A Sixpenny Christmas (11 page)

Sam had woken chiefly because he was so cold, but also because his head was whirling like a gramophone record on a turntable, and he knew with horrid suddenness that he was about to throw up. Groaning, he lurched out of bed, his feet cringing away from the icy boards. For a moment he was so disorientated that he thought himself at home, and wondered what had happened to the nice soft rug Ellen had placed on his side of the bed. Then his situation came back to him in a rush; she had kicked him out of his own home, the ungrateful bitch. He had paid the rent – not always but sometimes – kept the yard neat, filled the coal scuttle . . .

A tremendous heave from his inside reminded him of the pints, quarts, or possibly even gallons he had drunk the night before which were now fighting to get out. The room was a dormitory with five beds beside his own, all
occupied by sailors who had not managed to get a bed in the seamen’s home. They, lucky beggars, snored and slumbered still, but he, who had been a respectable homeowner until he had been ejected by his evil bitch of a wife, was awake and unwell. The room was long and narrow and Sam was scarcely halfway towards the door when the rumblings within became the rumblings without and he vomited all over the floor. The stench was awful, even Sam would have admitted that, had he been able to admit anything. As it was he lurched over to the row of pegs where the men’s clothing hung, took down trousers and a thick sweater, neither of which were his, opened the door and stumbled dizzily down the steep stairs. He was muttering: ‘Christmas bloody morning and I’m stuck in this horrible hole, debarred from me rightful place by the wickedest woman on God’s earth. Well, we’ll see how she likes it when I turns up, blacks both her eyes and knocks her bleedin’ teeth down her throat. We’ll see what she’ll do then.’

It was still dark, however, and halfway down the stairs his feet got tangled up and he fell the last half dozen steps and crashed into the newel post. Blackness descended and when he came round he could not imagine where he was or, for that matter, what he was doing there. Where was his cosy bedroom, his plump but comfortable wife and the blankets which he was sure must have been cuddled round his ears only seconds before? He pushed at a door and tumbled into the dirty greasy kitchen of some lodging house – he imagined it was a lodging house – without another soul awake. There was barely any heat left in the stove but there was the odd glowing coal or two and Sam knew that if he used
some of the wood chips standing by the hearth and added coal, using the bellows of course, he could soon have a bit of a fire. He was dry as a desert and terribly thirsty and considered a cup of tea, but the way his stomach reacted to the mere thought was sufficient to knock that idea on the head. No, he couldn’t face up to tea; what he needed was a hair of the dog that bit him. His eye brightened at the thought of a double gin; now that would warm him all through in the way a glass of water wouldn’t. He picked up a pile of wood chips and thrust them through the hole in the top of the stove, added some bits of coal, picked up the bellows and began to work them. Immediately, ash flew everywhere, making Sam stagger back flailing the air and trying to breathe through the whirling cloud, but as soon as he stopped wielding the bellows the dust began to settle and he was able to crouch close to the stove and struggle into the thick serge trousers and seaman’s jersey he had nicked out of the bedroom. The fire started to blaze and Sam began to feel warmer at last.

He looked around the room, thinking disapprovingly that it could do with a damned good clean, not connecting the thick layer of dust over every surface with his own recent activities. He was beginning to remember what he was doing in this place, why he was no longer in his comfortable home. He still had his socks on – nobody in the long bedroom had undressed completely, just removed their outer clothing – but he could not remember what he had done with his boots. He slumped into an armchair and looked round blearily. He saw another row of pegs holding donkey jackets and duffel coats and beneath it a line of boots.

Sam had big feet – he took a size twelve – so he would have to be careful when selecting footwear. He could see his donkey jacket on the very end of the row, with its leather patches on shoulders and elbows. He checked the buttons with his eye, because when he was drunk he frequently ripped his coat off without bothering to undo them – pop, pop, pop – and he did not want a coat that did not fasten in this cold. But at least no one had nicked it and probably his boots would not fit anyone but himself. He found them after a short search and was forcing his feet into them when he heard an indignant shout from the upper floor, followed by a crash. Sam grinned to himself. One of those lazy layabouts must have slipped in something; serve ’em right! Still, since it was he who had been sick all over the dormitory floor perhaps he’d better get a move on, be well out of the way before anyone else came down. Hastily, Sam grabbed a handsome fawn-coloured muffler from its peg, then with the speed which only fear could bring went through the pockets of every coat but his own, reaping a better haul than he might have expected: half a crown in one, a pile of coins, too many to count, in another, a couple of empty ones and then – oh joy! – a ten shilling note.

