Lalage, Hilda, and I went for a drive in one of the attractive carriages
which ply for hire in the Lisbon streets. We drove up one side of the
Avenida de Liberdade and down the other. I did the duty of a good
cicerone by pointing out the fountains, trees and other objects of
interest which Lalage and Hilda were sure to see for themselves. When we
had exhausted the Avenida I suggested going on to Belem. Lalage did not
seem pleased. She said that driving was not her idea of pleasure. She
wanted something more active and exciting. I agreed.
“We’ll go in a tram,” I said.
“Where to?”
“Belem.”
“Belem’s a church, isn’t it, Hilda?”
Hilda and I both admitted that it was.
“Then we can’t go there,” said Lalage decidedly.
“Why not?” I ventured to ask.
“You said yourself that it wouldn’t be decent.”
“Oh!” I said, “you’re thinking of those poor bishops; but you haven’t
done anything to the Portuguese patriarch yet. Besides, only half of
Belem is a church. The other half is a school, quite secular.”
“The only things I really want to see,” said Lalage, “are the dead
Portuguese kings in glass cases.”
“The what?”
“The dead kings. Stuffed, I suppose. Do you mean to say you’ve been here
nearly four years and don’t yet know the way they keep their kings,
like natural history specimens in a museum? Why, that was the very first
thing Hilda found out in the guide book.”
“I didn’t,” said Hilda. “It was you.”
“Let’s credit Selby-Harrison with the discovery,” I said soothingly. “I
remember now about those kings. But the exhibition has been closed to
the public now for some years. We shan’t be able to get in.”
“What’s the use of being an ambassador,” said Lalage, “if you can’t
step in to see a dead king whenever you like?”
An ambassador may be able to claim audiences with deceased royalties,
but I was not an ambassador. I offered Lalage as an alternative the
nearest thing at my command to dead kings.
“The English cemetery,” I said, “is considered one of the sights of
Lisbon. If you are really interested in corpses we might go there.”
“I hate Englishmen,” said Lalage. “All Englishmen.”
“That’s why I suggested their cemetery. It will be immensely gratifying
to you to realize what a lot of them have died. The place is nearly full
and there are lots of yew trees.”
Lalage did me the honour of laughing. Hilda, after a minute’s
consideration, also laughed. But they were not to be distracted from the
dead kings.
“We’ll go back to the hotel,” said Lalage, “and rout out poor Pussy.
She’ll be wanting more food by this time. You can go and call on the
present King or the Queen Mother, or whoever it is who keep the key of
that mausoleum and then come back for us. By the way, before you go,
just tell me the Portuguese for an ice. It’s desperately hot.”
I told her and then got out of the carriage. I did not call upon either
the King or his mother. They were in Cintra, so I should not have had
time to get at them even if I had wished. I saw my chief, and, with the
fear of Lalage before my eyes, worried him until he gave me a letter
to a high official. From him I obtained with great difficulty the
permission I wanted. I returned to the hotel. Miss Battersby, though
recovering rapidly, was still too feeble to accompany us; so Lalage,
Hilda, and I set off without her.
The dead kings were a disappointment. Hilda’s nerve failed her on
the doorstep and she declined to go in. Lalage and I went through the
exhibition alone. I observed, without surprise, that Lalage turned her
eyes away from the objects she had come to inspect. I ventured, when
we got out, to suggest that we might perhaps have spent a pleasanter
afternoon at Belem. Lalage snubbed me sharply.
“Certainly not,” she said. “I’m going in for the Vice-Chancellor’s prize
for English verse next year and the subject is mortality. I shall simply
knock spots out of the other competitors when I work in those kings.
“‘Sceptre and crown
Must tumble down,’
You know the sort of thing I mean.”
“That’s not original,” I said. “I remember it distinctly in the ‘Golden
Treasury,’ though I have forgotten the author’s name.”
“It wasn’t meant to be original. I quoted it simply as an indication of
the sort of line I mean to take in my poem.”
“You’ll win the prize to a certainty. When you publish the poem
afterward with notes I hope you’ll mention my name. Without me you
wouldn’t have got at those kings.”
“In the meanwhile,” said Lalage, “I could do with some tea and another
ice. Couldn’t you, Hilda?”
