Cotter's England

by Christina Stead

  He did not answer, looking rosily around, noticing everything.

  She did not insist then, but grasped his hand, kissed his cheek and said, "Eh, but that was grand, Tom, just when I needed it. You and me together. That's the way we meant it to be; but it can't be. You can't argue with the world. I need the world, Tom and that's why it all went wrong. Let's go; I must get back. Will ye drive me to the hospital?"

  "I'm not sure it's good for you."

  "I am the only one she can talk her heart out to. The rest she calls vultures."

  When they sat in the car, driving, looking ahead, she said, "I feel on top of the world, now, because you're the one I've given me real heart to, Tom. Don't let me down ever; or I'll think very little of you."

  "You know, Cushie, that you've always got me."

  "Bless you, pet."

  George, while…

  GEORGE, WHILE waiting for a Geneva transfer, had gone back to the Rome office. One day she got a telegram from George, saying that she was to leave for Rome as soon as she could arrange; he believed they had a job for her in his office. This was on a Thursday. The newspaper told Nellie to go at once. Not only had the doctor been in the office and given her warning, but anyone could see that she could not last much longer in this way.

  Two days later she was to leave by train. She sent Tom to Bridgehead to say goodbye for her and give presents and make promises. If Tom caught the early train down in the afternoon, he would just be able to say a few words to her before she went. He was to go straight from his train to a delicatessen near Victoria and wait outside. She would go there to buy a few sandwiches; then they could have the parting cup of tea. He left Bridgehead at the earliest possible moment and after the four-hour trip got to the rendezvous with about half an hour to spare. She could be counted on, though she often rushed in at the last minute. He stood there till there were only a few minutes left before train time, with anxiously beating heart, flushing with worry. At last he rushed across the station, where he found a crowd at the barrier. There were dozens and dozens of people there, kissing, shaking hands, calling out, laughing; every kind of affection and momentary tenderness, a feast of love and emotion. He looked eagerly about, straining, calling, "Nellie, Cushie, Cotter!" He asked the man at the gate if he could get in; but this was not allowed. He stood on tiptoe and poked his face through the railings. Nellie did not come and the train pulled out.

  This was unprecedented. They had had their last cup of tea together in every big terminal in England and in one or two in Scotland.

  Tom hurried to the telephone and telephoned the house in Lamb Street. Johnny Sterker answered. She said Nellie had certainly taken the train. Johnny had gone to the station with her. "Nellie thought you wouldn't make it."

  Johnny said she was glad he had come back. Nellie had left the house in her charge and that was not her line. She was quitting. If he had a key, she'd leave now. Tom was stabbed. Nellie was so anxious to get off to George, that she had not looked for him at all; she had had time for Johnny, though. His back had ached badly all the way down in the train; but it wasn't that that he counted. Perhaps she would not come back for years! He went to the station bar and had three whiskies. He picked up his bag with a twinge and went to the telephone again. He telephoned Eliza; she was always at home on Friday nights, helping her friends with the wash and the ironing. She had friends in the next street, a family in one room with a small wash basin in a cupboard, but no sink or bath.

  "Eliza! I was at the train and she never came! I waited half an hour and she didn't turn up and I went to the barrier, but she didn't come and she was on the train."

  "Is it you, Tom?" said Eliza.

  He sobbed, "Yes; everyone was there saying goodbye, everyone had someone talking to them. I looked everywhere. I called and I waited and I had no one. No one came to me. She went off without saying goodbye. So," he said petulantly, "I got drunk. I drank three whiskies on an empty stomach."

  Eliza said, "Oh, she is probably going to cry all the way to Rome because she missed you." But she did not laugh. "Take it easy, Tom; don't drink any more. Why don't you go home now, Tom, lad?"

  "The house is empty! I don't want to go there. Who will I talk to?"

  "Now come home now, lad, and I'll talk to you and you can come out with us this evening. There's a big party, they're dancing and afterwards they're going to the pub."

