by Gerald Kersh
He wanted all the world to know him for what he was, neither more nor less. So he took to wearing, off duty, a black suit with preposterous trousers, tight along the thigh and belling out to the dimensions of skirts at the ankle; big, black boots, a black cap, and a white choker. His wife also wore black – a voluminous skirt; a long-skirted jacket, incredibly tight at her tight-laced waist, and a black hat as big as a cartwheel, draped with immense ostrich feathers.
To relieve this funereal blackness, or perhaps to make themselves more conspicuous, they went in for an extraordinary number of white pearl buttons. There was rivalry among the costers over the matter of buttons. It was not long before they were decorating their coats, caps and trousers, jackets, hats and skirts, with pounds of little buttons sewn on in bizarre designs. So they came to be called Pearly Kings and Pearly Queens. To this day they survive – I know one old lady who boasts that she has 2,800 pearl buttons on her coat alone. These are the intrepid people whose ear-splitting voices dominated the roaring of millions when they shouted: “Go it, old girl!” at Queen Victoria when she rode through London in the jubilee procession – at which that dry-eyed, weary, inflexible Queen of England shed affectionate tears.
The last surviving Pearly Kings and Pearly Queens still go for their ritual binge to Hampstead Heath on Bank Holiday; and half of London goes with them. Carnival men come rumbling in from every corner of England to meet them. For a week before Bank Holiday you see them coming in – another strange, exclusive breed; the carnival people; and always the dark whispering, sidelong-glancing, sidling gypsies – yet another Chosen People with a secret language to be spoken through the teeth. The attractions are screwed together. The steam organs honk and squeal while the spotted horses and smiling tigers and goggle-eyed ostriches go bounding round and round, and the Londoners find their voices. Women who make it a point of honour to laugh at two-thousand-pound bombs and lie quiet in childbirth scream themselves hoarse in cardboard caves of artificial darkness. Men who can suck chocolate when they peel off embattled squadrons in desperate power-dives through the high clouds shriek with the girls on the swings. . . . Housewives who count farthings throw pennies at the discs.
Buck navvies in their best clothes, anxious to forget that they are compelled to swing hammers in order to live, swarm about the apparatus that measures the power of your hammer-stroke; where they pay twopence for the privilege of lifting and swinging a great maul, to drive an indicator up toward a bell. If they ring the bell, they win no prizes – they have nothing to show for their money; they have swung a hammer until they are sore, as a matter of course, to get the money to pay for the privilege of swinging a hammer. The difference is that now their everyday skill is admirable.
Self-conscious fellows who never knew the feel of a heavy sledge smite with all their might and main, and send the indicator less than half-way toward the bell at the top.
“Go on, Lofty – ’ave a go!” says a young lady. Shy in his best clothes the navvy pays the twopence and picks up the maul, gets his balance, measures his distance, and without apparent effort lets fly such a blow that the bell rings. He may strike fifty such blows on a weekday to earn the twopence he had to pay for the privilege of striking that one. But he has struck a gasp out of a crowd, and refreshed his pride: it is money well-spent. The steak-fed football-player looks and shakes his head admiringly. “That’s nothing,” says the navvy, taking off his coat and spitting on his hands. He rings the bell six times more, bursting his collar at the last stroke; and this costs him a shilling, which he does not begrudge, for the audience cheers, and his girl feels his muscles while she leads him away to squander five shillings on the Wheel of Luck. There, if he comes away with a prize worth fourpence, he is satisfied.
With the late afternoon there comes a lull. Long-drawn screams have teased themselves into woolly wisps and fibres of sound. Children, exhausted with excitement, become fretful: listlessly tearing up red, white and blue paper trumpets which they have blown limp and dumb, they seem to become aware of the vanity of earthly pleasure, and they all begin to cry. They want to go home, or they do not want to go home; they want to do that which it is impossible to do, and are ready to cry themselves into convulsions rather than leave undone that which it is improper to do. All their expensively-won dolls disintegrate – noses fall off, eyes drop out, hands amputate themselves. Girls kick their fathers; boys bite their mothers. The joyous music of the calliope grows louder and more urgent as the crowds thin. One may hear, now, something that sounds like the killing of a thousand little pigs, as harassed parents smack their children. The fair-ground people bathe their sore throats in hot tea or cold beer; while around Jack Straw’s Castle, and The Spaniards, fights break out. Misery comes back into the world.
