CHAPTER XLI.—ON DRY CHAMPAGNE AND A CRISIS.

THE next morning Archie drove one of his many machines round to Harold’s rooms and broke in upon him before he had finished his breakfast.

“Hallo, my tarty chip,” cried Archie; “what’s the meaning of this?”

He threw on the table an envelope addressed to him in the handwriting of Mrs. Lampson.

“What’s the meaning of what?” said Harold. “Have you got beyond the restraint of Mr. Playdell alcoholically, that you ask me what’s the meaning of that envelope?”

“I mean what does the inside mean?” said Archie.

“I’m sure you know better than I do, if you’ve read what’s inside it.”

“Oh, you’re like one of the tarty chips in the courts that cross-examine other tarty chips until their faces are blue,” said Archie. “There’s no show for that sort of thing here. So just open the envelope and see what’s inside.”

“How can I do that and eat my kidneys?” said Harold. “I wish to heavens you wouldn’t come here bothering me when I’m trying to get through a tough kidney and a tougher leading article. What’s the matter with the letter, Archie, my lad?”

“It’s all right,” said Archie. “It’s an invite from your sister for a big shoot at Abbeylands. What does it mean—that’s what I’d like to know? Does it mean that decent people are going to make me the apple of their eye, after all?”

“I don’t think it goes quite so far as that,” said Harold. “I expect it means that my sister has come to the end of her discoveries and she’s forced to fall back on you.”

“Oh, is that all?” Archie looked disappointed. “All? Isn’t it enough?” said Harold. “Why, you’re in luck if you let her discover you. I knew that her atheists couldn’t hold out. She used them up too quickly. One should he economical of one’s genuine atheists nowadays.”

“Great Godfrey! does she take me for an atheist?” shouted Archie.

“Did you ever hear of an atheist shooting pheasants?” said Harold. “Not likely. An atheist is a man that does nothing except talk, and talks about nothing except himself. Now, you’re asked to the shoot, aren’t you?”

“That’s in the invite anyway.”

“Of course. And that shows that you’re not taken for an atheist.”

“I’m glad of that. I draw the line at atheism,” Archie replied with a smile.

“I hope you’ll have a good time among the pheasants.”

“Do you suppose that I’ll go?”

“I’m sure you will. I may have thought you a bit of a fool before I came to know you, Archie—”

“And since you heard that I had taken the Legitimate.”

“Well, yes, even after that masterpiece of astuteness. But I would never think that you’d be fool enough to throw away this chance.”

“Chance—chance of what?”

“Of getting among decent people. I told you that my sister has nothing but decent people when there’s a shoot—there’s no Coming Man in anything among the house-party. Yes, it’s sure to be comfortable. It’s the very thing for you.”

“Is it? I’m not so certain about it. The people there are pretty sure to allude in a friendly spirit to my red hair.”

“Well, yes, I think you may depend upon that. That means that you’ll get on so well among them that they will take an interest in your personality. If you get on particularly well with them they may even allude to the simplicity of your mug. If they do that, you may be certain that you are a great social success.”

Archie mused.

It was in this musing spirit that he took in a contemplative way a lump of sugar out of the sugar bowl, turned it over between his fingers as though it was something altogether new to him. Then he threw the lump up to the ceiling, his face became one mouth, and the sugar disappeared.

“I think I’ll go,” he said, as he crunched the lump. “Yes, I’ll be hanged if I don’t go.”

“That’s more than probable,” said Harold.

“Yes, I’d like to clear off for a bit from this kennel.”

“What kennel?”

“This kennel—London. Do you go the length of denying that London’s a kennel?”

“I don’t do anything of the sort.”

“You’d best not. I was thinking if a run to Australia, or California, or Timbuctoo would not be healthy just now.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, I made up my mind yesterday, that if I don’t have better hands soon, I’ll chuck up the whole game. That’s the sort of new potatoes that I am.”

“The Legitimate?”

“The Legitimate be frizzled! Am I to continue paying for the suppers that other tarty chips eat? That’s what I want you to tell me. You know what a square deal is, Wynne, as well as most people.”

“I believe I do.”

“Well, then, you can tell me if I’m to pay for dry champagne for her guests.”

“Whose guests?”

“Great Godfrey! haven’t I been telling you? Mrs. Mowbray’s guests. Who else’s would they be? Do you mean to tell me that, in addition to giving people free boxes at the Legitimate every night to see W. S. late of Stratford upon Avon, it’s my business to supply dry champagne all round after the performance?”

“Well,” said Harold, “to speak candidly to you, I’ve always been of the opinion that the ideal proprietor of a theatre is one who supplies really comfortable stalls free, and has really sound champagne handed round at intervals during the performance. I also frankly admit that I haven’t yet met with any manager who quite realized my ideas in this matter. Archie, my lad, the sooner you get down to Abbeylands the better it will be for yourself.”

“I’ll go. Mind you, I don’t cry off when I know the chaps that she asks to supper—I’ll flutter the dimes for anyone I know; but I’m hanged if I do it for the chaps that chip in on her invite. They’ll not draw cards from my pack, Wynne. No, I’ll see them in the port of Hull first. That’s the sort of new potatoes that I am.”

“Give me your hand, Archie,” cried Harold. “I always thought you nothing better than a millionaire, but I find that you’re a man after all.”

