Tales of Mean Streets

"ALL THAT MESSUAGE."

"All that messuage dwelling-house and premises now standing on part of the said parcel of ground" was the phrase in the assignment of lease, although it only meant Number Twenty-seven Mulberry Street, Old Ford, containing five rooms and a wash-house, and sharing a dirty front wall with the rest of the street on the same side. The phrase was a very fine one, and, with others more intricate, lent not a little to the triumph and the perplexity the transaction filled old Jack Randall withal. The business was a conjunction of purchase and mortgage, whereby old Jack Randall, having thirty pounds of his own, had, after half-an-hour of helpless stupefaction in a solicitor's office in Cornhill, bought a house for two hundred and twenty pounds, and paid ten pounds for stamps and lawyer's fees. The remaining two hundred pounds had been furnished by the Indubitable Perpetual Building Society, on the security of a mortgage; and the loan, with its interest, was to be repaid in monthly instalments of two pounds and fourpence during twelve years. Thus old Jack Randall designed to provide for the wants and infirmities of age; and the outright purchase, he argued, was a thing of mighty easy accomplishment. For the house let at nine shillings a week, which was twenty-three pounds eight shillings a year; and the mortgage instalments, with the ground rent of three pounds a year, only came to twenty-seven pounds four, leaving a difference of three pounds sixteen, which would be more than covered by a saving of eighteenpence a week: certainly not a difficult saving for a man with a regular job and no young family, who had put by thirty pounds in little more than three years. Thus on many evenings old Jack Randall and his wife would figure out the thing, wholly forgetting rates and taxes and repairs.

Old Jack stood on the pavement of Cornhill, and stared at the traffic. When he remembered that Mrs. Randall was by his side, he said, "Well, mother, we done it;" and his wife replied, "Yus, fa', you're a lan'lord now." Hereat he chuckled and began to walk eastward. For to be a landlord is the ultimate dignity. There is no trouble, no anxiety in the world if you are a landlord; and there is no work. You just walk round on Monday mornings (or maybe you even drive in a trap), and you collect your rents: eight and six, or nine shillings, or ten shillings, as the case may be. And there you are! It is better than shopkeeping, because the money comes by itself; and it is infinitely more genteel. Also, it is better than having money in a bank and drawing interest; because the house cannot run away as is the manner of directors, nor dissolve into nothingness as is the way of banks. And here was he, Jack Randall, walking down Leadenhall Street a landlord. He mounted a tram-car at Aldgate, and all things were real.

Old Jack had always been old Jack since at fourteen young Jack had come 'prentice in the same engine-turner's shop. Young Jack was a married man himself now, at another shop; and old Jack was near fifty, and had set himself toward thrift. All along Whitechapel Road, Mile End Road, and Bow Road he considered the shops and houses from the tram-roof, madly estimating rents and values. Near Bow Road end he and his wife alighted, and went inspecting Twenty-seven Mulberry Street once more. Old Jack remarked that the scraper was of a different shape from that he had carried in his mind since their last examination; and he mentioned it to Mrs. Randall, who considered the scraper of fact rather better than the scraper of memory. They walked to and fro several times, judging the door and three windows from each side of the street, and in the end they knocked, with a purpose of reporting the completed purchase. But the tenant's wife, peeping from behind a blind, and seeing only the people who had already come spying about the house some two or three times, retired to the back and went on with her weekly washing.

They waited a little, repeated the knock, and then went away. The whole day was "off," and a stroll in the Tower Hamlets Cemetery was decided on. Victoria Park was as near, but was not in the direction of home. Moreover, there was less interest for Mrs. Randall in Victoria Park, because there were no funerals. In the cemetery, Mrs. Randall solaced herself and old Jack with the more sentimental among the inscriptions. In the poor part, whose miscellaneous graves are marked by mounds alone, they stopped to look at a very cheap funeral.

"Lor', Jack," Mrs. Randall said under her breath with a nudge, "wot a common caufin! Why, the body's very nigh a-droppin' through the bottom!" The thin under-board had, in fact, a bulge. "Pore chap! ain't it shockin'!"

