Jill (30 page)

In three minutes she came back with a thick sandwich on a plate and a packet of potato crisps. The sandwich was two slices of dry bread with a bit of cold bacon in between.

“Thank you—thank you very much.” He paid her, taking up the sandwich.

The assembled men watched her put the money away in silence, then they watched John as he ate. They did not show any personal interest in him: they seemed more as if they had to have their attention occupied all the time by one thing or another. Four were workmen, two looked as if, like John, they were awaiting a train.

The woman aimlessly rubbed the bar down with her dishcloth. “I thought I’d open as long as there’s anything to
sell,” she said. “Can’t have everything going on strike, can we?”

“That’s right,” said one of the men.

“How’s yer ’usband, Mrs. Page, ’ave you ’eard?” another said, stirring to speak. He was heavily built, with a moustache, bowler hat and overcoat stained with mud; like the rest of them he looked as if he had been sleeping in his clothes.

“No, I ’aven’t—and I shan’t, neither.” The woman settled her elbows on the bar again. “I’m not worrying, though. There’s no good worrying.”

“No, there’s no use worrying.”

“And ’e always ’ealed quick.”

“Ah, a quick ’ealer, like,” said the bowler-hatted man, as if helping her to find words.

“Oh, he always ’ealed quick, yes.”

“That’s a blessin’.”

“That’s right. And it’s only ’is leg. Lots ’ave ’ad worse. Be thankful, I say.”

Another man let his breath explode emphatically in assent and took up his beer. A third man, sitting with his elbows on his knees, looked up and broke excitedly into speech. He was under thirty, with a fresh face beginning to grow lined, fair wavy hair and a clipped moustache: his clothes were smart, but grubby, his oiled-stained camel-hair coat being fastened by a belt without a buckle. A soiled trilby hat lay by his beer-glass.

“I’ve had a time, I have. I don’t hardly know what I’m doing, why I’m here or anything. I came over from Manchester on Wednesday to see the branch here—Fowler’s, you know; business trip, firm’s petrol, bring the wife, expenses found. We was putting up at the King’s Head. Just started dinner when that little lot starts coming down. Well, there was a lull in the middle, you remember there was. We came out of the cellars and I told her to go up and pack a case and meet me round the front in five minutes, while I got the car out.”

He paused and drank, keeping his eyes fixed on the landlady, who still leant and stared back, a half-polished glass abandoned in her hands. The paper in the windows flapped. The
men had their heads lowered, as if in church: they seemed to recognize the young man’s need to speak without being overmuch interested in what he was saying.

“Of course, as soon as I get round to the garages a copper comes up and tells me not to be a b.f. The streets were all blocked—couldn’t get a wooden horse through them, let alone a V8. But I stand there arguing. Then we hear one coming down. The noise they make!—it gets the hotel fair and square, that was the one that hit it first. Now all yesterday and today—can’t get near the place, can’t get anything out of anyone. Don’t know a soul here—don’t know a soul here, except the manager of Fowler’s, and they say he’s copped it. Can’t get near the works, anyway. No one seems to know anything. I don’t know what to do.”

He stopped as abruptly as he had started, staring down at the ground between his feet. A very old man piped up in a trembling voice:

“They hit a shelter down our way.”

There was a pause.

“I reckon they’ll do this to everywhere,” said the young man, looking up again. “Everywhere. There won’t be a town left standing.”

His voice had a half-hysterical eager note as if he desired this more than anything.

“But they’ll get it back, the papers say,” said the bowler-hatted man, wiping his nose.

Nobody spoke, sitting half-listening in the silence.

John walked back to the station, which was hardly more than two platforms by a level crossing, and leant against a wooden fence to wait for the train. He was tired, and what he had seen made him feel as negligible as a fly crawling over a heap of stones: it made life seem like an unsuccessful attempt to light a candle in the wind.

He was travelling all night. At Birmingham he managed to get a meal which left him with two and threepence and the return half of his ticket. Most of the travellers were soldiers, clustering loudly about, dumping their kitbags like corpses on the floor of the waiting-room. Their necks were red as if
scalded. The train ran slowly, cautiously, through the darkness. He grew very tired and slept.

