Short Stories / Рассказы

“Will you tell me, madam,” he besought her, “who occupied the room I have before I came?”

“Yes, sir. I can tell you again. ’Twas Sprowls and Mooney, as I said. Miss Bretta Sprowls it was in the theatres, but Missis Mooney she was. My house is well known for respectability. The marriage certificate hung, framed, on a nail over – ”

“What kind of a lady was Miss Sprowls – in looks, I mean?”

“Why, black-haired, sir, short, and stout, with a comical face. They left a week ago Tuesday.

“And before they occupied it?”

“Why, there was a single gentleman connected with the draying business. He left owing me a week. Before him was Missis Crowder and her two children, that stayed four months; and back of them was old Mr Doyle, whose sons paid for him. He kept the room six months. That goes back a year, sir, and further I do not remember.”

He thanked her and crept back to his room. The room was dead. The essence that had vivified it was gone. The perfume of mignonette had departed.

The ebbing of his hope drained his faith. He sat staring at the yellow, singing gaslight. Soon he walked to the bed and began to tear the sheets into strips. With the blade of his knife he drove them tightly into every crevice around windows and door. When all was snug and taut he turned out the light, turned the gas full on again and laid himself gratefully upon the bed.

* * *

It was Mrs McCool’s night to go with the can for beer. So she fetched it and sat with Mrs Purdy in one of those subterranean retreats where house-keepers foregather and the worm diets seldom.

“I rented out my third floor, back, this evening,” said Mrs Purdy, across a fine circle of foam. “A young man took it. He went up to bed two hours ago.”

“Now, did ye, Mrs Purdy, ma’am?” said Mrs McCool, with intense admiration. “You do be a wonder for rentin’ rooms of that kind.

“Rooms,” said Mrs Purdy, in her furriest tones, “are furnished for to rent. I did not tell him, Mrs McCool.”

“’Tis right ye are, ma’am; ’tis by renting rooms we kape alive. Ye have the rale sense for business, ma’am. There be many people will rayjict the rentin’ of a room if they be tould a suicide has been after dyin’ in the bed of it.