DURING the next fortnight Mrs. Heyham's sitting-room took on a
business-like air. A desk appeared in it, a typewriter, and finally a
lady called Miss Percival. She was Rosemary's idea, and the theory of
her was that one cannot be certain of doing good, even to waitresses,
unless one knows something about them before one begins. Miss Percival,
who had been secretary to a philanthropic member of Parliament, was to
help her employer acquire this necessary knowledge, and then act, so to
speak, as a reservoir of information whose tap would be turned if Mrs.
Heyham showed signs of forgetfulness or of letting her feelings run away
with her.
There could be no doubt of the lady's fitness for this task, for away in
her past behind the conscientious member lay services to every
progressive society in London that wanted investigation done for
nothing. And if testimonials can be trusted each of these bodies had
relinquished Miss Percival with passionate regret.
Mary waited for such efficiency with certain misgivings. Her kind heart
had prompted her to buy a fumed oak desk instead of the elegant sycamore
she would have liked, in order that her secretary might feel at home.
Anything so ugly must, Mary thought, be excessively practical. But when
Miss Percival arrived she did not look like a person who would be
affected by the material of her desk. She was short, dark, unexpectedly
young, and quite kind to every one. She even informed Mrs. Heyham that
this was the sort of work she had been hoping to get. The only other
thing one noticed about her, at first, was that she would not speak, if
she could help it, in front of James or Trent. Mary, when she saw that
this was so, felt sorry for her, and almost suspected sad experiences.
The M. P. was out of the question--Mary had once sat next to him at
dinner--but she had no such guarantee about all the queer people there
must have been in the societies. But kindness might be trusted to remove
any doubts that lingered in Miss Percival's mind, and in the meantime
the important thing was that she seemed to have a clear notion of what
she meant to do. This was a relief to Mary, who could organise very well
when she must, but took no delight in thinking out a plan for its own
sake.
The first thing, according to the expert's scheme, was to ask Mr. Heyham
to give them an account of the business. This he willingly did, at ease
in his arm-chair, while Mary looked at him with quiet appreciation. Miss
Percival was not present. James, when he told a story, liked to tell it
in his own way, and in this case Mary's dead father and mother were
involved, besides James's own father, who was intensely alive and sinful
in South America. Mary could repeat the important facts to Miss Percival
afterwards, and then Miss Percival could make a note of them.
The business came into the family in the middle-age of James's father,
who in those days was a plausible, restless fellow, continually
initiating enterprises and continually throwing them up. At this period
in his career he was associated with a dubiously virtuous old man called
Matthew Clarkson, and Clarkson persuaded his ally to invest some money
they had recently acquired in a mineral water factory in East London. It
was called the "'Rule Britannia' Aerated Water Co.," and that, as its
vendor pointed out, was a very good name to start from. The factory, as
they found it, was small and exceedingly dirty, and perhaps for these
reasons congenial to Matthew, who developed a habit of visiting the
place very morning in order that he might irritate the foreman, and
conduct experiments in an unpleasant cupboard that he called his
laboratory. Meanwhile Mr. Henry Heyham was making the most of this brief
life, spending a good deal of mysterious money, moving into a larger
house, giving his sons a passable education, and looking about him for a
suitable match for his daughter Edith. Even her brothers thought Edith a
handsome girl, and in particular she was attractively plump. Henry found
it possible before his own financial needs became too glaring to marry
her to a wealthy gentleman interested in meat. And thank heaven this is
a Christian country where marriage is still held sacred.
He bore up until the honeymoon was over, for he always liked to do
things decently, but two days after Edith's return he summoned his
second son James, fresh from a London school, and told him, with an
almost tearful impressiveness, that he, Henry, was for the moment done
for. Honourably done for, mind you, not through his own fault but
through the fault of those he had trusted. Not that he regretted having
trusted them, he would rather have a mind full of faith and confidence
in his fellows even if he had to pay for it than pass through the world
crammed with ugly suspicions and for ever taking precautions against his
neighbour.
