Chapter II: The Ace of Cads

I

They tell a tale of high romance and desperate villainy, how one night the dæmon of wickedness arose from the depths and faced his master Capel Maturin, the pretty gentleman whose exploits have made him known to all London by the engaging title of Beau Maturin, the ace of cads. The tale begins in bitter darkness and its direction is Piccadilly, not the shopkeeper’s nor the wanton’s Piccadilly but the sweet sulky side where the pavement trips arm-in-arm with the trees of the Green Park and men are wont to walk alone with the air of thinking upon their debts and horses and women. There and thus, they say, George Brummel walked, to the doom that awaits all single-hearted men, and Scrope Davies, that pleasant wit, Lord Alvanley, the gross, D’Orsay, the beautiful and damned, and latterly Beau Maturin, who was a very St. George for looks and as lost to grace as the wickedest imp in hell.

But here was no night for your _beau_ to be abroad in, and a man had been tipsy indeed to have braved those inclement elements unless he must. Yet one there was, walking the Green Park side. Ever and often the east wind lashed the rain into piercing darts, as though intent to inflict with ultimate wretchedness the sodden bundles of humanity that may any night be seen lying one against the other beneath the railings of the Green Park. But the deuce was in it if the gentleman in question appeared to be in the least discommoded. His flimsy overcoat flung wide open and ever wider in paroxysms of outraged elegance by the crass wind, and showing an expanse of white shirt-front of that criss-cross _piqué_ kind which is one of the happiest discoveries of this century, and his silk hat rammed over his right eyebrow as though to dare a tornado to embarrass it, he strode up from Hyde Park Corner at a pace which, while not actually leisurely, seemed to be the outward manifestation of an entire absence of interest in time, place, destination, man, God and the devil. Nor was there anything about this gentleman’s face to deny this superlative indifference to interests temporal and divine; for, although that of a man still young enough, and possessed of attractions of a striking order, it showed only too plainly the haggard _blasé_ marks of a wanton and dissipated life.

It was with such epithets, indeed, that the more austere among his friends had some time before finally disembarrassed themselves of the acquaintance of Capel Maturin. A penniless cadet of good family, Mr. Maturin, after a youth devoted to prophecy as to the relative swiftness of horses and to experiments into the real nature of wines, had in his middle thirties been left a fortune by an affectionate uncle who, poor man, had liked his looks; and Mr. Maturin was now engaged in considering whether three parts of a decade had been well spent in reducing that fortune, with no tangible results, to as invisible an item as, so Mr. Maturin vulgarly put it to himself, a pony on a profiteer. It was a question, thought Mr. Maturin, which could demand neither deep thought nor careful answering, insomuch as the answer was only too decidedly a lemon.

At a certain point on Piccadilly Mr. Maturin suddenly stayed his walk. What it was that made him do this we shall, maybe, never know, but stop he did. There were witnesses to the event: the same lying at Mr. Maturin’s feet, huddled against the railings of the Green Park, a heap of sodden bundles with hidden faces; and it had wanted the attention of a physician or the like to decide which of the five or six was of the male or the female of the species.

“It’s a cold night,” said a husky voice.

Mr. Maturin, towering high into the night above the husky voice, agreed that it was a cold night.

“Ay, that it is!” said a woman’s cracked voice. “Cold as Christian charity!”

Whereupon Mr. Maturin exhorted her to thank her stars that he was a pagan and, withdrawing his hand from an inner pocket, scattered some bank-notes over the bewildered wretches.

“Oh! Oh!” they cried, but caught them quickly enough, not grabbing nor pushing overmuch, for there was maybe a couple or so for each. And when, with the bank-notes tight and safe in their hands, they stared their wonder up at their mad benefactor, it was to find him staring moon-struck at a point far above their heads, while across his face was stamped a singular smile. It should be known that Beau Maturin had in his youth been a great reader of romantic literature, and now could not but smile at the picture of himself in an ancient situation, for is not the situation of a penniless spendthrift, with that of a man in love, among the most ancient in the world?

A policeman, his black cape shining in the rain like black armour, approached heavily: the august impersonality of the law informed for the moment with an air of interest that had a terrifying effect on the suddenly enriched wretches, for the law does not by ordinary recognise any close connection between a person with no visible means of support and the Bank of England.

“Good evening, sir,” said the law to Mr. Maturin, who, returning the greeting somewhat absently, was about to continue his walk when an anxious voice from the ground whispered:

“’Ere, sir, these are fivers, sir!”

“I beg your pardon?” said Mr. Maturin.

The law, meanwhile, had taken one of the bank-notes from a reluctant hand and was examining it against the lamplight.

“These ’ere, sir,” said the law impersonally, “are five-pun notes.”

“True,” said Mr. Maturin. “True. Lovely white angels of the devil. Good-night, constable.”

“Good-night, sir,” said the constable, replacing the bank-note into an eager hand; and Mr. Maturin, for long devoid of common sense, and now entirely devoid of money as well, continued his walk in the rain. His direction, or such direction as his feet appeared to have, led him towards the

_A Paramount Picture._ _The Ace of Cads._

THE PARTING OF THE WAYS BETWEEN “BEAU” AND ELEANOUR.]

pillared arcade that protects the entrance of the Ritz Restaurant from the gross changes of London’s climate; and it was as he strode under this arcade, his steps ringing sharply on the dry white stones, that it was distinctly brought to his notice that he was being followed.

He did not, however, turn his head or show any other sign of interest, merely dismissing his pursuer as an optimist. Mr. Maturin’s, in point of fact, was a nature peculiarly lacking in any interest as to what might or might not at any moment be happening behind him; and one of his favourite _mots_ had ever been, whether in discussion, distress or danger, “Well, my friends, let’s face it!” There were, of course, not wanting those who ventured to doubt whether Beau Maturin had so readily faced “things” had he not had such a prepossessing face with which to conciliate them. “Ah,” Mr. Maturin would say to such, “you’re envious, let’s face it.”

