Mr Joyce intended to treat this parent very tactfully, in a manner unalarming to any possessive maternal jealousy. All he wanted to ensure was that the child shouldn’t now be forced from her natural bent, or, later, be taken too early from school and set to earn. (It was a grief to Mr Joyce to reflect how many years must elapse before Martha’s first one-woman show, before he could even send her for proper teaching; but he was prepared to wait.) What he intended to offer was to supply all the child’s drawing-materials for the present, in the future make himself responsible for her artistic education, and if necessary subsidise her as a non-earner from the age of twelve, in return for the pick of her output year by year.
In return, also, of course, for a share of fame. He didn’t mean to say anything of this to Mrs Brown, however; he foresaw that he would seem eccentric enough to her in the first place. But he had great faith in his powers of persuasion, and looked forward to the interview with confidence.
“A Mrs Brown coming to see me,” Mr Joyce instructed the commissionaire, “get one of the girls to bring her to my office straight away. Maybe she won’t look like regular clientèle, but I’m expecting her.”
It occurring to him that a woman of the type he anticipated would be reassured by a cup of tea, he also instructed one of the girls to get him some tea-things and a tray with a doily on it. “Attention to detail!” thought Mr Joyce, grinning. “The homey touch! I am eccentric, but homey!”
No intending patron could have been more acute, or better-intentioned. It was a pity Mrs Brown never came.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
1
At ease in Miss Diver’s sitting-room, drinking his now ritual cup of tea—
“Didn’t you tell me,” asked Mr Phillips, “you’d never taken lodgers before?”
“No, never,” said Miss Diver readily.
“Then who,” enquired Mr Phillips, “is Mr Gibson?”
2
Dolores had been lighting a cigarette: her hand trembled so violently that the match-flame shuddered out. Mr Phillips noticed, and waited.
“Just a friend,” said Dolores. “Has—has Martha been talking to you about him?”
“No,” said Mr Phillips. “But a day or two back, when she brought me my breakfast, she said, ‘Good morning, Mr Gibson.’”
There was too long a silence. Dolores’ riposte, when it came, wasn’t a bad one; but there had been too long a silence …
“I can assure you,” said Dolores, with a smile, “she has never said anything to Mr Gibson except good afternoon.”
There had been too long a silence.
“She must have said it pretty often,” observed Mr Phillips, “the way it slipped off her tongue.”
“As I say, he was a friend.”
“A close friend?”
Dolores nodded. The great sob checked by her first surprise was rising in her throat.
“Who doesn’t visit here any more?” suggested Mr Phillips.
There are times when every woman has the right to lie.
“His business took him abroad …”
“For good?”
At all times one has the right to refuse answers, that the questioner has no right to ask. Dolores summoned unexpected resources of dignity.
“My dear Mr Phillips,” she said coolly, “my private affairs can hardly concern you. If you weren’t such an excellent tenant—which is the only reason, I assure you, why I occasionally invite you into my private sitting-room—I should tell you to mind your own business.”
It was bravely spoken. Mr Phillips was silenced. But he had learnt what he wanted to learn. He withdrew silenced—but leaving Miss Diver for the first time in months to sob all night on the Rexine settee; he himself now knowing what was what.
3
Carefully, slowly, as he did all things, Mr Phillips made up his mind. He was a very careful, prudent man. His decision to make Miss Diver Mrs Phillips was nonetheless based on a misconception.
He thought the house was hers. He put two and two together and made not four but a dozen. He thought the vanished Mr Gibson had either given her, or been blackmailed into giving her, the house.
The point was a cardinal one; since she didn’t attract him personally. Indeed, there were several things about his landlady Mr Phillips positively disliked. He didn’t care for her appearance; her hair with its coronet of braids struck him as too outlandishly arranged, he thought it made her look foreign, and that it would look better in a bun. This of course was something that could be seen to after marriage; but her scarecrow thinness was probably for keeps, and she was a proper Skinny Lizzie. What Mr Phillips chiefly disliked, however, was that she evidently had some sort of opinion of herself.