  "I don't want to see a lot of people. I don't feel like it. I can't understand all that gaiety. She said to wait at the delicatessen. I waited until the last moment. I bought her sandwiches, ham and chicken, the best, and then I rushed over and she never even bothered to look for me. I waited and waited. I can't understand it."

  "Come here, lad, and eat something with us; there are a nice lot of youngsters here and some girls fresh from Ireland: they're lonely."

  "No, no; that would make it worse! I'll put up at a hotel. Or I'll come home later."

  Eliza said, after a hesitation, "Would you like me to come and meet you there at Victoria station? Can you get home all right?"

  "No, no, I'm all right, Eliza. Yes, I'll come home to Lamb Street. Goodbye. I wish I was coming to you with no one else there."

  "Take it easy then, Tom!"

  "It's all right, I just had to talk to someone, I was there at the barrier and no one came to me."

  He had another drink on the way home and had been in the Lamb Street house about ten minutes, when the front door opened and Eliza walked in.

  "Eliza!" he shouted with joy. He got up, not noticing the pain, rushed to her, "Eliza! Oh, I am glad you came."

  "It was just to find out how you are. I felt guilty with Nellie running off to George. Did you eat something?"

  "I was just going to eat the sandwiches I bought. I'm glad to talk to you. It was just being left like that. I didn't know I really wanted you. I didn't feel like seeing anyone tonight and I was just going to sit here and mope. But I feel better," he continued brightening and smiling at her. "Dear Eliza! I'm glad you came. That was just the right thing! Just the right thing!" he said in an astonished tone.

  "I'll get you some dinner," said Eliza. "Every homeless person in London has been in and out of here so I grabbed something at the ham-and-beef shop. We all live in common over there, there's always plenty. Here it is just one big tent, people walk in and out. Nellie is a wonderful woman; there is no one like her, Tom."

  Tom was standing close to her.

  "You are taller than you look, taller than me, but not as fat," she laughed.

  "I am much stronger than you really," he remarked, "but now my back is out of order."

  He followed her out to the kitchen and began once more to tell her indignantly about Nellie's betrayal.

  "I wouldn't do such a thing to her."

  After a while he laughed sadly and asked her to forgive him. He was very much upset because an awful thing had happened that day. A young soldier had fallen onto the line when a train was approaching at a station on the way down. His mate had jumped down to pull him back and both had been killed. Tom had seen what had happened. Then his train had moved on. "I didn't know what to do, I wanted to tell Nellie: she could have said something to me."

  He had also been in pain all the week, but, "I don't dare lie down, and I don't want to lie down. If you lie down you don't know when you're going to get up."

  He sat now on the edge of the chair by the table, twisted so as to give his back ease.

  "So long as I can keep going without pain-killing tablets I'm all right. I don't like to give in, and I can't. I've got to get a better job soon. There's Estelle; and there's Bridgehead."

  Then he discussed what he could do, if Nellie stayed abroad. He knew enough high-school French to begin with and wages for experienced men like himself, were high enough in Paris, which was a great engineering city. "And I could suit myself whether I kept paying out all that alimony or not. Maybe I could skip the life sentence. Of course I would soon have some other responsibility," he said demurely, w
ith a red little smile, looking for approval. He had studied trades union conditions and wages already: he had been thinking it over. "I sent away for the papers as soon as I knew Nellie might go."

  Then he talked about his lonely rides, the wind, the waste, the trees, the hungry wallowing of the vast open skies and country at him, their great formless bodies snatching at a love-hungry man who must spend his life alone. "The sky leans down to suck me up and the country bends all round me and seems to have hold of my feet: I don't know whether there's an ancient horror in the country, or whether it's only summer blowing in on me in my cell. I like work best, there I have company and plenty of space." In the factory he was thinking of, work was going ahead, they were getting army orders. He didn't like it, but didn't know what to do about it: it would be so in whatever branch of engineering he got into. He had helped in the last war, had to, but he had made up his mind to do nothing connected with killing in the next.

