by Stan Barstow
V
‘Let’s get it straight, then. You’re a fortnight overdue.’
‘Fifteen days,’ she says.
‘Okay, fifteen days. Is it such a long time? I don’t know much about it, but don’t women have this happen to them sometimes?’
‘Some women do, but they come to expect it. I’m not like that. I told you before, Vic, it’s never happened with me. I can nearly tell the date by it usually.’
‘Well, maybe you’re run down and need a tonic or something. Maybe you should see the doctor.’
‘I’ve a feeling I shall be seeing the doctor before long,’ she says; ‘only it won’t be for a tonic.’
‘Whatever you do, don’t get panicky. There’s always a chance. There’s always hope.’
We’re in the shelter in the park and it’s a fine warmish night with a clear sky. But we’re sitting about four feet apart and neither of us feels much like going out on the grass.
‘There’s something else,’ Ingrid says. ‘I couldn’t tell you over the phone… My mother knows. I had to tell her.’
I feel as if somebody’s planted a size ten boot right in my guts. It winds me. ‘Oh, for crying out loud, Ingrid, why did you have to do a daft thing like that? Couldn’t you have kept it dark a bit longer?’ Oh, Jesus, now we are in trouble.
‘I had to tell her, Vic. She knows as well as I do how regular I am. She started asking questions. You don’t know my mother, how she can worm things out of you. I just broke down and told her.’
As long as she doesn’t break down now, I’m thinking. As long as she doesn’t start bawling on top of everything else.
‘How much did you tell her?’
‘Well… enough…’
What does it matter what she told her? There’s only one way to make a baby, after all. It’s the oldest pastime known to man, don’t they say? I think of how many blokes must have been in this pickle before me and imagine them all stretching right back to ancient times. Wherever they all are now they must be nudging one another and sniggering and saying, Look, there’s another poor sod gone and got his wick wet.
‘Oh, Christ… What did she say?’
‘What d’you think she said? She was livid. I’ve never seen her so angry… I daren’t tell you all she did say.’
‘About me?’
‘Well, can you blame her?’
So if nothing worse comes of it I’ve got a woman walking about thinking of me as the dirty little tyke who nearly got her daughter into trouble. I’ll be lucky if she doesn’t spill the beans to the Old Lady. Any day might bring a letter telling all…
‘She made me have a hot bath and drink some gin. I think she wishes she hadn’t now, but she was in a real flap.’
‘It didn’t work, though?’
‘No. I couldn’t stand the bath hot enough and I was sick when I’d had one glass of gin.’
‘It’s… it’s a kind of murder, in a way, that…’
‘I suppose it is, in a way. But I’ll bet plenty of women try it on, and you wouldn’t have minded if it had worked, would you?’
‘What’s she going to do now?’
‘She says she’ll wait another week and then take me to the doctor’s.’
‘I suppose she’ll want to see me then?’
‘She said she’d write for me dad to come home. She says you’ll have a man to face when you do come.’
‘Oh, Christ, what a lousy mess.’
‘I suppose we should have thought about it before.’
‘But it’s a bit of bloody hard luck when we get caught first time and there’s people trying for ages to have kids.’
‘You’ll have to write a letter to somebody about it,’ she says. It’s the best joke I’ve ever heard her make but I’m not in a mood for laughing. I can’t even raise a smile.
I get up and walk up and down on the concrete a bit. There’s no way out, though. I’ve had it, sure as eggs are eggs. I take my cig case out. ‘May as well have a smoke. We’re not dead yet. Here…’ She takes one and we light up.
‘Vic,’ she says, ‘what are we going to do? What can we do?’
She’s upset, real upset, I can tell. I’m not the only one to have gone through it this past few days. And before that – she was carrying it around with her for days before she told me. And it’ll be worse for her in one way because she’ll be the one who’ll have the big belly to hump around for everybody to point at and talk about. Except, of course, that once that’s over she’ll have what she wants – me. And a bloody fine catch I am. Maybe that’s what’s worrying her now, maybe she’s wondering if I will marry her if the worst happens. Maybe that’s what’s getting her down…
I know she’s pregnant. I know for sure. I know for sure I’m not going to get out of this one. I’m caught and that’s a fact. Capital F-a-c-t. This is where all the dreams end, Vic Brown. No need to go on looking for that girl. You’ve found her, the only one you’ll get now. You’re trapped and there’s no way out. Oh, what a fool; what a bloody, bloody fool!
