Mrs. Bindle: Some Incidents from the Domestic Life of the Bindles by Jenkins (best ebook reader for chromebook TXT) 📗

Bindle was busy, her temper had a tendency to be on what Bindle called "the short side," and then even her favourite hymn, "Gospel Bells," frequently failed to stem the tide of her wrath.

"Ain't we goin' to 'ave tea in the parlour?" he enquired presently, as Mrs. Bindle smoothed the cloth over the kitchen table.

"No, we're not," she snapped, thinking it unnecessary to add that Millie had particularly requested that she might have it "in your lovely kitchen," because she was "one of the family."

Although Bindle infinitely preferred the kitchen to that labyrinth of furniture and knick-knacks known as the parlour, he felt that the occasion demanded the discomfort consequent upon ceremony. He was, however, too wise to criticise the arrangement; for Mrs. Bindle's temper and tongue were of a known sharpness that counselled moderation.

She had made no mention of the time of Millie's arrival, and Bindle decided not to take the risk of enquiring. He contented himself with hovering about, getting under Mrs. Bindle's feet, as she expressed it, and managing to place himself invariably in the exact spot she was making for.[Pg 95]

If he sat on a chair, Mrs. Bindle seemed suddenly to discover that it required dusting. If he took refuge in a corner, Mrs. Bindle promptly dived into it with an "Oh! get out of my way, do," and he would do a swift side-step, only to make for what was the high-road of her next strategic move.

"Why don't you go out like you always do?" she demanded at one point.

"Because Millikins is comin'," he replied simply.

"Yes, you can stay at home for—when somebody's coming," she amended, "but other days you leave me alone for weeks together."

"But when I do stay at 'ome you 'ustles me about like a stray goat," he complained, only just succeeding in avoiding a sudden dash on Mrs. Bindle's part.

"That's right, go on. Blame everything on to me," she cried, as she made a swift dive for the stove, and proceeded to poke the fire as if determined to break the fire-brick at the back. "If you'd only been a proper 'usband to me I might have been different."

Bindle slipped across the kitchen and stepped out into the passage. Here he remained until Mrs. Bindle suddenly threw open the kitchen door.

"What are you standing there for?" she demanded angrily.

"So as not to get in the way," was the meek reply.

"You want to be able to tell Millie that you were turned out of the kitchen," she stormed. "I know you and your mean, deceitful ways. Well, stay there if you like it!" and she banged the door, and Bindle heard the key turn in the lock.[Pg 96]

"There's one thing about Mrs. B.," he remarked, as he leaned against the wall, "she ain't dull."

When at length the expected knock came, it was Mrs. Bindle who darted out and opened the door to admit Millie Dixon, carrying in her arms the upper end of what looked like a cascade of white lace.

A sudden fit of shyness seized Bindle, and he retreated to the kitchen; whilst aunt and niece greeted one another in the passage.

"Where's Uncle Joe?" he heard Millie ask presently.

"I'm 'ere, Millikins," he called-out, "cookin' the veal for that there young prodigal."

A moment later Millie, flushed and happy, fluttered into the room, still holding the cascade of lace.

"Darling Uncle Joe," she cried, advancing towards him.

He took a step backwards, a look of awe in his eyes, which were fixed upon the top of the cascade.

"Aren't you going to kiss me, Uncle Joe?" she asked, holding up her face.

"Kiss you, my dear, why——" Bindle was seized with a sudden huskiness in his voice, as he leaned forward gingerly and kissed the warm red lips held out to him.

"Is that It?" he asked, looking down with troubled eyes at Millie's burden.

"This is Little Joe," she said softly, the wonder-light of motherhood in her eyes, as she placed one foot on the rail of a chair to support her precious burden, thus releasing her right hand to lift the veil from a red[Pg 97] and puckered face, out of which gazed a pair of filmy blue eyes.

"Ooooooosssss." Instinctively Bindle drew a deep breath as he bent a few inches forward.

For fully a minute he stood absorbing all there was to be seen of Joseph the Second.

"'E ain't very big, is 'e?" he enquired, raising his eyes to Millie's.

