A man who cried (26 page)

surprised, it happens. You should know that.” And he had answered stupidly to this, ”Yes, yes, I

should know that.” Then he had added, ”As you once said to me, I can only wish you everything

that you wish yourself.”

When she remained silent staring at him he had added still further, ”And I hope that is

happiness.”

”Oh, I’ll be happy. Never fear, I’ll be happy. I am. I am.” She had lifted her thin shoulders, then

had said, ”Well, so long, Abel. Happy days.” And she had gone from him and left him standing

staring after her. . . .

She had changed; she looked ill. She had always been thin but now she looked nothing but skin

and bone. Softly he said, ”You’re not well.”

”Oh, I’m right enough.” She turned from him and as she walked towards the fire she said over

her shoulder, ”What’s brought you, and at this time of the night ?”

He didn’t move from where he was as he said, ”I just learned, not half an hour ago, about. . .

well, about your husband.”

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”Yes, so I learned tonight.” ’ **&*

”My God! Our Hilda.” She shook her head. ”Sometimes I think she’s not human, and yet. . .’

She watched him coming towards her. When he reached her he put out both his hands and took

hers, and softly he said, ”I’m sorry, Florrie, I really am. From what I heard I understand he ... he was a good fellow.”

She withdrew her hand from his and sat down on the couch, and she bent down and buttoned the

bottom button of her dressing-gown, saying as she did so, ”Yes, yes, he was a good fellow, kind,

none better.”

He asked now quietly, ”Was it in convoy?” s.J|

”Yes.” She nodded. ”Only out two days. He . .vhe was sure they’d never catch him, I mean his

ship. He had made about ten_ trips and had always been lucky.” She now looked up at him and

said, ”I ... I wondered, when you didn’t turn up.”

He swallowed and shook his head, then said, ”I wouldn’t have known even yet but . . . but

someone said to her tonight at ... at the church dance - I’d gone to pick them up - that it was a

pity about . . . about your man.”

She sighed deeply, moved her head a little, then muttered, ”She’s a strange creature. She came

round immediately after I phoned up ... and she said she was sorry. She came again the second

week, but I’ve never seen her since. And . . . and she never asked me round. ... I wouldn’t go

without being asked, you know that, but . . . but” - she shrugged her shoulders - ”I thought . . .

well, I thought she would have told you.”

”She’s jealous of you, in all ways she’s jealous of you, she’s got to be pitied.”

”Dear! dear!” Again she shook her head. ”I’ve given her no reason to be jealous of me, have I?”

When she raised her eyes to his he looked back into them and said, ”No. No.”

”Oh dear God!” She now fell back against the couch and, covering her face with her two hands,

began to sob.

Immediately he was near her and, his arms going about her, he turned her head into his shoulder,

and as her crying mounted he

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stroked her hair, saying, ”There, there, let it out, it’ll do you

good.”

When at last her sobbing eased she pulled herself away from his embrace and leant back against

the couch again, and after drying her face she looked at him and muttered, ”Thanks.”

He made no reply, just moved his head while he continued to stare at her.

Then she said, ”I feel so awful, Abel.”

”You’re bound to; it’ll take time.”

”Aw -” She closed her eyes for a moment before saying, ”Not that kind of awful; I mean mean,

small. . . .”

”Huh! you could never be either of those two, Florrie.”

”Couldn’t I?” She twisted herself a little towards him and again she wiped her face; and then she

said, ”You spend yourself, you give all your best to the rotters, and to the decent ones you behave

like dirt, and he was a decent one . . . Peter. He was the kindest fellow I ever met.”

”Well, I am sure you were kind to him in turn.”

Slowly she shook her head and there was a shy note to her voice now as she said, ”Not really.

