by E. F. Benson
“Then they’ll be doubled,” cried Lucia triumphantly.
“And redoubled. It wouldn’t be any fun. Most monotonous. The dealer might as well pick up his hand and say Seven no-trumps, doubled and redoubled, before he looked at it.”
“I hope we take a more intelligent interest in the game than that,” said Lucia. “The judgment in declaring, the skill in the play of the cards, the various systems so carefully thought out — surely we shan’t cease to practise them just because a few pence are no longer at stake? Indeed, I think we shall have far pleasanter games. They will be more tranquil, and on a loftier level. The question of even a few pence sometimes produces acrimony.”
“I can’t agree,” said Georgie. “Those acrimonies are the result of pleasant excitement. And what’s the use of keeping the score, and wondering if you dare finesse, if it leads to nothing? You might try playing for twopence a hundred instead of threepence—”
“I must repeat that it’s the principle,” interrupted Lucia. “I feel that in my position it ought to be known that though I play cards, which I regard as quite a reasonable relaxation, I no longer play for money. I feel sure we should find it just as exciting. Let us put it to the test. I will ask the Padre and Evie to dine and play to-morrow, and we’ll see how it goes.”
It didn’t go. Lucia made the depressing announcement during dinner, and a gloom fell on the party as they cut for partners. For brief bright moments one or other of them forgot that there was nothing to be gained by astuteness except the consciousness of having been clever, but then he (or she) remembered, and the gleam faded. Only Lucia remained keen and critical. She tried with agonised anxiety to recollect if there was another trump in and decided wrong.
“Too stupid of me, Padre,” she said. “I ought to have known. I should have drawn it, and then we made our contract. Quite inexcusable. Many apologies.”
“Eh, it’s no matter; it’s no matter whatever,” he said. “Just nothing at all.”
Then came the adding-up. Georgie had not kept the score and everyone accepted Lucia’s addition without a murmur. At half past ten instead of eleven, it was agreed that it was wiser not to begin another rubber, and Georgie saw the languid guests to the door. He came back to find Lucia replaying the last hand.
“You could have got another trick, dear,” she said. “Look; you should have discarded instead of trumping. A most interesting manœuvre. As to our test, I think they were both quite as keen as ever, and for myself I never had a more enjoyable game.”
The news of this depressing evening spread apace through Tilling, and a small party assembled next day at Diva’s for shilling teas and discussions.
“I winna play for nowt,” said the Padre. “Such a mirthless evening I never spent. And by no means a well-furnished table at dinner. An unusual parsimony.’’
Elizabeth chimed in.
“I got hashed mutton and treacle pudding for lunch a few days ago,” she said. “Just what I should have had at home except that it was beef and marmalade.”
“Perhaps you happened to look in a few minutes before unexpectedly,” suggested Diva who was handing crumpets.
There was a nasty sort of innuendo about this.
“I haven’t got any cream, dear,” retorted Elizabeth. “Would you kindly—”
“It’ll be an eighteen-penny tea then,” Diva warned her, “though you’ll get potted meat sandwiches as well. Shall it be eighteen-pence?”
Elizabeth ignored the suggestion.
“As for playing bridge for nothing,” she resumed, “I won’t. I’ve never played it before, and I’m too old to learn now. Dear Worship, of course, may do as she likes, so long as she doesn’t do it with me.”
Diva finished her serving and sat down with her customers. Janet brought her cream and potted-meat sandwiches, for of course she could eat what she liked, without choosing between a shilling and an eighteen-penny tea.
“Makes it all so awkward,” she said. “If one of us gives a Bridge-party, must the table at which Lucia plays do it for nothing?”
“The other table, too, I expect,” said Elizabeth bitterly, watching Diva pouring quantities of cream into her tea. “Worship mightn’t like to know that gambling was going on in her presence.”
“That I won’t submit to,” cried Evie. “I won’t, I won’t. She may be Mayor but she isn’t Mussolini.”
“I see nought for it,” said the Padre, “but not to ask her. I play my Bridge for diversion and it doesna’ divert me to exert my mind over the cards and not a bawbee or the loss if it to show for all my trouble.”
