on awaking next morning dorothy's first thought was how would her father's coming affect her relations with sir tancred; and she at once changed it to how would it affect her relations with the whole of the little circle into which a fortunate whim had led her. she was an honest soul, and now she tried to be as honest with herself as a woman can bring herself to be. she did not hide from herself that of late she and sir tancred had been more and more drawn together; she even went to the length of admitting that her feeling for him was something stronger than friendship. indeed, she was full of pity for him. she had learned from tinker something of the story of his earlier life, and like a good woman she wished she might give him the happiness he had missed. she did not know how strongly she longed to give him that happiness, much less was she able to distinguish where pity merged into love. now she was in a great dread of her father's millions. she knew well enough that with many, indeed, with most men of sir tancred's class they would have been primroses, very large primroses, on the path of love; she feared that if he was the man she thought him, and she would not have him any other, they would prove barriers on that path, hard indeed to surmount. she dressed in no very good spirits, and came downstairs to find her father awaiting her in the hall, ready to stroll out and hear how the world had gone with her.
sir tancred also awoke with the sense of something unpleasant having happened. but at first he could not for the life of him remember what it was. then he began to consider the change which would be brought about by the irruption of the millionaire. he resented it. he found the prospect of tinker's losing dorothy's services exceedingly disagreeable. for a while he ascribed that resentment to the fact that she would cease to be the excellent influence with tinker she certainly was; and then he grew resentful on his own account. it was hard, indeed, that he should suddenly be deprived of the presence of so charming a creature at his table, of so delightful a companion of his evening stroll in the gardens of the casino. if it hadn't been for those confounded millions—there he checked himself sternly; the millions were there, and there was no more to be said, or thought. but his temper was none the better for the constraint.
after his late hours the night before, tinker did not get up as early as usual, and he and elsie decided to forego their bathe in the sea, but went straight to breakfast in the kitchen of the hotel. he found the staff greatly concerned about the trouble which was likely to befall him for borrowing the motor-car. it seemed that on finding it gone, its owner, a m. cognier, had displayed a wrath of the most terrible. of course an argus-eyed busy-body had seen tinker depart in it; and m. cognier, an anglophobe, had declared his intention of punishing this insolence of perfidious albion by handing him over to the police. tinker heard all their prophecies of evil with his wonted tranquillity; but he had no little difficulty in setting their minds at rest.
m. cognier had been impressive.
the two children had finished their breakfast, and were about to set out in search of adventure, when selina found them and began to set forth a petition. she wished to be allowed to enter tinker's service again. she was, she said, alone in the world once more, for her husband, having spent all her savings, had with determined scotch thriftiness incontinently died, and left her to shift for herself. she had been making a mean living as an ironer in a parisian laundry, when alexander mcneill had sent for her to apricale to help him deliver a young lady from the jesuits; and she saw in her curious meeting with tinker, at the country seat of the young monteleone, the finger of providence pointing the way back to her old situation. would he lay the matter before his father, and support her petition?
tinker was somewhat taken aback, and said, "but i'm too old for a nurse."
"oh, there are lots of things i could do, master tinker. there are really," said selina. "you want a housekeeper when you're at the refuge, a housekeeper who could get up your linen and sir tancred's as they can't do it at farndon-pryze. you want someone to look after you, when you've got a cold. you never did take any care of yourself." she was wringing her hands in her earnestness.
"you'd be a sort of valet-housekeeper then," said tinker, pondering the matter.
"yes, and i should want very little wages. all i want is to be in your service again. i never ought to have left it. i never had no real peace all the time i was married, what with wondering how you were being looked after, and whether you was ill or not. i always took in the morning post, though angus did grumble at the expense, all the time i was in paris, on purpose to see where you was; and every day i looked at the births, deaths, and marriages first, to see if anything had happened to you."
she stopped; and tinker was silent a while, thinking; then he said, "do you think you could act as maid to elsie?"
"why, of course i could, master tinker!"
"she wants someone to brush her hair most," said tinker thoughtfully.
"i don't want a maid. and i don't want anyone to brush my hair but you," said elsie firmly. "no one could do it so well."
"oh, you'll soon get used to selina's doing it," said tinker cheerfully. "and you'll find it so much more—so much more important having a maid of your own. you'll feel so grown-up, don't you know? i tell you what, we'll go upstairs, and selina can have a try at it, while i talk to my father."
elsie shook her head doubtfully; but she came. tinker left them at the door of elsie's room, and went to his father. he found him dressing, and after bidding him good-morning, came at once to the matter in hand. "selina wants to come back to us," he said. "she thinks she could be useful as valet-housekeeper and maid to elsie. she's awfully keen on it."
"if she wants to come back, she most certainly can," said sir tancred. "i owe selina a debt i can never pay—and so do you, for that matter. i don't pretend to know what the functions of a valet-housekeeper are, but doubtless selina knows her own capabilities best. besides, as you are losing your governess, you will want some woman about elsie."
