Polly, it soon transpired, was come to the midday dinner with her friend, and the dinner itself was coming in presently from “The Learned Pig.” The real purpose of the invitation was, it transpired equally, that Polly might explain to the Duchess the reading of a part alleged to be confused in the manuscript acquired with the Flippance Fit-Up: she was obviously fishing for tips. While these things were transpiring, poor Flippance in his fur was perspiring. Gradually Jinny saw a rift appearing in the bed-panels and widening to a cautious chasm of a few inches. It made her feel choky herself, especially as the caravan’s little window was closed. She signed apprehensively to Mr. Duke, who, however, was already revolving feverishly how to clear the stage for himself and his fellow-negotiator. And presently he broke into the feminine dialogue with, “I’m sure, dearest, Polly wouldn’t mind acting that bit for you. But there ain’t room for Polly’s genius here—she’d be breaking up the happy home! Hadn’t you better go into the inn-parlour, Bianca? There’ll be nobody there yet.”

The Duchess might have lacked talent, but she had not played in farces without learning how to behave in them: so without even needing a wink from her spouse, she made a kindly exit behind Polly, not, however, without turning back a grinning doll’s head at Mr. Flippance’s beaded countenance emerging gaspingly from his berth. But Jinny, who had already witnessed comedy and farce, was now more conscious of the tragedy of the situation than of its humours, as she saw the Duchess tripping down the ladder, with silken stockings revealed by the raised skirt. It seemed to Jinny that the poor lady was tripping thus blithely to her dark doom, behind the scenes of the puppet show; that her blue eyes and golden hair had flaunted their last upon the stage. And the irony of her grinning exit was accented by the manuscript in her hand: she was going off to study a part she would nevermore play. It all gave Jinny a sense of the Duchess being herself a puppet, with an ironic fate pulling the strings, and she was frightened by a thought hitherto beyond the reach of her soul; by a dim feeling that perhaps she too—and everybody else—was similarly mocked. Who was perpetually jerking her towards that young man, and then jerking her back? What force was always putting into her mouth words of fleer and flout, and pulling away the hand she yearned to lay in his?

“Whew!” exclaimed Mr. Anthony Flippance, as Jinny shut the door safely on the Duchess—for that lady never shut doors, partly because the process interfered with the sweep of one’s exit, partly because what concerned a scene from which she was absent never entered her golden head.

“Whew!” repeated Mr. Flippance, scrambling out. “I know now what Lady Agnes felt like. ‘Help, Lovel!—Father, help!—I faint—I die—Oh! Oh!’ But I’m disappointed in Polly,” he added, diving under a chair. “Fancy being all her life on the stage, and not espying these slippers!” He dug his feet into them.

“There’s no time for joking,” said Duke anxiously, as he tugged open the drawer of a desk in his “parlour.” “I suppose Jinny is in the know?”

“Jinny’s come as arbitrator!”

“What!” Duke wheeled round, his hair still more on end.

“Get on with your mystery-desk. It stands to reason a runaway financial imagination like yours needs a brake.”

“Ain’t you brake enough?” Mr. Duke’s tone was bitter.

“And you want me to be broke!” retorted Tony. “I give you my beautiful marionettes, life-sized and life-painted, all carved by the best maker——”

“Oh, I know all about that!” interrupted Duke impatiently.

“Well, you’re not going to deny your own skill, I hope?”

Duke glared impotently with his little pig-eyes.

“And with the costliest costumes,” Tony went on blandly. “And all these puppets moreover with the latest mechanical contrivances, regardless of expense——”

“And don’t I give you the finest goodwill in East Anglia,” burst in Mr. Duke, “the Flippance Fit-Up with all its plays, prestige, and unique takings?”

“One thing at a time, old cock. Packed into a box that itself opens out and forms part of the stage, combining portability of props with——”

“Do dry up!” cried the maddened Duke. “If you’re not quick, Bianca will be back.”

“What’s that to me? To cut it short, I give you the finest marionette show in the world, with scenery, sky-borders, and plays complete, and an old-established reputation, a show that has played before the crowned heads of Europe, America, and Australia, and, like the workhouse boy in Mr. Dickens’s book, you ask for more. What say you, Jinny? Thinkest thou the Duke should have more?”

“We all want more,” said Jinny. “Air! Mayn’t I open the window?”

“Oh, excuse me.” Mr. Duke, evidently trained by his big doll, rushed to do it. “But haven’t I lost enough without losing my twenty-five pounds too?”

