Chapter 11

'_Of_ course,' he murmured. '_Of_ course. But most braces, you may not be aware, slip down unpleasantly on the shoulder-blade, and so lead to an awkward habit of hitching them up by the sleeve-hole of the waistcoat at frequent intervals. Such a habit must be felt to be ungraceful. Thomas Webster Jones, to whom I pointed out this error of manufacture, has invented a brace the two halves of which diverge at a higher angle than usual, and fasten further towards the centre of the body in front--pardon these details--so as to obviate that difficulty. He has given me satisfaction, and he deserves to be rewarded.'

I heard through it all the voice of Lady Georgina observing, tartly, 'Why the idiots can't make braces to fit one at first passes _my_ comprehension. But, there, my dear; the people who manufacture them are a set of born fools, and what can you expect from an imbecile?' Mr. Ashurst was Lady Georgina, veneered with a thin layer of ingratiating urbanity. Lady Georgina was clever, and therefore acrimonious. Mr. Ashurst was astute, and therefore obsequious.

He went on with legacies to the inventor of a sauce-bottle which did not let the last drop dribble down so as to spot the table-cloth; of a shoe-horn the handle of which did not come undone; and of a pair of sleeve-links which you could put off and on without injury to the temper. 'A real benefactor, Miss Cayley; a real benefactor to the link-wearing classes; for he has sensibly diminished the average annual output of profane swearing.'

When he left Five Hundred Pounds to his faithful servant Frederic Higginson, courier, I was tempted to interpose; but I refrained in time, and I was glad of it afterwards.

At last, after many divagations, my Urbane Old Gentleman arrived at the central point--'and I give and bequeath to my nephew, Harold Ashurst Tillington, Younger of Gledcliffe, Dumfriesshire, attaché to Her Majesty's Embassy at Rome----'

I waited, breathless.

He was annoyingly dilatory. 'My house and estate of Ashurst Court, in the County of Gloucester, and my town house at 24 Park Lane North, in London, together with the residue of all my estate, real or personal----' and so forth.

I breathed again. At least, I had not been called upon to disinherit Harold.

'Provided always----' he went on, in the same voice.

I wondered what was coming.

'Provided always that the said Harold Ashurst Tillington does not marry----leave a blank there, Miss Cayley. I will find out the name of the young person I desire to exclude, and fill it in afterward. I don't recollect it at this moment, but Higginson, no doubt, will be able to supply the deficiency. In fact, I don't think I ever heard it; though Higginson has told me all about the woman.'

'Higginson?' I inquired. 'Is he here?'

'Oh, dear, yes. You heard of him, I suppose, from Georgina. Georgina is prejudiced. He has come back to me, I am glad to say. An excellent servant, Higginson, though a trifle too omniscient. All men are equal in the eyes of their Maker, of course; but we must have due subordination. A courier ought not to be better informed than his master--or ought at least to conceal the fact dexterously. Well, Higginson knows this young person's name; my sister wrote to me about her disgraceful conduct when she first went to Schlangenbad. An adventuress, it seems; an adventuress; quite a shocking creature. Foisted herself upon Lady Georgina in Kensington Gardens--unintroduced, if you can believe such a thing--with the most astonishing effrontery; and Georgina, who will forgive anything on earth, for the sake of what she calls originality--another name for impudence, as I am sure you must know--took the young woman with her as her maid to Germany. There, this minx tried to set her cap at my nephew Harold, who can be caught at once by a pretty face; and Harold was bowled over--almost got engaged to her. Georgina took a fancy to the girl later, having a taste for dubious people (I cannot say I approve of Georgina's friends), and wrote again to say her first suspicions were unfounded: the young woman was in reality a paragon of virtue. But _I_ know better than that. Georgina has no judgment. I regret to be obliged to confess it, but cleverness, I fear, is the only thing in the world my excellent sister cares for. The hussy, it seems, was certainly clever. Higginson has told me about her. He says her bare appearance would suffice to condemn her--a bold, fast, shameless, brazen-faced creature. But you will forgive me, I am sure, my dear young lady: I ought not to discuss such painted Jezebels before you. We will leave this person's name blank. I will not sully your pen--I mean, your typewriter--by asking you to transcribe it.'

