THE BANK LOOKED quiet. The doors, which opened cornerwise on to the street, were open to let in the early September sunshine, and the shafts of light streamed across the brown floor to the deeper brown of the long, heavy counter. There was the rustle of notes as the cashier counted them out for the solitary customer, stopping at every fifth one to select another pile. He, and all the five men behind the counter, wore dark suits and white shirts and all their heads looked as though they had been brushed by their mothers. That was the front line. Behind them were three other men and a girl, all equally immaculate in a dull, unnoticeable way. Except for Jos.
Jos sat at the end of the rear brigade at a small table. It was his job to check the bank statements being sent out, and enclose them with all the current cheques cashed. He put the whole lot into a large envelope, addressed it, and passed it on for posting. Sometimes he was called upon to stand in for one of the front line men, which he resented. Sitting at his little table he acquired such a deep feeling of sloth that the physical task of getting from one place to another exhausted him. He sat there, trance-like, day after day, looking through the doors and breaking the stillness with the clatter of his pen inside the pot.
There were tea breaks. Then he would go into the room at the back among all the unsubdued typists and drink his tea. He nearly always went back before he had to, into the calm of the ‘shop front’. At lunchtime, he went to a pub and had a glass of bitter and a nosh of shepherd’s pie, or two sausages and half a tomato. Afterwards, he went for a walk in a small nearby park, or if it was wet he went round the basement of Gamages looking at things. No one ever went with him. He realized it was his own fault that he’d made no friend at the bank, but that was the way he’d wanted it. All the men of his age were married and had children and lived at Pinner or Beckenham. He told himself he had nothing in common with them, except everything.
Just when he would leave he didn’t exactly know, but meanwhile he struggled to keep his individuality. He wore pale blue button-down shirts and high-necked jackets and straight, narrow ties. His hair was shining and sleek, but he had adopted a Beatles’ style which made everyone look twice to see if it was dirty. His trousers were very narrow and his shoes elegant. He was very well dressed, if with little variety because he hadn’t much money. With the band, he hadn’t been nearly so particular about his clothes, although he was on view much more then.
Sometimes he thought that after all it would be foolish to simply get up and go, which was what he had kept at the back of his mind from the day he started. He liked the quiet and the calm – he must do, or he wouldn’t resent any intrusion so much. What better than gently drifting life away in such a civilized manner? He had no ambitions, he was untroubled by materialistic greed. The reason, he concluded after many quiet afternoons listening to the flies buzz through the door, was that he was a hedonist. The bank wasn’t positive, active pleasure. It was enjoyable calm, as different from pleasure as contentment from ecstasy. Nothing there made him excited or worried, he didn’t look forward to going there, one day was uneventfully like the last. There were no kicks.
None of this would have mattered if life outside the bank had been different. Most people were bored by their jobs, he realized that, but they made up for it outside. Life began at 5.30 p.m. Jos was beginning to feel that for him it ended. At 5.30 p.m. he went home to George and the baby, finally named Sara. There, the bank calm was missing but the monotony redoubled. They never went out, because George didn’t approve of baby sitters. They didn’t watch tele because they couldn’t afford it. They didn’t have friends in because they hadn’t any. They didn’t make love very often, because George was tired. Altogether, it was deadly.
For one short week, it had been idyllic. Thinking this, Jos told himself he lied in his teeth. It had never been idyllic. The removal of Meredith, for which he had schemed and longed, was simply followed by a short period of relief and reaction. He had George all to himself and that was supposed to be what mattered. Only, of course, he didn’t have her to himself any more than he had done with Meredith around. There was Sara to contend with, forever needing to be fed and changed and rocked to sleep. She seemed to know when he came home and howled in greeting as he entered the front, downstairs door.
Yet it wasn’t all Sara’s fault. George was too ready and willing to slave over her. Sometimes she would actually go to see if she needed changing when the baby was blissfully asleep, or go on trying to force milk down her throat long after it was apparent that she’d had enough. At night George lay awake listening for her cry, and when she allowed him to make love she was abstracted and tense. Once, she had made him break off in the middle so that she could go to Sara.