  "I'll help the sick and wounded, I'll do any social work, helping evacuees, constructing hutments, arranging for supplies, I'll be a stretcherbearer, but I will never bring death to a human being, not even a bird! There was an analytical chemist in my last boarding house who agreed with me." He began to laugh. "I noticed he seized every opportunity of talking to me, and he was edging round all the time to the subject of war and peace. Presently I saw he was trying to get me to understand that war was a bad thing and ruinous for the country: he wanted me to see that peace was a good thing. So I let him go on converting me. He made progress: I told him I would be a stretcherbearer in the next war."

  "I hope your back gets better for the next war," said Eliza.

  "I'm very strong," said he, displeased. "I carried Marion up and down stairs often and she looked heavier than me—sometimes, that is," he said hastily. "I could carry you."

  She laughed. "Eh, no, lad, not now! Would you like to go to bed now? You're very tired. I'll stay here and tomorrow clean up a bit."

  He wanted to stay up. "I'm craving for some good talk. I look in wherever the curtains are not drawn and wish I could go in and talk. I like everybody, why can't I go in? Why aren't I let in?"

  He sat in his chair sideways getting drowsy, rosy, beginning to smile as if asleep, a smiling, silly, radiant look.

  "There's some wine left in the cupboard on the top shelf," he suddenly argued, "George left it there: I'm going to open some."

  "Can you take it, Tom?"

  "I'm all right. I can drink like a fish."

  "No, you can't."

  "I get drunk, but I can drink any amount."

  She got it because of his back.

  "I had to sit up all that way in the train: and when I got there, what did I find?" he said morosely.

  "It's all selfishness in this house," quoted Eliza.

  Tom was sulky at being ridiculed. "She let me down!" He grabbed the glass she held out to him and took a swallow. "I like wine! With wine nothing can get you down." He put down the glass. "I always knew those bottles were there! I always made up my mind to take one of them. It was there for months and he never offered to open one for me. I brought lots of wine to this house."

  "George is judicious about his presents," said Eliza: "he has a very direct mind."

  "I know, I'm obliged to stick around, so he needn't buy me. Any time he wants to desert my sister, I'm obliged to look after everything. I'm beginning to feel better."

  Eliza was sitting on the couch under the open window which looked on the street. It was still light, a long green summer evening. The back window which looked into Nellie's sleeping alcove was also open and the tree scents blew in. They could see the darkening shape of the top of a tree in the Square, and brilliant stardust.

  "What are you looking at?"

  "The sky," said Eliza, "over the back."

  "Let me come and see it too."

  He brought the little table over, put it in front of them: but he couldn't get a comfortable position; he was in pain.

  "Go to bed Tom, rest."

  "I don't want to leave you; I won't be alone."

  She went and sat on the bed in the alcove, so that he could lie beside her and talk to her; and fixed him up with some pillows.

  "I don't know what you've done to yourself," she said anxiously, "you may have hurt yourself."

  "Yes, I have, I think."

  He leaned against her and said he felt better now. He looked worn and wasted. She gave him some pain-killing tablets which he had brought along, but he said, "Don't leave me, stay with me," and she stayed. "Stay near me. I am so tired of being alone."

  Eliza had nursed a good many people and did what she could for Tom, who slept for a long time.

  In the morning she came in once or twice but found him asleep. She had slept on the couch near the window and not slept well.

  He smiled when he saw her, "I slept like a top." He had groaned and coughed all night; he didn't know it. "I'd like to sleep some more."

  She let him sleep and worked about the house.

  When Tom was awake again, she took him his breakfast. His clothes, blue and white, small and clean, were neatly folded into two heaps; the contents of his pockets were laid out on the table. He went through his lengthy toilet, coming out in the end looking like a fresh youth.

