Its beginning to shower and thank you once more for Niffls. Mrs. Thwaites threw the farewell over her shoulder. We shall have to run for it, Rolf.
In the steeple of the First Baptist Church of Ingleglade, two blocks distant, the clock struck eleven times. Except for the kitchen wing the residence of the Gridleys on Edgecliff Avenue was, as to its lower floor, all dark and shuttered. The rain beat down steadily, no longer in scattered drops but in sheets. It was drunk up by the thirsty earth. It made a sticky compound of a precious wagon-load of stable leavings with which Mrs. Gridley, one week before, had mulched her specimen roses in their bed under the living-room windows. It whipped and it drenched a single overlooked garment dangling on the clothes line between the two cherry trees in the back yard. Daylight, to any discriminating eye, would have revealed it as a garment appertaining to the worthy and broad-beamed Norah; would have proven, too, that Norah was not one who held by these flimsy, new-fangled notions of latter-day times in the details of feminine lingerie. For this was an ample garment, stoutly fashioned, generously cut, intimate, bifurcated, white, fit for a Christian woman to wear. It surreptitiously had been laved that morning in the sink and wrung out and hung for drying upon a lately almost disused rope, and then, in the press of culinary duties, forgotten. Now the rain was more or less having its way with it, making its limp ornamentation of ruffles limper still, making the horn buttons upon its strong waistband slippery. So much for the exterior of this peaceful homestead.
Above in the main guest-room, Mr. Boyce-Upchurch fretted as he undressed for bed. He felt a distinct sense of irritation. He had set forth his desires regarding a portable tub and plenty of water to be made ready against his hour of retiring yet, unaccountably, these had not been provided. His skin called for refreshment; it was beastly annoying.
A thought, an inspirational thought, came to him. He crossed to his front window and drew back the twin sashes. The sashes opened quite down to the floor and immediately outside, and from the same level, just as he remembered having noted it following his arrival, the roof of the veranda sloped away with a gentle slant. The light behind him showed its flat tin covering glistening and smooth, with a myriad of soft warm drops splashing and stippling upon it. Beyond was cloaking impenetrable blackness, a deep and Stygian gloom; the most confirmed Styg could have desired none deeper.
So Mr. Boyce-Upchurch walked back and entered the bathroom. There, from a pitcher, he poured the basin full of water and then stripped to what among athletes is known as the buff, meaning by that the pink, and he dipped an embroidered guest towel in the basin and with it sopped himself from head to feet, then dampened a cake of soap and wielded it until his body and his head and his limbs and members richly had been sudded. This done he recrossed his chamber, pausing only to turn out the lights. He stepped out upon the porch roof, gasping slightly as the downpouring torrent struck him on his bare flesh.
From the head of the stairs Mr. Gridley, in a puzzled way, called down:
Say, Emaline?
In a minute Im just making sure everything is locked up down here, answered Mrs. Gridley in a voice oddly strained.
Say, do you know what? Mr. Gridley retreated a few steps downward. Hes gone and put his shoes outside his door in the hall. What do you suppose the big idea is?
Put out to be cleaned, explained Mr. Braid from the foot of the stairs. Quaint old custom William the Conqueror always put his out. But dont call em shoes; thats one of those crude Americanisms of yours. The proper word is boot.
Well, who in thunder does he expect is going to clean them? thats what I want to know! demanded the pestered Mr. Gridley.
Perhaps the slavey began Mr. Braid.
Ollie, for heavens sake hush! snapped Mrs. Gridley. I warn you my nerves cant stand much more tonight. Theyre still up out in the kitchen and suppose Delia heard you. Its a blessing she didnt hear him this afternoon.
I wonder if he thinks Im going to shine em? inquired Mr. Gridley, his tone plaintive, querulous, protesting. He strengthened himself with a resolution: Well, Im not! Heres one worm thats beginning to turn.
Theres Ditto, speculated Mrs. Gridley. I wouldnt dare suggest such a thing to either of those other two. But maybe possibly Ditto
Never, except over my dead body, declared Mr. Braid. Id as soon ask His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury to press my pants for me. Fie, for shame, Dumplings!
But who
I, gallant Jack Harkaway the volunteer fireman, proclaimed Mr. Braid. I, Michael Strogoff the Courier of the Czar Ill shine his doggone shoes I mean, his doggone boots. Ill slip up and get em now. Theres a brush and some polish out back somewheres. Only, by rights, I should have some of the genuine Day & Martin to do it with. And I ought to whistle through my teeth. In Dickens they always whistled through their teeth, cleaning shoes.
Well, for one, Im going to take a couple of aspirin tablets and go straight to bed, said Mrs. Gridley. Thank goodness for one thing, anyway its just coming down in bucketsful outside!
On the porch top in the darkness, Mr. Boyce-Upchurch gasped anew but happily. The last of the lather coursed in rivulets down his legs; his grateful pores opened widely and he outstretched his arms, the better to let the soothing cloudburst from on high strike upon his expanded chest.
On the sudsy underfooting his bare soles slipped first one sole began to slip, then the other began to slip. He gasped once more, but with a different inflection. His spread hands grasped frantically and closed on the void. Involuntarily he sat down, painfully and with great violence. He began to slide: he began to slide faster: he kept on sliding. His curved fingers, still clutching, skittered over stark metal surfaces as he picked up speed. He slid thence, offbound and slantwise, toward the edge. He gave one low muffled cry. He slid faster yet. He slid across the spouting gutter, over the verge, on, out, down, into swallowing space.
Out in the service ell the last of the wastage from the Gridleys dinner party was being disposed of and the place tidied up against the next gustatory event in this house, which would be breakfast. Along the connecting passage from his butlers pantry where he racked up tableware, Ditto was speaking rearward to the two occupants of the kitchen. He had been speaking practically without cessation for twenty minutes. With the hs it would have taken longer probably twenty-two to twenty-four minutes.
He was speaking of the habits, customs, and general excellencies of the British upper classes among whom the greater part of his active life congenially had been spent. He was approaching a specific illustration in support and confirmation of his thesis. He reached it:
Now, you tyke Mr. Boyce-Upchurch, now. Wot pride of bearin es got! Wot control! Wot a flow of language when the spirit moves im! Always the marster of any situation thats im all oaver. Never losin is ead. Never jostled out of is stride. Never lackin for a word. Stock of the old bull-dog thats wot it is!
Where he stood, so discouraging, he could not see Norah. Perhaps it was just as well he could not see her. For a spell was lifting from Norah. If there is such a word as unenglamored then unenglamored is the proper word for describing what Norah rapidly was becoming.