IF WINTER
DON’T

A.B.C.D.E.F.

NOTSOMUCHINSON

BY

BARRY PAIN

NEW YORK

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY

PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1922, by
Frederick A. Stokes Company

All rights reserved

First Printing, September 9, 1922
Second Printing, October 19, 1922
Third Printing, November 22, 1922
Fourth Printing, December 5, 1922

Printed in the United States of America

These parodies do good to the book parodied; great good, sometimes; they are kindly meant, and the parodist has usually keenly enjoyed the book of which he sits down to make a fool.

R. L. STEVENSON.

Table of Contents

PREFATORY NOTE

I

“If Winter Comes” placed its author not only as a Best Seller, but as one of the Great Novelists of to-day. Not always are those royalties crowned by those laurels. Tarzan (of, if I remember rightly, the Apes) never won the double event. And I am told by superior people that, intellectually, Miss Ethel M. Dell takes the hindmost. Personally, I found “If Winter Comes” a most sympathetic and interesting book. I think there are only two points on which I should be disposed to quarrel with it. Firstly, though Nona is a real creation, Effie is an incredible piece of novelist’s machinery. Secondly, I detest the utilization of the Great War at the present day for the purposes of fiction. It is altogether too easy. It buys the emotional situation ready-made. It asks the reader’s memory to supplement the writer’s imagination. And this is not my sole objection to its use.

II

I wonder if I might, without being thought blasphemous, say a word or two about the Great Novelists of to-day. They have certain points of resemblance. I do not think that over-states it.

They have the same little ways. They divide their chapters into sections, and number the sections in plain figures. This is quite pontifical, and lends your story the majesty of an Act of Parliament. The first man who did it was a genius. And the other seven hundred and eighteen showed judgment. I propose to use it myself when I remember it.

Then there is the three-dot trick. At one time those dots indicated an omission. To-day, some of our best use them as an equivalent of the cinema fade-out. Those dots prolong the effect of a word or sentence; they lend it an afterglow. You see what I mean? Afterglow ...

One must mention, too, the staccato style—the style that makes the printer send the boy out for another hundred gross of full-stops. All the Great Novelists of to-day use it, more or less.

III

Let us see what can be done with it. Here, for instance, is a sentence which was taught me in the nursery, for its alleged tongue-twisting quality: “She stood at the door of Burgess’s fish-sauce shop, Strand, welcoming him in.” In that form it is not impressive, but now note what one of these staccato merchants might make of it.

“Across the roaring Strand red and green lights spelling on the gloom. ‘BURGESS’S FISH-SAU.’ A moment’s darkness and again ‘BURGESS’S FISH-SAU.’ Like that. Truncated. The final —CE not functioning. He had to look though it hurt him. Hurt horrible. Damnably. And his eyes traveled downward.

“Suddenly and beyond hope she! Isobel-at-the-last. Standing in the doorway. White on black. Slim. Willowy. Incomparable. Incommensurable. She saw him and her lips rounded to a call. He sensed it through the traffic. Come in. Calling and calling. Come in.

“Come in....

“Out of the rain.”

It is like a plaintive hymn sung to a banjo accompaniment.

Incidentally it illustrates another favorite trick of these gentlemen—the introduction of a commonplace or even jarring detail into a romantic scene in order to increase its appearance of reality. It is quite a good trick.

IV

And sometimes, not every day but sometimes, one gets a little weary even of the best tricks. Need the author depend quite so much on the printer for his effects? Scenes and passages in a book seem to be standing very near the edge, and the wanton thought occurs to one that a little shove would send them over. In fact, one gets irritable. And then anything bad may happen. This parody for instance.

IF WINTER DON’T

CHAPTER I

Luke Sharper. Age, thirty-four. Married, but not much. Private residence, Jawbones, Halfpenny Hole, Surrey. Favorite recreation, suffering. Favorite flower——

Oh, drop it! Let us rather listen to Mr. Alfred Jingle, solicitor, talking to his artist friend.

“Met Sharper yesterday. Remember him at the old school? Flap Sharper we called him. Not that they really did flap. His ears, I mean. They just crept up and bent over when he was thinking hard. People came to see it. Came from miles around.

“Rum chap. Rum ways. Never agreed with anybody present, including himself. Always inventing circumstantial evidence to convict himself of crimes he had never committed. Remember the window? Half-brick came flying through it. Old Borkins looked out. Below stood Flap Sharper with the other half-brick in his hand. Arm drawn back. No other boy in sight. The two halves fitted exactly. It certainly looked like it. Poor old Flap found that it felt like it, too. But he had never chucked that half-brick. Ogilvie did it. Remember him? The one we called Pink-eye. Have a drink?

