Luck of the Bodkins (2 page)

'As you come off the gang-plank, he will slap you on the back.' Mr Lle
wejlyn started. ·George will?' ‘
Yes.'

'Your brother George?' ‘
Yes.'

'He will if he wants a good poke in the nose,' said Mr Llewellyn.

Mabel Spence resumed her remarks, still with that rather trying resemblance in her manner to a nurse endeavouring to reason with a half-witted child.

'Don't be so silly, Ikey. Listen. When I bring the necklace on board at Cherbourg, I am going to sew it in your hat. When you go ashore at New York, that is the hat you will be wearing. When George slaps you on the back, it will fall off. George will stoop to pick it up, and his hat will fall off. Then he will give you his hat and take yours and walk off the dock. There's no risk at all.'

Many men's eyes would have sparkled brightly at the ingenuity of the scheme which this girl had outlined, but Ivor Llewellyn was a man whose eyes, even under the most favourable conditions, did not sparkle readily. They had been dull and glassy before she spoke, and they were dull and glassy now. If any expression did come into them, it was one of incredulous amazement.

'You mean to say you're planning to let your brother George get his hooks on a necklace that's worth - how much is it worth?
’

'About fifty thousand dollars.'

'And George is to be let walk off the dock with a fifty thousand dollar necklace in his hat? George?' said Mr Llewellyn, as if wondering if he could have caught the name correctly. 'Why, I wouldn't trust your brother George alone with a kid's money-box.'

Mabel Spence had no illusions about her flesh and blood. She saw his point. A perfectly sound point. But she remained calm.

'George won't steal Grayce's necklace,'

'Why not?'

'He knows Grayce.'

Mr Llewellyn was compelled to recognize the force of her argument. His wife in her professional days had been one of the best-known panther-women on the silent screen. Nobody who had seen her in her famous role of Mimi, the female Apache in
When Paris Sleeps,
or who in private life had watched her dismissing a cook could pretend for an instant that she was a good person to steal pearl necklaces from.

'Grayce would skin him.'

A keen ear might have heard a wistful sigh proceed from Mr Llewellyn's lips. The idea of someone skinning his brother
-
in-law George touched a responsive chord in him. He had felt like that ever since his wife had compelled him to put the other on the Superba-Llewellyn pay-roll at a thousand dollars
a
week as a production expert.

'I guess you're right,' he said. 'But I don't like it. I don't like it, I tell you, darn it. It's too risky. How do you know something won't go wrong? These Customs people have their spies everywhere, and I'll probably find, when I step ashore with that necklace -'

He did not complete the sentence. He had got thus far when there was an apologetic cough from behind him, and a voice spoke:

'I say, excuse me, but do you happen to know how to spell "sciatica"?'

III

It was not immediately that Monty Bodkin had decided to apply to Mr Llewellyn for aid in solving the problem that was vexing him. Possibly this was due to a nice social sense which made him shrink from forcing himself upon a stranger, possibly to the fact that some instinct told him that when you ask
a
motion-picture magnate to start spelling things you catch him on his weak spot. Be that as it may, he had first consulted his friend the waiter, and the waiter had proved a broken reed. Beginning by affecting not to believe that there was such
a
word, he had suddenly uttered a cry, struck his forehead and exclaimed:
‘
Ah! La sciatique!'

He had then gone on to make the following perfectly asinine speech:

'Comme ca, m'sieur. Like zis, boy. Wit'
a
ess, wit' a say, wit' a ee, wit' a arr, wit' a tay, wit' a ee, wit' a ku, wit'
a
uh, wit' a ay. Via! Sciatique.'

Upon which, Monty, who was in no mood for this sort of thing, had very properly motioned him away with
a
gesture and gone off to get a second opinion.

His reception, on presenting his little difficulty to this new audience, occasioned him
a
certain surprise. It would not be too much to say that he was taken aback. He had never been introduced to Mr Llewellyn, and he was aware that many people object to being addressed by strangers, but he could not help feeling a little astonished at the stare of horrified loathing with which the other greeted him as he turned. He had not seen anything like it since the day, years ago, when his Uncle Percy, who collected old china, had come into the drawing-room and found him balancing a Ming vase on his chin.

The female, fortunately, appeared calmer. Monty liked her looks. A small, neat brunette, with nice grey eyes. 'What,' she inquired, 'would that be, once again?'
‘I
want to spell "sciatica".' 'Well, go on,' said Mabel Spence indulgently. 'But I don't know how to.'

‘I
see. Well, unless the New Deal has changed it, it ought to be s-c-i-a-t-i-c-a.' 'Do you mind if I write that down?
’
‘I’
d prefer it.'

'. . . -t-i-c-a. Right. Thanks,' said Monty warmly. 'Thanks awfully. I thought as much. That ass of a waiter was pulling my leg. All that rot about "with a ess, with a tay, with a arr", I mean to say. Even I knew there wasn't an "r" in it. Thanks. Thanks frightfully.
’

'Not at all. Any other words you are interested in? I could do you "parallelogram" or "metempsychosis", if you wished, and Ikey here is a wizard at anything under two syllables. No? Just as you say.'

She watched him with a kindly eye as he crossed the terrace, then, turning to her brother-in-law, became aware that he was apparently in the throes of an emotional crisis. His eyes were bulging more than ever, and he had produced a handkerchief and was mopping his face with it.

'Something the matter?' she asked.

It was not immediately that Mr Llewellyn found speech. When he did. the speech he found was crisp and to the point. 'Listen!' he said hoarsely. 'It's off!' 'What's off?'

'That necklace. I'm not going to touch it
’

'Oh, Ikey, for goodness' sake!'

That's all right, "Oh, Ikey, for goodness' sake." That guy heard what we were saying.' 'I don't think so.'
‘
I do.'

