by Ian Hay
CHAPTER XVII
THE WORD "SWANK"
"That's how it goes, 'Melia," panted Tilly, whirling her partner into anarmchair. "It's quite easy, really; Dicky taught me in thebilliard-room on Saturday night in ten minutes. Hallo, hallo, hallo!Here I am, everybody! Hallo, Mother darling!"
Mrs. Welwyn gently parried the approaching embrace.
"Here's your father, dear," she remarked, with the least tinge ofreproof in her voice.
"Hallo, Dad! I did n't see you," exclaimed Tilly, kissing her maleparent excitedly.
"Welcome home, my daughter!" said Mr. Welwyn. "Now kiss your mother."
Tilly had already begun to do so, and an eager conversation followed.
"Of course, we've heard a bit from Perce," began Mrs. Welwyn at once,drawing the pins out of her daughter's hat, "and my word! you seem tohave got into the very thick of it this time, and no mistake!"
"I should just think so," gabbled Tilly. "Such a place, Mother!Billiard-rooms, and garages, and butlers, and a fire in your bedroom anda hot bottle in your bed, and a maid to put you into your clothes, and Idon't know what all! And I was introduced to a lot of future relations.There was Lady Adela. She tried to patronise me, but was n't much good.Then Sylvia, the daughter. I hate her--she is a cat. And ConnieCarmyle. She is no relation, but I love her. And Father Mainwaring, heis a dear. He says he was at Cambridge with you, Dad."
Mr. Welwyn put down the newspaper.
"What is that?" he enquired in a sharp voice. "Cambridge?"
"Yes. He does n't remember you at all distinctly," said Tilly, "butsays he has an impression that you were the most brilliant man of youryear."
"If that," remarked Mr. Welwyn, in a distinctly relieved tone, "is allthat he recollects about me, I shall be pleased to meet him again."
"How is Dicky, Tilly?" enquired Amelia.
Tilly's merry face softened.
"Dicky," she said, half to herself, "is just Dicky. He brought me asfar as the door, but I would n't let him come in."
"And are they all coming to tea?" enquired Mrs. Welwyn anxiously.
"Yes--the whole boiling of them, at five this afternoon--a state call!"replied Tilly. "By the way, Mother, that was a bloomer we made aboutthe invitation. I knew at the time we talked about it that you ought tohave written a note and chanced the spelling. Her ladyship made that_quite_ plain to me."
"Oh dear!" said Mrs. Welwyn in distress. "What did she say?"
"She did n't say anything in particular," admitted Tilly, crinkling herbrow. "Nothing one could take hold of, you know. Just--just--"
"Sort of snacks," suggested her mother sympathetically.
Tilly nodded her head.
"That's it," she said. "Anyhow, she has sent you a written reply. Hereit is."
Mrs. Welwyn and Amelia breathed hard and respectfully at the sight ofthe large thin grey envelope, addressed by Lady Adela's own compellinghand.
"You read it, dearie," said Mrs. Welwyn.
"No; I'll tell you what," exclaimed Tilly. "We'll let little 'Melia readit. She does n't get much fun."
"Oh, Tilly!" cried Amelia gratefully.
She took the letter, opened it with an air, and began:--
"_My deah Mrs. Welwyn--haw!_"
There was great merriment at this, for in her own family circle MissAmelia enjoyed a great reputation as a wit and mimic. The fact thatneither she nor any of her audience, save Tilly, had ever beheld LadyAdela in the flesh detracted not a whit from their enjoyment of herperformance.
"_It is really too good of you,_" continued Amelia, in the high-pitchedand even tones of a lady of exceptional breeding, "_to invite usall--such a crowd of us--to come to tea on Monday. As it happens, weshall be in town that day, so Mr. Mainwaring and I propose to take youat your word, and shall be charmed to come with our son and daughter atfive o'clock._"
"That'll be four cups," murmured Mrs. Welwyn abstractedly. "We can getMehta Ram's. Go on, Ducky."
"_After our recent experience of your daughter's society--_"
Here Amelia broke off, to observe that in her opinion the last phrasesounded tabbyish.
"Never mind! Go on!" urged Mrs. Welwyn.
"_--Daughter's society, we are naturally anxious to make theacquaintance of her forbears._"
"Her four what?" asked Mrs. Welwyn in a dazed voice.
Amelia carefully examined the passage, and repeated:--
"It says 'four bears'--written as one word. Does that mean you and Dadand me and Perce?"
