The fame which came to me through that gallant rescue was a littleembarrassing. I was a marked man. Did I walk through the village,heads emerged from windows, and eyes followed me out of sight. Did Isit on the beach, groups formed behind me and watched in silentadmiration. I was the man of the moment.
"If we'd wanted an advertisement for the farm," said Ukridge on one ofthese occasions, "we couldn't have had a better one than you, Garny,my boy. You have brought us three distinct orders for eggs during thelast week. And I'll tell you what it is, we need all the orders we canget that'll bring us in ready money. The farm is in a criticalcondition. The coffers are low, deuced low. And I'll tell you anotherthing. I'm getting precious tired of living on nothing but chicken andeggs. So's Millie, though she doesn't say so.""So am I," I said, "and I don't feel like imitating your wife's proudreserve. I never want to see a chicken again. As for eggs, they arefar too much for us."For the last week monotony had been the keynote of our commissariat.
We had had cold chicken and eggs for breakfast, boiled chicken andeggs for lunch, and roast chicken and eggs for dinner. Meals became anuisance, and Mrs. Beale complained bitterly that we did not give hera chance. She was a cook who would have graced an alderman's house andserved up noble dinners for gourmets, and here she was in this remotecorner of the world ringing the changes on boiled chicken and roastchicken and boiled eggs and poached eggs. Mr. Whistler, set to paintsign-boards for public-houses, might have felt the same restlessdiscontent. As for her husband, the Hired Retainer, he took life astranquilly as ever, and seemed to regard the whole thing as the mostexhilarating farce he had ever been in. I think he looked on Ukridgeas an amiable lunatic, and was content to rough it a little in orderto enjoy the privilege of observing his movements. He made nocomplaints of the food. When a man has supported life for a number ofyears on incessant Army beef, the monotony of daily chicken and eggsscarcely strikes him.
"The fact is," said Ukridge, "these tradesmen round here seem to be asordid, suspicious lot. They clamour for money."He mentioned a few examples. Vickers, the butcher, had been the firstto strike, with the remark that he would like to see the colour of Mr.
Ukridge's money before supplying further joints. Dawlish, the grocer,had expressed almost exactly similar sentiments two days later; andthe ranks of these passive resisters had been receiving fresh recruitsever since. To a man the tradesmen of Combe Regis seemed as deficientin Simple Faith as they were in Norman Blood.
"Can't you pay some of them a little on account?" I suggested. "Itwould set them going again.""My dear old man," said Ukridge impressively, "we need every penny ofready money we can raise for the farm. The place simply eats money.
That infernal roop let us in for I don't know what."That insidious epidemic had indeed proved costly. We had painted thethroats of the chickens with the best turpentine--at least Ukridge andBeale had,--but in spite of their efforts, dozens had died, and we hadbeen obliged to sink much more money than was pleasant in restockingthe run. The battle which took place on the first day after theelection of the new members was a sight to remember. The results of itwere still noticeable in the depressed aspect of certain of therecently enrolled.
"No," said Ukridge, summing up, "these men must wait. We can't helptheir troubles. Why, good gracious, it isn't as if they'd been waitingfor the money long. We've not been down here much over a month. Inever heard of such a scandalous thing. 'Pon my word, I've a good mindto go round, and have a straight talk with one or two of them. I comeand settle down here, and stimulate trade, and give them large orders,and they worry me with bills when they know I'm up to my eyes in work,looking after the fowls. One can't attend to everything. The businessis just now at its most crucial point. It would be fatal to pay anyattention to anything else with things as they are. These scoundrelswill get paid all in good time."It is a peculiarity of situations of this kind that the ideas ofdebtor and creditor as to what constitutes a good time never coincide.
* * * * *I am afraid that, despite the urgent need for strict attention tobusiness, I was inclined to neglect my duties about this time. I hadgot into the habit of wandering off, either to the links, where Igenerally found the professor, sometimes Phyllis, or on long walks bymyself. There was one particular walk along the cliffs, through someof the most beautiful scenery I have ever set eyes on, which more thanany other suited my mood. I would work my way through the woods till Icame to a small clearing on the very edge of the cliff. There I wouldsit and smoke by the hour. If ever I am stricken with smoker's heart,or staggers, or tobacco amblyopia, or any other of the cheery thingswhich doctors predict for the devotee of the weed, I shall feel that Isowed the seeds of it that summer in that little clearing overlookingthe sea. A man in love needs much tobacco. A man thinking out a novelneeds much tobacco. I was in the grip of both maladies. Somehow Ifound that my ideas flowed more readily in that spot than in anyother.
I had not been inside the professor's grounds since the occasion whenI had gone in through the box-wood hedge. But on the afternoonfollowing my financial conversation with Ukridge I made my waythither, after a toilet which, from its length, should have producedbetter results than it did. Not for four whole days had I caught somuch as a glimpse of Phyllis. I had been to the links three times, andhad met the professor twice, but on both occasions she had beenabsent. I had not had the courage to ask after her. I had an absurdidea that my voice or my manner would betray me in some way. I feltthat I should have put the question with such an exaggerated show ofindifference that all would have been discovered.
The professor was not at home. Nor was Mr. Chase. Nor was Miss NorahDerrick, the lady I had met on the beach with the professor. MissPhyllis, said the maid, was in the garden.
I went into the garden. She was sitting under the cedar by the tennis-lawn, reading. She looked up as I approached.
