A Prodigal Child

by Storey, David;

  ‘I suppose so,’ Mrs Morley said.

  The smell of cooking drifted down the slope. For a while, after Mrs Patterson had gone inside, Mrs Morley stood on the step and savoured the smell. Smoke trailed from the distant houses. They were a vast community, bound on a common venture, each household joined, yet each distant: she turned indoors with a feeling of pleasure.

  She cooked the breakfast, then she went upstairs, brought down the child, dressed it, then woke her husband.

  ‘Sithee, first morning,’ he said, his hair tousled against the pillow. ‘That’s bacon I can smell, then, is it?’

  ‘All ready.’

  ‘By go. Worth coming home to.’

  ‘I should hope it is.’

  ‘Do’st get a kiss?’ he added, reaching up.

  ‘You’ll get your breakfast,’ she said, ‘when you come downstairs,’ yet she sat on the bed and stooped and thought, ‘If I love him now I shall love him for ever,’ and kissed his lips. As she went downstairs she clapped her hands and, laughing at the child as it came, half-curious, to the foot of the stairs, lifted it and thought as well, ‘We’ve set out on a journey. We’ve cast off from the past. We’re going home at last.’

  In the afternoon they walked out, through the half-completed roads, to the summit of Spinney Top. They came out, between two rows of pebble-dash houses, on the broad High Top Road which ran along the spine of the ridge and which was flanked, in turn, on the lower side by houses and on the other by the stone-built church.

  Children were milling around the door.

  ‘Send him up here when he’s o’d enough,’ Morley said. He glanced over an adjoining lane which separated the grounds of the church from the brick-built school. ‘Theer an’ all I shouldn’t wonder.’ He looked to the view, and added, ‘I could fair step over to Spencer’s from here,’ pointing out, beyond the river and the hedged fields the other side, the curve of the lane, the line of trees by the hump-backed bridge and the thicker clump which marked the site of the farm itself. ‘Like being on top of the world.’

  They continued the walk: a path led off across the ridge, and down through the farm fields the other side; they crossed a stream, climbed up the valley slope and came out, finally, on a road of private houses which led back once more to the foot of Stainforth estate.

  ‘It’s a pretty place,’ Mr Morley said. ‘I think I shall like it here, tha knows.’

  ‘If you don’t, it’s too late to complain,’ Mrs Morley said, pushing the pram.

  ‘Ne’er too late to change,’ Mr Morley said.

  ‘In all things?’ Mrs Morley said.

  ‘In all things,’ Mr Morley answered, then added, seeing her look, ‘Save one. I s’ll never change in that.’

  During the next few days, when he came home from work, Mr Morley dug the garden; he would stand out with Mr Patterson, their plots separated by a single strand of wire which, further along the road, was being replaced in the other gardens by a wooden fence. ‘Nothing much’ll grow in this,’ Mr Patterson said, the first evening Mr Morley went out and made a start on clearing the builders’ debris into the field. ‘All clay up here.’ He indicated the extensive patch he’d dug himself. ‘I hear MacMasters,’ he added, indicating his neighbour on the other side, ‘has ordered a cartful of soil. I reckon I shall see if I can borrow a bit.’ The MacMasters’s garden had already been dug and the earth levelled off as if for a lawn.

  ‘I can fetch you some manure, if you like,’ Mr Morley said. ‘We’ve any amount where I work.’

  Mr Patterson had no children. When, sometimes, before he went to bed, Alan would come out to watch his father, and occasionally delve at the soil himself, Patterson would say, ‘Tha wants to get him to give you a hand. He’s got a bit of muscle on his arm already.’

  ‘I shall, if he can stand up straight,’ Mr Morley said, watching the boy fall then pick himself up. ‘By the time I’ve been here a bit I s’ll have him dig the lot, don’t worry.’

  Yet he had no great appetite for digging himself; it was too much like the work he did all day, whereas for Mr Patterson, who worked at a mill, it was always a change. He would watch the broad-muscled, bald-headed figure heave at the soil, stoop to his own task, then stand up to watch his neighbour once again.

