Umbrella Read Online Free PDF Page B

and her mother mix tea and gin into his flask. Only Albert remains at table, his eyes triangulating a realm of purer forms, his fork negligently sccccrrrraping gravy shapes. Samuel cries, Get the Coniston’s! A hair tonic he madly applies to the front and back of his dome, as he places first one profile, then the other, before the oval of looking-glass chained up by the door – this, a motion that shows off to its fullest effect the sharp isosceles that, together with his love of swank, has earned him his moniker. Not, Audrey muses, that he’s like the landlord, Silver, who comes attired soberly in bowler, wing collar, impeccably shined and elastic-sided boots – but whose face is sallow, handsome, the features somehow exaggerated, outlined wiv charcoal . The Deaths are plaster mouldings, Romish swags and vine trails pressed into their whiteness. They are pink and blond, brown and blonder, all save Audrey, whose flaming glory and cake-crumb-scattered cheeks betoken . . . wot? Or-dree, Or-dree, Ordree’s mammy gorrersel knocked up by a navvy! Howsoever the taint was acquired, these are no distinguishing marks – leastways not up towards the Munster Road, where the houses are all knocked abaht and there’s a family of Irish – or two – in every room, and the ginger nuts are everywhere in the streets. Still, Comes the Jew-boy, Comes the Yid, Comes the Jew-boy for iz gelt . . . is sung with gusto on Thursday evening, with whichever of the two little girls is to hand, grabbed and bounced on his knee. Samuel breaks off only when he hears the sccccrrrreeeching of the front gate, then he goes to the door to watch, derisively, as Silver undoes his trouser clips, pulls off his gloves and courteously doffs his hat. From the Horeb heights of the doorstep Audrey’s father hands down a tosheroon, then a second, which is followed – after an insulting interval – by a sixpence. He places the coins in the dapper man’s palm, paying t’be fucking crucified , before, sucking on his own gall, he retreats to the Golgotha of the parlour so that Silver may trot upstairs and do the same to the other tenants.
    The odd panting and heaving that accompanies a tall and corpulent man working his way into a full-length overcoat. Oof-oof . The rabbit fur lies slick and rough in the gaslight, the Coniston is sweating offuvim stink up the privyole . Over her father’s shoulder Audrey sees Stanley’s impish expression: a valet, preparing to cuttim dahn t’size , by saying, I say, Pater, that’s a wewwy extwavagant costume for an hexplorer-chappie who ain’t heggzackerly headin’ up the Wivver Congo, only dahn to the ’bus garage by Putney Bridge – say it, that is, if ’e wuz mad . Samuel Death takes a further dekko around the room, then makes a final imposition of paternal discipline: Wozzat?! He snatches the flick-book Violet has just that moment snatched from dozy Olive – Audrey knows which one, it was given away with the Daily Mail on the occasion of the old Queen’s final birthday parade, stiff cards sewn so they could be riffled and By Jingo! The horsemen fresh back from bashin’ the Boer soundlessly jingle across Horse Guards Parade, their mounts breasting the staccato dust-puffs. Samuel peers at it, lets it fall to the painted floor, extwavagantly unbuttons the just-buttoned skirts of his coat. Parts them and reaches in his waistcoat pocket for his watch. Well, pshaw! – the skin curtain billows – You’re welcome to vese guttersnipes, Mary, me old Dutch – she simpers on the chaise – if’en I don’t look lively . . . All eyes are on his fumbling fingers, all except Albert’s. Samuel Death holds the timepiece up by its gold-plated bracelet, its face a lozenge of jet eclipsing the present that flows behind and in front of it. He pinches the tiny buttons either side of the casing and peers at the red illumined figures, 08.54, each digit composed with straight bars, bevelled at their ends. Gaol numbers . . . I’m in