"Oh, come!" I said, "that's a bit scathing, isn't it? Everything has its funny side. Go and look steadily into the face of the Honourable James over there in the corner. That ought to do the trick."
"Thanks," he answered shortly, "I'd sooner keep the record unbroken. Besides, he wouldn't make me laugh: he'd make me cry. I suppose," he went on thoughtfully, "that there are uses for things like that in the world."
"Certainly," I answered. "The old man has some excellent shootings."
"Well, I wish to heaven you'd bag the son the next time you go there. Good Lord, he's coming over here!"
I glanced round: the Honourable James had risen and was bearing down on us.
"I say, dear old boy," he burbled, coming to rest in front of me, "my old governor wants me to bring down two guys next Saturday. Would you care to come?"
"Very much, James," I said.
"What about you, Carruthers?" went on James.
"Thanks, no," grunted the other. "I'm afraid I'm already engaged."
The Honourable James continued to burble, and after about two minutes Carruthers, with a strangled snort, got up and left.
"By Jove!" said James plaintively, "he never waited to hear the end of the story. You know, Bill,"—he waxed confidential—"I don't believe that fellow likes me."
"My dear James," I cried, "what put that idea into your head? I expect he's got an appointment."
"Yes—but he might have waited to hear the end of the story," repeated James. "No—I don't think he likes me. He never even laughed."
He drifted away—the personification of utter futility— leaving me shaking silently. I had been privileged to gaze on Carruthers's face as he left the room.
"It would take more than you, James, to make him laugh," I called after him. "In fact, if you ever do I'll stand you a drink."
A promise which I repeated to Carruthers when, half an hour later, he returned warily to the room.
"It's all right," I reassured him. "Our little James has gone. I gathered that he has a date with the most beautiful woman in London."
"Long may she keep him occupied," he grunted. "He is the most ghastly example of a Philandering Percy I've ever seen. Still, I suppose when a fellow has got the amount of money he possesses, beautiful women will suffer in silence."
And an hour later we rose to go home. The night was fine and warm, and refusing a waiting taxi we fell into step and walked. And Carruthers, I remember, was still inveighing against the system by which the Honourable Jameses of this world inherit totally undeserved wealth.
"Put that excrescence on his own feet," he argued, "and what would be the result? Take away his money and let him fight for his food, and where would he be?"
"Still," I murmured, "a man is the son of his father."
"Call that thing a man," he grunted. "Look here, I want a drink."
We were at the corner of Albemarle Street, and I glanced at my watch.
"It's half-past eleven," I remarked. "In a moment of mental aberration I joined the Sixty-Six a few weeks ago. Let's go there."
Now, the Sixty-Six, as all the world knows, is one of those night-clubs that spring up like mushrooms in a damp field, endure for a space, and then disappear into oblivion to the tune of a hundred-pound fine. The fact that they open a few weeks later as the Seventy-Seven, and the same performance is repeated, is neither here nor there.
"Right," said Henry St. John Carruthers. "One can only hope the police will not choose tonight to raid it!"
And at that moment he paused in the door and blasphemed. I glanced over his shoulder, and then, taking him gently by the arm, I propelled him across the room to a vacant table.
"If we get the police as well," I murmured, "our evening will not be wasted."
In the centre of the floor was the Honourable James. He hailed us with delight as we passed, and Carruthers sat down muttering horribly. "Can I never get away from that mess?" he demanded hopelessly. "I ask you—I ask you—look at him now!"
And assuredly the Honourable James was a pretty grim spectacle. I lay no claim to being a dancing man myself, but James attempting to Charleston was a sight on which no man might look unmoved. In fact, the only thing about the Honourable James which caused one any pleasure was his partner. To say that she was attractive would be simply banal: she was one of the most adorable creatures I have ever seen in my life. Moreover, she seemed to reciprocate James's obvious devotion. Three times did I see her return his fish—like glance of love with a slight drooping of her eyelids which spoke volumes.
"Evidently out to hook him," I remarked, turning to Carruthers. "Hullo! what has stung you?"
For he was leaning forward, staring at the girl with a completely new expression in his eyes.
"Good Lord!" he muttered, half to himself. "It can't be. And yet—"
He suddenly stood up and glanced round the room; then, equally abruptly, he sat down again. "It is." he remarked. "As I live—it is. How deuced funny!" And he grinned: he positively grinned.
"What is?" I demanded. "Elucidate."
"They will part him from his money," he went on happily. "And I hope they sock him good and strong."
"What the devil are you talking about?" I said peevishly.
"If you look over there to the right," he answered, "behind that woman in green, you will see a large and somewhat bull-necked man sitting at a table by himself. He is smoking a cigar, and gives one the impression that he owns the earth."
"I've got him," I said.
"Just a year ago," he continued, "I was over in Chicago. I was sitting in the lounge of my hotel talking to an American I knew who was something pretty big in the police. He'd been giving me a good deal of inside information about crime over there, when suddenly he leant forward and touched me on the arm. 'See that guy who has just come in,' he said, 'with a cigar sticking out of his face?'
"I saw him all right; you couldn't have helped it if you tried. 'Well, that bloke,' went on my pal, 'is just about the highest spot in the confidence game that we've got. He specialises in you Britishers, and I reckon he's parted more of you from your money than one is ever likely to be told about.'
"'What's his line?' I demanded.
"'Anything and everything,' he replied. 'From running bogus charities to blackmail. And he generally works with an amazingly pretty girl. There she is: just joined him.'
"'His wife?' I said. My pal shrugged his shoulders. 'I shouldn't imagine the Church has been over-worked in the matter,' he answered. 'But you can call her that.'"
Henry St. John Carruthers lay back in his chair and actually chuckled.
"You mean?" I said slowly.
"Precisely," he answered. "There they are. And so is dear James."
I glanced over at the table where the big man had been joined by James and the girl. He was smiling in the most friendly way and filling James's glass with more champagne. Then he handed him his cigar case, and James, coming out of a dream, helped himself. Then James relapsed into his dream to the extent of forgetting to light it. And the dream was what one would have expected in the circumstances.
Assuredly she was the most divinely pretty girl. And James was totally unable to take his eyes off her face. He was in the condition of trying to touch her hand under the table, of little by little moving his chair nearer hers, in the fond belief that the manoeuvre would pass unnoticed.
"Look here," I said, "we must do something."