by E. F. Benson
The story of the little boy and the whisky pleased Lady Appledore very much. “A teetotaller for life I expect,” she said to Miss Jobson, “I should like some more stories of that sort.”
Colonel Chase sat down for a moment after this, and drank a little water out of the glass in which he had pretended as a little boy to put back the whisky. This took the audience’s fancy tremendously, and he couldn’t conceive why. He was in so strange a mental state that even Mrs. Bliss, the interpreter of Mind, would have found him hard to treat. He was simmering with fury at the story of the man-eater having been received with those ribald gusts of laughter, and felt sure that he would have gripped his audience and made them catch their breath with suspense, had not that wretched mongrel bounded on to the stage at the climax. On the other hand, the roars of laughter and applause which had greeted him went to his head like wine, and he hardly knew whether to be elated or indignant. He rose to tell his ghost story, and little did they think what terrors and goose-flesh were coming: then, as the encore, he would restore them with the tale of the grocer.
The little boy with the whisky had rather damped the spirits of his audience, but on the announcement of ‘My own ghost’ they brightened up again, and cheerfully beat time to the first few bars of ‘On the road to Mandalay’.
“In the year 1895,” said Colonel Chase, “I was stationed at Futipur-Sekri, and by the order of his Excellency the Viceroy—”
The quicker-witted portion of his audience began to laugh. It was like Mr. George Robey saying ‘The last time I had tea with the King’. They knew the sort of thing that was coming. Colonel Chase drew himself up, and fingered his medals. So like George Robey.
“By the order of his Excellency the Viceroy,” said Colonel Chase, rather severely, “I was sent into the district of Astmetagaga to make a report on the discontent among the Bizributmas. Bellialonga, the capital of the Bizributma tribe was a three-days journey from Futipur-Sekri, and I had to sleep at two dak-bungalows on the way. Just before sunset on the day of which I am speaking I came in sight of the dak-bungalow of Poona-padra, and sent my khitmagar on with a couple of coolies to cook my dinner, and deal with superfluous cobras.”
“Really very good,” said Lady Appledore to Miss Jobson, “a perfect parody of Mr. Kipling. I am sure something very comical is coming.”
Colonel Chase could not hear what she said, but saw that both she and Miss Jobson had their eyes fixed on him in avid attention.
“The khitmagar was in the cook-house when I arrived,” said he, turning slightly towards the piano to show Miss Howard that her cue was imminent, “and night was at hand. My table was laid and I was just about to light the lamp, when I saw at the other end of the room — I mean, in the far corner—”
The piano punctually emitted a moaning wail, and Colonel Chase raised his voice a little.
“ — a grey shape forming itself into the semblance of a man. As the lamp burned brighter—”
“You ‘aven’t lit it yet mister,” said some precisian from the back.
“ — burned brighter,” repeated Colonel Chase, “I saw the dread form with greater distinctness, and my heart stood still. It was clothed in ragged garments, sparse elfin-locks hung over its forehead — forehead,” said he, looking wildly round for the man whose duty it was at this particular moment to switch off all the lights in the hall except one close above the platform, by which the audience could see his face of horror surrounded by darkness, “and blood dripped from a jagged wound in its throat. Slowly it detached itself from the wall and advanced on me—”
Every single light went out, including that above the platform, and the man at the switches seeing his mistake, put them all on again. The laughter became general, but, as it were, expectant, holding itself in for the climax.
“ — towering ever higher as it approached. Cold sweat broke out on my forehead, my throat was dry as dust—”
“‘Ave a drink,” said a delighted voice.
“ — my knees trembled, and I knew that the powers of Hell were loose. ‘Avaunt’, I cried, ‘In the name of God avaunt’ . . . The phantom shrieked—”
Miss Howard, whose hands were poised above the keys, struck a tremendous ascending arpeggio, the end of which was drowned in a roar of laughter. The hall hooted with inextinguishable joy: never was there such a comic as the Colonel.
