V
Mr. Polly walked back to the house because he wanted to be alone.
Miriam and Minnie would have accompanied him, but finding Uncle
Pentstemon beside the Chief Mourner they went on in front.
"You're wise," said Uncle Pentstemon.
"Glad you think so," said Mr. Polly, rousing himself to talk.
"I likes a bit of walking before a meal," said Uncle Pentstemon, and
made a kind of large hiccup. "That sherry rises," he remarked.
"Grocer's stuff, I expect."
He went on to ask how much the funeral might be costing, and seemed
pleased to find Mr. Polly didn't know.
"In that case," he said impressively, "it's pretty certain to cost
more'n you expect, my boy."
He meditated for a time. "I've seen a mort of undertakers," he
declared; "a mort of undertakers."
The Larkins girls attracted his attention.
"Let's lodgin's and chars," he commented. "Leastways she goes out to
cook dinners. And look at 'em!
"Dressed up to the nines. If it ain't borryd clothes, that is. And
they goes out to work at a factory!"
"Did you know my father much, Uncle Pentstemon?" asked Mr. Polly.
"Couldn't stand Lizzie throwin' herself away like that," said Uncle
Pentstemon, and repeated his hiccup on a larger scale.
"That _weren't_ good sherry," said Uncle Pentstemon with the first
note of pathos Mr. Polly had detected in his quavering voice.
The funeral in the rather cold wind had proved wonderfully appetising,
and every eye brightened at the sight of the cold collation that was
now spread in the front room. Mrs. Johnson was very brisk, and Mr.
Polly, when he re-entered the house found everybody sitting down.
"Come along, Alfred," cried the hostess cheerfully. "We can't very
well begin without you. Have you got the bottled beer ready to open,
Betsy? Uncle, you'll have a drop of whiskey, I expect."
"Put it where I can mix for myself," said Uncle Pentstemon, placing
his hat very carefully out of harm's way on the bookcase.
There were two cold boiled chickens, which Johnson carved with great
care and justice, and a nice piece of ham, some brawn and a steak and
kidney pie, a large bowl of salad and several sorts of pickles, and
afterwards came cold apple tart, jam roll and a good piece of Stilton
cheese, lots of bottled beer, some lemonade for the ladies and milk
for Master Punt; a very bright and satisfying meal. Mr. Polly found
himself seated between Mrs. Punt, who was much preoccupied with Master
Punt's table manners, and one of Mrs. Johnson's school friends, who
was exchanging reminiscences of school days and news of how various
common friends had changed and married with Mrs. Johnson. Opposite him
was Miriam and another of the Johnson circle, and also he had brawn to
carve and there was hardly room for the helpful Betsy to pass behind
his chair, so that altogether his mind would have been amply
distracted from any mortuary broodings, even if a wordy warfare about
the education of the modern young woman had not sprung up between
Uncle Pentstemon and Mrs. Larkins and threatened for a time, in spite
of a word or so in season from Johnson, to wreck all the harmony of
the sad occasion.
The general effect was after this fashion:
First an impression of Mrs. Punt on the right speaking in a refined
undertone: "You didn't, I suppose, Mr. Polly, think to '_ave_ your
poor dear father post-mortemed--"
Lady on the left side breaking in: "I was just reminding Grace of the
dear dead days beyond recall--"
Attempted reply to Mrs. Punt: "Didn't think of it for a moment. Can't
give you a piece of this brawn, can I?"
Fragment from the left: "Grace and Beauty they used to call us and we
used to sit at the same desk--"
Mrs. Punt, breaking out suddenly: "Don't _swaller_ your fork, Willy.
You see, Mr. Polly, I used to '_ave_ a young gentleman, a medical
student, lodging with me--"
Voice from down the table: "'Am, Alfred? I didn't give you very much."
Bessie became evident at the back of Mr. Polly's chair, struggling
wildly to get past. Mr. Polly did his best to be helpful. "Can you get
past? Lemme sit forward a bit. Urr-oo! Right O."
Lady to the left going on valiantly and speaking to everyone who cares
to listen, while Mrs. Johnson beams beside her: "There she used to sit
as bold as brass, and the fun she used to make of things no one
_could_ believe--knowing her now. She used to make faces at the
mistress through the--"
Mrs. Punt keeping steadily on: "The contents of the stummik at any
rate _ought_ to be examined."
Voice of Mr. Johnson. "Elfrid, pass the mustid down."
Miriam leaning across the table: "Elfrid!"
"Once she got us all kept in. The whole school!"
Miriam, more insistently: "Elfrid!"
Uncle Pentstemon, raising his voice defiantly: "Trounce 'er again I
would if she did as much now. That I would! Dratted mischief!"
Miriam, catching Mr. Polly's eye: "Elfrid! This lady knows Canterbury.
I been telling her you been there."
Mr. Polly: "Glad you know it."
The lady shouting: "I like it."
Mrs. Larkins, raising her voice: "I won't '_ave_ my girls spoken of,
not by nobody, old or young."
Pop! imperfectly located.
Mr. Johnson at large: "_Ain't_ the beer up! It's the 'eated room."
Bessie: "Scuse me, sir, passing so soon again, but--" Rest
inaudible. Mr. Polly, accommodating himself: "Urr-oo! Right? Right
O."
The knives and forks, probably by some secret common agreement, clash
and clatter together and drown every other sound.
"Nobody 'ad the least idea 'ow 'E died,--nobody.... Willie, don't
_golp_ so. You ain't in a 'urry, are you? You don't want to ketch a
train or anything,--golping like that!"
"D'you remember, Grace, 'ow one day we 'ad writing lesson...."
