The Old Adam: A Story of Adventure

by Arnold Bennett

  II.

  "Welcome to Stirling's box, Machin!" Robert Brindley greeted thealderman with an almost imperceptible wink. Edward Henry hadencountered this wink once or twice before; he could not decideprecisely what it meant; it was apt to make him reflective. He did notdislike Robert Brindley, his habit was not to dislike people; headmitted Brindley to be a clever architect, though he objected to the"modern" style of the fronts of his houses and schools. But he did takeexception to the man's attitude towards the Five Towns, of which, by theway, Brindley was just as much a native as himself. Brindley seemed tolive in the Five Towns like a highly cultured stranger in a savage land,and to derive rather too much sardonic amusement from the spectacle ofexistence therein. Brindley was a very special crony of Stirling's, andhad influenced Stirling. But Stirling was too clever to submit undulyto the influence. Besides, Stirling was not a native; he was only aScotchman, and Edward Henry considered that what Stirling thought of thedistrict did not matter. Other details about Brindley which EdwardHenry deprecated were his necktie, which, for Edward Henry's taste, wastoo flowing, his scorn of the "Pianisto" (despite the man's tremendousinterest in music), and his incipient madness on the subject of books--amadness shared by Stirling. Brindley and the doctor were foreverchattering about books, and buying them.

  So that, on the whole, Dr. Stirling's box was not a place where EdwardHenry felt entirely at home. Nevertheless, the two men, having presentedMr. Bryany, did their best, each in his own way, to make him feel athome.

  "Take this chair, Machin," said Stirling, indicating a chair at thefront.

  "Oh, I can't take the front chair!" Edward Henry protested.

  "Of course you can, my dear Machin," said Brindley sharply. "The frontchair in a stage-box is the one proper seat in the house for you. Do asyour doctor prescribes."

  And Edward Henry accordingly sat down at the front, with Mr. Bryany byhis side; and the other two sat behind. But Edward Henry was not quitecomfortable. He faintly resented that speech of Brindley's. And yet hedid feel that what Brindley had said was true, and he was indeed glad tobe in the front chair of a brilliant stage-box on the grand tier,instead of being packed away in the nethermost twilight of the GrandCircle. He wondered how Brindley and Stirling had managed todistinguish his face among the confusion of faces in that distantobscurity; he, Edward Henry, had failed to notice them, even in theprominence of their box. But that they had distinguished him showed howfamiliar and striking a figure he was. He wondered, too, why theyshould have invited him to hobnob with them. He was not of their set.Indeed, like many very eminent men, he was not to any degree inanybody's set. Of one thing he was sure,--because he had read it on theself-conscious faces of all three of them,--namely, that they had beendiscussing him. Possibly he had been brought up for Mr. Bryany'sinspection as a major lion and character of the district. Well, he didnot mind that; nay, he enjoyed that. He could feel Mr. Bryany covertlylooking him over. And he thought: "Look, my boy! I make no charge."He smiled and nodded to one or two people who with pride saluted himfrom the stalls. It was meet that he should be visible there on thatFriday night!

  "A full house!" he observed, to break the rather awkward silence of thebox, as he glanced round at the magnificent smoke-veiled pageant of thearistocracy and the democracy of the Five Towns crowded together, tierabove gilded tier, up to the dim roof where ragged lads and maidsgiggled and flirted while waiting for the broken plates to be clearedaway and the moving pictures to begin.

  "You may say it!" agreed Mr. Bryany, who spoke with a very slightAmerican accent. "Dakins positively hadn't a seat to offer me. Ihappened to have the evening free. It isn't often I do have a freeevening. And so I thought I'd pop in here. But if Dakins hadn'tintroduced me to these gentlemen, my seat would have had to be astanding one."

  "So that's how they got to know him, is it?" thought Edward Henry.

  And then there was another short silence.

  "Hear you've been doing something striking in rubber shares, Machin?"said Brindley at length.

  Astonishing how these things got abroad!

