The Joyous Adventures of Aristide Pujol Part 36

"The Chislehurst, where else?"

"My dear fellow," said I, rising, "do you seriously suppose that these two English maiden ladies have taken on themselves the responsibility of that foreign brat's upbringing?"

"_Mon Dieu!_" said he taken aback for the moment, hypothesis having entered his head. Then, with a wide gesture, he flung the preposterous idea to the winds. "Of course. They have hearts, these English women.

They have maternal instincts. They have money." He looked at Bradshaw again, then at his watch. "I have just time to catch a train. _Au revoir, mon vieux._"

"But," I objected, "why don't you write? It's the natural thing to do."

"Write? _Bah!_ Did you ever hear of a Provencal writing when he could talk?" He tapped his lips, and in an instant, like a whirlwind, he pa.s.sed from my ken.

Aristide on his arrival at Chislehurst looked about the pleasant, leafy place--it was a bright October afternoon and the wooded hillside blazed in russet and gold--and decided it was the perfect environment for Miss Janet and Miss Anne, to say nothing of little Jean. A neat red brick house with a trim garden in front of it looked just the kind of a house wherein Miss Janet and Miss Anne would live. He rang the bell. A parlour-maid, in spotless black and white, tutelary nymph of Suburbia, the very parlour-maid who would minister to Miss Janet and Miss Anne, opened the door.

"Miss Honeywood?" he inquired.

"Not here, sir," said the parlour-maid.

"Where is she? I mean, where are they?"

"No one of that name lives here," said the parlour-maid.

"Who does live here?"

"Colonel Brabazon."

"And where do the two Miss Honeywood live?" he asked with his engaging smile.

But English suburban parlour-maids are on their guard against smiles, no matter how engaging. She prepared to shut the door.

"I don't know."

"How can I find out?"

"You might enquire among the tradespeople."

"Thank you, mademoiselle, you are a most intelligent young----"

The door shut in his face. Aristide frowned. She was a pretty parlour-maid, and Aristide didn't like to be so haughtily treated by a pretty woman. But his quest being little Jean and not the eternal feminine, he took the maid's advice and made enquiries at the prim and respectable shops.

"Oh, yes," said a comely young woman in a fragrant bakers' and confectioners'. "They were two ladies, weren't they? They lived at Hope Cottage. We used to supply them. They left Chislehurst two years ago."

"_Sacre nom d'un chien!_" said Aristide.

"Beg pardon?" asked the young woman.

"I am disappointed," said Aristide. "Where did they go to?"

"I'm sure I can't tell you."

"Do you remember whether they had a baby?"

"They were maiden ladies," said the young woman rebukingly.

"But anybody can keep a baby without being its father or mother. I want to know what has become of the baby."

The young woman gazed through the window.

"You had better ask the policeman."

"That's an idea," said Aristide, and, leaving her, he caught up the pa.s.sing constable.

The constable knew nothing of maiden ladies with a baby, but he directed him to Hope Cottage. He found a pretty half-timber house lying back from the road, with a neat semi-circular gravelled path leading to a porch covered thick with Virginia creeper. Even more than the red brick residence of Colonel Brabazon did it look, with its air of dainty comfort, the fitting abode of Miss Janet and Miss Anne. He rang the bell and interviewed another trim parlour-maid. More susceptible to smiles than the former, she summoned her master, a kindly, middle-aged man, who came out into the porch. Yes, Honeywood was the name of the previous tenants. Two ladies, he believed. He had never seen them and knew nothing about a child. Messrs. Tompkin & Briggs, the estate agents in the High Street, could no doubt give him information. Aristide thanked him and made his way to Messrs. Tompkin & Briggs. A dreary spectacled youth in resentful charge of the office--his princ.i.p.als, it being Sat.u.r.day afternoon, were golfing the happy hours away--professed blank ignorance of everything. Aristide fixed him with his glittering eye and flickered his fingers and spoke richly. The youth in a kind of mesmeric trance took down a battered, dog's eared book and turned over the pages.

"Honeywood--Miss--Beverly Stoke--near St. Albans--Herts. That's it," he said.

Aristide made a note of the address. "Is that all you can tell me?"

"Yes," said the youth.

"I thank you very much, my young friend," said Aristide, raising his hat, "and here is something to buy a smile with," and, leaving a sixpence on the table to s.h.i.+mmer before the youth's stupefied eyes, Aristide strutted out of the office.

"You had much better have written," said I, when he came back and told me of his experiences. "The post-office would have done all that for you."

"You have no idea of business, _mon cher ami_"--(I--a successful tea-broker of twenty-five years' standing!--the impudence of the fellow!)--"If I had written to-day, the letter would have reached Chislehurst on Monday morning. It would be redirected and reach Hertfords.h.i.+re on Tuesday. I should not get any news till Wednesday. I go down to Beverly Stoke to-morrow, and then I find at once Miss Janet and Miss Anne and my little Jean! The secret of business men, and I am a business man, the accredited representative of Dulau et Compagnie--never forget that--the secret of business is no delay."

He darted across the room to Bradshaw.

"For G.o.d's sake," said I, "put that nightmare of perpetual motion in your pocket and go mad over it in the privacy of your own chamber."

"Very good," said he, tucking the brain-convulsing volume under his arm.

"I will put it on top of The Times and the family Bible and I will say 'Ha! now I am British. Now I am very respectable!' What else can I do?"

"Rent a pew in a Baptist chapel," said I.

After a three-mile trudge from St. Albans Aristide, following directions, found himself on a high road running through the middle of a straggy common decked here and there with great elms splendid in autumn bravery, and populated chiefly by geese, who when he halted in some perplexity--for on each side, beyond the green, were indications of a human settlement--advanced in waddling flocks towards him and signified their disapproval of his presence. A Sundayfied youth in a rainbow tie rode past on a bicycle. Aristide took off his hat. The youth nearly fell off the bicycle, but British doggedness saved him from disaster.

"Beverly Stoke? Will you have the courtesy----"

"Here," bawled the youth, with a circular twist of his head, and, eager to escape from a madman, he rode on furiously.

Aristide looked to left and right at the little houses beyond the green--some white and thatched and dilapidated, others horridly new and perky--but all poor and insignificant. As his eyes became accustomed to the scene they were aware of human forms dotted spa.r.s.ely about the common. He struck across and accosted one, an elderly woman with a prayer-book. "Miss Honeywood? A lady from London?"

"That house over there--the third beyond the poplar."