If Only etc. | Page 7

to give him so
much as a word.
"I think I had the pleasure of seeing you perform the other night, Mrs.
Doss," remarked Mr. Meynell.

"Don't she look a figger in tights? now tell the truth and shame the old
gentleman: a female as fat as my wife ought not never to leave off her
petticoats, that's what I says."
"Samuel, fie! You make me blush." His wife coughed discreetly behind
her hand. "It's a new departure, I grant; but I've had a good many
compliments paid me since I took to the nautical style, I can tell you."
"Gammon!" grunted Mr. Doss, with a dissatisfied air. "Did you see her
as the 'Rabbit Queen,' sir? My! the patience that woman displayed in
the training of them little furry animals would have astonished you.
Struck the line, sir, out of her own 'ed! 'I'm going, Samuel,' she said, 'to
supply a want.' 'You!' I says. 'Me!' says she; 'they have got their
serpents,' she says, 'and their ducks, and their pigeons and their
kangaroos,' 'What's their void?' said I. 'Rabbits,' she says, and there you
are!"
"Saidie, why don't you sit down? We will have some supper directly,"
said Bella.
"Oh, my dear, I'm dying for a drink!" cried Miss Blackall, flinging
herself in an attitude more easy than graceful into an armchair.
Bella opened the chiffonier and produced glasses and a spirit stand.
"Saves the trouble of ringing for the servant," she said archly to
Meynell.
Chetwynd could fairly have groaned; and when his wife put the climax
upon everything by drinking out of her sister's glass he could contain
himself no longer. "I never saw you touch spirits before," he said,
determined that his friend should know that his wife was an abstemious
woman.
"Ah," she said lightly, "there are lots of things you never saw me do,
Jack, which I am capable of, all the same." Whereupon Saidie burst out
laughing as at some prodigious joke.

"Good for you, Bella! All right, dear! I'm not one to tell tales out of
school."
"Are you a married man, sir, may I ask?"
Doss put his thumbs under his arm-pits and looked scrutinisingly into
Meynell's face. "I should say not."
"No, I'm a bachelor, and likely to continue one."
"Well," remarked Mrs. Doss sentimentally, "I don't know nothing
jollier than courting time. Such little ordinary things seem sweet like,
then."
"Hark at the old girl," chuckled Doss.
"You can't kidd me, Doss. You know it, too. I think of our own billing
and cooing, sir--his and mine. I was not a draw in those days; the last
turn in the bill at the "Middlesex" was about my mark, and Doss, he
hadn't risen, neither. We used to walk 'ome that lovin' up Drury Lane,
and Doss, he would say, 'fish, Tilda,' and I would say, 'if you could
fancy a bit, Sam.' And in he would pop for two penny slices and chips.
And eat--lor', how we did eat. When I look back on that fish,
sometimes I could cry. Money and fame ain't everythink in the world,
believe me, they ain't. You may be 'appy in your 'umbleness."
All this was gall and wormwood to John Chetwynd, and he approached
his wife again and whispered.
"It is getting late--are these people never going?"
"Not until they have had supper, most certainly."
"And do you expect my friend to join you?"
"You can please yourselves. I don't think either of you would be much
acquisition in your present frame of mind. Mrs. Doss, somebody
interrupted you; you were talking about a kindred soul and an attic.
Money and position are not everything you were saying. I agree with

you. Give me an easy life and no stilts."
John Chetwynd could stand it no longer.
"Madam," he said, addressing Mrs. Doss; "I must really apologise, but
Mr. Meynell and I have important business to discuss, and--"
Mrs. Doss might be vulgar, but she was not obtuse. Seeing she and her
husband were not wanted, she sprang to her feet.
"Sam--right about face; we must be off 'ome."
"Nonsense, you must have some supper before you go," said Bella.
"Oh, I think we will be toddling, thanks. Are you coming with us,
Saidie?"
"No, I'm not," returned that young woman, sturdily. "Since this house is
the joint property of Dr. John Chetwynd and his wife, I reckon I shall
stop awhile. Bella, you are not going to turn me out, are you?"
"Not I. I can't imagine what Jack means by behaving so inhospitably. I
hope you will all stop."
But Mr. Doss, exceedingly affronted at the slight offered him, had
tucked his wife's arm under his own and was already at the door.
"Good night, gents. My best respects to you, Mrs.