The H.G. Wells Reader (78 page)

“Podger's hearse you'll have,” said Johnson conclusively. “It's the best in Ease-wood.”

“Everything that's right and proper,” said Mr. Polly.

“Podger's ready to come and measure at any time,” said Johnson.

“Then you'll want a mourner's carriage or two, according as to whom you're going to invite,” said Mr. Johnson.

“Didn't think of inviting any one,” said Polly.

“Oh! you'll have to ask a few friends,” said Mr. Johnson. “You can't let your father go to his grave without asking a few friends.”

“Funerial baked meats like,” said Mr. Polly.

“Not baked, but of course you'll have to give them something. Ham and chicken's very suitable. You don't want a lot of cooking with the ceremony coming
into the middle of it. I wonder who Alfred ought to invite, Harold. Just the immediate relations; one doesn't want a great crowd of people and one doesn't want not to show respect.”

“But he hated our relations—most of them.”

“He's not hating them
now
,” said Mrs. Johnson, “you may be sure of that. It's just because of that I think they ought to come—all of them—even your Aunt Mildred.”

“Bit vulturial, isn't it?” said Mr. Polly unheeded.

“Wouldn't be more than twelve or thirteen people if they
all
came,” said Mr. Johnson.

“We could have everything put out ready in the back room and the gloves and whiskey in the front room, and while we were all at the ceremony, Bessie could bring it all into the front room on a tray and put it out nice and proper. There'd have to be whisky and sherry or port for the ladies. . . .”

“Where'll you get your mourning?” asked Johnson abruptly.

Mr. Polly had not yet considered this by-product of sorrow. “Haven't thought of it yet, O' Man.”

A disagreeable feeling spread over his body as though he was blackening as he sat. He hated black garments.

“I suppose I must have mourning,” he said.

“
Well
!” said Johnson with a solemn smile.

“Got to see it through,” said Mr. Polly indistinctly.

“If I were you,” said Johnson, “I should get ready-made trousers. That's all you really want. And a black satin tie and a top hat with a deep mourning band. And gloves.”

“Jet cuff links he ought to have—as chief mourner,” said Mrs. Johnson.

“Not obligatory,” said Johnson.

“It shows respect,” said Mrs. Johnson.

“It shows respect of course,” said Johnson.

And then Mrs. Johnson went on with the utmost gusto to the details of the “casket,” while Mr. Polly sat more and more deeply and droopingly into the armchair, assenting with a note of protest to all they said. After he had retired for the night he remained for a long time perched on the edge of the sofa which was his bed, staring at the prospect before him. “Chasing the O' Man about up to the last,” he said.

He hated the thought and elaboration of death as a healthy animal must hate it. His mind struggled with unwonted social problems.

“Got to put 'em away somehow, I suppose,” said Mr. Polly.

“Wish I'd looked him up a bit more while he was alive,” said Mr. Polly.

Bereavement came to Mr. Polly before the realisation of opulence and its anxieties and responsibilities. That only dawned upon him on the morrow—which chanced to
be Sunday—as he walked with Johnson before church time about the tangle of struggling building enterprise that constituted the rising urban district of Easewood. Johnson was off duty that morning, and devoted the time very generously to the admonitory discussion of Mr. Polly's worldly outlook.

“Don't seem to get the hang of the business somehow,” said Mr. Polly. “Too much blooming humbug in it for my way of thinking.”

“If I were you,” said Mr. Johnson, “I should push for a first-class place in London—take almost nothing and live on my reserves. That's what I should do.”

“Come the Heavy,” said Mr. Polly.

“Get a better class reference.”

There was a pause. “Think of investing your money?” asked Johnson.

“Hardly got used to the idea of having it yet, O' Man.”

“You'll have to do something with it. Give you nearly twenty pounds a year if you invest it properly.”

“Haven't seen it yet in that light,” said Mr. Polly defensively.

“There's no end of things you could put it into.”

“It's getting it out again I shouldn't feel sure of. I'm no sort of Fiancianier. Sooner back horses.”

“I wouldn't do that if I were you.”

“Not my style, O' Man.”

