Page:Punch Vol 148.djvu/462

"We are going to have three," announced my cousin as I sat down beside the tea-table.

Cynthia has a habit, which occasionally makes her a little difficult to follow, of picking up by a very small thread some conversation of the week before last.

"Bravo!" I said, hoping for further light.

"You see, it was a question of bedrooms," she continued.

"In all these cases," I agreed, "it is the bedrooms that really count—that is, I should say, it is the bedrooms that have to be counted."

"Cynthia feels with me that what is imperatively needed in this—ahs—omewhat remote district is a practical example," said my Uncle James from the fireplace.

Uncle James is generally to be found near the fireplace. He is a man for whom I have the greatest respect. A rural dean in rather a large way, with an apostolic manner faintly diluted at times by a decorous bonhomie, he may certainly be regarded as one of the stouter pillars of our local society. His remark, however, though embodying a sound ethical principle, did not seem to get us much farther forward.

"I shall have to rub up my French," said Cynthia.

At last I understood. "Pas du tout," I said politely.

"What?" asked Uncle James in a slightly puzzled voice.

"Je ne voulais que dire," I replied with some difficulty, "que mademoiselle votre fille parle déjà assez couramment la langue de nos Alliés."

With the gravest dignity Uncle James finished his cup of tea and took out his watch.

"I must be going," he said; "the Archdeacon is expecting me at 5.30."

"Poor Papa!" said Cynthia as the door closed behind him; "I do hope our Belgians will be able to speak English."

About a week later I received a note from Cynthia asking me to come round in the afternoon. I obeyed, and found her looking distinctly worried.

"Où sont vos amis?" I asked.

"You needn't bother. Monsieur speaks English quite well and translates everything to his wife and daughter. Papa likes them immensely. He has taken them out for a walk."

"Capital! Then you've all settled down comfortably together?"

"I thought so till this morning," said Cynthia with a sigh.

"Qu'est-ce que vous—I mean, what's the matter?"

"It is Monsieur. You know Papa's Venus, the statuette he bought last year in Brussels?"

"Yes, I was with him at the time."

"Monsieur noticed it yesterday in the hall, and this morning he came to me and said that he and his family must leave us."

"But I had no idea that the Latin races———"

"It isn't that. It appears that he was the proprietor of the shop where Papa bought it, and that he sold it to him as a genuine antique, whereas in reality it was made in Birmingham."

"Ah!" I said sadly.

"Monsieur is overwhelmed with remorse and declares it is impossible longer to accept the hospitality of one whom he has betrayed. However, I begged him to wait at any rate till tomorrow before he said anything to Papa about it. And then I sent for you at once. So now what is to be done?"

I stared very hard at the carpet for five minutes. "Cynthia," I said at length, "your father must be sacrificed, but it shall be a painless operation—in fact, he will never realise that it has taken place."

"Are you sure?" she asked doubtfully.

"Perfectly," I said; "leave it to me."

A little later Uncle James and his guests returned, and we all took tea together. Conversation with Madame and Mademoiselle was carried on, as Cynthia had said, through the medium of Monsieur. I myself made no attempt to reach them by the more direct route, since my French, though perfect in its way, is not of the sudden, unpremeditated type so much in vogue in Continental circles. After tea I managed to secure a few minutes alone with Monsieur.

I decided to come straight to the point. "Monsieur," I said, "my cousin has told me all."

"Behold," he replied, "an angel! Mademoiselle would forgive. To her it is a bagatelle. She—how say you?—she snaps at it the thumb. But for me, Monsieur, I am desolated. The business is the business; I know it. But to have betrayed one's host, it is other thing. It is impossible that I rest here."

"My dear Sir," I said soothingly, "do not distress yourself. I was with my uncle when he bought the Venus. He paid you with a 100-franc note."

"It is true," he admitted with an ineffable gesture of despair.

"Did you pass it on?" I asked.

"But naturally."

You were indeed fortunate."

"What mean you?"

"Monsieur," I said, "on the morning of our departure from your beautiful city we discovered that one of you countrymen had deceived us."

"The note!" exclaimed Monsieur "it was then a bad?"

"Alas! yes. On the previous after noon I had gone to the races, unaccompanied by my uncle, who as a ecclesiastic of the middle degree doe not permit himself such distractions On my return I was able to settle a little debt that I owed him with a 100 franc note. Next morning, when he paid his hotel bill, he offered this to the manager. The manager, who had once been a Scotchman, rejected it. My uncle was annoyed. He asked me to take hack the note and to give him another in exchange. But I also had just paid my bill—a larger one than had looked for—and had little more than my return ticket left. My uncle thought deeply. Finally he said to me "This is an unfortunate business, but it may well be that not all the inhabitants are so fastidious as the unpleasant manager of our hotel. Let us endeavour to rid ourselves elsewhere of this pestilent note. It will be but just, since what is sauce for the goose is sauce also for the gander."

"I comprehend. Then it was who?———"

"You were the gander," I said.

He smiled. "Yet at the end not I but another." I nodded.

"Monsieur," he said happily, "you have raised the weight from my soul It is what you call allsquare."

"They had had the B hop of Buckingham among them, and he was sure they would wish him to greet him under his new title and say how greatly they looked forward to an increase of spiritual activity in the Church owing to his appointment."

Report of Oxford Diocesan Conference.

Where the B hops, there hop I.

"PORTMAN-SQUARE (two miles from it).—Very bright Furnished ROOMS on second and third floor, bath, electric light; references."

Advertisement in "The Times."

This apparent prejudice against Portman Square is to us inexplicable. We have always understood it to be quite a respectable locality.