Death's Jest-Book

 

 

 

 

The
woodcut illustrations which prefigure each of the novel's thirteen
sections are taken from Hans Holbein the Younger's
Dance of Death
and the decorated letters at the start of each chapter derive
from the same artist's
Alphabet of Death

For death is more 'a jest' than
Life, you see

Contempt grows quick from
familiarity.

I owe this wisdom to Anatomy.

T. L. beddoes
Lines to B.W. Proctor

... fat men
can't write sonnets
T. L. beddoes
The Bride's Tragedy
l.ii.

1

 

 

Clifton,
Glos. June 1808

That's
it, man. Hold her head, hold her head. For God's sake, you behind,
get your shoulder into it. Come, girl. Come, girl.’

The shouter of these
instructions, a burly man of about fifty years with a close-cropped
head and a face made to command, stands halfway up a broad sweeping
staircase. A few stairs below him a rustic, his naturally ruddy
complexion even more deeply incarnadined by exertion, is leaning
backwards like the anchor in a tug-o'-war, pulling with all his
strength on a rope whose lower end is tied round the neck of a large
brown cow.

Behind the beast a
nervous-looking footman is making encouraging fluttering gestures
with his hands. From the marble-floored hallway below a housekeeper
and butler watch with massive disapproval, while over the balustrade
of the landing lean a pair of housemaids, arms full of sheets, all
discipline forgotten, their faces bright with delight at this rare
entertainment, and especially at the discomfiture of the footman.

Between them kneels a
solemn-faced little boy, his hands gripping the gilded wrought iron
rails, who observes the scene with keen but unsurprised gaze.

‘Push, man, push, it can't
bite you!' roars the burly man.

The footman, used to obey and
perhaps aware of the watching maids, takes a step forward and leans
with one hand on each of the cow's haunches.

As if stimulated by the pressure,
the beast raises its tail and evacuates its bowels. Caught full in
the chest by the noxious jet, the footman tumbles backwards, the
maids squeal, the little boy smiles to see such fun, and the cow as
if propelled by the exuberance of its own extravasation bounds up the
remaining stairs at such a pace that both the rustic and the burly
man are hard put to retreat safely to the landing.

Below, the butler and the
housekeeper check that the bemired footman is unhurt. Then the woman
hastens up the stairs, her face dark with indignation, which the
maids observing, they beat a hasty retreat.

'Dr Beddoes!' she cries. 'This is
beyond toleration!'

'Come now, Mrs Jones,' says the
burly man. 'Is not your mistress's health worth a little labour with
brush and pan? Lead her on, George.'

The rustic begins to lead the now
completely cowed cow along the landing towards a half-open bedroom
door. The man follows, with the small boy a step behind.

Mrs Jones, the housekeeper,
finding no answer to the doctor's reproof, changes her line of
attack.

'A sick room is certainly no
place for a child,' she proclaims. 'What would his mother say?'

'His mother, ma'am, being a woman
of good sense and aware of her duty, would say that his father knows
best,' observes the doctor sardonically. 'A child's eye sees the
simple facts of things. It is old wives' fancies that give them the
tincture of horror. My boy has already looked unmoved on sights which
have sent many a strapping medical student tumbling into the runnel.
‘Twill stand him in good stead if he chooses to follow his
father's example. Come, Tom.'

So saying, he takes the boy by
the hand and, passing in front of the cow and its keeper, he pushes
open the bedroom door.

This is a large room in the
modern airy style, but rendered dark by heavily draped windows and
illumined only by a single taper whose glim picks out the features of
a figure lying in a huge square bed. It is a woman, old, sunken
cheeked, eyes closed, pale as candle wax, and showing no sign of
life. By the bedside kneels a thin black-clothed man who looks up as
the door opens and slowly rises.

'You're too late, Beddoes,' he
says. 'She is gone to her maker.'

‘That's your professional
opinion, is it, Padre?' says the doctor. 'Well, let's see.'

He goes to the window and pulls
aside the drapes, letting in the full beam of a summer sun.

In its light he stands looking
down at the old woman, with his hand resting lightly on her neck.

Then he turns and calls, 'George,
don't hang back, man. Lead her in.'

The rustic advances with the cow.

The parson cries, 'Nay, Beddoes,
this is unseemly. This is not well done! She is at peace, she is with
the angels.'

The doctor ignores him. Helped by
the rustic and observed with wide unblinking eyes by his son, he
manoeuvres the cow's head over the still figure in the bed. Then he
punches the beast lightly in the stomach so that it opens its jaws
and exhales a great gust of grassy breath directly into the woman's
face. Once, twice, three times he does this, and on the third
occasion the cow's long wet tongue licks lightly over the pallid
features.

The woman opens her eyes.

Perhaps she expects to see
angels, or Jesus, or even the ineffable glory of the Godhead itself.

