William Again (5 page)

He put his head in at the window as he went towards the gate.

‘I’m goin’ out, Mother,’ he said in a voice which expressed stern sorrow rather than anger.

‘All right, dear,’ said Mrs Brown sweetly.

‘I may not be coming back – never,’ he added darkly.

‘All right, dear,’ said William’s mother.

William walked with slow dignity down to the gate.

All I say
is,’
he remarked pathetically to the gatepost as he passed, ‘I might as well be
dead
for all anyone thinks of tryin’ to make my life a bit
happier.’

He walked down to the village – a prey to black dejection. What people came away for holidays
for
beat him. At home there was old Jumble to take for a walk and throw sticks for, and the
next-door cat to tease and the butcher’s boy to fight, and various well-known friends and enemies to make life interesting. Here there was – well, all he said
was,
he might as well be
dead.

A
charabanc stood outside the post office, and people were taking their places in it. William looked at it contemptuously. He began to listen in a bored fashion to the conversation of two
young men.

‘I’m awfully glad you ran down,’ one of them was saying to the other; ‘we can have a good tramp together. To tell you the truth I’d got so bored that I’d
taken a ticket for this charabanc show . . . Can’t stand ’em really.’

‘Will they give you your money back?’ said the other.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said the first.

Then he met William’s dark, unflinching gaze and said carelessly, ‘Here, kid, like a ticket for the charabanc trip?’

William considered the question. Anything that would take him away from the immediate vicinity of his family seemed at that moment desirable.

‘Does it come back?’ he said.

‘It’s
supposed to,’
said the young man.

That seemed rather a drawback. William felt that he would have preferred to go away from his family on something that did not come back. However, this was better than nothing.

‘All right,’ he said graciously, ‘I don’t mind going.’

The young man handed him the ticket.

William sat in the middle of a seat between a very fat lady and a very fat gentleman.

‘Not much
room,’
he remarked bitterly to the world in general.

The fat lady and the fat gentleman turned crushing glances upon him simultaneously. William received and returned them. He even enlarged upon his statement.

‘All I say
is
,’ he said pugnaciously, trying to scowl up at both sides at once, ‘that there’s not much
room.’

The fat lady put up lorgnettes and addressed the fat gentleman over William’s head.

‘What a very rude little boy!’ she said.

Being apparently agreed upon that point they became friendly and conversed together for the rest of the journey, ignoring the subterranean rumbles of indignation that came from the small boy
between them.

At last the charabanc stopped at a country village. The driver explained that the church was an excellent example of Early Norman architecture. This left William cold. He did not even glance at
it. The driver went on to remark that an excellent meal could be obtained at the village inn. Here William’s expression kindled into momentary animation only to fade again into despair. For
William had spent his last twopence that morning upon a stick of liquorice. It had caused a certain amount of friction between himself and his elder brother. William had put it – partially sucked –
upon a chair while he went to wash his hands, and Robert had come in from tennis and inadvertently sat down upon it. Being in a moist condition it had adhered to Robert’s white flannel
trousers. Even when detached the fact of its erstwhile adherence could not be concealed. William had considered Robert’s attitude entirely unreasonable.

‘ALL I SAY IS.’ WILLIAM SAID PUGNACIOUSLY, TRYING TO SCOWL UP AT BOTH SIDES AT ONCE, ‘THAT THERE’S NOT MUCH
ROOM.’

‘Well, I don’t know what he’s got to be mad about . . . I didn’t make him sit down on it, did I? He talks about me spoilin’ his trousers – well, wot about him
spoilin’ my liquorice? All I say
is –
who wants to eat it, now he’s been sittin’ on it?’

Robert had unkindly taken this statement at its face value and thrown the offending stick of liquorice into the fire.

William sadly extricated himself from the charabanc, thinking bitterly of the vanished twopence, and liquorice, and the excellent meal to be obtained from the village inn. He regarded himself at
that moment as a martyr whose innocence and unjust persecution equalled that of any in the pages of the Church History book.

An elderly lady in
pince-nez
looked at him pityingly.

‘What’s the matter, little boy?’ she said. ‘You look unhappy.’

William merely smiled bitterly.

‘Is your mother with you?’ she went on.

‘Nope,’ said William, thrusting his hands into his pockets and scowling still more.

‘Your father, then?’

‘Huh!’ said William, as though bitterly amused at the idea.

‘You surely haven’t come alone?’ said the lady

William gave vent to the dark emotions of his soul.

‘All I say
is,’
he said, ‘that if you knew my family you’d be jolly glad to go anywhere alone if you was me.’

The lady made little clicking noises with her tongue expressive of sorrow and concern.

‘Dear, dear, dear!’ she said. ‘And are you going to have tea now?’

William assumed his famous expression of suffering patience.

‘I’ve got no money. It’s not much use goin’ to have tea anywhere when you haven’t got no money.’

‘Haven’t they given you any money for your tea?’ said the lady indignantly.

‘Not
they
!’ said William with a bitter laugh.

‘They
wun’t of let me come if they’d known.
They
wun’t of paid anything for me. It was a frien’ gave me the ticket jus’ to giv’ me a bit
of pleasure,’ he said pathetically, ‘but
they
wun’t even give me money for my tea.’

‘Perhaps,’ said the lady, ‘you had a late lunch and they thought—’

‘Huh!’ ejaculated William. ‘I din’ have
any
lunch worth speakin’ of.’ He thrust aside the mental picture of two helpings of steak and three of rice
pudding.