On this occasion, so absorbed was he in absence of thought, he allowed himself to reach the corner of Arlington Street before swinging round to “face it.”

“Well?” said Mr. Maturin.

“’Ere!” said the other _sans_ courtesy. “You do walk a pace, you do!”

“I am sorry,” said Mr. Maturin. “What do you want?”

“Want!” said the other. “I like that! What do _I_ want! Jerusalem!”

“If you want Jerusalem,” said Mr. Maturin severely, “you should apply to the Zionist Society. They would be company for you. It must be very depressing for a man of your size to go about wanting Jerusalem all by yourself.”

That the pursuer had no evil intentions, at least to one of Mr. Maturin’s stature, had instantly been obvious. He was a small seedy-looking man in a bowler-hat of some past civilisation: his clothes sadly reflected the inclemencies of the weather, but had the air of not being very valuable, while the coloring of his face was that of one who had not in recent times suffered the delightful but perilous purification of water; and, as he stood panting beneath our gentleman, his expression was one of such bitter disgust that Mr. Maturin, being able to account for it only by the continued action of acid foods on the liver, thought it but right to advise him not to take so much vinegar with his tinned salmon.

“Am I,” snapped the small seedy man, “talking to Mr. Chapel Matcherin, or am I not?”

“More or less,” Mr. Maturin could not but admit.

“Orl I knows is,” snapped the small seedy man, “that you was the gent pointed out to me as yer left that club in Belgrave Square. Gent told me to give yer this. ’Ere.”

Mr. Maturin quickly opened the envelope, which was addressed to his name, and drew from it a folded sheet of note-paper and a folded bank-note. The small seedy man looked bitterly surprised and hurt.

“Money!” he sighed. “Money! ’Ow I ’ate money! And me carrying it abaht! I like that! Me!”

“You’re still here?” said Mr. Maturin.

“Still ’ere!” said the small seedy man. “I like that! Still ’ere! Me!”

But Mr. Maturin was giving his full attention to the note-paper, the while the folded bank-note depended tantalisingly from between the knuckles of two fingers. The small seedy man stared at it fascinated.

“If I’d _known_!” he sighed bitterly.

The letter addressed to Mr. Maturin ran thus:

“Enclosed Mr. Maturin will find a bank-note, which is in the nature of a present to him from the correspondent: who, if he was not misinformed, this night saw Mr. Maturin lose the last of his fortune at _chemin de fer_. Should Mr. Maturin’s be a temperament that does not readily accept gifts from strangers, which the correspondent takes the liberty to doubt, he may give the bank-note to the bearer, who will no doubt be delighted with it. The correspondent merely wishes Mr. Maturin to know that the money, having once left his hands and come into contact with Mr. Maturin’s, interests him no further. Nor are there any conditions whatsoever attached to this gift. But should Mr. Maturin retain some part of honour, which the correspondent takes the liberty to doubt, he may return service for service. In so remote a contingency Mr. Maturin will find a closed motor-car awaiting him near the flower-shop in Clarges Street.”

Mr. Maturin thoughtfully tore the note into several parts and dropped them to the pavement. The folded bank-note he, very thoughtful indeed, put into an inner pocket.

“’Ere!” whined the small seedy man.

“Tell me,” said Mr. Maturin, “what manner of gentleman was the gent who gave you this?”

“Bigger than you!” snarled the small seedy man. “Blast ’im for an old capitalist, else my name isn’t ’Iggins!”

“I am sorry your name is Higgins if you don’t like it. But why,” asked Mr. Maturin, “do you blast the gent who sent you after me?”

“I like that! Why hell! ’Ere he gives me two bob to go chasing after you to give you a bank-note! Two bob! You couldn’t offer two bob for a bloater in Wapping without getting arrested for using indecent language. And you’re so blarsted superior, you are, that you ain’t even looked to see ’ow much it is!”

“Why, I had forgotten!” smiled Mr. Maturin, and, producing the bank-note, unfolded it. It was a Bank of England note for £1,000.

“It’s not true!” gasped the small seedy man. “Oh, Gawd, it can’t be true! And in my ’and all that time and me chasing orl up Piccadilly with it to _give_ away!”

“Well, good-night,” said Mr. Maturin. “And thank you.”

“’E thanks me!” gasped the small seedy man. “’Ere, and ain’t you even going to give me a little bit of somethink extra so’s I’ll remember this ewneek occasion?”

“I’m very afraid,” said Mr. Maturin, feeling carefully in all his pockets, “that this note you have brought me is all I have. I am really very sorry. By the way, don’t forget what I said about the salmon. And be very careful of what you drink. For what, let’s face it, do they know of dyspepsia, who only Kia-Ora know?”

“’Ere!” whined the small seedy man, but Mr. Maturin, crossing Piccadilly where the glare of an arc-lamp stamped the mire with a thousand yellow lights, was already lost in the shadow of the great walls of Devonshire House. In Clarges Street, near the corner, he came upon a long, closed car. The chauffeur, a boy, looked sleepily at him.

“I believe you have your directions,” said Mr. Maturin.

“_And_ I’ve had them for hours!” said the boy sleepily. A nice boy.

II

We live in a world of generalisations, which the wise never tire of telling the foolish to mistrust and with which the foolish never tire of pointing the failures of the wise. There is one, for instance, that lays it down that a bad conscience is a sorry bedfellow. Yet Mr. Maturin, whose conscience could not have been but in the blackest disorder, immediately went to sleep in the car: to awake only when, the car having stopped, the young chauffeur flung open the door of the tonneau and said:

“If you please, sir!”

