IN WHICH THE ENTIRE WOBBLES FAMILY FOR ONCE GET TOGETHER
Mr. Eugene Wobbles, who tried to live down his American ancestry in
London clubs and was, consequently, more British than any Englishman,
came to Mr. Courtney lazily apologetic.
"I fancy I'm going to give you a lot of bother, my dear Courtney," he
observed, lounging feebly against the porch rail.
"I prefer bother to almost anything," returned his host pleasantly; "it
gives me something to do."
"Rather clever that," laughed Eugene, swinging his monocle with one
hand and stroking his drooping yellow mustache with the other. "Really
I never thought of bother in that way before. Keeps one bothered, I
think you said," and he gazed out over the broad lawn where the young
people were noisily congregating, in pleasant contemplation of
Courtney's wonderful new philosophy.
"What is this particular bother?" gently suggested Courtney after a
pause.
"Oh, yes," responded Eugene, "we were discussing that, weren't we? I've
a rotten memory; but my oldest brother, Tommy, can't even remember his
middle initial. Pretty good that, don't you think; Tommy is a perfect
ass in every respect." And idly considering Tommy's perfection as an
ass, he turned and gazed down into the ravine where Courtney had built
some attractive little waterfalls and cave paths. "About how deep
should you say it was down there, Courtney?"
"Three hundred and fifty feet," answered Courtney. "I think you were
speaking about a little bother."
"Oh, yes, so I was," agreed Eugene. "Very good of you to remind me of
it. You know, Courtney, Mr. Gamble--who wants to buy some land of
ours--has made the remarkable discovery that we're all here together.
First time in years, I assure you. No matter how necessary it may be
for us to hold a complete family council, one of my brothers--most
unreliable people in the world, I think--is always missing."
"And when they're all together I suppose you are somewhere else,"
suggested Courtney.
That proposition was so unique that Eugene was forced to spend profound
thought on it.
"Curious, isn't it?" he finally admitted. "A chap becomes so in the
habit of thinking that he is himself always present, wherever he
happens to be, that it's no end starting to reflect that sometimes he
isn't."
"I see," said Courtney, grasping eagerly at the light. "You merely
happen to be all here at the same time, and you think it advisable to
hold a family business meeting because the accident may never occur
again. Sensible idea, Eugene. The east loggia off the second-floor hall
is just the place. Assemble there and I'll send you any weapons you
want."
"Perfectly stunning how you Americans grasp things!" commented Eugene,
agape with admiration. "But I say, old chap, that's a joke about the
weapons. Really, we shan't need them."
"You're quite right; I was joking," returned Courtney gravely. "I'll go
right up and have some chairs and tables put out on the loggia."
"I knew it would be a deuced lot of bother for you," regretted Eugene
apologetically. "It's a lot of face in us to ask it. So crude, you
know. By the way, should you say that this Mr. Gamble chap was all
sorts reliable?"
"Absolutely," Courtney emphatically assured him.
"Ow," returned Eugene reflectively. "And his solicitor fellow, Loring?"
"Perfectly trustworthy."
"Ow," commented Eugene, and fell into a study so deep that Courtney was
able to escape without being missed.
In the library, where he went to ring for a servant, he found Constance
Joy looking gloomily out of a window, with a magazine upside down in
her hands. She immediately rose.
"Don't let me disturb you," begged Courtney as he rang the bell. "Do
you know where I can find Johnny Gamble?"
"I really couldn't say," replied Constance sweetly. "I left him out in
the gardens a few minutes ago." And she made for the door, confident
that she had not spoken with apparent haste, embarrassment or coldness.
"Won't you please tell him that Joe Close and Morton Washer and Colonel
Bouncer are coming out on the next train?" requested Courtney. "You're
sure to see him by and by, I know."
"With pleasure," lied Constance miserably, and hurried to finish her
escape. At the door, however, she suddenly turned and came back,
walking nonchalantly but hastily out through the windows upon the side
porch. A second later Paul Gresham and Billy Wobbles, the latter
walking with temperamental knees, passed through the hall.
Courtney looked after Constance in perplexity, but, a servant entering,
he gave orders for the furnishing of the loggia and went up to make
sure of the arrangements. He found Johnny Gamble in moody solitude,
studying with deep intensity the braiding of his sailor straw hat.
"Hello, Johnny!" hailed Courtney cordially. "I was just asking Miss Joy
about you."
Johnny looked at him with reproachful eyes. Courtney was to blame for
his present gloom.
