Selections from “A Book of Stories”
Date: 1901-12-31T15:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Short Fiction; Social Criticism; Satire; Wit and Humor
Description: Three short stories in a satirical mood. ~~~ A coquettish young woman invites the attentions of an unattractive young baronet; an unhappy married woman persuades a gentleman friend to run away with her; a convincing braggart crows about how he would “beat up” or “kill” any offending transgressor.
Publisher: MobileRead
Rights: Public domain in countries where the copyright term is “Life+80” or less.

SELECTIONS FROM
A Book of Stories

G. S. STREET

•   CONTENTS

Selections from A BOOK OF STORIES

… About This eBook
The Good Baronet
Saved
The Hero and the Burglars
… Editing Notes

•   ABOUT
THIS EBOOK

SELECTIONS FROM
A Book of Stories

BY  G. S. Street (1867–1936)

Three short stories in a satirical mood, taken from the collection A Book of Stories.

A coquettish young woman invites the attentions of an unattractive young baronet; an unhappy married woman persuades a gentleman friend to run away with her; a convincing braggart crows about how he would “beat up” or “kill” any offending transgressor.

George Slythe Street (18 July 1867 – 31 October 1936) was a British critic, journalist and novelist. He was associated with William Ernest Henley and the “counter-Decadents” on the staff of the National Observer. In 1914 he was appointed to the office of the Lord Chamberlain as Examiner of Plays.

Street is perhaps best known for his 1894 novel, The Autobiography of a Boy, which satirized contemporary aesthetes Oscar Wilde and Lord Alfred Douglas, and the Decadent movement of the late nineteenth century. [—Wikipedia]

This ebook was created by E.C.M. for MobileRead.com, February 2019, and may be freely distributed for non-commercial purposes.

This book was first published in 1902. The text of this book is in the public domain in countries where the copyright term is “Life+80” or less.

Click here for editing notes.

•   THE GOOD BARONET

CHAPTER 1

There have been innumerable bad baronets in fiction, and baronets in real life whose conduct has not been approved by a censorious world. But the order might fairly have pointed to Sir Arthur Whittleworth, Baronet, as a set-off to many unworthy members, and as a considerable refutation of public prejudice. He was without any eccentricity in morals or manners, if you excepted a habit of perpetually fiddling with his double eyeglasses, which seemed never to rest conveniently on his nose. He was not bold or dashing in any way whatever. He was modest and painstaking, temperate at the table, and fond of going early to bed. As for gallantry, fate, to be sure, had denied him much advantage for the pursuit. He was not handsome, being chinless and pasty in face, with a long and, as it were, aimless nose, and dim and blinking eyes, with an awkward and stooping form. He was very shy, and apt to grow muddled in his speech if anyone listened to him. Also he was as poor as a church mouse.

The Whittleworths were none of your broad-acred baronets. Sir Arthur’s grandfather, the first baronet, had been a successful soldier. Sir Arthur’s father an unsuccessful gambler. The territorial possessions of the Whittleworths had never been more than a house in Porchester Square and a little place near Dorking, and these were no more. The remnant of their money was spent in giving Sir Arthur a university education. He lived frugally at Oxford, and the money lasted till he took his degree, a third class in Litterae Humaniores, gained with enormous study and very nearly at the cost of a brain fever. It was then a question what he should do for a living. He went down to stay with his maternal uncle, a rural dean, to talk it over, and the subject occupied and rather bored the rural deanery for several weeks. It was really a difficult one. Age and want of funds ruled out the Services and the Bar. The Rural Dean, who had never credited his nephew with any views or opinions on any subject whatever, was amazed to find that he had conscientious objections to the Church and still more amazed to find that he would not be bullied out of them, but, on the contrary, after witnessing their demolition in silence, would pick them up and sort them together as before. The City was suggested, but he was not the kind of baronet who is useful to companies, and he could not do sums. Some mild sort of secretaryship might have been obtained if he had been able to write legibly or spell—but he could not. Schoolmastering? But he was unathletic to the last degree, and boys frightened him. It really seemed as if this young man, a baronet, a gentleman, with a decent classical education, no vices, and the very best principles, could do nothing for which the world would give him bread and cheese.

“He ought to marry,” said the Rural Dean’s wife. But she knew full well that for years this desirable solution had haunted her feminine mind, and haunted it in vain. She was as little worldly as it is reasonable to expect, even of the wife of a rural dean, and she would much have preferred that if any rich young woman should espouse Sir Arthur Whittleworth, the said rich young woman should be good and amiable; but she was prepared to consider the claims of any rich young woman, or for that matter, of any woman of any age, so she were even merely well-to-do, and could give this distressed baronet a comfortable home. Unfortunately, her sphere of possible operations was narrow; she knew but few dowered women, and they did not want to marry her nephew. Sir Arthur, in fact, had somehow become rather a joke in the neighbourhood, and a little moral courage as well as a rather peculiar taste was almost necessary for his espousal.

The Rural Dean sighed. “Poor Arthur,” he said, “would never marry anyone for whom he had not a sincere respect and a conscientious affection.”

“He is such a duffer,” said the Rural Dean’s wife.

“And he’s so ugly,” said he.

“And can’t say ‘Boo!’ to a goose,” said she. Yet somewhere, surely, in this country of too many daughters, someone there must have been ready to lead the poor baronet to the altar. Such a thought possibly crossed the lady’s mind, for she said: “I wish we could advertise.”

The Rural Dean smiled sadly.

“I suppose husbands are not wanted in the colonies?”

It was a forlorn idea, and he only shook his head. “In the commercial classes,” he said, “there are probably many excellent young women who would have a very pardonable readiness to marry a man with a title, and who might come to love poor Arthur. He has many excellent qualities. Perhaps in America there exists some machinery for effecting these unions. But it is useless to expect—even if we desired it—that he should lend himself to any sordid enterprise. In our own society he is very unlikely to meet anybody for whom a mere baronetcy, without any means to support any dignity which may still attach to it, would be an attraction. And I fear no one is likely to marry him for his principles, high as they undoubtedly are. So I think, my dear, we must abandon the idea. Indeed, there is a suspicion of indelicacy about it. Marriage is sacred.”

But It was all very well for the Rural Dean to criticize his wife’s desperate proposals; it was she who had to manage the household affairs on a small income, and the indefinite support of Sir Arthur Whittleworth was not a cheerful prospect to her. She was a practical and quick-witted person, and the sight of his modest idleness got on her nerves. Nor is the silent maintenance of principles, however high, conversationally amusing. But his invariable, if rather negative politeness, and his deferential manner towards herself, made it extremely difficult to the good-natured woman to hint that he was a burden. It did not occur to him, it seemed—perhaps from the fact that he had been accustomed to stay at the Rural Deanery as a boy, and so took the regular supply of his wants as a matter of course. His “Yes, uncle,” and “No, aunt,” were pronounced in the same tone as when he was twelve, and he seemed to rely on them for direction as much now as then, except when his principles, as in the case of the Church, interfered. His aunt began to look on this blameless young man as her cross. One day, however, when the subject of his career had been discussed for two months and dropped for another two, an idea struck her, and she called herself a fool for not having thought of it before.

