,’ he added, turning to the girl, ‘you wouldn’t
care to sneak out to-night and come and have one final spot of shoe-slithering
at the Home from Home? It’s a Gala Night. Might be fun, what? Give us a chance
of saying good-bye properly, and all that.’

‘I never heard
anything so silly,’ said Hypatia, mechanically. ‘Of course I’ll come.’

‘Right-ho.
Meet you down the road about twelve then,’ said Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne.

He walked
swiftly away, and presently was lost to sight behind the shrubbery. Hypatia
turned with a choking sob, and Augustine took her hand and squeezed it gently.

‘Cheer up, old
onion,’ he urged. ‘Don’t lose hope. Remember, many waters cannot quench love.
Song of Solomon, 5, 7.’

‘I don’t see
what quenching love has got to do with it,’ said Hypatia peevishly. ‘Our
trouble is that I’ve got an uncle complete with gaiters and a hat with
bootlaces on it who can’t see Ronnie with a telescope.’

‘I know.’
Augustine nodded sympathetically. And my heart bleeds for you. I’ve been
through all this sort of thing myself. When I was trying to marry Jane, I was
stymied by a father-in-law-to-be who had to be seen to be believed. A chap, I
assure you, who combined chronic shortness of temper with the ability to bend
pokers round his biceps. Tact was what won him over, and tact is what I propose
to employ in your case. I have an idea at the back of my mind. I won’t tell you
what it is, but you may take it from me it’s the real tabasco.’

‘How kind you
are, Augustine!’ sighed the girl.

‘It comes from
mixing with Boy Scouts. You may have noticed that the village is stiff with
them. But don’t you worry, old girl. I owe you a lot for the way you’ve looked
after Jane these last weeks, and I’m going to see you through. If I can’t fix
up your little affair, I’ll eat my Hymns Ancient and Modern. And uncooked at
that.’

And with these
brave words Augustine Mulliner turned two hand-springs, vaulted over the rustic
bench, and went about his duties in the parish.

Augustine was
rather relieved, when he came down to dinner that night, to find that Hypatia’
was not to be among those present. The girl was taking her meal on a tray with
Jane, his wife, in the invalid’s bedroom, and he was consequently able to
embark with freedom on the discussion of her affairs. As soon as the servants
had left the room, accordingly he addressed himself to the task.

‘Now listen,
you two dear good souls,’ he said. ‘What I want to talk to you about, now that
we are alone, is this business of Hypatia and Ronald Bracy-Gascoigne.’The Lady
Bishopess pursed her lips, displeased. She was a woman of ample and majestic
build. A friend of Augustine’s, who had been attached to the Tank Corps during
the War, had once said that he knew nothing that brought the old days back more
vividly than the sight of her. All she needed, he maintained, was a
steering-wheel and a couple of machine-guns, and you could have moved her up
into any Front Line and no questions asked.

‘Please, Mr
Mulliner!’ she said coldly.

Augustine was
not to be deterred. Like all the Mulliners, he was at heart a man of reckless
courage.

‘They tell me
you are thinking of bunging a spanner into the works,’ he said. ‘Not true, I
hope?’

‘Quite true,
Mr Mulliner. Am I not right, Percy?’

‘Quite,’ said
the Bishop.

‘We have made
careful enquiries about the young man, and are satisfied that he is entirely
unsuitable.’

‘Would you say
that?’ said Augustine. A pretty good egg, I’ve always found him. What’s your
main objection to the poor lizard?’

The Lady
Bishopess shivered.

‘We learn that
he is frequently to be seen dancing at an advanced hour, not only in gilded
London night-clubs but even in what should be the purer atmosphere of Walsingford-below-Chiveney-on-Thames.
There is a resort in this neighbourhood known, I believe, as the Home from
Home.’