the King down Saturday to see her . . . (I won’t have him travelling
third class). It fair brought tears to my eyes. Kept skipping about all
the time, she did, dodging. Thought they were throwing things at her.’
‘It is one strange thing, too,’ said the King. ‘All my family they have
bombs thrown at them, but the Queen, never. My poor Uncle Joseph he blow
all to bits one night at the opera, and my sister she find three bombs
in her bed. But my wife, never. But one day her maid is brushing her
hair before dinner, and she said, “Madam,” she said, “the cook has had
lesson from the cook at the French Legation”—the food at my home was
not what you call _chic_. One day it was mutton hot, then mutton cold,
then the same mutton hot again, but less nicer, not _chic_, you
understand me—“he has had lesson from the French cook,” the maid say,
“and he has made one big bomb as a surprise for your dinner party
to-night for the Swedish Minister.” Then the poor Queen say “Oh”, like
so, and since then always her poor brains has was all no-how.’
The ex-King of Ruritania sighed heavily and lit a cigar.
‘Well,’ said Lottie, brushing aside a tear, ‘what about a little drink?
Here, you over there, your Honour Judge What’s-your-name, how about a
drink for the gentlemen?’
The American, who, like all the listeners, had been profoundly moved by
the ex-King’s recitation, roused himself to bow and say, ‘I shall esteem
it a great honour if His Majesty and yourself, Mrs Crump, and these
other good gentlemen . . .’
‘That’s the way,’ said Lottie. ‘Hi, there, where’s my Fairy Prince?
Powdering hisself again, I suppose. Come here, Nancy, and put away the
beauty cream.’
In came the waiter.
‘Bottle of wine,’ said Lottie, ‘with Judge Thingummy there.’ (Unless
specified in detail, all drinks are champagne in Lottie’s parlour. There
is also a mysterious game played with dice which always ends with
someone giving a bottle of wine to every one in the room, but Lottie has
an equitable soul and she generally sees to it, in making up the bills,
that the richest people pay for everything.)
After the third or fourth bottle of wine Lottie said, ‘Who d’you think
we’ve got dining upstairs to-night? _Prime Minister._’
‘Me, I have never liked Prime Ministers. They talk and talk and then
they talk more. “Sir, you must sign that.” “Sir, you must go here and
there.” “Sir, you must do up that button before you give audience to the
black plenipotentiary from Liberia.” Pah! After the war my people give
me the bird, yes, but they throw my Prime Minister out of the window,
bump right bang on the floor. Ha, ha.’
‘He ain’t alone either,’ said Lottie with a terrific wink.
‘What, Sir James Brown?’ said the Major, shocked in spite of himself. ‘I
don’t believe it.’
‘No, name of Outrage.’
‘He’s not Prime Minister.’
‘Yes, he is. I saw it in the paper.’
‘No, he’s not. He went out of office last week.’
‘Well I never. How they keep changing. I’ve no patience with it. Doge.
Doge. What’s the Prime Minister’s name?’
‘Beg pardon, mum.’
‘What’s the name of the Prime Minister?
‘Not to-night, I don’t think, mum, not as I’ve been informed anyway.’
‘What’s the name of the Prime Minister, you stupid old man?’
‘Oh, I beg your pardon, mum. I didn’t quite hear you. Sir James Brown,
mum, Bart. A very nice gentleman, so I’ve been told. Conservative, I’ve
heard said. Gloucestershire they come from, I think.’
‘There, what did I say?’ said Lottie triumphantly.
‘It is one very extraordinary thing, your British Constitution,’ said
the ex-King of Ruritania. ‘All the time when I was young they taught me
nothing but British Constitution. My tutor had been a master at your
Eton school. And now when I come to England always there is a different
Prime Minister and no one knows which is which.’
‘Oh, sir,’ said the Major, ‘that’s because of the Liberal Party.’
‘Liberals? Yes. We, too, had Liberals. I tell you something now, I had a
gold fountain-pen. My godfather, the good Archduke of Austria, give me
one gold fountain-pen with eagles on him. I loved my gold fountain-pen.’
