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Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
Text enclosed by plus signs has small capital letters
(+small capital letters+).
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
HUGH WALPOLE
* * * * * *
_Books by_ HUGH WALPOLE
_NOVELS_
THE WOODEN HORSE
THE GODS AND MR. PERRIN
THE GREEN MIRROR
THE DARK FOREST
THE SECRET CITY
THE CAPTIVES
_ROMANCES_
MARADICK AT FORTY
THE PRELUDE TO ADVENTURE
FORTITUDE
THE DUCHESS OF WREXE
_SHORT STORIES_
THE GOLDEN SCARECROW
JEREMY
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
_BELLES-LETTERS_
JOSEPH CONRAD: A CRITICAL STUDY
* * * * * *
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
by
HUGH WALPOLE
Author of "The Captives," "Jeremy," "The Secret
City," "The Green Mirror," Etc.
New [Illustration] York
George H. Doran Company
Copyright, 1921,
by George H. Doran Company
[Illustration]
Copyright, 1920, 1921,
by the Pictorial Review Company
Printed in the United States of America
TO
JOSEPH HERGESHEIMER
IN FRIENDSHIP
"After they were blown up they were blown down again, and then had to
pause for a moment to get their breath...."--_Hanspickle._
+Henry Galleon+
CONTENTS
I +Absalom Jay+
II +Fanny Close+
III +The Hon. Clive Torby+
IV +Miss Morganhurst+
V +Peter Westcott+
VI +Lucy Moon+
VII +Mrs. Porter and Miss Allen+
VIII +Lois Drake+
IX +Mr. Nix+
X +Lizzie Rand+
XI +Nobody+
XII +Bombastes Furioso+
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
AUTHOR'S NOTE
_No character in this book is drawn from any person now living._
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
I
ABSALOM JAY
Somewhere in the early nineties was Absalom Jay's first period. He
was so well known a figure in London at that time as to be frequently
caricatured in the weekly society journals, and Spy's "Absalom," that
appeared in the 1894 volume of _Vanity Fair_, is one of his most
successful efforts. In those days were anyone so ignorant as to be
compelled to ask who Jay was he would probably receive the answer:
"Oh, don't you know? He's a cousin of John Beaminster's. He founded
the "Warrington" with Pemmy Stevens. He's.... Oh, I don't know.... He
goes everywhere. Knows more people than anyone else in London, I should
imagine."
Spy's caricature of him has caught that elegant smartness that was
Absalom's most marked individuality, _too_ smart critics have been
known to say; and certainly, if the ideal of correct dress is that no
one should notice your clothes Absalom was not correct. Everyone always
noticed his clothes. But here again one must be fair. It may not have
been altogether his clothes that one noticed. From very early years his
hair was snow-white, and he wore it brushed straight back from his pink
forehead in wavy locks. He wore also a little white tufted Imperial.
He had an eyeglass that hung on a thick black cord. His favourite
colour was a dark blue, and with this he wore spats (in summer of a
truly terrific whiteness), a white slip, black tie, and pearl pin.
He wore wonderful boots and shoes and was said to have more of these
than any other man in London. It was also said that his feet were the
smallest (masculine) in the British Isles. He was made altogether on a
very small scale. He was not, I should think, more than five-feet-six
in height, but was all in perfect proportion. His enemies, of whom he
had, like everyone else, a few, said that his wonderful pink complexion
was not entirely Nature's work, but here his enemies lied. Even at
the very last he did not give way to the use of cosmetics. He was
the kindest-hearted little man in the world, and in the days of his
prosperity was as happy as the day was long. He lived entirely for
Society, and because this is intended to be a true portrait, I must
admit that there was something of the snob in his character. He himself
admitted it frankly. "I like to be with people of rank," he would say,
"simply because I'm more comfortable with them. I know just what to say
to Johnny Beaminster, and I'm tongue-tied with the wife of my barber.
_Que voulez-vous?_"
I'm afraid, however, that it went a little further than that. In the
Season his looking-glass was thronged with cards, invitations to dinner
and dances and musical evenings. "I live for Society," he said, "as
some men live for killing pheasants, and other men for piling up money.
My fun is as good as another man's. At any rate I get good company."
It was his intention to be seen at every London function, public or
private, that could be considered a first-class function; people
wondered how he got about as he did. It seemed as though there must be
three or four Absaloms.
His best time was during the last few years of King Edward VII.'s
reign. His funny little anxious face could be frequently seen in
those groups of celebrities invited to meet the King at some famous
house-party. It was said that the King liked his company, but I don't
know how that can have been because Absalom was never in his brightest
days very amusing. He talked a good deal, but always said just what
everyone else said. He was asked everywhere because he was so safe,
because he was so willing to fetch and carry, and because he knew
exactly what it was that ladies wanted. He entertained only a little in
return, but nobody minded that because, as everyone knew, "he really
hadn't a penny in the world"--which meant that he had about £1,500 a
year in various safe investments.
A year before the war he was seized with a little gust of speculation.
Against the advice of "Tony" Pennant, who looked after his investments
for him, he ventured to buy here and sell there with rather serious
results. He pulled up just in time to save disaster, but he had to
give up his little house in Knightsbridge and took a flat at Hortons
in Duke Street. Although this was a "service" flat he still retained
his man James, who had been with him for a number of years and knew his
habits to perfection.
