Rooney

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘I’ll just slip my things on. I won’t be long. I’ll be back before they are anyway. They’ll be here shortly after three. They’re going to take the wedding presents straight to the flat, then call at Harry’s place.’

  She had put her coat on and departed before he went upstairs; and as he made his way to his room, he hoped, with a surprising urgency, that he would get there without meeting…her. Like Betty’s his pseudonym for Nellie had changed…she was no longer the little one, a name that had its birth in pity, but ‘her’, and he gave no reason to himself for the meaning of the change.

  Before going to have a wash he sat down before the fire. It was burning brightly, and the hearth looked neat and tidy and his bits once again looked good to his eye. And he should have felt relaxed and at ease; but he felt neither. He was wishing fervently that he was out of this, yet at the same time he wished that there was not lying before him the search for a new home.

  No movement whatever could be heard in the room next door, and he tried to keep his ears from straining to hear some sound by thinking, I have enough on me own plate.

  She was likely sleeping off her hangover, and if he knew anything, her head would be feeling as if there was a shipyard riveter inside it…her not being used to it.

  It was after two o’clock when he went across the landing to have his wash. Back in his room, he was fastening the collar on a clean shirt when a tap-tap came on the door. He turned from the mirror and stared towards it for some moments. Then, one hand on the still unfastened collar, he went to the door and opened it.

  Nellie was standing there, dressed as she had been last night. He imagined that when he next came across her he would see her slightly cowed, or at least shamed, but the Nellie before him was in neither of these admonished states; she looked—the only word he could think of was pert.

  ‘Hallo, Rooney.’

  He swallowed, brought the other hand to the aid of his collar, then said, ‘Hallo.’

  ‘I would like a word with you.’

  He blinked at her while trying to push the stud through the hole.

  ‘Are you shocked about last night?’ she asked quietly.

  He let an end go. ‘It’s none of my business.’

  ‘Oh!’ Her pertness vanished, and she cried with a mixture of irritation and bitterness, ‘Don’t say it like that, as if I was still of no consequence.’

  ‘Well, it isn’t, is it…no business of mine?’

  She looked hard at him, and as she did so she seemed to become deflated, and the old Nellie came back into her voice as she said, ‘You are shocked because I staged it all, and came in drunk…I had no intention of coming in like that…I wasn’t really drunk, it was because I’m not used to it. I thought I’d have a glass of wine to…to give me courage. And then I had another. I didn’t think you could get like that on port wine.’ She waited a moment and continued to look up at him, and he said lamely, ‘Well, yes…you can…and badly.’

  ‘I had intended just to walk in and through them and leave them guessing as to where I had got my things.’

  To leave them guessing. She was pretty hard-boiled about it. He ignored the thought that she should have intended to do just what he himself had imagined would have been a most effective entry and exit.

  ‘Did I act silly…talk a lot?’

  ‘Well, you said enough.’

  ‘I feel I did too, although I can’t remember everything clearly.’ Her eyes dropped. ‘Only yelling at Grace, and…and what I said to Tim. I’m sorry I spoke to him like that. I shouldn’t have done it. But it’s been burning in me for years. And yet now, today, it seems as if it doesn’t matter any more, that it has never mattered. I can forgive Tim, and I’m even sorry for him, but I can’t forgive her. What she did was calculated and cruel…not Queenie, her mother I mean. Queenie just went where she was pushed…she’d never have carried it off on her own…Tim and I were to have been married. I suppose you guessed that?’

  He did not reply immediately. And when he did it was not to say yes or no, but to ask a straight question. And to his own surprise he asked it angrily. ‘Why did you stay on here after, then, if she did all that to you?’

  ‘I stayed because I was afraid to go.’ She said this boldly, making it a statement of fact. ‘The only other person in the world I have ever felt belonged to me, other than Tim, was Grandpa…I needed somebody, I even needed them.’ She flung her arms wide, taking in the rooms that had once been full of her relatives. ‘I wanted to belong somewhere, to have people to call my own. If I had gone then, I think I would have jumped in the river. We shouldn’t be left to face things alone. I didn’t feel capable of living without some kind of love…Grandpa gave that to me, and still does.’