So that’s it. It only wants saying, and I lean my head against the roof post and look out over the park and say it.
‘Don’t worry. We’ll get married. That’s what we’ll do.’
She says nothing and in a few seconds I hear a little noise and I turn round and see she’s crying.
‘Don’t worry, I said, we’ll get married. You didn’t think I’d let you down, did you? You didn’t think I’d take my hook and leave you to face it all on your own, did you? I’m no bloody angel but I’m not that kind of louse.’
She’s sobbing away like billy-ho now. The hanky’s out and the waterworks are turned on good and proper.
‘I’ve always wanted to marry you, Vic,’ she says. ‘I’ve often imagined how you might propose to me. And now it has to be this way. Forcing you into it. You’d never have asked me but for this, would you? I know you wouldn’t. I know you don’t love me like I love you.’
Well, she can’t have it both ways, can she? Just like a woman to want it, though.
‘I’ve asked you, haven’t I? I’ve said we’ll get married, haven’t I?’
‘You’ve no need to if you don’t want to,’ she says all at once. ‘I shan’t force you.’
This is a laugh. Even if she won’t force me, what about everybody else? I can just imagine them all if I make so much as a sign that I don’t want to go through with it. I can just see them all putting the screws on. It’d take a better man than me to stand out against all that.
‘You know damn well you won’t turn me down, though,’ I tell her, and if it sounds conceited I can’t help it. It’s not much joy to me to know she loves me. If she didn’t we should probably never have got into this mess.
Me saying that turns the waterworks on in a fresh gush. ‘I won’t,’ she says. ‘I won’t. I’ve always wanted you. You know I have.’
I turn round again and look at the park.
‘Well,’ I say in a quiet voice, ‘now you’ve got me.’
And as I’m standing there I wish to God, I wish more than I’ve ever wished for anything else, that I’d never laid eyes on her.
5
I
I watch the water go down the plug-hole. Anti-clockwise. Due to the sun’s pull, or something, they say. It goes down clockwise in the southern hemisphere. I wonder what it does on the equator. Goes straight down, I suppose. I think it might be a good wheeze to take a holiday walking down Africa, watching water go down the plug-holes every place you stopped at. You’d know when you got to the equator when it changed. Maybe you’d get a town slap bang on the equator with a street where it went down anti-clockwise at one end and clockwise at the other. And straight down in the middle. Doing all that walking you wouldn’t have time to get into trouble. Take years to walk all that way…
‘Victor, your tea’s on the table.’
‘Coming.’
It’s Monday and the room’s all warm and cosy with the ironing. There’s finny haddock for my tea and I usually enjoy this
, lying there all crispy gold on the plate with great dollops of best butter melting over it till it’s nearly afloat. But today it’s just like cardboard in my mouth and I can hardly get it down. The Old Lady watches me struggling with something I usually scoff in no time and she says:
‘You’re not getting your tea, Victor.’
‘I don’t feel up to it today.’
‘You reckon to be fond of a bit o’ finny, don’t you?’
‘I like it all right. I’m just not hungry, that’s all.’
Half past six. I’m meeting Ingrid at a quarter past seven and she’ll expect me to have something to tell her. Funny how many times I’ve sat down to a plateful of finny haddock for my tea and then leaned back pogged and with nothing more on my mind than which picture I fancy seeing best.
The Old Man’s cleared a space on the other side of the table and he’s got his pools coupons spread out. He likes to fill them in early so’s he won’t forget.
‘Have you been filling yourself with all sorts o’ peg-meg this afternoon?’ the Old Lady says.
‘I haven’t had a thing.’
