CHAPTER XV.
To Mord Em'ly's great relief, her father did not appear at the cemetery, and as, for some days after this, she heard nothing of him, she persuaded herself that he had disappeared. A letter came from Henry Barden, dated from Brindisi—a brief letter, which announced the arrival there of the P. & O. steamer; stated that he had not ceased to think of her; and that he was her affectionate friend. The letter was unexpected, and it cheered Mord Em'ly.
Mitchell's Dining-Rooms were giving to a few customers hospitality in the shape of tea and toast when Mord Em'ly's father blundered through the narrow swing-doors. He came so awkwardly, that the two doors, seeing, perhaps, that his presence was not desired, clipped him and held him there for a few moments. He swore a good deal at this incident, and Mrs. Mitchell craned herself up and protested warmly.
"We don't allow no language 'ere," said Mrs. Mitchell, with spirit. "Outside, if you like, but not inside, thank you."
"I've come on civil bis'ness," said Mord Em'ly's father, rather thickly, "and I ask to be treated in civil manner. I'm Eng'shman!"
"Your native country's proud of you, no doubt," said Mrs. Mitchell satirically.
"Nev' you mind 'bout my native country. My native country's all ri'. I'm all ri'. We're all," added Mord Em'ly's father, with a burst of amiability, "we're all all ri'."
"Now you've settled that question, you may as well go."
"I've come 'ere," he said, steadying himself by placing one hand on the counter and addressing the customers, "I come 'ere as parent. I want see Mord Em'ly."
"What do you want to see her for?"
"Nev' you mind. Perduce her."
"I shall do nothing of the kind," said Mrs. Mitchell, with spirit. "A low, drunken lout like you dare to come 'ere—"
Mord Emly's father snatched a few of the thick plates from the mound on the counter, and smashed them noisily on the floor. The customers rose from their seats; Mord Em'ly herself left the kitchen at the back of the dining-rooms, and came forward. She turned very white on seeing her father.
"There!" he said agreeably, "That's the kind of man I am."
"Send for a constable," cried Mrs. Mitchell, panting. "Somebody bolt off for a—"
Mord Em'ly interrupted.
"There she is," exclaimed her father, "There's my daughter. There's sole sport of her remaining parent. Mord Em'ly, how's world using you?"
"Why do you come here? You've no business to come making all this disturbance."
"No bis'ness?" he repeated amazedly. "Well, that's a good 'un. Ain't you my daughter, and ain't I your father? Vurry well then. Gimme 'alf-dollar."
"Is it true what he says, my dear?" asked Mrs. Mitchell.
Mord Em'ly nodded.
"A pretty object for a father, I must say!"
"I ain't arguin that I'm pretty," he said loudly. "My looks may be 'genst me, for all I know. Anyhow, they don't 'fect my argiment. You give me 'arf-dollar, my gel, 'r else I'll make myself jolly—hic—unpleasant."
"Don't see how you could be off of doing that!" snapped Mrs. Mitchell. "A brute like you doesn't deserve to 'ave a good daughter."
"Calls me names now," continued Mord Em'ly's father to the customers. "Tike a note of it, some of you. We'll make a blawsted lor case out of this!"
"Yes, an you'll be in the dock!" cried Mrs. Mitchell. "Wouldn't be the first time, I lay, neither, not by a long chalk!"
"What if I 'ave, mother? Don't we all get our misfortunes in life, aye I ain't the only one. Take care you don't find yourself there, that's all. Take care I don't set the police—"
"You low person!" cried Mrs. Mitchell; "you dare to say a word against my 'ouse! You dare to utter a single word—"
"Aren't you ashamed of yourself, father?"
"No," he replied defiantly. "Are you?"
"I'll give him some money," said Mord Em'ly, distressedly, "and then p'raps he'll go!"
"If you give him money," declared Mrs. Mitchell, "he'll be always comin' 'ere."
"Spoke like the voice of truth," agreed the deplorable man. "If you never tol' the truth before, you've tol it now, old lady. She's going to be my li'l bread-winner; when I'm stony, I come t' her for 'alf-dollar." He beamed foolishly at the interested customers, and then at Mrs. Mitchell, and slapped the counter. "Just like I've come for it nah. See what I mean, mother?"
