It"s all very well. You never had sisters. You know----"
Fred held his pipe elaborately out of the way and protruded his face to a confidential nearness.
"I believe they half like it," said Fred, in a confidential half whisper. "Such a go, you know. Mabel pretty near as bad. And the girls.
All making the very most they can of it. Me! I think Chatteris was the only man alive to hear "em. _I_ couldn"t get up emotion as they do, if my feet were being flayed. Cheerful home, eh? For holidays."
"Where"s--the princ.i.p.al gentleman?" asked Melville a little grimly. "In London?"
"Unprincipled gentleman, I call him," said Fred. "He"s stopping down here at the Metropole. Stuck."
"Down here? Stuck?"
"Rather. Stuck and set about."
My cousin tried for sidelights. "What"s his att.i.tude?" he asked.
"Slump," said Fred with intensity.
"This little blow-off has rather astonished him," he explained. "When he wrote to say that the election didn"t interest him for a bit, but he hoped to pull around----"
"You said you didn"t know what he wrote."
"I do that much," said Fred. "He no more thought they"d have spotted that it meant Miss Waters than a baby. But women are so thundering sharp, you know. They"re born spotters. How it"ll all end----"
"But why has he come to the Metropole?"
"Middle of the stage, I suppose," said Fred.
"What"s his att.i.tude?"
"Says he"s going to see Adeline and explain everything--and doesn"t do it.... Puts it off. And Adeline, as far as I can gather, says that if he doesn"t come down soon, she"s hanged if she"ll see him, much as her heart may be broken, and all that, if she doesn"t. You know."
"Naturally," said Melville, rather inconsecutively. "And he doesn"t?"
"Doesn"t stir."
"Does he see--the other lady?"
"We don"t know. We can"t watch him. But if he does he"s clever----"
"Why?"
"There"s about a hundred blessed relatives of his in the place--came like crows for a corpse. I never saw such a lot. Talk about a man of good old family--it"s decaying! I never saw such a high old family in my life. Aunts they are chiefly."
"Aunts?"
"Aunts. Say, they"ve rallied round him. How they got hold of it I don"t know. Like vultures. Unless the mater-- But they"re here. They"re all at him--using their influence with him, threatening to cut off legacies and all that. There"s one old girl at Bate"s, Lady Poynting Mallow--least bit horsey, but about as all right as any of "em--who"s been down here twice. Seems a trifle disappointed in Adeline. And there"s two aunts at Wampach"s--you know the sort that stop at Wampach"s--regular hothouse flowers--a watering-potful of real icy cold water would kill both of "em. And there"s one come over from the Continent, short hair, short skirts--regular terror--she"s at the Pavilion. They"re all chasing round saying, "Where is this woman-fish sort of thing? Let me peek!""
"Does that const.i.tute the hundred relatives?"
"Practically. The Wampachers are sending for a Bishop who used to be his schoolmaster----"
"No stone unturned, eh?"
"None."
"And has he found out yet----"
"That she"s a mermaid? I don"t believe he has. The pater went up to tell him. Of course, he was a bit out of breath and embarra.s.sed. And Chatteris cut him down. "At least let me hear nothing against her," he said. And the pater took that and came away. Good old pater. Eh?"
"And the aunts?"
"They"re taking it in. Mainly they grasp the fact that he"s going to jilt Adeline, just as he jilted the American girl. The mermaid side they seem to boggle at. Old people like that don"t take to a new idea all at once. The Wampach ones are shocked--but curious. They don"t believe for a moment she really is a mermaid, but they want to know all about it.
And the one down at the Pavilion simply said, "Bosh! How can she breathe under water? Tell me that, Mrs. Bunting. She"s some sort of person you have picked up, I don"t know how, but mermaid she _cannot_ be." They"d be all tremendously down on the mater, I think, for picking her up, if it wasn"t that they can"t do without her help to bring Addy round again.
Pretty mess all round, eh?"
"I suppose the aunts will tell him?"
"What?"
"About the tail."
"I suppose they will."
"And what then?"
"Heaven knows! Just as likely they won"t."
My cousin meditated on the veranda tiles for a s.p.a.ce.
"It amuses me," said Fred Bunting.
"Look here," said my cousin Melville, "what am I supposed to do? Why have I been asked to come?"
"I don"t know. Stir it up a bit, I expect. Everybody do a bit--like the Christmas pudding."
"But--" said Melville.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Adjusting the folds of his blanket to a greater dignity.]
"I"ve been bathing," said Fred. "n.o.body asked me to take a hand and I didn"t. It won"t be a good pudding without me, but there you are!
There"s only one thing I can see to do----"
"It might be the right thing. What is it?"
"Punch Chatteris"s head."
"I don"t see how that would help matters."