The Parts Men Play

by Beverley Baxter

CHAPTER X.

GATHERING SHADOWS.

I.

Breakfast at Roselawn was a studiously inconsequential meal. Places were set as usual by the servants, but the viands and the paraphernalia necessary for their preparation were placed on a separate table in the alcove by the great window overlooking the lawn. Having performed this duty, the servants did nothing more; but one could not help feeling that they were just outside the door, like a group of prompters, ready to render instantaneous assistance should the amateurs falter.

Lord Durwent made a kindly and efficient supervisor of the commissariat table, and—there was no question of it—could boil an egg with any one in the county. And the guests plying between the source of supply and the breakfast-table proper created a vagabondish camping-out air of geniality that did much to dispel the natural stiffness of the morning intercourse. As the meal had no formal opening, every one arrived at any time during the breakfast period, and though constant apologies were offered for the frequent interruptions to Lord Durwent's own meal, it could be seen that his enjoyment of buffet proprietorship was almost a professional one.

Lady Durwent's part in the function was to supervise the coffee, and ask each guest how he or she had slept, expressing regret that the night had not been cooler, warmer, calmer, or fresher, according to the polite customs of social dialogue at breakfast.

At nine-fifteen the papers used to arrive from the village, always causing a flutter of excitement. The sense of solitude at Roselawn made the outside world something so remote and apart that there was genuine curiosity to discover what the deuce it had been doing with itself during the house-party's retreat.

Lord Durwent read the Morning Post as a sort of 'prairie oyster' or 'bromo-seltzer.' It settled him. There was something about that journal's editorial page and its dignified treatment of events that made Roselawn seem the embodiment of British principle. Being a man who prided himself on a catholicity of view-point, he also subscribed to the Daily Mail—that frivolous young thing that has as many editions as a débutante has frocks, and by its super-delicate apparatus at Carmelite House can detect a popular clamour before it is louder than a kitten's miaow.

As a concession to the ladies of the household, he took, in addition, the Daily Sketch and the Daily Mirror, those two energetic illustrated papers, which, benefiting from the remarkable geographical fact that every place of consequence in England is exactly two hours from London, are able to offer photos of riders in Rotten How, bathers at Brighton, rowers at Oxford, and foreign monarchs walking at Windsor, the very morning after all these remarkable persons have astonished the world by riding, bathing, rowing, or walking.

But to Lord Durwent these papers and the Daily Mail were but interludes. The Morning Post was the real business of life, and after reading through its solid columns of type, he enjoyed the sensation of somehow having done something for his country.

II.

It was just before the arrival of the morning papers that Selwyn descended to the dining-room. Helping himself to porridge, he answered Lady Durwent's polite conventional questions.

'And how did you sleep?' asked his hostess, putting into the inquiry that artistic personal touch which made it seem as if this were the first time she had asked the question, and he the first guest to whom it had been propounded.

'Lady Durwent,' he answered, smiling, 'I haven't the faintest idea.'

'Then,' said his hostess, triumphantly explaining the obvious, 'you must have slept well.'

Selwyn thought that when he answered Lady Durwent's query a quick look of relief had passed across the face of Elise. It was for her peace of mind he had lied, as into the hours of dawn he had lain awake, trying to unravel the meaning of the nocturnal scene. He knew that her prodigal brother had been forbidden the ancestral home, but it was hardly necessary that he should lie in hiding like a negro slave dreading the hounds upon his track. And yet, as he recalled the sudden glimpse of Dick's face, Selwyn remembered that there had been a hunted look in the dark-shadowed, luminous eyes. Vaguely he felt that this new development would hinder the understanding reached by Elise and himself during the evening. If only he could go to her and offer his help or solace; or if she would come to him frankly and let him share the unhappy secret, whatever it was, it might prove a bond of comradeship instead of another element to deepen her consciousness of aloofness.

Still churning these various thoughts, he smiled his greetings to her, and affecting an easy unconcern, took his part in the fashionable agricultural conversation which marks the morning intercourse of country-living gentle-folk. If it had not been that the pigs mentioned were Lord Fitz-Guff's, and the cabbages Lady Dingworthy's—and the accents of the speakers beyond question—Selwyn could have imagined that he was sitting around Hank Myer's stove in Doanville, N.Y., listening to the gossip of the local Doanvillians on earth's produce.

