Free Cotter's England by Christina Stead Page B

of the lessee of one of the others that he had sent nothing when asked, with the excuse that he did not believe in mourning. He was obliged later to place a wreath in beadwork on the grave itself. The cricket, bowling and football clubs were represented; the policemen, and the Atheneum Club had delegates. It was a fine day: and the firemen sent a band; and the dogs and all the little boys ran along with some long-legged skinny little girls, merry and mean, whose skins and lungs would never quite lose their present coating of Bridgehead gray. That evening, the sports edition squeezed their figures and forecasts to get in some fine glowing remarks about the man who had played for Wales, his subsequent soldierly career, his fine family; and they passed over the misfortune of Cushie's wearing her heart on her sleeve. The sun set on a glorious murky reddish day, with the dark gray river, reflecting in sulky oils its fires and greening. Mr. Cotter was quite right in his life. He lived respected and died as a great man; and for the next week or two, even the next few months, Nellie Cook and Thomas Cotter, Junior, were able to get little concessions from the landlord for the two women left in the house, Mrs. Mary Cotter and Peggy. The assurance company, the football club and the police thought about getting up a subscription. Nellie and Tom gave their mother and sister all they had in the bank and then they had to go back to work.
     
    With old Mrs. Cotter after the funeral, time had been, time was and time might be again, but it was all one time: she knew no difference between the living and the dead. Sometimes she did not recognize the living and sometimes the dead fled from her. She recovered her strength, they moved her upstairs, but to the back bedroom which had been Peggy's; and now Peggy slept with her to attend to her in the night. The fine front bedroom with the oak wardrobe and the air still faintly scented with Thomas Cotter's lotions, pomades and soaps, was empty. There was a lock and they kept it locked; but she found the key; or else her brother Simon gave it to her when she asked for it. The lock soon got broken with the way she treated it, rattling and pecking at it with the key; and then Simon would take the lock off, lay all the parts out in order on the kitchen table and put it together, clean and strong. Mrs. Cotter always had to look in to see if the room was in order and to see who was there. Her husband Thomas Cotter was often away now. Sometimes he was away to London or over the Border on a trip; or to Teesside, sometimes to Wales to see his brothers in business there. Often he was up there too, but asleep; and he was tired, with his traveling; she didn't want to disturb him. The room had to be orderly though; for he was fastidious, even vain, always titivating, as she said with a slight laugh, "a man proud of his looks and with a right to be." Sometimes when she found him out several times running, it occurred to her that something was wrong; and she would climb the stairs to the attic to see if her sister Lily or her own mother was still lying there as they had done for years. When she found no one there, she would hasten down to the kitchen, laugh and say to Simon, "Yes, now I have got it right, Lily is dead and Tom is out on business; what was I thinking of?"
    Simon was anxious, for she spent a good deal of time on the stairs where she had had her fall; and he encouraged her to do her polishing, which she did when she was too tired for climbing. She would be down on her knees polishing the fenders and the grate, rubbing a duster on polished wood and on mantelpiece, scolding Peggy for tarnished silver or a spotted tablecloth; and if she could not find a bit of chamois leather, she would wrap silver up in paper.
    "You mustn't let the house go to wrack and ruin just because I'm not watching," she scolded Peggy. She worried about the disorder which she imagined was somewhere, things left on plates; and if she