  ‘I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have asked.’

  ‘Yes, you should. It’s all right.’

  ‘Well, what’ll happen to him now, when…when you go?’

  It was a long moment before she said, ‘When I go, he’ll go, too.’ She pulled the strap of a new brown leather bag back and forward through her hands before adding, ‘I…I only came because I…I felt I owed you some kind of explanation.’

  His fingers became agitated on the collar again. ‘You owe me nothing. Why should you? You don’t need to explain to me, it’s none of my business.’

  She suddenly brought her eyes up to his, fixing them on him intently, forcing him to look back into them, and as he did so he saw her face change, and she became again, in spite of her fine rig-out and make-up, the old Nellie he had seen on the first Saturday he came here, stiff, buttoned up.

  ‘You…you believe—’ She paused, her hand to her head. ‘I’ve been trying to remember all morning what she said last night about…about Mr Brummell, I can only remember—’ She paused again, before adding harshly, ‘Do you believe that there is something between Mr Brummell and me?’

  What could he say? To say, ‘Yes, that’s about it. You gave yourself away when you tried to laugh it off,’ would be to hit her as hard as Ma had done.

  Viciously now, he pulled on his collar, tugging at both ends, his chin stretched up and out. And as he was bringing the ends together her laugh struck him as suddenly as it had done last night. The tightness had vanished, and she looked gay, recklessly gay. ‘I don’t believe you do…not really. Stop pulling at that collar for a minute, will you, and listen to me; I want to tell you something. I don’t want any misunderstanding with you, Rooney, at least. Here, let me fix it for you and be done with it.’

  Before he could step back and ward off her hands, she had reached up and, taking the two ends of the collar from him, was fastening them together with the stud. ‘There!’ She patted the achievement with two quick gestures similar to those she used after writing Grandpa’s notes.

  The patting hit his Adam’s apple and caused him to swallow. Worse than that, he almost choked, for looking over her head towards the stairs he saw Betty’s half-startled, half-shocked face looking at them.

  Following his gaze, Nellie swung round, and her colour rose, outdoing the rouge on her cheeks. Then, moving slowly away, she muttered something which sounded to him like ‘More evidence’. But still the unexpected sight of Betty did not cower her, for she marched boldly towards the stairs, tucking her bag under her arm to enable her to draw on her gloves as she did so.

  Betty had now mounted to the landing, and, looking at Nellie as she passed, she said pointedly, ‘You’re making up for lost time, aren’t you, Nellie?’

  Without pausing in her walk, Nellie replied, ‘Being your mother’s daughter, Betty, it would be unnatural for you to think otherwise.’

  Quickly and quietly Rooney closed his door, and standing with his back to it he took in air, filling his chest and expanding his stomach. If that had been Ma, my God!

  But no doubt she would get to know, and then…

  He touched his collar. Never before had a woman fixed his collar. What had made her do it? Trying out her hand? Pert? Yes, that’s what she had become. And he didn’
t like it; he preferred her as she had been, miserable. Yet the little one was still there. But why had she tied his collar? He could feel her fingers on his neck yet. When Ma did get to know…He jerked himself from the door. Blast Ma, and all her works! What had Ma got to do with it, anyway? She was becoming an obsession. What kind of a bloke was he to be frightened of a fat old woman?

  He quickly put on his coat, grabbed his cap and mac, and went downstairs. Betty was in the hall. She did not speak, but her eyes spoke for her. And he stared back into them defiantly. He had, he considered, put up with enough; he wasn’t going to be cowed by the lot of them and made to feel he was up to something when he wasn’t.

  He could hear Grandpa’s voice coming from the front room, and guessed…she was in there. That she might come out and leave the house with him spurred his departure, and he hurried down the street. And not until he was at a safe distance did he slacken his pace. Then a not entirely irrelevant thought struck him. If the man was sixty-five or so, and she took Grandpa with her, it would be like an old-age pensioners’ home. The thought was not funny. A lover of sixty-five and a charge of nearly eighty?…No.

