“Not very well, sir,” said Mr Purkis, taking up a huge clump-soled boot. “I’ve been a deal worried to-day, sir, over this boot. Mr D. Wragg’s, sir, as you recommended to come to me, and that leg of his as is shorter than the other never seems to keep the same length two days together, and I can’t get the sole thick enough, even now. But he’s a good customer all the same, and I thank you ever so much for recommending me to him. Make that dark gi – young lady’s boots too, I do, sir; her as comes with the little Frenchman; but where he picks up his boots, I don’t know.”
Here Mrs Jared cut a long story short by speaking about Totty’s shoes.
He would send for those little shoes first thing in the morning, without fail; but would not Mr and Mrs Pellet step in.
Jared thought not, but Mrs Jared took the opposite, for she had other thoughts than shoes upon her mind; so declaring herself to be tired, she followed Mr Purkis into the back room, where Mrs Purkis left off ironing to dust a couple of chairs, and drew a small black saucepan, simmering upon the hob, a little farther from the cheery blaze.
“Poor Mrs Nimmer’s dead and gone, sir,” said Mr Purkis.
“Indeed!” said Jared and his wife together.
“Yes, sir – went very suddenly – only this very afternoon, sir. Forty year had she been pew-opener at St Runnles – twenty year before I took the beadleship.”
The conversation had taken the very turn Mrs Jared desired; in fact, she had dragged Jared round in order to enlist Mr Purkis upon their side – at all events, to prevent him from trying to run a friend of his own. She was somewhat shocked at the suddenness of the beadle’s announcement, yet she felt that, for the sake of a family friend, so good an opportunity must not be lost.
“Who is to be the new pew-opener, Mr Purkis?” she said, after a while.
“Who, mum?” said Purkis, after a good wipe; “I don’t know, mum, I’m sure. I should like the Missus there to try, but she says she won’t.”
“Not if I know it, Joseph,” exclaimed his lady, as if in doubt whether she might commence the undertaking in ignorance. “Not if I know it, Joseph,” she exclaimed, polishing an iron with a duster, after giving it a vicious rub in the ashes. “If a married woman hasn’t enough to do to mind her own house and bits of things, it’s a pity. The church has got you, and has you a deal away from the business with weddings and such; and besides, I never opened pews, and I’m too old to learn now.”
“Perhaps Mrs Purkis will think better of it,” said Mrs Jared.
“Better of it! No, ma’am; nor worse, neither. I shall never commit myself by doing of it, as I’ve told Joseph a score of times.”
“Then, under those circumstances, perhaps Mr Purkis would not mind helping a friend of ours to obtain that post?”
“Friend of yours, mum?” said Purkis, eagerly; “I’d do all I could in my way, mum, though that wouldn’t be much. But,” he exclaimed, as a bright thought seemed to strike him, “I could keep other people away.”
“But that would hardly be fair,” observed Mrs Jared.
“Perhaps we had better not go into that part of the business, mum,” said Mr Purkis, with dignity. “Elections is things as ladies don’t understand; and those in elections have to serve their own friends, and serve out their enemies. What we want to do is to remember Mr Pellet’s kindness.”
“Which we shall never forget,” chimed in Mrs Purkis, looking up from her ironing in support of her husband’s allusion to Jared’s “donus,” and a timely loan supplied at a time when Mr Purkis had got himself into what he termed “a mess” by obliging a friend in a bill transaction.
“’Taint every one as will put himself to inconvenience and help them as is pushed,” said Mr Purkis.
“Which it’s well enough we know that, Joseph,” chimed in Mrs Purkis, halting in her task, and burning the mark of the flat-iron into the garment being smoothed.
“There! I must go, if you are going to keep this on,” exclaimed Jared, rising from the chair in which he had been fidgeting about until it scraped upon the floor. “I can’t stand this, you know,” and he glanced from Purkis to his wife, who was wiping her eye upon the corner of her apron.
“Don’t go, sir, please,” exclaimed Purkis; “for I was going to say – to ask, you know – that is, if you wouldn’t mind – ”
Here he made a telegraphic signal with one arm to his wife, and in one sweep indicated “Clear away and lay the cloth.” The signal having the effect upon Mrs Purkis of making her dab down an iron and raise the saucepan lid.
“We’re very homely, Mr Pellet, sir,” she said, as she diffused a savoury odour through the little room; “but if you wouldn’t mind?”
Jared did not wish to stay, but Mrs Jared did, and she had her way, when, over a snug little supper, the pew-opening business was discussed in all its bearings, though frequently during his stay Jared was ready to get up and leave the place in consequence of the beadle’s allusions to his kindness.
It was very plain, though, that Purkis and his wife looked up to their visitors as people far above the ordinary run; and after their departure, Mr Purkis dabbed himself for five minutes, and then, bringing his hand down upon his counter with a loud spang, he exclaimed, like a monarch bestowing dignities —
“She shall have it, that she shall.”
“But, Joseph,” exclaimed his wife, deprecatingly, “whatever you do, don’t commit yourself.”
“Don’t talk stuff,” exclaimed Purkis, fiercely.
“But it wouldn’t be stuff, Joseph, if you was to commit yourself,” whimpered Mrs Purkis.
“Mrs Purkis, ma’am,” said the beadle, donning imaginary robes, “Mr Pellet has asked for the post for a humble friend of his. Mr Pellet’s humble friend shall have it, ma’am, or I’ll know the reason why. Mr Pellet, ma’am, is our friend; and what’s more, or what isn’t more – I won’t say as to that – Mr Pellet, ma’am, is an ornament to my church, for he’s the finest organist in London.”
Volume One – Chapter Seventeen.
Mrs Nimmer’s Successor
There was no very great difficulty in the matter. Jared Pellet, under protest, wrote a note to the Rev. John Gray, the vicar, telling him that a friend – he haggled a great deal over that word “friend” – would be glad to undertake the duties of pew-opener in the place of the defunct Mrs Nimmer; and the vicar mentioned the matter to his friend Mr Timson, churchwarden and tea-dealer, and both agreed that they would be most happy to oblige Mr Jared Pellet in the matter.
Then Mr Timson had an interview with Jared, and told him personally he would be glad to give his weight to the matter, if Jared’s friend was a worthy suitable woman.
Now there came a hitch in the smoothness, for Jared went home and told his wife that that red-faced old humbug Purkis had played double; and, in fact, he had gone head-dabbing into the presence of the vicar and churchwarden to tell them he should be glad if the post lately occupied by Mrs Nimmer could be conferred upon a friend of his.
But explanations followed: the two principal candidates were found to be one and the same; and Mrs Tim Ruggles was duly appointed to a post, for whose proper filling she seemed to have been specially manufactured by Dame Nature.
She, that is to say Mrs Tim Ruggles, glided, as it were, into the correct rut upon the very first Sunday – coming to St Runwald’s in a mournful-hued dress – a shot putty and soot, while a tightly-fitting cap crowned her head – a cap like a white sarcenet raised pie, all tiny bows and tuckers