In a sense it was to make up for the uncompromising official attitude of the Order that he was travelling up to Tadford on the day before the funeral. The thought had occurred to him that he might be useful. He remembered very clearly what it had been like in his own home when Alice’s aunts had arrived, tearful and self-important, to bury Alice’s mother. There had been enough to do and think of then—even with plenty of money in the house to make things easy. He could picture what it must be like for an agitated woman with barely enough to live on to attempt to cope with the verger and the stone-mason, the cemetery and the mutes, the organist and the chaplain. It required such a lot of people to bury one person in a state of civilisation.
When at last he got to Tadford it was not greatly different from what he had been used to. The walls were plastered with the same advertisements which covered the London Underground, and the same multiple stores shone out like ugly and familiar faces. Mr. Biddle asked for Station Approach and was directed towards the other end of the town.
Apparently there were two stations, and the Approach where the Sneyds lived was at the second one. Carrying a suitcase containing his nightclothes and his toilet things and his black, ceremonial tie—he was already dressed in a dark suit—he set out to walk. It was some distance. On the way, he passed the Bon Marché where Mr. Sneyd’s business life had been spent; Mr. Biddle remembered what Mr. Sneyd had said about it and guessed how much they must be missing him inside. He also thought, as he caught sight of his reflexion in one of the plate-glass windows how pleased Mr. Sneyd would have been if only he could have seen him, too.
The thought comforted him, as he walked away. But not for long. The suitcase seemed to have grown very heavy and Station Approach seemed a very long way off. And it was hot; the afternoon—it was about three o’clock—had settled down to a kind of Saharan fierceness. He paused for a moment and undid his waistcoat. At the corner of Corporation Street he loosened his tie as well. Then he carried his hat and kept passing his handkerchief across his forehead. When he finally arrived at number six he was like a dusty and perspiring bagman.
Mrs. Sneyd did not recognise him when she opened the door and Mr. Biddle was too much out of breath to say who he was. They just stood there, both in black, staring at each other. Quite suddenly Mrs. Sneyd came to her senses.
“Good gracious,” she said, “it’s Mr. Biddle. You did give me a turn.”
“I—I came along early to see if I could do anything,” Mr. Biddle said lamely.
“Oh, that’s all right,” Mrs. Sneyd answered. “Come on in. I was afraid you’d mistaken the day or something.”
The hall through which Mrs. Sneyd led him was dark and narrow: it was necessary to sidle by the hat-stand in order to get past. And the little drawing-room with the looped curtains seemed unnaturally small and obscured. After the brilliant sunshine outside it was like diving into a tank. Mr. Biddle sat back on the corner of the couch and looked around him. To a man in his line of business there was obviously a distressing amount that wanted doing. In the language of his trade he could see at a glance that the place was in need of a thorough inside and out. In short the property was in a state.
But he was distracted from further thoughts by Mrs. Sneyd.
“Well, this is a surprise,” she said, “seeing you to-day instead of to-morrow.”
She had changed into a plain black dress without any lace on it and looked a different woman. He could even see from the tilt of her head as she sat there that she must have been quite good looking when she was a girl.
“If I’m in the way just turn me out,” Mr. Biddle responded.
“Oh, I couldn’t do that,” Mrs. Sneyd replied promptly. “Won’t you stop and have some tea?”
Mr. Biddle looked at his watch.
“Thanks,” he said. “I don’t mind if I do.”
He was in that state of exhaustion when a cup of tea seemed something to lift a man over the gulf between collapse and recovery.
Mrs. Sneyd was an expert tea maker. In her lifetime she had always met crises with tea, and great khaki-coloured tides of the stuff had flowed through number six Station Approach. On the day on which Mr. Sneyd had returned home from the Bon Marché and announced that he was too ill to go back to work it had been like Chekhov.
Mr. Biddle was still idly trying to figure out mentally what it would cost to do up the house properly from top to bottom when Mrs. Sneyd returned carrying a tray. She had managed to find a piece of Swiss roll as well. They held off at first saying that they were not hungry and then set to and finished it between them. Mrs. Sneyd went and filled up the teapot and came back again. There was a luxurious domesticity about it that comforted Mr. Biddle. He hadn’t been so comfortable since Mrs. Biddle had died. When Mrs. Sneyd told him not to mind her if he wanted to smoke a pipe he was a happy man.