"but i don't intend to lose my governess!" cried tinker.
sir tancred looked at him with unaffected interest. "am i to understand that you propose to retain the daughter of a millionaire as your adopted sister's governess?" he said.
"yes," said tinker firmly. "dorothy's a very good governess: she suits elsie and she suits me."
"that sounds like a reason," said sir tancred. "but i shall be interested to see if mr. rainer listens to it."
"i think," said tinker thoughtfully, "we shan't have much trouble with mr. rainer."
"of course, if you've made up your mind—but millionaires are kittle cattle."
tinker went to selina and elsie, looked carefully into the matter of hair-brushing; gave selina a few hints on the process, and then told her that her request was granted. he fled from the room to escape her joyful gratitude; and went down into the hall to await the conclusion of the process, and elsie's coming.
of a sudden there descended on him an exceedingly animated french gentleman of forty, who cried, "tell me then a little, good-for-nothing! why did you steal my motor-car yesterday?"
tinker was suavity itself; he protested that he was desolated, grieved beyond measure that the necessity of borrowing the motor-car had been forced on him; but he had borrowed it in the service of a lady; and he told briefly the story of the kidnapping. the aggrieved frenchman listened to it with a face in which amazement battled with incredulity; but fortunately, towards the end of it, dorothy and her father came into the hotel from walking in the garden of the casino; and tinker introduced the frenchman to them. at the sight of dorothy's beauty, he forgot his righteous wrath; forgot that it was an international matter, another instance of the cunning insolence of perfidious albion; protested his delight that his car should have been of use to her; would not listen to septimus rainer's proposal to fit it out with fresh tires, declaring that the tires on it, worn in her service, had become one of his most cherished possessions; and in the end turned upon tinker with outstretched arms, and cried, "embrace me! i have called you a good-for-nothing! but you are a hero!"
with infinite quickness tinker seized the nearest hand, wrung it warmly, and ducked out of the way of the embrace. then he explained that unless the police caught the kidnappers, they desired to let the matter drop, for the gossip would be unpleasant to dorothy. the frenchman understood; and assured them that as far as he was concerned, it should be buried in the most secret depths of his bosom.
with that he took his leave of them; and on his heels came two italian detectives to inquire into the kidnapping. sir tancred was summoned to the conference; and for all that their questioners assumed a good deal of the air of inquisitors with all the horrors of the torture-chamber behind them, he and tinker saw to it that they went away very little wiser than they came.
at déjeuner septimus rainer told them that now he was in europe he proposed to stay in europe, and enjoy a little of his daughter's society. he could carry on all of his business he wanted to by cablegram and letter. one thing, however, he must have, and that was clothes, for in his haste he had come away with a gripsack and nothing more. sir tancred suggested that tinker, who knew his nice, should take him over there, and put him in the hands of the right tailor, hatter, hosier, and bootmaker; and septimus rainer accepted the offer gratefully.
accordingly the two of them caught a train early in the afternoon, and went to nice. septimus rainer had supposed the getting of clothes to be a simple and tiresome affair of a few minutes; you went to a tailor and said, "make me suits of clothes," or to a bootmaker and said, "make me pairs of boots." he was vastly mistaken. he found himself embarked upon a serious business.
he awoke to the seriousness of it in the train, when he found tinker, who had taken his commission to heart, regarding him with a cold, calculating air, very disquieting. he endured it as long as he could, then he said cautiously, "you aren't measuring me for my coffin; are you, sonny?"
"oh, no!" said tinker with a reassuring smile of a seraphic sweetness. "i was only thinking how you ought to be dressed."
"oh, anything will do for me," said septimus rainer carelessly.
"i'm afraid not; you see i'm responsible," said tinker seriously. "and i was thinking that, getting your clothes here in nice, i shall have to keep a very sharp eye on them, or they'll go dressing you like a french american—you know, an american who is dressed by a paris tailor. and that wouldn't do at all."
"no: of course not," said septimus rainer quickly.
but it was not till they came to the tailor's that he realised the full seriousness of the business before them. at first he supposed that he was to have his say in the matter; but at the end of ten minutes, with a half-humorous abandonment, he put himself entirely in the hands of the conscientious tinker, and indeed had he not done so, there is no saying that he might not have gone about the world parading a velvet collar on a grey frock coat. it was tinker who decided, after weighty consideration, upon the colour and texture of the stuff of each suit, chose the very buttons for it, and forced upon the reluctant niçois his ideas of the way each separate garment should be cut. septimus rainer was frankly bewildered at the end of half an hour; he was used, in the way of business, to carrying a multiplicity of details in his head, but these details it could not carry. when he found that tinker had them at his finger ends, he was filled with admiration and respect.
from the tailor's they went to the hatter's; and there septimus rainer found himself trying on hats by the score. but, strangely enough, he did not grow weary: tinker's absorbed interest in his task was catching to the point that at the hosier's the millionaire found himself discussing the shade of his socks with real enthusiasm.
when they came out of the last shop tinker said, with the deep breath of one relieved of a heavy responsibility, "there—i think you'll look all right—as far as a french tailor can do it."