He wasn’t unjust. A woman owning a house he allowed entitled to think something of herself—not so much as a woman who owned a whole row, of course, but still something; and had Miss Diver’s uppishness derived from a sense of property he could have pardoned it. But he had an irritated feeling that it did not. She never mentioned the house, with any reference to ownership. In fact, it seemed as though it was actually herself, her own feminine person, she had an opinion of: which in a woman of that age and appearance struck Mr Phillips as downright silly.
It will be seen that he was far from sharing Dolores’ own conception of herself as a Spanish rose, even while perceiving in her its effects. They would have put him off altogether, he would have found her altogether too lah-di-dah, if it hadn’t been for the house. As it was, he resolved to wait until after they were married, and then take her down a peg.
It will be seen also that Mr Phillips had no idea of a refusal—for all that he’d been sent off with a flea in his ear. And naturally: what Miss Diver stood to gain was nothing less than being made an honest woman of. (“Just a friend, eh?” thought Mr Phillips sardonically. “I’m none so green as that, my lass!”) Her house-property notwithstanding, Mr Phillips was confident that his landlady would jump at him. He still wasn’t in any particular hurry. He had plenty of time, he feared no rival; moreover the knowledge that with four words he could transform the whole set-up in Alcock Road, gave him a sense of secret power too enjoyable not to savour while he might …
“Should I have placed a word amiss,” offered Mr Phillips, at their next encounter, “I tend my sincere apologies.”
Dolores, who certainly didn’t want him to leave, and whose mind in the interval had been apprehensive on this account, inclined her head forgivingly.
“I suppose we all speak thoughtlessly at times, Mr Phillips.”
“When carried away by our own interest,” said Mr Phillips gravely.
They were soon on their old terms again. Mr Phillips continued to empty the garbage; after a week Miss Diver resumed her habit of inviting him into the sitting-room for an evening cup of tea. On the surface their relation remained that of lodger and landlady: a very considerate lodger, a landlady wonderfully fortunate. The person to whose life this new undercurrent first gave a fresh direction was, unexpectedly, Martha.
4
“What’s that stuff on your hand?” asked Mr Phillips kindly. “All that red stuff?”
“Blood,” said Martha.
It was in fact a smear of sanguin chalk. Naturally she said, Blood.
“Dear me! We must tie it up for you,” said Mr Phillips—with all-too-ready credulousness.
Martha put her hands behind her back.
“I don’t want it tied up …”
“If it’s not clean it may turn nasty,” warned Mr Phillips. “You’d better let me see you wash it.”
“I don’t want it washed,” said Martha.
“I’m afraid you’re a dirty little girl,” said Mr Phillips.
“No, I’m not,” said Martha.
“I say you are.”
“Then it’s not true,” said rude Martha.
Rude, and resentful. Martha didn’t want to be rude: acceptable manners, like a respectable appearance, she had long found one of her best defences in a world of
interfering adults. But it now happened continually—and even when she had less excuse, for in this particular instance Martha was pretty sure Mr Phillips didn’t believe in her cut hand a moment, he was just being nosy—it happened continually that his each kindly attempt at conversation ended in Martha’s being rude. Without appreciating his dialectic skill, Martha felt she was being made to be rude, that the character of a rude child was somehow being imposed upon her, by Mr Phillips for his own ends.
What these were, she had to guess. But not only friends, or lovers, without a plain word spoken, divine the underlying trend of each other’s thoughts: so also do enemies. Martha guessed, and guessed rightly, that Mr Phillips no longer aimed merely at bridling her will, but wished to be rid of her altogether; and feared that by turning her into a rude child, he might make Dolores want to be rid of her too.