Why should not Arthur be a private tutor? He had taken honours in classics, and had an irreproachable character. He was certainly quiet and steady-going enough—if you could speak of his going at all—for anybody. Then, too, surely there must be people who would like to have a baronet for a domestic tutor, even if he were not much of a social acquisition in himself. Surely, too, he could have no principle against it. The parents would prevent the pupils bullying him. She hurried with her idea to her husband, and at lunch it was communicated to Sir Arthur.

Sir Arthur looked at his plate and sighed. “I can’t manage boys,” he said.

“You won’t have to manage them,” said his aunt briskly.

“I have never thought out a theory of education.”

“So much the better; besides, you’ll have plenty of time for that.”

“But suppose—suppose one didn’t like the people—suppose they were underbred or something—suppose—”

“My dear Arthur, there are objections to everything, or at least you seem to think so. This time you must at least make an effort to overcome them.”

A managing woman had got her head, and Sir Arthur, who could have held, however silently, his position with his uncle, was quite powerless to resist his aunt. “Yes, aunt,” said he.

“Very well. I suppose you know somebody, Jasper, who can tell you who are the right agents, or whatever they’re called, to go to. I’m sure dear Arthur will make a splendid tutor; and perhaps among fresh people—well, well! I’m sure you’re right, Arthur, to determine to work.”

He did not look determined, but he murmured, “Yes, aunt,” and the thing was settled.

To do Sir Arthur justice, it did not occur to him that tutoring was a poor profession for a baronet. It did occur to the Rural Dean, who remarked afterwards to his wife that it was not the usual thing for baronets to be tutors.

“The usual thing,” said she; “is it the usual thing for them to live on other people?”

He thought it was not infrequently the case, but went to his study to write for enquiries.

The agents were prompt, and before many days Sir Arthur had interviewed Mr. Lessiter, Q.C., and Mrs. Lessiter, and had agreed to be tutor to Master Lessiter, a boy of twelve who was going to Harrow, to accept therefore the sum of £200 a year, and to be domiciled with the Lessiters in Lancaster Gate and in the country. His report of his future employers was that they seemed to be businesslike people—respectable, yes, certainly. His aunt wished for more information, and pending Sir Arthur’s departure, wrote to a friend in town who might possibly know them. It so happened that the friend did know them, and replied at once.

“They are Jews,” wrote the friend. “That is, Mr. Lessiter’s father was originally called Levi—it’s odd how these names grow, isn’t it?—and made a fortune in something or other. Mr. Lessiter is an extremely clever and cultivated person, very successful at the bar—not at all like a Jew in Dickens or that sort of thing, you know. She is a great fat prosperous sort of woman—quite nice though in a kind of way. There is a daughter, a really beautiful girl now, and accomplished, too, I believe. But you must not let your romantic imagination run away with you. She is sure to marry someone covered with money, or else someone with a really good position. Poor Sir Arthur’s qualifications … but you understand, and you mustn’t think me coarse or worldly. I don’t suppose they took him for his title: Mr. Lessiter at least would be above that. I expect he will find them quite pleasant to get on with.”

Sir Arthur’s aunt said nothing to him of Mr. Lessiter’s race. She did not know if some antiSemitic prejudices might not lurk among those principles of his. She did mention the beautiful daughter’s existence, but observing that it seemed to pain him, dropped the subject. So Sir Arthur Whittleworth, Baronet, set out to make a living.

CHAPTER 2

He arrived at Lancaster Gate late in the afternoon, and was shown at once to his room to dress for dinner. To which meal, as soon as he appeared in the drawing-room, he and his host and hostess proceeded at once, not waiting for the beautiful daughter or the pupil. Sir Arthur felt it was a little respite: beautiful young women terrified him. With Mr. Lessiter and his wife he was more at his ease, feeling no burden on him to entertain them; but not much at ease. Yet he should have been so—even he. In discussing his duties and his salary they had been rather sharp and businesslike, but now at dinner they were evidently desirous to make him feel at home, and asked him intelligent questions about the country with much affable interest. Both were unmistakably Jews, though Sir Arthur, not an observant person, did not know it—but Jews of very different types.

Mr. Lessiter was of the intellectual type, with a long thin face, very keen eyes and mobile lips. His father had been the money-making Jew, pure and simple, but in himself some strain of a better blood seemed to have come out. His forehead was that of a philosopher, his carriage that of a man who respected but did not think about himself. To go for a moment below the surface, it may be said of Mr. Lessiter, Q.C., that he cared for money only as the average practical man who is aware of its value, and that if the racial characteristic of esuriency existed in him it was directed to an honourable ambition. He was both a sound and effective advocate; was a widely read man and a lover of music.

His wife was of a different calibre—a life-loving, colour-loving, materialistic Jewess, shrewd it might be, but certainly not intellectual. Sir Arthur’s aunt’s friend had not wronged her in calling her fat, but a kinder critic would have noticed first that she was handsome. Forty years or so of hearty and concentrated enjoyment of the good things of life had left their mark on her features as well as on her figure, but the features were bold and regular, she had beautiful dark eyes and beautiful black hair.

Her critic had done the Lessiters justice in supposing that Sir Arthur’s title was no particular attraction to them. They had seen too much of the world and were too well seen by it for that. All the same, Mrs. Lessiter had thought that a title as part of the domestic machinery would be rather decorative. On the other hand, it was rather a bore to have to address by it a person whom in the natural order of things she would patronize; and she made up her mind to adopt Sir Arthur at once as an old and intimate friend of the family—whom it good-naturedly supported—and call him Arthur as soon as possible: it would be convenient and look rather well. To this end she began at once to try and make him talk about himself, and kept an expression of kindly interest in her beautiful eyes. That was rather lost on a person who looked steadily at his plate; but he thawed feebly, and gave her a faint outline of his studies at the University, which Mr. Lessiter kindly made intelligible by a running commentary. Mrs. Lessiter, dreadfully bored, reflected that at least this difficult young man would not inspire her practical and lively daughter with any undesirable desire.

That young lady came in with the fish, and banished Sir Arthur’s incipient self-possession. She was indeed a beautiful girl. She stood a moment in the light of a sideboard lamp, and Sir Arthur politely walked from his place to greet her. If he had not been too confused to look at her, he might have seen that she was tall and supple, and had in her face something of that exotic light and mystery which in beautiful Jewesses of twenty may sometimes be seen by an amorist. She was like her mother, on the whole, with a grace and dignity that may have come from her father’s side, with a beautifully oval face and an ivory fair skin. The years of grossness, if they were to come, were still far off; her graceful form was rounded and vigorous, but not yet inconsistent with a poet’s theme. This distressing apparition, as Sir Arthur seemed to find her, gave him her hand with a graciousness which had just the faintest tinge of impertinence in it, and wasted a brilliant smile on his down-turned eyeglasses. Then she went to her place, and talking to her parents, gave him time to recover. Mrs. Lessiter smiled with a little maternal satisfaction at his confusion. She thought her daughter had already taken his scalp. She was wrong: he was far more frightened than attracted by Miss Lessiter, and avoided looking at her again.

His pupil, who came in immediately afterwards, was a consolation, since he was an obviously quiet and studious boy, with none of the down-right heartiness which Sir Arthur had chiefly feared. So the dinner went on: a very good dinner if only he had not been too nervous to eat, but not a sparkling dinner. It was not more amusing for the Lessiters in the drawing-room afterwards. Mrs. Lessiter continued the attempt to raise an atmosphere of home round the tutor, and womanfully kept back her yawns. Mr. Lessiter played softly on the piano, rather a disturbing thing, Sir Arthur thought, for a Q.C. to do. Miss Lessiter read a book at the far end of the room, to his relief, though he thought it rude. The boy had disappeared.