Tears stood in the King’s eyes. Champagne was a rare luxury to him now.
‘I loved very well my pen with the little eagles. And one day there was
a Liberal Minister. A Count Tampen, one man, Mrs Crump, of exceedingly
evilness. He come to talk to me and he stood at my little escritoire and
he thump and talk too much about somethings I not understand, and when
he go—where was my gold fountain-pen with eagles—gone too.’
‘Poor old King,’ said Lottie. ‘I tell you what. You have another drink.’
‘. . . Esteem it a great honour,’ said the American, ‘if your Majesty
and these gentlemen and Mrs Crump . . .’
‘Doge, tell my little love-bird to come hopping in . . . you there,
Judge wants another bottle of wine.’
‘. . . Should honour it a great esteem . . . esteem it a great honour if
Mrs Majesty and these gentlemen and His Crump . . .’
‘That’s all right, Judge. Another bottle coming.’
‘. . . Should esteem it a great Crump if his honour and these Majesties
and Mrs Gentlemen . . .’
‘Yes, yes, that’s all right, Judge. Don’t let him fall down, boys. Bless
me, how these Americans do drink.’
‘. . . I should Crump it a great Majesty if Mrs Esteem . . .’
And his Honour Judge Skimp of the Federal High Court began to laugh
rather a lot. (It must be remembered in all these people’s favour that
none of them had yet dined.)
Now there was a very bland, natty, moustachioed young man sitting there
who had been drinking away quietly in the corner without talking to
anyone except for an occasional ‘Cheerio’ to Judge Skimp. Suddenly he
got up and said:
‘Bet-you-can’t-do-this.’
He put three halfpennies on the table, moved them about very
deliberately for a bit, and then looked up with an expression of pride.
‘Only touched each halfpenny five times, and changed their positions
twice,’ he said. ‘Do-it-again if you like.’
‘Well, isn’t he a clever boy?’ said Lottie. ‘Wherever did they teach you
that?’
‘Chap-in-a-train showed me,’ he said.
‘It didn’t look very hard,’ said Adam.
‘Just-you-try. Bet-you-anything-you-like you can’t do it.’
‘How much will you bet?’ Lottie loved this kind of thing.
‘Anything-you-like. Five hundred pounds.’
‘Go on,’ said Lottie. ‘You do it. He’s got lots of money.’
‘All right,’ said Adam.
He took the halfpennies and moved them about just as the young man had
done. When he finished he said, ‘How’s that?’
‘Well I’m jiggered,’ said the young man. ‘Never saw anyone do it like
that before. I’ve won a lot of money this week with that trick. Here you
are.’ And he took out a note-case and gave Adam a five-hundred-pound
note. Then he sat down in his corner again.
‘Well,’ said Lottie with approval, ‘that’s sporting. Give the boys a
drink for that.’
So they all had another drink.
Presently the young man stood up again.
‘Toss you double-or-quits,’ he said. ‘Best-out-of-three.’
‘All right,’ said Adam.
They tossed twice and Adam won both times.
‘Well I’m jiggered,’ said the young man, handing over another note.
‘You’re a lucky chap.’
‘He’s got pots of money,’ said Lottie. ‘A thousand pounds is nothing to
him.’
She liked to feel like that about all her guests. Actually in this young
man’s case she was wrong. He happened to have all that money in his
pocket because he had just sold out his few remaining securities to buy
a new motor car. So next day he bought a second-hand motor bicycle
instead.
Adam felt a little dizzy, so he had another drink.
‘D’you mind if I telephone?’ he said.
He rang up Nina Blount.
‘Is that Nina?’
‘Adam, dear, you’re tight already.’
‘How d’you know?’
‘I can hear it. What is it? I’m just going out to dinner.’
‘I just rang up to say that it’s all right about our getting married.
I’ve got a thousand pounds.’
‘Oh good. How?’
‘I’ll tell you when we meet. Where are you dining?’
‘Ritz. Archie. Darling. I _am_ glad about our getting married.’
‘So am I. But don’t let’s get intense about it.’
