“It’s my first wage, Uncle Dave,” Corky spoke tremulously.
“Congratulations! an’ many happy returns of the day!” Uncle Dave beamed. “Now you can get one or two of those little things you’d had your mind set on. Let’s see, you wanted a complete woodwork set with every tool a carpenter ought to have. Perhaps you’ll be able to make a pair of bellows, so I don’t have to wind myself lighting this fire. And a wallet you wanted, a nice leather one——”
“—No, no,” interrupted Corky. “It’s my wage, Uncle Dave, not spending money. It’s for you—that’s why I didn’t open it.”
“Aw, son.” Uncle Dave was suddenly near tears, he bent his head a little. “’Taint like I was—like I was your mother, an’ an’ sort of was in need of it for bringing up a family.”
“You’ve been mother and father to me, Uncle Dave——” Corky stopped. “Open it, please, let’s see how much there is.”
“My hands are dirty, you slit it open.”
Holding down his excitement, Corky worked a knife under the flap. “We don’t want to cut the note——” He turned the envelope up. Out fell a shilling. There was a note inside, Corky’s fingers went in for it, drew it out. A nice crisp one-pound note.
“There y’are, Uncle Dave—a guinea! I was scared for the moment it might only be a ten-bob note.” It was quiet in the house.
“Not bad for a start?” said Corky, a minute later.
“It’s grand!” Uncle Dave’s eyes were bright. “I think you might keep it—perhaps stick it in the bank?”
Corky shook his head. “No, I don’t want that. What I’d like, Uncle, is for you to buy something special for yourself. A new pipe, eh? One with an amber stem. And a nice white muffler for evenings, you’ve always said you were going to buy yourself a new one. Now stop blowing the fire, Uncle Dave, it’s burning lovely.” Corky took him by the shoulder. “When I think of all the years I’ve been fed, clothed, and cared for by you, Uncle ... it’s—it’s fine to feel I can do something back.”
Over tea Corky began telling Uncle Dave of what Ginger thought about the boys smoking. “He reckons it’s mad to spend your money right off.”
“I suppose it is, son, but there are some people like that, and generally speaking they’re very good-natured souls, too. We’ve a man at work, Wild Harry, we call him, and he’s about the roughest handful you can imagine. Well, he had a bit of a kink in him for drinking and fighting. But mind you, a heart of gold. Yet he had this way of flaring up if somebody said something he didn’t like or if he didn’t care for the look on a bloke’s face. “Another thing he couldn’t stand—arguing. He used to say, It causes more bad feeling than a war. I don’t hold with it. Let him have a poke in the eye, and let him give you one back. Shake hands, and have done with it. ’Tain’t natural for human beings to keep yapping and argufying without a spot of action.’
“Now the returns from this sort of reasoning,” went on Uncle Dave, “combined with his fancy for pints of ale, rather worried me and Harry’s other workmates. He’d turn in many a Monday morning with a couple of black eyes, and not a copper in his pocket. He’d the habit on Friday evenings of calling in the first pub and changing a note over a pint, and in the next pub he’d do the same, till his pockets were full of silver. He used to spend on everyone he met. And used to defend himself by saying it caused nobody any trouble but himself, since he lived alone. But finally we managed to drag a promise from him one pay day, that he’d go straight home with his money, and not get into any trouble no matter how he was tempted. He left us outside the dock gates on Friday evening, shook hands, and said he’d give our advice a trial.
“Oh, but you should have seen him the next morning! I had to go to the police station and bail him out. When I saw him coming out of the cell I could have cried in despair. His lips swollen, a gash down the side of his face, and his left eye a deep purple. I didn’t say a word of reproach, not till we were passing a coffee shop and he asked for the loan of tuppence. I said: ‘Harry, I don’t know how you can do it—after your faithful promise to us!’
“A dangerous light shot in Harry’s eye: If you don’t want your block knocking off——’ he snarled at me, ‘keep your trap shut!’
“It was over a few cups of tea he told me all about it.
