Stories

by Doris Lessing

  A month later they heard George had married someone else. Rose had a pang of regret, but it was the kind of regret one feels for something inevitable, that could not have been otherwise. When they met in the street, she said “Hullo, George,” and he gave her a curt, stiff nod. She even felt a little hurt because he would not let bygones be; that he felt he had to store resentment. If she could greet him nicely as a friend, then it was unkind of him to treat her coldly…. She glanced with covert interest at the girl who was his wife, and waited for a greeting; but the girl averted her face and stared coldly away. She knew about Rose; she knew she had got George on the rebound.

  This was in 1938. The rumours and the fear of war were still more an undercurrent in people’s minds than a part of their thinking. Vaguely, Rose and her father expected that everything would continue as it was. About four months after Mother’s death, Jem said one day: “Why don’t you give up your work now. We can manage without what you earn, if we’re careful.”

  “Yes?” said Rose, in the sceptical way which already told him his pleading was wasted. “You’ve got too much,” he persisted. “Cleaning and cooking, then out all day at work.”

  “Men,” she said simply, with a good-natured but dismissing sniff.

  “There’s no sense in it,” he protested, knowing he was wasting his breath. His wife had insisted on working until Rose was sixteen and could take her place. “Women should be independent,” she had said. And now Rose was saying: “I like to be independent.”

  Jem said: “Women. They say all women want is a man to keep them, but you and your mother, you go on as if I’m trying to do you out of something when I say you mustn’t work.”

  “Women here and women there,” said Rose. “I don’t know about women. All I know is what I think.”

  Jem was that old type of Labour man who has been brought up in the trade union movement. He went to meetings once or twice a week, and sometimes his friends came in for a cup of tea and an argument. For years he had been saying to his wife: “If they paid you proper, it’d be different. You work ten hours a day, and it’s all for the bosses.” Now he used the argument on Rose, and she said: “Oh, politics, I’m not interested.” Her father said: “You’re as stubborn as a mule, like your mother.”

  “Then I am,” said Rose, good-humouredly. She would have said she had not “got on” with her mother; she had had to fight to become independent of that efficient and possessive woman. But in this she agreed with her: it had been instilled into her ever since she could remember, that women must look after themselves. Like her mother, she was indulgent about the trade union meetings, as if they were a childish amusement that men should be allowed; and she voted Labour to please him, as her mother had done. And every time her father pleaded with her to give up her job at the bakery she inexorably replied: “Who knows what might happen? It’s silly not to be careful.” And so she continued to get up early in order to clean the basement kitchen and the two little rooms over it that was their home; then she made the breakfast and went out to shop. Then she went to the bakery, and at six o’clock came back to cook supper for her father. At weekends she had a grand clean-up of the whole place, and cooked puddings and cakes. They were in bed most nights by nine. They never went out. They listened to the radio while they ate, and they read the newspapers. It was a hard life, but Rose did not think of it as hard. If she had ever used words like “happiness,” she would have said she was happy. Sometimes she thought wistfully, not of George, but of the baby his wife was going to have. Perhaps, after all, she had made a terrible mistake? Then she squashed the thought and comforted herself: There’s plenty of time, there’s no hurry, I couldn’t leave Dad now.

  When the war started, she accepted it fatalistically while her father was deeply upset. His vision of the future had been the old socialist one: everything would slowly get better and better; and one day the working man would get into power by the automatic persuasion of commonsense, and then—but his picture of that time was not so clear. Vaguely he thought of a house with a little garden and a holiday by the sea once a year. The family had never been able to afford a proper holiday. But the war cut right across this vision.

  “Well, what did you expect?” asked Rose satirically.

  “What do you mean?” he demanded aggressively. “If Labour’d been in, it wouldn’t have happened.”

  “Maybe, maybe not.”

  “You’re just like your mother,” he complained again. “You haven’t got any logic.”