I made up my mind at once. 'Mr. Ashurst,' I said, looking up from my keyboard, '_I_ can give you this girl's name; and then you can insert the proviso immediately.'

'_You_ can? My dear young lady, what a wonderful person you are! You seem to know everybody, and everything. But perhaps she was at Schlangenbad with Lady Georgina, and you were there also?'

'She was,' I answered, deliberately. 'The name you want is--Lois Cayley!'

He let his notes drop in his astonishment.

I went on with my typewriting, unmoved. 'Provided always that the said Harold Ashurst Tillington does not marry Lois Cayley; in which case I will and desire that the said estate shall pass to----whom shall I put in, Mr. Ashurst?'

He leant forward with his fat hands on his ample knees. 'It was really _you_?' he inquired, open-mouthed.

I nodded. 'There is no use in denying the truth. Mr. Tillington did ask me to be his wife, and I refused him.'

'But, my dear Miss Cayley----'

'The difference in station?' I said; 'the difference, still greater, in this world's goods? Yes, I know. I admit all that. So I declined his offer. I did not wish to ruin his prospects.'

The Urbane Old Gentleman eyed me with a sudden tenderness in his glance. 'Young men are lucky,' he said, slowly, after a short pause; '--and-- Higginson is an idiot. I say it deliberately--an idiot! How could one dream of trusting the judgment of a flunkey about a lady? My dear, excuse the familiarity from one who may consider himself in a certain sense a contingent uncle--suppose we amend the last clause by the omission of the word _not_. It strikes me as superfluous. "Provided always the said Harold Ashurst Tillington consents to marry"-- I think that sounds better!'

He looked at me with such fatherly regard that it pricked my heart ever to have poked fun at his Interpretation of Prophecy on Stock Exchange principles. I think I flushed crimson. 'No, no,' I answered, firmly. 'That will not do either, please. That's worse than the other way. You must not put it, Mr. Ashurst. I could not consent to be willed away to anybody.'

He leant forward, with real earnestness. 'My dear,' he said, 'that's not the point. Pardon my reminding you that you are here in your capacity as my amanuensis. I am drawing up my will, and if you will allow me to say so, I cannot admit that anyone has a claim to influence me in the disposition of my Property.'

'_Please!_' I cried, pleadingly.

He looked at me and paused. 'Well,' he went on at last, after a long interval; 'since _you_ insist upon it, I will leave the bequest to stand without condition.'

'Thank you,' I murmured, bending low over my machine.'

'If I did as I like, though,' he went on, 'I should say, Unless he marries Miss Lois Cayley (who is a deal too good for him) the estate shall revert to Kynaston's eldest son, a confounded jackass. I do not usually indulge in intemperate language; but I desire to assure you, with the utmost calmness, that Kynaston's eldest son, Lord Southminster, is a con-founded jackass.'

I rose and took his hand in my own spontaneously. 'Mr. Ashurst,' I said, 'you may interpret prophecy as long as ever you like, but you are a dear kind old gentleman. I am truly grateful to you for your good opinion.

'And you will marry Harold?'

'Never,' I answered; 'while he is rich. I have said as much to him.'

'That's hard,' he went on, slowly. 'For ... I should like to be your uncle.'

I trembled all over. Elsie saved the situation by bursting in abruptly.

I will only add that when Mr. Ashurst left, I copied the will out neatly, without erasures. The rough original I threw (somewhat carelessly) into the waste-paper basket.

That afternoon, somebody called to fetch the fair copy for Mr. Ashurst. I went out into the front office to see him. To my surprise, it was Higginson--in his guise as courier.

He was as astonished as myself. 'What, _you_ here!' he cried. 'You dog me!'

'I was thinking the same thing of you, M. le Comte,' I answered, curtsying.

He made no attempt at an excuse. 'Well, I have been sent for the will,' he broke out, curtly.

'And you were sent for the jewel-case,' I retorted. 'No, no, Dr. Fortescue-Langley; _I_ am in charge of the will, and I will take it myself to Mr. Ashurst.'

'I will be even with you yet,' he snapped out. 'I have gone back to my old trade, and am trying to lead an honest life; but _you_ won't let me.'

