by Stan Barstow
‘It’s no good giving Maude the eye,’ says somebody at my side. ‘She’s spoken for.’
I look round as Percy Walshaw pulls himself up on to the next buffet.
‘Doesn’t look as though that’d stop her, Percy.’
‘Ah,’ he says, ‘you can’t always go on appearances. She’s as respectable as the vicar’s wife.’
‘Which vicar’s that?’ I say, and Percy laughs as the blonde bint comes along behind the counter and says good evening to him. He says good evening back and calls her by her first name.
‘The usual?’ she says, and Percy nods. ‘Please.’
She takes a tankard off a hook and draws half a pint of bitter. I watch Percy take a good pull at it.
‘How come the tankard?’
‘I’m a regular, old cock. They look after the regulars.’
Still the same old Percy, I think to myself. He’s a bloke about my age who I was at Grammar School with for a while, till he left among a lot of rumour that he’d been kicked out for having a bash at one of the lasses during the lunch-hour (I never did know how much truth there was in it) and went to a boarding school in the Midlands somewhere. Good pals we were for a bit, me and Percy, and though we don’t see so much of one another nowadays we’ve always kept friendly. What I always liked about Percy was that he didn’t throw his money in your face, though he liked to make the best of it. I had to find out he lived in a house with seven bedrooms and they had a maid and a housekeeper, and I liked him all the more for not bragging about it or thinking it made him any different from the other lads. I liked him even at his barmiest, and he could be pretty barmy at times, believe you me. I reckon it came from having too much money too young and an old man who didn’t lick the tar out of him often enough. You don’t have to look twice now to see there’s plenty of lolly hanging on to him. He looks the part in this checked cap and fur-collared short overcoat that must have set him back nigh on thirty quid. And if I know him he won’t have walked here either, nor come on the bus.
‘Well, how’s life, me old sweat?’ he says. ‘I haven’t seen you around lately.’
The honest answer to this is ‘bloody awful’, but I give him the stock reply: ‘Oh, just, steady, y’know.’
‘Still pushing a pencil?’
‘No, I’m in a shop now. What about you?’
Percy empties his tankard and signals the blonde. He’s fishing a fistful of silver out of his pocket. ‘Same again?’ I say thanks.
‘I’m in the business, old lad,’ he says when he’s ordered the drinks. ‘Finally capitulated. They’re trying to make a salesman out of me. I think they’ll do it too. I like beetling about the countryside flannelling people into placing orders. Just up my alley. Plenty of strange pubs. Bags of expenses.’ He touches the bit of fair down on his top lip. ‘That’s why I’m growing the tash. People don’t like to think they’re dealing with a lad.’
The blonde puts the new drinks in front of us and Percy pays.
‘Cheers.’
‘All the best.’
Percy gets his cig case out and we light up. ‘What’s on the board tonight?’ he says. ‘Just passing an hour on?’
‘Something like that.’
‘You don’t look too chirpy to me, Vic. Have you got the miseries or something?’
I admit I’m feeling a bit cheesed. ‘You know how you get sometimes.’
‘Hmm,’ he says, as though he’s never felt cheesed in his life but has to be polite. ‘Started courting yet?’
Well, there’s no getting out of it now.
‘I’m a bit past that, Percy, lad.’
‘Past it?’
‘Aye, I’m married.’
Percy stares at me. ‘You never are! Well you old dark horse, you. When did all this take place?’
‘About six months since.’
‘And you’re sitting in pubs moping already?’ He shakes his head. ‘It’s amazing what marriage will do to a good man.’
‘Oh, wrap it up, Percy.’
‘Takes away your sense of humour too.’
‘I can laugh like bloody hell when I feel like it,’ I tell him, ‘only I don’t feel like it tonight.’
‘Proper browned off, eh?’
‘To the back teeth.’
‘Well, well…’ He takes a swig from his tankard and reckons to wipe froth off his tash. ‘I consider it me bounded duty to hoist an old school chum out of the doldrums,’ he says. ‘I’m at a bit of a loose end myself tonight. A date I had fell through at the last minute. What say we embark on a small crawl, eh?’
