 Chapter 15 Part 1 of Ruggles of Red Gap by Harry Leon Wilson. This the Bravax recording is in the public domain. Launched now upon a business venture that would require my unremitting attention if it were to prosper, it may be imagined that I had little leisure for the social vagaries of the honourable George, shocking as these might be to one's finer tastes. And yet on the following morning I found time to tell him what. To put it quite bluntly, I gave him beans for his loose behaviour the previous evening, in publicly orgling and meeting as an equal, one whom one didn't know. To my amazement, instead of being heartily ashamed of his licentiousness, I found him recalcitrant, stubborn as a mule he was, and, with a low animal cunning, that I had never given him credit for. Tomasthenes was the son of a cutler, said he, and Napoleon worked on a canal boat what? Didn't you say so yourself, you juggins? What? Fancy there being upper and lower classes among natives? What rot? And I like North America, I don't mind telling you straight, I'm going to take it up. Horrified by these reckless words, I could only say, No bless oblige, meaning to convey that whatever the North Americans did, the next Earl of Brinstead, must not meet persons one doesn't know, where at he rejoined tartly that I was to stow that piffle. Being now quite alarmed, I took the further time to call upon Belknap Jackson, believing that he, if anyone, could recall the honourable George to his better nature. He too was shocked, as I had been, and at first would have put the blame entirely upon the shoulders of Cousin Egbert. At this I was obliged to admit that the honourable George had too often shown a regrettable fondness for the society of persons that did not matter, especially females, and I cited the case of the typing girl and the Brixton millinery person, with either of whom he would have allied himself in marriage, had not his lordship intervened. Belknap Jackson was quite properly horrified at these revelations. Has he no sense of no bless oblige? he demanded, at which I quoted the result of my own use of this phrase to the unfortunate man. Quite too plain it was that no bless oblige would never stop him from yielding to his baser impulses. We must be tactful then, remarked Belknap Jackson, without appearing to oppose him. We must yet show him who is really who in red gap. We shall let him see that we have standards which must be as rigidly adhered to as those of an older civilisation. I fancy it can be done. Privately I fancied not, yet I forebore to say this, or to prolong the painful interview, particularly as I do at the United States Grill. The recorder of that morning had done me handsomely, declaring my opening to have been a social event long to be remembered, and describing the costumes of a dozen or more of the smartly gowned matrons, quite as if it had been an assembly ball. My task now was to see that the Grill was kept to the high level of its capacity, both as a social ganglion, if one may use the term, and as a place to which the public would ever turn, for food that mattered. For my first luncheon the raccoons had prepared under my direction a steak and kidney pie, in addition to which I offered a thick soup and a pudding of high nutritive value. To my pleased astonishment the crowd at midday was quite all that my staff could serve, several of the Hobbs brood being at school, and the luncheon was received with every sign of approval by the business persons who sat to it. Not only were there drapers, chemists, and shop assistants, but solicitors and baristers, bankers, and estate agents, and all quite eager with their praise of my fare. To each of these I explained that I should give them but few things, but that these would be food in the finest sense of the word, adding that the fault of the American school lay in attempting a too great profusion of dishes, none of which in consequence could be raised to its highest power. So sound was my theory, and so nicely did my simple dished luncheon demonstrate it, that I was engaged on the spot to provide the bimonthly banquet of the Chamber of Commerce, the president of which rather seriously proposed that it now be made a monthly affair, since they would no longer be at the mercy of a hotel caterer whose ambition ran inversely to his skill. Indeed, after the pudding, I was this day asked to become a member of the body, and I now felt that I was indubitably one of them. America and I had taken each other as seriously as could be desired. More than once during the afternoon I wondered rather painfully what the Honourable George might be doing. I knew that he had been promised to a meeting of the Onwards and Upwards Club through the influence of Mrs. Effie, where it had been hoped that he would give a talk on country life in England. At least she had hinted to them that he might do this. Though I had known from the beginning that he would do nothing of the sort, and had merely hoped that he would appear for a dish of tea and stay quiet, which was as much as the Northside set could expect of him. Induced to speak, I was quite certain he would tell them straight that country life in England was silly rot, and that was all to it. Now, not having seen him during the day, I could but hope that he had attended the gathering in suitable afternoon attire, and that he would have divined that the cattle-person's hat did not coordinate with this. At 4.30, while I was still concerned over the possible misadventures of the Honourable George, my first patrons for tea began to arrive, for I had let it be known that I should specialise in this. Toasted crumpets there were, and muffins, and a tea-cake rich with plums, and tea, I need not say, which was all that tea could be. Several tables were filled with prominent ladies of the Northside set who were loud in their exclamations of delight, especially at the finished smartness of my service. Poor it was perhaps now that the profoundly serious thought I had given to my silver, linen, and glassware showed to best advantage. I suspect that this was the first time many of my guests had encountered a tea-cozy, since from that day they began to be prevalent in red-gap homes. Also my wagon containing the crumpets, muffins, and tea-cake, jam, and bread and butter, which I now used for the first time, created a veritable sensation. There was an agreeable hum of chatter from these early comers when I found myself welcoming Mrs. Judge Ballard and half a dozen members of the Onwards and Upwards Club, all of them wearing what I made out to be a baffled look. From these I presently managed to gather that their guest of honour for the afternoon had simply not appeared, and that the meeting, after awaiting him for two hours, had dissolved in some resentment, the time having been spent chiefly in an unflattering dissection of the clondike woman's behaviour the evening before. He is a naughty man to disappoint us so cruelly, declared Mrs. Judge Ballard of the honourable George, but the trajectory of it was feigned to cover a very real irritation. I made haste with possible excuses. I said that he might be ill, or that important letters in that day's post might have detained him. I knew he had been astonishingly well that morning, also that he loathed letters, and almost practically never received any, but something had to be said. A naughty, naughty fellow, repeated Mrs. Ballard, and the members of her party echoed it. They had looked forward, rather pathetically, I saw, to hearing about country life in England from one who had lived