Everybody was too pleased with "Good King Wenceslas" to trouble about Mrs. St.i.tchley"s stay-busk. The word "encore," however, had given them an idea. Mr. Hearty looked interrogatingly at Mrs. Bindle.
"Do you think----" he began.
"Shall we have it again?" she queried, and there was a chorus of pleased acquiescence. Everybody was determined to put a little bit more into the encore than into the original rendering. There was only one dissentient voice, that of Mr. d.y.k.es, who was eager for "The First Noel," which gave him such a chance for individual effort. When out with the Chapel Christmas singers, Mr. d.y.k.es had been known to awaken as many as six streets with a single verse of that popular carol.
Mrs. Bindle almost smiled. Her party was proving a success.
Mrs. St.i.tchley, still holding the top of her stay-busk in her left hand, nodded approval, her beady little eyes fixed upon the singers. She was awaiting an opportunity to bring from her pocket a half-quartern bottle containing what, if she had been caught drinking it, she would have described as clove-water, taken medicinally.
To give colour to her a.s.sertion, she always chewed a clove after each reference to the bottle.
At The Golden Horse, Mrs. St.i.tchley"s clove-water was known as Old Tom Special.
For an hour Mrs. Bindle"s guests sang, encoring themselves with enthusiasm. Mr. d.y.k.es got in his famous "Noel," he p.r.o.nounced it "No-ho-h.e.l.l," and everyone else seemed satisfied, if a little sore of throat.
It was half-past eight when Mrs. Bindle decided that the time had come for refreshments.
Throughout the evening her ears had been keenly alert for sounds from the kitchen; but beyond a suppressed hum of voices, she could detect nothing; still she was ill-at-ease. If Mrs. Hearty, for instance, knew that Bindle was in the house, she would certainly go over to the enemy.
In the matter of catering for her guests Mrs. Bindle had nothing to learn. She was a good cook and delighted in providing well for those she entertained. Her sausage-rolls, straightforward affairs in which the sausage had something more than a walking-on part, were famous among her friends. Her blanc-mange, jam puffs, rock-cakes, and sandwiches had already established her reputation with those who had been privileged to taste them. She basked in the sunshine of the praise lavished on what she provided. Without it she would have felt that her party was a failure.
This evening there was no lack of approval, cordially expressed. Mrs.
St.i.tchley, who purposely had partaken of a light luncheon and no tea, was particularly loud in her encomiums, preluding each sausage-roll she took, from the sixth onwards, with some fresh adjective.
Mrs. Bindle was almost happy.
She was in the act of pouring out a gla.s.s of lemonade for Miss Lamb, when suddenly she paused. An unaccustomed sound from the kitchen had arrested her hand. Others heard it too, and the hum of conversation died away into silence, broken only by Mr. Hearty"s mastication of a sausage-roll.
Through the dividing wall came the sound of a concertina. Mrs. Bindle put down the jug and turned towards the door. As she did so a thin, nasal voice broke into song:
For "e was oiled in every joint, A bobby came up who was standin" point.
He blew "is whistle to summon more, Bill got "ome on the point of "is jaw.
Then "e screamed, an" kicked, an" bit their knees, As each grabbed a leg or an arm by degrees.
An" that"s "ow Bill Morgan was taken "ome On the night of "is first wife"s funeral.
The verse was followed by a full-throated chorus, accompanied by a pounding as if someone were hurling bricks about.
After that came silence; but for the hum of conversation, above which rose Bindle"s voice forbidding further singing until "them next door "ave "ad a go."
The guests looked at one another in amazement. The set expression of Mrs. Bindle"s face hardened, and the lines of her mouth became grim. Her first instinct had been to rush to the kitchen; but she decided to wait.
She did not want a scene whilst her guests were there.
Gradually the carol-singers returned to their plates and gla.s.ses, and Mr. Hearty"s mastication was once more heard in their midst. Mr. Hearty always ate with relish.
Un.o.bserved by Mrs. Bindle, Mrs. Hearty stole out of the parlour on her way to investigate; a minute later Mrs. St.i.tchley followed. The solitude of the pa.s.sage gave her an admirable opportunity of finishing the "clove-water" she had brought with her.
When everyone had a.s.sured Mrs. Bindle, in answer to her pressing invitation to refresh themselves still further, that they "really couldn"t, not if she were to pay them," she turned once more to Mr.
Hearty for the necessary encouragement to start another carol.
Their first effort, however, clearly showed that Mrs. Bindle"s refreshments had taken the edge off their singing. Miss St.i.tchley had lost much of her shrillness, Mrs. Bindle was less sharp and Mr. Hearty more woolly. Mr. d.y.k.es"s boom was but a wraith of its former self, proving the truth of Mrs. d.y.k.es"s laughing remark that if he ate so many of Mrs. Bindle"s sausage-rolls he wouldn"t be able to sing at all. Only Miss Death was up to form, her shrill soprano still cleaving the atmosphere like a javelin.