But in one stroke she destroyed his composure.
“I heard afterwards he need never have died,” she said bitterly. “He’d got as much chance as you or me.”
“How do you mean?” Mr. Biddle asked.
“I know someone who knows one of the Sisters,” she replied. “He was going along all right till something happened.”
Mr. Biddle shook his head. It was terrible to think that, but for somebody else’s blunder, his momentary friend, Mr. Sneyd, would be alive and with them to-day.
“What did happen?” he asked. A little chilling doubt had started up in his mind; perhaps she knew.
“It was that Order of his,” she answered fiercely. “I always said it would kill him and it did.”
Mr. Biddle sat up very straight.
“Eh?” he said.
“They got up a party to go and see him,” Mrs. Sneyd went on. “The Night Sister told me. Twenty or thirty of them there were … ”
“Oh, no,” said Mr. Biddle. “There were only four of… ” He was about to say “us” but stopped himself in time; there was something in Mrs. Sneyd’s attitude that did not make him very anxious to admit that he had been there at all. “Four of them,” he finished up.
“How do you know?” Mrs. Sneyd asked.
Mr. Biddle looked at her and then lowered his eyes. “Don’t forget that I’m in the Order too,” he said.
They sat for a while after that in silence, Mr. Biddle smoking and Mrs. Sneyd staring into the empty fireplace. It was some minutes before he noticed that she was crying. They were not noisy tears this time. In fact, she was silent. She was simply sitting there, her shoulders rising and falling and large, glyceriny tears running down her cheeks. When she saw that he was looking at her she shook her head and tried to smile.
“It’s only that I just saw his slippers,” she said. “Nobody thought to put them away.”
He got up and put his hand on her shoulder.
“Try not to think about it,” he said. “It’ll only make it harder for you.”
And then the extraordinary thing happened. She took hold of his hand and kissed it. They neither of them said a word and, when he finally removed his hand, the incident might never have occurred.
“I—I think I ought to be getting along now,” he said.
Mrs. Sneyd got up and smoothed her hair.
“You can leave your bag here,” she said. “Are you coming back to supper?”
“Thanks—thanks very much,” he said. “I’d like to.”
At the door Mrs. Sneyd hesitated for a moment.
“If you remember,” she said. “You might buy an evening paper. Stan always used to bring one with him.”
When Mr. Biddle left the house he set out with the determined air of a man on important business. He was looking for the Pyramid Hotel. Not that it was difficult to find. On the contrary, when they put it there at the corner of Corporation Street, Messrs. Rawling and Mews, the brewers, gave a certain and unmistakable centre to their little bit of the universe. Mr. Biddle paused for a moment to satisfy himself that this yellow stucco Parthenon was the pub he was looking for, and then went into the gold and fros
ted splendour of the saloon bar. The atmosphere was rich with palms and singing birds and barmaids with black silk bosoms.
“Can you tell me if the Mariners are meeting here to-night?” he asked.
The lady whom he had addressed looked up. She was evidently the owner—there was just that subtle Bernhardt air of authority about her.
“You’re late, dear,” she said. “The boys have just gone through.”
Mr. Biddle followed them and came to a door outside which two men were standing. An outsider would have taken them to be simply two large complacent loafers, leaning up against a door-post, chatting. But Mr. Biddle knew better. He recognised them at once as the Harbour Watch placed there to give the “Strange Craft” warning on the approach of any invader.
“Your business?” the larger of the two men demanded.
“Brother Mariner seeking refuge,” Mr. Biddle replied almost without thinking.
“What is the password of the Venerable Order?”
“——” Mr. Biddle replied.
“Pass, Brother,” said the larger man.
Mr. Biddle went inside and put on his Commodore’s chain. It was more comfortable round his neck than in his pocket; it had been digging into him as he walked, ever since he had left East Finchley.
