Berry and Co Part 16

"Your ingenuity is only equalled by your consideration. Isn't that neatly put? You see, I'm writing a letter to _The Observer_, and, when I get going, I can just say things like that one after another."

"How wonderful. But I'm afraid I'm interrupting you, and I shouldn't like to deprive Humanity----"

"Your name," said I, "is Dot. But I shall call you Mockery. And if you're half as sweet as you sound----"

"Good-bye."

I protested earnestly.

"Please don't say that. We've only just met. Besides ... why was Clapham Common?"

"Clapham what?"

"No, Common. Why was Clapham Common?"

"Well, why was it?"

"I can't think, my dear. I thought you might know. It's worried me for years."

There was a choking sound, which suggested indignation struggling with laughter. Then--

"I've a good mind to ring off right away," said Dot in a shaking voice.

"That would be cruel. Think of the dance you led me this morning. More.

Think of the dances you're going to give me on Wednesday week."

"Oh, you're going, are you?"

"If you are."

"What as?" she demanded.

"A billiard-marker in the time of Henry the Fourth. And you?"

"I can't rise to that. I'm going as myself in a silver frock."

"Could anything be sweeter? A little silver Dot. I shall cancel the body-s.n.a.t.c.her--I mean billiard-marker--and go as Carry One. Then we can dance together all the evening. By the way, in case I don't hear your voice, how shall I know you?"

"A dot," said my lady, "is that which hath position, but no magnitude."

"Possibly," said I. "It hath also a dear voice, which, though it be produced indefinitely, will never tire. All the same, in view of the capacity of the Albert Hall, you've not given me much to go on."

"As a matter of fact, each of us is going as a parallel line. And that's why I can tell you that I like the sound of you, and--oh, well, enough said."

"Thank you, Dot. And why parallel lines?"

"They never meet. So long."

There was a faint chunk.

My lady had rung off.

Heavily I hung up my receiver.

When the others came in, I was still sitting in the dark at the table, thinking....

The bitter wind reigned over London for seven long days, meting untempered chastis.e.m.e.nt to its reluctant subjects, and dying unwept and gasping on a Monday night. Tuesday was fair, still by comparison and indeed. The sun shone and the sky was blue, and the smoke rose straight out of its chimneys with never the breath of a breeze to bend it, or even to set its columns swaying over the high roofs. There was a great calm. But, with it all, the weather was terribly cold.

That rare beauty which Dusk may bring to the Metropolis was that evening vouchsafed. Streets that were mean put off their squalor, ways that were handsome became superb. Grime went unnoticed, ugliness fell away. All things crude or staring became indistinct, veiled with a web of that soft quality which only Atmosphere can spin and, having spun, hang about buildings of a windless eve.

As Night drew on, Magic came stealing down the blurred highways. Lamps became lanterns, shedding a m.u.f.fled light, deepening and charging with mystery the darkness beyond. Old friends grew unfamiliar. Where they had stood, fantastic shapes loomed out of the mist and topless towers rose up spectral to baffle memory. Perspective fled, shadow and stuff were one, and, save where the radiance of the shops in some proud thoroughfare made gaudy noon of evening, the streets of Town were changed to echoing halls and long, dim, rambling galleries, hung all with twinkling lights that stabbed the gloom but deep enough to show their presence, as do the stars.

So, slowly and with a dazzling smile, London put on her cloak of darkness. By eight o'clock you could not see two paces ahead.

On Wednesday morning the fog was denser than it had been the night before. There was no sign of its abatement, not a puff of wind elbowed its way through the yellow drift, and the cold was intense. The prospect of leaving a comfortable home at nine in the evening to undertake a journey of some two miles, clad in habiliments which, while highly ornamental, were about as protective from cold as a grape-skin rug, was anything but alluring.

For reasons of my own, however, I was determined to get to the Ball. My sister, whom nothing daunted, and Jill, who was wild with excitement, and had promised readily to reserve more dances than could possibly be rendered, were equally firm. Jonah thought it a fool's game, and said as much. Berry was of the same opinion, but expressed it less bluntly, and much more offensively. After a long tirade--

"All right," he concluded. "You go. It's Lombard Street to a china orange you'll never get there, and, if you do, you'll never get back.

None of the band'll turn up, and if you find twenty other fools in the building to exchange colds with, you'll be lucky. To leave your home on a night like this is fairly clamouring for the special brand of trouble they keep for paralytic idiots. I've known you all too long to expect sagacity, but the instinct of self-preservation characterizes even the lower animals. What swine, for instance, would leave its cosy sty----"

"How dare you?" said Daphne. "Besides, you can't say 'its.' Swine's plural."

"My reference was to the fever-swine," was the cold reply. "A singular species. Comparable only with the deep-sea dip-sheep."

"I think you're very unkind," said Jill, pouting. "Boy can walk in front with a lamp, and Jonah can walk behind with a lamp----"

"And I can walk on both sides, I suppose, with a brazier in either hand.

Oh, this is too easy."

"We can but try," said I.

"You can but close your ugly head," said Berry. "If you want to walk about London half the night, looking like a demobilised pantaloon, push off and do it. But don't try and rope in innocent parties."

To this insult I made an appropriate reply, and the argument waxed. At length----

"There's no reason," said Jonah, "why we shouldn't go on like this for ever. If we had any sense, we should send for Fitch and desire his opinion. It's rather more valuable than any one of ours, and, after all, he's more or less interested. And you can trust him."

Now, Fitch was our chauffeur.

Amid a chorus of approval, I went to the telephone to speak to the garage.

I was still waiting to be connected, when--

"Is that the Club?" said a voice.

"No," said I. "Nothing like it."