Project Gutenberg's A Man of Means, by P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: A Man of Means Author: P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill Release Date: July 27, 2009 [EBook #8713] Last Updated: March 12, 2018 Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A MAN OF MEANS *** Produced by The United States Members of the Blandings E-Group, and David Widger A MAN OF MEANS A SERIES OF SIX STORIES By Pelham Grenville Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill From the Pictorial Review, May-October 1916 Contents THE EPISODE OF THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTER THE EPISODE OF THE FINANCIAL NAPOLEON THE EPISODE OF THE THEATRICAL VENTURE THE EPISODE OF THE LIVE WEEKLY THE DIVERTING EPISODE OF THE EXILED MONARCH THE EPISODE OF THE HIRED PAST THE EPISODE OF THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTER First of a Series of Six Stories [First published in Pictorial Review, May 1916] When a seed-merchant of cautious disposition and an eye to the main chance receives from an eminent firm of jam-manufacturers an extremely large order for clover-seed, his emotions are mixed. Joy may be said to predominate, but with the joy comes also uncertainty. Are these people, he asks himself, proposing to set up as farmers of a large scale, or do they merely want the seed to give verisimilitude to their otherwise bald and unconvincing raspberry jam? On the solution of this problem depends the important matter of price, for, obviously, you can charge a fraudulent jam disseminator in a manner which an honest farmer would resent. This was the problem which was furrowing the brow of Mr. Julian Fineberg, of Bury St. Edwards, one sunny morning when Roland Bleke knocked at his door; and such was its difficulty that only at the nineteenth knock did Mr. Fineberg raise his head. “Come in—that dashed woodpecker out there!” he shouted, for it was his habit to express himself with a generous strength towards the junior members of his staff. The young man who entered looked exactly like a second clerk in a provincial seed-merchant's office—which, strangely enough, he chanced to be. His chief characteristic was an intense ordinariness. He was a young man; and when you had said that of him you had said everything. There was nothing which you would have noticed about him, except the fact that there was nothing to notice. His age was twenty-two and his name was Roland Bleke. “Please, sir, it's about my salary.” Mr. Fineberg, at the word, drew himself together much as a British square at Waterloo must have drawn itself together at the sight of a squadron of cuirassiers. “Salary?” he cried. “What about it? What's the matter with it? You get it, don't you?” “Yes, sir, but——” “Well? Don't stand there like an idiot. What is it?” “It's too much.” Mr. Fineberg's brain reeled. It was improbable that the millennium could have arrived with a jerk; on the other hand, he had distinctly heard one of his clerks complain that his salary was too large. He pinched himself. “Say that again,” he said. “If you could see your way to reduce it, sir——” It occurred to Mr. Fineberg for one instant that his subordinate was endeavoring to be humorous, but a glance at Roland's face dispelled that idea. “Why do you want it reduced?” “Please, sir, I'm going to be married.” “What the deuce do you mean?” “When my salary reaches a hundred and fifty, sir. And it's a hundred and forty now, so if you could see your way to knocking off ten pounds——” Mr. Fineberg saw light. He was a married man himself. “My boy,” he said genially, “I quite understand. But I can do you better than that. It's no use doing this sort of thing in a small way. From now on your salary is a hundred and ten. No, no, don't thank me. You're an excellent clerk, and it's a pleasure to me to reward merit when I find it. Close the door after you.” And Mr. Fineberg returned with a lighter heart to the great clover-seed problem. The circumstances which had led Roland to approach his employer may be briefly recounted. Since joining the staff of Mr. Fineberg, he had lodged at the house of a Mr. Coppin, in honorable employment as porter at the local railway-station. The Coppin family, excluding domestic pets, consisted of Mr. Coppin, a kindly and garrulous gentleman of sixty, Mrs. Coppin, a somewhat negative personality, most of whose life was devoted to cooking and washing up in her underground lair, Brothers Frank and Percy, gentleman of leisure, popularly supposed to be engaged in the mysterious occupation known as “lookin' about for somethin',” and, lastly, Muriel. For some months after his arrival, Muriel had been to Roland Bleke a mere automaton, a something outside himself that was made only for neatly-laid breakfast tables and silent removal of plates at dinner. Gradually, however, when his natural shyness was soothed by use sufficiently to enable him to look at her when she came into the room, he discovered that she was a strikingly pretty girl, bounded to the North by a mass of auburn hair and to the South by small and shapely feet. She also possessed what, we are informed —we are children in these matters ourselves—is known as the R. S. V. P. eye. This eye had met Roland's one evening, as he chumped his chop, and before he knew what he was doing he had remarked that it had been a fine day. From that wonderful moment matters had developed at an incredible speed. Roland had a nice sense of the social proprieties, and he could not bring himself to ignore a girl with whom he had once exchanged easy conversation about the weather. Whenever she came to lay his table, he felt bound to say something. Not being an experienced gagger, he found it more and more difficult each evening to hit on something bright, until finally, from sheer lack of inspiration, he kissed her. If matters had progressed rapidly before, they went like lightning then. It was as if he had touched a spring or pressed a button, setting vast machinery in motion. Even as he reeled back stunned at his audacity, the room became suddenly full of Coppins of every variety known to science. Through a mist he was aware of