Beasts and Super Beasts

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She felt the meanness of the wish come over her with a qualm of
self-reproach one day when she came into the kitchen and found an
unaccustomed state of things in that usually busy quarter. Old Martha
was not working. A basket of corn was on the floor by her side, and out
in the yard the poultry were beginning to clamour a protest of overdue
feeding-time. But Martha sat huddled in a shrunken bunch on the window
seat, looking out with her dim old eyes as though she saw something
stranger than the autumn landscape.

"Is anything the matter, Martha?" asked the young woman.

"'Tis death, 'tis death a-coming," answered the quavering voice; "I knew
'twere coming. I knew it. 'Tweren't for nothing that old Shep's been
howling all morning. An' last night I heard the screech-owl give the
death-cry, and there were something white as run across the yard
yesterday; 'tweren't a cat nor a stoat, 'twere something. The fowls knew
'twere something; they all drew off to one side. Ay, there's been
warnings. I knew it were a-coming."

The young woman's eyes clouded with pity. The old thing sitting there so
white and shrunken had once been a merry, noisy child, playing about in
lanes and hay-lofts and farmhouse garrets; that had been eighty odd years
ago, and now she was just a frail old body cowering under the approaching
chill of the death that was coming at last to take her. It was not
probable that much could be done for her, but Emma hastened away to get
assistance and counsel. Her husband, she knew, was down at a
tree-felling some little distance off, but she might find some other
intelligent soul who knew the old woman better than she did. The farm,
she soon found out, had that faculty common to farmyards of swallowing up
and losing its human population. The poultry followed her in interested
fashion, and swine grunted interrogations at her from behind the bars of
their styes, but barnyard and rickyard, orchard and stables and dairy,
gave no reward to her search. Then, as she retraced her steps towards
the kitchen, she came suddenly on her cousin, young Mr. Jim, as every one
called him, who divided his time between amateur horse-dealing, rabbit-
shooting, and flirting with the farm maids.

"I'm afraid old Martha is dying," said Emma. Jim was not the sort of
person to whom one had to break news gently.

"Nonsense," he said; "Martha means to live to a hundred. She told me so,
and she'll do it."

"She may be actually dying at this moment, or it may just be the
beginning of the break-up," persisted Emma, with a feeling of contempt
for the slowness and dulness of the young man.

A grin spread over his good-natured features.

"It don't look like it," he said, nodding towards the yard. Emma turned
to catch the meaning of his remark. Old Martha stood in the middle of a
mob of poultry scattering handfuls of grain around her. The turkey-cock,
with the bronzed sheen of his feathers and the purple-red of his wattles,
the gamecock, with the glowing metallic lustre of his Eastern plumage,
the hens, with their ochres and buffs and umbers and their scarlet combs,
and the drakes, with their bottle-green heads, made a medley of rich
colour, in the centre of which the old woman looked like a withered stalk
standing amid a riotous growth of gaily-hued flowers. But she threw the
grain deftly amid the wilderness of beaks, and her quavering voice
carried as far as the two people who were watching her. She was still
harping on the theme of death coming to the farm.

"I knew 'twere a-coming. There's been signs an' warnings."

"Who's dead, then, old Mother?" called out the young man.

"'Tis young Mister Ladbruk," she shrilled back; "they've just a-carried
his body in. Run out of the way of a tree that was coming down an' ran
hisself on to an iron post. Dead when they picked un up. Aye, I knew
'twere coming."

And she turned to fling a handful of barley at a belated group of guinea-
fowl that came racing toward her.

* * * * *

The farm was a family property, and passed to the rabbit-shooting cousin
as the next-of-kin. Emma Ladbruk drifted out of its history as a bee
that had wandered in at an open window might flit its way out again. On
a cold grey morning she stood waiting, with her boxes already stowed in
the farm cart, till the last of the market produce should be ready, for
the train she was to catch was of less importance than the chickens and
butter and eggs that were to be offered for sale. From where she stood
she could see an angle of the long latticed window that was to have been
cosy with curtains and gay with bowls of flowers. Into her mind came the
thought that for months, perhaps for years, long after she had been
utterly forgotten, a white, unheeding face would be seen peering out
through those latticed panes, and a weak muttering voice would be heard
quavering up and down those flagged passages. She made her way to a
narrow barred casement that opened into the farm larder. Old Martha was
standing at a table trussing a pair of chickens for the market stall as
she had trussed them for nearly fourscore years.




