Part 27 (1/2)

But beyond spelling his name 'Injle,' we alone refused to hit a man when he was down.

'There's no need,' said Ollyett. 'The whole press is on the buckle from end to end.'

Even Woodhouse was a little astonished at the ease with which it had come about, and said as much.

'Rot!' said Ollyett. 'We haven't really begun. Huckley isn't news yet.'

'What do you mean?' said Woodhouse, who had grown to have great respect for his young but by no means distant connection.

'Mean? By the grace of G.o.d, Master Ridley, I mean to have it so that when Huckley turns over in its sleep, Reuters and the Press a.s.sociation jump out of bed to cable.' Then he went off at score about certain restorations in Huckley Church which, he said--and he seemed to spend his every week-end there--had been perpetrated by the Rector's predecessor, who had abolished a 'leper-window' or a 'squinch-hole'

(whatever these may be) to inst.i.tute a lavatory in the vestry. It did not strike me as stuff for which Reuters or the Press a.s.sociation would lose much sleep, and I left him declaiming to Woodhouse about a fourteenth-century font which, he said, he had unearthed in the s.e.xton's tool-shed.

My methods were more on the lines of peaceful penetration. An odd copy, in _The Bun's_ rag-and-bone library, of Hone's _Every-Day Book_ had revealed to me the existence of a village dance founded, like all village dances, on Druidical mysteries connected with the Solar Solstice (which is always unchallengeable) and Mid-summer Morning, which is dewy and refres.h.i.+ng to the London eye. For this I take no credit--Hone being a mine any one can work--but that I rechristened that dance, after I had revised it, 'The Gubby' is my t.i.tle to immortal fame. It was still to be witnessed, I wrote, 'in all its poignant purity at Huckley, that last home of significant mediaeval survivals'; and I fell so in love with my creation that I kept it back for days, enamelling and burnis.h.i.+ng.

'You's better put it in,' said Ollyett at last. 'It's time we a.s.serted ourselves again. The other fellows are beginning to poach. You saw that thing in the _Pinnacle_ about Sir Thomas's Model Village? He must have got one of their chaps down to do it.'

''Nothing like the wounds of a friend,' I said. 'That account of the non-alcoholic pub alone was--'

'I liked the bit best about the white-tiled laundry and the Fallen Virgins who wash Sir Thomas's dress s.h.i.+rts. Our side couldn't come within a mile of that, you know. We haven't the proper flair for s.e.xual s...o...b..r.'

'That's what I'm always saying,' I retorted. 'Leave 'em alone. The other fellows are doing our work for us now. Besides I want to touch up my ”Gubby Dance” a little more.'

'No. You'll spoil it. Let's shove it in to-day. For one thing it's Literature. I don't go in for compliments as you know, but, etc. etc.'

I had a healthy suspicion of young Ollyett in every aspect, but though I knew that I should have to pay for it, I fell to his flattery, and my priceless article on the 'Gubby Dance' appeared. Next Sat.u.r.day he asked me to bring out _The Bun_ in his absence, which I naturally a.s.sumed would be connected with the little maroon side-car. I was wrong.

On the following Monday I glanced at _The Cake_ at breakfast-time to make sure, as usual, of her inferiority to my beloved but unremunerative _Bun_. I opened on a heading: 'The Village that Voted the Earth was Flat.' I read ... I read that the Geoplanarian Society--a society devoted to the proposition that the earth is flat--had held its Annual Banquet and Exercises at Huckley on Sat.u.r.day, when after convincing addresses, amid scenes of the greatest enthusiasm, Huckley village had decided by an unanimous vote of 438 that the earth was flat. I do not remember that I breathed again till I had finished the two columns of description that followed. Only one man could have written them. They were flawless--crisp, nervous, austere yet human, poignant, vital, arresting--most distinctly arresting--dynamic enough to s.h.i.+ft a city--and quotable by whole sticks at a time. And there was a leader, a grave and poised leader, which tore me in two with mirth, until I remembered that I had been left out--infamously and unjustifiably dropped. I went to Ollyett's rooms. He was breakfasting, and, to do him justice, looked conscience-stricken.

'It wasn't my fault,' he began. 'It was Bat Masquerier. I swear _I_ would have asked you to come if--'

'Never mind that,' I said. 'It's the best bit of work you've ever done or will do. Did any of it happen?'

'Happen? Heavens! D'you think even _I_ could have invented it?'