Even without the old man's deprecating look, James would have understood
that this was Henry's way for apologising for some gross and culminating
piece of carelessness.
But that was not all he had to say. Many fathers, if not most fathers,
when they had reached the age of having grown-up sons who had been
treated with every kindness, supplied with every luxury, and equipped
with an unsurpassed education, would consider--and in his opinion they
wouldn't go beyond their rights if they did--that the time had come when
the said sons were in duty bound to turn to and support the authors of
their being. But he, Henry, was not that sort of man. He would never be
a burden on any child of his. On the contrary it had been the object of
his steadfast endeavour to provide a safe start in life for his boys, no
matter what might happen to their old father. Edith couldn't have been
better disposed of, Timothy was doing well with the smartest, most
up-to-date solicitors in London, and he now proposed to complete the
beneficent work by giving James an opportunity that most young fellows
would cut off their ears to get, an opportunity so resplendent, if he
only liked to use it, that ten years might see him a rich man, and
twenty find him a captain of industry--and this in an age when to be a
captain of industry, honest British industry, was the goal of every
decent man's ambition. There was much that might be said upon this
subject, upon the essential meanness and hollowness of politics, art,
literature, the Church, the services, science, medicine, and teaching,
regarded as careers. But time pressed. He would put what he wanted to
say briefly, simply, without trimmings, as befitted a business man. He
proposed to make over to his dear son James his share in the thriving
mineral water business known as the Rule Britannia Aerated Water Co. And
to whatever quarter of the globe fortune might drive him, to whatever
depths of squalor she might plunge him, he would never forget to pray
for the immediate, the triumphant, the cataclysmic success of his dear
son, his old friend, and the Rule Britannia.
James had not known that there was such happiness. He could not speak.
His eyes were dazzled by a vision of shining bottles, thousands of
smooth glass bottles, crystal clear, through which gleamed splendidly
the ruby, the topaz, the diamond, of their appetising contents. Above
waved the flag of the greatest of nations, and the distant voices
singing a glorious song broke off to acclaim him a captain of industry.
His heart was full; for a moment he forgot his anxiety concerning the
fate of a parent.
Old Henry, who had only paused for dramatic effect, felt no pain at this
lack of piety. Let James rejoice, he went on, and not sadden his days by
thinking about him. He had knocked about the world before now, and if a
peaceful old age was denied him he would submit anew to the scourgings
of fate. As a matter of fact--here his eye brightened--he had heard of a
little affair in South America. There might be something in it or there
might not. In any case no good would be served by talking about it now.
If matters went well his boys would hear from him. If not--he hoped they
would keep a warm corner in their hearts for the memory of their poor
old father. And now James had better come along and see to the necessary
papers, as he was sailing for Montevideo in a couple of days.
When next his boys did hear of him, two years later, he was lodged in a
South American prison. James, who had long feared something of the sort,
could only be thankful that it had happened in a romantic continent.
None of Henry's family doubted that when Henry returned--if he ever did
return--he would have some explanation compatible with the greatest
physical courage and the loftiest qualities of heart and head. As a
matter of fact when a letter arrived it contained the tale of a maiden
in distress so beautiful, so tender, so virtuous, that only a scoundrel
could have turned away from her piteous appeals.
Meanwhile James worked hard, for the captain of industry still dominated
his dreams. But it was some time before he began to make more than a
bare living. Even when he had to a certain extent surmounted his own
inexperience he was faced by his partner's refusal to spend a penny on
making the factory even decently clean, by the impossibility of keeping
a good class of work-girl owing to the same old gentleman's roving eye,
and by Clarkson's Ginger Cordial. This was the result of years of
patient and muddled investigation on Matthew's part. He was not
satisfied with it yet, he said, and meanwhile he was offended if he was
not allowed to call the whole staff away from their work in order that
they might conduct experiments with him. This was particularly
troublesome because the coadjutor he most favoured was the forewoman,
the only person in the place whose tongue was sharp enough to keep the
girls in order. It was useless for James to explain that no business
carried on in this way could have any chance of succeeding. Clarkson
replied that it didn't matter a damn whether it succeeded or not until
the Ginger Cordial was ready for the market. After that event it
wouldn't be able to help succeeding. And further, he wasn't going to be
preached at in his own factory by--young puppies.
