"You have had an awful experience, old chap. My God, you have lived
through an awful thing."
Mr. Boyle said: "I believe you, guv'nor. Now this is a funny thing,
ain't it. I was 'it on the leg by somethink; and whatever it was, it
went right through me trouser but never 'urt the sock. Funny thing,
that, ain't it?"
"Quite extraordinary," I admitted. "All the other poor chaps in your
shop are dead, aren't they?"
"Twelve chaps and four females; all dead," admitted Mr. Boyle. "Funny
thing, wasn't it? Right through me trouser and never touched the sock!"
"Eighty injured from the other shops!" I reflected. "What did you
think--how did you feel, when--when you realised it all?"
"I never thought much abaht it," responded Mr. Boyle. "Me leg was
'urtin'."
"It isn't a matter one need encourage him to think about," suggested the
doctor.
"I can't 'elp thinking about one thing, though," interpolated Mr. Boyle.
"Such a funny thing: Right through----"
"It must have been an awful moment," I hazarded, "when you came to your
senses and looked about and saw the--the awfulness of it. What did you
do?"
"I don't remember, not clearly," responded Mr. Boyle.... "I know I
laughed. It seemed so queer for anything to rip right through a
person's trouser-leg and not go near 'is sock."
*XXIV*
*MORE OF PRUDENCE*
Prudence and midday post arrived together at Baffin's washhouse on the
day appointed for her second stance.
"Oo-er, Mr. Baffin," was her greeting: "_I_ got your letters. Gimme the
stamps, wown't you? Me an' my friend we allus c'lect stamps. We ain't
gointer stop till we got ten thousand, and then we're gointer make a
bonfire when my mother's out. 'Ere, an' I ain't bin 'avin' _'arf_ a
lark with your postman, Mr. Baffin. Oo, an' the conductor on the bus
what I come by, 'e wasn't 'arf drunk, I tell you. I was frightened, I
was, 'cos my father useder git drunk, an' once 'e bit my mother. 'E
_was_ a bad man, my father, an' they made 'im go out an' be a soldier in
Egypt, an' 'e got the fever in 'is 'ead, an' we got a picture of 'im at
'ome before 'e was buried, an' you ought to see the funny black man
a-settin' alongside of 'im. 'Ere, I'm all in a knot at the back, Mr.
Baffin: arst your friend to undo me. An' don't you foget to keep them
stamps, an' I spoge it's the chin agen, an' I 'ope you've remembered the
muffins!"
"Yes," responded Baffin, "I remembered to get the muffins, and I've also
remembered to get an empty flour-sack. Know what that's for?"
Prudence shook her head--gravely, wonderingly.
"To smother up tiresome girls in that _will_ wriggle and _will_ talk,"
explained Baffin.
"He! he!" giggled Prudence. "Wown't tie up _me_, I know. 'Cos if you
was to do that you couldn't paint me. See?" She gurgled with triumph.
"And now," said Baffin, "it is time to leave off playing. Sit up, like
a good girl, and keep quiet. Get rid of that bull's-eye."
"Yes," said Prudence. And the lollipop was "got rid of" of by a simple
and effective means. "I _should_ laugh if someone was to tread on it,"
observed Prudence. "If my mother was to see---- Oo-er, Mr. Baffin,
down't 'oller at me, please, Mr. Baffin. I _will_ be good, I will;
on'y, if you look like that I shall cry, 'Cos you frighten me."
Silence reigned for a little space, whilst Prudence, with clenched
hands, maintained an attitude of strenuous repose. Baffin's actions
alternated between brief and seemingly motiveless dabs at his canvas,
and a critical inspection of his model, for the purposes of which he
spread out his legs and wagged his head--slowly and pensively, from side
to side--like an elderly cockerel surveying the domestic landscape.
This proceeding terminated in a sigh that had all the eloquence of a
shout, and Baffin pounced, as it were, upon his canvas.
Prudence selected this moment in which to throw up both her hands, and
wail with sorrow. "Ooh," she moaned, "ooh, I am a bad gel, I am. Ooh,
what will my mother say when I go 'ome? She give me a letter to powst,
she did, an' I never powsted it, an' it's a letter for our landlord, it
is, an' I promised faithful to put it into the first box I come to. An'
now I've fogot it, I 'ave, an' my mother 'll be cross. An' I love my
mother, I do, an' she's got a bad place on her arm, an' I am a bad,
wicked gel to tease an' trouble 'er, I am. Oo-er, I must get up and go
out, Mr. Baffin. I must, 'cause I fogot to powst my mother's letter."
