I
When Ralph eventually telephoned, Percy Nicholls was out playing golf. So the next morning Wilson was interviewed by Brooker at the Labour Exchange.
‘Six months?’ Brooker said, and waited.
Wilson stared at a small patch of damp on the wall behind Brooker; a thin, sarcastic smile twitched his lips.
‘Well?’ Brooker was impatient. ‘I’ll have to know something about it.’
‘I thought they sent you particulars of all that stuff.’
‘I’ve told you, I can’t trace that we’ve had anything.’ And he wasn’t going to spend the morning searching, his tone implied; there were decent men waiting for jobs. ‘What were you charged with?’
‘Grievous bodily harm.’
Brooker made a note on a piece of paper. Wilson tried to force himself to speak again; his tongue was heavy, the words were hard to form, but he managed to say:
‘It wasn’t as bad as it sounds. He . . . he smashed up a café, and I knew the old fellow that ran it . . .’ Now the words were beginning to slither out all too eagerly; he wanted to stop himself talking but he couldn’t. There was no control; he either blurted it all out or he buttoned up completely. And he must talk, mustn’t he? Otherwise he would never get back.
‘He was an Italian and he had put all his money into the café; he worked damned hard. The Teds hadn’t got anything against him, they just liked breaking things, and it made me so angry because no one ever did anything about it. And I knew this chap was leader of the mob, so I went along to see him. He just laughed, and I thought he ought to be taught a lesson, so . . .’
‘And you got six months for that?’
‘There wasn’t any proof he’d ever been in the café, so . . .’
‘I see.’ Brooker had heard that kind of tale before.
‘The police were very decent about it.’ That made Brooker smile. The sweat broke out on Wilson’s forehead; it made him sick to hear himself, but he went on: ‘They thought I was unfortunate because the magistrate . . .’
‘All right, all right,’ Brooker sighed. ‘You’re a good friend of the police. I’ll take your word for it.’
He studied the piece of paper in front of him. Wilson felt the sweat breaking out all over his body, he was beginning to tremble; he clenched his hands and tried to stop the trembling. Brooker looked at him for a moment as though trying to think what should be done with him. The warders had looked at him like that when they finally got tired of him playing up. He had sweated and shaken then and they had waited a long time watching him; those moments of bodily depravity had hurt him more than the mild roughing-up they had finally given him to teach him to play things their way. All his self-respect had seemed to sweat out of him. If he had been more sure of his legs now, he would have stumbled to the door and run out into the road. Eventually, Brooker said:
‘What can you do?’
‘Anything. I’ll do anything.’
‘What was your previous job?’
‘I was in the navy. When I came out my father paid for me to do a course at the London School of Journalism.’ How difficult it was to regulate conversation! Now he was telling this man his life story. He put a brake on his tongue and said: ‘I could do most kinds of clerical work.’
‘It won’t be easy to get you clerical work.’
Brooker wasn’t even going to try; but there was a fascination about the interview. It gave him a sense of power, in a righteous way. They let these youngsters off too lightly nowadays. Let him sweat a little. In a week or so he would be beating someone else up.
‘What else can you do?’
‘Anything.’ There was a flicker of something nasty that had not been stamped out in the young man’s eyes, and his tone became aggressive. ‘I’ve told you. I’ll do anything. I’ll sweep the roads if that’s all I can get.’
He spoke well, Brooker noted. He had had a bad fright, but before that he had not been accustomed to begging much from other people. A public school? Perhaps not, but a good school. Not senior elementary and then thrust out into the world at thirteen to fend for himself as Brooker had been. There hadn’t been any welfare officers hanging around to help him. He picked up his pencil again.
‘Any technical skills?’
‘Not exactly . . .’
‘Ever driven a lorry?’
‘No, but I can drive . . .’
‘Know anything about costing?’
‘No.’
‘You haven’t much to offer, have you?’
Wilson’s mouth tightened. There was a look in his eyes which the warders had come to know well. He would not co-operate any more, Brooker sighed and eased himself out of his chair; he looked at his watch and sighed again.
‘Wait here.’
Wilson sat crouching forward; when the man had gone he moved his hand uneasily across the pit of his stomach. Once in prison when he had had diarrhoea the warder had refused to let him go to the lavatory: the memory seemed to loosen his bowels. Suppose he should lose control of himself now, in front of this dreadful man? He doubled up, digging his elbows into his sides. After a minute or two he heard footsteps approaching. He managed to force himself to sit upright, but he must have looked bad because Brooker glanced at him sharply and said:
‘Like a glass of water?’