"Leave my establishment this minute!" screamed Mrs. Mitchell.
"’Stablishment?" He laughed ironically. "Come to somethin', 'pon my word! Calls her blooming cawfee-shop a 'stablishment! Why don't you call it a rest'rong, and 'ave done it? Café des bloaters!"
"Will you leave," cried Mrs. Mitchell, stamping the floor, "or will you not?"
"When it suits me to," he said obstinately. "I've got my rights, and I mean to stick to 'em. Gimme a penny mug of cawfee, and not so much cackle!"
"We don't make pennyworths, and you sha'n't be served. You're the worse for liquor!"
"Wish I was!" said Mord Em'ly's father.
"And, besides that, you're a low, vulgar, noisy person: You're a disgrace, that's what you are!"
"I'm a-goin' look af'er my gel," said Mord Em'ly's father. "She's been torn from me by cruel fate, she has, and now cruel fate's got to take back seat. This is where I come in. Unnerstand?"
"Take your filthy 'ands off my clean counter!" commanded Mrs. Mitchell.
"Don’t go and throw a man's 'ands in his face," he said pathetically. "Don't do that, mother." He showed the palms of his hands to the customers. "That's work!" he said proudly.
"More like dirt!" remarked Mrs. Mitchell,
"Wha' is it the song says?" he asked them, "’Ow does the old song go? Summing like this, ain't it?"
"Your talkin's bad enough," said Mrs. Mitchell. "Begin to sing, and I shall certainly send for the police."
"Very well," replied Mord Em'ly's father. "I won't sing, then. Lady's only got to express wish, and I bow in a most def—in a most defer—" He hiccoughed, and gave up the attempt. "When's your birthday, my love?"
"Out of the door in less than two minutes," cried Mrs. Mitchell fiercely, "or I'll 'ave you put out."
He pulled the white cloth from one of the tables and upset the cruet-stand with its contents.
"That's what you get," he said, "for being imp'dent."
"Father," begged Mord Em'ly' appealingly, "I wish you'd go. You're not wanted and you'll only get yourself in trouble."
"What th' ell do I care," he shouted furiously, "’bout trouble? Ain't I bin in trouble before? Ain't I served me—"
"Be quiet!" commanded Mord Em'ly.
"Sha'n't be quiet. And," in a scream, "Take yer 'and off my shoulder, 'r else I'll make you."
"You're going out, father."
No, I ain't. Leggo my shoulder, I tell you. Leggo!" He struggled with her, and the customers came forward. "Chrise, I'll perish you, if you ain't careful."
He turned suddenly, and, with a quick movement of his foot and a wicked blow of the fist, sent her down on the floor. Then, before the men could reach him, he had gained the doorway. He smashed with his elbow the two sheets of embossed glass in the doors, and turned.
"You ask for it," he said, "and you've got it. I shall be this way agen to-morrer."
It did not take long to revive poor Mord Em'ly, and the broken fragments on the floor were soon cleared away, but the two jagged open spaces in the doorway remained to give sorrow to Mrs. Mitchell. Mord Em'ly pasted brown paper over them tearfully, as a temporary measure, and Mrs. Mitchell, looking on, shook her head. When Miss Mitchell returned home, her nerves unstrung owing to the discovery that her young gentleman's second Christian name was Samuel, her lamentations added to the poignancy of her mother's regrets. Mrs. Mitchell retired to her room alone, for better and calmer consideration of the matter, and presently Mord Em'ly was called up. Mrs. Mitchell sat very upright on the sofa, her hands clasped at her capacious waist.
"My dear," said the old lady, in a lachrymose voice, "I've thought it out, and I've decided. You'll 'ave to go."
"Me? Go?"
"I'm very sorry, my dear, because you're a good girl, and I sha'n't get another like you."
"I should rather think you won't!" declared Mord Em'ly. "Why, I do the work of two!"
"I know," said Mrs. Mitchell regretfully. "A 'andier or a willinger girl I never met, and never wish to meet. But the only way to prevent that horrible father of yours from coming here and kickin' up a disturbance is for me to be able to tell him that you're gone."
