HUMPHREY COUNTS HIS CHICKENS
Humphrey went from Kencote to Thatchover, where Lady Aldeburgh was for
the time being residing with her numerous family. This did not include
her husband, who preferred to play a Box and Cox game with her in
respect of his two houses; but on his way through London Humphrey
called on his prospective father-in-law to gain formal authorisation of
his suit.
Lord Aldeburgh had fitted himself up a suite of bachelor chambers on
the top floor of his great house in Manchester Square, and had
installed a lift, which no one was allowed to use without his
permission, as its rumbling disturbed him in his chosen occupations.
The chief of these was the collection of portraits of people and
pictures of places, which he cut out of illustrated papers and
magazines and pasted into large albums, indexing them up very
thoroughly as he went on. He was also an ardent attender of plays and
concerts and a persistent but indifferent bridge-player. He had found
a club where the stakes were half a crown a hundred, and there was
always a rubber to be had in the afternoon. So in the winter, which he
spent mostly in London, his days were fully occupied. Early in the
year he went to the Riviera or to Egypt, and about the time that his
family came up to London for the season he installed himself at
Thatchover and enjoyed his garden. In the autumn he went abroad again
or travelled about England. He was not a rich man, but he was an
entirely happy and contented one.
"His lordship is very busy this morning and I don't think he would like
to be disturbed," said the servant who opened the door.
"Well, take up my name and say I won't keep him long," said Humphrey.
"I'll come up with you."
"I don't think his lordship will see you, sir," said the man; but
Humphrey climbed the four flights of stairs after him and waited in the
hall of Lord Aldeburgh's self-contained flat until he was admitted to
the presence.
Lord Aldeburgh was in what he called his work-room. It was a large
light room furnished chiefly with deal tables, each devoted to a
particular pursuit. One had paste-pots and scissors and knives and
rulers and a sheet of glass and a pile of papers and albums. Another
was for the making of jig-saw puzzles, a third for their elucidation, a
fourth was for typewriting; and there was a reduplicating apparatus,
and another table with materials for illuminating. The walls were
covered with rubbings of monumental brasses, all ingeniously overlaid
with colour and gilding. Lord Aldeburgh had hundreds more of these
rubbings rolled up and put away in labelled drawers, and hoped before
he died to have acquired one of every brass in England.
He was standing by his scissors-and-paste table when Humphrey went in,
and there was a slight frown of annoyance on his otherwise amiable
face. He was a big man, clean-shaven except for the rudiments of a
pair of whiskers, and looked like an intelligent family solicitor,
preoccupied with affairs of moment. His appearance had sometimes
caused him to be taken for a serious politician and had caused him some
annoyance. "I'm all for the constitution and that sort of thing," he
was accustomed to say, "and my vote's safe enough when it's wanted.
But I will _not_ take the chair at political meetings. It interferes
with my work. Besides, if they interrupt I don't know what to say."
He had on a voluminous apron with bib and pockets over his tweed suit,
which rather detracted from his habitual air of weight; but paste was
sticky, and Lord Aldeburgh was careful of his clothes, which it was his
custom to wear until they were hardly worth passing on to his valet.
"Always pleased to see you," he said, shaking hands, his habitual
courtesy struggling with his annoyance at being disturbed. "But if you
hadn't come straight up I should have asked you to call again
to-morrow. Friday is a very busy day with me. I have all these papers
to get through, and there are so many of them now that if I don't clear
them up at once the next week's are on me before I know where I am."
"I'm sorry," said Humphrey, looking with interest at the pile of
cut-out pictures on the table and the pile of disjointed papers on the
floor. "But I'm going down to Thatchover this afternoon and I had to
see you first."
"Oh, you're going down to Thatchover!" repeated Lord Aldeburgh. "I
wish I could get down. There's a good deal of replanting being done,
and my gardener is such a fool that if I'm not on the spot something's
bound to go wrong, though I type him out the most detailed
instructions. But I really can't get away at present. I'll tell you
what you might do. Just see whether he's put glass over the Androsaces
and things in the rock-garden, will you? My wife's no good at that
sort of thing; she don't care about it. I don't believe she knows the
difference between a saxifrage and a sedum; and you can't trust to
servants. If you'll do that, like a good fellow, I shall be very much
obliged to you."
