CHOOSING A PARTY.
ROOMS--DECISION--ODD MEN--RETURN--ARRANGEMENTS--THEORIES--OBJECTION
--PROPOSITIONS--ELECTIONS--THE LADIES--WHO'S HOST?--GUESTS--HOSTESS
--MORE PROPOSALS--GRANDMOTHERS--AUNTS--HALFSISTERS--SISTERHOOD
PROPOSED--GRAND IDEA--CHAPERONS--TERMS--IDEAL--A PROFESSION--A
DEFECT--OR ADVANTAGE--ADDITIONAL ATTRACTIONS--OLD MAN--DULNESS--
THEATRICAL--PLANS--THE PRESIDENT--EXPLANATION--IDEA.
There are, it appears, sixteen bed-rooms in the house, independently of
servants' rooms.
The question is, How shall we decide?
_Happy Thought._--Toss up.
We do so. The "odd man" to toss again, and so on. I am the last odd man.
Boodels chooses the room with the stain on the floor. He says he prefers
it.
We drive back to Station. Thoughtful and sleepy journey.
Chilvern is to arrange all details as to fitting up and furnishing.
This, he says, he can do, inexpensively and artistically, in a couple of
weeks' time.
Milburd points out clearly to us that the old woman in charge evidently
doesn't want to be turned out, and so invented the ghost. We all think
it highly probable, except Boodels, who says he doesn't see why there
shouldn't be a ghost. We don't dispute it.
The next thing is to make up a party. Cazell tells us "what we ought to
do." "We ought," he says, "to form ourselves into a committee, and ask
so many people."
[Illustration: "I'LL TELL YOU WHAT YOU OUGHT TO DO."]
We meet in the evening to choose our party. Rather difficult to propose
personal friends, whom every one of us will like. We agree that we must
be outspoken, and if we don't like a guest proposed, we must say so,
and, as it were, blackball him.
Or _her_?--This remark leads to the question, Are there to be any
ladies? Boodels says decidedly, Yes.
Chilvern, putting it artistically, says, "We want a bit of colour in a
house like that."
Cazell wants to know who is to be the host. Boodels proposes me.
I accept the position; but what am I _exactly_? that's what I must
clearly understand.
Milburd explains--a sort of president of a Domestic Republic.
Very good. Then how about the ladies?
Chilvern says we must have a hostess. We all suppose, doubtfully, that
we must. I ask, Won't that interfere with our arrangements?
Boodels replies, that "we can't have any arrangements without a
hostess." He says, after some consideration, that he has got a
Grandmother who might be useful. Chilvern, deferentially, proposes an
Aunt of his own, but does not, as it were, press her upon us, on account
of some infirmities of temper. I've got a half-sister who was a widow
about the time I was born, and if she's not in India ....
On the whole we think that if Boodels would have no objection to his
grandmother coming.....
"Not in the least," says Boodels. "I think she can stand a fortnight of
it or so."
Carried nem. con. Boodels' grandmother to be lent for three weeks, and
to be returned safely.
_Happy Thought (to suggest to ladies)._--Why shouldn't there be a
sisterhood of chaperons? Let somebody start it. "Oh!" says a young lady,
"I can't go there wherever it is, because I can't go alone, and I
haven't got a chaperon."
Now carry out the idea. The young lady goes to The Home (this sort of
establishment is always a Home--possibly because people to be hired are
never _not_ at home),--well, she goes to the Home, sees the lady
superioress or manageress, who asks her what sort of a chaperon she
wants. She doesn't exactly know; but say, age about 50, cheerful
disposition, polished manners.
Good. Down comes photograph book.
Young lady inspects chaperons and selects one.
She comes downstairs. "Is she," asks the lady manageress, "to be dressed
for evening or for day, a fete or for what?"
Well then, that's all settled.
Terms, so much an hour, and something for herself. What the French call
a _pour boire_.
This is a genuinely good idea, and one to be adopted, I am sure. What an
excellent profession for ladies of good family and education, of a
certain age, and an uncertain income.
They might form a Social Beguinage, on the model of the one at Ghent. No
vows. All sorts of dresses. All sorts of feeding. Respectable address.
And a Home.
Boodels' grandmother, it turns out, is deaf.
Here again what a recommendation for a chaperon! and how very few
employments are open to deaf people. No harmless, bodily ailment would
disqualify, except a violent cold and sneezing.
A chaperon with a song: useful. Consider this idea in futuro. Put it
down and assist the others in our list.
We ought to make our company a good salad.
I propose my friend, Jenkyns Soames.
Jenkyns Soames is a scientific man.
"We mustn't be _dull_," says Boodels, which I feel is covertly an
objection to my friend.
[Illustration: JENKYNS SOAMES, ESQ.
(_Professor of Scientific Economy._)]
Chilvern says that he thinks we ought to have an old man.
What for?
Well, ... he hesitates, then says, politely, that with all young ones,
won't Mrs. Boodels be rather dull?
(_Happy Thought._--Old man for Mrs. Boodels, to talk to her through her
ear-trumpet.)
Boodels says, "Oh, no! his grandmother's never dull."
Milburd observes, that this choosing is like making up characters for a
play. He takes in a theatrical newspaper, and proposes that we should
set down what we want, after the style in which the managers frame their
advertisements.
[Illustration: THE "LEADING HEAVY." "But--soft! I must dissemble!"]
_Wanted._--A First Old Man. Also A Leading Heavy.
He proposes "Byrton--Captain Byrton. He was in a dragoon regiment."
_Happy Thought._--Good for "Leading Heavy."
Milburd's man is Byrton. Mine is Soames. I have an instinctive dislike
to Byrton, I don't know why, perhaps because I perceive a certain amount
of feeling against Soames.
_Boodels' Proposal._--That we should meet once a week to determine whose
invitations should be renewed, and whose _conge_ should be given.
_As President_ I say, "Well, but I can't tell our guests that they must
go."
Cazell strikes in, "I tell you what we ought to do--only ask everyone
for a week, and then, if we like them, we can ask 'em to stop on."
_Agreed._--That we take these matters into weekly consideration.
Milburd wishes to know who is to order dinner every day.
_Happy Thought._--Take it in turn, and I'll begin as President.
Boodels, when this has been agreed to, says that we ought to have good
dogs about and outside a large house like that.
I tell them that there is one--a very fierce beast.
Boodels says he's sure I must be mistaken, as they went all over the
house, and there was only a little snarling, growling puppy making darts
at a mouse, or a rat, which he saw moving behind some door which was
locked.
[_Happy Thought._--Keep the facts to myself. Only a Puppy! and I thought
it was a mastiff! [Good name, by the way, for a novel--_Only a Puppy_.]
If I'd shaken that door again, then they could have let me out.]
We've all got dogs, except myself. I have, I say, my eye on a dog. I
remember some one promising me a clever poodle a year ago. Will think
who it was, and call on him.
Cazell is of opinion that we ought to wear some peculiar sort of dress,
and call ourselves by some name.
_Happy Thought._--Why not be an Order?
Someone is just going to speak, when I beg his pardon, and say, "Look
here!" I am
[Illustration: STRUCK BY A HAPPY THOUGHT.]