Despite his queasy stomach and the hangover that was making his head spin, Sam was out of there and legging it up the road within seconds of hearing the first footfall on the steep wooden stair. When he reached the main road he stopped for a moment, shaking his head slowly from side to side. What the devil was happening? He remembered it had been dark when he first woke, but now it was light, light with the pearly grey of early morning, and far away to the east he could just make out
the pink and gold of winter sunrise. He also remembered falling on the stairs and giving his noggin one hell of a bump. He believed he’d actually lost consciousness for a few minutes. Sam scowled; what the devil was going on? This road should have been crammed with vehicles and people, yet it was deserted. It was silent as the grave and just about as cheerful, he thought resentfully. Didn’t they know that good old Sam O’Mara was up and doing and badly in need of a drink? Didn’t they know that after a binge such as he must have had last night a feller needed a hair of the dog? Well, he would wake one of the lazy beggars up, because he had a vague feeling that there would be no drink at home, that his selfish useless wife wouldn’t have thought to provide a feller with what he needed most. Still, dockside pubs are open at the most peculiar hours, and if the first one he came to wasn’t open he’d batter on the bleedin’ door until it was. Sam lurched on. He was trying to remember just why he had spent the night in a narrow, cold and uncomfortable bed in an ugly dirty house owned by Popeye the sailor, but for the moment at least he could not for the life of him remember.

It was nearly noon before Sam was himself once more. The urge to batter down a pub door had passed, though he still felt pretty groggy and his memory was erratic. He was surprised to find that although warmly enough clad he appeared to be wearing someone else’s clothes, for the thick Guernsey and the navy serge trousers were seamen’s gear rather than docker’s, and the muffler, which was lovely and warm, was not the sort of thing the average working man owned let alone wore. But Sam was not too discontented, for he had money in his pocket,
and as soon as the pubs opened he would get himself a couple of doubles and a place by the fire. His memory of recent events had come back to him in dribs and drabs over the past couple of hours, and he now knew why the streets were deserted and why he had spent the night in a doss house. It was Christmas Day, so almost everyone was closeted with their families, but his bitch of a wife had had something called an injunction placed upon him, which meant he could not re-enter his own home.

Sam seethed with fury at the treatment Ellen had handed out, but though he was furious with her, and longed to punish her, he was even more annoyed with their small daughter. Before the kid’s birth he and Ellen had muddled along all right. A bit like Punch and Judy in the puppet show on the pier, they had started off by exchanging insults and had then begun trading blows. He was much the stronger and bigger of the two, of course, but Ellen had grown both cunning and capable. She had thumped him on the head with the coal scuttle once – he had not felt himself for days – cracked him across the shins with the poker and threatened him with a pan of boiling fat and sliced potatoes – ‘eat ’em and be grateful or I’ll empty the whole perishin’ lot over your ugly head,’ she had said, and he had known she had meant it. But when that miserable whining brat had been born, everything had changed. With the baby in her arms she could not fight back, and even when the child was in its cot she would hiss at him to stop shouting, or reply to a punch in the face by whimpering and getting between him and their little girl. He had found this insulting since he had never hit the child, not even accidentally, and did not intend to, telling himself that he was not such a monster.

But promises, which he fully intended to keep, had not been enough and she had applied for this here injunction and now he was as homeless as any tramp, not even able to exchange a few words with his wife far less go within twenty yards of their house. Nevertheless, he meant to spy on them over the Christmas period, to see if he could find some way, some loophole, which would enable him to obtain some sort of Christmas cheer for himself. He knew that his wife and daughter would be at old Ma Meakin’s for pretty well the whole day, coming home very late at night, probably laden with presents both of food and of toys for the child, at a time when the streets were pretty well lit but the jiggers were always black as pitch. He dwelt with anticipatory pleasure on the idea of pouncing out as Ellen and Lana, arms full of gifts, made their way to their back gate.

