Читать книгу The Anxious Days - Philip Gibbs - Страница 4

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He sat in the corner of a smoking carriage and had a look at the headings of an evening paper. The Election results were to be declared, beginning at nine o’clock. All the party leaders anticipated victory for their own side. Mr. Baldwin was confident. Mr. Lloyd George expected a Liberal rally. He had promised to conquer unemployment. At the worst the Liberals could hold the balance. Labour was certain of heavy gains.

A fellow passenger on the other side of the carriage—they had talked now and then during the voyage—made a comment or two about the political situation.

“The same old war cries! These politicians make me sick. What England wants is a Mussolini to wake up the slackers and get a move on. It’s the dole that’s demoralizing the nation. What we want is Imperial Economic Unity, but what do these little whippersnappers in the House of Commons know about the Empire? They’ve never been further than Peckham or Tooting. We must get together or go under. Don’t you agree?”

“I expect we’ll scrape through,” said Commander Compton.

His fellow passenger was doubtful about it. He expressed his doubts at some length, but Compton was thinking about his daughter Madge. He had an uneasy idea that he had sent a telegram to the wrong address. He might have put Church Row, instead of Church Street, Chelsea. Idiotic if he had done that! He would feel hipped if he couldn’t get hold of her before dinner. He had been looking forward to their first greeting all the way from Singapore, counting the days. Perhaps Madge had gone to see her aunt—his sister Betty—in Kensington. Perhaps the telegram was lying on her doormat, unopened. He ought to have cabled earlier on the voyage. He might have sent a wireless from Aden.

His fellow passenger was deep in The Times. It would be very pleasant to get The Times on the day of publication, instead of six weeks old, when he was on the edge of a jungle in Borneo for a spell, looking after a new plantation hopelessly mismanaged by a drunken assistant—poor wretch.

Compton stared out of the carriage window. They were passing an endless wilderness of bricks and mortar, mile after mile of mean streets. He could see the washing hanging out in back gardens. Every little house seemed to have its wireless aerial. Thousands of chimney-pots were smoking, and the wind was smudging all this smoke across the wet roofs of bluish slates. Hideous and squalid, after the unimaginable beauty of Malay—that receding dream in his memory—with its mountain peaks, swept by ever-changing colours; and great rivers swirling through alluvial flats and jungle forests; and tall, straight lines of rubber trees like the endless aisles of interminable cathedrals with splashes of gold where the sun shone aslant their trunks. The London slums again—and how good to see them! That endless vista of sooty chimney-pots—and how comforting to a homesick man, five years out East, with a daughter waiting for him.

Compton took a taxi from Liverpool Street to his club in St. James’s Square. Yes, he could have a bedroom.... Commander Compton, wasn’t it? The hall-porter remembered him as though he had just returned from a week-end’s golf.

“I want to telephone,” said Compton, before going to his room.

He went into the telephone box and rang up a number which he had kept in his pocket-book next to a photograph of a nice-looking girl. Sloane 2389.

A girl’s voice answered him, and he spoke with a slight tremor in his own. “Is that you, Madge?”

There was a slight pause, and then the girl’s voice answered again.

“No. This is Jean. Madge is away on tour. Edinburgh. I expect her back to-night, with luck.”

“I’m her father,” said Compton.

“Oh! ... Welcome home! ... She’s often spoken about you.”

It was a friendly voice, and had a laugh in it.

Compton hesitated. There was a look of disappointment on his face, but he spoke cheerily.

“Give her my love. Tell her that ... well ... I’m keen to see her! I’ll ring up in the morning.”

“I’ll tell her.”

“Many thanks.”

Compton put the receiver back and stood in the telephone box for a moment. Rather disappointing. Away on tour, eh? Yes, she had said something about it in her last letter. She had fixed up a part in a musical comedy. She expected it would be great fun. Well, he would have to spend a lonely evening. Hard luck on a man just home from the Malay. Of course, he might go and visit his sister in Kensington. That was not a bad idea, failing Madge.

He rang up a Kensington number. Mrs. Middleton was dining out and was not expected back until late, because of the Election.

Well, that was that! Dinner at the club? Not cheery for a night of homecoming. He might do a show afterwards.

The Alhambra? No, too many old ghosts there. It would make him feel blue sitting alone in the stalls.

Outside the telephone box a friendly voice greeted him.

“Hullo, Compton! Thought you were in Borneo or Singapore?”

“Just back,” said Compton. “Enormously glad to see you, old man. How are things with you?”

It was old Bartlett, “axed” out of the Navy about the same time as himself, now something in the City, but the same cheery-looking customer. He had done some pretty good work in the Dardanelles when men like him were needed.

“Things?” he asked with a grin. “Putrid, my dear fellow. This country is demoralized. Nothing doing except a pall of pessimism. Now we’re awaiting the results of an Election which will probably seal our fate as a nation for some time to come. Have a drink?”

“Dine with me,” said Compton. “I’m as lonely as death.”

Bartlett could not dine with him. He was dining with a lovely lady and going on afterwards to hear the Election results at Horridge’s in Oxford Street. It was going to be an amusing show. Horridge did that kind of thing remarkably well. All the notabilities would be there. All the little ladies.

He remembered he had another ticket. If it was any good to Compton ...

“Oh, rather!” said Compton. “Anything’s better than a lonely seat at some third-rate play. I was hoping to meet my daughter Madge, but she’s away out of town.”

“Well,” said old Bartlett, “here’s the ticket. I’ll meet you there. White tie, you know. Any time after nine. How’s Singapore? Still wicked? I remember a girl who used to dance at that cabaret ...”

Compton dined alone with a white tie under his chin. The club was almost empty. Probably most of the members had done some electioneering and were away in the country, or dining in restaurants where the Election results would be announced later on. He was just a little hipped because of that lonely feeling.