A Knight on Wheels Part 49

"Bed," replied her exhausted papa, before any one else could speak.

The Joy-Week was nearly over. For five days and nights the newly emanc.i.p.ated Miss Sylvia Mablethorpe had been allowed a free hand. Each morning she had conducted her mother relentlessly to shops. Once or twice her devoted father had accompanied the expedition, but after being twice warned by an officious young policeman for loitering outside a modiste's in Dover Street, had excused himself from further attendance.

"They are a most amazing s.e.x," he observed to Philip. "My precious pair actually spent an hour and a quarter in a hosiery establishment in Knightsbridge yesterday morning (into which my modesty prevented me from accompanying them), and when they came out neither of them could say for certain if she had bought anything or not. I wonder how they do it: if a mere man were to spend an hour and a quarter in a shop, he would by the end of that time either be lying dead on the floor or else equipped with several thousand pairs of everything. No! Henceforth they shop alone! I decline to run any further risk of contracting flat-foot through standing about on a hard pavement, or mental prostration from thinking out topics of conversation suitable to retired heroes who open carriage doors. To-morrow morning, Philip, I will give them one s.h.i.+lling each--they don't really need so much, for it costs nothing to have things dragged off high shelves and put back again; but they will probably require ices or some other poison about eleven--and you and I will get up an appet.i.te for lunch by going for a ride."

At the present moment the party were taking tea at the Carlton, after a matinee.

"I think it would be nice," continued Sylvia in a far-away voice, entirely ignoring her male parent's suggestion, "if we went to a music-hall. I haven't been to one yet; and I am getting a bit tired of theatres." (Which was not altogether surprising, considering that Miss Sylvia and suite had visited seven in five days.) "Then you could smoke, daddy," she continued artfully. "You will come, won't you, Philip?"

"It may possibly have escaped your memory," Mr. Mablethorpe mentioned, "that we are engaged to dine to-night with Derek Rayner."

"Oh, bother!" said the ungrateful Dumps; "so we are. Has he invited you, Philip?"

"No," said Philip; and Mr. and Mrs. Mablethorpe exchanged glances.

"Well, I'll tell you what," announced Sylvia, who was not of an age to have any regard for the feelings of young men; "we will dine with Derek, and you must join us afterwards, and we will all go to the Arena together. I hear it is the best place. Derek won't mind, will he?"

"I am sure the arrangement will meet with his entire approval," remarked Mr. Mablethorpe solemnly.

"In that case," continued Sylvia with great cheerfulness, having gained her point, "we had better telephone to him that we shall want dinner earlier. What time do music-halls begin?"

"The performance," said her father, "is timed to commence at eight P.M., but attendance during the earlier turns is not compulsory."

He spoke bravely, but without hope, for he knew his daughter.

"I insist," announced the voracious Dumps, "on being there when the curtain goes up. I shall tell Derek that we will dine at a quarter to seven. Do you think this hotel is on the telephone?"

"Possibly. If not, we can always climb to the top of the Haymarket and light a beacon-fire," replied the caustic Mr. Mablethorpe, still sore at the thought of yet another scrambled dinner.

His daughter ignored the pleasantry.

"Will you come and help me to find it, Philip?" she said.

Philip complied, and the pair went out to the hotel telephone exchange, leaving Mr. and Mrs. Mablethorpe to regard one another curiously.

"Poor Derek!" said Mrs. Mablethorpe.

"Poor Dumps!" said Mr. Mablethorpe, to himself.

Meanwhile, at the telephone, Sylvia was saying to Philip:--"It would never do to leave you out, Philip, on the last evening, would it?"

For a moment their eyes met. Then Sylvia's dropped quickly.

Philip dined in solitary state in his own flat. He still retained his holding therein, for his duties involved a good deal of travelling, and it was convenient to have a _pied-a-terre_ in London. Timothy was out, and he had the premises to himself, for which he was not altogether sorry. He had a good deal to occupy his mind just at present, and he wanted to think.

But his thoughts had made no appreciable progress when he arrived at the Arena Palace of Varieties at five minutes to eight.

He found the party already a.s.sembled in the _foyer_, under the radiant direction of Sylvia and the thundercloud escort of Mr. Derek Rayner, who greeted Philip gloomily but politely. A mincing damsel in a lace tucker conducted them to their seats, which were situated in the fourth row of an unpeopled desert of stalls.

