The Long Corridor

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘You’re not ready yet.’ She looked at Lorna, and Lorna rising slowly from the couch said, ‘I told you, Mammy, I’ve only to put my hat and coat on, they’re in the hall. Bye-bye, Aunt Jenny.’ She bent and kissed Jenny. ‘See you later.’

  ‘Yes, dear.’

  ‘Goodnight, Mrs Hoffman.’ He remembered names.

  ‘Goodnight,’ said Jenny.

  Then Bett was standing in front of her, pulling on her gloves. ‘You don’t mind…you’re sure?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure.’

  ‘Bye then.’

  ‘Bye-bye. Oh, what time will I tell Paul you’ll be back.’

  ‘You can tell him to expect me when he sees me.’

  Jenny turned her head away impatiently, and when she heard the front door bang she rose slowly and walked about the room. She had come home, as she thought of this house, full of her new self, but now it didn’t seem to be of the slightest importance. As usual, she felt swamped by the needs of those around her, by Bett’s in particular. What was going to be the end of her and this constant warfare with Paul? What was equally bad was her obsession with youth. Didn’t she realise even yet she’d get talked about, laughed at? It had happened before. Well, she couldn’t do anything about it, she knew that, because although Bett was in no way as mature as herself, she was stronger, for being selfish and self-willed she was less amenable.

  But she was glad in a way that Bett had gone out, for this would enable her to meet Paul alone.

  She sat down again, and opening her handbag took out her mirror, and for the thousandth time in the past few days she scanned her face. She still couldn’t believe she was looking at herself, that this ordinary, normal-looking creature was her.

  When she heard the surgery door close she put the mirror quickly back into her bag and snapped it closed. She waited. She paced his steps to Elsie’s room. After this she had to wait a further five minutes, and when she next heard his feet crossing the hall she was in such a state of agitation that beads of sweat were resting on her upper lip. The steps came to a halt some way from the drawing room door and in the silence there came the distant blare of the Salvation Army’s band. Being Friday night, the money night, and club night, the army was off to do battle in the centre of Fellburn. The sound was cheery, rousing. She wondered if Paul was standing listening to it. The band or the players never aroused his ire, as it did Bett’s. He had been brought up on the sound of it. Such was her agitation that when the drawing room door eventually opened she gave a start. She hadn’t heard him come in.

  ‘Why, Jinny!’ His deep rumbling voice was loud, pleased. ‘When did you come?’ She turned towards him as he rounded the couch.

  ‘About half an hour ago, Paul.’

  ‘Jinny!…Jinny!’ His big face seemed to be spreading even wider. His head was moving in small, almost imperceivable little motions.

  ‘Well, Paul?’

  ‘Jin-ny!’ He took a slow heavy step towards her; then taking her hands, his eyes still on her face, he said, ‘So this was it?’

  She gulped and nodded. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I…I don’t know. Honest, I don’t know. I…I liked you as you were, Jinny.’

  ‘Well, I’m still me. But…but I always wanted to get rid of it and…and Ben said I must.’

  ‘Ben did?’ He jerked his chin to the side, and it gave emphasis to the question.

  ‘Yes; he was the only one I ever spoke to about it. He wanted me to go and have the operation when he was still alive, but I wouldn’t. He didn’t want me to do it for—for his sake, but for my own.’

  Paul’s face crinkled now into painful lines, and he said under his breath, ‘But, Jinny, I didn’t know it worried you so. I could have arranged something, but…but I would never have thought of putting it to you.’

  ‘No, I understand; it had to come from me. But still’—she leant away from him—‘what do you think? Does it make any improvement?’ Her lips were apart, there was a beseeching look in her eyes, and he too leant back from her, still holding her hands, and surveyed her from head to foot before saying, ‘You’re all changed, right from your feet up. Yes, Jinny, I suppose it does. In fact there’s no doubt about it. I suppose I should say you look extremely smart, and you do.’

  ‘But…but you’re not really in favour of me having done it, Paul, are you?’

  ‘Yes, Jinny, yes.’ His voice was loud now, like a gentle roar, and he shook her two hands up and down. ‘Yes, I am, and it’s going to make you happier. Not that I ever thought you were sad, but…but some time later on, when I get thinking about it, I know I’ll be flaming mad with myself for not having proposed it.’

