§ 1.
Freddie Rooke gazed coldly at the breakfast-table. Through a gleaming
eye-glass he inspected the revolting object which Parker, his faithful
man, had placed on a plate before him.
“Parker!” His voice had a ring of pain.
“Sir?”
“What’s this?”
“Poached egg, sir.”
Freddie averted his eyes with a silent shudder.
“It looks just like an old aunt of mine,” he said. “Remove it!”
He got up, and, wrapping his dressing-gown about his long legs, took up
a stand in front of the fireplace. From this position he surveyed the
room, his shoulders against the mantelpiece, his calves pressing the
club-fender. It was a cheerful oasis in a chill and foggy world, a
typical London bachelor’s breakfast-room. The walls were a restful
gray, and the table, set for two, a comfortable arrangement in white
and silver.
“Eggs, Parker,” said Freddie solemnly, “are the acid test!”
“Yes, sir?”
“If, on the morning after, you can tackle a poached egg, you are all
right. If not, not. And don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.”
“No, sir.”
Freddie pressed the palm of his hand to his brow, and sighed.
“It would seem, then, that I must have revelled a trifle
whole-heartedly last night. I was possibly a little blotto. Not
whiffled, perhaps, but indisputably blotto. Did I make much noise
coming in?”
“No, sir. You were very quiet.”
“Ah! A dashed bad sign!”
Freddie moved to the table, and poured himself a cup of coffee.
“The cream-jug is to your right, sir,” said the helpful Parker.
“Let it remain there. Café noir for me this morning. As noir as it can
jolly well stick!” Freddie retired to the fireplace and sipped
delicately. “As far as I can remember, it was Ronny Devereux’ birthday
or something …”
“Mr Martyn’s, I think you said, sir.”
“That’s right. Algy Martyn’s birthday, and Ronny and I were the guests.
It all comes back to me. I wanted Derek to roll along and join the
festivities—he’s never met Ronny—but he gave it a miss. Quite right! A
chap in his position has responsibilities. Member of Parliament and all
that. Besides,” said Freddie earnestly, driving home the point with a
wave of his spoon, “he’s engaged to be married. You must remember that,
Parker!”
“I will endeavor to, sir.”
“Sometimes,” said Freddie dreamily, “I wish I were engaged to be
married. Sometimes I wish I had some sweet girl to watch over me and …
No, I don’t, by Jove! It would give me the utter pip! Is Sir Derek up
yet, Parker?”
“Getting up, sir.”
“See that everything is all right, will you? I mean as regards the
foodstuffs and what not. I want him to make a good breakfast. He’s got
to meet his mother this morning at Charing Cross. She’s legging it back
from the Riviera.”
“Indeed, sir?”
Freddie shook his head.
“You wouldn’t speak in that light, careless tone if you knew her! Well,
you’ll see her tonight. She’s coming here to dinner.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Miss Mariner will be here, too. A foursome. Tell Mrs Parker to pull up
her socks and give us something pretty ripe. Soup, fish, all that sort
of thing. _She_ knows. And let’s have a stoup of malvoisie from the
oldest bin. This is a special occasion!”
“Her ladyship will be meeting Miss Mariner for the first time, sir?”
“You’ve put your finger on it! Absolutely the first time on this or any
stage! We must all rally round and make the thing a success.”
“I am sure Mrs Parker will strain every nerve, sir.” Parker moved to
the door, carrying the rejected egg, and stepped aside to allow a tall,
well-built man of about thirty to enter. “Good morning, Sir Derek.”
“Morning, Parker.”
Parker slid softly from the room. Derek Underhill sat down at the
table. He was a strikingly handsome man, with a strong, forceful face,
dark, lean and cleanly shaven. He was one of those men whom a stranger
would instinctively pick out of a crowd as worthy of note. His only
defect was that his heavy eyebrows gave him at times an expression
which was a little forbidding. Women, however, had never been repelled
by it. He was very popular with women, not quite so popular with
men—always excepting Freddie Rooke, who worshipped him. They had been
at school together, though Freddie was the younger by several years.
“Finished, Freddie?” asked Derek.
Freddie smiled wanly,
“We are not breakfasting this morning,” he replied. “The spirit was
willing, but the jolly old flesh would have none of it. To be perfectly
frank, the Last of the Rookes has a bit of a head.”
“Ass!” said Derek.
“A bit of sympathy,” said Freddie, pained, “would not be out of place.
We are far from well. Some person unknown has put a threshing-machine
inside the old bean and substituted a piece of brown paper for our
tongue. Things look dark and yellow and wobbly!”
“You shouldn’t have overdone it last night.”
“It was Algy Martyn’s birthday,” pleaded Freddie.
“If I were an ass like Algy Martyn,” said Derek, “I wouldn’t go about
advertising the fact that I’d been born. I’d hush it up!”
He helped himself to a plentiful portion of kedgeree, Freddie watching
him with repulsion mingled with envy. When he began to eat, the
spectacle became too poignant for the sufferer, and he wandered to the
window.
“What a beast of a day!”
It was an appalling day. January, that grim month, was treating London
with its usual severity. Early in the morning a bank of fog had rolled
up off the river, and was deepening from pearly white to a lurid brown.
It pressed on the window-pane like a blanket, leaving dark, damp
rivulets on the glass.
“Awful!” said Derek.
“Your mater’s train will be late.”
“Yes. Damned nuisance. It’s bad enough meeting trains in any case,
without having to hang about a draughty station for an hour.”
“And it’s sure, I should imagine,” went on Freddie, pursuing his train
of thought, “to make the dear old thing pretty tolerably ratty, if she
has one of those slow journeys.” He pottered back to the fireplace, and
rubbed his shoulders reflectively against the mantelpiece. “I take it
that you wrote to her about Jill?”
“Of course. That’s why she’s coming over, I suppose. By the way, you
got those seats for that theatre tonight?”
“Yes. Three together and one somewhere on the outskirts. If it’s all
the same to you, old thing, I’ll have the one on the outskirts.”
Derek, who had finished his kedgeree and was now making himself a blot
on Freddie’s horizon with toast and marmalade, laughed.
“What a rabbit you are, Freddie! Why on earth are you so afraid of
mother?”
Freddie looked at him as a timid young squire might have gazed upon St.