'Well, what of it?'

Mr Llewellyn snorted, but in an undertone, as if the shadow of Monty still brooded over him. He was much shaken.

'What of it? You forgotten what I told you about these Customs people having their spies everywhere? That bird's one of them.'

'Oh, be yourself.'

'That's a lot of use, saying "Be myself".'

‘
I admit it's an awful thing to ask you to be.'

'Think you're smart, don't you?' said Mr Llewellyn, piqued.

'I know I'm smart.'

'Not smart enough to understand the first thing about the way these Customs people work. A hotel like this is just the place where they would plant a spy.'

'Why?'

'Why? Because they know there would be certain to be some damn-fool woman coming along sooner or later shouting out at the top of her voice about smuggling necklaces.'

'You were the one who was shouting.'

'I was not.'

'Oh, well, let it go. What does it matter? That fellow wasn't a Customs spy.' 'I tell you he was.' 'He didn't look like one.'

'So you're so dumb you think a spy looks like a spy, are you? Why, darn it, the first thing he does is to see that he doesn't look like a spy. He sits up nights, studying. If that guy wasn't a spy, what was he doing listening in on us? Why was he there?'

'He wanted to know how to spell "sciatica",
’
‘
Pshaw!'

'Must you say "Pshaw"?'

'Why wouldn't I say "Pshaw"?' demanded Mr Llewellyn, with an obvious sense of grievance. 'What on earth would a man - at twelve o'clock on a summer morning in the South of France - want to spell "sciatica" for? He saw we had seen him, and he had to say the first thing he could think of. Well, this lets me out. If Grayce imagines after this that I'm going to so much as look at that necklace of hers, she's got another guess coming. I wouldn't handle the thing for a million.'

He leaned back in his chair, breathing heavily. His sister-in-law eyed him with disfavour. Mabel Spence was by profession an osteopath with a large clientele among the stars of Beverly Hills, and this made her something of a purist in the matter of physical fitness.

'The trouble with you, Ikey,' she said, 'is that you're out of condition. You eat too much, and that makes you weigh too much, and that makes you nervous. I'd like to give you a treatment right now.'

Mr Llewellyn came out of his trance.

'You touch me I' he said warningly. 'That time I was weak enough to let Grayce talk me into letting you get your hands on me, you near broke my neck. Never you mind what I eat or what I don't eat...'

'There isn't much you don't eat' .. Never you mind whether I want a treatment or whether I don't want a treatment. You listen to what I say. And that is that I'm out of this sequence altogether. I don't put a finger on that necklace.'

Mabel rose. There seemed to her little use in continuing the discussion.

'Well,' she said, 'use your own judgement. It's got nothing to do with me, one way or the other. Grayce told me to tell you, and I've told you. It's up to you. You know best how you stand with her. All I say is that I shall be joining the boat at Cherbourg with the thing, and Grayce is all in favour of your easing it through. The way she feels is that it would be sinful wasting money paying it over to -the United States Government, because they've more than is good for them already and would only spend it. Still, please yourself.'

She moved away, and Ivor Llewellyn, with a pensive frown, for her words had contained much food for thought, put a cigar in his mouth and began to chew it

Monty, meanwhile, ignorant of the storm which his innocent request had caused, was proceeding with his letter. He had got now to the part where he was telling Gertrude how much he loved her, and the stuff was beginning to flow a bit. So intent, indeed, had he become that the voice of the waiter at his elbow made him jump and spray ink. He turned, annoyed.

'Well? Que est-il maintenant? Que voulez-vous?'

It was no idle desire for conversation that had brought the waiter to his side. He was holding a blue envelope.

'Ah,' said Monty, understanding. 'Une telegramme pour moi, eh? Tout droit. Donnez le ici.'

To open a French telegram is always a matter of some little time. It is stuck together in unexpected places. During the moments while his fingers were occupied, Monty chatted pleasantly to his companion about the weather, featuring
le soleil
and the beauty of
le ci
el.
Gertrude, he felt, would have wished this. And so carefree was his manner while giving out his views on these phenomena that it came as all the more of a shock to the waiter when that awful cry sprang from his lips.

It was a cry of agony and amazement, the stricken yowl of a man who has been pierced to the heart. It caused the waiter to leap a foot. It made Mr Llewellyn bite his cigar in half. A drinker in the distant bar spilled his Martini.

And well might Montague Bodkin cry out in such a manner. For this telegram, this brief telegram, this curt, cold, casual telegram which had descended upon him out of a blue sky was from the girl he loved.

In fewer words than one would have believed possible and without giving any explanat
ion whatsoever, Gertrude Butter
wi
ck had broken their engagement.

Chapter 2

On a pleasant, sunny morning, about a week after the events which the historian has just related, a saunterer through Waterloo Station in the city of London, would have noticed a certain bustle and activity in progress on platform number eleven. The boat train for the liner
Atlantic,
sailing from Southampton at noon, was due to leave shortly after nine; and, the hour being now eight-fifty, the platform was crowded with intending voyagers and those who had come to see them off.

Ivor Llewellyn was there, talking to the reporters about Ideals and the Future of the Screen. The members of the All England Ladies' Hockey Team were there, saying good-bye to friends and relations before embarking on their tour of the United States. Ambrose Tennyson, the novelist, was there, asking the bookstall clerk if he had anything by Ambrose Tennyson. Porters were wheeling trucks; small boys with refreshment baskets were trying to persuade passengers that what they needed at nine o'clock in the morning was a slab of milk chocolate and a bath bun; a dog with a collecting-box attached to its back was going the rounds in the hope of making a quick touch in aid of the Railwaymen's Orphanage before it was too late. The scene, in short, presented a gay and animated appearance.