  "I'd sit in the sun all day. I couldn't face a trip anywhere today. But I must make a visit over to Kensington. I must tell a woman to get the hell out of my life. She's young and has a child and she's getting too involved. And I can't go down to Bob's any more for a while. There's a woman there, too, I mustn't see any more. I've helped her. I taught her to understand music. I always try to help."

  She sat down with him while he had his tea on the couch by the window. He sat talking about his life, various ideas that crossed his mind. He wished he had time to study: he must marry. He had sent a check for some shoes he had not received. In his old job, a firm had sent him a present which he had sent back. He still regretted having taken that job; he had found out that the man in line for his job was a soak, but a good engineer; he had done what he could for the man. To drink was only a substitute for something that had failed, a proof of frustration: happy people didn't drink. The thing he hated in a manager's position, was that you had to sort out people who came for jobs, turn some away. All the time, he sat shrunk into a little chair, soft and young, his eyes no longer inflamed and starting, but large, quiet, full of light.

  Suddenly he got up and coming to kneel beside Eliza, put his arms round her,

  "Dear, dear Eliza; you give me peace."

  He went back to his chair and prattled on, smiling. He must do this and that. The country walks must be pleasant now. Think that one evening, taking a long walk in a private forest, he had come to the end of the road and struck into the green grassy hillside and come to a mound and there a crowd of pheasants had risen screaming, their wings tearing the air up, the heavy bodies whirring. They were all round his head and he stood still with fright, expecting every gamekeeper within miles to be coming over and possibly taking potshots at him. But nothing happened; the perfect stillness returned. He had been just near the shallow grassy valley of Grimes's Graves by himself. He liked the country there. He liked that old, old England.

  "Although now you can hardly cross the fields in some parts; the Americans have taken it up. An Englishman can't cross his own fields."

  "Aye, we're quartered upon."

  He leaned forward and rose again, stole over to the couch and once more knelt beside her, putting his arms around her. She held him to her until he became restless. The host of suppressed maternal feelings which had come back to her during the night rose, their wings whirred round her and she felt darkness; it became love. She let him go. He left her.

  He started his remarks again. He must get a job and a girl in the country; all this would not do. He didn't mind if that was his fate; other people lived through it. What did Eliza think?

  "Yes, you must. You can't go through such loneliness; you can't be alone when yo
u're sick."

  "Oh, I'm very strong. I'm very young. The Pikes are very young all their lives and live long. Uncle Simon looks sixty sometimes."

  Eliza said, "I often wonder if I should go back to Bridgehead; but I can't get over the fascination of London. It has life. Where can you get a cup of tea after six on Saturday in Bridgehead? In the back kitchen. Not even at the railway station."

  "I never look at Bridgehead if I can help it. I just go to Hadrian's Grove and to the station. It reminds me of when we were all up there and how the people used to be. The women were kind to me, when I sold the party paper door to door. They'd listen to me; That's rait, it's true, hinny; or, Tha's rait, la'ad; but they looked as if they could hardly stand up; and it was only to please me very often, because they had lads of their own. They don't all even vote Labour, though it's a Labour stronghold. And when they took over the mines but compensated the noble owners, who had been compensated over and over again long before, the miners ran up a flag at their great victory."

  Eliza flushed a roaring red, "Aye, but when I see it, I've got to take them by the necks and make them see it."

  "They'll be socialists in the end, but they'll import it: they'll wait to see the rest of the world test it first: they're canny and cool."

  "Then we need rabble-rousers, like George used to be," said she hotly.

  "I'm not a zealot," said Tom meekly.

  After a silence, he got up again and knelt by Eliza, letting her hold him while she liked, like a good son to his mother.

  She kissed him and he said, "Eliza, I'll never forget a single minute of last night. I thought I was lying in bed with two pistons that throbbed and I thought, What am I doing in bed with two pistons? It was my thighs. I woke up, it was so unpleasant. I had one bad spot when I thought of you and a whole hour had gone; it was between five and six. You were asleep the whole time. Then I slept sweetly. I'll never forget. I couldn't go away today even if I felt all right. That is, if you want me here."