George when the latter set out to do battle with the dragon. He was of
the amiable type which makes heroes of its friends. In the old days
when he had fagged for him at Winchester he had thought Derek the most
wonderful person in the world, and this view he still retained. Indeed,
subsequent events had strengthened it. Derek had done the most amazing
things since leaving school. He had had a brilliant career at Oxford,
and now, in the House of Commons, was already looked upon by the
leaders of his party as one to be watched and encouraged. He played
polo superlatively well, and was a fine shot. But of all his gifts and
qualities the one that extorted Freddie’s admiration in its intensest
form was his lion-like courage as exemplified by his behavior in the
present crisis. There he sat, placidly eating toast and marmalade,
while the boat-train containing Lady Underhill already sped on its way
from Dover to London. It was like Drake playing bowls with the Spanish
Armada in sight.
“I wish I had your nerve!” he said, awed. “What I should be feeling, if
I were in your place and had to meet your mater after telling her that
I was engaged to marry a girl she had never seen, I don’t know. I’d
rather face a wounded tiger!”
“Idiot!” said Derek placidly.
“Not,” pursued Freddie, “that I mean to say anything in the least
derogatory and so forth to your jolly old mater, if you understand me,
but the fact remains she scares me pallid! Always has, ever since the
first time I went to stay at your place when I was a kid. I can still
remember catching her eye the morning I happened by pure chance to bung
an apple through her bedroom window, meaning to let a cat on the sill
below have it in the short ribs. She was at least thirty feet away,
but, by Jove, it stopped me like a bullet!”
“Push the bell, old man, will you? I want some more toast.”
Freddie did as he was requested with growing admiration.
“The condemned man made an excellent breakfast,” he murmured. “More
toast, Parker,” he added, as that admirable servitor opened the door.
“Gallant! That’s what I call it. Gallant!”
Derek tilted his chair back.
“Mother is sure to like Jill when she sees her,” he said.
“_When_ she sees her! Ah! But the trouble is, young feller-me-lad, that
she _hasn’t_ seen her! That’s the weak spot in your case, old
companion! A month ago she didn’t know of Jill’s existence. Now, you
know and I know that Jill is one of the best and brightest. As far as
we are concerned, everything in the good old garden is lovely. Why,
dash it, Jill and I were children together. Sported side by side on the
green, and what not. I remember Jill, when she was twelve, turning the
garden-hose on me and knocking about seventy-five per cent off the
market value of my best Sunday suit. That sort of thing forms a bond,
you know, and I’ve always felt that she was a corker. But your mater’s
got to discover it for herself. It’s a dashed pity, by Jove, that Jill
hasn’t a father or a mother or something of that species to rally round
just now. They would form a gang. There’s nothing like a gang! But
she’s only got that old uncle of hers. A rummy bird! Met him?”
“Several times. I like him.”
“Oh, he’s a genial old buck all right. A very bonhomous lad. But you
hear some pretty queer stories about him if you get among people who
knew him in the old days. Even now I’m not so dashed sure I should care
to play cards with him. Young Threepwood was telling me only the other
day that the old boy took thirty quid off him at picquet as clean as a
whistle. And Jimmy Monroe, who’s on the Stock Exchange, says he’s
frightfully busy these times buying margins or whatever it is chappies
do down in the City. Margins. That’s the word. Jimmy made me buy some
myself on a thing called Amalgamated Dyes. I don’t understand the
procedure exactly, but Jimmy says it’s a sound egg and will do me a bit
of good. What was I talking about? Oh, yes, old Selby. There’s no doubt
he’s quite a sportsman. But till you’ve got Jill well established, you
know, I shouldn’t enlarge on him too much with the mater.”
“On the contrary,” said Derek. “I shall mention him at the first
opportunity. He knew my father out in India.”
“Did he, by Jove! Oh, well, that makes a difference.”
Parker entered with the toast, and Derek resumed his breakfast.
“It may be a little bit awkward,” he said, “at first, meeting mother.
But everything will be all right after five minutes.”
“Absolutely! But, oh, boy! that first five minutes!” Freddie gazed
portentously through his eye-glass. Then he seemed to be undergoing
some internal struggle, for he gulped once or twice. “That first five
minutes!” he said, and paused again. A moment’s silent self-communion,
and he went on with a rush. “I say, listen. Shall I come along, too?”
“Come along?”
“To the station. With you.”
“What on earth for?”
“To see you through the opening stages. Break the ice and all that sort
of thing. Nothing like collecting a gang, you know. Moments when a
feller needs a friend and so forth. Say the word, and I’ll buzz along
and lend my moral support.”
Derek’s heavy eyebrows closed together in an offended frown, and seemed
to darken his whole face. This unsolicited offer of assistance hurt his
dignity. He showed a touch of the petulance which came now and then
when he was annoyed, to suggest that he might not possess so strong a
character as his exterior indicated.
“It’s very kind of you,” he began stiffly.
Freddie nodded. He was acutely conscious of this himself.
“Some fellows,” he observed, “would say ‘Not at all!’ I suppose. But
not the Last of the Rookes! For, honestly, old man, between ourselves,
I don’t mind admitting that this _is_ the bravest deed of the year, and
I’m dashed if I would do it for anyone else.”
“It’s very good of you, Freddie …”
“That’s all right. I’m a Boy Scout, and this is my act of kindness for
today.”
Derek got up from the table.
“Of course you mustn’t come,” he said. “We can’t form a sort of
debating society to discuss Jill on the platform at Charing Cross.”
“Oh, I would just hang around in the offing, shoving in an occasional
tactful word.”
“Nonsense!”
“The wheeze would simply be to …”
“It’s impossible.”
“Oh, very well,” said Freddie, damped. “Just as you say, of course. But
there’s nothing like a gang, old man, nothing like a gang!”
§ 2.
Derek Underhill threw down the stump of his cigar, and grunted
irritably. Inside Charing Cross Station business was proceeding as
usual. Porters wheeling baggage-trucks moved to and fro like
Juggernauts. Belated trains clanked in, glad to get home, while others,
less fortunate, crept reluctantly out through the blackness and
disappeared into an inferno of detonating fog-signals. For outside the
fog still held. The air was cold and raw and tasted coppery. In the
street traffic moved at a funeral pace, to the accompaniment of hoarse
cries and occasional crashes. Once the sun had worked its way through
the murk and had hung in the sky like a great red orange, but now all
was darkness and discomfort again, blended with that odd suggestion of
mystery and romance which is a London fog’s only redeeming quality.
