The Rise of Henry Morcar (21 page)

“How can I possibly explain that to a man who's never handled a hank of yarn in his life?” exclaimed Morcar irritably. “Any West Riding man would know the difference right away, but you—”

“Ah! You could call expert witnesses if necessary?” said Harington swiftly.

“Of course.”

“A useful point,” said the barrister. “My second point, Mr. Morcar,” he continued in his mellifluous drawling tones: “springs from my surprise that the Patent Office accepted such a name as Thistledown as a trademark. It is a word in general use, which might legitimately be used as a noun of description, for purposes of comparison, in many trades, especially those concerned with woollen manufactures. It therefore lacks distinctiveness, and might also be judged to operate unfavourably, in unfair restriction that is to say, towards other traders. However, am I to understand that the word was so accepted and registered?”

“No,” said Morcar with the calm of extreme anger. “It was neither accepted nor registered. I was not aware that such registration was necessary.”

“But then, my dear Mr. Morcar,” drawled Harington, throwing out his hands, palm upwards, in a gesture of amused resignation: “Your case is infinitely weakened.”

The barrister's fine white hands, his drawl, the way he pronounced
Patent
, his formal phrases which he evidently enjoyed, his stress on the words
trade
and
traders
, which somehow defined such matters as beneath a gentleman's consideration, exacerbated Morcar's rage to a pitch where he could no longer restrain himself from venting it.

“The fact of non-registration could have been ascertained from Mr. Nasmyth by letter,” he said coldly. “There was no need to drag me here to discuss it.”

“Mr. Nasmyth had reported the fact to me,” said the barrister at once.

His voice was calm but his face showed a faint flicker. “He's afraid for his conference fee,” thought Morcar contemptuously, and he remarked aloud: “Then why bring me here to report it all over again?” He answered himself in secret: “To show off his learning and his voice,” and added angrily aloud: “I'm a busy man, sir, if you are not.”

The barrister flushed—it was possible that Morcar had hit an awkward nail on the head—and raised his fair eyebrows haughtily, but drawled without apparent concern: “It was essential that I should hear your personal testimony on your business connection with Mr. Shaw, and I should like also to go into the matter of your proofs of use of the trademark—if you have time.”

“Certainly,” said Morcar, trying to maintain his cool tone, though he felt his head congested with angry blood: “I have time for anything which furthers the establishment of my exclusive right to this trade name.”

“It is simply a
name
, I take it, not a name printed in any special manner or associated with a picture or design?”

“That is so.”

“You have used it for five years, to all your customers?”

“Yes. All over the world.”

“Can you show correspondence referring to this name, ordering cloths by it, and so forth?”

“Most certainly I can. Here's a specimen,” said Morcar, pulling out his pocket-book and handing over a letter from a New York merchant laying a big order for
your Thistledown cloths
.

The barrister scanned it, and was about to speak when the telephone on his desk interrupted him. He spoke down it quietly, quickly and with evident displeasure, but in the same mellifluous drawl he had employed during the interview. “The
drawl must be genuine, then,” thought Morcar derisively. “Poor fellow!” Nasmyth was trying to fix him with a glance, and mouthing a query as to what Morcar thought of Harington. It was clear that he expected an admiring answer; Morcar, though not without perception of the barrister's acumen, which had revealed even to him several new aspects of the case, gave himself the pleasure of replying: “Nowt!” with emphasis. Nasmyth coloured and sat back, disconcerted; Morcar, looking away, saw that the barrister's large pale eyes were on him and that Harington, though doubtless ignorant of the significance of the Yorkshire word, was perfectly aware of his client's valuation of his services. Harington now laid down the telephone and stated in his smooth unpausing drawl:

“I will send Mr. Nasmyth my formal opinion in writing of course, but there is no harm perhaps in my telling you now informally of my main conclusions. It would appear that the proper course is undoubtedly for Mr. Morcar to proceed at once to register the trademark, furnishing all possible proofs of usage with his application. The proposed registration will be as is customary advertised in the appropriate trademark journal. Mr. Shaw may then choose to oppose it, in which case the onus of proof of his own use will rest on him. The Patent Office will then make a decision, which can be contested by a case against Mr. Shaw, if necessary; it would seem that Mr. Morcar will be able to prove longer and wider usage. If Mr. Shaw does not oppose registration and the trademark is registered, his case, if he then uses the trademark, will be immensely weakened by his lack of opposition. I have put the matter simply and informally and not in legal form for you, Mr. Morcar—”

“Thank you,” said Morcar sardonically.

