Читать книгу Two Black Sheep - Warwick Deeping - Страница 15

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Mary Summerhays explored.

Elsie was out, saying good-bye to friends, and Elsie’s mother invaded Elsie’s room, and opened drawers and wardrobe, for if Elsie was a little careless about her clothes that same carelessness had been created by necessity. As her father’s typist and secretary she had been credited with an allowance, but for the last two or three years much of her allowance had remained on credit.

Mrs. Summerhays’ pale and deliberate hands took down dresses and hung them up again, and explored the privacies of her daughter’s underclothing. Yes, as she had suspected their condition was deplorable, and there was no need for her to hold the garments to the light. Her daughter’s wardrobe was suffering from a universal shabbiness, and Mary Summerhays stood thinking.

Poor Elsie!

And though poverty can be relative, the mother was moved to compassion. Mr. Jordan Summerhays—that public person and inveterate diner-out—had to the last gone forth with an immaculate white waistcoat and a case of cigars. Mrs. Summerhays passed to her own room, and unlocking a drawer extracted an old jewel case. She placed it on the dressing-table and when she raised the lid the October sunlight played on a few rings and brooches, a Victorian necklace, a gold bracelet, and a watch. The vanities of her youth! Mr. Summerhays had not left her much vanity. She explored elsewhere. She had two Sheffield plate entrée dishes and four salt-cellars wrapped up in tissue paper at the bottom of a drawer. She packed the jewel-case and the plate into a small suit-case, put on a hat and coat, and going out into Spellwood Terrace she happened upon a strolling taxi.

She allowed herself and her adventure that taxi.

“Drive me to Smart’s in Duke Street. Yes, I think it is in Duke Street. The jewellers and silversmiths.”

“That’s it, ma’am.”

He drove her there.

Mary Summerhays had known other desperate occasions, but this was a different affair, less consciously shabby and far happier in its inspiration. She carried her suit-case into the shop, and was met by a suave young man in black.

“Good morning, madam.”

She did not prevaricate, and her pride was in her purpose.

“I have some things to sell. I understand that you purchase plate and jewellery.”

His manner became a little less charming, for insensibly she had become the suppliant, he—the autocrat.

“Yes, we do—buy.”

She noticed that he ceased to address her as madam. He allowed her to place her shabby old suit-case on the counter, and then he diverged to attend to another customer who had entered. She heard his glucous voice.

“Shagreen toilet sets? Yes, madam, we have a very nice selection. If you will come this way, please.”

Presently he returned to her, and was joined by an abrupt and bulky person with an aggressive grey moustache. Mary Summerhays opened her suit-case and displayed its contents, and the man with the moustache screwed a magnifying glass into his left eye and examined the jewellery. He was laconic but not offensive. He was doing business.

“Not worth very much to us, I’m afraid. Poor stones. The necklace, absolutely no demand for such a specimen.”

But he was kinder to the Sheffield plate. It was genuine.

“Yes, we might make you an offer for this. Can you produce any guarantee?”

She looked surprised.

“Guarantee? It has been in my family—”

“Quite so, madam, but we have responsibilities. If you can refer me to your bank.”

He offered her ten pounds for the Sheffield plate, and she demurred.

“It is worth more.”

“We have to make a profit, madam. Well—I’ll offer you eighteen guineas for the whole lot. The jewellery isn’t much use to us, but if you care to meet us, well and good.”

She stood reflecting, calculating, and trying not to feel ashamed. Why should she feel ashamed? Eighteen guineas. The sum might represent two cheap frocks, new underclothing, a new trunk, shoes. This Mrs. Pym was a woman of the world, and if Mary Summerhays’ pride was growing old and thin, Elsie’s pride was young and sensitive.

“Very well—I agree. Perhaps you would like to ring up the manager of my bank. He knows me very well. Mrs. Summerhays of 7, Spellwood Terrace, Chelsea.”

She gave the bank’s address, and was left standing while the shopman put through the call. The response was satisfactory, and he came back to complete the business. He paid her the money in three five-pound notes, three pound notes, and the surplus in silver. She had to sign a receipt. She closed her suit-case, put on her gloves, and walked out of the shop. No one opened the door for her.

