"Age?" It was as if I heard the uninflected accents of Destiny.
"Is it absolutely necessary?" I queried.
"Absolutely!"
"Forty-three. Of course in confidence," I added hastily.
"There is no confidence in Eternity."
"Then you, too, are a sceptic?" I ventured. She merely stared at me
fixedly, then proceeded to turn over the leaves of the tome in front of
her. Soon she found what appeared to be the correct page. After fully
a minute's deliberate contemplation of the entry, she looked up suddenly
and regarded me with a solemn gravity that struck me as grotesque.
"Not a very bad case, let's hope," I put in cheerfully. "There have
been----"
"Silence!"
I started as if shot, and looking round discovered beside me the
impassive visage of the ill-favoured Vestal of the ante-room.
"I wish you wouldn't bawl in my ear like that," I snapped. "It's most
unpleasant."
"Anthony Charles Windover," it was Mrs. Grundy who spoke in a voice that
was deep-throated and disapproving, "age forty-three." She looked up
again with her cold and malevolent stare; "yours is a grave record; we
will deal with it in detail."
"Surely, Madam," I protested, "it is not necessary to go over
everything. I am so hopeless at accounts."
"First there was the case of Cecily Somers," she proceeded unmoved.
"A mere boy and girl affair. Cecily was young, and--well, it didn't
last long."
"Then there was the case of Laura Merton," continued the
arch-inquisitor.
"Poor Laura," I murmured. "I never could resist red hair, and hers
was----poor Laura!"
"There were circumstances of a very grave nature."
"You mean the curate? He was a bloodless creature; besides it all ended
happily."
"You intervened between an affianced man and wife," continued Mrs.
Grundy.
"I am very sorry to appear rude, Madam," I protested hotly, irritated by
the even, colourless tones of her voice, "but it was Laura's hair that
intervened! Am I to blame because she preferred the ripeness of my
maturity to the callowness of his inexperience?"
"You caused her mother--an estimable lady--indescribable anguish of
soul."
"She hadn't one," I replied, triumphantly, "She was a scheming old----"
"Silence!" fulminated the Vestal again.
"Really, madam," I protested with asperity, "unless you request this
person not to shout in my ear, I shall refuse to remain here another
minute."
"There was Rosie de Lisle----"
"Ah, what ankles! what legs! what----" I was interrupted by a gurgle
from the Vestal in whose eyes there was something more than horror. I
turned and found Mrs. Grundy obviously striving to regain the power of
speech.
Conscious that my ecstasy upon Rosie's legs had caused the trouble, I
hastened to explain that I had seen them in common with the rest of the
play-going world.
"Rosie was the belle of the Frivolity," I proceeded, "Bishops have been
known to hasten ordinations, or delay confirmations because of Rosie's
legs. She danced divinely!"
Rosie's legs seemed to have a remarkable effect upon Mrs. Grundy. She
hurriedly turned over the pages of her book and then turned them back
again.
"There was Evelyn Relton----"
"A minx, madam, to adopt the idiom of your sex, whilst my kisses were
still warm upon her lips----" Another gurgle from the Vestal and a
"look" from Mrs. Grundy,--"she married a wealthy brewer, and is now the
mother of eight embryo brewers, or is it nine?"
"You--you are aggravating your case, stammered Mrs. Grundy, with some
asperity.
"I am very sorry, but your attitude annoys me; it always did. I'm a
social free-trader, a bohemian----"
"STOP!" thundered Mrs. Grundy. "That word is never permitted here."
"I think you're extremely suburban," I replied. "You might be Tooting,
or even Brixton from your attitude."
Ignoring this, Mrs. Grundy proceeded to read the names of a number of
women who had long ceased to be to me anything but names. I could not
even remember if they were dark or fair, tall or short. At last she
reached Mary Vincent, relict of Josiah Vincent, pork-packer of Chicago.
"Why, she was a most shameless person," I cried. "I am surprised,
madam, that you should support such a woman. She actually proposed to
me."
"Ahem!" coughed Mrs. Grundy, apparently somewhat taken aback.
