The Little Warrior Part 31

"It isn't only Ronny, you know," Freddie hastened to interject. "Algy Martyn's talking about it, too. And lots of other fellows. And Algy's sister and a lot of people. They're all saying ..."

"What are they saying?"

Freddie bent down and chafed the back of his legs. He simply couldn't look at Derek while he had that Lady Underhill expression on the old map. Rummy he had never noticed before how extraordinarily like his mother he was. Freddie was conscious of a faint sense of grievance.

He could not have put it into words, but what he felt was that a fellow had no right to go about looking like Lady Underhill.

"What are they saying?" repeated Derek grimly.

"Well ..." Freddie hesitated. "That it's a bit tough ... On Jill, you know."

"They think I behaved badly?"

"Well ... Oh, well, you know!"

Derek smiled a ghastly smile. This was not wholly due to mental disturbance. The dull heaviness which was the legacy of the Dry-Salters' dinner had begun to change to something more actively unpleasant. A sub-motive of sharp pain had begun to run through it, flashing in and out like lightning through a thunder-cloud. He felt sullen and vicious.

"I wonder," he said with savage politeness, "if, when you chat with your friends, you would mind choosing some other topic than my private affairs."

"Sorry, old man. But they started it, don't you know."

"And, if you feel you've got to discuss me, kindly keep it to yourself. Don't come and tell me what your d.a.m.ned friends said to each other and to you and what you said to them, because it bores me.

I'm not interested. I don't value their opinions as much as you seem to." Derek paused, to battle in silence with the imperious agony within him. "It was good of you to put me up here," he went on, "but I think I won't trespa.s.s on your hospitality any longer. Perhaps you'll ask Parker to pack my things tomorrow." Derek moved, as majestically as an ex-guest of the Worshipful Company of Dry-Salters may, in the direction of the door. "I shall go to the Savoy."

"Oh, I say, old man! No need to do that."

"Good night."

"But, I say ..."

"And you can tell your friend Devereux that, if he doesn't stop poking his nose into my private business, I'll pull it off."

"Well," said Freddie doubtfully, "of course I don't suppose you know, but ... Ronny's a pretty hefty bird. He boxed for Cambridge in the light-weights the last year he was up, you know. He ..."

Derek slammed the door. Freddie was alone. He stood rubbing his legs for some minutes, a rueful expression on his usually cheerful face.

Freddie hated rows. He liked everything to jog along smoothly. What a rotten place the world was these days! Just one thing after another.

First, poor old Jill takes the knock and disappears. He would miss her badly. What a good sort! What a pal! And now--gone. Biffed off.

Next, Derek. Together, more or less, ever since Winchester, and now--bing! ...

Freddie heaved a sigh, and reached out for the Sporting Times, his never-failing comfort in times of depression. He lit another cigar and curled up in one of the arm-chairs. He was feeling tired. He had been playing squash all the afternoon, a game at which he was exceedingly expert and to which he was much addicted.

Time pa.s.sed. The paper slipped to the floor. A cold cigar followed it. From the depths of the chair came a faint snore ...

A hand on his shoulder brought Freddie with a jerk troubled dreams.

Derek was standing beside him. A tousled Derek, apparently in pain.

"Freddie!"

"Hullo!"

A spasm twisted Derek's face.

"Have you got any pepsin?"

Derek uttered a groan. What a mocker of our petty human dignity is this dyspepsia, bringing low the haughtiest of us, less than love itself a respecter of persons. This was a different Derek from the man who had stalked stiffly from the room two hours before. His pride had been humbled upon the rack.

"Pepsin?"

Freddie blinked, the mists of sleep floating gently before his eyes.

He could not quite understand what his friend was asking for. It had sounded just like pepsin, and he didn't believe there was such a word.

"Yes. I've got the most d.a.m.ned attack of indigestion."

The mists of sleep rolled away from Freddie. He was awake again, and became immediately helpful. These were the occasions when the Last of the Rookes was a good man to have at your side. It was Freddie who suggested that Derek should recline in the arm-chair which he had vacated; Freddie who nipped round the corner to the all-night chemist's and returned with a magic bottle guaranteed to relieve an ostrich after a surfeit of soda-water bottles; Freddie who mixed and administered the dose.

His ministrations were rewarded. Presently the agony seemed to pa.s.s.

Derek recovered.

One would say that Derek became himself again, but that the mood of gentle remorse which came upon him as he lay in the arm-chair was one so foreign to his nature. Freddie had never seen him so subdued. He was like a convalescent child. Between them, the all-night chemist and the Dry-Salters seemed to have wrought a sort of miracle. These temporary softenings of personality frequently follow city dinners.

The time to catch your Dry-Salter in angelic mood is the day after the semi-annual banquet. Go to him then and he will give you his watch and chain.

"Freddie," said Derek.

They were sitting over the dying fire. The clock on the mantelpiece, beside which Jill's photograph had stood, pointed to ten minutes past two. Derek spoke in a low, soft voice. Perhaps the doctors are right after all, and two o'clock is the hour at which our self-esteem deserts us, leaving in its place regret for past sins, good resolutions for future behavior.

"What do Algy Martyn and the others say about ... you know?"

Freddie hesitated. Pity to start all that again.

"Oh, I know," went on Derek. "They say I behaved like a cad."

"Oh, well ..."

"They are quite right. I did."

"Oh, I shouldn't say that, you know. Faults on both sides and all that sort of rot."

"I did!" Derek stared into the fire. Scattered all over London at that moment, probably, a hundred worshipful Dry-Salters were equally sleepless and subdued, looking wide-eyed into black pasts. "Is it true she has gone to America, Freddie?"

"She told me she was going."

"What a fool I've been!"

The clock ticked on through the silence. The fire sputtered faintly, then gave a little wheeze, like a very old man. Derek rested his chin on his hands, gazing into the ashes.

"I wish to G.o.d I could go over there and find her."