It seemed to Derek that he had been patrolling the platform for a
life-time, but he resumed his sentinel duty. The fact that the
boat-train, being already forty-five minutes overdue, might arrive at
any moment made it imperative that he remain where he was instead of
sitting, as he would much have preferred to sit, in one of the
waiting-rooms. It would be a disaster if his mother should get out of
the train and not find him there to meet her. That was just the sort of
thing which would infuriate her; and her mood, after a Channel crossing
and a dreary journey by rail, would be sufficiently dangerous as it
was.
The fog and the waiting had had their effect upon Derek. The resolute
front he had exhibited to Freddie at the breakfast-table had melted
since his arrival at the station, and he was feeling nervous at the
prospect of the meeting that lay before him. Calm as he had appeared to
the eye of Freddie and bravely as he had spoken, Derek, in the recesses
of his heart, was afraid of his mother. There are men—and Derek
Underhill was one of them—who never wholly emerge from the nursery.
They may put away childish things and rise in the world to affluence
and success, but the hand that rocked their cradle still rules their
lives. As a boy, Derek had always been firmly controlled by his mother,
and the sway of her aggressive personality had endured through manhood.
Lady Underhill was a born ruler, dominating most of the people with
whom life brought her in contact. Distant cousins quaked at her name,
while among the male portion of her nearer relatives she was generally
alluded to as The Family Curse.
Now that his meeting with her might occur at any moment, Derek shrank
from it. It was not likely to be a pleasant one. The mere fact that
Lady Underhill was coming to London at all made that improbable. When a
man writes to inform his mother, who is wintering on the Riviera, that
he has become engaged to be married, the natural course for her to
pursue, if she approves of the step, is to wire her congratulations and
good wishes. When for these she substitutes a curt announcement that
she is returning immediately, a certain lack of complaisance seems to
be indicated.
Would his mother approve of Jill? That was the question which he had
been asking himself over and over again as he paced the platform in the
disheartening fog. Nothing had been said, nothing had even been hinted,
but he was perfectly aware that his marriage was a matter regarding
which Lady Underhill had always assumed that she was to be consulted,
even if she did not, as he suspected, claim the right to dictate. And
he had become engaged quite suddenly, without a word to her until it
was all over and settled.
That, as Freddie had pointed out, was the confoundedly awkward part of
it. His engagement had been so sudden. Jill had swept into his life
like a comet. His mother knew nothing of her. A month ago he had known
nothing of her himself. It would, he perceived, as far as the
benevolent approval of Lady Underhill was concerned, have been an
altogether different matter had his choice fallen upon one of those
damsels whose characters, personality, and ancestry she knew. Daughters
of solid and useful men; sisters of rising young politicians like
himself; nieces of Burke’s peerage; he could have introduced without
embarrassment one of these in the role of bride-elect. But Jill … Oh,
well, when once his mother had met Jill, everything was sure to be all
right. Nobody could resist Jill. It would be like resisting the
sunshine.
Somewhat comforted by this reflection, Derek turned to begin one more
walk along the platform, and stopped in mid-stride, raging. Beaming
over the collar of a plaid greatcoat, all helpfulness and devotion,
Freddie Rooke was advancing towards him, the friend that sticketh
closer than a brother. Like some loving dog, who, ordered home, sneaks
softly on through alleys and by-ways, peeping round corners and
crouching behind lamp-posts, the faithful Freddie had followed him
after all. And with him, to add the last touch to Derek’s discomfiture,
were those two inseparable allies of his, Ronny Devereux and Algy
Martyn.
“Well, old thing,” said Freddie, patting Derek encouragingly on the
shoulder, “here we are after all! I know you told me not to roll round
and so forth, but I knew you didn’t mean it. I thought it over after
you had left, and decided it would be a rotten trick not to cluster
about you in your hour of need. I hope you don’t mind Ronny and Algy
breezing along, too. The fact is, I was in the deuce of a funk—your
jolly old mater always rather paralyzes my nerve-centers, you know—so I
roped them in. Met ’em in Piccadilly, groping about for the club, and
conscripted ’em both, they very decently consenting. We all toddled off
and had a pick-me-up at that chemist chappie’s at the top of the
Hay-market, and now we’re feeling full of beans and buck, ready for
anything. I’ve explained the whole thing to them, and they’re with you
to the death! Collect a gang, dear boy, collect a gang! That’s the
motto. There’s nothing like it!”
“Nothing!” said Ronny.
“Absolutely nothing!” said Algy.
“We’ll just see you through the opening stages,” said Freddie, “and
then leg it. We’ll keep the conversation general, you know.”
“Stop it getting into painful channels,” said Ronny.
“Steer it clear,” said Algy, “of the touchy topic.”
“That’s the wheeze,” said Freddie. “We’ll … Oh, golly! There’s the
train coming in now!” His voice quavered, for not even the comforting
presence of his two allies could altogether sustain him in this ordeal.
But he pulled himself together with a manful effort. “Stick it, old
beans!” he said doughtily. “Now is the time for all good men to come to
the aid of the party!”
“We’re here!” said Ronny Devereux.
“On the spot!” said Algy Martyn.
§ 3.
The boat-train slid into the station. Bells rang, engines blew off
steam, porters shouted, baggage-trucks rattled over the platform. The
train began to give up its contents, now in ones and twos, now in a
steady stream. Most of the travellers seemed limp and exhausted, and
were pale with the pallor that comes of a choppy Channel crossing.
Almost the only exception to the general condition of collapse was the
eagle-faced lady in the brown ulster, who had taken up her stand in the
middle of the platform and was haranguing a subdued little maid in a
voice that cut the gloomy air like a steel knife. Like the other
travellers, she was pale, but she bore up resolutely. No one could have
told from Lady Underhill’s demeanor that the solid platform seemed to
heave beneath her feet like a deck.
“Have you got a porter, Ferris? Where is he, then? Ah! Have you got all
the bags? My jewel-case? The suit-case? The small brown bag? The rugs?
Where are the rugs?
“Yes, I can see them, my good girl. There is no need to brandish them
in my face. Keep the jewel-case and give the rest of the things to the
porter, and take him to look after the trunks. You remember which they
are? The steamer trunk, the other trunk, the black box … Very well.
Then make haste. And, when you’ve got them all together, tell the
porter to find you a four-wheeler. The small things will go inside.
Drive to the Savoy and ask for my suite. If they make any difficulty,
tell them that I engaged the rooms yesterday by telegraph from Mentone.
Do you understand?”
“Yes, m’lady.”
