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Read Ebook: The Arbiter: A Novel by Bell Florence Eveleen Eleanore Olliffe Lady
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Ebook has 431 lines and 22862 words, and 9 pages
"Oh! to be sure, yes," said Wentworth. "I saw the placard."
"This is Mrs. Birkett," said Lady Chaloner.
Wentworth bowed and said politely, "I hope the bazaar will be a great success."
"I hope so, thank you," Mrs. Birkett said, feeling that if the bazaar were not a great success, she would have gone through a good deal for a very little. She longed to be allowed to go away, but she was not quite sure whether she would not be jeopardising the success of the bazaar by leaving at this juncture. Visions of having promised to meet her reverend husband to go for a walk at a given moment were haunting her. Finally, with a desperate effort, she said--
"I am afraid I have an appointment, Lady Chaloner, and must go now, unless there is anything more I can do."
"Oh, must you go?" said Lady Chaloner, "we had better meet in the morning, I think, and make a final list of the stalls."
"Certainly," said Mrs. Birkett, with a sigh of relief, and with a determined effort she tried to include the circle she was leaving in one salutation, and made away as fast as she could.
"I hope," said the Princess, "the poor lady is not shocked at having a Caf? Chantant in her Church bazaar."
"At any rate," said Wentworth, "she will be consoled when you hand over the results to her afterwards."
"What is the name of the piece you are going to do?" said Lady Chaloner, pencil in hand.
"Oh! if you think we'll have that one!" said the Princess. "Would you believe, Lady Chaloner, that he wants me to be the maid in it instead of the leading lady, because he kisses the maid behind the door!"
"My dear Maddy!" said Lady Chaloner, reprovingly.
"Mrs. Birkett," suggested Wentworth.
"Precisely," said the Princess.
"And a song from Mr. Wentworth," said Moricourt.
"That's splendid," said Lady Chaloner. "The Caf? Chantant will do. The only thing I rather regret is about the stalls, that every one is goin' to sell the same thing."
"And who is going to buy?" said the Princess.
"That's another difficulty," said Lady Chaloner, "they'll all have to buy from one another."
"We had better have some autographs," said the Princess, "they always sell."
"Very good," said Lady Chaloner, putting it down on the list. "You had better get some."
"All right," said the Princess. "We'll have some of all kinds, I think. I will get some from those people too," nodding her head in the direction of the London manager.
"Everybody considers himself an autograph in these days," said Wentworth; "it is terrible what a levelling age we live in."
"We might sell photographs, of course," said the Princess, "instead of autographs."
"Or both," said Lady Chaloner, earnestly and anxiously, as though contemplating all sources of revenue. "Signed photographs."
"Excellent," said Wentworth.
"The Rendels? Are they here?" said Wentworth, with much interest.
"So it says here. What is she like?" said Lady Chaloner. "Would she help?"
"I am not sure," said Wentworth. "She's in mourning, and very quiet--but very charming."
"You are too bad, Maddy, really," said Lady Chaloner, smiling at this brilliant sally.
"You might beat them up to come and buy, at any rate," said Lady Chaloner, "if they can't do anything else."
"I will do what I can," said Wentworth with a smile, reflecting as he walked off what a strange blurring of the focus of life there is when, everything being concentrated on to one particular purpose, whether it be a bazaar, an election, or the giving of a ball, all the human beings one encounters are considered from the point of view of their fitness to one particular end--in the aspect of a buyer or seller, as a voter, as a partner, as the case may be. There was no doubt that at this moment the whole of mankind were expected to fit somehow into Lady Chaloner's pattern: to be useful for the bazaar, or to be thrown away as useless.
"You seem very busy, Lady Chaloner," he said, as he looked at the sheets of paper on the table by her.
"We are gettin' up a bazaar," Lady Chaloner said. "Will you help us?"
"I shall be delighted," said Pateley obviously. "What do you want me to do?"
"Give us your autograph," said the Princess promptly, "and we will sell it for large sums of gold."
She had certainly chosen a skilful way of enlisting Pateley's co-operation. He revelled in the joy of being a political potentate, and every fresh proof that he received of the fact was another delight to him.
"I shall be greatly honoured," he said.
"We are going to have autographs of all the distinguished people we can find," said the Princess, continuing her system of ingratiation.
"I can tell you of an autograph who has just arrived," said Pateley. "I have just seen him driving up from the station; a very expensive autograph indeed--Lord Stamfordham."
"Lord Stamfordham?" said Lady Chaloner, the Foreign Secretary, like the rest of the world, falling instantly into his place in her kaleidescope. "Certainly, if he would give us a dozen autographs we should do an excellent business with them."
"You had better make Adela Prestige ask him, then," said the Princess with a laugh.
"I wonder where Adela is?" said Lady Chaloner, considering the question entirely on its merits.
"Tuesday?--let me see, this is Thursday. Yes, I think so," said Lady Chaloner. Then she gave a cry of dismay. "Oh! no, Maddy, Tuesday is the bazaar; that will never do."
"Oh, yes," said the Princess, "all the better. The bazaar doesn't open till half-past five after all, and we can lunch at half-past twelve. It will do us good to be in the fresh air before our labours begin; we shall look all the better for it."
"Very well," said Lady Chaloner dubiously. "But then what about the arrangements?"
"Can't those be made on Monday?" said the Princess; "and if there are any finishing touches required, Mrs. Birkett and her friends can do them on Tuesday. They won't want to look their best, I daresay," and she laughed again.
"Very well," said Lady Chaloner. "Tuesday, then, for Waldlust. I will ask Lord Stamfordham to come."
"And I will ask Adela," said the Princess.
"Come then, Moricourt," said the Princess, "if you want to rehearse that play before we act it."
"Pray do," said Lady Chaloner anxiously. "I am sure people who act always rehearse first."
"I am more than willing," said M. de Moricourt, throwing an infinity of expression into his voice and glance as he looked at the Princess.
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