  It was in a way as Bett had said, but only in a way, for she could see that he was still flabbergasted at what she had done, at the complete change in her. Well, she was flabbergasted herself.

  ‘Where did you go?’

  ‘To Belling’s Clinic.’

  ‘Oh, he’s good, he’s got a name. You went to the best place. Come on, sit down and tell me about it. I mean the whole thing, all you did.’

  So with one hand still in his she told him about the operation, about Doctor Belling himself, about all the contacts she made from the clinic, the beauty specialist, the dress shop with the private room and the two women hovering over her; and she finished with, ‘And you know, Paul, altogether I spent five hundred pounds…five hundred pounds on me.’ She thumped her chest.

  ‘You couldn’t have spent it on a better person. Good for you, Jinny. And now what are your plans? What are you thinking about doing?’

  ‘Well, I thought of getting a flat, perhaps on Brampton Hill; they’re turning the big houses into flats there.’

  ‘Nice; that’s nice. I’m glad you’ll be near. You’re a comfort; you know that, Jinny, don’t you? You’ve always been a comfort.’ Letting go her hand now and getting to his feet, he added, ‘How is it you’re cousins and there’s not a spark of you in her? I’ve looked for it for years; but no, you’re poles apart.’

  ‘You’re too hard on her, Paul.’

  ‘Huh!’ He swung his big body quickly round and his voice was accusing now. ‘You mean that? You really think that, Jinny?’

  ‘Yes, I do, Paul.’

  ‘But you know how she goes on, you know she’s unbearable.’

  ‘Yes, but…’ Jenny shook her head, she couldn’t say, It’s unbearable for her too, isolated at the end of the corridor. She wished she didn’t feel that Bett had a point in her favour; she didn’t want to feel any sympathy for Bett. ‘It’s none of my business,’ she went on. ‘I don’t want to get involved, Paul. What I mean is, I don’t want to take one side against the other.’

  ‘I don’t understand you…at least with regard to Bett, Jinny. I know she’s as fond of you as she can be of anyone, yet she’s used you at every opportunity; all her life she’s used you.’

  ‘Perhaps I wanted to be used, Paul. Free agents, and I’m a free agent, are not often made to do things. If they do them it’s because in some part they want to do them. We were brought up together; she and her mother were the only family I had. I suppose that’s the explanation really; they were my people. And I’ve always wanted her to be happy, because in spite of everything, her looks and her gaiety, she’s never been happy, not even when she was young.’

  He made a sound in his throat, then turned from her as if tired of the conversation, and looking at his watch he said, ‘I’ve got a full evening; I’d better be off.’

  ‘Have you had your meal?’

  His mouth twisted in a semblance of a smile as he said, ‘No. Anyway, I’ve never liked eating in the kitchen. You know that, Jinny. And the new order is, the kitchen or the cold dining room.’ He waited for her to make some comment, but when she didn’t he went on, ‘I could put my foot down and turn every blasted radiator in the house to the top of its bent; I could put every electric fire on, every gadget; but what would that lead to? Anyway,’ he wrinkled his nose, ‘it’s getting to mean less and les
s. Everything’s getting to mean less and less.’

  ‘Oh, Paul; don’t sound like that.’

  ‘It’s a fact, Jinny. Aw, well, I must be off.’ He bent quickly towards her now and, touching her cheek gently, scanned her face for a second before saying, ‘Don’t change inside, Jinny.’

  ‘There’s not much fear of that.’

  ‘Aw, you never know.’

  ‘I’m set in me ways.’ She laughed at him.

  ‘I’m glad. Goodnight, Jinny.’ He tapped her cheek.

  ‘Goodnight, Paul.’

  When he was gone she sat with her chin drawn into her neck, her eyes fixed on her hands gripped together in her lap. And she sat like this until she heard the sound of his car moving out of the yard; then she rose heavily from the couch and went up to her room.

