MR. CHOWDLER WINS A BATTLE AND MEETS WITH A REBUFF
When Term began again towards the end of January, Mr. Tipham and his
many-coloured scarf were no longer a feature of Chiltern. He had
transferred himself to Cambridge and tutorial work, feeling possibly
that Cleopas College and the undergraduate were in closer touch with
Nature than Chiltern and the public schoolboy. Anyhow he was gone, and
his place had been taken by a young man of less pronounced views, who
wore spectacles and listened deferentially to Mr. Chowdler.
Mr. Chowdler himself had returned in splendid fighting form. He had
spent the greater part of the holidays at Sauersprudel, and he had
employed the time in wrestling and prevailing. Long before “all the
vulgar people that Harry hates so” (we are quoting from Mrs. Chowdler)
flocked out to Switzerland at Christmas, Mr. Chowdler had discovered
Sauersprudel in the Spitzenthal and planted the British flag there.
It is true that all the English families who have visited the place in
Mr. Chowdler’s wake speak of themselves as having discovered it too. But
that does not alter the fact that Mr. Chowdler was the real Christopher
Columbus of Sauersprudel and the father of the Adler Hotel--at least as
a winter resort.
In the early days of the British occupation the settlers were not
numerous, but they came regularly every winter. There were, besides Mr.
and Mrs. Chowdler, the Hon. Fitzroy Plashy and party, Canon and Mrs.
Dubbin, Dr. Cushat and family, Mr. Weatherbury, K.C., and a few others
who had suddenly realised that sunshine and frost are not peculiar to
the Engadine, and that Sauersprudel is much nearer to London than St.
Moritz is. These pioneers lived together on fairly amicable terms,
enjoying equal rights, but possessing no written laws, no organised
constitution.
But, as the tide of cheap immigration brought strange faces to the
Adlerhof in ever-increasing numbers, the old patriarchal life was
bound to come to an end in favour of some system more congenial to
the British temperament--one, that is to say, which would classify
the guests and admit of a distinction between governors and governed.
Accordingly, Mr. Chowdler and the original families took up the white
man’s burden, formed themselves into a permanent committee, and set
themselves to organise life on the principles which have made sport the
thing it is. They created a skating club, a tobogganing club, a ski-ing
club, and a curling club, each with rules and tests and an etiquette of
its own; they appointed competitions, and decided in what particular
form of dissipation the guests were to indulge of an evening. In a
word, they gave the Adlerhof the blessings of a firm and orderly
government. With a prescriptive right to the best rooms and the chief
place at feasts, they were the aristocracy of the hotel, governing,
as befits an aristocracy, in the interests of the many, but holding
discreetly aloof.
Unfortunately, amongst Britons, one of the first results of a firm
government is a factious and discontented Opposition; and the Adlerhof
was no exception to the rule. No sooner had Mr. Chowdler and his
friends assumed the cares of office than murmurs of complaint began to
be heard, feeble at first but gathering strength with each successive
season. Wild young men and women, athirst for bandy and bunny-hugs, for
impossible ski-jumps and noisy races along the corridors, protested
that they had not come out to be drilled like schoolboys but to
enjoy themselves; and they began to question the authority of the
self-appointed committee. Profoundly ignorant of the past history
of the place and of all that it owed to its aristocracy, they felt
no reverence for Mr. Chowdler and the Hon. Fitzroy Plashy circling
sedately round an orange, and only wondered why the best part of the
rink was reserved for these old fogeys and their friends. At last a
moment came when, conscious of their strength, they passed from murmurs
to action. When the committee arranged a toboggan race, the opposition
organised a ski-ing competition; when the committee decreed a gymkhana,
the opposition engineered a dance; and the hotel was divided into
hostile camps.
Things were in this critical state when, on December 28, Mr. Chowdler
arrived in Sauersprudel to lend his powerful support to the cause of
law and order. His annual appearance had always been treated as an
event of importance in the life of the hotel--obsequious smiles from
mine host and a flutter among the servants. You would have thought him
a governor returning to his colony, or a chieftain to his clan. But,
on this occasion, Mr. Chowdler, who had left his wife at home, was met
in the hall by the landlord with a face of woe. The room on the first
floor with the south aspect, the room that he had selected as his own
in 1896 and which had been specially reserved for him ever since, had
been forcibly annexed and occupied, a fortnight previously, by a young
English Herr who refused to turn out for all the Chowdlers in creation.
