I
THE harbor of Cowes lies on the sheltered side of the Isle of Wight, and is the headquarters of the Royal Yacht Squadron and scene of the great regatta every summer. Here came the Bluebird at the beginning of May, in time for the pleasant weather and the opening of the London “season.”
The gay company broke up. Edna Hackabury received a communication from a firm of solicitors representing her husband, and went up to the city to learn her fate. Beauty Budd was going to visit the Eversham-Watsons at their town house. Marcel Detaze was returning to his studio on the Cap d'Antibes, to put upon canvas his memories of Africa and Greece. The plan had been for Lanny to return with him; but here was a letter from Eric Vivian Pomeroy-Nielson, to whom Lanny had written from Athens. Rick begged: “Oh, please don't go away without seeing me! I'll come to town to meet you, and we'll go to the opera and the Russian ballet. Pretty soon school will be over,' and you can come to the country with me. Kurt Meissner is coming, and we'll have a grand time.”
Kurt wrote from his school. He had worked hard and won prizes, and his father had promised him a reward. He had an uncle who was an official in a rubber company and had business in London, and was willing to take him along, to see the Russian ballet, and to hear the symphony orchestra and the opera, and to learn all he could about English music. So of course Lanny began begging to stay, and Lady Eversham-Watson said: “Why not? The dear little fellow can enjoy himself at our country place as long as he pleases, and if he wants to come to town, there will be someone to bring him.”
If you have ever drunk Kentucky Bourbon, you have probably contributed to the fortune of Margy Petries; if you have ever read a magazine in the English language, you have surely not escaped the self-praises of “Petries' Peerless.” Lord Eversham-Watson had met the creator of this beverage at one of the racing meets, and had been invited to come to the bluegrass country and see how they raised horses. He had come, and seen, and conquered, or so he had thought; but that was because he didn't know Kentucky girls. A4argy was one of those talkative little women who make you think they are shallow, but underneath have a sleepless determination to have their own way. His lordship — “Bumbles” to his friends — was heavy and slow, and liked to be comfortable; Margy was his second wife, and all he demanded was that she shouldn't go too far with other men. She had paid his debts, and he let her spend the rest of her father's money for whatever she fancied.
As a result, here was an old English country house that you could really live in. All the rooms had been rearranged and everybody had a bathtub. The old furniture, dingy, smelling of the Wars of the Roses — so Margy said, though she had the vaguest idea what or when they were — had been sold as antiques, and everything was now bright chintz or satin, with color schemes that said, gather ye rosebuds while ye may. There were light wicker chairs and tables, and twin beds for fashionable young wives. Old tapestries in the billiard room had been replaced with a weird device called “batik,” and there was a bar in the smoking room, patronized mainly by the ladies, and having decorations out of a children's nursery tale. The rugs were woven in futurist patterns, and on them lay two Russian wolfhounds with snow-white silky hair; when these noble creatures went out in wet weather they donned waterproof garments of a soft gray color edged with scarlet and fastened with two leather straps in front and another about the middle.
If you were a guest at Southcourt you could have anything there was in the Empire; all you had to do was to indicate your wish to one of the silent servants. This silence was to Lanny the most curious aspect of life in England; for in Provence the servants talked to you whenever they felt like it, and laughed and joked; but here they never spoke unless it was part of a ritual, such as to ask whether you wanted China or Ceylon tea, and white or Demerara sugar. If you spoke an unnecessary word to them, they would answer so briefly that you felt you were being rebuked for a breach of form. They wanted you to assume that they did not exist; and if one of them forgot something, or did it wrong, the usually placid “Bumbles” would storm at the unfortunate creature in a manner that shocked Lanny Budd far more than it did the creature.
You weren't supposed to notice this, and if you didn't, you would find Southcourt a delightful place to stay. There were plenty of horses, and generally somebody wanting to ride. There was a comfortable library, and Margy had not bothered to change the books. The pleasantest part of life at an English country house was the way you were let alone to do what you pleased. The rule of silence applied only to house servants; the gardener would talk to you about flowers, and the kennelman about dogs, and the stableman about horses. The place was in Sussex, and there were rolling hills, now fresh with spring grass; Lanny had thought of England as a small island, but there seemed to be great tracts of land that nobody wanted to use except for sheep. The shepherds, too, didn't mind talking — the only trouble was they used so many strange words.