“Good night,” said Mrs. Lessiter; “and please, please, Sir Arthur, do consider yourself one of us, and make yourself at home.”

She dropped his limp hand with a cordial pressure. Miss Lessiter also, to his surprise, shook hands very heartily with him; and this time he did not miss her friendly smile. He wondered at this friendliness when he went to his room, remembering she had not said three words to him all the evening. But she laughed to herself as she scribbled a note in her dressing-gown.

“Darling Molly,” it ran, “He has come, and is the most dreadful stick and muff and idiot you ever saw. But that is so much the better, isn’t it, for our plan? A little judicious management will do it, I’m sure; and that you can leave, can’t you?—to your devoted Mabel.”

It seemed that Sir Arthur Whittleworth was going to be of use to somebody at last, though not in the way, perhaps, that his principles would have suggested.

CHAPTER 3

He soon settled down into a regular life, and grew accustomed even to Mabel Lessiter’s beauty, so that it no longer caused him discomfort. He had, indeed, small leisure for nervousness. His pupil was a clever boy, anxious to have a distinguished career at school prepared for him, and quite alive to the wisdom of making the most of his tutor. He asked incessantly intelligent questions, which gave Sir Arthur a good deal of hunting in dictionaries and other books before he could answer them. He suggested that his tutor might write out correct copies of his exercises, and was visibly annoyed if his tutor was not ready with the correct translation of the authors they read together. Sir Arthur had to work hard in off hours to keep pace with him. The ordinary relation was in fact almost reversed: it was the pupil who was taskmaster, and the tutor who made apologies. Sir Arthur was almost tempted to think that an ordinary lazy, cheeky boy would have been better. However, he comforted himself with the reflection that he was spared playing games. Master Lessiter went to a gymnasium for an hour a day, and the severest exercise they took in company was a walk to Hyde Park Corner and back. Mrs. Lessiter soon established the relation of old and grateful friend and old and benevolent friend between them. Meeting with little help from him, she quietly assumed it, and found at once that he fitted into the place. His aunt had accustomed him to the management of an older woman. He even said “Yes, aunt,” once, by mistake, and she seized the occasion to call him Arthur, in fun, and elicited a bashful request that she would continue to do so. After that she did not trouble much to talk to him, but found it rather agreeable to have a domestic baronet whom she called Arthur and sent on little errands; there were people so silly, she said to herself, as to be impressed by it. These little services tended to multiply, but were always so pleasantly required that it was impossible for a polite young man to evade them. I mention the circumstance to show that his position in the Lessiter household was familiar and mutually-beneficial. Mr. Lessiter was always cheerful and genial with him, though not disposed to very lengthy conversations.

So far he was moderately content. But Mabel Lessiter, though custom had removed the terrors of her sparkling eyes and brilliant smile, nevertheless occasioned him great perturbation. When they were alone—which was often the case—at breakfast, in the drawing-room before dinner and so forth—her manner varied like an English summer. Sometimes she was sympathetic with such few tastes as he expressed, solicitous about his health, deferential to his opinions. At other times she was impudently patronizing, or would chaff him with brutal frankness, and yet at other times she was down-right and pointedly rude. Sir Arthur was quite incapable of taking advantage of these vagaries to repay her in kind or press an intimacy with her. He could not even resent or snub the patronage or the rudeness. He was simply helpless, and met them with the weakest smile ever seen on a human face, as Miss Lessiter said to her friend Molly. But in his spare time, in bed at night, or walking with a note of Mrs. Lessiter’s—“the walk will do you so much good,” Mrs. Lessiter said—he wondered and wondered over her conduct till his head ached. It was not ill breeding: she was perfectly well mannered when she liked. Could it be coquetry? He tried to think it for vanity’s sake, though the conviction would have embarrassed him sadly, but he could not. Did she like him or dislike him? Did he—the question came suddenly to him—did he hate her, or did he … Oh no,—but he quickened his pace and frowned. Certainly she interested him; he waited with anxiety for the changes of her moods. She was very beautiful; now that he was accustomed to it, he found her face a charming picture for furtive glances. It is probable that, with her confusing alternation of flouts and kindness. Miss Lessiter, by accident or by art, had hit on the only method possible to a young lady of attracting such inclination to her sex as there was in this excellent young man. But it did not amount to very much.

There was an occasional visitor at Lancaster Gate for whom Sir Arthur Whittleworth conceived a dislike which for him was almost fierce. This was a young man called Benjamin Lemon: a deathly pale young man, eager in speech and forcible in movement. He had a passion for music, and in a lesser degree for the stage, and his conversation about these subjects seemed to Sir Arthur Whittleworth quite offensively exaggerated and paradoxical. Sir Arthur, being short-sighted, may be excused for not remarking that on the coarse-featured pale face there was the fire of genuine enthusiasm, and that the awkward gestures were sometimes finely eloquent. The young man was a cousin of the family, and in spite of a common love for music it was understood that Mr. Lessiter disapproved of him; Sir Arthur gathered dimly that he had refused to be a stock-broker, and was regarded as a ne’er-do-well. He had had an opera produced in Rome, and had quarrelled with several eminent musicians in England. His visits were generally made at lunch, when Mr. Lessiter was absent, and he used to talk hard all the time—sometimes earnestly, sometimes wittily and caustically, seeming to find inspiration in Mabel’s interested face Sir Arthur detested him. The conversation was generally outside his knowledge, and Lemon, after a few vain attempts to include him, ended by ignoring his existence. Sir Arthur, more or less at home by this time, did not like to be ignored by a person he considered to be a “bounder,” and fell back on as much of the “Oxford manner” as he possessed, which—it is not at all peculiar to Oxford—consists of bland, faint smiles when other people laugh, and of quasi-offensive interjections, such as, “my dear sir,” and “really.” If only he had noticed things more, he might have seen that Mabel Lessiter frowned at these interjections, and that she was ruder than ever on the first opportunity afterwards.

CHAPTER 4

About six weeks from the beginning of his tutorship Sir Arthur Whittleworth was sitting one afternoon in the room where he and Master Lessiter pursued their studies, correcting some Latin verses, and trying hard to make some better ones himself. His pupil was at the gymnasium. He was struggling with a peculiarly obstinate pentameter, when, looking up from the Gradus, he saw the beautiful face of Mabel Lessiter smiling down at him. She had come in softly, holding an open book. He jumped up nervously, but she entreated him to sit down, touching his arm with her hand, and using a soft and almost tender tone of voice. She was so sorry to disturb him, but she was puzzled over a Latin quotation, and he was so learned, would he be so kind, and so forth. Evidently she was in her kindest mood, and Sir Arthur blinked almost fearlessly at her. The quotation was a stanza of Horace. She drew a chair close to his, and pointed to the passage word by word, so that Sir Arthur’s face nearly touched her hand as he bent over the book. Then she wanted it all over again, and bent over the book herself, so that their faces nearly touched each other. Sir Arthur would hardly have been human if the contiguity had not affected him. “That day we read no more,” flashed into his brain: he felt romantic, very nearly. His translation was extremely lame, but Miss Lessiter was warm in praise of his scholarship and his beautiful English. “Oh, yes—yes—I see: how well you put it! How splendid it must be to be able to read Latin just like English!” and so on. Sir Arthur smiled with a little proper pride. The translation over, she still sat on, as though hesitating to say something. Then suddenly: “I do want to say something to you. May I? I’m only a girl, I know, but we are friends, aren’t we? I know I often tease you, and you’re awfully sweet not to mind, but that only shows we’re good friends, doesn’t it?” His hand was resting on the desk, and in a pretty, affectionate manner she laid her own on it, and gently pressed it. “I do so want you to do something in the world worthy of your splendid talents and learning and your name and all that: I know this teaching must be irksome to a mind like yours, and I do hope you’ll soon find something better fitted to you—statesmanship or something. There! You forgive me, don’t you?”

