THE CONFOUNDED HOTEL CLERK
“Whoop!” shouted the American, joyously. “Didn’t I tell you things were
going to hum? You stand on me! Steindal, Constantine and Co. haven’t a
dog’s chance!”
I pointed out that such unseemly behavior at the door of a busy hotel
in the High was likely to cause unpleasant comment, if, indeed, it did
not excite proctorial wrath, and he retorted that a freeborn Yankee
was entitled to unfurl the Stars and Stripes on all such occasions as
seemed personally fitting. In fact, we both were very elated by the
really remarkable confirmation of Karl’s story given by Mrs. Grier’s
telegram, and we exhibited our emotions after the manner of our
respective kith.
Though we Anglo-Saxons, the Siamese twins of the Atlantic, are so
closely bound together by the ties of speech and history, though the
best blood of Britain has been generously given to the building up of
the great nation of the west, there are differences of temperament,
probably induced by climate, which divide us into well-marked
varieties of the human family. Thus, while Hooper did not hesitate to
express his wordy delight, and with animated face and lively movement
exhibit the dynamic energy called into play by Karl’s announcement, I
strove to stiffen myself into a passable representation of a wooden
image. I suppose we Britons do that sort of thing because we think that
sort of thing is the correct thing, don’chyno.
You have but to cross the Atlantic a few times to obtain clear
mind-pictures of the expansive Jonathan and the bovine Bull. An
American liner puts off from Pier 14 in the Hudson River and swings
slowly in the stream until her nose points towards the Statue of
Liberty. Look back at the wharf banked high with people, and see the
innumerable little flags, the countless handkerchiefs, signalling
frantic farewells! That is enthusiasm! If Brown and his wife set
forth for Europe, Smith, Jones, and Robinson and their respective
wives gather on the steamer to see the Browns off. There is a lot of
excitement, flowers, and flag-wagging--perhaps some furtive tears--but,
anyhow, an honest display of unbridled human nature. Then see that
same vessel edging away from Southampton quay, and note the guarded
leave-taking of those rare individuals who depart so greatly from
British traditions as to speed their voyaging friends as far as the
ship’s gangway. The last time I was there, a dozen of us, cowering
behind rain-swept railway trucks, had journeyed from London to see
off a whole ship’s company. Do you fancy we flagged anybody, or
waved handkerchiefs, or yelled cheery messages? Not we! We watched
the steamer disappearing into a squall and then eyed each other
suspiciously, if not with active hostility; while some of us negotiated
for the only available cab.
Yet it is all gammon, this seeming stoicism, a smug respectability
which “goes well,” as the milliners say, with a silk hat and an
umbrella. Indeed, if for “climate” you read “umbrella,” you have
what Max Müller would call the “root concept” of my philosophy. John
adapts his garments to suit his uncertain weather, and he carries this
covering-up method into all the affairs of life.
Certain explanations to the authorities procured permission for Karl
to go to London. I accompanied him in the time-honored rôle of _amicus
curiæ_, but Hooper, of his own accord, said it would be more seemly if
he were held in reserve as one who could offer confirmatory evidence if
it were required.
Three hours after the receipt of Mrs. Grier’s telegram we were at the
inquiry office of the Pall Mall Hotel. It was then 6 P.M.
“The _Merlin_ is not in yet,” said the hotel clerk, in the curt,
off-hand manner which the Londoner is beginning to learn from his
American fellow-official.
“Not in yet!” I gasped. “Why, man, we received a message hours ago at
Oxford concerning people on board.”
“That is more than we have done.”
He made pretence to be exceedingly busy with a ledger; but prolonged
ill-usage by ticket examiners, platform inspectors, and the rest of the
Jacks in office who seldom know much about their duties, has hardened
me.
“Are you so overworked that you cannot attend to me, or shall I ask Mr.
Schmidt’s assistance?” I demanded.
Now here I have given you a most useful tip. Always ascertain the name
of the manager of the hotel. The prompt, familiar reference to the
august “Schmidt”--whom I did not know--warned the clerk that here might
be some person of importance, worthy to be on terms of intimacy with
the great gun of the Pall Mall Hotel. He groveled, closing the ledger
carefully lest the bang should annoy me further.
“I beg your pardon, sir. I hope you did not misunderstand me,” he
said, smiling--oh, how I hate that false smirk--“the _Merlin_ was
signaled from Queenstown yesterday, but she has not reached Liverpool.
We place a notice in the vestibule the moment we have any news, and the
telegram itself states--what time--the special--Excuse me, sir, but
your friend--”
Karl was standing by my side during the brief colloquy with the clerk.
I saw the pert Londoner’s eyes droop. His lips parted and whitened, his
voice faltered, his demeanor was that of Richard III on the eve of the
battle of Bosworth Field. I half expected to hear him yelp:
My conscience hath a thousand several tongues,
And every tongue brings in a several tale,
And every tale condemns me for a villain.
