Читать книгу The Man Who Bought London - Edgar Wallace - Страница 5

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MR. TACK stood by the cashier's desk in the ready-made department. He wore upon his face the pained look of one who had set himself the pleasant task of being disagreeable, and yet feared the absence of opportunity.

"She won't come; we'll get a wire at eleven, saying she's ill, or her mother has been taken to the infirmary," he said bitterly, and three sycophantic shop-walkers, immaculately attired in the most perfect fitting of frock-coats who stood at a respectful distance, said in audible tones that it was really disgraceful.

They would have laughed at Mr. Tack's comment on the sick mother, but they weren't sure whether he wanted them to laugh, because Mr. Tack was a strict Churchman, and usually regarded sickness as part and parcel of the solemn ritual of life.

"She goes on Saturday week—whatever happens," said Mr. Tack grimly, and examined his watch. "She would go at once if it wasn't for the fact that I can'tget anybody to take her place at a minute's notice." One of the shop-walkers, feeling by reason of his seniority of service that something was expected from him, remarked that he did not know what things were coming to.

It was to this unhappy group that Elsie Marion, flushed and a little breathless, came in haste from the stuffy dressing-room which Tack and Brighton's provided for their female employees.

"I'm so sorry!" she said, as she opened the glass-panelled door of the cash rostrum and swung herself up to the high stool.

Mr. Tack looked at her. There he stood, as she had predicted, his gold chronometer in his hand, the doom on his face, an oppressive figure.

"Nine o'clock I was here, miss," he said.

She made no reply, opening her desk, and taking out the check pads and the spikes of her craft.

"Nine o'clock I was here, miss," repeated the patient Mr. Tack —who was far from patient, being, in fact, in a white heat of temper.

"I'm very sorry!" she repeated.

A young man had strolled into the store, and since the officials responsible for piloting him to the counter of his desire were at that moment forming an admiring audience about Mr. Tack, he was allowed to wander aimlessly. He was a bright boy, in a fawn dustcoat, and his soft felt hat was stuck on the back of his head. He had all the savoir-faire and the careless confidence which is associated with one profession in the world—and one only. He drew nearer to the little group, having no false sense of modesty.

"You are sorry!" said Mr. Tack with great restraint. He was a stout little man with a shiny bald head and a heavy, yellow moustache. "You are sorry! Well, that's a comfort! You've absolutely set the rules—my rules—at defiance. You have ignored my special request to be here at nine o'clock—and you're sorry!"

Still the girl made no reply, but the young man in the soft felt hat was intensely interested.

"If I can get here, Miss Marion, you can get here!" said Mr. Tack.

"I'm very sorry," said the girl again. "I overslept. As it is, I have come without any breakfast."

"I could get up in time," went on Mr. Tack.

Elsie Marion turned on him, her patience exhausted. This was his way —he would nag from now till she left, and she wanted to see the end of it. She scented dismissal, anyway.

"What do you think I care?" she asked, stung to wrath, "about what time you got up? You're horribly old compared to me; you eat more than I, and you haven't my digestion. You get up because you can't sleep, probably. I sleep because I can't get up."

It was a speech foreign to her nature, but she was stung to resentment.

Mr. Tack was dumbfounded. Here were at least six statements, many of them unthinkably outrageous, which called for reprimand.

"You're discharged," he snorted. The girl slipped down from her stool, very white of face.

"Not now—not now!" said Mr. Tack hastily. "You take a week's notice from Saturday."

"I'd rather go now," she said quietly.

"You'll stay to suit my convenience," breathed Mr. Tack, "and then you will be discharged without a character."

She climbed back to her stool, strangely elated.

"Then you've got to stop nagging me," she said boldly. "I'll do whatever it is my duty to do, but I won't be bullied. I don't want your linen-draper's sarcasms," she went on recklessly, encouraged by the sympathetic smile of the young man in the soft felt hat, who was now an unabashed member of the audience, "and I won't have your ponderous rebukes. You are the head of a beastly establishment in which your hirelings insult defenceless girls who dare not resent. One of these days I'm going to take the story of Tack and Brighten to The Monitor.'"

It was a terrible threat born of a waning courage, for the girl was fast losing her exhilaration which came to her in her moment of temporary triumph; but Mr. Tack, who was no psychologist, and did not inquire into first causes, turned pink and white. Already The Monitor had hinted at scandal in "a prosperous sweating establishment in Oxford Street," and Mr. Tack had the righteous man's fear of publicity.

"You—you dare!" he spluttered. "You—you be careful, Miss—I'll have you out of here, by Jove! Yes—neck and crop! What can we do for you, sir?"

He turned sharply to the young man in the trilby hat, having observed him for the first time.

"My name's Gillett," said the youth bluntly, "and I am a representative of The Monitor—er—I want to see this young lady for two minutes.

"Go to the devil!" said Mr. Tack defiantly.

The young man bowed.

"After I have interviewed this young lady," he said.

"I forbid you to give this man information about my business," exploded the enraged partner.

The reporter closed his eyes wearily.

"My poor fellow," he said, shaking his head, "it isn't about your business I want to see this lady, it's about King Kerry."

Mr. Tack opened his mouth in astonishment.

"Mr. King Kerry?" he said. "Why, that's the gentlemanwho is buying this business!"

He blurted it out—a secret which he had so jealously guarded. He explained in one sentence the reason for the economies, the sales at less than cost, the whole disastrous and nefarious history of the past months.

"Buying this business, is he?" said Gillett, unimpressed. "Why, that's nothing! He was nearly murdered at Oxford Circus Tube Station half an hour ago, and he's bought Portland Place Mansions since then."

He turned to the alarmed girl.

"Told me to come along and find you," he said. "Described you so that I couldn't make any mistake."

"What does he want?" she asked, shaking.

"Wants you to come to lunch at the Savoy," said Mr. Gillett, "and tell him whether Tack and Brighton's is worth buying at the price."

Mr. Tack did not swoon, he was too well trained. But as he walked to his private office he swayed unsteadily, and the shop-walker in the Ribbon Department, who was a member of the Anti-Profanity League, heard what Mr. Tack was saying to himself, and put his fingers in his ears.