by Unknown
“You seem to forget that I’ve been behind the scenes. I’m not simply an ordinary member of the audience. I know how the illusion is produced. I’ve seen the strings pulled. Why, dash it, I showed you how to pull them. I never came across a finer example of seething the kid in its mother’s milk. I put you up to the system, and you turn round and try to take me in with it. Yes, you’re a wonder, James.”
“You don’t mean to say you think–-!”
“Don’t be an ass, James. Of course I do. You’ve had the brazen audacity to attempt to work off on Eva the game you played on Margaret. But you’ve made a mistake. You’ve forgotten to count me.”
I paused, and ate a muffin. James watched me with fascinated eyes.
“You,” I resumed, “ethically, I despise. Eva, personally, I detest. It seems, therefore, that I may expect to extract a certain amount of amusement from the situation. The fun will be inaugurated by your telling Eva that she may have to wait five years. You will state, also, the amount of your present income.”
“Suppose I decline?”
“You won’t.”
“You think not?”
“I am sure.”
“What would you do if I declined?”
“I should call upon Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell and give her a quarter of an hour’s entertainment by telling her of the System, and explaining to her, in detail, the exact method of its working and the reason why you set it going. Having amused Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell in this manner, I should make similar revelations to Eva. It would not be pleasant for you subsequently, I suppose, but we all have our troubles. That would be yours.”
He hesitated.
“As if they’d believe it,” he said, weakly.
“I think they would.”
“They’d laugh at you. They’d think you were mad.”
“Not when I produced John Hatton, Sidney Price, and Tom Blake in a solid phalanx, and asked them to corroborate me.”
“They wouldn’t do it,” he said, snatching at a straw. “They wouldn’t give themselves away.”
“Hatton might hesitate to, but Tom Blake would do it like a shot.”
As I did not know Tom Blake, a moment’s reflection might have told James that this was bluff. But I had gathered a certain knowledge of the bargee’s character from James’s conversation, and I knew that he was a drunken, indiscreet sort of person who might be expected to reveal everything in circumstances such as I had described; so I risked the shot, and it went home. James’s opposition collapsed.
“I shall then,” administering the coup de grâce, “arrange a meeting between the Gunton-Cresswells and old Mrs. Goodwin.”
“Thank you,” said James, “but don’t bother. On second thoughts I will tell Eva about my income and the five years’ wait.”
“Thanks,” I said; “it’s very good of you. Good-bye.”
And I retired, chuckling, to Rupert Street.
CHAPTER 23
IN A HANSOM (Julian Eversleigh’s narrative continued)
I spent a pleasant week in my hammock awaiting developments.
At the end of the week came a letter from Eva. She wrote:—
My Dear Julian,—You haven’t been to see us for ages. Is Kensington Lane beyond the pale? Your affectionate cousin, Eva.
“You vixen,” I thought. “Yes; I’ll come and see you fast enough. It will give me the greatest pleasure to see you crushed and humiliated.”
I collected my evening clothes from a man of the name of Attenborough, whom I employ to take care of them when they are not likely to be wanted; found a white shirt, which looked presentable after a little pruning of the cuffs with a razor; and drove to the Gunton-Cresswells’s in time for dinner.
There was a certain atmosphere of unrest about the house. I attributed this at first to the effects of the James Orlebar Cloyster bomb-shell, but discovered that it was in reality due to the fact that Eva was going out to a fancy-dress ball that night.
She was having dinner sent up to her room, they told me, and would be down presently. There was a good deal of flitting about going on. Maids on mysterious errands shot up and down stairs. Old Mr. Gunton-Cresswell, looking rather wry, was taking cover in his study when I arrived. Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell was in the drawing-room.
Before Eva came down I got a word alone with her. “I’ve had a nice, straight-forward letter from James,” she said, “and he has done all he can to put things straight with us.”
“Ah!” said I.
“That telegram, he tells me, was the outcome of a sudden panic.”
“Dear me!” I said.
