Chapter Seven

The Mudroom of Evil Tidings

Protruding from the house like lanced boils, and bounded by walls and topiaries and hedges and borders of every shape and size, were the various and sundry ornamental gardens laid out by the general’s older sister, Dame Hortensia Hunnibee, DBE, widow of the sickly Baron Harribal Hunnibee, KBE, who may or may not have evaporated under mysterious circumstances on his wedding night in the Bois du Boulogne. The redoubtable Dame Hortensia (who never allowed just anyone to address her as Mary Ellen, her baptismal name) had, like her brother, firm convictions when it came to gardens. The General may have planted his vegetables according to the principles of the well-ordered parade ground, a campaign he completed, save for thrice daily inspections, without ever having to leave his study, but Dame Hortensia (who had received her Damery for services rendered for the Promotion of Sound Intestinal Flora within members of Her Majesty’s Household Cavalry during the Boar War) had even firmer ideas when it came to the etiquette governing an acceptable jardin de fleurs. She was a firm believer in the healing powers of colours and, quite naturally, in the gastric benefits of a well-ordered society. “Common flowers in common hues,” she would trumpet, “shall not be tolerated.” While she never went so far as to actually take the brush in hand and paint her roses (in the manner of Lewis Carroll’s ‘Red Queen’, considered the epitome of womanhood by Dame Hortensia), she did take great pains to ensure that no two colours or textures were combined in an unfortunate manner, and that her costume du moment always agreed with the garden in which she found herself. Roses curried special favour with her, but she did find a certain grim satisfaction, not to say glee, in her successful attempts at cross-pollination in the herbaceous borders and cucumber frames.

Lady Penelope, her sister-in-law, had little say when it came to the creation and management of the garden. Whether she might have, had the circumstances been different, is hard to say. As it was, the question never arose; during the entire twelve seasons it took to design and plant the horticultural masterpiece, The General’s Gentle Wife was confined to her dressing room. On the morning the first consignment of slurry was laid down, Lady Penelope’s Ivory and Mother-of-Pearl Door slammed with an unexpected ‘bang’, due to a series of mysterious draughts throughout the house that season, draughts which had been inspired by the arrival of Dame Hortensia and her cat (the late ‘Colonel Flavius Aurelius Bossington-ffiend’, who lived in a glass dome with fourteen stuffed canaries and the decayed remains of the pigeon he was eating when he choked to death). The unannounced slamming affected Lady Penelope’s sensibilities, and for many years she quite forgot where the door was, what its function was, or even what the handle looked like.

But that was then and this is much later. The second-best family dining room, in which Miss Havering Ma’am now lived and breathed and conducted her affairs, protruded from the rear of the west wing, its splendidly gothic bays opening on to what had been intended as a graceful terrazzo in the Palladian tradition, overlooking a small, artificial lake. Due, however, to the over abundance of slate, oppressively gloomy weather and exuberantly gothic features (“one simply cannot have too many gargoyles or too much stained glass!”) it was more reminiscent of a Dickensian orphanage or abattoir, and had been known to frighten the ears off small children. Nonetheless, no amount of discouragement on the part of minor mortals and their anatomical problems would alter the present chatelaine’s opinion of its aspect in the least. “It is, to me, a most pleasing outlook, perhaps the most pleasing ever created by Man or God!”

It was off the left-hand bay window of this room that Miss Havering constructed her new mudroom. “What a delightful little vestibule I have erected!” she tootled. “And so convenient to both the kitchen gardens and the florabundae (the fact that she had a weak grasp on the rudiments of Latin never discouraged her from its usage, which she considered the right and duty of her class).

The mudroom, in all its medieval opulence and inquisitional splendour, immediately became home to a substantial variety of miscellaneous coats and shawls and jackets and bits and bobs of garden implements, as well as a selection from Miss Havering Ma’am’s collection of whips. In one corner, in a spot closest to the door, was a small rectangle of rush matting, formerly part of the nursery floor covering. This bristly, but completely innocent-looking oblong of horsehair and porcupine quills and nettles (“SO good for the feet of naughty children”) had been rescued from The Great Nursery Fire of 1905, at which point it was cut up into little bits. Much of it had been destined for the hen house, though certain fragments (those portions less singed and smelling of brimstone) were installed in The New Mudroom as the permanent home of Miss Havering Ma’am’s garden foot ware, and especially her detestable Gumboots (known throughout The Bog as the terrible, terrible sisters Welliffomething-ffomething, the hideous Muffin and the shy and retiring Wambledy-Jane).

