Poor Relations Part 26

"We wanted to jolly the mater along," he explained. "No harm was intended, but Hughie was keen to prove his respectability; so, as you and he weren't on the most cordial terms, we introduced your brother, George, as yourself. It was a compliment, really, to your public character; but old George rather enjoyed dining here, and I'm bound to say he sold the mater some very decent port. In fact, you're drinking it now."

"And I suppose," said John, angrily, "that between you all you've perpetrated some discreditable fraud, what? I suppose you've been ordering shirts in my name as well as selling port, eh? I'll disown the bill. You understand me? I won't have you masquerading as a gentleman, Hugh, when you can't behave like one. It's obtaining money under false pretenses, and you can write to your mother till you're as blue in the face as the ink in your bottle--it won't help you. I can put up with laziness; I can tolerate stupidity; I can endure dissipation; but I'm d.a.m.ned if I'll stand being introduced as George. Port, indeed! Don't try to argue with me. You must take the consequences. Mr. Fenton, I'm sorry I allowed myself to be inveigled like this into your mother's house. I shall write to her when I get home, and I hope she will take steps to clear that impostor out. No, I won't have a cigar--though I've no doubt I shall presently receive the bill for them, unless I've also been pa.s.sed off as a tobacconist's agent by George. As for him, I've done with him, too. I shall advertise in the _Times_ that neither he nor Hugh has any business to order things in my name. I came here to-night in response to an urgent appeal; I find that I've been made a fool of; I find myself in a most undignified position. No, I will not have another gla.s.s of port. I don't know how much George exacted for it, but let me tell you that it isn't even good port: it's turbid and fiery."

John rose from the table and was making for the door, when Hugh took hold of his arm.

"Look here, old chap," he began.

"Don't attempt to soften me with pothouse endearments," said John, fiercely. "I will not be called 'old chap.'"

"All right, old chap, I won't," said Hugh. "But before you go jumping into the street like a lighted cracker, please listen. n.o.body has been ordering anything in your name. You're absolutely off the lines there.

Why, I exhausted your credit years ago. And I don't see why you should grudge poor old George a few dinners."

"You rascal," John stammered. "You impudent rascal!"

"Don't annoy him, Hughie," Aubrey advised. "I can see his point."

"Oh, you can, sir, can you?" John snapped. "You can understand, can you, how it affects me to be saddled with brothers like these and port like this?"

John was so furious that he could not bring himself to mention George or Hugh by name: they merely represented maddening abstractions of relationship, and he longed for some phrase like "my son's friend" with which he might disown them forever.

"You mustn't blame your brother George, Mr. Touchwood," urged Aubrey.

"He's not involved in this latest affair. I'm sorry we told the mater that he was you, but the mater required jollying along, as I explained.

She can't appreciate Hugh. He's too modern for her."

"I sympathize with Mrs. Fenton."

"You must forgive a ruse. It's just the kind of ruse I should think a playwright would appreciate. You know. Charley's Aunt and all that."

John clenched his fist: "Don't you mutter to me about a sense of humor,"

he said to Hugh, wrathfully.

"I wasn't muttering," replied Hugh. "I merely observed that a little sense of humor wouldn't be a bad thing. I'm sorry that George has been dragged like a red herring across the business, because it's a much more serious matter than simply introducing George to Mrs. Fenton as you and selling her some port which personally I think is not at all bad, eh, Aubrey?"

He poured himself out another gla.s.s to prove his conviction.

"You may think all this a joke," John retorted. "But I don't. I consider it a gross exhibition of bad taste."

"All right. Granted. Let's leave it at that," sighed Hugh, wearily. "But you don't give a fellow much encouragement to own up when he really is in a tight corner. However, personally I've got past minding. If I'm sentenced to penal servitude, it'll be your fault for not listening.

Only don't say I disgraced the family name."

"Hugh's right," Aubrey put in. "We really are in a deuce of a hole."

"Disgrace the family name?" John repeated. "Allow me to tell you that when you hawk George round London as your brother, the playwright, I consider _that_ is disgracing the family name."

"So that if I'm arrested for forgery," Hugh asked, "you won't mind?"

"Forgery?" John gasped.

Hugh nodded.

"Yes, we had bad luck in the straight," he murmured, tossing off two more gla.s.ses of port. "Cleared every hurdle like a bird and ... however, it's no good grumbling. We just didn't pull it off."

"No," sighed Aubrey. "We were beaten by a short head."

John sat down unsteadily, filled up half a gla.s.s of Burgundy with sherry, and drank it straight off without realizing that George's port was even worse than he had supposed.

"Whose name have you forged?" he brought himself to ask at last.

"Stephen Crutchley's."

"Good heavens!" he groaned. "But this is horrible. And has he found out?

Does he know who did it?"

It was characteristic of John that he did not ask for how much his friend's name had been forged.

"He has his suspicions," Hugh admitted. "And he's bound to know pretty soon. In fact, I think the only thing to do is for you to explain matters. After all, in a way it was a joke."

"Yes, a kind of experimental joke," Aubrey agreed.

"But it has proved to me how easy it is to cash a forged check," Hugh continued, hopefully. "And, of course, if you talk to Crutchley he'll be all right. He's not likely to be very severe on the brother of an old friend. That was one of the reasons we experimented on him--that, and also partly because I found an old check book of his. He's awfully careless, you know, is Stephen--very much the high-brow architect and all that, though he doesn't forget to charge. In fact, so many people have had to pay for his name that it serves him right to find himself doing the same for once."

"Does Mrs. Fenton know anything of this?" John asked.

"Why, no," Aubrey answered, quickly. "Well, women don't understand about money, do they? And the mater has less idea of the wicked world than most. My father was always a bit of a recluse, don't you see?"

"Was he?" John said, sarcastically. "I should think his son will be a bit of a recluse, too, before he's done. But forgery! No, it's incredible--incredible!"

"Don't worry, Johnnie," Hugh insisted. "Don't worry. I'm not worrying at all, now that you've come along. n.o.body knows anything for certain yet.

George doesn't know. Mama doesn't know. Mrs. Fenton doesn't know. And Stevie only guesses."

"How do you know that he guesses?" John demanded.

"Well, that's part of the story, eh, Aubrey?" said Hugh, turning to his accomplice, who nodded sagely.

"Which I suppose one ought to tell in full, eh, Aubrey?" he went on.

"I think it would interest your brother--I mean--quite apart from his being your brother, it would interest him as a playwright," Aubrey agreed.

"Gla.s.ses round, then," called Hugh, cheerfully.

"There's a vacant armchair by the fireplace," Aubrey pointed out to John.

"Thanks," said John, stiffly. "I don't suppose that the comfort of an armchair will alleviate my feelings. Begin, sir," he commanded Hugh.

"Begin, and get it finished quickly, for heaven's sake, so that I can leave this house and think out my course of action in solitude."

"Do you know what it is, Johnnie?" Hugh said, craning his neck and examining his brother with an air of suddenly aroused curiosity. "You're beginning to dramatize yourself. I suppose it's inevitable, but I wish you wouldn't. It gives me the same kind of embarra.s.sed feeling that I get when a woman starts reciting. You're not subjective. That's the curse of all romantic writers. You want to get an objective viewpoint.

You're not the only person on in this scene. I'm on. Aubrey's on. Mrs.

Fenton and Stevie Crutchley are waiting in the wings, as it were. And, for all I know, the police may be waiting there, too, by this time. Get an objective viewpoint, Johnnie. Subjectivity went out with Rousseau."