Her soft warm touch thrilled the baronet’s nerves, while the delightful sentences soothed and flattered his mind. He looked at her sympathetic beautiful face, and down at her pretty little hand. Then, hardly knowing what he did, he bent and kissed it.

“Oh,” said Miss Lessiter, drawing it—but gently—away, “Oh, why did you do that? what do you mean?”

He might have said that he meant nothing, or he might have asked her what she meant by pressing his hand first. He did neither. He felt that his act had been extraordinary—he had never done such a thing before—and demanded a serious explanation. He looked hard in front of him, blushing violently. What ought one to do? Was he in love? It was a terrible situation. “I meant,” said he, “I meant—”

“Yes, yes?” said she, smiling. “I meant, I beg—” she stopped that at once. “You meant,” said she, very softly and shyly—“you meant that you care for me?”

“Er—yes,” said the gentleman.

She laughed with affectionate gaiety. “You foolish boy! why didn’t you tell me before?”

He felt, and looked, a very foolish boy indeed. She laid her hand on his again. He let it alone. Then she started up and bent over him, and for a moment touched his cheek with hers. “I’m so happy,” said she. It was well that one of them should be so. “But we shall have a lot to go through.” He looked as though he had begun already. “You must speak to my father now, at once: that will be best, won’t it?”

At this Sir Arthur fairly started. It seemed like a nightmare. She was proceeding by leaps and bounds: did it really all follow from his feat? He felt bewildered and afraid; but something in him said that he was a fine fellow, and it was really agreeable—this contiguity with the girl whose vagaries had so distracted him. So she loved him after all! He took her hand and kissed it again. That clinched the matter. Miss Lessiter began to speak with judicial gravity.

“You see,” she said, “both my father and mother, though I daresay you wouldn’t think it, have awfully strong prejudices about race and that. The idea of my marrying outside the—you understand?”

He did not understand in the least. The word marry smote heavily on his consciousness. He did not quite understand as yet why she should marry him—he had not thought of the question why she should not. “Er—why—I don’t—” he faltered.

“Why, you know, of course, that we’re Jews.”

“Jews?” quoth he.

“Yes; I suppose you’ve heard of Jews.” She frowned slightly and spoke rather sharply, but immediately recovered her air of affectionate confidence. “I can’t help it, can I? They don’t care about the religion, you know, but the race feeling is awfully strong. I know father wouldn’t own it: he’ll put it on something else. Mother wouldn’t to you, either. They’ll both make other objections. I tell you this, to show you that you must be prepared to fight. You must be firm, dear.”

He looked a picture of unwarlike indecision, and the girl bit her lip, and for a moment her voice was a little unsteady. “Best get it over. Father’s in the library now. Come, be brave.”

Jews—marriage—it was all utterly strange and unreal. Here was he. Sir Arthur Whittleworth, suddenly going to ask leave to marry, and to be opposed on the ground that he was not a Jew. He had always thought of Jews as a kind of Dissenters, and this novel idea of race distinction almost engrossed his reflective mind to the exclusion of the personal difficulty. He sat still, and Mabel Lessiter, standing a little behind him, looked as though she were going to hit him. But she only laid her hand firmly on his arm, and repeated, “Come.” Slowly he rose, and she guided him, as it were, to the door, opened it, and stood still.

“But—but—you’re coming too, I suppose?” the swain faltered.

“No; father wouldn’t like that—you must go alone. Oh, do be a man, Arthur!”

She fairly pushed him through the doorway, and watched him slowly walking, with bent head, down the passage. Then, when she heard the library door shut, she swiftly stole to it and listened at the keyhole.

To Sir Arthur’s further dismay, Mrs. Lessiter was with her husband.

“Well, Whittleworth,” said Mr. Lessiter pleasantly, “anything I can do for you?” Mrs. Lessiter encouraged him with a smile. Unsuspecting parents, they had forgotten the boldness and badness of baronets!

“Er—Mr. Lessiter—I wanted to say—I’m very sorry to interrupt you—I came to ask—”

But the reader must imagine how Sir Arthur Whittleworth, with many an “er” and many a hesitation, was finally delivered of his proposal; how Mr. Lessiter courteously pointed out its impossibility, while, with just a touch of irony, thanking Sir Arthur for the honour; how the question of the future support of Lady Whittleworth remained unanswered; how Sir Arthur was exhorted to forget all about it, and very nearly promised to do so, but remembered in time that he would have to face Miss Lessiter; how he professed to be firm; how furious Mrs. Lessiter looked, and with what apt remarks she clinched her husband’s arguments.

When he left their presence, Sir Arthur went back to the schoolroom, which he found empty. He sat desolately in his chair for five minutes; then, with an air of desperate helplessness, seized the Gradus and went on with the Latin verses.

They discussed the matter meanwhile. Both admitted their dislike of their daughter marrying a Gentile, but both admitted that the dislike might be overcome in a desirable case; in this it could not be. A penniless and incapable young man—a drivelling idiot, said Mrs. Lessiter—who had only an inferior baronetcy to give in return for being supported by them—it was altogether out of the question. It was utterly incomprehensible that Mabel could really mean it. They sent for her, and she said that she did mean it. They accused her of having her head turned by a title, like a silly schoolgirl; she accused them of sordidness and prejudice. They, or rather her mother, called Sir Arthur a fool; she extolled his gentleness and culture and sweetness of disposition. They were firm; she was firm, and unlike Sir Arthur, looked it. Finally, Mrs. Lessiter, who still hoped that this folly would be forgotten and she might regain the comfort of her baronet, decided that he should be given a fortnight’s holiday to see what happened. So Sir Arthur went back to the rural deanery.

•    •    •

“Darling Molly—The dénouement has happened. I did have to act hard. He was like a sheep, and I drove him into the library, where father was like a sheep-dog. I simply couldn’t go in with him; I know I should have laughed. You never saw anything so absurd as he looked. I should feel a brute if I thought he cared, but I know he doesn’t. He’s simply … but I won’t be ungrateful to him, poor thing. He’s gone back to the country for the present. I am firm. It will soon be time for Ben’s influence over me to be called in. You clever angel, to think of it!—Mabel.”

