Produced by Dagny and John Bickers
STORIES BY ENGLISH AUTHORS
LONDON
CONTENTS:
THE INCONSIDERATE WAITER, J. M. Barrie
THE BLACK POODLE, F. Anstey
THAT BRUTE SIMMONS, Arthur Morrison
A ROSE OF THE GHETTO, I. Zangwill
AN IDYL OF LONDON, Beatrice Harraden
THE OMNIBUS, “Q” [Quiller-Couch]
THE HIRED BABY, Marie Correlli
THE INCONSIDERATE WAITER, By J. M. BARRIE
Frequently I have to ask myself in the street for the name of the man I
bowed to just now, and then, before I can answer, the wind of the first
corner blows him from my memory. I have a theory, however, that those
puzzling faces, which pass before I can see who cut the coat, all belong
to club waiters.
Until William forced his affairs upon me that was all I did know of
the private life of waiters, though I have been in the club for twenty
years. I was even unaware whether they slept downstairs or had their own
homes; nor had I the interest to inquire of other members, nor they the
knowledge to inform me. I hold that this sort of people should be fed
and clothed and given airing and wives and children, and I subscribe
yearly, I believe for these purposes; but to come into closer relation
with waiters is bad form; they are club fittings, and William should
have kept his distress to himself, or taken it away and patched it up
like a rent in one of the chairs. His inconsiderateness has been a pair
of spectacles to me for months.
It is not correct taste to know the name of a club waiter, so I must
apologise for knowing William’s, and still more for not forgetting it.
If, again, to speak of a waiter is bad form, to speak bitterly is the
comic degree of it. But William has disappointed me sorely. There were
years when I would defer dining several minutes that he might wait
on me. His pains to reserve the window-seat for me were perfectly
satisfactory. I allowed him privileges, as to suggest dishes, and
would give him information, as that some one had startled me in the
reading-room by slamming a door. I have shown him how I cut my finger
with a piece of string. Obviously he was gratified by these attentions,
usually recommending a liqueur; and I fancy he must have understood my
sufferings, for he often looked ill himself. Probably he was rheumatic,
but I cannot say for certain, as I never thought of asking, and he had
the sense to see that the knowledge would be offensive to me.
In the smoking-room we have a waiter so independent that once, when
he brought me a yellow chartreuse, and I said I had ordered green,
he replied, “No, sir; you said yellow.” William could never have been
guilty of such effrontery. In appearance, of course, he is mean, but I
can no more describe him than a milkmaid could draw cows. I suppose we
distinguish one waiter from another much as we pick our hat from the
rack. We could have plotted a murder safely before William. He never
presumed to have any opinions of his own. When such was my mood he
remained silent, and if I announced that something diverting had
happened to me he laughed before I told him what it was. He turned the
twinkle in his eye off or on at my bidding as readily as if it was the
gas. To my “Sure to be wet to-morrow,” he would reply, “Yes, sir;” and
to Trelawney’s “It doesn’t look like rain,” two minutes afterward, he
would reply, “No, sir.” It was one member who said Lightning Rod would
win the Derby and another who said Lightning Rod had no chance, but it
was William who agreed with both. He was like a cheroot, which may be
smoked from either end. So used was I to him that, had he died or got
another situation (or whatever it is such persons do when they disappear
from the club), I should probably have told the head waiter to bring him
back, as I disliked changes.
It would not become me to know precisely when I began to think William
an ingrate, but I date his lapse from the evening when he brought me
oysters. I detest oysters, and no one knew it better than William. He
has agreed with me that he could not understand any gentleman’s liking
them. Between me and a certain member who smacks his lips twelve times
to a dozen of them William knew I liked a screen to be placed until we
had reached the soup, and yet he gave me the oysters and the other man
my sardine. Both the other member and I quickly called for brandy and
the head waiter. To do William justice, he shook, but never can I forget
his audacious explanation: “Beg pardon, sir, but I was thinking of
something else.”
In these words William had flung off the mask, and now I knew him for
what he was.
I must not be accused of bad form for looking at William on the
following evening. What prompted me to do so was not personal interest
in him, but a desire to see whether I dare let him wait on me again. So,
recalling that a caster was off a chair yesterday, one is entitled to
make sure that it is on to-day before sitting down. If the expression
is not too strong, I may say that I was taken aback by William’s manner.
Even when crossing the room to take my orders he let his one hand play
nervously with the other. I had to repeat “Sardine on toast” twice, and
instead of answering “Yes, sir,” as if my selection of sardine on toast
was a personal gratification to him, which is the manner one expects
of a waiter, he glanced at the clock, then out at the window, and,
starting, asked, “Did you say sardine on toast, sir?”
It was the height of summer, when London smells like a chemist’s shop,
and he who has the dinner-table at the window needs no candles to
show him his knife and fork. I lay back at intervals, now watching a
starved-looking woman sleep on a door-step, and again complaining of the
club bananas. By-and-by I saw a girl of the commonest kind, ill-clad and
dirty, as all these Arabs are. Their parents should be compelled to feed
and clothe them comfortably, or at least to keep them indoors, where
they cannot offend our eyes. Such children are for pushing aside with
one’s umbrella; but this girl I noticed because she was gazing at the
club windows. She had stood thus for perhaps ten minutes when I became
aware that some one was leaning over me to look out at the window. I
turned round. Conceive my indignation on seeing that the rude person was
William.
