Then he saw that it was indeed so arranged, and that his daughter was clad in a sort of loose, extremely long knickerbockers.
“It will be so convenient for my sea-boots,” she explained.
Her father shook his head sadly. “Your dear mother would not have liked it, Clara,” said he.
For a moment the conspiracy was upon the point of collapsing. There was something in the gentleness of his rebuke, and in his appeal to her mother, which brought the tears to her eyes, and in another instant she would have been kneeling beside him with everything confessed, when the door flew open and her sister Ida came bounding into the room. She wore a short grey skirt, like that of Mrs. Westmacott, and she held it up in each hand and danced about among the furniture.
“I feel quite the Gaiety girl!” she cried. “How delicious it must be to be upon the stage! You can’t think how nice this dress is, papa. One feels so free in it. And isn’t Clara charming?”
“Go to your room this instant and take it off!” thundered the Doctor. “I call it highly improper, and no daughter of mine shall wear it.”
“Papa! Improper! Why, it is the exact model of Mrs. Westmacott’s.”
“I say it is improper. And yours also, Clara! Your conduct is really outrageous. You drive me out of the house. I am going to my club in town. I have no comfort or peace of mind in my own house. I will stand it no longer. I may be late to-night — I shall go to the British Medical meeting. But when I return I shall hope to find that you have reconsidered your conduct, and that you have shaken yourself clear of the pernicious influences which have recently made such an alteration in your conduct.” He seized his hat, slammed the dining-room door, and a few minutes later they heard the crash of the big front gate.
“Victory, Clara, victory!” cried Ida, still pirouetting around the furniture. “Did you hear what he said? Pernicious influences! Don’t you understand, Clara? Why do you sit there so pale and glum? Why don’t you get up and dance?”
“Oh, I shall be so glad when it is over, Ida. I do hate to give him pain. Surely he has learned now that it is very unpleasant to spend one’s life with reformers.”
“He has almost learned it, Clara. Just one more little lesson. We must not risk all at this last moment.”
“What would you do, Ida? Oh, don’t do anything too dreadful. I feel that we have gone too far already.”
“Oh, we can do it very nicely. You see we are both engaged and that makes it very easy. Harold will do what you ask him, especially as you have told him the reason why, and my Charles will do it without even wanting to know the reason. Now you know what Mrs. Westmacott thinks about the reserve of young ladies. Mere prudery, affectation, and a relic of the dark ages of the Zenana. Those were her words, were they not?”
“What then?”
“Well, now we must put it in practice. We are reducing all her other views to practice, and we must not shirk this one.
“But what would you do? Oh, don’t look so wicked, Ida! You look like some evil little fairy, with your golden hair and dancing, mischievous eyes. I know that you are going to propose something dreadful!”
“We must give a little supper to-night.”
“We? A supper!”
“Why not? Young gentlemen give suppers. Why not young ladies?”
“But whom shall we invite?”
“Why, Harold and Charles of course.”
“And the Admiral and Mrs. Hay Denver?”
“Oh, no. That would be very old-fashioned. We must keep up with the times, Clara.”
“But what can we give them for supper?”
“Oh, something with a nice, fast, rollicking, late-at-night-kind of flavor to it. Let me see! Champagne, of course — and oysters. Oysters will do. In the novels, all the naughty people take champagne and oysters. Besides, they won’t need any cooking. How is your pocket-money, Clara?”
“I have three pounds.”
“And I have one. Four pounds. I have no idea how much champagne costs. Have you?”
“Not the slightest.”
“How many oysters does a man eat?”
“I can’t imagine.”
“I’ll write and ask Charles. No, I won’t. I’ll ask Jane. Ring for her, Clara. She has been a cook, and is sure to know.”
Jane, on being cross-questioned, refused to commit herself beyond the statement that it depended upon the gentleman, and also upon the oysters. The united experience of the kitchen, however, testified that three dozen was a fair provision.
