登陆注册
14824800000014

第14章

I was dining in town that evening, and took my purchase home by a late train; his demeanour was grave and intensely respectable; he was not the animal to commit himself by any flagrant indiscretion; he was gentle and tractable too, and in all respects an agreeable contrast in character to the original. Still, it may have been the after-dinner workings of conscience, but I could not help fancying that I saw a certain look in the creature's eyes, as if he were aware that he was required to connive at a fraud, and rather resented it.

If he would only be good enough to back me up! Fortunately, however, he was such a perfect facsimile of the outward Bingo that the risk of detection was really inconsiderable.

When I got him home I put Bingo's silver collar round his neck, congratulating myself on my forethought in preserving it, and took him in to see my mother. She accepted him as what he seemed without the slightest misgiving; but this, though it encouraged me to go on, was not decisive--the spurious poodle would have to encounter the scrutiny of those who knew every tuft on the genuine animal's body!

Nothing would have induced me to undergo such an ordeal as that of personally restoring him to the Curries. We gave him supper, and tied him up on the lawn, where he howled dolefully all night and buried bones.

The next morning I wrote a note to Mrs. Currie, expressing my pleasure at being able to restore the lost one, and another to Lilian, containing only the words, "Will you believe /now/ that I am sincere?"

Then I tied both round the poodle's neck, and dropped him over the wall into the colonel's garden just before I started to catch my train to town.

I had an anxious walk home from the station that evening; I went round by the longer way, trembling the whole time lest I should meet any of the Currie household, to which I felt myself entirely unequal just then. I could not rest until I knew whether my fraud had succeeded, or if the poodle to which I had intrusted my fate had basely betrayed me; but my suspense was happily ended as soon as I entered my mother's room. "You can't think how delighted those poor Curries were to see Bingo again," she said at once; "and they said such charming things about you, Algy--Lilian particularly; quite affected she seemed, poor child! And they wanted you to go round and dine there and be thanked to-night, but at last I persuaded them to come to us instead. And they're going to bring the dog to make friends. Oh, and I met Frank Travers; he's back from circuit again now, so I asked him in too to meet them!"

I drew a deep breath of relief. I had played a desperate game, but I had won! I could have wished, to be sure, that my mother had not thought of bringing in Travers on that of all evenings, but I hoped that I could defy him after this.

The colonel and his people were the first to arrive, he and his wife being so effusively grateful that they made me very uncomfortable indeed; Lilian met me with downcast eyes and the faintest possible blush, but she said nothing just then. Five minutes afterward, when she and I were alone together in the conservatory, where I had brought her on pretence of showing a new begonia, she laid her hand on my sleeve and whispered, almost shyly, "Mr. Weatherhead--Algernon! Can you ever forgive me for being so cruel and unjust to you?" And I replied that, upon the whole, I could.

We were not in the conservatory long, but before we left it beautiful Lilian Roseblade had consented to make my life happy. When we reentered the drawing-room we found Frank Travers, who had been told the story of the recovery; and I observed his jaw fall as he glanced at our faces, and noted the triumphant smile which I have no doubt mine wore, and the tender, dreamy look in Lilian's soft eyes. Poor Travers! I was sorry for him, although I was not fond of him. Travers was a good type of rising young common-law barrister, tall, not bad- looking, with keen dark eyes, black whiskers, and the mobile forensic mouth which can express every shade of feeling, from deferential assent to cynical incredulity; possessed, too, of an endless flow of conversation that was decidedly agreeable, if a trifling too laboriously so, he had been a dangerous rival. But all that was over now; he saw it himself at once, and during dinner sank into dismal silence, gazing pathetically at Lilian, and sighing almost obtrusively between the courses. His stream of small talk seemed to have been cut off at the main.

"You've done a kind thing, Weatherhead," said the colonel. "I can't tell you all that dog is to me, and how I missed the poor beast. I'd quite given up all hope of ever seeing him again, and all the time there was Weatherhead, Mr. Travers, quietly searching all London till he found him! I sha'n't forget it. It shows a really kind feeling."

I saw by Travers's face that he was telling himself he would have found fifty Bingos in half the time--if he had only thought of it; he smiled a melancholy assent to all the colonel said, and then began to study me with an obviously depreciatory air.

