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Here it was reappearing in a valet's son, as it was bound to reappear in all classes! Yes, Peterkin had supplied the one shining incident of the costly day to the colonel, who found himself without his headquarters for the night at the Galland house as planned, waiting for orders on this confounded little knoll.
Fisher hastened to obey and noted with some wonder that the visitor did not attempt to assist him either by loosening his hold of the volumes or raising his hand. Accidentally the valet's hand pressed against the other's sleeve and he received a shock, for the forearm was clearly an artificial one.
Whereupon the envied of all painters, the symbol of artistic glory and triumph, had assumed the valet's notorious puce dressing-gown and established himself in a hard chair for a night of discomfort. The bell rang once more, and there was a sharp impressive knock that reverberated through the forlorn house in a most portentous and terrifying manner. It might have been death knocking.
The very gunsmith who sold it, and who knew Peytel, would he not have known that he had sold him this pistol? At his own house, Peytel has a collection of weapons of all kinds; everybody has seen them a man who makes such collections is anxious to display them. Did any one ever see this weapon? Not one. And Madame Peytel did, in her lifetime, remark a pistol in the valet's possession.
Bennett was too remorseful to think of that. Do It Now had ever been his motto, so he started by ringing the bell for Webster. The same writers who would have screamed with joy at the chance of dilating on Mr. Bennett's emotions would find a congenial task in describing the valet's thought-processes when the bell roused him from a refreshing sleep at a few minutes after three a.m.
"What, even to your wife?" The courteous rascal placed his hand to his heart and bowed. "You shall not suffer by your fidelity you shall take your wife with you." The conjugal valet's countenance fell. "No," he said, "no; he could not take advantage of Monsieur's generosity." "I insist upon it not another word."
"Well, if you couldn't understand the words, no harm was done. Say, fellows, how do I look in the valet's togs?" asked Holmes turning around as if he was in a tailor shop trying on a new suit. "It fits you kind of quick under the shoulders, Holmes, but I guess it will do," said the Earl, with a critical eye. "What are you wearing those valet's clothes for, anyhow?" exclaimed Hicks.
The Prince of Fairoaks, who was tolerably prudent and had no need of ready money, would as soon have thought of borrowing from his uncle's servant as of stealing the valet's pocket-handkerchief, and was on the point of making some haughty reply to Morgan's offer, but was checked by the humor of the transaction. Morgan a capitalist! Morgan offering to lend to him! The joke was excellent.
Moreover, the valet's protests had proved unavailing this time. The two heard his approaching footsteps. Meiklejohn's care-worn face turned almost green with fright, and even his hardier companion yielded to a sense of peril. He leaped up, moving catlike on his toes. "Where does that door lead to?" he hissed, pointing. "A bedroom. But I've given orders "
But never a day passed by that the clearance of at least one apartment did not fall to his lot, and never an occupant quitted those cells without placing a golden gratuity in the valet's palm. His appetite returned, and he slept soundly enough in his clean white bedroom, content to lose the upper world, temporarily, and to become a dweller in the catacombs where tips were large and plentiful.
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