The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories, by Arnold Bennett

Title: The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories

Author: Arnold Bennett

Release Date: July 22, 2004 [eBook #12995]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MATADOR OF THE FIVE TOWNS AND OTHER STORIES***

E-text prepared by Jonathan Ingram, Wilelmina Malliere,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

THE MATADOR

OF THE FIVE TOWNS

AND OTHER STORIES

BY ARNOLD BENNETT

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

NOVELS

• A MAN FROM THE NORTH
• ANNA OF THE FIVE TOWNS
• LEONORA
• A GREAT MAN
• SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE
• WHOM GOD HATH JOINED
• BURIED ALIVE
• THE OLD WIVES' TALE
• THE GLIMPSE
• HELEN WITH THE HIGH HAND
• CLAYHANGER
• HILDA LESSWAYS
• THE CARD

FANTASIAS

• THE GRAND BABYLON HOTEL
• THE GATES OF WRATH
• TERESA OF WATLING STREET
• THE LOOT OF CITIES
• HUGO
• THE GHOST
• THE CITY OF PLEASURE

SHORT STORIES

• TALES OF THE FIVE TOWNS
• THE GRIM SMILE OF THE FIVE TOWNS

BELLES-LETTRES

• JOURNALISM FOR WOMEN
• FAME AND FICTION
• HOW TO BECOME AN AUTHOR
• THE TRUTH ABOUT AN AUTHOR
• THE REASONABLE LIFE
• HOW TO LIVE ON TWENTY-FOUR HOURS A DAY
• THE HUMAN MACHINE
• LITERARY TASTE
• THE FEAST OF ST FRIEND

DRAMA

• POLITE FARCES
• CUPID AND COMMON SENSE
• WHAT THE PUBLIC WANTS
• THE HONEYMOON

(In Collaboration with EDEN PHILLPOTTS)

• THE SINEWS OF WAR: A ROMANCE
• THE STATUE: A ROMANCE

First Published in 1912.

CONTENTS

TRAGIC

• THE MATADOR OF THE FIVE TOWNS
• MIMI
• THE SUPREME ILLUSION
• THE LETTER AND THE LIE
• THE GLIMPSE

FROLIC

• JOCK-AT-A-VENTURE
• THE HEROISM OF THOMAS CHADWICK
• UNDER THE CLOCK
• THREE EPISODES IN THE LIFE OF MR COWLISHAW, DENTIST
• CATCHING THE TRAIN
• THE WIDOW OF THE BALCONY
• THE CAT AND CUPID
• THE FORTUNE-TELLER
• THE LONG-LOST UNCLE
• THE TIGHT HAND
• WHY THE CLOCK STOPPED
• HOT POTATOES
• HALF-A-SOVEREIGN
• THE BLUE SUIT
• THE TIGER AND THE BABY
• THE REVOLVER
• AN UNFAIR ADVANTAGE

THE MATADOR OF THE FIVE TOWNS

I

Mrs Brindeley looked across the lunch-table at her husband with glinting, eager eyes, which showed that there was something unusual in the brain behind them.

"Bob," she said, factitiously calm. "You don't know what I've just remembered!"

"Well?" said he.

"It's only grandma's birthday to-day!"

My friend Robert Brindley, the architect, struck the table with a violent fist, making his little boys blink, and then he said quietly:

"The deuce!"

I gathered that grandmamma's birthday had been forgotten and that it was not a festival that could be neglected with impunity. Both Mr and Mrs Brindley had evidently a humorous appreciation of crises, contretemps, and those collisions of circumstances which are usually called "junctures" for short. I could have imagined either of them saying to the other: "Here's a funny thing! The house is on fire!" And then yielding to laughter as they ran for buckets. Mrs Brindley, in particular, laughed now; she gazed at the table-cloth and laughed almost silently to herself; though it appeared that their joint forgetfulness might result in temporary estrangement from a venerable ancestor who was also, birthdays being duly observed, a continual fount of rich presents in specie.

Robert Brindley drew a time-table from his breast-pocket with the rapid gesture of habit. All men