Complete Novels of E Nesbit

by Edith Nesbit

  She came into the room, and advanced towards the gate table.

  “Don’t put them down there,” he said, and opened the door into the dining-room.

  “Don’t be cross,” she said again. “ I’ll go away if you insist. But you’d better get back to your work, and let me set the table.”

  She was drawing the pins out of her hat with the air of being very much at home.

  “I’m all to pieces, I know,” she said. “Such a day! “ She felt in her pocket and brought out a little mirror.

  “Pause! “ said Mr. Bats. “You little know your blessings. I got this expressly for you.”

  He showed an oval looking-glass with a frame of carved wood, that hung behind the door.

  “How beautiful!” said Rose, looking in and not at the glass. “I knew I was all to pieces.” Her hands were busy with her hair, and his with the parcels on the table. “How did you think of such a simple and charming idea? It’s nothing less than genius. And what a beautiful frame!” she added, giving it the briefest glance.

  “I’ve been convinced for the last six months that you wouldn’t be happy till you got it. My mind moves slowly, as you know. Only to-day the conviction crystallized in action. Say you’re pleased.”

  “You’re an angel,” she told him, her eyes still on the glass. “Haven’t I brought nice things to eat?”

  “You always do,” he said; “much too nice,” and folded the discarded papers neatly, and rolled the string into little self-contained circlets. “What’s the book?”

  “Oh, that’s for Tony! That’s really why I came early. If it hadn’t been for that, I could have walked round and round Soho Square, getting wetter and wetter, till it was real right time to arrive. I wanted to show it to you, to see if it’s any good. It looks as if it might be the real original key to the real original Bacon-Shakespeare cypher.”

  “You excite me almost beyond endurance,” he said placidly, putting the string and paper into the proper drawer for such things. “I’ll put your hat in my room, shall I?”

  “No, I’ll hang it on the hatstand in the hall,” she said. “It’ll be handier if I have to rush out for anything. And may I wash the lettuce while you look at the book?”

  “Don’t let the tap splash,” he said; “if you hold the basin under it for a moment, it won’t.”

  The hatstand in the hall was a nail driven into the back of the door of the tiny kitchen.

  “Don’t watch me,” she said, dabbling among the wet lettuces. “You always make me feel so large, and clumsy and awkward.”

  “Yes, I’m a delicate little thing, aren’t I?” he said, leaning a lazy six feet against the kitchen door.

  “If I didn’t like you so much, I should hate you,” she said. “When you’re not there, I am neat, orderly, competent, adequate, worthy. When I’m with you, I’m a worm — an untidy, expansive worm. You ought to curb your moral nature, and not make people so uncomfortable. I say, do look at that book instead of talking to me. It’s got ‘ Antonii Drelincourt ‘ on the book-plate, and the same coat-of-arms that’s on Tony’s snuff-box that was his grandfather’s.”

  “A romance! Cheers from the bystanders,” remarked Mr. Bats. “Long lost heir mercifully restored. Triumphant arches, garlands. Downtrodden tenantry. Sycophantic cheers. Don’t I see the Daily Mail, foaming at the headlines.”

  “Just as you like,” said Rose, putting the lettuce on the dresser. “Only the others will be here directly. And I can lay a table when your eye isn’t on me. And I — know where everything is.” She opened the smooth-sliding drawer of the Welsh dresser, and took out a folded tablecloth. “If you watch me, I’ll drop the glasses. You might be fifty brothers rolled into one, instead of a perfect stranger, if one judged by your attitude of criticism.”

  “You remember,” he said, turning the pages of the book, “that the Septet was formed on the distinct basis of our all being as disagreeable as we liked to each other, and I’m the only one who has ever tried to live up to the old ideal. All the others merely grovel before you, wormlike. How you can stand it, I can’t think!”

  “I don’t. I mean, they don’t. Don’t be silly.”

  “Who don’t? Lena does, frankly. Esther and Milton also, after their kind. Tony, of course, does too, or he wouldn’t be human.”

