The Lunatic at Large Page 9

  CHAPTER I.

  The Baron Rudolf von Blitzenberg sat by himself at a table in thedining-room of the Hotel Mayonaise, which, as everybody knows, is thelargest and most expensive in London. He was a young man of a florid andburly Teutonic type and the most ingenuous countenance. Being possessed ofa curious and enterprising disposition, as well as the most ample means,he had left his ancestral castle in Bavaria to study for a few months thecustoms and politics of England. In the language he was alreadyproficient, and he had promised himself an amusing as well as aninstructive visit. But, although he had only arrived in London thatmorning, he was already beginning to feel an uncomfortable apprehensionlest in both respects he should be disappointed. Though his introductionswere the best with which the British Ambassador could supply him, theywere only three or four in number,--for, not wishing to be hampered withtoo many acquaintances, he had rather chosen quality than quantity: andnow, in the course of the afternoon, he had found to his chagrin that inevery case the families were out of town. In fact, so far as he couldlearn, they were not even at their own country seats. One was abroad,another gone to the seaside to recover from the mumps, or a third paying around of visits.

  The disappointment was sharp, he felt utterly at sea as to what he shoulddo, and he was already beginning to experience the loneliness of a singlemortal in a crowded hotel.

  As the frosty evening was setting in and the shops were being lit, he hadstrolled out into the streets in the vague hope of meeting some strangeforeign adventure, or perhaps even happily lighting upon somehalf-forgotten diplomatic acquaintance. But he found the pavements crowdedwith a throng who took no notice of him at all, but seemed every man andmost women of them to be pushing steadily, and generally silently, towardsa million mysterious goals. Not that he could tell they were silent exceptby their set lips, for the noise of wheels and horses on so many hundredsof miles of streets, and the cries of busmen and vendors of eveningpapers, made such a hubbub that he felt before long in a maze. He lost hisway four times, and was patronisingly set right by beneficent policemen;and at last, feeling like a man who has fallen off a precipice on to asoft place--none the worse but quite bewildered--he struggled back to hishotel. There he spun out his time by watching the people come and go, andat last dressed with extra deliberation.

  About eight o'clock he sat down to his solitary dinner. The great gilt andpanelled room was full of diners and bustling waiters, but there was not aface the Baron had ever seen before. He was just finishing a plate ofwhitebait when he observed a stranger enter the room and stroll in a veryself-possessed manner down the middle, glancing at the tables round him asthough he was looking either for a friend or a desirable seat. Thisgentleman was tall, fair, and clean-shaved; he was dressed in a suit ofwell-fitting tweeds, and his air impressed the Baron as being natural andyet distinguished. At last his eye fell upon the Baron, who felt consciousof undergoing a quick, critical scrutiny. The table at which that noblemansat was laid for two, and coming apparently to a sudden resolution, thegood-looking stranger seated himself in the vacant chair. In an agreeablevoice and with an unmistakably well-bred air he asked a waiter for thewine-list, and then, like a man with an excellent appetite, fell to uponthe various _hors d'oeuvres_, the entire collection of which, in fact, heconsumed in a wonderfully short space of time. The Baron, being himself notrifler with his victuals, regarded this feat with sympathetic approval,and began to feel a little less alone in the world. His naturally opendisposition was warmed besides, owing to a slight misconception he hadfallen into, perfectly excusable however in a foreigner. He thought he hadread somewhere that port was the usual accompaniment to the first coursesof an English dinner, and as his waiter had been somewhat dilatory inbringing him the more substantial items of the repast, he had alreadydrunk three claret-glasses of this cheering wine. The chill recollectionsof his sixteen quarterings and the exclusiveness he had determined tomaintain as becoming to his rank were already melting, and he met thestranger's eye with what for the life of him he could not help being acordial look.

  His _vis-a-vis_ caught the glance, smiled back, and immediately asked,with the most charming politeness, "Do you care, sir, to split a bottle ofchampagne?"

  "To--er--_shplid?_" said the Baron, with a disappointed consciousness ofhaving been put at a loss in his English by the very first man who hadspoken to him.

  "I beg your pardon,--I am afraid I was unintelligibly idiomatic. To divide,I should say, you consuming one-half, I the other. Am I clear, sir?"

  For a moment the Baron was a little taken aback, and then recollectingthat the dining habits of the English were still new to him, he concludedthat the suggestion was probably a customary act of courtesy. He hadalready come to the conclusion that the gentleman must be a person ofrank, and he replied affably, "Yah--zat is, vid pleasure. Zanks, very."

  "The pleasure is mine," said the stranger--"and half the bottle," he added,smiling.

  The Baron, whose perception of humour had been abnormally increased bythis time, laughed hilariously at the infection of his new acquaintance'ssmile.

  "Goot, goot!" he cried. "Ach, yah, zo."

  "Am I right, sir, in supposing that, despite the perfection of yourEnglish accent, I cannot be fortunate enough to claim you as acountryman?" asked the stranger.

  The Baron's resolutions of reticence had vanished altogether before suchunexpected and (he could not but think) un-English friendliness. Heunburdened his heart with a rush.

  "You have ze right. I am Deutsch. I have gom to England zis day for tolairn and to amuse myself. But mein, vat you call?--introdogtions zey arenot inside, zat is zey are from off. Not von, all, every single gone to zegontry or to abroad. I am alone, I eat my dinner in zolitude, I am pleasedto meet you, sare."

  A cork popped and the champagne frothed into the stranger's glass. Raisingit to his lips, he said, "Prosit!"

  "Prosit!" responded the Baron, enthusiastically. "You know ze Deutsch,sare?"

  "I am safer in English, I confess."

