Anthony Lyveden Part 5

"Mr. Hopkins is taking Sunday, madam, so I can't go out then."

"I can't 'elp that," was the testy reply.

"I don't wish to inconvenience you, madam, but, as it was arranged that I should always have----"

"Subjec' to _my_ convenience," snapped Mrs. Slumper. "That's wot I said." She had said nothing of the sort. "An' am I to go pus.h.i.+n' orf to a dandy crush without a servant? Hopenin' me own dores, an'

fetchin' me own car, an' wot not, jus' like a common beggar in a 'ired fly? Look 'ere, young man, I didn't ought to 'ave took you at all, reelly. Wot with no refs an' no experience, yer might 'ave walked the soles orf of yer peris.h.i.+n' boots before yer got into a 'ouse like this.

But I gave you a chance, I did. An' if you think ter try an' turn me own words agains' me an' talk 'igh about contrax, yer kin jus' shove orf." She regarded him furiously. "Ugh! I'm fed up with the bunch of yer. Nasty, ungrateful swabs! I serpose yer kin 'ave Monday, can't yer?"

"I will take Monday, madam."

The malevolent pig's eyes followed him in silence till he was out of the room....

It was on Monday, then, that Lyveden called for his dog.

His decision to revisit the scene of his encounter with my lady was not fully formed until it was time to act upon it. He had deliberately walked in the direction of the inn, so that, when the hour came, he could, if he chose, indulge the inclination of which he was wholly ashamed. Honestly, he reflected, he had not a good word to say for the girl. (Observe, please, that the fact that the pleasaunce was to his liking did not weigh with him. The little inn and its curtilage had become but environs.) She had been unreasonable and worse than churlish. There was no getting away from it--she had been aggressively rude, administering a rebuff though he had made no advance. To pile Ossa upon Pelion, she now knew him for what he was--a flunkey, acting the gentleman and sporting a dog. And was not that a dainty dish for him to digest, sitting under the lime-trees in full view of that garden doorway which nine days ago had been so honoured? That, of course, was the trouble. Anthony had seen a picture which he could not forget.

The girl had done her best to efface it, but had only succeeded in clouding a sunny memory.

With something of the _mauvaise honte_ with which a player of "Patience" corrects a mistake he has made by restoring some cards, Anthony took Ossa off Pelion, said to himself, "I don't believe she recognized me," and, walking into the inn, desired the mistress to bring him some tea.

By the time he had finished his meal he had sunk so low in his own eyes--lost so much self-respect, that the rest did not seem worth keeping, and he inquired whether anything had been seen of the lady whose dog his had fought, in much the same spirit of recklessness as moves a bravo to toss his last piece to a beggar.

"She had tea here the day before yesterday, sir," replied his hostess.

"All alone, with her little dog. I don't think he's none the worse, sir. Thank you. Good day, sir."

Anthony left the house like a man in a dream....

Why had she come?

To this question the answer which his heart vouchsafed was vain and a vanity. His head, however, gave innumerable replies--all of them obvious and none of them flattering. A hundred times Reason drove Hope headlong, but always the baggage returned....

By way of relieving his feelings, Anthony cursed Mrs. Slumper with earnest bitterness. He began to feel that there was much in what the chauffeur had said about her forbears. At the time he had secretly deplored his epithets, but now.... Certainly he had misjudged the fellow. He was quite right.

As for Patch, he had never been paid so little attention. Not that he cared. The country was full of scents....

By a quarter past seven Lyveden was back at Lancaster Gate.

The first thing he saw below stairs was the library silver, which he had cleaned that morning and the parlour-maid should have restored to its place. Without waiting to change, he picked up the tray and carried it upstairs, intending, if the room was unoccupied, to replace it at once.

As he gained the hall, the twitch of an inserted latchkey came to his ears. Then pressure was put upon the front door. This, however, remained fast shut. The key was withdrawn violently, reinserted, and wrenched. The pressure upon the door being maintained, the lock was jammed. Whosoever was there had lost his temper and was kicking against the p.r.i.c.ks. This was unlike Mr. Slumper, but it could be n.o.body else. Lyveden set down his tray and stepped to the door....

His master came in with a rush, stumbling. Anthony caught him, and he recovered his balance. There was running sweat upon his face, which was all grey, and he was shaking fearfully. Holding on to the furniture as he went, he tottered as far as the library, clawed at the switch by the door, missed it, and swayed out of sight into the black of the room.

