CHAPTER VI
IN WHICH WE DINE OUT IN GROSVENOR
SQUARE
FATHER sat down to write a letter, and Uncle Philip smoked a cigarette in a meerschaum holder and read the Sporting Times. But the unfortunate young man could hardly bring his mind to bear upon those chaste pink pages for all that the Dwarf and Mr. Pitcher were quite at the top of their form this week.
Was it that his conscience hurt him? Fretting about Busoni do you suppose? Wondering whether the seventh unmarried daughter and the dearest mother had got to Queen’s Hall unscathed, and had also managed to get back again all right?
May have been so. If there is a doubt about it, conscientious fellow is entitled to benefit thereby; but we are bound to admit there is a doubt upon the subject.
And our reasons be these, lieges all and masterful men. At twenty to seven, long before Father had finished his letters, who should deign to enter the silence room but the identical Arminius Wingrove, to whom the gentle reader has already had the honor of a formal introduction.
Ping went the heart of the heir to the barony. He rose from his chair of russia leather, lately recovered at the behest of the Committee, and trod softly across the turkey carpet, old but good.
“Fathead,” said the heir to the barony—for this coarse familiarity we can only offer the excuse that the Great Man had always been Fathead to his familiars since his Oxford days—“Fathead,” said the heir to the barony, “I want to talk to you.”
Fathead almost looked as though he had no desire to converse with the too-familiar groundling, being due to take the Dowager Duchess of Bayswater to dine at the Ritz Hotel.
But on all occasions Arminius knew how to assume the air of the bon camarade.
“Fire away. Only five minutes. Dining old Polly Bayswater at the Ritz.”
“More fool you,” said the profane young man.
Alas! that nothing is sacred to the helots of the Button Club.
“Come into the smoking-room, where we can talk a bit.”
“Five minutes only,” said Arminius Wingrove, fixing his eyeglass with his accustomed air of mental power.
The heir to the barony laid hold of the arm of the famous dramatist, as though he didn’t intend to let it go; hustled him into a room adjoining, deposited him in the emptiest corner, ordered two sherries and angostura bitters, and straightway proceeded to show what comes of spending Saturday afternoon in places licensed by the Lord Chamberlain for stage performances.
“Do you know by any chance the girl who was Cinderella?”
Superfluous question to ask of Arminius Wingrove, we can tell you that. Are you not aware that the young person who played Cinderella had already captured all that was best in the life of the metropolis? What a question to ask Arminius Wingrove who knew every man, woman, and infant phenomenon worthy of regard, from Anna Maria, Duchess Dowager of Bayswater, to the ticket inspector on the Vauxhall trams.
“Know her? Of course I know her. And it was I who chose her first long-clothes for her.” At least the air of bland surprise of Arminius Wingrove was open to that interpretation, although, of course, modesty would have restrained him from saying anything of the kind. “Everybody knows her—now.”
“Didn’t know she was famous,” said the heir to the barony, limp as rags.
Arminius measured him in his naïveté, though not with the naked eye.
“Absolute nailer,” said the heir to the barony.
All vieux jeu to Arminius W. Took out his watch—inset with jewels of rare variety—a present from—never mind who, ye froward journalists.
“Ritz at eight. Polly will curse if kept waiting for her meals.”
“Absolute nailer,” said the vain young man. “Would like to meet her awfully if you can manage it for me.”
Arminius Wingrove pondered some.
“Why—ye-es,” said that great man.
“Thought perhaps?”
Arminius Wingrove pondered more.
“Must go—poor old Polly. But be at the Carlton Monday at five.”
With suppressed, but deep and sincere, emotion the heir to the barony wrung the bejeweled hand of Arminius Wingrove. Never more would he pull his leg. Not a bad chap; harmless very.
“Have another sherry?”
Nary.
