CHAPTER XXII
MR. PROHACK'S TRIUMPH
"And where is your charming daughter?" asked Mr. Softly Bishop so gentlyof Eve, when he had greeted her, and quite incidentally Mr. Prohack, inthe entrance hall of the Grand Babylon Hotel. He was alone--no sign ofMiss Fancy.
"Sissie?" said Eve calmly. "I haven't the slightest idea."
"But I included her in my invitations--and Mr. Morfey too."
Mr. Prohack was taken aback, foreseeing the most troublesomecomplications; and he glanced at Eve as if for guidance and support. Hewas nearly ready to wish that after all Sissie had not gone and gotmarried secretly and prematurely. Eve, however, seemed quiteundisturbed, though she offered him neither guidance nor support.
"Surely," said Mr. Prohack hesitatingly, "surely you didn't mentionSissie in your letter to me!"
"Naturally I didn't, my dear fellow," answered Mr. Bishop. "I wrote toher separately, knowing the position taken up by the modern young lady.And she telephoned me yesterday afternoon that she and Morfey would bedelighted to come."
"Then if you know so much about the modern young lady," said Eve, withbright and perfect self-possession, "you wouldn't expect my daughter toarrive with her parents, would you?"
Mr. Softly Bishop laughed.
"You're only putting off the evil moment," said Mr. Prohack in thesilence of his mind to Eve, and similarly he said to Mr. Softly Bishop:
"I do wish you wouldn't call me 'my dear fellow.' True, I come to yourlunch, but I'm not your dear fellow and I never will be."
"I invited your son also, Prohack," continued Mr. Bishop. "Together withMiss Winstock or Warburton--she appears to have two names--to make apair, to make a pair you understand. But unfortunately he's beensuddenly called out of town on the most urgent business." As he utteredthese last words Mr. Bishop glanced in a peculiar manner partly at hisnose and partly at Mr. Prohack; it was a singular feat of glancing, andMr. Prohack uncomfortably wondered what it meant, for Charles laycontinually on Mr. Prohack's chest, and at the slightest provocationCharles would lie more heavily than usual.
"Am I right in assuming that the necklace affair is satisfactorilysettled?" Mr. Softly Bishop enquired, his spectacles gleaming andblinking at the adornment of Eve's neck.
"You are," said Eve. "But it wouldn't be advisable for you to be toocurious about details."
Her aplomb, her sangfroid, astounded Mr. Prohack--and relieved him. Withan admirable ease she went on to congratulate their host upon hisengagement, covering him with petals of flattery and good wishes. Mr.Prohack could scarcely recognise his wife, and he was not sure that heliked her new worldiness quite as much as her old ingenuous andsometimes inarticulate simplicity. At any rate she was a changed woman.He steadied himself, however, by a pertinent reflection: she was alwaysa changed woman.
Then Sissie and Ozzie appeared, looking as though they had been marriedfor years. Mr. Prohack's heart began to beat. Ignoring Mr. SoftlyBishop, Sissie embraced her mother with prim affectionateness, and Evesurveyed her daughter with affectionate solicitude. Mr. Prohack feltthat he would never know what had passed between these two on theprevious day, for they were a pair of sphinxes when they chose, and hewas too proud to encourage confidences from Ozzie. Whatever it mighthave been it was now evidently buried deep, and the common life, after aterrible pause, had resumed.
"How do you do, Miss Prohack," said Mr. Softly Bishop, greeting. "Soglad you could come."
Mr. Prohack suspected that his cheeks were turning pale, and was ashamedof himself. Even Sissie, for all her young, hard confidence, wavered.
But Eve stepped in.
"Don't you know, Mr. Bishop?--No, of course you don't. We ought to havetold you. My daughter is now Mrs. Morfey. You see in our family we allhave such a horror of the conventional wedding and reception and formalhoneymoon and so on, that we decided the marriage should be strictlyprivate, with no announcements of any kind. I really think you are thefirst to know. One thing I've always liked about actresses is that inthe afternoon you can read of them getting married that day and then goand see them play the same evening. It seems to me so sensible. And aswe were all of the same opinion at our house, especially Sissie and herfather, there was no difficulty."
"Upon my word," said Mr. Softly Bishop shaking hands with Ozzie. "Ibelieve I shall follow your example."
Mr. Prohack sank into a chair.
"I feel rather faint," he said. "Bishop, do you think we might have acocktail or so?"
"My dear fellow, how thoughtless of me! Of course! Waiter! Waiter!" AsMr. Bishop swung round in the direction of waiters Eve turned in alarmto Mr. Prohack. Mr. Prohack with much deliberation winked at her, andshe drew back. "Yes," he murmured. "You'll be the death of me one day,and then you'll be sorry."
"I don't think a cocktail is at all a good thing for you, dad," Sissiecalmly observed.
The arrival of Miss Fancy provided a distraction more agreeable than Mr.Prohack thought possible; he positively welcomed the slim, angularblonde, for she put an end to a situation which, prolonged anothermoment, would have resulted in a severe general constraint.
"You're late, my dear," said Mr. Softly Bishop, firmly.
The girl's steely blue-eyed glance shot out at the greeting, but seemedto drop off flatly from Mr. Bishop's adamantine spectacles like a bulletfrom Bessemer armour.
"Am I?" she replied uncertainly, in her semi-American accent. "Where'sthe ladies' cloakroom of this place?"
"I'll show you," said Mr. Bishop, with no compromise.
The encounter was of the smallest, but it made Mr. Prohack suspect thatperhaps Mr. Bishop was not after all going into the great warfare ofmatrimony blindly or without munitions.
"I've taken the opportunity to tell Miss Fancy that she will be the onlyunmarried woman at my lunch," said Mr. Bishop amusingly, when hereturned from piloting his beloved. A neat fellow, beyond question!
Miss Fancy had apparently to re-dress herself, judging from the lengthof her absence. The cocktails, however, beguiled the suspense.
"Is this for me?" she asked, picking up a full glass when she came back.
"No, my dear," said Mr. Bishop. "It isn't. We will go in to lunch." Andthey went in to lunch, leaving unconsumed the cocktail which theabstemious and spartan Sissie had declined to drink.