  He stopped dead in the street. She wouldn’t do such a thing. If she was taking the old fellow, then it wasn’t Brummell she was going to. Anyway, she had just denied it. But that it was some man he could not doubt; though it must be as she had said last night, that she had done better for herself than Brummell.

  She had been about to explain it all to him. She had said she didn’t want him to misunderstand, and had seemed anxious that he shouldn’t. Yes, when he came to think of it, she had.

  He walked on slowly now. If he hadn’t left the house like a frightened hare, she might have come out and caught him up.

  He was pulled up sharply by his cautious self that had been somewhat neglected of late. What was he thinking now? Did he want to get involved in this business? No, no, of course he didn’t. Well then, he’d go for a walk round the market, then to the pictures, and finish up at the dogs; and keep minding his own business, and let her keep her explanations to herself—he was going to be no recipient of confidences, of how she had got herself a man, one who could rig her out like a fashion plate at that.

  He walked round the market, then went to the pictures. But he didn’t go to the dogs—he went straight to The Anchor. He had considered going to Danny’s, but he knew that once he got there and started talking the whole business of…her might slip out. And more than that might slip out—things inside himself. Oh! he wished to God he had never set foot in Filbert Terrace.

  Neither Fred nor Bill was in the MPs’ corner. He hadn’t expected to see Albert there, but before he had been sitting down a few minutes he saw Johnny come into the bar and look straight towards him. But he didn’t immediately come over—he ordered his drink first; then slowly crossed to the corner, carrying the pint mug in his hand. And when he reached the table he did a strange thing. Strange for him anyway. He did not greet Rooney straight away, but stood looking down at him over the mug of beer.

  ‘Hallo,’ said Rooney. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ He did not speak too affably, for he was thinking illogically that if it hadn’t been for this fellow he would have known nothing about Filbert Terrace, Ma, her family…or Nellie.

  ‘Nowt’s the matter with me, lad.’ Slowly Johnny sat down, put his beer on the table, and with the back of his hand dabbed the point of his nose. It was in no way intended to be a cleansing process, but apparently to engender thought, for Johnny now gazed into the space between Rooney and the bar proper, and became lost for a time in contemplation. When he did return to his surroundings, he startled Rooney with a quick demand. ‘Well, let’s hev it,’ he said.

  ‘Have what?’

  ‘Aw! now, look, man…I’m on your side, even after the way she turned on me last night. She was tight and we all say things when we’re tight.’ Johnny took a drink from his mug, then looked at Rooney again from beneath his brows, and what he saw made him say, ‘Now look, you needn’t get on your high horse.’

  ‘Have what?’ repeated Rooney again.

  Johnny straightened up in his chair, took hold of the sides of the table, and pushed his elbows out. ‘It’s no business of mine, it’s got nothing to do with me, but you must admit I took you there.’

  ‘Damn well I know you did! But what you getting at?’

  Johnny’s brows drew more closely together and his face took on a surly look. ‘Why you trying to come the high hat all of a sudden? Betty saw you.’

  ‘Saw me what?’

  ‘Well, if you must have it in plain words, necking on the landing with Nellie. It didn’t strike her till later. And then she put two and two together. She said all along it wasn’t old Brummell.’

  Rooney had always known just what type of a fellow he himself was…he was the placid type. His nerves were steady; he did not get het up about the things men usually got het up about, politics, religion, unions, and women; yet he wasn’t without his emotions—his two brief love affairs had called up other feelings that could be described as stirrings of the blood. But when the stirrers of his blood had disappointed him his reactions had not driven him to any strong measures; perhaps they had strengthened his affection for his furniture and his own company, but that was all. In his own quiet way he sometimes compared other people’s reactions to his own, and found them wanting in control. It was nothing to see two young fellows fighting outside a dance hall over some lass; it was nothing to see two grown men, well in their forties, as he had done a short while ago, come out of the Winter Garden, walk side by side to the nearest back lane, and then proceed to bash each other’s brains out. He had walked unsuspectingly behind these two and had been one of the blokes who had helped separate them. As far as he could gather their wives had got mixed up, and he had thought, Fair enough…have it out. But why had they to make a holy show of themselves in the street? And now, with his hand gripping a large fistful of Johnny’s collar and the blood pounding in his head as if he had been standing on it, and a desire to bash this fellow’s face in filling every pore of his body, the old placid Rooney was struggling for dear life against this wild animal that was in possession.

