第130章

"She took it?" asked Minikin, who was mopping up his gravy with his bread.

"She accepted me, sir," returned Uncle Gutton, in a voice that would have awed any one but Minikin. "Can you give me any good reason for her not doing so?"

"No need to get mad with me," explained Minikin. "I'm not blaming the poor woman. We all have our moments of despair."

The unfortunate Clapper again exploded. Uncle Gutton rose to his feet. The ready Jarman saved the situation.

"'Ear! 'ear!" cried Jarman, banging the table with the handles of two knives. "Silence for Uncle Gutton! 'E's going to propose a toast.

'Ear, 'ear!"

Mrs. Clapper, seconding his efforts, the whole table broke into applause.

"What, as a matter of fact, I did get up to say--" began Uncle Gutton.

"Good old Uncle Gutton!" persisted the determined Jarman. "Bride and bridegroom--long life to 'em!"

Uncle Sutton, evidently pleased, allowed his indignation against Minikin to evaporate.

"Well," said Uncle Gutton, "if you think I'm the one to do it--"

The response was unmistakable. In our enthusiasm we broke two glasses and upset a cruet; a small, thin lady was unfortunate enough to shed her chignon. Thus encouraged, Uncle Sutton launched himself upon his task. Personally, I should have been better pleased had Fate not interposed to assign to him the duty.

Starting with a somewhat uninstructive history of his own career, he suddenly, and for no reason at all obvious, branched off into fierce censure of the Adulteration Act. Reminded of the time by the maternal Sellars, he got in his first sensible remark by observing that with such questions, he took it, the present company was not particularly interested, and directed himself to the main argument. To his, Uncle Gutton's, foresight, wisdom and instinctive understanding of humanity, Mr. Clapper, it appeared, owed his present happiness. Uncle Gutton it was who had divined from the outset the sort of husband the fair Rosina would come eventually to desire--a plain, simple, hard-working, level-headed sort of chap, with no hity-tity nonsense about him: such an one, in short, as Mr. Clapper himself--(at this Mr. Clapper expressed approval by a lengthy laugh)--a gentleman who, so far as Uncle Gutton's knowledge went, had but one fault: a silly habit of laughing when there was nothing whatever to laugh at; of which, it was to be hoped, the cares and responsibilities of married life would cure him. (To the rest of the discourse Mr. Clapper listened with a gravity painfully maintained.) There had been moments, Uncle Gutton was compelled to admit, when the fair Rosina had shown inclination to make a fool of herself--to desire in place of honest worth mere painted baubles. He used the term in no offensive sense. Speaking for himself, what a man wanted beyond his weekly newspaper, he, Uncle Gutton, was unable to understand; but if there were fools in the world who wanted to read rubbish written by other fools, then the other fools would of course write it; Uncle Gutton did not blame them. He mentioned no names, but what he would say was: a plain man for a sensible girl, and no painted baubles.

The waiter here entering with a message from the cabman to the effect that if he was to catch the twelve-forty-five from Charing Cross, it was about full time he started, Uncle Gutton was compelled to bring his speech to a premature conclusion. The bride and bridegroom were hustled into their clothes. There followed much female embracing and male hand-shaking. The rice having been forgotten, the waiter was almost thrown downstairs, with directions to at once procure some.

There appearing danger of his not returning in time, the resourceful Jarman suggested cold semolina pudding as a substitute. But the idea was discouraged by the bride. A slipper of remarkable antiquity, discovered on the floor and regarded as a gift from Providence, was flung from the window by brother George, with admirable aim, and alighted on the roof of the cab. The waiter, on his return, not being able to find it, seemed surprised.

I walked back as far as the Obelisk with the O'Kelly and the Signora, who were then living together in Lambeth. Till that morning I had not seen the O'Kelly since my departure from London, nearly two years before, so that we had much to tell each other. For the third time now had the O'Kelly proved his utter unworthiness to be the husband of the lady to whom he still referred as his "dear good wife."

"But, under the circumstances, would it not be better," I suggested, "for her to obtain a divorce? Then you and the Signora could marry and there would be an end to the whole trouble."

"From a strictly worldly point of view," replied the O'Kelly, "it certainly would be; but Mrs. O'Kelly"--his voice took to itself unconsciously a tone of reverence--is not an ordinary woman. You can have no conception, my dear Kelver, of her goodness. I had a letter from her only two months ago, a few weeks after the--the last occurrence. Not one word of reproach, only that if I trespassed against her even unto seven times seven she would still consider it her duty to forgive me; that the 'home' would always be there for me to return to and repent."

A tear stood in the O'Kelly's eye. "A beautiful nature," he commented. "There are not many women like her."

"Not one in a million!" added the Signora, with enthusiasm.

"Well, to me it seems like pure obstinacy," I said.

The O'Kelly spoke quite angrily. "Don't ye say a word against her! I won't listen to it. Ye don't understand her. She never will despair of reforming me."

"You see, Mr. Kelver," explained the Signora, "the whole difficulty arises from my unfortunate profession. It is impossible for me to keep out of dear Willie's way. If I could earn my living by any other means, I would; but I can't. And when he sees my name upon the posters, it's all over with him."

"I do wish, Willie, dear," added the Signora in tones of gentle reproof, "that you were not quite so weak."