"i ought to, after all the trouble you've taken, sonny," said septimus rainer, smiling.
"you have to take trouble about dressing a man. a woman is easy enough. i got elsie her clothes in about an hour. but a man is much more difficult. and clothes are so important," said tinker gravely.
"i suppose they are—over here," said septimus rainer.
"i'm glad you don't take them really seriously," said tinker, approving his tone, "because you'll soon get into the way of wearing them when you've got them. it's very funny, but well-dressed americans—men, i mean—don't often wear their clothes properly; they look as if they felt so awfully well-dressed. i don't think you will."
"now you've told me about it, i'll try not to."
"i think you'll want a good man, though, to keep you up to the mark. you might get slack, don't you know?"
"no, no; i can't have a valet, and i won't," said septimus rainer firmly.
"ah, we shall have to see what dorothy says about that," said tinker with a smile of doubtful meaning.
"that's playing it rather low down on me, isn't it?" said septimus rainer reproachfully. "it's—it's coercion."
"oh, if you have to wear clothes, you may as well do it thoroughly. you see, it's been put into my hands, and i must go through with it," said tinker apologetically.
the millionaire gazed at him ruefully.
"and now," tinker went on, regarding him with another cold, calculating air, that of a proprietor, "i think i'll take you to a hair-dresser, and have your hair and beard dealt with."
"crop away! crop away!" said the millionaire.
tinker took him to a hair-dresser, and told the man exactly how he wanted the hair and beard cut. "he'd make you a french american, too, if i let him," he said to septimus rainer.
when the hair-dresser had done, the millionaire looked at himself in the glass with approval, and said, "well, i do look spick and span, though gritty; yes—sir."
"you'll look better when you have your clothes," said tinker. "and, now, i think you must want a drink."
"that is so, sonny. this is dry work, this getting clothes."
tinker took him to a café, adorned with an american bar. septimus rainer lighted a cigar and refreshed himself with the whiskey sour of his native land; tinker ate ices. over these agreeable occupations they talked; and the millionaire derived considerable entertainment and no little instruction from his young companion's views of life on the mediterranean littoral, illustrated from the passing pleasure-seekers.
when they got into the railway carriage on their return, he lighted another cigar, and lay back in the seat with the content of a man who had done a hard day's work. but presently he roused himself and said, "i've been thinking about those kidnapping scum. they were going to ransom dorothy for three hundred thousand dollars, you said."
"yes, a million and a half francs," said tinker.
"well, sonny, i've been thinking i must pay you fifty thousand dollars over that business. you took a big risk holding up a gang like that."
"it wasn't me: selina held them up," said tinker quickly.
"selina did her share, and i shan't forget it. but it was your show. i think fifty thousand dollars would be fair."
tinker's face went very grave. "thank you very much," he said slowly, "but i couldn't take any money for helping dorothy out of a mess. when i've taken money for helping people, they've been strangers—like the kernabies and blumenruth. but dorothy is different—quite different."
septimus rainer pulled at his beard, and said in a grumbling voice, "that's all very well, sonny; but where do i come in? you get my little girl out of a tight place—a very tight place—and you save me three hundred thousand dollars. business is business, and i ought to pay."
"it is rather awkward for you," said tinker, looking at him with a puzzled face and knitted brow. "but i think the thing is that it wasn't business. i like dorothy—i like her very much. she's a friend. and there can't be any business between friends, don't you know?"
"shake, sonny," said the millionaire, holding out his hand. "i'm glad you and she are friends."
tinker shook his hand gravely.
when they came back to the hotel, at the sight of her father, dorothy cried, "oh, papa, what have you been doing? you look ten years younger. and what a nice shape your head is!"
"yes," said septimus rainer, "i pride myself on the shape of my head. but it's all your young friend's doing."
"wait till his clothes come," said tinker with modest pride.
"i shall look fine in those clothes, i tell you—fine," said septimus rainer, and his air was almost fatuous.
"i think he ought to have a valet," said tinker. "you can't learn about clothes all out of your own head. either you must have always worn the right clothes, or you want someone to teach you."
"of course, you must have a valet, papa," said dorothy.
"i can't—i can't have a man messing about me," said septimus rainer in a tone of almost pathetic pleading.
"i'm afraid there's no way out of it," said tinker firmly.
"i'm sure there isn't if tinker says so. he knows all about these things," said dorothy. "you must be brave, papa: you really must."
"i'll find him one," said tinker.
septimus rainer yielded with a gesture of hopeless resignation.
该作者其它作品
《arsene lupin》
《the three eyes19章节》