Mr. Maturin found himself before the doors of a mansion of noble proportions. From the head of the broad steps he looked about him and recognised the long narrow park of trees as that of Eaton Square. A voice said:

“Come in, Mr. Maturin. A wretched night.”

“Thank you,” said Mr. Maturin. “It is.”

Within, in a vast hall floored with black and white marble, he found himself faced by an old gentleman who, as the small seedy man had said, was even taller than himself. Mr. Maturin bowed. The tall old gentleman said:

“It is good of you to have come, Mr. Maturin. I thank you. I must confess, however, that I expected you would.”

“It is a rare pleasure for me, Sir Guy, to do what is expected of me,” smiled Mr. Maturin.

“You know me then! You recognised me to-night at your--your club?”

Mr. Maturin smiled at that. It was, let’s face it, a low club. But, what with one thing and another, he had had to resign from all his others. He only said:

“Naturally. Who does not know you, Sir Guy!”

The deep old eyes seemed to pierce the younger man with a savage contempt. “In coming here to-night, Mr. Maturin,” said old Sir Guy, “am I to understand that you are serious? You have, as you may know, something of a reputation for having made an art of misbehaviour.”

Mr. Maturin delayed answering while he thoughtfully considered the ceiling of the great hall, which was so high as to refuse itself to exact scrutiny. At the gaming-club that night he had immediately recognised the formidable old gentleman; for the great lean height, the sabre-wound across the left cheek, the mass of loosely brushed white hair and the savage blue eyes under bushy white eyebrows, were the well-known marks of Sir Guy Conduit de Gramercy, a _seigneur_ of a past century who made no secret of the fact that he disdained any part in this. For a passing moment Mr. Maturin had wondered what the proud old gentleman was doing in those depths; but now, revealed as the donor of the magnificent note, he could not but suspect what had brought Sir Guy down from his contemptuous seclusion. Sir Guy’s descent, however, was far from pleasing to Beau Maturin, for it always offended that man as much to see pride humbled and the mighty fallen as to watch the lowly being exalted and the humble getting above themselves. Mr. Maturin was not a religious man; but he was decidedly one who had what he called “let’s face it, a code of ethics.”

“Why, I’m serious enough,” said he at last. “I take your gift----”

“Ha!” snapped the old gentleman.

“In the spirit in which you give it, Sir Guy.”

“And what the devil can you know of that, sir?”

“Nothing, nothing!” said Mr. Maturin peaceably, and without more ado old Sir Guy led the way into a wide, dim room lined with many books in rare bindings, for here was a small part of the famous de Gramercy library. From the shadows a lady emerged. Very beautiful this lady must have been in her youth, but she was no longer young and now a sad, gentle dignity was the flower of her personality, half hiding, while it half revealed, the lovely dead graces of her youth. It was plain to see, however, that she was not in her best looks this night, for her eyes were as though strained with some pitiless anxiety; and, distantly acknowledging Mr. Maturin’s bow, she retired again into the shadows of the room, for it is only in the East that vanity dies with youth.

Said old Sir Guy: “I believe you have met my daughter-in-law. She and my granddaughter are staying with me for a few days.”

From her shadows Mrs. de Gramercy spoke swiftly, almost breathlessly, as though she would at all costs and quickly be done with something she must say:

“Mr. Maturin, I have tried my best to dissuade Sir Guy from taking this step. I feel there _must_ be a way of effecting our--our wish other than one which must offend you so deeply----”

The voice of the old gentleman fell like a bar of iron across the poor lady’s swift light speech. “Eleanour, you will kindly leave this to me, as you promised. And Mr. Maturin is, I fancy, past taking offence at the truth.”

“That depends on the truth,” said Mr. Maturin in a reasonable way. “So far, I am quite mystified.”

“You lie, Mr. Maturin. You are not mystified.”

“Very well, sir. I lie. I am not mystified.”

Said Mrs. de Gramercy in distress: “I think, then, I will leave you, since I can do nothing----”

“You will kindly stay, Eleanour. Surely you see that the occasion needs the authority of your presence!”

“Yes, please stay, Mrs. de Gramercy,” Mr. Maturin begged. “For if I am called a liar by my host while you are present, Heaven only knows what I may not be called when you are gone. Please stay. And, if I may, I would like to congratulate you on a very beautiful and talented daughter.”

Quivering with passion, the gigantic old man raised an arm. Mr. Maturin did not move. He was lazy, and disliked moving.

“Mr. Maturin,” the old man whispered just audibly, “you are an unbelievable cad! You are the--sir, you are the ace of cads!”

“Father, _please_!” the lady begged from the shadows, but in return Mr. Maturin begged her not to be distressed, protesting that the insult was not so pointed as it first appeared, whereas it would certainly be provoking to be called the deuce of cads, which in the degree of degradations must take a place near that of being run over by a Ford car. “But please continue, Sir Guy. Your last words were that I am the ace of cads. I would beg you not be constrained by any such small consideration as my presence in your house.”

“Sit down, sit down,” said a _hidalgo_ to a hound, but it was Sir Guy himself who sat down, while the other remained standing before the fireplace. Mr. Maturin, for all his forty odd years of self-indulgence, had still a very good figure, and he liked to be seen at his best. He has, in point of fact, the best figure of any man in this book, and should therefore be treated with some respect. Mrs. de Gramercy, a shadow of distress, sat in a deep chair away in the dimness of the room. And the thousands of books around the oak walls lent a fictitious air of dignity to an occasion which must have embarrassed any but a _grand seigneur_ and an ace of cads. Sir Guy, with a perceptible effort at calm, addressed Mr. Maturin:

“As you may have gathered, sir, I want you to do me a service----”

“Only a great brain like mine could have divined it, sir.”

