The Mountebank Part 24

Chapter XIII

Through one of the little ironies of fate, my mission at the Peace Conference ended a day or two after Andrew's arrival in Paris, so that when he called at my hotel I had already returned to London. A brief note from him a day or two later informed me of his visit and his great regret at missing me. Of his plans he said nothing. He gave as his address "c/o c.o.x's Bank." You will remark that this was late April, and I did not receive his famous ma.n.u.script till June. Of his private history I knew nothing, save his beginnings in the Cirque Rocambeau and his ident.i.ty with a professional mountebank known as Pet.i.t Patou.

Soon afterwards I spent a week-end with the Verity-Stewarts. Before I could have a private word with Lady Auriol, whom I found as my fellow-guest, Evadne, as soon as she had finished an impatient though not unsubstantial tea, hurried me out into the garden. There were two litters of Sealyhams.

Lady Verity-Stewart protested mildly.

"Uncle Anthony doesn't want to see puppies."

"It's the only thing he's interested in and the only thing he knows anything about," cried Evadne. "And he's the only one that's able to pick out the duds. Come on."

So I went. Crossing the lawn, she took my arm.

"We're all as sick as dogs," she remarked confidentially.

"Indeed? Why?"

"We asked----" Note the modern child. Not "Papa" or "Mamma," as a well-conducted little girl of the Victorian epoch would have said, but "we," _ego et parentes_--"we asked," replied Evadne, "General Lackaday down. And crossing our letter came one from Paris telling us he had left England for good. Isn't it rotten?"

"The General's a very good fellow," said I, "but I didn't know he was a flame of yours."

"Oh, you stupid!" cried Evadne, with a protesting tug at my arm "It's nothing to do with me. It s Aunt Auriol."

"Oh?" said I.

She shook her fair bobbed head. "As if you didn't know!"

"I'm not so senile," said I, "as not to grasp your insinuation, my dear.

But I fail to see what business it is of ours."

"It's a family affair--oh, I forgot, you're not real family--only adopted."

I felt humiliated. "Anyhow you're as near as doesn't matter." I brightened up again. "I've heard 'em talking it over--when they thought I wasn't listening. Father and mother and Charles. They're all potty over General Lackaday. And so's Aunt Auriol. I told you they had clicked ages ago."

"Clicked?"

"Yes. Don't you know English?"

"To my sorrow, I do. They clicked. And father and mother and Charles and Aunt Auriol are all potty."

"And so am I," she declared, "for he's a dear. And they all say it's time for Aunt Auriol to settle down. So they wanted to get him here and fix him.

Charles says he's a shy bird----"

"But," I interrupted, "you're talking of the family. Your Aunt Auriol has a father, Lord Mountshire."

"He's an old a.s.s," said Evadne.

"He's a peer of the realm," said I rebukingly, though I cordially agreed with her.

"He's not fit to be General Lackaday's ancient butler," she retorted.

"Is that your own?"

"No. It's Charles's. But I can repeat it if I like."

"And all this goes to prove----" said I.

"Well, don't you see? You are dense. The news that the General had gone to France knocked them all silly. Aunt Auriol's looking rotten. Charles says she's off her feed. You should have seen her last night at dinner, when they were talking about him."

"Again, my dear Evadne," said I, opening the gate of the kitchen garden for her to pa.s.s through, "this is none of my business."

She took my arm again. "It doesn't matter. But oh, darling Uncle Tony, couldn't we fix it up?"

"Fix up what?" I asked aghast.

"The wedding," replied this amazing young person, looking up at me so that I had only a vision of earnest grey eyes, and a foreshortened snub nose and chin. "He's only shy. You could bring him up to the scratch at once."

She went on in a whirl of words of which I preserve but a confused memory.

