Title: The Prophet of Berkeley Square
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Author: Robert Smythe Hichens
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The Prophet of Berkeley Square
Robert Smythe Hichens
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Table of Contents
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Robert Smythe Hichens...........................................................................................................................1
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The Prophet of Berkeley Square
Robert Smythe Hichens
CHAPTER I. MRS. MERILLIA IS CARRIED TO BED
CHAPTER II. MALKIEL THE SECOND IS BETRAYED BY THE YOUNG LIBRARIAN
CHAPTER III. THE TWO PROPHETS PARTAKE OF "CREAMING FOAM."
CHAPTER IV. THE SECRET WATERS OF THE RIVER MOUSE
CHAPTER V. MALKIEL THE SECOND POISONS MISS MINERVA
CHAPTER VI. THE OLD ASTRONOMER DISCOURSETH OF THE STARS
CHAPTER VII. THE DOUBLE LIFE OF MISS MINERVA
CHAPTER VIII. THE PROPHET RECEIVES HIS DIRECTIONS FROM MADAME
CHAPTER IX. THE PROPHET BEGINS TO CARRY OUT HIS DIRECTIONS
CHAPTER X. THE PROPHET AND MALKIEL THE SECOND CONVERSE BY TELEGRAM
CHAPTER XI. MISS MINERVA OPENS HER BOOK OF REVELATION IN A CAB
CHAPTER XII. THE ELABORATE MIND OF MISS MINERVA
CHAPTER XIII. THE PROPHET IS INTERVIEWED BY TWO KIDS
CHAPTER XIV. THE PROPHET JOURNEYS TO THE MOUSE
CHAPTER XV. THE PROPHET CREATES A DIVERSION AT HIS OWN EXPENSE
CHAPTER XVI. THE PROPHET RETURNS FROM THE MOUSE WITH TWO OLD AND VALUED
FRIENDS
CHAPTER XVII. MALKIEL THE SECOND IS MISTAKEN FOR A RATCATCHER
CHAPTER XVIII. THE SILLY LIFE
CHAPTER XIX. MRS. MERILLIA HEATS THE POKER
CHAPTER XX. THE PROPHET RETIRES FROM BUSINESS
CHAPTER I. MRS. MERILLIA IS CARRIED TO BED
The great telescope of the Prophet was carefully adjusted upon its lofty, brassbound stand in the bow
window of Number One Thousand Berkeley Square. It pointed towards the remarkably bright stars which
twinkled in the December sky over frosty London, those guardian stars which always seemed to the Prophet
to watch with peculiar solicitude over the most respectable neighbourhood in which he resided. The polestar
had its eye even now upon the mansion of an adjacent ex premier, the belt of Orion was not oblivious of a
belted earl's cosy redbrick home just opposite, and the house of a certain famous actor and actress close by
had been taken by the Great Bear under its special protection.
The Prophet's butler, Mr. Ferdinandthat bulky and veracious gentleman threw open the latticed
windows of the drawingroom and let the cold air rush blithely in. Then he made up the fire carefully, placed
a copy of Mr. Malkiel's /Almanac/, bound in dull pink and silver brocade by Miss Clorinda Dolbrett of the
Cromwell Road, upon a small tulipwood table near the telescope, patted a sofa cushion affectionately on the
head, glanced around with the meditative eye of the butler born not made, and quitted the comfortable
apartment with a salaried, but soft, footstep.
It was a pleasant chamber, this drawingroom of Number One Thousand. It spoke respectfully of the
generations that were past and seemed serenely certain of a comfortable future. There was no too modern
uneasiness about it, no trifling, gimcrack furniture constructed to catch the eye and the angles of any one
venturing to seek repose upon it, no unmeaning rubbish of ornaments or hectic flummery of secondrate
pictures. Above the high oaken mantelpiece was a little pure bust in marble of the Prophet when a small
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boy. To right and left were pretty miniatures in golden frames of the Prophet's delightfully numerous
grandmothers. Here might be seen Mrs. Prothero, the great ship builder's faithful wife, in blue brocade, and
Lady Camptown, who reigned at Bath, in grey tabinet and diamond buckles, when Miss Jane Austen was
writing her first romance; Mrs. Susan Burlington, who knew Lord Byrona remarkable factand Lady
Sophia Green, who knew her own mind, a fact still more remarkable. The lastnamed lady wore black with a
Roman nose, and the combination was admirably convincing. Here might also be observed Mrs. Stuefitt,
Mistress of the Mazurka, and the Lady Jane Follington, of whom George the Second had spoken openly in
terms of approbation. She affected plum colour and had eyes like sloesthe fashionable hue in the
neatfootandprettyankle period. The flames of the fire twinkled brightly over this battalion of deuced
fine women, who were all, without one exception, the grandmothersin various degreesof the Prophet.
When speaking of them, in the highest terms, he never differentiated them by the adjectives great, or
greatgreat. They were all kind and condescending enough to be his grandmothers. For a man of his
sensitive, delicate and grateful disposition this was enough. He thought them all quite perfect, and took them
all under the protection of his soft and beaming eyes.
Of Mrs. Merillia, the live grandmother with whom he had the great felicity to dwell in Berkeley Square, he
seldom said anything in public praise. The incense he offered at her shrine rose, most sweetly perfumed, from
his daily life. The hearth of this agreeable and grandmotherly chamber was attractive with dogs, the silver
cage beside it with green lovebirds. Upon the floor was a heavy, dullblue carpet over whichas has been
intimatedeven a butler so heavy as Mr. Ferdinand could go softly. The walls were dressed with a dull blue
paper that looked like velvet.
Here and there upon them hung a picture: a landscape of George Morland, lustily English, a Cotman, a
Cuypcows in twilighta Reynolds, faded but exquisitely genteel. A lovely little harpsichordmeditating
on Scarlattistood in one angle, a harp, tied with most delicate ribands of ivory satin powdered with
pimpernels, in another. Many waxen candles shed a tender and unostentatious radiance above their careful
grease catchers. Upon pretty tables lay neat books by Fanny Burney, Beatrice Harraden, Mary Wilkins, and
Max Beerbohm, also the poems of Lord Byron and of Lord de Tabley. Near the hearth was a sofa on which
an emperor might have laid an easy head that wore a crown, and before every low and seductive chair was set
a low and seductive footstool.
A grandmother's clock pronounced the hour of ten in a frail and elegant voice as the finelycarved oak door
was opened, and the Prophet seriously entered this peaceful room, carrying a copy of the /Meditations of
Marcus Aurelius/ in his hand.
He was a neatlymade little man of fashionable, even of modish, cut, spare, smart and whimsical, with a
cleanshaved, smallfeatured face, large, shining brown eyes, abundant and slightlywaving brown hair, that
could only be parted, with the sweetest sorrow, in the centre of his wellshaped, almost philosophical head,
and movements light and temperate as those of a meditative squirrel. Having just dined he was naturally in
evening dress, with a butterfly tie, gleaming pumps, and a buttonhole of violets. He shut the door gently,
glanced at his nice looking grandmothers, and, walking forward very quietly and demurely, applied his eye
to the telescope, lowering himself slightly by a Sandow exercise, which he had practised before he became a
prophet. Having remained in this position of astronomical observation for some minutes, he deviated into the
upright, closed the window, and tinkled a small silver bell that stood on the tulipwood table beside Malkiel's
/Almanac/.
Mr. Ferdinand appeared, looking respectfully buoyant.
"Has Mr. Malkiel sent any reply to my inquiry, Mr. Ferdinand?" asked the Prophet.
"He has not, sir," replied Mr. Ferdinand, sympathetically.
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"Did the boy messenger say he delivered my note?"
"He said so, sir, on his Bible oath, sir."
"And do you believe him?"
"Oh, sir!" responded Mr. Ferdinand, in a shocked voice, "surely a London lad would not be found to tell a
lie!"
"I hope not, Mr. Ferdinand. Stilldid he look a nervous sort of lad?"
"He was a trifle pale, sir, about the gillsbut a heart of gold, sir, I feel sure. He wore four medals, sir."
"Four medals! Nevertheless, he may have been frightened to go to Mr. Malkiel's door. That will do, Mr.
Ferdinand."
Mr. Ferdinand was about to bow and retire when the Prophet, after a moment of hesitation, added,
"Stay, Mr. Ferdinand. Mrs. Merillia has gone to the Gaiety Theatre tonight. I expect her back at halfpast
eleven. She may need assistance on her return."
"Assistance, sir! Mrs. Merillia, sir!"
Mr. Ferdinand's luminous eyes shone with amazement.
"She mayI say she /may/have to be carried to bed."
Mr. Ferdinand's jaw dropped. He gave at the knees and was obliged to cling to a Chippendale cabinet for
support.
"Have an armchair ready in the hall in case of necessity and tell Gustavus to sit up. Mrs. Merillia must not be
dropped. You understand. That will do, Mr. Ferdinand."
Mr. Ferdinand endeavoured to bow, and ultimately succeeded in retiring. When his tremulous shoulders were
no longer visible, the Prophet opened Marcus Aurelius, and, seating himself in a corner of the big couch by
the fire, crossed his legs one over the other and began to read that timid Ancient's consolatory, but
unconvincing, remarks. Occasionally he paused, however, murmured doubtfully, "Will she have to be carried
to bed?" shook his head mournfully and then resumed his reading.
While he thus employs his time, we must say a word or two about him.
Mr. Hennessey Vivian was now a man of thirtyeight, of excellent fortune, of fine connections, and of
admirable disposition. He had become an orphan as soon as it was in his power to do so, having lost his
fatherCaptain Vivian of Her Majesty's Tenth Lancerssome months before, and his motherwho had
been a Merillia of Chipping Sudburya few minutes after his birth. In these unfortunate circumstances, over
which he, poor infant, had absolutely no controlwhatever unkind people might say!he devolved upon
his mother's mother, the handsome and popular Mrs. Merillia, who assumed his charge with the rosy alacrity
characteristic of her in all her undertakings. With her the little Hennessey had passed his infantine years,
blowing happy bubbles, presiding over the voyages of his own private Noahfrom the Army and Navy
Stores, with two hundred animals of both sexes!eating pap prepared by Mrs. Merillia's own /chef/, and
sleeping in a cot hung with sunny silk that might have curtained Venus or have shaken about Aurora as she
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rose in the first morning of the world. From her he had acquired the alphabet and many a gingernut and
decorative bonbon. And from her, too, he had set forth, with tears, in his new Eton jacket and broad white
collar, to go to Mr. Chapman's preparatory school for little boys at Slough. Here he remained for several
years, acquiring a respect for the poet Gray and a love of Slough peppermint that could only cease with life.
Here too he made friends with Robert Green, son of Lord Churchmore, who was afterwards to be a certain
influence in his life. His existence at Slough was happy. Indeed, so great was his affection for the place that
his removal to Eton cost him suffering scarcely less acute than that which presently attended his departure
from Eton to Christchurch. Over his sensations on leaving Oxford we prefer to draw a veil, only saying that
his last outlookas an undergraduateover her immemorial towers was as hazy as the average Cabinet
Minister's outlook over the events of the day and the desires of the community.
But if the moisture of the Prophet did him credit at that painful period of his life, it must be allowed that his
behaviour on being formally introduced into London Society showed no puling regret, no backward longings
after echoing colleges, lost dons and the scouts that are no more. He was quite at his ease, and displayed none
of the high pitched contempt of Piccadilly that is often so amusingly characteristic of the young gentlemen
accustomed to "the High."
Mrs. Merillia, who had been a widow ever since she could remember, possessed the lease of the house in
Berkeley Square in which the Prophet was now sitting. It was an excellent mansion, with everything
comfortable about it, a duke on one side, a Chancellor of the Exchequer on the other, electric light, several
bathrooms and the gramophone. There was never any question of the Prophet setting up house by himself. On
leaving Oxford he joined his ample fortune to Mrs. Merillia's as a matter of course, and they settled down
together with the greatest alacrity and hopefulness. Nor were their pleasant relations once disturbed during
the fifteen years that elapsed before the Prophet applied his eye to the telescope in the bow window and gave
Mr. Ferdinand the instructions which have just been recorded.
These fifteen years had not gone by without leaving their mark upon our hero. He had done several things
during their passage. For instance, he had written a play, very nearly proposed to the third daughter of a
London clergyman and twice been to the Derby. Such events had, not unnaturally, had their effect upon the
formation of his character and even upon the expression of his intelligent face. The writing of the playand,
perhaps, its refusal by all the actormanagers of the town had traced a tiny line at each corner of his
mobile mouth. The third daughter of the London clergymanhis sentiment for herhad taught his hand the
slightly episcopal gesture which was so admired at the Lambeth Palace Garden Party in the summer of 1892.
And the great race meeting was responsible for the rather tight trousers and the gentlemanjockey smile
which he was wont to assume when he set out for a canter in the Row. From all this it will be guessed that
our Prophet was exceedingly amenable to the influences that throng at the heels of the human destiny. Indeed,
he was. And some few months before this story opens it came about that he encountered a gentleman who
was, in fact, the primary cause of this story being true. Who was this gentleman? you will say. Sir Tiglath
Butt, the great astronomer, Correspondent of the Institute of France, Member of the Royal College of
Science, Demonstrator of Astronomical Physics, author of the pamphlet, "Star Gazers," and the brochure,
"An investigation into the psychical condition of those who see stars," C.B.F.R.S. and popular member of the
Colley Cibber Club in Long Acre.
The Prophet was introduced to Sir Tiglath at the Colley Cibber Club, and though Sir Tiglath, who was of a
freakish disposition and much addicted to his joke declined to speak to him, on the ground that he (Sir
Tiglath) had lost his voice and was unlikely to find it in conversation, the Prophet was greatly impressed by
the astronomer's enormous brickred face, round body, turned legs, eyes like marbles, and capacity for
drinking portwineso much so, in fact that, on leaving the club, he hastened to buy a science primer on
astronomy, and devoted himself for several days to a minute investigation of the Milky Way.
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As there is a fascination of the earth, so is there a fascination of the heavens. Along the dim, empurpled
highways that lead from star to star, from meteorite to comet, the imagination travels wakefully by night, and
the heart leaps as it draws near to the silver bosses of the moon. Mrs. Merillia was soon obliged to permit the
intrusion of a gigantic telescope into her pretty drawingroom, and found herself expected to converse at the
dinnertable on the eight moons of Saturn, the belts of Jupiter, the asteroids of Mars and the phases of Venus.
These last she at first declined to discuss with a man, even though he were her grandson. But she was won
over by the Prophet's innocent persuasiveness, and drawn on until she spoke almost as readily of the
movements of the stars as formerly she had spoken of the movements of the Court from Windsor to London,
and from London to Balmoral. In truth, she expected that Hennessey's passion for the comets would cease as
had ceased his passion for the clergyman's daughter; that his ardour for astronomy would die as had died his
ardour for playwriting; that he would give up going to /Corona Borealis/ and to the Southern Fish as he had
given up going to the Derby. Time proved her wrong. As the days flew Hennessey became increasingly
impassioned. He was more often at the telescope than at the Bachelors', and seemed on the way to become
almost as gibbous as the planet Mars. Even he slightly neglected his social duties; and on one terrible
occasion forgot that he was engaged to dine at Cambridge House because he was assisting at a transit of
Mercury.
Now all this began to weigh upon the mind of Mrs. Merillia, despite the amazing cheerfulness of disposition
which she had inherited from two long lines of confirmed optimistsher ancestors on the paternal and
maternal sides. She did not know how to brood, but, if she had, she might well have been led to do so. And
even as it was she had been reduced to so unusual a condition of dejection that, a week before the evening we
are describing, she had been obliged to order a box at the Gaiety Theatre, she, who, like all optimists,
habitually frequented those playhouses where she could behold gloomy tragedies, awful melodramas, or
those ironic pieces called farces, in which the ultimate misery of which human nature is capable is drawn to
its farthest point.
In the beginning of this new dejection of hers, Mrs. Merillia was now seated in a stage box at the "Gaiety,"
with an elderly General of Life Guards, a Mistress of the Robes, and the grandfather of the Central American
Ambassador at the Court of St. James, and all four of them were smiling at a neat little low comedian, who
was singing, without any voice and with the utmost precision, a pathetic romance entitled, "De Coon Wot Got
de Chuck."
Meanwhile the Prophet was engaged for the twentieth time in considering whether Mrs. Merillia, on her
return from this festival, would have to be carried to bed by hired menials.
Why?
This brings us to the great turning point in our hero's life, to the point when first he began to respect the
strange powers stirring within him.
Until he encountered Sir Tiglath Butt in the diningroom of the Colley Cibber Club Hennessey had been but
a dilettante fellow. He had written a play, but airily, and without the twenty years of arduous and persistent
study declared by the dramatic critics to be absolutely necessary before any intelligent man can learn how to
get a bishop on, or a chambermaid off, the stage. He had nearly proposed to a clergyman's daughter, but
thoughtlessly, and without any previous examination into the clericalism of rectory females, any firsthand
knowledge of mothers' meetings, devoid of which he must be a stout hearted gentleman who would rush in
where even curates often fear to tread. He had been to the Derby, but without wearing a bottlegreen veil or
carrying a bettingbook. In fact, he had not taken life very seriously, or fully appreciated the solemn duties it
brings to all who bear its yoke. Only when the plump red hand of Sir Tiglathholding a bumper of
thirtyfour portpointed the way to the heavens, did Hennessey beginthrough his telescopeto see the
great possibilities that foot it about the existence of even the meanest man who eats, drinks and suffers. For
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through his telescope he saw that he might be a prophet. Malkiel read the future in the stars. Why not he?
He endeavoured to do so. He sought an intimacy with the benefic /Jupiter/, and found itperhaps by a secret
kowtowing to /Sagittarius/. He made up openly to /Canis Major/ and was shortly on what might almost be
considered terms of affection with /Venus/. And he was, moreover, presently quite fearless in the presence of
/Saturn/, quite unabashed beneath the glittering eye of /Mercury/. Then, as the neophyte growing bold by
familiarity with the circle of the great ones, he ventured on his first prophecy, a discreet and even humble
forecast of the weather. He predicted a heavy fall of snow for a certain evening, and so distrusted his own
prediction that when the evening came, mild and benign, he sallied forth to the Empire Palace of Varieties,
and stayed till near midnight, laughing at the sallies of French clowns, and applauding the frail antics of
cockatoos on motor bicycles. When, on the stroke of twelve, he came airily forth wrapped in the lightest of
dust coats, he was obliged to endure the greatest of man's amazementsthe knowledge that there was a well
of truth within him. Leicester Square was swathed in an ivory fleece, and he was obliged to gain Berkeley
Square on foot, treading gingerly in pumps, escorted by linkmen with flaring golden torches, and preceded by
tipsy but assiduous ruffians armed with shovels, who, with many a lusty oath and horrid imprecation, cleared
a thin thread of path between the towering walls of snow that sparkled faintly in the gaslight.
This experience fired him. He rose up early, lay down late, and, quite with her assent, cast the horoscope of
Mrs. Merillia in the sweat of his brow. He cast, we say, her horoscope and, from a certain conjunction of the
planets, he gathered, to his horror, that upon the fifteenth day of the month of January she would suffer an
accident while on an evening jaunt. We find him now, on this fifteenth day of the first month, aware of his
revered grandmother's intrepid expedition to the Gaiety Theatre, waiting her return to Berkeley Square with
mingled feelings which we might analyse for pages, but which we prefer baldly to state.
He longed to be proved indeed a prophet, and he longed also to see his beloved relative return from her sheaf
of pleasures in the free and unconstrained use of all her graceful limbs. He was, therefore, torn by foes in a
mental conflict, and was in no case to sip the philosophic honey of Marcus Aurelius as he sat between the
telescope and the fire in the comfortable drawingroom awaiting his grandmother's return.
"Gustavus," said Mr. Ferdinand in the servants' hall to the flushed footman who lay upon a whatnot, sipping
a glass of ale and reading a new and unabridged farthing edition of Carlyle's /French Revolution/, "Gustavus,
Mrs. Merillia has been and gone to the Gaiety Theatre tonight. We expect her back at eleventhirty sharp.
She may need assistance on her return, Gustavus."
The footman put down the tumbler which he was in the act of raising to his pouted lips.
"Assistance, Mr. Ferdinand!" he ejaculated. "Mrs. Merillia, Mr. Ferdinand!"
"She maywe say she /may/have to be carried to bed, Gustavus."
Gustavus's jaw dropped, and the /French Revolution/ fluttered in his startled hands.
"Good lawks, Mr. Ferdinand!" he exclaimed (not quoting from Carlyle).
"Have an armchair ready in the hall, Gustavus. Mrs. Merillia must not be dropped. You understand? That will
do, Gustavus."
And Mr. Ferdinand passed to the adjacent suppertable, to join the upper housemaid in a discussion of two
subjects that were very near to their hearts, a round of beef and a tureen of pickled cabbage, while Gustavus
got up from the whatnot in a bemused manner, and proceeded to search dreamily for an armchair. He came
upon one by chance in the diningroom, and wheeled it out into the hall just as the clocks in the house rang
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out the halfhour after eleven.
The Prophet above sprang up from the couch by the fire, Mr. Ferdinand below closed his discussion with the
upper housemaid, and the former rapidly came down, the latter up, stairs as the roll of wheels broke through
the silence of the square.
Gustavus, in an attitude of bridled curiosity, was posed beneath a polar bear that held an electric lamp. His
hand was laid upon the back of the armchair, and his round hazel eyes were turned expectantly towards the
hall as his two masters joined him.
"Is all ready, Mr. Ferdinand?" said the Prophet, anxiously.
"All is ready, sir," replied the butler.
"Wheel the chair forward, Gustavus, if you please," said the Prophet. "Mrs. Merillia must not be dropped.
Remember that."
"Not be dropped, sirno."
The chair ran forward on its amicable castors as a carriage was heard to stop outside. Mr. Ferdinand flung
open the portal, and the Prophet glided out excitedly upon the step.
"Well?" he cried, "well?"
A footman, in a long drab coat with red facings, was preparing to get off the box of a smart brougham, but
before he could reach the pavement, a charming head, covered with a lace cap, was thrust out of the window,
and a musical and almost girlish voice cried,
"All nonsense, Hennessey, all rubbish! Saturn don't know what he's talkin' about. Look!"
The carriage door was vivaciously opened from the inside and a delightful little old lady, dressed in brown
silk, with a long, cheerful pointed nose, rosy cheeks, and chestnut hairthat almost mightn't have been a wig
in certain lightsprepared to leap forth without waiting for the reverent assistance that the Prophet, flanked
by Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus, was in waiting to afford.
As she jumped, she began to cry, "Not much wrong with me, is there, Hennessey?" but before the sentence
was completed she had caught her neat foot in her brown silk gown, had stumbled from the step of the
carriage to the pavement, had twisted her pretty ankle, had reeled and almost fallen, had been caught by the
Prophet and Mr. Ferdinand, borne tenderly into the hall, and placed in the armchair which the terrified
Gustavus, with almost enraged ardour, drove forward to receive her. As she sank down in it, helpless, Mrs.
Merillia exclaimed, with unabated vivacity,
"It's happened, Hennessey, it's happened! But it was my own doin' and yours. You shouldn't have prophesied
at your age, and I shouldn't have jumped at mine.
"Dearest grannie!" cried the Prophet, on his knees beside her, "how grieved, how shocked I am! Is itis
it"
"Sprained, Hennessey?"
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He nodded. Mechanically Mr. Ferdinand nodded. Gustavus let his powdered head drop, too, in imitation of
his superiors.
"I'll tell you in the drawin'room."
She placed her pretty, mittened hands upon the arms of the chair, and gave a little wriggle, trying to get up.
Then she cried out musically,
"No, I must be carried up. Mr. Ferdinand!"
"Ma'am!"
"Is Gustavus to be trusted?"
"Trusted, ma'am!" cried Mr. Ferdinand, looking at Gustavus, who had assumed an expression of pale and
pathetic dignity. "Trusteda London footman! Oh, ma'am!"
His voice failed. He choked and began to rummage in the pocket of his black tail coat for his perfumed
handkerchief.
"T'st, t'st! I mean his arms," said Mrs. Merillia, patting her delicate hands quickly on the chair. "Can he carry
me?"
The countenance of Mr. Ferdinand cleared, while Gustavus eagerly extended his right arm, bent it sharply,
and allowed his magnificent biceps to rise up in sudden majesty. Mrs. Merillia was reassured.
"Hoist me to the drawin'room, then," she said. "Hennessey, will you walk behind?"
The procession was formed, and the little old lady proceeded by a succession of jerks to the upper floor, her
silk gown rustling against the balusters, and her tiny feet dangling loosely in midair, while her long and
elegant head nodded each time Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus pranced carefully sideways to a higher step. The
Prophet followed solicitously behind, with hands outstretched to check any dangerous recoil. His face was
very grave, but not entirely unhappy.
"Set me down by the fire," said Mrs. Merillia, when she found herself being smoothly propelled through the
atmosphere of the drawingroom.
The menials obeyed with breathless assiduity.
"And now bring me a sandwich, a glass of toast and water and a fan, if you please. Yes, put the footstool well
under me."
"Dearest grannie," said the Prophet, when the men had retired, "are you in great pain?"
"No, Hennessey. Are you?"
Mrs. Merillia's green eyes twinkled.
"I!"
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"Yes, at my accident. For my ankle is sprained, I'm almost sure, and I shall have to lie up presently in wet
bandages. Tell me, are you really pained that I have had the accident you prophesied?"
She glanced from her grandson to the telescope that pointed toward the stars and back again.
"I am, indeed, sincerely grieved," the Prophet answered with genuine emotion.
"Yes. But if I'd jumped out all right, and was sittin' here now in a perfect condition of health, you'd have been
sincerely grieved, too."
"I hope not, grannie," said the Prophet. But he looked meditative.
Mr. Ferdinand brought the toast and water, the sandwich and the fan. When he had trodden across the carpet
out of the room Mrs. Merillia continued,
"Hennessey, you see where this prophetic business is leadin' you. It has made you charmed at my accident.
Yes, it has."
She spoke without any pathos, humorously indeed, in a bright tone full of common sense. And she nodded at
him over her toast and water with a chaffing, demure smile. But the Prophet winced and put his hand to his
thick brown hair.
"No, no," he cried quickly. "That's impossible. It can't be." But the statements sounded like perturbed
questions.
"Think!" said his grandmother, looking down at her poor, helpless foot as it lay on the velvet stool. "If I
hadn't had an accident tonight, you'd have been obliged to think ill ofofwhich of them was it that had
the impertinence to talk my affairs over with you?"
"Mercury and Uranus, Jupiter, Saturn and Venus," said the Prophet with almost terrible gravity.
"Exactly. I always have thought ill of the last, but that's nothin' to do with it. Weigh me in the balance against
five planetsare they all planets?and how do the scales go? You see, Hennessey!"
The Prophet looked much distressed. He saw his beloved grandmother by the fire and the bright stars
twinkling through the frosty window panes. He thought of his telescope, of Sir Tiglath, of Mr. Malkiel, and
of the future, and the velvety blue walls of the drawingroom seemed to spin round him.
"Prophecy," continued Mrs. Merillia, fanning herself till the lace lappets of her priceless cap fluttered above
her orderly and clasping wig, "is dangerous, for often it can cause its own fulfilment. If you hadn't said that
because of a certain conjunction of planetsor whatever it wasin my horoscope, I should have an accident
tonight, I shouldn't have jumped out of the brougham. I should have waited for Mr. Ferdinand to assist me,
as befits a gentlewoman."
"But, grannie, I assure you I was most anxious to save you. I hoped I had made a mistake in your horoscope. I
did, really. I was so nervous that I sent to Mr. Malkiel while you were at the theatre and implored him to look
into the matter as an expert."
"Mr. Malkiel! Who is he? Do we know him?"
"No. But we know his marvellous /Almanac/."
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"The /Almanac/ person! Why, Malkiel is surely a myth, Hennessey, a number of people, a company, a
syndicate, or something of that kind."
"So I thought, grannie. But I have made inquiriesthrough a detective agencyand I have discovered that
he is one person; in fact, a man, just like you and me."
"Rather an odd man then! Is he in the Red Book?"
"No. He is, I understand, of a very retiring and secretive disposition. In fact, I have had great difficulty in
learning anything about him. But at length I have discovered that he receives and answers letters at an address
in London."
"Indeed. Where is it?"
"Jellybrand's Library, Eleven Hundred Z, Shaftesbury Avenue. I sent a boy messenger there today."
"Did you receive a reply?"
"No. I think the boyalthough Mr. Ferdinand tells me he wore four medals, I presume for couragemust
have become nervous on perceiving Mr. Malkiel's name on the envelope, have thrown the note down a
grating, and bolted before he reached the place, though he saidon his Bible oath, I understand from Mr.
Ferdinandhe delivered the note. In any case I got no answer. How are you feeling?"
"Twisted, but prophetic. I foretell that my ankle will be swelled beyond recognition tomorrow. Help me to
bed, Hennessey."
The Prophet flew to his dear relative's assistance, and Mrs. Merillia endeavoured to rise and to lean upon his
anxious arm. After a struggle, however, in which the Prophet took part and two chairs were overset, she was
obliged to desist.
"You must ring the bell, Hennessey," she said. "Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus must carry me to bed in the
chair."
The Prophet sprang tragically to the bell. It was answered. The procession was reformed, and Mrs. Merillia
was carried to bed, still smiling, nodding at each stair and bearing herself with admirable courage.
As Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus descended to the basement after the completion of their unusual task, the
latter said solemnly,
"However should master have come to know as the missis wouldn't be able to put foot to floor this night, Mr.
Ferdinand? However?"
"I cannot answer you, Gustavus," Mr. Ferdinand replied, shaking his broad and globelike head, round whose
bald cupola the jetblack hair was brushed in two half moons decorated with a renowned "butler's own
special pomade."
"Well, Mr. Ferdinand," rejoined Gustavus, stretching out one hand for pale ale, the other for /French
Revolution/, "I don't like it."
"Why, Gustavus?" inquired Mr. Ferdinand, preparing to resume his discussion with the accommodating
upper housemaid. "Why?"
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"Because it seems strange like, Mr. Ferdinand," said Gustavus, lifting the glass to his lips, the /French
Revolution/ to his eyes.
"It do seem strange, Gustavus," answered Mr. Ferdinand, leaving out the "like" in a cultivated manner. "It
do."
In the drawingroom the Prophet stood, with clenched hands, gazing through the telescope at Mercury and
Uranus, Jupiter, Saturn and Venus, while, on the second floor, Mrs. Fancy Quinglet, Mrs. Merillia's devoted,
but occasionally disconcerting, maid, swathed her mistress's ankle in bandages previously steeped in cold
water and in vinegar.
CHAPTER II. MALKIEL THE SECOND IS BETRAYED BY THE YOUNG LIBRARIAN
Mrs. Merillia's accident made a very deep impression upon the Prophet's mind. He thought it over carefully,
and desired to discuss it in all its bearings with Mrs. Fancy Quinglet, who had been his confidante for full
thirty years. Mrs. Fancywho had not been marriedwas no longer a pretty girl. Indeed it was possible that
she had never, even in her heyday, been otherwise than moderately plain. Now, at the age of fifty one and a
half, she was a faithful creature with a thin, pendulous nose, a pale, hysteric eye, a tendency to cold in the
head and chilblains in the autumn of the year, and a somewhat incoherent and occasionally frenzied turn of
mind. Argument could never at any time have had much effect upon her nature, and as she grew towards
maturity its power over her most markedly decreased. This fact was recognised by everybody, last of all by
Mrs. Merillia, who was at length fully convinced of the existence of certain depths in her maid's peculiar
character by the following circumstance.
Mrs. Merillia had a bandylegged dachshund called Beau, whose name was for many years often
affectionately, and quite correctly, pronounced by Fancy Quinglet. One day, however, she chanced to see it
written upon paperB.E.A.U.
"Whatever does that mean, ma'am?" she asked of Mrs. Merillia.
"Why, Beau, of course, Beauthe dog. What should it mean?"
"Bow?" cried Fancy. "Is he writ so?"
"Of course, silly girl. It is written Beau, and you can pronounce it as you would pronounce a bow of ribbon."
Fancy said no more, though it was easy to see that she was much shaken by this circumstance. But she could
never afterwards be induced to utter her favourite's name. She was physically unable to speak the word so
strangely, so almost impiously, spelt. This she declared with tears. Persuasion and argument were unavailing.
Henceforth Beau was always called by her "the dog," and it was obvious that, had she been led out to the
stake, she must have burned rather than save herself by a pronouncing of the combination of letters by which
she had been so long deceived.
Such an inflexible mind had Mrs. Fancy, to whom the Prophet now applied himself with gestures almost
Sinaic.
She was dressed in mousecoloured grenadine, and was seated in a small chamber opening out of Mrs.
Merillia's bedroom, engaged in what she called "plain tatting."
"Fancy," said the Prophet, entering and closing the door carefully, "you know me well."
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"From the bottle, sir," she answered, darting the bone implements in and out.
"Have you ever thoughthas it ever occurred to you"
"I can't say it has, sir," Fancy replied, with the weak decision peculiar to her.
She was ever prone thus to answer questions before they were fully asked, or could be properly understood
by her, and from such premature decisions as she hastened to give she could never afterwards be persuaded to
retreat. Knowing this the Prophet said rapidly,
"Fancy, if a man finds out that he is a prophet what ought he to do?"
The lady'smaid rattled her bones.
"Let it alone, sir," she answered. "Let it alone, Master Hennessey."
"Well, but what d'you mean by that?"
"What I say sir. I can't speak different, nor mean other."
"But can't you explain, Fancy?"
"Oh, Master Hennessey, the lives that have been wrecked, the homes that have been broke up by
explainings!"
Her eye seemed suddenly lit from within by some fever of sad, worldly knowledge.
"Well, but" the Prophet began.
"I know it, Master Hennessey, and I can't know other."
She sighed, and her gaze became fixed like that of a typhoid patient in a dream.
"Them that knows other let them declare it," she ejaculated. "I say again, as I did aforethe homes that have
been broken up by explainings!"
She tatted. The Prophet bowed before her decision and left the apartment feeling rather hungry. Fancy
Quinglet's crumbs were not always crumbs of comfort. He resolved to apply again to Mr. Malkiel, and this
time to make the application in person. But before he did so he thought it right to tell Mrs. Merillia, who was
still steeped in bandages, of his intention. He therefore went straight to her room from Fancy Quinglet's. Mrs.
Merillia was lying upon a couch reading a Russian novel. A cup of tea stood beside her upon a table near a
bowl of red and yellow tulips, a canary was singing in its cage amid a shower of birdseed, and "the dog" lay
stretched before the blazing fire upon a milkwhite rug, over which a pale ray of winter sunshine fell. As the
Prophet came in Mrs. Merillia glanced up.
"Hennessey," she said, "you are growin' to look like Lord Brandling, when he combined the Premiership with
the Foreign Office and we had that dreadful complication with Iceland. My dear boy, you are corrugated with
thought and care. What is the matter? My ankle is much better. You need not be anxious about me. Has
Venus been playing you another jade's trick?"
The Prophet sat down and stroked Beau's sable back with his forefinger.
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"I have scarcely looked at Venus since you were injured, grannie," he answered. "I have scarcely dared to."
"I'm glad to hear it. Since the days of Adonis she has always had a dangerous influence on young men. If you
want to look at anybody, look at that pretty, sensible cousin of Robert Green's."
"Lady Enid. Yes, she is sensible. I believe she is in Hampshire staying with the Churchmores."
He looked calmer for a moment, but the corrugated expression quickly returned.
"Grannie," he said, "I think it my duty to make an effort to see Mr. Malkiel."
"The /Almanac/ man. What do you want with him?"
She tapped one of her small, mittened hands over the other and slightly twisted her long and pointed nose.
"I want to learn his views on this strange faculty of prophecy. Has it ever occurred to you that among all our
immense acquaintance we don't number a single prophet?"
"One can't know everybody, Hennessey. And I believe that prophets always spring from the lower classes.
The line must be drawn somewhere even in these days."
"Why not draw it at millionaires then?"
"I should like to. Somethin' will have to be done. If the nobodies continue to go everywhere the very few
somebodies that are left will soon go nowhere.
"Perhaps they do go nowhere. Perhaps that is why we have never met a prophet."
Mrs. Merillia looked up sharply, with her wide, cheerful mouth set awry in a shrewd smile that seemed to say
"So ho!" She recognised a strange, new note of profound, though not arrogant, selfrespect in her grandson.
"Prophets," Hennessey added more gently, "have always been inclined to dwell in the wilderness."
"But where can you find a wilderness in these days?" asked Mrs. Merillia, still smiling. "Even Hammersmith
is becomin' quite a fashionable neighbourhood. And you say that the /Almanac/ man lives in Shaftesbury
Avenue, only half a minute from Piccadilly Circus."
"My dear grannie," he corrected her, "I said he received letters there. I don't know where he lives."
"How are you goin' to find him then?"
"I shall call this afternoon at eleven hundred Z."
"To see if he has run in for a postcard! And what sort of person do you expect him to be?"
"Something quite out of the common."
Mrs. Merillia screwed up her eyes doubtfully.
"I hope you won't be disappointed. How many editions have there been of the /Almanac/?"
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"Seventy yearly editions."
"Then Malkiel must be a very old man."
"But this Mr. Malkiel is Malkiel the Second."
"One of a dynasty! That alters the case. Perhaps he's a young man about town. There are young men about
town, I believe, who have addresses at clubs and libraries, and sleep on doorsteps, or in the Park. Well,
Hennessey, I see you are getting fidgety. You had better be off. Buy me some roses for my room on your way
home. I'm expectin' someone to have tea with the poor victim of prophecy this afternoon."
The Prophet kissed his grandmother, put on his overcoat and stepped into the square.
It was a bright, frosty, genial day, and he resolved to walk to Jellybrand's Library.
London was looking quite lighthearted in the dry, cold air, which set a bloom even upon the cheeks of the
ambassadors who were about, and caused the butcher boys to appear like peonies. The crossingsweepers
swept nothing vigorously, and were rewarded with showers of pence from pedestrians delighting in the
absence of mud. Crystal as some garden of an eternal city seemed the green Park, wrapped in its frosty
mantle embroidered with sunbeams. Even the drivers of the "growlers" were moderately cheerfula very
rare occurrenceand the blind man of Piccadilly smiled as he roared along the highway, striking the feet of
the charitable with the wand which was the emblem of his profession.
Only the Prophet was solemn on this delicious afternoon. People looked at him and thought that he must
surely be the richest man of the town. His face was so sad.
He wound across the whirlpool, where the green image postures to the human streams that riot below it. He
saw beneath their rooves of ostrich feathers the girls shake their long earrings above sweet violets and roses
fainting with desire to be bought by country cousins.
"Where is eleven hundred Z, if you please?" he asked the Shaftesbury Avenue policeman.
"Jellybrand's sir? On the right between the cream shop and the engine warehouse, just opposite the place
where they sell parrots, after that there patent medicine depot."
The Prophet bowed, thinking of the blessings of knowledge. In a moment he stood before the library and
glanced at its dirty window. He saw several letters lying against the glass. One was addressed to "Miss
Minerva Partridge." He stepped in, wondering what she was like.
Jellybrand's Library was a small, square room containing a letter rack, a newspaper stand, a bookcase and a
counter. It was fitted up with letters, papers, books, and a big boy with a bulging head. The last named stood
behind the counter, stroking his irregular profile with one hand, and throwing a box of J nibs into the air and
catching it with the other. Upon the Prophet's entrance this youth obligingly dropped the nibs accidentally
upon the floor, and arranged his sharp and anemic face in an expression of consumptive inquiry. The Prophet
approached the counter softly, and allowed the sable with which his coat was trimmed to rest against it.
"Did a boy messenger call here a few days ago with a note for Mr. Malkiel?" he asked.
The young librarian assumed an attitude of vital suspicion and the expression of a lynx.
"For Malkiel the Second, sir?" he replied in a piercing soprano voice.
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"Yes," said the Prophet. "A boy messenger with four medals. There was a crest on the envelopean elephant
rampant surrounded by a swarm of bees."
A dogged look of combined terror and resolution overspread the young librarian's countenance.
"There's been no elephant and no swarm of bees in here," he said with trembling curtness.
"You are sure you would have remembered the circumstance if there had been?"
"Rather! What do you think? We don't allow things of them sort in here, I can tell you."
The Prophet drew out half a sovereign, upon which a ray of sunshine immediately fell as if in benediction.
"Does Mr. Malkiel?
"Malkiel the Second," interrupted the young librarian, whose pinkish eyes winked at the illumination of the
gold.
"Malkiel the Second ever call herein person?"
"In person?" said the young librarian, very suspiciously.
"Exactly."
"I don't know about in person. He calls here."
"Ah," said the Prophet, recognising in the youth a literary sense that instinctively rejected superfluity. "He
does call. May I ask when?"
"When he chooses," said the young librarian, and he winked again.
"Does he choose often?"
"He's got his day, like Miss Partridge and lots of 'em."
"I see. Is his dayby chancea Thursday?"
It was a Thursday afternoon.
"I don't know about by chance," rejoined the young librarian, his literary sense again coming into play. "But
it's"
At this moment the library door opened, and a tall, thin, middleaged man walked in sideways with his feet
very much turned out to right and left of him.
"Any letters, Frederick Smith?" he said in a hollow voice, on reaching the counter.
"Two, Mr. Sagittarius, I believe," replied the young librarian, moving with respectful celerity towards the
letter rack.
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The Prophet started and looked eagerly at the newcomer. His eyes rested upon an individual whose face was
comic in outline with a serious expression, and whose form suggested tragic farce dressed to represent
commonplace, as seen at Margate and elsewhere. A top hat, a spotted collar, a pink shirt, a white satin tie, a
chocolate brown frock coat, brown trousers and boots, and a black overcoat thrown open from top to
bottomthese appurtenances, clerkly in their adherence to a certain convention, could not wholly disguise
the emotional expression that seems sometimes to lurk in shape. The lines of Mr. Sagittarius defied their
clothing. His shoulders gave the lie to the chocolate brown frock coat. His legs breathed defiance to the
trousers that sheathed them. One could, in fancy, see the former shrugged in all the abandonment of thirdact
despair, behold the latter darting wildly for the cover afforded by a copper, a cupboard, or any other friendly
refuge of those poor victims of ludicrous and terrific circumstance who are so sorely smitten and afflicted
upon the funny stage.
Mr. Sagittarius, in fine, seemed a man dressed in a mask that was unable to deceive. His lean face was almost
absurd in its irregularity, its high cheekbones and deep depressions, its sharp nose, extensive mouth and
nervous chin. But the pale blue eyes that were its soul shone plaintively beneath their shaggy, blonde
eyebrows, and even an application of pomade almost hysterically lavish could not entirely conceal the curling
gloom of the heavy, matted hair.
"Yes, two, Mr. Sagittarius," cried the young librarian, approaching from the rack.
The gentleman held out a hand covered with a yellow dogskin glove.
"Thank you, Frederick Smith," he said.
And he turned to leave the building. But the Prophet intercepted him.
"Excuse me," said the Prophet. "I beg your pardon, butbut" he looked at the young librarian and
accidentally let the half sovereign fall on the counter. It gave the true ring. "I believe I heard you
mentionlet drop the name Mr. Sagittarius."
"I don't know about let drop," began the youth in his usual revising manner. "But I"
At this point the gentleman in question began to move rather hastily sideways towards the door. The Prophet
followed him up and got before him near the letter rack, while the young librarian retrieved the half sovereign
and bit it with his teeth.
"I really beg your pardon," said the Prophet, while Mr. Sagittarius stood still in the violent attitude of one
determined to dodge so long as he has breath. "I am not at all in the habit of"Mr. Sagittarius dodged"of
intruding upon strangers" Mr. Sagittarius dodged again with such extraordinary abruptness and
determination that he nearly caused the young librarian to swallow the Prophet's golden bribe. "I see you
don't believe me," the Prophet continued, flushing pink but still holding his ground, and indeed trying to turn
Mr. Sagittarius's flank by a strategic movement of almost military precision. "I see that plainly, but" Mr.
Sagittarius ducked to the left, endeavouring to cover the manoeuvre by an almost simultaneous and extremely
passionate feint towards the Prophet's centre, which was immediately withdrawn in good order"but your
remarkarkable name, Saagittittarius, suggested to me that you are reaeally the man I seek."
He had now got Mr. Sagittarius into a very awkward bit of country between the letter P. in the rack, under
which reposed Miss Partridge's correspondence, and the newspaper bureau, with the counter immediately on
his rear, and taking advantage of this circumstance, he continued rapidly:
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"May I ask whether you recently received a letterone moment! envelopecrestI only want to know
if you have receivedonlyan elephant rampantswarm ofof bees"
"I have never received a rampant elephant and a swarm of bees," cried Mr. Sagittarius with every symptom of
unbridled terror. "Help, Frederick Smith!"
"Right you are, Malkiel the Second!" cried the young librarian, hastily pocketing the half sovereign and
making a feverish lunge at nothing in particular over the counter. "Right you are!"
"Malkiel the Second!" ejaculated the Prophet. "Then you are the man I seek."
Malkiel the Secondfor it was indeed hesank back against the counter in an attitude of abandoned
prostration that would have made a fortune of a comic actor.
"I trusted to Jellybrand's," he said, drawing from his tail pocket a white handkerchief covered with a pattern
of pink storks in flight. "I trusted to Jellybrand's and Jellybrand's has betrayed me. Oh, Frederick Smith!"
He put a stork to each eye. The young librarian assumed an injured air.
"It was the agitation did it, Mr. Sagittarius," he said. "If you hadn't akep' dodging I shouldn't have lost my
memory."
And he looked avariciously at the Prophet, who smiled at him reassuringly and drew forth a card case.
"I feel sure, Mr. SagMalkiel"
"Malkiel the Second, sir, is my name if it is betrayed by Jellybrand's," said that gentleman with sudden
dignity. "There is no need of any mister."
"I beg your pardon," said the Prophet, handing his card. "That is my name and address. May I beg you to
forgive my apparent anxiety to make your acquaintance, and implore you to grant me a few moments of
private conversation on a matter of the utmost importance?"
Malkiel the Second read the card.
"Berkeley Square," he said. "/The/ Berkeley Square?"
"Exactly, the Berkeley Square," said the Prophet, modestly.
"Not the one at Brixton Rise behind the Kimmins's mews?" said Malkiel the Second, suspiciously.
"Certainly not. The one near Grosvenor Square."
"That's better," said Malkiel, upon whom the Prophet's address had evidently made a good impression.
"Kimmins's is no class at all. Had you come from there, Ibut what may you want with me?"
The Prophet glanced significantly at the young librarian, who was leaning upon the counter in a tense,
keyhole position, with his private ear turned somewhat ostentatiously towards the two speakers.
"I can tell you in an inner room," he murmured, in his most ingratiating manner.
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"You're certain it's not Berkeley Square behind Kimmins's?" said Malkiel, with a last flicker of suspicion.
"Quite certainquite."
"Frederick Smith," said Malkiel the Second, "since Jellybrand's has betrayed me Jellybrand's must abide the
consequences. Show this gentleman and me to the parlour."
"Right, Mr. Sagittarius," replied the young librarian whose memory had again become excellent. "But Miss
Minerva is coming at threethirty."
"Has she bespoke the parlour, Frederick Smith?"
"Yes, Mr. Sagittarius."
"Then she can't have it. That's all. Jellybrand's must abide the full consequences of my betrayal. Go forward,
Frederick Smith."
The young librarian went forward towards a door of deal and ground glass which he threw open with some
ceremony.
"The parlour, gents," he said.
"After you, sir, after you," said Malkiel the Second, making a side step and bringing his feet together in the
first position.
"No, no," rejoined the Prophet, gently drawing the sage to the front, and inserting him into the parlour in such
an ingenious manner that he did not perceive the journey of a second half sovereign from the person of the
Prophet to that of the young librarian, who thereafter closed the deal and ground glass door, and returned to
the counter, whistling in an absentminded manner, "I'm a Happy Millionaire from Colorado."
CHAPTER III. THE TWO PROPHETS PARTAKE OF "CREAMING FOAM."
"And now, sir," said Malkiel the Second, pointing to a couple of cane chairs which, with the table,
endeavoured, rather unsuccessfully, to furnish forth the parlour at Jellybrand's, "now sir, what do you want
with me?"
As he spoke he threw his black overcoat wide open, seated himself on the edge of one of the chairs in a
dignified attitude, and crossed his feetwhich were not innocent of spatsone over the other.
The Prophet was resolved to dare all, and he, therefore, answered boldly,
"Malkiel the Second, I wish to speak to you as one prophet to another."
At this remark Malkiel started violently, and darted a searching glance from beneath his blonde eyebrows at
Hennessey.
"Do you live in the Berkeley Square, sir," he said, "and claim to be a prophet?"
"I do," said Hennessey, with modest determination.
Malkiel smiled, a long and wreathed smile that was full of luscious melancholy and tragic sweetness.
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"The assumption seems rather ridiculousforgive me," he exclaimed. "The Berkeley Square! Whatever
would Madame say?"
"Madame?" said the Prophet, inquiringly.
"Madame Malkiel, or Madame Sagittarius, as she always passes."
"Your wife?"
"My honoured lady," said Malkiel, with pride. "More to me almost than any lunar guide or starry monitor.
What, oh, what would she say to a prophet from the Berkeley Square?"
He burst into hollow laughter, shaking upon the cane chair till its very foundations seemed threatened as by
an earthquake, and was obliged to apply the flight of storks to his eyes before he could in any degree recover
his equanimity. At length he glanced up with tears rolling down his cheeks.
"Excuse me, sir," he said. "But what can you know of prophecy in such a fashionable neighbourhood, close to
Grosvenor Square and within sight, as one may say, of Piccadilly? Oh, dear, oh, dear!"
"But really," said the Prophet, who had flushed red, but who still spoke with pleasant mildness, "what
influence can neighbourhood have upon such a superterrestrial matter?"
"Did Isaiah reside in the Berkeley Square, sir?"
"I fancy not. Still"
"I fancy not, too," rejoined Malkiel. "Nor Bernard Wilkins either, or any prophet that ever I heard of. Why,
even Jesse Jones lives off Perkin's Road, Wandsworth Common, though he does keep a sittingroom in
Berners Street just to see his clients in, and he is a very lowclass person, even for a prophet. No, no, sir,
Madame is quite right. She married me despite the damningyes, I say, sir, the damning fact that I was a
prophet" here Malkiel the Second brought down one of the dogskin gloves with violence upon the rickety
parlour table"but before ever we went to the Registrar's she made me take a solemn oath. What was it, do
you say?"
"Yes, I do," said Hennessey, leaning forward and gazing into Malkiel's long and excited face round which the
heavy mat of pomaded hair vibrated.
"It was this, sirto mix with no prophets so long as we both should live. Prophets, she truly said, are
lowclass, even dirty, persons. Their parties, their 'at homes' are shoddy. They live in fourthrate
neighbourhoods. They burn gas and sit on horsehair. Only in rare cases do they have any bathroom in their
houses. Their influence would be bad for the children when they begin to grow up. How could Corona make
her /debut/"Malkiel pronounced it debbew"in prophetic circles? How could she come out in Drakeman's
Villas, Tooting, or dance with such young fellers as frequent Hagglin's Buildings, Clapham Rise? How could
she do it, sir?"
"I don't know, I'm sure," gasped the Prophet.
"Nor I, sir, nor I," continued Malkiel, with unabated fervour. "And it's the same with Capricornus. My boy
shall not be thrown in with prophets. Did Malkiel the First start the /Almanac/ for that? Did he foster it till it
went from the poor servant girl's attic into the gilded apartments of the aristocracy and lay even upon Royal
tables for that? Did he, I say?"
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"I haven't an idea," said the Prophet.
