Christmas Eve! I woke this morning with a new fund of spirits—I’m glad
to say. I went off into the city to see the crowds. Mr. Bang accompanied
me. He said he had a business engagement. We parted in the business
section.
I know all the streets now, or most of them, and can find my way about
nicely. I did not meet any of my friends, or anybody I knew. While
pleasant and interesting, it was an uneventful morning.
Shortly after my return Mr. Bang arrived carrying a bundle which proved
to contain a quantity of evergreen wreathing. This he dumped on the
drawing-room floor, remarking: “You may help me decorate this afternoon,
Little Partner.”
After lunch we set to work, festooning the chandeliers and picture
frames, and soon I became absorbed in the effort—and in Mr. Bang’s
conversation. For the time being I forgot society and found myself
laughing quite merrily. In fact, I confess I was thoroughly happy.
Mr. Bang, like Uncle, has a tendency to run off into long, confidential
dissertations. He began to talk about himself, and I was interested. I
will try and reproduce what he said in his own words. He is rather fond
of long words, which sometimes are ponderous.
“I’m engaged in driving a tunnel on the Rat River Railway; MacDonald,
who is my partner, and I have the contract. This will keep us going for
months. It is an important piece of work and he is here negotiating for
it. There is plenty of red-tape in the way, so I am likely to be here a
tolerable time. Shall you be glad?”
Fancy asking me that question! “I shall be glad if you have a good
time,” I said cautiously.
“There is no reason you should be glad if I stay, so far as I can see,”
he said frankly. “I asked the question simply out of interest in your
reply. May I confess that I take an interest in my ‘Little Partner,’ and
am anxious to learn if society is spoiling her? She is too good to be
spoiled.” He looked at me as if he were looking through me.
“Why?” I demanded, startled by the trend of his conversation.
“You have a conscience and—you have a heart.”
“I!”
“Yes,” and again this man’s serious eyes were upon me. Evidently he saw
through my motives last night. I thought of last night, of Ethel
Bassett’s goodness to me and my mental attitude towards her—and the
humiliation attending my talk with Mrs. Mount.
“I’m afraid—” I began, and faltered, not quite knowing what to say.
“The fact that you’re afraid shows you have a conscience.”
“Do you like the West?” I asked, to change the conversation.
“The West! I love the West. British Columbia is the best province in
Canada; the climate the best, the scenery the grandest, the people the
nicest.”
“Oh! Oh! Oh!” I laughed.
“But, of course, my ideas of nice people are different from those of
say, Mrs. Mount.”
“Yes!” I said, somewhat mischievously. He went on:
“Many of us were poor when we went West, but the thing is that we’re
cosmopolitan and have formed the habit of looking below the surface of
things. Remember that! The social side of life out West is different
from the East. So are the people. Here the fellows are all the same;
were you to throw a dozen fellows into a sack and heave them about, the
product of one grab from the bag would be the same as another. You could
not tell them apart, all with the same narrow views of life.” Mr. Bang
then suddenly changed his tone, “I’m ready to admit the fellows here
have as much right to hate me as I have to hate them.”
“You hate them, hate the East?”
“I hate the East, or rather the hollowness and shallowness of its
people, their snobbery, their affectations, silly emulation, mean
ambitions and limitations; their patronizing impertinences.”
The delivery of this weighty charge relieved him, for he smiled and
proposed a walk.
At dinner I talked of my Skating Club experiences, Uncle opening the way
by asking how I had enjoyed myself. I replied, “Nicely, thank you,” and
followed up with the announcement that I had met Polly Townsend, Mr.
MacKenzie, and Mr. Davidson.
“Ah, so you met Polly Townsend. That was an experience. What did you
think of him?”
“I liked him, that is, I think I do, though he did not skate with me. I
really———”
“Polly would be a profitable study, if you are seriously interested in
such folk. A study of such insects is helpful to establishing an
entomological view of society.”
“Well,” I said, “he is the best skater——”
“Pooh! His skating is the least interesting phase of Polly. He is the
expression of modern social finesse. He has no brains, no manners, save
those that are bad, no money——”
“No money! then that discredits the theory that wealth is necessary in
society,” I sang out.
“Therein lies whatever genius the man possesses,” exclaimed Uncle with
glee. “Polly has a wealth of impertinence, of self-assurance, and
conceit. By birth he should be a gentleman, but a gentleman’s instincts
he lacks. Whatever he does, he does well,—tennis, golf, skating. Even
his self-adulation is masterly. But of the things that really matter he
is a futility. He can be ineffably rude, insolent, contemptible through
his contemptuousness.”
“From this one may gather———”
“That the snub is an effective lever with weak human nature. We are
jealous of our sensibilities and guard them. When social exigencies
compel us to approach such as Polly, we lift our hat to the conqueror.
The only self-respecting way to treat Polly is to leave him alone; but
because of his success in sport, at the golf club, and so on, Polly is
an unavoidable evil.”
“Poor Polly?” I dared to ask, as Uncle closed his long speech.
“His chin goes in,” he rejoindered, as if he enjoyed it, “his forehead
goes back, his nose is squash, and his voice resembles—as you
suggest—that of ‘Poor Poll’.”