Part 24 (1/2)

”And so shall mine be,” said Mr. Prohack.

III

When at length Mr. Prohack escorted Dr. Veiga out into the hall he saw Sissie kissing Eliza Brating with much affection on the front-door step.

They made an elegant group for a moment and then Eliza Brating departed hurriedly, disappearing across the street behind Dr. Veiga's attendant car.

”Now I'll just repeat once more to both of you,” resumed Dr. Veiga, embracing father and daughter in one shrewd glance. ”You've nothing to worry about upstairs.” He indicated the boudoir by a movement of his somewhat tousled head. ”But you've got just a little to worry about here.” And he indicated Mr. Prohack.

”I know,” said Sissie with a.s.surance. ”But I shall look after him, doctor. You can rely on me. I understand--both cases.”

”Well, there's one good thing,” said Sissie, following her father into the dining-room after the doctor had gone. ”I've done with that foolish Eliza. I knew it couldn't last and it hasn't. Unless I'm there all the time to keep my eye on everything--of course it all goes to pieces. That girl is the biggest noodle...!”

”But haven't I just seen you and her joined in the deepest affection?”

”Naturally I had to kiss her. But I've finished with her. And what's more, she knows what I think of her. She never liked me.”

”Sissie,” said Mr. Prohack, ”you shock me.” And indeed he was genuinely shocked, for he had always thought that Sissie was different from other girls; that she had all the feminine qualities without any of the feminine defects. Yes, he had thought that she might develop into a creature more perfect even than Marian. And here she was talking and behaving exactly as men at the club would relate of their own conventional women.

Sissie gazed firmly at her father, as it were half in pity and half in disdain. Did the innocent fellow not then understand the nature of women? Or was he too sentimental to admit it, too romantic to be a realist?

”Would you believe,” said Sissie, ”that although I was there last night and told her exactly what to do, she's had a quarrel this morning with the landlord of the studio? Well, she has. You know the A.R.A. on the first floor has been making a lot of silly complaints about the noise--music and so on--every night. And some other people have complained. _I_ could have talked the landlord round in ten minutes!

Eliza doesn't merely not talk him round,--she quarrels with him! Of course it's all up. And as if that wasn't enough, a County Council inspector has been round asking about a music and dancing licence. We shall either have to give up business altogether or else move somewhere else. Eliza says she knows of another studio. Well, I shall write her to-night and tell her she can have my share of the fittings and furniture and go where she likes, but I shan't go with her. And if she never liked me I can honestly say I never liked her. And I don't want to run a dancing studio any more, either. Why should I, after all? We _were_ the new poor. Now we're the new rich. Well, we may as well _be_ the new rich.”

Mr. Prohack was now still more shocked. Nay, he was almost frightened.

And yet he wasn't either shocked or frightened, in the centre of his soul. He was rather triumphant,--not about his daughter with the feet of clay, but about himself.

”But I shan't give up teaching dancing entirely,” said Sissie.

”No?” He wondered what would come next.

”No! I shall teach you.”

”Indeed you won't!” He instinctively recoiled.

”Yes, I shall. I promised the doctor he could rely on me. You'll buy a gramophone, and we'll have the carpet up in the drawing-room. Oh! You startled deer, do you want to run back into the depths of the forest?...

Father, you are the funniest father that ever was.” She marched to him and put her hand on his shoulder and just twitched his beard. ”I can look after you quite as well as mother can. We're pals, aren't we?”

”Yes. Like the tiger and the lamb. You've got hold of my silky fleece already.”

IV

Mr. Prohack sat in the dining-room alone. The room was now heated by an electric radiator which Eve had just bought for the sake of economy. But her economy was the economy of the rich, for the amount of expensive current consumed by that radiator was prodigious, while the saving it effected in labour, cleanliness and atmospheric purity could certainly not have been measured without a scientific instrument adapted to the infinitely little. (Still, Machin admired and loved it.) Mr. Prohack perceived that all four bars of it were brightly incandescent, whereas three bars would have been ample to keep the room warm. He ought to get up and turn a bar off.... He had a hundred preoccupations. His daughter had cla.s.sed him with the new rich. He resented the description, but could he honestly reject it? All his recent troubles sprang from the new riches. If he had not inherited from a profiteer he would a.s.suredly have been at his office in the Treasury, earning an honest living, at that very moment. For only sick persons of plenteous independent means are ever prescribed for as he had been prescribed for; the others either go on working and making the best of such health as is left to them, or they die. If he had not inherited from a profiteer he would not have had a car and the car would not have had an accident and he would not have been faced with the prospect (as he was faced with it) of a legal dispute, to be fought by him on behalf of the insurance company, with the owner of the colliding car. (The owner of the colliding car was a young woman as to whose veracity Carthew had had some exceedingly hard things to say.) Mr. Prohack would have settled the matter, but neither Eve nor the insurance company would let him settle it. And if the car had not had an accident Eve would not have had traumatic neurasthenia, with all its disconcerting reactions on family life. And if he had not inherited from a profiteer, Charlie would not have gone off to Glasgow,--he had heard odds and ends of strange tales as to Charlie's doings in Glasgow,--not in the least rea.s.suring! And if he had not inherited from a profiteer Sissie would not have taken a share in a dancing studio and might never have dangerously danced with that worm Oswald Morfey. And if he had not inherited from a profiteer he would not have been speculating, with a rich chance of more profiteering, in Roumanian oil with Paul Spinner. In brief--well, he ought to get up and turn off a bar of that wasteful radiator.

Yet he was uplifted, happy. Not because of his wealthy ease. No! A week or two ago he had only to think of his fortune to feel uplifted and happy. But now!

No! He was uplifted and happy now for the simple reason that he had caught the romance of the doctor's idea of taking idleness seriously and practising it as a profession. If circ.u.mstances forced him to be idle, he would be idle in the grand manner. He would do everything that the doctor had suggested, and more. (The doctor saw life like a poet. He might be a cross between a comedian and a mountebank, but he was a great fellow.) Every species of idleness should have its appointed hour. In the pursuit of idleness he would become the busiest man in London. A definite programme would be necessary. Strict routine would be necessary. No more loafing about! He hankered after routine as the drunkard after alcohol. Routine was what he had been missing. The absence of routine, and naught else, was r.e.t.a.r.ding his recovery. (Yes, he knew in his heart that what they all said was true,--he was not getting better.) His own daughter had taught him wisdom. Inevitably, unavoidably, he was the new rich. Well, he would be the new rich thoroughly. No other aim was logical.... Let the radiator burn!