A Duet (with an occasional chorus), Arthur Conan Doyle [free e books to read online TXT] 📗
- Author: Arthur Conan Doyle
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‘Of course it is. How foolish I am! Then the waiter knows! O Frank, what shall we do?’
‘Not he. He knows nothing. I am sure of it. He is a dull sort of person. I had my eye on him all the time. Besides, I threw in a few remarks just to set the thing right.’
‘That was when you spoke about our travels in the Tyrol?’
‘Yes.’
‘O Frank, how COULD you? And you said how lonely it was when we were the only visitors at the Swiss hotel.’
‘That was an inspiration. That finished him.’
‘And about the closeness of the Atlantic staterooms. I blushed to hear you.’
‘But he listened eagerly to it all. I could see it.’
‘I wonder if he really believed it. I have noticed that the maids and the waiters seem to look at us with a certain interest.’
‘My dear girlie, you will find as you go through life that every man will always look at you with a certain interest.’
Maude smiled, but was unconvinced.
‘Cheese, dear?’
‘A little butter, please.’
‘Some butter, waiter, and the Stilton. You know the real fact is, that we make the mistake of being much too nice to each other in public. Veterans don’t do that. They take the small courtesies for granted—which is all wrong, but it shows that they ARE veterans. That is where we give ourselves away.’
‘That never occurred to me.’
‘If you want to settle that waiter for ever, and remove the last lingering doubt from his mind, the thing is for you to be rude to me.’
‘Or you to me, Frank.’
‘Sure you won’t mind?’
‘Not a bit.’
‘Oh, hang it, I can’t—not even for so good an object.’
‘Well, then, I can’t either.’
‘But this is absurd. It is only acting.’
‘Quite so. It is only fun.’
‘Then why won’t you do it?’
‘Why won’t you?’
‘He’ll be back before we settle it. Look here! I’ve a shilling under my hand. Heads or tails, and the loser has to be rude. Do you agree?’
‘Very well.’
‘Your call.’
‘Heads.’
‘It’s tails.’
‘Oh goodness!’
‘You’ve got to be rude. Now mind you are. Here he comes.’
The waiter had come up the room bearing the pride of the hotel, the grand green Stilton with the beautiful autumn leaf heart shading away to rich plum-coloured cavities. He placed it on the table with a solemn air.
‘It’s a beautiful Stilton,’ Frank remarked.
Maude tried desperately to be rude.
‘Well, dear, I don’t think it is so very beautiful,’ was the best that she could do.
It was not much, but it had a surprising effect upon the waiter. He turned and hurried away.
‘There now, you’ve shocked him?’ cried Frank.
‘Where HAS he gone, Frank?’
‘To complain to the management about your language.’
‘No, Frank. Please tell me! Oh, I wish I hadn’t been so rude. Here he is again.’
‘All right. Sit tight,’ said Frank.
A sort of procession was streaming up the hall. There was their fat waiter in front with a large covered cheese-dish. Behind him was another with two smaller ones, and a third with some yellow powder upon a plate was bringing up the rear.
‘This is Gorgonzola, main,’ said the waiter, with a severe manner. ‘And there’s Camembert and Gruyere behind, and powdered Parmesan as well. I’m sorry that the Stilton don’t give satisfaction.’
Maude helped herself to Gorgonzola and looked very guilty and uncomfortable. Frank began to laugh.
‘I meant you to be rude to ME, not to the cheese,’ said he, when the procession had withdrawn.
‘I did my best, Frank. I contradicted you.’
‘Oh, it was a shocking display of temper.’
‘And I hurt the poor waiter’s feelings.’
‘Yes, you’ll have to apologise to his Stilton before he will forgive you.’
‘And I don’t believe he is a bit more convinced that we are veterans than he was before.’
‘All right, dear; leave him to me. Those reminiscences of mine must have settled him. If they didn’t, then I feel it is hopeless.’
It was as well for his peace of mind that Frank could not hear the conversation between the fat waiter and their chambermaid, for whom he nourished a plethoric attachment. They had half an hour off in the afternoon, and were comparing notes.
‘Nice-lookin’ couple, ain’t they, John?’ said the maid, with the air of an expert. ‘I don’t know as we’ve ‘ad a better since the spring weddin’s.’
‘I don’t know as I’d go as far as that,’ said the fat waiter critically. ”E’d pass all right. ‘E’s an upstandin’ young man with a good sperrit in ‘im.’
‘What’s wrong with ‘er, then?’
‘It’s a matter of opinion,’ said the waiter. ‘I likes ‘em a bit more full-flavoured myself. And as to ‘er taste, why there, if you ‘ad seen ‘er turn up ‘er nose at the Stilton at lunch.’
‘Turn up ‘er nose, did she? Well, she seemed to me a very soft-spoken, obligin’ young lady.’
‘So she may be, but they’re a queer couple, I tell you. It’s as well they are married at last.’
‘Why?’
‘Because they ‘ave been goin’ on most owdacious before’and. I ‘ave it from their own lips, and it fairly made me blush to listen to it. Awful, it was, AWFUL!’
‘You don’t say that, John!’
