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"I've often read in the police reports," I said, "of persons who lead double lives, and I'm much interested in " Malim and Kit bore down upon us. We rose. "It's the march past," observed the former. "Come upstairs." "Kiddie," said Kit, "give me your arm." At half-past four we were in Wellington Street.
Then I was compelled to take pencil and paper, and settle down seriously to what I now saw would be a task of some difficulty. After half an hour I read through my list, and could not help smiling. I had indeed a mixed lot of acquaintances. First came Julian and Malim, the two pillars of my world. I scratched them out.
I don't suppose he had ever enjoyed himself so much in his life. He was standing now on a cart full of potatoes, and firing them in with tremendous force. Kit saw him too. "Why, there's that blackguard Tom!" she cried. She had been told to sit down behind Malim for safety. Before anyone could stop her, or had guessed her intention, she had pushed her way through us and stepped out into the road.
We poked them in, sir, with our sticks." Mr. Maundrell emitted a placid chuckle at this reminiscence. "A good many members of this club," whispered Malim to me, "would have gone back into that barrel." A bell sounded. "That's for the second part to begin," said Malim. We herded back along the passage. A voice cried, "Be seated, please, gentlemen."
Julian had been asked and had refused; and, as for Malim, I shrank from exposing my absurd compositions to his critical eye. A man who could deal so trenchantly over a pipe and a whisky-and-soda with Established Reputations would hardly take kindly to seeing my work in print under his name. I wished it had been possible to secure him, but I did not disguise it from myself that it was not.
Except for the type of fiction provided by "penny libraries of powerful stories." Kit had probably not read more than half a dozen books in her life. Grimm's fairy stories she recollected dimly, and she betrayed a surprising acquaintance with at least three of Ouida's novels. I fancy that Malim appeared to her as a sort of combination of fairy prince and Ouida guardsman.
Appeals have been made to them on filial, not to say religious, grounds. Threats would have availed nothing; but appeals downright tearful appeals from mamma, husky, hand-gripping appeals from papa that is what has made escape impossible. A huge act of unselfishness has been compelled; a lifetime of reactionary egotism is inevitable and legitimate. I was wrong when I said Malim was typical.
All at once those nearest the door sprang to their feet. A girl in scarlet and black had come in. "Ah, there's Kit at last," said Malim. "They're cheering her," said Julian. As he spoke, the tentative murmur of a cheer was caught up by everyone. Men leaped upon chairs and tables. "Hullo, hullo, hullo!" said Kit, reaching us. "Kiddie, when they do that it makes me feel shy."
"Sed filius minor natu adeò malè se gessit, ut malim transire in nepotem ex primo filio." De Vita Propria, ch. xxxvi. p. 112. De Vita Propria, ch. xxvii. p. 71. De Vita Propria, ch. xii. p. 40. Opera, tom. x. p. 459. De Vita Propria, ch. xvii. p. 56. De Vita Propria, ch. xxiii. p. 104. This opinion prevailed with men of learning far into the next century.
But it was not his brain that took Malim to the fried fish shop. It was his heart. He loved Kit, and presently he married her. One would have said this was an impossible step. Misery for Malim's people, his friends, himself, and afterwards for Kit. But Nature has endowed both Malim and Kit with extraordinary commonsense. He kept to his flat; she kept to her job in the fried fish shop.
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