CHAPTER III TRIBULATIONS OF AN AUNT

He had scarcely gone a hundred yards down Southampton Row, when he heard his name called.

"Mr Frank!"

He turned. Bridgewater was pursuing him with something in his hand.

"Mr James told me to give you this."

Leavesley took the envelope presented to him, and Bridgewater bolted back to the office like a fat old rabbit, returning to its burrow.

In the envelope was a sovereign wrapped up in a half sheet of notepaper.

"Well, of all the meannesses!" said the dutiful nephew, pocketing the coin. "Still, it's decent of the old boy after my cheeking him like that. I have now one pound four. I'll go now and cheek aunt."

Miss Hancock was in; she had a handkerchief tied round her head, a duster in her hand; she had just given the cook warning and was in a debatable temper. She was[Pg 126] also in a dusting mood. She had plenty of servants, yet the inspiration came on her at times to tie a handkerchief round her head and dust.

"Well?" she said, as she led the way into the dining-room, and continued an attack she was making on the sideboard with her duster.

Leavesley had scarcely the slightest hope of financial assistance from this quarter. Patience had given him half-a-crown for a birthday present once when he was a little boy, and then worried it back from him and popped it into a missionary box for the Wallibooboo Islanders.

He never forgot that half-crown.

"I've come round to borrow some money from you," he said.

Patience sniffed, and went on with her dusting. Then suddenly she stopped, and, duster in hand, addressed him.

"Are you never going to do anything for a living? Have you no idea of the responsibilities of life? What are you going to do?"

"I'm going for a holiday in the country if I can scrape up money enough."

[Pg 127]

"You won't scrape it up here," said his aunt, continuing her dusting; then, for she was as inquisitive as a mongoose: "And what part of the country do you propose to take a holiday in?"

"Sonning-on-Thames."

"And where, may I ask, is Sonning-on-Thames?"

"It's on the Thames. See here, will you lend me five pounds?"

"Five what?"

"Pounds."

"What for?"

"To take a girl for a trip to Sonning-on-Thames."

Miss Hancock was sweeping with her duster round a glass arrangement made to hold flowers, in the convulsion incident on this statement she upset the thing and smashed it, much to Leavesley's delight.

He made for the door, and stood for a moment with the handle in his hand.

"I'm awfully sorry. Can I help you to pick it up?"

"Go away," said Miss Hancock, who was on her knees collecting the fragments of glass; "I want to see nothing more of you.[Pg 128] If you are lost to respectability you might retain at least common decency."

"Decency!"

"Yes, decency."

"I don't know that I've said anything indecent, or that there is anything indecent in going for a day on the river with a girl. Well, I'm going——" A luminous idea suddenly struck him. He knew the old maid's mind, and the terror she had of the bare idea of her brother marrying; he remembered the spruce appearance of his uncle that morning and the lavender satin necktie. "I say——"

"Well?"

"Talking of girls, how about uncle and his girl?"

"What's that you say!"

"Nothing, nothing; I oughtn't to have said anything about it. Well, I'm off."

He left the room hurriedly and shut the door, before she could call him back he was out of the house.

His random remark had hit the target plumb in the centre of the bull's-eye, and could he have known the agitation and irritation in the mind of his aunt he would have written off as paid his debt against the Wallibooboo Islanders.

[Pg 129]

The river was impossible now, and the whole thing had shrunk to luncheon at the studio and a visit to Madame Tussaud's or the Tower.

He reached the studio before twelve, and there he found waiting for him Mr Verneede and the Captain.

The Captain was in his trousers; he had come to show them as a proof of good faith and incidentally to get a glass of whisky. Leavesley gave him the whisky and sent him off, then he turned to Verneede.

"The whole thing has bust up. Miss Lambert is coming at one to go up the river and I have no money. Stoney broke; isn't it the deuce?"

"How very unfortunate!" said Mr Verneede. "How very unfortunate!"

"Unfortunate isn't the name for it."

"Did Miss Lambert write?"

"Yes—Oh, she told me to remember her to you, sent her love to you."

"Ah!"

"I've only got one pound four."

"But surely, my dear Leavesley—one pound four—why, it is quite a little sum of money."

"It's not enough to go up the river on—three of us."

[Pg 130]

"Why go up the river?"

"Where else can we go?"

"I have an idea," said Mr Verneede. "May I propound it?"

"Yes."

"Have you ever heard of Epping Forest?"

"Yes."

"Why not go there and spend a day amidst the trees, the greenery, the blue sky, the——"

"What would it cost?"

"A fractional sum; one takes the train to Woodford."

Leavesley reached for an A.B.C. guide and plunged into details.

"There are hamlets in the forest, where tea may be obtained in cottages at a reasonable cost——"

"We can just do it, I think," said Leavesley, who had been making distracted calculations on paper. He darted to the bell and rang it.

"Belinda," he said, when the slave of the bell made answer, "there's a lady coming here to luncheon, have you anything in the house?"

Belinda, with a far-away look in her eyes, made a mental survey of the larder, twiddling the door-handle to assist thought.

[Pg 131]

"There's a pie, sir, and sassiges, and a cold mutton chop. There's half a chicken——"

"That'll do, and get a salad. I'll run out and get some flowers and a bottle of claret."