'Is it exclusive to _The Cake_?' I cried.

'It cost Bat Masquerier two thousand,' Ollyett replied. 'D'you think he'd let any one else in on that? But I give you my sacred word I knew nothing about it till he asked me to come down and cover it. He had Huckley posted in three colours, ”The Geoplanarians' Annual Banquet and Exercises.” Yes, he invented ”Geoplanarians.” He wanted Huckley to think it meant aeroplanes. Yes, I know that there is a real Society that thinks the world's flat--they ought to be grateful for the lift--but Bat made his own. He did! He created the whole show, I tell you. He swept out half his Halls for the job. Think of that--on a Sat.u.r.day! They--we went down in motor char-a-bancs--three of 'em--one pink, one primrose, and one forget-me-not blue--twenty people in each one and ”The Earth _is_ Flat” on each side and across the back. I went with Teddy Rickets and Lafone from the Trefoil, and both the Silhouette Sisters, and--wait a minute!--the Crossleigh Trio. You know the Every-Day Dramas Trio at the Jocunda--Ada Crossleigh, ”Bunt” Crossleigh, and little Victorine?

Them. And there was Hoke Ramsden, the lightning-change chap in _Morgiana and Drexel_--and there was Billy Turpeen. Yes, you know him! The North London Star. ”I'm the Referee that got himself disliked at Blackheath.”

_That_ chap! And there was Mackaye--that one-eyed Scotch fellow that all Glasgow is crazy about. Talk of subordinating yourself for Art's sake!

Mackaye was the earnest inquirer who got converted at the end of the meeting. And there was quite a lot of girls I didn't know, and--oh, yes--there was 'Dal! 'Dal Benzaguen herself! We sat together, going and coming. She's all the darling there ever was. She sent you her love, and she told me to tell you that she won't forget about Nellie Farren. She says you've given her an ideal to work for. She? Oh, she was the Lady Secretary to the Geoplanarians, of course. I forget who were in the other brakes--provincial stars mostly--but they played up gorgeously.

The art of the music-hall's changed since your day. They didn't overdo it a bit. You see, people who believe the earth is flat don't dress quite like other people. You may have noticed that I hinted at that in my account. It's a rather flat-fronted Ionic style--neo-Victorian, except for the bustles, 'Dal told me,--but 'Dal looked heavenly in it!

So did little Victorine. And there was a girl in the blue brake--she's a provincial--but she's coming to town this winter and she'll knock 'em--Winnie Deans. Remember that! She told Huckley how she had suffered for the Cause as a governess in a rich family where they believed that the world is round, and how she threw up her job sooner than teach immoral geography. That was at the overflow meeting outside the Baptist chapel. She knocked 'em to sawdust! We must look out for Winnie.... But Lafone! Lafone was beyond everything. Impact, personality--conviction--the whole bag o' tricks! He sweated conviction.

Gad, he convinced _me_ while he was speaking! (Him? He was President of the Geoplanarians, of course. Haven't you read my account?) It _is_ an infernally plausible theory. After all, no one has actually proved the earth is round, have they?'

'Never mind the earth. What about Huckley?'

'Oh, Huckley got tight. That's the worst of these model villages if you let 'em smell fire-water. There's one alcoholic pub in the place that Sir Thomas can't get rid of. Bat made it his base. He sent down the banquet in two motor lorries--dinner for five hundred and drinks for ten thousand. Huckley voted all right. Don't you make any mistake about that. No vote, no dinner. A unanimous vote--exactly as I've said. At least, the Rector and the Doctor were the only dissentients. We didn't count them. Oh yes, Sir Thomas was there. He came and grinned at us through his park gates. He'll grin worse to-day. There's an aniline dye that you rub through a stencil-plate that eats about a foot into any stone and wears good to the last. Bat had both the lodge-gates stencilled ”The Earth _is_ flat!” and all the barns and walls they could get at.... Oh Lord, but Huckley was drunk! We had to fill 'em up to make 'em forgive us for not being aeroplanes. Unthankful yokels! D'you realise that Emperors couldn't have commanded the talent Bat decanted on 'em? Why, 'Dal alone was.... And by eight o'clock not even a bit of paper left! The whole show packed up and gone, and Huckley hoo-raying for the earth being flat.'

'Very good,' I began. 'I am, as you know, a one-third proprietor of _The Bun_.'