it. I was now drawn to greet the Belknap Jacksons who entered, and to the pleasure of winning their hearty approval for the perfection of my arrangements. As the wife presently joined Mrs. Ballard's group, the husband called me to his table, and disclosed that almost the worst might be feared of the honourable George. He was at that moment it appeared, with a rabble of cowpersons, and members of the lower class, gathered at a stockade at the edge of town, where various native horses, fresh from the wilderness, were being taught to be ridden. The wretched flower is with him, continued my informant, also the tuttle-charp, who continues to be received by our best people in spite of my remonstrances, and he yells quite like a demon when one of the riders is thrown. I passed as quickly as I could. The spectacle was, of course, I make allowances for vain Basingwell's ignorance of our standards. It was nothing short of disgusting, a man of his position, consorting with a herd. He told me no longer ago than this morning, I said, that he was going to take up America. He has, said Belknap Jackson with bitter emphasis. You should see what he has on, a cowboy hat and chaps, and the very lowest of them are calling him Judge. He flunked a meeting of the onwards and upwards society, I added. I know, and who could have expected it, in one of his lineage, at this very moment he should be conducting himself as one of his class. Can you wonder at my impatience with the West, here at an hour when our social life should be in evidence, when all trade should be forgotten, I am the only man in town who shows himself in a tea-room, and vain Basingwell over there, debasing himself without common assort. All at once I saw that I myself must bear the brunt of this scandal. I had brought hither the Honourable George, promising a personage who would for once and all unify the Northside set, and perhaps disintegrate its rival. I had been felicitated upon my master-stroke, and now it seemed I had come a cropper. But I resolved not to give up, and said as much now to Belknap Jackson. I may be blamed for bringing him among you, but trust me, if things are really as bad as they seem, I'll get him off again. I'll not let myself be bowled by such a silly lob as that. Trust me to devote profound thought to this problem. Well, have every confidence in you, he assured me. But don't be too severe all at once with the chap. He might recover a sane balance even yet. I shall use discretion, I assured him, but if it proves that I have fluffed my catch, reply upon me to use extreme measures. Red gap needs your best effort," he replied, in a voice that brimmed with feeling. At five-thirty, my rush being over, I repaired to the neighbourhood where the Honourable George had been reported. The stockade now contained only a half-score of the untaught horses, but across the road from it was a public-house, or saloon, from which came unmistakable sounds of carousing. It was an unsavory place, frequented only by cattle and horse-persons, the proprietor being an abandoned character named Spilmer, who had once done a patron to death in a drunken quarrel. Only slight legal difficulties had been made for him, however, yet having been depleted that he acted in self-defense, and the creature had it once resumed his trade as publican. There was even public sympathy for him at the time on the ground that he possessed a blind mother, though I have never been able to see that this should have been a factor in adjudging him. I paused now before the low place, imagining I could detect the tones of the Honourable George high above the forest that came out to me, deciding that in any event it would not become me to enter a resort of this stamp. I walked slowly back toward the more reputable part of town, and was presently rewarded by seeing the crowd emerge. It was led, I saw, by the Honourable George. The cattle-hat was still down upon his ears, and to my horror he had come upon the public third affair, with his legs encased in the chaps. A species of leather and pantalettes covered with goat's wool, a garment which I need not say no gentleman should be seen abroad in. As worn by the cow persons in their daily toil, they are only just possible, being as far from true vogue as anything well could be. Accompanying him or cousin Egbert, the Indian Tuttle, the cow persons Hank and Buck, and three or four others of the same rough stamp, unobtrusively I followed them to our main third affair, deeply humiliated by the atrocious spectacle the Honourable George was making of himself, only to observe them turn into another public house, entitled The Family Liquor Store, where it seemed only too certain, since the bearing of all was highly animated, that they would again carouse, at once seeing my duty, I boldly entered, finding them aligned against the American bar and clamoring for drink. My welcome was heartfelt, even enthusiastic. Almost every one of them beginning to regale me with incidents of the afternoon's horse-breaking. The Honourable George, it seemed, had himself briefly mounted one of the animals, having fallen into the belief that the cow persons did not try earnestly enough to stay on their mounts. I gathered that one experience had dissuaded him from this opinion. That their little paint horse, observed Cousin Egbert genially, stepped out from under the judge the prettiest you ever saw. He sure did, remarked the Honourable George with a palpable effort to speak the American Brogue. A most flighty beast he was, nerves all gone, I dare say a hopeless neurasthenic. And then, when I would have rebuked him for so shamefully disappointing the ladies of the onwards and upwards society, he began to tell me of the public house he had just left. I say, you know that spill-ma-chop? He's a genuine murderer. He let me hold the weapon with which he did it. And he has blind relatives dependent upon him, or something of that sort. Otherwise I fancy they'd have sent him to the gallows. And, by God, he's a witty scoundrel, what? Looking at his sign, leaving the settlement it reads, last chance. But entering the settlement it reads, first chance, last chance, and first chance, for a peg. Do you see what I mean? I tried it out, walked both ways under the sign and looked up. It worked perfectly. Enter the settlement, first chance, leave the settlement, last chance. Do you see what I mean? Suggestive what? Witty. You'd never have expected that murderer, Johnny, to be so subtle. Our own murderers aren't that way. I say it's a tremendous wheeze. I wonder the press-chaps don't take it up. It's better than the blind factory. Though the chap's mother, or something, is blind. What ho? But that's silly. To be sure one has nothing to do with the other. I say, have another, you chaps. I've not felt so fit in ages. I'm going to take up America. Plainly it was no occasion to use serious words to the man. He slapped his companions smartly on their backs, and was slapped in turn by all of them. One or two of them called him an old horse. Not only was I doing no good for the Northside set, but I had felt obliged to consume two glasses of spirits that I did not wish. So I discreetly withdrew. As I went the Honorable George was again telling them that he was going in for North America, and Cousin Egbert was calling, three thousand cheers. Thus luredly began, I may say, a scandal that was to be far reaching in its dreadful effects. Far from feeling a proper shame on the following day, the Honorable George was as pleased as punch with himself, declaring his intention of a gain