HIS FIRST LEVEE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3019, 24 January 1912, Page 89

HIS FIRST LEVEE.

By Edith E. Rednall.

His Worship the Mayor was in high good humour. His cup of pleasure had never seemed so full and sparkling as at this moment, The keenest joy lay, for him, in the fact that his -wife was not in the house when he sought to make her a sharer of hjis news. Too impatient to fumble in more than one of his many pockets for the latchkey—it was in its usual place, but his fingers in their hurry did not feel it—he pressed the bellbutton hard and long. He passed by Jane, who admitted him, with such a whirlwind in his manner and such a look of triumphant glee upon his countenance, that she, returning to the kitchen, told cook she’d like to set the house-bells ringing. Never had master returned without a scowl upon his face since she had been housemaid at the “Paper Mills.” Indeed, it would nol have been too much if the bells of both the parish churches of which Campington boasted could have been made to join in the rejoicings at such a comparatively rare event.

“We shall hear something before night, and it will be something the town must know, you bet!” said the cook. In his own dining room waited hia Worship in an attitude not unusual to men—masters of houses or of towns—with his back to the fireplace. Humming to himself the while he waited with more or less impatience the entrance of his little round, fresh-faced, dark-eyed, cushion of a wife.

It was especially hard upon her husband that she should to-day have lingered so long in her visitation of one or the two districts she had taken in charge. As her husband was a town official she deemed it a point of honour to become a churchworker in both parishes. Thil she could the more easily do, as thf meetings for churchworkers were arranged at the two rectories, one at the beginning and the other at the end of each month.

i In the early days of their settlement at Campington Paper 'Mills, Mrs Gamer had joined tho worshipperrs at the Methodist Chapel. In that form of faith had her father, a worthy grocer in » Cornish mining town, brought up his seven children, of whom she was the only girl. It was the fond old man’s proud boast that his Em’ly could marry as rich a man ns could be found and not bo ashamed to look him in the face. When Burden W'itherington Gamer succeeded to his father’s paper mills and a fortune of twenty thousand pounds, the match was deemed by all save the bridegroom’s own relatives,' to be in every way ‘ a suitable one from a worldly point of _view. “Witherington hasn’t got a very nice temper, but Em’ly—she can keep her end up!” said Em’ly’s old father, somewhat vulgarly. Absence of stagnation is perhaps almost inevitable among the characteristics of persons of ambition and of vigorous minds. Whether their activities show backward or forward movements must be left to circumstances to decide. After some time the couple found the ministrations at the Congregational Chapel more

uited to their tastes; the members of the congregation worshipping there, too, being “more of their own set,” as Mrs Gamer expressed it. But as years passed on, and her husband found a seat in the Town Council, the holding of which entailed, though not necessarily, an occasional following in the Mayor’s trahp to worship at the Parish Church on “Corporation Sunday,” another revolution took place. The hassocks were removed from the pew in Queen Street Chapel to an equally comfortable pew in St. Mary’s Parish Church. From this time onwards to Witherington Gamer’s second election to the mayoralty things went very well with them at the mills. The occupation of the Mayor’s chair had always been an object of ambition to Mr Gamer. He felt compelled to signalise the year in which he was first asked to accept this important office by the presentation to the town of some additional apparatus to the works of the Town Hall clock. Man’s work did not always end when the shades of evening fell. Citizens hurrying to and fro across the Market square needed to know the time in the darkness as well as in the light, and the illumination of the clock was felt to be a grateful recognition of the honour paid to the new Mayor. But by the time the works were completed they were found to be so costly, they so far exceeded the Bum estimated and set apart, that he felt compelled to announce at a council meeting that at the close of that year the Town Council itself must bear the cost of the necessary gas. This announcement was not made till after his re-election to the mayoralty. This second filling of the chair coincided with what is known as the “Diamond” Jubilee. And it was in the spring of this year, following the November of his re-election, that what was to him the moment of final triumph came. Along with other provincial mayors, Campington’s mayor was “commanded” to attend a levee held by the then Prince of Wales, as representing our late lamented Queen. It was tlie gorgeously-emblazoned card letting forth this command, just received from the Lord Chamberlain’s office, that Witherington Gamer was now burning with eager desire to show to his wife. From the fireplace, in which the chilling east winds made it necessary to keep up a cheerful blaze to an unusually late date in this particular season, his Worship moved to the window and looked cut upon the trim and painfully tidy lawns, with their geometrical beds ablaze with tulips, that filled in the expanse between the house and the mill stream.

