CHAPTER III
THE BISHOP PROPOSES A TOAST
EDMUND had gone to Brighton to meet his partner and inspect the “desirable premises” for their proposed curiosity shop.
Captain Welfare was to return with him some time before dinner. I had the day before me and I awaited their coming with a great curiosity as to the personality of this stranger. I was uneasy too, for Edmund was so much committed to him, and seemed to leave his destiny so much in his hands. From all he had told me about him, Captain Welfare did not seem to me the most desirable kind of person to have such a responsibility. He was certainly an adventurer, and hitherto not even a very successful one. And he was admittedly a man of low origin.
However, it was clear that Edmund was born a bohemian and would always be one. There had always been some such in our family, and as I thought of what I knew of their careers I could not deny that they seemed on the whole to have been much more charming people and to have got much more really out of life, than the sober average of the rest of us.
I was certain that Welfare would prove to be vulgar and could only hope he had a sense of honour.
Although I had carefully refrained from any criticism, which I knew would only irritate Edmund, I did in fact rather dislike the idea of the shop, and though my ignorance of commercial matters was fairly complete, it seemed to me unnecessary and unbusinesslike to have brought the Astarte all the way from the Eastern Mediterranean for the purpose of establishing and stocking it. I could only suppose it was a case of combining business with pleasure.
I determined to put aside all these worrying preoccupations and return to some literary work that had been interrupted since Edmund’s return.
Again I was interrupted, and somewhat fluttered, by the receipt of a telegram.
This was from the bishop to say he was coming over about lunch time and would stay the night if convenient.
Whatever Captain Welfare proved to be I felt he would harmonise ill with the bishop, and my first impulse was to reply with some honourable fiction that would postpone the visit. But even as I cast about in my mind for the suitable subterfuge to commit to the pre-paid form, I bethought me of how seldom my dear bishop got a chance of taking refuge with me for one quiet bachelor evening, of the disappointment it would be to both of us to lose this one. Besides, I reflected, Parminter is a man of the world, much more so than I am, and he has a catholic taste in mankind. Captain Welfare will interest him, whatever he is, and he has always wanted to meet Edmund. Anyhow there would be time enough to explain everything to him.