At this point another visitor was announced. His name was Mr. William Bateman. He was a bright looking man of perhaps a year or two over thirty, and though he was close upon six feet in height he probably would have ridden under ten stone, so earnest was the attention that he had given to his figure.
He would not take any tea.
CHAPTER VII
We have been talking shop as usual, Mr. Bateman,” said Lady Severn. “I wonder if there’s another drawing-room in London where shop and shop only is talked!”
“To say that shop is talked in a drawing-room is only another way of saying that the people in that drawing-room never cease to be interesting,” said Amber. “So long as people talk of what they know they are interesting and shop is the shortest way of describing what people understand. So how is your shop, Mr. Bateman?”
“Flourishing,” said Mr. Bateman, with something of a Scotch accent. “Miss Amber, I bless the day when you suggested that I should take up the advertising business. I had no idea that it was a business that required the exercise of so much imagination.”
“Have you made much money to-day?” enquired Amber.
“I think I must hurry away,” said Josephine. “We have a political party to-night, and I’m tired of seeing Amber’s friends flaunting their wealth before us. If Mr. Galmyn made eight pounds in the course of the morning and he is a poet, what must Mr. Bateman have made?”
“And he is a Scotchman,” said Mr. Bateman pleasantly.
“Yes, that finish was in my mind I must confess,” said Josephine. “Do not be led into dishonesty by any one, Mr. Galmyn; you will be far happier as a humble lyric poet with the consciousness of being honest than as a great financier with an imaginary mine up your sleeve.”
“Go away, before you do any further mischief,” cried Amber. “Don’t believe her, Arthur. If you ever have a gold mine up your sleeve, we’ll float it between us.”
“And we’ll let Miss West in on the ground floor,” said Arthur. “That’s another good phrase that I’ve got hold of already. The ‘ground floor.’ ”
“What does it mean?” asked Lady Severn, when Josephine had left the room. “Does it mean anything in particular?”
“It means joining a thing at par,” replied Arthur sadly. “Oh, yes! I’m getting into the swing of the thing. Perhaps I may know what contango means before another week has gone by.”
“I should dearly like to know what contango means,” said Amber sympathetically. It was her sympathetic manner that made a word or two from her change the whole course of certain young lives—for a time. “I was asking you about your prospects, Mr. Bateman,” she added, turning to the latest addition to her circle. “I do hope that you are making your way.”
“Making my way?” said he gravely, and then he gave a little laugh—a cautious little laugh, as of feeling his way to ascertain how far he might safely go in the direction of hilarity. “Making my—oh, yes; I can’t complain. I see a great future for my business if it is developed on the right lines, and if too many adventurers do not take it up.”
“It requires too much imagination to turn out a success in everybody’s hands,” said Amber.
“Imagination,” said he. “My dear Miss Amber, it requires nothing but imagination. In these days advertising is the greatest power that exists. It is, counting all its branches, the most important British industry. There’s nothing that cannot be accomplished by discreet advertising.”
“You can sell a soap by it at any rate,” said Lady Severn.
“Oh, soap selling and pill selling are too easy to need any of the more delicate methods,” said Mr. Bateman. “Everybody—nearly everybody—wants soap and no one can live without medicine—some people live on nothing else. Of course I don’t trouble myself over the rough and tumble advertising of drugs. As I told you last week I intend to proceed on a higher plane. I leave posters and sandwich men and other antediluvian methods for others. I am determined never to forget that I am an artist and that I was once in a cavalry regiment.”
“Have you struck out anything new since you told us of your scheme for pushing things on by holding them up to ridicule?” asked Amber.
“Oh, you allude to what I did for the Technical School of Literature. You know, of course, that I only got that ridiculed into notice because of the interest you took in it, Miss Amber. But I’ve undertaken to see a young chap into Parliament by the same means. He is really such a foolish young man I believe that nothing could keep him out of Parliament in the long run; but he wants to get in at the next General Election, so we haven’t much time to spare. I got him to make a Vegetarian Speech a fortnight ago, and then I arranged with a number of excellent newspapers to ridicule all that he had said. They are at it to-day, all over the country.”
“His name is Thornleigh and he said that no one could wear leather boots and remain a Christian,” cried Amber.
“There, you see,” said Mr. Bateman proudly. “He has already become known to you—yes, and he shall be known to every man, woman and child in England. The Vegetarians are taking him up and he’ll become more ridiculous every day until his name is a by-word. You can’t keep a man out of Parliament whose name is a by-word throughout the length and breadth of the country. Then I’ve a young woman who simply wants to get her name into the papers. It’s marvellous how universal this aspiration is. Anyhow I think I can promise her a good move.”
“She has only to kill a baby,” suggested Mr. Galmyn in a flash of inspiration.
“No more brilliant suggestion could be made,” said Mr. Bateman. “But it does more credit to your heart than to you head, Galmyn, my friend. If you sit down and give the matter that thoughtful consideration it deserves, I think you will agree with me that the goal aimed at can be reached by equally legitimate means and with less risk. I am going to put up the young woman at the next meeting of the County Council’s Licensing Committee to oppose the renewal of any singing and dancing licenses whatsoever. That is the least expensive and most effective way of pushing forward a nonentity with aspirations. She will soon come to be looked upon as an intelligent woman, and the newspapers will publish her opinion upon the conduct of the recent campaign as well as upon the management of children.”
“You don’t think that you are too sanguine, Mr. Bateman,” suggested Lady Severn.
“I prefer to understate rather than exaggerate the possibilities of such a step as I have suggested, Lady Severn,” said Mr. Bateman. “And moreover I will do my best to prevent my client from writing a novel. Writing a novel rather gives away the show. Then another client whom I have just secured to-day is the mother of two very ordinary daughters. The mother is vulgar and wealthy, and the daughters wear birds in their toques. They know no one in Society and yet before six months have gone by you will find that no column of society gossip will be considered complete that does not contain some reference to their movements, and they will probably marry baronets—perhaps peers. I have also got on my books a young American lady, who has set her heart on a peer, poor thing!”
“Poor thing? does that refer to the lady or to the peer?” asked Amber.
“Possibly to both, Miss Amber. Anyhow I’m going to start the campaign by denying on authority