Impromptu in Moribundia

by Patrick Hamilton

  I even feared that if this went on I might be obliged to acquire the requisite amount of merit by doing some sort of work. Such a fate, with the disastrous result it would have of curtailing to a minimum the remaining time at my disposal for scientific investigation, had to be avoided at all costs. You will notice that I had by now abandoned any project I ever had of trying to explain who and what I was to the authorities, and getting public support from them. I knew by now that if I did so I would be regarded as a lunatic, and probably locked up. However inadequately I have portrayed Moribundia so far, I think I have at least made it clear that the one thought the Moribundian, by his nature, is incapable of entertaining, is the thought that there may be any conceivable world of things and ideas other than his own. Merely to mention, let alone to propound, such a theory in public, would be to be regarded as a madman, or worse perhaps, a Tsixram.

  I was, then, with one thing and another, worried almost to the point of desperation. It soon became quite clear that I would have to clear out of the ‘Moribundian’ and take up my abode in some more humble place. It was this last realization which at last gave me the solution to my troubles.

  It dawned upon me, in a flash, that my life on this planet up to this moment had been spent exclusively amongst the upper and middle classes, and that apart from a few bus-conductors and Yenkcocs I had seen nothing of the lower orders and poor as a whole, the labouring classes, the toilers in their own surroundings.

  It was clear that, from the point of view of social investigation, I could not possibly overlook this side of Moribundian life. Why not then, since I was seemingly being shunned and cold-shouldered by everyone in this present station of life, go and live amongst the working people, whom I might not offend, and who might accord me more simple and human treatment? At the same time I could study their habits at first hand, and certainly gain a less one-sided view of Moribundian society.

  Also, I would not be living above my income. As soon as I came to these conclusions I felt an enormous measure of relief, and decided to act upon them without delay. I still had enough money to pay my bill at the ‘Moribundian,’ and I did so at once. Then, with only three pounds in my pocket and a suitcase containing a few clothes and necessities, I stepped out into the street, and boarded a bus in the direction of the working-class districts, which lie to the east of Nwotsemaht.

  Notes

  30. “‘Even my best friend won’t tell me? Is that it?’”: a direct reference to the well-known advertisement for ‘Lifebuoy’ soap in treating the ‘social crime’ of B.O. and ensuring ‘personal freshness’.

  31. See Note 15 for the source of the allusion in this scene.

  32. Teews Enileda: ‘Sweet Adeline’. Although at least three songs go under this tide, the one Hamilton must be referring to was composed in 1896 by Harry Armstrong, with lyrics by Richard Jerrard. It was originally called ‘Down Home in Old New England’, and made very little stir; but in 1903, it was re-titled ‘Sweet Adeline’, and from then on became a music-hall favourite on both sides of the Atlantic. It is the kind of sentimental ballad commonly associated with the comic drunk.

  CHAPTER XIV

  I dismounted from the bus at a point at which, so I had been told, the homes of the working people began, but I could not believe at first that I had reached my destination. This was because the working-class districts in Moribundia are so entirely different from anything we know on our own earth.33

  There were, it is true, several humble grey dwellings of the type which I had expected to see, but these were so completely hidden away and absorbed by the other features, that I at first could hardly realize the fact that they were there at all.

  My first impression was, indeed, that instead of being in the working-class district I had alighted upon some strange, rather sordid sort of Coney Island34 on its outskirts—a neighbourhood entirely devoted, not to work, but to amusement. Nearly every other building, it seemed to me, was either a cinema or a place of entertainment, and I have never seen so many cars, so many greyhounds, so many fur coats, so many silk stockings and so many idle people bent on pleasure in my life. But it was the number of the cinemas which impressed me most.

  Surprised as I was, I regained my composure when I recollected certain facts in the history of the Moribundian working class, facts with which I was then acquainted, but about which the reader will, of course, know nothing.

  There was, it seems, a time when the working people suffered very considerably from bad housing conditions, insecurity, overwork and penury. But now all that has been changed. In very much the same way that ‘modern’ science completely replaced and eliminated ‘old-fashioned’ science in Moribundia, so ‘modern conditions’ have replaced the ‘old conditions,’ and the ‘present-day’ working man has replaced the old-fashioned one.

  Whereas the old-fashioned working man led a life of toil and received very little in return, the modern working man does practically nothing, and as any Moribundian authority will tell you, ‘has everything.’

  His income is admittedly not so large as that of his social superior, but this is ‘made up for him’ in so many ways that it would be difficult to say that he is not a great deal better off materially. In fact, nearly everything which other people have to buy with money, is to him either given freely or is so cheap that it can scarcely be said to touch his pocket at all. If I began to make a list of his assets—if I began to speak of the free hospitals, the free libraries, the free schools, the free insurance—or the cheap wireless, the cheap cars, the cheap clothes, the cheap cinemas and entertainments, etc.—I should not know where to stop.

