by Saki
‘The New Didactic, in Calais Street.’
‘The New Didactic!’ exclaimed Lady Drakmanton with an air of returning illumination; ‘thank you so much. Of course, I remember now who I am. I’m Ellen Niggle, of the Ladies’ Brass-polishing Guild. The Club employs me to come now and then and see to the polishing of the brass fittings. That’s how I came to know Lady Drakmanton by sight; she’s very often in the Club. And you are the ladies who so kindly asked me out to lunch. Funny how it should all have slipped my memory, all of a sudden. The unaccustomed good food and wine must have been too much for me; for the moment I really couldn’t call to mind who I was. Good gracious,’ she broke off suddenly, ‘it’s ten past two; I should be at a polishing job in Whitehall. I must scuttle off like a giddy rabbit. Thanking you ever so.’
She left the room with a scuttle sufficiently suggestive of the animal she had mentioned, but the giddiness was all on the side of her involuntary hostesses. The restaurant seemed to be spinning round them, and the bill when it appeared did nothing to restore their composure. They were as nearly in tears as it is permissible to be during the luncheon hour in a really good restaurant. Financially speaking, they were well able to afford the luxury of an elaborate lunch, but their ideas on the subject of entertaining differed very sharply, according to the circumstances of whether they were dispensing or receiving hospitality. To have fed themselves liberally at their own expense was, perhaps, an extravagance to be deplored, but, at any rate, they had had something for their money; to have drawn an unknown and socially unremunerative Ellen Niggle into the net of their hospitality was a catastrophe that they could not contemplate with any degree of calmness.
The Smithly-Dubbs never quite recovered from their unnerving experience. They have given up politics and taken to doing good.
A Bread and Butter Miss
‘Starling Chatter and Oakhill have both dropped back in the betting,’ said Bertie van Tahn, throwing the morning paper across the breakfast table.
‘That leaves Nursery Tea practically favourite,’ said Odo Finsberry.
‘Nursery Tea and Pipeclay are at the top of the betting at present,’ said Bertie, ‘but that French horse, Le Five O’Clock, seems to be fancied as much as anything. Then there is Whitebait, and the Polish horse with a name like some one trying to stifle a sneeze in church; they both seem to have a lot of support.’
‘It’s the most open Derby there’s been for years,’ said Odo.
‘It’s simply no good trying to pick the winner on form,’ said Bertie; ‘one must just trust to luck and inspiration.’
‘The question is whether to trust to one’s own inspiration, or somebody else’s. Sporting Swank gives Count Palatine to win, and Le Five O’Clock for a place.’
‘Count Palatine – that adds another to our list of perplexities. Good morning, Sir Lulworth; have you a fancy for the Derby by any chance?’
‘I don’t usually take much interest in turf matters,’ said Sir Lulworth, who had just made his appearance, ‘but I always like to have a bet on the Guineas and the Derby. This year, I confess, it’s rather difficult to pick out anything that seems markedly better than anything else. What do you think of Snow Bunting?’
‘Snow Bunting?’ said Odo, with a groan, ‘there’s another of them. Surely, Snow Bunting has no earthly chance?’
‘My housekeeper’s nephew, who is a shoeing-smith in the mounted section of the Church Lads’ Brigade, and an authority on horseflesh, expects him to be among the first three.’
‘The nephews of housekeepers are invariably optimists,’ said Bertie; ‘it’s a kind of natural reaction against the professional pessimism of their aunts.’
‘We don’t seem to get much further in our search for the probable winner,’ said Mrs de Claux; ‘the more I listen to you experts the more hopelessly befogged I get.’
‘It’s all very well to blame us,’ said Bertie to his hostess; ‘you haven’t produced anything in the way of an inspiration.’
‘My inspiration consisted in asking you down for Derby week,’ retorted Mrs de Claux; ‘I thought you and Odo between you might throw some light on the question of the moment.’
Further recriminations were cut short by the arrival of Lola Pevensey, who floated into the room with an air of gracious apology.
‘So sorry to be so late,’ she observed, making a rapid tour of inspection of the breakfast dishes.
‘Did you have a good night?’ asked her hostess with perfunctory solicitude.
