Part 20 (1/2)

It's all very well. You never had sisters. You know----”

Fred held his pipe elaborately out of the way and protruded his face to a confidential nearness.

”I believe they half like it,” said Fred, in a confidential half whisper. ”Such a go, you know. Mabel pretty near as bad. And the girls.

All making the very most they can of it. Me! I think Chatteris was the only man alive to hear 'em. _I_ couldn't get up emotion as they do, if my feet were being flayed. Cheerful home, eh? For holidays.”

”Where's--the princ.i.p.al gentleman?” asked Melville a little grimly. ”In London?”

”Unprincipled gentleman, I call him,” said Fred. ”He's stopping down here at the Metropole. Stuck.”

”Down here? Stuck?”

”Rather. Stuck and set about.”

My cousin tried for sidelights. ”What's his att.i.tude?” he asked.

”Slump,” said Fred with intensity.

”This little blow-off has rather astonished him,” he explained. ”When he wrote to say that the election didn't interest him for a bit, but he hoped to pull around----”

”You said you didn't know what he wrote.”

”I do that much,” said Fred. ”He no more thought they'd have spotted that it meant Miss Waters than a baby. But women are so thundering sharp, you know. They're born spotters. How it'll all end----”

”But why has he come to the Metropole?”

”Middle of the stage, I suppose,” said Fred.

”What's his att.i.tude?”

”Says he's going to see Adeline and explain everything--and doesn't do it.... Puts it off. And Adeline, as far as I can gather, says that if he doesn't come down soon, she's hanged if she'll see him, much as her heart may be broken, and all that, if she doesn't. You know.”

”Naturally,” said Melville, rather inconsecutively. ”And he doesn't?”

”Doesn't stir.”

”Does he see--the other lady?”

”We don't know. We can't watch him. But if he does he's clever----”

”Why?”

”There's about a hundred blessed relatives of his in the place--came like crows for a corpse. I never saw such a lot. Talk about a man of good old family--it's decaying! I never saw such a high old family in my life. Aunts they are chiefly.”

”Aunts?”

”Aunts. Say, they've rallied round him. How they got hold of it I don't know. Like vultures. Unless the mater-- But they're here. They're all at him--using their influence with him, threatening to cut off legacies and all that. There's one old girl at Bate's, Lady Poynting Mallow--least bit horsey, but about as all right as any of 'em--who's been down here twice. Seems a trifle disappointed in Adeline. And there's two aunts at Wampach's--you know the sort that stop at Wampach's--regular hothouse flowers--a watering-potful of real icy cold water would kill both of 'em. And there's one come over from the Continent, short hair, short skirts--regular terror--she's at the Pavilion. They're all chasing round saying, 'Where is this woman-fish sort of thing? Let me peek!'”

”Does that const.i.tute the hundred relatives?”

”Practically. The Wampachers are sending for a Bishop who used to be his schoolmaster----”