"Oh, Tatcho! Oh, Tatcho!
Rejoice, ye bald and weary men!
You'll soon be regular hairy men!
Sing! Rejoice! Let your voices go!
Sprinkle some on your cranium!
What, ho! Tatcho!"
The poetry was vulgar; but long ago his insight into the heart of man had taught Tinker to attack the vulgar with the only weapon effective against them, vulgarity.
Sooner or later, whether he was walking, or sitting with Claire, those vulgar strains would be wafted to Mr. Arthur Courtnay's ears, and they injured his cause. They kept alive in the girl's mind an uneasy doubt whether her father was right in asserting Arthur Courtnay to be one of the nicest fellows he had ever met, a veritable gentleman of the old school, an opinion founded on the fact that Courtnay was the only man who had ever given two hours' close attention to his views on Protection.
But, for all this lurking doubt, Courtnay's influence over her was growing stronger and stronger. He was forever appealing to her pity by telling her of the hard and lonely life he had lived since his father, a poor gentleman of good family, had died in exile at Boulogne. Really, his father, a stout but impecunious horse-dealer of the name of Budgett, certainly in exile at Boulogne owing to a standing difference with the bankruptcy laws of his country, was alive still. But Arthur was very fond of himself, and once in the mood of self-pity, he could invent pathetic anecdote after pathetic anecdote of his privations which would have touched the heart of a hardened grandmother, much more of a susceptible girl. She fell into the way of calling him "King Arthur" to herself.
He devoted himself to winning her with an unrelaxing energy, for she had forty thousand pounds of her own.
But he cared very little for her, and sometimes he found his love-making hard work. She was not the type of girl whom he admired; her delicacy irritated him; he preferred what the poet has called "an armful of girl," buxom and hearty. Often, therefore, when she had gone to bed, he would refresh himself by a vigorous flirtation with Madame Séraphine de Belle-Île, a brisk and vivacious young widow, who affected always gowns of a peculiarly vivid and searching scarlet. And this self-indulgence proved in the end the ruin of his fine scheme of establishing himself in life on a sound monetary basis.
Tinker was about to get into bed one evening, and found himself slow about it. His conscience was worrying him about some duty left undone, and he could not remember what the duty was. Of a sudden his terrible omission flashed into his mind: in his patient application to the task of shadowing and annoying Mr. Arthur Courtnay he had forgotten his daily bolt into the gambling rooms. Reluctant, but firm, he slipped on his pumps and went downstairs. Four minutes later the feverish gamblers in the Salles de Jeu were gratified by the sight of a seraph-like child in blue silk pyjamas who flew gaily round the tables pursued by two stout and joyfully excited Southern Europeans in livery. The pursuit was lively, but short, for Tinker ran into the arms of a wily croupier who had slipped from his seat, and unexpectedly joined the chase. He was handed over to his pursuers and conducted from the rooms, amidst the plaudits of the gamblers. He bade good-night to his liveried friends on the threshold of the Casino, congratulating them on their increasing efficiency in "Le Sport," and warm, but happy with the sense of one more duty done, he strolled into the gardens to cool.
