‘Nonsense. We must have a party on your birthday. We’ll go to the theatre and then we’ll have supper at Geisenheimer’s again. I may be working after hours at the bank today, so I guess I won’t come home. I’ll meet you at that Italian place at six.’
‘Very well. You’ll miss your walk, then?’
‘Yes. It doesn’t matter for once.’
‘No. You’re still going on with your walks, then?’
‘Oh, yes, yes.’
‘Three miles every day?’
‘Never miss it. It keeps me well.’
‘Yes.’
‘Goodbye, darling.’
‘Goodbye.’
Yes, there was a distinct chill in the atmosphere. Thank goodness, thought Henry, as he walked to the station, it would be different tomorrow morning. He had rather the feeling of a young knight who has done perilous deeds in secret for his lady, and is about at last to receive credit for them.
Geisenheimer’s was as brilliant and noisy as it had been before when Henry reached it that night, escorting a reluctant Minnie. After a silent dinner and a theatrical performance during which neither had exchanged more than a word between the acts, she had wished to abandon the idea of supper and go home. But a squad of police could not have kept Henry from Geisenheimer’s. His hour had come. He had thought of this moment for weeks, and he visualized every detail of his big scene. At first they would sit at their table in silent discomfort. Then Sidney Mercer would come up, as before, to ask Minnie to dance. And then—then—Henry would rise and, abandoning all concealment, exclaim grandly: ‘No! I am going to dance with my wife!’ Stunned amazement of Minnie, followed by wild joy. Utter rout and discomfiture of that pinhead, Mercer. And then, when they returned to their table, he breathing easily and regularly as a trained dancer in perfect condition should, she tottering a little with the sudden rapture of it all, they would sit with their heads close together and start a new life. That was the scenario which Henry had drafted.
It worked out—up to a certain point—as smoothly as ever it had done in his dreams. The only hitch which he had feared—to wit, the non-appearance of Sidney Mercer, did not occur. It would spoil the scene a little, he had felt, if Sidney Mercer did not present himself to play the role of foil; but he need have had no fears on this point. Sidney had the gift, not uncommon in the chinless, smooth-baked type of man, of being able to see a pretty girl come into the restaurant even when his back was towards the door. They had hardly seated themselves when he was beside their table bleating greetings.
‘Why, Henry! Always here!’
‘Wife’s birthday.’
‘Many happy returns of the day, Mrs. Mills. We’ve just time for one turn before the waiter comes with your order. Come along.’
The band was staggering into a fresh tune, a tune that Henry knew well. Many a time had Mme. Gavarni hammered it out of an aged and unwilling piano in order that he might dance with her blue-eyed niece. He rose.
‘No!’ he exclaimed grandly. ‘I am going to dance with my wife!’
He had not under-estimated the sensation which he had looked forward to causing. Minnie looked at him with round eyes. Sidney Mercer was obviously startled.
‘I thought you couldn’t dance.’
‘You never can tell,’ said Henry, lightly. ‘It looks easy enough. Anyway, I’ll try.’
‘Henry!’ cried Minnie, as he clasped her.
He had supposed that she would say something like that, but hardly in that kind of voice. There is a way of saying ‘Henry!’ which conveys surprised admiration and remorseful devotion; but she had not said it in that way. There had been a note of horror in her voice. Henry’s was a simple mind, and the obvious solution, that Minnie thought that he had drunk too much red wine at the Italian restaurant, did not occur to him.
He was, indeed, at the moment too busy to analyse vocal inflections. They were on the floor now, and it was beginning to creep upon him like a chill wind that the scenario which he had mapped out was subject to unforeseen alterations.
At first all had been well. They had been almost alone on the floor, and he had begun moving his feet along dotted line A B with the smooth vim which had characterized the last few of his course of lessons. And then, as if by magic, he was in the midst of a crowd—a mad, jigging crowd that seemed to have no sense of direction, no ability whatever to keep out of his way. For a moment the tuition of weeks stood by him. Then, a shock, a stifled cry from Minnie, and the first collision had occurred. And with that all the knowledge which he had so painfully acquired passed from Henry’s mind, leaving it an agitated blank. This was a situation for which his slidings round an empty room had not prepared him. Stage fright at its worst came upon him. Somebody charged him in the back and asked querulously where he thought he was going. As he turned with a half-formed notion of apologizing, somebody else rammed him from the other side. He had a momentary feeling as if he were going down the Niagara Rapids in a barrel, and then he was lying on the floor with Minnie on top of him. Somebody tripped over his head.
He sat up. Somebody helped him to his feet. He was aware of Sidney Mercer at his side.
‘Do it again,’ said Sidney, all grin and sleek immaculateness. ‘It went down big, but lots of them didn’t see it.’
The place was full of demon laughter.
‘Min!’ said Henry.
They were in the parlour of their little flat. Her back was towards him, and he could not see her face. She did not answer. She preserved the silence which she had maintained since they had left the restaurant. Not once during the journey home had she spoken.
