The Oversight
"It's like a Chinese puzzle," said Lady Prowche resentfully, staring
at a scribbled list of names that spread over two or three loose
sheets of notepaper on her writing-table. Most of the names had a
pencil mark running through them.
"What is like a Chinese puzzle?" asked Lena Luddleford briskly; she
rather prided herself on being able to grapple with the minor
problems of life.
"Getting people suitably sorted together. Sir Richard likes me to
have a house party about this time of year, and gives me a free hand
as to whom I should invite; all he asks is that it should be a
peaceable party, with no friction or unpleasantness."
"That seems reasonable enough," said Lena.
"Not only reasonable, my dear, but necessary. Sir Richard has his
literary work to think of; you can't expect a man to concentrate on
the tribal disputes of Central Asian clansmen when he's got social
feuds blazing under his own roof."
"But why should they blaze? Why should there be feuds at all within
the compass of a house party?"
"Exactly; why should they blaze or why should they exist?" echoed
Lady Prowche; "the point is that they always do. We have been
unlucky; persistently unlucky, now that I come to look back on
things. We have always got people of violently opposed views under
one roof, and the result has been not merely unpleasantness but
explosion."
"Do you mean people who disagree on matters of political opinion and
religious views?" asked Lena.
"No, not that. The broader lines of political or religious
difference don't matter. You can have Church of England and
Unitarian and Buddhist under the same roof without courting
disaster; the only Buddhist I ever had down here quarrelled with
everybody, but that was on account of his naturally squabblesome
temperament; it had nothing to do with his religion. And I've
always found that people can differ profoundly about politics and
meet on perfectly good terms at breakfast. Now, Miss Larbor Jones,
who was staying here last year, worships Lloyd George as a sort of
wingless angel, while Mrs. Walters, who was down here at the same
time, privately considers him to be--an antelope, let us say."
"An antelope?"
"Well, not an antelope exactly, but something with horns and hoofs
and tail."
"Oh, I see."
"Still, that didn't prevent them from being the chummiest of mortals
on the tennis court and in the billiard-room. They did quarrel
finally, about a lead in a doubled hand of no-trumps, but that of
course is a thing that no account of judicious guest-grouping could
prevent. Mrs. Walters had got king, knave, ten, and seven of clubs-
-"
"You were saying that there were other lines of demarcation that
caused the bother," interrupted Lena.
"Exactly. It is the minor differences and side-issues that give so
much trouble," said Lady Prowche; "not to my dying day shall I
forget last year's upheaval over the Suffragette question. Laura
Henniseed left the house in a state of speechless indignation, but
before she had reached that state she had used language that would
not have been tolerated in the Austrian Reichsrath. Intensive bear-
gardening was Sir Richard's description of the whole affair, and I
don't think he exaggerated."
"Of course the Suffragette question is a burning one, and lets loose
the most dreadful ill-feeling," said Lena; "but one can generally
find out beforehand what people's opinions--"
"My dear, the year before it was worse. It was Christian Science.
Selina Goobie is a sort of High Priestess of the Cult, and she put
down all opposition with a high hand. Then one evening, after
dinner, Clovis Sangrail put a wasp down her back, to see if her
theory about the non-existence of pain could be depended on in an
emergency. The wasp was small, but very efficient, and it had been
soured in temper by being kept in a paper cage all the afternoon.
Wasps don't stand confinement well, at least this one didn't. I
don't think I ever realised till that moment what the word
'invective' could be made to mean. I sometimes wake in the night
and think I still hear Selina describing Clovis's conduct and
general character. That was the year that Sir Richard was writing
his volume on 'Domestic Life in Tartary.' The critics all blamed it
for a lack of concentration."
"He's engaged on a very important work this year, isn't he?" asked
Lena.
"'Land-tenure in Turkestan,'" said Lady Prowche; "he is just at work
on the final chapters and they require all the concentration he can
give them. That is why I am so very anxious not to have any
unfortunate disturbance this year. I have taken every precaution I
can think of to bring non-conflicting and harmonious elements
together; the only two people I am not quite easy about are the
Atkinson man and Marcus Popham. They are the two who will be down
here longest together, and if they are going to fall foul of one
another about any burning question, well, there will be more
unpleasantness."
