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MISS CAYLEY'S ADVENTURES
RECENT FICTION
By A. CONAN DOYLE.
A Duet. 6s.
By GRANT ALLEN.
An African Millionaire. 6s.
Linnet. 6s.
By FREDERIC BRETON.
True Heart. 6s.
'God Save England!' 6s.
By M. P. SHIEL.
Contraband of War. 6s.
The Yellow Danger. 6s.
By GRAMMONT HAMILTON.
The Mayfair Marriage. 6s.
By HALDANE MACFALL.
The Wooings of Jezebel Pettyfer. 6s.
By F. C. CONSTABLE.
Aunt Judith's Island. 6s.
Morgan Hailsham. 6s.
By FRANK NORRIS.
Shanghaied. 3s. 6d.
By MARIE CONNOR LEIGHTON and ROBERT LEIGHTON.
Convict 99. 3s. 6d.
Michael Dred, Detective. 3s. 6d.
* * * * *
London: GRANT RICHARDS, 1899
[Illustration: ALL AGOG TO TEACH THE HIGHER MATHEMATICS.--_See page_
142.]
MISS CAYLEY'S ADVENTURES
BY
GRANT ALLEN
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY GORDON BROWNE
London
GRANT RICHARDS
9 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C.
1899
_Printed April 1899_
_Reprinted July 1899_
CONTENTS
PAGE
1. THE ADVENTURE OF THE CANTANKEROUS OLD LADY 1
2. THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUPERCILIOUS _ATTACHE_ 29
3. THE ADVENTURE OF THE INQUISITIVE AMERICAN 59
4. THE ADVENTURE OF THE AMATEUR COMMISSION AGENT 85
5. THE ADVENTURE OF THE IMPROMPTU MOUNTAINEER 115
6. THE ADVENTURE OF THE URBANE OLD GENTLEMAN 141
7. THE ADVENTURE OF THE UNOBTRUSIVE OASIS 170
8. THE ADVENTURE OF THE PEA-GREEN PATRICIAN 199
9. THE ADVENTURE OF THE MAGNIFICENT MAHARAJAH 225
10. THE ADVENTURE OF THE CROSS-EYED Q.C. 252
11. THE ADVENTURE OF THE ORIENTAL ATTENDANT 281
12. THE ADVENTURE OF THE UNPROFESSIONAL DETECTIVE 305
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
All agog to teach the higher mathematics _Frontispiece_
I am going out, simply in search of adventure 5
Oui, Madame; Merci Beaucoup, Madame 8
Excuse me, I said, but I think I can see a way out of your
difficulty 10
A most urbane and obliging Continental gentleman 17
Persons of Miladi's temperament are always young 20
That succeeds? the shabby-looking man muttered 24
I put her hand back firmly 30
He cast a hasty glance at us 35
Harold, you viper, what do you mean by trying to avoid me? 37
Circumstances alter cases, he murmured 43
Miss Cayley, he said, you are playing with me 50
I rose of a sudden, and ran down the hill 54
I was going to oppose you and Harold 56
He kept close at my heels 63
I was pulled up short by a mounted policeman 64
Seems I didn't make much of a job of it 66
Don't scorch, miss; don't scorch 78
How far ahead the first man? 82
I am here behind you, Herr Lieutenant 83
Let them boom or bust on it 86
His open admiration was getting quite embarrassing 91
Minute inspection 96
I felt a perfect little hypocrite 99
She invited Elsie and myself to stop with her 103
The Count 107
I thought it kinder to him to remove it altogether 110
Inch by inch he retreated 113
Never leave a house to the servants, my dear! 118
I may stay, mayn't I? 123
I advanced on my hands and knees to the edge of the precipice 129
I gripped the rope and let myself down 132
I rolled and slid down 136
There's enterprise for you 145
Painting the sign-board 148
The urbane old gentleman 150
He went on dictating for just an hour 153
He bowed to us each separately 156
I waited breathless 164
What, you here! he cried 168
He read them, cruel man, before my very eyes 174
'Tis Doctor Macloghlen, he answered 177
Too much Nile 181
Emphasis 184
Riding a camel does not greatly differ from sea-sickness 186
Her agitation was evident 189
Crouching by the rocks sat our mysterious stranger 194
An odd-looking young man 201
He turned to me with an inane smile 205
Nothing seemed to put the man down 210
Yah don't catch me going so fah from Newmarket 214
Wasn't Fra Diavolo also a composah? 216
Take my word for it, you're staking your money on the wrong
fellah 220
I am the Maharajah of Moozuffernuggar 227
Who's your black friend? 232
A tiger-hunt is not a thing to be got up lightly 238
It went off unexpectedly 245
I saw him now the Oriental despot 248
It's I who am the winnah! 250
He wrote, I expect you to come back to England and marry me 254
It was endlessly wearisome 256
The cross-eyed Q.C. begged him to be very careful 262
I was a grotesque failure 265
The jury smiled 270
The question requires no answer, he said 272
I reeled where I sat 279
The messenger entered 284
He took a long, careless stare at me 291
I beckoned a porter 293
You can't get out here, he said, crustily 296
We told our tale 298
I have found a clue 303
I've held the fort by main force 306
Never! he answered. Never! 308
We shall have him in our power 312
Victory! 316
You wished to see me, sir? 320
Well, this is a fair knock-out, he ejaculated 325
Harold, your wife has bested me 329
I
THE ADVENTURE OF THE CANTANKEROUS OLD LADY
On the day when I found myself with twopence in my pocket, I naturally
made up my mind to go round the world.
