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Page 9
He was now thirty. He had come to Waldheim for a holiday,
because he liked the look of the station. His ticket entitled
him to travel further, but he had always intended to please
himself in the matter. Waldheim attracted him, and he had a
suit-case in the carriage with him and money in his pocket. Why
not get out?
The landlady of "The George" was only too glad to put him up, and
promised that her husband would drive over that afternoon for his
luggage.
"And you would like some lunch, I expect, sir."
"Yes, but don't give yourself any trouble about it. Cold
anything-you've-got."
"What about beef, sir?" she asked, as if she had a hundred
varieties of meat to select from, and was offering him her best.
"That will do splendidly. And a pint of beer."
While he was finishing his lunch, the landlord came in to ask
about the luggage. Antony ordered another pint, and soon had him
talking.
"It must be rather fun to keep a country inn," he said, thinking
that it was about time he started another profession.
"I don't know about fun, sir. It gives us a living, and a bit
over."
"You ought to take a holiday," said Antony, looking at him
thoughtfully.
"Funny thing your saying that," said the landlord, with a smile.
"Another gentleman, over from the Red House, was saying that only
yesterday. Offered to take my place 'n all." He laughed
rumblingly.
"The Red House? Not the Red House, Stanton?"
"That's right, sir. Stanton's the next station to Waldheim. The
Red House is about a mile from here--Mr. Ablett's."
Antony took a letter from his pocket. It was addressed from "The
Red House, Stanton," and signed "Bill."
"Good old Bill," he murmured to himself. "He's getting on."
Antony had met Bill Beverley two years before in a tobacconist's
shop. Gillingham was on one side of the counter and Mr. Beverley
on the other. Something about Bill, his youth and freshness,
perhaps, attracted Antony; and when cigarettes had been ordered,
and an address given to which they were to be sent, he remembered
that he had come across an aunt of Beverley's once at a
country-house. Beverley and he met again a little later at a
restaurant. Both of them were in evening-dress, but they did
different things with their napkins, and Antony was the more
polite of the two. However, he still liked Bill. So on one of
his holidays, when he was unemployed, he arranged an introduction
through a mutual friend. Beverley was a little inclined to be
shocked when he was reminded of their previous meetings, but his
uncomfortable feeling soon wore off, and he and Antony quickly
became intimate. But Bill generally addressed him as "Dear
Madman" when he happened to write.
Antony decided to stroll over to the Red House after lunch and
call upon his friend. Having inspected his bedroom which was not
quite the lavender-smelling country-inn bedroom of fiction, but
sufficiently clean and comfortable, he set out over the fields.
As he came down the drive and approached the old red-brick front
of the house, there was a lazy murmur of bees in the
flower-borders, a gentle cooing of pigeons in the tops of the
elms, and from distant lawns the whir of a mowing-machine, that
most restful of all country sounds ....
And in the hall a man was banging at a locked door, and shouting,
"Open the door, I say; open the door!"
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