“With Jerry in this state? Nonsense! How like a man! My boy never gave me a moment’s anxiety in——”
“Don’t, dear—don’t!” The Major looked almost as uncomfortable as St. Peter.
“Well, nothing compared with what he would give me if he weren’t passed.”
“Didn’t I hear you singing just now?” Death asked, seeing that his companion needed a breathing-space.
“Of course you did,” the mother intervened. “He sings beautifully. And that’s another reason! You’re bass, aren’t you now, darling?”
St. Peter glanced at the agonised Major and hastily initialled him a pass. Without a word of thanks the Mother hauled him away.
“Now, under what conceivable Ruling do you justify that?” said Death.
“I.W.—the Importunate Widow. It’s scandalous!” St. Peter groaned. Then his face darkened as he looked across the great plain beyond The Gate. “I don’t like this,” he said. “The Lower Establishment is out in full force to-night. I hope our pickets are strong enough——”
The crowd here had thinned to a disorderly queue flanked on both sides by a multitude of busy, discreet emissaries from the Lower Establishment who continually edged in to do business with them, only to be edged off again by a line of watchful pickets. Thanks to the khaki everywhere, the scene was not unlike that which one might have seen on earth any evening of the old days outside the refreshment-room by the Arch at Victoria Station, when the Army trains started. St. Peter’s appearance was greeted by the usual outburst of cock-crowing from the Lower Establishment.
“Dirty work at the cross-roads,” said Death dryly.