PEOPLE
FOR six months Philip continued to give rope to his esteemed colleagues
Messrs. Atherton and Murgatroyd, and within that period the pair duly
hanged themselves.
Mr. Murgatroyd went first. For a whole winter he waited patiently for
Philip's reforming zeal to spend itself; and then, finding that things
were no better but rather grew worse, he retired from the conflict like
a prudent man, and invested his not inconsiderable savings in a wayside
garage upon a lonely stretch of the Great North Road, where motorists,
who are always in a hurry, would not be disposed to haggle over the
price of petrol or the cost of tyre-repairs.
He parted from Philip without rancour, and another and younger man was
sent up from headquarters to take his place.
Mr. Atherton was not so easy to eject, and was only disposed of in the
fulness of time and by the process of filling up the cup. But he went at
last, and the change of atmosphere throughout the entire establishment
was most noticeable. The two clerks and the office-boy carried out their
duties with what is known in transatlantic business circles as "a
punch"; the books were put in order; accounts were straightened out;
business increased; headquarters said encouraging things. For the
present Philip decided not to ask for a successor to Atherton. He felt
that he wanted to run the whole Universe single-handed in those days.
Of course there were still crumpled rose-leaves. There was Brand, for
instance--Brand of the repairing-shop. He was a strenuous worker and an
admirable mechanic, but he suffered intermittently from a severe form of
the popular disease of the day--the disease which has its roots in the
British national policy of educating a man sufficiently to make him
discontented with his lot and then leaving off. Brand was a Socialist,
or a Revolutionist, or an Anarchist. Philip could never find out which,
and the muddled but pertinacious Brand could never enlighten him. The
most noticeable feature of his malady was an over-copious supply of what
the repairing-shop as a whole termed "back-chat." Mr. Brand was a
stalwart upholder of what he called the dignity of labour. He declined
to be patronised; he smelt patronage as an Orangeman smells Popery. He
also refused to accept an order with any degree of cheerfulness; though,
to do him justice, once he had expressed his opinion of it and the
degradation which he incurred in accepting it, he usually carried it out
with efficiency and dispatch. To one who knows his job almost anything
can be forgiven. We shall hear of Mr. Brand again.
Then there was Alfred, the office-boy. He was a stunted but precocious
child, with a taste for music of a vibratory nature. He believed firmly
in the adage that a merry heart goes all the way, and whistled
excruciatingly from dawn till dusk. His _tremolo_ rendering of "All That
I Ask is Love" appeared to afford him the maximum of human enjoyment.
The departure of Mr. Atherton involved him in some financial loss, for
he had been employed by that vicarious sportsman to execute turf
commissions on his behalf with an unostentatious individual who
conducted his business in the private bar of an unassuming house of call
in Wardour Street. Consequently he considered it only just to make
things unpleasant for the new manager. This object he accomplished in
divers ways, which will be obvious to any schoolboy. Philip suffered in
silence, for he was disinclined to further dismissals, and, moreover,
could not help liking the impudent youth. His patience was rewarded; for
one day, with incredible suddenness, the nuisance ceased, and Master
Alfred became almost demonstrative in his assiduity and doglike in his
affection. Presently the mystery was unfolded. Alfred had discovered
that that usurper, that tyrant, that slave-driver, Mr. Meldrum, was the
identical P. Meldrum who had scored the winning try for the Harlequin
Football Club against Blackheath on the previous Saturday afternoon. One
day, after office hours, almost timidly, he approached his employer and
presented a petition from his own club, the Willesden Green Vampires,
humbly praying that the great Meldrum would honour this unique
brotherhood by consenting to become one of its Vice-Presidents. Philip's
heart warmed at the compliment, and he complied gladly. He achieved
further and lasting popularity among the Vampires of Willesden Green by
officiating as referee in their annual encounter with the Stoke
Newington Hornets. Verily the road to the heart of healthy young-manhood
is marked in plain figures.
A third and by no means unattractive rose-leaf was Miss Jennings, the
typist. She troubled Philip considerably at first. He found her presence
disturbing. To him it seemed fundamentally wrong that a man should sit
in a room with his hat on while a young and ladylike girl stood waiting
at his elbow for orders. He endeavoured to remedy these anomalies by
removing his hat in Miss Jennings's presence and rising from his seat
whenever she entered his private room--courtesies which his typist
secretly regarded as due to weakness of intellect rather than the
instinct of chivalry, though she valued them in her heart none the less.
It was a long time, too, before Philip grew accustomed to dictating
letters. His first incursion into this enterprise gave him an
uncomfortable quarter of an hour. He began by ringing for Alfred, and
asking him to request Miss Jennings to be so good as to come and speak
to him for a moment. His message was delivered by that youthful
humourist with elaborate ceremony,--this was in the pre-Willesden-Green
days,--coupled with a confident assurance that it portended either a
proposal of marriage or "the sack." Miss Jennings's reply Philip did not
catch, for only Alfred's raucous deliverances could penetrate closed
doors, but it effectually silenced that young gentleman's guns. His only
discernible retort was "Suffragette!"