“Mr. Maturin, would you not provoke my father-in-law!” spoke the lady sharply, and was as sharply told:

“This is men’s business, Eleanour. Now, sir! My son, this lady’s husband, was killed in the war, as you may know. The best men _were_ killed, Mr. Maturin. Fate is not very generous to fine men in time of war. You, I believe, were years ago cashiered from the Brigade for drunkenness in a restaurant?”

“I assure you, sir, that the provocation was more than I could bear,” Mr. Maturin explained with a gravity becoming in one faced by such a misdeed. “I am, you must know, very musical. Perhaps you would hardly think it, but I undoubtedly have a musical _flair_. And in that wretched restaurant the orchestra would insist on playing Mendelssohn’s _Spring Song_! Now I put it to you, Sir Guy--and to you, Mrs. de Gramercy, if I may--could a man bear Mendelssohn’s _Spring Song_ over dinner? Yet I bore myself with a fortitude which some of my lighter friends have since been kind enough to think remarkable. I begged the conductor to cease, once, twice, and thrice; and then, you know, I wasted a bottle of wine over his head. I was hasty, let’s face it. But the provocation!”

Dimly spoke Mrs. de Gramercy from the shadows:

“Father, I believe Mr. Maturin has a D.S.O. with a bar.”

“Mr. Maturin,” the old gentleman said, “I apologise if I have seemed to reflect at all on your courage. Such men as you are, I believe, frequently very courageous----”

“Only when drunk, Sir Guy. In which such men as I are very much the same as other men. Were you, may I ask, ever in a trench before an attack?”

“My fighting days were over before Omdurman, sir----”

“Oh, dear, dashing Omdurman! Illustrations by R. Caton Woodville! You will agree with me that one didn’t need the stimulus of alcohol to turn machine-guns on to a lot of septic-looking niggers without even a water-pistol between them, even though they were devils with assegais, darts, catapults or boomerangs. But the Germans needed fighting. I remember----”

“That will do, Mr. Maturin. Your modesty takes as singular a form as your manners. My son, I was saying, was killed in the war, and his son and daughter were left to the charge of their mother. My grandchildren, Mr. Maturin--heirs to an ancient name and a fortune which must, by decent people, be taken as a responsibility rather than as a means for self-indulgence. I have never agreed with that principle of privilege which demands respect for ancient lineage and great fortune: such things alone are merely baubles; and without the dignity of some office and the ardour of some responsibility they can be of no value, but rather of grave detriment, to serious minds.”

“Oh, quite,” said Mr. Maturin.

“I wished my grandchildren to be brought up to a lofty conception of the duties of their station. My son had, quite rightly, a great regard for the strength and good-sense of his wife, and left her as their sole guardian. I, who have a no less regard for my daughter-in-law, was content with the situation; and, with my mind at rest, continued to lead the very retired life to which my years entitle me, even had I been able to endure the manners of a generation of which, Mr. Maturin, you are such a polished example. Thus, it was only lately that I heard of my grandson’s folly. My grandson, Mr. Maturin! Or must I call upon you to strain your imagination before you can realise that there are still some men in this world to whom the honour of their name is dear!

“I was as displeased as I was surprised when I heard that my daughter-in-law had lately met you at a ball at Lady Carnal’s. The Carnals of my day were more discreet in their introductions. In my day, sir, such fine gentlemen as you were not so easily enabled to corrupt youth by your companionship. Such men as you, sir, used not to be received in decent houses. Nor had good people yet become inured to the habit of going to balls in the houses of _parvenu_ Americans and grotesquely rich Jews, to mix with bankrupts, card-sharpers, notorious adulterers and Socialist politicians. In some such house you must have met my grandson; and, Mr. Maturin, I must grant you the quality of attraction, little though I myself may be privileged to feel it, for with your good looks and casual airs you seem to taint every child you meet. You corrupted my grandson, Mr. Maturin! You flattered him by treating him as a grown man, you taught him to gamble, to dissipate, and, worst of all, to think uncleanly. Both my grandson and my granddaughter, as you were aware, have fortunes of their own from their mother’s father--and by God, sir, you played the devil with that wretched boy’s money, didn’t you!”

“Why,” Mr. Maturin smiled, “the boy _enjoyed_ money for the first time in his life! Until he met me, Sir Guy, he had only worried about what he was going to do with it.”

“And did he, Mr. Maturin, _enjoy_ the money he lost to you at cards? It is not for nothing, I have gathered, that you are spoken of as the best _picquet_ player in London. That wretched boy would, I am sure, give you a certificate----”

“I should be even better pleased, Sir Guy, with a cheque for what he owes me.”

“You shall have it. Eleanour, my cheque-book! A flower in hell, Mr. Maturin, would not be more lonely than a debt of honour on your person.”

“Quite,” said Mr. Maturin, thoughtfully folding the cheque. “Thank you very much.”

“I have dealt with the boy,” old Sir Guy went on in a low voice, “as you are no doubt aware; and he is now expiating his folly and, I hope, regaining his health and self-respect, with some hard work on my Canadian property. At our last meeting he defended you to me. He remained, you understand, a gentleman even after his connection with you, and he couldn’t but speak up for one who had been his friend.”

“He was a good boy,” said Mr. Maturin softly. “I liked that boy.”

Sir Guy rose to his full lean height. The two men faced one another. “Mr. Maturin,” the old gentleman said, “you have corrupted my grandson. You have plundered the best years of his life. Have you anything to say?”

Mr. Maturin said: “If you don’t mind, sir, I will reserve my defence. Isn’t there still worse to come?”

