CHAPTER XVI
After purchasing and eating four penny buns and drinking a mugful of Bovril, Griselda decided to seek a job by a different method. She took an omnibus from Liverpool Street to Piccadilly Circus, and rambled through the back streets north of Piccadilly and west of Regent Street, looking in the shops, and seeking also a place where she could possibly want to work. It was what her school had described as the Direct Method. On this occasion, the Direct Method proved immediately efficacious.
The aspect of a certain small bookshop appealed to her greatly. The window was stocked neither with Books of the Month nor with sombre ancients; but with a well chosen selection of books published during the preceding fifty years or thereabouts. Unfortunately for the enlightened management, the shop appeared to be empty. Above the window was the name “Tamburlane.”
Griselda entered. A tall, well-made man, with a red face and white fluffy hair, emerged briskly from an inner room.
“I’m afraid we are out of Housman today,” he said in a gentle cultivated voice.
“I already have him, thank you.”
“Indeed? I must apologize for my precipitancy. I supposed that like my other customers today, you might have been guided here by that thing in ‘The Times’.”
“I’m afraid I missed that particular thing in ‘The Times’.”
“Just as well, really. At least in my opinion. Not that I’ve anything against the old man himself. But ‘The Times’ does rather dote, don’t you think? On A.E.H. and J.M.B.?” His articulation of the word “dote” was pleasantly idiosyncratic.
“Yes,” said Griselda. “Now you mention it, I really believe that ‘The Times’ does.”
“Insufficient catholicity. Their enormous parsonical readership is at the back of it. It’s useless attaching blame to the Editor. Quite a broad-minded well-read chap in his private life, I’m told. I wonder if you’d care for a small glass of port? I always indulge myself after luncheon and it’s all too seldom I have a friend to indulge with me.”
“There’s nothing I’d like better.”
“Delightful. You have spontaneity, the one real virtue. But I must not let myself stray into compliments. Please sit down.” He indicated a Chinese Chippendale chair. Griselda saw that there were a number of them in the inner room.
“Are you Mr. Tamburlane?”
“Yes and no. But yes for present purposes. Certainly yes. And you?”
“Griselda de Reptonville.”
He was filling two beautiful little glasses, from a beautiful little decanter, with assuredly most beautiful port.
“That is the most delightful name I have ever heard. In what is vulgarly known as ‘real life’, of course. I do hope I shall enrol you among my permanent customers.”
Griselda swallowed half the contents of the glass at one unsuitable gulp.
“I really rather hope to be enrolled among your employees.”
He was sipping like a rare and fastidious fowl.
“Well, nothing could be easier than that. Nothing at all. I take it you love books?”
“Perhaps I love them more than I know about them.”
“Indeed I certainly hope so or you would stand little chance here. In view of what you say, you’re engaged. Do you wish to start work now?”
“Would tomorrow suit you?”
“Excellently well. Naturally you will not be expected to lower the shutters. Ten o’clock I therefore suggest?”
He recharged the two glasses. The wine looked rich as Faust’s blood.
“I think I should tell you of my qualifications. For working in a bookshop I have one or two.”
“They are apparent to me. You have beauty and spontaneity, and you love books. Those things are rare and becoming daily rarer. They suffice. Indeed they suffice.”
“I shall try very hard indeed,” said Griselda.
“Never forget the words of the great Prince Talleyrand: ‘Surtout, point de zèle.’ That advice will carry you far in life. Though I am perfectly sure that you will be carried far in any case.”
“I have made a sadly slow start.”
“ ‘He tires betimes, who spurs too fast betimes.’ I never can overcome my lust for Shakespeare. Can you?”
“I haven’t tried. Should I try?”
“Peasant stuff much of it really; but none the less a genius. Indisputably a genius. I was speaking only figuratively. You mustn’t take anything I say too literally.”
Griselda looked up from her port.
“Oh, don’t take alarm. My words are not serious, but my deeds move mountains. Or so I sometimes like to flatter myself.”
