"Doesn"t it for the moment sufficiently answer your question," Lord Theign asked, "that they"re definitely not bought at Dedborough?"
"Why," said Mr. Bender with a wealthy patience, "you talk as if it were my interest to be _reasonable_--which shows how little you understand.
I"d be ashamed--with the lovely ideas I have--if I didn"t make you kick." And his st.u.r.dy smile for it all fairly proclaimed his faith.
"Well, I guess I can wait!"
This again in turn visibly affected Lord John: marking the moment from which he, in spite of his cultivated levity, allowed an intenser and more sustained look to keep straying toward their host. "Mr. Bender"s bound to _have_ something!"
It was even as if after a minute Lord Theign had been reached by his friend"s mute pressure. ""Something"?"
"Something, Mr. Bender?" Lord John insisted.
It made their visitor rather sharply fix him. "Why, have _you_ an interest, Lord John?"
This personage, though undisturbed by the challenge, if such it was, referred it to Lord Theign. "Do you authorise me to speak--a little--as if I have an interest?"
Lord Theign gave the appeal--and the speaker--a certain attention, and then appeared rather sharply to turn away from them. "My dear fellow, you may amuse yourself at my expense as you like!"
"Oh, I don"t mean at your expense," Lord John laughed--"I mean at Mr.
Bender"s!"
"Well, go ahead, Lord John," said that gentleman, always easy, but always too, as you would have felt, aware of everything--"go ahead, but don"t sweetly hope to create me in any desire that doesn"t already exist in the germ. The attempt has often been made, over here--has in fact been organised on a considerable scale; but I guess I"ve got some peculiarity, for it doesn"t seem as if the thing could be done. If the germ is there, on the other hand," Mr. Bender conceded, "it develops independently of all encouragement."
Lord John communicated again as in a particular sense with Lord Theign.
"He thinks I really mean to _offer_ him something!"
Lord Theign, who seemed to wish to advertise a degree of detachment from the issue, or from any other such, strolled off, in his restlessness, toward the door that opened to the terrace, only stopping on his way to light a cigarette from a matchbox on a small table. It was but after doing so that he made the remark: "Ah, Mr. Bender may easily be too much for you!"
"That makes me the more sorry, sir," said his visitor, "not to have been enough for _you!_"
"I risk it, at any rate," Lord John went on--"I put you, Bender, the question of whether you wouldn"t Move," as you say, to acquire that Moretto."
Mr. Bender"s large face had a commensurate gaze. "As I say? I haven"t said anything of the sort!"
"But you do "love" you know," Lord John slightly overgrimaced.
"I don"t when I don"t want to. I"m different from most people--I can love or not as I like. The trouble with that Moretto," Mr. Bender continued, "is that it ain"t what I"m after."
His "after" had somehow, for the ear, the vividness of a sharp whack on the resisting surface of things, and was concerned doubtless in Lord John"s speaking again across to their host. "The worst he can do for me, you see, is to refuse it."
Lord Theign, who practically had his back turned and was fairly dandling about in his impatience, tossed out to the terrace the cigarette he had but just lighted. Yet he faced round to reply: "It"s the very first time in the history of this house (a long one, Mr. Bender) that a picture, or anything else in it, has been offered----!"
It was not imperceptible that even if he hadn"t dropped Mr. Bender mightn"t have been markedly impressed. "Then it must be the very first time such an offer has failed."
"Oh, it isn"t that we in the least press it!" Lord Theign quite naturally laughed.
"Ah, I beg your pardon--I press it very hard!" And Lord John, as taking from his face and manner a cue for further humorous license, went so far as to emulate, though sympathetically enough, their companion"s native form. "You don"t mean to say you don"t feel the interest of that Moretto?"
Mr. Bender, quietly confident, took his time to reply. "Well, if you had seen me up on that chair you"d have thought I did."
"Then you must have stepped down from the chair properly impressed."
"I stepped down quite impressed with that young man."
"Mr. Crimble?"--it came after an instant to Lord John. "With _his_ opinion, really? Then I hope he"s aware of the picture"s value."
"You had better ask him," Mr. Bender observed.
"Oh, we don"t depend here on the Mr. Crimbles!" Lord John returned.
Mr. Bender took a longer look at him. "Are you aware of the value yourself?"
His friend resorted again, as for the amus.e.m.e.nt of the thing, to their entertainer. "Am I aware of the value of the Moretto?"
Lord Theign, who had meanwhile lighted another cigarette, appeared, a bit extravagantly smoking, to wish to put an end to his effect of hovering aloof.
"That question needn"t trouble us--when I see how much Mr. Bender himself knows about it."
"Well, Lord Theign, I only know what that young man puts it at." And then as the others waited, "Ten thousand," said Mr. Bender.
"Ten thousand?" The owner of the work showed no emotion.
"Well," said Lord John again in Mr. Bender"s style, "what"s the matter with ten thousand?"
The subject of his gay tribute considered. "There"s nothing the matter with ten thousand."
"Then," Lord Theign asked, "is there anything the matter with the picture?"
"Yes, sir--I guess there is."
It gave an upward push to his lordship"s eyebrows. "But what in the world----?"
"Well, that"s just the question!"
The eyebrows continued to rise. "Does he pretend there"s a question of whether it _is_ a Moretto?"
"That"s what he was up there trying to find out."
"But if the value"s, according to himself, ten thousand----?"
"Why, of course," said Mr. Bender, "it"s a fine work anyway."
"Then," Lord Theign brought good-naturedly out, "what"s the matter with _you_, Mr. Bender?"
That gentleman was perfectly clear. "The matter with me, Lord Theign, is that I"ve no use for a ten thousand picture."
""No use?""--the expression had an oddity. "But what"s it your idea to do with such things?"
"I mean," Mr. Bender explained, "that a picture of that rank is not what I"m after."