The old lady was standing in the kitchen doorway, and as usual she looked like a bundle of rags tied together. Her white hair was hanging loose from a couple of pins, and her face looked as if it hadn’t been washed for a week. Yet she held her tall, lean body as straight as a ramrod.
‘What’s up?’ asked Rooney.
‘Look at that,’ said Albert, pointing to the bin. ‘Full of wet muck. Wet tea leaves on top of all that stuff, and it’s running out of the bottom.’
‘Get away this minute! And take that bin with you,’ ordered the old lady.
‘I can refuse to lift it in that state.’
The old lady’s face darkened even further. ‘Get out of here at once!’
‘Aye. I will an’ all. And you can do what the hell you like with your bin.’
Albert, turning away, cried to Rooney, ‘Come on.’
But Rooney did not immediately come on. He looked at the bin which was certainly in a mess, and he looked at the old lady, and quietly he said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll see to it. But, you know, you shouldn’t put wet stuff in.’
‘It’s a bin, and I’ll put what I like in it. And I’ll report that man immediately.’
Looking at her, Rooney thought, She will an’ all. He didn’t like any trouble among the gang; there was enough in the yard at times, and if Bannister got any more complaints from this end he could become unpleasant and Danny’d be the first to get it in the neck. He pushed his hair back before replying, ‘I wouldn’t do that, mum. He’s not usually like that. You see, he’s in a bit of trouble.’
‘Trouble? What trouble?’ demanded the old lady.
‘Well—’ Rooney looked at his boots and said under his breath, ‘It’s his wife…she’s left him.’
‘And a very sensible thing to do. Who’d put up with a man like that? Daring to speak to me in such a fashion! Because I’m alone they think they can do what they like. But they can’t…You’ll take that bin.’
It was an order, and Rooney said, soothingly, ‘Yes, mum, I’ll take the bin.’
With a jerk from his wrist on the handle and a lift from his hand at the bottom he swung the dustbin on to his shoulder as if it was a pail, and as he did so he was thankful for his leather jerkin.
At the van, Albert challenged him. ‘What you go and do it for? The likes of her! Who does she think she is? Her day’s past, and a damned good job, too.’
‘Aye,’ said Rooney. ‘But it’ll save a lot of trouble, man.’
‘Trouble be damned! There should be more trouble,’ cried Albert, stamping away.
Rooney returned down the walk and put the bin under the covered way. The old lady was in the yard now and she watched him in silence. And as he passed her on his way back he suggested again, ‘I wouldn’t put no more wet stuff in, mum.’
‘I’ll put in what I please. You only call when it suits you; weeks go by before you collect.’
‘Oh, mum.’ Rooney smiled, as if at an irritated child. ‘We come if we can get in. But sometimes your gate’s locked.’
She made no comment on this. So saying, ‘Good day, mum,’ Rooney departed, thinking: Poor old wife, living in that great place alone. He did not voice the opinion of the gang as to why she should be allowed to live there when the place would house four families comfortably—to him, old Double-Barrel was of a class that had always lived in big houses. Nor did he envy her any part of Honeycroft, for it did not fit in with his idea of a home. What he wanted was a little house, something he could manage. That place would be a headache to anybody, even the Council, he thought, for the whole roof needed retiling and the bricks pointing, for a start.
At the bottom of the road they stopped, and Fred and Bill, together with Rooney gathered on the kerb. This was the spot where they usually had their break, after which Fred would wind up the van end to make way for more dirt.
Rooney had taken up a pole and was distributing the refuse more evenly, so that Albert could get his last binful on, when Bill said softly, ‘Hold your hand a minute. What was that?’
Leaning over, he pulled from among the indescribable mess a battered cardboard box, in which a galaxy of colours was dimmed by ashes and clots of what could have been porridge.
‘Beads, and bairns’ things…look.’ He picked up some little bricks in one hand. ‘They’re bonny, they’re painted with real little pictures, look—’ He rubbed at them. ‘They’ll do for the bairns.’
‘Better watch out,’ said Fred. ‘Remember Hughie Foggarty.’
‘What’s that got to do with it?’ said Bill. ‘I’m not going to sell the damned things, these are only bairns’ bits. I’m havin’ them, and to hell!’