"A fact! She asked me if I did not think a middle-aged man--she was
always impertinent--would have a better chance of happiness with a woman
of ripe experience, a widow for instance, than with some mere
inexperienced girl. Really a most offensive suggestion."
"It's very curious," muttered Mrs. Grundy, as she turned over the leaves
in obvious embarrassment. "It's very curious, but I see no record here
of any such conversation."
"Ha! I thought your books were defective," I exclaimed, now feeling
thoroughly at my ease. "Why, I have letters, shameless letters, from
Mrs. Vincent, which would make your hair stand on end." I did not
appreciate until too late how thin and sparse her hair really was.
"We will proceed," was her response. I was secretly glad that she had
dropped that even tone of inevitability and remembered Tully's axiom
"make a woman angry and she is half won over."
"There was the case of Sir John Plumtree, 26th baronet. You committed a
most brutal assault upon that most distinguished man."
"Plumtree was a bounder, more at home in his own country house than
among gentlemen. I certainly did punch his head in the club
smoking-room; but do you know why, madam?"
"There is no mention of the cause," said Mrs. Grundy, a little ill at
ease.
"We were discussing a very charming member of your sex"--(Mrs. Grundy
started and coughed, the word "sex" evidently distressed her)--"when
Plum, as we called him, growled out that all women were--I really cannot
repeat it, but he quoted a saying of a well-known Eastern potentate
whose matrimonial affairs were somewhat--"
"We will pass on," said Mrs. Grundy, huskily. I thought I detected a
slight reddening of the sallow cheeks, whilst the Vestal coughed loudly.
"I should really prefer not to pass over this little affair so lightly,"
I remarked sweetly, seeing my advantage. "There were several
circumstances which--"
"We will pass on," was the firm reply, "I will not proceed with that
specific charge." The smile with which I greeted this concession did
not conduce to put my interlocutor at her ease. "There are certain
unconventions recorded against you. We will take a few of the most
glaring."
"Why this reticence? Can we not take them all and in chronological
order?" I enquired, settling myself in the most comfortless of chairs.
Disregarding my request, Mrs. Grundy proceeded:
"On the night of June 7th, 1914, you dined with Mrs. Walker Trevor at
----," she paused and bent over the register.
"This is very strange," she muttered, _sotto voce_. "I don't quite see
the reason of this entry. There seems to have been a mistake."
"Can I assist you?" I ventured, becoming interested.
She paid no heed to my offer, and after a few minutes' silence proceeded
in the same half-muttering voice.
"Dined with Mrs. Walker Trevor, wife of Captain Walker Trevor, absent on
military duty, at Princes, P.R. It does not say what prince, but rank
is----" She paused, then continued: "There is no breach of the
conventions in dining at a prince's, even with a married lady whose
husband is away. I cannot understand the meaning of P.R. either. It is
very strange, very strange indeed."
Here I broke in. "Permit me, madam, to explain. I think you are
labouring under a mistake. Princes is a famous Piccadilly Restaurant,
which has lost some of its one-time glory through the opening of the
Carlton and the Ritz. 'P.R.' of course means Private Room. It was
Millicent's idea."
At this juncture there was a loud knocking, evidently at the end of the
corridor, followed by expostulations in an angry voice and interjections
of "Silence!" in what appeared to be a replica of the Vestal's tones.
Mrs. Grundy looked up, scandalised enquiry imprinted on her visage.
"I'm goin' in, I tell you," the angry voice was now just outside. "Get
out of the way, you old Jezebel! Silence? I'm damned if I'll be
silent. Why I've sneezed three times already. Draughty hole! Get out
of the way I say."
The door burst open and there entered a little man in a very great
passion. I recognised him instantly as the Duke of Shires, a notorious
viveur and director of wild-cat companies. I leant forward and
whispered to Mrs. Grundy the name of her illustrious visitor.
"This is an unexpected pleasure, Duke," I remarked smilingly. He
regarded me for a few minutes coldly.
"Who the devil are you, and who's that old ---- sitting
there?"--indicating Mrs. Grundy. Then without waiting for a reply, he
continued: "I know you now: you're the feller that said that dashed
impertinent thing about my being the Duke of Shares."