The olive branch was thrust aside, a hint of the tiger again.
‘I just want a job.’
Brooker shrugged his shoulders and handed across a piece of paper with the name Joshua Kleine written on it and an address.
‘Go along to Mr. Kleine this morning. He may be able to fix you up.’
Wilson took the paper and went to the door. In too much of a hurry even to say thank you, Brooker thought bitterly; but then discharged prisoners were a privileged class.
Wilson was walking very fast when Myra Kimberley met him in the Uxbridge Road some twenty minutes later, but he was not going in the direction of Joshua Kleine’s timber yard. Myra was standing outside the butcher’s shop, her slim figure enveloped in a rather worn beaver lamb, her pointed nose peeping out inquisitively above a thick woollen scarf. She put out a hand and touched his arm.
‘Now where can you be off to in such a hurry? You look as though you were heading for John o’ Groats.’
She was in a good mood, having just emerged victorious from a battle with the butcher, and her tone was gay. Wilson did not respond.
‘The Labour Exchange was a waste of time. It always is a waste of time for discharged prisoners, you know.’
He sounded surly. Myra, however, did not object to rudeness; it was indifference that she could not tolerate. So she kept her good- humour and said:
‘No, I didn’t know. Come and tell me about it. We’ll have coffee together.’
She tucked her arm through his and was surprised to feel his muscles become tense. He is as prickly as a porcupine, she thought. Aloud, she said:
‘You must try to put all this behind you.’
He muttered ‘Jesus!’ under his breath.
‘What a bloody silly thing to say!’ she acknowledged.
He looked shocked, which rather pleased Myra. Lately she had begun to do and say shocking things, but her husband had not reacted. Sometimes she was rather frightened by her inability to make an impact: it was as though she had ceased to exist.
‘You haven’t been in the Labour Exchange all this time,’ she said as they edged their way through a crowd outside the Home and Colonial Stores.
‘I wandered round a bit. But it’s not much fun. Once you have a record you have to walk fast; if you stop to tie a shoelace the cops pick you up for loitering with intent.’
She darted a shrewd look at him. Misfortune does not necessarily equate with innocence and she wondered how much he was to be trusted. For a moment she felt uneasy: the uneasiness added spice to the encounter. They turned into a side road and walked towards a small café just behind a baker’s shop.
‘The coffee is very good here,’ she said encouragingly as his feet began to drag.
The café was half-full; the customers included several young women with children, two old women sitting alone, three young girls; there were no men. Myra led Wilson to a tab e in a corner by the window. He sat down before she was seated and glanced at her quickly, like a child who has deliberately done something naughty. Life during the last six months had made it necessary to demonstrate his independence in childish ways. Myra unwound her scarf and eased her coat off her shoulders. She did this slowly, partly because her hands were cold and partly because it always gave her a luxurious feeling of release to shed heavy clothes. Wilson watched her. She must have been quite a witch in her time, he decided. He turned his head and looked out of the window.
The waitress came and Myra ordered coffee and rolls and butter. She felt quite exhilarated by this break in her dull morning routine. Her companion was not exhilarated. She studied his averted face in amusement. A serious, intense young man who had probably thought rather well of himself until he stepped across that intangible line that divides the lawful from the unlawful. There was some pride still in the eyes, not much humour about the mouth, and a good deal of obstinacy in the line of the jaw. He would have been a difficult prisoner to handle. She did not dislike him for that. In the circumstances she would have been difficult herself; she was not naturally a law-abiding person.
‘Did they beat you up in prison?’ she asked.
‘I think they would say that they had to discipline me.’
He had become wary; it was almost as though he felt a certain solidarity with his tormentors. How strange he is! she thought.
‘Didn’t you complain?’
‘When I was charged with violence?’
‘That’s not the point. We’re supposed to be too civilized to punish prisoners now. We rehabilitate them.’
She was not in the least interested in penal reform and the worn phrases sounded unconvincing on her lips. He looked out of the window, studying some women who were making a hard bargain, with the owner of a fruit stall.
The door of the cafe opened and Mrs. Thomas came in. Damn the woman! Myra thought, and assumed her most aloof expression. In spite of this, or perhaps because of it, Mrs. Thomas strode across to her. Wilson made reluctant motions of rising and Mrs. Thomas pushed him back in his seat.
