Part 60 (2/2)

A bottle of the very best champagne was opened; and he brought the invalid a gla.s.s of it, to drink Mrs. Marsden's health. Mrs. Prentice, staunchly obeying, drank the old, still wine, and immediately felt as if she had stepped from an ocean-going liner into a dancing row-boat.

In the exuberance of his rapture, Mr. Prentice also invited the parlourmaid to drink Mrs. Marsden's health.

”There, toss that off--to the most remarkable lady _you_'ve ever seen.”

”Yes, sir. She _is_ a nice lady, sir--and always speaks so sensible.”

”_Sensible!_ Why, bless my soul, there's no one in the length and breadth of England that can hold a candle to her for sheer--” But he could not of course talk freely of these high matters to a parlourmaid.

So he trotted off to the other room, to tell Mrs. Prentice once again.

As he walked to the office next morning, he hummed one of the comic songs that he had not sung for years, and snapped his fingers by way of castanet accompaniment. He felt so light-hearted and joyous that he would have willingly thrown his square hat in the air, and cut capers on the pavement.

He could not work. For two or three days he was quite unable to attend to ordinary business. When clients came to talk about themselves, he scarcely listened; but, giving the conversation a violent wrench, began talking to them about Mrs. Marsden.

Then one afternoon he was taken with a burning desire for a quiet chat with Archibald Bence. If he could get hold of little Archibald and ply him with questions, he would obtain all sorts of delightful explanatory details concerning Mrs. Marsden's splendid mystery.

He hurried down High Street, and, approaching the old shop, was puzzled by a strange phenomenon.

The pavement in front of Marsden & Thompson's seemed to be blocked by a dense crowd. The blinds were drawn on the upper floor; the iron shutters masked the windows and doors on the ground floor: the whole shop was closed--and yet there were infinitely more people lingering outside it than when it had been open.

White bills on all the shutters showed the cause of the phenomenon.

”Astonis.h.i.+ng Bargains”--these two portentous words headed each white placard in monstrous red capitals;--”Bence Brothers, having acquired this old-established business, will clear the entire stock, together with surplus and slightly soiled goods from their own house, at heart-breaking reductions on cost;”--”Opening 9 A.M. Monday next. Come early. This is not an ordinary bargain sale, but a forced sacrifice by which only the public can benefit.” And the public, eager for the benefit, wis.h.i.+ng that it was already Monday, pressed and strove to read and reread the white and red notices on the iron shutters.

”Don't push,” said one nursemaid to another. ”Take your turn. I've just as much right to see as you have.”

Mr. Prentice laughed heartily and happily. He thought as he crossed the road and entered Bence's, ”What a dog this Archibald is--to be sure!”

He found the grand little man in his private room, and was affably received by him.

”Oh, yes,” said Archibald, sn.i.g.g.e.ring modestly. ”We hope to make rather a big thing of our clearance sale.... How long shall we keep it going?

Well, that depends. It wouldn't last long, if we'd nothing to dispose of beyond what's left over there; but we shall clear this side at the same time.”

And Bence rattled on glibly, as though Mr. Prentice had come to interview him for an article in an important newspaper.

”The ancient notion was that this kind of special selling took the cream off one's ordinary trade. But experience has taught us that such is not the case. We find that trade breeds trade. And you can't _tire_ your public--you can't over-stimulate them. It is the excited public that is your best _buying_ public.”

Mr. Prentice listened respectfully; and then, after the manner of a good interviewer, begged the host to pa.s.s from general views to personal reminiscences.

”What is it you wish to know?”

”About you and her,” said Prentice. ”I should enormously like to know the inward history of it.”

”Well, now that the secret's out,” said Archibald, rubbing his chin, and wrinkling the flesh round his bright little eyes, ”I suppose there's no harm in speaking about it.”

”Certainly not to me,” said Prentice. ”Although I wasn't in her confidence about this, I am a real true friend of hers.”

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