Mike helped himself to beetroot in moody silence.
His mouth was full when Comrade Prebble asked him a question. Comrade Prebble, as has been pointed out in an earlier part of the narrative, was a good chap, but had no roof to his mouth.
“I beg your pardon?” said Mike.
Comrade Prebble repeated his observation. Mike looked helplessly at Psmith, but Psmith’s eyes were on his plate.
Mike felt he must venture on some answer.
“No,” he said decidedly.
Comrade Prebble seemed slightly taken aback. There was an awkward pause. Then Mr. Waller, for whom his fellow Socialist’s methods of conversation held no mysteries, interpreted.
“The mustard, Prebble? Yes, yes. Would you mind passing Prebble the mustard, Mr. Jackson?”
“Oh, sorry,” gasped Mike, and, reaching out, upset the water jug into the open jam tart.
Through the black mist which rose before his eyes as he leaped to his feet and stammered apologies came the dispassionate voice of Master Edward Waller reminding him that mustard was first introduced into Peru by Cortez.
His host was all courtesy and consideration. He passed the matter off genially. But life can never be quite the same after you have upset a water jug into an open jam tart at the table of a comparative stranger. Mike’s nerve had gone. He ate on, but he was a broken man.
At the other end of the table it became gradually apparent that things were not going on altogether as they should have done. There was a sort of bleakness in the atmosphere. Young Mr. Richards was looking like a stuffed fish, and the face of Mr. Waller’s niece was cold and set.
“Why, come, come, Ada,” said Mr. Waller, breezily, “what’s the matter? You’re eating nothing. What’s George been saying to you?” he added jocularly.
“Thank you, uncle Robert,” replied Ada precisely, “there’s nothing the matter. Nothing that Mr. Richards can say to me can upset me.”
“Mr. Richards!” echoed Mr. Waller in astonishment. How was he to know that, during the walk back from church, the world had been transformed, George had become Mr. Richards, and all was over?
“I assure you, Ada—” began that unfortunate young man. Ada turned a frigid shoulder towards him.
“Come, come,” said Mr. Waller disturbed. “What’s all this? What’s all this?”
His niece burst into tears and left the room.
If there is anything more embarrassing to a guest than a family row, we have yet to hear of it. Mike, scarlet to the extreme edges of his ears, concentrated himself on his plate. Comrade Prebble made a great many remarks, which were probably illuminating, if they could have been understood. Mr. Waller looked, astonished, at Mr. Richards. Mr. Richards, pink but dogged, loosened his collar, but said nothing. Psmith, leaning forward, asked Master Edward Waller his opinion on the Licensing Bill.
“We happened to have a word or two,” said Mr. Richards at length, “on the way home from church on the subject of Women’s Suffrage.”
“That fatal topic!” murmured Psmith.
“In Australia—” began Master Edward Waller.
“I was rayther—well, rayther facetious about it,” continued Mr. Richards.
Psmith clicked his tongue sympathetically.
“In Australia—” said Edward.
“I went talking on, laughing and joking, when all of a sudden she flew out at me. How was I to know she was ’eart and soul in the movement? You never told me,” he added accusingly to his host.
“In Australia—” said Edward.
“I’ll go and try and get her round. How was I to know?”
Mr. Richards thrust back his chair and bounded from the room.
“Now, iawinyaw, iear oiler—” said Comrade Prebble judicially, but was interrupted.
“How very disturbing!” said Mr. Waller. “I am so sorry that this should have happened. Ada is such a touchy, sensitive girl. She—”
“In Australia,” said Edward in even tones, “they’ve got Women’s Suffrage already. Did you know that?” he said to Mike.
Mike made no answer. His eyes were fixed on his plate. A bead of perspiration began to roll down his forehead. If his feelings could have been ascertained at that moment, they would have been summed up in the words, “Death, where is thy sting?”
XVIII
Psmith Makes a Discovery
“Women,” said Psmith, helping himself to trifle, and speaking with the air of one launched upon his special subject, “are, one must recollect, like—like—er, well, in fact, just so. Passing on lightly from that conclusion, let us turn for a moment to the Rights of Property, in connection with which Comrade Prebble and yourself had so much that was interesting to say this afternoon. Perhaps you”—he bowed in Comrade Prebble’s direction—“would resume, for the benefit of Comrade Jackson—a novice in the Cause, but earnest—your very lucid—”
Comrade Prebble beamed, and took the floor. Mike began to realize that, till now, he had never known what boredom meant. There had been moments in his life which had been less interesting than other moments, but nothing to touch this for agony. Comrade Prebble’s address streamed on like water rushing over a weir. Every now and then there was a word or two which was recognizable, but this happened so rarely that it amounted to little. Sometimes Mr. Waller would interject a remark, but not often. He seemed to be of the opinion that Comrade Prebble’s was the master mind and that to add anything to his views would be in the nature of painting the lily and gilding the refined gold. Mike himself said nothing. Psmith and Edward were equally silent. The former sat like one in a trance, thinking his own thoughts, while Edward, who, prospecting on the sideboard, had located a rich biscuit-mine, was too occupied for speech.
After about twenty minutes, during which Mike’s discomfort changed to a dull resignation, Mr. Waller suggested a move to the drawing-room, where Ada, he said, would play some hymns.
The prospect did not dazzle Mike, but any change, he thought, must be for the better. He had sat staring at the ruin of the blancmange so long that it had begun to hypnotize him. Also, the move had the excellent result of eliminating the snub-nosed Edward, who was sent to bed. His last words