Sir Guy stared, as though he was seeing him for the first time, at the elegant figure who stood with his back to the fire, warming his hands. The savage old man was, so far as it was possible for him to be, nonplussed. Always a great reader of those memoirs and _belles-lettres_ that tell intimately of the lives of gentlemen of more careless and debonair times, the anatomy of _galanterie_, scoundrelism and coxcombry, as exemplified in the Restoration gallants and the eighteenth-century fops, had interested old Sir Guy’s leisure; but never had he thought he would be faced by one so completely unashamed, so bad, by one who could wear the evil _dandysme_ of his soul as nonchalantly as a monocle. Sir Guy again sat himself at his long, burdened writing-table and played thoughtfully with a paper-knife. For the first time in his life he was faced with the humiliation of not knowing what to do: for here before him was a man, an incredible man, to whom such ancient words as honour, loyalty, betrayal, were without meaning. Beau Maturin would take such words, distort them with a slanting smile, put false feet to them, and send them tripping away on the wings of a merry laugh. Merry, for what could shame such a man from his gaiety? And Sir Guy realised now that he had made a mistake in sending Capel Maturin the bank-note. He had sent it to arouse the man’s curiosity, thus to ensure his presence at this interview, from which the old gentleman still, though grimly, expected the best issue; but, more particularly, he had sent that bank-note as an earnest of what he might be prepared to do for Mr. Maturin if he would help the de Gramercys to bring about that blessed issue. But now Sir Guy realised his false step. A thousand pounds more or less did not matter very much to him; but did they matter so very much, he could now reflect, to that pretty, penniless gentleman? Money, to be sure, could not be of the first importance to so complete a cad as Capel Maturin: he had spent his own considerable fortune quickly enough, and, they said, generously enough: it must, thought Sir Guy, be the little cads to whom money really appealed.

The old gentleman’s voice, when he continued, was more subdued, less proud. And has it not been already remarked that Mr. Maturin did not like to see the descent from pride to humility? which, had he had any part of virtue, he should have taken for a sign of grace, even as it is written in the Scriptures. But maybe he did not notice the slight tremor that played in that proud old voice before it could be subdued, for at the moment he was intent on examining his patent-leather shoes, which were exquisite examples of Lobb’s later manner.

Sir Guy was saying: “My grandson, you corrupted. My granddaughter, you have sed----”

“Dear!” cried Mrs. de Gramercy.

Mr. Maturin was quite silent, examining his shoes.

“Perhaps that was too harsh a word,” the old gentleman conceded--he conceded!

“It was,” said Beau Maturin softly. “Much.”

Now Sir Guy’s voice was so low as to be barely audible, while his eyes were as though enchanted by the monogram on his paper-knife.

“I was carried beyond my intention, Mr. Maturin. I apologise, to you and to the child’s mother. But I have had a day that I would not wish for my bitterest enemy. I am very old, Mr. Maturin. Peace, comfort, heart’s ease, have lately assumed an importance which only a few years ago I would have disdained to allow them. Was it essential to you, Capel Maturin, to pilfer my granddaughter from me?”

“But why do you say ‘pilfer,’ sir? Am I not allowed to be like any other man, to make love?”

“Men,” said old Sir Guy, “did not, I thought, make love to young girls. Bankrupts, I am sure, should not. And a man who has been a corespondent in two notorious divorce cases--he _cannot_! Mr. Maturin, it is not that I wish to insult you wantonly, but----”

“I quite understand, Sir Guy. Let us, after all, face the facts.”

“Yes. My granddaughter has just come of age--and, incidentally, into her fortune. You, I believe, are forty or so----”

“Ah, those confounded facts! Forty-seven.”

“I must say they become you very lightly. But, even so, there is a grave disparity of age between you and the child; and, Mr. Maturin, there is an even graver disparity of everything else. By Heaven, man, how could you, how could any man like you, have so blinded yourself to all the decencies of life as to put yourself in the way of a girl like my granddaughter!”

“I’m positively damned if I know!” murmured Mr. Maturin. “But these things happen. They just happen, Sir Guy.”

Sir Guy at last looked up from the shine of the paper-knife; and pressing down with his knuckles on the writing-table as though to steady himself, said: “Mr. Maturin, to-day I have had the greatest shock of my life. My granddaughter told me she was going to marry you.”

“A brave girl!” said Mr. Maturin softly.

The old gentleman’s voice trembled. “Man, you cannot be serious!”

“I can be in love!” said Mr. Maturin coldly.

“Love!” cried the lady in the shadows.

“More,” said Mr. Maturin, “I can love. I did not know that until quite lately. I did not know that when I was young. I get quite rhetorical when I think of it. I did not know, Sir Guy, of this beautiful thing lying in wait for me, Capel Maturin--to love, without fear, without shame, even without hope, without desire----”

“Without desire!” cried Mrs. de Gramercy. “Mr. Maturin, aren’t you exalting yourself?”

Mr. Maturin suddenly looked old and very tired. He said: “I did not speak the exact truth a moment ago. I knew when I was young that I could love. I suspected it. I have awaited the moment for many years. Of course, I have had to kill time meanwhile. I must inform you, Sir Guy, that when I was born a sunflower looked over a wall in Elm Park Gardens. All the gardeners in the neighbourhood were astounded. No sunflower has ever before looked over a wall in Elm Park Gardens. It could only have meant that I would love--one day. And the day has come, I love.”

Sir Guy said: “You blaspheming _poseur_!”

“I beg your pardon,” said Mr. Maturin, “for speaking the truth about myself. People are not used to hearing others speak the truth about themselves. It shall not occur again.”

The voice of Mrs. de Gramercy rose bitterly from the shadows: “Love! What, dear Heaven, do you mean by ‘love,’ Mr. Maturin?”

“Love,” said Mr. Maturin, “is one of the few diseases of the liver which cannot be cured by temperance or an apple a day. That is merely a suggestion.”

“A vile one!” said old Sir Guy.

“Sorry,” sighed Mr. Maturin.

“Mr. Maturin,” cried Mrs. de Gramercy, “how dare you, you of all men, talk so glibly of love! For you were right just now, when you spoke in jest. For men like you love is no more than a fine word for a physical distemper.”