“Then go along. Oh, and give the porter sixpence. Sixpence is ample.”
“Yes, m’lady.”
The little maid, grasping the jewel-case, trotted off beside the now
pessimistic porter, who had started on this job under the impression
that there was at least a bob’s-worth in it. The remark about the
sixpence had jarred the porter’s faith in his species.
Derek approached, acutely conscious of Freddie, Ronny, and Algy, who
were skirmishing about his flank. He had enough to worry him without
them. He had listened with growing apprehension to the catalogue of his
mother’s possessions. Plainly this was no flying visit. You do not pop
over to London for a day or two with a steamer trunk, another trunk, a
black box, a suit-case, and a small brown bag. Lady Underhill had
evidently come prepared to stay; and the fact seemed to presage
trouble.
“Well, mother! So there you are at last!”
“Well, Derek!”
Derek kissed his mother. Freddie, Ronny, and Algy shuffled closer, like
leopards. Freddie, with the expression of one who leads a forlorn hope,
moved his Adam’s apple briskly up and down several times, and spoke.
“How do you do, Lady Underhill?”
“How do you do, Mr Rooke?”
Lady Underhill bowed stiffly and without pleasure. She was not fond of
the Last of the Rookes. She supposed the Almighty had had some wise
purpose in creating Freddie, but it had always been inscrutable to her.
“Like you,” mumbled Freddie, “to meet my friends. Lady Underhill. Mr
Devereux.”
“Charmed,” said Ronny affably.
“Mr Martyn.”
“Delighted,” said Algy with old-world courtesy.
Lady Underhill regarded this mob-scene with an eye of ice.
“How do you do?” she said. “Have you come to meet somebody?”
“I-er-we-er-why-er—” This woman always made Freddie feel as if he were
being disembowelled by some clumsy amateur. He wished that he had
defied the dictates of his better nature and remained in his snug rooms
at the Albany, allowing Derek to go through this business by himself.
“I-er-we-er-came to meet _you_, don’t you know!”
“Indeed! That was very kind of you!”
“Oh, not at all.”
“Thought we’d welcome you back to the old homestead,” said Ronny,
beaming.
“What could be sweeter?” said Algy. He produced a cigar-case, and
extracted a formidable torpedo-shaped Havana. He was feeling
delightfully at his ease, and couldn’t understand why Freddie had made
such a fuss about meeting this nice old lady. “Don’t mind if I smoke,
do you? Air’s a bit raw today. Gets into the lungs.”
Derek chafed impotently. These unsought allies were making a difficult
situation a thousand times worse. A more acute observer than young Mr
Martyn, he noted the tight lines about his mother’s mouth and knew them
for the danger-signal they were. Endeavoring to distract her with light
conversation, he selected a subject which was a little unfortunate.
“What sort of crossing did you have, mother?”
Lady Underhill winced. A current of air had sent the perfume of Algy’s
cigar playing about her nostrils. She closed her eyes, and her face
turned a shade paler. Freddie, observing this, felt quite sorry for the
poor old thing. She was a pest and a pot of poison, of course, but all
the same, he reflected charitably, it was a shame that she should look
so green about the gills. He came to the conclusion that she must be
hungry. The thing to do was to take her mind off it till she could be
conducted to a restaurant and dumped down in front of a bowl of soup.
“Bit choppy, I suppose, what?” he bellowed, in a voice that ran up and
down Lady Underhill’s nervous system like an electric needle. “I was
afraid you were going to have a pretty rough time of it when I read the
forecast in the paper. The good old boat wobbled a bit, eh?”
Lady Underhill uttered a faint moan. Freddie noticed that she was
looking deucedly chippy, even chippier than a moment ago.
“It’s an extraordinary thing about that Channel crossing,” said Algy
Martyn meditatively, as he puffed a refreshing cloud. “I’ve known
fellows who could travel quite happily everywhere else in the
world—round the Horn in sailing-ships and all that sort of thing—yield
up their immortal soul crossing the Channel! Absolutely yield up their
immortal soul! Don’t know why. Rummy, but there it is!”
“I’m like that myself,” assented Ronny Devereux. “That dashed trip from
Calais gets me every time. Bowls me right over. I go aboard, stoked to
the eyebrows with seasick remedies, swearing that this time I’ll fool
’em, but down I go ten minutes after we’ve started and the next thing I
know is somebody saying, ‘Well, well! So this is Dover!’”
“It’s exactly the same with me,” said Freddie, delighted with the
smooth, easy way the conversation was flowing. “Whether it’s the hot,
greasy smell of the engines …”
“It’s not the engines,” contended Ronny Devereux.
“Stands to reason it can’t be. I rather like the smell of engines. This
station is reeking with the smell of engine-grease, and I can drink it
in and enjoy it.” He sniffed luxuriantly. “It’s something else.”
“Ronny’s right,” said Algy cordially. “It isn’t the engines. It’s the
way the boat heaves up and down and up and down and up and down …” He
shifted his cigar to his left hand in order to give with his right a
spirited illustration of a Channel steamer going up and down and up and
down and up and down. Lady Underhill, who had opened her eyes, had an
excellent view of the performance, and closed her eyes again quickly.
“Be quiet!” she snapped.
“I was only saying …”
“Be quiet!”
“Oh, rather!”
Lady Underhill wrestled with herself. She was a woman of great
will-power and accustomed to triumph over the weaknesses of the flesh.
After awhile her eyes opened. She had forced herself, against the
evidence of her senses, to recognize that this was a platform on which
she stood and not a deck.
There was a pause. Algy, damped, was temporarily out of action, and his
friends had for the moment nothing to remark.
“I’m afraid you had a trying journey, mother,” said Derek. “The train
was very late.”
“Now, _train_-sickness,” said Algy, coming to the surface again, “is a
thing lots of people suffer from. Never could understand it myself.”
“I’ve never had a touch of train-sickness,” said Ronny.
“Oh, I have,” said Freddie. “I’ve often felt rotten on a train. I get
floating spots in front of my eyes and a sort of heaving sensation, and
everything kind of goes black …”
“Mr Rooke!”
“Eh?”
“I should be greatly obliged if you would keep these confidences for
the ear of your medical adviser.”
“Freddie,” intervened Derek hastily, “my mother’s rather tired. Do you
think you could be going ahead and getting a taxi?”
“My dear old chap, of course! Get you one in a second. Come along,
Algy. Pick up the old waukeesis, Ronny.”