“I offered Sharper my sympathy. Wouldn’t have it. Said ‘Why?’ Maintained that we had all got to suffer in this life, and it was better to begin early. Excellent practice. Then his ears crept up and bent over. Got it again later in the day for drawing a caricature of old Borkins. Never did it, of course. Couldn’t draw. Can’t remember who did it. Oh, you did, did you? Like you. Have another?

“Yes, we have a certain amount of business in Dilborough. I’m generally down there once or twice a year. I walk over to Halfpenny Hole and lunch with Sharper. It’s a seven mile walk. But lunch at the hotel is seven-and-six. Doing uncommonly well, is Sharper. He’s in Pentlove, Postlethwaite and Sharper. You know. The only jams that really matter. Pickles, too. Chutney. Very hot stuff. Oh, yes, Sharper’s all right.

“You ought to run down and see Halfpenny Hole. What is it the agents say? Old-world. It’s very old-world. Only three houses in it, and all different. Whether the garden settlement will spoil it or not is another matter. You go and paint it before it gets spoilt.

“Strictly between ourselves, I am not quite sure that Sharper and his wife hit it off. Oh, nothing much. It’s just that when he speaks to her she never answers, and when she speaks to him he never answers. In fact, if she speaks at all he groans and moves his ears. Charming woman, very. Quite pretty. There may be nothing in it. I saw no actual violence. Sharper may merely have been suffering. He wouldn’t be happy if he wasn’t. Have a drink. No?”

CHAPTER II

Halfpenny Hole lay in the bottom of a slope seven miles from Dilborough. Dilborough was almost the same distance from Halfpenny Hole. Jawbones was, I think we must say, an old-world house, and had the date 1623 carved over the doorway. Luke Sharper had carved it himself. A little further down the road there was—there’s no other word for it—an old-world bridge with—I’m afraid we must have it once more—an old-world stream running underneath it. It gave one the impression that it had always been like that. Always the stream under the bridge. Never the bridge under the stream. But now that the Garden Settlement had come things might be very different. Houses were going up; Mr. Doom Dagshaw’s Mammoth Circus was going up; even the rates were going up.

At the end of his honeymoon Luke Sharper went to see a man about a dog, and left his wife to prepare Jawbones for his accommodation. She was a good housekeeper, and Luke acknowledged it. Whenever he thought about her at all, he always added “but she is a good housekeeper.” He was desperately fair.

“This,” said Mabel, opening a door, as Luke began his visit of inspection, “this is your den.”

Luke’s ears moved. He kissed her twice. “But, you know, I cannot bear it. There are some words which I am unable to endure, such as salt-cellar, tuberculosis, tennis-net and den.”

“Very well,” said Mabel, a little coldly, “we’ll call it your cage. And just look. There is a pair of my father’s old slippers that I have brought for you. Size thirteen. You’ve got none quite like that, have you?”

He put one arm round her waist.

“Where did you say the dustbin was?” he asked.

“But,” she said amazed, “you don’t mean to say——Surely you wear slippers?”

“I never was,” he replied firmly. Nor did he.

“And now,” said Mabel, “come into the kitchen and see the two maids that I have engaged. Two nice respectable sisters named Morse—Ellen Morse and——”

“There isn’t an ‘l’ in Morse,” he said gloomily.

“And Kate Morse,” Mabel continued.

She opened the door into the spotless kitchen, and the two maids sprang instantly to attention. One of them was cleaning silver, the other was still lingering over tea. The first was very long, and the second very short.

Luke slapped his leg enthusiastically. “Oh, by Jove,” he said, “this is ripping. Morse. Don’t you see? Dot and Dash. Dot and Dash.”

He howled with laughter. Dash dropped the tea-pot. Dot had hysterics.

“I think,” said Mabel, without a smile, “we had better go into the garden.”

Everything in the garden was lovely.

“Luke,” said Mabel, “I did not quite like what you said in the kitchen just now. It was just a teeny-weeny——”

“Funny, wasn’t it?” said Luke. “You must admit it was funny. Seemed to come to me all of a flash. I’ll bet that nothing more amusing has been said in this house since the day it was built. Dot and Dash! Dot and Dash! Oh, help!”

He rolled about the path in uncontrollable laughter.

Mabel looked sadder and sadder. He said that made it all the funnier, and laughed more.

