And mighty Peace had spread her wings again over a world new blessed?
Not at all. Far from it!
When they have a holiday in Heaven they suck it out to the last
half-minute, and beyond if they can; for Heaven has been hard-worked
since the Fall, and play is precious to it.
That merry Dæmon to whom Mr. Petre had been handed over for a
plaything still had a few days to disport himself--a few minutes,
as they call them in Heaven--and he was not going to waste them. He
wasn’t going to drop his toy till Higher Powers should come and take
it from him. Not he! Mr. Petre was still in for it.
* * * * *
In that same great Rotor boat which had brought the new millionaire
and his fortune to Plymouth upon that April day, these five months
agone, was borne to the shores of Europe a real old millionaire, a
matured one.
Mr. Batterby had been perfectly right. That real old millionaire,
that matured one, had indeed taken the same boat; and his name
_was_ quite certainly and without ambiguity, and without problem,
and without mystery or miracle, John Kosciusko Petre. But with
a charming modesty he had taken his ticket and registered under
the name of Carroll. It secured him isolation; a thing he prized.
For John Kosciusko Petre (who never wasted a moment of his waking
hours--they were eighteen, for he only slept six) knew himself to
be the target of innumerable arrows, the desired prey of a million
ravenous appetites, the flesh at which a host of claws throughout
the world were clutching, and he built round himself a wall of
secrecy. It had been his rule for years. When he was off and away no
man should know where he might be; save when, at rare intervals, he
cabled a code word during his travels, awaited the reply, and then
moved off again. In these annual bouts of leisure John Kosciusko
Petre improved his mind, and he read, and read, and read, and read,
and read. He had already read in this vacation all George Eliot, all
Dickens, all Hardy, all Meredith, and a literal translation of the
_Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_ by Homer, and he was now halfway through
the works of William Shakespeare. He had begun with the poems, and
he was rapidly nearing the end of _Henry V_. Tennyson was yet to
come--oddly enough.
John Kosciusko Petre was a man nearly seventy years of age, and
looked fifty or ninety as you felt inclined. His skin was of fine
vellum, drawn strongly over strong bones, with not much in between.
And he had neither eyebrows nor eyelashes, which was an economy.
His eyes gave nothing away, and in this they were unlike his hands,
which, for thirty years past, had been giving away wholesale and in
the oddest fashion--public baths, and food in famine areas, and funds
for the observation of seismological phenomena--earthquakes, that
was--and splendid collections to museums, and one model University,
complete in every detail, and even including a Papist among its
professors: the professor of Mismatices. It was the first University
of that Mountain State, and large enough to train all its youth of
all its sexes, in all the higher departments of learning. He was
tall, bald, as strong and energetic as any man twenty years his
junior. He was silent, and prided himself on being silent; and he
prided himself also on this, that he never had a suit of clothes
built for him in his life, but had always bought what was necessary
from the hook.
As for his blood, it was very good. He knew his ancestry right away
back a good deal longer than most people do who boast of blood in
Europe. And it was good blood, for those who prefer the blood of
New England. Nor was there poverty in his lineage, nor, until his
own opportunities had come, great wealth; but whether he was of the
English Petres or not he could not have told you, for he did not
pretend to go back beyond the mid-seventeenth century. But he was as
old as that.
As for his names, he had been called John after his grandfather,
who had farmed in New Hampshire, and was a very honest man; and
Kosciusko from a hero of that grandfather, of whom that grandfather
had read in a book of excerpts (called _A Thousand Gems of Poetry_)
that Freedom had shrieked when Kosciusko had had the misfortune to
fall. Nor was his grandfather aware what horrid superstitions that
hero had followed in religion, or he perhaps would have been less
devoted. At any rate, Kosciusko had the baby been called, nearly
seventy years ago, for his middle name. Hence the K.
Mr. John Kosciusko Petre--John K. as he was affectionately
known--traveled with no valet; and therein he was wise. Where he was
wiser still was that he traveled with a man who did his work for
him, and whom he paid a very high salary indeed. You may call him
a Private Secretary, or a Confidential Secretary if you will, but
John Kosciusko did not give him these titles, he called him simply
“My Clurk,” and this attendant was devoted and efficient in such a
degree, that you would not believe it if you saw it in a book.
It was his business never to approach John Kosciusko until he was
summoned; he traveled second in boat and train in Europe when John
Kosciusko traveled first; in the States he went Pullman as his
master did, but not in the same drawing-room reservation. He kept
all letters, papers, figures--everything--orderly in his mind;
with a free hand to organize what sized office he willed, and what
bureaucracy he chose for the maintenance of all this; and to spend
at large for keeping in touch, and having everything in order.
So did John Kosciusko arrange his life. And the Dæmon had even
arranged that John Kosciusko should come on deck well muffled up,
and gaze without too much interest upon the town of Plymouth while
that other gentleman stepped ashore towards his fate. For John
Kosciusko was bound for Cherbourg and would land among the French,
whose civilization he affected more than he did that of the English,
though blaming the Gauls in certain points, and particularly in their
plumbing, their religion, and their lack of their religion; all which
three things he disapproved. Of all the Gauls he chiefly relaxed in
the district of Touraine, and on the Coast of Azure. Upon this last,
indeed, he had a set of rooms kept for him permanently, though he
visited them but once in two years at the oftenest.
