Читать книгу Bring the Monkey - Miles Franklin - Страница 9

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Percy created equal excitement below stairs. He held court in a back corridor leading from the butler's offices to the servants' quarters. Even the butler took notice of him and was elated when Percy sparred playfully with him. Kitchen- and house-maids and others piled around as if he were a popular actor at the Chelsea Garden Party. In Ydonea's suite was an Indian with the form of him who 'trod the ling like a buck in spring,' whose legs were like water pipes painted white, and whose head was haughtily reared under a hefty turban of kalsomine green with a fan tail over the left ear. He had a coat of the same shade embroidered with golden leaves.

"Some rooster, ain't he?" whispered a housemaid. Nothing but the ballet skirts and war bonnet of a Highlander with a beard on his knees, and a burr in his beard proper could have rivalled so spectacular a retainer. He regarded Percy with aloof disdain. He had the features and expression of some ruler on an ancient coin.

This was Ydonea's chauffeur. The friendly housemaid informed me that he had been presented to her by the young Rajah of Bogwallhoop. (This was her version of the nick-name given him by her master). He had been commanded to watch over Ydonea and the precious jewels till recalled from that post by the boss Rajah himself. "And they say she can only keep the jewels while she remains pure. That's why she has to be so careful--her mother around her all die time, and kep' on ice so to speak. It ain't very modern, is it?"

"What you think--that a gooda plan?"

"All right while it pays, but a trifle dull. What do you think yourself?" She threw me a long knowing wink.

"You mean to be so pure, or so veree careful?" My sociological tendencies were interrupted by the cook, who shooed us all to our pursuits, and I was left with the chauffeur, whose real name was Gulam, but Yusuf will serve to identify him. Ydonea called all her Indian chauffeurs by that name, as some mistresses call the office of footman Jeames regardless of its incumbent. I retreated from Yusuf's distinguished presence, trying to recall a resemblance. It came suddenly. This imperial creature had sniffed beside me in the Reading Room of the British Museum. English fogs had evidently distressed him, and he had sniff-sniff-snuffle-sniffed till I wanted to shriek "Use your handkerchief!" His beauty had not reconciled me, for I had been reared to a complex that the proper use of handkerchiefs is indispensable good form.

Pooh! So the faithful and picturesque attendant presented by a potentate was probably a modest Indian student employing his week-end in earning a little extra money to pursue his studies! The Rajah and Maharajah were figments of Ydonea's publicity expert. Pooh! Yusuf's beauty and sniffs had attracted me, but he had not deigned me a glance so I walked past him now saying "Have you da handkerchief?"

He produced a shawl-like square of silk patterned as a tropic garden, smelling as the roses of yesterday.

"Da handkerchief for da use. This way, look!" I used a firm white one vigorously, and retreated with the parting shot "Da Engleesh not lika da people not blow da nose, when da nose need da blow."

I went victoriously to cultivate Mammy Lou, Ydonea's Negress maid. We began on a good level, she being exotic and personal maid to the great star, and I keeping up my end as foreign maid to a distinguished charmer with a popular monkey. Mammy Lou was a vast old darkey, genial and approachable as only Negresses can be. None of the flunkies could speak Italian, so the pidgin jargon I had assumed could not be questioned.

Mammy was probably an actress. She was a skilled publicity agent. She welcomed me. I babbled artlessly about Percy. Mammy as artfully babbled about Ydonea. She showed her Mistress's jewel safe. It was not very large or heavy, but was locked with a chain to a big wardrobe trunk. The trunk in its turn was locked with a chain to the bedstead. A burglar could not therefore pick up the safe and walk out with it without shattering the trunk and bedstead. It was at present guarded by a stout man who sat on a chair with a revolver near at hand. I wondered if he might be a gangster. A second member of Ydonea's staff was posted under the window, and a gentleman, who had persistently ambulant movements for a guest, was frequently to be seen in the gallery approaching the door.

Mammy whispered that these were Pinkerton gennelmen who always guarded Miss Ydonea's jewels. I suggested that the real stones were probably in some bank, but Mammy raised her hands in pious protest. "No, siree! I should say not. Miss Ydonea is the real genoowine article. If she says a thing, that thing sure is true."

I persisted that it was unnecessary to carry jewels about to private house parties in England. Mammy mounted a big draught farm high-horse. It did not matter what the folks did in these out of date old castles. Miss Ydonea had better ideas. She always wore her grand jewels on Saturday night. What was the use of spending all that money on jewels if they were not to be seen and used. Miss Ydonea believed in spreading the sunshine, not in gathering up cobwebs and dust on pretty things. I was dismissed as a dolt that had not read the papers. The Pinkerton man winked at me, and chucked Percy under the chin.

I attempted to lessen the worth of the jewels, but Mammy said that the blue diamond alone was worth five hundred thousand dollars. I adopted a more pacific manner and inquired if Miss Ydonea wore grand oriental brocade with the rajah's gems.

