SAMSON AND DELILAH
I
THE little girl continued to sit upon the top rail of the gate, with her
heels on the second and her long black legs tucked up beneath her. She
had taken off her jacket, and was using it as a cushion to mitigate the
hardness of her perch. She was dressed in a blue cotton frock, which was
gathered in round her waist with a shiny red leather belt. At least
Philip considered it red: the little girl would have explained that it
was _cerise_.
She also continued to smile. Her teeth were very small and regular, her
eyes were soft and brown, and some of her hair had blown up across the
front of her tam-o-shanter, which matched the colour of her belt.
Philip stood stock still, and surveyed her a little less severely.
"Hallo, boy!" said the little girl again.
"Hallo!" said Philip, in guarded tones.
"I saw you on Sunday," the little girl informed him.
"Yes, I know," said Philip coldly, and prepared to pass on. Uncle
Joseph's warning had recurred to him with the mention of Sunday.
"Don't go," said the small siren on the gate.
"I think I will," said Philip.
"Why?"
Philip hesitated. Uncle Joseph had trained him always to say exactly
what he thought, and never to make excuses. But he experienced a curious
difficulty in informing this little creature that he was leaving her
because she belonged to a dangerous and unscrupulous class of the
community. It was the first stirring of chivalry within him. So he did
not reply, but began to move away, rather sheepishly.
The little girl promptly unlimbered her stern-chasers, and the scornful
accusation rang out:--
"You're shy!"
Into an ordinary boy such an insult would have burned like acid. But
Philip merely said to himself thoughtfully, as he walked away:--
"I wonder if I _am_ shy?"
Then presently he decided:--
"No, I'm not: I can't be, because I wanted to stay and talk to her!"
He walked on a few yards, and then paused again. Boy nature, long
dormant, was struggling vigorously to the surface.
"I _won't_ be called shy!" he said to himself hotly.
He turned and walked quickly back.
The little girl was still sitting on the gate, studiously admiring the
sunset. Once more Philip stood before her.
"I say," he said nervously, "I'm not shy."
The little girl looked down languidly.
"Have you come back again?" she enquired.
"Yes," said Philip, scarlet.
"Why?"
"I wanted to tell you," pursued Philip doggedly, "that I wasn't shy just
now."
The little girl nodded her head.
"I see," she said coldly. "You were not shy--only rude. Is that it?"
The greater part of Philip's short life had been spent, as the reader
knows, in imbibing the principle that a man not only may, but, if he
values his soul, must, be rude to women upon all occasions. It is
therefore regrettable to have to record that at this point--at the very
first encounter with the enemy--Philip threw his principles overboard.
"Oh, no," he said in genuine distress. "I didn't mean to be rude to you.
It--it was a different reason."
The little girl made no reply for a moment, but stood up on her heels
and unrolled her cushion to double its former width.
"Come up here and tell me about it," she said maternally, patting the
seat she had prepared.
Philip began to climb the gate. Then he deliberately stepped down again.
"Aren't you coming?" asked the little girl, with the least shade of
anxiety in her voice.
"Yes," said Philip. "But I'll come up on the other side of you. Then I
shall be able to keep the wind off you a bit. It's rather cold."
And he did so. Poor Uncle Joseph!
Now they were on the gate together, side by side, actually touching.
Philip, feeling slightly dazed, chiefly noted the little girl's hands,
which were clasped round her knees. His own hands were broad, and
inclined to be horny; hers were slim, with long fingers.
The little girl turned to him with a quick, confiding smile.
"Now tell me why," she commanded.
"Why what?" asked Philip reluctantly.
"Why you went away just now."
Philip took a deep breath, and embarked upon the task of relegating this
small but dangerous animal to her proper place in the Universe.
"It was--it was what Uncle Joseph said," he explained lamely.
"Who is Uncle Joseph?"
"He--I live with him."
"Haven't you got a father or a mother?" A pair of very kind eyes were
turned full upon him.
"No."
"Poor boy!"
To Philip's acute distress a small arm was slipped within his own.
"I have a father and a mother," said the little girl. "You may come and
see them if you like."
Philip, who intended to cut the whole connection as soon as he could
decently escape from the gate, thanked her politely.
"Only don't come without telling me," continued his admonitress,
"because Father isn't always in a good temper."
Philip thought he might safely promise this.
"Now tell me what Uncle Joseph said," resumed the little girl. "What is
your name?" she added, before the narrative could proceed.
