Lalage's Lovers Part 15

"You needn't trouble yourself. I sha'n't commit you to anything and the whole thing will be verbal. There won't be a sc.r.a.p of paper for her to show afterward, even if she turns nasty."

It seemed to me likely that there would be paper to show afterward. If Lalage has Selby-Harrison behind her she will go to that interview with an agreement in her pocket ready for signature.

"All the same," I said, "I'd like to be there simply out of curiosity."

t.i.therington shrugged his shoulders.

"Very well," he said, "but let me do the talking. I don't want you to get yourself tied up in some impossible knot. You'd far better leave it to me."

I a.s.sured him that I did not in the least want to talk, but I persisted in my determination to be present at the interview. t.i.therington had bullied me enough for one evening and my promise to put myself entirely in his hands was never meant to extend to the limiting of my intercourse with Lalage. Besides, I enjoyed the prospect of seeing him tied up in some impossible knot, and I believed that Lalage was just the girl to tie him.

CHAPTER X

t.i.therington had a room, temporarily set apart for his use as an office, in the house of the Conservative and Unionist Parliamentary a.s.sociation.

Here he was at liberty to spread about on a large table all the papers he carried in his despatch box and many others. The profusion was most impressive, and would, I am sure, have struck a chill into the soul of Vittie had he seen it. Here were composed and written the letters which I afterward signed, wonderful letters, which like the witches in Macbeth "paltered in a double sense." Here t.i.therington entered into agreements with bill printers and poster artists, for my election was to be conducted on the best possible system with all the modern improvements, an object lesson to the rest of Ireland. Here also the interview with Lalage took place. The room was a great convenience to us. Our proper headquarters were, of course, in Ballygore, the princ.i.p.al town in the East Connor division of Down. But a great deal of business had to be done in Dublin and we could hardly have got on without an office.

I walked into this room a few minutes before eleven on the morning after I had entertained t.i.therington in my hotel.

"The lady hasn't arrived yet," I said.

"She's gone," said t.i.therington. "She was here at half-past eight o'clock."

I noticed that t.i.therington spoke in a subdued way and that his eyes had a furtive expression I had never seen in them before. I felt encouraged to give expression to the annoyance which I felt. I told t.i.therington plainly that I thought he ought not to have changed the hour of the interview without telling me. It seemed to me that he had played me a mean trick and I resented it. Greatly to my surprise t.i.therington apologized meekly.

"It wasn't my fault," he said, "and I hadn't time to communicate with you. I only got this at twenty minutes past eight and had no more than time to get here myself."

He handed me a telegram.

"Eleven quite impossible. Say 8.30. Jun. Soph. Ord. begins at 9.30.

Lalage Beresford."

"I was just sitting down to breakfast," said t.i.therington, "and I had to get up without swallowing so much as a cup of tea and hop on to a car.

She's a tremendously prompt young woman."

"She is," I said, "and always was."

"You know her then?"

"I've known her slightly since she was quite a little girl."

"Why didn't you tell me so last night?"

"I tried to," I said, "but you kept on interrupting me, so I gave up."

t.i.therington's conscience may have p.r.i.c.ked him. He was certainly in a chastened mood, but he showed no sign of wis.h.i.+ng to make any further apologies. On the contrary he began to recover something of his habitual self-a.s.sertiveness.

"If you know her," he said, "perhaps you can tell me what a Jun. Soph.

Ord. is?"

"No, I can't. She was always, even as a child, fond of using contractions. I remember her writing to me about a 'comp.' and she habitually used 'hols' and 'rec.' for holidays and recreation."

"It sounds to me," said t.i.therington, "like a police court."

"You don't mean to say that you think she's been arrested for anything?"

"I hope so."

"Why?" I asked. "Was she too much for you this morning?"

t.i.therington ignored the second question.

"I hope so," he said, "because if she's the sort of girl who gets arrested, she'll be most useful to us. She was quite on for annoying Vittie. She says she's been looking up his speeches and that he's one of the worst liars she ever came across. She's quite right there."

"I wish," I said, "that you'd go and bail her out. Her father's a clergyman and it will be a horrible thing if there's any public scandal."

"I hinted at that as delicately as I could. I didn't actually mention bail, because I wasn't quite sure that a Jun. Soph. Ord. mightn't be something in the Probate and Divorce Court. She simply laughed at me and said she didn't want any help. She told me that she and Hilda, whoever Hilda is, are sure to be all right, because the Puffin is always a lamb--I suppose the Puffin is some name they have for the magistrate--but that a Miss Harrison would probably be stuck."

"She can't have said Miss Harrison."

"No. She said Selly, or Selby-Harrison, short for Selina I thought."

"As a matter of fact, Selby-Harrison--it's a hyphenated surname--is a man."

"Oh, is it?" said t.i.therington, using the neuter p.r.o.noun because, I suppose, he was still uncertain about Selby-Harrison's s.e.x.

"I wish," I said, "that I knew exactly what they've done."

"It doesn't in the least matter to us. So long as she's the kind of young woman who does something we shall be satisfied."

"Oh, she's that."

"So I saw. And she's an uncommonly good-looking girl. The crowd will be all on her side when she starts breaking up Vittie's meetings."

"You accepted her offer of help then?"

"Certainly," said t.i.therington. "She's to speak at a meeting of yours on the twenty-first."

t.i.therington was by this time talking with all his usual buoyant confidence, but I still caught the furtive look in his eyes which I had noticed at first. He seemed to me to have something to conceal, to be challenging criticism and to be preparing to defend himself. Now a man who is on the defensive and who wants to conceal something has generally acted in a way of which he is ashamed. I felt encouraged.

"You didn't commit me in any way, I hope," I said.

"Certainly not. I didn't have to. She was as keen as nuts on helping us and didn't ask a single question about your views on the suffrage question. I needn't say I didn't introduce the subject."

"You didn't sign anything, I suppose?"