Hugh Walpole
The Thirteen Travellers
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4057664105967
Table of Contents
VII MRS. PORTER AND MISS ALLEN
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
AUTHOR'S NOTE
No character in this book is drawn from any person now living.
THE THIRTEEN TRAVELLERS
I
ABSALOM JAY
Somewhere in the early nineties was Absalom Jay's first period. He was so well known a figure in London at that time as to be frequently caricatured in the weekly society journals, and Spy's "Absalom," that appeared in the 1894 volume of Vanity Fair, is one of his most successful efforts. In those days were anyone so ignorant as to be compelled to ask who Jay was he would probably receive the answer: "Oh, don't you know? He's a cousin of John Beaminster's. He founded the "Warrington" with Pemmy Stevens. He's. … Oh, I don't know. … He goes everywhere. Knows more people than anyone else in London, I should imagine."
Spy's caricature of him has caught that elegant smartness that was Absalom's most marked individuality, too smart critics have been known to say; and certainly, if the ideal of correct dress is that no one should notice your clothes Absalom was not correct. Everyone always noticed his clothes. But here again one must be fair. It may not have been altogether his clothes that one noticed. From very early years his hair was snow-white, and he wore it brushed straight back from his pink forehead in wavy locks. He wore also a little white tufted Imperial. He had an eyeglass that hung on a thick black cord. His favourite colour was a dark blue, and with this he wore spats (in summer of a truly terrific whiteness), a white slip, black tie, and pearl pin. He wore wonderful boots and shoes and was said to have more of these than any other man in London. It was also said that his feet were the smallest (masculine) in the British Isles. He was made altogether on a very small scale. He was not, I should think, more than five-feet-six in height, but was all in perfect proportion. His enemies, of whom he had, like everyone else, a few, said that his wonderful pink complexion was not entirely Nature's work, but here his enemies lied. Even at the very last he did not give way to the use of cosmetics. He was the kindest-hearted little man in the world, and in the days of his prosperity was as happy as the day was long. He lived entirely for Society, and because this is intended to be a true portrait, I must admit that there was something of the snob in his character. He himself admitted it frankly. "I like to be with people of rank," he would say, "simply because I'm more comfortable with them. I know just what to say to Johnny Beaminster, and I'm tongue-tied with the wife of my barber. Que voulez-vous?"
I'm afraid, however, that it went a little further than that. In the Season his looking-glass was thronged with cards, invitations to dinner and dances and musical evenings. "I live for Society," he said, "as some men live for killing pheasants, and other men for piling up money. My fun is as good as another man's. At any rate I get good company."
It was his intention to be seen at every London function, public or private, that could be considered a first-class function; people wondered how he got about as he did. It seemed as though there must be three or four Absaloms.
His best time was during the last few years of King Edward VII.'s reign. His funny little anxious face could be frequently seen in those groups of celebrities invited to meet the King at some famous house-party. It was said that the King liked his company, but I don't know how that can have been because Absalom was never in his brightest days very amusing. He talked a good deal, but always said just what everyone else said. He was asked everywhere because he was so safe, because he was so willing to fetch and carry, and because he knew exactly what it was that ladies wanted. He entertained only a little in return, but nobody minded that because, as everyone knew, "he really hadn't a penny in the world"—which meant that he had about £1,500 a year in various safe investments.
A year before the war he was seized with a little gust of speculation. Against the advice of "Tony" Pennant, who looked after his investments for him, he ventured to buy here and sell there with rather serious results. He pulled up just in time to save disaster, but he had to give up his little house in Knightsbridge and took a flat at Hortons in Duke Street. Although this was a "service" flat he still retained his man James, who had been with him for a number of years and knew his habits to perfection.
He made his rooms at Hortons charming, and he had the dark blue curtains and the gold mirror bristling with invitations, and the old coloured prints and the big, signed photographs of Queen Alexandra and the Duchess of Wrexe in their silver frames, and the heavy silver cigarette-box that King Edward had given him, all in their accustomed places. Of course, the flat was small. His silver-topped bottles and silver-backed brushes, and rows of boots and shoes and the two big trouser-presses simply overwhelmed his bedroom.
But he was over sixty-five now (although he would have been horrified if he thought that you knew it) and he didn't need much space—moreover, he was always out.
Then came the war, and the first result of this was that James joined up! During those first August days Absalom hadn't fancied that the war would touch him at all, although he was hotly patriotic and cried out daily at the "Warrington" that he wished he were a lad again and could shoulder a gun.
James's departure frightened him; then "Tony" Pennant explained to him that his investments were not so secure as they had been and he'd be lucky if any of them brought him in anything. And of course the whole of his social world vanished—no more parties, no more balls, no more Ascots and Goodwoods, no more shooting in Scotland, no more opera. He bustled around then in a truly remarkable manner and attacked his friends with the pertinacity of a bluebottle. The war was not a month old before Bryce-Drummond secured him a job in one of the Ministries at six hundred a year. It was not a very difficult job (it consisted for the most part in interviewing eager young men, assuring