“They’re quite as conservative. ’Notice how they still keep the old Holbein uniforms? ’Morning, Sergeant Fell. How goes it?” said Death as he swung the dusty doors and nodded at a Commissionaire, clad in the grim livery of Death, even as Hans Holbein has designed it.
“Sadly. Very sadly indeed, sir,” the Commissionaire replied. “So many pore ladies and gentlemen, sir, ’oo might well ’ave lived another few years, goin’ off as you might say, in every direction with no time for the proper obsequities.”
“Too bad,” said Death sympathetically. “Well, we’re none of us as young as we were, Sergeant.”
They climbed a carved staircase, behung with the whole millinery of undertaking at large. Death halted on a dark Aberdeen granite landing and beckoned a messenger.
“We’re rather busy to-day, sir,” the messenger whispered, “but I think His Majesty will see you.”
“Who is the Head of this Department if it isn’t you?” St. Peter whispered in turn.
“You may well ask,” his companion replied. “I’m only—” he checked himself and went on. “The fact is, our Normal Civil Death side is controlled by a Being who considers himself all that I am and more. He’s Death as men have made him—in their own image.” He pointed to a brazen plate, by the side of a black-curtained door, which read: “Normal Civil Death, K.G., K.T., K.P., P.C., etc.” “He’s as human as mankind.”
“I guessed as much from those letters. What do they mean?”
“Titles conferred on him from time to time. King of Ghosts; King of Terrors; King of Phantoms; Pallid Conqueror, and so forth. There’s no denying he’s earned every one of them. A first-class mind, but just a leetle bit of a sn——”
“His Majesty is at liberty,” said the messenger.