"Certainly I will," said Humphrey, taking out his pocketbook. "Better
give me the name of the things."
"I'll type out a list from my garden book and send it down to you,"
said Lord Aldeburgh. "They're all properly labelled, and if you'll
just go through them---- Thanks very much; you've relieved me of an
anxiety. I very nearly threw everything up to go down for a day. But
I'm glad I didn't now. Well, if you don't mind I'll get on with my
work now that's settled."
He held out his hand with an engaging smile, but Humphrey said, "I
haven't told you what I came about yet. I want to marry Susan. She's
game, and Lady Aldeburgh doesn't object. But I wanted to know what you
thought about it before we went ahead."
A frown of perplexity showed itself on Lord Aldeburgh's face. "Marry
Susan!" he repeated. "Well, I don't see any objection, if you think
she's old enough. But----"
"She's twenty-four," interpolated Humphrey.
"Twenty-four! Is she really? Well, it shows what I've always said,
that time flies quicker than you think it does. Twenty-four! My
goodness! Well, then, of course she's old enough, and I rather wonder
my wife hasn't seen to it before. And what I was going to say was that
my wife looks after all that sort of thing, and I'm much too busy a man
to be worried about details. If I give my consent, which you're quite
right in coming to ask for, I hope I shan't have any more bother about
it. That's all I meant."
"I don't see why you should be bothered," said Humphrey. "There'll be
questions of settlements, I suppose. But the lawyers will fix up all
that."
"Oh, my goodness, yes!" said Lord Aldeburgh. "Thank heaven all that
sort of thing was fixed up when I was married myself. I don't want
ever to go through it again. It was sign, sign, sign from morning to
night. I've forgotten what the girls were to have when they married,
but I know it wasn't much, and I'm not in a position to increase it.
The rock-garden cost me an infernal lot of money last year, and I'm
going to enlarge it. I suppose you don't know where I can get good
blocks of limestone fairly cheap, do you? I don't care much about the
sandstone I've got. At least, I don't want any more of it."
"No, I don't know," said Humphrey. "You had better give me the name of
your solicitors, and we can get on to them. I suppose I can settle all
the other points with Lady Aldeburgh."
"Oh, my goodness, yes!" said Lord Aldeburgh. "I'm much too busy to
attend to it. Look here, I'll show you an interesting thing. It just
proves what we were talking about just now, how time flies. You see
this picture of Miss Enid Brown, of Laurel Lodge, Reigate, who is going
to marry this fellow, Mr. Bertie Pearson, of the Cromwell Road?"
"Yes, I see," said Humphrey. "I don't particularly envy Mr. Bertie
Pearson."
"Oh, I think she's a very nice-looking girl," said Lord Aldeburgh.
"But that isn't the point. Now twenty-two years ago, when I first
began to make my collection, one of the first photographs I got was of
a Mr. Horace Brown, of Petersfield House, Reigate, who married--here he
is--I was just looking it up when you came in--see?--Miss Mary Carter,
of Croydon--turn to the C book for her--it's all carefully
cross-indexed--here she is. Now you've only got to compare these two
faces--Miss Enid Brown and Mrs. Horace Brown--Miss Carter that
was--taking Reigate into consideration--to make it quite plain that
they are mother and daughter. You see it at once, don't you?"
"Yes," said Humphrey. "Same silly sort of simper."
"Oh, well, I don't know about that. But that isn't the point. The
point is that this particular work of mine, which I just took up
five-and-twenty years or so ago to amuse myself with, is developing
into something that will be of the greatest importance to the nation by
and by. When I die I've a jolly good mind to leave it to the British
Museum; or if I could get some fellow to leave some money and have it
carried on--why, there's no telling what it wouldn't come to. Here
you're beginning to have an illustrated register of every single soul
in the country that amounts to anything. If you're good enough to have
your portrait in some paper you're good enough to go down to posterity
in my collection. I tell you, it's monumental. Already I've got
thousands and thousands of portraits--not only of people like ourselves
that you can look up in a book, but of thousands of others--quite
respectable people--and at all stages. Why, if I were to begin to
publish the whole thing in parts I should make a fortune, and I've a
jolly good mind to see some publisher and get it done. There isn't a
soul whose name was represented who wouldn't buy it. I can tell you
it's turning into a jolly big thing."
