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signed three months earlier. “Just this, my friend,” he said. “You have
asked me to reduce Mrs. Jones’s flow of talk to one-sixteenth of its
present volume. What you apparently do not know it, that neither her
Creator, nor I nor man can by any power or persuasion reduce the flow of
any woman’s talk by one word or one syllable against her will.”
“You mean…?” Tydvil stared at him incredulous.
“I have failed in my last service to you—and believe me, Tydvil, it is
the one I would most gladly perform if I could.
“So that…” He nodded at the Bill in Nicholas’s hand.
“This is null and void.” Nicholas was rereading his endorsement.
“It seems so simple though.” Tydvil’s voice was full of wonder.
“So simple—yet the only thing in the Universe that is impossible.”
“I just can’t understand,” said Tydvil.
“Listen, my friend. When the Creator first formed woman, and the work was
completed, it was discovered, too late, that one of the assisting angels
had omitted to adjust the brake on her tongue. The mistake was
irreparable, and beyond even the power of the Creator to remedy.”
“And mankind has suffered for it ever since,” sighed Tydvil.
Nicholas nodded. “But the wrath of the Creator was so great that he
ordered a terrible punishment to the erring’ angel. He decreed that so
long as mankind lived on earth, that angel should take human form, to be
reincarnated through all time, and in each incarnation to be a married
man.”
“What a fearful fate,” murmured Tydvil, sympathetically.
Nicholas nodded his agreement. “But the worst part of the punishment was
that through all his reincarnation he would know himself to be the
missing angel and to realise the paradise he had lost.”
“But can’t he tell his wife he is the angel?” asked Tydvil.
“To guard against that, the Creator ordained that throughout time, every
married man should always believe himself to be a missing angel. So, as
all men try to persuade their wives they are angels, the real angel’s
wife always regards him as being like the rest of them, and no better
than them.”
“Terrible,” murmured Tydvil, “why, I might be—I’m sure lam…”
“So are all the rest,” Nicholas said, holding out the Bill to Tydvil.
“Au revoir, my friend.”
Tydvil reached out to take the Bill. As he did so there was a crash and a
blinding flash of light. The window and the glass walls of Tydvil’s
office clashed down in clang of broken glass. Tydvil was flung to the
floor beside his splintered writing table. One sleeve was almost torn out
of his coat. As the smoke cleared he recovered his shocked senses.
Geraldine, Amy and Billy, turned and rushed to the shattered walls.
Staring through, they beheld a dishevelled Tydvil sitting on the ruins of
his chair, by the remains of his table. He still held his smoking cigar
in the corner of his mouth, and he was turning over, with evident
interest, a scorched piece of paper he held in his hand.
It was Amy who first found her voice. “Tydvil!” she exclaimed
dramatically, “this is a visitation of heaven.”
“Fat lot you know!” came the rude and truculent answer from a belligerent
Tydvil.
“Are you hurt?” asked Geraldine anxiously.
Tydvil regarded the three with interest. “Come in here the three of you,
and don’t stand gaping there.” Then, to the white-faced crowd of
employees who had rushed to the scene, “Clear out, you people,” he
shouted. “There’s nothing wrong—only a flash of lightning.”
Putting her hand through the broken pane, Geraldine opened the shattered
door and the three joined Tydvil as he scrambled to his feet.
“I hope, if there is any decency left in you, Tydvil,” Amy took the
floor, “that this will be a terrible warning to you.”
Disregarding her words entirely, he surveyed the three; then he fixed his
eyes on Amy. “You two,” he said with a glance at Geraldine and Billy,
“know as much of my affairs as I do—nearly. So I don’t mind your hearing
what I am going to say.” Then, to Amy, “I’m absolutely fed up of you and
all your works. Now, here’s my only offer. Either you give me a judicial
separation or I’ll sue for divorce, and, by Jove, I’ll get it!”
“You! You divorce me?” Amy gasped.
Tydvil stepped close to her, bent his head and murmured some words in her
ear.
Amy paled and stepped back with terror in her eyes. “Well!” he snapped.
“Separation or Divorce?”
“I will have to submit to your cruelty,” Amy stammered. “Then get out of
this and wait at home till you hear from me.”
With one savage glance at Geraldine, Amy turned and walked out of the
room.
“What on earth was the row about?” demanded Geraldine. “Where’s Mr.
Senior?”
“Thanks to you,” Tydvil held out the note on which the word “Cancelled”
appeared in scorched letters.
Her eyes lit up. “It worked?”
“It did,” agreed Tydvil looking round the wrecked room.
“What worked?” asked the bewildered Billy.
“Best not tell him, Geraldine,” grinned Tydvil, “the news would scare him
too much.”
“She’s scared me enough already this morning,” growled Billy. “So I won’t
ask any more questions.”
Tydvil looked to Geraldine for enlightenment, and Geraldine told her
story.
“You mean to tell me that you put that on to poor Billy? You ought to
spank her,” laughed Tydvil.
“She deserves it, but she has me scared, Chief,” grinned Billy. “I’d
never know what she’d do next.”
“Oh! by the way,” Tydvil said, “I forgot to tell you. You’re both sacked.”
“Chief!” expostulated Billy.
“What gratitude.” Geraldine laughed. “I’ve saved your body from Amy and
your soul from your friend—and you sack me…”
“Billy,” Tydvil commanded, “take that woman some where and marry her as
soon as you can. She’s not safe to be left lying about loose…”
“You’re not as cracked as I thought you were,” retorted Billy
audaciously.
“I hope I’m not,” Tydvil went on, “because I’m off to Europe for a
holiday next month, and you, Billy, are going to manage C. B. & D. in my
place…”
And now, gentle reader, should you be a woman and married, I have written
this story to tell you why you should be patient and gentle with him.
Because he really believes he is an angel—that is his fate. And besides,
he really might be. You never know your luck, and that missing angel is
somewhere in the world.
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