They hadn’t exactly stopped talking. After supper, and if Sara had gone off to sleep and George had stopped clearing up the baby debris that seemed to accumulate each day, they still sat on the sofa each night and talked. George talked. She asked him where Sara was going to go to school. He said whatever school happened to be at the end of the street they were living in when she was five. George said he couldn’t mean a State school and he said none other and then they argued until George cried because she said he didn’t care what happened to his daughter. Alternatively, she asked him when he thought Sara should be punished and how, and when he said he’d know when the occasion arose, she wanted him to tell her how she would know. She worried about Sara’s height and looks, whether she would be tall and ugly like her. Jos said he didn’t see why Sara should bear any resemblance to her, as she wasn’t her mother, apart from the fact that she wasn’t tall and ugly anyway. George cried for a solid hour.
There was one other topic of conversation apart from Sara: George’s sterility. She hadn’t become pregnant. Jos replied, rather bitterly, that he wasn’t surprised as surely she’d noticed she’d been slightly nun-like recently. George said that didn’t explain it, they’d made love enough times for her to have been pregnant if she was normal. She wanted to know what she should do about it, whether she, or both of them, should go to see a doctor, or go to a clinic, or what they should do. Jos said, emphatically, that considering their relationship was exactly three months old any doctor would think them crackers. George lapsed into a frustrated silence, leaving Jos to shudder with horror at the thought of another baby.
Actually, they had one faithful visitor in Peg, whom Jos could well have done without. She came up about eight in the evening, every Tuesday and Thursday when she didn’t have any classes. Usually, she brought her rug-making tools and sat pulling pieces of rag about in a slow, obsessed way. Her greeting every night was, ‘I just thought I’d come and pay my respects to the baby.’ George would usher her in and they both bent over the cot for a minute’s silence. Should Sara be crying, Peg didn’t offer to hold her, but sat and shook her head and said, ‘There’s a child that needs loving.’
On those evenings, Jos was driven to near suicide. Peg was the audience, the stooge, that George needed. She was willing to debate endlessly not only education and punishment as related to Sara, but also whether her complexion was good or bad, whether she was constipated, whether she should be put on to mixed feeding then, or later, or never. George had the edge in these interchanges because she had possession of Sara, but Peg’s comments as an outsider had all the weight of an impartial observer and they drove George frantic. Peg had only to say that her cousin’s baby was Sara’s age but twice her weight for George to be convinced Sara was desperately ill. She would ask Peg if she thought Sara was being fed properly and go into exact details of what she was given. Peg would consider, purse her lips, and say it wasn’t for her to say. George would beg her to say, but Peg knew her advantage and held silently on to it. Pronouncement might prove her wrong, discretion never could.
Jos felt all this couldn’t go on, but he knew it would. Like the bank, inevitably and imperceptibly, his home life would take on an immovable pattern. Come home, take his coat off, eat, help to wash up, help to put Sara to sleep, read the paper, fall into a doze listening to George, go to bed. There wasn’t even an open door to gaze at and imagine himself walking through. At the bank, no one would much care or be affected by his disappearance, but at home the implications of desertion were terrible.
At least, that was what he thought before he tried to make George see what she was doing to him.
‘Let’s go out,’ he said one evening.
‘Don’t be silly,’ said George, ‘you know perfectly well we can’t leave Sara.’
‘Peg could baby sit,’ he said.
‘I don’t want her to,’ said George.
‘In fact you’d rather stay here with Sara, who’s asleep, than go out with me,’ he said.
‘Yes. I don’t know why you want to go out.’
‘Because I’m bored,’ he said.
‘You want to grow up,’ George said.
‘In this atmosphere,’ he said, ‘my growth is stunted.’
‘Go by yourself,’ George said, ‘I don’t mind.’
‘Fine,’ he said, and went.
It wasn’t that he had scruples of conscience. George had said she was perfectly happy staying in, it wasn’t as though she was being a martyr. He knew she really did prefer to stay in, that was what angered him. She didn’t need his companionship, she didn’t want to talk to him or do anything with him more than she wanted to be with Sara. There was no closeness, no unity at all. It was as if she had put the clock back a hundred years, when a man would rightly expect his wife to stay at home, obsessed by her children and household cares, while he pursued his own pastimes. He might as well be ‘Mr Jones’ to her. He didn’t want to develop his own amusements in which she had no part. He hated to think of the pubs he could go to and form a drinking circle of acquaintances, or the band he could join again and play for in the evenings. He wanted George, and if he couldn’t have her all the time, he didn’t want her as a drudge and housewife and mother.