He made his rooms at Hortons charming, and he had the dark blue
curtains and the gold mirror bristling with invitations, and the old
coloured prints and the big, signed photographs of Queen Alexandra
and the Duchess of Wrexe in their silver frames, and the heavy silver
cigarette-box that King Edward had given him, all in their accustomed
places. Of course, the flat was small. His silver-topped bottles and
silver-backed brushes, and rows of boots and shoes and the two big
trouser-presses simply overwhelmed his bedroom.
But he was over sixty-five now (although he would have been
horrified if he thought that you knew it) and he didn't need much
space--moreover, he was always out.
Then came the war, and the first result of this was that James joined
up! During those first August days Absalom hadn't fancied that the war
would touch him at all, although he was hotly patriotic and cried out
daily at the "Warrington" that he wished he were a lad again and could
shoulder a gun.
James's departure frightened him; then "Tony" Pennant explained to him
that his investments were not so secure as they had been and he'd be
lucky if any of them brought him in anything. And of course the whole
of his social world vanished--no more parties, no more balls, no more
Ascots and Goodwoods, no more shooting in Scotland, no more opera. He
bustled around then in a truly remarkable manner and attacked his
friends with the pertinacity of a bluebottle. The war was not a month
old before Bryce-Drummond secured him a job in one of the Ministries
at six hundred a year. It was not a very difficult job (it consisted
for the most part in interviewing eager young men, assuring them that
he would do his best for them, and then sending them along to somebody
else). He had a room to himself, and a lady typist who looked after him
like a mother. He was quite delighted when he discovered that she was a
daughter of the Bishop of Polchester and very well connected. She was
most efficient and did everything for him.
He took his work very seriously indeed, and was delighted to be "doing
his bit." No one knew exactly what it was that he did at the Ministry,
and he himself was very vague about it, but he hinted at great things
and magnificent company. During those first years when there were so
many wonderful rumours, he hinted and hinted and hinted. "Well, I
mustn't mention names, of course; but you can take it from me----" and
people really did think he _did_ know. He had been in the closest touch
with so many great people before the war that it was only natural that
he should be in touch with them still. As a matter of fact he knew
nothing except what his typist told him. He led an extremely quiet
life during these years, but he didn't mind that because he understood
that it was the right thing to do. All the best people were absorbed
in their work--even old Lady Agatha Beaminster was running a home for
Serbians, and Rachel Seddon was a V.A.D. in France, and old "Plumtree"
Caudle was a Special Constable. He did not therefore feel left out of
things, because there was nothing really to be left out of. Moreover,
he was so hard up that it was safer to be quiet. All the more would he
enjoy himself when the war was over.
But as the years went on and there seemed to be no sign of the war
being over, he began to be querulous. He missed James terribly,
and when in the summer of 1917 he heard that James was killed in
Mesopotamia it was a very serious blow. He seemed to be suddenly quite
alone in the world. In Hortons now they employed only women, and the
girl straight from Glebeshire who "valeted" him seemed to have but
little time to listen to his special needs, being divided up between
four flats and finding it all she could do, poor girl, to satisfy them
all. "After the war," Mr. Nix, the manager of Hortons, assured Absalom,
"we shall have men again!"
"After the war!"--those three simple little words became the very
Abracadabra of Absalom's life. "After the war" everything would be
as it had always been--prices would go down, Society would come up,
his gold mirror would once again be stuck about with invitations,
he would find a successor to James, and a little house. What would
he live on? Oh, that would be all right. They would keep him at the
Ministry. He was so useful there that he couldn't conceive that they
would ever get on without him--there would be his work, of course, and
probably they would raise his salary. He was an optimist about the
future. Nothing made him so indignant as unjustified pessimism. When
someone talked pessimistically it was as though he, Absalom Jay, were
being personally threatened. Throughout the terrible spring of 1918 he
remained optimistic. "Britain _couldn't_ be beaten"--by which he meant
that Absalom Jay must be assured of his future comforts. In spite of
all that had happened he was as incapable in June, 1918, as he had been
in June, 1914, of imagining a different world, a different balance of
moral and ethical values. Then the tide turned. During that summer
and early autumn of 1918 Absalom was as happy as he had ever been. He
simply lived for the moment when "life would begin again." He began
to go out a little, to pay calls, to visit an old friend or two. He
found changes, of course. His own contemporaries seemed strangely old;
many of them had died, many of them had shattered nerves, many were
frightened of the future.
If they were frightened it was their own fault, he declared. They
_would_ talk of ridiculous things like the Russian Revolution--nothing
angered him more than to hear chatter about the Russian Revolution--as
though that absurd affair with its cut-throats and Bolsheviks and Jews
and murderers could have anything to do with a _real_ country like
England.
It was all the fault of our idiotic government; one regiment of British
soldiers and _that_ trouble would have been over.... No, he'd no
patience....
November 11th came, and with it the Armistice; he actually rode all the
way down Whitehall on a lorry and waved a flag. He _was_ excited, it
seemed as though the whole world were crying, "Hurray! Absalom Jay!
You were right, after all. You shall have your reward."