"Thanks," he returned. "What did she say?"
"Not much," replied Courtney, smiling slyly. "She didn't know where you
were, but she's looking for you."
"Where is she?" asked Johnny, jumping up with alacrity.
"She just went out on the side porch of the library," announced
Courtney. "Her message is from me, however. Washer and Close and the
colonel are coming out this noon."
"Thanks," replied Johnny starting away. "Did I understand you to say
the side porch of the library?"
A thin-legged figure stopped in the door and twitched.
"Mornin'," it observed. "I knew Eugene's intellect was woozing again.
Always announcing some plan for us to bore each other, don't you know,
and never having it come off."
"This is the place and the hour, Reggie," declared Mr. Courtney. "If
you'll just stay here I'll send you out a brandy and soda and some
cigars."
"Thanks awfully, old man," returned Reggie, looking dubiously out at
the loggia. It was enticing enough, with its broad, cool, tiled
flooring and its vine-hung arches and its vistas of the tree-clad hills
across the ravine; but it was empty. "I think I'll return when the rest
of them are together.", And Reggie, stumbling against the door-jamb on
his way out, wandered away, choosing the right-hand passage because his
body had happened to lurch in that direction.
"Johnny, if you say anything I'll be peevish," protested Courtney in
advance. "Please remember that the gentleman is a guest of mine."
"I was grinning at something else," Johnny soothed him, still grinning,
however.
"I apologize," observed Courtney. "Do you think the Wobbles family will
hold their conclave if each of them waits until all the others are
together?"
"I hope so," replied Johnny. "I'll make some money if they do."
"How rude!" expostulated Courtney with a laugh. "Business at a week-end
house-party!"
"Business is right," confessed Johnny. "They admit that you run the
best private exchange in America out here."
Courtney, enjoying that remark, laughed heartily.
"I'm glad they give me credit," he acknowledged. "Well, help yourself
to all the facilities. Where are you going?"
"Library porch," answered Johnny promptly. "Excuse me, I'm in a hurry."
Constance Joy was not on the library porch. Instead, Johnny found there
Polly Parsons and her adopted sister Winnie, Ashley Loring and Sammy
Chirp. This being almost a family party for Johnny, he had no
hesitation in asking bluntly for Constance.
"This is her morning for Wobbling," returned Polly disdainfully. "A
while ago she was dodging the perfectly careless compliments of old
Tommy and trying not to see that his toupee was on crooked; and now
she's down toward the ravine some place, watching young Cecil stumble.
You could make yourself a very solid Johnny by trotting right down
there and breaking up the party."
"I think I'd rather have a messenger for that," calculated Johnny. "His
brothers wish to see Cecil up in the east loggia."
"Sammy will go," offered Winnie confidently; whereat Sammy, smiling
affably, promptly rose.
"Go with him, Winnie," ordered Polly. "Trot on now, both of you. I want
to talk sense."
Quite cheerfully Winnie gave Sammy her fan, her parasol, her vanity
box, her novel, her box of chocolates and her hat, stuffed a
handkerchief in his pocket and said: "Come on, Sammy; I'm ready."
"Constance showed me that schedule last night, Johnny," rattled Polly.
"You ought to see it, Loring. On Wednesday, at four o'clock, he was
exactly even with it; five hundred thousand dollars to the good."
"I know," laughed Loring, "and he'll beat his schedule if the Wobbleses
will only hold steady for ten minutes."
"You don't mean to say that a Wobbles could be useful!" protested Polly.
"Half a million dollars' worth," Loring informed her; then he drew his
chair closer and lowered his voice. "It's a funny story, Polly. Two
weeks ago Johnny took Courtney and Close and Washer and Colonel Bouncer
up to the Bronx in my machine and arranged to sell them a subdivision
for three and a half million dollars."
"Help!" gasped Polly. "Burglar!"
"They'll double their money," asserted Johnny indignantly. "Fanciest
neglected opportunity within a gallon of gasolene from Forty-second
Street."
"Trouble is, Johnny didn't own it and doesn't yet," laughed Loring.
"He's been trying to buy it from the Wobbleses ever since he arranged
to sell it."
"He'll get it," decided Polly confidently.
"Will they agree when they get together?" Loring worried. "Individually
each one needs the money, and each one is satisfied with Johnny's offer
of three million cash."
"Don't say another word," ordered Polly. "I have to figure this out.
