Love Among the Chickens Page 8

  A LITTLE DINNER

  VIII

  "Edwin comes to-day," said Mrs. Ukridge.

  "And the Derricks," said Ukridge, sawing at the bread in his energeticway. "Don't forget the Derricks, Millie."

  "No, dear. Mrs. Beale is going to give us a very nice dinner. Wetalked it over yesterday."

  "Who is Edwin?" I asked.

  We were finishing breakfast on the second morning after my visit tothe Derricks. I had related my adventures to the staff of the farm onmy return, laying stress on the merits of our neighbors and theirinterest in our doings, and the hired retainer had been sent off nextmorning with a note from Mrs. Ukridge, inviting them to look over thefarm and stay to dinner.

  "Edwin?" said Ukridge. "Beast of a cat."

  "O Stanley!" said Mrs. Ukridge plaintively. "He's not. He's such adear, Mr. Garnet. A beautiful, pure-bred Persian. He has takenprizes."

  "He's always taking something--generally food. That's why he didn'tcome down with us."

  "A great, horrid _beast_ of a dog bit him, Mr. Garnet." Mrs. Ukridge'seyes became round and shining. "And poor Edwin had to go to a cats'hospital."

  "And I hope," said Ukridge, "the experience will do him good. Sneakeda dog's bone, Garnet, under his very nose, if you please. Naturally,the dog lodged a protest."

  "I'm so afraid that he will be frightened of Bob. He will be verytimid, and Bob's so exceedingly boisterous. Isn't he, Mr. Garnet?"

  I owned that Bob's manner was not that of a Vere de Vere.

  "That's all right," said Ukridge; "Bob won't hurt him, unless he triesto steal his bone. In that case we will have Edwin made into a rug."

  "Stanley doesn't like Edwin," said Mrs. Ukridge plaintively.

  * * * * *

  Edwin arrived early in the afternoon, and was shut into the kitchen.He struck me as a handsome cat, but nervous. He had an excited eye.

  The Derricks followed two hours later. Mr. Chase was not of the party.

  "Tom had to go to London," explained the professor, "or he would havebeen delighted to come. It was a disappointment to the boy, for hewanted to see the farm."

  "He must come some other time," said Ukridge. "We invite inspection.Look here," he broke off suddenly--we were nearing the fowl run now,Mrs. Ukridge walking in front with Phyllis Derrick--"were you ever atBristol?"

  "Never, sir," said the professor.

  "Because I knew just such another fat little buffer there a few yearsago. Gay old bird, he was. He--"

  "This is the fowl run, professor," I broke in, with a moist, tinglingfeeling across my forehead and up my spine. I saw the professorstiffen as he walked, while his face deepened in color. Ukridge'sbreezy way of expressing himself is apt to electrify the stranger.

  "You will notice the able way--ha, ha!--in which the wire netting isarranged," I continued feverishly. "Took some doing, that. By Jove!yes. It was hot work. Nice lot of fowls, aren't they? Rather a mixedlot, of course. Ha, ha! That's the dealer's fault, though. We aregetting quite a number of eggs now. Hens wouldn't lay at first.Couldn't make them."

  I babbled on till from the corner of my eye I saw the flush fade fromthe professor's face and his back gradually relax its pokerlikeattitude. The situation was saved for the moment, but there was noknowing what further excesses Ukridge might indulge in. I managed todraw him aside as we went through the fowl run, and expostulated.

  "For goodness' sake, be careful," I whispered. "You've no notion howtouchy the professor is."

  "But _I_ said nothing," he replied, amazed.

  "Hang it, you know, nobody likes to be called a fat little buffer tohis face."

  "What else could I call him? Nobody minds a little thing like that. Wecan't be stilted and formal. It's ever so much more friendly to relaxand be chummy."

  Here we rejoined the others, and I was left with a leaden forebodingof grewsome things in store. I knew what manner of man Ukridge waswhen he relaxed and became chummy. Friendships of years' standing hadfailed to survive the test.

  For the time being, however, all went well. In his role of lecturer heoffended no one, and Phyllis and her father behaved admirably. Theyreceived the strangest theories without a twitch of the mouth.