‘I wasn’t, and anyway you’re tight.’
He went back to the parlour. Miss Runcible had arrived and was standing
in the hall very much dressed up.
‘Who’s that tart?’ asked Lottie.
‘That’s not a tart, Lottie, that’s Agatha Runcible.’
‘Looks like a tart. How do you do, my dear, come in. We’re just thinking
of having a little drink. You know everyone here, of course, don’t you?
That’s the King with the beard. . . . No, dearie, the King of Ruritania.
You didn’t mind my taking you for a tart, did you, dear? You look so
like one, got up like that. Of course, I can see you aren’t now.’
‘_My dear_,’ said Miss Runcible, ‘if you’d seen me this afternoon . . .’
and she began to tell Lottie Crump about the Customs House.
‘What would you do if you suddenly got a thousand pounds?’ Adam asked.
‘A thousand _pound_,’ said the King, his eyes growing dreamy at this
absurd vision. ‘Well, first I should buy a house and a motor car and a
yacht and a new pair of gloves, and then I would start one little
newspaper in my country to say that I must come back and be the King,
and then I don’t know what I do, but I have such fun and grandness
again.’
‘But you can’t do all that with a thousand pounds, you know, sir.’
‘No . . . can’t I not? . . . not with thousand pound. . . . Oh, well,
then I think I buy a gold pen with eagles on him like the Liberals
stole.’
‘I know what I’d do,’ said the Major. ‘I’d put it on a horse.’
‘What horse?’
‘I can tell you a likely outsider for the November Handicap. Horse named
Indian Runner. It’s at twenty to one at present, and the odds are likely
to lengthen. Now if you were to put a thousand on him to win and he won,
why you’d be rich, wouldn’t you?’
‘Yes, so I would. How marvellous. D’you know, I think I’ll do that. It’s
a _very_ good idea. How can I do it?’
‘Just you give me the thousand and I’ll arrange it.’
‘I say, that’s awfully nice of you.’
‘Not at all.’
‘No, really, I think that’s frightfully nice of you. Look, here’s the
money. Have a drink, won’t you?’
‘No, you have one with me.’
‘I said it first.’
‘Let’s both have one, then.’
‘Wait a minute though, I must go and telephone about this.’
He rang up the Ritz and got on to Nina.
‘Darling, you do telephone a lot, don’t you?’
‘Nina, I’ve something very important to say.’
‘Yes, darling.’
‘Nina, have you heard of a horse called Indian Runner?’
‘Yes, I think so. Why?’
‘What sort of a horse is it?’
‘My dear, quite the worst sort of horse. Mary Mouse’s mother owns it.’
‘Not a good horse?’
‘No.’
‘Not likely to win the November Handicap, I mean.’
‘Quite sure not to. I don’t suppose it’ll run even. Why?’
‘I say, Nina, d’you know I don’t think we shall be able to get married
after all.’
‘Why not, my sweet?’
‘You see, I’ve put my thousand pounds on Indian Runner.’
‘That was silly. Can’t you get it back?’
‘I gave it to a Major.’
‘What sort of a Major?’
‘Rather a drunk one. I don’t know his name.’
‘Well, I should try and catch him. I must go back and eat now.
Good-bye.’
But when he got back to Lottie’s parlour the Major was gone.
‘What Major?’ said Lottie, when he asked about him. ‘I never saw a
Major.’
‘The one you introduced me to in the corner.’
‘How d’you know he’s a Major?’
‘You said he was.’
‘My dear boy, I’ve never seen him before. Now I come to think of it, he
did look like a Major, didn’t he? But this sweet little girlie here is
telling me a story. Go on, my dear. I can hardly bear to hear it, it’s
so wicked.’
While Miss Runcible finished her story (which began to sound each time
she told it more and more like the most lubricious kind of anti-Turkish
propaganda) the ex-King of Ruritania told Adam about a Major _he_ had
known, who had come from Prussia to reorganize the Ruritanian Army. He
had disappeared south, taking with him all the mess plate of the Royal
Guard, and the Lord Chamberlain’s wife, and a valuable pair of
candlesticks from the Chapel Royal.