II
Somebody was motoring to town, and Lanny went along. Automobiles were becoming faster and more dependable every year, also more luxurious. It had suddenly occurred to many persons at once that they didn't need to ride in the open, with a gale blowing on them, and ladies' hats having to be tied on with many yards of chiffon. No, they were now enclosing cars like little rooms. The one Lanny rode in was called a “sporting saloon,” and consisted of a square black box in the rear, with a long black cylinder in front for the engine; it was heavy and the tires were small, but Lanny had never seen anything so elegant, and it was marvelous to come rolling into London in your own private parlor. The chauffeur sat out in the wind, and wore goggles, and his cap was fastened to them, and a high tight collar made him sit up straight and stiff. He drove on the left side of the road, and Lanny couldn't get over the idea that somebody would forget about that and run into them.
Rick came to town to spend Saturday and Sunday, and they fell into each other's arms. He was English, but being a devotee of the arts, he didn't mind letting a friend know that he was glad to see him. Rick was such a handsome fellow, with dark eyes and hair very wavy; he had a slender figure, elegant manners, and fastidious tastes — Lanny was quite overwhelmed by him, and proud to introduce him to his friends.
And what a lot they had to talk about! Lanny had been to Silesia, and to Greece and Africa, while Rick had been coming in week-ends to theaters and operas. They were both at the growing age, and measured each other, and tried each other's muscles, and danced a bit, and played odds and ends of music, and chatted about the Russian ballet which was to open next week, and they would make a date for the Saturday matinees and get their tickets right away.
This was at the town house of the Eversham-Watsons, where Beauty was staying, and also Edna Hackabury. The latter had been to see her husband's solicitors, and had been informed that he had filed suit for divorce in Indiana. If Mrs. Hackabury contested the action, she would undoubtedly lose and get nothing; if she agreed not to contest, Mr. Hackabury would give her the choice of the following: the yacht, to be placed in escrow and to become her property on the day the decree was final; or an income of ten thousand dollars a year for life.
Edna had been making inquiries, and learned that yachts were a standard commodity, bringing good prices, so she was all for proposition number one. But her military gentleman announced that his rights as a future husband were not going to be put in escrow. He said if Edna got the price of the yacht she would spend it on clothes and parties in a year; whereas Bluebird Soap stood close to British consols in the estimation of “the City,” and two thousand pounds a year was a sum on which a retired army officer and his spouse could live comfortably in some not too fashionable part of the Riviera. So it was settled; and Edna's friends agreed that she was fairly lucky. She had her clothes for the present season, and would be “top-notch” for that long. She must put on a bold front and not let anything get her down.
There was gossip, of course; you couldn't keep such a story from the journalists, who flutter like hummingbirds over the social flower beds, sticking their long noses into everything. There were paragraphs of the sort known as “spicy”: a yacht that was in the social as well as the marine register, and an owner in the role of infuriated husband chopping down a cabin door with an ax intended for a different sort of fire. No names were given, but “everybody” knew who it was, and ladies whispered and put up their lorgnettes when the soapman's wife and her slightly lame captain came strolling across the greensward at Ranelagh. Edna wore a genuine Paquin creation — it was a “Paquin year,” and the famed woman dressmaker had set off the American's soft white skin and raven-black hair with a striking ensemble of the same bold contrasts. Picture a dashing wide black hat with three saucy corners, and with aigrettes sticking in several directions like broom-tails; a black riding jacket and white blouse with rolling collar and tie like a man's; a huge muff of black fur with tails nearly to the ankles; a tall white cane like a shepherd's crook; and on a leash the world's wonder, one of those priceless Japanese Chin dogs famed for their resemblance to a chrysanthemum — a black “butterfly” head with a white blaze over the skull, and long white hair almost to the ground, and a tail curved exactly like the petals of a great flower. That was “swank” of the season of 1914; it was vif, it was chic, it was la grande tenue.