  “Well, you’ve been going to meetings for years and years, and you make resolutions, and you talk, but there’s a war just the same.” She felt as if this ended the argument. She felt, though she could never have put it into words, that there was a deep basic insecurity, that life itself was an enemy to be placated and humoured, liable at any moment to confront her, or people like her, with death or destitution. The only sensible thing to do was to gather together every penny that came along and keep it safe. When her mother had been alive, she paid thirty shillings of the two pounds a week she earned towards the housekeeping. Now that thirty shillings went straight into the post office. When the newspapers and the wireless blared war and horror at her, she thought of that money, and it comforted her. It didn’t amount to much, but if something happened … What that something might be, she did not clearly know. But life was terrible, there was no justice—had not her own mother been killed by a silly lorry crossing the street she had crossed every day of her life for twenty-five years … that just proved it. And now there was a war, and all sorts of people were going to be hurt, all for nothing—that proved it too, if it needed any proof. Life was frightening and dangerous—therefore, put money into the post office; hold on to your job, work, and—put money into the post office.

  Her father sat over the wireless set, bought newspapers, argued with his cronies, trying to make sense of the complicated, cynical movements of power politics, while the familiar pattern of life dissolved into the slogans and noise of war, and the streets filled with uniforms and rumours. “It’s all Hitler,” he would say aggressively to Rose.

  “Maybe, maybe not.”

  “Well, he started it, didn’t he?”

  “I’m not interested who started it. AU I know is, ordinary people don’t want war. And there’s war all the time. They make me sick if you want to know—and you men make me sick, too. If you were young enough, you’d be off like the rest of them,” she said accusingly.

  “But Rosie,” he said, really shocked, “Hitler’s got to be stopped, hasn’t he?”

  “Hitler,” she said scornfully. “Hitler and Churchill and Stalin and Roosevelt—they all make me sick, if you want to know. And that goes for your Attlee too.”

  “Women haven’t got any logic,” he said, in despair.

  So they came not to discuss the war at all, they merely suffered it. Slowly, Rose came to use the same words and slogans as everyone else; and like everyone else, with deep sad knowledge that it was all talk, and what was really happening in the world was something vast and terrible, beyond her comprehension; and perhaps it was wonderful too, if she only knew—but she could never hope to understand. Better get on with the job, live as best she could, try not to be afraid and—put money in the post office.

  Soon she switched to a job in a munitions factory. She felt she ought to do something for the war, and also she was paid much better than in the bakery. She did fire-watching too. Often she was up till three or four and then woke at six to clean and cook. Her father continued as a bricklayer and did fire-watching three or four nights a week. They were both permanently tired and sad. The war went on, month after month, year after year, food was short, it was hard to keep warm, the searchlights wheeled over the dark wilderness of London, the bombs fell screaming, and the black-out was like a weight on their minds and spirits. They listened to the news, read the newspapers, with the same look of bewildered but patient courage; and it seemed as if the war was a long, black, noisome tunnel from which th
ey would never emerge.

  In the third year Jem fell off a ladder one cold, foggy morning and injured his back. “It’s all right, Rosie,” he said. “I can get back to work all right.”

  “You’re not working,” she said flatly. “You’re sixty-seven. That’s enough now, you’ve been working since you was fourteen.”

  “There won’t be enough coming in every week.”

  “Won’t there?” she said triumphantly. “You used to go on at me for working. Aren’t you glad now? With your bit of pension and what I get, I can still put some away every week if I try. Funny thing,” she said reflectively, not without grim humour: “It was two pounds a week when there was peace, and I was supposed to be grateful for it. Comes a war and they pay you like you was a queen. I’m getting seven pounds a week now, one way and another. So you take things easy, and if I find you back to work, with your back as it is, and your rheumatism, you’ll catch it from me, I’m telling you.”

  “It’s not easy for me to sit at home, with the war and all,” he said uneasily.

  “Well, did you make the war? No! You have some sense now.”

