Yet his whole being revolted at the thought of allowing the sanctity of the museum to be violated. Officially its contents belonged to Lord Emsworth, but ever since his connection with the castle he had been put in charge of them, and he had come to look on them as his own property. If he was only a collector by proxy he had, nevertheless, the collector's devotion to his curios, beside which the lioness' attachment to her cubs is tepid; and he was prepared to do anything to retain in his possession a scarab toward which he already entertained the feelings of a life proprietor.
No--not quite anything! He stopped short at the idea of causing unpleasantness between the father of the Honorable Freddie and the father of the Honorable Freddie's fiancee. His secretarial position at the castle was a valuable one and he was loath to jeopardize it.
There was only one way in which this delicate affair could be brought to a satisfactory conclusion. It was obvious from what he had seen that night that Mr. Peters' connection with the attempt on the scarab was to be merely sympathetic, and that the actual theft was to be accomplished by Ashe. His only course, therefore, was to catch Ashe actually in the museum. Then Mr. Peters need not appear in the matter at all. Mr. Peters' position in those circumstances would be simply that of a man who had happened to employ, through no fault of his own, a valet who happened to be a thief.
He had made a mistake, he perceived, in locking the door of the museum. In the future he must leave it open, as a trap is open; and he must stay up nights and keep watch. With these reflections, the Efficient Baxter returned to his room.
Meantime Ashe had entered Mr. Peters' bedroom and switched on the light. Mr. Peters, who had just succeeded in dropping off to sleep, sat up with a start.
"I've come to read to you," said Ashe.
Mr. Peters emitted a stifled howl, in which wrath and self-pity were nicely blended.
"You fool, don't you know I have just managed to get to sleep?"
"And now you're awake again," said Ashe soothingly. "Such is life! A little rest, a little folding of the hands in sleep, and then bing!--off we go again. I hope you will like this novel. I dipped into it and it seems good."
"What do you mean by coming in here at this time of night? Are you crazy?"
"It was your suggestion; and, by the way, I must thank you for it. I apologize for calling it thin. It worked like a charm. I don't think he believed it--in fact, I know he didn't; but it held him. I couldn't have thought up anything half so good in an emergency."
Mr. Peters' wrath changed to excitement.
"Did you get it? Have you been after my--my Cheops?"
"I have been after your Cheops, but I didn't get it. Bad men were abroad. That fellow with the spectacles, who was in the museum when I met you there this evening, swooped down from nowhere, and I had to tell him that you had rung for me to read to you. Fortunately I had this novel on me. I think he followed me upstairs to see whether I really did come to your room."
Mr. Peters groaned miserably.
"Baxter," he said; "He's a man named Baxter--Lord Emsworth's private secretary; and he suspects us. He's the man we--I mean you--have got to look out for."
"Well, never mind. Let's be happy while we can. Make yourself comfortable and I'll start reading. After all, what could be pleasanter than a little literature in the small hours? Shall I begin?"
...
Ashe Marson found Joan Valentine in the stable yard after breakfast the next morning, playing with a retriever puppy. "Will you spare me a moment of your valuable time?"
"Certainly, Mr. Marson."
"Shall we walk out into the open somewhere--where we can't be overheard?"
"Perhaps it would be better."
They moved off.
"Request your canine friend to withdraw," said Ashe. "He prevents me from marshaling my thoughts."
"I'm afraid he won't withdraw."
"Never mind. I'll do my best in spite of him. Tell me, was I dreaming or did I really meet you in the hall this morning at about twenty minutes after two?"
"You did."
"And did you really tell me that you had come to the castle to steal--"
"Recover."
"--Recover Mr. Peters' scarab?"
"I did."
"Then it's true?"
"It is."
Ashe scraped the ground with a meditative toe.
"This," he said, "Seems to me to complicate matters somewhat."
"It complicates them abominably!"
"I suppose you were surprised when you found that I was on the same game as yourself."
"Not in the least."
"You weren't!"
"I knew it directly I saw the advertisement in the Morning Post. And I hunted up the Morning Post directly you had told me that you had become Mr. Peters' valet."
"You have known all along!"
"I have."
Ashe regarded her admiringly.
"You're wonderful!"
"Because I saw through you?"
"Partly that; but chiefly because you had the pluck to undertake a thing like this."
"You undertook it."
"But I'm a man."
"And I'm a woman. And my theory, Mr. Marson, is that a woman can do nearly everything better than a man. What a splendid test case this would make to settle the Votes-for-Women question once and for all! Here we are--you and I--a man and a woman, each trying for the same thing and each starting with equal chances. Suppose I beat you? How about the inferiority of women then?"
"I never said women were inferior."
"You did with your eyes."
"Besides, you're an exceptional woman."
"You can't get out of it with a compliment. I'm an ordinary woman and I'm going to beat a real man."
Ashe frowned.
"I don't like to think of ourselves as working against each other."
"Why not?"
"Because I like you."
"I like you, Mr. Marson; but we must not let sentiment interfere with business. You want Mr. Peters' five thousand dollars. So do I."
"I hate the thought of being the instrument to prevent you from getting the money."