  "Ach, das ist goot, I vant for to practeese. Ve vill talk English."

  "With all my heart," said the stranger. "I, too, am alone, and I holdmyself more than fortunate in making your acquaintance. It's a devilishdull world when one can't share a bottle--or a brace of them, for thematter of that."

  "You know London?" asked the Baron.

  "I used to, and I daresay my memory will revive."

  "I know it not, pairhaps you can inform. I haf gom, as I say, to-day."

  "With pleasure," said the stranger, readily. "In fact, if you are everdisengaged I may possibly be able to act as showman."

  "Showman!" roared the Baron, thinking he had discovered a jest. "Ha, ha,ha! Goot, zehr goot!"

  The other looked a trifle astonished for an instant, and then as he sippedhis champagne an expression of intense satisfaction came over his face.

  "I can put away my lantern," he said to himself,--"I have found him."

  "May I have the boldness to ask your name, sir?" he asked aloud.

  "Ze Baron Rudolph von Blitzenberg," that nobleman replied. "Yours,sare--may I dare?"

  "Francis Bunker, at your service, Baron."

  "You are noble?" queried the Baron a little anxiously, for his prejudiceson this point were strong.

  "According to your standard I believe I may say so. That's to say, myfamily have borne arms for two hundred odd generations; twenty-five percent of them have died of good living; and the most malicious have neveraccused us of brains. I myself may not be very typical, but I assure youit isn't my ancestors' fault."

  The latter part of this explanation entirely puzzled the Baron. The firststatement, though eminently satisfactory, was also a little bewildering.

  "Two hondred generations?" he asked, courteously. "Zat is a vary oldfamily. All bore arms you say, Mistair Bonker?"

  "All," replied Mr Bunker, gravely. "The first few bore tails as well."

  "Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the Baron. "You are a fonny man I
pairceive, vat youcall clown, yes?"

  "What my friends call clown, and I call wit," Mr Bunker corrected.

  "Vit! Ha, ha, ha!" roared the Baron, whose mind was now in an El Dorado ofhumour when jokes grew like daisies. His loneliness had disappeared as ifby magic; as course succeeded course his contentment showed itself in aperpetually beaming smile: he ceased to worry even about his friend'spedigree, convinced in his mind that manners so delightful anddistinguished could only result from repeated quarterings and unoccupiedforefathers. Yet by the time dessert arrived and he had again returned tohis port, he began to feel an extreme curiosity to know more concerning MrBunker. He himself had volunteered a large quantity of miscellaneousinformation: about Bavaria, its customs and its people, more especiallythe habits and history of the Blitzenberg family; about himself, hisparentage and education; all about his family ghost, his official positionas hereditary carpet-beater to the Bavarian Court, and many other thingsequally entertaining and instructive. Mr Bunker, for his part, had so farconfined his confidences to his name.

  "My dear Bonker," said the Baron at last--he had become quite familiar bythis time--"vat make you in London? I fear you are bird of passage. Do youstay long?"

  Mr Bunker cracked a nut, looking very serious; then he leant on one elbow,glanced up at the ceiling pensively, and sighed.

  "I hope I do not ask vat I should not," the Baron interposed, courteously.

  "My dear Baron, ask what you like," replied Mr Bunker. "In a city full ofstrangers, or of friends who have forgotten me, you alone have myconfidence. My story is a common one of youthful folly and presentrepentance, but such as it is, you are welcome to it."

  The Baron gulped down half a glass of port and leaned forwardsympathetically.

  "My father," Mr Bunker continued with an air of half-sad reminiscence, "isone of the largest landowners and the head of one of the most ancientfamilies in the north of England. I was his eldest son and heir. I amstill, I have every reason to believe, his eldest son, but my heirship, Iregret to say, is more doubtful. I spent a prodigal youth and a larger sumof money than my poor father approved of. He was a strict though a kindparent, and for the good of my health and the replenishment of the familycoffers, which had been sadly drained by my extravagance, he sent meabroad. There I have led a roving life for the last six years, and atlast, my wild oats sown, reaped, and gathered in (and a well-filledstackyard they made, I can assure you), I decided to return to England andbecome an ornament to respectable society. Like you, I arrived in Londonto-day, but only to find to my disgust that my family have gone to winterin Egypt. So you see that at present I am like a shipwrecked sailorclinging to a rock and waiting, with what patience I can muster, for aboat to take me off."

  "You mean," inquired the Baron, anxiously, "that you vish to go to Egyptat vonce?"

  "I had thought of it; though there is a difficulty in the way, I admit."

  "You vill not stay zen here?" "My dear Baron, why should I? I have neitherfriends nor----"

  He stopped abruptly.

  "I do not like to zink I shall lose your company so soon."

  "I admit," allowed Mr Bunker, "that this fortunate meeting tempts me tostay."

  "Vy not?" said the Baron, cordially. "Can your fader not vait to see you?"

  "I hardly think he will worry about me, I confess."

  "Zen stay, my goot Bonker!"

  "Unfortunately there is the same difficulty as stands in the way of mygoing to Egypt."

  "And may I inquire vat zat is?"

  "To tell you the truth," replied Mr Bunker, with an air of reluctantcandour, "my funds are rather low. I had trusted to finding my father athome, but as he isn't, why----" he shrugged his shoulders and threw himselfback in his chair.

  The Baron seemed struck with an idea which he hesitated to express.

  "Shall we smoke?" his friend suggested.

  "Vaiter!" cried the Baron, "bring here two best cigars and two coffee!"

  "A liqueur, Baron?"

  "Ach, yah. Vat for you?"

  "A liqueur brandy suggests itself."

  "Vaiter! and two brandy."

  "And now," said the Baron, "I haf an idea, Bonker."