He pictured to himself what was coming: 1919 would be the year; let
those dirty ruffians try and imitate Russian methods. They would see
what they would get. He resumed his old haughtiness of demeanour to
dependents. It was necessary in these days to show them their place.
Not that he was never kind. When they behaved properly he was very
kind indeed. To Fanny, the portress at Hortons--a nice girl with a
ready smile and an agreeable willingness to do _anything_, however
tiresome--he was delightful, asking her about her relations and once
telling her that he was grateful for what she did. He was compelled,
however, to speak haughtily to Rose, the "valet." He was forced often
to ring twice for her, and once when she came running and out of breath
and he showed her that she had put some of his waistcoats into one
drawer and some into another, thereby making it very difficult for him
to find them, she actually tossed her head and muttered something. He
spoke to her very kindly then, and showed her how things were done in
the best houses, because, after all, poor child, she was straight up
from the country. However, she did not take his kindliness in at all
the right spirit, but burst out angrily that "times was different now,
and one was as good as another"--a shocking thing to say, and savouring
directly of Bolshevism.
He was getting into the habit of calling almost everything Bolshevism.
Then the first blow fell. He found a letter on his table at the
Ministry; he opened it carelessly and read therein that as the war
was in process of being "wound up," changes were taking place that
would compel the Ministry, most reluctantly, to do without Mr. Jay's
services. Would he mind taking a month's notice?...
He would mind very much indeed--Mind? It was as though a thunderbolt
had struck him on the very top of his neat little head. He stood in
front of the Ministerial fireplace, his little legs extended, the
letter trembling in his hand, his eyes, if the truth must be spoken,
flushed with tears. Dismissed! With a month's notice! He would speak
... he would protest ... he would abuse.... In the end, of course, he
did nothing. Bryce-Drummond said he was so very sorry, "but really
everythin' was tumblin' about one's ear's these days," and offered him
a cigarette. Lord John, to whom he appealed, looked distressed and said
it was "a damn shame; upon his word, he didn't know what we were all
coming to...."
Absalom Jay was left; he realised that he could do nothing; he retired
into Hortons.
There was in his soul a fund of optimism, or rather, to speak more
accurately, it took him time to realise the shifting sands upon which
his little house was built. He made now the very most of Hortons. It is
true that time began to lie heavy upon his hands. He rose very late in
the morning, having his cup of tea and boiled egg at nine, his bath at
ten; he read the _Morning Post_ for an hour; then the barber, Merritt,
from next door, came in to shave him and give him the news of the day.
Merritt was a most amusing dark and dapper little man. In him was the
very spirit of St. James's, and the Lord only knows how many businesses
he carried on beside his ostensible hair-dressing one. He could buy
anything for you, and sell anything, too! And his gossip! Well, really,
Absalom had thought himself a good gossip in his day, but he had never
been anything to Merritt! Of course, half-a-crown was a good deal for
a shave, and Absalom was not sure whether in these days he ought to
afford it--"my only luxury" he called it.
He did not see many of his friends this Christmas time. They were all
out of London he supposed. He was a little surprised that the Beaumonts
hadn't asked him to spend Christmas at Hautoix. In the old days that
invitation had been as regular as the Waits. However, they had lost
their eldest son in the Cambrai fighting. They were having no parties
this Christmas, of course.
He had thought that the Seddons might ask him. He got on so well with
Roddy and Rachel. They sent him a card "from Rollo," their baby. Kind
of them to remember him! So he busied himself about the flat. He was
preparing for the future--for that wonderful time when the war would be
really and truly over, and the world as it had been in the old days.
His life was centred in Hortons and the streets that surrounded it. He
could be seen every morning walking up Duke Street into Piccadilly. He
knew every shop by heart, the picture shops that seemed to be little
offspring of the great "Christie's" round the corner, with their
coloured plates from Ackermann's "Microcosm," and Pierce Egan, and
their oils of large, full-bosomed eighteenth century ladies; and the
shops with the china and the cabinets and the lacquer (everything very
expensive indeed); and Bottome's, the paper shop, with Mr. Bottome's
humourous comments on the day's politics chalked on to a slate near the
door, and the _Vie Parisienne_ very large in the window; then there was
the shop at the corner of Jermyn Street, with the silk dressing-gowns
of dazzling colours, and the latest fashions with pink silk vests,
pyjamas; and the great tobacconists and the wine-windows of Fortnum and
Masons--at last the familiar broad splendours of Piccadilly itself.
Up and down the little old streets that had known all the famous men
of their day, that had lodged Thackeray and Swift and Dryden, and now
lodged Mr. Bottomley and the author of _Mutt and Jeff_, the motors
rolled and hooted and honked, and the messenger boys whistled, and the
flower-man went up and down with his barrow, and everything was as
expensive and pleasant and humourous as could be. All this Absalom Jay
adopted. He was in his own mind, although he did not know it, King of
St. James's, and he felt that they must all be very glad to have him
there, and that rents must have gone up since it was known that he had
taken his residence among them.
He even went in one day and expostulated with Mr. Bottome for having
the _Daily Herald_ in his window. Mr. Bottome agreed with him that it
was not a "nice" paper, but he also added that sinister sentence that
Absalom was getting now so tired of hearing that "these were strange
times. 'E didn't know what we were coming to."