Hilda could and did. I took them to an excellent shop in the Rua Aurea,
where Hilda had three ices and Lalage four, after tea. I only had one.
Lalage twitted me with my want of appetite.
“I can’t eat any more.” I said. “The thought of poor Miss Battersby
sitting alone in that stuffy hotel has spoiled my appetite.”
“The hotel is stuffy,” said Lalage. “Where are you stopping?”
I mentioned Mont ‘Estoril and Lalage at once proposed to move her whole
party out there.
There were difficulties with the Lisbon hotel keeper, who wanted to be
paid for the beds which Lalage and Hilda had not slept in as well as
for that which Miss Battersby had enjoyed during the afternoon. Lalage
argued with him in French, which he understood very imperfectly, and she
boasted afterward that she had convinced him of the unreasonableness of
his demand. I, privately, paid his bill.
There were also difficulties with Miss Battersby. She had, so Hilda told
me, the strongest possible objection to putting on her clothes again.
But Lalage was determined. In less than an hour after our return to the
hotel I was sitting opposite to Miss Battersby, who was swathed rather
than dressed, in a railway carriage, speeding along the northern shore
of the Tagus estuary.
I had, early in the summer, made friends with a Mr. and Mrs Dodds,
who were living in my hotel. Mr. Dodds was a Glasgow merchant and was
conducting the Portuguese side of his firm’s business. Mrs. Dodds was
a native of Paisley. They were both very fond of bridge, and I had got
into the habit of playing with them every evening. We depended on chance
for a fourth member of our party, and just at the time of Lalage’s visit
were particularly fortunate in securing a young English engineer who was
installing a service of electric light somewhere in the neighbourhood.
The Doddses were friendly people and I had gradually come to entertain
a warm regard for them in spite of the extreme severity of their bridge
and Mrs. Dodds’s habit of speaking plainly about my mistakes. I would
not, except under great pressure, cause any inconvenience or annoyance
to the Doddses. But Lalage is great pressure. When she said that I was
to spend the evening talking to her I saw at once that the bridge must
be sacrificed. My plan was to apologize profusely to the Doddses, and
leave them condemned for one evening to sit bridgeless till bedtime.
But Lalage would not hear of this. She wanted, so she said, to talk
confidentially to me. Miss Battersby was an obstacle in her way, and
so she ordered me to introduce Miss Battersby as my substitute at the
bridge table.
If Miss Battersby had acted reasonably and gone to bed either before or
immediately after dinner this would have been unnecessary. But she did
not. She became immoderately cheerful and was most anxious to enjoy
herself. I set her down at the card table and then, as quickly as
possible, fled. Miss Battersby’s bridge is of the most rudimentary and
irritating kind and she has a conscientious objection to paying for
the small stakes which usually gave a brightness to our game. It was
necessary for me to get out of earshot of the Doddses and the engineer
before they discovered these two facts about Miss Battersby. I thought
it probable that I should have to go to a new hotel next day in order
to escape the reproaches of my friends. But I did not want to move that
night, so I went into the hotel garden, hustling Hilda before me. There
was no need to hustle Lalage. She understood the need for haste even
better than I did. I knew Miss Battersby’s capacity for bridge, having
occasionally played with her in my uncle’s house. Lalage understood
how acutely the pain brought on by Miss Battersby’s bridge would be
aggravated by the deprecating sweetness of Miss Battersby’s manner. In
the hotel garden there were a number of chairs made, I expect, by a man
whose regular business in life was the manufacture of the old-fashioned
straw beehives. When forced by the introduction of the new wooden hives
to turn his hand to making chairs, he failed to shake himself free of
the tradition of his proper art. His chairs were as like beehives as it
is possible for chairs to be and anybody who sits back in one of them
is surrounded on all sides by walls and overshadowed by a hood of woven
wicker-work. When Lalage sat down I could see no more of her than the
glowing end of her cigarette and the toes of her shoes. Hilda was to
the same extent invisible. I was annoyed by this at first, for Lalage
is very pretty to look at and the night was not so dark when we sat down
but that I could, had she been in any ordinary chair, have traced the
outline of her figure. Later on, when our conversation reached its
most interesting point, I was thankful to recollect that I also was in
obscurity. I am not, owing to my training as a diplomatist, an easy man
to startle, but Lalage gave me a severe shock. I prefer to keep my face
in the shadow when I am moved to unexpected emotion.
