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The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton, a novel by E. Phillips Oppenheim |
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Chapter 19. A Bad Half-Hour |
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_ CHAPTER XIX. A BAD HALF-HOUR Burton slept that night under a gorse bush. He was no sooner alone on the great unlit Common with its vast sense of spaciousness, its cool silence, its splendid dome of starlit sky, than all his anger and disappointment seemed to pass away. The white, threatening faces of the professor and Mr. Bomford no longer haunted him. Even the memory of Edith herself tugged no longer at his heartstrings. He slept almost like a child, and awoke to look out upon a million points of sunlight sparkling in the dewdrops. A delicious west wind was blowing. Little piled-up masses of white cloud had been scattered across the blue sky. Even the gorse bushes creaked and quivered. The fir trees in a little spinney close at hand were twisted into all manners of shapes. Burton listened to their music for a few minutes, and exchanged civilities with a dapple-breasted thrush seated on a clump of heather a few yards away. Then he rose to his feet, took in a long breath of the fresh morning air, and started briskly across the Common towards the nearest railway station. He was conscious, after the first few steps, of a dim premonition of some coming change. It did not affect--indeed, it seemed to increase the lightness of his spirits, yet he was conscious at the back of his brain of a fear which he could not put into words. The first indication of real trouble came in the fact that he found himself whistling "Yip-i-addy-i-ay" as he turned into the station yard. He knew then what was coming. After the first start, the rapidity of his collapse was appalling. The seclusion of the first-class carriage to which his ticket entitled him, and which his somewhat peculiar toilet certainly rendered advisable, was suddenly immensely distasteful. He bought Tit-bits and Ally Sloper at the bookstall, squeezed his way into a crowded third-class compartment, and joined in a noisy game of nap with half a dozen roistering young clerks, who were full of jokes about his crumpled dinner clothes. Arrived in London, he had the utmost difficulty to refrain from buying a red and yellow tie displayed in the station lavatory where he washed and shaved, and the necessity for purchasing a collar stud left him for a few moments in imminent peril of acquiring a large brass-stemmed production with a sham diamond head. He hastened to his rooms, scarcely daring to look about him, turned over the clothes in his wardrobe with a curious dissatisfaction, and dressed himself hastily in as offensive a combination of garments as he could lay his hands upon. He bought some common Virginian cigarettes and made his way to the offices of Messrs. Waddington and Forbes. Mr. Waddington was unfeignedly glad to see him. His office was pervaded by a sort of studious calm which, from a business point of view, seemed scarcely satisfactory. Mr. Waddington himself appeared to be immersed in a calf-bound volume of Ruskin. He glanced curiously at his late employee. "Did you dress in a hurry, Burton?" he inquired. "That combination of gray trousers and brown coat with a blue tie seems scarcely in your usual form." Burton dragged up a chair to the side of his late employer's desk. "Mr. Waddington," he begged, "don't let me go out of your sight until I have taken another bean. It came on early this morning. I went through all my wardrobe to find the wrong sort of clothes, and the only thing that seemed to satisfy me was to wear odd ones. Whatever you do, don't lose sight of me. In a few hours' time I shouldn't want to take a bean at all. I should be inviting you to lunch at the Golden Lion, playing billiards in the afternoon, and having a night out at a music hall." Mr. Waddington nodded sympathetically. "Poor fellow!" he said. "Seems odd that you should turn up this morning. I can sympathize with you. Have you noticed my tie?" Burton nodded approvingly. "Very pretty indeed," he declared. "You won't think so when you've had that bean," Mr. Waddington groaned. "It began to come on with me about an hour ago. I forced myself into these clothes but the tie floored me. I've a volume of Ruskin here before me, but underneath, you see," he continued, lifting up the blotting-paper, "is a copy of Snapshots. I'm fighting it off as long as I can. The fact is I've a sale this afternoon. I thought if I could last until after that it might not be a bad thing." "How's the biz?" Burton asked with a touch of his old jauntiness. "Going strong, eh?" "Not so good and not so bad," Mr. Waddington admitted. "We've got over that boom that started at first when people didn't understand things. They seem to regard me now with a mixture of suspicion and contempt. All the same, we get a good many outside buyers in, and we've pulled along all right up till now. It's been the best few months of my life," Mr. Waddington continued, "by a long way, but I'm getting scared, and that's a fact." "How many beans have you left?" Burton inquired. "Four," Mr. Waddington replied. "What I shall do when they've gone I can't imagine." Burton held his head for a moment a little wearily. "There are times," he confessed, "especially when one's sort of between the two things like this, when I can't see my way ahead at all. Do you know that last night the man with whom I have been staying--a man of education too, who has been a professor at Oxford University,--and another, a more commercial sort of Johnny, offered me a third partnership in a great enterprise for putting on the market a new mental health-food, if I would give them one of the beans for analysis. They were convinced that we should make millions." Mr. Waddington was evidently struck with the idea. "It's a great scheme," he said hesitatingly. "I suppose last night it occurred to you that it was just a trifle--eh?