Would Mr. Chowdler mind going into a room on the other side of the
passage for a few days--a larger and a better room, though facing
north? The young Herr talked of leaving very shortly.
“His name?” asked Mr. Chowdler curtly.
“Mr. Maurice Veal of London.”
“Bring him to me,” said Mr. Chowdler.
Impossible; the young man had gone out ski-ing for the day, taking his
lunch with him.
“Then send my boxes up to my room,” said Mr. Chowdler. “My _own_ room
mind. I will arrange matters.”
The landlord hesitated between fear of Mr. Chowdler and the danger of
losing a wealthy customer who drank champagne every night and paid
exactly twice as much for the room as Mr. Chowdler did. But fear of Mr.
Chowdler prevailed; and, when young Mr. Veal returned from his day’s
sport at five in the afternoon, he found his own effects in the passage
and Mr. Chowdler, in shirt sleeves, busily engaged in installing
himself in the disputed apartment.
Mr. Veal, though not deficient in bounce, was not remarkable for his
physical proportions. Perhaps a long and fatiguing day in the snow,
in the course of which he had taken many severe falls, had damped his
spirits; or, perhaps the sight of Mr. Chowdler in shirt sleeves, with
his broad shoulders, bullet head, red face, and determined jaw, was
more formidable than anything he had anticipated. At all events he lost
his nerve, and, after a little bluster and some futile threats, he
withdrew to abuse the landlord, leaving Mr. Chowdler in possession.
“I engaged this room in 1896,” Mr. Chowdler shouted after him, “and I
intend to keep it.”
And he kept it.
However, the victory of the bedroom did not end the campaign against
the committee; it only spurred the enemy to greater exertions. And
young Veal, panting for revenge, became the recognised leader of a
guerilla campaign. No step that the committee took was allowed to pass
unchallenged; no rule was made but it was straightway broken, no notice
was posted without provoking a counter-notice or a parody. Half the
hotel was on terms of active hostility with the other half. The older
men and their wives stood by the committee, the younger ones rallied
round the banner of Veal. And a climax seemed to have been reached one
afternoon, when Veal and a friend dashed across the sacred enclosure,
where Messrs. Chowdler, Plashy and Weatherbury were cutting figures,
kicked away the orange which formed the centre of their evolutions, and
spilled Mr. Chowdler--accidentally, as they maintained; of set purpose
and malice aforethought, as others asserted. After this anything was
possible. But the situation was saved by the timely arrival of Lord
Budleigh of Salterton and his brother the Admiral. By a masterly stroke
of policy they were co-opted on to the committee before they had been
five minutes in the hotel; and the opposition collapsed. For even in
moments of the wildest aberration, a hotelful of English folk knows the
value of a lord. Moreover, Lord Budleigh was a man of courteous and
conciliatory manners, far less exclusive in his behaviour than either
Mr. Chowdler or the Hon. Fitzroy Plashy, and tolerant of the vagaries
of youth; while his brother the Admiral, who was out to enjoy himself
and sublimely unconscious of anything amiss, fraternised with everybody
in the most natural and friendly way. Within eight-and-forty hours, Mr.
Veal found himself without followers and left the hotel. The committee
had triumphed, and, with the committee, Mr. Chowdler.
“There _had_ been a little unpleasantness before I arrived,” he said
afterwards, in describing the events, “but I soon settled all that.”
It will be readily understood, therefore, that Mr. Chowdler was in no
mood to tolerate rebuffs when he returned to Chiltern. And yet, as
ill-luck would have it, a rebuff of the most unexpected kind awaited
him. On the eve of his departure for Switzerland he had written to
the headmaster to intimate that he wished to have Cheeny as a house
Prefect in the following term, and it would therefore be convenient if
the boy were made a school Prefect at the same time. In all his past
experience a wish of this kind had been equivalent to a command, and
had only needed the official endorsement of the headmaster. However,
this time, on his return from Sauersprudel, he found, not the official
endorsement he expected, but a note, requesting him to come and see Mr.
Flaggon on the matter at his earliest convenience. The interview was
more surprising even than the note. Mr. Flaggon, it appeared, intended,
when appointing Prefects, to take much less account in future of mere
athletic distinction and much more of mental ability; “because,” he
said, “although I know that there are often striking exceptions, brain
power and character are closely allied, and the boy who has brains
is more likely to understand and appreciate high ideals than the boy
who has none. I have gone into Cheeny’s claims very carefully; and,
except for your high opinion of him, which of course weighs with me, I
can find no reason for promoting him to such a responsible post. He is
quite low in the school and----”
“Then you can’t have seen him in the Cock-house match last Term,”
interrupted Mr. Chowdler angrily.
