by David Storey
I listened to him helplessly, pounding with love for him. ‘I’m sure you can do it. You’ve changed a lot since you’ve been down here. Just be yourself. That’s all you have to do.’
‘But you’ve never had any care for my family.’
‘I know.… But it doesn’t matter.’
Michael stood up, rigid and aloof. ‘We ought to go straight away,’ he said. ‘Before we have time to think again.’ He’d got his own way, again; but now for some reason he resented it.
‘Yes,’ Howarth said. ‘The sooner we’ve got this thing settled.…’ He brought my bag out from under the bed.
‘Howarth,’ I asked him, ‘how can I?’
He straightened slowly, to look at me. ‘You didn’t stop me from going to see Joyce.’
‘Do you hate her?’
‘No.… It’s not hate.’
‘I hate my family now. I could never go back.’
‘You can do something for them, Margaret. That’s all it amounts to.’
‘Do you want me to go, Howarth?’
‘Yes.’ He put my bag on the bed and opened it.
‘Why?… I don’t understand.’ I looked from him to Michael.
But Howarth was already packing my bag. Their faces showed nothing. Then Howarth, recognizing my feeling, came to hold me. ‘You’re making it far worse than it is,’ he said. ‘But that’s your brother’s fault. Take no notice.’
‘I don’t understand it, that’s all. Not any of it.’
He helped me pack my bag: a nightdress and my cosmetics. It hardly held anything else. I was trying to think, but it all confused me. Why was I going?
‘Aren’t you coming to the station?’ I asked him with a sudden dread. He’d stopped at the top of the stairs behind me. Michael was ahead of me and looked up at us both.
‘No. I’ll say good-bye here, and wait for you here.’
I went back in dismay. ‘But why aren’t you coming?’
‘Don’t you know what it’s like to wait?’ He was smiling and ridiculing me.
‘But I won’t be so long,’ I said, kissing him and hugging him.
‘I’m glad.’
‘Oh, I’ll be back in no time. I’ll be back tomorrow, the first moment.’
I couldn’t leave him. Even for a second. ‘Go on, Margaret,’ he said, pulling my arms down.
‘You won’t go away and leave me?’
He shook his head at me, smiling with contempt. ‘After all this?’
I kissed him again. He held me tightly a moment. ‘You’ll never leave me, will you, Howarth?’ I whispered.
‘How could I ever leave you?’ He began pushing me away. ‘Go on. You’ll have to go. You’ll be here all night if you don’t.’
I turned down the stairs, warm with him, waiting for the last sight of him with his feet astride, smiling and waving, bending down so that he could see me on the stairs. He looked so certain and strong.
‘Take care of yourself, love.’
‘Oh, I will,’ I called back.
Michael said nothing. At the station for some reason he booked first-class tickets and we had a compartment to ourselves. But the train was empty. It was the slow last train of the night, cold and makeshift, with not a sound of anyone aboard.
There was the blackness outside, and Michael, and nothing else on that aching journey north. I cried for Howarth, aching for the return, wearied by the thought that all I was passing took me away from him, that it would all have to be travelled back. It dragged at me. I hated the greed of my parents.
The shock of the evening was at last heavy on Michael. He was white, and hardly spoke. He smoked continuously. I felt sick with it. The train spluttered on through the darkness. There was a terrible shrouded whiteness outside: the snow was plastered against the window frame and glazed the darkness with its white bands. It crusted against the window, thawed, and was flung off. It came swooping past, flickering and flashing, swirling with smoke. At one point it rained: the coldness seemed to shatter the train, tearing through it in long gusts and torrents. It seemed hollow and empty, eerie with its coldness, swaying through the damp desolation of stations and the heaving darkness. Its monotonous struggling drove into me. My arm still throbbed. I was gladdened by it. The pain was luxury and warmth and comfort.
13
The darkness of the estate was broken up by the small yellow pools of the lamps. The roads were empty; there was not even a parked car or a cat. But a solitary light went on upstairs when the taxi re-started its engine and moved off down the road. Its noise drowned the place, sending back waves between the houses.