“To-morrow,” I said pleasantly, by way of opening the conversation, “we
shall have another long day’s sight-seeing, mitigated with ices.”
“I’m sorry to say,” said Lalage, “that we go home to-morrow. The steamer
sails at 11 a.m.”
“Surely there can be no real need for such hurry. Now that we have
Miss Battersby among us the Archdeacon and Hilda’s mother will be quite
satisfied.”
“It’s not that in the least,” said Lalage. “Is it, Hilda?”
Hilda said something about return tickets, but Lalage snubbed her. I
gathered that there was reason for precipitancy more serious than the
by-laws of the steamboat company.
“I am confident,” I said, “that Selby-Harrison is capable of carrying on
the work of exterminating bishops.”
“It’s not that either,” said Lalage. “The fact is that we have come
to Lisbon on business, not for pleasure. You’ve probably guessed that
already.”
“I feared it. Of the two reasons you gave me this morning for coming
here----”
“I haven’t told you any reason yet,” said Lalage.
“Excuse me, but when we first met this morning you said distinctly that
you had come to see me. I hardly flattered myself that could really be
true.”
“It was,” said Lalage. “Quite true.”
“It’s very kind of you to say so and of course I quite believe you, but
then you afterward gave me to understand that your real object was to
work up the emotion caused by the appearance of a dead king with a view
to utilizing it to add intensity to a prize poem. That, of course, is
business of a very serious kind. That’s why I meant to say a minute ago
that of the two reasons you gave me for coming here the second was the
more urgent.”
“Don’t ramble in that way,” said Lalage. “It wastes time. Hilda, explain
the scheme which we have in mind at present.”
Hilda threw away the greater part of a cigarette and sat up in her
beehive. I do not think that Hilda enjoys smoking cigarettes. She
probably does it to impress the public with the genuine devotion to
principle of the A.T.R.S.
“The society,” said Hilda “has met with difficulties. Its objects----”
“He knows the objects,” said Lalage. “Don’t you?”
“To expose in the public press----” I began.
“That’s just where we’re stuck,” said Lalage.
“Do you mean to tell me that the Irish newspapers have been so
incredibly stupid as not to publish the articles sent by you, Hilda, and
Selby-Harrison?”
“Not a single one of them,” said Lalage.
“And the bishops,” I said, “still wear their purple stocks, their
aprons, and their gaiters; and still talk tommyrot through the length
and breadth of the land.”
“But we’re not the least inclined to give in,” said Lalage.
“Don’t,” I said. “Keep on pelting the editors with articles. Some day
one of them will be away from home and an inexperienced subordinate----”
“That would be no use,” said Hilda.
“What we have determined to do,” said Lalage, “is to start a paper of
our own.”
“It ought,” I said, “to be a huge success.”
“I’m glad you agree with us there,” said Lalage. “We’ve gone into the
matter minutely. Selby-Harrison worked it out and we don’t see how we
could possibly make less than 12 per cent. Not that we want to make
money out of it. Our efforts are purely--what’s that word, Hilda? You
found it in a book, but I always forget it.”
“Altruistic,” said Hilda.
“You understand that, I suppose?” said Lalage to me.
“Yes,” I said, “I do. But I wasn’t thinking of the financial side of the
enterprise when I spoke of its being an immense success. What I had in
mind----”
“Finance,” said Lalage severely, “cannot possibly be ignored.”
“All we want,” said Hilda, “is some one to guarantee the working
expenses for the first three months.”
“And I said,” added Lalage, “that you’d do it if we came out here and
asked you.”
I recollected hearing of an Englishman who started a daily paper which
afterward failed and it was said that he lost £300,000 by the venture. I
hesitated.
“What we ask,” said Lalage, “is not money, but a guarantee, and we are
willing to pay 8 per cent, to whoever does it. The difference between
a guarantee and actual money is that in the one case you will probably
never have to pay at all, while in the other you will have to fork out
at once.”
“Am I,” I asked, “to get 8 per cent, on what I don’t give, but merely
promise?”