It was my stepfather's death that drove me to it. I had never seen my
stepfather. Indeed, I never even thought of him as anything more than
Colonel Watts-Morgan. I owed him nothing, except my poverty. He married
my dear mother when I was a girl at school in Switzerland; and he
proceeded to spend her little fortune, left at her sole disposal by my
father's will, in paying his gambling debts. After that, he carried my
dear mother off to Burma; and when he and the climate between them had
succeeded in killing her, he made up for his appropriations at the
cheapest rate by allowing me just enough to send me to Girton. So, when
the Colonel died, in the year I was leaving college, I did not think it
necessary to go into mourning for him. Especially as he chose the
precise moment when my allowance was due, and bequeathed me nothing but
his consolidated liabilities.
'Of course you will teach,' said Elsie Petheridge, when I explained my
affairs to her. 'There is a good demand just now for high-school
teachers.'
I looked at her, aghast. '_Teach!_ Elsie,' I cried. (I had come up to
town to settle her in at her unfurnished lodgings.) 'Did you say
_teach_? That's just like you dear good schoolmistresses! You go to
Cambridge, and get examined till the heart and life have been examined
out of you; then you say to yourselves at the end of it all, "Let me
see; what am I good for now? I'm just about fit to go away and examine
other people!" That's what our Principal would call "a vicious
circle"--if one could ever admit there was anything vicious at all about
_you_, dear. No, Elsie, I do _not_ propose to teach. Nature did not cut
me out for a high-school teacher. I couldn't swallow a poker if I tried
for weeks. Pokers don't agree with me. Between ourselves, I am a bit of
a rebel.'
'You are, Brownie,' she answered, pausing in her papering, with her
sleeves rolled up--they called me 'Brownie,' partly because of my dark
complexion, but partly because they could never understand me. 'We all
knew that long ago.'
I laid down the paste-brush and mused.
'Do you remember, Elsie,' I said, staring hard at the paper-board,' when
I first went to Girton, how all you girls wore your hair quite straight,
in neat smooth coils, plaited up at the back about the size of a
pancake; and how of a sudden I burst in upon you, like a tropical
hurricane, and demoralised you; and how, after three days of me, some of
the dear innocents began with awe to cut themselves artless fringes,
while others went out in fear and trembling and surreptitiously
purchased a pair of curling-tongs? I was a bomb-shell in your midst in
those days; why, you yourself were almost afraid at first to speak to
me.'
'You see, you had a bicycle,' Elsie put in, smoothing the half-papered
wall; 'and in those days, of course, ladies didn't bicycle. You must
admit, Brownie, dear, it _was_ a startling innovation. You terrified us
so. And yet, after all, there isn't much harm in you.'
'I hope not,' I said devoutly. 'I was before my time, that was all; at
present, even a curate's wife may blamelessly bicycle.'
'But if you don't teach,' Elsie went on, gazing at me with those
wondering big blue eyes of hers, 'whatever will you do, Brownie?' Her
horizon was bounded by the scholastic circle.
'I haven't the faintest idea,' I answered, continuing to paste. 'Only,
as I can't trespass upon your elegant hospitality for life, whatever I
mean to do, I must begin doing this morning, when we've finished the
papering. I couldn't teach' (teaching, like mauve, is the refuge of the
incompetent); 'and I don't, if possible, want to sell bonnets.'
'As a milliner's girl?' Elsie asked, with a face of red horror.
'As a milliner's girl; why not? 'Tis an honest calling. Earls' daughters
do it now. But you needn't look so shocked. I tell you, just at present,
I am not contemplating it.'
'Then what _do_ you contemplate?'
I paused and reflected. 'I am here in London,' I answered, gazing rapt
at the ceiling; 'London, whose streets are paved with gold--though it
_looks_ at first sight like muddy flagstones; London, the greatest and
richest city in the world, where an adventurous soul ought surely to
find some loophole for an adventure. (That piece is hung crooked, dear;
we shall have to take it down again.) I devise a Plan, therefore. I
submit myself to fate; or, if you prefer it, I leave my future in the
hands of Providence. I shall stroll out this morning, as soon as I've
"cleaned myself," and embrace the first stray enterprise that offers.
Our Bagdad teems with enchanted carpets. Let one but float my way, and,
hi, presto, I seize it. I go where glory or a modest competence waits
me. I snatch at the first offer, the first hint of an opening.'
Elsie stared at me, more aghast and more puzzled than ever. 'But, how?'
she asked. 'Where? When? You _are_ so strange! What will you do to find
one?'
'Put on my hat and walk out,' I answered. 'Nothing could be simpler.
This city bursts with enterprises and surprises. Strangers from east and
west hurry through it in all directions. Omnibuses traverse it from end
to end--even, I am told, to Islington and Putney; within, folk sit face
to face who never saw one another before in their lives, and who may
never see one another again, or, on the contrary, may pass the rest of
their days together.'
I had a lovely harangue all pat in my head, in much the same strain, on
the infinite possibilities of entertaining angels unawares, in cabs, on
the Underground, in the aerated bread shops; but Elsie's widening eyes
of horror pulled me up short like a hansom in Piccadilly when the
inexorable upturned hand of the policeman checks it. 'Oh, Brownie,' she
cried, drawing back, 'you _don't_ mean to tell me you're going to ask
the first young man you meet in an omnibus to marry you?'
[Illustration: I AM GOING OUT, SIMPLY IN SEARCH OF ADVENTURE.]
I shrieked with laughter, 'Elsie,' I cried, kissing her dear yellow
little head, 'you are _impayable_. You never will learn what I mean. You
don't understand the language. No, no; I am going out, simply in search
of adventure. What adventure may come, I have not at this moment the
faintest conception. The fun lies in the search, the uncertainty, the
toss-up of it. What is the good of being penniless--with the trifling
exception of twopence--unless you are prepared to accept your position
in the spirit of a masked ball at Covent Garden?'
'I have never been to one,' Elsie put in.
