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A SERVANT OF THE PUBLIC


      *      *      *      *      *      *

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

  A MAN OF MARK
  MR. WITT'S WIDOW
  FATHER STAFFORD
  A CHANGE OF AIR
  HALF A HERO
  THE PRISONER OF ZENDA
  THE GOD IN THE CAR
  THE DOLLY DIALOGUES
  COMEDIES OF COURTSHIP
  THE CHRONICLES OF COUNT ANTONIO
  THE HEART OF PRINCESS OSRA
  PHROSO
  SIMON DALE
  RUPERT OF HENTZAU
  THE KING'S MIRROR
  QUISANTE

      *      *      *      *      *      *


[Illustration: "I SHOULD BE RATHER AFRAID NEVER TO CHANGE TO A PERSON.
IT WOULD MAKE HIM MEAN SO TERRIBLY MUCH TO ONE, WOULDN'T IT?" PAGE 62]


A SERVANT OF THE PUBLIC

by

ANTHONY HOPE

With Four Illustrations by Harold Percival, A.R.E.







Methuen & Co.
36 Essex Street W.C.
London

First Published in 1905




CONTENTS


  CHAPTER                                             PAGE

      I. MUDDOCK AND MEAD                                1

     II. FIRST IMPRESSIONS                              15

    III. AN ARRANGEMENT FOR SUNDAY                      29

     IV. BY WAY OF PRECAUTION                           43

      V. A DAY IN THE COUNTRY                           55

     VI. AWAY WITH THE RIBBONS!                         70

    VII. UNDER THE NOSEGAY                              86

   VIII. THE LEGITIMATE CLAIMANT                       102

     IX. RENUNCIATION: A DRAMA                         118

      X. THE LICENCE OF VIRTUE                         133

     XI. WHAT IS TRUTH?                                149

    XII. AT CLOSE QUARTERS                             164

   XIII. THE HEROINE FAILS                             179

    XIV. AS MR. FLINT SAID                             194

     XV. THE MAN UPSTAIRS                              210

    XVI. MORALITY SMILES                               227

   XVII. AT SEA AND IN PORT                            243

  XVIII. THE PLAY AND THE PART                         257

    XIX. COLLATERAL EFFECTS                            270

     XX. THE WAYS DIVIDE                               286

    XXI. WHAT DOES IT MEAN?                            301

   XXII. OTHER WORLDS                                  316

  XXIII. THE MOST NATURAL THING                        332

   XXIV. "A GOOD SIGHT"                                348




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


                                                      PAGE
  "I SHOULD BE RATHER AFRAID NEVER TO CHANGE TO A
    PERSON. IT WOULD MAKE HIM MEAN SO TERRIBLY MUCH
    TO ME, WOULDN'T IT?"                    _Frontispiece_

  "SOMEBODY'LL BE GLAD TO SEE ME, ANYHOW," HE ENDED,
    WITH A LAUGH                                       224

  THE CONTRACT PUNCTILIOUSLY SIGNED BY ALL THE
    PARTIES AND WITNESSED BY JANET THE MAID... THEY
    HAD OPENED A BOTTLE OF CHAMPAGNE                   301

  WALKED IN SILENCE SIDE BY SIDE                       360




A Servant of the Public




CHAPTER I

MUDDOCK AND MEAD


The social birth of a family, united by a chain of parallel events with
the commercial development of a business, is a spectacle strange to no
country but most common among the nation of shopkeepers; it presents,
however, interesting points and is likely to produce a group of persons
rather diverse in character. Some of the family breathe the new air
readily enough; with some the straw of the omnibus (there was straw in
omnibuses during the formative period) follows on silken skirts into the
landau. It takes, they say, three generations to make a gentleman; the
schools ticket them--National or Board, Commercial or Grammar, Eton or
Harrow. Three generations, not perhaps of human flesh, but of mercantile
growth, it takes to make a great Concern. The humble parent-tree in the
Commercial Road puts forth branches in Brixton, Camberwell, Stoke
Newington, wherever buyers are many and "turnover" quick: here is the
second period, when the business is already large and lucrative, but not
yet imposing. Then a new ambition stirs and works in the creator's mind;
there is still a world to conquer. Appearance is added to reality, show
to substance. A splendid block rises somewhere within the ken of
fashion; it is red, with white facings, a tower or two, perhaps a
clock. First and last, a good deal is said about it in talk and in
print.