Mary Olivier: a Life Part 13

They could see Mamma and Aunt Lavvy a long way on in front picking their way gingerly among the furrows. If only Mark had been there instead of Roddy. Roddy _would_ keep on saying: "The great plague of London. The great plague of London," to frighten himself. He pointed to a heap of earth and said it was the first plague pit.

In the middle of the ploughed-up plain she saw people in black walking slowly and crookedly behind a coffin that went staggering on black legs under a black pall. She tried not to look at them.

When she looked again they had stopped beside a heap that Roddy said was the second plague pit. Men in black crawled out from under the coffin as they put it down. She could see the bulk of it flattened out under the black pall. Against the raw, ochreish ground the figures of two mutes stood up, black and distinct in their high hats tied in the bunched out, streaming weepers. There was something filthy and frightful about the figures of the mutes. And when they dragged the pall from the coffin there was something filthy and frightful about the action.

"Roddy," she said, "I'm frightened."

Roddy said, "So am I. I say, supposing we went back? By ourselves. Across Wanstead Flats." He was excited.

"We mustn't. That would frighten Mamma."

"Well, then, we'll have to go straight through."

They went, slowly, between the rows of mounds, along a narrow path of yellow clay that squeaked as their boots went in and out. Roddy held her hand. They took care not to tread on the graves. Every step brought them nearer to the funeral. They hadn't pointed it out to each other. They had pretended it wasn't there. Now it was no use pretending; they could see the coffin.

"Roddy--I can't--I can't go past the funeral."

"We've got to."

He looked at her with solemn eyes, wide open in his beautiful face. He was not really frightened, he was only trying to be because he liked it.

They went on. The tight feeling under her waist had gone; her body felt loose and light as if it didn't belong to her; her knees were soft and sank under her. Suddenly she let go Roddy's hand. She stared at the funeral, paralysed with fright.

At the end of the path Mamma and Aunt Lavvy stood and beckoned to them.

Aunt Lavvy was coming towards them, carrying her white flower cross. They broke into a stumbling, nightmare run.

The bare clay plain stretched on past the place where Mamma and Aunt Lavvy had turned. The mounds here were big and high. They found Mamma and Aunt Lavvy standing by a very deep and narrow pit. A man was climbing up out of the pit on a ladder. You could see a pool of water shining far down at the bottom.

Mamma was smiling gently and kindly at the man and asking him why the grave was dug so deep. He said, "Why, because this 'ere lot and that there what you've come acrost is the pauper buryin' ground. We shovel 'em in five at a time this end."

Roddy said, "Like they did in the great plague of London."

"I don't know about no plague. But there's five coffins in each of these here graves, piled one atop of the other."

Mamma seemed inclined to say more to the grave-digger; but Aunt Lavvy frowned and shook her head at her, and they went on to where a path of coa.r.s.e gra.s.s divided the pauper burying ground from the rest. They were now quite horribly near the funeral. And going down the gra.s.s path they saw another that came towards them; the palled coffin swaying on headless shoulders. They turned from it into a furrow between the huddled mounds.

The white marble columns gleamed nearer among the black trees.

They crossed a smooth gravel walk into a crowded town of dead people.

Tombstones as far as you could see; upright stones, flat slabs, rounded slabs, slabs like coffins, stone boxes with flat tops, broken columns; pointed pillars. Rows of tall black trees. Here and there a single tree sticking up stiffly among the tombstones. Very little trees that were queer and terrifying. People in black moving about the tombstones. A broad road and a grey chapel with pointed gables. Under a black tree a square plot enclosed by iron railings.

Grandmamma and Grandpapa Olivier were buried in one half of the plot under a white marble slab. In the other half, on the bare gra.s.s, a white marble curb marked out a place for another grave.

Roddy said, "Who's buried there?"

Mamma said, "n.o.body. Yet. That's for--"

Mary saw Aunt Lavvy frown again and put her finger to her mouth.

She said, "Who? For who?" An appalling curiosity and fear possessed her.

And when Aunt Lavvy took her hand she knew that the empty place was marked out for Mamma and Papa.

Outside the cemetery gates, in the white road, the black funeral horses tossed their heads and neighed, and the black plumes quivered on the hea.r.s.es. In the wagonette she sat close beside Aunt Lavvy, with Aunt Lavvy's shawl over her eyes.

She wondered how she knew that you were frightened when Mamma didn't.

Mamma couldn't, because she was brave. She wasn't afraid of the funeral.

When Roddy said, "She oughtn't to have taken us, she ought to have known it would frighten us," Mark was angry with him. He said, "She thought you'd like it, you little beast. Because of the wagonette."

Darling Mamma. She had taken them because she thought they would like it.

Because of the wagonette. Because she was brave, like Mark.

VI.

Dead people really did rise. Supposing all the dead people in the City of London Cemetery rose and came out of their graves and went about the city? Supposing they walked out as far as Ilford? Crowds and crowds of them, in white sheets? Supposing they got into the garden?

"Please, G.o.d, keep me from thinking about the Resurrection. Please G.o.d, keep me from dreaming about coffins and funerals and ghosts and skeletons and corpses." She said it last, after the blessings, so that G.o.d couldn't forget. But it was no use.

If you said texts: "Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night."

"Yea, though I walk through the City of London Cemetery." It was no use.

"The trumpet shall sound and the dead shall arise ... Incorruptible."

That was beautiful. Like a bright light shining. But you couldn't think about it long enough. And the dreams went on just the same: the dream of the ghost in the pa.s.sage, the dream of the black coffin coming round the turn of the staircase and squeezing you against the banister; the dream of the corpse that came to your bed. She could see the round back and the curled arms under the white sheet.

The dreams woke her with a sort of burst. Her heart was jumping about and thumping; her face and hair were wet with water that came out of her skin.

The grey light in the pa.s.sage was like the ghost-light of the dreams.

Gas light was a good light; but when you turned it on Jenny came up and put it out again. She said, "Goodness knows when you'll get to sleep with _that_ light flaring."

There was never anybody about at bedtime. Jenny was dishing up the dinner. Harriet was waiting. Catty only ran up for a minute to undo the hooks and brush your hair.

When Mamma sent her to bed she came creeping back into the dining-room.

Everybody was eating dinner. She sickened with fright in the steam and smell of dinner. She leaned her head against Mamma and whimpered, and Mamma said in her soft voice, "Big girls don't cry because it's bed-time.

Only silly baby girls are afraid of ghosts."

Mamma wasn't afraid.

When she cried Mark left his dinner and carried her upstairs, past the place where the ghost was, and stayed with her till Catty came.

VII

I.