"I had the honour, Duke, of immortalising Your Grace in epigram.
Wherever the English language is----"
"Then be damned to you, sir," was the angry response.
"We were not expecting Your Grace yet," interposed Mrs. Grundy; I was
astonished at the unctuous tones she adopted in speaking to the Duke.
"No, nor I, confound it! I've just been knocked down by a taxicab,
light green, driver had red hair, couldn't see his number."
"I am extremely sorry," croaked Mrs. Grundy in what she evidently
intended to be ingratiating tones. "Will not Your Grace take a seat."
"No, I won't!" the Duke tossed his head indignantly. "Draughty
hole--damn it, sir, what are you grinning at?"
The remark was directed at me. The little man made a dive in my
direction, and in stepping back to avoid him I knocked my head violently
against what appeared to be the mantel-piece, although I had been
sitting several yards from it.
* * * * *
"What is it?" I looked about dazed. Two policemen were bending over
me, and behind them was a sea of interested faces that looked very pale,
I was out of doors, apparently sitting on the pavement, with my head
propped up upon a policeman's knee.
"It was a banana skin, sir," responded one of the policemen, holding up
something before my eyes--(how the police love an "exhibit")--"you 'urt
your 'ead, sir, but you're all right now."
"And Mrs. Grundy and the Duke?" I queried.
"'Ere's the stretcher!" said a voice.
"It's a bad business, I'm afraid 'e'll----"
Then my mind trailed off into darkness and my body was trundled off to
St. George's Hospital, from which the almost tearful Rogers later
fetched me in a taxi, bemoaning the narrowness, not of my escape from
death, but his own from destitution.
"I wonder wot 'Earty 'ud think o' that little yarn," Bindle remarked
meditatively as he tapped the table before him with his mallet in token
of applause. As chairman Bindle modelled himself upon him who lords it
over the public-house "smoker." "'E wouldn't like to 'ave to give up
'is 'arp with angels flapping about."
"But it's only a--a--sort of dream, like mine," interjected Angell
Herald, with a touch of superior knowledge in his voice.
Bindle turned and regarded Angell Herald as if he were an object of
great interest. Then when he had apparently satisfied himself in every
particular about his identity, he remarked quietly with a grin:
"O' course it was. Silly o' me to forget. Poor ole 'Earty. I wouldn't
'ave 'im disappointed. 'E's nuts on 'arps."
*CHAPTER VIII*
*THE MAKING OF A MAN OF GENIUS*
It was rather by way of an experiment that I determined to try the
effect of irony upon the members of the Night Club. I confess I was
curious as to how it would strike Bindle, remembering that remarkable
definition of irony as "life reduced to an essence." The story had been
told me by Old Archie, if he had another name none of us had ever heard
it, who keeps a coffee-stall not far from Sloane Square. He was a
rosy-faced little fellow, as nippy as a cat in spite of his seventy
years, and as cheerful as a sparrow. He has seen life from many angles,
and there has come to him during those three score years and ten a
philosophy that seems based on the milk of human kindness.
Had he been gifted with a ready pen, he could have written a book that
would have been valuable as well as interesting. "A man shows 'is 'eart
an' a woman 'er soul round a coffee-stall," was one of his phrases that
has clung to my memory. "Lord bless you, sir," he said on another
occasion, "there's good an' bad in everyone. Even in a rotten apple the
pips is all right."
I chose a night for Old Archie's story when I knew there would be a full
attendance, and without anything in the nature of an introduction began
the tale as he had told it to me.
In arriving at a determination to marry, Robert Tidmarsh, as in all
things, had been deliberate. It was an act, he told himself, that he
owed to the success he had achieved. From the time when he lived with
his parents in a depressing tenement house in Boulger Street, Barnsbury,
Robert Tidmarsh had been preoccupied with his career. It had become the
great fetish of his imagination.
In childhood it had brought down upon him scorn and ridicule. Studious
habits were not popular in Boulger Street; but Robert remained resolute
in his pursuit of success. He saw that in time the star of his destiny
would take him far from Boulger Street--it had. At the age of
thirty-eight he was head clerk to Messrs. Middleton, Ratchett & Dolby,
Solicitors, of 83 Austin Friars, E.C., wore a silk hat and frock-coat,
lived at Streatham, drew a salary of two hundred and thirty pounds a
year and had quite a considerable sum in the bank. Boulger Street had
been left far behind.
