RGL e-Book Cover 2018©
RGL e-Book Cover 2018©
Ladbroke (Lionel Day) Black (1877-1940) was an English writer and journalist who also wrote under the pseudonym Paul Urquhart. His life and career are summarised in the following entry in Steve Holland's Bear Alley blog:
Black, born in Burley-in-Wharfdale, Yorkshire, on 21 June 1877, was educated in Ireland and at Cambridge where he earned a B.A. He became assistant editor of The Phoenix in 1897 before moving to London in 1899 where he joined The Morning Herald as assistant editor in 1900. He later became assistant editor of the Echo in 1901, joint editor of Today, 1904-05, and special writer on the Weekly Dispatch, 1905-11. After a forgettable first novel, "A Muddied Oaf" (1902), co-written with Francis Rutter, Black collaborated on the collection "The Mantle of the Emperor" (1906) with Robert Lynd, later literary editor of the News Chronicle. He then produced a series of novels in collaboration with [Thomas] Meech under the name Paul Urquhart, beginning with "The Eagles" (1906). Black also wrote for various magazines and newspapers, sometimes using the pen-name Lionel Day. His books ranged from romances to Sexton Blake detective yarns. His recreations included sports (boxing and rugby), reading and long walks. He lived in Wendover, Bucks, for many years and was Chairman of the Mid-Bucks Liberal Party in 1922-24. He died on 27 July 1940, aged 63, survived by his wife (Margaret, née Ambrose), two sons and two daughters."
JOHN MASTERTON came out of his elder son's big blatant house in Fitzjohn's Avenue and walked with tremulous haste down the neat drive. Though there was a touch of frost in the air and the branches of the bare trees were powdered with snow, his old wrinkled face was flushed, and beneath his crown of white hair beads of perspiration stood out upon his forehead.
'He offers me a pound a week! And I must be careful and not get into debt—I who have done everything for him,' he muttered to himself. At the age of 73, ruin, utter and complete, had descended upon old John Masterton. His misfortunes were comparable to those of Job, for they had come with the same suddenness and thoroughness.
Three weeks ago he had been a wealthy man, and then the dykes which had protected his life of ease and prosperity had broken down, and the waters of disaster bad swept over him, leaving him nothing—except twenty-thousand shares in the Surramandra Rubber Company at a nominal value of sixpence a piece and quite unsaleable.
With that pride of integrity which was second nature to him, he had sold everything he possessed—his town house, his country house, his fleet of motor cars, his pictures—and had paid his creditors in full. He had taken counsel of nobody, but had acted as he thought right.
The future did not trouble him very much: he was an old man, and his eldest son James, on whom he had lavished so much money and so much affection, would look after him for the short space of time that remained to him.
And he had just seen James and Mrs. James, and his disillusionment was complete. Mrs. James, who had always treated him with such affectionate respect, had rated him as if he had been a naughty child. She had railed him a 'stupid old man,' and James himself, instead of offering him a home and a shelter, had spoken to him about his business worries, and had finally offered him an allowance of a pound a week.
'You can dine here on Sundays, and, with a little care, that sum ought to be quite sufficient for your needs, he said. He had said other things, too —excuses, explanations, obviously untrue, about his own financial position, censures of what he called his father's prodigal extravagance--things the old man didn't remember. There remained in his mind only that cold offer of a pound a week and 'You will dine with us, of course, on Sundays.'
In a kind of haze he felt his way down Fitzjohn's Avenue end mounted a bus going towards Charing Cross. He had left his luggage there, expecting his son to send for it—a bag containing a few of his clothes that he had felt justified in retaining, and that tin box which had once contained so many valuable securities, but was now empty, save for the certificate of those twenty-thousand shares in the derelict Surramandra Rubber Company. He got out at Trafalgar Square, and a policeman, seeing his frail, tottering figure amidst the maze of traffic, helped him across the Strand.
Automatically John Masterdom, when he was safe on the opposite pavement, put his hand in his pocket and then withdrew it quickly, his face flushing.
'I'm sorry,' he stammered. 'Thank you very much, constable.'
He turned away quickly and began to walk towards the station. He had just reached the first entrance, when a young man dressed in an old, worn suit, saw him and stopped.
For a moment the young man hesitated, and then, with the colour mounting to his pale cheeks, he hurried forward and touched the other's arm. 'Father,' he said.
Old John Masterton halted, trembling. There before him stood his younger son, Donald, whom he had not seen for three years—the wild, wayward boy who had refused to go into his father's business, who had always run contrary to his father's wishes, who had finally committed the unpardonable offence of marrying contrary to his father's direct instructions, and, as a consequence, had been cut off from the paternal roof without even the proverbial shilling. For three yeans he had not seen him. And now...