By the time Miss Runcible had finished, Lottie was in a high state of
indignation.
‘The very idea of it,’ she said. ‘The dirty hounds. And I used to know
your poor father, too, before you were born _or_ thought of. I’ll talk
to the Prime Minister about this,’ she said, taking up the telephone.
‘Give me Outrage,’ she said to the exchange boy. ‘He’s up in number
twelve with a Japanese.’
‘Outrage isn’t Prime Minister, Lottie.’
‘Of course he is. Didn’t Doge say so. . . . Hullo, is that Outrage? This
is Lottie. A fine chap you are, I don’t think. Tearing the clothes off
the back of a poor innocent girl.’
Lottie prattled on.
Mr Outrage had finished dinner, and, as a matter of fact, the phrasing
of this accusation was not wholly inappropriate to his mood. It was some
minutes before he began to realize that all this talk was only about
Miss Runcible. By that time Lottie’s flow of invective had come to an
end, but she finished finely.
‘Outrage your name, and Outrage your nature,’ she said, banging down the
receiver. ‘And that’s what I think of _him_. Now how about a little
drink?’
But her party was breaking up. The Major was gone. Judge Skimp was
sleeping, his fine white hair in an ash-tray. Adam and Miss Runcible
were talking about where they would dine. Soon only the King remained.
He gave her his arm with a grace he had acquired many years ago; far
away in his sunny little palace, under a great chandelier which
scattered with stars of light like stones from a broken necklace, a
crimson carpet woven with a pattern of crowned ciphers.
So Lottie and the King went in to dinner together.
Upstairs in No. 12, which is a suite of notable grandeur, Mr Outrage was
sliding back down the path of self-confidence he had so laboriously
climbed. He really would have brought matters to a crisis if it had not
been for that telephone, he told himself, but now the Baroness was
saying she was sure he was busy, must be wanting her to go: would he
order her car.
It was so difficult. For a European the implications of an invitation to
dinner _tête-à-tête_ in a private room at Shepheard’s were definitely
clear. Her acceptance on the first night of his return to England had
thrown him into a flutter of expectation. But all through dinner she had
been so self-possessed, so supremely social. Yet, surely, just before
the telephone rang, surely then, when they left the table and moved to
the fire, there had been _something_ in the atmosphere. But you never
know with Orientals. He clutched his knees and said in a voice which
sounded very extraordinary to him, must she go, it was lovely after a
fortnight, and then, desperately, he had thought of her in Paris such a
lot. (Oh, for words, words! That massed treasury of speech that was his
to squander at will, to send bowling and spinning in golden pieces over
the floor of the House of Commons; that glorious largesse of vocables he
cast far and wide, in ringing handfuls about his constituency!)
The little Baroness Yoshiwara, her golden hands clasped in the lap of
her golden Paquin frock, sat where she had been sent, more puzzled than
Mr Outrage, waiting for orders. What did the clever Englishman want? If
he was busy with his telephone, why did he not send her away; tell her
another time to come: if he wanted to be loved, why did he not tell her
to come over to him? Why did he not pick her out of her red plush chair
and sit her on his knee? Was she, perhaps, looking ugly to-night? She
had thought not. It was so hard to know what these Occidentals wanted.
Then the telephone rang again.
‘Will you hold on a minute? Father Rothschild wants to speak to you,’
said a voice. ‘. . . Is that you, Outrage? Will you be good enough to
come round and see me as soon as you can? There are several things which
I must discuss with you.’
‘Really, Rothschild . . . I don’t see why I should. I have a guest.’
‘The baroness had better return immediately. The waiter who brought you
your coffee has a brother at the Japanese Embassy.’
‘Good God, has he? But why don’t you go and worry Brown? He’s P.M., you
know, not me.’
‘You will be in office to-morrow. . . . As soon as possible, please, at
my usual address.’
‘Oh, all right.’
‘Why, of course.’
