Something New

Something New Page 5

by P. G. Wodehouse

  CHAPTER V

  The four-fifteen express slid softly out of Paddington Stationand Ashe Marson settled himself in the corner seat of hissecond-class compartment. Opposite him Joan Valentine had begunto read a magazine. Along the corridor, in a first-class smokingcompartment, Mr. Peters was lighting a big black cigar. Stillfarther along the corridor, in a first-class non-smokingcompartment, Aline Peters looked through the window and thoughtof many things.

  In English trains the tipping classes travel first; valets,lady's maids, footmen, nurses, and head stillroom maids, second;and housemaids, grooms, and minor and inferior stillroom maids,third. But for these social distinctions, the whole fabric ofsociety would collapse and anarchy stalk naked through theland--as in the United States.

  Ashe was feeling remarkably light-hearted. He wished he had notbought Joan that magazine and thus deprived himself temporarilyof the pleasure of her conversation; but that was the only flawin his happiness. With the starting of the train, which might beconsidered the formal and official beginning of the delicate anddangerous enterprise on which he had embarked, he had definitelycome to the conclusion that the life adventurous was the life forhim. He had frequently suspected this to be the case, but it hadrequired the actual experiment to bring certainty.

  Almost more than physical courage, the ideal adventurer needs acertain lively inquisitiveness, the quality of not being contentto mind his own affairs; and in Ashe this quality was highlydeveloped. From boyhood up he had always been interested inthings that were none of his business. And it is just thatattribute which the modern young man, as a rule, so sadly lacks.

  The modern young man may do adventurous things if they are thruston him; but left to himself he will edge away uncomfortably andlook in the other direction when the goddess of adventure smilesat him. Training and tradition alike pluck at his sleeve and urgehim not to risk making himself ridiculous. And from sheer horrorof laying himself open to the charge of not minding his ownbusiness he falls into a stolid disregard of all that is out ofthe ordinary and exciting. He tells himself that the shriek fromthe lonely house he passed just now was only the high note ofsome amateur songstress, and that the maiden in distress whom hesaw pursued by the ruffian with a knife was merely earning thesalary paid her by some motion-picture firm. And he proceeds onhis way, looking neither to left nor right.

  Ashe had none of this degenerate coyness toward adventure. Thoughborn within easy distance of Boston and deposited bycircumstances in London, he possessed, nevertheless, to aremarkable degree, that quality so essentially the property ofthe New Yorker--the quality known, for want of a more polishedword, as rubber. It is true that it had needed the eloquence ofJoan Valentine to stir him from his groove; but that was becausehe was also lazy. He loved new sights and new experiences. Yes;he was happy. The rattle of the train shaped itself into a livelymarch. He told himself that he had found the right occupation fora young man in the Spring.

  Joan, meantime, intrenched behind her magazine, was also busywith her thoughts. She was not reading the magazine; she held itbefore her as a protection, knowing that if she laid it down Ashewould begin to talk. And just at present she had no desire forconversation. She, like Ashe, was contemplating the immediatefuture, but, unlike him, was not doing so with much pleasure. Shewas regretting heartily that she had not resisted the temptationto uplift this young man and wishing that she had left him towallow in the slothful peace in which she had found him.

  It is curious how frequently in this world our attempts tostimulate and uplift swoop back on us and smite us likeboomerangs. Ashe's presence was the direct outcome of her lectureon enterprise, and it added a complication to an alreadycomplicated venture.

  She did her best to be fair to Ashe. It was not his fault that hewas about to try to deprive her of five thousand dollars, whichshe looked on as her personal property; but illogically she foundherself feeling a little hostile.

  She glanced furtively at him over the magazine, choosing by illchance a moment when he had just directed his gaze at her. Theireyes met and there was nothing for it but to talk; so she tuckedaway her hostility in a corner of her mind, where she could findit again when she wanted it, and prepared for the time being tobe friendly. After all, except for the fact that he was herrival, this was a pleasant and amusing young man, and one forwhom, until he made the announcement that had changed her wholeattitude toward him, she had entertained a distinct feeling offriendship--nothing warmer.

  There was something about him that made her feel that she wouldhave liked to stroke his hair in a motherly way and straightenhis tie, and have cozy chats with him in darkened rooms by thelight of open fires, and make him tell her his inmost thoughts,and stimulate him to do something really worth while with hislife; but this, she held, was merely the instinct of a generousnature to be kind and helpful even to a comparative stranger.

  "Well, Mr. Marson," she said, "Here we are!"

  "Exactly what I was thinking," said Ashe.

  He was conscious of a marked increase in the exhilaration thestarting of the expedition had brought to him. At the back of hismind he realized there had been all along a kind of wistfulresentment at the change in this girl's manner toward him.During the brief conversation when he had told her of his havingsecured his present situation, and later, only a few minutesback, on the platform of Paddington Station, he had sensed acoldness, a certain hostility--so different from her pleasantfriendliness at their first meeting.

  She had returned now to her earlier manner and he was surprisedat the difference it made. He felt somehow younger, more alive.The lilt of the train's rattle changed to a gay ragtime. This wascurious, because Joan was nothing more than a friend. He was notin love with her. One does not fall in love with a girl whom onehas met only three times. One is attracted--yes; but one does notfall in love.

  A moment's reflection enabled him to diagnose his sensationscorrectly. This odd impulse to leap across the compartment andkiss Joan was not love. It was merely the natural desire of agood-hearted young man to be decently chummy with his species.

  "Well, what do you think of it all, Mr. Marson?" said Joan. "Areyou sorry or glad that you let me persuade you to do thisperfectly mad thing? I feel responsible for you, you know. If ithad not been for me you would have been comfortably in ArundellStreet, writing your Wand of Death."

  "I'm glad."

  "You don't feel any misgivings now that you are actuallycommitted to domestic service?"

  "Not one."

  Joan, against her will, smiled approval on this uncompromisingattitude. This young man might be her rival, but his demeanor onthe eve of perilous times appealed to her. That was the spiritshe liked and admired--that reckless acceptance of whatever mightcome. It was the spirit in which she herself had gone into theaffair and she was pleased to find that it animated Ashealso--though, to be sure, it had its drawbacks. It made hisrivalry the more dangerous. This reflection injected a touch ofthe old hostility into her manner.

  "I wonder whether you will continue to feel so brave."

  "What do you mean?"

  Joan perceived that she was in danger of going too far. She hadno wish to unmask Ashe at the expense of revealing her ownsecret. She must resist the temptation to hint that she haddiscovered his.

  "I meant," she said quickly, "that from what I have seen of himMr. Peters seems likely to be a rather trying man to work for."

  Ashe's face cleared. For a moment he had almost suspected thatshe had guessed his errand.

  "Yes. I imagine he will be. He is what you might callquick-tempered. He has dyspepsia, you know."

  "I know."

  "What he wants is plenty of fresh air and no cigars, and aregular course of those Larsen Exercises that amused you somuch."

  Joan laughed.

  "Are you going to try and persuade Mr. Peters to twist himselfabout like that? Do let me see it if you do."

  "I wish I could."

  "Do suggest it to him."

  "Don't you think he would resent it f
rom a valet?"

  "I keep forgetting that you are a valet. You look so unlike one."

  "Old Peters didn't think so. He rather complimented me on myappearance. He said I was ordinary-looking."

  "I shouldn't have called you that. You look so very strong andfit."

  "Surely there are muscular valets?"

  "Well, yes; I suppose there are."

  Ashe looked at her. He was thinking that never in his life had heseen a girl so amazingly pretty. What it was that she had done toherself was beyond him; but something, some trick of dress, hadgiven her a touch of the demure that made her irresistible. Shewas dressed in sober black, the ideal background for herfairness.

  "While on the subject," he said, "I suppose you know you don'tlook in the least like a lady's maid? You look like a disguisedprincess."

  She laughed.

  "That's very nice of you, Mr. Marson, but you're quite wrong.Anyone could tell I was a lady's maid, a mile away. You aren'tcriticizing the dress, surely?"

  "The dress is all right. It's the general effect. I don't thinkyour expression is right. It's--it's--there's too much attack init. You aren't meek enough."

  Joan's eyes opened wide.

  "Meek! Have you ever seen an English lady's maid, Mr. Marson?"

  "Why, no; now that I come to think of it, I don't believe Ihave."

  "Well, let me tell you that meekness is her last quality. Whyshould she be meek? Doesn't she go in after the groom of thechambers?"

  "Go in? Go in where?"

  "In to dinner." She smiled at the sight of his bewildered face."I'm afraid you don't know much about the etiquette of the newworld you have entered so rashly. Didn't you know that the rulesof precedence among the servants of a big house in England aremore rigid and complicated than in English society?"

  "You're joking!"

  "I'm not joking. You try going in to dinner out of your properplace when we get to Blandings and see what happens. A publicrebuke from the butler is the least you could expect."

  A bead of perspiration appeared on Ashe's forehead.

  "Heavens!" he whispered. "If a butler publicly rebuked me I thinkI should commit suicide. I couldn't survive it."

  He stared, with fallen jaw, into the abyss of horror into whichhe had leaped so light-heartedly. The servant problem, on thislarge scale, had been nonexistent for him until now. In the daysof his youth, at Mayling, Massachusetts, his needs had beenministered to by a muscular Swede. Later, at Oxford, there hadbeen his "scout" and his bed maker, harmless persons both,provided you locked up your whisky. And in London, his lastphase, a succession of servitors of the type of the disheveledmaid at Number Seven had tended him.

  That, dotted about the land of his adoption, there were houses inwhich larger staffs of domestics were maintained, he had beenvaguely aware. Indeed, in "Gridley Quayle, Investigator; theAdventure of the Missing Marquis"--number four of the series--hehad drawn a picture of the home life of a duke, in which a butlerand two powdered footmen had played their parts; but he had hadno idea that rigid and complicated rules of etiquette swayed theprivate lives of these individuals. If he had given the matter athought he had supposed that when the dinner hour arrived thebutler and the two footmen would troop into the kitchen andsquash in at the table wherever they found room.