Baffin did the philosophic thing: put away his canvas, and put on the
kettle, and invited his sitter to unsit and rejoice. That young person
responded to this invitation by sitting wonderfully silent--strangely
still--for ten minutes. It was only at the very end of this unique
performance that we perceived her to be shedding tears. Real tears,
this time.
It was possible in that moment to realise that Prudence had passed her
twenty-second year. Baffin touched her shoulder, and she shrank from
him and shuddered. She spoke, and her voice was the voice of a woman.
"Lemme alone: lemme alone. You donnow what a un'eppy gel I am.
You--you----"
It finished in a gurgle.
Then, with the laudable motive of clearing the air, Baffin referred in a
tone of banter to the still visible presence of red flannel. The
success of his experiment amazed us both. All in a moment the whims and
capers of infancy possessed her again, and she succumbed to an ecstasy
of wriggles.
"Ooh, 'ere, 'ere, Mr. Baffin; 'ere, I say, what do you think some man
'as done? Some man 'as sent me a--a something: a underneath something,
all white. Yes, reely!"
"An' my mother says it didn't 'arf cost somethink, neether. But ain't
'e got a cheek to do it? 'Cos it ain't right for a man to send presents
like that to a gel when she's grown up: 'cos my mother says it's takin'
a liberty. Whoever sent me it, 'e must 'a' been a artist because of the
tasty yoke. My mother says as I'm a grown-up gel now, an' I got to be
very pertickler.
"Oo, it is pretty, though, I tell you: pink ribbon on the shoulders, an'
my mother says 'ooever 'e is 'e oughter be ashamed of 'isself, an' all
my gel cousins from Catford are comin' on Sunday to 'ave a look, an'
when I find out 'oo it is, my mother says I can tell 'im what I think of
'im."
Stimulated and cheered by the thought of this exciting prospect,
Prudence fell upon the muffins. Her appetite, at any rate, was
thoroughly grown up, and, having performed a veritable gastronomic feat,
she curled herself up on the musty old curtain which carpeted Baffin's
"throne" and--went to sleep.
Whereupon, the unauthorised kittens--they crawled everywhere--you found
them in the milk jug--promptly employed the skirts of Prudence as a
playground.
"Move those kittens away, like a good chap," Baffin called out to me.
"They'll worry Prudence when she wakes up. Hates the silly beggars, you
know."
But to our surprise, when Prudence did wake up, she stretched forth a
foot, and began to tease the plumpest of them with the point of her
shoe.
"Funny objec's, ain't they, when they're fat and soft, like this?" said
Prudence. "Breakable, ain't they? No strength in their legs. On'y fit
to lie on their backs an' be tickled."
And Prudence stooped down, and lifted the plump one into her lap.
"Ooh, my! 'is little pores ain't 'arf soft!" She spoke in the woman's
voice that we had heard but once before. "'Is little pores ain't 'arf
soft; you could bite 'em."
She kissed a paw.
"Ain't 'e got a funny morsel of a nose. Sich a cheeky nose; such a teeny
one. You could bite it. You--you----"
She lifted the absurd little animal to her face, and rubbed her cheek
against his cosy side, and she kissed his impertinent nose.
"Oo's a precious, then!" continued Prudence. "Oo's a sleepy precious.
My, 'e's a sleepy little 'elpless little lump of fat! Ain't you, boy?
What price a see-saw, fat boy?"
She held him so that he hung by his shoulders in an attitude that was
not suggestive of dignity. And she dandled and bounced him in a manner
with which kittens are not familiar. She lifted him to her face again,
and made as if to kiss the nose once more.
But the lips, half bunched for that purpose, parted suddenly, as if with
pain--as if with wonder--as if with horror. The kitten slipped from her
fingers, and fell with an indignant mew into the soft, warm haven of her
lap. And Prudence's hands went up to her startled face, and her hair
fell over her like a shroud, and she sobbed as women sob.
"Oh, Gawd!" she cried; "its eyes, its eyes! Its little, winkin' eyes!