“I did,” replied Mr. Flaggon. “I admired his spirit and I envied him
his agility. But that kind of spirit alone doesn’t make a Prefect; and
I notice that all his masters say of him that he collapses before any
difficulty in his work and is inclined to sulk.”
Mr. Chowdler was too indignant to speak; but worse was in store; for
Mr. Flaggon continued implacably:
“But there is another boy in your house whom I _am_ very glad to make
a Prefect. I mean Dennison. He has earned the honour by his place in
the school alone, and, so far as I can judge--and I have been studying
him rather closely--he has qualities which justify me in feeling very
hopeful about him.”
Dennison! Mr. Chowdler nearly had a fit. Dennison! One of those morbid,
cantankerous, precocious boys, who have none of the good-fellowship,
none of the joy of life, that are the crown of youth. A boy with a
jealous, sour, carping disposition, unpopular with his fellows and
unresponsive to his housemaster; a boy without influence and eaten up
by an unhealthy egotism.
“You misjudge him,” said Mr. Flaggon. “The boy is reserved, rather
sensitive, and shy of expressing himself; but he has character and a
conscience. With guidance and a little sympathy he will make a very
useful Prefect.”
“_Will_ make!” Mr. Chowdler protested vehemently. _He_ knew the boy
as only a housemaster _could_ know a boy, whereas the headmaster was
only judging superficially. At no price would he accept Dennison as a
Prefect in his house.
“I am sorry,” said Mr. Flaggon stiffly, “to be obliged to force on you
as Prefect a boy with whom you are clearly so much out of sympathy. But
I have quite made up my mind to make Dennison a school Prefect; and, of
course, if he is a school Prefect, he must be a house Prefect too.”
“In that case,” said Mr. Chowdler, scarlet with passion, “I decline to
be responsible for anything that may happen in my house.”
“Those are serious words for a housemaster to use,” said Mr. Flaggon
gravely.
“They were not spoken in jest,” retorted Mr. Chowdler, as he left the
study; and, though the headmaster made no reply, he realised that
things could not go on much longer on this unsatisfactory footing.
From that moment Mr. Chowdler became a man with an obsession. The mere
mention of the name Flaggon temporarily upset his mental balance.
In all the petty annoyances of life he saw the hand of Flaggon, and
anybody who was not ready to curse Flaggon by all his gods became at
once suspect.
At Chiltern, as in all intellectual societies, the personal doings and
idiosyncrasies of its individual members formed the staple of daily
conversation; and, before the Term was two days old, Mr. Chowdler
knew that Bent and Flaggon had walked together in the holidays, taken
tea together, and, no doubt, conspired together. He never _had_ liked
Bent--a cynical egotist (all the people whom Mr. Chowdler disliked were
egotists) with dangerous principles. He shouldn’t wonder if Bent had
been poisoning the “empty one’s” mind against Cheeny. Bent always had a
grudge against _his_ boys.
Accordingly, coming across Bent one morning in the masters’
reading-room, which adjoined the Common Room, he could not resist the
impulse to attack.
“Well, Bent,” he said, in tones of forced geniality through which the
sarcasm pierced like a needle, “I’m told I ought to congratulate you
on your promotion. I hear that you have been privileged to drink deep
draughts out of the Flaggon in the holidays. I hope you found the
beverage stimulating.”
Mr. Bent had returned from his week-end in town with a chill on the
liver which made him disagreeable to his friends and offensive to his
foes. He flushed with anger, but forced himself to reply with affected
airiness.
“Very, thank you. And I suppose _you_ have been rapping tables and
communicating with the spook of Old Lanchester. Did he tell you, by the
way, that I have been reading some unpublished letters of his, which
are rather sensational and upset most of your pet theories about the
tradition?”
It came as a perpetual surprise to Mr. Chowdler, whenever they had
words, that Bent did not know how to behave like a gentleman or answer
a civil question civilly. But this went beyond all bounds. So he drew
himself up and replied with dignity:
“I am not in the habit of answering flippant and offensive questions.”
“In that case,” said Mr. Bent, suddenly losing his self-control, “I
should advise you not to make offensive and impertinent remarks about
matters which don’t concern you.”
Which reply left Mr. Chowdler justly indignant, and confirmed him in
the belief that Bent _had_ had something to do with the rejection of
Cheeny.