'On the contrary,' I answered, smiling a polite smile. 'I rejoice to hear it. If you say nothing more against me to your employer, I will not disclose to him what I know about you. But if you slander me, I will. So now we understand one another.'

And I kept the will till I could give it myself into Mr Ashurst's own hands in his rooms that evening.

VII

THE ADVENTURE OF THE UNOBTRUSIVE OASIS

I will not attempt to describe to you the minor episodes of our next twelve months--the manuscripts we type-wrote and the Manitous we sold. 'Tis one of my aims in a world so rich in bores to avoid being tedious. I will merely say, therefore, that we spent the greater part of the year in Florence, where we were building up a connection, but rode back for the summer months to Switzerland, as being a livelier place for the trade in bicycles. The net result was not only that we covered our expenses, but that, as chancellor of the exchequer, I found myself with a surplus in hand at the end of the season.

When we returned to Florence for the winter, however, I confess I began to chafe. 'This is slow work, Elsie!' I said. 'I started out to go round the world; it has taken me eighteen months to travel no further than Italy! At this rate, I shall reach New York a gray-haired old lady, in a nice lace cap, and totter back into London a venerable crone on the verge of ninety.'

However, those invaluable doctors came to my rescue unexpectedly. I do love doctors; they are always sending you off at a moment's notice to delightful places you never dreamt of. Elsie was better, but still far from strong. I took it upon me to consult our medical attendant; and his verdict was decisive. He did just what a doctor ought to do. 'She is getting on very well in Florence,' he said; 'but if you want to restore her health completely, I should advise you to take her for a winter to Egypt. After six months of the dry, warm desert air, I don't doubt she might return to her work in London.'

That last point I used as a lever with Elsie. She positively revels in teaching mathematics. At first, to be sure, she objected that we had only just money enough to pay our way to Cairo, and that when we got there we might starve--her favourite programme. I have not this extraordinary taste for starving; _my_ idea is, to go where you like, and find something decent to eat when you get there. However, to humour her, I began to cast about me for a source of income. There is no absolute harm in seeing your way clear before you for a twelvemonth, though of course it deprives you of the plot-interest of poverty.

'Elsie,' I said, in my best didactic style--I excel in didactics--'you do not learn from the lessons that life sets before you. Look at the stage, for example; the stage is universally acknowledged at the present day to be a great teacher of morals. Does not Irving say so?--and he ought to know. There is that splendid model for imitation, for instance, the Clown in the pantomime. How does Clown regulate his life? Does he take heed for the morrow? Not a bit of it! "I wish I had a goose," he says, at some critical juncture; and just as he says it--pat--a super strolls upon the stage with a property goose on a wooden tray; and Clown cries, "Oh, look here, Joey; _here's_ a goose!" and proceeds to appropriate it. Then he puts his fingers in his mouth and observes, "I wish I had a few apples to make the sauce with"; and as the words escape him--pat again--a small boy with a very squeaky voice runs on, carrying a basket of apples. Clown trips him up, and bolts with the basket. _There's_ a model for imitation! The stage sets these great moral lessons before you regularly every Christmas; yet you fail to profit by them. Govern your life on the principles exemplified by Clown; expect to find that whatever you want will turn up with punctuality and dispatch at the proper moment. Be adventurous and you will be happy. Take that as a new maxim to put in your copy-book!'

'I wish I could think so, dear,' Elsie answered. 'But your confidence staggers me.'

That evening at our _table-d'hôte_, however, it was amply justified. A smooth-faced young man of ample girth and most prosperous exterior happened to sit next us. He had his wife with him, so I judged it safe to launch on conversation. We soon found out he was the millionaire editor-proprietor of a great London daily, with many more strings to his journalistic bow; his honoured name was Elworthy. I mentioned casually that we thought of going for the winter to Egypt. He pricked his ears up. But at the time he said nothing. After dinner, we adjourned to the cosy _salon_. I talked to him and his wife; and somehow, that evening, the devil entered into me. I am subject to devils. I hasten to add, they are mild ones. I had one of my reckless moods just then, however, and I reeled off rattling stories of our various adventures. Mr. Elworthy believed in youth and audacity; I could see I interested him. The more he was amused, the more reckless I became. 'That's bright,' he said at last, when I told him the tale of our amateur exploits in the sale of Manitous. 'That would make a good article!'