  "Tell me," he said. "Tell me all you know. I feel as though I hadescaped a frightful disaster."

  "You probably have. I don't suppose there is anything so terribleas a snub from a butler."

  "If there is I can't think of it. When I was at Oxford I used togo and stay with a friend of mine who had a butler that lookedlike a Roman emperor in swallowtails. He terrified me. I used togrovel to the man. Please give me all the pointers you can."

  "Well, as Mr. Peters' valet, I suppose you will be rather a bigman."

  "I shan't feel it."

  "However large the house party is, Mr. Peters is sure to be theprincipal guest; so your standing will be correspondinglymagnificent. You come after the butler, the housekeeper, thegroom of the chambers, Lord Emsworth's valet, Lady AnnWarblington's lady's maid--"

  "Who is she?"

  "Lady Ann? Lord Emsworth's sister. She has lived with him sincehis wife died. What was I saying? Oh, yes! After them come thehonorable Frederick Threepwood's valet and myself--and then you."

  "I'm not so high up then, after all?"

  "Yes, you are. There's a whole crowd who come after you. It alldepends on how many other guests there are besides Mr. Peters."

  "I suppose I charge in at the head of a drove of housemaids andscullery maids?"

  "My dear Mr. Marson, if a housemaid or a scullery maid tried toget into the steward's room and have her meals with us, she wouldbe--"

  "Rebuked by the butler?"

  "Lynched, I should think. Kitchen maids and scullery maids eat inthe kitchen. Chauffeurs, footmen, under-butler, pantry boys, hallboy, odd man and steward's-room footman take their meals in theservants' hall, waited on by the hall boy. The stillroom maidshave breakfast and tea in the stillroom, and dinner and supper inthe hall. The housemaids and nursery maids have breakfast and teain the housemaid's sitting-room, and dinner and supper in thehall. The head housemaid ranks next to the head stillroom maid.The laundry maids have a place of their own near the laundry, andthe head laundry maid ranks above the head housemaid. The chefhas his meals in a room of his own near the kitchen. Is thereanything else I can tell you, Mr. Marson?"

  Ashe was staring at her with vacant eyes. He shook his headdumbly.

  "We stop at Swindon in half an hour," said Joan softly. "Don'tyou think you would be wise to get out there and go straight backto London, Mr. Marson? Think of all you would avoid!"

  Ashe found speech.

  "It's a nightmare!"

  "You would be far happier in Arundell Street. Why don't you getout at Swindon and go back?"

  Ashe shook his head.

  "I can't. There's--there's a reason."

  Joan picked up her magazine again. Hostility had come out fromthe corner into which she had tucked it away and was once morefilling her mind. She knew it was illogical, but she could nothelp it. For a moment, during her revelations of servants'etiquette, she had allowed herself to hope that she hadfrightened her rival out of the field, and the disappointmentmade her feel irritable. She buried herself in a short story, andcountered Ashe's attempts at renewing the conversation with coldmonosyllables, until he ceased his efforts and fell into a moodysilence.

  He was feeling hurt and angry. Her sudden coldness, following onthe friendliness with which she had talked so long, puzzled andinfuriated him. He felt as though he had been snubbed, and for noreason.

  He resented the defensive magazine, though he had bought it forher himself. He resented her attitude of having ceased torecognize his existence. A sadness, a filmy melancholy, creptover him. He brooded on the unutterable silliness of humanity,especially the female portion of it, in erecting artificialbarriers to friendship. It was so unreasonable.

  At their first meeting, when she might have been excused forshowing defensiveness, she had treated him with unaffected ease.When that meeting had ended there was a tacit understandingbetween them that all the preliminary awkwardnesses of the firststages of acquaintanceship were to be considered as having beenpassed; and that when they met again, if they ever did, it wouldbe as friends. And here she was, luring him on with apparentfriendliness, and then withdrawing into herself as though he hadpresumed.

  A rebellious spirit took possession of him. He didn't care! Lether be cold and distant. He would show her that she had nomonopoly of those qualities. He would not speak to her until shespoke to him; and when she spoke to him he would freeze her withhis courteous but bleakly aloof indifference.

  The train rattled on. Joan read her magazine. Silence reigned inthe second-class compartment. Swindon was reached and passed.Darkness fell on the land. The journey began to seem interminableto Ashe; but presently there came a creaking of brakes and thetrain jerked itself to another stop. A voice o
n the platform madeitself heard, calling:

  "Market Blandings! Market Blandings Station!"

  * * *

  The village of Market Blandings is one of those sleepy Englishhamlets that modern progress has failed to touch; except by theaddition of a railroad station and a room over the grocer's shopwhere moving pictures are on view on Tuesdays and Fridays. Thechurch is Norman and the intelligence of the majority of thenatives Paleozoic. To alight at Market Blandings Station in thedusk of a rather chilly Spring day, when the southwest wind hasshifted to due east and the thrifty inhabitants have not yet littheir windows, is to be smitten with the feeling that one is atthe edge of the world with no friends near.

  Ashe, as he stood beside Mr. Peters' baggage and raked theunsympathetic darkness with a dreary eye, gave himself up tomelancholy. Above him an oil lamp shed a meager light. Along theplatform a small but sturdy porter was juggling with a milk can.The east wind explored Ashe's system with chilly fingers.

  Somewhere out in the darkness into which Mr. Peters and Aline hadalready vanished in a large automobile, lay the castle, with itsbutler and its fearful code of etiquette. Soon the cart that wasto convey him and the trunks thither would be arriving. Heshivered.

  Out of the gloom and into the feeble rays of the oil lamp cameJoan Valentine. She had been away, tucking Aline into the car.She looked warm and cheerful. She was smiling in the old friendlyway.

  If girls realized their responsibilities they would be so carefulwhen they smiled that they would probably abandon the practicealtogether. There are moments in a man's life when a girl's smilecan have as important results as an explosion of dynamite.

  In the course of their brief acquaintance Joan had smiled at Ashemany times, but the conditions governing those occasions had notbeen such as to permit him to be seriously affected. He had beenpleased on such occasions; he had admired her smile in a detachedand critical spirit; but he had not been overwhelmed by it. Theframe of mind necessary for that result had been lacking.

  Now, however, after five minutes of solitude on the depressingplatform of Market Blandings Station, he was what thespiritualists call a sensitive subject. He had reached that depthof gloom and bodily discomfort when a sudden smile has all theeffect of strong liquor and good news administeredsimultaneously, warming the blood and comforting the soul, andgenerally turning the world from a bleak desert into a landflowing with milk and honey.

  It is not too much to say that he reeled before Joan's smile. Itwas so entirely unexpected. He clutched Mr. Peters' steamer trunkin his emotion. All his resolutions to be cold and distant wereswept away. He had the feeling that in a friendless universe herewas somebody who was fond of him and glad to see him.

  A smile of such importance demands analysis, and in this caserepays it; for many things lay behind this smile of JoanValentine's on the platform of Market Blandings Station.

  In the first place, she had had another of her swift changes ofmood, and had once again tucked away hostility into its corner.She had thought it over and had come to the conclusion that asshe had no logical grievance against Ashe for anything he haddone to be distant to him was the behavior of a cat. Consequentlyshe resolved, when they should meet again, to resume her attitudeof good-fellowship. That in itself would have been enough to makeher smile.

  There was another reason, however, which had nothing to do withAshe. While she had been tucking Aline into the automobile shemet the eye of the driver of that vehicle and had perceived acurious look in it--a look of amazement and sheer terror. Amoment, later, when Aline called the driver Freddie, she hadunderstood. No wonder the Honorable Freddie had looked as thoughhe had seen a ghost.

  It would be a relief to the poor fellow when, as he undoubtedlywould do in the course of the drive, he inquired of Aline thename of her maid and was told that it was Simpson. He wouldmutter something about "Reminds me of a girl I used to know," andwould brood on the remarkable way in which Nature producesdoubles. But he had a bad moment, and it was partly at therecollection of his face that Joan smiled.

  A third reason was because the sight of the Honorable Freddie hadreminded her that R. Jones had said he had written her poetry.That thought, too, had contributed toward the smile which sodazzled Ashe.

  Ashe, not being miraculously intuitive, accepted the easierexplanation that she smiled because she was glad to be in hiscompany; and this thought, coming on top of his mood of despairand general dissatisfaction with everything mundane, acted on himlike some powerful chemical.

  In every man's life there is generally one moment to which inlater years he can look back and say: "In this moment I fell inlove!" Such a moment came to Ashe now.

  Betwixt the stirrup and the ground, Mercy I asked; mercy I found.

  So sings the poet and so it was with Ashe.

  In the almost incredibly brief time it took the small but sturdyporter to roll a milk can across the platform and hump it, with aclang, against other milk cans similarly treated a moment before,Ashe fell in love.

  The word is so loosely used, to cover a thousand varying shadesof emotion--from the volcanic passion of an Antony for aCleopatra to the tepid preference of a grocer's assistant for theIrish maid at the second house on Main Street, as opposed to theNorwegian maid at the first house past the post office--the merestatement that Ashe fell in love is not a sufficient descriptionof his feelings as he stood grasping Mr. Peters' steamer trunk.Analysis is required.

  From his fourteenth year onward Ashe had been in love many times.His sensations in the case of Joan were neither the terrificupheaval that had caused him, in his fifteenth year, to collecttwenty-eight photographs of the heroine of the road company of amusical comedy which had visited the Hayling Opera House, nor themilder flame that had caused him, when at college, to give upsmoking for a week and try to read the complete works of EllaWheeler Wilcox.

  His love was something that lay between these two poles.

  He did not wish the station platform of Market Blandings tobecome suddenly congested with red Indians so that he might saveJoan's life; and he did not wish to give up anything at all. Buthe was conscious--to the very depths of his being--that a futurein which Joan did not figure would be so insupportable as not tobear considering; and in the immediate present he very stronglyfavored the idea of clasping Joan in his arms and kissing heruntil further notice.

