IN THE MACHINE - The Roll-Call

Page 191 of 210

At half-past ten he sent the parlourmaid to get a taxi. Having inspected his luggage in the hall, he went to the telephone again and ascertained that Laurencine had actually started from home. Almost at the same moment a taxi stopped in front of the house. "She's been jolly quick," thought George, meaning the parlourmaid; but going to the window he saw that his stepfather and his mother were in the taxi. He did not rush out to them. He did not move. The comfortable sense of the perfect reliability and benevolence of his 'people' filled and warmed him. They had not written again; they had just come themselves.

He affectionately and critically watched them as they got out of the taxi. Alderman Edwin Clayhanger, undeniably stout, with grey hair and beard, was passing from middle-age into the shadow of the sixties. He dressed well, but the flat crown of his felt hat, and the artificial, exaggerated squareness of the broad shoulders, gave him a provincial appearance. His gesture as he paid the driver was absolutely characteristic--a mixture of the dignified and the boyish, the impressive and the timid. He had descended from the vehicle with precautions, but Mrs. Clayhanger jumped down lightly, though she was about as old and as grey as her husband. Her costume was not successful; she did not understand and never had understood how to dress herself. But she had kept her figure; she was as slim as a girl, and as restless.

George ran to the door, which the feverish parlourmaid had neglected to shut. His mother, mounting the steps, was struck full in the face by the apparition of her son in uniform. The Alderman, behind her, cried mockingly to cover his emotion: "Hal_lo_! Hal_lo_!"

"When did you come up?" asked George quietly, taking his mother's hand and kissing her. She slid past him into the house. Her eyes were moist.

"Last night," the Alderman answered. "Last train. Your mother's idea. All of a sudden. Thought you might be leaving."

"Well, I am," said George. "I have to report at Headquarters at Wimbledon by twelve o'clock. It's rather a good thing you've come. Lois is ill. Oh! Here's _my_ taxi." The parlourmaid had driven up.

"Ill!" exclaimed Mrs. Clayhanger.

"Yes. I've sent for the doctor, and he's sent for the nurse. I'm expecting the nurse every minute."

"You don't mean to say--" Mrs. Clayhanger began.

George nodded.

"She _must_ have had a shock. I knew what it would be for her. It's all very well, but--" Mrs. Clayhanger again left a sentence unfinished.

"I've sent for Laurencine too," said George. "She also may be here any minute."

"Oh!" said the old lady tartly. "I can stay as long as you like, you know. Lois and I get on splendidly."

It was true. They had had one enormous quarrel, which had mysteriously ended by both of them denying superiorly to all males that any quarrel had ever occurred.

		"If this is coffee, please bring me some tea; but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee." Abraham Lincoln

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