“The engagement was put on the club calendar. I’m not sure it was pointed to with much pride by the younger set; but the old fellows seemed to want it there, and, seeing their wishes really had to be consulted, more or less, the polo crowd waived their objections. On the next Tuesday, after luncheon, no man went back to his office—if he had one. Two live pigs—pretty good sized ones, too—were fetched in crated. A tarpaulin was spread on the grillroom floor, and Joe and I stripped to the skin and put on butchers’ togs. We went through it, from squeal to sausage. I was told, afterwards, that the club house had to be gone over, from crypt to spire. They had grease on the stairsteps and bristles in the soup and cracklings in the rugs for days thereafter.”
“Did it improve the democratic tone of the club?” asked Masterson, laughing.
Old Nicholas shook his head and smiled.
“No. I don’t think so. Once you outgrow the simplicities, you can’t recover them or even remember them with any satisfaction. It’s not far, you know, from corn pone to plum pudding, but it’s a long way back!”
“What do you make of our new second generation, Mr. Merrick?” inquired Masterson.
“You mean—yours and Bobby’s, perhaps? Yours is the third, you know—counting from where I am. Well—I presume there’s more to be hoped for from yours than from the one that immediately preceded you.”
Nicholas’ eyes strayed in Bobby’s direction, and he continued, “There’s a youngster, for example, preparing to be a doctor. His father, at his age, was an amateur deer-slayer. When Clif heard about this hog-dressing episode, he was considerably excited. I said, ‘But, Clif, I heard you bragging about skinning and curing a buck.’ ‘Oh, well,’ he said, ‘that was quite a different matter.’ … And—I ’spect it was,” he added generously, after a pause.
“Our family”—there was a trace of cynicism in Masterson’s tone—“has been curiously undisturbed by the problems incident to the accumulation of large fortune. My father is the editor of a small town paper in Indiana. His father was a country doctor, his grandfather a Methodist circuit rider. All the trouble that money has ever given us has been how to get enough of it to pay our bills … But, so far as Bobby is concerned, he isn’t running true to type, at all … He’s a biological—or, should one say—a fiscal sport?”
Nicholas was meditative.
“Well, yes—Bobby’s case is, as you say, somewhat unusual.”
Masterson’s corrugated brow signed that he was tuning his kettledrums to this key and would presently be holding forth again unless promptly checked.
“Let’s not bother to diagnose my case,” protested Bobby, with an amicable growl. “Besides, I haven’t done anything yet. And this is no time for serious talk … Grandpère—how about telling Tommy the story of the time you and Mr. Anderson bet on which one of you could mow the most hay in an hour.”
Masterson furtively glanced at his watch and was caught at it by old Nicholas who immediately pushed back his chair, ignoring Bobby’s suggestion, and led the way toward the big drawing-room where he paused to toy with the music on the piano desk.
“What’s this Unfinished Symphony, Bobby? … Mind playing it for us?”
“Not much in a mood for that one, Grandpère … Too stuffed. We need something a bit livelier.”
“How about this one—‘Neapolitan Nights’?”
“Pretty good; but it’s rather soft and sticky too for a holiday celebration.”
“Something with a lot of bang in it, then,” said Nicholas, sinking with a satisfied sigh into a deep chair.
Masterson edged up to Bobby and muttered, under his breath, “I say, do you think your grandfather would take it nicely if I ran along? I’ve promised to look in, later, at Gordon’s. There’s a special little party on there tonight … a Revue … Wouldn’t care to come along, would you?”
“Who will be there?”
“Oh—everybody! The old gang … that you’ve snooted so damnably for months!”
Bobby was thoughtful for a moment; then, quite on impulse and greatly to Masterson’s surprise, he said, “I believe I will, Tommy. I’d rather like to see the bright lights again, myself. It’s been a good while.”
Masterson drummed nervously on the top of the piano. Recalling himself suddenly, he said with enthusiasm, “Attaboy, old mole! Let’s tell Grandpère and hop … Just make the eight-twenty-five … In at midnight. Right time to be there.”
“You weren’t taking anybody, were you?”
“Well—yes,” Tom admitted hesitantly. “That is, I had a tentative arrangement to pick up Joyce Hudson, around midnight, and drive her out—provided it was quite agreeable I should return from here. But there’s no reason why you can’t come with us, is there?’
“Not so good! … Don’t care to horn in … But—I’ll run down with you and spend the night at Grandpère’s club … Have to be there in the morning, anyway … Perhaps I’ll drop in for a look at Gordon’s … We’ll see.”
Old Nicholas was glad enough to have done with both of them. So long as they stayed, he must be mindful of his sacred obligation as host. Late that afternoon he had arrived at a most perplexing situation in The Tragedy in Stateroom 33, and was feverish to discover whether the pilot, whom the count had tied up in the closet, would contrive to release himself and warn
