The Doctor Is Sick (12 page)

Off Great Russell Street he saw a man in a cap carrying sandwich-boards. He shambled despondently along a grey street, under a grey sky. The fore-board said: MARVEL NOT, MY BRETHREN, IF THE WORLD HATE YOU. 1 St John 3. On the rear-board was written: THE FOOLISH BODY HATH SAID IN HIS HEART: THERE IS NO GOD. Psalm 53. ‘'Ippo,' said Edwin.

‘Eh? What?' 'Ippo stared, lined and grimy, his upper lip sunk in where the wedge of teeth was missing. ‘What you want?' he said.

‘You know,' said Edwin, ‘bloody well what I want. I want my bloody watch.' He held his hand out.

‘Don't know who you are,' said 'Ippo. ‘Never seen you before in me bleedin' life.'

‘Shove-ha'penny. Hospital. Watch.' A passer-by took this as an imperative. He stopped for an instant. ‘A right bloody pair we must look,' thought Edwin. 'Ippo's voice began to rise in the bazaar whine of the Cockney.

‘Never seen your bleedin' watch. Never even knew you had a bleedin' watch. Gettin' on to me.' He made Oriental gestures. ‘Do a charitable bleedin' turn and that's what you get. I won't be got at,' he said, ‘by the likes of you nor nobody.' He tried to collect a small crowd. ‘Him here reckons I stole his bleedin' watch. Never seen his bleedin' watch. Never even knew he had one.' His biblical texts made him an object of sympathy.

‘Shame,' said a woman in out-of-date tweeds, already genteelly tipsy. ‘They ought to be kept in their own country. Foreigners doing our own people out of jobs.'

A man in overcoat and spectacles said: ‘If you say that he stole your watch you ought to prove it. You ought to take him to the station and charge him in the proper way.'

‘I don't want trouble.' said Edwin. ‘All I want is my watch or the cash equivalent thereof.'

‘They come here,' said a man carrying a wad of the midday edition, ‘learning our language. Too soft with them the government is, way I see it.'

‘Sayin' I've pinched his bleedin' watch,' whined 'Ippo. ‘What right has he got to go round sayin' that? I've done him no harm nor nobody. Tryin' to earn a honest livin'goin' round with these 'ere boards and he comes up and tries to get on to me. A bleedin' shame.'

‘That's right,' said the tipsy tweedy woman, ‘It's a free country, or was until these foreigners started pouring in. You can see them,' she said to a small chubby woman who had joined the group, ‘living off the immoral earnings of white women. There's nothing lower than that.'

‘Just goin' round advertisin',' said 'Ippo, ‘as you can see from what's written here. Advertisin' some decent caffy I think it is where they wouldn't have Johnsons like him comin' in. You can see I'm only tryin' to earn a respectable livin' keepin' a wife and seven kids.' The whine rose higher.

Edwin did not like the imputation, initiated by the tweedy woman, completed by 'Ippo, that he was a ponce. Moreover the fact of 'Ippo's illiteracy had dawned on the small crowd and made him a further object of sympathy. Edwin's intuition sparked up. He said to 'Ippo:

‘I know all about you. You did a tray on the moor.'

Startled, 'Ippo waved his arms higher. ‘It wasn't a tray,' he whined, ‘it was only a stretch. And that's over and done with. I swear to Almighty God that I've gone straight. I'm not goin' to stay here and let him insult me. I'm gettin' out of his way,' he told his sympathisers. ‘Gettin' on to me like that.' He prepared to shamble off, hoisting his boards.

‘You have the police on to him,' said the tweedy woman. Dead on his cue, a policeman appeared at the far end of the street, looking. ‘I think,' said the tweedy woman, ‘we'd better not cause an obstruction.' Universal guilt, thought Edwin as, shamefaced, the tiny crowd broke up. The state's substitute for original sin. 'Ippo went off faster than any. But the man with the midday editions dropped, in his haste, a copy of the
Star
. An autumn gust caught this
and plastered a sheet of it on to 'Ippo's back-board. THE FOOLISH BODY HATH SAID IN HIS HEART was momentarily covered up, and 'Ippo proclaimed atheism to the London street. To him, however, it would be all one.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

‘Me and Carmen,' said Les, ‘were to come in and see you tonight and give you this. But, seeing as you're here, I can give it you now.' He handed Edwin a note in an open envelope. It said:

‘Darling. Am not staying in Farnworth now as too expensive. Don't yet know where but will write. So glad operation is over. Will come and see you when you are
really
better. Love. S.'