'Gracious heavens, neither have I! What on earth do you take me for? But
I mean to see where fate will lead me.'
'I may go with you?' Elsie pleaded.
'Certainly _not_, my child,' I answered--she was three years older than
I, so I had the right to patronise her. 'That would spoil all. Your dear
little face would be quite enough to scare away a timid adventure.' She
knew what I meant. It was gentle and pensive, but it lacked initiative.
So, when we had finished that wall, I popped on my best hat, and popped
out by myself into Kensington Gardens.
I am told I ought to have been terribly alarmed at the straits in which
I found myself--a girl of twenty-one, alone in the world, and only
twopence short of penniless, without a friend to protect, a relation to
counsel her. (I don't count Aunt Susan, who lurked in ladylike indigence
at Blackheath, and whose counsel, like her tracts, was given away too
profusely to everybody to allow of one's placing any very high value
upon it.) But, as a matter of fact, I must admit I was not in the least
alarmed. Nature had endowed me with a profusion of crisp black hair, and
plenty of high spirits. If my eyes had been like Elsie's--that liquid
blue which looks out upon life with mingled pity and amazement--I might
have felt as a girl ought to feel under such conditions; but having
large dark eyes, with a bit of a twinkle in them, and being as well able
to pilot a bicycle as any girl of my acquaintance, I have inherited or
acquired an outlook on the world which distinctly leans rather towards
cheeriness than despondency. I croak with difficulty. So I accepted my
plight as an amusing experience, affording full scope for the congenial
exercise of courage and ingenuity.
How boundless are the opportunities of Kensington Gardens--the Round
Pond, the winding Serpentine, the mysterious seclusion of the Dutch
brick Palace! Genii swarm there. One jostles possibilities. It is a land
of romance, bounded on the north by the Abyss of Bayswater, and on the
south by the Amphitheatre of the Albert Hall. But for a centre of
adventure I choose the Long Walk; it beckoned me somewhat as the
North-West Passage beckoned my seafaring ancestors--the buccaneering
mariners of Elizabethan Devon. I sat down on a chair at the foot of an
old elm with a poetic hollow, prosaically filled by a utilitarian plate
of galvanised iron. Two ancient ladies were seated on the other side
already--very grand-looking dames, with the haughty and exclusive
ugliness of the English aristocracy in its later stages. For frank
hideousness, commend me to the noble dowager. They were talking
confidentially as I sat down; the trifling episode of my approach did
not suffice to stem the full stream of their conversation. The great
ignore the intrusion of their inferiors.
[Illustration: OUI, MADAME; MERCI BEAUCOUP, MADAME.]
'Yes, it's a terrible nuisance,' the eldest and ugliest of the two
observed--she was a high-born lady, with a distinctly cantankerous cast
of countenance. She had a Roman nose, and her skin was wrinkled like a
wilted apple; she wore coffee-coloured point-lace in her bonnet, with a
complexion to match. 'But what could I do, my dear? I simply _couldn't_
put up with such insolence. So I looked her straight back in the
face--oh, she quailed, I can tell you; and I said to her, in my iciest
voice--you know how icy I can be when occasion demands it'--the second
old lady nodded an ungrudging assent, as if perfectly prepared to admit
her friend's rare gift of iciness--'I said to her, "Celestine, you can
take your month's wages, and half an hour to get out of this house." And
she dropped me a deep reverence, and she answered: "_Oui, madame; merci
beaucoup, madame; je ne desire pas mieux, madame._" And out she
flounced. So there was the end of it.'
'Still, you go to Schlangenbad on Monday?'
'That's the point. On Monday. If it weren't for the journey, I should
have been glad enough to be rid of the minx. I'm glad as it is, indeed;
for a more insolent, upstanding, independent, answer-you-back-again
young woman, with a sneer of her own, _I_ never saw, Amelia--but I
_must_ get to Schlangenbad. Now, there the difficulty comes in. On the
one hand, if I engage a maid in London, I have the choice of two evils.
Either I must take a trapesing English girl--and I know by experience
that an English girl on the Continent is a vast deal worse than no maid
at all: _you_ have to wait upon _her_, instead of her waiting upon you;
she gets seasick on the crossing, and when she reaches France or
Germany, she hates the meals, and she detests the hotel servants, and
she can't speak the language, so that she's always calling you in to
interpret for her in her private differences with the _fille-de-chambre_
and the landlord; or else I must pick up a French maid in London, and I
know equally by experience that the French maids one engages in London
are invariably dishonest--more dishonest than the rest even; they've
come here because they have no character to speak of elsewhere, and they
think you aren't likely to write and enquire of their last mistress in
Toulouse or St. Petersburg. Then, again, on the other hand, I can't wait
to get a Gretchen, an unsophisticated little Gretchen of the Taunus at
Schlangenbad-- I suppose there _are_ unsophisticated girls in Germany
still--made in Germany--they don't make 'em any longer in England, I'm
sure--like everything else, the trade in rustic innocence has been
driven from the country. I can't wait to get a Gretchen, as I should
like to do, of course, because I simply _daren't_ undertake to cross the
Channel alone and go all that long journey by Ostend or Calais, Brussels
and Cologne, to Schlangenbad.'
'You could get a temporary maid,' her friend suggested, in a lull of the
tornado.
The Cantankerous Old Lady flared up. 'Yes, and have my jewel-case
stolen! Or find she was an English girl without one word of German. Or
nurse her on the boat when I want to give my undivided attention to my
own misfortunes. No, Amelia, I call it positively unkind of you to
suggest such a thing. You're _so_ unsympathetic! I put my foot down
there. I will _not_ take any temporary person.'
I saw my chance. This was a delightful idea. Why not start for
Schlangenbad with the Cantankerous Old Lady?