"He's only six weeks old," snapped Mrs. Bindle, who had followed Millie into the kitchen and now stood, with ill-concealed impatience, whilst Bindle was gazing at the infant. "What did you expect?" she demanded.

"Don't 'e look 'ot?" said Bindle at length, his forehead seamed with anxiety.

"Hot, Uncle Joe?" enquired Millie, unable to keep from her voice a tinge of the displeasure of a mother who hears her offspring criticised.

"I mean 'e don't look strong," he added hastily, conscious that he had said the wrong thing.

"Don't be silly, Uncle Joe, he's just a wee little baby, aren't you, bootiful boy?" and she gazed at the red face in a way that caused Bindle to realise that his niece was now a woman.

"'E's the very spit of 'is old uncle, ain't 'e?" and he turned to Mrs. Bindle for corroboration.

She ignored the remark; but Millie smiled sympathetically.

"I 'ad a takin' way with me when I was a little 'un," continued Bindle reminiscently. "Why, once I was nearly kissed by a real lady—one with a title, too."[Pg 98]

"Oh! do tell me, Uncle Joe," cried Millie, looking at him with that odd little lift of the brows, which always made Charley want to kiss her. She had heard the story a score of times before.

"Well, 'er 'usband was a-tryin' to get into Parliament, an' 'is wife, wot was the lady, came round a-askin' people to vote for 'im. Seein' me in my mother's arms, she says, 'Wot a pretty child.' You see, Millikins, looks was always my strong point," and he paused in the narrative to grin.

"Then she bends down to kiss me," he continued, "an' jest at that moment wot must I go and do but sneeze, an' that's 'ow I missed a kiss an' 'er 'usband a vote."

"Poor Uncle Joe," laughed Millie, making a little motion with her arms towards Mrs. Bindle.

Without a word, Mrs. Bindle took the precious bundle of lace, out of which two filmy eyes gazed vacantly. With a swaying movement she began to croon a meaningless tune, that every now and then seemed as if it might develop into "Gospel Bells"; yet always hesitated on the brink and became diverted into something else.

The baby turned on her a solemn, appraising look of interrogation, then, apparently approving of the tune, settled down comfortably to enjoy it.

Bindle regarded Mrs. Bindle with wonder. Into her eyes had crept a something he had only once seen there before, and that was on the occasion he had brought Millie to Fenton Street when she left home.

Seeing that "Baby" was content, Millie dropped[Pg 99] into a chair with a tired little sigh, her eyes fixed upon the precious bundle of lace containing what would one day be a man.

Mrs. Bindle continued to sway and croon in a way that seemed to Little Joe's entire satisfaction.

"Aren't you glad we called him after you, Uncle Joe?" said Millie, tearing her eyes with difficulty from the bundle and turning them upon Bindle.

"Yer aunt told me," he said simply.

"Oh! I do hope he'll grow up like you, Uncle Joe, dear Uncle Joe," she cried, clasping her hands in her earnestness, as if that might help to make good her wish.

"Like me?" There was wonder and incredulity in his voice.

"Charley says he must grow up like you, darling Uncle Joe. You see——" She broke off as Bindle suddenly turned and, without a word, made for the door. A moment later it banged-to behind him arousing Mrs. Bindle from her pre-occupation.

"Where's your Uncle gone?" she enquired, lifting her eyes from their absorbed contemplation of the flaming features of her nephew.

"He's—he's gone to fetch something," lied Millie. Instinctively she felt that this was an occasion that called for anything but the truth. She had seen the unusual brightness of Bindle's eyes.

From the passage he was heard vigorously blowing his nose.

"It's them toys he's after," said Mrs. Bindle, with scornful conviction.[Pg 100]

"Toys?" Millie looked up enquiringly.

"He bought a lot of hideous things for this little precious," and her eyes fell upon the bundle in her arms, her lips breaking into a curve that Bindle had never seen.

"You see, Millie," she continued, "he doesn't know. We've neither chick nor child of——" She broke off suddenly, and bowed her head low over the baby.

In a second Millie was on her feet, her arm round Mrs. Bindle's shoulders.