It was indeed the truth. Mr Phillips’ design for wedded bliss didn’t include Martha. In the first place—being a man whose hatred of all qualities above the mediocre, especially in a female, almost put him off Dolores with her house-property—Mr Phillips disliked Martha even more than she did him. Confronted by any superior temper (especially in a female), his instinct was to thwart it, and Martha had successfully held her own. In the second place, her attic would be needed for a lodger—for Mr Phillips had no idea of wasting space, himself moved up to the position of husband; another lodger in his old bed-sit, and yet another in Martha’s attic, were essential factors in his thrifty plan. (It was no mad dream, like poor Dolores’; a large Insurance Company, with a large intake from the provinces, offers exceptional supplies of lodger-timber.) Martha’s attic could be let with ease; and with her Civil Service connections in mind, and having taken pains to inform himself on the subject, Mr Phillips knew of two orphanages already where she could hardly be refused.
At such details Martha’s powers of telepathy naturally broke down. She was nonetheless apprehensive; and so took what measures she could to consolidate her position.
They were economic. Children are frequently more interested in making money than their elders think quite nice, only the little girl gathering sticks to support an aged grandmother has passed into sentimental legend. Martha, who was not sentimental, had never contemplated supporting Miss Diver; but once her egoism took alarm, she was more than ready to turn to.
“How much do I eat a week?” asked Martha.
“Good heavens, you should know that!” exclaimed Miss Diver sharply. (Her voice was sharpening like her profile.)
“I mean in money?” persisted Martha.
“I’m sure I don’t know. Perhaps a pound …”
Dolores really didn’t know. In her muddled housekeeping Mr Phillips’ payments, with an occasional dip into her own savings account, just kept them all going. Martha however took the figure as accurate, and cogitated. If she could earn a pound a week she wouldn’t be costing anything, and she carried all the trays. Earning a pound a week she would be not only a self-supporting child, but a profitable child. It undoubtedly showed a flaw in Martha’s character that she so completely discounted her aunt’s affection for her. Dolores was still prepared to go on being fond of Martha, as she used to be fond, in the overflow of her love for King Hal, if Martha had shown the least sign of reciprocal tenderness. But Martha, herself unaffectionate, put no reliance on affection; she relied on economics. If she could earn a pound a week, she thought, she would be in a really strong position.
Spurred by this ambition, as splendid in conception as hopeless of execution, Martha embarked on her professional career.
5
She began by making out a beautifully lettered card announcing REPAIRS DONE WHILE YOU WAIT, with a drawing of a boot in one corner and a shoe in the other, which she carried round to her friend Mr Punshon. “What’s this, a present?” asked Mr Punshon, agreeably surprised. “No, it’s a shilling,” said Martha. “If you want it, of course.” At this Mr Punshon scrutinised the card more narrowly. (It was a moment Martha found intensely exciting. Her knees actually stiffened—and not with financial anxiety alone. She was meeting her first public.) “A boot all that heavy wants a thicker sole,” pronounced Mr Punshon at last. Martha looked for herself and acknowledged him to be right. She also realised how the mistake had come about—through shaving down the original boot-sole, because the boot-corner over-balanced the shoe-corner, without altering the upper to match.
“I’m sorry,” she apologised. “Thank you for telling me.”
“Business is business,” said Mr Punshon. “Seeing you’re in the business way.”
“I want to be,” said Martha. “If I make a new one, properly, will you order it?”
Mr Punshon agreed. Out of this first commission, because she had to buy a fresh bottle of ink, Martha made eightpence.
The criticism offered by her other friend Mr Johnson, off whom she took sixpence for a fresh WOUNDED AT MONS card, was equally professional. “Just tread it in the gutter a bit, will you?” said Mr Johnson. “It won’t suit me too posh. You got to meet your market, see?” elaborated this professional hero. “What’s my market? The charitable human ’eart. The downer-and-outer I look, the more it beats for me. I took one-and-six this very afternoon.”
“I wish I had,” said Martha.
Mr Johnson looked at her thoughtfully. He wasn’t wondering why. Martha was fortunate in having such sensible friends, neither Mr Punshon nor Mr Johnson saw anything odd, or not very nice, in her wishing to make money; they’d each of them been earning themselves, at Martha’s age. Mr Johnson wasn’t now unco-operative: on the contrary.