She wasn’t his wife anyway. Since Meredith had walked out, they hadn’t seen her, though she had sent them an address and asked them to forward all her belongings without mentioning the means of transport or who was going to pay for it. Jos had refused to send anything unless she sent the money. Instead, a man had turned up in a mini van one evening saying Meredith had asked him to collect all her things. They were only too pleased to get rid of them. It meant, however, that contact wasn’t renewed so the question of the divorce hung fire, and until he was divorced he couldn’t marry George.
The angle that worried her was Sara’s opinion, and what people might think later if they knew her father lived with a woman who wasn’t his wife or her mother.
‘It will be years before that becomes a problem,’ Jos said.
‘I don’t know,’ George said, ‘it might take years to get divorced.’
‘Not with Meredith’s co-operation,’ Jos said.
‘Then get it,’ said George.
‘Why?’
George didn’t pretend to misunderstand. ‘Don’t you want to marry me?’
‘Not particularly,’ Jos said abruptly.
‘You’ve changed,’ George said.
‘You mean you have.’
She didn’t deny it. She picked up Sara defensively, as though that were explanation enough.
‘I don’t like marriage,’ Jos said, ‘not marriage with children.’
‘Child,’ George said.
‘Child, then. You don’t love me, except as Sara’s father. You couldn’t be less interested in me.’
‘I know,’ said George. ‘I can’t help it.’
If he left her, he would be the only one hurt. He thought wildly of dumping Sara in a river, to see if that would bring George back, but it wasn’t likely to. She would just carry on as usual, only thinking instead about her own child she so desperately wanted. And yet he was reluctant to go. She had no money, since she’d given up her classes when Sara arrived. He supposed her family would keep her, but there was a chance they might not. No one would marry her, and Sara would go away when she grew up. Furthermore, George would have no legal right to the baby, and that would haunt her.
He remembered how he had married Meredith out of a sense of duty, and where that had landed him. He could stay with George with better justification, because he loved her, but for his own future it would be as catastrophic as marrying Meredith, if he wanted a future.
Almost as a test, he left the bank. It wasn’t even the lure of the sun shafts coming through the door that drew him out, because it was raining and the doors were tight closed. He could hear the rain beating on the glass panels as he sat at his desk and felt his pay packet still square and firm, in his pocket. Winter’s coming, poor Jos is a’ cold, he chanted, and leaving his desk got up, passed through the front line and tugging the doors open walked through them without so much, sir, as a by-your-leave.
It seemed very important to get home as quickly as possible, as though coming on George unexpectedly would give him some miraculous power over her. He ran for a bus, leapt on it, and sat in the nearest seat to the door to get off all the quicker when it got to his stop. He was off, straight into a puddle, before the bus had really slowed down, and as he ran down the road into the square his wet shoe and sock squelched and clung unpleasantly to his foot. By the time he reached the outside door of the house, he was soaked. He hammered frantically with the knocker and only when no one answered, stopped to search for his key. He’d forgotten it. There was no one in the building. Furious, he huddled into the door under the mere six inches of overhanging porch.
The whole square was empty and desolate, the trees in the middle thin, mean streaks stripped of their leaves which lay in drenched but bright piles all round them. He left the inadequate shelter of the doorway and suddenly not caring about the rain he walked slowly over to the trees. The gate to the garden was closed, as usual. He vaulted over it and on to the small triangle of glowing grass. He bent down and picked up three of the biggest and most vivid leaves, orange, orangey yellow, and red, and stuck them in his lapel where they flattened themselves out against the wet tweed. Then he leant against the railings and waited for George, with his back to the trees he had wanted to reach and touch.
She looked about forty. She looked like a suburban housewife loaded down with pounds of stewing steak and the washing for the launderette. It was her huddled, drooping walk, hands clutching the handle of the pram firmly, more than the old leather coat strapped tightly round her waist. She had wellingtons on, short ones, and breasted every puddle dauntlessly. On top of the pram was a bag covered with a plastic mack. The pram cover was securely hooked on to the hood, but even then she seemed worried that Sara would get wet and kept peering anxiously at her, pushing the pram with one hand and walking along beside it so as not to lose time.
She didn’t see him even though she passed quite close. Her head-square, pulled unbecomingly low on her forehead, acted as blinkers do to a horse.
‘Whoa there,’ he said, as she came level with him.
She stopped and looked back, pushing a long strand of wet hair back under cover.
‘I’m soaked,’ she said.
‘So am I,’ he said.