Instead what her dim vision
discovers is a gaping maw beneath broad flaring nostrils, all topped
by a pair of sharp pointed horns.

She shrieks and sits bolt
upright.

The cow retreats, the doctor puts
a supporting arm round the woman's shoulders.

'Welcome back, my lady. Will you
take a little nourishment?'

Her gaze clearing and the
agitation fading from her features, she nods feebly and the doctor
eases her back on to her pillows.

'Take Betsy out, George,' says
Beddoes. 'Her work is done.'

And to his son he says, 'You see
how it is, young Tom. The parson here preaches miracles. We lesser
men have to practise them. Mrs Jones, a little nourishing broth for
your mistress, if you please.'

Clifton,
Glos, December 1808

Another
bedroom, another bed, with another still figure stretched on it, arms
crossed on breast, eyes staring sightlessly at the ceiling. But this
is no old woman paled into a simulacrum of death by illness and
debility. She, by the mercy of God and the ministrations of her
doctor, still lives, but now Thomas Beddoes Sr, aged only forty-eight
and looking as strong and wilful as ever he did in life, has
leapfrogged his ancient patient into the grave.

Two women stand by the bed, one
with her face so scored by grief she looks more fit to be laid on a
bier than her husband, the other, some years older, with her arm
round the wife's waist, offering comfort.

'Do not give yourself over so
utterly to grief, Anne,' she urges. 'Remember the children. You must
be their strength now, and they will be yours.'

The children . . . yes, the
children,' says Anne Beddoes distractedly. They must be told . . .
they must be shown and take their farewells

'Not all of them,' says the other
gently. 'Let Tom do for all. He is a thoughtful child for his age and
will know how best to tell the others. Shall I fetch him now,
Sister?'

'Please, yes, if you think it
best. . .'

'But first his eyes . . . should
we not close his eyes?'

They look down at the strong
staring face.

The parson tried but could not
draw the lids down,' says Anne. 'He was in his prime, so full of
energy ... I do not think he was ready to leave the world he could
see for one which is invisible

'It is a great loss, to you, to
us all, to the poor of Bristol, to the world of science. Compose
yourself a little, Sister, and I will fetch young Tom.'

She leaves the room, but does not
have far to go.

Little Thomas Lovell Beddoes is
sitting on the top stair, reading a book.

‘Tom, my sweet, you must
come with me.’ she says.

The boy looks up and smiles. He
likes his Aunt Maria. To the world she is Miss Edgeworth, the famous
novelist, and when he told her that one day he too would like to
write books, she didn't mock him but said seriously, 'And so you
shall, Tom, else you would not be your father's son.'

Also she tells him stories. They
are good stories, well structured, but lacking a little of the colour
and excitement he already prefers in a narrative. But this is no
matter as when he retells the tales to his brother and sisters, he is
quite capable of adding enough of these elements to give them
nightmares.

He stands up and takes his aunt's
hand.

'Is Father well again?' he asks.

'No, Tom, though he is in a place
where all are well,' she says. 'He has left us, Tom, he has gone to
Heaven. You must be a comfort to your dear mama.'

The little boy frowns but does
not speak as Aunt Maria leads him into the bedroom.

'Oh, Tom, Tom,' sobs his mother,
embracing him so tightly he can hardly breathe. But all the time as
she presses his head against her breast, his eyes are fixed upon the
still figure on the bed.

His aunt prises him loose from
the sobbing woman and says, 'Now say goodbye to your papa, Tom. Next
time you see him will be in a better world than this.'

The boy goes to the bedside. He
stands a little while, looking down into those staring eyes with a
gaze equally unblinking. Then he leans forward as if to plant a kiss
on the dead man's lips.

But instead of a kiss, he blows.
Once, twice, thrice, each time harder, aiming the jet of warm breath
at the pale mouth and flared nostrils.

‘Tom!' cries his aunt.
'What are you doing?'

'I'm bringing him back,' says the
boy without looking up.

He blows again. Now the assurance
which had marked his mien till this moment is beginning to fade. He
is gripping his father's right hand, and squeezing the fingers in
search of a respondent pressure. And all the time he is puffing and
blowing, his face red with effort, like an athlete straining for the
tape at the end of a long race.

His aunt moves swiftly forward.

‘Tom, stop that. You are
upsetting your mama. Tom!'

She seizes him, he resists, not
blowing now but shouting, and she has to pull him away from the
corpse by main force. His mother stands there, clenched fist to her
mouth, shocked to silence by this unexpected turn.

And as he is dragged out of the
bedroom by his aunt, and across the landing, and down the stairs, his
cries fade away like the calls of a screech owl across a darkling
moor which still echo disturbingly in the mind long after they have
died from the ear.

'Fetch the cow . . . Fetch the
cow . . . Fetch the cow. ..'