“In the good old days gone by,” he mused, “I’d ha’ taken you on. Dressed up proper in rags, you could ha’ bin my pore little child. I’ve no doubt we could ha’ made a very nice thing of it, ’specially if I acted ’arsh towards you. But what’ud happen to-day?” asked Mr Johnson regretfully. “They’d whip you off for care-an’-protection before you could say knife. But I’m good for a tanner now and then, if it’s any help.”
It was Martha’s turn to look at Mr Johnson. As Mr Punshon had said, business was business. To go into the ragged-child line was something she wouldn’t have objected to at all, but she wasn’t in it yet; and her professional conscience stirred.
“Did you give me that sixpence just to give it me?”
“Why not?” said Mr Johnson. “I get ’em give me.”
The card was still in Martha’s hand. She hadn’t yet dirtied it. She hadn’t wanted to, even to meet a market. (The bayonets decorating each side had red-ink blood on them.) She said slowly,
“If you like to give it me because I’m a friend, thank you very much. But I’d rather you didn’t take the card, because I don’t think you really want it.”
“You go on being so sharp, one day you’ll cut yourself,” agreed Mr Johnson amiably.
This second episode was important chiefly because it taught Martha where she stood. She had stumbled, in fact, on a cardinal point of professional ethics, and obscurely recognised it. The taking of Mr Johnson’s sixpence as a pseudo-payment, instead of as a gift, would have stamped her an amateur; and the gulf between amateur and professional opening at her feet, she instinctively chose the professional side.
She never approached a friend again. (Mr Punshon was different; Mr Punshon had criticised with genuine authority. When in due course Martha made him a couple of cards more, at a shilling apiece, she in each case had to do the work twice—once on a point of boot-laces, once on a point of tongues. She was glad to.) Fortunately for her financial prospects, however, she lived in a district uncommonly rich in the sort of newsagent and sweet-shop that add to their income by displaying local advertisements—one actually adorned already by her handiwork. Martha went back to look at her Apartments card, and found it still markedly superior to the rest. Some were almost illegible. (“Ain’t that gent found ’is congenial model yet?” derided Mr Johnson, who happened to be by. “No wonder, the way they’re writ!”) Martha stood and stared for half an hou
r, and so perfect was her visual memory that a day later she returned with the whole display neatly and accurately duplicated in Indian ink.
The newsagent gave her two bob for the lot, any more that came in to rate twopence apiece.
At two other newsagents, and three sweet-shops, Martha made the same terms. After a first capital gain of nine shillings, her takings naturally fell off; but she usually made about one-and-eight a week.
6
One-and-eight is a far cry from twenty shillings.
Martha was sometimes uneasily aware of this; yet it couldn’t dim the pleasure of entering each consecutive twopence in the shiny black note-book she bought specially for the purpose. (Buying the note-book a pleasure in itself; having money in her pocket.) She added the total once or twice a day, making it sometimes more, sometimes less; and since her subtraction was equally uncertain, commonly ignored the occasional pennies she spent on sweets. (It was too much to expect of a regular visitor to three sweet-shops never to buy cocoanut-ice; which indeed a more sophisticated accountant might have laid off as good-will.) Martha’s long-term project was in fact rather lost sight of; however threatening the future she had immediately money in her pocket, the constant interest of seeing if any fresh cards had come in for her, cocoanut-ice, and appreciation for her skill. She also enjoyed, as most children do, getting to grips with life.
Mr Johnson pointed out that if she used ordinary ink, instead of Indian, the new cards would fade as fast as the originals had done, thus reviving the demand. Mr Johnson knew of an ink made with powder that faded even faster. But Martha wouldn’t.
7
Miss Diver had no note-book for such daily consultation; but she had a calendar. Through the two mid-weeks of December was drawn a thick black line, covering the date, as yet precisely unknown to her, upon which Mr Gibson would make Miss Joyce his bride. Dolores turned to it almost as often as Martha—but with how different emotions!—turned to her note-book. Whether the twelfth or the eleventh, the fourteenth or fifteenth, the day was drawing very near.
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