‘It’s no use trying to propitiate me, young man!’ She laughed at his dismayed expression, and explained to Myra: ‘He walked straight past me just beyond the Labour Exchange and gave me a look that would have shrivelled me up if I had been a more sensitive soul.’
The waitress came with coffee and rolls. Mrs. Thomas looked pointedly at the shopping bag on the third chair. Myra made no movement.
‘Well, I won’t interrupt you.’ Mrs. Thomas, whose weapons were blunt, added: ‘It isn’t every day that middle-aged ladies like us find a young man to take us out to coffee.’
She went to a table towards the back of the café from where she observed the couple without taking trouble to disguise her interest. Wilson was looking out of the window again. Myra, who liked conversation, tried to rouse him.
‘You’re not going to brood over your misfortunes, I hope?’ She poured coffee and passed him a cup. ‘You mustn’t start thinking of yourself as a desperate character. You were very unfortunate. The Prison Welfare Officer told my husband all about it. It might have happened to anyone. . . .’
He watched the women who were still arguing with the owner of the fruit stall. Her voice went on. It was like the blurb of a book, he thought; you read it, and then when you began to read the book you found that the story was about something entirely different. He found her version, as unreal as the version which Brooker had built up for himself. Perhaps, on the whole, he preferred Brooker’s cynicism. He felt very lonely.
‘So if you are sensible,’ Myra concluded, ‘this will be behind you in a year.’
He took a buttered roll.
‘Thank you.’
She smiled, and he saw that she was no more convinced of this than he was himself. The deception lay between them as though they shared a secret. It was rather dark in the café; she seemed to sparkle in the dim light and the small, pointed face looked less worn than when he first met her. He saw her again as a young woman; something of the imp about her, maddening at times, but hard to resist.
‘Tell me about your parents,’ she invited. ‘You were at boarding school, weren’t you? Did your parents live abroad?’
‘My mother died when I was eleven. My father is in the Merchant Navy.’
‘You never thought of making the Merchant Navy a career?’
She could see him as an officer, rather enjoying being in command of other men.
‘I was in the Royal Navy for a few years. But I wanted to be . . . to do something different.’
She waited, but he was making no confidences. He turned his head again.
‘There must be something terribly interesting happening at that fruit stall,’ she teased.
‘I like watching people—at a distance.’
He was trying to withdraw from her because he was disturbed by her probing. She was flattered. How near the surface his nerves were! If she went on pressing him, he might break down. The thought brought with it an unpleasant realization of power. A little shocked, she said more briskly:
‘Did the Labour Exchange find anything for you?’
To her surprise this comparatively innocent enquiry seemed to unnerve him completely.
‘Well, yes, they did as a matter of fact.’ He was quite voluble now. ‘But I don’t think I shall follow it up. I’ll just give myself a bit of time to get settled and then I’ll find a job. It won’t be difficult, and it would be silly to rush into anything.’
Heavens! What do I do now? she asked herself. Ralph would know; he managed this sort of thing so well. But Ralph was not here. She counted out change and snapped her handbag shut.
‘Of course you must follow up this job.’
‘I think that is my affair,’ he said without conviction.
‘And where will you be living while you are waiting around for the right job to drop into your lap?’
In spite of her sharpness, she felt very sorry for him; but she knew that the only way she could help was to goad him on, hoping that he had enough strength to last the distance. She paid the bill, ignored Mrs. Thomas’s energetic salutations, and hustled him out on to the pavement. They walked in silence to Joshua Kleine’s timber yard and she stayed in the road as he walked through the gates, feeling like a warder watching a prisoner on his way to the punishment block. He did not look round. When at last he disappeared into the dilapidated hut in which old Kleine conducted his office affairs, Myra turned and began to walk slowly home.
As Wilson crossed the yard he tried to steady himself with the thought that at least it would be over soon. That part of himself that could stand aside and watch events as though they were happening to another person told him that this was the worst moment, the moment they all ran away from. It wasn’t much help; after all, he was one of them.
The hut was mostly a store area, but at the far end there was a partition with a door in it. The words J. KLEINE were painted on the door. Wilson walked across to the door, knocked and went in. There was an old Jew, fat and coarse-looking, slouched behind a littered table in a room not much bigger than a solitary cell. He looked up as Wilson came in. He had protruding, veined eyes with a mournful expression. He looked familiar, Wilson thought; the kind of character that always cropped up at such a time.