CHAPTER 5

There was expectant joy in the rural deanery. It cost the Dean’s wife some pains to extract from Sir Arthur the reason for his sudden return, but when she had done so she was triumphant. “I suppose,” she said to the Dean, “that sweet girl was right, and they don’t like the idea of his not being a Jew. It sounds funny—rather impertinent I call it, but of course they’ll soon come round. Perhaps they want a little time to consult the Rabbis or something. But they must see what an advantageous thing it will be for the girl to marry a man of Arthur’s position. Thank heaven he’s provided for—they’re enormously rich, I know. I don’t quite like his marrying a Jewess, but still—”

“They are an ancient race,” remarked the Rural Dean.

Sir Arthur seemed to be troubled, one might have said haunted, by some strange memory; but he was even quieter and more modest than before. His aunt took it for granted that he was lost in a lover’s reveries, and after dinner she would sing to him songs she thought appropriate to the occasion, while the Rural Dean read the newspaper. “Here stand I to live or die, as you prove false or true,” or words to that effect, was one of them, and “The Devout Lover” another. But the days went on, and no acceptance of his generous proposal arrived. She was puzzled.

•    •    •

“I think I have almost persuaded her. Cousin Rachel,” said Mr. Benjamin Lemon to Mrs. Lessiter. A few days later he said, “I have persuaded her, but I’ve gone further than you intended.”

“What do you mean, Ben?”

The young man came close to her and put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re surprised,” he said. “You told me to use my influence with her. I have. I appealed to our old friendship, to the liking we’ve had for one another since we were children. I appealed to her successfully. No, don’t look cross, you dear woman. She and I were made for one another. I know you like me, and I know in your inmost heart you’re glad she’ll marry one of us. Cousin Reuben disapproves of me, and you’ve got to persuade him. I believe after all this bother he’ll be glad. I give you my word to work hard and make a name for myself, and we won’t ask you for anything.”

•    •    •

“Dear Sir Arthur, You must forgive me. It was only a girlish whim, I know now. You overcame me that day in the schoolroom with your impetuous, masterful way. But I should wrong us both if I married you. Ben and I have been chums since we were children….”
So wrote Miss Lessiter.

“My dear Arthur (I must call you that still, for I shall always look on you as a very dear friend)—Mabel has explained herself. It was just a whim on her part, and I cannot help hoping on yours too. Anyhow, I’m sure you will have the wisdom to forget it all. You may rely on our never alluding to it, and no one but ourselves knows of it. If after what has happened you feel able to come back to us and resume your excellent tuition of our boy, my husband and I will be more than glad.—Yours most sincerely, Rachel Lessiter.”

•    •    •

“‘Varium et mutabile,’” said the Rural Dean.

“I call her a minx of the worst sort,” said the Rural Dean’s wife.

“Will you go back, Arthur?” asked the Rural Dean.

“I don’t know,” said he.

“Good gracious!” said his aunt. “Did you care for the girl?”

“I—er—I don’t know,” said Sir Arthur Whittleworth.

•    •    •    •    •    •

•   SAVED

Boxley Gardens,
Tuesday.

I give way—I can bear my lot no longer—it cannot be wrong to escape from it—I shall range myself with the women who have defied the cruel and senseless usages of society—the world stoned them, but they kept their own self-respect. Come to lunch and arrange details—you must take me a thousand miles from England.

This was the fateful letter which Mrs. Eric Lister sent to Mr. Percy Gunting, her great friend. He read it sitting in a comfortable arm-chair at half-past nine in the morning. He was a very young man, but large for his age, full-bodied, with close black hair, and a dark and round and generally cheerful face; he wore a beautiful smoking suit, with collar and cuffs of yellow satin. His cheerful face clouded; his hand holding the letter dropped upon his knee; he looked vacantly round the neatly-curtained and neatly-pictured room. His glance fell on the breakfast waiting for him, the silver teapot and the rack of perfect toast, the silver cover promising nourishment within, the marmalade in its pretty glass pot. Mr. Percy Gunting cultivated his body generously and carefully on settled principles. He felt dimly that there was a pathos in the waiting marmalade, that its days were gone, that the letter summoned him to sterner things. But habit is strong, and presently he moved to the table, and ate his filleted sole and his egg and his marmalade, and drank his tea solemnly, without joy. Then he lit a cigarette, and went back to the arm-chair and read the letter again.

Of course he was devoted to Fanny Lister, had been for months. And her husband was hard and matter-of-fact, who could never understand her beautiful nature. He had professed his love for her over and over again; but he had never thought she would take—he had never hoped in his wildest dreams she would give herself to him. He sighed, and dropped his cigarette on the floor.

His reflections were not exaggerated: he had indeed been Mrs. Eric Lister’s friend—one hesitated to use the word lover of an appearance so correct and comfortable—for months. She was about twenty-eight, and her husband, a fairly prosperous merchant, was quite middle-aged, a methodical and reasonable person who typified for her the commonplace, almost—it is painful to relate—the commercial; while she had a soul, and was read in the minor poets, and knew a few words of Spanish, and longed accordingly for a poetic temperament, for a sympathiser who should bring her beautiful thoughts and passionate impulses. His friends had not found these qualities in Percy Gunting, but Mrs. Lister trusted her woman’s instinct. He came often to tea when she was alone; he made love to her, diffidently at first, cheerfully anon. He cut likely bits of poetry out of an evening paper, and sent them to her, ineffectually denying their authorship. He was pleased—who would not have been?—with the romance. Yet, as time went on, it would have burdened a less heroic chivalry, for Mrs. Lister’s soul took little heed of times and places. She lived remotely, and would summon him by telegram as though he were a doctor. She forgot that it is wise to lunch always at the same time, she forgot that even passionate man must dine, she forgot that men of all kinds have engagements. Percy never complained, but on occasions his face wore a wistful, almost a hunted, expression; and Mrs. Lister wondered, and, being a woman, perhaps rejoiced, at what vultures of love were tearing him.

But now his great triumph was come.

As he dressed it occurred to him that a journey of thousands of miles could not be made in a frock coat; on the other hand, he had intended to call on some people in the afternoon. He decided to wear a suit of dark tweed; he put on also brown boots. He almost sighed again as he looked round his pretty flat, perhaps for the last time. That reminded him: it might be well to have a portmanteau packed with things appropriate to a very distant journey. And that again reminded him that his cigarette case was empty: he filled it and forgot the portmanteau. As he went forth into Dover Street, braced for his great enterprise, he felt inclined to shake hands with the obliging hall porter, who typified for him the comfort of his past.

Mrs. Lister was waiting for him in the drawing-room. She was a little, slight, fair-haired woman, with a thinly wailing voice and many gestures. “Ah, Percy, you have come to me!”

“Yes,” said Percy.

She put her head on his breast, and he caressed her rigidly, with a certain melancholy determination.

“We will fly together, Percy.”

“Yes, darling.” The thought glanced upon him that his life in London had been rather pleasant. He was twenty-four, and had a thousand a year, and dined out a good deal.

“Percy, Eric was dreadful today.” It was odd that, though her chief grievance against Mr. Lister was that he was commonplace and commercial, she always called him Eric, a second name given him by his mother, whereas he, good man, preferred his father’s choice of Thomas. As she pronounced it, one thought rather of a romantic and daring person.

“What has he done?” Percy asked. I would not say that his indignation had not a taint of fretfulness.

“Oh, everything. He treated me to a lecture last night about not seeing enough of his relations. He complained of the dinner—he seems to think I—I can be a household drudge. He is impossible, Percy.”