In its way Boulger Street was proud of him; it had seen him mount the
ladder step by step. It had made him, nourished him, neglected him,
ridiculed him, and later, with the servility of a success-loving
plebeian, it respected and worshipped him. He remained its standard by
which to measure failure. The one thing it did not do was to imitate
him.
Robert saw that, economically, the way was clear before him. His career
demanded the sacrifice; for somehow he could never quite rid his mind of
the idea that marriage _was_ a sacrifice. Such considerations belonged,
however, to a much earlier stage of his reasoning. Whatever he had to
resign was laid upon the altar of ambition. If destiny demanded
sacrifice, he would tender it without hesitation, without complaint.
As he had climbed the ladder of success, Robert found to his surprise
that his horizon was enlarging; but he was not deceived into the belief
that it would continue to expand to infinity. Being something of a
philosopher, he knew that there must be limitations. In a vague,
indeterminate way he was conscious that he lacked some quality necessary
to his continued progression. He could not have put it into words; but
he was conscious that there was something holding him back.
Could he at twenty-one have started where he was at thirty-eight, there
might have been a prospect of achieving greatness for the house of
Tidmarsh. This he now knew to be impossible, and he wasted no time in
vain regrets. His reason told him that, but for some curious shuffling
of the cards, he was unlikely to rise much higher. "But should
twenty-six years of work and sacrifice be allowed to pass for nothing?"
He could not himself climb much higher, but if a son of his were to
start from the social and intellectual rung whereon he now stood, there
would be a saving of twenty-six years. Then again, his son would have
the advantage of his father's culture, position, experience. Slowly the
truth dawned upon him; he was destined to play Philip to his son's
Alexander. From the moment that Robert Tidmarsh reached this conclusion
marriage became inevitable.
For weeks he pondered on the new prospect he saw opening out before him.
He was pleased with its novelty. The weakness of the reasoning that a
son starts from where his father stands did not appear to strike him.
With a new interest and energy he walked through miles of streets
adorned with the latest architectural achievements in red brick and
stucco. It was characteristic of him that he had fixed upon the avenue
that was to receive him, long before his mind turned to the serious
problem of finding a suitable partner in his enterprise.
Robert Tidmarsh's views upon women were nebulous. Hitherto girls had
been permitted to play no part in his life. He had studiously avoided
them. A young man, he had told himself, could not very well nurture a
career and nourish a wife at the same time. He was not a woman-hater;
he was merely indifferent; the hour had not struck.
For weeks he deliberated upon the kind of wife most likely to further
his ends. His first thought had been of a woman of culture, a few years
younger than himself. But would the cultures war with one another? The
risk was great, too great. He accordingly decided that youth and health
were to be the sole requisites in the future Mrs. Tidmarsh.
At this period Robert began to speculate upon his powers of attraction.
He would seek to catch a glimpse of himself in the mirrors he passed in
the street. He saw a rather sedate, dark-haired man of medium height,
with nondescript features and a small black moustache. In a vague way he
knew that he was colourless: he lacked half-tones, atmosphere. He
studied other men, strove to catch their idiom and inflection, to
imitate their bearing and the angle at which they wore their hats. He
began to look at women, mentally selecting and rejecting. One night he
spoke to a girl in Hyde Park, but he found conversation so difficult
that, with a muttered apology about catching a train and a lifting of
his hat, he fled. As he hurried away he heard the girl's opinion of him
compressed into one word as she turned on her heel, midst a swirl of
petticoats, to seek more congenial company. That night he found his
philosophy a poor defence against his sensitiveness.
Robert Tidmarsh would have turned away in horror from the suggestion
that he depended upon a casual meeting with some girl in Hyde Park to
furnish him with a wife. This was intended to be merely an adventure
preliminary to the real business of selection. He did not know what to
talk about to women, and the knowledge troubled him. When the time came
he found, as other men have found, an excellent subject ready to
hand--himself.
