Not to be outdone by Olympia we have just held a motor show in our
provincial Town Hall. What though the motoring magazines, obese with the
rich diet of advertisement, grew no fatter in its honour, it was at least
the most successful social function we have known since the War began. The
Town Hall externally was magnificent with flags by day and coloured lamps
by night, and within was a blaze of bunting and greenstuff. The band of the
Free Shepherds played popular music, and the luncheon and tea rooms were
the scene of most delightful little gatherings. Besides all this, quite a
number of cars were to be found amongst the decorations.
Nearly every demobilised officer in the county seems to have taken up an
agency for a car or two, and bought himself spats on the strength of a
prospective fortune. Jimmy Wrigley and I are amongst them. Wrigley in the
Great War was M.T., R.A.S.C., and knows so much about cars that he can tell
the make of lamps from the track of the tyres; while I was a cavalryman and
know so little that I judge Jimmy's cleverness only by other people's
incredulity. On our stand at the show we exhibited two cars, which, as I
carefully learned beforehand from the book of the words, were a Byng-Beatty
and a Tanglefoot, these being the cars for which we are what they call
concessionaires. (The _bat_ is tricky, but one picks it up loafing about
garages.)
As a rule Jimmy and I do the correspondence between us--Jimmy contributing
the technique and I the punctuation; but for the three days of the show his
cousin Sheila volunteered to preside at a dainty little table and make
jottings of our orders. Sheila is always ornamental, and as we had the
stand draped to tone with her hair, and she wore a dress which harmonized
like soft music with the pale heliotrope of the Tanglefoot's body-work, our
display was a magnet from the word "Go."
And then on the morning of the opening day Jimmy went down with his Lake
Doiran malaria and left me to it!
I am as brave as most people, but this calamity unmanned me. "Sheila," I
said to a pair of pitying grey eyes, as the crowd, having heard the show
declared open, massed about our stand--"Sheila, the situation is desperate.
These people will ask me about the cars. They will expect me to answer them
intelligently, and it's no use in the world talking horse to them--I can
see that from their sordid looks. I shall disappear. You can say I have
gone out on a trial run, which won't be a lie, only an understatement. And
you can just hand them out the little books and let them paw the varnish.
Silence will be better than anything I could say. Probably it is better
than what any conscientious man could say about the Tanglefoot."
"I'll carry on, Nobby," said Sheila. "You go and buy buns for Miss
Hurdlewing, and be happy. Fly! here's a purchaser."
Sheila's whisper dispersed me into the crowd and I strolled away, while she
bestowed a smile and a specification pamphlet on the first of the crowd to
step on to our stand.
I found it impossible to keep away for long. Sheila looked so well against
the heliotrope Tanglefoot limousine that I had to go back to look at her.
The stand was surrounded by a throng, hushed and breathless with interest.
Sheila was talking volubly. Hardened motorists listened with their mouths
open; zealots, feverish to expend their excess profits on motoring because
it was a novelty and expensive, stood spell-bound; a rival agent drank in
her words with tears in his eyes--tears for his old innocence--and his
cheek flushed with a sudden and splendid determination to amalgamate with
our firm.
"This chassis, gentlemen," Sheila was saying, with a glance towards the
Byng-Beatty, "has the most exclusive features. The torque-tube being fitted
with an automatic lighter, it is possible to change tyres without leaving
your seat; while by a simple adjustment of the universal joint the car will
take any reasonable obstacle gracefully and without any inconvenience to
the occupants. The clutch is of the Alabama type. This new pattern created
a great sensation at Olympia, owing to the ease with which it permits even
the amateur driver to convert the present body into a _char-a-banc_ or a
tipping-waggon. The hood is reversible, so that passengers may be sheltered
from the wind when the car runs backwards. In the rear of the boot,
concealed by a door flush with the panels, is an EINSTEIN parachute, by
means of which a passenger may leave the car before an imminent accident or
when tired of the company."
I could not move; I did not want to either; and I certainly dared not
interrupt.
"The Tanglefoot," continued Sheila, while a sigh of sheer rapture rose from
the crowd, "is pre-eminently the car for a medical man or pushful
undertaker. No horn is supplied, though this will be fitted if desired. The
car is not cheap, but properly used will soon repay itself. Amongst the
accessories supplied with the standard chassis I should like to call your
attention to the collapsible game-bag and landing-net."
This went on for a long, long time, and I stayed till a man in the crowd
recognised me and showed symptoms of coming out of his trance. I fled, and
returned only at the luncheon interval.
"Sheila," I said--"Sheila, this may be fun for you, but James Wrigley and I
may sing in the streets to pay for it."
"You great stupid"--her eyes were sparking as she spoke--"I've booked more
orders than you will be able to carry out before you've learned wisdom.
Look!" It was practically a nominal roll of the local capitalists that she
showed me. "Nobody believes what you say about a car, so you can say what
you like. The thing is to get it noticed."
"Did they study these cars much before they let you take their names?"
Sheila looked into my eyes and laughed happily.