‘You
poor
child,’ said the lady. ‘Come along,
I’ll
give you your tea.’

‘Thanks,’ said William humbly and gratefully, trudging off with her in the direction of the village inn.

He felt torn between joy at the immediate prospect of a meal and pity for his unhappy home life. William, generally speaking, had only to say a thing to believe it. He saw himself now as the
persecuted victim of a cruel and unsympathetic family, and the picture was not without a certain pleasure. William enjoyed filling the centre of the stage in any capacity whatsoever.

‘I suppose,’ said the lady uncertainly, as William consumed boiled eggs with relish, ‘that your family are
kind to you.’

‘You needn’t s’pose that,’ said William, his mouth full of bread and butter, his scowling gaze turned on her lugubriously. ‘You jus’ needn’t
s’pose that. Not with
my
family.’

‘They surely aren’t
cruel
to you?’ said the lady in horror.

‘Crule,’
said William with a shudder, ‘jus’ isn’t the word. All I say
is,
crule isn’t the word.’

The lady leant across the table.

‘Little boy,’ she said soulfully, ‘you must tell me
all.
I want to
help
you. I go about the world helping people, and I’m going to help you. Don’t be
frightened. You know people can be put in prison for being cruel to children. If I reported the case to the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children—’

William was slightly taken back.

‘Oh, I wun’t like you to do that!’ he said hastily. ‘I wun’t like to get them into trouble.’

‘Ah,’ she said, ‘but you must think of your happiness, not theirs!’

She watched, fascinated, as William finished a third plate of bread and butter, and yet his hunger seemed to be unappeased. She was not acquainted with the digestive capacity of an average
healthy boy of eleven.

‘LITTLE BOY,’ SHE SAID SOULFULLY, ‘YOU MUST TELL ME ALL . . . IF I REPORTED THE CASE TO THE SOCIETY FOR PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN—’

‘I can see you’ve been starved,’ she said, ‘and I could tell at once from your expression that you were unhappy Have you any brothers and sisters?’

William, who had now reached the second stage of his tea, put half a cake into his mouth, masticated and swallowed it before replying.

‘Two,’ he said briefly. ‘One each. Grown-up. But they jus’ care nothin’ but their own pleasure. Why,’ he went on warming to his theme, ‘this morning I
bought a few sweets with jus’ a bit of money I happened to have, an’ he took them from me and threw them into the fire. Jus’ threw them into the fire.’

The lady made the sympathetic clicking sound with her tongue.

‘Dear! Dear! Dear!’ she said again. ‘How very unkind!’

William somewhat reluctantly refused the last piece of cake. He had, as a matter of fact, done full justice to the excellent meal provided by the village inn. It had given him a feeling of
gentle, contented melancholy. He was basking in the thought of his unhappy home life.

‘I’m sorry to keep reminding you of it,’ said the lady, ‘but I feel I really want to get to the bottom of it. There’s generally only one explanation of an unhappy
home. I’ve investigated so many cases. Does your father drink?’

William nodded sadly.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s it.’

‘Oh,’ breathed the lady, ‘your
poor
mother!’

But William wanted no division of sympathy

‘Mother drinks, too,’ he said.

‘You
poor,
poor child!’ said the lady

William wondered whether to make Robert and Ethel drink too, then decided not to. As an artist he knew the value of restraint.

‘Never mind,’ said the lady, ‘you shall have
one
happy afternoon, at any rate.’

She took him to the village shop and bought him chocolates, and sweets, and bananas, and a top. William found some difficulty in retaining an expression suggestive of an unhappy home life, but
he managed it fairly successfully.

He began to feel very sleepy on the way home. He had had a lovely time. His pockets were full of sweets and chocolates, and he held his top in his hand. He even felt that he could forgive his
family. He’d heap coals of fire on Robert’s head by giving him a chocolate . . . He was almost asleep when the charabanc drew up at the post office. Everyone began to descend. He took a
polite and distant farewell of the elderly lady and set off for his home. But he found that the elderly lady was coming with him.

‘Where do you live?’ she said.

‘Oh,’ said William vaguely ‘jus’ somewhere along here.’

‘I’m coming to see your father,’ said the lady in a determined voice.

William was aghast.

‘Oh – er – I wun’t do that if I was you!’ he said.

‘I often find,’ she said, ‘that a drunkard does not realise what unhappiness he makes in his home. I often find that a few words of warning are taken to heart—’

‘You’d better
not
,’ said William desperately. ‘He dun’t mind
wot
he does! He’d throw knives at you or shoot you or cut your head off soon as
not. He’ll be jus’ mad drunk when we get in. He went off to the public house jus’ after breakfast. You’d better not come
near
our house . . . All I say
is
, you
might jus’ as well be
dead
as coming to our house.’

‘But what about you?’

‘Oh, I’m used to it,’ said William valiantly. ‘I don’t mind. Please, you’d better not come,’ he urged. ‘I’m thinkin’ of
you
—’

‘I shan’t feel that I’ve done my duty till I’ve at any rate tried to make him see his sin.’

They were in the street now in which William’s family were living. William looked pale and desperate. Matters seemed to have gone beyond his control. Suddenly he had an idea. He would lead
her past the house and on and on till one or other of them dropped from fatigue. She’d have to go home some time. She couldn’t go on all night. He could say he’d forgotten where
he lived. He began to dislike her intensely. Fussy ole thing! Believing everything everyone said to her! Interfering with other people’s drunken fathers! He was creeping cautiously and
silently past his house by the side of his unsuspecting companion, when a shrill cry reached him.