"Yes, ma'am, and his wife—she was a schoolfellow of mine. A decent man, Ralph always was, and at one time a very rich one; but there was something about the son—I never heard the rights of it. It killed poor Annie, I believe; and Ralph looks heartbroken himself. I see very little of him—he is out all day. There never was such a man for going about the country."
Mrs. Cloudesley's next visit was to Mr. Trulock, or rather to his door, for her knock brought no one to let her in. Mrs. Short's door opened, and that dumpy dame put out her round head and called out:
"You need not knock again, ma'am, for Mr. Trulock is out; and out he always is, I may truly say. I couldn't abear to see you knocking, standing there in the bitter wind, you that has lately had a cold too; I'm that good-natered. 'Do as you'd be done by,' is my motter, and I wouldn't fancy standing out in the cold;—you're welcome back, Mrs. Cloudesley,—and won't you walk in?"
"I was coming to see you," replied May, going round to the door, and following the waddling steps of Mrs. Short into the parlour. If that room had surprised her on her first visit, it fairly astounded her now! The handsome chiffonier with glass doors, the wax flowers under a bell shade, the pictures in their massive gilt frames! These last were three in number, and one of them represented Mrs. Short—a shade less round than Mrs. Short was now, but still an undeniable likeness,—looking sentimental with all her might at a miniature which she held out straight before her—so straight, in fact, that only half the miniature could be got into the picture at all. The second picture represented the late Mr. Short, a thin little man with a deprecating smile upon his face, carrying in his hand a bunch of flowers, of which he seemed mortally afraid. The third was that of the youthful son of this worthy couple, a fat, staring boy with crimson cheeks, hard and shiny as two rosy apples. He was depicted drawing by a string a toy horse—black with red spots. The horse was very well done: it was quite as wooden and as little like a real horse as the original had been.
"You're looking at my picter, ma'am! Ah, I'm greatly altered since that was done. It was a minnychure of my poor diseased—" (probably meant for deceased) "father that I 'ad in my 'and, ma'am, and I requested of the artiss to put in my poor father's face, but would you believe it, he refused! He said I wanted to get two 'eads out of him for the price of one! Some folks is wonderful ill-natered. That's my poor Matthew, as is dead and buried, poor man! Very like him it is, but you never saw him. And that's my son Matt; and I hope he'll do well and be 'appy, though he's not been quite the son he might have been to his widowed mother, as did for him for years, and kept his places like a 'pictur.' But there! I'll never mention it to mortal, nor remember it against him—I'm too good-natured for that!"
"How is Mr. Trulock getting on?" said May, longing to interrupt the flow of words. "Has he got a servant yet?"
"No, ma'am, nor won't! I've been at him about it dozens of times, for it spoils my disjection to see him look the way he does—half-starved—half-clothed, too, I may say; for though decent, yet very threadbare and scant, ma'am, as your own heyes may tell you. But there! I might as well talk to a stone, the best I get is, 'You've no gel yourself'; and it's vain to tell him that I'm a woman and he's a man, and so the cases is very differential. And what is he starving himself for, now? As I says to him, while there was a chance of righting the business and keeping his connection together, it was all very well to be miserly; but now that he's broke, and had to retire to this place, which others that expected it as little, though never keeping a carriage nor having a viller at 'Ackney, mightn't he as well make use of the comforts provided for him, and not go on pinch, pinch, and look at a friendly neighbour as if he'd like to bid her to mind her own business? But there! A hard man Ralph Trulock ever was—hard to his son, and hard to all, and hard he'll be, to his dying day."
"He does not look like a hard man, exactly," said May Cloudesley.
"Ah, but if you knew his story, ma'am, which I can tell it to you, for I know it well. I've known him all my life."
May by no means wished to listen to gossip of this kind; but she found she must listen to Mrs. Short, or abruptly say good-bye, and this she did not like to do. She was not one of those who have one manner for the rich and another for the poor; so it was as impossible for her to interrupt Mrs. Short rudely, as if she had been my Lady Short, and the vulgar little crowded parlour a spacious reception room; so she heard her perforce.