I gazed anxiously at my companion, and became partly aware of what
had happened. Karl had magnetized the clerk! In another instant the
dapper little man would be crawling over the counter, looking up with
uncomprehending terror at the Jove-like being who bent those lightning
shafts on him.
I caught Karl by the arm. Instantly the concentrated energy which had
shrunk the pupils of his eyes to pin-points relaxed, the relieved
motor and sensory nerves returned to their ordinary functions, and he
looked benignantly at the quivering clerk, whom he had not seen at all
during the transient oblivion of his surroundings.
“It is all right,” he said, turning towards me. “A railway porter has
just told Maggie that the train will leave the landing-stage station in
twenty minutes. In fact, at this moment she is talking to Steindal’s
representative, a man named Bocci. And, do you know, from what she said
I imagine--”
I caught the clerk listening now with a rabbit-eared amazement that
nearly equaled his previous alarm. I was sorry for him. He must be in
a state of agitation somewhat akin to the flutterings of a sparrow
rescued from the deadly fascination of a snake.
So I laughed, with the best assumption of the actor’s art of which I
was capable.
“Let him off, Karl!” I cried. “The next time we seek information I am
sure he will give it to us readily.”
Karl took my cue and grinned in concert. I led him away to a lounge,
but, ever and anon, the clerk watched us from the corner of his eye,
and I chortled to see him comparing the clock with the time stated on a
telegram which reached him a few minutes later, wherein the departure
of the _Merlin_ special was announced in exact concord with Karl’s
statement.
Meanwhile I learnt what had taken place. No sooner had Grier heard
the unexpected fact of the steamer’s non-arrival than he, quite
carelessly, “sent out,” as he phrased it, to find Maggie and the ship.
He experienced no difficulty this time. He saw the girl and her mother
standing in a huge shed and conversing with a foreign-looking person.
Through several doors he distinguished the brass-rimmed port-holes
and white rails of a large vessel, and he heard a hum of voices, the
clanking of cranes, and the tramping of many feet.
“From what I gathered,” he said, “Signor Bocci was surprised, even
annoyed, to learn that Miss Hutchinson was not prepared to accept at
once the contract which Steindal offered. ‘No artiste has ever obtained
more favorable terms from my principal,’ he told her. ‘Is it that
you demand more money, or more frequent appearances?’ ‘Oh, no,’ said
Maggie, and she has such a nice, sweet voice; ‘I am, indeed, greatly
obliged to Mr. Steindal, and to you, signor, for having troubled to
come to Liverpool. But I really must ask you to let arrangements stand
in abeyance until my mother and I meet you in London.’ ‘But what am
I to cable to Steindal?’ he asked. ‘Why cable this evening?’ she
persisted. ‘Am I such an important little person that the world is
waiting breathlessly for my decision?’ That is all I heard while I was
paralyzing the clerk.”
“How was Miss Hutchinson dressed?”
“In a navy blue costume trimmed with black braid. She wore a white
yachting cap and white gloves. Mrs. Hutchinson was dressed in black,
with a sort of black lace mantle and a black bonnet of lace and
feathers.”
“And Bocci--what is _he_ like?”
“An ordinary, under-sized, pasty-faced Italian, fiercely outlined with
black hair, eyebrows, and moustache.”
I went to the bureau again. The inquiry clerk was apprehensive, but I
only wanted the London Directory. And therein I hunted up the entry:
“Bocci, Giovanni, concert agent,” with a number in a Strand side-street.
“How did you know that Steindal’s London representative was named
Bocci?” I asked Karl.
“Oh, I forgot to tell you that Miss Hutchinson held his card in her
hand.”
He rattled off “Signor Giovanni Bocci,” and the rest of the copperplate
legend! I wonder what the inquiry clerk would have thought had he
overheard the whole of Karl’s story. Afterwards, when steeled to the
marvel of it all, I did not hesitate to prod the dull wits of the heavy
tribe which Emerson describes as “only understanding pitch-forks and
the cry of ‘Fire!’” But that evening I forebore, lest we should be
turned out of the hotel.
Indeed, that monstrous British dread of a “scene” induced me to beseech
Karl not to go wandering off through space until the conditions were
more private. We had four hours to spare, so we dined, strolled to
Hyde Park and back, and finally awaited in the hotel vestibule the
advent of the two ladies. It was the height of the London season. One
of the many fine days which the world’s capital manages to smuggle in
between layers of fog and sheeted storm was drawing to a close. And how
majestic, how radiantly calm, is London at such an hour! The purple
haze of evening glorifies the harsh lines of myriad roofs; the long
rows of twinkling lights might have been designed by Whistler; beneath
the opulent robe of the great city one can hear its tremendous heart
beating peacefully.
It was Grier’s first adult experience of London, and I was certain
that it affected him powerfully. He told me later that he was tempted
many times to expand those awesome caverns of his brain, and seek to
understand with their seemingly immeasurable receptive capacity the
giant influences at work amidst that vast aggregation of humanity.