Robert may be said to have entered seriously upon his quest when he
joined a dancing-class, a tennis-club and learned to manage a punt. He
afterwards saw that any one of these recreations would have supplied him
with all the material he could possibly require. Eventually his choice
fell upon Eva Thompson, the daughter of a Tulse Hill chemist. She was
pretty, bright, and to all appearance, strong and healthy. He was
introduced to the parents, who were much impressed with their potential
son-in-law.
Mrs. Thompson was subjected to a dexterous cross-examination, the
subtlety of which in no way deceived that astute lady. Accordingly the
result was satisfactory to both parties. Eva herself at twenty-two had
all the instincts of a February sparrow. To mate well she had been
taught was the end and aim of a girl's life, a successful marriage, that
is from the worldly point of view, its crown of wild olive. To Robert,
however, marriage was the first step towards founding a family. Risks
there were, he saw this clearly, but where human forethought could
remove them they should be removed.
One of the secrets of Robert's success had been a singleness of purpose
that had enabled him to pursue his own way in spite of opposing factors.
He was always quietly resolute. It was not so much by his perseverance
that he achieved his ends, as by the care which he bestowed upon each
detail of his schemes. As in his career, so with his marriage, in
itself a part of the scheme of his life. Too astute to be convinced by
a mother's prejudiced evidence, or by his own unskilled judgment, he
determined to have expert opinion as to Eva's fitness to become the
mother of an Alexander. A slight chill the girl had contracted gave him
his opportunity. During an evening walk, he took her to his own doctor,
who had previously received instructions. Such a thing did not appear
to him as callous; he was not marrying for romance, but for a definite
and calculated purpose.
To some men marriage is a romance, to others a haven of refuge from
rapacious landladies; but to Robert Tidmarsh it was something between a
hobby and a career. He asked but one thing from the bargain, and
received far more than he would have thought any man justified in
expecting. From the hour that he signed the register in the vestry, the
training of his son commenced.
Among other things, Robert's reading had taught him that a child's
education does not necessarily begin with its birth. Accordingly he set
himself to render his bride happy. There was a deep strain of wisdom in
this man's mind, which no amount of undigested philosophical reading
could quite blot out. He saw the necessity of moulding his wife's
unformed character; and he decided that first he must render her happy.
He took her to the theatre, with supper at a cheap restaurant
afterwards, followed by the inevitable scurry to catch the last train.
Occasionally there were week-ends in the country, or by the sea. In
short the model son of one suburb became the model husband of another.
Months passed and Robert's anxiety increased. As the critical period
approached he became a prey to neurasthenia. He lost his appetite,
started at every sound, was incoherent in his speech, and slept so ill
as to be almost unfit for the day's work.
There is one night that Robert Tidmarsh will never forget. For two
hours he paced Schubert Avenue from end to end, his mind fixed on what
was happening in the front bedroom of Eureka Lodge. The biting East
wind he did not feel. He was above atmospheric temperatures. His
life's work, he felt, was about to be crowned or----he would not permit
himself to give even a moment's thought to the alternative. The
suspense was maddening. As he paced the Avenue he strove to think
coherently. He strove to compare his own childhood with that which
should be the lot of his son. Coherent thought he found impossible.
Everything in his mind was chaotic. Had he really any mind at all?
Would he lose his reason entirely? Then he fell to wondering what they
would do with him if he went mad?
He had got to this point, and had just turned round, when he saw that
the front door of Eureka Lodge was open and a woman's figure standing
out against the light. With a thumping heart, Robert ran the fifty
yards that separated him from the silhouetted figure as he had not run
since boyhood. What could it mean--a mishap? As he stopped at the gate,
his trembling fingers fumbling with the latch, he heard a voice that
seemed to come from no-where telling him that his ambition had been
realised. For the first time in his manhood he felt the tears streaming
down his face as he clutched at the gate-post sobbing. Fortunately the
woman had fled back to her post, and he was spared what to him would
have appeared an intolerable humiliation.