Other customers came in; the room filled up and Diva had to get busy again. The office boy from the Hampshire Argus and a friend had a good blow-out, and ate an entire pot of jam, which left little profit on their teas. On the other hand, Evie and the Padre and Elizabeth were so concerned about the Bridge crisis that they hardly ate anything. Diva presented them with their bills, and they each gave her a tip of twopence, which was quite decent for a shilling tea, but the office boy and his friend, in the bliss of repletion, gave her threepence. Diva thanked them warmly.
Evie and the Padre continued the subject on the way home.
“Such hard luck on Mr. Georgie,” she said. “He’s as bored as anybody with playing for love. I saw him yawn six times the other night and he never added up. I think I’ll ask him to a Bridge-tea at Diva’s, just to see if he’ll come without Lucia. Diva would be glad to play with us afterwards, but it would never do to ask her to tea first.”
“How’s that?” asked the Padre.
“Why she would be making a profit by being our guest. And how could we tip her for four teas, when she had had one of them herself? Very awkward for her.”
“A’weel, then let her get her own tea,” said the Padre, “though I don’t think she’s as delicate of feeling as all that. But ask the puir laddie by all means.”
Georgie was duly rung up and a slightly embarrassing moment followed. Evie thought she had said with sufficient emphasis “So pleased if you will come to Diva’s tomorrow for tea and Bridge,” but he asked her to hold on while he saw if Lucia was free. Then Evie had to explain it didn’t matter whether Lucia was free or not, and Georgie accepted.
“I felt sure it would happen,” he said to himself, “but I think I shan’t tell Lucia. Very likely she’ll be busy.”
Vain was the hope of man. As they were moderately enjoying their frugal lunch next day, Lucia congratulated herself on having a free afternoon.
“Positively nothing to do,” she said. “Not a committee to attend, nothing. Let us have one of our good walks, and pop in to have tea with Diva afterwards. I want to encourage her enterprise.”
“A walk would be lovely,” said Georgie, “but Evie asked me to have tea at Diva’s and play a rubber afterwards.”
“I don’t remember her asking me,” said Lucia. “Does she expect me?”
“I rather think Diva’s making our fourth,” faltered Georgie.
Lucia expressed strong approval.
“A very sensible innovation,” she said. “I remember telling you that it struck me as rather bourgeois, rather Victorian, always to have husbands and wives together. No doubt also, dear Evie felt sure I should be busy up till dinner-time. Really very considerate of her, not to give me the pain of refusing. How I shall enjoy a quiet hour with a book.”
“She doesn’t like it at all the same,” thought Georgie, as, rather fatigued with a six mile tramp in a thick sea mist, he tripped down the hill to Diva’s, “and I shouldn’t wonder if she guessed the reason . . .” The tea-room was crowded, so that Diva could not have had tea with them even if she had been asked. She presented the bill to Evie herself (three eighteenpenny teas) and received the generous tip of fourpence a head.
“Thank you, dear Evie,” she said pocketing the extra shilling. “I do call that handsome. I’ll join you in the card-room as soon as ever I can.”
They had most exciting games at the usual stakes. It was impossi
ble to leave the last rubber unfinished, and Georgie had to hurry over his dressing not to keep Lucia waiting. Her eye had that gimlet-like aspect, which betokened a thirst for knowledge.
“A good tea and a pleasant rubber?” she asked.
“Both,” said Georgie. “I enjoyed myself.”
“So glad. And many people having tea?”
“Crammed. Diva couldn’t join us till close on six.”
“How pleasant for Diva. And did you play for stakes, dear, or for nothing?”
“Stakes,” said Georgie. “The usual threepence.”
“Georgie, I’m going to ask a favour of you,” she said. “I want you to set an example — poor young Twistervant, you know — I want it to be widely known that I do not play cards for money. You diminish the force of my example, dear, if you continue to do so. The lime-light is partially, at any rate, on you as well as me. I ask you not to.”