He turned back to his desk, and extricating from its remoter recesses another large narrow fat account book—the twin of that he had been poring over—held it up theatrically. “Here’s my marionette accounts for sixteen years—look through ’em and see if you can find any single week—ay, even the week of King William’s funeral—as low as the best of the weeks since I touched your wretched show.”

“My wretched show!” Mr. Flippance lost his blandness. “Why, if that’s the case, it’s you that have depreciated it. You ought to pay me compensation.”

But Duke had dramatically dumped the book down side by side with its twin. “Look on this picture and on that!” he said. “Duke’s Marionettes, week ending March 10th, 1849, Colchester. Total, £23 18s. 10d. Flippance Fit-Up, Colchester Corn Exchange, week ending March 8th, 1851. Monday. Eleven shillings. There’s an opening! Tuesday——”

“Oh, come to the d——d total!” said Tony impatiently.

“There ain’t any total,” said Duke crushingly. “Tuesday, sixteen shillings and sixpence.”

“Always rising, you see!” said Tony.

“Wednesday,” Duke went on implacably, “nine shillings and fourpence——”

“Why, how do you get fourpence?” interrupted Tony severely. “You haven’t been letting down the prices, I hope.”

“That’s noted at the side. See!” said the careful Duke. “A swindler passed off a groat as a tanner. Thursday, Eight and sixpence—imagine the Colchester Corn Exchange with eight and sixpence! Friday. Nine shillings——”

“Rising again, you see,” chirruped Tony.

“Saturday. One pound thirteen and six.”

“There you are! That pulls you up.”

“Saturday evening,” concluded Duke. “Two pounds eight.”

“And then he grumbles!” Mr. Flippance raised his great ringed hands towards Jinny.

“Total, six pounds five and tenpence!”

“And isn’t that enough to live on?” cried Tony. “Only two in family and a little bird or so! And if your box-office man had been smart enough to tell a groat from a tester, you’d have had six guineas!”

“He wasn’t such a fool,” said Duke dryly, “for on another night it’s noted that a half-sovereign was passed off on him for sixpence.”

“And then you outrage Providence by complaining of the takings,” said Tony.

“Rent of Corn Exchange,” continued Duke doggedly, “three guineas. Salaries (to company, including check-taker), four pounds eight. Lighting, a pound. Advertising (including bill-poster), three pounds ten——”

“But, my dear chap, what extravagance! No wonder——”

“Travelling expenses (company and scenery, excluding caravan), eighteen and ninepence. Drinks to Pressmen—one and sixpence——”

“Oh, not enough! No wonder——!”

“Net deficit, seven pounds sixteen and threepence, plus the salary of Bianca and me!”

“What! Why, you said salary of company, four pounds eight!”

“You don’t suppose I included ourselves with the check-taker!”

“You didn’t? Oh, my dear fellow,” said Tony sympathetically, “no wonder you’re down in the mouth. A wise manager always pays his salary before any other expense; then he’s always sure of a stand-by!”

“It isn’t the money that’s the worst,” Duke explained. “It’s the dreadful loneliness.”

“Why didn’t you stuff the house with paper and put up ‘Free List Absolutely Suspended’?”

“Easier said than done in a place where you don’t know a soul. Why, Bianca had a Benefit Night, and how many do you think were in the stalls? Two women and a boy.”

“I’ve known only the theatre cat——” began Tony cheerfully.

“And the boy went to sleep!”

“Wasn’t it his bedtime? But I will say it’s not entirely the fault of your acting. I’ve noticed ever since that Crystal Palace loomed on the horizon, it’s unsettled the public within at least fifty miles from Hyde Park. I was talking to a showman who told me that in March and April this year business fell off everywhere—there was no interest in giants, dwarfs, fat men, pig-faced ladies, and even jugglers, animal magnetizers, lion-tamers, performing elephants, ventriloquists, prestidigitators, and professors of necromancy. Didn’t you hear of the fate of poor Wishbone, the conjurer, at Chelmsford Fair? Not even a kid dropped into his booth, so he went out to perform outside, but before he could ‘hey, presto!’ the purse back to the owner, the peeler copped him. The magistrate wouldn’t listen to his patter, and he can’t tap himself out of quod either, poor chap. Besides, we all remember the awful weather in March, yes and up to the very opening of the Crystal Palace—rain, rain, rain.”