After dinner he wrote the joke out carefully. It seemed a pity that Punch should not have it. Mabel yawned, and said she would go up to bed.

“Tired?” asked Luke.

“A little. There’s something about you, Luke, that makes one feel tired. By the way, did you ever know Mr. Mark Sabre?”

“God forbid—I mean, no.”

“Well, he called one of his maids High Jinks and the other Low, but it turned out later in the story that the one that was first Low became High, while High became Low. I thought I’d just mention it to you as a warning.”

“Right-o. I’ll be very careful. I may as well come up to bed myself. The editor of Punch will be a happy man to-morrow morning.”

At intervals that night Mabel was awakened by screams of laughter. Once she enquired what the cause was.

“Dot and Dash,” he replied, chuckling. “Too good for words! Oh, can’t you see it?”

“Good-night again,” said Mabel.

On the following night, when he returned from business, Mabel met him in the hall.

“Darling,” she said, “we’ve had trouble with the sink in the scullery.”

“What did you do about it?”

“I sent for the plumber. He seemed such a nice, intelligent man.”

“Have you kept him to dine with us?”

“No. Why on earth should I? He had a glass of beer in the kitchen.”

“People dine with me sometimes,” said Luke, “who are neither nice nor intelligent. Oh, can’t you see, Mabel, that we are all equal in the sight of Heaven?”

“Yes,” said Mabel, “but you’re not in sight of Heaven—not by a long way. I don’t suppose you ever will be. Besides, if he had stayed, the dinner could not have gone on.”

Luke’s ears twitched convulsively. “I can’t see that,” he said. “It is unthinkable. How can you say that?”

“Well,” said Mabel, “one of the vegetables we are to eat to-night happens to be leeks. And, of course, he, being a plumber, would have stopped them.”

Luke did not swear. He simply went up to his bedroom in silence. There he began ticking certain subjects off on his finger. Number One, Den. Number Two, Slippers. Number Three, Dot and Dash. Number Four, Plumber. She would never see. She would never understand. And he was married to it. He put up both hands and pushed his ears back into position.

(I had fully intended to divide this chapter into sections and to number them in plain figures. Careless of me. Thoughtless. Have a shot at it in the next chapter? I think so. Yes, almost ...)

CHAPTER III

1

Pentlove, Postlethwaite and Sharper occupied a large factory, with offices and showroom attached, in Dilborough. They had no address. The name of the firm alone was quite sufficient to find them. Some people added the word Dilborough; some simply put Surrey; some merely England. They were known to everybody. Their motto—“Perfect Purity”—was in every daily paper every day. And during those weeks when the pickle manufacturing was going on, every little hamlet within a radius of twenty miles was aware of the fact if the wind set in that direction.

There was no Pentlove in the firm, and no Postlethwaite, and hardly any Sharper. An ex-schoolmaster, Diggle by name, had secured the entire control of the business. He had no partners, though Sharper had a small interest in the firm. He had achieved this position by unscrupulousness and low cunning. For of real ability he had not a trace. In fact, the staff mostly called him Cain, because he was not able. Another point of resemblance was that he was not much of a hand at a sacrifice. He looked after the financial side of the business, and did a good deal of general interference in every branch of it.

The manufacturing side was under the control of Arthur Dobson, a red-faced man who had been with the firm for twenty years. He very wisely maintained its tradition of the very highest quality coupled with the very highest prices. “Perfect Purity.” It was an admitted fact that Pentlove, Postlethwaite and Sharper actually used limes in the manufacture of lime juice. Another startling innovation was the use of calves’ feet in the preparation of calf’s-foot jelly. This was the more extravagant because, of course, only the front feet of the calf may be used for this purpose. Three back feet make one back-yard. Naturally the price was ruinous. But it all added to the reputation of the firm. And the best hotels thought it worth while to advertise that the pickles and preserves they provided were by Messrs. Pentlove, Postlethwaite and Sharper. It may be as well to add that Arthur Dobson was a knave. When he was talking to Cain he always slated Sharper. When he was talking to Sharper he always slated Cain. His specialty was the continuous discovery of some cheaper place in which to lunch. He would ask Luke Sharper to join him in these perilous adventures, but Luke, in his sunny way, always refused.

“Standoffish,” said Dobson. “Damn standoffish.”

