THE ONLY MAN IN THE WORLD WHO WOULD BELIEVE HIM
The tobacco took the edge from his desire for food, increased his blood
pressure, and gave rest to his mind.
He sat thinking. The story of "Moths" rose up before his mind and he
fell to wondering how it ended and what became of the beautiful heroine
with whom he had linked Teresa Countess of Rochester, of Zouroff with
whom he had linked Maniloff, of Corréze with whom he had linked himself.
The colour of that story had tinctured all his sea-side experiences. Then
Mrs. Henshaw rose up before his mind. What was she thinking of the
lodger who had flashed through her life and vanished over the back
garden wall? And the interview between her and Hoover--that would have
been well worth seeing. Then the boy on the bicycle and the screaming
invalid rose before him, and that mad rush down the slope to the
esplanade; if those children with spades and buckets had not parted as
they did, if a dog had got in his way, if the slope had ended in a
curve! He amused himself with picturing these possibilities and their
results; and then all at once a drowsiness more delightful than any
dream closed on him and he fell asleep.
It was after dark when he awoke with the remnant of a moon lighting the
field before him. From far away and borne on the wind from the sea came
a faint sound as of a delirious donkey with brass lungs braying at the
moon. It was the sound of a band. The Northbourne brass band playing in
the Cliff Gardens above the moonlit sea. Jones felt to see that his
cigarettes and matches were safe in his pocket, then he started, taking
a line across country, trusting in Providence as a guide.
Sometimes he paused and rested on a gate, listening to the faint and
indeterminate sounds of the night, through which came occasionally the
barking of a distant dog like the beating of a trip hammer.
It was a perfect summer's night, one of those rare nights that England
alone can produce; there were glow worms in the hedges and a scent of
new mown hay in the air. Though the music of the band had been blotted
out by distance, listening intently he caught the faintest suspicion of
a whisper, continuous, and evidently the sound of the sea.
An hour later, that is to say towards eleven o'clock, weary with finding
his way out of fields into fields, into grassy lanes and around farm
house buildings, desperate, and faint from hunger, Jones found a road
and by the road a bungalow with a light in one of the windows.
A dauntingly respectable-looking bungalow in the midst of a well
laid-out garden.
Jones opened the gate and came up the path. He was going to demand food,
offer to pay for it if necessary, and produce gold as an evidence of
good faith.
He came into the verandah, found the front door which was closed, struck
a match, found the bell, pulled and pulled it. There was no response. He
waited a little and then rang again, with a like result. Then he came to
the lighted window.
It was a French window, only half closed, and a half turned lamp showed
a comfortably furnished room and a table laid out for supper.
Two places were set. A cold fowl intact on a dish garnished with parsley
stood side by side with a York ham the worse for wear, a salad, a roll
of cowslip coloured butter, a loaf of home-made bread and a cheese
tucked around with a snow-white napkin made up the rest of the eatables
whilst a decanter of claret shone invitingly by the seat of the carver.
There was nothing wanting, or only the invitation.
The fowl supplied that.
Jones pushed the window open and entered. Half closing it again, he took
his seat at the table placing his hat on the floor beside him. Taking a
sovereign from his pocket, he placed it on the white cloth. Then he fell
to.
You can generally tell a man by his claret, and judging from this claret
the unknown who had supplied the feast must have been a most estimable
man.
A man of understanding and parts, a man not to be deluded by specious
wine lists, a generous warmhearted and full-blooded soul--and here he
was.
A step sounded on the verandah, the window was pushed open and a man of
forty years or so, well-dressed, tall, thin, dark and saturnine stood
before the feaster.
He showed no surprise. Removing his hat he bowed.
Jones half rose.
"Hello," said he confusedly, with his mouth full--then he subsided into
his chair.
"I must apologise for being late," said the tall man, placing his hat on
a chair, rubbing his long hands together and moving to the vacant seat.
"I was unavoidably detained. But I'm glad you did not wait supper."
He took his seat, spread his napkin on his knees, and poured himself out
a glass of claret. His eyes were fixed on the sovereign lying upon the
cloth. He had noted it from the first. Jones picked it up and put it in
his pocket.
"That's right," said the unknown. Then as if in reply to a question: "I
will have a wing, please."
Jones cut a wing of the fowl, placed it in the extra plate which he had
placed on one side of the table and presented it. The other cut himself
some bread, helped himself to salad, salt and pepper and started eating,
absolutely as though nothing unusual had occurred or was occurring.
For half a minute or so neither spoke. Then Jones said:
"Look here," said he, "I want to make some explanations."
"Explanations," said the long man, "what about?"
Jones laughed.
"That sovereign which I put on the table and which I have put back in my
pocket. I must apologise. Had I gone away before you returned that would
have been left behind to show that your room had been entered neither by
a hobo nor a burglar, nor by some cad who had committed an
impertinence--perhaps you will believe that."
The long man bowed.
"But," went on Jones, "by a man who was driven by circumstances to seek
hospitality without an invitation."
The other had suddenly remembered the ham and had risen and was helping
himself, his pince-nez which he wore on a ribbon and evidently only for
reading purposes, dangling against his waistcoat-buttons.
"By circumstance," said he, "that is interesting. Circumstance is the
master dramatist--are you interested in the Drama?"
"Interested!" said Jones. "Why, I _am_ a drama. I reckon I'm the biggest
drama ever written, and that's why I am here to-night."