Rooney himself could not see the harm in it. As Bill said, he wasn’t going to sell the stuff, or anything like that. If a chap took stuff for that purpose he deserved all he got. But these were just beads and things; and well, after all, they’d been thrown away.
As Bill pocketed a rubber doll, a little monkey on a stick, and the bricks and beads, Rooney pushed the rubbish still farther back, exclaiming, ‘I think there’s some more here, Bill. Red beads. Look!’ He raked them forward towards Bill, and it was at this point that Fred warned them in a whisper, ‘Look out. Here’s Danny.’
Danny had always been dead nuts on them picking up anything. Long before Foggarty got pulled up, Danny would say, ‘Now none of that, it’s not worth the candle.’ And so Bill abruptly finished his scrambling and turned away.
Rooney had the beads under his hand. They looked nice beads in spite of them being all messed up. They were on a chain of some sort, and it seemed a shame to push them back among all the muck, when they’d please some bairn. With a quiet movement he covered them with his fist and unobtrusively pocketed them.
Now that Albert’s tongue had been released, it seemed impossible for him to control it. Walking half a dozen paces each way in front of the lorry, he stormed against his wife and the world that dared to give foot-room to Negroes, and women in general.
Danny motioned to the rest of them to let him carry on, and the fact that Albert carried on for the rest of the day contributed to Rooney’s forgetting to hand over the beads to Bill. That, and one or two other things he had on his mind, the main one being that before he went home he had to make a purchase.
At four-thirty he left his mates at the depot, and making his way to King Street he started to look round. And it was before a high-class gentlemen’s outfitters that he finally stopped and saw in the window what he wanted. It took him some time to enter the shop, for to his mind his working togs were not in line with what he was after, but had he gone home and changed the shops would all have been closed, and he would have had to wait until the weekend. And he couldn’t wait till then to go to the bathroom. And he wasn’t going to risk another look like he got yesterday when he met that madam on the landing, with just his trousers on and his galasses hanging down. He’d been having a bath when he ran into her, and she’d looked as shocked as if he’d been naked. She was in a dressing gown, they all wore them. The old woman made the breakfast in hers. And this morning he had seen the little one draped in a thing that made her look worse, if anything, than she really was.
In the shop, an assistant stepped forward and said, ‘Can I help you?’
‘I want a dressing gown.’
There was a moment’s pause while the assistant took in Rooney from head to toe.
‘Yes, sir. Have you any particular colour in mind? How about this?’ He went to a stand, where a red-patterned, artificial-silk dressing gown draped a headless man.
‘No, not like that,’ said Rooney. He didn’t want to look like a Chinese mandarin. ‘Like the one in the middle of the window.’
‘The mushroom-coloured one? Yes, sir.’
There had been no price on the dressing gown, and when the assistant laid it on the counter and Rooney saw its thick, tartan-lined interior, he thought, I’ve done it now. I should have asked him what it was first.
‘How much?’ he said.
Eight pounds nineteen and eleven. Nine quid! It would have to be beautiful quality…why, he could get a suit for eight pounds nineteen and eleven. He looked towards the headless man, and the assistant said, ‘That’s very good value at seventy shillings. And we have others, thicker, a mixture of wool and cotton. But I think this will be more your size, sir. It allows for breadth, where the cheaper ones don’t, and your shoulders are’—he smiled congratulatorily—‘pretty broad.’
Rooney remained dumb, staring at the dressing gown. He couldn’t have a suit and this an’ all and put twenty pounds in the bank. But did he need to put twenty pounds in the bank? If he hadn’t had the win he couldn’t have done it. ‘I’ll take it,’ he said.
‘And anything else, sir? Pyjamas? Shirts?’
Pyjamas. If you had a dressing gown you’d have to have pyjamas, he supposed. He never wore anything in bed; winter and summer he slept…blank. He bought two sets of pyjamas.
‘Slippers, sir?’
Lord! He groaned inwardly. He had slippers, but they were felt ones, and they certainly couldn’t stand up to this rig-out. He bought slippers, leather ones with lamb’s wool lining, and left the shop fifteen pounds lighter, telling himself he was barmy, but accompanied by a feeling of recklessness touched with excitement. If his coal had come—he had asked Harry Baker on his way to work to be sure and drop him a couple of bags in—then he would get dressed up and sit in expensive comfort afore the fire…By! lad, eh? He shook his head and laughed at himself. What would the chaps say if they knew! Phew! He grew hot at the thought.