  "Oh, very little, very little!" Edward Henry laughed modestly. "Toolate to do much! In another fortnight the bottom will be all out of therubber market!"

  "Of course I'm an Englishman--" Mr. Bryany began.

  "Why 'of course'?" Edward Henry interrupted him.

  "Hear! Hear! Alderman. Why 'of course'?" said Brindley approvingly,and Stirling's rich laugh was heard. "Only it does just happen,"Brindley added, "that Mr. Bryany did us the honour to be born in thedistrict."

  "Yes. Longshaw," Mr. Bryany admitted, half proud and half apologetic,"which I left at the age of two."

  "Oh, Longshaw!" murmured Edward Henry with a peculiar inflection, whichhad a distinct meaning for at least two of his auditors.

  Longshaw is at the opposite end of the Five Towns from Bursley, and themajority of the inhabitants of Bursley have never been to Longshaw intheir lives, have only heard of it, as they hear of Chicago or Bangkok.Edward Henry had often been to Longshaw, but, like every visitor fromBursley, he instinctively regarded it as a foolish and unnecessaryplace.

  "As I was saying," resumed Mr. Bryany, quite unintimidated, "I'm anEnglishman. But I've lived eighteen years in America, and it seems tome the bottom will soon be knocked out of pretty nearly all the marketsin England. Look at the Five Towns!"

  "No, don't, Mr. Bryany!" said Brindley. "Don't go to extremes."

  "Personally, I don't mind looking at the Five Towns," said Edward Henry."What of it?"

  "Well, did you ever see such people for looking twice at a five-poundnote?"

  Edward Henry most certainly did not like this aspersion on his nativedistrict. He gazed in silence at Mr. Bryany's brassy and yet simpleface, and did not like the face either.

  And Mr. Bryany, beautifully unaware that he had failed in tact,continued: "The Five Towns is the most English place I've ever seen,believe me! Of course it has its good points, and England has her goodpoints; but there's no money stirring. There's no field for speculationon the spot, and as for outside investment, no Englishman will touchanything that really is good." He emphasised the last three words.

  "What d'ye do yeself, Mr. Bryany?" inquired Dr. Stirling.

  "What do I do with my little bit?" cried Mr. Bryany. "Oh, I know whatto do with my little bit. I can get ten per cent. in Seattle, andtwelve to fifteen in Calgary, on my little bit; and security just asgood as English railway stock--_and_ better."

  The theatre was darkened, and the cinematograph began its recklesstwinkling.

  Mr. Bryany went on offering to Edward Henry, in a suitably loweredvoice, his views on the great questions of investment and speculation;and Edward Henry made cautious replies.

  "And even when there is a good thing going at home," Mr. Bryany said, ina wounded tone, "what Englishman'd look at it?"

  "I would," said Edward Henry with a blandness that was only skin-deep,for all the time he was cogitating the question whether the presence ofDr. Stirling in the audience ought or ought not to be regarded asprovidential.

  "Now, I've got the option on a little affair in London," said Mr.Bryany, while Edward Henry glanced quickly at him in the darkness, "andcan I get anybody to go into it? I can't."

  "What sort of a little affair?"

  "Building a theatre in the West End."

  Even a less impassive man than Edward Henry would have started at thecoincidence of this remark. And Edward Henry started. Twenty minutesago he had been idly dreaming of theatrical speculation, and now hecould almost see theatrical speculation shimmering before him in thepale shifting rays of the cinematograph that cut through the gloom ofthe mysterious auditorium.

  "Oh!" And in this new interest he forgot the enigma of the ways ofProvidence.

  "Of course, you know, I'm in the business," said Mr. Bryany. "I'm SevenSachs's manager." It was as if he owned and operated Mr. Seven Sachs.

  "So I heard
," said Edward Henry, and then remarked with mischievouscordiality: "And I suppose these chaps told you I was the sort of manyou were after. And you got them to ask me in, eh, Mr. Bryany?"

  Mr. Bryany gave an uneasy laugh, but seemed to find naught to say.

