Cut and Come Again (20 page)

He shook the raindrops off his cap and kept saying in aristocratic tones: ‘Demn it. The bladdy weather,' and the old man kept speaking of him as Milk, while the boy sat in a corner, on an old harrow, taking no part in the conversation, but only watching and listening.

A moment or two later there were footsteps outside the hovel again, and in came a second man, a roadman, a large, horse-limbed man holding a sack round his shoulders like a cape. He moved with powerful languor, regarding the milkman with extreme contempt. He seemed almost to fill the hovel and he lounged and swaggered here and there as though it were his privilege to fill it.

‘The bladdy weather,' the milkman said.

‘We want it,' said the big man. It was like a challenge.

‘Who does?'

‘We do. Joe and me. More rain, less work. Ain't that it, Joe?'

‘That's it,' said the old man.

‘Be demned,' Milk said. ‘It hinders my work.'

‘Get up earlier,' said the big man. ‘Poor old Milk. All behind, like the cow's tail.'

The milkman was silent, but his face was curiously white, as though he were raging inwardly. It looked for a moment as though there must be a quarrel. And from the corner the boy watched in fascination, half hoping there would be.

Then, just as it seemed as if there would be a quarrel the big man spoke again.

‘Heard about Wag?' he said. ‘Wag Thompson.'

‘About Wag?' said the old man.

‘He's dead.'

‘Dead?' said Milk. ‘Dead? I see him this morning.'

‘You won't see him no more,' said the big man. ‘He's dead.'

The old man stared across the field, into the rain, half-vacantly, looking as though he did not know what to say or think, as though it were too strange and sudden to believe.

‘It's right,' the big man said. ‘He's dead.'

‘How?'

‘All of a pop. Dropped down.'

The men were silent, staring at the rain. It was still raining very fast outside and clay-coloured pools were beginning to form in the furrows. But strangely the larks were still singing. The men could hear them above the level hiss of the rain.

‘It whacks me,' the old man said. ‘Strong man like Wag.'

‘That's it,' Milk said. ‘He was too strong. Too strong and fat.'

‘Fat?' said the big man. ‘No fatter'n me. Not so fat.'

‘His face was too red. Too high-coloured.'

‘It's a licker,' said the big man.

He took a snuff-box from his waistcoat pocket,
flicked it open, and handed it first to the old man, then to Milk. In silence they took pinches of the snuff and then he took a pinch, the sweetish smell of the spilt snuff filling the hovel.

‘Rare boy for snuff,' said the big man. ‘Old Wag.'

‘Boy. I like that,' Milk said. ‘Must have been sixty.'

‘Over.'

For almost the first time the old man spoke.

‘Wag was sixty-five,' he said. ‘We went plough together. Boys, riding the for'ardest.'

He broke off suddenly, drawn back into memory. It was still raining very fast but the men seemed to have forgotten it. It was as though they could think of nothing but the dead man.

‘Ever see Wag a-fishing?' the big man said. ‘Beautiful.'

‘Times,' said the old man. ‘He was a don hand. A masterpiece. I bin with him. Shooting too. When we were kids once we shot a pike. It lay on the top o' the water and Wag let go at it. Young pike. I can see it now.'

‘And mushrooms,' Milk said. ‘You'd always see him with mushrooms.'

‘He could smell mushrooms. Made his living at it,' said the big man. ‘That and fishing, and singing.'

‘He
could
sing,' said the old man. ‘Ever hear him sing
On the Boat that First took me Over
?

‘I thought every minit

We should go slap up agin it.'

The old man broke off, tried to remember the rest of the words, but failed, and there was silence again.

In the corner the boy listened. And gradually, in his mind, he began to form a picture of a man he had never known, and had never even seen. It was
like a process of dreamy creation. Wag took shape in his mind slowly, but with the clarity of life. The boy began to feel attached to him. And as the image increased and deepened itself he felt as though he had known Wag, the plump, red-faced, mild-hearted man, the fisherman, the snuff taker and the singer, all his life. It affected him profoundly. He sat in a state of wonder. Until suddenly he could bear it no longer. He burst into tears. And the men, startled by the sound of them, gazed at him with profound astonishment.

‘Damned if that ain't a licker,' the big man said.

‘What's up with you? What're you crying for?'

‘Something frit him.'