Thus, a burly costermonger sat on the grass hugging his knees and saying: “Never again! Never again! Never again, not while I’m alive!”
His wife said: “Shut your jaw.” She was holding a five-year-old girl, sticky with raspberry syrup, heavily asleep. Tightly gripped in the little girl’s fingers was a rubber instrument which, if you blew into it, made an indecent noise: she had blown into this until she had become unconscious. Not far from the man sat a seven-year-old boy, quietly sullen, beating the grass with the remains of a doll that had been stuffed with sawdust, the crockery head of which he had broken on his father’s chin; for which he had received a slap on the head.
“Just a minute,” said the man, and he got up and accosted three people who were making their way to the road. There was a pretty young woman, arm-in-arm with a young man who might have passed as a city clerk if he had not looked so happy. His disengaged arm pressed to his bosom a large stamped tin tea-caddy, a Chinese-looking vase, and a glass flower-bowl. She was carrying a doll. Walking in step with them, a small, plump, humorous man was pretending to drop a pair of plaster buddhas painted to resemble ancient bronze.
“Wasn’t it nice, Teddykins?” the lady was saying.
“Oi!” shouted the coster, catching Middleton by the lapels of his coat. “Samatter with you?”
“Grab hold of this stuff, will you, Trewie, old boy? Walk along with Trewie, will you, Louie dear?” said Middleton. “Trewie, take Louie along for a minute, can’t you?”
Trew had already dragged Louisa ten yards along. “You coward!” she said. “You call yourself a friend? Leave go of my arm!”
“Take it easy,” said Trew.
Middleton clenched his fists and said: “Well? Go on! What is it?”
The coster looked down at him, and frowned, red and exasperated. “Don’t know me, now, is that it? Eh?” he said.
“Can’t say I have the pleasure,” said Middleton.
“Knew me on Saturday all right, though, eh? ’Ow’d the creases go down with that cue?”
“What?”
“I give you a bunch o’ watercreases – remember? Last Saturday when you bought that cucumber?”
Then Middleton recognised the salad-seller and said: “I’m ever so sorry. Of course I remember. It was very nice watercress. We enjoyed it. But you look so smart, I didn’t know you for the moment. I thought you were trying to pick a fight with me, you see.”
“What, me – wiv you? Why, I wouldn’t insult my own intelligence, picking a fight with you. Just wanted to know if you enjoyed them watercreases, to set my mind at rest.”
“Very much indeed,” said Middleton. “Have you had a good time?”
“Lovely. But me and the old ball-and-chain and the Gawd-ferbids over there done in every penny I ’ad and so we’re getting ready to walk ’ome. That’s ’ow it is, guv, ’ere to-day and gone to-morrow.”
Now Middleton experienced a new sensation. He was going to reward somebody who was kind to him in the past when he was poor. Glowing with pleasure, he slid a pound note out of his pocket and pressed it into the coster’s calloused palm, saying: “I wouldn’t like to see you walking home. Better have this.”
“Well!” said the coster, t
oo surprised to swear. “Well, now, that’s——”
“ – That’s quite all right.”
“Next time you pass by my stall, I’ll let you ’ave it back, if you make it late next week,” said the coster; and such was the pressure of grateful emotion that the arteries in his neck became thick as ropes. “On my oath! Gawd bless you – good luck to you!”
“Say no more about it,” said Middleton, and went to join Louisa and Trew.
“I was just getting the lady out of the way, and then I was coming back to give you a hand,” said Trew.
“Quite unnecessary, old boy. I handled him,” said Middleton.
“Oh Ted, I never knew you were so brave!” said Louisa.
“You certainly did stand up to him, old man,” said Trew.
“More than some people would have done,” said Louisa.
Trew was ashamed of his cowardice. He had had about enough of this Middleton, who was smiling smugly at the sky – this prig of a Middleton, who, not satisfied with seventy-six thousand pounds, had to push himself forward and blossom as a hero. Well, let’s wait and see his face to-morrow, thought Trew, and smiled.