  Now things were not so hard for Rose, because when Jem could get out of bed he cleaned the rooms for her and there was a cup of tea waiting when she came in at night. But there was an emptiness in her and she could not pretend to herself there was not. One day she saw George’s wife in the street with a little girl of about four, and stopped her. The girl was hostile, but Rose said hurriedly: “I wanted to know, how’s George?” Rather unwillingly came the reply: “He’s all right, so far, he’s in North Africa.” She held the child to her as she spoke, as if for comfort, and tears came into Rose’s eyes. The two women stood hesitating on the pavement; then Rose said appealingly: “It must be hard for you.” “Well, it’ll be over some day—when they’ve stopped playing soldiers” was the grim reply; and at this Rose smiled in sympathy and the women suddenly felt friendly towards each other. “Come over some time if you like,” said George’s wife, slowly; and Rose said quickly: “I’d like to ever so much.”

  So Rose got into the habit of going over once a week to the rooms that had originally been got ready for herself. She went because of the little girl, Jill. She was secretly asking herself now: Did I make a mistake then? Should I have married George? But even as she asked the question she knew it was futile: she could have behaved in no other way; it was one of those irrational, emotional things that seem so slight and meaningless, but are so powerful. And yet, time was passing, she was nearly thirty, and when she looked in the mirror she was afraid. She was very thin now, nothing but a white-faced shrimp of a girl, with lank, tired, stringy black hair. Her sombre dark eyes peered anxiously back at her over hollowed and bony cheeks. “It’s because I work so hard,” she comforted herself. “No sleep, that’s what it is, and the bad food, and those chemicals in the factory … it’ll be better after the war.” It was a question of endurance; somehow she had to get through the war, and then everything would be all right. Soon she looked forward all week to the Sunday night when she went over to George’s wife with a little present for Jill. When she lay awake at night, she thought not of George, nor of the men she met at the factory who might have become interested in her, but of children. What with the war and all the men getting killed, she sometimes worried, perhaps it’s too late. There won’t be any left by the time they’ve finished killing them all off. But if her father could have managed for himself before, he could not now; he was really dependent on her. So she always pushed away her fears and longings with the thought: When the war’s over, we can eat and sleep again, and then I’ll look better, and then perhaps …

  Not long before the war ended, Rose came home late one night, dragging her feet tiredly along the dark pavement, thinking that she had forgotten to buy anything for supper. She turned into her street, was troubled by a feeling that something was wrong, looked down towards the house where she lived, and stopped dead. There were heaps of smoking rubble showing against the reddish glare of fire.

  At first she thought: I must have come to the wrong street in the black-out. Then she understood and began to run towards her home, clutching her handbag tightly, holding the scarf under her chin. At the edge of the street was a deep crater. She nearly fell into it, but righted herself and walked stumblingly among bomb refuse and tangling wires. Where her gate had been she stopped. A group of people were standing there. “Where’s my father?” she demanded angrily. “Where is he?” A young man came forward and said, “Take it easy, miss.” He laid a hand on her shoulder. “You live here? I think your dad was an unlucky one.” The words brought no conviction to her and she stared at him, frowning. “What have you done with him?” she asked, accusingly. “They took him away, miss.” She stood passively, then she heavily lifted her head and looked around her. In this part of the street all the houses were gone. She pushed her way through the people and stood looking down at the steps to the basement door. The door was hanging loose from the frame, but the glass of the window was whole. “It’s all right,” she said half-aloud. She took a key from her handbag and slowly descended the steps over a litter of bricks. “Miss, miss,” called the young man, “you can’t go down there.” She made no reply, but fitted the key into the door and tried to turn it. It would not turn, so she pushed the door; it swung in on its one remaining hinge and she went inside. The place looked as it always did, save that the ornaments on the mantelpiece had been knocked to the floor. It was half-lit from the light of burning houses over the street. She was slowly picking up the ornaments and putting them back when a hand was laid on her arm. “Miss,” said a compassionate voice, “you can’t stay down here.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?” she retorted, with a flash of stubbornness.

  She looked upwards. There was a crack across the ceuing and dust was still settling through the air. But a kettle was boiling on the stove. “It’s all right,” she announced. “Look, the gas is still working. If the gas is all right then things isn’t too bad, that stands to reason, doesn’t it now?”

