by James Hanley
‘Sitting on their——’
‘Don’t stand there! He’s a fool. He’s a fool. Knows nothing.’
‘Liar! You know everything. Where is she? Gone! A lot you care.’
‘Please keep quiet! We have no further news, we are sorry to say.’
‘It is wise for you people to return home. No good can be done here.’
‘No! Too late! A lot you care.’
The stairways were alive. The building seemed to rock under the deluge of voices. Somebody pushed Mrs. Fury, she found herself standing in a small office.
A young woman looked at her—an old man.
‘Ronsa! Next door! Next office.’
She did not move. She clenched her fists, rested them on the table. Went on staring at men and women.
‘Is it true?’
‘Yes. It is very sad. Very sad.’
‘Is there no hope?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ the old man said, and added, shifting his glance from Mrs. Fury to the young lady: ‘Have you sent those papers to Mr. Willis?’
‘Are you certain—my husband—I—is there any news?’
She struck the desk with her clenched fist.
‘Is there any news?’
‘I regret to say, no. You are in the wrong department. This is the catering section.’
‘My name is Fury——’
‘Yes, yes, of course. Of course. I understand! Miss Denton, you might call Mr. Willis. I want those figures verified at once. The Cahia is making a quick turn round and going out on the morning’s tide. It is very important.’
‘Please tell me——Oh, my God! I don’t believe it.’
She struck the desk again.
‘Miss Denton, please show this lady next door. She’s made a mistake. Pardon me,’ he said, and vanished through an inner door.
‘This way, please,’ Miss Denton said.
She began to descend the staircase. At the bottom she could see more women streaming in through the swing-doors. Some men dashed past them waving newspapers. A crowd ran with them. One shouted.
‘News! News!’
A man turned, said quickly. ‘No. No. There are——’
‘It’s the Sipia docking.’
Mrs. Fury reached the bottom. A woman stood in the centre of the floor and seemed like a statue. People went past her. One circled round her. She did not move. On the bottom stair Mrs. Fury sat, and buried her face in her hands.
More women, young girls, crying children, ascended, descended. The bells went on ringing, the telephones buzzed. Lift-gates slashed back with vicious sounds, lifts purred upwards, downwards. Columns of air shot through into this big hall each time the door swung. A man hung a large notice on the board in the hall. People ran to it, one stepped on Mrs. Fury’s foot. She did not feel it. She heard nothing, saw nothing. Only Denny swimming in the sea.
‘Poor Denny.’
She sobbed very quietly, no one heard, or noticed. Her body rocked to and fro, her hat had been knocked sideways on her head, the hem of her coat had been trodden on. She never noticed. The stair was marble-cold beneath her.
‘I can’t believe it. God look down on him. Oh, I won’t—I won’t believe it.’
Gone! Just like that! And she’d thought he’d be home to-day, to-morrow, next week, at the end of the month. And the room all prepared. And Anthony’s girl coming to tea. And Peter has written to his father, and I posted a letter two days ago. Gone. Like that! Just like that! Without a word—without a sound.
‘I know now. I’ve lost everything that matters. I didn’t know and now I know. I neglected him—I—he——Well——’ and the thoughts, like many matches, struck in her brain.
‘He’s gone! Denny! And I can’t believe—Oh, Christ, I can’t believe!’
A child slipped on the stairs, an old man kicked against a door that would not open. A silent door, a wooden face. People ran up and down. Down and up. Round and round. Circled clerks, circled porters, circled the lift-men.
‘Any news?’
‘Too late.’
‘Johnny in the sea. Oh, God!’
‘Quiet, please! See the notice on the board.’
‘Where?’
‘There!’
‘Which board?’
‘That!’
‘Where?’
‘Everywhere!’
The building cried. ‘Sunk! Sunk! Too late! Too late.’
‘You must go now.’
‘I won’t go.’
‘She can’t. She won’t.’
‘She must.’
‘Blast you, we won’t! We want news. News! God, tell the truth, will you?’
‘I am sorry to say …’
‘I have no time.’
‘Bring those papers here.’
‘That’s the sodden Germans for you.’
‘Is there a little lad named Jenkins saved?’
‘Nobody’s saved.’
‘Don’t hide anything. We know.’
Two women ran up the stairs together, holding hands, cried towards the corridors: ‘We know! We know!’ Came down again, still shouting.
‘See these two ladies out. We have arranged with the tramway company for a late car to stop here. We can do no more at present. It is senseless. These unfortunate people hanging round here through the night.’
‘A lot you know.’
‘Or care.’
‘We’ll wait till we hear more news.’
‘There is no more news, I regret to say.’
The voice spoke through a megaphone from the top of the building.
‘He was kind, Denny was. And then I thought, well——Oh, what does it matter? I let him go. I didn’t care. He cared—he was wonderful. Now I know. He was good, Denny was. He worked hard. Oh, God, I can’t cry. I can’t cry.’
‘Please!’
A hand touched her arm. She shivered under the touch.
‘Please,’ the voice said.
She looked up. ‘Go away, please,’ she said.
‘We are closing the building,’ the man said.
‘Close it.’
‘You will have to go now,’ the man said.
‘Go then. Why don’t you go?’
‘I mean you will have to go,’ the man said. ‘It is half-past one.’
‘I thought we’d get home one fine day. So did he! God help him! In the sea. The sea. Denny in the sea. Gone! I don’t believe it. I can’t. I can’t. Denny! No. No!’
‘Please! You must go,’ the man said.
When he put an arm through hers and raised her up she did not look at him, nor hear him speak as he led her out of the building.
‘There,’ he said.
The lower step was full of seated women. Mrs. Fury sat with them. The doors closed. Lights began to go out, one after the other.