“How dare you, William?” I said, sternly. He seemed not to hear me. Let
me tell, in the measured words of one describing a past incident, what
then took place. To get nearer the window he pressed heavily on my
shoulder.
“William, you forget yourself!” I said, meaning--as I see now--that he
had forgotten me.
I heard him gulp, but not to my reprimand. He was scanning the street.
His hands chattered on my shoulder, and, pushing him from me, I saw that
his mouth was agape.
“What are you looking for?” I asked.
He stared at me, and then, like one who had at last heard the echo of my
question, seemed to be brought back to the club. He turned his face from
me for an instant, and answered shakily:
“I beg your pardon, sir! I--I shouldn’t have done it. Are the bananas
too ripe, sir?”
He recommended the nuts, and awaited my verdict so anxiously while I ate
one that I was about to speak graciously, when I again saw his eyes drag
him to the window.
“William,” I said, my patience giving way at last, “I dislike being
waited on by a melancholy waiter.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied, trying to smile, and then broke out
passionately, “For God’s sake, sir, tell me, have you seen a little girl
looking in at the club windows?”
He had been a good waiter once, and his distracted visage was spoiling
my dinner.
“There,” I said, pointing to the girl, and no doubt would have added
that he must bring me coffee immediately, had he continued to listen.
But already he was beckoning to the child. I have not the least interest
in her (indeed, it had never struck me that waiters had private affairs,
and I still think it a pity that they should have); but as I happened to
be looking out at the window I could not avoid seeing what occurred.
As soon as the girl saw William she ran into the street, regardless of
vehicles, and nodded three times to him. Then she disappeared.
I have said that she was quite a common child, without attraction of
any sort, and yet it was amazing the difference she made in William. He
gasped relief, like one who had broken through the anxiety that checks
breathing, and into his face there came a silly laugh of happiness. I
had dined well, on the whole, so I said:
“I am glad to see you cheerful again, William.”
I meant that I approved his cheerfulness because it helped my digestion,
but he must needs think I was sympathising with him.
“Thank you, sir,” he answered. “Oh, sir! when she nodded and I saw it
was all right I could have gone down on my knees to God.”
I was as much horrified as if he had dropped a plate on my toes. Even
William, disgracefully emotional as he was at the moment, flung out his
arms to recall the shameful words.
“Coffee, William!” I said, sharply.
I sipped my coffee indignantly, for it was plain to me that William had
something on his mind.
“You are not vexed with me, sir?” he had the hardihood to whisper.
“It was a liberty,” I said.
“I know, sir; but I was beside myself.”
“That was a liberty also.”
He hesitated, and then blurted out:
“It is my wife, sir. She--”
I stopped him with my hand. William, whom I had favoured in so many
ways, was a married man! I might have guessed as much years before had I
ever reflected about waiters, for I knew vaguely that his class did
this sort of thing. His confession was distasteful to me, and I said
warningly:
“Remember where you are, William.”
“Yes, sir; but you see, she is so delicate--”
“Delicate! I forbid your speaking to me on unpleasant topics.”
“Yes, sir; begging your pardon.”
It was characteristic of William to beg my pardon and withdraw his wife,
like some unsuccessful dish, as if its taste would not remain in the
mouth. I shall be chided for questioning him further about his
wife, but, though doubtless an unusual step, it was only bad form
superficially, for my motive was irreproachable. I inquired for his
wife, not because I was interested in her welfare, but in the hope of
allaying my irritation. So I am entitled to invite the wayfarer who has
bespattered me with mud to scrape it off.
I desired to be told by William that the girl’s signals meant his
wife’s recovery to health. He should have seen that such was my wish
and answered accordingly. But, with the brutal inconsiderateness of his
class, he said:
“She has had a good day; but the doctor, he--the doctor is afeard she is
dying.”
Already I repented my questions. William and his wife seemed in league
against me, when they might so easily have chosen some other member.
“Pooh! the doctor,” I said.
“Yes, sir,” he answered.
“Have you been married long, William?”
“Eight years, sir. Eight years ago she was--I--I mind her when . . . and
now the doctor says--”
The fellow gaped at me. “More coffee, sir?” he asked.
“What is her ailment?”
“She was always one of the delicate kind, but full of spirit, and--and
you see, she has had a baby lately--”
“William!”
“And she--I--the doctor is afeard she’s not picking up.”
“I feel sure she will pick up.”
“Yes, sir?”
It must have been the wine I had drunk that made me tell him:
“I was once married, William. My wife--it was just such a case as
yours.”
“She did not get better sir?”
“No.”
After a pause he said, “Thank you, sir,” meaning for the sympathy that
made me tell him that. But it must have been the wine.
“That little girl comes here with a message from your wife?”
“Yes; if she nods three times it means my wife is a little better.”
“She nodded thrice to-day.”
“But she is told to do that to relieve me, and maybe those nods don’t
tell the truth.”
“Is she your girl?”
“No; we have none but the baby. She is a neighbour’s; she comes twice a
day.”
“It is heartless of her parents not to send her every hour.”
“But she is six years old,” he said, “and has a house and two sisters
to look after in the daytime, and a dinner to cook. Gentlefolk don’t
understand.”
“I suppose you live in some low part, William.”
“Off Drury Lane,” he answered, flushing; “but--but it isn’t low. You
see, we were never used to anything better, and I mind when I let her
see the house before we were married, she--she a sort of cried because
she was so proud of it. That was eight years ago, and now--she’s afeard
she’ll die when I’m away at my work.”