After this stupendous success Colonel Chase should have stopped: to tell the story of the grocer was to whitewash the lily. But it served to quiet the audience again, though when Mr. Banks in a fruity baritone melodiously bade them come fishing, since tomorrow would be Friday, there were cheerful dissentients who reminded him it would be Thursday. He most obligingly accepted the correction in the second verse, and in the third said it would be Tuesday which gave much satisfaction. He at once sang an encore, and then hurried to the ‘artists’ room’, where Dr. Dobbs was arranging top hats and canaries and handkerchiefs, and put it tactfully to the owner of the performing dog that, as that intelligent animal had already scored the success of the evening as the man-eater, and as Lady Appledore had kept them waiting so long, would it be possible to reserve dear little Toby’s performance for the next entertainment at Christmas. Toby’s master with some asperity, said that it would not only be possible but probable that Toby’s next performance would be reserved for ever and ever, and left by the back door in high dudgeon.
Slightly crushed by this severity, Mr. Banks stole back on tiptoe to hear the piano solo. Miss Howard had begun splendidly, and with dreamy eyes fixed on the ceiling and head a little on one side to catch the messages from the harmonious spirits of the air, was improvising that charming fragment from the waltz by Chopin with delicacy and precision. Then she closed her eyes and sank her head over the pensive section by moonlight, and made everybody feel that tomorrow would be Monday, so Sunday-like was the chorale that toothache had inspired. She opened her eyes again, and was wreathed in smiles as the spirits of the air suggested to her that pretty device of the long shake and the crossing arpeggios, but next moment those nearest her might have observed a slightly glazed look coming over her face as the magnificent fortissimo passage for octaves in both hands drew near. She tried to calm herself by letting her eyes stray about to shew her complete mastery of her task: now they glanced at Lady Appledore, now at Florence who was leaning forward towards her with a look of yearning ecstasy, rather disconcerting. Now she was among the octaves, but for the life of her once more she could not remember how she rescued herself from this tempestuous sea and slid into the calm waters of the Chopin waltz again, and she projected anxious thoughts into the rapidly approaching future, instead of trusting to Mind, or at least her memory, to prompt her when she came to that point. She wished passionately that she had not improvised this fine passage at all: it would have been so easy to go straight into the Chopin waltz from the chorale. Her agitation increased, and the octaves grew faster and louder: she missed a change of key and found herself with fingers already aching with fatigue apparently committed to thunder forth fortuitous octaves with both hands till she swooned with the exertion. In vain she thought of Mrs. Bliss, in vain she stretched her mouth in an agonised smile and denied octaves and improvisation and forgetfulness and fatigue and anything else that came into her head. Her face was getting crimson, and yet she could not stop and if she could she would now be unable to recollect even the Chopin waltz. Finally, in absolute despair, she took her hands off the notes, hurled them at the piano again in three crashing chords, and rose. The moment she was on her feet she remembered exactly what the transition should have been, but now it was too late. . . . After the tremendous din that had been going on the applause sounded but faint, except for Florence’s indefatigable smacks.
Long before the hour for collection and carriages Wentworth collectively had been puzzling over what its demeanour to Colonel Chase should be. He was sitting a little apart from the rest, and sideway glances at him observed that he appeared slightly morose, or as if he was puzzling
too. There was no doubt that he had won the success of the evening, but that success had been purchased with strange coin, for his humorous tales had produced depression, and in others the suspense and terror which it had been his firm intention to evoke had roused gales of laughter. Not even the excitement of seeing how much Dowager Countesses gave to collections nor the pained disgust to observe that this one considered sixpence ample, put this difficult problem of demeanour out of Mrs. Oxney’s mind, and her sister whom she consulted in whispers was utterly at a loss: Mrs. Bertram merely shook her head sadly, and thought it very awkward. Should they congratulate him on his success, or execrate the odious light-mindedness of the audience, or ignore the whole affair and talk lightly about the weather?
There they all were then in a rather tense group, waiting for Lady Appledore’s motor to start and leave the entrance clear for the Wentworth bus. The reception committee including Colonel Chase was bowing its thanks to her for her distinguished patronage and her sixpence, and it was Lady Appledore herself who solved the problem for them.