Presently Miss Jennings appeared, slightly flushed, and shut the door
behind her.
"You want me, Mr. Meldrum?" she asked.
Philip rose to his feet.
"Yes. Would you mind taking down one or two letters for me, Miss
Jennings?" he said.
"Oh, is that all?" replied Miss Jennings, quite composed again. "Mr.
Atherton usually just shouts. I'll go and get my things."
She returned with her writing-pad, and taking a chair at Philip's elbow,
sat down and regarded him with an indulgent smile.
Philip began, huskily:--
_The Britannia Motor Company, Limited, Oxford Street, London,
October._
Miss Jennings sat patiently waiting.
"I know that bit," she intimated gently.
Philip apologised, and continued hurriedly:--
"_Dear Sir_--No, I expect you know that bit, too."
"That bit's all right," said Miss Jennings calmly. "I wasn't to know who
you were writing to. It might have been your wife."
Philip, who had not hitherto realised that it was possible for a man to
correspond with the wife of his bosom by means of a machine operated by
a third party, apologised again, and added quite gratuitously that he
was not married.
Miss Jennings, having secured the information she required, smiled
forgivingly, and the dictation proceeded.
_We are in receipt of your letter of October the fourteenth._
"They usually say 'esteemed communication,'" said Miss Jennings.
"Thank you," said Philip humbly. "Please correct it." Miss Jennings did
so. Philip, regarding the curving neck and prettily coiled hair close
beside him, found himself wondering why such a beautiful thing as a
young girl should be compelled to work for a living.
Miss Jennings looked up, and caught his eye.
"Well?" she enquired shortly.
Philip coloured guiltily, and continued:--
_The cylinders you mention are cast in pairs, and their internal
diameter is one hundred millimetres, or_--
He paused again. It seemed to him monstrous that a woman should be
compelled to waste her youth taking down dry technical stuff like this,
when she ought to be outside in the sunshine. If a woman must earn her
bread, at least let her do work that was woman's work and not man's
leavings. Her real mission, of course, should be to stand apart from the
struggle for existence, rendering first aid to her man when he was
stricken and companionship when he was weary. But to sit--
Miss Jennings looked up again.
"We can go faster than this," she observed severely. "I'm a trained
stenographer."
Philip, collecting himself, dictated an elaborate formula for
ascertaining the indicated horse-power of the engine under discussion,
at a pace which caused the trained stenographer to pant for breath.
When he had finished, he said:--
"There are two more letters to do, Miss Jennings, but perhaps you would
like to rest for a moment."
"No, thank you," said Miss Jennings. "I'm not made of sugar."
Possibly this statement was made--as many feminine statements of the
kind are made--in order to be contradicted. More probably it was
intended as a test of character. Whatever it was, it failed to intrigue
Philip.
"Very well, then," he said, and proceeded to dictate another letter.
"Of course I see how it is, Mr. Meldrum," said Miss Jennings, unbending
a little as their joint task came to an end. "You have not been
accustomed to working with a woman, and you think she can't work the
same as a man. You'll soon find out your mistake. She works twice as
hard, and makes less fuss about it."
"I am sure she does," said Philip meekly.
"It's kind of you," proceeded Miss Jennings maternally, "to consider my
feelings; but we shall get through a great deal more work if you look on
me simply as a machine."
"I do not think that would be possible," said Philip. "I could not do my
own work properly if I thought you were not comfortable."
For a moment Miss Jennings eyed her employer keenly.
"Well, try, anyway," she urged. Experience had taught her to beware of
gentlemen who were too solicitous about her comfort, and she had not yet
taken Philip's complete measure. "I've been earning my living for five
years now--ever since I was sixteen," she added carelessly--"and I have
found that we do our work better and are much more friendly and
comfortable when the gentleman I am working for doesn't worry too much
about whether I want a cushion for my back, and that sort of thing."
"I see you are an independent lady," said Philip, smiling.
"Independent? Yes, that's me," agreed Miss Jennings. "You wouldn't take
me for a Suffragette, though, would you?" she added, with a tinge of
anxiety in her voice.
"I don't think I have ever met one."
"Well, go to one of their meetings--the Park on Sunday, or
somewhere--and you won't want to meet one twice. What they're to gain by
it all beats me, let alone the show they make of themselves. A woman has
enough trouble coming to her in life, without going out in a procession
and asking for it. That's how I look at it. Well, I'll go and type these
letters."
Miss Jennings's presence gradually ceased to affect Philip's powers of
concentration, and he soon dropped into the habit of regarding her as
she had asked to be regarded,--namely, as part of the office
furniture,--though he persisted in certain small acts of consideration
not usually offered to articles of upholstery. Miss Jennings, finding
that her defensive attitude was entirely unnecessary, promptly set out
with the perversity of her sex--or perhaps quite unconsciously--to
stimulate her employer's interest in her. It was a pleasant and quite
innocuous diversion, for Philip was usually far too busy to take notice
of her little coquetries, and had far too much regard for the sanctity
of the unprotected female to respond to them if he did.