"He did not, sir. And II myself"he arranged the diamond pin in his white satin tie with an almost
imperial gesture"have not followed upon the lines he laid down without imbibing, as I may truly say, the
lofty spirit that guided him, the lofty social spirit, as Madame calls it. There have been other prophets, I
know. There are other prophets. I do not attempt to deny it. But where else than here, sir"the dogskin glove
lay upon the breast of the chocolate brown frock coat"where else than here will you find a prophet who
hides his identity beneath an /alias/, who remains, as Madame always says, /perdew/, and who conducts his
profession on honourable and businesslike lines? Am I dressed like a prophet?" He suddenly brought his
doubled fist down upon the Prophet's knee.
"No," cried Hennessey. "Certainly not!"
"Why, sir, how can I be when I tell you that Merriman Saxster of Regent Street are my tailors, and have been
since my first pair of trouserings? Do I bear myself prophetically? I think you will agree that I do not when
you know that I am frequently mistaken for an outside brokeryes, sir, and that this has even happened upon
the pier at Margate. You have seen my demeanour at Jellybrand's. You saw me come into the library. You
saw my manner with Frederick Smith. Was it assuming? Did I lord it over the lad?"
"Certainly not."
"No. I might have been anybody, any ordinary person living in Grosvenor Place, or, like yourself, in the
Berkeley Square. And so it ever is. Other prophets there arepossibly men of a certain ability even in that
directionbut there is only one Malkiel, only one who attends strictly to business, who draws a good income
from the stars, sir, and satisfies the public month in, month out, without making a fuss about it. Wait a few
years, sir, only wait!"
"Certainly," said the Prophet. "I will."
"Wait till the children are grown up. Wait till Capricornus has got his Latin by heart and gone to Oxford.
Then, and only then, you will know whether Malkiel the Second is the exception to the rule of prophets. Yes,
and Madame shall know it, too. She trusted me, sir, as only a woman can. She knew I was a prophet and had
a prophet for a father before me. And yet she trusted me. It was a daring thing to do. Many would call it
foolhardy. Wouldn't they, sir?"
The dogskin glove was raised. The Prophet hastened to reply,
"I daresay they would."
"But she was not afraid, and she shall have her reward. Corona shall never set foot in Drakeman's Villas, nor
breathe the air of Hagglin's. I must have a glass of water, I must, sir, indeed."
He gasped heavily and was about to rise, when the Prophet said:
"Join me in a glass of wine."
"I should be delighted," Malkiel answered. "Delighted, I'm sure, but I doubt whether Jellybrand's"
"Could not Frederick Smith go out and fetch us aa pint bottle of champagne?" said the Prophet, playing a
desperate card in the prophetic game.
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An expression almost of joviality overspread the tragic farce of Malkiel's appearance.
"We'll see," he answered, opening the deal door. "Frederick Smith!"
"Here, Mr. Sagittarius," cried the soprano voice of the young librarian.
"Can you leave the library for a moment, Frederick Smith?"
The Prophet held up a sovereign over Malkiel the Second's narrow shoulder.
"Yes, Mr. Sagittarius, for half a mo!"
"Ah! Where is the nearest champagne, Frederick Smith?"
"The nearest"
"Champagne, I said, Frederick Smith."
"I daresay I could get a dozen at Gillow's next the rabbit shop," replied the young librarian, thoughtfully.
The Prophet shuddered to the depths of his being, but he was now embarked upon his enterprise and must
crowd all sail.
"Go to Gillow's," he exclaimed, with an assumption of feverish geniality, "and bring back a couple of
rabbitsI mean bottles. They must be dry. You understand?"
The young librarian looked out of the window.
"Oh, I'll manage that, sir. It ain't raining," he replied carelessly.
The Prophet stifled a cry of horror as he pressed the sovereign into the young librarian's hand.
"You can keep the change," he whispered, adding in a tremulous voice, "Tell metell me franklydo you
think in your own mind that there will be any?"
"I don't know about in my own mind," rejoined the young librarian, drawing a tweed cap from some hidden
recess beneath the counter. "But if you only want two bottles I expect there'll be ten bob over."
The Prophet turned as pale as ashes and had some difficulty in sustaining himself to the parlour, where he and
Malkiel the Second sat down in silence to await the young librarian's return. Frederick Smith came back in
about five minutes, with an ostentatiouslooking bottle smothered in gold leaf under each arm.
"There was four shillings apiece to pay, sir," he remarked to the Prophet as he placed them upon the table. "I
got the 'our own make' brand with the 'creaming foam' upon the corks."
The Prophet bent his head. He was quite unable to speak, but he signed to the young librarian to open one of
the bottles and pour its contents into the two tumblers of thick and rather dusty glass that Jellybrand's kept for
its moments of conviviality. Malkiel the Second lifted the goblet to the window and eyed the beaded nectar
with an air of almost rakish anticipation.
"Ready, sir?" he said, turning to the Prophet, who, with a trembling hand, followed his example.
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"Quiteready," said the Prophet, shutting his eyes.
"Then," rejoined Malkiel the Second in a formal voice, "here's luck!"
He held the tumbler to his lips, waiting for the Prophet's reply to give the signal for a unanimous swallowing
of the priceless wine.
"Luck," echoed the Prophet in a faltering voice.
As he gradually recovered his faculties, he heard Malkiel the Second say, with an almost debauched
accent,
"That puts heart into a man. I shall give Gillows an order. Leave us, Frederick Smith, and remember that
Miss Minerva is on no account to be let in here till this gentleman and I have finished the second bottle."
The Prophet could not resist a wild movement of protest, which was apparently taken by the young librarian
as a passionate gesture of dismissal. For he left the room rapidly and closed the door with decision behind
him.
"And now, sir, I am at your service," said Malkiel the Second, courteously. "Let me pour you another glass of
wine."
The Prophet assented mechanically. It seemed strange to have to die so young, and with so many plans
unfulfilled, but he felt that it was useless to struggle against destiny and he drank again. Then he heard a
voice say,
"And now, sir, I am all attention."
He looked up. He saw the parlour, the ground glass of the door, the tumblers and bottles on the table, the
sharp features and strained, farcical eyes of Malkiel framed in the matted, curling hair. Then all was not over
yet. There was something still in store for him. He sat up, pushed the creaming fourshilling foam out of his
sight, turned to his interlocutor, and with a great effort collected himself.
"I want to consult you," he began, "about my strange powers."
Malkiel smiled with easy irony.
"Strange powers in Berkeley Square!" he ejaculated. "The Berkeley Square! But go on, sir. What are they?"
"Having been led to study the stars," continued the Prophet with more composure and growing earnestness, "I
felt myself moved to make a prophecy."
"Weather forecast, I suppose," remarked Malkiel, laconically.
"How did you know that?"
"The easiest kind, sir, the number one beginner's prophecy. Capricornus used to tell Madame what the
weather'd be as soon as he could talk. But go on, sir, go on, I beg."
The Prophet began to feel rather less like Isaiah, but he continued, with some determination,
The Prophet of Berkeley Square
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"If that had been all, I daresay I should have thought very little of the matter."
"No, you wouldn't sir. Who thinks their first baby a little one? Can you tell me that?"
The Prophet considered the question for a moment. Then he answered,
"Perhaps you're right."
"Perhaps so," rejoined Malkiel, indulgently. "Well, sir, what was your next attemptin the Berkeley
Square?"
The Prophet's sensitive nature winced under the obvious irony of the interrogation, but either the "creaming
foam" had rendered him desperate, or he was to some extent steeled against the satire by the awful
selfrespect which had invaded him since Mrs. Merillia's accident. In any case he answered firmly,
"Malkiel the Second, in Berkeley Square I had a relationan honoured grandmother."
"You've the better of me there, sir. My parents and Madame's are all in Brompton Cemetery. Well, sir, you'd
got an honoured grandmother in the Berkeley Square. What of it?"
"She was naturally elderly."
"And you predicted her death and she passed over. Very natural too, sir. The number two beginner's
prophecy. Why, Corona"
But at this point the Prophet broke in.
"Excuse me," he said in a scandalised voice, "excuse me, Malkiel the Second, she did nothing of the kind.
Whatever my faults may beand they are many, I am awareII"
He was greatly moved.
"Take another sup of wine, sir. You need it," said Malkiel.
The Prophet mechanically drank once more, grasping the edge of the table for support in the endurance of the
fourbob ecstasy.
"You prophesied it and she didn't pass over, sir," continued Malkiel, with unaffected sympathy. "I understand
the blow. It's cruel hard when a prophecy goes wrong. Why, even Madame"
But at this point the Prophet broke in.
"You are mistaken," he cried. "Utterly mistaken."
Malkiel the Second drew himself up with dignity.
"In that case I will say no more," he remarked, pursing up his lengthy mouth and assuming a castiron
attitude.
The Prophet perceived his mistake.
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"Forgive me," he exclaimed. "It is my fault."
"Oh, no, sir. Not at all," rejoined Malkiel, with icy formality. "Pray let the fault be mine."
"I will not indeed. But let me explain. My beloved grandmother still lives, although I cast her horoscope
and"
"Indeed! very remarkable!"
"I meannot althoughbut I thought I would cast her horoscope. And I did so."
"In the square?" asked Malkiel, with quiet, but piercing, irony.
"Yes," said the Prophet, with sudden heat. "Why not?"
Malkiel smiled with an almost paternal pity, as of a thoughtful father gazing upon the quaint and
inappropriate antics of his vacant child.
"Why not, sirif you prefer it?" he rejoined. "Pray proceed."
The Prophet's face was flushed, either by the "creaming foam," or by irritation, or by both.
"Surely," he began, in a choking voice, "surely the stars are the same whether they are looked at from
Berkeley Square or fromfromor from"he sought passionately for a violent contrast"from
Newington Butts," he concluded triumphantly.
"I have not the pleasure to have ever observed my guides from the neighbourhood of the Butts," said Malkiel,
serenely. "But pray proceed, sir. I am all attention. You cast your honoured grandmother's horoscopein the
Berkeley Square."
The Prophet seized his glass, but some remnants of his tattered self control still clung to him, and he put it
down without seeking further madness from its contents.
"I did," he said firmly, even obstinately. "And I discoveredI say discovered that she was going to have an
accident while on an evening expeditionor jaunt as you might perhaps prefer to call it."
"I should certainly call it soin the case of a lady who was an honoured grandmother," said Malkiel the
Second in assent.
"Well, Malkiel the Second," continued the Prophet, recovering his composure as he approached his /coup/,
"my grandmother did have an accident, as I foretold."
"Did she have it in the square, sir?" asked Malkiel.
"And what if she did?" cried the Prophet with considerable testiness.
He was beginning to conceive a perfect hatred of the admirable neighbourhood, which he had loved so well.
"I merely ask for information, sir."
"The accident did take place in the square certainly, and on the very night for which I predicted it."
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Malkiel the Second looked very thoughtful, even morose. He poured out another glass of champagne, drank it
slowly in sips, and when the glass was empty ran the forefinger of his right hand slowly round and round its
edge.
"Can Madame be wrong?" he ejaculated at length, in a muffled voice of meditation. "Can Madame be
wrong?"
The Prophet gazed at him with profound curiosity, fascinated by the circular movement of the yellow dogskin
finger, and by the inward murmurso acutely mentalthat accompanied it.
"Madame?" whispered the Prophet, drawing his cane chair noiselessly forward.
"Ah!" rejoined Malkiel, gazing upon him with an eye whose pupil seemed suddenly dilated to a most
preternatural size. "Can she have been wrong all these many years?"
"Whatwhat about?" murmured the Prophet.
Malkiel the Second leaned his matted head in his hands and replied, as if to himself,
"Can it be that a prophet should live in Berkeley Squarenot Kimmins's"here he raised his head, and
raked his companion with a glance that was almost fierce in its fervour of inquiry"not Kimmins's butthe
Berkeley Square?"
CHAPTER IV. THE SECRET WATERS OF THE RIVER MOUSE
To this question the Prophet could offer no answer other than a bodily one. He silently presented himself to
the gaze of Malkiel, instinctively squaring his shoulders, opening out his chest, and expanding his nostrils in
an effort to fill as large a space in the atmosphere of the parlour as possible. And Malkiel continued to regard
him with the staring eyes of one whose mind is seething with strange, upheaving thoughts and alarming
apprehensions. Mutely the Prophet swelled and mutely Malkiel observed him swell, till a point was reached
from which further progressat least on the Prophet's partwas impossible. The Prophet was now as big as
the structure of his frame permitted him to be, and apparently Malkiel realised the fact, for he suddenly
dropped his eyes and exclaimed,
"This matter must be threshed out thoroughly, Madame herself would wish it so."
He paused, drew his chair nearer to the Prophet's, took off a glove and continued,
"Sir, you may be a prophet. You may have prophesied correctly in the Berkeley Square. But if you are, and if
you have, remember thisthat you have proved the selfsacrifice, the privation, the denial, the subterfuge,
the /mask/, and the position of Sagittarius Lodge in its own grounds beside the River Mouse at Crampton St.
Peter, N.N., I said, sirtotally and entirely unnecessary. I will go further, sir, and I will say more. You
have not only done that. You have also proved the sacred instinct of a woman, a respectable married
womansuch as we must all reverencefalse and deceived. Remember this, sir, remember all this, then
search yourself thoroughly and say whether what you have told me is strictly true."
"I assure you" began the Prophet, hastily.
But Malkiel sternly interrupted him.
"Search yourself, sir, I beg!" he cried.
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The Prophet of Berkeley Square 25
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"But upon my honour"
"Hush, sir, hush! I beg, nay, I insist, that you search yourself thoroughly before you answer this momentous
question."
The Prophet felt rather disposed to ask whether Malkiel expected him to examine his pockets and turn out his
boots. However, he sat still while Malkiel drew out a large gold watch, held it solemnly in his hand for a
couple of minutes and then returned it to the waistcoat.
"Now, sir," he said.
"I assure you," said the Prophet, "on my honour that all I have said is strictly true."
"And took place in the Berkeley Square?"
"And took place in the Berkeley Square."
Malkiel nodded morosely.
"It may have been chance," he said. "A weather forecast and an honoured grandmother may have been mere
luck. Still it looks badvery bad."
He sighed heavily, and seemed about to fall into a mournful reverie when the Prophet cried sharply,
"Explain yourself, Malkiel the Second. You owe it to me to explain yourself. Why should my strange gift"
"If you have it, sir," interrupted Malkiel, quickly.
"If I have it, very wellaffect you? Why should it render the self sacrifice andand the position ofof
Sagittarius Lodge on the river the riverwhat river did you say?"
"The River Mouse," rejoined Malkiel in a muffled voice, and shaking his head sadly.
"Exactlyon the River Mouse at Crompton"
"Crampton."
"Crampton St. Peter total"
"N.!"
"What?"
"Crampton St. Peter. N. That is the point."
"Very wellCrampton St. Peteren, totally and entirely unnecessary?"
"You desire my revelation, sir? You desire to enter into the bosom of a family that hitherto has dwelt apart,
has lain as I may say /perdew/ beside the secret waters of the River Mouse? Is it indeed so?"
"Oh, I beg your pardon," cried the Prophet, hastily. "I would not for the world intrude upon"
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"Those hallowed precincts! Well, perhaps you have the right. Jellybrand's has betrayed me to you. You know
my name, my profession. Why should you not know more? Perhaps it is better so."
With the sudden energy of a man who is reckless of fate he seized his goblet, poured into it at least a
shilling's worth of "creaming foam," drained it to the dregs and, shaking back his matted hair with a leonine
movement of the head, exclaimed,
"Malkiel the First, who founded the /Almanac/, lay /perdew/ all his life."
"Beside the secret waters of the River Mouse?" the Prophet could not help interposing.
"No, sir. He would never have gone so far as that. But he lived and died in Susan Road beside the gasworks.
He was a great man."
"I'm sure he was," said the Prophet, heartily.
"He wished me to live and die there too," said Malkiel. "But there are limits, sir, even to the forbearance of
women. Madame was affected, painfully affected, by the gas, sir. It stank in her nostrilsto use a figure.
And then there was another drawback that she could not get over."
"Indeed!"
"The sweeps, sir."
"I beg your pardon!" said the Prophet.
"I saidthe sweeps."
"I heard youwell?"
"Being the only people that were not, in the whole road, made for loneliness, sir."
The Prophet was entirely /bouleverse/.
"I'm afraid I'm very stupid, but really I" he began.
"Is it possible that you live in London, sir, and are not aware that Susan Road lies in the most soughtafter
portion of the sweeps' quarter?" said Malkiel, with pitying amazement.
The Prophet blushed with shame.
"I beg your pardon. Of courseI understand. Pray go on."
"It made for loneliness, sir."
"Naturally."
"Their hours were not our hours. And then the professional colour! Madame said it was like living among the
Sandwich Islanders. And so, to an extent, it was. My father had left a very tidy bit of moneya very tidy bit
indeed, and we resolved to move. But where? That was the problem. For I was not as other men. I could not
live like themin the Berkeley Square."
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He smiled with mournful superiority and continued,
"At least I thought so then, and have done till today. Prophetsso my father believed, and so
Madamemust be connected with the suburbs or with outlying districts. They must not, indeed they cannot,
be properly prophetic within the radius. A central atmosphere would reduce them to the level of the conjuror
or the muscular suggestionist. Malkiel the First, my father, was born himself in Peckham, and met my mother
when coming through the rye."
He brushed aside a tear that flowed at this almost rustic recollection, and continued,
"Yet Madame was wishful, and I was wishful too, that the childrenif we had anyshould not grow up
Eastern. It was a natural and a beautiful desire, sir, was it not?"
"Oh, very," replied the Prophet, considerably confused.
"The habits and manners of the East, you see, sir, are not always in strict accordance with propriety. Are
they?"
Before the Prophet had time to realise that this question was merely rhetorical, he began,
"From what Professor Seligman says in his /The Inner History of Baghdad/, I feel sure"
"Nor are the customs of the East quite what many a clergyman would approve of," continued Malkiel. "Yet
even this was not what weighed most with Madame."
"What was it then?" inquired the Prophet, deeply interested.
"Sir, it was the Eastern language."
"Ah!"
"Could we let our children learn to speak it? Could we bear to launch them in life, handicapped, weighed
down by such a tongue? Could we do this?"
Again the Prophet mistook the nature of the question, and was led to reply,
"Certainly English children speaking only Arabic might well be at some loss in ordinary conver"
"We could not, sir. It was impossible. So we resolved to go to the north of London and to avoid Whitechapel
at whatever cost."
"Whitechapel!" almost cried the Prophet.
"This determination it was, sir, that eventually led our steps to the borders of the River Mouse."
"Oh, really!"
"You know it, sir?"
"Not personally."
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"But by repute, of course?"
"No doubt, no doubt," stammered the Prophet, who had in fact never before heard of this celebrated flood.
"That poor governess, sir, last Augustyou recollect?"
"Ah, indeed!" murmured the Prophet, a trifle incoherently.
"And then the mad undertaker in the autumn," continued Malkiel, with conscious pride; "he floated past our
very door."
"Did he really?"
"Singing his swan song, no doubt, poor feller, as Madame said after she read about it in the paper. There were
the grocer's twins as well, just lately. But they will be fresh in your memory."
Before the Prophet had time to state whether this was so or not Malkiel proceeded,
"Well, sir, as soon as Madame and I had come to the Mouse we resolved that we could do no better than that.
It was salubrious, it was retired, and it was N."
"You said?"
"N., sir."
"But what is en?"
"Sir?"
The Prophet had grown very red, but he was seized by the desperation that occasionally attacks ignorance,
and renders it, for a moment, determinedly explicit.
"I ask you what does en mean? I am, I fear, a very illinformed person, and I really don't know."
"Think of an envelope, sir," said Malkiel, with gentle commiseration. "Well, are you thinking?"
The Prophet grew purple.
"I ambut it is no use. Besides, why on earth should I think of an envelope? I beg you to explain."
"North, sir, the northern postal district of the metropolis. Fairly simple thatI think, sir."
"N.!" cried the illuminated Prophet. "I see. I was thinking of en all the time. I beg your pardon. Please go on.
N.of course!"
Malkiel concealed a smile, just sufficiently to make its existence for an instant vitally prominent, and
continued,
"By the Mouse we resolved to build a detached residence such as would influence suitably the minds of the
childrenshould we have any. For we had resolved, sir, by that time that with me the /Almanac/ should
cease."
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Here Malkiel leaned forward upon the deal table and lowered his voice to an impressive whisper.
"Yes, sir, it had come to that. We all have our ambitions and that was mine."
"Good Heavens!" said the Prophet. "Malkiel's /Almanac/ cease! But why? Such a very useful institution!"
"Useful! More than that, sir, sublime! There's nothing like it."
"Then why let it cease?"
"Because the social status of the prophet, sir, is not agreeable to myself or Madame. I've had enough of it, sir,
already, and I'm barely turned of fifty. Besides, my father would have wished it, I feel sure, had he lived in
these days. Had he seen Sagittarius Lodge, the children, and how Madame comports herself, he would have
recognised that the family was destined to rise into a higher sphere than that occupied by any prophet,
however efficient. Besides, I will not deceive you, I have made money. In another ten years' time, when I
have laid by sufficient, I tell you straight, sir, that I shall go out of prophecy, right out of it."
"Then your Capricorthat is your sonwill not carry on the"
"Capricornus a prophet, sir!" cried Malkiel. "Not if Madame and I know it. No, sir, Capricornus is to be an
architect."
As Malkiel pronounced the last words he flung his black overcoat wide open with an ample gesture, thrust
one hand into his breast, and assumed the fixed and farseeing gaze of a man in a cabinet photograph. He
seemed lost to his surroundings, and rapt by some great vision of enchanted architects, busy in drawing plans
of the magic buildings of the future ages. The Prophet felt that it would be impious to disturb him. Malkiel's
reverie was long, and indeed the two prophets might well have been sitting in Jellybrand's parlour now, had
not a violent sneeze called for the pink assistance of the flight of storks, and brought the sneezer down to the
level of ordinary humanity.
"Yes, sirI give you my word Capricornus is to be an architect," repeated Malkiel. "What do you say to
that?"
"Is itis it really a better profession than that of prophecy?" asked the Prophet, rather nervously.
Malkiel smiled mournfully.
"Sir, it may not be more lucrative, but it is more select. Madame will not mix with prophets, but she has a
'day,' sir, on the banks of the Mouse, and she has gathered around her a very pleasant and select little circle."
"Indeed."
"Yes, sir. Architects and their wives. You understand?"
"Quite," rejoined the Prophet, "quite."
Under the mesmeric influence of Malkiel he began to feel as if architects were some strange race of sacred
beings set apart, denizens of some holy isle or blessed nook of mediaeval legend. Would he ever meet them?
Would he ever encounter one ranging unfettered where flowed the waters of the River Mouse?
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"They do not know who we are, sir," continued Malkiel, furtively. "To them and to the whole
worldexcepting Jellybrand's and youwe are the Sagittariuses of Sagittarius Lodge, people at ease, sir,
living upon our competence beside the Mouse. They do not see the telescope, sir, in the locked studio at the
top of the lodge. They do not know why sometimes, on Madame's 'Wednesdays,' I am palewith sitting up
on behalf of the /Almanac/. For Capricornus's sake and for Corona's all this is hid from the world. Madame
and I are the victims of a double life. Yes, sir, for the children's sake we have never dared to let it be known
what I really am."
Suddenly he began to grow excited.
"And now," he cried, "after all these years of secrecy, after all these years of avoiding the central
districtsin which Madame longs to live after all these years of seclusion beyond the beat even of the
buses, do you come here to me, and search yourself and say upon your oath that a prophet can live and be a
prophet in the Berkeley Square, that he can read the stars with Gunter's just opposite, ay, and bring out an
almanac if he likes within a shilling fare of the Circus? If this is so"he struck the deal table violently with
his clenched fist"of what use are the sacrifices of myself and Madame? Of what use is it to live under a
modest name such as Sagittarius, when I might be Malkiel the Second to the whole world? Of what use to
flee from W. and dwell perpetually in N.? Why, if what you say is true, we might leave the Mouse
tomorrow and Madame could pop in and out of the Stores just like any lady of pleasure."
At the thought of this so long foregone enchantment Malkiel's emotion completely overcame him, his voice
died away, overborne by a violent fit of choking, and he sat back in his cane chair trembling in every limb.
The Prophet was deeply moved by his emotion, and longed most sincerely to assuage it. But his deep and
growing conviction of his own power rendered him useless as a comforter. He could not lie. He could not
deny that he was a prophet. He could only say, in his firmest voice,
"Malkiel the Second, be brave. You must see this thing through."
On hearing these original and noble words Malkiel lifted up his marred countenance.
"I know it, sir, I know it," he answered. "One moment. The thought of Madamethe StoresIof all that
might perhaps have been"
He choked again. The Prophet looked away. A strong man's emotion is always very scared and very terrible.
Three minutes swept by, then the Prophet heard a calm and hollow voice say,
"And now, sir, to business."
The Prophet looked up, and perceived that Malkiel's overcoat was tightly buttoned and that his mouth was
tightly set in an expression of indomitable, though tragic, resolution.
"What business?" asked the Propet.
"Mine," replied Malkiel. "Mine, sir, and yours. You have chosen to enter my life. You cannot deny that. You
cannot deny that I sought to avoidI might even say to dodge you."
With the remembrance of the recent circus performance in the library still strong upon him the Prophet could
not. He bowed his head.
"Very well, sir. You have chosen to enter my life. That act has given me the right to enter yours. Am I
correct?"
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"I supposeI meanyes, you are," answered the Prophet, overwhelmed by the pitiless logic of his
companion, and wondering what was coming next.
"I have been forcedI think I may say thatto reveal myself to you, sir. Nothing can ever alter that.
Nothing can ever take from you the knowledgedenied by Madame to the very architectsof who I really
am. You have told me, sir, that I must see this thing through. I tell you now, at this table, in this parlour, that I
intend to see it through and through."
As Malkiel said the last words he gazed at the Prophet with eyes that seemed suddenly to have taken on the
peculiar properties of the gimlet. The Prophet began to feel extremely uneasy. But he said nothing. He felt
that there was more to come. And he was right.
"It is my duty," continued Malkiel, in a louder voice, "my sacred duty to Madameto say nothing of Corona
and Capricornusto probe you to the core"here the Prophet could not resist a startled movement of
protest"and to search you to the quick."
"Oh, really!" cried the Prophet.
"This duty I shall carry out unflinchingly," pursued Malkiel, "at whatever cost to myself. This will not be our
last interview. Do not think it."
"I assure you," inserted the Prophet, endeavouring vainly to seem at ease, "I do not wish to think it."
"It matters little whether you wish to do so or not," continued Malkiel, with an increasingly Juggernaut air.
"The son of Malkiel the First is not a man to be trifled with or dodged. Moreover, much more than the future
of myself and family depends upon what you really are. From this day forth you will be bound up with the
/Almanac/."
"Merciful Heavens!" ejaculated the Prophet, unable, intrepid as he was, to avoid recoiling when he found
himself thus suddenly confronted with the fate of an appendix.
"For why should it ever cease?" proceeded Malkiel, with growing passion. "Whyif a prophet can live, as
you declare, freely and openly in the Berkeley Square? If this is so, why should I not remove, along with
Madame and family, from the borders of the Mouse and reside henceforth in a central situation such as I
should wish to reside in? Why should not Capricornus eventually succeed me in the /Almanac/ as I succeeded
Malkiel the First? Already the boy shows the leanings of a prophet. Hitherto Madame and I have
endeavoured to stifle them, to turn them in an architectural direction. You understand?"
"I am trying to," stammered the Prophet.
"Hitherto we have corrected the boy's table manners when they have become too like those of the average
prophetas they often havefor hitherto we have had reason to believe that all prophetswith the
exception of myselfwere dirty, deceitful and essentially suburban persons. But if you are a prophet we
have been deceived. Trust me, sir, I shall find speedy means to pierce you to the very marrow."
The Prophet began mechanically to feel for his hat.
"Are you desirous of anything, sir?" said Malkiel, sharply.
"No," said the Prophet, wondering whether the moment had arrived to throw off all further pretence of
bravery and to shout boldly for the assistance of the young librarian.
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"Then why are you feeling about, sir? Why are you feeling about?"
"Was I?" faltered the Prophet.
"You are looking for another glass of wine, perhaps?"
"No, indeed," said the Prophet, desperately. "For anything but that."
But Malkiel, moved by some abruptly formed resolution, called suddenly in a powerful voice,
"Frederick Smith!"
"Here, Mr. Sagittarius!" cried the young librarian, appearing with suspicious celerity upon the parlour
threshold.
"Draw the cork of the second bottle, Frederick Smith," said Malkiel, impressively. "This gentleman is about
to take the pledge"on hearing this ironic paradox the Prophet stood up, very much in the attitude formerly
assumed by Malkiel when about to dodge in the library"that I shall put to him," concluded Malkiel, also
standing up, and assuming the library posture of the Prophet.
Indeed the situation of the library seemed about to be accurately reversed in the parlour of Jellybrand's.
The young librarian assisted the cork to emerge phlegmatically from the neck of the second bottle of
champagne, mechanically smacking his lips the while.
"Now pour, and leave us, Frederick Smith."
The young librarian helped the fatiguedlooking wine into the two glasses, where it lay as if thoroughly
exhausted by the effort of getting there, and then languidly left the parlour, turning his bulging head over his
shoulder to indulge in a pathetic /oeillade/ ere he vanished.
The Prophet watched him go.
"Close the door, Frederick Smith," cried Malkiel, in a meaning manner.
The Prophet blushed a guilty red, and the young librarian obeyed with a bang.
"And now, sir, I must request you to take a solemn pledge in this vintage," said Malkiel, placing one of the
tumblers in the Prophet's trembling hand.
"Really," said the Prophet, "I am not at all thirsty."
"Why should you be, sir? What has that got to do with it?" retorted Malkiel. "Lift your glass, sir."
The Prophet obeyed.
"And now take this pledgethat, till the last day"
"What day?"
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"The last day, sir, you will reveal to no living person that there is such an individual as Malkiel, that you have
ever met him, who he is, or who Madame and family are, unless I give the word. You have surprised my
secret. You have forced yourself upon me. You owe me this. Drink!"
Mechanically the Prophet drank.
"Swear!"
Mechanicallyindeed almost like a British working manthe Prophet swore.
Malkiel drained his tumbler, and drew on the dogskin glove which, in the agitation of a previous moment, he
had thrown aside.
"I have your card, sir, here is mine. I shall now take the train to the River Mouse, on whose banks I shall
confer at once with Madame. Till I have done this I cannot tell you what form the tests I shall have to apply
to you will take. When I have done it you will hear from me. Your servant, sir."
He bowed majestically, and was turning towards the door when it was hastily opened and a lady appeared
frantically in the aperture.
CHAPTER V. MALKIEL THE SECOND POISONS MISS MINERVA
"Miss Minerva!" exclaimed Malkiel the Second.
"Lady Enid!" cried the Prophet, at the same moment.
"You can't go in there, Miss Partridge!" ejaculated the young librarian, simultaneously, from the further
room.
The lady, a tall girl of twentytwo, with grey eyes, dark smooth hair, and a very agreeable, though slightly
Scottish, mouth, began to behave rather like a stag at bay. She panted, and looked wildly round as if
meditating how, and in what direction, she could best bolt.
"What's the matter?" cried the Prophet, his voice becoming not a little piercing from surprise and his previous
stress of agitation.
"You can't go in there, Miss Minerva," requested the young librarian, who had now gained the parlour
threshold, and who seemed about to take up a very determined stand thereon.
"I must go inI must," said the lady, in a mellow, but again slightly Scottish, voice. "Don't tell anybody I'm
here, or you'll be sorry."
And, with these words, she bounded into the parlour and banged the door on the young librarian. The Prophet
opened his lips preparatory to a third wild exclamation.
"Hush!" the lady hissed aristocratically.
She shook her head vigourously at him, sank down on one of the cane chairs, held up her right hand, and
leant towards the door. It was obvious that she was listening for something with strained attention, and so
eloquent was her attitude that the two prophets were infected with her desire. They turned their eyes
mechanically towards the deal door and listened too. For a moment there was silence. Then a heavy footstep
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resounded upon the library floor, accompanied by the sharp tap of a walking stick. The lady's attitude became
more tense and the pupils of her handsome grey eyes dilated.
"Has a young female just entered this shop?" said a very heavy and rumbling voice.
"This ain't a shop, sir," replied the high soprano of the young librarian, indignantly.
"Bandy no words with me, thou infamous malapert!" returned the first voice. "But answer my question. Have
you a young female concealed within these loathsome precincts?"
Under ordinary circumstances it is very possible that the young librarian might have betrayed the lady as he
had already betrayed Malkiel the Second. But it happened that there existed upon the earth one object, and
one object only, towards which he felt a sense of chivalry. This object was Jellybrand's Library. His reply to
the voice was therefore as follows, and was delivered in his highest key and with extreme volubility and
passion:
"Loathsome precincts yourself! You're a nice one, you are, chasing respectable ladies about at your age.
There ain't no young females in the library, and if there was I shouldn't trot 'em out for you to clap your ugly
old eyes on. Now then, out yer go. No more words about it. Out yer go!"
A prolonged sound of hard breathing and of feet scraping violently upon bare boards followed upon this
deliverance, complicated by the sharp snap of a breaking walking stick, the thump of a falling chair, a bang as
of a heavy body encountering firm resistance from some inflexible article of furnitureprobably a
bookcaseand finally a tremendous thundering, as of the hoofs of a squadron of cavalry charging over a
parquet floor, the crash of a door, the grinding of a key swiftly turning in a lock, andsilence.
The lady, Malkiel the Second and the Prophet looked at one another, and the lady opened her mouth.
"D'you think he's killed him?" she whispered with considerable curiosity.
There came a distant noise of a torrent of knocks upon a door.
"No, he hasn't," added the lady, arranging her dress. "That's a good thing."
The two prophets nodded. The torrent of knocks roared louder, slightly failed upon the ear, made a crescendo,
emulated Niagara, surpassed that very American effort of nature, wavered, faltered to Lodore, died away to a
feeble tittup like water dropping from a tap to flagstones, rose again in a final spurt that would have made
Southey open his dictionary for adjectives, and drained away to death.
The lady leaned back. For the first time her composure seemed about to desert her entirely. That fatal sign in
woman, a working throat, swallowing nothing with extreme rapidity and persistence, became apparent.
"A glass of wine, Miss Minerva?" cried Malkiel, gallantly.
He placed a tumbler to her lips. She feebly sipped, than sprang to her feet with a cry.
"I'm poisoned!"
"You never spoke a truer word," said the Prophet, solemnly.
"What is it?" continued the lady, frantically. "What has he given me?"
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"Champagne at four shillings a bottle brought fresh from next door to a rabbit shop," answered the Prophet,
looking at Malkiel with almost malignant satisfaction.
The lady, who had gone white as chalk, darted to the door and flung it open.
"A glass of water!" she cried. "Get me a glass of water."
The young librarian came forward with a black eye.
"It's all right, ma'am. The gentleman's gone," he piped.
"What gentleman? Give me a glass of water or I shall die!"
The young librarian, who had already an injured air, proceeded from a positive to a comparative condition of
appearance.
"Well, I never! What gentleman!" he exclaimed. "And me blue and black all over, to say nothing of the
bookcase and the new paint that'll be wanted for the door!"
"Can you chatter about trifles at such a moment?" cried the Prophet. "Don't you see the lady's been
poisoned?"
"Whatby the old gent?" returned the young librarian. "Then what does she come to a library for? Why
don't she go to a chemist?"
The lady turned her agonised eyes upon the Prophet.
"Take me to one," she whispered through pale lips.
She tottered towards him and leaned upon his arm.
"Trust me, trust me, I will," said the Prophet. "Direct me!" he added to the young librarian.
"There's one on the other side of the rabbit shop," said that worthy, who had suddenly become exceedingly
glum in manner and morose in appearance.
"Thank you. Kindly unlock the door."
The young librarian did so, lethargically, and the lady and the Prophet began to move slowly into the street.
Just as they were gaining it Malkiel the Second cried out,
"One moment, sir!"
"Not one," retorted the Prophet, firmly. "Not one till this lady has had an antidote."
He walked on with determination. Supporting the lady. But ere he got quite out of earshot he caught these
fragments of a shattered speech, hurtling through the symphony of London noises:
"Banks of the MouseMadamesake of Capricorbe sure Iprobequick searchthe very
corehear from mearchitectsmarrowalmanacthe last daythe Berkeley square"
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The final ejaculation melted away into the somewhat powerful discord produced by the impact of a brewer's
dray with a runaway omnibus at the corner of Greek Street, which was eventually resolved by the bursting of
a motor carcontaining two bookmakers and an acting managerwhich mingled with them at the rate of
perhaps forty miles an hour.
"Yes, please, a hansom," said Lady Enid Thistle, some five minutes later, as she and the Prophet stood
together upon the kerb in front of the rabbit shop. "I feel much better now."
The Prophet hailed a hansom and handed her into it.
"Which way are you going?" he asked.
Lady Enid looked doubtful.
"I ought to be going back to Jellybrand's," she said. "I had an appointment. But reallyyou see Mr.
Sagittarius is there, and altogetherI don't know."
She was obviously still upset by the "creaming foam," and the other incidents of the afternoon.
"Come to tea with grannie," said the Prophet.
"She's at home?"
"Yes. She's twisted her ankle."
"Oh, I'm so sorry."
"Let me escort you."
"Thanks. I think I will."
"You won't mind stopping for a moment at Hollings's?" said the Prophet, in Piccadilly Circus. "I promised to
buy some roses. Somebody is coming in to tea."
"On, no. But who is it?"
"I don't know. Only one person, I think. An old friend, no doubt. Probably the Central American
Ambassador's grandfather."
"Oh, if that's all! I feel a little shaky still."
"Naturally."
The Prophet bought the roses and they drove on.
"It's very nice of you not to ask any questions," observed Lady Enid, presently.
The Prophet had been thinking it was, but he only said,
"Oh, not at all."
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"I'm a woman," promised Lady Enid, "and I don't know whether I can be so nice."
The Prophet glanced at her and met her curious grey eyes.
"Tryplease," he replied very gently, thinking of the oath which he had just taken.
Lady Enid was silent for two minutes, then she remarked,
"I have tried, but I can't succeed. Why on earth were you closeted in the parlourat my time, toowith Mr.
Sagittarius this afternoon?"
"Then you really are Miss Minerva Partridge? And it was really you who hadhadwell, 'bespoke' the
parlour at halfpast three?"
"Certainly. Now we are neither of us nice, but we're both of us human."
"There were some letters for you," said the Prophet.
Lady Enid wrinkled her smooth, young, healthylooking forehead.
"How stupid of me! I'll fetch them tomorrow. Well?"
She looked at the Prophet with obvious expectation.
"I'm so sorry I can't tell you," he replied with gentle firmness.
"Oh, all right," she rejoined. "But now I'm at a disadvantage. You know I'm Miss Minerva."
"Yes. But I don't know why you are, or why you go to Jellybrand's, or why you rushed into the parlour, or
who the old gentleman was that"
The cab stopped before Mrs. Merillia's house.
In the hall, upon an oaken bench, they perceived a very broadbrimmed top hat standing on its head. Beside
it lay two pieces of a stout and knobbly walking stick which had been broken in half. Lady Enid started
violently.
"Good Heavens!" she cried.
She picked up the walking stick, examined it, and laid it down.
"I don't think I want any tea," she murmured.
"I'm sure you do," said the Prophet, with some pressure.
She stood still for a moment. Then, catching the attentive round eye of Gustavus, who was waiting by the hall
door, she shrugged her shoulders and walked towards the staircase.
"It's very hard lines," she murmured as she began to ascend: "all the questions you wanted to ask are being
answered. You know I'm Miss Minerva already. In another minute you'll know who the old gentleman was
that"
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The Prophet could tell from the expression of her straight, slightly Scottish, back that she was pouting as she
entered the drawingroom where Mrs. Merillia was having tea withsomebody.
CHAPTER VI. THE OLD ASTRONOMER DISCOURSETH OF THE STARS
Never before had the Prophet felt so alive with curiosity as he did when he followed Lady Enid into Mrs.
Merillia's presence, for he knew that he was about to see the venerable victim of the young librarian's
indignant chivalry, the "old gent" who had come to intimate terms with Jellybrand's bookcase, and who had
kicked and knocked at least a pint of paint off Jellybrand's door. His eyes were large and staring as he
glanced swiftly from his grandmother's sofa to the huge telescope, under whose very shadow was seated no
less a personage than Sir Tiglath Butt, holding a cup of tea on one hand and a largesized muffin in the other.
No wonder the Prophet jumped. No wonder Mrs. Merillia cried out, in her pretty, clear voice,
"Take care of Beau, Hennessey! You're treading on him."
The dachshund's pathetic shriek of outrage made the rafters ring. Mrs. Merillia put her mittens to her ears,
and Sir Tiglath dropped his muffin into a jar of potpourri.
"I beg your pardon," said the Prophet, earnestly. "Sir Tiglaththis is indeed a sura pleasure."
Lady Enid was being embraced by Mrs. Merillia. The Prophet extended his hand to the astronomer, who,
however, turned his back to the company and, diving one of his enormous hands into the potpourri jar,
began to rummage violently for his vanished meal.
"What is it?" said the Prophet, who had not seen the muffin go. "Can I help you?"
Still presenting his huge back and the purple nape of his fat neck to the assemblage, the astronomer, after
trying in vain to extract the lost dainty in a legitimate manner, turned the jar upside down, and poured the
roseleaves and the muffin in a heterogeneous libation upon the Chippendale table. After a close examination
of it he turned around, holding up the food to whose buttered surface several leaves adhered in a disordered,
but determined, manner.
"Only a Persian could devour this muffin now," he said, in his rumbling, singsong and strangely theatrical
voice, which always suggested that he was about to deliver a couple of hundred or so lengths of blank verse.
"Omar beneath his tree perchance, or Gurustu who to Baghdad came with steed afoam and eyes aflame.
Wherefore do you trample upon hapless animals that are not dumb, young man, and cause the poor
astronomer to cast his muffin upon the roses, where, mayhap, the housemaid might find it after many days?
Ohhhh!"
He uttered a tremulous bass cry of mingled reproach and despair, that sounded rather like the wail of some
deplorable watchman upon a city wall, shaking his enormous head at the Prophet the while, and flapping his
red hands slowly in the air.
"How d'you do, Sir Tiglath?" said Lady Enid, coming up to him with light carelessness.
Sir Tiglath bowed.
"Very ill, very ill," he rumbled, looking at her furtively with his glassy eyes. "One has had an afternoon of
tragedy, an afternoon of brawling and of disturbance, in an avenue that shall henceforth be called accursed."
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He sat down upon his armchair, with his short legs stuck straight out and resting upon his heels alone, his
hands folded across his stomach, and his purple triple chin sunk in his elaborate, but very dusty, cravat.
Wagging his head to and fro, he added, with the heavy, concluding tremolo that decorated most of his vocal
efforts, "Thrice accursed. Ohhhh!"
Lady Enid, who seemed to have quite recovered her selfpossession, sat down by Mrs. Merillia, while the
Prophet, in some confusion, offered to his grandmother the bunch of roses he had bought at Hollings's."
"They're a little late, grannie, I'm afraid," he said. "But I was unavoidably detained."
Mrs. Merillia glanced at him sharply.
"Detained, Hennessey! Then you found what you were seeking?"
The Prophet remembered his oath and turned scarlet.
"No, no, grannie," he murmured hastily, and looking like a criminal. "I met Lady Enid," he added.
"Where did you meet the lady, young man?" said Sir Tiglath. "Was it in the accursed avenue?"
Lady Enid shot a hasty glance of warning at the Prophet. Mrs. Merillia intercepted it, and began to form fresh
ideas of that young person, whom she had formerly called sensible, but whom she now began to think of as
crafty.
"Which avenue is that, Sir Tiglath?" asked the Prophet, with a rather inadequate assumption of innocence.
"The Avenue in which one beholds the perfidy darting into hidden places, young man, in which the defenders
of foolish virgins are buffeted and browbeaten by counterjumpers with craniums as big as the great nebula
of Orion. The avenue named after a crumbled philanthropist, who could walk, sheeted, through the atrocious
night could his sacred dust awake to the abominations that are perpetrated under the protection of his shadow.
Let dragons lay it waste like the highways of Babylon."
He gathered up a crumpet, and blinked at Lady Enid, who was airily sipping her tea with a slightly detached
air of calm and maidenly dignity.
"I think Sir Tiglath must be describing Shaftesbury Avenue," remarked Mrs. Merillia, rather mischievously.
"Oh, really," stammered the Prophet, "I had no idea that it was such an evil neighbourhood."
"Where is Shaftesbury Avenue?" asked Lady Enid, gently folding a fragment of thin bread and butter and
nibbling it with her pretty mouth.
Sir Tiglath elevated his hands and rolled his eyes.
"Where partridges are to be found in January, ohhhh!" was his very unexpected reply.
The Prophet started violently, and even Lady Enid looked disconcerted for a moment.
"What do you mean, Sir Tiglath?" she said, recovering herself.
She turned to Mrs. Merillia.
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"I wonder what he means," she said. "He never talks sensibly unless he is in his observatory, or lecturing to
the Royal Society on the 'Regularity of Heavenly Bodies,' or"
"The irregularities of earthly ones," interposed Sir Tiglath. "In the accursed avenueohhh!"
"I fear, Sir Tiglath, you must be a member of the Vigilance Society," said Mrs. Merillia.
"Yes. He looks at the morals of the stars through his telescope, said Lady Enid. "By the waydo you, too?"
she added to the Prophet, for the first time observing the instrument in the bow window.
Mrs. Merillia and Sir Tiglath exchanged a glance. An earnest expression came into the Prophet's face.
"I confess," he said, with becoming modesty in the presence of the great master of modern astronomy, "that I
do watch the heavens from that window."
"And for what purpose, young man?" rumbled Sir Tiglath, for the first time dropping his theatrical manner of
an old barnstormer, and speaking like any ordinary fogey, such as you may see at a meeting on behalf of the
North Pole, or at a dinner of the Odde Volumes.
"Forfor purposes of research, Sir Tiglath," answered the Prophet, with some diplomacy.
"The young man trieth to put off the old astronomer with fair words," bellowed Sir Tiglath. "The thief
inserteth his thumb into the tail pocket of the unobservant archbishop for purposes of research. The young
man playeth merrily forsooth with the old astronomer."
Mrs. Merillia nodded her lace cap at him encouragingly. It was evident that there was an understanding
between them. Lady Enid began to wonder what was its nature. The Prophet seemed rather disconcerted at
the reception given to his not wholly artless ambiguity.
"Grannie," he said, turning to Mrs. Merillia, "you know how deeply the stars interest me."
"For their own sake, young man?" said Sir Tiglath. "Or as the accursed avenue interests the foolish
virginsfor the sake of frivolity, idle curiosity, or dark doings which could not support the light even of a
star of the sixth magnitude? Can you tell your admirable and revered granddam that?"
This time, underneath his preposterous manner and fantastic speech, both Lady Enid and the Prophet fancied
that they could detect an element of real gravity, even perhaps a hint of weighty censure which made them
both feel very youngrising two, or thereabouts.
"I was originally led to study stars, Sir Tiglath, because I had the honour to meet you and make your
acquaintance," said the Prophet, valiantly.
The astronomer lapsed at once into his first manner.
"In what fair company did the old astronomer converse with the young man?" he cried. "His memory faileth
him. He doteth and cannot recall the great occasion."
"It was at the Colley Cibber Club, Sir Tiglath," said the Prophet, firmly. "But wewe did not converse. You
had aa slight indisposition."
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"Would you venture to implyin the presence of your notable granddam that one had looked upon the
wine when it was red, young man?"
"You had a glass of port by you certainly, Sir Tiglath. But you also had a cold which, you gave me to
understandby signshad affected your throat and prevented you from carrying on conversation.
"Then was it the vision of the old astronomer's personal and starry beauty that led you, hot foot, to Venus
through yonder telescope? Ohhhh!"
"I did not take observations of Venus first," answered the Prophet, with a certain proud reserve. "I began by
an examination into 'The Milky Way.' "
Sir Tiglath impounded another crumpet.
"Go on, young man," he cried. "The old astronomer lendeth ear."
The Prophet, who felt very much like a nervous undergraduate undergoing a /vivavoce/ examination,
continued,
"I became deeply interested, strongly attracted by thethe heavenly bodies. They fascinated me. I could
think of nothing else."
Lady Enid's Scottish lips tightened almost imperceptibly.
"I could talk of nothing else," proceeded the Prophet. "Could I, grannie?"
"No, indeed, Hennessey," assented Mrs. Merillia. "All other topics were banished from discussion."
"All," cried the Prophet, with increasing fervour and lack of self consciousness. "I could not tear myself
from the telescope. I longed for a perpetual night and found the day almost intolerably irksome."
Sir Tiglath's brickred countenance was irradiated with a smile that did not lack geniality.
"The old astronomer lendeth attentive ear to the young man's epic," he roared, through the crumpet. "He
approveth the young man's admiration for the heavenly bodies. Go on."
But at the last command the Prophet seemed suddenly to jib. The reserved expression returned to his face.
"That's all, Sir Tiglath," he said.
The astronomer and Mrs. Merillia again exchanged a glance which was not unobserved by Lady Enid. Then
Sir Tiglath, with an abrupt and portentous gravity, exclaimed in thunderous tones,
"Sir, are you a man of science or have you the brain of a charlatan enclosed in the fleshy envelope of a
conjurer and a sinner? Do you study the noble and beautiful stars for their own sakes to find out what they
are, and what they are doing, what is their nature and what their place in the great scheme, or do you peek and
pry at them through the keyhole of a contemptible curiosity in order to discover what you think they can do
for you, to set you on high, to puff you out into a personage and cause you to be noticed of the foolish ones of
this world? Which are you, sir, a young man of parts whose hand I can grasp fraternally, or an insulter of
planets, sir, a Peeping Tom upon the glorious nudity of Venus, a Paul Pry squinting at the mysteries of
Mercury for an unholy and, what is more, an idiotic purpose? What do you ask of the stars, sir? Tell the old
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astronomer that!"
The Prophet was considerably taken aback by this tirade, which caused the many ornaments in the pretty
room to tremble. He gazed at his grandmother, and found her nodding approval of Sir Tiglath. He glanced at
Lady Enid. She was leaning back in her chair and looking amused, like a person at an entertainment.
"What do I ask, Sir Tiglath?" he murmured in some confusion.
"Do you ask about your reverent granddam's hallowed ankles, sir? Do you afflict the stars with inquiries
about the state of the ridiculous weather? Is that it?"
The Prophet understood that Mrs. Merillia had been frank with the astronomer. He cast upon her a glance of
respectful reproach.
"Yes, Hennessey," she answered, "I have. My dear child, I thought it for the best. This prophetic business
would soon have been turning the house upside down, and at my age I'm really not equal to living at close
quarters with a determined young prophet. To do so would upset the habits of a lifetime. So Sir Tiglath
knows all about it."
There was a moment of silence, which was broken by the agreeable voice of Lady Enid saying,
"All about what? Remember, please, that I'm a young woman and that all young women share one quality.
All about what, please?"
Mrs. Merillia looked at the Prophet. The Prophet looked at Sir Tiglath, who wagged his great head and cried,
with rolling pathos and rebuke,
"Ohhhh!"
"PleaseMr. Vivian!" repeated Lady Enid, with considerable determination.
"Grannie means that Ithatwell, that I have been enabled by the stars to foretell certain future events,"
said the Prophet, glancing rather furtively at Sir Tiglath while he spoke, to note the effect of the desperate
declaration."
"Ohhhh!" bellowed the distressed astronomer, shaking like a jelly in his wrath.
"What?" cried Lady Enid, in an almost piercing voice, and with a manner that had suddenly become most
animated. "Whatlike Malkiel's /Almanac/ does?"
This remark had a very striking effect upon Sir Tiglath, an effect indeed so striking that it held Mrs. Merillia,
Lady Enid and the Prophet in a condition of paralytic expectation for at least three minutes by the
grandmother's clock in the corner of the drawingroom.
