Tea & Antipathy Read Free

here’s your clothesline,” she said, trying to open a door with five or six burglar-proof locks on it.
    â€œWe won’t need that,” I said. “We’ll take the clothes to the launderette.”
    â€œOh, there’s one ever so near,” Mrs. Stackpole cried happily. “It won’t be difficult for you at all.” She moved rapidly back down the hall to the playroom with the blue linoleum floor. “And here are all my children’s playthings,” she said, allowing us to see a blackboard, a rocking horse, a little desk, several touching crayon drawings of crooked houses and lopsided ladies, and a cupboard stuffed with teddy bears. “They’re all ever so precious to them, so you
will
just keep this door closed, won’t you, and not let anyone use it? It’s just their precious little bits.”
    I could feel my smile stiffening again. It’s just their precious little bits, I said to myself, keep your shirt on. Later on, when Eric became frightened by Hamlet’s uncle and refused to stay upstairs alone, he kept creeping into the playroom and nearly drove us crazy playing “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer” over and over on Mrs. Stackpole’s children’s precious little phonograph which had a straight pin in it instead of a needle. In addition, he wrote “Ringo” in a wavering hand on the upper left-hand corner of the blackboard and we allowed the desecration to remain.
    Before we left the nether regions, Mrs. Stackpole mentioned that she had locked all
her
precious bits and pieces in the “cupboard,” which proved to be the kitchen pantry. “So you won’t have to be bothered with looking after them,” she explained. “But you can quite easily keep all your groceries and things in here,” she went on, leading us back down the passage toward the laundry room again, and opening a door beneath the stairsto reveal a damp darkness, in the depths of which we could distinctly hear the scurrying of many startled little feet. “That will work out quite well for you,” Mrs. Stackpole said, beaming at me.
    We followed her upstairs to the bathroom on the landing to discuss the linen, Mrs. Stackpole remaining ebullient and persistently pleasant as she explained to us why she had left only two sheets for our bed. “If I leave you the other two I own, I won’t have any clean ones when I get back.”
    Neither of us understood this, but we both pretended we did. I kept nodding and smiling.
    â€œI’ve bought nylon sheets for the children’s beds,” she told us, aspirating the final syllable of “nylon” in the French way, “and here are your four towels. I’m afraid they’re all I have for you.”
    Still nodding and smiling, we descended to the living room or drawing room or whatever it was.
    â€œBy the way,” Mrs. Stackpole said, “Miss Pip, the young lady who is renting the top floor in the autumn, has asked permission to bring in a few things one afternoon. Is that all right?”
    I nodded, smiling.
    â€œPlease tell me if it isn’t,” Mrs. Stackpole said earnestly, leaning toward me in her solicitous way, “because it can quite easily be put off until you are out of the house.”
    â€œOh, it’s perfectly all right,” I said. “One afternoon?”
    â€œOh, just one afternoon,” Mrs. Stackpole said. “Is that all right?”
    â€œCertainly,” Jordan said.
    â€œYou’re sure?”
    We were sure.
    â€œAnd I’ve left six or seven vases in the back lavatory,” she said. “It seems a lot, but one never knows, one frequently needs many vases.”
    â€œOh yes,” I said. “I do like my vases.”
    â€œHere is a list of things—grocers who will deliver, laundries, things of that sort.”
    She produced more papers.
    â€œPlumbers… And Mrs. Grail will be here tomorrow. She’s