ALL KINDS OF FOG IN THE CHARING CROSS ROAD
I
Towards the middle of the dim afternoon as the first straight pale
houses began to close in upon the train, a lady and gentleman on the
opposite side to Peter were discovered by him, as he awoke from a long
sleep, to be talking:
“Well, my dear Lucy, how we are ever to get on if you want to do these
absurd things I don't know. In London one must do as London does. In the
country of course...”
He was short, breathless and a little bald. The lady was young and very
upset.
“But, Henry, what does it matter?”
“What does it matter? My dear Lucy, in London everything matters--”
She was excited. “In Kensington perhaps, but in London--”
“Allow me, my dear Lucy, to decide for you. When you are my age--”
Peter went to sleep again.
II
The vast iron-girdled station was very dark and Mr. Zanti explained that
this was because, outside, there was a Fog--
“The Fog,” he added, as though it had been a huge and ferocious animal,
“is very yellow and has eaten up London. It will take us a very long
time to find our home.”
To Peter, short and square, in his rough suit shouldering his bag, this
was all as the infernal regions. The vast place towered high, into misty
distances above him. Trains, like huge beasts, stretched their limbs
into infinity; screams, piercing and angry, broke suddenly the voices
and busy movement that flooded the place with sounds. He was jostled and
pushed aside and people turned and swore at him and a heated porter ran
a truck into his legs. And through it and above it all the yellow fog
came twisting in coils from the dark street beyond and every one coughed
and choked and cursed England.
Mr. Zanti, after five minutes' angry pursuit, caught a reluctant and
very shabby four-wheeler, and they both climbed into its cavernous
depths and Peter's nose was filled with something that had leather and
oranges and paper bags and whisky in it; he felt exactly as though Mr.
Zanti (looking very like an ogre in the mysterious yellow light with his
bowler on the back of his head and mopping his face with a huge crimson
handkerchief) were decoying him away to some terrible fastness where it
was always dark and smelly.
And indeed that first vision of London, seen through the grimy windows
of the cab, was terrible enough. The cab moved a little, stopped, moved
again; it seemed that they would be there for ever and they exchanged
no word. There were no buildings to be seen; a vast wall of darkness
surrounded him and ever and again, out of the heart of it, a great
cauldron of fire flamed and by the side of it there were wild, agitated
faces--and again darkness. On every side of the stumbling cab there was
noise--voices shouting, women screaming, the rumbling of wheels, the
plunging of horses' hoofs; sometimes things brushed against their
cab--once Peter thought that they were down because they were jerked
right forward against the opposite seats. And then suddenly, in the most
wonderful way, they would plunge into silence, a silence so deep and
cavernous that it was more fearful than those other noises had been, and
the yellow darkness seemed to crowd upon them with a closer eagerness
and it was as though they were driving over the edge of the world. Then
the noises returned, for a moment the fog lifted showing houses, rising
like rocks from the sea sheer about them on every side, then darkness
again and the cab stopped with a jerk.
“Ah, good,” said Mr. Zanti, rolling his red handkerchief into a ball.
“'Ere we are, my young friend--Mr. Peter, after you, please.”
Before him a light faintly glimmered and towards this, after stumbling
on the slippery pavement, he made his way. He found himself in a
bookshop lighted with gas that hissed and spit like an angry cat; the
shop was low and stuffy but its walls were covered with books that
stretched into misty fog near the ceiling. Behind a dingy counter a man
was sitting. This man struck Peter's attention at once because of
the enormous size of his head and the amount of hair that covered
it--starting out of the mist and obscurity of the shop, this head looked
like some strange fungus, and from the heart of it there glittered two
very bright eyes.
Peter, standing awkwardly in the middle of the shop, gazed at this head
and was speechless.
Outside, Mr. Zanti could be heard disputing with the cabman.