  "Ah," the professor would say, "now, is that really so? Veryinteresting, indeed."

  Only once, when Ukridge was describing some more than usually originaldevice for the furthering of the interests of his fowls, did a slightspasm disturb Phyllis's look of attentive reverence.

  "And you have really had no previous experience in chicken farming?"she said.

  "None," said Ukridge, beaming through his glasses, "not an atom. But Ican turn my hand to anything, you know. Things seem to come naturallyto me, somehow."

  "I see," said Phyllis.

  It was while matters were progressing with such beautiful smoothnessthat I observed the square form of the hired retainer approaching us.Somehow--I cannot say why--I had a feeling that he came with bad news.Perhaps it was his air of quiet satisfaction which struck me asominous.

  "Beg pardon, Mr. Ukridge, sir."

  Ukridge was in the middle of a very eloquent excursus on the feedingof fowls. The interruption annoyed him.

  "Well, Beale," he said, "what is it?"

  "That there cat, sir, what came to-day."

  "O Beale," cried Mrs. Ukridge in agitation, "_what_ has happened?"

  "Having something to say to the missus--"

  "What has happened? O Beale, don't say that Edwin has been hurt? Whereis he? Oh, _poor_ Edwin!"

  "Having something to say to the missus--"

  "If Bob has bitten him, I hope he had his nose _well_ scratched," saidMrs. Ukridge vindictively.

  "Having something to say to the missus," resumed the hired retainertranquilly, "I went into the kitchen ten minutes back. The cat wassitting on the mat."

  Beale's narrative style closely resembled that of a certain book I hadread in my infancy. I wish I could remember its title. It was awell-written book.

  "Yes, Beale, yes?" said Mrs. Ukridge. "Oh, do go on!"

  "'Halloo, puss,' I says to him, 'and 'ow are you, sir?' 'Be careful,'says the missus. ''E's that timid,' she says, 'you wouldn't believe,'she says. ''E's only just settled down, as you may say,' she says.'Ho, don't you fret,' I says to her, ''im and me we understands eachother. 'Im and me,' I says, 'is old friends. 'E's me dear old pal,Corporal Banks, of the Skrimshankers.' She grinned at that, ma'am,Corporal Banks being a man we'd 'ad many a 'earty laugh at in the olddays. 'E was, in a manner of speaking, a joke between us."

  "Oh, do--go--on, Beale! What has happened to Edwin?"

  The hired retainer proceeded in calm, even tones.

  "We was talking there, ma'am, when Bob, which had followed me unknown,trotted in. When the cat ketched sight of 'im sniffing about, therewas such a spitting and swearing as you never 'eard, and blowed," saidMr. Beale amusedly, as if the recollection tickled him, "blowed if theold cat didn't give one jump and move in quick time up the chimley,where 'e now remains, paying no 'eed to the missus's attempts to gethim down again."

  Sensation, as they say in the reports.

  "But he'll be cooked," cried Phyllis, open-eyed.

  Ukridge uttered a roar of dismay.

  "No, he won't. Nor will our dinner. Mrs. Beale always lets the kitchenfire out during the afternoon. It's a cold dinner we'll get to-night,if that cat doesn't come down."

  The professor's face fell. I had remarked on the occasion when I hadlunched with him his evident fondness for the pleasures of the table.Cold, impromptu dinners were plainly not to his taste.

  We went to the kitchen in a body. Mrs. Beale was standing in front ofthe empty grate making seductive cat noises up the chimney.

  "What's all this, Mrs. Beale?" said Ukridge.

  "He won't come down, sir, not while he thinks Bob's about. And how I'mto cook dinner for five with him up the chimney I don't see, sir."

  "Prod at him with a broom handle, Mrs. Beale," urged Ukridge.

&nbs
p; "I 'ave tried that, sir, but I can't reach him, and I've only bin anddrove 'im further up. What must be," added Mrs. Beale philosophically,"must be. He may come down of his own accord in the night. Bein''ungry."

  "Then what we must do," said Ukridge in a jovial manner which to me atleast seemed out of place, "is to have a regular, jolly, picnicdinner, what? Whack up whatever we have in the larder, and eat that."