"You won't be. I shall be the instrument to prevent you from getting it. I don't like that thought, either; but one has got to face it."
"It makes me feel mean."
"That's simply your old-fashioned masculine attitude toward the female, Mr. Marson. You look on woman as a weak creature, to be shielded and petted. We aren't anything of the sort. We're terrors! We're as hard as nails. We're awful creatures. You mustn't let my sex interfere with your trying to get this reward. Think of me as though I were another man. We're up against each other in a fair fight, and I don't want any special privileges. If you don't do your best from now onward I shall never forgive you. Do you understand?"
"I suppose so."
"And we shall need to do our best. That little man with the glasses is on his guard. I was listening to you last night from behind the door. By the way, you shouldn't have told me to run away and then have stayed yourself to be caught. That is an example of the sort of thing I mean. It was chivalry--not business."
"I had a story ready to account for my being there. You had not."
"And what a capital story it was! I shall borrow it for my own use. If I am caught I shall say I had to read Aline to sleep because she suffers from insomnia. And I shouldn't wonder if she did--poor girl! She doesn't get enough to eat. She is being starved--poor child! I heard one of the footmen say that she refused everything at dinner last night. And, though she vows it isn't, my belief is that it's all because she is afraid to make a stand against her old father. It's a shame!"
"She is a weak creature, to be shielded and petted," said Ashe solemnly.
Joan laughed.
"Well, yes; you caught me there. I admit that poor Aline is not a shining example of the formidable modern woman; but--" She stopped. "Oh, bother! I've just thought of what I ought to have said--the good repartee that would have crushed you. I sup
pose it's too late now?"
"Not at all. I'm like that myself--only it is generally the next day when I hit the right answer. Shall we go back?... She is a weak creature, to be shielded and petted."
"Thank you so much," said Joan gratefully. "And why is she a weak creature? Because she has allowed herself to be shielded and petted; because she has permitted man to give her special privileges, and generally--No; it isn't so good as I thought it was going to be."
"It should be crisper," said Ashe critically. "It lacks the punch."
"But it brings me back to my point, which is that I am not going to imitate her and forfeit my independence of action in return for chivalry. Try to look at it from my point of view, Mr. Marson. I know you need the money just as much as I do. Well, don't you think I should feel a little mean if I thought you were not trying your hardest to get it, simply because you didn't think it would be fair to try your hardest against a woman? That would cripple me. I should not feel as though I had the right to do anything. It's too important a matter for you to treat me like a child and let me win to avoid disappointing me. I want the money; but I don't want it handed to me."
"Believe me," said Ashe earnestly, "it will not be handed to you. I have studied the Baxter question more deeply than you have, and I can assure you that Baxter is a menace. What has put him so firmly on the right scent I don't know; but he seems to have divined the exact state of affairs in its entirety--so far as I am concerned, that is to say. Of course he has no idea you are mixed up in the business; but I am afraid his suspicion of me will hit you as well. What I mean is that, for some time to come, I fancy that man proposes to camp out on the rug in front of the museum door. It would be madness for either of us to attempt to go there at present."
"It is being made very hard for us, isn't it? And I thought it was going to be so simple."
"I think we should give him at least a week to simmer down."
"Fully that."
"Let us look on the bright side. We are in no hurry. Blandings Castle is quite as comfortable as Number Seven Arundel Street, and the commissariat department is a revelation to me. I had no idea English servants did themselves so well. And, as for the social side, I love it; I revel in it. For the first time in my life I feel as though I am somebody. Did you observe my manner toward the kitchen maid who waited on us at dinner last night? A touch of the old noblesse about it, I fancy. Dignified but not unkind, I think. And I can keep it up. So far as I am concerned, let this life continue indefinitely."
"But what about Mr. Peters? Don't you think there is danger he may change his mind about that five thousand dollars if we keep him waiting too long?"
"Not a chance of it. Being almost within touch of the scarab has had the worst effect on him. It has intensified the craving. By the way, have you seen the scarab?"
"Yes; I got Mrs. Twemlow to take me to the museum while you were talking to the butler. It was dreadful to feel that it was lying there in the open waiting for somebody to take it, and not be able to do anything."
"I felt exactly the same. It isn't much to look at, is it? If it hadn't been for the label I wouldn't have believed it was the thing for which Peters was offering five thousand dollars' reward. But that's his affair. A thing is worth what somebody will give for it. Ours not to reason why; ours but to elude Baxter and gather it in."
"Ours, indeed! You speak as though we were partners instead of rivals."
Ashe uttered an exclamation. "You've hit it! Why not? Why any cutthroat competition? Why shouldn't we form a company? It would solve everything."
Joan looked thoughtful.
"You mean divide the reward?"
"Exactly--into two equal parts."
"And the labor?"
"The labor?"
"How shall we divide that?"
Ashe hesitated.
"My idea," he said, "was that I should do what I might call the rough work; and--"
"You mean you should do the actual taking of the scarab?"
"Exactly. I would look after that end of it."
"And what would my duties be?"
"Well, you--you would, as it were--how shall I put it? You would, so to speak, lend moral support."
"By lying snugly in bed, fast asleep?"
Ashe avoided her eye.
