Luck of the Bodkins (38 page)

'Poor old Butterwick!' echoed Miss Purdue. Too bad. Have another gasper and tell me all about it'

Chapter
21

Unless delayed by such Acts of God as typhoons and waterspouts or slowed up
en route
by mutiny on the high seas and piracy, the R.M.S.
Atlantic
was what is technically known in transatlantic shipping circles as a four-day boat. That is to say, she did the voyage in six days and a bit. On the present occasion, having sailed from England at noon on a Wednesday, she was expected to dock in New York shortly after lunch on the following Tuesday, and she did not disappoint her public. She came steaming up the bay well on time.

Everything during the concluding stages of the trip had worked out according to plan. The first-class concert (No.
6
,
Solo: 'The Bandolero' - A. E. Peasemarch) had been performed. The final dinner had been eaten. The morning papers had come aboard, reassuring citizens who had been absent for some time from their native shores that American womanhood had not abandoned the fine old custom of hitting its husband over the head with hammers and that sugar daddies were still being surprised in love-nests. The port officials had appeared and issued landing tickets in the rather grudging way that characterizes the port officials of New York; as if they had reluctantly decided to stretch a point for once, but wished it to be understood that this sort of thing must not occur again. And now the voyagers had disembarked and were in the Customs shed, waiting for their baggage to be examined.

As far as the permanent staff of a transatlantic liner is concerned, joy is always the prevailing sentiment when the vessel arrives at journey's end. The captain is happy because he is at last freed from the haunting fear that this time he may have taken the wrong turning and fetched up in Africa
’
The purser is happy because he will now be able to get away for a little from the society of people like Monty Bodkin. The doctor is congratulating himself on having come through one more orgy of quoits-playing and backgammon-playing without committing himself to anything definite. The crew like the idea of
a
few days' rest and repose, and the stewards are pleased for the same reason - while those of their number who are bigamists have long since got over the pang of parting from their wives and children in Southampton and are looking forward with bright affection to meeting once more their wives and children in New York.

Coming to the passengers, however, we find mixed emotions, varying according to the circumstances of the individual. In the crowd which was thronging the Customs sheds today there were hearts that were light and also hearts that were heavy.

Ambrose Tennyson's, for example, was heavy. He had derived no enjoyment from the sight of New York's celebrated skyline, and did not think much of the Customs sheds. Reggie Tennyson, on the other hand, though still exercised in his mind about Monty's broken romance, felt at the top of his form. He had kissed Mabel Spence almost incessantly all the way up the bay and had told her he thought her high buildings were wonderful.

Another of the debonair brigade was Ivor Llewellyn. He had not felt blither since the time when he had stolen three stars and a Czecho-Slovakian director from the Ne-Plus-Ultra-Zizz-baum in a single morning. Able, now that the weight of that necklace was off his mind, to devote the whole force of his powerful intellect exclusively to his brother-in-law George and the sock in the waistcoat which he was going to give the latter when he slapped him on the back, he had administered that sock precisely in the manner of which he had dreamed, causing George to double up like a pocket-rule and nearly swallow his bridge-work. He was now talking to the reporters about Ideals and the Future of the Screen.

Turning to Monty Bodkin, we find gloom once more. The skyline of New York had left Monty as cold as it had left Ambrose. It had seemed to him in his black despondency just
a
skyline, if that, and all he had thought about the Statue of Liberty was that it reminded him of a frightful girl in the Hippodrome chorus named Bella something, with whom he had once got landed at a theatrical luncheon party. Moodily clutching the Mickey Mouse which Albert Peasemarch had done up for him overnight in a neat brown paper parcel, he opened his trunks for inspection, his nervous system in no way soothed by the fact that, their names both beginning with a B, he had found himself standing practically cheek by jowl with Gertrude Butterwick.

For one fleeting instant he had caught her eye. It had stared through him, coldly and proudly. He had been relieved when some fellow-travellers named Burgess, Bostock and Billington-Todd had insinuated themselves and their trunks between them, hiding her from his view.

Nor was Gertrude herself in serener mood. This close proximity to the man she had once loved had put the last touch but one to the depression and anguish which had been weighing on her since she got out of bed that morning. The final touch was now being applied by Albert Peasemarch, who for some ten minutes had been frolicking about her like a white-jacketed grasshopper.

For Albert Peasemarch was a man who took his duties conscientiously. He was not one of those stewards who pocket their tip on the last morning and are never seen again. When the vessel docked, he sought out his clients and became helpful. He had been helping Gertrude now, as we say, for some ten minutes, and her gentle soul had begun rather to resemble that of a female rogue elephant. There are times when one is in the vein for airy conversation with stewards, and times when one is not. Gertrude yearned to be able to look round and find that Albert Peasemarch was not there.

And quite suddenly the miracle happened. Albert disappeared. One moment, he had been deep in an anecdote about a dog belonging to a friend of his in Southampton; the next he had gone. The solitude she had so greatly desired was hers.

But not for long. The sigh of relief had scarcely passed her lips when he was back again.

‘
You will excuse me running off like that, miss,' he said, with gentlemanly apology, reappearing like a rabbit out of a conjuror's hat.
‘I
was beckoned for.'