The venerable astronomer was already very stout in person and very inflamed in appearance. But at this point
in the discourse he suddenly became so very much stouter and so very much more inflamed, that his audience
of three gazed upon him rather as little children gaze upon dough which has been set by the cook to "rise" and
which is fulfilling its mission with an unexpected, and indeed intemperate, vivacity. Their eyes grew round,
their features rigid, their hands tense, their attitudes expectant. Leaning forward, they stared upon Sir Tiglath
with an unwinking fixity and preternatural determination that was almost entirely infantine. And while they
did so he continued slowly to expand in size and to deepen in colour until mortality seemed to drop from him.
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He ceased to be a man and became a phenomenon, a purple thing that journeyed towards some unutterable
end, portentous as marching judgment, tragic as fate, searching as epidemic, and yet heavily painted and
generally touched up by the brush of some humorous demon, such as lays about him in preparation for
Christmas pantomime, sworn to provide the giants' faces and the ogres' heads for Drury Lane.
"Don't!" at last cried a young voice. "Don't, Sir Tiglath!"
A peal of laughter followed the remark, of that laughter which is loud and yet entirely without the saving
grace of merriment, a mere sudden demonstration of hysteria.
"Oh, Sir Tiglathdon't!"
A second laugh joined the first and rang up with it, older, but also hystericalMrs. Merillia's.
"No, noplease don't, Sir TigTig"
A third laugh burst into the ring, seeming to complete it fatallythe Prophet's.
"Sir Tiglathfor Heaven's sakedon't!"
The adjuration came from a trio of choked voices, and might have given pause even to a descending lift or
other inflexible and blind machine.
But still the astronomer grew steadily more gigantic in person and more like the god of wine in hue. The three
voices failed, and the terrible, united laughter was just upon the point of breaking forth again when a
diversion occurred. The door of the drawingroom was softly opened, and Mrs. Fancy Quinglet appeared
upon the threshold, holding in her hands an icewool shawl for the comfort of her mistress. It chanced that as
the phenomenon of the astronomer was based upon a large elbow chair exactly facing the door she was
instantly and fully confronted by it. She did not drop the shawl, as any ordinary maid would most probably
have done. Mrs. Fancy was not of that kidney. She did not even turn tail, or give a month's warning or a
scream. She was of those women who, when they meet the inevitable, instinctively seem to recognise that it
demands courage as a manner and truth as a greeting. She, therefore, stared straight at Sir Tiglathmuch as
she stared at Mrs. Merillia when she was about to arrange that lady's wig for an assembly and remarked in
a decisive, though very respectful, tone of voice,
"The gentleman's about to burst, ma'am. I can't speak different nor mean other."
Upon finding their thoughts thus deftly gathered up and woven into a moderately grammatical sentence, Mrs.
Merillia, Lady Enid and the Prophet experienced a sense of extraordinary relief, and no longer felt the stern
necessity of laughing. But this was not the miracle worked by Mrs. Fancy. Had she, even then, rested
satisfied with her acumen, maintained silence and awaited the immediate fulfilment of her prediction, what
must have happened can hardly be in doubt. But she was seized by that excess of bravery which is called
foolhardiness, and driven by it to that peculiar and thoughtless vehemence of action which sometimes wins
V.C.'s for men who, in later days, conceal amazement under the cherished decoration. She suddenly laid
down the icewool shawl upon a neighbouring sociable, walked up to the phenomenon of the astronomer,
and remarked to it with great distinctness,
"You're about to burst, sir. I know it, sir, and I can't know other."
At this point the miracle happened, for, instead of responding to the lady'smaid's appeal, and promptly
disintegrating into his respective atoms, Sir Tiglath suddenly became comparatively small and comparatively
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pale, sat forward, wagged his head at Mrs. Fancy, and rumbled out in his ordinary voice,
"Have you never heard where liars go to, woman? Ohhhh!"
On finding that nothing of supreme horror was about to happen, Mrs. Fancy's courageas is the way of
woman's courageforsook her, she broke into tears, and had to be immediately led forth to the servant's hall
by the Prophet, exclaiming persistently with every step they took,
"I can't help it, Master Hennessey. I say again as I said aforethe gentleman's about to burst. Them that
knows other let them declare it."
"Yes, yes. It's all right, Fancy, it's all right. We all agree with you. Now, now, you mustn't cry."
"I can'tknowother, Master Hennessey, normean different. I can't indeed, Master Hennessey, I
can'tknow othernor"
"No, no. Of course not. There, sit down and compose yourself."
He gave the poor, afflicted liar tenderly into the care of the upper housemaid, and retraced his steps quickly to
the drawingroom. As he entered it he heard Sir Tiglath saying,
"The stars in their courses tremble when the accursed name of Malkiel is mentioned, and the old astronomer
is dissolved in wrath at sound of the pernicious word. Ohhhh!"
"There, Hennessey!" cried Mrs. Merillia, turning swiftly to her grandson with all her cap ribands fluttering.
"You hear what Sir Tiglath says?"
"If that accursed name belonged to an individual," continued the astronomer, waving his hands frantically
over the last remaining crumpet, "instead of representing a syndicate of ruffianly underground criminals, the
old astronomer, well stricken in years though he be, would hunt him out of his hidingplace and slay him
with his own feeble and scientific hands."
So saying, he grasped the crumpet as if it had been an assegai, and assailed himself with it so violently that it
entirely disappeared.
"But Malkiel is an" began Mrs. Merillia.
The Prophet stopped her with a glance, whose almost terrorstricken authority surprised her into silence.
"But I thought Malkiel was a man," cried Lady Enid, looking towards the Prophet.
"Hefor I will not foul my lips with the accursed nameis not a man," roared Sir Tiglath. "He is a
syndicate. He is a company. He meets together, doubtless, in some low den of the city. He reads reports to
himself of the illgotten gains accruing from his repeated insults to the heavens round some abominable table
covered with green cloth. He quotes the prices of the shares in him, and declares dividends, and carries
balances forward, and some day will wind himself up or cast himself anew upon the mercy of the market.
Part of him is probably Jew, part South African and part America. The whole of him is thrice accursed."
He began to expand once more, but Mrs. Merillia perceived the tendency and checked it in time.
"Pray, Sir Tiglath," she said almost severely, "don't. With my sprained ankle I am really not equal to it."
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Sir Tiglath had enough chivalry to stop, and Lady Enid once again chipped in.
"But, really, I'm almost sure Malkiel is a"
She caught the Prophet's eye, as Mrs. Merillia had, and paused. He turned to the astronomer.
"But how can a company make itself into a prophet?" he asked.
"Young man, you talk idly! What are companies formed for if not to make profits?" retorted Sir Tiglath.
"Every one is a company nowadays. Don't you know that? Murchison, the famous writer of novels, is a
company. Jeremy, the actormanager, is a company. So is Bynion the quack doctor, and the Rev. Mr.
Kinnimer who supplies tracts to the upper classes, and Upton the artist, whose pictures make tours like Sarah
Bernhardt, and Watkins, whose philosophy sells more than Tupper's, and Caroline Jingo, who writes war
poems and patriotic odes. If you were to invite these supposed seven persons to dinner, and all of them came,
you would have to lay covers for at least fifty scoundrels. Ohhhh!"
"Well, but how are you sure thatahemthe /Almanac/ person is also plural, Sir Tiglath?" inquired Mrs.
Merillia.
"Because I sought him with the firm intention of assault and battery for fiveandforty years," returned the
astronomer. "And only gave up my Christian quest when I was assured, on excellent authority, that he was a
company, and had originally been formed in the United States for the making of money and the defiance of
the heavenly bodies. May bulls and bears destroy him!"
"Well, it's very odd," said Lady Enid. "Very odd indeed."
As she spoke she glanced at the Prophet and met his eyes. There are moments when the mere expression in
another person's eyes seems to shout a request at one. The expression in the Prophet's eyes performed this
feat at this moment, with such abrupt vehemence, that Lady Enid felt almost deafened. She leaned back in her
chair, as if avoiding a missile, and exclaimed,
"Of course! And I never guessed it!"
"Guessed what, my dear?" inquired Mrs. Merillia.
"Why, thatheitwas a company," replied Lady Enid.
The Prophet blessed and thanked her with a piercing and saved look.
"Nor I," he assented, descending into the very mine of subterfuge for his recent oath's sake, "nor I, or I should
never have taken the useless trouble that I have taken.
He managed to say this with such conviction that his grandmother, who, in the past, had always found him to
be transparently honest and sincere, was carried away by the deception. She wrinkled her long nose, as was
her habit when sincerely pleased, and cried gaily,
"Then, Hennessey, now you've heard Sir Tiglath's opinion of the practice of trying to turn the stars into
moneymakers, and the planets into old gipsy women who tell fortunes to silly servant girls, I'm sure you'll
never study them again. Come, promise me!"
The Prophet made no answer.
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"Hennessey," cried his grandmother, with tender pertinacity, "promise me! Sir Tiglath, join your voice to
mine!"
Sir Tiglath had become really grave, not theatrically serious.
"Young man," he said, "your revered granddam asks of you a righteous thing. Who are you to trifle with
those shining worlds that make a beauty of the night and that stir eternity in the soul of man? Who are you to
glue your pinpoint of a human eye to yonder machine and play with the stupendous Jupiter and Saturn as a
child plays with marbles or with pegtops? Who are you that thinks those glittering monsters have nothing to
do but to inform your pigmy brain of snowfalls, street accidents, and loveaffairs prematurely, so that you
may flaunt about your pockethandkerchief of a square pluming your dwarfship that you are a prophet? Fie,
young man, and again fie! Bow the knee, as I do, to the mysteries of the great universal scheme, instead of
bothering them to turn informers and 'give away' the knowledge which is deliberately hidden from us. Show
me a man that can understand the present and you'll have shown me a god. And yet you knock at the gates of
the heavens through that telescope and clamour to be told the future! Fie upon you, young man, fie!
Ohhhh!"
Now the Prophet, as has been before observed, possessed a very sensitive nature. He was also very devoted to
his grandmother, and had an extraordinary reverence for the worldfamed attainments of Sir Tiglath Butt.
Therefore, when he heard Mrs. Merillia's pleading, and the astronomer's weighty denunciation, he was deeply
moved. Nevertheless, so strongly had recent events appealed to his curiosity, so ardently did he desire to
search into the reality of his own peculiar powers, that it is very doubtful whether he might not have
withstood both the behests of affection and of admiration had it not been that they took to themselves an ally,
whose force is one of the moving spirits of the world. This ally was fear. Just as the Prophet was beginning to
feel obstinate and to steel himself to resistance, he remembered the fierce and horrible threats of Malkiel the
Second. If he should cease to concern himself with the stars, if he should cease to prophesy, not alone should
he restore peace to his beloved grandmother, and pay the tribute of respect to Sir Tiglath, but he should do
more. He should preserve his quick from being searched and his core from being probed. His marrow, too,
would be rescued from the piercing it had been so devoutly promised. The dread, by which he was now
companionedof Malkiel, of that portentous and unseen lady who dwelt beside the secret waters of the
Mouse, of those imagined offshoots of the prophetic tree, Corona and Capricornusthis would drop away.
He would be free once more, lighthearted, a happy and mildly intellectual man of the town, emerged from
the thrall of bogies, and from beneath the yoke which he already felt laid upon his shoulders by those august
creatures who were the centre of the architectural circle.
All these things suddenly presented themselves to the Prophet's mind with extraordinary vividness and force.
His resolve was taken in a moment, and, turning to his eager grandmother and to the still slightly inflated
astronomer, he exclaimed without further hesitation,
"Very well. I'll give it up. I promise you."
Mrs. Merillia clapped her mittens together almost like a girl.
"Thank you, Sir Tiglath," she cried. "I knew you would persuade the dear boy."
The astronomer beamed like the rising sun.
"Let the morning starsfreed from insultsing together!" he roared.
The Prophet glanced towards Lady Enid. She was looking almost narrow and not at all pleased. She, and all
her family, had a habit of suddenly appearing thinner than usual when they were put out. This habit had
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descended to them from a remote Highland ancestor, who had perished of starvation and been very vexed
about it. The Prophet felt sure that she did not applaud his resolution, but he could not discuss the matter with
her in public, and she now got uplooking almost like a skeletonand said that she must go. Sir Tiglath
immediately rolled up out of his chair and roared that he would accompany her.
"The old astronomer will protect the injudicious young female," he exclaimed, "lest she wander forth into
accursed places."
"I'm only going to Hill Street," said Lady Enid, rather snappishly. "Come to see me tomorrow at three," she
whispered to the Prophet as she took his hand. "We must have a talk. Don't tell anybody!"
The Prophet nodded surreptitiously. He felt that she was curious to her fingertips as he gently pressed them.
When he and his grandmother were alone together he rang the drawing room bell. Mr. Ferdinand appeared.
"Mr. Ferdinand," said the Prophet, "kindly call Gustavus to your aid and take away the telescope."
"Sir!" said Mr. Ferdinand in great astonishment.
"Take away the telescope."
"Certainly, sir. Where shall we place it, sir?"
"Anywhere," said the Prophet. "In the pantrythe squarein Piccadilly if you likeit's all the same to
me."
And, unable to trust himself to say more, he hurried almost tumultuously from the room.
"Here's a go, Gustavus," remarked Mr. Ferdinand a moment later as he entered the servants' hall.
"Where, Mr. Ferdinand?" replied Gustavus, glancing up from a dish of tea and a couple of Worthing shrimps
with which he was solacing an idle moment.
"Here, in this mansion, Gustavus. Me and you've got to take the telescope out of the drawingroom, and
Master Hennessey says if we wish we can chuck it in Piccadilly."
The round eyes of Gustavus brightened.
"That is my wish, Mr. Ferdinand," he exclaimed. "Here's a lark!"
He sprang up. But Mr. Ferdinand checked his very agreeable vivacity.
"I am your head, Gustavus," he remarked, with severe ambiguity, "and master having also said that, if we
wish, we can set the instrument in the butler's pantry, I have decided that so it shall moreover be. It will be
very useful to us there."
"Useful, Mr. Ferdinand! However?"
"Never mind, Gustavus, never mind," replied Mr. Ferdinand with some acrimony.
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Being of a dignified nature he did not care to explain to a subordinate that there was a very pleasantlooking
secondcook just arrived at the house of the Lord Chancellor on the opposite side of the square.
CHAPTER VII. THE DOUBLE LIFE OF MISS MINERVA
On the following day, just as the Prophet was drawing on a new pair of suede gloves preparatory to setting
out to Hill Street, Gustavus entered with a silver salver.
"A telegram for you, sir," he said.
The Prophet took the blushing envelope, ripped it gently open, and read as follows:
"Madame and self must confer with you this afternoon without fail. Shall be with you five sharp; most
important.
JUPITER SAGITTARIUS."
Gustavus nearly dropped at sight of the wrinkles that seamed the Prophet's usually smooth face as he grasped
the full meaning of this portentous missive.
"Any answer, sir?"
The wrinkles increased and multiplied.
"Any reply, sir?"
"Whatno."
Gustavus glided in a welltrained manner towards the door. When he got there the Prophet cried, rather
sharply,
"Stop a moment!"
Gustavus stopped.
"Sir?"
"TheIerI am expecting aacouple this afternoon," began the Prophet, speaking with considerable
hesitation, and still gazing, in a hypnotised manner, at the telegram.
"A couple, sir?"
"Exactly. A pair."
"A pair, sir? Of horses, sir?"
"Horses! Noof people, that is, persons."
"A pair of persons, sir. Yes, sir."
"They should arrive towards five o'clock."
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"Yes, sir."
"If I should not be home by that time you will show them very quietly into my librarynot the
drawingroom. Mrs. Merillia is not at present equal to receiving ordinary guests."
The Prophet meant extraordinary, but he preferred to put it the other way.
"Yes, sir. What name, sir?"
"Mr. and Mrs.that is, Madame Sagittarius. That will do."
Gustavus hastened to the servants' hall to discuss the situation, while the Prophet stood rereading the
telegram with an expression of shattered dismay. Not for at least five minutes did he recover himself
sufficiently to remember his appointment with Lady Enid, and, when at length he set forth to Hill Street, he
was so painfully preoccupied that he walked three times completely round the square before he discovered
the outlet into that fashionable thoroughfare.
When he reached the dark green mansion of Lady Enid's worthy father, the Marquis of Glome, and had
applied the bronze demon that served as a knocker four separate times to the door, he was still so lost in
thought that he started violently on the appearance of the Scotch retainer at the portal, and behaved for a
moment as if he were considering which of two courses he should pursue: /i.e./, whether he should clamber
frantically into the seclusion of the area, or take boldly to the open street. Before he could do either
M'Allister, the retainer, had magnetised him into the hall, relieved him of his hat almost with the seductive
adroitness of a Drury Lane thiefand drawn him down a tartan passage into a very sensiblelooking
boudoir, in which Lady Enid was sitting by a wood fire with a very tall and lusty young man.
"Mr. Hennessey Vivian!"
"What, Bobyou here!" said the Prophet to the lusty young man, after shaking hands a little distractedly
with Lady Enid.
"Yes, old chap. But I'm just off. I know you two want to have a confab," returned Mr. Robert Green,
wringing his old school friend's hand. "Niddy's given me the chuck. And anyhow I'm bound to look in at the
Bath Club at four to fence with Chicky Bostock."
Mr. Green spoke in a powerful baritone voice, rolling his r's, and showing his large and square white teeth in
a perpetual cheery and even boisterous smile. He was what is called a thorough good fellow, springy in body
and essentially gay in soul. That he was of a slightly belated temperament will be readily understood when
we say that he was at this time just beginning to whistle, with fair correctness, "Tararaboom deay," to
discuss the character of Becky Sharp, to dwell upon the remarkable promise as a vocalist shown by Madame
Adelina Patti, and to wonder at the marvellous results said to be accomplished by the telephone. He had also
never heard of Christian Science, and was totally unaware that there exists in the metropolis a modest and
retiring building called "The Imperial Institute." Nevertheless, he was repeatedly spoken of by substantial
people as a young man of many parts, was a leading spirit in Yeomanry circles, and was greatly regarded by
the Prophet as a trusty friend and stalwart upholder of the British Empire. He had rather the appearance of a
bulwark, and something of the demeanour of a flourishing young oak tree.
"Yes, Bob, you've got to go," assented Lady Enid, examining the Prophet's slightly distorted countenance
with frank, and even eager, curiosity. "Mr. Vivian and I are going to talk of modern things."
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"I know, Thackeray and Patti, and threevolume novels, and skirt dancing, and all the rest of it," said Mr.
Green, with unaffected reverence. "Well, I'm off. I say, Hen, pop in at the Bath on your way home and have a
whiskey and soda. I shall just be out of the hot room and"
"I'm sorry, Bob," said the Prophet with almost terrible solemnity, that I can't, thatin factI am unable."
"What? Going to the dentist?"
"Exactlythat is, not at all."
"Well, what's up? Some intellectual business, lecture on Walter Scott, or Dickens, or one of the other
Johnnies that are so popular just now?"
"No. I have aa small gathering at home this afternoon.
"All right. Then I'll pop round on yousay five o'clock."
"No, Bob, no, I can't say that. I'm very sorry, but I can't possibly say that."
"Right you are. Too clever for me, I s'pose. Look me up at the Tintack tonight thenany time after ten."
"If I can, Bob, I will," replied the Prophet, with impressive uncertainty, "I say if I can I will do so."
"Done! If you can't, then I'm not to expect you. That it?"
"That is itprecisely."
"Goodbye, Niddy, old girl. Keep your pecker up. By the way, if you want a real good tune for a Charity
singsong, a real rouser, try 'Nancy Lee.' "
He was gone, humming vigorously that newfangled favourite.
"Sit down, Mr. Vivian," said Lady Enid, looking her right size. "We've got a lot to say to one another."
"I have to be home at five," replied the Prophet, abstractedly.
Lady Enid begin to appear a trifle thin.
"Why? How tiresome! I didn't think you really meant it."
"It is very, very tiresome."
He spoke with marked uneasiness, and remained standing with the air of one in readiness for the punctual call
of the hangman.
"What is it?" continued Lady Enid, with her usual inquisitiveness.
"I have, as I said, aa small gathering at home at that hour," said the Prophet, repeating his formula
morosely.
"A gatheringwhat of?"
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"Peoplepersons, that is."
"Whata party?"
"Two parties," replied the Prophet, instinctively giving Mr. Sagittarius and Madame their undoubted due.
"Two."
"Two parties at the same timeand in the afternoon! How very odd!"
"They will look very odd, veryin Berkeley Square," responded the Prophet, in a tone of considerable
dejection. "I don't know, I'm sure, what Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus will think. Still I've given strict orders
that they are to be let in. What else could I do?"
He gazed at Lady Enid in a demanding manner.
"What else could I possibly do under the circumstances?" he repeated.
"Sit down, dear Mr. Vivian," she answered, with her peculiar Scotch lassie seductiveness, "and tell me, your
sincere friend, what the circumstances are."
Unluckily her curiosity had led her to overdo persuasion. That cooing interpolation of "your sincere
friend"too strongly honeyedsuddenly recalled the Prophet to the fact that Lady Enid was not, and could
never be, his confidante in the matter that obsessed him. He therefore sat down, but with an abrupt air of
indefinite social liveliness, and exclaimed, not unlike Mr. Robert Green,
"Well, and how are things going with you, dear Lady Enid?"
She jumped under the transition as under a whip.
"Me! Butthese parties you were telling me about?"
But the Prophet remembered his oath. He was a strictly honourable little man, and never swore carelessly.
"Parties!" he said. "You and I are too old friends to waste our life in chattering about such London nonsense."
"Then we'll talk of yesterday," said Lady Enid, very firmly.
The Prophet looked rather blank.
"Yes," she repeated. "Yesterday. I've guessed your secret."
"Which one?" he cried, much startled.
"Which?" she said reproachfully. "Oh, Mr. Vivianand I thought you trusted in me."
The Prophet was silent. The third daughter of the clergyman had often made that remark to him when they
were nearly engaged. It recalled bygone memories.
"That's what I thought," she added with pressure.
"I'm sorry," the Prophet murmured, rather obstinately.
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"I always think," she continued, with deliberate expansiveness, "that nearly all the miseries of the world come
about from people not trusting inin people."
"Or from people trusting in the wrong people. Which is it?" said the Prophet, not without slyness.
She began to look thin, but checked herself.
"Tell me," she said, "why did you stop me yesterday when I was beginning to say to Sir Tiglath that I was
sure Malkiel was a man and not a syndicate?"
"Did I stop you?" said the Prophet, artlessly.
"Yes, with your eyes."
"Becausebecause I was surethat is, certain you couldn't be sure."
"How could you be certain?"
"How?"
"Yes."
"Well, how is one certain of anything?" said the Prophet, rather feebly.
"How are you certain that I'm Miss Minerva Partridge?"
"Because you told me so yourself, because I've seen you come into Jellybrand's for your letters, because"
"Haven't I seen Malkiel come into Jellybrand's for his?"
This unexpected retort threw the Prophet upon his beam ends. But he remembered his oath even in that very
awkward position.
"Does he go to Jellybrand's?" he exclaimed, with a wild attempt after astonishment. "But he's a
companySir Tiglath said so."
"And what did your eyes say yesterday?"
"I had a cold in my eyes yesterday," said the Prophet. "They were very weak. They werethey were
aching."
Lady Enid was silent for a moment. During that moment she was conferring with her feminine instinct. What
it said to her must be guessed by the manner in which she once more entered into conversation with the
Prophet.
"Mr. Vivian," she said, with a complete change of demeanour to girlish geniality and impulsiveness, "I'm
going to confide in you. I'm going to thrown myself upon your mercy."
The Prophet blinked with amazement, like a martyr who suddenly finds himself snatched from the rack and
laid upon a plush divan with a satin cushion under his head.
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"I'm going to trust you," Lady Enid went on, emphasising the two pronouns.
"Many thanks," said the Prophet, unoriginally.
She was sitting on a square piece of furniture which the Marquis of Glome called an "Aberdeen leanto." She
now spread herself out upon it in the easy attitude of one who is about to converse intimately for some
centuries, and proceeded.
"I daresay you know, Mr. Vivian, that people always call me a very sensible sort of girl."
The Prophet remembered his grandmother's remark about Lady Enid.
"I know they do," he assented, trying not to think of five o'clock.
"What do they mean by that, Mr. Vivian?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"I say what do they mean by a sensible sort of girl?"
"Why, I suppose"
"I'm going to tell you," she interrupted him. "They mean a sort of girl who likes fresh air, washes her face
with yellow soap, sports dogskin gloves, drives in an open cart in preference to a shut brougham, enjoys a
cold tub and Whyte Melville's novels, laughs at ghosts and cries over 'Misunderstood,' considers the Bishop
of London a deity and the Albert Memorial a gem of art, would wear a neat Royal fringe in her grave, and a
straw hat and shirt on the Judgment Day if she were in the country for itwalks with the guns, sings 'Home,
Sweet Home' in the evening after dinner to her baldheaded father, thinks the /Daily Mail/ an intellectual
paper, the Royal Academy an uplifting institution, the British officer a demigod with a heart of gold in a
body of steel, and the road from Calais to Paris the way to heaven. That's what they mean by a sensible sort
of girl, isn't it?"
"I daresay it is," said the Prophet, endeavouring not to feel as if he were sitting with a dozen or two of very
practised stump orators.
"Yes, and that's what they think I am."
"And aren't you?" inquired the Prophet.
Lady Enid drew herself upon the Aberdeen leanto.
"No," she said decisively, "I'm not. I'm a Miss Minerva Partridge."
"Well, but what is that?" asked the Prophet, with all the air of a man inquiring about some savage race.
"That's the secret"
"Oh, I beg your pardon!"
"That I'm going to tell you now, because I trust you"
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Again the pronouns were emphasised, and the Prophet thought how difficult it would be to keep his oath.
"And because I know now that you're silly too."
The Prophet jumped, though not for joy.
"I've been Miss Minerva Partridge forwait a moment, I must look."
She got up, went to a writing table, opened a drawer in it, and took out a large red book and turned its leaves.
"My diary," she explained. "It's foolish to keep one, isn't it?"
Her intonation so obviously called for an affirmative that the Prophet felt constrained to reply,
"Very foolish indeed."
She smiled with pleasure.
"I'm so glad you think so. Ahexactly a year and a half."
"You've been Miss Minerva Partridge?"
"Yes."
"So long as that?"
"Yes, indeed. Mr. Vivian, during that time I have been leading a double life."
The Prophet remembered the other double life beside the borders of the River Mouse, and began to wonder if
he were acquainted with any human being who led a single one.
"Many people do that," he remarked rather aimlessly.
Lady Enid looked vexed.
"I did not say I had a monopoly of the commodity," she rejoined, evidently wishing that she had.
"Oh, no," said the Prophet, making things worse; "one meets people who live double lives every day, I might
almost say every hour."
The clock had just struck four, and he had begun to think of five. Lady Enid's pleasant plumpness began
rapidly to disappear.
"I can't say I do," she said sharply, feeling that most of the gilt was being stripped off her sin.
She stopped in such obvious dissatisfaction that the Prophet, vaguely aware that he had made some mistake,
said,
"Please go on. I am so interested. Why have you led a double life for the last week and a half?"
"Year and a half, I said."
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"I mean year and a half."
He forced his mobile features to assume a fixed expression of greedy, though rather too constant, curiosity.
Lady Enid brightened up.
"Mr. Vivian," she said, "many girls are born sensiblelooking without wishing it."
"Are they really? It never occurred to me."
"Such things very seldom do occur to men. Now that places these girls in a very painful position. I was
placed in this position as soon as I was born, or at least as soon as I began to look like anything at all. For
babies really don't."
"That's very true," assented the Prophet, with more fervour.
"People continually said to me, 'What a nice sensible girl you are'; or'One always feels your Common
sense'; or'There's nothing foolish about you, Enid, thank Heaven!' The Chieftain relied upon me
thoroughly. So did the tenants. So did everybody. You can understand that it became very trying?"
"Of course, of course."
"It's something to do with the shape of my eyebrows, the colour of my hair, the way I smile and that sort of
thing."
"No doubt it is."
"Mr. Vivian, I'll tell you now, that I've never felt sensible in all my life."
"Really!" ejaculated the Prophet, still firmly holding all his features together in an unyielding expression of
fixed curiosity.
"Never once, however great the provocation. And in my family, with the Chieftain, the provocation you can
understand is exceptionally great."
The Marquis of Glome, who was the head of a clan called "The MacArdells," was always named the
Chieftain by his relations and friends.
"I felt sure it must be," said the Prophet, decisively.
"Nevertheless it is so extremely difficult, if not impossible, not to try to be what people take you for that I
was in a perpetual condition of acting sensibly, against my true nature."
"How very trying!" murmured the Prophet, mechanically.
"It was, Mr. Vivian. It often made me fell quite ill. Nobody but you knows how I have suffered."
"And why do I know?" inquired the Prophet.
"Because I realised yesterday that you must be almost as silly by nature as I am."
"Yesterdaywhy? When?"
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"When you said to Sir Tiglath that you could prophesy."
The Prophet stiffened. She laughed almost affectionately.
"So absurd! But I was vexed when you said you'd give it up. You mustn't do that, or you'll be flying in the
face of your own folly."
She drew the Aberdeen leanto, which ran easily on Edinburgh castors, a little nearer to him, and continued.
"At least I felt obliged to seek an outlet. I could not stifle my real self for ever, and yet I could not be
comfortably silly with those who were absolutely convinced of my permanent good sense. I tried to be
several times.
"Didn't you succeed?"
"Not once."
"Tch! Tch!"
"So at last I was driven to the double life."
"Then your coachman knows?"
"MacSpillan! No! I took a caba fourwheelerat the corner of the Square, and the name of Minerva
Partridge. It's a silly name, isn't it?"
She asked the question with earnest anxiety.
"Quite idiotic," said the Prophet, reassuringly.
"I felt quite sure it was," she cried, obviously comforted. "Because it came to me so inevitably. I was so
perfectly naturaland alonewhen I invented it. No one helped me."
"I assure you," reiterated the Prophet, "there is no doubt the name is absolutely and entirely idiotic."
"Thank you, dear Mr. Vivian! What a pleasure it is to talk to you! Under this name I have, for a year and a
half, led an idiotic life, such a life as really suits me, such a life as is in complete accord with my true nature.
Oh, the joy of it! The sense of freedom! If only all other silly girls who look sensible like me had the courage
to do what I have done!"
"It is a pity!" said the Prophet, in assent, beginning to be genuinely moved by the obvious sincerity of this
human being's bent towards folly. "But what have you done during this year and a half of truth and freedom?"
"More foolish things than many crowd into a lifetime," she cried ecstatically. "It would take me days to tell
you of half of them!"
"Oh, then you mustn't," said the Prophet, glancing furtively at the clock. "Had you come out to be silly
yesterday afternoon?"
"Yes, I hadto be sillier even than usual. And if it hadn't been for Sir Tiglath catching sight of me in the
avenue, and thenMr. Sagittarius and you being in the parlour"
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She stopped.
"By the way," she said, in her usual tone of breezy common sense, "were you living a double life in the
parlour?"
"I!" said the Prophet. "Oh, no, not at all. I never do anything of that kind."
"Sure?"
"Quite certain."
"You're not going to?"
"Certainly not. Nothing would induce me."
She looked at him, as if unconvinced, raising her dark, sensible eyebrows.
"All Jellybrand's clients do," she said. "And I'm certain Mr. Sagittarius"
"I assure you," said the Prophet, with the heavy earnestness of absolute insincerity, "Mr. Sagittarius is the
most single lived man I ever met, the very most. But why did Sir Tiglath, that is, why did you?"
"Try to avoid him? Well"
For the first time she hesitated, and began to look slightly confused.
"Well," she repeated, "Sir Tiglath is a very strange, peculiar old man."
The Prophet thought that if the young librarian had been present he would have eliminated the second
adjective.
"Peculiar! Yes, he is. His appearance, his manner"
"Oh, I don't mean that."
"No?"
"No. Lots of elderly men have purple faces, turned legs and roaring voices. You must know that. Sir Tiglath
is peculiar in this wayhe is quite elderly and yet he's not in the least little bit silly."
"Oh!"
"He's a thoroughly sensible old man, the only one I ever met."
"Your father?"
"The Chieftain can be very foolish at times. That's why he's always relied so on me."
She gave this proof triumphantly. The Prophet felt bound to accept it.
"Sir Tiglath is really, as an old man, what everybody thinks I am, as a young woman. D'you see?"
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"You mean?"
"The opposite of me. And in this way too. While I hide my silliness under my eyebrows, and hair, and smile,
and manner, he hides his sensibleness under his. When people meet me they always thinkwhat a
commonsense young woman! When they meet him they always thinkwhat a preposterous old man!"
"Well, but then," cried the Prophet, struck by a sudden idea, "if that is so, how can you live a double life as
Miss Minerva Partridge? You can't change your eyebrows with your name!"
"Ah, you don't know women!" she murmured. "No, but you see I begin at once."
"Begin?"
"Being silly. All the people who know me as Miss Partridge know I'm an absurd person in spite of my looks.
I've proved it to them by my actions. I've begun at once before they could have time to judge by my
appearance. I've told them instantly that I'm a Christian Scientist, and a believer in the value of tightlacing
and in ghosts, an anti vaccinator, a Fabian, a member of 'The Masculine Club,' a 'spirit,' a friend of
Mahatmas, an intimate of the 'Rational Dress' setyou know, who wear things like half inflated balloons in
Piccadillya vegetarian, a follower of Mrs. Besant, a drinker of hop bitters and Zozophine, a Jacobite, a
hater of false hair and of all collective action to stamp out hydrophobia, a stampcollector, an engager of
lady helps instead of servants, an amateur reciter and skirt dancer, an owner of a lock of Paderewski's
hairtorn fresh from the head personally at a concertan admirer of George Bernard Shaw as a thinker but
a hater of him as a humourist, a rationalist and reader of /Punch/, an atheist and tableturner, a friend of all
who think that women don't desire to be slaves, a homoeopathist and Sandowite, an enemy of babiesas if
all women didn’t worship them!a lover of catsas if all women didn't hate one another!a"
"Oneone moment!" gasped the Prophet at this juncture. "Many of these views are surely in opposition, in
direct opposition to each other."
"I daresay. That doesn't matter in the least to a real silly woman such as I am."
"And then you said that you proved by your actions instantly that"
"So I did. I caught up a happy dog in the street, cried over its agony, unmuzzled it and allowed it to add its
little contribution to the joy of life by mangling a passing archdeacon. I sat on the floor and handled snakes. I
wore my hair parted on one side and smoked a cigarette in a chiffon gown. I refused food in a public
restaurant because it had been cooked by a Frenchman. I"
"Enough! Enough!" cried the Prophet. "I understand. You forced Miss Partridge's acquaintances to believe in
Miss Partridge's folly. But who were these acquaintances?"
"It would take me hours to tell you. First there was"
"I really have to go at five."
"Then I'll finish about Sir Tiglath. He's an utterly sensible old man, and so is different from all other old men,
for you know human folly increases enormously with age. Isn't that lovely? Now, Mr. Vivian, Sir Tiglath
admires me."
"Ah!"
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"I know. You think that proves him the contrary of what I've said."
"Not at all!" exclaimed the Prophet, with frenzied courtesy, "not at all!"
"Yes, you do. But you're wrong. He doesn't exactly admire my character, but he likes me because I'm tall, and
have pleasant coloured eyes, and thick hair, and walk well, and know that he's really an unusually sensible
old man."
"Oh, is that it?"
"Yes. But now, if he could be made to think that I really am what I look likea thoroughly sensible young
woman, he would more than admire me, he would adore me."
"But if you wish him to?" asked the Prophet in blank amazement.
"I do."
"Why?"
"The Miss Minerva part of me desires it."
"Indeed."
"Yes. He's got to do one or two things for Miss Minerva without knowing that I'm Miss Minerva. That is why
I bolted into the parlour yesterday. Just as I was stepping into Jellybrand's I happened to see Sir Tiglath and
he happened to think he saw me."
"Only to think?"
"Yes. He is not certain. I saw that by the expression of his face. He was wondering whether I was meor is
it I?or not. I didn't give him time to be certain. I rushed into the parlour."
"You did."
"So it's all right. Frederick Smith would never betray a client."
"Really?"
"Never; so I'm saved. For Sir Tiglath isn't certain even now. I found that out on the way home with him last
night. And an old man who's uncertain of the truth can soon be made certain of the lie, by a young woman he
admires, however sensible he is. And now I'll tell you part of what I want Sir Tiglath to do for Miss
Minerva"
But at this moment the clock struck five, and the Prophet bounded up with hysterical activity, and hastily
took his leave, promising to call again and hear more on the following day.
"And tell more," thought Lady Enid to herself as the door of the sensiblelooking boudoir shut behind him.
CHAPTER VIII. THE PROPHET RECEIVES HIS DIRECTIONS FROM MADAME
When the Prophet reached his door he rang the bell with a rather faltering hand. Mr. Ferdinand appeared.
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"Any one called, Mr. Ferdinand?" asked the Prophet with an attempt at airy gaiety.
"Yes, sir," replied Mr. Ferdinand, looking rather like an elderly maiden lady when she unexpectedly
encounters her cook taking an airing with a corporal in the Life Guards, "the pair of persons you expected,
sir, has come."
The Prophet blushed.
"Oh! Youyou haven't disturbed Mrs. Merillia with them, I hope," he rejoined.
"No, sir, indeed. Gustavus said your orders was that they was to be shown quietly to the library."
"Exactly."
"I begged them to walk atiptoe, sir."
"What?" ejaculated the Prophet.
"I informed them there was illness in the house, sir."
"And did theyer?"
"The male person got on his toes at once, sir, but the female person shrieks out, 'Is it catching? Ho! Think
ofof Capericornopus,' sir, or something to that effect."
"Tch! Tch!"
"I took the liberty to say, sir, that ankles was not catching, and that I would certainly think of Capericornopus
if she would but walk a tiptoe."
"Well, and"
"By hook and cook I got them to the library, sir. But the male person's boots creaked awful. The getting on
his toes, sir seemed to induce it, as you might say."
"Yes, yes. So they're in the library?"
"They are, sir, and have been talking incessant, sir, ever since they was put there. We can hear their voices in
our hall, sir."
Mr. Ferdinand again pursed his lips and looked like an elderly lady. The Prophet could no longer meet his
eye.
"Bring some tea, Mr. Ferdinand, quietly to the library. Andand if Mrs. Merillia should ask for me say
I'msay I'm busyerwriting."
Mr. Ferdinand moved a step backward.
"Master Hennessey!" he cried in a choked voice. I, a London butler, and you ask me to!"
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"No, no. I beg your pardon, Mr. Ferdinand. Simply say I'm busy. That will be quite true. I shall bevery
busy."
"Yes, sir," said Mr. Ferdinand with a stern and at length successful effort to conquer his outraged feelings.
He wavered heavily away to fetch the tea, while the Prophet, like a guilty thing, stole towards the library.
When he drew near to the door he heard a somewhat resounding hubbub of conversation proceeding within
the chamber. He distinguished two voices. One was the hollow and sepulchral organ of Malkiel the Second,
the other was a heavy and authoritative contralto, of the buzzing variety, which occasionally gave an almost
professional clicksuggesting mechanismas the speaker passed from the lower to the upper register of
her voice. As the Prophet reached the mat outside the door he heard the contralto voice say,
"How are we to know it really is only ankles?"
The voice of Malkiel the Second replied plaintively,
"But the gentleman who opened the door and"
The contralto voice clicked, and passed to its upper register.
"You are over fifty years of age," it said with devastating compassion, "and you can still trust a gentleman
who opens doors! /O sanctum simplicitatus!/"
On hearing this sudden gush of classical erudition the Prophet must have been seized by a paralysing awe, for
he remained as if glued to the mat, and made no effort to open the door and step into the room.
"If I am sanctified, Sophronia," said the voice of Malkiel, "I cannot help it, indeed I can't. We are as we are."
"Did Bottom say so in his epics?" cried the contralto, contemptuously. "Did Shakespeare imply that when he
invented his immortal Bacon, or Carlyle, the great Cumberland sage, when he penned his worldfamed
'Sartus'?"
"P'r'aps not, my dear. You know best. Still, ordinary mennot that I, of course, can claim to be onemust
remain, to a certain extent, what they are."
"Then why was Samuel Smiles born?"
"What, my love?"
"Why, I say? Where is the use of effort? Of what benefit was Plato's existence to the republic? Of what
assistance has the great Tracy Tupper been if men must still, despite all his proverbs, remain what they are?
/O curum hominibus! O imitatori! Servus pecum!/"
At this point the voice of Mr. Ferdinand remarked in the small of the Prophet's back,
"Shall I set down the tea on the mat, sir, or"
The Prophet bounded into the library, tingling in every vein. His pantherlike entrance evidently took the two
conversationalists aback, for Malkiel the Second, who had been plaintively promenading about the room, still
on his toes according to the behest of Mr. Ferdinand, sat down violently on a small table as if he had been
shot, while the contralto voice, which had been sitting on a saddleback chair by the hearth, simultaneously
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bounced up; both these proceedings being carried out with the frantic promptitude characteristic of complete
and unhesitating terror.
"I beg your pardon!" said the Prophet. "I hope I haven't disturbed you."
Malkiel the Second leaned back, the contralto voice leaned forward, and both breathed convulsively.
"I really must apologise," continued the Prophet. "I fear I have startled you."
His guests swallowed nothing simultaneously and mechanically drew out their handkerchiefs. Then Malkiel
feebly got up and the contralto voice feebly sank down again.
"II thought I said sharp, sir," remarked Malkiel, at length, with a great effort recovering himself.
"Wasn't I sharp?" returned the Prophet. "Will you present me?"
"Are you equal to it, my love?" inquired Malkiel, tenderly, to the contralto voice.
The contralto voice nodded hysterically.
"Madame Sagittarius, sir," said Malkiel, turning proudly to the Prophet, "my wife, the mother of Corona and
Capricornus."
The Prophet bowed and the lady inclined herself, slightly protruding her elbows as she did so, as if just to
draw attention to the fact that she was possessed of those appendages and could use them if necessary.
Madame Malkiel, or rather Madame Sagittarius, as she must for the present be called, was a smallish woman
of some forty winters. Her hair, which was drawn away intellectually from an ample and decidedly convex
brow, was as black as a patent leather boot, and had a gloss upon it as of carefullyadjusted varnish. Her eyes
were very large, very dark and very prominent. Her features were obstreperous and rippling, running from
right to left, and her teeth, which were shaded by a tiny black moustache, gleamed in a manner that could
scarcely be called natural. She was attired in a black velvet gown trimmed with a very large quantity of
beadwork, a bonnet adorned with purple cherries, green tulips and orangecoloured ostrich tips, a pelisse, to
which bugles had been applied with no uncertain hand, and an opal necklace. Her gloves were of white, her
boots of black kid, the latter being furnished with elastic sides, and over her left wrist she carried a plush
reticule, whose mouth was kept shut by a tightlydrawn scarlet riband. On the left side of her pelisse reposed
a round bouquet of violets about the size of a Rugby football.
"I thought you might like to have some tea," began the Prophet, in his most soothing manner, while Mr.
Ferdinand, with pursed lips, softly arranged that beverage upon the seat which Mr. Sagittariusso we must
call himhad just vacated.
"Thank you," said Madame Sagittarius, with dignity. "It would be acceptable. The long journey from the
banks of the Mouse to these central districts is not without its fatigue. A beautiful equipage!"
"You said"
"You have a very fine equipage."
"You have seen the brougham?" said the Prophet, in some surprise.
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"What broom?" buzzed Madame Sagittarius.
"I thought you were admiring"
"The tea equipage."
"Oh, yes, to be sure. Queen Anne silver, yes."
"A great woman!" said Madame Sagittarius, spreading a silk handkerchief that exactly matched the ostrich
tips in her bonnet carefully over her velvet lap. "All who have read Mrs. Markham's work of genius with
understanding must hold her name in reverence. A noble creature! A pity she died!"
"A great pity indeed!"
"Still we must remember that /Mors omnis communibus/. We must not forget that."
"No, no."
"And after all it is the will of Providence. /Mors Deo/."
"Quite so."
During this classical and historical retrospect Mr. Ferdinand had finished his task and quitted the apartment.
As soon as he had gone Madame Sagittarius continued,
"As the mother of Corona and Capricornus I feel it my duty to ask you, sirthat is, Mr."
"Vivian."
"Mr. Vivian, whether the illness in your house is really only ankles as the gentleman who opened the door
assured me?"
"It is only that."
"Not catching?"
"Oh, dear, no."
"There, Sophronia!" said Mr. Sagittarius. "I told you it was merely the prophecy."
He suddenly assumed a formidable manner, and continued,
"And now, sir, that we are alone"
But Madame interrupted him.
"Kindly permit our host to succour my fatigue, Jupiter," she said severely. "I am greatly upset by the journey.
When I am restored we can proceed to business. At present I am fit only for consolation."
Mr. Sagittarius subsided, and the Prophet hastily assisted the victim of prolonged travel to some buttered
toast. Having also attended to the wants of her precipitate underling, he thought it a good opportunity to
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proceed to a full explanation with the august couple, and he therefore remarked, with an ingratiating and
almost tender smile,
"I think I ought to tell you at once that there will be no need for any further anxiety on your part. I have put
down my telescope and have well, in fact, I have decided once and for all to give up prophecy for the
future."
The Prophet, in his innocence, had expected that this declaration of policy would exercise a soothing
influence upon his guests, more especially when he addedit is to be feared with some insincerity,
"I have come to the conclusion that I overrated my powers, as amateurs will, you know, and that I have never
really possessed any special talent in that direction. I think I shall take up golf instead, or perhaps the motor
car."
He spoke deliberately in a lightminded, even frivolous, manner, toying airily with a sugar biscuit, as he
leaned back in his chair, which stood opposite to Madame Sagittarius's. To his great surprise his well
meaning remarks were received with every symptom of grave dissatisfaction by his illustrious companions.
Madame Sagittarius threw herself suddenly forward with a most vivacious snort, and her husband's face was
immediately overcast by a threatening gloom that seemed to portend some very disagreeable expression of
adverse humour.
"That won't do, sir, at this time of day!" he exclaimed. "You should have thought of that yesterday. That
won't do at all, will it, Madame?"
"/O miseris hominorum mentas/!" exclaimed that lady, tragically. "/O pectorae caecae/!"
"You hear her, sir?" continued Mr. Sagittarius. "You grasp her meaning?"
"I do hear certainly," said the Prophet, beginning to feel that he really must rub up his classics.
"She helps Capricornus, sir, of an evening. She assists him in his Latin. Madame is a lady of deep education,
sir."
"Quite so. But"
"There can be no going back, sir," continued Mr. Sagittarius. "Can there, Madame?"
"No human creature can go back," said Madame Sagittarius. "Such is the natural law as exemplified by the
great Charles Darwin in his /Vegetable Mould and Silkworms/. No human creature can go back. Least of all
this gentleman. He must go forward and we with him."
The Prophet began to feel uncomfortable.
"But" he said.
"There is no such word as 'but' in my dictionary," retorted the lady.
"Ah, an abridged edition, no doubt," said the Prophet. "Still"
"I am better now," interposed Madame Sagittarius, brushing some crumbs of toast from her pelisse with the
orange handkerchief. "Jupiter, if you are ready, we can explain the test to the gentleman."
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So saying she drew a vinaigrette, set with fine imitation carbuncles, from the plush reticule, and applied it
majestically to her nose. The Prophet grew really perturbed. He remembered his promise to his grandmother
and Sir Tiglath, and felt that he must assert himself more strongly.
"I assure you," he began, with some show of firmness, "no tests will be necessary. My telescope has already
been removed from its position, and"
"Then it must be reinstated, sir," said Mr. Sagittarius, "and this very night. Madame has hit upon a plan, sir,
of searching you to the quick. Trust a woman, sir, to do that."
"I should naturally trust Madame Sagittarius," said the Prophet, very politely. "But I really cannot"
"So you say, sir. Our business is to find out whether, living in the Berkeley Square as you do, you can bring
off a prophecy of any importance or not. The future of myself, Madame and family depends upon the results
of the experiments which we shall make upon you during the next few days."
The Prophet began to feel as if he were shut up alone with a couple of determined practitioners of vivisection.
"Let's see, my dear," continued Mr. Sagittarius, addressing his wife, "what was it to be?"
"The honored grandmother one," replied the lady, tersely.
The Prophet started.
"I cannot possibly consent" he began.
"Pray, Mr. Vivian, listen to me," interposed Madame Sagittarius.
"Pray, sir, attend to Madame!" said Mr. Sagittarius, sternly.
"But I must really"
"January," said Madame, "is a month of grave importance to grandmothers this year, is it not, Jupiter?"
"Yes, my dear. In consequence of Scorpio being in the sign of Sagittarius. The crab will be very busy up till
the third of February."
"Just so."
"At which date the little dog, my love, assumes the roll of maleficence towards the aged."
"I know. /Cane cavem/. When was the old lady born, Mr. Vivian, if you please?"
"What old lady?" stammered the Prophet, beginning to perspire.
"The old lady who's got ankles, your honoured grandmother?"
"On the twentieth of this month. But"
"At what time?"
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"Six in the morning. But"
"Under what star?"
"Saturn. But"
"That's lucky, isn't it, Jupiter?" said Madame, in an increasingly businesslike manner. "That brings her into
touch with the Camelopard doesn't it?"
"Into very close touch indeed, my dear, and also with the bull. He goes right to her, as you may say."
"I cannot conceivably permit" began the Prophet in much agitation.
But Madame, without taking the smallest notice of him, proceeded.
"Will the scorpion be round her on her birthday?"
"Close round her, my lovewith the serpent. They work together."
"Together, do they? You know what effect they'll have on her, don't you, Jupiter?"
"I should rather think so, my darling," replied Mr. Sagittarius, with an air of profound and sinister
information.
The Prophet's blood ran cold in his veins. Yet he felt for the moment unable to utter a syllable, or even to
make a gesture of protest. So entirely detached from him did the worthy couple appear to be, so completely
wrapped up in their own evidently wellconsidered and carefullylaid plans, that he had a sense of being in
another sphere, not theirs, of hearing their remarks from some distance off. Madame Sagittarius now turned
towards him in a formal manner, and continued.
"And now, Mr. Vivian, I shall have to lay down the procedure that you will follow. Have you a good
memoryno, a pencil and notebook will be best. /Litterae scriptus manetur/, as we all know full well. Have
you a pencil and?"
The Prophet nodded mechanically.
"Will you kindly get them?"
The Prophet rose, walked to his writing table and felt for the implements.
"If you will sit down now I will direct you," continued Madame, authoritatively.
The Prophet sat down at the table, holding a lead pencil upside down in one hand and an accountbook
wrong side up in the other.
"Let's seewhat's today?" inquired Madame, of her husband.
"The seventeenth, my dear," replied Mr. Sagittarius, looking at his wife with almost sickly adoration.
"To be sure. Capricornus's day for Homer's Idyl. Very well, Mr. Vivian, today being the seventeenth, and
the old lady's birthday the twentieth, you have three days, or rather nights, of steady work before you."
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"Steady work?" murmured the Prophet.
"What should be his hours, Jupiter?" continued Madame. "At what time of night is he to commence? Shall I
say nine?"
The Prophet remembered feebly that, during the next three nights, he had two important
dinnerengagements, a party at the Russian Ambassador's, and a reception at the Lord Chancellor's just
opposite. However, he made no remark. Somehow he felt that words were useless when confronted with such
an iron will as that of the lady in the pelisse.
"Nine would be too early, my dear," said Mr. Sagittarius. "Eleven p.m. would be more to the purpose."
"Eleven let it be then, punctually. Will you dot down, Mr. Vivian, that you have to be at the telescope to take
observations at eleven p.m. every night from now till the twentieth."
"But I have had the telesc"
"Kindly dot it down."
The Prophet dotted it down with the wrong end of the pencil on the wrong side of the accountbook.
"And what are his hours to be exactly, Jupiter?" continued Madame. "From eleven till dawn, I suppose?"
The Prophet shuddered.
"Eleven till three will be sufficient, my love. The crab, you know, has pretty well done his London work by
that time. And the old lady will have to depend very much on the crab for these few nights."