  Mingled with these feelings was an excited gratitude to her forcoming to him like this, with that electric smile on her face; astunned realization that she was a thousand times prettier thanhe had ever imagined; and a humility that threatened to make himloose his clutch on the steamer trunk and roll about at her feet,yapping like a dog.

  Gratitude, so far as he could dissect his tangled emotion was thepredominating ingredient of his mood. Only once in his life hadhe felt so passionately grateful to any human being. On thatoccasion, too, the object of his gratitude had been feminine.

  Years before, when a boy in his father's home in distant Hayling,Massachusetts, those in authority had commanded that he--in hiseleventh year and as shy as one can be only at that interestingage--should rise in the presence of a roomful of strangers, adultguests, and recite "The Wreck of the Hesperus."

  He had risen. He had blushed. He had stammered. He had contrivedto whisper: "It was the Schooner Hesperus." And then, in a cornerof the room, a little girl, for no properly explained reason, hadburst out crying. She had yelled, she had bellowed, and would notbe comforted; and in the ensuing confusion Ashe had escaped tothe woodpile at the bottom of the garden, saved by a miracle.

  All his life he had remembered the gratitude he had felt for thatlittle timely girl, and never until now had he experienced anyother similar spasm. But as he looked at Joan he found himselfrenewing that emotion of fifteen years ago.

  She was about to speak. In a sort of trance he watched her lipspart. He waited almost reverently for the first words she shouldspeak to him in her new role of the only authentic goddess.

  "
Isn't it a shame?" she said. "I've just put a penny in thechocolate slot machine--and it's empty! I've a good mind to writeto the company."

  Ashe felt as though he were listening to the strains of somegrand sweet anthem.

  The small but sturdy porter, weary of his work among the milkcans, or perhaps--let us not do him an injustice even inthought--having finished it, approached them.

  "The cart from the castle's here."

  In the gloom beyond him there gleamed a light which had not beenthere before. The meditative snort of a horse supported hisstatement. He began to deal as authoritatively with Mr. Peters'steamer trunk as he had dealt with the milk cans.

  "At last!" said Joan. "I hope it's a covered cart. I'm frozen.Let's go and see."

  Ashe followed her with the gait of an automaton.

  * * *

  Cold is the ogre that drives all beautiful things into hiding.Below the surface of a frost-bound garden there lurk hiddenbulbs, which are only biding their time to burst forth in a riotof laughing color; but shivering Nature dare not put forth herflowers until the ogre has gone. Not otherwise does cold suppresslove. A man in an open cart on an English Spring night maycontinue to be in love; but love is not the emotion uppermost inhis bosom. It shrinks within him and waits for better times.

  The cart was not a covered cart. It was open to the four winds ofheaven, of which the one at present active proceeded from thebleak east. To this fact may be attributed Ashe's swift recoveryfrom the exalted mood into which Joan's smile had thrown him, hisalmost instant emergence from the trance. Deep down in him he wasaware that his attitude toward Joan had not changed, but hisconscious self was too fully occupied with the almost hopelesstask of keeping his blood circulating, to permit of thoughts oflove. Before the cart had traveled twenty yards he was a merechunk of frozen misery.

  After an eternity of winding roads, darkened cottages, and blackfields and hedges, the cart turned in at a massive iron gate,which stood open giving entrance to a smooth gravel drive. Herethe way ran for nearly a mile through an open park of great treesand was then swallowed in the darkness of dense shrubberies.Presently to the left appeared lights, at first in ones and twos,shining out and vanishing again; then, as the shrubberies endedand the smooth lawns and terraces began, blazing down on thetravelers from a score of windows, with the heartening effect offires on a winter night.

  Against the pale gray sky Blandings Castle stood out like amountain. It was a noble pile, of Early Tudor building. Itshistory is recorded in England's history books and Viollet-le-Duchas written of its architecture. It dominated the surroundingcountry.

  The feature of it which impressed Ashe most at this moment,however, was the fact that it looked warm; and for the first timesince the drive began he found himself in a mood thatapproximated cheerfulness. It was a little early to begin feelingcheerful, he discovered, for the journey was by no means over.Arrived within sight of the castle, the cart began a detour,which, ten minutes later, brought it under an arch and overcobblestones to the rear of the building, where it eventuallypulled up in front of a great door.

  Ashe descended painfully and beat his feet against the cobbles.He helped Joan to climb down. Joan was apparently in a gentleglow. Women seem impervious to cold.

  The door opened. Warm, kitcheny scents came through it. Strongmen hurried out to take down the trunks, while fair women, in theshape of two nervous scullery maids, approached Joan and Ashe,and bobbed curtsies. This under more normal conditions would havebeen enough to unman Ashe; but in his frozen state a merecurtsying scullery maid expended herself harmlessly on him. Heeven acknowledged the greeting with a kindly nod.

  The scullery maids, it seemed, were acting in much the samecapacity as the attaches of royalty. One was there to conductJoan to the presence of Mrs. Twemlow, the housekeeper; the otherto lead Ashe to where Beach, the butler, waited to do honor tothe valet of the castle's most important guest.

  After a short walk down a stone-flagged passage Joan and herescort turned to the right. Ashe's objective appeared to belocated to the left. He parted from Joan with regret. Her moralsupport would have been welcome.

  Presently his scullery maid stopped at a door and tapped thereon.A fruity voice, like old tawny port made audible, said: "Comein!" Ashe's guide opened the door.

  "The gentleman, Mr. Beach," said she, and scuttled away to theless rarefied atmosphere of the kitchen.

  Ashe's first impression of Beach, the butler, was one of tension.Other people, confronted for the first time with Beach, had feltthe same. He had that strained air of being on the very point ofbursting that one sees in bullfrogs and toy balloons. Nervous andimaginative men, meeting Beach, braced themselves involuntarily,stiffening their muscles for the explosion. Those who had thepleasure of more intimate acquaintance with him soon passed thisstage, just as people whose homes are on the slopes of MountVesuvius become immune to fear of eruptions.

  As far back as they could remember Beach had always looked asthough an apoplectic fit were a matter of minutes; but he neverhad apoplexy and in time they came to ignore the possibility ofit. Ashe, however, approaching him with a fresh eye, had thefeeling that this strain could not possibly continue and thatwithin a very short space of time the worst must happen. Theprospect of this did much to rouse him from the coma into whichhe had been frozen by the rigors of the journey.

  Butlers as a class seem to grow less and less like anything humanin proportion to the magnificence of their surroundings. There isa type of butler employed in the comparatively modest homes ofsmall country gentlemen who is practically a man and a brother;who hobnobs with the local tradesmen, sings a good comic song atthe village inn, and in times of crisis will even turn to andwork the pump when the water supply suddenly fails.

  The greater the house the more does the butler diverge from thistype. Blandings Castle was one of the more important of England'sshow places, and Beach accordingly had acquired a dignifiedinertia that almost qualified him for inclusion in the vegetablekingdom. He moved--when he moved at all--slowly. He distilledspeech with the air of one measuring out drops of some preciousdrug. His heavy-lidded eyes had the fixed expression of astatue's.

  With an almost imperceptible wave of a fat white hand, heconveyed to Ashe that he desired him to sit down. With a statelymovement of his other hand, he picked up a kettle, which simmeredon the hob. With an inclination of his head, he called Ashe'sattention to a decanter on the table.

  In another moment Ashe was sipping a whisky toddy, with thefeeling that he had been privileged to assist at some mysticrite. Mr. Beach, posting himself before the fire and placing hishands behind his back, permitted speech to drip from him.

  "I have not the advantage of your name, Mr.----"

  Ashe introduced himself. Beach acknowledged the information witha half bow.

  "You must have had a cold ride, Mr. Marson. The wind is in theeast."

  Ashe said yes; the ride had been cold.

  "When the wind is in the east," continued Mr. Beach, letting eachsyllable escape with apparent reluctance, "I suffer from myfeet."

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "I suffer from my feet," repeated the butler, measuring out thedrops. "You are a young man, Mr. Marson. Probably you do not knowwhat it is to suffer from your feet." He surveyed Ashe, hiswhisky toddy and the wall beyond him, with heavy-liddedinscrutability. "Corns!" he said.

  Ashe said he was sorry.

  "I suffer extremely from my feet--not only corns. I have butrecently recovered from an ingrowing toenail. I suffered greatlyfrom my ingrowing toenail. I suffer from swollen joints."

  Ashe regarded this martyr with increasing disfavor. It is theflaw in the character of many excessively healthy young men that,though kind-hearted enough in most respects, they listen with aregrettable feeling of impatience to the confessions of thoseless happily situated as regards the ills of the flesh. Rightlyor wrongly, they hold that these statements should be reservedfor the ear of the medical profession, and other and mor
e generaltopics selected for conversation with laymen.

  "I'm sorry," he said hastily. "You must have had a bad time. Isthere a large house party here just now?"

  "We are expecting," said Mr. Beach, "a number of guests. We shallin all probability sit down thirty or more to dinner."

  "A responsibility for you," said Ashe ingratiatingly, wellpleased to be quit of the feet topic.

  Mr. Beach nodded.

  "You are right, Mr. Marson. Few persons realize theresponsibilities of a man in my position. Sometimes, I can assureyou, it preys on my mind, and I suffer from nervous headaches."

  Ashe began to feel like a man trying to put out a fire which, asfast as he checks it at one point, breaks out at another.

  "Sometimes when I come off duty everything gets blurred. Theoutlines of objects grow indistinct and misty. I have to sit downin a chair. The pain is excruciating."

  "But it helps you to forget the pain in your feet."

  "No, no. I suffer from my feet simultaneously."

  Ashe gave up the struggle.

  "Tell me all about your feet," he said.

  And Mr. Beach told him all about his feet.

  The pleasantest functions must come to an end, and the momentarrived when the final word on the subject of swollen joints wasspoken. Ashe, who had resigned himself to a permanentcontemplation of the subject, could hardly believe he heardcorrectly when, at the end of some ten minutes, his companionchanged the conversation.