Oh, mother, _mother_!"
*XXV*
*A TALK WITH JAMES*
I had extinguished the flame of the doctor's gas-stove, and was warming
myself on the lid, when James burst in and interrupted me.
"Come off it, like a dear, and listen," said James. "I've had a
proposal!"
I wondered, for a moment, whether this flippant manner of stating a
serious fact did not call for some form of fatherly rebuke. But all that
I actually said was: "Well, I hope you think you've started soon
enough."
"Started!" echoed James, regarding me with an air as of dignified
amazement. "My dear young man, I _started_ years ago. Why, Baffin was
my third; and Baffin began to woo me before I was eleven."
"How long ago was that?" I meekly inquired.
"Don't you be rude," said James. "I take a grown-up size in almost
everything. If Baffin perseveres, I suppose I shall really have to
accept him--if it's only to make him leave off wearing those New Art
ties. But, really and truly, I'd rather not be married at all. I don't
believe I've got a married mind. I'm much too fond of rats."
"But," I ventured to point out, "people have been known to combine the
two interests."
"Not successfully," asserted James. "Rats require a fearful lot of
attention. Another thing about Baffin is his hands. I really
_couldn't_ be married to them."
"Why 'another' thing?" I inquired. "You haven't stated any firstly."
"I daresay my grammar isn't quite correct, but I haven't noticed that
yours is perfect," rejoined James. "And, anyhow, my ideas are sound
even if my grammar is weak. Of course, one could _train_ him to take
care of his nails; but with rats you have more to show for your trouble.
He really was most touching."
"Baffin has a fine vein of sentiment," I admitted.
"Why Baffin?" demanded James. "I was talking about Mr. Grimsdick."
"Pardon me," I said. "You think so rapidly, and my hands are cold. Who
is Mr. Grimsdick?"
"The one I was telling you about," explained James. "He's our grocer."
"But you never were telling me about him," I protested. "He is quite a
new character."
"Nonsense," cried James. "Why, the very first thing I said to you was
that Mr. Grimsdick had proposed to me. At least, I take it as a
proposal. He held my hand and----"
"Excuse me," I ventured to observe, "but do you think it quite correct
in the daughter of a respected family physician that she should go about
the country holding hands with grocers? Now had it been----"
James cut short my speech with characteristic impatience. "Mr.
Grimsdick," she said, "has been holding my hand for years."
"Does he sell lard?" I inquired.
"He is a very religious man, and when his wife died, when I was about
seven, he used to give me raisins and pat my head to comfort himself.
And this afternoon, when he gave me my change, he held my hand and he
said, 'R! Miss, I expect we shall soon see you round yere shopping on
your own account. How time do fly, to be shaw. You'll be having your
hair up soon. And yet it don't seem no time since the days when you
used to sit on the cheese barrels and swing your little legs and heat my
raisins. 'E'll be a lucky young fellar whoever 'e is. They'll 'ave to
'urry up, miss, some of 'em--what? I on'y wish I was a young man--_I'd_
give some of 'em a lead.'
"So I said, 'Never mind, Mr. Grimsdick. I shall always come to you for
my soap and tea.'
"And he laughed. And he said, 'R! We shan't see much of you round 'ere,
I reckon, miss. You'll be marrying into the aristocracy and goin' to
live at Herne Bay or Clacton.'
"So then I gave him Fatty's well-known speech about the Idle Rich.
"And he said, 'Oh! If that's your way of thinkin' there's a chance for
all of us. Well, miss, there's a empty chair in my parlour and a seat
be'ind the cash desk.' _I_ call that a proposal."
"A most definite and unequivocal proposal," I agreed. "What did you say
next?"
"Oh," said James, "there was nothing else of importance. We got off on
to the subject of Carlsbad plums: they were beauties, but too dear. He
wouldn't reduce them."
"Pooh!" I cried. "And he calls himself a lover!"
"_All_ men aren't like Baffin and other people, thank goodness," said
James disdainfully. "Mr. Grimsdick thinks about the future. But I'd
rather go in for rats, I think. There's Baffin, for instance: he never
shuts a door after him."
"Rats don't either," I submitted.
