The Lonely Londoners

by Sam Selvon

  ‘Why is that?’ Galahad ask.

  ‘Well, as far as I could figure, they frighten that we get job in front of them, though that does never happen. The other thing is that they just don’t like black people, and don’t ask me why, because that is a question that bigger brains than mine trying to find out from way back.’

  ‘Things as bad over here as in America?’ Galahad ask.

  ‘That is a point the boys always debating,’ Moses say. ‘Some say yes, and some say no. The thing is, in America they don’t like you, and they tell you so straight, so that you know how you stand. Over here is the old English diplomacy: “thank you sir,” and “how do you do” and that sort of thing. In America you see a sign telling you to keep off, but over here you don’t see any, but when you go in the hotel or the restaurant they will politely tell you to haul – or else give you the cold treatment.’

  ‘I know fellars like you,’ Galahad say in turn. ‘You all live in a place for some time and think you know all about it, and when any green fellars turn up you try to frighten them. If things bad like that how come you still holding on in Brit’n?’

  ‘You don’t believe, eh?’ Moses say. ‘Listen, I will give you the name of a place. It call Ipswich. There it have a restaurant run by a Pole call the Rendezvous Restaurant. Go there and see if they will serve you. And you know the hurtful part of it? The Pole who have that restaurant, he ain’t have no more right in this country than we. In fact, we is British subjects and he is only a foreigner, we have more right than any people from the damn continent to live and work in this country, and enjoy what this country have, because is we who bleed to make this country prosperous.’

  ‘Well look,’ Galahad say, ‘we could stay here talking all day, but I better go and look for work. Where you have to go to?’

  ‘The employment exchange by Edgware Road. You will have a lot of company there, you shouldn’t feel lonely. What work you used to do in the oilfields?’

  ‘Electrician.’

  ‘Well you better tell them that, else they will want to throw some hard work on you, lift iron and heavy box or something.’

  ‘I did hear some fellars talking on the train when we was coming from Southampton, about how you could go on the dole if you ain’t working, and how they intend to find out about it before they start to hustle.’

  ‘It have some fellars like that,’ Moses say. ‘You want to be like that?’

  Sir Galahad hesitate like if he thinking, then he say, ‘No. If I can’t get electrician work I will take something else for the time being.’

  ‘But you could refuse jobs, you know,’ Moses press the Galahad, wanting to find out what kind of fellar he really is. ‘And all the time the State will go on supporting you. By and by you will learn the ropes and how you could coast a long time without work.’

  Galahad think about all the things that Moses tell him, then he say, ‘Boy, I don’t know about you, but I new in this country and I don’t want to start antsing on the State unless I have to. Me, I am a born hustler.’

  ‘I wish it had plenty other fellars like you,’ Moses say, ‘but a lot of parasites muddy the water for the boys, and these days when one spade do something wrong, they crying down the lot. So don’t expect that they will treat you like anybody special – to them you will be just another one of them black Jamaicans who coming to London thinking that the streets paved with gold.’

  ‘Something else I want to tell you,’ Galahad say. ‘I know you mean well telling me all these things, but papa, I want to find out for myself. So just tell me how to get to this place and I will go. You not working today?’

  ‘I have a night work.’

  ‘You didn’t work last night.’

  ‘I get the night off. But I have to go tonight. Anyway, I not leaving until late this evening, so you will meet me here when you come back. Now, go down the road until you come to Westbourne Grove, and there any bus going up towards Paddington – you better ask somebody – will take you to the school.’

  With that, Moses start shining his shoes, and Sir Galahad went out to try and get a work.

  Galahad make for the tube station when he left Moses, and he stand up there on Queensway watching everybody going about their business, and a feeling of loneliness and fright come on him all of a sudden. He forget all the brave words he was talking to Moses, and he realise that here he is, in London, and he ain’t have money or work or place to sleep or any friend or anything, and he standing up here by the tube station watching people, and everybody look so busy he frighten to ask questions from any of them. You think any of them bothering with what going on in his mind? Or in anybody else mind but their own? He see a test come and take a newspaper and put down the money on a box – nobody there to watch the fellar and yet he put the money down. What sort of thing is that? Galahad wonder, they not afraid somebody thief the money?

  He bounce up against a woman coming out the station but she pass him like a full trolley before he could say sorry. Everybody doing something or going somewhere, is only he who walking stupid.

  On top of that, is one of those winter mornings when a kind of fog hovering around. The sun shining, but Galahad never see the sun look like how it looking now. No heat from it, it just there in the sky like a force-ripe orange. When he look up, the colour of the sky so desolate it make him more frighten. It have a kind of melancholy aspect about the morning that making him shiver. He have a feeling is about seven o’clock in the evening: when he look at a clock on top a building he see is only half-past ten in the morning.

  By and by he drift down to Whiteleys. Suddenly he stand up and look back. He wonder if he could find his way back to Moses room! Jesus Christ, suppose he get lost? He ain’t even remember the name of the street where Moses living. In the panic he start to pat pocket to make sure he have money on him, and he begin to search for passport and some other papers he had. A feeling come over him as if he lost everything he have – clothes, shoes, hat – and he start to touch himself here and there as if he in a daze.

