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Read Ebook: Two Sides of the Face: Midwinter Tales by Quiller Couch Arthur
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nd awarded the 'historic' flitch for conjugal happiness. Call them A and Mrs. A, B and Mrs. B. On returning to the hotel with their trophies, it is discovered that B and Mrs. A are old flames, while each finds a mistaken reason to suspect that A and Mrs. B have also met years before, and at least dallied with courtship. Thus while their spouses alternately rage with suspicion and invent devices to conceal their own defaults, A and Mrs. B sit innocently nursing their illusions and their symbolical flitches. The situation holds plenty of comedy, and the main motive begins to explain itself. Now then for anagnorisis, comic peripeteia, division into acts, and the rest of the wallet!
I smoked another two cigarettes and flung away a third in despair. Useless! The plaguey thing refused to take shape. I sprang up and paced the sands, dogged by an invisible Cozens piping thin reproaches above the hum of the breakers.
I had missed the midday boat, and reached Dover by the later and slower one as the June night began to descend. From Victoria I drove straight to my club, and snatched a supper of cold meats in its half-lit dining-room. Twenty minutes later I was in my hansom again and swiftly bowling westward--I say 'bowling' because it is the usual word, and I was in far too fierce a hurry to think of a better.
I had dropped back upon London in the fastest whirl of the season, and at the hour when all the world rolls homeward from the theatres. Two hansoms raced with mine, and red lights by the score dotted the noble slope of Piccadilly. To the left the street-lamps flung splashes of theatrical green on the sombre boughs of the Green Park. In one of the porticos to the right half a dozen guests lingered for a moment and laughed together before taking their leave. One of them stood on the topmost steps, lighting a cigarette: he carried his silk-lined Inverness over his arm--so sultry the night was--and the ladies wore but the slightest of wraps over their bright frocks and jewels. One of them as we passed stepped forward, and I saw her dismissing her brougham. A night for walking, thought the party: and a fine night for sleeping out of doors, thought the road-watchman close by, watching them and meditatively smoking behind his barricade hung with danger-lanterns. Overhead rode the round moon.
It is the fashion to cry down London, and I have taken my part in the chorus; but always--be the absence never so short--I come back to her with the same lift of the heart. Why did I ever leave her? What had I gone a-seeking in Ambleteuse?--a place where a man leaves his room only to carry his writing-desk with him and plant it by the sea. London offered the only true recreation. In London a man might turn the key on himself and work for so long as it pleased him. But let him emerge, and--pf!--the jostle of the streets shook his head clear of the whole stuffy business. No; decidedly I would not return to Madame Peyron's. London for me, until my comedy should be written, down to the last word on the last page!
We were half way down the Cromwell Road when I took this resolution, and at once I was aware of a gathering of carriages drawn up in line ahead and close beside the pavement. At intervals the carriages moved forward a few paces and the line closed up; but it stretched so far that I soon began to wonder which of my neighbours could be entertaining on a scale so magnificent.
"What number did you say, sir?" the cabman asked through his trap.
"Number 402," I called up.
"Blest if I can get alongside the pavement then," he grumbled. He was a surly man.
"Never mind that. Pull up opposite Number 402 and I'll slip between. I've only my bag to carry."
"Didn't know folks was so gay in these outlyin' parts," he commented sourly, and closed the trap, but presently opened it again. His horse had dropped to a walk. "Did you say four-nought-two?" he asked.
"Oh, confound it--yes!" I was growing impatient.
He pulled up and began to turn the horse's head.
"Hi! What are you doing?"
"Goin' back to the end of the line--back to take our bloomin' turn," he answered wearily. "Four-nought-two, you said, didn't you?"
"Yes, yes; are you deaf? What have I to do with this crowd?"
"I hain't deaf, but I got eyes. Four-nought-two's where the horning's up, that's all."
"The horning? What's that?"
"But there's no party at Number 402," I insisted. "The thing's impossible."
"Very well, then; I'm a liar, and that ends it." He wheeled again and began to walk his horse sullenly forward. "'Oo's blind this time?" he demanded, coming to a standstill in front of the house.
An awning stretched down from the front door and across the pavement, where two policemen guarded the alighting guests from pressure by a small but highly curious crowd. Overhead, the first-floor windows had been flung wide; the rooms within were aflame with light; and, as I grasped the rail of the splashboard, and, straightening myself up, gazed over the cab-roof with a wild surmise into the driver's face, a powerful but invisible string band struck up the 'Country Girl' Lancers!
"'Oo's a liar now?" He jerked his whip towards the number "402" staring down at me from the illuminated pane above the awning.
"But it 'is my own house!" I gasped.
"Here, give me my bag!" I fumbled in my pocket for his fare.
"Cook giving a party? Well, you're handy for the Wild West out here--good old Earl's Court!" He jerked his whip again towards the awning as a North American Indian in full war-paint passed up the steps and into the house, followed by the applause of the crowd.
I must have overpaid the man extravagantly, for his tone changed suddenly as he examined the coins in his hand. "Look here, guvnor, if you want any little 'elp, I was barman one time at the 'Elephant'--"
But I caught up my bag, swung off the step, and, squeezing between a horse's wet nose and the back of a brougham, gained the pavement, where a red-baize carpet divided the ranks of the crowd.
"Hullo!" One of the policemen put out a hand to detain me.
"It's all right," I assured him; "I belong to the house." It seemed a safer explanation than that the house belonged to me.
"Is it the ices?" he asked.
But I ran up the porchway, eager to get to grips with Trewlove.
On the threshold a young and extremely elegant footman confronted me.
"Where is Trewlove?" I demanded.
The footman was glorious in a tasselled coat and knee-breeches, both of bright blue. He wore his hair in powder, and eyed me with suspicion if not with absolute disfavour.
"Where is Trewlove?" I repeated, dwelling fiercely on each syllable.
The young footman resumed. "When you've had a good look round and seen all you want to see--"
"I am Mr. Richardson," I interrupted; "and up to a few minutes ago I supposed myself to be the owner of this house. Here--if you wish to assure yourself--is my card."
"You had my telegram, then?"
"Telegram, sir?" He hesitated, searching his memory.
"Certainly--a telegram sent by me at one o'clock this afternoon, or thereabouts--"
Here, with an apology, he left me to attend to a new arrival--a Yellow Dwarf with a decidedly music-hall manner, who nudged him in the stomach and fell upon his neck exclaiming, "My long-lost brother!"
"Addressed to 'Trewlove, 402, Cromwell Road.'"
"William!" He summoned another footman forward. "This gentleman is inquiring for a telegram sent here this afternoon, addressed 'Trewlove'."
"There was such a telegram," said William. "I heard Mr. Horrex a-discussing of it in the pantry. The mistress took the name for a telegraphic address, and sent it back to the office, saying there must be some mistake."
"But I sent it myself!"
"Indeed, sir?"
"It contained an order to get my room ready."
"This gentleman is Mr. Richardson," explained the younger footman.
"Indeed, sir?" William's face brightened. "In that case there's no 'arm done, for your room is ready, and I laid out your dress myself. Mr. 'Erbert gave particular instructions before going out."
"Mr. Herbert?" I gazed around me blankly. Who in the name of wonder was Mr. Herbert?
"If you will allow me, sir," suggested William, taking my bag, while the other went back to his post.
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