"But cats don't open them," argued James, not without logic. "And then
there's always having to be at home on the second Tuesday. Really, I
can't decide about my future at all. Most girls haven't any
difficulties, because they can make up their minds to be nurses and
relieve the sufferings of the poor. But I've been brought up to that
sort of thing, and it bores me. Of course, you can always get an
opium-eater, or drunkard, or something, and devote your life to
reforming him. But then, again, they always smell of it. Really, it's
very hard. And Baffin's so irritable. Look at the way men fuss over
trifles. And if you get one who is clean and not fussy, and not a
grocer, and decently young, he is sure to be ugly and a bore."
I said, "You are referring now, I suppose, to Boag, the Conative
Meliorist?"
"No," replied James. "Mr. Boag is a bore, but he isn't downright ugly.
As a matter of fact, I was thinking of _you_."
"Oh!" I said.
"Yes," said James. "I know you like one to be frank. Apart from
everything else, men make me sick. It will really have to be rats."
*XXVI*
*THE APRIL BARGE*
I set out, sedately enough, one April morning, to rescue James from her
aunt at Bayswater. I set out grandly enthroned upon a 'bus.
But I came quite unexpectedly upon this April Barge, and James and her
aunt were forgotten.
The April sun had come out sharp to time, you see, and was winking
fitfully upon all of us, like the unsettled, rakish fellow that he is.
And a girl with two great baskets full of wondering daffodils had come
out, too; and some conscienceless vagabond was extracting melody from a
cornet. So that even the Regent's Canal, with its sombre vicinage and
sulky craft, seemed, as if by some surprising effort, to have taken on
an air of sweetness and youth and hope.
You could consider this fact at leisure as our 'bus toiled slowly up the
rise of a road which spans the canal. There was a public-house in front
of us--the public-house and the cornet seem to be inseparably united in
this neighbourhood--but the canal was to one's left, and appeared,
somehow, to convey that air of refreshment which the tavern so
conspicuously lacked.
As one looked down upon the face of these waters, so strangely heartened
by the sunlight, a sort of certainty grew upon him that they would break
suddenly into perspective; that their vista would cease to be obscured
by coal wharves and cranes and hoardings; that somebody's whisky,
commended to your notice in large white letters on a blue-enamelled
background, would fade and fade and fade, until it merged with the white
clouds and the blue sky behind it. Then need you but sigh and sit back,
beholding a silver streak set snugly between hills, and flowing,
flowing, flowing to the edge of the world. Instead of which----
Pooh! There was no instead. The April sun kept winking at the
daffodils, and the daffodils kept staring at the sun, and the cornet-man
made music by the waterside. So that even a poet might have smiled at it
all. For here, I'll swear, was none of your mere "waterways," created
by syndicates for profit; here was none of your world capitals. Just a
little old river, sunning itself gratefully in a little old town that
God had made.
And, as if to strengthen this conceit, a woman came up through the
hatchway of a barge that I was looking at. She was wearing a
sun-bonnet, in accordance with the custom of barge-women, and she stood
up gracefully, one hand on her hip, the other before her eyes, to seek
out the cornet player.
We are the boys of the bulldawg breed
What's made ole Hengland's Nime.
Those were the words which had inspired the melody which the
cornet-blower was blowing. The woman tapped her foot in time with the
notes.
Her husband came up then, accompanied by tobacco clouds and a baby. He
seemed to be a fortunate sort of husband, for I noticed that the woman
laughed appreciatively at some joke which he made.
Then the man's eye wandered to the canal-side, and he caught sight of
the daffodil-girl, who was standing there. And what must the fellow do
but throw kisses to her, which gallantry was reciprocated by the
flower-girl. The barge-woman laughed at this new jest with even more
good humour (if that were possible) than that which she had shown
before. The man shouted some message or other to the flower-girl, and
she replied, whereupon he handed the baby to his wife, saying, "Catch
'old, Fatty!"--an utterance which I heard without hearing, as one can
when an April sun is shining on men's hearts. And, advancing to the
side of the boat, the man held out his arms, and the girl threw
daffodils towards him.
The first bloom fell into the water, and the second; the third he
caught. One more poor daffodil was drowned, and he caught the two next.
So that there was one for his cap, and one for the missus, and one for
the baby, who, being now safely delivered from the paternal arms (which
were not built for cradling babies), needed but the additional stimulus
of a yellow thing to marvel at ere it smiled as largely as any of them.
