CHAPTER IV

TRAVELS WITH A FIRST RESERVE

I arrived at Shotley Beauchamp (for Widgerley and the Sludyard Valley Branch) with my heart gradually settling into my boots.

Most of us--men, not women: a woman, I fancy, provided she knows that her hat is on straight, is prepared to look the whole world in the face at any moment--are familiar with the sinking sensation which accompanies us to the door of a house to which we have been bidden as a guest for the first time. We foresee ahead of us a long vista of explanations, and for the moment we hate explanations more than anything on earth.

First, we shall have to explain ourselves to the butler. Then, pending the tardy appearance of our host and hostess, we shall have to explain ourselves to uninterested fellow-guests. At tea, knowing no one, we shall stand miserably aloof, endeavouring _faute de mieux_ to explain our presence to ourself, and wondering whether it would be decent to leave before breakfast next morning. After dressing for dinner we shall come down too early, and have to explain ourselves to an embarrassed governess and a critical little girl of twelve. There for the present our imagination boggles. Pondering these things, we enquire bitterly why we ever left the club, where, though life may be colourless, no questions are asked.

It is true that these illusions dispel themselves with the first grip of our host's hand, but they usually cling to us right up to the opening of the front door; and as I on this particular occasion had only got as far as the platform of the local station, my soul _adhaesit pavimento_.

After the habit of shy persons, I compiled a list of my own special handicaps as I sat in my solitary smoking-compartment. As far as I can remember they ran something like this:--

(1) I have been roaming about the waste places of the earth for more than ten years, and have entirely lost any social qualities that I ever possessed.

(2) For people who like that sort of thing, house-parties are well enough. But I do not understand the young man of the present day, and he apparently does not understand me. As for the modern young woman, I simply shrink from her in fear.

(3) I have never met my host and hostess in my life.

(4) It is quite possible that The Freak has forgotten to tell his parents that he has invited me.

(5) In any case I probably shall not be met at the station, and there are never any conveyances to be had at these places. Altogether--

At this moment the train drew up at Shotley Beauchamp, and a smiling groom opened the door and enquired if I were for The Towers. Item Number Five was accordingly deleted from my catalogue of woes. Two minutes later Items One to Four slipped silently away into the limbo of those things that do not matter. A girl was sitting in the brougham outside the station.

"Lady goin' up, too, sir," remarked the groom into my ear. "Her maid," he added, "is in the dogcart. You got a man, sir?"

"No."

The groom touched his hat and departed, doubtless to comfort the maid.

I paused at the carriage-door, and by means of a terrifying cough intimated that I, too, had been invited to The Towers, and, although a stranger and unintroduced, begged leave in the humblest manner possible to assert my right to a seat in the brougham.

I was greeted with a friendly smile.

"Come in! I expect you are Mr. Carmyle."

I admitted guardedly that this was so, and proceeded to install myself in that part of the brougham not already occupied by the lady's hat.

"My name is Constance Damer," said my companion, as the brougham started. "Perhaps you have heard of me?"

"No," I replied, "I have not."

"Not very well put!" said Miss Damer reprovingly.

"I have been abroad for several years," I murmured in extenuation.

"I know," said my companion, nodding her head. "You have been building a dam across something in Africa."

I accepted this precise summary of my professional career with becoming meekness. Miss Damer continued:--

"And I suppose you are feeling a little bit lost at present."

"Yes," I said heartily, "I am."

"You should have said 'Not _now_!'" explained my companion gently.

I apologised again.

"I shall make allowances for you until you find your feet," said Miss Damer kindly.

I thanked her, and asked whom I was likely to meet at The Towers.

Miss Damer ticked off the names of the party on her small gloved fingers. (Have I mentioned that she was _petite_?)

"Mr. Mainwaring and Lady Adela," she said. "You know _them_, of course?"

"No. I saw them once on Speech Day at school fifteen years ago. That is all."

"Well, they are your host and hostess."

"Thank you: I had gathered that," I replied deferentially.