We heard my father’s nasal panting down the stairs. The light glowed dimly through the frosted panels, then my father opened the door carefully, wide-eyed, and flung his arms round me. I fell between them, frightened by him, by his closeness. We held one another silently, but I couldn’t return his warmth. ‘Where’s Mum?’ I said.
He pulled back, and Michael shut the door behind me, then went into the living-room and put the light on. I sensed some betrayal on his part.
‘Where’s Mum?’
‘She’s upstairs,’ my father said. ‘Go on up and see her. Go up and see her.’ He let me pass. He was still in his pyjamas, and so small and pleased that he seemed a child. ‘Go on up, love.’ I climbed hurriedly up the stairs, and he didn’t follow me. He was already talking to Michael in the living-room when I reached the landing: the low growl of their voices seemed to come from the roots of the house.
My mother was sitting up in bed, waiting for me to switch on the light by the door, away from her. I could hear her moving nervously on the bed; then she blinked in the sudden burst of light, shy and uncertain, and not familiar.
I went and held her for a moment, but I could bring no surge of feeling into me. There was a coldness in her, too; inexplicable and puzzling to her. She was strangely self-contained. ‘But I thought you were so ill from what our Michael said,’ I told her.
‘I haven’t been too well,’ she said finally, looking at me, still shocked, and strange with sleep. She suddenly burst out, ‘Oh, Margaret, love,’ and held me again, sobbing to herself and trying to speak.
‘It’s all right, Mum. You can see I’m all right.’
‘Yes, I know. It’s been so bad.’
I drew back from her, and we looked at one another, pleased; she was still shy of her emotion.
‘Mum, I’ve to tell you now. I’ve only come for a visit. I’m going back to London. I’ve only come to let you see that I’m all right.’
‘Yes,’ she said disbelievingly, without interest, pushing it from her mind.
There was so much between us now, dividing us; and it was solid. I was glad of its protection, that I needn’t care, and was only mildly angered at Michael’s exaggeration of her illness. I began to think of Howarth more and more intensely. The silence of the estate outside was terrifying. My body sobbed for him. ‘Michael said you were ever so ill – he seemed to make it like that.’
‘He’s always exaggerating,’ she said lightly. And suddenly pressed me against her.
‘Doesn’t it make you feel better to see me like this?’
‘Oh, yes. I feel better already, Margaret. Just the sight of you.’ But there was still the coldness and strangeness. When I tried to talk about Howarth she said, ‘Please, not tonight. I can’t cope with any more, love.’ She shook her head wearily.
I talked with her a while longer, then she insisted on getting out of bed and padding in her bare feet to my room to make sure my bed was aired. They’d been relying on Michael. There was a hot water bottle barely cooled in the bed, and a pair of my old pyjamas. They’d expected it of me all the time.
I was shocked by the preparation. There was no recognition of my sacrifice. Only the old blindness and wilfulness. My father came up and encouraged my mother back to bed. There was something worn and useless about them both now. Irrelevant. I felt betrayed. I would have gladly gone back, even walking. But Howarth had wanted me to come
. I fell into a broken sleep, yearning and empty, resting in a huge hollow. My body ached for him, every limb feeling for him. My body curved to his in the bed. We’d lain here months ago. I rested against him, sobbing at his absence, filling my dreams with the nightmare of my journey from him.
In the morning my mother treated me with the privilege of a stranger. She was up early – if she’d even slept – and when I came down the fire was burning brightly and the table set for our breakfasts. Michael had gone home and was coming back at lunchtime. My father came down shortly after me, and we had our breakfasts together, quiet, and with already an air of futility. I told them about the job I had at the B.B.C. and the sort of people I met, the odd glimpses of well-known people. They listened distantly.
‘You’ve got nice clothes,’ my mother said. She hated liking them, not sure what they meant. ‘You seem quite changed. I hardly recognized you last night.’
‘Howarth chose the clothes.’