“That’s what it comes to,” said Lalage. “I call it a good offer.”
“It’s one of the most generous I ever heard,” I said. “May I ask if
Selby-Harrison----?”
“It was his suggestion,” said Hilda. “Neither Lalage nor I are any good
at sums, specially decimals.”
“And,” said Lalage, “you’ll get a copy of each number post free just the
same as if you were a regular subscriber!”
“We’ve got one advertiser already,” said Hilda.
“And,” said Lalage, “advertisments pay the whole cost of newspapers
nowadays. Any one who knows anything about the business side of the
press knows that. Selby-Harrison met a man the other day who reports
football matches and he said so.”
“Is it cocoa,” I asked, “or soap, or hair restorer?”
“No. It’s a man who wants to buy second-hand feather beds. I can’t
imagine what he means to do with them when he gets them, but that’s his
business. We needn’t worry ourselves so long as he pays us.”
“Lalage,” I said, “and Hilda, I am so thoroughly convinced of your
energy and enterprise, I feel so sure of Selby-Harrison’s financial
ability and I am so deeply in sympathy with the objects of your, may
I say our, society, that if I possessed £300,000 you should have it
to-morrow; but, owing to, recent legislation affecting Irish land, the
ever-increasing burden of income tax and the death duties----”
“Don’t start rambling again,” said Lalage. “It isn’t in the least funny,
and we’re both beginning to get sleepy. Nobody wants £300,000.”
“It takes that,” I said, “to run a newspaper.”
“What we want,” said Lalage, “is thirty pounds, guaranteed--ten pounds a
month for three months. All you have to do is to sign a paper----”
“Did Selby-Harrison draw up the paper?”
“Yes. And Hilda has it upstairs in her trunk.”
“That’s enough,” I said. “Anything Selby-Harrison has drawn up I’ll
sign. Perhaps, Hilda, you’ll be good enough--I wouldn’t trouble you if I
knew where to find it myself.”
“Get it, Hilda,” said Lalage.
Hilda struggled out of her beehive and immediately stumbled into a bed
of stocks. It had become very dark while we talked, but I think the
scent of the flowers might have warned her of her danger. I picked her
up carefully and set her on the path.
“Perhaps,” I said, “you won’t mind taking off your shoes as you cross
the hall outside the drawing-room. Mr. and Mrs. Dodds must have found
out about Miss Battersby’s bridge by this time.”
I think Hilda winked. I did not actually see her wink. It was too dark
to see anything; but there was a feeling in the air as if somebody
winked and Lalage had nothing to wink about.
“If,” I added, “they rush out and catch you, they will certainly ask
you where I am. You must be prepared for that. Would you very much mind
exaggerating a little, just for once?”
This time Hilda giggled audibly.
“You might say that Lalage and I had gone for a long walk and that you
do not know when we will be back.”
“That wouldn’t be true,” said Lalage, “so of course it can’t be said.”
“We can easily make it true,” I said. “I don’t want to go for a walk
at this time of night and I’m sure you don’t, after the exhausting day
you’ve had--but rather than put Hilda in an awkward position and set her
conscience gnawing at her during the night we might start at once, not
telling Hilda when we’ll be back.”
“All right,” said Lalage. “Pussy will fuss afterward of course. But----”
“I entirely forgot Miss Battersby,” I said. “She would fuss to a
certainty. She might write to the Archdeacon. After all, Hilda, you’ll
have to chance it with your shoes off. But for goodness’ sake don’t
sneeze or fall or anything of that sort just outside the door.”
Hilda returned in about ten minutes. She told us that she whistled
“Annie Laurie” on her way upstairs so as to give any one who might hear
her the impression that she was the boy employed by the hotel proprietor
to clean boots. The ruse, a brilliantly original one, was entirely
successful. The bridge party, as I learned next day, including Miss
Battersby, had gone to bed early. They did not play very much bridge.
Hilda brought Selby-Harrison’s form of guarantee with her. It was
written on a sheet of blue foolscap paper and ornamented with a penny
stamp, necessary, so a footnote informed me, because the sum of money
involved was more than two pounds. I signed it with a fountain pen by
the light of a wax match which Lalage struck on the sole of her shoe and
obligingly held so that it did not quite burn my hair.