  How far the Moribundian working man is ‘grateful’ for these Moribundian advantages, the use to which he puts them, and the effect they have upon his character, are different matters which I will come to later when I describe the working-class family with which I stayed.

  As I have said, in addition to the cinemas and places of amusement, there still remained a few dwellings of the type, more or less, which I expected to see, and it was amongst these that I wandered, looking for somewhere where I might lodge.

  I had to wander a long way before I could find anything, but at last I came across a house with a board in the window saying ‘Room to Let,’ and, with a feeling of relief, I put down the bag on the step and rang the bell.

  My ring was not immediately answered, but as there was a wireless blaring away at full blast inside the house, and as there were other wirelesses blaring away at full blast in all the other houses down the street, I was not surprised at this, and rang again more loudly. This still had no effect, and so I was compelled to use the knocker violently. At last I heard someone coming, and the door was opened by a young man with such a rude manner, and of so untidy and slouching an appearance, that I felt I wanted to shake him.

  This, I later learned, was the son of the house, Bill Juggins. At his heels there were two very well-kept but rather overfed bulldogs.

  With all the politeness I could muster I asked him if I could see the room which was advertised in the window, but he said that he knew nothing about it, and that I would have to ask his mother about it.

  I asked him if I could see his mother, but he said she was out. She was at the cinema. Also he himself was just leaving for a football match. I could, however, if I wished, wait inside until his mother returned.

  I accepted his offer and he conducted me into a living-room on the right of the passage. Here there was a small child with a hopelessly untended appearance, and who looked to me as though it was underfed. The young man took no notice of this child, but before he went out, I noticed, he went to a large refrigerator which stood in one corner of the room and took out two enormous lumps of prime beef steak (each weighing at least five pounds) and threw then to the bulldogs, who ate them on an expensive Turkish rug, in front of the fire. I need hardly add that before going out he made no attempt to save the current by turning off the wireless.

  It was still early in the afternoon, and I had to w
ait something like two hours before his mother returned. But at last she came in, and I was pleased to find that she had a much more prepossessing appearance and character than her son.

  Mrs. Juggins, in point of fact, was a more or less old-fashioned soul, a Mary Brough-like type35 of the old school, who could still vividly remember the days before the great revolution in working-class conditions of which I have spoken, and who had not even yet fully adjusted her mind and habits to the wonderful change.

  She greeted me most hospitably and apologized for having kept me waiting so long—for having been, indeed, out of doors when I arrived.

  “But there you are,” she said. “That’s what life is for us workin’ women of to-day. With all these modern conveniences—what with cheap electricity, cheap vacuum cleaners, running hot and cold water, and all the other innumerable devices for relieving the burden of domestic tasks, each within the reach of the humblest purse—the modern housewife can do in as many minutes what used to take hours. The word drudgery can no longer be applied to domestic work. Why, look at to-day. Everything was finished in a quarter of an hour, and by nine o’clock I was free to go out for a spin in the new car with my old man. Then I went on to the cinema, where I saw as fine a show as you could see anywhere for a few pence—and here I am.”

  “Remarkable,” I said. “You must feel the change enormously.”

  “Oh, yes, it’s nice enough,” she replied, “but bless your heart, do we appreciate it? Are we thankful for it? Of course not. Instead of being grateful for what we’ve got, all we do is to ask for more. And it all comes out of the tax-payers’ money too.”

  I should here explain that in Moribundia the working classes are exempt from any form of taxation, direct or indirect, and that almost the entire bulk of the tax-payers’ money is given over to the furnishing of the working class with these luxuries.

  I now asked her if I could see the room she had to let, and she took me upstairs. The room was pleasant enough, and the sheets on the bed looked to me immaculately clean. It was not clean enough for this excellent soul, however. She said, indeed, looking at me in a rather shocked way, that she thought her linen was white until she saw it next to my newly-washed handkerchief, and she added that she would have it changed before I slept in the bed.

  We then went downstairs again, where, with the aid of an electric kettle and grilling device, tea and toast were made in less than a minute. After this we had a talk, and as the evening drew on we were joined by the youngest daughter of the house, Mary, who had returned from her work.

  She was, physically, a most attractive young thing, expensively, if somewhat flashily, dressed, and she had an indolent, pampered and haughty air which confirmed my impression that the children of this household, having been brought up under the new conditions, were certainly not the equal of their mother in character and courtesy. This girl, I soon discovered, worked as a domestic servant.

  “You’re home very early, Mary,” said her mother. “Got the evening off?”

  “Oh, no,” said Mary, in the most matter-of-fact tone. “I walked out of the place, and gave her a piece of my mind, too.”

  “Dear me,” said her mother, but she scarcely seemed surprised. “That’s the fourth situation you’ve left this week. What was the trouble this time?”

  “Of all the blooming cheek,” said Mary, “she complained when I gave a cocktail party to a few friends in the kitchen, and then asked me if I’d occasionally do the washing up after lunch!”