Of course, I had not the slightest intention of taking a lady's-maid's
place for a permanency. Nor even, if it comes to that, as a passing
expedient. But _if_ I wanted to go round the world, how could I do
better than set out by the Rhine country? The Rhine leads you on to the
Danube, the Danube to the Black Sea, the Black Sea to Asia; and so, by
way of India, China, and Japan, you reach the Pacific and San Francisco;
whence one returns quite easily by New York and the White Star Liners. I
began to feel like a globe-trotter already; the Cantankerous Old Lady
was the thin end of the wedge--the first rung of the ladder! I proceeded
to put my foot on it.
[Illustration: EXCUSE ME, I SAID, BUT I THINK I SEE A WAY OUT OF YOUR
DIFFICULTY.]
I leaned around the corner of the tree and spoke. 'Excuse me,' I said,
in my suavest voice, 'but I think I see a way out of your difficulty.'
My first impression was that the Cantankerous Old Lady would go off in a
fit of apoplexy. She grew purple in the face with indignation and
astonishment, that a casual outsider should venture to address her; so
much so, indeed, that for a second I almost regretted my well-meant
interposition. Then she scanned me up and down, as if I were a girl in a
mantle shop, and she contemplated buying either me or the mantle. At
last, catching my eye, she thought better of it, and burst out laughing.
'What do you mean by this eavesdropping?' she asked.
I flushed up in turn. 'This is a public place,' I replied, with dignity;
'and you spoke in a tone which was hardly designed for the strictest
privacy. If you don't wish to be overheard, you oughtn't to shout.
Besides, I desired to do you a service.'
The Cantankerous Old Lady regarded me once more from head to foot. I did
not quail. Then she turned to her companion. 'The girl has spirit,' she
remarked, in an encouraging tone, as if she were discussing some absent
person. 'Upon my word, Amelia, I rather like the look of her. Well, my
good woman, what do you want to suggest to me?'
'Merely this,' I replied, bridling up and crushing her. 'I am a Girton
girl, an officer's daughter, no more a good woman than most others of my
class; and I have nothing in particular to do for the moment. I don't
object to going to Schlangenbad. I would convoy you over, as companion,
or lady-help, or anything else you choose to call it; I would remain
with you there for a week, till you could arrange with your Gretchen,
presumably unsophisticated; and then I would leave you. Salary is
unimportant; my fare suffices. I accept the chance as a cheap
opportunity of attaining Schlangenbad.'
The yellow-faced old lady put up her long-handled tortoise-shell
eyeglasses and inspected me all over again. 'Well, I declare,' she
murmured. 'What are girls coming to, I wonder? Girton, you say; Girton!
That place at Cambridge! You speak Greek, of course; but how about
German?'
'Like a native,' I answered, with cheerful promptitude. 'I was at school
in Canton Berne; it is a mother tongue to me.'
'No, no,' the old lady went on, fixing her keen small eyes on my mouth.
'Those little lips could never frame themselves to "schlecht" or
"wunderschoen"; they were not cut out for it.'
'Pardon me,' I answered, in German. 'What I say, that I mean. The
never-to-be-forgotten music of the Fatherland's-speech has on my infant
ear from the first-beginning impressed itself.'
The old lady laughed aloud.
'Don't jabber it to me, child,' she cried. 'I hate the lingo. It's the
one tongue on earth that even a pretty girl's lips fail to render
attractive. You yourself make faces over it. What's your name, young
woman?'
'Lois Cayley.'
'Lois! _What_ a name! I never heard of any Lois in my life before,
except Timothy's grandmother. _You're_ not anybody's grandmother, are
you?'
'Not to my knowledge,' I answered, gravely.
She burst out laughing again.
'Well, you'll do, I think,' she said, catching my arm. 'That big mill
down yonder hasn't ground the originality altogether out of you. I adore
originality. It was clever of you to catch at the suggestion of this
arrangement. Lois Cayley, you say; any relation of a madcap Captain
Cayley whom I used once to know, in the Forty-second Highlanders?'
'His daughter,' I answered, flushing. For I was proud of my father.
'Ha! I remember; he died, poor fellow; he was a good soldier--and
his'--I felt she was going to say 'his fool of a widow,' but a glance
from me quelled her; 'his widow went and married that good-looking
scapegrace, Jack Watts-Morgan. Never marry a man, my dear, with a
double-barrelled name and no visible means of subsistence; above all, if
he's generally known by a nickname. So you're poor Tom Cayley's
daughter, are you? Well, well, we can settle this little matter between
us. Mind, I'm a person who always expects to have my own way. If you
come with _me_ to Schlangenbad, you must do as I tell you.'
'I _think_ I could manage it--for a week,' I answered, demurely.
She smiled at my audacity. We passed on to terms. They were quite
satisfactory. She wanted no references. 'Do I look like a woman who
cares about a reference? What are called _characters_ are usually essays
in how not to say it. You take my fancy; that's the point! And poor Tom
Cayley! But, mind, I will _not_ be contradicted.'
'I will not contradict your wildest misstatement,' I answered, smiling.
'_And_ your name and address?' I asked, after we had settled
preliminaries.
A faint red spot rose quaintly in the centre of the Cantankerous Old
Lady's sallow cheek. 'My dear,' she murmured, 'my name is the one thing
on earth I'm really ashamed of. My parents chose to inflict upon me the
most odious label that human ingenuity ever devised for a Christian
soul; and I've not had courage enough to burst out and change it.'
A gleam of intuition flashed across me, 'You don't mean to say,' I
exclaimed, 'that you're called Georgina?'
The Cantankerous Old Lady gripped my arm hard. 'What an unusually
intelligent girl!' she broke in. 'How on earth did you guess? It _is_
Georgina.'