"If her ladyship," began Mrs. Welwyn warmly, "is going to start namingnames from the Zoo--"
Tilly laid a quick hand upon her mother's arm and turned in thedirection of the fireplace.
"Dad," she enquired, "what does 'forbears' mean?"
A chuckling voice from behind "The Daily Mail" enlightened her.
"The laugh is on your mother, children," said Mrs. Welwyngood-temperedly. "Finish it, 'Melia."
Amelia did so. "_What weather! Sincerely yours, Adela Mainwaring_.That's all."
"Quite enough, too!" commented Mrs. Welwyn, who still had her doubtsabout the four bears.
"Any way," remarked Tilly energetically, "they are coming; and we havetill five o'clock to get ready for them. Hallo, Perce!"
To the company assembled entered Mr. Percy Welwyn, immaculate in frockcoat, brown boots, and a rakish bowler hat.
"What oh, Sis!" he exclaimed, kissing Tilly affectionately. "Back againfrom the Moated Grange--eh? My dinner ready, Mother?"
"Wait a minute, Percy dear," said Tilly quickly. "I want to talk toyou--all of you. Sit down, everybody. Father!"
"My daughter?"
"Come and sit here, please!"
"A round-table conference?" enquired Mr. Welwyn amiably. "Capital!"
Tilly upon her own quarter-deck was a very different being from thefrightened little alien whom we saw at Shotley Beauchamp. In twominutes the Welwyn family had meekly packed themselves round theoctagonal table. Tilly took the chair.
"Now, then, all of you," she began, with a suspicion of a high-strungquaver in her voice--"Father, Mother, Percy, and little 'Melia--listento me! You know, no one better, that when I went down to ShotleyBeauchamp on Saturday I meant to act perfectly square to Dicky'speople--tell them who I was and what I was, and that I worked for myliving and so on; and generally make sure that they did n't take me inon false pretences. Is that correct?"
"Yes--quite correct," chorused the family.
"Well," continued Tilly defiantly--"I have n't done it! I have n't saida word! There! I _couldn't_! I have seen Dicky's people, and theirhouse, and their prosperity, and the way they look at things. They're apretty tough proposition, the Mainwarings. They are no better born thanwe are; but they are rich, and stupid, and conceited, and purse-proud--"
"Tilly! Tilly!" said Mrs. Welwyn, scandalised to hear the gentry somiscalled.
"Yes, they _are_, Mother!" cried the girl passionately. "You don't knowwhat I have had to put up with this week-end, when Dicky was n't by.Why--"
"Dicky," observed Mr. Welwyn dryly, "is also a Mainwaring, Tilly."
"Dicky," replied Tilly, with feminine contempt for the laws of heredityand environment, "may be a Mainwaring, but he does n't take after therest of the family. But never mind Dicky for a moment. What I want tosay is this. In dealing with people of this kind--people who regardthose who have no money as so much dirt beneath their feet--there isonly one thing that pays; and that thing," she concluded with intenseconviction, "is--swank, swank, swank!"
"Good old Tilly!" shouted Percy enthusiastically; and the rest of theWelwyns, quite carried away by their small despot's earnestness, beatupon the table with their fists.
"The Mainwarings swanked for my benefit, I can tell you," continuedTilly, with cheeks glowing hotly. "They laid off to me about their townhouse and their country house and their shooting and their hunting andtheir grand relations; and they did their
best--especially thedaughter--to make me feel like a little dressmaker who has come in forthe day."
"I bet you stood up to them, Sis," said the admiring Percy.
Tilly smiled in a dreamy, reminiscent fashion.
"I did," she said. "I matched them, brag for brag. They asked who youwere, Mother. I said you were a Banks--one of _the_ Bankses--ofBedfordshire!"
Unseemly but sympathetic laughter greeted this announcement, and Mrs.Welwyn was made the recipient of several congratulatory thumps from herson and younger daughter.
"I wasn't quite sure whether it was Bedfordshire or Cambridgeshire,"continued Tilly. "Where is Hitchin, anyway?"
"Hertfordshire," replied Amelia, and every one laughed again. They hadall things in common, the Welwyns, especially their jokes.
"Then," Tilly proceeded, "I told them a lovely fairy-tale about our oldtown house. Been in the family for generations, and so on."
"So it has," said Mr. Welwyn.
"And I also told them," continued the unfilial Tilly, "that Dad was abit of an antique himself, and could n't bear to move. Has his roots inthe cellar, so to speak. You don't mind, do you, dear?" she enquiredeagerly.
"My child," replied Mr. Welwyn, "I feel proud to have figured as one ofyour assets."
