The Grand Babylon Hotel. Bennett Arnold
much to settle with regard to the completion of the purchase, and also there are things which you might want to ask me. Also, to tell the truth, I am not anxious to leave the old place with too much suddenness. It will be a wrench to me.’
‘I shall be delighted if you will stay,’ said the millionaire, ‘but it must be as my guest, not as the guest of the hotel.’
‘You are very kind.’
‘As for wishing to consult you, no doubt I shall have need to do so, but I must say that the show seems to run itself.’
‘Ah!’ said Babylon thoughtfully. ‘I have heard of hotels that run themselves. If they do, you may be sure that they obey the laws of gravity and run downwards. You will have your hands full. For example, have you yet heard about Miss Spencer?’
‘No,’ said Racksole. ‘What of her?’
‘She has mysteriously vanished during the night, and nobody appears to be able to throw any light on the affair. Her room is empty, her boxes gone.
You will want someone to take her place, and that someone will not be very easy to get.’
‘H’m!’ Racksole said, after a pause. ‘Hers is not the only post that falls vacant to-day.’
A little later, the millionaire installed himself in the late owner’s private room and rang the bell.
‘I want Jules,’ he said to the page.
While waiting for Jules, Racksole considered the question of Miss Spencer’s disappearance.
‘Good morning, Jules,’ was his cheerful greeting, when the imperturbable waiter arrived.
‘Good morning, sir.’
‘Take a chair.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘We have met before this morning, Jules.’
‘Yes, sir, at 3 a.m.’
‘Rather strange about Miss Spencer’s departure, is it not?’ suggested Racksole.
‘It is remarkable, sir.’
‘You are aware, of course, that Mr Babylon has transferred all his interests in this hotel to me?’
‘I have been informed to that effect, sir.’
‘I suppose you know everything that goes on in the hotel, Jules?’
‘As the head waiter, sir, it is my business to keep a general eye on things.’
‘You speak very good English for a foreigner, Jules.’
‘For a foreigner, sir! I am an Englishman, a Hertfordshire man born and bred. Perhaps my name has misled you, sir. I am only called Jules because the head waiter of any really high-class hotel must have either a French or an Italian name.’
‘I see,’ said Racksole. ‘I think you must be rather a clever person, Jules.’
‘That is not for me to say, sir.’
‘How long has the hotel enjoyed the advantage of your services?’
‘A little over twenty years.’
‘That is a long time to be in one place. Don’t you think it’s time you got out of the rut? You are still young, and might make a reputation for yourself in another and wider sphere.’
Racksole looked at the man steadily, and his glance was steadily returned.
‘You aren’t satisfied with me, sir?’
‘To be frank, Jules, I think—I think you—er—wink too much. And I think that it is regrettable when a head waiter falls into a habit of taking white ribbons from the handles of bedroom doors at three in the morning.’
Jules started slightly.
‘I see how it is, sir. You wish me to go, and one pretext, if I may use the term, is as good as another. Very well, I can’t say that I’m surprised. It sometimes happens that there is incompatibility of temper between a hotel proprietor and his head waiter, and then, unless one of them goes, the hotel is likely to suffer. I will go, Mr Racksole. In fact, I had already thought of giving notice.’
The millionaire smiled appreciatively. ‘What wages do you require in lieu of notice? It is my intention that you leave the hotel within an hour.’
‘I require no wages in lieu of notice, sir. I would scorn to accept anything. And I will leave the hotel in fifteen minutes.’
‘Good-day, then. You have my good wishes and my admiration, so long as you keep out of my hotel.’
Racksole got up. ‘Good-day, sir. And thank you.’
‘By the way, Jules, it will be useless for you to apply to any other first-rate European hotel for a post, because I shall take measures which will ensure the rejection of any such application.’
‘Without discussing the question whether or not there aren’t at least half a dozen hotels in London alone that would jump for joy at the chance of getting me,’ answered Jules, ‘I may tell you, sir, that I shall retire from my profession.’
‘Really! You will turn your brains to a different channel.’
‘No, sir. I shall take rooms in Albemarle Street or Jermyn Street, and just be content to be a man-about-town. I have saved some twenty thousand pounds—a mere trifle, but sufficient for my needs, and I shall now proceed to enjoy it. Pardon me for troubling you with my personal affairs. And good-day again.’
That afternoon Racksole went with Felix Babylon first to a firm of solicitors in the City, and then to a stockbroker, in order to carry out the practical details of the purchase of the hotel.
‘I mean to settle in England,’ said Racksole, as they were coming back. ‘It is the only country—’ and he stopped.
‘The only country?’
‘The only country where you can invest money and spend money with a feeling of security. In the United States there is nothing worth spending money on, nothing to buy. In France or Italy, there is no real security.’
‘But surely you are a true American?’ questioned Babylon.
‘I am a true American,’ said Racksole, ‘but my father, who began by being a bedmaker at an Oxford college, and ultimately made ten million dollars out of iron in Pittsburg—my father took the wise precaution of having me educated in England. I had my three years at Oxford, like any son of the upper middle class! It did me good. It has been worth more to me than many successful speculations. It taught me that the English language is different from, and better than, the American language, and that there is something—I haven’t yet found out exactly what—in English life that Americans will never get. Why,’ he added, ‘in the United States we still bribe our judges and our newspapers. And we talk of the eighteenth century as though it was the beginning of the world. Yes, I shall transfer my securities to London. I shall build a house in Park Lane, and I shall buy some immemorial country seat with a history as long as the A. T. and S. railroad, and I shall calmly and gradually settle down. D’you know—I am rather a good-natured man for a millionaire, and of a social disposition, and yet I haven’t six real friends in the whole of New York City. Think of that!’
‘And I,’ said Babylon, ‘have no friends except the friends of my boyhood in Lausanne. I have spent thirty years in England, and gained nothing but a perfect knowledge of the English language and as much gold coin as would fill a rather large box.’
These two plutocrats breathed a simultaneous sigh.
‘Talking of gold coin,’ said Racksole, ‘how much money should you think Jules has contrived to amass while he has been with you?’
‘Oh!’ Babylon smiled. ‘I should not like to guess. He has had unique opportunities—opportunities.’
‘Should