During the days immediately following that night of torture, Robert felt
that his life was to be crowned indeed. Hitherto the great moment of
his career had been when he was called into Mr. Middleton's room, and,
in the presence of the other partners, told that he was to be promoted
to the position of chief clerk. Now a greater had arrived, and from that
hour, when a son was born to the ambitious and self-made solicitor's
clerk, his life became one series of great moments.
Robert Tidmarsh early found the rearing of a man child productive of
grave anxieties. The slightest deviation from what he considered to be
the normal condition of infants produced in him a frenzy of alarm. His
forethought had provided books upon the rearing of infants. He consulted
them and his fears increased. Convulsions held for him a subtle and
petrifying horror. A more than usually robust exhibition of crying on
the part of Hector Roland (as the child was christened) invariably
produced in his father's mind dismal forebodings. In time, however, he
became more controlled, and the arrival of the customary period of
measles, whooping-cough, scarlet-fever and other childish ailments found
him composed if anxious.
But nervous solicitude for the boy's health did not in the least
interfere with the father's dominant preoccupation. The question of
education was never wholly absent from his thoughts. With so pronounced
a tendency to narrowness, it was strange to find with what wisdom and
foresight he entered upon his task. As if by instinct he saw that
influence alone could achieve his object. He would form no plan, he
would guide, not direct his son's genius. Above all he would not commit
the supreme indiscretion of taking anyone into his confidence.
Sometimes he was tempted to tell Eva of his ambition, he yearned for
sympathy in his great undertaking, but he always triumphed over this
weakness.
Eva was a little puzzled at his solicitude about her health, and the
frequent cross-questionings to which she was subjected as to what she
ate and drank; but woman-like she saw in this only evidence of his
devotion. He talked often of children whose lives had been imperilled
by injudicious indulgence on the part of their mothers. When the time
came for the child to be fed by hand, Robert made the most careful
enquiries of the doctor and his father-in-law as to the best and most
nutritious infant foods. The result of all this was that the child
showed every tendency to become a fine healthy young animal.
But in the care of the body, Robert Tidmarsh by no means neglected the
budding mind of his infant son. When the period of toys and
picture-books arrived, the same careful discrimination was shown. The
old fairy stories, with well-printed illustrations, diverted the young
Hector's mind just as the best foods nourished his body. When he tired
of literature there were cheap mechanical toys, bought in the hope of
stimulating the germ of enquiry as it should manifest itself. People
shook their heads and thought such extravagance unwarranted; but Robert
smiled. They did not share his secret.
As the years passed and Hector grew up into a sturdy youngster, his
father watched furtively for some sign as to the direction that his
genius was to take; but Hector, as if desirous of preserving to himself
the precious knowledge, refused to evidence any particular tendency
beyond a healthy appetite, a robust frame and a general enjoyment of
life.
With the selection of Hector's first school, an affair productive of
acute anxiety and many misgivings, commenced the education proper of the
man-to-be. The first official report, so eagerly awaited, was
noncommittal; the second proved little better, and the third seemed to
indicate that Hector was by no means an assiduous student. If the boy
evinced no marked tendency towards the acquirement of book-learning, he
showed an unmistakable liking for out-door sports and stories of
adventure. He was encouraged to read the works of "healthy" writers
such as Kingston and Ballantyne, strongly recommended by the book-seller
who had charge of Robert Tidmarsh's literary conscience. In the winter
evenings the boy would pore over the thrilling adventures of the heroes
with an attention that did not fail to arouse his father's hopes.
The first tragedy between this Philip and Alexander was the discovery,
in the pocket of the younger, of a copy of _The Firebrand of the
Pacific; or The Pirate's Oath_, a highly-coloured account of doings of a
particularly sanguinary cut-throat. On this occasion Robert Tidmarsh
showed something almost akin to genius. He took the book and
deliberately read it from cover to cover, subsequently returning it
without comment to his nervously-expectant son. The next evening he
brought home a copy of _The Treasure Island_, recommended by the
bookseller as the finest boy's book ever written, and without a word
gave it to Hector. After dinner, the Tidmarshes always "dined," Hector
dutifully commenced to read. At nine o'clock his mother's reminder that
it was bed-time was received with a pleading look and an appeal for
another five minutes, to which Robert signified assent. At ten o'clock
Hector reluctantly said good-night and went to bed. At five the next
morning he was again with John Silver. By six o'clock in the afternoon
the book was finished and Hector was at the station to meet his father.