III
The social whirl was now in full career. There were two or three smart dances every night; also people had taken to dancing at teas and at supper parties after the theater. The Argentine tango was the rage, also the maxixe — “a slide, a swing, and a throw away.” In short, the town had gone dance-crazy, and some of the fetes were of magnificence such as you read about in the days of Marie Antoinette. The Duchess of Winterton turned the garden of her town house into a dancing pavilion, with a board platform and the shrubs and trees sticking through holes. With a rustic bandstand and colored lanterns at night it was a scene from the Vienna woods — but no waltzes, no, the music of a famous “nigger-band.”
A half-grown boy wasn't invited to such affairs, but there were plenty of other things he could do to keep “in the swim.” He could walk by Rotten Row, and see the great ladies and gentlemen of fashion in their riding costumes, and crowds of people lined up to stare, separated from them only by a wooden railing. He could go to hear the “bell-ringing” for the Queen's birthday. He could see the coaching parade; the smart gentlemen, and even one smart lady, driving fancy turnouts with four horses, an array of guests, and two grooms sitting in back as stiff as statues. He could attend the military tournament at Olympia, and see a score of riders charging at a long hurdle from opposite directions, all leaping over it at the same moment, passing each other in the air so close that the knees of the riders often touched.
Also Lanny was invited to ride on a coach with his mother's friends to the races on Derby Day. That was the time you really saw England. Three or four hundred thousand people came out to Epsom Downs, on trains, in carriages or motorcars, or in the huge rhotorbusses which were the new feature of the town. The roads were packed all day long, first going and then coming; Epsom was described as a vast garage, and people said that soon there would be no horses at the Derby except those in the races. The common people were out for a holiday, and ate and drank and laughed and shouted without regard to etiquette. The people of fashion were there to be looked at, and they put on the finest show that money could buy.
Everybody agreed that the styles for that summer of 1914 were the most extreme since the Restoration, the Grand Monarque, the Third Empire — whatever period of history sounded most impressive. Svelte contours were gone, and flufEness was the rule; waists were becoming slimmer, side panniers were coming back, flounces were multiplied beyond reason; skirts were tight — a cause of embarrassment to ladies ascending the steps of motorcars and coaches, and the moralists commented sternly upon the unseemly exhibitions which resulted. They complained also that the distinction between evening and day frocks was almost lost; really, flesh-pink chiffon was too intime for open air! Fete and race gowns were cut low at the throat, and materials worn over the arms were so diaphanous that they were hardly to be seen at all.
Those who aimed to be really smart did not heed the moralists, but they had to heed the weather; so with these scanty costumes went capes. Everyone agreed that it was a renaissance of the cape; Venetian capes, Cavalier capes, manteaux militaires, all made of the most exquisite materials, of silk and satin brocade, sometimes embroidered with great flowers, painted ninons and delicate doublures; the linings were velvet, always of the brightest colors, and the capes were weighted down with diamonds or other jewels, and held across the figure by straps of plaid silk or chiffon, with jeweled buckles of butterfly or flower design.
In short, the fancy of the dressmakers had been turned loose for many months, and the product was set up conspicuously on the tops of coaches or in open motorcars for the crowds to inspect. If they liked it they said so, and if they didn't they said it even louder. Fashionable society tittered over the misadventure of the Dowager Duchess of Gunpowder, a stout old lady who arrayed herself in pink taffeta, with a wide hat of soft straw covered with pink chiffon and roses, known as a “Watteau confection.” In a traffic jam her carriage was halted, and some navvies working by the road leaned on their shovels and had a good long look at the show. “Wot ho, Bill!” one of them shouted. “Wot price mutton dressed as lamb!”
Inside the racetrack the big busses were lined all the way down the straight. The weather was fine, and everybody happy. The royal family put in an early appearance, and the King and Queen stood in the royal box and received a hearty ovation. “Bumbles” pointed out to Lanny the precautions taken to keep the suffragettes from interfering with the.race; for last year one of them had dashed out and thrown herself under the horses' hoofs and got killed — “the daughter of a very good family, too,” said his lordship, with disgust. To keep that from happening a second time the track had been lined with three sets of railings, and police and soldiers were watching all the way around. Every Derby receives a name, and this one was dubbed “the silent Derby,” because a French horse won and two outsiders were placed; the favorites were nowhere, so that everybody lost money except the bookies.
