CHAPTER XX

On a January night in 1898, Charles Bramham was smoking and writing in the dining-room of Sea House.

All the doors and windows were open: his coat was off: his white silk shirt gaped at the neck and the sleeves were turned up. Mosquitoes in vicious clouds proclaimed with shrill, treble voices their intention to make a dash for his throat and hands as soon as they could find a way through the tobacco smoke.

It had been a pitiless day--the sun a ball of bra.s.s, and the thermometer at eighty-five degrees--but the evening sea-breeze had reduced the temperature by five degrees. Flying ants and gnats of every description were flinging themselves at the electric lights, and a bat circled monotonously round the ceiling. But Bramham wrote and smoked placidly on. A little stack of a dozen or more finished letters stood at his elbow, and he was busy on his last now--one to his brother in England.

"Read the _Field_ for December 16th. There are two letters about American cartridges for shot-guns--they've impressed me very much, and for long shots at grouse, and driven partridge, I am certain they'll be better than anything we've had yet."

As he made his period voices and steps advanced upon him, and he blew an opening through the smoke to get a view of the doorway. Entered Carson and Luce Abinger with scowls upon their brows.

"Ah, you great, lazy hulk!" growled Abinger amiably. "Sitting here in your shirt sleeves, and neglecting the decencies of civilised life."

They distributed themselves upon chairs and proceeded to add to the density of the atmosphere.

"Yes, I know," said Bramham, pushing back his chair and regarding them--"a boiled shirt with a flopping front to it like yours, and poker with a lot of perpetual growlers. What made you leave the delights of the Club to come and spoil my mail-night?"

"Cap.r.o.n," said Abinger laconically.

"What! again? A repet.i.tion of last night?"

Bramham shot a glance at Carson, but the latter's face expressed nothing more than _ennui_: he had put his head far back in his chair, and was smoking ceilingwards, following the gyrations of the bat with a contemplative eye.

"A repet.i.tion of every night until he gets knocked on the head by some fellow whose temper isn't so sweet as mine." Abinger's smile was not seductive. "He as good as told me that I had an ace up my sleeve, and later, he suggested that Carson had better not play for such high stakes in case he shouldn't find it convenient to pay. We discovered that we had a pressing appointment with you: but we left him Ferrand to insult."

Bramham got up and went to the sideboard, bringing gla.s.ses and decanters to the table.

"Cap.r.o.n isn't built for too much corn," he remarked. "Water-gruel is his tack, and he ought to be put on to it before somebody hurts him."

They all drank and smoked again in reflective concord.

"It is a pity," continued Bramham, with a dreamful Socratic air, "that some fellows' tastes and appet.i.tes are not matched by their physical abilities. There's an odd jumble of material in our construction! It would be an advantage and make life much more interesting, now, if all our anatomical parts were standardised, so that every weak or worn portion could be taken out and renewed from a stock controlled by the highest power, who would only replace the affected piece if one had made a decent effort to retain one's mind and body in a healthy condition."

"Oh, get out!" said Abinger. "Is your name Max Nordau, perhaps?"

"Or are you Mr. Lecky?" derided Carson.

"Ah, well, you fellows can laugh, but it would be a good scheme all the same. Cap.r.o.n, now----"

Without warning of either foot or voice the last-named person at this moment appeared in the doorway with a debonair smile upon his lips, the figure of Ferrand behind him.

"Cap.r.o.n, now--is thirsty," said he. "And what was the interesting remark you were about to make, Brammie, my dear?"

"Only just _that_," Bramham responded serenely. "That you were probably thirsty--as usual. Help yourself--and you, Ferrand."

They drank and were seated, and all smoked, less peacefully now, but more reflectively. Cap.r.o.n appeared to be the only person afflicted with _gaiete de coeur_.

"What do you men think?" he demanded. "I went with Ferrand to see his patient at the Royal--he's actually got a patient!--and what do you suppose I saw while I was waiting for him in Ulundi Square?"

The others remained calm and incurious.

