When Ghost Meets Ghost

by William De Morgan

"Tell us, Dave dear, about old Mrs. Marrowbone. Is she very old? Is she as old as me?" To which Aunt M'riar as a sort of Greek chorus added:—"There, Davy, now, you be a good boy, and tell how old Mrs. Marrowbone is."

Dave considered. "She's not the soyme oyge," said he. "She can walk to chutch and back, Sunday morning." But this was a judgment from physical vigour, possibly a fallible guide. Dave, being prompted, attempted description. Old Mrs. Marrowbone's hair was the only point he could seize on. A cat, asleep on the hearthrug, supplied a standard of comparison. "Granny Marrowbone's head's the colour of this," said Dave, with decision, selecting a pale grey stripe. And Widow Thrale's was like that—one with a deeper tone of brown, with scarcely any perceptible grey.

"And which on Pussy is most like mine, Dave?" said Mrs. Prichard. There was no hesitation in the answer to this. It was "that sort";—that is, the colour of Pussy's stomach, unequivocal white. And which did Dave like best—an unfair question which deserved and got a Parliamentary answer. "All free," said Dave.

But this was merely colour of hair, a superficial distinction. How about Granny Marrowbone's nose. "It's the soyme soyze," was the verdict, given without hesitation. What colour were her eyes? "Soyme as yours." But Dave was destined to incur public censure—Aunt M'riar representing the public—for a private adventure into description. "She's more teef than you," said he candidly.

"Well, now, I do declare if ever any little boy was so rude! I never did! Whatever your Uncle Moses would say if he was told, I can't think." Thus Aunt M'riar. But her attitude was artificial, for appearance sake, and she knew perfectly well that Uncle Moses would only laugh and encourage the boy. The culprit did not seem impressed, though ready to make concessions. Yet he did not really better matters by saying:—"She's got some teef, she has"; leaving it to be inferred that old Mrs. Prichard had none, which was very nearly true. The old lady did not seem the least hurt. Nor was she hurt even when Dave—seeking merely to supply accurate detail—added, in connection with the old hand that wandered caressingly over his locks and brows:—"Her hands is thicker than yours is, a lot!"

"I often think, Mrs. Wardle," said she, taking no advantage of the new topic offered, "what we might be spared if only our teeth was less untrustworthy. Mine stood me out till over fifty, and since then they've been going—going. Never was two such rows of teeth as I took with me to the Colony. Over fifty years ago, Mrs. Wardle!"

"To think of that!" said Aunt M'riar. It was the time—not the teeth—that seemed so wonderful. Naturally old Mrs. Prichard's teeth went with her. But fifty years! And their owner quite bright still, when once she got talking.

She was more talkative than usual this afternoon, and continued:—"No, I do not believe, Mrs. Wardle, there was ever a girl with suchlike teeth as mine were then." And then this memory brought back its companion memory of the long past, but with no new sadness to her voice: "Only my dear sister Phoebe's, Mrs. Wardle, I've told you about. She was my twin sister ... I've told you ... you recollect?..."

"Yes, indeed, ma'am, and died when you was in the Colony!"

"I've never seen another more beautiful than Phoebe." She spoke with such supreme unconsciousness of the twinship that Aunt M'riar forgot it, too, until her next words came. "I was never free to say it of her in those days, for they would have made sport of me for saying it. There was none could tell us apart then. It does not matter now." She seemed to fall away into an absent-minded dream, always caressing Dave's sunny locks, which wanted cutting.