Gaveston was nothing if not thorough. Food that was not Kosher rarely passed those once fastidious lips of his, and unblenchingly he had gone to spend a night in one of Limehouse’s most notorious dope-dens.
“Terrible,” the hardened Head of the Hostel had cried, when Gaveston had told him of what he had seen. Not that he had tasted there the papaverous poison—that was a phase whose charms he had long since exhausted: no, on the contrary, he had preached to the degenerate denizens more salutary, more British habits of relaxation.
“Muchee lovee opiumee,” the Chinks had protested. But Gaveston was firm.
“Dumbee bellee muchee betteree,” he had insisted.
The ffoulises were all linguists.
He returned to Oxford convinced of the immediate importance of pressing his campaign. Munich and Haggerston had been equally encouraging. The fifth number of The Mongoose was already in the press. It contained a signed interview with a well-known Chinatown bruiser, and an unpublished photograph of The King. On the day before publication the bolt fell. Jade-eyed jealousy had dogged the footsteps of success. Two powers had clashed.
In an ukase of fine Latinity which Gaveston was the first to appreciate, the Vice-Chancellor ordered the suppression of The Mongoose and the rustication of its editor unless its policy were changed.
For a moment Gaveston thought of boldly publishing the dread decree and appealing to the immense force of public opinion. That would be the Areopagitical gesture, wouldn’t it? But should he not rather temper it with the practice of the old school and try diplomacy? With the trusted David he discussed the subject monologically on an afternoon’s tramp over Shotover.
Little was his position to be envied. He stood alone, alone against the most autocratic power left in modern Europe. One by one his collaborators had unobtrusively resigned. Only David remained as business-manager.