CHAPTER VI

MISS BEAMAN

He was up at eight o'clock next morning, was dressed and out by nine. An hour too soon. At nine o'clock London is seemingly awake, but with its eyes still closed.

He walked from Sloane Square to Charing Cross and then on to Fleet Street, arriving at White Lion Court a few minutes after ten. Martia had not arrived yet, but the senior partner, Miss Beaman, was there--a capable, middle-aged woman who received him and held him in talk till the arrival of the junior.

Rose Beaman was one of those people who do not hang on formalities. She talked to Bobby as though she had known him all her life; she talked of his work and she talked of her partner.

Martia was killing herself with work; she was one of those conscientious people who slave themselves to death over detail; she had taken only a week's holiday that summer, and a month would not have been too much.

"You see," said Miss Beaman, "it all depends on the person and where they were born. A born Londoner is different from a person brought up in the country. I have known Martia since she was a child. We used to call her March Hare, she was so wild and such a tom-boy: now she is like a creature tamed and depressed by captivity. Cities are all wrong, it seems to me; great prisons--work-houses--where the people are quite content, not because they ought to be content but because they are subdued to their surroundings."

Then the arrival of the discussed one broke off the conversation, and a minute later Bobby found himself tête-à-tête with her and trying to explain Behrens' whole proposition in a few words.

"He's backing me to the extent of three thousand pounds," he finished at last, "and we are to divide the profits. And that brings me to what I want to say. You introduced me to this business and, of course, your firm must have a share in it."

The girl laughed.

"I think we will discuss that," said she, "when we see how things turn out. There mightn't be anything to share. Then, again, it's all very well to say we ought to share in the profits, but how about the work and the danger of the business? It was no trouble to me to give you an introduction to Mr. Behrens. He asks you to take the matter up; you take all sorts of risks and the work is sure to be hard. Why should we take a commission when we run no risks with you and do no work?"

She spoke without animation, in a tired way. Here, in the full light of morning, Bobby began to perceive the truth of Miss Beaman's words. March Hare, the light-hearted creature of other days pictured by Miss Beaman, was far from being suggested by this girl, fading in the air of Fleet Street, exhausted by office work and the struggle with editors, authors, clerks, typewriters, and all the gnomes and fiends that move behind the great set stage of Storyland.

Bobby sometimes had luminous ideas; one came to him now.

"Why not?" asked he.

"Why not what?" asked she.

"Share in the risks and the work. Take a holiday and come with us. I'm not joking. We'll only be a few months, and think of it--think of it," said Bobby, almost frightened at the daring of the proposal, which in the Victorian age would have caused him to be exterminated by an outraged parent or guardian, but which left Martia Hare quite unshocked--she had, indeed, driven an ambulance in the Great War. "Think of it! There was never such an expedition before. Think of the fun and the excitement? Fishing? It beats fishing hollow. It's not fishing for fish but for old gods and things. There's no knowing what we may get up out of that place. Think of the Greek Islands! It's a regular town, streets and buildings, all covered with shallow water clear as a diamond. Hyalos is the name of it."

"Don't," said the girl almost irritably. "How could I? I'm tied to my work. It's like holding out an apple to a donkey that's behind bars and can't reach it. Would I come? Of course I would come, if I were free."

"Miss Beaman said you were working yourself to death, and that you wanted a long holiday. She'd let you free soon enough. Besides, you're a partner, aren't you? And it's business; you would have your commission on your share!"

"It's impossible," said Martia. "There are too many things to be done here."

"Leaving everything else aside," said he, "your brains would help to make the thing a success. I'm not a brainy person, at all events in that way. I'm always forgetting things. Well, say this at all events; say that you'll think of it."

"I'm sure to do that," she answered, with a sigh.

"I mean as a business proposition. Promise me to think it over and try and find some way by which you may be able to come."

"Yes, I'll do that, if you wish, but it's hopeless."

"No, that's no use. Promise me that you will put the hopelessness aside and really think of it and try and find some way out. Think it out like a problem."

"Very well. I will."

"Remember you will be one of the expedition, so you'll have no expenses. Oh, promise me another thing."

"What?"

"That you'll talk the matter over with Miss Beaman."

"But I thought it was to be kept a secret?"

"So it is. But Miss Beaman is safe."

"Very well. I will talk to her about it."

He looked at his watch.

"Now I must be going. I have to catch the train to Bournemouth and get to Poole Harbour to see a man I know there who may be able to help me. May I come to-morrow and tell you how I am getting on?"

"Yes, certainly," said Martia, looking at the clock behind him. "Have you got your luggage with you or will you have to go home to pack?"

"Which luggage?" asked Bobby.

"Well, a bag or something. You see, Poole is a good way from Bournemouth, and you mayn't be able to get back to-night."

He hadn't thought of this. He had reckoned in a hazy way that he could be back by the evening.

"There you are," said he. "I clean forgot all about that. You remember the first time I saw you you said I was a forgetful person. I am. I'll just have to buy a toothbrush and a few things on the way to the station."

Off he went, and the girl sat for a moment looking at the morning correspondence before her on the desk, but gazing in reality at the mental picture of Bobby and his irresponsibility. She knew his character quite well by now--or so she thought. Anyhow, she knew pieces of it. Picking up the railway guide that lay on her desk, she followed the traveller in her mind. She found that the proper way to get to Poole is not to go to Bournemouth but to Poole, direct.