CHAPTER XXX--HALF IN LOVE

The Faun Man looked up from his writing. Peter had been with him on _The Skylark_ for five days--five gorgeous days. He had found to his surprise that the golden woman was of the party. So far as outward appearances went, the picture-smashing incident might never have happened; Cherry conducted herself as a good comrade and the golden woman called her “dear.” They had to act as friends, since the Faun Man had taken rooms for them at the same hotel that they might chaperone each other. The men slept on board the house-boat.

It was nearly six. The last of the Finals had been rowed; the Regatta was ended. Far up the course one could still hear the distant cheering from the lawn where prizes were being distributed. The most sensational race of the afternoon had been the Diamond Sculls, in which Hardcastle had won by a bare half-length. Peter still tingled with the madness of the excitement, the splendid grit of the contested fight and the wildness of the applause. He had seen a slight young hero lifted out of his shell and carried shoulder-high; he wanted something like that to happen to himself so that Cherry might approve of him. He had just come from accompanying her back to The Red Lion; in an hour, when she had changed for dinner, he was going to fetch her. He had one more night before him--the gayest of them all, when the crews broke training, and then----. How often would he see her again? The gray old town would recover from its invasion, and settle back into routine and eventless quiet. Would something similar happen to his life? Nevertheless, he had one more night.

As he climbed aboard _The Skylark_ and entered, the Faun Man looked up. “Peter, i'm tired of being respectable--I want to be vulgar.”

Peter threw himself into a creaking wicker-chair. “That's not difficult; it's chiefly a matter of clothes.”

“And accent,” the Faun Man added; “refined speech is the soap and water of good manners.”

Peter chuckled. “Then don't tub.”

The Faun Man stood up and stretched himself. “I haven't. I've written a love-lyric that never saw a nailbrush. It's called _The Belle of Shoreditch_. When I've sung it to you I'll tell you why I wrote it. Isn't this a ripping tune?” He tinkled it over; then sat down crosslegged on the floor and commenced to drawl the words out:

“My bloke's a moke

And 'e cawn't tell me why;

But the fust time 'e spoke

'Twas no more than a sigh.

Says I, 'Don't mind me; we'll soon be dead.'

Says 'e, 'If yer dies, I'll break me 'ead.'

Says I, 'Why not yer 'eart instead,

Yer quaint old moke?'

“For yer cawn't be 'appy when yer 'alf in love--!

Yer must taik one road or the other;

Yer can maike o' life an up'ill shove,

Or marry a bloke wot ain't yer brother.”

“Chorus, Peter. Pick it up.”

The Faun Man nodded the time, swaying from the hips and rolling his head.

“For yer cawn't be 'appy when yer 'alf in love.”

He laid his mandolin aside. “Catchy, isn't it? There mayn't be much soap about the dialect, but there's plenty of philosophy in the sense. More than one person in this party is half in love. Take example from me, Peter; don't make a fool of yourself.”

Peter's face went red. He didn't think he'd been so obvious. To escape further pursuit, he turned the corner rapidly, “When are you going to start being vulgar?”

“Ah, yes!” The Faun Man came back. He struck a pose, his left hand resting on his hip, his right beating against his breast. “To-night,” he said. “To-night I lose my identity. I cease to be Lorenzo Arran and become Bill Willow, with his performing troupe of eccentric minstrels. I wear a red nose. My clothes might have been picked out of any ash-barrel.”

Peter interrupted. “From where do you get the eccentric minstrels?”

The Faun Man grabbed him by the shoulder, as though he feared he might dash away when the full glory of the project was divulged. “My boy, you're one of them. You operate upon a bun-bag folded over a hair-comb. You wear--let me see? You wear a sheet, with holes cut in it for your eyes and mouth. Your nose may remain incognito; I've seen better. In a word, you play the ghost to my Hamlet.”

“And Harry and the girls?”

The Faun Man passed his hand over his forehead and reflected. “Let me see! Harry blacks his physiognomy; the mouth-organ disguises the rest of him--it always does. And as for the girls--they hang their hair before their faces and sing through it. Believe me, nothing alters a woman's appearance so much as letting down her hair; that's why all divorces occur after marriage. Now, with me it's different; I look my best in bed. Of course I can't ask anyone to see me there--that's why I'm a bachelor.--But to get back to vulgarity; we start to-night in a punt. We'll wait till it's dusk, and we'll have lanterns. We'll collect money for the private insane asylum