THE LULL


"I've asked Latimer Springfield to spend Sunday with us and stop the
night," announced Mrs. Durmot at the breakfast-table.

"I thought he was in the throes of an election," remarked her husband.

"Exactly; the poll is on Wednesday, and the poor man will have worked
himself to a shadow by that time. Imagine what electioneering must be
like in this awful soaking rain, going along slushy country roads and
speaking to damp audiences in draughty schoolrooms, day after day for a
fortnight. He'll have to put in an appearance at some place of worship
on Sunday morning, and he can come to us immediately afterwards and have
a thorough respite from everything connected with politics. I won't let
him even think of them. I've had the picture of Cromwell dissolving the
Long Parliament taken down from the staircase, and even the portrait of
Lord Rosebery's 'Ladas' removed from the smoking-room. And Vera," added
Mrs. Durmot, turning to her sixteen-year-old niece, "be careful what
colour ribbon you wear in your hair; not blue or yellow on any account;
those are the rival party colours, and emerald green or orange would be
almost as bad, with this Home Rule business to the fore."

"On state occasions I always wear a black ribbon in my hair," said Vera
with crushing dignity.

Latimer Springfield was a rather cheerless, oldish young man, who went
into politics somewhat in the spirit in which other people might go into
half-mourning. Without being an enthusiast, however, he was a fairly
strenuous plodder, and Mrs. Durmot had been reasonably near the mark in
asserting that he was working at high pressure over this election. The
restful lull which his hostess enforced on him was decidedly welcome, and
yet the nervous excitement of the contest had too great a hold on him to
be totally banished.

"I know he's going to sit up half the night working up points for his
final speeches," said Mrs. Durmot regretfully; "however, we've kept
politics at arm's length all the afternoon and evening. More than that
we cannot do."

"That remains to be seen," said Vera, but she said it to herself.

Latimer had scarcely shut his bedroom door before he was immersed in a
sheaf of notes and pamphlets, while a fountain-pen and pocket-book were
brought into play for the due marshalling of useful facts and discreet
fictions. He had been at work for perhaps thirty-five minutes, and the
house was seemingly consecrated to the healthy slumber of country life,
when a stifled squealing and scuffling in the passage was followed by a
loud tap at his door. Before he had time to answer, a much-encumbered
Vera burst into the room with the question; "I say, can I leave these
here?"

"These" were a small black pig and a lusty specimen of black-red
gamecock.

Latimer was moderately fond of animals, and particularly interested in
small livestock rearing from the economic point of view; in fact, one of
the pamphlets on which he was at that moment engaged warmly advocated the
further development of the pig and poultry industry in our rural
districts; but he was pardonably unwilling to share even a commodious
bedroom with samples of henroost and stye products.

"Wouldn't they be happier somewhere outside?" he asked, tactfully
expressing his own preference in the matter in an apparent solicitude for
theirs.

"There is no outside," said Vera impressively, "nothing but a waste of
dark, swirling waters. The reservoir at Brinkley has burst."

"I didn't know there was a reservoir at Brinkley," said Latimer.

"Well, there isn't now, it's jolly well all over the place, and as we
stand particularly low we're the centre of an inland sea just at present.
You see the river has overflowed its banks as well."

"Good gracious! Have any lives been lost?"

"Heaps, I should say. The second housemaid has already identified three
bodies that have floated past the billiard-room window as being the young
man she's engaged to. Either she's engaged to a large assortment of the
population round here or else she's very careless at identification. Of
course it may be the same body coming round again and again in a swirl; I
hadn't thought of that."

"But we ought to go out and do rescue work, oughtn't we?" said Latimer,
with the instinct of a Parliamentary candidate for getting into the local
limelight.

