William the Fourth (5 page)

‘I’m going to call the next one a Fête,’ she said. ‘It will seem more of a change.’

‘Fake?’ said William with interest.

She murmured ‘Dear boy,’ vaguely.

‘We’ll advertise it widely. I’m thinking of calling it the King of Fêtes. Such an
arresting
title. We’ll have donkey rides and coconut shies, so
democratic
– and we ought to have fortune-telling. One doesn’t – h’m – of course,
believe
in it – but it’s what people expect. Some quite
harmless
fortune-telling – by cards, for instance—’

William gasped.

‘She did mine –
wonderful,’
he said excitedly, ‘it came – just wot I wished. There was it for tea!’

‘Who? What?’ said the Vicar’s wife.

‘The new one – at the cottage – I did all her furniture for her an’ got paint on my clothes an’ she told me about him not coming back ’cause of her hair
p’raps an’ I got some of her things broke but not many an’ she gave me tea an,’ said to come again.’

Gradually they elicited details.

‘I’ll call,’ said the Vicar’s wife. ‘It would be so nice to have someone one
knows
how to do it – someone
respectable.
Fortune-tellers are so
often not
quite
– you know what I mean, dear,’ she cooed to William’s mother.

‘Of course,’ murmured William abstractedly, ‘it mayn’t have been her hair. It may have been jus’ anything . . . ’

William was having a strenuous time. Fate was making one of her periodic assaults on him. Everything went wrong. Miss Drew, his form mistress at school, had taken an altogether
misguided and unsympathetic view of his zeal for nature study. In fact, when the beetle which William happened to be holding lovingly in his hand as he did his sums by her desk, escaped and made
its way down her neck, her piercing scream boded no good to William. The further discovery of a caterpillar and two woodlice in his pencil-box, a frog in his satchel, and earwigs in his pocket,
annoyed her still more, and William stayed in school behind his friends to write out one hundred times, ‘I must not bring insects into school.’ His addition ‘because they friten
Miss Drew’ made relations still more strained. He met with no better luck at home. His unmelodious and penetrating practices on a mouth-organ in the early hours of the morning had given rise
to a coldness that changed to actual hostility when it was discovered that he had used Ethel’s new cape as the roof of his wigwam in the garden and Robert’s new expensive brown shoe
polish to transform himself to a Red Indian chief. He was distinctly unpopular at home. There was some talk of not allowing him to attend the King of Fêtes, but as the rest of the family were
going and the maids had refused to be left with William on the premises it was considered safer to allow him to go.

‘But any of your
tricks
—’ said his father darkly, leaving the sentence unfinished.

The day of the King of Fêtes was fine. The stalls were bedecked in the usual bright and inharmonious colours. A few donkeys with their attendants surveyed the scene contemptuously. Ethel
was wearing the new cape (brushed and cleaned to a running accompaniment of abuse of William), Mrs Brown was presiding at a stall. Robert, wearing a large buttonhole, with his shoes well browned
(with a new tin of polish purchased with William’s pocket-money) presided at a miniature rifle range. William, having been given permission to attend, and money for his entrance, hung round
the gateway glaring at them scornfully. He always disliked his family intensely upon public occasions. He had not yet paid his money and was wondering whether it was worth it after all, and would
it not be wiser to spend it on bulls’ eyes and gingerbreads, and his afternoon in the fields as a solitary outlaw and hunter of cats or whatever other live prey Fate chose to send him. In a
tent at the farther end of the Fête ground was Miss Tabitha Croft, arrayed in a long and voluminous garment covered with strange signs. They were supposed to be mystic Eastern signs, but were
in reality the invention of the Vicar’s wife, suggested by the freehand drawing of her youngest son, aged three. It completely enveloped Miss Tabitha from head to foot, leaving only two holes
for her eyes and two holes for her arms. She had shown it to William the day before.

‘I don’t
quite
like it,’ she had confessed. ‘I hope there’s nothing – blasphemous about it. But she ought to know – being a Vicar’s wife
she ought to know. I only hope,’ she went on, shaking her head, ‘that I’m not tampering with the powers of darkness – even for the cause of the church organ.’

Outside was a large placard: ‘Fortune Telling by the Woman of Mystery, 2s. 6d. each.’ Inside the Woman of Mystery sat trembling with nervousness in front of a table on which reposed
her little well-worn pack of cards, each with a neat hieroglyphic in the corner to show whether it meant a death or a wedding or a legacy or anything else.

William, surveying this scene from the gateway, became aware of a figure coming slowly down the road. It was a man – a very tall man who stooped slightly as he walked. As he came to
William he became suddenly aware in his turn of William’s scowling regard. He lifted his hat.

‘Good afternoon,’ he said courteously.

‘Afternoon,’ said William brusquely.

‘Do you know,’ went on the man, ‘whether a – Miss Croft lives in the village?’

He pointed down the hill to the cluster of roofs.