"It's lucky we got here in time," mused Mr. Mablethorpe, surveying the Sahara around them. "We might have had to stand."

"If people," remarked Sylvia with asperity, "think it grand not to come to a heavenly place like this till ten o'clock, so much the worse for them!"

She sank down luxuriously in the armchair which called itself a stall, and commanded Philip and Rayner to dispose themselves upon either side of her, leaving her parents to s.h.i.+ft for themselves. Rayner, with the air of a conjuror who is a little doubtful as to whether his audience are not getting slightly tired of this trick, produced a box of chocolates out of his hat, and the party settled down to enjoy the performance.

The ladies and gentlemen who figured in the earlier portion of the programme were obviously surprised and pleased to find the stalls inhabited. Accustomed to shout across an ocean of blue plush to an audience of pigmies situated upon the distant horizon, their gratification at finding human beings within a few yards of them was extreme. More than one of the comedians worked an allusion to the fact into his "patter."

About a quarter to nine the ranks of the stallholders were stiffened by the arrival of a magnificent gentleman in evening dress, with a gardenia in his b.u.t.tonhole. He took a seat in the front row.

"I told you there would be lots of people soon," announced Sylvia.

But alas! her triumph was premature. Shortly after the arrival of the gentleman with the gardenia the drop-curtains ascended upon Turn Number Five--Professor Boko, the Man of Mystery, a.s.sisted by a stout lady in mauve tights. The Professor, speaking with a French accent which had plainly served an apprentices.h.i.+p in New York, opened the proceedings by appealing to the audience to send up an impartial and unbiased body of gentlemen upon the stage, to act--why, Heaven knows--as "Committee."

"You go, dad!" said Sylvia.

"I expect the Man of Mystery has made his own arrangements," replied Mr.

Mablethorpe.

And sure enough, almost before he had spoken, the gentleman with the gardenia left his seat and scrambled up a pair of plush-covered steps to the stage.

He must have repented bitterly of his public-spirited precipitancy; for instead of being treated with respect due to a Committee,--no one else had come forward,--he was subjected by the Professor to a series of humiliating and embarra.s.sing experiences. Showers of playing-cards were squeezed from his nose; flapping goldfish were extracted from his ears; bullets were fired point-blank into his s.h.i.+rt-front and discovered (by the lady in tights) in his coat-tail pockets. His silk hat was turned into a coffee-urn. His very gardenia was s.n.a.t.c.hed from him and shaken out into a Union Jack. Still, he maintained a heroic att.i.tude throughout, smiling woodenly at each successive outrage, and loudly proclaiming his entire satisfaction with the genuineness of the performance before resuming his seat. However, it was plain that the strain had been too great for him; for presently he put on his hat, stole quietly away, and was no more seen.

"Poor thing! I wonder where he has gone to," said the sympathetic Sylvia.

Derek Rayner, who was at the age for which the drama has no secrets, explained that this gentleman was now probably travelling in the same cab with the Man of Mystery and the lady in tights to undergo further humiliations at another music-hall.

Presently the stalls began to fill up in real earnest, and turns came thick and fast. Some were sentimental, some were funny, a few were vulgar, and some were merely idiotic. Once or twice Mr. Mablethorpe held his head and said his brain was going; but on the whole they enjoyed themselves greatly, especially that unspoiled child of nature, Miss Sylvia.

Sylvia was particularly pleased with Mr. Arthur Mow, Comedian. When that gentleman's number went up there was a round of applause, and the orchestra dashed into a merry tune.

There came a pause. Then the tune was played again. Then another pause.

Slight uneasiness among the audience.

"He hasn't turned up," remarked the worldly-wise Rayner. "These chaps do four Halls a night. He's probably on the other side of London, in a broken-down taxi."

The band played its prelude once more, and then some one--presumably the manager--appeared upon the stage and offered an apology for Mr. Mow's absence.

"He was here a moment ago, ladies and gentlemen," he declared.

"Rats!" observed a disappointed lady in the gallery.

The manager redoubled his a.s.surances. They had searched high and low, he said, but could not find Mr. Mow anywhere. Would the audience--

His speech was interrupted by the conductor of the orchestra.

"If Arfur Mow reelly 'asn't arrived," he announced, rising to his feet, "I'll give you a turn meself."