Marriage. H. G. Wells

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СКАЧАТЬ said Mr. Pope approvingly.

      Mr. Magnet said very quietly that all true humour did that.

      Then Mrs. Pope asked what the play was to be about, and Mr. Magnet, who seemed disinclined to give an answer, turned the subject by saying he had to prepare an address on humour for the next dinner of the Literati. "It's to be a humourist's dinner, and they've made me the guest of the evening—by way of a joke to begin with," he said with that dry smile again.

      Mrs. Pope said he shouldn't say things like that. She then said "Syd!" quietly but sharply to Sydney, who was making a disdainful, squinting face at Theodore, and told the parlourmaid to clear the plates for sweets. Mr. Magnet professed great horror of public speaking. He said that whenever he rose to make an after-dinner speech all the ices he had ever eaten seemed to come out of the past, and sit on his backbone.

      The talk centered for awhile on Mr. Magnet's address, and apropos of Tests of Humour Mr. Pope, who in his way was "no mean raconteur," related the story of the man who took the salad dressing with his hand, and when his host asked why he did that, replied: "Oh! I thought it was spinach!"

      "Many people," added Mr. Pope, "wouldn't see the point of that. And if they don't see the point they can't—and the more they try the less they do."

      All four girls hoped secretly and not too confidently that their laughter had not sounded hollow.

      And then for a time the men told stories as they came into their heads in an easy, irresponsible way. Mr. Magnet spoke of the humour of the omnibus-driver who always dangled and twiddled his badge "by way of a joke" when he passed the conductor whose father had been hanged, and Mr. Pope, perhaps, a little irrelevantly, told the story of the little boy who was asked his father's last words, and said "mother was with him to the end," which particularly amused Mrs. Pope. Mr. Wintersloan gave the story of the woman who was taking her son to the hospital with his head jammed into a saucepan, and explained to the other people in the omnibus: "You see, what makes it so annoying, it's me only saucepan!" Then they came back to the Sense of Humour with the dentist who shouted with laughter, and when asked the reason by his patient, choked out: "Wrong tooth!" and then Mr. Pope reminded them of the heartless husband who, suddenly informed that his mother-in-law was dead, exclaimed "Oh, don't make me laugh, please, I've got a split lip...."

      § 9

      The conversation assumed a less anecdotal quality with the removal to the drawing-room. On Mr. Magnet's initiative the gentlemen followed the ladies almost immediately, and it was Mr. Magnet who remembered that Marjorie could sing.

      Both the elder sisters indeed had sweet clear voices, and they had learnt a number of those jolly songs the English made before the dull Hanoverians came. Syd accompanied, and Rom sat back in the low chair in the corner and fell deeply in love with Mr. Wintersloan. The three musicians in their green and sulphur-yellow and white made a pretty group in the light of the shaded lamp against the black and gold Broadwood, the tawdry screen, its pattern thin glittering upon darkness, and the deep shadows behind. Marjorie loved singing, and forgot herself as she sang.

      "I love, and he loves me again,

       Yet dare I not tell who;

       For if the nymphs should know my swain,

       I fear they'd love him too,"

      she sang, and Mr. Magnet could not conceal the intensity of his admiration.

      Mr. Pope had fallen into a pleasant musing; several other ripe old yarns, dear delicious old things, had come into his mind that he felt he might presently recall when this unavoidable display of accomplishments was overpast, and it was with one of them almost on his lips that he glanced across at his guest. He was surprised to see Mr. Magnet's face transfigured. He was sitting forward, looking up at Marjorie, and he had caught something of the expression of those blessed boys who froth at the feet of an Assumption. For an instant Mr. Pope did not understand.

      Then he understood. It was Marjorie! He had a twinge of surprise, and glanced at his own daughter as though he had never seen her before. He perceived in a flash for the first time that this troublesome, clever, disrespectful child was tall and shapely and sweet, and indeed quite a beautiful young woman. He forgot his anecdotes. His being was suffused with pride and responsibility and the sense of virtue rewarded. He did not reflect for a moment that Marjorie embodied in almost equal proportions the very best points in his mother and his mother-in-law, and avoided his own more salient characteristics with so neat a dexterity that from top to toe, except for the one matter of colour, not only did she not resemble him but she scarcely even alluded to him. He thought simply that she was his daughter, that she derived from him, that her beauty was his. She was the outcome of his meritorious preparations. He recalled all the moments when he had been kind and indulgent to her, all the bills he had paid for her; all the stresses and trials of the coach-building collapse, all the fluctuations of his speculative adventures, became things he had faced patiently and valiantly for her sake. He forgot the endless times when he had been viciously cross with her, all the times when he had pished and tushed and sworn in her hearing. He had on provocation and in spite of her mother's protests slapped her pretty vigorously, but such things are better forgotten; nor did he recall how bitterly he had opposed the college education which had made her now so clear in eye and thought, nor the frightful shindy, only three months since, about that identical green dress in which she now stood delightful. He forgot these petty details, as an idealist should. There she was, his daughter. An immense benevolence irradiated his soul—for Marjorie—for Magnet. His eyes were suffused with a not ignoble tenderness. The man, he knew, was worth at least thirty-five thousand pounds, a discussion of investments had made that clear, and he must be making at least five thousand a year! A beautiful girl, a worthy man! A good fellow, a sound good fellow, a careful fellow too—as these fellows went!

      Old Daddy would lose his treasure of course.

      Well, a father must learn resignation, and he for one would not stand in the way of his girl's happiness. A day would come when, very beautifully and tenderly, he would hand her over to Magnet, his favourite daughter to his trusted friend. "Well, my boy, there's no one in all the world——" he would begin.

      It would be a touching parting. "Don't forget your old father, Maggots," he would say. At such a moment that quaint nickname would surely not be resented....

      He reflected how much he had always preferred Marjorie to Daffy. She was brighter—more like him. Daffy was unresponsive, with a touch of bitterness under her tongue....

      He was already dreaming he was a widower, rather infirm, the object of Magnet's and Marjorie's devoted care, when the song ceased, and the wife he had for the purpose of reveries just consigned so carelessly to the cemetery proposed that they should have a little game that every one could play at. A number of pencils and slips of paper appeared in her hands. She did not want the girls to exhaust their repertory on this first occasion—and besides, Mr. Pope liked games in which one did things with pencils and strips of paper. Mr. Magnet wished the singing to go on, he said, but he was overruled.

      So for a time every one played a little game in which Mr. Pope was particularly proficient. Indeed, it was rare that any one won but Mr. Pope. It was called "The Great Departed," and it had such considerable educational value that all the children had to play at it whenever he wished.

      It was played in this manner; one of the pseudo twins opened a book and dabbed a finger on the page, and read out the letter immediately at the tip of her finger, then all of them began to write as hard as they could, writing down the names of every great person they could think of, whose name began with that letter. At the end of five minutes Mr. Pope said Stop! and then began to read his list out, beginning with the first name. Everybody СКАЧАТЬ