But he resisted successfully, feeling somewhat awed, even a little
frightened, by the belief that he alone, among the passing thousands,
was endowed with almost omniscient knowledge of the actions and
utterances of his fellow-men. Not of their thoughts. There was
something of that to come--a grand expansion of that sympathetic
transmission of ideas vaguely known to men and animals since the Spirit
moved over the face of the waters, and the heavens and the earth and
all the host of them were designed. But not yet. The most sceptical
of scientists could not accuse Karl of flights of imagination, for
he recorded naught save positive facts of contemporary occurrence.
That, to me, was the most startling feature of his sixth sense. There
scarcely exists a man or woman of any real intelligence who has not, at
one time or another, communicated the unspoken thought to another at
a distance. Truly, this comparatively general attribute of mankind is
a far more stupendous and less comprehensible achievement than Karl’s
telegnomy. But, as Hooper said about the wheel and the use of fire, we
soon become surfeited with wonders.
The hands of the great clock over the fireplace crept slowly past 11.30
P.M., the hour named in the telegram from the shipping company as that
at which the _Merlin_ passengers would reach Euston. Thence, with the
best intentions, otherwise a fast hansom, the Hutchinson ladies could
not arrive at the hotel much before midnight.
Nevertheless, at a quarter to twelve, Grier showed some signs of
restlessness. I have often thought that these physical indications
of the psychic force pent up in certain tiny pyramidal cells situate
within the cortex of the gray matter of the brain greatly resembled
the throbbings and strainings and extraordinarily minute movements of
a boiler getting up steam. Your inch-thick, riveted cylinder may be
bolted to iron beams imbedded in granite-like concrete, yet the living
power of steam makes its presence felt long ere the engineer bids the
impatient giant get to work.
And it was so now with Karl. He could not sit still. The vestibule
was full of people waiting to meet the _Merlin_ contingent--oh, no,
not of English people, but of Americans, anxious to welcome other
Americans--yet Karl and I, amidst all the lively throng, enlisted the
sustained attention of the inquiry clerk.
Once, after catching his eye, an impulse of sheer devilment sent me to
greet Mr. Schmidt most warmly. The manager, of course, being an affable
man who liked to stand on pleasant terms with his patrons, was quite
amenable to that kind of polite attention. We entered into a lively
conversation for a minute or two, and I kept darting expressive glances
towards the clerk.
I am sure the poor fellow quaked. Quitting Mr. Schmidt, I rejoined
Karl, and the inquiry clerk ran across the vestibule. He was most
anxious now to be civil.
“I have just heard of a telephone message from Euston,” he said to me.
“There are ninety passengers for this hotel, and they will be here in a
few minutes.”
“The first station omnibus is just coming round the corner,” said Karl,
quietly. “Maggie and her mother are in the next one, not in a hansom.”
Now, from where we stood, there was no visible vehicle of the type
mentioned. The clerk looked puzzled, as well he might, thinking my
companion had commented on his statement. I knew what had happened.
During my momentary talk with Schmidt, Karl had taken a peep beyond.
Sure enough, almost at once a London and North Western Railway ’bus
deposited the first consignment of _Merlin_ folk at the hotel
entrance. Out of the next conveyance stepped two ladies whom I
recognized, from the description supplied by Karl, as Mrs. Hutchinson
and her daughter.
I must confess that the sight of them gave me a shock, well prepared
though I was for their appearance. Yet it is one thing to expect a
certain experience, but quite another to undergo it--as, to wit, being
ready for the sensation of a needle-bath and receiving the impact of
the icy jets of water on your bare skin.
It was so exceedingly strange to see the mother and daughter,
unconscious objects of experiments of epoch-marking importance, quietly
appearing at the door of a London hotel under ordinary conditions open
to any of the well-dressed, unheeding crowd within or the hurrying
multitude without.
They passed through the revolving doors, and looked about them.
Karl stepped forward, somewhat shyly, though there was an instant
charm in his smiling disingenuousness. You see, he fancied he had to
introduce himself, being now a tall man in place of the little boy Mrs.
Hutchinson had last seen, and whom Maggie must wholly fail to remember.
So far as mama was concerned, be sure she could not distinguish Grier,
at first glance, from any other man present.
But Maggie saw him instantly. She became very pale, and her eyes,
extremely pretty eyes they were (and are), dilated.
“Oh, mother!” she cried aloud. “There he is!”
So curiously perturbed was she, so timid and childlike in her words and
attitude, that Grier’s conventional welcome died away in his throat.
Yet he held out his hand, and the girl, stepping forward impulsively,
caught it in both of hers.
But her eyes filled with tears, and the corners of her mouth quivered,
and not another word could she utter. The scene was unexpected,
embarrassing, and, of course, dreadfully un-English. And what did it
all signify?