"Well, yes--er--something on those lines."
"While you ran all the risks?"
"No, no. The risks are practically nonexistent."
"I thought you said just now that it would be madness for either of us to attempt to go to the museum at present." Joan laughed. "It won't do, Mr. Marson. You remind me of an old cat I once had. Whenever he killed a mouse he would bring it into the drawing-room and lay it affectionately at my feet. I would reject the corpse with horror and turn him out, but back he would come with his loathsome gift. I simply couldn't make him understand that he was not doing me a kindness. He thought highly of his mouse and it was beyond him to realize that I did not want it.
"You are just the same with your chivalry. It's very kind of you to keep offering me your dead mouse; but honestly I have no use for it. I won't take favors just because I happen to be a female. If we are going to form this partnership I insist on doing my fair share of the work and running my fair share of the risks--the practically nonexistent risks."
"You're very--resolute."
"Say pig-headed; I shan't mind. Certainly I am! A girl has got to be, even nowadays, if she wants to play fair. Listen, Mr. Marson; I will not have the dead mouse. I do not like dead mice. If you attempt to work off your dead mouse on me this partnership ceases before it has begun. If we are to work together we are going to make alternate attempts to get the scarab. No other arrangement will satisfy me."
"Then I claim the right to make the first one."
"You don't do anything of the sort. We toss up for first chance, like little ladies and gentlemen. Have you a coin? I will spin, and you call."
Ashe made a last stand.
"This is perfectly--"
"Mr. Marson!"
Ashe gave in. He produced a coin and handed it to her gloomily.
"Under protest," he said.
"Head or tail?" said Joan, unmoved.
Ashe watched the coin gyrating in the sunshine.
"Tail!" he cried.
The coin stopped rolling.
"Tail it is," said Joan. "What a nuisance! Well, never mind-- I'll get my chance if you fail."
"I shan't fail," said Ashe fervently. "If I have to pull the museum down I won't fail. Thank heaven, there's no chance now of your doing anything foolish!"
"Don't be too sure. Well, good luck, Mr. Marson!"
"Thank you, partner."
They shook hands.
As they parted at the door, Joan made one further remark: "There's just one thing, Mr. Marson."
"Yes?"
"If I could have accepted the mouse from anyone I should certainly have accepted it from you."
CHAPTER VII
It is worthy of record, in the light of after events, that at the beginning of their visit it was the general opinion of the guests gathered together at Blandings Castle that the place was dull. The house party had that air of torpor which one sees in the saloon passengers of an Atlantic liner--that appearance of resignation to an enforced idleness and a monotony to be broken only by meals. Lord Emsworth's guests gave the impression, collectively, of being just about to yawn and look at their watches.
This was partly the fault of the time of year, for most house parties are dull if they happen to fall between the hunting and the shooting seasons, but must be attributed chiefly to Lord Emsworth's extremely sketchy notions of the duties of a host.
A host has no right to interne a regiment of his relations in his house unless he also invites lively and agreeable outsiders to meet them. If he does commit this solecism the least he can do is to work himself to the bone in the effort to invent amusements and diversions for his victims. Lord Emsworth had failed badly in both these matters. With the except
ion of Mr. Peters, his daughter Aline and George Emerson, there was nobody in the house who did not belong to the clan; and, as for his exerting himself to entertain, the company was lucky if it caught a glimpse of its host at meals.
Lord Emsworth belonged to the people-who-like-to-be-left-alone- to-amuse-themselves-when-they-come-to-a-place school of hosts. He pottered about the garden in an old coat--now uprooting a weed, now wrangling with the autocrat from Scotland, who was theoretically in his service as head gardener---dreamily satisfied, when he thought of them at all, that his guests were as perfectly happy as he was.
Apart from his son Freddie, whom he had long since dismissed as a youth of abnormal tastes, from whom nothing reasonable was to be expected, he could not imagine anyone not being content merely to be at Blandings when the buds were bursting on the trees.
A resolute hostess might have saved the situation; but Lady Ann Warblington's abilities in that direction stopped short at leaving everything to Mrs. Twemlow and writing letters in her bedroom. When Lady Ann Warblington was not writing letters in her bedroom--which was seldom, for she had an apparently inexhaustible correspondence--she was nursing sick headaches in it. She was one of those hostesses whom a guest never sees except when he goes into the library and espies the tail of her skirt vanishing through the other door.
As for the ordinary recreations of the country house, the guests could frequent the billiard room, where they were sure to find Lord Stockheath playing a hundred up with his cousin, Algernon Wooster--a spectacle of the liveliest interest--or they could, if fond of golf, console themselves for the absence of links in the neighborhood with the exhilarating pastime of clock golf; or they could stroll about the terraces with such of their relations as they happened to be on speaking terms with at the moment, and abuse their host and the rest of their relations.
This was the favorite amusement; and after breakfast, on a morning ten days after Joan and Ashe had formed their compact, the terraces were full of perambulating couples. Here, Colonel Horace Mant, walking with the Bishop of Godalming, was soothing that dignitary by clothing in soldierly words thoughts that the latter had not been able to crush down, but which his holy office scarcely permitted him to utter.
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