“You can go and be damned--ze bags were not on ze outside--Zat is plenty
for your pay and you be damned--”
The shop door closed with a bang shutting out the fog and Mr. Zanti
filled the little bookshop. He seemed taller and larger than he had been
in Cornwall and his voice was sharper. The head removed itself from the
counter and Peter saw that it belonged to a small man with a hump who
came forward to Mr. Zanti very humbly.
“Ah, Gottfried,” said Zanti, “you well?”
“Very, sir,” answered the little man, bowing a little and smiling; his
voice was guttural with a very slight accent.
“This is Mr. Peter Westcott. 'E will work here and 'elp you with ze
books. 'E is a friend of mine and you will be kind to him. Mr. Peter,
zis is Herr Gottfried Hanz--I owe 'im much--ver' clever man.”
They shook hands and Peter liked the pair of eyes that gazed into his.
Then Mr. Zanti said, “Come, I will show you ze rest of ze place. It is
not a mansion, you will find.”
Indeed it was not. Behind the shop there was a room, brown and green,
with two windows that looked on to a yard, so Mr. Zanti said. There was
no furniture in it save a table and some chairs; a woman was spreading
a cloth on the table as they came in. This woman had grey hair that
escaped its pins and fell untidily about her shoulders. She was very
pale, tall and thin and her most striking features were her piercing
black eyes and with these she stared at Peter.
“Zis is Mrs. Dantzig,” said Mr. Zanti, “an old friend--Mr. Peter
Westcott, Mrs. Dantzig. 'E will work wiz us.”
The woman said nothing but nodded her head and continued her work. They
passed out of the room. Stairs ran both up and down.
“What is down there?” asked Peter.
“Ah, zat is ze kitchen,” said Mr. Zanti, laughing. Upstairs there was
a clean and neat bedroom with a large bed in it, an old sofa and two
chairs.
“Zis is where I sleep,” said Mr. Zanti. “For a night or two until you
'ave discovered a lodging you shall sleep on zat sofa. Zay will make it
whilst we 'ave supper.”
It was now late and Peter was very very tired. Downstairs there was much
bread and butter and bacon and eggs, and beer. The woman waited upon
them but they were all very silent and Peter was too sleepy to be
hungry.
The table was cleared and Mr. Zanti sat smoking his pipe and talking
to the woman. Peter sat there, nodding, and he thought that their
conversation was in a foreign tongue and he thought that they looked at
him and that the woman was angry about something--but the sleep always
gained upon him--he could not keep it away.
At last a hand was upon his shoulder and he was led up to bed.
He tumbled out of his clothes and his last impression was of Mr. Zanti
standing in front of him, looking vast and very solemn in a blue cotton
night-shirt.
“Peter,” Mr. Zanti seemed to be saying, “you see in me, one, two, a
hundred men.... All my life I seek adventure--fun--and I find it--but
there 'as not been room for ze affections. Then I find you--I love you
as my son and I say 'Come to my bookshop'--But only ze bookshop mind
you--you are there for ze books and because I care for you--I care
for you ver' much, Peter, and zere 'as not been room in my life for ze
affections ... but I will be a ver' good friend to you--and you shall
only be in ze shop--with ze books--I will be a good friend--”
Then it seemed that Mr. Zanti kissed Peter on both cheeks, blew out the
candle, and climbed into his huge bed; soon he was snoring.
But Peter could not be sure of these things because he was so very tired
that he did not know whether he were standing on his head or his heels
and he was asleep on his sofa and dreaming about the strangest and most
confused events in less than no time at all.
III
And then how wonderful to discover, on waking up the next morning, that
it was a beautiful day, as beautiful a day as any that Cornwall could
give him. It was indeed odd, after the great darkness of the afternoon
before to find now a burning blue sky, bright shining pavements and the
pieces of iron and metal on the cabs glittering as they rolled along.
The streets were doubtless delightful but Peter was not, on this day at
any rate, to see very much of them; he was handed over to the care of
Herr Gottfried Hanz, who had obviously not brushed his hair when he got
up in the morning; he also wore large blue slippers that were too big
for his feet and clattered behind him as he walked. Whatever light there
might be in the street outside only chinks of it found their way into
the shop and the gas-jet hissed and flared as it had done on the
day before. The books seemed mistier and dustier than ever and Peter
wondered, in a kind of despair, how in the world if any one did come in
and ask for anything he was going to tell them whether it were there or
not.
But here Herr Gottfried came to the rescue. “See you,” he said with
an air of pride, “it is thus that they are arranged. Here you have the
Novel--Brontë, Bulwer, Bunyan (“The Pilgrim's Progress,” that is not a
novel but it is near enough). Here you have History, and here the Poets,
and here Philosophy and here Travel--it will all be simple in time--”
Peter's eyes spun dizzily to the heights.
“There is a little ladder,” said Herr Gottfried.
“And,” at last said Peter timidly, “May I--read--when there is no one
here?”
Herr Gottfried looked at him with a new interest. “You like reading?”
“Like!” Peter's voice was an ecstasy.
“Why of course, often.” Herr Gottfried smiled. “And then see! (he opened
the shop door) there is a small boy, James, who is supposed to look
after these (these were the 1_d_., 2_d_. and 3_d_. boxes outside the
window, on the pavement) but he is an idle boy and often enough he is
not there and then we must have the door open and you must watch them.
Often enough (this seemed a favourite phrase of his) these gentlemen
(this with great scorn) will turn the books over and over and they will
look up the street once and they will look down the street once, and
then into the pocket a book will go--often enough,” he added, looking
beyond the door savagely at a very tired and tattered lady who was
turning the 1_d_. lot over and over.
Then, this introductory lesson concluded, Herr Gottfried suddenly
withdrew into the tangles of his hair and retreated behind his counter.
Through the open door there came the most entrancing sound and the
bustle of the street was loud and startling--bells ringing, boys
shouting, wheels rattling, and beyond these immediate notes a steady hum
like the murmur of an orchestra heard through closed doors. All this
was wonderful enough but it was nothing at all to the superlative
fascination of that multitude of books. Peter found a hard little chair
in a dark corner and sat down upon it. Here he was in the very heart of
his kingdom! He could never read all the books in this place if he lived
for two hundred years... and so he had better not try. He made a blind
dash at the volumes nearest him (quietly lest he should disturb Herr
Gottfried who seemed very busy at his counter) and secured something and
read it as well as he could, for the light was very bad. It was called
“The True and Faithful Experiences of the Reverend James Scott in the
Other World Being a Veracious History of his Experiences of the Life
after Death”--the dust rose from its pages in little clouds and tempted
him to sneeze but he bit his lip and counted forty and saved the
situation.
Herr Gottfried dealt with the customers that morning and Peter stood
nervously watching him. The customers were not very many--an old lady
who “wanted something to read” caused many volumes to be laid before
her, and finally left the shop without buying anything--a young man with
spectacles purchased some tattered science and a clergyman some Sermons.
A thin and very hungry looking man entered, clutching a badly-tied
paper parcel. These were books he wanted to sell. They were obviously
treasured possessions because he touched them, when they were laid upon
the counter, with a loving hand.
“They are very good books,” he said plaintively.
“Three shillings,” said Herr Gottfried.
The hungry man sighed.
“Five shillings,” he said, “they are worth more.”
“Three shillings for the lot,” said Herr Gottfried.
“It is very little,” said the hungry man, but he took the money and went
out sadly.
Once their came a magnificent gentleman--that is, he looked magnificent
in the distance away from the gas jet. He was tall with a high hat, a
fine moustache and a tailcoat; he had melancholy eyes and a languid
air. Peter was sorry to observe on a closer view that his tail-coat was
frayed and his collar not very clean.
He gave Herr Gottfried a languid bow and passed through the shop into
the room beyond.
“Guten Tag, Herr Signer,” said Herr Gottfried with deference, but the
gentleman had already disappeared.
Then, after a time, one o'clock struck and Peter understood that if he
would place himself under Herr Gottfried's protection he should be led
to an establishment where for a small sum meat-pies were to be had...
all this very novel and delightful, and Peter laid down “The Experiences
of the Reverend James Scott,” which were not at present very thrilling
and followed his guide into the street. Peter was still wondering where
Herr Gottfried had put his blue slippers and whence had come the large
flat boots and the brown and faded squash hat when he was suddenly in a
little dark street with the houses hanging forward as though they were
listening and any number of clothes dangling from the window sills and
waving about as though their owners were still inside them and kicking
vigorously. Although the street was dark it was full of noise, and a
blaze of light at the other end of it proclaimed more civilised quarters
(Trafalgar Square in fact) at no great distance.
“Gerade aus,” said Herr Gottfried and pushed open a swinging door. Peter
followed him into the most amazing babel of voices, a confusion and a
roaring, an atmosphere thick with smoke and steam and a scent in the air
as though ten thousand meat-pies were cooking there before his eyes.
By the door a neat stout little woman, hung all over with lockets and
medallions as though she were wearing all the prizes that the famous
meat-pies had ever won, was sitting in a little box with a glass front
to it.
“Bon jour, Monsieur Hanz.”
“Tag, Meine Gnädige Frau.”
All down the room, by the wall, ran long tables black with age and
grime. Men of every age and nationality were eating, drinking, smoking
and talking. Some of them knew Herr Gottfried, some did not.
“Wie gehts, Gottfried?”
And Herr Gottfried, planting his flat feet like dead weights in front of
him, taking off his hat and running his fingers through his hair, smiled
at some, spoke to others, and at last found a little corner at the end
of the room, a corner comparatively quiet but most astoundingly smelly.
Peter sat down and recovered his breath. How far away now was Treliss
with its cobbled street, and the Grey Hill with the Giant's Finger
pointing solemnly to the sky.
“I have no money,” he said.
“The Master has given me this for you,” Herr Gottfried said, handing him
two sovereigns, “he says it is in advance for the week.”
The meat-pies, beer and bread were ordered and then for a time they sat
in silence. Peter was turning in his mind a thousand questions that he
would like to ask but he was still afraid of his strange companion and
he felt a little as though he were some human volcano that might at any
moment burst forth and cover him with furious disaster.
Then Herr Gottfried said:
“And so you care for reading?”
“Yes.”
“What do you read?”
What had Peter read? He mentioned timidly “David Copperfield,” “Don
Quixote,” and “Henry Lessingham.”
“Ah, that's the way--novels, novels, novels--always sugar ... Greek,
Latin?”
“No, just a little at school.”
“Ah, yes, your schools. I know them. Homer?”
“No, I'm afraid not.”
“Ah, well you shall read Homer. He is the greatest, he is the Master.
There is Pope for a beginning. I will teach you Greek.... Goethe?”
“I--beg your pardon.”
“Goethe, Goethe, Goethe--he has never heard of him--never. Ah, these
schools--I know them. Teach them nonsense--often enough--but any
wisdom--never--”
“I'm very sorry--” said Peter humbly.
“And music?”
“I've had no opportunity--”
“But you would love it? Yes, I see that you would love it--it is in your
eyes. Beethoven? No--later perhaps--then often enough--but Schubert! Ah,
Schubert!” (Here the meat-pies arrived but Herr Gottfried did not see
them). “Ah, the Unfinished! He shall hear that and he will have a new
soul--And the songs! Gott in Himmel, the songs! There is a man I know,
he will sing them to you. Die Mullerlieder. It is always water, the
Flowers, the Sun and all the roses in the world ... ach! 'Dir Spinnerin'
'Meersstille' ... 'Meersstille'--yah, Homer, Schubert--meat and
drink--Homer the meat-pie, Schubert the beer, but not this beer--no,
Helles, beautiful Helles with the sun in it....”