He remembered with a pang of regret that he had forgotten to count the heads pf asparagus in the long beds that morning—a precaution he always took to prevent his being robbed by his gardener. His little soul, a prey to pangs connected with the objects of wealth and power, could never believe in the possible honesty of any human beings he might employ. His attitude of mind towards all his employees was: “Do well by me, and you shall have your just wages —no more; and if I give you a chance of robbing me it will be my look-ont. I won’t be such a fool if I can help it.’’ To such a nature as Ids was continually meted out its own share of justice. The man was rarely happy and at his ease, save, perhaps, when warmed by generous wine; for which, it, must he admitted, he showed an undue fondness at times.

The want of ordinary human joy was seen in his face, which nsuallv wore a very ill-tempered expression. To his little wife continually fell the task of pouring much oil upon many troubled waters, and oven in this she was not always successful. The vulgarity produced by an incessant craving for gain is hard to root out of some natures. And it has a contaminating influence. Gamer did not step from the window to the garden and his asparagus beds then, but fell into a reverie, pondering oyer the cost and style of garments, and other matters necessarily attendant upon a worthy representation of his town at the Palace of St. James’s; a reverie so deep that he did not hear his wife’s return. She had been to her room and removed her outdoor raps before she appeared in the dining room for the old-fashioned, comfortable 5 o’clock tea that was the custom in that household. The effects of this were somewhat irritating to her lord and master. Ho upbraided her for her tardiness. To this she replied, thinking to soothe him, by a narrative of what she had said to two of his pet aversions in the town, and what thev had said to her.

“I wouldn’t go near them if the rector and Mrs Cornwall did not think so much of them, and if one were not sure to meet them in all the best houses.”

She chattered on, heedless apparently of her husband's fixed look and seeming pre-occupation. “But how those two Miss Bensons can live in that lonely old house doing all their own work, without a single maid to help them! They tell me quite unfa I us hi gly that they even do some of their own washing and enjoy it ! How they live like that, and make friends with the people they do, I can’t imagine. I’ve asked them to come and see me, and have a chat over a cup of tea many a time; and they’ve always had some excuse or other. So to-day I lost my temper with them, and gave it to them straight. T told them - it was very bad indeed to be poor; but to be poor and proud along with it made folks seem positively wicked in my eves I I wanted the youngest one to give Kathleen some drawing lessons. She’s always had a taste that way ; and Mrs Cornwall (the rector’s wife) says there is no hotter teacher anywhere. She must know. But their fee is actually double what little §mith, the Art School master, charges, "and I told them so. They only said they thought he would be the best teacher for Kathleen. As if we would have him imioking and making eyes at our jjirlsl

The man has no manners whatever! I said ‘No!’ I-thought if people wanted work they should name fees that would bring it within their reach. Everybody says they are the sort of people that like plain speech ; and I never say behind folk’s backs whot I don’t say to their faces.”

“No, my dear, you don’t!” said her husband, who had some uncomfortable memories of a few plain home-truths launched from time to time in his direction.

“But never mind the Miss Bensons now! I daresay with all their airs and graces they have never been to Court, and that is where we, at least I, shall have been before a month has passed. See here!”

And he handed to the fiery little lady opposite him the card that he carried in its envelope in his large breast pocket. It had already been exhibited to half the leading townspeople whom he had met on his way in from the office to the house, and it was in a fair way to be well-worn ere it could again pass into the Lord Chamberlain's hands.