‘I’m Wilson.’
The old Jew nodded. He looked as though he thought that Wilson was familiar, too. It seemed to sadden him.
‘I’ve nothing but rough work to offer you,’ he said in a nasal voice.
‘So I understand.’
The two men looked at one another. The old Jew spread his hands out, palms upwards.
‘That’s all there is to it, son. You’ll find my foreman across the yard.’
He watched, his grizzled head a little on one side, as the young man went to the door.
‘Just a minute, son.’ He waited while Wilson turned round, wary again, hating the form of address. ‘I don’t care what you did or why you did it. But the men won’t be the same. So I shouldn’t start telling them your life story.’
‘That’s the last thing I would do.’
‘And don’t get above yourself, or they’ll give you a rough time.’
‘Any more advice?’
The old Jew looked at him sadly, but he did not say any more.
II
Ralph drove into Acton to visit a patient at the General Hospital after he left the newspaper office. He came back, quite unnecessarily, via Western Avenue where he drove the car very fast for a time. There was a gentle, contented smile on his lips; he might have been composing the most benign of sermons, but in fact he was congratulating himself on having just jumped a red. He never explained his attitude to driving by saying that he was a different man behind the wheel of a car, because he was well aware that the Ralph Kimberley who liked to drive recklessly was the same Ralph Kimberley who would have liked to live, if not recklessly, at least a little more adventurously than his calling permitted. He slowed down, however, before he reached the roundabout at East Acton.
‘You want to go carefully, Vicar,’ Inspector Pym had warned him. ‘You’ve upset a good few people in the Force and from now on you can expect to be pulled in for any offence in the book.’ To be arrested for demonstrating against the bomb would be one thing: it would be quite another matter to be arrested for dangerous driving. Nevertheless, he had enjoyed his ride and as he turned the car into a side-street just beyond the Savoy Cinema he was still smiling to himself.
He intended to leave the car at a garage near by for an overhaul, but he had a call to make first. The road along which he was driving had once been part of a residential area, but now the buses ran along it and the ground floors of the terraced houses had been converted into shops, none of which looked very prosperous. Half-way along the road on the right-hand side there was a sports ground owned by an engineering firm which had a rather desolate appearance because it was never used, the employees preferring other forms of entertainment which the management could not be expected to provide. On the opposite side of the road to the sports ground there was a bookshop, sandwiched between a hairdresser’s and a launderette. The bookshop, in spite of a brave display of new covers in the window, also had the rather desolate appearance of the unwanted.
There was no one serving when Ralph went in, which added to the impression that trade was not flourishing. From somewhere at the back, however, there came the sound of a typewriter. Ralph listened; the keys were being struck hard and regularly, but there was no rhythm. ‘Two fingers,’ he decided. ‘It must be Frank.’ His attention was drawn to a display of periodicals, pamphlets and paper-backs set out on a table just inside the door. The literature was exclusively left-wing and pamphlets concerned with the nuclear disarmament campaign were given prominence. Ralph chuckled. Frank Godfrey, as always, showed his colours uncompromisingly. Not that Ralph entirely agreed with this form of display. In his opinion propaganda should be kept out of print as much as possible: it made very boring reading and probably put off far more people than it ever converted. Also, there was a certain dedicated earnestness about some of the disarmament literature which sometimes made him feel like a well-intentioned amateur. He strolled across to the shelf where the volumes of poetry and literary criticism were usually to be found. There was, as he had hoped, a new one on Yeats. He took it down and began reading at random. After a few minutes, he exploded:
‘What does it matter what he meant by “That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea”!’
The door at the back of the shop opened and a thin, frail man appeared holding a very large stapler.
‘Oh, it’s you.’
He withdrew momentarily and then reappeared with a pair of horn-rimmed glasses replacing the stapler in his hands.
‘It’s one of the most magnificent lines ever written. Why can’t it be left at that?’
Frank Godfrey adjusted his glasses, took the book from Ralph’s hands and skimmed one or two lines. He held the book up rather high to read and tucked his chin in. This gave him the appearance, Ralph thought affectionately, of a very ancient tenor preparing for his entrance in one of the more demanding passages of the ‘Messiah’. But the voice which spoke was dry and decisive.
‘Personally, I do like to know what things mean. Otherwise I’m always afraid that they mean nothing.’
‘What does your son think of it?’ Ralph asked.