That seemed an impregnable position, but Matthew's defences had one weak
spot. The passing of the Employers' Liability Act revealed the fact that
the senior partner was terrified of inspectors and of the fiendish
things inspectors might do to him. He had no knowledge of the law, and
only a vivid something in his past seemed adequate to account for his
fear of it. Happily in this country we have, besides the clumsy and
public efforts of our legislators, the subtle and intricate machinery of
Home Office orders. One Julius Trent, a friend of James's, persuaded him
to spend a few pounds at a costumier's and a few shillings at a
printer's. After that one of Her Majesty's Factory Inspectors, in an
imposing blue uniform, visited Mr. Clarkson several times a week. The
old man withstood this onslaught for some time, but when the inspector
arrived one day with a printed document which set forth that owing to
information and complaints recently received regulations had been issued
to the effect that those who were guilty of any breaches of the rules
laid down for the safety and good government of the English people, and
in particular of obstructing or using obscene or filthy language to Her
Majesty's Factory Inspectors in the course of their duty, should in
future be liable to imprisonment with hard labour without the option of
a fine, the old man's courage failed. He undertook to allow the
necessary cleaning, he promised to respect a salutary rule just made by
the Home Secretary that no forewoman was on any account whatever to
enter her employer's private room, he even gave up his laboratory
because the same authority had found it inexpedient to permit
experimental research into the composition of cordials to be carried on
under one roof with the manufacture of mineral waters between the hours
of 6 A.M. and 10 P.M. He retired routed to a shed at the bottom of his
garden with no revenge but his votes, and the next thing to do was to
buy him out before he discovered what had happened.
That took some time, partly because every penny James could spare was
needed for repairs and improvements, partly because Mr. Clarkson, as
soon as he found that James wished it, showed an obstinate reluctance to
being bought out. The Home Secretary could not exclude him from his own
premises altogether, and he still enjoyed an occasional ramble round.
Finally James, who was growing more masterful, dismissed the forewoman.
That was a blow, for her successor and her successor's underlings did
not appreciate Mr. Clarkson's practised smiles. James found him one day
examining himself rather sadly in a looking-glass.
The sight of James's reflected face suddenly mingled with an already
unpleasing picture roused Mr. Clarkson. Hitherto, he said, he had borne
with young Heyham's goings-on in a Christian spirit, but this was
spying. Heyham seemed to think that he was cock of the walk, that he'd
only got to say the word and every one would lick his boots; well, they
wouldn't. And when he, Matt Clarkson, liked to be nasty he could be
nasty. And no mistake about it.
Being nasty meant abusing James in front of the hands, jeering at him,
or, what was worse, assuming in public that nothing delighted him more
than to hear one of Mr. Clarkson's appalling anecdotes. Even the Home
Secretary cannot forbid a Briton to make the jokes that please him.
Nevertheless in his heart the old man was afraid. He did not attempt to
control the business, and when he had made his partner really angry, he
would say that he didn't mean anything by it, it was just his way.
Meanwhile James had arrived at a time of his life that he could discuss
more fittingly with a wife on the sofa beside him than with a wife on a
separate chair. Julius Trent, afterwards such a nuisance, then so
charming, introduced his friend James to his parents, and old Mr. Trent
took a fancy to the young man. Old Mr. Trent approved of young men who
worked very hard and showed every intention of succeeding, and he had
been amused by Julius's account of Mr. Clarkson and the factory
inspector. He also enjoyed discussing books with James, for in those
days James took an interest in political theory. He hadn't much time to
think of these things himself, but there were plenty of men who had, and
surely some day one of them would produce the simple, gentlemanly,
inexpensive solution of social problems that would relieve an overworked
business man of further anxiety.