However, he knew that this was just wishful thinking. There was absolutely no way that Ellen would take their spoilt little daughter round the back after dark. He admitted, grudgingly, that Ellen knew him probably far better than he knew her. She must realise he was homeless save for the doss house, and once they’d discovered who had fouled the floor, and taken the warmest clothing from the pegs, he imagined Mr Popeye would be only too happy to kick him out, make him homeless with a vengeance. What was more, the landlord had probably already called in the scuffers over the missing clothing. Sam groaned; it wasn’t bloody well fair. What had he actually done, when it came right down to it? He had slapped his wife around a bit, but didn’t everyone? So far as he understood it, that was just marriage, and heaven only knew old Ellen had got her own back one way and another, yet there was she,
enjoying a wonderful Christmas Day whilst poor Sam was out in the cold; no grand dinner, no comfortable place by the fire, no hot toddy to drink with the mince pies at which Ellen excelled. His eyes filled with tears of self-pity, but then he remembered that by now the pubs would be open and he still had money. He shoved his hands into his donkey jacket pockets and felt the lovely round half-crown, the pennies and halfpennies, sixpences and shillings, and last of all the crisp beauty of the ten bob note. He would hang on to that note, for until dock work started again after the holiday it might be all that stood between him and the life of a tramp, sleeping on benches with a newspaper his only blanket.

Sam set off in the direction of his favourite watering hole, a pub much frequented by dockers. Crabby Cranshaw was one of his regular drinking partners, and now it occurred to Sam that Crabby might well introduce him to his own doss house, for Crabby, too, had had woman trouble. He had never actually married his Daisy, but had managed to father near on a dozen kids on her. The couple were famous for their ferocious fights and it was no unusual thing for Crabby to find himself kicked out after a particularly drunken argument. When Crabby could not gain access to his own home, he would go first to the pub and then to a doss house which he always swore was near on as good as his home in Snowdrop Street. However, before availing himself of Crabby’s counsel, Sam meant to come back after dark and see if there was any way he could gain admittance to his own house after Ellen had taken herself off to bed. He still had his key, and he could help himself to some of the Christmas grub with which the pantry would be laden,
snooze in front of the fire, and leave before the first tram came rattling out of the depot.

Sam rubbed his hands gleefully at the thought; yes, if he played his cards right he would have a comfortable billet for the night. Dreamily, he planned the food he would eat, the hot cup of tea he would enjoy before settling down on the creaking old sofa pulled up close to the fire. It would not be the first time by a long chalk that he had spent the night in the kitchen, unable or unwilling to face the struggle of getting his drink-sodden body up the steep and narrow flight of stairs. He would wait, he decided, until his womenfolk had been in bed for at least twenty or thirty minutes. Then he would go down the jigger, ease open the back gate, cross the yard and slip into the kitchen through the back door. He must remember to lie down on the sofa with extreme caution, since the springs had always creaked when they felt his weight. But once settled, with a comfortably full belly and a jug of water to hand in case he grew thirsty after his potations, he would sleep the hours of darkness away. When morning began to grey the sky he would go to the pantry and take as much food as he could carry in the pockets of his donkey jacket. He would sneak out, locking the door behind him, and though Ellen might suspect that he had entered the house clandestinely she would never be certain, and if she was not certain she would think twice before complaining to the scuffers.

Immensely cheered by the thought of the pleasures to come, Sam pushed open the door of the alehouse.

In the warmth and cheer of the pub, Sam found plenty of his old mates who sympathised with his plight, though
rather to his disappointment no one offered him a bed. Crabby, however, so nicknamed because he was always taking ‘a nip of this and a nip of that’, had already decided not to return to his own home that night, due to a row over some missing money. Instead, he had booked himself a place at his regular doss house, and assured Sam that there would be a bed for him if he had half a crown to spare. Sam, fingering the ten shilling note wistfully, said that if his wife really wouldn’t let him return to his own house he would be glad to take up Crabby’s offer. Until the landlord called time, therefore, the two men drank sparingly, and on being turned out into the cold – for the temperature had not risen above freezing all day – they went along to a Salvation Army hostel where a party for seamen a long way from home was being held. They managed to insinuate themselves into the party by saying that they were brothers married to two sisters, and that the girls had gone into the country to visit relatives. ‘But we’s workin’ the day after Boxin’ Day, as soon as dockers is needed,’ Crabby, always inventive, had explained. ‘So no trips into the bleedin’ country for the likes of us. We’s okay for a bed, like, it’s just we’re on the loose daytime.’