★ 27 ★::A Gentleman of Leisure
A Declaration of Independence
If Jimmy had any the of this disclosure, they would have at the of the other’s face. Just as the rich of a slowly into an almost green, so did the of Sir Thomas’s become, in stages, a red, then pink, and take on a pallor. His mouth open. His of had crumpled. Unsuspected appeared in his clothes. He had the of one who has been in the machinery.
Jimmy was a little puzzled. He had to check the enemy, to him to reason, but not to him in that way. There was something in this which he did not understand. When Spike had him the stones, and his eye, after a moment’s examination, had him suspicious, and when, finally, a test had proved his correct, he was aware that, though with the necklace on his person, he had knowledge which, to Sir Thomas, would him well. He that Lady Julia was not the of Lady who would the that her rope of diamonds was a fraud. He of her to know that she would another necklace, and see that she got it, and that Sir Thomas was not one of those and natures which think nothing of an of twenty thousand pounds.
This was the line of which had him what might otherwise have been a trying interview. He was aware from the that Sir Thomas would not in the purity of his motives; but he was that the would be satisfied to secure his on the of the paste necklace on any terms. He had looked to rage, denunciation, and a dozen other of emotion, but not to of this kind.
The other had to make strange, noises.
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“Mind you,” said Jimmy, “it’s a very good imitation—I’ll say that for it. I didn’t it till I had the thing in my hands. Looking at it—even close—I was taken in for a moment.”
Sir Thomas nervously.
“How did you know?” he muttered.
Again Jimmy was surprised. He had and for proof, of the that the had cost twenty thousand pounds.
“How did I know?” he repeated. “If you what me suspect, I couldn’t tell you; it might have been one of a score of things. A can’t say how he on the of stones. He can them, he can almost them. I with a once; that’s how I got my knowledge of jewels. But if you mean, can I prove what I say about this necklace, that’s easy. There’s no deception; it’s simple. See here. These are to be diamonds. Well, the diamond is the in existence—nothing will it. Now, I’ve got a little out of a pin which I know is genuine. By rights, then, that ought not to have these stones. You that? But it did. It two of them, the only two I tried. If you like I can continue the experiment, but there’s no need. I can tell you away what these are. I said they were paste, but that wasn’t accurate. They’re a called white jargoon. It’s a that’s very easily worked. You work it with the of a blow-pipe. You don’t want a full description, I suppose? Anyway, what is that the blow-pipe sets it up like a tonic, it gravity, and a healthy complexion, and all of great of that kind. Two minutes in the of a blow-pipe is like a week at the to a of white jargoon. Are you satisfied? If it comes to that, I you can be to be; is a word. Are you convinced, or do you after like light and liquids?”
Sir Thomas had to a chair.
“So that was how you knew!” he said.
“That was—” Jimmy, when a across his mind. He Sir Thomas’s keenly.
“Did you know?” he asked.
He that the possibility had not to him earlier.
“By George, I you did!” he cried. “You must have 178done. So that’s how it happened, is it? I don’t wonder it was a when I said I about the necklace.”
“Mr. Pitt!”
“Well?”
“I have something to say to you.”
“I’m listening.”
Sir Thomas to rally. There was a touch of the old in his manner when he spoke.
“Mr. Pitt, I you in an position——”
Jimmy interrupted.
“Don’t you worry about my position,” he said. “Fix your attention upon your own. Let us be with one another. You’re in the cart. What do you to do about it?”
“I do not you,” he began.
“No?” said Jimmy. “I’ll try and make my meaning clear. Correct me from time to time if I am wrong. The way I size the thing up is as follows: When you married Lady Julia I that it was, so to speak, up to you to some extent. People you were a millionaire, and they something special in the way of gifts from the to the bride. Now you, being of a and nature, to wonder if there wasn’t some way of a for without actually up to any great extent. Am I right?”
Sir Thomas did not answer.