I’m going to Ingrid’s house tonight and I’ve told her I’ll tell the Old Lady and the Old Feller first… The ironing board creaks under the weight the Old Lady’s putting on the iron. I’ll be getting that in the earhole any minute now…
‘I’m talkin’ to you, Vic,’ the Old Man says.
‘Eh? What?’
‘I said what do you think of Sheffield United’s chances this week.’
‘How the heck should I know?’ I say, letting some of it out. ‘They don’t call me Old Moore.’
‘’Ere, ’ere,’ the Old Man says. ‘I asked you a civil question, young feller-me-lad.’
‘Well I don’t know everything about football. Why don’t you use your own judgement, ‘stead o’ keep askin’ me?’
The Old Man lifts his eyebrows over the frames of his glasses and looks at the Old Lady.
‘What’s wrong with you, Victor?’ she says. ‘Have you been having some trouble at shop, or summat?’
‘I’m okay.’
I get up from the table and go and sit down with the evening paper. I intended softening them up a bit before springing it and now I’ve gone and done just the opposite. What I need is some kind of opening so’s I can break it gently like. As if you can break a thing like that gently! I read the paper from back to front without taking in hardly a word and then it’s ten to seven. I can’t put it off much longer. It’s got to be any minute now. The Old Man’s breathing heavy and muttering to himself as he puts his forecasts in with his ball-point pen. The ironing board goes on creaking as the Old Lady goes steadily on with her work.
Nobody says anything for a minute or two and then all of a sudden I hear this voice speak, just as though somebody’s popped his head round the door to share a bit of news.
‘I’m thinking of getting married.’
And by the way everything goes quiet I know it’s me.
The Old Lady stands there with the iron up in the air and it even brings the Old Man out of his pools. The Old Lady drops the iron with a clatter on to the stand, but she’s too flabbergasted to say anything for a minute.
‘Who you thinkin’ o’ marryin’?’ she says when she’s got her wind back.
‘A lass called Ingrid Rothwell. She lives up on Park Drive.’
‘How is it we haven’t heard owt of it afore?’
‘I didn’t know before. I’ve only just made me mind up.’
The Old Lady’s sharp enough sometimes and she seems to get this situation weighed up in double-quick time. ‘It’s happen a case of you’ve had to make your mind up, is it?’
I shift in the chair. I can’t look at her. She’s watching and so’s the Old Man, but he hasn’t said anything yet.
‘Is it a forced do, Victor?’ the Old Lady says straight out then.
I open my mouth to say something but nothing comes out. Then I shrink back small as the Old Lady comes at me across the hearth-rug. She’s got her hand up I’m sure for a minute she’s going to clout me one. Then she drops it and lets me have it with her tongue.
‘You girt fool,’ she says. ‘You girt silly fool. You with all your future afore you lettin’ yerself get entangled with some cheap young piece ’at knows nowt but carryin’ on an’ gettin’ down on her –’
‘She’s not like that. She’s not like that at all. You stand there callin’ her all t’names under t’sun and you don’t even know her.’
‘I know this much about her – she’s trapped you nicely. When I think of all the decent respectable lasses you could ha’ married and you come home an’ tell me you’re weddin’ some little slut ’at’s got her claws into you this way…’
I’m on my feet shouting. I’m surprised at the amount of feeling I can put into sticking up for Ingrid. ‘She’s not like that, I tell you. You don’t even know her.’
‘Nah just a minute, you two,’ the Old Feller says. He gets up and walks between us so’s we have to fall back. ‘It’s allus been my experience ’at there’s two folk to reckon wi’ in cases like this.’
‘Your experience?’ the Old Lady says. ‘What do you know about it?’
‘Well I’m sixty-one-year old,’ the Old Man says, ‘and I courted thee an’ married thee an’ helped thee bring three bairns into t’world, so I think I can say I know a bit… Now fair’s fair, an’ I don’t like to hear you carryin’ on about this lass afore you’ve even seen her. I don’t know who’s most to blame, but it’s bound to be a bit o’ both. I reckon our Victor’s on’y yuman like any young feller an’ if this lass is a bit softhearted like, an’ affectionate, summat like this can happen. It’s not first time an’ it won’t be t’last. An’ if our Victor’s had his fun he’s a right to pay for it just like anybody else.’
