Frivolities Part 28

And she did insist--showing herself to be wiser than she supposed. As I gradually became conscious that others would have insisted had they not feared the appearance of rudeness, I felt that Nowell had been an a.s.s in supposing that such a subject would fitly usher in a little dance, and that I had been another in not snubbing him upon the spot.

So, as Steingard was behind his time, I decided that when he did come I would ask him to stop and join the party and have a bit of supper, and just casually as it were put off the lecture to some future occasion.

But I was not prepared for the kind of man Steingard proved himself to be.

Directly he arrived I ran out into the street and found him getting out of a four-wheeled cab, the top of which was covered with large wooden cases.

"You are Mr. Steingard? Delighted to meet you. You are a little late; so, as we're just beginning dancing, I think we'll have the lecture some time next week. But of course you'll stop and join the--eh--festive throng?"

"Your name is Barker?"

I explained that my name was Parker. He spoke with a strong foreign accent, and in a tone of voice which I instinctively disliked. He was about six and a half feet high, and had a moustache which stood out three inches on either side of his face; not at all the sort of looking person with whom one would care to quarrel.

"I have not come to be made a fool of," he remarked. "I have come to give a lecture, and that lecture I will give!"

And he gave it. It is all very well to say that when I saw what sort of man he was I ought not to have let him into the house. But he was invited, and I have the instincts of a gentleman. So they hauled four great wooden cases up the stairs. It took six strong men to do it; they broke the banisters and knocked pieces out of the wall as they went. When the cases were opened they proved to be full of bottles of all sorts, shapes, sizes, and colours.

"Reminds you of the old Polytechnic. Do you remember the Leyden jars they used to have?"

When George Foster said that in a sort of whisper I thought of Edison's ideas of the dreadful part which electricity might be made to play in modern warfare. I did not require any ill.u.s.trations of electrocution in my house, so I asked the lecturer a question.

"I suppose it has nothing to do with electricity?"

"Electricity? It is not electricity which kills men like flies, do not believe it. It is what I have in here."

He waved his hand towards his bottles. His manner was not rea.s.suring.

"And of course there's nothing explosive?"

"Explosive? What have I to do with explosives?--ask of yourself. It is not dynamite, it is not melinite, it is not cordite which destroys millions. It is noding of the kind. The Great Death is in these bottles."

He said this in a way which made me quite uncomfortable--it was most unsuited to an evening party. Every moment I liked the fellow less and less, towards his bottles I felt an absolute aversion. I own that my impulse would have been to have sneaked out into the street and strolled round the square till the lecture was finished. But as I occupied the position of host I was in duty bound to see it through.

And I did. Shall I ever forget it? Anything more monstrous than Nowell's idea of what was a fitting prelude to a little party I never yet encountered.

The lecturer commenced. He was as grave as a judge. It gave you the creeps to hear him. There was nothing humorous about him; he was a dreadful man. His accent was peculiar.

"In modern warfare de battle is not to de soldier, it is to de ghemist. I will prove it to you very easily. I have here dree bottles.

They are little bottles"--they were, quite small--"yet I have only to take de stoppers out and you will know it as certainly as if I had exploded dree dynamite bombs."

I am sure the people paled, it was enough to make them.

"De first bottle will make you cough, de second will affect your eyesight, and de dird bottle will make you ill. I will soon show to you dat I am not lying. From de first bottle I will now take de stopper."

He did, before anyone could stop him; in fact, before I, for one, had any idea of what it was that he was driving at. Directly he did so the atmosphere of the room became impregnated with an acrid odour which had a most irritating effect on the tonsils of the throat. Whether the man was a maniac or not, to this hour I have not certainly decided; but there he stood, the stopper in his hand, the atmosphere growing worse and worse, my guests staring at him with scared faces, every second increasing their sense of discomfort. One person began to cough, then another, then another, until presently everyone was coughing as I doubt if they had ever coughed before. It was a horrid spectacle. As for me--my throat is uncomfortably sensitive--I expected every moment I should choke.

"Did I not say," observed the scoundrel Steingard, "dat de first bottle would make you cough? I will now replace de stopper."

He replaced it. By degrees that peculiar acrid quality in the air became less prominent. People began to recover--just in time. It is my belief that if they had continued to cough much longer something serious would have happened. As it was several of them were too exhausted to be able to give expression to their feelings in audible speech.

"I will now remove de stopper from de second bottle."

Had I been able to do so I should have prevented him, even at the risk of a scene--I am sure I should, I don't care who denies it. But the truth is I was so shaken that it was all I could do to stand, and before I was sufficiently recovered to allow of my interference the miscreant had worked his wicked will. He had unstoppered bottle No. 2, and for the former acrid odour there was subst.i.tuted a pungent something which affected one like an unusual kind of smelling-salts.

One's eyes not only began to water, they continued to water. They watered more and more. The tears trickled down our noses. We had to use our pocket-handkerchiefs to mop them up with. The more we mopped the more they flowed. It was ludicrous. We were literally blinded by our tears. Nothing could have been more out of place in a jovial gathering. For my part my lachrymal ducts were acted on to such an extraordinary extent that I could see nothing. I endured the acme of discomfort.