  Suddenly Galahad feel a hand on his shoulder and though he want to look and see who it is, is as if the hand paralyse him and he can’t move. He just stand up there and he hear a voice say: ‘Move along now, don’t block the pavement.’

  When he was able to look Galahad see a policeman near him. Again he panic, though he ain’t do anything against the law. Still is so people does feel in Trinidad when police near them, as if, even though they ain’t commit a crime, the policeman would find something wrong that they do and want to lock them up.

  Galahad start to stammer, all the big talk left him now.

  ‘Can I help you to get some place?’ the policeman say.

  ‘I looking for the employment exchange,’ Galahad say, looking around as if he expect it to be near.

  ‘You have to catch a bus over there,’ the policeman say, pointing across the road. ‘The conductor will tell you where to get off.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Galahad say. He went across the road quick and stand up by Queen’s to catch himself.

  ‘You getting on like a damn fool,’ he tell himself. ‘What happen to you? All of a sudden like you gone stupid. Take it easy,’ he say, unconsciously repeating Moses advice. ‘You new in this place, it will take you some time to settle in.’

  But the pep talk ain’t do much to help, and he nearly dead with joy when he look up the road and see Moses coming. He start to whistle monkeyeric like how fellars in the West Indies whistle when they see a friend and want to attract attention. But he didn’t have to do that, for Moses was coming straight to him.

  ‘Moses,’ he say, ‘I too glad to see you, boy. If you don’t mind I want you to come with me.’

  ‘I thought so,’ Moses say. ‘Boy, you lucky I have soft heart, else you never see me again as long as you stay in London. You don’t know that does happen? Fellars don’t see one another for years here. Anyway, one thing is you must done with all this big talk.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Galahad say, so relie
ved to see Moses that he putting his hands on his shoulders like they is old pals.

  ‘Come and catch a bus,’ Moses say, and he take Galahad to the bus queue. When the bus come, Galahad pushing in front of the other people though Moses try to hold him back, and the conductor say, ‘’Ere, you can’t break the queue like that, mate.’ And Galahad had to stand up and watch all the people who was there before him get on the bus, and a old lady look at him with a loud tone in her eye, and a girl tell a fellar she was with: ‘They’ll have to learn to do better, you know.’

  ‘I tell you to take it easy,’ Moses say when they was in the bus, ‘you not in Park Street waiting for a trolley.’

  ‘Fares please.’

  ‘Two fours,’ Moses say, and he nudge Galahad. ‘Pay.’

  Galahad hand the conductor a pound because he not sure how much two fours is.

  When the conductor gone Moses say, ‘You could always tell when a test new in London – he always handing the conductor pound note or ten-shilling cause he ain’t learn yet how to work out money in pounds, shillings and pence.’

  ‘That was fourpence,’ Galahad say to himself. ‘That is four pennies, and we pay eight. Eight twos are sixteen.’ Aloud to Moses: ‘That was sixteen cents.’

  ‘You sharp,’ Moses say. ‘Keep practising.’

  When they get to the building that mark Ministry of Labour Galahad see it had a lot of notice box with glass window on the walls with all kind of vacancies for instrument repairers and makers and turners and millers, and operators of this and that. Sign like: Gateway to a Secure Future Join the Post Office as a Postman hit him between the eyes, and a lot of others that encouraging you to join the army and the navy and the air force.

  ‘Like plenty job going,’ he tell Moses.

  ‘Let we go inside,’ Moses say. And when they was inside, with a lot of other tests sitting around, Moses tell Galahad to go to the desk that mark Enquiries and tell the clerk he want a job.

  The clerk take down some particulars and tell Galahad to wait that they would call him, and he went and sit down with Moses.

  After a while they call Galahad name and he went into a small cubicle where a test was sitting at a desk.

  ‘What work can you do?’ the clerk ask him.

  ‘Electrician,’ Galahad say.

  ‘Electrician,’ the clerk say to himself, and he look through some papers. ‘We haven’t got anything for you at the moment. Will you go to the next building and register and get your insurance card, please.’

  Moses take him round the block to the next building. When they enter a kind of atmosphere hit Galahad hard so that he had to stand up against the wall for a minute. It ain’t have no place in the world that exactly like a place where a lot of men get together to look for work and draw money from the Welfare State while they ain’t working. Is a kind of place where hate and disgust and avarice and malice and sympathy and sorrow and pity all mix up. Is a place where everyone is your enemy and your friend. Even when you go to draw a little national assistance it don’t be so bad, because when you reach that stage is because you touch bottom. But in the world today, a job is all the security a man have. A job mean place to sleep, food to eat, cigarette to smoke. And even though it have the Welfare State in the background, when a man out of work he like a fish out of water gasping for breath. It have some men, if they lose their job it like the world end, and when two-three weeks go by and they still ain’t working, they get so desperate they would do anything.

  ‘You see that fellar there?’ Moses nod his head at a old English fellar rolling a cigarette. ‘He is one of the regulars. He does only draw dole. The last time I was here was last year, and he still in the queue.’