'Fellow-feeling,' I answered. 'So is mine, Georgina Lois. But as I quite
agree with you as to the atrocity of such conduct, I have suppressed the
Georgina. It ought to be made penal to send innocent girls into the
world so burdened.'
'My opinion to a T! You are really an exceptionally sensible young
woman. There's my name and address; I start on Monday.'
I glanced at her card. The very copperplate was noisy. 'Lady Georgina
Fawley, 49 Fortescue Crescent, W.'
It had taken us twenty minutes to arrange our protocols. As I walked
off, well pleased, Lady Georgina's friend ran after me quickly.
'You must take care,' she said, in a warning voice. 'You've caught a
Tartar.'
'So I suspect,' I answered. 'But a week in Tartary will be at least an
experience.'
'She has an awful temper.'
'That's nothing. So have I. Appalling, I assure you. And if it comes to
blows, I'm bigger and younger and stronger than she is.'
'Well, I wish you well out of it.'
'Thank you. It is kind of you to give me this warning. But I think I can
take care of myself. I come, you see, of a military family.'
I nodded my thanks, and strolled back to Elsie's. Dear little Elsie was
in transports of surprise when I related my adventure.
'Will you really go? And what will you do, my dear, when you get there?'
'I haven't a notion,' I answered; 'that's where the fun comes in. But,
anyhow, I shall have got there.'
'Oh, Brownie, you might starve!'
'And I might starve in London. In either place, I have only two hands
and one head to help me.'
'But, then, here you are among friends. You might stop with me for
ever.'
I kissed her fluffy forehead. 'You good, generous little Elsie,' I
cried; 'I won't stop here one moment after I have finished the painting
and papering. I came here to help you. I couldn't go on eating your
hard-earned bread and doing nothing. I know how sweet you are; but the
last thing I want is to add to your burdens. Now let us roll up our
sleeves again and hurry on with the dado.'
'But, Brownie, you'll want to be getting your own things ready.
Remember, you're off to Germany on Monday.'
I shrugged my shoulders. 'Tis a foreign trick I picked up in
Switzerland. 'What have I got to get ready?' I asked. 'I can't go out
and buy a complete summer outfit in Bond Street for twopence. Now, don't
look at me like that: be practical, Elsie, and let me help you paint the
dado.' For unless I helped her, poor Elsie could never have finished it
herself. I cut out half her clothes for her; her own ideas were almost
entirely limited to differential calculus. And cutting out a blouse by
differential calculus is weary, uphill work for a high-school teacher.
By Monday I had papered and furnished the rooms, and was ready to start
on my voyage of exploration. I met the Cantankerous Old Lady at Charing
Cross, by appointment, and proceeded to take charge of her luggage and
tickets.
Oh my, how fussy she was! 'You will drop that basket! I hope you have
got through tickets, _via_ Malines, _not_ by Brussels-- I won't go by
Brussels. You have to change there. Now, mind you notice how much the
luggage weighs in English pounds, and make the man at the office give
you a note of it to check those horrid Belgian porters. They'll charge
you for double the weight, unless you reduce it at once to kilogrammes.
_I_ know their ways. Foreigners have no consciences. They just go to the
priest and confess, you know, and wipe it all out, and start fresh again
on a career of crime next morning. I'm sure I don't know why I _ever_ go
abroad. The only country in the world fit to live in is England. No
mosquitoes, no passports, no--goodness gracious, child, don't let that
odious man bang about my hat-box! Have you no immortal soul, porter,
that you crush other people's property as if it was blackbeetles? No, I
will not let you take this, Lois; this is my jewel-box--it contains all
that remains of the Fawley family jewels. I positively decline to appear
at Schlangenbad without a diamond to my back. This never leaves my
hands. It's hard enough nowadays to keep body and skirt together. _Have_
you secured that _coupe_ at Ostend?'
[Illustration: A MOST URBANE AND OBLIGING CONTINENTAL GENTLEMAN.]
We got into our first-class carriage. It was clean and comfortable; but
the Cantankerous Old Lady made the porter mop the floor, and fidgeted
and worried till we slid out of the station. Fortunately, the only other
occupant of the compartment was a most urbane and obliging Continental
gentleman--I say Continental, because I couldn't quite make out whether
he was French, German, or Austrian--who was anxious in every way to meet
Lady Georgina's wishes. Did madame desire to have the window open? Oh,
certainly, with pleasure; the day was so sultry. Closed a little more?
_Parfaitement_, there _was_ a current of air, _il faut l'admettre_.
Madame would prefer the corner? No? Then perhaps she would like this
valise for a footstool? _Permettez_--just thus. A cold draught runs so
often along the floor in railway carriages. This is Kent that we
traverse; ah, the garden of England! As a diplomat, he knew every nook
of Europe, and he echoed the _mot_ he had accidentally heard drop from
madame's lips on the platform: no country in the world so delightful as
England!
'Monsieur is attached to the Embassy in London?' Lady Georgina inquired,
growing affable.
He twirled his grey moustache: a waxed moustache of great distinction.
'No, madame; I have quitted the diplomatic service; I inhabit London now
_pour mon agrement_. Some of my compatriots call it _triste_; for me, I
find it the most fascinating capital in Europe. What gaiety! What
movement! What poetry! What mystery!'
'If mystery means fog, it challenges the world,' I interposed.
He gazed at me with fixed eyes. 'Yes, mademoiselle,' he answered, in
quite a different and markedly chilly voice. 'Whatever your great
country attempts--were it only a fog--it achieves consummately.'
I have quick intuitions. I felt the foreign gentleman took an
instinctive dislike to me.
To make up for it, he talked much, and with animation, to Lady Georgina.
They ferreted out friends in common, and were as much surprised at it as
people always are at that inevitable experience.