"Well, but—but what's going to 'appen to me?" demanded Mord Em'ly blankly.
"I shouldn't think you'd be long out, my dear. I shall give you a week's wages, and p'raps a little something extra."
"Want me to go to-night?"
"Oh, no, my dear. But I think you'd best be off as soon as you possibly can."
"It's all very well," said poor Mord Em'ly, "to say 'be off'; it's another thing to know where to be off to. It might be weeks before I found another place, and meanwhile—"
"You don't think I'm over-stern, my dear, I hope?"
"I ain't complainin'," said Mord Em'ly.
When business was over, the house seemed stifling to Mord Em'ly, and she obtained permission to run out for half-an-hour. She asked Miss Mitchell to accompany her, but that young lady replied coldly that one had to be particular in this world, and really one must draw the line somewhere. So little Mord Em'ly, her head full of bitterness against the world, went out alone into New Cross Road, and walked away in the desultory rain without knowing or caring where she went.
The road was crowded, because there had occurred a Bank Holiday but a week or so before, and people had not yet recovered from that hilarious event. At the corner of Lewisham High Road, near a public-house, nigger minstrels, in a semi-circle, were clattering bones, banging tambourines, and twanging banjoes, and Mord Em'ly stopped to hear one song. Happening to be one soaked with sentiment, it increased Mord Em'ly's depression. A short, corpulent man out in the centre sang it to the balcony of the public-house:
"Sister's joined the inegels, in the courts above,
We on earth shall never see her mo-ar;
Never see her visage, 'ear the voice we love,
Ontil we reach the 'eppy goldin sho-ar.
The black-faced men, marching round, repeated the chorus with a triumphant roar, and women in the crowd, sniffing and rubbing their eyes, told their husbands to contribute a penny to the offered tambourine.
Mord Em'ly hastened along Lewisham High Road, where there were fewer people, and hummed desolately the chorus which pursued her. She found herself wondering who would regret her dis appearance if she were to go out of this life. Her sleeves were wet now with the insidious rain, and they glistened with tiny drops when she neared a lamp. It seemed to Mord Em'ly that this was a world where it was always raining; and, whatever doubts she had about the next world, she felt confident that the weather there would be above reproach. But she had not yet decided on the few people who would be sorry if they never saw her again.
Henry Barden?
Yes, Henry, certainly. But he might never hear of what had become of her. It might not get into the papers; if it did, the papers might not reach Australia; if they reached Australia, they might not come under his notice.
Gilliken?
Yes, Gilliken. Mord Em'ly, standing for a few moments in the doorway of a closed shop, because the rain seemed to have determined at last to come down in earnest, felt sure that Gilliken would be very sorry indeed. Gilliken would come to the funeral, and would pray. Mrs. Mitchell would settle for the funeral, and would enjoy it, too, in her lugubrious way.
Wetherell? She was not quite sure. She had never been able entirely to overcome a vague disinclination to treat Wetherell with a certain reserve. She had labelled him "Dangerous," and the label still remained. And Ronicker—poor Ronicker! Several of the customers at Mitchell's Dining Rooms, too, would miss her. The young secretary of the Home, who married: if she ever heard of it she would be sorry—perhaps she would cry.
"They ain't a big crowd," said Mord Em'ly, with something of bitterness, "when you come to reckon 'em up."
Two youthful sparks, with cigars at an acute angle in the corners of their mouths, swaggered up to her and spoke. She pushed one against the other, much to their astonishment, and ran out again into the night.