So in that happy springtime John Kosciusko wandered. A contract motor
of sufficient size met him at Cherbourg. Once more did he survey the
castles of the Loire, once more the conservatories of the Riviera.
It was his glory that in these vacations (though he lost not a moment
and continued to read; Shakespeare was finished long before he had
gutted Chinon and Tennyson was polished off and Thackeray was passing
along the belt to the Receiver) he put business on one side. The
clurk saw to that. But my Dæmon, having need of him, quite instantly
jerked him out of his repose.
The weather was torrid, as September in France can be, the same
weather in which, half a lifetime before, and more, the German armies
had marched upon Paris; and John Kosciusko, reading yesterday’s
_Matin_ in the town of Angers (where he found himself in his progress
north to the coast), read a paragraph which he would certainly not
have read in any English paper; and, reading it, wondered whether he
were alive or dead.
It was plain French, and he could read plain French well enough.
There would have seemed, to any one else, nothing very startling
in the news. It was a commonplace story of modern speculation, and
described in the light French manner how a big Rotor merger had
taken place in London that summer and how its monopoly was virtually
established by the Government decision to adopt the Combine system
in the ports and on board the King’s ships as well as in the Postal
System; and how the Dominions had followed suit.
But it was not these first few lines which had knocked John Kosciusko
sideways; it was the last three. They ran:
“It is the secret of Punchinello that the soul of this affair, of one
so large _envergure_, is but that John K. Petre, the man of fantastic
millions, who is of passage at London, seems it, and of whom one
talks currently in the best clubs of the Bond Street and of the
Strand....”
John Kosciusko Petre put the paper down on the little marble table
in the café where he sat, spread it out with two large bony hands,
and fixed upon the ill-conditioned print of the French journal those
steel spectacles, that firm and concentrated gaze, which were his
marks.
He registered every word. He felt a duty to take some immediate
decision, but he could not decide what the decision was to be. He
could not decide decisively, as decisions should be decided. For once
in his life he was flummoxed. Then--for our millionaires are men
of rapid conclusions, that is why they now and then die poor--the
corners of his mouth drew down; he had solved the problem. During
that long vacuity of his in France he had been impersonated in
London. His clurk should have known of this!
He pulled forth a little knife, rather blunt, and slowly cut out the
offending paragraph. He unscrewed his big black Waterman pen and
wrote on it in the bold American hand “7/10/53.” He blotted it with
the vile French blotting paper, frowned to see it blurred, folded
it carefully, and put it into a cheap leather wallet which he had
carried for over forty years. He was still angry against the clurk.
But he was a just man, and reflected under what difficulties of a
foreign language and of slow communication that very efficient young
man had kept up communications during all these months of travel; and
he acquitted him. But he must consult with him, and he went back to
the hotel.
There was not a day to be lost. They could not make the night boat at
Havre, but they could catch the morning Air Mail from Paris if they
motored through the night; and motor through the night that old man
of iron did; sleeping with arms crossed as he tore through the warm
air. He took the earliest of the three air services, and by the time
that he and his companion were at the Splendide it was the younger
man who was tired out, not the elder. As he registered the clerk
hesitated. John Kosciusko pulled him up sharply and said: “What’s the
matter now?” in tones which were of metal and startled the lounge.
“Well, sir ...” said the clerk.
“That’s my name, ain’t it?” said John Kosciusko, showing an envelope.
And the clerk succumbed. But his head was going round. How many John
K. Petre’s were there in this wicked world?
Then with no deliberation, at once, the wires were set to work. The
agencies which the clerk held in the hollow of his hand, the points
on the map of Central London where he could press a button, the
centers from which money could work anything, whatever it willed, all
buzzed; all the wheels went round.
And upon the morning of the third day John Kosciusko, who had kept
strictly to himself all the time, never so much as leaving his rooms,
receiving the reports, coördinating them, mastering the thing like
a man of thirty-five, and a genius in staff work at that--on the
morning of the third day, I say, the whole thing was before him,
shaken into shape, and presented as lucidly as a good diagram. He had
got it all.
Five months ago, on the 3rd of April (the very day, by gosh! that he
himself had looked on Plymouth before he had landed at Cherbourg!) a
man of such and such appearance, perhaps twenty years younger than
himself, utterly different from himself, stout, gray, in the early
fifties (some said he might be American, and some said he might be
English) had impersonated him in that very hotel, the Splendide. He
had crossed the tracks of those very agencies, apparently to find out
what the real John K. was doing and where he might be. He had moved
to rooms in the Temple. He had lunched and dined at such and such a
house; he had been the constant associate of one Terrard, of Blake
and Blake, Brokers on ’Change in the City of London, and he had had
the gall to make good!