“I so much enjoyed your very amusing stories, Colonel Chase,” she said. “Did I not Miss Jobson? The ghost! Quite killing! How I laughed! And the man-eater! What a clever little dog to come in just when you told it. Beautifully trained! And the comic music for the ghost! Most humorous.”
Now two courses were open to Colonel Chase. He might either turn livid with passion and tell Lady Appledore that she was as contemptible as the rest of the yokels who had laughed when they should have shuddered, or he might adopt Lady Appledore’s heresy as orthodox, and promulgate it, so to speak, as his own official Bull. The fact that he was a snob to the bottom of his appendix, and soberly considered countesses to be of a clay apart was perhaps the determining factor which settled the puzzling question of his demeanour. He bowed again and all his medals jingled.
“Delighted to have afforded you a little amusement, Lady Appledore,” he said in a voice that Wentworth could hear. “We had many a laugh in the mess when I told my ghost story.”
That, of course, settled the matter for Wentworth, and when he rejoined his party everybody knew exactly what line to take. That he had told the two thrilling tales of the man-eater and the ghost often and often before, and that they had been received with shudders and gasps and tremblings, and protests from Mrs. Oxney that she wouldn’t dare to go to bed to-night, must now be forgotten: from henceforth, world without end, these were comic stories, and Wentworth would scream with laughter at all the points where hitherto it had frozen with horror.
“Oh, Colonel,” said Mrs. Oxney, “what a treat you gave us! You made me ache with laughing. How we all enjoyed it! You never told them so wonderfully. Miss Howard, too! Her comic accompaniment: how you must have practised it together. And then your lovely improvisation afterwards, Miss Howard; all coming to you on the spur of the moment like that! At one moment I thought the inspiration was going to fail you, but how foolish of me to have been alarmed. Those grand chords at the end! You two made the whole success of the evening and Mr. and Mrs. Banks of course as well,” she hastily added at the approach of these artists. “The violin: such a sweet instrument. And tomorrow will be Tuesday or Wednesday, I declare I don’t know what to-day is after that. And ‘Curfew shall not ring to-night’! What a heroine! She deserved the Victoria Cross at least. And your dear little choir boys singing so beautifully and of course — good evening, Dr. Dobbs — Dr. Dobbs’s wonderful conjuring tricks. I couldn’t see how any of them were done, and fancy the Countess of Appledore only giving sixpence!”
The official and orthodox view could not have been more ably stated, and after a pleasant little refection of sandwiches and cake in the lounge, with some hot soup for the artists who must be exhausted with their efforts, Colonel Chase was induced to give them the ghost story again (new style) with piano accompaniment. Mrs. Holders had not been to the entertainment and to her unbounded astonishment she heard the shuddering and gruesome tale received with hoots of merriment. This was quite inexplicable and almost more so was the evident satisfaction of Colonel Chase.
“Well, a good laugh does us no harm now and again,” he said, “and I must say that I was pleased with the quickness with which the audience took my points. Nothing so depressing for the entertainer as to find that his humour is not appreciated. Lady Appledore — a charming woman — said she had enjoyed my little stories immensely. Very kind of her, I’m sure. I must bicycle over to the Grange some day soon and leave my card.”
“And Miss Howard’s playing too, Mrs. Holders,” continued Mrs. Oxney, who wanted everyone to feel happy and appreciated. “You did miss something there. Quite a sensation! How I should like to hear it again! You ought to write it down, Miss Howard, you ought indeed, so that your inspiration shouldn’t be lost, and that others might play it as well if they had the fingers, though I’m sure only the most superior pianists could do it. What an evening of enjoyment! And the picture exhibition to look forward to next week.”
“But fancy the Countess of Appledore only giving sixpence,” said Mrs. Bertram, on whom this miserly incident had made the deepest impression. “I thought that was a very paltry sum indeed, and I could hardly believe my eyes. Sixpence, and Miss Jobson nothing at all.”