"Nonsense, my good man," said Absalom rather tartly, "England isn't
Russia."
"Looks damned like it sometimes," said Mr. Bottome.
Then as the year 1919 extended Absalom began to feel terribly lonely.
This fear of loneliness was rapidly becoming a concrete and definite
terror, lurking behind the curtains in his flat, ready to spring out
upon him at any moment. Absalom had never in all his life been alone.
There had always been people around him. Where now were they all?
Men now were being demobilised, houses were opening again, hospitals
were closing, dances were being given, and still his gold mirror
remained innocent of invitations. He fancied, too (he was becoming very
sensitive to impressions), that the men in the "Warrington" were not so
eager to see him as they had been. He went to the "Warrington" a great
deal now "to be cheered up." He talked to men to whom five years ago he
would not have condescended to say "Good-morning"--to Isaac Monteluke,
for instance, and Bandy Manners. Where were all his old friends? They
did not come to the club any longer, it seemed. He could never find a
bridge four now with whom he was really at home. This may have been
partly because he was nervous these days of losing money--he could not
afford it--and he did not seem to have his old control of his temper.
Then his brain was not quite so active as it had been. He could not
remember the cards....
One day he heard some fellow say: "Well, if I'd had my way I'd
chloroform everyone over sixty. We've had enough of the old duds
messing all the world up."
Chloroform all the old duds! What a terrible thing to say? Why, five
years ago it had been the other way. Who cared then what a young man
said? What could he know? After all, it was the older men who had had
the experience, who knew life, who could tell the others....
He found himself laying down the law about things--giving ultimatums
like--"They ought to be strung up on lamp-posts--pandering to the
ignorant lower classes--that's what it is."
If there had been one thing above all others that Absalom had hated
all his life it had been rudeness--there was the unforgivable sin. As
a young man he had been deferential to his elders, and so in his turn
he expected young men to be to him now. But they were not. No, they
were not. He had positively to give up the "Warrington" because of the
things that the young men said.
There was a new trouble now--the trouble of money. His investments
were paying very badly, and the income tax was absurd. He wrote to the
_Times_ about his income tax, and they did not print his letter--did
not print it when they printed the letters of every sort of nobody.
Everything was so expensive that it took all his courage to look at
his weekly bill. He must eat less; one ate, he read in the paper,
far more than one needed. So he gave up his breakfast, having only a
cup of coffee and a roll, as he had often done in France in the old
days. He was aware suddenly that his clothes were beginning to look
shabby. Bacon, the valet, informed him of this. He did not like Bacon;
he found himself, indeed, sighing for the departed Rose. Bacon was
austere and inhuman. He spoke as seldom as possible. He had no faults,
he pressed clothes perfectly, kept drawers in absolute order, did not
drink Absalom's claret nor smoke Absalom's cigarettes. No faults--but
what an impossible man! Absalom was afraid of him. He drew his little
body together under the bedclothes when Bacon called him in the morning
because of Bacon's ironical eyes. Bacon gave him his _Times_ as though
he said: "How dare you take in the _Times_--spend threepence a day when
you are as poor as you are?"
It was because of Bacon that Absalom gave up Merritt. He did not dare
to have him when Bacon knew his poverty.
"I'm going to shave myself in the future, Merritt," he said; "it's only
laziness having you." Merritt was politely sorry, but he was not very
deeply grieved. Why should he be when he had the King's valet and Sir
Edward Hawksbury, the famous K.C., and Borden Hunt, the dramatist, to
shave every morning?
But Absalom missed him terribly. He was now indeed alone. No more
gossip, no more laughter over other people's weaknesses, no more hearty
agreement over the wicked selfishness of the lower orders.
Absalom gave up the _Times_ because he could not bear to see the lower
orders encouraged. All this talk about their not having enough to live
on--wicked nonsense! It was people like Absalom who had not enough to
live on. He wrote again to the _Times_ and said so, and again they did
not publish his letter.
Then he woke from sleep one night, heard the clock strike three, and
was desperately frightened. He had had a dream. What dream? He could
not remember. He only knew that in the course of it he had become very,
very old; he had been in a room without fire and without light; he had
been in prison--faces had glared at him, cruel faces, young, sneering,
menacing faces.... He was going to die.... He awoke with a scream.
Next day he read himself a very serious lecture. He was becoming
morbid; he was giving in; he was allowing himself to be afraid of
things. He must pull himself up. He was quite severe to Bacon, and
reprimanded him for bringing his breakfast at a quarter to nine instead
of half-past eight. He made out then a list of houses that he would
visit. They had forgotten him--he must admit that. But how natural it
was! After all this time. Everyone had forgotten everybody. Why, he had
forgotten all sorts of people! Could not remember their names!
For months now he had been saying, "After the war," and now here "after
the war" was. It was May, and already Society was looking something
like itself. Covent Garden was open again. Soon there would be Ascot
and Henley and Goodwood; and the Peace Celebrations, perhaps, if only
those idiots at Versailles moved a little more quickly! He felt the
old familiar stir in his blood as he saw the red letters and the green
pillars repainted, saw the early summer sunshine upon the glittering
windows of Piccadilly, saw the green shadows of Hyde Park shift and
tremble against the pale blue of the evening sky, saw, once again, the
private cars quiver and tremble behind the policeman's hand in the
Circus; saw Delysia's name over the Pavilion, and the posters of the
evening papers, and the fountains splashing in Trafalgar Square.
