whom should he meet one day, but beaver!
beaver of the inky thumbs and the bitten nails, who had, somehow, eluded him, though they both worked in the narrow street. nothing astonishing in this, for the work of beaver lay in circles different from his own. he never came outside the radius of meetings, inquests, the opening of bazaars and the hundred and one minor happenings that are to be found in "to-day's diary." but here he was, utterly unchanged from the beaver with whom humphrey had lived in guilford street, with mrs wayzgoose, her wasteful coal-scuttles and her bulrushes.
they met in a chop-house by temple bar, a strange place, where the lower floor was packed with keen-faced men from the courts of justice over the way and the temple at the back. they sat crowded together, abandoning all comfort in the haste to enjoy the luxury of the chops and steaks for which the house was famed.
there were no table-cloths on the round tables, where coffee-cups and plates of poached eggs and rounds of toast jostled each other. only in england would people sit with joy and eat cheek by jowl in this fashion, with the smell of coffee and hot food in their nostrils, and the clatter of plates and knives and forks in their ears.
upstairs men played chess and dominoes over coffee and rolls, cracking their boiled eggs with difficulty in the cramped space.
humphrey heard a voice hail him as he threaded his way between the tables. he looked back and saw beaver waving a friendly fork at him.
"hullo!" cried beaver, shifting his chair away a few[248] inches, and seriously incommoding a grey-haired man so absorbed in his game of chess that his coffee was cold and untouched. "come and sit here," cried beaver.
they shook hands. "well, how goes it?" humphrey asked. "still with the nose to the grindstone?"
"that's it," beaver said. their positions had been changed since the days of easterham, when beaver seemed miles above him in worldly success. he remembered the day beaver left for london, to embark on a career which shone clear and brilliant in humphrey's imagination. "write in!" those had been beaver's last words. "write in. that's what i did." the vision of it all rose before him now, as he sat by beaver: the dingy office, with the scent of the fishmonger next door, the auctioneer's bills on the walls, with samples of mourning and wedding cards, and tradesmen's invoice headings, to show the excellence of the gazette's jobbing department. and now—? he was conscious of a change in beaver's attitude towards him.
humphrey had taken his place in fleet street among the personalities, among the young men of promise and achievement. he had even seen his name signed to occasional articles in the day—glorious thrill, splendid emotion, that repaid all the long anonymous hours of patient work!
"you're getting on!" beaver said. there was admiration unconcealed in his eyes and voice. "great scott! it seems impossible that you and i ever worked together on that rotten easterham paper. that was a fine story you did of the hextable railway smash."
"i've got nothing to complain of," humphrey replied, hacking at a roll of bread. "it hasn't been easy work. yours isn't, for the matter of that."
beaver laughed. "oh, mine—it isn't difficult, you know. i get so used to it, that i can report a speech mechanically without even thinking of the speaker."
[249]
"it's a safe job, you know," he said, after a pause. "a life job."
humphrey knew what beaver's exultation in the safety of his job meant.
there were men in fleet street, husbands of wives, and fathers of families, who lived and worked tremblingly from day to day, never certain when a fatal envelope would not contain the irrevocable "regret" of the editor that he could no longer continue the engagement.
why, it might happen to humphrey himself, for aught he knew. truly, beaver was to be envied after all.
"but don't you think you'd do better on a daily paper?" humphrey said. "i could tell rivers about you, you know. there might be room on the day."
"i'm taking no risks. i'm going to stop where i am. you see—er—" beaver became suddenly hesitant, and smiled foolishly. "what i mean to say is—i'm engaged to be married."
he leant back in his seat and contemplated the astonishment in humphrey's face.
"no—are you really!"
"fact," retorted beaver. "been engaged for the last year."
beaver going to be married! the news touched humphrey oddly: beaver could be earning very little more than humphrey had earned at the time when he had almost plunged into married life, and there was no desire on beaver's part to reach out and grasp greater things; he was in a life job, untouched by the wrack and torment of ambition, and the craving for success. oh, assuredly, beaver was not to be pitied in the equable calmness of his life and temperament.
"well, i congratulate you, old man—though i never thought you were the marrying sort."
beaver took the congratulations blushingly. "nor did i, until i met her."