Luke Sharper represented the literary side of the business. He wrote all the advertisements. It was a rule of the firm that the advertisements should be scholarly, and that none should appear which did not contain at least one quotation from a classical language. Luke had also initiated the production of various booklets dealing with the materials and the methods of business. Nominally they were published; practically they were given away to any considerable purchaser. Some of these were written by Sharper himself. There was, for example, “The Romance of the Raspberry,” of which the Dilborough Gazette had said: “An elegant little brochure.” This was a great triumph. Even Diggle had to admit it. He had gone so far as to say that one of these fine days he would really have to think about making Sharper a partner. Other of the booklets were written in collaboration. For instance, in the composition of “Thoughts on Purity,” Sharper had the assistance of the Reverend Noel Atall.

Luke kept a set of these booklets, bound in lilac morocco, in his room at the office. He loved them. He was proud of them. He regarded them as his children, and would sit for hours patting them gently. As the issue of each booklet was limited to one hundred copies, and it was customary to present one of them with each order of £20 or upwards, some of them were out of print, and difficult to obtain. This had been enough to start the collectors. In book catalogues there would sometimes appear a complete set of the Pentlove, Postlethwaite and Sharper booklets. And the price asked was gratifying. Luke fainted with joy the first time he saw this in the catalogue.

At one time he had been in the habit of taking the booklet home in order to read it aloud to Mabel. He never did it now. It was hopeless. No insight. No sympathy. No appreciation. No anything. Blind and deaf to beauty. But she really was a good housekeeper.

2

Luke bicycled from home to business every morning, and from business to home every evening. He enjoyed this immensely. Every morning as he rode off he said to himself: “Further from Mabel. Further and further from Mabel. Every day, in every way, I’m getting further and further.” On his return journey in the evening he experienced the same relief in getting further from old Cain, and further from the office.

At the middle point of his journey it always seemed to him that he did not belong to the office any more, and that he did not belong to Mabel either. He was all his own, in a world by himself. He would go on in a snow-white ecstasy. Then he would get up, dust his clothes, and re-mount.

He had some habits, which, to the stupid and censorious, might almost seem childish. He cut for himself with his little hatchet a number of pegs, and always carried some of them in his pocket. At every point on the road where he fell off, he drove in a peg. It seemed to him a splendid idea. In a wave of enthusiasm he told Mabel all about it.

“Isn’t it absolutely splendid?” he asked.

“Dotty,” said Mabel, briefly.

He went out into the woodshed and cut more pegs.

One Monday morning as he started on his ride he saw before him at intervals all down the road little white specks. Yes, every one of those pegs had been painted white by somebody.

Who could have done it? He decided at once that it must be Mabel. She had repented of her harshness. She had made up her mind to try to enter more into his secret soul. This was her silent way of showing it. He determined that if this were so he would start kissing her again that evening. It overcame him completely. He drove in one more peg, and re-mounted.

“Mabel,” he said that night at dinner, “It’s good and sweet of you to have painted all those pegs white. It must have taken you a long time.”

“Never touched your rotten old pegs,” said Mabel. “Pass the salt.”

His ears twitched.

3

Later that evening he sat alone in his bedroom. He also used this room as a study. He had been driven to this somewhat frowsty practice by the fact that he could not possibly sit in any room that had ever been called a den.

A tap at the door. Ellen Morse entered to turn the bed down. A bright idea flashed across Luke’s mind. His ears positively jumped.

He believed in liberty, equality and familiarity, especially familiarity. So did Ellen Morse.

“Dot,” he said, “was it you who painted my fall-pegs white?”

“Well, old bean,” said Dot, “it was like this. I’ll tell you.” She seated herself on the bed. “You see, this house has only got four reception-rooms and eight bedrooms, and all the washing’s done at home, and all the dressmaking, and there’s a good deal of entertaining, mostly when you’re not there, and everything has to be right up to the mark. Well, as there were the whole two of us to do it, your old woman thought time would be hanging heavy on our hands, so now we do the garden as well. The other day Mr. Doom Dagshaw was lunching here, and they were going to play tennis afterwards. Your bit of skirt has some proper games with that Dagshaw. I watch them out of the pantry window in my leisure moments. Well, anyhow, I’d to mark out the tennis court, and I mixed up a bit more of the stuff than was needed, and I thought I might as well use it up on your pegs. You see, I get a half-Sunday off every three months, and it was only a fourteen-mile walk there and back. And I’m sure I didn’t know what else to do with my holiday.”

“Dot,” said Luke, “you seem to be able to enter into things. You get the hang of my ideas. Some do, some don’t. If you can sneak off for half-an-hour to-morrow evening we’ll go and play at boats together.”

“Boats?”

“Yes. You know the bridge. We get two pieces of wood, throw them in the stream on one side, then run across and watch them come out on the other. And the one that comes out first, wins. Won’t that be glorious?”

