"A chicken farm," echoed Mrs. Ukridge with an affectionate and admiring glance at her husband.
"Ah," said Garnet, who felt his responsibilities as chorus.
"I've thought it all out," continued Ukridge, "and it's as clear as mud. No expenses, large profits, quick returns. Chickens, eggs, and no work. By Jove, old man, it's the idea of a lifetime. Just listen to me for a moment. You buy your hen——"
"One hen?" inquired Garnet.
"Call it one for the sake of argument. It makes my calculations clearer. Very well, then. You buy your hen. It lays an egg every day of the week. You sell the eggs—say—six for fivepence. Keep of hen costs nothing. Profit at least fourpence, three farthings on every half-dozen eggs. What do you think of that, Bartholomew?"
Garnet admitted that it sounded like an attractive scheme, but expressed a wish to overhaul the figures in case of error.
"Error!" shouted Ukridge, pounding the table with such energy that it groaned beneath him. "Error? Not a bit of it. Can't you follow a simple calculation like that? The thing is, you see, you get your original hen for next to nothing. That's to say, on tick. Anybody will let you have a hen on tick. Now listen to me for a moment. You let your hen set, and hatch chickens. Suppose you have a dozen hens. Very well, then. When each of the dozen has a dozen chickens, you send the old hens back with thanks for the kind loan, and there you are, starting business with a hundred and forty-four free chickens to your name. And after a bit, when the chickens grow up and begin to lay, all you have to do is to sit back in your chair and gather in the big checks. Isn't that so, Millie?"
"Yes, dear," said Mrs. Ukbridge with shining eyes.
"We've fixed it all up. Do you know Lyme Regis, in Dorsetshire? On the borders of Devon. Quiet little fishing village. Bathing. Sea air. Splendid scenery. Just the place for a chicken farm. I've been looking after that. A friend of my wife's has lent us a jolly old house with large grounds. All we've got to do is to get in the fowls. That's all right. I've ordered the first lot. We shall find them waiting for us when we arrive."
"Well," said Garnet, "I'm sure I wish you luck. Mind you let me know how you get on."
"Let you know!" roared Ukridge. "Why, old horse, you've got to come, too. We shall take no refusal. Shall we, Millie?"
"No, dear," murmured Mrs. Ukridge.
"Of course not," said Ukridge. "No refusal of any sort. Pack up to-night, and meet us at Waterloo to-morrow."
"It's awfully good of you—" began Garnet a little blankly.
"Not a bit of it, not a bit of it. This is pure business. I was saying to my wife when we came in that you were the very man for us. 'If old Garnet's in town,' I said, 'we'll have him. A man with his flow of ideas will be invaluable on a chicken farm.' Didn't I, Millie?"
Mrs. Ukridge murmured the response.
"You see, I'm one of these practical men. I go straight ahead, following my nose. What you want in a business of this sort is a touch of the dreamer to help out the practical mind. We look to you for suggestions, Montmorency. Timely suggestions with respect to the comfort and upbringing of the fowls. And you can work. I've seen you. Of course you take your share of the profits. That's understood. Yes, yes, I must insist. Strict business between friends. We must arrange it all when we get down there. My wife is the secretary of the firm. She has been writing letters to people, asking for fowls. So you see it's a thoroughly organized concern. There's money in it, old horse. Don't you forget that."
"We should be so disappointed if you did not come," said Mrs. Ukridge, lifting her childlike eyes to Garnet's face.
Garnet stood against the mantelpiece and pondered. In after years he recognized that that moment marked an epoch in his life. If he had refused the invitation, he would not have—but, to quote the old novelists, we anticipate. At any rate, he would have missed a remarkable experience. It is not given to everyone to see Mr. Stanley Ukridge manage a chicken farm.
"The fact is," he said at last, "I was thinking of going somewhere where I could get some golf."
Ukridge leaped on the table triumphantly.
"Lyme Regis is just the place for you, then. Perfect hotbed of golf. Fine links at the top of the hill, not half a mile from the farm. Bring your clubs. You'll be able to have a round or two in the afternoons. Get through serious work by lunch time."
"You know," said Garnet, "I am absolutely inexperienced as regards fowls."
"Excellent!" said Ukridge. "Then you're just the man. You will bring to the work a mind entirely unclouded by theories. You will act solely by the light of your intelligence."
"Er—yes," said Garnet.
"I wouldn't have a professional chicken farmer about the place if he paid to come. Natural intelligence is what we want. Then we can rely on you?"
"Very well," said Garnet slowly. "It's very kind of you to ask me."
"It's business, Cuthbert, business. Very well, then. We shall catch the eleven-twenty at Waterloo. Don't miss it. You book to Axminster. Look out for me on the platform. If I see you first, I'll shout."
Garnet felt that that promise rang true.
"Then good-by for the present. Millie, we must be off. Till to-morrow, Garnet."
"Good-by, Mr. Garnet," said Mrs. Ukridge.
Looking back at the affair after the lapse of years, Garnet was accustomed to come to the conclusion that she was the one pathetic figure in the farce. Under what circumstances she had married Ukridge he did not learn till later. He was also uncertain whether at any moment in her career she regretted it. But it was certainly pathetic to witness her growing bewilderment during the weeks that followed, as the working of Ukridge's giant mind was unfolded to her little by little. Life, as Ukridge understood the word, must have struck her as a shade too full of incident to be really comfortable. Garnet was wont to console himself by the hope that her very genuine love for her husband, and his equally genuine love for her, was sufficient to smooth out the rough places of life.
As he returned to his room, after showing his visitors to the door, the young man upstairs, who had apparently just finished breakfast, burst once more into song:
"We'll never come back no more, boys,
We'll never come back no more."
Garnet could hear him wedding appropriate dance to the music.
"Not for a few weeks, at any rate," he said to himself, as he started his packing at the point where he had left off.
Waterloo, Some Fellow-Travelers, and a Girl with Brown Hair
WATERLOO station is one of the things which no fellow can understand. Thousands come to it, thousands go from it. Porters grow gray-headed beneath its roof. Buns, once fresh and tender, become hard and misanthropic in its refreshment rooms, and look as if they had seen the littleness of existence and were disillusioned. But there the station stands, year after year, wrapped in a discreet gloom, always the same, always baffling and inscrutable. Not even the porters understand it. "I couldn't say, sir," is the civil but unsatisfying reply with which research is met. Now and then one, more gifted than his colleagues, will inform the traveler that his train starts from "No. 3 or No. 7," but a moment's reflection and he hedges with No. 12.
Waterloo