She was pale, and did look ill. Her skin was like ivory, so damp-looking and smooth. Neither she nor my father ate much. Shortly afterwards my father went upstairs and was sick. We listened to him in silence, sitting at the table with the three half-eaten breakfasts. He came down gaunt and smiling, and made a joke about his greedy appetite, and went to sit by the fire. He shivered in its heat.
I helped my mother to clear the table. When I mentioned Howarth she hung on to my words grimly, not listening, only hearing the implication. She looked at my stomach once or twice, suspiciously. I despised her for her silent narrowness. ‘Is my dad still off work?’ I asked. ‘What’s been the matter with him?’
‘There’s something wrong with his back,’ she said tonelessly.
‘Won’t you ever be reconciled to me living with him? Either of you?’
She sat in the easy chair away from the fire. She looked supremely old, as did my father. ‘Is that what you really want, that?’
‘We’ll be married in a year. I’m sure of it. Will that be so terrible?’
‘You’ll never be married to him.’
‘She’ll have to divorce him. She can’t leave him dangling like that. She can’t even want it for herself.’
‘She said she’d never divorce him,’ my father said lifelessly.
‘We’ll have to wait longer, then. But it’ll change. It can’t go on like this for much longer.’
‘What about the children you’ll have?’ my mother said weakly. She had tired quickly, and now seemed on the verge of absolute exhaustion, devoid of any argument or reason. ‘What sort of life can you give them? They’ll be worse off than you are: afraid of anybody asking questions. What will they do when they have to give the names of their parents?’
‘Those things don’t matter,’ I told her fiercely. ‘It doesn’t even come into the immediate future.’
‘That’s a right old one,’ my father said. ‘We weren’t going to have any children for two or three years, but our Michael was born afore we’d been wed one. If you live with a man like that …’ He broke off in distaste, sickening within himself.
‘You know you can’t go on,’ my mother said. ‘It’s not right. Not to any of us.’
‘Nobody’s turned their back on us yet, and we haven’t made it a secret. People take you as you are.’
‘Do they? Well they haven’t done round here. They couldn’t have been more shocked,’ she said. ‘You can’t realize how it’s affected folk here. It’s just hell for me and your dad to step into the street … a decent girl like you.’
They were so worn and faded. I could hardly believe in their feelings and their concern. They were no longer wanting to help me, but for me to help them. Only they wouldn’t admit to that, through habit. We were each helpless to one another, and drawing away from one another.
‘I only came back because I thought you really needed me, to see me … and because Howarth wanted me to. I’m well. And I’m fit and happy. I’ve never been so happy in my life before. Can’t you see?’
‘Aye, you’re prospering,’ my father said.
‘But there’s no reason to fret over me. Why do you do it? You can see just by looking at me.’
My mother, for a moment, was too tired to talk. She lay back in the chair breathing deeply, staring at the fire as she concentrated on some physical discomfort. We both watched her guiltily, my father gripping his chair with barely concealable remorse.
‘Mother, you do see that this is the only thing I want, don’t you? I’ve always done what I thought was right. Would I ever have done this if it wasn’t everything to me?’
‘You’re a grown woman, and you’ve done what you wanted, Margaret. I can’t see that there’s ought we can do.’
‘But why must you be ill like this?’
‘This’s how we are. We can’t change now. We’ve lived through life … I’m sure, you see, that you’ll live to regret it – and to come at us for not making you see sense. You’ve done it always before as children, blaming us like that. There’s nothing worse in a mother’s life.’ She held her chest with her hand, her face twisted as she breathed. She tormented us both.
‘I don’t think we ought to talk any more about it for now,’ I told her. ‘I’ll stay today, and go back tomorrow morning. You want to rest now, Mum.’
She closed her eyes, and turned her head sideways on to the back of the chair. Her skin was tight and unusually smooth, with the veins deep blue under the paleness. My father looked at her, shaking his head hopelessly from side to side. ‘Why won’t you give o’er worrying, Mother?’ he said to her dismally.