“Well, you are one to think of things,” said Dot.

(And now we’ll have a little novelty. The Great Novelists of to-day number their sections. We’ll have a number without any section. This has never been done be——

4

CHAPTER IV

It can be hardly necessary to say that Mabel caught Luke and Dot playing boats on the following evening. Luke was always discovered. He was even detected when he had done nothing.

As he dressed for dinner that night, he reflected that once more Mabel had disappointed him. He had expected her to get into a fury of jealousy, and to suspect him of the most criminal intentions with regard to Dot. This would have been real suffering for him, and he would have enjoyed it. But all she had said to him was that she wished he would behave a little more like a man and a little less like a baby, and an imbecile baby at that. All she had said to Dot was that she thought she could find her some other occupation. It was difficult for him to keep his temper. But he exercised self-control. In fact, he never spoke another word for the rest of the evening. It was a pity. He was such a pleasant man. Why could not Mabel see it?

Things were no better at breakfast next morning.

Mabel said, “Just fancy, Mrs. Smith in a sable stole at church last Sunday, and I know for a fact that he only gets three-ten. If it was real sable it was wicked, and if it was not she was acting a lie.”

Luke smote the table once with his clenched fist, spilt his tea, and resumed his newspaper.

“Further from Mabel,” he thought, as he mounted his bike. “Every day, in every way, I’m getting further and further.”

About two miles from Dilborough he became suddenly aware that two motor-cars were approaching him. They were being driven abreast at racing speed, and occupied the whole of the road. For one moment Luke thought of remaining where he was, and causing Mabel to be a widow. Then, murmuring to himself, “Safety first,” he ran up the grassy slope at the side of the road and fell off. Both the cars pulled up. A man’s voice sang out cheerily: “Hallo, Sharper. Hallo, hallo. Who gave you leave to dismount?”

Luke recognized the voice. One of the cars was driven by Lord Tyburn, and the other by his wife, Jona.

Luke hurriedly drove in a peg to mark the spot, and came down into the road again.

“How’s yourself?” said Lord Tyburn. “We’ve been away for two years. Timbuctoo, Margate. All over the place. Only got back to Gallows last night.”

Luke shook hands with him and with Jona.

“You’ve not changed much,” said Jona. “Same funny old face.”

“It is the only one that I happen to have, Lady Tyburn.”

“Oh, drop it. Call me Jona. You always used to, Lukie, you know. And Bill don’t mind; do you, Bill?”

“That? Lord, no. But what you have been and done, Sharper, is to spoil a very pretty and sporting event. Jona and I were racing to Halfpenny Hole, and I’d got her absolutely beaten.”

“Liar,” said Jona, “I was leading—leading by inches.”

“Ah, but I’d lots in reserve.”

“Strong, silent man, ain’t you?” said Jona.

They both laughed.

“Yes,” said Luke, “I’m afraid I was rather in the way. I seem to be almost always in the way. It happens at home. It happens at the office. I say, I wonder what you two would have done if you’d met a cart?”

“Jumped it,” said Jona, and laughed again.

“Sorry,” said Lord Tyburn, “but I must rush off. I’ve just spotted my agent, five fields away. So long, Sharper. Come up and inspect us soon.”

He drove the car up the grassy slope, smashed a way through the hedge—after all, it was his own hedge—and vanished.

“He drives wonderfully,” said Luke.

“He’s that kind,” said Jona. “He does everything well. He does himself well. Are you glad to see me again, Lukie?”

The tips of his ears crept slowly forward. “I shall have to think for a long time to know that I really am to see you again.”

“’Fraid I can’t wait a long time,” said Jona. “See you again soon.”

She waved her hand to him and drove off.

Luke rode on as if in a dream. Suddenly he became aware that he had passed the door of his office. He thought of turning round in the street and riding back, but he had turned round in the street once before, and a great number of people had been hurt. He dismounted and walked back.

As his custom was, he knocked at the door of Mr. Diggle’s room and entered. Mr. Diggle, who still retained much of his schoolmaster manner, sat at his desk with his back to Sharper. He did not look round.

“That you, Sharper?” he said.

“Yes, sir. Good morning,” said Sharper.

Diggle went on writing for a minute in silence, and then said drearily: “Well, what is it?”

“Please can I have that partnership now?” asked Sharper.

“Not to-day. Don’t fidget with your hands. Keep your ears quiet, if possible. Close the door gently as you go out.”

Luke went gloomily back to his own room. He had not done himself justice. He never did do himself justice with Diggle. Diggle made him feel as if he were fifteen.