“Did she tell you that?”
“Never; she always says she is feeling a little stronger.”
“Then how can you know she is afraid of that?”
“I don’t know how I know, sir; but when I am leaving the house in the
morning I look at her from the door, and she looks at me, and then I--I
know.”
“A green chartreuse, William!”
I tried to forget William’s vulgar story in billiards, but he had
spoiled my game. My opponent, to whom I can give twenty, ran out when
I was sixty-seven, and I put aside my cue pettishly. That in itself
was bad form, but what would they have thought had they known that a
waiter’s impertinence caused it! I grew angrier with William as the
night wore on, and next day I punished him by giving my orders through
another waiter.
As I had my window-seat, I could not but see that the girl was late
again. Somehow I dawdled over my coffee. I had an evening paper before
me, but there was so little in it that my eyes found more of interest
in the street. It did not matter to me whether William’s wife died, but
when that girl had promised to come, why did she not come? These lower
classes only give their word to break it. The coffee was undrinkable.
At last I saw her. William was at another window, pretending to do
something with the curtains. I stood up, pressing closer to the window.
The coffee had been so bad that I felt shaky. She nodded three times,
and smiled.
“She is a little better,” William whispered to me, almost gaily.
“Whom are you speaking of?” I asked, coldly, and immediately retired to
the billiard-room, where I played a capital game. The coffee was much
better there than in the dining-room.
Several days passed, and I took care to show William that I had
forgotten his maunderings. I chanced to see the little girl (though I
never looked for her) every evening, and she always nodded three times,
save once, when she shook her head, and then William’s face grew white
as a napkin. I remember this incident because that night I could not get
into a pocket. So badly did I play that the thought of it kept me awake
in bed, and that, again, made me wonder how William’s wife was. Next day
I went to the club early (which was not my custom) to see the new books.
Being in the club at any rate, I looked into the dining-room to ask
William if I had left my gloves there, and the sight of him reminded
me of his wife; so I asked for her. He shook his head mournfully, and I
went off in a rage.
So accustomed am I to the club that when I dine elsewhere I feel
uncomfortable next morning, as if I had missed a dinner. William knew
this; yet here he was, hounding me out of the club! That evening I dined
(as the saying is) at a restaurant, where no sauce was served with the
asparagus. Furthermore, as if that were not triumph enough for William,
his doleful face came between me and every dish, and I seemed to see his
wife dying to annoy me.
I dined next day at the club for self-preservation, taking, however,
a table in the middle of the room, and engaging a waiter who had once
nearly poisoned me by not interfering when I put two lumps of sugar into
my coffee instead of one, which is my allowance. But no William came to
me to acknowledge his humiliation, and by-and-by I became aware that he
was not in the room. Suddenly the thought struck me that his wife must
be dead, and I--It was the worst cooked and the worst served dinner I
ever had in the club.
I tried the smoking-room. Usually the talk there is entertaining, but on
that occasion it was so frivolous that I did not remain five minutes.
In the card-room a member told me excitedly that a policeman had spoken
rudely to him; and my strange comment was:
“After all, it is a small matter.”
In the library, where I had not been for years, I found two members
asleep, and, to my surprise, William on a ladder dusting books.
“You have not heard, sir?” he said, in answer to my raised eyebrows.
Descending the ladder, he whispered tragically: “It was last evening,
sir. I--I lost my head, and I--swore at a member.”
I stepped back from William, and glanced apprehensively at the two
members. They still slept.
“I hardly knew,” William went on, “what I was doing all day yesterday,
for I had left my wife so weakly that--”
I stamped my foot.
“I beg your pardon for speaking of her,” he had the grace to say, “but
I couldn’t help slipping up to the window often yesterday to look for
Jenny, and when she did come, and I saw she was crying, it--it sort
of confused me, and I didn’t know right, sir, what I was doing. I hit
against a member, Mr. Myddleton Finch, and he--he jumped and swore at
me. Well, sir, I had just touched him after all, and I was so miserable,
it a kind of stung me to be treated like--like that, and me a man as
well as him; and I lost my senses, and--and I swore back.”
William’s shamed head sank on his chest, but I even let pass his
insolence in likening himself to a member of the club, so afraid was I
of the sleepers waking and detecting me in talk with a waiter.
“For the love of God,” William cried, with coarse emotion, “don’t let
them dismiss me!”
“Speak lower!” I said. “Who sent you here?”
“I was turned out of the dining-room at once, and told to attend to the
library until they had decided what to do with me. Oh, sir, I’ll lose my
place!”
He was blubbering, as if a change of waiters, was a matter of
importance.
“This is very bad, William,” I said. “I fear I can do nothing for you.”
“Have mercy on a distracted man!” he entreated. “I’ll go on my knees to
Mr. Myddleton Finch.”
How could I but despise a fellow who would be thus abject for a pound a
week?
“I dare not tell her,” he continued, “that I have lost my place. She
would just fall back and die.”
“I forbade your speaking of your wife,” I said, sharply, “unless you can
speak pleasantly of her.”
“But she may be worse now, sir, and I cannot even see Jenny from here.
The library windows look to the back.”
“If she dies,” I said, “it will be a warning to you to marry a stronger
woman next time.”