“It's a nest egg,” said Johnson.

Mr. Polly made an indeterminate noise.

“There's building societies,” Johnson threw out in a speculative tone. Mr. Polly, with detached brevity, admitted there were.

“You might lend it on mortgage,” said Johnson. “Very safe form of investment.”

“Shan't think anything about it—not till the O' Man's underground,” said Mr. Polly with an inspiration.

They turned a corner that led towards the junction.

“Might do worse,” said Johnson, “than put it into a small shop.”

At the moment this remark made very little appeal to Mr. Polly. But afterwards it developed. It fell into his mind like some small obscure seed, and germinated.

“These shops aren't in a bad position,” said Johnson.

The row he referred to gaped in the late painful stage in building before the healing touch of the plasterer assuages the roughness of the brickwork. The space for the shop yawned an oblong gap below, framed above by an iron girder; “windows and fittings to suit tenant,” a board at the end of the row promised; and behind was the door space and a glimpse of stairs going up to the living rooms above. “Not a bad position,” said Johnson, and led the way into the establishment. “Room for fixtures there,” he said, pointing to the blank wall.

The two men went upstairs to the little sitting-room or best bedroom (it would have to be) above the shop. Then they descended to the kitchen below.

“Rooms in a new house always look a bit small,” said Johnson.

They came out of the house again by the prospective back-door, and picked their way through builder's litter across the yard space to the road again. They drew nearer the junction to where a pavement and shops already open and active formed the commercial centre of Easewood. On the opposite side of the way the side door of a flourishing little establishment opened, and a man and his wife and a little boy in a sailor suit came into the street. The wife was a pretty woman in brown with a floriferous straw hat, and the group was altogether very Sundayfied and shiny and spick and span. The shop itself had a large plate-glass window whose contents were now veiled by a buff blind on which was inscribed in scrolly letters: “Rymer, Pork Butcher and Provision Merchant,” and then with voluptuous elaboration: “The World-Famed Easewood Sausage.”

Greetings were exchanged between Mr. Johnson and this distinguished comestible.

“Off to church already?” said Johnson.

“Walking across the fields to Little Dorington,” said Mr. Rymer.

“Very pleasant walk,” said Johnson.

“Very,” said Mr. Rymer.

“Hope you'll enjoy it,” said Mr. Johnson.

“That chap's done well,” said Johnson sotto voce as they went on. “Came here with nothing—practically, four years ago. And as thin as a lath. Look at him now!”

“He's worked hard of course,” said Johnson, improving the occasion.

Thought fell between the cousins for a space.

“Some men can do one thing,” said Johnson, “and some another. . . . For a man who sticks to it there's a lot to be done in a shop.”

All the preparations for the funeral ran easily and happily under Mrs. Johnson's skillful hands. On the eve of the sad event she produced a reserve of black sateen, the kitchen steps and a box of tintacks, and decorated the house with festoons and bows of black in the best possible taste. She tied up the knocker with black crape, and put a large bow over the corner of the steel engraving of Garibaldi, and swathed the bust of Mr. Gladstone, that had belonged to the deceased, with inky swathings. She turned the two vases that had views of Tivoli and the Bay of Naples round, so that these rather brilliant landscapes were hidden and only the plain blue enamel showed, and she anticipated the long-contemplated purchase of a tablecloth for the front room, and substituted a violet purple cover for the now very worn and faded raptures and roses in plushette that had hitherto done duty there. Everything that loving consideration could do to impart a dignified solemnity to her little home was done.

She had released Mr. Polly from the irksome duty of issuing invitations, and as the moment of assembly drew near she sent him and Mr. Johnson out into the narrow long strip of garden at the back of the house, to be free to put a finishing touch or so
to her preparations. She sent them out together because she had a queer little persuasion at the back of her mind that Mr. Polly wanted to bolt from his sacred duties, and there was no way out of the garden except through the house.

Mr. Johnson was a steady, successful gardner, and particularly good with celery and peas. He walked slowly along the narrow path down the centre pointing out to Mr. Polly a number of interesting points in the management of peas, wrinkles neatly applied and difficulties wisely overcome, and all that he did for the comfort and propitation of that fitful but rewarding vegetable. Presently a sound of nervous laughter and raised voices from the house proclaimed the arrival of the earlier guests, and the worst of that anticipatory tension was over.