"Then Dicky."

"Dicky? Who is-- Oh, The Frea-- Yes. Quite so! Proceed!"

"What did you call him?" asked Miss Damer, frankly curious.

"I--well--at school we used to call him The Freak," I explained. "Men very often never know the Christian names of their closest friends," I added feebly. "Who else?"

"There is Hilda Beverley, of course. You have heard of her?"

"N--no. Ought I to have done?"

Miss Damer's brown eyes grew quite circular with surprise.

"Do you mean to tell me," she asked incredulously, "that Dicky never informed you that he was engaged?"

"No. You see," I pointed out, anxious to clear my friend of all appearance of lukewarmness as a lover, "I only met him the other day for the first time in fifteen years, and we naturally had a good deal to tell one another; and so, as it happened--that is--" I tailed off miserably under Miss Damer's implacable eye.

"You are his greatest friend, aren't you?" she enquired.

On reflection I agreed that this was so, although I had never seriously considered the matter before. Women have a curious habit of cataloguing their friends into a sort of order of merit--"My greatest friend, my greatest friend but six," and so on. The more sensitive male shrinks from such an invidious undertaking. Dicky and I had corresponded with one another with comparative regularity ever since our University days; and when two Englishmen, one hopelessly casual and the other entirely immersed in his profession, achieve this feat, I suppose they rather lay themselves open to accusations of this sort.

"And he never told you he was engaged?"

I shook my head apologetically.

"Ah, well," said Miss Damer charitably, "I dare say he would have remembered later. One can't think of everything in a single conversation, can one?" she added with an indulgent smile.

I was still pondering a suitable and sprightly defence of masculine reserve where the heart is concerned, when the carriage swung round through lodge-gates, and the gravel of the drive crunched beneath our wheels.

"I hope the old Freak and his girl will be very happy together," I said, rather impulsively for me. "He deserves a real prize."

"You are right," said Miss Damer, "he does."

My heart warmed to this little lady. She knew a good man when she saw one.

"Have they been engaged long?" I asked.

"About a month."

"Where did he come across her?"

"He did not come across her," replied Miss Damer with gentle reproof, as a Mother Superior to a novice. "They were brought together."

"That means," I said, "that it is what is called an entirely suitable match?"

Miss Damer nodded her small wise head.

"From a parental point of view," I added.

"From Lady Adela's point of view," corrected Miss Damer. "Mr. Mainwaring, poor old dear, has not got one."

"But what about The Freak's point of view?" I enquired.

"I can hear you quite well in your ordinary tone of voice," Miss Damer assured me.

I apologised, and repeated the question.

The girl considered. Obviously, it was a delicate subject.

"He seems quite content," she said at last. "But then, he never could bear to disappoint any one who had taken the trouble to make arrangements for his happiness."

"Would you mind telling me," I said, "without any mental reservation whatsoever, whether you consider that this engagement is the right one for him?"

Miss Damer's eyes met mine with perfect frankness.

"No," she said, "I don't. What is more, the engagement is beginning to wear rather thin. In fact,"--her eyes twinkled,--"I believe that Lady Adela is thinking of calling out her First Reserve."

"You mean--"

"I mean," said Miss Damer, "that Lady Adela is thinking of calling out her First Reserve."

A natural but most impertinent query sprang to my lips, to be stifled just in time.

"You were going to say?" enquired Miss Damer.

"I was going to say what a pretty carriage drive this is," I replied rapidly. "You will be glad of a cup of tea, though?"

"Yes, indeed," replied my companion brightly; but her attitude said "Coward!" as plainly as could be.

Still, there are some questions which one can hardly ask a lady after an acquaintance of only ten minutes.

"There is the house," continued Miss Damer, as our conveyance weathered a great clump of rhododendrons. "Are n't you glad that this long and dusty journey is over?"

"Not _now_!" I replied.

My little preceptress turned and bestowed on me a beaming smile.

"That is _much_ better!" she remarked approvingly.