‘Quite, thank you,’ said Lola; ‘I dreamt a most remarkable dream.’
A flutter, indicative of general boredom, went round the table. Other people’s dreams are about as universally interesting as accounts of other people’s gardens, or chickens, or children.
‘I dreamt about the winner of the Derby,’ said Lola.
A swift reaction of attentive interest set in.
‘Do tell us what you dreamt,’ came in a chorus.
‘The really remarkable thing about it is that I’ve dreamt it two nights running,’ said Lola, finally deciding between the allurements of sausages and kedgeree; ‘that is why I thought it worth mentioning. You know, when I dream things two or three nights in succession, it always means something; I have special powers in that way. For instance, I once dreamed three times that a winged lion was flying through the sky and one of his wings dropped off, and he came to the ground with a crash; just afterwards the Campanile at Venice fell down. The winged lion is the symbol of Venice, you know,’ she added for the enlightenment of those who might not be versed in Italian heraldry. ‘Then,’ she continued, ‘just before the murder of the King and Queen of Servia I had a vivid dream of two crowned figures walking into a slaughter-house by the banks of a big river, which I took to be the Danube; and only the other day –’
‘Do tell us what you’ve dreamt about the Derby,’ interrupted Odo impatiently.
‘Well, I saw the finish of the race as clearly as anything; and one horse won easily, almost in a canter, and everybody cried out “Bread and Butter wins! Good old Bread and Butter”. I heard the name distinctly, and I’ve had the same dream two nights running.’
‘Bread and Butter,’ said Mrs de Claux, ‘now, whatever horse can that point to? Why – of course; Nursery Tea!’
She looked round with the triumphant smile of a successful unraveller of mystery.
‘How about Le Five O’Clock?’ interposed Sir Lulworth.
‘It would fit either of them equally well,’ said Odo; ‘can you remember any details about the jockey’s colours? That might help us.’
‘I seem to remember a glimpse of lemon sleeves or cap, but I can’t be sure,’ said Lola, after due reflection.
‘There isn’t a lemon jacket or cap in the race,’ said Bertie, referring to a list of starters and jockeys; ‘can’t you remember anything about the appearance of the horse? If it were a thick-set animal thick bread and butter would typify Nursery Tea; and if it were thin, of course, it would mean Le Five O’Clock.’
‘That seems sound enough,’ said Mrs de Claux; ‘do think, Lola dear, whether the horse in your dream was thin or stoutly built.’
‘I can’t remember that it was one or the other,’ said Lola; ‘one wouldn’t notice such a detail in the excitement of a finish.’
‘But this was a symbolic animal,’ said Sir Lulworth; ‘if it were to typify thick or thin bread and butter, surely it ought to have been either as bulky and tubby as a shire cart-horse, or as thin as a heraldic leopard.’
‘I’m afraid you are rather a careless dreamer,’ said Bertie resentfully.
‘Of course, at the moment of dreaming I thought I was witnessing a real race, not the portent of one,’ said Lola; ‘otherwise I should have particularly noticed all helpful details.’
‘The Derby isn’t run till tomorrow,’ said Mrs de Claux; ‘do you think you are likely to have the same dream again tonight? If so, you can fix your attention on the important detail of the animal’s appearance.’
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br /> ‘I’m afraid I shan’t sleep at all tonight,’ said Lola pathetically; ‘every fifth night I suffer from insomnia, and it’s due tonight.’
‘It’s most provoking,’ said Bertie; ‘of course, we can back both horses, but it would be much more satisfactory to have all our money on the winner. Can’t you take a sleeping-draught, or something?’
‘Oakleaves, soaked in warm water and put under the bed, are recommended by some,’ said Mrs de Claux.
‘A glass of Benedictine, with a drop of eau-de-Cologne –’ said Sir Lulworth.
‘I have tried every known remedy,’ said Lola, with dignity; ‘I’ve been a martyr to insomnia for years.’
‘But now we are being martyrs to it,’ said Odo sulkily; ‘I particularly want to land a big coup over this race.’
‘I don’t have insomnia for my own amusement,’ snapped Lola.