"Philip."
"Philip what?"
"Philip Meldrum."
"Shall I call you Phil?" enquired the lady, with a friendly smile.
"Yes, please," replied Philip, feeling greatly surprised at himself.
There was a pause. Philip became dimly conscious that something was
expected of him--something that had nothing to do with Uncle Joseph. He
turned to his companion for enlightenment. Her face was slightly
flushed, and her eyes met his shyly.
"What is _your_ name?" he enquired cautiously.
"Marguerite Evelyn Leslie Falconer," replied the little girl, in tones
of intense relief.
"Oh," said Philip. "Do they call you all that?"
"No. I am usually called Peggy. Sometimes Pegs."
"Why?"
Miss Falconer sighed indulgently.
"Peggy is the short for Marguerite," she explained. "Didn't you know?"
"No," said Philip.
He was about to proceed to a further confession, when the little girl
said graciously:--
"You may call me Peggy if you like."
Here Philip, whose moral stamina seemed to be crumbling altogether, took
his second downward step.
"I shall call you Pegs," he said boldly.
"All right," replied the lady so designated. "Now tell me what Uncle
Joseph said."
"Uncle Joseph," began Philip once more, "was with me on Sunday, when you
were sitting here."
"Was I?" enquired Peggy with a touch of _hauteur_. Then she continued
inconsequently: "I remember him quite well. Go on."
"He saw you," continued the hapless Philip, "when you smiled at me."
Miss Falconer's slim body stiffened.
"O--o--o--oh!" she gasped. "How can you say such a thing? I _never_
did!"
Poor Philip--who had yet to learn the lesson that feminine indiscretions
must always be accepted without comment and never again referred to
without direct invitation--merely reiterated his tactless statement.
"But you did," he said. "Or perhaps," he added desperately, for Peggy's
eyes were almost tearful, "you were only smiling to yourself about
something."
To his profound astonishment this lame suggestion was accepted. Miss
Falconer nodded. Her self-respect was saved.
"Yes," she said; "that was it. Go on."
"--And when Uncle Joseph saw you smiling--to yourself--he said that
women always did that. He said they couldn't help it. It was a--a
prebby--a prebby-something instinct. I can't remember the word."
"Presbyterian?" suggested Miss Falconer helpfully. "Our cook is one."
"Something like that. Yes, I believe it _was_ that," said Philip. He was
quite sure it was not, but he was anxious not to offend again. "He said
it was due to a--a Presbyterian instinct. He thinks women ought to be
avoided."
"Why?" asked Peggy, deeply intrigued.
"He doesn't like them," explained Philip. He spoke quite apologetically.
Half an hour ago he could have set forth the doctrines of Uncle Joseph
as matters of fact, not of opinion.
But Miss Falconer did not appear to be offended. She seemed rather
pleased with Uncle Joseph.
"I don't like them much myself," she announced. "Except Mother, of
course. I like little girls best--and then little boys." She squeezed
Philip's arm in an ingratiating manner. "But why doesn't Uncle Joseph
like women? They can't do anything to _him_! They can't stop _him_ doing
nice things! They can't send _him_ to bed!" concluded Miss Falconer
bitterly. Evidently the memory of some despotic nurse was rankling. "Did
he ever tell you why?"
"Oh, yes--often."
"What does he say?"
"He says," replied Philip, getting rapidly into his stride over
long-familiar ground, "that women are the disturbing and distracting
force in Nature. They stray deliberately out of their own appointed
sphere in order to interfere with and weaken the driving-force of the
world--Man. They are a parry--parry--parry-sitic growth, sapping the
life out of the strongest tree. They are subject to no standard laws,
and therefore upset the natural balance of Creation. They act from
reason and not instinct--no, I think it is the other way round--they act
from instinct and not from reason. They have no breadth of view or sense
of proportion. They argue from the particular to the general; and in all
argument they habitually beg the question and shift their ground if
worsted. They cannot organise or direct; they only scheme and plot.
Their own overpowering instinct is the Prebby--Presbyterian
instinct--the instinct of plunder--to obtain from Man the wherewithal to
deck their own persons with extravagant and insanitary finery. This they
do, not to gratify man, but to mortify one another. A man who would
perform his life's work untravelled--no, untrammelled--must avoid women
at all costs. At least," concluded Philip traitorously, "that is what
Uncle Joseph says."
Miss Falconer puckered her small brow. Evidently she declined to go all
the way with Uncle Joseph in his views.
