THE FIRST TURNING TO THE RIGHT
Next day I lunched with The Freak in Hall in the Inner Temple, where I
was introduced by my host to the surrounding company as a "distinguished
engineer, who had dammed the Nile several times and was now prepared to
speak disrespectfully of the Equator."
After luncheon Dicky suggested that I should walk round with him to his
chambers in Bolton Street. It was a murky December afternoon. Christmas
shopping had set in with its usual severity, and visitors from the
country, armed with sharp-cornered parcels, surged tumultuously along
the wrong side of every pavement, while the ordinary citizens of London
trudged resignedly in the gutter.
Dicky, quite undisturbed by the press, continued the conversation.
"Yes, the family are all very fit," he said. "You must come and stay
with us. I shall give myself a week's holiday at Christmas and take you
and Connie down to Shotley Beauchamp, and we will have a pop at
Ethelbert, our pheasant, and discuss the days that are no more."
"Talking of the days that are no more," I began, stepping aside to avoid
a stout lady carrying an inverted baby under one arm and an imperfectly
draped rocking-horse under the other, "what has become--"
"Hilda Beverley--eh?" replied Dicky cheerfully. "I'll tell you all about
her. (Don't apologise, sir, really! After all, I still have an eye
left, and you very nearly lost your umbrella.) She is engaged, if not
married, to an Oxford Don. I believe they are very happy. They go out
and sing an ode to Apollo every morning before breakfast, or something
of that kind."
A wedge of excursionists clove its way between us, and it was with a
voice unconsciously raised that I remarked from the gutter:--
"You had an escape that time, my lad."
"Not at all!" yelled Dicky loyally from the other side of the pavement.
("Mind that kiddie's balloon, old son!) No," he continued, as we
converged once more, "I had a very profitable six months. Hilda took
immense pains with me, and it was n't her fault that I turned out a
failure."
Presently I asked a question which always rose to my lips when I met
Dicky after any considerable interval.
"Have your family any fresh matrimonial irons in the fire for you at
present?" I enquired.
"No," replied my friend, "I rejoice to say they have not. The market is
utterly flat. The Hilda Beverley slump knocked the bottom out of
everything, and for the last half-year I have been living a life of
perfect peace. I am settling down to a contented spinsterhood," he
added, to the obvious surprise and consternation of a grim-looking
female in a blue mackintosh who had become wedged between us. "In a few
years I shall get a tabby cat and a sampler, and retire to end my days
in the close of some quiet cathedral city."
The female in the mackintosh, by dint of using her elbows as levers and
our waistcoats as fulcrums, heaved herself convulsively out of our
company and disappeared in the crowd, probably in search of police
protection. Dicky and I came together again.
"Occasionally," he continued fraternally, "I shall come and stay with
you and Connie, and give you advice as to--Bill! Tiny! My son William!
Look at that girl's face! Did you catch her profile? Did you ever see
anything so lovely in all your life?"
We had reached that spot in the narrowest part of Piccadilly where all
the omnibuses in the world seem to stop to take up passengers. Dicky's
fingers had closed round my left biceps muscle with a grip like iron. I
turned and surveyed him. His cheery good-tempered face was transfigured:
his eyes blazed.
"Look!" he said again, pointing. He was trembling like a nervous
schoolgirl.
But I was just too late. All I saw was a trim lithe young
figure--rather like Connie's, I thought--stepping on to an omnibus.
(When I told the story at home I was at once asked how she was dressed,
but naturally could not say.) I caught sight of a pair of slim square
shoulders, a good deal of pretty brown hair, and finally a pair of neat
black shoes, as their owner deftly mounted to the top of the swaying
vehicle.
"I just missed her face, old man," I replied. "Was she pretty?"
Here I stopped. To address empty air in Piccadilly for any length of
time causes one to incur the unworthy suspicions of the bystanders. It
also causes a crowd to collect, which is an indictable offence.
For I was alone. Afar off, pursuing a motor-omnibus just getting into
its top speed, I beheld the flying figure of my friend. Presently he
overtook the unwieldy object of his pursuit, hopped on board, and
proceeded to climb to the top.
At this moment the omnibus reached Bond Street--the first turning to the
right--swung round the corner, and disappeared.
BOOK THREE
THE RIGHT ROAD
NOTE
The main idea of Book Three was suggested by a very minor episode in the
closing chapters of 'A Man's Man.' The usual acknowledgments are
therefore made to the author of that work.