A DINNER AT THE CLUB
Leonard stood looking straight before him when the girl had gone. Well,
the omissions so much regretted by Constance seemed to be fully
supplied. He was now exactly like other people, with poor relations and
plenty of scandals and people to be ashamed of. Only a week ago he had
none of these things. Now he was supplied with all. Nothing was wanting.
He was richly, if unexpectedly, endowed with these gifts which had been
at first withheld. As yet he hardly rose to the situation: he felt no
gratitude: he would have resigned these new possessions willingly: the
tragedies, the new cousins, the ennobling theory of hereditary sorrow.
He remembered the brown-paper parcel which he had promised to read; he
tore off the covering. Within there was a foolscap volume of the kind
called “scrap-book.” He opened it, and turned over the pages. It was
more than half filled with newspaper cuttings and writing between and
before and after the cuttings. As he turned the pages there fell upon
him a sense of loathing unutterable. He threw the book from him, and
fell back upon an easy-chair, half unconscious.
When he recovered, he picked up the book. The same feeling, but not so
strong, fell upon him again. He laid it down gently as a thing which
might do him harm. He felt cold; he shivered: for the first time in his
life, he was afraid of something. He felt that deadly terror which
superstitious men experience in empty houses and lonely places in the
dark--a terror inexplicable, that comes unasked and without cause.
This young man was not in the least degree superstitious. He had no
terror at all concerning things supernatural; he would have spent a
night alone in a church vault, among coffins and bones and grinning
skulls, without a tremor. Therefore this strange dread, as of coming
evil, astonished him. It seemed to him connected with the book. He took
it up and laid it down over and over again. Always that shiver of dread,
that sinking of the heart, returned.
He thought that he would leave the book and go out; he would overcome
this weakness on his return. And he remembered that the returned
Australian--the man of wealth, the successful man of the family--was to
dine with him at the club. He left the book on the table; he took his
hat, and he sallied forth to get through the hours before dinner away
from the sight of this enchanted volume charged with spells of fear and
trembling.
Uncle Fred arrived in great spirits, a fine figure of Colonial
prosperity, talking louder than was considered in that club to be good
form. He called for a brandy and bitters, and then for another, which
astonished the occupants of the morning-room. Then he declared himself
ready for dinner.
He was; he displayed not only an uncommon power of putting away food,
but also an enviable power of taking his wine as a running stream never
stopping. He swallowed the champagne, served after the modern fashion
with no other wine, as if it was a brook falling continuously into a
cave, without pause or limit.
When the dinner was over, a small forest of bottles had been
successively opened and depleted. Never had the club-waiters gazed upon
a performance so brilliant in a house where most men considered a mere
little pint of claret to be a fair whack, a proper allowance. After
dinner this admirable guest absorbed a bottle of claret. Then, on
adjourning to the smoking-room, he took coffee and three glasses of
curaçoa in rapid succession. Then he lit a cigar, and called for a soda
and whisky. At regular intervals of a quarter of an hour he called for
another soda and whisky. Let us not count them. They were like the
kisses of lovers, never to be counted or reckoned, either for praise or
blame. It was half-past nine when this phenomenal consumption of wine
and whisky began, and it lasted until half-past eleven.
Leonard was conscious that the other men in the room were fain to look
on in speechless wonder; the increased seriousness in the waiters’
faces showed their appreciation and envy. The club-waiter loveth most
the happy few who drink with freedom. His most serious admiration and
respect go forth to one who becomes a mere cask of wine, and yet shows
no signs of consequences. Now, this performer, from start to finish,
turned not a hair; there was no thickness in his speech; there was no
sign of any effect of strong drink upon this big man.
That he talked more loudly than was at this club generally liked is
true. But, then, he always talked loud enough to be heard in every part
of the largest room. The things of which he spoke; the stories he told;
the language in which he clothed these stories, astonished the other
members who were present--astonished and delighted them beyond measure,
because such a loud and confident guest had never before been known in
the place, and because it had been the fortune of Campaigne, Leonard
Campaigne--the blameless, the austere, the cold--who had brought this
elderly Bounder, this empty hogshead or barrel to be filled with strong
drink, this trumpet-voiced utterer of discreditable stories. Next day
there were anecdotes told in the club by those who had been present, and
scoffers laughed, and those who had not been present envied those who
had.
“Leonard,” said this delightful guest, late in the evening, and in a
louder voice than ever, “I suppose someone has told you about the
row--you know--when I had to leave the country. There had been plenty
of rows before; but I mean the big row. You were only three or four
years old at the time. I suppose you can’t remember.”
The other men lifted their heads. They were like Mrs. Cluppins.
Listening they scorned, but the words were forced upon them.
“No one told me--that is to say, I heard something the other day. No
details--something alleged as the cause.”
“Would you like to know the real truth?”
“No! Good heavens, no! Let bygone scandals rest,” he replied, in a
murmur as low as extreme indignation would allow. “Let the thing
die--die and be forgotten.”
“My dear nephew”--he laid a great hand on Leonard’s knee--“I dare say
they told you the truth. Only, you see”--he said this horrid thing loud
enough to gratify the curiosity of all present--“the real truth is that
the fellow who put the name at the bottom of you know what, and did the
rest of it, was not me, but the other fellow--Chris. That’s all. Chris
the respectable it was--not me.”
“I tell you I want to know nothing about it.”