'Ah yes, madame, I recollect him well in Vienna. I was there at the
time, attached to our Legation. He was a charming man; you read his
masterly paper on the Central Problem of the Dual Empire?'
'You were in Vienna then!' the Cantankerous Old Lady mused back. 'Lois,
my child, don't stare'--she had covenanted from the first to call me
Lois, as my father's daughter, and I confess I preferred it to being
Miss Cayley'd. 'We must surely have met. Dare I ask your name,
monsieur?'
I could see the foreign gentleman was delighted at this turn. He had
played for it, and carried his point. He meant her to ask him. He had a
card in his pocket, conveniently close; and he handed it across to her.
She read it, and passed it on: 'M. le Comte de Laroche-sur-Loiret.'
'Oh, I remember your name well,' the Cantankerous Old Lady broke in. 'I
think you knew my husband, Sir Evelyn Fawley, and my father, Lord
Kynaston.'
The Count looked profoundly surprised and delighted. 'What! you are then
Lady Georgina Fawley!' he cried, striking an attitude. 'Indeed, miladi,
your admirable husband was one of the very first to exert his influence
in my favour at Vienna. Do I recall him, _ce cher_ Sir Evelyn? If I
recall him! What a fortunate rencounter! I must have seen you some years
ago at Vienna, miladi, though I had not then the great pleasure of
making your acquaintance. But your face had impressed itself on my
sub-conscious self!' (I did not learn till later that the esoteric
doctrine of the sub-conscious self was Lady Georgina's favourite hobby.)
'The moment chance led me to this carriage this morning, I said to
myself, "That face, those features: so vivid, so striking: I have seen
them somewhere. With what do I connect them in the recesses of my
memory? A high-born family; genius; rank; the diplomatic service; some
unnameable charm; some faint touch of eccentricity. Ha! I have it.
Vienna, a carriage with footmen in red livery, a noble presence, a crowd
of wits--poets, artists, politicians--pressing eagerly round the
landau." That was my mental picture as I sat and confronted you: I
understand it all now; this is Lady Georgina Fawley!'
I thought the Cantankerous Old Lady, who was a shrewd person in her way,
must surely see through this obvious patter; but I had under-estimated
the average human capacity for swallowing flattery. Instead of
dismissing his fulsome nonsense with a contemptuous smile, Lady
Georgina perked herself up with a conscious air of coquetry, and asked
for more. 'Yes, they were delightful days in Vienna,' she said,
simpering; 'I was young then, Count; I enjoyed life with a zest.'
[Illustration: PERSONS OF MILADI'S TEMPERAMENT ARE ALWAYS YOUNG.]
'Persons of miladi's temperament are always young,' the Count retorted,
glibly, leaning forward and gazing at her. 'Growing old is a foolish
habit of the stupid and the vacant. Men and women of _esprit_ are never
older. One learns as one goes on in life to admire, not the obvious
beauty of mere youth and health'--he glanced across at me
disdainfully--'but the profounder beauty of deep character in a
face--that calm and serene beauty which is imprinted on the brow by
experience of the emotions.'
'I have had my moments,' Lady Georgina murmured, with her head on one
side.
'I believe it, miladi,' the Count answered, and ogled her.
Thenceforward to Dover, they talked together with ceaseless animation.
The Cantankerous Old Lady was capital company. She had a tang in her
tongue, and in the course of ninety minutes she had flayed alive the
greater part of London society, with keen wit and sprightliness. I
laughed against my will at her ill-tempered sallies; they were too funny
not to amuse, in spite of their vitriol. As for the Count, he was
charmed. He talked well himself, too, and between them I almost forgot
the time till we arrived at Dover.
It was a very rough passage. The Count helped us to carry our nineteen
hand-packages and four rugs on board; but I noticed that, fascinated as
she was with him, Lady Georgina resisted his ingenious efforts to gain
possession of her precious jewel-case as she descended the gangway. She
clung to it like grim death, even in the chops of the Channel.
Fortunately I am a good sailor, and when Lady Georgina's sallow cheeks
began to grow pale, I was steady enough to supply her with her shawl and
her smelling-bottle. She fidgeted and worried the whole way over. She
_would_ be treated like a vertebrate animal. Those horrid Belgians had
no right to stick their deck-chairs just in front of her. The
impertinence of the hussies with the bright red hair--a grocer's
daughters, she felt sure--in venturing to come and sit on the same bench
with _her_--the bench 'for ladies only,' under the lee of the funnel!
'Ladies only,' indeed! Did the baggages pretend they considered
themselves ladies? Oh, that placid old gentleman in the episcopal
gaiters was their father, was he? Well, a bishop should bring up his
daughters better, having his children in subjection with all gravity.
Instead of which--'Lois, my smelling-salts!' This was a beastly boat;
such an odour of machinery; they had no decent boats nowadays; with all
our boasted improvements, she could remember well when the cross-Channel
service was much better conducted than it was at present. But _that_ was
before we had compulsory education. The working classes were driving
trade out of the country, and the consequence was, we couldn't build a
boat which didn't reek like an oil-shop. Even the sailors on board were
French--jabbering idiots; not an honest British Jack-tar among the lot
of them; though the stewards were English, and very inferior Cockney
English at that, with their off-hand ways, and their School Board airs
and graces. _She'd_ School Board them if they were her servants; _she'd_
show them the sort of respect that was due to people of birth and
education. But the children of the lower classes never learnt their
catechism nowadays; they were too much occupied with literatoor,
jography, and free-'and drawrin'. Happily for my nerves, a good lurch to
leeward put a stop for a while to the course of her thoughts on the
present distresses.
