Late Night on Watling Street

by Bill Naughton

  A Skilled Man

  Edgar Kay got off the bus at the stop by the municipal housing estate. A five-day week sounds all right, he thought, but look at the money a Saturday morning off runs away with. That conquerer at snooker cost me nine bob—a hiccup on the black did me—and what with fags and bus fares I’ve six bob to see me through the week. Those semi-skilled upstarts are at the bottom of a chap’s troubles, and most of ‘em only got into the union because of the war. Nothing I enjoyed better of a Saturday morning than getting off to work and away from the wife and kids for a few hours. You might get extra time in bed, but by heck you pay for it. Folk never treat you with the same respect on a day off either. I know in my dad’s day a skilled man was properly looked up to. A Lancashire textile fitter could pack his tool-case and go off to India, Russia, or Japan; aye, we put up their machines so that they could steal the bread out of our mouths. And here I’m stuck with a miserable six bob to see me through the week.

  “Talkin’ to your little self again?”

  He looked up with a start at the voice, and saw Amy, his wife, standing in front of him. “I was not,” he said, surprised to see he was on the main avenue.

  “I heard you,” she said. Uckle went the hiccup. “Have you not got rid of them hiccups yet?” she asked.

  “Been plaguin’ me since breakfast,” he said.

  “They haven’t plagued me an’ the kids,” she said, “an’ we had the same kippers.”

  “Where are you off at dinner time?” he said.

  She drew closer to him: “They won’t plague you much longer,” she said slowly, “when I tell you.”

  “What’s up?” he said, trying not to let the alarm show in his voice. “What’s up, Amy?”

  “I’m off to my mam’s,” she said, “to see if I can borrow a fiver.”

  It nearly made him laugh: “A fiver?” he said. “From your mam?”

  “Yes, a fiver,” she said, “from my mam.” She looked around at the windows and then whispered: “Bum bailiffs* are in. Two of ’um, great big chaps, sittin’ on two chairs. Say they won’t go till they get five quid in ready cash.”

  “Geroff, Amy,” he said, feeling a spread of cold spots come over his face. “Bailiffs? What ever for?”

  “For gettin’ in arrears with the blasted telly payments,” she said. “If I don’t curse an’ roast the day you brought that telly into our house!”

  “But I thought you were only a week behind,” he said, “or tvvo at the most.”

  “You thought,” she said, “you flamin’ thought, did you? Why, you never think of anybody but your own little miserable self.”

  Old tears loosened up behind his eyes and he had to force them back. “But why didn’t you tell me, Amy?” he said.

  “Tell you?” she said, “I’m never done tellin’ you. You never listen, you never heed a body. You’re mister flamin’ know-all you are. You know I never wanted a rotten lousy television in the first place. Since that thing came in the door I haven’t known what it was to have a proper little talk inside my own home. You never have it off. I’m sick to death of it.”

  “But I only got it for you an’ the kids in the first place, Amy,” he said. He could see she was mad now and it upset him in another way. “I mean after the Coronation put the idea into your head. You remember—you kept talkin’ about it.”

  “Shut your big gob can’t you?” she said. “You’ll set folk talkin’ worse than they are already. Coronation eh?— Coronation my behind! You got that telly, mister, to see your bloody silly cricket matches on. And how any man in his right senses, supposed to be, can take interest in a game like that, I do not know.”

  “Keep cricket out of it,” he said. She was ready to go off, and he didn’t want her to go and leave him, so he said: “Shall I come with you, Amy?”

  “A fat lot of use you’d be,” she said, smiling at him.

  Her smile comforted him at once. “Do be sharp back,” he said.

  “Sharp back?” she said. “I’m not sayin’ she’ll have it. You haven’t got it tucked away?” she asked.

  “I’ve five bob, just,” he said. “Do you want it?”

  She shook her head, and when he saw the look cross her eyes he thought, she’s going to say something nice to me. But then he saw she wasn’t going to, and she didn’t say it, but she gave him an encouraging wink and then hurried off.

  He felt dizzy, and when he began to light a cigarette he tasted a sick dryness on his tongue. Bum bailiffs, my God! Folk’ll have been watching, I’d better get my shoulders back. But when he came to the turning that led down to their home he couldn’t face it—the news will be all over the estate by this—and he walked straight on, pretending to himself he was going to buy something in the shopping avenue. He went walking off the estate at the far end.