At this point the Prophet's brain began to swim. Sparks seemed to float before his eyes, and amid these
sparks, nebulous and fragmentary visions appeared, visions of his beloved grandmother companioned by
scorpions and serpents, in close touch with camelopards and bovine monsters, and, in the last stress of terror
and dismay, left entirely dependent upon crustaceans for that help and comfort which hitherto her devoted
grandson had ever been thankful to afford.
"Oh, very well," replied Madame. "You will be able to get to bed at three, Mr. Vivian. Dot that down."
"Thank you," murmured the Prophet, making a minute pencil scratch in the midst of a bill for butcher's meat.
"During these hoursbut you can tell him the rest, Jupiter."
So saying, and with an air of one retiring from business upon a well earned competence, Madame
Sagittarius lay back in her chair, settled her bonnetstrings, flicked a crumb from the football of violets that
decorated her left side, and, extending her kid boots towards the cheerful blaze that came from the fire, fell
with a sigh into a comfortable meditation. Mr. Sagittarius, on the other hand, assumed a look of rather
hectoring authority, and was about to utter what the Prophet had very little doubt was a command when there
came a gentle tap to the door.
"Come in," said the Prophet.
He thought he had spoken in his ordinary voice. In reality he had merely uttered a very small whisper. The
tap was repeated.
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"Louder, sir, louder!" said Mr. Sagittarius, encouragingly.
"Come in!" shrieked the Prophet.
Mr. Ferdinand appeared, looking more like the elderly spinster lady when confronted with the corporal in the
Life Guards than ever.
"If you please, sir, I was to tell you that Lady Enid Thistle is with Mrs. Merillia taking tea. Mrs. Merillia
thought you would wish to know."
Madame Sagittarius took the kid boots from the blaze on hearing this aristocratic name. Mr. Sagittarius
assumed a look of reverence, and the Prophet realised, more acutely than ever, that even wellborn young
women can be inquisitive.
"Very well," he said. "Say I'llI'll"he succeeded in making his voice sound absolutely firm"I'll come in
a moment."
"Yes, sir."
Mr. Ferdinand cast a glance of respectful, but unlimited, horror upon the Prophet's guests and retired, while
the Prophet, calling upon all his manhood, turned to Mr. Sagittarius.
"I regret more than I can say that I shall be obliged now to obey my grandmother's summons," he said
courteously. "Suppose we defer this this pleasant little discussion to some future oc"
"Impossible, sir!" cried Mr. Sagittarius. "Quite impossible. You must get to work tonight, and how can you
do it without your directions?"
"Oh, I can manage all right," said the Prophet, desperately. "I can give a guess as to"
"/Non sunt ad astrae mollibus a terrus viae/!" cried Madame. "The road from Berkeley square to the stars is
not so easy, is it, Jupiter?"
"No indeed, my love. Why"
"Then," exclaimed the Prophet, much agitated, and feeling it incumbent upon him to get rid of Mr. Sagittarius
at once lest the curiosity of Lady Enid should increase beyond all measure, and lead to an encounter between
the two clients of Jellybrand's, "then kindly give me my directions as briefly as possible, and"
There was another tap upon the door.
"What is it?" cried the Prophet, distractedly, "Come in!"
Mr. Ferdinand reentered very delicately.
"Her ladyship can only stay a minute, sir. Mrs. Merillia hopes you can leave your businessI said as you
was very busy, sirand come up to the drawingroom."
"Yes, yes. I'll come. Say I'll come, Mr. Ferdinand."
"Yes, sir."
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As the door closed the Prophet exclaimed excitedly,
"I fear I really must"
"Take down your directions, sir," broke in Mr. Sagittarius, firmly.
"Very well," rejoined the Prophet, desperately, seizing his pencil and the accountbook. "What are they?"
"You swear to follow them, sir?"
"Yes, yes, anythinganything!"
"Have you a star map?"
"Yesno!"
"You must get one."
"Very well."
"You had better do so at the Stores."
Madame breathed an almost sensuous sigh which caused her husband to glance tenderly towards her.
"I know, my love, I know," he said. "It may come some day."
"/O festum dies! Longa intervallam!/" she murmured, shaking her bonnet with the manner of a martyr to
duty.
Mr. Sagittarius was greatly moved.
"She's a saint," he whispered aside to the Prophet, as if imparting some necessary information.
"Certainly. Please go on!"
Mr. Sagittarius started, as if suddenly recalled to mundane matters.
"Get it at the Stores," he said. "In the astronomical department."
"Very well."
"Having done so, and keeping the old lady perpetually in your mind, you will place her in the claws of the
crab"
"What!"
"Mentally, sir, mentally, of course."
"Oh."
"And, allowing for the natural effect of the scorpion and serpent upon one of her venerable age"
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"Good Heavens!"
"When close round her, as they will bebut you will observe that for yourself"
The Prophet shut his eyes as one who refuses to behold sacrilege.
"You will trace the cycloidal curve of the planetscan you do that?"
The Prophet nodded.
"As it affects her birthday, the twentieth. Should the lynx be near her"
"No, no!" cried the Prophet. "It shall not be!"
"Well, you'll have to find that out and keep an eye to it. But should it be, you will commit to paper what
result its presence is likely to produce to her, and work the whole thing out clearly for myself and Madame on
paperin prophetic form, of courseso that we receive it bywhat post shall I say, my dear?"
"First post, Jupiter."
"First post onwhat day is the twentieth?"
"I don't know," replied the Prophet, helplessly.
"A Thursday," said Madame. "Capricornus's day for chronic sections."
"She always knows," said Mr. Sagittarius to the Prophet.
"Always."
"Very well then, first post Thursday morning. Now is that quite clear?"
"Oh, quite, quite."
"You will of course send the old lady's horoscope to us at the same time with full particulars."
"Full particulars?" said the Prophet. "What of?"
"Of her removal from the bottle, cutting of her first tooth, short coating, going into skirts, putting of the hair
up, day of marriage and widowhood, illnesses"
"Especially the rashes, Jupiter," struck in Madame.
"What a mind!" said Mr. Sagittarius aside to the Prophet.
"What!"
"Especially as Madame says, any illnesses taking the form of a rash the epidemic form, as I may sayand
so forth. We are to receive this document by the first post Thursday morning."
"Have you dotted all that down, Mr. Vivian?" inquired Madame.
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The Prophet hastily made a large variety of scratches with the lead pencil.
"And now," continued Mr. Sagittarius.
There was a third tap at the door.
"Come in," cried the Prophet, distractedly, and feeling as if homicidal mania were rapidly creeping upon him.
Mr. Ferdinand appeared once more, with a mouth like a purse.
"Her ladyship says she really must go in a moment, sir, andand Mrs. Merillia begs that"
"I am coming at once, Mr. Ferdinand. I swear it. Go upstairs and swear I swear it."
"Yes, sir."
Mr. Ferdinand departed, rather with the demeanour of an archbishop who has been inveigled into pledging
himself, on his archiepiscopal oath, to commit some horrid crime. The Prophet turned, almost violently,
towards his guests.
"I must go," he cried. "I must indeed. Pray forgive me. You see how I am circumstanced. Permit me to show
you to the door."
"You swear, sir, to carry out all our directions and to dot down"
"I do. I swear solemnly to dot downif you will onlythis way. Take care of the mat."
"We trust you, Mr. Vivian," said Madame, with majestic pathos. "A wife, a mother trusts you. /Placens uxus!
Mater familiaris/."
"I pledge my honour. This is theno, no, not that way, not that way!"
The worthy couple, by mistake, no doubt, were proceeding towards the grand staircase, having missed the
way to the hall door, and as the Prophet, following them up with almost unimaginable activity, drew near
enough to drum the right direction into their backs, Lady Enid became visible on the landing above. Mr.
Sagittarius perceived her.
"Why, it's Miss Minerv" he began.
"This way, this way!" cried the Prophet, wheeling them round and driving them, but always like a thorough
gentleman, towards the square.
"Then she leads a double life, too!" said Mr. Sagittarius, solemnly, fixing his strained eyes upon the Prophet.
"She? Who?" said Madame, sharply.
She had not seen Lady Enid.
"All of us, my love, all of us," returned her husband, as the Prophet succeeded in shepherding them on to the
pavement.
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"Goodbye," he cried.
With almost inconceivable rapidity he shut the door. As he did so two vague echoes seemed to faint on his
ear. One was male, a dreamlike "First post, Thursday!" The other was female, a fairylike"/Jactum alea
sunt/."
CHAPTER IX. THE PROPHET BEGINS TO CARRY OUT HIS DIRECTIONS
"Mr. Ferdinand," said the Prophet the same evening, after he had dressed for dinner, "what has become of the
telescope?"
He spoke in a low voice, not unlike that of a confirmed conspirator, and glanced rather furtively around him,
as if afraid of being overheard.
"I have removed it, sir, according to your orders," replied Mr. Ferdinand, also displaying some uneasiness.
"Yes, yes. Where have you placed it?"
"Well, sir, I understood you to say I might throw it in Piccadilly, if I so wished."
The Prophet suddenly displayed relief.
"I see. You have done so."
"Well, no, sir."
The Prophet's face fell.
"Then where is it?"
"Well, sir, for the moment I have set it in the butler's pantry."
"Indeed!"
"I thought it might be of use there, sir," continued Mr. Ferdinand, in some confusion, which, however, was
not noticed by the Prophet. "Of great use toto Gustavus and me inin our duties, sir."
"Quite so, quite so," returned the Prophet, abstractedly.
"Did you wish it to be taken to the drawingroom again, sir?"
The Prophet started.
"Certainly not," he said. "On no account. As you very rightly saya butler's pantry is the place for a
telescope. It can be of great service there."
His fervour surprised Mr. Ferdinand, who began to wonder whether, by any chance, his master knew of the
Lord Chancellor's agreeablelooking secondcook. After pausing a moment respectfully, Mr. Ferdinand was
about to decamp when the Prophet checked him with a gesture.
"One moment, Mr. Ferdinand!"
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"Sir?"
"One moment!"
Mr. Ferdinand stood still. The Prophet cleared his throat, arranged his tie, and then said, with an air of very
elaborate nonchalance,
"At what time do you generally go to bed, Mr. Ferdinand, when you don't sit up?"
"Sometimes at one time, sir, and sometimes at another."
"That's rather ambiguous."
"I beg pardon, sir."
"What is your usual hour for being quitethat is, entirely in bed."
"Entirely in bed, sir?"
Mr. Ferdinand's fine bass voice vibrated with surprise.
"Yes. Not partially in bed, but really and truly in bed?"
"Well, sir," returned Mr. Ferdinand, with decided dignity, "when I am in bed, sir, I am."
"And when's that?"
"By twelve, sir."
"I thought as much," cried the Prophet, with slightly theatrical solicitude. "You sit up too late, Mr.
Ferdinand."
"I hope, sir, that I"
"That's what makes you so pale, Mr. Ferdinand, and delicate."
"Delicate, sir!" cried Mr. Ferdinand, who had in fact been hopelessly robust from the cradle, totally incapable
of acquiring even the most universal complaints, and, moreover, miraculously exempt from that
wellrecognised affliction of the members of his profession so widely known as "butler's feet."
"Yes," said the Prophet, emphatically. "You should be in bed, thoroughly in bed, by a quarter to eleven. And
Gustavus too! He is young, and the young can't be too careful. Begin tonight, Mr. Ferdinand. I speak for
your health's sake, believe me."
So saying the Prophet hurried away, leaving Mr. Ferdinand almost as firmly rooted to the Turkey carpet with
surprise as if he had been woven into the pattern at birth, and never unpicked in later years.
At ten that evening the Prophet, having escaped early from his dinner on some extravagant plea of sudden
illness or second gaiety, stood in the small and sober passage of the celebrated Tintack Club and inquired
anxiously for Mr. Robert Green.
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"Yes, sir. Mr. Green is upstairs in the smokeroom," said the functionary whom the club grew under glass for
the benefit of the members and their friends.
"Sam, show this gentleman to Mr. Green."
Sam, who was a redfaced child in buttons, with a man's walk and the back of one who knew as much as
most people, obeyed this command, and ushered the Prophet into a room with a sealingwax red paper, in
which Robert Green was sitting alone, smoking a large cigar and glancing at the "stonybroke edition" of an
evening paper. He greeted the Prophet with his usual unaffected cordiality, offered him every drink that had
yet been invented, and, on his refusal of them all, handed him a cigar and a matchbox, and whistled
"Tararaboomdeav" at him in the most friendly manner possible.
"Bob," said the Prophet, taking a very long time to light the cigar, "what, in your opinion, is the exact
meaning of the term honour?"
Mr. Green's cheerful, though slightly belated, face assumed an expression of genial betwaddlement.
"Oh, well, Hen," he said, "exact meaning you know's not so easy. But hang it, we all understand the thing,
eh, without sticking it down in words. What?"
"I don't, Bob," rejoined the Prophet, in the tone of a man at odds with several consciences. "In what direction
does honour lie?"
"It don't lie at all, old chap," said Mr. Green, with the decided manner which had made him so universally
esteemed in yeomanry circles.
The Prophet began to look very much distressed.
"Look here, Bob, I'll put it in this way," he said. "Would an honourable man feel bound to keep a promise?"
"Rather."
"Yes, but would he feel bound to keep two promises?"
"Rather, if he'd made 'em."
"Suppose he had!"
"Go ahead, Hen, I'm supposing," said Mr. Green, beginning to pucker his brows and stare very hard indeed in
the endeavour to keep the supposition fixed firmly in his head.
"And, further, suppose that these two promises were diametrically opposed to one another."
Mr. Green stuck out one leg, looked obliquely at the carpet, pressed his lips together and nodded.
"So that if he fulfilled them both he'd have to break them both"
"Stop a sec! Gad, I've lost it! Start again, Hen!"
"No, I mean so that if he didn't break one he would be forced to break the other. Have you got that?"
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"Stop a bit! Don't believe I have. Let's see!"
He moved his lips silently, repeating the Prophet's words.
"Yes. I've got that all right now," he said, after three minutes of strenuous mental exertion.
"Well, what would you say of him?"
"That he was a damned fool."
The Prophet looked very much upset.
"No, no, Bob, I meant to him. What would you say to him?"
"That he was a damned fool."
The Prophet began to appear thoroughly broken down. However, he still stuck to his interpellation.
"Very well, Bob," he said, with unutterable resignationas of a toad beneath the harrow"but, putting all
that aside"
"Give us a chance, Hen! I've got to shunt all that, have I?"
"Yes, at least all you would say of, and to, the man."
"Oh, only that. Wait a bit! Yes, I've done that. Drive on now!"
"Putting all that aside, what should you advise the man to do?"
"Not to be such a damned fool again."
"No, no! I mean about the two promises?"
"What about 'em?"
"Which would his sense of honour compel him to keep?"
"I shouldn't think such a damned fool'd got a sense of honour."
The Prophet winced, but he stuck with feverish obstinacy to his point.
"Yes, Bob, he had."
"I don't believe it, Hen, 'pon my word I don't. You'll always find that damned f"
"Bob, I must beg you to take it from me. He had. Now which promise should he keep?"
"Who'd he made 'em to?"
"Who?" said the Prophet, wavering.
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"Yes."
"One toto a very near and dear relative, the other towell, Bob to two comparative strangers."
"What sort of strangers."
"The sort of strangers whowho live beside a river, and whowho mix principally withwell, in fact,
with architects and their wives."
"Rum sort of strangers?"
"They are decidedly."
"Oh, then, you know 'em?"
"That's not the point," exclaimed the Prophet, hastily. "The point is which promise is to be kept."
"I should say the one made to the relative. Wait a bit, though! Yes, I should say that."
The Prophet breathed a sigh of relief. But some dreadful sense of honesty within him compelled him to
add,
"I forgot to say that he'd pledged his honour to the architectsthat is, to the strangers who lived beside a
river."
"Whatand not pledged it to the relative?"
"Well, no."
"Then he ought to stick to the promise he'd pledged his honour over, of course. Nice for the relative! The
man's a damned fool, Hen. Do have a drink, old chap."
Thus did Mr. Robert Green drive the Prophet to take the first decisive step that was to lead to so many
complications,the step towards Mr. Ferdinand's pantry.
At precisely a quarter to eleven p.m. the Prophet stood upon his doorstep and, very gently indeed, inserted his
latchkey into the door. A shaded lamp was burning in the deserted hall, where profound silence reigned.
Clear was the night and starry. As the Prophet turned to close the door he perceived the busy crab, and the
thought of his beloved grandmother, sinking now to rest on the second floor all unconscious of the
propinquity of the scorpion, the contiguity of the serpent, filled his expressive eyes with tears. He shut the
door, stood in the hall and listened. He heard a chair crack, the ticking of a clock. There was no other sound,
and he felt certain that Mr. Ferdinand and Gustavus had heeded his anxious medical directions and gone
entirely to bed betimes, leaving the butler's pantry free for the nocturnal operations of the victim of Madame.
For he recognised that she was the guiding spirit of the family that dwelt beside the Mouse. He might have
escaped out of the snare of Mr. Sagittarius, but Madame was a fowler who would hold him fast till she had
satisfied herself once and for all whether it were indeed possible to dwell in the central districts, within reach
of the Army and Navy heaven in Victoria Street, and yet remain a prophet. Yes, he must now work for the
information of her ambitious soul. He sighed deeply and went softly up the stairs. His chamber was on the
same floor as Mrs. Merillia's, and, as he neared her door, he rose instinctively upon his toes and, grasping the
tails of his evening coat firmly with his left hand, to prevent any chance rustling of their satin lining, and
bearing his George the Third silver candlestick steadily to control any clattering of its extinguisher, he moved
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on rather like a thief who was also a trained ballerina, holding his breath and pressing his lips together in a
supreme agony of dumbness.
Unluckily he tripped in the raised pattern of the carpet, the candlestick uttered a silver note, his pentin
breath escaped with a loud gulp, and Mrs. Merillia's delicate voice cried out from behind her shut door,
"Hennessey! Hennessey!"
The Prophet bit his lip and went at once into her room.
Mrs. Merillia looked simply charming in bed, with her long and elegant head shaded by a beautiful muslin
helmet trimmed with lace, and a delicious embroidered wrapper round her shoulders. The Prophet stood
beside her, shading the candleflame with his hand.
"Well, grannie, dear," he said, "what is it? You ought to be asleep."
"I never sleep before twelve. Have you had a pleasant dinner?"
"Very. Stanyer Phelps, the American, was there and very witty. And we had a marvellous /supreme de
volaille/. Everybody asked after you."
Mrs. Merillia nodded, like an accustomed queen who receives her due. She knew very well that she was the
most popular old woman in London, knew it too well to think about it.
"Well, goodnight, grannie."
The Prophet bent to kiss her, his heart filled with compunction at the thought of the promise he was about to
break. It seemed to him almost more than sacrilegious to make of this dear and honoured ornament of old age
a vehicle for the satisfaction of the vulgar ambitions and disagreeable curiosity of the couple who dwelt
beside the Mouse.
"Goodnight, my dear boy."
She kissed him, then added,
"You like Lady Enid, don't you?"
"Very much."
"So does Robert Green. He thinks her such a thoroughly sensible girl."
"Bob! Does he?" said the Prophet, concealing a slight smile.
"Yes. If you want her to get on with you, Hennessey, you should come up to tea when she is here."
"I couldn't today, grannie."
"You were really busy?"
"Very busy indeed."
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"I suppose you only saw her for a moment on the stairs?"
"That was all."
It was true, for Lady Enid had scarcely stayed to speak to the Prophet, having hurried out in the hope of
discovering who were the "two parties" he had been entertaining on the ground floor.
Mrs. Merillia dropped the subject.
"Goodnight, Hennessey," she said. "Go to bed at once. You look quite tired. I am so thankful you have
given up that horrible astronomy."
The Prophet did not reply, but, as he went out of the room, he knew, for the first time, what criminals with
consciences feel like when they are engaged in following their dread profession.
As he walked across the landing he heard a clock strike eleven. He started, hastened into his room, tore off
his coat, replaced it with a quilted smokingjacket, sprang lightly to his table, seized a planisphere, or
starmap, which he had succeeded in obtaining that night from a small working astronomer's shop in the
Edgeware Road, and, mindful of the terms of his oath and the decided opinion of Robert Green, scurried
hastily, but very gingerly, down the stairs. This time Mrs. Merillia did not hear him. She had indeed become
absorbed in a new romance, written by a very rising young Montenegrin who was just then making some stir
in the literary circles of the elect.
Very surreptitiously the Prophet tripped across the hall and reached the stout door which gave access to the
servants' quarters. But here he paused. Although he had lived in Mrs. Merillia's most comfortable home for at
least fifteen years, he had actually never once penetrated beyond this door. It had never occurred to him to do
so. Often he had approached it. Quite recently, when Mrs. Fancy Quinglet had broken into tears on the refusal
of Sir Tiglath Butt to burst according to her prediction, he had handed her to this very portal. But he had
never passed through it, nor did he know what lay beyond. No doubt there was a kitchen, very probably the
mysterious region of watery activities commonly known as a scullery, quite certainly a butler's pantry. But
where each separate sanctum lay, and what should be the physiognomy of each one the Prophet had not the
vaguest idea. As he turned the handle of the door he felt like Sir Henry Stanley, when that intrepid explorer
first set foot among the leafy habitations of the dwarfs.
As the door opened the Prophet found himself in a large apartment whose walls were decorated with the
efforts of those great painters who feed the sentimental imaginations of the masses in the beautiful Christmas
numbers of our artistic day. Enchanting little girls and exceedingly human dogs observed his entrance from
every hand, while such penetrating and suggestive legends as "Don't bite!" "Mustn't!" "Naughty!" "Would
'ums?" and the like, filled his mind with the lofty thoughts so suitable to the Christmas season. Over the
mantelpiece was a /Cook's Almanac for the Home/, decorated in bright colours, a /Butler's own book/, bound
in claretcoloured linen, and a large framed photograph of Francatelli, that immortal /chef/ whose memory is
kept green in so many kitchens, and whose recipes are still followed as are followed the footprints of the
great ones in the Everlasting Sands of Time. One corner of the room Gustavus had made his own, and here
might be seen his tasteful whatnot and his little libraryneatly arranged unabridged farthing editions of
Drummond's /Ascent of Man/, Mill's /Liberty/, Crampton's /Origin of SelfRespect/, Barlow's /A
Philosophical Examination into the Art and Practice of Tipping and Receiving Tips/, and other volumes
suitable for an intellectual footman's reading. An eightday clock, which was carefully and lovingly wound
up by the prudent Mrs. Fancy Quinglet every morning and evening, snored peacefully in a recess by the
hearth, and, from a crevice near the window, the bright, intelligent eyes of a couple of welldeveloped
blackbeetlesmother and soncontentedly surveyed the cheerful scene.
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The Prophet, after a moment's pause of contemplation, passed on through a swing door, covered with green
baize, and down some stairs to the inner courts of this interesting region. This time he came to anchor in a
room which, he thought, might well have been a butler's pantry had it contained a largesized telescope. It
was in fact the parlour set apart for the use of the kitchen and scullery maids, and was brightly fitted up with a
dresser, a cupboard for skewers, a rollingpin, a basting machine, and other similar adjuncts. It gave on to the
kitchen, in which the cat of the house was enjoying wellearned slumber in the attitude of a black ball. So far
his exploring tour had quite fulfilled the rather vague expectations of the Prophet, but he now began to feel
anxious. Time was passing on and he had sworn to be at the telescope by eleven sharp. He had, therefore,
already slightly fractured his oath, and he had no desire to earn the anathema of all such men as Robert Green
by breaking it into small pieces. Where was the butler's pantry? He glanced eagerly round the kitchen,
perceived a door, passed through it, and found himself confronted by a sink. He had gained the scullery, but
not his goal. To the right of the sink was yet another door through which the Prophet, who carried the
planisphere in one hand, the George the Third candlestick in the other, rather excitedly debouched into a
goodsized passage. As he did so he heard the muffled alto voice of the eightday clock proclaim that it was
a quarterpast eleven. Feeling that he was now upon the point of breaking both the promises of the damned
fool, the Prophet hastened along the passage, darted through the first outlet, and found himself abruptly face
to back with what appeared at first glance to be an enormously broad and bowlegged dwarf, with a bald
head and a black tail coat, which, in an attitude of savage curiosity, was gazing through a gigantic instrument,
whose muzzle projected from an open window into a spacious area. So great was the Prophet's surprise, so
supreme the shock to his whole nervous system occasioned by this unexpected encounter, that he did not utter
a cry. His amazement carried him into that terrible region which lies beyond the realms of speech. He simply
stood quite still and gazed at the bowlegged dwarf, which, in its turn, continued to gaze savagely through
the gigantic instrument into the area. Not for perhaps three or four minutes did the Prophet realise that this
dwarf was merely an ingeniously shortened form of Mr. Ferdinand, who, with his legs very wide apart, and
making two accurate right angles at their respective kneejoints, his head thrown well back, and his arms
arranged in two perfect capital V's, with the elbows pointing directly at the walls on either side of him, had
been busily engaged for the last hour and a quarter in trying to focus firstly the Lord Chancellor's house on
the opposite side of the square, and secondly the pleasantlooking second cook in it. That his chivalrous
efforts had not yet been crowned with complete success will be understood when we say that he had seen
during his first halfhour of contemplation nothing at all, during his second halfhour the lefthand top star
of the Great Bear, and finally the fourth spike from the end of the iron railing which enclosed the square
garden, at which he had been gazing closely for precisely fifteen minutes and a half when the Prophet darted
into the pantry.
Having at length recovered from his shock of surprise sufficiently to realise that the enormous and immobile
dwarf was Mr. Ferdinand, and that Mr. Ferdinand was not yet aware of his presence, the Prophet resolved to
beat a rapid and noiseless retreat. He carried this resolve into execution by turning sharply round, knocking
his head against a plate chest, firing the George the Third candlestick into the passage, and letting the
planisphere go into the china jar of "Butler's own special pomade" which Mr. Ferdinand kept always open for
use upon the pantry table.
To say that Mr. Ferdinand ceased from looking through the telescope for the Lord Chancellor's secondcook
at this juncture would, perhaps, not convey quite a fair idea of the activity which he could on occasion display
even at his somewhat advanced age. It might be more just to state that, without wasting any precious time in
useless elongation, he described an exceedingly rapid circular movement, still preserving the shortened form
of himself which had so deceived and startled his master, and brought his eye from the orifice of the
telescope to a level with the Prophet's knees exactly at the moment when the Prophet rebounded from the
plate chest into the centre of the apartment.
"Oh, is it you, Mr. Ferdinand?" said the Prophet, controlling every symptom of anguish, with the exception of
a rapid flutter of the eyelids. "I was looking forfor a bradawl."
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The Prophet's choice of this useful little implement as the reason for his presence in Mr. Ferdinand's special
sanctum was prompted by the fact that, just as he was speaking, he happened to see a bradawl lying upon a
neighbouring knife cupboard in the company of a corkscrew.
"And here, I see, is just what I want," he added calmly.
So far he had displayed extraordinary composure, but at this point he made a slight mistake, for he picked up
the corkscrew and sauntered quietly away with it into the darkness, leaving Mr. Ferdinand still in the attitude
of a Toby jug, the planisphere still head downwards in the butler's own special pomade, and the George the
Third candlestick stretched at full length upon the passage floor.
CHAPTER X. THE PROPHET AND MALKIEL THE SECOND CONVERSE BY TELEGRAM
"Hennessey Vivian, 1000 Berkeley Square, W.
"Please wire result of last night's observations from eleven till three inclusive.Sagittarius."
"Jupiter Sagittarius, Sagittarius Lodge, Crampton St. Peter, N.
"Impossible wire result, will write at length after taking further observations tonight.Vivian."
"Certainly write at length, but meanwhile wire all important results in condensed form.Sagittarius."
"Results not sufficiently important to wire, letter without fail tomorrow.Vivian."
"Never mind unimportance, wire whatever results obtained. Sagittarius."
"On consideration think results too important to wire, will explain by letter.Vivian."
"Your second and third wires in direct contradiction; kindly reconcile opposing statements.Sagittarius."
"Cannot reconcile by wire, will do so by letter.Vivian."
"Then meanwhile request forecast of grandmother so far as gathered last night.Sagittarius."
"Quite impossible discuss grandmother by wire.Vivian."
"Not at all; couch in careful terms, shall understand; no need put grandmother's name.Sagittarius."
"Quite impossible; grandmother too sacred for treatment by wire, long and full letter tomorrow.Vivian."
"Absurd! Call her Harry and wire her future as obtained last night; shall understand.Sagittarius."
"Cannot possibly consent call grandmother Harry; pray cease; succession of telegraph boys to house
attracting general attention in square.Vivian."
"Must insist; then call her Susan and wire.Sagittarius."
"Cannot possibly consent to call her Susan; discussion of such matter by wire not decent; regret must
absolutely decline. Vivian."
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"Madame and self insulted by accusation not decent; demand explanation and apology.Sagittarius."
"Regret; no desire give pain to lady, but this must cease; grandmother and square seriously upset by
procession of telegraph boys.Vivian."
"Cannot help square and grandmother; must have last night's result to compare with own observation of
grandmother with crab and scorpion.Sagittarius."
"Pray cease; would rather die than discuss grandmother with crab and scorpion by wire.Vivian."
"Rubbish! Call crab Susan, scorpion Jane, grandmother Harry, and wire; absolutely insist.Sagittarius."
"Absolutely decline discuss crab, scorpion and grandmother by wire; final.Vivian.
"Scandalous! not behaviour of gentleman; Madame cut to heart; infamous.Sagittarius."
"Mater familiaris pallidibus ira.Madame Sagittarius."
"If receive no reply as to grandmother and crab, et cetera, shall start at once for Square.Jupiter and
Madame Sagittarius."
"On no account trouble come up; going out immediately; important engagement.Vivian."
"Madame putting on boots.Sagittarius."
"Utterly useless put on boots; leaving house.Vivian."
"Madame boots on; tying bonnet.Sagittarius."
"Totally useless tie bonnet; absolutely forced leave house. Vivian."
"Madame in pelisse; shall come in wait till your return. Sagittarius."
"Regret pelisse; quite useless; out till late evening.Vivian."
"Shall stay till whatever hour; have on hat and bonnet now; starting.Jupiter and Madame Sagittarius."
"For Heaven's sake don't; will wire whatever you wish.Vivian."
"Don't. Ankles perhaps catching; dangerous Capricornus.Vivian."
"Have you started?Vivian."
"Have not started, but at threshold of door; wire full explanation of crab with grandmother, et cetera, last
night or shall start instanter.Jupiter and Madame Sagittarius."
"Truth is very little result last night; did not see crab with grandmother; deeply regret.Vivian."
"Then wire result of scorpion with grandmother.Sagittarius."
"Very sorry did not see scorpion with grandmother.Vivian."
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"Impossible; believe stars out; clear sky; self and Madame distinctly observed crab and scorpion with
grandmother for four hours.Sagittarius."
"On honour did not see crab, scorpion or grandmother.Vivian."
"Then has grandmother passed over?Sagittarius."
"Certainly not, but no result; pray cease discussion, grandmother and square distracted by incessant uproar of
boys at door. Vivian."
"Leaving house; with you as soon as possible.Jupiter and Madame Sagittarius."
"Heaven's sake don't; tell truth; did not look through telescope at all last night.Vivian."
"What meaning of this swore oath broken; no gentleman; coming at once for explanation.Jupiter and
Madame Sagittarius."
"Stop; sending boy messenger with full explanation; severe accident last night, injured head, so unable look
for crab, grandmother and scorpion.Vivian."
"Astounded, upset, Madame says not conduct gentleman; might have seen crab, grandmother and scorpion
with injured head; mere excuse caput mortuus decrepitum cancer.Sagittarius."
"Pray excuse; look tonight without fail; Heaven's sake cease writing; grandmother and whole square
amazement, confusion; shall go mad if continues.Vivian."
"Very well, but insist on full letter; confidence in oath much shaken; wires most shifty; gross neglect of crab,
grandmother and scorpion.Sagittarius."
"Homo miserum sed magnum est veritatus et praevalebetur.Madame Sagittarius."
CHAPTER XI. MISS MINERVA OPENS HER BOOK OF REVELATION IN A CAB
"Assure the Lord Chancellor that the last boy has been and gonegone away, that is, Mr. Ferdinand, and
that I pledge my sacred word not to have another telegram today."
"Yes, sir. His lordship desired that you should be informed that, according to the law regulating public
abominations and intolerable street noises, you was liable to"
"I know, I know."
"And that, by the Act dealing with gross offences against the public order and scandalous crimes against the
peace of metropolitan communities, you was amenable"
"Exactly. Go to his lordship and swear"
"I couldn't do that so soon again, sir, really. I swore only as short ago as yesterday, sir, by your express order,
but"
"I mean asseverate to his lordship that the very last boy has knocked for the very last time."
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"It wasn't so much the knocking, sir, his lordship complained of, as the boys coming to the door meeting the
boys going away from it, and blocking up the pavement, sir, so that no one could get past and"
"Yes, yes. Go and asseverate at once, Mr. Ferdinand."
"Very well, sir. And Her Grace, the Duchess of Camberwell, who is passing from one fit to another, sir, from
fright at the uproar and telegrams going to the wrong house, sir?"
"Implore Her Grace to have courage and to trust me as a gentleman when I promise solemnly that the
knocking shall not be renewed."
"Very well, sir."
"Mr. Ferdinand!"
"Sir?"
"Have the knockers swathed in cottonwool at once."
"Yes, sir,"
"Andfix a bulletin on the door. Wait! I'll write it."
The Prophet hastened to his writing table and, with a hand that trembled violently, wrote on a card as
follows:
"Owner of this house seriously ill, pray do not knock or /death/ shall certainly ensue."
"There! Poor grannie will have peace now. Nail that up, Mr. Ferdinand, under the cottonwool."
"Very well, sir. Mrs. Merillia, sir, would be glad to speak to you for a moment. You remember I informed
you?"
"I'll go to her at once. But first bring me a glass of brandy, Mr. Ferdinand. I'm feeling extremely unwell."
And the Prophet, who was paler far than ashes, and beaded from top to toe with perspiration, sank down
feebly upon a chair and let his head drop on the blottingpad that lay on his writingtable.
When he had swallowed an inch or two of cognac he got up, pulled himself together with both hands, and
walked, like an elderly person afflicted with incipient locomotor ataxy, upstairs into the drawing room
where Mrs. Merillia was lying on a sofa, ministered to by Fancy Quinglet, who, at the moment of his
entrance, was busily engaged in stuffing a large wad of cottonwool into the right ear of her beloved
mistress.
"Leave us please, Fancy," said Mrs. Merillia, in a voice that sounded much older than usual. "And as your
head is so bad, too, you had better lie down."
"Thank you, ma'am. If I keep upright, ma'am, I feel my head will split asunder. I can't speak different nor feel
other."
"Then don't be upright."
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"No, ma'am. Them that feels other, let them declare it!" and Mrs. Fancy retired, holding both hands to her
temples, and uttering very distinctly sundry stifled moans.
Mrs. Merillia motioned the Prophet to a chair, and, after lying quite still for about five minutes with her eyes
tightly shut, said in a weak tone of voice,
"How many more telegrams do you expect, Hennessey? You have had twenty seven within the last three
hours. Can you give me a rough general idea of the average number you anticipate will probably arrive every
hour from now till the offices close?"
"Grannie, grannie, forgive me! I assure you"
"Don't be afraid to tell me, Hennessey. It is much better to know the worst, and fact it bravely. Will the
present average be merely sustained, or do you expect the quantity to increase towards night? because if
so"
"Grannie, there will be no more. I swear to you solemnly that I will not have another telegram today. I will
not upon my sacred honour. Nothingnot wild horses evenshall induce me."
"Horses! Then were they racing tips, Hennessey? Yes, give me the /eau de Cologne/ and fan me gently. Were
they racing tips?"
"Oh, grannie, how could you suppose"
At this moment Mr. Ferdinand entered softly and went up to Mrs. Merillia.
"Mr. Q. Elisha Hubsbee, ma'am. He is deeply distressed and asks for news . . ."
"The Central American Ambassador's grandfather," said Mrs. Merillia, reading the card which Mr. Ferdinand
handed to her.
"Shocked to hear you are so ill that a knock will finish you. Guess you must be far gone. Earnest sympathy.
Have you tried patent morphia molasses?
Q. E. H."
"Ah! how things get about! Tell Mr. Elisha Hubsbee the knocks have nearly killed us all, Mr. Ferdinand, but
we are bearing up as well as can be expected. If necessary we will certainly try the molasses."
"Yes, ma'am."
"It is two o'clock now, Hennessey. The Charing Cross office is open till midnight, I believe, so at the present
rate you should only have about ninety more telegrams today. But if you have reason to expect"
Mr. Ferdinand reentered.
"Mrs. Hendrick Marshall has called, ma'am. She desired me to say she was passing the door and was much
horrified to find that you are so near the point, ma'am."
"What point, Mr. Ferdinand?"
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"Of death, ma'am. She had no idea at all, ma'am."
"Oh, thank Mrs. Hendrick Marshall, Mr. Ferdinand, and say we shall try to keep from the point for the
present.
"Yes, ma'am."
"That the numbers will go up as the afternoon draws on, Hennessey"
"Grannie, haven't I sworn, and have you ever known me to tell you a"
Suddenly the Prophet stopped short, thinking how that very night he would be forced by his oath to "Madame
and self" to break his promise to his grandmother, how already it would have been broken had not Mr.
Ferdinand on the previous night been in possession of the telescope.
"The Chancellor of the Exchequer, ma'am, desires his compliments, and he begs you to last out, if possible,
till he has fetched Sir William Broadbent to see you. He is going there on his bike, ma'am, and had no
conception you was dying till he knew it this moment, ma'am."
"Thank the Chancellor, Mr. Ferdinand, and say that though we must all go out some day I have no desire for
a dissolution at present, and shall do my best to prove myself worthy of my constitution."
"Yes, ma'am."
Mr. Ferdinand retired, brushing away a tear.
"It would not be feasible, I suppose, Hennessey, to station Gustavus permanently at the telegraph office with
a small hamper, so that he might collect the wires in it as they arrive and convey them here, once an hour or
so, entering by the area door. I thought perhaps that might obviate"
Mr. Ferdinand once more appeared, looking very puffy about the eyes.
"If you please, ma'am, Laady Julia Posostlethwaite is below, and asks wheether you are truly going
ma'am?"
"Going? Where to, Mr. Ferdinand?"
"The other plaace, ma'am. Her ladyship is crying something terrible, ma'am, and says, till she
nononoticed the fact she had nono notion you was leaving us so soon, ma'am."
Here Mr. Ferdinand uttered a very strange and heartrending sound that was rather like the bark of a dog with
a bad cold in its head.
"It is really very odd so many people finding out so soon!" said Mrs. Merillia in some surprise. "Tell her
ladyship, Mr. Ferdinand, that"
But at this moment there was the sound of feet on the stairs, and Lady Enid Thistle hurried into the room,
closely followed by Mr. Robert Green. Lady Enid went up at once to Mrs. Merillia.
"I am so shocked and distressed to see your news, dear Mrs. Merillia," she cried affectionately. "But," she
added, with much inquisitiveness, "is it really true that if anyone tapped on the door you would certainly die?
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How can you be so sure of yourself."
"What do you mean? Ah, Mr. Green, how d'you do? See my news!"
"Yes, written up on the front door. Everyone's shocked."
"Rather!" said Mr. Green, gazing at Mrs. Merillia with confused mournfulness. "One doesn't see death on a
front door every day, don't you know, in big round hand too, and then one of those modern words."
"Death on the front door in big round hand!" said Mrs. Merillia in the greatest perplexity.
"I put it there, grannie," said the Prophet, humbly. "I wrote that if another boy knocked, death would certainly
ensue."
"Ensue. That's it. I knew it was one of those modern words," said Mr. Green.
"Another boy?" said Lady Enid. "Why should another boy knock?"
"Hennessey receives about nine telegrams an hour," answered Mrs. Merillia.
"Really!"
Lady Enid looked at him with keen interest, while Mrs. Merillia continued,
"You had better take death off the door now, Mr. Ferdinand. I feel more myself. Please thank her ladyship
and tell her so."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Nine telegrams an hour!" repeated Lady Enid. "Mr. Vivian, would you mind just seeing me as far as Hill
Street? Bob has to go to Tattersall's."
"Have I, Niddy?" asked Mr. Green, with evident surprise.
"Yes, to pick up a polo pony. Don't you recollect?"
"A polo pony, was it? By Jove!"
"I will come with pleasure," said the poor Prophet, who felt fit only to lie down quietly in his grave. "If you
don't mind being left, grannie?"
Mrs. Merillia was looking pleased.
"No, no. Go with Lady Enid, my dear boy. If any telegrams come shall I open"
"No," cried the Prophet, with sudden fierce energy. "For mercy's sake I mean, grannie, dear; that none will
come. If they should"his ordinary gentle eyes flamed almost furiously"Mr. Ferdinand is to burn them
unreadyes, to ashes. I will tell him." And he escorted Lady Enid tumultuously downstairs, missing his
footing at every second step.
In the square they parted from Mr. Green, who said,
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"Goodbye, Niddy, old girl. What do I want to pick up at Tattersall's?"
"A polo pony, Bob," she answered firmly.
"Oh, a polo pony. Thanks, Chin, chin, Hen. Polo pony is it?"
He strode off, whistling "She wore a wreath of roses" in a puzzled manner, but still preserving the accepted
demeanour of a bulwark.
As soon as Mr. Green was out of sight Lady Enid said,
"We aren't going to Hill Street."
"Aren't we?" replied the Prophet, feebly.
"No. I must see Sir Tiglath Butt today. I want you to take me to his door."
"Where is his door?"
"In Kensington Square. Do you mind hailing a fourwheeler. We can talk privately there. No one will hear
us."
The Prophet hailed a growler, wondering whether they would be able to hear each other. As they got in Lady
Enid, after giving the direction, said to the cabman, who was a short person, with curling ebon whiskers, a
brokenup expression and a brokendown manner:
"Drive slowly, please and I'll give you an extra sixpence."
"Lydy?"
"Drive slowly, and I'll give you another sixpence."
"How did yer think I was gawing to drive, lydy?"
"I wonder why cabmen are always so interested in one's inmost thoughts," said Lady Enid, as the horse fell
down preparatory to starting.
"I wonder."
"I hope he will go slowly."
"He seems to be doing so."
At this point the horse, after knocking on the front of the cab with his hind feet ten or a dozen times, got up,
hung his head, and drew a large number of deep and dejected breaths.
"Am I gawing slowly enough, lydy?" asked the cabman, anxiously.
"Yes, but you can let him trot along now."
"Right, lydy, I ain't preventing of him."
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As eventually they scrambled slowly forward in the Kensington direction, Lady Enid remarked,
"Why don't you have them sent to Jellybrand's?"
"Have what?" asked the Prophet.
"Your telegrams. The messages from your double life. I do."
"But I assure you"
"Mr. Vivian, it's useless really. I find you hidden away in the inner room of Jellybrand's with Mr. Sagittarius,
closely guarded by Frederick Smith; fourpenny champagne"
"Four bobshilling, I mean."
"Oh, was it?Upon the table. After I've been poisoned, and we are leaving, Mr. Sagittarius calls after you
such expressions as 'Banks of the Mousehear from memarrowarchitects and the last day.' You are
obviously agitated by these expressions. We reach your house. I find you have been prophesying through a
telescope. The name of Malkiela wellknown prophetis mentioned. You turn pale and glance at me
imploringly, as if to solicit my silence. I am silent. The next day you announce that you are going to have two
afternoon parties."
"No, no, not afternoon! I never said afternoon!" interposed the Prophet, frantically, as the horse fell down
again in order to earn the extra sixpence.
"Well, two parties in the afternoon. It's the same thing. You say they are odd. You yourself acknowledge it.
You tell me you have secrets."
"Did I?"
"Yes. When I said I had guessed your secret you replied, 'Which one?' "
"Oh!" murmured the Prophet, trying not to say "come in!" to the horse, which was again knocking with both
feet upon the front of the cab.
"You go home. I call during the afternoon, and find that you are entertaining all your guests in your own little
room and that your grandmother knows nothing of it and believes you to be working. As I am leaving I see
the backs of two of your guests. One is a pelisse, the other a spotted collar. As I near them they mount into a
purple omnibus on which is printed in huge letters, /'To the "Pork Butcher's Rest" '/"
"No! No!" ejaculated the Prophet, pale with horror at this revelation.
"/Rest/, Crampton Vale, N. I lose them in the shadows. The next day I call and find your grandmother is
dying from the noise made by boys bringing you private telegrams. And then you tell me, meMinerva
Partridgethat you have no double life! Yes, you can let him get up now, please."
The cabman permitted the horse to do so and they again struggled funereally forward. The Prophet was still
very pale.
"I suppose it is useless tovery well," he said. "My life is double."
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"Ah!"
"But only lately, quite lately."
"Never mind that. Oh! How glad I am that you have had the courage too! You will soon get into it, as I did.
But you should have all your telegrams and so forth directed to Jellybrand's."
"It's too late," replied the Prophet, dejectedly. "Too late. I do wish that horse wouldn't fall down so
continually! It's most monotonous."
"The poor man naturally wants the extra sixpence. I think I shall give him a shilling. But now who is Mr.
Sagittarius?"
"Who is he?"
"Yes. I've seen him several times at Jellybrand's, and when I first met him I though he was an outside
broker."
"You! Was it on the pier at Margate?"
"Certainly not! Really, Mr. Vivian! even in my double life I occasionally draw the line."
"I beg your pardon. Ithe horse confuses me."
"Well, he's stopped knocking now and will be up in another minute. Who did you say Mr. Sagittarius was?"
"I didn't say he was anybody, but he's a man."
"I'd guessed that."
"And an acquaintance of mine."
"Yes?"
"I'm afraid it's going to rain."
"It generally does in Knightsbridge. Yes?"
"Is Sir Tiglath likely to be in?"
"He knows I'm coming. Well, you haven't told me who Mr. Sagittarius is."
"Lady Enid," said the Prophet, desperately, "I know very little of Mr. Sagittarius beyond the fact that he's a
man, which I've already informed you of."
"Is he an outside broker?"
"No."
"Then he's Malkiel. You can't deny it."
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"I can deny anything," said the Prophet, who, already upset by the events of the day, was now goaded almost
to desperation. "I can and and must. There's the horse down again!"
"I shall have to give the man one and sixpence. Are your going to keep your promise to Mrs. Merillia and Sir
Tiglath?"
To this question the Prophet determined to give a direct answer, in order to draw Lady Enid away from the
more dangerous subjects.
"No," he said, with a spasm of pain.
"I knew you wouldn't be able to."
"Why?"
"Because when one's once been really and truly silly it's impossible not to repeat the act, absolutely
impossible. You'll never stop now. You'll go on from one thing to another, as I do."
"I cannot think that prophecy is silly," said the Prophet, with some stiffness.
She looked at him with frank admiration.
"You're worse than I am! It's splendid!"
"Worse!"
"Why, yes. You're foolish enough to think your silly acts sensible. I wish I could get to that. Then perhaps I
could impose on Sir Tiglath more easily too."
She considered this idea seriously, as they started on again, and gradually got free of the little crowd that had
been sitting on the horse's head.
"I must impose upon him," she said. "And you've got to help me."
"I!" cried the Prophet, feeling terribly unequal to everything. "I cannot possibly consent"
"Yes, dear Mr. Vivian, you can. And if two thoroughly silly people can't impose upon one sensible old man,
it will be very strange indeed. And now I'm going to tell you what I hadn't time to tell you yesterday."
She leaned forward and tapped sharply on the rattling glass in front of the cab. The cabman, bending down,
twisted his whiskers towards her.
"Don't go too fast."
"I can't get 'im to fall down agyne, lydy. 'E's too tired."
"I daresay. But don't let him walk quite so fast."
She drew back.
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"Mr. Vivian," she saidand the Prophet thought she had never looked more sensible than now, as she began
this revelation"Mr. Vivian, among the silly people I have met in my dear double life, who do you think are
the very silliest?"
"The antivaccinators?"
"No. Besides, they so often have smallpox and become quite sensible."
"The atheists?"
"I used to think so, but not now. And most of those I knew are Roman Catholics at present."
"The women who don't desire to be slaves?"
"There aren't any."
"The tearers of Paderewski's hair?"
"I so seldom meet them, because they all live out in the suburbs."
"The tightlacers?"
"They get red noses, poor things, and disappear. They're not permanent enough to count as the very silliest."
"I give it up."
"The Spiritualists and the Christian Scientists. That's why I love them best, and spend most of my double life
with them. How you would get on with them! How much at ease you would be in their midst!"
"Really! But aren't they in opposite camps?"
"Dear things! They often think so, I believe. But really they aren't. Half the Christian Scientists begin as
Spiritualists. And a great many Spiritualists were once Christian Scientists."
"Which are you?"
"Both, of course."
"Dear me!"
"As you will be when you've got thoroughly into your double life. Well, my greatest friendin my double
life, you understandis a Mrs. Vane Bridgeman, a Christian Scientist and Spiritualist. She is very rich, and
magnificently idiotic. She supports all foolish charities. She has almshouses for brokendown mediums on
Sunnington Common in Kent. She has endowed a hospital for sick fortunetellers. She gave five hundred
pounds to the home for indigent thoughtreaders, and nearly as much to the 'Palmists' Seaside Retreat' at
Millaby Bay near Dover. I don't know how many Christian Science Temples she hasn't erected, or subscribed
liberally to. She turns every table in her house. She won't leave even one alone. Her early breakfasts for
stargazers are famous, and it's impossible to dine with her without sitting next to a horoscopecaster, or
being taken into dinner, of courseby a crystal diviner or a noseprophet."
"A noseprophet! What's that?"
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"A person who tells your fortune by the shape of your nose."
"Oh, I see."
"Well, you understand now that there's no sillier person in London than dear Mrs. Bridgeman?"
"Oh, quite."
"She's done a great deal for me, more than I can ever repay."
"Indeed."
"Yes, in introducing me to the real inner circles of idiotcy. Well, in return, I've sworn"
"You too!"
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, nothing. I beg your pardon. Please go on."
She looked at him curiously, and continued.
"I've swornthat is, pledged my honour, you know"
"I know! I know!"
"To introduce her to at least one thoroughly sensible persona man, she prefers."
"And you've chosen?"
"Sir Tiglath, because he's the only one I know. Once, I confess, I thought of you."
"Of me!"
"Yes, but of course I didn't really know you then."
She looked at him with genuine regard. The Prophet scarcely knew whether to feel delighted or distressed.
"Now, you see, Mr. Vivian, if Sir Tiglath found out for certain that I was Miss Minerva, he might discover
my double life, and if he did that, he is so sensible that I am sure he would never speak to me again, and I
could not fulfil my vow to dear Mrs. Bridgeman."
"I quite see."
"Nor my other vow to myself."
"Which one?"
"Oh, never mind."
"I won't."
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"He only said that about partridges in January, I find, because he happened to see one of my letters in
Jellybrand's window. He doesn't associate that letter with me. So it ought to be all right, and I've arranged my
campaign."
"But what can I?"
She smiled at him with some Scottish craft.
"Don't bother. You've got to be my aidedecamp, that's all. Ah, here we are!"
For at this moment the horse, with a great effort succeeded in falling down, for the last time, before the
astronomer's door.
CHAPTER XII. THE ELABORATE MIND OF MISS MINERVA
On being shown, by an elderly housekeeper with a Berlin wool fringe, into an oldfashioned oval
bookroom, Lady Enid and the Prophet discovered the astronomer sitting there /teteatete/ with a muffin,
which lay on a china plate surrounded by manuscripts, letters, pamphlets, books and blottingpaper. He was
engaged in tracing lines upon an immense sheet of foolscap with the aid of a ruler and a pair of compasses,
and when he perceived his visitors, he merely rolled his glassy eyes at them, shook his large head as if in
rebuke, and then returned to his occupation without uttering a word.