  ‘How about a shift down Spinney Moor Avenue?’ he asked one evening, glancing at the house.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind,’ Mr Patterson said. ‘I s’ll tell the wife. I shan’t be a minute.’

  Yet Mr Morley didn’t go into his own house; he walked round the side and across the front and was already at Mr Patterson’s gate by the time his neighbour came out.

  ‘I don’t suppose it’ll run away,’ he said to Patterson, indicating the garden. ‘We’re going to be here a long time, so I don’t suppose there’ll be any rush.’

  They walked down the slope, their sleeves rolled, their hands in their pockets, glancing over at the other gardens: ‘He’s made a mess of that,’ and, ‘He’s doing wonders with that,’ they each observed, pausing here and there, where a privet hedge had already been planted, envisaging the effect of this civilizing feature on their own front gardens, leaning on a gate and persuading another man, whom Mr Patterson knew, to join them. ‘By go, we’ll have a party afore we’re through,’ Mr Morley concluded, clapping his hands, laughing, and thinking that, apart from the army, his present life, on Stainforth estate, was turning out to be the best on earth.

  It was after dark by the time he got back: the light was on in the living-room and when he tried the front door he found it locked.

  He went round to the back: it was locked as well.

  He knocked; for a while there was no response and he was on the point of going to the window to look into the living-room when he heard Sarah’s footsteps cross the hall.

  ‘Is anyone there?’

  ‘It’s me,’ Mr Morley said.

  ‘Is that you?’

  ‘It’s me,’ he said again, lowering his voice.

  ‘Is that you, Arthur?’

  ‘It’s me,’ he called again and rattled the latch.

  ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘Let me in.’

  He tried the latch; the door was still locked. From its firmness, at the bottom, he assumed it was also bolted.

  ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘I’ve been to the pub.’

  He rattled the latch more fiercely.

  ‘You never said.’

  ‘O’ppen the door or I’ll smash it.’ When he tried the latch and the door still held he went to the window. That, too, was locked.

  He went back to the porch.

  ‘Do I have to bre’k the glass?’ he said, yet he heard no sound from the other side. ‘Sarah?’ He pushed his weight against the door. The light which, through the keyhole and the cracks in the door, he had seen earlier had now gone out. He steppped back from the porch: the light had gone off in the living-room, too.

  The house was in darkness.

  He went round the front.

  ‘Sarah.’

  His voice echoed along the road and, since the houses opposite were in darkness, and a light was showing only in Patterson’s scullery window, he called again, ‘Sarah!’ between cupped hands.

  There was no response; despite the warmth of the evening, the windows of the house were closed.

  The curtains, too, were drawn on Alan’s room.

  He sat down on the front step and gazed along the road; then, when a light went on in a bedroom opposite, he went round the back: he was in his shirt-sleeves and, despite the warmth of the evening, he could feel the dew as he walked about the garden.

  Then, conscious of just how much he could see of the ground, he raised his head and saw, projecting above the nearest roof, the tip of the moon. Its light flooded into the field and gleamed, eerily, in the windows of the half-completed houses on the other side.

  He ducked under the wire dividing his garden from the field and walked across the moonlit grass; he pulled down his sleeves, fas
tened them, and stood for a while with his hands in his pockets. He was’nt drunk; he’d borrowed money from Patterson to buy him a drink. Buy him two drinks to be exact, and two for his friend. He’d had a pleasant evening; he’d been very happy. She didn’t wish to see him happy; she wished to see him tied to the house.

  He gazed up at the moon: its shape was fully visible now from the centre of the field. The sky was clear: he was reminded of nights like this near Suez, gazing up at a myriad of stars so clear it was as if, sober or not, he could have touched them. Life was larger than Sarah imagined: she had never travelled further than the nearest seaside town, and even that she hadn’t liked – not so much the place as the fact he’d gone there to enjoy himself. She didn’t understand pleasure; she didn’t, come to that, understand men; men were beyond her: feeling was beyond her.

  Nevertheless, he concluded, she was still a gift. She was still the animal he was conjuring from its burrow.