“I am,” said Jimmy. “Well, it to you, naturally enough, that a properly-selected gift of might work the trick. It only needed a little nerve. When you give a present of diamonds to a lady she is not likely to call for light and and the of the circus. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred she will take the thing on trust. Very well. You off to a and put the thing to him confidentially. I you paste; but, being a person, he pointed out that paste has a of not well. It is when it’s new, but a small amount of ordinary wear and tear the of the surface and the of the cutting. It easily. Having this, and that Lady Julia was not likely to keep the necklace under a case, you rejected paste as too risky. The then white jargoon, mentioning, as I have done, that after an or so of the blow-pipe its own mother wouldn’t 179know it. If he was a of an antiquary, he added that in the eighteenth century were to be actually an of diamond. What be more suitable? ‘Make it jargoon, dear heart,’ you joyfully, and all was well. Am I right? I notice that you have not me so far.”
Whether Sir Thomas would have in the is uncertain. He was opening his mouth to speak when the at the end of the room heaved, and Lord Dreever out like a cannon-ball in tweeds.
The any speech that Sir Thomas might have been to make. Lying in his chair, he at the new arrival. Even Jimmy, though that his was in hiding, was taken aback.
His the silence.
“Great Scot!” he cried.
Neither Jimmy Sir Thomas to the or inadequate. They permitted it to pass without comment.
“You old scoundrel!” added his lordship, Sir Thomas; “and you’re the man who called me a welsher!” There were of a of in the knight’s eyes, but they died away. He no reply.
“Great Scot!” his lordship, in a of self-pity, “here have I been all these years you give me Hades in every shape and form, when all the while—— My goodness, if I’d only earlier!”
He to Jimmy.
“Pitt, old man,” he said warmly, “I—dash it—I don’t know what to say. If it hadn’t been for you—I always did like Americans.”
“I’m not one,” said Jimmy; but his on, unchecked.
“I always it that that in—in—wherever it was. If it hadn’t been for like you,” he continued, Sir Thomas once more, “there wouldn’t have been any of that Declaration of Independence business. Would there, Pitt, old man?”
These were problems too for examination. Jimmy his shoulders.
“Well, I should say Sir Thomas might not have got along with George Washington, anyhow,” he said.
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“Of not. Well”—his moved the door—“I’m off to see what Aunt Julia has to say about it all.”
A shudder, as if from some electric Sir Thomas. He to his feet.
“Spencer,” he cried, “I you to say a word to your aunt.”
“Oh!” said his lordship. “You do, do you?”
Sir Thomas shivered.
“She would let me the last of it.”
“I she wouldn’t. I’ll go and see.”
“Stop!”
“Well?”
Sir Thomas at his with his handkerchief. He not the of Lady Julia in of the truth. At one time the she might the little he had had him at night, but gradually, as the days by, and the of the had to upon her and upon every one else who saw them, the had diminished. But it had always been at the of his mind. Even in her moments his wife was a of mild terror to him. His at the of what of and she would in a case like this.
“Spencer,” he said, “I that you shall not your aunt of this!”
“What? You want me to keep my mouth shut? You want me to an in this beastly, low-down deception? I like that!”
“The point,” said Jimmy, “is well taken—noblesse oblige, and all that of thing. The blood of the Dreevers at the idea. Listen! You can it sizzling.”
Lord Dreever moved a step nearer the door.
“Stop!” Sir Thomas again. “Spencer!”
“Well?”
“Spencer, my boy, it to me that I have not always you very well.”
“‘Perhaps!’ ‘Not always!’ Great Scot! I’ll have a each way on those. Considering you’ve me like a kid since you’ve me, I call that rich. Why, what about this very night, when I asked you for a pounds?”
“It was only the that you had been gambling——”
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“Gambling! How about off diamonds on Aunt Julia for a gamble?”
“A game of skill, surely,” Jimmy.
“I have been the over,” said Sir Thomas, “and if you need the—— Was it not fifty pounds?”
“It was twenty,” said his lordship, “and I don’t need it. Keep it. You’ll want all you can save for a new necklace.”
His closed on the door-handle.
“Spencer—stop!”
“Well?”
“We must talk this over. We must not be hasty.”
He passed the over his forehead.
“In the past, perhaps,” he resumed, “our relations have not been quite—— The fault was mine. I have always to do my duty. It is a difficult to look after a man of your age——”
His lordship’s of his him eloquent.
“Dash it all!” he cried. “That’s just what I well complain of. Who the wanted you to look after me? Hang it! you’ve your on me all these years like a policeman! You cut off my right in the middle of my time at the ’Varsity, just when I needed it most, and I had to come and for money I wanted to a cigarette. I looked a I can tell you! Men who me used to be about it. I’m of the whole business. You’ve me a thin time all this while, and now I’m going to a of my own back. Wouldn’t you, Pitt, old man?”
