“He wants you,” said Mitchell, pushing Mendel forward.
“Come here, boy,” growled Calthrop, stabbing with his pipe-stem in the direction of the seat by his side. “Come here and bring your friends. Bought a drawing of yours this morning. Damn good.”
Mitchell, Kessler, and Weldon came and sat at the table, all too overawed to speak.
“What’s your drink, heh?”
Drinks were ordered.
“Rotten trade, art,” said Calthrop. “Dangerous trade. Drink, women, flattery. Don’t drink. Marry, settle down, and your wife’ll hate you because you’re always about the place. . . . God! I wish I could be a Catholic. I’d be a monk. . . . My boy, don’t get into the habit of doing drawings. They won’t look at your pictures if you do, and we want pictures—my God, we do! Everybody paints pictures as though they were for a competition. You’ve got life to draw from—real, stinking life. That’s why I have hopes of you.”
Mendel was so fluttered and flattered that he could only gulp down his drink and blink round the café, feeling that all eyes were upon him; and indeed he was attracting such attention as had never before been bestowed on him. A girl at the next table ogled him and smiled. She was with a young man whom the four detested and despised. This young man reached over to take a bowl of sugar from their table. To take anything from the great man’s table without so much as “By your leave” was sacrilege and was very properly resented. There was a scuffle, the sugar was scattered on the floor, glasses fell crashing down, Mitchell and Weldon hurled themselves on the young man, and the manager came bustling up, crying: “If-a-you-pleess-a-gentlemen.” But there was no breaking the mêlée. A waiter was sent out for the police, and three constables came filing in. One of them seized Mitchell, and Mendel, half mad with drink and excitement, seeing his beloved friend, as he thought, being taken off to prison, leaped on the policeman’s back and brought him down. In the confusion Calthrop and the others slipped away and Mendel was arrested, still fighting like a wild cat, and led off to the police-station, the constable whispering kindly in his ear: “Steady, my boy, steady. A youngster like you should keep clear of the drink.”
The inspector smiled at the extreme youthfulness of the offender, but decided that a taste of the cells would do no harm and that the boy had better be sober before he was sent home. So Mendel had four hours on a hard bench until a constable came in and asked him if he wanted bail. He said “Yes,” and, when asked for a name, gave Calthrop’s, who presently arrived and saw him liberated, after being told to appear in court next morning at ten o’clock.
When he reached home he found his mother waiting up for him with wet cloths in case his head should be bad.
“What now? What now?” she asked.