The Ghost Ship

by Richard Middleton

  On the Brighton Road

  Slowly the sun had climbed up the hard white downs, till it brokewith little of the mysterious ritual of dawn upon a sparkling worldof snow. There had been a hard frost during the night, and the birds,who hopped about here and there with scant tolerance of life, left notrace of their passage on the silver pavements. In places thesheltered caverns of the hedges broke the monotony of the whitenessthat had fallen upon the coloured earth, and overhead the sky meltedfrom orange to deep blue, from deep blue to a blue so pale that itsuggested a thin paper screen rather than illimitable space. Acrossthe level fields there came a cold, silent wind which blew a finedust of snow from the trees, but hardly stirred the crested hedges.Once above the skyline, the sun seemed to climb more quickly, and asit rose higher it began to give out a heat that blended with thekeenness of the wind.

  It may have been this strange alternation of heat and cold thatdisturbed the tramp in his dreams, for he struggled tor a moment withthe snow that covered him, like a man who finds himself twisteduncomfortably in the bed-clothes, and then sat up with staring,questioning eyes. "Lord! I thought I was in bed," he said to himselfas he took in the vacant landscape, "and all the while I was outhere." He stretched his limbs, and, rising carefully to his feet,shook the snow off his body. As he did so the wind set him shivering,and he knew that his bed had been warm.

  "Come, I feel pretty fit," he thought. "I suppose I am lucky to wakeat all in this. Or unlucky--it isn't much of a business to come backto." He looked up and saw the downs shining against the blue, likethe Alps on a picture-postcard. "That means another forty miles orso, I suppose," he continued grimly. "Lord knows what I did yesterday.Walked till I was done, and now I'm only about twelve miles fromBrighton. Damn the snow, damn Brighton, damn everything!" The suncrept higher and higher, and he started walking patiently along theroad with his back turned to the hills.

  "Am I glad or sorry that it was only sleep that took me, glad orsorry, glad or sorry?" His thoughts seemed to arrange themselves in ametrical accompaniment to the steady thud of his footsteps, and hehardly sought an answer to his question. It was good enough to walkto.

  Presently, when three milestones had loitered past, he overtook aboy who was stooping to light a cigarette. He wore no overcoat, andlooked unspeakably fragile against the snow, "Are you on the road,guv'nor?" asked the boy huskily as he passed.

  "I think I am," the tramp said.

  "Oh! then I'll come a bit of the way with you if you don't walk toofast. It's bit lonesome walking this time of day."

  The tramp nodded his head, and the boy started limping along by hisside.

  "I'm eighteen," he said casually. "I bet you thought I was younger."

  "Fifteen, I'd have said."

  "You'd have backed a loser. Eighteen last August, and I've been onthe road six years. I ran away from home five times when I was alittle 'un, and the police took me back each time. Very good to me,the police was. Now I haven't got a home to run away from."

  "Nor have I," the tramp said calmly.

  "Oh, I can see what you are," the boy panted; "you're a gentlemancome down. It's harder for you than for me." The tramp glanced at thelimping, feeble figure and lessened his pace.

  "I haven't been at it as long as you have," he admitted.

  "No, I could tell that by the way you walk. You haven't got tiredyet. Perhaps you expect something at the other end?"

  The tramp reflected for a moment. "I don't know," he said bitterly,"I'm always expecting things."

  "You'll grow out of that;" the boy commented. "It's warmer in London,but it's harder to come by grub. There isn't much in it really."

  "Still, there's the chance of meeting somebody there who willunderstand--"

  "Country people are better," the boy interrupted. "Last night I tooka lease of a barn for nothing and slept with the cows, and thismorning the farmer routed me out and gave me tea and toke because Iwas so little. Of course, I score there; but in London, soup on theEmbankment at night, and all the rest of the time coppers moving youon."

  "I dropped by the roadside last night and slept where I fell. It's awonder I didn't die," the tramp said. The boy looked at him sharply.

  "How did you know you didn't?" he said.

  "I don't see it," the tramp said, after a pause.

  "I tell you," the boy said hoarsely, "people like us can't get awayfrom this sort of thing if we want to. Always hungry and thirsty anddog-tired and walking all the while. And yet if anyone offers me anice home and work my stomach feels sick. Do I look strong? I knowI'm little for my age, but I've been knocking about like this for sixyears, and do you think I'm not dead? I was drowned bathing atMargate, and I was killed by a gypsy with a spike; he knocked my headand yet I'm walking along here now, walking to London to walk awayfrom it again, because I can't help it. Dead! I tell you we can't getaway if we want to."

  The boy broke off in a fit of coughing, and the tramp paused while herecovered.

  "You'd better borrow my coat for a bit, Tommy," he said, "yourcough's pretty bad."

  "You go to hell!" the boy said fiercely, puffing at his cigarette;"I'm all right. I was telling you about the road. You haven't gotdown to it yet, but you'll find out presently. We're all dead, all ofus who're on it, and we're all tired, yet somehow we can't leave it.There's nice smells in the summer, dust and hay and the wind smack inyour face on a hot day--and it's nice waking up in the wet grass on afine morning. I don't know, I don't know--" he lurched forwardsuddenly, and the tramp caught him in his arms.

  "I'm sick," the boy whispered--"sick."

  The tramp looked up and down the road, but he could see no houses orany sign of help. Yet even as he supported the boy doubtfully in themiddle of the road a motor car suddenly flashed in the middledistance, and came smoothly through the snow.

  "What's the trouble?" said the driver quietly as he pulled up. "I'm adoctor." He looked at the boy keenly and listened to his strainedbreathing.

  "Pneumonia," he commented. "I'll give him a lift to the infirmary,and you, too, if you like."

  The tramp thought of the workhouse and shook his head "I'd ratherwalk," he said.

  The boy winked faintly as they lifted him into the car.

  "I'll meet you beyond Reigate," he murmured to the tramp. "You'llsee." And the car vanished along the white road.

  All the morning the tramp splashed through the thawing snow, but atmidday he begged some bread at a cottage door and crept into a lonelybarn to eat it. It was warm in there, and after his meal he fellasleep among the hay. It was dark when he woke, and started trudgingonce more through the slushy roads.

  Two miles beyond Reigate a figure, a fragile figure, slipped out ofthe darkness to meet him.

  "On the road, guv'nor?" said a husky voice. "Then I'll come a bit ofthe way with you if you don't walk too fast. It's a bit lonesomewalking this time of day."

  "But the pneumonia!" cried the tramp, aghast.

  "I died at Crawley this morning," said the boy.