Now every one knows that there is little real affection among the
lower orders. As soon as they have lost one mate they take another. Yet
William, forgetting our relative positions, drew himself up and raised
his fist, and if I had not stepped back I swear he would have struck me.
The highly improper words William used I will omit, out of consideration
for him. Even while he was apologising for them I retired to the
smoking-room, where I found the cigarettes so badly rolled that they
would not keep alight. After a little I remembered that I wanted to see
Myddleton Finch about an improved saddle of which a friend of his has
the patent. He was in the newsroom, and, having questioned him about the
saddle, I said:
“By the way, what is this story about your swearing at one of the
waiters?”
“You mean about his swearing at me,” Myddleton Finch replied, reddening.
“I am glad that was it,” I said; “for I could not believe you guilty of
such bad form.”
“If I did swear--” he was beginning, but I went on:
“The version which has reached me was that you swore at him, and he
repeated the word. I heard he was to be dismissed and you reprimanded.”
“Who told you that?” asked Myddleton Finch, who is a timid man.
“I forget; it is club talk,” I replied, lightly. “But of course the
committee will take your word. The waiter, whichever one he is, richly
deserves his dismissal for insulting you without provocation.”
Then our talk returned to the saddle, but Myddleton Finch was
abstracted, and presently he said:
“Do you know, I fancy I was wrong in thinking that the waiter swore at
me, and I’ll withdraw my charge to-morrow.”
Myddleton Finch then left me, and, sitting alone, I realised that I
had been doing William a service. To some slight extent I may have
intentionally helped him to retain his place in the club, and I now see
the reason, which was that he alone knows precisely to what extent I
like my claret heated.
For a mere second I remembered William’s remark that he should not
be able to see the girl Jenny from the library windows. Then this
recollection drove from my head that I had only dined in the sense that
my dinner-bill was paid. Returning to the dining-room, I happened to
take my chair at the window, and while I was eating a deviled kidney
I saw in the street the girl whose nods had such an absurd effect on
William.
The children of the poor are as thoughtless as their parents, and this
Jenny did not sign to the windows in the hope that William might see
her, though she could not see him. Her face, which was disgracefully
dirty, bore doubt and dismay on it, but whether she brought good news
it would not tell. Somehow I had expected her to signal when she saw
me, and, though her message could not interest me, I was in the mood in
which one is irritated at that not taking place which he is awaiting.
Ultimately she seemed to be making up her mind to go away.
A boy was passing with the evening papers, and I hurried out to get
one, rather thoughtlessly, for we have all the papers in the club.
Unfortunately, I misunderstood the direction the boy had taken; but
round the first corner (out of sight of the club windows) I saw the girl
Jenny, and so asked her how William’s wife was.
“Did he send you to me?” she replied, impertinently taking me for a
waiter. “My!” she added, after a second scrutiny, “I b’lieve you’re one
of them. His missis is a bit better, and I was to tell him as she took
all the tapiocar.”
“How could you tell him?” I asked.
“I was to do like this,” she replied, and went through the supping of
something out of a plate in dumb-show.
“That would not show she ate all the tapioca,” I said.
“But I was to end like this,” she answered, licking an imaginary plate
with her tongue.
I gave her a shilling (to get rid of her), and returned to the club
disgusted.
Later in the evening I had to go to the club library for a book, and
while William was looking in vain for it (I had forgotten the title) I
said to him:
“By the way, William, Mr. Myddleton Finch is to tell the committee
that he was mistaken in the charge he brought against you, so you will
doubtless be restored to the dining-room to-morrow.”
The two members were still in their chairs, probably sleeping lightly;
yet he had the effrontery to thank me.
“Don’t thank me,” I said, blushing at the imputation. “Remember your
place, William!”
“But Mr. Myddleton Finch knew I swore,” he insisted.
“A gentleman,” I replied, stiffly, “cannot remember for twenty-four
hours what a waiter has said to him.”
“No, sir; but--”
To stop him I had to say: “And, ah, William, your wife is a little
better. She has eaten the tapioca--all of it.”
“How can your know, sir?”
“By an accident.”
“Jenny signed to the window?”
“No.”
“Then you saw her, and went out, and--”
“Nonsense!”
“Oh, sir, to do that for me! May God bl--”
“William!”
“Forgive me, sir; but--when I tell my missis, she will say it was
thought of your own wife as made you do it.”
He wrung my hand. I dared not withdraw it, lest we should waken the
sleepers.
William returned to the dining-room, and I had to show him that if he
did not cease looking gratefully at me I must change my waiter. I also
ordered him to stop telling me nightly how his wife was, but I continued
to know, as I could not help seeing the girl Jenny from the window.
Twice in a week I learned from this objectionable child that the ailing
woman had again eaten all the tapioca. Then I became suspicious of
William. I will tell why.
It began with a remark of Captain Upjohn’s. We had been speaking of the
inconvenience of not being able to get a hot dish served after 1 A.M.,
and he said:
“It is because these lazy waiters would strike. If the beggars had a
love of their work they would not rush away from the club the moment one
o’clock strikes. That glum fellow who often waits on you takes to his
heels the moment he is clear of the club steps. He ran into me the other
night at the top of the street, and was off without apologising.”
“You mean the foot of the street, Upjohn,” I said; for such is the way
to Drury Lane.
“No; I mean the top. The man was running west.”
“East.”
“West.”
I smiled, which so annoyed him that he bet me two to one in sovereigns.