The dirty yellow light spread over his face and hands, showing them relaxed, and his pale silky hair. His shoes were stained with red mud, so were the bottoms of his trousers and his right sleeve. The galloping wheels insinuated their unrest into his dreams, and he saw once again the scarecrow buildings, the streets half heaved-up by detonations, the candlelit bar. It no longer seemed meaningless: struggling awake again, rubbing his eyes with chilled hands, he thought it represented the end of his use for the place. It meant no more to him now, and so it was destroyed: it seemed symbolic, a kind of annulling of his childhood. The thought excited him. It was as if he had been told: all the past is cancelled: all the suffering connected with that town, all your childhood, is wiped out. Now there is a fresh start for you: you are no longer governed by what has gone before.

The train ran on, through fields lying under the frost and darkness.

And then again, it was like being told: see how little anything matters. All that anyone has is the life that keeps him going, and see how easily that can be patted out. See how appallingly little life is.

He yawned and grinned, clasping his hands between his knees. What a mess he had been making, when it was all really so easy: he could hardly believe it. He had been a proper fool, worrying and bothering himself. But he’d show them. Stretching full length on the carriage seat, he did not bother to formulate any particular promises; light-heartedly, he simply repeated that he’d have done with it, that it was all over, that now they’d be seeing something. It was cold, and he pulled the short flaps of his overcoat as far as they would go over his knees. In his position, half-awake, shivering and imagining things to himself, he spent the rest of the slow journey through the night, squinting round the blind as they stopped and restarted. He was aching when at a little before five in the morning they drew into the long, almost-deserted station. It was frosty, and he wished for gloves. Rows of lamps spread pools of light along
the platform. Here and there there were milk churns and a pile of parcels. From the end of the train came a banging as porters threw luggage in and out of the van.

He left the station and walked slowly through the streets. The shops were all locked up, every entrance being chained and barred. His head rang with fatigue. His body was weary to hysteria, inventing dance-rhythms and figures for the echo of his footsteps. Now and then they became suddenly hollow as he passed an arcade or deep shop door. In the gutter the wind rustled an invisible bit of paper.

There was a faint starlight in the open, but he had in the alleys to feel his way along rough stone walls, encountering cold moss with his fingers. Above him soared the elaborate-shaped colleges. And as five began to strike, his exalted exhaustion took one more queer twisted impulse from them. He leant against the wall, sobbing dryly, as the numerous bells discussed the hour in the darkness and the frost. Their age was comforting: he could wrap himself in it like a cloak.

It was easy to climb over the wall near a chestnut tree, and he did so, scratching his hands. Then he made his way quietly back to his own room.

He did not wake up till after two the next day. The black-out was taken down, the room cleaned and Christopher’s bed made all without disturbing him. For some minutes he lay staring at the ceiling, reviewing the thoughts and memories in his mind, arranging them in an orderly way: then he heaved back the bedclothes and got up. He drank a glass of cold water and stretched his arms.

There were voices coming from the sitting-room, so after slipping on his overcoat and hanging a towel round his neck, he pushed open the door. Christopher, Eddy and Patrick were sitting round an enormous coal fire drinking bottled beer and smoking cigars. The air was hot and smelt richly.

“Oh, come off it,” Patrick was saying contemptuously. “You don’t know anything about racing.”

“All right, then!” Eddy sat indignantly upright. “I bet you I’m up on the month—on the term, then! I bet you I’m up on the term.”

Eddy was wearing a yellow waistcoat with brass buttons, which made his flushed face look very pink. The ash from his cigar broke and fell.

“Hallo, John,” said Christopher, sitting with his back to the door and twisting his neck to look round. “Have a drink.”

“There’s none left,” said Patrick, filling up his tumbler again and throwing the bottle away into a corner. It thundered on the boards without breaking.

John found a full bottle under the desk, and, pouring himself a glassful, sat down at the table to cut bread and butter. He ate huge slices ravenously, scattering crumbs.

“It doesn’t mean anything, just being up on the term,” Patrick persisted. “You might follow a tipster and do that.”

“You know damn all about it, there’s the hell of a science in betting. You have to work on a system——”

“Where’s this lad been?” demanded Patrick, pointing at John. “Why isn’t he dressed properly?”

John chewed for a few moments in silence, staring at Patrick.