Mrs. Coppin crying in a corner, of Mr. Coppin drinking his health in the remains of sparkling limado, of Brothers Frank and Percy, one on each side trying to borrow simultaneously half-crowns, and of Muriel, flushed but demure, making bread-pellets and throwing them in an abstracted way, one by one, at the Coppin cat, which had wandered in on the chance of fish. Out of the chaos, as he stood looking at them with his mouth open, came the word “bans,” and smote him like a blast of East wind. It is not necessary to trace in detail Roland's mental processes from that moment till the day when he applied to Mr. Fineberg for a reduction of salary. It is enough to say that for quite a month he was extraordinarily happy. To a man who has had nothing to do with women, to be engaged is an intoxicating experience, and at first life was one long golden glow to Roland. Secretly, like all mild men, he had always nourished a desire to be esteemed a nut by his fellow men; and his engagement satisfied that desire. It was pleasant to hear Brothers Frank and Percy cough knowingly when he came in. It was pleasant to walk abroad with a girl like Muriel in the capacity of the accepted wooer. Above all, it was pleasant to sit holding Muriel's hand and watching the ill-concealed efforts of Mr. Albert Potter to hide his mortification. Albert was a mechanic in the motor-works round the corner, and hitherto Roland had always felt something of a worm in his presence. Albert was so infernally strong and silent and efficient. He could dissect a car and put it together again. He could drive through the thickest traffic. He could sit silent in company without having his silence attributed to shyness or imbecility. But —he could not get engaged to Muriel Coppin. That was reserved for Roland Bleke, the nut, the dasher, the young man of affairs. It was all very well being able to tell a spark-plug from a commutator at sight, but when it came to a contest in an affair of the heart with a man like Roland, Albert was in his proper place, third at the pole. Probably, if he could have gone on merely being engaged, Roland would never have wearied of the experience. But the word marriage began to creep more and more into the family conversation, and suddenly panic descended upon Roland Bleke. All his life he had had a horror of definite appointments. An invitation to tea a week ahead had been enough to poison life for him. He was one of those young men whose souls revolt at the thought of planning out any definite step. He could do things on the spur of the moment, but plans made him lose his nerve. By the end of the month his whole being was crying out to him in agonized tones: “Get me out of this. Do anything you like, but get me out of this frightful marriage business.” If anything had been needed to emphasize his desire for freedom, the attitude of Frank and Percy would have supplied it. Every day they made it clearer that the man who married Muriel would be no stranger to them. It would be his pleasing task to support them, too, in the style to which they had become accustomed. They conveyed the idea that they went with Muriel as a sort of bonus. The Coppin family were at high tea when Roland reached home. There was a general stir of interest as he entered the room, for it was known that he had left that morning with the intention of approaching Mr. Fineberg on the important matter of a rise in salary. Mr. Coppin removed his saucer of tea from his lips. Frank brushed the tail of a sardine from the corner of his mouth. Percy ate his haddock in an undertone. Albert Potter, who was present, glowered silently. Roland shook his head with the nearest approach to gloom which his rejoicing heart would permit. “I'm afraid I've bad news.” Mrs. Coppin burst into tears, her invariable practise in any crisis. Albert Potter's face relaxed into something resembling a smile. “He won't give you your raise?” Roland sighed. “He's reduced me.” “Reduced you!” “Yes. Times are bad just at present, so he has had to lower me to a hundred and ten.” The collected jaws of the family fell as one jaw. Muriel herself seemed to be bearing the blow with fortitude, but the rest were stunned. Frank and Percy might have been posing for a picture of men who had lost their fountain pens. Beneath the table the hand of Albert Potter found the hand of Muriel Coppin, and held it; and Muriel, we regret to add, turned and bestowed upon Albert a half-smile of tender understanding. “I suppose,” said Roland, “we couldn't get married on a hundred and ten?” “No,” said Percy. “No,” said Frank. “No,” said Albert Potter. They all spoke decidedly, but Albert the most decidedly of the three. “Then,” said Roland regretfully, “I'm afraid we must wait.” It seemed to be the general verdict that they must wait. Muriel said she thought they must wait. Albert Potter, whose opinion no one had asked, was quite certain that they must wait. Mrs. Coppin, between sobs, moaned that it would be best to wait. Frank and Percy, morosely devouring bread and jam, said they supposed they would have to wait. And, to end a painful scene, Roland drifted silently from the room, and went up-stairs to his own quarters. There was a telegram on the mantel. “Some fellows,” he soliloquized happily, as he opened it, “wouldn't have been able to manage a little thing like that. They would have given themselves away. They would——” The contents of the telegram demanded his attention. For some time they conveyed nothing to him. The thing might have been written in Hindustani. It would have been quite appropriate if it had been, for it was from the promoters of the Calcutta Sweep, and it informed him that, as the holder of ticket number 108,694, he had drawn Gelatine, and in recognition of this fact a check for five hundred pounds would be forwarded to him in due course. Roland's first feeling was one of pure bewilderment. As far as he could recollect, he had never had any dealings whatsoever with these open-handed gentlemen. Then memory opened her flood-gates and swept him back to a morning ages ago, so it seemed to him, when Mr. Fineberg's eldest son Ralph, passing through the office on his