It was said that he had begun with a deal in some stock. One line of
inquiries made sure it was French African stock, but another that it
was a Bear account in the External Loan. Anyhow, immediately after,
he had bought the Paddenham Site and then sold it to the Government
for some ten million dollars. Then he had gone in with the Trefusis
crowd at fifty-fifty; but about three weeks after the Contract had
gone through with the Commons he had sold out. What he had done after
this it was too soon to know, as it was only a few days before; but
he had gone out with half the capital. He had not been frozen out, or
anything of that kind. He had it good and tight, mayhap in National
Bonds.
John Kosciusko was in such a cold anger that the parchment of his
skin showed white. For men of that energy can be very angry indeed,
at and beyond their seventieth year.
The next thing--and it was all done the same morning--was an
interview with the lawyer--the only lawyer whom he trusted on this
side, and whom he had good reason to trust, for John Kosciusko had a
method of his own, not only with his lawyers, but with his doctors;
not only with his doctors but with the humble watchers, who saw to
it that his rest was not disturbed by undue sounds. He paid them all
regularly and largely; but the payments stopped dead when the service
failed in the least point, and during his slightest indisposition
the steady and satisfactory income of three excellent practitioners
ceased suddenly; to resume as suddenly when John K. could honestly
say he felt himself again.
The lawyer asked for a little time to turn the matter over. He was
not given that time. He was told to decide, and he decided, naturally
enough, that there was matter for fees--I mean for an Action. The
dreadful Kosciusko forbade the ordinary courtesies, of warning, of
acceptance.
Therefore it was that on the morning of the 15th of September a
chirping young man in a rather dirty collar popped his head into St.
James’s Place, put a not too clean envelope into Mr. Peter Blagden’s
hand, uttered a few cabalistic words, and went out sideways. Mr.
Blagden (of Harrington), opening the missive, was agreeably surprised
to find a document partly in print, and partly in writing, and all in
an English of its own which ran, or rather hobbled, as opposite.
=In the High Court of Justice.= 1953.--No. 42.
KING’S BENCH DIVISION.
=Between=
_John Kosciusko Petre_
PLAINTIFF
AND
_Peter Charles Tamporley Blagden_
DEFENDANT
=George the fifth=, by the Grace of God, of the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and of the British
Dominions beyond the Seas, King, Defender of the Faith, To
_Peter Charles Tamporley Blagden_
of _Harrington Hall, Harrington_
in the _County_ of _Dorset_
WE COMMAND YOU, That within Eight Days after the Service of
this Writ on you, inclusive of the day of such Service, you
do cause an Appearance to be entered for you in an Action
at the Suit of
_John Kosciusko Petre_
And take Notice, that in default of your so doing, the
Plaintiff may proceed therein, and Judgment may be given in
your absence.
Witness, ERMYNTRUDE VISCOUNTESS BOOLE, Lord High Chancellor
of Great Britain, the _fifteenth_ day of _September_, in the
year of Our Lord One thousand nine hundred and _fifty-three_.
* * * * *
N.B.--This Writ is to be served within TWELVE Calendar Months
from the date thereof, or, if renewed, within SIX Calendar
Months from the last date of the last renewal, including
the day of such date, and not afterwards.
The Defendant may appear hereto by entering Appearance,
either personally or by Solicitor, at the Central Office,
Royal Courts of Justice, Strand, London.
If the Defendant fail to deliver a defence within TEN Days
after the last day of the time limited for Appearance,
he may have Judgment entered against h_im_ without notice,
unless he has in the meantime been served with a Summons for
Judgment or for Directions.
Mr. Blagden stared hopelessly at this rigmarole. Why this solicitude
of his Sovereign for his old false self? Why this peremptory, this
tyrannical summons from a Monarch whom he had loyally served on the
Commission of the Peace during so prolonged and prosperous a reign?
He happened to turn the sheet over. On the other side was a line of
print followed by writing:
THE PLAINTIFF’S CLAIM IS
_For damages for impersonation of the Plaintiff in
connection with financial and commercial transactions
conducted in his name without his consent._
This Writ was issued by _Jacob King_
of _16 Flag Buildings, Inner Temple_
whose Address for Service is _16 Flag Buildings, Inner Temple_
Solicitor for the said Plaintiff, who reside_s_ at _The
Hotel Splendide_.
Mr. Blagden read this document three times over: first mechanically,
noting only the larger printed words; then still more mechanically,
noting nothing at all; lastly, with a concentrated attention, closely
following every syllable of the Royal harshness to his Liege and
puzzled at the reappearance of that address “The Hotel Splendide.”
Could there be some mistake? Could he be claiming damages against
himself?
He had not yet the habits of his new rank in our plutocracy. He did
not summon his secretary, for he had none. He did not even send for a
messenger, for it was not in his habits to afford such luxuries. He
simply sat and wondered what men did under worries of this kind.
Then he bethought him of the dear old family lawyer, Mr. Wilkins.
Everything belonging to that real life of his--better, for all its
troubles than the mad episode of fortune--was to Mr. Blagden now at
once very distinct and very small, like a picture looked at through
one of these diminishing glasses which the block makers use to decide
on the effect of a wash drawing when it shall be reduced to scale.
