The City of Beautiful Nonsense Part 10

Perpetual motion out of these rusty old things--rusting for fifteen years in the corners of his pockets! Perpetual motion!

But here the reality of it all broke upon me--burst out with its thundering sense of truth. Mad the blind beggar might be; yet there, before my very eyes, in those motionless objects, was the secret of perpetual motion. Rust, decay, change--the obstinate metal of the iron rod, the flimsy substance of the tin pot, always under the condition of change; rusting in his pocket where they had lain for fifteen years--never quiescent, never still, always moving--moving--moving--in obedience to the inviolable law of change, as we all, in servile obedience to that law as well, are moving continually, from childhood into youth, youth to middle-age--middle-age to senility--then death, the last change of all. All this giant structure of manhood, the very essence of complicated intricacy compared to that piece of rod iron, pa.s.sing into the dust from which the thousands of years had contrived to make it. What more could one want of perpetual motion than that?

I looked up into his face again.

"You've taught me a wonderful lesson," I said quietly.

"Ah," he replied--"it's all there--all there--the whole secret of it; if only I had the eyes to put it together."

If he only had the eyes? Have _any_ of us the eyes? Have any of us the eyes?

When he had finished, he folded it slowly and put it back in his pocket.

"Well----?" he said.

His heart was beating with antic.i.p.ation, with apprehension, with exaltation. With one beat he knew she must think it was good. It was his best. He had just done it and, when you have just done it, you are apt to think that. But with another beat, he felt she was going to say the conventional thing--to call it charming--to say--"But how nice." It would be far better if she said it was all wrong, that it struck a wrong note, that its composition was ill. One can believe that about one's work--but that it is charming, that it is nice--never!

For that moment Destiny swung in a balance, poised upon the agate of chance. What was she going to say? It all depended upon that. But she was so silent. She sat so still. Mice are still when you startle them; then, when they collect their wits, they scamper away.

Suddenly she rose to her feet.

"Will you be here in the Gardens to-morrow morning at this time," she said--"Then I'll tell you how very much I liked it."

CHAPTER X

THE NEED FOR INTUITION

In such a world as this, anything which is wholly sane is entirely uninteresting. But--thank heaven for it!--madness is everywhere, in every corner, at every turning. You will not even find complete sanity in a Unitarian; in fact, some of the maddest people I have ever met have been Unitarians. Yet theirs is an aggravating madness. You can have no sympathy with a man who believes himself sane.

But anything more utterly irresponsible than this sudden, impulsive departure of the Lady of St. Joseph can scarcely be imagined. John did not even know her name and, what is more, did not even realise the fact until she and Ronald had crossed the stretch of gra.s.s and reached the Broad Walk. Then he ran after them.

Ronald turned first as he heard the hurrying footsteps. Anything running will arrest the attention of a boy, while a woman hears, just as quickly, but keeps her head rigid. Evidently, Ronald had told her. She turned as well. John suddenly found himself face to face with her.

Then the impossible delicacy of the situation and his question came home to him.

How, before Ronald, to whom he had just been introduced as a friend, could he ask her name? Simplicity of mind is proverbial in those who traffic in deep waters; but could the master of the good ship _Albatross_ ever be so simple as not to find the suggestion of something peculiar in such a question as this?

And so when he reached her side, he stood there despairingly dumb.

"You wanted to say something?" said she.

He looked helplessly at Ronald. Ronald looked helplessly at him. Then, when he looked at her, he saw the helplessness in her eyes as well.

"What is it you want?" said her eyes--"I can't get rid of him. He's as cunning as he can be."

And his eyes replied--"I want to know your name--I want to know who you are." Which is a foolish thing to say with one's eyes, because no one could possibly understand it. It might mean anything.

Then he launched a question at a venture. If she had any intuition, she could guide it safe to port.

"I just wanted to ask," said John--"if you were any relation to the--the----" At that moment the only name that entered his head was Wrigglesworth, who kept a little eating-house in Fetter Lane--"the--oh--what is their name!--the Merediths of Wrotham?"

He had just been reading "The Amazing Marriage." But where on earth was Wrotham? Well, it must do.

She looked at him in amazement. She had not understood. Who could blame her?

"The Merediths?" she repeated--"But why should you think----"

"Oh, yes--I know,"--he interposed quickly--"It's not the same name--but--they--they have relations of your name--they told me so--cousins or something like that, and I just wondered if--well, it doesn't matter--you're not. Good-bye."

He lifted his hat and departed. For a moment there was a quite unreasonable sense of disappointment in his mind. She was wanting in intuition. She ought to have understood. Of course, in her bewilderment at his question she had looked charming and that made up for a great deal. How intensely charming she had looked! Her forehead when she frowned--the eyes alight with questions. Anyhow, she had understood that what he had really wanted to say could not be said before Ronald and, into her confidence she had taken him--closing the door quite softly behind them. Without question, without understanding, she had done that. Perhaps it made up for everything.

Presently, he heard the hurrying of feet, and turned at once. How wonderfully she ran--like a boy of twelve, with a clean stride and a sure foot.

"I'm so sorry," she said in little breaths. "I didn't understand. The Merediths and the Wrotham put me all out. It's Dealtry--Julie Dealtry--they call me Jill. We live in Prince of Wales' Terrace." She said the number. "Do they call you Jack? Good-bye--to-morrow." And she was off.

CHAPTER XI

A SIDE-LIGHT UPON APPEARANCES

He watched the last sway of her skirt, the last toss of her head, as she ran down the hill of the Broad Walk, then, repeating mechanically to himself:

_Jack and Jill went up the hill_ _To fetch a pail of water,_ _Jack fell down and broke his crown_ _And Jill came tumbling after,_

and, wondering what it all meant, wondering if, after all, those nursery rhymes were really charged with subtle meaning, he made his way to Victoria Gate in the Park Railings.

In the high road, he saw a man he knew, a member of his club, top-hatted and befrocked. The silk hat gleamed in the sunlight. It looked just like a silk hat you would draw, catching the light in two brilliant lines from crown to brim. The frock coat was caught with one b.u.t.ton at the waist. Immaculate is the word. John hesitated. They were friends, casual friends, but he hesitated. There might be two opinions about the soft felt hat he was wearing. He found it comfortable; but one gets biased in one's opinions about one's hats. Even the fact that the evening before he had driven with this friend in a hansom for which he had paid as the friend had no money on him at the time--even this did not give him courage. He decided to keep to his, the Park side of the Bayswater Road.

But presently the friend saw him, lifted his stick, and shook it amicably in greeting. He even crossed the road. Well, after all, he could scarcely do anything else. John had paid for his hansom only the evening before. He remembered vividly how, on the suggestion that they should drive, his friend had dived his hand into his pocket, shaken his bunch of keys and said, with obvious embarra.s.sment, that he had run rather short of change. It always is change that one runs short of.

Capital is never wanting. There is always a balance at the poor man's bank, and the greater his pride the bigger the balance. But at that moment, John had been rich in change--that is to say, he had half a crown.

"Oh--I've got heaps," he had said. It is permissible to talk of heaps when you have enough. And he had paid for the whole journey. It was not to be wondered at then, that his friend came amicably across the road.

John greeted him lightly.

"Going up to town?"

"Yes--are you?"

John nodded. "Are you lunching at the Club?"

"No--I've got to meet some people at the Carlton--How's the time--my watch is being mended."