It sounds like a good idea. Not long ago I was wondering where my mates might be and now here’s Percy – just the one to take me out of myself, if anybody can. I take my wallet out and check. I see I have a quid note in there.
‘Righto, Percy, you’re on.’
‘Right,’ Percy says. He swigs the last of his beer and waits for me to finish mine. ‘Step this way,’ he says, slapping me on the shoulder. ‘The carriage awaits.’
Outside on the cobbles there’s a two-seater sports job of a make I can’t identify in the dark. ‘Nice car,’ I say as we get into these low bucket seats.
‘Like it?’ Percy says with pride in his voice. ‘Triumph T.R.3. I talked the Old Man into buying it when I went out on the road. He wanted me to have a Humber or an Austin. More dignified, he said; but I won him over.’
Like you’ve been winning him over all your life, you old so and so, I think. But it certainly is a nice car…
He starts her up and she coughs and growls as though they’ve got a tiger down in the pub cellar. I feel a thrill in my guts at all this power, and I’m a bit jealous that it’s Percy and not me behind the wheel.
‘Ever been to the Monks’ Rest?’ he says, and I say no.
‘New place out on the way to Bradford… La Posh… Right, that’s the first stop.’ He revs up fit to bust the windows. ‘Hold your hat on.’
It seems to me we sample the beer in half the pubs in the West Riding in the next three hours: two here, an odd one somewhere else, and always Percy with his hand on my arm, saying, ‘C’mon, let’s move on.’ Until I lost count of the bars we’ve leaned against, the people we’ve talked to, the brews of ale we’ve tasted, and the Gents we’ve got rid of it in. In one place in Leeds Percy nearly fixes us up with a couple of hard-faced gin-drinking bints who like his line in dirty tales and his easy way with his brass; and he only breaks it off when he remembers his car’s only a two-seater and anyway I’m married and not my own man any more.
‘P’haps I should ha’ got the Humber after all,’ he says as we go out and get into the car on the way to another port of call.
Closing-time finds us in a floodlit roadhouse full of yellow wood and shiny chrome fittings somewhere Harrogate way. We walk out down the steps and weave our way between the cars in the park. Neither of us is too steady now and as Percy settles himself in his seat and slams the door he suddenly bursts out laughing. Not loud, but that quiet, helpless kind of laughing like when you don’t know what you’re laughing about but you just can’t help it.
‘How’re you feeling, Vic?’ he says.
‘Pissed, Percy lad,’ I say. ‘Pissed as a flamin’ newt.’
And then all at once I’m at it as well and we’re both lolling back in our seats gurgling like drains, going on and on till it hurts across the middle under the ribs.
Eventually we get over it and Percy says, ‘Well, I reckon we shall have to be heading for home. Where are we?’
‘Somewhere near Harrogate, I think.’
‘Never heard of it,’ Percy says and I begin to feel a bit uneasy as he starts the car and lets it roll down on to the road.
‘Are you okay, Percy?’ I ask him. I’m thinking that this is all very well but we’re in a powerful car and Percy’s a bit on the mad side at the best of times.
‘Never felt better,’ he says. He’s leaning forward with the neb of his cap touching the windscreen. ‘Which way?’
&n
bsp; ‘I don’t know.’
‘Which way did we come in?’
‘From the left, I think.’
‘Okay, we’ll go to the right. It’s as good a way as any.’
He swings the car out into the road, changes up and puts his foot down hard. I feel as though a big hand pushes me back into the seat as we zoom away up the road. It’s when I begin to feel scared that the effects of the booze start to lift. I’ve never been scared in a car before but I am now. I stick it for a bit, clenching my teeth and stiffening my legs against the bulkhead, but then I have to say something.
‘Take it easy, Percy.’
‘What?’ Percy says.
‘I said take it easy. It isn’t daylight, y’know.’