  “You’ve got the whole weight of the house lying on that ceiling,” said the man dubiously.

  “The house has always stood over the ceiling, hasn’t it,” she said, with a tired humour that surprised him. He could not see what was funny, but she was grinning heavily at the joke. “So nothing’s changed,” she said, airily. But there was a look on her face that worried him, and she was trembling in a hard, locked way, as if her muscles were held rigid against the weakness of her flesh. Sudden spasmodic shudders ran through her, and then she shut her jaw hard to stop them. “It’s not safe,” he protested again, and she obediently gazed around to see. The kettle and the pans stood as they had ever since she could remember; the cloth on the table was one her mother had embroidered, and through the cracked window she could see the black, solid shape of the dust-can, though beyond it there were no silhouettes of grey houses, only grey sky spurting red flame. “I think it’s all right,” she said, stolidly. And she did. She felt safe. This was her home. She lifted the kettle and began making tea. “Have a cup?” she enquired, politely. He did not know what to do. She took her cup to the table, blew off the thick dust and began stirring in sugar. Her trembling made the spoon tinkle against the cup.

  “I’ll be back,” he announced suddenly, and went out, meaning to fetch someone who would know how to talk to her. But now there was no one outside. They had all gone over to the burning houses; and after a little indecision he thought: I’ll come back later, she’s all right for the moment. He helped with the others over at the houses until very late, and he was on his way home when he remembered: That kid, what’s she doing? Almost, he went straight home. He had not had his clothes off for nights, he was black and grimy, but he made the effort and returned to the basement under the heap of rubble. There was a faint glow beneath the ruin and, peering low, he saw two candles on the table, while a small figure sat sewing beside them. Well I’ll be … he thought, and went in. She was darning s
ocks. He went beside her and said: “I’ve come to see if you’re all right.” Rose worked on her sock and replied calmly: “Yes, of course I’m all right, but thanks for dropping in.” Her eyes were enormous, with a wild look, and her mouth was trembling like that of an old woman. “What are you doing?” he asked, at a loss. “What do you think?” she said, tartly. Then she looked wonderingly at the sock which was stretched across her palm and shuddered. “Your dad’s sock?” he said carefully; and she gave him an angry glance and began to cry. That’s better, he thought, and went forward and made her lean against him while he said aloud: “Take it easy, take it easy, miss.” But she did not cry for long. Almost at once she pushed him away and said: “Well there’s no need to let the socks go to waste. They’ll do for someone.”

  “That’s right, miss.” He stood hesitantly beside her and after a moment she lifted her head and looked at him. For the first time she saw him. He was a slight man, of middle height, who seemed young because of the open, candid face, though his hair was greying. His pleasant grey eyes rested compassionately on her and his smile was warm. “Perhaps you’d like them,” she suggested. “And there’s his clothes, too—he didn’t have anything very special, but he always looked after his things.” She began to cry again, this time more quietly, with small, shuddering sobs. He sat gently beside her, patting her hand as it lay on the table, repeating, “Take it easy, miss, take it easy, it’s all right.” The sound of his voice soothed her and soon she came to an end, dried her eyes and said in a matter-of-fact voice: “There, I’m just silly, what’s the use of crying?” She got up, adjusted the candles so that they would not gutter over the cloth, and said: “Well we might as well have a cup of tea.” She brought him one, and they sat drinking in silence. He was watching her curiously; there was something about her that tugged at his imagination. She was such an indomitable little figure sitting there staring out of sad, tired eyes, under the ruins of her home, like a kind of waif. She was not pretty, he decided, looking at the small, thin face, at the tired locks of black hair lying tidily beside it. He felt tender towards her; also he was troubled by her. Like everyone who lived through the big cities during the war, he knew a great deal about nervous strain; about shock; he could not have put words around what he knew, but he felt there was still something very wrong with Rosie; outwardly, however, she seemed sensible, and so he suggested: “You’d better get yourself some sleep. It’ll be morning soon.”