“Well, take the March of 1849,” said Duke, turning back his oblong pages, “and don’t forget people’ll sit in Assembly Rooms or a Corn Exchange when they won’t risk a draughty tent. Now look at the weather that year—when I pulled my own strings. Tuesday, W.S.—that is, wet, snow. Wednesday, R.N. (rough night). Thursday, S.H.T. (storm, hail, and thunder). Saturday, W.T. (wind, tilt OFF!). Come now, you could hardly have a worse week, could you? Everything except B.F.1 or B.F.2 (black fog or big funeral). Yet see, my takings for that week were——”

Tony flipped away the book with his jewelled hand. “What you’ve got to compare with your Colchester week,” he said, “is not your marionette week in March ’49, but my Fit-Up week for that date.”

“I don’t see that.”

“It stands to reason.”

They debated the point warmly: finally Tony referred it to Jinny: that was what she was there for, he recalled.

“I certainly think,” arbitrated the little Carrier, “that we ought to see what Mr. Flippance’s live theatre could do in the same weather.”

“Oh, very well,” acquiesced Duke sulkily. “And what did you do that week?”

“Heavens, man, how on earth can I remember?”

“But haven’t you got it written down?”

“What do you take me for?” asked Tony. “A tradesman? A bookkeeper? Unless Polly——”

“You told me the other Christmas that you averaged twenty-five,” said Duke bitterly, “and I paid you one week’s takings by way of douceur.”

“Well, then you do know my weekly takings,” said Tony loftily.

“I can’t stay here for ever,” put in Jinny. “I’ve got my work.”

“I’m paying you, ain’t I?” Tony rebuked her.

“But not giving me work.” She assumed a judicial air. “Do you, Mr. Flippance, maintain that your theatre is a more valuable concern than Mr. Duke’s marionettes?”

“Of course I do.”

“Then,” said the young Solomon in petticoats, “surely if you get it back, you ought to pay him the difference in value.”

“Bravo! Bravo!” Mr. Duke’s little pig-eyes gleamed. “A sensible girl!”

“Oh, Jinny!” groaned Mr. Flippance: “To desert your old pal!”

“And do you, Mr. Duke,” went on Jinny imperturbably, “maintain that your marionettes are a better property than the Flippance Fit-Up?”

“Certainly not,” said Mr. Duke, not to be caught.

“The marionettes are a worse property then?” she asked.

Duke banged his book. “Much worse.”

“Then why do you want it back?”

Tony uttered a shriek of delight. “A Daniel come to judgment! Oh, Jinny, I could hug you!”

A sweep of her horn kept him at arm’s length. “You say, Mr. Duke, that the Fit-Up property is the better, and yet you want to give it up?”

Mr. Duke leaned his elbows on the desk, and dropped his head in his hands. “You confuse me—I must have time to think.”

“Hamlet!” observed Tony pleasantly. “But I don’t think the ghost will walk.” His hand moved towards the gin decanter, but again that baffling horn intervened.

“Look here!” said Duke, rummaging in his drawer. “I’ve got the transfer written out, ready for signature, two copies—the exact words of our last agreement, only turned the other way, of course. I’m a plain man—is it to be or not to be?”

“That is the question,” said Tony sepulchrally. “But you see it isn’t so plain as you. You’ve depreciated my theatre and it’s not worth the extra pony. Why can’t you make a reasonable compromise and just swap back?”

“What! And be a pony out of pocket?”

“You’ll be an elephant out of pocket if you don’t,” Jinny reminded him. “Seven pounds sixteen and threepence a week mount up.”

“Ah, that was a particularly bad week.”

“Then there were good weeks?” flashed Tony.

“I tell you the best weren’t as good as the marionettes’ worst.”

“Come, come, old cock, draw it mild!”

“If you don’t believe me,” said Duke, firing up, “look for yourself! And what’s more, if you find I’m wrong, keep the pony and be hanged to you!”

“Easy! Easy! But I was never a man to refuse a sporting offer—tip us the tomes!”

Duke handed him the twin account books, but soon, tiring of the rows of figures, Mr. Flippance begged Jinny to pursue the investigation while he studied the document of transfer.