The bet could have been decided most quickly by asking William a
question, but I thought, foolishly doubtless, that it might hurt his
feelings, so I watched him leave the club. The possibility of Upjohn’s
winning the bet had seemed remote to me. Conceive my surprise, therefore
when William went westward.
Amazed, I pursued him along two streets without realising that I was
doing so. Then curiosity put me into a hansom. We followed William,
and it proved to be a three-shilling fare, for, running when he was in
breath and walking when he was out of it, he took me to West Kensington.
I discharged my cab, and from across the street watched William’s
incomprehensible behaviour. He had stopped at a dingy row of workmen’s
houses, and knocked at the darkened window of one of them. Presently a
light showed. So far as I could see, some one pulled up the blind and
for ten minutes talked to William. I was uncertain whether they talked,
for the window was not opened, and I felt that, had William spoken
through the glass loud enough to be heard inside, I must have heard him
too. Yet he nodded and beckoned. I was still bewildered when, by setting
off the way he had come, he gave me the opportunity of going home.
Knowing from the talk of the club what the lower orders are, could I
doubt that this was some discreditable love-affair of William’s?
His solicitude for his wife had been mere pretence; so far as it was
genuine, it meant that he feared she might recover. He probably told her
that he was detained nightly in the club till three.
I was miserable next day, and blamed the deviled kidneys for it. Whether
William was unfaithful to his wife was nothing to me, but I had two
plain reasons for insisting on his going straight home from his club:
the one that, as he had made me lose a bet, I must punish him; the other
that he could wait upon me better if he went to bed betimes.
Yet I did not question him. There was something in his face that--Well,
I seemed to see his dying wife in it.
I was so out of sorts that I could eat no dinner. I left the club.
Happening to stand for some time at the foot of the street, I chanced
to see the girl Jenny coming, and--No; let me tell the truth, though the
whole club reads: I was waiting for her.
“How is William’s wife to-day?” I asked.
“She told me to nod three times,” the little slattern replied; “but she
looked like nothink but a dead one till she got the brandy.
“Hush, child!” I said, shocked. “You don’t know how the dead look.”
“Bless yer,” she answered, “don’t I just! Why, I’ve helped to lay ‘em
out. I’m going on seven.”
“Is William good to his wife?”
“Course he is. Ain’t she his missis?”
“Why should that make him good to her?” I asked, cynically, out of my
knowledge of the poor. But the girl, precocious in many ways, had never
had any opportunities of studying the lower classes in the newspapers,
fiction, and club talk. She shut one eye, and, looking up wonderingly,
said:
“Ain’t you green--just!”
“When does William reach home at night?”
“‘Tain’t night; it’s morning. When I wakes up at half dark and half
light, and hears a door shutting, I know as it’s either father going off
to his work or Mr. Hicking come home from his.”
“Who is Mr. Hicking?”
“Him as we’ve been speaking on--William. We calls him mister, ‘cause
he’s a toff. Father’s just doing jobs in Covent Gardens, but Mr.
Hicking, he’s a waiter, and a clean shirt every day. The old woman would
like father to be a waiter, but he hain’t got the ‘ristocratic look.”
“What old woman?”
“Go ‘long! that’s my mother. Is it true there’s a waiter in the club
just for to open the door?”
“Yes; but--”
“And another just for to lick the stamps? My!”
“William leaves the club at one o’clock?” I said, interrogatively.
She nodded. “My mother,” she said, “is one to talk, and she says Mr.
Hicking as he should get away at twelve, ‘cause his missis needs him
more’n the gentlemen need him. The old woman do talk.”
“And what does William answer to that?”
“He says as the gentlemen can’t be kept waiting for their cheese.”
“But William does not go straight home when he leaves the club?”
“That’s the kid.”
“Kid!” I echoed, scarcely understanding, for, knowing how little the
poor love their children, I had asked William no questions about the
baby.
“Didn’t you know his missis had a kid?”
“Yes; but that is no excuse for William’s staying away from his sick
wife,” I answered, sharply. A baby in such a home as William’s, I
reflected, must be trying; but still--Besides, his class can sleep
through any din.
“The kid ain’t in our court,” the girl explained. “He’s in W., he is,
and I’ve never been out of W.C.; leastwise, not as I knows on.”
“This is W. I suppose you mean that the child is at West Kensington?
Well, no doubt it was better for William’s wife to get rid of the
child--”
“Better!” interposed the girl. “‘Tain’t better for her not to have the
kid. Ain’t her not having him what she’s always thinking on when she
looks like a dead one?”
“How could you know that?”
“Cause,” answered the girl, illustrating her words with a gesture, “I
watches her, and I sees her arms going this way, just like as she wanted
to hug her kid.”
“Possibly you are right,” I said, frowning; “but William had put the
child out to nurse because it disturbed his night’s rest. A man who has
his work to do--”
“You are green!”
“Then why have the mother and child been separated?”
“Along of that there measles. Near all the young ‘uns in our court has
‘em bad.”
“Have you had them?”
“I said the young ‘uns.”
“And William sent the baby to West Kensington to escape infection?”
“Took him, he did.”
“Against his wife’s wishes?”
“Na-o!”
“You said she was dying for want of the child?”
“Wouldn’t she rayther die than have the kid die?”
“Don’t speak so heartlessly, child. Why does William not go straight
home from the club? Does he go to West Kensington to see it?”
