The Golden Scarecrow | Page 9

gain the
intimacy and confidence of some of the children who played in the
Gardens there. They trusted him and told him more than they told many
people. He had never forgotten Mr. Pidgen; that walk, that vision of the
Scarecrow, stood, as such childish things will, for a landmark in his
history. He came to believe that those experiences that he knew, in his
own life, to be true, were true also for some others. That's as it may be.
I can only say that Barbara and Angelina, Bim and even Sarah Trefusis
were his friends. I daresay his theory is all wrong.
I can only say that I know that they were his friends; perhaps, after all,
the Scarecrow is shining somewhere in golden armour. Perhaps, after

all, one need not be so lonely as one often fancies that one is.
CHAPTER I
HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER
I
March Square is not very far from Hyde Park Corner in London Town.
Behind the whir and rattle of the traffic it stands, spacious and cool and
very old, muffled by the little streets that guard it, happily unconscious,
you would suppose, that there were any in all the world so unfortunate
as to have less than five thousand a year for their support. Perhaps a
hundred years ago March Square might boast of such superior
ignorance, but fashions change, to prevent, it may be, our own too
easily irritated monotonies, and, for some time now, the Square has
been compelled, here, there, in one corner and another, to admit the
invader. It is true that the solemn, respectable grey house, No. 3, can
boast that it is the town residence of His Grace the Duke of Crole and
his beautiful young Duchess, née Miss Jane Tunster of New York City,
but it is also true that No. ---- is in the possession of Mr. Munty Ross of
Potted Shrimp fame, and there are Dr. Cruthen, the Misses Dent,
Herbert Hoskins and his wife, whose incomes are certainly nearer to
£500 than £5,000. Yes, rents and blue blood have come down in March
Square; it is, certainly, not the less interesting for that, but----
Some of the houses can boast the days of good Queen Anne for their
period. There is one, at the very corner where Somers Street turns off
towards the Park, that was built only yesterday, and has about it some
air of shame, a furtive embarrassment that it will lose very speedily.
There is no house that can claim beauty, and yet the Square, as a whole,
has a fine charm, something that age and colour, haphazard adventure,
space and quiet have all helped towards.
There is, perhaps, no square in London that clings so tenaciously to any
sign or symbol of old London that motor-cars and the increase of speed
have not utterly destroyed. All the oldest London mendicants find their
way, at different hours of the week, up and down the Square. There is, I

believe, no other square in London where musicians are permitted. On
Monday morning there is the blind man with the black patch over one
eye; he has an organ (a very old one, with a painted picture of the
Battle of Trafalgar on the front of it) and he wears an old black
skull-cap. He wheezes out his old tunes (they are older than other tunes
that March Square hears, and so, perhaps, March Square loves them).
He goes despondently, and the tap of his stick sounds all the way round
the Square. A small and dirty boy--his grandson, maybe--pushes the
organ for him. On Tuesday there comes the remnants of a German
band--remnants because now there are only the cornet, the flute and the
trumpet. Sadly wind-blown, drunken and diseased they are, and the
Square can remember when there were a number of them, hale and
hearty young fellows, but drink and competition have been too strong
for them. On Wednesdays there is sometimes a lady who sings ballads
in a voice that can only be described as that contradiction in terms "a
shrill contralto." Her notes are very piercing and can be heard from one
end of the Square to the other. She sings "Annie Laurie" and "Robin
Adair," and wears a battered hat of black straw. On Thursday there is a
handsome Italian with a barrel organ that bears in its belly the very
latest and most popular tunes. It is on Thursday that the Square learns
the music of the moment; thus from one end of the year to the other
does it keep pace with the movement.
On Fridays there is a lean and ragged man wearing large and, to the
children of the Square, terrifying spectacles. He is a very gloomy
fellow and sings hymn-tunes, "Rock