  Her new cases were standing by her bed. She did not look at them but walked towards the wardrobe mirror and there, gazing at herself, she asked her reflection, ‘And for what?’ All the excitement of her transformed being was gone; she felt flatter, more desolate, more alone than she had ever done in her life before. Addressing her new self in the mirror, she said, ‘Get yourself out of here as quickly as possible.’ And she watched her head nod slowly in answer…

  It was around nine o’clock when the front doorbell rang. There had been no calls during the evening, and Jenny knew it wouldn’t be them back from the club, because Bett had her key. When she opened the door she expected to find someone from the vicinity, who found it quicker to come to the doctor’s house than to phone, but she actually fell back in amazement as Lorna dashed past her into the hall.

  ‘Where are the…?’ She didn’t finish the question but, putting her head out of the door, she looked into the Square. There was no-one to be seen; so, closing the door, she hurried after Lorna into the drawing room.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  Lorna was standing in the centre of the room, the fingers of one hand pressed tightly across her mouth.

  ‘What is it, dear?’ Jenny approached her slowly and put her arms about her; and Lorna, as if she had been holding her breath for an unimagined time, whipped her hand from her mouth and as her body deflated cried, ‘I hate Mammy, Aunt Jenny, I hate her!’

  ‘Oh, Lorna, Lorna. Don’t say such a thing. What’s upset you?’ She drew her to the fire. ‘Here, take your coat off and sit down.’ She threw her hat and coat to one side and asked again, ‘What is it? What’s upset you like this?’

  ‘Oh, Aunt Jenny, Aunt Jenny.’ Lorna collapsed against her and began to cry noisily.

  ‘There now, there now. Don’t go on like that. Come on, come on, dear. Sit down and tell me what it is.’

  Slowly the crying ebbed away; and then Lorna, pulling herself upwards, looked through her streaming eyes at Jenny and said quietly, ‘I do hate her, Aunt Jenny, I do really.’

  ‘Lorna, you mustn’t say things like that.’ Jenny’s voice was stern. ‘Now don’t; it’s a dreadful thing to say, no matter what she’s done…But what has she done?’

  Lorna moved slowly from the couch on to the pouffe that was near the fire, and she crouched on it like someone on a rock trying to evade the incoming tide, and with her head hanging she began, ‘We couldn’t get in at the club, it was full, and there was a dance on at the Borough Hall. She’s always looked down her nose at the Borough Hall, yet when Brian said what about it, she went all girlish.’ A slight repulsive shiver went through her body. ‘She pretended she was going slumming, and Brian met a boy he knew and he joined up with us. And I didn’t like him, and he saw I didn’t like him, and after the first dance he didn’t ask me again. But Mammy’—her head jerked violently—‘she didn’t give Brian a chance, she danced with him nearly all the time. She made him dance with her. She kept teasing him and laughing and joking, and showing him she could twist better than anybody else…trying to beat the young girls. I—I felt sick. I couldn’t watch her any more so I just walked out.’

  The room became very quiet, until Jenny said, ‘You know, Lorna, you must realise that your mammy isn’t old, she’s only thirty-six. It’s not old.’

  ‘But she’s a mother.’ Lorna twisted quickly around on the pouffe and confronted Jenny. ‘She’s my mother. Queenie Price’s mother doesn’t act like that, she—she acts properly…like a doctor’s wife should. And Rhona Watson’s mother doesn’t act like her, and she’s pretty. Nor Phyllis Bell’s; nor any of the others I know…She wants Brian, Aunt Jenny.’

  ‘Don’t say that, Lorna.’ Jenny sounded shocked.

  ‘I will say it; yes, I will say it, Aunt Jenny. I’m no longer a child, I know about things. I read, I read a lot. She’s never told me anything that a mother should tell a daughter, and I can’t talk to Daddy, not about that. But I’ve read all about it.’ She lowered her eyes. Then lifting her head sharply, and her husky sounding voice coming from deep within her, she said bitterly, ‘Mammy wants Brian, and he knows it. He’s only been coming to the house for about three weeks and he’s changed. I’ve known him for a long time; he used to meet me on and off coming from school. He had other girls. I know two he went round with. Paula Bradford. She left last year; he used to go with her. And then Mary Weir. But every now and again he would meet me; and then one night he came to the house and waited outside and Daddy saw him and told him to come in. That was the first time she had met him, and she went silly, ab-so-lute-ly silly…Oh, Aunt Jenny, it makes me feel terrible when I watch her.’

