Mrs. Ridley said that whatever else went, she meant at all costs to save the presentation clock given to her late husband by a very celebrated patient, whose name she was not at liberty to state. I’m inclined to think this was mentioned as a set-off against Mrs. Brash’s diamond necklace; the late Mr. Brash, though an admirable husband, did not seem to have generated anything remarkable in the way of public esteem, whereas the late Dr. Ridley was known to be anything but generous.
Mrs. Ridley had no diamonds; but the clock was of solid granite, made on the model of a pyramid. It was surmounted by a coy-looking sphinx, representing about a quarter of a hundredweight of bronze metal. Accompanying the pyramid—one at each end of the mantelpiece—was a pair of heavy granite obelisks (like Cleopatra’s Needle, but just a size smaller). It took both the servants to lift the clock every time the mantelpiece was dusted, Mrs. Ridley explained with pride. Besides, the obelisks were very useful to hang her knitting bag on, and so appropriate too, with our brave lads out there rallying round and defending the poor sphinx from the Turks. (Virginia whispered in my ear, it was no wonder the bronze lady looked so cheerful.)
So of course these weighty items joined the jewellery at the bedside.
Other valuables rapidly suggested themselves; also more sordid things, such as matches and candles, a tin of biscuits, and a small stove and kettle, for use if we had to sit out in the road all night gazing at a ruined home.
And of course we placed pails of sand and buckets of water close at hand, to use if it should be an incendiary bomb. (I hoped I shouldn’t hop out of bed straight into the water!)
Here Ursula reminded me that the pile of sand placed on the platform of our London station several months (or was it years?) ago, for Anti-zeptic treatment, was now sprouting luscious grass; obviously the lawn-mower and garden-roller must be added to the bedside museum.
But I told her afterwards, she had better keep quiet if she lacks the ability to grasp the strenuosity of any situation where a group of conscientious women are conversing on the subject of “doing something.” As it was, her remark only incited Miss Quirker to spend a tedious five minutes in explaining to her how impossible it would be for a single woman, with only one maid, to get the garden-roller upstairs, and another ten in giving her recipes for exterminating grass; while Mrs. Ridley went off at a tangent on the shortage of gardeners, and the advantages of paraffin over fish-oil as a lubricant for mowing-machines.
I only succeeded in getting her back to the agenda, by begging her to advise us, as she was such an authority on paraffin, whether to take an oil-stove or a spirit-lamp for the outdoor encampment.
At length, when any ordinary bedroom must have been packed quite full, and suggestive of a furniture depository, Virginia’s voice rose above the babel—