Naturally,
their teams of horses emit what amounts to a steady deluge of turd,
transforming a street named for the skirt of a woman into a stable.
Meanwhile the stone facades of the surrounding buildings create a
veritable cauldron of steaming excrement, while intensifying the
harsh clatter of horseshoes, the crack of whips, and the oaths of
drivers. Without the dreadful envelope, Whitty feels as though he is
rid of a canker. He rests his head upon the rotting pillow, slick
from the pomade of a thousand heads, and reviews his position. The
significance of David's death six and a half years ago would be lost
on a Londoner today. Thanks to Crimea, the death of an eldest has now
become common; parlours all over England feature portraits of dead
young men in medieval armour, attended by allegorical women.
Photographers have accrued fortunes taking portraits of corpses,
framed by locks of their hair. That was not so when David died. At
that time, only rarely did a young man of good family achieve an
untimely death: by fever, a fall from a horse – or, in the case
of his brother, by drowning while boating on the Thames. Accidental
death (to say nothing of suicide) was not tragic or heroic, it was
unpleasant and embarrassing, to be discussed in whispers. Hence,
lacking a public forum in which to express their grief, the rather,
mother and brother responded according to individual temperament:
Father chose the path of financial ruin; Mother chose the path of
sickliness; and Edmund chose the path of dissolution and trouble.
Today, Sir Richard Whitty resides in California, Mrs Whitty resides
in Marylebone Cemetery, David Whitty lies beside his mother, and
brother Edmund sits in a stinking carriage, on his way to the house
65 WHITE STONE DAY of a blackmailer who threatens to pulverise the
remaining shreds of the Whitty reputation. He rests his gloved hands
upon his walking–stick and his chin upon his hands, and peers
through the curtain, at the sudden greenery of St Charles Square;
wisps of fog (ghosts of the Stuarts perhaps) catch onto the branches
of plane trees, like swathes of cotton, or bearded heads –
severed, then dissolved into mist. Whitty pounds upon the door with
his stick until his arm aches, to no avail, then tries the handle
which might as well be welded to the door. Clearly, visitors are not
expected at 5 Buckingham Gate. Returning to the courtyard, he
proceeds to a corner of the house and descends a set of crumbling
steps to the trade entrance, whose wooden door has gone to rot. Two
kicks with his boot and he is inside. He stoops to enter, not to
crack his head on the ancient stone lintel. As a precaution against a
meat cleaver welcome, he hollers a hearty and nonsensical Halloo! Is
anyone there? into the darkness, as though it were the customary
thing for a visitor to kick the tradesman's door down, on a visit.
Reassured by a lack of response, he proceeds down a short hallway
into the kitchen – deserted, slippery underfoot, heavy with the
odour of sheep fat and the eerie silence of disuse. The cast–iron
range, set within its predecessor – an ancient open hearth with
hooks dangling above – is barely warm to the touch; in front of
the stove sits the coal–hod, three–quarters filled,
suggesting that the stove was lit this morning. The meat–table,
invisible beneath a cloak of insects the colour of syrup, contains
what seems to be the remains of a joint of boiled mutton. In a corner
of the room, a rat awaits its turn at the spoils; when Whitty
threatens the animal with his stick, it backs away but does not flee.
Clearly, the pantry has been vacated abruptly and unexpectedly. One
shelf is piled high with dried soups, pots of beans, grains, as well
as the iron black–stone with which Irishmen prepare their dry,
tasteless oat– cakes. The next shelf is empty, save for a
single bottle with the label of Charleson's; the drawer below gapes
open like a toothless jaw. Whitty concludes that the Irish have left
the
their teams of horses emit what amounts to a steady deluge of turd,
transforming a street named for the skirt of a woman into a stable.
Meanwhile the stone facades of the surrounding buildings create a
veritable cauldron of steaming excrement, while intensifying the
harsh clatter of horseshoes, the crack of whips, and the oaths of
drivers. Without the dreadful envelope, Whitty feels as though he is
rid of a canker. He rests his head upon the rotting pillow, slick
from the pomade of a thousand heads, and reviews his position. The
significance of David's death six and a half years ago would be lost
on a Londoner today. Thanks to Crimea, the death of an eldest has now
become common; parlours all over England feature portraits of dead
young men in medieval armour, attended by allegorical women.
Photographers have accrued fortunes taking portraits of corpses,
framed by locks of their hair. That was not so when David died. At
that time, only rarely did a young man of good family achieve an
untimely death: by fever, a fall from a horse – or, in the case
of his brother, by drowning while boating on the Thames. Accidental
death (to say nothing of suicide) was not tragic or heroic, it was
unpleasant and embarrassing, to be discussed in whispers. Hence,
lacking a public forum in which to express their grief, the rather,
mother and brother responded according to individual temperament:
Father chose the path of financial ruin; Mother chose the path of
sickliness; and Edmund chose the path of dissolution and trouble.
Today, Sir Richard Whitty resides in California, Mrs Whitty resides
in Marylebone Cemetery, David Whitty lies beside his mother, and
brother Edmund sits in a stinking carriage, on his way to the house
65 WHITE STONE DAY of a blackmailer who threatens to pulverise the
remaining shreds of the Whitty reputation. He rests his gloved hands
upon his walking–stick and his chin upon his hands, and peers
through the curtain, at the sudden greenery of St Charles Square;
wisps of fog (ghosts of the Stuarts perhaps) catch onto the branches
of plane trees, like swathes of cotton, or bearded heads –
severed, then dissolved into mist. Whitty pounds upon the door with
his stick until his arm aches, to no avail, then tries the handle
which might as well be welded to the door. Clearly, visitors are not
expected at 5 Buckingham Gate. Returning to the courtyard, he
proceeds to a corner of the house and descends a set of crumbling
steps to the trade entrance, whose wooden door has gone to rot. Two
kicks with his boot and he is inside. He stoops to enter, not to
crack his head on the ancient stone lintel. As a precaution against a
meat cleaver welcome, he hollers a hearty and nonsensical Halloo! Is
anyone there? into the darkness, as though it were the customary
thing for a visitor to kick the tradesman's door down, on a visit.
Reassured by a lack of response, he proceeds down a short hallway
into the kitchen – deserted, slippery underfoot, heavy with the
odour of sheep fat and the eerie silence of disuse. The cast–iron
range, set within its predecessor – an ancient open hearth with
hooks dangling above – is barely warm to the touch; in front of
the stove sits the coal–hod, three–quarters filled,
suggesting that the stove was lit this morning. The meat–table,
invisible beneath a cloak of insects the colour of syrup, contains
what seems to be the remains of a joint of boiled mutton. In a corner
of the room, a rat awaits its turn at the spoils; when Whitty
threatens the animal with his stick, it backs away but does not flee.
Clearly, the pantry has been vacated abruptly and unexpectedly. One
shelf is piled high with dried soups, pots of beans, grains, as well
as the iron black–stone with which Irishmen prepare their dry,
tasteless oat– cakes. The next shelf is empty, save for a
single bottle with the label of Charleson's; the drawer below gapes
open like a toothless jaw. Whitty concludes that the Irish have left
the
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