‘What was it? Something fright you? What're you crying for?'

‘Nothing.'

‘What you think o' that? Nothing.'

‘Whose boy is it?'

‘Emma's. My daughter's. Here, what're you crying for?'

‘Nothing.'

‘He's tender-hearted. That's how kids are.'

‘Here, come, dry up. We've had enough rain a'ready. Come, come.'

And gradually, after a few tears, the boy stopped crying. Looking up through the film of his tears he saw that the rain was lessening too. The storm-clouds had travelled across the valley.

Milk and the big man got up and went outside.

‘Blue sky,' said Milk.

‘Yes, and you better get on. Folks'll get milk for supper.'

Milk went through the gate and out into the road and a moment later the big man said ‘So long' and followed him.

Patches of blue sky were drifting up and widening and flecks of sunlight were beginning to travel over the land as the man and the boy went back to the plough. In the clay-coloured pools along the furrows the reflection of the new light broke and flickered here and there into a dull silver, almost as light as the rain-washed ploughshare. The turned-up coltsfoot flowers that had withered on the ridges had begun to come up again after the rain, the earth gave up a rich fresh smell and the larks were rising higher towards the sunlight.

The man took hold of the plough handles. ‘Come on, get up there, on, get up.' And the plough started forward, the horse slower and the share stiffer on the wet land.

Walking by the horse's head, on the unploughed earth, the boy had forgotten the dead man. Skylarks kept twittering up from among the coltsfoots and he kept marking the point of their rising with his eyes, thinking of nothing but the nests he might find.

But all the time the man kept his eyes on the far distance of cloud and sunlight, as though he were lost in the memory of his dead friend.

And the plough seemed almost to travel of its own accord.

Slowly Jonah rested his elbows on the high teacher's desk, first one and then with the same deliberation the other, tucking his white cuffs into his jacket sleeves at the same time. He looked at the class dangerously. It was the second lesson of the morning, but the windows of the classroom were north and south, so that we had no sun, a half-glass partition on the eastern side cutting us off from Miss Salt and standard five. We could see Miss Salt's iron-coloured hair, done up in a magnificent dome, if she moved across her room towards us, and in silent intervals we could hear her voice in haughty command, ‘Pens
down
, fold
arms
, sit
straight
!' and the scuffle of obedience in answer. And sometimes Jonah or Miss Salt would write pencil notes to each other on the torn-out pages of exercise books and then hold them flat on the glass for each other to read, Miss Salt's neck reddening, Jonah's mouth leering up to one side under his stiff whitish moustache.

‘India is the central peninsula of southern Asia.' Jonah began to articulate the words slowly and significantly, his grey eyes transfixing us. We sat still, forty of us, two to a desk, in a paralysis of attention. Jonah was about fifty, his flesh the colour of pork, a greyish white, his knuckles standing out almost like white raw bone under the drawn skin, his almost fleshless nose thin and very long, with a faint twist in it, a perpetual sneer of contempt at us. ‘Extensive irrigation is practised. The crops include wheat, maize, cotton, coffee, tea, rice …'

‘Pudden,' whispered Bruno.

‘Opium poppy, spices, sugar-cane and so on. There are large tracts of jungle.' Jonah went on without a pause or change of his voice.

Bruno sat next to me, in the same narrow desk. He had hair like a lion, yellow, with tawnier streaks in it. As always, it needed cutting; it hung over his collar in fierce little curls of yellow which flopped down like a mane over his thick-skinned face whenever he bent over the desk. It was his hair that gave Bruno the untamed look as he sat sullenly listening to Jonah, his lips pouched.

‘Precious metals are found in the provinces of Burma and Assam. There are mines of coal, iron, manganese ore, copper …'

‘Nob,' Bruno said. He spoke out of the corner of his mouth, so that we could just hear. ‘Copper nob.'

We sat tense, half-laughing inside ourselves, watching Jonah. There was no sign. He went on reciting, the tops of his fingers pressed together, forming a cage of bone. ‘Tin and other metals. Then we come to one of the most important assets of India, its forests. Its forests ——' He paused for a moment. ‘Its forests ——' He waited, spoke slightly louder. ‘Its forests ——' His lips pressed themselves into the formation of a smile. ‘If God had intended our friend Clarke to look out of the back of his head he would have given him eyes there.' Nobby came round like a shot, the blood in his face. Jonah relaxed his lips. ‘Now that our friend Clarke is listening: its forests ——' His hands slowly unformed and then formed the cage again. ‘Characteristic trees are teak, sandalwood, ebony, rubber …'

‘Soles,' Bruno whispered.