“Then we shall have eight dozen altogether,” said Ida, jotting down all her requirements upon a sheet of paper. “And two pints of champagne. And some brown bread, and vinegar, and pepper. That’s all, I think. It is not so very difficult to give a supper after all, is it, Clara?”
“I don’t like it, Ida. It seems to me to be so very indelicate.”
“But it is needed to clinch the matter. No, no, there is no drawing back now, Clara, or we shall ruin everything. Papa is sure to come back by the 9:45. He will reach the door at 10. We must have everything ready for him. Now, just sit down at once, and ask Harold to come at nine o’clock, and I shall do the same to Charles.”
The two invitations were dispatched, received and accepted. Harold was already a confidant, and he understood that this was some further development of the plot. As to Charles, he was so accustomed to feminine eccentricity, in the person of his aunt, that the only thing which could surprise him would be a rigid observance of etiquette. At nine o’clock they entered the dining-room of Number 2, to find the master of the house absent, a red-shaded lamp, a snowy cloth, a pleasant little feast, and the two whom they would have chosen, as their companions. A merrier party never met, and the house rang with their laughter and their chatter.
“It is three minutes to ten,” cried Clara, suddenly, glancing at the clock.
“Good gracious! So it is! Now for our little tableau!” Ida pushed the champagne bottles obtrusively forward, in the direction of the door, and scattered oyster shells over the cloth.
“Have you your pipe, Charles?”
“My pipe! Yes.”
“Then please smoke it. Now don’t argue about it, but do it, for you will ruin the effect otherwise.”
The large man drew out a red case, and extracted a great yellow meerschaum, out of which, a moment later, he was puffing thick wreaths of smoke. Harold had lit a cigar, and both the girls had cigarettes.
“That looks very nice and emancipated,” said Ida, glancing round. “Now I shall lie on this sofa. So! Now, Charles, just sit here, and throw your arm carelessly over the back of the sofa. No, don’t stop smoking. I like it. Clara, dear, put your feet upon the coal-scuttle, and do try to look a little dissipated. I wish we could crown ourselves with flowers. There are some lettuces on the sideboard. Oh dear, here he is! I hear his key.” She began to sing in her high, fresh voice a little snatch from a French song, with a swinging tra la-la chorus.
The Doctor had walked home from the station in a peaceable and relenting frame of mind, feeling that, perhaps, he had said too much in the morning, that his daughters had for years been models in every way, and that, if there had been any change of late, it was, as they said themselves, on account of their anxiety to follow his advice and to imitate Mrs. Westmacott. He could see clearly enough now that that advice was unwise, and that a world peopled with Mrs. Westmacotts would not be a happy or a soothing one. It was he who was, himself, to blame, and he was grieved by the thought that perhaps his hot words had troubled and saddened his two girls.
This fear, however, was soon dissipated. As he entered his hall he heard the voice of Ida uplifted in a rollicking ditty, and a very strong smell of tobacco was borne to his nostrils. He threw open the dining-room door, and stood aghast at the scene which met his eyes.
The room was full of the blue wreaths of smoke, and the lamp-light shone through the thin haze upon gold-topped bottles, plates, napkins, and a litter of oyster shells and cigarettes. Ida, flushed and excited, was reclining upon
the settee, a wine-glass at her elbow, and a cigarette between her fingers, while Charles Westmacott sat beside her, with his arm thrown over the head of the sofa, with the suggestion of a caress. On the other side of the room, Clara was lounging in an arm-chair, with Harold beside her, both smoking, and both with wine-glasses beside them. The Doctor stood speechless in the doorway, staring at the Bacchanalian scene.
“Come in, papa! Do!” cried Ida. “Won’t you have a glass of champagne?”
“Pray excuse me,” said her father, coldly, “I feel that I am intruding. I did not know that you were entertaining. Perhaps you will kindly let me know when you have finished. You will find me in my study.” He ignored the two young men completely, and, closing the door, retired, deeply hurt and mortified, to his room. A quarter of an hour afterwards he heard the door slam, and his two daughters came to announce that the guests were gone.