IV
At the next week-end came the art lover Rick, and they saw the Russians in Le Coq d’Or by Rimsky-Korsakov. They saw the foolish King Dodon with a tall gold crown and a great black bear.d to his waist, and a huge warrior in chain mail, with a curved sword half as big as himself and shining like a bass tuba. This was the Tsar's own ballet troupe, trained for the dance since early childhood, and all London raved over them. Lanny's enthusiasm for dancing came back, and he and Rick exhausted themselves trying to reproduce those amazing Muscovite leaps.
Also, they went to hear Chaliapin, an enormous blond man with a voice that filled the firmament. They went to see Westminster Abbey, and found a fashionable wedding going on; they heard the clamor of high-toned bells, and got a glimpse of the bridal pair emerging, one in a cloud of tulle, the other with a pale, peaked face, dwarfed by a tall black cylinder on top. Rick didn't seem to think very highly of the old families which ruled his country; he said the groom was probably dim-witted, while the bride would be the daughter of a brewer or a South African diamond king.
Later on came the Trooping of the King's Colours on the Horse Guards' Parade, the occasion being the King's “official birthday”: a gorgeous ceremony with a troop of horsemen wearing huge bearskin hats. The King rode at their head, a frail-looking gentleman with dark brown mustaches and beard closely trimmed. They had mounted one of those bearskins on top of him, also a uniform much too large for him, loaded with gold epaulets and a belt, a wide blue sash, and a variety of stars and orders. The young Prince of Wales looked still more uncomfortable, having a pathetic thin face and a sword which he would have had a hard time brandishing.
They made the Queen colonel-in-chief of a regiment; her uniform was blue, all over gold in front, and her hat was of fur with a blue bag hanging from it, and a tall white pompon standing up a foot in the air. Lanny had seen in an American magazine a picture of a drum major in such a costume. He said that to Rick, who replied that the influence of this royal family was a very bad thing for England. “They give themselves up entirely to the tailoring and dressmaking business,” said the severe young art lover. “Their friends are the big money snobs. If an artist receives honors, it is some painter of fashionable portraits. Titles are entirely a question of finance; you pay so much cash into the party treasury, and become Sir Snuffley Snooks or the Marquess of Paleale.” In short, Sir Alfred Pomeroy-Nielson having got no honors for his efforts to promote little theaters in England, his eldest son thought ill of the government.
“Go and see it in action,” he advised. So Lanny went on a weekday to Westminster, and was admitted to the visitors' gallery of the House of Commons, now covered with heavy wire net on account of suffragettes' attempts to throw themselves over the railing. Lanny looked down upon the members of the House, mostly wearing top hats, except for the Labour non-conformists. The front-benchers sprawled with their feet upon the bench in front of them. Any of the members, when they didn't like what was said, shouted loudly. The Labour men hated the Tories, the Tories hated the Liberals, and the Irish hated everybody. A fierce controversy was under way over the question of self-government for Ireland; the Ulstermen were swearing they would never be ruled by Catholics, and Sir Edward Carson was organizing an army and threatening civil war. In short, the Mother of Parliaments was hardly setting the best of examples to her children all over the world.
V
There were two “Courts,” at which fashionable American ladies dreamed of being presented; but not Beauty Budd, a divorced woman. The same applied to the “state ball,” and to the levee at St. James's Palace. But there were plenty of private balls — it was becoming the fashion to give them at West End hotels, where there was room enough for everybody you knew. There would be dinner parties in advance. Margy, Lady Eversham-Watson, was having one at the Savoy; Lanny Budd, so proud of his beautiful blond mother, saw her in a state of exaltation, being got ready for this grand occasion, and her friends Margy and Sophie in the same state of mind and body.
Lanny knew a lot about women's costumes, being a little ladies' man, and hearing them talking all the time, and going with them to be fitted, or seeing it done at home. Just as lovers of painting hoped to find a genius whom they could buy up cheap, so women like Beauty Budd, forced to economize, dreamed of finding a seamstress of talent who would make them something as good as the great establishments could turn out. And when they got it, was it really good? They would torment themselves, and would ask even a boy who loved beautiful things, and knew the names of materials and ways of cutting them, and what colors went together.
