was snapped off.
No, only when at the end of this day Pelham was safely asleep could she attend to her own troubles. Perhaps that would be time enough.
She found Pelham excited rather than distressed, at least outwardly.
‘Miss Unwin, Miss Unwin, the funeral carriage has arrived. Hannah and I peeped through the blind and saw it. And can I creep down when Grandpapa goes and watch through the banisters?’
‘Certainly not. And, Hannah, you can go back to your worknow. No, Pelham, your mother and your grandmother will be staying in their rooms, as is proper, and you must stay up here.’
‘But, miss, must I?’
‘Yes, you must. No two ways about it.’
‘Well, but … But couldn’t we peek round the blinds again? The horses have all got tall black feathers on their heads.’
Miss Unwin thought for a moment. Perhaps, after all, it would be better for the boy if he did see the coffin leave. At least it would prevent him harbouring in his head unpleasantly fantastic thoughts.
‘All right. You may do that. But you mustn’t lift the blind more than an inch or two, mind.’
‘No, Miss Unwin. I won’t. Really I won’t. Thank you, Miss Unwin.’
So when the procession was due to leave they each went to a window and peered downwards at the enormous hearse, its black relieved only by gold-painted skulls at each corner and gold-painted cherubs along its sides, at the four black horses in its traces nodding and tossing the ostrich plumes on their heads, at the coachman, massive in his all-black coat and hat.
‘Oh, look, Miss Unwin, one of the horses is –’
‘Sssh, Pelham. I can see that quite well, but a little gentleman does not mention such things.’
‘No, Miss Unwin.’
Then along the path to the gate between the heavy clumps of laurel there came the big, black elm-wood coffin, carried on the shoulders of half a dozen black-clad mutes.
Miss Unwin thought she recognised them from a funeral she had encountered nearby one day when she was taking Pelham for his walk. The two of them had stood respectfully to the side then as that other coffin had been carried to the hearse and Miss Unwin had been assailed as the mutes had passed with such a reek of gin that for an instant she had been transported back to her earliest, most terrible days and the full-bellied parish beadle who on his visits to the workhouse had always exuded such an odour of juniper.
No doubt, she thought, a similar waft of sweetness is eddying along the path down there now.
But a lady, however newly arrived at that state, does not mention such things. Even to herself.
The new Mr Thackerton emerged a moment later and went down the path in the wake of the coffin and climbed stiffly into the family carriage drawn up behind the hearse. He was followed by the other mourners who had come to the house. There were not, Miss Unwin noted, all that many of them although they included a number of under-managers from the office with among them the dark, dour figure of Ephraim Brattle.
Eventually the cortège moved off in the direction of the notably respectable Kensal Green burial ground, the lumbering hearse, the mourning carriages and finally the carriages of neighbours sent empty to follow the procession as a mark of respect.
Then, just as the last carriage turned the far corner at its slow walking-pace, a four-wheeler cab came up from the other direction and tagged itself on to the end of the line. Through its window, which was opened to its fullest on this day of inappropriate sultriness, Miss Unwin caught a distorted glimpse of a vivid brown suit.
She shuddered at the sight. In a swift spasm of true fear.
But this was no time for considering her own future. Pelham had to be kept fully occupied until his head lay on his pillow in sleep. There had been certain small signs, a quick frown, a withdrawn look momentarily about the eyes, that had told her that for all his merry talk of black-plumed horses’ disrespectful behaviour some decidedly
No, only when at the end of this day Pelham was safely asleep could she attend to her own troubles. Perhaps that would be time enough.
She found Pelham excited rather than distressed, at least outwardly.
‘Miss Unwin, Miss Unwin, the funeral carriage has arrived. Hannah and I peeped through the blind and saw it. And can I creep down when Grandpapa goes and watch through the banisters?’
‘Certainly not. And, Hannah, you can go back to your worknow. No, Pelham, your mother and your grandmother will be staying in their rooms, as is proper, and you must stay up here.’
‘But, miss, must I?’
‘Yes, you must. No two ways about it.’
‘Well, but … But couldn’t we peek round the blinds again? The horses have all got tall black feathers on their heads.’
Miss Unwin thought for a moment. Perhaps, after all, it would be better for the boy if he did see the coffin leave. At least it would prevent him harbouring in his head unpleasantly fantastic thoughts.
‘All right. You may do that. But you mustn’t lift the blind more than an inch or two, mind.’
‘No, Miss Unwin. I won’t. Really I won’t. Thank you, Miss Unwin.’
So when the procession was due to leave they each went to a window and peered downwards at the enormous hearse, its black relieved only by gold-painted skulls at each corner and gold-painted cherubs along its sides, at the four black horses in its traces nodding and tossing the ostrich plumes on their heads, at the coachman, massive in his all-black coat and hat.
‘Oh, look, Miss Unwin, one of the horses is –’
‘Sssh, Pelham. I can see that quite well, but a little gentleman does not mention such things.’
‘No, Miss Unwin.’
Then along the path to the gate between the heavy clumps of laurel there came the big, black elm-wood coffin, carried on the shoulders of half a dozen black-clad mutes.
Miss Unwin thought she recognised them from a funeral she had encountered nearby one day when she was taking Pelham for his walk. The two of them had stood respectfully to the side then as that other coffin had been carried to the hearse and Miss Unwin had been assailed as the mutes had passed with such a reek of gin that for an instant she had been transported back to her earliest, most terrible days and the full-bellied parish beadle who on his visits to the workhouse had always exuded such an odour of juniper.
No doubt, she thought, a similar waft of sweetness is eddying along the path down there now.
But a lady, however newly arrived at that state, does not mention such things. Even to herself.
The new Mr Thackerton emerged a moment later and went down the path in the wake of the coffin and climbed stiffly into the family carriage drawn up behind the hearse. He was followed by the other mourners who had come to the house. There were not, Miss Unwin noted, all that many of them although they included a number of under-managers from the office with among them the dark, dour figure of Ephraim Brattle.
Eventually the cortège moved off in the direction of the notably respectable Kensal Green burial ground, the lumbering hearse, the mourning carriages and finally the carriages of neighbours sent empty to follow the procession as a mark of respect.
Then, just as the last carriage turned the far corner at its slow walking-pace, a four-wheeler cab came up from the other direction and tagged itself on to the end of the line. Through its window, which was opened to its fullest on this day of inappropriate sultriness, Miss Unwin caught a distorted glimpse of a vivid brown suit.
She shuddered at the sight. In a swift spasm of true fear.
But this was no time for considering her own future. Pelham had to be kept fully occupied until his head lay on his pillow in sleep. There had been certain small signs, a quick frown, a withdrawn look momentarily about the eyes, that had told her that for all his merry talk of black-plumed horses’ disrespectful behaviour some decidedly
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