And upon my word I smiled, too, and could, indeed, have laughed
outright. But I sat in awe of a fat man on the adjacent seat. He did
not belong to that order of lunatics who laugh for nothing in the
sunshine. "What we want," he was saying to his companion, "what we
want," he said, with his eyes fixed tight upon this April barge, "what
we want is a total _change of Government_. Nothin' won't ever be right
again till we get it."
I had a heavy parcel of books on my knee, and to drop them heavily upon
his foot had been, as it were, the accident of a moment. But the sweet
temperance of springtime had stolen into my blood, and I forbore.
Besides which there were the barges and the daffodils, and they were
better worth a man's consideration than this fool.
So I looked over the side again, and saw that the barge-man had turned
his attention to the cornet-blower, with whom he was exchanging highly
flavoured sarcasms. With a view, probably, of adding zest to his
humours, and because a springtime madness was upon him, he had changed
headgear with his wife, and stood there in her sun-bonnet, grimacing and
laughing. He had a long barge-pole in his hand, and somehow--I don't
quite know how it happened--in assuming to hurl that weapon at the
cornet-blower, he overbalanced himself, and fell sideways into the
water, striking his head as he fell against the side of another barge,
which was moored close to his own in that jumble fashion which is
peculiar to barges.
He came up again almost directly, looking queer in his wife's sun-bonnet
(for he had tied the tapes beneath his chin), and then immediately sank
again. The nerveless ineptitude of it all made one angry with the man:
it seemed to be wilful.
As for the wife, she looked wonderingly over the side, and realisation
came to her so slowly that a laugh still flickered faintly on her face
when he came up again. Even then, the sound which she uttered was as
much like a chuckle as a cry. And when words came to her, they were few
enough. "Oh, my pore man!" she moaned. "Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore
man!"
And the baby lay on its back, and chuckled knowingly into the petals of
a dishevelled daffodil.
Our 'bus had made the bend of the canal bank by this time, and now was
parallel with the water, and exactly opposite to this barge. Under the
united stimulus of instinctive curiosity and instinctive horror, the
driver pulled up sharp; and so the 'bus stood still, and we passengers
sat there, gaping at that funny thing in the sun-bonnet as it came up
for a second time and sank again.
"Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore man!" moaned the wife.
And the cornet-blower, pale with horror, still applied himself
automatically to the cornet. He had changed his tune since first I
heard him, and the aquatic feats of the man in the sun-bonnet were
conducted to music, the strains of which, being interpreted into words,
ran as follows--
Hi! Hi! clear the road
For the rowdy, dowdy boys.
It came up again for the third time, and the woman on the barge grabbed
frantically at nothing, and tore her arm in the effort, so that a
crimson splash mingled with the eddying waters as he sank again.
And then the cornet-blower remembered himself, and dropped his cornet
hastily, as though it burned him. And, of all queer things for a
cornet-blower to do, he blubbered weakly, like a woman found out.
And the mischievous sun cast his shadow upon the water, and caused it to
dance joyously thereon, so that you would have deemed it to be the
shadow of one consumed with joy.
"Oh, my pore man!" cried the wife. "Oh, my pore man! Oh, my pore man!"
And the fat person from the next seat said to his friend, "I saw it
comin'. The giddy fool was larkin' about like a ape." And, in the
meantime, the giddy fool did not come up again.
Suddenly the flower-girl spoke. "My Gawd!" she screamed, struggling
feverishly to disentangle herself from her shawl and the straps of her
basket and her fringe; "my Gawd! where's all the blarsted men got to?
What's 'appened to you? For Christ's sake find a _man_, you fools!"
The 'bus emptied itself, and men ran into each other along the roadway,
and somebody ran for a policeman. So that there was a great deal of
noise and bustle shorewards. But at the same time certain male persons
of a much more silent and effective character made their appearance upon
the barges adjacent to the April barge. They did not shout, and they
did not run about much. They fetched poles and produced ropes, and one
of their number climbed into the water at the end of one; and presently,
after much probing and searching and jerking (and not a little
swearing), they brought him up at the end of a barge-pole, with a slime
concealing all of him except the sun-bonnet, which had slipped upon one
side, and looked more comical than ever.
"Oh, my pore man!" cried the barge-woman, who by now was surrounded by a
stimulating coterie of other barge-women.