'Yes,' I answered, with bravado, determined to strike while the iron was hot. 'What the _Daily Telephone_ lacks is just one enlivening touch of feminine brightness.'

He smiled. 'What is your forte?' he inquired.

'My forte,' I answered, 'is--to go where I choose, and write what I like about it.'

He smiled again. 'And a very good new departure in journalism, too! A roving commission! Have you ever tried your hand at writing?'

Had I ever tried! It was the ambition of my life to see myself in print; though, hitherto, it had been ineffectual. 'I have written a few sketches,' I answered, with becoming modesty. As a matter of fact, our office bulged with my unpublished manuscripts.

'Could you let me see them?' he asked.

I assented, with inner joy, but outer reluctance. 'If you wish it,' I murmured; 'but--you must be _very_ lenient!'

Though I had not told Elsie, the truth of the matter was, I had just then conceived an idea for a novel--my _magnum opus_--the setting of which compelled Egyptian local colour; and I was therefore dying to get to Egypt, if chance so willed it. I submitted a few of my picked manuscripts accordingly to Mr. Elworthy, in fear and trembling. He read them, cruel man, before my very eyes; I sat and waited, twiddling my thumbs, demure but apprehensive.

When he had finished, he laid them down.

'Racy!' he said. 'Racy! You're quite right, Miss Cayley. That's just what we want on the _Daily Telephone_. I should like to print these three,' selecting them out, 'at our usual rate of pay per thousand.'

'You are very kind.' But the room reeled with me.

'Not at all. I am a man of business. And these are good copy. Now, about this Egypt. I will put the matter in the shape of a business proposition. Will you undertake, if I pay your passage, and your friend's, with all travelling expenses, to let me have three descriptive articles a week, on Cairo, the Nile, Syria, and India, running to about two thousand words apiece, at three guineas a thousand?'

My breath came and went. It was positive opulence. The super with the goose couldn't approach it for patness. My editor had brought me the apple sauce as well, without even giving me the trouble of cooking it.

The very next day everything was arranged. Elsie tried to protest, on the foolish ground that she had no money: but the faculty had ordered the apex of her right lung to go to Egypt, and I couldn't let her fly in the face of the faculty. We secured our berths in a P. and O. steamer from Brindisi; and within a week we were tossing upon the bosom of the blue Mediterranean.

People who haven't crossed the blue Mediterranean cherish an absurd idea that it is always calm and warm and sunny. I am sorry to take away any sea's character; but I speak of it as I find it (to borrow a phrase from my old gyp at Girton); and I am bound to admit that the Mediterranean did not treat me as a lady expects to be treated. It behaved disgracefully. People may rhapsodize as long as they choose about a life on the ocean wave; for my own part, I wouldn't give a pin for sea-sickness. We glided down the Adriatic from Brindisi to Corfu with a reckless profusion of lateral motion which suggested the idea that the ship must have been drinking.

I tried to rouse Elsie when we came abreast of the Ionian Islands, and to remind her that 'Here was the home of Nausicaa in the Odyssey.' Elsie failed to respond; she was otherwise occupied. At last, I succumbed and gave it up. I remember nothing further till a day and a half later, when we got under lee of Crete, and the ship showed a tendency to resume the perpendicular. Then I began once more to take a languid interest in the dinner question.

I may add parenthetically that the Mediterranean is a mere bit of a sea, when you look at it on the map--a pocket sea, to be regarded with mingled contempt and affection; but you learn to respect it when you find that it takes four clear days and nights of abject misery merely to run across its eastern basin from Brindisi to Alexandria. I respected the Mediterranean immensely while we lay off the Peloponnesus in the trough of the waves with a north wind blowing; I only began to temper my respect with a distant liking when we passed under the welcome shelter of Crete on a calm, star-lit evening.

It was deadly cold. We had not counted upon such weather in the sunny south. I recollected now that the Greeks were wont to represent Boreas as a chilly deity, and spoke of the Thracian breeze with the same deferentially deprecating adjectives which we ourselves apply to the east wind of our fatherland; but that apt classical memory somehow failed to console or warm me. A good-natured male passenger, however, volunteered to ask us, 'Will I get ye a rug, ladies?' The form of his courteous question suggested the probability of his Irish origin.