consorting with the cattle and horse persons, and very definitely declining an invitation to play at golf with Belnapped Jackson. Golf! he spluttered. You do it, and then you've directly to do it all over again. I mean to say, one gets nowhere. A silly game. What? Wishing to be in no manner held responsible for his vicious pursuits, I that day removed my diggings from the flout home to chambers in the Pettengill block above the grill, where I did myself quite nicely with decent mantel ornaments, some vivacious prints of old world cathedrals, and a few good books. Having for body servant one of the Hobbes lads who seemed rather teachable, I must admit, however, that I was frequently obliged to address him more sharply than one should ever address one servant, my theory having always been that a serving person should be treated quite as if he were a gentleman temporarily performing menial duties. But there was that strain of lowness in all the Hobbeses, which often forbade this, a blending of servility with more or less skillfully dissembled impertinence, which I dare say is the distinguishing mark of our lower class serving people. Removed now from the immediate and more intimate effects of the Honourable George's digressions, I was privileged for days at a time to devote my attention exclusively to my enterprise. It had thriven from the beginning, and after a month I had so perfected the minor details of management that everything was right as rain. In my catering I continued to steer a middle course between the British School of Plain Roast and Boiled, and a too often piffling French complexity, seeking to retain the desirable features of each. My luncheons for the tradesmen rather held to a cut from the joint with vegetables and a suitable sweet, while in my dinners I relaxed a bit into somewhat imaginative salads and entrees. For the tea-hour I constantly strove to provide some appetizing novelty, often I confess, sacrificing nutrition to mere sightliness in view of my almost exclusive feminine patronage, yet never carrying this to an undignified extreme. As a result of my sound judgment, dinner serving in Red Gap began that winter to be done almost entirely in my place. There might be small informal affairs at home, but for dinners of any pretension the hostesses of the Northside set came to me relying almost quite entirely upon my taste in the selection of the menu. Although at first I was required to employ unlimited tact in dissuading them from strange and labored concoctions, whose photographs they fetched me from their women's magazines, I at length converted them from this unwholesome striving for novelty and laid the foundations for that sound scheme of gastronomy which today distinguishes this fastest-growing town in the state, if not in the west of America. End of Chapter 15 Part 1 Chapter 15 Part 2 Of Ruggles of Red Gap by Harry Leon Wilson This the Bravax recording is in the public domain. It was during these early months, I ought perhaps to say, that I rather distinguished myself in the matter of a relish which I compounded one day when there was a cold round of beef for luncheon. Little dreaming of the magnitude of the moment, I brought together English mustard and the American tomato katsu. In proportions which, for reasons that will be made obvious, I do not hear disclose, together with three other and lesser condiments, whose identity also must remain a secret. Serving this with my cold joint I was rather amazed at the sensation it created. My patrons clamored for it repeatedly. And a barrister wished me to prepare a flask of it for use in his home. The following day it was again demanded, and other requests were made for private supplies. While by the end of the week my relish had become rather famous, followed a suggestion from Mrs. Judson as she overlooked my preparation of it one day from her own task of polishing the glassware. Put it on the market! said she, and at once I felt the inspiration of her idea. To her I entrusted the formula. I procured a quantity of suitable flasks, while in her own home she compounded the stuff and filled them. Having no mind to claim credit not my own, I may now say that this rather remarkable woman also evolved the idea of the label, including the name, which was pasted upon the bottles when our product was launched. Ruckel's international relish, she had named it after a moment's thought, below was a print of my face, taken from an excellent photographic portrait, followed by a brief summary of the article's unsurpassed excellence, together with a list of the viands for which it was commended. As the international relish is now a matter of history, the demand for it having spread as far east as Chicago, and those places, I may add that it was this capable woman, again, who devised the large placard for hoardings in which a middle-aged but growing bon vivant in evening dress rebukes the blackamore who has served his dinner for not having at once placed Ruckel's international relish upon the table. The genial annoyance of the diner and the apologetic concern of the black are excellently depicted by the artist, for the original drawing of which I paid a stiffish price to the leading artist fellow of Spokane. This now adorns the wall of my sitting-room. It must not be supposed that I had been free during these months from annoyance and chagrin at the manner in which the Honourable George was conducting himself. In the beginning it was hoped, both by Bill Napjaxon and myself, that he might do no worse than merely consort with the rougher element of the town. I mean to say we suspected that the apparent charm of the raffish cattle persons might suffice to keep him from any notorious alliance with the dreaded Bohemian set. So long as he abstained from this he might still be received at our best homes, despite his regrettable fondness for low company, even when he brought the murderer Spilmer to dine with him at my place. The thing was condoned as a freakish grotesquery in one who, of unassailable social position, might well afford to stoop momentarily. I must say that the murderer, a heavy jowled brute of husky voice and quite lacking a forehead, conducted himself on this occasion with an entirely decent restraint of manner, quite in contrast to the Honourable George who betrayed an expansively naive pride in his guest, seeming to wish the world to know of the event. Between them they consumed a fair bottle of the relish. Indeed the Honourable George was inordinately fond of this, as a result of which he would often come out quite spotty again. Cousin Egbert was another who became so addicted to it that his fondness might well have been called a vice. Both he and the Honourable George would drench every course with the sauce, and Cousin Egbert, with that explicit directness which distinguished his character, would frankly sop his bread-cross in it, or even sip it with a coffee spoon. As I have intimated, in spite of the Honourable George's affiliations with the slum characters of what I may call red gaps east and, he had not yet publicly identified himself with the Klondike woman and her Bohemian set, in consequence of which let him dine and whine a spilmer as he would. There was yet hope that he would not alienate himself from the north side set. At intervals during the early months of his sojourn among us he accepted dinner invitations at the grill from our social leaders. In fact, after the launching of the international relish, I know of none that he declined. But it was evident to me that he moved but half-heartedly in