Love on the Dole (19 page)

The moment passed; she remembered occasions when the gentle expression on his face and the soft light in his eyes had told her all that she wished to know; occasions when he had made a confidante of her; although some of his confessions had been, in a sense, akin to warnings. How dreadfully disenchanting his repudiation of marriage when he spoke of it in general as concerning people in their circumstances. Yet, she told herself, he must have contemplated it in regard to himself else why should he bother talking to her about it? She was on shifting sands, here; was full of doubts of her surmisings, failed, entirely, to agree with his strange notions, but would not permit her courage to be shaken in her hope that, ultimately, all this perplexing tangle would be straightened. His notions were so perverse. Yet, she told herself, setting her chin, if he didn’t want marriage then neither did she: it was Larry Meath she desired and not so much marriage. But even that, so it seemed, was not suitable to him: ‘No, no, Sal, you misunderstand me. It isn’t this marriage business that matters: marriage is only for hogs anyway. It’s this damned poverty. My wages. What are they? Forty-five shillings a week. How on earth could we live decently on that? It isn’t enough to keep us decently clothed and fed: it means a life of doing without the things that make life worth while. And - ‘ a gesture of helplessness: ‘It can’t be explained, Sal. If you don’t see it as I then you just don’t see it, that’s all.’

What a supremely bewildering person he was. It was marriage, then it wasn’t marriage but poverty. Imagine that, too! His wage was forty-five shillings a week
regularly.
And here he was crying poverty! Why, who in North Street could depend on forty-five shillings every week? Nobody, There never was a week but what the family income fluctuated. Yet these people ventured into matrimony.

‘Doing without the things that make life worth while.’ What did he mean by that? And by all his other incomprehensible talk which he uttered when addressing the crowds at street corners. Words and phrases of which she was jealous since they meant so much to him; jealous of them because they meant something to him whose secret was hid from her; jealous of them because she wished to be the inspiration in him of such animation as they occasioned. She could only have blind faith in his beliefs. She resented them, yet, at the same time, acknowledged them as the medium by which, in her eyes, he was elevated above other men. She wished him an ordinary type whilst preserving his extraordinary qualities. She …

‘But what
do
you want, Larry?’ the remembrance of her questioning him interrupted her thoughts. He had answered: ‘What do I want eh? Ha! What I’m not likely to get,’ an impatient gesture indicative of the street and neighbourhood in general: ‘Aw, having to live amongst all this. Blimey, day after day and no change at all. Work and bed and work again. … Oh,’ an expression of intense disgust: ‘It’s enough to drive a man mad.’

Mad! Enough to drive a woman mad too. She found herself in a bog of conflicting emotions. Out of the chaos rose the question: ‘What could be denied a home that had a constant income of forty-five shillings a week?’ She could not think of anything. Then what was it that Larry referred to: ‘doing without the things that make life worth while?’ There’d be enough for food, rent and clothes, surely. What else was there? He must be wrong. She could not be sure. He was so different from others. If only she could understand.

Still, to meet him this evening meant more confidences. It occurred to her that she should consider herself fortunate; he
might
have chosen some more intellectual girl in whom to confide. She smiled, reassured: an impelling force surged in her heart: she quickened her pace; her lustrous eyes took on an added glow as she gazed expectantly into the distance.

She did not find him. Three-quarters of an hour later saw her retracing her steps, dawdling along, her listless fingers holding a sprig of hawthorn blossom. She had visited all Larry’s customary haunts: the meadows where he had shown her larks’ nests in the deep grass, the nettle beds by the river side colonized by the Red Admirals, and the sand deposits there, pitted with holes into and out of which sand martins darted like shadows. Disconsolate and further depressed by the melancholy cries of the wheeling lapwings, she returned, and, passing a flowering thorn, idly plucked a sprig of blossom.

It was deeply disappointing, especially so when she dwelt on the delectable image of the pleasure that had been denied her; that, doubtless, he
had
traversed this path this evening and that she had missed him perhaps by only a few moments, was an irritating thought. As she left the canal bank and set her face towards Hanky Park she remembered that if she waited at the street corner she would, likely enough, meet him returning.

