Kipps, H. G. Wells [uplifting book club books TXT] 📗

recognised at once as an Army Corps of string, rags and odds and ends tied together. Kipps unpacked it with a table knife, assisted at a critical point by the poker, and found a number of books and other objects of an antique type.

There were three bound volumes of early issues of Chambers’ Journal, a copy of Punch’s Pocket Book for 1875, Sturm’s Reflections, an early version of Gill’s Geography (slightly torn), an illustrated work on spinal curvature, an early edition of Kirke’s Human Physiology, The Scottish Chiefs and a little volume on the Language of Flowers. There was a fine steel engraving, oak-framed and with some rusty spots, done in the Colossal style and representing the Handwriting on the Wall. There were also a copper kettle, a pair of candle snuffers, a brass shoehorn, a tea caddy to lock, two decanters (one stoppered) and what was probably a portion of an eighteenth century child’s rattle.

Kipps examined these objects one by one and wished he knew more about them. Turning over the pages of the Physiology again he came upon a striking plate in which a youth of agreeable profile displayed his interior in an unstinted manner to the startled eye. It was a new view of humanity altogether for Kipps, and it arrested his mind.

This anatomised figure made him forget for a space that he was “practically a gentleman” altogether, and he was still surveying its extraordinary complications when another reminder of a world quite outside those spheres of ordered gentility into which his dreams had carried him overnight, arrived (following the servant) in the person of Chitterlow.

“Ul-lo!” said Kipps, rising.

“Not busy?” said Chitterlow, enveloping Kipps’ hand for a moment in one of his own and tossing the yachting cap upon the monumental carved oak sideboard.

“Only a bit of reading,” said Kipps.

“Reading, eh?” Chitterlow cocked the red eye at the books and other properties for a moment and then, “I’ve been expecting you ’round again one night.”

“I been coming ’round,” said Kipps. “On’y there’s a chap ’ere⁠—. I was coming ’round last night on’y I met ’im.”

He walked to the hearthrug. Chitterlow drifted around the room for a time, glancing at things as he talked. “I’ve altered that play tremendously since I saw you,” he said. “Pulled it all to pieces.”

“What play’s that, Chit’low?”

“The one we were talking about. You know. You said something⁠—I don’t know if you meant it⁠—about buying half of it. Not the tragedy. I wouldn’t sell my twin brother a share in that. That’s my investment. That’s my Serious Work. No! I mean that new farce I’ve been on to. Thing with the business about a beetle.”

“Oo yes,” said Kipps. “I remember.”

“I thought you would. Said you’d take a fourth share for a hundred pounds. You know.”

“I seem to remember something⁠—”

“Well, it’s all different. Every bit of it. I’ll tell you. You remember what you said about a butterfly? You got confused, you know⁠—Old Meth. Kept calling the beetle a butterfly and that set me off. I’ve made it quite different. Quite different. Instead of Popplewaddle⁠—thundering good farce name that, you know; for all that it came from a Visitors’ List⁠—instead of Popplewaddle getting a beetle down his neck and rushing about, I’ve made him a collector⁠—collects butterflies, and this one you know’s a rare one. Comes in at window, centre.” Chitterlow began to illustrate with appropriate gestures. “Pop rushes about after it. Forgets he mustn’t let on he’s in the house. After that⁠—. Tells ’em. Rare butterfly, worth lots of money. Some are, you know. Everyone’s on to it after that. Butterfly can’t get out of room, every time it comes out to have a try, rush and scurry. Well, I’ve worked on that. Only⁠—”

He came very close to Kipps. He held up one hand horizontally and tapped it in a striking and confidential manner with the fingers of the other. “Something else,” he said. “That’s given me a Real Ibsenish Touch⁠—like the Wild Duck. You know that woman⁠—I’ve made her lighter⁠—and she sees it. When they’re chasing the butterfly the third time, she’s on! She looks. ‘That’s me!’ she says. Bif! Pestered Butterfly. She’s the Pestered Butterfly. It’s legitimate. Much more legitimate than the Wild Duck⁠—where there isn’t a duck!

“Knock ’em! The very title ought to knock ’em. I’ve been working like a horse at it.⁠ ⁠… You’ll have a gold mine in that quarter share, Kipps.⁠ ⁠… I don’t mind. It’s suited me to sell it, and suited you to buy. Bif!”

Chitterlow interrupted his discourse to ask, “You haven’t any brandy in the house, have you? Not to drink, you know. But I want just an eggcupful to pull me steady. My liver’s a bit queer.⁠ ⁠… It doesn’t matter, if you haven’t. Not a bit. I’m like that. Yes, whiskey’ll do. Better!”

Kipps hesitated for a moment, then turned and fumbled in the cupboard of his sideboard. Presently he disinterred a bottle of whiskey and placed it on the table. Then he put out first one bottle of soda water and after the hesitation of a moment another. Chitterlow picked up the bottle and read the label. “Good old Methusaleh,” he said. Kipps handed him the corkscrew and then his hand fluttered up to his mouth. “I’ll have to ring now,” he said, “to get glasses.” He hesitated for a moment before doing so, leaning doubtfully as it were towards the bell.

When the housemaid appeared he was standing on the hearthrug with his legs wide apart, with the bearing of a desperate fellow. And after they had both had whiskeys⁠—“You know a decent whiskey,” Chitterlow remarked and took another “just to drink.”⁠—Kipps produced cigarettes and the conversation flowed again.

Chitterlow paced the room. He was, he explained, taking a day off; that was why he had come around to see Kipps. Whenever he thought of any extensive change in a play he was writing he always took a day off. In the end it saved time to do