The House Opposite. J. Farjeon Jefferson

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       3

       Ben Accepts a Job

      SHOCKS have an inconsiderate habit of getting you both ways. If you expect a parson and receive a cannibal, or if you expect an Indian and receive a beautiful girl, the world spins round, just the same. What you really need is a nice quiet life, with breakfast, dinner and tea, and ordinary things in between.

      The beautiful girl who provided Ben with his present shock, and made him go all weak like, seemed quite as surprised to see Ben as he was to see her. There was, at least, equality of emotion, and that was something. Moreover, as he stared at her with mouth wide open (Ben never did his mouth by halves) and an exhibition of teeth that could not hold their own beside those she herself displayed, he began to discover certain other compensations in the situation. Item, her eyes. They really were rather a knock-out. The kind of eyes that made you feel sort of … Item, her hair. You couldn’t see much of it because of the natty little helmet hat she was wearing, but what you could see was good. Item, her nose. Now there was a nose fit for anybody! Item, her mouth, and the teeth that put Ben’s incomplete army in the shade … Yes, as he stared at her and she, framed in the doorway, stared back, he realised that the world could spin quite agreeably.

      Still, one couldn’t stand staring all one’s life! What was she doing here? But it was the girl who recovered first and opened the attack.

      ‘Who are you?’ she demanded.

      Ben spent half his life telling inquisitive people who he was, and he had a large assortage of answers. He had confessed to being everybody under the sun, from Lloyd George to Tom Thumb. But he did not think in the present circumstances he could improve on the answer he had given to his two other callers, so he murmured: ‘Caretaker, miss.’ And hoped for the best.

      ‘What—are you the caretaker of this house?’ exclaimed the girl, with unflattering incredulity.

      ‘That’s right,’ blinked Ben. ‘No. 29 Jowle Street.’

      He would prove he knew the number, anyway.

      ‘I see—it’s to let,’ said the girl slowly.

      ‘Yus,’ nodded Ben solemnly. ‘But you better not tike it.’

      ‘Why not?’

      ‘Carn’t yer see? Comin’ ter bits. Look at that there plarster!’

      He pointed to the ceiling. The girl smiled. Yes, her teeth were winners, and no mistake! Like rows of little gravestones. Noo ones, o’ corse …

      ‘If you’re really the caretaker here,’ she observed, ‘you’re not doing your duty very well. You oughtn’t to run the place down.’

      ‘It don’t need me to,’ retorted Ben. ‘It does it itself.’

      ‘I—I suppose you really are the caretaker?’

      Ben looked uncomfortable. He hated having to repeat things.

      ‘Why not?’ he hedged. ‘Come ter that, miss, one might arsk ’oo you was, comin’ in like this?’

      ‘One might,’ she agreed, without hesitation.

      ‘Yus—and torkin’ o’ that—’ow did yer come in?’ inquired Ben suddenly.

      ‘I came in through an open window at the back,’ she responded. ‘Like you.’

      ‘Like me?’

      ‘Yes.’

      Ben capitulated.

      ‘Oh, orl right,’ he grunted. ‘But it’s fifty-fifty, so we ain’t got nothin’ on each hother.’

      ‘No,’ smiled the girl. ‘We both came in to get out of the rain!’

      ‘Oh rainin’, is it?’ murmured Ben. ‘Well, that’s an idea.’

      Yes, it was an idea for him. But was it an idea for her? He regarded her dubiously, and an uneasy suspicion came into his mind that she wasn’t playing fair. She had caught him up in a fib—made him admit it—and it looked as though she were fibbing herself!

      Still, p’r’aps it didn’t matter. It really wasn’t Ben’s affair, and there is something human about a fib, so long as it doesn’t hurt you. What mattered was that she was here and he was here, and the sooner they both cleared out, the better.

      ‘Well, tike my advice, miss,’ said Ben, returning to first principles, ‘and git aht agin, like I’m goin’ ter.’

      ‘But the rain—’ she began.

      Unceremoniously, he waved her down.

      ‘Yus, I knows orl abart that, miss,’ he interposed; ‘but I knows somethin’ helse, as well.’

      ‘What?’

      ‘Why, that fer orl the rine, yer more likely ter catch something’ in ’ere than aht there.’

      Now the girl frowned.

      ‘I wish you wouldn’t be so mysterious,’ she exclaimed. ‘Won’t you tell me what you mean exactly?’

      ‘Well,’ answered Ben, after a pause, ‘I don’t wanter frighten yer, see, but this ’ouse ain’t ’ealthy.’

      ‘What makes you say that?’ Her voice was interested.

      ‘Creaks and things.’ He was evading the issue. He really didn’t want to frighten her. He knew what fright was. ‘You know. On the stairs. Cupboards and that. You know.’

      He wasn’t doing it very well.

      ‘I’m afraid I don’t know,’ replied the girl, her interest waning. ‘Creaks don’t worry me.’ Ben looked incredulous. ‘I don’t believe in ghosts. Still, if you do, you’d better go. I won’t keep you.’

      What? Him go, and her stay? All the manhood in him—and he had a spoonful—rebelled against the suggestion. What would he feel like tomorrow morning when he read in the headlines:

      EMPTY HOUSE MYSTERY

      BEAUTIFUL GIRL FOUND WITH

      THROAT CUT

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