Old Mr. Trent, like many people who have few chances of talking over the
subjects that interest them, had invented two or three systems that
would abolish bad times and make England prosperous for evermore. The
trouble with most of them was that they involved a good deal of
compulsion at the outset--before people had learned to appreciate their
excellence--and Mr. Trent was against compulsion in any form. It was
this that had made him give up his great Malthusian scheme of grading
workmen according to their capacity and regulating their families in a
corresponding manner. He still hoped that a more enlightened generation
might adopt it of their own free will, and to this end he subscribed
considerable sums to a Neo-Malthusian journal. But the plan to which he
had finally devoted his declining years might perfectly well, if only
the Government would leave off wasting their time, be put into effect at
once. It consisted in taking a tenth of the capital of anybody who had
got a sufficient quantity, buying gold with it, and depositing the gold
in the vaults of the Bank of England. It would not be at all an
oppressive measure, for the resulting prosperity and expansion of credit
would far more than compensate everybody concerned. After only two or
three years he was sure that no more compulsion would be necessary, for
here you would be dealing, not with uneducated workmen, blind to their
own interests, but with astute financiers and men of business. The only
difficulty would be that other countries might get hold of the idea and
refuse to sell gold. But let his hearers take heart, recent discoveries
all went to show that there was a far greater quantity of gold in
various parts of the planet--mostly, by the direct favour of God,
British possessions--than one was apt to imagine. If James would glance
at these geological maps....
James was not always allured by these problems, but he appreciated Mr.
Trent's library and the comfortable, sufficiently cultured air of Mr.
Trent's house. The manners that prevailed in it seemed to James very
gracious and elegant--they were in any case a pleasant change from the
manners of Mr. Clarkson. He also grew fond of Mrs. Trent, who was kind
to him, and he fell in love with whatever her mother and her governess
allowed him to see of Mary. She was sixteen when he saw her first, very
pretty, very quiet, very easily made to blush. She would laugh
delightfully, as if she could not help it, at the clever, witty things
James said, and then stop suddenly, and droop her head over her
embroidery, until James surpassed himself to make her look up again.
They were engaged when she was eighteen, and at the end of another year
he felt that he was in a position to marry her. Mr. and Mrs. Trent
believed in girls marrying young, while they would still view facts in a
romantic light and before they had become unable to adapt their
dispositions to those of their husbands. James's only regret was that he
could not present himself as the sole owner of his growing business, but
old Clarkson persistently demanded not only three thousand pounds for
what had only cost him fifteen hundred but an extra five hundred for the
formula of his Ginger Cordial. Nobody wanted his cordial, but he would
not sell one without the other. That he would sell at all was due to the
fact that James was still bent on developing the business instead of
considering all the returns as profit.
Neither James nor Mary was ever sure of the motives that led Mr. Trent
to make his daughter part owner of the "Rule Britannia." But they
believed that the idea must have occurred to him first on the day when
he met Mr. Clarkson in James's office. The senior partner's clothes were
particular greasy that day, he had been drinking a good deal of Ginger
Cordial with a little rum in it to make it more satisfying, and he
insisted on showing the visitor some picture postcards that he
considered truly comic. Mr. Trent was a fastidious little man, and as an
estate agent he had come into contact with some very good people. He
asked James at the time whether he ever saw Mr. Clarkson outside the
factory, and James's reply of "Not if I can help it!" may not have
seemed sufficiently reassuring. At any rate when James came to sign his
marriage settlements he found that Mr. Clarkson had sold his share in
the firm and his rights over Clarkson's Ginger Cordial for £3,500, the
said rights to revert to him if the said cordial were ever sold under
any other name, and that Mrs. James Heyham would in future be entitled
to half the profits of the business.