Until then she knew that this present irksome feeling of bleak loneliness would remain with her. Imagine it! At one time, not very long ago, she had found pleasure in dances and the picture theatres. What had come over her? Those diversions gave only a transitory pleasure: she saw herself returning home when pictures or dance were done, returning to the dreariness of No. 17 North Street. It wasn’t that kind of life she wanted: she wanted something real and permanent, not the mere whiling away of time watching flickering shadows on a screen or the trumpery gaiety of a dance-room. She wanted Larry and a home of her own… ._Dreariness of No. 17 North Street A stupendous suspicion pounced upon her. The dreariness of her home represented marriage, to her father and mother both of whom, before their marriage must surely have been as she now was, desirous of homes of their own. They now had obtained it and, to her, it represented something that filled her with overwhelming dreariness. Could it be possible that Larry in his condemnation of marriage, was really suggesting that her mother’s and father’s married life with all its scratchings and scrapings was only removed from a newly married couple’s experiences by the matter of a few years? Her mother and father had never been away from North Street on even a day’s holiday since their honeymoon: Hardcastle himself was a smouldering volcano ready to erupt the moment she or Harry suggested expenditure on clothes: ‘D’y’ think bloody money grows on trees?’ He was worried eternally over money. And Larry had said: ‘It isn’t this marriage business that matters. … It’s this damned poverty … doing without the things that make life worth while… . ‘ Was
this
understanding. She crushed all her thoughts. ‘I want Larry … I want Larry,’ she defied herself.

Night was falling. She was on Broad Street now passing the parish church. Her train of thought was interrupted by the sound of a hoarse voice speaking her name. She turned her head. Sam Grundy’s fat, apoplectic visage smirked at her from the illuminated rear windows of his car. It kept pace with her walking; doubtless the chauffeur was obeying Sam’s instructions. He put his face out of the window: ‘Hey, Sal,’ he cried, winking: ‘Wharra bout a little ride, eh?’ he nodded and winked again: ‘Ah’ll get y’ back, early… . Go on… . What’j’say, eh?’ Another grin and a wink.

She scowled at him, voiced a contemptuous exclamation, walked behind the car and crossed the road without even another glance. Surlily she turned into Hanky Park. The fool to think that his most tempting offers could ever be of interest to her. She put him from her mind.

The public-houses were closing. Slatternly women, dirty shawls over their heads and shoulders, hair in wisps about their faces, stood in groups congregated on the pavements in the shafts of light thrown from the open doors of the public-house. Now and then they laughed, raucously, heedless of the tugs at their skirts from their wailing, weary children.

In front of Sally was gloomy Mrs Dorbell, tiny Mrs Jike, fat Mrs Bull and the resourceful Mrs Nattle who ‘obligded’ her ‘naybores’. Mrs Dorbell was saying, as the party turned into North Street: ‘… an’ Ah say agen it’s a fair sin an’ a shame that they should be closed at ten o’clock,’ she referred to the public-houses. Mrs Nattle answered, in reference to the bottle she kept at home: ‘An Ah say there’s nowt t’ stop workin’ folk from havin’ a nip i’ their own homes sociable like. Them as mek laws g’ nowt short, Ah’ll bet … ‘ Mrs Dorbell tripped, tipsily, and clutched Mrs Bull’s arm which caused Mrs Bull to suggest that Mrs Dorbell had had enough for one evening. Mrs Dorbell thought otherwise since she continued walking with them to Mrs Nattle’s home.

Sally was disgusted. It did not occur to her that they had been as she now was, young, once upon a time. She saw them as she saw them, four ragged old women, creatures divorced from the species, institutions, as part and parcel of the place as the houses themselves.

As she passed the clog shop next the Duke of Gloucester public-house a hand stole out from the doorway’s dark recess and touched her arm. She started and turned. It was Kate Malloy, one of the girls who worked in the same shed at Marlowe’s.

‘Oh,’ cried Sally: ‘Ah wondered who it was. What a turn you gave me,’ curiously: ‘Whatever are y’ doin’ there, Kate?’ She stared at her, searchingly.

A thin, pale-faced girl, Kate’s facial expression reminded one of a hunted animal; always there was a light of furtive nervousness in her eyes. She rarely spoke to anybody at the mill save Sally for whom she nursed a dog-like devotion, which, sometimes, became something of a nuisance. Though, since she had no parents and lived in lodgings, which, Sally thought, may have been the cause of her nervousness and reticence, Sally never could find it in her heart to rebuff her.

Kate whispered: ‘Is he there?’ She inclined her head towards the crowd just loosed from the Duke of Gloucester.

‘Who?’

Kate reproached her with a glance: ‘Ned, o’ course.’

Sally sniffed: ‘Ah dunno. Why, what d’y want him for?’

‘Oh, Sally,’ again, reproachfully: ‘An’ all Ah’ve told y’ about how he ses he likes me.’