  "You have been with Mr. Peters some time, Mr. Marson?"

  "Eh? Oh! Oh, no only since last Wednesday."

  "Indeed! Might I inquire whom you assisted before that?"

  For a moment Ashe did what he would not have believed himselfcapable of doing--regretted that the topic of feet was no longerunder discussion. The question placed him in an awkward position.If he lied and credited himself with a lengthy experience as avalet, he risked exposing himself. If he told the truth andconfessed that this was his maiden effort in the capacity ofgentleman's gentleman, what would the butler think? There wereobjections to each course, but to tell the truth was the easierof the two; so he told it.

  "Your first situation?" said Mr. Beach. "Indeed!"

  "I was--er--doing something else before I met Mr. Peters," saidAshe.

  Mr. Beach was too well-bred to be inquisitive, but his eyebrowswere not.

  "Ah!" he said. "?" cried his eyebrows. "?--?--?"

  Ashe ignored the eyebrows.

  "Something different," he said.

  There was an awkward silence. Ashe appreciated its awkwardness.He was conscious of a grievance against Mr. Peters. Why could notMr. Peters have brought him down here as his secretary? To besure, he had advanced some objection to that course in theirconversation at the offices of Mainprice, Mainprice & Boole; butmerely a silly, far-fetched objection. He wished he had had thesense to fight the point while there was time; but at the momentwhen they were arranging plans he had been rather tickled by thethought of becoming a valet. The notion had a pleasingmusical-comedy touch about it. Why had he not foreseen thecomplications that must ensue? He could tell by the look on hisface that this confounded butler was waiting for him to give afull explanation. What would he think if he withheld it? He wouldprobably suppose that Ashe had been in prison.

  Well, there was nothing to be done about it. If Beach wassuspicious, he must remain suspicious. Fortunately the suspicionsof a butler do not matter much.

  Mr. Beach's eyebrows were still mutely urging him to reveal all,but Ashe directed his gaze at that portion of the room which Mr.Beach did not fill. He would be hanged if he was going to lethimself be hypnotized by a pair of eyebrows into incriminatinghimself! He glared stolidly at the pattern of the wallpaper,which represented a number of birds of an unknown species seatedon a corresponding number of exotic shrubs.

  The silence was growing oppressive. Somebody had to break itsoon. And as Mr. Beach was still confining himself to thelanguage of the eyebrow and apparently intended to fight it outon that line if it took all Summer, Ashe himself broke it.

  It seemed to him as he reconstructed the scene in bed that nightthat Providence must have suggested the subject to Mr. Peters'indigestion; for the mere mention of his employer's sufferingsacted like magic on the butler.

  "I might have had better luck while I was looking for a place,"said Ashe. "I dare say you know how bad-tempered Mr. Peters is.He is dyspeptic."

  "So," responded Mr. Beach, "I have been informed." He brooded fora space. "I, too," he proceeded, "suffer from my stomach. I havea weak stomach. The lining of my stomach is not what I could wishthe lining of my stomach to be."

  "Tell me," said Ashe gratefully, leaning forward in an attitudeof attention, "all about the lining of your stomach."

  It was a quarter of an hour later when Mr. Beach was checked inhis discourse by the chiming of the little clock on themantelpiece. He turned round and gazed at it with surprise notunmixed with displeasure.

  "So late?" he said. "I shall have to be going about my duties.And you, also, Mr. Marson, if I may make the suggestion. No doubtMr. Peters will be wishing to have your assistance in preparingfor dinner. If you go along the passage outside you will come tothe door that separates our portion of the house from the other.I must beg you to excuse me. I have to go to the cellar."

  Following his directions Ashe came after a walk of a few yards toa green-baize door, which, swinging at his push, gave him a viewof what he correctly took to be the main hall of the castle--awide, comfortable space, ringed with settees and warmed by a logfire burning in a mammoth fireplace. On the right a broadstaircase led to the upper regions.

  It was at this point that Ashe realized the incompleteness of Mr.Beach's directions. Doubtless, the broad staircase would take himto the floor on which were the bedrooms; but how was he toascertain, without the tedious process of knocking and inquiringat each door, which was the one assigned to Mr. Peters? It wastoo late to go back and ask the butler for further guidance;already he was on his way to the cellar in quest of the evening'swine.

  As he stood irresolute a door across the hall opened and a man ofhis own age came out. Through the doorway, which the young manheld open for an instant while he answered a question fromsomebody within, Ashe had a glimpse of glass-topped cases.

  Could this be the museum--his goal? The next moment the door,opening a few inches more, revealed the outlying portions of anEgyptian mummy and brought certainty. It flashed across Ashe'smind that the sooner he explored the museum and located Mr.Peters' scarab, the better. He decided to ask Beach to take himthere as soon as he had leisure.

  Meantime the young man had closed the museum door and wascrossing the hall. He was a wiry-haired, severe-looking youngman, with a sharp nose and eyes that gleamed through rimlessspectacles--none other, in fact than Lord Emsworth's privatesecretary, the Efficient Baxter. Ashe hailed him:

  "I say, old man, would you mind telling me how I get to Mr.Peters' room? I've lost my bearings."

  He did not reflect that this was hardly the way in which valetsin the best society addressed their superiors. That is the worstof adopting what might be called a character part. One can managethe business well enough; it is the dialogue that provides thepitfalls.

  Mr. Baxter would have accorded a hearty agreement to thestatement that this was not the way in which a valet should havespoken to him; but at the moment he was not aware that Ashe was avalet. From his easy mode of address he assumed that he was oneof the numerous guests who had been arriving at the castle allday. As he had asked for Mr. Peters, he fancied that Ashe must bethe Honorable Freddie's American friend, George Emerson, whom hehad not yet met. Consequently he replied with much cordialitythat Mr. Peters' room was the second at the left on the secondfloor.

  He said Ashe could not miss it. Ashe said he was much obliged.

  "Awfully good of you," said Ashe.

  "Not at all," said Mr. Baxter.

  "You lose your way in a place like this," said Ashe.

  "You certainly do," s
aid Mr. Baxter.

  Ashe went on his upward path and in a few moments was knocking atthe door indicated. And sure enough it was Mr. Peters' voice thatinvited him to enter.

  Mr. Peters, partially arrayed in the correct garb for gentlemenabout to dine, was standing in front of the mirror, wrestlingwith his evening tie. As Ashe entered he removed his fingers andanxiously examined his handiwork. It proved unsatisfactory. Witha yelp and an oath, he tore the offending linen from his neck.

  "Damn the thing!"

  It was plain to Ashe that his employer was in no sunny mood.There are few things less calculated to engender sunniness in anaturally bad-tempered man than a dress tie that will not letitself be pulled and twisted into the right shape. Even whenthings went well, Mr. Peters hated dressing for dinner. Wordscannot describe his feelings when they went wrong.

  There is something to be said in excuse for this impatience: Itis a hollow mockery to be obliged to deck one's person as for afeast when that feast is to consist of a little asparagus and afew nuts.

  Mr. Peters' eye met Ashe's in the mirror.

  "Oh, it's you, is it? Come in, then. Don't stand staring. Closethat door quick! Hustle! Don't scrape your feet on the floor.Try to look intelligent. Don't gape. Where have you been all thiswhile? Why didn't you come before? Can you tie a tie? All right,then--do it!"

  Somewhat calmed by the snow-white butterfly-shaped creation thatgrew under Ashe's fingers, he permitted himself to be helped intohis coat. He picked up the remnant of a black cigar from thedressing-table and relit it.

  "I've been thinking about you," he said.

  "Yes?" said Ashe.

  "Have you located the scarab yet?"

  "No."

  "What the devil have you been doing with yourself then? You'vehad time to collar it a dozen times."

  "I have been talking to the butler."

  "What the devil do you waste time talking to butlers for? Isuppose you haven't even located the museum yet?"

  "Yes; I've done that."

  "Oh, you have, have you? Well, that's something. And how do youpropose setting about the job?"

  "The best plan would be to go there very late at night."

  "Well, you didn't propose to stroll in in the afternoon, did you?How are you going to find the scarab when you do get in?"

  Ashe had not thought of that. The deeper he went into thisbusiness the more things did there seem to be in it of which hehad not thought.

  "I don't know," he confessed.

  "You don't know! Tell me, young man, are you considered prettybright, as Englishmen go?"

  "I am not English. I was born near Boston."

  "Oh, you were, were you? You blanked bone-headed, bean-eatingboob!" cried Mr. Peters, frothing over quite unexpectedly andwaving his arms in a sudden burst of fury. "Then if you are anAmerican why don't you show a little more enterprise? Why don'tyou put something over? Why do you loaf about the place as thoughyou were supposed to be an ornament? I want results--and I wantthem quick!

  "I'll tell you how you can recognize my scarab when you get intothe museum. That shameless old green-goods man who sneaked itfrom me has had the gall, the nerve, to put it all by itself,with a notice as big as a circus poster alongside of it sayingthat it is a Cheops of the Fourth Dynasty, presented"--Mr. Peterschoked--"presented by J. Preston Peters, Esquire! That's howyou're going to recognize it."

  Ashe did not laugh, but he nearly dislocated a rib in his effortto abstain from doing so. It seemed to him that this act on LordEmsworth's part effectually disposed of the theory that Britonshave no sense of humor. To rob a man of his choicest possessionand then thank him publicly for letting you have it appealed toAshe as excellent comedy.

  "The thing isn't even in a glass case," continued Mr. Peters."It's lying on an open tray on top of a cabinet of Roman coins.Anybody who was left alone for two minutes in the place couldtake it! It's criminal carelessness to leave a valuable scarababout like that. If Lord Jesse James was going to steal my Cheopshe might at least have had the decency to treat it as though itwas worth something."

  "But it makes it easier for me to get it," said Ashe consolingly.

  "It's got to be made easy if you are to get it!" snapped Mr.Peters. "Here's another thing: You say you are going to try forit late at night. Well, what are you going to do if anyonecatches you prowling round at that time? Have you consideredthat?"

