The Lost Girl Part 46

"Oh, yes!" said Madame. Miss Pinnegar was frightfully affronted. The meal, with the three women at table, pa.s.sed painfully.

Miss Pinnegar rose to go upstairs and weep. She felt very forlorn.

Alvina rose to wipe the dishes, hastily, because the funeral guests would all be coming. Madame went into the drawing-room to smoke her sly cigarette.

Mr. May was the first to turn up for the lugubrious affair: very tight and tailored, but a little extinguished, all in black. He never wore black, and was very unhappy in it, being almost morbidly sensitive to the impression the colour made on him. He was set to entertain Madame.

She did not pretend distress, but sat black-eyed and watchful, very much her business self.

"What about the theatre?--will it go on?" she asked.

"Well I don't know. I don't know Miss Houghton's intentions," said Mr. May. He was a little stilted today.

"It's hers?" said Madame.

"Why, as far as I understand--"

"And if she wants to sell out--?"

Mr. May spread his hands, and looked dismal, but distant.

"You should form a company, and carry on--" said Madame.

Mr. May looked even more distant, drawing himself up in an odd fashion, so that he looked as if he were trussed. But Madame's shrewd black eyes and busy mind did not let him off.

"Buy Miss Houghton out--" said Madame shrewdly.

"Of cauce," said Mr. May. "Miss Houghton herself must decide."

"Oh sure--! You--are you married?"

"Yes."

"Your wife here?"

"My wife is in London."

"And children--?"

"A daughter."

Madame slowly nodded her head up and down, as if she put thousands of two-and-two's together.

"You think there will be much to come to Miss Houghton?" she said.

"Do you mean property? I really can't say. I haven't enquired."

"No, but you have a good idea, eh?"

"I'm afraid I haven't.

"No! Well! It won't be much, then?"

"Really, I don't know. I should say, not a _large_ fortune--!"

"No--eh?" Madame kept him fixed with her black eyes. "Do you think the other one will get anything?"

"The _other one_--?" queried Mr. May, with an uprising cadence.

Madame nodded slightly towards the kitchen.

"The old one--the Miss--Miss Pin--Pinny--what you call her."

"Miss Pinnegar! The manageress of the work-girls? Really, I don't know at all--" Mr. May was most freezing.

"Ha--ha! Ha--ha!" mused Madame quietly. Then she asked: "Which work-girls do you say?"

And she listened astutely to Mr. May's forced account of the work-room upstairs, extorting all the details she desired to gather.

Then there was a pause. Madame glanced round the room.

"Nice house!" she said. "Is it their own?"

"So I _believe_--"

Again Madame nodded sagely. "Debts perhaps--eh? Mortgage--" and she looked slyly sardonic.

"Really!" said Mr. May, bouncing to his feet. "Do you mind if I go to speak to Mrs. Rollings--"

"Oh no--go along," said Madame, and Mr. May skipped out in a temper.

Madame was left alone in her comfortable chair, studying details of the room and making accounts in her own mind, until the actual funeral guests began to arrive. And then she had the satisfaction of sizing them up. Several arrived with wreaths. The coffin had been carried down and laid in the small sitting-room--Mrs. Houghton's sitting-room. It was covered with white wreaths and streamers of purple ribbon. There was a crush and a confusion.

And then at last the hea.r.s.e and the cabs had arrived--the coffin was carried out--Alvina followed, on the arm of her father's cousin, whom she disliked. Miss Pinnegar marshalled the other mourners. It was a wretched business.

But it was a great funeral. There were nine cabs, besides the hea.r.s.e--Woodhouse had revived its ancient respect for the house of Houghton. A posse of minor tradesmen followed the cabs--all in black and with black gloves. The richer tradesmen sat in the cabs.

Poor Alvina, this was the only day in all her life when she was the centre of public attention. For once, every eye was upon her, every mind was thinking about her. Poor Alvina! said every member of the Woodhouse "middle cla.s.s": Poor Alvina Houghton, said every collier's wife. Poor thing, left alone--and hardly a penny to bless herself with. Lucky if she's not left with a pile of debts. James Houghton ran through some money in his day. Ay, if she had her rights she'd be a rich woman. Why, her mother brought three or four thousands with her. Ay, but James sank it all in Throttle-Ha'penny and Klond.y.k.e and the Endeavour. Well, he was his own worst enemy. He paid his way. I'm not so sure about that. Look how he served his wife, and now Alvina. I'm not so sure he was his own worst enemy. He was bad enough enemy to his own flesh and blood. Ah well, he'll spend no more money, anyhow. No, he went sudden, didn't he? But he was getting very frail, if you noticed. Oh yes, why he fair seemed to totter down to Lumley. Do you reckon as that place pays its way?