"Can't you find out anything about them? About their opinions, I
mean."
"Anything? My dear Lena, there's scarcely anything that I haven't
found out about them. They're both of them moderate Liberal,
Evangelical, mildly opposed to female suffrage, they approve of the
Falconer Report, and the Stewards' decision about Craganour. Thank
goodness in this country we don't fly into violent passions about
Wagner and Brahms and things of that sort. There is only one thorny
subject that I haven't been able to make sure about, the only stone
that I have left unturned. Are they unanimously anti-vivisectionist
or do they both uphold the necessity for scientific experiment?
There has been a lot of correspondence on the subject in our local
newspapers of late, and the vicar is certain to preach a sermon
about it; vicars are dreadfully provocative at times. Now, if you
could only find out for me whether these two men are divergently for
or against--"
"I!" exclaimed Lena; "how am I to find out? I don't know either of
them to speak to."
"Still you might discover, in some roundabout way. Write to them,
under as assumed name of course, for subscriptions to one or other
cause--or, better still, send a stamped type-written reply postcard,
with a request for a declaration for or against vivisection; people
who would hesitate to commit themselves to a subscription will
cheerfully write Yes or No on a prepaid postcard. If you can't
manage it that way, try and meet them at some one's house and get
into argument on the subject. I think Milly occasionally has one or
other of them at her at-homes; you might have the luck to meet both
of them there the same evening. Only it must be done soon. My
invitations ought to go out by Wednesday or Thursday at the latest,
and to-day is Friday.
"Milly's at-homes are not very amusing, as a rule," said Lena, "and
one never gets a chance of talking uninterruptedly to any one for a
couple of minutes at a time; Milly is one of those restless
hostesses who always seem to be trying to see how you look in
different parts of the room, in fresh grouping effects. Even if I
got to speak to Popham or Atkinson I couldn't plunge into a topic
like vivisection straight away. No, I think the postcard scheme
would be more hopeful and decidedly less tiresome. How would it be
best to word them?"
"Oh, something like this: 'Are you in favour of experiments on
living animals for the purpose of scientific research--Yes or No?'
That is quite simple and unmistakable. If they don't answer it will
at least be an indication that they are indifferent about the
subject, and that is all I want to know."
"All right," said Lena, "I'll get my brother-in-law to let me have
them addressed to his office, and he can telephone the result of the
plebiscite direct to you."
"Thank you ever so much," said Lady Prowche gratefully, "and be sure
to get the cards sent off as soon as possible."
On the following Tuesday the voice of an office clerk, speaking
through the telephone, informed Lady Prowche that the postcard poll
showed unanimous hostility to experiments on living animals.
Lady Prowche thanked the office clerk, and in a louder and more
fervent voice she thanked Heaven. The two invitations, already
sealed and addressed, were immediately dispatched; in due course
they were both accepted. The house party of the halcyon hours, as
the prospective hostess called it, was auspiciously launched.
Lena Luddleford was not included among the guests, having previously
committed herself to another invitation. At the opening day of a
cricket festival, however, she ran across Lady Prowche, who had
motored over from the other side of the county. She wore the air of
one who is not interested in cricket and not particularly interested
in life. She shook hands limply with Lena, and remarked that it was
a beastly day.
"The party, how has it gone off?" asked Lena quickly.
"Don't speak of it!" was the tragical answer; "why do I always have
such rotten luck?"
"But what has happened?"
"It has been awful. Hyaenas could not have behaved with greater
savagery. Sir Richard said so, and he has been in countries where
hyaenas live, so he ought to know. They actually came to blows!"
"Blows?"
"Blows and curses. It really might have been a scene from one of
Hogarth's pictures. I never felt so humiliated in my life. What
the servants must have thought!"
"But who were the offenders?"
"Oh, naturally the very two that we took all the trouble about."
"I thought they agreed on every subject that one could violently
disagree about--religion, politics, vivisection, the Derby decision,
the Falconer Report; what else was there left to quarrel about?"
"My dear, we were fools not to have thought of it. One of them was
Pro-Greek and the other Pro-Bulgar."
_________
-THE END-
[H.H. Munro] Saki's short story: The Oversight
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