She began to move on. He stayed where he was, just to disconcert her, and watched her dash across the road, the pram sticking momentarily on the kerb, and up to the door. She fumbled for the key, opened the door, and lugged the pram through it. For a few minutes, she disappeared, then he saw her at the window beckoning impatiently. He waved cheerfully, and pulling the leaves out of his lapel brandished them above his head. Taking his time, he climbed back over the railings and dawdled into the house. As he climbed the stairs, he took off his streaming jacket, and trailed it behind him, hearing with satisfaction the wet sploshes as it bumped on each stair.
The flat was full of steam, rising in clouds from a clothes horse draped with nappies in front of the electric fire. All the windows were misted over. He went towards them, and rubbed a hole clear in the corner pane so that he could look out on to the square.
‘You’d better get out of those wet clothes,’ George said.
Jos started taking them off, flinging them into the corner one by one. When he was naked, he went across to the fire and took the clothes horse away so that he could get warm. He stood with his hands behind his back and beamed at her.
‘I suppose you’ve left the bank,’ she said.
‘Correct,’ he said.
‘I’m not surprised,’ she said dully.
‘Oh go on, be surprised,’ he begged. ‘I’d like to surprise you.’
‘Did you get your pay before you left?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Thank God for that,’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t have been a bit surprised if you’d been too high and mighty to think about that.’
‘So you are surprised,’ he said. ‘Hurrah.’
‘Oh shut up,’ she said. ‘I suppose you think you’ve done your bit actually working for ten whole months at a steady job.’
‘Well, I do rather,’ he said.
‘And now you’re just going to sit around and wait for money to arrive from heaven.’
‘I haven’t actually thought what I’m going to do,’ he said.
‘It amazes me.’ George stopped, her voice was shaking. ‘It amazes me how a man with your responsibilities can behave the way you do.’
‘You’re a shrew,’ Jos said. ‘I would never have thought it possible, but you’ve turned into a first class shrew and it doesn’t become you.’
‘Should I be pleased you’ve given up your job?’ she said bitterly.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘you once told me money didn’t matter and said you didn’t see why I should have to work in a bank just for the sake of getting it. You said I should stick to music at all costs.’
‘Things have changed,’ she said, ‘the circumstances were quite different then.’
‘Apparently,’ he said.
George abruptly grabbed the clothes horse. ‘I’d like to put these back,’ she said, ‘if you’ve finished.’
‘I’m entitled to warm my arse as long as I like,’ said Jos, smiling benignly. ‘You may put them to one side.’
She snatched a wet nappy and hit him with it. The sharp, knife-like edge left a long red mark across his chest. He picked up the clothes horse and held it in front of himself like a shield, shouting encouragement to her until she had torn all the nappies off and he was left with the empty framework. He was just beginning to relish the approaching unarmed combat, when she suddenly sat down and started to cry.
‘Oh Christ,’ he said, in disgust.
She went on howling. Quietly, he set the horse up and arranged the nappies neatly on it in front of the fire, then, whistling, he went into the bathroom and ran a hot bath.
George was still bawling as he stepped into it and lay back, balancing his toes in between the taps. He had to listen carefully to hear her above the noise of the hot water tank gurgling and choking above him. When that noise stopped, he heard the sniffs that meant she had nearly finished. Contentedly, he smiled, and told himself he shouldn’t hold it against her that she cried so much, so often, and for so little. It was a reflex reaction. Some people bit their nails, or smoked, she cried. Her cries had grades too, according to the amount and quality of emotion involved.
After his bath, he dressed in his most casual clothes and settled down to read the paper. He didn’t speak, but kept smiling at George so that she would have no cause to think there was any row as far as he was concerned. Sara seemed very quiet. The only one making any noise was George as she stalked backwards and forwards doing her housework. When she’d brushed and patted everything in sight, she went into the kitchen and closed the door. Jos reached for the telephone and the directory and hoped she wouldn’t hear.
The rain stopped at twelve o’clock and a thin sun came straggling through the still threatening clouds. George made them both an omelette, which Jos ate with relish, humming in between forkfuls.
‘I’m going to take Sara for a walk,’ he said.
‘Where? You don’t usually take her out,’ said George suspiciously.
‘No, I don’t, do I?’ said Jos politely, ‘but then I don’t usually have all day to myself.’
He waited, but George could hardly object.
‘Are you coming?’ he said, when he was ready.
‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ll take the opportunity to really clean the bedroom out.’
