By serving in shops, by drinking himself drunk, and by shamming good
fortune, Jacob Griffiths gave testimony to the miseries and joys of
life, and at the age of fifty-six he fell back in his bed at his
lodging-house in Clapham, suffered, drew up his crippled knees and died.
On the morrow his brother Simon hastened to the house; and as he neared
the place he looked up and beheld his sisters Annie and Jane fach also
hurrying thither. Presently they three saw one another as with a single
eye, wherefore they slackened their pace and walked with seemliness to
the door. Jacob's body was on a narrow, disordered bed, and in the state
of its deliverance: its eyes were aghast and its hands were clenched in
deathful pangs.
Then Simon bowed his trunk and lifted his silk hat and his umbrella in
the manner of a preacher giving a blessing.
"Of us family it can be claimed," he pronounced, "that even the Angel do
not break us. We must all cross Jordan. Some go with boats and bridges.
Some swim. Some bridges charge a toll--one penny and two pennies. A toll
there is to cross Jordan."
"He'll be better when he's washed and laid out proper," remarked the
woman of the lodging-house.
"Let down your apron from your head," Simon said to her. "We are
mourning for our brother, the son of the similar father and mother. You
don't think me insulting if I was alone with the corpse. I shan't be
long at my religious performance. I am a busy man like you."
The woman having gone, he spoke at Jacob: "Perished you are now, Shacob.
You have unraveled the tangled skein of eternal life. Pray I do you will
find rest with the restless of big London. Annie and Jane fach,
sorrowful you are; wet are your tears. Go you and drink a nice cup of
tea in the café. Most eloquent I shall be in a minute and there's
hysterics you'll get. Arrive will I after you. Don't pay for tea; that
will I do."
"Iss, indeed," said Annie. "Off you, Jane fach. You, Simon, with her,
for fear she is slayed in the street. Sit here will I and speak to the
spirit of Shacob."
"The pant of my breath is not back"--Jane fach's voice was shrill. "Did
I not muster on reading the death letter? Witness the mud sprinkled on
my gown."
"Why should you muster, little sister?" inquired Simon.
"Right that I reach him in respectable time, was the think inside me,"
Jane fach answered. "What other design have I? Stay here I will. A boy,
dear me, for a joke was Shacob with me. Heaps of gifts he made me;
enough to fill a yellow tin box."
"Generous he was," Simon said. "Hap he parted with all. Full of feeling
you are. But useless that we loll here. No odds for me; this is my day
in the City. How will your boss treat you, Annie, for being away without
a pass? Angry will your buyer be, I would be in a temper with my young
ladies. Hie to the office, Jane. Don't you borrow borrowings from me if
you are sacked."
"You are as sly as the cow that steals into clover," Annie cried out.
She removed her large hat and set upright the osprey feathers thereon,
puffed out her hair which was fashioned in a high pile, and whitened
with powder the birth-stain on her cheek. "They daren't discharge me.
I'd carry the costume trade with me. Each second you hear, 'Miss
Witton-Griffiths, forward,' and 'Miss Witton-Griffiths, her heinness is
waiting for you.' In favor am I with the buyer."
"Whisper to me your average takings per week," Simon craved. "Not repeat
will I."