  He so obviously refrained from looking at her when he said this, that he might as well have stared her out of countenance with his deep-set alert eyes.

  She thought of Mr. Abrahamson. Did her silly secret then, she asked herself, stick out of her, as Mr. Henry James puts it?

  “Of course, he adores me,” she answered hardily, and she might just as well have denied it for any screen she got. “And so,” she added, helplessly trying for words that should not let silence close round her last ones, “and so do you. Only you don’t know it yet. But you will some day. And I adore you all, of course! “ She got away from the subject on that, and breathed a little quickly.

  “You are very discerning,” said Mr. Bats. “I did not know that you knew of my adoration. Concealment being at an end, let me remark that you have not put the tablecloth on straight.”

  “Trust me not at all, or all in all.” She pushed him gently to the door. “Do go and look at the book, there’s an angel, and hide it if — if any one comes in.”

  “Don’t drop the salt-cellars as you did the other day,” he said, as the door closed upon him.

  “You look at the book,” she called after him. “Don’t go into a dream about something else.”

  Whatever dream he may have gone into, it was at least brief, for when she went into the room, he was deep in the book; so deep that he did not raise his head when she came in — did not even hear her when she asked reproachfully where he kept the mustard now.

  In Gower Street, Bloomsbury, stands, as you may or may not know, University College; and there swarm students of all degrees; students of Art and Literature, and Law and Language, Medicine and Chemistry, and Engineering and Semitic Epigraphy, Physics and Mathematics; young men and women of all types and tastes. Some of them desire to learn and some desire to appear to have learnt, but all, or almost all, desire, deeply and with the whole heart, to enjoy themselves. This they do, each in his own way. You have heard of the strawberry teas; perhaps you have passed along Gower Street, gazed curiously through the iron railings, and beheld young women in bright muslins adorning the steps and the green sward in front of the Art School, and dispensing tea and chatter to lounging youths. You cannot be ignorant of the brilliance and charm of Slade dances; and the story of the Brown Dog statue is next door to history. But there are other ways in which the students of University College seek to wring the full perfume from life. There used to be clubs: one, I remember, met in two horrid little rooms over a railway collecting-office near Euston, and gave musical teas. There were never enough cups, and the things to eat were like Lockhart’s things, but I believe the members thought they were living their own lives — always an invigorating conviction. And there was another club where they had bent-wood chairs and smoking was forbidden. But that was very select, and I never went to it. Besides the clubs, there are Societies, Debating Societies and Critical Societies, the Chemical and Physical Society, the Christian Association, the Literary Society, where people go for tea and gas, the Natural Science, which is very young and takes itself seriously, and the Mathematical Society, which is serious.

  The members of the Septet, for which Rose Royal was laying the table, had all “ lived their own lives “ in most of the respectable ways dictated by the student convention. They had had, and given, strawberry teas, they had got up dances, they had opened debates on Capital Punishment and the Right of Women to the Suffrage. One had even read a paper on “ Bacon: our Shakespeare” to an exasperated Literary Society. In living, even your own life, you do, as the proverb says, learn. These young people had learned several things, the most important being that clubs and societies are things which bores infest. Further, that they none of them bored
each other. Acting on these two discoveries, they formed a society of their own, whose membership should be strictly limited to eight, and those eight the founders. Now that Sullivan had gone to America, there were only seven, and these met every Tuesday in term time at the rooms of one or other of them, ate together, drank together, and took it in turns to suggest the evening’s amusement. And it was a point of honour with the Septet to carry out the suggestion made by the Ruler of the Evening. They had done most of the amusing silly things you can think of, from making toffee over Rose Royal’s studio fire, to going from Hammersmith to Gravesend on a stone-barge. And in the intervals of doing the silly amusing things, they talked and talked and talked, which always sounds dull, but sometimes isn’t. And they all got to know each other very well indeed.

  “Where do you keep the mustard now? “ repeated Rose, and William, with the book in his hand, got up and found the mustard, in its right place of course, and went back to his reading-chair without a word.

