A Little World. George Manville Fenn
take a weight off his shoulders than one asserted itself upon his mind. But it did not matter, he said, so long as he did not get so much more than his share. Upon the present occasion he felt like a man carrying a sheet of plate-glass down Fleet Street; for he had apples in the same pocket with the eggs, and that pocket being disposed to bulge, people would keep coming in contact, even though he used a market bunch of greens as the “ease-her-stop-her” boys do the fenders on the “Citizen” steamers to soften collision or contact with pier.
Then, too, there was Mrs. Jared to protect in the crowd, for she was a very little woman; and though she would not own to it, that big basket bothered her sadly, being a regular tyrant, and, in spite of the coolness of the night, keeping her in a profuse perspiration.
It really was a brute of a basket—one of those wicker enormities with a cross handle, two flaps, and a large interior. Plenty of room when you could get anything inside; but an abomination of obstinacy, which seemed to like to have goods carried half in and half out, top-heavy fashion, with the flap lids cocked up and in the way of the handle.
And so it was upon the night in question; nothing would pack in as it should. The potatoes certainly did dive in properly when the scale was turned up; but the beef would not enter in spite of all the coaxing and contriving bestowed. No; it would not go in, but broke the wedge of fine old Cheshire all to crumbs; and there it was being carried home with the rough, red, freshly-sawed bone sticking out, and anointing with wet marrow Mrs. Jared’s second-best shawl. Even the tea-paper was broken, and “Timson’s fine old family mixture” escaping in secret amongst the potatoes. However the moist sugar was safe, for it was being carried is a brown paper cone, balanced inside Jared’s hat, to the serious alarm of the two sparrows, till Jared stopped for a moment at a street corner and let them fly.
Any one with sympathetic feelings will easily understand that homely shopping under such circumstances was rather trying to the temper. Mrs. Jared’s temper was tried, but it only displayed itself in slight compressions of her lips; and even this outward and visible sign of something wrong soon passed off, giving place to an air of anxiety as they passed through a by-street, where she suddenly arrested her husband.
The stopping-place was at a liberally painted shoemaker’s shop, over which, in large letters, shone the golden words, “Purkis’s Boot and Shoe Emporium,” while the gilt flourishes and bands upon the board seemed to remind the beholder strangely of the beadle’s uniform and wand of office.
“Hallo!” exclaimed Jared, waking up from a dream of Farmer’s Gloria in Excelsis, “What do you want here?”
“Only to tell Mr. Purkis to send for Totty’s little boots,” said Mrs. Jared.
Jared was satisfied, and they entered, sending a small bell hung upon the half door into a very rage of ringing, to summon attendance, although the owner of the establishment was ponderously taking the measure of a customer’s foot, by means of a long slip of paper and a sliding rule, slowly the while making entries upon the said white slip, and afterwards smearing them out and re-writing them. The next minute, though, he had fallen into a state of doubt, and measured again, till, in his confusion, he not only made himself extremely inky, but blotted his customer’s white stockings.
But at last Mr. Purkis had finished, sighed relief, dismissed the measured lady, with a promise very doubtful of fulfilment, taken off his glasses, and then turned to welcome his visitors, Mr. Jared Pellet, organist of his (Mr. Purkis’s) church, being a customer held by him in some reverence.
A very warm, moist man was Mr. Purkis in all weathers, and during conversation he was always busy dabbing his forehead, or wiping his neck or hands, even continuing the desiccating process sometimes within his shirt-collar; but his broad face was wreathed with smiles, and a Chesterfield could not have been more polite to his visitors as he responded to Jared’s inquiries about his health.
“Not very well, sir,” said Mr. Purkis, taking up a huge clump-soled boot. “I’ve been a deal worried to-day, sir, over this boot. Mr. D. Wragg’s, sir, as you recommended to come to me, and that leg of his as is shorter than the other never seems to keep the same length two days together, and I can’t get the sole thick enough, even now. But he’s a good customer all the same, and I thank you ever so much for recommending me to him. Make that dark gi—young lady’s boots too, I do, sir; her as comes with the little Frenchman; but where he picks up his boots, I don’t know.”
Here Mrs. Jared cut a long story short by speaking about Totty’s shoes.
He would send for those little shoes first thing in the morning, without fail; but would not Mr. and Mrs. Pellet step in.
Jared thought not, but Mrs. Jared took the opposite, for she had other thoughts than shoes upon her mind; so declaring herself to be tired, she followed Mr. Purkis into the back room, where Mrs. Purkis left off ironing to dust a couple of chairs, and drew a small black saucepan, simmering upon the hob, a little farther from the cheery blaze.
“Poor Mrs. Nimmer’s dead and gone, sir,” said Mr. Purkis.
“Indeed!” said Jared and his wife together.
“Yes, sir—went very suddenly—only this very afternoon, sir. Forty year had she been pew-opener at St. Runnles—twenty year before I took the beadleship.”
The conversation had taken the very turn Mrs. Jared desired; in fact, she had dragged Jared round in order to enlist Mr. Purkis upon their side—at all events, to prevent him from trying to run a friend of his own. She was somewhat shocked at the suddenness of the beadle’s announcement, yet she felt that, for the sake of a family friend, so good an opportunity must not be lost.
“Who is to be the new pew-opener, Mr. Purkis?” she said, after a while.
“Who, mum?” said Purkis, after a good wipe; “I don’t know, mum, I’m sure. I should like the Missus there to try, but she says she won’t.”
“Not if I know it, Joseph,” exclaimed his lady, as if in doubt whether she might commence the undertaking in ignorance. “Not if I know it, Joseph,” she exclaimed, polishing an iron with a duster, after giving it a vicious rub in the ashes. “If a married woman hasn’t enough to do to mind her own house and bits of things, it’s a pity. The church has got you, and has you a deal away from the business with weddings and such; and besides, I never opened pews, and I’m too old to learn now.”
“Perhaps Mrs. Purkis will think better of it,” said Mrs. Jared.
“Better of it! No, ma’am; nor worse, neither. I shall never commit myself by doing of it, as I’ve told Joseph a score of times.”
“Then, under those circumstances, perhaps Mr. Purkis would not mind helping a friend of ours to obtain that post?”
“Friend of yours, mum?” said Purkis, eagerly; “I’d do all I could in my way, mum, though that wouldn’t be much. But,” he exclaimed, as a bright thought seemed to strike him, “I could keep other people away.”
“But that would hardly be fair,” observed Mrs. Jared.
“Perhaps we had better not go into that part of the business, mum,” said Mr. Purkis, with dignity. “Elections is things as ladies don’t understand; and those in elections have to serve their own friends, and serve out their enemies. What we want to do is to remember Mr. Pellet’s kindness.”
“Which we shall never forget,” chimed in Mrs. Purkis, looking up from her ironing in support of her husband’s allusion to Jared’s “donus,” and a timely loan supplied at a time when Mr. Purkis had got himself into what he termed “a mess” by obliging a friend in a bill transaction.
“ ’Taint every one as will put himself to inconvenience and help them as is pushed,” said Mr. Purkis.
“Which it’s well enough we know that, Joseph,” chimed in Mrs. Purkis, halting in her task, and burning the mark of the flat-iron into the garment being smoothed.
“There! I must go, if you are going to keep this on,”