Michael didn’t bring Gwen at lunch-time. He came along expecting almost anything. ‘Have you cleared it up yet?’ he asked tensely, the first moment he got me alone.
‘I’m going back tomorrow morning. There’s nothing I can do.… How ill is my mother?’
‘The doctor’s been calling once a week. He just says she’s tired and run-down, and should go away for a rest. She’s got a tonic, and some pills.’
‘It absolutely exhausts me seeing her like this. It’s almost as if it were all deliberate. It’s terrible.’
‘She’s much better since even yesterday. Your coming back has made a difference already.’
‘And when I go back to London?’
‘I don’t know.’ He was cautious. ‘It depends how well you convince her.’
‘She won’t be convinced.’
‘No,’ he said lifelessly. ‘I didn’t think she would. She can’t see anything to hope for by it.’
‘What can I do?’
‘Can’t you leave Howarth?’ he asked suddenly, carelessly.
‘How can you ask me, after yesterday?’
His face clouded: he became absorbed in himself. ‘It’s almost a straight choice,’ he said thickly, the blood rushing to his face. ‘Between him and my mother.’
‘It’s not like that at all. It’s … evil, you saying that.’
‘I don’t know,’ he warned me. ‘We can’t do anything for her, except you. She’s not really ill. She just wants you out of all this. Every little bit of it’s wrong to her.’
‘She’s not fair to me. She’s always run the home, and now she wants to be treated like a queen in it, doing just what she wants. She doesn’t give me a chance. She’s made it so I can only hate her.’
‘It’s only the particular circumstance of you and Howarth. How can you expect them to stomach him? If he’d been single they’d have minded less.’
‘Yet even then they’d have disliked him, wouldn’t they? You gave them all that artist nonsense. They believe he’s just a callous man, with no feelings for anyone but himself.… Why do you hate him?’
‘He’s useless.’
‘But he’s tried …’
‘All those like him – they’re just useless. All this subculture nonsense. Art!… He’s simple. He tries to be honest with himself. But you believe he’s far more than that.’
‘I only know we need one another. I don’t think you’ll ever un
derstand that. It’s something that I don’t think you have with Gwen.’
‘That’s not a very wise thing to say,’ he decided, without any frankness.
‘I’m going back to Howarth and never coming here again,’ I said bursting into tears at the finality and hopelessness of it all. ‘Nothing on earth can stop me. I don’t care if they die.’
My mother sensed the inevitable result. During the afternoon it seemed to strengthen her: now that there was no hope at all and she had to face it, she gathered herself together with a visible determination, and even managed to smile once at Michael’s joking insistence.
I wanted to leave them then, and catch an evening train to London, but Michael was determined that I should stay just one more night. ‘I think she’s coming round,’ he said. ‘Don’t go just yet. Give her a good chance.’
Gwen came in the evening and we played cards together. In the middle of the game my mother suddenly burst into tears and ran from the room. We heard her crying upstairs. My father listened dourly, looking at me with murderous eyes. But we were relieved. It seemed she had released herself. She came down later, at the limit of her exhaustion, and sat in the easy chair, her eyes glazed, her arms dropping down beside her. We tried to be natural. But we couldn’t ignore the final tearing apart of the family. There was nothing to be said. We looked at one another like ghosts.
I missed Howarth more than I could bear. I was incomplete and lifeless without him: I had no existence. I would have gladly trampled on my parents to reach him even for a moment. But I lay still in bed, my body cold with absence. It was unbearable to lie still and wait, to wait for the morning, for the train, for the long journey. It was a separation from life itself: the silence of the estate around was that of an entombment, a graveyard, booming and flaming in its emptiness.
In the middle of the night I got up and made a cup of tea in the scullery. I could hear my mother and father moving about upstairs, and when I opened the curtains there was the patch of light from their bedroom flung across the narrow lawn, spreading out into the darkness of the road. It was a big patch of light, broadening as it extended from the house, and falling aimlessly over the simple shapes outside.