The image of Mr. Wilkins stood out thus exceedingly sharp and yet
still remote. It was Mr. Wilkins who had presided over the steady
decline of his mother’s income and his own. It was Mr. Wilkins who
had drawn a substantial income from loyal work performed for a dozen
such families of the declining gentry--clients inherited from his
worthy father and grandfather; for it was a fine old firm. It was
Mr. Wilkins who had given him every possible piece of advice--on
legal technicalities always accurate, on policy always bad--since
he had come of age. To Mr. Wilkins he now turned. He remembered the
telephone number well enough, and considered curiously within himself
what a strange thing this faculty of memory must be, that not only
faded, but could be wholly exiled, and then could present the past
again with all the violent reality of immediate things.
As he waited for the answer on the machine it struck him that Mr.
Wilkins might be dead. He was twelve years older than Mr. Blagden,
and an absence of twenty-eight months is a gap. To his joy he heard
the same clerk’s familiar voice answering with the same irritability
it had invariably answered with in the old days, he heard the
familiar formula when he had given his name, that he would be put
through to Mr. Wilkins; and at last he heard once more the familiar
tones of the principal, still clear in his sober age. They wasted
very little time in greetings. Mr. Wilkins was free? Mr. Blagden
would go round now, at once.
An old association of more than thirty years endeared the two men to
each other; money lost upon the one side and gained upon the other
was a further bond.
Mr. Wilkins heard patiently the details; of the sudden loss of
memory, the name Petre, the financial dealings, the writ. He showed
not the faintest surprise at any part of the extraordinary story of
lost identity (which he entirely disbelieved), he jotted down dates
and then gave tongue.
He used the customary string of technicalities, to each of which was
attached a customary payment. He took for granted, in that clear-cut
professional manner which was part of his job, that his client had
done something quite amazingly astute; that he had been running very
close to the wind. He felt a strong professional admiration for so
much daring and skill. Who would have expected it of Peter Blagden?
He changed his tone to one of conversation and said:
“My dear Mr. Peter” (Mr. Blagden heard that formal familiarity of
Harrington with a double recognition--of old days, and of the past
fevered months), “my dear Mr. Peter, if the interests involved were
not so very large, I should advise an arrangement. But seeing what
those interests are” (and, he added to himself, the considerable fees
that can be milked out of them), “it is worth your while to fight.
There can be no question about the profit on Touaregs. No hurt was
suffered there. Nor of the purchase and sale of land; you were free
to transact it under any trade name. The only doubtful ground is the
Rotor affair.”
“I have no anxiety to go on with that,” said Mr. Blagden wearily.
“None at all.”
“My dear sir,” said Mr. Wilkins, shocked, “do consider what you are
saying! Two millions! More than two millions!”
“I assure you I mean it,” said Mr. Blagden sincerely and simply.
“What on earth does a man want with more than sixty thousand a year?
I’ve got that now, apart from all this last detestable nonsense.”
The image of Mr. Trefusis rose in his mind and nauseated him; for
the morbid mood of those last days remained as a strong impression,
although he was now back again in his right mind. Doubtless had he
met the Great Organizer again in his new condition he would have
respected him as highly as did, and still does, all our business
world. But he had met him in days of mental torture and warping, and
the picture was distorted.
“Why, bless you, Mr. Wilkins,” went on Mr. Blagden, with more
assurance than he would have shown before the older man in his former
days of poverty, “all I want is peace. And if a man can’t have
leisure on £60,000 a year....”
“Less taxes,” broke in Mr. Wilkins anxiously. “Less taxes, my dear
Mr. Peter!”
“Yes, I know,” said Mr. Blagden wearily. “But if a man cannot have
leisure on, say, £30,000 pounds a year, he’s not likely to get it.
What do I want with another quarter million or so of income?”
Mr. Wilkins’ age did not impair his rapidity of decision and his
power for an immediate change of front; for here habit was strong.
He at once went off upon a new tack.
“Have you considered, Mr. Peter,” he said solemnly, and Mr. Blagden
was back again in his twenty-first year, listening to the solemn
admonitions of the Family Lawyer in the old study at home, “have
you considered what the effect will be upon your whole position?
What people will say of your motives, Mr. Peter?” And here he leaned
forward and tapped Mr. Blagden on the knee. “The Paddenham Site
purchase was made under that other name also. Remember that! No doubt
they won’t go into it, but remember what it means! If you let them
take it into court it will make you talked about, that’s true; but it
may clear you.”
Peter Blagden was struck with the full force of that argument, and he
felt the blood going to his face.
The lawyer continued: “No, Mr. Peter, the more I think of it, the
more I see that you must fight it.”
“But if I fight it with the truth,” said Blagden, “all the miserable
humiliating business comes out. I shall be known as a man who has
lapses of memory; a deficient; an absurdity.”
Mr. Wilkins did not understand the objection.
“Why not?” said he. “The only objection is that it’s a poor defense.”
“I won’t have it,” said Mr. Blagden, with sudden fierceness. “I won’t
have it. D’you understand?”