Colonel Chase went up to bed satisfied that he had acted for the best in taking the verdict of the audience (especially when endorsed by a Countess) as final. He had gone through the most poignant emotions that evening, in which rage and disgust were the keenest. His feelings when the house began to laugh at the story of the tiger were indescribable, and when that miserable little terrier came on to the platform and begged, he would willingly have shot it, had the imaginary rifle in his hands, suddenly materialised: and when the house again rocked with merriment at his ghost story, he would, had the rifle undergone a further transmutation into a machine-gun have felt the greatest satisfaction in mowing them down in swathes, beginning with a Countess. Then his comic stories had failed altogether (these rustic audiences had the most perverted sense of humour) and probably no more deeply-chagrined a reciter had ever stepped down from a platform. He really could not see how he could face Wentworth at all: it is true they had not laughed except in the right places, and when others laughed they had worn expressions of pain and sympathy, and throughout the remainder of the entertainment he had been thinking of some very severe things to say about being subjected to the insults of an unmannerly mob. Then, owing to Lady Appledore’s comments, he had seized his opportunity, and mounted the throne of the supreme comic artist. It was like a conjuring trick, one of Dr. Dobbs’s best.
As he undressed and did his valuable exercises, puffing out his big chest, and bending till he touched his toes, he wondered if a more surprising success had ever come to a man out of ruinous failure. Wentworth, too, had caught on at once, and had laughed at the repetition of the ghost story just now, as if they had never known what it felt like to shudder. . . . And then suddenly the thought of Mrs. Bliss came to him. She had told him that if only he relied on Mind, in his kind and unselfish efforts in aid of the poor children in hospital, they must be crowned with brilliant success. That had certainly happened, though as a matter of fact the poor children in hospital had not even so much as entered his head, since he was first approached by Mr. Banks. And then he remembered also that Mrs. Bliss had said that Mind was often inscrutable in its workings: the aspirations of those who trusted it were always fulfilled, but mortal sense could never accurately predict the manner of it. Certainly he had never expected that Mind would fulfil his aspirations by causing his audience to peal with laughter at what had been designed to make their flesh creep, and when their first giggles broke out he had determined to have nothing to do with Mind. But now that apparent failure wore a different aspect, one that could only be accounted for by the theory of inscrutable dealings, ‘Upon my word,’ he said to himself, as he got into bed, ‘I’ll look into it all a bit further. My cold, my pedometer, and now this! It all seems to hang together in the most
marvellous fashion.’
Mr. Banks came up to Wentworth again next day to see Colonel Chase, full of congratulations and with a further request to make.
“Stupendous, Colonel,” he said, “you were simply stupendous last night. There were some nurses there from the Children’s Hospital, and they told me on my visit there this morning that they’d never laughed so much in all their born days. ‘Curfew shall not ring to-night’ seems to have pleased them too, but that’s neither here nor there.”
“Remarkably fine, I thought,” said Colonel Chase, who could easily afford to commend minor lights.
“Very good of you to say so. I thought I gripped the audience. Well, the matron charged me to ask you if you wouldn’t very kindly give the story of the tiger and the ghost in the wards. Poor little mites you know: there’ve got small cause for laughter in their lives, and it really would be most good of you.”
Colonel Chase was highly gratified, and good-naturedly abandoned his walk, and went to the hospital that afternoon. The matron thought she could introduce her cat into the tiger story to take the place of that clever dog, while it was in course of narration, for it was a lethargic cat, usually asleep and good at staying exactly where it was put: she could put it down on one of the beds quite quietly. It was thought better to feed the cat first, for after food sleep was assured, so would the Colonel begin with the ghost story? The children were all agog with pleasure and excitement at the prospect of hearing the funny man.
The nurses, already tittering at what was coming, preceded the funny man into the first ward, and he began his ghost story. But the effect was highly disastrous: child after child broke into shrieks of terror and dismay, nurses hurried from bed to bed to comfort the howling occupants, and assure them they shouldn’t be frightened any more, and the matron had to beg the Colonel to leave the ward without delay. So, within ten minutes of his arrival, he was on his way back to Wentworth in a state of complete bewilderment as to whether the ghost story was terrible or comic; its effect seemed to be wholly incalculable. And surely Mind was acting again in the most inscrutable manner.
