A Little Death (12 page)

Well, one day Thomas came to me and said, ‘Mr. Lomax says you’re to keep rabbits.’

I didn’t think I’d heard right at first. Rabbits! You could have knocked me down with a feather. I said to Thomas, ‘Where I am going to get rabbits? I don’t know anything about them.’

‘Oh, don’t worry about that, leave it to me.’

Well, the next time he came, he’d got his hammer and nails with him, and he set to in the yard, making these cages. I said, ‘I thought we were keeping rabbits, not mice!’ Because they were tiny, far too small. I could tell he thought I must be a bit touched, but he knocked two together so they made one, and he put in small windows to give the poor creatures a bit of light. I asked Thomas, ‘How many rabbits are you going to bring here?’ because he was making enough cages for a zoo. He said, only the buck and the doe, and the rest would follow— which they did before you could say Jack Robinson. Thomas stacked up the cages on the veranda, at the side. I had a look to make sure you couldn’t see them from the front—the place looked bad enough from falling slates and want of paint without turning it into a farmyard as well.

I used to love going to see those bunnies. I’d stroke their lovely soft fur and talk to them. Well, I’d no one else and it was better than talking to myself. Miss Georgina never went near them. She evidently wasn’t interested
—or maybe she just had more sense. You don’t want to be pals with something that’s going to end up on your plate, do you? Because, every so often, Thomas would kill one and I’d have to cook it, which I hated.

Well, this went on for quite a few months. One day that summer I was in the hall when I saw this rabbit hopping about. It was the big one, the male. I saw afterwards that it had chewed through the wood of the cage, which I wouldn’t have thought possible, but it had. That rabbit knew when it was well off, it was jumping up and down and dancing about all over the place, and it wasn’t going to let me anywhere near. I was nearly in tears because I couldn’t catch the wretched thing and I knew if it burrowed into all the rubbish on the stairs I’d never see it again. So I dashed forward and grabbed. I was practically on top of it, it was kicking and struggling, and I was flat out on the ground: ‘Oh no, you don’t!’ when suddenly I saw, out of the corner of my eyes, a man’s legs. Just inside the front door, trouser legs and shiny shoes. As soon as I saw those shoes I knew they couldn’t belong to Mr. Lomax. It must be a strange gentleman and he’d seen everything! I wanted the floor to swallow me up, but I’d got a tight hold of old Hoppity Houdini, and I wasn’t letting go again, not for anyone. So I scrambled up on to my knees—oh, it was ridiculous, there I was, kneeling on the floor, holding this enormous rabbit. I couldn’t even straighten my hair because I needed both my hands to hold this animal, and I was huffing and blowing so much I couldn’t get my words out straight.

‘Beg pardon, sir, can I help you?’ The gentleman was standing half in the shadow so I couldn’t see his face properly, but I could tell he was trying not to laugh.

He said, ‘Hadn’t you better go and put that rabbit back in its box?’

And that was when I met Mr. James. You could see he was a business gentleman, an important one, right away. He had good clothes—good tailor—and a look to him that made you think, there’s plenty of money there. But he wasn’t a young man, even then. Well, I say he wasn’t young, he was past his middle thirties and certainly he was old beside Miss Georgina. Quite a big man, you might have said he was portly, and compared to somebody like William you couldn’t have called him handsome, although he had a good head of hair. But he was a kind man and he was certainly tickled pink by that rabbit. That was what made me think he was different from the other businessmen who came to Dennys, because it seemed to me they only came to see what they could get out of Mr. Lomax. But Mr. James wasn’t like that, I knew it as soon as I set eyes on him.

Well, my head was spinning, but all the time I was planning how to manage it so that he didn’t see one inch of the house more than necessary. I was kicking myself for not checking the front door—Mr. Lomax sometimes went off for walks and didn’t shut it, so of course anyone could come in. It turned out Mr. James had come in a car and the reason I never heard it was that he’d told his chauffeur to stop at the gates, which was a bit sly. And he never sent a telegram or even a letter to warn us, he just arrived. I overheard him say something afterwards about ‘just passing’, but I never believed it. He had it in mind to do some business with Mr. Lomax, where Mr. Lomax still had the control of it, and I think he’d heard some rumours and he wanted to see for himself.