“‘Tain’t a hit, it’s an ‘e. Course he do.”
“Then he should not. His wife has the first claim on him.”
“Ain’t you green! It’s his missis as wants him to go. Do you think she
could sleep till she knowed how the kid was?”
“But he does not go into the house at West Kensington?”
“Is he soft? Course he don’t go in, fear of taking the infection to the
kid. They just holds the kid up at the window to him, so as he can have
a good look. Then he comes home and tells his missis. He sits foot of
the bed and tells.”
“And that takes place every night? He can’t have much to tell.”
“He has just.”
“He can only say whether the child is well or ill.”
“My! He tells what a difference there is in the kid since he seed him
last.”
“There can be no difference!”
“Go ‘long! Ain’t a kid always growing? Haven’t Mr. Hicking to tell how
the hair is getting darker, and heaps of things beside?”
“Such as what?”
“Like whether he larfed, and if he has her nose, and how as he knowed
him. He tells her them things more ‘n once.”
“And all this time he is sitting at the foot of the bed?”
“‘Cept when he holds her hand.”
“But when does he get to bed himself?”
“He don’t get much. He tells her as he has a sleep at the club.”
“He cannot say that.”
“Hain’t I heard him? But he do go to his bed a bit, and then they both
lies quiet, her pretending she is sleeping so as he can sleep, and him
‘feard to sleep case he shouldn’t wake up to give her the bottle stuff.”
“What does the doctor say about her?”
“He’s a good one, the doctor. Sometimes he says she would get better if
she could see the kid through the window.”
“Nonsense!”
“And if she was took to the country.”
“Then why does not William take her?”
“My! you are green! And if she drank port wines.”
“Doesn’t she?”
“No; but William, he tells her about the gentlemen drinking them.”
On the tenth day after my conversation with this unattractive child I
was in my brougham, with the windows up, and I sat back, a paper before
my face lest any one should look in. Naturally, I was afraid of being
seen in company of William’s wife and Jenny, for men about town are
uncharitable, and, despite the explanation I had ready, might have
charged me with pitying William. As a matter of fact, William was
sending his wife into Surrey to stay with an old nurse of mine, and I
was driving her down because my horses needed an outing. Besides, I was
going that way at any rate.
I had arranged that the girl Jenny, who was wearing an outrageous
bonnet, should accompany us, because, knowing the greed of her class, I
feared she might blackmail me at the club.
William joined us in the suburbs, bringing the baby with him, as I had
foreseen they would all be occupied with it, and to save me the trouble
of conversing with them. Mrs. Hicking I found too pale and fragile for a
workingman’s wife, and I formed a mean opinion of her intelligence from
her pride in the baby, which was a very ordinary one. She created quite
a vulgar scene when it was brought to her, though she had given me her
word not to do so, what irritated me even more than her tears being
her ill-bred apology that she “had been ‘feared baby wouldn’t know her
again.” I would have told her they didn’t know any one for years had I
not been afraid of the girl Jenny, who dandled the infant on her knees
and talked to it as if it understood. She kept me on tenter-hooks by
asking it offensive questions, such as, “‘Oo know who give me that
bonnet?” and answering them herself, “It was the pretty gentleman
there;” and several times I had to affect sleep because she announced,
“Kiddy wants to kiss the pretty gentleman.”
Irksome as all this necessarily was to a man of taste, I suffered even
more when we reached our destination. As we drove through the village
the girl Jenny uttered shrieks of delight at the sight of flowers
growing up the cottage walls, and declared they were “just like a
music-’all without the drink license.” As my horses required a rest, I
was forced to abandon my intention of dropping these persons at their
lodgings and returning to town at once, and I could not go to the
inn lest I should meet inquisitive acquaintances. Disagreeable
circumstances, therefore, compelled me to take tea with a waiter’s
family--close to a window too, through which I could see the girl Jenny
talking excitedly to the villagers, and telling them, I felt certain,
that I had been good to William. I had a desire to go out and put myself
right with those people.
William’s long connection with the club should have given him some
manners, but apparently his class cannot take them on, for, though he
knew I regarded his thanks as an insult, he looked them when he was
not speaking them, and hardly had he sat down, by my orders, than he
remembered that I was a member of the club, and jumped up. Nothing is in
worse form than whispering, yet again and again, when he thought I was
not listening, he whispered to Mrs. Hicking, “You don’t feel faint?” or
“How are you now?” He was also in extravagant glee because she ate two
cakes (it takes so little to put these people in good spirits), and when
she said she felt like another being already the fellow’s face charged
me with the change. I could not but conclude, from the way Mrs. Hicking
let the baby pound her, that she was stronger than she had pretended.
I remained longer than was necessary, because I had something to say to
William which I knew he would misunderstand, and so I put off saying it.
But when he announced that it was time for him to return to London,--at
which his wife suddenly paled, so that he had to sign to her not to
break down,--I delivered the message.
“William,” I said, “the head waiter asked me to say that you could take
a fortnight’s holiday just now. Your wages will be paid as usual.”
Confound them! William had me by the hand, and his wife was in tears
before I could reach the door.
“Is it your doing again, sir?” William cried.
“William!” I said, fiercely.
“We owe everything to you,” he insisted. “The port wine--”
“Because I had no room for it in my cellar.”
“The money for the nurse in London--”
“Because I objected to being waited on by a man who got no sleep.”