  Don’t wed her, lad, she’s from the wrong end of town: my mam’s words to me. Never a skilled tradesman in the family, nothing but labourers and blasted hod carriers. Never rely on folks as don’t do skilled work: the times I’ve heard my dad say that! Bum bailiffs—he’d turn in his grave. I hope neither of ‘em is a sexual maniac. My poor kids. I married beneath me. I was only a textile fitter, a scutcher erector, but I was and I am a skilled man, and I married beneath me.

  “Howgo there?” said someone.

  He turned and saw a man called Rostron from the far end of The Crescent. “Ho, mate,” he said.

  “Tha were steppin’ it out a bit,” said Rostron.

  “Aye,” he said. He knows and he’s cracking on he don’t. He’ll get nothing out of me. “That’s a grand bit o’ sunshine.”

  “Aye,” said Rostron, “it is that an’ all.” They walked along together. “I’m thinkin’ of slippin’ into ‘The Collier’s Arms’ to see a bowlin’ match.”

  “Oh, aye,” he said.

  “Jock Murphy playin’ Len Smith. Murphy’ll eat it.”

  He’ll not he thought. Smith’s the winner. I’d stake my life on Len Smith. He knew neither player, and had seen only one bowling match, but such flashes continually came to him. I’d stake my life on Len Smith.

  They reached “The Collier’s Arms” and Rostron said: “Fancy a vessel?”

  “I were thinkin’ of stretchin’ me legs a bit,” he said.

  “One pint won’t kill thee,” said Rostron.

  With only six bob in my pocket and that trouble hid away the last thing I want is to sup and listen to this chap. “I suppose it won’t,” he said, following Rostron into the public bar.

  “I never go into the best room,” said Rostron, “because I like to see my ale drawn from the barrel before my two eyes. I’m havin’ a pint of i.p.a.—what’s thine?”

  “A gill,” said Edgar, “a gill of mild.”

  “Tha wants no gill,” said Rostron, ‘what tha wants is a pint—a pint of i.p.a. Billy, two pints of Indian pale ale.”

  That’s a sure sign of the unskilled worker, thought Edgar, he forces on you what he thinks you should have. Now if he had worked by blueprint and not always with a spade he’d have learnt to heed other folk. Chaps like that might mean well, but they’re a menace. Rostron handed him a pint of light bitter beer: “That’ll do thee more good than thy gill of mild.”

  Edgar waited with the glass in his hand: “Cheers,” he said, and they drank together.

  “Now what did I tell thee?” said Rostron. “Yon’s a gradely pint. Straight from the wood. Tha can’t lick it. I never fancy them pumps—tha can taste the aluminium. Leastaways I can.”

  “They’re sellin’ a lot in cans these days,” said Edgar.

  “I’ve seen ‘urn,” said Rostron, “but it don’t stand thinkin’ about.”

  Edgar took another drink in the silence. “Aye, yon’s a fair pint,” he said. And then he became aware of a strange thing happening. He lightened up inside. Funny, he thought, I must have had a big dollop of pain or something on top of my stomach. It’s gone now. I never thought it could shift like that. He smiled.

  “Fa
ncy a Knowle’s pork pie?” said Rostron.

  “I’ll get ‘um,” said Edgar. “Two Knowle’s pork pies, please.”

  Billy placed two pies on one plate and was reaching for knives from a pint pot on the shelf when Rostron said: “We want no knives.” Then he glanced at Edgar and said: “Leastways I don’t.”

  “Nor me,” said Edgar.

  Rostron stuck out his chin, bared his large white dentures, and said: “National Health. I’d have had ‘um in as a baby if I’d known they were that comfortable. I can crack nuts with ‘um. To think of all the toothache I suffered afore they passed that bill. One chap tried to threep me out that when the Tories got in they’d tak’ ‘um all back.”

  “The Tories,” said Edgar, “aren’t doin’ too bad.” He let it go at that and turned to the landlord: “You might as well stick a couple of gills in them two,” he said, looking at the pint glasses. Billy filled each pint to the top without measuring, and Edgar paid him. Straightened my end up, he thought.

  “What about goin’ out in the fresh air?” said Rostron.