For the whole of thirty-two years Mr. Wilkins had had no experience
of such a mood, either in this client or in any other. At first
he was prepared to wrestle with it; then he thought of the vast
interests involved, and he gave way; instead of replying, he pondered
within himself for a moment.
“It can’t help coming out, Mr. Peter,” he said at last. “Supposing
you say that you used the name at random, and had never heard of
John K. Petre; do you suppose anybody will believe you? And even if
they did believe you, do you suppose you could convince a Court of
Justice that you were having all these opportunities given to you for
love? The first quarter of an hour’s examination of any one of your
witnesses, the first five minutes of an arbitrator ... and whether
you won or lost, you would be branded.”
Mr. Blagden suffered. He was in a cleft stick; he suffered more when
he heard a further remark from the lawyer--not very original, a piece
of human wisdom as old as any fossil monkey’s skull; but ancient
wisdom has an amazing force when it falls pat.
“Every decision in life,” said the older man, “is a choice between
two evils, and there is no doubt which is the worst evil here. You
want peace. You can get it if you tell them this--” (he had almost
slipped out the words “Cock-and-bull story” but he had caught himself
in time)--“this misfortune of yours. You will have an unfortunate
and strange incident remembered of you, but nothing affecting your
honor. If you take the other line, at the very best you will be shown
up as a swindler in every newspaper in the world; and at the worst
... well, I don’t like to go on.”
But Mr. Blagden had recovered his fierce determination.
“No!” he said, “I _won’t_. I’ll make an arrangement.”
“And if they won’t take it?” said the lawyer.
There was a silence--luckily for Peter Blagden’s future happiness
he was the first to break it; the Dæmon had suggested with his
supernatural vision just what was needed, and had slid it into Mr.
Blagden’s heart: “I never said I was John K. Petre. I never alluded
to one act of John K. Petre’s life,” he said slowly; “it was thrust
upon me. I’ll give reasons--good reasons, I’ll find ’em--for not
wishing to have my own name come out. I’ll swear--and it’s the
truth--it was a chance name; I’ll swear I knew nothing of John K.
Petre the millionaire; and I’ll let ’em believe what they like. I
_won’t_ have my humiliation published. I _won’t_. If the lawyers
insist, my own evidence will break them. Go to this man’s lawyers and
tell him I’ll compromise. I’ll take any terms they offer.”
Poor Mr. Wilkins saw vast receipts from a most juicy Action fade
away. He sighed and accepted his fate.
* * * * *
As I draw near to the conclusion of this simple story I review in my
mind the little army of those who had done well out of Mr. John K.
Petre’s--I mean Mr. Peter Blagden’s--little adventure, and I conclude
that Providence orders all things together for good.
An economist, perhaps, might tell you who had provided these various
windfalls. I cannot. But I mark that Charlie Terrard was now
established for life and precariously married to his Dada; that Mr.
Charlbury would in the next honors list be Sir Marmaduke Charlbury
(he had dropped his original Christian name), and had already bought
that fine old Jacobean country house which I have not had the leisure
to describe for you; that the hard-faced man in the Court off Broad
Street had retired upon a small, but for him, excellent competence;
that at least fifteen of the hangers-on round the Paddenham Site had
collared from one or two hundred up to five hundred; that Williams,
intermediary grasper of the Paddenham Site, had been saved--certainly
from bankruptcy, possibly from prison, and was now sunning himself
in Madeira planning a new coup (for you cannot teach wisdom to such
men); that the innumerable new Debenture holders in the Trefusis
reconstruction of B.A.R.’s were not disappointed in their steady
eight per cent.; that the ordinary shares still crept upwards; that
even the little people of that distant luncheon table had pocketed
their little packets safely; that Mrs. Cyril had been able to cover
the silly old Victorian walls of her house with brand-new pictures
which looked as if they had been painted by a lunatic in hell, and
to stuff it with chairs and tables like the inside of a German
philosopher’s mind; that the kind old Cabinet Minister had a little
more to leave to his nephews, and even the two ex-Lord Chancellors
had for a brief moment enjoyed a few extra hundreds, which they had
lost (and a little more) through a combined speculation in Virtue
Deeps, to which they had been emphatically recommended by a friend of
prominent South African type.
I said just now that I could not tell you who had provided all these
sums; but upon consideration it seems to me that they can only have
been provided by the British taxpayer at large. The burden was
therefore distributed over the widest possible field and nothing more
equitable could be imagined.
* * * * *
An arrangement had been proposed--even to the sacrifice of the
proceeds of Mr. Blagden’s sale of B.A.R.’s ordinary; it was refused.
John K. Petre wasn’t out to add to his fifty millions a paltry two.
He was out for blood.
Counsel’s opinion had been taken, experts called in, documents of
every kind drawn up, written, engrossed, typed, filed, stamped,
endorsed, docketed, and in general treated to the excellently
elaborate and lucrative ritual which documents in such cases
uncomplainingly suffer; pleadings had been entered, several
consultations enjoyed, briefs marked, tremendous leaders chosen.