way to borrow money from his father, had offered him for ten shillings down a piece of cardboard, at the same time saying something about a sweep. Partly from a vague desire to keep in with the Fineberg clan, but principally because it struck him as rather a doggish thing to do, Roland had passed over the ten shillings; and there, as far as he had known, the matter had ended. And now, after all this time, that simple action had borne fruit in the shape of Gelatine and a check for five hundred pounds. Roland's next emotion was triumph. The sudden entry of checks for five hundred pounds into a man's life is apt to produce this result. For the space of some minutes he gloated; and then reaction set in. Five hundred pounds meant marriage with Muriel. His brain worked quickly. He must conceal this thing. With trembling fingers he felt for his match-box, struck a match, and burnt the telegram to ashes. Then, feeling a little better, he sat down to think the whole matter over. His meditations brought a certain amount of balm. After all, he felt, the thing could quite easily be kept a secret. He would receive the check in due course, as stated, and he would bicycle over to the neighboring town of Lexingham and start a bank-account with it. Nobody would know, and life would go on as before. He went to bed, and slept peacefully. It was about a week after this that he was roused out of a deep sleep at eight o'clock in the morning to find his room full of Coppins. Mr. Coppin was there in a nightshirt and his official trousers. Mrs. Coppin was there, weeping softly in a brown dressing-gown. Modesty had apparently kept Muriel from the gathering, but brothers Frank and Percy stood at his bedside, shaking him by the shoulders and shouting. Mr. Coppin thrust a newspaper at him, as he sat up blinking. These epic moments are best related swiftly. Roland took the paper, and the first thing that met his sleepy eye and effectually drove the sleep from it was this head-line: ROMANCE OF THE CALCUTTA SWEEPSTAKES And beneath it another in type almost as large as the first: POOR CLERK WINS £40,000 His own name leaped at him from the printed page, and with it that of the faithful Gelatine. Flight! That was the master-word which rang in Roland's brain as day followed day. The wild desire of the trapped animal to be anywhere except just where he was had come upon him. He was past the stage when conscience could have kept him to his obligations. He had ceased to think of anything or any one but himself. All he asked of Fate was to remove him from Bury St. Edwards on any terms. It may be that some inkling of his state of mind was wafted telepathically to Frank and Percy, for it can not be denied that their behavior at this juncture was more than a little reminiscent of the police force. Perhaps it was simply their natural anxiety to keep an eye on what they already considered their own private gold-mine that made them so adhesive. Certainly there was no hour of the day when one or the other was not in Roland's immediate neighborhood. Their vigilance even extended to the night hours, and once, when Roland, having tossed sleeplessly on his bed, got up at two in the morning, with the wild idea of stealing out of the house and walking to London, a door opened as he reached the top of the stairs, and a voice asked him what he thought he was doing. The statement that he was walking in his sleep was accepted, but coldly. It was shortly after this that, having by dint of extraordinary strategy eluded the brothers and reached the railway-station, Roland, with his ticket to London in his pocket and the express already entering the station, was engaged in conversation by old Mr. Coppin, who appeared from nowhere to denounce the high cost of living in a speech that lasted until the tail-lights of the train had vanished and Brothers Frank and Percy arrived, panting. A man has only a certain capacity for battling with Fate. After this last episode Roland gave in. Not even the exquisite agony of hearing himself described in church as a bachelor of this parish, with the grim addition that this was for the second time of asking, could stir him to a fresh dash for liberty. Altho the shadow of the future occupied Roland's mind almost to the exclusion of everything else, he was still capable of suffering a certain amount of additional torment from the present; and one of the things which made the present a source of misery to him was the fact that he was expected to behave more like a mad millionaire than a sober young man with a knowledge of the value of money. His mind, trained from infancy to a decent respect for the pence, had not yet adjusted itself to the possession of large means; and the open-handed role forced upon him by the family appalled him. When the Coppins wanted anything, they asked for it; and it seemed to Roland that they wanted pretty nearly everything. If Mr. Coppin had reached his present age without the assistance of a gold watch, he might surely have struggled along to the end on gun- metal. In any case, a man of his years should have been thinking of higher things than mere gauds and trinkets. A like criticism applied to Mrs. Coppin's demand for a silk petticoat, which struck Roland as simply indecent. Frank and Percy took theirs mostly in specie. It was Muriel who struck the worst blow by insisting on a hired motor-car. Roland hated motor-cars, especially when they were driven by Albert Potter, as this one was. Albert, that strong, silent man, had but one way of expressing his emotions, namely to open the throttle and shave the paint off trolley-cars. Disappointed love was giving Albert a good deal of discomfort at this time, and he found it made him feel better to go round corners on two wheels. As Muriel sat next to him on these expeditions, Roland squashing into the tonneau with Frank and Percy, his torments were subtle. He was not given a chance to forget, and the only way in which he could obtain a momentary diminution of the agony was to increase the speed to sixty miles an hour. It was in this fashion that they journeyed to the neighboring town of Lexingham to see M. Etienne Feriaud