‘Well,' said Les, ‘they got everything over very quickly, didn't they? Wonderful what they can do nowadays.'

‘Have you no idea where she's gone to?' asked Edwin. ‘Didn't she say?'

‘She was in here last night,' said Les, ‘with this painter. I got the idea she was going over Earl's Court way. I can't be sure, of course.'

‘I just haven't got a penny,' said Edwin. ‘I've got nothing except this blasted hat.' This, in its
Times
wrapping, rested on the bar.

‘You wouldn't get much for it,' said Les. ‘Couple of bob perhaps. Money's always a problem. I've got Carmen out working now. A hamburger bar,' he added.

Les was, decided Edwin, a far nicer man than Chasper. Les had already stood two pints of light ale mixed with bitter. The people here in the public bar of the Anchor
seemed all very nice people. The landlord and landlady seemed very nice, too. Very sympathetic.

‘It's no good worrying too far into the future,' said Les. ‘That's what you've got to learn. If you worry as far as the next drink, that's far enough. We could,' he said, ‘if you like——' He belched and converted the belch into the opening of Siegfried's
Trauermarsch
. ‘Marvellous,' said Les, ‘that is. Carrying old Siegfried to the funeral pyre. Weighs a bloody ton. This one we've got now, Hans Wahnfreud, he slips each of the ones who carry him half a bar. So they can drink his health. A lovely fellow. What I was going to say was that, if we're worried about where the next drink's coming from, why don't we challenge those two over there to shove-ha'penny? When we win and they say what are you going to have, don't just say a half of mild. Say a gold watch or a vera lynn. They can afford it.'

‘And if we lose?' asked Edwin.

‘We won't lose,' said Les. His confidence was very large. He called over to two drinkers, one bloated, the other craftily thin. They sat on a bench by the great opaque window of the public bar, their pints behind them on the window-ledge. ‘Larry,' called Les, ‘Fred. Him and me will take you on.' He chinked the five coins in his hand. ‘You Albert,' said Les, ‘you take chalk.' Albert was an exbantam who had retired punch-drunk. He shook himself like a dog, sat down beside the shove-ha'penny board and waited, panting.

Les and Edwin won the toss.Les shot his three coins straight into the Scotchman, all three clean in the middle of the bed.Albert chalked the bed full.Larry got three out of his five, untidily. Edwin felt a sudden games-player's joy.
Les was right: the end of this game was the only end worth worrying about. Edwin shot two into the top bed, one in a middle bed. The other two went on lines, ‘Good,' said Les, quite loudly, ‘we've got 'em,' Fred, with a stylish spinning style, got four in, but nothing near the top. Les placed all five. The top bed was full now. ‘Lovely, lovely.' said Les. Larry went for the top two beds, placed three coins there. Edwin sent up four which sat on the lines. His fifth slid them clean into beds. ‘Beautiful,' said Les, smacking his lips.

It was in the bag. The gap between the two teams was never narrower than five. Les filled the bottom bed, put two in the bed immediately above – all with insolent skill. It was up to Edwin to deliver the
coup de grâce
, somewhere in the middle. He faltered; he failed. The gap now narrowed dangerously. Both needed one only. A young voice behind Edwin said:

‘Look here, whose is this hat?'

‘Not now,' said Les. ‘Just a minute, please.'

Edwin failed with three coins. He got the fourth in a good lay. ‘Tickle it,' said Les. ‘Just tickle it, that's all.' Edwin's heart beat fast. He touched the fourth coin with the fifth. The fourth slid in. Les was exultant.

‘Bit tight for a last one,' said Fred.

‘Tight?' said Les. ‘Tight?' He appealed to Albert. ‘You could drive a bloody coach and horses through it, man.' Albert said it was not tight. Larry and Fred ceded victory to Les and Edwin, whom they now asked what they would have. A light mit bitter and a gold watch. ‘Look here,' said the young man, smart and citified, ‘whose is this hat?'
The Times
had slipped away, leaving the coke sitting in curl-brimmed nakedness.

‘It's mine,' said Edwin, ‘more or less.'

‘Lend it me,' said the young man, ‘just for the afternoon. It's important.'

‘I would,' said Edwin, ‘but——'

‘You shouldn't have said it was important,' said Les, ‘because that puts the charge up. We'll say a quid deposit, returnable on return of the hat, and a straight charge of an Oxford for the loan. Right?'