He had forgotten Peter and Peter did not understand anything that he
said, but he sat there with his eyes wide open and felt assured that
it was all very useful to him and very important. The inferno continued
around them, the air grew thicker with smoke, a barrel-organ began to
play at the door, draughts and dominoes rattled against the long wooden
tables....
Ah! this was, indeed, London.
Peter was so greatly moved that his hunger left him and it was with
difficulty that the meat-pie was finished.
IV
During the three days that followed Peter learnt a very great deal about
the bookshop. At night he still slept in Mr. Zanti's bedroom, but it
was only a temporary pitching of tents during these days whilst he was a
stranger and baffled by the noise and confusion.
Already his immediate surroundings had ceased to be a mystery. He had
as it were taken them to himself and seated himself in the midst of them
with surprising ease. Treliss, Scaw House, his father, had slipped back
into an unintelligible distance. He felt that they still mattered to him
and that the time would most certainly come when they would matter to
him even more, but they were not of immediate concern. The memory of his
mother was closer to him....
But in this discovery of London he was amazingly happy--happier than he
had ever been in all his life, and younger too. There were a great many
things that he wished to know, a great many questions that he wished
to ask--but for the moment he was content to rest and to grasp what he
could see.
In a day he seemed to understand the way that the books went, and not
only that but even the places where the individual books were lodged. He
did not, of course, know anything about the contents of the books, but
their titles gave them, in his mind, human existence so that he thought
of them as actual persons living in different parts of the shop. There
was, for instance, the triumph of “Lady Audley's Secret.” An old lady
with a trembling voice and a very sharp pair of eyes wished for a
secondhand copy.
“I've very sorry, Madame,” began Herr Gottfried, “but I'm afraid we
haven't...”
“I think--” said Peter timidly, and he climbed the little ladder and
brought the book down from a misty corner. Herr Gottfried was indeed
amazed at him--he said very little but he was certainly amazed.
Indeed, with the exception of the “meat-pie” interval he scarcely spoke
throughout the day. Peter began to look forward to one o'clock for
then the German, in the midst of the babel and the smoke, continued the
educating progress, and even read Goethe's poetry aloud (translating it
into the strangest English) and developed Peter's conception of Homer
into an alluring and fascinating picture.
Of London itself during these days Peter saw nothing. At eight o'clock
in the evening the shutters were put up by the disobedient James and the
shop retired for the night. Herr Gottfried shuffled away to some hidden
resting-place of his own and Peter found supper waiting for him in the
room at the back. He ate this alone, for Mr. Zanti was not there and
during these three days he was hardly visible at all. He was up in
the morning before Peter was and he came to bed when Peter was already
asleep. The boy was not, however, certain that his master was always
away when he seemed to be. He appeared suddenly at the most surprising
moments, smiling and cheerful as ever and with no sign of hurry about
him. He always gave Peter a nod and a kind word and asked him how the
books were going and patted him on the shoulder, but he was away almost
as soon as he was there.
One strange thing was the number of people that came into the bookshop
with no intention whatever of having anything to do with the books.
Indeed they paid no heed to the bookshop, and after flinging a word at
Herr Gottfried, they would pass straight into the room beyond and as far
as Peter could see, never came out again.
The magnificently-dressed gentleman, called by Herr Gottfried “Herr
Signor,” was one of these persons.
However, Peter, happy enough in the excitement of the present, asking no
questions and only at night, before he fell asleep, lying on his
sofa, listening to the sounds in the street below him, watching the
reflections of the gas light flung up by the street lamps on to the
walls of his room, he would wonder ... and, so wondering, he was asleep.
And then, on the fourth day, something happened.