this higher circle. On one occasion too he appeared in the trousers of a lounge suit of tweeds, instead of his dress trousers, and with tan boots. The trousers, to be sure, were of a somber hue, but the brown boots were quite too dreadfully unmistakable. After this I may say that I looked for anything, and my worst fears were soon confirmed. It began as the vaguest sort of gossip. The Honourable George, it was said, had been a guest at one of the Klondike woman's evening affairs. The rumour crystalised. He had been asked to meet the Bohemian set at a Dutch supper and had gone. He had lingered until a late hour, dancing the American folk dances, for which he had shown a surprising adaptability, and conducting himself generally as the next Earl of Brinstad should not have done. He had repeated his visit, repairing to the woman's house both afternoon and evening. He had become a constant visitor. He had spoken regrettably of the dullness of a meeting of the onwards and upward society which he had attended. He was in the woman's toils. With gossip of this sort there was naturally much indignation, and yet the leaders of the Northside set were so delicately placed that there was every reason for concealing it. They redoubled their attentions to the unfortunate man, seeking to leave him not an unoccupied evening or afternoon. Such was the gravity of the crisis. Belnap Jackson alone remained finely judicial. The situation is of a grievous character. He confided to me. But we must be wary. The day isn't lost so long as he doesn't appear publicly in the creature's train. For the presence we have only unverified rumour, as a man about town being basing well may feel free to consort with vicious companions and still maintain his proper standing, deplore it as all right-thinking people must. Under present social conditions he is undoubtedly free to lead what is called a double life. We can only wait. Such was the state of the public mind, be it understood, up to the time of the notorious and scandalous defection of this obsessed creature, an occasion which I cannot recall without shuddering, and which inspired me to a course that was later to have the most inexplicable and far-reaching consequences. Theatrical plays had been numerous with us during the season, with the natural result of many after-theatres suppers being given by those who attended, among them the Northside leaders, and frequently the Klondike woman with her following. On several of these occasions, moreover, the latter brought as supper guests certain representatives of the theatrical profession, both male and female. She apparently having a wide acquaintance with such persons, that this sort of thing increased her unpopularity with the Northside set will be understood when I add that now and then her guests would be of undoubted respectability in their private lives, as theatrical persons often are, and such as our smartest hostesses would have been only too glad to entertain. To counteract this effect Palmap Jackson now broached to me a plan of undoubted merit, which was nothing less than to hold an afternoon reception at his home in honour of the world's greatest piano forte artist, who was presently to give a recital in red gap. I have not met the chap myself, he began, but I knew his secretary and travelling companion quite well in a happier day in Boston. The recital here would be Saturday evening, which means that they will remain here on Sunday until the evening train east. I shall suggest to my friend that his employer, too wild away the tedium of the Sunday, might care to look in upon me in the afternoon and meet a few of our best people. Nothing boring, of course! I've no doubt he will arrange it. I've written him to Portland where they now are. Rather a card that will be, I instantly cried, rather better class than entertaining strolling players. Indeed the merit of the proposal rather overwhelmed me. It would be dignified and yet spectacular. It would show the Klondike woman that we chose to have contact only with artists of acknowledged preeminence and that such were quite willing to accept our courtesies. I had hopes, too, that the Honourable George might be aroused to advantages which he seemed bent upon casting to the American winds. A week later, Belnaptax enjoyously informed me that the great artist had consented to accept his hospitality. There would be light refreshments with which I was charged. I suggested tea in the Russian manner, which he applauded. And everything dainty and way of food, he warned me, nothing common, nothing heavy, some of those tiny lettuce sandwiches, a bit of caviar, macaroons, nothing gross, a decanter of dry sherry, perhaps, a few of the lightest wafers, things that cultivated persons may trifle with, things not repugnant to the artist's soul. I promised my profoundest consideration to these matters. And it occurs to me, he thoughtfully added, that this may be a time for Bane Vasingwell to silence the slurs upon himself that are becoming so common. I shall beg him to meet our guest at his hotel and escort him to my place. A note to my friend. The bearer, the Honourable George Augustus Vane Basingwell, brother of his lordship, the Earl of Brinstead, will take great pleasure in escorting to my home. You get the idea? Not bad. Again, I applauded, resolving that for once the Honourable George would be suitably attired, even if I had to bully him. And so was launched what promised to be Red Gap's most notable social event of the season. The Honourable George, being consulted, promised, after a rather sulky hesitation, to act as the great artist's escort, though he persisted in referring to him as that piano Johnny, and betrayed a suspicion that Bill Napjackson was merely bent upon getting him to perform without price. But no! cried Bill Napjackson, I should never think of anything so indelicate as asking him to play. My own piano will be tightly closed and I dare say removed to another room. At this the Honourable George professed to wonder why the chap was desired if he wasn't to perform. All hair, and bad English, silly brutes when they don't play, he declared. In the end, however, as I have said, he consented to act as he was wished to. Cousin Egbert, who was present at this interview, took somewhat the same view as the Honourable George, even asserting that he should not attend the recital. He don't sing. He don't dance. He don't recite. Just plays the piano. That ain't any kind of a show for folks to set up a whole evening for. He protested bitterly, and went on to mention various theatrical pieces which he had considered worthy. Among them I recall being one entitled The Two Johns, which he regretted not having witnessed for several years, and another called Ben Hur, which was better than all the piano players alive, he declared. But with the Honourable George enlisted, both Belknap Jackson and I considered the opinions of Cousin Egbert to be quite wholly negligible. Saturday's recorder, in its advanced notice of the recital, announced that the Belknap Jackson's a Boston in bread gap would entertain the artist on the following afternoon at their palatial home in the Gettengill Edition, where a select few of the Northside set had been invited to meet him. Belknap Jackson himself was, as a man, uplifted. He constantly revised and re-revised his invitation list. He sought me out each day to suggest subtle changes in the very artistic menu I had prepared for the affair. His last touch was to supplement the decanter of sherry with a bottle of vodka. About the caviar he wordied quite