But thoughts of Diggle did not long occupy his mind. Once more he seemed to be standing in the road, with the warm fragrance of petrol and lubricating oil playing on his face. Once more he saw her.

Jona.

Some would have hesitated to call her beautiful. To Luke she was all the beauty in the world. Concentrated. At one time Jona had had the chance of marrying him, but apparently she did not know a good thing when she saw it. Tyburn had the title and the property, and was better-looking and more amusing, and had stationary ears. But had he the character of a child martyr? He had not. Now Luke was great at martyrdom; also at childishness.

For nearly an hour Luke sat with his manuscript before him. He was writing another elegant little brochure. This one dealt with the jam-pots of Ancient Assyria. During that hour he did not write one single word, but thought continuously of Jona.

He pulled himself up abruptly. Why, he was married to Mabel. Of course, he was. It was just as if he could not trust his memory for anything these days. He had been rather rude to Mabel at breakfast. Well, not rude exactly, but not friendly. Mrs. Smith had a sable stole. He ought to have said something about it. He must try at once to think of something that would be said about a sable stole.

He must make it up to Mabel in some way. What could he give her? He could give her more of his society. He would stop work, go back to her at once, and be just as nice as nice could be.

He put on his hat, and met Diggle in the passage.

“Where are you going?” said Diggle.

“I was going home, sir,” said Luke, “I’m not very well this morning.”

(For a Christian martyr he certainly did lie like sin.)

“Don’t let it occur again,” said Diggle.

He encountered Mabel in the hall of his house. She had a letter in her hand. She seemed surprised to see him, and very far from pleased.

“What in goodness are you here for?” she said. “Forgotten something?”

He set his teeth. In spite of discouragement, he was going to be very nice indeed.

“I am afraid,” he said, “I rather forgot my manners at breakfast this morning. Sorry.”

“I didn’t notice they were any worse than usual. You surely didn’t come back to say that?”

“Oh, no. I thought we’d take a holiday together. Like old times, what? We’ll go for a nice long walk, and take a packet of sandwiches and——”

“Oh, don’t be silly. I can’t possibly go out. Probably Mr. Doom Dagshaw is coming to lunch.”

“He’s a damned sweep,” said Luke impulsively, and corrected himself. “I mean to say, he’s not a man whose society I’m particularly anxious to cultivate.”

“How was I to know you would come barging in like this? I never wanted you to meet him.”

More self-control needed.

“I shall be perfectly pleasant and chatty to him,” said Luke resolutely.

“This letter’s just come for you,” said Mabel. “The address is in Lady Tyburn’s handwriting.”

He blushed profusely. His ears waved to and fro. Why on earth had not Jona warned him that this was going to happen?

“Read it,” said Mabel.

He glanced through it. It was very brief.

“Well?” asked Mabel.

“It’s nothing. Nothing at all.”

“I should like to see it, if you don’t mind.”

She took the letter and read aloud: “Lukie, dear. Just back from two years’ travel. You two might blow in to lunch one day. Any old day. Chops and tomato sauce. Yours, Jona.”

“Most extraordinary,” said Mabel. “Why does she call you Lukie?”

“Well, damn it all,” said Luke, “she couldn’t call me lucky. Oh, what does it matter? We were boy and girl together. Innocent friends of long standing.”

“And what does this mean? Chops and tomato sauce? Chops! Gracious Heavens! And tomato sauce.”

“It’s just a joke. Silly, no doubt.”

“It might be an allusion to your complexion at the present moment. It might be a mere substitute for some endearing word or promise, agreeably to a preconcerted system of correspondence.”

He had an uneasy feeling that he had heard or read all this before somewhere.

“Merely a joke,” he pleaded. “And what does it matter?”

“She’s a cat, anyhow. She’d better keep off the grass, and I’ll tell her so. What did she say when she saw you this morning?”

“Hardly anything. Her husband was with her. I say, how on earth did you know?”

“Her husband was not with her when I met her. But do you know what this sudden return of yours means? This unusual desire to apologize for your manners, and to take me out for the day? Guilty conscience. I’m going into the garden to cut flowers for the luncheon table.”

“Let me come with you and hold the scissors?”

“If you hold the scissors, how the dickens am I going to cut the flowers? You’re really too trying.”

No, it was not going well. More self-control would be needed. A happy idea struck him.

“Didn’t you say that Mrs. Smith had a stable sole—I mean, a sable stole, in church or somewhere?”

“And you don’t try that on either.”