"Oh, naw, naw. That would be too ordinairy," said Mammy, about whom I was now sure there was nothing Southern but her uniform and her name. She was a more practised actress than Ydonea, who had acquired her in Hollywood. "Naw, my lawdy! Miss Ydonea will have a palest, pale sea-green silk embroidered in cream, and then she looks like a northern mermaid, and all the jewels, oh, boy! like the lights you see flash on the waves at Catalina Island."

I was promised a glimpse of Ydonea when dressed. Other maids now appeared for a peep at the jewel safe, and Mammy Lou went through her piece again. Her only interest in Tattingwood, other than promoting her mistress's reputation, was a possible ghost. She was supplied with information that excited and terrified her. At a certain time of the year, according to contradictory authorities, or when there was going to be a death in the family, a ghost always paraded in the grand corridor. What shape the ghost took was not forthcoming.

Suddenly all the vassals disappeared as marvellously as young turkeys when Mommer Turkey announces a hawk, and I was face to face with the master of the house. The baron in his hall was as interested in Percy as the menials had been. Only the timid and the curmudgeon were ever above Percy's society.

"Oh, er, how did you carry the little blighter down?" inquired Lord Tattingwood, stopping to poke an affable finger under Percy's chin. Percy waved his arms like a windmill and made passes at imaginary monkeys in a way natural to him. His host grunted.

"Where will the little chap sleep? Must be careful he doesn't get out where one of the dogs will make short work of him...You are very fond of him, aren't you, my girl?"

"Veree, My Lord."

"Pity we couldn't find you something better than a little devil of a monkey at Tattingwood Hall." He looked at me with unmistakable amusement in his small cunning eyes.

"Percy sleep in da basket," I volunteered.

"I should like to see," remarked the gentleman, and it devolved upon a lady's maid to conduct him to our apartment.

He examined the waste paper basket lined with Percy's bedding. He was a man of simple interests, fond of shooting and hunting. He said there was a heavy footstool in his apartments which would make the scuttle quite safe as an anchor, and in a most democratic way took the hassock already being used and proceeded to make the change himself. "Come and see," he commanded. We met the friendly housemaid on the way to Lord Tattingwood's rooms, which were at the other end of the grand corridor beyond the middle tower. The housemaid rushed to take the hassock. As opportunity occurred she winked at me and murmured "The old chap's findin' his way home with you!"

"Da gentleman mooch interest in ma leetle monk."

"Monkey, my eye!" she retorted, an uncompromising girl, and spry. "You are not as used to these parties as I am. Sing out if you need any help." She deposited the heavy mahogany leather-cushioned foot-stool in Zarl's room and withdrew, again winking at large. Lord Tattingwood remained to place the foot-stool, and was apparently infatuated with Percy's antics. "Tie the little blighter up," he commanded. "I want to see if he can move all that."

Percy, when tethered, settled down in the glow of the fire with unusual placidity. Lord Tattingwood seated himself on a chair near by and without preliminaries pulled me to his knee. I remembered the housemaid's offer, but did not summon help. I eyed the poker near by and struggled to free myself. "Oh, Mr. Engleesh Lord, pies, pies, I good girl. I pray da Virgin all da time. I tink I hear someone coming."

That was efficacious. Lord Tattingwood resumed his game with Percy. "Who's in there?" he asked, indicating the door into the Chief Inspector's room.

"The swell polissman," I responded, critically surveying Swithwulf George Cedd St Erconwald Spillbeans, Sixteenth Baron Tattingwood. The eugenics of primogeniture had secured for him a coarse frame upon which sat a big red face with small eyes, a long ungainly nose, a narrow forehead and a sloppy mouth. He had one of those sandy skins, more often seen on dukes than barbers, and hair everywhere, even in his ears and nostrils. Ugh! On this had Clarice Lesserman sunk decent soap-suds money. What economics! Thinking enviously of what I could do with fortune of a few pounds, I murmured with genuine dejection "la poor girl!"

Swithwulf fossicked in his pockets and brought up half-a-crown. He proffered it, murmuring half to himself "The old harridan keeps me deucedly short!"

Noblesse oblige!

"Half-a-crown no gooda me."

"Hum, you know more than you seem to, it strikes me. You're a dago, aren't you? Dagoes are hot stuff. One has to pay for what one wants these days--and the man who doesn't take what he wants, when he feels like it, and the cost be damned, is a poor man. Do you know enough English to get the gist of that?"

I shook my head. "Da reech gentleman he must have what he wants," I ventured.

He took a pin from his tie and handed it. "Come to my room after dinner when they are looking at the shouties. You know where it is."

He was gone out the door.

I popped out in his wake. "Mista Lord," I called, feigning breathlessness. He was already at some distance. "Taka back--I honest. Perhaps I hava da monk and notta get away."

"Tie the blasted little ape up," he said, disappearing with astonishing celerity.

I returned to my quarters and examined the pin, a large pearl exactly like those priced ten bob at the Oriental jewel shops.

Blasted little ape, indeed! More like a blasted big gorilla! And all that good soap-suds money wasted. What a life!

Quel gaspillage!