An Amiable Charlatan Part 30

Toward the center of the field, seated upon a ridiculously inadequate seat on the top of a reaping machine, was Mr. Bundercombe. He had divested himself of coat and waistcoat, and was hatless. The perspiration was streaming down his face as he gripped the steering wheel. He was followed by a little crowd of children and sympathizing men, who cheered him all the time.

At a little distance away, on the other side of a red flag, Henry Jonas, the large farmer of the district, and the speaker on whom my opponent chiefly relied, was seated upon a similar machine in a similar state of undress. It was apparent, however, even to us, that Mr. Bundercombe's progress was at least twice as rapid as his opponent's.

"What on earth is it all about?" I exclaimed, absolutely bewildered.

Eve, who was standing by my side, clasped her hands round my arm.

"It seems to me," she murmured sweetly, "as if dad were trying his reaping machine against some one else's."

I looked at her demure little smile and I looked at the field in which I recognized very many of my staunchest opponents. Then I looked at the marquee. The table there must have been set for at least a hundred people.

Suddenly I received a shock. Seated underneath the hedge, hatless and coatless, with his hair in picturesque disorder, was Mr. Jonas' cousin, also a violent opponent of my politics, and a nonconformist. He had a huge tumbler by his side, which--seeing me--he raised to his lips.

"Good old Walmsley!" he shouted out. "No politics to-day! Much too hot!

Come in and see the reaping match."

He took a long drink and I sat down in the car.

"You know," I said to Mr. Ansell, who was standing on the front seat, "there'll be trouble about this!"

Mr. Ansell was looking a little grave himself.

"Is Mr. Bundercombe really the manufacturer of that machine?" he asked.

"Of course he is!" Eve replied. "It's the one hobby of his life--or, rather, it used to be," she corrected herself hastily. "Even now, when he begins talking about his reaping machine he forgets everything else."

Mr. Ansell hurried away and made a few inquiries. Meanwhile we watched the progress of the match. Every time Mr. Bundercombe had to turn he rocked in his seat and retained his balance only with difficulty. At every successful effort he was loudly cheered by a little group of following enthusiasts. Mr. Ansell returned, looking a little more cheerful.

"Everything is being given by the Bundercombe Reaping Company," he announced, "and Mr. Bundercombe's city agent is on the spot prepared to book orders for the machine. It seems that Mr. Bundercombe has backed himself at ten to one in ten-pound notes to beat Mr. Jonas by half an hour, each taking half the field."

"Who's ahead?" Eve asked excitedly.

"Mr. Bundercombe is well ahead," Mr. Ansell replied, "and they say that he can do better still if he tries. It looks rather," Mr. Ansell concluded, dropping his voice, "as though he were trying to make the thing last out.

Afterward they are all going to sit down to a free meal--that is, if any of them are able to sit down," he added, with a glance round the field.

"h.e.l.lo! Here's Harrison."

Mr. Harrison, recognizing us, descended from his car and came across. He shook hands with Eve, at whom he glanced in a somewhat peculiar fashion.

"Mr. Walmsley," he said, "a week ago we were rather proud of having inveigled away one of your adherents. All I can say at the present moment is that we should have been better satisfied if you had left Mr.

Bundercombe in town."

"Why, he's been speaking against me at nearly every one of your meetings!"

I protested.

"That's all very well," Mr. Harrison complained; "but he's not what I should call a convincing speaker. He is a democrat all right, and a people's man--and all the rest of it; but he hasn't got quite the right way of advocating our principles. I have been obliged to ask him to discontinue public speaking until after the election. The fact of it is, I really believe he's cost us a good many more votes than he's gained. All he says is very well; but when he sits down one feels that our people are all for what they can get out of it--and yours are prepared to give their services for nothing."

"What's all this mean?" I asked, waving my hand toward the field.

Mr. Harrison looked at me very steadily indeed. Then he looked at Eve. I can only hope that my own expression was as guileless as Eve's.

"I told you about that hint we were obliged to give Mr. Bundercombe," Mr.

Harrison went on. "I suppose this is the result of it. He seems to have bewitched the whole of Little Bildborough. There's Jonas there, who was due to speak in four places today--he will take no notice of anybody. I walked by the side of his machine, begging him to get down and come and keep his engagements, and he took no more notice of me than if I'd been a rabbit!

"There's his cousin, who has more hold upon the nonconformists of the district than any man I know--sitting under a hedge drinking out of a tumbler! There are at least a score of men with their eyes glued on that tent who ought to be hard at work in the district. I am beginning to doubt whether they'll even be in in time to vote!"

"Well, we must be getting on, anyway," I said. "See you later, Mr.

Harrison!"

Mr. Harrison nodded a little gloomily and we glided off. Eve squeezed my hand under the rug.

"Isn't dad a dear!" she murmured in my ear.

Eve was one of the first to congratulate me when, late that night, the results came in and I found that by a majority of twenty-seven votes I had been elected the member for the division.

"Aren't you glad now, Paul, dear, that we brought father down to keep him out of mischief?" she whispered.

Mr. Bundercombe himself held out his hand.

"Paul," he said, "I congratulate you, my boy! I was on the other side; but I can take a licking with the best of them. Congratulate you heartily!"

He held out his hand and gripped mine. Once more he winked.

CHAPTER XII--THE EMANc.i.p.aTION OF LOUIS

At about half past ten the following morning I turned into Prince's Gardens, to find a four-wheel cab drawn up outside the door of Mr.

Bundercombe's house. On the roof was a dressing case made of some sort of compressed cane and covered with linen. Accompanying it was a black tin box, on which was painted, in white letters: "Hannah Bundercombe, President W.S.F." Standing by the door was a footman with an article in his hand that I believe is called a grip, which, in the present instance, I imagine took the place of a dressing case.

I surveyed these preparations with some interest. The temporary departure of Mrs. Bundercombe would, I felt, have an enlivening influence upon the establishment. As I turned in at the gate Mrs. Bundercombe herself appeared. She was followed by a young woman who looked distinctly bored and whom I was not at first able to place. Mrs. Bundercombe was in a state of unusual excitement.

"Say, Mr. Walmsley," she began, and her voice seemed to come from her forehead--it was so shrill and nasal; "how long will it take me to get to St. Pancras?"

I looked at the four-wheeler, on the roof of which another servant was now arranging a typewriter in its tin case.

"I should say about thirty-five minutes--in that!" I replied. "A taxi would do it in a quarter of an hour."

"None of your taxis for me!" Mrs. Bundercombe declared warmly. "I am not disposed to trust myself to a piece of machinery that can be made to tell any sort of lies. I like to pay my fare and no more. If thirty-five minutes will get me to St. Pancras, then I guess I'll make my train."

"You are leaving us for a few days?" I remarked, suddenly catching a glimpse of a face like a round moon beaming at me from the window.

"I have received a dispatch," Mrs. Bundercombe announced, drawing a letter with pride from an article that I believe she called her reticule, "signed by the secretary of the Women's League of Freedom, asking me to address their members at a meeting to be held at Leeds to-night."

"Very gratifying!" I murmured.

"How the woman knew that I was in England," Mrs. Bundercombe continued, carefully replacing the missive, "I cannot imagine; but I suppose these things get about. In any case I felt it my duty to go. Some of us, Mr.

Walmsley," she added, regarding me with a severe air, "think of little else save the various pleasures we are able to cram into our lives day by day. Others are always ready to listen to the call of duty."