Here was Beauty ready to be launched in a costume about which her son had been hearing talk for weeks: a ball dress of pink tulle, with simili diamonds put on the skirt in three-tier pleated flounces. The corsage was a little coat of heavy guipure lace embroidered with amethysts and gold. It was cut in that ultra style which had caused an old gentleman at a dinner party to say that he couldn't express an opinion of the ladies' costumes because he hadn't looked under the table. The plump and creamy-white bust of Beauty appeared on the point of emerging from the corsage, like Venus from the waves, all that prevented it being two little straps made of flat links of gold. The tiny dancing slippers were of tissue of gold in-crusted with gems, and the high heels took you back to Empire days, having flower designs worked on them in jewels.
“Well, how do you like me?” asked the mother, and Lanny said he liked her well enough to dance with her all night if she needed him. She gave him eager little pats on the head, but he mustn't kiss her because of her powder.
Then he had to admire the costume of the Baroness de la Tourette, likewise completed after labors and consultations. Sophie's crown of henna hair topped a gown of brocade; roses and rose leaves in silver on a ground of rich blue, very supple, and draped graciously — so said its creator, a couturier who was on hand to approve the final effect, and who rubbed his hands together with delight. The gown had a narrow train from the waist, to be held up for dancing, and a deep belt of dark blue velvet, with pleatings of silver lace carried to make kimono sleeves. There was a Cavalier cape of fine old Brussels lace weighted with embroidery of diamonds and gold; and slippers of stamped velvet to match, also embroidered with diamonds. The only difference was that Sophie's were real, while Beauty's were not, and would people notice the difference? It was terrible to feel yourself just an imitation.
But Sophie, good soul, said: “Nonsense! None of the richest people wear their valuable gems any more. They keep them stored in vaults and wear replicas.”
“Yes, of course,” said Beauty. “But then everybody knows they have the real ones; and everybody knows I haven't!”
“Forget it!” commanded the hardware manufacturer's daughter. “You've got what not one in a hundred has, and most of them would give their eyeteeth for.” Kind Sophie said things like that.
Beauty put one more dab of powder on her little white nose, and there was Harry Murchison waiting for her, tall, well set up, looking like a fashion plate. Lanny watched them get into the rich young American's motorcar, and went back into the house, reckoning the months before he, too, would have a full-dress suit and an opera hat, and be able to take his mother to balls at the Savoy Hotel!
VI
Lanny, left alone, went out for a walk. He liked to walk anywhere, but especially in the streets of London. At this time of year it didn't get dark until after nine o'clock, and meantime there were mists and haze and pastel colors in the sky. Lanny would walk by the Serpentine River in Hyde Park, and watch the beautiful black and white swans; he would walk along the Embankment, observing the clouds across the river, and the tugs and launches gliding over the dull gray surface. Sometimes he would climb to the top of one of those new motorbusses, from which for thruppence you could see everything there was in London — seven million people, and nobody had ever counted how many houses, or how many cabs, carriages, and automobiles.
The city had been laid out by ancient Saxon or Roman cows, and rarely had their paths been straight. One village had run into, another, all higgledy-piggledy; and where was Bandbox Lane High Court, or Old Pine Hill New Corners? — you might be within a quarter of a mile of the place, but you couldn't find a soul who had ever heard of it. Few streets had the same name for any distance; you would start walking on the Strand, and presently it was Fleet Street, and then it was Ludgate Hill, Cannon Street, Fenchurch, Aldgate — and like as not would evaporate and disappear entirely. The same peculiarity was shared by the old buildings; you would go down a corridor, and descend three steps, and turn to the left, pass three doors and climb a winding stairway, turn to the right, walk a dozen steps — and knock on a door which hadn't been opened for a hundred years.
Lanny felt in an adventurous mood that evening and started off in a new direction. For a while he was on a wide thoroughfare, with motorcars taking people to the theaters, and crowds looking into windows of gaily decorated shops. Then little by little the neighborhood changed; the shops became poorer, the men wore caps, and the women dingy shawls. The street began to ramble, and Lanny did the same; he was keeping in a general easterly direction, but that didn't mean anything special, for he had never heard of the East End of London. He had the general idea that the seven million population was composed mainly of ladies and gentlemen such as he had seen in Mayfair, with their servants and tradespeople, and a sprinkling of saucy flower girls, lively newsboys, and picturesque old beggars trying to sell you “a box o' lights.”