"I don't understand it all," she said frankly, "but some of it sounds
pretty silly. Is your Uncle Joseph a nice man? Do you like him?"
"Yes," said Philip stoutly. "He is very kind to me."
"He sounds a funny man," mused Peggy. "I shall talk to Mother about him.
I must go now. It is getting dark."
She slipped off the gate, and Philip perceived, for the first time, that
for all her youthfulness she was half a head taller than himself.
"Where do you live?" enquired Philip, forgetting his previous
intentions.
"Over there, where the lamp-posts are. Goodnight, Phil!"
"Good night, Pegs!"
The children shook hands gravely. Both desired most ardently to ask the
same question; but Philip was restrained by his principles (now
returning hurriedly to duty), and Miss Peggy by maidenly reserve. But
each secretly made the same resolution at the same moment.
II
Philip found his uncle smoking a pipe in a big armchair before the study
fire. He was jotting down calculations on a blotting-pad.
"The opposite sex has its uses, Philip," he said. "To-day, thanks to the
sentimental credulity of a number of estimable but credulous females, we
have raked in forty-seven pounds ten. With that sum we shall be able to
do some real good."
"How are you going to spend it this week, Uncle Joseph?" asked Philip.
"Considering the season of the year, I think the best thing I can do is
to devote practically all of it to Christmas benevolences--chiefly of
the coal-and-blanket order. I have no quarrel with the very young, and I
don't like to think of any child, male or female, going hungry or cold
on Christmas Day. You can do a lot with forty-seven pounds ten, Philip.
For about fourpence you can distend a small stomach to its utmost
capacity, and you can wrap it up and keep it warm for very little more.
What a blessed thing it is that these misguided females have some one to
divert their foolish offerings into wise channels. This very week, but
for us, forty-seven pounds ten would have dropped into the
banking-account of some professional beggar, or gone to bolster up some
perfectly impossible enterprise, such as the overthrow of the Church of
Rome or the conversion of the Jews."
Uncle Joseph laughed whimsically.
"There is a touch of humour about it all," he said. "It would appeal to
the editor of the 'Searchlight.' I must tell him all about it some
day--when I go out of business! Yes, we'll stick to coal-and-blanket
charities at present, Philip. After Christmas I want to tackle the
question of emigration again. Now get your writing-pad. I want to
dictate rough copies of the letters for next Monday."
Uncle Joseph filled a fresh pipe, and began to stimulate his epistolary
faculties by walking about the room. Philip silently took his seat at
the table.
"Aubrey Buck must go," was Uncle Joseph's first announcement. "Let us
make a start upon his successor. His name shall be Arthur Brown, M.A.,
late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Trinity is so big that it is
very hard to trace all its late Fellows, especially if their name is
Brown. John's is good, too, but we did very well with a Johnian
missionary to Central Patagonia a couple of years ago, and we must
divide our favours impartially. Now, take this down:--
"_Dear Madam,--Not long ago I was like yourself--a personality
in the world of letters. Not of letters such as this, which
(between you and I) it is with the utmost repugnance that I have
brought myself to sit down and address to a fellow-scribe_--
"That's a purposely turgid and ungrammatical sentence, but she won't
know. It does me good to dictate it--
"--_but of the great world of Literature, where the rarest
spirits assemble and meet together_--
"That's out of the Prayer Book, and fits in rather well there--
"--_spirits that live as gods, and take sweet counsel
together._
"That last bit is King David, but she will probably think it is Ella
Wheeler Wilcox--
"_The busy life that you lead, as one of the protagonists of
modern thought_--
"She won't know what a protagonist is, but it will please her to be
called one--
"--_deprives me of the hope that you can possibly have found
time to glance through my poor works. Yet, believe me, even I
have had my little circle. I, too, have walked in the groves of
the Academy with my cluster of disciples, striving to contribute
my mite to the sum-total of our knowledge._
"Now we might come to the point, I think--
"_But my course is run; my torch extinguished. Two years ago I
was attacked by paralysis of the lower limbs_--
"Always say 'lower limbs' when talking to a lady, Philip--
"--_lower limbs, followed by general prostration of the entire
system. I am now sufficiently recovered to don my armour once
more; but alas! my occupation is gone. My Fellowship expired six
months ago, and has not been renewed. My pupils are dispersed to
the corners of the earth. Entirely without private means, I
have migrated to London, where I am endeavouring to eke out an
existence in a populous but inexpensive quarter of the town--the
existence of a retired scholar and gentleman, save the mark!--_
"That's a good touch, Philip!