As they walked home Robert felt a crumpled paper thrust into his hand.
It was _The Firebrand of the Pacific_. Robert has never been able to
determine if this was not after all _the_ moment of his life.
At the age of ten Hector was placed at a school of some repute in the
South West of London, and three months later at the Annual Sports won
the Junior Hundred Yards and Junior Quarter of a Mile scratch. Robert
was pleased when he heard of the achievement, but he was no Greek, and
the winning of the parsley wreath was not what he had in mind for his
son; still it was gratifying to see the boy outshine his fellows.
Hector showed an ever-increasing love of outdoor sports. Cricket,
football, running, jumping--nothing came amiss to him. His father
watched in vain for some glimmerings of the genius that his imagination
told him would develop sooner or later. His hope had been that, by
means of scholarships, his son might reach Oxford or Cambridge, for he
had all the middle-class exaggerated opinion of the advantages of a
University education. He saw him a senior wrangler, he saw his
photograph in the papers, heard himself interviewed as to his son's
early life and pursuits. From these dreams he would awaken to renewed
exertions; but always with the same lack of success.
Unfortunately perhaps for both, Robert Tidmarsh saw little in his son's
successes. Athletics were with him incidents in a career, incapable of
being glorified into achievements. To him a judge was not a judge
because he had won his blue, but rather in spite of it. He could not
very well expostulate. No man, as Robert clearly saw, has a right to
rebuke a son for failing to realise his father's ambitions for him. For
one thing, he had no very clear idea himself what those ambitions were.
All he was conscious of was a feeling that in some way or other Hector
Tidmarsh was to carry on the torch that he, Robert Tidmarsh, had
lighted. He was to achieve fame in some channel of life; but it must be
a material fame, one that would make him a celebrity. It never occurred
to Tidmarsh _pere_ that a man capable of making a century at cricket, or
being the best centre-forward in the district, could be worthy of a
place among a nation's contemporary worthies.
At sixteen Hector left school, regretted by masters and scholars alike,
for his was a nature that commanded liking. By the influence of Mr.
Ratchett, who had always been particularly partial to his chief clerk
and, as an old Oxford cricket blue, was much interested in his clerk's
son, Hector was articled to a solicitor. In a flash Robert Tidmarsh saw
the possibility of his cherished dream being realised. He recalled
instances of young men who had achieved fame in the field and
subsequently become successful in the more serious walks of life. He
watched the boy closely, talked to him of law, encouraged him to study,
pointed out the greatness of this golden opportunity. But in vain, the
boy's heart was in sport, not in law.
Sometimes in introspective moments the father examined himself as to how
he had filled the role of Philip. Had he failed? Was he the cause?
Could he have prevented what now appeared highly probable, the
fluttering to earth of his house of cards? He had never been harsh, had
he erred by being over lenient?
As he watched Hector, it slowly dawned upon him that for the first time
in his life he was about to experience failure. His son was doomed to
be lost in the flood of the commonplace, would be respectable,
comfortably off, live at Streatham or Balham; but could never become
famous. When this conviction became fixed in Robert Tidmarsh's mind, he
grew gloomy and depressed. The dice had gone against him. It was fate.
It is only a long line of ancestors that enables a man to play a losing
game. The Tidmarsh blood lacked that tenacity and fire that comes with
tradition. It remained only to wait and hope and speculate from what
quarter the blow would fall.
At nineteen Hector received an invitation to play for the Surrey Colts.
He "came off," making a dashing fifty. Mr. Rachett was there to shake
the young giant warmly by the hand as he returned to the pavilion, but
not his chief clerk. In the heart of the disappointed father there was
a dull resentment against sport in general. He saw in it a siren who
had bewitched his son, and diverted him from the path he should have
trod. His secret was hard to keep. He needed sympathy, someone to tell
him that he had done a great deal if not so much as he had anticipated.
