by David Storey
It was impossible to enter the room itself and they each looked in in turn, the agent as briefly as Attercliffe himself, the woman, if anything, more quickly: on one wall, in red, had been printed, ‘THIS HOUSE IS NOT FOR SALE’.
Only in the main bedroom, Sheila’s own, had the effort to dismember the drawers and the cupboards – as well as the desk – been interrupted, possibly by the sounds of their arrival. Clothes and bedding were strewn across the floor, but one or two of the drawers, though pulled out, were undisturbed. What appeared to have been more broadly disseminated about the room, scattered over the floor as well as the cupboards, the desk and the drawers, and the bed, were the remnants of Attercliffe’s scrapbooks – yellow newsprint and photographs – the majority of them torn.
‘NOT FOR SALE’ was written on the dressing-table mirror. In the bathroom, the bath was full of discoloured water; the basin appeared to be stacked with mud. Sheets of newspaper were screwed up in the toilet: they too appeared to have been discoloured.
When, preceded by Attercliffe, they returned downstairs, Sheila, a tray in her hand, inquired, emerging from the kitchen, ‘Do you want to see the kitchen?’
‘We’ve seen all we need to see,’ the agent said behind Attercliffe’s back.
‘Coffee won’t be a minute.’
‘We have to leave, Mrs Attercliffe,’ the agent added, but already Sheila had returned to the kitchen.
‘It’s a bit cluttered,’ she called. ‘But make yourself at home in the lounge.’
Stepping around Attercliffe, the agent approached the front door: he tried the handle.
Attercliffe took out his key and fitted it in the lock.
‘I’ve locked the front door,’ Sheila said behind his back and he turned to find her standing there, the tray – containing what looked like a plate of biscuits, three cups of coffee, a bowl of sugar and a jug of milk – held before her. ‘I’ll just find somewhere to put it down,’ she added as she disappeared into the living-room, ‘I’ve changed the front door lock.’ Reappearing an instant later, without the tray, she announced, ‘A woman, living on her own, with young children,’ she smiled at the woman, ‘has only herself to look to for protection.’
‘Have you changed the back door lock?’ Attercliffe asked.
‘I find,’ she smiled to the woman again, ‘with so much violence about, a woman, particularly with young children to protect, can’t be too careful. Do you find that, Mrs …?’
She waited for the name to be announced.
‘Samson,’ the agent said behind Attercliffe’s back.
‘You must have your coffee before it gets cold.’ Sheila indicated the living-room. ‘I’ve put some biscuits out as well.’
‘No, thank you,’ the woman said.
‘We might as well,’ Attercliffe said.
‘No, thank you,’ the woman said again, and added, ‘I’d be very grateful if you’d unlock the door.’
‘And I’d be grateful too,’ Sheila said, ‘if you wouldn’t keep coming back to my house. This house,’ she concluded, ‘is not for sale.’
‘Your husband, Mrs Attercliffe,’ the woman replied, ‘has said it is.’
‘My husband is not its sole owner,’ Sheila said. ‘Without my permission,’ she added, ‘he has no right – nor will he ever have the right – to sell it.’
‘Your husband, Mrs Attercliffe,’ the agent said, his hand on the door, ‘is within his rights to put this house on the market.’
‘If,’ Sheila said, ‘you don’t want your coffee, perhaps you wouldn’t mind if I had a cup myself?’
She returned to the living-room; there was the sound of the tray being thrown on the floor or even – the sound was repeated – against the fireplace.
She reappeared, a cup in her hand.
The woman flinched.
‘Don’t you find that men are arrogant, Mrs Samson?’
Raising the cup, she sipped from the rim.
‘The way things are at present,’ the woman flushed beneath the brim of her hat, ‘I find they have a great deal to put up with.’
‘I find,’ Sheila said, ‘they’ve scarcely anything at all,’ and added, ‘You, on the other hand, because you submit to the humiliation of pandering to a man, take the masochistic line of “do whatsoever thou wishest unto me for it’ll only show I love you.”’
‘I’d appreciate it if you’d unlock the door,’ the woman said.