“Guests! Whose guests?” he cried angrily. “What is the meaning of this exhibition?”
“We have been giving a little supper, papa. They were our guests.”
“Oh, indeed!” The Doctor laughed sarcastically. “You think it right, then, to entertain young bachelors late at night, to, smoke and drink with them, to —— Oh, that I should ever have lived to blush for my own daughters! I thank God that your dear mother never saw the day.”
“Dearest papa,” cried Clara, throwing her arms about him. “Do not be angry with us. If you understood all, you would see that there is no harm in it.”
“No harm, miss! Who is the best judge of that?”
“Mrs. Westmacott,” suggested Ida, slyly.
The Doctor sprang from his chair. “Confound Mrs. Westmacott!” he cried, striking frenziedly into the air with his hands. “Am I to hear of nothing but this woman? Is she to confront me at every turn? I will endure it no longer.”
“But it was your wish, papa.”
“Then I will tell you now what my second and wiser wish is, and we shall see if you will obey it as you have the first.”
“Of course we will, papa.”
“Then my wish is, that you should forget these odious notions which you have imbibed, that you should dress and act as you used to do, before ever you saw this woman, and that, in future, you confine your intercourse with her to such civilities as are necessary between neighbours.”
“We are to give up Mrs. Westmacott?”
“Or give up me.”
“Oh, dear dad, how can you say anything so cruel?” cried Ida, burrowing her towsy golden hair into her father’s shirt front, while Clara pressed her cheek against his whisker. “Of course we shall give her up, if you prefer it.”
“Of course we shall, papa.”
The Doctor patted the two caressing heads. “These are my own two girls again,” he cried. “It has been my fault as much as yours. I have been astray, and you have followed me in my error. It was only by seeing your mistake that I have become conscious of my own. Let us set it aside, and neither say nor think anything more about it.”
CHAPTER XI. A BLOT FROM THE BLUE.
So by the cleverness of two girls a dark cloud was thinned away and turned into sunshine. Over one of them, alas, another cloud was gathering, which could not be so easily dispersed. Of these three households which fate had thrown together, two had already been united by ties of love. It was destined, however, that a bond of another sort should connect the Westmacotts with the Hay Denvers.
Between the Admiral and the widow a very cordial feeling had existed since the day when the old seaman had hauled down his flag and changed his opinions; granting to the yachts-woman all that he had refused to the reformer. His own frank and downright nature respected the same qualities in his neighbour, and a friendship sprang up between them which was more like that which exists between two men, founded upon esteem and a community of tastes.
“By the way, Admiral,” said Mrs. Westmacott one morning, as they walked together down to the station, “I understand that this boy of yours in the intervals of paying his devotions to Miss Walker is doing something upon ‘Change.”
“Yes, ma’am, and there is no man of his age who is doing so well. He’s drawing ahead, I can tell you, ma’am. Some of those that started with him are hull down astarn now. He touched his five hundred last year, and before he’s thirty he’ll be making the four figures.”
“The reason I asked is that I have small investments to make myself from time to time, and my present broker is a rascal. I should be very glad to do it through your son.”
“It is very kind of you, ma’am. His partner is away on a holiday, and Harold would like to push on a bit and show what he can do. You know the poop isn’t big enough to hold the lieutenant when the skipper’s on shore.”
“I suppose he charges the usual half per cent?”
“Don’t know, I’m sure, ma’am. I’ll swear that he does what is right and proper.”
“That is what I usually pay — ten shillings in the hundred pounds. If you see him before I do just ask him to get me five thousand in New Zealands. It is at four just now, and I fancy it may rise.”
“Five thousand!” exclaimed the Admiral, reckoning it in his own mind. “Lemme see! That’s twenty-five pounds commission. A nice day’s work, upon my word. It is a very handsome order, ma’am.”
“Well, I must pay some one, and why not him?”
“I’ll tell him, and I’m sure he’ll lose no time.”