  "Well, what is your little affair?" Edward Henry encouraged him.

  "Oh, I can't tell you now," said Mr. Bryany. "It would take too long.The thing has to be explained."

  "Well, what about to-morrow?"

  "I have to leave for London by the first train in the morning."

  "Well, some other time?"

  "After to-morrow will be too late."

  "Well, what about to-night?"

  "The fact is, I've half promised to go with Dr. Stirling to some club orother after the show. Otherwise we might have had a quiet confidentialchat in my rooms over the Turk's Head. I never dreamt--" Mr. Bryanywas now as melancholy as a greedy lad who regards rich fruit at arm'slength through a plate-glass window, and he had ceased to bepatronising.

  "I'll soon get rid of Stirling for you," said Edward Henry, turninginstantly towards the doctor. The ways of Providence had been made plainto Edward Henry. "I say, Doc!" But the Doctor and Brindley were inconversation with another man at the open door of the box.

  "What is it?" said Stirling.

  "I've come to fetch you. You're wanted at my place."

  "Well, you're a caution!" said Stirling.

  "Why am I a caution?" Edward Henry smoothly protested. "I didn't tellyou before because I didn't want to spoil your fun."

  Stirling's mien was not happy.

  "Did they tell you I was here?" he asked.

  "You'd almost think so, wouldn't you?" said Edward Henry in a playful,enigmatic tone. After all, he decided privately, his wife was right: itwas better that Stirling should see the infant. And there was also thisnatural human thought in his mind: he objected to the doctor giving anentire evening to diversions away from home; he considered that adoctor, when not on a round of visits, ought to be forever in hisconsulting-room, ready for a sudden call of emergency. It was monstrousthat Stirling should have proposed, after an escapade at the music-hall,to spend further hours with chance acquaintances in vague clubs! Halfthe town might fall sick and die while the doctor was vainly amusinghimself. Thus the righteous layman in Edward Henry!

  "What's the matter?" asked Stirling.

  "My eldest's been rather badly bitten by a dog, and the missis wants itcauterized."

  "Really?"

  "Well, you bet she does!"

  "Where's the bite?"

  "In the calf."

  The other man at the door having departed, Robert Brindley abruptlyjoined the conversation at this point.

  "I suppose you've heard of that case of hydrophobia at Bleakridge?" saidBrindley.

  Edward Henry's heart jumped.

  "No, I haven't," he said anxiously. "What is it?"

  He gazed at the white blur of Brindley's face in the darkened box, andhe could hear the rapid clicking of the cinematograph behind him.

  "Didn't you see it in the _Signal_?"

  "No."

  "Neither did I," said Brindley.

  At the same moment the moving pictures came to an end, the theatre wasfilled with light, and the band began to play, "God Save the King."Brindley and Stirling were laughing. And indeed, Brindley had scored,this time, over the unparalleled card of the Five Towns.

  "I make you a present of that," said Edward Henry. "But my wife's mostprecious infant has to be cauterized, Doctor," he added firmly.

  "Got your car here?" Stirling questioned.

  "No. Have you?"

  "No."

  "Well, there's the tram. I'll follow you later. I've some businessround this way. Persuade my wife not to worry, will you?"

  And when a discontented Dr. Stirling had made his excuses and adieux toMr. Bryany, and Robert Brindley had decided that he could not leave hiscrony to travel by tram-car alone, and the two men had gone, then EdwardHenry turned to Mr. Bryany:

  "That's how I get rid of the doctor, you see."

  "But _has_ your child been bitten by a dog?" asked Mr. Bryany, acutelyperplexed.

  "You'd almost think so, wouldn't you?" Edward Henry replied, carefullynon-committal. "What price going to the Turk's Head now?"

  He remembered with satisfaction, and yet with misgiving, a remark madeto him, a judgment passed on him, by a very old woman very many yearsbefore. This discerning hag, the Widow Hullins by name, had said to himbriefly, "Well, you're a queer 'un!"