"Well, it is rather interesting," said Humphrey. "What have you got
about the Clintons?"
"Oh, of course, I've got a separate book about the Clintons. Like to
see it? You'll find some pictures of your little lot there."
"Well, if I may, some other time," said Humphrey. "My train goes in
half an hour, and I must be getting off. Then you've no objection to
my urging my suit? I believe that's the correct expression."
"Not a bit in the world, my dear fellow," replied Lord Aldeburgh. "I'm
not much of a family man. I'm too busy. But from what I've seen of
her I should say Susan would make you a good wife, and I'm sure you'll
make her a good husband. So I wish you every sort of good luck. And
now I must get to work again."
So, blessed with Lord Aldeburgh's approval, Humphrey went down to
Thatchover, and found a party of considerable size assembled there, all
bent on extracting as much amusement as possible out of the passing
hours.
He arrived at dusk and found the family and its guests assembled in the
big hall of the house. The men had been shooting, the women playing
bridge, for the weather was too raw for them to care about leaving the
warmth of the house. Humphrey received a somewhat vociferous welcome,
for there was no one in the house with whom he was not on terms of
intimacy, and felt cheered by the warmth of social intercourse into
which he was plunged. "This really is rather jolly," he said to Susan
Clinton, with whom he found himself presently sitting a little apart
from the noisy central group. "I don't know that I ever want anything
better than a big house in the country and to have it filled with jolly
people."
"I shouldn't like to live in the country all the year round," said
Susan. "You'd soon get out of touch."
"Oh, lor', yes," said Humphrey. "I didn't mean that. Look at my
people at Kencote. It's jolly enough there every now and then in the
winter when there's something to do, although it isn't exactly gay.
But to settle down there year in and year out for ever--I'd just as
soon emigrate. And that's what I want to talk to you about. Things
are going all right for us. We shall have enough to get along on. I
tell you, I'm in high favour. But the idea is that we shall set up in
the dower-house, and----"
"Oh, but that will be delightful!" Susan interrupted him. "With all
those jolly old things! And the presents we shall have! Humphrey, how
ripping! And there's plenty of room to have people there. If we can
afford to do things well----"
"Yes, that'll be all right," said Humphrey. "But the idea is that we
shall cut all the rest. I'm to give up my job, which I don't care
about either one way or the other, except that it keeps me about where
I want to be, and I'm to be sort of head bailiff. That's the scheme,
as it's shaping itself out. Question is whether it's good enough."
"Do you mean we shouldn't be allowed to go to London at all?"
"Oh, allowed! We could go up for a day or two now and again--though if
I know my respected parent there would be black looks even at that, if
we did it too often--but as for anything more than that---- No, it's
meant and it's intended to mean that I join the governor in business.
He's really, if you look at it properly, a farmer in a big way, and
he's not very good at it, though he thinks he is. It's where I come in
over Dick that he must have somebody to help him out of the muddles he
makes, and that will be a pretty stiff job, and there won't be much
running away from it."
"Then you mean we can't even pay visits?"
"Precious few of 'em. We shall be expected to stay at home and lead
the domestic life. Are we cut out for it, Susan?"
She smiled at him, and slipped her hand into his. "I shan't mind very
much, Humphrey," she said.
Humphrey returned her pressure. "Good girl!" he said. "I don't know
that I shall either for a few years. But we'd better look it all in
the face. We shall feel cut off, there's no doubt of it. But there's
this to be said, it won't last for ever. If we're submissive
now--well, in the long run we shall come off all right. Question is,
can you make up your mind to stand it for as long as may be necessary?'
"I can if you can," said Susan.
"Oh, I shall be better off than you. I'm afraid there's no doubt
you'll be dull at times. We'll have our own friends to stay with us,
but there won't be much going on at home to enliven us. It isn't like
other big houses in the country. Still, there are the kids. They're
growing up, and they're pretty bright. You ought to get some fun out
of them, and it'll be a godsend to them to have somebody like you about
the place."
"I'm not certain that they care for me much," said Susan; "and I'm a
little afraid of them. In fact, I'm rather afraid of all your family,
Humphrey. Do you think Mrs. Clinton likes me?"