‘I think,’ said William slowly, ‘I’ve seen your photo – only you wasn’t so old when you had it took.’

‘Where have you seen my photo?’ said the man.

‘In her house – wot I helped her to remove to,’ said William proudly

The man’s kind, rather weak face lit up.

‘Could you show me her house? You see,’ he went on simply, ‘I’m a very unhappy man. I went away, but I’ve carried her in my heart all the time, but it’s taken
me a long, long time to find her. I’m a very tired, unhappy man.’

William looked at him with some scorn.

‘You was soft,’ he said. ‘P’raps it was ’cause of her hair not curlin’?’

‘Where is she?’ said the man.

‘In there,’ said William, pointing to the enclosure sacred to the King of Fêtes. ‘I’ll get her if you like.’

‘Thank you,’ said the man.

William, still grudging his entrance money, walked round the enclosure till he found a weak spot in the hedge behind a tent. Through this he scrambled with great difficulty, leaving his cap en
route, blackening and scratching his face, tearing his knickers in two places, and his jersey in three. But William, who could not see himself, fingering tenderly the price of admission in his
pocket, felt that it had been trouble well expended. He met the Vicar’s wife. She was raffling a tea-cosy highly decorated with red and yellow and purple tulips on a green ground. She wore
her Sale of Work smile. William accosted her.

‘He wants her. He’s come back. Could you get her?’ he said. ‘He’s had the right one in his inside all the time. He said so . . .’

But she had no use for William. William did not look as if he was good for a one-and-six raffle ticket for a tea-cosy.

‘Sweet thing!’ she murmured vaguely, and effusively caressed his disordered hair as she passed.

William made his way towards the tent of the Woman of Mystery. But there was an ice-cream stall on his way and William could not pass it. Robert and Ethel, glasses of fashion and moulds of form,
passed at the minute. At the sight of William with torn coat and jersey, dirty scratched face, no cap and tousled hair, consuming ice-cream horns among a crowd of his social inferiors, a shudder
passed through both of them. They felt that William was a heavy handicap to them in Life’s race.

‘Send him home,’ said Robert.

‘I simply wouldn’t be seen speaking to him,’ replied Ethel.

William, having satisfied his craving for ice-cream with the greater part of his entrance money, wandered on towards the tent of the Woman of Mystery. He entered it by crawling under the canvas
at the back. The Woman of Mystery happened to be having a slack time. The tent was empty.

‘He’s come,’ announced William. ‘He’s waiting outside.’

‘Who?’ said the Woman of Mystery

‘The one wot you’ve got a photo of. You know. He’s jus’ by the gate.’

‘Oh, dear!’ gasped the Woman of Mystery. ‘Does he want me?’

‘ ’Um,’ said William.

‘Oh, dear!’ fluttered the Woman of Mystery. ‘I must go – yet how can I go? People will be coming for their fortunes.’

William waved aside the objection.

‘Oh, I’ll see to that,’ he said.

‘But – can you tell fortunes, dear?’ she asked.

‘I dunno,’ said William. ‘I’ve never tried yet.’

The Woman of Mystery drew off her curious gown.

‘I must go,’ she said.

With that she fled – through the back opening of the tent.

William slowly and deliberately arrayed himself. He put on the gown and arranged it so that his eyes came to the two eye-holes and his hands out of the two armholes. Then he lifted the hassock
on which the Woman of Mystery had disposed her feet, on to the chair, and took his seat upon it, carefully hiding it with the gown. At that moment the flap of the tent opened and a client entered.
She put half a crown on the table, and sat down on the chair opposite William.

Peering through his eye-holes William recognised Miss Drew.

He spread out a row of the playing cards and began to whisper. William’s whisper was such a little known quantity that it was not recognised.

‘You’ve got a bad temper,’ he whispered.

‘True!’ sighed Miss Drew.

‘You’ve got a cat and hens,’ went on William.

‘True.’

‘You’ve been hard on a boy jus’ lately. He – he may not live very long. You’ve time to make up to him.’

Miss Drew started.

‘That’s all.’

Miss Drew, looking bewildered and troubled, withdrew from the tent.

William was surprised on peering through his eyeholes to recognise Ethel in his next visitor. He spread out the cards and began to whisper again.

‘You’ve got two brothers,’ he whispered.

Ethel nodded

‘The small one won’t live long prob’ly. You better be kinder to him while he lives. Give in to him more. That’s all.’

Ethel withdrew in an awed silence.

Robert entered next. William was beginning to enjoy himself.

‘You’ve gotter brother,’ he whispered. ‘Well, he’s not strong an’ he may die soon. This is a warning for you. You’d better make him happy while
he’s alive. That’s all.’

Robert went slowly from the tent. At that moment the little Woman of Mystery fluttered in from the back.

‘Oh, thank you
so
much, dear. Such a
wonderful
thing has happened. But I must return to my post. He’ll wait till the end, he says.’

Still talking breathlessly, she drew the robe of mystery from William and put it on herself.