I “Cannot I go, too?” asked the little ■ lady, piteously. Then, after “taking in” the situation, “Oh, no! of course not; it is a levee, not a drawing room,” she added, before her husband could speak, and with a lingering note of regret in her voice. j “You shall come to town to the ■ tailor’s,” said he, “to help me to arrange | the details of the suit.” 1 “No, thank you, Witherington!” she ' replied. “I know my place better than i that. No, you must get James (naming I the town clerk) to see you through all j the preliminaries, and,” she asked hesitatingly, “hadn’t you better have a few j deportment lessons, so that you make sure everything is all correct and proper?”

j “My dear, I have arranged all that,” lie replied, somewhat pomously and testily. “But I mean to have my photograph taken at White’s in the suit; and, let me see, don’t you ladies who attend i drawing rooms invite your friends to ' see their gowns? I’m sure no one in Campington has ever seen a Court suit, so I shall let folk come in and have a look at it when all is ready.” So the details were all arranged, and many simple citizens saw the wondrous array of black velvet coat and knee . breeches, bright buttons, black silk hose, and patent leather shoes. Rome few favoured ones saw the garments with the wearer insire them. The invitations to such “private views” became so frequent and lavish that Mrs Gamer felt thankful

there -would be but one prospect of a levee during their lifetime. Characteristically enough, the tailor’s bill was included in the elements of the “private view.”

At length the eventful day arrived, and Campington’s Mayor found himself on the platform of London Bridge Station, with all the glories of his State attire concealed below the long, heavy, handsome fur-lined overcoat he habitually wore on great occasions during the winter months—a piece of vanity this, of which he was very proud indeed. He felt that this outer garment must in itself sufficiently advertise his dignity and destination. He had lunched liberally during his two hours’ railway journey to town ; and now he felt a sense of comfort approaching to drowsiness as he sought out the neatest-looking “growler” he could find upon the cab-rank. “To the Palace !” he said pompously to the man as he entered. A waggish railway official with a cap ornamented with gold braid sprang forward with a salute, and closed the door upon him, seemingly repeating the direction he had heard given to the cab driver in a tone audible to hif ear alone. Returning to the window, he said deferentially to Gamer, by way of reasurring iiim, “He will take you all right, sir; he knows!”

The effects of the wine, of which Gamer had partaken generously at luncheon, combined with the warmth of the day and of his outer attire, brought on a drowsiness to which he readily succumbed. He had anticipated a long time of waiting in a line of other vehicles, so allowed himself to slumber on peacefully, having no thought but that his destination was patent to all beholders. He was dimly conscious at times of long lines of .sordid streets, of mean and dirty houses, through which they passed. It was .strange that the pavements of so many main thoroughfares should be so continuously “up.” Put these cabman knew everything. And no doubt this man, who looked a decent fellow enough, was taking him by all the short-cuts possible. But surely he ought to the “there” by now. The fine old trees of Alleyn Park. Dulwich, appeared. These he took to be the outskirts of fSt. James’s Park, entering by a way till now unknown to him. But surely ho could not remember anywhere near Pimlico such a long and steep hill as that they were now climbing. And what was that?—that great square tank that towered above the summit of that hill? And the still taller blnish-grev class structure that rose into the sky behind it? Thunder and furies! The Crystal Pdace! by all that was living! Here we must let the curtain fall upon his own expostulations and those of his driver. The latter, aided by the waggish railway official, had taken him for a great musician hound for a special performance at the Crystal Palace that afternoon, and was only puzzled at his preference of a long drive to a 20-minntes’ raihvav journey But there was no accounting for the eccentricities of genius. A return to Campington immediately after this was out of the question. It would have been ignominious. He telegraphed to liis wife that he had been seized with a sudden attack of illness, and that the. doctor summoned to his aid at the London Hotel, to which he had hastened back, had ordered him off to Torquay for complete rest and quiet. Would she pack a portmanteau and follow him as soon as possible?

Thus Campington heard little about its mayor’s first levee.