I had not seen Penfentenyou since the Middle Nineties, when he was
Minister of Ways and Woodsides in De Thouar's first Administration. Last
summer, though he nominally held the same portfolio, he was his Colony's
Premier in all but name, and the idol of his own province, which is two
and a half times the size of England. Politically, his creed was his
growing country; and he came over to England to develop a Great Idea in
her behalf.
Believing that he had put it in train, I made haste to welcome him to my
house for a week.
That he was chased to my door by his own Agent-General in a motor; that
they turned my study into a Cabinet Meeting which I was not invited to
attend; that the local telegraph all but broke down beneath the strain
of hundred word coded cables; and that I practically broke into the
house of a stranger to get him telephonic facilities on a Sunday, are
things I overlook. What I objected to was his ingratitude, while I thus
tore up England to help him. So I said: “Why on earth didn't you see
your Opposite Number in Town instead of bringing your office work here?”
“Eh? Who?” said he, looking up from his fourth cable since lunch.
“See the English Minister for Ways and Woodsides.”
“I saw him,” said Penfentenyou, without enthusiasm.
It seemed that he had called twice on the gentleman, but without an
appointment--(“I thought if I wasn't big enough, my business was”)--and
each time had found him engaged. A third party intervening, suggested
that a meeting might be arranged if due notice were given.
“Then,” said Penfentenyou, “I called at the office at ten o'clock.”
“But they'd be in bed,” I cried.
“One of the babies was awake. He told me that--that 'my sort of
questions'”--he slapped the pile of cables--“were only taken between 11
and 2 P.M. So I waited.”
“And when you got to business?” I asked.
He made a gesture of despair. “It was like talking to children. They'd
never heard of it.”
“And your Opposite Number?”
Penfentenyou described him.
“Hush! You mustn't talk like that!” I shuddered. “He's one of the best
of good fellows. You should meet him socially.”
“I've done that too,” he said. “Have you?”
“Heaven forbid!” I cried; “but that's the proper thing to say.”
“Oh, he said all the proper things. Only I thought as this was England
that they'd more or less have the hang of all the--general hang-together
of my Idea. But I had to explain it from the beginning.”
“Ah! They'd probably mislaid the papers,” I said, and I told him
the story of a three-million pound insurrection caused by a deputy
Under-Secretary sitting upon a mass of green-labelled correspondence
instead of reading it.
“I wonder it doesn't happen every week,” he answered. “D'you mind my
having the Agent-General to dinner again tonight? I'll wire, and he can
motor down.”
The Agent-General arrived two hours later, a patient and expostulating
person, visibly torn between the pulling Devil of a rampant Colony,
and the placid Baker of a largely uninterested England. But with
Penfentenyou behind him he had worked; for he told us that Lord
Lundie--the Law Lord was--the final authority on the legal and
constitutional aspects of the Great Idea, and to him it must be
referred.
“Good Heavens alive!” thundered Penfentenyou. “I told you to get that
settled last Christmas.”
“It was the middle of the house-party season,” said the Agent-General
mildly. “Lord Lundie's at Credence Green now--he spends his holidays
there. It's only forty miles off.”
“Shan't I disturb his Holiness?” said Penfentenyou heavily. “Perhaps
'my sort of questions,”' he snorted, “mayn't be discussed except at
midnight.”
“Oh, don't be a child,” I said.
“What this country needs,” said Penfentenyou, “is--” and for ten minutes
he trumpeted rebellion.
“What you need is to pay for your own protection,” I cut in when he
drew breath, and I showed him a yellowish paper, supplied gratis by
Government, which is called Schedule D. To my merciless delight he had
never seen the thing before, and I completed my victory over him and
all the Colonies with a Brassey's “Naval Annual” and a “Statesman's Year
Book.”
The Agent-General interposed with agent-generalities (but they were
merely provocateurs) about Ties of Sentiment.
“They be blowed!” said Penfentenyou. “What's the good of sentiment
towards a Kindergarten?”
“Quite so. Ties of common funk are the things that bind us together; and
the sooner you new nations realize it the better. What you need is an
annual invasion. Then you'd grow up.”
“Thank you! Thank you!” said the Agent-General. “That's what I am always
trying to tell my people.”
“But, my dear fool,” Penfentenyou almost wept, “do you pretend that
these banana-fingered amateurs at home are grown up?”
“You poor, serious, pagan man,” I retorted, “if you take 'em that way,
you'll wreck your Great Idea.”
“Will you take him to Lord Lundie's to-morrow?” said the Agent-General
promptly.
“I suppose I must,” I said, “if you won't.”