'You are very kind,' I answered. 'If you don't want it for yourself, I'm sure my friend would be glad to have the use of it.'

'Is it meself? Sure I've got me big ulsther, and I'm as warrum as a toast in it. But ye're not provided for this weather. Ye've thrusted too much to those rascals the po-uts. 'Where breaks the blue Sicilian say,' the rogues write. _I'd_ like to set them down in it, wid a nor'-easter blowing!'

He fetched up his rug. It was ample and soft, a smooth brown camel-hair. He wrapped us both up in it. We sat late on deck that night, as warm as a toast ourselves, thanks to our genial Irishman.

We asked his name. ''Tis Dr. Macloghlen,' he answered. 'I'm from County Clare, ye see; and I'm on me way to Egypt for thravel and exploration. Me fader whisht me to see the worruld a bit before I'd settle down to practise me profession at Liscannor. Have ye ever been in County Clare? Sure, 'tis the pick of Oireland.'

'We have that pleasure still in store,' I answered, smiling. 'It spreads gold-leaf over the future, as George Meredith puts it.'

'Is it Meredith? Ah, there's the foine writer! 'Tis jaynius the man has: I can't undtherstand a word of him. But he's half Oirish, ye know. What proof have I got of it? An' would he write like that if there wasn't a dhrop of the blood of the Celt in him?'

Next day and next night, Mr. Macloghlen was our devoted slave. I had won his heart by admitting frankly that his countrywomen had the finest and liveliest eyes in Europe--eyes with a deep twinkle, half fun, half passion. He took to us at once, and talked to us incessantly. He was a red-haired, raw-boned Munster-man, but a real good fellow. We forgot the aggressive inequalities of the Mediterranean while he talked to us of 'the pizzantry.' Late the second evening he propounded a confidence. It was a lovely night; Orion overhead, and the plashing phosphorescence on the water below conspired with the hour to make him specially confidential. 'Now, Miss Cayley,' he said, leaning forward on his deck chair, and gazing earnestly into my eyes, 'there's wan question I'd like to ask ye. The ambition of me life is to get into Parlimint. And I want to know from ye, as a frind--if I accomplish me heart's wish--is there annything, in me apparence, ar in me voice, ar in me accent, ar in me manner, that would lade annybody to suppose I was an Oirishman?'

I succeeded, by good luck, in avoiding Elsie's eye. What on earth could I answer? Then a happy thought struck me. 'Dr. Macloghlen,' I said, 'it would not be the slightest use your trying to conceal it; for even if nobody ever detected a faint Irish intonation in your words or phrases--how could your eloquence fail to betray you for a countryman of Sheridan and Burke and Grattan?'

He seized my hand with such warmth that I thought it best to hurry down to my state-room at once, under cover of my compliment.

At Alexandria and Cairo we found him invaluable. He looked after our luggage, which he gallantly rescued from the lean hands of fifteen Arab porters, all eagerly struggling to gain possession of our effects; he saw us safe into the train; and he never quitted us till he had safely ensconced us in our rooms at Shepheard's. For himself, he said, with subdued melancholy, 'twas to some cheaper hotel he must go; Shepheard's wasn't for the likes of him; though if land in County Clare was wort' what it ought to be, there wasn't a finer estate in all Oireland than his fader's.

Our Mr. Elworthy was a modern proprietor, who knew how to do things on the lordly scale. Having commissioned me to write this series of articles, he intended them to be written in the first style of art, and he had instructed me accordingly to hire one of Cook's little steam dahabeeahs, where I could work at leisure. Dr. Macloghlen was in his element arranging for the trip. 'Sure the only thing I mind,' he said, 'is--that I'll not be going wid ye.' I think he was half inclined to invite himself; but there again I drew a line. I will not sell salt fish; and I will not go up the Nile, unchaperoned, with a casual man acquaintance.

He did the next best thing, however: he took a place in a sailing dahabeeah; and as we steamed up slowly, stopping often on the way, to give me time to write my articles, he managed to arrive almost always at every town or ruin exactly when we did.