What, the Endeavour?--they say it does. They say it makes a nice bit. Well, it's mostly pretty full. Ay, it is. Perhaps it won't be now Mr. Houghton's gone. Perhaps not. I wonder if he _will_ leave much. I'm sure he won't. Everything he's got's mortgaged up to the hilt. He'll leave debts, you see if he doesn't. What is she going to do then? She'll have to go out of Manchester House--her and Miss Pinnegar. Wonder what she'll do. Perhaps she'll take up that nursing. She never made much of that, did she--and spent a sight of money on her training, they say. She's a bit like her father in the business line--all flukes. Pity some nice young man doesn't turn up and marry her. I don't know, she doesn't seem to hook on, does she?

Why she's never had a proper boy. They make out she was engaged once. Ay, but n.o.body ever saw him, and it was off as soon as it was on. Can you remember she went with Albert Witham for a bit. Did she?

No, I never knew. When was that? Why, when he was at Oxford, you know, learning for his head master's place. Why didn't she marry him then? Perhaps he never asked her. Ay, there's that to it. She'd have looked down her nose at him, times gone by. Ay, but that's all over, my boy. She'd snap at anybody now. Look how she carries on with that manager. Why, _that's_ something awful. Haven't you ever watched her in the Cinema? She never lets him alone. And it's anybody alike. Oh, she doesn't respect herself. I don't consider. No girl who respected herself would go on as she does, throwing herself at every feller's head. Does she, though? Ay, any performer or anybody. She's a tidy age, though. She's not much chance of getting off. How old do you reckon she is? Must be well over thirty. You never say. Well, she _looks_ it. She does beguy--a dragged old maid. Oh but she sprightles up a bit sometimes. Ay, when she thinks she's hooked on to somebody. I wonder why she never did take? It's funny. Oh, she was too high and mighty before, and now it's too late. n.o.body wants her. And she's got no relations to go to either, has she? No, that's her father's cousin who she's walking with. Look, they're coming.

He's a fine-looking man, isn't he? You'd have thought they'd have buried Miss Frost beside Mrs. Houghton. You would, wouldn't you? I should think Alvina will lie by Miss Frost. They say the grave was made for both of them. Ay, she was a lot more of a mother to her than her own mother. She _was_ good to them, Miss Frost was. Alvina thought the world of her. That's her stone--look, down there. Not a very grand one, considering. No, it isn't. Look, there's room for Alvina's name underneath. Sh!--

Alvina had sat back in the cab and watched from her obscurity the many faces on the street: so familiar, so familiar, familiar as her own face. And now she seemed to see them from a great distance, out of her darkness. Her big cousin sat opposite her--how she disliked his presence.

In chapel she cried, thinking of her mother, and Miss Frost, and her father. She felt so desolate--it all seemed so empty. Bitterly she cried, when she bent down during the prayer. And her crying started Miss Pinnegar, who cried almost as bitterly. It was all rather horrible. The afterwards--the horrible afterwards.

There was the slow progress to the cemetery. It was a dull, cold day. Alvina shivered as she stood on the bleak hillside, by the open grave. Her coat did not seem warm enough, her old black seal-skin furs were not much protection. The minister stood on the plank by the grave, and she stood near, watching the white flowers blowing in the cold wind. She had watched them for her mother--and for Miss Frost. She felt a sudden clinging to Miss Pinnegar. Yet they would have to part. Miss Pinnegar had been so fond of her father, in a quaint, reserved way. Poor Miss Pinnegar, that was all life had offered her. Well, after all, it had been a home and a home life. To which home and home life Alvina now clung with a desperate yearning, knowing inevitably she was going to lose it, now her father was gone. Strange, that he was gone. But he was weary, worn very thin and weary. He had lived his day. How different it all was, now, at his death, from the time when Alvina knew him as a little child and thought him such a fine gentleman. You live and learn and lose.

For one moment she looked at Madame, who was shuddering with cold, her face hidden behind her black spotted veil. But Madame seemed immensely remote: so unreal. And Ciccio--what was his name? She could not think of it. What was it? She tried to think of Madame's slow enunciation. Marasca--maraschino. Marasca! Maraschino! What was maraschino? Where had she heard it. Cudgelling her brains, she remembered the doctors, and the suppers after the theatre. And maraschino--why, that was the favourite white liqueur of the innocent Dr. Young. She could remember even now the way he seemed to smack his lips, saying the word _maraschino_. Yet she didn't think much of it. Hot, bitterish stuff--nothing: not like green Chartreuse, which Dr. James gave her. Maraschino! Yes, that was it.