“I don’t care. You must. After all these years, do you think now that I
am home again, with my pile made, that I’m going to labour under such an
imputation any longer? No, sir. I’ve come to hold up my head like you.
Chris may hang his if he likes. I won’t. (Boy, another whisky and
soda.) In those days Chris and I hunted in couples. Very good sport we
had, too. Then we got through the money, and there was tightness. Chris
did it. Run him in if you like. For, you see----”
“Enough said--enough said.” Leonard looked round the room. There were
only three or four men present: they sat singly, each with a magazine in
his hand: they preserved the attitude of those who read critically, but
there was a _je-ne-sais-quoi_ about them which suggested that they had
heard the words of this delightful guest. Indeed, he spoke loud enough
for all to hear. It is not every day that one can hear in a respectable
club revelations about putting somebody’s name on the front and on the
back of a document vaguely described as “you know what.”
“Enough said,” Leonard repeated impatiently.
“My dear fellow, you interrupt. I am going to set the whole thing right,
if you’ll let me.”
“I don’t want to hear it.”
“It isn’t what you want to hear; it’s what you’ve got to hear,” said
uncle Fred impressively and earnestly. He had taken, even for him, a
little more than was good for him: it made him obstinate: it also made
his speech uncertain as to loudness and control: he carried off these
defects with increased earnestness. “Character, Leonard, character is
involved; and self-respect; also forgiveness. I am not come home to bear
malice, as will be shown by my testamentary dispositions when Abraham
calls me to his bosom----”
“Oh! But really----”
“Really--you shall hear! (Boy, why the devil do you keep me waiting for
another whisky and soda?) Look here, Leonard. There was a money-lender
in it----”
“Never mind the money-lender----”
“I must mind him. Man! he was in it. I quite forget at this moment where
old Cent. per Cent. got in. But he was there--oh yes! he was there. He
always was there in those days either for Chris or for me. Devil of a
fellow, Chris! Now, then. The money-lending Worm--or Crocodile--wanted
to be paid. He was always wanting to be paid. Either it was Chris or it
was me. Let me think----”
“Does it matter?”
“Truth, sir, and character always matter. What the money-lender said I
forget at this moment. I dare say Chris knows; it was more his affair
than mine. It amounted to this----” He drained his glass again, and
forgot what he had intended to say. “When the fellow was gone, ‘Chris,’
I said, ‘here’s a pretty hole you’re in.’ I am certain that he was in
the hole, and not me, because what was done, you know, was intended to
pull him out of the hole. So it must have been Chris, and not me. It is
necessary,” he added with dignity, “to make this revolution--revelation.
It is due to self-respect. My brother Chris, then, you understand, was
in the hole. (Boy, I’ll take another whisky and soda.) I want you to
understand exactly what happened.” Leonard groaned. “Of course, when it
came to sticking a name on a paper, and that paper a cheque----”
“For the Lord’s sake, man, stop!” Leonard whispered.
“I knew and told him that the world, which is a harsh world and never
makes allowance, would call the thing by a bad name. Which happened. But
who could foresee that they would tack that name on to me?”
Leonard sprang to his feet. The thing was becoming serious. “It is
eleven o’clock,” he said. “I must go.”
“Go? Why, I’ve only just begun to settle down for a quiet talk. I
thought we should go on till two or three. And I’ve nearly done; I’ve
only got to show that the cheque----”
“No--I must go at once. I have an appointment. I have work to do. I have
letters to write.”
Uncle Fred slowly rose. “It’s a degenerate world,” he said. “We never
thought the day properly begun before midnight. But if these are your
habits--well, Leonard, you’ve done me well. The champagne was excellent.
Boy--no, I’ll wait till I get back to the hotel. Then two or three
glasses, and so to bed. Moderation--temperance--early hours. These are
now my motto and my rule.”
“This way down the stairs,” said Leonard, for his uncle was starting off
in the opposite direction.
“One warning. Don’t talk to Chris about that story, for you’ll hear a
garbled version--garbled, sir--garbled.” He lurched a little as he
walked down the stairs, but otherwise there were no indications of the
profound and Gargantuan thirst that he had been assuaging all the
evening.
Leonard went home in the deepest depression and shame. Why did he take
such a man to such a club? He should have given him dinner in the
rowdiest tavern, filled with the noisiest topers.
“He cannot be really what he pretends,” Leonard thought. “A man of
wealth is a man of responsibility and position. This man talks without
any dignity or reticence whatever. He seems to associate still with
larrikins and cattle-drovers; he sits in bars and saloons; he ought to
keep better company, if only on account of his prosperity.”
The Family History asserted itself again.
“You have entertained,” it said, “another Unfortunate. Here is a man
nearly fifty years of age. He has revealed himself and exposed himself:
he is by his own confession, although he is rich and successful, the
companion and the friend of riffraff; his sentiments are theirs. He has
no morals; he drinks without stint or measure; he has disgraced you in
the Club. No doubt the Committee will interfere.”
It is, the moralist declares, an age of great laxity. A man may make a
living in more ways than were formerly thought creditable; men are
admitted to clubs who formerly would not have dared to put their names
down. In Leonard’s mind there still remained, strong and clear, the
opinion that there are some things which a gentleman should not do:
things which he must not do: companions with whom he must not sit. Yet
it appeared from the revelations of this man that, whatever he had done,
he had habitually consorted with tramps, hawkers, peddlers, and
shepherds.