Love Among the Chickens | Page 8

his voice suggested the Irishman. It was not a brogue. There were no strange words. But the general effect was Irish. Garnet congratulated himself. Irishmen are generally good company. An Irishman with a pretty daughter should be unusually good company.
The bustle on the platform had increased momently, until now, when, from the snorting of the engine, it seemed likely that the train might start at any minute, the crowd's excitement was extreme. Shrill cries echoed down the platform. Lost sheep, singly and in companies, rushed to and fro, peering eagerly into carriages in the search for seats. Piercing cries ordered unknown "Tommies" and "Ernies" to "keep by aunty, now." Just as Ukridge returned, the dreaded "Get in anywhere" began to be heard, and the next moment an avalanche of warm humanity poured into the carriage. A silent but bitter curse framed itself on Garnet's lips. His chance of pleasant conversation with the lady of the brown hair and the eyes that were either gray or blue was at an end.
The newcomers consisted of a middle-aged lady, addressed as aunty; a youth called Albert, subsequently described by Garnet as the rudest boy on earth--a proud title, honestly won; lastly, a niece of some twenty years, stolid and seemingly without interest in life.
Ukridge slipped into his corner, adroitly foiling Albert, who had made a dive in that direction. Albert regarded him fixedly for a space, then sank into the seat beside Garnet and began to chew something grewsome that smelled of aniseed.
Aunty, meanwhile, was distributing her weight evenly between the toes of the Irish gentleman and those of his daughter, as she leaned out of the window to converse with a lady friend in a straw hat and hair curlers. Phyllis, he noticed, was bearing it with angelic calm. Her profile, when he caught sight of it round aunty, struck him as a little cold, even haughty. That, however, might be due to what she was suffering. It is unfair to judge a lady's character from her face, at a moment when she is in a position of physical discomfort. The train moved off with a jerk in the middle of a request on the part of the straw-hatted lady that her friend would "remember that, you know, about him," and aunty, staggering back, sat down on a bag of food which Albert had placed on the seat beside him.
"Clumsy!" observed Albert tersely.
"Albert, you mustn't speak to aunty so."
"Wodyer want sit on my bag for, then?" inquired Albert.
They argued the point.
Garnet, who should have been busy studying character for a novel of the lower classes, took up his magazine and began to read. The odor of aniseed became more and more painful. Ukridge had lighted a cigar, and Garnet understood why Mrs. Ukridge preferred to travel in another compartment. For "in his hand he bore the brand which none but he might smoke."
Garnet looked stealthily across the carriage to see how his lady of the hair and eyes was enduring this combination of evils, and noticed that she, too, had begun to read. And as she put down the book to look out of the window at the last view of London, he saw with a thrill that it was "The Maneuvers of Arthur." Never before had he come upon a stranger reading his work. And if "The Maneuvers of Arthur" could make the reader oblivious to surroundings such as these, then, felt Garnet, it was no common book--a fact which he had long since suspected.
The train raced on toward the sea. It was a warm day, and a torpid peace began to settle down on the carriage.
Soon only Garnet, the Irishman, and the lady were awake.
"What's your book, me dear?" asked the Irishman.
"'The Maneuvers of Arthur,' father," said Phyllis. "By Jeremy Garnet."
Garnet would not have believed without the evidence of his ears that his name could possibly have sounded so well.
"Dolly Strange gave it to me when I left the abbey," continued Phyllis. "She keeps a shelf of books for her guests when they are going away. Books that she considers rubbish and doesn't want, you know."
Garnet hated Dolly Strange without further evidence.
"And what do you think of it, me dear?"
"I like it," said Phyllis decidedly. The carriage swam before Garnet's eyes. "I think it is very clever. I shall keep it."
"Bless you," thought Garnet, "and I will write my precious autograph on every page, if you want it."
"I wonder who Jeremy Garnet is?" said Phyllis. "I imagine him rather an old young man, probably with an eyeglass and conceited. He must be conceited. I can tell that from the style. And I should think he didn't know many girls. At least, if he thinks Pamela Grant an ordinary sort of girl."
"Is she not?" asked her father.
"She's a cr-r-reature," said Phyllis