The ignominy of a funeral with no feathers was a thing accepted of course, but the horror of a cheap coffin they had never realized till now. They turned away. In the main path they met the turgid funeral of a Bow Road bookmaker. After the dozen mourning coaches there were cars and pony traps, and behind these came a fag-end of carts and donkey-barrows. Ahead of all was the glazed hearse, with attendants in weepers, and by it, full of the pride of artistry, walked the undertaker himself.

"Now that," said old Jack, "is somethin' like a caufin." (It was heavy and polished and beset with bright fittings.) "Ah," sighed his missis, "ain't it lovely!"

The hearse drew up at the chapel door, where the undertaker turned to the right-about and placidly surveyed the movements of his forces. Mrs. Randall murmured again: "Lovely – lovely!" and kept her eyes on the coffin. Then she edged gently up to the undertaker, and whispered, "What would that kind o' caufin be called, mister?"

The undertaker looked at her from the sides of his eyes, and answered briskly, "Two-inch polished oak solid extry brass fittin's." Mrs. Randall returned to old Jack's side and repeated the words. "That must cost a lot," she said. "What a thing, though, to be certain you won't be buried in a trumpery box like that other! Ah, it's well to be rich."

Old Jack gazed on the coffin, and thought. Surely a landlord, if anybody, was entitled to indulge in an expensive coffin? All day he had nursed a fancy that some small indulgence, something a little heavier than usual in the matter of expense, would be proper to celebrate the occasion. But he reflected that his savings were gone and his pockets no fuller than had always been their Wednesday wont: though, of course, in that matter the future would be different. The bearers carried the coffin into the chapel, and Mrs. Randall turned away among the graves. Old Jack put his hands in his pockets, and, looking at the ground, said: "That was a nobby caufin, mother, wasn't it?" Whereunto Mrs. Randall murmured: "Lovely – lovely!" yet again.

Old Jack walked a little further, and asked, "Two-inch polished oak, 'e said, didn't 'e?"

"Solid, an' extry brass fittin's; beautiful!"

"I'll remember it. That's what you shall 'ave if it 'appens you go fust. There!" And old Jack sat on the guard-chain of a flowery grave with the air of one giving a handsome order.

"Me? Git out! Look at the expense."

"Matter o' circumstances. Look at Jenkins's Gardens. Jenkins was a bench-'and at the Limited; got 'is 'ouses one under another through building s'ieties. That there caufin 'ud be none too dear for 'im. We're beginnin'; an' I promise you that same, if you'd like it."

"Like it!" the missis ejaculated. "Course I should. Wouldn't you?"

"Wy, yus. Any one 'ud prefer somethin' a bit nobby; an' thick."

And the missis reciprocated old Jack's promise, in case he died first: if a two-inch polished oak solid could be got for everything she had to offer. And, tea-time approaching, they made well pleased for home.

In two days old Jack was known as a landlord all about. On the third day, which was Saturday, young Jack called to borrow half a sovereign, but succeeded only to the extent of five shillings: work was slack with him, and three days of it was all he had had that week. This had happened before, and he had got on as best he could; but now, with a father buying house-property, it was absurd to economize for lack of half a sovereign. When he brought the five shillings home, his wife asked why he had not thrown them at his father's head: a course of procedure which, young Jack confessed, had never occurred to his mind. "Stingy old 'unks!" she scolded. "A-goin' about buyin' 'ouses, an' won't lend 'is own son ten shillin's! Much good may all 'is money do 'im with 'is 'ateful mean ways!" This was the beginning of old Jack's estrangement from his relatives. For young Jack's missis expressed her opinion in other places, and young Jack was soon ready to share it: rigidly abstaining from another attempt at a loan, though he never repaid the five shillings.

In the course of the succeeding week two of his shopmates took old Jack aside at different times to explain that the loan of a pound or two would make the greatest imaginable difference to the whole course of their future lives, while the temporary absence of the money would be imperceptible to a capitalist like himself. When he roundly declared that he had as few loose sovereigns as themselves, he was set down as an uncommon liar as well as a wretched old miser. This was the beginning of old Jack's unpopularity in the workshop.

He took a half-day off to receive the first week's rent in state, and Mrs. Randall went with him. He showed his written authority from the last landlord, and the tenant's wife paid over the sum of nine shillings, giving him at the same time the rent-book to sign and a slip of written paper. This last was a week's notice to terminate the tenancy.