‘What a marvellous idea,’ Jos said. ‘You do that.’
She came with him as far as the outside door, still fussing over the pram.
‘Don’t put the hood down,’ she said, ‘there’s a cold wind.’
‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ Jos said.
‘You won’t leave her outside a shop or anything, will you?’ George said.
‘Her highness will be attended every waking or sleeping moment,’ Jos promised.
‘How long will you be?’
‘Not long. You get cracking on that bedroom.’
He was aware that she was watching as he wheeled the chariot slowly along the square with the utmost decorum.
In half an hour, he was back. The rain was still holding off and more blue sky appeared every second from nowhere. He felt like going on the river.
George wheeled round from the drawer she was tidying as he came into the flat.
‘You’ve hardly been out,’ she said accusingly. ‘What’s the matter? There’s nothing wrong with Sara is there?’
‘Nothing,’ said Jos. ‘Sara is blooming. I left her in hands even more experienced and loving than yours.’
‘You left her – whatever do you mean?’ said George, feeling suddenly sick and faint.
‘I took her to a nursery and said could they look after her for a few hours because my wife was very ill and I had to take her to hospital.’
‘You liar!’
‘I know,’ said Jos smiling. ‘I probably needn’t have said that but I thought it might make things easier.’
‘I’m not ill. I don’t want to be rid of her – if I’d known you were just dumping her somewhere instead of pretending you wanted to take her for a walk, I’d never have let her out of the flat.’
‘Well, she’s there now,’ said Jos, ‘so you might as well make the most of it. I thought we’d go on the river – sail to Greenwich or somewhere. What do you think?’
‘I think you’re the most selfish, unfeeling bastard that ever walked this earth,’ said George.
Jos let the pose of the last few hours slip off his shoulders. He stopped smiling and concentrating on being jaunty, and let her see how tired and defeated he was, before he could trust himself to speak.
‘It’s only one afternoon George,’ he pleaded. ‘I’m miserable and upset. You don’t seem to love me, I can’t stand my job any more. I need just one afternoon alone with you.’ She shrugged and turned away. ‘Please,’ he said, ‘even if you think I’m being melodramatic. I don’t have to go down on my knees and beg you, do I?’
‘No,’ said George, ‘you don’t. I’ll come, just to show you that it won’t do any good. I won’t enjoy it one bit either.’
He was about to make a sarcastic rejoinder, or tell her in that case she could go to hell and he’d spend the afternoon packing instead. But he swallowed his anger, and told himself it was all this he had to overcome in one short afternoon.
They took a bus down to the Embankment and walked along to Westminster Bridge. There was a boat sailing to Greenwich in fifteen minutes, for which Jos bought two return tickets. He felt nervous and didn’t know what to suggest to put in the time, but luckily the boat was already tied up there and they clambered on board and took seats in the front part. George was sullen and sat huddled into her coat as though the day was much colder than it really was.
By the time the boat left, it was nearly full. Comfortably so, no one was squashed and there was plenty of room to put raincoats and bags and feet. Jos wondered where everyone had come from because none of them looked like tourists. There was not a camera in sight, nor a map. They must all have their own private, desperate reasons for sailing to Greenwich on a doubtful, late September Wednesday afternoon. Seized with a sense of excitement, he twisted in his seat to look back at Big Ben as the boat swung round into the river and the engines chugged noisily into action. By the time he saw Big Ben again, in two hours’ time, he promised himself that all would be decided, and almost said it aloud to George, as though it was only fair to warn her that her fate hung in the balance. Solemnly, he turned in his seat and settled down instead, to wait.
There was a guide of sorts on the boat, with a good line in quick and quite witty patter which Jos enjoyed very much. He swung his eyes dutifully from one side of the river to the other as the various landmarks were pointed out, and laughed heartily at all the inevitable quips. George visibly winced, and stared straight ahead, ignoring both Jos and the guide. She wished it would rain, but the sun grew stronger and so did the wind and really by the time they were level with the Tower it was a beautiful afternoon.
‘You’ve got to have a heartache when you fa-all in luv,’ sang Jos, and continued the rest of the song in a strong hum.
‘You don’t sound as though you’ve got much heartache,’ said George sourly.
‘Oh but I have,’ said Jos. ‘It really hurts.’
‘Don’t be facetious,’ snapped George.
‘I mean it. Why else should I take such bold and desperate steps to win you all over again?’