  He sat down in the grass; the fact was, as usual, he’d drunk more than he’d imagined. He knew, very soon, if he didn’t do something, he’d fall asleep.

  The moon loomed above the house; it appeared to grow smaller and more intense, its light colder: he was conscious of several stumbling footsteps, then a figure appeared, its arms outstretched.

  ‘Arthur?’

  The back door of the house was open.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I wa’re having a rest.’

  ‘Are you coming in?’

  ‘Tha shouldn’t have locked the door.’

  ‘You never told me you were going off.’

  ‘Do I have to tell you everything?’

  ‘You could have said. Mrs Patterson will think you never tell me anything.’

  ‘Nay, I can damn well walk down to the pub if I want to.’

  ‘Aren’t you coming in?’

  ‘Nay,’ he said, ‘thy’s locked the door.’

  ‘You can come in now.’

  ‘I’m damned if I shall.’

  ‘Then don’t,’ she said. ‘I’ve told you it was unfastened.’

  She turned back to the house.

  ‘She’s more worried about being seen than ought I might feel,’ he told himself. ‘That’s a rare game to play: alus under the eye of other people.’

  He saw the back door close; a light was switched off in the landing window.

  ‘Let her wait,’ he thought, looking about him at the uncompleted houses. ‘I can sleep over theer, if the worse come to the worst.’

  He got up after a moment and walked over to the nearest shell.

  But the houses that had a roof on had also doors and when he tried the first and then the second, and the windows, too, he found them fastened.

  He turned back to the field; he had no facility for telling the time at night, and had taken his watch off earlier that evening when he dug the garden.

  He opened the scullery door, half-expecting it to be locked, turned the key, fastened the bolt and for a moment stood in the dark, listening; then, taking off his boots, he went upstairs.

  He washed in the bathroom, took off his clothes, his nightshirt having been laid on the landing rail.

  She murmured quietly as he got into bed.

  ‘Is that you?’

  ‘Who else would it be?’ he said. ‘Or ar’t thy expecting somebody better?’

  She moved away.

  ‘Why lock the door on your husband?’ he asked.

  ‘Let’s talk about it in the morning,’ she said.

  ‘Let’s talk about it now,’ he said. ‘I’ve been out theer for half an hour.’

  ‘I’m tired.’

  ‘We’ll see what happens if I’m locked out again.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘We’ll see what happens to the back door, for a start.’

  ‘Did you lock it when you came in?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘Well, then,’ she said. ‘We’ll see in the morning.’

  ‘So this is what it is,’ he thought, lying on his back, gazing at the ceiling, at the faint glow of light which came in from the road outside.

  ‘Have you any money left?’ she asked.

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘that’s one thing settled.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I’ve none left either till the end of the week.’

  Yet tiredness, too, enveloped his mind, and the last thing he thought of was a joke told him at the Spinney Moor by Patterson’s friend, and he remembered, too, how Patterson had laughed and how the friend had slapped his back and had said, ‘Have another, Arthur, before they throw us out.’

  ‘Aye, another,’ Morley said, already fast asleep.

  THREE

  The garden was dug; he planted flowers, vegetables and, in the lower half, he set a lawn: another he shaped out in the plot at the front. Workmen came and erected fences; a privet hedge was planted and a gate put up. Within a month most of the houses in the road were occupied.

  The noise of the builders’ lorries faded. In the house next to the Morleys’ a policeman came to live; his wife was young: they had a daughter, the same age as Alan, and in the evenings, when the policeman came home from work, he would sit in the porch, the girl on his knee, bouncing her up and down and, laughing, throw a ball for a dog to fetch. A tall, bald-headed man, with dark-brown eyes and a flushed, thick-featured face, he would come out at these intervals between his shifts and dig the garden; soon he had overtaken Morley, and Patterson, and the MacMasters: he laid paths, erected a walk, planted roses, arranged a trellis, a rockery and a stepped terrace which led up to the top half of the garden. His name was Foster; occasionally he would come into the Morleys’ house, tapping on the door – for the girl, nicknamed ‘Pretty’ by him, and called Alison, would often wander across the footpath between the houses and come into the scullery to play with Alan – ‘Pretty?’ he would call, his tall figure, with its gleaming, dome-shaped head, thrust round the door and, hearing the child’s voice, he would add, ‘Come to visit her boyfriend, has she? You can see where her thoughts will turn in two or three years’ time.’