Then he pushed open the green baize door and joined his brothers within. The formal part of the proceedings was over. The oath had been taken standing, and now they were down to smaller local business. Mr. Biddle’s entry caused quite a stir—they noticed the Commodore’s chain at once. It wasn’t every evening that a visiting Commodore dropped in on them like this, and the Tadford Captain (it was only a Sub-Fleet without a Commodore of its own) was not slow to take advantage of his presence.
“Would our visiting Brother Commodore care to say a few words?”
The local Captain leant invitingly forward over the table like a conjurer choosing an assistant for a card trick.
“Thank you,” said Mr. Biddle simply and mounted the platform in front of him.
He was surprised to find that he was nervous. He wasn’t usually nervous; certainly never nervous at East Finchley. But now that he was facing them here at Tadford he felt awkward and self-conscious. It was somehow all so difficult to explain.
“Brother Mariners,” he began in a voice so low that they could scarcely hear him. “I’m here because of Brother Sneyd that was.”
“Mr. Sneyd left the Order,” said a voice.
“I know that,” said Mr. Biddle. “He left the Order because he was too hard up to continue and didn’t want to ask for help.”
“It doesn’t make any difference,” replied the man who had interrupted him. “He left the Order, didn’t he?”
“Well, even if he did,” Mr. Biddle continued, “it might seem sort of friendly if a few of us could be there to pay a bit of respect.”
There was still no sign of response from the five rows of faces in front of him; they might not have heard what he was saying. And somehow or other he couldn’t deliver the sort of address that he’d been planning.
“It’s the widow I’m thinking of,” he went on. “She’d appreciate it, you know, if a few of his friends turned up. It means a lot to have a proper Mariner’s funeral.”
“Not for someone who left the Order,” the man in the second row said decisively.
At that point Mr. Biddle’s patience deserted him. He had been travelling all day and he was tired.
“All right,” he said, “if that’s your final decision I’ll wire the East Finchley Fleet to send out a Life-line. You can fight it out among yourselves afterwards.”
He turned and began to go down the steps from the platform. There was a long strained silence. Then as he reached the bottom the Captain stopped him.
“What time’s the funeral?” he asked.
“Three-thirty, New Cemetery,” Mr. Biddle replied.
His voice was unsteady as he said it; and now that he had lost his temper he was trembling all over.
The Captain rang the ship’s bell on the table in front of him.
“Volunteers for a Boat Crew for ex-Brother Sneyd’s interment,” he said.
One by one the hands came up. Soon there were eleven of them; only three abstained.
The Captain turned to Mr. Biddle.
“We’ll be there,” he said.
When Mr. Biddle got back to Mrs. Sneyd’s it was nearly ten o’clock: he hoped as he rang the bell that he wasn’t keeping her up.
But Mrs. Sneyd seemed quite glad to see him. “I’ve got a meal ready for you,” she said. “I expect you’re hungry.”
“That’s uncommonly nice of you,” Mr. Biddle replied. “I really only called round for my bag.”
By the time he had eaten—Mrs. Sneyd had something with him as well—it was ten-thirty. Mr. Biddle looked at his watch.
“I must be getting along,” he said. “I’m putting up at the Pyramid.”
“Why don’t you stop here?” Mrs. Sneyd asked. “You could have our room. I’m sleeping in with Vi until I’ve got over it.”
Mr. Biddle started to refuse, but the prospect of the walk back to the Pyramid with his bag in his hand was not a pleasant one. After the walk from the station his feet still felt as though they might go back on him.
“Are you sure it won’t be putting you out?” he asked.
Mrs. Sneyd said that she was sure.
“Well, then I’d like to very much,” said Mr. Biddle. “I shall be on the spot if you want me.”
Half an hour later, in young Violet’s room Mrs. Sneyd turned out the light. She had ransacked every bed in the house to make Mr. Biddle comfortable. She herself was sleeping with Vi in a single bed.
“If this isn’t the absolute limit,” she said. “Having old Biddle turn up on top of everything else.”
Chapter Fourteen
The Mariners were true to their word. They were there the next day eleven strong; and Mrs. Sneyd was furious.