“Oh, there is no great hurry. By the way, I understand from what you said just now that he has a partner.”
“Yes, my boy is the junior partner. Pearson is the senior. I was introduced to him years ago, and he offered Harold the opening. Of course we had a pretty stiff premium to pay.”
Mrs. Westmacott had stopped, and was standing very stiffly with her Red Indian face even grimmer than usual.
“Pearson?” said she. “Jeremiah Pearson?”
“The same.”
“Then it’s all off,” she cried. “You need not carry out that investment.”
“Very well, ma’am.”
They walked on together side by side, she brooding over some thought of her own, and he a little crossed and disappointed at her caprice and the lost commission for Harold.
“I tell you what, Admiral,” she exclaimed suddenly, “if I were you I should get your boy out of this partnership.”
“But why, madam?”
“Because he is tied to one of the deepest, slyest foxes in the whole city of London.”
“Jeremiah Pearson, ma’am? What can you know of him? He bears a good name.”
“No one in this world knows Jeremiah Pearson as I know him, Admiral. I warn you because I have a friendly feeling both for you and for your son. The man is a rogue and you had best avoid him.”
“But these are only words, ma’am. Do you tell me that you know him better than the brokers and jobbers in the City?”
“Man,” cried Mrs. Westmacott, “will you allow that I know him when I tell you that my maiden name was Ada Pearson, and that Jeremiah is my only brother?”
The Admiral whistled. “Whew!” cried he. “Now that I think of it, there is a likeness.”
“He is a man of iron, Admiral — a man without a heart. I should shock you if I were to tell you what I have endured from my brother. My father’s wealth was divided equally between us. His own share he ran through in five years, and he has tried since then by every trick of a cunning, low-minded man, by base cajolery, by legal quibbles, by brutal intimidation, to juggle me out of my share as well. There is no villainy of which the man is not capable. Oh, I know my brother Jeremiah. I know him and I am prepared for him.”
“This is all new to me, ma’am. ‘Pon my word, I hardly know what to say to it. I thank you for having spoken so plainly. From what you say, this is a poor sort of consort for a man to sail with. Perhaps Harold would do well to cut himself adrift.”
“Without losing a day.”
“Well, we shall talk it over. You may be sure of that. But her
e we are at the station, so I will just see you into your carriage and then home to see what my wife says to the matter.”
As he trudged homewards, thoughtful and perplexed, he was surprised to hear a shout behind him, and to see Harold running down the road after him.
“Why, dad,” he cried, “I have just come from town, and the first thing I saw was your back as you marched away. But you are such a quick walker that I had to run to catch you.”
The Admiral’s smile of pleasure had broken his stern face into a thousand wrinkles. “You are early to-day,” said he.
“Yes, I wanted to consult you.”
“Nothing wrong?”
“Oh no, only an inconvenience.”
“What is it, then?”
“How much have we in our private account?”
“Pretty fair. Some eight hundred, I think.”
“Oh, half that will be ample. It was rather thoughtless of Pearson.”
“What then?”
“Well, you see, dad, when he went away upon this little holiday to Havre he left me to pay accounts and so on. He told me that there was enough at the bank for all claims. I had occasion on Tuesday to pay away two cheques, one for L80, and the other for L120, and here they are returned with a bank notice that we have already overdrawn to the extent of some hundreds.”
The Admiral looked very grave. “What’s the meaning of that, then?” he asked.
“Oh, it can easily be set right. You see Pearson invests all the spare capital and keeps as small a margin as possible at the bank. Still it was too bad for him to allow me even to run a risk of having a cheque returned. I have written to him and demanded his authority to sell out some stock, and I have written an explanation to these people. In the meantime, however, I have had to issue several cheques; so I had better transfer part of our private account to meet them.”
“Quite so, my boy. All that’s mine is yours. But who do you think this Pearson is? He is Mrs. Westmacott’s brother.”
“Really. What a singular thing! Well, I can see a likeness now that you mention it. They have both the same hard type of face.”
Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) Page 553