‘I tell you, Jane, I couldn’t ‘ardly believe my ears. They was married on Tuesday last, as we know well, and to-day’s Times to prove it, and yet if you’ll believe me, they was talkin’ about ‘ow they ‘ad travelled alone abroad—’
‘Never, John!’
‘And alone in a Swiss ‘otel!’
‘My goodness!’
‘And a steamer too.’
‘Well, there! I’ll never trust any one again.’
‘Oh, a perfec’ pair of scorchers. But I’ll let ‘im see as I knows it. I’ll put that Times before ‘im to-night at dinner as sure as my name’s John.’
‘And a good lesson to them, too! If you didn’t say you’d ‘eard it from their own lips, John, I never could ‘ave believed it. It’s things like that as shakes your trust in ‘uman nature.’
Maude and Frank were lingering at the table d’hote over their walnuts and a glass of port wine, when their waiter came softly behind them.
‘Beg pardon, sir, but did you see it in the Times?’
‘See what?’
‘THAT, sir. I thought that it might be of interest to you and to your good lady to see it.’
He had laid one page of the paper before them, with his forefinger upon an item in the left-hand top corner. Then he discreetly withdrew. Frank stared at it in horror.
‘Maude, your people have gone and put it in.’
‘Our marriage!’
‘Here it is! Listen! “Crosse—Selby. 30th June, at St. Monica’s Church, by the Rev. John Tudwell, M.A., Vicar of St. Monica’s, Frank Crosse, of Maybury Road, Woking, to Maude Selby, eldest daughter of Robert Selby, Esq., of St. Albans.” Great Scot, Maude! what shall we do?’
‘Well, dear, does it matter?’
‘Matter! It’s simply awful!’
‘I don’t mind much if they do know.’
‘But my reminiscences, Maude! The travels in the Tyrol! The Swiss Hotel! The Stateroom! Great goodness, how I have put my foot into it.’
Maude burst out laughing.
‘You old dear!’ she cried, ‘I don’t believe you are a bit better as a conspirator than I am. There’s only one thing you can do. Give the waiter half a crown, tell him the truth, and don’t conspire any more.’
And so ignominiously ended the attempt which so many have made, and at which so many have failed. Take warning, gentle reader, and you also, gentler reader still, when your own turn comes.
The days of holiday were over, and for each of them the duties of life were waiting. For him it was his work, and for her, her housekeeping. They both welcomed the change, for there was a rush and a want of privacy about the hotel life which had been amusing at first, but was now becoming irksome. It was pleasant, as they rolled out of Waterloo Station that summer night, to know that their cosy little home was awaiting them just five-and-twenty miles down the line. They had a first-class carriage to themselves—it is astonishing how easy it is for two people to fit into one of those armchair partitions,—and they talked all the way down about their plans for the future. Golden visions of youth, how they can glorify even a suburban villa and four hundred a year! They exulted together over the endless vista of happy days which stretched before them.
Mrs. Watson, Frank’s trusty housekeeper, had been left in charge of The Lindens, and he had sent her a telegram the evening before to tell her that they were coming. She had already engaged the two servants, so everything would be ready for them. They pictured her waiting at the door, the neat little rooms with all their useful marriage-presents in their proper places, the lamplight and the snowy cloth laid for supper in the dining-room. It would be ten o’clock before they got there, and that supper would be a welcome sight. It was all delightful to look forward to, and this last journey was the happiest of all their wanderings. Maude wanted to see her kitchen. Frank wanted to see his books. Both were eager for the fight.
But they found a small annoyance waiting for them at Woking. A crowded train had preceded them, and there was not a single cab left at the station. Some would be back soon, but nobody could tell when.
‘You don’t mind walking, Maude?’
‘I should prefer it.’
So a friendly porter took charge of their trunks, and promised to send them up when a conveyance had arrived. In the meantime they started off together down an ill-lit and ill-kept road, which opened into that more important thoroughfare in which their own villa was situated. They walked quickly, full of eager anticipations.
‘It’s just past the third lamp-post on the right,’ said Frank. ‘Now it’s only the second lamp-post. You see it will not be far from the station. Those windows among the trees are where Hale lives—my best man, you know! Now it is only one lamp-post!’ They quickened their pace almost to a run, and so arrived at the gate of The Lindens.
It was a white gate leading into a short path—‘carriage sweep’ the house-agent called it,—and so to a low but comfortable-looking little house. The night was so dark that one could only see its outline. To their surprise, there was no sign of a light either above the door or at any of the windows.
‘Well, I’m blessed!’ cried Frank.
‘Never mind, dear. They live at the back, no doubt.’
‘But I gave them the hour. This is too bad. I am so sorry.’
‘It will be all the more cosy inside. What a dear little gate this is! The whole place is perfectly charming.’
But in spite of her brave attempts at making the best of it, it could not be denied that this black house was not what they had pictured in their dreams. Frank strode angrily up the path and pulled at the bell. There was no answer, so he knocked violently. Then he knocked with one hand while he rang with the other, but no sound save that of the clanging bell came from the gloomy house. As they stood forlornly in front of their own hall-door, a soft rain began to rustle amidst the bushes. At this climax of their troubles Maude burst into such a quiet, hearty, irresistible fit of laughter, that the angry Frank was forced to laugh also.
‘My word, it will be no laughing matter for Mrs. Watson if she cannot give a good
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