"_E's_ done for!" said my fat neighbour, and spat contentedly.
And the baby snatched at its mother's head, which was still covered with
her husband's hat, from which a single daffodil was dangling.
In the meantime, they laid him down upon the deck of a barge, and relays
of men, acting under the direction of a policeman, jerked at his arms,
and pulled his legs, and pummelled his chest. But, as the fat man had
said, _he_ was done for, and these exhausting efforts only made the baby
laugh. So they lifted him hurriedly, with a change of manner, as
befitted a changed burden, and conveyed him to the shore, where he was
placed upon an ambulance and deported.
The fat man formed himself into an impromptu committee of inspection.
He returned to his friend (and my side) after a lengthy dalliance by the
ambulance, and spoke as one well pleased.
"Crack in 'is 'ead as long as my 'and. 'Orrible! Never noted afore that
blood 'ad such a salty smell to it. Quite sickly, ain't it? To think
of it, poor fool! ... And on a day like this, too!"
And he took off his hat and sunned himself. "I'm for a drink arter all
that," he added; and, his companion agreeing with him, he walked over to
the tavern, in company with many other of the 'bus passengers, and the
driver and conductor of that vehicle, and most of the barge-men.
They took the cornet-blower with them, and somebody collected a store of
coppers in that musician's interest, with which he was presented upon
the understanding that he should "bite off a yard o' somethink lively"
to cheer the mourning host withal.
So while the woman on the barge was being carried below deck by her
sympathisers; whilst faint gurgles issued from the daffodil-girl,
standing over her baskets by the water-side; whilst the sun winked down
upon all of us--the cornet-blower threw out his chest with an air
something at variance with the muddy tears upon his cheek, and blared
out a song of mourning.
Leave off tickerlin', leave off tickerlin',
Leave off tickerlin', Jock!
sang the mourners; and the jolly young sun must have winked itself into
a headache.
By the time our 'bus went on again every note of tragedy save one had
departed from the scene. That solitary note was supplied by the
daffodil-girl, who stood by her garden dabbing disconsolately at her
nose and eyes with an apron-end.
Nought was stirring on the April barge, save one plump little figure,
which squatted all by itself in the centre of the deck. They had
forgotten the baby in this coil. But the baby was quite happy--happier
than any of them. For it sat there, eating its father's cap, and
smiling amiably at the sunshine, as who should know that there is a
benign and beautiful purpose in everything, even unto the falling of a
sparrow.
The daffodils upon the waterside, pressing each other close within their
baskets, stared up into the heavens more wonderingly than ever.
*XXVII*
*THE CASE OF MRS. ROPER*
"Beg pardon, young fellar," said Mrs. Roper, "but ain't you the young
fellar from the doctor's?"
Mrs. Roper is a sullen-eyed lady with very many chins. She is, _vide_
her shop sign, a dealer in antiques, and, to quote the same authority,
old metal, old teeth, old glass and china, and every variety of new and
second-hand wearing apparel are bought and sold by her. She is not the
cleanest woman in London, nor is her shop the cleanest in Bovingdon
Street. But there is charm in the variety and abundance of Mrs. Roper's
assets, which are the working parts, as it were, of our complex
civilisation, amongst which tokens Mrs. Roper is always sitting,
silently, mournfully, by day and night, like a lonely widow on a coral
reef, surrounded by mementoes of a shipwreck.
I hastened to reply with civility to Mrs. Roper's question, for that
lady had just sold to me for ninepence an ancient brass tobacco jar,
which expert opinion has since valued at half a guinea.
"Then," said Mrs. Roper, "I will thank you to send the doctor round
'ere. Tell 'im that the stuff what 'e calls medicine is makin' me
worse."
"Madam," said I, thinking rather of my benefactress than of my friend,
"the doctor is outside now. Shall I----?"
"I thought I seed the shadder of 'is 'at," said Mrs. Roper; "call 'im
in."
I called the doctor, as directed, and he came in with a brisk and
cheerful air, kicking me brutally upon the shin in passing. I then,
very naturally, prepared to retire; but Mrs. Roper held me back.
"_You_ needn't run away, young man," she said. "I ain't ashamed for
anybody to 'ear _my sufferings_.... Doctor, what's to be done about me?