“Mental,” said Mr. Maturin. “Quite mental, I assure you.”

“It’s a passing mood, it doesn’t last! Oh, the lives that have been crucified in the name of love! And now you would crucify my little Joan’s!”

Sir Guy said with savage calm: “Come, come, Eleanour, not so dramatic! You will make the man shy. Mr. Maturin,” Sir Guy went on with a perceptible effort, “I cannot stop the girl from marrying, as you know. She came of age to-day, and from to-day has her own fortune. But, man, is there no way in which we can appeal to your--your generosity! I pay you the compliment of thinking that you are not intending to marry Joan primarily for her money. Am I right?”

“I don’t know. You see,” Mr. Maturin rose to explain seriously, “these things get awfully entangled. To-night, as you saw, the cards ran very badly against me. And as I came away from the place I was so annoyed with myself that I emptied my pockets of the last penny I had. I was intending to begin life entirely afresh from to-morrow. With your daughter, madam, if I may say so. For I am like any other Englishman, Sir Guy, very sentimental about money when I haven’t any and not in the least romantic about it when I have. And so I thought I wouldn’t bring the taint of what money I had to my life with Joan. You must allow me, Sir Guy, and you, Mrs. de Gramercy, to respect and love Joan.”

“And I almost believe you do!” said Sir Guy savagely. “After your fashion. But fashions change, Mr. Maturin.”

“And so do the moon, the stars, the clouds and dancing; yet, let’s face it, they are eternal and everlasting. Sir Guy, I would wish to marry your granddaughter if she were penniless. Why should I not marry her because she is not penniless? What is this spurious humbug about honour that covers the middle and upper classes of England like verdigris: that a poor man may not with honour marry a rich woman, that a poor girl can only “sell” herself to a rich man? Can a man or woman not be loved, then, because he or she is rich? Is that what our religion means when it says that a rich man shall not enter the kingdom of heaven? Was it for that, then, that the late Charles Garvice devoted his life?”

“A moment!” Sir Guy begged wearily. “I am to understand from this rigmarole that you hold Joan to her promise?”

“Mr. Maturin, please!” sighed, as though involuntarily, the voice from the shadows.

Mr. Maturin lit another cigarette and inhaled it. “Wasn’t Joan,” he asked, “at all swayed by your arguments against me? They must have been cogent enough, I fancy.”

“Like the boy,” Sir Guy said with sudden gentleness, “she defended you. You have some magic for youth, it seems. They admit your faults, but do not hold them against your character. But I have observed that it takes grown-up people to condemn caddishness. Children will overlook it.”

“True,” said Mr. Maturin. “You see, Sir Guy, children like people for what they are, not for what they do.” He turned to the dim lady. “I fancy,” he said, “that you have both got hold of the wrong end of the stick. I mean, don’t you see, that it’s not really much use persuading me to give Joan up. I mean, it wouldn’t be much use if I did.”

“How, sir!”

“Mr. Maturin, I don’t quite understand.”

“Well, let’s face it, we must persuade her to give me up. Otherwise,” said Mr. Maturin with an air of conviction, “if I were to break my promise to her she would guess that it was at your persuasion--you might indeed insinuate that you had paid me off, but she wouldn’t believe it--and you would be faced for the rest of your days by an accusing girl. And that would be beastly for you.”

There was a heavy silence: which fled sharply before a rattle when old Sir Guy, with a gesture of distaste, flung his paper-knife on to the table.

“Do I understand you to be caring for my old age, Mr. Maturin?”

“Neither your youth nor your old age are of any interest for me, sir. I am merely suggesting that if I were to give up Joan without her consent she would make a martyr of herself. Her very name will encourage the idea. Mrs. de Gramercy, I am sure you understand me.”

“But,” the lady cried gladly, “does this mean that you _will_ give Joan up? Father, I knew he would. Oh, I knew!”

Mr. Maturin said quickly: “You have misunderstood me. I will not give Joan up.”

“Bah!” snapped Sir Guy.

“But,” said Mr. Maturin.

“Bah!” snapped Sir Guy.

“_But_,” said Mr. Maturin, “I will persuade Joan to give me up.”

“Oh, thank God, thank God!” breathed the mother.

“For,” said Mr. Maturin, “it is, as you say, a deplorable connection. I see that. Besides, when the sunflower looked over the wall in Elm Park Gardens nothing was said about my being loved, only that I should love. And how much more fitting, Sir Guy, for a lady to disown a cad than for a cad to disown a lady! Let us be reasonable.”

The taut old gentleman seemed almost to smile. “You are a dangerous comedian, Mr. Maturin. And how will you effect this _finesse_?”

“Is Joan awake? Splendid! The practice of love grows easier every moment. You ought to try it, Sir Guy. Do you mind if I now make a small speech? It is about girls. Girls are by nature hero-worshippers. When they are not they dress badly and write novels. There is, however, some nonsense abroad to the effect that there is a ‘modern’ girl. How one detests the word ‘modern!’ Disbelieve in the existence of the ‘modern’ girl, Sir Guy. Girlhood is an ancient situation, is exalted by ancient joys, suffers ancient sorrows, reacts to ancient words. There is no modern girl except on the tongues of certain silly people who find an outlet for their own lewdness by ascribing it to other people.”

“And what is the point of all this, sir?”