  Was a long room that Galahad see, shape like a L, and it have a counter going all the way, and on this counter it have files that in immediate use. It have some folding chairs at the beginning and the ending of the L, where some tests sit down waiting like guilty criminals. Over the counter it have numbers on placards 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on. Over the counter it also have a pipe what have the electric wires in it, and the clerks and them have pencils tie-up on the pipe with long string, dangling down to the counter, for the boys to sign up with. Fellars stand up in little groups here and there, all of them looking destitute and poor-me-one. It had a folding blind, and two fellars was getting in the folds to keep warm. The floor dirty with footprint and cigarette butt. The walls have plenty notice hang up, asking you to join the forces, and telling you what you must do to get pension and insurance and all that kind of thing.

  ‘You see them papers it have on the counter?’ Moses tell Galahad. ‘One time in this office they used to have plenty more, but one day a Jamaican fellar come in and get ignorant and start to make rab. He tear up all the files and papers they had on the counter, and he make a snatch at one of the clerk behind. He bawling out and cursing and getting on like if he mad, and police had was to come and take him away. Since that time, the clerks not taking any chances, and the only files they have on the counter now is those that they using the same time.’

  A few fellars call out to Moses, asking him what he doing in the school, if he on the dole, but Moses say no, he only showing a new test around.

  ‘Now, on all the records of the boys, you will see mark on the top in red ink. J-A, Col. That mean you from Jamaica and you black. So that put the clerks in the know right away, you see. Suppose a vacancy come and they want to send a fellar, first they will find out if the firm want coloured fellars before they send you. That save a lot of time and bother, you see. In the beginning it cause a lot of trouble when fellars went saying that they come from the labour office and the people send them away saying it ain’t have no vacancy. They don’t tell you outright that they don’t want coloured fellars, they just say sorry the vacancy get filled. But this office here ain’t so bad, some of the clerks — up, but on the whole they treat you decent.’

  And so between Moses and the labour office Galahad get fix up. When they was outside and Galahad showing him the unemployment card, Moses say, ‘Keep that careful, and don’t go about the place making grandcharge when you ain’t have work. One time a fellar was trying to impress some girls in a café, talking all kind of big talk and saying how he have a big work in the government service. Same time he put his hand in his pocket to take out something and the unemployment card drop out.’

  ‘You think I will get a work?’ Galahad ask.

  ‘Sure. When you come back to report tell them you will take anything for the time being. And now, we better go and see the landlord about the room.’

  When Moses did arrive fresh in London, he look around for a place where he wouldn’t have to spend much money, where he could get plenty food, and where he could meet the boys and coast a old talk to pass the time away – for this city powerfully lonely when you on your own.

  It had such a place, a hostel, and you could say that in a way most of the boys graduate from there before they branch off on their own and begin to live in London. This place had some genuine fellars who really studying profession, but it also had fellars who was only marking time and waiting to see what tomorrow would bring.

  It had a big dining room, and you had was to buy a meal ticket before you could get any food. Well some of the boys soon get in with the servant girls and get meal tickets free. Sometimes in the evening some fellars coming in, watching in the queue to see if they see a friend who would buy them a meal. Then afterwards in the lounge they would sit around – the genuine fellars with text-books in they hand, and some fellars with the Worker, and big discussion on politics and thing would start up. Especially with them who come from British Guiana and don’t want federation in the West Indies, saying that they belong to the continent of South America and don’t want to belittle themself with the small islands. Meanwhile a African fellar would be playing the piano – he would give you a classic by Chopin, then a calypso, then one of them funny African tune. It had a game them Africans used to play with a calabash shell and some
seeds, and nobody but a African could understand it, and all the time two-three of them sitting by a table playing this game. In another room had a pingpong table, and they used to play knockout, and some sharp games used to play there. In another room had a billiards table.

  Them was the old days, long before test like Galahad hit London. But that don’t mean to say it didn’t have characters. There was a fellar name Captain. Captain was Nigerian. His father send him to London to study law, but Captain went stupid when he arrive in the big city. He start to spend money wild on woman and cigarette (he not fussy about drink) and before long the old man stop sending allowance.

  Cap had a greenstripe suit and a pair of suede shoes, and he live in them for some years. He used to wash the clothes every night before he go to sleep, and when he get up press them, so that though he wearing the same things they always fairly clean. If he have money, he would get up in the morning. If not, he would sleep all day, for to get up would mean hustling a meal. So all day long he stay there in bed, not really sleeping but closing his eyes in a kind of squint. Come evening, Cap get up, go in the bathroom and look to see if anybody leave a end of soap for him to bath with. Come back, press the clothes and put them on, comb hair, blow the nose in the sink and gargle loud, watch himself in the mirror, and then come down the stairs to the dining room, wiping his face with a clean white handkerchief.

  The old Cap have the sort of voice that would melt butter in the winter, and he does speak like a gentleman. So the thing is, after he sponge on all the fellars he know for meals, he used to look around for newcomers, and put on a soft tone and the hardluck story.

  It have some men in this world, they don’t do nothing at all, and you feel that they would dead from starvation, but day after day you meeting them and they looking hale, they laughing and they talking as if they have a million dollars, and in truth it look as if they would not only live longer than you but they would dead happier.