‘It’s the notice what that man left—I forgot to give it you,’ explained Ophelia, producing a crumpled printed form from the mysterious depths of her apron pocket. ‘It says that owing to the draft we shall be incurring a penalty of forty shillings for the first offence and not exceeding fourteen days ever after.’
‘Nonsense.’ Miss Tilehurst had a sublime faith in the personal equation, which sometimes worked out but occasionally failed to be quite so successful. ‘That can’t apply to me of course. I pay a water rate and anyone can see that the garden needs watering. Put the notice in the fire and then I shall be able to say truthfully that I haven’t seen it.’
‘That I will, mum,’ undertook Ophelia stoutly.
‘And—wait a minute, Ophelia; don’t run away, child, when I’m in the middle of speaking. There’s someone doing something in the lane out by the side gate—that tinkering has been going on for the past half hour. On your way back just glance out there—you needn’t let it appear that you’ve gone on purpose: you can seem to be looking up the lane as if you expected the baker.’
‘He doesn’t come till later of a Saturday,’ objected Ophelia, entering into the spirit of the strategy perhaps even too precisely.
‘That doesn’t matter in the least. They are not to know or you may be looking for the butcher. But if there are gipsies or tinmen about we shall have to keep our eyes open after anything they can lay their hands on.’
Of course it was Ophelia’s fault; she ought to have come back with a more coherent tale, but when on her return with the second can she breathlessly reported, ‘… the man. Something about water. And—look out, mum, he’s coming!’ Miss Tilehurst not unnaturally jumped—quite literally, indeed—to the conclusion that this man must be identical with ‘that man’ and the reference to water was only capable of one construction. In spite of her assurance of personal immunity from the obnoxious order it began to look more serious when this emissary of injustice would seem to have deliberately tracked her down, and it was her rather frantic efforts to conceal her own can among the rose bushes on his approach, and at the same time to induce Ophelia by vigorous gestures to retire in good order with the other, that prevented her from grasping at the outset exactly what it was that the stranger was talking about.
‘I wonder if I might trouble you?’ was what he really said. ‘I see you are busy with it yourself—just a small can of water?’ Quite a personable individual he appeared to be—dignified, well-dressed, urbane, and he advanced doffing his distinctive hat with a ceremonialism that could not have failed to impress Miss Tilehurst if she had been composed enough to realise it.
‘Oh no, indeed I’m not—I can assure you that I never use a watering can in the garden,’ she exclaimed, rather remarkably in the circumstances; meaning, as she afterwards assured herself, that she was not actually using one then and that in any case she only watered certain special beds and did not—as so many thoughtless people did—waste precious canfuls drenching the entire garden.
‘I—I beg your pardon.’ The intruder was, not altogether unnaturally, for the moment nonplussed by the denial he had occasioned, but this did not in the least affect the magnificent composure of his bearing. ‘The fact is,’ he deigned to explain with gracious allowance for any misunderstanding, ‘my chauffeur happens to be away ill and I’m having some bother with my engines and being held up just outside your gate here.’
‘Oh. Oh? Oh!’ apologised Miss Tilehurst on several notes of emotion. ‘Then you are not the—er—the water authority?’
‘Madam,’ he affably admitted, with the light touch of a playful buffalo, ‘I am no authority on water in any form—not even, I regret to find, on the water cooling my own car engines. I’m afraid that my intrusion rather startled you—I ought to have been more explicit. At least permit me to establish my bona fides before I go. My name is Olivant—Dr Olivant of Harley Street. I am merely a stranger, you see, motoring through your charming district and having, so to speak, fallen by the wayside—’
‘Oh, Dr Olivant, I am so sorry,’ protested the lady, deeply mortified at the unfortunate blunder.
‘Of course now that I really look at you—’ and, without actually being so bold as to put the inference into words, Miss Tilehurst made it abundantly clear that in her opinion no one who really looked at him could by any chance take Dr Olivant for anything resembling a water inspector. ‘But seriously, you know, in this water famine the company is driving us half crazy with its absurd prohibitions and regulations. That,’ she explained, speaking with extreme clarity and deliberation, ‘is what I meant just now when I said that a watering can is never much use in the garden. Of course it needs the hose pipe to be effective.’