Exit Arminius Wingrove to dress to take old Polly to the Ritz Hotel. Let us hope his evenin’ will not be as dull as in his heart of hearts he fears it will be; and even if he is carried out a corpse at a quarter-past eleven from that palatial building which is not so far from Piccadilly, his dying thought must be that he perished in the performance of a kind, considerate, and gentlemanly action.
Not of course, my lords and gentlemen, that it was the first he had performed by many.
The plutocrat was dining, too. With whom? inquires Transatlantic Journalist. With his people, of course, in Grosvenor Square. Not at all romantic. Wasn’t it, though? Adela and her Pa were going, although Pa never went anywhere since the rheumatism.
Nobody else; just en famille. Something in the air? Does look rather like it, doesn’t it, Cousin? A little previous perhaps; and it doesn’t do to be too previous, even in modern journalism.
Dressed in the Albany in his tightest evening trousers did this idle, rich young fellow; although the question why he could not have performed that action under the roof of his excellent parents at No. 88 Grosvenor Square, the corner house, can only be answered on the plain hypothesis that his uncle and aunts and other collaterals had left him a great deal of money to play with.
White waistcoat, of course; buttons mother o’ pearl; tie by Mr. Thomas Ling; pomade by Truefitt for the upper story. Even his man was proud of him. But we grieve to relate that his reception at No. 88 Grosvenor Square, the corner house, was not so cordial as it might have been, considering that up to the time of writing the life of this idle, rich young fellow was void of serious blemishes.
He could feel the frost even before he took off the coat with the astrachan collar.
“Ought to keep a stove, Jenkins, in this hall during the winter months.”
But that well-trained servitor looked solemnly down his Wellington nose, because even he could perceive that the temperature that was already up against Master Philip had nothing whatever to do with the state of the British climate.
“Lady Adela and his lordship ’ave been here a quarter of a hower, sir.”
What! twenty past eight. O curst pantomime of Drury! O curst vision in thy chestnut curls, that thou shouldst annihilate time and space for a comparatively recent creation—although a Tory one, happily!
“I look like getting it in the neck properly,” said the vain young fellow for his personal private information; and Mr. Jenkins, that well-trained servitor, who heard him not, would yet have concurred had he happened to do so.
Certainly this surmise was fairly accurate. Adela’s gaze was very cool and level; her method of voice production also enhanced her statuesque appearance. Even her Pa looked the reverse of cordial, but that of course, was rheumatism.
Such a pity he had missed Busoni, said the good old Mater. Dear Adela had enjoyed the Second Rhapsodie of Liszt so much.
Pa’s seventh daughter may have done so, but her demeanor seemed rather to make a secret of the information.
Certainly have to take to Jaeger underclothing, now that the frost had come at last. Shivered poor young fellow, as he took in Adela in sequins, a frock he had seen her in before.
Cross as two sticks. Oh, yes, a proper minx. If she will go on like this, we shall really have to see about a boor who will abuse her.
Pa talked high politics with First Baron: whether it was merely fun of Wilhelm, or whether Wilhelm weally meant it.
“We will keep our eyes upon him,” said these two distinguished compeers of Mr. Harold Box.
“Dear Adela,” said the good old Mater, “don’t you think that Elektra is quite the finest music that Wagner has ever written?”
Dear Adela didn’t really know. In fact she didn’t seem to care about Elektra, or about Busoni, or about Sir Henry Wood. Seemed to think that salted almonds and Burgundy were of more importance far, although we are bound to say that we think dear Adela was wrong in this.
Of course it was up to Mr. Philip, as a man of birth and education to have a word or two to say. But unluckily for him, in the stress of his laudable ambition, he suddenly slipped his bridle, and waltzed right into the conversation.
It was not so much lack of tact as the act of destiny. He could be as tactful as another previous to attending this ill-fated matinée at Drury Lane; but since that tragic action he was merely one more tempest-tossed mortal—for all the soigné look he had—in the grim toils of fate.
“I wish you had come, Adela, really,” said the vain young man. “There was a girl there playing Cinderella!”
