The Tower of Oblivion Part 19

This time I slept as soundly as he.

Afterwards he blamed himself that he had not sent me away; but that sleep had dropped on him like a falling beam. All his sleep, he explained, was like that. Immeasurable chasms of time seemed to have pa.s.sed away between his closing his eyes and his opening them again.

So this is what came next:

A light creaking of his chair brought me suddenly wide awake and sitting up. A peep of grey daylight showed in the upper portion of the window-frame, but the incandescent mantle still glared yellowly above his head. He had moved, but without waking. He turned his head and slumbered on.

But the turn of his head had brought his face into the light....

He only shaved once a day, in the morning; and on the following morning he shaved again. But it was his whole beard that he thus shaved off daily, thirty days' growth in a night. He had had no set intention of growing that beard that I had seen in the hansom. A few days before coming to Trenchard's place he had woke up one morning, stroked his face, and found it there.

There he slept--in his golden beard.

IV

"Most certainly he shall write his book," Julia declared.

"Not if I can prevent it," I replied.

"We'll see about that. You don't think he'll give us the slip again?"

"I don't think so--I mean he doesn't seem to want to at present."

"And he was all right when you left him? Is he comfortable there? Had he a good breakfast? Was his bed made? Does anybody go in and clear up for him? Had he any flowers?"

"He's quite all right there. He wants to see me as much as he can. He'd ask me to stay with him, but he's determined to get ahead with that book."

I did not tell her of any other reason why he might wish to be alone when he woke up in the morning. I a.s.sumed that a man's shaving operations could have no interest for her. But this is what had taken place:

On seeing his first signs of stirring I had slipped quietly into his bedroom. There, lying on his bed, I had pretended to be asleep. I had heard his tiptoe approach, the slight creaking of the door as he had peeped in, his stealthy crossing to the dressing-table, where his razors were. Then he had stolen out again, and I had heard a kettle filled and other preparations. A quarter of an hour later he had (as he supposed) woke me. He stood there by the bedside with a cup of tea in his hand.

His chin was smooth. I wondered about that other morning when, pa.s.sing his hand over his face, he had first found the beard there. And I wondered what his companion, if he had had one, had thought of it.

"But he shall write his book, poor darling," Julia repeated.

This was at half-past ten in the morning, in her studio, whither I had walked straight from Derry's loft over the mews.

"He ought to be locked up for life if he does," I answered.

But she was very obstinate. Derry (she said) should do whatever he had a mind to do. More than that (and a crafty light stole into her dark eyes as she said it), she intended to help him.

"To write his book? And what do you know about writing books?"

"I didn't say to write his book. You say he's--what d'you call it?--sharpening his tools, getting himself fit. Well, I can help him to do that."

"How?"

"I'll leave the door open so you can hear."

She ran out of the studio to the little cabinet where her telephone was.

I heard the following, her side of the conversation that ensued.

"Is that 9199? Miss Oliphant would like to speak to Mrs Aird, please....

Is that you, Madge? Yes, this is my dinner-call.... Oh, like a top, and I know your phone's by your bed. Madge, my dear, I want to know who that learned person was I was talking to last night: yes, the bibliomaniac person.... Who?" Then, with a jump of her voice, "What, he's staying with you? He's in the house _now_? Do send for him immediately.... Of course not, you goose, but you have an extension, haven't you?..."

And then this:

"Oh, good morning! Miss Oliphant speaking.... Ah, you've forgotten!...

Most frightfully excited about our conversation last night. Will you tell me again the t.i.tle of that book and whether I can see it in the British Museum? Wait a minute, I want to write it down...."

Then, carefully and as it were a letter at a time:

"_Manuel--du--Repertoire--Bibliographique--Universel...._ Yes, I've got that.... _Paris, 44, Rue de Rennes...._ Now the other book, please....

_Decimal Cla.s.sification and Relative Index...._ Yes.... _Melvil Dewey...._ Is that enough to identify them?"

Then a rapid perfunctory gush, a "Thank you _so_ much," the receiver clapped on again, and re-enter Julia, her face ashine with triumph.

"Well, did you hear all that?" she said. "You can take me along to the British Museum as soon as you like. You'll have to get me into the reading-room, because I haven't a ticket. Then if I were you I should trot away off to Haslemere."

"Who's that you were talking to?"

"A most fearful bore I met at the Airds' at dinner last night. At least I thought he was a bore then. Now he's a duck and an angel and I could kiss him all over his bald old head. Goodness is _always_ rewarded, George, but not often the next morning like this." She clapped her hands.

"You're less comprehensible than ever I knew you, which is saying a good deal."

"Dear old George! When you're bald I'll kiss you too. And Derry _shall_ write his book."

"And fight Carpentier?"

"Poodledoodle!"

And she flitted out again, unfastening her painting-blouse at the back as she went.

I knew enough of Miss Oliphant by this time to treat her apparent irresponsibilities with respect. I had never heard of either of the books of which she had spoken over the telephone, but I risked a guess at their nature--_Bibliographique Universel_--_Decimal Cla.s.sification_--evidently the subject was indexing, and she had met somebody at dinner the night before who had led her into these arid fields. Naturally she had been bored. But now she was in a rapture of plotting and machination. She intended to a.s.sist and encourage Derry in that inordinate plan of his. She came in again, dressed for walking, humming a blithe tune.

"Dear, dear Providence! There was I ready to snap Madge's head off for seizing quite a nice man herself and giving me old Drybones, but now I'm going to send her some flowers. See the idea, George?"

"What are these books?"

"The very latest thing in the way of indexing. It lasted nearly the whole of dinner. Oh, I _love_ myself for being so good! He drooled along, and I said 'How thrilling' and things like that, thinking of something else all the time, and now _this_ gorgeous piece of luck!"

"A Universal Index?"

"Yes, of the whole of human knowledge. It's all done with decimals--or do they call them semicolons? Dots anyway. You can turn up anything from the solar system to a packet of pins at a moment's notice. If Derry doesn't know about it he'll dance with joy.... But come along. I must see those books. Let's go by bus. You can get me a reader's ticket, can't you?"

She pushed me out in front of her and closed the door with a reckless bang. All the way to the bus she talked as delightedly as if it had been her birthday.

"So I shall mug up those decimals and things and then go and be his secretary. I know more or less how he wrote his _Vicarage_. He used to stride up and down my room, thinking aloud about it. And this will be the same, only enormous! He says he wants to make it as Moses made his Decalogue? He shall, bless his heart. Why shouldn't he? I don't see your stuffy old objections, George."