The Philanderers | Page 8

dear fellow, don't!' said Mallinson; 'I loathe hearing about them.
It's so degrading to us to think we sprang from them.'
The peculiar sensitiveness of a mind ever searching, burrowing in, and
feeding upon itself struck a jarring note upon its healthier companion.
'Why, what on earth does it matter?' asked Drake.

'Ah! Perhaps you wouldn't understand.'
Conway gave a shrug of the shoulder and laughed to Drake across the
table. The latter looked entreaty in reply and courageously started a
different topic. He spoke of their boyhood in the suburb on the heights
six miles to the south of London, and in particular of a certain hill,
Elm-tree Hill they called it, a favourite goal for walks and the spot
where the three had last met on the night before Drake left England.
London had lain beneath it roped with lights.
'The enchanted city,' said Conway, catching back some flavour of those
times. 'It seemed distant as El Dorado, and as desirable.'
Mallinson responded with the gentle smile with which a man
recognises and pities a childishness he has himself outgrown.
Drake ordered port, having great faith in its qualities, as inducive of a
cat-like content and consequent good-fellowship. Mallinson, however,
never touched port; nothing but the lightest of French burgundies after
dinner for him. The party withdrew to the smoking-room.
'By the way, Drake,' asked Mallinson, 'have you anything to do
to-night?'
'No, why?'
'I was asked to take you to a sort of party.'
Conway looked up sharply in surprise.
'You were asked to take me!' exclaimed Drake. 'Who asked you?'
'Oh, nobody whom you know.' He hesitated for a second, then added
with studied carelessness, 'A Miss Le Mesurier. Her mother's dead,' he
explained, noticing the look of surprise on Drake's face, 'so she keeps
house for her father. There's an aunt to act as chaperon, but she doesn't
count. I got a note from Miss Le Mesurier just before I came here
asking me to bring you.'

'But what does she know of me?'
'Oh, I may have mentioned your name,' he explained indifferently, and
Conway smiled.
'Besides,' said Conway, 'the Meteor has transformed you into a public
character. One knows of your movements.'
'What I don't see is how Miss Le Mesurier could have known that you
had landed yesterday,' commented Mallinson.
'I was interviewed by the Meteor on Plymouth Quay. You received the
note, you say, this evening. She may have seen the interview.'
Drake called to a waiter and ordered him to bring a copy of the paper.
Conway took it and glanced at the first page.
'Yes, here it is.'
He read a few lines to himself, and burst into a laugh.
'Guess how it begins?'
'I know,' said Drake.
'A sovereign you don't.'
Drake laid a sovereign on the table. Conway followed his example.
'It begins,' said Drake, 'with a Latin quotation, O si sic omnes!'
'It begins,' corrected Conway, pocketing the money, 'with very
downright English'; and he read, 'Drake, with the casual indifference of
the hardened filibuster, readily accorded an interview to our
representative on landing from the Dunrobin Castle yesterday
afternoon!'
Drake snatched the paper out of Conway's hand, and ran his eye down
the column to see whether his words had been similarly transmuted by

the editorial alchemy. They were printed, however, as they had been
spoken, but interspersed with comments. The editor had contented
himself with stamping his own device upon the coin; he had not tried to
change its metal. Drake tossed the paper on one side. 'The man goes
vitriol-throwing with vinegar,' he said.
Conway picked up the Meteor.
'You are a captain, aren't you?' he asked. 'The omission of the title
presumes you a criminal.'
'I don't object to the omission,' replied Drake. 'I suppose the title
belongs to me by right. But, after all, a captain in Matanga! There are
more honourable titles.'
Mallinson looked at him suddenly, as though some fresh idea had shot
into his brain.
'Well, will you come?' he asked carelessly.
'I hardly feel inclined to move.'
'I didn't imagine you would.' There was evidence of distinct relief in the
brisk tone of Mallinson's voice. He turned to Conway, 'We ought to be
starting, I fancy.'
'I shall stay with Drake,' Conway answered, despondently to Drake's
thinking, and he lapsed into silence after Mallinson's departure, broken
by intervals of ineffective sarcasm concerning women, ineffectively
accentuated by short jerks of laughter. He roused himself in a while and
carried Drake off to his club, where he found Hugh Fielding pulling his
moustache over the Meteor. He introduced Drake, and left them
together.
'I was reading a list of your sins,' said Fielding, and he waved the
newspaper.
Drake laughed in reply.

'The vivisectionists,' said Fielding, 'may cite you as proof of the