“How interesting,” said the good old Mater.
Adela nibbled a salted almond pensively.
“Absolute nailer,” said Mr. Philip.
“How very interesting. And Busoni’s first piece was the overture to the polonaise by Chopin—quite classical, of course, but so full of verve and charm.”
“Her name is Mary Caspar, and Teddy Clapham hadn’t heard of her before.”
“What a strain it must be for those poor professionals. It made one quite ill to watch Busoni. Poor man got so excited, but a polonaise in such a difficult form of music, one understands.”
“‘Nelson and his Boys in Blue’ was absolutely rippin’. I say, Mater, if you have some free afternoon, Saturday or Wednesday, I should like you and Adela to come and hear her sing it, awfully.”
“And Sir Henry Wood conducted so admirably, didn’t he, Adela dear?”
“I suppose he is a good conductor,” said Adela. “But music is so tiresome unless one happens to be musical, and even then one is likely to be bored.”
“Ought to have come to Cinderella,” said Mr. Philip. “Enjoyed it awfully, I’m sure. An absolute nailer. I mean to go again.”
Even with a weight-for-age allowance for the tact, the charm, and the urbanity of one of London’s leading Constitutional hostesses, it would be idle to speak of the evening as a great success. The good old Mater did all that a brave woman and a devoted mother could have done in the circumstances, but such was the atmospheric pressure that at last she was obliged to ask the butler whether anything had gone wrong with the ventilator of the new fire grate, which she had always viewed with suspicion from the moment it had been put in.
In the withdrawing-room the frost grew worse.
“I must really have my cloak,” said the mother of the heir.
Vain to stir the fire; nought could uncongeal the atmosphere. No, it was not one of your successes, Mater; no use pretending, is it? Better face the facts, but you are not to blame, my dear. From the first you have acted in simple good faith, in accord with your excellent Suffolk Colthurst instincts; and they are very safe things to go by as a rule.
It was right and kind of you to help dear Adela to take up the problem of a young man who had rather more money than was good for him, and who would be all the better for having a nice sensible girl to spend it for him. And we are free to admit that Adela was capable of making herself uncommonly useful in that way if only she would have brought her mind to bear upon the subject.
Please don’t jump to such hasty conclusions, says a Feminine Reader at this point—alas! that we have so few. When sir, you suggest that dear Adela was not allowing her mind to bear upon the subject of Mr. Philip, you merely prove how nearly human ignorance of the crude masculine variety can come to the precipice of a very unsafe conclusion.
The fact that dear Adela wore sequins, says this wise lady, when she knew that Mr. Philip thought they did not do justice to her charms, and the fact that she was at pains to let him know that her afternoon at Queen’s Hall had tired her so much that she now preferred salted almonds to general conversation, should make it clear to the meanest intelligence that dear Adela had a thinking part. If, as you say, proceeds our mentor, this young man was an eldest son, and his evening clothes suited him so very well—which, by the way, one rather takes for granted in Grosvenor Square—it was just as well perhaps for him to learn to come to heel at the outset, so that both dear Adela and he might be saved unnecessary trouble after Dr. Bridge had played Op. 9.
It is hard, concludes the wise lady, for human error of the crude masculine variety to go much further than yours has done, if for a moment you could allow your deluded readers to imagine that a well-born girl could treat with more than feigned indifference an educated Englishman with a comfortable private fortune. Because no well-born girl ever is indifferent to three addresses and possibly a yacht, however much she may appear to be so.
The morning following being Sunday, dear Adela kept her bed till Monday instead of going to church.
“Where is the Pain?” said Sir Wotherspoon Ogle Bart.
The rude girl snapped at him a little, although he was such a very dear old Fellah, as Windsor Cassel used to say. But he quite agreed that dining with dull people was likely to overthrow a sensitive digestion; still for the next twenty-four hours at any rate, she must take nothing in the way of nourishment but peptonized biscuits and desiccated milk.