“I’ll make things hum at the Legitimate yet,” said Archie—his voice was fast approaching the shouting stage. “I’ll send them waltzing round. I thought once upon a time that, when she laid her hand upon my head and said, ‘Poor old Archie,’ I could go on for ever—that to see the decimals fluttering about her would be the loveliest sight on earth for the rest of my life. But I’m tired of that show now, Wynne. Great Godfrey! I can get my hair smoothed down at a barber’s for sixpence, and yet I believe that she charged me a thousand pounds for every time she patted my head. A decimal for a pat—a pat!”

“You could buy the whole Irish nation for less money, according to some people’s ideas—but they’re wrong,” said Harold.

“Wynne,” said Archie, solemnly. “I’ve been going it blind for some time. Shakespeare’s a fraud. I’ll shoot those pheasants.”

He had picked up his hat, and in another minute Harold saw him sending his pair of chestnuts down the street at a pace that showed a creditable amount of self-restraint on the part of Archie.

Three days afterwards Harold got a letter from Mrs. Lampson, giving him a number of commissions to execute for her—delicate matters that could not be intrusted to any one except a confidential agent. The postscript mentioned that Archie Brown had arrived a few days before and had charmed every one with his shyness. On this account she could scarcely believe, she said, that he was a millionaire. She added that Lady Innisfail and her daughter had just arrived at Abbeylands, that the Miss Avon about whom she had inquired, had accepted her invitation and was coming to Abbeylands on the next day; and finally, Mrs. Lampson said that her father was dull enough to make people believe that he was really reformed. He was inquiring when Miss Avon was coming, and he shared the fate of all men (and women) who were unfortunate enough to be reformed: he had become deadly dull. Lady Innisfail had assured her, however, that it was very rarely that a Hardened Reprobate permanently reformed—even with the incentive of acute rheumatism—before he was sixty-five, so that it would be unwise to be despondent about Lord Fotheringay. If this was so—and Lady Innisfail was surely an authority—Mrs. Lampson said that she looked forward to such a lapse on the part of her father as would restore him to the position of interest which he had always occupied in the eyes of the world.

Harold lay back in his chair and laughed heartily at the reference made by his sister to the shyness of Archie, and also to the fact of Norah Innisfail’s sitting at the table with the Young Reprobate as well as the Old. He wondered if the conversation had yet turned upon the management of the Legitimate Theatre.

It was after he had lunched on the next Tuesday that Harold received this letter—written by his sister the previous day. He had passed an hour with Beatrice, who was to start by the four-twenty train for Abbeylands station. He had said goodbye to her for a week, and already he was feeling so lonely that he was soon pacing his room calling himself a fool for having elected to remain in town while she was to go.

He thought how they might have had countless strolls through the fine park at Abbeylands—through the picturesque ruins of the old Abbey—on the banks of the little trout stream. Instead of being by her side among those interesting scenes, he would have to remain—he had been foolish enough to make the choice—in the neighbourhood of nothing more joyous than St. James’s Palace.

This was bad enough; but not merely would he be away from the landscapes at Abbeylands, the elements of life in those landscapes would be represented by Beatrice and Another.

Yes; she would certainly appear with someone at her side—in the place he might have occupied if he had not been such a fool.

An hour had passed before he had got the better of his impulse to call a hansom and drive to the railway terminus and take a seat beside her in the train. When the clock had struck four, and it was therefore too late for him to entertain the idea of going with her, he became more inclined to take a reasonable view of the situation.

“I was right.” he said, as he seated himself in front of the fire, and stared into the smouldering coals. “Yes, I was right. No one must suspect that we are—bound to one another”—the words were susceptible of a sufficiently liberal interpretation. “The penetration of Edmund Airey will be at fault for the first time, and the others who had so many suspicions at Castle Innisfail, will find themselves completely at fault.”

He began to think how, though he had been cruelly dealt with by Fate in some respects—in respect of his own father, for instance, and also in respect of his own poverty—he had still much to be thankful for.

He was beloved by the loveliest woman whom he had ever seen—the only woman for whom he had ever felt a passion. And the peculiar position which she occupied, had enabled him to see her every day and to kiss her exquisite face—there was none to make him afraid. Such obstacles in the way of a lover’s freedom as the Average Father, the Vigilant Mother and the Athletic Brother he had never encountered. And then a curious circumstance—the thought of Beatrice as a part of the landscapes around Abbeylands caused him to lay special emphasis upon this—had enabled him to bind the girl to him with a bond which in her eyes at least—yes, in his eyes too, by heaven, he felt—was not susceptible of being loosened.

Yes, the ways of Providence were wonderful, he felt. If he had not met Mr. Playdell.... and so forth.

But now Beatrice was his own. She might stray through the autumn woods by the side of Edmund Airey or any man whom she might meet at Abbeylands; she would feel upon her finger the ring that he had placed there—the ring that——

He sprang to his feet with a sudden cry.

“Good God! the Ring! the Ring!”

He looked at the clock on the mantelpiece. It pointed to four-seventeen.

He pulled out his watch. It pointed to four-twenty-two.

He rushed to the sofa where an overcoat was lying. He had it on him in a moment. He snatched up a railway guide and stuffed it into his pocket.

In another minute he was in a hansom, driving as fast as the hansomeer thought consistent with public safety—a trifle over that which the police authorities thought consistent with public safety—in the direction of the Northern Railway terminus.