Percy laughs and twitches the car under the tail of a big long-distance lorry. For a second I’m ready to swear we went right underneath between the wheels. We roar up a narrow country lane with stone walls on both sides.
‘Any idea where we are?’ Percy says.
‘Have I hell,’ I say, startled. ‘Don’t you know?’
‘I haven’t known for the last ten minutes,’ he shouts, full of good cheer. ‘Took a wrong turning somewhere back yonder.’
‘Well, we’ll be in Scotland afore we know where we are, going at this speed. I might have been feeling a bit low earlier on but I’m not ready to snuff it yet.’
I think of Ingrid waiting up for me and me not turning up. The police going and breaking it to her. I wonder if she’d cry. Then there’s my mother and dad and Chris…
‘Snuff it?’ Percy says. ‘What’re you talking about? You’re not scared, are you?’
‘Yes, I am. It’s dark, man, for Christ’s sake, and you don’t know the road.’
‘We’ve got good lights,’ is all he says, and on we go belting into the dark.
Well the headlights are powerful enough, admitted; but the dark’s funny and shadows can look like real things and real things like nothing at all.…
I catch a split-second glimpse of a sign. ‘For Christ’s sake, Percy, watch the bend. It’s a right angle –’ And then I can’t talk, only shut my mouth and my eyes tight and brace myself for the smash as a tall drystone wall rushes at us up the beam of the headlights. I feel the sideways drag as Percy pulls the car round and hear the screech of stone on metal on my side of the car. Then we stop.
I stay like I am for a few seconds, with my head down. My heart’s going like a donkey engine and my hands are trembling like leaves in the wind. We’ve no business to be unhurt and I can hardly believe we are.
Percy’s jumped out as soon as we’ve stopped and run round to my side. He comes back now and gets in. ‘A foot,’ he says. ‘Just another ruddy foot and we’d have made it.’
I say nothing. He starts the car up and puts it into reverse and pulls back clear of the wall. Then he gets out again. He taps on my window and I wind it down.
‘Made a lousy mess of this wing,’ he says.
I’m not bothered about Percy’s wing, just my own skin.
‘Could be worse, though. At least the wheels still go round.’ He comes back round the other side and gets in again. ‘We’d better beat it before we have parker trouble.’
I stop his hand as it reaches for the starter.
‘Look, hold on a bit. I’m not ready for any more of that just yet.’ I give a false kind of laugh. ‘What time does the next bus go from here?’
Percy gives a short polite laugh and falls to drumming his fingers on the steering wheel.
‘A foot, though,’ he says in a minute. ‘Another foot and we’d have cleared it. What lousy luck!’
‘I call it bloody good luck,’ I tell him. ‘A foot the other way and they’d have been scraping me off the wall in the morning.’
Percy turns his head and looks at me. ‘You really are in a state, aren’t you?’
‘I thought that was it, Percy. I don’t want to come as near as that again for a long, long time.’
Percy feels in the door pocket on his side. ‘Hang on a tick. I’ve got the very thing… Have I? Yes, here it is.’
He’s holding a metal flask and he unscrews the top before handing it to me. ‘Have a pull at that.’
‘What is it?’
‘Brandy.’
‘I think I’ve had enough to
‘Go o-on. Do you good.’
I lift the flask and as I’m taking a swig Percy tilts it up so the stuff pours down my throat. I splutter and cough.
‘How’s that?’
‘I’m on fire.’
‘It’ll change into a warm glow in a minute. You won’t have a care in the world.’
He wipes the neck of the flask with his hand and takes a swig himself and says, ‘A-agh!’ Then he screws the cap back on and puts it away. He reaches for the starter.
‘Ready now?’
‘In a minute.’ I open the door.
‘What’s up now?’
‘I want a leak.’
‘Okay. I’ll back up and have a look at the sign.’
‘Right,’ he says when I’m back in the car. ‘I know where we are now. We’ll be home in quicksticks.’