'Ah,' said Lord Durwent, sighting a messenger from over the egg-timer, 'here are the papers.'

Directly afterwards the butler entered with the four morning journals, solemnly presented them to his master (with a little more dignity than a Foreign Minister displays in handing the ambassador of an enemy country his passports), then made his exit with his eyes sedately raised, to avoid noting more than was necessary of the 'behind-stage' aspect of his domain.

'Hello!' said Lord Durwent, perusing the Morning Post; 'what's this?
Austria has delivered an ultimatum to Servia.'

'What!' cried one of the ladies; 'over that unpronounceable assassination?'

'Dear me!' said the woman who kept record of retired royalties, 'that will upset my dear friend Empress——'

But her voice was lost in the clamour, as every one, deserting breakfast, crowded about Lord Durwent, and half in jest demanded to know what the ramshackle empire had to say for itself.

In a voice that grew tremulous with anger, the host read the details, point by point, and as the seriousness of the thing broke upon the hearers, even the very lightest tongues were for the moment stilled.

With a frown the nobleman looked up as he reached the end of the ultimatum, in which one nation, for its pride, demanded that another should hand over its honour, debased and shackled.

'It is infamous,' said Lord Durwent.

'I tell you what,' said a bland youth named Maynard, who was always in high spirits at breakfast, bored at lunch, 'frightfully bucked' by a cup of tea at four, and invariably sentimental after dinner; 'it would do these nasty little Balkans a lot of good to hold 'em all under water for about three minutes—what?'

'But this is more than a Balkan quarrel,' said Lord Durwent.

'Balkan quarrels always are,' said the youth amiably.

In a chorus of quick questions and answers, in which surmise and conjecture played ducks and drakes with fact, the party divided into two camps, the majority taking the stand that it was a local affair and would lead to nothing; the minority, led by a retired army captain called Fensome, reading a dark augury for the future. In the midst of all the chaffing Selwyn noticed, however, that the placidity of decorum had been dropped, and both men and women were leaning forward in the unaccustomed stimulus of their brains rallying to meet a new and powerful situation.

The men did not lose that note of easy banter which seemed the rule when women were present, but in the faces of the little group who contended that danger was ahead he could detect the stiffening of the jaw and the steadying of the eye which come to those who see events riding towards them with the threat of a prairie fire driven by a wind.

'But, good heavens!' said Selwyn, in answer to some one's prophecy that war would result, 'surely the big nations can stop it. Germany and you and America—we three won't let Austria cut Servia's throat in full daylight.'

The retired army captain turned a monocle on him. 'You have been in
Germany, Mr. Selwyn?'

'Yes, just recently.'

'Did you ever hear them toasting Der Tag? My friend, it has arrived.—Durwent, old boy, if you will excuse me, I think I shall go to town at noon. If my old bones aren't lying, the thing which a few of us fossils have been preaching to deaf ears has come to pass, and there may be a job for a belivered old devil like me yet.'

'But,' cried Lady Durwent, whose easily roused theatrical instinct gave her the delightful sensation of presiding at a meeting of the Cabinet, 'what have we to do with Austria and Servia?'

'Hear, hear,' said the bland youth. 'Let 'em hop aboard each other if they like. I think it would be deucedly splendid for us to have another war; we're all fed up—aren't we?—with just enjoying ourselves. But I don't see how we can intrude into those blighters' little show.'

'Exactly,' said Selwyn; 'it's an isolated incident in European affairs.
In what possible way can it lead to a rupture between Britain and
Germany, as Captain Fensome here predicts?'

The officer referred to shrugged his shoulders. 'It's fairly simple,' he said. 'If, as I think, Germany is behind all this, Servia will appeal to Russia; and remember that the Great Bear is mother to all the Slavs. There will, of course, be jockeying for position, bluff, bravado, and all the rest of it; but France is bound to act with Russia, and with all that explosive hanging around it will be strange if some spark doesn't fall among it.'