‘You just wanted an afternoon out,’ said George.
‘I could have gone on my own.’
‘You don’t like being on your own.’
‘I’ve been getting used to it recently,’ said Jos. She didn’t reply. ‘Admit you’re enjoying yourself,’ he said.
‘I couldn’t,’ said George, ‘because I’m not. I’m more miserable than you.’
‘Why?’ said Jos. ‘You’ve got a man who loves you and a baby you adore. You once said that was all you wanted, especially the first bit.’
‘I don’t think I love you any more,’ said George quietly. ‘I want to, but nothing happens.’
Jos cleared his throat. ‘You’ve been cooped up too much with Sara,’ he said.
‘I want to be,’ said George.
‘Do you want me to leave you then?’ said Jos.
‘I don’t know. How would we live?’
He tried to keep his voice steady and practical. ‘You could put Sara in a nursery and go on with your dancing classes. Or your mother might look after her.’
‘She needs a father,’ said George.
He couldn’t say any more. All anyone wanted to use him for was a father. He vowed that as long as he lived he would take good care never to sire another child for bloodthirsty women to devour. Meredith had had the right idea when she had Sara adopted – there were people who loved children and people who didn’t and he and she belonged to the latter category. There was no such thing as a natural instinct. He thought he wouldn’t mind being dead. He wouldn’t commit suicide or anything, but if it just so happened that he was killed he wouldn’t mind. Not that he didn’t like being alive, but there were pros and cons for both states. Anyway, he didn’t have to wait to see Big Ben again to know that his way was clear. He was finished with duty and responsibility, he’d just go quietly off that evening.
It seemed silly to be stuck in the middle of the river with her after deciding that. He got up and walked round the boat to the other end and stood leaning against the rail. When they got to Greenwich, he’d give her a return ticket and the address of the nursery where he’d left Sara, and then he’d go back to the flat by tube or bus and collect his things.
He walked round to her end again as the boat drew up alongside the quay, and followed her off.
‘Your return ticket,’ he said, holding it out.
‘Why, aren’t you going back with me?’ she said.
‘There doesn’t seem much point, does there?’ he said. ‘I mean, you’ve proved your case.’
‘Right,’ she said, ‘thanks. Will I see you back at the flat?’
‘Probably,’ he said.
He turned and went off, and out through the landing stage gates, and then right along the river walk. When he came to a seat, he sat down, and watched the boat he’d just come on loading up to go back. George had got straight back on it, and sat in the same seat. She looked the picture of misery and all the old pity, which was once the only emotion he’d felt for her, came back. She was such a stupid, silly bitch. Once she’d been Meredith’s catspaw, making herself ill with jealousy and the conviction that she was ugly and useless and doomed to a dreary life, and now she was Sara’s. It was as though she had a talent for martyrdom. All her troubles this time were entirely of her own making. He got worked up thinking about it, and wanted to stretch his arms out over the path and docks that separated them and shake her hard.
He jumped on to the boat just as it was moving off. The captain spent five minutes telling him what a bloody fool he was, and he agreed unreservedly.
‘Hello,’ he said to George, ‘you’re very like a girl I used to know. In fact, I once took her for a sail on this boat, only it was the other way – Westminster to Greenwich.’
‘Why did you get back on?’ George said.
‘She was quite an attractive girl really,’ Jos said, ‘except that she would go around looking suicidal all the time and towards the end of me knowing her she never bothered to comb her hair or anything. She was very sweet and kind and loving too, do anything for anybody, but she had one big fault.’
‘You should have stayed in Greenwich,’ George said.
‘She kept imagining that she had to do things when really she didn’t have to do them at all,’ said Jos. ‘She made herself unhappy when she had everything she could possibly want. She worried herself sick about nothing and forgot that life was quite simple. The basic trouble was an over-active conscience and an inability to take life as it came.’
George got up and moved. He followed her. ‘That was a good idea,’ he said, ‘there’s a much better view from this side.’
‘Go away,’ she said, ‘or I’ll cry.’
