Kipps, H. G. Wells [uplifting book club books TXT] 📗

arrested each customer who came down the shop with a grave and penetrating look. “Showing very ’tractive line new sheason’s shun-shade,” he would remark, and, after a suitable pause, “ ’Markable thing, one our ’sistant leg’sy twelve ’undred a year. V’ry ’tractive. Nothing more today, mum? No!” And he would then go and hold the door open for them with perfect decorum and with the sunshade dangling elegantly from his left hand.⁠ ⁠…

And the second apprentice, serving a customer with cheap ticking, and being asked suddenly if it was strong, answered remarkably,

“Oo! no, mum! Strong! Why it ain’t ’ardly stronger than lemonade.⁠ ⁠…”

The head porter, moreover, was filled with a virtuous resolve to break the record as a lightning packer and make up for lost time. Mr. Swaffenham, of the Sandgate Riviera, for example, who was going out to dinner that night at seven, received at half-past six, instead of the urgently needed dress shirt he expected, a corset specially adapted to the needs of persons inclined to embonpoint. A parcel of summer underclothing selected by the elder Miss Waldershawe, was somehow distributed in the form of gratis additions throughout a number of parcels of a less intimate nature, and a box of millinery on approval to Lady Pamshort (at Wampachs) was enriched by the addition of the junior porter’s cap.⁠ ⁠…

These little things, slight in themselves, witness perhaps none the less eloquently to the unselfish exhilaration felt throughout the Emporium at the extraordinary and unexpected enrichment of Mr. Kipps.

The bus that plies between New Romney and Folkestone is painted a British red and inscribed on either side with the word “Tip-top” in gold amidst voluptuous scrolls. It is a slow and portly bus. Below it swings a sort of hold, hung by chains between the wheels, and in the summer time the top has garden seats. The front over the two dauntless unhurrying horses rises in tiers like a theatre; there is first a seat for the driver and his company, and above that a seat and above that, unless my memory plays me false, a seat. There are days when this bus goes and days when it doesn’t go⁠—you have to find out. And so you get to New Romney.

This bus it was, this ruddy, venerable and immortal bus, that came down the Folkestone hill with unflinching deliberation, and trundled through Sandgate and Hythe, and out into the windy spaces of the Marsh, with Kipps and all his fortunes on its brow. You figure him there. He sat on the highest seat diametrically above the driver and his head was spinning and spinning with champagne and this stupendous Tomfoolery of Luck and his heart was swelling, swelling indeed at times as though it would burst him, and his face towards the sunlight was transfigured. He said never a word, but ever and again as he thought of this or that, he laughed. He seemed full of chuckles for a time, detached and independent chuckles, chuckles that rose and burst in him like bubbles in a wine.⁠ ⁠… He held a banjo sceptre-fashion and restless on his knee. He had always wanted a banjo, and now he had got one at Malchior’s while he was waiting for the bus.

There sat beside him a young servant who was sucking peppermint and a little boy with a sniff, whose flitting eyes showed him curious to know why ever and again Kipps laughed, and beside the driver were two young men in gaiters talking about “tegs.” And there sat Kipps, all unsuspected, twelve hundred a year, as it were, disguised as a common young man. And the young man in gaiters to the left of the driver eyed Kipps and his banjo, and especially his banjo, ever and again as if he found it and him, with his rapt face, an insoluble enigma. And many a King has ridden into a conquered city with a lesser sense of splendour than Kipps.

Their shadows grew long behind them and their faces were transfigured in gold as they rumbled on towards the splendid West. The sun set before they had passed Dymchurch, and as they came lumbering into New Romney past the windmill the dusk had come.

The driver handed down the banjo and the portmanteau, and Kipps having paid him⁠—“That’s aw right,” he said to the change, as a gentleman should⁠—turned about and ran the portmanteau smartly into Old Kipps, whom the sound of the stopping of the bus had brought to the door of the shop in an aggressive mood and with his mouth full of supper.

“Ullo, Uncle, didn’t see you,” said Kipps.

“Blunderin’ ninny,” said Old Kipps. “What’s brought you here? Ain’t early closing, is it? Not Toosday?”

“Got some news for you, Uncle,” said Kipps, dropping the portmanteau.

“Ain’t lost your situation, ’ave you? What’s that you got there? I’m blowed if it ain’t a banjo. Goo-lord! Spendin’ your money on banjoes! Don’t put down your portmanty there⁠—anyhow. Right in the way of everybody. I’m blowed if ever I saw such a boy as you’ve got lately. Here! Molly! And, look here! What you got a portmanty for? Why! Goo-lord! You ain’t really lost your place, ’ave you?”

“Somethin’s happened,” said Kipps slightly dashed. “It’s all right, Uncle. I’ll tell you in a minute.”

Old Kipps took the banjo as his nephew picked up the portmanteau again.

The living room door opened quickly, showing a table equipped with elaborate simplicity for supper, and Mrs. Kipps appeared.

“If it ain’t young Artie,” she said. “Why! Whatever’s brought you ’ome?”

“Ullo, Aunt,” said Artie. “I’m coming in. I got somethin’ to tell you. I’ve ’ad a bit of Luck.”

He wouldn’t tell them all at once. He staggered with the portmanteau round the corner of the counter, set a bundle of children’s tin pails into clattering oscillation, and entered the little room. He deposited his luggage in the corner beside the tall clock, and turned to his Aunt and Uncle again. His Aunt regarded him doubtfully, the yellow light from the little lamp on the table escaped above the shade and