But now Lanny had walked through a looking glass, or plunged down a shaft to the center of the earth, or to the bottom of the sea; he had taken a drug, or fallen into a trance — something or other that had transported him into a new world. He couldn't believe his eyes, and walked on, fascinated, staring; it just couldn't be real, there couldn't be such creatures on earth! English men and women were tall, and stood up straight, and took bold strides, and had long thin faces, sometimes a little too long, especially the women — Robbie impolitely called them horse-faces! Both men and women whom Lanny had met had rosy complexions, sometimes alarmingly so, suggestive of apoplexy. But suddenly here were creatures squat and stooped, that shambled instead of walking; their legs were short and their arms long — they looked like apes more than human beings! Features crooked, teeth missing, complexions sallow or pasty — no, this couldn't be England!
And the clothes they had on! Lanny had never seen such rags, never dreamed they existed on earth. Clothes that were not fitted to the human form, but dangled as on scarecrows, and when they threatened to fall to pieces were fastened with pins or bits of string, or even pieces of wood. They were filthy with every sort of grime and grease, and gave out the musty acrid smell of stale human sweat; the sum total of it filled the streets and polluted the winds that blew from the North Sea.
And the swarms of these creatures! Where did they come from, and where could they go? The sidewalks were crowded, so that you had to jostle your way. There were no longer any motorcars or carriages, and few horse-drawn vehicles, only pushcarts, called “barrows.” Many had things to sell, things that must surely have been gathered out of dustbins: old rags of clothing, as bad as what the people had on; worn, badly patched shoes set in rows along the curb; the cheapest vegetables, wilted and bruised; stinking fish, scraps of meat turned purple or black, old rusty pans, chipped and damaged crockery, all the rubbish of the world. Shops had it spread out in front, and shopkeepers stood watching, while dingy women with bedraggled skirts pulled things about and smelled and chaffered and argued. Tired workingmen sat on the steps, puffing at pipes. Babies swarmed everywhere, ghostly death's-head children suckled on gin. There were innumerable garbage cans, and hardly one without some human creature digging in it for food.
Every other place, it seemed, was a pub. Murmurs and sometimes uproar came from within, and now and then a drunken man would push back the swinging doors and stagger forth — bringing with him a reek of alcohol, and more of that dreadful animal stench, and shouts and curses in a language bearing odd resemblances to the one that Lanny used. He would listen and try to puzzle out the words. A young woman with a ragged straw hat, pulling herself loose from a man: “Blymee, I 'ave ter git the dyner fer me bybee!” What was that? And two fellows coming out of a pub wiping big mustaches on coatsleeves and carrying on an argument, one shouting at the other: “Ow, gow an' be a Sowcialist!”
VII
The sun had gone down behind Lanny's back, and twilight was letting down its veils over this strange nightmare. One who thought of being a painter might have noted interesting effects of darkness and shadow; somber brick tenements, three or four stories high, blackened with the smoke of centuries; forests of chimney pots pouring out new blackness all the time; sodden human figures, shawl clad and hunched, growing dimmer in the twilight, blending into the shadows of walls and doorways and dustbins full of trash. But Lanny wasn't thinking about art; he was overcome with more direct, more human emotions. That there should be a world like this, so near to the glittering hotel where his mother and her friends were dancing in their jeweled gowns and slippers! That there should be human beings of English blood, sunk to this state of squalor!
Lanny was beginning to be uneasy. This slum appeared to be endless, and he didn't know how to get out of it. He had been told that any time he lost his way, he should ask a “bobby,” but there appeared to be none in this lost world, and Lanny didn't know if it was safe to speak to any of these lost people. The men seemed to be looking at him with hostile eyes, and the leering women frightened him no less. “Two bob to you, mytey!” a girl would say, holding out her hands with what she meant for a seductive gesture. Starved children followed him, beggars whined and showed their sores and crippled limbs; he hurried on, being afraid to take out his purse.
