Podbury

“ Podbury-street, a small and narrow street of unimportant houses, in the south-western postal district of London, has seen various mutations of fortune. Twenty years ago, it was Podbury-street, Pimlico, and the unimportant houses were for the most part occupied by persons who contented themselves with the basement floor, and let the rest of the rooms in lodgings. The tenants of these lodgings were generally young men who were engaged in qualifying themselves for the medical profession by 'walking' the near-lying St. ”

“ Podb. More water than ground in a place like this, eh? But I know what you mean—we must be duffers if we don't leave Venice engaged men—which we're not as yet, worse luck!
Culch. No—but we shall be, if we only insist upon being treated seriously.
Podb. She treats me a devilish deal too seriously, my boy. But there, never mind—things will go better now!
SCENE—A double-bedded room in the Grand Hotel, Dandolo, which PODBURY and CULCHARD have to share for the night.
Podb. (from his bed, suspiciously, to CULCHARD, who is setting fire to a small pastille in a soap-dish) . ”

“ But she's bound to know sooner or later, now she and Miss Trotter have struck up such a friendship. And Hypatia will be awfully pleased about it—why shouldn't she, you know? ... I'm going to see if there's any one on the tennis-court, and get a game if I can. Ta-ta! [90]
Culch. (alone) . Podbury knows very little about women. If Hyp—Miss Prendergast—once found out why I renounced my suitorship, I should have very little peace, I know that—I've taken particular care not to betray my attachment to Maud. ”

“ Miss T. Well, it's this way. Poppa don't want to get fooling around any more one-horse towns than he can help, and he's got to be fixed up with the idea that Nuremberg is a prominent European sight before he drops everything to get there.
Culch. I will undertake to interest him in Nuremberg. Fortunately, we are all getting off at Bingen, and going, curiously enough, to the same hotel. (To himself.) Confound that fellow Podbury, here he is again!
Podb. (to himself, as he advances) . If she's carrying on with that fellow, Culchard, to provoke me, I'll soon show her how little I— (Aloud.) ”

“ Podgers dropped Lord Arthur’s right hand, and seized hold of his left, bending down so low to examine it that the gold rims of his spectacles seemed almost to touch the palm. For a moment his face became a white mask of horror, but he soon recovered his sang-froid, and looking up at Lady Windermere, said with a forced smile, ‘It is the hand of a charming young man.
‘Of course it is!’ answered Lady Windermere, ‘but will he be a charming husband? That is what I want to know.’
‘All charming young men are,’ said Mr. Podgers. ”

“ As Podge Byerly walked up the worn stone walk of the lawn she saw a familiar image at the door—her mother.
"You here, mother?" said Podge. "What is the meaning of it?"
"This is my house, my darling. There is our friend who gave it to us. You will need to teach no more. The mill and a little farm surrounding us will make us independent."
Podge turned to Duff Salter.
"How kind of you!" she said. "Yet it frightens me the more. These surprises, tender as they are, excite me. Everything about you is mysterious. You are not even deaf as you were. ”

“ Most men and women are forced to perform parts for which they have no qualifications. Our Guildensterns play Hamlet for us, and our Hamlets have to jest like Prince Hal. The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast.
Suddenly Mr. Podgers entered the room. When he saw Lord Arthur he started, and his coarse, fat face became a sort of greenish-yellow colour. The two men’s eyes met, and for a moment there was silence.
‘The Duchess has left one of her gloves here, Lord Arthur, and has asked me to bring it to her,’ said Mr. Podgers finally. ‘Ah, I see it on the sofa! ”

“ Podmore enjoyed the ride amazingly. To escape for a few hours from the narrow labyrinths of Soho was good; to get into a little open country where grass and flowers were growing and blooming was better; and to see bright colour come to the children's cheeks and bright sparkles to their eyes was best of all. It was as Mr. Podmore said, a treat for them. The wives had brought sandwiches and bread-and-butter with them, and water in ginger-beer bottles. (Gribble junior, outside the coach, had two bottles filled with beer--four-penny ale--which he and the driver drank and enjoyed.) ”