"We're very well satisfied with the 'ouse," the tenant's wife said (she was a painfully clean, angular woman, with a notable flavor of yellow soap and scrubbing-brush about her), "but my 'usband finds it too far to get to an' from Albert Docks mornin' and night. So we're goin' to West 'Am." And she politely ejected her visitors by opening the door and crowding them through it.

The want of a tenant was a contingency that old Jack had never contemplated. As long as it lasted it would necessitate the setting by of ten and sixpence a week for the building society payments and the ground-rent. This was serious: it meant knocking off some of the butcher's meat, all the beer and tobacco, and perhaps a little firing. Old Jack resolved to waste no more half-days in collecting, but to send his missis. On the following Monday, therefore, while the tenant's wife kept a sharp eye on the man who was piling a greengrocer's van with chairs and tables, Mrs. Randall fixed a "To Let" bill in the front window. In the leaves of the rent-book she found another thing of chagrin: to wit, a notice demanding payment of poor, highway, and general rates to the amount of one pound eighteen and sevenpence. Now, no thought of rates and taxes had ever vexed the soul of old Jack. Of course, he might have known that his own landlord paid the rates for his house; but, indeed, he had never once thought of the thing, being content with faithfully paying the rent, and troubling no more about it. That night was one of dismal wakefulness for old Jack and his missis. If he had understood the transaction at the lawyer's office, he would have known that a large proportion of the sum due had been allowed him in the final adjustment of payment to the day; and if he had known something of the ways of rate-collecting, he would have understood that payment was not expected for at least a month. As it was, the glories of lease-possession grew dim in his eyes, and a landlord seemed a poor creature, spending his substance to keep roofs over the heads of strangers.

On Wednesday afternoon a man called about taking the house, and returned in the evening, when old Jack was home. He was a large-featured, quick-eyed man, with a loud, harsh voice and a self-assertive manner. Quickly old Jack recognized him as a speaker he had heard at certain street-corners: a man who was secretary, or delegate, or that sort of thing, to something that old Jack had forgotten.

He began with the announcement, "I am Joe Parsons," delivered with a stare for emphasis, and followed by a pause to permit assimilation.

Old Jack had some recollection of the name, but it was indefinite. He wondered whether or not he should address the man as "sir," considering the street speeches, and the evident importance of the name. But then, after all, he was a landlord himself. So he only said, "Yus?"

"I am Joe Parsons," the man repeated; "and I'm looking for a 'ouse."

There was another pause, which lasted till old Jack felt obliged to say something. So he said, "Yus?" again.

"I'm looking for a 'ouse," the man repeated, "and, if we can arrange things satisfactory, I might take yours."

Mr. Joe Parsons was far above haggling about the rent, but he had certain ideas as to painting and repairs that looked expensive. In the end old Jack promised the paint a touch-up, privily resolving to do the work himself in his evenings. And on the whole, Mr. Joe Parsons was wonderfully easy to come to terms with, considering his eminent public character. And anything in the nature of a reference in his case would have been absurd. As himself observed, his name was enough for that.

Old Jack did the painting, and the new tenant took possession. When Mrs. Randall called for the first week a draggle-tailed little woman with a black eye meekly informed her that Mr. Parsons was not at home, and had left no money nor any message as to the rent. This was awkward, because the first building society instalment would be due before next rent-day – to say nothing of the rates. But it would never do to offend Mr. Parsons. So the money was scraped together by heroic means (the missis produced an unsuspected twelve and sixpence from a gallipot on the kitchen dresser), and the first instalment was paid.

Mrs. Randall called twice at Mulberry Street next rent-day, but nobody answered her knocks. Old Jack, possessed by a misty notion, born of use, that rent was constitutionally demandable only on Monday morning, called no more for a week. But on Thursday evening a stout little stranger, with a bald head which he wiped continually, came to the Randalls to ask if the tenant of Twenty-seven Mulberry Street was Mr. Joe Parsons. Assured that it was, he nodded, said, "Thanks! that's all," wiped his head again, and started to go. Then he paused, and "Pay his rent regular?" he asked. Old Jack hesitated. "Ah, thought so," said the little stranger. "He's a wrong 'un. I've got a bit o' paper for 'im." And he clapped on his hat with the handkerchief in it and vanished.