The duck was plump and tender, and when she had trifled with a wing, the prima donna, hoping that nobody would be horrified, asked for a cigarette. The ice and coffee and liqueurs finished, I called for the bill—hors-d'œuvre, 2s.; marmite, 1s. 6d.; tournedos, 4s.; pommes, 1s.; caneton, 8s. 6d.; salade, 1s.; ices, 2s.; coffee, 1s.; one bottle Deutz and Gelderman, 12s. 6d.; cigarettes, 1s.; liqueurs, 2s. 6d.; couverts, 1s.; total, £1: 18s.—and then suggested that we should go down on to the terrace. The prima donna leant over the balustrade, her cigarette making a point of light, and gazed in silence at the darkened landscape. The river, visible still amidst the darkness, had caught and held in its bosom the reflections of the summer stars and of a newborn moon. Presently she threw away the little roll of paper and tobacco, and began quoting in a low voice—a speaking voice as musical as singing—the lines of poor Mortimer Collins's swan song:—
Stern hours have the merciless fates
Plotted for all who die;
But looking down upon Richmond aits,
Where the merles sing low to their amorous mates,
Who cares to ask them why?
The conversion of the little American was complete.
9th August.
[CHAPTER XXVIII]
THE CAVOUR (LEICESTER SQUARE)
I first met Arthur Roberts in the buffet of the Cavour, and first heard there the tale of "The Old Iron Pot." On that occasion I was taken by a friend into the buffet, a long room with a bar decorated with many-coloured glasses, a broad divan running along the wall, and many small tables by it. Seated on the divan was a thin, clean-shaven little man, talking to a very tall man, also clean-shaven. So immersed in their conversation were the two that they hardly acknowledged me when I was introduced to them; "they" being Messrs. Arthur Roberts and "Long Jack" Jervis, both of them then playing in "Black-eyed Susan" at the Alhambra, almost next door. As far as I could make out, the entrancing story that Mr. Arthur Roberts was telling, had as its central figure an old iron pot. He was in deadly earnest in his recital. Mr. Jervis and my friend were thoroughly, almost painfully, interested, and accompanied the story with little exclamations of surprise and sympathy, but for the life of me I could not follow the narrative. All sorts and conditions of people suddenly were introduced into the tale by name, and as suddenly disappeared out of it. Arthur Roberts finished, and the other two broke into speeches of congratulation, saying how thoroughly interested and affected they had been. I, in a bewildered way, commenced to ask questions, when the mouth of the merry comedian began to twitch up on one side, and his eyelids to blink. Then I understood. I was another victim to the tale of "The Old Iron Pot."
It was in this buffet, which remains now as it was then, that Arthur Roberts invented the game of "spoof,"—but that is a very long story.