‘Let us hope for the best,’ said Mrs de Claux soothingly; ‘tonight may prove all exception to the fifth-night rule.’
But when breakfast time came round again Lola reported a blank night as far as visions were concerned.
‘I don’t suppose I had as much as ten minutes’ sleep, and, certainly, no dreams.’
‘I’m so sorry, for your sake in the first place, and ours as well,’ said her hostess; ‘do you think you could induce a short nap after breakfast? It would be so good for you – and you might dream something. There would still be time for us to get our bets on.’
‘I’ll try if you like,’ said Lola; ‘it sounds rather like a small child being sent to bed in disgrace.’
‘I’ll come and read the Encyclopædia Britannica to you if you think it will make you sleep any sooner,’ said Bertie obligingly.
Rain was falling too steadily to permit of outdoor amusement, and the party suffered considerably during the next two hours from the absolute quiet that was enforced all over the house in order to give Lola every chance of achieving slumber. Even the click of billiard balls was considered a possible factor of disturbance, and the canaries were carried down to the gardener’s lodge, while the cuckoo clock in the hall was muffled under several layers of rugs. A notice, ‘Please do not Knock or Ring’, was posted on the front door at Bertie’s suggestion, and guests and servants spoke in tragic whispers as though the dread presence of death or sickness had invaded the house. The precautions proved of no avail: Lola added a sleepless morning to a wakeful night, and the bets of the party had to be impartially divided between Nursery Tea and the French Colt.
‘So provoking to have to split our bets,’ said Mrs de Claux, as her guests gathered in the hall later in the day, waiting for the result of the race.
‘I did my best for you,’ said Lola, feeling that she was not getting her due share of gratitude; ‘I told you what I had seen in my dreams, a brown horse, called Bread and Butter, winning easily from all the rest.’
‘What?’ screamed Bertie, jumping up from his seat, ‘a brown horse! Miserable woman, you never said a word about it’s being a brown horse.’
‘Didn’t I?’ faltered Lola. ‘I thought I told you it was a brown horse. It was certainly brown in both dreams. But I don’t see what colour has got to do with it. Nursery Tea and Le Five O’Clock are both chestnuts.’
‘Merciful Heaven! Doesn’t brown bread and butter with a sprinkling of lemon in the colours suggest anything to you?’ raged Bertie.
A slow, cumulative groan broke from the assembly as the meaning of his words gradually dawned on his hearers.
For the second time that day Lola retired to the seclusion of her room; she could not face the universal looks of reproach directed at her when Whitebait was announced winner at the comfortable price of fourteen to one.
Bertie’s Christmas Eve
It was Christmas Eve, and the family circle of Luke Steffink, Esq., was aglow with the amiability and random mirth which the occasion demanded. A long and lavish dinner had been partaken of, waits had been round and sung carols, the house-party had regaled itself with more carolling on its own account, and there had been romping which, even in a pulpit reference, could not have been condemned as ragging. In the midst of the general glow, however, there was one black unkindled cinder.
Bertie Steffink, nephew of the aforementioned Luke, had early in life adopted the profession of ne’er-do-well; his father had been something of the kind before him. At the age of eighteen Bertie had commenced that round of visits to our Colonial possessions, so seemly and desirable in the case of a Prince of the Blood, so suggestive of insincerity in a young man of the middle-class. He had gone to grow tea in Ceylon and fruit in British Columbia, and to help sheep to grow wool in Australia. At the age of twenty he had just returned from some similar errand in Canada, from which it may be gathered that the trial he gave to these various experiments was of the summary drum-head nature. Luke Steffink, who fulfilled the troubled role of guardian and deputy-parent to Bertie, deplored the persistent manifestation of the homing instinct on his nephew’s part, and his solemn thanks earlier in the day for the blessing of reporting a united family had no reference to Bertie’s return.
Arrangements had been promptly made for packing the youth off to a distant corner of Rhodesia, whence return would be a difficult matter; the journey to this uninviting destination was imminent, in fact a more careful and willing traveller would have already begun to think about his packing. Hence Bertie was in no mood to share in the festive spirit which displayed itself around him, and resentment smouldered within him at the eager, self-absorbed discussion of social plans for the coming months which he heard on all sides. Beyond depressing his uncle and the family circle generally by singing ‘Say au revoir, and not good-bye’, he had taken no part in the evening’s conviviality.