“I don’t suppose I should look well in it,” he said brightly.

He followed her into the garden. The flowers were cut, and subsequently arranged, in complete silence. He had the feeling that anything he said might not be taken down, but would certainly be used in evidence against him.

And then, in the hall, was heard the voice of Mr. Doom Dagshaw, the proprietor of the Mammoth Circus at the Garden Settlement.

“Lunch ready? So it ought to be. Don’t announce me. Waste of time. I know my way about in this house.”

He entered. He was a young man of sulky, somewhat dictatorial expression. His dress had something of the clerical appearance, an effect at which he distinctly aimed.

“Hallo,” he said, and sat down on the table and yawned. Then he caught sight of Luke.

“You here?” he said. “What for?”

“Just a little holiday,” said Luke nervously, “a little treat for me. You don’t mind?”

Doom Dagshaw did not answer him, but turned to Mabel.

“Lunch is ready,” he said, “let’s get on to it.”

They passed into the dining-room. Luke observing salmon at one end of the table, and cutlets at the other, asked, with a smile, if those two sentences generally ran concurrently.

“Oh, hold your jaw,” said Dagshaw.

“That’s the way to talk to him,” said Mabel approvingly.

“Yours, too,” Dagshaw added, turning to Mabel. “I’ll do any talking that has to be done. I’m here to talk about my circus. Yes, and to eat ham. Isn’t any? Ought to be. Give me three of those cutlets. You don’t realize what a circus is, you people. It’s a church. It’s a cathedral. It’s more.”

“I hope,” said Luke, “that it’s getting on nicely, and will be a great success.”

“Bound to be. Can’t help it. When I bought the land from the Garden Settlement Syndicate I made it a condition that there should be a clause in every lease granted that a year’s season ticket should be taken for the Mammoth Circus.”

“I don’t quite see,” said Mabel, “how it’s like a church.”

“The circus has a ring. The ring is a circle. The circle is the symbol of eternity. Will anybody be able to see my highly-trained chimpanzee in the trapeze act without realizing as he has never realized before, the meaning of the word uplift? Think of the stars in their program. And by what strenuous discipline and self-denial they have reached their high position.”

“‘Per ardua ad astra,’” quoted Luke.

“Hold your jaw. Three more cutlets. Think of the clowns. They tumble over, they fall from horses, they fail to jump through the rings. They are lashed by the whip of the ring-master. What a lesson in reverence is here. People who jeer, people who make fun, people who parody great works of fiction always and invariably come to a bad end. It will be not only a mammoth circus but a moral circus. It will be the greatest ethical institution in this part of the world. Its work will be more subtle than that of any other. Its appeal will be to the unconscious rather than to the conscious mind. Freud never thought of that. I did it myself. I am a genius. Potatoes.”

After lunch it was suggested that Mr. Doom Dagshaw should take Mabel up to the Garden Settlement to see the progress that was being made in the building of the Mammoth Circus.

“You won’t care to come?” said Mabel to her husband. And it seemed less like a question than a command.

“No, not in my line,” said Luke, still doing his best. “Hope you’ll enjoy yourselves.”

When they had gone, Luke retired to his study-bedroom. There was a tap at the door. It was Dot who entered.

“She’s out,” said Dot. “Boats?”

“Right-o. Gorgeous,” said Luke.

Normally dinner was at half-past seven. But Mabel did not get back till a quarter to eight. It was eight o’clock before they began. Mabel offered no explanation beyond saying that there really had been a great deal of architectural detail to examine. Luke had prepared a series of six pleasant and gratifying things to say about Mr. Doom Dagshaw and the Mammoth Circus. He found himself absolutely unable to say any of them. He could say other things. He could say “Windmill, watermill” ten times over, very quickly, without a mistake. But somehow he could not say Mammoth Circus.

Well, at any rate, he might be bright and amusing. At this time it was customary—perhaps too customary—to ask if you had read a certain book by a certain author, the name of the author being artfully arranged so as to throw some light on the title of the book. Luke remembered three of these which had been told him at the office. Unfortunately they were all of them far too improper for general use.

So he just said any bright thing that came into his mind. Mabel looked very tired. She admitted she was tired. She said she had walked about a thousand miles.

“And then I come back to this kind of thing,” she said.

The rest of the dinner, which was brief, passed in complete silence. Then Mabel went into the drawing-room, and Luke remained behind and lit a cigarette.

“This will never do,” he said to himself. “I must keep it up. I must be pleasant. I must say number one of those six sentences about Doom Dagshaw and the Mammoth Circus, even it if splits my palate and my tongue drops out.”