“These lodgings--”
“Because I wanted to do something for my old nurse.”
“And now, sir, a fortnight’s holiday!”
“Good-bye, William!” I said, in a fury.
But before I could get away Mrs. Hicking signed to William to leave
the room, and then she kissed my hand. She said something to me. It was
about my wife. Somehow I--What business had William to tell her about my
wife?
They are all back in Drury Lane now, and William tells me that his wife
sings at her work just as she did eight years ago. I have no interest in
this, and try to check his talk of it; but such people have no sense of
propriety, and he even speaks of the girl Jenny, who sent me lately
a gaudy pair of worsted gloves worked by her own hand. The meanest
advantage they took of my weakness, however, was in calling their baby
after me. I have an uncomfortable suspicion, too, that William has given
the other waiters his version of the affair; but I feel safe so long as
it does not reach the committee.
THE BLACK POODLE, By F. Anstey
I have set myself the task of relating in the course of this story,
without suppressing or altering a single detail, the most painful and
humiliating episode of my life.
I do this, not because it will give me the least pleasure, but simply
because it affords me an opportunity of extenuating myself, which has
hitherto been wholly denied to me.
As a general rule, I am quite aware that to publish a lengthy
explanation of one’s conduct in any questionable transaction is not the
best means of recovering a lost reputation; but in my own case there
is one to whom I shall nevermore be permitted to justify by word of
mouth--even if I found myself able to attempt it. And as she could
not possibly think worse of me than she does at present, I write this,
knowing it can do me no harm, and faintly hoping that it may come to her
notice and suggest a doubt whether I am quite so unscrupulous a villain,
so consummate a hypocrite, as I have been forced to appear in her eyes.
The bare chance of such a result makes me perfectly indifferent to all
else; I cheerfully expose to the derision of the whole reading world
the story of my weakness and my shame, since by doing so I may possibly
rehabilitate myself somewhat in the good opinion of one person.
Having said so much, I will begin my confession without further delay.
My name is Algernon Weatherhead, and I may add that I am in one of the
government departments, that I am an only son, and live at home with my
mother.
We had had a house at Hammersmith until just before the period covered
by this history, when, our lease expiring, my mother decided that my
health required country air at the close of the day, and so we took
a “desirable villa residence” on one of the many new building estates
which have lately sprung up in such profusion in the home counties.
We have called it “Wistaria Villa.” It is a pretty little place,
the last of a row of detached villas, each with its tiny rustic
carriage-gate and gravel sweep in front, and lawn enough for a
tennis-court behind, which lines the road leading over the hill to the
railway-station.
I could certainly have wished that our landlord, shortly after giving us
the agreement, could have found some other place to hang himself in than
one of our attics, for the consequence was that a housemaid left us in
violent hysterics about every two months, having learned the tragedy
from the tradespeople, and naturally “seen a somethink” immediately
afterward.
Still it is a pleasant house, and I can now almost forgive the landlord
for what I shall always consider an act of gross selfishness on his
part.
In the country, even so near town, a next-door neighbor is something
more than a mere numeral; he is a possible acquaintance, who will at
least consider a new-comer as worth the experiment of a call. I soon
knew that “Shuturgarden,” the next house to our own, was occupied by a
Colonel Currie, a retired Indian officer; and often, as across the low
boundary wall I caught a glimpse of a graceful girlish figure flitting
about among the rose-bushes in the neighbouring garden, I would lose
myself in pleasant anticipations of a time not too far distant when the
wall which separated us would be (metaphorically) levelled.
I remember--ah, how vividly!--the thrill of excitement with which I
heard from my mother, on returning from town one evening, that the
Curries had called, and seemed disposed to be all that was neighbourly
and kind.
I remember, too, the Sunday afternoon on which I returned their
call--alone, as my mother had already done so during the week. I was
standing on the steps of the colonel’s villa, waiting for the door to
open, when I was startled by a furious snarling and yapping behind, and,
looking round, discovered a large poodle in the act of making for my
legs.
He was a coal-black poodle, with half of his right ear gone, and absurd
little thick moustaches at the end of his nose; he was shaved in the
shamlion fashion, which is considered, for some mysterious reason, to
improve a poodle, but the barber had left sundry little tufts of hair,
which studded his haunches capriciously.
I could not help being reminded, as I looked at him, of another black
poodle, which Faust entertained for a short time with unhappy results,
and I thought that a very moderate degree of incantation would be enough
to bring the fiend out of this brute.
He made me intensely uncomfortable, for I am of a slightly nervous
temperament, with a constitutional horror of dogs, and a liability to
attacks of diffidence on performing the ordinary social rites under
the most favourable conditions, and certainly the consciousness that a
strange and apparently savage dog was engaged in worrying the heels of
my boots was the reverse of reassuring.
The Currie family received me with all possible kindness. “So charmed to
make your acquaintance, Mr. Weatherhead,” said Mrs. Currie, as I shook
hands. “I see,” she added, pleasantly, “you’ve brought the doggie in
with you.” As a matter of fact, I had brought the doggie in at the
ends of my coat-tails; but it was evidently no unusual occurrence for
visitors to appear in this undignified manner, for she detached him
quite as a matter of course, and as soon as I was sufficiently collected
we fell into conversation.