perform his feat of looping the loop in his aeroplane. It was Brother Frank's idea that they should make up a party to go and see M. Feriaud. Frank's was one of those generous, unspoiled natures which never grow blasé at the sight of a fellow human taking a sporting chance at hara-kiri. He was a well-known figure at every wild animal exhibition within a radius of fifty miles, and M. Feriaud drew him like a magnet. “The blighter goes up,” he explained, as he conducted the party into the arena, “and then he stands on his head and goes round in circles. I've seen pictures of it.” It appeared that M. Feriaud did even more than this. Posters round the ground advertised the fact that, on receipt of five pounds, he would take up a passenger with him. To date, however, there appeared to have been no rush on the part of the canny inhabitants of Lexingham to avail themselves of this chance of a breath of fresh air. M. Feriaud, a small man with a chubby and amiable face, wandered about signing picture cards and smoking a lighted cigaret, looking a little disappointed. Albert Potter was scornful. “Lot of rabbits,” he said. “Where's their pluck? And I suppose they call themselves Englishmen. I'd go up precious quick if I had a five-pound note. Disgrace, I call it, letting a Frenchman have the laugh of us.” It was a long speech for Mr. Potter, and it drew a look of respectful tenderness from Muriel. “You're so brave, Mr. Potter,” she said. Whether it was the slight emphasis which she put on the first word, or whether it was sheer generosity that impelled him, one can not say; but Roland produced the required sum even while she spoke. He offered it to his rival. Mr. Potter started, turned a little pale, then drew himself up and waved the note aside. “I take no favors,” he said with dignity. There was a pause. “Why don't you do it.” said Albert, nastily. “Five pounds is nothing to you.” “Why should I?” “Ah! Why should you?” It would be useless to assert that Mr. Potter's tone was friendly. It stung Roland. It seemed to him that Muriel was looking at him in an unpleasantly contemptuous manner. In some curious fashion, without doing anything to merit it, he had apparently become an object of scorn and derision to the party. “All right, then, I will,” he said suddenly. “Easy enough to talk,” said Albert. Roland strode with a pale but determined face to the spot where M. Feriaud, beaming politely, was signing a picture post-card. Some feeling of compunction appeared to come to Muriel at the eleventh hour. “Don't let him,” she cried. But Brother Frank was made of sterner stuff. This was precisely the sort of thing which, in his opinion, made for a jolly afternoon. For years he had been waiting for something of this kind. He was experiencing that pleasant thrill which comes to a certain type of person when the victim of a murder in the morning paper is an acquaintance of theirs. “What are you talking about?” he said. “There's no danger. At least, not much. He might easily come down all right. Besides, he wants to. What do you want to go interfering for?” Roland returned. The negotiations with the bird-man had lasted a little longer than one would have expected. But then, of course, M. Feriaud was a foreigner, and Roland's French was not fluent. He took Muriel's hand. “Good-by,” he said. He shook hands with the rest of the party, even with Albert Potter. It struck Frank that he was making too much fuss over a trifle— and, worse, delaying the start of the proceedings. “What's it all about?” he demanded. “You go on as if we were never going to see you again.” “You never know.” “It's as safe as being in bed.” “But still, in case we never meet again——” “Oh, well,” said Brother Frank, and took the outstretched hand. The little party stood and watched as the aeroplane moved swiftly along the ground, rose, and soared into the air. Higher and higher it rose, till the features of the two occupants were almost invisible. “Now,” said Brother Frank. “Now watch. Now he's going to loop the loop.” But the wheels of the aeroplane still pointed to the ground. It grew smaller and smaller. It was a mere speck. “What the dickens?” Far away to the West something showed up against the blue of the sky—something that might have been a bird, a toy kite, or an aeroplane traveling rapidly into the sunset. Four pairs of eyes followed it in rapt silence. THE EPISODE OF THE FINANCIAL NAPOLEON Second of a Series of Six Stories [First published in Pictorial Review, June 1916] Seated with his wife at breakfast on the veranda which overlooked the rolling lawns and leafy woods of his charming Sussex home, Geoffrey Windlebird, the great financier, was enjoying the morning sun to the full. His chubby features were relaxed in a smile of lazy contentment; and his wife, who liked to act sometimes as his secretary, found it difficult to get him to pay any attention to his morning's mail. “There's a column in to-day's Financial Argus,” she said, “of which you really must take notice. It's most abusive. It's about the Wildcat Reef. They assert that there never was any gold in the mine, and that you knew it when you floated the company.” “They will have their little joke.” “But you had the usual mining-expert's report.” “Of course we had. And a capital report it was. I remember thinking at the time what a neat turn of phrase the fellow had. I admit he depended rather on his fine optimism than on any examination of the mine. As a matter of fact, he never went near it. And why should he? It's down in South America somewhere. Awful climate—snakes, mosquitoes, revolutions, fever.” Mr. Windlebird spoke drowsily. His eyes closed. “Well, the Argus people say that they have sent a man of their own out there to make inquiries, a well-known expert, and the report will be in within the next fortnight. They say they will publish it in their next number but one. What are you going to do about it?” Mr. Windlebird yawned. “Not to put too fine a point on it, dearest, the game is up. The Napoleon of Finance is about to meet his Waterloo. And all for twenty thousand pounds. That is the really bitter part of it. To-morrow we sail for the Argentine. I've