FROM AN INK WELL

Southland Times, Issue 19546, 9 May 1925, Page 13

FROM AN INK WELL

RATS.

(By

“Brunnhilde.”)

Gad! What a night! And you said it couldn’t rain and freeze at the same time, Emily. Yes, only yesterday morning when you were tugging my scarf round my neck, you said: “Not freezing, John. Nonsense! It’s raining!” and you pushed me outside into the wet—and the frost, mind, Emily! —-before I could point out the difference to you. And last night, when I took up the subject and tried to show you how you were wrong, you sat with your legs crossed so primly, and those blessed needles of yours going in and out, and flashing impudence at me—me, your meek * old Darby and, Emily, when I thought that at last I had piqued your interest and stirred you to speech, what did you say? “We’re getting old, John, we’re getting old. My needles crawl along, and crawl, and take me nowhere. And you, why, John! you’re dribbling down your beard!” We’ll build up the fire and stuff in the cones. Let’s see how many we can get into the old range, Emily. Cones give a wonderful heat when they’re dry ■ and brittle, and the crackle and the crunching is fine company for two love-birds like us. I chuckle, my dear, when I think about those cones, how your ’ little round pink face beamed and flushed like the schoolgirl that you were . . . Emily . . . fifty years ago! You haven’t changed much in fifty years—a little more beautiful, perhaps ; but that’s the white hairs, which changed you from a sparkling girl to a glowing woman. That’s it: sparkling and glowing. Your black hair and your big brown eyes and your teeth, and your comely round 'figure sparkled at me and bewitched me, and left me marvelling that you .... and such as I ...

But now your lovely soft hair, and your wavy cheeks, a little more like a harbour sunset, a little less like the old peaches and cream—and after all, fruit soon withers and rots, Emily, and the cream sours!— their glow, their loving, warm glow permeate my unworthy skin —so unworthy, my love—and' swells my heart, leaving me thankful . . . thankful . . . thankful . . . Emily . . • sparkle and glow . . . sparkling Emily . . . glowing Emily . . . my sparkle . . . my glow . . .

my Emily . . . But remember your delight when young Claudie came with his barrow-load of cones. The way you almost flew to open the woodhouse door for him, and help him out with them, and when one of them fell too hard and broke in'half, do you how you nearly cried? You sang out to me to bring out the last two bits of date-cake —my favourite date-cake—from the dish, and you did not see the way Claudie looked at you. I did, and I knew what he was thinking. I did not get to you in time to hear him say: “That’s one and six, Gran,” but I saw your look of dismay. I- vow your lip trembled, just like our Mary’s used to tremble when she thought she was badly done by, or wasn’t receiving as much attention as she wanted—such a petted, drooping little tremble, and I wanted to lift you up and hold you tight and say: “There, there, you poor hurt child, it’s all right,” and kiss you protectingly on the lips. But instead, I found the eighteen pence—three sixpennies I gave him, and sent him on his lordly young way. And how we laughed together, you and I, as we have always laughed; as. we laughed when our Jessie bit a hole right through her rattle with her two little teeth, and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at what she’d done; as we laughed the first time Dick, our baby Dick, called me “Old Man,” and held out his grubby, chubby hand for me to shake. It is not hard bo remember when we have laughed, Emily! Not hard, indeed, and you always show your dimples when you laugh. It’s a wonderful old range to be giving all that heat, you know. Many’s the time I’ve heard you complaining that the oven’s so cold, so inadequate for cooking. But you were always the good cook—how. we have laughed together when I would tell you I had chosen you for your cooking, and you would reply so saucily, “and I married you for your money, John!” Married me for my money, my dear, when your mother never forgave me for being chosen by you before old Ready-money’ Easton’s boy. You never once complained, Emily, through the years—seven beautiful years for me, and for you too, my dear—that your mother kept away, in her stern, unrelenting way. And when I came home with the word of her death, you only said: “Poor mother. Poor, poor mother,” and the tears ran down your cheeks; but you did not turn from me, or give me one little look of reproach. You have never been sorry for choosing your big, hulking Joffli, your devoted, honest John, your humble lowly John?

Yes, Emily, I will put more cones on the fire. Draw your chair up close to mine. See, I have opened the oven door, and the heat is poiiring out! What do you say about that, little woman! We will put our feet in the oven, and toast our toes as we have always toasted them, you and I together. Do you remember the night—a Sunday night it was—when we both fell asleep, and you woke up and cried out: “Something is burning, John,” and we found that the soles of my slippers were on fire ? Your dear fr»e was as whifo*as death, and you trembled all over. I could have cried aloud/to have given you such a fright. And do you remember how we made a sole of brown paper -and paste, layer upon layer, and* how you wouldn’t let me go to the woodhouse without putting on my boots, after that? We will toast our toes, and defy the chilblains. -Wonderful that you have never had chilblains, Emily, and you skin so soft and fine,' and the chill frosty mornings, and the hard, hard work! What, are you going to bed, my love! Is it your nine o (clock, so soon ?

It is strange how empty and still everything is when she is gone. The kitchen, from being alive with swarming, happy memories, becomes a heavy void. The fire burns low with a single flicker, and the flaming mass of warmth and light, and the cheerfulness turns to a dull black shapeless ugliness. Something vibrant and living has been removed, taking joy with it, leaving pain, and a vague, soft, aching fear

Down from the shadowy corners creep the years, .down and upon me in their Creep . . . ing down; creep . . . ing down. Down . . . upon me; down . . •. upon me. Creep . . . ing down; down

. . . Good God! What is that ? Out of the sticky gloom is born this fearful, steady sound, fearful in its empty formlessness, in the inevitable rhythm of its vengeful beating. Nearer it brushes and nearer like the laboured breathing of the universe; it falls . . and falls . . . and falls . . upon me—in drops of silence, drops of silence on the infinitude. What is it, what am I, that this should be so? What is it? What is ... . ah! I know, I know.

You are growing old, old man. like the others before you, you are not the master

of time. Drops of silence, drops on the infinitude . . . dropping . . . dropping . . . dropping . . . From their shelter under the coal-scuttle, two sensuous, sleeking rats move noiselssly towards the cavernous black of the cupboard, with laboured, regular breathing; and it chills and absorbs my own. I*n not, but a bitter black palsy overflows the void. They move, and they are gone, breathing softly, evenly . . . rising and falling. And the echo lingers dimly, before it, too, is gone. I have seen them before—they are rats, just rats, but to-night, why are they so difEexpnt, so menacing, so chilling, <My pipe shatters on the cold stone hearth. In a torment my nerveless fingers shudder and fumble. This is . . . Fear marching with Time, and the gnawing teeth of the years; then ... I am growing old . . . my God! I am growing old . . . old . . . growing . . . old . . . and Emily?