  "No."

  "You would have to say something, wouldn't you? You wouldn't chatabout the weather, would you? You wouldn't discuss the latestplay? You would have to think up some mighty good reason forbeing out of bed at that time, wouldn't you?"

  "I suppose so."

  "Oh, you do admit that, do you? Well, what you would say is this:You would explain that I had rung for you to come and read me tosleep. Do you understand?"

  "You think that would be a satisfactory explanation of my beingin the museum?"

  "Idiot! I don't mean that you're to say it if you're caughtactually in the museum. If you're caught in the museum the bestthing you can do is to say nothing, and hope that the judge willlet you off light because it's your first offense. You're to sayit if you're found wandering about on your way there."

  "It sounds thin to me."

  "Does it? Well, let me tell you that it isn't so thin as yousuppose, for it's what you will actually have to do most nights.Two nights out of three I have to be read to sleep. Myindigestion gives me insomnia." As though to push this fact home,Mr. Peters suddenly bent double. "Oof!" he said. "Wow!" Heremoved the cigar from his mouth and inserted a digestivetabloid. "The lining of my stomach is all wrong," he added.

  It is curious how trivial are the immediate causes that producerevolutions. If Mr. Peters had worded his complaint differentlyAshe would in all probability have borne it without activeprotest. He had been growing more and more annoyed with thislittle person who buzzed and barked and bit at him, yet the ideaof definite revolt had not occurred to him. But his sufferings atthe hands of Beach, the butler, had reduced him to a state wherehe could endure no further mention of stomachic linings. Therecomes a time when our capacity for listening to detailed dataabout the linings of other people's stomachs is exhausted.

  He looked at Mr. Peters sternly. He had ceased to be intimidatedby the fiery little man and regarded him simply as ahypochondriac, who needed to be told a few useful facts.

  "How do you expect not to have indigestion? You take no exerciseand you smoke all day long."

  The novel sensation of being criticized--and by a beardless youthat that--held Mr. Peters silent. He started convulsively, but hedid not speak. Ashe, on his pet subject, became eloquent. In hisopinion dyspeptics cumbered the earth. To his mind they had thechoice between health and sickness, and they deliberately chosethe latter.

  "Your sort of man makes me angry. I know your type inside out.You overwork and shirk exercise, and let your temper run awaywith you, and smoke strong cigars on an empty stomach; and whenyou get indigestion as a natural result you look on yourself as amartyr, nourish a perpetual grouch, and make the lives ofeverybody you meet miserable. If you would put yourself into myhands for a month I would have you eating bricks and thriving onthem. Up in the morning, Larsen Exercises, cold bath, a briskrubdown, sharp walk--"

  "Who the devil asked your opinion, you impertinent young hound?"inquired Mr. Peters.

  "Don't interrupt--confound you!" shouted Ashe. "Now you have mademe forget what I was going to say."

  There was a tense silence. Then Mr. Peters began to speak:

  "You--infernal--impudent--"

  "Don't talk to me like that!"

  "I'll talk to you just--"

  Ashe took a step toward the door. "Very well, then," he said."I'll quit! I'm through! You can get somebody else to do this jobof yours for you."

  The sudden sagging of Mr. Peters' jaw, the look of consternationthat flashed on his face, told Ashe he had found the rightweapon--that the game was in his hands. He continued with afeeling of confidence:

  "If I had
known what being your valet involved I wouldn't haveundertaken the thing for a hundred thousand dollars. Just becauseyou had some idiotic prejudice against letting me come down hereas your secretary, which would have been the simple and obviousthing, I find myself in a position where at any moment I may bepublicly rebuked by the butler and have the head stillroom maidlooking at me as though I were something the cat had brought in."

  His voice trembled with self-pity.

  "Do you realize a fraction of the awful things you have let me infor? How on earth am I to remember whether I go in before thechef or after the third footman? I shan't have a peaceful minutewhile I'm in this place. I've got to sit and listen by the hourto a bore of a butler who seems to be a sort of walking hospital.I've got to steer my way through a complicated system ofetiquette.

  "And on top of all that you have the nerve, the insolence, toimagine that you can use me as a punching bag to work your badtemper off! You have the immortal rind to suppose that I willstand for being nagged and bullied by you whenever your suicidalway of living brings on an attack of indigestion! You have thesupreme gall to fancy that you can talk as you please to me!

  "Very well! I've had enough of it. I resign! If you want thisscarab of yours recovered let somebody else do it. I've retiredfrom business."

  He took another step toward the door. A shaking hand clutched athis sleeve.

  "My boy--my dear boy--be reasonable!"

  Ashe was intoxicated with his own oratory. The sensation ofbullyragging a genuine millionaire was new and exhilarating. Heexpanded his chest and spread his feet like a colossus.

  "That's all very well," he said, coldly disentangling himselffrom the hand. "You can't get out of it like that. We have got tocome to an understanding. The point is that if I am to besubjected to your--your senile malevolence every time you have atwinge of indigestion, no amount of money could pay me to stopon."

  "My dear boy, it shall not occur again. I was hasty."

  Mr. Peters, with agitated fingers, relit the stump of his cigar.

  "Throw away that cigar!"

  "My boy!"

  "Throw it away! You say you were hasty. Of course you were hasty;and as long as you abuse your digestion you will go on beinghasty. I want something better than apologies. If I am to stophere we must get to the root of things. You must put yourself inmy hands as though I were your doctor. No more cigars. Everymorning regular exercises."

  "No, no!"

  "Very well!"

  "No; stop! Stop! What sort of exercises?"

  "I'll show you to-morrow morning. Brisk walks."

  "I hate walking."

  "Cold baths."

  "No, no!"

  "Very well!"

  "No; stop! A cold bath would kill me at my age."

  "It would put new life into you. Do you consent to the coldbaths? No? Very well!"

  "Yes, yes, yes!"

  "You promise?"

  "Yes, yes!"

  "All right, then."

  The distant sound of the dinner gong floated in.

  "We settled that just in time," said Ashe.

  Mr. Peters regarded him fixedly.

  "Young man," he said slowly, "if, after all this, you fail torecover my Cheops for me I'll--I'll--By George, I'll skin you!"

  "Don't talk like that," said Ashe. "That's another thing you havegot to remember. If my treatment is to be successful you must notlet yourself think in that way. You must exercise self-controlmentally. You must think beautiful thoughts."

  "The idea of skinning you is a beautiful thought!" said Mr.Peters wistfully.

  * * *

  In order that their gayety might not be diminished--and the foodturned to ashes in their mouths by the absence from the festiveboard of Mr. Beach, it was the custom for the upper servants atBlandings to postpone the start of their evening meal untildinner was nearly over above-stairs. This enabled the butler totake his place at the head of the table without fear ofinterruption, except for the few moments when coffee was beingserved.

  Every night shortly before half-past eight--at which hour Mr.Beach felt that he might safely withdraw from the dining-room andleave Lord Emsworth and his guests to the care of Merridew, theunder-butler, and James and Alfred, the footmen, returning onlyfor a few minutes to lend tone and distinction to thedistribution of cigars and liqueurs--those whose rank entitledthem to do so made their way to the housekeeper's room, to passin desultory conversation the interval before Mr. Beach shouldarrive, and a kitchen maid, with the appearance of one who hasbeen straining at the leash and has at last managed to get free,opened the door, with the announcement: "Mr. Beach, if you please,dinner is served." On which Mr. Beach, extending a crooked elbowtoward the housekeeper, would say, "Mrs. Twemlow!" and lead theway, high and disposedly, down the passage, followed in order ofrank by the rest of the company, in couples, to the steward'sroom.

  For Blandings was not one of those houses--or shall we sayhovels?--where the upper servants are expected not only to feedbut to congregate before feeding in the steward's room. Under theauspices of Mr. Beach and of Mrs. Twemlow, who saw eye to eyewith him in these matters, things were done properly at thecastle, with the correct solemnity. To Mr. Beach and Mrs. Twemlowthe suggestion that they and their peers should gather togetherin the same room in which they were to dine would have been asrepellent as an announcement from Lady Ann Warblington, thechatelaine, that the house party would eat in the drawing-room.

  When Ashe, returning from his interview with Mr. Peters, wasintercepted by a respectful small boy and conducted to thehousekeeper's room, he was conscious of a sensation of shrinkinginferiority akin to his emotions on his first day at school. Theroom was full and apparently on very cordial terms with itself.Everybody seemed to know everybody and conversation wasproceeding in a manner reminiscent of an Old Home Week.

  As a matter of fact, the house party at Blandings being in themain a gathering together of the Emsworth clan by way of honorand as a means of introduction to Mr. Peters and his daughter,the bride-of-the-house-to-be, most of the occupants of thehousekeeper's room were old acquaintances and were renewinginterrupted friendships at the top of their voices.

  A lull followed Ashe's arrival and all eyes, to his greatdiscomfort, were turned in his direction. His embarrassment wasrelieved by Mrs. Twemlow, who advanced to do the honors. Of Mrs.Twemlow little need be attempted in the way of pen portraiturebeyond the statement that she went as harmoniously with Mr.Beach as one of a pair of vases or one of a brace of pheasantsgoes with its fellow. She had the same appearance of imminentapoplexy, the same air of belonging to some dignified and haughtybranch of the vegetable kingdom.

  "Mr. Marson, welcome to Blandings Castle!"

  Ashe had been waiting for somebody to say this, and had been alittle surprised that Mr. Beach had not done so. He was alsosurprised at the housekeeper's ready recognition of his identity,until he saw Joan in the throng and deduced that she must havebeen the source of information.

  He envied Joan. In some amazing way she contrived to look not outof place in this gathering. He himself, he felt, had impostorstamped in large characters all over him.

  Mrs. Twemlow began to make the introductions--a long and tediousprocess, which she performed relentlessly, without haste andwithout scamping her work. With each member of the aristocracy ofhis new profession Ashe shook hands, and on each member hesmiled, until his facial and dorsal muscles were like to crackunder the strain. It was amazing that so many high-classdomestics could be collected into one moderate-sized room.