The coster went back to his wife and said: “There you are, you see! Do a good turn and get done one back. ’Arf the night you nagged me about them watercreases I give that clurk on Saturday. Better give ’em to some poor devil than chuck ’em in the dust-’ole, I said, them creases’r no good to us – blimey, do a good deed wiv ’em and chance it! Well, that was the geezer I give them creases to, and look at what ’e give me.” He opened his hand dramatically; then continued: “Let’s get back ’ome and put these bloody little miseries to bed, and you and me go to the rub-a-dub and ’ave a pig’s-ear. What say?”
“Suits me.”
So the coster and his old ball-and-chain took the God-forbids (or kids) to Uncle Ned (or bed); and went to the rub-a-dub (or pub) and drank pig’s-ear (or beer), singing “Knees Up Mother Brown” until closing time. Then there was a bull-and-cow (or row), in the course of which the coster received a damaged mince-pie (or eye). Having won the battle and shaken hands with his defeated enemy, he was helped by his wife to climb the apples-and-pears (or stairs); and went to bo-peep . . . healthy, dreamless bo-peep.
Louisa, having put her prizes where she could see them when she awoke, slept deeply. Middleton twisted and turned until the small hours, thinking of to-morrow; but at last he too slept.
* * * * *
Pismire’s managing clerk, a little brittle-looking half-transparent old man, opened the office punctually at nine o’clock in the morning. His name was Napking, and he was known and feared in legal circles; but admired as a “character”. He was the worst-dressed man in the City of London. Strangers, seeing Napking in the tomb-like ante-rooms of the courts, thought of him as some poor, hopeless wretch of a creditor; or perhaps a palsied shorthand writer – one of the walking dead. His shoes were terribly run down. His coat had been black, his waistcoat had been blue; and his trousers, which had been striped black-and-grey, were of no colour at all. He wore a celluloid collar and cuffs, and a fivepenny readymade bow tie that clipped into a patent stud, and sometimes fell off. His hat was an antique billycock; it shone like a stove. In the cold weather he wrapped himself in a black ulster that had been the worse for wear when he had got it from the lawyer to whom he had been clerk when Edward VII was King. But when he wanted to know the time Napking unbuttoned himself and took out a gold repeater worth two hundred pounds. It was said that Napking could lay his hands on a hundred thousand pounds.
Arriving at the office at one minute before nine o’clock on Tuesday morning, he paused on the landing to look at two young people who were standing nervously, hand-in-hand, close to the office door. Napking said nothing, but unlocked the door and went in.
“Ted, he went in,” said Louisa.
“Yes I know, Louie dear. Take it easy. Everything’s all right. I dare say he’s the old man who opens the windows, and empties the wastepaper baskets, and all that.”
“Wouldn’t they have a woman to do that, Ted?”
“Not necessarily, Louie – not these old-established firms. Some of them won’t even have a woman in the place, you know.”
“Shall we ask him, Ted?”
“Ask him what?”
“I don’t know . . . just ask him. Perhaps he could let us go in and sit down. It looks so silly, sort of standing.”
Middleton knocked peremptorily at the door, pushed it open without waiting for a reply, and, feeling for a shilling (the poor old fellow might enjoy something hot for dinner) called: “I say!”
“What do you want?” replied Napking, in a tone that made Middleton jump, and put him out of countenance.
“Oh . . . I want to speak to Mr. Pismire.”
“What’s your business?”
“Private business with Mr. Pismire,” said Middleton, sturdily.
“What’s your name?”
“What business is that of yours?”
“I am Mr. Pismire’s managing clerk. What is your business?”
“Oh,” said Middleton, blushing, “I’m sorry. My name is Edward Middleton.” He paused. The managing clerk said:
“Yes? Well?”
“ – Mr. Pismire wrote me a letter asking me to come and see him about the estate of Mr. Joseph Hugh Middleton of Wagga-Wagga, Australia: net personalty £76,000,” said Middleton.
“I know nothing about this. Middleton, did you say your name was? A letter? Where is it?”
Middleton said, indignantly: “Here it is. You don’t mind if we sit down, I hope.”