‘Yaa,’ replied Sally. ‘What d’y’ listen t’ his gab for? He tells same to anybody as’ll listen. Ah’ve told y’ before. Leave him alone. All he wants y’ for is what he can get out o’ y’,’ imperiously: ‘Come on, now. Get off home wi’ y’.’

‘Oh, no, no, Sal,’ alarmed: ‘Oh, no. He told me to wait here.’

Sally sneered: ‘H’m. Fine ‘un he is, makin’ a girl wait till he’s finished his boozin’. Yaa, ain’t y’ got no sense? What’ll he be like if ever y’ was daft enough t’ wed him, which y’ won’t … he ain’t that kind.’

‘Oh, Sal. He promised.’

Impatiently: ‘You - make - me - sick, Kate. Hangin’ around after a feller. Y’d catch me doin’ it. … Not for best man alive. How long have y’ bin waiting there?’

‘Not long. … On’y since half eight. … Ah guess they kep’ him talkin’ an’ he forgot…. We was goin’ t’ go t’ t’ pictures.’

‘V daft,’ replied Sally, with emphasis. ‘What y’ can see in a bloke like Narkey, Ah - don’t - know.’

‘Eh, Sal, but Ah love him … really, Ah do. … He’s bin good t’ me … ‘

‘Aye, an he’d be good t’ me if he could get what he wanted. Don’t be a ninny. Get off home t’ bed while y’ safe. Ah’d have no boozer muckin’ around wi’ me.’

‘But Ah can’t go, Sal. Ah promised Ah’d wait. - An’ Ah don’t want him to - Oh, Ah want t’ see him.
You’d
be the same about a feller if y’ thought owt about him like Ah do.’

‘Aw,’ said Sally, impatiently: ‘You make me sick, Kate. Ah’m goin’; see y’ tomorrow.’

She had not taken more than a half dozen strides when, passing the Duke of Gloucester public-house she suddenly found herself confronted by Ned Narkey who, having seen her, detached himself from the group outside the doors, and, with unsteady gait, intercepted her. A drunken smirk parted his lips; he planted himself in front of her, thrust his thumbs into his belt and stood there, grinning, swaying slightly: ‘Hallo, Sal,’ he said, warmly.

‘Get out o’ my way,’ she snapped, and made as though to pass him. Instantly his expression changed: he scowled and caught her by the hand holding the sprig of blossom: ‘Here,’ he growled: ‘Half a mo’,’ a thorn pricked his finger; he glanced at her hand: ‘Ha!’ he sneered: ‘Bin in t’ country, have y’?’ thickly: ‘Ah suppose y’ve bin wi’ that …’

She snatched her hand away: ‘You tek your dirty hands off me, Narkey.’

His lips tightened across his teeth: ‘Dirty hands, eh. They wusn’t dirty when Ah’d got plenty o’ jack an’ Ah wus payin’ for y’ t’ go dancin’, wus they, eh?’

‘I ne’er asked y’ t’ pay. Ah’d ha’ paid my whack an’ you know it’

‘Luk here, Sal Hardcastle,’ he muttered: ‘No tart can make a runt out o’ Ned Narkey. Ah’ve offered t’ marry y’ fair and square an’ Ah mean it. … But if Ah don’t have y’ Ah’ll mek sure that
that
yellow-bellied rat up street don’t either. … Not if Ah have t’ swing for him,’ his voice was low with passion, his small, deep-set eyes glittered.

She curled her lip: ‘You touch him, that’s all, Narkey. Just touch him once, if y’ dare. Our Harry told me what y’ said t’day…. He heard y’…’

Ned flushed, glad in a sense that Sally had been informed of his passage of words with Larry. In Sally’s being unaccompanied at present he was convinced that his threats had intimidated Larry. Doubtless she had been walking with him this evening, else how had she come by the blossom? He grinned, hitched up his belt: ‘He’s yellow,’ he sneered: ‘You’ve bin out wi’ him tonight. … An’ Ah suppose he left y’ at top of Hanky Park

an’ sneaked down back way so’s Ah wouldn’t see him Yaa,’

with a return to his threatening demeanour: ‘He knows what’s good for him…’

‘An’ if you know what’s good for you you’ll leave him be, Narkey. Ah’m standin’ no more from you. Next time Ah’ll call a copper,’ raising her brows warningly: ‘Ah’ve told y’ . …’ Blazing, she pushed by him to stand by Mr Hulkington’s the grocer’s shop window.