“Petsie Le Poyntz,” put in another voice, “of the West End Theater. Petsie of the lissom—ahem!—limbs, of the patent mechanical smile—mistress of the wink that convulses the gallery, and inventor of the kick that enraptures the stalls. Petsie, who has won her way into what Slump, of the Morning Gush, calls the ‘peculiar favor of the British playgoer,’ by her exquisite and spontaneous rendering of the ballad, ‘Buzzy, Buzzy, Busy Bee,’ sung nightly and at two matinées per week in The Charity Girl. Petsie, once the promised bride of a thriving young greengrocer, now——”
“Now, Viscountess Rustleton,” said Hambridge Ost. “Don’t forget that, dear fellow, pray. I can conceive, even while I condemn my cousin’s ill-considered action in taking to his—shall I say bosom? yesterday morning at the Registrar’s—a young lady of obvious gifts and obscure parentage without letting his family into the secret—that he found her a soothing change from Miss Twissing. No Greek, no athletics, no strenuousness of any kind. An appearance distinctly pleasing, even off the boards, a certain command of repartee of the ‘You’re another’ sort, an agreeable friskiness varied by an inclination to lounge languidly—and there you have Petsie, dear fellow. The weddin’ breakfast took place at the Grill Room of the Savoy Hotel, the extra-sized table, number three, at the east upper end against the glass partition havin’ been specially engaged by the management of the West End Theater. That, not bein’ an invited guest, I ascertained from the waiter who usually looks after me when I lunch there. The menu was distinctly a good ’un. Hors d’œuvres ... a bisque, follered by turban de turbot.... Birds with bread-cream sauce, chipped potatoes, tomatoes stuffed, and a corn salad. Chocolate omelette soufflée—ices in the shape of those corrugated musk melons with pink insides, figs, and nectarines. Of course, a claret figured—Château-Nitouche; but, bein’ a theatrical entertainment, the Boy washed the whole thing down. The name of the liqueur I did not get hold of.”
“Parfait Amour, perhaps?” said a feeble voice, with a faint chuckle.
“As I have said, I failed to ascertain,” returned Hambridge Ost, with a dry little cough. “But as Lord Pomphrey, justly indignant with his heir for throwing over Miss Twissing, with whose hand goes a colossal fortune, has practically reduced his income to a mere”—he elevated his eyebrows and blew a speck of cigar-ash from his coat-sleeve—“that—the stirrup-cup that sped my cousin and his bride upon their wedding journey was certainly not, shall I say, Aqua d’Oro?”
There was a faint chorus of applause. Hambridge, repressing all sign of triumph, smoothed his preternaturally sleek head and uncrossed his little legs preparatory to getting out of his chair. The circle of listeners melted away; the man who had said “By Jingo!” straightened his hat carefully, staring at the reflection of a distinctly good-looking face in the mantel-glass.
“If she had known—if that girl Celine Twissing had known—the game that bilious little rotter meant to play, he’d have had his liqueur before his soup, and it would have been punch—not Milk Punch or Turtle Punch, but the real thing, with trimmings.” He arranged a very neat mustache with care. “Sorry she got her lip split,” he murmured; “hope it’s healed all right.... Waiter, get me a dozen Sobranie cigarettes. It’s a pity, a confounded pity, that the only man who is really able to appreciate that grand girl Celine Twissing happens to be a younger son. But, anyhow, I can have a shot at her, and I will.”
A DYSPEPTIC’S TRAGEDY
“He is a constant visitor,” observed Lady Millebrook.
“And a constant friend,” said Mrs. Tollebranch. A delicate flush mantled on her otherwise ivory cheek, her great gray eyes, famed for their far-away, saintly expression, shone through a gleaming veil of tears. With the lithe, undulating movement so characteristic of her, she crossed the velvety carpets to the window, and, lifting a corner of her silken blind, peeped out over her window-boxes of jonquils as the hall-door closed, and a well-dressed man with a slight stoop and a worn, dyspeptic countenance went slowly down the doorsteps and got into his cab. As though some subtle magnetic thrill had conveyed to him the knowledge that fair eyes looked on his departure, he glanced up and bowed, for one moment becoming a younger man, as a temporary glow suffused his pallid features. Then the cab drove off, and Mrs. Tollebranch, slipping her hand within the arm of Lady Millebrook, drew her back to her cosy seat within the radius of the fire-glow, and rang for tea.
“I did not have it up while poor Cadminster was here,” she explained. “The sight of Sally Lunn is horrible to him, and he is positively forbidden tea.”