The very morning Owld Misther Bucket unaccountably sprung his many unfortunate leaks, the terrible sisters were nestled in their corner of the mud room, as was their wont, pretending to sleep, snoring away with awful ferocity, and in general getting up to no end of mischief in their daydreams. Neither of them was as young as she once was, and after a lifetime of slopping through mucky places and being rudely inconsiderate when it came to the exact direction and location of their troddings, neither of them much relished the thought of, once again, having to get out of bed.

“Let the world come to us for a change, if it desires our delicate ministrations,” was their considered opinion, voiced loudly and every time they were asked to move. Their complaints to the contrary, however, being who they were: older than the hills and smelling of all manner of rancidity and foulness (surpassing even Miss Havering in their personal Factor), they were bothered as little as possible. After all, who in his or her right mind chooses bad-tempered and ill-mannered gumboots as boon companions for a moonlight stroll? Unfortunately (as they saw it), this particular day promised to be one on which they would be bothered, and bothered a great deal. They were going to be obliged to “Walk Out of Doors!” How they wished they could simply run away and hide! However, since neither of them were able to move very fast of their own accord (except, perhaps, to topple over), such an escape was out of the question. As always, Muffin and Wambledy-Jane Welliffomething-ffomething were at the mercy of destiny, and not even screaming would help (‘their destiny’ was routinely offended by their vocalisms, and was accustomed to beating them soundly, often without just cause). Truly, on days such as this, it was not in the least surprising that the terrible, smelly, mouldy sisters welliffomething-ffomething were possessed of dispositions evil, foul and mostly vile.

Their suspicions that the forthcoming day was about to be bothersome and inexcusably tedious had first been aroused when they heard the horrid shuffling scuffles approaching the mudroom, noises to which various bangings and clangings and rude mutterings were appended. It was an all-too familiar cacophony, and one which inevitably arose three minutes before they were to be terribly inconvenienced (and without so much as a “by your leave”).

“Oh, piffle!” they said in unison (only using a much more unattractive word). “Why on earth haven’t we sprouted feet of our own? Why can’t we simply try a little harder? If we try hard enough, we should be the most trying sisters in the county, and no one would bother us again. Just think of all the bother we should have missed!” To which Wambledy-Jane, ever wistful as usual, added, “We was dreaming just now of the cream tea we might have et in an hour or three, but now we shall be forced to starve!…”

… at which point they both broke into song.

The Lament of The Angry Gumboots


A cream tea we be craving, it’s what we really want,
Instead we will be starving, just like a ellipffunt.

We hates them garden flowurs,

They is not very nice.

But what are we to do wiv them

Wiv ears stuffed full of rice.

Ommmm Ommmm Ommmm.

Mmmmmm...

Mud is in our noses,

Filling up our gums,

The rats they eats our clotheses,

And cats they smell like bums.

Rain is wet and stupid

Choclit drives you mad,

Your mother wets her pinny,

Your father is a cad.

Ommmm Ommmm Ommmm

Mmmmmm...

I love my little toesis,

They’re good with damson jam.

One brother’s made of relish,

The other’s made of ham.

I miss my little nosey,

It was so very nice,

A jar of purple posey,

Got eaten by the mice.

Ommmm Ommmm Ommmm…

Mmmmmm...


After which they forgot the words and became even more depressed.


Less than a minute later, the beleaguered but completely evil sisters (welliffomething-ffomething, lest you forget) were overcome by the certain dread that they were to be trod upon. And since this was not the first time this had happened, they knew what this meant: their ancient noses and mouths would be utterly and completely clogged up with foul mud, oozings and all manner of bad things.