He put on his best clothes and went out.
He called upon Mary, Countess of Gosport, the Duchess of Aisles, Lady
Glenrobert, Mrs. Leo Torsch, and dear Rachel Seddon. At the Countess of
Gosport's he found a clergyman, a companion, and a Chow; at the Duchess
of Aisles' four young Guardsmen, two girls, and Isaac Monteluke, who
had the insolence to patronise him; at Lady Glenrobert's a vast crowd
of men and women rehearsing for a Peace pageant shortly to be given at
the Albert Hall; at Mrs. Leo Torsch's an incredible company of artists,
writers, and actors, people unwashed and unbrushed, at sight of whom
Absalom's very soul trembled; at dear Rachel's charming young people,
all of whom looked right through him as though he were an easy and
undisturbing ghost.
He came back from these visits a weary, miserable, and tired little
man. Even Rachel had seemed to have no time to give him.... An
incredible lassitude spread through all his bones. As he entered
the portals of No. 2 a boy passed him with a _Pall Mall_ poster.
"Railwaymen issue Ultimatum." In his room he read a _Times_ leader,
in which it said that the lower classes were starving and had nowhere
to sleep. And they called the _Times_ a reactionary paper! The lower
classes starving! What about the upper classes? With his door closed,
in his own deep privacy, surrounded by his little gods, his mirror, his
silver frames, and his boot-trees, he wept--bitterly, helplessly, like
a child.
From that moment he had no courage. Enemies seemed to be on every side.
Everywhere he was insulted. If he went out boys pushed against him,
taxi-men swore at him, in the shops they were rude to him! There was
never room in the omnibuses, the taxis were too expensive, and the
Tubes! After an attempt to reach Russell Square by Tube he vowed he
would never enter a Tube door again. He was pushed, hustled, struck in
the stomach, sworn at both by attendants and passengers, jammed between
stout women, hurled off his feet, spoken to by a young soldier because
he did not give up his seat to a lady who haughtily refused it when he
offered ... Tubes!... never again--never, oh, never again!
What then to do? Walking tired him desperately. Everywhere seemed now
so far away!
So he remained in his flat; but now Hortons itself was different.
Now that he was confined to it it was very small, and he was always
tumbling over things. A pipe burst one morning, and his bathroom was
flooded. The bathroom wall-paper began to go the strangest and most
terrible colours--it was purple and pink and green, and there were
splotches of white mildew that seemed to move before your eyes as you
lay in your bath and watched them. Absalom went to Mr. Nix, and Mr.
Nix said that it should be seen to at once, but day after day went by
and nothing was done. When Mr. Nix was appealed to he said rather
restively that he was very sorry but he was doing his best--labour was
so difficult to get now--"You could not rely on the men."
"But they've got to come!" screamed Absalom.
Mr. Nix shrugged his shoulders; from his lips fell those fatal and now
so monotonous words:
"We're living in changed times, Mr. Jay."
Changed times! Absalom should think we were. Everyone was ruder and
ruder and ruder. Bills were beginning to worry him terribly--such
little bills, but men would come and wait downstairs in the hall for
them.
The loneliness increased and wrapped him closer and closer. His temper
was becoming atrocious as he well knew. Bacon now paid no attention to
his wishes, his meals were brought up at any time, his rooms were not
cleaned, his silver was tarnished. All he had to do was to complain
to Mr. Nix, who ruled Hortons with a rod of iron, and allowed no
incivilities or slackness. But he was afraid to do that; he was afraid
of the way that Bacon would treat him afterwards. Always, everywhere
now he saw this increasing attention that was paid to the lower
classes. Railwaymen, miners, hair-dressers, dockers, bakers, waiters,
they struck, got what they wanted and then struck for more.
He hated the lower classes--hated them, hated them! The very sight of a
working man threw him into a frenzy. What about the upper classes and
the middle classes! Did you ever see a word in the paper about them?
Never!
He was not well, his heart troubled him very much. Sometimes he lay on
his sofa battling for breath. But he did not dare to go to a doctor. He
could not afford a doctor.
But God is merciful. He put a period to poor Absalom's unhappiness.
When it was plain that this world was no longer a place for Absalom's
kind He gathered Absalom to His bosom.
And it was in this way. There arrived suddenly one day a card: "The
Duchess of Aisles ... Dancing." His heart beat high at the sight of it.
He had to lie down on his sofa to recover himself. He stuck his card
into the mirror and was compelled to say something to Bacon about it.
Bacon did not seem to be greatly impressed at the sight.
He dressed on the great evening with the utmost care. The sight of
his bathroom affected him; it seemed to cover him with pink spots
and mildew, but he shook that off from him and boldly ventured forth
to Knightsbridge. He found an immense party gathered there. Many,
many people.... He didn't seem to recognise any of them. The Duchess
herself had apparently forgotten him. He reminded her. He crept about;
he felt strangely as though at any moment someone might shoot him in
the back. Then he found Mrs. Charles Clinton, one of his hostesses
of the old days. She was kind but preoccupied. Then he discovered
Tom Wardour--old Tom Wardour, the stupidest man in London and the
greediest. Nevertheless he was glad to see him.