“—but that is the gist of my conclusion.”

Morcar, revolving the statement in his mind, decided that it was clear and on the whole comforting. “Damn him, he knows his job,” he conceded reluctantly. Aloud he said: “I am obliged to you, Mr. Harington.” He rose briskly, implying, in courteous contrast to his previous hints, that the barrister was a busy man whose time must not be wasted.

“And now that our formal conference is concluded,” said the barrister cheerfully, rising also: “Perhaps you and Mr. Nasmyth will give me the pleasure of your company at lunch?”

“Either he has another textile case on hand and wants to pump me, or he wants to soothe me down for Nasmyth with a view to further business,” thought Morcar cynically. He felt that he had been made to look such a fool by the two men of law that it was a point of textile pride not to reveal the extent
of his humiliation. “Thanks—that would be very pleasant,” he said. “I'm not sure whether I'm engaged or not—there'll be a message for me at my hotel. If I might telephone?”

“By all means,” said Harington affably, offering him the instrument.

The message, as Morcar expected, liberated him for the lunch hour, and the three men were soon passing through the arched entrance to the court and climbing into a taxi which speeded swiftly to answer Harington's loud smooth call. Morcar's mind for the last few minutes had been on the business which his telephone call had settled, and on returning his attention to the present he found Harington apologising with unexpected emphasis for the Bloomsbury restaurant towards which they were driving. It seemed he was meeting his wife there—a previous arrangement—better perhaps not to attempt at this late hour an alteration which might cause delay—he and Mrs. Harington were to attend an auction together—some nice pieces were being sold from Lord So-and-So's place. He did not say where the auction was to be held, and Morcar felt sure, from the pucker on the full lips and the frown on the bald brow, that the auction-room lay far away from Bloomsbury, which had doubtless been chosen for the barrister's convenience. He felt sure also that Harington had thought the restaurant quite adequate for the entertainment of Morcar until he heard on the telephone the name of Morcar's hotel, which was highly expensive and well-known, even famous. Morcar smiled pleasantly and said he should be glad to make the acquaintance of the restaurant named, as he had not visited it before and liked to find new places. At this Harington looked even less comfortable than before, as Morcar had intended. He might, he reflected, be ignorant in law, but when it came to money he could probably buy up Harington five times over and not notice it; if Harington chose to insist on his own advantages, so would Morcar.

They entered the restaurant, which was Italian and, as Morcar had expected, of good and even stylish quality—he could not imagine the barrister contenting himself with anything less than fine wines and a good cuisine. It appeared that Harington was well known there, and the business of exchanging a small table for a larger one was carried out expeditiously, which somewhat restored the barrister's good-humour. Mrs. Harington, it seemed, had not arrived. The men settled themselves and ordered drinks; the drinks came and were disposed of; the barrister looked at his watch and frowned impatiently, fidgeted, frowned again, spoke of telephoning to Kensington, decided against it, summoned again the wine waiter, who did not immediately
appear. His fine voice had an edge on it when at last he said: “Ah, Christina!” and the three men rose.

“Mr. Morcar, my dear,” said Harington smoothly. “Nasmyth you know of old.”

The tone of his voice shouted aloud: “I want something from this man, so soothe him and flatter him.” Morcar had heard this tone in men's voices before when they were addressing their wives, and he now wondered cynically to which type of wife it was addressed on this occasion—the seductive, the condescending or the motherly. He turned, and found that Christina Harington was none of these things; she was the elegant, the gracious, the beautiful. It struck him that he had never seen an elegant woman before in his life.