I was ashamed of the house, but I had something up my sleeve: one room that I called the ‘business room’. Anyone who came, they went straight in there and never saw anything else if I could help it. Because I
wasn’t having them going away and talking about us all going queer, not those swindlers, saying how the place wasn’t kept up and then all flocking back to rob poor old Mr. Lomax because of it. This little room, I’d managed to keep it decent by locking it up and I’d hidden all the keys away where neither Mr. Lomax nor Miss Georgina could get at them. Otherwise, they’d have been in there like a pair of magpies and there wouldn’t have been a stick of furniture left to bless it.

I said, ‘Won’t you come and sit down, sir, until I fetch Mr. Lomax?’ I had my hands full of this rabbit, it was struggling and kicking its great big feet, and when I opened the door to my special room it jumped out of my arms and disappeared under the table.

Mr. James said, ‘Quick, before it escapes!’ and whisked me inside the room and shut the door behind us.

I said, ‘Oh, I must catch it.’

‘No,’ he said. ‘This is my fault for being so rude as to come uninvited. I’d like to see Mr. Lomax, so if you would announce me, I shall catch the rabbit.’ And he pulled out a card and gave it to me for Mr. Lomax. I thought, that’s a good start, I don’t think, but I couldn’t argue, so off I went. Mr. Lomax was asleep on the sofa in his study, but he woke up and said he’d come along. I knew he’d take his time, so I thought: I’ll have to fetch the rabbit out of there because I was terrified it would mess on the floor and then what would I do? So I rushed to the kitchen and made a pot of tea as quick as I could and when I opened up the door with my tray, there was the gentleman sitting there and next to him, stroking the rabbit, cool as you like—Miss Georgina!

Well, as Ellen used to say, ‘Close your mouth, Ada, there’s a bus coming.’ Because it was always a great worry of mine, Miss Georgina showing herself in front
of strangers, because she had such queer ideas about what was decent. And of course, all who came to the house, she knew. She must have been watching our little pantomime over the banisters and we never saw her. Usually, she’d go and hide until they were gone, but not this time. As to what she was wearing, well! I don’t know where she’d found it, but I suppose it must have been her mother’s. It was a ball gown. It was ten years out of date at the very least, not that I know much about fashion, but it was the most beautiful thing. Mr. James and I were both staring at her, she was exquisite. Her eyes were huge and she’d got her beautiful black hair done up in these combs with jewels on them—and the effect was… well, it was quite fantastic. Never mind that it was four o’clock in the afternoon and she was sitting there with her shoulders bare in front of a perfect stranger, and there was a black-and-white rabbit the size of a cat in her arms, and—what I’d been so afraid of—it had done its business on the floor. Miss Georgina was sitting there just as if gentlemen came for tea every afternoon. I couldn’t take my eyes off her and, as I say, I wasn’t the only one.

She said, ‘Tea, how nice. Ada, this is Mr. Gresham. He has come to see my father. Why don’t you take Bunny away, and then you can bring the tea things on to the veranda.’ Bunny! As if it was a pet! The veranda! I was so flabbergasted I didn’t say anything, not ‘yes, Miss Georgina’ or anything like that. I just took the rabbit and left. The thought of the veranda sent me panicking all over again. The garden chairs were filthy, falling to pieces, but Miss Georgina took Mr. James— not that I knew him as Mr. James then, of course— straight out there and he sat down on one of these revolting things. Thank goodness it was warm enough that the cushions had dried out, that was all I could
think, they’d been out there all winter—well, I couldn’t do everything and it must have slipped my mind. And of course the table had to be in full view of the blasted rabbit hutches! I took a sniff, discreetly I hope, but the smell wasn’t
too
noticeable, thank Heaven. Miss Georgina was carrying on as if she was in Buckingham Palace and, as I came to know later, Mr. James was far too much of a gentleman to pass any remarks. Besides, at that time he couldn’t notice nothing in the world but her.

He was a man of the world, but he’d obviously never seen anything like Miss Georgina before. That’s one thing you can say about her, she’s more like herself than anyone else is, if you see what I mean. But she was perfectly ladylike. She hardly said anything, she was doing it all right, listening to what he said, agreeing, asking questions so that he could talk more, very polite, pouring the tea, offering the bread and butter, just as if she’d been doing it all her life. I stopped behind her chair, because I thought he might think it was queer if I left them alone, and I must say I felt ever so proud of her. A duchess couldn’t have done better than she did, I’m sure of that. Then Mr. Lomax appeared, smelly old scarf over his face as usual. He looked at the pair of us and grunted. If it had been in English, it would have meant ‘Get out’. I thought, well, that’s put the kibosh on it, now there’ll be trouble, but Miss Georgina didn’t bat an eyelid. She said, ‘This is my father, Mr. Gresham. Please excuse me,’ and she went back into the house.