"We can't," said Vera decidedly, "we haven't any boats and we're cut off
by a raging torrent from any human habitation. My aunt particularly
hoped you would keep to your room and not add to the confusion, but she
thought it would be so kind of you if you would take in Hartlepool's
Wonder, the gamecock, you know, for the night. You see, there are eight
other gamecocks, and they fight like furies if they get together, so
we're putting one in each bedroom. The fowl-houses are all flooded out,
you know. And then I thought perhaps you wouldn't mind taking in this
wee piggie; he's rather a little love, but he has a vile temper. He gets
that from his mother--not that I like to say things against her when
she's lying dead and drowned in her stye, poor thing. What he really
wants is a man's firm hand to keep him in order. I'd try and grapple
with him myself, only I've got my chow in my room, you know, and he goes
for pigs wherever he finds them."

"Couldn't the pig go in the bathroom?" asked Latimer faintly, wishing
that he had taken up as determined a stand on the subject of bedroom
swine as the chow had.

"The bathroom?" Vera laughed shrilly. "It'll be full of Boy Scouts till
morning if the hot water holds out."

"Boy Scouts?"

"Yes, thirty of them came to rescue us while the water was only waist-
high; then it rose another three feet or so and we had to rescue them.
We're giving them hot baths in batches and drying their clothes in the
hot-air cupboard, but, of course, drenched clothes don't dry in a minute,
and the corridor and staircase are beginning to look like a bit of coast
scenery by Tuke. Two of the boys are wearing your Melton overcoat; I
hope you don't mind."

"It's a new overcoat," said Latimer, with every indication of minding
dreadfully.

"You'll take every care of Hartlepool's Wonder, won't you?" said Vera.
"His mother took three firsts at Birmingham, and he was second in the
cockerel class last year at Gloucester. He'll probably roost on the rail
at the bottom of your bed. I wonder if he'd feel more at home if some of
his wives were up here with him? The hens are all in the pantry, and I
think I could pick out Hartlepool Helen; she's his favourite."

Latimer showed a belated firmness on the subject of Hartlepool Helen, and
Vera withdrew without pressing the point, having first settled the
gamecock on his extemporised perch and taken an affectionate farewell of
the pigling. Latimer undressed and got into bed with all due speed,
judging that the pig would abate its inquisitorial restlessness once the
light was turned out. As a substitute for a cosy, straw-bedded sty the
room offered, at first inspection, few attractions, but the disconsolate
animal suddenly discovered an appliance in which the most luxuriously
contrived piggeries were notably deficient. The sharp edge of the
underneath part of the bed was pitched at exactly the right elevation to
permit the pigling to scrape himself ecstatically backwards and forwards,
with an artistic humping of the back at the crucial moment and an
accompanying gurgle of long-drawn delight. The gamecock, who may have
fancied that he was being rocked in the branches of a pine-tree, bore the
motion with greater fortitude than Latimer was able to command. A series
of slaps directed at the pig's body were accepted more as an additional
and pleasing irritant than as a criticism of conduct or a hint to desist;
evidently something more than a man's firm hand was needed to deal with
the case. Latimer slipped out of bed in search of a weapon of
dissuasion. There was sufficient light in the room to enable the pig to
detect this manoeuvre, and the vile temper, inherited from the drowned
mother, found full play. Latimer bounded back into bed, and his
conqueror, after a few threatening snorts and champings of its jaws,
resumed its massage operations with renewed zeal. During the long
wakeful hours which ensued Latimer tried to distract his mind from his
own immediate troubles by dwelling with decent sympathy on the second
housemaid's bereavement, but he found himself more often wondering how
many Boy Scouts were sharing his Melton overcoat. The role of Saint
Martin malgre lui was not one which appealed to him.

Towards dawn the pigling fell into a happy slumber, and Latimer might
have followed its example, but at about the same time Stupor Hartlepooli
gave a rousing crow, clattered down to the floor and forthwith commenced
a spirited combat with his reflection in the wardrobe mirror. Remembering
that the bird was more or less under his care Latimer performed Hague
Tribunal offices by draping a bath-towel over the provocative mirror, but
the ensuing peace was local and short-lived. The deflected energies of
the gamecock found new outlet in a sudden and sustained attack on the
sleeping and temporarily inoffensive pigling, and the duel which followed
was desperate and embittered beyond any possibility of effective
intervention. The feathered combatant had the advantage of being able,
when hard pressed, to take refuge on the bed, and freely availed himself
of this circumstance; the pigling never quite succeeded in hurling
himself on to the same eminence, but it was not from want of trying.