--just a trifle vulgar?" he asked tentatively. Burton assented gloomily. "Last night," he declared, "it seemed to me like a crime. It made me shiver all over while they talked of it. To-day, well, I'm half glad and I'm half sorry that they're not here. If they walked into this office now I'd swallow a bean as quickly as I could, but I tell you frankly, Mr. Waddington, that at the present moment it seems entirely reasonable to me. Money, after all, is worth having, isn't it?--a nice comfortable sum so that one could sit back and just have a good time. Don't stare at me like that. Of course, I'm half ashamed of what I'm saying. There's the other part pulling and tugging away all the time makes me feel inclined to kick myself, but I can't help it. I know that these half formed ideas of enjoyment by means of wealth are only degrading, that one would sink--oh, hang it all, Mr. Waddington, what a mess it all is!" Mr. Waddington pulled down his desk. "We must go through with it, Burton," he said firmly. "You're more advanced than I am in this thing, I can see. You'll need your bean quickly. I believe I can hold off till after the sale. But--I've a curious sort of temptation at the present moment, Burton. Shall I tell you what it is?" "Go ahead," Burton answered gloomily. Mr. Waddington slapped his trousers pocket. "Before we do another thing," he suggested, "let's go round to the Golden Lion and have just one bottle of beer--just to feel what it's like, eh?" Burton sprang up. "By Jove, let's!" he exclaimed. "I've had no breakfast. I'm ravenous. Do they still have that cheese and crusty loaf there?" Mr. Waddington glanced at the clock. "It's on by now," he declared. "Come along." They went out together and trod eagerly yet a trifle sheepishly the very well-known way that led to the Golden Lion. The yellow-haired young lady behind the bar welcomed them with a little cry of astonishment. She tossed her head. Her manner was familiar but was intended to convey some sense of resentment. "To think of seeing you two again!" she exclaimed. "You, Mr. Waddington, of all gentlemen in the world! Well, I declare!" she went on, holding out her hand across the counter, after having given it a preliminary wipe with a small duster. "Talk about a deserter! Where have you been to every morning, I should like to know?" "Not anywhere else, my dear," Mr. Waddington asserted, hastily, "that I can assure you. Seem to have lost my taste for beer, or taking anything in the morning lately. Matter of digestion, I suppose. Must obey our doctors, eh? We'll have a tankard each, please. That's right, isn't it, Burton?" Burton, whose mouth was already full of bread and cheese, nodded. The two men sat down in a little enclosed partition. The yellow-haired young lady leaned across the counter with the air of one willing for conversation. "Such queer things as I've heard about you, Mr. Waddington," she began. "My! the way people have been talking!" "That so?" Mr. Waddington muttered. "Wish they'd mind their own business." "That's too much to expect from folks nowadays," the young lady continued. "Why, there were some saying as you'd come into a fortune and spent all your time in the west-end, some that you'd turned religious, and others that you'd gone a bit dotty. I must say you're looking somehow different, you and Mr. Burton too. It's quite like old times, though, to see you sitting there together. You used to come in after every sale and sit just where you're sitting now and go through the papers. How's the business?" "Very good," Mr. Waddington admitted. "How have you been getting along, eh?" The young lady sighed. She rolled her eyes at Mr. Waddington in a manner which was meant to be languishing. "Very badly indeed," she declared, "thanks to you, you neglectful, ungrateful person! I've heard of fickle men before but I've never met one to come up to one that I could name." Mr. Waddington moved a little uneasily in his place. "Been to the theatre lately?" he inquired. The theatre was apparently a sore point. "Been to the theatre, indeed!" she repeated. "Why, I refused all the other gentlemen just so as to go with you, and as soon as we got nicely started, why, you never came near again! I've had no chance to go." Mr. Waddington took out a little book. "I wonder," he suggested, "if any evening--" "Next Thursday night at seven o'clock, I shall be free," the young lady interrupted promptly. "We'll have a little dinner first, as we used to, and I want to go to the Gaiety. It's lucky you came in," she went on, "for I can assure you that I shouldn't have waited much longer. There are others, you know, that are free enough with their invitations." She tossed her head. With her hands to the back of her hair she turned round to look at herself for a moment in one of the mirrors which lined the inside of the bar. Burton grinned at his late employer. "Now you've gone and done it!" he whispered. "Why, you'll have taken a bean before then!" Mr. Waddington started. "I'll have to make some excuse," he said. "You won't be able to," Burton reminded him. "Excuses are not for us, nowadays. You'll have to tell the truth. I'm afraid you've rather put your foot in it." Mr. Waddington became thoughtful. The young lady, having disposed of some other customers, returned to her place. She rubbed the counter for a few minutes with a duster which hung from the belt around her waist. Then she leaned over once more towards them. "It's a pity Maud's off duty, Mr. Burton," she remarked. "She's been asking about you pretty nearly every day." A vision of Maud rose up before Burton's eyes. First of all he shivered. Then in some vague, unwholesome sort of manner he began to find the vision attractive. He found himself actually wishing that she were there--a buxom young woman with dyed hair and sidelong glances, a loud voice, and a distinct fancy for flirtations. "She is quite well, I hope?" he said. "Oh, Maudie's all right!" the young lady