“’I made to go straight home, just as I had promised. I went by every pub. I smiled at everybody. And if I came across a face I didn’t like I looked the other way. Just like a saint from heaven I took my place in the 47 bus queue. Now I hadn’t been there many moments when I felt a little guy come up at the back of me. A fellow with a pair of nasty elbows and uncontrolled feet. There was no bus in sight, but he would keep shoving and digging at me. My temper kept rising, but every time it did, I’d grab at the promise I made you lot, and I’d bring a sweet little smile to me kisser. Well, at last a bus did hove to and though I was a bit heel-scraped and back-digged by this time, it was nothing to what came after. He practically kicked me along, and there were two old ladies in front of me, so I had to move slowly to avoid shoving them over. But at last I could stand these ploughing tactics no longer. I turns round on this fellow, and very nicely suggests he can take my place. And without a word of thanks he does. But just as he’s stepping on the bus the conductor puts a hand out. “That’s enough this time.” Now what does this bloke do but turn very nasty on me. “Clever, aincher? Saw there wasn’t going to be enough room, so you thought to take the mike out of me, eh?”
“It’s all I can manage to hold myself in,’ Harry tells me, ‘but I do. I just says, “Sorry, mate. I could see you were in a hurry, that’s why I let you go.” “Oh, you’re one of those funny tykes, eh?” he says. “A smart guy, eh?” I says nothing to that. I’m only just holding myself in, just clinging to my temper by a button, you might say, a button on a single thread. “Well, I’ve got my own little way of dealing with your sort,” said this bloke. And I shakes my head. “If it’s a fight you’re after, count me out. I promised I wouldn’t.” “Oh, you think that’s funny, eh? Well, perhaps you’ll find this is not quite as funny as you think! ...” And with that he cracks me right in the eye! and sends me flying on my back ...!’”
“Phew! ...” sighed Corky. “What did Harry do then?”
“He took one crazy leap at where this guy had been. I say, ‘where he had been’—because when Harry got there, a bobby was in his place. And Harry went into the bobby before realizing his mistake! And before Harry knew what was happening there were two more bobbies there. And kicking, spitting, roaring and raging they dragged old Harry to the lock-up.
“’And when I got to my senses,’ Harry said, ‘and felt in my pockets, I found the wage packet was gone! It must have been jerked out and lost in the struggle.’
“Harry nigh knocked the bottom out of his coffee cup, the force he put it down on the table. ‘In future, I don’t want no one to give me advice! I’m going my own way. I’m going to change all my notes into silver at the first pub. And any face I see that’s got any inclination of meanness written across it, I’m going to take a crack at it ...! To save any bother.
“That was a bit of bad luck, Uncle Dave.”
“It was an’ all, son—but one you can learn a lesson from. It don’t always do to go mending people’s ways. It seems there’s what you might call ‘other phenomena’ guiding and steering every single one of us, and it’s not likely you’ll be a hundred per cent right in judging somebody else.
“But coming back to this first wage packet of yours, how about us having a little celebration this weekend? Go to a theatre or something—what do you say, Corky? And bring Ginger with you.”
“Coo, that’ll be smashing,” cried Corky. And it was decided that all three should go along on Saturday.
8 A Visit to the Theatre
“Is it any use knowing the source of the
Mississippi, or where Timbuctoo is situated,
if I don’t know the shortest cuts to
Portobello Road or Swiss Cot
tage?”
A MAN and two boys gazed disconsolately at the Full Up notices outside the Majestic Theatre on Saturday evening.
“That’s torn it!” groaned Uncle Dave.
“I wonder could we pinch in?” whispered Ginger.
“All the seats are numbered,” replied Uncle Dave, “so we’d only get thrown out if we got in. Unless there’s some seats been returned at the box office.”
They went into the crowded foyer, and Uncle Dave asked the ticket clerk. They were in luck—a certain Lady Mellerow had been let down. “It’s a box for six,” said the clerk, “she’s there with her two daughters.” So three expensive tickets and some money changed hands.
“Like as not she’ll have a coronet on her napper,” said Corky, going up the stairs with Ginger and Uncle Dave.
However, they found Lady Mellerow had no coronet on her napper. And she didn’t fling her voice. She was a chatty old lady in a drab brown dress. Ginger looked at her rather closely, and decided she wasn’t washed properly—which in fact she wasn’t. Truth to tell, both he and Corky were a shade disappointed, for as Corky later remarked, “I expected somebody about seven foot, barrel-chested, and splashed in jewels.”