“Not me! I'm going home,” said the Agent-General, and departed. I am
glad that I am no colony's Agent-General.
Penfentenyou continued to argue about naval contributions till 1.15
A.M., though I was victor from the first.
At ten o'clock I got him and his correspondence into the motor, and
he had the decency to ask whether he had been unpolished over-night.
I replied that I waited an apology. This he made excuse for renewed
arguments, and used wayside shows as illustrations of the decadence of
England.
For example we burst a tyre within a mile of Credence Green, and, to
save time, walked into the beautifully kept little village. His eye was
caught by a building of pale-blue tin, stencilled “Calvinist Chapel,”
before whose shuttered windows an Italian organ-grinder with a
petticoated monkey was playing “Dolly Grey.”
“Yes. That's it!” snapped the egoist. “That's a parable of the general
situation in England. And look at those brutes!” A huge household
removals van was halted at a public-house. The men in charge were
drinking beer from blue and white mugs. It seemed to me a pretty sight,
but Penfentenyou said it represented Our National Attitude.
Lord Lundie's summer resting-place we learned was a farm, a little out
of the village, up a hill round which curled a high hedged road. Only
an initiated few spend their holidays at Credence Green, and they have
trained the householders to keep the place select. Penfentenyou made a
grievance of this as we walked up the lane, followed at a distance by
the organ-grinder.
“Suppose he is having a house-party,” he said: “Anything's possible in
this insane land.”
Just at that minute we found ourselves opposite an empty villa. Its roof
was of black slate, with bright unweathered ridge-tiling; its walls were
of blood-coloured brick, cornered and banded with vermiculated stucco
work, and there was cobalt, magenta, and purest apple-green window-glass
on either side of the front door. The whole was fenced from the road by
a low, brick-pillared, flint wall, topped with a cast-iron Gothic rail,
picked out in blue and gold.
Tight beds of geranium, calceolaria, and lobelia speckled the
glass-plat, from whose centre rose one of the finest araucarias (its
other name by the way is “monkey-puzzler”) that it has ever been my
lot to see. It must have been full thirty feet high, and its foliage
exquisitely answered the iron railings. Such bijou ne plus ultras,
replete with all the amenities, do not, as I pointed out to
Penfentenyou, transpire outside of England.
A hedge, swinging sharp right, flanked the garden, and above it on
a slope of daisy-dotted meadows we could see Lord Lundie's tiled and
half-timbered summer farmhouse. Of a sudden we heard voices behind the
tree--the fine full tones of the unembarrassed English, speaking to
their equals--that tore through the hedge like sleet through rafters.
“That it is not called 'monkey-puzzler' for nothing, I willingly
concede”--this was a rich and rolling note--“but on the other hand--”
“I submit, me lud, that the name implies that it might, could, would,
or should be ascended by a monkey, and not that the ascent is a physical
impossibility. I believe one of our South American spider monkeys
wouldn't hesitate... By Jove, it might be worth trying, if--”
This was a crisper voice than the first. A third, higher-pitched, and
full of pleasant affectations, broke in.
“Oh, practical men, there is no ape here. Why do you waste one of God's
own days on unprofitable discussion? Give me a match!”
“I've a good mind to make you demonstrate in your own person. Come on,
Bubbles! We'll make Jimmy climb!”
There was a sound of scuffling, broken by squeaks from Jimmy of the high
voice. I turned back and drew Penfentenyou into the side of the flanking
hedge. I remembered to have read in a society paper that Lord Lundie's
lesser name was “Bubbles.”
“What are they doing?” Penfentenyou said sharply. “Drunk?”
“Just playing! Superabundant vitality of the Race, you know. We'll watch
'em,” I answered. The noise ceased.
“My deliver,” Jimmy gasped. “The ram caught in the thicket, and--I'm the
only one who can talk Neapolitan! Leggo my collar!” He cried aloud in a
foreign tongue, and was answered from the gate.
“It's the Calvinistic organ-grinder,” I whispered. I had already found
a practicable break at the bottom of the hedge. “They're going to try to
make the monkey climb, I believe.”
“Here--let me look!” Penfentenyou flung himself down, and rooted till he
too broke a peep-hole. We lay side by side commanding the entire garden
at ten yards' range.
“You know 'em?” said Penfentenyou, as I made some noise or other.
“By sight only. The big fellow in flannels is Lord Lundie; the
light-built one with the yellow beard painted his picture at the last
Academy: He's a swell R.A., James Loman.”
“And the brown chap with the hands?”
“Tomling, Sir Christopher Tomling, the South American engineer who built
the--”
“San Juan Viaduct. I know,” said Penfentenyou. “We ought to have had him
with us.... Do you think a monkey would climb the tree?”