'But what has that to do with England?'

'Nothing and everything. The greatest hope of maintaining peace lies with Great Britain. If we had the army we should have, I don't think there would be a war; but, thanks to our ostrich temperament, we are reduced to a handful of men and our action is robbed of everything but merely moral strength.'

'But that is a tremendous factor,' said Selwyn.

'Yes,' admitted the other dryly; 'but I prefer guns.'

'Then you don't think Britain powerful enough to steady the situation if it comes?'

'N-no. Not unless'—— The monocle dropped from the speaker's eye, and with annoying coolness he paused to replace it. 'Do you think America will swallow her doctrine and throw in her lot with us?'

Selwyn bit his lip to keep himself from too impetuous an answer. For the first time he felt an envy for the cool imperturbability of the Island Race.

'If you ask me,' he said, 'whether America will plunge into war at the bidding of a group of diplomats who shuffle the nations like a pack of cards, then I say no. If you older nations over here allow this thing to come to a crisis with a rattling of swords and "Hock der Kaiser!" and "Britannia Rules the Waves," count us out. But should the occasion arise when palpable injustice is being done, and the soul of Britain calls to the soul of America that Right must be maintained, then the Republic that was born—if you will permit me to say so—born out of its resentment against injustice will act instantly.'

'Supposing,' said the other, 'that Germany invades Belgium?'

'But—I understand that Germany has guaranteed Belgium's neutrality.'

The ex-officer showed no signs of having heard him, but shook his head impatiently as one does when annoyed by a fly. 'Supposing,' he repeated, 'that Germany invades Belgium.'

'In that case,' said Selwyn sternly, 'America will be the first to protest.'

'To protest?'

'And fight,' said the American, swallowing a desire to hurl a plate at the monocle.

'You will pardon me,' said Lord Durwent, 'but I do not think we can expect America to become mixed up in this thing. She has her own problems of the New World, and it is too much to hope that she is going to come over here and become embroiled in a European conflict.'

'But, dad,' said Elise Durwent, speaking for the first time, 'if, as Mr. Selwyn says, it is clear that a wrong is being committed, America will insist upon acting.'

'Oh, I don't know,' broke in the youth who was always lively at breakfast, but who was beginning to be bored; 'it's one thing to get waxy about your own corns, and quite another when they're on some other blighter's foot—what? I mean, you chaps over there got awfully hot under the collar when dear old Georgius Rex—Heaven rest his soul!—tried to jump down your throat with both spurs on and gallop your little tum-tums out. But the question is, does it hurt in the same place if old Frankie-Joseph of Austria pinks Thingmabob of Servia underneath the fifth rib—what, what?'

'Is Britain great enough for such a situation?' asked Selwyn, repressing a smile. 'Would she accept Belgium's crisis as her own?'

'Oh, that's another thing,' said the young man a little uncomfortably. 'We've signed the bally thing, and of course we'll play the game, and'——

'As Maynard says,' interrupted the former army man, 'it's a bigger thing for America than for us. Mind you, I don't say we need America to help us to make war, but we do need her help if war is to be averted; and any move of such a nature on her part demands what you author fellows would call "a high degree of altruism." How's that, Durwent, for a chap who never reads anything but the Pink Un?'

'Oh, well,' said Lady Durwent complacently, 'it's probably all a storm in a teacup, anyway. Some Austrian diplomat has been jilted for a Servian, I suppose. Isn't that the way wars always happen?' and she sighed heavily, recalling to her mind the classic features of H. Stackton Dunckley.

'That's what I say,' said the bright youth of the morning splendour. 'Why make a horse cross a bridge if it won't drink? Here goes—heads, a European war; tails, another thousand years of peace.—Ah, tough luck, Fensome, old son; it's tails.'

'Then let's begin the thousand years with some tennis,' cried Elise, whose eyes were sparkling, 'immediately after breakfast.'

'Shall us? Let's,' cried the talkative Maynard. 'So lay on, comrades—the victuals are waiting—and "damned be he that first cries, 'Hold, enough!"'