Everything had been done upon Mr. Blagden’s side to swell the costs
to the largest possible figure; and that is the test of sincere and
conscientious work on the part of a man’s legal advisers. Upon John
K. Petre’s side the same process had been even more thoroughly and
conscientiously performed. In his own country the Rotor King--I mean
Baron--would have known how to check these figures; here under the
immemorial traditions of the English Courts, he was helpless. But his
relentless humor tolerated any extravagance, so only that he might
drink deep of vengeance.
The case was set down for October the 20th. It came before Mr.
Justice Honeybubble. Its importance as a precedent, and the fees--a
record, as the American Press was careful to call them--were checks
upon undue haste.
Nine times the space that measures day and night to mortal man did
those lawyers on the floor grind guineas out of the great John K.
Petre mill. Then the lawyer perched up above them talked for half
a day more, and after that the judgment. The decision fell for
the Defendants. Mr. John K. Petre, of Summit, Merryvale, in New
Hampshire, one of the United States of North America, failed to
recover.
Nor was the Defendant subjected to the necessity of disproving
impersonation though he was prepared in evidence clearly and firmly
to swear that he had no such intention, but had had thrust upon
him a chance name at a moment when he did not desire to do business
under his own. _That_ point--which had loomed so large before the
case came on, was forgotten by public and professionals in the really
interesting development which the great action took.
For behold, the Defendant’s counsel had advanced on a most unexpected
line, coming in flank upon John K.’s attack and disturbing it
horribly. They granted--while they vigorously denied--the technical
plea of impersonation--it was nothing of the sort, but no matter.
They based the defense on the Statute cited as _Fraudeurs et
Tireurs_, vulgarly and humorously known as “Frauds and Terrors,”
of the 13th of Ed. III., Cap. 2, where it is laid down that if a
merchant use the name of another, even by error, and under such
obtain a delivery of cheptal, he is at the mercy of the King, _saving
in Market of Free Cloison_ (that is the point) and (of course)
“excepting precincts.”
Mr. Justice Honeybubble’s judgment will long be quoted as a model. It
was lengthy--that was inevitable under the circumstances--but it was
conclusive.
Free Cloison being proved, the exception of Precincts (a technical
term) did not lie.
The Press vigorously applauded the common sense and justice of the
decision.
A writer hired to write in the _Howl_ said it was bluff English
stuff. Another writer, hired to write on the _Times_, said it bore
witness to that sense of reality and impatience with technicalities,
peculiar to the Anglo-Saxon race.
Anyhow, judgment for the Defendants, and John Kosciusko beaten on
points.
Against this judgment the Plaintiff appealed, and _Petre v. Blagden_
was taken to the Court of Appeal upon the two points, (_a_) that the
original _negoce_ was not that of _Merchaunts Libres_ nor of _New
Livery_, (_b_) that the transit was not of Goods in Marque but of
Instrument sole.
The Lords Justices of the Court of Appeal reversed the judgment
of the lower Court (Mr. Justice Cubber dissenting). They pointed
out that the acts complained of were obviously not done in _Free
Cloison_, and admitted “_Merchaunts Libres_.” But they left _Livery_
open, as being free to either party regardant.
The Press vigorously applauded the common sense and justice of this
judgment.
The most ignorant layman can grasp the effect of this last point upon
the issues involved. It meant, in practice, that Mr. John K. Petre
had Record of Relief _Non Obstante_; that is, he had the technical
decision in his favor. But he could not recover what the old Law
called (before the Consolidating Act of 22 Vic. 15) “Damnification
Personal”; in plain English, he could not proceed to enforce Seizin
Virtual and in Plein; or, as Mr. John K. Petre’s solicitor explained
to him in the simplest possible terms, he could not get any money
out of Mr. Blagden, and he was left, of course, to bear the costs of
the action.
The anger of John Kosciusko on hearing this upshot of the affair was
terrible to witness.
He used the most extravagant language against the Majestic Fabric
of British Jurisprudence, and passed all bounds in his abuse of our
Courts and Magistrates. He seemed quite to forget that he was our
guest, and sorely tried the patience of his legal adviser, Mr. Jacob
King, devoted though he was to the financier’s service.
“See here,” the Rotor King--I mean Baron--began, when the first
paroxysm of his indignation had subsided, “hev I got to gi’ back home
to Summit with nothing out of that skunk, and all this fall wasted?
Is that what you call progress? How d’ye _do_ it? If it wasn’t for
the principle of the thing, I’d never want to hear the name of your
town again! I’d get quit of this place for good. Why! sir! There’s
not a coon court on our continent that couldn’t give a plain verdict
on a thing like that! Why ain’t the fellow jailed? But I’m coming
back! Don’t you think you’re rid of me; no! There’s some way round
it, and I’ll take it till I burst him! I’ll send a man here and start
a paper. I’ll track his holdings and wreck ’em. I’ll....”
Mr. Jacob King dammed the torrent with the remark that there was
still the House of Lords.
“Still the what?” said the angry man of millions.
“The House of Lords,” said Mr. Jacob King again, “appeal to the House
of Lords.”
[Illustration: _John Kosciusko protesting against the interference of
Peers in Judicial Procedure._]
That excellent and straightforward millionaire wondered if he had
heard aright.