It should here be explained that the vile sisters welliffonething-ffomething, brutish Muffin and whiny Wambledy-Jane, were always sent into a dithersome panic at the first hint of rain. All it took was a certain squeak from the auld barometer hanging on the wall above their bed and their tempers would drop at the exact same rate as the needle. It was a miracle of nature, but there is it was! Rain was an enemy; rain was the enemy. It made their lives a misery, and had always done so ever since they young and shiny and called each other ‘gels’. As far as they were concerned, the barometer was entirely to blame for everything which ailed the world, their world (the other world not counting for much, except, perhaps, for the miseries it brought into their lives). But in reality, of course, the barometer, itself, was quite as much a victim as they were, being totally at the mercy of the squeak. Without this abomination in the eyes of potatoes, the needle in the barometer would not know when to drop; without the needle dropping, the clouds would not know when to come back from their holidays and ruin the first beautiful, sunny day in months. Without having their holidays so rudely interrupted, the clouds would not be inclined to throw an unpleasant and unnecessary temper tantrum. Without the snitty temper tantrum, they wouldn’t bawl and bawl and bawl and over-flow their baths. Without the baths slopping over the sides with such enthusiasm, the bathrooms wouldn’t flood. Without the bathrooms flooding and threatening to drown the cats, the clouds wouldn’t have to open the trap doors under their bottoms to let the water out. It was all very complicated, and required a rigorous scientific training if one wanted to desire a satisfactory understanding of the problem, but the upshot was that the squeak led to rain, and that was as clear as the nose on your face. And RAIN, as far as the evil sisters welliffomething-ffomething were concerned, meant one thing and one thing only, and that was that they would be dragged from their quiet bed in the corner of the mudroom and forced quite against their will to go out of doors. And once there, they would be obliged, not only to miss their tea, but to inconvenience the mud (already upset by the torrential rain, and by the rivulets getting into its eyes, smearing its makeup, playing havoc with its pores and making its nose itch in an unbearable manner). So you see, the sisters’ appalling manners were not entirely of their own doing. At heart and left to their own devices, they might have been quite genial and, in their small way, effervescent. As it was, however, they had no devices of any kind. They had only those awful, dreadful, sausagey things, which unfailingly sought them out and attacked their innards from without. Massive, gnarled, horrible, terrible, unspeakable, pushy, heavy Footie Smell Engines coming down from above and filling them up and shoving them around, making them go places they didn’t want to go, keeping them from their lovely afternoon jam roly-poly and their nap. Forcing them to walk in the most frightening and filthy sludge puds. And not even asking permission or saying so much as “how’d’ya do?”

The sisters, being ill-educated and possessing poor insight, were not altogether sure what these Footie Smell Engines were, or even what they wanted. It was, you see, so very difficult to see upwards when one’s eyes were pointed downwards and in the opposite direction. However, there had been a time many years before, when their much-blighted mother, Mimsy Riding Boot, had actually seen one the monsters from afar, and had even caught sight of the Horrible, Horrible Miss Havering Mountain Monster that drove them. Until her dying day - (and hadn’t it been the mountain, itself, which had plucked her up and flung her over the high wall into the mysterious black pond of effluvium, that unknown and much-feared place from which no one had ever returned?) - Mimsy Riding Boot, in her nightmares, had screamed and moaned and whimpered about dark green and mouldy encasements, called for some mysterious reason, ‘socks’, which were woven from wool, thick and scratchy and never washed on pain of death. These encasements (for that is what they were) had nubbly ends protruding out the front. Sharp shovers with sharp pointy points oozing cheese and unpleasantness. Toes and Bunions is what they were called official-like, only the victimised boots didn’t know what they were or what they were called that or why they existed. All they knew is that they were horrible and hard lumpy things, mostly with coarse hair sticking out of the woolly encasements. Mimsy’s glimpse, the day she caught it, occurred one accursed afternoon when she was facing backwards, and had her eyes facing the mountain monster as it lumbered across the mudroom in her direction. At that moment, she had understood what the word ‘disagreeable’ meant.

But there it was. There was nothing the vile sisters welliffomething-ffomething could do about any of it, a situation which had made them perpetually cross and more determined than ever to show their displeasure to the world.

One tiny squeak and the mudroom would fill with evil portents, with moans and groans and snivellings and coughings from the unseen mountain and her gigantic clomping smell engines. The vile sisters would shortly be yanked untimely from their cosy corner rectangle of rush matting. And in a nonce there would follow additional, even more terrible, heavings and grumblings from the Unseeable Miss Havering Mountain, after which massive, great weights (the horrible horrible Smell Engines) were clomped down upon the insides of their heads. As always, the first to be attacked in this way would be Muffin (being the eldest and most infirm, it was unlikely the poor dear could escape, was it? Besides which she was a natural born leader). Poor Wambledy-Jane would be next, but then she would be, wouldn’t she, what with having an American father and being more than uncommonly slow-witted?

Following this mayhem, but quite before the sisters had got their bearings, the outer door into the garden would open with its usual scraping, grinding sound…

Skreeeek…
…and the two sisters would be forced to shuffle out the door, their innards full to overflowing with the ancient, bloaty feet and narsty Smell Engines of Miss Havering Ma’am.

Skreeeek…
… it went, and it was enough to turn your nose to butter.


Copyright 2007 JA Weeks