_Chapter Four_
At Archie Schwert’s party the fifteenth Marquess of Vanburgh, Earl
Vanburgh de Brendon, Baron Brendon, Lord of the Five Isles and
Hereditary Grand Falconer to the Kingdom of Connaught, said to the
eighth Earl of Balcairn, Viscount Erdinge, Baron Cairn of Balcairn, Red
Knight of Lancaster, Count of the Holy Roman Empire and Chenonceaux
Herald to the Duchy of Aquitaine, ‘Hullo,’ he said. ‘Isn’t this a
repulsive party? What are you going to say about it?’ for they were both
of them, as it happened, gossip writers for the daily papers.
‘I’ve just telephoned my story through,’ said Lord Balcairn. ‘And now
I’m going, thank God.’
‘I can’t think of what to say,’ said Lord Vanburgh. ‘My editress said
yesterday she was tired of seeing the same names over and over
again—and here they are again, all of them. There’s Nina Blount’s
engagement being broken off, but she’s not got any publicity value to
speak of. Agatha Runcible’s usually worth a couple of paragraphs, but
they’re featuring her as a front-page news story to-morrow over this
Customs House business.’
‘I made rather a good thing over Edward Throbbing being in a log shanty
in Canada which he built himself with the help of one Red Indian. I
thought that was fairly good because, you see, I could contrast that
with Miles being dressed as a Red Indian to-night, don’t you think so,
or don’t you?’
‘I say, that’s rather good, may I use it?’
‘Well, you can have the shanty, but the Red Indian’s mine.’
‘Where is he actually?’
‘Heaven knows, Government House at Ottawa, I think.’
‘Who’s that awful-looking woman? I’m sure she’s famous in some way. It’s
not Mrs Melrose Ape, is it? I heard she was coming.’
‘Who?’
‘That one. Making up to Nina.’
‘Good lord, no. She’s no one. Mrs Panrast she’s called now.’
‘She seems to know you.’
‘Yes, I’ve known her all my life. As a matter of fact, she’s my mother.’
‘My dear, how too shaming. D’you mind if I put that in?’
‘I’d sooner you didn’t. The family can’t bear her. She’s been divorced
twice since then, you know.’
‘My dear, of course not, I quite understand.’
Five minutes later he was busy at the telephone dictating his story.
‘. . . Orchid stop, new paragraph. One of the most striking women in the
room was Mrs Panrast—P-A-N-R-A-S-T-, no, T for telephone, you
know—formerly Countess of Balcairn. She dresses with that severely
masculine chic, italics, which American women know so well how to
assume, stop. Her son, comma, the present Earl, comma, was with her,
stop. Lord Balcairn is one of the few young men about town. . . .
‘. . . the Hon. Miles Malpractice was dressed as a Red Indian. He is at
present living in the house of his brother, Lord Throbbing, at which
yesterday’s party was held. His choice of costume was particularly—what
shall I say? hullo, yes—was particularly piquant, italics, since the
latest reports of Lord Throbbing say that he is living in a log shack in
Canada which he built with his own hands, aided by one Red Indian
servant, stop. . . .’
You see, that was the kind of party Archie Schwert’s party was.
Miss Mouse (in a very enterprising frock by Cheruit) sat on a chair with
her eyes popping out of her head. She never _could_ get used to so much
excitement, never. To-night she had brought a little friend with her—a
Miss Brown—because it was so much more fun if one had some one to talk
to. It was too thrilling to see all that dull money her father had
amassed, metamorphosed in this way into so much glitter and noise and so
many bored young faces. Archie Schwert, as he passed, champagne bottle
in hand, paused to say, ‘How are you, Mary darling? Quite all right?’
‘That’s Archie Schwert,’ said Miss Mouse to Miss Brown. ‘Isn’t he too
clever?’
‘Is he?’ said Miss Brown, who would have liked a drink, but didn’t know
quite how to set about it. ‘You _are_ lucky to know such amusing people,
Mary darling. I never see any one.’
‘Wasn’t the invitation clever? Johnnie Hoop wrote it.’
