Page:The Strange Case of Miss Annie Spragg (1928).djvu/224

 embroidered in appropriately sombre colors by Amanda Winnery and long ago had turned faded and dusty. Bessie found them depressing. During the first few weeks, especially at those moments when the cheerful Mr. Winnery was not in the house, she was filled with a terrible desire to make a visit to the Pot and Pie. Alone in the depths of that mausoleum, her soul cried out for the companionship of Teena Bitts, Alf and 'Arry and old Mrs. Crumyss.

Then slowly, bit by bit, the presence of Amanda Winnery's virtuous ghost began to give way to the presence of the very living Bessie. The framed legends slowly disappeared, whither no one knew, and in their place appeared bright chromos purchased in Mile End Road and a great deal of brass work, for which Bessie developed a great taste. And last of all, a gramophone, a parrot, two canaries and a pair of white poodles made their appearance. She loved food and drink with a passion equalled only by that of Mr. Winnery and so they gave themselves over to a perpetual orgy of eating and drinking. She gracefully allowed her natural indolence to take possession of her, sometimes not troubling to dress until the evening, and each day she grew plumper and plumper and, to the taste of the old-fashioned Mr. Winnery, more desirable. Mr. Winnery beamed with happiness and for the first time in all his seventy years, life seemed to be what he had always believed that it should be. In his lodgings Mr. Blundon seemed to be content. She visited him three or four times weekly and his spells of drunkenness grew fewer and fewer. He