got the tickets.” “You're joking, Geoffrey. You must be able to raise twenty thousand. It's a flea-bite.” “On paper—in the form of shares, script, bonds, promissory notes, it is a flea-bite. But when it has to be produced in the raw, in flat, hard lumps of gold or in crackling bank-notes, it's more like a bite from a hippopotamus. I can't raise it, and that's all about it. So —St. Helena for Napoleon.” Altho Geoffrey Windlebird described himself as a Napoleon of Finance, a Cinquevalli or Chung Ling Soo of Finance would have been a more accurate title. As a juggler with other people's money he was at the head of his class. And yet, when one came to examine it, his method was delightfully simple. Say, for instance, that the Home-grown Tobacco Trust, founded by Geoffrey in a moment of ennui, failed to yield those profits which the glowing prospectus had led the public to expect. Geoffrey would appease the excited shareholders by giving them Preference Shares (interest guaranteed) in the Sea-gold Extraction Company, hastily floated to meet the emergency. When the interest became due, it would, as likely as not, be paid out of the capital just subscribed for the King Solomon's Mines Exploitation Association, the little deficiency in the latter being replaced in its turn, when absolutely necessary and not a moment before, by the transfer of some portion of the capital just raised for yet another company. And so on, ad infinitum. There were moments when it seemed to Mr. Windlebird that he had solved the problem of Perpetual Promotion. The only thing that can stop a triumphal progress like Mr. Windlebird's is when some coarse person refuses to play to the rules, and demands ready money instead of shares in the next venture. This had happened now, and it had flattened Mr. Windlebird like an avalanche. He was a philosopher, but he could not help feeling a little galled that the demand which had destroyed him had been so trivial. He had handled millions—on paper, it was true, but still millions—and here he was knocked out of time by a paltry twenty thousand pounds. “Are you absolutely sure that nothing can be done?” persisted Mrs. Windlebird. “Have you tried every one?” “Every one, dear moon-of-my-delight—the probables, the possibles, the highly unlikelies, and the impossibles. Never an echo to the minstrel's wooing song. No, my dear, we have got to take to the boats this time. Unless, of course, some one possessed at one and the same time of twenty thousand pounds and a very confiding nature happens to drop from the clouds.” As he spoke, an aeroplane came sailing over the tops of the trees beyond the tennis-lawn. Gracefully as a bird it settled on the smooth turf, not twenty yards from where he was seated. Roland Bleke stepped stiffly out onto the tennis-lawn. His progress rather resembled that of a landsman getting out of an open boat in which he has spent a long and perilous night at sea. He was feeling more wretched than he had ever felt in his life. He had a severe cold. He had a splitting headache. His hands and feet were frozen. His eyes smarted. He was hungry. He was thirsty. He hated cheerful M. Feriaud, who had hopped out and was now busy tinkering the engine, a gay Provencal air upon his lips, as he had rarely hated any one, even Muriel Coppin's brother Frank. So absorbed was he in his troubles that he was not aware of Mr. Windlebird's approach until that pleasant, portly man's shadow fell on the turf before him. “Not had an accident, I hope, Mr. Bleke?” Roland was too far gone in misery to speculate as to how this genial stranger came to know his name. As a matter of fact, Mrs. Windlebird, keen student of the illustrated press, had recognized Roland by his photograph in the Daily Mirror. In the course of the twenty yards' walk from house to tennis-lawn she had put her husband into possession of the more salient points in Roland's history. It was when Mr. Windlebird heard that Roland had forty thousand pounds in the bank that he sat up and took notice. “Lead me to him,” he said simply. Roland sneezed. “Doe accident, thag you,” he replied miserably. “Somethig's gone wrong with the worgs, but it's nothing serious, worse luck.” M. Feriaud, having by this time adjusted the defect in his engine, rose to his feet, and bowed. “Excuse if we come down on your lawn. But not long do we trespass. See, mon ami,” he said radiantly to Roland, “all now O. K. We go on.” “No,” said Roland decidedly. “No? What you mean—no?” A shade of alarm fell on M. Feriaud's weather-beaten features. The eminent bird-man did not wish to part from Roland. Toward Roland he felt like a brother, for Roland had notions about payment for little aeroplane rides which bordered upon the princely. “But you say—take me to France with you——” “I know. But it's all off. I'm not feeling well.” “But it's all wrong.” M. Feriaud gesticulated to drive home his point. “You give me one hundred pounds to take you away from Lexingham. Good. It is here.” He slapped his breast pocket. “But the other two hundred pounds which also you promise me to pay me when I place you safe in France, where is that, my friend?” “I will give you two hundred and fifty,” said Roland earnestly, “to leave me here, and go right away, and never let me see your beastly machine again.” A smile of brotherly forgiveness lit up M. Feriaud's face. The generous Gallic nature asserted itself. He held out his arms affectionately to Roland. “Ah, now you talk. Now you say something,” he cried in his impetuous way. “Embrace me. You are all right.” Roland heaved a sigh of relief when, five minutes later, the aeroplane disappeared over the brow of the hill. Then he began to sneeze again. “You're not well, you know,” said Mr. Windlebird. “I've caught cold. We've been flying about all night—that French ass lost his bearings—and my suit is thin. Can you direct me to a hotel?” “Hotel? Nonsense.” Mr. Windlebird spoke in the bluff, breezy voice which at many a stricken board-meeting had calmed frantic shareholders as if by magic. “You're coming right into my house and up to bed this instant.” It was not till he was between the sheets with a hot-water bottle