Grass in Piccadilly
Page 27
* * * * *
Jeremy corrected the last page of typescript; he stretched out his arms, yawned and covered the typewriter. His eyes ached from having typed in the dying light. He had only to stretch out a hand to switch on his lamp, but he had been too intent to do that. It had been a good day. There was not much that he had written that he would take back. He went down the passage to the front room to get himself a glass of beer. The room looked oddly like a railway waiting-room since Freda had left it. It was put tidy every morning by Mrs. Parks, but it had the detached look of a place where nobody lived. Goodness knew Freda had never been domesticated, but somehow, when she was about, the room had looked different. Mostly there had been a mess, empty glasses that had held her whisky, ash trays with stubbed out cigarettes, and the cushions mucked up where she had laid on them, but there had always been flowers. He went to the drink cabinet and got himself a bottle of beer. He poured it out. He opened the window and leant on the window-sill. As a Londoner he was a bit hazy as to what ought to be happening at what time of year, but it struck him that trees without a leaf on them looked pretty gaunt for April; but a bird was singing in the square garden, and in the window-boxes on the Nettels’ floors there was a fine show of hyacinths. Jeremy took a deep breath of air. It was fine drinking beer after a decent day’s work. He listened to the pleasant roar of the traffic passing up Piccadilly. The people in his book were still with him, they were more alive than any one in the real world. Queer, he hadn’t forgiven Freda, but she had begun to cease to matter. He had not yet got to the point when he could face thinking much about Audrey, but even she hurt less than she had. Soon he would think about her quite easily, even think about her husband. Neither woman was in his book, but because of them he knew more about the women in his book than he had when he started writing about them. He did not know what he thought about Penny. He had not seen much of her lately, she had been busy over this Coroner’s case, but he saw Jane. He ought to see Penny one day soon; might be able to advise him. Probably have a fit when she learnt that he had not yet told his people that Jane was not his child. Queer to think of asking advice from Penny; he ought to loathe her guts but somehow he didn’t. He had said that as soon as his book was finished he would move. That was awkward; he liked this flat, he liked the square, it got you somehow. He was getting a thing about his study. Jeremy was not psychological about himself; he did not know how much harm a disbelief in himself, sown first by lack of notice of his books and later by being laughed at by Freda, had done to him. In that study—quite a small room with a window looking out on some dreary ruins—he was able to write. He was no Somerset Maugham, never would be; but in that room he was more or less saying what he wanted to say in the way he wanted to say it. He did not want to leave that study. He leant further out of the window.
Two girls were gossiping at the end of the square. Jeremy, without thinking, registered that they would be a couple of doxies from Curzon Street having a chat before the night’s work. He watched the newsagent come down the square and stop and speak to the caretaker of the house two or three doors up. He watched a boy and a girl saunter past. The girl giggled, her shrill voice reached him, “Give over, do. Give us a cig.” Jeremy watched them affectionately; they would have come from one of the small streets round about, probably going to the pictures. Gently, with the night air, peace flooded into him. He was not happy, but he was alive and finding contentment. He gave one more fond glance round the square and closed the window.
* * * * *
The policeman walked round the square. He stopped when he saw the caretaker.
“Still a cold wind. You going away for the holiday?”
“No. What I say is, until it settles down proper, give me me own fire. It was chronic at me sister’s at Christmas. The old gentleman and Lady Nettel went off to-day.”
“Don’t blame ’em. Though, mind you, she’s well out of that. We were talking about the boy round at the station, never would have been any good, always an anxiety.”
The caretaker nodded.
“That’s what I say. Terrible for her, though. Funny, looking at a house like that, you’d never think things like that could happen in it.”
The policeman looked knowing.
“You’d be surprised! It’s the houses where you’d least expect it where the most goes on. Well, I must be moving. Good-night.”
The policeman paced on, trying the front doors, peering into the areas.
The milkman came out of the front door. He was tired. Moving was hard work. It had been a grand day, though; Joany’s flash brother had got nothing on him now; Joany knew it too. First thing she said when she looked round was they must have them up to tea, maybe next Sunday. This was better than squatting any day. A nice flat in a posh square, and everything signed and sealed; couldn’t want better. Back there in the bedroom Joany was getting undressed, plenty of room to move around, plenty of room for the baby’s cradle, any amount of space to hang up the laundry and that. Joany was acting up a bit about the room where the young man had shot himself, but that would pass; by the time the baby had crawled all over the place she would have a lot of other marks to wash up and would forget there’d ever been blood. Joany’s flash brother wouldn’t half have a fit when he saw their bathroom; might be Buckingham Palace. What price the basin with all those mirrors in the bedroom? Joany said it would make a lot of work, but she wasn’t half-pleased, he could see that. Well, they said the birth rate was falling and there oughter be more kids. He wouldn’t be surprised if Joany and he didn’t do something about that now. Be a bit of all right, another baby. Could bring up some smashin’ kids in a house like this.
The old man watched until the milkman went back into the house. He had not been in the square since the previous summer. He had spent the winter in vagrants’ lodgings. His overcoat was hung together by disintegrating threads. His boots were shapeless and worn. He pushed his way through the gap in the privet and lauristinus into the square garden. He shuffled across to one of the seats. Out of his pockets he took wads of newspapers, placing some on the seat beneath him and some on his knees. He drew his coat round him; it was still parky but it was wonderful to sleep out again. Lovely night too, full of stars. He was glad the black-out was back; you never saw stars properly, not when the street lights were on. He sucked at a hollow tooth. He could still taste a bit of onion; nothing like onion for supper. If he remembered rightly, he’d had a bit of onion in that tooth last time he sat in this garden. His eye was caught by a naked light in the front room of the ground floor of a house. Presently the milkman drew the curtains. That was better, all that glare, no peace for anybody. The old man raised his head and stared at the velvety sky. Big Ben struck ten o’clock. A cold wind blew across the garden, rustling the dead leaves and stirring the bare branches. Quietly, like the hum of bees, came the roar of the traffic passing up Piccadilly. The old man sighed with contentment. This was a bit of all right, this was. A seat in a London square on a fine night, nothing like it. His lids dropped, he was asleep.
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Noel Streatfeild
Mary Noel Streatfeild was born in Sussex in 1895. She was one of five children born to the Anglican Bishop of Lewes and found vicarage life very restricting. During World War One, Noel and her siblings volunteered in hospital kitchens and put on plays to support war charities, which is where she discovered her talent on stage. She studied at RADA to pursue a career in the theatre and after ten years as an actress turned her attention to writing adult and children’s fiction. Her experiences in the arts heavily influenced her writing, most notably her famous children’s story Ballet Shoes which won a Carnegie Medal and was awarded an OBE in 1983. Noel Streatfeild died in 1986.
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Bello
hidden talent rediscovered
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First published 1947 by Collins
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Copyright © Noel Streatfeild 1947
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