Darkness was falling fast. The shopping district of the slum came to an end, and Lanny, trying to find a better neighborhood, followed a street that widened out. There were sheds, and gravel under foot; dimly he could see benches, and people sitting on them — the same terrible ape figures in stinking rags, men and women and children: a baby laid on its back, and no one even troubling to put a cover on it; whole families huddled near together; a bearded man with his head back, snoring, a woman curled up against him; a man and a woman lying in each other's arms.
A raw wind had sprung up, and Lanny felt chilly, even while he was walking; but these people sat or lay, never moving. Could it be that they had no place to go? The boy had observed human forms curled up alongside dustbins and sheds, and had supposed they must be drunk; but could it be that they slept out all night?
He pressed on, still more hurriedly; he was beginning to be really afraid now. He had broken his promise to his mother, never to go anywhere except where plenty of people were to be seen. He was in a dark street, and the figures that passed were slinking and furtive, and many seemed to be watching him. He saw two women righting, shrieking at each other, pulling hair; children stood watching them, apathetic and silent.
It was a street of tenements, but now and then came a pub, with lights and sounds of roistering. A man came out, and as he swung the doors open, the light fell on Lanny. The stranger fell in beside him on the narrow sidewalk. “'Ullo, little tyke!” said he.
Lanny thought he ought to be polite. “Hello,” he replied; and the fellow doubtless noted something different about his accent. “Whur yer bound fer, mytey?” he demanded.
“I don't know,” replied Lanny, hesitatingly. “I'm afraid maybe I'm lost.”
“Ho! Little toff!” exclaimed the other. “Little toff come inter the slums lookin' fer mayflowers, eh, wot?” He was a burly fellow, and in the light of the pub the boy had seen that his face was grimy, as if he were a coal heaver; or perhaps it was several days' growth of beard. His breath reeked of alcohol. “Listen, mytey,” he said, leaning over cajolingly, “gimme a bob, will yer? Me throat is so dry it burns up, it fair do.”
This was a problem for the boy. If he took out his purse the fellow would probably grab it. “I'm sorry, I haven't any money with me,” said he.
“Garn!” snarled the other, turning ugly at once. “A toff don't go withaht no brass.”
They had come to a dark place in the street, and Lanny had just decided to make a dash for it, when to his terror the man grabbed him by the arm. “Cough up!” he commanded.
Lanny struggled; then, finding that the fellow's grip was too strong, he screamed: “Help! Help!”
“Shut yer bloomin' fyce,” growled the man, “or I'll bryke every bone in yer body!” He fetched the boy a cuff on the side of the head. It was the first time that Lanny had ever been struck in his whole life, and it had a terrifying effect on him; he became frantic, he twisted and struggled, harder than ever, and shouted at the top of his lungs.
The ruffian began to drag him toward a dark opening leading into a court. Lanny's cries brought people to doors and windows, but not one moved a hand to help him; they just stood and looked. They were interested, but not concerned — as if it were a Punch and Judy show.
But suddenly a door in the court was flung open, and a light streamed upon the scene. A young woman emerged, wild-looking, with tousled black hair and a blouse open at the throat and hanging out at the waist, as if she had put it on in a hurry. When she saw the man and his victim, she darted toward them. “Wot yer doin', Slicer?”
The answer was, “Shut yer silly fyce!” But the girl began shouting louder: “'Ave yer gone barmy, ye bleedin' fool? Carnt yer see the kid's a toff? An' right in front of yer own drum!” When the man continued to drag Lanny into the court, she rushed at him like a wildcat. “Cut it, I sye! Yer'11 'ave the tecs 'ere, an' we'll all do a stretch!”
He called her a “bitch,” and she told the world in return that he was a “muckworm.” When he still wouldn't give up, she began clawing at his face in a fury. He had to take one hand to push her away, and that gave Lanny his chance; with a frantic effort he tore himself loose and dashed for the street.
The crowd gave way; it wasn't theirs to stop him. The man came pounding behind, cursing; but Lanny hadn't been climbing mountains and swimming in the Golfe Juan and practicing Muscovite leaps for nothing. He was built like a deer, whereas the man was heavy and clumsy, and presently he gave up. But the boy didn't stop until he had got to a thoroughfare thronged with long-bearded Jews and curly-headed babies, and having signs that said: “Whitechapel High Street.”