‘Really?’ Jos said. ‘I’ve never seen you cry. How very peculiar. You mean salt tears will actually run down your cheeks? Now the cause of crying is an excess of something to somewhere, I’ve forgotten the technicalities. My God, yes, how extraordinary,’ he said, putting up a finger, and wiping one tear gently down her cheek, ‘tears. Have you thought about patenting them? Shall I cry? I’m trying, but it’s very difficult. I don’t think I’ve cried since I fell off the seat of my bike on to the crossbar when I was eight. Can’t you teach me? I mean, it must be so very useful being able to cry.’ George stopped crying and closed her eyes. ‘You’ve stopped,’ he said, ‘was it wearing you out too much? What have you got your eyes closed for? Is the pain too great to bear? Heh, fat face, I’m talking to you.’ She moved away again, and he followed. ‘That’s dangerous,’ he said, ‘you don’t want to be waltzing round ships with your eyes closed. Oh, I see, you’re maintaining a dignified silence. There’s nothing like a bit of dignity for putting a chap in his place. It’s really making me shrivel up inside, I can tell you. I’m going all hot and cold with the unbearable humiliation.’
George opened her eyes and looked round for a ladies, but it was a small boat and there wasn’t one.
‘Do you want to go to the lavatory?’ Jos said. ‘Forgive me for being crude, but I know how it is. I’ve always had a weak bladder. I think it was something to do with my early training. Do you know that my mother used to lift all three of us out of bed twice during the night and make us use the pot even if we didn’t want to? It was so that we wouldn’t wet the sheets. Even now my recurrent nightmare when I’m in a strange house is that I can’t find the lavatory. Shall I go and ask the guide if he has his own private one that you could use? I’ll do that – won’t be a minute.’
‘Jos – don’t dare,’ said George.
‘You’ve spoken. I’ll have to sit down, the relief has made my knees go all funny. I was afraid the suppression of emotion coupled with the suppression of urine would paralyse your vocal chords.’
‘I’m not really laughing,’ George said. The corners of her mouth twitched and her cheeks ached.
‘I’m sure you’re not,’ said Jos. ‘You can trust me. Even in the face of violent contortions and strange noises produced from the throat I won’t think you’re laughing. Other people might, but I won’t. I’m not easily fooled. I can see through what other people think is a laugh just like that.’ He tried to click his fingers. ‘That was meant to be my fingers clicking, only I used my tongue because I can’t click my fingers. I’m a ventriloquist actually, I’ve been taking people in for years. I don’t know why I can’t click them, I’m like Peter Pan, he couldn’t click his you know. It can be very embarrassing.’ She was laughing. He bent forward and kissed her and put his arm round her. ‘For God’s sake make me shut up,’ he said. ‘I’m shattered.’
George smiled at him uncertainly, and put her hand lightly over his mouth.
‘I don’t know what makes me behave so stupidly,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.’
Jos firmly knocked aside her hand. ‘I can stand anything,’ he said, ‘except abject apologies. We’ll both just shut up.’
They sat close together through what remained of the sail. Jos didn’t quite know what he had achieved, if anything, nor where they went from this truce, but he wasn’t going to ask. He’d done too much asking, it only encouraged a whole lot of self-analysis that didn’t do anyone any good. If they enjoyed fifteen minutes on the river and went home together, that was something to be grateful for.
The wind was blowing into their faces. Jos closed his eyes, and held his face up and back to feel the cold gust. It ought to iron out his worries, like a facial. He tried to concentrate on just feeling and not thinking, but it didn’t quite work. His head ached and his eyes felt tight and strained. He shivered.
At half past ten that night, Jos ceremoniously finished packing the large holdall that held all his belongings with ease. There was an old travel tag on it saying ‘Aer Lingus’, commemorating the one and only time he’d been out of the country. It gave him the idea that he might go to Ireland. He put on his raincoat, lifted the bag up and walked into the sitting room where George was absorbed in feeding Sara. She didn’t look up. He pulled out the pay packet which was still in his jacket pocket, and drawing out five pounds, put the other ten on the table.
‘I won’t come back,’ he said, ‘but in case you ever want me, you can get me Poste Restante at the post office in Holborn. I’ll call there once a week and if I ever get a permanent address I’ll let you have it. I’ll send you some money every week so don’t worry too much. Keep Sara’s nose clean and don’t take her dear father’s name in vain.’ He picked up the bag. There was no risk this time of a repeat performance of the afternoon. ‘Good-bye, George.’ He opened the door as Peg lifted her hand to knock on it.
‘I was just going to knock,’ she said, ‘isn’t that funny.’
‘I’m splitting my sides,’ Jos said. ‘Excuse me, I was just leaving.’
‘Is George in?’ said Peg.
