Part 24

“That woman has got some hold over him,” opined his sister-in-law, darkly; “either she is helping him to finance the show, and presumes on the fact, or else, which Heaven forbid, he’s got some queer infatuation for her. Men do take the most extraordinary fancies.”

Matters never came exactly to a crisis. Mrs. Pentherby, as a source of personal offence, spread herself over so wide an area that no one woman of the party felt impelled to rise up and declare that she absolutely refused to stay another week in the same house with her. What is everybody’s tragedy is nobody’s tragedy. There was ever a certain consolation in comparing notes as to specific acts of offence. Reggie’s sister-in-law had the added interest of trying to discover the secret bond which blunted his condemnation of Mrs. Pentherby’s long catalogue of misdeeds. There was little to go on from his manner towards her in public, but he remained obstinately unimpressed by anything that was said against her in private.

With the one exception of Mrs. Pentherby’s unpopularity, the house-party scheme was a success on its first trial, and there was no difficulty about reconstructing it on the same lines for another winter session. It so happened that most of the women of the party, and two or three of the men, would not be available on this occasion, but Reggie had laid his plans well ahead and booked plenty of “fresh blood” for the departure. It would be, if any thing, rather a larger party than before.

“I’m so sorry I can’t join this winter,” said Reggie’s sister-in-law, “but we must go to our cousins in Ireland; we’ve put them off so often. What a shame! You’ll have none of the same women this time.”

“Excepting Mrs. Pentherby,” said Reggie, demurely.

“Mrs. Pentherby! Surely, Reggie, you’re not going to be so idiotic as to have that woman again! She’ll set all the women’s backs up just as she did this time. What is this mysterious hold she’s go over you?”

“She’s invaluable,” said Reggie; “she’s my official quarreller.”

“Your—what did you say?” gasped his sister-in-law.

“I introduced her into the house-party for the express purpose of concentrating the feuds and quarrelling that would otherwise have broken out in all directions among the womenkind. I didn’t need the advice and warning of sundry friends to foresee that we shouldn’t get through six months of close companionship without a certain amount of pecking and sparring, so I thought the best thing was to localise and sterilise it in one process. Of course, I made it well worth the lady’s while, and as she didn’t know any of you from Adam, and you don’t even know her real name, she didn’t mind getting herself disliked in a useful cause.”

“You mean to say she was in the know all the time?”

“Of course she was, and so were one or two of the men, so she was able to have a good laugh with us behind the scenes when she’d done anything particularly outrageous. And she really enjoyed herself. You see, she’s in the position of poor relation in a rather pugnacious family, and her life has been largely spent in smoothing over other people’s quarrels. You can imagine the welcome relief of being able to go about saying and doing perfectly exasperating things to a whole houseful of women—and all in the cause of peace.”

“I think you are the most odious person in the whole world,” said Reggie’s sister-in-law. Which was not strictly true; more than anybody, more than ever she disliked Mrs. Pentherby. It was impossible to calculate how many quarrels that woman had done her out of.

MARK

Augustus Mellowkent was a novelist with a future; that is to say, a limited but increasing number of people read his books, and there seemed good reason to suppose that if he steadily continued to turn out novels year by year a progressively increasing circle of readers would acquire the Mellowkent habit, and demand his works from the libraries and bookstalls. At the instigation of his publisher he had discarded the baptismal Augustus and taken the front name of Mark.

“Women like a name that suggests some one strong and silent, able but unwilling to answer questions. Augustus merely suggests idle splendour, but such a name as Mark Mellowkent, besides being alliterative, conjures up a vision of some one strong and beautiful and good, a sort of blend of Georges Carpentier and the Reverend What’s-his-name.”

One morning in December Augustus sat in his writing-room, at work on the third chapter of his eighth novel. He had described at some length, for the benefit of those who could not imagine it, what a rectory garden looks like in July; he was now engaged in describing at greater length the feelings of a young girl, daughter of a long line of rectors and archdeacons, when she discovers for the first time that the postman is attractive.

“Their eyes met, for a brief moment, as he handed her two circulars and the fat wrapper-bound bulk of the East Essex News. Their eyes met, for the merest fraction of a second, yet nothing could ever be quite the same again. Cost what it might she felt that she must speak, must break the intolerable, unreal silence that had fallen on them. ‘How is your mother’s rheumatism?’ she said.”

The author’s labours were cut short by the sudden intrusion of a maidservant.

“A gentleman to see you, sir,” said the maid, handing a card with the name Caiaphas Dwelf inscribed on it; “says it’s important.”

Mellowkent hesitated and yielded; the importance of the visitor’s mission was probably illusory, but he had never met any one with the name Caiaphas before. It would be at least a new experience.

Mr. Dwelf was a man of indefinite age; his high, narrow forehead, cold grey eyes, and determined manner bespoke an unflinching purpose. He had a large book under his arm, and there seemed every probability that he had left a package of similar volumes in the hall. He took a seat before it had been offered him, placed the book on the table, and began to address Mellowkent in the manner of an “open letter.”

“You are a literary man, the author of several well-known books—”

“I am engaged on a book at the present moment—rather busily engaged,” said Mellowkent, pointedly.

“Exactly,” said the intruder; “time with you is a commodity of considerable importance. Minutes, even, have their value.”

“They have,” agreed Mellowkent, looking at his watch.

“That,” said Caiaphas, “is why this book that I am introducing to your notice is not a book that you can afford to be without. Right Here is indispensable for the writing man; it is no ordinary encyclopædia, or I should not trouble to show it to you. It is an inexhaustible mine of concise information—”

“On a shelf at my elbow,” said the author, “I have a row of reference books that supply me with all the information I am likely to require.”

“Here,” persisted the would-be salesman, “you have it all in one compact volume. No matter what the subject may be which you wish to look up, or the fact you desire to verify, Right Here gives you all that you want to know in the briefest and most enlightening form. Historical reference, for instance; career of John Huss, let us say. Here we are: ‘Huss, John, celebrated religious reformer. Born 1369, burned at Constance 1415. The Emperor Sigismund universally blamed.’”