At Ostend the Count made a second gallant attempt to capture the
jewel-case, which Lady Georgina automatically repulsed. She had a fixed
habit, I believe, of sticking fast to that jewel-case; for she was too
overpowered by the Count's urbanity, I feel sure, to suspect for a
moment his honesty of purpose. But whenever she travelled, I fancy, she
clung to her case as if her life depended upon it; it contained the
whole of her valuable diamonds.
We had twenty minutes for refreshments at Ostend, during which interval
my old lady declared with warmth that I _must_ look after her registered
luggage; though, as it was booked through to Cologne, I could not even
see it till we crossed the German frontier; for the Belgian _douaniers_
seal up the van as soon as the through baggage for Germany is unloaded.
To satisfy her, however, I went through the formality of pretending to
inspect it, and rendered myself hateful to the head of the _douane_ by
asking various foolish and inept questions, on which Lady Georgina
insisted. When I had finished this silly and uncongenial task--for I am
not by nature fussy, and it is hard to assume fussiness as another
person's proxy--I returned to our _coupe_ which I had arranged for in
London. To my great amazement, I found the Cantankerous Old Lady and the
egregious Count comfortably seated there. 'Monsieur has been good enough
to accept a place in our carriage,' she observed, as I entered.
He bowed and smiled. 'Or, rather, madame has been so kind as to offer me
one,' he corrected.
'Would you like some lunch, Lady Georgina?' I asked, in my chilliest
voice. 'There are ten minutes to spare, and the _buffet_ is excellent.'
'An admirable inspiration,' the Count murmured. 'Permit me to escort
you, miladi.'
'You will come, Lois?' Lady Georgina asked.
'No, thank you,' I answered, for I had an idea. 'I am a capital sailor,
but the sea takes away my appetite.'
'Then you'll keep our places,' she said, turning to me. 'I hope you
won't allow them to stick in any horrid foreigners! They will try to
force them on you unless you insist. _I_ know their tricky ways. You
have the tickets, I trust? And the _bulletin_ for the _coupe_? Well,
mind you don't lose the paper for the registered luggage. Don't let
those dreadful porters touch my cloaks. And if anybody attempts to get
in, be sure you stand in front of the door as they mount to prevent
them.'
The Count handed her out; he was all high courtly politeness. As Lady
Georgina descended, he made yet another dexterous effort to relieve her
of the jewel-case. I don't think she noticed it, but automatically once
more she waved him aside. Then she turned to me. 'Here, my dear,' she
said, handing it to me, 'you'd better take care of it. If I lay it down
in the _buffet_ while I am eating my soup, some rogue may run away with
it. But mind, don't let it out of your hands on any account. Hold it
so, on your knee; and, for Heaven's sake, don't part with it.'
[Illustration: THAT SUCCEEDS? THE SHABBY-LOOKING MAN MUTTERED.]
By this time my suspicions of the Count were profound. From the first I
had doubted him; he was so blandly plausible. But as we landed at Ostend
I had accidentally overheard a low whispered conversation when he passed
a shabby-looking man, who had travelled in a second-class carriage from
London. 'That succeeds?' the shabby-looking man had muttered under his
breath in French, as the haughty nobleman with the waxed moustache
brushed by him.
'That succeeds admirably,' the Count had answered, in the same soft
undertone. '_Ca reussit a merveille!_'
I understood him to mean that he had prospered in his attempt to impose
on Lady Georgina.
They had been gone five minutes at the _buffet_, when the Count came
back hurriedly to the door of the _coupe_ with a _nonchalant_ air. 'Oh,
mademoiselle,' he said, in an off-hand tone, 'Lady Georgina has sent me
to fetch her jewel-case.'
I gripped it hard with both hands. '_Pardon_, M. le Comte,' I answered;
'Lady Georgina intrusted it to _my_ safe keeping, and, without her
leave, I cannot give it up to any one.'
'You mistrust me?' he cried, looking black. 'You doubt my honour? You
doubt my word when I say that miladi has sent me?'
'_Du tout_,' I answered, calmly. 'But I have Lady Georgina's orders to
stick to this case; and till Lady Georgina returns I stick to it.'
He murmured some indignant remark below his breath, and walked off. The
shabby-looking passenger was pacing up and down the platform outside in
a badly-made dust-coat. As they passed their lips moved. The Count's
seemed to mutter, '_C'est un coup manque._'
However, he did not desist even so. I saw he meant to go on with his
dangerous little game. He returned to the _buffet_ and rejoined Lady
Georgina. I felt sure it would be useless to warn her, so completely had
the Count succeeded in gulling her; but I took my own steps. I examined
the jewel-case closely. It had a leather outer covering; within was a
strong steel box, with stout bands of metal to bind it. I took my cue at
once, and acted for the best on my own responsibility.
When Lady Georgina and the Count returned, they were like old friends
together. The quails in aspic and the sparkling hock had evidently
opened their hearts to one another. As far as Malines they laughed and
talked without ceasing. Lady Georgina was now in her finest vein of
spleen: her acid wit grew sharper and more caustic each moment. Not a
reputation in Europe had a rag left to cover it as we steamed in beneath
the huge iron roof of the main central junction.
I had observed all the way from Ostend that the Count had been anxious
lest we might have to give up our _coupe_ at Malines. I assured him more
than once that his fears were groundless, for I had arranged at Charing
Cross that it should run right through to the German frontier. But he
waved me aside, with one lordly hand. I had not told Lady Georgina of
his vain attempt to take possession of her jewel-case; and the bare fact
of my silence made him increasingly suspicious of me.
'Pardon me, mademoiselle,' he said, coldly; 'you do not understand these
lines as well as I do. Nothing is more common than for those rascals of
railway clerks to sell one a place in a _coupe_ or a _wagon-lit_, and
then never reserve it, or turn one out half way. It is very possible
miladi may have to descend at Malines.'