‘How old is she?’ the Old Lady asks, surly like, but quieter now the Old Feller’s had a say.
‘Nineteen.’
‘Nobbut a bairn,’ the Old Man says.
‘There’s many a lass at nineteen these days knows more than I do at my age,’ the Old Lady says, letting the rag show a bit again.
‘Aye, happen there is, an’ happen she’s not one of ’em. If they’d both known a bit more they might not ha’ got into this. We’ll know more about that when we’ve seen her. When are you bringin’ her home with you, Victor?’
‘I reckon it can be any time now.’
‘I’m not sure I want her in my house,’ the Old Lady says.
‘You can’t turn your own daughter-in-law away, Lucy.’
‘She’s not me daughter-in-law yet.’
‘Seems to me the quicker she is the better for everybody.’
‘An’ what are all t’neighbours an’ everybody goin’ to think?’ the Old Lady says. ‘Such a lovely wedding our Christine had…’
‘We’ll let neighbours attend to their own business and we’ll see to ours.’
Well, I’ve never seen the Old Man like this before, taking charge with a firm hand. But I wish it was something else brought it on.
‘Have you seen her parents yet?’ the Old Lady says.
‘I’m going tonight. I wanted to tell you first.’
‘Very thoughtful of you,’ the Old Lady says. ‘Well just watch your manners. We don’t want ’em thinkin’ you come from any sort of family. And not a word to our Jim ’at it’s not all above board. There’s plenty of time for him to get to know about such things.’
I catch the Old Man’s eye. He’s got an expression on his face that I can’t weigh up. I look away and go and get my coat.
II
‘Did you tell ’em?’ Ingrid asks me.
‘Yes, I told ’em.’
‘What did they say?’
‘Pretty much what you’d expect. Me mother was wild. I thought she was going to clout me with the iron at one bit. The Old Man was reasonable enough, though.’
‘I don’t know how I’ll ever face them.’
‘Oh, you’ll man
age okay. You’ll get on straight away with me dad but you might have to dig a bit deeper with me mother. She’s all right when you get to know her, though, and she’ll see straight off ’at you’re a decent lass.’
‘Is that what you told them?’
‘What?’
‘That I’m a decent girl.’
‘Well, you are, aren’t you? You know I’ve always thought so.’
She’s got her arm through mine in a possessive sort of way she’s never shown before and now she gives it a squeeze. When I look at her I catch the sparkle of tears in her eyes.
‘What’s up now?’
She shakes her head. ‘It’s nothing. It’s just when you’re nice to me, that’s all.’
God, what a louse I must have been to her sometimes!
It takes only a few minutes from the end of the road and we’re going up the steps to their house. She’s got her hand on the door-handle when she says, ‘Remember to act as though you’ve never been in the house before.’
‘You didn’t tell them about that, then?’
‘Gosh, no. They don’t even know you’ve been here before.’
‘Okay, I’ll remember.’
Ingrid’s dad’s a shortish neatish sort of bloke, about forty-five, I’d say. His hair’s black and smooth and parted down the middle. His eyes are nearly black as well but they don’t look too unfriendly to me as we shake hands when Ingrid’s introduced us to one another. He’s got suede fur-lined slippers on, grey flannels with a good crease, a red long-sleeved cardigan over a grey shirt, and a heather mixture tie.
‘Nippy out tonight, is it?’ he says, standing with his back to the fire. ‘I thought it might be. Turning colder again… Well, you’d better sit down, er… er, Victor. Take his coat, Ingrid; make yourself useful.’
She takes my raincoat over her arm and asks where her mother is.
‘Upstairs, tidying up, I think. She won’t be long.’
Ingrid goes out and doesn’t come straight back. Mr Rothwell waves me to a chair and we both sit down. He’s in the chair Ingrid was sitting in that night. I look at the couch and remember her there as bare as the day she was born and wonder what her old man would say if he knew. I think now I might as well have made a job of it then while we were warm and private if I only had to go and do it later in the park, when it was cold and neither of us enjoyed it.