Percy walked moodily to the window, turned round, and faced her sadly. His fine face was perplexed. “Poor fellow!” he said.

“What do you mean?” Mrs. Lister asked sharply.

“I pity him,” said Percy, “because he cannot appreciate you, dearest. And now he will lose you—at least I suppose so.”

“What do you mean, Percy?”—her air was tragic; her hands fell by her sides—“Do you regret?”

“No, dear, no.” He regained a laborious cheerfulness. “But I can’t help feeling for him. Poor chap!”

Mrs. Lister thought he was harping over-much on the subject. She turned round abruptly, and then turned back again. “We must brace ourselves—we must venture all for our freedom. Let us plan. It is hateful to think of common things, but we must be practical. Percy, you must take me to some beautiful island thousands of miles away.”

His mind bent to the practical, Percy reflected rapidly that one could read for the Bar in a beautiful island as well as in London. But he would have to return for the examination.

“I ought to go and get tickets,” he said.

“Tickets!” Mrs. Lister exclaimed impatiently. but added “Yes, dear, you are so thoughtful.”

Here a servant announced that lunch was ready. “Lunch!” Mrs. Lister exclaimed with bitter irony, when the servant was gone. But Percy received the announcement cheerfully, and made towards the door. They went down to the dining-room in silence: she helped him to curry. But as soon as they were alone, and before he had tasted it, she started from the table.

“This is not a time for trifling,” she cried. “Lunch! Percy, you must go.”

To lunch was not to trifle in Percy’s philosophy of life. He looked at her amazed. “Go?” he asked. “Why?”

“We must strain every nerve. There is not a moment to lose. You must go and get those tickets.”

“Where to?” His tone was distinctly unhappy, but she overbore him in her zeal.

“Anywhere, anywhere—away from this hateful place.”

“Shall we go to Paris?” he asked.

“Paris!” A familiar name excited her scorn, as of course. “You talk as if it were a holiday trip.” But, after all, Paris was appropriate. “Yes,” she said wearily, “we will go to Paris.”

“All right,” said Percy, “then there is no hurry about the tickets. We can’t go before the evening, and we’ll get them at the station.”

“No, no. That is too great a risk. Go, Percy, get them now; let us be prepared.”

“All right, I’ll get them at Cook’s. But they don’t shut, probably, till—”

Mrs. Lister had sunk aghast into her chair. Cook’s! That all her tragedy should end in Cook’s! She leaned forward and buried her face in her hands and gave a little sob. Percy was moved at once. He was never proof against a sob.

“Dear, what is it?” he asked gently.

“Oh, Percy,” she wailed, “you are so hard, so hard. I give up all the world for you, and you have nothing for me but cold words and sordid details. Never one word of love. Leave me now, Percy; go to—go and get the tickets, and come back for me. I shall lie down a little on my bed. I shall be well when you come back.” She smiled wanly upon him.

“Can’t I go with you, and—”

“Percy! To my room!” Her surprise was patently genuine.

“I forgot,” said Percy feebly.

“Go,” she said.

He looked dolefully at the curry, which had by this time a greasy aspect, and rose.

“My poor boy,” Mrs. Lister said, “you look ill. We must be brave. Drink some brandy, Percy.”

The idea of brandy on an empty stomach was abhorrent to Percy Gunting. He shook his head, intimating, as she took it, that no stimulant was necessary to his love. He went away, manfully facing his destiny. He repelled the idea of going to lunch at his club.

•    •    •

In two hours he returned. He sank into a chair in the empty drawing-room, hopeless and lunchless, and presently Mrs. Lister ran in, all tumbled and fluffy and muddled.

“I’ve been packing a box all by myself,” she said breathlessly; “I dared not ask my maid. I sent her out. You know that grey skirt you said you liked—Oh, Percy, Eric comes home at six. When does the train go? Eight, isn’t it? Well, you must come here at half-past five—Oh, of course, yes, I must write a farewell note to Eric, poor Eric. Percy, what is it Shelley says about the past, you know—Oh, never mind—yes, you come at half-past five, and we’ll drive about London till it’s time to go to the station.”

“We can’t go today,” Percy interrupted.

She stood suddenly still.

“When I got to that beastly Cook’s,” he went on, “I found I hadn’t enough money for the tickets, and then I remembered I was overdrawn at the bank. I went to my solicitor, and he wasn’t in. You see, I must see my solicitor before we go, and raise some money somehow.”

“Your solicitor?”

“Yes,” he rejoined, almost irritably. “I must see him personally. I know he’ll let me have some money at once. I shan’t tell him what it’s for. We shall be able to go tomorrow all right.”

“We can’t go today, Percy? We can’t fly at once while we may?”

“We can go just as well tomorrow. Oh, don’t you understand, Fanny? I must see my solicitor.”

“You never loved me Percy.” She sat gravely down. “You think more of your solicitor, more of wretched, stupid trifles than you do of me, I might have known it would end in this way. It doesn’t matter,” her voice got thin and tearful; “I was never meant to have any happiness. I must dree my weird. Go, Percy, go and talk to your solicitor about money. Never mind me. I hope you will be happy.”

Percy had half risen from his chair with an expression not altogether miserable, but when she began to cry, he pulled himself together. “I do love you, Fanny. I love you tremendously.”

She looked at him wistfully. “Do you, Percy?” she asked.

He went to her, and kneeled beside her chair, and she smoothed his hair back from his forehead. It was their customary attitude. He talked to her wisely and soothingly. He told her how he would see his solicitor early the next morning, and get the tickets, and they would go by the eleven o’clock train; they would be very happy together; it would be one long dream of happiness; they had better lunch at Dover; he preferred it to waiting for Calais. She was calmed, and when he went was resigned to the delay.

Percy Gunting walked all the way to his club deep in thought. His soul was oppressed by cares greater than had come before into his harmless life. Would it all end well? Would he and Fanny really find in one another a true unity of spirit? Should he discharge his man, or take him with them? What should he do about his flat? He stared vacantly at the passing omnibuses. That evening he felt vaguely that he was a sort of criminal, and should hide himself from detection. He avoided his fellow-men and dined in his flat. He looked round it with affection as he sat there after dinner. The soft arm-chair, the convenient tables and bookcases, the appliances for drinking, his pipe-racks and cigar cabinet, all the little comforts of his single life were grown inexpressibly dear to him. There grew on him a feeling that the world was using him ill—him who had done it no harm.

He slept fitfully that night, and woke finally at seven o’clock. There was an hour before he need get up and be heroic, and he lay and counted the galloping minutes with deeper and deeper depression. Then, being brave, he pulled himself together and dressed. For the first time in his life, so far as he could remember, he could not eat his breakfast, and the fact brought home to him very fully on what strange seas he was embarking. He told his man to pack a portmanteau, that he was going away for a week; he felt that he could not tell this bland domestic that he was to live forever on a beautiful island. Then, with something of a scared look, he got into a cab and drove to his solicitor’s.

At a quarter past ten he arrived at Boxley Gardens, and nervously rang the bell. A housemaid opened the door. Mrs. Lister was ill in bed and could not see him, she said: she was to give him this note. He received it with a sense of tragedy, and read:

“The doctor says it is a severe cold, but I think I shall die. I cannot possibly go today; and, Percy, I shall never go. I feel that fate is against me. Eric was kind last night. It all ends in bathos; it is like life. I cannot begin it over again. A cold in the head! How little they know me! Go, Percy, and forget me, and forgive me if I have wronged you. Be brave and live your life.”

