PAGE 8
Doing Clarence A Bit Of Good
by
I was feeling most frightfully sorry for the poor old chap by this time, don’t you know, but I thought it would be kindest to give it him straight instead of breaking it by degrees.
“I won’t say a word to Clarence, Mr. Yeardsley,” I said. “I quite understand your feelings. The Artistic Temperament, and all that sort of thing. I mean–what? I know. But I’m afraid–Well, look!”
I went to the door and switched on the electric light, and there, staring him in the face, were the two empty frames. He stood goggling at them in silence. Then he gave a sort of wheezy grunt.
“The gang! The burglars! They have been here, and they have taken Clarence’s picture!” He paused. “It might have been mine! My Venus!” he whispered It was getting most fearfully painful, you know, but he had to know the truth.
“I’m awfully sorry, you know,” I said. “But it was.”
He started, poor old chap.
“Eh? What do you mean?”
“They did take your Venus.”
“But I have it here.”
I shook my head.
“That’s Clarence’s ‘Jocund Spring,'” I said.
He jumped at it and straightened it out.
“What! What are you talking about? Do you think I don’t know my own picture–my child–my Venus. See! My own signature in the corner. Can you read, boy? Look: ‘Matthew Yeardsley.’ This is my picture!”
And–well, by Jove, it was, don’t you know!
* * * * *
Well, we got him off to bed, him and his infernal Venus, and we settled down to take a steady look at the position of affairs. Bill said it was my fault for getting hold of the wrong picture, and I said it was Bill’s fault for fetching me such a crack on the jaw that I couldn’t be expected to see what I was getting hold of, and then there was a pretty massive silence for a bit.
“Reggie,” said Bill at last, “how exactly do you feel about facing Clarence and Elizabeth at breakfast?”
“Old scout,” I said. “I was thinking much the same myself.”
“Reggie,” said Bill, “I happen to know there’s a milk-train leaving Midford at three-fifteen. It isn’t what you’d call a flier. It gets to London at about half-past nine. Well–er–in the circumstances, how about it?”