  ‘Come now.’ Jenny leant over and pulled her gently from the pouffe, and when she was seated on the couch again she cradled her in her arms and said soothingly, ‘You’re in love for the first time and everything is larger than life. It’s a very nice state to be in, but you tend to exaggerate lots of things when you’re like that. Now, have you looked at it this way? Brian is being nice to your mother because he wants her on his side, because he’s in love with you?’

  ‘Yes, I thought that at first; but then you see, Aunt Jenny, that’s not Mammy’s side of it, she’ll not see it like that. I tell you she’s gone all shot about him.’

  Suddenly Jenny pulled her to her feet. ‘Come on; you’ll see everything clearer in the morning. The time’s getting on. You get to bed and I’ll bring you a hot drink up, and we’ll sit and have a natter. I’ve got lots of plans for the future, about my flat and everything, and I want someone to listen to me. Go on now.’

  As if her light body was held down by weights Lorna went slowly from the room, and Jenny went into the kitchen, and here she stood resting against the edge of the table for a moment. Paul would do something desperate if Bett started that again. Was she mad altogether? Well, not altogether, only a part of her, the part that was starved of physical expression. And who could blame her? You couldn’t say to Bett that she should sublimate it. No, that kind of thing was only expected of nurses with big noses. As her thoughts turned bitter she went hastily to the cupboard and, taking out a pan, she warmed some milk.

  A few minutes later, when she mounted the stairs with the tray in her hand, she saw Lorna coming out of the bathroom. She was dressed now in her pyjamas and she looked like a slim boy, a beautiful, dark, oriental slim boy, and the sight hurt her, and she wondered if it hurt Paul.

  She had been sitting on the edge of Lorna’s bed for about ten minutes when she heard the front door open. On the sound she stopped talking, and leaning towards Lorna she said, urgently, ‘Now don’t be nasty. Just say you came home because you felt tired.’

  At this Lorna lowered her lids and pressed her lips together, but said nothing. There was the sound of the drawing room door banging, then footsteps on the stairs, followed by the bedroom door being thrust open. And there stood Bett, an enraged Bett, no semblance of the girl visible now.

  ‘What do you think you’re up to, madam?’ She came quickly towards the bed, ignoring Jenny, her eyes fixed hard on her daughter. ‘We’ve searched the place for you. Frightening the life out of me, going off like that.’

  ‘I didn’t think you would not
ice.’ Lorna’s voice sounded cool.

  ‘What do you mean, you didn’t think I’d notice? I went to the trouble of going to that beastly dance hall just so that you could have a dance—you’re always on about going to dances—and then what happens? You sit like a stook, and then you just go off without a word to anyone. Well, it won’t happen again; I’m not going to waste my time…’

  ‘Oh, stop kidding yourself, Mammy.’ Lorna had pulled herself swiftly up in the bed, and now her face was on a level with her mother’s.

  ‘How dare you speak to me like that!’ Bett’s face was scarlet.

  ‘Well, you’ve asked for it. You are kidding yourself. You kid yourself all the time…’

  The force of the slap overbalanced Lorna and knocked her head against the wall. And Bett, leaning over the bed, would have repeated it if Jenny hadn’t gripped her by the arms, crying, ‘Bett! Bett, stop it! Pull yourself together. What’s come over you, woman?’

  ‘I’m not having her speak to me like that. How dare she. How dare she. I won’t stand for it.’ One arm was flaying the air now. Then all of a sudden it dropped; and Bett’s voice dropped, too, and, her small body crumpling, she burst into tears, loud hysterical tears, and tearing herself from Jenny’s hold she rushed out of the room.

  Jenny didn’t follow her, except to close the bedroom door. Then, returning to the bed, she gently drew Lorna to her and held her shivering body tightly in her arms. Yet strangely it was Bett she thought of as she comforted Lorna, Bett who had now lost her daughter, for this thing would always be between them. She wished she hadn’t to be sorry for Bett; oh, how she wished that.

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