“Tell Mrs. Lister I’m so sorry she’s ill, and I quite understand,” said Percy. He was very brave: neither the housemaid nor the cabman saw desolation in his face. As he drove back to his rooms, he looked at himself critically in the glass of the cab. He looked ill, he thought, but not despairing: he was bearing up. Bah! he thought, such are women. He laughed aloud, quite cheerfully. He was determined to put his self-control to an unnecessary test. As the cab passed his club in Piccadilly, he stopped it and went to the billiard-room, and amazed and disgusted an old friend by slapping him heartily on the back.

•    •    •    •    •    •

•   THE HERO AND THE BURGLARS

My hero’s name was William James Haddock: he was thirty-four years old, and a junior partner in a respectable and tolerably prosperous firm of tea merchants. I do not assert that he was called a hero by the world at large, which is notoriously ignorant of its greatest men:—a private hero, a hero to his mother, his aunts, his sisters, his wife, his wife’s mother, his wife’s sisters. Their opinion was not, I am inclined to think, founded on his actual achievements. He was, it is true, in the second cricket eleven at school; he was an expert lawn-tennis player; and he was in the habit of riding immense distances on his bicycle on Saturday afternoons, sometimes even going so far as to sleep at a remote inn, right in the country, and return on the following Sunday. But these achievements and accomplishments, though repeatedly impressed on his acquaintances by his female relations, were not the only or the chief cause of his reputation.

Beyond all men I have had the honour of meeting, William James Haddock was resolute and strong in speech. Not that he used oaths: his idea of refinement excluded them, and he disdained such paltry methods of emphasis. No—he used simple, unornamented English; but its effect was always trenchant, and (a hostile critic might have said) even ferocious. “I’m not going to stand any nonsense,” was one of his favourite phrases; and he used it concerning innumerable details of daily life—the failure of a servant to black his boots to his liking, the lateness of his train to the City and so forth. He did not, indeed, address it directly to the servant in question, or to station-masters, being a very kindly man; but impressed it afterwards on his wife, her sister, or an aunt who might be staying with him. “I’d like to see anybody do that to me,” was a comment he made on any slight reported to him as having been inflicted on somebody else, and one felt, as he made it, that the consequences would have been dreadful indeed. He had a deep voice, and wore a very large black moustache.

I remember relating in his family circle a mild joke made by an acquaintance at my expense, and how disconcerted I was when Haddock interjected, “I should have knocked him down.” It had not seemed at all necessary to me, but I am afraid Mrs. Haddock thought I had been very cowardly. Haddock was frequently thrashing, in conversation, some hypothetical offender within an inch of his life, or breaking every bone in an imaginary body. In fact, even outside his family he was regarded as a brave and determined fellow.

As a lover of peace and a friend of Haddock, I used often to rejoice that in our age and country, there are, on the whole, few opportunities for physical strife or chastisement. It may have been partly due to Haddock’s known readiness to break every bone, but the fact is that nobody ever insulted him. It happened once that a rude man pushed against Haddock and his wife as they were entering a railway carriage, and he told me afterwards that had he been alone he would have thrashed that man “till his own mother wouldn’t have known him”: he was luckily prevented by the presence of Mrs. Haddock, fearing the effect on her nerves. At another time, when I was with him, a cabman he had just paid at Waterloo Station was abusive, and Haddock afterwards regretted that he had not pulled that cabman from his perch, and flung him under the horse’s hoofs: fortunately there had been no time, as we had to catch the train. I can remember no other occasion on which there was the least excuse for Haddock to have recourse to violent action. But for all that I lived in fear that someday one of those terrible scenes which Haddock had assured me would happen under certain conditions would actually come to pass.

I was therefore greatly alarmed when I heard that burglaries had been committed in Haddock’s neighbourhood. My friend was ready, I knew, to inflict the most frightful punishment on offences which seemed to me to be comparatively slight; my imagination refused to suggest to me what he would do to a man who entered his house with the purpose of stealing his property. That he would kill such a man I could not doubt, but mere killing was disproportionately mild. Haddock would render a man who knocked off his hat a hopeless invalid for life. Simply to have killed a burglar, however, would be a disagreeable remembrance, I could not doubt, to a naturally benevolent nature. On the other hand, there was the risk that the burglar, if very unscrupulous, or irritated by the prospect of his own demise, might kill Haddock by a fluke; or there might be more than one burglar, and my heroic friend, being the only man in his house, might be overpowered. I feared his intrepidity, the reckless courage with which he would rush into danger to protect his hearth and home.

He asked me to stay with him one Saturday to Monday, and I was glad to go, not only for my pleasure, but because I hoped, if burglars should come, to add some element of caution to his foolhardy contempt of danger.

Haddock’s house is in an extremely western suburb of London, not far from a public park. It is moreover, on the outskirts of the suburb itself, in a lonely lane, by no means uninviting to burglars. He had not returned from his bicycle ride when I arrived, and I was received by his wife and sister-in-law, I found that they shared my fears in connexion with the burglars. Haddock, it seemed, had been more intrepid than ever. He had uttered such dreadful threats against their occasional gardener, who had neglected his duties, that Mrs, Haddock had dismissed the man on her own authority, while Haddock was in the City, and had warned him not to come near the house. She said that her husband’s face, when the possible burglary of their house was suggested, was terrible to see. “He is so rash,” she said; “you will try to calm him if they come, won’t you?” I did my best to comfort her wifely terrors.

Haddock looked extremely determined when he arrived. In the short conversation I had with him alone before dinner he warned me not to talk of burglary to Mrs. Haddock and her sister: it was useless to alarm them, he said. I remembered with some shame that I had already done so, and reflected that true courage is always considerate of others’ timidity in the hour of danger. He then told me, with some heat, that the local inspector of police had refused, on the ground that he had no men to spare, to have Haddock’s lane patrolled throughout the night. His anger, of course, was that of an unjustly-treated taxpayer, not of a resourceless man abandoned to his fate: in fact, he said with a grim smile, “If the police can’t protect us, they must not complain if we take the law into our own hands.” But I was all the more surprised to hear that there were no firearms in the house. There was not even a gun, since Haddock did not shoot, and he told me hastily that his wife had a horror of revolvers: I could see he was a little ashamed to acknowledge his perhaps excessive tenderness for her feelings, and did not press the subject. He warned me again, as we went upstairs to dress, not to allude to burglars at dinner.

So that subject was tabooed. I remember that we talked chiefly of duels, and I mention the fact because it emphasized Haddock’s boldness in my mind. If Haddock had lived in the old duelling days, I am afraid he would have slain a large number of people. He regretted the disappearance of duels from England (I am surprised, by the way, that he has not fought any during his trips abroad). Mentioning the case of a man who, it seemed, had been rude to a friend of Haddock’s at some local meeting, “Now in any other country but this,” he said, “one would simply call out a fellow like that and shoot him like a dog.” Mrs. Haddock’s eyes—in spite of her horror of revolvers—glistened as her hero spoke. I remarked, rather superfluously perhaps, that the right person did not always survive. “Oh, you literary fellows!” Haddock said: “that’s different.” I remembered that abroad literary fellows fight rather more often than other people, and I was not aware that tea merchants were particularly warlike; but I accepted the rebuke meekly, and Haddock’s sister-in-law gave me a look of compassionate amusement, as who should say that all men could not be champions.