III.

With an animated burst of chatter the house-party had given itself over to a thorough enjoyment of the remainder of breakfast. Ultimatums and the alarums of war vanished into thin air, like mists dispelled by the sun. The serious face of the ex-officer and the unwonted air of distraction on Lord Durwent's countenance were the only indications that the morning was different from any other. Tongues and hearts were light, and airy bubbles of badinage were blown into space for the delectation of all who cared to look.

It was during a fashionable monologue of the Court-Circular lady that Maynard, the man of moods, who was sitting next to Selwyn, leaned over and whispered, 'Get hold of the Sketch. It's on your right. Pretend you're looking at the pictures. I've got the Mirror.'

Wondering what asinine prank was in the young man's mind, but not wanting to disturb the monologuist by untimely controversy, Selwyn reached for the Sketch, and assumed a deep interest in the very latest picture of London's very latest stage favourite who could neither sing, dance, nor act, and was tremendously popular.

'Excuse me, Lady Durwent,' said the gilded youth when a lull permitted him to speak, 'but would you pass the Daily Mail, please?'

'My dear Horace,' said Elise, 'you haven't taken to reading the Mail?'

'No, dear one. Heaven forbid! I merely write for it.'

'What!' There was an ensemble of astonishment.

'Ra-ther. I sent their contributed page a scholarly little thing from my pen entitled "Should One Kiss in the Park?" If it's in I get three guineas, and I'm going to start for Fiji to escape old Fensome's war.'

'Mr. Selwyn,' said Lady Durwent, passing the journal along, 'you have a rival.'

With an air of considerable embarrassment the fair-haired contributor to newspapers opened the pages of the Daily Mail, but protesting that he was too bashful to endure the gaze of the curious, he begged permission to retire to the library, there to search in privacy for his literary child.

'I say, Selwyn,' he said, 'you come along too if you're through pecking. Nothing like having the opinion of an expert, even if he is jealous.'

With a promise to return immediately and read the effort aloud, the two men left the table and adjourned to the adjoining room. With a frown of impatience Selwyn was about to demand the reason for his inclusion in the silly affair, when the other stopped him with a gesture and closed the door.

'Quick!' he said. 'Grab that knife—here's the Sketch. Look through it for anything about Dick Durwent.'

Seeing that the other was serious, Selwyn spread the paper before him and hurriedly searched its columns.

'Great Scott!' he cried. 'Here it'——

'Sh-sh! Hurry up and cut it out. Right. I'll fix up the Mirror in the same way. Now skim through the Mail. Got it? By Jove! damn near a whole column. Here'—Maynard ran the knife down the side of the column. 'Now then, old Fensome has promised to get the thing out of the Post, and to tell Lord Durwent before he goes to town. But he mustn't hear of it this way, and those women are not to know a word about it while they're in the house.'

Selwyn nodded and looked at the ragged clippings in his hand:

'ATTEMPTED MURDER IN WEST END.' 'WELL-KNOWN NOBLEMAN ATTACKED BY PEER'S SON.' 'QUARREL OVER DEMI-MONDAINE.'

'Gad, those are juicy lines, aren't they?' said Maynard. 'Won't some of our worthy citizens lick their chops over them, and point to the depravity of the upper classes? Do you know Dick Durwent?'

'I have seen him a couple of times.'

'Awfully decent chap. Screw loose, you know, and punishes his Scotch no end, but a topping fellow underneath. I don't know who the bit of fluff is that they're fighting about, but you can wager a quid to a bob that Dick thought he was doing her a good turn.'

'I wonder who the nobleman is.'

'Can't say, I'm sure. Probably he can't either just now, seeing what Durwent did to him. Of course, it's a rotten thing to say, but if the blighter's really going to die, I hope he's one of the seventeen who stand between me and the Earldom of Forth.'

There was a knock at the door, and an inquiry regarding the newly discovered author.

'Coming,' called Maynard, reaching for the Daily Mail. 'Shove those clippings in your pocket, Selwyn, and for the love of Allah help me to select something here that I can pretend to have written. Fortunately I can play the blithering idiot without much trouble.'