“ No, sir,” I said.
Mr. Heatley stood and waited and I realised I should have to tell him the whole story. In a way he had a right to know. I made the story as short as I could but he kept on interrupting and asking questions, so it took some time to tell. I told him about the dirt and discomfort of the boarding-house and how I had found the flat and used all my money to furnish it.
“ You should have left yourself something to feed on,” commented Mr. Heatley.
“ I did,” I replied. “ But Mrs. Hall rooked me out of two pounds; she said it was the usual thing when you gave up your room.”
“ Nonsense! A week’s notice is the usual thing. Why didn’t you ask me? A week’s rent or a week’s notice is all she was entitled to.”
I did not reply. Mr. Heatley would have thought me an even bigger fool if I had told him the truth; if I had told him that I had paid the money because I wanted to escape, because I wanted to avoid saying good-bye to my fellow-boarders.
“ How much have you got? ” asked Mr. Heatley after a moment’s silence.
“ Fivepence, sir,” I replied, smiling. “ But I’ve got plenty of bread——”
“ Fivepence! Good Lord! Why on earth didn’t you ask me to give you an advance? ”
“ I never thought of it.”
“ You never thought of it! Here you are! ” said Mr. Heatley, fishing in his pocket. “ Take a pound. That ought to see you through.”
“ No, sir. I don’t want it.”
“ You don’t want it? ”
“ I’d rather not,” I said.
“ Why? ” he asked staring at me.
This was difficult to answer because I had no idea why I did not want the money.
“ Why? ” repeated Mr. Heatley.
“ I want to be independent,” I replied, groping for words. “ It’s—it’s a sort of game, really. I want to manage on my own.”
“ Oh well,” he said with a chuckle. “ It’s a sort of game, is it? A funny sort of game if you ask me! You’re a fool, Kirke, but perhaps it’s a pity there aren’t more fools of your kidney knocking about. I can’t see Ullenwood starving on bread and water because he was too proud to accept an advance—nor Wrigson either. What are you having for supper, if it isn’t a rude question? ”
“ Cauliflowers, sir.”
“ Cauliflowers! ”
I told him how I had acquired the cauliflowers and he laughed.
“ That’s a good story,” he said. “ I’m dining out to-night and I shall tell the story of the cauliflower bomb.”
This was the first time Mr. Heatley had spoken to me about anything except my work; I had thought him a stiff old poker—when I had thought of him at all—but now I realised he was human and kindly.
We were still talking when Mr. Penman came in; Mr. Penman looked at us in surprise. I had a feeling Mr. Penman was not very pleased to see me hob-nobbing with the Boss and I wondered why—it seemed absurd to suspect him of jealousy!
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
That evening I stayed on at the office later than usual to check some figures for Mr. Heatley. There was nobody in the office except myself, everybody else had gone. I finished the work quickly and, as I took my hat from the rack, I suddenly felt happy. I was going home. I was done with Mrs. Hall and her “ guests.” They would all sit round the table with the stained cloth in front of them and the harsh light overhead and they would carp at one another. They would all complain and nobody would listen; Madame Futrelle would poke malicious fun at Beryl—they were always up against each other—Miss Bulwer would whine about her indigestion and Mr. Kensey about the unkindness of his relations. Ned would sit, lost in gloomy dreams, wondering how he was going to make ends meet without somebody from whom he could borrow, and Mrs. Hall would preside over the table watching to see that her “ guests ” did not take more than their fair share of the food she provided … but I had decided not to think about these people any more (it depressed me to think of them and I could do them no good) so I banished them from my mind.
I locked the door of the office and ran down the steps and, as I did so, somebody moved forward and stood in front of me. It was Beryl.
“ David! ” she exclaimed, seizing my arm. “ Oh, David, you never said good-bye! ”
“ How did you know I was here? ”
“ Mrs. Hall told me. She knew the address of the office … so I came to meet you. Oh, David, it was horrid of you to slink off like that without saying good-bye. I couldn’t believe it when Mrs. Hall said you’d gone. I simply—couldn’t—believe it! ”
“ I hate saying good-bye,” I told her. “ There’s no point in it; but we can say good-bye now if that’s what you want.”
