THESE TWAIN. Bennett Arnold

‘ast said ‘If two on ye sh’ll agray on earth as touching onything that they sh’ll ask it sh’ll be done for them of my Father which is in ‘eaven. For where two or three are gathered together i’ my name theer am I in th’ midst of ’em. Oh Lord, George Edwin Clay’anger wants a two-bladed penknife. We all three on us want ye to send George Edwin Clay’anger a two-bladed penknife.”

      The words fell with impressive effect on the men in the garden.

      “What the—” Edwin exclaimed.

      “Hsh!” Ingpen stopped him in an excited whisper. “Don’t disturb them for anything in the world!”

      Silence followed.

      Edwin crept away like a scout towards a swing which he had arranged for his friend George before he became the husband of George’s mother. He climbed into it and over the wall could just see three boys’ heads in the yard illuminated by a lamp in the back-window of the cottage. Tertius Ingpen joined him, but immediately climbed higher on to the horizontal beam of the swing.

      “Who are they?” Ingpen asked, restraining his joy in the adventure.

      “The one on the right’s my stepson. The other big one is my sister Clara’s child, Bert. I expect the little one’s old Clowes’, the gravedigger’s kid. They say he’s a regular little parson—probably to make up for his parents. I expect they’re out somewhere having a jollification.”

      “Well,” Ingpen breathed. “I wouldn’t have missed this for a good deal.” He gave a deep, almost soundless giggle.

      Edwin was startled—as much as anything by the extraordinary deceitfulness of George. Who could possibly have guessed from the boy’s demeanour when his Aunt Clara mentioned Bert to him, that he had made an outrageous rendezvous with Bert that very night? Certainly he had blushed, but then he often blushed. Of course, the Benbows would assert that George had seduced the guileless Bert. Fancy them hunting the town for Bert at that instant! As regards Peter Clowes, George, though not positively forbidden to do so, had been warned against associating with him—chiefly because of the bad influence which Peter’s accent would have on George’s accent. His mother had said that she could not understand how George could wish to be friendly with a rough little boy like Peter. Edwin, however, inexperienced as he was, had already comprehended that children, like Eastern women, have no natural class bias; and he could not persuade himself to be the first to inculcate into George ideas which could only be called snobbish. He was a democrat. Nevertheless he did not like George to play with Peter Clowes.

      The small Peter, with uplifted face and clasped hands, repeated urgently, passionately:

      “O God! We all three on us want ye to send George Edwin Clay’anger a two-bladed penknife. Now lads, kneel, and all three on us together!”

      He stood between the taller and better-dressed boys unashamed, fervent, a born religionist. He was not even praying for himself. He was praying out of his profound impersonal interest in the efficacy of prayer.

      The three boys, kneeling, and so disappearing from sight behind the wall, repeated together:

      “O God! Please send George Edwin Clayhanger a two-bladed penknife.”

      Then George and Bert stood up again, shuffling about. Peter Clowes did not reappear.

      “I can’t help it,” whispered Ingpen in a strange, moved voice, “I’ve got to be God. Here goes! And it’s practically new, too!”

      Edwin in the darkness could see him feeling in his waistcoat pocket, and then raise his arm, and, taking careful aim, throw in the direction of the dimly lighted yard.

      “Oh!” came the cry of George, in sudden pain.

      The descending penknife had hit him in the face.

      There was a scramble on the pavement of the yard, and some muttered talk. The group went to the back window where the lamp was and examined the heavenly penknife. They were more frightened than delighted by the miracle. The unseen watchers in the swing were also rather frightened, as though they had interfered irremediably in a solemn and delicate crisis beyond their competence. In a curious way they were ashamed.

      “Yes, and what about me?” said the voice of fat Bert Benbow, sulkily. “This is all very well. But what about me? Ye tried without me and ye couldn’t do anything. Now I’ve come and ye’ve done it. What am I going to get? Ye’ve got to give me something instead of a half-share in that penknife, George.”

      George said:

      “Let’s pray for something for you now. What d’you want?”

      “I want a bicycle. Ye know what I want.”

      “Oh, no, you don’t, Bert Benbow!” said George. “You’ve got to want something safer than a bike. Suppose it comes tumbling down like the penknife did! We shall be dam well killed.”

      Tertius Ingpen could not suppress a snorting giggle.

      “I want a bike,” Bert insisted. “And I don’t want nothin’ else.”

      The two bigger boys moved vaguely away from the window, and the little religionist followed them in silence, ready to supplicate for whatever they should decide.

      “All right,” George agreed. “We’ll pray for a bicycle. But we’d better all stand as close as we can to the wall, under the spouting, in case.”

      The ceremonial was recommenced.

      “No,” Ingpen murmured. “I’m not being God this time. It won’t run to it.”

      Footsteps were heard on the lawn behind the swing. Ingpen slid down and Edwin jumped down. Johnnie Orgreave was approaching.

      “Hsh!” Ingpen warned him.

      “What are you chaps—”

      “Hsh!” Ingpen was more imperative.

      All three men walked away out of earshot of the yard, towards the window of the drawing-room—Johnnie Orgreave mystified, the other two smiling but with spirits disturbed. Johnnie heard the story in brief; it was told to him in confidence, as Tertius Ingpen held firmly that eavesdroppers, if they had any honour left, should at least hold their tongues.

      ii

      When Tertius Ingpen was introduced to Hilda in the drawing-room, the three men having entered by the French window, Edwin was startled and relieved by the deportment of the orientalist who thought that the proper place for women was behind the veil. In his simplicity he had assumed that the orientalist would indicate his attitude by a dignified reserve. Not at all! As soon as Ingpen reached Hilda’s hospitable gaze his whole bearing altered. He bowed, with a deferential bending that to an untravelled native must have seemed exaggerated; his face was transformed by a sweet smile; his voice became the voice of a courtier; he shook hands with chivalrous solicitude for the fragile hand shaken. Hilda was pleased by him, perceiving that this man was more experienced in the world than any of the other worldly guests. She liked that. Ingpen’s new symptoms were modified after a few moments, but when he was presented to Mrs. Fearns he reproduced them in their original intensity, and again when he was introduced to Vera Cheswardine.

      “Been out without your cap?” Hilda questioned Edwin, lifting her eyebrows. She said it in order to say something, for the entry of this ceremonious personage, who held all the advantages of the native and of the stranger, had a little overpowered the company.

      “Only just to see after Mr. Ingpen’s machine. Give me your cap, Mr. Ingpen. I’ll hang it up.”

      When he returned to the drawing-room from the hatstand Ingpen was talking with Janet Orgreave, whom he already knew.

      “Have you seen George, Edwin?” Hilda called across the drawing-room.

      “Hasn’t he gone to bed?”

      “That’s