One October morning the moment of final dis-illusionment arrived. When
he came down to breakfast Hector was waiting in the dining-room with a
copy of _The Sportsman_, which he handed to his father, at the same time
pointing to a long description of a football match between two
well-known league clubs; it was headed "A Man of Genius," and ran:
"The outstanding feature of the game was the marvellous display
of the young amateur, Mr. Hector Tidmarsh, who was given a trial
at centre forward in the home team. His pace, his subtlety, his
bustling methods stamped him as a great centre-forward. The way
he kept his wings together was a revelation. Time after time
the quintette raced away as if opposition did not exist. The
young amateur seemed to have hypnotised his professional
_confreres_. His shooting was equal to his feinting, and his
forward-passing such as has not been seen for many a day. In
short he is the greatest find of the season, or of many seasons
for that matter. The directors of the ---- Club are to be
congratulated in having discovered a man of genius."
Robert Tidmarsh put down the paper and looked at his son; but happily
bereft at the Comic Spirit, he merely articulated some commonplace words
of congratulation. That morning two disappointed men commenced their
breakfasts, the father realising that his cherished ideal had finally
been shattered; the son depressed because a carefully planned surprise
had been productive of only a few colourless words, and upon them both
smiled a proud wife and happy mother, to whom fame for those she loved,
be it in what form it may, was a great and glorious gift to be welcomed
with laughter and with tears.
I lay aside the manuscript and proceeded to light a cigarette. As a
rule at the end of a reading there is a babel of comment. To-night
there was an unusual silence. I looked round the room. There was a
far-away look in Sallie's eyes, which seemed unusually bright. Dick
Little was gazing straight in front of him, Bindle was recharging his
pipe with great deliberation and care. The Boy was lost in the
contemplation of his finger nails.
"Silly ass!"
It was Angell Herald who had broken the silence, and snapped the thread.
All eyes turned in his direction. Bindle, who was just in the act of
lighting his pipe, paused and gazed curiously at Angell Herald over the
flame of the match, then he turned to me and I saw that he understood.
It was Windover, however, who expressed the opinion of the Club upon
Angell Herald's comment, when he muttered loud enough for all to hear:
"Oh! for the jawbone of an ass!"
*CHAPTER IX*
*MRS. BILTOX-JONES'S EXPERIMENT*
I do not think any of us really liked Angell Herald, his self-satisfied
philistinism constituting a serious barrier to close personal relations.
I have already commented upon certain of his characteristics that jarred
upon us all; but it seemed no one's business to indicate, delicately or
otherwise, that he was not so welcome as we might have wished.
Dick Little had introduced him on the strength of a story he had heard
him tell at some masonic dinner, I think it was, and he had decided that
Angell Herald would be an acquisition to the Night Club. Sallie thought
otherwise, and had summed him up as "a worm in a top hat": he always
wore a top hat. It was the only occasion on which I had known Sallie
break out into epigram. Both she and Bindle disliked Angell Herald
almost to the point of intolerance. As a matter of fact he is not a bad
fellow, if his foibles are not too much emphasized.
His principal asset, however, is that he has a fund of interesting
experiences which, strangely enough, he rates far lower than the stories
he at first would insist on telling.
He assured us that Mrs. Biltox-Jones was no imaginary person and we,
knowing his limitations, believed him, and that her social experiment
was at the time the talk of Fleet Street.
*I*
"Damn the war!" exclaimed Angell Herald, leaning back in his chair and
looking at his clerk, who had just entered.
"Yes sir," said Pearl, in a non-committal manner. There are moments
when Pearl rises almost to inspiration. His sympathetic utterance was
balm to his employer's anguished soul.
Pearl accepts his chief's moods or reflects them, whichever seems the
more expedient at the moment. Incidentally Pearl has a heart that
filled the War Office with foreboding; so Pearl will never become a V.C.
When Angell Herald uttered his impulsive remark, with which Pearl had so
tactfully concurred, he had just finished reading a letter from Messrs.
Simoon, Golbrith and Cathpell, Ltd. It consisted of three lines; but
those three lines had brushed away a hundred a year from his income.
This is what they wrote:--
"To Angell Herald, Esq.,
Publicity Agent,
382, Fleet Street, E.C.