‘I’ll unlock it in my own good time,’ Sheila said, and added, as Attercliffe stepped towards her, ‘I’ve hidden the keys. Though you can,’ she continued, addressing the woman, ‘climb out of the window. Crawling, with your philosophy, should come as second nature.’
‘Couldn’t we ring the police?’ the agent said.
‘That’ll look good,’ Sheila announced. ‘Two able-bodied men molested by a woman.’ To the woman, she added, ‘It’s not you I’m attacking, but him.’ She indicated Attercliffe. ‘One day you’ll see how all you’ve taken for granted has been mistaken and how all the women around you are slaves. Even those who believe they’ve achieved their liberation and have been given a token place by men. Only, this time, instead of taking them for granted, the men, like him, and no doubt like him,’ she indicated the agent, tall, dark-eyed, dark-haired, ‘will laugh, as they’re laughing now.’
‘Isn’t that paranoia?’ the woman said.
She was looking for an alternative exit from the house and had glanced down the hall to the recess and the cupboards at the other end.
‘It is paranoia,’ Sheila said, ‘as long as you’re a man.’ She added, ‘If you’re a woman, it’s common sense. They give us children, respect our potency, then put us out to grass.’
To stress this final declaration she threw her cup – not at Attercliffe, nor at the woman, nor even at the agent (who, like the woman, raised both arms and cowered) – but through the doorway at the fireplace in the living-room.
It shattered.
‘You fill me with contempt,’ she said. ‘Titivate yourself up to complement an odious image of you engendered by a man. Come to look at a house you will never own yourself. Fit in. Collaborate. Where’s your spirit?’
Sweeping her arm in the direction of the living-room, she said, ‘At least my daughters will never turn out the way their father wants.’
Glancing first at the floor and then at Attercliffe, the woman said, ‘It seems to me you’re sick.’
‘I am sick,’ Sheila said: ‘Of seeing your silly painted face and your ridiculous hat and stockings.’
She returned to the kitchen, rattled several pans, then shouted, ‘The back door’s open, if you want to leave.’
Stepping over a bucket, several pans, the contents of an upturned drawer and of several emptied cupboards, they emerged in the drive at the side of the house.
The woman, her handbag suspended loosely from her hand, walked briskly to her car, got in and, with a glance behind, to see that the road was clear, drove off.
The agent paused by the gate, said, ‘I’ll be in touch,’ crossed the road to his own car, got in, and followed her.
‘That seems to have gone well,’ Sheila said in the still open door behind Attercliffe’s back.
‘Very,’ Attercliffe said.
‘Given her something to think about.’
‘It has.’
‘You have,’ she said, ‘to make a strong impression. It’s first impressions,’ she went on, ‘that count.’
‘What happened to Elise and Cathy?’ Attercliffe asked.
‘I left them in town,’ she said.
‘Did they know you were coming back?’
‘I told them,’ she said, ‘I was going to the toilet. I thought when they suggested going shopping it sounded very odd.’
‘Odder still when they come back here.’
‘I’ll soon have this straightened.’ She touched her hair. ‘Ready for the next lot,’ she added, ‘should you choose to bring them in.’
‘I shall have to have a key,’ h
e said.
‘I’ll get one made.’
‘Haven’t you had one made for the children?’
‘Not yet.’
‘How do they get in?’
‘I’m always here,’ she said. Taking hold of the door from the other side, she added, ‘Anything else?’
‘Nothing for the present,’ he said.
‘I’ll have them ready when you come at the weekend. Sound the horn,’ she called through the vibrating panes of the door as she closed it. ‘It’ll save you coming in.’
‘People in our situation,’ Benjie said, addressing his remark to Tiny, ‘don’t stand a chance.’
Slight, slim-featured, he leaned back in the chair and laughed; Tiny, too, leaned back, his fisted hands on his knees.
‘It’s all to do with colour. If you’re black, people treat you as if you’re scum. Or, if not, they condescend.’
‘They condescend.’ Tiny turned his head in Attercliffe’s direction: he had, Catherine had announced, on their arrival, got ‘a stiff back’. (‘A copper fell over me’ – laughter.)
‘It stands to reason,’ Benjie announced.
