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"So I gather," said I. "And now can you tell me something else? What is the present state of political parties in Guatemala?" I was not in the least interested in Guatemala; but I did not care to discuss Dale with Renniker. When he had completed his sketch of affairs in that obscure republic, I thanked him politely and ordered coffee.
She rode in a circus or had a talking horse he was not quite sure; and concerning her conjugal or extra-conjugal heart affairs he admitted that his information was either unauthenticated or conjectural. At any rate, she had not a shred of reputation. And she didn't want it, said Renniker; it would be as much use to her as a diving suit. "She has young Dale Kynnersley in tow," he remarked.
The country is flat and barren. A dismal creek runs miles inland an estuary fed by the River Murgle. A few battered cottages, a general shop, a couple of low public-houses, and three perky red-brick villas all in a row form the city, or town, or village, or what you will, of Murglebed-on-Sea. Renniker is a wonderful man. I have rented a couple of furnished rooms in one of the villas.
Renniker, being in a flippant mood, mentioned a fashionable watering-place on the South Coast. I pleaded the seriousness of my question. "What I want," said I, "is a place compared to which Golgotha, Aceldama, the Dead Sea, the Valley of Jehoshaphat, and the Bowery would be leafy bowers of uninterrupted delight." "Then Murglebed-on-Sea is what you're looking for," said Renniker.
For some odd reason he is devotedly attached to me, and respects my opinion on worldly matters. He walked to the window and looked out. Presently, without turning round, he said: "I suppose she has been rubbing it in about Lola Brandt?" "She did mention the lady's name," said I. "So did Renniker at the club. I suppose every one you know and many you don't are mentioning it."
I lunched at the club, and turned up the article "Lola Brandt" in the living encyclopaedia that was my friend Renniker. The wonderful man gave me her history from the cradle to Cadogan Gardens, where she now resides. I must say that his details were rather vague.
I should have gone about the world, a modern Admetus, snivelling at my accursed luck, without even the chance of persuading a soft-hearted Alcestis to die for me. I should have been a dismal nuisance to society. "Bless you," I cried this afternoon, waving, as I leaned against a post, my hand to the ambient mud, "Renniker was wrong! You are not a God-forsaken place.
It was all very well to say proudly "io son' io"; but io used to be a person of some importance who was not cavalierly "how d'ye do'd" by creatures like Renniker. This and the chance encounters of the next few weeks gave me furiously to think. I knew that in one respect my sister Agatha was right.
I met Renniker the other day at the club. He is a man who knows everything from the method of trimming a puppy's tail for a dog-show, without being disqualified, to the innermost workings of the mind of every European potentate. If I want information on any subject under heaven I ask Renniker. "Can you tell me," said I, "the most God-forsaken spot in England?"
If any one had prophesied that I should be a stranger in Piccadilly, I should have laughed aloud. Yet I was. Walking moodily up Saint James's street I met the omniscient and expansive Renniker. He gave me a curt nod and a "How d'ye do?" and passed on. I felt savagely disposed to slash his jaunty silk hat off with my walking-stick.
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