Lion and the Unicorn | Page 3

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THE LION AND THE UNICORN
by RICHARD HARDING DAVIS

IN MEMORY OF MANY HOT DAYS AND SOME HOT CORNERS
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO LT.-COL. ARTHUR H. LEE, R.A.
British Military Attache with the United States Army

Contents
THE LION AND THE UNICORN
ON THE FEVER SHIP
THE MAN WITH ONE TALENT
THE VAGRANT
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER

THE LION AND THE UNICORN
Prentiss had a long lease on the house, and because it stood in Jermyn
Street the upper floors were, as a matter of course, turned into lodgings
for single gentlemen; and because Prentiss was a Florist to the Queen,
he placed a lion and unicorn over his flowershop, just in front of the
middle window on the first floor. By stretching a little, each of them
could see into the window just beyond him, and could hear all that was
said inside; and such things as they saw and heard during the reign of
Captain Carrington, who moved in at the same time they did! By day
the table in the centre of the room was covered with maps, and the
Captain sat with a box of pins, with different-colored flags wrapped
around them, and amused himself by sticking them in the maps and
measuring the spaces in between, swearing meanwhile to himself. It
was a selfish amusement, but it appeared to be the Captain's only
intellectual pursuit, for at night, the maps were rolled up, and a green
cloth was spread across the table, and there was much company and
popping of soda-bottles, and little heaps of gold and silver were moved
this way and that across the cloth. The smoke drifted out of the open
windows, and the laughter of the Captain's guests rang out loudly in the
empty street, so that the policeman halted and raised his eyes
reprovingly to the lighted windows, and cabmen drew up beneath them
and lay in wait, dozing on their folded arms, for the Captain's guests to

depart. The Lion and the Unicorn were rather ashamed of the scandal of
it, and they were glad when, one day, the Captain went away with his
tin boxes and gun-cases piled high on a four-wheeler.
Prentiss stood on the sidewalk and said: "I wish you good luck, sir."
And the Captain said: "I'm coming back a Major, Prentiss." But he
never came back. And one day--the Lion remembered the day very well,
for on that same day the newsboys ran up and down Jermyn Street
shouting out the news of "a 'orrible disaster" to the British arms. It was
then that a young lady came to the door in a hansom, and Prentiss went
out to meet her and led her upstairs. They heard him unlock the
Captain's door and say, "This is his room, miss," and after he had gone
they watched her standing quite still by the centre table. She stood there
for a very long time looking slowly about her, and then she took a
photograph of the Captain from the frame on the mantel and slipped it
into her pocket, and when she went out again her veil was down, and
she was crying. She must have given Prentiss as much as a sovereign,
for he called her "Your ladyship," which he never did under a
sovereign.
And she drove off, and they never saw her again either, nor could they
hear the address she gave the cabman. But it was somewhere up St.
John's Wood way.
After that the rooms were empty for some months, and the Lion and the
Unicorn were forced to amuse themselves with the beautiful ladies and
smart-looking men who came to Prentiss to buy flowers and
"buttonholes,"