CHAPTER XV
IT was Friday morning, the 5th of June, 1915, and the young and popular Prime Minister was busied in the Inaugural Ceremony of the Wardenship of the Court of Dowry.
Repton or no Repton, the place must be filled. Demaine was back and Demaine must be there on the front bench before there was an explosion.
The Inaugural Ceremony which introduces a Statesman to the Wardenship of the Court of Dowry, technically called “L’Acceptance,” in strict constitutional practice requires the presence of at least three persons, the outgoing Warden (technically the Dischargee), the incoming Warden (technically the Discoverer) and the Sovereign; but since GHERKIN had, in spite of his eccentric Radicalism, raised the office to its present position, the outgoing Warden could be represented by proxy, though such a substitution was rarely made since it eliminated the quaint custom of the “Braise”—one hundred pounds one hundred shillings one hundred pence, and a new brass farthing specially minted for the occasion, the whole in a silver-gilt case, and handed over to the outgoer, to be regarded with historic respect and some one of its coins to be kept as an heirloom.[5]
But Dolly, as he considered the situation on the Friday morning, Friday the 5th of June, 1915, could see no way out of it; he must simply tell Lady Repton briefly, and best by telephone, that she must not dream of her husband’s appearing at Court, even with a keeper, and that it would be necessary for the Repton household to forego the hundred sovereigns, the hundred shillings, the hundred pence and the new brass farthing specially minted for the occasion (the whole in a silver-gilt case), rather than have a scandal.
It was Friday, and he was glad to remember it, a Private Members’ Day. There were no questions. There was all Saturday and Sunday before him. He would arrange for the Inauguration the very next week. He was already advised that the officials had been permitted by the highest authority, in view of Demaine’s recent privations when he was blown out to sea in the little boat, treacherously abandoned by the foreign vessel and rescued by the willing hands, etc., to omit the final accolade with the ebony cudgel which had now for so many generations formed the last and most picturesque feature of the ritual.
He took up his telephone and asked the next room to put him on to the Reptons. He held the receiver while a servant told him that his message should be immediately communicated, and then in a few seconds, heard, to his great astonishment, not the tremulous tones of Maria, but the masterly voice of Sir Charles, as incisive and direct as of old, saying, “What is it?” in the tone of a man who must come at once to business and has many things to do.
“Oh!” cried Dolly into the machine, quite taken aback. “That’s you, Repton, is it?”