Ginger sized up the two girls in their plain, simple attire: “Not my type. I like ’em looking mysterious, and wearing bright-coloured frocks. An’ a bit of jewellery don’t look out of place.” Corky cautiously refused to allow himself an opinion till he saw a bit more of them.
“Ain’t it good?” gasped Corky. “Why, you’re practically on the stage yourself in one of these boxes.”
“Yeh, sure, an’ the way they’ve got all this carpet under your feet——”
“An’ how everybody around you is sitting in expectancy.”
“The atmosphere, that’s what it is, Corky, the theatre atmosphere is all wrapped-up in excitement.”
“Hush, the curtain.”
The show opened with a dancing chorus. Though the boys enjoyed the lively music, they soon felt bored at watching the troop of girl dancers, and began to wish they might have a go themselves.
Next came a marionette show. Oh, most delightful were the little figures on strings, strutting around, shaking hands, with the spry man on the flying trapeze, and the pompous figure playing the piano to it all. There was much applause at the end of this act, to which the tiny figures gravely bowed their acknowledgement; all except one excited little fellow who began clapping himself, and promptly got sidekicked off for his bad manners.
On walked Sammy Fry the next. He wore a short jacket that hardly reached his waist, and left a gap between the bottom and his trousers, the latter held up by a suspender belt instead of braces. He had enormous feet, a tiny bowler hat, and an inch-wide parting down the middle of his hair. Sammy had just got himself a porter’s job at the Admiralty, and a man with long black whiskers, a foreign spy, was attempting to bribe him: “You haf these dropped,” he said, handing Sammy a thick bundle of notes. “Thanks,” said Sammy, and counting them—“forty-nine, fifty,” he added: “I just wanted to make sure they were right—it’s me dinner money.”
Then the beautiful spy accomplice called Sammy to sit beside her: “Come, handsome man, whisper ze words of love to me.” “I’d sooner stand here,” replied Sammy, “and throw mud at you.
Ginger gave gusty guffaws of approval. And somehow he set them all laughing. Especially Lady Mellerow who was a little deaf, and occasionally missed the last word and so was grateful for the cue.
As for Corky, he found himself madly in love with a silvery laugh. It came from the girl they called Pat, a melodious trill, it was, cascading in exquisite enchantment on what Corky felt to be his unworthy ears. Twice, turning sideways, he glanced at her comely profile, but it was almost more than he could stand—the agonizing fascination, the anguished joy. It brought specks and spots before his eyes, which obscured from him the exit of Sammy Fry, now promoted from porter to First Lord of the Admiralty.
Then came the interval, lights up, and Lady Mellerow made introductions first of herself and the two girls, and then Uncle Dave obliged for his party. And suddenly they were all chatting like old friends.
“It’s the twins’ birthday, Angela and Pat here,” said Lady Mellerow, “so I thought I’d give them a treat. Three of their friends were joining us but one by one they caught something. This must be the season for germs.”
Uncle Dave said he was sorry to hear it. “Now, what about some lemonade?” he suggested. “An’ you, ma’am, a pot of tea? Or coffee?”
“Er, yes, please,” Lady Mellerow hesitated: “Just a moment, I’m not sure.” She beckoned Uncle Dave, whispered to his bent head, and sat back contentedly as he nodded. “The very thing, I was going to get one for myself.”
The boys and girls talked together over the drinks. The unstoppable Ginger was soon launched.
“Do you work?” Pat had asked.
“Y—yes, I work,” said Corky.
“Better’n school work,” put in Ginger. “What’s the use of learning all about some old cove that burnt cakes, Rump Parliament, and all that lark, if I don’t know what government I’m living under today?” He gave another snort: “Geography! Now I ask you, is it any use knowing the source of the Mississippi, or where Timbuctoo is situated, if I don’t know the shortest cuts to Portobello Road or Swiss Cottage? An’ what’s the use of French when I can’t speak English properly? And, considering the nearest I’ll ever get to France will be a day’s outing at Southend I don’t see as it matters.”