“ Let’s go and have supper together, David.”
“ I’m going home to supper,” I told her … and I thought of the cauliflowers and smiled.
“ Where? ” she asked, looking up at me. “ Where are you staying? ”
“ In a flat in a friend’s house. I told you that before.”
“ Let’s go there and talk, shall we? I want to see your flat so that I can think about you. Is it near Mrs. Hall’s? ”
“ No,” I said. “ It’s in—it’s in a friend’s house. He’s a bachelor and he doesn’t like women. I can’t take you there.” I held out my hand and added, “ Good-bye, Beryl.”
Beryl did not take my hand. “ We could go to the pictures,” she wheedled. “ Do let’s go to the pictures. I don’t want to go back to Mrs. Hall’s. It’s worse than ever now you’ve gone. Mrs. Hall hasn’t been able to let your room, she’s as cross as a bear about it, and Ned has got the sack—so you can imagine what he’s like! Let’s do something together, David.”
“ I’m afraid I can’t,” I said.
“ Oh, David, you’re still angry! Why won’t you be friends? Please be friends with me. It’s so unkind and unfair of you to be angry. I told you it wasn’t my fault that we drove away and left you behind. I told you I made them stop and go back.”
The party seemed so long ago that for a moment I could not think what she meant. Then I remembered. “ Goodness! ” I exclaimed. “ I’m not angry about that.”
“ You’re angry about something.”
“ I’m not angry at all. Listen, Beryl, why don’t you make it up with Ned? You and Ned both like parties; you like the same things. Ned’s very fond of you——”
“ Ned’s selfish,” she said in a trembling voice. “ He thinks of himself all the time. You know he does.”
I looked at her and saw her eyes were full of tears and I felt very sorry for her.
“ Beryl, it’s no good,” I said. “ I can’t take you out to supper, because I’ve no money.”
“ No money! I thought you had lots of money! ”
I laughed. “ Well, you were wrong,” I said. “ I’ve no money to take girls out to supper or to pictures or anything else, so it isn’t the slightest use for you to bother with me any more.”
“ But David, we’re friends, aren’t we? ”
“ Look! ” I said, taking the five pennies out of my pocket. “ There, Beryl! That’s all I’ve got to last me to the end of the week.”
She looked at the coppers in amazement. “ How are you going to eat? ” she asked.
“ I’ve got some bread and three cauliflowers.”
Beryl hesitated. I wondered if she would offer to lend me money. I would not have taken it from her, but I rather hoped she would offer it.
“ I don’t believe you,” she said at last, but she said it without conviction.
“ It’s true,” I told her. “ That’s all I’ve got.”
“ I don’t believe you! ” she cried. “ You’re just being horrid. I thought you were nice—you seemed different from the others—but you’re just horrid.”
“ All right, I’m horrid,” I agreed and I turned and walked away. I felt “ horrid ” too, but it was no good. I could not be friends with her. To be friends with Beryl meant spending a lot of mone
y; it meant taking her out and giving her meals, and, even if I had wanted to do it, I could not afford it. Even if I had wanted to … and I did not want to.
When I got to the corner I looked back and she was still standing in the same place. All the way home I thought about her and argued with myself. It was absurd to feel upset about Beryl; she was a “ gold-digger.” Beryl wanted somebody to take her out and give her a good time—anybody would do. All the same I felt upset about her and it was not until I had cooked the cauliflowers and had my supper that I was able to get her out of my mind.
The next morning (and all that week) I got up early and helped to unload before I went to the office. I discovered that the red-faced man was called Mr. Smith and he was a decent soul in spite of his fiery temper and foul language. He gave me all I could use in the way of slightly damaged fruit and vegetables which kept me going comfortably. I had hoped to see the girl again but I was too busy to keep a look-out for her and as a matter of fact it was extremely difficult to see anybody in the crowded streets. The unwonted exercise made me stiff at first but I got used to it and I made up my mind to carry on with the job; it saved money to get fruit and vegetables for nothing. There were still things I wanted to make the flat comfortable and the more I could save the sooner I could have them.