“It seems that he made some most ghastly mistake about his finances. What exactly happened I can’t quite understand, but the gist of it is, he thought he was quite well off, whereas, really, his income is infinitesimal.”
“How odd!” I remarked.
“It sounds odd; in fact, I could scarcely believe it until I got his letter of explanation. I’ll show it to you. Here it is.”
I read James Orlebar Cloyster’s letter with care. It was not particularly long, but I wish I had a copy of it; for it is the finest work in an imaginative vein that has ever been penned.
“Masterly!” I exclaimed involuntarily.
“Yes, isn’t it?” she echoed. “Enables one to grasp thoroughly how the mistake managed to occur.”
“Has Eva seen it?”
“Yes.”
“I notice he mentions five years as being about the period–-“
“Yes; it’s rather a long engagement, but, of course, she’ll wait, she loves him so.”
Eva now entered the room. When I caught sight of her I remembered I had pictured her crushed and humiliated. I had expected to gloat over a certain dewiness of her eyes, a patient drooping of her lips. I will say plainly there was nothing of that kind about Eva tonight.
She had decided to go to the ball as Peter Pan.
The costume had rather scandalised old Mr. Gunton-Cresswell, a venerable Tory who rarely spoke except to grumble. Even Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell, who had lately been elected to the newly-formed Les Serfs d’Avenir, was inclined to deprecate it.
But I was sure Eva had chosen the better part. The dress suited her to perfection. Her legs are the legs of a boy.
As I looked at her with concentrated hatred, I realised I had never seen a human soul so radiant, so brimming with espičglerie, so altogether to be desired.
“Why, Julian, is it you. This is good of you!”
It was evident that the past was to be waived. I took my cue.
“Thanks, Eva,” I said; “it suits you admirably.”
Events at this point move quickly.
Another card of invitation is produced. Would I care to use it, and take Eva to the ball?
“But I’m not in fancy dress.”
Overruled. Fancy dress not an essential. Crowds of men there in ordinary evening clothes.
So we drove off.
We hardly exchanged a syllable. No one has much to say just before a dance.
I looked at Eva out of the corner of my eye, trying to discover just what it was in her that attracted men. I knew her charm, though I flattered myself that I was proof against it. I wanted to analyse it.
Her photograph is on the table before me as I write. I look at it critically. She is not what I should describe as exactly a type of English beauty. You know the sort of beauty I mean? Queenly, statuesque, a daughter of the gods, divinely fair. Her charm is not in her features. It is in her expression.
Tonight, for instance, as we drove to the ball, there sparkled in her eyes a light such as I had never seen in them before. Every girl is animated at a ball, but this was more than mere animation. There was a latent devilry about her; and behind the sparkle and the glitter a film, a mist, as it were, which lent almost a pathos to her appearance. The effect it had on me was to make me tend to forget that I hated her.
We arrive. I mutter something about having the pleasure.
Eva says I can have the last two walt
zes.
Here comes a hiatus. I am told that I was seen dancing, was observed to eat an excellent supper, and was noticed in the smoking-room with a cigarette in my mouth.
At last the first of my two waltzes. The Eton Boating Song—one of my favourites. I threaded my way through the room in search of her. She was in neither of the doorways. I cast my eyes about the room. Her costume was so distinctive that I could hardly fail to see her.
I did see her.
She was dancing my waltz with another man.
The thing seemed to numb my faculties. I stood in the doorway, gaping. I couldn’t understand it. The illogical nature of my position did not strike me. It did not occur to me that as I hated the girl so much, it was much the best thing that could happen that I should see as little of her as possible. My hatred was entirely concentrated on the bounder who had stolen my dance. He was a small, pink-faced little beast, and it maddened me to see that he danced better than I could ever have done.
As they whirled past me she smiled at him.
I rushed to the smoking-room.
Whether she gave my other waltz to the same man, or whether she chose some other partner, or sat alone waiting for me, I do not know. When I returned to the ballroom the last waltz was over, and the orchestra was beginning softly to play the first extra. It was “Tout Passe,” an air that has always had the power to thrill me.
My heart gave a bound. Standing in the doorway just in front of me was Eva.
