Pure as the Lily (14 page)

“Yes, Your Honour.”

“Hmm!”

Mr. Justice Broadside slowly straightened his back and the two figures solemnly receded from the bench.

Well, let him get this over; He was hungry, it had been a long day. “Alee James Walton, you have admitted causing grievous bodily harm to one Benjamin Arthur Tollett.” Mr. Justice Broadside now paused as if he were waiting for some comment from the prisoner, which would have surprised him had it been forthcoming. Then he went on to tell the man in the box that he couldn’t do this kind of thing and hope to escape the consequences, not in this country, and not in this particular county. People like him, if they couldn’t restrain themselves, would have to be put under restraint by those in responsible positions. True, he had been provoked, and he was taking into consideration the understandable feelings of a father, and, therefore, would not make the sentence actually fit the crime but would show leniency towards him. He ordered him to prison for a term of eighteen months.

The prisoner made no response, neither of surprise nor of dismay. When he was turned about and taken from the box his actions were those of a puppet.

“Eighteen months! Oh Da! Oh Da!”

Mary stood waiting in a bare room. They said she could see him for a few minutes. How could she look at him? How could she bear to look at him? Eighteen months in prison. But then she supposed he had got off light, because they had been making bets in the street on the length of time he would get.

Jimmy said some of them were betting it would be five years because it had been close on murder, and he was lucky he wasn’t swinging.

She didn’t remember him coming through the door, she wasn’t aware of anything until his arms were about her and he was saying, “There lass.

There lass. It’s all right, it’s all right. Look. Look at me. “ She looked at him.

“I’m not worried, I’m not, only for one thing.” He paused, then said with a break in his voice, “Do something for me, will you, Mary?”

“Yes, Da, any... anything, anything.”

Tell Ben, I’m. I’m sorry. “

She nodded, then clung to him; and after a minute he gently pushed her from him and said, “You’ll come an’ see me?”

She was unable to answer, she could only nod her head, and then he was gone. But it was queer, she thought, him wanting Ben to know that he was sorry, for the fact still remained that Ben had given her the hairn. Her da had never mentioned her condition, it was as if it had escaped his memory, yet that’s what it was all about, wasn’t it?

All the way down in the train from Durham to Newcastle she cried, and people looked at her. One woman sat beside her and patted her arm and said to those sitting opposite, “She’s likely had someone gone along the line,” and they all nodded.

At Newcastle she was so confused she got on to the wrong platform for the Shields train and missed it, and had to wait for the next. When she alighted at Jarrow the twilight was deepening and she walked slowly back to the shop.

Mrs. McArthur was waiting for her.

“What did he get hinny?” she asked.

“Eighteen months!”

“Oh, that’s not bad. I thought it’d be twice that. If he behaves himself he’ll get out afore his time, too.” Oh, she wanted to die, she did, she did; she wanted to fall on Mrs.

McArthur’s neck and sob out her misery. But she must wait until she got to her grannie’s later on.

Neither of the old people had been able to come to Durham with her because her gran da was in bed, bad with his chest. They were afraid of angina or something and her grannie couldn’t leave him. She felt responsible for this too, for whatever her gran da had, had been brought on by worry.

When Mrs. McArthur put her arm about her shoulders, she didn’t wait any longer before giving way completely.

A week later she took Ben’s clothes down to the hospital and for the first time saw him without the bandages on his face, and she hardly stopped herself from exclaiming aloud.

The red scar started near his scalp, came down over his eyebrow, taking the corner of the top eyelid with it, then went on down the cheek to the chin. He had another scar that ran in a diagonal line across his neck. But it was the scar that pulled his eyelid down that gave his face the strange sinister effect. It made him look, she thought, like one of the men in the squeally vampire pictures.

When she put the case down by the bed their faces were on a level, and he stared at her and said quietly, “Well Mary?”

She made herself look at the good side of his face as she said, “It’s all right, Ben; it’ll get better.”

“That’s what they tell me. They say the redness’ll go; they say it’ll tighten. But the more it tightens the more me eye will be pulled down. That’s how I see it. How do you see it, Mary? “ His voice was as tight as the skin of his face.

