The Observations of Henry | Page 4

be Caroline Trevelyan's dog
as would be doing something out of the common, getting himself lost
or summoned or drowned--it didn't matter much what.
I moved from Oxford Street to the new "Horseshoe" that year--it had
just been rebuilt--and there I saw a good deal of them, for they came in
to lunch there or supper pretty regular. Young "Kipper"--or the
"Captain" as everybody called him--gave out that he was her
half-brother.
"I'ad to be some sort of a relation, you see," he explained to me. "I'd a'
been 'er brother out and out; that would have been simpler, only the
family likeness wasn't strong enough. Our styles o' beauty ain't
similar." They certainly wasn't.
"Why don't you marry her?" I says, "and have done with it?"
He looked thoughtful at that. "I did think of it," he says, "and I know,
jolly well, that if I 'ad suggested it 'fore she'd found herself, she'd have
agreed, but it don't seem quite fair now."
"How d'ye mean fair?" I says.
"Well, not fair to 'er," he says. "I've got on all right, in a small way; but
she--well, she can just 'ave 'er pick of the nobs. There's one on 'em as
I've made inquiries about. 'E'll be a dook, if a kid pegs out as is
expected to, and anyhow 'e'll be a markis, and 'e means the straight
thing--no errer. It ain't fair for me to stand in 'er way."
"Well," I says, "you know your own business, but it seems to me she
wouldn't have much way to stand in if it hadn't been for you."

"Oh, that's all right," he says. "I'm fond enough of the gell, but I shan't
clamour for a tombstone with wiolets, even if she ain't ever Mrs. Capt'n
Kit. Business is business; and I ain't going to queer 'er pitch for 'er."
I've often wondered what she'd a' said, if he'd up and put the case to her
plain, for she was a good sort; but, naturally enough, her head was a bit
swelled, and she'd read so much rot about herself in the papers that
she'd got at last to half believe some of it. The thought of her
connection with the well-known judge seemed to hamper her at times,
and she wasn't quite so chummy with "Kipper" as used to be the case in
the Mile-End Road days, and he wasn't the sort as is slow to see a
thing.
One day when he was having lunch by himself, and I was waiting on
him, he says, raising his glass to his lips, "Well, 'Enery, here's luck to
yer! I won't be seeing you agen for some time."
"Oh," I says. "What's up now?"
"I am," he says, "or rather my time is. I'm off to Africa."
"Oh," I says, "and what about--"
"That's all right," he interrupts. "I've fixed up that--a treat. Truth, that's
why I'm going."
I thought at first he meant she was going with him.
"No," he says, "she's going to be the Duchess of Ridingshire with the
kind consent o' the kid I spoke about. If not, she'll be the Marchioness
of Appleford. 'E's doing the square thing. There's going to be a quiet
marriage to-morrow at the Registry Office, and then I'm off."
"What need for you to go?" I says.
"No need," he says; "it's a fancy o' mine. You see, me gone, there's
nothing to 'amper 'er--nothing to interfere with 'er settling down as a
quiet, respectable toff. With a 'alf-brother, who's always got to be spry

with some fake about 'is lineage and 'is ancestral estates, and who drops
'is 'h's,' complications are sooner or later bound to a-rise. Me out of
it--everything's simple. Savey?"
Well, that's just how it happened. Of course, there was a big row when
the family heard of it, and a smart lawyer was put up to try and undo
the thing. No expense was spared, you bet; but it was all no go.
Nothing could be found out against her. She just sat tight and said
nothing. So the thing had to stand. They went and lived quietly in the
country and abroad for a year or two, and then folks forgot a bit, and
they came back to London. I often used to see her name in print, and
then the papers always said as how she was charming and graceful and
beautiful, so I suppose the family had made up its mind to get used to
her.
One evening in she comes to the Savoy. My wife put me up to getting
that job, and a good job it is, mind you, when you know your way
about. I'd never have had the cheek to try for it, if it hadn't been for the