‘Bamboo, deodar, and the banyan tree.' He finished speaking, made a pause. And then suddenly, like an unexpected shot:

‘Did I hear you say something, Bruno?'

‘Nosir.'

‘It is curious, as I think I have remarked before, how my ears deceive me. I thought you spoke.'

‘Nosir.'

‘Curious. What are the trees of Indian forests, Bruno?'

‘Teak, sandalwood, ebony, rubber, bamboo, deodar and the banyan tree.' Bruno spoke fast, producing the words in a mechanical strip, like a tape machine. His head was up, bold and sullen, his yellow hair flung back.

‘One other tree, I think, Bruno.'

‘Nosir.'

‘I think so, Bruno.'

‘Nosir.'

Jonah did not speak. He sat looking at Bruno, his fingers lightly caged, an expression of ironical sweetness on his face, his eyes like stone. The class, caught up in a new tension of fear and expectation, sat as still as tightened wire.

Suddenly Jonah spoke again. ‘My mistake,' he sneered. Almost simultaneously he got up quickly, went to the window behind the desk and shut it.

It was the fatal sign; we knew it at once. When he turned back to us from the window the sweetish look had already vanished from Jonah's face, and the irony was also beginning to vanish, melted by a rush of anger. And now when Jonah was standing, upright, away from the desk, we realised how tall he was. He stood stiff and thin and ungiving, like a post of iron.

‘I give you one more chance, Bruno,' he said dangerously.

Bruno was silent.

‘Very well. Stand up!'

Bruno sat motionless. His gaze had lowered a little now; it was more sullen; the tawny lion hair hung half down in his eyes.

‘Stand up!'

There was no movement that Jonah could see; but underneath the desk I could see a movement of Bruno's hands, as they tightened on the seat of the desk.

An instant later Jonah was down on him. He came in long strides of fury down the gangway between the desks. His face was like bone, quite bloodless, his neck-muscles hard in anger against his come-to-Jesus collar. And now for the first time his voice was lifted:

‘Will you stand up!' he shouted.

Bruno, staring now at the desk, never stirred. And suddenly Jonah seized him. He caught him at the back of the neck, by the collar of his jacket, and in one single movement of fury half-lifted him off the seat. The desk lid, caught by Bruno's body, flapped open and shut again like a shot. ‘Stand up!' Jonah shouted. ‘Stand up, can't you? Stand up!' I felt the desk lifting bodily at each of Jonah's shouts. By this time Bruno had locked his feet round the iron stays of the desk and his fingers were like iron clamps on the seat and Jonah could not move him. The desk went up and down with a dull clanging of wood and iron, like some stubborn animal that Bruno was riding and trying to tame. And all the time Bruno's hands were so clenched and his feet so locked that Jonah could not move him. His jacket was wrenched halfway up his back, so that I could see his shirt, but each time he came down on the seat again, locking his feet tighter.

Then all at once Jonah hit him. He struck him full across one ear, knocking his head to one side like an Aunt Sally, and then across the other, knocking his head back again. He hit with furious frenzy, flat-handed, and Bruno, caught unawares, half raised his hands in terror. It was all that Jonah wanted. In another second he had Bruno on his feet and in another, before Bruno could make the effort to struggle back to the desk, he struck him again.

It was a sort of half blow. It caught Bruno on the back of the neck and sent him staggering down the gangway and out into the open space in the class-front, towards Jonah's desk and the blackboard. In a second Jonah was after him. We sat tense, in an excitement of fear and hatred. Bruno staggered back against the teacher's desk and then out again as Jonah came down the gangway, his hair more than ever lion-like, flopping down into his eyes so that he had to shake it back again. Jonah strode down between the desks and went for him, his hand stretched. He caught Bruno by the hand, half-twisting it, swinging him out. The cane was hung on a peg behind the blackboard and Bruno knew it, so that when Jonah swung him one way he tried to swing with a furious effort the other. But Jonah had him. He could do nothing. Jonah kept swinging him outward and then round and so nearer and nearer the blackboard, the boy's face puckered with the pain of it.