Mr. Philip hardly missed her genial presence at St. Sepulchre’s as much as he might have done perhaps. Sitting with his mother only two rows off the chancel, with his hair brushed back from his intellectual forehead, he got wrong in the responses, couldn’t find the psalms appointed for the Third Sunday, got mixed most hopelessly over the order of the prayers. He allowed his mind to wander in respect of those appointed for the Royal Family; and when the Reverend Canon Fearon, robed in full canonicals and a rather ritualistic stole, came to grips with the Laws of Moses, the mind of Mr. Philip as it envisaged him, saw a golden chariot where other people saw a wooden pulpit merely, and instead of an uncovered sconce of shining silver, a diadem of chestnut curls.
Mr. Philip finally left the chancel with the good old Mater leaning on his arm. She was in need of no assistance, but it looked maternal. They took a short turn in the park to find an appetite for luncheon, but Adela wasn’t among the earnest throng of morning worshipers a-walking there.
In spite of Adela’s absence from the sacred function, Mr. Philip did himself quite well at luncheon, as he always made rather a point of doing in the matter of his meals. In the opinion of this natural philosopher, if you have a good inner lining the crosses of this life are easier to bear.
Adela read the Ladies’ Field and nibbled at her biscuits and toyed with her desiccated milk. But we shall waste no sympathy upon her, she having snapped at the Court Physician—such a very dear old Fellah, with a delightful old-world manner, and a clinical thermometer in the lining of his hat.
Where Mr. Philip spent the afternoon of Sunday is not germane to the issue, but where he spent that of Monday can be handed in as evidence if the Court is quite agreeable.
At five o’clock on Monday, the heir to the barony looked in at a resort of fashion that we almost blush to mention. Youth and beauty in their various disguises were also there. Some in mink and some in ermine, some in frieze and some in velvet, some with clocks upon their wrists, some with clocks upon their stockings, some in paint and some in feathers, some in hobbles, some without ’em, some in turquoise earrings, some in pearls, some in mutch of sanguine hue, some in coalscuttle, some in beehive and other arch creations; and as east of Piccadilly the weather was really getting rather chilly, all we hope, wearing Jaeger underclothing.
Ping went the heart of the heir to the barony as each fresh arrival entered. Ping went the heart of Philip. Ping, ping it went continuous, as the patent doors revolved upon their hinges, and rank and fashion, youth and beauty swept proudly past commissionaires and other quite unimportant people. But as late as 5:15 Arminius Wingrove hadn’t shown a feather.
A puss in every corner worrying buttered scones and muffins with the aid of silver-plated forks. All across the parquet, under palms and awnings, the latest things by Paquin, toyed with their real old china teacups, and coquetted with toast and bread, butter and Monsieur Eschoffier’s most delightful comfit cakes.
Ping went the heart of the heir to the barony; ping went the heart of Philip; but although the strain upon that important organ was terrific, Arminius Wingrove never showed a feather.
The Blue Bulgarian Bazoukas discoursed really delightful music; tunes by Strauss and tunes by Wagner, oratorio by Monckton, masterpiece by Rubens, chic morsels by Debussy, rhapsodies by gentlemen whose names are easier to spell in Russian, the latest expression of the genius of German, things in Spanish, things in French, Elgar and Villiers Stanford, Sullivan and Dr. Parry, Leslie Stuart and the Abbé Liszt—but Arminius Wingrove never showed a feather.
Actually the hour of six had struck. With a glance of despair at the gold hunting repeater of infamous memory, the unhappy young man, for the good of the house, peremptorily ordered a glass of water and a toothpick. Already the motley throng of muffin-worriers, replete with tea and cake and music, had begun to take again to taxis, and to pair-horse vehicles, with and without cockades.
Now, what do you suppose had happened to Arminius? His excuse, when ten days later it happened to be forthcoming, was so comprehensive, that the dignity of human nature calls for a special chapter in which to unfold the same.