Part 27 (1/2)

Denry objected to accompanying his mother into the kitchen. But he was forced to submit. She shut the door on both of them. It is probable that during the seven minutes which they spent mysteriously together in the kitchen, the practicability of the kitchen apparatus for carrying off waste products was duly tested. Denry came forth, very pale and very cross, on his mother's arm.

”There's no danger now,” said his mother easily.

Naturally the party was at an end. The Cotterills sympathised, and prepared to depart, and inquired whether Denry could walk home.

Denry replied, from a sofa, in a weak, expiring voice, that he was perfectly incapable of walking home, that his sensations were in the highest degree disconcerting, that he should sleep in that house, as the bedrooms were ready for occupation, and that he should expect his mother to remain with him.

And Mrs. Machin had to concur. Mrs. Machin sped the Cotterills from the door as though it had been her own door. She was exceedingly angry and agitated. But she could not impart her feelings to the suffering Denry.

He moaned on a bed for about half an hour, and then fell asleep. And in the middle of the night, in the dark strange house, she also fell asleep.

VI

The next morning she arose and went forth, and in about half-an-hour returned. Denry was still in bed, but his health seemed to have resumed its normal excellence. Mrs. Machin burst upon him in such a state of complicated excitement as he had never before seen her in.

”Denry,” she cried. ”What do you think?”

”What?” said he.

”I 've just been down home, and they 're-they 're pulling the house down. All the furniture 's out, and they 've got all the tiles off the roof, and the windows out. And there's a regular crowd watching.”

Denry sat up.

”And I can tell you another piece of news,” said he. ”Mr. Cecil Wilbraham is dead.”

”Dead!” she breathed.

”Yes,” said Denry. ”_I think he 's served his purpose_. As we 're here, we 'll stop here. Don't forget it's the most sensible kind of a house you 've ever seen. Don't forget that Mrs. Cotterill could run it without a servant and have herself tidy by ten o'clock in a morning.”

Mrs. Machin perceived then, in a flash of terrible illumination, that there never had been any Cecil Wilbraham; that Denry had merely invented him and his long moustaches and his wall eye for the purpose of getting the better of his mother. The whole affair was an immense swindle upon her. Not a Mr. Cecil Wilbraham, but her own son had bought her cottage over her head and jockeyed her out of it beyond any chance of getting into it again. And to defeat his mother the rascal had not simply perverted the innocent Nellie Cotterill to some co-operation in his scheme, but he had actually bought four other cottages because the landlord would not sell one alone, and he was actually demolis.h.i.+ng property to the sole end of stopping her from re-entering it!

Of course, the entire town soon knew of the upshot of the battle, of the year-long battle, between Denry and his mother, and the means adopted by Denry to win. The town also had been hoodwinked, but it did not mind that. It loved its Denry the more, and, seeing that he was now properly established in the most remarkable house in the district, it soon afterwards made him a town councillor as some reward for his talent in amusing it.

And Denry would say to himself:

”Everything went like clockwork, except the mustard and water. I did n't bargain for the mustard and water. And yet, if I was clever enough to think of putting a label on the bottle and to have the beds prepared, I ought to have been clever enough to keep mustard out of the house.”

It would be wrong to mince the unpleasant fact that the sham poisoning which he had arranged to the end that he and his mother should pa.s.s the night in the house had finished in a manner much too realistic for Denry's pleasure. Mustard and water, particularly when mixed by Mrs.

Machin, is mustard and water.

She had that consolation.

CHAPTER IX. THE GREAT NEWSPAPER WAR

I

When Denry and his mother had been established a year and a month in the new house at Bleakridge, Denry received a visit one evening which perhaps flattered him more than anything had ever flattered him. The visitor was Mr. Myson. Now Mr. Myson was the founder, proprietor, and editor of the _Five Towns Weekly_, a new organ of public opinion which had been in existence about a year; and Denry thought that Mr. Myson had popped in to see him in pursuit of an advertis.e.m.e.nt of the Thrift Club, and at first he was not at all flattered.

But Mr. Myson was not hunting for advertis.e.m.e.nts, and Denry soon saw him to be the kind of man who would be likely to depute that work to others.