‘Oh, of course—naturally,’ agreed Dr Olivant. ‘And they don’t permit—’
‘Oh my goodness no! It would be a crime of’—the situation had gone a little to her head—‘ha! ha! Dr Olivant, a crime of the first water!’
‘Ha! ha!’ weightily confirmed Dr Olivant. ‘Very apt, indeed. “A crime of the first water”! I must tell my colleague, Sir Peter Mullaby, that. He’ll appreciate it.’
‘And I—ahem!—hear,’ added Miss Tilehurst, determined to clear her conscience thoroughly by the white fire of voluntary confession, ‘that very soon we may not be allowed to use even a watering can.’
‘Really?’ contributed the doctor, suitably impressed. ‘In the circumstances I scarcely like to repeat my request for a small canful.’
‘Oh nonsense, Dr Olivant; it hasn’t quite come to that yet. Ophelia—give Dr Olivant the can you have. Will that be sufficient for your purpose, Doctor?’
‘Oh, quite I think. Thank you; thank you. I won’t keep it a minute longer than I can help, I need hardly say.’
‘Pray don’t hurry. And if you should want any more—Of course’—as he reached the gate—‘you unscrew the nozzle for pouring.’
‘Oh quite so,’ he acquiesced. Really, did the woman take him for a loon or was it that she only wanted to hear the sound of her own silly tongue clacking?
In the circumstances Miss Tilehurst decided to go on gardening there—not watering, which would take Ophelia off her work and could be done equally well later, but just tidying up the beds. Then if Dr Olivant should happen to need—A most distinguished-mannered gentleman—a specialist, of course, being in Harley Street—and how immeasurably different from the usual type of country doctor! Dr Tyser, for instance, was well enough but ineradicably commonplace, while this locum tenens he had just got—well, it was said that he had been seen buying fried fish himself at one of those malodorous little places in Mutbury. The idea of Dr Olivant going into—
‘Coo-ee!’ said a voice in playful claim of recognition.
‘Well, well; I wondered if you would run round this afternoon, Nora. How long have you been there? I never heard you coming.’
Nora Melhuish was, it may be recalled, the speculative element in the timetable of Tilehurst’s arrangements, and now that we have been permitted to see her the only possible slur on his taste is that he should have taken even the most infinitesimal risk of missing so delectable an encounter. For the rest, she was nineteen, rather small, rather brown, and rather mysterious in her impressions. On this occasion she wore neither hat nor gloves but carried a moderate basket, and as she had come into the garden by the front, or road, gate and along the further path she had evidently failed to encounter the prepossessing specialist.
‘Oh, not long,’ replied Nora as they went through the ritual of kissing. ‘Only I heard you talking to someone so I slunk. Who is he?’
‘A Dr Olivant—a Harley Street specialist, or at least I suppose he must be. At any rate his car has broken down just outside there and he wanted some water.’
‘That’s what everyone seems to be wanting just now—I feel I’m getting it on the brain myself. Mrs Hattock says that the vicar is doubtful if he ought to go on praying for rain any longer—it seems to be making a fool of him when nothing happens.’
‘Well, perhaps it is but they certainly seem to be getting much more snappy. Are you watering the roses? Haven’t they cut off your supply yet?’
‘Good gracious no. Are they going to?’
‘They say so—all except an hour or two night and morning. And someone goes round listening at those little trap-door affairs in the road to catch you wasting any. And then fine you.’
‘Can they tell that? My dear! what next? And here that tiresome Ophelia is bringing out another canful! Take that back again at once, Ophelia, and don’t draw any more.’
‘All right,’ acquiesced the impassive Ophelia. ‘Good afternoon, miss. Just stepped across to see if we were all alive still? Shall I put this lot on the beans, mum?’
‘No, we haven’t got to waste any. Pour it down the sink quickly.’
‘That I will, mum.’ A rather constrained silence marked the time until Ophelia was out of hearing. ‘Of course I’m glad to find you alive but I really ran across with a few pears if you care to have them,’ remarked Nora, displaying the contents of her basket. ‘Jargonelles. We’ve got heaps and heaps and I know that yours are all the late kinds.’