“Aw, Ben, Ben.”

“It’s all right,” he closed his eyes. Don’t distress yourself; we’ll talk about it when we get home. Did you order a taxi? “

“Yes.”

“Well then, I’ll get into me things.” He got up and pulled a dressing-gown around him and, having picked up the case, went through a door, while she sat by the bed waiting.

When he came out dressed, he had his face turned to the side as he spoke to someone, and he was Ben again, and she told herself she must keep looking at this side until she got used to the other side. She mustn’t let him see how it affected her because he was still the same; no matter how he looked, he was still the same.

She noticed that the sister and the nurses were nice to him. They were all shaking hands with him; he seemed very popular. Then he would be:

Ben was attractive, at least he had been. Oh what was she thinking?

She was acting small, mean, ordinary, letting herself be affected by the look of him. She should be ashamed of herself, she should that.

She would never forgive herself, never if she made him feel worse than he already was.

She smiled at the sister and added her thanks, and then they were walking out of the hospital, and the taxi was waiting for them.

She did not know whether or not it was on purpose, but he placed himself in the cab with his bad side next to her, and although he held her hand all the way home he didn’t speak.

When they entered the house Mrs. McArthur set the pattern for future reactions. The sight of the scarred face brought her mouth open and she exclaimed, “Oh my God! lad; he did make a mess of you.”

After swallowing deeply Ben made an attempt at lightness, although his tone was grim as he retaliated, “I was no oil painting to begin with.” But Mrs. McArthur imagined she was helping matters when she stated flatly, “Oh! now, that’s a lie, if ever there was one....” Mary had the desire to take the kindly woman by the shoulders and run her down the stairs.

“Where’s David?” she put in quickly.

“Oh; Katie Smith and young Bella took him to the park. I thought it’d do him good, he hasn’t been out much lately.”

Five minutes later, when Mrs. McArthur had gone, Ben took Mary by the hand and led her into the sitting-room. There, sitting her down on the couch, he brought his face squarely to hers, saying, ‘now take a good look. She’s right, Alee did make a mess of me. Let’s face up to it, let’s try to face up to the whole bad business. Your da’s in gaol, I’m marked, and’—he lifted her hand now and placed it over his eye ‘what you’ve got to realize is that I’m going to be like this for the rest of me life. You won’t always be able to look at this side. “ He patted his cheek.

“The only hope they’ve given me of improvement is that later when the skin heals they might be able to cut the lid and lift it. But that’s in the future; now, as you know, I want to marry you, Mary. I’ve wanted you’—his voice dropped low now “ I’ve wanted you since the day you first set foot in the shop. You know all that, and if I hadn’t gone mad that night none of this would have happened.

But I did go mad; you can’t undo what’s done. But the point is now I’m not going to hold you to it; you can have the baim and I’ll bring him up as me own, but I’m not going to hold you to marrying me. “ The bigness of him, the kindness of him, and even the wonder of a love such as his for somebody, as she put it to herself, with nothing much about them and no education, brought her falling against him, and she cried, “Oh Ben! Ben, I would marry you if it was on both sides.” Now she made herself put her lips to the corner of his drooping lid, and the act completed her transition into a woman.

Book Two. Jimmy, Jarrow

1943

‘burrows I’ “Yes, sir.” The tall boy unwound himself from his desk and stood up.

The book held before him, he blinked a number of times before saying, “The twentieth sonnet, sir.” Jimmy smiled inwardly.

“Cany on,” he said.

“A woman’s face, with Nature’s own hand painted, Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion; A woman’s gentle heart, but not acquainted With shifting change, as is false women’s fashion; An eye more bright than theirs less false in rolling. “

“There’s a comma in that line, you must use it. It reads:

“An eye more bright than theirs ... less false in rolling....” The tall boy nodded, then went on:

“G... gliding the object whereupon it g... gaze th

There was a smothered titter and when Jimmy cast a withering glance over the class the sound died away, but an echo of it remained in

himself. Why did Burrows pick a piece in with two g’s in one line? He could never manage his g’s; they had been waiting for those g’s.