The organ-grinder at the gate fenced his beast with one arm as
Jimmy talked.
“Don't show off your futile accomplishments,” said Lord Lundie. “Tell
him it's an experiment. Interest him!”
“Shut up, Bubbles. You aren't in court,” Jimmy replied. “This needs
delicacy. Giuseppe says--”
“Interest the monkey,” the brown engineer interrupted. “He won't climb
for love. Cut up to the house and get some biscuits, Bubbles--sugar ones
and an orange or two. No need to tell our womenfolk.”
The huge white figure lobbed off at a trot which would not have
disgraced a boy of seventeen. I gathered from something Jimmy let fall
that the three had been at Harrow together.
“That Tomling has a head on his Shoulders,” muttered Penfentenyou. “Pity
we didn't get him for the Colony. But the question is, will the monkey
climb?”
“Be quick, Jimmy. Tell the man we'll give him five bob for the loan of
the beast. Now run the organ under the tree, and we'll dress it when
Bubbles comes back,” Sir Christopher cried.
“I've often wondered,” said Penfentenyou, “whether it would puzzle
a monkey?” He had forgotten the needs of his Growing Nation, and was
earnestly parting the white-thorn stems with his fingers.
* * * * * * * * * *
Giuseppe and Jimmy did as they were told, the monkey following them with
a wary and malignant eye.
“Here's a discovery,” said Jimmy. “The singing part of this organ comes
off the wheels.” He spoke volubly to the proprietor. “Oh, it's so as
Giuseppe can take it to his room o' nights. And play it. D'you hear
that? The organ-grinder, after his day's crime, plays his accursed
machine for love. For love, Chris! And Michael Angelo was one of 'em!”
“Don't jaw! Tell him to take the beast's petticoat off,” said Sir
Christopher Tomling.
Lord Lundie returned, very little winded, through a gap higher up the
hedge.
“They're all out, thank goodness!” he cried, “but I've raided what I
could. _Marrons glacés_, candied fruit, and a bag of oranges.”
“Excellent!” said the world-renowned contractor.
“Jimmy, you're the light-weight; jump up on the organ and impale these
things on the leaves as I hand 'em!”
“I see,” said Jimmy, capering like a springbuck. “Upward and onward, eh?
First, he'll reach out for--how infernal prickly these leaves are!--this
biscuit. Next we'll lure him on--(that's about the reach of his
arm)--with the _marron glacé_, and then he'll open out this orange. How
human! How like your ignoble career, Bubbles!”
With care and elaboration they ornamented that tree's lower branches
with sugar-topped biscuits, oranges, bits of banana, and _marrons glacés_
till it looked a very ape's path to Paradise.
“Unchain the Gyascutis!” said Sir Christopher commandingly. Giuseppe
placed the monkey atop of the organ, where the beast, misunderstanding,
stood on his head.
“He's throwing himself on the mercy of the Court, me lud,” said Jimmy.
“No--now he's interested. Now he's reaching after higher things. What
wouldn't I give to have here” (he mentioned a name not unhonoured in
British Art). “Ambition plucking apples of Sodom!” (the monkey had
pricked himself and was swearing). “Genius hampered by Convention? Oh,
there's a whole bushelful of allegories in it!”
“Give him time. He's balancing the probabilities,” said Lord Lundie.
The three closed round the monkey,--hanging on his every motion with
an earnestness almost equal to ours. The great judge's head--seamed and
vertical forehead, iron mouth, and pike-like under-jaw, all set on that
thick neck rising out of the white flannelled collar--was thrown against
the puckered green silk of the organ-front as it might have been a cameo
of Titus. Jimmy, with raised eyes and parted lips, fingered his grizzled
chestnut beard, and I was near enough to note, the capable beauty of his
hands. Sir Christopher stood a little apart, his arms folded behind his
back, one heavy brown boot thrust forward, chin in as curbed, and black
eyebrows lowered to shade the keen eyes.
Giuseppe's dark face between flashing earrings, a twisted rag of red and
yellow silk round his throat, turned from the reaching yearning monkey
to the pink and white biscuits spiked on the bronzed leafage. And upon
them all fell the serious and workmanlike sun of an English summer
forenoon.
“Fils de Saint Louis, montez au ciel!” said Lord Lundie suddenly in a
voice that made me think of Black Caps. I do not know what the
monkey thought, because at that instant he leaped off the organ and
disappeared.
There was a clash of broken glass behind the tree.
The monkey's face, distorted with passion, appeared at an upper window
of the house, and a starred hole in the stained-glass window to the left
of 'the front door showed the first steps of his upward path.
