Waterloo station is one of the things which no fellow can understand.
Thousands come to it, thousands go from it. Porters grow gray-headed
beneath its roof. Buns, once fresh and tender, become hard and
misanthropic in its refreshment rooms, and look as if they had seen
the littleness of existence and were disillusioned. But there the
station stands, year after year, wrapped in a discreet gloom, always
the same, always baffling and inscrutable. Not even the porters
understand it. "I couldn't say, sir," is the civil but unsatisfying
reply with which research is met. Now and then one, more gifted than
his colleagues, will inform the traveler that his train starts from
"No. 3 or No. 7," but a moment's reflection and he hedges with No. 12.
Waterloo is the home of imperfect knowledge. The booking clerks cannot
state in a few words where tickets may be bought for any station. They
are only certain that they themselves cannot sell them.
* * * * *
The gloom of the station was lightened on the following morning at ten
minutes to eleven when Mr. Garnet arrived to catch the train to
Axminster, by several gleams of sunshine and a great deal of bustle
and movement on the various platforms. A cheery activity pervaded the
place. Porters on every hand were giving their celebrated imitations
of the car of Juggernaut, throwing as a sop to the wounded a crisp "by
your leave." Agitated ladies were pouring forth questions with the
rapidity of machine guns. Long queues surged at the mouths of the
booking offices, inside which soured clerks, sending lost sheep empty
away, were learning once more their lesson of the innate folly of
mankind. Other crowds collected at the bookstalls, and the bookstall
keeper was eying with dislike men who were under the impression that
they were in a free library.
An optimistic porter had relieved Garnet of his portmanteau and golf
clubs as he stepped out of his cab, and had arranged to meet him on
No. 6 platform, from which, he asserted, with the quiet confidence
which has made Englishmen what they are, the eleven-twenty would start
on its journey to Axminster. Unless, he added, it went from No. 4.
Garnet, having bought a ticket, after drawing blank at two booking
offices, made his way to the bookstall. Here he inquired, in a loud,
penetrating voice, if they had got "Mr. Jeremy Garnet's last novel,
'The Maneuvers of Arthur.'" Being informed that they had not, he
clicked his tongue cynically, advised the man in charge to order that
work, as the demand for it might be expected shortly to be large, and
spent a shilling on a magazine and some weekly papers. Then, with ten
minutes to spare, he went off in search of Ukridge.
He found him on platform No. 6. The porter's first choice was, it
seemed, correct. The eleven-twenty was already alongside the platform,
and presently Garnet observed his porter cleaving a path toward him
with the portmanteau and golf clubs.
"Here you are!" shouted Ukridge. "Good for you. Thought you were going
to miss it."
Garnet shook hands with the smiling Mrs. Ukridge.
"I've got a carriage," said Ukridge, "and collared two corner seats.
My wife goes down in another. She dislikes the smell of smoke when
she's traveling. Let's pray that we get the carriage to ourselves. But
all London seems to be here this morning. Get in, old horse. I'll just
see her ladyship into her carriage and come back to you."
Garnet entered the compartment, and stood at the door, looking out in
order, after the friendly manner of the traveling Briton, to thwart an
invasion of fellow-travelers. Then he withdrew his head suddenly and
sat down. An elderly gentleman, accompanied by a girl, was coming
toward him. It was not this type of fellow-traveler whom he hoped to
keep out. He had noticed the girl at the booking office. She had
waited by the side of the line, while the elderly gentleman struggled
gamely for the tickets, and he had plenty of opportunity of observing
her appearance. For five minutes he had debated with himself as to
whether her hair should rightly be described as brown or golden. He
had decided finally on brown. It then became imperative that he should
ascertain the color of her eyes. Once only had he met them, and then
only for a second. They might be blue. They might be gray. He could
not be certain. The elderly gentleman came to the door of the
compartment and looked in.
"This seems tolerably empty, my dear Phyllis," he said.
Garnet, his glance fixed on his magazine, made a note of the name. It
harmonized admirably with the hair and the eyes of elusive color.
"You are sure you do not object to a smoking carriage, my dear?"
"Oh, no, father. Not at all."
Garnet told himself that the voice was just the right sort of voice to
go with the hair, the eyes, and the name.
"Then I think--" said the elderly gentleman, getting in. The
inflection of his voice suggested the Irishman. It was not a brogue.
There were no strange words. But the general effect was Irish. Garnet
congratulated himself. Irishmen are generally good company. An
Irishman with a pretty daughter should be unusually good company.
The bustle on the platform had increased momently, until now, when,
from the snorting of the engine, it seemed likely that the train might
start at any minute, the crowd's excitement was extreme. Shrill cries
echoed down the platform. Lost sheep, singly and in companies, rushed
to and fro, peering eagerly into carriages in the search for seats.
Piercing cries ordered unknown "Tommies" and "Ernies" to "keep by
aunty, now." Just as Ukridge returned, the dreaded "Get in anywhere"
began to be heard, and the next moment an avalanche of warm humanity
poured into the carriage. A silent but bitter curse framed itself on
Garnet's lips. His chance of pleasant conversation with the lady of
the brown hair and the eyes that were either gray or blue was at an
end.