“’Tain’t that Ginger finds anything wrong about all these subjects in themselves,” explained Corky. “It’s this way, at seven every morning we’re trotting off to work, an’ we’ve got to get down to brushing, cleaning, getting our ponies ready. They aren’t a blind bit of use to us, most the things we learnt at school.”
“Perhaps you could know things just for the pleasure of knowing,” suggested Angela.
“What pleasure——” Ginger was suddenly cut short. A green, half or rather three-parts chewed apple stump whizzed from above and hit him between the eyes!
He jumped to his feet. Gazed round at the field of faces, stalls, dress circle, upper circle; not one you could say had thrown it.
“I can hear a persistent stream of whistling from somewhere,” remarked Pat.
“From the gallery I believe,” said Angela.
They all looked up.
A volley of shouts greeted them:
“Wotcher, Ginger!”
“There’s ol’ Corky. Hy, Corky, howzit goin’?”
They saw a bunch of excited faces leaning over the top rail of the gallery.
“Blimey,” gasped Corky, “if it ain’t Alfie Green, Joe Eck, Pongo, an’ all that crew!”
Ginger opened his mouth very wide, looked round the box, and shut it again. It would look out of place among all that plush, he felt, to fling a real Billingsgate yell to the gallery. He waved, frustrated.
“Ain’t speaking, eh?” screeched Alfie. “Got yer girls wiv’ ya, eh?”
“Bet you ain’t half telling ’em the tale!” cried Pongo.
“You’d better say something,” put in Lady Mellerow, who seemed to relish the prospect of a slanging match. “Don’t let those frightful tykes shout you down.”
“Pipe down——” but Ginger could get no further. More shouting was hurled at him:
“Don’t spill your drink on that shirt, Ginger—I only lent it to you for tonight!”
“How’s the shoes fitting, Corky? You can have ’em again next Saturday.”
Ginger shook his head regretfully.
“I wish I could get up there for a minute—this ain’t no place for shouting.”
The orchestra struck up. A man in old corduroys came on singing “Kitty of Coleraine”. He got a good clap when it was over. Then he followed with “My Old County Down”. His voice was awful, but you could see he thought it was good. And he convinced the audience it was.
Corky caught his breath as Pat leant f
orward, her profile was so beautiful.
“You’re in for the treat of your lives after this lot,” said Ginger.
“Who will it be?” asked the girls.
“Samson, the strongest man on earth.”
An expectant hush fell on the audience when the lights went out.
The curtain lifted, but the stage remained in complete darkness. Then began the muted sounds of music, of voices in revelry, coming louder and louder, and now a lamp revealed the presence of many figures in ancient costume, shouting and jeering, as a sightless man was led in by the hand of a young boy. The man’s head was bent in sadness and the people spat on him and sneered. In the middle of the great room stood two mighty pillars, and when he stumbled and almost fell, the man whispered to the boy, and to these pillars the boy led him, as though for support. As the man rested his body, grasping an arm round each pillar, volleys of mocking calls rose from the crowd gathered there. At the highest pitch of this spurning the figure resting against the pillars suddenly tensed. He lifted his head and called out.
There came a silence. And now was seen the mighty figure straining at the pillars—a huge chest, powerful arms. The building on the stage began to tremble. Cries of alarm and fear were heard. As he bowed down there was a fearful ripping and tearing of marble and plaster; horrified screams, arms raised in agony, and down came the whole edifice.
Loud and tremendous cheering broke from the audience as the curtain swung across. A dapper little man ran in from the side, gestured an introduction:
“Ladies and Gentlemen, the eighth wonder of the world—” the curtains parted—“SAMSON! ...” and there he was while the air resounded with more cheers, claps, yells, and shouts.
The dapper man continued: “There is now to be an exhibition of muscle control, which will prove beyond all shadow of doubt that this twentieth century Samson is in nowise muscle bound! Behold——”
Now it was for Samson to give a singular display of his muscular prowess. The spotlight on him—first he made his biceps rise, fall, rise, then tremble loosely. Then his calf and thigh muscles rose and rolled lightly. Next he turned, and holding hands above his head, he displayed a mighty back, muscles lifting and rippling. Finally, facing the audience, he performed an “Abdominal Isolation”: his chest expanded enormously, and his stomach became a sort of cavity.
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