A man entered the shop and began to explore the shelves. “Perhaps I should go,” said Griselda. “Thank you very much indeed for the port. And for the job.”
“It has been the greatest possible joy to me. Such a lovely head, such lustrous eyes: always about the shop. Blessedness, indeed: beata Beatrix, and all that. And don’t misunderstand me in any particular. My homage is entirely aesthetic; wholly impersonal, so to speak. My eros veers almost entirely towards Adonis.”
The customer looked up at these words, uttered in a voice like a ring of treble bells; and suddenly left the shop.
Griselda noticed the repeated claim of men to be regarding her impersonally. Their motives for this claim seemed as varied as their implication that the process ennobled them was consistent.
“I entirely understand,” said Griselda. “Good-bye until tomorrow morning.”
“Take something to read,” cried Mr. Tamburlane. “Take this.” It was ‘Rupert of Hentzau’. “I presume you’ve read ‘The Prisoner’?”
“I’m afraid that’s one I’ve missed.”
“Then take ‘The Prisoner’ too.”
“You are most thoughtful. I’ll return them very quickly.”
“Indeed not. You’ll read them for solace in years to come, most blessed damozel.”
It was only later while eating an éclair in Fullers that Griselda realized that this time the matter of wages had not been mentioned at all.
CHAPTER XVII
But it settled itself quite suitably. As soon as Griselda diffidently raised the subject upon her arrival the next morning, Mr. Tamburlane cried out: “Please, please, please. No more holding back, I beg. Though alas, I cannot be prodigal. You will soon see for yourself the state of business, and I make it my policy to try to confine outgoings to a sum not exceeding takings. Would four pounds per week keep your slim gilt soul, if I may quote my old friend, within your rosy fingered body?”
“I believe that’s about the market rate,” replied Griselda, perhaps a little disappointed, however unreasonably. “Thank you very much.” It would be necessary to depart from the Great Exhibition Hotel as soon as possible.
“The shop shuts at six o’clock, and at one on Saturdays. You will find that much of the business, such as it is, takes place each day during the general matutinal interregnum.”
In many respects the job was an ideal one. The work was of the lightest and unfailingly interesting; and Mr. Tamburlane, apparently the only other person connected with the running of the business, became upon further acquaintance more and more likeable and sympathetic. The few customers were mainly artists, aristocrats, idlers, and scholars; persons bashed by life into extreme inoffensiveness, varied in certain cases by mild and appealing eccentricity. There was also a small number of exceedingly beautiful women customers, who lighted up the shop as with nimbuses. The main drawback, perceived by Griselda from the outset, was that the job entirely lacked what she believed to be termed “prospects”. Until one knew him, it was difficult to understand what need Mr. Tamburlane had of an assistant. After one knew him, it was plain that his need could not truly be translated into financial terms.
Griselda also experienced much difficulty in finding a dwelling place. Having little idea how to set about this search, she attempted several unsuitable neighbourhoods, and a greater number of much more unsuitable landladies. She
knew that she needed advice, but hesitated to apply for it to Mr. Tamburlane. By the end of her first week in the shop, she was still lodged at the Great Exhibition Hotel, and facing insolvency for lack of a few pounds.
In other ways, however, her acquaintanceship with her employer throve exceedingly. He proved a man precisely of his word: he complimented her ceaselessly and often imaginatively upon her appearance, her ideas, and even her work; but showed no sign at all of ever intending to go further. It seemed to Griselda an admirable attitude for an employer.
The real trouble, of course, was the loss of Louise. The extent and hopelessness of this loss, and also its unnecessariness, saturated Griselda’s thoughts and feelings only by degrees. By Friday, however, she felt so despairing, and her acquaintanceship with Mr. Tamburlane had developed so warmly, that she resolved to confide in him, at least in part. It was necessary to confide in someone or die; and she could think of no other possible person among all her few friends and relatives, most of whom were, moreover, geographically unavailable. She was not sure that she would want to live in quarters found by Mr. Tamburlane; but in the matter of Louise, and Louise’s disappearance, there might well be less suitable confidants. So early in the morning there was little risk of interruption by customers.