And Freddie, accompanied by his henchmen, ambled off, well pleased with
himself. He had, he felt, helped to break the ice for Derek and had
seen him safely through those awkward opening stages. Now he could
totter off with a light heart and get a bite of lunch.
Lady Underhill’s eyes glittered. They were small, keen, black eyes,
unlike Derek’s, which were large and brown. In their other features the
two were obviously mother and son. Each had the same long upper lip,
the same thin, firm mouth, the prominent chin which was a family
characteristic of the Underhills, and the jutting Underhill nose. Most
of the Underhills came into the world looking as though they meant to
drive their way through life like a wedge.
“A little more,” she said tensely, “and I should have struck those
unspeakable young men with my umbrella. One of the things I have never
been able to understand, Derek, is why you should have selected that
imbecile Rooke as your closest friend.”
Derek smiled tolerantly.
“It was more a case of him selecting _me_. But Freddie is quite a good
fellow really. He’s a man you’ve got to know.”
“_I_ have not got to know him, and I thank heaven for it!”
“He’s a very good-natured fellow. It was decent of him to put me up at
the Albany while our house was let. By the way, he has some seats for
the first night of a new piece this evening. He suggested that we might
all dine at the Albany and go on to the theatre.” He hesitated a
moment. “Jill will be there,” he said, and felt easier now that her
name had at last come into the talk. “She’s longing to meet you.”
“Then why didn’t she meet me?”
“Here, do you mean? At the station? Well, I—I wanted you to see her for
the first time in pleasanter surroundings.”
“Oh!” said Lady Underhill shortly.
It is a disturbing thought that we suffer in this world just as much by
being prudent and taking precautions as we do by being rash and
impulsive and acting as the spirit moves us. If Jill had been permitted
by her wary fiancé to come with him to the station to meet his mother,
it is certain that much trouble would have been avoided. True, Lady
Underhill would probably have been rude to her in the opening stages of
the interview, but she would not have been alarmed and suspicious; or,
rather, the vague suspicion which she had been feeling would not have
solidified, as it did now, into definite certainty of the worst. All
that Derek had effected by his careful diplomacy had been to convince
his mother that he considered his bride-elect something to be broken
gently to her.
She stopped and faced him.
“Who is she?” she demanded. “Who is this girl?”
Derek flushed.
“I thought I made everything clear in my letter.”
“You made nothing clear at all.”
“By your leave!” chanted a porter behind them, and a baggage-truck
clove them apart.
“We can’t talk in a crowded station,” said Derek irritably. “Let me get
you to the taxi and take you to the hotel. … What do you want to know
about Jill?”
“Everything. Where does she come from? Who are her people? I don’t know
any Mariners.”
“I haven’t cross-examined her,” said Derek stiffly. “But I do know that
her parents are dead. Her father was an American.”
“American!”
“Americans frequently have daughters, I believe.”
“There is nothing to be gained by losing your temper,” said Lady
Underhill with steely calm.
“There is nothing to be gained, as far as I can see, by all this talk,”
retorted Derek. He wondered vexedly why his mother always had this
power of making him lose control of himself. He hated to lose control
of himself. It upset him, and blurred that vision which he liked to
have of himself as a calm, important man superior to ordinary
weaknesses. “Jill and I are engaged, and there is an end of it.”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Lady Underhill, and was driven away by another
baggage-truck. “You know perfectly well,” she resumed, returning to the
attack, “that your marriage is a matter of the greatest concern to me
and to the whole of the family.”
“Listen, mother!” Derek’s long wait on the draughty platform had
generated an irritability which overcame the deep-seated awe of his
mother which was the result of years of defeat in battles of the will.
“Let me tell you in a few words all that I know of Jill, and then we’ll
drop the subject. In the first place, she is a lady. Secondly, she has
plenty of money …”
“The Underhills do not need to marry for money.”
“I am not marrying for money!”
“Well, go on.”
“I have already described to you in my letter—very inadequately, but I
did my best—what she looks like. Her sweetness, her loveableness, all
the subtle things about her which go to make her what she is, you will
have to judge for yourself.”
“I intend to!”
“Well, that’s all, then. She lives with her uncle, a Major Selby …”
“Major Selby? What regiment?”
“I didn’t ask him,” snapped the goaded Derek. “And, in the name of
heaven, what does it matter?”
“Not the Guards?”
“I tell you I don’t know.”
“Probably a line regiment,” said Lady Underhill with an indescribable
sniff.
“Possibly. What then?” He paused, to play his trump card. “If you are
worrying about Major Selby’s social standing, I may as well tell you
that he used to know father.”
“What! When? Where?”
“Years ago. In India, when father was at Simla.”
“Selby? Selby? Not Christopher Selby?”
“Oh, you remember him?”
“I certainly remember him! Not that he and I ever met, but your father
often spoke of him.”
Derek was relieved. It was abominable that this sort of thing should
matter, but one had to face facts, and, as far as his mother was
concerned, it did. The fact that Jill’s uncle had known his dead father
would make all the difference to Lady Underhill.
“Christopher Selby!” said Lady Underhill reflectively. “Yes! I have
often heard your father speak of him. He was the man who gave your
father an I.O.U. to pay a card debt, and redeemed it with a check which
was returned by the bank!”
“What!”
“Didn’t you hear what I said? I will repeat it, if you wish.”
“There must have been some mistake.”
“Only the one your father made when he trusted the man.”
“It must have been some other fellow.”
“Of course!” said Lady Underhill satirically. “No doubt your father
knew hundreds of Christopher Selbys!”
Derek bit his lip.
“Well, after all,” he said doggedly, “whether it’s true or not …”
“I see no reason why your father should not have spoken the truth.”
“All right. We’ll say it is true, then. But what does it matter? I am
marrying Jill, not her uncle.”
“Nevertheless, it would be pleasanter if her only living relative were
not a swindler!… Tell me, where and how did you meet this girl?”
“I should be glad if you would not refer to her as ‘this girl.’ The
name, if you have forgotten it, is Mariner.”
“Well, where did you meet Miss Mariner?”
“At Prince’s.”
“Restaurant?”
“Skating-rink,” said Derek impatiently. “Just after you left for
Mentone. Freddie Rooke introduced me.”
“Oh, your intellectual friend Mr Rooke knows her?”
“They were children together. Her people lived next to the Rookes in
Worcestershire.”
“I thought you said she was an American.”
“I said her father was. He settled in England. Jill hasn’t been in
America since she was eight or nine.”