Of course it was her own idea. She had heard her mother hint that Anthony Hylton might be a useful man to have about--but all the same she had her plan. Why shouldn't I go off to Paris and bring him back? I gasped. I fought for air. But Evadne hurried me on, talking all the time. She was dying for a wedding. She had never seen one in her life. She would be a bridesmaid. She described her costume. And she had set her heart on a wedding present--the best of the bunch of Sealyham puppies. Why, certainly they were all hers. t.i.t and Tat, from whom the rather extensive kennels had originally sprung, were her own private property. They had been given to her when she was six years old. Tat had died. But t.i.t. I knew t.i.t? Did I not? No one could spend an hour in Mansfield Court without making the acquaintance of the ancient thing on the hearthrug, with the shape of a woolly lamb and the eye of a hawk and the smile of a Court jester. Besides, I had known him since he was a puppy. I, _moi qui parle_, had been the donor of t.i.t and Tat. I reminded her. I was a stupid. As if she didn't know. But I was to confirm her right to dispose of the pups. I confirmed it solemnly. So we hastened to the stable yard and inspected the kennels, where the two mothers lay with their slithery tail-wagging broods. We discussed the points of each little beast and eventually decided on the one which should be Evadne's wedding present to General Lackaday and Lady Auriol Dayne.

"Thanks ever so much, darling," said Evadne. "You are _so_ helpful."

I returned to the drawing-room fairly well primed with the family preoccupations, so that when Lady Verity-Stewart carried me off to her own little den on the pretext of showing me some new Bristol gla.s.s, and Sir Julius came smoking casually in her wake, I knew what to expect. They led up to the subject, of course, very diplomatically--not rushing at it brutally like Evadne, but nothing that the child said did they omit--with the natural exception of the bridesmaid's dress and the wedding present.

And they added little more. They were greatly concerned, dear elderly folk, about Auriol. She and General Lackaday had been hand in glove for months.

He evidently more than admired her. Auriol, said Sir Julius, in her don't-care-a-dam-for-anybody sort of way made no pretence of disguising her sentiments. Any fool could see she was in love with the man. And they had _affiched_ themselves together all over the place. Other women could do it with impunity--if they didn't have an infatuated man in tow at a restaurant, they'd be stared at, people would ask whether they were qualifying for a nunnery--but Auriol was different. Aphrodite could do what she chose and no one worried; but an indiscretion of Artemis set tongues wagging. It was high time for something definite to happen. And now the only thing definite was Lackaday's final exodus from the scene, and Auriol's inclination to go off and bury herself in some savage land. Lady Verity-Stewart thought Borneo. They were puzzled. General Lackaday was the best of fellows---so simple, so sincere--such a d.a.m.ned fine soldier--such a gentle, kindly creature--so scurvily treated by a disgraceful War Office--just the husband for Auriol--etcetera, etcetera in strophe and antistrophe of eulogy.

All this was by way of beginning. Then came the point of the conclave.

It was obvious that General Lackaday couldn't have trifled with Auriol's affections and thrown her off. I smiled at the conception of the lank and earnest Lackaday in the part of Don Juan. Besides, they added sagely, Auriol had been known to make short work of philanderers. It could only be a question of some misunderstanding that might easily be arranged by an intelligent person in the confidence of both parties. That, it appeared, was where I came in. I, as Evadne had said, was a useful man to have about.

"Now, my dear Anthony," said Sir Julius, "can't you do something?"

What the deuce was I to do? But first I asked:

"What does Auriol say about it?"

They hadn't broached the subject. They were afraid. I knew what Auriol was. As likely as not she would tell them to go to the devil for their impertinence.

"And she wouldn't be far wrong," said I.

"Of course it seems meddlesome," said Sir Julius, tugging at his white moustache, "but we're fond of Auriol. I've been much more of a father to her than that d.a.m.ned old a.s.s Mountshire"--Evadne, again; though for once in her life she had exercised restraint--"and I hate to see her unhappy. She's a woman who ought to marry, hang it all, and bring fine children into the world. And her twenties won't last for ever--to put it mildly. And here she is in love with a fine fellow who's in love with her or I'll eat my hat, and--well--don't you see what I mean?"

Oh yes. I saw perfectly. To soothe them, I promised to play the high-cla.s.s Pandarus to the best of my ability. At any rate, Lady Auriol, having taken me into her confidence months ago, couldn't very well tell me to go to the devil, and, if she did, couldn't maintain the mandate with much show of outraged dignity.

I did not meet her till dinner. She came down in a sort of low cut red and bronze frock without any sleeves--I had never seen so much of her before--and what I saw was exceedingly beautiful. A magnificent creature, with muscular, shapely arms and deep bosom and back like a Greek statue become dark and warm. Her auburn hair crowned her strong pleasant face. As far as appearances went I could trace no sign of the love-lorn maiden. Only from her talk did I diagnose a more than customary unrest. The war was over. Hospitals were closed. Her occupation (like Lackaday's) was gone.