When the boy finished he looked at the master, and Jimmy said, “That was quite good, Burrows,” and the boy, his face pink, eased himself down into his seat like a snake uncoiling.

Poor Burrows! five foot eleven and not sixteen. He knew what it felt like; he had experienced it. On his sixteenth birthday he had been five foot ten and his hands and forearms had been hanging out of his coat’s sleeves like tortured limbs from a rack. To add to his humiliation she had sewn cuffs on the sleeves he always thought of his mother as she which had been fuller than the sleeves and of a softer material and looked like frills, and the lads had ribbed him.

Poor Burrows; he was of the same breed. But he had the excuse that he couldn’t get clothes because of the lack of clothing coupons.

“You, Felton! what have you chosen?”

The sixty-sixth, sir. “

As he nodded to the boy to begin he congratulated himself. He knew little Felton would pick that one.

He was a romantic, was Felton . at the opposite pole from Burrows, for he was small, even under-sized, but his heart was big. He would suffer would little Felton, even more than Burrows.

“When the boy finished with the lines:

Tired with all these, from thee would I be gone, Save that, to die, I leave my love alone. “ he thought. Poor Felton. He liked little Felton; he hoped that one day he would find a love that he would hate to leave alone. God, what was he thinking about, finding love? Get on with it! what was the matter with him ?

“Quite good.” He nodded at Felton.

“But you use a little too muchemphasis’let the words speak for themselves. Our author knew where to lay on emphasis, don’t you think, Felton?”

Yes, sir, yes. “ The small boy smiled and sat down.

You, Weir! “ / The thick-set, bull-headed boy began in a Northern accent that could be cut with a knife;

“Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Luv is not luv which alters When it alteration finds... /

Luv is not luv which alters when it alteration finds! How would a numskull like Weir tackle love? Like a dog let off a chain.

Cook! “

“Riley!”

Tawcett! * Youlden! “

One after the other they recited the sonnets of their choice as part of the Friday afternoon’s English lesson. Then after Youlden’s oration there was a sound of scuffling feet and something being kicked along the floor, and as if another man had suddenly entered the skin of the benign gangling English master he now burst forth in a voice like a sergeant major’s, mil ligan Leave that . gas-mask case alone! How many times have I to tell you? Stand up! “

Milligan stood up. He was red-haired, square-faced, and he was grinning.

“If you want to practise football there’s a school yard in which to do it. Why must you keep dribbling that... that gas-mask case? Give it here.”

The boy stooped down, retrieved his gas-mask case and came down the aisle, his body rocking from side to side with a half-sheepish, half-defying swagger.

Tut it on my desk. “ He stared at Milligan, and Milligan looked up at him, an innocent expression on his face now.

Don’t you stand looking at me like that, Milligan, guileless. I know you; you’re the biggest irritant in this class. Well,. what have you to say? “

8 ii3

As soon as he uttered the last word he knew he had asked for it. He had given Milligan an opening.

“You were going to say bloody, sir; you were going to say, leave that bloody gas-mask case alone.

And then you were going to say, that damned ...!”

“Quiet! get!” He thrust his long arm out, and Milligan got. He walked back up the aisle with the whole class roaring

“Silence!” He banged the long ruler on the desk, and after the tittering had died away they all looked at him bright—eyed while he stared at Milligan, seated now, innocently looking back at him.

He liked Milligan, you couldn’t help but like Milligan. You could murder him, but you couldn’t help but like him. Funny, how some of them played you up and you could still feel for them. But there were others, like Crockford for in stance, who, no matter what they did, good, bad or indifferent, you loathed.

In the past month he hadn’t once asked Crockford to stand up and speak his piece; even last week when they were doing Henry VIII and he knew Crockford was willing him to say “And now you, Crockford’; because, as Crockford had once boasted, he had done Wolsey so often he felt he was Wolsey. What was it about the lad he couldn’t stand? His self-assurance? his sharp nose? those round dark all-seeing eyes? or was it because Crockford saw through him, and like one or two of the old brigade in the Common Room, thought he was out of place here, and if it hadn’t been for the war he would never have got his nose inside the school, he with only his Teachers’ Training College behind him!