Neither side could claim any decisive success, and the struggle had been
practically fought to a standstill by the time that the maid appeared
with the early morning tea.

"Lor, sir," she exclaimed in undisguised astonishment, "do you want those
animals in your room?"

_Want_!

The pigling, as though aware that it might have outstayed its welcome,
dashed out at the door, and the gamecock followed it at a more dignified
pace.

"If Miss Vera's dog sees that pig--!" exclaimed the maid, and hurried off
to avert such a catastrophe.

A cold suspicion was stealing over Latimer's mind; he went to the window
and drew up the blind. A light, drizzling rain was falling, but there
was not the faintest trace of any inundation.

Some half-hour later he met Vera on the way to the breakfast-room.

"I should not like to think of you as a deliberate liar," he observed
coldly, "but one occasionally has to do things one does not like."

"At any rate I kept your mind from dwelling on politics all the night,"
said Vera.

Which was, of course, perfectly true.




THE UNKINDEST BLOW


The season of strikes seemed to have run itself to a standstill. Almost
every trade and industry and calling in which a dislocation could
possibly be engineered had indulged in that luxury. The last and least
successful convulsion had been the strike of the World's Union of
Zoological Garden attendants, who, pending the settlement of certain
demands, refused to minister further to the wants of the animals
committed to their charge or to allow any other keepers to take their
place. In this case the threat of the Zoological Gardens authorities
that if the men "came out" the animals should come out also had
intensified and precipitated the crisis. The imminent prospect of the
larger carnivores, to say nothing of rhinoceroses and bull bison, roaming
at large and unfed in the heart of London, was not one which permitted of
prolonged conferences. The Government of the day, which from its
tendency to be a few hours behind the course of events had been nicknamed
the Government of the afternoon, was obliged to intervene with
promptitude and decision. A strong force of Bluejackets was despatched
to Regent's Park to take over the temporarily abandoned duties of the
strikers. Bluejackets were chosen in preference to land forces, partly
on account of the traditional readiness of the British Navy to go
anywhere and do anything, partly by reason of the familiarity of the
average sailor with monkeys, parrots, and other tropical fauna, but
chiefly at the urgent request of the First Lord of the Admiralty, who was
keenly desirous of an opportunity for performing some personal act of
unobtrusive public service within the province of his department.

"If he insists on feeding the infant jaguar himself, in defiance of its
mother's wishes, there may be another by-election in the north," said one
of his colleagues, with a hopeful inflection in his voice. "By-elections
are not very desirable at present, but we must not be selfish."

As a matter of fact the strike collapsed peacefully without any outside
intervention. The majority of the keepers had become so attached to
their charges that they returned to work of their own accord.

And then the nation and the newspapers turned with a sense of relief to
happier things. It seemed as if a new era of contentment was about to
dawn. Everybody had struck who could possibly want to strike or who
could possibly be cajoled or bullied into striking, whether they wanted
to or not. The lighter and brighter side of life might now claim some
attention. And conspicuous among the other topics that sprang into
sudden prominence was the pending Falvertoon divorce suit.

The Duke of Falvertoon was one of those human _hors d'oeuvres_ that
stimulate the public appetite for sensation without giving it much to
feed on. As a mere child he had been precociously brilliant; he had
declined the editorship of the _Anglian Review_ at an age when most boys
are content to have declined _mensa_, a table, and though he could not
claim to have originated the Futurist movement in literature, his
"Letters to a possible Grandson," written at the age of fourteen, had
attracted considerable notice. In later days his brilliancy had been
less conspicuously displayed. During a debate in the House of Lords on
affairs in Morocco, at a moment when that country, for the fifth time in
seven years, had brought half Europe to the verge of war, he had
interpolated the remark "a little Moor and how much it is," but in spite
of the encouraging reception accorded to this one political utterance he
was never tempted to a further display in that direction. It began to be
generally understood that he did not intend to supplement his numerous
town and country residences by living overmuch in the public eye.

