The Rough Road. Locke William John
seen before in the Deanery garden.
“That’s my man. Peggy’s valet,” said Oliver airily. “His name is Chipmunk. A beauty, isn’t he?”
“Like master, like man,” murmured Doggie.
Oliver’s quick ears caught the words intended only for Peggy. He smiled brightly.
“If you knew what a compliment you were paying me, Doggie, you wouldn’t have said such a thing.”
The man seeing the company stare at him, halted, took his pipe out of his mouth, and scratched his head.
“But – er – forgive me, my dear Oliver,” said the Dean. “No doubt he is an excellent fellow – but don’t you think he might smoke his pipe somewhere else?”
“Of course he might,” said Oliver. “And he jolly well shall.” He put his hand to his mouth, sea-fashion – they were about thirty yards apart – and shouted: “Here, you! What the eternal blazes are you doing here?”
“Please don’t hurt the poor man’s feelings,” said the kindly Dean.
Oliver turned a blank look on his Uncle. “His what? Ain’t got any. Not that kind of feelings.” He proceeded: “Now then, look lively! Clear out! Skidoo!”
The valet touched his forehead in salute, and – “Where am I to go to, Cap’en?”
“Go to – ”
Oliver checked himself in time, and turned to the Dean.
“Where shall I tell him to go?” he asked sweetly.
“The kitchen garden would be the best place,” replied the Dean.
“I think I’d better go and fix him up myself,” said Oliver. “A little conversation in his own language might be beneficial.”
“But isn’t he English?” asked Peggy.
“Born and bred in Wapping,” said Oliver.
He marched off across the lawn; and, could they have heard it, the friendly talk that he had with Chipmunk would have made the Saint and the Divines, and even the Crusader, Sir Guy de Chevenix, who were buried in the cathedral, turn in their tombs.
Doggie, watching the disappearing Chipmunk, Oliver’s knuckles in his neck, said:
“I think it monstrous of Oliver to bring such a disreputable creature down here.”
Said the Dean: “At any rate, it brings a certain excitement into our quiet surroundings.”
“They must be having the time of their lives in the Servants’ Hall,” said Peggy.
CHAPTER IV
After breakfast the next morning Doggie, attired in a green shot-silk dressing-gown, entered his own particular room and sat down to think. In its way it was a very beautiful room – high, spacious, well-proportioned, facing south-east. The wall-paper, which he had designed himself, was ivory-white with veinings of peacock-blue. Into the ivory-silk curtains were woven peacocks in full pride. The cushions were ivory and peacock-blue. The chairs, the writing-table, the couch, the bookcases, were pure Sheraton and Hepplewhite. Vellum-bound books filled the cases – Doggie was very particular about his bindings. Delicate water-colours alone adorned the walls. On his neatly arranged writing-table lay an ivory set – inkstand, pen-tray, blotter and calendar. Bits of old embroidery harmonizing with the peacock shades were spread here and there. A pretty collection of eighteenth-century Italian ivory statuettes were grouped about the room. A spinet, inlaid with ebony and ivory, formed a centre for the arrangement of many other musical instruments – a viol, mandolins gay with ribbons, a theorbo, flutes and clarinets. Through the curtains, draped across an alcove, could be guessed the modern monstrosity of a grand piano. One tall closed cabinet was devoted to his collection of wall-papers. Another, open, to a collection of little dogs in china, porcelain, faïence; thousands of them; he got them through dealers from all over the world. He had the finest collection in existence, and maintained a friendly and learned correspondence with the other collector – an elderly, disillusioned Russian prince, who lived somewhere near Nijni-Novgorod. On the spinet and on the writing-table were great bowls of golden rayon d’or roses.
Doggie sat down to think. An unwonted frown creased his brow. Several problems distracted him. The morning sun streaming into the room disclosed, beyond doubt, discolorations, stains and streaks on the wall-paper. It would have to be renewed. Already he had decided to design something to take its place. But last night Peggy had declared her intention to turn this abode of bachelor comfort into the drawing-room, and to hand over to his personal use some other apartment, possibly the present drawing-room, which received all the blaze and glare of the afternoon sun. What should he do? Live in the sordidness of discoloured wall-paper for another year, or go through the anxiety of artistic effort and manufacturers’ stupidity and delay, to say nothing of the expense, only to have the whole thing scrapped before the wedding? Doggie had a foretaste of the dilemmas of matrimony. He had a gnawing suspicion that the trim and perfect life was difficult of attainment.
Then, meandering through this wilderness of dubiety, ran thoughts of Oliver. Every one seemed to have gone crazy over him. Uncle Edward and Aunt Sophia had hung on his lips while he lied unblushingly about his adventures. Even Peggy had listened open-eyed and open-mouthed when he had told a tale of shipwreck in the South Seas: how the schooner had been caught in some beastly wind and the masts had been torn out and the rudder carried away, and how it had struck a reef, and how something had hit him on the head, and he knew no more till he woke up on a beach and found that the unspeakable Chipmunk had swum with him for a week – or whatever the time was – until they got to land. If hulking, brainless dolts like Oliver, thought Doggie, like to fool around in schooners and typhoons, they must take the consequences. There was nothing to brag about. The higher man was the intellectual, the æsthetic, the artistic being. What did Oliver know of Lydian modes or Louis Treize decoration or Astec clay dogs? Nothing. He couldn’t even keep his socks from slopping about over his shoes. And there was Peggy all over the fellow, although before dinner she had said she couldn’t bear the sight of him. Doggie was perturbed. On bidding him good night, she had kissed him in the most perfunctory manner – merely the cousinly peck of a dozen years ago – and had given no thought to the fact that he was driving home in an open car without an overcoat. He had felt distinctly chilly on his arrival, and had taken a dose of ammoniated quinine. Was Peggy’s indifference a sign that she had ceased to care for him? That she was attracted by the buccaneering Oliver?
Now suppose the engagement was broken off, he would be free to do as he chose with the redecoration of the room. But suppose, as he sincerely and devoutly hoped, it wasn’t? Dilemma on dilemma. Added to all this, Goliath, the miniature Belgian griffon, having probably overeaten himself, had complicated pains inside, and the callous vet. could or would not come round till the evening. In the meantime, Goliath might die.
He was at this point of his reflections, when to his horror he heard a familiar voice outside the door.
“All right, Peddle. Don’t worry. I’ll show myself in. Look after that man of mine. Quite easy. Give him some beer in a bucket and leave him to it.”
Then the door burst open and Oliver, pipe in mouth and hat on one side, came into the room.
“Hallo, Doggie! Thought I’d look you up. Hope I’m not disturbing you.”
“Not at all,” said Doggie. “Do sit down.”
But Oliver walked about and looked at things.
“I like your water-colours. Did you collect them yourself?”
“Yes.”
“I congratulate you on your taste. This is a beauty. Who is it by?”
The appreciation brought Doggie at once to his side. Oliver, the connoisseur, was showing himself in a new and agreeable light. Doggie took him delightedly round the pictures, expounding their merits and their little histories. He found that Oliver, although unlearned, had a true sense of light and colour and tone. He was just beginning to like him, when the tactless fellow, stopping before the collection of little dogs, spoiled everything.
“My