As Morcar made so much material which women wore, it was a habit with him, part of his work, to observe the apparel of all women. The season was spring, the day cool and bright; Christina was wearing a dress of thin black cloth, admirably cut, with a small black hat and an abundance of silver foxes. Her figure was charming, her hands slender; she had no jewellery save one magnificent sapphire ring. So much Morcar had noticed while she drew off her soft white gloves; then he looked in her face and received a shock of surprise. She was lovely, she was unhappy, she was frightened. Her complexion was milk-white, her profile most delicately chiselled, pure, clear and flawless; her eyes were dark-blue like her sapphire, deep yet bright, like the sea; her dark hair, cut short in the style of the day, curled so thickly that one might guess she had some difficulty in confining it within the limits set by her taste. Her lips, beautifully moulded, delicate yet full, were lightly touched with carmine. This style had not then penetrated to the provinces, and Morcar felt a delight, a sense of joyous release from old shibboleths, in the company of a woman of quality who thus showed her fashion. Her voice was soft and gentle; her southern pronunciation struck Morcar as childlike, touching. Harington became infinitely more real to him through her presence. At the moment she was apologising rather breathlessly for being late; her husband, in frowning concentration over the menu, seemed to deride her apology as unnecessary yet wait for more.

“There's no need to make a song and dance about it, my dear,” he said drily at length, without looking up at her. “After all, it's not the first time.”

The waiter now appeared expectantly at Harington's elbow. A handsome lad of some southern nation, he displeased Harington by tapping his order pad with his pencil.

“Don't do that,” said the barrister, with an irritable gesture
which knocked the pencil from the boy's hand to the floor. This result was probably unintended, for Harington flushed, but his irritation was not calmed by shame for his bad temper, but rather heightened.

“You're not the man I usually have,” he drawled. “Where is Morelli?”

“Pardon—this is my table, that is his,” explained the boy, smiling and waving. He added helpfully: “The sole is off.”

“I haven't ordered it yet,” snapped Harington. “Well, what is there to eat to-day?”

As the menu consisted of a card about twelve inches long and eight inches wide, closely written in smudged purple ink, the question was a large one, and Morcar was not surprised that the boy seemed perplexed how to answer.

“There are oysters,” he began in a conscientious effort to please: “Hors d'œuvres. Smoked salmon. Minestrone. Ravioli.” His stubby forefinger indicated these items on the card. Harington shook the menu to dislodge the finger, but the well-meaning boy persisted in his indications. Suddenly Harington, colouring violently, snatched a fork and aimed a jab at the intruding hand. He missed, of course; but to stab at a young waiter with a fork! A fork! Upon my soul, a fork, thought Morcar, horrified. Nasmyth, colouring, began a rapid three-cornered conversation with Christina and his client—on the weather, plays, films, anything. They tried to keep it up, but the inquisition inexorably proceeding in the background beat down their feeble efforts into silence.

“What else is there?”

“The salmi of game is best. Or the risotto.”

“Answer my question. What else is there?”

“That is the best, the salmi, that is what I recommend you to 'ave.”

“I ask you a question and you don't answer it. What else is there?”

Perspiring in his anguished wrestle with an unfamiliar language, the wretched boy wailed: “The sole is off.”

“He means:
Only
the sole is off, the rest are all available, Edward,” murmured Christina softly.

“Kindly allow me to give the order myself, my dear,” said Harington, colouring with anger, so that even his bald forehead grew pink. “I am perfectly competent, I assure you. Now, boy!”

“It is late, and the fish is off,” almost wept the waiter, turning in an instant from a sophisticated servant into a crumpled schoolboy just promoted.

“Oh, go away and send me someone who understands the
language!” cried Harington in a false-friendly tone, with a large gesture of rejection.

“There is all, all it says there, sir, only the sole is off.”

“Oh, clear out! Hop it! Go away!” shouted Harington, slamming the menu so viciously on the table that plates bounced and cutlery flew. Everyone in the room looked round; the head waiter rushed up, and with an angry glance shooed the unhappy boy in disgrace away from the table. Bowing obsequiously and drawing an order pad from his coat-tail pocket, in a trice he collected orders from all four guests. He withdrew; service of the meal began almost immediately.