‘Take all the time you like, Percy lad,’ I tell him. ‘Take all night if you like.’
He laughs.
He’s still laughing when he drops me off outside Rothwells’ and shouts good night before rocketing away down the road like a bat out of hell.
IV
I’m not too steady on my feet. The brandy’s stirred all the other booze up again and I’m as drunk as I was earlier. Only not in the same way: not laughing drunk now, but mean and nasty drunk, spoiling for trouble if there’s any coming. There’s a light behind the front-room curtains so somebody’s waiting up for me. There has to be somebody waiting because I haven’t got a key. I’ve never had a key to this house. Anyway, I think, Ma Rothwell should be safely out of the way in bed by this time and if Ingrid’s got anything to say about me coming home sozzled at going up to midnight, well, let her say it and see what happens. Just see what happens tonight.
But it’s the old bitch herself who turns her head when I stand in the doorway, blinking in the light.
‘Ingrid in bed?’ I say, a bit taken aback like.
‘She’s been in bed over an hour. I should have been too if I hadn’t had to wait up for you. Don’t you know what time it is?’
I know, but I look at the little imitation marble clock on the mantelpiece. ‘Ten to twelve.’
‘Yes, ten to twelve, and people being kept from their beds waiting on your convenience till you decide you’ll come home.’
I can tell from the way she lets her eyelids droop and her little podgy chin’s tucked in that she’s got it in for me. Well, all right, I think, if that’s the way she wants it. I’ve practised giving her a piece of my mind so often I could do it in my sleep and I’ve always dreamed of having a real set-to with her one day. If she wants it now she can have it.
I feel a kind of relief, as though a big weight’s lifting off me as I start the ball rolling. ‘Home?’ I say. ‘You don’t really mean that, do you? You don’t really mean this is my home? I haven’t even got a key. If I had a key you wouldn’t have had to wait up for me. But I’m no more than a lodger here and you don’t let me forget it.’
I watch the way her head turns. She’s so dignified it’s painful to watch her. I’m wondering how far I’ll have to go before she drops the act and shows what a common piece she is at bottom.
‘When you have a home of your own you’ll be able to do as you like,’ she says. ‘I expect people who live in my house to accept my standards. Even if they haven’t been brought up that way,’ she says, standing up and gathering her knitting and smoothing her skirt down over her fat behind with one hand.
‘I can see me getting a house. I can’t rent one and I can’t afford to buy one. We might get out of here round about 1968 the way I see it.’
‘You know,’ she says, ‘you obviously don’t feel the smallest shred of gratitude that
I allowed you to come here to live.’
‘You’ve got it wrong,’ I tell her. ‘We came here as a favour to you because you didn’t want to lose your lovey-dovey daughter. Well, you’ve no need to worry; I don’t like it any more than you do and you’ll be rid of me the first chance that comes.’
‘Which as you say doesn’t seem likely for a long time.’
I’m taking my raincoat off now and having a bit of trouble with the buttons. I know she’s watching me more carefully than she pretends to be.
‘As soon as Ingrid feels like going back to work we’ll be able to save more. Then we can buy a place.’
‘I don’t know that Ingrid wants to go back to work. She thinks like me – that a husband should be able to support a wife, or he’s a poor fish.’
This isn’t the way I’ve understood it. It seems to me half my trouble is not knowing whether to believe what Ingrid says or what her mother says she says. I’m getting mad.
‘Well, she’ll have to get rid of her fancy ideas. lf she wants a house of her own she’ll have to help to pay for it. I’m no mill-owner’s son. Maybe that’s what you had in mind for her, eh? Somebody loaded with brass to keep her in luxury all the rest of her life.’
‘You’re certainly not what I had in mind.’
‘Well I married her. And bloody glad she was to have me, make no mistake.’
‘Is there any need for language like that?’
Somehow I feel I’m not winning and this makes me all the madder. Here I am telling her all I’ve ever wanted to tell her and somehow she’s not reacting. She’s just taking it in her stride and making me feel small.