Why, Johnny, if you carry this through it will finish your million, and
this is only the thirteenth of May. That's going some! You weren't
supposed to have it till the thirty-first. Polly's proud of you!"
"I don't think you get the joke of this yet, though, Polly," Loring
went on. "The Wobbleses don't know that Johnny had already arranged to
sell their land, and the subdivision company doesn't know that the
beautiful Bronx tract is the Wobbles estate. In the meantime both
parties are here, and I'm lurking behind the scenery with all the
necessary papers ready to sign, seal and deliver."
"Hush!" commanded Polly; "I'm getting excited. It sounds like the
finish of the third act. Oh, lookee! Who's the graceful party with
Gresham?"
Both Johnny and Loring glanced up at a tall, suave, easy-moving
gentleman, whose clothing fitted him like a matinee idol's, whose
closely trimmed beard would have served as a model for the nobility
anywhere, and whose smile was sickening sweet.
"Eugene Wobbles' friend, Birchard," stated Johnny, who kept himself
well posted on Wobbles affairs. "He's always either with Gresham or a
Wobbles, and he travels for a living, I believe." And Johnny suddenly
rose.
Coming from the direction of the ravine were Constance and Cecil,
Winnie and Sammy, and passing Gresham and Birchard with the nod of
compulsion Johnny walked carelessly on to meet the quartet.
"Good morning, Cecil," he observed. "Your brothers are about to hold a
meeting in the east loggia, and I think they're looking for you."
"No doubt," admitted Cecil wearily. "It's barely possible that one or
two of them are already believing that they will go up. Do you know, I
think I shall establish a record for family promptness, if I may be
excused. Most annoying to be torn away from such a jolly talk, I'm
sure." And receiving the full and free permission of the company to
depart he did so, changing his mind twice about whether to go through
the rose arbor or round by the sun-dial.
Johnny swung in by the side of Constance.
"Some one told me you had a message for me," he blundered.
"Who said so?" she was cruel enough to ask.
Johnny turned pink, but he was brave and replied with the truth.
"Mr. Courtney," he admitted.
"So I imagined," she answered icily. "Mr. Washer and Mr. Close and
Colonel Bouncer are to arrive on the noon train. You'll excuse me,
won't you, please?" And she hurried on to the house by herself to dress
for luncheon.
Johnny Gamble tried to say "Certainly", but he dropped his sailor straw
hat. Constance heard it and every muscle in her body jumped and
stiffened. Johnny turned to business as a disappointed lover turns to
drink.
There seemed a conspicuous dearth of Wobbleses on the east loggia that
morning. Loring, pathetically faithful to his post, entertained them in
relays as Johnny brought them up: sometimes one, sometimes two, and
once or twice as many as three of them at one time; but they all lost
their feeble mooring and drifted away.
Luncheon-time passed; Washer and Bouncer and Close and Courtney went
into executive session; two o'clock came, three o'clock, four o'clock,
and still no meeting. At the latter hour Johnny, making his tireless
rounds but afflicted with despair, located Billy Wobbles, the one with
the jerky eyelids and impulsive knees, on the loggia with Loring;
Eugene was in the poker room trying numbly to discover the difference
between a four-flush and a deuce-high hand; Tommy, his toupee well down
toward his scanty white eyebrows, was boring the Courtney girls to the
verge of tears; Cecil, stumbling almost rhythmically over his own
calves, was playing tennis with Winnie and Sammy and Mrs. Follison; and
Reggie, the twitcher, was entertaining Val Russel and Bruce Townley
with a story he had started at nine o'clock in the morning.
Suddenly Johnny was visited with a long-sought inspiration and hurried
down to the kennels, remembering with much self-scorn that he had
dragged each of the Wobbleses away from there at least once.
The master of the dogs was Irish and young, with eyes the color of a
six-o'clock sky on a sunny day, and he greeted Johnny with a
white-toothed smile that would have melted honey.
"I locked Beauty up, sir," he said with a touch of his cap, referring
to the gentle collie that had poked its nose confidingly into Johnny's
hand at every visit. "There was too much excitement for her with all
the strangers round, but she'll be glad to see you, sir."
"Give Beauty my card and tell her I'll be back," directed Johnny with a
friendly glance in the direction of Beauty's summer residence. "Didn't
you say something this morning about a crowd of setter puppies?"
"Yes, sir," replied the dog expert proudly. "Several of the gentlemen
have been down to see them, but the day has been so hot I didn't care
to bring them out. It's cool enough now, sir, if you'd like to see
them."
