Stubbens, her chauffeur, did not like honking.
“But if you’ve got one,” she used to insist.
Everything was geared to Mrs Musto’s orders.
“You boys care for a lift?” she would call when she had pulled Stubbens up. “By ghost, isn’t it hot, eh? Hot enough to burn the parson’s nose!”
Because she was so rich — Fairy Flour — it was accepted that Mrs Musto should speak so authentically. Her chauffeur Stubbens never turned a hair.
When you had wrenched the door open — Stubbens didn’t open doors for boys — and climbed pulling Arthur, somehow, up, it was coolly awful to sit beside Mrs Musto in her motor overwhelmed by her appurtenances: the green veil, which did not prevent her adding to her freckles, the too collapsible parasol, the alpaca cape, prayer-book, and smelling-salts, on longer journeys, it was said — though Waldo had never travelled far enough in Mrs Musto’s company — cold plum pudding and a bottle of port-wine.
When they were seated Mrs Musto would give her usual command: “Wind ’er up, Stubbens” — and to the objects of her kindness, as Stubbens wound and wound: “Hold yer ribs, boys, or he’ll crack a couple for yer!”
She loved perpetual motion, and clergymen, and presents — to give rather than receive, though one so rich as Mrs Musto naturally received a lot. She loved to eat rich food, surrounded by those who condescended to call her their friend, after which she would drop off in the middle of a sentence to revive burping in the middle of another. Music was her grandest passion, which did not prevent her snoring through it, but she could always be relied upon to applaud generously at the end. And sometimes she would organize tennis parties for those she referred to as the “youngsters”. Youngsters, Mrs Musto used to say, are my investment against old age.
Mrs Brown once remarked she hoped the market would not let Mrs Musto down.
But somehow Mother did not altogether care for Mrs Musto, who had “known about the Browns” in the beginning. She could not bear Mrs Musto’s kindness.
“Oh, but she is so kind!” Mother used to sigh. “One can’t deny it. I will not hear a word against the poor thing, though she is — one must face it — what I call a soloist.”
Certainly Mrs Musto loved to talk. In fact, talk was another of her grand passions.
“What are mouths given us for? Yairs, I know — food. Lovely, too. Within everybody’s reach in a country like Australia. Give me a good lump of corned beef, with a nice slice of yellow fat, and a boiled onion. Ooh, scrumptious! There are, of course, other things besides. But never forget one in remembering the other. As I said to the Archbishop, it doesn’t pay, never ever, not even an evangelical, to neglect the flesh altogether. The Archbishop was of my opinion. But She — She — She’s not only a poor doer, she’s clearly starving ’erself to make sure of a comfy passage to the other side. As I didn’t hesitate to tell ’er. But as I was saying — what was I saying? Conversation is the prime purpose this little slit was given us for — to communicate in words. We are told: in the beginning was the Word. Which sort of proves, don’t it?”
She had a snub nose you could look right up.
“In the beginning was what word?” Arthur asked, seated on that beaded stool, looking up Mrs Musto’s nose.
“Why,” she said, “the Word of God!”
“Oh,” said Arthur. “God.”
He might have started to argue, or at least to wonder aloud, but fortunately stopped short, lowering his thick eyelids as if to prevent others calculating the distance to which he had withdrawn.
Mother was holding her head on one side, smiling at something, not necessarily Mrs Musto. She had also turned slightly red. Waldo knew he was the only one of those present who understood the reason why, which made him contemptuous of other people’s stupidity, and proud of his alliance with Mother. He might even have admitted his father to their circle of enlightenment if Dad had walked in.
As it was too early, Waldo continued looking at Mother. He hadn’t quite the courage to laugh, but even so, felt delightfully unencumbered and superior.
All told, Ma Musto wasn’t such a bad stick. The timid protested that she bullied them. Certainly she bullied her men of God into preaching what she wished to hear. Nobody remembered her husband, or knew whether she had ordered him out of existence so that she might enjoy a breezy widowhood. On the other hand Mrs Musto was bullied by her maids and the chauffeur Stubbens who wouldn’t honk.
Stubbens had been a coachman, or groom, and the leggings moulded to his thick calves suggested horses still. He was an invariably surly man, who refused to hear visitors’ requests, and those of his mistress only on their becoming commands. He had trouble in breathing through one of his nostrils, which forced him to dilate it from time to time, which gave the impression that Stubbens was smelling a permanently bad smell. In spite of his shortcomings, ladies, the more forward ones, complimented Mrs Musto on her personable chauffeur. He was, too, in some way. His broad hands, resting on the wheel, had thickish fingers, the skin of which ended surprisingly cleanly round the nails.
“He was too long running with the horses to adapt himself to progress,” his mistress would explain, not always out of earshot, sometimes adding: “Though Stubbens will tell yer the trouble is he’s been too long runnin’ me.”
That the chauffeur did run Mrs Musto Waldo discovered by witnessing.
Mrs Musto had just dismissed that boy — the brighter of the two Browns — who had come with a note of thanks from his mother. Waldo was winding crunching round the gravel drive, when Stubbens came out of the house to where Mrs Musto had continued standing, under a cedar, on her perfect lawn. Stubbens was carrying a cardigan. He was wearing the leggings of his office, but for the first time, Waldo saw him without his cap, in his own crisp, startlingly silver, hair. He was certainly improved by hair.
But Mrs Musto had grown used to it, or seemed in no mood to be startled.
“Southerly’s come,” Stubbens announced.
“Oh,” she said, keeping her heavy back turned, tossing her head peevishly, more like a girl. “It isn’t cold,” she complained.
“Well, I brought yer woolly,” said Stubbens. “So put it on!”
And Mrs Musto did. She shrugged herself into the sleeves, without letting him touch her, though.
Mrs Musto would come out shrugging off the advice or accusations of her servants on the occasions when she entertained. There were the big shivoos with celebrities from Sydney, many of whom had forgotten they had met the hostess, there were the afternoons for local talent, and there were what she herself particularly enjoyed, her parties for “youngsters”, to one of which Waldo Brown was asked, only one and not another, not that Mrs Musto was fickle, she just had to press on. In any case, what was done was done, whether Mrs Musto realized or not, or Waldo himself, except later and in his sleep. (Awake, he only used to wonder whether Mrs M. would leave him a hundred pounds in her will.)
Anyway, Waldo was grateful she had issued the invitation with what appeared like thought and care. That was to say: in the holidays, on an afternoon during the week. Though on the morning of the day he didn’t know exactly what attitude to take.
“Oh, I shan’t worry,” said Arthur. “I’ve got my job, haven’t I? Mr Allwright depends on me.”
“Yes,” said Waldo.
“We have stock-taking,” Arthur added ostentatiously.