"Oh, of course she does," said Humphrey. "You'll get on well with the
whole bunch of them. And as for the governor, you've only got to
flatter him a bit and avoid treading on his corns, and you can live in
his pocket--if you want to. I say, Susan, excuse my asking, but is
your own papa all there?"
Susan laughed. "He has never grown up. That's all," she said. "But
his tastes are harmless enough. Think what it would be if he had a
taste for running after--well--er--you know--like Clinton. He doesn't
really spend much money. There are worse fathers."
Humphrey digested this point of view. "Well, I think I would rather
have mine," he said, "tiresome as he can be, and is, sometimes. Anyhow
he's going to do the right thing by us. I needn't go into details, but
you'll be able to have some pretty frocks, old girl; and you may find
yourself in a big house before you've done, yet."
Their conversation was interrupted by the breaking up of the tea-party
and the setting up of the bridge tables. Bridge was the serious
pursuit at Thatchover, and it was only, so to speak, at off times that
the household indulged in their tastes for romps. There was never any
paltering with the valuable hours between five o'clock and eight
o'clock in the evening, and there were few of the present party who
showed any inclination to shirk their duty, even to the extent of
sitting out a rubber. But as the total number of players was divisible
by two, but not by four, two of them were obliged to sit out, and Lady
Aldeburgh suggested to Humphrey that he and she should have a little
talk and cut in later. "I hate doing it," she said, "because there's a
certain sense of satisfaction in sitting down to begin, which you miss
if you wait till everything is in full swing. Still, it would look
well for me to appear self-sacrificing, and if you don't mind we'll get
our little chat over now, for I'm dying to hear what you've managed to
fix up."
Humphrey, sitting with her in a corner by the fire away from the green
tables, put her in possession of the state of affairs. "There'll be at
least fifteen hundred a year, and probably more," he concluded, "and
that ought to make it good enough."
"If that were all, it wouldn't be good enough," said Lady Aldeburgh
decisively. "You and Susan couldn't live on fifteen hundred a year or
anything like it. I shouldn't consider it for a moment."
"Oh yes, you would," said Humphrey calmly. "Still, it isn't all.
We're to have a house, for one thing--a house more than half furnished,
and there'll be all sorts of perquisites. I'm to go in for the land
agency business; and by and by, if I behave myself, as I mean to, and
Susan behaves herself, as _she_ means to do, we shall be very well off."
"What on earth are you talking about?" enquired Lady Aldeburgh,
thoroughly bewildered. "The land agency business----'
"We are to live at the dower-house at Kencote," said Humphrey. "I
don't think you saw it, but it's a topping little house. And I'm to
help the governor look after things. That's the scheme."
"My _dear_ Humphrey! What absolute nonsense!" exclaimed Lady
Aldeburgh. "You and Susan burying yourselves in the country! Why,
you'd be bored stiff in a week, and you'd get sick to death of one
another in a month. You can't seriously consider such a ridiculous
scheme."
"Why ridiculous?" enquired Humphrey. "We're in the country at this
moment, and we're not bored stiff--far from it."
"That's entirely different, a big house, with crowds of people whenever
you want them--and in winter, when there's something for the men to do.
To settle down for good! and at a place like Kencote! Well, I don't
want to be rude to your people, but I ask you, are they alive or dead?"
Humphrey flushed. "My people are all right," he said, keeping his
voice level. "And Susan will get on with them. You needn't worry
yourself about that side of the question."
"I can't help it if you are angry with me," said Lady Aldeburgh, with a
slight recurrence to her infantile manner. "I say what I think, and
although I have the greatest possible respect for your people, it would
drive me crazy to live in the way they do. And I'm not going to let
Susan be killed and buried and made miserable for life."
"All right," said Humphrey. "Then I'd better pack up and clear off."
"Oh, don't be silly. If you can screw a couple of thousand a year out
of your father, with the little bit that Susan will have, which will
pay for her frocks, you could take a nice little flat and be fairly
comfortable. I shouldn't mind your waiting for the rest to come later."
"If I do that, the rest won't come later; it won't come at all. Dick
has kicked over the traces, and I'm to take his place--to a certain
extent. I don't want to think too much about all that, but you force
me to say it. You understand the situation well enough if you'd give
your mind to it. I don't want to bury myself in the country all the
year round any more than you would; but, hang it! isn't it worth making
some sacrifice for a time? Besides, it's such nonsense to talk as if
living in the country, and living comfortably too, within three hours
of London, were the same thing as going off to Siberia or somewhere.