  "Miss Simpson you know," said Mrs. Twemlow, and Ashe was about todeny the charge when he perceived that Joan was the individualreferred to. "Mr. Judson, Mr. Marson. Mr. Judson is the HonorableFrederick's gentleman."

  "You have not the pleasure of our Freddie's acquaintance as yet,I take it, Mr. Marson?" observed Mr. Judson genially, asmooth-faced, lazy-looking young man. "Freddie repaysinspection."

  "Mr. Marson, permit me to introduce you to Mr. Ferris, LordStoc
kheath's gentleman."

  Mr. Ferris, a dark, cynical man, with a high forehead, shook Asheby the hand.

  "Happy to meet you, Mr. Marson."

  "Miss Willoughby, this is Mr. Marson, who will take you in todinner. Miss Willoughby is Lady Mildred Mant's lady. As of courseyou are aware, Lady Mildred, our eldest daughter, married ColonelHorace Mant, of the Scots Guards."

  Ashe was not aware, and he was rather surprised that Mrs. Twemlowshould have a daughter whose name was Lady Mildred; but reason,coming to his rescue, suggested that by our she meant theoffspring of the Earl of Emsworth and his late countess. MissWilloughby was a light-hearted damsel, with a smiling face andchestnut hair, done low over her forehead.

  Since etiquette forbade that he should take Joan in to dinner,Ashe was glad that at least an apparently pleasant substitute hadbeen provided. He had just been introduced to an appallinglystatuesque lady of the name of Chester, Lady Ann Warblington'sown maid, and his somewhat hazy recollections of Joan's lectureon below-stairs precedence had left him with the impression thatthis was his destined partner. He had frankly quailed at theprospect of being linked to so much aristocratic hauteur.

  When the final introduction had been made conversation broke outagain. It dealt almost exclusively, so far as Ashe could followit, with the idiosyncrasies of the employers of those present. Hetook it that this happened down the entire social scale belowstairs. Probably the lower servants in the servants' halldiscussed the upper servants in the room, and the still lowerservants in the housemaids' sitting-room discussed theirsuperiors of the servants' hall, and the stillroom gossiped aboutthe housemaids' sitting-room.

  He wondered which was the bottom circle of all, and came to theconclusion that it was probably represented by the smallrespectful boy who had acted as his guide a short while before.This boy, having nobody to discuss anybody with, presumably satin solitary meditation, brooding on the odd-job man.

  He thought of mentioning this theory to Miss Willoughby, butdecided that it was too abstruse for her, and contented himselfwith speaking of some of the plays he had seen before leavingLondon. Miss Willoughby was an enthusiast on the drama; and,Colonel Mant's military duties keeping him much in town, she hadhad wide opportunities of indulging her tastes. Miss Willoughbydid not like the country. She thought it dull.

  "Don't you think the country dull, Mr. Marson?"

  "I shan't find it dull here," said Ashe; and he was surprised todiscover, through the medium of a pleased giggle, that he wasconsidered to have perpetrated a compliment.

  Mr. Beach appeared in due season, a little distrait, as becomes aman who has just been engaged on important and responsibleduties.

  "Alfred spilled the hock!" Ashe heard him announce to Mrs.Twemlow in a bitter undertone. "Within half an inch of hislordship's arm he spilled it."

  Mrs. Twemlow murmured condolences. Mr. Beach's set expression wasof one who is wondering how long the strain of existence can besupported.

  "Mr. Beach, if you please, dinner is served."

  The butler crushed down sad thoughts and crooked his elbow.

  "Mrs. Twemlow!"

  Ashe, miscalculating degrees of rank in spite of all his caution,was within a step of leaving the room out of his proper turn; butthe startled pressure of Miss Willoughby's hand on his arm warnedhim in time. He stopped, to allow the statuesque Miss Chester tosail out under escort of a wizened little man with a horseshoepin in his tie, whose name, in company with nearly all the othersthat had been spoken to him since he came into the room, hadescaped Ashe's memory.

  "You were nearly making a bloomer!" said Miss Willoughbybrightly. "You must be absent-minded, Mr. Marson--like hislordship."

  "Is Lord Emsworth absent-minded?"

  Miss Willoughby laughed.

  "Why, he forgets his own name sometimes! If it wasn't for Mr.Baxter, goodness knows what would happen to him."

  "I don't think I know Mr. Baxter."

  "You will if you stay here long. You can't get away from him ifyou're in the same house. Don't tell anyone I said so; but he'sthe real master here. His lordship's secretary he calls himself;but he's really everything rolled into one--like the man in theplay."

  Ashe, searching in his dramatic memories for such a person in aplay, inquired whether Miss Willoughby meant Pooh-Bah, in "TheMikado," of which there had been a revival in London recently.Miss Willoughby did mean Pooh-Bah.

  "But Nosy Parker is what I call him," she said. "He mindseverybody's business as well as his own."

  The last of the procession trickled into the steward's room.Mr. Beach said grace somewhat patronizingly. The meal began.

  "You've seen Miss Peters, of course, Mr. Marson?" said MissWilloughby, resuming conversation with the soup.

  "Just for a few minutes at Paddington."

  "Oh! You haven't been with Mr. Peters long, then?"

  Ashe began to wonder whether everybody he met was going to askhim this dangerous question.

  "Only a day or so."

  "Where were you before that?"

  Ashe was conscious of a prickly sensation. A little more of thisand he might as well reveal his true mission at the castle andhave done with it.

  "Oh, I was--that is to say----"

  "How are you feeling after the journey, Mr. Marson?" said a voicefrom the other side of the table; and Ashe, looking upgratefully, found Joan's eyes looking into his with a curiouslyamused expression.

  He was too grateful for the interruption to try to account forthis. He replied that he was feeling very well, which was not thecase. Miss Willoughby's interest was diverted to a discussion ofthe defects of the various railroad systems of Great Britain.

  At the head of the table Mr. Beach had started an intimateconversation with Mr. Ferris, the valet of Lord Stockheath, theHonorable Freddie's "poor old Percy"--a cousin, Ashe hadgathered, of Aline Peters' husband-to-be. The butler spoke inmore measured tones even than usual, for he was speaking oftragedy.

  "We were all extremely sorry, Mr. Ferris, to read of yourmisfortune."

  Ashe wondered what had been happening to Mr. Ferris.

  "Yes, Mr. Beach," replied the valet, "it's a fact we made apretty poor show." He took a sip from his glass. "There is noconcealing the fact--I have never tried to conceal it--that poorPercy is not bright."

  Miss Chester entered the conversation.

  "I couldn't see where the girl--what's her name? was so verypretty. All the papers had pieces where it said she wasattractive, and what not; but she didn't look anything special tome from her photograph in the Mirror. What his lordship could seein her I can't understand."

  "The photo didn't quite do her justice, Miss Chester. I waspresent in court, and I must admit she was svelte--decidedlysvelte. And you must recollect that Percy, from childhood up, hasalways been a highly susceptible young nut. I speak as one whoknows him."

  Mr. Beach turned to Joan.

  "We are speaking of the Stockheath breach-of-promise case, MissSimpson, of which you doubtless read in the newspapers. LordStockheath is a nephew of ours. I fancy his lordship was greatlyshocked at the occurrence."

  "He was," chimed in Mr. Judson from down the table. "I happenedto overhear him speaking of it to young Freddie. It was in thelibrary on the morning when the judge made his final summing upand slipped it into Lord Stockheath so proper. 'If ever anythingof this sort happens to you, you young scalawag,' he says toFreddie--"

  Mr. Beach coughed. "Mr. Judson!"

  "Oh, it's all right, Mr. Beach; we're all in the family here, ina manner of speaking. It wasn't as though I was telling it to alot of outsiders. I'm sure none of these ladies or gentlemenwill let it go beyond this room?"

  The company murmured virtuous acquiescence.

  "He says to Freddie: 'You young scalawag, if ever anything ofthis sort happens to you, you can pack up and go off to Canada,for I'll have nothing more to do with you!'--or words to thateffect. And Freddie says: 'Oh, dash it all, gov'nor, youknow--what?'"

  However short Mr. Judson's imitation of
his master's voice mayhave fallen of histrionic perfection, it pleased the company. Theroom shook with mirth.

  "Mr. Judson is clever, isn't he, Mr. Marson?" whispered MissWilloughby, gazing with adoring eyes at the speaker.

  Mr. Beach thought it expedient to deflect the conversation. Bythe unwritten law of the room every individual had the right tospeak as freely as he wished about his own personal employer; butJudson, in his opinion, sometimes went a trifle too far.

  "Tell me, Mr. Ferris," he said, "does his lordship seem to bearit well?"

  "Oh, Percy is bearing it well enough."

  Ashe noted as a curious fact that, though the actual valet of anyperson under discussion spoke of him almost affectionately by hisChristian name, the rest of the company used the greatestceremony and gave him his title with all respect. Lord Stockheathwas Percy to Mr. Ferris, and the Honorable Frederick Threepwoodwas Freddie to Mr. Judson; but to Ferris, Mr. Judson's Freddiewas the Honorable Frederick, and to Judson Mr. Ferris' Percy wasLord Stockheath. It was rather a pleasant form of etiquette, andstruck Ashe as somehow vaguely feudal.

  "Percy," went on Mr. Ferris, "is bearing it like a littleBriton--the damages not having come out of his pocket! It's hisold father--who had to pay them--that's taking it to heart. Youmight say he's doing himself proud. He says it's brought on hisgout again, and that's why he's gone to Droitwich instead ofcoming here. I dare say Percy isn't sorry."

  "It has been," said Mr. Beach, summing up, "a most unfortunateoccurrence. The modern tendency of the lower classes to get abovethemselves is becoming more marked every day. The young female inthis case was, I understand, a barmaid. It is deplorable that ouryoung men should allow themselves to get into suchentanglements."