‘Right.' The young man handed over his Oxford scholar. ‘And now perhaps you gentlemen——' A pound deposit; a pound on the counter.

‘We'll have the same again,' said Les to the landlady, a handsome humorous woman. To Edwin he said: ‘What did I tell you? Ten minutes ago you were worried about having no money to buy a drink with. Look at you now -you're double-barrelled.
And
you've got something in your pocket.'

‘I ought to buy a shirt,' said Edwin.

‘Shirt? What do you want a shirt for?
I
never wear a shirt.' He plucked at his close-fitting striped garment. ‘Not, that is, a real shirt that you have to wear a tie with. That you've got on is like a new fashion. Saves a lot of time in the morning. If you sleep in pyjamas, that is. And must save a lot of time at night. Here,' said Les, ‘come the two erbs. They might know something about your missis.' But all Edwin saw was the dog Nigger. This dog put his paws up to the bar-counter and was given a pub sausage. ‘You'd better pay,' said Les to Edwin. ‘You've got the money.'

By the time Nigger had finished his sausage the Stone twins had entered the public bar. ‘Look oo's 'ere,' said Harry Stone sadly. ‘It's ve perfesser. 'At on an' all. If she
was my missis, I can tell you, I'd 'ave 'er across my knee. You seen vat yobbo what she's been wiv? I wouldn't ‘ave it.'

‘Where is she now?' asked Edwin.

‘I'll return it this evening without fail,' said the smart young man, waving Chasper's hat with grace. ‘And thank you again.'

‘No hurry,' said Les. The young man left, cramming the hat on to his head. It was a fair fit.

‘She was in yesterday,' said Harry Stone, ‘and she said she might be in again today. 'Arfa bitter, please, Leo.' Leo Stone was looking intently at Edwin. He began to speak what sounded like gibberish, rapid, rhythmical. Edwin was a philologist and knew that this was one of the
trompel'oreille
auxiliaries of old London. Syllables of genuine words were separated from each other by the vocable ‘boro'. It was much too fast to follow, however. Harry Stone answered in the same lingo, looked at Edwin, made comments of his own. The twins grew Jewishly excited.

‘What 'e wants to know,' said Harry Stone, ‘is what you've got under vat 'at.'

‘Not hair,' said Edwin. ‘Not at present. Bald as a coot for clinical reasons.'

‘Does it look 'orrible?' asked Harry Stone. ‘What I mean is, is it sort of deformed an' 'orrible? I mean, is it sort of full of scars and cuts and fings what'd turn ve stomach of an ordinary person?' It was tacitly assumed, then, that nobody there was quite ordinary.

‘No,' said Edwin. Two whiskies and a couple of pints inside him, he was losing his inhibitions. ‘Look.' He whipped off his cap. Leo Stone said: ‘Aaaaah. Bloody wonderful.'

‘It's a nice 'un, right enough,' said Harry Stone. ‘I fink we can use it.'

‘I'il get on the blower right away,' said Leo Stone. Excited, he began to search for coppers. ‘Lend us a couple of clods,' he said to his twin. Armed with fourpence, he ran off.

‘What is this?' said Edwin. ‘What's going on?' Harry Stone had started examining his nude scalp from all angles. ‘If you think,' said Edwin, ‘that anybody's going to start using me as a thing again – I've had enough of that, I tell you.' He put his cap on with dignity.

‘Manny,' said Harry Stone with passion. ‘It means manny. Everyfink means manny if you go abaht it ve right way. Vat bald 'ead means manny.' He struck Edwin with flailing arms in his excitement. ‘Manny,' he repeated. Edwin admired that stressed vowel. ‘Manny.' Centralised, lengthened, spread, so that Harry's mouth seemed to open greedily and yet contemptuously as to snatch at flies of money floating in the London air.

Leo Stone rushed in. ‘You
are
under forty, aren't you?' he panted at Edwin. Edwin nodded, wondering what -'And what name do you usually go under?' panted Leo.

‘My own,' said Edwin. ‘Spindrift. But what——'

‘Spindryer,' said Leo. ‘That's a gimmick, too.' He was off again, back to the blower.

‘It's only right,' said Larry in the corner, ‘that we should have us revenge,' He finished his pint and got flatly up.

‘Sright,' said thin Fred. ‘Albert take chalk again,' Albert was still sitting by the board, chalk in hand, mouth open.

Les nodded vigorous acceptance of the return challenge and began to sing disconcertingly the sailor's song which
begins
Tristan und Isolde
. He sang it in a strange and apocryphal translation: