Potterism Part 5

'Well, I should say so. Don't rub it in, dad.'

Lord Pinkerton looked at her, with his whimsical, affectionate paternity.

'You can come if you like, Babs. I want another secretary. Must have one.

If you'll do some of the shorthand typing and filing, you can come along. How about it?'

Jane thought for exactly thirty seconds, weighing the shorthand typing against Paris and the Majestic and Life. Life had it, as usual.

'Right-o, daddy. I'll come along. When do we go over?'

That afternoon Jane gave notice to her department, and in the middle of January Lord Pinkerton and his bodyguard of secretaries and a.s.sistants went to Paris.

4

That was Life. Trousseaux, concerts, jazzing, dinners, marble bathrooms, notorious persons as thick as thieves in corridors and on the stairs, dangers of Paris surging outside, disappointed journalists besieging proud politicians in vain, the Council of Four sitting in perfect harmony behind thick curtains, Signor Orlando refusing to play, but finding they went on playing without him and coming back, Jugo-Slavs walking about under the aegis of Mr. Wickham Steed, smiling sweetly and triumphantly at the Italians, going to the theatre and coming out because the jokes seemed to them dubious, Sir George Riddell and Mr. G.H. Mair desperately controlling the press, Lord Pinkerton flying to and fro, across the Channel and back again, while his bodyguard remained in Paris. There also flew to and fro Oliver Hobart, the editor of the _Daily Haste_. He would drop in on Jane, sitting in her father's outer office, card-indexing, opening and entering letters, and what not.

'Good-morning, Miss Potter. Lord Pinkerton in the office this morning?'

'He's in the building somewhere. Talking to Sir George, I think.... Did you fly this time?'

Whether he had flown or whether he had come by train and boat, he always looked the same, calm, unruffled, tidy, the exquisite nut.

'Pretty busy?' he would say, with his half-indulgent smile at the round-faced, lazy, drawling child who was so self-possessed, sometimes so impudent, often so sarcastic, always so amusingly different from her slim, pretty and girlish elder sister.

'Pretty well,' Jane would reply. 'I don't overwork, though.'

'I don't believe you do,' Hobart said, looking down at her amusedly.

'Father does, though. That's why he's thin and I'm fat. What's the use?

It makes no difference.'

'You're getting reconciled, then,' said Hobart, 'to working for the Pinkerton press?'

Jane secretly approved his discernment. But all she said was, with her cool lack of stress, 'It's not so bad.'

Usually when Hobart was in Paris he would dine with them.

5

Lady Pinkerton and Clare came over for a week. They stayed in rooms, in the Avenue de l'Opera. They visited shops, theatres, and friends, and Lady Pinkerton began a novel about Paris life. Clare had been run down and low-spirited, and the doctor had suggested a change of scene. Hobart was in Paris for the week-end; he dined with the Pinkertons and went to the theatre with them. But on Monday he had to go back to London.

On Monday morning Clare came to her father's office, and found Jane taking down letters from Lord Pinkerton's private secretary, a young man who had been exempted from military service through the war on the grounds that he was Lord Pinkerton's right hand.

Clare sat and waited, and looked round the room for violets, while this young gentleman dictated. His letters were better worded than Lord Pinkerton's, because he was better at the English language. Lord Pinkerton would fall into commercialisms; he would say 're' and 'same'

and 'to hand,' and even sometimes 'your favour of the 16th.' His secretary knew that that was not the way in which a great newspaper chief should write. Himself he dictated quite a good letter, but annoyed Jane by putting in the punctuation, as if she was an imbecile. Thus he was saying now, pacing up and down the room, plunged in thought:--

'Lord Pinkerton is not comma however comma averse to' (Jane wrote 'from') 'entertaining your suggestions comma and will be glad if you can make it convenient to call to-morrow bracket Tuesday close the bracket afternoon comma between three and five stop.'

He could not help it; one must make allowances for those who dictate. But Clare saw Jane's teeth release her clenched tongue to permit it to form silently the word 'Ninny.'

The private secretary retired into his chief's inner sanctum.

'Morning, old thing,' said Jane to Clare, uncovering her typewriter without haste and yawning, because she had been up late last night.

'Morning,' Clare yawned too. She was warm and pretty, in a spring costume, with a big bunch of sweet violets at her waist. She touched these.

'Aren't they top-hole. Mr. Hobart left them this morning before he went.

Jolly decent of him to think of it, getting off in a hurry like he was.... He's not a bad young thing, do you think.'

'Not so bad.' Jane extracted carbons from a drawer and fitted them to her paper. Then she stretched, like a cat.

'Oh, I'm sleepy.... Don't feel like work to-day. For two pins I'd cut it and go out with you and mother. The sun's s.h.i.+ning, isn't it?'

Clare stood by the window, and swung the blind-ta.s.sel. They had five days of Paris before them, and Paris suddenly seemed empty....

'We're going to have a topping week,' she said.

Then Lord Pinkerton came in.

'Hobart gone?' he asked Jane.

'Yes.'

'Majendie in my room?'

'Yes.'

Lord Pinkerton patted Clare's shoulder as he pa.s.sed her.

'Send Miss Hope in to me when she comes, Babs,' he said, and disappeared through the farther door.

Jane began to type. It bored her, but she was fairly proficient at it.

Her childhood's training stood her in good stead.

'Mr. Hobart must have run his train pretty fine, if he came in here on the way,' said Clare, twirling the blind-ta.s.sel.

'He wasn't going till twelve,' said Jane, typing.

'Oh, I see. I thought it was ten.... I suppose he found he couldn't get that one, and had to see dad first. What a bore for him.... Well, I'm off to meet mother. See you this evening, I suppose.'

Clare went out into Paris and the March suns.h.i.+ne, whistling softly.

That night she lay awake in her big bed, as she had lain last night.

She lay tense and still, and stared at the great gas globe that looked in through the open window from the street. Her brain formed phrases and pictures.

'That day on the river.... Those Sundays.... That lunch at the Florence.... "What attractive shoes those are."... My gray suedes, I had.... "I love these Sunday afternoons."... "You're one of the few girls who are jolly to watch when they run."... "Just you and me; wouldn't it be rather nice? I should like it, anyhow."... He kept looking.... Whenever I looked up he was looking.... his eyes awfully blue, with black edges to them.... Peggy said he blacked them.... Peggy was jealous because he never looked at her.... I'm jealous now because ... No, I'm not, why should I be? He doesn't like fat girls, he said....

He watches her.... He looks at her when there's a joke.... He bought me violets, but he went to see her.... He keeps coming over to Paris.... I never see him.... I don't get a chance.... He cared, he did care....