"Nicer girls no one ever 'ad--though I say it who shouldn't."
Mrs. Johnson in a shrill clear hospitable voice: "Harold, won't Mrs.
Larkins '_ave_ a teeny bit more fowl?"
Mr. Polly rising to the situation. "Or some brawn, Mrs. Larkins?"
Catching Uncle Pentstemon's eye: "Can't send _you_ some brawn, sir?"
"Elfrid!"
Loud hiccup from Uncle Pentstemon, momentary consternation followed by
giggle from Annie.
The narration at Mr. Polly's elbow pursued a quiet but relentless
course. "Directly the new doctor came in he said: 'Everything must be
took out and put in spirits--everything.'"
Willie,--audible ingurgitation.
The narration on the left was flourishing up to a climax. "Ladies,"
she sez, "dip their pens _in_ their ink and keep their noses out of
it!"
"Elfrid!"--persuasively.
"Certain people may cast snacks at other people's daughters, never
having had any of their own, though two poor souls of wives dead and
buried through their goings on--"
Johnson ruling the storm: "We don't want old scores dug up on such a
day as this--"
"Old scores you may call them, but worth a dozen of them that put them
to their rest, poor dears."
"Elfrid!"--with a note of remonstrance.
"If you choke yourself, my lord, not another mouthful do you '_ave_.
No nice puddin'! Nothing!"
"And kept us in, she did, every afternoon for a week!"
It seemed to be the end, and Mr. Polly replied with an air of being
profoundly impressed: "Really!"
"Elfrid!"--a little disheartened.
"And then they 'ad it! They found he'd swallowed the very key to
unlock the drawer--"
"Then don't let people go casting snacks!"
"_Who's_ casting snacks!"
"Elfrid! This lady wants to _know_, '_ave_ the Prossers left
Canterbury?"
"No wish to make myself disagreeable, not to God's 'umblest worm--"
"Alf, you aren't very busy with that brawn up there!"
And so on for the hour.
The general effect upon Mr. Polly at the time was at once confusing
and exhilarating; but it led him to eat copiously and carelessly, and
long before the end, when after an hour and a quarter a movement took
the party, and it pushed away its cheese plates and rose sighing and
stretching from the remains of the repast, little streaks and bands of
dyspeptic irritation and melancholy were darkening the serenity of his
mind.
He stood between the mantel shelf and the window--the blinds were up
now--and the Larkins sisters clustered about him. He battled with the
oncoming depression and forced himself to be extremely facetious about
two noticeable rings on Annie's hand. "They ain't real," said Annie
coquettishly. "Got 'em out of a prize packet."
"Prize packet in trousers, I expect," said Mr. Polly, and awakened
inextinguishable laughter.
"Oh! the things you say!" said Minnie, slapping his shoulder.
Suddenly something he had quite extraordinarily forgotten came into
his head.
"Bless my heart!" he cried, suddenly serious.
"What's the matter?" asked Johnson.
"Ought to have gone back to shop--three days ago. They'll make no end
of a row!"
"Lor, you _are_ a Treat!" said cousin Annie, and screamed with
laughter at a delicious idea. "You'll get the Chuck," she said.
Mr. Polly made a convulsing grimace at her.
"I'll die!" she said. "I don't believe you care a bit!"
Feeling a little disorganized by her hilarity and a shocked expression
that had come to the face of cousin Miriam, he made some indistinct
excuse and went out through the back room and scullery into the little
garden. The cool air and a very slight drizzle of rain was a
relief--anyhow. But the black mood of the replete dyspeptic had come
upon him. His soul darkened hopelessly. He walked with his hands in
his pockets down the path between the rows of exceptionally cultured
peas and unreasonably, overwhelmingly, he was smitten by sorrow for
his father. The heady noise and muddle and confused excitement of the
feast passed from him like a curtain drawn away. He thought of that
hot and angry and struggling creature who had tugged and sworn so
foolishly at the sofa upon the twisted staircase, and who was now
lying still and hidden, at the bottom of a wall-sided oblong pit
beside the heaped gravel that would presently cover him. The stillness
of it! the wonder of it! the infinite reproach! Hatred for all these
people--all of them--possessed Mr. Polly's soul.
"Hen-witted gigglers," said Mr. Polly.
He went down to the fence, and stood with his hands on it staring away
at nothing. He stayed there for what seemed a long time. From the
house came a sound of raised voices that subsided, and then Mrs.
Johnson calling for Bessie.
"Gowlish gusto," said Mr. Polly. "Jumping it in. Funererial Games.
Don't hurt _him_ of course. Doesn't matter to _him_...."
Nobody missed Mr. Polly for a long time.
When at last he reappeared among them his eye was almost grim, but
nobody noticed his eye. They were looking at watches, and Johnson was
being omniscient about trains. They seemed to discover Mr. Polly
afresh just at the moment of parting, and said a number of more or
less appropriate things. But Uncle Pentstemon was far too worried
about his rush basket, which had been carelessly mislaid, he seemed to
think with larcenous intentions, to remember Mr. Polly at all. Mrs.
Johnson had tried to fob him off with a similar but inferior
basket,--his own had one handle mended with string according to a
method of peculiar virtue and inimitable distinction known only to
himself--and the old gentleman had taken her attempt as the gravest
reflection upon his years and intelligence. Mr. Polly was left very
largely to the Larkins trio. Cousin Minnie became shameless and kept
kissing him good-by--and then finding out it wasn't time to go.
Cousin Miriam seemed to think her silly, and caught Mr. Polly's eye
sympathetically. Cousin Annie ceased to giggle and lapsed into a
nearly sentimental state. She said with real feeling that she had
enjoyed the funeral more than words could tell.
