Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 44).djvu/238

 "Who the devil's Harry?"

"Not Harry. Marry. He's going to marry a palmist."

About four hundred waiters noticed a speck of dust on an ash-tray at the table next to ours, and swooped down on it.

"Edwin is going to marry a palmist?"

"Yes."

"She must be mad. Hasn't she seen Edwin?"

And just then who should stroll in but Edwin himself. I sighted him and gave him a hail.

He curveted up to us. It was amazing the way the fellow had altered. He looked like a two-year-old. Flower in his buttonhole, and a six-inch grin, and all that. Lord Worplesdon seemed surprised, too. I didn't wonder. The Edwin he remembered was a pretty different kind of a chap.

"Halloa, dad!" he said. "Fancy meeting you here! Have a cigarette?"

He shoved out his case. Lord Worplesdon helped himself in a sort of dazed way.

"You are Edwin?" he said, slowly.

I began to sidle out. They didn't notice me. They had moved to a settee, and Edwin seemed to be telling his father a funny story. At least, he was talking and grinning, and Lord Worplesdon was making a noise like distant thunder, which I supposed was his way of chuckling. I slid out and left them.

Some days later Percy called on me. The old boy was looking scared.

"Reggie," he said, "what do doctors call it when you think you see things you don't? Hal-something. I've got it, whatever it is. It's sometimes caused by overwork. But it can't be that with me, because I've not been doing any work. You don't think my brain's going or any bally rot like that, do you?"

"What do you mean? What's been happening?"

"It's like being haunted. I read a story somewhere of a fellow who kept thinking he saw a battleship bearing down on him. I've got it, too. Four times in the last three days I could have sworn I saw my father and Edwin. I saw them as plainly as I see you. And, of course, Edwin's at Weeting and father's on the Continent somewhere. Do you think it's some sort of a warning? Do you think I'm going to die?"

"It's all right, old man," I said. "As a matter of fact, they are both in London just now."

"You don't mean that? Great Scot, what a relief! But, Reggie, old top, it couldn't have been them really. The last time was at Covent Garden, and the chap I mistook for Edwin was wearing a false nose and dancing all by himself in the middle of the floor."

I admitted it was pretty queer.

I was away for a few days after that in the country. When I got back I found a pile of telegrams waiting for me. They were all from Florence, and they all wanted me to go to Eaton Square. The last of the batch, which had arrived that morning, was so jolly peremptory that I felt as if something had bitten me when I read it.

For a moment I admit I hung back. Then I rallied. There are times in a man's life when he has got to show a bit of the old bulldog British pluck, don't you know, if he wants to preserve his self-respect. I did then. My bag was still unpacked. I told my man to put it on a cab. And in about two ticks I was bowling off to Charing Cross. I left for France by the night boat.

About three weeks later I fetched up at Nice. You can't walk far at Nice without bumping into a Casino. The one I hit my first evening was the Casino Municipale, in the Place Massena. It looked more or less of a Home from Home, so I strolled in. There was quite a crowd round the boule-tables, and I squashed in. And when I'd worked through into the