And realising how swiftly the golden minutes were fleeting beyond recall, he cast desperately about for his pipe.
By some miracle he chanced to find it, and so resumed packing.
Behind him, Milly made noises with tissue-paper.
Presently he heard a smothered "O sir!" and looked round to discover the housemaid in an att.i.tude of unmitigated adoration before what he could not deny was a perfect dream of a hat--the sort of a hat that only a woman or a society reporter could do justice to. In his vision it bore a striking resemblance to a Gainsborough with all modern improvements--as most big hats do to most men. Briefly, it was big and black and trimmed with an atmosphere of costly simplicity, a monstrous white "willow"
plume and a huge buckle of brilliants. It impressed him, hazily, as just the very hat to look ripping on an ash-blonde. Aside from this he was aware of no sensation other than one of aggravated annoyance.
Milly, to the reverse extreme, was charmed to distraction, thrilled to the core of her and breathless--though by no means dumb. Women are never dumb with admiration.
"O sir!" she breathed in ecstasy--"it"s a real creashun!"
"Daresay," Staff conceded sourly. "Did you find a note?"
"And the price-tag, sir--it says _twen_-ty five pounds!"
"I hope there"s a receipted bill, then.... Do you see anything remotely resembling a note--or something?"
With difficulty subduing her transports--"I"ll see, sir," said Milly.
Grunting with exasperation, Staff bent over a trunk and stuffed things into it until Milly committed herself to the definite announcement: "I don"t seem to find nothing, sir."
"Look again, please."
Again Milly pawed the tissue-paper.
"There ain"t nothing at all, sir," she declared finally.
Staff stood up, thrust his hands into his pockets and champed the stem of his pipe--scowling.
"It is a bit odd, sir, isn"t it?--having this sent to you like this and you knowing nothing at all about it!"
Staff said something indistinguishable because of the obstructing pipe-stem.
"It"s perfectly beautiful, sir--a won"erful hat, really."
"The devil fly away with it!"
"Beg pardon, sir?"
"I said, I"m simply crazy about it, myself."
"Oh, did you, sir?"
"Please put it back and tie it up."
"Yessir." Reluctantly Milly restored the creation to its tissue-paper nest. "And what would you wish me to do with it now, sir?" she resumed when at length the ravishing vision was hidden away.
"Do with it?" stormed the vexed gentleman. "I don"t care what the d--ickens you do with it. It isn"t my hat. Take it away. Throw it into the street. Send it back to the place it came from. Give it ... or, wait!"
Pausing for breath and thought, he changed his mind. The hat was too valuable to be treated with disrespect, no matter who was responsible for the mistake. Staff felt morally obligated to secure its return to the Maison Lucille.
"Look here, Milly ..."
"Yessir?"
"I"ll just telephone ... No! Half a minute!"
He checked, on the verge of yielding to an insane impulse. Being a native of New York, it had been his instinctive thought to call up the hat-shop and demand the return of its delivery-boy. Fortunately the instinct of a true dramatist moved him to sketch hastily the ground-plot of the suggested tragedy.
In _Act I_ (_Time: the Present_) he saw himself bearding the telephone in its lair--that is, in the darkest and least accessible recess of the ground-floor hallway. In firm, manful accents, befitting an intrepid soul, he details a number to the central operator--and meekly submits to an acidulated correction of his Amurrikin accent.
_Act II_ (_fifteen minutes have elapsed_): He is clinging desperately to the receiver, sustained by hope alone while he attends sympathetically to the sufferings of an English lady trying to get in communication with the Army and Navy Stores.
_Act III_ (_ten minutes later_): He has exhausted himself grinding away at an obsolete rotary bell-call. Abruptly his ears are enchanted by a far, thin, frigid moan. It says: "_Are_ you theah?" Responding savagely "NO!" he dashes the receiver back into its hook and flings away to discover that he has lost both train and steamer. Tag line: For this is London in the Twentieth Century. _Curtain: End of the Play._...
Disenchanted by consideration of this tentative synopsis, the playwright consulted his watch. Already the incident of the condemnable bandbox had eaten up much invaluable time. He would see himself doomed to unending perdition if he would submit to further hindrance on its behalf.
"Milly," said he with decision, "take that ... thing down-stairs, and tell Mrs. Gigg to telephone the hat-shop to call for it."
"Yessir."
"And after that, call me a taxi. Tell it to wait. I"ll be ready by ten or know--"
Promptly retiring, Milly took with her, in addition to the bandbox, a confused impression of a room whose atmosphere was thick with flying garments, in the wild swirl of which a lanky lunatic danced weirdly, muttering uncouth incantations....
Forty minutes later (on the stroke of ten) Mr. Staff, beautifully groomed after his habit, his manner (superbly nonchalant) denying that he had ever known reason why he should take a single step in haste, followed his trunks down to the sidewalk and, graciously bidding his landlady adieu, presented Milly with a keepsake in the shape of a golden coin of the realm.
A taxicab, heavy-laden with his things, fretted before the door. Staff nodded to the driver.
"Euston," said he; "and a shilling extra if you drive like sin."
"Right you are, sir."
In the act of entering the cab, Staff started back with bitter imprecations.
Mrs. Gigg, who had not quite closed the front door, opened it wide to his remonstrant voice.
"I say, what"s this bandbox doing in my cab? I thought I told Milly--"
"Sorry, sir; I forgot," Mrs. Gigg interposed--"bein" that fl.u.s.tered--"
"Well?"
"The woman what keeps the "at-shop said as "ow the "at wasn"t to come back, sir. She said a young lidy bought it yestiddy ahfternoon and awsked to "ave it sent you this mornin" before nine o"clock."
"The deuce she did!" said Staff blankly.