I did it--I who should have known better. I persuaded Reginald to go to
the McKillops' garden-party against his will.
We all make mistakes occasionally.
"They know you're here, and they'll think it so funny if you don't go.
And I want particularly to be in with Mrs. McKillop just now."
"I know, you want one of her smoke Persian kittens as a prospective wife
for Wumples--or a husband, is it?" (Reginald has a magnificent scorn for
details, other than sartorial.) "And I am expected to undergo social
martyrdom to suit the connubial exigencies"--
"Reginald! It's nothing of the kind, only I'm sure Mrs. McKillop Would
be pleased if I brought you. Young men of your brilliant attractions are
rather at a premium at her garden-parties."
"Should be at a premium in heaven," remarked Reginald complacently.
"There will be very few of you there, if that is what you mean. But
seriously, there won't be any great strain upon your powers of endurance;
I promise you that you shan't have to play croquet, or talk to the
Archdeacon's wife, or do anything that is likely to bring on physical
prostration. You can just wear your sweetest clothes and moderately
amiable expression, and eat chocolate-creams with the appetite of a
_blase_ parrot. Nothing more is demanded of you."
Reginald shut his eyes. "There will be the exhaustingly up-to-date young
women who will ask me if I have seen _San Toy_; a less progressive grade
who will yearn to hear about the Diamond Jubilee--the historic event, not
the horse. With a little encouragement, they will inquire if I saw the
Allies march into Paris. Why are women so fond of raking up the past?
They're as bad as tailors, who invariably remember what you owe them for
a suit long after you've ceased to wear it."
"I'll order lunch for one o'clock; that will give you two and a half
hours to dress in."
Reginald puckered his brow into a tortured frown, and I knew that my
point was gained. He was debating what tie would go with which
waistcoat.
Even then I had my misgivings.
* * * * *
During the drive to the McKillops' Reginald was possessed with a great
peace, which was not wholly to be accounted for by the fact that he had
inveigled his feet into shoes a size too small for them. I misgave more
than ever, and having once launched Reginald on to the McKillops' lawn, I
established him near a seductive dish of _marrons glaces_, and as far
from the Archdeacon's wife as possible; as I drifted away to a diplomatic
distance I heard with painful distinctness the eldest Mawkby girl asking
him if he had seen _San Toy_.
It must have been ten minutes later, not more, and I had been having
_quite_ an enjoyable chat with my hostess, and had promised to lend her
_The Eternal City_ and my recipe for rabbit mayonnaise, and was just
about to offer a kind home for her third Persian kitten, when I
perceived, out of the corner of my eye, that Reginald was not where I had
left him, and that the _marrons glaces_ were untasted. At the same
moment I became aware that old Colonel Mendoza was essaying to tell his
classic story of how he introduced golf into India, and that Reginald was
in dangerous proximity. There are occasions when Reginald is caviare to
the Colonel.
"When I was at Poona in '76"--
"My dear Colonel," purred Reginald, "fancy admitting such a thing! Such
a give-away for one's age! I wouldn't admit being on this planet in
'76." (Reginald in his wildest lapses into veracity never admits to
being more than twenty-two.)
The Colonel went to the colour of a fig that has attained great ripeness,
and Reginald, ignoring my efforts to intercept him, glided away to
another part of the lawn. I found him a few minutes later happily
engaged in teaching the youngest Rampage boy the approved theory of
mixing absinthe, within full earshot of his mother. Mrs. Rampage
occupies a prominent place in local Temperance movements.
As soon as I had broken up this unpromising _tete-a-tete_ and settled
Reginald where he could watch the croquet players losing their tempers, I
wandered off to find my hostess and renew the kitten negotiations at the
point where they had been interrupted. I did not succeed in running her
down at once, and eventually it was Mrs. McKillop who sought me out, and
her conversation was not of kittens.
"Your cousin is discussing _Zaza_ with the Archdeacon's wife; at least,
he is discussing, she is ordering her carriage."
She spoke in the dry, staccato tone of one who repeats a French exercise,
and I knew that as far as Millie McKillop was concerned, Wumples was
devoted to a lifelong celibacy.
"If you don't mind," I said hurriedly, "I think we'd like our carriage
ordered too," and I made a forced march in the direction of the croquet-
ground.
I found everyone talking nervously and feverishly of the weather and the
war in South Africa, except Reginald, who was reclining in a comfortable
chair with the dreamy, far-away look that a volcano might wear just after
it had desolated entire villages. The Archdeacon's wife was buttoning up
her gloves with a concentrated deliberation that was fearful to behold. I
shall have to treble my subscription to her Cheerful Sunday Evenings Fund
before I dare set foot in her house again.
At that particular moment the croquet players finished their game, which
had been going on without a symptom of finality during the whole
afternoon. Why, I ask, should it have stopped precisely when a counter-
attraction was so necessary? Everyone seemed to drift towards the area
of disturbance, of which the chairs of the Archdeacon's wife and Reginald
formed the storm-centre. Conversation flagged, and there settled upon
the company that expectant hush that precedes the dawn--when your
neighbours don't happen to keep poultry.
"What did the Caspian Sea?" asked Reginald, with appalling suddenness.
There were symptoms of a stampede. The Archdeacon's wife looked at me.
Kipling or someone has described somewhere the look a foundered camel
gives when the caravan moves on and leaves it to its fate. The
peptonised reproach in the good lady's eyes brought the passage vividly
to my mind.