replied. "Fortunately for her, she's like me--she don't lay too much store on the things you gentlemen say when you come in. Staying away for months at a time!" she continued indignantly. "I'm ashamed of both of you. It's the way we girls always get treated. I shall tell them to lay for you for lunch to-day, anyway." The two men looked at one another across the round table. Mr. Waddington heaved a sigh. "I shouldn't bother about that sale, if I were you," Burton whispered hoarsely. "I tell you what it is, I daren't go on like this any longer. I shall do something desperate. This horrible place is getting attractive to me! I shall probably sit here and order more beer and wait till Maud comes; I shall stay to lunch and sit with my arm around her afterwards! I am going to take a bean at once." Mr. Waddington sighed and produced the snuff-box from his waistcoat pocket. Burton followed suit. The young woman, leaning across the counter, watched them curiously. "What's that you're taking?" she inquired. "Something for indigestion?" "Not exactly," Mr. Waddington replied. "It's a little ailment I'm suffering from, and Burton too." They both swallowed their beans. Burton gave a deep sigh. "I feel safe again," he murmured. "I am certain that I was on the point of suggesting that she send up for Maud. We might have taken them out together to-night, Mr. Waddington--had dinner at Frascati's, drunk cheap champagne, and gone to a music-hall!" "Burton," Mr. Waddington said calmly, "I do not for a moment believe that we should so far have forgotten ourselves. I don't know how you are feeling, but the atmosphere of this place is most distasteful to me. These tawdry decorations are positively vicious. The odor, too, is insufferable." Burton rose hastily to his feet. "I quite agree with you," he said. "Let us get out as quickly as we can." "Something," Mr. Waddington went on, "ought to be done to prevent the employment of young women in a public place. It is enough to alter one's whole opinion of the sex to see a brazen-looking creature like that lounging about the bar, and to be compelled to be served by her if one is in need of a little refreshment." Burton nodded his approbation. "How we could ever have found our way into the place," he said, "I can't imagine." "A moment or two ago," Mr. Waddington groaned, "you were thinking of sending up for Maud." Burton, at this, wiped the perspiration from his forehead. "Please don't remind me of it," he begged. "Let us get away as quickly as we can." The young lady leaned over from the bar, holding out a hand, none too clean, on which sparkled several rings. "Well, you're in a great hurry all at once," she remarked. "Can't you stay a bit longer?"--She glanced at the clock.--"Maud will be down in ten minutes. You're not going away after all this time without leaving a message or something for her, Mr. Burton, surely?" Burton looked at her across the counter as one might look at some strange creature from a foreign world, a creature to be pitied, perhaps, nothing more. "I am afraid," he said, "that mine was only a chance visit. Pray remember me to Miss Maud, if you think it would be any satisfaction to her." The young woman stared at him. "My, but you are funny!" she declared. "You were always such a one for acting! I'll give her your love, never fear. I shall tell her you'll be round later in the day. On Thursday night, then," she added, turning to Mr. Waddington, "if I don't see you before, and if you really mean you're not going to stay for lunch. I'll meet you at the corner as usual." Mr. Waddington turned away without apparently noticing the outstretched hand. He raised his hat, however, most politely. "If I should be prevented," he began,--The young woman glared at him. "Look here, I've had enough of this shilly-shallying!" she exclaimed sharply. "Do you mean taking me out on Thursday or do you not?--because there's a gentleman who comes in here for his beer most every morning who's most anxious I should dine out with him my next night off. I've only to say the word and he'll fetch me in a taxicab. I'm not sure that he hasn't got a motor of his own. No more nonsense, if you please, Mr. Waddington," she continued, shaking out her duster. "Is that an engagement with you on Thursday night, or is it not?" Mr. Waddington measured with his eye the distance to the door. He gripped Burton's arm and looked over his shoulder. "It is not," he said firmly. They left the place a little precipitately. Once in the open air, however, they seemed quickly to recover their equanimity. Burton breathed a deep sigh of relief. "I must go and change my clothes, Mr. Waddington," he declared. "I don't know how on earth I could have come out looking such a sight. I feel like working, too." "Such a lovely morning!" Mr. Waddington sighed, gazing up at the sky. "If only one could escape from these hateful streets and get out into the country for a few hours! Have you ever thought of travelling abroad, Burton?" "Have you?" Burton asked. Mr. Waddington nodded. "I have it in my mind at the present moment," he admitted. "Imagine the joy of wandering about in Rome or Florence, say, just looking at the buildings one has heard of all one's life! And the picture galleries--just fancy the picture galleries, Burton! What a dream! Have you ever been to Paris?" "Never," Burton confessed sadly. "Nor I," Mr. Waddington continued. "I have been lying awake at nights lately, thinking of Versailles. Why do we waste our time here at all, I wonder, in this ugly little corner of the universe?" Burton smiled. "There is something of the hedonist about you, Mr. Waddington," he remarked. "To me these multitudes of people are wonderful. I seem driven always to seek for light in the crowded places." Mr. Waddington called a taxicab. "Can I give you a lift?" he asked. "I have no sale until the afternoon. I shall go to one of the galleries. I want to escape from the memory of the last half-hour!" _ |
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