‘Why did you ring me up and tell me,’ Attercliffe asked, ‘that Cathy had been taken in?’
‘I thought I should.’ He stamped his foot on the carpet, laughed again, and added, ‘There you go again. Suspicious.’
‘I’m trying to find out,’ Attercliffe said, ‘what it is in me you thought you were responding to.’
‘Suspicious,’ Benjie said again.
‘He thought you’d care,’ Catherine said, ‘what happened to your daughter.’
Even the room, Attercliffe reflected, they treated with suspicion, unable to understand, for one thing, why he should have come to live here and, now that he had, what it was that kept him.
‘If you imagine that I care about her, then you must care about her, too,’ he said.
‘Sure.’ He dug his heel at the carpet.
‘If you do,’ Attercliffe went on, ‘why do you involve her in things which won’t do her any good?’
‘What things?’
‘Giving her clothes that are stolen. Giving her records. Giving her books. If she’s a receiver of stolen goods she could,’ Attercliffe went on, ‘be sent to prison.’
‘She won’t go to prison.’ He glanced not at Attercliffe, nor at Catherine, but at Tiny.
‘Why not?’
‘None of them are nicked.’
‘I thought they were.’
‘I borrow them.’ He laughed; the larger figure beside him laughed as well.
‘Borrowing without permission amounts to stealing,’ Attercliffe said.
‘They were stolen from me in the first place.’
‘How do you reckon that?’
‘The British exploited the empire. Part of the empire,’ he went on, ‘is us. When we were aboriginals we let you do it. Now we’re taking back some of the things you took from us.’
‘Such as?’
He spread out his hands. ‘You name it. We nick it. Wealth from the Commonwealth is what made this country, and wealth from the Commonwealth,’ he added, ‘is what we’re taking back.’
Tiny turned his foot on one side; he turned his other foot on its outer edge as well: the ribbed soles of his shoes confronted one another across several inches of threadbare carpet.
‘All this is clapped out.’ Benjie gestured at the room, but intended to indicate, Attercliffe imagined, not merely the flat, the house, and the town, but the country. ‘It lives on its glorious past and suffers,’ he said, ‘from delusions of grandeur.’
‘If you’ve been arrested for a crime which you confess privately you’ve committed, why do you lie about it when you get into court?’ Attercliffe said.
‘What court?’
‘Of law.’
‘What law?’
‘The country’s.’
Benjie frowned.
‘I don’t belong to this country, Mr Attercliffe,’ he said.
‘What country do you belong to?’ Attercliffe asked.
‘His country.’ He dug his finger at Tiny’s chest.
The two of them laughed, kicking their heels at the floor.
‘I thought you lived round here,’ Attercliffe said.
‘We live in our own land,’ Benjie said. He added, ‘I don’t ask you to live in it. Why should you ask me to live in yours?’
‘You wear clothes like I do,’ Attercliffe said. ‘Live in a house like I do, go to the same schools, visit the same doctors, pay with the same money, go to the same prison if you break the law, do the same sort of work, pay the same taxes. How can you say,’ he went on, ‘you live in another country?’
‘Our land isn’t this land,’ Benjie said.
‘What is your land?’ Attercliffe said.
‘Our land,’ he said, ‘is all around you. Only, if you’re not in it, you can’t see it. And if you can’t see it, you’re not in it.’
‘What about Cathy?’
‘She makes up her own mind.’
‘The only difference between us,’ Attercliffe said, ‘is that, whereas we can both see my land, I’m not allowed to see yours.’
‘You can see my land any time you like.’ He laughed, spread out his hands, and kicked his feet once more at the carpet.
‘Does your father live in your land, or does he live in mine?’ Attercliffe asked.
‘He doesn’t know where he lives. All I can say is,’ he added, ‘I don’t live where he lives. I’ve emigrated,’ he concluded, and laughed again.
A little later they got up to leave, going out to the kitchen, rinsing the mugs they had used, laughing, banging down the stairs.
‘See you,’ Catherine said, as she started to follow.
‘That didn’t go down too well,’ he said.