“The fact,” said Lady Underhill, “that the girl is a friend of Mr Rooke
is no great recommendation.”
Derek kicked angrily at a box of matches which someone had thrown down
on the platform.
“I wonder if you could possibly get it into your head, mother, that I
want to marry Jill, not engage her as an under-housemaid. I don’t
consider that she requires recommendations, as you call them. However,
don’t you think the most sensible thing is for you to wait till you
meet her at dinner tonight, and then you can form your own opinion? I’m
beginning to get a little bored with this futile discussion.”
“As you seem quite unable to talk on the subject of this girl without
becoming rude,” said Lady Underhill, “I agree with you. Let us hope
that my first impression will be a favorable one. Experience has taught
me that first impressions are everything.”
“I’m glad you think so,” said Derek, “for I fell in love with Jill the
very first moment I saw her!”
§ 4.
Parker stepped back, and surveyed with modest pride the dinner-table to
which he had been putting the finishing touches. It was an artistic job
and a credit to him.
“That’s that!” said Parker, satisfied.
He went to the window and looked out. The fog which had lasted well
into the evening, had vanished now, and the clear night was bright with
stars. A distant murmur of traffic came from the direction of
Piccadilly.
As he stood there, the front-door bell rang, and continued to ring in
little spurts of sound. If character can be deduced from bell-ringing,
as nowadays it apparently can be from every other form of human
activity, one might have hazarded the guess that whoever was on the
other side of the door was determined, impetuous, and energetic.
“Parker!”
Freddie Rooke pushed a tousled head, which had yet to be brushed into
the smooth sleekness that made it a delight to the public eye, out of a
room down the passage.
“Sir?”
“Somebody ringing.”
“I heard, sir. I was about to answer the bell.”
“If it’s Lady Underhill, tell her I’ll be in in a minute.”
“I fancy it is Miss Mariner, sir. I think I recognise her touch.”
He made his way down the passage to the front-door, and opened it. A
girl was standing outside. She wore a long gray fur coat, and a filmy
gray hood covered her hair. As Parker opened the door, she scampered in
like a gray kitten.
“Brrh! It’s cold!” she exclaimed. “Hullo, Parker!”
“Good evening, miss.”
“Am I the last or the first or what?”
Parker moved to help her with her cloak.
“Sir Derek and her ladyship have not yet arrived, miss. Sir Derek went
to bring her ladyship from the Savoy Hotel. Mr Rooke is dressing in his
bedroom and will be ready very shortly.”
The girl had slipped out of the fur coat, and Parker cast a swift
glance of approval at her. He had the valet’s unerring eye for a
thoroughbred, and Jill Mariner was manifestly that. It showed in her
walk, in every move of her small, active body, in the way she looked at
you, in the way she talked to you, in the little tilt of her resolute
chin. Her hair was pale gold, and had the brightness of coloring of a
child’s. Her face glowed, and her gray eyes sparkled. She looked very
much alive.
It was this aliveness of hers that was her chief charm. Her eyes were
good and her mouth, with its small, even teeth, attractive, but she
would have laughed if anybody had called her beautiful. She sometimes
doubted if she were even pretty. Yet few men had met her and remained
entirely undisturbed. She had a magnetism. One hapless youth, who had
laid his heart at her feet and had been commanded to pick it up again,
had endeavored subsequently to explain her attraction (to a bosom
friend over a mournful bottle of the best in the club smoking-room) in
these words: “I don’t know what it is about her, old man, but she
somehow makes a feller feel she’s so damned _interested_ in a chap, if
you know what I mean.” And, though not generally credited in his circle
with any great acuteness, there is no doubt that the speaker had
achieved something approaching a true analysis of Jill’s fascination
for his sex. She was interested in everything Life presented to her
notice, from a Coronation to a stray cat. She was vivid. She had
sympathy. She listened to you as though you really mattered. It takes a
man of tough fibre to resist these qualities. Women, on the other hand,
especially of the Lady Underhill type, can resist them without an
effort.
“Go and stir him up,” said Jill, alluding to the absent Mr Rooke. “Tell
him to come and talk to me. Where’s the nearest fire? I want to get
right over it and huddle.”
“The fire’s burning nicely in the sitting-room, miss.”
Jill hurried into the sitting-room, and increased her hold on Parker’s
esteem by exclaiming rapturously at the sight that greeted her. Parker
had expended time and trouble over the sitting-room. There was no dust,
no untidiness. The pictures all hung straight; the cushions were smooth
and unrumpled; and a fire of exactly the right dimensions burned
cheerfully in the grate, flickering cosily on the small piano by the
couch, on the deep leather arm-chairs which Freddie had brought with
him from Oxford, that home of comfortable chairs, and on the
photographs that studded the walls. In the center of the mantelpiece,
the place of honor, was the photograph of herself which she had given
Derek a week ago.
“You’re simply wonderful, Parker! I don’t see how you manage to make a
room so cosy!” Jill sat down on the club-fender that guarded the
fireplace, and held her hands over the blaze. “I can’t understand why
men ever marry. Fancy having to give up all this!”
“I am gratified that you appreciate it, miss. I did my best to make it
comfortable for you. I fancy I hear Mr Rooke coming now.”
“I hope the others won’t be long. I’m starving. Has Mrs Parker got
something very good for dinner?”
“She has strained every nerve, miss.”
“Then I’m sure it’s worth waiting for. Hullo, Freddie.”
Freddie Rooke, resplendent in evening dress, bustled in, patting his
tie with solicitous fingers. It had been right when he had looked in
the glass in his bedroom, but you never know about ties. Sometimes they
stay right, sometimes they wiggle up sideways. Life is full of these
anxieties.
“I shouldn’t touch it,” said Jill. “It looks beautiful, and, if I may
say so in confidence, is having a most disturbing effect on my
emotional nature. I’m not at all sure I shall be able to resist it
right through the evening. It isn’t fair of you to try to alienate the
affections of an engaged young person like this.”
Freddie squinted down, and became calmer.
“Hullo, Jill, old thing. Nobody here yet?”
“Well, I’m here,—the petite figure seated on the fender. But perhaps I
don’t count.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean that, you know.”
“I should hope not, when I’ve bought a special new dress just to
fascinate you. A creation I mean. When they cost as much as this one
did, you have to call them names. What do you think of it?”
Freddie seated himself on another section of the fender, and regarded
her with the eye of an expert. A snappy dresser, as the technical term
is, himself, he appreciated snap in the outer covering of the other
sex.
