Count Bunker Part 3

At present he was being tolerated or befriended by a small circle of acquaintances, and rapidly becoming a familiar figure to three or four tailors and half a dozen door-keepers at the stage entrances to divers Metropolitan theatres. In the circle of acquaintances, the humorous sagacity of Essington struck him as the most astonishing thing he had ever known. He felt, in fact, much like a village youth watching his first conjuring performance, and while the whim lasted (a period which Essington put down as probably six weeks) he would have gone the length of paying a bill or ordering a tie on his recommendation alone.

To-night the distinguished appearance and genial conversation of Essington's friend impressed him more than ever with the advantages of knowing so remarkable a personage. A second bottle succeeded the first, and a third the second, the cordiality of the dinner growing all the while, till at last his lordship had laid aside the last traces of his national suspicion of even the most charming strangers.

"I say, Essington," he said, "I had meant to tell you about a devilish delicate dilemma I'm in. I want your advice."

"You have it," interrupted his host. "Give her a five-pound note, see that she burns your letters, and introduce her to another fellow."

"But--er--that wasn't the thing----"

"Tell him you'll pay in six months, and order another pair of trousers,"

said Essington, briskly as ever.

"But, I say, it wasn't that----"

"My dear Tulliwuddle, I never give racing tips."

"Hang it!"

"What is the matter?"

Tulliwuddle glanced at the Baron.

"I don't know whether the Baron would be interested----"

"Immensely, my goot Tollyvoddle! Supremely! hugely! I could be interested to-night in a museum!"

"The Baron's past life makes him a peculiarly catholic judge of indiscretions," said Essington.

Thus rea.s.sured, Tulliwuddle began--

"You know I've an aunt who takes an interest in me--wants me to collar an heiress and that sort of thing. Well, she has more or less arranged a marriage for me."

"Fill your gla.s.ses, gentlemen!" cried Essington.

"Hoch, hoch!" roared the Baron.

"But, I say, wait a minute! That's only the beginning. I don't know the girl--and she doesn't know me."

He said the last words in a peculiarly significant tone.

"Do you wish me to introduce you?"

"Oh, hang it! Be serious, Essington. The point is--will she marry me if she does know me?"

"Himmel! Yes, certainly!" cried the Baron.

"Who is she?" asked their host, more seriously.

"Her father is Darius P. Maddison, the American Silver King."

The other two could not withhold an exclamation.

"He has only two children, a son and a daughter, and he wants to marry his daughter to an English peer--or a Scotch, it's all the same. My aunt knows 'em pretty well, and she has recommended me."

"An excellent selection," commented his host.

"But the trouble is, they want rather a high-cla.s.s peer. Old Maddison is deuced particular, and I believe the girl is even worse."

"What are the qualifications desired?"

"Oh, he's got to be ambitious, and a promising young man--and elevated tastes--and all that kind of nonsense."

"But you can be all zat if you try!" said the Baron eagerly. "Go to Germany and get trained. I did vork twelve hours a day for ten years to be vat I am."

"I'm different," replied the young peer gloomily. "n.o.body ever trained me. Old Tulliwuddle might have taken me up if he had liked, but he was prejudiced against me. I can't become all those things now."

"And yet you do want to marry the lady?"

"My dear Essington, I can't afford to lose such a chance! One doesn't get a Miss Maddison every day. She's a deuced handsome girl too, they say."

"By Gad, it's worth a trip across the Atlantic to try your luck," said Essington. "Get 'em to guarantee your expenses and you'll at least learn to play poker and see Niagara for nothing."

"They aren't in America. They've got a salmon river in Scotland, and they are there now. It's not far from my place, Hechnahoul."

"She's practically in your arms, then?"

"Ach. Ze affair is easy!"

"Pipe up the clan and abduct her!"

"Approach her mit a kilt!"

But even those optimistic exhortations left the peer still melancholy.

"It sounds all very well," said he, "but my clansmen, as you call 'em, would expect such a devil of a lot from me too. Old Tulliwuddle spoiled them for any ordinary mortal. He went about looking like an advertis.e.m.e.nt for whisky, and called 'em all by their beastly Gaelic names. I have never been in Scotland in my life, and I can't do that sort of thing. I'd merely make a fool of myself. If I'd had to go to America it wouldn't have been so bad."

At this weak-kneed confession the Baron could hardly withhold an exclamation of contempt, but Essington, with more sympathy, inquired--

"What do you propose to do, then?"

His lordship emptied his gla.s.s.

"I wish I had your brains and your way of carrying things off, Essington!" he said, with a sigh. "If you got a chance of showing yourself off to Miss Maddison she'd jump at you!"

A gleam, inspired and humorous, leaped into Essington's eyes. The Baron, whose glance happened at the moment to fall on him, bounded gleefully from his seat.

"Hoch!" he cried, "it is mine old Bonker zat I see before me! Vat have you in your mind?"

"Sit down, my dear Baron; that lady over there thinks you are preparing to attack her. Shall we smoke? Try these cigars."