When Friday came I was tired of nothing but bread and vegetables and although I felt perfectly fit I had lost a good deal of weight.
Mr. Heatley smiled when he gave me my week’s salary. “ Well, Kirke,” he said. “ Your fast is over, I suppose.”
“ Yes, sir,” I replied. “ It’s been all right.”
“ I suppose your pockets are empty? ”
I laughed and showed him that I still had the five pennies left.
“ How did you do it? ” he asked. “ Well, never mind now. Come and have supper with us on Sunday night; I’ll hear about it then. I told my wife the story of the cauliflowers and she wants to meet you.”
I thanked him and accepted. To tell the truth I was not particularly anxious to go to supper with the Heatleys—the prospect alarmed me—but there was no way of getting out of it. Mr. Heatley’s invitation was in the nature of a Royal Command.
It was good to have money to spend and when I got out of the office I went straight to the Wooden Spoon and had a solid meal and a glass of beer. It was the best meal I had ever tasted.
On Sunday evening I spruced myself up and went to supper at the Heatleys’. Mrs. Heatley was delightful, she was much younger than Mr. Heatley and full of fun. They asked me all sorts of questions, first about my “ week of starvation ” and then about my home. Mrs. Heatley had been to Haines, she had stayed at Drumburly when she was a girl and knew the district quite well, so there was plenty to talk about. I discovered that my host and hostess had not been married long; it was obvious that they were very fond of each other. Mr. Heatley was quite different at home; he enjoyed being teased by his wife and played up to her in the most amusing way … I laughed until I cried to see him fooling about and pretending to be the butler.
“ You must come again soon,” said Mr. Heatley as he saw me out at the door. “ It’s good for Sylvia to have somebody young to talk to. I’m an old fogey, you know.”
“ There’s not much old fogey about you,” I told him. I should have liked to say more but I was afraid he might think it impertinent.
It was so long since I had spoken to cheerful pleasant people and enjoyed good talk that I felt quite elated as I walked home. The streets were quiet at this hour and my footsteps sounded loud upon the pavements.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
When I had been in my new abode for a week I felt settled and comfortable. I could feed myself better and live more cheaply than at Mrs. Hall’s. Mr. Coe was very good to me but I helped him in various ways, so it was not one-sided. In the morning, before I went to the office, I took down the shutters for him; sometimes if I were home in time I put them up at night. They were heavy old-fashioned shutters and it was difficult for him to climb the ladder and fix the bolts. It was no bother to me.
When his knees were painful I did his shopping for him and once or twice when he wanted to go out he left me in charge of the shop. This job amused me vastly. I had never expected to serve in a shop. It reminded me of the times when Freda and I played at shops together in the old ruined cottage on the banks of the Ling.
“ Good afternoon, sir! ” I would say to Mr. Coe’s customers. “ What can I do for you? ”
Usually they looked round vaguely and said, “ Where’s Mr. Coe? ” but when I explained that Mr. Coe was out they would tell me what they wanted. The books were not listed nor properly arranged, which made it difficult, but if I could not find the books they asked for, I could at least be polite and pleasant and suggest that they should come back later and see the proprietor.
Quite soon I realised that Mr. Coe was lonely. He knew plenty of people in the way of business but he was an individual sort of man with odd ideas and he had no real friends who could share his interests. Sometimes Mr. Coe was irritable but I knew he suffered a good deal of pain so if I found him in a grumpy mood I left him alone and did not worry.