  ‘Oh, a bit longer than that,’ Mrs Morley would say, looking up from her washing, or from where she was cooking, shy at first with the uniformed figure, standing there, invariably without his tunic, blue-shirted, dark-tied, dark-bracered, big-booted, the geniality of the bald-headed man, and the way he strode through the house to retrieve his daughter, setting her on his shoulder, or thrusting her with her blonde-coloured, dancing curls across his back, soon putting Mrs Morley at her ease: he would sit at the table and take a cup of tea. ‘She’s too much like her mother for me not to know: an eye for the lads from the age of dot.’

  The girl would laugh; he would bounce her up and down: Alan, dark-eyed, would gaze up at the uniformed figure, with its heavy, laughing, red-cheeked face, at the laughing figure of the girl set on his knee and, scowling, tip one foot on its side, or, speculatively, put out a hand and endeavour to join in the bouncing up and down, and the laughter and the rolling of the blonde-haired girl from side to side in the policeman’s heavy hands. Soon, the two of them would be bouncing up and down together, their shrieks and laughter filling the house, the policeman’s wife, if the activity continued long enough, tapping on the woodwork at the side of the door and saying, ‘This is where he’s got to? Send him on an errand and it’s another two hours before I see him.’

  ‘Like mine,’ Mrs Morley would say, offering her neighbour a cup of tea, the two women chatting at the side of the table while the tall, blue-shirted figure, set on a stool, bounced the children up and down, tickled one and then the other, slid one down then pulled it up, scratched the one’s head and then the other’s, and, still jogging, would sing, ‘Here’s two rabbits, fit for a stew; which shall we have: this ’un, or you!’ chasing them finally into the other room, or up the stairs, Mrs Foster calling, ‘Now, that’s enough,’ and, ‘He never knows when to stop,’ still chastising the blue-s
hirted figure, who was almost twice her size, as they returned to the house, the tiny figure of the girl set up on the policeman’s shoulder where she shouted and laughed and tapped the tall man’s head as, finally, swinging her down, he carried her inside their door.

  ‘At least they’re happy,’ Mrs Morley would say when Morley, returning home, came upon these scenes.

  ‘Why shouldn’t they be happy? He’s got a good job.’

  ‘You could have one.’

  ‘Nay, I’ve been in a uniform half my life, I’m damned if I’ll step in another. Any road, I’m not the right man.’

  ‘You’re not a criminal, are you?’ Mrs Morley would ask.

  ‘I’m just not cut out for a bobby. You’ve to be the right sort of man for a job like that.’

  ‘You don’t begrudge him it?’ Mrs Morley would ask.

  ‘I begrudge him nought. I begrudge no one nothing,’ Mr Morley would add. ‘All I’m saying is, it’s a damned easy job compared to some. You retire,’ he would conclude, ‘afore you’re fifty.’

  ‘Only if you’ve been in long enough.’

  ‘He’ll have been in long enough. He’s been a bobby, I should think, since afore he wa’ two year old.’

  Yet, despite his misgivings, Mr Morley would talk to the taller man in the evenings across the fence and would sometimes cross over to his garden, examine his trellis, his crazy-paving, his bedding roses and his climbers, his border plants, the grass he had planted, the neat rows of vegetables already showing green, and would crouch down, too, and smoke a cigarette while the blue-shirted figure sat beside him in the porch, smoking a pipe, Morley returning later to report, ‘His father wa’re a policeman, tha knows,’ or, ‘He used to lake football for the City’ or, ‘He wa’ telling me o’ one chap they copped who’d had one hundred previous convictions. It makes you wonder what the world is coming to,’ his manner deferential in the presence of the taller man, his head upraised, his face inflamed, as if, in courting the attention of Mr Foster, he were seeking ways to ingratiate himself with the law itself. ‘You never know what they might pinch you for: a man like that can come in useful.’