You see he ... well, he loved me, he really, really loved me and . . . and it made no difference

when he knew that I didn’t love him. I liked him, I liked him a lot, but that is not loving He said

he loved me so much it would be impossible for some of it not to rub off on me, and he was quite

willing to wait a lifetime. He was a fellow who didn’t have a lot to say, he wasn’t very articulate, you know what I mean, but when he did get going, well, he had a way of putting things that some

people would have called poetry.” She paused and looked towards the fire, then said sadly, ”He

was sure that he was lucky, he was sure that he was going to come through all this. He ... he had

our life planned out for years ahead.” She now closed her eyes tightly, bowed her head, and

swallowed deeply before muttering, ”The last thing he said to me before he left was that he

wouldn’t die before he heard me say four words . . . four words” - her voice was a mere whisper

now - ”I love you, Peter.”

She was crying again but quietly, and he did not touch her or speak to her, for he was

experiencing within himself again the great want, the deep aloneness, added to which he was

finding himself jealous of a dead man.

She was still crying quietly as she went on, ”He wouldn’t let

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me come to the bus that last night, he ... he wantttl to remember me in this room, but he was no

sooner out of the door than I had the urge to run after him and say those very words. It didn’t

seem to matter about them not really being true, the only thing I wanted in that moment was to

send him away happy. But I hesitated too long. When I got to the gate he had already jumped on

the bus. But when I yelled he turned and saw me. He didn’t wave, it was as if he was standing

stock still, sort of suspended in the air outside the bus. It was a weird experience.”

When she shivered he looked towards the fire and seeing it low he rose and using the tongs from

the coal scuttle he put some coal on to it. He did it as if he were used to doing it every day of his life. As he replaced the tongs he turned to her and said, ”Can I get you a drink, something hot ?”

”I ... I would like a cup of tea. But you’ll never find the things, I’ll see to it.”

He put his hand towards her without touching her. ”Sit where you are,” he said, ”I’m used to

finding things.”

It was ten minutes later when he returned to the room carrying two cups of tea and as he handed

one to her, he said ”There’s a spoonful of sugar in the saucer.” Then he asked her, ”Have you

been to work?”

”Oh yes. Oh” - she moved her head slowly from shoulder to shoulder - ”I can’t stay in, I’d go

mad. Yet just a couple of months back I was for giving it up. I’m losing interest in it; you can’t

get decent clothes now.”

After sipping at the tea she turned to him and asked in a polite conversational tone, ”And how

have you been? I haven’t seen you for some time.”

”Oh, jogging along, same old pattern. But like you, business is pretty flat except for the bikes.

But then I do part time at the factory an’ all now.”

After a moment he looked at his watch, then said, ”I’m afraid I’ll have to be going, Florrie, I’m

on duty.”

”Oh. Oh, I’m sorry.” She moved to the front of the couch. ”I didn’t mean to keep you.”

”Nonsense. Don’t talk rot. Look, I’ll pop along tomorrow. What time will you be in?”

”I’m in most nights after six. But Hilda ... I wouldn’t want to...”

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”It’s all right.” He nodded at her. ”I’ll be alongtomorrow night. Now get yourself to bed. . . .

Don’t get up.”

’I’ve got to see to the blackout.”

At the heavily curtained French windows they stood looking at each other and she said quietly,

”Thank you, Abel; it’s helped a

lot.”

He said nothing but turned quickly from her and went out.

When he reached the end of the drive he stopped for a moment before going into the street and

he muttered to himself, ”He wouldn’t die before he heard her say ’I love you, Peter.’ ”

Would he himself live long enough to hear her say ”I love you, Abel?”

God Almighty! Wasn’t his life complex enough already? He should say it was. At times, and

more so of late, he had the desire to straighten it out by walking out; but then he would remember

he had walked out once before, and what had he walked into ? Yet in this moment he knew that if

he could make Florrie say the words to him that she hadn’t said to her husband, and mean them,

then he wouldn’t hesitate to add another twisted strand to his life. But with one difference, not

before he had come clean to her.

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”What are you going to do about that boy?”