In the evenings, when I had had my supper and washed up, I settled down to write. It was quiet and peaceful and there were no interruptions. I began to write articles for the papers but it bothered me to think of what would please editors; the articles were dull and worthless, there was no life in them. At last I gave up trying and I began to write for my own pleasure about things that interested me. I wrote about Covent Garden, about people that I saw in the Park, about the river and the Tower. I wrote about Dickens walking at night in the streets of London, with his lame leg and his seeing eye, and making friends with all sorts and conditions of his fellow citizens. I put in some history—odd scraps of history which I picked up from old books in Mr. Coe’s shop—and I illustrated it as I went along with little sketches. I wrote about Haines, too. Somehow I could see Haines very clearly—it was all inside my head—and this reminded me of Robert Louis Stevenson who wrote so feelingly about the scenes of his childhood when he was living on a South Sea island thousands of miles away. Writing all this made me think of the story about Malcolm which I had written so long ago, and oddly enough the same thing happened: at first it was difficult to get going but afterwards it came easily and my pencil flew. The work gave me a great deal of pleasure and amusement; it made the evenings pass like lightning and I was obliged to make a hard and fast rule to go to bed at eleven o’clock or I should have been writing all night. No editor would look at it of course because it was just my own ideas about things. It was not a diary, nor a guide book, it was not a series of essays. In fact I could not say what it was. At the back of my mind was the idea that mother would enjoy it. When it was finished—if ever it was finished—I thought I would send it to Mother to put in the wooden chest.
The illustrations amused me too. Some were comic and others serious but they were all extremely simple. I reduced them to a minimum of lines. There was a drawing of a tiny, bow-legged Covent Garden porter carrying an enormous crate of vegetables which consisted of eight bold lines and some shading. This was my favourite.
My letters from home were addressed to the office and I left it like that and did not tell Mother I had moved. I knew she would only worry and I decided to wait until I could tell her I was settled in my new quarters. When at last I wrote and broke the news I was able to tell her it was a great success and I was comfortable and happy; I told her I had begun to write again (which I knew would please her); last but not least I was able to tell her that Mr. Heatley had raised my salary.
Mother’s reaction to my letter was surprising. She replied by return of post saying she and Father were very much distressed to hear I had moved. It seemed a pity when I had got to know the people in the boarding-house—and Mrs. Hall had seemed so kindly. It would be lonely for me living in a flat by myself. Who looked after me and gave me my breakfast? What would happen if I were ill?
I could not help laughing when I read Mother’s letter. It was my own fault of course. I had made a point of writing home cheerfully (sometimes it had been difficult to write cheerfully from that Slough of Despond), evidently I had managed to give an entirely false picture of the conditions and to conceal the horrors from my loving parents. The best of the joke was that Mother herself would not have stayed in that boarding-house half an hour; the dirt and discomfort would have disgusted her.
Mother’s letter came when I was having breakfast and I wrote off at once assuring her that I was much happier living alone, that I cooked my own meals myself and was as fit as a fiddle. It was a short note, I had no time for more, and I posted it on my way to the office. Mother replied immediately to say she was coming to London to see me and I was to book a room for her in a hotel.
The news that Mother was coming to London was absolutely staggering, it was fantastic. Mother in London! I could not believe it was true. I thought vaguely about a hotel and then I realised I could have her in the flat. I could give her my bedroom and sleep on the divan. It would be tremendous fun to entertain Mother in my own place!
When Mr. Coe heard the news he offered to lend me some furniture and I accepted gladly for I wanted to make everything as comfortable as I could. He lent me a carpet for the bedroom and a couple of chairs and a small wardrobe and a few other odds and ends.
Mr. Coe did not visit me often, but the evening before Mother’s arrival he came puffing up the stairs like a small steam-tug and had a good look round.
“ It’s clean,” he said. “ I thought it would be a mess. Who cleans it? ”
“ I do,” I said, laughing. “ I had enough dirt at the boarding-house to last me all my life.”
“ She’ll want a bedside table and a lamp. If you come downstairs I’ll give them to you … and an eiderdown quilt. We must make her comfortable, you know. We don’t want her to say it’s a pig-sty and whisk you away.”
“ I won’t let her whisk me away.”
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