  And then there came other steps on the stairs, and Rose snatched the book from Mr. Bats.

  “Is it any good?” she asked; “it looks like a lunatic’s diary in cypher.”

  “It’s all right,” said Mr. Bats; “but it’s not much use to Tony. He can’t read it.”

  “Can you? “she asked.

  “More or less, given time,” he told her. “But present it. The name and the coat-of-arms will be enough to endear it.”

  Then Anthony Drelincourt came in, and the rest of the members followed him so quickly that there was no time to present the book before they all arrived, all talking, and all talking at once.

  And now you see them seated at the long narrow table, Bats at one end and Drelincourt at the other. Rose at Anthony’s right hand, and on his left Linda Smith, small, delicate, pale, with fair hair, and an embroidery of soft blues and purples round the shoulders of her gown of soft green. It is Linda’s trade to make embroidered dresses.

  “Oh yes, I went to the Slade, and I meant to be an artist,” she will tell you (if she likes you well enough to tell you anything), “but I soon found there was no money in it,” she will add with the jolly laugh that is such an odd surprise from that thin-lipped, severely cut mouth, “and I’m not doing so badly.” just now she is pleased with her dress. Also she is pleased that she is sitting next to Anthony and opposite Rose.

  On her other side is Wilfred Wilton; he is just going up for his final, and the others find it amusing to call him Doctor.

  Esther Raven sits by William Bats. She has her trade, like the rest, and her trade is journalism. She is a regular contributor to Home Drivel and Woman in Chains. In secret she writes verses, and is very sorry that she was not born beautiful. She wears tweed coats and skirts, and knows that they do not suit her.

  There is one other man. They call him the Outsider and the Copy Cat, and he laughs and does not mind. He never thinks of anything for himself, but he is quite good at carrying out other people’s ideas. He is very kind and admiring and soothing. William Bats once got him out of a scrape, and it was like saving a dog — a very nice, thoroughbred dog — from drowning. He has no trade, and has more money than any of the others. That is why he is always shabbier than they are. He tries to live up to them and their poverty, and is very grateful to them for receiving him on terms of equality in spite of his money. His name is Mullinger, and his father was Mullinger’s Matchless Vermin Killer, Swift and Sure. You know the poster? — rats, mice, bats, and smaller things that creep and jump, and fly and bite, all done very large and plain on a pale blue background, with the motto, “ Death to Pests: harmless to children and domestic animals.”

  These were the seven young people who ate and drank, and talked and laughed in the back-room of Mr. William Bats on that March evening. You will have noticed, perhaps with a pained surprise, that I have omitted to name or describe the chaperon. Well — there wasn’t one. Among young people who work, or are training to work, for their living, the idea has somehow ceased to obtain that when seven young people spend an evening together, the fires of youth blaze up so fiercely that only a wet blanket can avert the regrettable.

  When the meal was over, they washed up in the little kitchen, and William Bats saw to it that each crock and cup, and spoon and glass returned to its appointed place.

  And then they grouped themselves about the sitting-room, Rose and Linda lounging on the divan, Esther very upright on a high-backed chair, smoking cigarettes and wishing she had been born picturesque.

  In the middle of the half circle round the fire sat Drelincourt, who is, I suppose, the hero of this romance. At any rate it was to him that most of the happenings came. Women said he was interesting. This meant that he was pale and thin and dark, and had grey eyes that did not always see what they seemed to be looking at. His hands were long and thin, and his face was clean-shaven, and a little hollow in the cheek.

  He rapped on the arm of his Windsor chair.

  “The business of the evening will now begin,” he said; “Miss Raven has kindly consented to address the meeting.”

  “Don’t be silly,” said Miss Raven. “I know it is my turn to say what we shall do to-night. But the fire’s so ripping. My landlady’s callous — no fires after March. She has the chimneys swept on the first. Couldn’t we just sit here and jaw?”