"Ah," said the other, "this is becoming more interesting still or
promising to become, for I warn you, plainly, that what may appear of
intense interest to the individual is generally of little interest to
the general. Now a man may, let's say, commit some little act that the
thing we call Justice disapproves of, and eluding Justice finds himself
pressed by Circumstance into queer and dramatic positions, those
positions though of momentary and intense interest to the man in
question would be of the vaguest interest to the man in the stalls or
the girls eating buns in the gallery, unless they were connected by that
thread of--what shall we call it--that is the backbone of the thing we
call Story."
"Oh, Justice isn't bothering after me," said Jones--Then vague
recollections began to stir in his mind, that long glabrous face, the
set of that jaw, that forehead, that hair, brushed back.
"Why, you're Mr. Kellerman, aren't you?" said he.
The other bowed.
"Good heavens," said Jones, "I ought to have known you. I've seen your
picture often enough in the States, and your cinema plays--haven't read
your books, for I'm not a reading man--but I've been fair crazy over
your cinema plays."
Kellerman bowed.
"Help yourself to some cheese," said he, "it's good. I get it from
Fortnum and Masons. When I stepped into this room and saw you here, for
the first moment I was going to kick you out, then I thought I'd have
some fun with you and freeze you out. So you're American? You are
welcome. But just tell me this. Why did you come in, and how?"
"I came in because I am being chased," said Jones. "It's not the law, I
reckon I'm an honest citizen--in purpose, anyhow, and as to how I came
in I wanted a crust of bread and rang at your hall door."
"Servants don't sleep here," said Kellerman. "Cook snores, bungalow like
a fiddle for conveying sounds, come here for sleep and rest. They sleep
at a cottage down the road."
"So?" said Jones. "Well, getting no reply I looked in at the window, saw
the supper, and came in."
"That's just the sort of thing that might occur in a photo play," said
Kellerman. "When I saw you, as I stepped in, sitting quietly at supper
the situation struck me at once."
"You call that a situation," said Jones. "It's bald to some of the
situations I have been in for the last God knows how long."
"You interest me," said Kellerman, helping himself to cheese. "You talk
with such entire conviction of the value of your goods."
"How do you mean the value of my goods?"
"Your situations, if you like the term better. Don't you know that good
situations are rarer than diamonds and more valuable? Have you ever read
Pickwick?"
"Yep."
"Then you can guess what I mean. Situations don't occur in real life,
they have to be dug for in the diamond fields of the mind and--"
"Situations don't occur in real life!" said Jones. "Don't they--now, see
here, I've had supper with you and in return for your hospitality I'll
tell you every thing that's happened to me if you'll hear it. I guess
I'll shatter your illusions. I'll give you a sample: I belong to the
London Senior Conservative Club and yet I don't. I have the swellest
house in London yet it doesn't belong to me. I'm worth one million and
eight thousand pounds, yet the other day I had to steal a few
sovereigns, but the law could not touch me for stealing them. I have an
uncle who is a duke yet I am no relation to him. Sounds crazy, doesn't
it, all the same it's fact. I don't mind telling you the whole thing if
you care to hear it. I won't give you the right names because there's a
woman in the case, but I bet I'll lift your hair."
Kellerman did not seem elated.
"I don't mind listening to your story," said he, "on one condition."
"What's that?"
"That you will not be offended if I switch you off if the thing palls
and hand you your hat, for I must tell you that though I came down here
to get sleep, I do most of my sleeping between two in the morning and
noon. I work at night and I had intended working to-night."
"Oh, you can switch me off when you like," said Jones.
Supper being finished, Kellerman fastened the window, and, carrying the
lamp, led the way to a comfortably furnished study. Here he produced
cigars and put a little kettle on a spirit stove to make tea.
Then, sitting opposite to his host, in a comfortable armchair, Jones
began his story.
He had told his infernal story so often that one might have fancied it a
painful effort, even to begin. It was not. He had now an audience in
touch with him. He suppressed names, or rather altered them,
substituting Manchester for Rochester and Birdwood for Birdbrook. The
audience did not care, it recked nothing of titles, it wanted Story--and
it got it.
At about one o'clock the recital was interrupted whilst tea was made, at
two o'clock or a little after the tale finished.
"Well?" said Jones.
Kellerman was leaning back in his chair with eyes half closed, he seemed
calculating something in his head.
"D' you believe me?"
Kellerman opened his eyes.
"Of course I believe you. If you had invented all that you would be
clever enough to know what your invention is worth and not hand it out
to a stranger. But I doubt whether anyone else will believe
you--however, that is your affair--you have given me five reels of the
finest stuff, or at least the material for it, and if I ever care to use
it I will fix you up a contract giving you twenty-five per cent
royalties. But there's one thing you haven't given me--the dénouement.
I'm more than interested in that. I'm not thinking of money, I'm a film
actor at heart and I want to help in the play. Say, may I help?"
"How?"
"Come along with you to the end, give all the assistance in my power--or
even without that just watch the show. I want to see the last act for
I'm blessed if I can imagine it."
"I'd rather not," said Jones. "You might get to know the real names of
the people I'm dealing with, and as there is a woman in the business I
don't feel I ought to give her name away even to you. No. I reckon I'll
pull through alone, but if you'd give me a sofa to sleep on to-night I'd
be grateful. Then I can get away in the morning."
Kellerman did not press the point.
"I'll give you better than a sofa," he said. "There's a spare bed, and
you'd better not start in the morning; give them time to cool down. Then
towards evening you can make a dash. The servants here are all right,
they'll think you are a friend run down from town to see me. I'll
arrange all that."