Abel always knew Hilda was furious when she referred to Dick as your son, or that boy, but he

also knew that her fury had no connection whatever with Dick. ;

”What do you expect me to do ?”

”Get him to a doctor. He’s just a jangle of nerves; he’s beginning to stammer now.”

”It’s mere excitement because he’s got to go before the board next week.”

”You know that they’ll never take him in that state.”

”Yes, I know; but he’s got to find that out for himself.” He rounded on her now, his voice low

and harsh. ”He’s determined he’s not going to be like me, a conscientious objector, he’s going to

show that he’s for this war, so let him go and try.”

Hilda stared at him, and her voice seemingly calm, she said, ”You know something, you don’t

seem to care what happens to him. His nerves have got worse over the past two years and you

should have done something about it. Why wouldn’t you let me take him to the doctor and to see

a psychiatrist when I told you it was my belief that he was worrying over something?”

He turned from her and picked up his overcoat from a chair, and as he put it on he said, ”Boys go

through this phase.”

”Not without a reason they don’t. Mr Gilmore . . .” She stopped abruptly even before he shot

round on her, crying, ”I don’t want to hear any more of Mr Gilmore’s advice ! You tell Mr

Gilmore that when I want his help I’ll come and ask for it, and by God! that’ll be some days

ahead.”

He fastened the buttons on his coat now as if he were testing the strength of the thread with

which they were sewn on; then snatching his trilby hat from the chair, he started towards the

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kitchen door; and he had opened it before she said, ”Where you

going?”

He turned his head and stared at her before he answered, ”It’s Sunday, me half day, isn’t it? I can

go where I like; I’m free on me half day.”

Her face was working now, her lips trembling as she cried at him ”Don’t tell me you’re going

tramping and it coming down heavens hard.”

”I never said anything about going tramping.”

”Oh you! You!” Her lips pressed themselves tightly together after the words and then sprang

wide as she cried, ”I know where you’re off to.”

”Well, why ask the road you know then ?”

”You’re a disgrace! That’s what you are, you and her, you’re shameful.”

He now stepped quickly back into the kitchen and closed the door; and standing stiffly, he looked

down on her as he said, ”Put your hat and coat on and come along with me. She’s your sister,

she’s lonely, she needs someone.”

”Lo . . . nely!” The word, broken up, trembled out of her mouth as if it were bouncing over rocks.

”Her! who’s had every man in the town, an’ some. And then her husband not dead five minutes.”

”Her husband’s been dead six months, and after your two secret visits to her you’ve never looked

in on her since. If it wasn’t for her father and me she’d have nobody.”

”Oh my -” she just stopped herself from saying ”God!” by clapping her hand over her mouth and

turning her head away. But swiftly she looked back at him again, glaring at him now and crying,

”You know what you are, Abel Gray ? You’re a thankless beast, a godforsaken thankless beast.

I’ve done everything for you and that boy since you came in that yard all those years gone, and

what have you given me in return ?”

His brows were in a deep furrow, his eyes half closed. ”What have I given you in return ? Only

twelve to fourteen hours every day except an occasional Saturday and me Sunday afternoon.

Apart from that I’ve tried to give you love, but you wouldn’t have any of it.”

”Love!” Her upper lip curled away from her teeth. ”You call that love? The very thought of it

makes me sick.”

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”Yes, it would.” He nodded at her, his voice andrtnien quiet now. ”Yes, I’ve realized that for a

long time now, Hilda, you’re the kind of woman, you’re the kind of female that would be

sickened by that kind of love because there’s so little woman in you. You wouldn’t understand

that, but, you know, there are females and women, and males and men.”

She took two steps back from him now, her head shaking, her voice trembling as she said, ”You

think you’re clever, don’t you ? You can talk round things, you can make black seem white, but

you can’t make a prostitute into a good woman, or into a good female, and that’s what she is.

And you in your way are as bad. Yes you are. All those women, the woman on the boat, and the