Read Online The Lily Hand and Other Stories by Ellis Peters - Free Book Online
Authors: Ellis Peters
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from the last industrial boom, who had any money to be philanthropic with, and if he wanted a brass band, and a horticultural society, and a few other local activities to lord it over, he had to provide the money for âem.
The band was his favourite good work, it gave him more scope than the other groups. Plenty of kids used to come along at one time, keen as mustard to follow in fatherâs footsteps, because ours is a district with a band tradition. Broke their innocent hearts, Eb Langley did. Iâm not saying he wasnât a good musician, he was, but he liked nothing better than tyrannizing over all the lot of us, letting fly like a wild man if we made a bit of a mistake in practice, and sarcastic â you wouldnât believe! Had all the youngsters scared to blow at all, and all of a shiver if he looked at âem. I should never had stuck it myself, those few months after I started, if it hadnât been for Nora Weatherly. She was only seventeen, and so was I, but we knew our own minds before we left school, and I was set on getting in with her old man, so I put up with Ebâs bullying better than most. But if you hadnât got a reason as good as mine, you broke down and slunk out after a few weeks of it.
Lije was the only one who used to treat his lordship with disrespect. After Ebâs worst outbursts thereâd be a sudden blast from Lijeâs double-B, right out of the cellar, and even the kid whoâd just been chewed to pulp would venture a feeble grin, and begin to get his colour back.
But there wasnât much we could do about Eb, really. Heâd had twenty years to get everything well into his own hands. We used to meet in the clubroom at the Black Horse, which was the pub heâd bought after he sold out his dog-hole collieries to the National Coal Board. There wasnât another suitable room in the place, and heâd never charged the band rent for using it â I reckon he got value for his money making us that much more beholden to him. And then there were the instruments. Only a few of the old ones had turned up again after the ten-year interval caused by the war, and the rest heâd provided out of his own pocket; times without number, when we were in funds, someone would suggest that we pay off the debt, and heâd never take it. Oh, dear me, no, a pity if he couldnât help us to a few instruments, and the band his only pleasure! It suited him fine to have us obliged to him still. We should have known! As if he ever gave anything away without being sure he could get back ten times the value some other way! Why, his poor wife hadnât had a new coat for years, and he grudged his lorry drivers a ten-minute break on the road in a four-hour journey!
He got worse as he grew older. They do. We didnât all say it, like Lije, but we were all mighty relieved when he took to his bed, especially when weeks went on with me deputizing, and it began to look as though he wouldnât be coming back. He was better, heâd reached the stage of getting up and thumping about his front bedroom at the Black Horse, and you could hear him roaring at his wife halfway down the High Street. But heâd grown monstrously fat and heavy during the time he was lying up, and his heart wouldnât be responsible for the consequences if he started running about the town again, and finally he had to resign.
Then he comforted himself with thinking how we should go to pieces without him, and if we had heâd have been happy. I didnât know as much about conducting as he did, but I knew more about how to get on with folks, and I was learning the rest as fast as I could. When he heard we were doing well, his bile rose so there was no living with him. He used to spend his days lying in the window of his front bedroom, keeping an eye on everything that went on in the street, and interfering as much as he could with all of it. Looked like a great fat toad, only
The band was his favourite good work, it gave him more scope than the other groups. Plenty of kids used to come along at one time, keen as mustard to follow in fatherâs footsteps, because ours is a district with a band tradition. Broke their innocent hearts, Eb Langley did. Iâm not saying he wasnât a good musician, he was, but he liked nothing better than tyrannizing over all the lot of us, letting fly like a wild man if we made a bit of a mistake in practice, and sarcastic â you wouldnât believe! Had all the youngsters scared to blow at all, and all of a shiver if he looked at âem. I should never had stuck it myself, those few months after I started, if it hadnât been for Nora Weatherly. She was only seventeen, and so was I, but we knew our own minds before we left school, and I was set on getting in with her old man, so I put up with Ebâs bullying better than most. But if you hadnât got a reason as good as mine, you broke down and slunk out after a few weeks of it.
Lije was the only one who used to treat his lordship with disrespect. After Ebâs worst outbursts thereâd be a sudden blast from Lijeâs double-B, right out of the cellar, and even the kid whoâd just been chewed to pulp would venture a feeble grin, and begin to get his colour back.
But there wasnât much we could do about Eb, really. Heâd had twenty years to get everything well into his own hands. We used to meet in the clubroom at the Black Horse, which was the pub heâd bought after he sold out his dog-hole collieries to the National Coal Board. There wasnât another suitable room in the place, and heâd never charged the band rent for using it â I reckon he got value for his money making us that much more beholden to him. And then there were the instruments. Only a few of the old ones had turned up again after the ten-year interval caused by the war, and the rest heâd provided out of his own pocket; times without number, when we were in funds, someone would suggest that we pay off the debt, and heâd never take it. Oh, dear me, no, a pity if he couldnât help us to a few instruments, and the band his only pleasure! It suited him fine to have us obliged to him still. We should have known! As if he ever gave anything away without being sure he could get back ten times the value some other way! Why, his poor wife hadnât had a new coat for years, and he grudged his lorry drivers a ten-minute break on the road in a four-hour journey!
He got worse as he grew older. They do. We didnât all say it, like Lije, but we were all mighty relieved when he took to his bed, especially when weeks went on with me deputizing, and it began to look as though he wouldnât be coming back. He was better, heâd reached the stage of getting up and thumping about his front bedroom at the Black Horse, and you could hear him roaring at his wife halfway down the High Street. But heâd grown monstrously fat and heavy during the time he was lying up, and his heart wouldnât be responsible for the consequences if he started running about the town again, and finally he had to resign.
Then he comforted himself with thinking how we should go to pieces without him, and if we had heâd have been happy. I didnât know as much about conducting as he did, but I knew more about how to get on with folks, and I was learning the rest as fast as I could. When he heard we were doing well, his bile rose so there was no living with him. He used to spend his days lying in the window of his front bedroom, keeping an eye on everything that went on in the street, and interfering as much as he could with all of it. Looked like a great fat toad, only
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