It was not without a thrill that, setting the volumes on a hanging flap that Duke had changed for her into a table, she went back over the pages of faded ink that told of toils and tribulations in the years before she had come into being: as a carrier she was peculiarly sensitive to these records of wrecked tents and ruined takings. Through the peace of the summer morning in that poky caravan, the winds from that pre-natal period seemed to be rushing, its snows falling, its hails and thunders crashing, and with these imagined tempests came up the thought of Will. What was he doing now, with his beautiful black horses? Was he looking for Mr. Flippance at “The Black Sheep”? But the thought of him was too agitating; she crushed it down and got absorbed in her task and the tales the figures told: the blanks carefully explained by Good Friday or royal mourning or the journey to some distant pitch; the varying cost of these pitches in publicans’ meadows; the varying expense of cartage; the sudden jumps in the takings, due—as annotated—to high days and holidays, or to royal weddings, or to favourite pieces. She wondered why Mr. Duke ever played any others. “What is D.F.N.?” she asked suddenly.

“Dismissed. Fine night,” said Mr. Duke in melancholy accents. It was the supreme tragedy. “Although a fine night,” he explained, rubbing it in to himself, “not enough to be worth playing to.”

“You didn’t always do good business, you see,” gurgled Tony from the gin-glass he had imperceptibly acquired.

“Accidents will happen,” Duke retorted.

“And what is D.S.?” put in Jinny. “Dismissed. Snow?”

“D.S. is diddling show,” explained Duke gloomily. “I struck one only last week at the very public-house I hired my pitch from.”

“That wasn’t playing fair,” said Tony.

“No, indeed. They stuck a placard in the window, ‘Great Water Otter. Free.’ And when you’d had your drink they took you to the stables to see it in its tub. There were crowds every night. It was put in the paper.”

Tony grinned. “‘Lord, what fools these mortals be!’”

“But why?” asked Jinny. “I’d rather see a water-otter than a dancing doll.”

“You’re not even a country mouse,” said Tony. “When the fools push and squeeze to get near the tub, they warn ’em, ‘Don’t go too near!’ And all the while it’s only a big iron kettle—a water-’otter. See!”

Jinny laughed.

“Yes, that’s what they all do,” said Duke dismally. “Laugh and help to gull the others. And between them the legitimate goes to the dogs.”

“Or the otters.” Jinny bent in lighter spirits over the twin volumes. “I’m afraid you’ve lost, Mr. Flippance,” she announced at last. “I can’t see any drama week of Mr. Duke’s that goes as high as the worst of his marionette weeks.”

“Right you are!” said Tony, cheerful under his liquid. “Sport is sport and the pony is yours. Here goes!” And picking up a pen from the desk, he signed one of the documents with a long thick line sweeping backward from his final “e.” Duke signed the other copy more soberly, and Jinny witnessed both signatures with careful calligraphy. “It only remains, old cock,” said Tony, “to deliver the twenty-five pounds.”

“Hear, hear,” agreed Duke.

“You don’t suppose I carry it about with me?”

Duke’s face fell. “But without money passing, it ain’t legal.”

“But I jumped out of bed in a hurry—Jinny’ll bear me out. I mean,” he added hurriedly, as a dramatic interest flickered across Duke’s face, “look at my slippers!”

“Oh, I’ve seen your stinking old slippers!” Duke was getting unpleasant. “What I want to see is my money.”

“Sorry, old boy—no use letting your dander rise—it’s a case of H.G.I.—haven’t got it, and M.O.I.U.—must owe it you! Still, I dare say we can rake up something on account, to make a legal consideration. Doubtless Jinny has got half a crown. Give me one, Jinny, till I get home.”

Jinny, who had always hitherto dealt with Polly, and been scrupulously paid, had no hesitation in handing him the coin. She did not know it was the cost of her arbitration. Duke accepted it ungraciously as earnest money.

“And if I may advise you how to run your own show, now you’ve got it back,” said Tony handsomely, “don’t go so much by the fairs. There’s not only the waste of time and travel in between one and t’other, it’s lowering a fine art to the level of a merry-go-round or the talking lobst——”

“I can’t wait for ever,” interposed Jinny. “Are you coming?” She opened the door.

“Your time’s paid,” said Mr. Flippance severely. “However, Duke takes my meaning. Here’s luck to him!” And with a last gulp at Duke’s gin, he followed her to the door. “Send me my scenery and props and the same cart can take back yours and the box of figures.”

“No, no,” said Duke, “that’ll need several journeys or carts. We divide the freightage.”

“What! When I throw in twenty-five pounds! O Duke, Duke, if you ain’t careful there’ll be a show of the meanest man on earth.” And shaking his fat jewelled forefinger waggishly at the caravan proprietor, he followed the Carrier. “Now for a last kick at the company,” he observed to her, as the door closed upon the dismal Duke.