"Did I not say," remarked the experimental Steingard--he spoke as if he were uttering the merest commonplace!--"dat de second bottle would affect de eyesight? Did I choose, de mere continuation of de stopper out of de bottle in de end would make you blind. But for our purpose to-night it is not necessary to go so far as dat. We will now pa.s.s on to de dird bottle."

"Pardon me, sir--excuse me for one moment!" The interruption came from General Wheeler, and evinced considerable presence of mind. Steingard paused with his hand upon the stopper. The General went on. "Did I understand you to say that the effect of unstoppering that other bottle will be to make us ill?"

"Yes, my friend, dat is so. I am now about to show it to you."

"You needn't, it is unnecessary. I'm ill already. So ill, indeed, that I shall send for a physician the instant I reach home. And I'm going home at once. If this is a party it's the first I've ever been to, and I'll take my oath it shall be the last. Now, Mrs. Wheeler! Now, Augusta! Philippa! Mary! Matilda! Lucy! you girls! George! Frederic!

Ferdinand! you boys, put your things on and come away with me at once.

We're not going to stop here to be slaughtered by way of ill.u.s.trating a murderous lecture on warfare up-to-date."

And the General began to collect his numerous progeny with what was, undoubtedly, a considerable show of heat. That he should have been moved to such behaviour in my house was most distressing. My wife regards the Wheelers as being among the most distinguished of her acquaintance--though an uglier lot of girls I never saw. But the General was not the only person who felt himself outraged--I wish he had been.

"Oh!--oh!--oh! Take me out of this dreadful house before I faint!"

That's what my wife's aunt, Mrs. Merridew, said before the whole a.s.semblage--and from that particular aunt my wife has always had the most sanguine expectations. Of course, when she went on like that, my wife began at me--there are occasions on which Louisa has no sense of propriety, nor of justice either.

"This is Mr. Parker's idea of a little surprise! You can always rely on Mr. Parker doing anything to please his friends! When Mr. Parker's in sight you never need look far for a fool!"

That was the sort of remark she kept making--out loud; it was most annoying. I endeavoured to calm her, and the General, and Mrs.

Merridew, and others--for I was pained to see that a general feeling of unrest was making itself unpleasantly obvious. While I was striving, as it were, to spread oil upon the troubled waters, the voice of the miscreant Steingard was heard to observe:

"I will now remove de stopper from de dird bottle. If de ladies and gentlemen will keep deir seats dey will be de better able to abbreciate de success of dis exberiment."

In a moment the room was filled with a perfume--I use the word advisedly!--of a kind which no pen could adequately describe. Never did I come across anything of the sort before--it was astounding.

Most of the people had been standing up; there and then they most of them sat down again--they had to. I noticed the General drop back on to his chair with a kind of gasp. Folks looked at each other with startled faces; they looked at me; they looked at the lecturer--that bottle fiend; they looked about them dumbly, as if in search of something--speech was impossible while that bottle remained unstoppered. Their countenances were transfigured--it is really no exaggeration to say that they turned most of the colours of the rainbow. Some crammed their handkerchiefs into their mouths; some pinched their nostrils between their fingers; some clapped their hands to the pits of their stomachs. Nothing they could do was the slightest protection against the mephitic vapours which issued from that unstoppered bottle. It was a moving spectacle to see those people all bent double--especially if you regarded it from the point of view of the host, and remembered that you had invited them to an evening party.

At last--it seemed a long at last to me, but I suppose, after all, it could only have been a second or two--at last those against the door began to shuffle through it--when they were once through they never stopped till they had rushed downstairs and were out into the street.

Others followed, a tottering crew, so that by degrees the room was emptied, and finally--a happy finally!--my guests, my wife, and I stood, a s.h.i.+vering crowd, on the windblown pavement.

At this point the demon Steingard came out on the landing and shouted to us, so that we heard him in the street.

"Did I not say de dird bottle would make you ill? Very well den--is it not true? Has it not routed you--like a flock of sheep? Just so would it rout an army. Not all de armies of all de nations would stand against dat bottle when it was uns...o...b..red. Now, ladies and gentlemen, if you will return I will ba.s.s on to a fresh branch of my subject--or, rather, I will commence my subject brober, and I will show you dings combared to which that bottle is as noding--noding at all. You shall see if I am lying."

That frightful threat finished it; settled the affair out of hand; concluded it at once. Nothing thereafter could have persuaded my guests to stand upon the order of their going. They went at once--before the party had had a chance of starting. It was worse than a catastrophe--it was a cataclysm. I can only trust that such a disaster is unparalleled in the history of festive gatherings. I had not the heart to attempt to stay their going. I was too demoralised, both physically and mentally. The impression made upon me by that third bottle was an enduring one.

When I returned into the house the creature who was the cause of all the trouble was still standing on the landing. He appeared unconscious of the deeds which he had done.

"I am waiting. Do not de ladies and gentlemen return?"

"Mr. Steingard," I said, with as much firmness as at that moment I had it in my power to display, "come downstairs and bring your bottles with you."

He seemed at a loss to understand my meaning.

"My friend, what do you mean? My lecture is hardly begun--my lecture brober not at all."

"Begun!" I screamed. "Begun!--It's finished!--So's the party!"