“What in Hell hez any durn Lord to do with it?”
Mr. Jacob King explained the technicality. How the words “House
of Lords” in this connection meant no more than the supreme and
last Court of Appeal composed of Judges and presided over by the
Lord Chancellor of the day. He was free to add that it was a great
monument to the political genius of the English people that they had
preserved ... etc., etc. But his employer cut him short.
“Well, then, that’s more time and more money?”
“More time, certainly, yes,” said Mr. Jacob King thoughtfully. “You
may say a year, or the best part of a year.”
“What!” shouted John K. Petre. “’Fore they _begin_? ’Fore those
wind-artists _begin_?”
“Yes; usually. You see, it’s the rule that everything has to be
printed, and then....”
“Well, I’m not going to wait a year,” exploded the old gentleman.
“I’ll do something desperate! I’ll start one of these campaigns
that’ll make the whole darn herd feel like an old Caroliny note, kep’
for a curio, ’en framed.”
“There are ways,” mused Mr. Jacob King aloud, “by which even this can
be expedited; only, of course, when urgent public necessity demands
it.”
“Well, you’ve got to find that urgent public necessity,” said his
paymaster, without urbanity, indeed roughly. “That’s what you’ve got
to do. Else I won’t go down that road anyway. I’ll raise the Hell I
was telling you of.”
Mr. Jacob King hinted that this would be an extra expense. John
Kosciusko grumbled. If only they’d told him, he complained. And a man
never knew. They just tied him up tight round the eyes and emptied
his pockets. Hadn’t he been told in the first hearing, when he
allowed that 8,000 dollars to go out for the briefs, that there would
be things called consultations? And then there was the tomfoolery of
the Five Full Hours and a piece of smarty work called “refreshers,”
and the good Lord knew what and all. And then there was the Appeal,
and all that monkey business over again. And no end to it. And what
was the use, anyway?
But he made this proposition. If they could get it through in the
next term--Session, was it?--he was sick of these fool words--he’d
stay on and they could just bleed him; but--his word!--if they were
going to dawdle he’d be off and make Hell smoke! Mr. King pleaded for
a lump sum to turn round with and do the necessary work. After a good
deal of protest he got it; and having got it, he set to work to pull
all possible strings--and he did the trick.
There was precedent; there was the Art O’Brien case. It wasn’t on all
fours, to be sure; but the Authorities were given to understand that
it would please what are called “Our Cousins,” and the Authorities
are always eager where “Our Cousins” are concerned.
And who are the Authorities, you ask? It is a secret of State. None
may see those awful Beings in the flesh. Let it suffice the humble
reader to be told that we can only know them, like God, by their
effects, and that it is our duty to trust them with the faith of a
little child--as they used to sing at the Follies in better days than
these. So the Authorities worked the machinery, and the Appeal came
on in the House of Lords.
Never was the Political direction of a great action more delicate to
adjust. On the one hand everything should always be done (as every
Patriot agrees) to soothe, not to say dandle, our powerful American
Cousins and Hands across the Sea. Yes. On the other hand what on
earth would happen to the Majestic Fabric of Public Life if any one
even remotely connected with such a world as the Trefusis world were
to get a knock from the Lawyers? Upon the whole, upon balance, it lay
slightly in favor of the Majestic Fabric of Public Life and a shade
of odds against Hands across the Sea. But it was a close thing.
It was an open-mouthed marvel to John K. Petre. The Counsel in
full-bottomed wigs; the five old gentlemen, one of them bald; Lady
Boole sitting on the Woolsack, a squat alert little woman with
grinning eyes, and queer little fin-like movements of the hands which
she finally clasped and held still; the awful majesty of that Chamber
with its leather, its commercial oak, and its metal fittings, all
giving the alien Plaintiff an impression of incalculable age. He
tried to size it up, and failed.
He was moved to reverence for a moment; but very soon to
exasperation, as the heads hidden from him by the full-bottomed
wigs drawled on hour after hour, and one or another of the five old
gentlemen, but particularly the bald one, would jerk in a fusillade
of questions, using words of another world. Then (what was really
intolerable!) they would laugh at some jest of theirs, and the Bar
would discreetly join. It was interminable.
In the midst of it a tall, sad young man lounged in and sat far away
in a dark corner. John K. Petre wondered what secret ritual that
might mean; but the tall sad young man found it boring, and lounged
out again. He had but exercised one of those privileges for which
his father, the glue manufacturer, had paid half a million after the
fiber scandal; and he had never yet got his father’s money’s worth
out of the place.
The hours, the days, went by, and judgment was delivered.
Lady Boole went to the Woolsack and in a beautifully distinct,
silvery articulation spoke, for some hours, words meaningless to
mortal man. But it was one of the great judgments of our time, and
has been the basis of the law ever since. There was a rustle, and a
movement, and the beginnings of a departure.
Mr. John K. Petre, his gaunt powerful figure striding vigorously, for
all its age, by the side of Jacob King, was thundering down to the
central hall. He didn’t understand what had happened.
“Well,” sighed the solicitor, in an unpleasant tone of content, “so
that’s that.”