Jimmy, thus to, that, in his lordship’s place, he might have a to do something of the kind.
“Of course,” said his lordship. “Any would.”
“But, Spencer, let me——”
“You’ve my life,” said his lordship, a tense, Byronic frown. “That’s what you’ve done—soured my whole life. I’ve had a time. I’ve had to go about my friends for money to keep me going. Why, I you a fiver, don’t I, Pitt, old man?”
It was a tenner, to be about details, but Jimmy did not say so. He concluded, rightly, that the memory of the original five which he had Lord Dreever at the Savoy Hotel had from the other’s mind.
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“Don’t mention it,” he said.
“But I do mention it,” his shrilly. “It just proves what I say. If I had had a it wouldn’t have happened. And you wouldn’t give me to set me going in the Diplomatic Service. That’s another thing. Why wouldn’t you do that?”
Sir Thomas himself together.
“I you qualified, my dear boy.”
His did not actually at the mouth, but he looked as if he might do so at any moment. Excitement and the memory of his wrongs, lubricated, as it were, by the he had at and after dinner, had produced in him a of mind from the normal. His manners no longer had that which the of Vere de Vere. He his hands.
“I know, I know!” he shouted. “I know you didn’t. You me a fool. I tell you I’m of it. And always trying to make me money! Dashed humiliating! If she hadn’t been a girl you’d have Miss McEachern’s life as well as mine. You came very near it. I tell you, I’ve had of it. I’m in love! I’m in love with the girl in England. You’ve her, Pitt, old top. Isn’t she a ripper?”
Jimmy the lady with the seal of his approval.
“I tell you, if she’ll have me, I’m going to her.”
The on every of Sir Thomas’s at these words. Great as had been his for the of the title as a man, he had always been with a respect for the Dreever name.
“But, Spencer,” he almost howled, “consider your position! You cannot——”
“Can’t I, by Jove! if she’ll have me; and my position! What’s my position got to do with it? Katie’s the of a general, if it comes to that. Her was at the House with me. If I had a to call my own I’d have asked her to me ago. Don’t you worry about my position!”
Sir Thomas feebly.
“Now, look here,” said his lordship, with determination. “Here’s the whole thing in a old nutshell. If you want me to about this little in diamonds of yours you’ve 183got to your up and start in to do things. You’ve got to me to some Embassy, for a beginning. It won’t be difficult. There’s of old boys in London who the when he was alive who will jump at the of doing me a good turn. I know I’m a of an in some ways, but that’s of you in the Diplomatic Service. They only want you to wear as if you were used to them, and be a of a at dancing, and I can the bill all right as as that goes. And you’ve got to give your old to Katie and me—if she’ll have me. That’s about all I can think of for the moment. Now do we go? Are you on?”
“It’s preposterous,” Sir Thomas.
Lord Dreever gave the door-handle a rattle. He stopped.
“It’s a hold-up all right,” said Jimmy soothingly. “I don’t want to in on a family conclave, but my advice, if asked, would be to the begins. You’ve got something than a pipe pointing at you now. As my position in the business, don’t worry. My is in gratis. Give me one and my are sealed.”
Sir Thomas on him.
“As for you——” he cried.
“Never mind about Pitt,” said his lordship. “He’s a good fellow, Pitt. I wish there were more like him. And he wasn’t the either. If you had only when he to tell you, you mightn’t be in such a hole. He was the back, as he said. I know all about it. Well, what’s the answer?”
For a moment Sir Thomas on the point of refusal. But just as he was about to speak his opened the door, and at the movement he again.
“I will!” he cried. “I will!”
“Good,” said his lordship, with satisfaction. “That’s a bargain. Coming downstairs, Pitt, old man? We shall be wanted on the stage in about a minute.”
“As an to stage-fright,” said Jimmy, as they along the corridor, “little of that may be recommended. I shouldn’t mind that you fit for anything.”
“I like a two-year-old,” his enthusiastically. “I’ve all my part, but I don’t care. I’ll just go on and talk to them.”
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“That,” said Jimmy, “is the right spirit. Charteris will disease, but it’s the right spirit. A little more of that of thing and would be to. Step lively, Roscius; the stage waits.”
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