As he opened the kitchen door of No. 71 he was immediately aware that there was company, for from beyond the closed door of the living room there came the sound of voices, and the high-pitched note of a child squealing, ‘Just let me have one more look. Just one more. Yes! Yes! Mummy.’
He took off his coat and his boots, and put on his slippers which he had left in the corner, and with the parcel under his arm, he entered the room.
‘Oh! I didn’t hear you come in. You’re late. I thought you weren’t coming.’
Ma was seated at the table, and across from her was the wife of the miserable-looking fellow Dennis, and the young, stuck-up piece, Doreen. And by Ma’s side was a thin, pert-faced child of about six, who stopped her chattering to stare at Rooney.
‘Good evening.’
Pauline had the grace to answer, but Doreen continued her meal in silence.
‘I’ve got your pie all ready,’ said Ma. ‘Will you…?’ She paused as her granddaughter cried, ‘I’m going up to look just once more.’ The child had slipped from the chair and was now at the door.
‘You’re not! Come here. Be quiet. We’re going home in a minute,’ said Pauline, with calm preciseness.
The child, ignoring her mother, appealed to Ma, ‘Oh, Gran, can I? Just a peep. Say yes.’
‘Go on then,’ said Ma. ‘And don’t be a minute, mind. Now as I was saying—’ She turned to Rooney. ‘Oh, she’s a chatterbox, I don’t know where I was. Oh yes. Will you have your tea now or get washed first?’
Although he would, in any case, have said, ‘I’ll have a wash first,’ he felt that Ma had a way of placing her words so as to make you do what she wanted. And she evidently didn’t want him to sit down with her two daughters. Well, she needn’t have worried.
‘I’ll be down later,’ he said.
‘Very well.’
As he mounted the stairs, Doreen’s voice came up to him as it had done on Saturday, and he heard her say quite plainly, ‘How can you be so smarmy with him! He’s like a big gorilla.’
He stopped dead, and the heat from a wave of unaccustomed anger covered his face. Gorilla! By! lad, he’d like to take his hand and smack that one’s face.
It was such an unusual thought for him that he was upset as much by it as by the remark that had caused it.
A light streaming from the room next to his own lit the dark landing, and as he passed the open door he saw the child standing beside a single bed, and on the bed, propped up by a pillow, was a doll. The room was small, but even its size could not take away the impression of bareness, for all he could see in it was a corner hanging wardrobe, a small chest of drawers, and a bed. As he went into his own room his anger was lifted a little, for the fire was on and his curtains drawn, and his chair arranged before the hearth. The picture it made eased the hurt of the stinging words, yet as soon as he had put down the parcel he went to the dressing table and surveyed himself. His shoulders admittedly were big, and his body perhaps over-thick, but his face wasn’t even dark, it was fair-skinned, and he had a good skin, if nothing else. His sandy-brown hair was a bit unruly and wouldn’t stay put for five minutes, but he had seen worse. He had no false ideas about himself, but…gorilla!
Before opening the parcel he went across to the bathroom and had a good wash. Then, once again in his room, he gently lifted the dressing gown from its wrapping and tried it on.
Standing again before the mirror he stared for a long while at his reflection. Then his grey eyes gave himself an appreciative twinkle. By! lad, who would have believed he could have looked like this. It was the colour—mushroom, the fellow had said. Or was it the cut; easy, but fitting snugly like an old boot?…And that one saying ‘gorilla!’ Oh! he’d like to show her…
A scream, suddenly rising through the floor from the living room, startled him out of the rare act of self-approval, and he stared downwards.
It came again. And then again, but now through a confused babble of voices. And when it continued, he went swiftly to the door, and opening it, listened. It was the child, and it sounded as though she had been scalded or something. He heard a door open and the voice of the old man muttering, ‘What’s all this? What’s goin’ on?’ Then the muted voices from the living room seemed to explode into the hall, and he made out Ma’s above the rest, crying to the old man, ‘You get yourself back!…As for you, you’ll end up in the asylum.’
‘And who’ll put me there? She’s not having it, it’s mine.’
