My uncle wouldn't bear of Tosh or Porker. He wanted a
humorous name--a name he could roll lovingly round his tongue--a
name expressing a sort of humorous contempt--Wurzel-Flummery! I
can see now the happy ruminating smile which carne so often on my
Uncle Antony's face in those latter months. He was thinking of his
two Wurzel-Flummerys. I remember him saying once--it was at the
Zoo--what a pity it was he hadn't enough to divide among the whole
Cabinet. A whole bunch of Wurzel-Flummerys; it would have been
rather jolly.
CRAWSHAW. You force me to say, sir, that if _that_ was the way you
and your uncle used to talk together at his death can only be
described as a merciful intervention of Providence.
CLIFTON. Oh, but I think he must be enjoying all this somewhere,
you know. I hope he is. He would have loved this morning. It was
his one regret that from the necessities of the case he could not
live to enjoy his own joke; but he had hopes that echoes of it
would reach him wherever he might be. It was with some such idea, I
fancy, that toward the end he became interested in spiritualism.
CRAWSHAW (rising solemnly). Mr. Clifton, I have no interest in the
present whereabouts of your uncle, nor in what means he has of
overhearing a private conversation between you and myself. But if,
as you irreverently suggest, he is listening to us, I should like
him to hear this.
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