  This took even her mother aback, in spite of her old-fashioned principles, and she said: “Well, well, I’m not surprised you left.”

  If this should cause wonderment or astonishment in the reader (as no doubt it will) he should understand that in Moribundia the relations between maid and mistress, as we know them, are entirely reversed and distorted. Up there it is nothing for a mistress literally (and when I say literally, I mean literally) to go down on her knees to beg a maid or a cook to stay with her; and this absolute slavishness on one side is manifested in all their dealings with each other. It is nothing for a mistress to implore, to entreat, to bribe by any means her servant to perform so simple an act of grace as staying on to cook a meal in the evening; and employers will go about in a state of incessant, miserable nervousness and trepidation lest a tactless word should be uttered and heard in the kitchen. Cook-generals in particular are appallingly tyrannical, and, it seems to me, consciously cruel under these conditions, having an awful way of folding their arms, and frowning in a basilisk stare, which puts such terror into the hearts of their supposed superiors that they visibly tremble and quake before them, stuttering their apologies. It is a wonder to me that these servants are ever employed at all, since I myself would put up with any sort of hardship rather than suffer such snubbing and humiliation. On the other hand, it is a wonder that they themselves, being in such a strong position, ever condescend to go into service, if service it can be called.

  “These mistresses are above themselves these days,” Mary went on. “And she was only giving me five pounds a week, too!”36

  I knew too much of Moribundia now to do anything other than acquiesce in the ideas I found prevalent therein, and I joined with Mary’s mother in applauding the sentiments which had led her to walk haughtily out of a situation in which she had been so scandalously treated.

  Soon afterwards we were joined by Bill, the son of the house, who had returned from his football match. It soon became apparent that this young man was out of work—had been out of work for months in fact, and was living on the dole.

  The most extraordinary conversation, but one utterly characteristic of the younger working-class man, now followed. His mother asked him whether he had been to the Labour Exchange that day, to see if anything had turned up that he could do.

  “Oh, yes,” he answered morosely, “I went along.”

  “Was there nothing for you?” asked his mother.

  “Oh, yes,” he said, “there were plenty of jobs. They’re crying for men. They always are.”

  “What was the matter, then?” asked his mother. “Weren’t they the sort of jobs you could do?”

  “Do them?” he replied in the same gloomy way. “Of course I could. But catch me.”

  I think he must have seen that I looked a little surprised at this, for he added, looking at me:

  “Why should I, when I can live on the tax-payers’ money?”

  His mother and sister quietly nodded at this, as though it were axiomatic, and the subject was dropped, but personally I began to feel that I had come to live in a sort of madhouse.

  At about six o’clock we were joined by the father of the family, Mr. Juggins, who had finished his work for the day.

  When I say we were joined by him, I do not want to give the impression that I had not seen him before; for he had, as a matter of fact, been coming into the house and going out of it again at short intervals ever since four o’clock. He was, as it happened, a plumber by trade, and was working on a job at a house not far away. The trouble with this man was that he was absolutely incapable of remembering to take the necessary tools with him, and was always having to come back to fetch those he required.

  This deficiency of memory amounted, in my eyes, to a positive mania, possibly sexual at root, and for which he might profitably have been treated by a psycho-analyst; but he and his family treated these exits and entrances in the most matter-of-fact way.

  Frequently, instead of returning himself, he sent his ‘mate’ back to fetch the desired implement. Naturally, no work on the house could be started until the tools were assembled; and since, as I learned later, he charged at the fullest rate for the time spent merely in going to and fro, I could not help feeling a pang of pity for the householder who had called him in.

  My impression, then, of being in a madhouse was increased rather than lessened by the behaviour of the father, but this was nothing compared with that of the last member of the family, who came in now—the eldest girl, Joan, who w
orked in a munition factory. At first she seemed normal enough, physically resembling her younger sister, Mary, though much more flashily dressed, and covered ostentatiously with jewels which I could see at once were genuine.

  When she had come in the entire family was assembled in full force, and it was felt that it was an appropriate moment to prepare an evening meal.

  They all joined in the task, and it pains me to describe the waste which took place on all sides. Joan, who earned an enormous salary at her factory, and who could literally afford to buy anything she wanted, had brought back with her the choicest foods of all kinds, and the extravagant way in which these were got ready was an agony to see. In the mere process of preparation alone, at least half of this expensive nourishment was thrown into the dustbin, or left to rot in the sink; the rest being cooked in villainously expensive butter, and finally being served, not on plates on a table with a table-cloth, but on the french polish of a beautiful grand piano, which stood in the sitting-room, and which Joan had lately purchased from her salary! Needless to say, when the meal was finished, so thoughtlessly had it been planned, that at least half of it was left over, and instead of being saved for the next day, it joined the rest of the refuse in the dustbin.

  After ‘dinner’ Joan began to play, in an excruciatingly vulgar, crude and noisy way upon the piano; the others joined in with singing, and I did my best to bear it as well as I could.