fearfully until it proved upon arrival to be fresh and of prime quality. My man, the hob's boy, had under my instructions pressed and smarted the Honourable George's suit for afternoon wear. The carriage was engaged. Saturday night it was tremendously certain that no hitch could occur to mar the affair. We had left no detail to chance. The recital itself was quite all that could have been expected. But underneath the enthusiastic applause there ran even a more intense fervour among those fortunate ones who were to meet the artist on the motto. Belknap Jackson knew himself to be a hero. He was elaborately cool. He smiled tolerantly at intervals, and undoubtedly applauded with the least hint of languid proprietorship in his manner. He was heard to speak of the artist by his first name. The Klondike woman and many of her bohemian set were prominently among those present and sustained glances of pitying triumph from those members of the Northside set so soon to be distinguished above her. The motto dawned auspiciously, very cloudy with smartish drives of wind and rain, confined to the dingy squalor of his hotel. How gladly would the artist, it was felt, seek the refined cheer of one of our best homes, where he would be enlivened by an hour or so of contact with our most cultivated people. Belknap Jackson telephoned me with increasing frequency as the hour drew near, nervously seeming to dread that I would have overlooked some detail of his refined refreshments, or that I would not have them at his house on time. He telephoned often to the Honourable George to be assured that the carriage with its escort would be prompt. He telephoned repeatedly to the driver-chap to impress upon him the importance of his mission. His guests began to arrive even before I had decked his sideboard with what was, I have no hesitation in declaring, the most superbly dainty buffet collation that Red Gap had ever beheld. The atmosphere at once became tense with expectation. At three o'clock the host announced from the telephone, Vain Basingwell has started from the flood-house. The guests thrilled and hushed the careless chatter of new arrivals. Belknap Jackson remained heroically at the telephone, having demanded to be put through to the hotel. He was flushed with excitement. A score of minutes later he announced with an effort to control his voice. They have left the hotel. They are on way. The guests stiffened in their seats. Some of them nervously and for no apparent reason exchanged chairs with others. Some late arrivals bustled in and were immediately awed to the same electric silence of waiting. Belknap Jackson placed the sherry decanter where the vodka bottle had been and the vodka bottle where the sherry decanter had been. The effect is better! he remarked, and went to stand where he could view the driveway. The moments passed. At such crises, which I need not say have been plentiful in my life, I have always known that I possessed an immense reserve of coolness. Seldom have I ever been so much as slightly flustered. Now I was calmness itself, and the knowledge brought me no little satisfaction as I noted the rather painful distraction of our host. The moments passed. Long, heavy, silent moments. Our host ascended trippingly to an upper floor whence he could see farther down the drive. The guests held themselves in smiling readiness. Our host descended and again took up his post at a lower window. The moments passed. Stilled, leaden moments. The silence had become intolerable. Our host jiggled on his feet. Some of the quicker-minded guests made a pretense of little conversational flurries. That second movement, oh, exquisitely rendered. No one has ever read Chopin so divinely. How his family must idolize him, they say. That exquisite concerto. Hasn't he the most stunning hair? Those staccato passages left me actually limp. I'm starting Myrtle on Tuesday to take of Professor Glickstein. She wants to take stenography, but I tell her. Did you think the preludes were just the tiniest bit idealized? I always say if one has one's music and one's books, of course he must be very, very fond of music. Such were the hushed tentative fragments I caught. The moments passed. Belnap Jackson went to the telephone. What? But they're not here. Very strange. They should have been here half an hour ago. Send someone. Yes, at once. In the ensuing silence he repaired to the buffet and drank a glass of vodka. Quite distraught he was. The moments passed. Again several guests exchanged seats with other guests. It seemed to be a device for relieving the strain. Once more there were scattering efforts at normal talk. Myrtle is a strange girl, a creature of moods, I call her. She wanted to act in the moving pictures, until Papa bought the car. And she knows every one of the new tango steps. But I tell her a few lessons and cooking wouldn't- Perome is just the same puzzling child. One thing one day and another thing the next. A mere bundle of nerves and so sensitive if you say the least little thing to her. If we could only get Ling Wang back, this chap boy is always threatening to leave if the men don't get up to breakfast on time or if Gertie makes fudge in his kitchen of an afternoon. Our boy sends all his wages to his uncle in China, but I simply can't get him to say dinner is served. He just slides in and says, all right, you come. It's very annoying, but I always tell the family, remember what a time we had with the Swede. I mean to say things were becoming rapidly impossible. The moments passed. Bill and Ab Jackson again telephoned. You did send a man after them? Send someone after him then? Yes, at once. He poured himself another peg of the vodka. Silence fell again. The waiting was terrific. We had endured an hour of it, but little more was possible to any sensitive human organism. All at once. As if the very last possible moment of silence had passed, the conversation broke loudly and generally. Han, did you notice the slimsy things she wore last night? Indecent if you ask me, with not a petticoat under it, I'll be bound. Always wear shoes twice too small for her. What man can see in her? How they can endure that perpetual smirk. They were at last discussing the Klondike woman and whatever had befallen our guest of honour, I knew that those present would never regain their first awe of the occasion. It was now unrestrained gavel. The second hour passed quickly enough. The latter half of it being enlivened by the buffet collation, which elicited many compliments upon my ingenuity and good taste. Quite almost every guest partook of a glass of the vodka. They chattered of everything but music. I dare say it being thought graceful to ignore the afternoon's disaster. Belknap Jackson had sunk into a mood of sullen desperation. He drained the vodka bottle. Perhaps the liquor brought him something of the chill Russian fatalism. He was dignified but sodden, with a depression that seemed to blow from the bleak Siberian steps. His wife was already receiving the adduce of their guests. She was smoldering ominously. Uncertain where the blame lay, but certain there was blame. Criminal blame! I could read as much in her narrowed eyes as she tried for aplomb with her guests. My own leave I took unobtrusively. I knew our strangely missing guest was to depart by the six-two train, and I strolled toward the station. A block away I halted, awaiting. It had been a time of waiting. The moments passed. I heard the whistle of the approaching train. At the same moment I was startled by the approach of a team that I took to be running