Mrs. Bindle: Some Incidents from the Domestic Life of the Bindles by Jenkins (best books to read in your 20s .txt) 📖
- Author: Jenkins
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This evening there was no lack of approval, cordially expressed. Mrs. Stitchley, 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 glass 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 con[Pg 76]versation 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:
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 glasses, and Mr. Hearty's mastication was once more heard in their midst. Mr. Hearty always ate with relish.
Unobserved by Mrs. Bindle, Mrs. Hearty stole out of[Pg 77] the parlour on her way to investigate; a minute later Mrs. Stitchley followed. The solitude of the passage gave her an admirable opportunity of finishing the "clove-water" she had brought with her.
When everyone had assured 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 Stitchley had lost much of her shrillness, Mrs. Bindle was less sharp and Mr. Hearty more woolly. Mr. Dykes's boom was but a wraith of its former self, proving the truth of Mrs. Dykes'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.[Pg 78]
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:
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 passage 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. Stitchley.
Without so much as an apology to her guests, who stood still gazing blankly at one another, Mrs. Bindle slipped out into the passage, 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[Pg 79] 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 glass of beer in one hand and beating her breast with the other, whilst opposite to her sat Mrs. Stitchley, 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. Stitchley 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:[Pg 80]
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:
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 cockney 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. Stitchley'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 Stitchley standing at her shoulder. A moment later she realised that the little passage was overflowing with carol-singers.
Still she made no sign, not even when Miss Stitchley slipped past her and took up a position behind her[Pg 81] mother's chair. Mrs. Bindle realised that she was faced with a delicate situation.
The second chorus still further complicated matters. Mrs. Bindle was sure she heard the haunting refrain mumbled from behind her. She turned quickly; but treason came from the other direction. Suddenly Miss Stitchley burst into song, and the passage, throwing aside its hesitation, joined in, softly it is true, still it joined in.
"Come in, everybody!" cried Mrs. Stitchley, when the chorus ceased, momentarily forgetful that it was Mrs. Bindle's kitchen.
"Ain't 'e clever," she added, looking admiringly at the musician, who glanced up casually at the mistress of the house. Art Wiggins was accustomed to feminine worship and unlimited beer; he regarded them as the natural tributes to his genius.
"Come in, the 'ole lot," cried Bindle cheerily, as he proceeded to unscrew the stopper of a bottle. "'Ave a wet, Art," he cried, addressing the vocalist. "You deserves it."
The remainder of the parlour-party filtered into the kitchen, and Mrs. Bindle realised the anguish of a Louis XVIII. Her legions had gone over to the enemy.
"Now this," remarked Mrs. Stitchley to Ginger a quarter-of-an-hour later, "is wot I calls a cosy evenin'."
To which Ginger grumbled something about not "'oldin' wiv women."
Art Wiggins was the hero of the occasion. He[Pg 82] smoked halves of endless cigarettes, chewing the remainder; he drank beer like a personified Sahara, and a continuous stream of song flowed from his lips.
When at length he paused to eat, Mrs. Stitchley took up the running, urged on by Bindle, to whom she had confided that, as a girl, she had achieved what was almost fame with, "I Heard the Mavis Singing."
Art Wiggins did not know the tune; but was not to be deterred.
"Carry on, mother," he cried through a mouthful of ham-sandwich, "I'll pick it up."
The result was that Art played something strongly reminiscent of "Bubbles," whilst Mrs. Stitchley was telling how she had heard the mavis singing, to the tune of "Swanee." It was a great success until Art, weary of being so long out of the picture, threw "Bubbles," "Swanee," Mrs. Stitchley and the mavis overboard, and broke into a narrative about a young man of the name of Bert, who had become enamoured of a lady whose abbreviated petticoats made an excellent rhyme for the hero's name.
Mrs. Stitchley continued singing; but Art and Bert and the young lady of his choice, plus the concertina, left her little or no chance.
Like a figure of retribution Mrs. Bindle stood in the doorway, hard of eye and grim of lip, whilst just behind her Mr. Hearty picked nervously at the quicks of his fingers.
The other guests had proved opportunists. They had thrown over the sacred for the profane.
They came out particularly strong in the choruses.[Pg 83]
III
"I never remember sich a evenin', my dear," was Mrs. Stitchley's valediction. "Stitchley'll be sorry 'e missed it," she added, indifferent to the fact that he had not been invited.
She was the last to go, just as she had been the first to arrive. Throughout the evening she had applauded every effort of Art Wiggins to add to what Bindle called "the 'armony of the evenin'."
"I have enjoyed it, Mrs. Bindle," said Miss Stitchley. "It was lovely."
With these encomiums ringing in her ears, and confirmed by what she herself had seen and heard, Mrs. Bindle closed the door and returned to the kitchen.
Bindle watched her uncertainly as she tidied up the place, whilst he proceeded to arrange upon the dresser the beer-bottles, sixteen in number and all empty.
As a rule he could anticipate Mrs. Bindle's mood; but to-night he was frankly puzzled. When he had asked Huggles and Wilkes to drop in "for a jaw," he had not foreseen that on the way they would encounter Ginger, his cousin Art Wiggins and two bosom friends of Art, nor could he be expected to foresee that Art went nowhere without his concertina. It was as much part of him as his elaborate quiff.
Their arrival had inspired Bindle with something[Pg 84] akin to panic. For a long time he had striven to mute Art's musical restiveness. At length he had been over-ruled by the others, and Art had burst into song about Bill Morgan and his first wife's funeral. After that, as well try to dam Niagara as seal those lips
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