"These want paying," said Suzanne as she bounced into my nominally sacred
den at a strictly prohibited hour. Therewith she thrust a _dossier_ of
tradesmen's bills into my feebly-resisting hands, and bang went an idea I
had been tenderly nursing since breakfast.
"But I can't spend the rest of the morning writing cheques," I protested.
"I'm engaged just now on a most important article."
"With your eyes shut," commented Suzanne, stooping to a grossly unfair
insinuation. "I must tell Cook to make the breakfast coffee stronger in
future; then you might manage to--"
"Look here, Suzanne, you've been married to me long enough to know my
methods of work. I can't begin an article until I've got the whole thing
shaped in my mind, and to do that I must shut out everything else."
"Especially your wife, I suppose. Well, I won't stay. You've got all the
bills there; but don't start writing the cheques till you've got them well
shaped in your mind."
"But what on earth does all this mass of accounting literature represent?"
I asked.
"For the benefit of new readers a synopsis is attached," said Suzanne.
"They're mostly small items; for instance, Madame Pillby--she's the little
dressmaker round the corner, you know; though why an all-British spinster
should call herself 'Madame' I can't imagine--five-and-fourpence-ha'penny."
"Suzanne; I will _not_ write a cheque for five-and-fourpence-ha'penny! Are
they all like that?"
"The biggest is two guineas; that's what it cost to have my last dance-hat
altered to your specifications, because you said it tickled your nose.
There are seventeen of them in all--bills, not hats; total, twelve pounds
fifteen shillings and elevenpence three farthings, pa-pa."
"I'll tell you what I'm going to do," I said. "I'm going to advertise in
the Personal Columns of the papers that I will not be responsible for
payment of any debts incurred by my wife under the sum of one pound.
That'll stop this half-crown cheque nuisance. Why don't you go out and buy
yourself a packet of assorted postal-orders?"
"I did once; but I got in with a nice long list just before closing-time,
and there was very nearly a riot on both sides of the counter."
"Well, anyhow, this sort of thing has got to stop; I can't waste all the
morning settling your miserable little bills. What we'll do is this: you
shall have your own banking-account, and in future you can write your own
cheques--as long as the Bank will stick it."
"Oh, how perfectly splendid!" cried Suzanne. "I've always wanted to have a
cheque-book of my own, but Father thought it unsexing. Do let's go and take
out the licence at once."
The precious hour of fertilisation was already wasted, so there and then I
escorted Suzanne to the Bank. At my demand we were ushered into the
Manager's room, where we were received with a courtesy only too obviously
tempered by the suspicion that I had come to suggest an overdraft. On my
explaining our errand, however, the Manager's features relaxed their
tenseness, and as I wrote the cheque that brought Suzanne's account into a
sordid world he even attempted a vein of fatherly benediction.
"Now we shall require a specimen of the lady's signature," he said as he
produced an amazingly obese ledger and indicated where Suzanne was to sign
her name. "Remove the glove, please," he added hastily.
"Just like old times in the vestry," said Suzanne to me in a whisper. Then
she wrote her name--"Suzanne Désirée Beverley Trumpington-Jones"--all of
it. By the time she had finished she had trespassed into several columns
reserved for entirely different uses. The Manager surveyed the effect with
consternation.
"Rather a long name, isn't it?" he asked diffidently. "I was only wondering
if our cheque-forms would accommodate it all."
"Well, I'm not really responsible for it all," she replied. "The
Trumpington-Jones part is the more or less permanent result of a serious
accident when I was little more than a child. But I might shorten it a bit.
I sometimes answer to the name of Soozles, but I suppose that would only do
for really intimate cheques. How would 'S. Beverley T.-Jones' do? I
shouldn't like to lose the 'Beverley' as it's a kind of family heirloom,
and I always use it, even when I'm writing to the sweep."
I edged away to the window and left them to settle the signature question
among themselves.
"And what kind of cheques would you like--'Order' or 'Bearer'?" I next
heard the Manager asking.
"Show me some patterns, please," commanded Suzanne.
On the wall was a frame containing a number of different cheque varieties,
to which her attention was directed.
"Haven't you any other colours?" she asked. "I thought a black-and-yellow
cheque would be rather becoming; but don't bother about it if it's not in
stock."
She ended by taking one book of blue and one of purple cheques, and with
these and a paying-in-book (which she said would do so nicely for spills)
we at last departed. From behind the closed door of the private office I
distinctly heard a prolonged sigh of relief.
A few days later I came upon Suzanne sitting at her writing-table and
examining a cheque with a mystified air.
"Anything wrong?" I asked.
"I don't quite know," she replied. "I sent Angela this cheque the other day
to pay for my ticket for the Law-Courts' Revel, and she says the Bank
people have returned it to her. And it's marked 'R.D.' in red ink. Who is
'R.D.'?"
"He's the gentleman who censors cheques; and he has a way of disqualifying
them when there's not enough cash to pay them. Suzanne, what have you done
with all that money I paid into your account last Monday?"
"But I've only paid those footling little bills. There must be tons of
money left, unless the Bank's been speculating with it."
"Let me have a look at that cheque," I said.
She handed it to me and I examined it carefully.
"I see it's signed 'Thine, Suzanne.'"
"But that's how I always sign myself to Angela," she said; "and the Manager
distinctly told me to use my customary signature."
"Signature--not signatures," I explained gently. "They're rooted in
convention at the Bank and can't bear the least approach to variety. And
what's this scribbled on the back of it?"
"Oh, that's only a note I dashed off to Angela telling her what I was going
to wear. It seemed such a pity to waste a sheet of notepaper when there was
all that space to spare."
I gave her a quarter-of-an-hour's lesson in the art of drawing cheques.
Then I took up the paying-in book which was lying on the table. I knew it
ought to be in a virgin state as I had added nothing to the entrance money.
"And what might all these figures portend?" I asked.
"Those? Oh, that's baby's weight-chart. I'm always going to keep it there."
Well, well, if Suzanne looks after the weighing-in I can at least control
the paying-in. And I left it at that.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Brown._ "WHAT DID THEY GIVE OLD SLOWCOMBE THE O.B.E. FOR?"
_Jones._ "THE 'OTHER BEGGARS' ENERGY,' I IMAGINE."]
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Fond Parent_ (_who has done pretty well in woollens_).
"WELL, SONNY, WE'VE DECIDED TO GIVE YOU THE BEST EDUCATION THAT MONEY CAN
BUY. AFTER ALL, YOU WON'T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING EXCEPT BE A GENTLEMAN."]
* * * * *