away. I saw it was the carriage of the pierce chap, and that he was driving with the most abandoned recklessness. His passengers were the Honourable George, Cousin Egbert, and her missing guest. The great artist as they passed me seemed to feel a vast delight in his wild ride. He was cheering on the driver. He waved his arms and himself shouted to the maddened horses. The carriage drew up to the station with the train, and the three descended. The artist hurriedly shook hands in the warmest manner with his companions, including the pierce chap, who had driven them. He beckoned to his secretary who was waiting with his bags. He mounted the steps of the coach, and as the train pulled out he waved frantically to the three. He kissed his hand to them, looking far out as the train gathered momentum. Again and again he kissed his hand to the hat-waving trio. It was too much. The strain of the afternoon had told, even upon my own iron nerves. I felt unequal at that moment to the simplest inquiry, and plainly the situation was not one to attack in haste. I mean to say it was too pregnant with meaning. I withdrew rapidly from the scene, feeling the need for rest and silence. As I walked I hesitated profoundly. CHAPTER 16 From the innocent lips of Cousin Egbert the following morning there fell a tale of such cold-blooded depravity that I found myself with difficulty giving it credit. At ten o'clock, while I still mused pensively over the events of the previous day, he entered the grill, in search of breakfast, as had lately become his habit. I greeted him with perceptible restraint, not knowing what guilt might be his. But his manner to me was so unconsciously genial that I had once acquitted him of any simplicity in whatever base-doings had been forward. He took his accustomed seat with a pleasant word to me. I waited, feeling a mite off this morning. He began, account of a lot of truck I ate yesterday. I guess I'll just take something kind of dainty. Tell Clarice to cook me up a nice little steak with plenty of fat on it, and some fried potatoes, and a cup of coffee, and a few waffles to come. The judge, he wouldn't get up yet. He looked kind of mottled and anguished, but I guess he'll pull around all right. I had the chink take him up about a gallon of strong tea. Say, listen here, the judge ain't so awful much of a stayer, is he? Burning with curiosity I was to learn what he could tell me of the day before. Yet I controlled myself to the calmest of leisurely questioning, in order not to alarm him. It was too plain that he had no realization of what had occurred. It was always the way with him, I had noticed. Events of the most momentous might culminate furiously about his head. But he never knew that anything had happened. The Honorable George, I began, was with you yesterday? Perhaps he ate something he shouldn't. He did. He done it repeatedly. He ate pretty much near as much of that sauerkraut and frankfurters as the piano guy himself did. And that some tribute, believe me, Bill, some tribute. The piano guy? I murmured quite casually. And say, listen here, that guy is all right. If anybody should ask you, you talk about your mixers. This was a bit puzzling, for of course I had never talked about my mixers. I shouldn't a bit know how to go on. I ventured another query. Where was it this mixing and that sort of thing took place? Why, but Miss Kenners, where we was having a little party, frankfurters and sauerkraut and beer. My stars, but that steak looks good. I'm feeling better already. His food was before him and he attacked it with no end of spirit. Tell me quite all about it, I amably suggested. And after a moment's hurried devotion to the steak, he slowed up a bit to talk. Well, listen here now. The judge says to me, when Eddie Pierce comes, sourdough, he says, look in at Miss Kenners this afternoon if you got nothing else on. I fancy it will repay you, just like that. Well, I says, all right, Judge, I fancy, I will. I fancy, I ain't got anything else on, I says, and I'm always glad to go there, I says, because no matter what they're always saying about this here Bohemian stuff, Kate Kenners, one good scout, take it from me. So in a little while I slicked up some and went on around to her house, then hitched outside, I seen Eddie Pierce's hack, and I says, my lands, that's a funny thing, I says, I thought the judge was going to haul this here piano guy out to the Jackson place where he could wile away the Teejum, like Jackson said. Now it looks as if they was here. Or maybe it was just Eddie himself that was fancy to look in, not having anything else on. Well, so anyway, I go up on the stoop and knock, and when I get in the parlor, there the piano guy is, and the judge, and Eddie Pierce too, Eddie helping the chap around with frankfurters and sauerkraut and beer and one thing and another. Besides them was about a dozen of Miss Kenners own particular friends, all of them good scouts, let me tell you, and everybody laughing and gasping back and forth and cutting up and having a good time all around. Well, so as soon as they seen me, everybody says, oh, here comes sourdough, good old sourdough, and all like that, and they introduce me to the piano guy who gets up to shake hands with me and spills his beer off the chairarm onto the wife of Eddie Fosdick in the Farmers and Merchants National, and so I sat down and ate with him and had a few steins of beer and everybody had a good time all round. The wonderful man appeared to believe that he had told me quite all of interest concerning this monstrous festivity. He surveyed the mutilated remnant of his steak and said, I guess Clarice might as well fry me a few eggs, I'm feeling a lot better. I directed that this be done, musing upon the dreadful menu he had recited and recalling the exquisite finish of the collation I myself had prepared. Sausages, to be sure, had their place and beer as well, but sauerkraut I have never been able to regard as an at all possible food for persons that really matter, Germans, to be sure. Discretely, I renewed my inquiry. I dare say the Honourable George was in good form. I suggested. Well, he ate a lot. Him and the piano guy was bragging which could eat the most sausages. I was unable to restrain a shudder at the thought of this revolting contest. The piano guy beat him out though. He'd been at the Palace Hotel for three meals, and I guess his appetite was right craving. And afterward? Well, it was like Jackson said. This lad wanted to wile away the teardom of a Sunday afternoon, and so he wiled it. That's all. Pretty soon Miss Kenner sat down to the piano and sung some coon songs that tickled him most to death, and then she got around to playing ragtime. Say, believe me, Bill, when she starts in on that rag stuff, she can make a piano simply stutter itself to death. Well, at that the piano guy says it's great stuff, and so he sets down himself to try it, and he catches on pretty good. I'll say that for him. So we got to dancing while he plays for us. Only he don't remember the tunes good and has to fake a lot. Then he makes Miss Kenner play again while he dances with Miss Fosdick that he spilled the beer on, and after that we had some more beer, and this guy, another played a crowd, and a few sausages, and Miss Kenner sings the Robert E. Lee and a couple more good ones, and the guy played some more ragtime himself trying to get the tunes right. And then he played some fancy pieces that he'd practiced up on, and we danced some and had a few more beers with everybody laughing and cutting up and having a nice