The Clicking of Cuthbert | Page 7

following as a celebrity, and then
you run up against another bigger celebrity and your admirers desert
you. One could moralize on this at considerable length, but better not,
perhaps. Enough to say that the glamour of Raymond Devine ceased
abruptly in that moment for Adeline, and her most coherent thought at
this juncture was the resolve, as soon as she got up to her room, to burn
the three signed photographs he had sent her and to give the
autographed presentation set of his books to the grocer's boy.

Mrs. Smethurst, meanwhile, having rallied somewhat, was
endeavouring to set the feast of reason and flow of soul going again.
"And how do you like England, Mr. Brusiloff?" she asked.
The celebrity paused in the act of lowering another segment of cake.
"Dam good," he replied, cordially.
"I suppose you have travelled all over the country by this time?"
"You said it," agreed the Thinker.
"Have you met many of our great public men?"
"Yais--Yais--Quite a few of the nibs--Lloyid Gorge, I meet him.
But----" Beneath the matting a discontented expression came into his
face, and his voice took on a peevish note. "But I not meet your real
great men--your Arbmishel, your Arreevadon--I not meet them. That's
what gives me the pipovitch. Have you ever met Arbmishel and
Arreevadon?"
A strained, anguished look came into Mrs. Smethurst's face and was
reflected in the faces of the other members of the circle. The eminent
Russian had sprung two entirely new ones on them, and they felt that
their ignorance was about to be exposed. What would Vladimir
Brusiloff think of the Wood Hills Literary Society? The reputation of
the Wood Hills Literary Society was at stake, trembling in the balance,
and coming up for the third time. In dumb agony Mrs. Smethurst rolled
her eyes about the room searching for someone capable of coming to
the rescue. She drew blank.
And then, from a distant corner, there sounded a deprecating, cough,
and those nearest Cuthbert Banks saw that he had stopped twisting his
right foot round his left ankle and his left foot round his right ankle and
was sitting up with a light of almost human intelligence in his eyes.
"Er----" said Cuthbert, blushing as every eye in the room seemed to fix

itself on him, "I think he means Abe Mitchell and Harry Vardon."
"Abe Mitchell and Harry Vardon?" repeated Mrs. Smethurst, blankly.
"I never heard of----"
"Yais! Yais! Most! Very!" shouted Vladimir Brusiloff, enthusiastically.
"Arbmishel and Arreevadon. You know them, yes, what, no, perhaps?"
"I've played with Abe Mitchell often, and I was partnered with Harry
Vardon in last year's Open."
The great Russian uttered a cry that shook the chandelier.
"You play in ze Open? Why," he demanded reproachfully of Mrs.
Smethurst, "was I not been introducted to this young man who play in
opens?"
"Well, really," faltered Mrs. Smethurst. "Well, the fact is, Mr.
Brusiloff----"
She broke off. She was unequal to the task of explaining, without
hurting anyone's feelings, that she had always regarded Cuthbert as a
piece of cheese and a blot on the landscape.
"Introduct me!" thundered the Celebrity.
"Why, certainly, certainly, of course. This is Mr.----."
She looked appealingly at Cuthbert.
"Banks," prompted Cuthbert.
"Banks!" cried Vladimir Brusiloff. "Not Cootaboot Banks?"
"Is your name Cootaboot?" asked Mrs. Smethurst, faintly.
"Well, it's Cuthbert."
"Yais! Yais! Cootaboot!" There was a rush and swirl, as the

effervescent Muscovite burst his way through the throng and rushed to
where Cuthbert sat. He stood for a moment eyeing him excitedly, then,
stooping swiftly, kissed him on both cheeks before Cuthbert could get
his guard up. "My dear young man, I saw you win ze French Open.
Great! Great! Grand! Superb! Hot stuff, and you can say I said so! Will
you permit one who is but eighteen at Nijni-Novgorod to salute you
once more?"
And he kissed Cuthbert again. Then, brushing aside one or two
intellectuals who were in the way, he dragged up a chair and sat down.
"You are a great man!" he said.
"Oh, no," said Cuthbert modestly.
"Yais! Great. Most! Very! The way you lay your approach-putts dead
from anywhere!"
"Oh, I don't know."
Mr. Brusiloff drew his chair closer.
"Let me tell you one vairy funny story about putting. It was one day I
play at Nijni-Novgorod with the pro. against Lenin and Trotsky, and
Trotsky had a two-inch putt for the hole. But, just as he addresses the
ball, someone in the crowd he tries to assassinate Lenin with a
rewolwer--you know that is our great national sport, trying to
assassinate Lenin with rewolwers--and the bang puts Trotsky off his
stroke and he goes five yards past the hole, and then Lenin, who is
rather shaken, you understand, he misses again himself, and