"_--by clerical work._
"No, don't put that. She will think clerical means something to do with
the Church. Say 'secretarial' instead--
"_Have you any typing you could give me to do? I hate asking,
and I know that you know I hate asking; but there is a
subconscious, subliminal bond, subjective and objective,--_
"I don't know what that means, but it sounds splendid--
"_--that links together all brothers of the pen; and I venture
to hope that in appealing to you, of all our great brotherhood,
I shall not appeal in vain._
"We had better wind up with a classical quotation of some kind,"
concluded Uncle Joseph. "She will expect it from a Don with paralytic
legs, I fancy. Reach me down that Juvenal, Philip. I have a notion. Yes,
here we are:--
"_Possibly you may ask, and ask with justice, why the University
has done nothing for me. I did make an appeal to the
authorities; but--well, a man hates to have to appeal twice for
a thing that should by rights be granted without appeal at all;
and I desisted. The University is rich and respectable; I am
worn-out and shabby. What could I do?_
_Plurima sunt quae
Non homines audent pertusa dicere laena._
"Get that down right, Philip. She may take it to some educated person to
get it translated."
"What does it mean, Uncle Joseph?" asked Philip, carefully copying out
the tag.
"It means, roughly, that a man with patches on his trousers cannot
afford to ask for much. Now to wind up:--
"_So I pray you--not of your charity, but of your
good-comradeship--to send me a little work to do. The
remuneration I leave to you. I am too destitute--and perhaps too
proud--to drive a bargain._
_Yours fraternally,
Arthur Brown._
"Put 'Late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.' You can add the
Islington address when James Nimmo has fixed it up. Then type it out. Do
about seventy copies. I have been going through the lady members of the
Authors' Society, and have picked out most of its female geniuses. Now
for next week's list for the Kind Young Hearts! Three or four of the old
items can stand--particularly Papodoodlekos: he is a very lucrative old
gentleman--but the others must come out. I shall not send the revised
list, though, to your friend--what was that humourist's name?"
"Mr. Julius Mablethorpe," said Philip.
"That's the man. Now I think of it, I have read some novels by him. I
shall not send him the revised list, but I am grateful to him, all the
same, for one or two useful hints. That scheme for sending children to
the seaside ought not to have gone in at this time of year. The
foolishness of the average female philanthropist is so stupendous that
one grows careless. Instead, we will substitute a League of Playground
Helpers--a band of interfering young women whose primary act of
officiousness shall be to invade the East End and instruct slum-children
in the art of playing games scientifically and educatively. There's a
great rage for that sort of thing just now, though how one can make a
mud-pie, or play hop-scotch, or throw kittens into a canal
scientifically and educatively beats me. Still, the idea is good for a
few postal orders."
The list was completed, to a running accompaniment of this sort, and
Philip began to put away his writing materials.
Uncle Joseph glanced at the clock.
"There is just time for one more letter before dinner," he said. "I am
going to ring the changes on Tommy Smith a trifle. Next week, I think,
instead of writing to grown-ups, he must send an ill-spelt but touching
appeal to some little girls. About a dozen will do--the children of
wealthy or titled widows. The difficulty will be to get hold of the
brats' Christian names. However, we will work it somehow. We might say
'Little Miss So-and-So,' or, 'The Little Girl who lives with Mrs.
So-and-So.' Either will look childish and pretty. Just take this down,
and we'll see how it sounds:--
_"Dear Little Girl,--I am only a little boy about your age, and
my Daddy does not know I am writing to you._
"Put in spelling mistakes as usual."
_"My Daddy is a curate. We are very poor, and he has been ill
for months. I often hear my mother crying in the night, when she
thinks we are all in bed asleep. I have no sister of my
own--only a little baby brother. How I wish you were my sister.
Then you might help me to earn some money for my father. Shall
we pretend to be brother and sister, and then--_
"Hallo, Philip, old man. Getting tired?"
Philip had stopped writing. He was gazing dully, fixedly, and
rebelliously at the paper before him. His pencil dropped from his
fingers.
For nearly three years he had been a faithful secretary and a willing
amanuensis. He had performed his duties mechanically, without even
considering the morality of his conduct or the feelings of his
correspondents. Now, suddenly, he hated Uncle Joseph and all his works.
"Why?" he wondered.