home afternoon. Well, the piano guy enjoyed himself every minute, if anybody asks you, being lit up like a main chandelier. They made him feel like he was one of their own folks. You certainly got to hand it to him for being one little good mixer. Talk about whiling away the Teejum. He'd done it all right, all right. He whiled away so much Teejum there, he darn near missed his train. Eddie Pierce kept telling him what time it was, only he'd keep asking Miss Kenner to play just one more rag, and at last we had to just shoot him into his fur overcoat while he was kissing all the women on their hands, and we'd have missed the train at that if Eddie hadn't poured the leather into them skates of his all the way down to the depot. He just did make it, and he told the judge and Eddie and me that he ain't had such a good time since he left home. I kind of hated to see him go. He here attacked the eggs with what seemed to be a freshening of his remarkable appetite, and as yet, be it noted, I had detected no consciousness on his part that a foul betrayal of confidence had been committed. I approached the point. Uh, the Belknap Jacksons were rather expecting him, you know. My impression was that the Honorable George had been sent to escort him to the Belknap Jackson house. Well, that's what I thought too, but I guess the judge forgot it, or maybe he thinks the guy will mix in better with Miss Kenner's crowd. Anyway, there they was, and it probably didn't make any difference to the guy himself. He likely thought he could wile away the teaching there as well as he could wile at any place, all of them being such good scouts, and the judge has certainly got a case on Miss Kenner, so maybe she asked him to drop in with any friend of his. She's got him bridalized and broke to all gates. He visibly groped for an illuminating phrase. He, he just looks at her. The simple words fell upon my ears with a sickening finality. He just looks at her. I had seen him just look at the typing girl and at the Brixton Milliner. All too fearfully I divined their preposterous significance. Beyond question a black infamy had been laid bare, but I made no effort to convey its magnitude to my guileless informant. As I left him he was mildly bemoaning his own lack of skill on the piano forte. Darned if I don't wish I had took some lessons on the piano myself, like that I'd done. It certainly does help to wile away the Teejum when you got friends in for the afternoon. But then I was just a hillbilly, likely I couldn't have learned the notes good. It was a half hour later that I was called to the telephone to listen to the anguished accents of Belknap Jackson. Have you heard it? He called. I answered that I had. The man is a paranoic. He should be at once confined in an asylum for the criminal insane. I shall row him fiercely about it, never fear. I've not seen him yet. But the creature should be watched. He may do harm to himself or to some innocent person. They run wild, they kill, they burn, set fire to buildings, that sort of thing. I tell you, none of us is safe. The situation, I answered, has even more shocking possibilities. But I have an idea. I shall be equal to it. If the worst seems to be imminent, I shall adopt extreme measures. I closed the interview. It was too painful. I wished to summon all my powers of deliberation. To my amazement, who should presently appear among my throng of lunch and patrons? But the honourable George, I will not say that he a slunk in. But there was an unaccustomed diffidence in his bearing. He did not meet my eye. And it was not difficult to perceive that he had no wish to engage my notice. As he sought a vacant table, I observed that he was spotted quite profusely, and his lunch in order was of the simplest. Straight I went to him. He winced a bit, I thought, as he saw me approach. But then he apparently resolved to brass it out, for he glanced full at me with a terrific assumption of bravado, and had once begun to give me beans about my service. Your belly-tea-shop running down, what! louts for waiters, clawdish louts, disgraceful my word, slow-beggers, take a year to do you a rasher and a bit of what? To this absurd tirade I replied not a word, but stood silently regarding him. I daresay my gaze was of the most chilling character, and steady. He endured it, but a moment. His eyes fell, his bravado vanished. He fumbled with the cutlery. Quite abashed he was. Come, your explanation! I said curtly, divining that the moment was one in which to adopt a tone with him. He wriggled a bit, crumpling a roll with panic-fingers. Come, come! I commanded. His face brightened, though with an intention most obviously false, he coughed, a cough of pure deception. Not only were his eyes averted from mine, but they were glassed to an uncanny degree. The fingers wrought piteously at the now-plastic roll. My word, that chap was taken bad, had to be seen to what? Revived, I mean to say, all piano-johnies that way, nervous wrecks, what? Spells, and spells. Come, come! I said crisply. The glassed eyes were those of one hypnotised. In the carriage to the hyphen chap's place to be sure. Fainting spell, weak heart, what? No stimulants about. Passing house, perhaps have stimulants, hot tablets, beer, things of that sort. Lead him in. Revive him. Quite well presently, but not well enough to go on. Couldn't let a piano-johnie die on her hands, what? Inquests, evidence, witnesses, or that silly rot. Save his life, what? Presence of mind, kind hearts, what? Humanity. Do as much for any chap. Not let him die like a dog in the gutter, what? Get no credit, though. His curiously mechanical utterance trailed off to be lost in a mere husky murmur. The glassy stare was still at my wall. I have, in the course of my eventful career, had occasion to mark the varying degrees of plausibility with which men speak untruths. But never, I confidently aver, have I beheld one lie with so piteous a futility. The art, and I dare say, with diplomat chaps and that sorts, it may probably be called an art, demands, as its very essence, that the speaker seems to be himself convinced of the truth of that which he utters. And the honourable George, in his youth, mentioned for the foreign office. I turned away. The exhibition was quite too indecent. I left him to mince at his meager fare. As I glanced his way at odd moments thereafter, he would be muttering feverishly to himself. I mean to say, he no longer was himself. He presently made his way to the street, looking neither to right nor left. He had, in truth, the dazed manner of one stupefied by some powerful narcotic. I wondered pittingly when I should again behold him, if it might be that his poor wits were bedeviled past mending. My period of uncertainty was all too brief. For some two hours later, full into the tide of our afternoon shopping throng, there issued a spectacle that removed any lingering doubt of the unfortunate man's plight. In the rather smart pony-trap of the Klondike woman, driven by the person herself, rode the honourable George. Full in the startled gaze of many of our best people, he advertised his defection from all that makes for a sanely governed stability in our social organism. He had gone flagrantly over to the Bohemian set. I could detect that his eyes were still glassy, but his head was erect. He seemed to flaunt his shame. And the guilty partner of his downfall drove with an affectation of easy carelessness. Yet with a lift of the chin, which, though barely perceptible, had all the effect of binding the prisoner to her chariot-wheels, a prisoner