“I went to Huddlesford.”

“Why?”

“I live there, that’s why.”

“Do people live there?” inquired Patrick, with an air of surprise. “I thought it was a music-hall fiction.”

John was cutting himself more bread. “Yes,” he said, “quite a lot of people live there.”

“I’d forgotten,” said Christopher. “Is there a lot of damage?”

“A fair amount, yes.”

“The blitz is like a good show,” Patrick remarked, putting his feet up against the fireplace. “After a long run in town, it’s touring the provinces.” Eddy coughed, and put his cigar back into his mouth. “See much of it?” he inquired, not without truculence. John thought he was being addressed, and said:

“The centre was all barricaded off.”

“Is that so,” said Christopher. “Of course, there’s not much to hit in these provincial towns, they can hit it all at once. I must say, I found the blitz rather fun. One was nearly always tight, and it seemed quite natural. Did I ever tell you how when we were having that party of Julian’s, how one came down and put all the lights out, and when he got candles we found all the corks had been pulled out of the bottles?”

“Oh, I don’t believe that, Chris,” said Eddy, grinning broadly. “Not unless you’d done it yourself.”

“Well, near Shepherd’s Bush, when I was doing special constable’s duty,” said Patrick, “we found a shelterful of corpses, not a mark on them. There hadn’t been a bomb within twenty yards. We thought it was gas or something. But it was only blast, all their lungs had been burst with the blast——”

“Cheery,” said Eddy. “Of course, I shouldn’t be surprised at anything happening at a party of Julian’s. If the Archangel ruddy Gabriel came in and blew the Last Trump, it would never surprise me. Lord, what you can do with money.”

“Money!” exclaimed Christopher, theatrically clapping his pockets. “Have you got any?” he inquired of Patrick with interest. Patrick stared back at him and gave a sudden, barking belch.

John finished his bread and pushed his plate aside. “I could do with some,” he said. “Just now I’ve got two and threepence in the wide world. Have you a cigarette, Chris?”

Christopher threw him the packet. “I think we should have a party before term ends,” he said. “I think that would be a very useful contribution to the war effort.”

“Not in this college it wouldn’t,” said Patrick. “Not after all that damn row about Semple.”

“That twerp,” said Eddy. “Well, bring it round to my place. You can have women in there.”

Patrick frowned. “I think women mess up a serious party.”

“Well, you needn’t have anything to do with them,” said Christopher, throwing the end of his cigar into the fire. “You can leave them alone.”

“
You
can’t,” chuckled Eddy. “We all know what you’re after.”

Christopher attempted to tip Eddy’s chair over backwards and only succeeded in making him spill his beer. They scuffled for a few moments, knocking over a pile of books and papers.

“Don’t fart about,” said Patrick wearily.

“Well, when are we going to have it?” demanded Eddy, mopping himself. “I think it’s hell’s good idea, if we can get the stuff.”

“Oh, we can get the stuff all right,” said Patrick. “And you can pay for it out of your turf winnings.”

“You’re a mean sod,” said Eddy, simply and sincerely.

“This is the last week, isn’t it.” Christopher lolled by the fireplace, twisting the signet ring on his finger. “It’s happened fast, this term. No good starting work now.”

“How about Thursday night?” suggested Eddy. “Thursday, at my place.”

“I’ve got a tute on Friday.” Patrick leant back deeper in his chair.

“Well, Friday night.”

“I’m going to a dance.”

“Well, damn it,” Christopher was impatient. “You can work on Thursday.”

“I’ve got Corps.”

“Lord!” said Christopher sarcastically. “The man about town. You were a b.f. to join that racket.”

“I don’t think so. Wait till you’re pitched into the ranks.”

“Ranks my arse! They won’t get me yet.”

“I’ll lay half a dollar,” said Patrick judiciously, “that they register the nineteens in the next three months.”

“Half a dollar it is.”

“All right.” Patrick drew out his tiny notebook.

“All right yourself. I’ll join the Corps fast enough, when there’s any monkey business.”

“What closed down the nunnery?” chortled Eddy. “They’ll catch up with you!”

“You’ve said it,” said Patrick, stretching out his legs. “You can’t fool all the Ministry of Labour all the time.”