The rain had returned now to its earlier manner. The pavements were slippery, and once or twice Mord Em'ly nearly fell, recovering herself only by a dexterous movement. She reached the railway bridge, under which a train was rushing, and stopped to hear the thunderous noise. She was too short to see over the arch, but by the side a wooden fence guarded the steep green bank of the cutting through which the lines ran, and here, by standing on the first bar, Mord Em'ly could see the signal lights, with a black and grey back ground, could hear the complaining, distressful whistle of an engine, which, desiring to see green, saw red, and was in a great state of perturbation accordingly. Shrubs grew on the bank, and Mord Em'ly decided, in her dazed and confused little mind, that she could get down without much trouble. She would stand just out of the glare of the signal-box, which made the bright wet rails shine like bars of polished silver, and there—
She wished that she had written something to be read at the inquest. In last Sunday's paper there had appeared such a letter, full of mysterious messages to friends, and with poetry in it, too. If one only knew where to find it, there was surely plenty of poetry in the world, and, with its aid, she could have made up a letter which the papers would have called "An Extraordinary Missive". The baffled engine, waiting behind the signal-box, snorted with temper, being probably anxious to get home to shed, and enjoy its night's rest; the driver and fireman stood on opposite sides, peering anxiously for the change of light. From the signal-box the elderly man in his shirt sleeves looked out, and shouted across to the driver, telling him that old Jack Somebody, porter at Nunhead, had been and got himself superannuated. Mord Em'ly heard three rings in the signal-box, and almost instantly the engine gave a shrill whistle of joy, and attempted to start on the slippery rails. The wheels did not at first catch a hold on the rails; the engine gave way to uncontrollable fury.
She was at the top of the wooden fence when a small, round white light flashed near her. Instinctively she looked back; instinctively, too, she stepped down.
"What have we here?" demanded a bass voice, at the back of the small round lamp. "Face seems familiar. What game are we playing now, may I ask?"
The white smoke and sparks of the passing engine, and a burst of light from its suddenly-opened and fiercely-blazing stoke-hole, enabled Mord Em'ly to see the speaker's face.
"What?" she said, trembling, but affecting to be perfectly composed. "They've made a sergeant of you, then? Whose mistake was that?"
"Fancy running across you again," said the sergeant, turning off his bull's-eye lantern. "Why, it must be years since you and me travelled down to that place in Surrey. How did you get on there?"
"First-class!" said Mord Em'ly.
"Well done!" said the sergeant heartily.
"I've had a whack in the eye just lately," confessed Mord Em'ly, "that's rather upset me. Lost me—me mother."
"Cheer up!" said the sergeant. "We can't expect to keep 'em with us always."
"That ain't the worst," said Mord Em'ly, trying to laugh; "I've found me father. And a nice pleasant, useful, 'andy sort of parent he is."
"You'll get over that," remarked the sergeant cheerfully. "Let me know if the old man gets too interfering." He looked down at her with interest. "I thought they'd make something of you. My word, why, if I've spoke about you to the wife once, I've spoke about you fifty times."
"Don't mean to say you found anyone willing to marry you?" she inquired pertly.
"Rather!" said the sergeant. "As 'appy a couple as you'd meet in a day's march, if it isn't taking too much on meself to say so. Which way are you going?"
"’Ome to my place of business in the New Cross Road."
"I'm going that way," said the sergeant, walking with her in his noiseless shoes. "We'll stroll along together. 'Aven't you got no umbrella? What were you getting on top of that fence for just now?"
"Dropped me glove over," said Mord Em'ly readily, "whilst I was watching the trains go by."
"I'll get one of our men to look for it in the morning," said the sergeant. "He'll find it for you."
"I'm not so sure."
"And you're getting on in the world like one o'clock, I lay," he said genially. "Mord, I'm glad of it."
"How came you to be made sergeant so quick?"
"Oh," he said modestly, "it was more of a fluke than anything else. One evening, I'd got a rare old 'ump of it; as down in the mouth as—well, I don't suppose you can understand."
"I can guess," said Mord Em'ly.
"And that very evening a case turned up over in the district where I was then, and it turned out all right for me, and the papers spoke well of me, and—well, here I am, as you see, a sergeant in the R Division, and very pleased to meet you. Why not come in some evening, and see the wife? Come to-morrow. She'll cheer you up, if you feel a bit down in the mouth. And so'll the boy."
"There's a baby, is there?"
The sergeant stopped, and laughed with so much enjoyment that he had to hold the iron railings.
"See him in my helmet," said the sergeant exhaustedly. "See him lock me up, and take me off to the police-station in the back kitchen! See him talk to his doll, because he finds it playing pitch-and-toss! Laugh?" The sergeant shook hands with Mord Em'ly, whose hour of depression had now gone, and wiped his eyes. "I tell you," he said, "it's enough to make a cat laugh."