Lady Enid was in nowise abashed. She looked more sensible even than usual, and at once commenced her
campaign by the remark,
"I know you wonder why I wanted to see you this afternoon, Sir Tiglath. Well, I'll tell you at once. Mr.
Vivian has persuaded me to act as his ambassador."
At this very unexpected statement the Prophet started, and was about to utter what might, perhaps, have taken
the form of a carefullyworded denial, when Lady Enid made a violent face at him, and proceeded, in a calm
manner.
"He wishes you to do something for him, and he has confessed to me that he does not quite like to ask you
himself."
On hearing these words the Prophet's brain, already sorely tried by the tragic duel which had taken place
between himself and the couple who lived beside the Mouse, temporarily collapsed. He attempted no protest.
His mind indeed was not in a condition to invent one. He simply sat down on a small pile of astronomical
instruments which, with some scientific works, an encyclopaedia and a pair of carpet slippers, occupied the
nearest chair, and waited in a dazed manner for what would happen next.
Sir Tiglath continued measuring and drawing lines with a very thin pen, and Lady Enid proceeded further to
develop her campaign.
"Mr. Vivian tells me," she said, "that he has a very old and dear friend who is most anxious to make your
acquaintancenot, of course, for any idle social purpose, but in order to consult you on some obscure point
connected with astronomy that only you can render clear. Isn't this so, Mr. Vivian?"
The Prophet shifted uneasily on the astronomical instruments, and, grasping the carpet slippers with one hand
to steady himself, in answer to an authoritative sign from Lady Enid, feebly nodded his head.
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"But," Lady Enid continued, apparently warming to her lies, "Mr. Vivian and his friend, knowing how much
your time is taken up by astronomical research and how intensely valuable it is to the world at large, have not
hitherto dared to intrude upon it, although they have wished to do so for a very long time, and have even
made one attemptat the Colley Cibber Club."
The Prophet gasped. Sir Tiglath took a bit out of the muffin and returned to his tracing and measuring.
"On that occasion you may remember," Lady Enid went on with increasing vivacity and assurance, "you
declined to speak. This naturally damped Mr. Vivianwho is very sensitive, though you might not think
it"here she cast a glance at the instruments on which the Prophet sat"and his friend. So much so, in fact,
that unless I had undertaken to act for them I daresay they would have let the matter drop. Wouldn't you, Mr.
Vivian?" she added swiftly to the Prophet.
"Certainly," he answered, like a creature in a dream. "Certainly."
"More especially as the friend, Mrs. Vane Bridgeman"the Prophet at this point made an inarticulate, but
very audible, noise that might have meant anything, and that did in fact mean "Merciful Heavens! what will
become of me?""Mrs. Vane Bridgeman is also of a very retiring disposition and would hate to put such a
man as you are to the slightest inconvenience."
Sir Tiglath took another bite at the muffin, which seemed to be getting the worst of the /teteatete/,
rummaged among the mess of things that loaded his table till he found a gigantic book, opened it, and began
to compare some measurements in it with those he had made on the foolscap paper. His brickred face
glistened in the light of the lamp that stood beside him. His moist red lips shone, and he seemed totally
unaware that there was anyone in the chamber endeavouring to gain his attention.
"In these circumstances, Sir Tiglath," Lady Enid went on, with pleasant ease, and a sort of homespun
selfpossession that trumpeted, like a military band, her sensibleness, "Mr. Vivian consulted me as to what to
do; whether to give the whole thing up, or to make an appeal to you at the risk of disturbing you and taking
up a little of your precious time. When he had explained the affair to me, however, I at once felt certain that
you would wish to know of it. Didn't I, Mr. Vivian? Didn't I say, only this afternoon, that we must at once
take a fourwheeler to Sir Tiglath's?"
"Yes, you did," said the Prophet, in a muffled voice.
"For I knew that no investigation, no serious, reverent investigation into heavenly, that is starry, conditions
could be indifferent to you, Sir Tiglath."
The astronomer, who had been in the act of lifting the last morsel of the muffin to his mouth, put it down
again, and Lady Enid, thus vehemently encouraged, went on more rapidly.
"You know of Mr. Vivian's interest, almost more than interest, in the planets. This interest is shared, was
indeed prompted by Mrs. Bridgeman, a woman of serious attainments and a cultivated mind. Isn't she, Mr.
Vivian?"
The Prophet heard a voice reply, "Oh, yes, she is." He often wondered afterwards whether it was his own.
"It seems that she, during certain researches, hit upon an idea with regard towell, shall I say with regard to
certain stars?which she communicated to Mr. Vivian in the hope that he would carry it further, and in fact
clear it up. Didn't she, Mr. Vivian?"
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"Oh, yes, she did," said a voice, to which the Prophet again listened with strained attention.
"It was in connection with this idea that Mr. Vivian developed his enthusiasm for the telescopewhich led
him, perhaps, a little too far, Sir Tiglath, but I'm sure Mrs. Merillia and you have quite forgotten that!"
Here Lady Enid paused, and the astronomer achieved the final conquest of the muffin.
"He and Mrs. Bridgeman have been, in fact, working together, she being the brain, as it were, and Mr. Vivian
the eye. You've been the eye, Mr. Vivian?"
"I've been the eye."
"But, despite all their ardour and assiduity, they have come to a sort of deadlock. In these circumstances they
come to you, making meas your, may I say intimate, friend?their mouthpiece."
Here Lady Enid paused rather definitely, and cast a glance of apparently violent invitation at the Prophet, as
if suggesting that he must now amplify and fill in her story. As he did not do so, a heavy silence fell in the
room. Sir Tiglath had returned to his measuring, and Lady Enid, for the first time, began to look slightly
embarrassed. Sending her eyes vaguely about the apartment, as people do on such occasions, she chanced to
see a newspaper lying on the floor near to her. She bent down towards it, then raising herself up she said,
"Mrs. Bridgeman some time ago came to the conclusion that there was probably oxygen in certain stars, and
not only in the fixed stars."
At this remark the astronomer's countenance completely changed. He swung round in his revolving chair,
wagged his huge head from side to side, and finally roared at the Prophet,
"Is she telling the truth?"
"I beg your pardon," said the Prophet, bounding on the instruments.
"Get off those precious tools, young man, far more valuable than your finite carcase! Get off them this
moment and answer meis this young female speaking the truth?"
The Prophet got off the instruments and, in answer to a firm, Scottish gesture from Lady Enid, nodded his
head twice.
"What!" continued Sir Tiglath, puffing out his cheeks, "a woman be a pioneer among the Heavenly Bodies!"
The Prophet nodded again, as mechanically as a penny toy.
"The old astronomer is exercised," bawled Sir Tiglath, with every symptom of acute perturbation. "He is
greatly exercised by the narrative of the young female!"
So saying, he heaved himself up out of his chair and began to roll rapidly up and down the room, alternately
distending his cheeks and permitting them to collapse.
"I should tell you also, Sir Tiglath," interposed Lady Enid, as if struck by a sudden idea, "that Mrs.
Bridgeman's original adviser and assistant in her astronomical researches was a certain Mr. Sagittarius, who
is also an intimate friend of Mr. Vivian's."
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The Prophet sat down again upon the instruments with a thud.
"Get off those precious tools, young man!" roared the astronomer furiously. "Would you impose your vile
body upon the henchmen of the stars?"
The Prophet got up again and leaned against the wall.
"I feel unwell," he said in a low voice. "Exceedingly unwell. I regret that I must really be going."
Lady Enid did not seem to regret this abrupt indisposition. Perhaps she thought that she had already
accomplished her purpose. At any rate she got up too, and prepared to take leave. The astronomer was still in
great excitement.
"Who is this Mr. Sagittarius?" he bellowed.
"A man of science. Isn't he, Mr. Vivian?"
"Yes."
"An astronomer of remarkable attainments, Mr. Vivian?"
"Yes."
"One knows not his abnormal name," cried the astronomer.
"He is very modest, very retiring. Mrs. Bridgeman's is really the only house in London at which you can meet
him. Isn't that so, Mr. Vivian?"
"Yes."
"You say he has made investigation into the possibility of there being oxygen in many of the holy stars?"
"Mr. Vivian!"
"Yes."
"The old astronomer must encounter him!" exclaimed Sir Tiglath, puffing furiously as he rolled about the
room.
"Mr. Vivian will arrange it," Lady Enid said, with sparkling eyes, "at Mrs. Bridgeman's. That's a bargain.
Come, Mr. Vivian!"
And almost before the Prophet knew what she was doing, she had maneuvered him out into Kensington
Square, and was pioneering him swiftly towards the High street.
"We'll take a hansom home," she said gaily, "and the man can drive as fast as ever he likes."
In half a minute the Prophet found himself in a hansom, bowling along towards Mayfair. The first words he
said, when he was able to speak, were,
"WhyMr. Sagittariusoh, why?"
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Lady Enid smiled happily.
"It just struck me while I was talking to Sir Tiglath that I would introduce Mr. Sagittarius into the affair."
"Oh, why?"
"Whybecause it seemed such an utterly silly thing to do," she answered. "Didn't it?"
The Prophet was silent.
"Didn't it?" she repeated. "A thing worthy of Miss Minerva."
It seemed to the Prophet just then as if Miss Minerva were going to wreck his life and prepare him accurately
for a future in Bedlam.
"And besides you wouldn't tell me who Mr. Sagittarius was," she added.
The Prophet began to realise that it is very dangerous indeed to deny the curiosity of a woman.
"What a mercy it is," Lady Enid continued lightly, "that Malkiel is a syndicate, instead of a man. If he wasn't,
and Sir Tiglath ever got to know him, he would try to murder him, and how foolish that would be! It would
be rather amusing, though, to see Sir Tiglath do a thoroughly foolish thing, wouldn't it!"
The Prophet's blood ran cold in the cab, as he began, for the first time, to see clearly into the elaborate mind
of Miss Minerva, into the curiously deliberate complications of a definite and determined folly. He perceived
the danger that threatened the prophet who dwelt beside the Mouse, but he had recovered himself by this time
sufficiently to meet craft with craft. And he therefore answered carelessly,
"Yes, it is lucky that Malkiel's a syndicate."
When they reached Hill street Lady Enid said,
"I'm so much obliged to you, Mr. Vivian, for all you've done for Miss Minerva."
"Not at all."
"The next step is to introduce you to Mrs. Bridgeman, and you can introduce her to Mr. Sagittarius. Then I'll
introduce Sir Tiglath to her and she will introduce Mr. Sagittarius to him. It all works out so beautifully!
Thank you a thousand times. You'll hear from me. Probably I'll give you your directions how to act
tomorrow. Goodnight."
The Prophet drove on to Berkeley Square, feeling that, between Mr. and Madame Sagittarius and Miss
Minerva, he was being rapidly directed to his doom.
CHAPTER XIII. THE PROPHET IS INTERVIEWED BY TWO KIDS
Mr. Ferdinand met the Prophet in the hall.
"I have done as you directed, sir," he said respectfully.
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"As I directed, Mr. Ferdinand? I was not aware that I ever directed anybody," replied the Prophet, suspecting
irony.
"I understood you to say, sir, that if any more telegrams was to arrive, I was to burn them, sir."
"Telegrams! Good Heavens! You don't mean to say that"
"There has been some seventeen or eighteen, sir. I have burnt them, sir, to ashes, according to your orders."
"Quite right, Mr. Ferdinand," said the Prophet, putting his hand up to his hair, to feel if it were turning grey.
"Quite right. How ishow, I say, is Mrs. Merillia?"
"Well, Master Hennessey, she's not dead yet."
And Mr. Ferdinand, with a contorted countenance moved towards the servants' hall.
The Prophet stood quite still with his hat and coat on for several minutes. An amazing selfpossession had
come to him, the unnatural selfpossession of despair. He felt quite calm, as the statue of a dead alderman
feels on the embankment of its native city. Nothing seemed to matter at all. He might have been Marcus
Aureliustill a loud double knock came to the front door. Then he might have been any dangerous lunatic,
ripe for a strait waistcoat. Mr. Ferdinand approached. The Prophet faced him.
"Kindly retire, Mr. Ferdinand," he said in a very quiet voice. "I will answer that knock."
Mr. Ferdinand retired rather rapidly. The knock was repeated. The Prophet opened the door. A telegraph boy,
about two and a half feet high, stood outside upon the step.
"Telegram, sir," he said in a thin voice.
"Give it to me, my lad," replied the Prophet.
The small boy handed the telegram and turned to depart.
"Wait a moment, my lad," said the Prophet, very gently.
The small boy waited.
"Do you wish to be strangled, my lad?" asked the Prophet.
The small boy tried to recoil, but his terror rooted him firmly to the spot.
"Do all the other boys at the office wish to be strangled?" continued the Prophet. "Come, my lad, why don't
you answer me?"
"No, sir," whispered the small boy, passing his little tongue over his pale lips.
"Very well, my lad, the next boy who brings a telegram to this house will be strangled, do you understand
that?"
"Yes, sir," sighed the small boy, like a terrorstricken Zephyr.
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"That's right. Goodnight, my lad."
The Prophet closed the street door very softly, and the small boy dropped fainting on the pavement and was
carried to the nearest hospital on a stretcher by two dutiful policemen.
Meanwhile the Prophet opened the telegram and read as follows:
"Insufferable insolence. How dare you; shall pay dearly; with you tomorrow first 'bus.
"JUPITER AND MADAME SAGITTARIUS."
"Mr. Ferdinand!" called the Prophet.
"Yes, sir."
"I am about to write a telegram. Gustavus will take it to the office."
"Yes, sir."
The Prophet went into the library and wrote these words on a telegraph form:
"Jupiter Sagittarius, Sagittarius Lodge, Crampton St. Peter, N. Your life is in danger; keep where you are;
another telegram may destroy you. Grave news.
"VIVIAN."
The Prophet gave this telegram to Gustavus and then prepared to go upstairs to his grandmother. As he
mounted towards the drawingroom he murmured to himself over and over again,
"Sir TiglathMalkiel! MalkielSir Tiglath!"
He found Mrs. Merillia very prostrate. It seemed that the telegraph boys had very soon worn through the
cottonwool with which the knocker had been shrouded, and that the incessant noise of their efforts to attract
attention at the door had quite unnerved the gallant old lady. Nevertheless, her own condition was the last
thing she thought of.
"I don't mind for myself, Hennessey," she said. "But it is very sad after all these years of respect and even, I
think, a certain popularity, to be considered a nuisance by one's square. We are hopelessly embroiled with the
Duchess of Camberwell, and the Lord Chancellor has sent over five times to explain the different laws and
regulations that we are breaking. I don't see how you can go to his Reception tonight, really."
"I am not going, grannie," said the Prophet, overwhelmed with contrition. "I cannot go in any case."
"Why not?"
"II have some work to do at home."
He avoided the glance of her bright eyes, and continued.
"Grannie, I am deeply grieved at all you have gone through today. Believe me it has not been my faultat
least not entirely. I may have been injudicious, but I nevernever"
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He paused, quite overcome with emotion.
"I don't know what will happen if the telegrams go on till midnight," said Mrs. Merillia. "The Duke of
Camberwell is a very violent man, since he had that sunstroke at the last Jubilee, and I shouldn't wonder if
he"
"Grannie, there will not be any more telegrams."
"But you said that before, Hennessey."
"And I say it again. There will not be any more. I have just informed the messenger that the next boy who
knocks will certainly bewell, destroyed."
Mrs. Merillia breathed a sigh of relief.
"I am so thankful, Hennessey. Are you dining out tonight?"
"No, grannie. I don't feel very well. I have a headache. I shall go and lie down for a little."
"Yes, do. Everybody is lying down; Fancy, the upper housemaid, the cook. Even Gustavus, they tell me, is
trying to snatch a little uneasy repose on his whatnot. It has been a terrible day."
Mrs. Merillia lay back and closed her eyes, and the Prophet, overwhelmed with remorse, retired to his room,
lay down and stared desperately at nothing for half an hour. He then ate, with a very poor appetite, a morsel
of dinner and prepared to take, if possible, a short nap before starting on the labours of the night. As he got up
from the dining table to go upstairs he said to Mr. Ferdinand,
"By the way, Mr. Ferdinand, if I should come into the pantry again to night, don't be alarmed. I may chance
to require a bradawl as I did last night. Kindly leave one out, in case I should. But you need not sit up."
As the Prophet said the last words he looked Mr. Ferdinand full in the face. The butler's eyes fell.
"Thank you, Master Hennessey, I shall be glad to get to bedentirely to bedin good time. We are all a bit
upset in the kitthat is the hall today."
"Just so. Retire to rest at once if you like."
"Thank you, sir."
"Gustavus," said Mr. Ferdinand, a moment later in the servants' hall, "you are a man of the world, I believe."
Gustavus roused himself on his whatnot.
"I am, Mr. Ferdinand," he replied, in a pale and exhausted manner.
"Then tell me, Gustavus, have you ever lived in service with a gentleman who was partial to a bradawlof a
night, you understand?"
"No, never, Mr. Ferdinand. The nearest to it ever I got was the Bishop of Clapham."
"Explain yourself, Gustavus, I beg."
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"He used to ask for a nip sometimes before retiring, Mr. Ferdinand."
"A nip, Gustavus?"
"Warm water, with a slice of toast in it. But he was only what they call a suburban bishop, Mr. Ferdinand."
"Ah! a nip is hardly on all fours with a bradawl, Gustavus."
"P'r'aps not, Mr. Ferdinand, but it's the nearest ever I got to it."
Mr. Ferdinand said no more, but when he retired to rest that night he doublelocked his door, and dreamt of
bradawls till he woke, unrefreshed, the next morning to find the area full of telegrams.
Meanwhile the Prophet was conscientiously fulfilling his promise and keeping the oath he had pledged his
honour over, although he had to work under a grave disadvantage in the total loss of his planisphere, or
starmap.
He entered the butler's pantry precisely on the stroke of eleven, and found it, to his great relief, untenanted.
The dwarf was no longer at the telescope, and the silence in the region dedicated to Mrs. Merillia's menials
was profound. The night, too, was clear and starry, propitious for prophetic labours, and as the Prophet gazed
out upon the deserted square through the open window a strange peace descended upon his fevered soul.
Nature, with all her shining mysteries, her distant reticences and revelations, calmed the turmoil within him.
He looked upon the area railings and upon the sky, and smiled.
Then he looked for the starmap. He perceived in a very prominent position upon a silver salver, the bradawl
laid out, according to order, by the obedient Mr. Ferdinand. He perceived also the open pot of "Butler's Own
Special Pomade," but the planisphere had been removed from it. Where could it have been bestowed? The
Prophet instituted a careful search. He explored cupboards, drawerssuch at least as were unlockedin
vain. He glanced into a silver teapot reposing on a shelf, between the pages of an almanac hanging on the
wall, among some back numbers of the /Butler's Gazette/, which were lying in a corner. But the planisphere
was nowhere to be found, and at last in despair he resolved to do without it, and to trust to his fairly accurate
knowledge of the heavens. He, therefore, took up his station by the window and proceeded to extract from the
pocket of his smokingjacket the accountbook in which he had dotted down the directions of "Madame and
self." They were very vague, for his dots had been agitated. Still, by the help of the George the Third
candlestick, in which was a lighted taper, the Prophet was able to make out enough to refresh his memory. He
was to begin by placing his beloved grandmother in the claws of the crab. Leaning upon the sill of the
window he found the crab and breathing a short prayer for forgivenesscommitted his dear relation to its
offices. He then retreated and, assuming very much the position of Mr. Ferdinand, applied his right eye to the
telescope, at the same time holding his left eye firmly shut with the forefinger of his left hand. At once the
majesty of the starry heavens burst upon him in all its glory.
Exactly at halfpast one o'clock, two hours and a half later, the enthralled Prophet heard a low whistle which
seemed to reach him from the square. He withdrew his fascinated right eye from the telescope and
endeavoured to use it in an ordinary manner, but he could at first see nothing. The low whistle was repeated.
It certainly did come from the square, and the Prophet approached the open window and once more tried to
compel the eye that had looked so long upon the stars to gaze with understanding upon the earth. This time he
perceived a black thing, like a blot, about six feet high, beyond the area railings. From this blot came a third
whistle. The Prophet, who was still dazed by the fascination of stargazing, mechanically whistled in reply,
whereupon the blot whispered at him huskily,
"At it again, are you?"
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"Yes," whispered the Prophet, also huskily, for the night air was cold. "But how should you know?"
Indeed he wondered; and it seemed to him as if the blot were some strange night thing that must have
companioned him, invisibly, when he kept his nocturnal watches in the drawingroom, and that now partially
revealed itself to him in the, perhaps, more acutely occult region of the basement.
"How should I know!" rejoined the blot with obvious, though very hoarse, irony. "Whatever d'you take me
for?"
The Prophet began to wonder, but before he had gone on wondering for more than about half a minute, the
blot continued,
"She's gone to bed."
"I know she has," said the Prophet, presuming that the blot, which seemed instinct with all knowledge, was
referring to his grandmother.
"But she knows you're at it again," continued the blot.
The Prophet started violently and leaned upon the windowsill.
"No! How can that be?" he ejaculated.
"Ho! Them girls knows everything, especially the old uns," said the blot, with an audible chuckle.
"Good gracious!" gasped the Prophet, overwhelmed at this mysterious visitant's familiar description of his
revered grandmother.
"Have you seen her tonight?" inquired the blot, controlling its merriment.
"Yes," said the Prophet. "With the Crab."
"What!" cried the blot, in obvious astonishment. "Them instruments must be wonderful sightcarriers."
"They are," exclaimed the Prophet, with almost mystic enthusiasm. "Wonderful. I have seen her with the
Crab distinctly."
"Ah! well, I told her she ought to keep away from it," continued the blot.
"Did you?" said the Prophet, with increasing surprise. "But how could she?"
"Ah! that's just it! She couldn't."
"No, of course not."
"She was drawn right to it."
"She was. It wasn't her fault. It was the Crab's."
"A pity it was dressed."
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"What?"
"I say it's a pity 'twas dressed."
"What was dressed?"
"What! why, the Crab!"
"The Crabdressed!"
"Ay. They're a deal safer not dressed."
"Are they?"
"She knows it too."
"Does she?"
"But therethem women likes a spice of danger. She's in a nice state now, you bet. Not much sleep for her,
I'll lay. Well, I tried to keep her from it, so you needn't blame me."
"I won't," said the Prophet, feeling completely dazed.
"Well, go'night. I'm off round the square."
"Goodnight," said the Prophet.
Suddenly a blinding flash of light dazzled his eyes. He covered them with his hands. When he could see again
the blot was gone.
Although he was retired to rest that night when the clock struck three, the Prophet did not sleep. His nervous
system was in a condition of acute excitement. His brain felt like a burning ball, and the palms of his hands
were hot with fever. For the spirit of prophecy was upon him once more, and he was bound fast in the golden
magic of the stars. Like the morphia maniac who, after valiant fasting, returning to his drug, feels its
influence the stronger for his abstinence from it, the Prophet was conscious that the heavens held more
power, more meaning for him because, for a while, he had intended to neglect them. He was ravaged by their
mystery, their majesty and revelation.
When he came down in the morning pale, dishevelled, but informed by a curious dignity, he was met at once
by Mr. Ferdinand.
"I have cleared the area, sir," said the functionary.
"The area, Mr. Ferdinand. What of?"
"Telegrams, sir. The boys must have thrown 'em down without knocking."
"Very probably," replied the Prophet. "Their comrade was right. They did not wish to be strangled."
"No, sir. And I have placed them in a basket on the breakfast table, sir, while awaiting your orders."
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"Quite right, Mr. Ferdinand. By the way, here is the bradawl. Leave it out again tonight in case I have need
of it."
So saying, the Prophet handed the bradawl, which he had craftily conveyed from the pantry on the previous
night, to the astonished butler and walked swiftly into the breakfastroom. The basket of telegrams was set
outside beside a fried sole and the "equipage" which Madame had so much admired, and, while he sipped his
tea, the Prophet opened the wires one by one. They were fraught with terror and dismay. Evidently his
mysterious warning had thrown the worthies who dwelt beside the Mouse into a condition of the very gravest
amazement and alarm, and they had, despite the Prophet's final injunction, spent the remaining telegraphic
hours of the day in despatching wires of frantic inquiry to the square. Madame, in particular, was evidently
much upset, and expressed her angry agitation in a dead language that seemed positively to live again in fear
and novelty of grammatical construction. Sir Tiglath had been a brilliant card to play in the prophetic game,
although he had not achieved the Prophet's purpose of stopping the telegraphic flood.
While the Prophet was simultaneously finishing the fried sole and the perusal of the final wire Mr. Ferdinand
entered, in a condition of obvious astonishment that might well have cost him his place.
"If you please, sir," he said, in an upanddown voice, "if you please there are twotwotwo"
"Two what? Be more explicit, Mr. Ferdinand."
"Twowell, sir, kids at the door waiting for you to see them, sir."
"Two kids! Whatfrom the goat show that's going on at the Westminster Aquarium!" cried the Prophet in
great surprise.
"Maybe, sir. I can't say, indeed, sir. Am I to show them in, sir?"
"Show them in! Are you gone mad, Mr. Ferdinand? They must be driven out at once. If Mrs. Merillia were to
see them, she might be greatly alarmed. I'llI'llfollow me, Mr. Ferdinand, closely."
So saying the Prophet stepped valiantly into the hall. There, by the umbrella stand, stood two small children,
boy and girl, very neatly dressed in a sailor suit and a grey merino. The little boy held in his hand a large
round straw hat, on the blue riband of which was inscribed in letters of gold, "H.M.S. Hercules." The little
girl wore a pleasant pigtail tied with a riband of the same hue.
The meaning of Mr. Ferdinand's vulgar and misleading slang suddenly dawned on the Prophet. He cast a look
of very grave rebuke on Mr. Ferdinand, then, walking up to the little boy and girl he said in his most
ingratiating manner,
"Well, my little ones, what can I do for you?"
"Not so little, if you please, Mr. Vivian," replied the boy in a piping, but very selfpossessed voice. "Can we
see you in private for a moment?"
"If you please, Mr. Vivian," added the little girl. "Si sit prudentium."
"Dentia, Corona," corrected the little boy.
The Prophet turned white to the very lips.
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"Certainly, certainly," he said in a violently furtive manner. "Come this way, my children. Mr. Ferdinand, if
Mrs. Merillia should inquire for me, you will say that I'm busy writingno, no, just busyvery busy."
"Yes, sir."
"I'm not to be disturbed. This way, my little ones."
"Not so little, Mr. Vivian," piped again the small boy, trotting obediently, with his sister, into the Prophet's
library, the door of which was immediately closed behind them.
"Well, I'm" said Mr. Ferdinand. "Kids in the library! I am Gustavus!"
He rushed frenetically towards the servants' hall to confer upon the situation with his intellectual subordinate.
Meanwhile the Prophet was closeted with the two kids.
"Pray sit down," he said, very nervously, and smiling forcibly. "Pray sit down, my dears."
The kids obeyed with aplomb, keeping their large and strained eyes fixed upon the Prophet.
"Is it Coronus and Capricorna?" continued the Prophet, with an effort after blithe familiarity. "Is it?"
"No," piped the little boy. "It isn't Coronus and Capricorna."
A marvellous sensation of relief invaded the Prophet.
"Thank Heaven!" he ejaculated in a sigh. "I thought it must be."
"It's Corona and Capricornus," continued the little boy. "And we've brought you a letter from pater familias."
"And mater familiaris," added the little girl.
"Milias, Corona," corrected the little boy. "Here it is, Mr. Vivian," he added, drawing a large missive from
the breast of his blueandwhite sailor's blouse. "Pater and mater familias couldn't bring it themselves,
because he said it wasn't safe for him to come, and she's lying down ill at what you sent to her. It wasn't kind
of you, was it?"
So saying, he handed the missive to the Prophet, who took it anxiously.
"Would you like some cake, my litI mean, my dears, while I read this?"
"No, thank you. Cake is bad for us in the morning," replied the little boy. "You shouldn't eat it so early."
The Prophet was about to reply that he never did when it struck him that argument would probably be
useless. He, therefore, hastened to open the letter, which proved to be from Mr. Sagittarius, and which ran as
follows:
"SIR,Your terrible and mysterious wire, coming after your equally terrible and mysterious silence, has
caused devastation in a hitherto peaceful and happy family. To what peril do you allude? What creature can
there be so base as to wish to take my life merely on account of my sending you telegrams? Madame has
been driven to despair by your announcement, and I, myself, although no ordinary man, am, very rightly and
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properly, going about in fear of my life since receipt of your last telegram. Under these circs, and being
unable to wait upon you ourselves for a full explanation, we are sending our very lifeblood to youper rail
and 'buswith strict orders to bring you at once to the banks of the Mouse, there to confer with Madame and
self and arrange such measures of precaution as are suited to the requirements of the situation as indicated by
you.
"JUPITER SAGITTARIUS.
"P.S.You are to bring with you, according to solemn oath, all prophecy concerning grandmother, Crab,
etc., gathered up to date, together with full details of same's removal from the bottle, cutting of her first tooth,
shortcoating, going into skirts, putting of hair up, day of marriage and widowhood, illnesses especially
rashesand so forth. /Ab origino/.
"MADAME SAGITTARIUS."
On reading this communication the Prophet felt that all further struggle was useless. Fatecruel and
remorseless Fatehad him in her grasp. He could only bow his head and submit to her horrible decrees. He
could only go upstairs and at once prepare for the journey to the Mouse.
He laid the letter down and got up, fixing his eyes upon the kids, who sat solemnly awaiting his further
procedure.
"YouI suppose you know, my little ones, what thiswhat you have to do?" he said.
"Not so little, if you please, Mr. Vivian," returned the boy. "Yes, we've got to take you with us to see pater
familias."
"And mater familiarfamilias," added the little girl.
"I seeyou know," said the Prophet, in a despairing voice. "Very well. Wait here quietlyvery quietly,
while I go and get ready."
"And please don't forget the Crab and grandmother, rashes, et ceterus," said the little girl.
"Tera Corona," piped her brother.
"I won't," said the Prophet. "I will not."
And he tottered out of the room, carrying the Sagittarius letter in his hand.
In the hall he paused for a moment, holding on to the balusters and re reading his directions. Then he
crawled slowly up the stairs and sought his grandmother's room.
CHAPTER XIV. THE PROPHET JOURNEYS TO THE MOUSE
Mrs. Merillia was just beginning to recover from the prostration of the preceding day when the Prophet came
into the room where she was seated with Mrs. Fancy Quinglet. She looked up at him almost brightly, but
started when she saw how agitated he seemed.
"Grannie," said the Prophet, abruptly, "you would tell me anything, wouldn't you?"
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"Why, of course, my dear boy. But what about?"
"Aboutabout yourself?"
Mrs. Merillia looked very much astonished.
"There is nothing to hide, Hennessey," she said with gentle dignity. "You know that."
"I do, I do," cried the Prophet, passionately. "Yours has been the best, the sweetest life the world has ever
known!"
"Well, I don't wish to imply"
"But I do, grannie, I do. Can Fancy leave us for a moment?"
"Certainly. Fancy, you can go to your tatting."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Mr Hennessey has something to explain to me."
"Oh, ma'am, the houses that have been broke up by explainings!"
And with this, as the Prophet thought, appallingly appropriate exclamation, Mrs. Fancy hurried feverishly
from the room.
"Now what is the question you wish to ask me, Hennessey?" said Mrs. Merillia, with a soft dignity.
"There areone momentthere are eight questions, grannie," responded the Prophet, shrinking visibly
before the dread necessity by which he found himself confronted.
"Eight! So many?"
"Yes, oh, indeed, yes."
"Well, my dear, and what are they?"
"The first isisgrannie, when were you removed fromfrom the bottle?"
A very delicate flush crept into Mrs. Merillia's charming cheeks.
"The bottle, Hennessey! Never, never!" she said, with a sort of pathetic indignation. "How could you
supposeIthe bottle"
Her pretty old voice died away.
"Answered, darling grannie, answered!" ejaculated the Prophet. Pleaseplease don't!" And nowyour first
tooth?"
"My first what!" cried Mrs. Merillia in almost terrified amazement.
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"Toothwhen did you cut it?"
"I have no idea. Surely, Hennessey"
"Answered, dearest grannie!" cried the Prophet, with gathering agitation. "Did you ever wear a short coat?"
"II'm not a man!"
"You didn't! Always a skirt?"
"Of course! Why"
"And you're sixtyeight on the twentieth. So for sixtyeight years you've always worn a skirt. That's four."
"Four what? Are you?"
"When did you put your hair up, grannie, darling?"
"My hairnever. You know I've always had a maid to do these things for me. Fancy"
"Of course. You've never put your hair up. I might have known. You were married very young, weren't you?"
"Ah, yes. On my seventeenth birthday, and was left a widow in exactly two years' time. Your poor dear
granf"
"Thank you, grannie, thank you! Seven!"
"Seven what, Hennessey? One would th"
"And now, dear grannie, tell me one thing, only one little thing more. Aboutthat is, talking of rashes"
"Rashers!"
"No, grannie, rashesillnesses, you know, that take an epidemic form."
"Well, what about them? Surely there isn't an epidemic in the square?"
"How many have you had, grannie?"
"Where? Had what?"
"Here, anywhere in the square, grannie."
"Had what in the square?"
"Rashes."
"I! Have a rash in the square!"
"Exactly. Have you everan epidemic, you know?"
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"I have an epidemic in Berkeley Square? You must be crazy, Hennessey!"
"Probably, very likely, grannie. But have you? Tell me quickly! Have you?"
"Certainly not! As if any gentlewoman"
"Answered, grannie, answered! Eight!"
"Eight what?"
"Questions. Thank you, dearest grannie. I knew you'd tell me, I knew you would!"
And the Prophet rushed from the room, leaving Mrs. Merillia in a condition that cannot be described and that
not all the subsequent ministrations of Mrs. Fancy Quinglet were able to alleviate.
Having reached the hall, the Prophet hastily put on his coat and hat and called Mr. Ferdinand to him.
"Mr. Ferdinand," he said, assuming a fixed and stony dignity to conceal his agitation and dismay, "I am
leaving the house at once with thethe lady and gentleman who are in the library."
At this description of the kids Mr. Ferdinand was very nearly seized with convulsions. However, as he said
nothing and merely wrung his large hands, the Prophet, after a slight pause, continued,
"I may be away some time, so if Mrs. Merillia should make any inquiry, you will say that I have left to pay a
visit to some friends."
"Yes, sir. Shall I tell Gustavus to pack your things?"
"Certainly not."
The Prophet was turning towards the library when Mr. Ferdinand added,
"When shall we expect you back, sir? Am I to forward your letters?"
"No, no. I shall return in a few hours."
"Oh, I beg pardon, sir. And if any telegrams"
"There will not be any. I am now going to answer the telegrams in person."
"Yes, sir."
"Come along, my children," cried the Prophet, putting his head into the library.
"Not your children, if you please, Mr. Vivian," replied the little boy. "Corona, come on."
"How do we go, my dears?" asked the Prophet, with an attempt at gaiety, and endeavouring to ignore the
prostrated demeanour of Mr. Ferdinand, who was in waiting to open the hall door.
"By the purple 'bus as far as the Pork Butcher's Rest," piped the little boy(at this point Mr. Ferdinand could
not refrain from a slight exclamation)"then we take the train to the Mouse, Mouse, Mouse."
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"Mus, Mus, Mus," chanted the little girl.
As Mr. Ferdinand was unable to open the door, paralysis having apparently supervened, the Prophet did so,
and the cheerful little party emerged upon the step to find Lady Enid Thistle in the very act of pressing the
electric bell. When she beheld the vivacious trio, all agog for their morning's expedition, come thus suddenly
upon her, she cried out musically,
"Why, where are you off to?"
The Prophet was much embarrassed by the encounter.
"I am taking these lit"he caught the staring eye of Capricornus "these friends of mine for a little walk,"
he said.
"I'll come with you," said Lady Enid, with an almost Highland decision. "I've got something to say to you,
and we can talk as we go."
She glanced very inquisitively indeed at the two children, who had begun to frisk at sight of the square all
bathed in winter sunshine. The Prophet was very much upset.
"Don't you think" he began.
"It will be delightful to have some exercise," she interrupted firmly. "Which way are you going?"
"Which way! Oh, totowards"
The Prophet stopped. He did not know from what point the purple 'bus started to gain the Pork Butcher's
Rest. Capricornus hastened to inform him.
"We take the purple 'bus at the corner of Air Street," he piped.
"The purple 'bus!" cried Lady Enid. "The purple bus!"
She glanced searchingly at the Prophet.
"Ah!" she murmured, "so you are taking a purple 'bus to your double life!"
He could not deny it. They were now all walking forward in the sun and as the little Corona and Capricornus
became speedily intent upon the wonders of this central district, Lady Enid and the Prophet were able to have
a quiet word or two together.
"I came to tell you," she said, "that Mrs. Vane Bridgeman will expect you tonight at"
"I am engaged at eleven," cried the Prophet, in despair at the imposition of this fresh burden upon his weary
shoulders.
"I know. To the Lord Chancellor, but"
"No. I have an engagement which I dare not break, at home."
"Really!"
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She gazed at him with her large, handsome grey eyes, and added,
"I do believe you're silly enough to live your double life at home sometimes. How splendid!"
"No, no! I assure you"
"Of course you do! You dear foolish thing! You're ever so much sillier than I am. You're my master."
"No, indeed, no, no!"
"But you can go to Mrs. Bridgeman's for an hour easily. She expects you and I've promised that you will go."
"It's very kind of you, but really"
"So that's settled. You'll meet me there, but don't forget I'm Miss Minerva Partridge. The address is
Zoological House, Regent's Park, that big house in a garden just outside the Zoo."
"The big house in the Zoological Gardens," said the Prophet, feebly. "Thank you very much."
"No, no, outside the Zoo. And then we can arrange tonight about your introducing her to Mr. Sagittarius."
"Hush! Hush!" whispered the Prophet.
But he was too late. The long ears of the little pitchers had caught the wellknown word.
"Why, that’s pater familias," piped the little Capricornus.
"And mater familiaris," added the little Corona.
"You don't mean to say," cried Lady Enid to the Prophet, "that these are the children of Mr. Sagittarius?"
The Prophet bent his head.
"How very interesting!" said Lady Enid. "Everything is working out most beautifully. I must get them some
chocolates."
And she immediately stepped into a confectioner's and came out with a beautiful box of bonbons, tied with
amethyst ribbon, which she gave to the delighted children.
"I know your dear father," she said. "At least I know who he is."
And she looked firmly at the Prophet, who dropped his eyes. They were now at the corner of Air Street, and
the purple 'bus could be seen looming brilliantly in the distance.
"Goodbye, Lady Enid," said the Prophet.
"Oh, I'll see you off," she replied, evidently resolved to satisfy some further, unexpressed curiosity.
"There it is!" cried Capricornus. "It's coming! There it is!"
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"Isn't it pretty?" shrieked the little Corona, who was evidently growing much excited by the chocolates and
the centralness of the whole thing. "Let's go on the top! Let's go on the top!"
She began to jump on the pavement, and her brother was just about to follow her example when some sudden
idea struck him into gravity. He turned to the Prophet and exclaimed solemnly,
"Oh, if you please, Mr. Vivian, have you got the crab with you?"
"The crab!" cried Lady Enid, with much vivacity.
"Yes, yes, my boy, it's all right!" said the Prophet, hastily.
"Not your boy, if you please, Mr. Vivian," returned the little inquisitor. "And have you got the fist tooth?"
"Yes, yes!"
"And the rashes, and the honoured grandmother, and"
"I've got everything," cried the Prophet, "every single thing!"
"Because mater familias said I was to make you bring them if I stayed for them all day."
"Yes, yes, they're all hereevery one."
Lady Enid was gazing at the Prophet's slim form with almost passionate curiosity. It was evidently a problem
to her how he had managed to conceal so many various commodities about his person without altering his
shape. However, she had no time to study the matter, for at this moment the purple 'bus jerked along the kerb,
and the voice of the conductor was heard crying,
"Pork Butcher's Rest! All the way one penny! Porkpennyall the way
Butcher'sRestonePorkallPorkpennyPorkButcher'sPork RestPorkpenny!"
With a hasty farewell the Prophet, accompanied, and indeed closely clutched, by the little Corona and
Capricornus, scrambled fanatically, and not without two or three heavy falls, to the summit of the 'bus, while
Lady Enid read the legend printed on it with a smile, ere she turned to walk home, putting two and two
together, and thinking, with keen feminine satisfaction, how useless in the long run are all the negatives of
man.
In later years, though many memories intervene, the Prophet will never forget his journey to the banks of the
Mouse. Always it seemed very strange to him and dreamlike, that everlasting journey upon the purple 'bus,
complicated by the chatter of the younger scions of the Malkiel dynasty, and by the shrill cries of the
conductor summoning the passersby to hasten to that place of repose consecrated to the worthy and
hardworking individuals who drew their modest incomes from the pig. The character of the streets changed
as the central districts were left behind, and a curious scent, the scent of Suburbia, seemed to float between
the tall chimneys in the morose atmosphere. The purple chariot, which rolled on and on like the chariot of
Fate, drew gradually away from the large thoroughfares into mean streets, whose air of dull gentility was for
ever autumnal, and the Prophet, on passing some gigantic gasworks, mechanically wondered whether it might
not, perhaps, be that monument to whose shadow Malkiel the First had lived and died. Once, looking up at
the black sky, he remarked to the little Capricornus that it was evidently going to rain.
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"No, Mr. Vivian," replied the boy. "It won't rain hard this week. January's a fine month, but there'll be heavy
floods in March, especially along the banks of the Thames."
"And in February there'll be such a lot of scarlet fever in the southern portions of England," added the little
Corona. "Oh, Corney, just look at that kitty on the airey railings!"
"Area, Corona," corrected her brother. "Oh, my! ain't it funny?"
The Prophet remembered that he was travelling with the scions of a prophetic house.
It seemed many years before the 'bus stopped before a brick building full of quart pots, situated upon a gentle
eminence sloping to a coal yard, and the voice of the conductor proclaimed that the place of repose was
reached. The Prophet and his diminutive guides descended from the roof and were shortly in a train puffing
between the hunched backs of abominable little houses, sooty as street cats and alive with crying babies.
Then bits of waste land appeared, bald wildernesses in which fragments of broken crockery hibernated with
old tin cans and kettles yellow as dying leaves. A furtive brown rivulet wandered here and there like a thing
endeavouring to conceal itself and unable to find a hidingplace.
"That's the Mouse, Mr. Vivian," remarked Capricornus, proudly. "We shall soon be there."
"Ridiculum mus," rejoined his sister, who evidently took after her learned mother.
"Culus, Corona; and you're not to say that. Pater familias says that the Mouse is a noble stream. We get out
here, Mr. Vivian."
Here proved to be a wayside station on the very bank of the noble stream, and on the edge of a piece of waste
ground so large that it might almost have been called country.
The Prophet and the two kids set off across this earth, which was named by the inhabitants "the Common." In
the distance rose a fringe of detached brick and stone villas towards which Capricornus now pointed a
forefinger that trembled with pride.
"That's where we live," he said, in a voice that was grown squeaky from conceit.
"Dulce domus," piped his sister, clutching the skirt of the Prophet's coat, and, thus supported, performing
several very elaborate dancing steps upon the clayey soil over which he was feebly staggering. "Dulce dulce,
dulce domus. Look at that rat, Corney!"
A large, raking rodent, indeed, at that instant emerged from the wreckage of what had once been a copper
cauldron near by, and walked slowly away towards a slope of dust garnished with broken bottles and
abandoned cabbage stalks. The Prophet shuddered and longed to flee, but the two kids, as if divining his
thought, now clasped his hands and led him firmly forward to a yellow villa, fringed with white Bath stone
and garnished plentifully with griffins. From its flat front shot ostentatiously forth a porch adorned with
Roman columns which commanded a near view of the Mouse, and before the porch was a small garden in
which several healthylooking nettles had made their home.
As the Prophet and the two kids approached this delightful abode, a white face appeared, gluing itself to the
pane of an upper window.
"There's pater familias!" piped Capricornus. "Don't he look ill?"
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As they mounted the flight of imitation marble steps the face disappeared abruptly.
"He's coming to let us in," said Capricornus. "You're sure you've brought the crab and all the rashes?"
"Quite sure."
"Because, if you haven't, I don't know whatever mater familias'll"
At this moment the portal of the lodge was furtively opened about half an inch, and a very small segment of
ashencoloured human face, containing a large and apprehensive eye, was shown in the aperture.
"Are you alone?" said the hollow voice of Mr. Sagittarius.
"Quite, quite alone," said the Prophet, reassuringly.
"It's all right, pater familias!" cried Capricornus. "He's brought all the rashes and the first tooth and
everything. I made him."
"I don't think he wanted to," added the little Corona, suddenly developing malice.
"I've taken this long journey, Mr. Sagittarius," said the Prophet, with a remnant of selfrespect, "at your
special request. Am I to be permitted to come in?"
"If you're sure you're quite alone," returned the sage, showing a slightly enlarged segment of face.
"I am quite surepositive!"
At this the door was opened just sufficiently to admit the passage of one thin person at a time, and, in single
file, the Prophet, Corona and Capricornus passed into the lodge.
CHAPTER XV. THE PROPHET CREATES A DIVERSION AT HIS OWN EXPENSE
On stepping into a small vestibule, paved with black and white lozenges, and fitted up with an iron umbrella
stand, a Moorish lamp and a large yellow china pug dog, the Prophet found himself at once faced by Mr.
Sagittarius, whose pallid countenance, nervous eye and suspicious demeanour plainly proclaimed him to be,
as he had stated, very rightly and properly going about in fear of his life.
"Go to the schoolroom, my darlings," he whispered to his children. "Why, what have you there?"
"Choclets," said Capricornus.
"From the pretty lady, mulius pulchrum," added the little Corona.
"Who is a mulibus pulchrum, my love?" asked Mr. Sagittarius, before Capricornus had time to correct his
sister's Latin.
"It was Miss Minerva," said the Prophet. "We happened to meet her."
"Indeed, sir. Run away, my pretties, and don't eat more than one each, or mater familias will not approve.
Then, as the little ones disappeared into the shadows of the region above, he added to the Prophet,
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"You've nearly been the death of Madame, sir."
"I'm sure I'm very sorry," said the Prophet.
"Sorrow is no salve, sir, no salve at all. Were it not for her books I fear we might have lost her."
"Good gracious!"
"Mercifully her books have comforted her. She is resting among them now. Madame is possessed of a
magnificent library, sir, encyclopaedic in its scope and cosmopolitan in its point of view. In it are represented
every age and every race since the dawn of letters; thousands upon thousands of authors, sir, Rabelais and
Dean Farrar, Lamb and the Hindoos, Mettlelink and the pith of the great philosophers such as John Oliver
Hobbes, Locke, Hume and Earl Spencer; the biting sarcasm of Hiny, the pathos of Peps, the oratorical
masterstrokes of such men as Gladstone, Demosthenes and Keir Hardie; the romance of Kipling, sir, of Bret
Harte and Danty Rossini; the poetry of Kempis a Browning and of Elizabeth Thomas Barrettall, all are
there bound in Persian calf. Among these she seeks for solace. To these she flies in hours of anguish."
"Does she indeed?" said the Prophet, feeling thoroughly overwhelmed.
"She desires me to take you to her at once, sir, there to confer and" he lowered his voice and trembled
visibly"to arrange measures for the protection of my life."
The Prophet found himself wishing that he had been less precipitate in covertly alluding to Sir Tiglath's long
desire of assault and battery, but before he had time to wish anything for more than half a minute, Mr.
Sagittarius had guided him ceremoniously across the hall and was turning the handle of a door that was
decorated with black and scarlet paint.
"Here, sir," he whispered, "you will find Madame surrounded by the authors whom she loves, by their
portraits, their biographies and their writings. Here she communes with the great philosophers, sir, the poets,
the historians and the humourists of the entire world, from the earliest days down to this very momentin
Persian calf, sir."
He gazed awfully at the Prophet, and gently opened the door of this temple of the intellect.
The Prophet expected to find himself ushered into a gigantic chamber, lined from floor to ceiling with shelves
that groaned beneath their burden of the literature of genius. Indeed he had, in fancy, beheld even the chairs
and couches covered with stacks of volumes, the very floor littered with the choicest productions of the
brains of the dead and living. His surprise was, therefore, very great when, on passing through the door, he
beheld Madame Sagittarius reposing at full length upon a maroon sofa in a small apartment, whose bare
walls, were entirely innocent of bookshelves. Indeed the only thing of the sort which was visible was a
dwarf revolving bookcase which stood beside the sofa, and contained some twenty volumes bound, as Mr.
Sagittarius had stated, in Persian calf, each of these volumes being numbered and adorned with a label on
which was printed in letters of gold, "The Library of Famous Literature: Edited by Dr. Carter. Tasty Titbits
from all Times."
"Madame, sir, in her library," whispered Mr. Sagittarius by the door. "She is absorbed, sir, and does not
notice us."
In truth Madame Sagittarius did appear to be absorbed in thought, or something else, for her eyes were
closed, her mouth was open, and a sound of regular breathing filled the little room.
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"She is thinking out some problem, sir," continued Mr. Sagittarius. "She is communing with the mighty dead.
Sophronia, my love, Sophronia, Capricornus has brought the gentleman according to your orders. Sophy!
Sophy!"
His final utterances, which were somewhat strident caused Madame Sagittarius to come away from her
communion with the mighty dead with a loud ejaculation of the nature of a snort combined with a hissing
whistle, to kick up her indoor kid boots into the air, turn upon her right elbow, and present a countenance
marked with patches of red and white, and a pair of goggling, and yet hazy, eyes to the intruders upon her
intellectual exertions.
"Mr. Vivian has come, Sophronia, according to your directions."
Madame uttered a second snort, brought her feet to the floor, arranged her face in a dignified expression with
one fair hand, breathed heavily, and finally bowed to the Prophet with majestic reserve and remarked, with
the professional click,
"I was immersed in thought and did not perceive your entrance. /Mens invictus manetur/. Be seated, I beg."
Here certain very elaborate contortions and swellings of her interesting countenance suggested that she was
repressing a goodsized yawn, and she was obliged to rearrange her features with both hands before she
could continue.
"Thought conquers matter, as PlautoI should say as Platus very rightly obesrved."
"Quite so," assented the Prophet, trying to live up to the library, but scarcely succeeding.
"Even in the days of the great Juvenile," proceeded Madame, "to whose satires I owe much"here she laid a
loving hand upon Vol. 2 of the "Library of Famous Literature.""Long ere the days when Lord Lytton and
his Caxtons introduced us to the blessings of the printing press there were doubtless ladies who, like myself,
could forget the treachery and the lies of men in silent communion with the brains of the departed. Far better
to be Milton's 'Il Penserosero' than Lord Byron's 'L'Allegra!' "
To this pronounciamento, which was interrupted several times by more alarming contortions of the
brainworker's face, the Prophet replied with a vague affirmative, while Mr. Sagittarius whispered,
"Her whole knowledge, sir, comes straight from there"pointing towards the dwarf bookcase. "She brought
it on the instalment system. Dr. Carter has made her what she is! That man, sir, deserves to be canonised.
Eight guineas and a half, sir, and such a result!"
"Such a result!" the Prophet whispered back.
By this time Madame Sagittarius had apparently ceased to commune with the dead, for her striking face
assumed a more normal expression of feminine bitterness as she realised who was before her, and she
exclaimed sharply,
"Oh, so you've come at last, Mr. Vivian! And pray what have you to say? What about the rashes? And what is
this danger that threatens Mr. Sagittarius?"
"We'd better take the danger first, my dear," said Mr. Sagittarius, with grave anxiety.
"Very well. Not that it should be the most important to one who wears the /toga virilibus/!"
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"True, my love. Still, to take it first will clear the ground, I think, and set me more at ease. Well, sir?"
Thus adjured, the Prophet resolved to make a clean breast of Sir Tiglath's declarations, and he therefore
replied,
"I thought it only right to wire to you as I did, having learnt that there is in London a gentleman, an eminent
man, who has for fiveand forty years been seeking for Malkiel with the avowed intention of of"
"Oh what, sir, of what?" said Mr. Sagittarius with trembling lips.
