Time and Time Again by James Hilton

mishap in the kitchen, so that they were not at the table till after three o'clock, by which time Reg had fully established himself as the life of the party. He banged the piano with slapdash facility, he sang (in tune but thunderously), he played gramophone records of comic songs he had brought with him, cueing the laughter in which he expected everyone to join. Charles, after deploring a first painful handshake, was ready to admit his good intentions, but soon found even this effort hard to sustain; while Reg, it seemed, saw in Charles the kind of dull fellow whom it was his social duty to wake up at all costs. To assist him he had the natural equipment of a loud voice and a set of verbal clichés and stale witticisms which he unloaded at every chance, evoking shrieks of laughter from Bert and from Lily's two sisters, Evelyn and Maud. Charles was troubled to notice that Lily also laughed, though perhaps only from politeness; it soon became clear, though, that Reg was much attracted by Lily and was on jocularly affectionate terms with her. 'Nice bit o' stuff, ain't she, Charlie?' he commented, nudging Charles in the ribs, and Charles could only mumble an affirmative.
    After dinner they sat in a small glassed-in annex to the dining- room while Mrs. Mansfield and the girls cleared the table. Beyond the windows was the garden, neat and pretty as might have been expected, with tall hollyhocks affording a token privacy from neighbours on either side. After an ample meal and in a comfortable chair Charles was ready to relax; he could have done so, and by now would almost certainly have lost his shyness, but for Reg. Reg was indefatigable, and his range of facetiousness limitless. It seemed he possessed a motorcycle and had driven to Cambridge on it with Bert. He gave a vivid description of the undergraduates with their caps and gowns; indeed he had a snapshot which he produced there and then for general inspection. 'You mean the boys have to wear them in the street?' Maud queried, and when Reg answered: 'Well, look, stupid, that's in the street, ain't it?'--Maud turned to Charles with an incredulous: 'Do YOU have to, Mr. Anderson?'
    'Don't call him Mr. Anderson, he's Charlie,' said Reg. 'Of course he does, don't you, Charlie? Looks like a dog's dinner in 'em, too, I'll bet. . . . Wonder how I'd look if I wore 'em up the Mount?'
    This caused roars of merriment, during which Charles asked Lily, who was next to him, what the Mount was. 'It's where Reg works,' she whispered, but did not explain further.
    Maud did, whispering in his other ear. 'It's a cemetery. Reg works for an undertaker.'
    Charles smiled. At last he saw an opening and claimed his audience by the way he spoke up. 'I can understand, then, why Reg has such a sense of humour. What work exactly do you do, Reg?'
    'I'm in the office,' Reg answered, not quite comfortably.
    'You don't do any--er--spadework then?'
    'SPADEWORK?' Reg was at first genuinely puzzled, and puzzlement made him look sullen. After a pause he said truculently: 'I ain't a blasted gravedigger, if that's what you mean.'
    Charles was still smiling. 'No? I just thought that some of your jokes sounded a bit as if they'd been . . . disinterred.'
    At Cambridge or Beeching it would have raised a laugh, but not in Ladysmith Road. Evidently Reg's jokes were funny and Charles's weren't. Indeed a somewhat chilly silence supervened till Mrs. Mansfield broke it by a gentle rebuke to all: 'Really, I don't think we ought to laugh about things like that.' (But they HAD laughed, when Reg had first brought up the subject by mentioning the Mount!) Charles was bewildered even more than disconcerted, and from then on made no further attempts to challenge Reg in the field of humour. It was perhaps some consolation that Reg also seemed put out, and presently left to take a walk with Bert.
    Conversation was easier after that, and Charles gladly accepted an invitation from Mr. Mansfield to tour the garden. It could not have been