"By Jove, old man, you _do_ look seedy," Tom said; "what have you been
doing to yourself?"
Tactless of Tom, that! He felt more than ever that someone was going to
shoot him in the back. He crept away and hid himself in a corner. He
dozed a little, then woke to hear his own name. A woman was speaking of
him. He recognized Mrs. Clinton's voice.
"Whom do you think I saw just now?... Yes, old Absalom Jay. Like a
visit from the dead. Yes, and _so_ old. You know how smart he used to
be. He looked quite shabby, poor old thing. Oh no, of course, he was
always stupid. But now--oh, dreadful!... I assure you he gave me the
creeps. Yes, of course, he belonged to that old world before the war.
_Doesn't_ it seem a long time ago? Centuries. What I say is that one
can't believe one was alive then at all...."
Gave her the creeps! Gave Mrs. Clinton the creeps! He felt as though
his premonition had been true, and someone _had_ shot him in the back.
He crept away, out of the house, right away.
He crept into a Tube. The trains were crowded. He had to hang on to a
strap. At Hyde Park Corner two workmen got in; they had been drinking
together. Very big men they were. They stood one on each side of
Absalom and lurched about. Absalom was pushed hither and thither.
"Where the 'ell are you comin' to?" one said.
The other knocked Absalom's hat off as though by an accident. Then the
former elaborately picked it up and offered it with a low bow, digging
Absalom in the stomach as he did so.
"'Ere y'are, my lord," he said. They roared with laughter. The whole
carriage laughed. At Dover Street Absalom got out. He hurried through
the streets, and the tears were pouring down his cheeks. He could not
stop them; he seemed to have no control over them. They were not his
tears.... He entered Hortons, and in the lift hid his face so that
Fannie should not see that he was crying.
He closed his door behind him, did not turn on the lights, found the
sofa, and cowered down there as though he were hiding from someone.
The tears continued to race down his cheeks. Then suddenly it seemed as
though the walls of the bathroom, all blotched and purple, all stained
with creeping mildew, closed in the dark about him.
He heard a voice cry--a working-man's voice--he did not hear the words,
but the walls towered above him and the white mildew expanded into
jeering, hideous, triumphant faces.
His heart leapt and he knew no more.
* * * * *
Bacon and the maid found him huddled thus on the floor dead next
morning.
"Well now," said Bacon, "that's a lucky thing. Young Somerset next
door's been wanting this flat. Make a nice suite if he knocks a door
through--gives him seven rooms. He'll be properly pleased."
II
FANNY CLOSE
Since the second year of the war Fanny Close had been portress at
Hortons. It had demanded very much resolution on the part of Mr. Nix
to search for a portress. Since time immemorial the halls of Hortons
had known only porters. George, the present fine specimen, had been
magnificently in service there for the last ten years. However, Mr. Nix
was a patriot; he sent his son aged nineteen to the war (his son was
only too delighted to go), himself joined the London Air Defences, and
then packed off every man and boy in the place.
The magnificent James was the last to go. He had, he said, an ancient
mother dependent upon him. Mr. Nix was disappointed in him. He did not
live up to his chest measurement. "You're very nearly a shirker," he
said to him indignantly. Nevertheless he promised to keep his place
open for him....
He had to go out into the highways and by-ways and find women.
The right ones were not easily found, and often enough they were
disappointing. Mr. Nix was a tremendous disciplinarian, that was why
Hortons were the best service flats in the whole of the West End.
But he discovered, as many a man had discovered before him, that the
discipline that does for a man will not do nine times out of ten for a
woman. Woman has a way of wriggling out of the net of discipline with
subtleties unknown to man.
So Mr. Nix discovered.... Only with Fanny Close Mr. Nix had no trouble
at all. She became at the end of the first week a "jewel," and a jewel
to the end of her time she remained.
I don't wish, in these days of stern and unrelenting realism, to draw
Dickensian pictures of youth and purity, but the plain truth is that
Fanny Close was as good a girl as ever was made. She was good for
two reasons, one because she was plain, the other because she had a
tiresome sister. The first of these reasons made her humble, the other
made her enjoy everything from which her sister was absent twice as
much as anyone else would have enjoyed it.
She was twenty-five years of age; the mother had died of pleurisy
when the children were babies, and the father, who was something very
unimportant in a post office, had struggled for twenty years to keep
them all alive, and then caught a cold and died. The only brother had
married, and Aggie and Fanny had remained to keep house together. Aggie
had always been the beauty of the family, but it had been a beauty
without "charm," so that many young men had advanced with beating
hearts, gazed with eager eyes, and then walked away, relieved that for
some reason or another they had been saved from "putting the question."
She had had proposals, of course, but they had never been good enough.
At twenty-six she was a disappointed virgin.
Fanny had always been so ready to consider herself the plainer and
stupider of the two that it had not been altogether Aggie's fault that
she, Aggie, should take, so naturally, the first place. Many a relation
had told Fanny that she was too "submissive" and didn't stand up for
herself enough, but Fanny shook her head and said that she couldn't be
other than she was. The true fact was that deep down in her heart she
not only admired her sister, she also hated her. How astonished Aggie
would have been had she known this--and how astonished, to be truly
platitudinous for a moment, we should all be if we really knew what our
nearest and dearest relatives thought of us!