"Of doing him violence," replied the Prophet, impressively.
"What is the gent's name?" said Mr. Sagittarius, in great agitation.
"His name! /Nomen volens/!" added Madame.
"That," said the Prophet, "I prefer not to say at present."
"But why should he desire to?"
"Because you are a prophet."
"There, Jupiter!" cried Madame, with flushed spitefulness. "What have I always said! All prophets are what
they call outsiders/hors d'oeuvres/, neither more nor less."
"I know, my love, I know. But how should this gent recognise me for a prophet? I'm sure my dress, my
manner, are those of an outside broker, as I have often told you, Sophy. How"
"The gentleman has not yet recognised you," said the Prophet. "At the moment he believes you to be an
American syndicate."
"Thank mercy!" ejaculated Mr. Sagittarius.
"But one can never tell," added the Prophet. "He might find out."
"Nonsense!" cried Madame at this juncture. "We might quite well have gone to the square yesterday as I
always suspected. But you are so timid, Jupiter. /Timeo DanDan/well, /Dan/ something or other, as
Virgil so truly says."
"Cautious, Sophronia, only cautious, for your and the children's sakes!"
"I call a man who's afraid even when he's passing everywhere as an American syndicate a cowardly custard,"
rejoined Madame, who appeared to be suffering under that peculiar form of flushed irritability which is apt to
follow on heavy thought, indulged in to excess in a recumbent position during the daytime. "There, that's
settled. So now let us get to business. Kindly hand me your prophecy of last night, Mr. Vivian."
The Prophet drew from a breast pocket a sheet or two of notepaper, on which he had dotted down, in
prophetic form, the events of the night before. Madame received it and continued,
"Before perusing this report, Mr. Vivian, I should wish to be made acquainted with those particulars."
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"Which ones?" said the Prophet.
"Of your grandmother's career."
"Oh, I"
"Let us take them in order, please, and proceed /parri passo/. When was the old lady removed from the
bottle?"
"Never," replied the Prophet, firmly. "Never."
An expression of incredulous amazement decorated the obstreperous features of Madame.
"Do you mean to tell me, Mr. Vivian, that she sucks it still?" she inquired.
"I mean what I say, that she has never been removed from it," returned the Prophet, with energy.
"Well, sir, she must be very partial to milk and Indian rubber, very partial indeed!" said Mr. Sagittarius. "Go
on, my darling."
"Her first tooth, Mr. Vivianwhen did she cut it?"
"She has no idea."
Madame began to look decidedly grim.
"Date of shortcoating?" she rapped out.
"There was no date. She never wore a shortcoat."
"Do you desire me to believe, Mr. Vivian, that the old lady has been going about in long clothes ever since
she was born?" inquired Madame, with incredulous sarcasm.
"Most certainly I do," replied the Prophet.
"Then how does she get along, pray? Come! Come!"
"She has always worn long clothes," cried the Prophet, boldly standing up for his beloved relative, "and
always will. You can take that from me, Madame Sagittarius. I know my grandmother, and I am ready to
pledge my honour to it."
"Oh, very well. She must be a very remarkable lady. That's all I can say. When did she put her hair up?"
"Never. She has never put it up."
"She has never put her hair up!"
"No, never."
"You mean to say that your grandmother goes about in long clothes with her hair down in the central
districts?" cried Madame in blank amazement.
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"She has never put her hair up," answered the Prophet, with almost obstinate determination.
"Oh, wellif she prefers! But I wonder what the police are about!" retorted Madame. "And now the rashes?"
"There are none."
But at this Madame's temperalready somewhat upset by her prolonged communion with the mighty
deadshowed symptoms of giving way altogether.
"Rubbish, Mr. Vivian!" she said, clicking loudly and passing with an almost upheaving jerk to her upper
register! "I'm a mother and was once a child. Rubbish! I must insist upon knowing the number of the rashes."
"I assure you there are none."
"D'you wish me to believe that the old lady has gone about all her life in the Berkeley Square in long clothes
and her hair down, with her lips to the bottle and never had a rash? Do you wish me to believe that, Mr.
Vivian?"
"Yes, sir, do you wish Madame, a lady of deep education, sir, to believe that?" cried Mr. Sagittarius.
"I can only adhere to what I have said," answered the Prophet. "My grandmother has never been removed
from the bottle, has never worn a short coat, has never put her hair up and has never had an epidemic in
Berkeley Square."
"Then all I can say is that she's an unnatural old lady," cried Madame, with obvious temper, tossing her head
and kicking out the kid boots, as if seized with the sudden desire to use them upon a human football. "And
there's not many like her."
"There is no one like her, no one at all," said the Prophet with fervour.
"So I should suppose," cried Madame, forgetting the other questions as to the day of marriage, etc., in the
vexation of the moment. "She must certainly be the bird of whom Phoenix wrote that rose from ashes in the
days of the classics. /Rarum avis/ indeed! Eh, Jupiter?"
"Very rarum, my dear, very indeed!" responded her husband, with imitative sarcasm. "An avis indeed, not a
doubt of it."
"De Queechy should have known her," continued Madame. "He always loved everything out of the common.
Well, and now for the prophecy. What is all this, Mr. Vivian?"
"The result of last night's observation," said the Prophet.
"Do you call that a cycloidal curve?" asked Madame, with a contralto laugh that shook the library. "Look,
Jupiter!"
Mr. Sagittarius glanced over his wife's heaving shoulder.
"Very poor, my dear, very irregular indeed."
"It's the best I could do," said the Prophet, still politely.
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"I daresay," replied Mr. Sagittarius. "I daresay. Where's your star map?"
"I'm afraid I don't know," answered the Prophet. "I left it in the pomade."
"The pomade!"
"Yes, the butler's own special pomade, and it seems to have disappeared."
"Very careless, very careless indeed. Let's seeprophecy first, then how arrived at. 'Grandmother apparently
threatened with some danger at night in immediate future. Great turmoil in the house during dark hours.' H'm!
'Some stranger, or strangers, coming into her life and causing great trouble and confusion, almost resulting in
despair, and perhaps actually inducing illness.' H'm! H'm! We didn't arrive at any of this by our observations,
did we, Sophronia?"
"Decidedly not," snapped Madame, haughtily.
"And now let's see how arrived at. H'm! H'm! Grandmotheringress of Crabconjunction of Scorpio with
Serpensmoon in eleventh house. Yes, that's so. Jupiter in trine with SaturnWhat's this? 'Crab dressed
implies dangerundressed Crab much saferattempted intervention failureshe's in a nice state nowit
tried to keep her from it, but she was drawn right to it.' Right to what?"
"The Crab?"
"Of course she was drawn to it. She depends on the Crab these nights. But what does the rest mean?"
"The Crab was dressed."
"Dressedwhat in?"
"I don't know," said the Prophet. "It didn’t tell me."
Mr. Sagittarius and Madame exchanged glances.
"Explain yourself, Mr. Vivian, I beg," cried Madame in a somewhat excited manner. "How could the Crab be
dressed?"
"I have wondered," said the Prophet, gazing at the couple before him with shining eyes. "But it was dressed
last night, and that made it exceptionally dangerous in some way. Something seemed to tell me so. Something
did tell me so."
"What told you?" inquired Madame, with more excitement and a certain respect which had been quite absent
from her manner before.
"Something that came in the night. I don't know what it was. Light flashed from it."
"It sounds like a sort of comet, my darling," said Mr. Sagittarius, considerably perturbed. "We didn't observe
that the Crab was specially dressed, did we?"
"It had nothing on at all when we saw it," said Madame with growing agitation. "But whatever was this
comet that flashed light? That's what I want to get at."
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"It was a dark thing that told me the Crab was dressed, that my grandmother had been with it and that its
influence was inimical to her."
"A dark thing! That's not a comet!" said Mr. Sagittarius.
"It vanished with a flash of light into the square."
"At what time did you observe it, sir?" asked Mr. Sagittarius, while Madame leaned forward, gazing with
goggling eyes at the Prophet.
"At exactly halfpast one."
"Did it stay long?"
"A few minutes onlybut it made an impression upon me that I can never forget."
It had apparently also made a very great impression upon Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, who remained for
some seconds staring fixedly at the Prophet without uttering a word. At last Mr. Sagittarius turned to
Madame and said in a voice that shook with seriousness,
"Can it be, Sophronia, that prophets ought to live in the central districts? Can it really be that the nearer they
are to the Circus, and even to the Stores"
"/O beatus illa/!" interjected Madame upon the pinions of a sigh.
"Yes, Sophronia, the Stores, the more clearly is the knowledge of the future vouchsafed to them? If it should
prove to be so!"
Madame stared again upon the Prophet with a fixity and strained inquiry which made him shift in his seat.
"If it should!" she repeated, upon the lowest note of her lower register, which sounded, at that solemn
moment, like the keynote of a dreamer. Then, with a sudden change of manner, she cried sharply,
"Jupiter, you must accompany this gentleman back to the square today."
The Prophet started. So did Mr. Sagittarius.
"But" they cried simultaneously.
"And you must share his night watch."
"But, my darling"
"Or I will," cried Madame. "Which is it to be?"
"Mr. Sagittarius!" exclaimed the Prophet.
"Very well," said Madame. "Let mine be the weary task to wait and watch at home. /Fata feminus/. The
mystery of the dressed Crab must be unveiled. Should this mysterious visitant again vouchsafe a prophetic
message, a practical prophet must be at hand to receive it. Jupiter, this gentleman is not practical. This
report"she struck the paper on which the Prophet had dotted down his notes"is badly written. The
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cycloidal curve might have been made by a Board School child. The deductions drawn/deductio ad
absurdibus/reveal no talent, none of the prophetic /feu de joie/ at all. But this mystery of the dressed Crab
may mean much. Jupiter, you will accompany this gentleman back to London and you will assist him
practically at the telescope tonight."
"Very well, my love. I will risk the personal danger, for your and the children's"
"Butbut really" began the Prophet. "I am very sorry, but"
"Madame has spoken, sir," said Mr. Sagittarius, very solemnly.
"I know she has. Butyes, I know there are no buts in your dictionary, Madame, I know there aren'tbut I
have an engagement tonight that I have sworn"
"What engagement, sir?" said Mr. Sagittarius, sternly. "You have sworn to us. You must know that."
"I have sworn to almost everyone," cried the distracted Prophet. "But this swearI mean this oath must be
kept before yours."
"Before ours, sir?"
"It comes on before eleven. I keep my oath to you after it. I manage the two, don't you see?"
"He will see that you manage the two, Mr. Vivian, I can assure you," said Madame, viciously. "Won't you,
Jupiter?"
"Certainly, my dear. What is the oath, sir, that you place before ours?"
"An oath to Miss Minerva," returned the Prophet, beginning to feel reckless, firm in the conviction that it was
henceforth his destiny to be the very sport of Fate.
"Ha!" cried Mr. Sagittarius. "The double life!"
"Who is Miss Minerva, pray?" said Madame, shooting a very penetrating glance upon her husband.
"Your husband can tell you that," replied the Prophet, by no means without guile.
"Jupiter," cried Madame, "what is the meaning of this? Who is this person?"
Mr. Sagittarius looked exceedingly uncomfortable.
"My dear," he began, "she is a young fethat is, a young woI should say"
"A fe! A wo! Explain yourself, Jupiter!"
"She is a lady, my love."
"A lady! Do I know her?"
"I believe not, my dear."
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"And do you?"
"No, my darling. That isthat is"
"Yes, I suppose!" said Madame, with a very violent click.
"I can hardly say, Sophronia, that, I can't indeed. I have met her, by accident, quite by accident I assure you,
once or twice."
"Where?"
"At Jellybrand's. She goes there to fetch letters on the same day as I do."
Madame's very intellectual brow was overclouded with storm. She turned upon the Prophet.
"And what of this person, Mr. Vivian?" she cried. "What of her and this oath?"
The Prophet, who was secretly very delighted with the diversion he had so cleverly created, hastened to
reply,
"I have promised most solemnly to meet her tonight at a house in the Zoological Gardens!"
"A house in the Zoological Gardens!"
"I mean at the Zoological House, the residence of Mrs. Vane Bridgeman, who is"
But, at this point in his explanation, the Prophet was interrupted by both his hearers.
"The Jellybrand one!" cried Mr. Sagittarius.
"The prophets' patron!" vociferated Madame.
CHAPTER XVI. THE PROPHET RETURNS FROM THE MOUSE WITH TWO OLD AND VALUED
FRIENDS
At these exclamations the Prophet started in some surprise.
"You know this lady?" he asked.
"By repute, sir," replied Mr. Sagittarius.
"Who does not?" cried Madame. "She built the 'Prophets' Rest' at Birchington."
"And the Mediums' Almshouses at Sunnington."
"And the 'Palmists' Retreat' at Millaby Bay."
"And the"
"I see you know all about her," interposed the Prophet. "Well, she is giving a reception tonight at Zoological
House and I have sworn to be there. But I shall get home by eleven. You will understand, however, that I
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cannot have the pleasure of entertaining Mr. Sagittarius during the evening under my own roof. I regret this
extremely, but you see it is unavoidable."
To the Prophet's great surprise this lucid explanation was received by his hearers with a strange silence and a
combined meditative, and even moony, staring which was to him inexplicable. Both Madame and Mr.
Sagittarius seemed suddenly immersed in contemplation. They began, he thought, to look like Buddhists, or
like those devoted persons who, in the times of the desert monks, remained for long periods posed upon
pillows in sandy wastes musing upon Eternity. At first, as he met their fixed eyes, he fancied that they were,
perhaps, falling into a trance, but presently the conviction seized him that they must be, on the contrary,
busily thinking out some problem. He hoped fervently that he did not form part of it. At length the quivering
silence was broken by Mr. Sagittarius.
"I might accompany you to Mrs. Bridgeman's, sir," he said to the Prophet. "Might I not, Sophronia?"
"Oh, but" began the Prophet, very hastily.
"The lady has frequently pressed me to accept of her hospitality."
"Indeed!"
"For years she has been writing to me at Jellybrand's, under my real name of Malkiel the Second, you
understand. She addresses me simply as the master.' "
"But do the postal authorities"
"Not upon the envelope, sir, not upon the envelope."
"I see."
"Hitherto, true to myself, true to the principles of Malkiel the First, and to the instincts of Madame, I have
declined her personal acquaintance. But there is no reason why you should not introduce me to the house as
Mr. Sagittarius, no reason at all."
The Prophet knew only too well that there was not, but before he had time to go on trying to wriggle out of
the complication, Madame struck in.
"Miss Minerva is to be present at this reception, I believe," she said sharply.
"Yes, she is," answered the Prophet, illumined by a ray of hope.
"Jupiter," said Madame, "I will accompany you and Mr. Vivian to the Zoological Gardens tonight. It is my
sacred duty."
The Prophet groaned.
"But, my darling"
"The reception over, I will assist you and Mr. Vivian at the telescope in the Berkeley Square. In your
presence I can do so without departing from my principles, /salvo pudoribus/. Do not interrupt me, Jupiter, if
you please. I have thought the matter out. The crisis in our fate is at hand. Upon the events of the next three
nights depends our future. These mysterious messages of which Mr. Vivian speaks must be examined into by
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us upon the spot. This mystery of the dressed Crab must be made clear. A woman's intellect is needed. A
woman's intellect shall not be wanting. Ill as I am, worn down by the occurrences of yesterday and by this
gentleman's incessant telegrams, I will leave my books"here she waved one hand towards the dwarf
bookcase"I will assume an appropriate /neglige/ and my outdoor boots, a fichu and bonnet, and will
accompany you at once to the Berkeley Square, there to confer and arrange the programme of the evening.
Mrs. Bridgeman would fall down before us in worship could she know who we really are. As it is, Mr. Vivian
will introduce us modestly as two old and valued friends. The time may be at hand when we need no longer
hide ourselves beneath an /alibi/. Till then we must possess ourselves, and Mr. Vivian must possess us, in
patience. Ill as I am, I will accompany you. Tonight shall see me in the Zoological Gardens at my husband's
side."
Before the prospect of this sublime selfsacrifice both Mr. Sagittarius and the Prophet were as men dumb.
They said not a word. They only gazedwith a sort of strange idiotcyat Madame as she rose, with an
elaborate and studied feebleness, from the maroon couch and prepared to go upstairs to assume the
appropriate /neglige/. Only when she was at her full height did the Prophet, rendered desperate by the terrible
results of his own ingenuity, nerve himself to utter one last protest.
"I really do not think it would be quite according to the rules of etiquette which prevail in the central
districts," he cried, "for a lady to spend the night in the butler's pantry of a comparative stranger, even when
accompanied by her husband. It might give rise to talk in the square, and"
"The butler's pantry, sir!" exclaimed Mr. Sagittarius. "Explain yourself, I beg."
"The telescope is there, and"
"I have passed beyond the reach of etiquette," said Madame, looking considerably like Joan of Arc and other
wellknown heroines. "My duty lies plain before me. Of myself I should not have selected the Zoological
Gardens and the butler's pantry of a comparative stranger as places in which to pass the night, even when
accompanied by my husband. But my conscience/mens conscium recto/guides me and I will not resist
it. I will assume my /neglige/ and bonnet and will be with you in a moment."
So saying she majestically quitted the apartment.
The Prophet fell down upon the maroon sofa like a man smitten with paralysis. He felt suddenly old, and very
weak. He tried to think, to consider how he could explain Madame Sagittarius to his grandmother for she
must surely now become aware of the presence of strangers in her pretty homehow he could arrange
matters with Mr. Ferdinand, how he could apologise to a lady whom he had never yet seen for appearing at
her house with two uninvited guests, how he could get rid of the Sagittariuses when the horrible night watch
should be at an end and the frigid winter dawn be near. But his mind refused to work. His brain was a blank,
containing nothing except, perhaps, a vague desire for sudden death. Mr. Sagittarius did not disturb his
contemplation of the inevitable. Indeed, that gentleman also seemed meditative, and the silence lasted until
the reappearance of Madame, in a brown robeof a slightly teagown typetrimmed with green chiffon
and coffeecoloured lace, a black bonnet adorned with about a score of imitation plums made in some
highlyglazed material, a heavy cloak lined with priceless rabbitskins, and the outdoor boots.
If the Prophet had found the journey to the Mouse a painful experience, what can be said of his feelings
during the journey from that noble stream? Long afterwards he recalled his state of mind during the tramp
across the Common among the broken crockery, the dustheaps, the decaying vegetables and the occasional
lurking rats, the journey in the train, the reembarkment upon the purple 'bus from the gentle eminence sloping
towards the coalyard, the long pilgrimage towards the central districts with his very outlying companions.
He recalled the peculiar numbness that strove against the desperation of his thoughts, his feeble efforts to lay
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plans frustrated by a perpetual buzzing in his brain, his flitting visions of that gentle grandmother round
whose venerable age and dignity he was about to group such peculiar personalities, and beneath whose roof
he was about to indulge in such unholy prophetic practices. Long afterwardsbut even then he could not
smile as men so often smile when they look back on lost despairs!
He and his companions spoke but little together as they journeyed. Occasionally Madame and Mr. Sagittarius
conversed in husky whispers, like brigands the Prophet thought, and the veiled click of Madame's contralto
struck through the startled air. But mostly a silence prevaileda silence alive with fate.
At the corner of Air Street they got out and began to walk down Piccadilly towards the Berkeley square. It
was now evening. The lamps were lighted and the murmur of strolling crowds filled the gloomy air. Madame
stared feverishly about her, excited by the press, the flashing hansoms and the gailyilluminated shops. Once,
as she passed Benoist's, she murmured "/O festum dies/!" and again, by the Berkeley, when she was
momentarily jostled by a very large and umbrageous tramp who had apparently been celebrating the joys of
beggary"/Acto profanus vulgam/!" But generally she was silent, enwrapped, no doubt, in bookish thought.
When, at length, they stood before the door of number one thousand she breathed a heavy sigh.
"Please," said the Prophet, in a trembling voice, "please enter quietly. My grandmother is very unwell."
"Ankles seems to be a very painful complaint, sir," said Mr. Sagittarius. "But Madame and self are not in the
habit of creating uproar by our movements."
"No, no. Of course not. Stillon tiptoe if you don't mind."
"I cannot walk on tiptoe," said Madame, in a voice that sounded to the Prophet terrifically powerful. "The
attitude is precarious and undignified. As the great Juvenile"
"Yes, yes. Ah! that's it!"
He managed to get his key into the door and very gingerly opened it. Madame and Mr. Sagittarius stepped
into the hall, followed closely by the Prophet, who was content on conveying them unobserved to the library.
"This way," he whispered. "This way. Softly! Softly!"
He began to steal, like a shadow, across the hall, and, impressed by his surreptitious manner, his old and
valued friends instinctively followed his example. All three of them, then, with long steps and theatrical
pauses, were stagily upon the move, when suddenly the door that led to the servants' quarters swung open and
Mrs. Fancy Quinglet debouched into their midst, succeeded by Mr. Ferdinand, who carried in his hand a
menu card in a silver holder. At the moment of their appearance the Prophet, holding his finger to his lips,
was taking a soft and secret stride in the direction of the library door, his body bent forward and his head
protruded towards the sanctum he longed to gain, and Madame and Mr. Sagittarius, true to the instinct of
imitation that dwells in our monkey race, were in precisely similar attitudes behind him. The hall being rather
dark, and the gait of the trio it contained thus tragically surreptitious, it was perhaps not unnatural that Mrs.
Fancy should give vent to a piercing cry of terror, and that Mr. Ferdinand should drop the menu and crouch
back against the wall in a hunched position expressive of alarm. At any rate, such were their actions,
whilefor their partthe Prophet and his two old and valued friends uttered a united exclamation and
struck three attitudes that were pregnant with defensive amazement.
Having uttered herself, Mrs. Fancy, according to her invariable custom when completely terrified, displayed
all the semblance of clearsighted composure and explanatory discrimination. While Mr. Ferdinand remained
by the wall, with his face to it and his large white hands spread out upon his shut eyes, the lady's maid
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advanced upon Madame, and, addressing herself apparently to some hidden universe in need of information,
remarked in rather a piecing voice,
"I say again, as I said afore, the house has been broke into and the robbers are upon us. I can't speak different
nor mean other."
On hearing these words Madame's large and rippling countenance became suffused with indignant scarlet,
and a preliminary click rang through the hall. The Prophet bounded forward.
"Hush, Fancy," he cried. "What are you saying?"
"What I mean, Master Hennessey. The house has been broke"
"Hush! Hush! This lady and gentleman are"
"Two old and valued friends" boomed Madame.
"Two old and valued friends of mine. Mr. Ferdinand! Mr. Ferdinand, take your face from the wall, if you
please. There is no cause for alarm. Now, Fancynow!"
For Mrs. Fancy had, as usual, broken into tears on learning the reassuring truth, and was now displaying
every symptom of distress and enervation. The Prophet, unable to calm her, was obliged to assist her upstairs
and place her upon the landing, where he hurriedly left her uttering broken moans and murmurs, and
repeating again and again her statement of affairs and assertion of inability to conceal the revealed obvious.
On his return he found Madame, Mr. Sagittarius and Mr. Ferdinand grouped statuesquely in the hall as if to
represent "Perturbation."
"Mr. Ferdinand," he said rather severely, "I did not expect this conduct of you, shrinking from guests in this
extraordinary manner. A butler who shows terror at the sight of visitors does not conduce to the popularity of
his employers."
"I beg pardon, sir. I was not prepared."
"Please be prepared another time. You will serve dinner for three tonight, very quietly, in the inner
diningroom. I do not wish Mrs. Merillia to be disturbed in her illness, and"
"If you please, sir, Mrs. Merillia feels herself so much better that she is coming down to dinner tonight."
"Coming down to dinner!" said the Prophet, aghast.
"Yes, sir. And she has asked in Sir Tiglath Butt and the Lady Julia Postlethwaite to join her. I was about to
show Mrs. Merillia the menu, sir, when"
"Good Heavens! Merciful Powers!" ejaculated the Prophet.
"Sir?"
"What on earth is to be done?" continued the Prophet, lost for the moment to all sense of propriety.
Mr. Ferdinand looked at the old and valued friends.
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"I can't say, sir, I'm sure," he replied, pursing up his lips.
"What is the meaning" began Mr. Sagittarius.
"I'm not aware that" started Madame.
The Prophet darted to the library door and opened it.
"Pray, pray come in here," he hissed. "My grandmother! Softly!"
"But the old la"
"Hush, please!"
"I must remark, Mr. Viv"
"Tsh! Tsh! Mr. Ferdinand, wait in the hall. I shall want to speak to you in a moment."
"Yes, sir."
The Prophet closed the door and turned to this indignant visitors.
"This is terrible," he said. "Terrible!"
"Pray why?" cried Madame.
"Why," cried the Prophet, "why?"
He sought frantically for some excuse. Suddenly a bright idea occurred to him.
"Why," he said, impressively. "Because Sir Tiglath Butt, the gentleman who is coming to dinner, is the
person who for fiveandforty years has been seeking Mr. Sagittarius with the firm intention of assaulting,
perhaps of killing, him."
Mr. Sagittarius turned deathly pale, and made a movement as if to get out of the nearest window.
"This is a trap!" he stammered. "This is a rattrap. This was planned."
"Really"began the Prophet.
But Mr. Sagittarius did not heed the exclamation. Tremblig very violently, he continued,
"Sophy, my darling, you are in danger. Let us fly!"
And, clutching his wife by the arm, to the Prophet's unspeakable delight he endeavoured to lead, or rather to
drag her to the door. But Madame now showed the metal she was made of.
"Jupiter," she exclaimed, in her deepest note, "if you are a Prophet you can surely at moments be also a man.
Where is your /toga virilibus/?"
"I don't know, my love, I'm sure. Don't let us lose a moment. Come, my angel!"
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"I shall not come," retorted Madame, whose leaping ambition had been fired by the sound of titled names.
"The gentleman believes you to be an American syndicate."
"I know, my blessing, I know. But"
"Very well. If you don't behave like one he will never suspect you."
The Prophet saw his chance slipping from him and hastened to interpose.
"He might divine the truth," he said. "One can never"
But at this moment he was interrupted by Mr. Ferdinand who abruptly opened the door and observed,
"If you please, sir, Mrs. Merillia has sent down orders that the police are to be fetched at once."
Mr. Sagittarius, now thoroughly unnerved, turned from white to grey.
"The police!" he vociferated. "Sophy, my angel, let us fly. This is no place for you!"
"The police!" cried the Prophet. "Why?"
"I believe it's Mrs. Fancy's doing, sir. If you would go to Mrs. Merillia, sir, I think"
The Prophet rushed from the room and hastened upstairs four steps at a time. He found his beloved
grandmother in a state of grave agitation, and Mrs. Fancy, in floods of tears, reiterating her statement that
there were robbers in the house.
"Oh, Hennessey!" cried Mrs. Merillia, on his entrance, "thank God that you are come. There are burglars in
the house. Fancy has just encountered them in the hall. Go for the police, my dearest boy. Don't lose a
moment."
"My dear grannie, they're not burglars."
"I can't speak different, Master Hennessey, nor"
"Then who are they, Hennessey? Fancy declares"
"They are twotwowell, two old and valued friends of mine."
"Old and valued friends of ours!"
"Of mine, grannie. Fancy, pray don't make such a noise!"
"Fancy," said Mrs. Merillia, "you can go to your room and lie down."
"Yes, ma'am. I say again, as I said afore, the house has been broke into and the robbers"
At this point the Prophet shut the door on the faithful and persistent creature, who forthwith carried her
determination and sobs to an upper storey.
"Hennessey, what is all this? Who is really here?"
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"Grannie, dear, only two friends of mine," replied the Prophet, trying to look at ease, and feeling like a
criminal.
"Friends of yours? But surely then I know them. I thought I knew all your friends."
"So you do, grannie, all exceptexcept just these."
"And they are old and valued, you say?"
"No, nothat is, I mean yes."
Mrs. Merillia was too dignified to ask any further questions. She lay back on her sofa, and looked at her
grandson with a shining of mild reproach in her green eyes.
"Well, my dear," she said, "go back to your friends, but don't forget that Lady Julia and Sir Tiglath are dining
here at halfpast seven."
"Grannie," cried the Prophet, with a desperate feeling that Madame meant to stay, "you ought not to dine
downstairs tonight. Let me send and put them off."
"No, Hennessey," she answered, with gentle decision. "I feel better, and I want cheering up. My morning was
not altogether pleasant."
The Prophet understood that she was alluding to his questions, and felt cut to the heart. His home seemed
crumbling about him, but he knew not what to do or what to say. Mrs. Merillia observed his agitation, but she
did not choose to remark upon it, for she considered curiosity the most vulgar of all the vices.
"Go to your friends, dear," she said again. "But be in time for dinner."
"Yes, grannie."
The Prophet descended the stairs and met Mr. Ferdinand at the bottom.
"Am I to send for the police, sir?"
"No, no. I've explained matters."
"And about dinner, sir?"
"I'll tell you in a moment, Mr. Ferdinand," replied the Prophet, entering the library with the fixed intention of
getting Madame and Mr. Sagittarius out of the house without further delay.
The tableau that met his eyes, however, was not reassuring. He found Madame, having laid aside her bonnet,
and thrown the rabbitskin cloak carelessly upon a settee, arranging her hair before a mirror, and shaking up
the coffeecoloured lace fichu in a manner that suggested a permanent occupation of the house, while her
husband, sunk in a deep armchair in an attitude of complete nervous prostration, was gazing dejectedly into
the fire. When the Prophet entered, the latter bounded with alarm, while Madame turned round, a couple of
hairpins in her mouth and both hands to the back of her head.
"Ah," she remarked, through the pins, "/il a vous/! I am happy to say that I have induced Mr. Sagittarius to
assume his /toga virilibus/, and that we have, therefore, great pleasure in yielding to your thoughtful
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pressure"
"My what?" said the Prophet, blankly.
"You thoughtful pressure, and accepting your urgent invite to dine here before proceeding to the Zoological
Gardens and thence to the butler's pantry."
The Prophet tried not to groan while she emitted a pin and secured with it a wandering plait of raven hair.
"You're sure, sir," said Mr. Sagittarius, in a deplorable voice, "that the gentleman is convinced that I am
really an American syndicate?"
The Prophet rang the bell. He could not trust himself to speak, and, when he looked at Madame's large and
determined eyes, he knew that to do so would be useless.
Mr. Ferdinand appeared.
"Mr. Ferdinand," said the Prophet, "this lady and gentleman will join us at dinner tonight."
"Yes, sir," said Mr. Ferdinand, casting a glance of outraged prudery upon Mr. Sagittarius, who was attired in
his usual morning costume, including spats.
"What's the matter, Mr. Ferdinand?" asked the Prophet, following that functionary's eyes. "Ha! He's not
dressed!"
"No, sir!"
"Mr. Sagittarius," cried the Prophet, "you're not dressed!"
"Sir," cried that gentleman, "do you dare to accuse me of impropriety in a frock coat?"
"No, no. But for dinner. You can't possibly dine like that!"
"I have dined like this, sir, for the last twenty years. The architects and their wives"
"I daresay. But unluckily there will be no architects and their wives at dinner tonight. Please stand up."
"Sir?"
"Kindly stand up. Mr. Ferdinand!"
"Yes, sir."
"Place your back against this gentleman's if you pleasetouching, touching! Don't wriggle away like that.
Keep your heels to the ground while I fetch a sheet of notepaper. Don't move your heads either of you. I
thought so. You're pretty much the same height. Mr. Ferdinand, you will lay out a white shirt and one of your
black dress suits in my dressingroom at once. Madame, I regret that we must leave you for a few moments.
Will you rest here? Allow me to place a cushion for your head. And here is Juvenal in the original."
So saying, the Prophet hurried Mr. Sagittarius from the room, driving Mr. Ferdinand, in a condition of
elephantine horror, before him, and abandoning Madame to an acquaintance with the classics that she had
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certainly never achieved in the society of the renowned Dr. Carter.
CHAPTER XVII. MALKIEL THE SECOND IS MISTAKEN FOR A RATCATCHER
"If you tremble like that, of course it must look too big!" exclaimed the Prophet to Mr. Sagittarius, a quarter
of an hour later. "Draw it in at the back."
Mr. Sagittarius, with shaking hands, drew in the waistcoat of Mr. Ferdinand, which hung in folds around his
thin and agitated figure.
"That's better," said the Prophet. "They won't notice anything odd. But you've turned up yourMr.
Ferdinand's trousers!"
"They're too long, sir. You braced them too low for"
"I braced them low on purpose," cried the Prophet in great excitement, "to cover the spats, since you can't get
on Mr. Ferdinand's boots. Kindly turn them down."
"As to the spats, sir, the architects and their wives"
"Mr. Sagittarius," exclaimed the Prophet, "I think it right to inform you that if you mention the architects and
their wives again, I may very probably go mad. I don't say I shall, but I will not answer for myself. Have the
goodness to turn them down and follow me."
Mr. Sagittarius obeyed, and followed the Prophet from the room with a waddling gait and a terrible sensation
of having nothing on. The coat and trousers which he wore flapped about him as he descended the stairs in
the wake of the Prophet, glancing nervously about him and starting at the slightest sound. In the library they
found Madame, holding the great Juvenile upside down and looking exceedingly cross.
"Will you be good enough to come upstairs?" said the Prophet to her very politely, though his fingers
twitched to strangle her. "I wish to present you to my grandmother, and dinner is just ready."
Madame rose with dignity.
"I am ready too," she said, with a click. "/Semper paratis/."
And, shaking up the fichu, she ascended the stairs. Outside the drawingroom door the Prophet, who seemed
strangely calm, but who was in reality almost bursting with nervous excitement, paused and faced his old and
valued friends.
"You will forgive my saying so, I hope," he whispered, "but my grandmother is not well and much
conversation tires her. So we don't talk too much in her presence. Only just now and then, you understand."
And with this last injunctionfutile, he knew as he gave ithe commended himself to whatever powers
there be and opened the door.
Sir Tiglath had not yet arrived, but Lady Julia Postlethwaite was seated on a sofa by Mrs. Merillia, and was
conversing with her about the Court, the dreadful amount of money a certain dukeher third cousinhad
recently had to pay in Death Duties, the corrupt condition of society, and the absurd pretensions of the lower
middle classes. Lady Julia was sensitive and a very /grande dame/. She wore her hair powdered, and had a
slight cough and exquisite manners. Once a lady in waiting, she was now a widow, possessed a set of
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apartments in Hampton Court Palace, worshipped Queen Alexandra, and had scarcely ever spoken to
anybody who moved outside of Court Circles. The Duke of Wellington was said to have embraced her when
a child.
Mrs. Merillia and this lady looked up when the door opened, and Lady Julia paused midway in a sentence, of
which these were the opening words,
"The old duke wouldn't make it over, and so poor Loftus has to pay nearly a million to the Chancellor of the
Excheq"
"How d'you do, Lady Julia? Grannie, I have persuaded my friends, Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, to join us at
dinner. Sir Tiglath Butt is most anxious to meet Mr. Sagittarius, who is a great astronomer. Let me
Madame Sagittarius, Mrs. MerilliaMr. SagittariusMrs. Merillia, my grandmotherLady Julia
Postlethwaite."
Mrs. Merillia, although taken completely by surprise, and fully conscious that her grandson had committed an
outrage in turning an arranged and intimate quartette without permission into a disorganised sextette, bowed
with selfpossessed graciousness, and indicated a chair to Madame, who seated herself in it with that sort of
defensive and ostentatious majesty which is often supposed by illbred people to be a perfect society manner.
Mr. Sagittarius remained standing in his enormous suit, turning out his feet, over which Mr. Ferdinand's
trousers rippled in broadcloth waves, in the first position. A slight pause ensued, during which the Prophet
was uncomfortably affected by the behaviour of Madame, who gazed at the very neat and superior wig worn
by Mrs. Merillia, and at that lady's charming silver grey damask gown, in a manner that suggested
amazement tempered with indignation, her instant expression of these two sentiments being only held in
check by a certain reverence which was doubtless inspired by the pretty room, the thick carpet, the ancestral
pictures upon the walls, and the lofty bearing of Lady Julia Postlethwaite, who could scarcely conceal her
very natural surprise at the extraordinary appearance of Mr. Sagittarius. As to Mrs. Merillia, although she
was, in reality, near fainting with wonder at her grandson's escapade, she preserved an expression of gracious
benignity, and did not allow a motion of her eyelids or a flutter of her fan to betray her emotion at finding
herself the unprepared hostess of such unusual guests. The Prophet broke the silence by saying, in a voice
that cracked with agitation,
"I trustI sincerely trust that we shall have a clement spring this year."
Lady Julia, at whom he had looked while uttering this original desire, was about to reply when Madame
uttered a stentorian click and interposed.
"In the spring the young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love," she remarked, with the fictitious ease
of profound illbreeding.
No one dared to dispute the portentous statement, and she resumed majestically,
"The Mouse is delicious in spring."
There was another dead silence, and Madame, turning with patronising and heavy affability towards Lady
Julia, added,
"Your ladyship doubtless loves the Mouse/Mus Pulcherrimo/in spring as I do?"
The Prophet felt as if he were being pricked by thousands of redhot needles, and the perspiration burst out in
beads upon his forehead.
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"I am not specially fond of mice in spring, or indeed at any season," replied Lady Julia, with her slight, but
very distinct and belllike, cough.
"I said the Mouse, your ladyship," returned Madame, feeding upon this titled acquaintance with her bulging
black eyes, and pushing the kid boots well out from under her brown skirt. "I observed that the Mouse was
peculiarly delicious in the season of love."
"No mouse attracts me," said Lady Julia, coughing again and raising her fine eyebrows slightly. "I should
much prefer to pass the spring without the companionship of any mouse whatever."
Both Madame and Mr. Sagittarius opened their lips to reply, but before they could eject a single word the
door was opened by Mr. Ferdinand, who announced,
"Sir Tiglath Butt."
Mr. Sagittarius started violently and upset a vase of roses, the astronomer rolled into the room with a very red
face, and Mr. Ferdinand added,
"Dinner is served."
Mrs. Merillia shook hands with Sir Tiglath and glanced despairingly around her. It was sufficiently obvious
that she was considering how to arrange the procession to the diningroom.
"Hennessey," she began, "will you take Lady Julia? Sir Tiglath, will you"she paused, but there was no help
for it, she was obliged to continue"take Mrs. Sagittarius? Let me introduce you, Sir Tiglath ButtMrs.
Sagittarius. Mr. Sagittarius, will you take"
"Mr. Sagittarius!" roared Sir Tiglath. "Where is he?"
That gentleman gathered Mr. Ferdinand's trousers up in both hands and prepared for instantaneous flight.
"Where is he?" bellowed Sir Tiglath, wheeling round with amazing rapidity for so fat a man. "Ha!"
He had viewed Mr. Sagittarius, who, grasping Mr. Ferdinand's suit in pleats, ducked his head like one
wishing to be beforehand with violence and set the spats towards the door. Sir Tiglath advanced upon him.
"The old astronomer has heard the name of Sagittarius," he vociferated. "He has been informed that"
"It's not true, sir," cried Mr. Sagittarius, pale with terror. "It is not true. I deny it. I am an AmeriI mean I
am not the American syndicateyou are in error, in absolute error. I swear it. I take the heavens to witness."
At this remarkable and comprehensive statement Mrs. Merillia and Lady Julia looked at each other in elegant
amazement.
"What do you mean, sir?" exclaimed Sir Tiglath. "And why do you insult the sacred heavens, you an
astronomer!"
"I am not an astronomer," cried Mr. Sagittarius, cringing in the voluminous waistcoat of Mr. Ferdinand. "I am
an outside broker. I swear it. My dress, my manner proclaim the fact. Sophronia, tell the gentleman that I am
an outside broker and that all Margate has recognised me as such."
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"My husband states the fact," said Madame, in response to this impassioned appeal. "My husband brokes
outside, and has done for the last twenty years. Collect yourself, Jupiter. Pray do not doff your /toga virilibus/
in the presence of ladies!"
The terror of Mr. Sagittarius was such, however, that it is very doubtful whether he would not have proceeded
thus to disrobe had not the Prophet, rendered desperate by the turn of events, abruptly leaped between Sir
Tiglath and his old and valued friend and, gathering the outraged Lady Julia under his arm, exclaimed,
"Pray, praywe can discuss this matter more comfortably at dinner. Permit me, Lady Julia. Sir Tiglath, if
you will kindly give your arm to Madame Sagittarius. Mr. Sagittarius, my grandmother."
So saying, he made a sort of flank movement, so adroitly conceived and carried out that, in the twinkling of
an eye, he had driven Sir Tiglath to the side of Madame and hustled Mr. Sagittarius into the immediate
neighbourhood of Mrs. Merillia. Nor had more than two minutes elapsed before the whole party found
themselvesthey scarce knew howarranged around the dining table and being served with clear soup by
Mr. Ferdinand and the astounded Gustavus, whose naturally round eyes began to take an almost oblong form
as he attended to the wants of Mrs. Merillia's very unfamiliar guests, whose outlying demeanour and
architectural manners evidently filled him with the most poignant dismay.
As to Mrs. Merillia and Lady Julia, the foregoing scene had so reduced them that they were almost betrayed
into some hysterical departure from the rules of exquisite good breeding which they had unconsciously
observed from the cradle. Indeed, the latter, strong in the belief that the terms outside broker and raving
maniac were interchangeable, twice dropped her spoon into her soupplate before she could succeed in lifting
it to her mouth, and was unable to prevent herself from whispering to the Prophet,
"Pray, Mr. Vivian, tell me the worstis he absolutely dangerous?"
"No, no," whispered back the Prophet, reassuringly. "It's all his play."
"Play!" murmured Lady Julia, glancing at Mr. Sagittarius, who was holding back the right sleeve of Mr.
Ferdinand's coat with his left hand in order to have the free use of his dinner limb.
"Yes," whispered the Prophet. "He's the most harmless, innocent creature. A child might stroke him. I mean
he wouldn't hurt a child."
"Yes, but we are not children," said Lady Julia, still in great apprehension.
Meanwhile Sir Tiglath, concerned with his dinner, took no heed of Mr. Sagittarius for the moment, and that
gentleman, slightly reassured, endeavoured to make himself agreeable to Mrs. Merillia.
"You are very pleasantly situated here, ma'am," he began.
Mrs. Merillia thought he meant because she was at his elbow, and answered politely,
"Yes, very pleasantly situated."
"It is indeed a blessing to be within such easy reach of the Stores," added Mr. Sagittarius, finishing his soup,
and permitting Mr. Ferdinand's sleeves to flow down once more over his hands.
"The Stores!" said Mrs. Merillia.
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"/O festum dies beatus illa/!" ejaculated Madame, assuming an expression of profound and almost passionate
sentiment. "Happy indeed the good lady who dwells in the central districts!"
She permitted a gigantic sigh to leave her bosom and to wander freely among the locks of those at the table.
Sir Tiglath, who, on being assaulted by her learning, had shown momentary symptoms of apoplexy, now
gave a loud grunt, while the Prophet, perceiving that his grandmother and Lady Julia were quite unequal to
the occasion, hastily replied,
"Yes, Berkeley Square is very convenient in may ways."
"Ah!" said Mr. Sagittarius, keeping a wary eye on Sir Tiglath and re addressing himself to Mrs. Merillia,
"the Berkeley Square. But if you lived in the one behind Kimmins's Mews, it would be quite another pair of
boots, would it not, ma'am?"
Lady Julia, who was sitting next to Mr. Sagittarius, shifted her chair nearer to the Prophet, and whispered,
"I'm sure he is dangerous, Mr. Vivian!" while Mrs. Merillia, in the greatest perplexity, replied,
"The one behind Mr. Kimmins's Mews?"
"Ay, over against Brigwell's Buildings, just beyond the Pauper Lunatic Asylum."
Lady Julia turned pale.
"I daresay," answered Mrs. Merillia, bravely. "But I am not acquainted with the neighbourhood you
mention."
"You know the Mouse?"
At this abrupt return to the subject of mice Lady Julia became really terrified.
"Be frank with me, Mr. Vivian," she whispered to the Prophet, under cover of boiled salmon; "is he a
ratcatcher?"
"Good Heavens, no!" whispered back the Prophet. "He'she's quite the contrary."
"But"
"What mouse?" said Mrs. Merillia, endeavouring to seem pleasantly at ease, though she, too, was beginning
to feel a certain amount of alarm at these strange beings' persistent discussion of the inhabitants of the
wainscot. "Do you allude to any special mouse?"
"I do, ma'am. I allude to the Mouse that has helped to make Madame and self what we are."
Sir Tiglath began to roll about in his chair preparatory to some deliverance, and Mrs. Merillia, casting a
somewhat agitated glance at her grandson, answered,
"Really. I did not know that anything so small could have so much influence."
"It may be small, ma'am," said Mr. Sagittarius. "But to a sensitive nature it often seems gigantic."
"You mean at night, I suppose? Does it disturb you very much?"
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"We hear it, ma'am, but it lulls us to rest."
"Indeed. That is very fortunate. I fear it might keep me awake."
"So we thought at first. But now we should miss it. Should we not, Sophronia?"
"Doubtless," replied Madame, arranging a napkin carefully over her fichu, and dealing rigorously with some
mayonnaise sauce. "It has been our perpetual companion for many years, /mus amicus humano generi/."
Sir Tiglath swelled, and Mrs. Merillia responded,
"I see, a pet. Is it white?"
"No, ma'am," returned Mr. Sagittarius, "it is a rich, chocolate brown except on wet days. Then it takes on the
hue of a lead pencil."
"Indeed!" said Mrs. Merillia, trying nobly to remain social. "How very curious!"
"We worship it in summer," continued Mr. Sagittarius. "In the sultry season it soothes and calms us."
"Then it is quite tame?"
"At that time of year, but in winter nights it is sometimes almost wild."
"Ah, I daresay. They often are, I know."
"The architects and their wives love it as we do."
"Do they? How very fortunate!"
"We should hate to miss it even for a moment."
"Oh, Mr. Vivian!" whispered Lady Julia, "this is dreadful. "I'm almost sure he's brought it with him."
"No, no. It's not alive."
"A dead mouse!"
"It's a river."
"A river! But he said it was a mouse."
"It's both. Mr. Sagittarius," added the Prophet, in a loud and desperate tone of voice, "you'll find this
champagne quite dry. You needn't be afraid of it."
"Did you get it from by the rabbit shop, sir?" asked Mr. Sagittarius, lifting his glass. "I ordered a dozen in,
only the day before yesterday."
Lady Julia began to tremble.
"I see," she whispered to the Prophet. "His mania is about animals."
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Meanwhile the Prophet had made a warning face at Mr. Sagittarius, who suddenly remembered his danger
and subsided, glancing uneasily at Sir Tiglath, whose intention of addressing him had been momentarily
interfered with by a sweetbread masked in a puree of spinach.
Madame Sagittarius, assisted by food and dry champagne, was nowas the Prophet perceived with
horrorbeginning to feel quite at her ease. She protruded her elbows, sat more extensively in her chair,
rolled her prominent eyes about the room as one accustomed to her state, and said, with condescension, to
Lady Julia,
"Is your ladyship to make one of the party at the Zoological Gardens tonight?"
Lady Julia, who now began to suppose that Mr. Sagittarius's crazy passion for animals was shared by his
wife, gasped and answered,
"Are you going to the Zoological Gardens?"
"Yes, to an assembly. It should be very pleasant. Do you make one?"
"I regret that I am not invited," said Lady Julia, rather stiffly.
Madame bridled, under the impression that she was scoring off a member of the aristocracy.
"Indeed," she remarked, with a click. "Yet I presume that your ladyship is not insensible to the charms of rout
and collation?"
"I beg your pardon?" said Lady Julia, beginning to look like an image made of cast iron.
"I imagine that the social whirl finds in your ladyship a willing acolyte?"
"Oh, no. I go out very little."
"Indeed," said Madame, with some contempt. "Then you do not frequent the Palace?"
"The Palace! Do you mean the Crystal Palace?"
"Of Buckingham? You are not an /amicas curiae/?"
"I fear I don't catch your meaning."
"Does not your ladyship comprehend the Latin tongue?"
"Certainly not," said Lady Julia, who was born in an age when it was considered highly improper for a young
female to have any dealings with the ancients. "Certainly not."
"Dear me!" said Madame, with pitying amazement. "You hear her ladyship, Jupiter?"
"I do, my angel. Madame is a lady of deep education, ma'am," said Mr. Sagittarius, turning to Mrs. Merillia,
who had been listening to the foregoing crossexamination with perpetuallyincreasing horror.
"No decent female should understand Greek or Latin," roared Sir Tiglath at this point. "If she does she's sure
to read a great deal that she's no business to know anything about."
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At this challenge Madame's bulging brow was overcast with a red cloud.
"I beg to disagree, sir," she exclaimed. "In my opinion the Georgics of Horatius, Homer's Idyls and the satires
of the great Juvenile"
"The great what?" bellowed Sir Tiglath.
"The great Juvenile, sir."
"There never was a great juvenile, ma'am. Talent must be mellow before it is worth tasting, whatever the
modern whippersnapper may say. There never was, and there never will be, a great juvenilethere can
only be a juvenile preparing to be great."
"Really, sir."
"I affirm it, madam. And as you seem so mighty fond of Latin, remember what Horace says/Qui cupit
opatam cursu contingere metam, Multa tulit fecitque puer, sudavit et alsit/. Ohhhh!"
And Sir Tiglath flung himself back in his chair, puffing out his enormous cheeks and wagging his gigantic
head at Madame who, for once in her life, seemed entirely at a loss, and unable to call to her assistance a
single shred of learning from the library of Dr. Carter.
Having at last emerged from his Epicurean silence, the astronomer now proceeded to take the floor. Satisfied
that he had laid a presuming female low, he swung round, as if on a pivot, to where Mr. Sagittarius was
sitting in the greatest agitation, and roared,
"And now, sir what is all this about your being an outside broker? I was distinctly informed by this gentleman
only a night or two ago that you were a distinguished astronomer."
"I am betrayed!" cried Mr. Sagittarius, dropping the knife and fork which he had just picked up for the
dissection of a lobster croquette. "I said this was a trap. I said it was a rattrap from the first."
"I knew he must be a ratcatcher," whispered Lady Julia to the Prophet, who was about to rise from his seat
and endeavour to calm his guest. "I was certain no one but a ratcatcher could talk in such a manner."
"He is not indeed! Mr. Sagittarius, pray sit down! You are alarming my grandmother."
"I can't help that, sir. I am not going to sit here, sir, and be slain."
"Tsh! Tsh! I merely informed Sir Tiglath the other evening that what Miss Minerva had told him about you
was true."
"Miss Minerva!" cried Madame, glancing at her husband in a most terrible manner. "Miss Minerva!"
"Lady Enid Thistle, I mean," cried the Prophet, mentally cursing the day when he was born.
"Who's that?" exclaimed Madame, beginning to look almost exactly like Medusa.
"A young female who informed the old astronomer that your husband and an elderly female named Mrs.
Bridgeman had for a long while been carrying on astronomical investigations together"
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"Carrying on together!" vociferated Madame. "Jupiter!"
"And that they had come to the conclusion that there was probably oxygen in certain of the holy fixed stars.
Oxygen, so the elderly female"
"Oxygen in an elderly female!" cried Madame, in the greatest excitement. "Jupiter, is this true?"
Mr. Sagittarius was about to bring forward a flat denial when the Prophet, leaning behind the terrified back of
Lady Julia, hissed in his ear,
"Say yes, or he'll find out who you really are!"
"Yes," cried Mr. Sagittarius, in a catapultic manner.
Madame began to show elaborate symptoms of preparation for a large sized fit of hysterics. She caught her
breath five or six times running in a resounding manner, heaved her bosom beneath the green chiffon and
coffeecoloured lace, and tore feebly with both hands at a large medallion brooch that was doing sentry duty
near her throat.
"Pray, pray, Madame," exclaimed the Prophet, who was now near his wits' end. "Pray"
"How can I pray at table, sir?" she retorted, suddenly showing fight. "You forget yourself."
"Oh, Hennessey," said poor Mrs. Merillia, "what does all this mean?"
