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Ebook has 1792 lines and 94941 words, and 36 pages

I A ROMANCE IN OLD BRANDY 36

II THE ACE OF CADS 59

IV THE BATTLE OF BERKELEY SQUARE 116

V THE PRINCE OF THE JEWS 133

VI THE THREE-CORNERED MOON 166

X THE GHOUL OF GOLDERS GREEN 276

MAY FAIR

MAY FAIR

Once upon a time in London there was a young gentleman who had nothing better to do one afternoon, so what should he do but take a walk? Now he did not set out as one on pleasure bent, but with an air of determination that would have surprised his friends, saying between his teeth: "I have always heard that walking is good exercise. I will try a bit." However, he had not walked far before circumstances compelled him to abate his ardour, for it was an afternoon in July and quite warm for the time of the year.

Eastward our young gentleman strode, by Sloane Street, through Knightsbridge, across Hyde Park Corner, he strode even from Chelsea to Mayfair; for he was by way of being a writer and lived in Chelsea, whereas his people lived in Mayfair and understood nothing.

Now while we are about it we may as well add that the young writer's father was a baronet who had for some years been a perfect martyr to bankruptcy, and had called his son to him on this afternoon to impress upon him the fact that in future he, the young writer's father, could not and would not be a victim to his, the young writer's, extravagances. So much, then, for the young writer's father; but with himself we must continue yet a while, although what this tale is really about is a hand and a flower.

For that is what he chanced to see on the afternoon we tell of, a hand and a flower; and since it was inconceivable that the hand could belong to a man, so white and delicate it was, he put two and two together and decided that it could only belong to a lady. Further, there was that about the droop of the hand which fired him to think of it as the hand of an unhappy heart. While as for the flower, it was scarlet, and of the sort that anyone can buy at any florist's by just going in and saying: "I want some carnations, please, but not white ones, please, thank you, good-day."

Now the sun was so high and bright over London that day that the voices of Americans were distinctly heard rising above the polished tumult of the Berkeley Hotel, crying plaintively for ice; and when at last our young writer came into Mayfair he was grateful for the cool quiet streets, but being still at some discomfort from the effects of the heat on his person, he thought to turn into Mount Street Gardens and rest a while beneath the trees.

This, however, he was not to do that afternoon; for it chanced that he had not walked far towards that pleasaunce when, at that point of the pretty quarter of Mayfair where South Street becomes North Street and Grosvenor Square is but a step in the right direction, he was drawn to admire a great house that stood in a walled garden. Quite a country-house this looked like, and right in the heart of the town, so that our young gentleman thought: "Now I wonder whose house that is. Ah, to be rich! Or, at least, to be so attractive that rich people would take one to their hearts on sight!"

In this wise relishing the deplorable charms of money, he had stared long over the wall at the house in the garden had not something happened which instantly gave his fancies a prettier turn: for what should he suddenly espy through the curtain of leaves but a hand drooping from one of the upper windows, and what should he espy in the hand but a scarlet flower?

Now that made a delightful picture of innocence, of dreaming youth and fond imagining, and not at all the sort of thing you see every day, especially in Mayfair, where motor-cars grow from the cracks in the pavements and ladies recline in slenderness on divans, playing with rosaries of black pearls and eating scented macaroons out of bowls of white jade.

Presently a policeman happened by, and the young gentleman thought to turn from the wall and greet him in a friendly way with a view to further conversation.

"And what," he asked, "is the name of the lady who lives in the house with the garden?"

"Young sir," said the policeman severely, "that will do from you."

"I beg your pardon!" said the young writer with spirit.

"Granted," said the policeman severely.

"But this is absurd! I am an honest man and I have asked you an honest question."

The policeman unbent his expression so far as to say, with a significant look at the great house in the walled garden: "Young sir," said he, "there danger lies for the likes of you. For the likes of her is not for the likes of you."

"Oh, nonsense!" cried our young gentleman. "This is a free country. This is not America!"