He was surprised to hear the little one speaking.
‘Kathie…leave go! Do you hear? All this fuss about a bit of a doll.’ It was the mother’s voice. ‘Really, Nellie; you’re beyond me.’
Then Ma’s voice came again, outdoing them all, barking with finality, ‘The child’s goin’ to keep it! What is it, anyway, but a clouty doll? You can make another. You’re going bats…you and your dolls!’
There followed a quick, odd silence, during which even the old man’s tongue was still. Rooney moved forward to the top of the stairs, impelled by more than mere curiosity. Then very distinctly he heard the little one say, with quiet yet piercing emphasis, ‘If I don’t get it, I don’t put in another stitch…not one.’
The silence took hold again, until it was broken by Doreen’s pseudo-refined tone: ‘Give it back to Aunt Nellie, Kathie.’ Another silence—then, ‘If you don’t, I won’t have you for my bridesmaid, mind…I’ll get Aunt Betty’s Doris. That’s who I’ll get.’
No more words, but the sounds of movement, and before he knew what had taken place, Nellie was on the stairs below him, and there was nothing for him to do but to pretend to be on his way down.
He stood on the top stair to let her pass, and as she came abreast of him he stared at her, fascinated. In the dim light she looked like a young girl of seventeen or eighteen hugging a child. The doll was dressed up in a white lacy thing, like a christening gown, and her hand was covering its head, pressing its face into her chest.
She was not aware of him until she was close upon him, and then she lifted her head for one brief moment, and the pain he saw in her face caused a feeling of pain in himself as if he were witnessing the baiting of an animal or small child, and he wanted to cry out to her, ‘Don’t be hurt like that, whatever it is.’
He watched her run across the landing and into her room, and after her door banged he
waited for a moment before softly returning to his own room. He felt bewildered…he couldn’t make it out. He didn’t know what to think. She must set some store by that doll. Perhaps she’d had it since she was a bairn…The picture of her face came back to him. He’d never seen anybody in his life with such sad eyes. And they could be lovely eyes, he thought, if she was happy.
He took off the dressing gown and hung it on the back of the door, put the pyjamas away and the new slippers on; then sat down and waited until he heard Doreen come upstairs. When her door closed, he went down to the living room. The mother and child were gone, the old man was not to be seen, and Ma was clearing part of the table. She went into the kitchen and returned with his meal before she spoke.
‘I’m so ashamed. I’m sure you couldn’t help but overhear that terrible carry-on.’ She put the dish on the table, then threw out her arms. ‘And all for nothing, absolutely nothing! It makes me so ashamed. We never have rows in the house, I can’t stand rows.’
‘Oh, it’s all right,’ said Rooney. ‘Families always have dust-ups. It’s all right.’
‘It’s not all right, Rooney. Not at all.’ Ma placed her two plump hands flat on the table and leaned towards him. ‘Can you imagine a grown woman making herself a doll? And just because a child takes a fancy to it, going on like she did? Between you and me she’s a trial…a great trial. What with her and him’—she motioned with her index finger towards the right-hand side wall—‘life isn’t worth living at times.’
Rooney was never very curious about people, but there were a number of questions he would have liked to ask Ma, but all he could say was, ‘It’s better to have a family to quarrel with than no family at all.’
Ma looked at him hard for a moment, and after straightening and adjusting the back of her hair, she said, ‘I suppose there is something in that.’ She allowed a pause to follow before going on, ‘But when you try to make people feel one of the family and you get nothing but ingratitude it hurts. Do you know I’ve had her since she was ten? After her mother died I took her in—her father had died years before. My Queenie was nine at the time, and I had a boy of ten and one eight, and three younger girls. But I didn’t hesitate. She was one of the family—I treated them all alike—I didn’t make flesh of one and fish of the other. And this is what I get. And’—she drew in her chins as she stared at him—‘you’ve seen her, the sight of her. She gets worse. She doesn’t trouble. Now, there are my girls—you’ve seen three of them. Do they look like her? And my Queenie…no-one would believe there’s only a year between Queenie and her. You haven’t met my Queenie yet. She lives in Roker. I go over there once a month. She’s got a beautiful place, modern house, everything really up to date. And a lovely garden…They keep a gardener. Her husband’s manager for a large wholesale firm.’
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