Anthony stood spellbound. The spectacle of a bunch of keys dangling idly from the keyhole of the door, which he was still holding open, brought him to his senses, and, drawing the key from the lock, he closed the door swiftly and ran for brandy....

Mr. Slumper was sitting in the dark, with his head plunged between his knees. At Anthony's coming he started up and would have gone back, but the seat of his chair catching him under the hocks, he subsided again almost immediately. Anthony went to his side and held the gla.s.s to his lips. As he drank, his teeth chattered upon the rim of the tumbler, and some of the spirit ran over his chin. Twice he made a gesture for more. After the third dose he had swallowed more than a tumblerful....

Presently he began to look less grey, and the trembling abated. In three or four minutes he was quite calm. Anthony was about to ask if he should help him upstairs, when he spoke suddenly.

"Shut t' door."

Anthony did his bidding. When he came back, his master had a letter-case in his hand.

"What are your wages?" he said.

"Seventy-two pounds a year, sir."

Mr. Slumper put a hand to his brow and knitted this wearily, as if the effort of calculation was more than he could bear. Then he took out two five-pound notes and two one-pound notes.

"There's twelve pound," he said slowly. "One month's wages, and another's in lieu of notice."

Anthony stared at the money.

"I haven't been here a month yet, sir."

His master waved aside the objection.

"Only honest servant I've ever had," he said shortly. "Gentleman, aren't you? Never mind. Couldn't let you down. Others can go to h.e.l.l, but not you. And now--better clear out. Right away. Get your box and go. Don't let the others see you. Give 'em the slip."

"But--but won't you be dining, sir?" said Anthony desperately. He was trying instinctively to grapple with a situation which had put him upon his back.

At the mention of dinner Mr. Slumper laughed hideously. The brandy was getting into its stride now, and colour was beginning to climb into his cheeks.

"Dining?" he croaked. "Dining?"

In a deliberate, imperturbable tone a clock upon the mantelpiece chimed the half-hour, and the laugh snapped off short. The next moment the man had Lyveden's arm in a grip of iron.

"Listen," he breathed. "I'm broke ... ruined ... got to run for it.

Couldn't stand gaol at my age. It ain't pretty, I know, but I'm fifty-nine, Lyveden, fifty-nine." The tense utterance broke into a whimper. "An'--an' that's too old for prison, Lyveden, an' they wouldn't give me a chance. The lawyers 'd make it out bad. You can gamble with others' money as long as you win, Lyveden, but you mustn't lose ... mustn't ever lose. There's a law against that."

All the soldier in Anthony came to his aid.

"Are you going now, sir?" The other nodded, "Shall I get you a taxi?"

"Yes." Mr. Slumper jerked a contemptuous head at the ceiling. "She'll have to go with me," he added thickly. "Can't leave the old fool."

"I'll keep your keys, sir," said Anthony, "to let myself in."

With that he was gone.

Mrs. Slumper was in the midst of a very delicate operation, to wit, the obliteration of her natural complexion--obsequies which not even her maid was permitted to attend. Consequently she was anything but pleased when her husband entered the room. Such procedure was out of all order and convenience. That he came in suddenly and without first knocking upon the door was insufferable. She turned herself round on her seat, bristling....

There was no time for a scene, and, when Mrs. Slumper hurled herself against Necessity, she fell back bruised and broken.

When she would have screamed, a hand was clapped over her mouth, breaking her false teeth, and all her stifled shrieks, queries and expostulations were literally cuffed into a whimper. Five minutes later, toothless, half-dressed and trembling, she thrust a few things into a dressing-case, struggled into a fur coat, and pa.s.sed with sagging knees downstairs, clinging to the arm of a bully whom she had known as a worm.

Lyveden was waiting in the hall, beside him his case and hold-all--what belongings he had thrust into them anyhow. He was intending to see the couple into the cab and then go quietly away, for he was determined to avoid the loathsome saturnalia with which his colleagues were certain to signalize the _debacle_. When the two appeared, he started involuntarily. He had been prepared for violence, he had expected tears.... The vision of a blubbering idiot, that mowed and mumbled, its wig awry, its dreadful face blotched, like a clown's, with paint, swaddled from head to toe in gorgeous furs, leaning desperately upon the very reed it had broken--this was unearthly, h.e.l.lish. He found himself praying that it might not visit him in his dreams....

It is to his credit that Anthony, having helped Mr. Slumper into his hat and overcoat and Mr. and Mrs. Slumper into the taxi, flung his own kit upon the canopy and accompanied the fugitives to Charing Cross.