[Illustration: _Ermyntrude, First (and Last) Viscountess Boole: Lord
Chancellor of England._]
“Which way did it go?” said John K. Petre.
“Oh,” answered Jacob King, shaking his head very slightly and slowly,
“the original judgment was sustained.”
“What d’ye mean?” snapped John K. Petre, stopping short.
“Why, we’ve lost,” said Jacob King simply.
Then it was that John Kosciusko gave tongue to the eternal heavens,
and the central hall rang with such imprecations as startled the
crowd of boobies waiting for their M.P.’s and moved three stalwarts
of Division A to approach with leisured but determined majesty.
The protestor was hustled out, under the stony reproaches of dead
Statesmen, of the Thistle, the Rose, and even the Shamrock. Down past
Pitt and the rest of them, off through the end of Westminster Hall,
and into his motor and through the winter dark throughout, still
shouting vengeance.
But it was all over, and there was nothing left to do but the paying.
* * * * *
_The Times_ had a leader next day upon the interest, the
significance, and the indubitable soundness of the decision. John K.
Petre was already in Paris, and on his way to the warmer ports of
the South, and so by an Italian boat to his home. All thought of our
Island was doubly abhorrent to him now and for ever.
As for Mr. Blagden, he had paid and paid and paid, without the least
regret, delay or protest; and now that all was over, he sat with
Buffy Thompson in the dear library at Harrington settling his plans.
“I’ve made up my mind, Buffy,” he said. “I thought I could have
stayed here till the end of my life. But it needs a poorer man to do
that.”
“What’re you going to do?” said his friend.
“The first thing I’m going to do,” said Peter Blagden, “is to run
down to Southampton and buy a boat well found. I won’t wait. I’ve had
enough. Then I’m going off cruising. Will you come with me?”
“Yes, if you like,” said Buffy.
“We’ll pick up a house somewhere. I favor the Sicilian Coast. We
were there reading, you remember, in our fourth year with Turtle of
Kings’. And I’ll consider where to bank those cursed bonds abroad.”
“You must divide them,” said Buffy.
“I don’t know. Yes, I suppose so. I’ll wait. There’ll have to be some
one to collect. I’m going to work out the easiest way of doing it. I
want it automatic. I want peace.”
“But you’ll come back here,” said Buffy, “won’t you?”
“Yes,” said Peter Blagden, with a terrible regret in his eyes. “I
couldn’t live without that. Yes, I shall come without warning and
go without warning. You see what money does to a man, Buffy,” he
went on bitterly. “I used to wonder why they all seemed to carry on
like secretive, suspicious madmen. But I know now, I shall have to
organize peace. You’ll help me, won’t you?”
“Certainly,” said Buffy. “I’ve nothing else to do.”
Buffy Thompson had done nothing all his life, and was therefore a
very happy man.
“I shall have to do something with that money, Buffy. I shall tie up
something for that miserable young idiot, my cousin Albert’s son.
Thank God, he’s a minor; but it’s his right to come into the place
when I’m dead; and after all, he has the name. But it shall only be
enough to keep it up properly and give him a decent income. A few
thousands too much, and they’d be pulling the old walls about, and
playing the goat with the village. Good God! Buffy, they might put
up new lodges, like the horrors at Ballingham, the other side of
Patcham, since the whisky man bought it: the things we called ‘Little
Versailles,’” and he shuddered. “I shall endow you, Buffy.”
“I shall be very pleased,” said Buffy.
“It’d be only fair; and you’re not only my oldest friend, you’re
my only one, nowadays. And, you know, I’ll keep those rooms in St.
James’s Place. They feel part of me; and I’ll buy the house, if
they’ll sell it. You’d take the rooms below mine, wouldn’t you?”
“There’s nothing against it,” said Buffy.
“Now,” said Peter Blagden, suddenly rising and walking up and down
the room with his hands clasped behind his back and his head bent,
“what’s to be done with the bulk of it? I’ve never yet heard of
anything being done with a lump like that that didn’t bring disaster
to all concerned. How can one give big money and not give a curse
with it? I must think it out.”
* * * * *
And next day in Southampton, looking over one advertised boat and
another, he would suddenly break in with that sentence which became a
refrain of his: “I must think it out.”
And during the weeks of their cruise, on into the Mediterranean
spring, in one passage of talk after another, the phrase would crop
up. It had become his habit; if he had had a larger circle would have
become a jest: “I must think it out ... I must think it out.”
But he is still thinking.
THE END
Transcriber’s Note:
Words may have multiple spelling variations or inconsistent
hyphenation in the text. These have been left unchanged. Dialect,
obsolete and alternative spellings were not changed. The caption
for the illustration on page 218 and related entry in the list
of illustrations may have a typographical error of “Thomas” for
“Thompson.”
Words and phrases in italics are surrounded by underscores, _like
this_. Those in blackletter font are surrounded by equal signs,
=like this=. Final stops and quotation marks missing at the end of
sentences were added. One footnote was moved to follow the paragraph
in which its related anchor occurs.
The following item was changed:
Changed “be” to “he” ... he kept his own counsel ...