“ Later, his prejudice against trotting in the bush removed by stern measures, King Lightfoot flashed up the track like a meteor, with his furious rider determined to show something of what his steed could do. By that time Poddy was once more unsaddled, and was standing under a tree with his weary nose drooping earthwards, so that the crowd merely yelled with laughter anew, while the stewards unfeelingly requested the Melbourne man to get off the track. ”

“ He winked, and both the gentlemen laughed as if much humor underlay the remark.
"I will now proceed to put on our little private identification mark," continued Podmore with an air of having thought of everything, and he made a triangular scratch on one end of the satchel with his pocket-knife.
"Good Lord, Pod!" exclaimed the financier with a laugh. "Is it necessary to have all this fuss over this thing?"
"Take all the chances you like when you're by your lonesome, old man; but you don't do it when I'm with you," said Mr. Hugh Podmore, smilingly unperturbed by ridicule. ”

“ You cured me of years of suspicion, and I consented to hear again. The world grew candid to me; its sounds were melodious, its silence was sincere. It is you who are deaf. You cannot hear my heart."
"I hear no other's, at least," said Podge. "Tell me the story of your strange deceit."
They drew chairs upon the lawn. Podge took off [Pg 271] her bonnet and looked very delicate as her color rose and faded alternately in the emotions of one wooed in earnest and uncertain of her fate.
"I have not come by money without hard labor," said the hale and handsome man. ”

“ Even in the deep woods they could see that the light was growing very strong. The sun would be up, now, any time. At a little brook running beneath the road, they paused for a drink and a wash, which served the double purpose of refreshing them and removing Pod's anilin rash.
"Quick convalescence, eh?" smiled Ben, as they once more set forward and turned into a cross-road leading over the hills to Rawlins.
"Surest thing you know!" assented Pod. "Nobody could stay sick long, with your patent get-there line o' remedies." ”

“ Somewhat stouter, redder of face, more piggy of eye, with more decided whiskers, but still Madame Podvin.
She busied herself behind the zinc washing glasses, occasionally glancing at the men in the corner, smiling upon the inebriated camelots, and now and then casting a suspicious eye upon the quiet old gentleman behind his beer. ”

“ Mrs Podmore’s requirements were high, and she demanded an amount of virtue and industry from the genus girl which very few specimens of that class were able to maintain for more than a twelvemonth at a stretch. Either the girl was saucy, and ‘answered’ when Mrs. Podmore reproved her; or she was slovenly, and left the flue in the corners of the rooms; or she was that fearful animal, a breaker, and heralded her approach by a crash of dropped crockery, or a shiver of smashed glass. ”

“ Podmore, upon whose ears the old man's gentle voice falls so soothingly that the soft sleep-murmurs take more complete possession of him; he sways forward in his chair, and is on the point of falling to the ground on his face, when he recovers himself by a sudden convulsive movement. ”

“ Podington, “that is the ten-forty, up.”
“Does it come near here?” asked Mr. Buller, nervously. “Does it go over that bridge?”
“Yes,” said Podington, “but it can’t hurt us, for our road goes under the bridge; we are perfectly safe; there is no risk of accident.”
“But your horse! Your horse!” exclaimed Buller, as the train came nearer and nearer. “What will he do?”
“Do?” said Podington; “he’ll do what he is doing now; he doesn’t mind trains.”
“But look here, William,” exclaimed Buller, “it will get there just as we do; no horse could stand a roaring up in the air like that!” ”

“ Podmore unhesitatingly replied, "She've nothing fit to be seen, ma'am," which shows how differently the same things appear in different circumstances.
Podmore was a good friend to Madam Liberality. She had that open-handed spirit which one acquires quite naturally in a house where everything goes on on a large scale, at somebody else's expense. Now Madam Liberality's godmother, from the very largeness of her possessions, was obliged to leave the care of them to others, in such matters as food, dress, the gardens, the stables, etc. ”

