Georgy Girl

by Margaret Forster

  ‘That will be never,’ said Jos.

  ‘Look,’ said George, ‘you spent all last night telling me she wouldn’t give us a divorce out of sheer spite. Instead, she agreed right away. Now you say she’ll live here forever and ruin our lives, and I don’t believe that either. One day, she’ll just go.’

  ‘One day I’ll fly,’ said Jos.

  George got into bed and turned away from him, hitching the covers firmly over her shoulders and lying stiffly like a ramrod. Soaked in pessimism, he lay with his hands behind his head, staring into the darkness and counting the days till he left. Nothing could save them. It would all end as suddenly as it had begun. George made no overtures of friendship, so he let her lie, though he knew she was awake too. It was ridiculous that Meredith’s placid acceptance of the situation should be the thing to drive them apart. He sighed heavily, and then again. George turned towards him. ‘Jonah,’ she said, and ‘Misery.’ She cuddled down beside him.

  Jos went back to work the day after Meredith came out of hospital. He was entitled to four more days’ holiday, but he thought he would save them, for his honeymoon or something. When he left, Meredith was still in bed and George got quite angry with him when he whistled too loudly. However, he put up with that as good-humouredly as possible and kissed George good-bye.

  ‘Don’t forget the baby,’ she said.

  Jos stared. ‘But surely we’re not still having it?’ he said. ‘I mean, now that Meredith’s agreed and we’re staying here.’

  George’s face set in obstinate lines of stony calm.

  ‘That doesn’t make any difference,’ she said. ‘Try and ring up or go and see about it in your lunch hour.’

  Throughout the morning he pondered on whether he should or he shouldn’t, and when he finally decided to try to get his baby back it was a tactical move. He had a shrewd idea that Meredith would not relish the arrival in the flat of her baby, it would push her out quicker than anything else. So he went round to the adoption society’s headquarters and announced that he wanted his own baby back, please.

  It was two weeks before the baby finally arrived, and that was express service. Jos was tired of signing forms and being interviewed and swearing that he wouldn’t change his mind again. He thought it absolute impertinence to screen him so fiercely when it was his child after all, and said as much, many times, very pompously. But George kept him at it and told him off furiously when he said it was all for her, as though the baby was some extravagant present. Meredith said nothing, but smiled derisively when he related the various sagas about his dealings with the society.

  They, George and Jos, collected the baby in a taxi. George cradled her tenderly in her arms, while Jos tried to work up some interest.

  ‘Does she look different?’ said George.

  ‘About the same,’ said Jos. He tried to recognize the tiny creased face and couldn’t. ‘A bit fatter.’

  The taxi driver helped her out. He was discretion itself as he said, ‘You’ll make a lovely mother, madam.’

  ‘I hope so,’ George said.

  ‘Poor little mite,’ the driver said. ‘It makes you think, don’t it?’ Jos paid him off hurriedly.

  George climbed the stairs carefully. As they reached the flat, the baby began to cry, whining and shrill. Jos hummed loudly.

  ‘It sounds like a circus,’ said Meredith.

  ‘Hold her while I heat her bottle,’ said George, thrusting the child towards her.

  ‘No thank you,’ said Meredith sharply, ‘I had enough of that in hospital.’

  George plonked her burden into Jos’s arms. He stood in the centre of the room, holding the howling cargo. ‘Jog her up and down,’ shouted George from the kitchen. He jogged. The baby stopped. He stopped, and it cried, so he jogged again, vigorously. ‘Must give its innards hell,’ he said.

  He seemed to be running around the whole evening, obeying George’s commands to bring pins, fold that nappy, put this in the bin, let the cot sides down, pull the blanket up, put the light out. Exhausted, he collapsed in a chair. ‘Will it sleep all night?’ he said hopefully.

  ‘No,’ said George, ‘she’ll wake every four hours for feeds.’

  ‘Oh God,’ said Jos, ‘let’s push the cot in here.’ Meredith rustled her newspaper pointedly. ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘I forgot we couldn’t do that. It’s mother wouldn’t like it.’

  ‘We must choose a name,’ said George. She’d produced yet another needleful of baby knitting from somewhere.

  ‘All yours,’ said Jos, grandly.

  ‘It’s so important,’ said George. ‘Look at my awful name. What about Jane? It’s a nice, steady name and you can’t mess it up.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Jos. ‘Jane it is.’

  ‘Or Anne,’ said George.

  ‘Might as well call a child “the” if you’re going to call it Anne,’ said Jos. ‘Jane will do.’