“It is that no girl, Sir Guy, ancient or modern or what-not, will cease to love a man because of any of the ordinary accusations you can bring against him. There is only one which will destroy her love. You may call her man a cad, and she will smile, and if you repeat it she will get bored. He may be a burglar, but she won’t cease to love him, for is not the world a den of thieves? A poisoner, and she may still love him, for are there not many whom it would be good to poison? A coward, and she may not despise him, for girls are not necessarily fools and brave men can make uncommonly dull lovers. A card-sharper, and she may excuse him, for does not God Himself play with loaded dice? But verily, I say unto you, prove that man guilty of a deep disloyalty and at that moment her love will be as distant as your youth, Sir Guy, and as dead as mine; for disloyalty is the only bedfellow love will certainly reject. Will you call your daughter in, Mrs. de Gramercy, and I will tell her a story? Perhaps it will interest you, too.”

“Call her, Eleanour,” said old Sir Guy. “I fancy Mr. Maturin will have no difficulty in persuading her of his ineligibility on those grounds.”

“True,” said Mr. Maturin. “True.”

III

Now, at last, the occasion is complete, the parts of the comedy all filled: the persons of the play bear themselves with becoming suspense: and the scene is richly set with age, dignity, devilry and youth, one and all essential to the true spirit of comedy.

The grandeur of distress, the lofty silence of disdain--there is the girl’s mother in her shadowed chair and Sir Guy Conduit de Gramercy at his writing-table, the light of the shaded lamp by his elbow laying a rich gloss on his thick white hair. The indifference that masks the depths of emotion, the faint mockery, the deep gravity, and the cunning candour of love----there is Joan de Gramercy coiled in a chair near her mother, a girl with those cool eyes that dare a man to surprise in them any secret that they will not, in their own good time, completely surrender to him.

Mr. Maturin, handsome Beau Maturin, is talking. He generally is. A talkative man, let’s face it.

“Joan,” he addressed the girl’s eyes, “your mother and your grandfather have objected to our engagement. We guessed they would, you remember? Just lately, in fact, we’ve been guessing nothing else. Unfortunately for their authority, however, they are not in a position to prevent it. Now, Joan, we have had quite a long conversation in here, a little about you, but considerably more about me. That I am as God made me is a truth your grandfather will not for a moment admit. He is convinced that I am a good deal worse. That I am in love, your mother is unkind enough to doubt. She is convinced that I am suffering from a physical distemper. And so, just as you were not swayed by your guardians’ arguments to-day, I have not been swayed by them to-night----”

“How, sir!” cried Sir Guy hotly. “Are you----”

“I am talking, Sir Guy. But, Joan,” continued Mr. Maturin, “they insisted that I could cure you of your attachment to me, if I wished. I pointed out that I had already put myself before you as a man whose character contained certain grave flaws; and that you had, while deploring my recent and second bankruptcy and my only too frequent lapses from the strictly moral code, chosen to believe that there is still some good in me, and had therefore remained by your decision to become my wife. Your mother and grandfather, however, have dared me to tell you the complete truth about myself and yet hold you. Joan, did I think for one moment that I would lose you in this way, I frankly admit,” said Mr. Maturin emphatically, “that I would not put my hand to any such quixotic folly----”

“After all,” said Joan de Gramercy, “the past is dead.”

“My point exactly, child. And that is why,” said Mr. Maturin, “if only to satisfy your mother and grandfather of the inevitability of your choice and of my complete faith in your love, I have decided to do what I will do. Listen, Joan----”

It was Sir Guy’s stern voice that fell on the room like an axe.

“You live up to my description of you completely, Mr. Maturin. You are indeed the ace of cads! For now you are betraying your word of a few minutes ago.”

“I do wish you wouldn’t interrupt,” said Mr. Maturin warmly. “I am embarked, let’s face it, on a suspension-bridge of very doubtful strength and you keep on trying to upset my balance with sweeping comments on my character. My tale, Joan,” he continued into the middle air, and spoke from this moment on with his eyes fixed absently in the shadows of the books on the shelves opposite, “my tale has to do with many years ago. Now I have been and I have done many things in my time; and have become one of those men of whom it is vaguely said, ‘He could write a book about his life,’ which of course means that I have done everything in my life except write a book. At the time I speak of I was a subaltern in a Guards regiment; a mode of life which, it may distress you to hear, Sir Guy, bored me in the extreme. As, however, the small allowance my father gave me was contingent on my retaining my commission, and as even the smallest allowance is better than a poke in the eye, I endured in patience the while I gave myself up to the pleasures of the town. You must not for a moment think,” protested Mr. Maturin with feeling, “that I am trying to belittle the gentlemen of the Brigade, for better men than I have tried and failed at that game: nor that I am a slave to malice, for as you know I was later expelled from their company: but truth compels me to confess that my companions of those days were notable rather for the correctness of their appearance than for their learning, while their charm was of that static, profound sort which no one could call ingratiating and a certain kind of primitive _badinage_ was held among them to be the superior of wit. And as time went on I came to be esteemed among the lighter sort for those qualities of the tongue and mind that are calculated to send any man, in due course, headlong down the crooked path.

“But I must tell you I had one very great friend among them. This was a man who had everything I had not: a simple frankness, a plain but almost painfully honest bearing, and a heart like gold; which was then, of course, more evidently in circulation than it is now. I cannot imagine how a boy of that sort could have loved and admired me; but he undoubtedly did, and to a singular degree, so that I was frequently enabled to borrow money from him almost painlessly, for he was heir to a great fortune, with which went a great name; although, to be sure, he was often as hard put to it as I was to fit a morsel of caviare to a piece of toast, for his father had ideas about real estate quite contrary to ours.

“My friend became engaged to a beautiful girl. What she saw in the boy, I do not know. Women are, let’s face it, odd. That she loved him, I was instantly certain. Even my youthful cynicism could not ascribe to her the mean calculation of a fortune-hunter. That he loved her, madly and madly again, he frequently made clear to me in those broken and inarticulate periods that are the hall-mark of all honest Englishmen in love: and which, being often quite inaudible, have earned for Englishmen a delightful reputation for restraint. But let us not generalise when we can so profitably be particular.