'What do you want?' he asked huskily.
'I want to be friends,' answered the young man. 'Won't you forgive me now, father, after all these years, and let's make it up?'
Suspicions gathered quickly into the old man's distorted brain. Donald had not heard of the financial disaster that had overtaken him, He thought he was still wealthy, he was trying to curry favour with him.
That, after his past conduct, he could possibly care for him as a father seemed absurd. His interview that morning with James had shown him how mean and greedy human nature was. It occurred to him that he would teach Donald a lesson, even at the price of further bitterness.
'Where are you going?' he enquired,
'It's Saturday afternoon, and I'm going home,' Donald answered, and then, half nervously, he added:—'Won't you come with me father? You can't think how—how bucked I would be if you would.'
The old man, urged on by his distorted desire to tear the mask from this spurious affection—to see how far his son would go until he realised that his father was a pauper—readily allowed himself to be persuaded.
They travelled up together to a little South London suburb, taking the luggage with them, for Donald had pressed him to stay the night. They arrived at last at a mean little villa in a long street composed of exactly the same houses. Donald let himself in quietly with a latchkey.
'Mary,' he called. 'I've got such a surprise for you.'
A door opened at the end of the small passage, and a pretty, neat slip of a girl appeared, carrying a child of two in her arms.
'Mary dear, this is father,' Donald exclaimed in a curious voice. 'Father, this is my wife and your little grandson.'
For a fraction of a second Mary hesitated, and then, with a blush mantling her cheeks, she came forward, and timidly held out her hand.
'How do you do, Mr. Masterton?' she said. He had never set eyes on her before. He had always spoken or thought of her as 'that woman who caught my son,' and now she was so different to the picture painted in his own mind that he was taken aback.
'How do you do?' he stammered. The awkwardness of their meeting was removed by the child, who, quite suddenly and unexpectedly, with that unreasoning impetuosity of children, held out his arms to his grandfather, smiling with perfect familiarity.
Somehow or other old John Masterton found himself the next moment with the child in his arms. He was even conscious that he had kissed the little dimpled cheek. Then the old bitterness came back to him, and he put the child down in the passage and, turning, faced his son.
'You haven't heard, of course, Donald,' he said, with something that was almost like a sneer, 'that I am ruined —that I haven't a penny-piece left in the world.'
He expected an immediate change in the attitude of his son and his daughter-in-law towards him—an end to this pretence of an affectionate, warm-hearted greeting. To his amazement something quite different happened.
Donald suddenly came forward—there was an odd mist in his eyes—and put a hand upon his arm. 'Of course—I read about it in the papers, father. I didn't want to talk about it. I'm dreadfully sorry—but now, father, you must be tired; won't you sit down and let Mary get you some tea?'
AS Donald was forced to admit to himself—the three pounds a week he earned was hardly enough to go round as it was. With his father in the house it would be a more difficult matter still.
'But, of course, we must look after him, dear,' Mary exclaimed that night. 'Didn't you see how baby took to him at once?'
'Bless you, my dear,' said Donald, taking her in his arms and kissing her. The following morning he made his way to his brother's big office in the city, and, after waiting half an hour, was grudgingly granted an interview. James had sided with his father in the quarrel about Donald's 'disastrous marriage,' and the two brothers had not met since that event.
'I can give him a home if he'll stay with us; but I'm rather hard up, James, and I thought perhaps you might make him an allowance. He ought to have some money of his own to spend,' Donald explained when he had introduced the subject on which he had come.
James' jaw shut like a trap.
'I offered to make him an allowance of a pound a week yesterday, and he hadn't even the courtesy to wait and tell me whether he would accept my offer. If he wants it, he can write and say so.' Donald coloured slightly.
'It wasn't very much, was it, James? You're a rich man, and father used to make you a big allowonce.'
James shuffled the papers on his desk. 'I don't propose to discuss the question with you,' he said, with a sneer. 'I know what I can afford to give.'
Ten minutes later Donald left the office, his face flushed and his ears tingling. He had spoken his mind to his brother, all to no purpose. James declined to make any larger allowance to his father, or even to make the miserable allowance he suggested, unless the old man solicited it with proper humility.
Donald never mentioned to his father that he had seen James. It might hurt him, he felt, and he was anxious before all things to keep his father cheerful and happy—to make him forget, if he could, the great change in his fortune.
For himself, he cut down his little expenses as best he could, walking where he would formerly have taken a bus, and reducing his midday luncheon to a minimum. Every evening he returned smiling and cheerful, hiding his worries from both his wife and his father.