I said it was a lovely afternoon. After which there was a lull in theconversation. I was filled with a horrid fear that I was boring her. Ihad probably arrived at the very moment when she was most interestedin her book. She must, I thought, even now be regarding me as anuisance, and was probably rehearsing bitter things to say to the maidfor not having had the sense to explain that she was out.
"I--er--called in the hope of seeing Professor Derrick," I said.
"You would find him on the links," she replied. It seemed to me thatshe spoke wistfully.
"Oh, it--it doesn't matter," I said. "It wasn't anything important."This was true. If the professor had appeared then and there, I shouldhave found it difficult to think of anything to say to him which wouldhave accounted to any extent for my anxiety to see him.
"How are the chickens, Mr. Garnet?" said she.
The situation was saved. Conversationally, I am like a clockwork toy.
I have to be set going. On the affairs of the farm I could speakfluently. I sketched for her the progress we had made since her visit.
I was humorous concerning roop, epigrammatic on the subject of theHired Retainer and Edwin.
"Then the cat did come down from the chimney?" said Phyllis.
We both laughed, and--I can answer for myself--I felt the better forit.
"He came down next day," I said, "and made an excellent lunch of oneof our best fowls. He also killed another, and only just escaped deathhimself at the hands of Ukridge.""Mr. Ukridge doesn't like him, does he?""If he does, he dissembles his love. Edwin is Mrs. Ukridge's pet. Heis the only subject on which they disagree. Edwin is certainly in theway on a chicken farm. He has got over his fear of Bob, and is nowperfectly lawless. We have to keep a steady eye on him.""And have you had any success with the incubator? I love incubators. Ihave always wanted to have one of my own, but we have never keptfowls.""The incubator has not done all that it should have done," I said.
"Ukridge looks after it, and I fancy his methods are not the rightmethods. I don't know if I have got the figures absolutely correct,but Ukridge reasons on these lines. He says you are supposed to keepthe temperature up to a hundred and five degrees. I think he said ahundred and five. Then the eggs are supposed to hatch out in a week orso. He argues that you may just as well keep the temperature atseventy-two, and wait a fortnight for your chickens. I am certainthere's a fallacy in the system somewhere, because we never seem toget as far as the chickens. But Ukridge says his theory ismathematically sound, and he sticks to it.""Are you quite sure that the way you are doing it is the best way tomanage a chicken farm?""I should very much doubt it. I am a child in these matters. I hadonly seen a chicken in its wild state once or twice before we camedown here. I had never dreamed of being an active assistant on a realfarm. The whole thing began like Mr. George Ade's fable of the Author.
An Author--myself--was sitting at his desk trying to turn out any oldthing that could be converted into breakfast-food when a friend camein and sat down on the table, and told him to go right on and not mindhim.""Did Mr. Ukridge do that?""Very nearly that. He called at my rooms one beautiful morning when Iwas feeling desperately tired of London and overworked and dying for aholiday, and suggested that I should come to Combe Regis with him andhelp him farm chickens. I have not regretted it.""It is a lovely place, isn't it?""The loveliest I have ever seen. How charming your garden is.""Shall we go and look at it? You have not seen the whole of it."As she rose, I saw her book, which she had laid face downwards on thegrass beside her. It was the same much-enduring copy of the"Manoeuvres of Arthur." I was thrilled. This patient perseverance mustsurely mean something. She saw me looking at it.
"Did you draw Pamela from anybody?" she asked suddenly.
I was glad now that I had not done so. The wretched Pamela, once mypride, was for some reason unpopular with the only critic about whoseopinion I cared, and had fallen accordingly from her pedestal.
As we wandered down from the garden paths, she gave me her opinion ofthe book. In the main it was appreciative. I shall always associatethe scent of yellow lupin with the higher criticism.
"Of course, I don't know anything about writing books," she said.
"Yes?" my tone implied, or I hope it did, that she was an expert onbooks, and that if she was not it didn't matter.
"But I don't think you do your heroines well. I have just got 'TheOutsider--' " (My other novel. Bastable & Kirby, 6s. Satirical. Allabout Society--of which I know less than I know about chicken-farming.
Slated by /Times/ and /Spectator/. Well received by /London Mail/ and/Winning Post/)--"and," continued Phyllis, "Lady Maud is exactly thesame as Pamela in the 'Manoeuvres of Arthur.' I thought you must havedrawn both characters from some one you knew.""No," I said. "No. Purely imaginary.""I am so glad," said Phyllis.
And then neither of us seemed to have anything to say. My knees beganto tremble. I realised that the moment had arrived when my fate mustbe put to the touch; and I feared that the moment was premature. Wecannot arrange these things to suit ourselves. I knew that the timewas not yet ripe; but the magic scent of the yellow lupin was too muchfor me.
"Miss Derrick," I said hoarsely.
Phyllis was looking with more intentness than the attractions of theflower justified at a rose she held in her hand. The bee hummed in thelupin.
"Miss Derrick," I said, and stopped again.
"I say, you people," said a cheerful voice, "tea is ready. Hullo,Garnet, how are you? That medal arrived yet from the Humane Society?"I spun round. Mr. Tom Chase was standing at the end of the path. Theonly word that could deal adequately with the situation slappedagainst my front teeth. I grinned a sickly grin.
"Well, Tom," said Phyllis.
And there was, I thought, just the faintest tinkle of annoyance in hervoice.
* * * * *"I've been bathing," said Mr. Chase, /a propos des bottes/.
"Oh," I replied. "And I wish," I added, "that you'd drowned yourself."But I added it silently to myself.
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