She resented them from the moment she saw them getting off the tram-stop outside the cemetery gates.
“You would have thought they could have left us alone on this of all days,” she said under her breath to Mr. Biddle. “You would really.”
Mr. Biddle made no reply. He was holding young Violet by the hand—she had developed a passionate, adhesive affection for him—and he had caught a glimpse of something in the little mortuary chapel. What he had seen was eleven grown men in black coats proceeding to don the full regalia of the Order. That was something he hadn’t reckoned with. Evidently they had wired for a dispensation from Headquarters and were preparing to bury Mr. Sneyd with full Nautical honours. When the Captain, wearing his gold chain and his plumed hat, removed a bosun’s whistle from his pocket and proceeded to blow three shrill blasts on it as a signal for the Mariners’ part of the ceremony to begin, it was too much for Mrs. Sneyd.
“Send them away,” she said miserably. “Send them away. This is my funeral.”
But her words were drowned in the full-throated roar of male voices.
“Upon life’s ocean sailing,
In calm and in distress,
We hear our Maker hailing
The ships He doth possess.
“Amid the storm-waves’ welter,
Beneath the frowning sky…
Eleven men standing elbow to elbow and with their heads thrown back were giving Mr. Sneyd the send-off of their life. The only thing that was omitted was the rocket. This, however, was reserved very strictly for ex-officers who died in office. And no matter how you looked at it, Mr. Sneyd, owing two years and three months’ subscription, could hardly be held to have died that way.
Gerald did not arrive for the ceremony at all. At the moment when the six men in tight frock-coats were lowering his father into his final corner of England, Gerald was leaning up against a petrol pump watching a leisurely and unspeedable mechanic remove the cylinder head of his car.
As he stood there he told himself that it was his own fault: he must have o
verdriven the thing. He had allowed two and a half hours for the journey from London to Tadford, and he ought to have allowed three. It was Mr. Hubbard in I.P.P. who had made him cut it so fine. He had resented his going at all, and had insisted that he should go into the office that morning to see if a four-inch single for Tetter’s Tooth Paste had turned up. In a way, it was Mr. Hubbard who was responsible.
“Be long?” Gerald asked.
The mechanic straightened his back for a moment.
“Mm,” he said.
“How long?”
“Dunno.”
“An hour?”
“Perhaps.”
“Do you think it might be more than that?”
“Might be.”
“How much more?”
“Dunno.”
After that Gerald walked over to the post office and sent a wire. “SORRY I CAN’T BE WITH YOU STOP” he printed out in capitals with the jagged, official nib on the inferior paper. “CAR BROKEN DOWN STOP WILL GET ALONG AT EARLIEST POSSIBLE.” When he had composed it he approached the girl behind the telegram counter.
“Can I send this to someone in a cemetery?” he asked.
The girl started.
“Can you do what?” she asked.
“Send it to a cemetery. There’s a funeral going on,” he explained.
“I suppose you can, if you know the address.”
“I mean, will they deliver it to—to the grave?”
“I shouldn’t think so,” the girl said. “You see you can’t ride a bicycle in a cemetery.”
“O.K.,” said Gerald.
He crossed out the address and wrote in Mrs. Sneyd’s number in Station Approach. It was only when he left the post office altogether that he began to question whether the wording of the telegram was really suitable. Somehow it seemed more the sort of telegram one would send to a tennis party. He felt now that the words “Deeply Grieved” or “Heart-felt Condolences” should have been worked in somewhere.
The name of the place where he was stranded was Thruxton. It was a vague Midland area, a village that had outgrown itself and had just failed to become a town. It straggled along the Birmingham-Tadford road in a succession of dusty plate-glass shop fronts, small villas, vacant lots, public-houses (all closed until six o’clock), chapels, dingy little cottages, garages that looked as though they had once been stables, a chapel converted into the stucco brilliance of a Kinedrome, and a steam laundry. Gerald had never heard of Thruxton before but, by five-thirty when he was able to proceed, he felt that he knew the place better than anywhere else in England.
Love in Our Time Page 15
