“What became of her? Why by this time she’s half-way to Territet, laughing fit to die over the ridiculous figure you cut; in short, the wholly astonishing attitudes you struck, hurtling through the air with a Gladstone under each arm and half a score of telescopes and bundles and flying straps dancing about you like a kettle of beans tied to a dog’s tail.”
“Did I look such a fool as that? Hang it, I suppose I must have looked a bit grotesque though, eh, Fordham?”
“Infernally so,” was the consoling reply. “In fact, I noticed her looking over the side, taking particular stock of you in your admirably acted rôle of escaped lunatic. Ah, bonjour, François! Ca va bien, hein!” broke off the speaker in response to the smiling commissionaire who stepped forward at that moment to take charge of their luggage.
“Tenez, François,” went on Fordham, at the conclusion of the string of hearty inquiries with which the man had greeted him, for they were old acquaintances. “Vous allez nous emballer ces colis là sur la poste des Avants. Faut qu’ils nous réjoignent demain. Sans faute, mon brave, n’est ce pas?”
“Mais oui, Monsieur Fordhamme. Restez seulment tranquille. Vous pouvez y compter. Ah, vous allez monter par le Chauderon? Et bien – belle promenade, messieurs, et je vous remercie bien. Au revoir, messieurs!”
“That seems a good sort of chap,” began Philip Orlebar, dubiously, as they turned away. “But, hang it all, is it safe – don’t cher know?”
“What? The luggage? Rather. You may trust François to see a matter of this kind through. He is a good chap – most of these fellows are. They have a name among the British for being keen on pourboires– in a word, grasping. But show me the true-born Briton of the same class who in a race for gratuities couldn’t give them long odds, and beat them at that. It’s not to be done, I tell you. And now, Phil, we’ve plenty of time. First a cool lager at yonder café, then for our stroll up the Chauderon. And that said stroll on an afternoon like this is enough to make a man feel the pleasure of living, if anything is.”
Chapter Two
Two Unlikes
In his eulogy of the beauties of that fairy glen, the Gorge du Chauderon, Fordham was not exaggerating one whit; and while our two friends are pursuing their way along its winding path, under the cool shelter of a wealth of luxuriant greenery meeting overhead, and the roar and rush of the mountain stream leaping through a succession of black, rock-girt caldrons in their ears, we will take the opportunity of improving their acquaintance.
Philip Orlebar was a tall, fair, well-built young fellow of six and twenty, who had devoted the four years which had elapsed since he left college to sowing his wild oats; though, in justice to him, we must say that his crop was of the most moderate dimensions, in spite of his opportunities, for a sunny lightheadedness of manner, combined with a more than ordinarily prepossessing exterior, rendered him popular with everybody. This especially held good as regarded the other sex, and was bad both for it and for himself; in fact, his susceptibility in that line was a source of chronic misgiving to his friends, who never knew into what sort of entanglement it might plunge him.
He was the only son of a baronet, who doted on him. But his expectations were not great, for Sir Francis Orlebar, who had been a widower since a year or two after Philip’s birth, had recently endowed himself with a second wife, and taking this with the fact that his income did not exceed by a shilling 2,000 pounds per annum, it follows that a superfluity of spare cash was never a distinguishing feature in the Orlebar household.
But if Sir Francis doted on his son, his new spouse did not. She grudged the allowance of five hundred a year which that fortunate youth enjoyed. She would have grudged it just as much if it had been fifty. Two thousand a year to keep up the title and the house upon was a mere pittance, declared Lady Orlebar the Second – who, by the way, had never possessed a shilling of her own – and a quarter of that was to be thrown away upon an idle young man, who squandered it all on his own selfish pleasures. But on this point Sir Francis was firm. He refused to reduce his son’s allowance by one single penny.
So Philip came and went as he chose, and took life easily. He had no expensive tastes, and with a sufficiency of cash, good looks, excellent spirits, and an unlimited capacity for enjoyment, little is it to be wondered at if he found the process of “seeing the world” a very pleasant experience indeed. And he did so find it.
Richard Fordham was the exact antipodes to his friend both in appearance and disposition, which may have accounted for the excellent relations existing between the two. Externally he was of medium height and well-proportioned. His dark, almost swarthy countenance was handsome too, for his features were good and regular. But there was something sinister in his expression, something ruthless in the glitter of his keen black eyes as he emitted one of his pungent sarcasms; and he was a man to whom sarcasm was as the very breath of life. One peculiarity about him was that, though possessed of an abnormal sense of humour, he never laughed. At most he would break into a short dry guffaw which had more of a sneer in it than of mirth; and although he could send a roomful of people into roars whenever he chose, not a muscle of his own saturnine countenance would relax.
He was a good many years older than his travelling companion – how many it would have puzzled most people to determine, for he was one of those men whose ages are hard to guess. And what constituted the bond of union between them was also a poser, unless their utter dissimilarity. Anyhow, light-hearted Phil was wont enthusiastically to declare that “Old Fordham was the best fellow in the world. Only wanted knowing a bit. Why, there never was a fellow easier to get on with, by Jove – once you knew him.”
It is only fair to say that in his own experience the encomium was wholly deserved. They had been travelling companions for some time now, and yet had never had a difference, which is something to be able to say. The dry, caustic sparkle of the older man’s conversation had a great charm for the younger. “He could take any amount of chaff from Fordham,” the latter was wont to declare; “for he was a chap whose head was screwed on the right way, and, moreover, thoroughly knew his way about,” a qualification sure to inspire respect in the young.
We have said that Philip Orlebar was more than popular with the other sex, and here again the dissimilarity between the friends held good. Women detested Fordham uniformly and instinctively. There is something in the theory of reciprocity; Fordham, for his part, cordially and unaffectedly detested women.
“By Jove!” cried Philip, when they had covered rather more than half their distance – “By Jove! but this place is well named – ‘Kettle,’ isn’t it, eh, Fordham?”
“No, ‘Caldron,’ to be accurate.”
“Well, it’s pretty steamy just here. Let’s call a halt under that big rock and poke a smipe. What d’you say?”
“Just as you like,” was the tranquil reply. They had reached that part of the gorge where two great perpendicular cliffs, their black surface thickly grown with ferns and trailers, form a huge natural portal, narrowing the way to the road itself and the brawling, leaping mountain torrent which skirts it. A delightfully cool resting-place – almost too cool – for the whirl of the spray reached them even there. Soon the blue curl from a brace of pipes mingled fragrantly with the scent of pine resin and damp fern.
Hardly were they seated than a sound of approaching voices was heard, and two girls appeared in sight round the bend in the path. One carried a basket filled with wild flowers, eke a large handful of the same; the other a bag of sketching materials. Both shot a rapid glance at the two smokers as they walked swiftly by.
“Rather good-looking, eh?” said Phil, as soon as they were out of sight. “English, of course?”
“No mistake. The whole lake-side from Lausanne eastwards simply grows Britishers. I predict we shall soon be for annexing it.”
“They’re bound in the same direction as ourselves,” went on Philip. “At least there’s no other