"Is it swearing at me you are?" said the policeman severely. "Now move on, young man, move on."

"I will not!" cried our hero.

"Well, I will!" said the policeman, and walked away, while the young gentleman turned away from this unsatisfactory conversation just in time, alas, to see the scarlet flower drop from the white fingers; and the hand was withdrawn.

Now such was the effect of the hand and the flower on the young writer's susceptible mind that he quite forgot to go and see his father, who thereupon cut him off with a shilling, which he sent to the young writer in the form of postage stamps. But the occasion was not without some profit, albeit of the spiritual sort, to the young man; for that very night he dreamed he was kissing that very hand, and who shall say that that was all he dreamed, for surely he is a sorry young man who cannot kiss more than a lady's hand in a dream.

The Court Chronicles of the Grand Duchy of Valeria report the following conversation as having taken place between the reigning Duke and his consort. That the conversation took place in London is undoubtedly due to the fact that the Royal Duke and his Duchess were at the time on a state visit to that capital, with a view to taking a turn around the Wembley Exhibition.

"We will give a ball," said His Highness the Hereditary Grand Duke of Valeria. "In fact, we must give a ball. And everyone in London will come to it."

"Why should they?" said Her Highness.

"Now try not to be disagreeable, my dear. I have no idea why they should, but I am positive they will. They always do."

"But, Frederick, what is the matter with you to-night? Why do you want to give a ball, since you cannot dance? Upon my word, if I danced like you I should be ill at the very idea of a ball! So be sensible, my love, and go to sleep again."

"Then you are quite wrong, my love. Balls are for something quite different. I assure you that I have also worked out the matter very carefully. Balls are for English people to give, Americans to pay for, and Argentines to dance at."

"Now try not to be tiresome, my dear. It will seem extremely peculiar in us not to give at least one ball while we are in London. The Diplomatic Corps will not fail to remark our ill-timed economy. Do you forget that we are Royalty?"

"Fiddledidee!" said the Duchess.

"Bother Royalty!" said the Duchess. "I've never got anything by being Royal except to be treated like a village idiot all my life. And now you want me to give a beastly ball, at which I shall have to dance with a lot of clumsy Ambassadors. Frederick, I tell you here and now that I will not give a ball. And if you want to know my reasons for not giving a ball, they are, briefly, as follows."

They followed.

"You are not going to pretend, my love, that the happiness of our only daughter is influencing you in the least! You will not dare to pretend that, Frederick, considering that ever since we have been in London you have kept the poor child locked in her room."

"Ethelberta!" cried His Highness, leaping from the bed and looking sternly down at her. "I did not think you could carry levity so far. Woman, would you compromise with our honour and the honour of Valeria?"

"If there was any money in it, my love, I would of course ask your advice first, as you know so much more than I do about selling things. I really don't know where we would be now if you hadn't been so clever about our neutrality during the war. Now, my love, stop being silly and get back to bed. You look too ridiculous in those bright pink pyjamas. What the Lord-in-Waiting was doing to let you buy them I can't imagine!"

"Naturally, my love, if you will buy pyjamas like that!"

"These are strong words!" said the Duchess.

"I feel strongly about it," said the Duke.

"And anyhow, she can't be as innocent as all that," said the Duchess thoughtfully, "now. I know girls. Oh, dear, what fun girls have!"

"Ethelberta, this English lord must die!"

"All English lords must die, my love, in due course. It is a law of nature. Now come back to bed."

"I have worked the matter out very carefully, and that is why I am giving this ball. We cannot kill this coward out-of-hand by hiring some low assassin, for he is, after all, a gentleman. And besides, in this confounded country," His Highness continued warmly, "you cannot fire a revolver without every policeman in the neighbourhood wanting to know why you did it. Therefore, the ball."

"What, are you going to fire revolvers off at our ball? My love, are you sure that will be quite safe?"

"Oh, give your rotten ball!" said Her Highness sleepily.

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