Mr. Lomax practically threw the teapot at me: ‘Bring some more tea for our guest. This is stone cold!’ I didn’t like that too well, it made me look lazy, but off I went. When I came back with it, Mr. Lomax had his lips right up to Mr. James’s ear, telling him some tale about this man or that man who had cheated him. Sitting so close,
as he was, the alcohol fumes coming off him must have brought tears to Mr. James’s eyes, but he never flinched. Mr. Lomax kept saying, ‘I can trust you.’ He must have said it fifty times if he said it once. But my eyes flew open when I heard that. I thought, this must be someone very special for him to say that. And all the time Mr. James sat nodding his head, not interrupting once. Mind you, I don’t suppose he could have got a word in if he’d wanted to, Mr. Lomax was talking nineteen to the dozen. I poured the tea and went off round the veranda so I could go down the steps and back to the kitchen. Just before I turned the corner I looked back and I suddenly saw, not Mr. Lomax, but the old fellows in the pub at home—I say ‘home’ but Dennys was my home—what I mean is, the tenement where I lived when I was a girl. That was what he reminded me of. The kind of man who used to hang around by the door half drunk, great fish-eyes swivelling round for someone they can tell their troubles to, and they end up in a fight more often than not. It’s the ugliest thing in the world, a drunken man. I could understand why Ellen said she couldn’t bear it. But after that afternoon I was never again so frightened of Mr. Lomax as I had been.

Mr. Lomax talked for a good two hours, then Mr. James stood up to leave. Miss Georgina came down the stairs as he was going. I could see Mr. Lomax didn’t much care for it, but Mr. James’s eyes were out on stalks. Miss Georgina holds out her hand to him. ‘I do hope you will come and visit us again, Mr. Gresham,’ she says. ‘My father does so enjoy having a man to talk to about business. I’m afraid I don’t understand it at all.’ Mr. Lomax was glaring at her with eyes so blazing that I was amazed she didn’t burst into flames on the spot, but he managed to keep a civil tongue in his head, at least in front of Mr. James.

When I opened the front door for Mr. James, he asked me, ‘What is your name?’

Well, I turned scarlet, what with the rabbit and the veranda and everything. ‘Ada, sir.’

‘Well, Ada, mind you take care of those rabbits.’ And he laughed.

‘Yes, sir. Be careful of the drive, sir.’ Because you could come a cropper as easy as winking, there were so many potholes.

‘Goodbye, Ada.’

‘Goodbye, sir.’ I watched him on his way and felt as if I’d suddenly got a friend. It’s hard to explain, really, just that it was like he was going to help us; he was on our side somehow. It wouldn’t be right to say he was like an angel, but you could say he was our fairy godmother if you want to be sentimental. Except Cinderella wasn’t had up for murdering her fairy godmother, at least not in the story I know. Miss Georgina went back upstairs after Mr. James had gone and Mr. Lomax shouted out ‘Jezebel’ after her, but she didn’t take any notice.

Do you know, Mr. James never forgot those rabbits. For years afterwards, if he saw me checking for dust or looking in a cupboard, he’d say ‘found any rabbits, Ada?’ or ‘rabbit pie tonight, Ada?’. As I watched him go down the drive at Dennys, I thought, if gambling wasn’t wicked, I’d lay my last penny that he’ll be back, I was that sure. And I was right.

It turned out that Mr. James wanted to buy into the business—that is, what was left of it. Mr. Lomax took to him, insisted he must come down again to discuss such and such a matter and go into it all—which of course he did, and more times than he needed, I’m sure of that. You didn’t have to strain your eyes to see the reason for it. But Miss Georgina was always very well
behaved, I’ll say that for her, even if her clothes were rather queer—Miss Louisa sent things from time to time, otherwise she wouldn’t have had a stitch but what had been her mother’s. I’ll say another thing about Mr. James, too: I’m sure he paid Mr. Lomax more than he needed to when he bought his interest in the business, because of Miss Georgina. So then, of course, Mr. James owned the biggest part and the one that’s got most calls the tune, doesn’t he? I don’t suppose Mr. Lomax’s partners liked it, but I know for a fact that Mr. James soon put in his own men, who’d do as he wanted. ‘Everything he touched turned to gold’, that’s what people said about Mr. James.