  "The wonder to me," said the irrepressible Mr. Judson, "is thatmore of these young chaps don't get put through it. His lordshipwasn't so wide of the mark when he spoke like that to Freddie inthe library that time. I give you my word, it's a mercy youngFreddie hasn't been up against it! When we were in London,Freddie and I," he went on, cutting through Mr. Beach'sdisapproving cough, "before what you might call the crash, whenhis lordship cut off supplies and had him come back and livehere, Freddie was asking for it--believe me! Fell in love with agirl in the chorus of one of the theaters. Used to send me to thestage door with notes and flowers every night for weeks, asregular as clockwork.

  "What was her name? It's on the tip of my tongue. Funny how youforget these things! Freddie was pretty far gone. I recollectonce, happening to be looking round his room in his absence,coming on a poem he had written to her. It was hot stuff--veryhot! If that girl has kept those letters it's my belief we shallsee Freddie following in Lord Stockheath's footsteps."

  There was a hush of delighted horror round the table.

  "Goo'," said Miss Chester's escort with unction. "You don't sayso, Mr. Judson! It wouldn't half make them look silly if theHonorable Frederick was sued for breach just now, with thewedding coming on!"

  "There is no danger of that."

  It was Joan's voice, and she had spoken with such decision thatshe had the ear of the table immediately. All eyes looked in herdirection. Ashe was struck with her expression. Her eyes wereshining as though she were angry; and there was a flush on herface. A phrase he had used in the train came back to him. Shelooked like a princess in disguise.

  "What makes you say that, Miss Simpson?" inquired Judson,annoyed. He had been at pains to make the company's flesh creep,and it appeared to be Joan's aim to undo his work.

  It seemed to Ashe that Joan made an effort of some sort as thoughshe were pulling herself together and remembering where she was.

  "Well," she said, almost lamely, "I don't think it at all likelythat he proposed marriage to this girl."

  "You never can tell," said Judson. "My impression is that Freddiedid. It's my belief that there's something on his mind thesedays. Before he went to London with his lordship the other day hewas behaving very strange. And since he came back it's my beliefthat he has been brooding. And I happen to know he followed theaffair of Lord Stockheath pretty closely, for he clipped theclippings out of the paper. I found them myself one day when Ihappened to be going through his things."

  Beach cleared his throat--his mode of indicating that he wasabout to monopolize the conversation.

  "And in any case, Miss Simpson," he said solemnly, "with thingscome to the pass they have come to, and the juries--drawn fromthe lower classes--in the nasty mood they're in, it don't seemhardly necessary in these affairs for there to have been anydefinite promise of marriage. What with all this socialismrampant, they seem so happy at the idea of being able to do oneof us an injury that they give heavy damages without it. A fewardent expressions, and that's enough for them. You recollect theHavant case, and when young Lord Mount Anville was sued? What itcomes to is that anarchy is getting the upper hand, and the lowerclasses are getting above themselves. It's all these here cheapnewspapers that does it. They tempt the lower classes to getabove themselves.

  "Only this morning I had to speak severe to that young fellow,James, the footman. He was a good young fellow once and did hiswork well, and had a proper respect for people; but now he's goneall to pieces. And why? Because six months ago he had therheumatism, and had the audacity to send his picture and atestimonial, saying that it had cured him of awful agonies, toWalkinshaw's Supreme Ointment, and they printed it in half adozen papers; and it has been the ruin of James. He has got abovehimself and don't care for nobody."

  "Well, all I can say is," resumed Judson, "that I hope togoodness nothing won't happen to Freddie of that kind; for it'snot every girl that would have him."

  There was a murmur of assent to this truth.

  "Now your Miss Peters," said Judson tolerantly--"she seems a nicelittle thing."

  "She would be pleased to hear you say so," said Joan.

  "Joan Valentine!" cried Judson, bringing his hands down on thetablecloth with a bang. "I've just remembered it. That was thename of the girl Freddie used to write the letters and poems to;and that's who it is I've been trying all along to think youreminded me of, Miss Simpson. You're the living image ofFreddie's Miss Joan Valentine."

  Ashe was not normally a young man of particularly ready wit; buton this occasion it may have been that the shock of thisrevelation, added to the fact that something must be donespeedily if Joan's discomposure was not to become obvious to allpresent, quickened his intelligence. Joan, usually so sure ofherself, so ready of resource, had gone temporarily to pieces.She was quite white, and her eyes met Ashe's with almost a huntedexpression.

  If the attention of the company was to be diverted, somethingdrastic must be done. A mere verbal attempt to change theconversation would be useless. Inspiration descended on Ashe.

  In the days of his childhood in Hayling, Massachusetts, he hadplayed truant from Sunday school again and again in order tofrequent the society of one Eddie Waffles, the official bad boyof the locality. It was not so much Eddie's charm of conversationwhich had attracted him--though that had been great--as the factthat Eddie, among his other accomplishments, could give alifelike imitation of two cats fighting in a back yard; and Ashefelt that he could never be happy until he had acquired this giftfrom the master.

  In course of time he had done so. It might be that his absencesfrom Sunday school in the cause of art had left him in lateryears a trifle shaky on the subject of the Kings of Judah, buthis hard-won accomplishment had made him in request at everysmoking concert at Oxford; and it saved the situation now.

  "Have you ever heard two cats fighting in a back yard?" heinquired casually of his neighbor, Miss Willoughby.

  The next moment the performance was in full swing. Young MasterWaffles, who had devoted considerable study to his subject, hadconceived the combat of his imaginary cats in a broad, almostHomeric, vein. The unpleasantness opened with a low gurglingsound, answered by another a shade louder and possibly morequerulous. A momentary silence was followed by a long-drawn note,like rising wind, cut off abruptly and succ
eeded by a grumblingmutter. The response to this was a couple of sharp howls. Bothparties to the contest then indulged in a discontented whining,growing louder and louder until the air was full of electricmenace. And then, after another sharp silence, came war, noisyand overwhelming.

  Standing at Master Waffles' side, you could follow almost everymovement of that intricate fray, and mark how now one and now theother of the battlers gained a short-lived advantage. It was agreat fight. Shrewd blows were taken and given, and in the eye ofthe imagination you could see the air thick with flying fur.Louder and louder grew the din; and then, at its height, itceased in one crescendo of tumult, and all was still, save for afaint, angry moaning.

  Such was the cat fight of Master Eddie Waffles; and Ashe, thoughfalling short of the master, as a pupil must, rendered itfaithfully and with energy.

  To say that the attention of the company was diverted from Mr.Judson and his remarks by the extraordinary noises whichproceeded from Ashe's lips would be to offer a mere shadowysuggestion of the sensation caused by his efforts. At first,stunned surprise, then consternation, greeted him. Beach, thebutler, was staring as one watching a miracle, nearer apparentlyto apoplexy than ever. On the faces of the others every shade ofemotion was to be seen.

  That this should be happening in the steward's room at BlandingsCastle was scarcely less amazing than if it had taken place in acathedral. The upper servants, rigid in their seats, looked ateach other, like Cortes' soldiers--"with a wild surmise."

  The last faint moan of feline defiance died away and silence fellon the room. Ashe turned to Miss Willoughby.

  "Just like that!" he said. "I was telling Miss Willoughby," headded apologetically to Mrs. Twemlow, "about the cats in London.They were a great trial."

  For perhaps three seconds his social reputation swayed to and froin the balance, while the company pondered on what he had done.It was new; but it was humorous--or was it vulgar? There isnothing the English upper servant so abhors as vulgarity. Thatwas what the steward's room was trying to make up its mind about.

  Then Miss Willoughby threw her shapely head back and the squealof her laughter smote the ceiling. And at that the company madeits decision. Everybody laughed. Everybody urged Ashe to give anencore. Everybody was his friend and admirer---everybody butBeach, the butler. Beach, the butler, was shocked to his verycore. His heavy-lidded eyes rested on Ashe with disapproval. Itseemed to Beach, the butler, that this young man Marson had gotabove himself.

  * * *

  Ashe found Joan at his side. Dinner was over and the diners weremaking for the housekeeper's room.

  "Thank you, Mr. Marson. That was very good of you and veryclever." Her eyes twinkled. "But what a terrible chance you took!You have made yourself a popular success, but you might just aseasily have become a social outcast. As it is, I am afraid Mr.Beach did not approve."

  "I'm afraid he didn't. In a minute or so I'm going to fawn on himand make all well."

  Joan lowered her voice.

  "It was quite true, what that odious little man said. FreddieThreepwood did write me letters. Of course I destroyed them longago."

  "But weren't you running the risk in coming here that he mightrecognize you? Wouldn't that make it rather unpleasant for you?"

  "I never met him, you see. He only wrote to me. When he came tothe station to meet us this evening he looked startled to see me;so I suppose he remembers my appearance. But Aline will have toldhim that my name is Simpson."

  "That fellow Judson said he was brooding. I think you ought toput him out of his misery."

  "Mr. Judson must have been letting his imagination run away withhim. He is out of his misery. He sent a horrid fat man namedJones to see me in London about the letters, and I told him I haddestroyed them. He must have let him know that by this time."

  "I see."

  They went into the housekeeper's room. Mr. Beach was standingbefore the fire. Ashe went up to him. It was not an easy matterto mollify Mr. Beach. Ashe tried the most tempting topics. Hementioned swollen feet--he dangled the lining of Mr. Beach'sstomach temptingly before his eyes; but the butler was not to besoftened. Only when Ashe turned the conversation to the subjectof the museum did a flicker of animation stir him.

  Mr. Beach was fond and proud of the Blandings Castle museum. Ithad been the means of getting him into print for the first andonly time in his life. A year before, a representative of theIntelligencer and Echo, from the neighboring town of Blatchford,had come to visit the castle on behalf of his paper; and he hadbegun one section of his article with the words: "Under theauspices of Mr. Beach, my genial cicerone, I then visited hislordship's museum--" Mr. Beach treasured the clipping in aspecial writing-desk.