Fanny hated Aggie, but had quite made up her mind that she would never
be free of her. How could she be? She herself was far too plain for
anyone to want to marry her, and Aggie was apparently settling down
inevitably into a bitter old-maidenhood. Then came the war. Fanny was
most unexpectedly liberated. Aggie did, of course, try to prevent her
escape, but on this occasion Fanny was resolved. She would do what she
could to help--the country needed every single woman. At first she
washed plates in a canteen, then she ran a lift outside some Insurance
office, finally she fell into Mr. Nix's arms, and there she stayed for
three years.
She knew from the very first that she would like it. She liked Mr. Nix,
she liked the blue uniform provided for her, most of all she liked the
"atmosphere" of Hortons, the coloured repose of St. James's, the hall
of white and green, the broad staircase, the palms in the staircase
windows, the grandfather's clock near Mr. Nix's office; she even
liked her own little rabbit-hutch where were the little boxes for the
letters, the cupboard for her own private possessions, the telephone,
and a chair for her to sit upon. In a marvellously short time she was
the mistress of the whole situation. Mr. Nix could not have believed
that he would have missed the marvellous James so little. "Really," he
said to Mrs. Nix, "a great discovery, a remarkable find."
"Well, I hope she won't disappoint you," said Mrs. Nix, who was an
amiable pessimist. Fanny did not disappoint; she got better and better.
Everyone liked her, and she liked everyone.
Because she had as her standard Aggie's grudging and reluctant
personality, she naturally found everyone delightful. She was very
happy indeed because they all wanted her assistance in one way or
another. "Men _are_ helpless," was her happy comment after a year's
experience at Hortons. She stamped letters for one, delivered telephone
messages for another, found addresses for a third, carried bags for a
fourth, acted as confidential adviser for a fifth. She was not pretty,
of course, but she was much less plain in her uniform than she had been
in her private dress. The blue, peaked cap suited her, and managed
somehow, in combination with her pince-nez, to give her quite a roguish
complexion.
Nevertheless she was looked upon as a serious person--"quite like a
man," she reflected with satisfaction. She did not wish to waste her
time with flirtations, she wanted to do her job efficiently. It needed
great self-control not to take too active an interest in the affairs
of the ladies and gentlemen in her charge. She was, for instance,
deeply sorry for poor old Mr. Jay, who was obviously poor and helpless
and had no friends. He used to ask her whether "So-and-so" had called,
to tell her that he was expecting Lady This, and Lord That to ring up.
Of course, they never did. No one ever came to see him. Fanny's heart
simply ached for him.
Then there was young Mr. Torby--the Hon. Clive Torby. Fanny thought
him the most wonderful figure in London. He was in France and was
wounded, went back and was wounded again, this time losing an arm. He
had the D.S.O. and M.C., and was simply the most handsome young man
in London--but Fanny feared that he was leading a very idle life. He
was always happy, always good-tempered, always laughing, but Fanny
shivered at the thought of the money that he spent. Lord Dronda, his
father, used to come and see him and "remonstrate with him," so the
Hon. Clive told Fanny after the interview. But what was the good? All
the young ladies came just the same, and the flowers and the fruit and
the wine----
"We can only love once, Fanny," the young man declared one day. "And
I've been so near kicking the bucket so many times lately that I'm
going to make the most of the sunshine."
How could you blame him? At any rate, Fanny couldn't.
There were many others into whose histories and personalities this is
neither the time nor place to enter. Fanny felt as though she were
living at the very heart of the great, bustling, eventful world. When
she saw Edmund Robsart, the famous novelist, whose flat was No. 20,
go up in the lift, when he said "Good-evening" to her and smiled, he
whose picture was quite often in the daily papers, whose books were on
the railway book-stalls, whose name was even mentioned once in Fanny's
hearing by T. E. Dunville at the Victoria Palace--well, there was
something to be proud of. True, he was over fifty, and fat and a little
pompous--what did that matter? Fanny had taken messages to him in his
rooms and seen him once in a purple silk dressing-gown.
She did not consider herself overworked. She had to be on duty at
eight-thirty every morning, and she remained until six-thirty in the
evening. She had every Saturday afternoon and every other Sunday.
She did every kind of thing in between those hours. The whole warm
pulsing life of the twenty chambers seemed to radiate from her.
She fancied herself sitting there in her little office, taking the
messages from the flats and distributing them to the different valets
and servants in the kitchen, watching everyone who came in and out,
detecting suspicious people who wanted to see "So-and-so on very urgent
business," attending to Mr. Nix when he had anything to say or wanted
anything ... and sometimes in the hot summer weather she would sit
and look out upon the white and shining street, feeling the heat play
in little gleaming waves upon the green staircase behind her, hearing
the newsboys shout their war-news, watching stout Mr. Newbury, of
the picture-shop, as he stood in his doorway and speculated on the
weather. How cool here, and how hot out there!--and in the winter how
warm the flats and how cold the dusky blue-green street!
She sometimes wondered whether it were not wicked of her to care for
her life at Hortons so much when it all came to her from the horrible
war, which did indeed seem to her the most dreadful thing that had ever
happened.