“Indeed I can help,” cried Mr. Tamburlane, at the conclusion of the mournful tale. “You poor thing. And how fortunate today is Friday.”
“I am glad that something about it is fortunate,” said Griselda.
“Friday is the very day of the week for such a sad narration. Friday is the day Miss Otter calls.”
“Who is Miss Otter?”
“I shall tell you. There is a certain weekly newspaper. It circulates only privately—to subscribers, you understand; only to subscribers. Not many people know about it, but it serves a variety of special and important purposes. There is no need for me to be more specific. I am sure I have said enough for you to take me?” Griselda thought of the “St. James’s News-Letter”; wondered if Mr. Tamburlane were talking of something similar; and nodded. The drift of Mr. Tamburlane’s words seemed utterly beside the point, and had Griselda spoken, she would have started to weep.
“The paper is generally known among its subscribers as ‘The Otter’. It has, in fact, an entirely different, rather dull name, which is printed at the top of every copy; but ‘The Otter’ it has been for years, simply as a tribute to Miss Otter’s personality. Miss Otter is the Editor, so to speak; certainly the entrepreneur. She visits me each week and we decide the contents of the next issue. I am proud to say that from time to time it has been owing to me that there has been a further issue. The sum involved is really very tiny. But as the unacknowledged offspring of a rich nobleman—rich even in these days—I happily have some very small resources of my own, with which I endeavour to add to the douceur of life.”
“Unacknowledged, Mr. Tamburlane?”
“For good and obvious reasons, I’m afraid, Miss de Reptonville. Please don’t think I’m the rightful heir deprived; or even a younger son deprived. Nothing at all like that. I entirely uphold the strictest interpretation of the rules of blood and succession. Without them the nobility would very soon become unfit to govern.”
“I thought they’d ceased to govern anyway,” said Griselda, interested in spite of herself.
“Temporarily they have indeed. But you do not suppose that the present political bacchanal will last many years, I take it? As a wise and beautiful young woman, you cannot be deceived about that?”
“You will remember that I attended the All Party Dance, Mr. Tamburlane.”
“I am answered as by an oracle. But to return to ‘The Otter’. It is fortunate indeed that you decided to confide in me. For ‘The Otter’ exists largely in order to help with just such problems as yours, Miss de Reptonville. But, as I live, here comes Miss Otter in person.” He dashed out of the little inner room where this conversation had taken place.
Griselda looked at the new arrival with much curiosity. Miss Otter was a bent little woman, dressed, not very well, entirely in black. She had a quantity of white hair, and a brown wrinkled face, with a huge nose and enigmatic eyes. She wore no hat, but a wide black velvet band across her white hair.
Mr. Tamburlane introduced Griselda. Miss Otter accepted the introduction after the affable style of an important personage, took Griselda by the hand, and remarked: “I perceive you are in much distress of mind. I am grieved. Please accept my sympathy.” The last request was delivered somewhat in the tone of a dethroned Queen.
Griselda could only say: “Thank you very much.”
“You are indeed right, Miss Otter,” said Mr. Tamburlane, “as always. Miss de Reptonville lives under a heavy burden. But fortunately you and I may be privileged to assist in lightening those slender shoulders.”
“It will not be our first such case,” said Miss Otter, smiling graciously.
“Nor yet our our one hundred and first, if it were possible to keep a reckoning. Now, Miss de Reptonville, I leave the shop entirely in your management. Miss Otter and I have affairs to discuss. If any problems arise, you must call upon your own good judgment to solve them. For Miss Otter and I must on no account be disturbed. Help yourself to sherry and biscuits if you require to relieve responsibility with refreshment. Miss Otter and I shall not emerge until teatime. When I am sure we shall all be very ready for crumpets and anchovy toast.” He waved Miss Otter into the inner room and entering behind her, shut the door. Griselda noticed that Miss Otter carried a portfolio of papers and had a slight limp.