“Be seated, if you please. Middleton, eh? . . .” Mr. Napking glanced at the envelope and then looked at Middleton with suspicion in his washed-out eyes. Then he said: “Express? Hm!” He took out and unfolded the letter; read it and threw it on to a blotting pad. “That letter was never sent from this office, young man.”
“What do you mean?” cried Middleton, while Louisa put her hand to her throat.
“No such letter as this was written in this office. This is not Mr. Charles Pismire’s signature.”
When the hangman pulls the hood over the eyes of a condemned man and the great heavy noose slides smoothly into position, the condemned man must see such a darkness and feel such inevitability of shameful doom as Middleton saw and felt then. He said: “You’re wrong. You’re mistaken. There’s the letter to prove it. . . . You’re not telling the truth!” he shouted, so that his voice beat up echoes in remote corners of the stony, quiet old building.
“Am I to call the police?” said Napking. But then Mr. Pismire came in, cheered and refreshed by his long week-end, and, with less than half a glance at Middleton and Louisa, said: “Good morning, Napking. What is it?”
“Good morning, sir,” said Napking, handing Pismire the letter. “Look at this.”
He read it, shook his head, and said gently: “Mr. Middleton – you are Mr. Middleton, are you?”
“Yes, sir. We . . . we . . .” Middleton gulped.
“Well, Mr. Middleton, I’m afraid you are the victim of a joke. This letter was never typed by one of our typewriters.” Napking passed the envelope, and Mr. Pismire continued: “Our envelopes – show Mr. Middleton one of our envelopes, Napking – are of a very different quality. And this signature is not my signature . . . Napking, give me a scribbling pad. Here is my signature, Mr. Middleton. I hope, for your sake, that you have not built up too many hopes on this, because I can positively assure you that it is nothing but a hoax.”
“But, Mr. Pismire, sir!” said Middleton, while Louisa fell heavily into a little green leather armchair. “I wouldn’t have let myself in for what I have let myself in for without confirmation! I ’phoned your house. The gentleman who answered the ’phone said everything was quite in order.”
“You must be mistaken, Mr. Middleton.”
“Then do you mean to tell me that – that – that letter isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, sir?”
�
��Mr. Middleton, it is worth much less than the paper it is written on! The paper has a value; that which is written upon it has no value whatsoever.”
“But what am I to do?” cried Middleton.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you are to do. I cannot help you, I’m afraid. I would if I could. But let me tell you once and for all that I do not know either of the parties referred to in this letter. You would be well advised to put the matter out of your mind and go about your business as usual. Now you must excuse me, and so good day and good luck to you,” said Mr. Pismire.
“Let’s go and have a cup of coffee,” said Louisa, when they were in the street.
“A cup of coffee,” said Middleton. “Yes, let’s have a cup of coffee!”
In the teashop they looked at each other across the marble-topped table for several minutes without speaking. Then Middleton’s eyes filled and his voice thickened as he said: “Only about an hour or two ago I was thinking to myself that it’d make a nice change to go to the Savoy Hotel for lunch. . . . Never been inside the Savoy Hotel. I was going to take you shopping and buy up half Bond Street. Remember when we used to go for walks and look in the windows and pick out all the things we’d buy if we were rich? . . . I laid awake half last night thinking of all the things I was going to give you. Well, I can’t give you anything . . . but love . . . and you won’t get fat on that . . .”
“Dear, darling Ted! I don’t want anything else. And I don’t want to get fat. It’s the thought that counts,” said Louisa. “Don’t be downhearted, Teddykins; it was all a dream. Just a dream.”
Middleton said: “I wish it was all a dream, Louie. I wish to God it was. Don’t you see that I’m sunk, absolutely finished? Don’t you remember I cashed a cheque for twenty pounds? All right, I know, I know – you tried to stop me, and I wouldn’t let you, and it’s my fault, and I’m a damn fool, and I deserve everything I get. But why should you be the sufferer? Well, this is what’s going to happen, Louie: my cheque’ll come back, and the man in the pub’ll go to the office, as sure as fate, and I’ll be out in the street at a minute’s notice. And then what are we going to do? We’ll starve, that’s all, Louie. I shall have to go on the dole. And what about the baby? What about you? What are we going to do? I don’t know. Who could have played a trick like that on me? I can’t see why.”