“We've got to catch him,” cried Sir Christopher. “Come along!”
They pushed at the door, which was unlocked.
“Yes. But consider the ethics of the case,” said Jimmy. “Isn't this
burglary or something, Bubbles?”
“Settle that when he's caught,” said Sir Christopher. “We're responsible
for the beast.”
A furious clanging of bells broke out of the empty house, followed by
muffed gurglings and trumpetings.
“What the deuce is that?” I asked, half aloud.
“The plumbing, of course,” said Penfentenyou. “What a pity! I believe
he'd have climbed if Lord Lundie hadn't put him off!”
“Wait a moment, Chris,” said Jimmy the interpreter; “Guiseppe says he
may answer to the music of his infancy. Giuseppe, therefore, will go
in with the organ. Orpheus with his lute, you know. Avante, Orpheus!
There's no Neapolitan for bathroom, but I fancy your friend is there.”
“I'm not going into another man's house with a hurdy-gurdy,” said Lord
Lundie, recoiling, as Giuseppe unshipped the working mechanism of the
organ (it developed a hang-down leg) from its wheels, slipped a strap
round his shoulders, and gave the handle a twist.
“Don't be a cad, Bubbles,” was Jimmy's answer. “You couldn't leave us
now if you were on the Woolsack. Play, Orpheus! The Cadi accompanies.”
* * * * * * * * *
With a whoop, a buzz, and a crash, the organ sprang to life under
the hand of Giuseppe, and the procession passed through the
grained-to-imitate-walnut front door. A moment later we saw the monkey
ramping on the roof.
“He'll be all over the township in a minute if we don't head him,” said
Penfentenyou, leaping to his feet, and crashing into the garden. We
headed him with pebbles till he retired through a window to the tuneful
reminder that he had left a lot of little things behind him. As we
passed the front door it swung open, and showed Jimmy the artist sitting
at the bottom of a newly-cleaned staircase. He waggled his hands at us,
and when we entered we saw that the man was stricken speechless. His
eyes grew red--red like a ferret's--and what little breath he had
whistled shrilly. At first we thought it was a fit, and then we saw that
it was mirth--the inopportune mirth of the Artistic Temperament.
The house palpitated to an infamous melody punctuated by the stump of
the barrel-organ's one leg, as Giuseppe, above, moved from room to room
after his rebel slave. Now and again a floor shook a little under the
combined rushes of Lord Lundie and Sir Christopher Tomling, who gave
many and contradictory orders. But when they could they cursed Jimmy
with splendid thoroughness.
“Have you anything to do with the house?” panted Jimmy at last. “Because
we're using it just now.” He gulped. “And I'm--ah--keeping cavè.”
“All right,” said Penfentenyou, and shut the hall door.
“Jimmy, you unspeakable blackguard, Jimmy, you cur! You coward!”
(Lord Lundie's voice overbore the flood of melody.) “Come up here!
Giussieppe's saying something we don't understand.”
Jimmy listened and interpreted between hiccups.
“He says you'd better play the organ, Bubbles, and let him do the
stalking. The monkey knows him.”
“By Jove, he's quite right,” said Sir Christopher from the landing.
“Take it, Bubbles, at once.”
“My God!” said Lord Lundie in horror.
The chase reverberated over our heads, from the attics to the first
floor and back again. Bodies and Voices met in collision and argument,
and once or twice the organ hit walls and doors. Then it broke forth in
a new manner.
“He's playing it,” said Jimmy. “I know his acute Justinian ear. Are you
fond of music?”
“I think Lord Lundie plays very well for a beginner,” I ventured.
“Ah! That's the trained legal intellect. Like mastering a brief. I
haven't got it.” He wiped his eyes and shook.
“Hi!” said Penfentenyou, looking through the stained glass window down
the garden. “What's that!”
* * * * * * * * *
A household removals van, in charge of four men, had halted at the
gate. A husband and his wife householders beyond question--quavered
irresolutely up the path. He looked tired. She was certainly cross.
In all this haphazard world the last couple to understand a scientific
experiment.
I laid hands on Jimmy--the clamour above drowning speech and with
Penfentenyou's aid, propped him against the window, that he should see.
He saw, nodded, fell as an umbrella can fall, and kneeling, beat his
forehead on the shut door. Penfentenyou slid the bolt.
The furniture men reinforced the two figures on the path, and advanced,
spreading generously.
“Hadn't we better warn them up-stairs?” I suggested:
“No. I'll die first!” said Jimmy. “I'm pretty near it now. Besides, they
called me names.”