The clock on the mantelpiece ticked on. Outside an elevated train rumbled by. Voices came from the street.
‘Min, I’m sorry.’
Silence.
‘I thought I could do it. Oh, Lord!’ Misery was in every note of Henry’s voice. ‘I’ve been taking lessons every day since that night we went to that place first. It’s no good—I guess it’s like the old woman said. I’ve got two left feet, and it’s no use my ever trying to do it. I kept it secret from you, what I was doing. I wanted it to be a wonderful surprise for you on your birthday. I knew how sick and tired you were getting of being married to a man who never took you out, because he couldn’t dance. I thought it was up to me to learn, and give you a good time, like other men’s wives. I—’
‘Henry!’
She had turned, and with a dull amazement he saw that her whole face had altered. Her eyes were shining with a radiant happiness.
‘Henry! Was that why you went to that house—to take dancing lessons?’
He stared at her without speaking. She came to him, laughing.
‘So that was why you pretended you were still doing your walks?’
‘You knew!’
‘I saw you come out of that house. I was just going to the station at the end of the street, and I saw you. There was a girl with you, a girl with yellow hair. You hugged her!’
Henry licked his dry lips.
‘Min,’ he said huskily. ‘You won’t believe it, but she was trying to teach me the Jelly Roll.’
She held him by the lapels of his coat.
‘Of course I believe it. I understand it all now. I thought at the time that you were just saying goodbye to her! Oh, Henry, why ever didn’t you tell me what you were doing? Oh, yes, I know you wanted it to be a surprise for me on my birthday, but you must have seen there was something wrong. You must have seen that I thought something. Surely you noticed how I’ve been these last weeks?’
‘I thought it was just that you were finding it dull.’
‘Dull! Here, with you!’
‘It was after you danced that night with Sidney Mercer. I thought the whole thing out. You’re so much younger than I, Min. It didn’t seem right for you to have to spend your life being read to by a fellow like me.’
‘But I loved it!’
‘You had to dance. Every girl has to. Women can’t do without it.’
‘This one can. Henry, listen! You remember how ill and worn out I was when you met me first at that farm? Do you know why it was? It was because I had been slaving away for years at one of those places where you go in and pay five cents to dance with the lady instructresses. I was a lady instructress. Henry! Just think what I went through! Every day having to drag a million heavy men with large feet round a big room. I tell you, you are a professional compared with some of them! They trod on my feet and leaned their two hundred pounds on me and nearly killed me. Now perhaps you can understand why I’m not crazy about dancing! Believe me, Henry, the kindest thing you can do to me is to tell me I must never dance again.’
‘You—you—’ he gulped. ‘Do you really mean that you can—can stand the sort of life we’re living here? You really don’t find it dull?’
‘Dull!’
She ran to the bookshelf, and came back with a large volume.
‘Read to me, Henry, dear. Read me something now. It seems ages and ages since you used to. Read me something out of the Encyclopedia!’
Henry was looking at the book in his hand. In the midst of a joy that almost overwhelmed him, his orderly mind was conscious of something wrong.
‘But this is the MED-MUM volume, darling.’
‘Is it? Well, that’ll be all right. Read me all about “Mum.”’
‘But we’re only in the CAL-CHA—’ He wavered. ‘Oh, well—I’ he went on, recklessly. ‘I don’t care. Do you?’
‘No. Sit down here, dear, and I’ll sit on the floor.’
Henry cleared his throat.
‘“Milicz, or Militsch (d. 1374), Bohemian divine, was the most influential among those preachers and writers in Moravia and Bohemia who, during the fourteenth century, in a certain sense paved the way for the reforming activity of Huss.”’
He looked down. Minnie’s soft hair was resting against his knee. He put out a hand and stroked it. She turned and looked up, and he met her big eyes.
‘Can you beat it?’ said Henry, silently, to himself.
About the Author
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (P. G. Wodehouse) was an English humorist and writer best known for his Jeeves and Blandings Castle novels. Educated at boarding schools, Wodehouse turned to writing at a young age, demonstrating great skill at humorous sketches and musical lyrics. He continued to write part-time while pursuing, at the behest of his father, a career in banking, and successfully contributed numerous pieces to Punch, Vanity Fair, and The Daily Express, among other publications. In addition to his literary work, Wodehouse was incorporated into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in recognition of his collaboration with Cole Porter on Anything Goes, his lyrics to the song “Bill” from Show Boat, and his work on the musicals Rosalie and The Three Musketeers.
While interned along with other British citizens in Germany during the Second World War, Wodehouse made a series of radio broadcasts for which he was accused of being a collaborator; and, although later cleared of the charges, he never returned to England. His work has influenced many other writers including Evelyn Waugh, Rudyard Kipling, J. K. Rowling, and John Le Carré. P. G. Wodehouse died in 1975 at the age of ninety-three.
About the Series
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Copyright
HarperPerennial Classics
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EPub Edition December 2014 ISBN: 9781443441513
This title is in Canada’s public domain and is not subject to any licence or copyright.
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The Man With Two Left Feet Page 22