"How long will it take you to get to Wimbledon?" Challis asked the driver of the waiting cab.
"A tidy long time, the rate I'm going now!" was the reply. "Jump in!" Challis, feeling he was in the hands of a master-mind, obeyed without question, and the cab was off, at speed. Presently the master-mind said briefly, through his orifice above—as King Solomon may have spoken to the evil djinn he bottled—"Within the hour," and closed it on his fare for that period. The djinn was in for a lifer, and was immortal; so thought Challis to himself. That was too long, but short of that, something over an hour would not be unwelcome—just to think things over a little!
[CHAPTER XXIV]
HOW MARIANNE WENT TO TULSE HILL. OF BOB'S PHONOGRAPH, AND HOW HE POSTED A LETTER TO JUDITH. OF MARIANNE'S RETURN, AND MORE MISUNDERSTANDINGS. BUT IT WOULD BE ALL RIGHT IN THE MORNING
If King Solomon's captive had gone on scheming conciliatory attitudes through all eternity, he would probably have failed to hit upon the right one at the end of it, from mere want of presence of mind. Even the short "Within the hour" of Challis's cabman was a little too long for his fare to think things over in safety, without a risk of the things tripping one another up. He conceived a very good deportment to suit his return, based on sorrow for being so late, and then began to complicate it with considerations whether he should at once inquire more particulars about Marianne's alleged—and denied—indisposition of last night, or let it alone. Also, should he confess up at once where he had spent most of the morning, or let that alone! Perhaps that letter of Judith's that he would find on arriving would help matters. Yes, it would! He pictured himself to himself—as an actor in the concurrent drama of Life that he always made notes of by the way—saying, "Oh yes! That's nothing!—only about the play. I saw Miss Arkroyd for a few minutes this morning. You know, she was kept away last night by a sprained ankle, so I went to inquire. Hm-hm-hm!" He went the length of supplying the sound of reading a letter to himself, and threw the imaginary pieces he had torn it up into, to show how unimportant it was, into an image of a waste-paper basket. Then he turned round, that actor, and kissed his wife, who had recovered her temper. And then all went well in that play, and that actor told himself not to be a damned idiot about a fashionable beauty, who knew he was a married man with a family, and hadn't the slightest idea that—well?—that anything!
That was the play. The reality did not work out so comfortably. Challis was in time for lunch, as the cabman was as good as his word. "Fifty-six and a half," said he, looking at his watch; and added, in a comfortable sort of way, "Make it up eight shillings," as one who felt he really deserved the extra half-crown or so. He had a pleasant, engaging manner with the opposite sex, this cabman, saying to Harmood, when she brought him his money out: "Don't you get married without letting me know, my dear! My old woman, she might get sick of me any minute!" But Miss Harmood was accustomed to admiration.
Mrs. Challis had left word not to wait lunch, said the young lady, returning undisturbed. Also, there was a note to say with the letters—that is, to wit, with the postal accumulations. Challis, opening it, found a bald and severe statement that the writer was going to Tulse Hill, and might be late. Marianne's mother's domicile was always spoken of as Tulse Hill. Challis knew that this mother and daughter were seldom on cordial terms except when he was in disgrace with both, and it did not tend to allay the feeling of irritated mystification that came back now to Challis, with quickened memory of the events of the morning, that his wife should have pitched on this particular moment for a visit to Tulse Hill. She really seldom went to see her mother, for she was very lazy. But—and this was a big but—she always went to see her when there had been dissensions. So much so that when at any time Challis found that she had gone to Tulse Hill his tendency was to look back through the last twenty-four hours to discover what skirmish was responsible for the visit.
This time he was completely baffled. His wife knew perfectly well that she had been invited—cordially invited—to this last night's entertainment. Did all this mean that in the end he would have to give up associating with the outer world, and restrict himself to John Eldridge and Lewis Smithson? That seemed the only programme compatible with the enjoyment of a comfortable home. Only for God's sake let it be formulated! Let him know what he had to expect, and Challis would put his sign-manual to any reasonable treaty.... He stopped suddenly, yet asked himself—why stop? Then, knowing well that he dared not answer his own question, flinched off the subject.