6
Ginger Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called
upon at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet
restlessly and twisted his fingers.
"I hate talking about myself, you know," he said.
"So I supposed," said Sally. "That's why I gave you my autobiography
first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don't be such a shrinking
violet. We're all shipwrecked mariners here. I am intensely interested
in your narrative. And, even if I wasn't, I'd much rather listen to it
than to Jules' snoring."
"He is snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?"
"You seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature," said
Sally. "You appear to think of nothing else but schemes for harassing
poor Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start telling me about
yourself."
"Where shall I start?"
"Well, not with your childhood, I think. We'll skip that."
"Well..." Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic
opening. "Well, I'm more or less what you might call an orphan, like
you. I mean to say, both my people are dead and all that sort of thing."
"Thanks for explaining. That has made it quite clear."
"I can't remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last year
at Cambridge. I'd been having a most awfully good time at the 'varsity,'"
said Ginger, warming to his theme. "Not thick, you know, but good. I'd
got my rugger and boxing blues and I'd just been picked for scrum-half
for England against the North in the first trial match, and between
ourselves it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip for my
international."
Sally gazed at him wide eyed.
"Is that good or bad?" she asked.
"Eh?"
"Are you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get
up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?"
"Well, it's... it's a rugger blue, you know."
"Oh, I see," said Sally. "You mean a rugger blue."
"I mean to say, I played rugger--footer--that's to say, football--Rugby
football--for Cambridge, against Oxford. I was scrum-half."
"And what is a scrum-half?" asked Sally, patiently. "Yes, I know you're
going to say it's a scrum-half, but can't you make it easier?"
"The scrum-half," said Ginger, "is the half who works the scrum. He
slings the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the three-quarters
going. I don't know if you understand?"
"I don't."
"It's dashed hard to explain," said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. "I mean, I
don't think I've ever met anyone before who didn't know what a
scrum-half was."
"Well, I can see that it has something to do with football, so we'll
leave it at that. I suppose it's something like our quarter-back. And
what's an international?"
"It's called getting your international when you play for England, you
know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it hadn't
been for the smash, I think I should have played for England against
Wales."
"I see at last. What you're trying to tell me is that you were very
good at football."
Ginger Kemp blushed warmly.
"Oh, I don't say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves that
year."
"What a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely to
be picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the
smash?"
"Well, it turned out that the poor old pater hadn't left a penny. I
never understood the process exactly, but I'd always supposed that we
were pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn't anything at
all. I'm bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I had to come down from
Cambridge and go to work in my uncle's office. Of course, I made an
absolute hash of it."
"Why, of course?"
"Well, I'm not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn't
seem able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, getting a
bit fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a school, and I
made a hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, and I made a hash
of those."
"You certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!"
gasped Sally.
"I am," said Ginger, modestly.
There was a silence.
"And what about Scrymgeour?" Sally asked.
"That was the last of the jobs," said Ginger. "Scrymgeour is a pompous
old ass who think's he's going to be Prime Minister some day. He's a big
bug at the Bar and has just got into Parliament. My cousin used to devil
for him. That's how I got mixed up with the blighter."
"Your cousin used... ? I wish you would talk English."
"That was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning."
"And what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?"
"Oh, it's called devilling. My cousin's at the Bar, too--one of our
rising nibs, as a matter of fact..."
"I thought he was a lawyer of some kind."
"He's got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil
for Scrymgeour--assist him, don't you know. His name's Carmyle, you
know. Perhaps you've heard of him? He's rather a prominent johnny in his
way. Bruce Carmyle, you know."
"I haven't."
"Well, he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour."
"And why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?"
Ginger Kemp's face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt
that she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. She
liked him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her.
"I don't know if you're fond of dogs?" said Ginger.
"I used to be before this morning," said Sally. "And I suppose I shall
be again in time. For the moment I've had what you might call rather a
surfeit of dogs. But aren't you straying from the point? I asked you why
Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed you."
"I'm telling you."
"I'm glad of that. I didn't know."
"The old brute," said Ginger, frowning again, "has a dog. A very jolly
little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the sort of fool
who oughtn't to be allowed to own a dog. He's one of those asses who
isn't fit to own a dog. As a matter of fact, of all the blighted,
pompous, bullying, shrivelled-souled old devils..."
"One moment," said Sally. "I'm getting an impression that you don't
like Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?"
"Yes!"
"I thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on."
"He used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a dog
do tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They're frightfully sensitive.
Well, Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do tricks--fool-things
that no self-respecting dogs would do: and eventually poor old Billy got
fed up and jibbed. He was too polite to bite, but he sort of shook his
head and crawled under a chair. You'd have thought anyone would have
let it go at that, but would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the
poisonous..."
"Yes, I know. Go on."
"Well, the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the
chair and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him
with a stick. That is to say," said Ginger, coldly accurate, "he started
laying into him with a stick." He brooded for a moment with knit brows.
"A spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine anyone beating a spaniel? It's
like hitting a little girl. Well, he's a fairly oldish man, you know,
and that hampered me a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it
into about eleven pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he
happened to value rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been
presented to him by his constituents or something. I minced it up a
goodish bit, and then I told him a fair amount about himself. And then--
well, after that he shot me out, and I came here."
Sally did not speak for a moment.
"You were quite right," she said at last, in a sober voice that had
nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. "And what
are you going to do now?" she said.
"I don't know."
"You'll get something?"
"Oh, yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty
sick, of course."
"For goodness' sake! Why do you bother about the family?" Sally burst
out. She could not reconcile this young man's flabby dependence on his
family with the enterprise and vigour which he had shown in his dealings
with the unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of course, he had been brought up to
look on himself as a rich man's son and appeared to have drifted as such
young men are wont to do; but even so... "The whole trouble with you,"
she said, embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, "is
that..."
Her harangue was interrupted by what--at the Normandie, at one o'clock
in the morning--practically amounted to a miracle. The front door of the
hotel opened, and there entered a young man in evening dress. Such
persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, which catered
principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this youth's presence was
due, if one must pause to explain it, to the fact that, in the middle of
his stay at Roville, a disastrous evening at the Casino had so
diminished his funds that he had been obliged to make a hurried shift
from the Hotel Splendide to the humbler Normandie. His late appearance
to-night was caused by the fact that he had been attending a dance at
the Splendide, principally in the hope of finding there some
kind-hearted friend of his prosperity from whom he might borrow.
A rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the newcomer,
the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and the lift was
set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, Sally, suddenly aware
of an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off her light and jumped
into bed. Her last waking thought was a regret that she had not been
able to speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on the subject of enterprise,
and resolve that the address should be delivered at the earliest
opportunity.