  ‘Give over, man! What in the name of God’s got into you?’ It was Bill pulling at him.

  ‘Leave go! Do you hear me? Leave go!’ This was Stoddard, the manager, at the other side of him. ‘Leave go! Come on now, leave go. Whatever it is, talk it out. I want no fighting in here…You of all people, Rooney! I’ll believe anything after this.’

  The red mist was clearing and he was seeing Johnny’s startled countenance more clearly. He released his grip, and Johnny, although he was standing on his own feet, seemed to drop quite a distance to the floor.

  ‘There, now,’ said Stoddard, patting Rooney’s arm. ‘Sit down. Well, I’ve seen some things in me time from behind this bar, but nothing that has surprised me more…There now’—he went on patting—‘let up, man…relax. You want something stiff, eh? What about a whisky?’

  Rooney did not reply. But Bill said, ‘Let’s have three. I think this bloke’s more in need of one than anybody…No, sit down.’ He pushed Johnny back into the chair. But Johnny, recovering himself now, shook off Bill’s hand and rising on not very steady legs went to the counter without again looking at Rooney.

  ‘You could have knocked me down with a side-loader,’ said Bill, ‘when I come through that door and saw you holding that bloke by the throat. What was it?…He’s the fellow who got you the digs, isn’t he?’

  Rooney swallowed and blinked. Then taking a deep breath he leant against the back of the chair and closed his eyes. He felt suddenly very tired, as if he had been swimming and gone too far out.

  Stoddard came to the table with the drinks, and Rooney took the glass from his hand and drank the whisky in one gulp; then he shuddered, closed his eyes again, and said, ‘Give me another.’

  It was a full fifteen minutes later when Bill, in some exasperation, exclaimed, ‘Well, for the l
ove of Mike! let’s have it. What was it all about?’

  ‘If you must know,’ said Rooney, staring down into the sovereign gold of yet another whisky, ‘he accused me of keeping a woman.’

  Bill sat back. ‘Keeping a woman?…You?…Well, are you? All right! All right! Don’t start on me.’ He pushed his long arm out, warding off the look that Rooney levelled at him. ‘You late starters don’t know when to stop. But if you was, it would be the first damn sensible thing you’ve done in your life.’

  ‘You don’t always talk like that.’ Rooney did not raise his head, just his eyes. ‘You’re always growling about being tied.’

  ‘Who’re talking about being tied? You can keep her without being married, if that’s how you want it. And as for being tied, there’s worse states, I’m thinking, for you’re never out of trouble, free as you are. I used to envy you, you know, Rooney, but you’ve run into more bloody hot water through evading women than the lot of us have encountered with all our wives put together, and that, to my mind, includes Albert an’ all. Why don’t you get hooked? You’d only have one lot of trouble then. And you’d know which street you had it in. So far you’ve nearly covered the bloody town. It’s none of my business, but…’

  Bill left the ‘but’ in the air, finished his drink, and said, ‘What you havin’?’

  ‘The same.’

  Bill said nothing but raised his brows as he went to the counter. It was Rooney’s fourth and the night was young. He had never known him to take more than two, except on New Year’s Eve. In fact, his sticking so rigidly to the rules he had set down for himself had irritated the gang on more than one occasion. That was, all except Danny. But, then, Danny was a bit of an old wife at times…

  Rooney drank steadily until ten o’clock, and when he finally got to his feet his legs were afloat. But, he assured himself, he wasn’t drunk. No, he wasn’t drunk. If he could keep his feet on the floor he’d be all right.