Eleven o’clock had struck some half-hour ago, and the elder Steffinks began to throw out suggestions leading up to that process which they called retiring for the night.
‘Come, Teddie, it’s time you were in your little bed, you know,’ said Luke Steffink to his thirteen-year-old son.
‘That’s where we all ought to be,’ said Mrs Steffink.
‘There wouldn’t be room,’ said Bertie.
The remark was considered to border on the scandalous; everybody ate raisins and almonds with the nervous industry of sheep feeding during threatening weather.
‘In Russia,’ said Horace Bordenby, who was staying in the house as a Christmas guest, ‘I’ve read that the peasants believe that if you go into a cow-house or stable at midnight on Christmas Eve you will hear the animals talk. They’re supposed to have the gift of speech at that one moment of the year.’
‘Oh, do let’s all go down to the cow-house and listen to what they’ve got to say?’ exclaimed Beryl, to whom anything was thrilling and amusing if you did it in a troop.
Mrs Steffink made a laughing protest, but gave a virtual consent by saying, ‘We must all wrap up well, then.’ The idea seemed a scatterbrained one to her, and almost heathenish, but it afforded an opportunity for ‘throwing the young people together,’ and as such she welcomed it. Mr Horace Bordenby was a young man with quite substantial prospects, and he had danced with Beryl at a local subscription ball a sufficient number of times to warrant the authorised inquiry on the part of the neighbours whether ‘there was anything in it.’ Though Mrs Steffink would not have put it in so many words, she shared the idea of the Russian peasantry that on this night the beast might speak.
The cow-house stood at the junction of the garden with a small paddock, an isolated survival, in a suburban neighbourhood, of what had once been a small farm. Luke Steffink was complacently proud of his cow-house and his two cows; he felt that they gave him a stamp of solidity which no number of Wyandottes or Orpingtons could impart. They even seemed to link him in a sort of inconsequent way with those patriarchs who derived importance from their floating capital of flocks and herds, he-asses and she-asses. It had been an anxious and momentous occasion when he had had to decide definitely between ‘the Byre’ and ‘the Ranch�
� for the naming of his villa residence. A December midnight was hardly the moment he would have chosen for showing his farm-building to visitors, but since it was a fine night, and the young people were anxious for an excuse for a mild frolic, Luke consented to chaperon the expedition. The servants had long since gone to bed, so the house was left in charge of Bertie, who scornfully declined to stir out on the pretext of listening to bovine conversation.
‘We must go quietly,’ said Luke, as he headed the procession of giggling young folk, brought up in the rear by the shawled and hooded figure of Mrs Steffink; ‘I’ve always laid stress on keeping this a quiet and orderly neighbourhood.’
It was a few minutes to midnight when the party reached the cow-house and made its way in by the light of Luke’s stable lantern. For a moment every one stood in silence, almost with a feeling of being in church.
‘Daisy – the one lying down – is by a shorthorn bull out of a Guernsey cow,’ announced Luke in a hushed voice, which was in keeping with the foregoing impression.
‘Is she?’ said Bordenby, rather as if he had expected her to be by Rembrandt.
‘Myrtle is –’
Myrtle’s family history was cut short by a little scream from the women of the party.
The cow-house door had closed noiselessly behind them and the key had turned gratingly in the lock; then they heard Bertie’s voice pleasantly wishing them good night and his footsteps retreating along the garden path.
Luke Steffink strode to the window; it was a small square opening of the old-fashioned sort, with iron bars let into the stonework.
‘Unlock the door this instant,’ he shouted, with as much air of menacing authority as a hen might assume when screaming through the bars of a coop at a marauding hawk. In reply to his summons the hall-door closed with a defiant bang.
A neighbouring clock struck the hour of midnight. If the cows had received the gift of human speech at that moment they would not have been able to make themselves heard. Seven or eight other voices were engaged in describing Bertie’s present conduct and his general character at a high pressure of excitement and indignation.