"I'll be back, in five minutes," returned Johnny hastily. "I'll say
hello to Beauty first."
Beauty barked and capered when she was let out, and expressed her
entire approval of Johnny in fluent dog language, looking after him
reproachfully when he hurried away.
Johnny first begged a puppy of Courtney, then he brought Eugene Wobbles
and Tommy Wobbles and Billy and Cecil and Reggie Wobbles down in turns
to pick it out for him. Each of the Wobbleses was still there,
deciding, when he brought another. When the last Wobbles, including
their friend Birchard, was in the inclosure Johnny locked the gate and
sent Loring on a brisk errand. That energetic commercial attorney
returned in a very few minutes, laden with some papers and writing
materials, and followed by a servant carrying a wicker table.
"Gentlemen," said Johnny in a quite oratorical tone of voice, "suppose
we talk business."
The assembled Wobbleses turned in gasping surprise from the violent
family dispute over the puppies.
"Upon my soul, this is a most extraordinary thing!" exclaimed Eugene,
looking about him in amazement. "Why, the whole blooming family is
here, even Tommy. I say, Tommy, it's perfectly imbecile, with all due
respect to you, to prefer that little beggar with the white star."
"I'll back him for a hundred pounds before any official committee,"
indignantly quavered Tommy, feeling in all the wrong pockets for his
betting-book.
"Gentlemen," interposed Johnny most crudely indeed, "I am here to
repeat my offer of three million dollars, cash, for your Bronx
property; one-half million dollars to-day, one million dollars next
Saturday, May twentieth, and the remaining million and a half the
following Saturday, May twenty-seventh, title to remain vested in you
until the entire amount is paid. Just to show that I mean business I
have brought each of you a certified check for one hundred thousand
dollars." And he distributed them like diplomas to a class.
Tommy Wobbles, startled to find his toupee on straight, examined his
check with much doubt. "I say, you know," he expostulated, "this can't
be quite regular!"
"Why not?" inquired Johnny.
"Well--er--it's so very precipitate," responded Tommy, putting the
check in his pocket and taking it out again and folding and unfolding
it with uncertain fingers. "No time for deliberation and dignity and
such rot, you know."
"An advance cash payment of half a million dollars is so full of
dignity that its shoes squeak," announced Johnny. "As to delay, I don't
see any reason for it. You want to sell the property, don't you?"
Eugene said yes, and the others looked doubtful.
"You're satisfied with the price?" demanded Johnny.
Since Eugene kept silent the others answered that they were.
"You know that by my plan you are perfectly secured until you are fully
paid; so there's no reason why we shouldn't wind up the business at
once."
"Should you say that this was regular, Birchard?" asked Eugene, toying
with his check lovingly. He had just finished figuring that it was
worth something like twenty thousand pounds!
"Quite regular indeed," Mr. Birchard smilingly assured him. "Typically
American for its directness and decision, but fully as good a business
transaction in every way as could be consummated in London."
"Ow, I say," protested Eugene, but he seemed perfectly satisfied,
nevertheless.
"As I understand it," went on Mr. Birchard, "Mr. Gamble's proposition
is very simple. You are to execute a contract of sale to him to-day,
acknowledging receipt of half a million dollars' advance payment, and
are at the same time to execute a clear deed that will be placed in the
hands of your agent until Mr. Gamble completes his payments. The deed
will then be delivered to him and properly recorded. Is this correct,
Mr. Gamble?"
"I couldn't say it so well, but that's what I mean," replied Johnny.
"Then, gentlemen," continued Birchard, "I should advise you to sign the
papers at once and have the matter off your minds."
Loring had everything ready, but it was Johnny who really conducted the
meeting and manipulated the slow-moving Wobbleses so that they
concluded the business with small waste of time.
When it was finished Johnny thanked them with intense relief. The
Wobbles property was his, and he knew exactly where to sell it at a
half-million dollars' profit. His tremendous race for a million was to
be won, with a day or so of margin. There were a few technical matters
to look after, but in reality the prize was his. He could go to
Constance Joy now with a clear conscience and the ability to offer her
a fortune equal to the one she would have to relinquish if she married
him.
"By the way," said Johnny in parting, "who is your agent?"
"Why, I rather fancy it will be Mr. Birchard," replied Eugene. "Of
course nothing is decided as yet, since there are five of us and four
stubborn; but I rather fancy it will be Birchard. Eh, old chap?"
"I trust so," responded Birchard with a pleasant smile at Johnny.