Frank’s son was going up to Oxford next year to read English. Frank usually welcomed an opportunity to talk about him, but today the enquiry seemed to displease him.
‘I haven’t asked him.’
He replaced the book on the shelf and gave it a rather disapproving poke on the spine. While he was doing this a young man in slacks and a torn pullover slouched in and enquired about a translation of Rilke. Frank Godfrey gave him all the information that he wanted, but the young man did not place an order.
‘You might pick up a copy at one of the second-hand bookshops if you’re lucky,’ Frank informed him.
When the young man had gone out, having noted the names of one or two likely second-hand bookshops, Ralph said:
‘You need an assistant, Frank.’
‘Oh, this is a bad day,’ Frank answered, imagining that he was being teased. Ralph, however, was quite serious.
‘You wouldn’t care to employ an ex-prisoner to help you out?’
Frank looked up sharply. He saw his friend watching him with the suppressed excitement of a person who has prepared a very special treat and is shortly to see it enjoyed by all concerned.
‘No!’ Frank said. ‘Most definitely not.’
Ralph’s face furrowed in dismay.
‘But I was so sure that you, of all people . . .’
‘I haven’t the time.’ Frank lowered his head and directed a reproving glance over the tops of his glasses. ‘You, of all people, should know that.’
‘But it doesn’t require time. He’d be helping you. I know that the last one went off with your takings, but this lad is different . . .’
‘Not only do I lack time, but I haven’t the emotion to spare.’ Frank regarded his friend even more severely. ‘The youngster who went off with my takings taught me that lesson.’
‘But you don’t need to be emotional about it.’
‘I said “emotion” not “emotional”.’
The correction was made gently enough, but there was a hint of genuine displeasure in the tone which Ralph chose to ignore.
‘I can’t see that emotion need come into it.’
‘It comes into it because an ex-prisoner is a tremendous responsibility, the most difficult, complex, unrewarding creature on this earth! Before becoming entangled with him you must decide whether you can go the whole way with him—and that’s a very long way, it may be a whole life’s journey. If the answer is “no”, then you must leave him alone, otherwise you will only involve him in yet another unsuccessful relationship.’
Ralph, who felt that his own role was being usurped and that a certain amount of preaching was being directed at him, said impatiently:
‘I’m only asking you to let him work here.’
‘Could I take him in and leave it at that? Could I tell him that he must manage his problems as best he can and keep them in a separate compartment with which I am not to be troubled?’
‘Of course you could!’ Ralph was robustly determined. ‘What the boy needs is a job; he doesn’t need anyone to become involved with him—in fact, that’s probably the last thing he does need. And he’s quite a simple case.’
Frank Godfrey turned away. He picked up one of the pamphlets on the table and replaced it in a more commanding position.
‘I don’t see things that way, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘And I haven’t your manifold spiritual resources. My little effort must be directed into one channel, and one channel alone.’
He stood for a moment staring down at the table, aware that by moving the pamphlet he had destroyed the balance of the whole display. Perhaps it was this that gave an edge of irritation to his voice.
‘You undertake so much. How you manage to see everything through, I can’t imagine.’ The barest trace of envy had crept in. He seemed aware of this and turned away from the table, saying firmly: ‘You are so good, bless you! He’s very fortunate to be in your hands. And if he’s such a simple case, you won’t have much trouble getting him a job.’
‘I hope not.’ Ralph looked dejected. ‘He went to the Labour Exchange this morning. I meant to go with him, but one of the reporters from the Shepherd’s Bush Tribune wanted to see me about Saturday and it seemed an opportunity to get us some publicity . . . and as I was fairly sure I could get him settled with you . . .’
‘Is the Tribune sympathetic?’ Frank deftly diverted the conversation.
‘Definitely not!’
The glow on Ralph’s face indicated that the diversion was to his liking. He thrust the problems of the ex-prisoner into the background and settled himself on the edge of the table, scattering one or two pamphlets. A girl with a scarf tied round her head and the outlines of curlers showing through came in and made enquiries about the book of a film she had seen. She knew the names of the actors, but not the author or the publisher. Ralph waited impatiently, looking himself rather like an actor whose big scene has been spoilt by an intervention from the wings. The moment the girl had gone, he said:
‘This reporter laddie—I must say he put forward some rather interesting arguments. For one thing, he said that we are not really non-violent. Quite a refreshing approach! But he made one or two good points. He said that we have invented a kind of provocative violence. We break the law, thereby forcing the police to remove us which involves them in a controlled use of violence . . .’