  “I suppose it costs no more,” said Edgar. “What time will Jock an’ Smith be on, Billy?” asked Rostron.

  “Oh, any time now,” said Billy, drying his hands as his wife came into the bar.

  Rostron led the way through the lobby and out to a seat beside the bowling green. Edgar took a sup of his pint and carefully put it on the ground beside him, and then he had a bite of the pie, and looked around. Rhododendron bushes were clumped behind the path, and the bowling green itself was a large square of trim and tidy grass, beautifully green.

  “As nice a crown green,” remarked Rostron, “as tha’ll meet in these or any other parts. Took the best part of Billy’s day an’ his dad’s afore him to get it like that. That’s a nice bit o’ pie.”

  “Champion,” said Edgar.

  Men came put of the pub and stood in twos and threes around the green. Edgar was surprised to see so many wearing the old fashioned blue serge suit and old style billycocks, and caps that looked as though they had a circle of cane inside. “More bookies than backers here today,” said Rostron. “I say, ever seen ’um play in the South? They use four bowls—flat green, straight line. It’s more like bloomin’ skittles.”

  A man wearing a grey check suit was strolling round the path, and as he was passing he called out: “How’s the old firm, Edgar?”

  Edgar looked up with a start, realizing that he had been thinking: I wonder is yon chap one of the bailiffs? “Oh, howgo, Walt?” he said. “Sun were in my eyes. How’s it goin’?”

  “What art having?” asked the man.

  “We’ve just filled ‘em,” said Edgar.

  “I’ll be seein’ thee,” said the man.

  Rostron asked in a low voice: “Does tha know Walt Briddle?”

  “He used to work for me,” he said. “He were my labourer at Dobbie’s.”

  “Labourer,” said Rostron, “an’ today he’s worth thousands. He’s got two S.P. offices, an’ bought hisself a big house at Blackpool. God knows how many rooms one chap were tellin’ me.”

  “He were labourin’ for me,” said Edgar, “when he took his first bet.”

  “He must be rotten with it,” said Rostron. “They say his kids ride their own ponies on the sands.”

  A chap as doesn’t know a micrometer from a black pudding has kids riding ponies by the sea, whilst mine have the bum bailiffs for company.

  “Here they are now,” said Rostron, as two men came on the green. “The little un is Jock Murphy.”

  I don’t like him, thought Edgar, he’s too cocky. As he watched Murphy swiftly roll up his shirt sleeves, almost to the shoulder, he thought, there’s the unskilled man. Then he saw Smith, a tall pale man, adjust his arm-bands. That’s more like it. I’d lay ten to one he’d win, if I were a betting man. I know it but none of these do. Smith inspected the green, but Murphy chatted away in the one place.

  “I seem to know yon Murphy,” he said. “What does he do?”

  “He’s a demolisher for Bentley’s,” said Rostron. “They say he can knock down the side of a factory with a welt from his hammer.”

  “I shouldn’t fancy he’d be too good at this game,” said Edgar.

  “On a short length,” said Rostron, “he’s a world beater. A year back Smith would have been a dead favourite. He’s played for big money, but he deliberates that much that he’d almost have the game done away with. That reminds me, I’d better make my bet.”

  He came back with a solemn face: “I’d to lay six half-crowns to five,” he said. He looked to the green at the referee spinning a coin, and when he saw Smith pick up the jack he said: “He’s won the bloomin’ toss.” He’ll win the blooming game, thought Edgar, let alone the toss.

  Walt Briddle came along as Smith was sending the jack diagonally across the green. “Evens Smith,” he said. Edgar caught a look from him: “Fancy a bet, Edgar?” he said. I wouldn’t mind having my last couple of bob on Smith, he thought. “Tha can have five to four, Edgar, about Smith,” he said.

  “Tak’ it,” said Rostron. “Damn good odds.”

  “Aye, fair odds,” said Edgar.

  “Right, I’ll lay thee five quid to four,” said Walt Briddle. “That’s one bet I don’t have to put down.”

  He wanted to yell after him, No! no! no!—but his tongue made no sound. He turned instead to hear Rostron say: “Them’s good odds. An’ tha were game to take um like that. He must know thee well to trust thee.”