As usual there were few customers, though a young man who wanted a book on the botany of the Andes became quite offensive when Griselda, after much searching, was unable to find him one. A tired woman brought her son, aged about ten, to select his own birthday present. She seemed prepared to spend up to fifteen shillings, and urged the claims of a book of scientific wonders illustrated with many polychromatic plates, and acres of isonometry. The boy insisted on a copy of the Everyman Mabinogion. Despite the economy, his Mother seemed angry and disappointed. An elderly man prefaced his requirements by presenting Griselda with his card: Professor O. O. Gasteneetsia, F.R.S. The Professor then showed Griselda a minute cutting from a penny daily. It advised a book entitled “What About A Rumba?” Griselda offered to order it for him. But he kept saying “Tonight. I come again tonight” until drawn from the shop by a newsboy shouting about a crisis of some kind.
Griselda wondered whether she should procure crumpets and anchovies, but hesitated to leave the shop. The neighbourhood, moreover, seemed unpropitious, at least for crumpets. At about 5.15, however, when she had drunk all the sherry and eaten all the biscuits, and still felt exceedingly famished, a pleasing smell began to fill the shop. At 5.25, the inner door opened and Mr. Tamburlane called to her: “Enter, Miss de Reptonville. The fatted calf is dead. Alas! that Miss Otter has to leave us.”
The room was full of blue smoke, the beautiful eighteenth century table spread with hot crumpets and buttered toast, a Wedgwood Chinese teapot, with cups and plates to match, an opened jar of anchovies, and a litter of papers in process of reassembly by Miss Otter. Among the papers, Griselda noticed, seemed to be a number of very grimy and unpractised looking letters; others were inexplicable drawings in pompeian red on fresh white cartridge paper.
“All this clutter!” ejaculated Miss Otter, smilingly. “No, please don’t help me. I am an untidy old woman. You sit down and eat your tea.”
Griselda had never previously met with tea in the shop, or indeed, any other meal. It was true, however, that each day she left Mr. Tamburlane to provide for himself while she took lunch in a teashop. Today she was ready to tuck in.
“Good-bye, Mr. Tamburlane,” said Miss Otter, strapping her portfolio. “I’ll find my own way to the door. Good-bye, Miss de Reptonville. If you’ll take an old woman’s advice, you’ll turn down the next proposal you receive. Come what may, you should turn it down. No matter how keen on you the other party
seems to be. Feelings change, you know, with the passage of the years. Nor is that the only reason.” She was on her way through the shop. “Don’t forget what I say, Miss de Reptonville.” The outer door shut.
“Don’t you worry,” said Mr. Tamburlane to Griselda, repeating Lord Roller’s counsel. “I talked to Miss Otter very fully about your tragic misfortune. I think that together we shall have the great happiness of recapturing the lamb that has strayed. It is fortunate indeed that I was by when your need arose. Have a Bath Oliver?” He extended an exquisite Wedgwood biscuit box.
“Thank you. I’d like another piece of anchovy toast first.”
“I imagine, Miss de Reptonville, that my words of cheer fill you with scepticism?”
“I’m afraid I’m not very hopeful that I shall find my friend. But it is very kind of you to concern yourself.”
“You probably think that I am a crank and that Miss Otter is mad?” He was eating crumpet after crumpet.
“Certainly not.”
“And that our weekly paper, if it exists at all, has less than no power in the land?”
“Not at all.” Griselda began to wish she had never confided in Mr. Tamburlane.
“Yes, Miss de Reptonville, you certainly think all these things. How surprised you will be! That is all I care to say at the moment. How surprised you will be! How pleasantly and delicately surprised!”
“Would you let me see a copy of your paper?”
“Subscribers only, you will recall. I fear your sceptical attitude unfits you as yet to enter that charmed circle.” He had begun to drink cups of tea in as quick succession as he had eaten crumpets.
“I see.”
“Child of loveliness, yours but to reap where Miss Otter and I have sown.”
He began to talk about books; and very shortly afterwards Griselda was engaged upon a dreary quest for lodgings in and around Ladbroke Grove.
CHAPTER XVIII
The Late Breakfasters and Other Strange Stories Page 15