第54章

In later years, though many memories intervene, the Prophet will never forget his journey to the banks of the Mouse.Always it seemed very strange to him and dream-like, that everlasting journey upon the purple 'bus, complicated by the chatter of the younger scions of the Malkiel dynasty, and by the shrill cries of the conductor summoning the passers-by to hasten to that place of repose consecrated to the worthy and hard-working individuals who drew their modest incomes from the pig.The character of the streets changed as the central districts were left behind, and a curious scent, the scent of Suburbia, seemed to float between the tall chimneys in the morose atmosphere.The purple chariot, which rolled on and on like the chariot of Fate, drew gradually away from the large thoroughfares into mean streets, whose air of dull gentility was for ever autumnal, and the Prophet, on passing some gigantic gasworks, mechanically wondered whether it might not, perhaps, be that monument to whose shadow Malkiel the First had lived and died.Once, looking up at the black sky, he remarked to the little Capricornus that it was evidently going to rain.

"No, Mr.Vivian," replied the boy."It won't rain hard this week.

January's a fine month, but there'll be heavy floods in March, especially along the banks of the Thames.""And in February there'll be such a lot of scarlet fever in the southern portions of England," added the little Corona."Oh, Corney, just look at that kitty on the airey railings!""Area, Corona," corrected her brother."Oh, my! ain't it funny?"The Prophet remembered that he was travelling with the scions of a prophetic house.

It seemed many years before the 'bus stopped before a brick building full of quart pots, situated upon a gentle eminence sloping to a coal-yard, and the voice of the conductor proclaimed that the place of repose was reached.The Prophet and his diminutive guides descended from the roof and were shortly in a train puffing between the hunched backs of abominable little houses, sooty as street cats and alive with crying babies.Then bits of waste land appeared, bald wildernesses in which fragments of broken crockery hibernated with old tin cans and kettles yellow as dying leaves.A furtive brown rivulet wandered here and there like a thing endeavouring to conceal itself and unable to find a hiding-place.

"That's the Mouse, Mr.Vivian," remarked Capricornus, proudly."We shall soon be there.""Ridiculum mus," rejoined his sister, who evidently took after her learned mother.

"Culus, Corona; and you're not to say that.Pater familias says that the Mouse is a noble stream.We get out here, Mr.Vivian."Here proved to be a wayside station on the very bank of the noble stream, and on the edge of a piece of waste ground so large that it might almost have been called country.

The Prophet and the two kids set off across this earth, which was named by the inhabitants "the Common." In the distance rose a fringe of detached brick and stone villas towards which Capricornus now pointed a forefinger that trembled with pride.

"That's where we live," he said, in a voice that was grown squeaky from conceit.

"Dulce domus," piped his sister, clutching the skirt of the Prophet's coat, and, thus supported, performing several very elaborate dancing steps upon the clayey soil over which he was feebly staggering."Dulce dulce, dulce domus.Look at that rat, Corney!"A large, raking rodent, indeed, at that instant emerged from the wreckage of what had once been a copper cauldron near by, and walked slowly away towards a slope of dust garnished with broken bottles and abandoned cabbage stalks.The Prophet shuddered and longed to flee, but the two kids, as if divining his thought, now clasped his hands and led him firmly forward to a yellow villa, fringed with white Bath stone and garnished plentifully with griffins.From its flat front shot ostentatiously forth a porch adorned with Roman columns which commanded a near view of the Mouse, and before the porch was a small garden in which several healthy-looking nettles had made their home.

As the Prophet and the two kids approached this delightful abode, a white face appeared, gluing itself to the pane of an upper window.

"There's pater familias!" piped Capricornus."Don't he look ill?"As they mounted the flight of imitation marble steps the face disappeared abruptly.

"He's coming to let us in," said Capricornus."You're sure you've brought the crab and all the rashes?""Quite sure."

"Because, if you haven't, I don't know whatever mater familias'll--"At this moment the portal of the lodge was furtively opened about half an inch, and a very small segment of ashen-coloured human face, containing a large and apprehensive eye, was shown in the aperture.

"Are you alone?" said the hollow voice of Mr.Sagittarius.

"Quite, quite alone," said the Prophet, reassuringly.

"It's all right, pater familias!" cried Capricornus."He's brought all the rashes and the first tooth and everything.I made him.""I don't think he wanted to," added the little Corona, suddenly developing malice.

"I've taken this long journey, Mr.Sagittarius," said the Prophet, with a remnant of self-respect, "at your special request.Am I to be permitted to come in?""If you're sure you're quite alone," returned the sage, showing a slightly enlarged segment of face.

"I am quite sure--positive!"

At this the door was opened just sufficiently to admit the passage of one thin person at a time, and, in single file, the Prophet, Corona and Capricornus passed into the lodge.