“We were at that time in the barracks that guard the frontiers of Chelsea: my friend and I in adjacent rooms. Our ways of life, however, were at that time vastly different; for as I was passing through a financial void I would, with that resignation which no one can deny has been my one consistent virtue, go early to bed every night: whereas my friend would return night after night at about this hour, having escorted his betrothed home after a play and a ball; and night after night, as he prepared himself for bed in the adjoining room, he would softly whistle a tune. Thus, you understand, he expressed his happiness; and killed it, for the walls were thin and the tune intolerable.

“It was Mendelssohn’s _Spring Song_; and, Sir Guy, I have already told you,” said Mr. Maturin with a glance at the old gentleman, who was listening with every mark of attention if not of approval, “how my distaste for that composition led me, some months after the time I speak of, to a hasty action. But what that same distaste caused me to do to that boy was not done hastily.

“One day I borrowed a sum of money from him. He, poor boy, was so absorbed in his happiness that he scarcely noticed the third zero which, having seen how readily he had already attached two, I persuaded him to add to the primary numeral on the cheque. Whereupon, with his full permission, and a thousand pounds of his money, I prepared to make myself agreeable to his _fiancée_.

“He trusted me implicitly, that boy. And who,” Mr. Maturin asked dreamily of the middle distance, “who will tell the tale of the ramifications and subtleties and intrigues of the next few weeks, how I used every art on that beautiful girl, how she came to believe in my love for her--and maybe I believed in it myself--how she came to look wearily on the honest but plain features of her _fiancé_, how she came to suffer his inarticulate periods with a doubtful smile; and how finally--though he had long since ceased to whistle the _Spring Song_--she broke her engagement to him, and had certainly become my wife but that I was at about that time expelled from the Brigade and was never, until quite lately, a marrying man. That is all; and, I think,” said Beau Maturin softly, looking round at the chair which had until a moment ago been occupied by the figure of Joan de Gramercy, “quite enough.”

Sir Guy was silent: his thin long hands clasped nervously together on the surface of the writing-table, he stared fixedly at a point on the carpet. Mrs. de Gramercy was silent. Mr. Maturin examined, for quite a while, the points of his shoes. At last he murmured: “Well....”

Sir Guy said, as though to himself: “That was a very dreadful story.”

“Wasn’t it!” Mr. Maturin agreed gravely. “Well, good-night, Mrs. de Gramercy. Good-night, Sir Guy.” And he strode towards the distant shadows by the door.

“A moment!” the old gentleman seemed to awake. “Mr. Maturin, my daughter-in-law and I have to thank you. Good-bye.”

The tall shadow by the door, as though on the impulse of a sudden memory, seemed to touch the outside of his breast-pocket. “Oh, by the way,” he said, “I will, if you don’t mind, keep this bank-note. Your house owes it to me. Good-bye, good de Gramercys!”

Through the silence of the house the two heard the steps of Beau Maturin on the flags of the hall, the closing of the front-door, the faint echo of his passage down the square. Sir Guy was staring bemused at the still, distant figure of his daughter-in-law.

“What did he say, Eleanour? that our house owed him that money? What on earth did the man mean?”

“What he said,” the shadow whispered, and then it laughed, and old Sir Guy jumped from his chair with the queer shock of that laugh.

“Eleanour!”

As she came towards him he took her hands in his and looked intently down at her. Her eyes were very, very tired. She said: “I am very tired. I will go to bed now.”

Old Sir Guy held her hands very tenderly. “But what is on your mind, Eleanour? Why did you laugh in that dreadful way?”

She opened those tired eyes very wide. “Oh, surely, dear, I am allowed that--to laugh at your having called Beau Maturin the ace of cads!”

Old Sir Guy said sternly: “Yes, you are tired, Eleanour. You are not yourself.”

“Poor old gentleman!” she tenderly, bitterly, smiled up at him. “Poor old gentleman! Dear, like all your generation you have been wrong about everything in ours, but everything! Oh, you have been so wrong about what was good and what was rotten in young people! Wrong about your son, about me, about Beau Maturin----”

Sir Guy snapped with savage impatience: “You will kindly explain, Eleanour, what all this fantastic nonsense is about.”

“Of course,” she said thoughtfully, “there was a certain amount of excuse for your son Basil. I made it rather easy for him. You see, dear, Capel Maturin lied. As usual, you might say. Well, yes. He just told the story the wrong way round. You know, I was once engaged to be married to Mr. Maturin. And he introduced me to his best friend, Basil de Gramercy. Oh, dear, why did you give your son such a very small allowance? Whereas to be able to seduce his best friend’s _fiancée_ he needed money. But Capel Maturin had done very well on the Derby that year, and Basil easily managed to borrow a thousand from him, for no one, let’s face it, could ever call Beau Maturin mean with money. And one day Mr. Maturin, who used to whistle the _Spring Song_ to himself because he and I both loved it, suddenly found that I preferred Basil’s prospects to his good looks. I don’t suppose you can even yet realise, dear, the exquisite revenge that Mr. Maturin has had of me and of your house to-night. He intended, obviously, to marry my daughter: how, you might say, could I have borne that? But I tell you I could have borne it infinitely better than the memory of this night. Here I have sat, a faded woman, while Capel Maturin, fresher and more handsome in bankruptcy than ever I have been in success, having won my daughter’s love, killed it out of pity for you--Oh, not for me!--with a tale which, however he had told it, does me very little honour. And, for pity’s sake, for your sake, he spared you your son. I should not have told you now; I have done wrong, but I had to. Even the old, dear, cannot be allowed to be wrong about everything _all_ the time! But don’t look so sad! Why do you, why should you, look so sad? After all, the de Gramercys have had everything they ever wanted from me and my daughter--and the ace of cads certainly hasn’t! Good-night, dear.”