Wonderful London - ebook

Contents

I. THE GIRL IN THE NIGHT CLUB RAID

II. THE EASTER-MONDAY PRINCE

III. THE GIRL WHO WON AT EPSOM

IV. THE VAMPIRE OF WEMBLEY

V. THE MAN BEHIND THE OPERA

VI. THE PICTURE OF THE YEAR

VII. PRESENTED AT COURT

VIII. A DEAL ON THE DERBY

IX. WIMBLEDON AND A WOMAN

X. AN ASCOT ADVENTURE

XI. AN OLYMPIC INTERLUDE

XII. A HOUSEBOAT AT HENLEY

XIII. A GOODWOOD GUEST

XIV. A DEAUVILLE GAMBLE

XV. A HARROGATE ATTACHMENT

XVI. A MATTER OF PREFERENCEI. THE GIRL IN THE NIGHT CLUB RAID

“THERE are generally two sides to every question,” said Tressa.

Tressa’s flat is over Stobies and Stobies, at the brisk end of Piccadilly. So that Tressa may be said to be in the heart of things.

People, mostly young people, came to Tressa to resolve their immediate problems, for Tressa was wise in the ways of men and women, had London and its queer code at her finger-tips, and, a greater asset than her sophistication, had never lost touch with the human heart. She was fifty, slim, white of hair and hand, and, sophisticated as she was, had the habit of innocent interpretation.

Her visitor at the moment rubbed his silk hat tenderly on the sleeve of his faultless coat.

“What the dickens do they come to see you about?” he asked irritably. “They see me often enough, but it is generally money they want. Take Ella Bray–”

“Ella Bray is a nice girl,” said Tressa, “one of the nicest girls I know.”

Her elderly caller grunted something.

“She is not even a fool,” said Tressa with a faint smile. “That is a fault of yours, Dicky: you think that if you cannot understand a girl, she must necessarily be either a fool or a vampire.”

“I understand vampires,” he claimed in self-defence. “But Ella is a fool! How a serious-minded fellow like Johnny Bray came to marry her–”

“Probably he’s a fool too,” said Tressa sweetly and opened the door for her irascible relative.

Ella Bray was not a fool. Ella was indeed one of the cleverest women in London. This fact she twice reported to her youthful husband at breakfast that morning.

“I wish you wouldn’t read at breakfast, Johnny,” she said. “I was just telling you how clever I have been.”

Johnny was at that stage of married life when he was prepared to admit every virtue in his wife. They sat at breakfast in their little flat off Sloane Square, and Ella, beautiful at all times, was especially lovely at an hour when most women would prefer a dark room and shaded lights. Her hair was gold fluff, the lines of her slim body near to perfection.

“I am the very cleverest woman in the world,” she said complacently. “Not only have I chosen the right kind of husband, but I’ve chosen the right kind of career for him. You will be the greatest financial authority in Europe, and I shall be the leader of the English set in Vienna!”

Johnny smiled indulgently. He could better imagine her pre-eminence in the rôle she had assigned to herself than he could picture himself dictating the finances of Middle Europe.

“They’re queer devils, the Sebers; some of the old Jewish families are almost puritanical,” he said. “Do you know that they’ve got rid of one of the their partners because they did not approve of his friendship with a French actress?”

“And quite right, too,” said Ella primly. “He was probably married.”

The good fortune that had come to the Brays was as marked as it was unexpected. Johnny Bray had come down from Oxford with the conventional degree, a passion for classical music, and no particular idea as to how he was to enlarge the £400 a year which his mother had left him. His mind ran immediately to motor-cars, because all gentlemen of leisure who come down from Oxford with no visible means of support, dream of a profession which gives them unlimited leisure, a free choice of cars, and a sufficient income to enable them to pay their racing accounts.

He discovered that there were not sufficient of these jobs in London to go round. Other men had got there first. Johnny married on the strength of his dream prospects, and had his bitter disillusionments.

And then came this amazing offer to take up a position in the Viennese branch of Sebers, and he did not doubt that behind this wonderful happening was the small but capable hand of his pretty young wife.

Confirmation of the appointment had come that morning by letter, and this was the news which Ella carried to Tressa when they met that day for luncheon at the Embassy.