Lady Georgina bore him out by a large variety of selected stories
concerning the various atrocities of the rival companies which had
stolen her luggage on her way to Italy. As for _trains de luxe_, they
were dens of robbers.
So when we reached Malines, just to satisfy Lady Georgina, I put out my
head and inquired of a porter. As I anticipated, he replied that there
was no change; we went through to Verviers.
The Count, however, was still unsatisfied. He descended, and made some
remarks a little farther down the platform to an official in the
gold-banded cap of a _chef-de-gare_, or some such functionary. Then he
returned to us, all fuming. 'It is as I said,' he exclaimed, flinging
open the door. 'These rogues have deceived us. The _coupe_ goes no
farther. You must dismount at once, miladi, and take the train just
opposite.'
I felt sure he was wrong, and I ventured to say so. But Lady Georgina
cried, 'Nonsense, child! The _chef-de-gare_ must know. Get out at once!
Bring my bag and the rugs! Mind that cloak! Don't forget the
sandwich-tin! Thanks, Count; will you kindly take charge of my
umbrellas? Hurry up, Lois; hurry up! the train is just starting!'
I scrambled after her, with my fourteen bundles, keeping a quiet eye
meanwhile on the jewel-case.
We took our seats in the opposite train, which I noticed was marked
'Amsterdam, Bruxelles, Paris.' But I said nothing. The Count jumped in,
jumped about, arranged our parcels, jumped out again. He spoke to a
porter; then he rushed back excitedly. '_Mille pardons_, miladi,' he
cried. 'I find the _chef-de-gare_ has cruelly deceived me. You were
right, after all, mademoiselle! We must return to the coupe__!'
With singular magnanimity, I refrained from saying, 'I told you so.'
Lady Georgina, very flustered and hot by this time, tumbled out once
more, and bolted back to the _coupe_. Both trains were just starting. In
her hurry, at last, she let the Count take possession of her jewel-case.
I rather fancy that as he passed one window he handed it in to the
shabby-looking passenger; but I am not certain. At any rate, when we
were comfortably seated in our own compartment once more, and he stood
on the footboard just about to enter, of a sudden he made an unexpected
dash back, and flung himself wildly into a Paris carriage. At the
self-same moment, with a piercing shriek, both trains started.
Lady Georgina threw up her hands in a frenzy of horror. 'My diamonds!'
she cried aloud. 'Oh, Lois, my diamonds!'
'Don't distress yourself,' I answered, holding her back, for I verily
believe she would have leapt from the train. 'He has only taken the
outer shell, with the sandwich-case inside it. _Here_ is the steel box!'
And I produced it, triumphantly.
She seized it, overjoyed. 'How did this happen?' she cried, hugging it,
for she loved those diamonds.
'Very simply,' I answered. 'I saw the man was a rogue, and that he had a
confederate with him in another carriage. So, while you were gone to the
_buffet_ at Ostend, I slipped the box out of the case, and put in the
sandwich-tin, that he might carry it off, and we might have proofs
against him. All you have to do now is to inform the conductor, who will
telegraph to stop the train to Paris. I spoke to him about that at
Ostend, so that everything is ready.'
She positively hugged me. 'My dear,' she cried, 'you are the cleverest
little woman I ever met in my life! Who on earth could have suspected
such a polished gentleman? Why, you're worth your weight in gold. What
the dickens shall I do without you at Schlangenbad?'
II
THE ADVENTURE OF THE SUPERCILIOUS _ATTACHE_
The Count must have been an adept in the gentle art of quick-change
disguise; for though we telegraphed full particulars of his appearance
from Louvain, the next station, nobody in the least resembling either
him or his accomplice, the shabby-looking man, could be unearthed in the
Paris train when it drew up at Brussels, its first stopping-place. They
must have transformed themselves meanwhile into two different persons.
Indeed, from the outset, I had suspected his moustache--'twas so _very_
distinguished.
When we reached Cologne, the Cantankerous Old Lady overwhelmed me with
the warmth of her thanks and praises. Nay, more; after breakfast next
morning, before we set out by slow train for Schlangenbad, she burst
like a tornado into my bedroom at the Cologne hotel with a cheque for
twenty guineas, drawn in my favour. 'That's for you, my dear,' she said,
handing it to me, and looking really quite gracious.
I glanced at the piece of paper and felt my face glow crimson. 'Oh, Lady
Georgina,' I cried; 'you misunderstand. You forget that I am a lady.'
'Nonsense, child, nonsense! Your courage and promptitude were worth ten
times that sum,' she exclaimed, positively slipping her arm round my
neck. 'It was your courage I particularly admired, Lois; because you
faced the risk of my happening to look inside the outer case, and
finding you had abstracted the blessed box: in which case I might quite
naturally have concluded you meant to steal it.'
'I thought of that,' I answered. 'But I decided to risk it. I felt it
was worth while. For I was sure the man meant to take the case as soon
as ever you gave him the opportunity.'
'Then you deserve to be rewarded,' she insisted, pressing the cheque
upon me.
[Illustration: I PUT HER HAND BACK FIRMLY.]
I put her hand back firmly. 'Lady Georgina,' I said, 'it is very amiable
of you. I think you do right in offering me the money; but I think I
should do altogether wrong in accepting it. A lady is not honest from
the hope of gain; she is not brave because she expects to be paid for
her bravery. You were my employer, and I was bound to serve my
employer's interests. I did so as well as I could, and there is the end
of it.'
She looked absolutely disappointed; we all hate to crush a benevolent
impulse; but she tore the cheque up into very small pieces. 'As you
will, my dear,' she said, with her hands on her hips: 'I see, you are
poor Tom Cayley's daughter. He was always a bit Quixotic.' Though I
believe she liked me all the better for my refusal.