Anyhow, we're going to live at Kencote. I'm game and Susan's game. We
don't ask you to come and live with us."
"Now you're positively insulting," said Lady Aldeburgh, entirely
recovering her good-humour, for this was the way she liked to be
treated by good-looking young men. It implied that she appeared as
young as she felt. "Of course if you have made up your mind to hoe
turnips for the rest of your life, you naturally wouldn't expect me to
come and hoe them with you, and I shouldn't come if you did. The
question is, will Susan be happy hoeing turnips? That's what I have to
look at."
"I dare say you will be pleased to do an occasional week-end's hoeing,"
replied Humphrey. "And as for Susan, I've already told you she's ready
to hoe as long as is necessary. Please don't upset her about it. We
are going to eat our bread and butter quite contentedly for a few
years, and we shall get the jam by and by. If you put your oar in and
try and upset things, we shan't get nearly so much bread and butter,
and we shall miss the jam altogether. After all, it's a question for
us to decide; and we've already decided. We're going to be a good
little boy and girl, and if all goes well, by and by we shall be little
county magnates. I believe that's the proper expression."
"What is your father going to do?" asked Lady Aldeburgh. "Let's put it
quite plainly, as we are talking confidentially. Is he going to make
an eldest son of you? Is Dick finally out of the way? I know he's
going to marry Virginia Dubec in spite of everything. Does your father
still refuse to see him--or to see her, which is more to the point, for
I'm not a cat like some women, and I'll say this, that I believe if he
were to see her she would get round him; for she's a beautiful creature
and could turn any man round her little finger if she cared to try."
"She won't have a chance of trying with him," replied Humphrey. "You
may make your mind easy as to that. As for Dick, I suppose he's seeing
him at this moment. He was going down to Kencote this afternoon."
"What! Oh, then they've made it up?"
"No, they haven't. Neither side budges. Dick is going to marry
Virginia, as you say, and Dick's father has sworn to leave all he can
away from him if he does. Both of them will keep their word, for
they're both as obstinate as the devil. But they are going to patch up
a sort of peace, and I'm not altogether sorry. Dick hasn't behaved
particularly well to me, and I should be a humbug if I pretended that I
wanted him to get back what's now coming my way. But I don't want him
to feel left out in the cold altogether."
"How very sweet and forgiving! Are you sure that he won't persuade
your father to change his mind?"
"He won't try."
"How do you know that?"
"Because I know Dick."
"I suppose you wired to say you were coming down here because you
didn't want to meet him?"
"I suppose I did. We might have had a row. I haven't done anything to
persuade the governor to alter his will, as he's going to do, but it's
going to be altered in my favour, and Dick might not feel inclined to
do me justice over the matter. I don't want a row with him. We've
been fairly good pals so far, and I don't want to be open enemies with
him. Besides, Kencote will belong to him some day, and----"
"Well, when it does you won't be there any longer."
"Yes, I shall. I'm to have Partisham--that's pretty well settled.
There would be an explosion of wrath and surprise if I intimated that I
knew that and was counting on it; but you can see the governor's brain
working all the time. He lets everything out, and he's let out that.
It's only a question of one farm at present. I may get it with the
rest, or it may go to Walter, for there's an old manor-house on it, and
he thinks it would do for Walter to do up and live in when he gets
tired of doctoring. He can't quite make up his mind, but it's only a
hundred and fifty acres out of about two thousand, and it doesn't much
matter one way or the other."
"Well, you seem pretty sure about it. I hope you may not be making a
mistake. If I were Dick I should certainly have a try at getting back
what he's lost. Where is this place you're going to have?"
"The house is about four miles from Kencote, and the property adjoins.
My great-grandfather bought it with money his brother left him, and
some of it is good building land on the outskirts of Bathgate. I've
never been inside the house; it's let to a doctor and used as a private
lunatic asylum."
"That's pleasant!"
"It's a fine house, and the property is rising in value every year. I
shall be a richer man than Dick before I've done."
"How mercenary you are! Well, I suppose it's all right, as you say so,
and I must give my consent. Oh, look, there's a table up. Come on! I
feel as if I'm going to win stacks."