She walked all the way to Chelsea, and let herself in, and then realizing that Elsie had returned, she managed to smuggle the suit-case into the kitchen. Elsie was packing. She had three sugar-boxes arranged in the dining-room, and into these boxes she was stowing some of the superfluities of the house, for her mother would need very little that was personal in a Pulteney Street bed-sitting-room. The furniture was going to be stored.

“Where have you been, Mumsie?”

“Oh, just for a walk.”

Elsie had her sleeves rolled up, and her hair needed waving.

“I’ve decided to take the typewriter. It’s a portable. May I?”

Mrs. Summerhays sat down on the sofa.

“Of course.”

“I’m going on trying very hard at short stories. I ought to have some time to myself.”

Mary Summerhays was wondering why Elsie had been just a little reticent about Mrs. Pym, though Mrs. Pym had behaved with consideration in allowing Elsie these free days. The child Sylvia had gone to her godmother’s for a week, and Mrs. Pym’s world seemed to be a de luxe affair—Paris, Rome, and everything first class.

Mrs. Summerhays made a remark.

“You ought to get your hair waved, dear.”

“Yes—I know.”

“I should like you to have a few new things to take with you. Mrs. Pym won’t want you permanently black. Besides, it’s rather pagan.”

Elsie sat back on her heels.

“Yes—but—”

That negative word had loomed for years over the Summerhays’ household because of Mr. Jordan’s very positive publicity. Mrs. Summerhays seemed to dream for a moment, and then her eyes lit up. They had beauty behind her daughter’s back.

“I have a little money put by. We’ll do some shopping this afternoon. You can’t travel with a woman like Mrs. Pym—. I mean—I’d like you to have some pretties—”

Elsie got up and kissed her mother.

“I’m going to earn some money. Perhaps the shoe will be on the other foot—you dear.”

They went to Harris & Lord’s in Oxford Street. Messrs. Harris & Lord were universal providers, an establishment that gave you a great deal of exercise for your money, and if you walked a mile to buy a packet of pins, you could cover a second mile to procure a bottle of bath-salts. Departments had multiplied to match feminine complexities. There were hundreds of glass cases, and hundreds of sophisticated young saleswomen in black, whose coiffures were as elaborate as the organization. Masses of colour, masses of material, acres of glass and polished floor, perfumes, millions of stockings for the million, hats crowded like confectionery or hats solitary and select on little wooden pedestals.

Mrs. Mary was a wise woman.

“Frocks first. Doesn’t do to choose a frock when you’re tired.”

Frocks lived on the second floor. The Summerhays were shot up in an elevator to a sort of miniature Hall of the Mirrors, and the young gentlewoman who waited upon them had jocund brown eyes and a pleasant smile. For some inscrutable reason she was not bored. She consented to the showing and selling of frocks with an air of cheerfulness.

“Something not too expensive.”

The girl and Elsie looked at each other, and a little smile passed between them. The door of a glass case was opened; it was the four guinea case, and it was the girl who selected the frocks. She knew much better than Elsie did what Elsie ought to wear.

She persuaded mother and daughter to decide on a pongee silk and a taffeta, an amber and a blue green variant, and Mary had to side with the saleswoman, for Elsie was persuadable by anything pink. But a modern frock is a mere handful of tissue, and Messrs. Harris & Lord’s myriad glass cases symbolized the complexities of a feminine culture. If you purchased a dozen frocks, a nice discrimination would insist upon a dozen etceteras to match the frocks.

Eight guineas subtracted from eighteen! Mrs. Mary had two or three pound notes in reserve, and when they descended to underclothing it had to be of the plainest. Utility. And Elsie was one of those serious and innocent persons who assumed that no other creature would ever be interested in her underclothing or her nighties. They prepared no blush for the hypothetical bride-groom.

“Will it wear?”

Then she needed a hat, and a perfunctory lady tried to sell her one of those Amazonian helmets, a hard black casque, but here Elsie the sentimentalist rebelled.

“No, I’d like something a little softer.”

They bought two pairs of shoes, day and evening, and the evening shoes would go with either frock. A cheap, fibre travelling trunk completed the outfit, and Mrs. Summerhays had one pound, eleven and sevenpence left in her purse. But she had enjoyed herself, and so had Elsie. Paris and Rome and Mrs. Pym should not be made to stare, for when Elsie was dressed up she was quite a comely creature.

“You must have your hair waved, my dear.”

“Yes, I know.”