  At the first end Murphy got one in. He then threw a short length of twenty-five yards. Again he won, this time gaining two points. He won the next end and led Smith by five points to nil. Murphy was now made a six-to-four favourite. I can only win or lose, thought Edgar, no more than that. Smith’ll win: I can still feel it.

  Smith won the next end. Again he sent lengths right across the green, and in two ends he drew level with Murphy. Then Smith went right on ahead without losing a single end. He had a smooth graceful delivery that fascinated Edgar. How could anyone think the podgy Murphy could beat this man? Smith’s score reached double figures and then went on until he was seventeen points to Murphy’s five.

  “Is it twenty-one up?” asked Edgar.

  “Aye,” said Rostron, “an’ it’s as good as over. Why not go and put a quid on Murphy now—tha’ll get seven to one, so tha’rt sure to be a winner?”

  I’d like to, thought Edgar, but they might ask me for my quid.

  Smith got the next two points. “They’re callin’ ten to one,” said Rostron. “Just have a quid saver, in case anything goes wrong.”

  Edgar shook his head, and just then he felt the hunch leave him. When he heard that it was ten to one against Murphy he suddenly began to feel that Murphy might win. Murphy won the next end. He took the jack with the score against him at nineteen to six. He began to play short ends of twenty-five yards or so. He scored point after point. An odd backer here and there took up a long-odds bet. When he reached double figures odds of six to one were still being laid against Murphy. He played short curly lengths every time, and began to draw close.

  “Seventeen-nineteen,” said Rostron. “It’s barely six to four now. Look there now—old Jock’s goin’ to get another two in. Now what Smith should do is to send a smasher through as will belt Jock’s wood to hell, but he won’t. Know why? He’s an instrument-maker or something of the sort, an’ every damn thing has got to be done to a thou’ of an inch.”

  After the next two ends Murphy was leading. Twenty to nineteen. The betting had turned to three to one against Smith—and no takers. This is what comes of marrying a woman from the wrong end of the town. If I knew where I could cut my throat in peace I’d do it. Murphy sent his first bowl, and when it had gone halfway he yelled: “I like it! I like it!” The bowl rolled smoothly and came to a halt against the jack. “A toucher!” went up the cry.

  How do I get out of here? thought Edgar. He felt a hand on his shoulder: “You’ll be gettin’ into seriou
s trouble, young man,” said Billy the landlord, “if you pluck all my best flowers.”

  “Flowers?” he said. He opened his hand and saw a pulpy mass of petals. “I’m right sorry,” he said.

  “You’ve been tearin’ ‘em off,” said Billy, “like a chap goin’ mad.”

  He turned to the green. Three of the four bowls had been delivered. Jock Murphy had one toucher and a bowl a few inches short of the jack. Smith’s only bowl was a yard beyond the jack. Edgar looked at Smith’s long sad face as he adjusted his arm-bands and weighed up the situation. It’s the end of the likes of me and thee, Smith, he thought. “His only chance is to send a pile-driver an’ scatter the lot,” said someone. But Smith stopped, hesitated a moment, and sent a smooth careful bowl. A groan of anguish went up from his b2ckers. Smith watched the bowl anxiously, then suddenly he clapped his hands above his head and for the first time cried out “I love it! I do! I love it!”

  The bowl just grazed Murphy’s covering wood and ran on to the jack, met it full and carried it away from Murphy’s toucher. Then jack and bowl came to a stop beside Smith’s first wood. He had two in. The marker pointed at him. Murphy thumped his fist and swore, whilst Smith smoothed down his shirt-cuffs. Edgar felt the ping of cold sweat drops slipping from under his armpits. He saw Walt Briddle coming across.

  “I believe I owe thee a fiver, Edgar,” he said, counting five notes off a thick roll. “It were a right good game.”

  “Ta,” said Edgar. “Not bad, were it? We must have a drink sometime, Walt.”

  He hurried off home without waiting for Rostron. If they’re still waiting, he thought as he walked along The Crescent, I’ve got the money. He turned the key and went into the house. The living room was empty, and the television set was there in the corner. She must have got the money somehow. She came out of the kitchen.

  “Where the heck have you been?” she said.

  “You got it then?” he said.

  “Got what?” she said.

  “The fiver from your mam,” he said. “Yo’know, for them two men.”

  “You great big gobbin,” she said. “There hasn’t been any two men.”