moreover whom it was plain, she meant to parade to the last ignominious degree. She drove leisurely, and in the little infrequent curt turns of her head to address her companion, she contrived to instill so finished an effect of boredom that she must have goaded to frenzy any matron of the north side set who chanced to observe her, as more than one of them did. Fries did she halt along our main thoroughfare for bits of shopping, a mere running into of shops or to the doors of them, where she could issue verbal orders, the while she surveyed her waiting and drugged captive with a certain half-veiled but good-humoured insolence. At these moments, for I took pains to overlook the shocking scene, the Honourable George followed her with eyes no longer glassed, the eyes of helpless infatuation. He looks at her, Cousin Egbert had said. He had told it all and told it well. The equipage graced our street upon one paltry excuse or another for the better part of an hour. The woman being minded that none of us should longer question her supremacy over the next and eleventh earl of Brinstead. Not for another hour did the effects of the sensation die out among tradesmen and the street crowds. It was like waves that recede but gradually. They talked. They talked. They stopped to talk. They passed on talking. They hissed vivaciously. They rose to exclamations. I mean to say, there was no end of a gabbling row about it. There was in my mind no longer any room for hesitation. The quite harshest of extreme measures must be at once adopted before all was too late. I made my way to the telegraph office. It was not a time for correspondence by post. Afterward I had myself put through by telephone to Bellap Jackson. With his sensitive nature he had stopped in all day. Although still averse to appearing publicly he now consented to meet me at my chambers late that evening. The whole town is seething with indignation he called to me. It was disgraceful. I shall come at ten. We rely upon you. Again I saw that he was concerned solely with his humiliation as would be host. Not yet had he divined that the deluded Honourable George might go to the unspeakable length of a matrimonial alliance with the woman who had enchained him. And as to his own disaster he was less than accurate when he said that the whole town was seething with indignation. The members of the Northside set, to be sure, were seething furiously. But a flippant element of the baser sort was quite openly rejoicing. As at the time of that most slanderous minstrel performance it was said that the Bohemian set had again, if I have caught the phrase, put a thing over upon the side set. Many persons of low taste seemed quite to enjoy the dreadful affair. And the members of the Bohemian set naturally throughout the day had been quite coarsely beside themselves with glee. Little they knew I reflected what power I could wield, nor that I had already set in motion its deadly springs. Little did the woman dream, flaunting her triumph up and down our main business third affair, that one who watched her there had but to raise his hand to rest the victim from her toils. Little did she now dream that he would stop at no half measures. I mean to say she would never think I could bowl her out as easy as buying cockles off a burrow. At the hour for our confidence Penab Jackson arrived at my chambers muffled in an Ulster and with a soft hat well over his face. I gathered that he had not wished to be observed. I feel that this is a crisis. He began as he gloomily shook my hand. Where is our bolstered 20th century culture if outrageous like this are permitted for the first time I understand how these Western communities have in the past resorted to mob violence. Public feeling is already running high against the creature and her unspeakable set. I met this outburst with the serenity of one who holds the winning cards in his hand and begged him to be seated. Then upon I disclosed to him the weakly susceptible nature of the Honourable George reciting the incidents of the typing girl and the Brixton milliner. I added that now as before I should not hesitate to preserve the family honour and dreadful thing indeed. He murmured if that adventurous shall trap him into a marriage imagine her one day a Countess a Brixton but suppose the fellow prove stubborn suppose his infatuation dulls all his finer instincts. I explained that the Honourable George while he might upon a spur of the moment commit a folly was not to be taken too seriously that he was I believed quite incapable of a grand passion I mean to say he always forgot them after a few days more like a child staring into shop windows he was rapidly forgetting one desired object in the presence of others. I added that I had adopted the extremist measures. Then upon perceiving that I had something in my sleeve as the saying is my collar besought me to confide in him without a word I handed him a copy of my cable message sent that afternoon to his lordship your immediate presence required to prevent a monstrous folly he brightened as he read it you actually mean to say he began his lordship I explained will at once understand the nature of what is threatened he knows more over that I would not alarm him without cause he will come at once and the Honourable George will be told what his lordship has never failed he tells him what perfectly and that's quite all to it the poor chap will be saved my collar was profoundly stirred coming here to red gap his lordship the oil of Brinstead actually come in here my God this is wonderful he paused he seemed to moisten his dry lips he began once more and now his voice trembled with emotion he will need a place to stay hotels impossible had you thought he glanced at me appealingly I dare say I replied that his lordship will be pleased to have you put him up you would do him quite nicely you mean it seriously that would be oh inexpressible he would be our house guest the Earl of Brinstead I fancy that would silence a few of these serpent tongues that are wagging so venomously today but before his coming I insisted there must be no word of his arrival the Honourable George would know the meaning of it and the woman though I suspect now that she is only making a show of him might go on to the bitter end they must suspect nothing I had merely thought of a brief and dignified notice in our press he began quite wistfully but if you think it might defeat our ends it must wait until he has come glorious he exclaimed it will be even more of a blow to them he began to murmur as if reading from a journal his lordship the Earl of Brinstead is visiting for a few days it will surely be as much as a few days perhaps a week or more is visiting for a few days at sea bellop Jackson's of Boston and red gap you seem to regard the printed words better still the sea bellop Jackson's of Boston and red gap are for a few days entertaining as they're on it house guest his lordship the Earl of Brinstead yes that's admirable he arose and impulsively clasped my hand Rockles dear old chap I shan't know at all how to repay you the bohemian set such as are possible will be bound to come over to us there will be left of it but one unprincipled woman and she wretched and an outcast she has made me absurd I shall grind her under my heel the East Room shall be prepared for his lordship he shall breakfast there if he wishes I fancy he'll find us rather more like himself than he suspects he shall see that we have ideals that are not half bad he rung my hand again his eyes were misty with gratitude and of chapter sixteen