“I’m afraid I can’t consent,” said Georgie. “I don’t see any harm in it — Naturally you will do as you like—”
“Thank you, dear,” said Lucia.
“No need to thank me. And I shall do as I like.”
Grosvenor entered.
“Silentio!” whispered Lucia. “Yes, Grosvenor?”
“Mrs. Mapp-Flint has rung up” — began Grosvenor.
“Tell her I can’t attend to any business this evening,” said Lucia.
“She doesn’t want you to, ma’am. She only wants to know if Mr. Pillson will dine with her the day after tomorrow and play Bridge.”
“Thank her,” said Georgie firmly. “Delighted.”
Card-playing circles in Tilling remained firm: there was no slump. If, in view of her exemplary position, Worship declined to play Bridge for money, far be it from us, said Tilling, to seek to persuade her against the light of conscience. But if Worship imagined that Tilling intended to follow her example, the sooner she got rid of that fond illusion the better. Lucia sent out invitations for another Bridge party at Mallards but everybody was engaged. She could not miss the significance of that, but she put up a proud front and sent for the latest book on Bridge and studied it incessantly, almost to the neglect of her Mayoral Duties, in order to prove that what she cared for was the game in itself. Her grasp of it, she declared, improved out of all knowledge, but she got no opportunities of demonstrating that agreeable fact. Invitations rained on Georgie, for it was clearly unfair that he should get no Bridge because nobody would play with the Mayor, and he returned these hospitalities by asking his friends to have tea with him at Diva’s rooms, with a rubber afterwards, for he could not ask three gamblers to dinner and leave Lucia to study Bridge problems by herself, while the rest of the party played. Other entertainers followed his example, for it was far less trouble to order tea at Diva’s and find the card-room ready, and as Algernon Wyse expressed it, ‘ye olde tea-house’ became quite like Almack’s. This was good business for the establishment, and Diva bitterly regretted that it had not occurred to her from the first to charge card-money. She put the question one day to Elizabeth.
“All those markers being used up so fast,” she said, “and I shall have to get new cards so much oftener than I expected. Twopence, say, for card-money, don’t you think?”
“I shouldn’t dream of it, dear,” said Elizabeth very decidedly. “You must be doing very well as it is. But I should recommend some fresh packs of cards. A little greasy, when last I played. More daintiness, clean cards, sharp pencils and so on are well worth while. But card-money, no!”
The approach of the election to the vacancy on the Town Council diverted the Mayor’s mind from her abstract study of Bridge. Up to within a few days of the date on which candidates’ names must be sent in, Elizabeth was still the only aspirant. Lucia found herself faced by the prospect of her Mayoress being inevitably elected, and the thought of that filled her with the gloomiest apprehensions. She wondered if Georgie could be induced to stand. It was his morning for cleaning his bibelots, and she went up to his room with offers of help.
“I so often wish, dear,” she said pensively, attacking a snuff-box, “that you were more closely connected with me in my municipal work. And such an opportunity offers itself just now.”
“Do be careful with that snuff-box,” said he. “Don’t rub it hard. What’s this opportunity?”
“The Town Council. There’s a vacancy very soon. I’m convinced, dear, that with a little training, such as I could give you, you would make a marvellous Councillor, and you would find the work most absorbing.”
“I think it would bore me stiff,” he said. “I’m no good at slums and drains.”
Lucia decided to disclose herself.
“Georgie, it’s to help me,” she said. “Elizabeth at present is the only candidate, and the idea of having her on the Council is intolerable. And with the prestige of your being my husband I don’t doubt the result. Just a few days of canvassing; you with your keen interest in human nature will revel in it. It is a duty, it seems to me, that you owe to yourself. You would have an official position in the town. I have long felt it an anomaly that the Mayor’s husband had none.”
Georgie considered. He had before now thought it would be pleasant to walk in Mayoral processions in a purple gown. And bored though he was with Lucia’s municipal gabble, it would be different when, with the weight of his position to back him, he could say that he totally disagreed with her on some matter of policy, and perhaps defeat some project of hers at a Council Meeting. Also, it would be a pleasure to defeat Elizabeth at the poll . . .
