Читать книгу Old Pybus - Warwick Deeping - Страница 37

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Lance had left his car in the Saracen yard and had walked down to the cottage in search of his grandfather. It was half past four and the Venerable’s tea-time, and the pigeons waiting upon the gutters and the ridge-tiles were on the watch for the Venerable’s white head. A few of them fluttered down to Lance as he stood on his grandfather’s doorstep.

Getting no reply to his knock he walked back to the main yard, where Sally Summerscales, sitting idly at a window, smiled out upon him.

“Are you looking for Mr. Pybus, sir?”

“Yes. He’s not at the cottage.”

“He’s busy, sir. Put off his tea a quarter of an hour. A ‘sharry’ has just come in. Thirty of ’em. We call them ‘one-nighters.’”

Sally thought his smile as lovely as his eyes.

“Thank you so much. I suppose he’s in the hotel.”

“Looking after the luggage, sir.”

Lance entered. Sally’s “one-nighters” and their luggage were collected in the hall. They were very much in charge of a brisk and bald-headed man, who, standing on the third step of the stairs with a list in his right hand, was assigning his sheep to their pens. He knew his party. He was a humourist in the English manner. He drew little twitters of laughter from the women. “No. 12, Mr. and Mrs. Bibster—please. No. 13—Miss Soames. No, as you were. That wouldn’t be gallant. Can’t put a lady in No. 13, can we? Mr. Brown, perhaps—you—will take No. 13? Thank you, sir. Turn your pyjamas inside out for luck, sir. Supposed to be infallible—they tell me. No. 14, Mr. and Mrs. Lovejoy, and good luck to them. It’s a long time since I had a honeymoon.” Lance saw his grandfather standing in the centre of a circle of suit-cases and bags. The strong lad who helped with the luggage was having his half-day off, and old Pybus had the whole of it to deal with.

“Luggage for No. 12.”

The Venerable was about to ascend the stairs with a suit-case in either hand when Lance, pushing through the crowd, waylaid his grandfather.

“All right—I’ll do the carrying. Show me No. 12.”

Old Pybus gave him a queer, smiling look.

“You here, sir! Not one of the party? I can manage quite well.”

He climbed the first three steps, but Lance wilfully got in front of him.

“I’m serious. I’ve done it before. I was a porter at Southampton during the General Strike.”

His grandfather climbed two more steps.

“There’s no strike here, sir, thank you all the same.”

“You’ll let me carry that luggage. I ask you to let me.”

“You can’t do it here, sir.”

“But I can.”

“It’s not your job.”

They were alone on the stairs, Lance holding out his hands for the luggage, the Venerable looking up at his grandson, and refusing to surrender the burden.

“If you please, sir. Can’t allow it.”

Lance was smiling, but there was much behind that smile.

“I suppose I can help my own grandfather——”

He saw the Venerable’s figure stiffen where it stood. The old man’s face had a kind of staring pallor. He looked straight up at his grandson. He seemed to be asking himself and Lance some momentous question.

“Probyn’s boy?”

“Yes.”

“Does he know——?”

“No.”

Something happened to old John Pybus’s face. A sudden, strange softness overflowed it. The blue stare went out of his eyes. He allowed his grandson to take the luggage from him.

“All right.—Bit of a shock. Turn to the right when you reach the landing.”

Lance went up with a heart that was beating more rapidly. His grandfather followed him.

“Second door along the corridor—on the left.”

“Right, sir.”

“Don’t call me sir.”

“Of course,” said Lance, glancing over a shoulder, “you won’t do that to me any more, sir.”

“I shall—unless——”

“Grandfather,” said Lance, pausing outside the door of No. 12, “isn’t this a rather great occasion?”

Old Pybus’s white head seemed a little bent. Lance put down a suit-case, opened the door of No. 12, went in, and placed the suit-case he was carrying on the luggage stand.

“Why didn’t you tell me before, boy?”

“I—I wanted you to know me a little.”

“Ah,” said his grandfather. “I see.”

He carried the other suit-case into the room and placed it on a chair.

“Did they tell you about me?”

“No.”

They did not look at each other.

“Then—how——?”

“I heard something.”

“Made you feel inquisitive?”

“More than that. I think I had to come. I wanted to come. And—of course—now——”

The sunlight striking through the window fell upon the Venerable’s head and face.

“We had better clear up the rest of that luggage, Lance. Then—we’ll have tea.”