He threw down his cigarette, walked firmly into the drawing-room, and closed the door. “Mabel,” he said, “I hope you enjoyed your visit to the Doom Circus with Mr. Mammoth Dagshaw.”

Mabel looked up coldly from the book she was reading.

“Back again already?” she said. “Well, what was it you were saying?”

“I was saying,” said Luke gaily, “that I hoped you enjoyed your visit to the Dammoth Circus with Mr. Dag Moomshaw.”

“Port never did agree with you,” said Mabel. “You shouldn’t take it.” She resumed her book.

Luke tried the second of the pleasant sentences.

“Dagshaw always seems to me to be one of those masterful men who sooner or later——”

He ducked his head just in time, and the book which Mabel had thrown knocked over the vase of flowers behind him.

“If you can’t let me read in peace,” she said, “at any rate, you shan’t sneer at my friends. You’re always doing it, and everybody notices it. I simply can’t understand you. You’re like nothing on earth. What have you done with that love-letter of yours?”

“Oh, come,” he said, “I’ve had no love letter.”

“You silly liar; I mean the letter from your Lady Tyburn. Have you been kissing it?”

“Really, Mabel, this is absurd. I might as well ask you if you have been kissing the Mammoth Circus.”

“I’m going to bed,” said Mabel abruptly. “I’m absolutely fed up with you. I’m sick to death of you. I hate you. And I despise you.”

She went out and slammed the door violently. Four more vases went over, and three pictures fell.

Luke went over to the open window and looked out into the cool night. At the house opposite a girl was singing very beautifully “The End of a Perfect Day.”

CHAPTER V

As he sat in his office on the following Thursday morning, the whistle of the speaking-tube sounded shrilly and interrupted him in the act of composition. He went angrily to the tube.

“What do you want to interrupt me for,” he called, “when you know I’m busy? What the devil do you want, anyway?”

“I want you, Lukie,” said a gentle voice in reply.

“Come up at once,” he said. “Awfully sorry. Frightfully glad you’ve come. If there’s a chance of making a mistake within a hundred miles of me, I seldom miss it.”

Lady Tyburn came radiantly into the room, drawing off her gloves.

“Nasty shock for you, isn’t it?” she said. She held out both hands to him. “Will you ... will you help yourself?”

“Thanks,” he said, as he clasped them warmly. “I will have some of each.”

After a minute or two she withdrew her hands and sat down.

“Has that dirty dog given you a partnership yet?” she asked.

“Diggle? Not yet. I ask him from time to time. He always seems too busy to talk about it at any length. It’s wonderful to see you here, Jona.”

“You got my letter?”

“I did. In fact, there was some considerable beano about it at home. But never mind about that.”

“You didn’t come to see me, so I was drawn here. Magnet and tin-tack.”

He looked at her little white nose. “I see the point,” he said.

“Say some more,” she said, “I like to hear you talk, Funnyface. Funny old ears. Funny old cocoanut with, oh, such a lot of milk in it. You do think a lot of thinky thoughts, don’t you. And you put them all down in those dear little books of yours.”

“Not all,” said Luke, “I’m limited in my subjects. Jam, you know. Pickles. Sardines. That hurts—to be limited. I want to be free. Here, I am imprisoned. I am buried alive. Plunged, still teething, in the brougham.”

“Still teething? I knew you were young at heart. Still, at the age of thirty-two——”

“I had intended to say that I was plunged, still breathing, in the tomb. I do get carried away so. Sometimes I form plans. I think I will leave this business and write my biography. It would be a record, not of the facts that are, but of the facts as I should like them to be.”

“Brilliant,” said Jona.

“I don’t know,” said Luke, wagging his ears, “I sometimes doubt whether I am sufficiently in touch with real life. I must consult somebody about it.”

“Consult me. No, not now. Show me the first of the little books that you ever wrote.”

He handed her the little lilac-bound copy of “The Romance of a Raspberry.” She put it reverently to her lips, patted it gently, and laid it down again.

“Do you talk it over with Mabel? Isn’t Mabel tremendously proud of it?”

“She is tremendously proud, but she has great self-restraint.” He recalled the end of the perfect day. “As a general rule,” he added, “when nothing happens to irritate her.”

“Does she love you very much?”

“I don’t remember her mentioning anything of the kind recently. But it’s you I want to talk about, Jona. Tell me about your life.”

“I don’t live. I’m marking time. You throw a brick into the stream——”

“No,” said Luke, “not a brick. I sometimes play boats.”