He had grown so accustomed to regarding his typist as a mechanical
adjunct to the office typewriter that he suffered a mild shock when one
day Miss Jennings remarked:--
"So Mr. Atherton's gone? Well, he was no more use than nothing in the
office, but he wasn't a bad sort--not if you took him the right way and
kept him in his place."
"He was a friend of yours, then?" said Philip.
"Well, he used to take me out sometimes."
"Where to?"
"Oh, the White City, or a theatre. It's a nice change to be taken out by
a gentleman sometimes. When you go by yourself with your sister,"
explained Miss Jennings, "you go in the pit. When any one like Mr.
Atherton took me it was reserved seats and dinner somewhere first. I
love the theatre. Don't you?"
"I don't go very often," confessed Philip.
"Why not?"
"I don't know. Perhaps it is because I have no one to go with."
Miss Jennings collected her papers and rose.
"Well, I must finish these," she said. "Will there be anything more this
morning, Mr. Meldrum?"
"Thank you, that is all."
Philip surveyed the retreating form of Miss Jennings with thoughtful
eyes, and his heart smote him. By evicting the incapable Mr. Atherton he
had deprived this plucky, chirpy little city sparrow of one of her most
cherished recreations.
"Oh--Miss Jennings," he said nervously.
Miss Jennings turned.
"Would you care to come to the theatre with me?"
Miss Jennings's slightly anaemic features broke into a frank smile.
"It's no good my pretending I don't want to go to the theatre when I
do," she remarked; "so why not say so? Where shall we go?"
"Anywhere you please."
"When?"
"To-night, if you like."
Miss Jennings considered.
"I must see if my sister's to be at home," she said. "There are just two
of us, and one always stays in of an evening with mother. May I use the
telephone? My sister is with Goswell Brothers, in Finsbury Circus."
"Certainly," said Philip.
Miss Jennings sat down at the roll-top desk and took the receiver off
the hook. She flatly declined to accept the assurance of the operator at
the exchange that the number she required,--
(1) was out of order;
(2) was engaged;
(3) had not replied;
and in the incredible space of four minutes succeeded in establishing
telephonic communication with a place of business almost a mile away. A
much briefer but equally decisive encounter with the Finsbury Circus
office-boy ended with the production of Miss Jennings's sister, who was
forthwith addressed:--
"That you, May dear?"
"T'ck, t'ck," replied the instrument.
"I want to go out to-night. Can you stay in with mother, or are you
doing anything?"
Apparently the reply was satisfactory, for Miss Jennings turned to
Philip.
"That will be all right, Mr. Meldrum," she said.
They dined at Gatti's, and went on to the Gaiety. Philip dropped readily
into the etiquette of the amphitheatre stalls, and provided Miss
Jennings with chocolates and lemon squashes during the interval. Halfway
through the second act he decided that this was the pleasantest evening
he had spent since he came to London. What Miss Jennings thought of it
all he did not know, for she did not tell him. Having speared her hat to
the back of the seat in front and dabbed her hair into position, she sat
absolutely silent, with her eyes fixed unwinkingly upon the stage. For
the time her perpetual companion, the typewriter, was forgotten, and she
lived and moved in the world of romance, where ladies were always fair
and gentlemen either gallant or entertaining. Occasionally, without
removing her gaze, she would call her host's attention, by a
half-unconscious gesture, to some particularly attractive item of the
entertainment.
When all was over she sighed resignedly and preceded Philip out into the
roaring Strand. Philip, scanning the street for a disengaged cab, asked
her where she lived. Miss Jennings gave him an address in Balham.
"We had better walk down to the Embankment," he said. "We might pick up
a taxi or a hansom outside the Savoy."
Miss Jennings murmured something perfunctory about the facilities
offered to the public by the London General Omnibus Company, and then
accompanied him to the Embankment.
Presently a hansom was secured, and Philip handed his guest in, at the
same time furtively paying the driver.
"Good-night," said Miss Jennings, "and thank you."
They shook hands, for the first time in their acquaintanceship. The
cabman and his horse, however, did not know this, and immediately
feigned a studious interest in something on the Surrey side of the
river.
Philip walked home, and let himself into his dark and silent flat. On
turning up the light he found that the lady who "did" for him had
omitted to clear the breakfast-table. He accordingly set to work to wash
up himself, knowing full well that the task would be even less congenial
to-morrow morning.
As he groped philosophically in his tiny pantry for a dish-cloth, it
occurred to him that to a lonely man female society is a very helpful
thing. And he was right. For it is so helpful that though a man may, and
often does, exist contentedly enough without it, once he has tasted
thereof he must have it always or feel forever helpless.
And yet, every day, refined young women are surprised, and shocked, and
indignant, when a brother in London suddenly telegraphs home to say that
he has married a girl out of a tea-shop.