  “Forbidden by the rules,” said more than one voice. “Sloth and luxury,” said William Bats regretfully, “are shocking vices.”

  “Well, then,” said Miss Raven, “suppose we pretend we’re in a Dickens Christmas Number, and each tell the sad sweet story of our lives.”

  “We shouldn’t have time to make them up,” said Rose.

  “No, we shouldn’t — should we?” said the Outsider thoughtfully.

  “Well, then, let’s each tell a story that’s not the sad sweet, and write them afterwards, and print them and divide the money.”

  “The Monolith has cured most of us of that illusion. But I suppose the fact that you get paid for your stuff blinds you to the fact that other people don’t.”

  “I could tell you a dissecting-room story,” said the doctor, “but—”

  “No you don’t,” said Anthony firmly. “Miss Raven will now come to the point of her remarks. So far, I find myself in entire agreement with the lecturer. If we could do anything that would end in our dividing any money, I for one should ask no better of Fate. I may remind the meeting that the chairman’s watch and chain have been in seclusion since last April.”

  “Beastly bad form to brag about your jewellery,” said Wilton.

  “There’s a certain affluence attached to a state in which one no longer needs one’s medical library,” said the chairman. “Proceed, Miss Raven.”

  “Well, look here,” said Miss Raven, “I’ll tell you what—”and stopped short.

  “No hurry,” said the chairman, settling his back against the Windsor chair.

  “All right! I’ll think of something in a minute. Look here! Let’s all answer advertisements. ‘ Home work. How to make fifty pounds a week in your spare time without hindrance to present employment.’”

  “I’ve done that,” said Linda. “It turned out to be sewing jet beads on to net to dress fat Jewesses in. You might earn five shillings a week if you really stuck at it.”

  “Chair!” said Drelincourt. “Is this really your decision, Miss Raven? Is this the way in which you decree that seven sane persons shall spend an evening which, once wasted, can never be recalled?”

  “I can’t think of anything else,” she said. “Do stop rotting, Tony. If you can think of anything else, say so. If not—”

  “As chairman of the evening,” said he, “I am expressly debarred from thinking. Rather will I call upon Mr. William Bats to produce seven pens, seven inks, and seven sheets of notepaper, seven envelopes, and seven copies of the Daily Whatsitsname.”

  “You’ll have to send out for those,” said Mr. Bats.

  “I’ll go,” said Mullinger, getting up at once.

&n
bsp; “It’s all right,” Miss Raven assured him. “I bought seven evening papers, all different.”

  “And suppose we’d agreed to sit and jaw as you suggested? “ Linda asked.

  “That would have been cheap at threepence halfpenny, don’t you think?”

  And now with rustlings and white wavings the company vanished behind newspapers.

  “Of course,” said Miss Raven warningly, “we aren’t to tell each other what advertisement we answer.”

  “And suppose we all answer the same one?”

  “The more the merrier.”

  “This,” said Rose over the top of her paper, “is the dullest game I ever played.”

  “Oh no!” Linda protested: “dull? How can you?”

  “By the way,” Mr. Bats asked carelessly, “may we answer any advertisement, or only the ones about spare time?”

  “Oh, any,” answered Miss Raven, absorbed in her paper.

  “Right O!” said Mr. Bats, “I shall answer an agony one.”

  But no one paid any attention. And presently pens scratched, and wandering eyes, vaguely seeking the right word, met and fixed other eyes in that blank mutual glare which attains perfection only across a writing-table.

  And when all the letters were written, Miss Raven collected all the newspapers and put them away neatly.

  “Girl after my own heart! “ said Mr. William Bats.

  “I only do it to avoid fuss,” said Miss Raven, “not because I’m really tidy.”

  “It shall go no further,” said Bats.

  “Now all the letters are done, we can jaw,” said Linda luxuriously. “Anthony shall play to us.”

  She reached down the old viol-di-gamba which hung on the wall, as it had once hung on the wall of a great lady’s ante-room in the days when James the First was king, for the entertainment of guests waiting for an audience.