  He responded almost amiably to Ashe's questions. Yes; he had seenthe scarab--he pronounced it scayrub--which Mr. Peters hadpresented to his lordship. He understood that his lordshipthought very highly of Mr. Peters' scayrub. He had overheard Mr.Baxter telling his lordship that it was extremely valuable.

  "Mr. Beach," said Ashe, "I wonder whether you would take me tosee Lord Emsworth's museum?"

  Mr. Beach regarded him heavily.

  "I shall be pleased to take you to see his lordship's museum," hereplied.

  * * *

  One can attribute only to the nervous mental condition followingthe interview he had had with Ashe in his bedroom the rash actMr. Peters attempted shortly after dinner.

  Mr. Peters, shortly after dinner, was in a dangerous and recklessmood. He had had a wretched time all through the meal. TheBlandings chef had extended himself in honor of the house party,and had produced a succession of dishes, which in happier daysMr. Peters would have devoured eagerly. To be compelled byconsiderations of health to pass these by was enough to damp theliveliest optimist. Mr. Peters had suffered terribly. Occasionsof feasting and revelry like the present were for him so manybattlefields, on which greed fought with prudence.

  All through dinner he brooded on Ashe's defiance and the horrorswhich were to result from that defiance. One of Mr. Peters' mostpainful memories was of a two weeks' visit he had once paid toMr. Muldoon in his celebrated establishment at White Plains. Hehad been persuaded to go there by a brother millionaire whom,until then, he had always regarded as a friend. The memory of Mr.Muldoon's cold shower baths and brisk system of physical exercisestill lingered.

  The thought that under Ashe's rule he was to go through privatelyvery much what he had gone through in the company of a gang ofother unfortunates at Muldoon's froze him with horror. He knewthose health cranks who believed that all mortal ailments couldbe cured by cold showers and brisk walks. They were all alike andthey nearly killed you. His worst nightmare was the one where hedreamed he was back at Muldoon's, leading his horse up thatendless hill outside the village.

  He would not stand it! He would be hanged if he'd stand it! Hewould defy Ashe. But if he defied Ashe, Ashe would go away; andthen whom could he find to recover his lost scarab?

  Mr. Peters began to appreciate the true meaning of the phraseabout the horns of a dilemma. The horns of this dilemma occupiedhis attention until the end of the dinner. He shifted uneasilyfrom one to the other and back again. He rose from the table in athoroughly overwrought condition of mind. And then, somehow, inthe course of the evening, he found himself alone in the hall,not a dozen feet from the unlocked museum door.

  It was not immediately that he appreciated the significance ofthis fact. He had come to the hall because its solitude suitedhis mood. It was only after he had finished a cigar--Ashe couldnot stop his smoking after dinner--that it suddenly flashed onhim that he had ready at hand a solution of all his troubles. Abrief minute's resolute action and the scarab would be his again,and the menace of Ashe a thing of the past. He glanced about him.Yes; he was alone.

  Not once since the removal of the scarab had begun to exercisehis mind had Mr. Peters contemplated for an instant thepossibility of recovering it himself. The prospect of theunpleasantness that would ensu
e had been enough to make himregard such an action as out of the question. The risk was toogreat to be considered for a moment; but here he was, in aposition where the risk was negligible!

  Like Ashe, he had always visualized the recovery of his scarab asa thing of the small hours, a daring act to be performed whensleep held the castle in its grip. That an opportunity would bepresented to him of walking in quite calmly and walking out againwith the Cheops in his pocket, had never occurred to him as apossibility.

  Yet now this chance was presenting itself in all its simplicity,and all he had to do was to grasp it. The door of the museum wasnot even closed. He could see from where he stood that it wasajar.

  He moved cautiously in its direction--not in a straight line asone going to a museum, but circuitously as one strolling withoutan aim. From time to time he glanced over his shoulder. Hereached the door, hesitated, and passed it. He turned, reachedthe door again--and again passed it. He stood for a momentdarting his eyes about the hall; then, in a burst of resolution,he dashed for the door and shot in like a rabbit.

  At the same moment the Efficient Baxter, who, from the shelter ofa pillar on the gallery that ran around two-thirds of the hall,had been eyeing the peculiar movements of the distinguished guestwith considerable interest for some minutes, began to descend thestairs.

  Rupert Baxter, the Earl of Emsworth's indefatigable privatesecretary, was one of those men whose chief characteristic is avague suspicion of their fellow human beings. He did not suspectthem of this or that definite crime; he simply suspected them. Heprowled through life as we are told the hosts of Midian prowled.

  His powers in this respect were well-known at Blandings Castle.The Earl of Emsworth said: "Baxter is invaluable--positivelyinvaluable." The Honorable Freddie said: "A chappie can't take astep in this bally house without stumbling over that damn feller,Baxter!" The manservant and the maidservant within the gates,like Miss Willoughby, employing that crisp gift forcharacterization which is the property of the English lowerorders, described him as a Nosy Parker.

  Peering over the railing of the balcony and observing the curiousmovements of Mr. Peters, who, as a matter of fact, while makingup his mind to approach the door, had been backing and fillingabout the hall in a quaint serpentine manner like a man trying toinvent a new variety of the tango, the Efficient Baxter had foundhimself in some way--why, he did not know--of what, he could notsay--but in some nebulous way, suspicious.

  He had not definitely accused Mr. Peters in his mind of anyspecific tort or malfeasance. He had merely felt that somethingfishy was toward. He had a sixth sense in such matters.

  But when Mr. Peters, making up his mind, leaped into the museum,Baxter's suspicions lost their vagueness and became crystallized.Certainty descended on him like a bolt from the skies. On oath,before a notary, the Efficient Baxter would have declared that J.Preston Peters was about to try to purloin the scarab.

  Lest we should seem to be attributing too miraculous powers ofintuition to Lord Emsworth's secretary, it should be explainedthat the mystery which hung about that curio had exercised hismind not a little since his employer had given it to him to placein the museum. He knew Lord Emsworth's power of forgetting and hedid not believe his account of the transaction. Scarab maniacslike Mr. Peters did not give away specimens from theircollections as presents. But he had not divined the truth of whathad happened in London.

  The conclusion at which he had arrived was that Lord Emsworth hadbought the scarab and had forgotten all about it. To support thistheory was the fact that the latter had taken his check book toLondon with him. Baxter's long acquaintance with the earl hadleft him with the conviction that there was no saying what hemight not do if left loose in London with a check book.

  As to Mr. Peters' motive for entering the museum, that, too,seemed completely clear to the secretary. He was a curioenthusiast himself and he had served collectors in a secretarialcapacity; and he knew, both from experience and observation, thatstrange madness which may at any moment afflict the collector,blotting out morality and the nice distinction between meum andtuum, as with a sponge. He knew that collectors who would notsteal a loaf if they were starving might--and did--fall beforethe temptation of a coveted curio.

  He descended the stairs three at a time, and entered the museumat the very instant when Mr. Peters' twitching fingers were aboutto close on his treasure. He handled the delicate situation witheminent tact. Mr. Peters, at the sound of his step, had executed abackward leap, which was as good as a confession of guilt, andhis face was rigid with dismay; but the Efficient Baxterpretended not to notice these phenomena. His manner, when hespoke, was easy and unembarrassed.

  "Ah! Taking a look at our little collection, Mr. Peters? You willsee that we have given the place of honor to your Cheops. It iscertainly a fine specimen--a wonderfully fine specimen."

  Mr. Peters was recovering slowly. Baxter talked on, to give himtime. He spoke of Mut and Bubastis, of Ammon and the Book of theDead. He directed the other's attention to the Roman coins.

  He was touching on some aspects of the Princess Gilukhipa ofMitanni, in whom his hearer could scarcely fail to be interested,when the door opened and Beach, the butler, came in, accompaniedby Ashe. In the bustle of the interruption Mr. Peters escaped,glad to be elsewhere, and questioning for the first time in hislife the dictum that if you want a thing well done you must do ityourself.

  "I was not aware, sir," said Beach, the butler, "that you were inoccupation of the museum. I would not have intruded; but thisyoung man expressed a desire to examine the exhibits, and I tookthe liberty of conducting him."

  "Come in, Beach--come in," said Baxter.

  The light fell on Ashe's face, and he recognized him as thecheerful young man who had inquired the way to Mr. Peters' roombefore dinner and who, he had by this time discovered, was notthe Honorable Freddie's friend, George Emerson--or, indeed, anyother of the guests of the house. He felt suspicious.

  "Oh, Beach!"

  "Sir?"

  "Just a moment."

  He drew the butler into the hall, out of earshot.

  "Beach, who is that man?"

  "Mr. Peters' valet, sir."

  "Mr. Peters' valet!"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Has he been in service long?" asked Baxter, remembering that amere menial had addressed him as "old man."

  Beach lowered his voice. He and the Efficient Baxter were oldallies, and it seemed right to Beach to confide in him.

  "He has only just joined Mr. Peters, sir; and he has never beenin service before. He told me so himself, and I was unable toelicit from him any information as to his antecedents. His mannerstruck me, sir, as peculiar. It crossed my mind to wonder whetherMr. Peters happened to be aware of this. I should dislike to doany young man an injury; but it might be anyone coming to agentleman without a character, like this young man. Mr. Petersmight have been deceived, sir."

  The Efficient Baxter's manner became distraught. His mind wasworking rapidly.

  "Should he be informed, sir?"

  "Eh! Who?"

  "Mr. Peters, sir--in case he should have been deceived?"

  "No, no; Mr. Peters knows his own business."

  "Far from me be it to appear officious, sir; but--"

  "Mr. Peters probably knows all about him. Tell me, Beach, who wasit suggested this visit to the museum? Did you?"

  "It was at the young man's express desire that I conducted him,sir."

  The Efficient Baxter returned to the museum without a word.Ashe, standing in the middle of the room, was impressing thetopography of the place on his memory. He was unaware of thepiercing stare of suspicion that was being directed at him frombehind.

  He did not see Baxter. He was not even thinking of Baxter; butBaxter was on the alert. Baxter was on the warpath. Baxter knew!

 

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