The evening passed, and at eleven o’clock or so Haddock and I were alone in the smoking-room. We talked of various things, chiefly of fighting and of the decay of pluck in the daily habits of our countrymen, which Haddock alleged to be painfully apparent. It must have been shortly after twelve that I thought I heard a sound in the garden. The smoking-room window gave on to the large garden at the back of the house, and was connected with it by a flight of steps. Another flight of steps outside went down to the kitchen quarters, below the level of the garden. The night was quite still, but I thought I heard a rustle in the bushes, and something like a smothered cough. I mentioned my suspicion to Haddock; but he disbelieved me, and—I suppose to dissipate any fear I might have—began to talk more volubly than before. A little later I distinctly heard the crunch of a foot on the gravel. Haddock had not heard it, he said, and poop-poohed my idea that it would be well to open the window and look out. (I must mention that the window was closely fastened with heavy shutters, so that probably no light was seen from our room by the person or persons in the garden.) Haddock said it would be absurd to undo the shutters, and rallied me on my timidity. Just then there was the noise of somebody on the stone steps which led to the kitchen: I looked at Haddock, and saw that he too had heard it. “Good heavens,” he said, “what infernal cheek!” I thought that now the time was come when I must restrain his rashness. But Haddock had a far greater control over himself than I had imagined. He laughed, and said: “After all, they can’t possibly get into the house. It doesn’t hurt us if they walk about the garden, does it? It’s hardly worth the bother of tackling them.” This speech surprised me in its remarkable moderation, and I suggested that at least we might reconnoitre the burglars from an upstairs window. Haddock negatived this. “I think not, old chap,” he said; “my wife has a weak heart. She’d be certain to hear us, and the shock would alarm her terribly—it might be a serious thing for her. So long as they don’t get into the house, I prefer them to walk about my garden to giving my poor wife a shock. But it’s time we turned in.” He rose as he spoke, and lit a candle. “We’ll turn in if the burglars can’t—what?” he said. The jocularity seemed to be forced, and I surmised that he was holding in his rage with great difficulty. He turned out the lamps, and we took our way to bed. As we passed the door of the inside stairs which led down to the kitchen, I listened at it, and heard somebody moving about below. Haddock said it was the cat. “That infernal cat,” he said, “is always walking about at night and knocking things over.” I answered that I believed the burglars had got in—perhaps a window down there had been left open. “Nonsense,” said Haddock; “I tell you it’s impossible they should have got in. Come to bed.”

“At least,” I suggested, “we might go down and see.”

“No, no,” he replied, “my wife would hear, and she’d be terribly frightened. We can’t do that. But really, you’re awfully nervous tonight, old chap. There’s nothing to be afraid of.” He dragged me away from the door, and preceded me quickly up the stairs. As I shut my door, I heard him lock his and bolt it, no doubt at the entreaty of his wife. Haddock’s wonderful self-repression amazed me, and I have no words to tell how much I admired him for it.

At the same time I thought his consideration for his wife went a little too far. His house at that moment was probably being rifled, and it is not pleasant to think that within a few yards of one, in the dead of night, are armed and probably unscrupulous strangers. There was no key in the lock of my door, and it had no bolt. I reflected that burglars often go about their business in gangs, carrying revolvers with several chambers. I had no weapons but my razors, which, however convenient for cutting one’s own throat, are ineffectual weapons—their folding handles considered—for seriously damaging an active enemy. I can boast honestly that in the company of Haddock I would have faced the burglars; but, frankly to say it, I did not like the prospect of dealing with them single-handed, and I was almost guilty of thinking that, in his anxiety for his wife, Haddock had been a little neglectful of his friend. I heard the door of the kitchen stairs gently opened; it had been locked of course, but I suppose the lock had yielded to a hairpin. How strange is the disorder of our thoughts! In the midst of my alarm I made a mild joke to myself about the chivalry of the lock which yielded to the feminine … Ah! a whisper; then there was more than one, not a lonely burglar. A company! Messrs…. I wonder if imbecile irrelevances occur to other people at critical moments. My room was nearly over the lower staircase door, which accounts for my hearing the very slight noise. Steps went along the passage which led to the dining-room and smoking-room on one side, to the drawing-room and a smaller sitting-room on the other. I heard no more; but, if you will believe my protestation, I began to pull myself together for an effort on the side of the law. It seems easy to you, as you read this in the daytime; but wait for the silent, dark night, before you rebuke my hesitation.

My door was gently opened, and Haddock appeared. He spoke to me in a whisper. “My wife’s in a dreadful state of alarm,” he said. “There’s somebody in the dining-room underneath our bedroom. I daren’t leave her for more than a moment. I believe she’d have a fit. I don’t like to knock up the servants”—there was no manservant, as I have explained, and the three women-servants of the little establishment slept on the floor above us—“would you mind? Just to see what it is? It may be one of the servants, after all. I dare say it’s nothing, but my wife’s anxious, and I daren’t leave her.” To me this brave fellow made light of the danger; but I confess I was not so fearless, and disliked my mission exceedingly. However, there was no help for it, and I prepared to go. Haddock passed me the candle and a light malacca cane, and I noticed as he did so that he trembled with suppressed rage. “If you want me,” he said in a hoarse whisper, “give me a call, and I’ll come at once.”

He crept back to his room.

I descended the stairs, holding the candle in one hand and the cane in the other. I walked along the passage and into the dining-room. Two men were there, busied in filling a large sack. I asked them what they were doing. It was a superfluous question, I admit; they disdained to answer it; they simply knocked me down with a jemmy—I think it must have been a jemmy, a hard instrument, in any case—and before I could struggle to my feet, rather dazed as I was, they were gone through the window into the garden. I called for help, and Haddock’s voice answered me.

“Are there men in the house?” he cried.

“They are gone—escaped,” I shouted feebly, and Haddock came bounding down the stairs and tore into the room.

“Where are they? Show them me!” he cried, in his old determined voice. I suppose he had given up the hope of saving his wife’s alarm. He rushed to the window, but immediately came back to me. I had tumbled into a chair.

“Are you much hurt?” he asked. Even the pursuit of the burglars gave way to friendship in his mind….

There was not much harm done by the burglars. They had taken nothing of great value, not having found the plate. Yielding to his wife’s nervousness, Haddock has moved into Kensington, where the police are more numerous. As for me, I was well in a few days. But while I admit Haddock’s great tenderness for his wife, and the power of self-control he showed on that night of the burglars, and am far from grudging him his reputation for dare-devil courage, I think it rather unkind that the Haddock family should regard me as a typical coward. Haddock dwells facetiously on the timidity he maintains that I displayed, and Mrs. Haddock openly patronizes me on the strength of it. Haddock says he is glad, after all, that it was I, not he, whom fortune allowed to tackle the burglars. He is afraid that he might have killed them.

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•   EDITING NOTES

Text was obtained from the Internet Archive (bookofstories00streiala).

OCR and printer’s errors were silently corrected; punctuation, diacritics, and italics formatted; some spelling and punctuation normalized for consistency.

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