I discovered that the colonel and his wife were childless, and the
slender willowy figure I had seen across the garden wall was that of
Lilian Roseblade, their niece and adopted daughter. She came into the
room shortly afterward, and I felt, as I went through the form of an
introduction, that her sweet, fresh face, shaded by soft masses of
dusky-brown hair, more than justified all the dreamy hopes and fancies
with which I had looked forward to that moment.
She talked to me in a pretty, confidential, appealing way, which I
have heard her dearest friends censure as childish and affected; but I
thought then that her manner had an indescribable charm and fascination
about it, and the memory of it makes my heart ache now with a pang that
is not all pain.
Even before the colonel made his appearance I had begun to see that my
enemy, the poodle, occupied an exceptional position in that household.
It was abundantly clear by the time I took my leave.
He seemed to be the centre of their domestic system, and even lovely
Lilian revolved contentedly around him as a kind of satellite; he
could do no wrong in his owner’s eyes, his prejudices (and he was
a narrow-minded animal) were rigorously respected, and all domestic
arrangements were made with a primary view to his convenience.
I may be wrong, but I cannot think that it is wise to put any poodle
upon such a pedestal as that. How this one in particular, as ordinary
a quadruped as ever breathed, had contrived to impose thus upon his
infatuated proprietors, I never could understand, but so it was; he
even engrossed the chief part of the conversation, which after any lull
seemed to veer round to him by a sort of natural law.
I had to endure a long biographical sketch of him,--what a society paper
would call an “anecdotal photo,”--and each fresh anecdote seemed to me
to exhibit the depraved malignity of the beast in a more glaring light,
and render the doting admiration of the family more astounding than
ever.
“Did you tell Mr. Weatherhead, Lily, about Bingo” (Bingo was the
poodle’s preposterous name) “and Tacks? No? Oh, I _must_ tell him that;
it’ll make him laugh. Tacks is our gardener down in the village (d’ ye
know Tacks?). Well, Tacks was up here the other day, nailing up some
trellis-work at the top of a ladder, and all the time there was Master
Bingo sitting quietly at the foot of it looking on; wouldn’t leave it
on any account. Tacks said he was quite company for him. Well, at last,
when Tacks had finished and was coming down, what do you thing that
rascal there did? Just sneaked quietly up behind and nipped him in
both calves and ran off. Been looking out for that the whole time! Ha,
ha!--deep that, eh?”
I agreed, with an inward shudder, that it was very deep, thinking
privately that, if this was a specimen of Bingo’s usual treatment of
the natives, it would be odd if he did not find himself deeper still
before--probably _just_ before--he died.
“Poor, faithful old doggie!” murmured Mrs. Currie; “he thought Tacks
was a nasty burglar, didn’t he? He wasn’t going to see master robbed was
he?”
“Capital house-dog, sir,” struck in the colonel. “Gad, I shall never
forget how he made poor Heavisides run for it the other day! Ever met
Heavisides of the Bombay Fusileers? Well, Heavisides was staying
here, and the dog met him one morning as he was coming down from the
bath-room. Didn’t recognise him in ‘pajamas’ and a dressing-gown, of
course, and made at him. He kept poor old Heavisides outside the landing
window on top of the cistern for a quarter of an hour, till I had to
come and raise the siege!”
Such were the stories of that abandoned dog’s blunderheaded ferocity to
which I was forced to listen, while all the time the brute sat opposite
me on the hearth-rug, blinking at me from under his shaggy mane with his
evil, bleared eyes, and deliberating where he would have me when I rose
to go.
This was the beginning of an intimacy which soon displaced all ceremony.
It was very pleasant to go in there after dinner, even to sit with
the colonel over his claret, and hear more stories about Bingo; for
afterward I could go into the pretty drawing-room and take my tea from
Lilian’s hands, and listen while she played Schubert to us in the summer
twilight.
The poodle was always in the way, to be sure, but even his ugly black
head seemed to lose some of its ugliness and ferocity when Lilian laid
her pretty hand on it.
On the whole, I think that the Currie family were well disposed toward
me, the colonel considering me as a harmless specimen of the average
eligible young man,--which I certainly was,--and Mrs. Currie showing me
favour for my mother’s sake, for whom she had taken a strong liking.
As for Lilian, I believed I saw that she soon suspected the state of my
feelings toward her, and was not displeased by it. I looked forward with
some hopefulness to a day when I could declare myself with no fear of a
repulse.
But it was a serious obstacle in my path that I could not secure
Bingo’s good opinion on any terms. The family would often lament
this pathetically themselves. “You see,” Mrs. Currie would observe
in apology, “Bingo is a dog that does not attach himself easily to
strangers”--though, for that matter, I thought he was unpleasantly ready
to attach himself to _me_.
I did try hard to conciliate him. I brought him propitiatory buns, which
was weak and ineffectual, as he ate them with avidity, and hated me
as bitterly as ever; for he had conceived from the first a profound
contempt for me, and a distrust which no blandishments of mine could
remove. Looking back now, I am inclined to think it was a prophetic
instinct that warned him of what was to come upon him through my
instrumentality.
Only his approbation was wanting to establish for me a firm footing
with the Curries, and perhaps determine Lilian’s wavering heart in my
direction; but, though I wooed that inflexible poodle with an assiduity
I blush to remember, he remained obstinately firm.
Still, day by day, Lilian’s treatment of me was more encouraging; day by
day I gained in the esteem of her uncle and aunt; I began to hope that
soon I should be able to disregard canine influence altogether.