When Mr. Polly re-entered the house he found three entirely strange young women with pink faces, demonstrative manners and emphatic mourning, engaged in an incoherent conversation with Mrs. Johnson. All three kissed him with great gusto after the ancient English fashion. “These are your cousins Larkins,” said Mrs. Johnson; “that's Annie (unexpected hug and smack), that's Miriam (resolute hug and smack), and that's Minnie (prolonged hug and smack).

“Right-O,” said Mr. Polly, emerging a little crumpled and breathless from the hearty introduction. “I see.”

“Here's Aunt Larkins,” said Mrs. Johnson, as an elderly and stouter edition of the three young women appeared in the doorway.

Mr. Polly backed rather faint-heartedly, but Aunt Larkins was not to be denied. Having hugged and kissed her nephew resoundingly she gripped him by the wrists and scanned his features. She had a round, sentimental, freckled face. “I should 'ave known 'im anywhere,” she said with fervour.

“Hark at mother!” said the cousin called Annie. “Why, she's never set eyes on him before!”

“I should 'ave known 'im anywhere,” said Mrs. Larkins, “for Lizzie's child. You've got her eyes! It's a Resemblance! And as for never seeing 'im—I've dandled him, Miss Imperence. I've dandled him.”

“You couldn't dandle him now, Ma!” Miss Annie remarked with a shriek of laughter.

All the sisters laughed at that. “The things you say, Annie!” said Miriam, and for a time the room was full of mirth.

Mr. Polly felt it incumbent upon him to say something. “My dandling days are over,” he said.

The reception of this remark would have convinced a far more modest character than Mr. Polly that it was extremely witty.

Mr. Polly followed it up by another one almost equally good. “My turn to dandle,” he said, with a sly look at his aunt, and convulsed everyone.

“Not me,” said Mrs. Larkins, taking his point, “thank you,” and achieved a climax.

It was queer, but they seemed to be easy people to get on with anyhow. They were still picking little ripples and giggles of mirth from the idea of Mr. Polly dandling Aunt
Larkins when Mr. Johnson, who had answered the door, ushered in a stooping figure, who was at once hailed by Mrs. Johnson as “Why! Uncle Pentstemon!” Uncle Pentstemon was rather a shock. His was an aged rather than venerable figure; Time had removed the hair from the top of his head and distributed a small dividend of the plunder in little bunches carelessly and impartially over the rest of his features; he was dressed in a very big old frock coat and a long cylindrical top hat, which he had kept on; he was very much bent, and he carried a rush basket from which protruded coy intimations of the lettuces and onions he had brought to grace the occasion. He hobbled into the room, resisting the efforts of Johnson to divest him of his various encumbrances, halted and surveyed the company with an expression of profound hostility, breathing hard. Recognition quickened in his eyes.

“You here,” he said to Aunt Larkins and then; “You would be. . . . These your gals?”

“They are,” said Aunt Larkins, “and better gals—”

“That Annie?” asked Uncle Pentstemon, pointing a horny thumb-nail.

“Fancy your remembering her name!”

“She mucked up my mushroom bed, the baggage!” said Uncle Pentstemon un-genially, “and I give it to her to rights. Trounced her I did—fairly. I remember her. Here's some green stuff for you, Grace. Fresh it is and wholesome. I shall be wanting the basket back and mind you let me have it. . . . Have you nailed him down yet? You always was a bit in front of what was needful.”

His attention was drawn inward by a troublesome tooth, and he sucked at it spitefully. There was something potent about this old man that silenced everyone for a moment or so. He seemed a fragment from the ruder agricultural past of our race, like a lump of soil among things of paper. He put his basket of vegetables very deliberately on the new violet tablecloth, removed his hat carefully and dabbled his brow, and wiped out his hat brim with a crimson and yellow pocket handkerchief.

“I'm glad you were able to come, Uncle,” said Mrs. Johnson.