“ Ponderbury important? If being the most pestiferous old busybody in London, and badgering everybody to be made a peer for it, is being important, then he is important. He pesters my life out, since I'm one of the people who look after the party rewards. I get hundreds of letters from him, and he's always forcing himself on me here and everywhere. I wish to heavens the anarchists would blow him up|”
He had cleared my mind of the last bit of uneasiness about the hieroglyphics; but I decided to back Ponderbury to get his peerage every time I got the chance. ”

“ Peter smiled sadly. “How are Mrs. Podds and the children?” he asked kindly.
“What is a family at such a moment?” shrieked Podds.
“The world is my family. I love the whole world, and I’m going to revolutionize it. I’m going to give every man his rights. The gutters shall reek with blood, and every plutocrat’s castle shall be levelled to the soil. But I’ll spare you, for though you are one of the classes, it’s your ignorance, not your disposition, that makes you one. Get away from here. Get away before it’s too late.” ”

“ His nose was a pure specimen of a pug, and his short scrubby hair was of a colour sufficiently pronounced to earn him the nickname of "Carotty Pod" from sundry irreverent small boys of his acquaintance. His nose and his hair notwithstanding, Pod was a keen, bright-looking lad, with an air of shrewdness and decision about him by no means common in one of his age.
"Awfully dry reading--the Times," muttered Pod, tossing the paper on Mr. Kelvin's desk. "Only one suicide, and not a single murder in it. It's not worth buying. ”

“ Here the Honest Abe smiled abstractedly out of the window, and says he:
"She did get well, too, and lived to suffer often again for Podger's sake: You see," says the Honest Abe, turning suddenly upon the political chap, as though he had not seen him before,—"you see, Mrs. Podger had been so much in the habit of suffering everything for my friend Podger's sake, that when she spoke of suffering even for the noblest cause, he naturally thought she was only calling names. And that's the way," says the Honest Abe, cheerfully, "that's the way with your Democratic Organization. ”

“ The sherry and biscuits were still being discussed when Mr. Podger, the undertaker, arrived, a broad, cheerfully sorrowful, clean-shaven little man, accompanied by a melancholy-faced assistant. He conversed for a time with Johnson in the passage outside; the sense of his business stilled the rising waves of chatter and carried off everyone’s attention in the wake of his heavy footsteps to the room above.
IV
Things crowded upon Mr. Polly. Everyone, he noticed, took sherry with a solemn avidity, and a small portion even was administered sacramentally to the Punt boy. ”

“ Podge Byerly took the note and found in a woman's handwriting these words:
"Mr. Duff Salter, I suppose you know where you are. Your hostesses are very insinuating and artful—and what else, you can find out! One man has been murdered in that family; another has disappeared. They say in Kensington the house of Zane is haunted.
"A Warner."
Podge read the note, and her tears dropped upon it. He moved forward as if to speak to her, but correcting himself hastily, he wrote upon the tablets:
"Not even a suspicious person is affected the least by an anonymous letter. ”

“ On our way to the hotel a little girl, walking with her papa, expressed the wish to ride on my back. Pod overheard her, and jumping off, placed the little one in the saddle, and led me down the street.
Pod is never safe without a chaperone. He had no more than got his land legs than a monstrous colored woman, whose avoirdupois was out of proportion to her energy, and with shoes that made him keep his distance, stepped in his way, and with a grin half the width of an adult watermelon asked him if he was "shully dat wonderful traveler Pye-tag-o-rastus w'at was chasin' a mule roun de world." ”

“ No fuss or fury about Hugh Podmore in time of stress. It was Podmore's way to turn calm and cold and calculating in proportion to the extent to which any given crisis disturbed him. The news which had reached him over the 'phone from the incoherent Alderson had been grave enough ”

“ He let go the tiller. It was of no use to him.
“William,” he cried, “let us jump out the next time we are near enough to shore!”
“Don’t do that! Don’t do that!” replied Podington. “Don’t jump out in a runaway; that is the way to get hurt. Stick to your seat, my boy; he can’t keep this up much longer. He’ll lose his wind!”
Mr. Podington was greatly excited, but he was not frightened, as Buller was. He had been in a runaway before, and he could not help thinking how much better a wagon was than a boat in such a case. ”