‘An essential part of their job, anyway.’
‘Wait a bit. He said that when we get into police stations we become even more subtle, refusing to sit down, stand up, enter or leave a room, give names and addresses or answer questions. In the end, we succeed in goading some weary copper into lashing out at us and then we set up a howl about dedicated, non-violent individualists being beaten up by brutal officials.’
He paused and looked across at Frank Godfrey, as delighted as though he had just reported on the progress of a particularly promising pupil.
‘We are inviting violence, you see. And in that case, can we argue that we ourselves are really non-violent?’
Frank, who found no virtue in seeing two sides of an argument, regarded him blankly.
‘You know there is something in all this,’ Ralph insisted. ‘We really must examine our behaviour very carefully and make quite sure that we don’t appear to be mainly occupied in a tussle with authority. Personally, I have every intention when I’m arrested of co-operating with the authorities. Provided they send me to prison, of course—I shall be damned annoyed if they don’t! I said to this young man . . .’
What a tremendous zest for life he has! Frank thought as he watched Ralph. He found himself wondering as the deep voice went on painting the scene so vividly, whether this man might not glow just as brightly if he were leading a cause of a different character. One could imagine him as a fighter pilot, on the bridge of a destroyer . . . Before he could stop himself, he had asked the question: Is it the cause that matters to him, or the exhilaration of the campaign? Envy again, he rebuked himself; envy because he himself was old and worn and had never known joy in battle, only a dark fear which he tried to keep hidden. It was wrong to judge a man of so different a temperament, so much younger, so full of vigour and health and an abundant enthusiasm of spirit. The real trouble was that the climate of the age was against men like Kimberley; it was too cold and suspicious, with the result that instead of appreciating the few exceptional men one tried to scale them down to one’s own size. I lack generosity, Frank told himself wearily.
‘It sounds as though you found a worthy opponent,’ he said. But his voice was flat. Fortunately, once Kimberley was carried away he did not notice the reactions of others.’
‘It’s a pity you weren’t there.’ He smiled at Frank and there was no doubting his generosity. ‘You would probably have made points that I missed, and you have had a lifetime’s experience in this cause which I can’t possibly rival—including those years in prison as a conscientious objector. Never mind. There will be other opportunities.’ He stood up and scattered more pamphlets. ‘In fact, next Saturday might be one. You and your good lady must come to coffee. Rutledge, my warden, is coming round in the evening for a chat. He’s another worthy opponent—blunter metal, but durable. We shall have a wonderful argument.’
Frank, who was not interested in arguments because he thought that those who were opposed to him on this issue were insane, said:
‘I shall enjoy seeing you and Myra, anyway. But Edith will be visiting her mother.’
Ralph moved to the door.
‘And why not follow it up by coming to church the next day? I might convert you if you would only listen to me.’
Frank looked out of the window at the straight, grey monotony of the street; at the sparse playing field hemmed in by factories and warehouses. There were no clouds, but a film of dust and grit obscured the sun and the dun-coloured sky was smudged with smoke.
‘Are you going to preach to me about God in Shepherd’s Bush, Ralph?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Then?’
‘Shepherd’s Bush is only an infinitesimal part of the universe: a very drab part, I must admit. One needs to look beyond it.’
A bus rumbled by, ignoring the frantic signals of a straggle of women shoppers at a request stop. Frank began to collect the scattered pamphlets, his lips pursed, though whether in annoyance at Ralph’s untidiness or the large austerity of his faith it was difficult to tell.
‘I see you are not to be convinced,’ Ralph laughed as he went out.
It was no wonder that Frank was not to be convinced, he thought as he drove away; particularly if he never looked beyond his drab windowscape. He left the car at the garage and walked in the direction of the vicarage. By means of meandering backstreets he threaded his way into the quieter residential area that formed the larger part of his parish. He walked more slowly now, and some of his zest was evaporating. The property in the area was still quite good, he thought, surveying it moodily; a few of the larger houses were divided into flats but they had not yet deteriorated into one-room tenements. Yet no one could have called the atmosphere reassuring. The solid, double-fronted Victorian houses seemed to have an air of resignation; precariously, they survived, but they did not hope for better days.