"A stunning girl. Just arrived by to-day's mail-boat I found, upon discreet inquiry, in the office. You fellows ought to see her. She swung herself through that square like a yacht in full-rig. The funny part of it is that I saw her in Durban a year or two back, and she was pretty _then_; but now, by Gad! she has a face that would set any man's blood on fire."

"Indeed!" said Abinger dryly; and Bramham virtuously remarked: "We are not all so inflammable as you."

"Ah, I forgot! You're all saints and celibates here."

Cap.r.o.n's loose lips took a sardonic twist. "Quite a mistake for the women to call you and Abinger and Eve the three bad men, isn't it? I asked the beautiful Mrs. Gruyere only yesterday why it was--and what do you think she said, my dears?"

No one seemed anxious to learn, but Cap.r.o.n sprightfully proceeded:

"--Because one's wife wouldn't live with him, and another wouldn't live with his wife, and the third has a _penchant_ for the wife of his neighbour."

The withers of the three bad men were apparently unwrung. If any of them were embarra.s.sed they concealed the fact skilfully behind stony eyes and complexions of varying degrees of tan. Carson seemed to be composing himself for a good night's sleep. It is true that Bramham, whose wife had been dead for less than a year, appeared to swallow something unpleasant before he remarked in an equable manner that Cap.r.o.n and Mrs.

Gruyere were a nice brace of birds.

"Don't say that, Brammie." Cap.r.o.n was possessed of a high-pitched, rather Celtic voice. "I defended you all manfully. 'Oh,' said I, 'you should not be too hard upon them. They have a _mot_ which they respect about gates and girls.' At that she left me so suddenly that I hadn't time to find out from her which of you is which."

"P-per-haps," stammered Abinger softly, "if you ask us we'll tell you."

"Well, y-yes," said Cap.r.o.n, mocking Abinger with the fearlessness of the man of many drinks; "I think p-perhaps I ought to know, seeing that I have a wife myself."

The silence that ensued had a quality in it which made it differ from all the other silences of that evening: and it only lasted a second, for Carson awoke, and he and Bramham rose abruptly and spoke together.

"I am going to bed," said one.

"I must finish my mail," said the other; and added, "Don't go to bed, Carson. I want your opinion about those American cartridges for shot-guns. Would you advise me to have my guns re-chambered?" He put his hand on Carson's shoulder and they walked away together to the end of the room.

"Heum!" commented Cap.r.o.n. "Commend me to a Colonial for good manners and hospitality!" But both Abinger and Ferrand had turned their backs on him and gone into the verandah. In consideration of these things he helped himself once more to Bramham's good whiskey, and presently went home with the rest of his witticisms unsaid, but far from being dead within him.

Insensibly the others presently found themselves once more in their chairs in the dining-room. Desire for sleep had apparently forsaken Carson, and Bramham's mail no longer pressed. They looked at each other with grim, unsmiling faces.

"What did you want to bring him here for?" demanded Carson of Ferrand, but the latter was unabashed.

"I couldn't shake him, and I was tired of his insults. It was indicated that Bram should have a turn."

"Someone ought to do unto him as was done unto the Levite's concubine,"

was Abinger's graceful contribution.

"Stop talking about the fellow," said Bramham irritably. "He makes me tired. If he hadn't a beautiful and charming wife he would be lynched, and I'd supply the rope."

So they talked about other things, but there was a notable lack of charity, divine or human, about their conversation, for Cap.r.o.n's words had left a bad taste in the mouths of three of them, and the fourth knew it. Indeed, Ferrand, being a doctor, knew most things about his neighbours, and having lived in Africa for a score of years, he could not be expected to be entirely lacking in malice and a touching interest in other people's sins. He presently proceeded to give them a neighbourly dig.

"I caught a glimpse of the girl at the Royal myself. She certainly is a wonder. Let us hope that all Cap.r.o.n's legends are not based on an equally good foundation?" He grinned cynically at the others. It would have been better for all bad men present to have ignored this friendly amenity, but Carson had a raw place and didn't like it flicked.

"Hope is all most of us have to live on in this land of flies and lies,"

he snarled. "We won't rob you of your income, Ferrand."