‘Well, yes, I suppose it was. But you know, was it dreadful of me, I
hadn’t heard of any of the names.’[A]
-----
[A] Perhaps it should be explained—there were at this time three sorts
of formal invitation card; there was the nice sensible copybook hand
sort with a name and _At Home_ and a date and time and address; then
there was the sort that came from Chelsea, _Noel and Audrey are having a
little whoopee on Saturday evening: do please come and bring a bottle
too, if you can_; and finally there was the sort that Johnnie Hoop used
to adapt from _Blast_ and Marinetti’s _Futurist Manifesto_. These had
two columns of close print; in one was a list of all the things Johnnie
hated, and in the other all the things he thought he liked. Most of the
parties which Miss Mouse financed had invitations written by Johnnie
Hoop.
-----
‘My dear, of course you have,’ said Miss Mouse, feeling somewhere in her
depths—those unplumbed places in Miss Mouse’s soul—a tiny, most
unaccustomed flicker of superiority; for she had gone through that
invitation word by word in papa’s library some days ago and knew all
about it.
She almost wished in this new mood of exaltation that she had come to
the party in fancy dress. It was called a Savage party, that is to say
that Johnnie Hoop had written on the invitation that they were to come
dressed as savages. Numbers of them had done so; Johnnie himself in a
mask and black gloves represented the Maharanee of Pukkapore, somewhat
to the annoyance of the Maharajah, who happened to drop in. The real
aristocracy, the younger members of those two or three great brewing
families which rule London, had done nothing about it. They had come on
from a dance and stood in a little group by themselves, aloof, amused
but not amusing. Pit-a-pat went the heart of Miss Mouse. How she longed
to tear down her dazzling frock to her hips and dance like a Bacchante
before them all. One day she would surprise them all, thought Miss
Mouse.
There was a famous actor making jokes (but it was not so much what he
said as the way he said it that made the people laugh who did laugh).
‘I’ve come to the party as a wild widower,’ he said. They were that kind
of joke—but, of course, he made a droll face when he said it.
Miss Runcible had changed into Hawaiian costume and was the life and
soul of the evening.
She had heard some one say something about an Independent Labour Party,
and was furious that she had not been asked.
There were two men with a lot of explosive powder taking photographs in
another room. Their flashes and bangs had rather a disquieting effect on
the party, causing a feeling of tension, because every one looked
negligent and said what a bore the papers were, and how _too_ like
Archie to let the photographers come, but most of them as a matter of
fact wanted dreadfully to be photographed and the others were frozen
with unaffected terror that they might be taken unawares and then their
mamas would know where they had been when they said they were at the
Bicesters’ dance, and then there would be a row again, which was so
_exhausting_, if nothing else.
There were Adam and Nina getting rather sentimental.
‘D’you know,’ she said, pulling out a lump, ‘I’d quite made up my mind
that your hair was dark?’ Archie Schwert, pausing with a bottle of
champagne, said, ‘Don’t be so sadistic, Nina.’
‘Go away, hog’s rump,’ said Adam, in Cockney, adding, in softer tones,
‘Are you disappointed?’
‘Well, no, but it’s rather disconcerting getting engaged to some one
with dark hair and finding it’s fair.’
‘Anyway, we aren’t engaged any more, are we—or are we?’
‘I’m not sure that we’re not. How much money _have_ you, Adam?’
‘Literally, none, my dear. Poor Agatha had to pay for dinner as it was,
and God knows what I’m going to do about Lottie Crump’s bill.’
‘Of course, you know—Adam, don’t fall asleep—there’s always papa. I
believe he’s really much richer than he looks. He might give us some
money until your books start paying.’
‘You know, if I wrote a book a month I should be free of that contract
in a year. . . . I hadn’t thought of that before. I don’t at all see why
I shouldn’t do that, do you? . . . or do you?’
‘Of course not, darling. I’ll tell you what. We’ll go down and see papa
to-morrow, shall we?’
‘Yes, that would be divine, darling.’
‘Adam, don’t go to sleep.’
‘Sorry, darling, what I meant was that that would be divine.’
And he went to sleep for a little, with his head in her lap.
‘Pretty as a picture,’ said Archie, in Cockney, passing with a bottle of
champagne in his hand.