  ‘Jane what?’ said George. ‘Jane Elizabeth?’

  ‘Fine,’ said Jos.

  ‘Jane Elizabeth Jones. Jane Jones – oh no Jos, that doesn’t sound right. Jane Jones sounds like a nursery rhyme.’

  ‘Elizabeth, then,’ said Jos, wearily.

  ‘But she might get called Liz.’

  ‘I like Liz.’

  ‘Or Betty.’ George paused in the middle of a line. ‘What about Tanya.’

  ‘Christ,’ said Meredith, and threw down her paper.

  ‘None of your business,’ said Jos, quickly.

  ‘Don’t you like Tanya, Meredith?’ said George anxiously. ‘Maybe Tanya Jones does sound a bit far fetched. What names do you like?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what she likes,’ said Jos, ‘you’re choosing the name.’

  ‘I don’t give a damn,’ said Meredith. ‘You can call it what you like, only for God’s sake hurry up about it because it’s driving me mad.’

  ‘You don’t have to stay,’ said Jos.

  She picked up the paper again and disappeared stoically behind it.

  Maliciously, Jos swallowed his own boredom and drew George out on the name game endlessly. They went through every name they could both lay their tongues on, with Jos apparently agreeing and then at the last minute withdrawing his enthusiasm. Meredith’s paper twitched uncontrollably. When they’d gone back to discussing the merits and demerits of Jane for the fourth time, she got up.

  ‘Going out?’ said Jos gaily. For answer, Meredith grabbed her coat from behind the door and struggled into it. She slammed out of the flat and woke the still unnamed child.

  ‘Do you think she’s angry?’ said George, already on her feet to rush to the cot.

  ‘I hope so,’ said Jos. ‘Anyway, she’s out, gone, vamoosed. Do you realize this is the first time we’ve been really alone since she came back? I feel like double locking the door.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ said George, and began to pick the baby up.

  ‘You’ll spoil that child,’ said Jos sternly.

  ‘Do you think so?’ said George, withdrawing her arms.

  ‘Certainly – picking it up every time it cries.’ He watched George hover uncertainly over the cot, until a frenzied howl decided her and she picked the baby up and cradled it in her arms.

  ‘Doesn’t it make any difference?’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That it’s not yours. I don’t see how you can love it so much.’

  George didn’t answer.

  ‘I’m jealous,’ he said. ‘Meredith’s gone and I wanted you all to myself.’

  ‘You can have me, when she’s asleep.’

  He waited dutifully until the sniffling bundle had been put back in the cot, and then led George eagerly to the sofa and his arms. He kissed her warmly and she responded.

  ‘What about Sara, without an “h”?’ she said in his ear.

  ‘Definitely,’ said Jos, ‘definitely Sara without an “h”. Perfect. That’s settled then. Don’t say a word. It’s decided.’

  Meredith went round the square twice at a gallop. She didn�
�t know why she hadn’t smacked both their smug faces. She should have put her foot down and stopped them getting the baby, instead of being too idle and short-sighted to see that it mattered. Already, it was getting her down. The Sister would have said she was suffering from delayed guilt feelings, but that wasn’t true at all. She didn’t care about the baby, she really didn’t, it was those two she hated. They behaved as though they were in some private world, all sugar and spice and all things nice. She despised them and their cosiness. She hadn’t thought Jos could stoop so low.

  They probably wouldn’t give her her job back. It was six months since she’d worked and there were scores of first violinists all ready to murder each other to get a place in an established orchestra. If she couldn’t get in, there was nothing else she wanted to do, much. She reminded herself that she had no money, that she hadn’t had any for a long time. Grimly, she stopped walking and leant against a pillar box. She was furious with herself for getting so annoyed and now so worried. Jos would realize he had scored and would try again. He wanted her out of the flat, but she wasn’t going to go. Or should she? If she deliberately stayed just to spite them, she might regret it. It might mean good-bye to detachment. She’d lose her temper more often, react all the time to the remarks Jos would put in her way. She was better out of it, not caring, with nothing and no one to make her sorry or glad or annoyed. Above it all, that’s what she must strive to stay.

  There was no time like the present. All her clothes were in the flat, but she could collect them some time. She could hire or borrow or steal a violin, until she was stable enough to collect her own. She felt inside her pockets and found fourteen shillings and three halfpence, the change from the pound George had given her to get cigarettes. It would do to start her off. She turned her back on the square and ran to catch a bus.

  Chapter Seven

  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 thr
ee 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.