After his marriage James worked harder than ever. Old Mr. Trent made an
excellent father-in-law; he never interfered but he was always ready to
lend James a hundred or so when mineral-water provided some sudden
opportunity for a rich man to become a little richer. James found
considerable moral satisfaction in repaying these loans. Mrs. Trent was
sympathetic, helpful when Trent and Laura were born, and an unfailing
example to Mary of how a wife should cherish and revere a husband. The
Heyhams lived frugally, for the firm was still absorbing every penny
that could be spared. Bread companies and milk companies were beginning
to make fortunes out of shops for the sale of tea and light
refreshments. James did not see why a similar venture should not succeed
with mineral water for its basis. The "Rule Britannia" was turned into
a private company under the name of "Imperial Refreshments Limited." Mr.
Trent lent James the necessary capital and three tea-shops were
established.
The tea-shops flourished and their numbers grew. Before long they were
the most important part of the business. They did not provide the market
for mineral waters that James had expected, but, though it seemed a
little perverse of them, they were steady customers for the Ginger
Cordial. This proved to be a heartening mixture, unnecessarily
complicated perhaps, but undoubtedly with an interest of its own. In
summer it imparted life to our Imperial Fresh Fruit Drinks, in winter,
hot, it made clients feel brisk but not aggressive. James hated the
sight of it, and its smell gave him a headache.
Now he still worked, still looked for opportunities, still kept an open
mind. But it was with the ease and amplitude of recognised success.
Worries came and went, weather and government interfered with prices,
this man or that turned out bad, neighbourhoods altered, and rivals had
bright ideas. But at the bottom the Imperial was sound and everybody
knew it. Its methods and its machinery alike were the most up-to-date in
the trade. Its premises were spotless, the materials it put into its
products were absolutely the best that could be done for the money. And
James took trouble to please his customers' minds as well as their
bodies. The tea-shops had begun in a somewhat gloomy fashion; the glass
doors between their windows had been darkened with large bills of fare,
the upper panes of the windows themselves had been pasted over with
labels, and below a Japanese tea-set on one side and some fruit and a
boiled ham on the other had been thrown into relief by red plush
curtains. Inside there had been bamboo furniture, black screens with
gold birds on them, and an occasional artificial palm. But as James rose
in the world his taste improved. With the changes in Mary's furniture at
home the decorative scheme of the tea-shops changed too, until now they
were models of charm and sanitation. Their walls were white and their
paint was black. Customers' hats and coats were massed in places where
they did not destroy the effect. The tables had tops that were excellent
imitations of green marble and as light as wood to shift--heavy wood.
There were casement windows, and in winter the curtains and the crockery
were cherry-coloured, in summer they were white with a border of green
leaves. Trent thought this extravagant, but James preferred to consider
the beneficial effect on the æsthetic natures of his customers. Besides
it pays in the long run to be distinctive. Even the company's monogram
had been carefully designed to add to the beauty of these favoured
places. In short, they looked like shops where you might well have paid
sixpence for your cup of tea, and they, were shops, as the posters by
real artists reminded you, where you could get a superlative cup for
twopence.
The Imperial manufactured their own china, under another name, and held
the patent rights of the marble substitute. In the newer shops they were
paving the floors with it, green and white. The fact that several other
restaurants and tea-shops came innocently to him for their cups and
saucers gave James a good deal of quiet pleasure, though he didn't
attend to that side of the business himself. Nor, as the china factory
was naturally not in London, would Mary be likely to have dealings with
it, though they employed a good many girls. But he could assure her that
go where she would, at any time, whether she was expected or not
expected, she wouldn't find a corner of the Imperial's premises that she
would be ashamed to see in her own house. James knew all about dirt, and
he didn't believe in it.