I drew back.
Two or three men came up, and asked her for the dance. She sent them away, and my heart leaped as they went.
She was standing with her back towards me. Now she turned. Our eyes met. We stood for a moment looking at one another.
Then I heard her give a little sigh; and instantly I forgot everything—my hatred, my two lost dances, the pink-faced blighter—everything. Everything but that I loved her.
“Tired, Eva?” I said.
“Perhaps I am,” she replied. “Yes, I am, Julian.”
“Give me this one,” I whispered. “We’ll sit it out.”
“Very well. It’s so hot in here. We’ll go and sit it out in a hansom, shall we? I’ll get my cloak.”
I waited, numbed by her absence. Her cloak was pale pink. We walked out together into the starry night. A few yards off stood a hansom. “Drive to the corner of Sloane Street,” I said to the man, “by way of the Park.”
The night was very still.
I have said that I had forgotten everything except that I loved her. Could I remember now? Now, as we drove together through the empty streets alone, her warm, palpitating body touching mine.
James, and his awful predicament, which would last till Eva gave him up; Eva’s callous treatment of my former love for her; my own newly-acquired affection for Margaret; my self-respect—these things had become suddenly of no account.
“Eva,” I murmured; and I took her hand.
“Eva….”
Her wonderful eyes met mine. The mist in them seemed to turn to dew. “My darling,” she whispered, very low.
The road was deserted. We were alone.
I drew her face to mine and kissed her.
My love for her grows daily.
Old Gunton-Cresswell has introduced me to a big firm of linoleum manufacturers. I am taking over their huge system of advertising next week. My salary will be enormous. It almost frightens me. Old Mr. Cresswell tells me that he had had the job in his mind for me for some time, and had, indeed, mentioned to his wife and Eva at lunch that day that he intended to write to me about it. I am more grateful to him than I can ever make him understand. Eva, I know, cares nothing for money—she told me so—but it is a comfort to feel that I can keep her almost in luxury.
I have given up my rooms in Rupert Street.
I sleep in a bed.
I do Sandow exercises.
I am always down to breakfast at eight-thirty sharp.
I smoke less.
I am the happiest man on earth.
(End of Julian Eversleigh’s narrative.)
Narrative Resumed by James Orlebar Cloyster
CHAPTER 24
A RIFT IN THE CLOUDS
O perfidy of woman! O feminine inconstancy! That is the only allusion I shall permit to escape me on the subject of Eva Eversleigh’s engagement to that scoundrel Julian.
I had the news by telegraph, and the heavens darkened above me, whilst the solid earth rocked below.
I had been trapped into dishonour, and even the bait had been withheld from me.
But it was not the loss of Eva that troubled me most. It should have outweighed all my other misfortunes and made them seem of no account, but it did not. Man is essentially a materialist. The prospect of an empty stomach is more serious to him than a broken heart. A broken heart is the luxury of the well-to-do. What troubled me more than all other things at this juncture was the thought that I was face to face with starvation, and that only the grimmest of fights could enable me to avoid it. I quaked at the prospect. The early struggles of the writer to keep his head above water form an experience which does not bear repetition. The hopeless feeling of chipping a little niche for oneself out of the solid rock with a nib is a nightmare even in times of prosperity. I remembered the grey days of my literary apprenticeship, and I shivered at the thought that I must go through them again.
I examined my position dispassionately over a cup of coffee at Groom’s, in Fleet Street. Groom’s was a recognised Orb rendezvous. When I was doing “On Your Way,” one or two of us used to go down Fleet Street for coffee after the morning’s work with the regularity of machines. It formed a recognised break in the day.
I thought things over. How did I stand? Holiday work at the Orb would begin very shortly, so that I should get a good start in my race. Fermin would be going away in a few weeks, then Gresham, and after that Fane, the man who did the “People and Things” column. With luck I ought to get a clear fifteen weeks of regular work. It would just save me. In fifteen weeks I ought to have got going again. The difficulty was that I had dropped out. Editors had forgotten my work. John Hatton they knew, and Sidney Price they knew; but who was James Orlebar Cloyster? There would be much creaking of joints and wobbling of wheels before my triumphal car could gather speed again. But, with a regular salary coming in week by week from the Orb, I could endure this. I became almost cheerful. It is an exhilarating sensation having one’s back against the wall.