at his toes and a huge breakfast inside him that Roland learned the name of his good Samaritan. When he did, his first impulse was to struggle out of bed and make his escape. Geoffrey Windlebird's was a name which he had learned, in the course of his mercantile career, to hold in something approaching reverence as that of one of the mightiest business brains of the age. To have to meet so eminent a man in the capacity of invalid, a nuisance about the house, was almost too much for Roland's shrinking nature. The kindness of the Windlebirds—and there seemed to be nothing that they were not ready to do for him—distressed him beyond measure. To have a really great man like Geoffrey Windlebird sprawling genially over his bed, chatting away as if he were an ordinary friend, was almost horrible. Such condescension was too much. Gradually, as he became convalescent, Roland found this feeling replaced by something more comfortable. They were such a genuine, simple, kindly couple, these Windlebirds, that he lost awe and retained only gratitude. He loved them both. He opened his heart to them. It was not long before he had told them the history of his career, skipping the earlier years and beginning with the entry of wealth into his life. “It makes you feel funny,” he confided to Mr. Windlebird's sympathetic ear, “suddenly coming into a pot of money like that. You don't seem hardly able to realize it. I don't know what to do with it.” Mr. Windlebird smiled paternally. “The advice of an older man who has had, if I may say so, some little experience of finance, might be useful to you there. Perhaps if you would allow me to recommend some sound investment——” Roland glowed with gratitude. “There's just one thing I'd like to do before I start putting my money into anything. It's like this.” He briefly related the story of his unfortunate affair with Muriel Coppin. Within an hour of his departure in the aeroplane, his conscience had begun to trouble him on this point. He felt that he had not acted well toward Muriel. True, he was practically certain that she didn't care a bit about him and was in love with Albert, the silent mechanic, but there was just the chance that she was mourning over his loss; and, anyhow, his conscience was sore. “I'd like to give her something,” he said. “How much do you think?” Mr. Windlebird perpended. “I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll send my own lawyer to her with—say, a thousand pounds—not a check, you understand, but one thousand golden sovereigns that he can show her—roll about on the table in front of her eyes. That'll console her. It's wonderful, the effect money in the raw has on people.” “I'd rather make it two thousand,” said Roland. He had never really loved Muriel, and the idea of marrying her had been a nightmare to him; but he wanted to retreat with honor. “Very well, make it two thousand, if you like. Tho I don't quite know how old Harrison is going to carry all that money.” As a matter of fact, old Harrison never had to try. On thinking it over, after he had cashed Roland's check, Mr. Windlebird came to the conclusion that seven hundred pounds would be quite as much money as it would be good for Miss Coppin to have all at once. Mr. Windlebird's knowledge of human nature was not at fault. Muriel jumped at the money, and a letter in her handwriting informed Roland next morning that his slate was clean. His gratitude to Mr. Windlebird redoubled. “And now,” said Mr. Windlebird genially, “we can talk about that money of yours, and the best way of investing it. What you want is something which, without being in any way what is called speculative, nevertheless returns a fair and reasonable amount of interest. What you want is something sound, something solid, yet something with a bit of a kick to it, something which can't go down and may go soaring like a rocket.” Roland quietly announced that was just what he did want, and lit another cigar. “Now, look here, Bleke, my boy, as a general rule I don't give tips—But I've taken a great fancy to you, Bleke, and I'm going to break my rule. Put your money—” he sank his voice to a compelling whisper, “put every penny you can afford into Wildcat Reefs.” He leaned back with the benign air of the Alchemist who has just imparted to a favorite disciple the recently discovered secret of the philosopher's stone. “Thank you very much, Mr. Windlebird,” said Roland gratefully. “I will.” The Napoleonic features were lightened by that rare, indulgent smile. “Not so fast, young man,” laughed Mr. Windlebird. “Getting into Wildcat Reefs isn't quite so easy as you seem to think. Shall we say that you propose to invest thirty thousand pounds? Yes? Very well, then. Thirty thousand pounds! Why, if it got about that you were going to buy Wildcat Reefs on that scale the market would be convulsed.” Which was perfectly true. If it had got about that any one was going to invest thirty thousand pounds—or pence—in Wildcat Reefs, the market would certainly have been convulsed. The House would have rocked with laughter. Wildcat Reefs were a standing joke— except to the unfortunate few who still held any of the shares. “The thing will have to be done very cautiously. No one must know. But I think—I say I think—I can manage it for you.” “You're awfully kind, Mr. Windlebird.” “Not at all, my dear boy, not at all. As a matter of fact, I shall be doing a very good turn to another pal of mine at the same time.” He filled his glass. “This—” he paused to sip—“this pal of mine has a large holding of Wildcats. He wants to realize in order to put the money into something else, in which he is more personally interested.” Mr. Windlebird paused. His mind dwelt for a moment on his overdrawn current account at the bank. “In which he is more personally interested,” he repeated dreamily. “But of course you couldn't unload thirty pounds' worth of Wildcats in the public market.” “I quite see that,” assented Roland. “It might, however, be done by private negotiation,” he said. “I must act very cautiously. Give me your check for the thirty thousand to-night, and I will run up to town to-morrow morning, and see what I can do.” He