"Dear Aunt Lizzie!" she cried, her voice a little unsteady. "Darling Aunt Lizzie. I—I know—I——"

At this point Joseph the Second, objecting to the pressure to which he was being subjected between the two emotional bosoms, raised his voice in protest, just as Bindle entered, his arms full of the toys he had bought.

He stood in the doorway, gaping with amazement.

As Mrs. Bindle caught sight of him, she blinked rapidly.

"Don't bring that rubbish in here," she cried with a return to her normal manner. "You'll frighten the child out of its life."

"Oh! Uncle Joe," cried Millie, as Bindle deposited the toys on the table. "I think you're the darlingest uncle in all the world."

There were tears in the eyes she turned on him.

Mrs. Bindle swung her back on the pair, as Bindle proceeded to explain the virtues and mechanism of his purchases. She was convinced that such monstrosities would produce in little Joseph nothing less[Pg 101] than convulsions, probably resulting in permanent injury to his mind.

Whilst they were thus engaged, Mrs. Bindle walked up and down the kitchen, absorbed in the baby.

"Auntie Lizzie," cried Millie presently, "please bring Little Joe here."

Mrs. Bindle hesitated. "They'll frighten him, Millie," she said, with a gentleness in her voice that caused Bindle to look quickly up at her.

To disprove the statement, and with all the assurance of a young mother, Millie seized the rag-doll and a diminutive golliwog, and held them over the recumbent form of Joseph the Second.

In an instant a pudgy little hand was thrust up, followed immediately after by another, and Joseph the Second demonstrated with all his fragile might that, as far as toys were concerned, he was at one with his uncle.

Bindle beamed with delight. Seizing the monkey-on-a-stick he proceeded vigorously to work it up and down. The pudgy hands raised themselves again.

"Oh! let Uncle Joe hold him," cried Millie, in ecstasy at the sight of the dawning intelligence on the baby's face.

"Me!" cried Bindle in horror, stepping back as if he had been asked to foster-mother a vigorous young rattlesnake. "Me 'old It?" He looked uncertainly at Mrs. Bindle and then again at Millie. "Not for an old-age pension."

"He'll make him cry," said Mrs. Bindle with con[Pg 102]viction, hugging Little Joe closer and increasing the swaying movement.

"Oh yes, you must!" cried Millie gaily. "I'll take him, Auntie Lizzie," she said, turning to Mrs. Bindle, who manifested reluctance to relinquish the bundle.

"I might 'urt 'im," protested Bindle, retreating a step further, his forehead lined with anxiety.

"Now, Uncle Joe," commanded Millie, extending the bundle, "put your arms out."

Bindle extended his hands as might a child who is expecting to be caned. There was reluctance in the movement, and a suggestion that at any moment he was prepared to withdraw them suddenly.

"Not that way," snapped Mrs. Bindle, with all the scorn of a woman's superior knowledge.

Millie settled the matter by thrusting the bundle into Bindle's arms and he had, perforce, to clasp it.

He looked about him wildly, then, his eyes happening to catch those of Joseph the Second, he forgot his responsibilities, and began winking rapidly and in a manner that seemed entirely to Little Joe's satisfaction.

"Oh, Auntie Lizzie, look," cried Millie. "Little Joe loves Uncle Joe already." The inspiration of motherhood had enabled her to interpret a certain slobbering movement about Little Joe's lips as affection.

"Oh, look!" she cried again, as one chubby little hand was raised as if in salutation. "Auntie Lizzie——" She suddenly broke off. She had caught sight of the tense look on Mrs. Bindle's face as she gazed at the baby, and the hunger in her eyes.

Without a word she seized the bundle from Bindle's[Pg 103] arms and placed it in those of her aunt, which instinctively curved themselves to receive the precious burden.

"There, darling Joeykins," she crooned as she bent over her baby's face, as if to shield from Mrs. Bindle any momentary disappointment it might manifest. "Go to Auntie Lizzie."

"'Ere, wot 'ave I——?" began Bindle, when he was interrupted by a knock at the outer door.

"That's Charley," cried Millie, dancing towards the door in a most unmatronly manner. "Come along, Uncle Joe, he's going to mend the musical-box," and with that she tripped down the passage, had opened the door and was greeting her husband almost before Bindle had