And the church? Ralph could see it now on the far side of the green; a plain, red-brick building which lacked dignity in architecture or the mellowing influence of age, a poor house in which to honour a god. As he looked at it he experienced again the irrational feeling of guilt which had troubled him ever since he came to St. Gabriel’s. He ought not to dislike it so much; after all, It was a part of his job that he should go wherever he was called. But then it was not God who had called him to St. Gabriel’s, but a singularly unimaginative bishop. He cheered himself with the memory that he had been sent here because he had been spectacularly popular at his previous church in Cambridge where his views on disarmament had been much applauded. The hard grind of work in a decaying parish would drain his ardour—so the bishop had reckoned. As it happened, the bishop had been wrong. The nuclear disarmament campaign had intensified and Ralph, in London, had found himself well-placed to take an active part.
So much for the bishop! The feeling of guilt, however, remained. In fact, with every step that he took it grew stronger. Something other than the usual depression at the sight of his church was troubling him. He looked at his watch. It was ten to one. Lunch would not be ready until after one and he had no desire to arrive early at a time when Myra would have the vegetables on the boil and a few minutes to spare for angry reproaches because he had not accompanied Wilson to the Labour Exchange.
As he crossed the green he found his footsteps leading him towards the church rather than the vicarage. The gate squeaked and lurched to one side under the pressure of his hand. He shut it behind him with some difficulty and walked along the gravel path which divided the church garden from the graveyard. Or perhaps garden was hardly the word? He looked at the long grass and the bedraggled flower borders. Mr. Maynard, the church treasurer, walking briskly home to lunch, saw him and called put:
‘No day for gardening, Vicar.’
Ralph supposed that Maynard would be shocked if he told him that he was not gardening, but simply delaying an encounter with his wife. He kicked at the gravel, trying to smooth out a deep rut made by bicycle tyres; he had told the youth club youngsters that they must not ride their bicycles along this path. If only he could help Myra. He walked across the wet grass to get the gravel off his shoes and stood looking down at the flower border that ran along the south side of the church. But what could he say to her? That love passes at some stage beyond the personal, becomes diffuse, disinterested, infinitely more pure? She would never accept that. He bent down to pull at a weed, one of many growing in the border. Myra wanted things to remain always as they were in the early days of their marriage; she wanted to enclose him for ever in the tight world of the family. He studied the pale green stalks in his hand; he was not at all sure now that it was not a plant that he had uprooted. He looked round guiltily and then stuffed it back in the ground. It was a pity that he and Myra had had no children; it would have given her an outlet, and it would have prevented them from feasting so much on their own private joys in the early days of their marriage. He had seen the danger of their ingrowing love, she had not. As he crouched there, trying to restore the torn plant to the earth, he thought how hard the change in their relationship must have been for her. It came to him sometimes, in unguarded moments like this, that she had suffered greatly and that he had been the cause. The thought was agony to him and at such times he doubted everything. His knees were trembling and even when he had risen, and was dusting the earth from his hands, he could not stop himself trembling.
Then he noticed that the brick wall that divided the vicarage garden from the graveyard was beginning to crumble in one place. He hurried across to inspect it. Somewhere he heard a door slam and looking up he was surprised to see the verger limping across the road. Spencer opened the gate and came up the path as fast as his lame leg would allow; his face wore a strangely accusing expression.
‘What’s wrong, then?’ he demanded.
‘Wrong?’ Ralph repeated in surprise. ‘I was just . . .’
‘It’s much too early to clip that grass yet,’ Spencer said. ‘And . . .’
‘I don’t intend to clip the grass!’
‘And the ground has been too hard for any weeding. As for that brick wall, I noticed that and I was meaning . . .’
It was ridiculous, the man was actually shouting at him! Ralph said mildly:
‘Really Spencer, I have every right to inspect the grounds of my own church.’
Spencer seemed to shrink into himself, muttering:
‘I thought that something was wrong.’
‘Nothing is wrong,’ Ralph answered.
Except that, in spite of a hollow feeling in his stomach that proclaimed that lunch was now ready, he was reluctant to go in and face his wife. What cowards we men are! he told himself as he at last turned in the direction of the vicarage. He smiled at his frailty and quite forgot to utter any encouragement to Spencer who continued to prowl unhappily round the graveyard for some time afterwards.
As he reached the gate, Ralph saw young Wilson in the distance. He waited for him.
‘How did you get on?’
‘I got a job at Kleine’s timber yard.’
‘Fine!’ They walked up the path together. ‘That’s splendid news. The greater part of the battle, you know.’
And a relief to have one problem settled.