did it. What hidden strings he pulled, what levers he used, Roland did not know. All Roland knew was that somehow, by some subtle means, Mr. Windlebird brought it off. Two days later his host handed him twenty thousand one-pound shares in the Wildcat Reef Gold-mine. “There, my boy,” he said. “It's awfully kind of you, Mr. Windlebird.” “My dear boy, don't mention it. If you're satisfied, I'm sure I am.” Mr. Windlebird always spoke the truth when he could. He spoke it now. It seemed to Roland, as the days went by, that nothing could mar the pleasant, easy course of life at the Windlebirds. The fine weather, the beautiful garden, the pleasant company—all these things combined to make this sojourn an epoch in his life. He discovered his mistake one lovely afternoon as he sat smoking idly on the terrace. Mrs. Windlebird came to him, and a glance was enough to show Roland that something was seriously wrong. Her face was drawn and tired. A moment before, Roland had been thinking life perfect. The only crumpled rose-leaf had been the absence of an evening paper. Mr. Windlebird would bring one back with him when he returned from the city, but Roland wanted one now. He was a great follower of county cricket, and he wanted to know how Surrey was faring against Yorkshire. But even this crumpled rose-leaf had been smoothed out, for Johnson, the groom, who happened to be riding into the nearest town on an errand, had promised to bring one back with him. He might appear at any moment now. The sight of his hostess drove all thoughts of sport out of his mind. She was looking terribly troubled. It flashed across Roland that both his host and hostess had been unusually silent at dinner the night before; and later, passing Mr. Windlebird's room on his way to bed, he had heard their voices, low and agitated. Could they have had some bad news? “Mr. Bleke, I want to speak to you.” Roland moved like a sympathetic cow, and waited to hear more. “You were not up when my husband left for the city this morning, or he would have told you himself. Mr. Bleke, I hardly know how to break it to you.” “Break it to me!” “My husband advised you to put a very large sum of money in a mine called Wildcat Reefs.” “Yes. Thirty thousand pounds.” “As much as that! Oh, Mr. Bleke!” She began to cry softly. She pressed his hand. Roland gaped at her. “Mr. Bleke, there has been a terrible slump in Wildcat Reefs. To-day, they may be absolutely worthless.” Roland felt as if a cold hand had been laid on his spine. “Wor-worthless!” he stammered. Mrs. Windlebird looked at him with moist eyes. “You can imagine how my husband feels about this. It was on his advice that you invested your money. He holds himself directly responsible. He is in a terrible state of mind. He is frantic. He has grown so fond of you, Mr. Bleke, that he can hardly face the thought that he has been the innocent instrument of your trouble.” Roland felt that it was an admirable comparison. His sensations were precisely those of a leading actor in an earthquake. The solid earth seemed to melt under him. “We talked it over last night after you had gone to bed, and we came to the conclusion that there was only one honorable step to take. We must make good your losses. We must buy back those shares.” A ray of hope began to steal over Roland's horizon. “But——” he began. “There are no buts, really, Mr. Bleke. We should neither of us know a minute's peace if we didn't do it. Now, you paid thirty thousand pounds for the shares, you said? Well”—she held out a pink slip of paper to him—“this will make everything all right.” Roland looked at the check. “But—but this is signed by you,” he said. “Yes. You see, if Geoffrey had to sign a check for that amount, it would mean selling out some of his stock, and in his position, with every movement watched by enemies, he can not afford to do it. It might ruin the plans of years. But I have some money of my own. My selling out stock doesn't matter, you see. I have post-dated the check a week, to give me time to realize on the securities in which my money is invested.” Roland's whole nature rose in revolt at this sacrifice. If it had been his host who had made this offer, he would have accepted it. But chivalry forbade his taking this money from a woman. A glow of self-sacrifice warmed him. After all, what was this money of his? He had never had any fun out of it. He had had so little acquaintance with it that for all practical purposes it might never have been his. With a gesture which had once impressed him very favorably when exhibited on the stage by the hero of the number two company of “The Price of Honor,” which had paid a six days' visit to Bury St. Edwards a few months before, he tore the check into little pieces. “I couldn't accept it, Mrs. Windlebird,” he said. “I can't tell you how deeply I appreciate your wonderful kindness, but I really couldn't. I bought the shares with my eyes open. The whole thing is nobody's fault, and I can't let you suffer for it. After the way you have treated me here, it would be impossible. I can't take your money. It's noble and generous of you in the extreme, but I can't accept it. I've still got a little money left, and I've always been used to working for my living, anyway, so—so it's all right.” “Mr. Bleke, I implore you.” Roland was hideously embarrassed. He looked right and left for a way of escape. He could hardly take to his heels, and yet there seemed no other way of ending the interview. Then, with a start of relief, he perceived Johnson the groom coming toward him with the evening paper. “Johnson said he was going into the town,” said Roland apologetically, “so I asked him to get me an evening paper. I wanted to see the lunch scores.” If he had been looking at his hostess then, an action which he was strenuously avoiding, he might have seen a curious spasm pass over her face. Mrs. Windlebird turned very pale and sat down suddenly in the chair which Roland had vacated at the beginning of their conversation. She lay back in it with her eyes closed. She looked tired and defeated. Roland took the paper mechanically. He wanted it as a diversion to the conversation