A Damsel in Distress Part 41

"He's a good fellow. I like him. I liked him the moment we met. He knew it, too. And I knew he liked me."

A group of men and girls from a neighbouring table pa.s.sed on their way to the door. One of the girls nodded to Billie. She returned the nod absently. The party moved on. Billie frowned down at the tablecloth and drew a pattern on it with a fork.

"Why don't you let George marry your daughter, Lord Marshmoreton?"

The earl drew at his cigar in silence.

"I know it's not my business," said Billie apologetically, interpreting the silence as a rebuff.

"Because I'm the Earl of Marshmoreton."

"I see."

"No you don't," snapped the earl. "You think I mean by that that I think your friend isn't good enough to marry my daughter. You think that I'm an incurable sn.o.b. And I've no doubt he thinks so, too, though I took the trouble to explain my att.i.tude to him when we last met. You're wrong. It isn't that at all. When I say 'I'm the Earl of Marshmoreton', I mean that I'm a poor spineless fool who's afraid to do the right thing because he daren't go in the teeth of the family."

"I don't understand. What have your family got to do with it?"

"They'd worry the life out of me. I wish you could meet my sister Caroline! That's what they've got to do with it. Girls in my daughter's unfortunate position have got to marry position or money."

"Well, I don't know about position, but when it comes to money--why, George is the fellow that made the dollar-bill famous.

He and Rockefeller have got all there is, except the little bit they have let Andy Carnegie have for car-fare."

"What do you mean? He told me he worked for a living." Billie was becoming herself again. Embarra.s.sment had fled.

"If you call it work. He's a composer."

"I know. Writes tunes and things."

Billie regarded him compa.s.sionately.

"And I suppose, living out in the woods the way that you do that you haven't a notion that they pay him for it."

"Pay him? Yes, but how much? Composers were not rich men in my day."

"I wish you wouldn't talk of 'your day' as if you telling the boys down at the corner store about the good times they all had before the Flood. You're one of the Younger Set and don't let me have to tell you again. Say, listen! You know that show you saw last night.

The one where I was supported by a few underlings. Well, George wrote the music for that."

"I know. He told me so."

"Well, did he tell you that he draws three per cent of the gross receipts? You saw the house we had last night. It was a fair average house. We are playing to over fourteen thousand dollars a week. George's little bit of that is--I can't do it in my head, but it's a round four hundred dollars. That's eighty pounds of your money. And did he tell you that this same show ran over a year in New York to big business all the time, and that there are three companies on the road now? And did he mention that this is the ninth show he's done, and that seven of the others were just as big hits as this one? And did he remark in pa.s.sing that he gets royalties on every copy of his music that's sold, and that at least ten of his things have sold over half a million? No, he didn't, because he isn't the sort of fellow who stands around blowing about his income. But you know it now."

"Why, he's a rich man!"

"I don't know what you call rich, but, keeping on the safe side, I should say that George pulls down in a good year, during the season--around five thousand dollars a week."

Lord Marshmoreton was frankly staggered.

"A thousand pounds a week! I had no idea!"

"I thought you hadn't. And, while I'm boosting George, let me tell you another thing. He's one of the whitest men that ever happened.

I know him. You can take it from me, if there's anything rotten in a fellow, the show-business will bring it out, and it hasn't come out in George yet, so I guess it isn't there. George is all right!"

"He has at least an excellent advocate."

"Oh, I'm strong for George. I wish there were more like him ...

Well, if you think I've b.u.t.ted in on your private affairs sufficiently, I suppose I ought to be moving. We've a rehearsal this afternoon."

"Let it go!" said Lord Marshmoreton boyishly.

"Yes, and how quick do you think they would let me go, if I did?

I'm an honest working-girl, and I can't afford to lose jobs."

Lord Marshmoreton fiddled with his cigar-b.u.t.t.

"I could offer you an alternative position, if you cared to accept it."

Billie looked at him keenly. Other men in similar circ.u.mstances had made much the same remark to her. She was conscious of feeling a little disappointed in her new friend.

"Well?" she said dryly. "Shoot."

"You gathered, no doubt, from Mr. Bevan's conversation, that my secretary has left me and run away and got married? Would you like to take her place?"

It was not easy to disconcert Billie Dore, but she was taken aback.

She had been expecting something different.

"You're a shriek, dadda!"

"I'm perfectly serious."

"Can you see me at a castle?"

"I can see you perfectly." Lord Marshmoreton's rather formal manner left him. "Do please accept, my dear child. I've got to finish this d.a.m.ned family history some time or other. The family expect me to.

Only yesterday my sister Caroline got me in a corner and bored me for half an hour about it. I simply can't face the prospect of getting another Alice Faraday from an agency. Charming girl, charming girl, of course, but ... but ... well, I'll be d.a.m.ned if I do it, and that's the long and short of it!"

Billie bubbled over with laughter.

"Of all the impulsive kids!" she gurgled. "I never met anyone like you, dadda! You don't even know that I can use a typewriter."

"I do. Mr. Bevan told me you were an excellent stenographer."

"So George has been boosting me, too, has he?" She mused. "I must say, I'd love to come. That old place got me when I saw it that day."

"That's settled, then," said Lord Marshmoreton masterfully. "Go to the theatre and tell them--tell whatever is usual in these cases.

And then go home and pack, and meet me at Waterloo at six o'clock.

The train leaves at six-fifteen."

"Return of the wanderer, accompanied by dizzy blonde! You've certainly got it all fixed, haven't you! Do you think the family will stand for me?"