"And finally," concluded Tilly, "as I began to warm up to my work a bit,I added a few things, looking as sweet as anything all the time--likethis!" (Here she treated her enraptured audience to a very creditablereproduction of Sylvia Mainwaring's languid and superior smile.) "Ichatted about our billiard-room, and our old family butler, and ourmotor, and so on. I am afraid I lost my head a bit. I have a notionthat I gave them to understand that we went yachting in the summer!"
There was more laughter, but Mrs. Welwyn added anxiously:--
"You did n't mention anything about Southend, did you, dearie?"
"Not me!" said Tilly; "though I was feeling utterly reckless by thattime. For two pins I would have told them that I had been presented atCourt!"
She rose to her feet.
"That is all I have to say," she announced. "I just mention these littlefacts to you so that when the Mainwarings come to tea this afternoon youmay know what to talk about. See?"
The other members of the conference, avoiding the eager eye of thechairwoman, began to regard one another uneasily. Then Percy said:--
"Tilly, old girl, you've landed us with a bit of a shipping order, ain'tyou?"
Tilly nodded. "You are right," she said. "But it will only be for anafternoon. We need not invite them again."
But Percy, who was an honest youth, although he wore a dickey,hesitated.
"How about the gallant Ricardo?" he enquired. "What's his position inthis glee-party? Is he with us or them?"
"Oh--Dicky?" said Tilly, with less confidence. "I have been quite squarewith him. I have told him everything."
"Everything?" enquired several people at once.
"A good deal, anyhow," maintained Tilly. "I have warned him that Ishan't have a penny to my name; and that I have had very few of theadvantages that the ordinary girl gets; and that he must take me and mypeople as he finds us. And he says he prefers me that way. Infact"--Tilly's thoughts flew back to Sunday's idyll in the pinewood--"he has said a good deal more than that. And if I want him and hewants me," she added eagerly, like one anxious to struggle on to lessdebatable ground, "what does it matter what we say or do to his sillyold mother and sister? I want my Dicky!" Her eyes shone. "He loves meand I love him, and that is all there is to be said about it. Father,Mother, Percy, 'Melia"--Tilly's hands went forth appealingly--"promisethat you will stand by me and see me through!"
Eight impulsive Welwyn hands closed upon Tilly's two.
"We'll see you through, Sis," said Percy reassuringly. His eye sweptround the board in presidential fashion. "Those in favour?"
Four hands flew up.
"Carried unanimously!" announced Percy; while Tilly, reassured, ranround the table showering promiscuous embraces upon her relatives.
"There's the front-door bell, 'Melia," said Mrs. Welwyn, whose providentinstinct never deserted her in her most exalted moments. "It may be anew lodger. Run down and see."
Amelia obeyed, and the rest of the House of Welwyn went into Committee.
"I say," remarked the far-seeing Percy; "may I enquire who is going toopen the front door to our guests this afternoon?"
The Committee surveyed one another in consternation.
"None of us can't do it, that's quite plain," said Mrs. Welwyn. "Theywould think we had n't got a servant."
"They would be right, first time," confirmed Percy.
"The old family butler must do it," said Mr. Welwyn with a dry chuckle.
"You certainly overreached yourself in the matter of the butler, Sis,"observed Percy.
"We could get the charwoman, or borrow the girl from the Rosenbaums,"suggested Mrs. Welwyn.
"But I said a _butler_, Mumsie," objected Tilly dismally.
"Oh, dear, so you did," sighed Mrs. Welwyn.
Tilly pondered.
"I know what we can do," she said. "Percy must meet them, quitecasually, outside in the Square, on his way home from the City--"
"And let them in with my latch-key--eh?" cried Percy. "That's theticket!"
Mrs. Welwyn, greatly relieved, smiled upon her fertile offspring. Mr.Welwyn coughed gently.
"The word 'swank,'" he observed, "is unfamiliar to me; but as we havedecided to incorporate it in our plan of campaign, may I suggest, Percy,that you allow your guests to ring the front-door bell before overtakingthem?"
"Righto, Dad," said Percy. "But why?"
"Well," continued Mr. Welwyn diffidently, "it has occurred to me thatwhen you have ushered the party into the hall, you might call down thestaircase into the basement, distinctly but not ostentatiously, to someone--James, or Thomas--you can address him by any name you please--thatthere is no need to come up. You see the idea?"
"Dad," declared Percy, shaking his parent affectionately by the hand,"you are a marvel! Why, 'Melia, what's the trouble?"
Amelia, wide-eyed and frightened, was standing in the doorway.