“Topping!” he said spaciously. “No other word for it! All wool and a
yard wide! Precisely as mother makes it! You look like a thingummy.”
“How splendid! All my life I’ve wanted to look like a thingummy, but
somehow I’ve never been able to manage it.”
“A wood-nymph!” exclaimed Freddie, in a burst of unwonted imagery.
“Wood-nymphs didn’t wear creations.”
“Well, you know what I mean!” He looked at her with honest admiration.
“Dash it, Jill, you know, there’s something about you! You’re—what’s
the word?—you’ve got such small bones!”
“Ugh! I suppose it’s a compliment, but how horrible it sounds! It makes
me feel like a skeleton.”
“I mean to say, you’re—you’re dainty!”
“That’s much better.”
“You look as if you weighed about an ounce and a half! You look like a
bit of thistledown! You’re a little fairy princess, dash it!”
“Freddie! This is eloquence!” Jill raised her left hand, and twiddled a
ringed finger ostentatiously. “Er—you _do_ realize that I’m bespoke,
don’t you, and that my heart, alas, is another’s? Because you sound as
if you were going to propose.”
Freddie produced a snowy handkerchief, and polished his eye-glass.
Solemnity descended on him like a cloud. He looked at Jill with an
earnest, paternal gaze.
“That reminds me,” he said. “I wanted to have, a bit of a talk with you
about that—being engaged and all that sort of thing. I’m glad I got you
alone before the Curse arrived.”
“Curse? Do you mean Derek’s mother? That sounds cheerful and
encouraging.”
“Well, she is, you know,” said Freddie earnestly. “She’s a bird! It
would be idle to deny it. She always puts the fear of God into me. I
never know what to say to her.”
“Why don’t you try asking her riddles?”
“It’s no joking matter,” persisted Freddie, his amiable face overcast.
“Wait till you meet her! You should have seen her at the station this
morning. You don’t know what you’re up against!”
“You make my flesh creep, Freddie. What am I up against?”
Freddie poked the fire scientifically, and assisted it with coal.
“It’s this way,” he said. “Of course, dear old Derek’s the finest chap
in the world.”
“I know that,” said Jill softly. She patted Freddie’s hand with a
little gesture of gratitude. Freddie’s devotion to Derek was a thing
that always touched her. She looked thoughtfully into the fire, and her
eyes seemed to glow in sympathy with the glowing coals. “There’s nobody
like him!”
“But,” continued Freddie, “he always has been frightfully under his
mother’s thumb, you know.”
Jill was conscious of a little flicker of irritation.
“Don’t be absurd, Freddie. How could a man like Derek be under
anybody’s thumb?”
“Well, you know what I mean!”
“I don’t in the least know what you mean.”
“I mean, it would be rather rotten if his mother set him against you.”
Jill clenched her teeth. The quick temper which always lurked so very
little beneath the surface of her cheerfulness was stirred. She felt
suddenly chilled and miserable. She tried to tell herself that Freddie
was just an amiable blunderer who spoke without sense or reason, but it
was no use. She could not rid herself of a feeling of foreboding and
discomfort. It had been the one jarring note in the sweet melody of her
love-story, this apprehension of Derek’s regarding his mother. The
Derek she loved was a strong man, with a strong man’s contempt for
other people’s criticism; and there had been something ignoble and
fussy in his attitude regarding Lady Underhill. She had tried to feel
that the flaw in her idol did not exist. And here was Freddie Rooke, a
man who admired Derek with all his hero-worshipping nature, pointing it
out independently. She was annoyed, and she expended her annoyance, as
women will do, upon the innocent bystander.
“Do you remember the time I turned the hose on you, Freddie,” she said,
rising from the fender, “years ago, when we were children, when you and
that awful Mason boy—what was his name? Wally Mason—teased me?” She
looked at the unhappy Freddie with a hostile eye. It was his blundering
words that had spoiled everything. “I’ve forgotten what it was all
about, but I know that you and Wally infuriated me and I turned the
garden hose on you and soaked you both to the skin. Well, all I want to
point out is that, if you go on talking nonsense about Derek and his
mother and me, I shall ask Parker to bring me a jug of water, and I
shall empty it over you! Set him against me! You talk as if love were a
thing any third party could come along and turn off with a tap! Do you
suppose that, when two people love each other as Derek and I do, that
it can possibly matter in the least what anybody else thinks or says,
even if it is his mother? I haven’t got a mother, but suppose Uncle
Chris came and warned me against Derek …”
Her anger suddenly left her as quickly as it had come. That was always
the way with Jill. One moment later she would be raging; the next,
something would tickle her sense of humor and restore her instantly to
cheerfulness. And the thought of dear, lazy old Uncle Chris taking the
trouble to warn anybody against anything except the wrong brand of wine
or an inferior make of cigar conjured up a picture before which wrath
melted away. She chuckled, and Freddie, who had been wilting on the
fender, perked up.
“You’re an extraordinary girl, Jill! One never knows when you’re going
to get the wind up.”
“Isn’t it enough to make me get the wind up, as you call it, when you
say absurd things like that?”
“I meant well, old girl!”
“That’s the trouble with you. You always do mean well. You go about the
world meaning well till people fly to put themselves under police
protection. Besides, what on earth could Lady Underhill find to object
to in me? I’ve plenty of money, and I’m one of the most charming and
attractive of Society belles. You needn’t take my word for that, and I
don’t suppose you’ve noticed it, but that’s what Mr Gossip in the
_Morning Mirror_ called me when he was writing about my getting engaged
to Derek. My maid showed me the clipping. There was quite a long
paragraph, with a picture of me that looked like a Zulu chieftainess
taken in a coal-cellar during a bad fog. Well, after that, what could
anyone say against me? I’m a perfect prize! I expect Lady Underhill
screamed with joy when she heard the news and went singing all over her
Riviera villa.”
“Yes,” said Freddie dubiously. “Yes, yes, oh, quite so, rather!”
Jill looked at him sternly.
“Freddie, you’re concealing something from me! You _don’t_ think I’m a
charming and attractive Society belle! Tell me why not and I’ll show
you where you are wrong. Is it my face you object to, or my manners, or
my figure? There was a young bride of Antigua, who said to her mate,
‘What a pig you are!’ Said he, ‘Oh, my queen, is it manners you mean,
or do you allude to my fig-u-ar?’ Isn’t my figuar all right, Freddie?”
