The Way of Ambition. Robert Hichens

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СКАЧАТЬ well-built, handsome man of fifty-two, with gray hair and moustache, an agreeable tenor voice, which was never used in singing, and the best-cut clothes in London. Although easily kind he was thoroughly selfish. Everybody had a good word for him, and nobody, who really knew him, ever asked him to perform an unselfish action. "That isn't Jimmy's line" was their restraining thought if they had for a moment contemplated suggesting to Mr. Shiffney that he might perhaps put himself out for a friend. And Jimmy was quite of their opinion, and always stuck to his "line," like a sensible fellow.

      Two or three days after Mrs. Shiffney's visit to Claude Heath her husband, late one afternoon, found her in tears.

      "What's up, Addie?" he asked, with the sympathy he never withheld from her. "Another gown gone wrong?"

      Mrs. Shiffney shook her powerful head, on which was a marvellous black hat crowned with a sort of factory chimney of stiff black plumes.

      Mr. Shiffney lit a cigar.

      "Poor old Addie!" he said. He leaned down and stroked her shoulder. "I wish you could get hold of somebody or something that'd make you happy," he remarked. "I'm sure you deserve it."

      His wife dried her tears and sniffed two or three times almost with the frankness of a grief-stricken child.

      "I never shall!"

      "Why not, Addie?"

      "There's something in me—I don't know! I should get tired of anyone who didn't get tired of me!"

      She almost began to cry again, and added despairingly:

      "So what hope is there? And I do so want to enjoy myself! I wonder if there ever has been a woman who wanted to enjoy herself as much as I do?"

      Mr. Shiffney blew forth a cloud of smoke, extending the little finger of the hand which held his cigar.

      "We all want to have a good time," he observed. "A first-rate time. What else are we here for?"

      He spoke seriously.

      "We are here to keep things going, I s'pose—to keep it up, don't you know? We mustn't let it run down. But if we don't enjoy ourselves down it goes. And that doesn't do, does it?"

      He flicked the ash from his cigar.

      "What's the special row this time?" he continued, without any heated curiosity, but with distinct sympathy.

      Mrs. Shiffney looked slightly more cheerful. She enjoyed telling things if the things were closely connected with herself.

      "Well, I want to start for a cruise," she began. "I can't remain for ever glued to Grosvenor Square. I must move about and see something."

      She had just been for a month in Paris.

      "Of course. What are we here for?" observed her husband.

      "You always understand! Sit down, you old thing!"

      Mr. Shiffney sat down, gently pulling up his trousers.

      "And the row is," she continued, shaking her shoulders, "that I want Claude Heath to come and he won't. And, since he won't, he's really the only living man I want to have on the cruise."

      "Who is he?" observed Mr. Shiffney. "I've never heard of him. Is he one of your special pals?"

      "Not yet. I met him at Max's. He's a composer, and I want to know what he's like."

      "I expect he's like all the rest."

      "No, he isn't!" she observed decisively.

      "Why won't he come? Perhaps he's a bad sailor."

      "He didn't even trouble himself to say that. He was in such a hurry to refuse that he didn't bother about an excuse. And this afternoon he called, when I was in, and never asked for me, only left cards and bolted, although I had been to his house to ask him to come on The Wanderer."

      "Afraid of you, is he?"

      "I don't know, I'm sure. He's never been among us."

      "Poor chap! But surely that's a reason for him to want to get in?"

      "Wouldn't you think so? Wouldn't anyone think so? The way I'm bombarded! But he seems only anxious to keep out of everything."

      "A pose very likely."

      "I don't believe it is."

      "I leave it to you. No one sharper in London. Is he a gentleman—all that sort of thing?"

      "Oh, of course!"

      Mr. Shiffney pulled up his trousers a little more, exposing a pair of striped silk socks which emerged from shining boots protected by white spats.

      "To be sure. If he hadn't been he'd have jumped at you and The Wanderer."

      "Naturally. I shan't go at all now! What an unlucky woman I always am!"

      "You never let anyone know it."

      "Well, Jimmy, I'm not quite a fool. Be down on your luck and not a soul will stay near you."

      "I should think not. Why should they? One wants a bit of life, not to hear people howling and groaning all about one. It's awful to be with anyone who's under the weather."

      "Ghastly! I can't stand it! But, all the same, it's a fearful corvée to keep it up when you're persecuted as I am."

      "Poor old Addie!"

      Mr. Shiffney threw his cigar into the grate reflectively and lightly touched his moustaches, which were turned upward, but not in a military manner.

      "Things never seem quite right for you," he continued.

      "And other women have such a splendid time!" she exclaimed. "The disgusting thing is that he goes all the while to Violet Mansfield."

      "She's dull enough and quite old too."

      "No, she isn't dull. You're wrong there."

      "I daresay. She doesn't amuse me."

      "She's not your sort."

      "Too feverish, too keen, brainy in the wrong way. I like brains, mind you, and I know where they are. But I don't see the fun of having them jumped at one."

      "He does, apparently, unless it's really Charmian."

      "The girl? She's not bad. Wants to be much cleverer than she is, of course, like pretty nearly all the girls, except the sporting lot; but not bad."

      "Jimmy"—Mrs. Shiffney's eyes began once more to look audacious—"shall I ask Charmian Mansfield to come on the yacht?"

      "You think that might bring him? Why not ask both of them?"

      "No; I won't have the mother!"

      "Why СКАЧАТЬ