"Nothing, grannie, nothing except that Mr. Sagittarius is a very modest man and does not care to
acknowledge the greatness of his talents. Pray sit down, Mr. Sagittarius. Here is the ice pudding. Madame, I
am sure you will take some ice. Mr. Ferdinand!"
"Sir?"
"The ice to Madame Sagittarius instantly!"
Mr. Ferdinand, who was trembling in every limb at having to assist at such a scene in his diningroom, which
had hitherto been the very temple of soft conversation and the most exquisite decorum, advanced towards
Madame, clattering the flat silver dish, and causing the frozen delicacy that the cook had elegantly posed
upon it to run first this way and then that as if in imitative agitation.
"I cannot," sobbed Madame, beginning once more to catch her breath. "At such a moment food becomes
repulsive!"
"I assure you our cook's ice puddings are quite delicious; aren't they, grannie?"
"I have no idea, Hennessey," said Mrs. Merillia, who was so upset by the extraordinary scene at which she
was presiding in the character of hostess, that she mechanically clutched the left bandeau of her delightful
wig, and set it quite a quarter of an inch awry.
"Try it, Madame," cried the Prophet. "I implore you to try it."
Thus adjured Madame detached a large piece of the agile pudding with some difficulty, and subsided into a
morose silence, while her husband sat with his eyes fixed imploringly upon her, totally regardless of his
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social duties. As both Mrs. Merillia and Lady Julia were by this time thoroughly unnerved, and Sir Tiglath
was once more immersed in his food, the whole burden of conversation fell upon the Prophet, who indulged
in a feverish monologue that lasted until the end of dinner. What he talked about he could never afterwards
certainly remember, but he had a vague idea that he discussed the foreign relations of England with
Madagascar, the probable future of Poland, the social habits of the women of Alaska, the prospects of
tobacco culture in West Meath, and the effect that imported Mexicans would be likely to produce upon the
natural simplicity of such unsophisticated persons as inhabit Lundy Island or the more remote districts of the
Shetlands. When the ladies at length rose to leave the diningroom his brain was in a whirl and he had little
doubt that his temperature was up to 104. Nevertheless his mind was still active, was indeed preternaturally
acute for the moment, and he saw in a flash the impossibility of leaving Madame Sagittarius alone with his
grandmother and Lady Julia. As they got up from their seats he therefore took out his watch and said,
"Dear me! It is later than I had supposed. I am afraid we ought to be starting for Zoological House. Mrs.
Bridgeman will be expecting us."
"Certainly, sir, certainly!" said Mr. Sagittarius, with all the alacrity of supreme cowardice, and casting a
terrorstricken glance towards Sir Tiglath, who was glowering at him with glassy eyes above a glass of port.
"Mrs. Bridgeman will be expecting us!"
"I will assume my cloak," said Madame, fiercely. "Jupiter!"
"My darling!"
"Kindly seek my furs."
"Certainly, my love," replied Mr. Sagittarius, darting eagerly from the apartment to fetch the rabbitskins.
"Lady Julia, I hope you will forgive us," said the Prophet, with passionate contrition. "If I had had the
slightest idea that we should have the pleasure of seeing you tonight, of course I should have given up this
engagement. But it is such an old onesettled months agoand I have promised Mrs. Bridgeman so
faithfully that"
"The old astronomer will go with you," cried Sir Tiglath at this moment, swallowing his glass of port at a
gulp, and rolling out of his chair.
The Prophet turned cold, thinking of Miss Minerva, who would be present at Mrs. Bridgeman's living her
secret double life. It was imperative to prevent the astronomer from accompanying them.
"I did not think you knew Mrs. Bridgeman, Sir Tiglath," the Prophet began, while Mrs. Merillia and Lady
Julia stood blankly near the door, trying to look calm and dignified while everyone was ardently preparing to
desert them.
"The old astronomer must know her before the evening is one hour more advanced. He must question her
regarding the holy stars. He must examine her and this Sagittarius, who claims to be an outside broker and yet
to have discovered oxygen in the fixed inhabitants of the sacred heavens. My cloak!"
The last words were bellowed at Gustavus, who rushed forward with Sir Tiglath's Inverness.
The Prophet lowed his head, and metaphorically, threw up the sponge.
"Lady Julia," said Mrs. Merillia, in a soft voice that slightly trembled, "let us go upstairs."
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The two old ladies bowed with tearful dignity, and retired with a sort of gentle majesty that cut the Prophet to
the heart.
"One moment, if you please!" he said to his guests.
And he darted out of the room and leaped up the stairs. He found Mrs. Merillia and Lady Julia just about to
dispose themselves side by side upon a sofa near the fire. They turned and looked at him with reproachful
doves' eyes.
"GrannieLady Julia!" he exclaimed, "I implore your forgiveness. Pardon me! Appearances are against me,
I know. But some day you may understand how I am placed. My position ismymy
situationIyou do not wholly condemn me! Waitwait a few days, I implore you!"
He rushed out of the room.
The two old ladies seated themselves upon the sofa, and tremblingly spread abroad their damask skirts. They
looked at each other in silence, shaking their elegant heads. Then Mrs. Merillia said, in a fluttering voice,
"Oh, Julia, you were a lady in waiting to Her Majesty, you were kissed by the great Duketell metell me
what it all means!"
"Victoria," replied Lady Julia, "it means that your grandson has fallen into the clutches of a dangerous and
determined ratcatcher."
And then the two old ladies mingled their damask skirts and their lace caps and wept.
CHAPTER XVIII. THE SILLY LIFE
"Call a cab for Sir Tiglath, Mr. Ferdinand," whispered the Prophet"a fourwheeler with a lame horse. I'll
take both Mr. and Madame Sagittarius in the brougham."
"Must the horse be lame, sir?"
"Yes. I absolutely decline to encourage the practice of using good horses in fourwheeled cabs. It's a disgrace
to the poor animals. It must be a very lame horse."
"Yes, sir."
And Mr. Ferdinand, standing upon the doorstep, whistled to the night.
Strange to say, in about two minutes there appeared round the corner the very same cabman who had
conveyed the Prophet and Lady Enid to the astronomer's on the previous day, driving the very same horse.
"This horse will do admirably," said the Prophet to Mr. Ferdinand.
"He isn't lame, sir."
"P'r'aps not; but he knows how to tumble down. Sir Tiglath, here is a cab for you. We shall go in the
brougham. Zoological House, Regent's Park, is the direction. Let me help you in, Madame."
As the Prophet got in to sit bodkin between his old and valued friends, he whispered to the footman,
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"Tell Simkins to drive as fast as possible. We are very late."
The footman touched his hat. Just as the carriage moved off, the Prophet protruded his head from the
window, and saw the astronomer rolling into the fourwheeler, the horse of which immediately fell down in a
most satisfactory manner.
There was no general conversation in the brougham, but the Prophet, who was obliged to sit partly on
Madame, and partly on Mr. Sagittarius and partly on air, occasionally heard in the darkness at his back
terrible matrimonial whisperings, whose exact tenor he was unable to catch. Once only he heard Madame say
sibilantly and with a vicious click,
"I might have known what to expect when I married a Prophetwhen I passed over the /pons asinoribus/ to
give myself to a /monstram horrendo/."
To this pathetic heartcry Mr. Sagittarius made a very prolonged answer. The Prophet knew it was prolonged
because Mr. Sagittarius always whispered in such a manner as to tickle the nape of his neck. But he could not
hear anything except a sound like steam escaping from a small pipe. The steam went on escaping until the
brougham passed through a gate, rolled down a declivity, and drew up before an enormous mansion whose
windows blazed with light.
"Is this the Zoological Gardens?" inquired Madame in a stern voice. "Is this the habitation of the woman
Bridgeman?"
"I suppose this is Zoological House," replied the Prophet, sliding decorously off Madame's left knee in
preparation for descent.
"My darling! my love!" said Mr. Sagittarius. "I swear upon the infant head of our Capricornus that Mrs.
Bridgeman and I are"
"Enough!" cried Madame. "/Jam satus/! Be sure that I will inquire into this matter."
The carriage door was opened and, with some struggling, the Prophet and his two valued friends emerged and
speedily found themselves in a very large hall, which was nearly full of very large powdered footmen. In the
distance there was the sound of united frivolities, a band of twenty guitars thrumming a wilful /seguidilla/.
Roses bloomed on every side, and beyond the hall they beheld a vision of illuminated vistas, down which
vague figures came and went.
Evidently when Mrs. Bridgeman let herself go she let herself go thoroughly.
Mr. Sagittarius gazed about him with awestruck amazement, but Madame was equal to the occasion. She
cast the rabbitskins imperially to a neighbouring flunkey, arranged her hair and fichu before a glass, kicked
out her skirt with the heel of one of the kid boots, nipped the green chiffon into prominence with decisive
fingers, and then, turning to the Prophet with all the majesty of a suburban empress, said in a powerful
voice,
"Step forward, I beg. /J'ai pret/."
The Prophet, thus encouraged, stepped forward towards an aperture that on ordinary days contained a door,
but that now contained a stout elderly lady, with hennadyed hair, a powdered face, black eyebrows and a
yellow gown, on which rested a large number of jewelled ornaments that looked like small bombs. At this
lady's elbow stood a footman with an exceedingly powerful bass voice, who shouted the names of
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approaching guests in a manner so uncompromising as to be terrific. Each time he so shouted the stout lady
first started and then smiled, the two operations succeeding one another with almost inconceivable rapidity
and violence.
"What name, sir?" asked the footman of the Prophet, bending his powdered head till it was only about six feet
two inches from the floor.
"Mr. Hennessey Vivian," replied the Prophet, hesitating as to what he should add.
"Mr. Hemmerspeed Vivian!" roared the footman. "What name, Madame?" (to Madame Sagittarius).
"Mr. and Madame Sagittarius of Sagittarius Lodge, the Mouse!" replied the lady majestically.
"Mr.and MadameSegerteribusofSegerteribusLodge, the Mouse!" bawled the footman.
The stout lady, who was Mrs. Vane Bridgeman, started and smiled.
"Delighted to see you, Mr. Segerteribus!" she said to the Prophet.
The Prophet hastened to explain through the uproar of twenty guitars.
"Mr. Vivian is my name. I think Miss Minerva Partridge"
Mrs. Bridgeman started and smiled.
"Of course," she exclaimed. "Of course. You are to be kind enough to introduce me some day to Mr.
SagiSagisomething or other, and I am to introduce him to Sir Tiglath Butt, when Sir Tiglath Butt has
been introduced to me by dear Miss Partridge. It is all to work out beautifully. Yes, yes! Charming!
charming!"
"I have ventured to bring Mr. and Madame Sagittarius with me tonight," said the Prophet.
Mrs. Bridgeman started and smiled.
"They are my old and valued friends, andand here they are."
"Delighted! delighted!" said Mrs. Bridgeman, speaking in a confused manner through the guitars. "How
d'you do, Mr. Sagittarius?"
And she shook hands warmly with a very small and saturnine clergyman decorated with a shock of ebon hair,
who was passing at the moment.
"Biggle!" said the little clergyman.
Mrs. Bridgeman started and smiled.
"Biggle!" repeated the little clergyman. "Biggle!"
The guitars rose up with violence, and all the hot, drubbing passion of Bayswater being Spanish.
"Yes, indeed, I so agree with you, dear Mr. Sagittarius," said Mrs. Bridgeman to the little clergyman.
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"Biggle!" the little clergyman cried in a portentous voice. "Biggle! Biggle!"
"What does he mean?" whispered Mrs. Bridgeman to the Prophet. "How does one?"
"I think that is his name. These are Mr. and Madame Sagittarius."
Mrs. Bridgeman started and smiled.
"Biggleof course," she said to the little clergyman, who passed on with an air of reliant selfsatisfaction.
"Delighted to see you," she added, this time addressing the Prophet's old and valued friends. "Ah! Mr.
SagiSagiumI have heard so much of you from dear Miss Minerva."
The wild, high notes of a flute, played by a silly gentleman from Tooting, shrilled through the tupping of the
guitars, and Mr. Sagittarius, trembling in every limb, hissed in Mrs. Bridgeman's ear,
"Hush, ma'am, for mercy's sake!"
Mrs. Bridgeman started and forgot to smile.
"My loved and honoured wife," continued Mr. Sagittarius, in a loud and anxious voice, "more to me than any
lunar guide or starry monitor! Madame Sagittarius, a lady of deep education, ma'am."
"Delighted!" said Mrs. Bridgeman, making a gracious grimace at Madame, who inclined herself stonily and
replied in a sinister voice,
"It is indeed time that this renconter took place. Henceforth, ma'am, I shall be ever at my husband's side, /per
fus et nefus//et nefus/, ma'am."
"So glad," said Mrs. Bridgeman. "I have been longing for this"
"Mr. Bernard Wilkins!" roared the tall footman.
Mr. Sagittarius started and Mrs. Bridgeman did the same and smiled.
"Bernard Wilkins the Prophet!" Mr. Sagittarius exclaimed. "From the Rise!"
"Mrs. Eliza Doubleway!" shouted the footman.
"Mrs. Eliza!" cried Mr. Sagittarius, in great excitement. "That's the soothsayer from the Beck!"
"Madame Charlotte Humm!" yelled the footman.
"Madame Humm!" vociferated Mr. Sagittarius, "the crystalgazer from the Hill!"
"Professor Elijah Chapman!" bawled the footman.
"The nosereader!" piped Mr. Sagittarius. "The nosereader from the Butts!"
"Verano!" screamed the footman, triumphantly submerging the flute and the twenty guitars. "Verano!"
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"The South American Irish palmist from the Downs! My love," said Mr. Sagittarius, in a cracking voice, "we
are in it tonight, we are indeed; we are fairly and squarely in it."
Madame began to bridle and to look as ostentatious as a leviathan.
"And if we are, Jupiter!" she said in a voice that rivalled the footman's"if we are, we are merely in our
element. They needn't think to come over me!"
"Hush, my love! Remember that"
"Dr. Birdie Soames!" interposed the vibrant bass of the footman.
"The physiognomy lady from the Common!" said Mr. Sagittarius, on the point of breaking down under the
emotion of the moment. "Scot! Scot! Great Scot!"
Mrs. Bridgeman was now completely surrounded by a heterogeneous mass of very remarkablelooking
people, among whom were peculiarly prominent an enormously broadshouldered man, with Roman features
and his hair cut over his brow in a royal fringe, a small woman with a pointed red nose in bead bracelets and
prunecoloured muslin, and an elderly female with short grizzled hair, who wore a college gown and a
mortarboard with a scarlet tassel, and who carried in one hand a large skull marked out in squares with red
ink. These were Verano, the Irish palmist from the Downs; Mrs. Eliza Doubleway, the soothsayer from Beck;
and Dr. Birdie Soames, the physiognomy lady from the Common. Immediately around these celebrities were
grouped a very pale gentleman in a short jacket, who looked as if he made his money by eating nothing and
drinking a great deal, a plethoric female with a mundane face, in which was set a large and delicately
distracted grey eye; and a gentleman with a jowl, a pug nose, and a large quantity of brasscoloured hair
about as curly as hay, which fell down over a low collar, round which was negligently knotted a huge black
tie. This trio comprised Mr. Bernard Wilkins, the Prophet from the Rise; Madame Charlotte Humm, the
crystalgazer from the Hill; and Professor Elijah Chapman, the nosereader from the Butts. No sooner was
the news of the arrival of these great and notorious people bruited abroad through the magnificent saloons of
Zoological House than Mrs. Bridgeman's guests began to flock around them from all the four quarters of the
mansion, deserting even the neighbourhood of the guitars and the inviting seclusion of the various
refreshment rooms. From all sides rose the hum of comment and the murmur of speculation. Pincenez
were adjusted, eyeglasses screwed into eyes, fingers pointed, feet elevated upon uneasy toes. Pretty girls
boldly trod upon the gowns of elderly matrons in the endeavour to draw near to Mrs. Bridgeman and her
group of celebrities; youths pushed and shoved; chaperons elbowed, and old gentlemen darted from one place
to another in wild endeavours to find an inlet through the press. And amid this frantic scramble of the curious,
the famous members of the occult world stood, calmly conscious of their value and in no wise upset or
discomposed. Verano stroked his Roman features, and ran his large white hand through his curly fringe; Dr.
Birdie Soames tapped her skull; Mrs. Eliza Doubleway played with her bead bracelets; Mr. Bernard Wilkins
and Madame Charlotte Humm conversed together in dreamy murmurs; while Professor Elijah Chapman
shook his brasscoloured hair till it fell forward over his variegated shirtfront, and glanced inquiringly at the
multitudes of anxious noses which offered themselves to his inspection beneath the glare of the electric lights.
Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, completely overlooked in the throng, elbowed, trampled upon, jogged from
behind and prodded from before, gazed with a passion of bitter envy at their worshipped rivals, who were set
in the full blaze of success, while they languished in the outer darkness of anonymous obscurity.
"/O miseris hominum men/don't set your feet on me, sir, if you please!" cried Madame. "/O pectorae
caec/ma'am, I beg you to take your elbow from my throat this minute!"
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But even her powerful and indignant organ was lost in the hubbub that mingled with the wild music of the
guitars, to which was now added the tinkle of bells and the vehement click of a round dozen of castanets,
marking the bullfighting rhythm of a new air called "The Espada's Return to Madrid."
"Jupiter!" she gurgled. "I shall be suff"
"Mr. Amos Towle!" roared the footman savagely.
"The great medium from the Wick!"
"Towle the seer!"
"Amos Towle, the famous spiritualist!"
"Mr. Towle who materialises!"
"The celebrated Towle!"
"The great and only Towle!"
"Oh, is it /the/ Towle?"
"I must see Towle!"
"Where is he? Oh, where is Towle?"
"Towle who communicates with the other world!"
"Towle the magician!"
"Towle the hypnotist!"
"Towle the soothsayer!"
"The magnetic Towle!"
"The electric Towle!"
"We mustwe must see Towle!"
Such were a very few of the exclamations that instantly burst forth upon the conclusion of the footman's
announcement. The elbowing and trampling became more violent than ever, and Mrs. Bridgeman was
forcedfrom lack of roomto forego her society start, though she was still able to indulge in her society
smile, as she bowed, with almost swooning graciousness, to a short, perspiring, bald and sidewhiskered man
in greasy broadcloth, who looked as if he would have been quite at home upon the box of a fourwheeled
cab, as indeed he would, seeing that he had driven a growler for fiveandtwenty years before discovering
that he was the great and only Towle, medium, seer, and workerofmiraclesinchief to the large and
increasing crowd that lives the silly life.
"Oh, Mr. Towlecharmed, delighted!" cried Mrs. Bridgeman. "I was so afraidHow sweet of you to come
out all this way from your eyrie at the Wick! You'll find many friendsdear Madame Charlottethe
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ProfessorMrs. Elizathey're all here. And Miss Minerva, too! Your greatest admirer and disciple!"
At this moment the crowd, wild in its endeavour to touch the inspired broadcloth of the great Towle, surged
forward, and the Prophet was driven like a ram against the left side of his hostess.
"I begyourpard" he gasped; "but could you tellmewhere Miss Minervervais? I specially
want toto"
"I think she's with Eureka in tearoom number 1," replied Mrs. Bridgeman. "Oh, dear! Near the band. Oh,
dear! Oh, my gown! Oh! So sweet of you to come, Mrs. Lorrimer! Just a few interesting people! Oh, gracious
mercy! Oh, for goodness' sake!"
She was thrust against a new arrival, and the Prophet, bringing his shoulders vigorously into play, according
to the rules of Rugby football, presently found himself out in the open and free to wander in search of Miss
Minerva, whom he was most anxious to encounter before the arrival of Sir Tiglath Butt, which must now be
imminent, despite the marked disinclination of his horse to proceed at the rate of more than half a mile an
hour.
The Prophet abandoned Mr. and Madame Sagittarius to their fate, thankful, indeed, to be rid for a moment of
their prophetic importunity.
Following the gasped directions of Mrs. Bridgeman, he made towards the guitars, threading a number of
drawingrooms, and passing by the doors of various mysterious chambers which were carefully curtained off
in a most secret manner. Here and there he saw groups of peoplemen in extraordinary coats and with
touzled masses of hair, women in gowns made of the cheapest materials and cut in the most impossible
fashions. Some wore convolvulus on their heads, ivyleaves, trailing fuchsia, or sprigs of plants known only
to suburban haberdashers; others appeared boldly in caps of the porkpie order, adorned with
cherrycoloured streamers, clumps of feathers that had never seen a bird, bunches of shining fruits, or coins
that looked as if they had just emerged from the seclusion of the poorbox. Thread gloves abounded, and
were mostly in what saleswomen call "the loud shades"bright scarlet, marigold yellow, grass green or
acute magenta. Mittens, too, were visible covered with cabalistic inscriptions in glittering beadwork. Not a
few gentlewomen, like Madame, trod in elasticsided boots, and one small but intrepid lady carried herself
boldly in a cotton skirt topped with a tartan blouse "carried out" in vermilion and sulphur colour, over which
was carelessly adjusted a macintosh cape partially trimmed with distressedlooking swansdown. Here and
there might be seen some smart London woman, perfectly dressed and glancing with amused amazement at
the new fashions about her; here and there a well setup man, with normal hair and a tie that would not have
terrified Piccadilly. But for the most part Mrs. Bridgeman's guests were not quite usual in appearance, and,
indeed, were such as the Prophet had never gazed upon before.
Presently the uproar of the guitars grew more stentorian upon his ear, and, leaving on his left an astonishing
chamber that contained from a dozen to fifteen small round tables, with nothing whatever upon them, the
Prophet emerged into an inner hall where, in quite a grove of shrubs hung with fairy lights, twenty young
ladies, dressed from top to toe in scarlet, and each wearing a large golden medal, were being as Spanish as if
they had not been paid for it, while twelve more whacked castanets and shook bells with a frenzy that was
worth an excellent salary, the silly gentleman from Tooting the while blowing furiously upon his flute, and
combining this intemperate indulgence with an occasional assault upon a cottage piano that stood
immediately before him, or a wave of the baton that asserted his right to the position of /chef d'orchestre/.
Immediately beyond this shrine of music the Prophet perceived a Moorish nook containing a British buffet,
and, in quite the most Moorish corner of this nook, seated upon a divan that would have been at home in
Marakesh, he caught sight of Miss Minerva in company with a thin, fatigued and wispy lady in a very long
vermilion gown, and an extremely small gentlemanapparently of the Hebrew persuasionwho was
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smartly dressed, wore white gloves and a buttonhole, and indulged in a great deal of florid gesticulation while
talking with abnormal vivacity. Miss Minerva, who was playing quietly with a lemon ice, looked even more
sensible than usual, the Prophet thought, in her simple white frock. She seemed to be quite at home and
perfectly happy with her silly friends, but, as soon as she saw him hovering anxiously to the left of the
guitars, she beckoned to him eagerly, and he hurried forward.
"Oh, Mr. Vivian, I'm so glad you've come! Let me introduce you to my great friend Eureka"the lady in
vermilion bowed absentmindedly, and rolled her huge brown eyes wearily at the Prophet"and to Mr.
Briskin Moses."
The little gentleman made a stage reverence and fluttered his small hands airily.
"Pretty sight, pretty sight!" he said in a quick and impudent voice. "All these little dears enjoying themselves
so innocently. Mother Bridgeman's chickens, I call them. But it's impossible to count them, even after they're
hatched. Cheese it!"
The final imperative was flung demurely at a mighty footman, who just then tried to impound Mr. Moses's
not quite finished brandyandsoda.
"Sir?" said the mighty footman.
"Cheese it!" cried Mr. Moses, making a gesture of tragic repugnance in the direction of the footman.
The mighty footman cheesed it with dignity, and afterwards, in the servants' hall, spoke very bitterly of Israel.
The Prophet was extremely anxious to get a word alone with Miss Minerva. Indeed, it was really important
that he should warn her of Sir Tiglath's approach, but he could find no opportunity of doing so, for Mr.
Moses, who was not afflicted with diffidence, rapidly continued, in a slightly affected and tripping cockney
voice,
"Mother Bridgeman's a dear one! God bless her for a pretty soul! She'd be sublime in musical comedythe
black satin society lady, you know, who makes the aristocratic relief,
" 'I'm a Dowager Duchess, and everyone knows I'm a lady right down to the tip of my toes.'
"Very valuable among the minxes; worth her weight in halfcrowns! I'd give her an engagement any day,
pretty bird! Ever seen her driving in a cab? She takes off her gloves and spreads her hands over the apron to
get the air. A canary! Anything for me tonight, Eureka? A dove, a mongooseanything lucky? Give us a
chance, mother!"
The lady in vermilion, who had a tuft of golden hair in the midst of her otherwise raven locks, glanced
mysteriously at Mr. Moses.
"See anything, mother?" he asked, with theatrical solemnity. "A tiny chunk of luck for tricky little Briskin?"
"I do see something," said Eureka, in a dim and heavy voice. "It's just close to you on that table by the
brandy."
Mr. Moses started, and cast a glance of awe at the tumbler.
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"My word," he cried"my word, mother! What's the blessed little symbol like? Not a pony fresh from
Jerusalem for your believing boy!"
"You must wait a moment. It is not clear," replied Eureka, slowly and dreamily, fixing her heavy eyes on the
brandyandsoda. "It's all cloudy."
"Been imbibing, mother? Has the blessed little symbol been at it again? Briskin's shockshocked!"
"It's getting clearer. It stands in a band of fire."
"Shade of Shadrach! Apparition of Abednego! Draw it mild and bitter, mother!"
"Ah! now it steps out. It's got a hump."
"Got the hump, mother? My word! then it must be either a camel or an undischarged bankrupt! Which is it,
pretty soul?"
"It's a rhinoceros. It's moving to you."
"Yokohama, mother! Tell the pretty bird to keep back! What's it mean?"
"It's a sign of plenty."
"Plenty of what, mother? The ready or the nosebag? Give us a chance!"
"Plenty of good fortune, because its head is towards you. If it had presented its tail, it would mean black
weather."
"Don't let it turn tail, for Saturday's sake, mother. Keep its head straight while I finish the brandy!"
And so saying, little Mr. Moses, with elaborate furtiveness, caught up the tumbler, poured its contents down
his throat, and threw himself back on the divan with the air of a man who had just escaped from peril by the
consummate personal exercise of unparalleled and sustained ingenuity.
During this scene Miss Minerva had preserved her air of pronounced Scottish good sense, while listening
attentively, and she now said to Eureka,
"D'you see anything for Mr. Vivian, dear Eureka? Even the littlest thing would be welcomed."
Eureka stared upon the Prophet, who began to feel very nervous.
"There's something round his head," she remarked, with her usual almost sacred earnestness.
The Prophet mechanically put up his hands, like a man anxious to interfere with the assiduous attentions of a
swarm of bees.
"Something right round his head."
"Is it a halo?" asked Miss Minerva.
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"Is it a Lincoln Bennet, mother?" cried Mr. Moses. "One of the shiny onestwentyone bob, and
twentyfiveandsix if you want a kid lining?"
"No; it's like some sort of bird."
" 'I heard the owl beneath my eaves complaining,' " chirped Mr. Moses, taking two or three high notes in a
delicate tenor voice. " 'I looked forthgreat Scot! How it was raining!' Is it an owl, mother? Ask it to screech
to Briskin."
"It is no owl," said Eureka to the Prophet. "It is a sparrowyour bird."
"Is it upon the housetop, mother, having a spree all on its little alone?"
"No; it is hovering over the gentleman."
"What does that mean?" said the Prophet, anxiously.
But at this point Eureka suddenly seemed to lose interest in the matter. "Oh, you're all right," she said
carelessly. "I'm tired. I should like a wafer."
"Mother's peckish. Mother, I see an ostrich by your left elbow. That's a sign that you're so peckish you could
swallow anything. Waiter!"
"Sir!"
"This lady's so peckish she could eat anything. Bring her some tin tacks and a wafer. Stop a sec. Another
brandy for Briskin. Your calves'd do for the front row; 'pon my word, they would. Trot, boy, trot!"
"I must speak to you alone for one moment," whispered the Prophet to Miss Minerva, under cover of the
quips of Mr. Moses. "Sir Tiglath's coming!"
Miss Minerva started.
"Sir Tig" she exclaimed and put her finger to her lips just in time to stop the "lath" from coming out. "Mr.
Moses, I'm going to the buffet for a moment with Mr. Vivian. Eureka, darling, do eat something substantial!
All this second sight takes it out of you."
Eureka acquiesced with a heavy sigh, Mr. Moses cried, "Aunt Eureka's so hungry that one would declare she
could even eat oats if she found they were there!" and Miss Minerva and the Prophet moved languidly
towards the buffet, endeavouring, by the indifference of their movements, to cover the agitation in their
hearts.
"Sir Tiglath coming here!" cried Miss Minerva under her breath, as soon as they were out of earshot. "But he
doesn't know Mrs. Bridgeman!"
"I knowbut he's coming. And not only that, Mr. and Madame Sagittarius are here already!"
Miss Minerva looked closely at the Prophet in silence for a moment. Then she said,
"I seeI see!"
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"What?" cried the Prophet, in great anxiety, "not the sparrow on my head?"
"No. But I see that you're taking to your double life in real earnest."
"I?"
"Yes. Now, Mr. Vivian, that's all very well, and you know I'm the last person to complain of anything of that
sort, so long as it doesn't get me into difficulties."
"Think of the difficulties you and everyone else have got me into," ejaculated the poor Prophet, for once in
his life stepping, perhaps, a hair'sbreadth from the paths of good breeding.
"Well, I'm sure I've done nothing."
"Nothing!" said the Prophet, losing his head under the influence of the guitars, which were now getting under
way in a fantasia on "Carmen." "Nothing! Why, you made me come here, you insisted on my introducing Mr.
Sagittarius to Mrs. Bridgeman, you told Sir Tiglath Mrs. Bridgeman and I were old friends and had made
investigations together, assisted by Mr. Sagittarius, you"
"Oh, well, that's nothing. But Sir Tiglath mustn't see me here as Miss Minerva. Has he arrived yet?"
"I don't think so. He's got the cab we had yesterday and the horse."
"The one that tumbles down so cleverly when it's not too tired? Capital! Run to the cloakroom, meet Sir
Tiglath there, and persuade him to go home."
But here the Prophet struck.
"I regret I can't," he said, almost firmly.
"But you must."
"I regret sincerely that I am unable."
"Why? Mr. Vivian, when a lady asks you!"
"I am grieved," said the Prophet, with a species of intoxicated obstinacythe guitars seemed to be playing
inside his brain and the flute piping in the small of his back,"to decline, but I cannot contend physically
with Sir Tiglath, a man whom I reverence, in the cloakroom of a total stranger."
"I don't ask you to contend physically."
"Nothing but personal violence would keep Sir Tiglath from coming in."
"Really! Then what's to be done?"
She pursed up her sensible lips and drew down her sensible eyebrows.
"I know!" she cried, after a moment's thought. "I'll masquerade tonight as myself."
"As yourself?"
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"Yes. All these dear silly people here think that I've got an astral body."
"What's that?"
"A sort of floating businessa business that you can set floating."
"Whata company?"
"No, no. A replica of yourself. The great Towle"
"He's here tonight."
"I knew he was coming. Well, the great Towle detached this astral body once at a séance and, for a jokea
silly joke, you know"
"Yes, yes."
"I christened it by my real name, Lady Enid Thistle, and said Lady Enid was an ancestress of mine."
"Why did you?"
"Because it was so idiotic."
"I see."
"Well, I've only now to spread a report among these dear creatures that I'm astral tonight, and get Towle to
back me up, and I can easily be Lady Enid for an hour or two. In this crowd Sir Tiglath need never find out
that I'm generally known in these circles as Miss Partridge."
"Do you really think"
"Yes, I do. But I must find Towle at once."
So saying she hastened away from the buffet, followed by the trotting Prophet. As she passed Eureka and Mr.
Moses, she said,
"Eureka, darling, do I look odd? I suddenly began to feel astral just as I was going to eat a sandwich. I can't
help thinking that Lady Enid you know, my astral ancestress, who's always with meis peculiarly
powerful tonight. D'you notice anything?"
"Watch out for it, mother!" cried Mr. Moses. "See if it's got the lump."
Eureka fixed her heavy eyes on Miss Minerva and swayed her thin body to and fro in as pantherlike a
manner as she could manage.
"Mother's after it," continued Mr. Moses, twitching his left ear with his thumb in a Hebraic manner and
shooting his shining cuffs; "mother's on the trail. Doves for a bishop and the little mangelwurzel for the
labouring man. Clever mother! She'll take care it's suitable. Is it a haggis, mother, hovering over the lady with
outspread wings?"
Eureka closed her eyes and rocked herself more violently.
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"I see you," she said in a deep voice. "You are astral. You are Lady Enid emerged for an hour from our dear
Minerva."
"I thought so," cried Lady Enid, with decision. "I thought so, because when someone called me Miss Minerva
just now I felt angry, and didn't seem to know what they meant. Tell them, dear Eureka,tell all my friends
of your discovery."
And she hastened on with the Prophet in search of the great Towle.
"I'll get him to back Eureka up, and then it will be quite safe," she said. "Ah! there he is with Harriet Browne,
the demonstrator from the Rye."
Indeed, at this moment a small crowd was visible in one of the further drawingrooms, moving obsequiously
along in reverent attendance upon the great Towle, Mrs. Bridgeman and a thickset, redfaced lady, without a
waist and plainly clad in untrimmed linseywolsey, who was speaking authoritatively to a hystericallooking
young girl, upon whose narrow shoulder she rested a heavy, fatfingered hand as she walked.
"Harriet's evidently going to demonstrate," added Lady Enid. "That's lucky, because then I can get a quiet
word with Towle."
"Demonstrate?" said the Prophet.
"Yes. She's the great Christian Scientist and has the healing power. She demonstrated over Agatha Marshall's
left ear. You know. The case got into the papers. Ah, Harriet, darling!"
"My blessing! My Minerva!" said Harriet in a thick and guttural voice.
"Lady Enid, Harriet love, tonight. Eureka says I'm astral. Oh, Mr. Towle, what an honour to meet
youwhat an honour for us all!"
The great Towle ducked and scraped in cabman fashion.
"Oh, will you materialise for us tonight?"
"Yes, yes," cried Mrs. Bridgeman, trembling with excitement. "He's promised to after supper. He says he
feels less material thenmore /en rapport/ with the dear spirits."
"How delightful! Mr. Towle, tell me, do you agree with Eureka? I await your fiat. Am I astral?"
"Ay, miss, as like as not," said the great man, twisting his lips as if they held a straw between them. "Astral,
that's it. That's it to a T."
"Then I'm Lady Enid Thistle, my ancestress, who's always with me?"
"Ay, ay! Every bit of her. Her ladyship to a T."
The company was much impressed, and whispers of "It's Lady Enid; Eureka and Mr. Towle say it's her
ladyship in the astral plane!" flew like wildfire through the rooms.
At this point Harriet Browne, who was sufficiently Christian and scientific to like to have all the attention of
the company centred upon her, cleared her throat loudly and exclaimed,
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"If I am to heal this poor sufferer, I must be provided with an armchair."
"An armchair for Mrs. Browne!"
"Fetch a chair for Harriet!"
"Mrs. Harriet can't demonstrate without a chair!"
"What is she going to do?" whispered the Prophet to Lady Enid, feeling thoroughly ashamed of his ignorance.
"Demonstrate."
"Yes, but what's that?"
"Put her hands over that girl and think about her."
"Is that all?"
"Yes."
"Does she do it out of kindness?"
"Of course. But she's paid something, not because she wants to be paid, but because it's the rule."
"Oh!"
An armchair was now wheeled forward, and Mrs. Harriet ensconced herself in it comfortably.
"I'm very tired tonight," she remarked in her thick voice. "I've had a hard afternoon."
"Poor darling!" cried Mrs. Bridgeman. "Fetch a glass of champagne for Mrs. Harriet somebody. Oh, would
you, Mr. Brummich?"
Mr. Brummich, a gentleman with a remarkably foolish, ascetic face and a feeblywandering sandy beard,
was just about to hasten religiously towards the Moorish nook when the great Towle happened, by accident,
to groan. Mrs. Bridgeman, started and smiled.
"Oh, and a glass of champagne for Mr. Towle, too, dear Mr. Brummich!"
"Certainly, Mrs. Bridgeman!" said dear Mr. Brummich, hurrying off with the demeanour of the head of an
Embassy entrusted with some important mission to a foreign Court.
"Were you at work this afternoon, Harriet, beloved?" inquired Mrs. Bridgeman of Mrs. Browne, who was
leaning back in the armchair with her eyes closed and in an attitude of severe prostration.
"Yes."
"Which was it, lovebird? Hysteric Henry?"
"No, he's cured."
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Cries of joy resounded from those gathered about the chair.
"Hysteric Henry's cured!"
"Henry's better!"
"The poor man with the ball in his throat's been saved!"
"How wonderful you are, Harriet, sweet!" cried Mrs. Bridgeman. "But, then which was it?"
"The madwoman at Brussels. I've been thinking about her for two hours this afternoon, with only a cup of tea
between."
"Poor darling! No wonder you're done up! Ought you to demonstrate? Ah! here's the champagne!"
"I take it merely as medicine," said Mrs. Harriet.
At this moment, Mr. Brummich, flushed with assiduity, burst into the circle with a goblet of beaded wine in
either hand. There was a moment of solemn silence while Mrs. Harriet and the great Towle condescended to
the Pommery. It was broken only by a loud gulp from the hysterical looking girl who was, it seemed,
nervously affected by an imitative spasm, and who suddenly began to swallow nothing with extreme
persistence and violence.
"Look at that poor misguided soul!" ejaculated Mrs. Harriet, with her lips to the Pommery. "She fancies she's
drinking!"
The poor, misguided soul, yielded again to her distraught imagination, amid the pitiful ejaculations of the
entire company, with the exception of one mundane, young man who, suddenly assailed by the wild fancy
that he wasn't drinking, crept furtively to the Moorish rook, and was no more seen.
"Give her a cushion!" continued Mrs. Harriet, authoritatively.
"Mr. Brummich!" said Mrs. Bridgeman.
Mr. Brummich ran, and returned with a cushion.
"Sit down, poor thing! Sit at my feet!" said Mrs. Harriet, giving the hystericallooking girl a healing push.
The girl subsided in a piteous heap, and Mrs. Harriet, who had by this time taken all her medicine, leant over
her and inquired,
"Where d'you feel it?"
The girl put her hands to her head.
"Here," she said feebly. "It's like fire running over me and drums beating."
"Fire and drums!" announced Mrs. Harriet to the staring assembly. "That's what she's got, poor soul!"
Ejaculations of sympathy and horror made themselves heard.
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"Drums! How shocking!" cried Mrs. Bridgeman. "Can you cure even drums, Harriet, my own?"
"Give me ten minutes, Catherine! I ask but that!"
And, so saying, Mrs. Harriet planted her fat hands upon the head of the young patient, closed her eyes and
began to breathe very hard.
Silence now fell upon the people, who said not a word, but who could not prevent themselves from rustling
as they pressed about this exhibition of a latterday apostle. The Prophet and Lady Enid were close to the
armchair, and the Prophet, who had never before been present at any such ceremonyit was accompanied by
the twenty guitars, now tearing out the serenade, "From the bullring I come to thee!"was so interested
that he completely forgot Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, and lost for the moment all memory of Sir Tiglath.
The silly life engrossed him. He had no eyes for anyone but Mrs. Harriet, who, as she leaned forward in the
chair with closed eyes, looked like a determined middle aged man about to offer up the thin girl on the
footstool as a burnt sacrifice.
"You're better now, poor thing," said Mrs. Harriet, after five minutes has elapsed. "You're feeling much
better?"
"Oh, no, I'm not!" said the girl, shaking her head under the hands of the demonstrator. "The fire's blazing and
the drums are beating like anything."
Mrs. Harriet's hue deepened, and there was a faint murmur of vague reproof from the company.
"H'sh!" said the demonstrator, closing her hands upon the patient's head with some acrimony. "H'sh!"
And she began to breathe hard once more. Another five minutes elapsed, and then Mrs. Harriet exclaimed
with decision,
"There! It's gone now, all gone! I've sent it right away. The fire's out and the drums have stopped beating!"
Exclamations of wonder and joy rose up from the spectators. They were, however, a trifle premature, for the
hysterical girlwho was, it seemed, a person of considerable determination, despite her feeble
appearancereplied from the footstool,
"No, it isn't. No they haven't!"
Mrs. Harriet developed a purple shade.
"Nonsense!" she said. "You're cured, love, entirely cured!"
"I'm not," said the girl, beginning to cry. "I feel much worse since you pressed my head."
There was a burst of remonstrance from the crowd, and Mrs. Harriet, speaking with the air of an angry
martyr, remarked,
"It's just like the drinkingshe fancies she isn't cured when she is, just the same as she fancied she was
drinking when she wasn't."
This unanswerable logic naturally carried conviction to everyone present, and the hysterical girl was warmly
advised to make due acknowledgement of the benefits received by her at the healing hands of Mrs. Harriet,
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while the latter was covered with compliments and assiduously conducted towards the buffet, escorted by the
great Towle.
"Isn't she wonderful?" said Mrs. Bridgeman, turning ecstatically to the person nearest to her, who happened
to be the saturnine little clergyman. "Isn't she marvellous, Mr.erMr. Segerteribus?"
"Biggle!" cried the little clergyman.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Biggle!" vociferated the little clergyman. "Biggle!"
"Certainly. Did you ever see anything like that cure? Ah! you ought to preach about dear Harriet, Mr.
Segerteribus, you really"
"Biggle!" reiterated the little clergyman, excitedly. "Biggle! Biggle!"
"What does he" began Mrs. Bridgeman, turning helplessly towards the Prophet.
"It's his name, I fancy," whispered the Prophet.
Mrs. Bridgeman started and smiled.
"Mr. Biggle," she said.
The little clergyman moved on towards the guitars with all the air of a future colonial bishop. Mrs.
Bridgeman, who seemed to be somewhat confused, and whose manner grew increasingly vague as the
evening wore on, now said to those nearest to her,
"There are fifteen tables set outyes, set out,in the green boudoir."
"Bedad!" remarked an Irish colonel, "then it's meself'll enjoy a good rubber."
"For tableturning," added Mrs. Bridgeman. "Materialisation in the same room after supper. Mr.
Towleyeswill enter the cabinet at about eleven. Where's Madame Charlotte?"
"Looking into the crystal for Lady Ferrier," said someone.
"Oh, and the professor?"
"He's reading Archdeacon Andrew's nose, by the cloakroom.
Mrs. Bridgeman sighed.
"It seems to be going off quite pleasantly," she said vaguely to the Prophet. "I thinkperhapsmight I have
a cup of tea?"
The Prophet offered his arm. Mrs. Bridgeman took it. They walked forward, and almost instantly came upon
Sir Tiglath Butt, who, with a face even redder than usual, was rolling away from the hall of the guitars,
holding one enormous hand to his ear and snorting indignantly at the various clairvoyants, cardreaders,
spiritualists and palmists whom he encountered at every step he took. The Prophet turned pale, and Lady
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Enid, who was just behind him, put on her most sensible expression and moved quickly forward.
"Ah, Sir Tiglath!" she said. "How delightful of you to come! Catherine, dear, let me introduce Sir Tiglath
Butt to you. Sir Tiglath ButtMrs. Vane Bridgeman."
Mrs. Bridgeman behaved as usual.
"So glad!" she said. "So enchanted! Just a few interesting people. So good of you to come. Tableturning
is"
At this moment Lady Enid nipped her friend's arm, and Sir Tiglath exclaimed, looking from Mrs. Bridgeman
to the Prophet,
"What, madam? So you're the brain and eye, eh? Is that it?"
The guitars engaged in "The Gipsies of Granada are wild as mountain birds," and Mrs. Bridgeman looked
engagingly distraught, and replied,
"Ah, yes, indeed! The brain and I, Sir Tiglath; so good of you to say so!"
"You prompted his interest in the holy stars?" continued Sir Tiglath, speaking very loud, and still stopping
one ear with his hand. "You drove him to the telescope; you told him to clear the matter up, did you?"
"What matter?" said Mrs. Bridgeman, trying not to look as stupid as she felt, but only with moderate success.
"Say the oxygen, darling," whispered Lady Enid in one of her ears.
"Say the oxygen!" hissed the Prophet into the other.
"The occiput?" said Mrs. Bridgeman, hearing imperfectly. "Oh, yes, Sir Tiglath, I told him,I told Mr.
Biggleto make quite sureyes, as to the occiput matter."
The saturnine little clergyman, who was again in motion near by, caught his name and stopped, as Sir Tiglath,
roaring against "The Gipsies of Granada," continued,
"And your original adviser was Mr. Sagittarius, was he?"
On hearing a word she understood, Mrs. Bridgeman brightened up, and, perceiving the little clergyman, she
answered,
"Mr. Sagittariusah, yes! Sir Tiglath is speaking of you, Mr. Sagittarius."
The little clergyman turned almost black in the face.
"Biggle!" he exclaimed, in a voice of thunder. "Biggle! Biggle!"
And, without further parley, he rushed to the cloakroom, seized someone else's hat and coat, and fared forth
into the night. Lady Enid, who had meant to coach Mrs. Bridgeman very carefully for the meeting with Sir
Tiglath, but whose plans were completely upset by the astronomer's premature advent, now endeavoured to
interpose.
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"By the way," she said, in a very calm voice, where is dear Mr. Sagittarius? I haven't seen him yet."
"I'm afraid he's angry with me," said Mrs. Bridgeman, alluding to the little clergyman. "I really can't think
why."
"Sir Tiglath," said Lady Enid, boldly taking the astronomer's arm. "Come with me. I want you to find Mr.
Sagittarius for me. Yes, they do make rather a noise!"
This was in allusion to the guitars, for the astronomer had now placed both hands over his ears in the vain
endeavour to exclude "The Gipsies." Deafness, perhaps, rendered him yielding. In any case, he permitted
Lady Enid to detach him from Mrs. Bridgeman and to lead him through the rooms in search of Mr.
Sagittarius.
"Perhaps he's here," said Lady Enid, entering a darkened chamber. "Oh, no!"
And she hastily moved away, perceiving a large number of devoted adherents of tabletapping busily
engaged, with outspread fingers and solemn faces, at their intellectual pursuit. Avoiding the archdeacon, who
was now having his nose read by the professor, she conducted the astronomer, rendered strangely meek by
the guitars, into a drawingroom near the hall, in which only four people remainedVerano and Mrs. Eliza
Doubleway, who were conferring in one corner, and Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, who were apparently
having rather more than a few words together in another.
"Ah! there's Mr. Sagittarius!" said Lady Enid.
"Minnie!" cried Mrs. Eliza, beckoning to Lady Enid. "Minnie, ducky!"
Lady Enid pretended not to hear and tried to hasten with the astronomer towards the Sagittariuses. But Mrs.
Eliza was not to be put off.
"Minnie, my pet!" she piped. "Come here, Minnie!"
Lady Enid was obliged to pause.
"What is it, dear Eliza?" she asked, at the same time making a face at the soothsayer to indicate caution.
Mrs. Eliza and Verano rose and approached Lady Enid and the astronomer.
"I was laying the cards last night at Jane Seaman'syou know, dear, the Angel Gabriel who lives on the
Hackney Downsand whatever do you think? The hace of spades came up three times in conjugation with
the Knave of 'earts!"
"Terrific! Very great!" buzzed Verano, with a strong South American Irish broguea real broth of a brogue.
"Wonderful!" said Lady Enid, hastily, endeavouring to pass on.
"Wait a minute, darling. Well, I says to JaneI was laying the cards for her 'usband, dearI says to Jane, I
says, without doubt Hisaac is about to pass over, I says, seeing the red boy's come up in conjugation with the
hace. 'Lord! Mrs. Eliza! Lay them out again,' she says, 'for,' she says, 'if Hike is going to pass over,' she
says"
"Extraordinary, dear Mrs. Eliza! You're a genius!" cried Lady Enid in despair.
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"Tremendous! Very big!" buzzed Verano, staring at Sir Tiglath. "You got a very spatulate hand there, sir!
Allow me!"
And to Lady Enid's horror he seized the astronomer's hand with both his own.
"How dare you tamper with the old astronomer, sir?" roared Sir Tiglath. "Am I in a madhouse? Who are all
these crazy Janes! Drop my hand, sir!"
Verano obeyed rather hastily, and Lady Enid convoyed the spluttering astronomer towards the corner which
contained Mr. and Madame Sagittarius.
Now these worthies were in a mental condition of a most complicated kind. The reception at Zoological
House had upset in an hour the theories and beliefs of a lifetime. Hitherto Madame had always been filled
with shame at the thought that she was not the wife of an architect but of a prophet, and Mr. Sagittarius had
endeavoured to assume the mein and costume of an outside broker, and had dreamed dreams of retiring
eventually from a hated and despised profession. But now they found themselves in a magnificent mansion in
which the second rate members of their own tribe were worshipped and adored, smothered with attentions,
plied with Pommery and looked upon as gods, while they, in their incognito, were neglected, and paid no
more heed to than if they had been, in reality, mere architects and outside brokers, totally unconnected with
that mysterious occult world which is the fashion of the moment.
This position of affairs had, not unnaturally, thrown then into a condition of the gravest excitement. Madame,
more especially, had reached boiling point. Feeling herself, for the first time, an Imperial creature in exile,
who had only to declare herself to receive instant homage and to be overwhelmed with the most flattering
attentions, her lust of glory developed with alarming rapidity, and she urged her husband to cast the traditions
that had hitherto guided him to the winds and to declare forthwith his identity with Malkiel the Second, the
businesslike and as it were official head of the whole prophetic tribe.
Mr. Sagittarius, for his part, was also fired with the longing for instant glory, but he was by nature an
extremely timidor shall we say rather, an extremely prudentman. He remembered the repeated
injunctions of his great forebear who had lived and died in the Susan Road beside the gasworks. More, he
remembered Sir Tiglath Butt. He was torn between ambition and terror.
"Declare yourself, Jupiter!" cried Madame. "Declare yourself this moment!"
"My love!" replied Mr. Sagittarius. "My angel, we must reflect."
"I have reflected," retorted Madame.
"There are difficulties, my dear, many difficulties in the way."
"And what if there are? /Per augustum ad augustibus/. Every fool knows that."
"My dear, you are a little hard upon me."
"And what have you been upon me, I should like to know? What about those goingson with the woman
Bridgeman? What about your investigations with that hussy Minerva? You've been her owl, that's what
you've been!"
She began to show grave symptoms of hysteria. Mr. Sagittarius patted her hands in great anxiety.
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"My love, I have told you, I have sworn"
"And what man doesn't swear whenever he gets the chance?" cried Madame. "Why did I ever marry? /Heu
miserum me/."
"My angel, be calm. I assure you"
"Very well then, declare yourself, Jupiter, this minute, or I'll declare yourself for you!"
"But, my love, think of Sir Tiglath! I dare not declare myself. He will be here at any moment, and he has
sworn to kill me, if I'm not an American syndicate!"
"Rubbish!"
"But, my"
"Rubbish! That's only what Mr. Vivian says."
"Well, but"
"Besides, you can put on your /toga virilibus/ and knock him down. It's no use talking to me, Jupiter."
"I know it isn't, my darling, I know. But"
"If you don't declare yourself I shall declare yourself for you this very moment. I will not endure to be left in
the corner while all these nobodies are being truckled to. Bernard Wilkins, indeed! A prophet we wouldn't so
much as recognise to be a prophet, and that there Mrs. Elizapeople from the Wick going down to supper in
front of us, and a man from the Butts put before you! It's right down disgusting, and I won't have it."
It was exactly at this point in the matrimonial conference that Lady Enid and Sir Tiglath Butt, shaking
themselves free of Mrs. Eliza and Verano, bore down upon Mr. and Madame Sagittarius, who were so busily
engaged in disputation that they did not perceive that anyone was near until Lady Enid touched Mr.
Sagittarius upon the arm.