Then a blue uniform, the one sight that could really bring an end to Lanny's terror. The London bobby didn't carry weapons, like the French gendarme, but he was a symbol of the Empire. Lanny waited until he got back his breath and could speak normally, then he approached and said: “Please, would you tell me how to get to the tube?”
The bobby had a large blue helmet, with a strap across his chin. He answered like an automaton: “First t'right, second t'left.” He said it very fast, and when Lanny said: “I beg pardon?” he said it again, even faster than before.
The boy thought it over, and then dropped a delicate hint: “Please, might I walk with you if you're going that way?” It was obviously not the right accent for Whitechapel, and the “copper” looked him over more carefully, and then said: “Right you are, guv'nor.”
They walked together in silent state. When they parted, Lanny wasn't sure if the symbol of the Empire would accept a tip, but he took a chance, and held out a shilling which he had denied to “Slicer.” The symbol took it with one hand and with the other touched his helmet. “Kew!” said he. The visitor had already had it explained to him that this was the second half of “Thank you,” doing duty for the whole.
VIII
Lanny decided to say nothing to his mother about his misadventure. It would only worry her, and do no good; he had learned his lesson, and wouldn't repeat the mistake. He brooded all by himself over the state of the people of East London. When he went to call for his mother at a tea party in Kensington Gardens, the sight of exquisite ladies on the greensward under the trees made him think of the families that were lying out on benches all night because they had no place to go. Instead of snow-white tulle and pink mousseline de soie, he saw filthy and loathsome rags; instead of the fragrant concentrations of the flower gardens of Provence, he smelled the stink of rotting bodies and the reek of gin.
They drove to Ascot on the second day of the races, the day of the gold vase. It was known as a “black and white” Ascot, because of the costumes decreed by the fashion dictators. He saw black and white striped taffeta dresses with black and white parasols to match. He listened to the chatter of his mother and her friends, commenting upon the fashion parade — froufrou hats, broche effects, corsage prolonged into polonaise, shot silk draped as tunic, butterfly wing confection, black lisere straw, poufs of tea-rose taffeta, bandeau hats and plume towers, cothurns of lizard-green suede — and all the while he would be seeing babies lying on benches with only rags to cover them. He watched the royal procèssion, the King and Queen riding across the turf amid thunderous cheers from the crowd, and he thought: “I wonder if they know about it!”
The person he took into his confidence was Rick; and Rick said that people knew if they chose to know, but mostly they didn't. He said those conditions were as old as England. The politicians talked about remedying them, but when they got elected they thought about getting elected again. He said it was a problem of educating those slum people; of raising the tone of the intellectual and art life of the country. He took Lanny to a matinee of a play by Bernard Shaw which was the rage that season, and dealt with a flower girl who talked just the sort of Cockney that Lanny had heard during his descent into hell. A professor of phonetics succeeded in correcting her accent, making her into a regular lady of Mayfair. It was most amusing — and it seemed to be in line with Rick's suggestion.
Kurt Meissner arrived, and he, too, was taken into the discussion.
Said Kurt: “We don't leave our poor to the mercies of the wage market. The Germans are efficient, and provide decent housing for the workers, and insurance against sickness, old age, and unemployment.” Kurt was perhaps a little too well satisfied with conditions in his country, and too contemptuous of British slackness. Rick, who was willing to make any number of sarcastic remarks about his native land, wasn't so pleased to hear them from a foreigner. Rick and Kurt didn't get along so well in London as they had in Hellerau.
Lanny talked about the question of poverty with his mother also, and Beauty assured him that the kind English people were not overlooking the problem. He would soon see proof of it; the twenty-fourth of June was known as “Alexandra Day,” and the fashionable ladies of England honored their Queen Mother by putting on their daintiest white frocks and hats with many flowers and going out on the streets of the cities to sell artificial pink roses for the benefit of the overcrowded hospitals. Lanny.saw his mother, the loveliest sight in Piccadilly Circus, taking in silver coins hand over fist; he had to drive three times in one of Lord Eversham-Watson's cars to keep her supplied with stock in trade. He hoped that he might be able to provide accommodations for all those babies who were sleeping outdoors on benches.