‘Naturally,’ Jos said. ‘Where else would she be at the witching hour? She’s all yours, my dear Peg. There you are,’ he gestured through the open door, ‘a most touching scene, mother with child. And now, if you’ll stand aside madam.’
‘Are you going out?’ said Peg, obeying.
‘With your usual brilliance,’ said Jos, ‘you’ve penetrated my feeble attempt to disguise my movements. I am going out, never more to darken this door. George will make your ears tingle telling you all about it.’
‘You’re not going on holiday are you?’ said Peg, looking at the bag.
‘Yes,’ said Jos, feeling his patience coming to an end.
‘At this time of the year?’ said Peg. ‘The clocks will be going back soon.’
‘I’m going with them,’ said Jos, wearily.
‘That doesn’t make sense.’
‘No.’ He stepped past her and went down the stairs, dosing the outside door quietly behind him.
There were a lot of small things to be done. First, he went to Euston Station and left his bag in the left luggage. Then he rang up a friend he hadn’t contacted since he’d married Meredith and asked if he could put him up for a few nights. The friend said no. He went to the nearest Y.M.C.A. and booked in there. By this time it was after eleven, so he went back to the station and had a cup of coffee and a wash and brush-up while he debated whether to spend his five pounds on a ticket somewhere. He decided that would be a waste of five pounds. He’d try to get a job with a band the next day, and if he couldn’t, then he would go home to Derby, and recuperate for a few months. He knew, as he made his mind up, that with that alternative as an incentive, he’d land something the next day. He’d live from hand to mouth until he found a team to shack up with, and he’d be as lonely and miserable as hell in the process. He felt cheerful and cocky for the first time in weeks.
‘Has he left you?’ said Peg, solemnly.
‘Yes,’ said George.
‘Why?’
‘He was fed up.’
‘Huh,’ grunted Peg, ‘he’d reason to be fed up, I don’t think. What did he have to be fed up about?’
‘Quite a lot,’ said George.
‘You were too soft with him,’ said Peg. ‘You let him take advantage of you. He took advantage of Meredith and then of you. He shouldn’t be allowed to get away with it.’
George sat still, tilting the bottle up so that it trickled more easily into Sara’s mouth.
‘Did you quarrel?’ said Peg, greedily.
‘Not exactly,’ said George.
‘I thought I saw you going out this lunch time. You didn’t see me. I was coming out of the library and you passed me. It was about half past one.’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ said George.
‘You didn’t have Sara with you,’ said Peg, ‘you didn’t leave her on her own did you?’
‘Where was she then?’
George sighed. It would be much easier and quicker to satisfy Peg’s horrible curiosity in one rush, but she had neither the energy to do that nor to tell her to mind her own business and throw her out.
‘At the nursery down the road,’ she said.
‘You put her in a nursery?’ said Peg, scandalized.
‘Jos did.’
‘Why?’
‘He wanted to take me out for the afternoon.’
‘Where did you go?’
‘Greenwich. On the river.’
‘Was it nice?’ said Peg. ‘Did you enjoy it? I don’t know how you could, knowing Sara was in a nursery.’
‘Yes, I did,’ said George. ‘We had a good time.’
‘What’s he left you for then?’ said Peg.
‘He was fed up,’ said George.
‘After a nice afternoon out?’ said Peg. George remained stoically silent. ‘How did he come to be off work anyway?’ said Peg. ‘It’s Wednesday.’
‘He left this morning,’ said George.
‘You mean he was sacked?’
‘No, he left. He was fed up.’
‘Well,’ said Peg, ‘that beats the band. What right had he to be fed up with the bank? I’d like to know what the bank thought of him.’
Sara was fed. George held her on her shoulder until she brought her wind up and then went to lay her in the cot. Peg went on sitting there till she came back.
‘What will you do?’ she said.
‘I don’t know,’ said George. ‘Work.’
‘Will you keep Sarah?’
‘Of course.’
‘She’s not yours,’ said Peg.
‘No, I know. But her parents won’t ever want her.’
‘I don’t see why you should keep her,’ said Peg.
‘Don’t you?’ said George, distantly. She wished Peg would go. ‘I’m going to bed now,’ she said.
‘Do you want me to stay with you?’ said Peg, eagerly. ‘I could bring my nightie up in a jiffy.’
‘No thank you,’ said George. ‘Good night.’
She turned and went into the bedroom, leaving the aggrieved Peg to see herself out.