"You can't think," I heard Mrs. Currie telling my mother, "how really /touching/ it was to see poor Bingo's emotion at seeing all the old familiar objects again! He went up and sniffed at them all in turn, quite plainly recognising everything. And he was quite put out to find that we had moved his favourite ottoman out of the drawing-room. But he /is/ so penitent too, and so ashamed of having run away; he kept under a chair in the hall all the morning; he wouldn't come in here, either, so we had to leave him in your garden."

"He's been sadly out of spirits all day," said Lilian; "he hasn't bitten one of the tradespeople."

"Oh, /he's/ all right, the rascal!" said the colonel, cheerily. "He'll be after the cats again as well as ever in a day or two."

"Ah, those cats!" said my poor innocent mother. "Algy, you haven't tried the air-gun on them again lately, have you? They're worse than ever."

同类推荐
  • THE ODYSSEY

    THE ODYSSEY

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 琴谱序

    琴谱序

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 修真十书锺吕传道集

    修真十书锺吕传道集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 尊贤

    尊贤

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • Essays of Travel

    Essays of Travel

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 东园公记

    东园公记

    本书是林鹏先生新近编写而成的散文集,大部分的文章是跟林先生当兵时期的经历有关,可读性强,可供文学爱好者品读。
  • 总裁请再爱我一次

    总裁请再爱我一次

    “这世界,如果有如果。如果一切重头,如果你还在说你爱我……”只可惜,这个世界上不会有如果。有些错误已经造成了,在想弥补也是于事无补……当苏梓然替自己的同胞妹妹活着的时候,便知道自己这一生都是在赎罪了……但命运却让她遇到了与某人极其相似的贺君泽,意外之余发现他竟然是自己的新上司。只想保留私心偷偷地看他一眼,却发生了种种误会……(本文纯属虚构,请勿模仿。)
  • 胡桃树下

    胡桃树下

    不知道如何描述这个作品,我也仅仅粗略起草和构思,不明白脉络和故事走向,小说的创作更适合顺其自然,船到桥头。
  • 奢血日记..

    奢血日记..

    血的祭奠融下了她一身的悲哀多少次的惊醒给了她坚强的身心王族吸血鬼的地位换来的恶魔多少年后就会苏醒悲惨的重演血腥的历史
  • 快穿之深情男配炮灰女主

    快穿之深情男配炮灰女主

    当直男遇上耽美..在被掰弯的路上一去不复返,且看冰山男如何玩转各个位面,炮灰女主,勾引男主。
  • 天域霸主

    天域霸主

    三千大道,吾取其一……天域大陆,宗门林立,武道为尊,强者如云……群雄并起,血流成河,武道至极,唯吾一人……龙宇,穿越重生,拥百美图,练绝世神功,战数万群雄,诛诸天众神,成一世霸主……
  • 小儿诊视门

    小儿诊视门

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 福妻驾到

    福妻驾到

    现代饭店彪悍老板娘魂穿古代。不分是非的极品婆婆?三年未归生死不明的丈夫?心狠手辣的阴毒亲戚?贪婪而好色的地主老财?吃上顿没下顿的贫困宭境?不怕不怕,神仙相助,一技在手,天下我有!且看现代张悦娘,如何身带福气玩转古代,开面馆、收小弟、左纳财富,右傍美男,共绘幸福生活大好蓝图!!!!快本新书《天媒地聘》已经上架开始销售,只要3.99元即可将整本书抱回家,你还等什么哪,赶紧点击下面的直通车,享受乐乐精心为您准备的美食盛宴吧!)
  • 殖民崛起

    殖民崛起

    17世纪,海洋争霸,英国崛起,荷兰衰落,秦治能否带领中国,完成一次华丽转身,我们不仅掠夺土地,我们还要人才。
  • 地下王朝

    地下王朝

    一个剑与魔法并重的世界,一条神秘徽章里的乌金飞龙一只从万兽坑从爬出来的战兽会对这个世界造成什么样的影响?一个被神秘闪电洗礼过的少年,怎么从一个流氓头子,到建立了庞大的地下王朝,成为大陆黑暗中的王者?