“My dear, isn’t it perfectly wonderful! Eight hundred a year as a starting salary, two months’ holiday every summer, and Mr. Seber himself wrote to say that he can recommend the dearest little flat in Something-Strasse!”

“When are you leaving?”

“In a fortnight,” said Ella. “Vienna must be wonderful!”

“You’ll find that kind of wonderfulness in wonderful London,” said Tressa drily. “Yes, I think it is an awfully good start for you, and you don’t know enough German to get into mischief.”

“Mischief? I?” demanded the youthful bride scornfully. “Of course I shan’t get into mischief. I shall have all my work cut out to keep Johnny comfortable. I wish Johnny danced,” she added regretfully. “That is his one failing. Now if he could only dance as well as Willie Blair!”

Tressa displayed no enthusiasm.

“Do you see much of him?” she asked.

“I see him twice a week; he takes me to dances. Johnny doesn’t mind, of course.”

Tressa’s thin nose wrinkled.

“Surely, darling, you are not so old-fashioned as to think there is anything wrong in going out with Willie? What a queer grandmotherly idea! Tressa, I thought you–you were so modern!”

“A modern woman is very much like the mid-Victorian woman,” said Tressa, her lips twitching. “It is an illusion commonly held that the women of to-day have a something which is called freedom, because their mothers no longer send out footmen to walk behind them and because they may discuss things to-day which, apparently, our grandmothers knew very little about. But the truth is, darling, our grandmothers weren’t such fools as we think, and the things we discuss openly, they talked about freely in the boudoir. To-day only the audience is different. All the little things that we could not do in grandma’s day are as much verboten to-day. Do you believe for one moment that a young married woman who goes about with a man, other than her husband, excites neither comment nor criticism–nor suspicion?”

“Why, of course,” said Ella, turning red, “what a horrid thing for you to say, Tressa! This is a new London and a new world and women are different–”

Tressa’s soft laughter interrupted her.

“The Sebers wouldn’t like it.”

“The Sebers!” said the girl scornfully. “How absurd! Besides, everything depends upon a girl’s own poise and knowledge of life, her own sense of right and wrong. By-the-way, we’re dining with the Sebers to-morrow night. I like to see these paragons at close quarters.”

“It will be an experience,” was all Tressa’s comment, and then: “You’re a member of the Pan Club, aren’t you?”

Ella looked at her suspiciously.

“Surely, my dear, you’re not going to lecture me about that. Why, everybody’s a member of the Pan Club. There are, I don’t know how many, princes of the blood on the books and it is the most reputable place in London–and it has a most divine floor.”

“But are you a member?” insisted Tressa.

“Of course, I’m a member. Johnny knows.”

“You dance there pretty frequently with Willie Blair?”

“Now, what on earth are you getting at, Tressa? You know I dance with Willie Blair at the Pan Club. Even the Sebers would not object to the Pan Club.”

“They would not object,” said Tressa slowly, “unless you happened to be there one night when the police decided to come in to discover how many bottles of champagne were drunk after licensing hours. In that case, even if you were there quite innocently, quite properly, it would not prevent your name appearing in the newspapers or induce an unimaginative magistrate to remit the fine which is usually imposed upon people who are found in these resorts after hours.”

Ella gazed at her in horror.

“What a perfectly unpleasant idea, Tressa!”

“I’m only telling you–such things have happened. If you are a member of the chorus in a musical comedy, even if you’re a principal of that company, it doesn’t really hurt you to be arrested and marched off to Vine Street. A lot of people would think it was good fun. But it wouldn’t be very good fun for Johnny. The Sebers would drop him like hot cakes. Must you dance, Ella? Or isn’t it possible to confine your dancing to less dangerous resorts?”

Ella’s chin was out-thrust, the light of battle was in her eyes.

“Tressa, you’re trying to frighten me,” she said solemnly, “but I refuse to be frightened. I do go to the Pan Club and I’m going the night after I’ve got through this ghastly dinner with the Sebers. And, of course, it is going to be a ghastly dinner. I know just what will happen. There will be ten courses and Mr. Seber will talk about the Renten-Mark, and Mrs. Seber will show me her new diamond bangle, and Miss Seber, if there is a Miss Seber, will give me a list of all the country houses she has stayed at, from Goodwood onwards!”

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