Then there was Briggs, the actor. The very thought of him was a tonic. A born fighter, with the energy of six men, he was an ideal model for me. If I could work with a sixth of his dash and pluck, I should be safe. He was giving me work. He might give me more. The new edition of the Belle of Wells was due in another fortnight. My lyrics would be used, and I should get paid for them. Add this to my Orb salary, and I should be a man of substance.
I glared over my coffee-cup at an imaginary John Hatton.
“You thought you’d done me, did you?” I said to him. “By Gad! I’ll have the laugh of you all yet.”
I was shaking my fist at him when the door opened. I hurriedly tilted back my chair, and looked out of the window.
“Hullo, Cloyster.”
I looked round. It was Fermin. Just the man I wanted to see.
He seemed depressed. Even embarrassed.
“How’s the column?” I asked.
“Oh, all right,” he said awkwardly. “I wanted to see you about that. I was going to write to you.”
“Oh, yes,” I said, “of course. About the holiday work. When are you off?”
“I was thinking of starting next week.”
“Good. Sorry to lose you, of course, but–-“
He shuffled his feet.
“You’re doing pretty well now at the game, aren’t you, Cloyster?” he said.
It was not to my interests to cry myself down, so I said that I was doing quite decently. He seemed relieved.
“You’re making quite a good income, I suppose? I mean,
no difficulty about placing your stuff?”
“Editors squeal for it.”
“Because, otherwise what I wanted to say to you might have been something of a blow. But it won’t affect you much if you’re doing plenty of work elsewhere.”
A cold hand seemed laid upon my heart. My mind leaped to what he meant. Something had gone wrong with the Orb holiday work, my sheet-anchor.
“Do you remember writing a par about Stickney, the butter-scotch man, you know, ragging him when he got his peerage?”
“Yes.”
It was one of the best paragraphs I had ever done. A two-line thing, full of point and sting. I had been editing “On Your Way” that day, Fermin being on a holiday and Gresham ill; and I had put the paragraph conspicuously at the top of the column.
“Well,” said Fermin, “I’m afraid there was rather trouble about it. Hamilton came into our room yesterday, and asked if I should be seeing you. I said I thought I should. ‘Well, tell him,’ said Hamilton, ‘that that paragraph of his about Stickney has only cost us five hundred pounds. That’s all.’ And he went out again. Apparently Stickney was on the point of advertising largely with the Orb, and had backed out in a huff. Today, I went to see him about my holiday, and he wanted to know who was coming in to do my work. I mentioned you, and he absolutely refused to have you in. I’m awfully sorry about it.”
I was silent. The shock was too great. Instead of drifting easily into my struggle on a comfortable weekly salary, I should have to start the tooth-and-nail fighting at once. I wanted to get away somewhere by myself, and grapple with the position.
I said good-bye to Fermin, retaining sufficient presence of mind to treat the thing lightly, and walked swiftly along the restless Strand, marvelling at what I had suffered at the hands of Fortune. The deceiver of Margaret, deceived by Eva, a pauper! I covered the distance between Groom’s and Walpole Street in sombre meditation.
In a sort of dull panic I sat down immediately on my arrival, and tried to work. I told myself that I must turn out something, that it would be madness to waste a moment.
I sat and chewed my pen from two o’clock till five, but not a page of printable stuff could I turn out. Looking back at myself at that moment, I am not surprised that my ideas did not flow. It would have been a wonderful triumph of strength of mind if I had been able to write after all that had happened. Dr. Johnson has laid it down that a man can write at any time, if he sets himself to it earnestly; but mine were exceptional circumstances. My life’s happiness and my means for supporting life at all, happy or otherwise, had been swept away in a single morning; and I found myself utterly unable to pen a coherent sentence.