I'm very ill."
"Where?" said Dr. Brink, a little brusquely.
"It's a funny question for a doctor to ask," responded Mrs. Roper. "I
thought we paid you to find things out. But we do not want to waste
each other's time, and so I'll tell you.
"What's the matter with me is that I'm dying. That yellow medicine what
you sent me 'as brought the pains on worse than ever. You will 'ave to
try me with some red. Not that I look to that or any other doctor's
stuff to cure me now. Nothing can't cure me now. I've been neglected
too long. The on'y thing I got to look forward to now is me little
wooden ulster. It'll be a great pleasure to some people, I know, the
day the undertaker comes to measure me for it. What are you laughin'
at?"
"I wasn't laughing," protested the doctor. "I was yawning."
"Then what are you yawning at?"
"Up all night," explained the doctor.
"Ah!" quoth Mrs. Roper mysteriously, "I see, _you're_ one of the jolly
sort.... What you gointer do about me?"
The doctor equivocated. "Where's your husband?" he said.
Mrs. Roper closed both eyes and shook her head. "Wherever the man may
be," she responded, "you may be sure as it ain't be the bedside of 'is
dying wife. '_E's_ one of your jolly sort, likewise. 'E's one o' them
good-tempered, popular fellars, 'e is. _'E_ don't want no medicine."
"I was not proposing to give him any medicine," explained the doctor.
"I would like to talk to him concerning the painful state of--ah--health
in which--ah--you find yourself. When will he be in?"
"Ain't you got some more riddles you would like to ask a person?"
responded Mrs. Roper, with a bitter laugh. "How in gracious do _I_ know
when the man will be in? 'E's one of these _pleasant_ men, I tell you.
The sort as is always ready with a laugh or a joke or a funny remark.
'E ain't got time, bless you, to trouble 'is jolly self about no wives.
'E's one of your 'appy men--the sort that makes friends, and so on. 'E
would rather be out with 'is friends, 'e would, listenin' to their
flattery, than sit at 'ome 'ere with 'is lawful wife and 'ear the
_truth_ about 'isself. 'E's a plain man, too, and stammers 'orrible."
"I think," suggested Dr. Brink, "that I shall have to call again when he
is in, and talk things over with him. I can see," added my excellent
and ambiguous friend, "that what you want is more attention."
"What I want," retorted Mrs. Roper, "is me wooden ulster. The sooner
the better. Attention won't save me now--even if I could get it. I'm
gone too far. And what is the use of a 'usband's idea of attention? If
you want to see the kind of attention 'e gives me, just cast your eye on
the table there. Them things in the corner is supposed to be lemons.
'_E_ sent them in. _Look at 'em_! 'E on'y sent 'em 'cause I asked 'im,
mind you. Is it much to ask, d'ye think, Doctor? And me at death's
door! Look at 'em, I say. They're furrin lemons."
There was a pause. Then said Mrs. Roper again, "They're furrin lemons.
I would say it to 'is face. I ask 'im on me death-bed for lemons and 'e
sends me them! Furrin ones! Don't you think they're furrin, Doctor?"
"I'm sure of it," replied the doctor.
There was another pause, during which Mrs. Roper applied a variety of
new and second-hand wearing apparel to her eyes. But the gift of
articulation soon returned to her.
"I," she explained, with biting irony, "am on'y 'is wife. _I_ ain't
jolly. _I_ don't flatter 'im. _I_ don't make a fuss of 'im. _I_ don't
make meself agreeable. _I'm_ on'y 'is wife. _I_ on'y tell 'im the
truth. What does 'e wanter give good lemons to _me_ for?"
"If you could let me know when he returns," submitted Dr. Brink, "I
would talk these matters over with him. In the meantime, I will send
you round some medicine, which----"
"What's the good of medicine to _me_?" demanded Mrs. Roper. "I'm on'y
'is wife. You go round to the undertaker's, Doctor, and tell 'im to send
me round a wooden ulster. That's the on'y thing as'll bring _me_ any
peace. I ain't one of your jolly sort, you see. _I_ don't go round to
me cousin Alfered's and make meself agreeable and play nap. 'Is cousin
Alfered's, indeed! It isn't 'is cousin Alfered as 'e goes to visit,
Doctor; you take my word for _that_, Doctor; I s'pose I'm blind, eh,
Doctor? An' deaf an' dumb an' parulised? I s'pose I ain't aware that
cousin Alfered 'as got a wife? _A wife_! That's what 'e calls 'er! If
she's a honest married woman, Doctor, 'ow d'you account for 'er bein'
ser very lovin' to 'er 'usband?"