That gentleman started violently and, on perceiving Sir Tiglath Butt, who was positively sputtering with
wrath at the palmistic attentions paid to him by Verano, shrank against his wife, who pushed him vigorously
from her, and, getting upon her feet, announced in a loud voice,
"Very well, Jupiter, since you won't declare yourself I shall go at once to the woman Bridgeman and declare
yourself for you!"
And with this remark she scowled at Lady Enid and walked majestically away, tossing her head vehemently
at Mrs. Eliza and Verano as she swept into the adjoining drawingroom.
"Dear me," said Lady Enid, with great curiosity. "Dear me, Mr. Sagittarius, is your wife going to make a
declaration? This is most interesting!"
And, moved by her besetting idiosyncrasy, she added to the astronomer, "Excuse me, Sir Tiglath, "I'll be back
in one moment!" and glided swiftly away in the wake of Madame, leaving Mr. Sagittarius and his deadliest
foe /teteatete/.
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"Is this a madhouse, sir?" cried Sir Tiglath, on being thus abandoned. "The old astronomer demands to know
at once if one is, or is not, in a vast madhouse?"
"I don't know, sir, indeed," replied Mr. Sagittarius. "I should not like to express an opinion on the point. If
you will excu"
"Sir, the old astronomer will not excuse you," roared Sir Tiglath, forcibly preventing Mr. Sagittarius, who
was pale as ashes, from escaping into the farther room. "He will not be run away from by everybody in this
manner."
"I beg pardon, sir, I had no intention of running away," said Mr. Sagittarius, making one last despairing effort
to assume his /toga virilibus/.
"Then why did you do it, sir? Tell the old astronomer that!" cried Sir Tiglath, seizing him by the arm. "And
tell him, moreover, what you and the old female Bridgeman have been about together?"
"Nothing, sir; I swear that Mrs. Bridgeman and myself have never"
"Never made investigations into the possibility of there being oxygen in many of the holy stars? Do you
affirm that, sir?"
"I do!" cried Mr. Sagittarius. "I am an outside broker."
"Do you affirm that you are no astronomer, sir? Do you declare that you are not a man of science?"
"I do! I do!"
"Not an astronomer of remarkable attainments, but very modest and retiring withal? Ohhh!"
"Modest and retiring, sir?" cried Mr. Sagittarius, suddenly illumined by a ray of hope. "That's just it! I am a
modest and retiring outside broker, sir."
And he violently endeavoured to prove the truth of the words by escaping forthwith into obscurity.
"There never was a modest and retiring outside broker!" bellowed Sir Tiglath. "There never was, and there
never will be. The old"
"What's that?" interrupted Mr. Sagittarius. "Whatever's that?"
For at this moment an extraordinary hum of voices made itself audible above the fifty guitars, and a noise of
many feet trampling eagerly upon Mrs. Bridgeman's parquet grew louder and louder in the brilliant rooms.
Attracted by the uproar, Sir Tiglath paused for a moment, still keeping his hand upon the lapel of Mr.
Ferdinand's coat, however. The noise increased. It was evident that a multitude of people was rapidly
approaching. Words uttered by the moving guests, exclamations, and ejaculations of excitement now
detached themselves from the general murmur.
"The Prophet from the Mouse!"
"The great Malkiel here!"
"The founder of the almanac!"
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"The greatest Prophet of the age!"
"Malkiel the Second from the Mouse!"
"Where is Malkiel?"
"We must find Malkiel!"
"We must see Malkiel!"
"Is it really Malkiel?"
"Oh, is it /the/ Malkiel? Wherewhere is Malkiel?"
Such cries as these broke upon the ears of the astronomer and Mr. Sagittarius.
Sir Tiglath grew purple.
"Malkiel who has insulted the holy stars here!" he roared, letting go of Mr. Sagittarius. "Wherewhere is
he?"
"In there, sir, I verily believe!" cried Mr. Sagittarius, pointing in the direction of the crowd with a hand that
shook like all the leaves in Vallombrosa.
"Let me find him!" shouted the astronomer. "Let me only discover him! I'll break every bone in his accursed
body."
And with this rather bald statement he rolled out of the room in one direction, while Mr. Sagittarius, without
more ado, cast aside his /toga virilibus/ and darted out of it into another, just as Madame escorted by Mrs.
Bridgeman, Lady Enid, the great Towle and the whole of the company assembled at Zoological House,
appeared majesticallyand proceeding as an Empressin the aperture of the main doorway.
CHAPTER XIX. MRS. MERILLIA HEATS THE POKER
When Mr. Sagittarius, running at his fullest speed, emerged from Zoological House, wearing the hat and coat
that the saturnine little clergyman had left behind him, the night was damp and gusty. As he hastened down
the drive, and the sound of twenty guitars, playing "Oh would I were a Spaniard among you lemon groves!"
died away in the lighted mansion behind him, he heard the roaring of the beasts in the gardens close by. In the
wet darkness it sounded peculiarly terrific. He shuddered, and, holding up Mr. Ferdinand's trousers with both
hands, hurried onward through the mire, whither he knew not. His only thought was that all was now
discovered and that his life was in danger. A woman's vanity had wrecked his future. He must hide
somewhere for the night, and get away in the morning, perhaps on board some tramp steamer bound for
Buenos Ayres, or on a junk weighing anchor for Hayti or Java, or some other distant place. Vague memories
of books he had read when a boy came back to him as he ran through the unkempt wilds of the Regent's Park.
He saw himself a stowaway hidden in a hold, alone with rats and ships' biscuits. He saw himself working his
way out before the mast, sent aloft in hurricanes on pitchblack nights, or turning the wheel the wrong way
round and bringing the ship to wreck upon iron bound coasts swarming with sharks and savages. The lions
roared again, and the black panthers snarled behind their prison bars. He thought of the peaceful waters of the
river Mouse, of the library of Madame, of the happy little circle of architects and their wives, of all that he
must leave.
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What wonder if he dropped a tear into the muddy road? What wonder if a sob rent the bosom of Mr.
Ferdinand's now disordered shirt front? On and on Mr. Sagittariusor Malkiel the Second, as he may from
henceforth be calledwent blindly, on and on till the Park was left behind, till crescents gave way to
squares, and squares to streets. He passed an occasional policeman and slunk away from the penetrating
bull'seye. He heard now and then the faroff rattle of a cab, the shrill cry of a whistle, the howl of a butler
summoning a vehicle, the coo of a cook bidding goodnight to the young tradesman whom she loved before
the area gate. And all these familiar London sounds struck strangely on his ear. When would he hear them
again? Perhaps never. He stumbled on blinded with emotion.
Dogs, we know are guided by a strange instinct to find their homes even by unfamiliar paths. Pigeons will fly
across wide spaces and drop down to the wicker cage that awaits them. And it would appear that prophets are
not without a certain faculty that may be called topographical. For how else can the following fact be
explained? Malkiel the Second, after apparently endless wandering, found himself totally unable to proceed
further. His legs gave way beneath him. His breath failed. His brain swam. He reeled, stretched forth his
hands and clutched at the nearest support. This chanced to be a railing, wet, slimy, cold. He grasped it, leaned
against it, and for a few moments remained where he was in a sort of trance. Then, gradually, full
consciousness returned. He glanced up and beheld the black garden of a square. Somehow it looked familiar.
He seemed to know those shadowy, leafless trees, the roadway between him and them, even the pavement
upon which his bootshis own bootswere set. His lacklustre eyes travelled to the houses that bordered
the square, then to the house against whose area railings he was leaning, and he started with amazement. For
he was in Berkeley Square, leaning against the railing of number one thousand. He gazed up at the windows.
One or two faint lights twinkled. Then perhaps the household had not yet retired for the night. An idea seized
him. He must rest. He must snatch a brief interval of repose, before starting for the docks at dawn to find a
ship in whose hold he could seek seclusion, till the great seas roared round her, and he could declare himself
to the captain and crew without fear of being put ashore. Why not rest here in number one thousand? True,
the Prophet would presently be returning possibly with Madame, but he would bribe Mr. Ferdinand not to
mention his whereabouts. It was no doubt a very rash proceeding, but he was utterly exhausted, he felt that he
could go no further, he found himself before an almost friendly door. What wonder then if he tottered up the
steps and tapped feebly upon it? There was no answer. He tapped again more loudly. This time his summons
was heard. Steps approached. There was a moment's pause. Then the door opened, and Gustavus appeared
looking rather sleepy, but still decidedly intellectual. Malkiel the Second pulled himself together and faced
the footman boldly.
"You know me?" he said.
Gustavus examined him closely.
"Yes, sir," he replied at length. "By the clothes. I should know Mr. Ferdinand's trouserings among a
thousand."
Malkiel the Second realised that emotion probably rendered his face unrecognisable. But at least his legs
spoke for him. That was something, and he continued, with an attempt at ease and boldness,
"Right! I have returned to change them."
"Yes, sir. Mr. Ferdinand has retired to bed, sir."
"Don't wake him. I can just leave them for him."
"Very well, sir."
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And Gustavus admitted Malkiel to the dimlylit hall and shut the door softly.
"What is your name, young man?" said Malkiel, whispering.
"Gustavus, sir."
"Ah! Gustavus, would you like to earn a hundred pounds tonight?"
Gustavus started.
"I don't say as how I'd rather not, sir," he replied. "I don't go so far as to say that."
"Right! Do as I tell you and you will earn a hundred pounds."
The footman's eyes began to glow, almost like a cat's in the twilight.
"Why, I could buy the library near twelve times over," he murmured.
"The library?" said Malkiel, whose brain had suddenly become strangely clear.
"Ah, sirDr. Carter's," returned Gustavus, beginning to tremble.
"Dr. Carter's!" whispered Malkiel, excitedly. "I should think so. Eight guineas and a half, and you pay in
instalments."
"I'll do it, sir," hissed Gustavus, utterly carried away by the prospect. "What d'you want me to do?"
"First to let me change my clothes quickly, then to hide me somewhere so as I can get a sleep till dawn. Call
me directly it begins to get light and I shall be off to the docks."
"The docks, sir?"
"Ay. I start forfor Java tomorrow."
"Java, sirwhat, where the sparrows and the jelly"
"Ay, ay," returned Malkiel, secretly rehearsing his new nautical role.
"I'll do it sir. And the hundred?"
"I'll write you an order on my banker's. You can trust me. Now let me change my clothes. Quick!"
"They're in Mr. Vivian's bedroom, ain't they?"
Malkiel nodded.
"You must go very soft, sir, because of the old lady. She's abed, but she might be wakeful, specially tonight.
She's been awful upset. My word, she has!"
"I'll go as soft as a mouse," whispered Malkiel. "Show me the way."
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Gustavus advanced on tiptoe towards the staircase, followed by Malkiel, who held Mr. Ferdinand's clothes
together lest they should rustle, and proceeded with the most infinite precaution. In this manner they gained
the second floor and neared the bedroom door of Mrs. Merillia. Here Gustavus turned round, pointed to the
door, and put his finger to his pouting lips, at the same time rounding his hazel eyes and shaking his
powdered head in a most warning manner. Malkiel nodded, held Mr. Ferdinand's clothes tighter, and stole on,
as he thought, without making a sound. What was his horror, then, just as he was passing Mrs. Merillia's
door, to hear a voice cry,
"Hennessey! Hennessey!"
Gustavus and Malkiel stopped dead, as if they had both been shot. They now perceived that the door was
partially open, and that a faint light shone within the room.
"Hennessey!" cried the voice of Mrs. Merillia again. "Come in here. I must speak to you."
Gustavus darted on into the darkness of the Prophet's room, but Malkiel the Second was so alarmed that he
stayed where he was, finding himself totally incapable of movement.
"Hennessey!" repeated the voice.
Then there was a faint rustling, the door was opened more widely, and Mrs. Merillia appeared in the aperture,
clad in a most charming night bonnet, and robed in a dressinggown of white watered silk.
"The ratcatcher!" she cried. "The ratcatcher!"
Malkiel turned and darted down the stairs, while Mrs. Merillia, in the extreme of terror, shut her door, locked
it as many times as she could, and then hastened trembling to the bell which communicated with the faithful
Mrs. Fancy, rang it, and dropped half fainting into a chair. Mrs. Fancy woke from her second dream just as
Malkiel, closely followed by the now shattered Gustavus, reached the hall.
"Hide me! Hide me!" whispered Malkiel. "In here!"
And he darted into the servants' quarters, leaving Gustavus on the mat. Mrs. Merillia's other bell now pealed
shrilly downstairs. Gustavus paused and pulled himself together. He was by nature a fairly intrepid youth, and
moreover, he had recently made a close study of Carlyle's /Heroes and Heroworship/, which greatly
impressed him. He therefore resolved in this moment of peril to acquit himself in similar circumstances, and
he remounted the stairs and reached Mrs. Merillia's door just as Mrs. Fancy, wrapped in a woollen shawl and
wearing a pair of knitted nightsocks, descended to the landing, candle in hand.
"Oh, Mr. Gustavus!" said Mrs. Fancy. "Is it the robbers again? Is it murder, Mr. Gustavus? Is it fire?"
"I don't know, Mrs. Fancy, I'll ask the mistress."
He tapped upon the door.
"You can't come in!" cried poor Mrs. Merillia, who was losing her head perhaps for the first time in her life.
"You can't come in, and if you do I shall give you in charge to the police."
And she rang both her bells again.
"Ma'am!" said Gustavus, knocking once more. "Ma'am!"
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"It's no use your knocking," returned Mrs. Merillia. "The door is bolted. Go away, go away!"
And again she rang her two bells.
"Madam!" piped Mrs. Fancy. "Madam! It's me!"
"I know," said Mrs. Merillia. "I know it's you! I saw you! Leave the house unless you wish to be at once put
in prison.
Her bells pealed. Mrs. Fancy began to sob.
"Me to leave the house!" she wailed. "Me to go to prison!"
"Bear up, Mrs. Fancy, she doesn't know who it is!" said Gustavus. "Ma'am! Ma'am! Missis! Missis!"
"I am ringing," said Mrs. Merillia, in a muffled manner through the door. "I am summoning assistance! You
will be captured if you don't go away."
And again she pealed her bells. This time, as she did so, the tingling of a third bell became audible in the
silent house.
"Lord!" cried Gustavus, "if there isn't the hall door. It must be master. He left his key tonight. Here's a nice
go!"
The three bells raised their piercing chorus. Mrs. Fancy sobbed, and Gustavus, after a terrible moment of
hesitation, bounded down the hall. His instinct had not played him false. The person who had rung the bell
was indeed the Prophet, who had basely slunk away from Zoological House, leaving Madame surrounded by
her new and adoring friends.
"Thank you, Gustavus," he said, entering. "Take my coat, please. What's that?"
For Mrs. Merillia's bells struck shrilly upon his astonished ears.
"I think it's Mrs. Merillia, sir. She keeps on ringing."
"Mrs. Merillia. At this hour! Heavens! Is she ill?"
"I don't know, sir. She keeps ringing; but when I answer it she says, 'Go away!' she says. 'Go' she says,
sir."
"How very strange!"
And the Prophet bounded upstairs and arrived at his grandmother's door just in time to hear her cry out, in
reply to poor Mrs. Fancy's distracted knocking,
"If you try to break in you will be put in prison at once. I hear assistance coming. I hear the police. Go away,
you wicked, wicked man!"
"Grannie!" cried the Prophet through the keyhole. "Grannie, let me in! Grannie! Grannie! Don't ring!
Grannie! Grannie!"
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But Mrs. Merillia was now completely out of herself, and her only response to her grandson's appeal was to
place her trembling fingers upon the two bells, and to reply, through their uproar,
"It is useless for you to say that. I know who you are. I saw you. I shall go on ringing as long as I can stand. I
shall die ringing, but I shall never let you in. Go away! Go away!"
"What does she mean?" cried the Prophet, turning to Gustavus.
"I don't know indeed, sir," replied the footman, thinking of Mr. Carter's library. "I couldn't say indeed, sir."
"Oh, my poor missis!" wailed Mrs. Fancy, trembling in her nightsocks. "Oh, my poor dear missis! I can't
speak different nor mean other. Oh, missis, missis!"
"Hush, Fancy!" said the Prophet, in the greatest distraction. "Grannie! Grannie!"
And seizing the handle of the door he shook it violently. Mrs. Merillia was now very naturally under the
impression that the ratcatcher was determined to break in and murder her without more ado. Extreme danger
often seems to exercise a strangely calming influence upon the human soul. So it was now. Upon hearing her
bedroom door quivering under the assault of the Prophet, Mrs. Merillia was abruptly invaded by a sort of
desperate courage. She left the bells, tottered to the grate in which a good fire was blazing, seized the poker
and thrust it between the bars and into the heart of the flames, at the same time crying out in a quavering but
determined voice,
"I am heating the poker! If you come in you will repent it. I am heating the poker!"
On hearing this remark, the Prophet desisted from his assault upon the door, overcome by the absolute
conviction that his beloved grandmother was suffering from a pronounced form of homicidal mania. His
affection prompted him to keep such a catastrophe secret as long as possible, and he therefore turned to Mrs.
Fancy and Gustavus, and said hurriedly,
"This is a matter for me alone. Mrs. Fancy, please go away at once. Gustavus, you will accompany Mrs.
Fancy."
His manner was so firm, his face so iron in its determination, that Mrs. Fancy and Gustavus dared not proffer
a word. They turned away and disappeared softly down the stairs, to wait the /denouement/ of this tragedy in
the hall below. Meantime the poker was growing red hot in the coals, and Mrs. Merillia announced to the
supposed ratcatcher,
"I can hear youI hear you breathing" (the Prophet endeavoured not to breathe). "I hear you rustling, but
you can't touch me. The poker is red hot."
And she drew it smoking from the grate and approached the door, holding it in her delicate hand like a
weapon.
"Grannie!" said the Prophet, making his voice as much like it generally was as he possibly could. "Dearest
grannie!"
"I dare you to come in!" replied Mrs. Merillia, in an almost formidable manner. "I dare you to do it."
"I am not coming in, grannie," said the Prophet.
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"Then go away!" said Mrs. Merillia. "Go awayand let me hear you going."
A sudden idea struck the Prophet. He did not say another word, but immediately walked downstairs, tramping
heavily and shaking the wood balusters violently at every step he took. His ruse succeeded. Hearing the
intruder depart, Mrs. Merillia's curious courage deserted her, she dropped the poker into the grate, and once
more set both bells going with all her might and main. The Prophet let her ring for nearly five minutes, then
he bounded once more upstairs and tapped very gently on the door.
"Grannie," he cried, "are you ringing? What is it?"
This time Mrs. Merillia recognised his voice, tottered to the door, unlocked it, and fell, trembling, into his
anxious arms.
"Oh, Hennessey!" she gasped. "OhHennessey!"
"Grannie, what is it? What on earth is the matter?"
"The ratcatcher! The ratcatcher!"
"The ratcatcher!" cried the Prophet.
"He has come back. He is here. He has been trying to break into my room."
"What ratcatcher?"
"The one that dined tonightthe one you called your old andand valuedfriend."
"Mr. Sagittarius?" exclaimed the Prophet.
"He is here."
"Here!"
"I have seen him. He has tried to murder me."
"I will look into this at once," said the Prophet.
He ran to the head of the stairs and called out,
"Gustavus!"
"Sir!"
"Come up here at once,"
Gustavus came, followed closely by Mrs. Fancy, who was in a state of abject confusion and alarm.
"Has Mr. Sagittarius returned herethe gentleman who dined tonight?" asked the Prophet.
Gustavus hesitated, thought of Dr. Carter's library, and replied,
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"No, sir,"
"Has anybody entered the house?"
"No, sir."
"You have been up the whole evening?"
"Yes, sir."
"And nobody has been?"
"Nobody, sir."
"Grannie, you hear what Gustavus says."
"But, Hennessey, he is here; I saw him."
"Where?"
"By the door. I heard someone, and I thought it was you. I came to the door after calling you, and there he
stood, all dirty and wet, with a huge hat on his head" (the saturnine little clergyman was largely blessed with
brain), "and a most awful murderous expression on his face."
The Prophet began to suspect that his dear relative, upset by the tragic events of the dinner table, had gone to
sleep and had the nightmare.
"Grannie, it must have been a dream."
"No, Hennessey, no."
"It must indeed. I left Mr. Sagittarius at Zoological House. I feel certain of that."
The Prophet spoke the honest truth. He fully believed that Mr. Sagittarius was at that very moment sharing in
the triumph of his wife and receiving the worship of those who live the silly life.
"But I saw him, Hennessey," said Mrs. Merillia, adding rather unnecessarily, "with my own eyes."
"Grannie, darling, you must have been dreaming. At any rate, I'm here now. Nothing can hurt you. Go to bed.
Fancy will stay with you, and I swear to you that no harm will happen to you so long as I am breathing."
With these noble words the Prophet kissed his grandmother tenderly, assisted Mrs. Fancy into the room, and
walked downstairs quite determined that, come what might, whether he broke a thousand oaths or not, he
would put an end forthwith to the tyranny of the couple from the Mouse and abandon for ever the shocking
pursuit of prophecy.
CHAPTER XX. THE PROPHET RETIRES FROM BUSINESS
Exactly as the Prophet arrived at his resolution the hall door bell rang violently, and Gustavus, who had
slipped down before the Prophet in order to seek the traveller to Java in the servants' quarters, hurried into the
hall in rather a distracted manner.
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"Stop, Gustavus!" said the Prophet.
Gustavus stopped. The bell rang again.
"Gustavus," said the Prophet, "if that is a visitor I am not at home. Mrs. Merillia is not at home either."
It was by this time between one and two in the morning.
"Not at home, sir. Yes, sir."
The Prophet concealed himself near the hatrack, and Gustavus went softly to the door and opened it.
"Not at home, ma'am," the Prophet heard him say, formally.
"What d'you mean, young man?" replied the powerful voice of Madame. "Where is my husband?"
"Ma'am?"
"Where, I say, is my husband?"
"I couldn't say, I'm sure, ma'am. But Mrs. Merillia and Mr. Vivian are not at home."
"Then all I can say is they ought to be in at this time of night. Permit me to pass. Are you aware that Mr.
Vivian has invited me to spend the night here? /Noctes ambrosianes/."
"But, ma'am, Mr. Viv"
"That'll do. If I have any more of your impertinence I'll make you repent of it. You are evidently not aware
who I am."
The Prophet, by the hatrack, did not fail to hear a new note in the deep contralto of Madame, a note of
triumph, a trumpet note of profound conceit. His heart sank before this determined music, and it sank even
lower towards his pumps when, a moment later, he found himself confronted by the lady, wrapped closely in
the rabbitskins, and absolutely bulging with vanity and selfappreciation.
"What! Mr. Vivian!" began the lady.
"Hush! said the Prophet, "for mercy's sakehush!"
And, acting upon the impulse of the moment, he suddenly seized Madame by the hand, and hurried her
through the swinging door into the servants' hall.
"Here's a go," murmured Gustavus in the greatest trepidation. "If they don't find the thin party I'm a josser."
Meanwhile the Prophet and Madame were standing face to face before the whatnot of Gustavus.
"My grandmother is awakethat is asleep," said the Prophet. "We must not wake her on any account."
"Oh," returned Madame, with a toss of her head, "your grandmother seems to be a very fidgety old lady, I'm
surealthough you do tell a parcel of lies about her."
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"Lies!" said the Prophet, with some dignity.
"Yeslies. She don't wear long clothes"
"I beg your pardon!"
"She do not. She don't wear her hair down. She don't put her lips to the bottle. She don't. Where is Mr.
Sagiwhere is Malkiel the Second?"
"I have no idea. And now, Madame, I regret that I must conduct you to your carriage. The hour is late, my
grandmother is seriously indisposed, and I myself need rest."
"Well, then, you can't have it," retorted the lady with authoritative spitefulness. "You can't have it, not till
three o'clock."
"I beg your pardon!" said the Prophet, with trembling lips.
"What for?"
"I really regret that I must retire. Allow me"
"I'll not allow you. Where is my husband? He's not at the Zoological Gardens."
"He has probably returned home."
"To the Mouse! Then he's a coward and an oathbreaker, and if Sir Tiglath was to catch him I shouldn't be
sorry. Kindly lead me at once to the telescope. I will take his place. No one shall say that Madame Malkiel
ever flinched at duty's call. /Praesto et persistibus/. Conduct me at once to the telescope."
"The telescope!" cried the Prophet. "What for?"
"Lawks!" cried Madame, with pronounced temper. "Did we not journey from the Mouse apurpose to go
practically into the mystery of the dressed Crab?"
"I reallyI really cannot consent without a chaperon," began the Prophet.
"The wife of Malkiel the Second needs no chaperone," retorted Madame. "This night has altered my
conditionI stand from henceforth far beyond the reach of etiquette. The world knows me now and will not
dare to carp. /Carpe dies/."
During the foregoing colloquy her voice had become louder and louder, and the Prophet, dreading
unspeakably lest his grandmother should be disturbed and affrighted once more, gave up the struggle, and,
without more ado, conducted Madame into the butler's pantry in which the telescope still remained.
Meanwhile what had become of Malkiel the Second?
When Mrs. Merillia suddenly appeared before him in her nightbonnet and accused him of being a ratcatcher
he had very naturally fled, his first impulse being to leave the house at once and continue his journey to the
docks. But even a prophet is but mortal. Malkiel had passed through an eventful day followed by a still more
eventful evening. His mind was completely exhausted. Even so, however, he might have continued upon his
journey towards Java had not his legs prosaically shown signs of giving way under him just as he once more
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gained the hall. This decided him. He must have some short repose at whatever cost. He therefore pushed
feebly at the nearest door, and found himself promptly in the apartment of the upper servants. Staggering to
the whatnot of Gustavus, he sank down upon it and fell into a melancholy reverie, from which he was
roused by the constant tingling cry of Mrs. Merillia's second bell, which rang close to where he was reposing.
He tried to start up, but failed, and it was only when the hall door bell, attacked by the Prophet, added its
voice to its companion's that his terror lent him sufficient strength to flee very slowly into the inner fastnesses
of this unknown region. There was a light in the servant's hall, but darkness lay beyond and Malkiel knew not
whither he was penetrating. He barked his shins, but could not tell against what hard substance. He bruised
his elbow, but could not know what piece of furniture had assailed it. On coming in contact with a dresser he
saw a few sparks, but they speedily died out, and he was obliged to feel his way onward, till presently he
came across a large leather chair in which Mrs. Merillia's cook was wont to sit while directing her
subordinates at the basting machine. Into this he sank palpitating, and for a moment remained undisturbed.
Then, to his horror, he heard in the adjoining room the strident voice of his loved and honoured wife
apparently carrying on a decidedly vivacious argument with some person unknown. He bounded up. Possibly
she was accompanied by Sir Tiglath, who must now be aware of his identity. In any case, her wrath at his
scarcely chivalrous desertion of her in the house of a stranger would, he knew, be terrible. He dared not face
it. He dared not allow his project of flight at dawn to be interfered with, as it certainly would be if he came
across Madame. He therefore proceeded to flee once more. Nor did he pause until he had gained Mr.
Ferdinand's pantry, where stood the telescope. Now, in this pantry there was a large cupboard in which were
kept the very numerous and magnificent pieces of plate, etc., possessed by Mrs. Merillia; tall silver
candelabra, standard lamps of polished bronze, richlychased cups, gigantic vases for containing flowers,
oriental incense holders upon stands of ebony, Spanish charcoal dishes of burnished brass, and other treasures
far too numerous to mention. This cupboard was always carefully locked at night, but on this occasion Mr.
Ferdinand, totally disorganised by the frightful scenes which had taken place at his dinner table during the
evening, had retired to bed in a condition of collapse, leaving it open. Malkiel the Second, feeling frantically
about in the dark, came upon the door of this cupboard, pulled it, found that it yielded to his hand, and,
hearing the rapidly approaching voices of Madame and the Prophet, stumbled into the cupboard and sank
down on a large gold lovingcup, with one foot in a silver soup tureen, and the other in a priceless sugar
basin, just as the light of the candle borne by the Prophet glimmered in the darkness of the adjacent corridor.
"This way, Madame," said the Prophet. "But I really think such a proceeding is calculated to cause a grave
scandal in the square."
Malkiel the Second drew the cupboard door to, and grasped a silver candelabrum in each hand to sustain
himself upon the rather sharp rim of the lovingcup.
"What is the square to me or I to the square?" returned Madame with ungrammatical majesty. "Madame
Malkiel is not governed by any ordinary laws. /Lexes non scripta/ is her motto. To these alone she clings."
Her husband clung to the candelabra and burst into a violent perspiration. Through the keyhole of the
cupboard a ray of light now shone, and he heard the froufrou of his partner's skirt, the flump of the
rabbitskins as she cast them from her ample shoulders upon the floor. The Prophet's voice became audible
again.
"What do you wish me to do?" he said, with a sort of embittered courtesy.
"Throw open the window, place yourself before the telescope, and proceed at once to your investigations,"
replied the lady.
"I am not in a condition to investigate," said the Prophet. "I am not indeed. If you will only let me get you a
cab, tomorrow night"
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'It is useless to talk, Mr. Vivian," said Madame, very sharply. "The cab has not yet been made that will
convey me to the Mouse tonight."
"But your husband"
"My husband is a coward, unworthy of such a wife as he possesses. At the crisis of our fortunesWhat's
that?"
At this painful moment Malkiel the Second was so overcome by emotion, that he trembled, and allowed his
left foot to rattle slightly on the sugar basin.
"What was it?" repeated Madame.
"Rats, I have no doubt," answered the Prophet, who had heard nothing. "I believe that the basements of these
old houses are simplywell simply permeated with rats."
For a moment Madame blanched, but she was a woman of spirit, and moreover she was almost intoxicated
with ambition. Recognised at last as a lady of position and importance in one of the mansions of the idiotic
great, she was more anxious than ever to remove forthwith into the central districts, there to exercise that
sway which she had so long desired. Finding that there exists a world in which prophetsfar from being
considered as dirty and deceitful personsare worshipped and adored, entertained with Pommery and treated
almost as gods, she yearned to dwell in the midst of it. The peaceful seclusion of the Mouse was become
hateful to her. The architects and their wives began to seem to her uplifted fancy little better than the circle
that frequented Hagglin's Buildings, or appeared at the paltry entertainments given by the inhabitants of
Drakeman's Villas. She was resolved to soar, and even rats should not turn her from her passionate purpose.
Accordingly she replied,
"Rats or no rats, I intend to see this matter out. /Dixisti!/ The night wanes. Kindly go at once to the
telescope."
The Prophet obeyed, first opening the window into the area. The rain had now cleared off, but the sky was
still rather cloudy, and only a few stars peeped here and there.
"Really," said the Prophet, after applying his weary eye to the machine, "really I don't think it's any good,
there are so very"
"Have the goodness to place the old lady in the claws of the Crab, according to the directions of the coward
who has deserted me."
Malkiel shook with shame upon the lovingcup.
"But I really can't find the Crab," said the Prophet, who was so tired that he could scarcely stand. "I can see
the Great Bear."
"That is no use. The Bear has nothing to do with the old lady. You must find the Crab. Look again."
The Prophet did so. But his eye blinked with fatigue and the heavens swam before it.
"There is no Crab tonight," he said. "I assure you on my honour there is none."
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Exactly as he finished making this statement a low whistle rang through the silence of the night. The Prophet
started, Madame jumped, and Malkiel bounded on the lovingcup.
The whistle was repeated.
"It's the thing!" whispered the Prophet.
"What thing?" inquired Madame, who had become rather pale.
"The dark thing that told me the Crab was dressed. It has come again."
"My word!" ejaculated Madame, looking uneasily around. "Where is it?"
Just then Malkiel the Second's feet once more began to tremble among the plate of Mrs. Merillia.
"You hear it!" said the Prophet, much impressed.
"Did it rattle like that the other night?" gasped Madame, seizing the Prophet by the arm.
The Prophet told a lie with his head.
"Address it, I beg," said Madame, in a great state of excitement. "Meanwhile I will retire a few paces."
So saying, she backed into the passage, bearing the candle with her for company, and leaving the Prophet in
total darkness. The low whistle sounded again, and a husky voice said,
"Are you there?"
"Yes," replied the Prophet, summoning all his courage. "I am."
"What 'a' you put out the light for?" said the voice, which seemed to come from far away.
"I haven't put it out," returned the Prophet. "It's gone away."
At this juncture Malkiel, impelled by curiosity, ceased from trembling, and, leaning forward upon the
lovingcup, glued his ear to the keyhole of the cupboard.
"Why was you so late tonight?" proceeded the voice. "She's been in a rare taking, I can tell you."
"Who?"
"Who? You know well enough."
"Do you mean my grandmother?"
"Your grandmother!" ejaculated the voice with apparent sarcasm. "Ah! of course, what do you think?"
"I'm sure I don't know," said the poor Prophet, whose reason was beginning to totter upon its throne.
"Well," proceeded the voice, "she thought you'd give it up."
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"Whatmy grandmother did?"
"Ah, your grandmother. Get away with you! Ha! ha! ha!"
And the mysterious visitant broke forth into a peal of rather mundane laughter. After indulging in this
unseemly mirth for about a minute and a half, the personage resumed,
"The Crab did for her."
Upon hearing the mystic word Madame crept stealthily a pace or two nearer to the door, while the Prophet
exclaimed,
"The dressed Crab?"
"Ah, what do /you/ think? Not a wink of sleep and thought every minute'd be 'er next."
"Good Heavens!"
"She says she'd never go near a crab again, not if it's ever so."
"You are sure?" said the Prophet, eagerly. "You are positive she said that?"
"I'd stake my Davy, and I wouldn't do that on everything. There ain't a man living as'll ever get her to go
within fifty miles of a crab this side of Judgment."
At this point in the colloquy the curiosity of Madame overcame her, and she protruded her head suddenly
beyond the edge of the doorway.
"Ulloh!" exclaimed the voice. "Why, what's 'a' you got there?"
Madame hastily withdrew, and the voice continued,
"Blessed if it ain't a female!"
"I beg your pardon!" said the Prophet, trembling with propriety. "I Ithere is no female here!"
"Yes there is!" cried the voice, with a chuckle. "There's a female creeping and crawling about behind that
there door."
The Prophet's sense of chivalry was now fully aroused.
"You are mistaken," he said firmly. "There are no females creeping andand crawling about in thisthis
respectable house."
"Respectable!" ejaculated the voice, "respectable! I say there is a female. You're a nice one, you are! 'Pon my
word, I've a good mind to run you in for Mormonism, I have. Wherever's she got to?"
On the last words a sudden blaze of light shot into the pantry, and at the same moment there was the sound of
wheels rapidly approaching in the square.
"Hulloh!" said the voice, "someone acomin'."
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The light died out as rapidly as it had flashed in, the wheels drew close and stopped, and a bell pealed forth in
the silent house.
"Merciful Heavens!" cried the Prophet, pressing his hands to his throbbing brow. "Merciful Heavens! who
can that be?"
There was no answer, and the bell pealed again.
"Grannie will be disturbed!" exclaimed the Prophet, addressing himself, passionately to the darkness.
"Grannie will be killed by all this uproar."
The bell pealed again.
"This must cease," cried the Prophet. "This must and shall cease. I will bring it all to an end once and for
ever!"
And, with sudden desperate decision, he shut the window, burst out of the pantry and came upon Madame,
who was standing in a somewhat furtive manner by the door that opened into the cellars of the mansion.
"Mr. Vivian," she began, in a rather subdued voice, "that isn't a comet, that's a copper!"
The bell rang again.
"D'you thinkd'you think that can be my husband?" continued Madame, still seeming subdued. "I should
like him Do you think it's him?"
"What?"
"The bell."
"I will very soon see," replied the Prophet, in a most determined manner.
"But Mr. Viv"
"Don't hold me, if you please. Kindly let me pass!"
And, breaking from the lady's anxious grasp, the Prophet rushed into the hall just as Gustavus appeared,
descending the front stairs from the landing before Mrs. Merillia's door, where he had been in close
conference with Mrs. Fancy.
"Stand back, Gustavus," said the Prophet.
"Sir!"
"Stand back!"
"But, sir, there is someone"
"I know there is. I am about to answer the door myself."
"If you please, sir, Mrs. Merillia is greatly alarmed by the constant ringing, and Mrs. Fancy thinks"
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"Gustavus," said the Prophet in an awful voice, "you may retire, but first let me tell you one thing."
"Certainly, sir," said the footman, beginning to tremble.
"The circumstances that have rendered a hitherto peaceful household more disordered than an abode of
madmen are about to be brought to an end for ever. There is a point at which a gentleman must either cease to
be a gentleman or cease to be a man. I have reached that point, Gustavus, and I am about to cease to be a
gentleman."
And, with this terrible statement, the Prophet advanced with a sort of appalling deliberation and threw the
front door wide open.
Upon the doorstep stood Lady Enid wrapped in a pink opera cloak and Sir Tiglath Butt shrouded in the
Inverness. The Prophet faced them with a marble demeanour.
"I thought you'd be here, Mr. Vivian," began Lady Enid in a bright manner.
"I am here," said the Prophet, speaking in a voice that might well have issued from a statue.
"Where is he?" roared Sir Tiglath. "Where is he? Ohhhh!"
"Sir Tiglath means Malkiel," explained Lady Enid. "He is most anxious to meet him."
"Why?" said the Prophet, still in the same inhuman voice.
"Well, we shall see when they do meet," said Lady Enid, throwing a look of keen curiosity at the astronomer.
"I rather think" here she lowered her voice and whispered in the Prophet's ear"I rather think Sir Tiglath
wishes to try if he can murder Malkiel. Do you believe he could bring it off?"
"I'm sure I don't know," answered the Prophet, with stony indifference. "Goodnight to you!"
"But we want to come in," cried Lady Enid.
"Young man," roared Sir Tiglath, "the old astronomer will not leave this house till he has searched it from
attic to cellar."
"I am sorry," replied the Prophet, "but I cannot permit my grandmother's servants or wine to be disturbed at
such an hour. If you wish to murder Malkiel the Second, I shall not prevent you, but he is not here."
"Then where is he?" cried Lady Enid.
"I don't know. And now"
The Prophet stepped back into the hall, and was about to close the door unceremoniouslyhaving, as he
intended, ceased to be a gentlemanwhen Lady Enid caught sight of the round and fixed eyes of Gustavus
glaring out into the night from behind his master. The appalling feminine instinct, which makes woman the
mistress of creation, suddenly woke within her, and she cried out in a piercing voice,
"Malkiel's in the house, and Gustavus knows it!"
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She spoke these words with such conviction that the Prophet spun round, topwise, and stared at the
unfortunate flunkey, who instantly fell upon his kneebreeches and stammered out,
"Oh, sir, forgive me! It's Dr. Carter done it, sir, it is indeed. It's Dr. Carter done it!"
"Dr. Carter!" ejaculated the Prophet.
"The library, sir. He offered me the library eight times over, sir!"
"Who offered you the library?"
"The gent, sir, in Mr. Ferdinand's trouserings, what was at dinner, sir. He only wanted to change 'em, sir, and
he says to me, he says, 'Let me,' he says, 'but remove these trouserings,' he says, 'before I make off to Java,'
he says"
"To where?" roared Sir Tiglath.
"To Java, sir, where the jelly and the sparrows is manufactured, sir, that is born, sir. 'And,' he says, 'here is a
hundred pounds,' he says."
"Then he is in the house?" said the Prophet, sternly.
"Well, sir, he was, sir. And, as I ain't seen him go, sir, I expect as he's somewhere about changing of 'em, sir.
Oh, sir, if you'll only look it over sir, It's all the thirst, sir, it's all the thirst"
"What? You have been drinking?" cried the Prophet, in an outraged manner.
"No, sir, the thirst for knowledge, sir, as has brought me to this. Oh, sir, if only you'll"
"Hush!" said the Prophet fiercely. "Sir Tiglath," he added, turning towards the puffing astronomer, "you can
enter. My grandmother must have been right."
"Your grandmother?" said Lady Enid, with eager inquisitiveness.
"She informed me that the ruffian was in the house and had attempted to make away with her"
"Dear me! this is most interesting!" interposed Lady Enid.
"But I supposed she had had the nightmare. It seems that I was wrong. If you will step in, you can search the
house at once. And if you discover this nameless creature changing histhat is Mr. Ferdinand's
trouseringstrousers, that is,in any part of the building, as far as I am concerned you can murder him
forthwith."
The Prophet spoke quite calmly, in a soft and level voice. Yet there was something so frightful in his tone and
manner that even Sir Tiglath seemed slightly awestricken. At any rate, he accepted the Prophet's invitation
in silence, and stepped almost furtively into the hall, on whose floor Gustavus was still posed in the
conventional attitude of the Christian martyr. Lady Enid eagerly followed, and the Prophet was just about to
close the door, when a dark, hovering figure that was pausing at a short distance off upon the pavement
attracted his attention. He stopped short, and, perceiving that it was a policeman, beckoned to it. The figure
approached.
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"What's up now?" it said familiarly, emphasising the question with a sharp contraction of the left eyelid.
"You're having a nice game tonight, and no mistake."
"Game!" replied the Prophet, sternly. "This is no game. Stand there, by the area gate, and if anyone should
run out, knock him down with your truncheon. Do you hear me?"
With these impressive words he entered the house and shut the door, leaving the policeman to whistle
inquiringly to the stars that were watching over this house, once peaceful, but now the abode of violence and
tragedy.
In the hall he found Gustavus still on his knees between Lady Enid and Sir Tiglath.
"Lady Enid," he said, even in this hour mindful of the proprieties, "you have heard what this villain is doing
here, and must be sensible that you can take no part in this search."
"Oh, but I particularly want" began Lady Enid, hastily.
"Pardon me," said the Prophet, with more firmness than Napoleon ever showed to his marshals. "You must
retire. Please come this way. Mrs. Fancy will look after you."
"Oh, but really, Mr. Vivian, I"
"Kindly follow me."
Lady Enid hesitated for a moment, but the Prophet's manner was too much for her, and when he stepped, like
a clockwork automaton with a steel interior, towards the staircase, she crept mildly in his wake.
"Can't I really?" she whispered in his ear.
"Certainly not. If you were a married woman, possibly"
"Well, but I am engaged," she murmured.
The Prophet stopped short.
"Engaged!" he said. "To whom?"
"Sir Tiglath."
"Engaged to Sir Tiglath!"
"Yes. He proposed to me tonight at Zoological House."
"Why?"
She might well have resented the question, but perhaps she divined the distraught and almost maniacal
condition of mind that the Prophet masked beneath his impassive demeanour. At any rate she answered
frankly,
"Because he didn't find out I'm Miss Minerva, and in the midst of Mrs. Bridgeman's silly world I stood right
out as the only sensible creature living. Isn't it fun?"
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"Fun!"
"Yes. I always meant him to propose to me."
"Why?"
"Because I always thought it would be supremely idiotic of me to accept him."
The Prophet felt that if he listened to another remark of such a nature his brain would snap and he would
instantly be taken with a tearing fit of hysterics. He therefore turned round and slowly ascended to the first
floor.
"Kindly step into the drawingroom," he said, having first, by a rapid glance, assured himself that Malkiel
was not changing Mr. Ferdinand's trousers there. "I will send Mrs. Fancy to chaperon you."
Lady Enid stepped in obediently, and the Prophet, who could distinctly hear Mrs. Fancy sobbing on the
landing above, proceeded thither, took her hand and guided her down to the drawingroom.
"Oh, my poor, poor missis!" gulped the devoted creature. "Oh, my"
"Precisely," rejoined the Prophet, with passionless equanimity. "Please go in there and remain to guard this
young lady."
He assisted Mrs. Fancy to fall in a heap upon the nearest sociable, and then, still moving with a species of
frozen deliberation, betook himself once more to the hall. The astronomer and Gustavus were standing there
in silence.
"Sir Tiglath," said the Prophet, in a very formal manner, "you can now begin to search for this ruffian."
Sir Tiglath cleared his throat, and continued to stand still.
"I hope you will find him," continued the Prophet.
Sir Tiglath cleared his throat again and added,
"Why?"
"Why? Because I think it quite time that he was murdered," answered the Prophet, unemotionally. "Well!
why don't you search?"
The astronomer, whose face began to look less red than usual, rolled his glassy eyes round upon the shadowy
hall, the dim staircase and the gloomylooking closed doors that confronted them.
"Where is the old astronomer to search?" he asked, in a low voice. "Ohhhh!"
The final exclamation sounded remarkably tremulous.
"Anywhereexcept in my grandmother's bedroom. That of course is sacred. Well, why don't you begin?"
Sir Tiglath eyed the Prophet furtively.
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"I'mI'm going to," he murmured hoarsely. "The old astronomer does not know the meaning of the
wordfear."
Exactly as he uttered these inspiring words the hall clock growled, like a very large dog, and struck two. Sir
Tiglath started and caught hold of Gustavus, who started in his turn and shrank away. The Prophet alone
stood up to the clock, which finished its remark with a click, and resumed its habitual occupation of ticking.
"Pray begin, Sir Tiglath," said the Prophet.
"The old astronomermust have aaacandle."
"Here is one," said the Prophet, handing the desired article.
"A lighted candle."
"Why lighted? Oh, so that you can see to murder him! Gustavus, light the candle."
Gustavus, who was trembling a good deal more than an autumn leaf, complied after about fifteen unavailing
attempts.
"There, Sir Tiglath," said the Prophet. "Now you can begin." And he seated himself upon a settee, leaned
back and crossed his legs.
"You will not accompany the old astronomer? Ohhh"
"No. I will rest here. When you have found the ruffian and murdered him, I shall be glad to hear your news."
And, so saying, the Prophet settled himself comfortably with a cushion behind his back, and calmly closed
his eyes. The candlestick clattered in Sir Tiglath's gouty hand. The Prophet heard it, heard heavy feet
shuffling very slowly and cautiously over the floor of the hall, finally heard the door leading to the servants'
quarters swing on its hinges. Still he did not open his eyes. He felt that if he were to do so just then he would
probably begin to shriek, rave, foam at the mouth, and in all known ways comport himself as do the
inhabitants of Bedlam. A delicate silence fell in the hall. How long it lasted the Prophet never knew. It might
have been five minutes or five years as far as he was concerned. It was broken at length by the following
symphony of soundsan elderly man's voice roaring, a woman's voice uttering a considerable number of
very powerful screams on a rather low but still resounding note, a loud thump, a crash of glass, a prodigious
clattering, as of utensils made in some noisy material falling from a height and rolling vigorously in
innumerable directions, two or three bangs of doors, and the peculiar patter of rather large and flat feet,
unaccustomed to any rapid exercise, moving over boards, oilcloth and carpet. Then the swing door sang, and
the Prophet, opening his eyes, perceived Madame Malkiel moving forward with considerable vivacity, and
screaming as she moved, her bonnet depending down her back and the rabbitskins flowing from her ample
shoulders. Immediately behind her ran her spouse, holding in one hand a silver pepper castor, and in the other
a small and very beautifully finished bronze teapot of the William of Orange period. The worthy couple
fleeted by, and the Prophet turned his expressionless eyes towards the swing door expecting immediately to
perceive Sir Tiglath Butt in valiant pursuit. As no such figure presented itself, and as the Malkiels were now
beginning to mount the stairs with continually increasing velocity, the Prophet slowly uncrossed his legs, and
was thinking of getting upon his feet when there came a loud knock upon the hall door.
"Gustavus!" said the Prophet, glancing round.
He perceived the footman lying in a dead faint near the umbrella stand.
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"Oh!" he said, speaking to himself aloud. "Oh! Then I must go myself."
Acting upon his conception of his duty, he accordingly walked to the front door, opened it, and found the
policeman outside supporting the senseless form of Sir Tiglath Butt in one hand and holding a broken
truncheon in the other.
"Well?" said the Prophet, calmly. "Well?"
"I knocked him down as he was making a bolt," said the policeman.
The Prophet found himself wondering why so industrious and even useful an occupation should be interfered
with in such a manner. However, he only replied,
"Indeed!"
"Ah," said the policeman, stepping into the hall and laying the astronomer out across a chair, "what's up?"
"They are both up," answered the Prophet, pointing with a lethargic finger towards the staircase, from which,
at this moment, arose a perfect hubbub of voices.
"Come on!" cried the policeman.
"Why?" asked the Prophet.
"Why! you're a nice un, you are! Why! And nab 'em, of course!"
"You think it would be wise towhat was the wordnab them?" inquired the Prophet. "You really think
so?"
"Well, what am I here for then?" said the policeman, with angry irony.
"Oh, if you prefer," rejoined the Prophet, civilly. "Nab them by all means. I shall not prevent you."
The policeman, who was an active and industrious fellow deserving of praise, waited for no further
permission, but immediately darted up the stairs, and in less than a minute returned with Mrs.
Merilliaattired in a black silk gown, a bonnet, and an Indian shawl presented to her on her marriage by a
very great personagein close custody.
"Here's one of 'em!" he shouted. "Here, you lay hold of her while I fetch the rest!"
And with these words he thrust the Prophet's grandmother into one of his hands, the broken truncheon into
the other, and turning smartly round, again bounded up the stairs.
In a famous poem of the late Lord Tennyson there is related a dramatic incident of a lady whose
disinclination to cry, when such emotion would have been only natural, was overcome by the presentation to
her of her child. A somewhat similar effect was produced upon our Prophet by the constable's presentation to
him of his honoured grandmother. The sight of her reverent head, surmounted by the bonnet which she had
assumed in readiness to flee from the house which she could no longer regard as a homethe touch of her
delicate handthe flutter of her so hallowed Indian shawlthese things broke down the strange calm of her
devoted grandson. Like summer tempest came his emotion, and, when the policeman presently returned with
Malkiel the Second and Madame nabbed by his right and left hands, and followed by Lady Enid and the
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weeping Mrs. Fancy, he was confronted by a most pathetic tableau. The Prophet and Mrs. Merillia were
weeping in each other's arm's while Sir Tiglath and Gustavusjust returned to consciousnesswere
engaged in examining the proceeding with puppy dog's eyes.
Over the explanations that ensued a veil may be partially drawn. One lifted corner, however, allows us to note
that Sir Tiglath Butt, having come upon Madame hidden behind a bin of old port in the Prophet's cellar, had
been seized by a desire not to alarm a lady so profound that it prompted him to hurry to the butler's pantry,
and to seek concealment in the very cupboard which already contained Malkiel the Second. On perceiving
that gentleman perched upon the lovingcup, and protected by candlesticks, sugar basins, teapots and other
weapons, the astronomer's anxiety to become a murderer apparently forsook him. At any rate, he passed
through the plateglass of the window rather hastily into the area, where, as we know, he received the
solicitous attentions of the policeman who had served as an intermediary between the Lord Chancellor's
second cookwhose supper of dressed crab had caused so much confusionand the supposed Mr.
Ferdinand. Malkiel the Second, finding himself discovered, took to the open just as Madame fled forth from
the cellar, to be overtaken by the very natural misconception that she was about to become the victim of a
husband whose jealousy had at length caused him to assume his /toga virilibus/.
Perhaps it was Sir Tiglath's throwing off of the said garment which caused Lady Enid to throw him over. At
any rate, she eventually married Mr. Robert Green and made him a very sensible wife.
The Malkiels returned to the Mouse, where they still live, and still carry on a certain amount of intercourse
with architects and their wives. From time to time, however, they attend the receptions at Zoological House,
and a rumour recently ran through the circles of the silly to the effect that they had been looking at a house
not far from the Earls Court Station, with a viewit is surmisedof removing to more central districts.
They are no longer on terms with the Prophet.
He has retired from business and put down his telescope once and for all, recognising that prophecy is a
dangerous employment, and one likely to bring about the very evils it foreshadows. Calmly he dwells with
his beloved grandmother in the Berkeley Square, which has received them once more into its former favour.
Sometimes, at night, when the sky is clear, and the bright stars, the guardian stars, keep watch over his
aristocratic neighbourhood, he draws aside the curtain from the drawingroom window and glances forth at
Mercury and Uranus, Jupiter, Saturn and Venus. And when his eyes meet their twinkling eyes, he exchanges
with themnot a question and answer, not a demand for unholy information and a reluctant reply, but a
serene, gentlemanly and perfectly decorous goodnight.
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