And then had come the unlooked-for tidings of the imminent proceedings
for divorce. And such a divorce! There were cross-suits and allegations
and counter-allegations, charges of cruelty and desertion, everything in
fact that was necessary to make the case one of the most complicated and
sensational of its kind. And the number of distinguished people involved
or cited as witnesses not only embraced both political parties in the
realm and several Colonial governors, but included an exotic contingent
from France, Hungary, the United States of North America, and the Grand
Duchy of Baden. Hotel accommodation of the more expensive sort began to
experience a strain on its resources. "It will be quite like the Durbar
without the elephants," exclaimed an enthusiastic lady who, to do her
justice, had never seen a Durbar. The general feeling was one of
thankfulness that the last of the strikes had been got over before the
date fixed for the hearing of the great suit.

As a reaction from the season of gloom and industrial strife that had
just passed away the agencies that purvey and stage-manage sensations
laid themselves out to do their level best on this momentous occasion.
Men who had made their reputations as special descriptive writers were
mobilised from distant corners of Europe and the further side of the
Atlantic in order to enrich with their pens the daily printed records of
the case; one word-painter, who specialised in descriptions of how
witnesses turn pale under cross-examination, was summoned hurriedly back
from a famous and prolonged murder trial in Sicily, where indeed his
talents were being decidedly wasted. Thumb-nail artists and expert kodak
manipulators were retained at extravagant salaries, and special dress
reporters were in high demand. An enterprising Paris firm of costume
builders presented the defendant Duchess with three special creations, to
be worn, marked, learned, and extensively reported at various critical
stages of the trial; and as for the cinematograph agents, their industry
and persistence was untiring. Films representing the Duke saying good-
bye to his favourite canary on the eve of the trial were in readiness
weeks before the event was due to take place; other films depicted the
Duchess holding imaginary consultations with fictitious lawyers or making
a light repast off specially advertised vegetarian sandwiches during a
supposed luncheon interval. As far as human foresight and human
enterprise could go nothing was lacking to make the trial a success.

Two days before the case was down for hearing the advance reporter of an
important syndicate obtained an interview with the Duke for the purpose
of gleaning some final grains of information concerning his Grace's
personal arrangements during the trial.

"I suppose I may say this will be one of the biggest affairs of its kind
during the lifetime of a generation," began the reporter as an excuse for
the unsparing minuteness of detail that he was about to make quest for.

"I suppose so--if it comes off," said the Duke lazily.

"If?" queried the reporter, in a voice that was something between a gasp
and a scream.

"The Duchess and I are both thinking of going on strike," said the Duke.

"Strike!"

The baleful word flashed out in all its old hideous familiarity. Was
there to be no end to its recurrence?

"Do you mean," faltered the reporter, "that you are contemplating a
mutual withdrawal of the charges?"

"Precisely," said the Duke.

"But think of the arrangements that have been made, the special
reporting, the cinematographs, the catering for the distinguished foreign
witnesses, the prepared music-hall allusions; think of all the money that
has been sunk--"

"Exactly," said the Duke coldly, "the Duchess and I have realised that it
is we who provide the material out of which this great far-reaching
industry has been built up. Widespread employment will be given and
enormous profits made during the duration of the case, and we, on whom
all the stress and racket falls, will get--what? An unenviable notoriety
and the privilege of paying heavy legal expenses whichever way the
verdict goes. Hence our decision to strike. We don't wish to be
reconciled; we fully realise that it is a grave step to take, but unless
we get some reasonable consideration out of this vast stream of wealth
and industry that we have called into being we intend coming out of court
and staying out. Good afternoon."

The news of this latest strike spread universal dismay. Its
inaccessibility to the ordinary methods of persuasion made it peculiarly
formidable. If the Duke and Duchess persisted in being reconciled the
Government could hardly be called on to interfere. Public opinion in the
shape of social ostracism might be brought to bear on them, but that was
as far as coercive measures could go. There was nothing for it but a
conference, with powers to propose liberal terms. As it was, several of
the foreign witnesses had already departed and others had telegraphed
cancelling their hotel arrangements.

The conference, protracted, uncomfortable, and occasionally acrimonious,
succeeded at last in arranging for a resumption of litigation, but it was
a fruitless victory. The Duke, with a touch of his earlier precocity,
died of premature decay a fortnight before the date fixed for the new
trial.




THE ROMANCERS


It was autumn in London, that blessed season between the harshness of
winter and the insincerities of summer; a trustful season when one buys
bulbs and sees to the registration of one's vote, believing perpetually
in spring and a change of Government.