‘Thank you, dear. They look delicious. You must let me reciprocate towards Christmas. But how did you know that ours are only keepers?’
‘Oh I don’t know. Oh yes I do. Geoffrey must have told me.’
‘I see. “You plant pears; For your heirs.” Well, whoever planted ours must have credited his posterity with remarkably good teeth. And speaking of that young man, you didn’t happen to see anything of Geoffrey as you came along, did you?’
‘No; isn’t he here?’ said Nora. ‘I expected to find—At least I thought—What I mean is, if we happen to meet and neither of us is doing anything—’
‘That’s all right, my dear,’ said Geoffrey’s adopted mother, ‘—at least I hope that it’s going to be. And I’m glad it’s you, Nora. It will make me very happy.’
‘Oh, Miss Tilehurst, do you really mean that you’ve noticed anything? I thought that we were both being extraordinarily discreet, and for that matter, he—Geoffrey—hasn’t actually said anything.’
‘No; I noticed that you were both rather tongue-tied of late,’ commented Miss Tilehurst dryly. ‘Well, my dear, if I am to lose my only nephew—and of course I know that in a place like this a young man’s fancy must turn sooner or later to thoughts of either love or golf—I prefer it to be you.’
‘Oh, you are a dear!’ exclaimed Nora, who has been placed at a considerable disadvantage by being introduced just at this stage of her florescence. ‘It would have been too awful if you hadn’t—’
‘It’s so very handy you living just over the way,’ continued Miss Tilehurst, pursuing her own line of speculation. ‘At least I shall always know where to find him.’
‘Well,’ laughed Nora, ‘that’s one way of looking at it. But I hope that isn’t the only reason.’
‘No,’ admitted Miss Tilehurst circumstantially. ‘Still, it’s a great convenience all the same.’
‘And please, please, don’t let Geoffrey know that we have been talking—’
‘My dear! I’m not an absolute beginner. I can’t think where he can have got to.’
‘Why; where did he go?’
‘That’s just what I don’t know. He must have gone off somewhere immediately after lunch without saying anything about it. He may have ridden across to Cobbet Corner to see about some repairs to a few cottages I have there, or he may have gone to arrange some details of the Gymkhana Tournament with Mr Mostyn who’d written to him this morning. But’s it’s so unlike him not to mention what time to expect him back or where he was going—especially on a day when you might drop in and miss him.’
‘But of course he wouldn’t have the faintest idea that I should be here, Miss Tilehurst,’ protested Nora. ‘Why, I had no idea of it myself until I happened to think—’
‘Well,’ dubiously agreed Miss Tilehurst, ‘perhaps he wouldn’t. All the same I had a strong presentiment that way myself and there is no reason why the state of his emotions should make him less intelligent.’
‘Perhaps Ophelia saw which way he went,’ suggested Nora. ‘She’s just gone across to the coal house.’
‘It’s quite as likely she asked him where he was going if she did,’ declared Miss Tilehurst grimly.
‘At any rate it won’t be difficult to find out. I’ll warrant she only wanted coal on the chance of a little small talk. Oh, Ophelia; Mr Geoffrey doesn’t happen to have come in at the back while we’ve been here, does he?’
‘No, mum, or I should have seen him … He got his bicycle out after lunch and went off with Nipper … He didn’t say where he was going … When I just said: “Going out for a ride on your bicycle, Mr Geoffrey?” he said: “No, Ophelia, I’m going for a three-legged race only I like to wear this on my watch chain.” I thought it sounded funny.’
Presumably Nora thought so too for she found it necessary to turn aside and bury her face in a crimson rambler. Miss Tilehurst found it less amusing.
‘Thank you, Ophelia; that will do. Tell him we are out here if he does return that way.’
‘Yes, mum.’ Ophelia appeared to weigh the conditions with conscientious detail. ‘You mean if he returns in a three-legged race?’
‘No, no. If he returns without our seeing him—if he comes in the back way.’
‘Oh yes. That I will, mum.’