'Please don't stay if you're busy,' urged Gertrude.

Albert Peasemarch smiled a chivalrous smile.

'Never too busy to be of assistance and help to a lady, miss,
’
he said gallantly.
‘
It was simply that out of the tail of my eye I happened to observe Mr Bodkin beckoning to me. That was why I ran off. I have a message from Mr Bodkin, miss. Mr Bodkin presents his comps, and could he have the privilege of
a
word with you?
’

Gertrude quivered. Her face flushed and her eyes grew hard, as if she had had a goal disallowed in an important match.

‘
No!
'

'No, miss?
’

'No!'

'You do not desire to speak with Mr Bodkin?
’
·No!'

'Very good, miss. I will nip back and convey the information.
’

‘
Ass!'

'Sir?'

'Not you,
’
said Reggie Tennyson, for it was he who had spoken. He had come up from the direction of the '
‘I
' section, taking them in the rear. 'I was addressing Miss Butterwick.'

'Very good, sir,' said Albert Peasemarch, and disappeared.

Reggie was regarding Gertrude with a cousinly sternness.

'Ass!' he repeated. 'Why won't you speak to Monty?'

'Because I do not wish to.'

'Fool! Chump! Cloth-head!'
saidReggie.

There are doubtless girls in the world who will stand quite
a
lot of this sort of thing from their first cousins, but Gertrude Butterwick was not one of them. Her face, already flushed, grew pinker.

'Don't talk to me like that!
‘
she cried.

'I shall talk to you,' said Reggie, with unabated sternness but taking the precaution of stepping behind a large cabin-trunk, 'just like that. I come here, hoping to discover that you have thought things over and changed your mind, and the first thing I hear is you telling stewards that you do not wish to speak to poor old Monty. You make me sick, young Gertrude.
’

'Oh, go away.
’

‘I
will not go away. Do you mean to tell me that, having had two days to brood on it and sift the evidence and weigh this against that, you still refuse to believe that I was telling you the truth that night? Why, good gosh, look how the thing hangs together. It's like what we used to have to swot up at school about the inevitableness of Greek tragedy. One thing leading to another, I mean to say. Lottie Blossom steals the mouse from Monty... In order to lure her from her state-room while I search it, he arranges
a
tryst with her on the second-class promenade deck.. .
’

'I know, I know.
’

'Well, then?'

'I don't believe a word of it.
’

Reggie Tennyson expelled a deep breath.

'Young Gertrude,' he said, 'your sex protects you. I will not, therefore, give you the biff in the eye for which you are asking with every word you utter. But I'll tell you what I will do. I'll fetch Ambrose. Perhaps you will listen to him.'

‘I
won't.'

'You think you won't,
’
corrected Reggie, 'but I'll bet you will. Wait here. Don't stir a step.
’
'I shall not wait here.'

'Yes, you jolly well will,' said Reggie, 'because you haven't had your luggage examined yet. So sucks to you, young Gertrude.'

For some moments after he had gone, Gertrude remained heaving gently, and staring with unseeing eyes at the back of Mr Billington-Todd, who was having
a
little trouble with his inspector about a box of cigars. The recent unpleasant scene seemed to have put the clock back. Once more, she seemed to be a child - raging, as she had so often raged in those distant days when they had shared
a
mutual nursery, because Reggie had worsted her in cousinly debate. Like lightning flashes athwart
a
stormy sky, there flickered through her mind all the bitter, clever things she would have said if only she had thought of them.

As one waking from
a
trance, she became aware of her friend Miss Passenger at her side. On Miss Passenger's face was
a
grave, kindly, solicitous look; in her muscular hand a brown paper parcel.

'Well, Butterwick.'

‘
Oh, hullo, Jane.
’

There was no welcoming ring in Gertrude's voice. She liked Miss Passenger as a woman and respected her as a captain and
a
dashing outside-right, but she did not desire her company now. She feared...

That young man of yours, Butterwick.. .
’

That was what Gertrude had feared, that Miss Passenger was about to twist the knife in her heart by talking of Monty. Ever since she had been so unguarded as to make the captain of the All England Ladies' Hockey Team a confidante in the matter of her wrecked romance, the latter had shown an unwelcome disposition to turn the conversation to that topic when they found themselves alone together.

‘
Oh, Jane!'

'I've just been talking to him. I was coming along to see how you were getting on, and as I passed he called out to me. He says you won't speak to him.
’

‘
I won't.
’

Miss Passenger sighed. For all her rugged exterior, she was at heart a sentimentalist, and both as a private individual and as a hockey captain she mourned over this sundering of two young lives. As an individual, she had been devoted to Gertrude for many years - right back, indeed, to the days of cocoa-parties in the dormitory at the dear old school - and hated to see her unhappy. As a hockey captain, she feared lest blighted love might put her off her game.

It would not be the first time in Miss Passenger's experience that that had happened. She had not forgotten that county match when, with the score at one all and three minutes to go, her goalkeeper, who had recently severed relations with the man of her choice, suddenly burst into tears during a hot rally in the goalmouth, and, covering her face with her hands, let
a
sitter go past her into the net.

'You're making a mistake, Butterwick.'

'Oh, Jane!'