She had not known many young men, but there had been Mr. Simmons and
Mr. Frank Blake and his brother Tom Blake--nice young men, and most
amusing in the evening after supper or on an evening out at the Music
Hall--all gone.... Tom Blake dead, Frank Blake without a leg, Mr.
Simmons gassed.... Oh, she _hated_ this war, she _hated_ it--but she
loved Hortons.
The fly in the ointment was the old familiar fly of family comment. The
war had not had a good effect upon Aggie. She sat at home and grew more
and more pessimistic. There never _was_ such pessimism. Germany was to
Aggie a triumphing, dominating force that nothing could stop. "What's
the use of our fighting?" she would say when Fanny would arrive home to
supper, exhausted but cheerful. "What's the _use_? That's what I want
to know. Here we are at their mercy--can step over any time they like
and just take us."
Nothing made Fanny so angry as this. It was all she could do to control
herself; nevertheless, control herself she did.
"What about our Army?" she would say. "And the submarines? What about
Kitchener?" and later, "What about Haig?"
"Haig!" sniffed Aggie. "Haig!" The air-raids finished Aggie. A bomb
was dropped quite close to their upper-part in Bloomsbury. Aggie was
ill for weeks--she recovered, but rose from her bed a soured, injured,
vindictive woman. It was exactly as though the whole of the war, and
especially the bomb-dropping part of it, had been arranged simply
for the annoyance of Aggie Close. She always said that she hated the
Germans, but to hear her talk you'd think that she hated the English a
great deal more. Our incompetence, our cowardice, our selfishness, our
wickedness in high places--such were her eternal topics. Fanny, sitting
in her hutch at Hortons, saw the evening waiting for her--the horrible
evening with their little stuffy, food-smelling, overcrowded room,
with the glazed and grinning sideboard, the pink-and-white wool mats,
the heavy lace curtains over the window, the hideous oleographs, the
large, staring photographs. Unlike most of her kind she knew that all
this was ugly, and in the midst of the ugliness was Aggie, Aggie with
her square, short, thick-set figure, her huge flat feet, her heavy,
freckled hands. She would have escaped to a place of entertainment had
there been anybody to take her--just now there was nobody. She could
not walk about the streets alone.
At first she had tried to interest Aggie in the exciting events of her
day, in poor Mr. Jay, and magnificent Mr. Robsart, and funny, fussing
Mrs. Demaris, and the Hon. Clive. But Aggie had a marvellous way of
turning everything, however cheerful and bright it might seem, into
sin and sorrow and decay. If Fanny was happy, it was: "How can you
laugh when the world's in the state it's in?" If Fanny sighed, it was:
"I should have thought it was one's duty to be as cheerful as possible
just now. But some people think only of themselves."
If Fanny argued against some too outrageous piece of pessimism, it was:
"Really, Fanny, it's such as you is losing us the war."
"Oh! I hate Aggie!--I hate Aggie!" Fanny would sometimes cry to
herself in the heart of her hutch, but she could not summon to herself
sufficient resolution to go off and live by herself; she had a terror
of solitary evenings, all the terror of one who did not care for books,
who was soaked in superstition and loved lights and noise.
During the first two years of the war she did not consider the end of
the war. She never doubted for a single moment but that the Allies
would win, and for the rest she had too much work to do to waste
time in idle speculations. But in the third year that little phrase
"after the war" began to drive itself in upon her. Everyone said it.
She perceived that people were bearing their trials and misfortunes
and losses because "after the war" everything would be all right
again--there would be plenty of food and money and rest "after the war."
Her heart began to ache for all the troubles that she saw around her.
Mr. Nix lost his boy in France and was a changed man. For a month or
two it seemed as though he would lose all interest in Hortons. He was
listless and indifferent and suffered slackness to go unpunished. Then
he pulled himself together. Hortons was its old self again--and how
Fanny admired him for that!
Then came the Armistice, and the world changed for Fanny. It changed
because, in a sudden devastating horrible flash of revelation, she
realised that the women would all have to go! The men would come
back.... And she?
That night when she perceived this gave her one of her worst hours. She
had allowed herself--and she saw now how foolish she had been to do
so--to look upon the work at Hortons as the permanent occupation of her
life. How could she have done otherwise? It suited her so exactly; she
loved it, and everybody encouraged her to believe that she did it well.
Had not Mr. Nix himself told her that he could not have believed that
he could miss the magnificent James so little, and that no man could
have filled the blank as she had done? Moreover, in the third year of
the war James had been killed, and it would take a new man a long time
to learn all the ins-and-outs of the business as she had learnt them.
So she had encouraged herself to dream, and the dream and the business
had become one--she could not tear them apart. Well, now she must tear
them apart. Mr. Nix was dismissing all the women.
With teeth set she faced her future. No use to think of getting another
job--everywhere the men were returning. For such work as she could do
there would be a hundred men waiting for every vacancy. No, she would
have to live always with Aggie. They would have enough to live on--just
enough. Their brother allowed them something, and an aunt had left them
a little legacy. Just enough with a perpetual sparing and scraping--no
more of the little luxuries that Fanny's pay from Hortons had allowed
them. Certainly not enough for either of them to live alone. Tied for
ever together, that's what they would be--chained! and Aggie growing
ever more and more bitter.