"I have left off trying to account for these things," explained the
doctor. "About your medicine now. I want you----"
But Mrs. Roper had struck a more fascinating theme than that of
medicine. "Married!" she ejaculated. "Ha! Married! And she ser jolly!
Ser good-tempered, ser fussy, ser full o' compliments! No wonder as my
man likes to play nap at 'is cousin Alfered's. There's two or three
jolly ones together in _that_ 'ouse.
"She's a 'igh-spirited lady too. Ser full of romps an' all. She reads
the papers, too, and listens to their jokes, _and laughs_.
"Well, well, Doctor, it's time that wooden ulster come. It won't arrive
before I'm ready for it. This world ain't no fit place for me.
"I ain't jolly enough.
"I'm only a honest wife, I am, what sits at 'ome all day an' tells the
truth while other people makes theirselves ser popular. This world is
no fit place for honest wives.
"The other ladies are ser jolly; they makes theirselves ser pleasant.
They fuss about and flatter you, and laugh at all your jokes. They
makes theirselves ser pleasant....
"What's a respectable married woman to do, Doctor?"
*XXVIII*
*THE BLACK HAT*
"What I like Banking Day for," James had privately informed me, "is
because _then_ Fatty always puts on a cap. He looks so plain and
friendly in a cap."
At which I pondered deeply.
That which I pondered was the important problem of Dr. Brink in his
relationship to moral authority and the top-hat.
I had to admit to myself that James's aphorism was justified by facts.
The doctor did look more human in a cap. Upon the other hand, he did
not in the least look like himself.
"Banking Day" is a solemn occasion in the Brink household. It happens
once a fortnight. It affords the doctor an excuse for making holiday--a
two hours holiday--the only regular holiday in which he permits himself
to indulge. And of this regular and recurrent festival, the cap is an
outward and visible sign: the cap and golfing shoes and a poacher's
jacket. And a solemn black bag. The solemn black bag is filled with
sixpenny pieces. Thus equipped, the doctor goes into the
City--"giving'em a treat in Gracechurch Street," he calls it--and
deposits the toll which he has extracted from human misery upon some
banker's table. He then returns to Bovingdon Street, wearing your right
usurer's leer and a shilling cigar. And having in his right hand--the
hand he pulls the teeth out with--a fat, white book. It is his vulgar
custom, upon such occasions, to publish loudly a statement of accounts,
as thus--
"Forty-eight pounds fourteen and sixpence. Do you hear that, my friend?
Do _you_ hear it, Baffin? One thousand nine hundred and forty-nine
sixpences. Does this compete with literature, young man? Does it equal
the material gains of your art, Mr. Baffin? Nineteen hundred sixpences,
James, my dear, nineteen hundred and forty-nine. All screwed out of
the working man. Damn the working man. What's he made for? Where's
that bottle of Burgundy?"
The doctor, in this mood, presents an absurdly human appearance. His
cap---it is an old-fashioned neck-freezer, and a trifle small for him at
that--sits usually upon one side, and he rolls the cigar between his
lips in an unctuous manner, and has even been known to wear his feet
upon the mantel-piece. It is always his pleasure under these
circumstances to toy with Baffin, who, being so closely related to the
Leicestershire Baffins, is quite unjustly credited with a secret
sympathy for despotism. In point of fact, however, Baffin has no time
to sympathise with anything, except the Baffin School of Impressionist
Art. But the doctor, when his cap and the cares beneath it sit lightly
on him, chooses to exhibit a cordial sympathy for the supposed
convictions of Baffin.
"Dirty beggars, these working men: what, Baffin?" the doctor will
observe. "Have to be kept in their places. Eh? What? Sixpence a go,
Baffin. Nineteen hundred and forty-nine sixpences. A very reasonable
tribute, Baffin; a tribute to education and elegance and the cultivated
mind. The feudal system, Baffin, was a fool to our system. You must
write and explain it all to the Leicestershire Baffins. What, Baffin?"