merely, for his interest in the doings of Surrey and Yorkshire had waned to the point of complete indifference in competition with Mrs. Windlebird's news. Equally mechanically he unfolded it and glanced at front page; and, as he did do, a flaring explosion of headlines smote his eye. Out of the explosion emerged the word “WILD-CATS”. “Why!” he exclaimed. “There's columns about Wild-cats on the front page here!” “Yes?” Mrs. Windlebird's voice sounded strangely dull and toneless. Her eyes were still closed. Roland took in the headlines with starting eyes. THE WILD-CAT REEF GOLD-MINE ANOTHER KLONDIKE FRENZIED SCENES ON THE STOCK EXCHANGE BROKERS FIGHT FOR SHARES RECORD BOOM UNPRECEDENTED RISE IN PRICES Shorn of all superfluous adjectives and general journalistic exuberance, what the paper had to announce to its readers was this: The “special commissioner” sent out by The Financial Argus to make an exhaustive examination of the Wild-cat Reef Mine—with the amiable view, no doubt, of exploding Mr. Geoffrey Windlebird once and for all with the confiding British public—has found, to his unbounded astonishment, that there are vast quantities of gold in the mine. The discovery of the new reef, the largest and richest, it is stated, since the famous Mount Morgan, occurred with dramatic appropriateness on the very day of his arrival. We need scarcely remind our readers that, until that moment, Wild-cat Reef shares had reached a very low figure, and only a few optimists retained their faith in the mine. As the largest holder, Mr. Windlebird is to be heartily congratulated on this new addition to his fortune. The publication of the expert's report in The Financial Argus has resulted in a boom in Wild-cats, the like of which can seldom have been seen on the Stock Exchange. From something like one shilling and sixpence per bundle the one pound shares have gone up to nearly ten pounds a share, and even at this latter figure people were literally fighting to secure them. The world swam about Roland. He was stupefied and even terrified. The very atmosphere seemed foggy. So far as his reeling brain was capable of thought, he figured that he was now worth about two hundred thousand pounds. “Oh, Mrs. Windlebird,” he cried, “It's all right after all.” Mrs. Windlebird sat back in her chair without answering. “It's all right for every one,” screamed Roland joyfully. “Why, if I've made a couple of hundred thousand, what must Mr. Windlebird have netted. It says here that he is the largest holder. He must have pulled off the biggest thing of his life.” He thought for a moment. “The chap I'm sorry for,” he said meditatively, “is Mr. Windlebird's pal. You know. The fellow whom Mr. Windlebird persuaded to sell all his shares to me.” A faint moan escaped from his hostess's pale lips. Roland did not hear it. He was reading the cricket news. THE EPISODE OF THE THEATRICAL VENTURE Third of a Series of Six Stories [First published in Pictorial Review, July 1916] It was one of those hard, nubbly rolls. The best restaurants charge you sixpence for having the good sense not to eat them. It hit Roland Bleke with considerable vehemence on the bridge of the nose. For the moment Roland fancied that the roof of the Regent Grill-room must have fallen in; and, as this would automatically put an end to the party, he was not altogether sorry. He had never been to a theatrical supper-party before, and within five minutes of his arrival at the present one he had become afflicted with an intense desire never to go to a theatrical supper-party again. To be a success at these gay gatherings one must possess dash; and Roland, whatever his other sterling qualities, was a little short of dash. The young man on the other side of the table was quite nice about it. While not actually apologizing, he went so far as to explain that it was “old Gerry” whom he had had in his mind when he started the roll on its course. After a glance at old Gerry—a chinless child of about nineteen—Roland felt that it would be churlish to be angry with a young man whose intentions had been so wholly admirable. Old Gerry had one of those faces in which any alteration, even the comparatively limited one which a roll would be capable of producing, was bound to be for the better. He smiled a sickly smile and said that it didn't matter. The charming creature who sat on his assailant's left, however, took a more serious view of the situation. “Sidney, you make me tired,” she said severely. “If I had thought you didn't know how to act like a gentleman I wouldn't have come here with you. Go away somewhere and throw bread at yourself, and ask Mr. Bleke to come and sit by me. I want to talk to him.” That was Roland's first introduction to Miss Billy Verepoint. “I've been wanting to have a chat with you all the evening, Mr. Bleke,” she said, as Roland blushingly sank into the empty chair. “I've heard such a lot about you.” What Miss Verepoint had heard about Roland was that he had two hundred thousand pounds and apparently did not know what to do with it. “In fact, if I hadn't been told that you would be here, I shouldn't have come to this party. Can't stand these gatherings of nuts in May as a general rule. They bore me stiff.” Roland hastily revised his first estimate of the theatrical profession. Shallow, empty-headed creatures some of them might be, no doubt, but there were exceptions. Here was a girl of real discernment—a thoughtful student of character—a girl who understood that a man might sit at a supper-party without uttering a word and might still be a man of parts. “I'm afraid you'll think me very outspoken—but that's me all over. All my friends say, 'Billy Verepoint's a funny girl: if she likes any one she just tells them so straight out; and if she doesn't like any one she tells them straight out, too.'” “And a very admirable trait,” said Roland, enthusiastically. Miss Verepoint sighed. “P'raps it is,” she said pensively, “but I'm afraid it's what has kept me back in my profession. Managers don't like it: they think girls should be seen and not heard.” Roland's blood boiled. Managers were plainly a dastardly crew. “But what's the good of worryi...