In the early summer of Nineteen-Seventeen Uncle Fred paid a prolonged visit to Netherby—ostensibly to renew family ties, in reality for reasons not altogether unconnected with air-raids on London.
For the moment the fortunes of the war were back in the melting pot. The Battle of the Somme had bundled Brother Boche right back to the Siegfried Line, and enemy morale on the Western Front was low. The British army, fortified by twelve months of conscription, was blundering forward in characteristic fashion upon many fronts. The navy had swelled to a size undreamed of by any, and known only to few. Over the British coast alone nearly three thousand vessels of all sorts and conditions were keeping watch. The "Q" boat, too, with its crazy crew of immortals, was abroad upon the face of the waters, and the hunter had become the hunted.
But there was much to be set down upon the contra side. The spring offensive of the French army, after a brilliant beginning, had faltered, then halted. There had been recriminations, inquiries, resignations; and Pétain, the saviour of Verdun, had succeeded the gallant Nivelle. To keep the enemy from benefiting by the sudden relaxation of pressure on the Chemin des Dames the British army had flung itself into the premature Battle of Arras, and once more the casualty lists had shot up.
At home, the talk was mainly of Gothas—the Zeppelin was entirely démodé—and ration cards. The war was costing us six million pounds a day. Income tax at six shillings in the pound was teaching the man of moderate means the meaning of war; super-tax and excess profits tax were subjecting the capitalistic waistcoat to a not unsalutary reduction. Labour—or rather what was left, now that all that was best and soundest in Labour was away fighting—was going on strike periodically and with invariable success for more adequate recognition of its efforts to furnish the sinews of war to its wasteful and unproductive brothers in the trenches.
In Russia the Empire, battered from without and all corroded within, had collapsed upon itself; and an earnest but unpractical gentleman named Kerensky was rapidly undermining what was left of Russian staying-power, and, with the enthusiastic assistance of the German General Staff, paving the way for those great twin brethren, Lenin and Trotsky. One jaw of the vice which had been crushing the Hun to death was relaxed for good.
Still, there was no weakening on the Western Front. The Messines Ridge had recently "gone up," with a bang which had warmed the heart of every schoolboy in that schoolboy army, the British Expeditionary Force. The Salient of Ypres, that graveyard of British soldiers and German hopes, stood more inviolate than ever. Bagdad had been captured: Palestine was being freed. And in France, down in the Vosges, within the great quadrilateral formed by Chaumont, Toul, Vittel, and Ligny-en-Barrois, huge cantonments were being run up, and roads and railways laid down, by long-legged, slim-hipped, slow-speaking, workmanlike young men from a vast continent overseas—the forerunners of an army of indefinite millions which had pledged itself to come and redress the final balance at no very distant date.
But all this did not prevent London from being an extremely uncomfortable, not to say unsafe, place of residence for a high official of the noble army of Bomb-Dodgers. Finally, after a Gotha raid over London in broad daylight one bright morning in July, in which fifty-seven people were killed, Uncle Fred decided that it was no longer either just or prudent to risk a valuable life further, and went to Netherby, where he succeeded without any difficulty whatever in outstaying his welcome by a considerable margin.
Netherby itself was not over-cheerful, even though the master of the house was absent a good deal. Albert Clegg spent most of his time in those days on Tyneside, making himself liable to excess profits tax. Amos, his eldest son, who from early boyhood had cultivated the valuable habit of keeping one ear to the ground, was by this time in Glasgow, safely embedded in a convenient stronghold labelled "Civilian War Work of National Importance." Brother Joe was far away, as happy as a sandboy—and living like one—assisting General Allenby to construct a military railway from Beersheba to Dan. The younger members of the family were occupied in making unserviceable articles for the Red Cross, and complaining of the shortage of sugar. Mrs. Clegg faithfully attended committee meetings and gatherings where bandages were rolled and inside information imparted. Craigfoot lay remote from the tumult of war, though Edinburgh to the north, and Tynemouth to the south, had each been soundly bombed. Still, there was no lack of military atmosphere. Colonel Bethune himself—minus an arm, and with a bar to his D.S.O.—was back in command of the depot, an object of respectful worship to the entire community; and was always ready and willing to enlarge upon the situation, whether to an attentive mess or to a casually encountered ploughman. His august mother, Lady Christina, specialised upon the crimes of the Government, and had it on reliable authority that the counsels of the Cabinet were now entirely directed from Potsdam. Men on leave came and went, with tales of glory and gloom. Many of the girls were in London or in France; and there were countless letters to quote. Mrs. Clegg sat and listened to the babble of rumour and conjecture, shyly contributing here and there an excerpt from Palestine. Joe had never been home since his clandestine enlistment, but as the event had proved that conscription would have claimed him in any case, his father had decided to forgive him.