  "A regular, jolly, picnic dinner," repeated the professor gloomily. Icould read what was passing in his mind.

  "That will be delightful," said Phyllis.

  "I've only bin and drove 'im further up," said Mrs.Beale.]

  "Er--I think, my dear sir," said her father, "it would be hardly fairof us to give any further trouble to Mrs. Ukridge and yourself. If youwill allow me, therefore, I will--"

  Ukridge became gushingly hospitable. He refused to think of allowinghis guests to go empty away. He would be able to whack up something,he said. There was quite a good deal of the ham left, he was sure. Heappealed to me to indorse his view that there was a tin of sardinesand part of a cold fowl and plenty of bread and cheese.

  "And after all," he said, speaking for the whole company in thegenerous, comprehensive way enthusiasts have, "what more do we want inweather like this? A nice, light, cold dinner is ever so much betterfor us than a lot of hot things."

  The professor said nothing. He looked wan and unhappy.

  We strolled out again into the garden, but somehow things seemed todrag. Conversation was fitful, except on the part of Ukridge, whocontinued to talk easily on all subjects, unconscious of the fact thatthe party was depressed, and at least one of his guests rapidlybecoming irritable. I watched the professor furtively as Ukridgetalked on, and that ominous phrase of Mr. Chase's concerningfour-point-seven guns kept coming into my mind. If Ukridge were totread on any of his pet corns, as he might at any minute, there wouldbe an explosion. The snatching of the dinner from his very mouth, asit were, and the substitution of a bread-and-cheese and sardines menuhad brought him to the frame of mind when men turn and rend theirnearest and dearest.

  The sight of the table, when at length we filed into the dining room,sent a chill through me. It was a meal for the very young or the veryhungry. The uncompromising coldness and solidity of the viands wasenough to appall a man conscious that his digestion needed humoring. Ahuge cheese faced us in almost a swash-buckling way, and I noticedthat the professor shivered slightly as he saw it. Sardines, lookingmore oily and uninviting than anything I had ever seen, appeared intheir native tin beyond the loaf of bread. There was a ham, in itsthird quarter, and a chicken which had suffered heavily during aprevious visit to the table.

  We got through the meal somehow, and did our best to delude ourselvesinto the idea that it was all great fun, but it was a shallowpretense. The professor was very silent by the time we had finished.Ukridge had been terrible. When the professor began a story--hisstories would have been the better for a little more briskness andcondensation--Ukridge interrupted him before he had got halfwaythrough, without a word of apology, and began some anecdote of hisown. He disagreed with nearly every opinion he expressed. It is truethat he did it all in such a perfectly friendly way, and was obviouslyso innocent of any intention of giving offense, that another man mighthave overlooked the matter. But the professor, robbed of his gooddinner, was at the stage when he had to attack somebody. Every momentI had been expecting the storm to burst.

  It burst after dinner.

  We were strolling in the garden when some demon urged Ukridge, aproposof the professor's mention of Dublin, to start upon the Irishquestion. My heart stood still.

  Ukridge had boomed forth some very positive opinions of his own on thesubject of Ireland before I could get near enough to him to stop him.When I did, I suppose I must have whispered louder than I hadintended, for the professor heard my words, and they acted as thematch to the powder.

  "He's touchy on the Irish question, is he?" he thundered. "Drop it, isit? And why? Why, sir? I'm one of the best-tempered men that ever camefrom Ireland, let me tell you, and I will not stay here to be insultedby the insinuation that I cannot discuss Irish affairs as calmly asanyone."

  "But, professor--"

  "Take your hand off my arm, Mr. Garnet. I will not be treated like achild. I am as competent to discuss the affairs of Ireland withoutheat as any man, let me tell you."

  "Father--"

  "And let me tell you, Mr. Ukridge, that I consider your opinionspoisonous. Poisonous, sir. And you know nothing whatever about thesubject, sir. I don't wish to see you or to speak to you again.Understand that, sir. Our acquaintance began to-day, and it willcease to-day. Good night to you. Come, Phyllis, me dear. Mrs. Ukridge,good night."

  Mr. Chase, when he spoke of four-point-seven guns, had known what hewas talking about.