And they were serious worries. Christmas was drawing near, and rent-day approaching. It would be a thin Christmas, he told himself, but he could not help that. He could just scrape through his liabilities, and, as long as his father and Mary and the boy were well and happy, what else mattered?
But, unfortunately, a fortnight before Christmas the boy fell ill. For one awful night his life even hung in the balance. A second opinion had to be obtained, and not only did all Donald's savings go, but he was reduced to anticipating some of his meagre wages.
For a day or two the recovery of his boy filled Donald's heart with such thankfulness that he forget everything else; but at the end of that time he had to bring himself to face the future. The quarter's rent was only eight pounds ten shillings it was true, but he had not the money, and saw no possibility of getting it, and he knew what that meant. The landlord, represented by a firm of estate agents, was merciless. They would be turned out of their home, and the little furniture they had collected with such difficulty through their married life would be sold. It was with this prospect darkening his mind that Christmas drew near. Both to Mary and his father he appeared cheerful and quite unworried.
'We'll have a jolly Christmas, anyway, father, now that you're with us!' he said more than once.
'Don't tell Mary,' he said brokenly, when his father suddenly betrayed him into a confession. 'It'll all come right, I hope; but—'
He broke down, burying his face in his hands. 'I'm afraid it won't be much of a Christmas, after all,' he stammered.
To old John Masterton it was one of the bitterest moments of his life. He realised then the tremendous sacrifices that Donald had made for him. He was the author of all their difficulties, he told himself.
The Christmas tree and presents that had been promised the little boy would be an impossibility; the simple dinner that was to have marked the great festival could not be purchased. It was all his fault. James' wife had called him a stupid old man. He was more than stupid—he was useless.
'It's all my fault, Donald,' he stammered. 'You have involved yourself in these difficulties on my account. And to think that when I was rich I—'
He broke down utterly, and Donald, who stood in need of so much comfort himself, had to spend nearly an hour trying to cheer him.
But Mary had to be told at the last. It was useless to keep it from her. But if in private she wept, to her husband's face she made light of the whole matter. What did the Christmas dinner matter?
On the morning following the making of the sad confession to Mary, John Masterton sat at the breakfast-table reading his paper. Suddenly he let it fall from his hand, and with strangely flushed cheeks, rose from his chair. Donald and Mary looked at him anxiously.
'Is anything the matter, father?' Donald enquired.
'Nothing, nothing, my boy,' the old man replied. 'I think I'll just go out and take a little turn.'
'You ought to take a day in bed, father,' said Mary. 'You mustn't really tire yourself.'
Smilingly the old man patted her check, but of her advice he took no notice.
The following day he again left the house until late in the afternoon.
And the next day was Christmas. It was a gloomy morning for the small suburban household, rendered all the more gloomy by the fog and sleet that was falling in the street outside.
A little holly decorated the sitting-room and the passage, but these symbols failed to cheer either Donald or his wife. Only the child and old John Masterton seemed to have the real Christmas atmosphere.
And then disaster followed quick upon disaster. The butcher refund to send the meat, as his account was unpaid, and the grocer had left out of his parcel the small Christmas delicacies, declining to give more credit than was absolutely necessary.
'Never mind, my dear,' old Mr. Masterton said, when he found Mary in tears in the kitchen. 'A dinner of bread and cheese with content is worth more than anything else.'
And it was a dinner of bread and cheese that Mary set out on the Christmas board. She had just tearfully laid the last knife when there was a thundering knock at the door. Before she could get to it, old Mr. Masterton had run down the passage to open it.
To her amazement, he gave admittance to two men in white caps and white overalls, who solemnly brought into the house and laid upon the table mysterious dishes and bottles, a roast turkey, a plum pudding, mince pies, champagne and port, and the biggest box of crackers that had ever been seen. And hardly had Donald and Mary recovered from the shock of this surprise when another van drew up, and into the house, brushing down the narrow passage with great difficulty, came a completely decorated Christmas tree and a whole host of mysterious parcels.
Donald and Mary and the little boy stood open-mouthed staring at these things that seemed to have fallen from the sky.
'Who can have sent them?' Donald exclaimed at last. Something like a choking laugh came from behind him and, looking round, he saw his father. He was smiling, and the tears were streaming down his old face.
'Father!' he exclaimed, wonderingly.
'They're a present from me, Donald,' the old man cried, 'from the Prodigal Father. I had some worthless rubber shares which three days ago became valuable. And I'm a rich man again, my boy. And, thank heaven, I've been able to give you, who have been so loving and generous to me, something of the Christmas you deserve.'