It was growing late, and Peter underneath the gas jet was buried in
Mr. Pope's Homer. A knock on the door and the postman entered with the
letters. As a rule Herr Gottfried took them, but on this afternoon he
had left the shop in Peter's hands for half an hour whilst he went out
to see a friend. Peter took the letters and immediately the letter on
the top of the pile (Mr. Zanti's post was always a large one) set his
heart thumping. The handwriting was the handwriting of Stephen. There
could be no doubt about it, no possible doubt. Peter had seen that
writing many times and he had always kept the letter that Stephen had
written to him when he first went to Dawson's. To other eyes it
might seem an ordinary enough hand--rough and uneducated and
sprawling--anybody's hand, but Peter knew that there could be no
mistake.
The sight of the letter as it lay there on the counter swept away the
shop, the books, London--he sat looking at it with a longing, stronger
than any longing that he had ever known, to see the writer again. He
lived once more through that night on the farm--perhaps at that moment
he felt suddenly his loneliness, here in this huge and tempestuous
London, here in this dark bookshop with so many people going in or out.
He rubbed the sleeves of his blue serge suit because they made him feel
like Treliss, and he sat, with eyes staring into the dark, thinking of
Stephen.
That evening, just as he was going up to bed, Mr. Zanti came in and
greeted him with his accustomed cheerfulness.
“Going to bed, Peter? Ah, good boy.”
Peter stopped, hesitating, by the door.
“Oh, I wonder--” he said and stopped.
“Yes?” said Mr. Zanti, looking at him.
“Oh--well--it's nothing--” Then he blurted out--“I saw a letter--I
couldn't help it--a letter from Stephen this afternoon. They came when
Herr Gottfried was out--and I wanted--I want dreadfully--to hear about
him--if you could tell me--”
For an instant Mr. Zanti's large eyes closed until they seemed to be no
larger than pin-points--then they opened again.
“Stephen--Stephen? Stephen what? What is it that the boy talks of?”
“You know--Stephen Brant--the man who first brought me to see you when I
was quite a kid. I was--I always have been very fond of him. I should be
so very glad--”
“Surely the boy is mad--what has come to you? Stephen Brant--yes I
remember the man--but I have heard nothing for years and years--no,
nothing. See, here are my afternoon's letters.”
He took a bundle of letters out of his pocket and showed them to Peter.
The boy found the one in Stephen's handwriting.
“You may read it,” said Mr. Zanti smiling. Peter read it. He could not
understand it and it was signed “John Simmons” ... but it was certainly
in Stephen's handwriting.
“Thank you,” said Peter in rather a quivering voice and he turned away,
gulping down his disappointment.
Mr. Zanti patted him on the shoulder.
“That's right, my boy. Ah, I expect you miss your friend. You will be
lonely here, yes? Well--see--now that you have been here a few days
perhaps it is time for you to find a place to live--and I have talked
wiz a friend of mine, a ver' good friend who 'as lived for many years in
a 'ouse where 'e says there is a room that will just do for you--cheap,
pleasant people ... yes? To-morrow 'e will show you the place. There you
will 'ave friends--”
Peter smiled, thanked Mr. Zanti and went to bed. But his dreams were
confused that night. It seemed to him that London was a huge room with
closing walls, and that ever they came closer and closer and that he
screamed for Stephen and they would not let Stephen come to him.
And bells were ringing, and Mr. Zanti, with a lighted candle in his
hands, was creeping down those dark stairs that led to the kitchen,
and he might have stopped those closing walls but he would not. Then
suddenly Peter was running down the Sea Road above Treliss and the waves
were sounding furiously below him--his father was there waiting for him
sternly, at the road's end and Herr Gottfried with a Homer in one hand
and his blue shoes in the other sat watching them out of his bright
eyes. His father was waiting to kill him and Mrs. Pascoe was at his
elbow. Peter screamed, the sweat was pouring off his forehead, his
throat was tight with agony when suddenly by his side was old Frosted
Moses, with his flowing beard. “It isn't life that matters,” he was
whispering in his old cracked voice, “but the courage that you bring to
it.”
The figures faded, the light grew broader and broader, and Peter woke to
find Mr. Zanti, by the aid of a candle, climbing into bed.
But some time passed before he had courage to fall asleep again.