The newcomers consisted of a middle-aged lady, addressed as aunty; a
youth called Albert, subsequently described by Garnet as the rudest
boy on earth--a proud title, honestly won; lastly, a niece of some
twenty years, stolid and seemingly without interest in life.
Ukridge slipped into his corner, adroitly foiling Albert, who had made
a dive in that direction. Albert regarded him fixedly for a space,
then sank into the seat beside Garnet and began to chew something
grewsome that smelled of aniseed.
Aunty, meanwhile, was distributing her weight evenly between the toes
of the Irish gentleman and those of his daughter, as she leaned out of
the window to converse with a lady friend in a straw hat and hair
curlers. Phyllis, he noticed, was bearing it with angelic calm. Her
profile, when he caught sight of it round aunty, struck him as a
little cold, even haughty. That, however, might be due to what she was
suffering. It is unfair to judge a lady's character from her face, at
a moment when she is in a position of physical discomfort. The train
moved off with a jerk in the middle of a request on the part of the
straw-hatted lady that her friend would "remember that, you know,
about _him_," and aunty, staggering back, sat down on a bag of food
which Albert had placed on the seat beside him.
"Clumsy!" observed Albert tersely.
"Al_bert_, you mustn't speak to aunty so."
"Wodyer want sit on my bag for, then?" inquired Albert.
They argued the point.
Garnet, who should have been busy studying character for a novel of
the lower classes, took up his magazine and began to read. The odor of
aniseed became more and more painful. Ukridge had lighted a cigar, and
Garnet understood why Mrs. Ukridge preferred to travel in another
compartment. For "in his hand he bore the brand which none but he
might smoke."
Garnet looked stealthily across the carriage to see how his lady of
the hair and eyes was enduring this combination of evils, and noticed
that she, too, had begun to read. And as she put down the book to look
out of the window at the last view of London, he saw with a thrill
that it was "The Maneuvers of Arthur." Never before had he come upon a
stranger reading his work. And if "The Maneuvers of Arthur" could make
the reader oblivious to surroundings such as these, then, felt Garnet,
it was no common book--a fact which he had long since suspected.
The train raced on toward the sea. It was a warm day, and a torpid
peace began to settle down on the carriage.
Soon only Garnet, the Irishman, and the lady were awake.
"What's your book, me dear?" asked the Irishman.
"'The Maneuvers of Arthur,' father," said Phyllis. "By Jeremy Garnet."
Garnet would not have believed without the evidence of his ears that
his name could possibly have sounded so well.
"Dolly Strange gave it to me when I left the abbey," continued
Phyllis. "She keeps a shelf of books for her guests when they are
going away. Books that she considers rubbish and doesn't want, you
know."
Garnet hated Dolly Strange without further evidence.
"And what do you think of it, me dear?"
"I like it," said Phyllis decidedly. The carriage swam before
Garnet's eyes. "I think it is very clever. I shall keep it."
"Bless you," thought Garnet, "and I will write my precious autograph
on every page, if you want it."
"I wonder who Jeremy Garnet is?" said Phyllis. "I imagine him rather
an old young man, probably with an eyeglass and conceited. He must be
conceited. I can tell that from the style. And I should think he
didn't know many girls. At least, if he thinks Pamela Grant an
ordinary sort of girl."
"Is she not?" asked her father.
"She's a cr-r-reature," said Phyllis emphatically.
This was a blow to Garnet, and demolished the self-satisfaction which
her earlier criticisms had caused to grow within him. He had always
looked on Pamela as something very much out of the ordinary run of
feminine character studies. That scene between her and the curate in
the conservatory.... And when she finds Arthur at the meet of the
Blankshire.... He was sorry she did not like Pamela. Somehow it
lowered Pamela in his estimation.
"But I like Arthur," said Phyllis, and she smiled--the first time
Garnet had seen her do so.
Garnet also smiled to himself. Arthur was the hero. He was a young
writer. Ergo, Arthur was himself.
The train was beginning to slow down. Signs of returning animation
began to be noticeable among the sleepers. A whistle from the engine,
and the train drew up in a station. Looking out of the window, Garnet
saw that it was Yeovil. There was a general exodus. Aunty became
instantly a thing of dash and electricity, collected parcels, shook
Albert, replied to his thrusts with repartee, and finally headed a
stampede out of the door.
To Garnet's chagrin the Irish gentleman and his daughter also rose.
Apparently this was to be the end of their brief acquaintanceship.
They alighted and walked down the platform.
"Where are we?" said Ukridge sleepily, opening his eyes. "Yeovil? Not
far now, old horse."
With which remark he closed his eyes again and returned to his
slumbers.
Garnet's eye, roving disconsolately over the carriage, was caught by
something lying in the far corner. It was the criticized "Maneuvers of
Arthur." The girl had left it behind.
What follows shows the vanity that obsesses our young and rising
authors. It did not enter into his mind that the book might have been
left behind of set purpose, as being of no further use to the owner.
It only occurred to him that if he did not act swiftly the lady of the
hair and eyes would suffer a loss beside which the loss of a purse or
a hand bag were trivial.
He acted swiftly.
Five seconds later he was at the end of the platform, flushed but
courteous.
"Excuse me," he said, "I think--"
"Thank you," said the girl.
Garnet made his way back to his carriage.
"They are blue," he said.