[250]
he spoke of "her" in an awed, impressive manner, as though she were some abnormal person far removed from all other people in the world. humphrey tried to figure the girl whom beaver had chosen. he thought of her as a rather plain, nice homely sort of person, with no great burden of intellect or imagination.
beaver's hand dived into an inside pocket, and out came a leather case. this he opened, and displayed a photograph, reverently.
"that's her!" he said, showing the portrait.
humphrey kept his self-possession well. neither by a look nor a word did he betray the past: there was nothing in his manner to show beaver that the girl whose portrait he held in his hand was she whose lips had clung to his in the young, passionate kisses of yester-year.
but, as humphrey looked on the face of lilian filmer, the same lilian, even though the photograph was new, and the hair was done in a different fashion, an acute feeling of sorrow came over him, bringing with it the remembrance of aching days, of the early beginnings, of those meetings and partings, and hearts that strained, and he saw the reflection of himself, foolish and cruel, mistaking the shadow for the substance, struggling and struggling, all for nothing ... for not even as much as beaver had gained.
she looked at him out of the eyes of her photograph, and about her lips there still hovered that smile which had always been a riddle to him; a smile of indulgent love, or contempt? who knows—a woman's smile is the secret of her sex. yet now, it seemed, her lips were curved in triumph. this was her revenge on him, that he should go for ever loveless through the world, while she should steal into a haven of welcome peace.
beaver's voice brought him back to physical things. she would kiss beaver's shaggy-moustached lips, and his[251] arms would catch her in an embrace.... how soon she had forgotten ... he thought, unreasonably.... she might have waited.... she might have understood....
"well?" said beaver, awaiting praise. "you've had a good old look."
"she's awfully nice and charming," humphrey answered, returning the photograph. "she's like somebody i know."
"oh, you've probably seen the original, old man, when you used to come and call for me. she used to be one of the girls in our office."
he had forgotten that lunch in the fleet street public-house, when humphrey had asked for the name of the girl.
used to be one of the girls in the office! then lilian had left. he wondered what she was doing, and an impulse that could not be withstood, compelled him to find out whether she had ever mentioned him to beaver.
"by george!" he said. "i remember, now. miss filmer, her name was, wasn't it?"
"that's it, miss filmer. did you ever speak to her, then?"
he was treading on uncertain ground. it was clear that she had never spoken of him. he felt that she had forgotten him, absolutely and completely.
"oh, i think so—just casually, now and again."
"well, i never!" said the innocent beaver. "that's interesting. i'll tell her i met you."
"oh, she wouldn't remember me or my name," humphrey answered, hastily. "it was only just 'how-d'ye-do' and 'good-day' with us.... so she's left the office now."
"yes. it's rather a sad story. her father died, you know. he was a chronic invalid—paralysis, i think.[252] anyhow, we don't speak of it much, and i've never pressed her. but the father who was so useless in life, has been the salvation of the mother by his death. odd, isn't it? he was insured for a good round sum, and lilian's mother—did i tell you her name was lilian?—has bought a little annuity, so that lilian's free. she used to slave for her mother and the rest of the family until they grew up. that's why she worked overtime at the office. 'pon me soul, i'd rather be the lowest jackal in fleet street than some of these poor little typist girls at eighteen bob a week.... well, time's up. i've got to be at the mansion house at three: the lord mayor's taking the chair at some blooming meeting to raise a fund for something, somewhere. what are you doing to-day?"
"oh, i'm on the klipp case at the old bailey."
humphrey came away profoundly disturbed. something entirely unexpected had happened. lilian had lived as the vaguest shadow at the back of his mind, just as he had last seen her, when she bent down to kiss him, and now this picture would have to be erased. he shuddered at the thought. she was beaver's "girl": she would be beaver's "missis."
after all, what did it matter? he and lilian had long since parted; there had been little in common between them. he might have married her, and been as beaver; she might have married him, but never, never, could she have held the magic and the inspiration of elizabeth carr.
his mind, always susceptible to outside influences, brooded on the new fact that had come into his life. unconsciously, as a natural sequel to his thoughts, he began to dream of his new love, and to see himself happier than he had ever been, with elizabeth for ever at his side. the same motives that impelled him to lilian after that scene in the registry office, when[253] wratten was married, now urged him towards kenneth carr's sister....
and, of course, one day, beaver would have to mention his name to lilian. she would probably smile and say nothing. "he's engaged now," beaver would say. "there won't be any bachelors left, soon." and that would be his message to lilian.