As the last chords of the carol died away, the concertina in the kitchen took up the running, followed a minute later by the same voice as before, singing nasally about the adventures of a particularly rollicking set of boon-companions who knew neither care nor curfew.
At the first sound, Mrs. Bindle moved swiftly to the door, where she paused uncertainly. She was in a quandary. Her conception of good manners did not admit of a hostess leaving her guests; still something had to be done.
At the conclusion of the verse the voice ceased; but the concertina wailed on. Mrs. Bindle drew breath. Her guests gazed at one another in a dazed sort of way. Then with a crash came the chorus, rendered with enthusiasm:
We"ll all roll "ome, we"ll all roll "ome, For "ome"s the only place for weary men like us, We"ll all roll "ome, we"ll all roll "ome, For we "aven"t got the money to pay for a bus.
For it"s only "alf-past two, An" it won"t be three just yet.
So we"ll all roll "ome, we"ll all roll "ome, An" lay down in the pa.s.sage to be out of the wet.
The applause that followed was annihilating. Accompanying it again was the curious banging sound which Mrs. Bindle had noticed before. She was sure she recognised amid the cries of approval, the sound of a woman"s voice. That decided her. She had already noted the absence of Mrs.
Hearty and Mrs. St.i.tchley.
Without so much as an apology to her guests, who stood still gazing blankly at one another, Mrs. Bindle slipped out into the pa.s.sage, closing the door behind her, much to the disappointment of the others.
A moment later she threw open the kitchen door, conscious that one of the most dramatic moments of her life was at hand.
Through a grey film of tobacco smoke she saw half-a-dozen men, one seated on the floor, another on the fender, and two on the table. All were smoking.
About the room were dotted bottles and various drinking vessels, mostly cups, whilst on the mantelpiece were Bindle"s white cuffs, discarded on account of their inconvenient habit of slipping off at every movement of his hands.
Mrs. Hearty was seated in front of the dresser, holding a gla.s.s of beer in one hand and beating her breast with the other, whilst opposite to her sat Mrs. St.i.tchley, one hand still clutching the top of her stay-busk, an idiotic smirk upon her moist face.
As Mrs. Bindle gazed upon the scene, she was conscious of a feeling of disappointment; no one seemed to regard her presence as any deviation from the normal. Mrs. St.i.tchley looked up and nodded. Bindle deliberately avoided her eye.
Mrs. Bindle"s attention became focussed upon the man seated on her fender. In his hands he grasped a concertina, before him were stretched a pair of thin legs in tight blue trousers. Above a violent blue necktie there rose a pasty face, terminating in a quiff of amazing dimensions, which glistened greasily in the gaslight. His heavy-lidded eyes were half-closed, whilst in his mouth he held a cigarette, the end of which was most unwholesomely chewed. His whole demeanour was that of a man who had not yet realised that the curtain had risen upon a new act in the drama.
As Mrs. Bindle appeared at the kitchen door, the concertina once more began to speak. A moment later the musician threw back his head and gave tongue, like a hound baying at the moon:
For I love my mother, love "er with all my "eart, I can see "er now on the doorstep, the day we "ad to part.
A man that"s got a tanner, can always get a wife, But a mother is just a treasure that comes once in a life.
"Now then, ladies and gents, chorus if _you_ please," he cried.
They did please, and soon Mrs. Bindle"s kitchen echoed with a full-throated rendering of:
We all love mother, love her all the time, For there ain"t no other who seems to us the same.
From babyhood to manhood, she watches o"er our lives, For it"s mother, mother, mother, bless the dear old name.
It was a doleful refrain, charged with c.o.c.kney melancholy; yet there could be no doubt about the enthusiasm of the singers. Mrs. Hearty spilled beer over her blue satin bosom, as a result of the energy with which she beat time; Mrs. St.i.tchley"s hand, the one not grasping her stay-busk, was also beating time, different time from Mrs. Hearty"s, whilst two light-coloured knees rose and fell with the regularity of piston-rods, solving for Mrs. Bindle the mystery of the sounds like the tossing about of bricks she had heard in the parlour.
Ginger was joining in the chorus!
As the singer started the second verse, Mrs. Bindle was conscious that someone was behind her. She turned to find Miss St.i.tchley standing at her shoulder. A moment later she realised that the little pa.s.sage was overflowing with carol-singers.
Still she made no sign, not even when Miss St.i.tchley slipped past her and took up a position behind her mother"s chair. Mrs. Bindle realised that she was faced with a delicate situation.