“Well, if you’ll help me with the canvassing—” he began.
“Ah, if I only could!” she said. “But, dear, my position precludes me from taking any active part. It is analogous to that of the King, who, officially, is outside politics. The fact that you are my husband — what a blessed day was that when our lives were joined — will carry immense weight. Everyone will know that your candidature has my full approval. I shouldn’t wonder if Elizabeth withdrew when she learns you are standing against her.”
“Oh, very well,” said he. “But you must coach me on what my programme is to be.”
“Thank you, dear, a thousand times! You must send in your name at once. Mrs. Simpson will get you a form to fill up.”
Several horrid days ensued and Georgie wended his dripping way from house to house in the most atrocious weather. His ticket was better housing for the poorer classes, and he called at rows of depressing dwellings, promising to devote his best energies to procuring the tenants bath-rooms, plumbing, bicycle-sheds and open spaces for their children to play in. A disagreeable sense oppressed him that the mothers, whose household jobs he was interrupting, were much bored with his visits, and took very little interest in his protestations. In reward for these distasteful exertions Lucia relaxed the Spartan commissariat — indeed, she disliked it very much herself and occasionally wondered if her example was being either followed or respected — and she gave him Lucullan lunches and dinners. Elizabeth, of course, at once got wind of his candidature and canvassing, but instead of withdrawing, she started a hurricane campaign of her own. Her ticket was the reduction of rates, instead of this rise in them which these idiotic schemes for useless luxuries would inevitably produce.
The result of the election was to be announced by the Mayor from the steps of the Town Hall. Owing to the howling gale, and the torrents of rain the street outside was absolutely empty save for the figure of Major Benjy clad in a sou’wester hat, a mackintosh and waders, crouching in the most sheltered corner he could find beneath a dripping umbrella. Elizabeth had had hard work to induce him to come at all: he professed himself perfectly content to curb his suspense in comfort at home by the fire till she returned with the news, and all the other inhabitants of Tilling felt they could wait till next morning . . . Then Lucia emerged from the Town Hall with a candidate on each side of her, and in a piercing scream, to make her voice heard in this din of the elements, she announced the appalling figures. Mrs. Elizabeth M
app-Flint, she yelled, had polled eight hundred and five votes, and was therefore elected.
Major Benjy uttered a hoarse “Hurrah!” and trying to clap his hands let go of his umbrella which soared into the gale and was seen no more. . . . Mr. George Pillson, screamed Lucia, had polled four hundred and twenty-one votes. Elizabeth, at the top of her voice, then warmly thanked the burgesses of Tilling for the confidence which they had placed in her, and which she would do her best to deserve. She shook hands with the Mayor and the defeated candidate, and instantly drove away with her husband. As there were no other burgesses to address Georgie did not deliver the speech which he had prepared: indeed it would have been quite unsuitable, since he had intended to thank the burgesses of Tilling in similar terms. He and Lucia scurried to their car, and Georgie put up the window.
“Most mortifying,” he said.
“My dear, you did your best,” said Lucia, pressing his arm with a wet but sympathetic hand. “In public life, one has to take these little reverses—”
“Most humiliating,” interrupted Georgie. “All that trouble thrown away. Being triumphed over by Elizabeth when you led me to expect quite the opposite. She’ll be far more swanky now than if I hadn’t put up.”
“No, Georgie, there I can’t agree,” said Lucia. “If there had been no other candidate, she would have said that nobody felt he had the slightest chance against her. That would have been much worse. Anyhow she knows now that four hundred and — what was the figure?”
“Four hundred and twenty-one,” said Georgie.
“Yes, four hundred and twenty-one thoughtful voters in Tilling—”
“ — against eight hundred and five thoughtless ones,” said Georgie. “Don’t let’s talk any more about it. It’s a loss of prestige for both of us. No getting out of it.”
Lucia hurried indoors to tell Grosvenor to bring up a bottle of champagne for dinner, and to put on to the fire the pretty wreath of laurel leaves which she had privily stitched together for the coronation of her new Town Councillor.