Ophelia retired in the full assurance that this must be one of her good days as she was acquitting herself so successfully and at intervals snatches of her voice could be heard, subdued by the occasional clatter or bang of domestic zeal, as she confided all that was going on to the cat—sole confidant of her deeper feelings.
‘Isn’t she too dreadful?’ lamented Miss Tilehurst, as Ophelia disappeared towards the house. ‘But she’s really such a good, well-meaning girl that I can’t find it in my heart to be strict with her.’
‘No, indeed; it would spoil a gem—think of all the priceless things you’d miss hearing. But, you know, if Geoffrey is trundling a pushbike on a day like this, that might easily account for him not getting back as soon as he had intended.’
‘True; I expect that’s what it is. And speaking of bicycles, Nora, who was the young lady I saw dashing about the road on a motor cycle when I looked out at five o’clock this morning?’
‘Well, what’s the use of your brother having a motor bike if you can’t practise on it when he’s away? It’s about the only chance I do get.’
‘Oh? This is the first I’ve heard of you taking it up at all. I’m not an authority, I suppose, for I’ve always been accustomed to regard even a foot tricycle as rather an advanced form of propulsion for a woman but you struck me as being remarkably capable for a learner.’
‘I am,’ admitted Nora, with what could only be described as a knowing grin; ‘—but please don’t let on to anyone about it. I mean to surprise them one of these days.’
‘Them?’
‘Yes, all at home—oh, my word! my poor wits must indeed be wool-gathering! Do you know what I came across for?’
‘Well,’ replied Miss Tilehurst, with a spice of affectionate malice, ‘feminine intuition might be equal to the problem. Put into cold words I should say that you came—not to see Geoffrey, of course, but to afford him the unutterable pleasure of contemplating Miss Melhuish.’
‘Not at all—that may have been why I came perhaps, but it wasn’t what I came for. In spite of that truly feline stroke, dear Miss Tilehurst, I came to do you a kindness. Well, you know all about Uncle Max of course—you’ve always said how you wished to meet him.’
‘What—Mr Carrados?’
‘Yes, Uncle Max Carrados. Well, he turned up all unexpected this morning in his usual eccentric way. Shall I bring him across for an hour now? I would have done straight off but I thought you’d like to know he was coming.’
‘Yes indeed,
’ agreed Miss Tilehurst, rather fluttered at the prospect. ‘I should certainly be glad of a few minutes to make myself a little more presentable. But do you think that he would really care—?’ and with almost tragic eloquence the disparaging hands indicated the circumscribed garden in which they stood, the unpretentious little villa.
‘But whatever do you mean? Why shouldn’t he?’
‘Well, I should be overjoyed by the honour of course but I mean—wouldn’t it be rather dull for him? I feel that there ought to be something rather special going on to bring him here for—only there never is for that matter.’
‘Oh nonsense, dear. Isn’t he with us now, and what’s the difference? He doesn’t spend every day of his life tracking murderers down and bearding robbers in their dens. Although he’s so jolly well off—and rather clever, I suppose—he’s really the simplest old dear in the world.’
‘Old?’ The word was rather startling to Miss Tilehurst. ‘I didn’t know that Mr Carrados was at all elderly.’
‘Oh yes. He must be quite forty now. That’s getting on pretty well in years, I should think.’
‘Yes, I suppose it is,’ admitted Miss Tilehurst with a backward glance. ‘It certainly once seemed so. I’ll tell you what we’ll do to make it something special, Nora: we’ll have tea out in the arbour over there. That will be quite like a picnic, won’t it, and Geoffrey is certain to be back in time to join us.’
‘Splendid!’ agreed Nora, already on her way towards the gate; ‘I’ll dig out Uncle Max and we’ll dash back in no time.’
‘But you’ll give me just a few minutes to—I’m in the middle of gardening you know; I feel an awful fright,’ pleaded Miss Tilehurst who was rooted in a more ceremonial age when important visitors were not flung upon one ‘in no time’.
‘Right you are—will twenty minutes do? Oh no; never mind the old basket now—I’ll take it later on. Cheerio!’
‘Splendid!’ endorsed Miss Tilehurst to herself as another gate, fifty yards away, reverberated on its sorely tried hinges. ‘But how very strenuous!’
The Bravo of London Page 11