“Oh, _I_ think you’re topping.”
“But for some reason you’re afraid that Derek’s mother won’t think so.
Why won’t Lady Underhill agree with Mr Gossip?”
Freddie hesitated.
“Speak up!”
“Well, it’s like this. Remember I’ve known the old devil …”
“Freddie Rooke! Where do you pick up such expressions? Not from me!”
“Well, that’s how I always think of her! I say I’ve known her ever
since I used to go and stop at their place when I was at school, and I
know exactly the sort of things that put her back up. She’s a
what-d’you-call-it.”
“I see no harm in that. Why shouldn’t the dear old lady be a
what-d’you-call-it? She must do _something_ in her spare time.”
“I mean to say, one of the old school, don’t you know. And you’re so
dashed impulsive, old girl. You know you are! You are always saying
things that come into your head.”
“You can’t say a thing unless it comes into your head.”
“You know what I mean,” Freddie went on earnestly, not to be diverted
from his theme. “You say rummy things and you do rummy things. What I
mean to say is, you’re impulsive.”
“What have I ever done that the sternest critic could call rummy?”
“Well, I’ve seen you with my own eyes stop in the middle of Bond Street
and help a lot of fellows shove along a cart that had got stuck. Mind
you, I’m not blaming you for it …”
“I should hope not. The poor old horse was trying all he knew to get
going, and he couldn’t quite make it. Naturally, I helped.”
“Oh, I know. Very decent and all that, but I doubt if Lady Underhill
would have thought a lot of it. And you’re so dashed chummy with the
lower orders.”
“Don’t be a snob, Freddie.”
“I’m not a snob,” protested Freddie, wounded. “When I’m alone with
Parker—for instance—I’m as chatty as dammit. But I don’t ask waiters in
public restaurants how their lumbago is.”
“Have you ever had lumbago?”
“No.”
“Well, it’s a very painful thing, and waiters get it just as badly as
dukes. Worse, I should think, because they’re always bending and
stooping and carrying things. Naturally one feels sorry for them.”
“But how do you ever find out that a waiter has _got_ lumbago?”
“I ask him; of course.”
“Well, for goodness sake,” said Freddie, “if you feel the impulse to do
that sort of thing tonight, try and restrain it. I mean to say, if
you’re curious to know anything about Parker’s chilblains, for
instance, don’t enquire after them while he’s handing Lady Underhill
the potatoes! She wouldn’t like it.”
Jill uttered an exclamation.
“I knew there was something! Being so cold and wanting to rush in and
crouch over a fire put it clean out of my head. He must be thinking me
a perfect beast!” She ran to the door. “Parker! Parker!”
Parker appeared from nowhere.
“Yes, miss?”
“I’m so sorry I forgot to ask before. How are your chilblains?”
“A good deal better, miss, thank you.”
“Did you try the stuff I recommended?”
“Yes, miss. It did them a world of good.”
“Splendid!”
Jill went back into the sitting-room.
“It’s all right,” she said reassuringly. “They’re better.”
She wandered restlessly about the room, looking at the photographs.
“What a lot of girls you seem to know, Freddie. Are these all the ones
you’ve loved and lost?” She sat down at the piano and touched the keys.
The clock on the mantelpiece chimed the half hour. “I wish to goodness
they would arrive,” she said.
“They’ll be here pretty soon, I expect.”
“It’s rather awful,” said Jill, “to think of Lady Underhill racing all
the way from Mentone to Paris and from Paris to Calais and from Calais
to Dover and from Dover to London simply to inspect me. You can’t
wonder I’m nervous, Freddie.”
The eye-glass dropped from Freddie’s eye.
“Are _you_ nervous?” he asked, astonished.
“Of course I’m nervous. Wouldn’t you be in my place?”
“Well, I should never have thought it.”
“Why do you suppose I’ve been talking such a lot? Why do you imagine I
snapped your poor, innocent head off just now? I’m terrified inside,
terrified!”
“You don’t look it, by Jove!”
“No, I’m trying to be a little warrior. That’s what Uncle Chris always
used to call me. It started the day when he took me to have a tooth
out, when I was ten. ‘Be a little warrior, Jill!’ he kept saying—‘Be a
little warrior!’ And I was.” She looked at the clock. “But I shan’t be
if they don’t get here soon. The suspense is awful.” She strummed the
keys. “Suppose she _doesn’t_ like me, Freddie! You see how you’ve
scared me.”
“I didn’t say she wouldn’t. I only said you’d got to watch out a bit.”
“Something tells me she won’t. My nerve is oozing out of me.” Jill
shook her head impatiently. “It’s all so vulgar! I thought this sort of
thing only happened in the comic papers and in music-hall songs. Why,
it’s just like that song somebody used to sing.” She laughed. “Do you
remember? I don’t know how the verse went, but …
John took me round to see his mother,
his mother,
his mother!
And when he’d introduced us to each other,
She sized up everything that I had on.
She put me through a cross-examination:
I fairly boiled with aggravation:
Then she shook her head,
Looked at me and said:
‘Poor John! Poor John!’
“Chorus, Freddie! Let’s cheer ourselves up! We need it!”
‘John took me round to see his mother … !
“His mo-o-o-other!” croaked Freddie. Curiously enough, this ballad was
one of Freddie’s favorites. He had rendered it with a good deal of
success on three separate occasions at village entertainments down in
Worcestershire, and he rather flattered himself that he could get about
as much out of it as the next man. He proceeded to abet Jill heartily
with gruff sounds which he was under the impression constituted what is
known in musical circles as “singing seconds.”
“His mo-o-o-other!” he growled with frightful scorn.
“And when she’d introduced us to each other …”
“O-o-o-other!”
“She sized up everything that I had on!”
“Pom-pom-pom!”
“She put me through a cross-examination …”
Jill had thrown her head back, and was singing jubilantly at the top of
her voice. The appositeness of the song had cheered her up. It seemed
somehow to make her forebodings rather ridiculous, to reduce them to
absurdity, to turn into farce the gathering tragedy which had been
weighing upon her nerves.
“Then she shook her head,
Looked at me and said:
‘Poor John!’…”
“Jill,” said a voice at the door. “I want you to meet my mother!”
“Poo-oo-oor John!” bleated the hapless Freddie, unable to check
himself.
“Dinner,” said Parker the valet, appearing at the door and breaking a
silence that seemed to fill the room like a tangible presence, “is
served!”