Marjorie's name was never mentioned at Netherby, by decree of the master of the house. With Mrs. Clegg—gentle, submissive, colourless—to yield in act was to yield in opinion. She possessed the faculty (recently enjoined, with indifferent success, upon an entire nation) of being "neutral even in thought." She accepted Marjorie's excommunication as she would have accepted her death, or any other form of irrevocability.
It was the last day of Uncle Fred's hegira. On the morrow he was to return, to face the dangers of Dulwich. Evening prayers had been concluded, and Albert Clegg was setting the markers in the Bible for to-morrow morning's exercises. Suddenly he looked up, and spoke:
"Fred!"
"Yes, Albert?"
"When you return to London I shall be obliged to you if you will make inquiries about my daughter."
Uncle Fred sat up—his back perfectly straight for the first time for many years. Mrs. Clegg's knitting dropped from her fingers. No one else was present. Only children remained at Netherby, and they had gone to bed.
"I have been thinking matters over," announced Albert, in measured tones. "I try to be a just man in all my dealings. It is one year to-day since the news came to me that my daughter had taken to—her present ways. By this time her punishment has possibly begun. It is not my intention to intervene between her and her Maker; but I have decided that there can be no harm in taking steps to ascertain what has become of her."
Mrs. Clegg caught her breath. Uncle Fred, utterly dazed, wagged his beard weakly.
"That's very handsome of you, Albert," he said respectfully.
"Handsomeness has nothing to do with it!" snapped Albert, among whose rare and austere amusements none was more prized than that of keeping his younger brother in his place. "I am simply doing what I consider to be right and just. Now, when you return to London I want you to institute inquiries as to where my daughter is to be found. If you are successful, I wish you to visit her. I should not like to think that she was actually destitute. Of course, she can never return here, but I can see that she is provided for."
There was silence. Then Uncle Fred inquired, after the fashion of all feeble folk:
"How should I set about finding her? London is a big place. I suppose the police—"
"I will not have the police brought into the matter until absolutely necessary," thundered Albert. "You must search the theatres!"
It was a magnificent suggestion, but too daring for Albert's audience—certainly for Uncle Fred.
"I have never been inside a theatre in my life," he objected.
"Neither have I. But you need not go inside. Enquire at the door whether my daughter is employed there. Demand to see the manager!"
"Do you think he will tell me?"
"Threaten him with the law if he won't. These fellows are usually under police observation, in any case. They won't dare to fight."
"Perhaps a word with the stage-door keeper—" suggested Mrs. Clegg timidly.
"There's no need for Fred to get mixed up with the dissolute crowd that hangs round stage-doors," was the stern reply. "He'll go in by the front!"
Uncle Fred, flattered on the whole at being still regarded as a potential profligate, hastened to associate himself with this sentiment. But at heart he felt a little ashamed. There were elements of the dare-devil about Uncle Fred. Still, he reflected, he could take his own line of action when he got back to London. He propounded another conundrum.
"Supposing she isn't in one of the theatres—what then? Would it be any good trying the churches? She may be attending some place of worship regularly."
"If she is, it is bound to be Church of England; and I don't intend to be beholden to that body for any help!" replied Albert firmly. "You might try the Salvation Army. Their rescue work brings them in contact with every walk of life—the West End restaurants and clubs, and haunts of that kind."
The implied spectacle of Uncle Fred, assisted by a contingent of Hallelujah Lasses, raiding the Athenæum or The Popular Café, for a lost niece was not without its humour; but the paths of humour and righteousness converge too seldom, to their mutual detriment.
"When you find her," concluded Albert, "ascertain quietly what her circumstances are, and report to me. I will then decide what it is best for me to do."
Uncle Fred, duly uplifted, wagged his head with increased solemnity.
"I must say, Albert," he announced, "even though it angers you, that you are acting in a very generous manner."
"Yes, father," added Mrs. Clegg wistfully.
In a watery way, her heart yearned over her daughter.
"Nothing of the kind!" said Clegg. "I am merely acting as my conscience directs me. These are demoralising times for the best of us"—perhaps Albert's excess profits were pricking him—"and we must make certain allowances. Of course, having acted the way she has, after her Christian upbringing, she can never expect forgiveness. But—well, I shall wait until I hear from you, Fred."