‘You don’t understand a scale of values that’s based not on having but on being,’ Catherine said. ‘What they’re telling you happens to be true. Everything they do,’ she continued, ‘has a proper scale of values. For instance, how can you say they pay the same taxes? They can’t get any work. How can you say they live in a house like you do? The place they live in is almost a ruin. How can you say they visit the same doctor? The doctor you have wouldn’t touch them with a barge-pole. How can you say they go to the same prison? The law they break is not their own. How can you say they go to the same schools? The curriculum they’re taught has been made up by whites.’ Her name was called and the panelling on the door downstairs was banged. ‘Black is white, and white is black. It’s the world,’ she continued, ‘they have to live in. It’s the land,’ she concluded, ‘you’ll never see,’ and, yelling, ‘I’m coming,’ she started for the door.
‘Won’t you come at the weekend?’ Attercliffe said.
‘I’ll see,’ she said and, closing the flat door, skipped down the stairs, several at a time, calling from the hall below, ‘See you, Mr Wilkins.’
Attercliffe reopened the door of the flat. ‘It’s getting to be a habit,’ Wilkins said, as he reached the top of the stairs.
‘Do you object to them coming?’ Attercliffe asked.
‘I don’t object,’ he said. ‘They have a great deal,’ he went on, ‘to put up with.’
He looked round, standing in the door as Attercliffe, turning to his desk, sat down.
‘No one can disguise we live in a racialist society,’ he continued. ‘On a personal basis,’ he paused, ‘there’s little prejudice at all.’
Taking the cover off his typewriter Attercliffe started to type.
‘On a community basis,’ he went on, ‘it’s an entirely different matter.’
‘My daughter,’ Attercliffe said, ‘is going to end up in prison.’
‘She has her head screwed on. I could see that at a glance.’ He added, ‘You’re proud of her taking a stand with the disadvantaged. I can see that in your eyes.’
‘I have to get back to work,’ Attercliffe said.
‘Anything I can get you?’ Wilkins aske
d.
‘No, thanks,’ Attercliffe said.
‘I’m free for five to ten minutes.’
‘No, thank you.’
‘I’ll go downstairs and pacify the baby. It was jolted awake by all that noise.’
He left the flat door open; a moment later, from below, came the squeaking of the pram.
‘It’s fresh, innovative, and shows, above all, an intuitive grasp of theatrical effect.’
Towers sat back, his hands locked together on the top of his head: his chair creaked.
‘The dynamic is maintained by a constant flow of feeling. Everything,’ he went on, ‘is implicit. Nothing is stated.’
He tapped his hand on the script, examined the title, Players, which he read aloud, and said, ‘I never would have thought of setting a play in a football changing-room, with all the events you might assume to be of interest taking place off-stage. I like the idea of challenging people. This play, in that sense, is a challenge to me. It’s bigger than anything I’ve previously undertaken. I shall schedule it,’ he continued, ‘right away. There’ll be one or two problems with the nudity. The committee to whom I am accountable take a conservative view, but I’m sure,’ he added, ‘I can straighten them out.’
He called, ‘Meg,’ leaned over his desk, in the direction of the door, and when, a moment later, Meg came in – dark-haired, slim-featured, jeaned and denim-jacketed – he said, ‘I want you to prepare a contract. A good ’un. Make it,’ he continued, ‘so that, if it’s a success, he can afford to write another. One of many,’ he added to Attercliffe. ‘I can see a long line to follow this.’
‘Congratulations,’ the assistant said. ‘With Harry behind you I’m sure we’ll win.’
‘With me in front of him, an’ all,’ the pneumatically-featured figure replied.
Attercliffe gazed not so much at Towers, as he talked, as at the posters and the photographs on the wall, at the other scripts piled, some on a table, others on the floor: he gazed up at the window, out of which – on the top floor of the Phoenix – nothing was visible but the sky above the square.
‘You’ll come in for casting?’ The director set his feet on the desk. ‘I couldn’t cast it without your support. To have a touchstone would help me no end,’ and, leaning forward to gaze past his feet – two metal-studded boots with metal-capped toes – he added, ‘It’s extraordinary, with no experience of the theatre, that your instincts as to what can go on on a stage are so specific. It’s as if,’ he continued, ‘you’d been writing plays for years.’