A policeman passed by, looked at the huddled crowd, passed on, understanding. He would not move them. He could not move them. They were as the stone that seated them.
Night workers passed by, their feet clattering upon the stones. Wind blew up from the river and dust beat against the walls, clouded in the gutters, the day’s debris piled there for waiting carts. At the far end of the street lights winked against stone surfaces. A lorry hurtled by, dockwards, and its reverberations in the silent streets sounded like cracks of thunder.
A woman rose from the step, stood away from it, looked down the street, stood looking for some minutes. Towards the sea. Then she sat down again. A man stretched his legs, a young woman rubbed the fingers of one hand hard upon the palm of the other. A foghorn sounded somewhere far away. A night mist was rising. The dumb sat. Waited. The Sailor’s Church clock struck two.
The sea’s agents slept in their beds, the keys of the sea to their hands. The doors would open at nine a.m. The row of faces said: ‘Wait.’
The great building said: ‘Dumb. Dumb.’
There was a sound as of stamping, freshened horses in the next street, and a column of soldiers marched towards the docks. More wor
kers passed the big swing-doors, hurrying ciphers in the night air.
A goods train rumbled past the dock gates, crawled and twisted snake-like into the goods sheds, where the walls glistened from perpetual dampness. Above the building outside which they sat, a flag pole speared the sky, but no flag flew. Occasionally a dull roar came to their ears, where four streets away the great presses rolled and the man at his desk said:
‘All is quiet on the Western Front.’
Shadows danced in this street.
Riverwards it was dark, stabbed now and again by a blob of light as a tug or barge glided past. Ships stood at anchor, their signals hanging motionless. The tide was coming in, and water splashed against the quays, and sometimes spray spurted and struck the gates of a near-by shed. A pigeon fluttered on a coping, disturbing stones. They clattered roofwards. A cart came along and began to wash the street. Heads rose, eyes watched, one slept, his head against the wood of the door, no longer wondering.
Mrs. Fury woke to the sound, sat up, shivered, felt her hat, shook herself. She got up, walked away mumbling. She talked to herself as she went down the street. She turned the corner, went up another street, came down again. Made three wide circles, sat again.
A young woman clutched her arm, whispered: ‘There may be more news! I wonder?’ She bit her finger-nail and looked around her.
‘I wonder,’ Mrs. Fury said, the lump like lead rising in her throat again.
‘I wonder,’ the girl said, and burst into tears. Her head nestled on Mrs. Fury’s arm.
‘Ssh! Ssh! The others!’ Mrs. Fury said. ‘Don’t cry! God is good. Believe me He is.’
‘I must go away,’ she thought. ‘I must go somewhere. Walk. I can’t sit here. I can’t sit here because I don’t believe it. Oh, my God! I don’t believe it.’
She got up again, saying: ‘There! There!’ to the young woman.
She went down the street again. Stood beneath the Sailor’s Church. It struck the quarter hour. A quarter past four. At five the chapel of Saint Augustine opened.
‘I’ll go there! I’ll wait there.’ She talked aloud into the deserted street. ‘I was happy yesterday. I thought—well, all the rest have gone. But Denny is there! I didn’t know him properly. And now I do. I went to work. I wanted to save, to make up for the other things. He loved what I loved and his tongue was rough, but he was a good man to me. He was worth them all—all—oh, God, I can’t believe it. I won’t. What do they matter now? They don’t care. Like I do. They don’t care! Denny! I don’t believe it.’
The thoughts sang in her head, sang to her, made the rhythm for every step she took. She walked over the stones, down this street, along that. She walked through Gelton, past all the places she knew, she went down the lanes of Ireland. Laughed when others laughed. Saw friends, heard voices in the air. She walked through the worlds she knew. She stopped by a shop window, and a faint shadow of herself looked out at her from the glass.
‘Good heavens,’ she said, and straightened her hat. ‘That child must have lain on it.’
She walked on, rumbling. Here it was, Saint Augustine’s and all in darkness. Chains upon the iron gate. The door closed. And in the house near by one sickly light glimmering.
‘It won’t be long,’ she said. ‘I used to come here often once on a time. It’s a handy chapel, so near to the docks. Denny used to come here too.’
To the right of the iron gate there was a single tree, and in front of it a wooden bench. She sat down. She dozed off to sleep, and woke later to the sound of a banging door, and two people passed her, went into the chapel. She stood up, settled her hair under her hat, swept her hands down her coat, and went into the chapel.
‘I could go to Communion this morning,’ she thought. ‘I should have gone to the early mass at my own chapel,’ and she walked quietly up the aisle.
There were five people in the chapel. An altar boy came out and began to light the two candles. She knelt a moment, then sat back in her seat. She stared hard at the boy, at candles, at the fresh flowers in the vases, at the great picture of Christ that hung over the boy’s head. Soon she heard cracking, tinkling sounds in the water-pipes under the iron grating. The air began to feel warm. The priest came out wearing blue and white robes.
‘I’ll go to communion,’ she said. ‘I don’t believe it! I can’t! Oh, Denny! Denny!’
The other people knelt, but she remained seated. Her hands were folded in her lap. She looked straight ahead. A man in workman’s dungarees left his bench, hands joined, walked with clumsy gait, then on tip-toe towards the altar rails. The priest bowed his head over the chalice. The boy rang the bell, its sound rose to the height of the building, circled there. A woman moved out, went to the rails. Mrs. Fury got up, followed her. She bowed her head.
‘When I know,’ she muttered softly to herself, ‘when I know, I will bear it. But I won’t believe it. Oh, God! I can’t believe it. He’s all—everything now.’
The priest raised the chalice, the sounds of rustling silk were in her ears as silently he seemed to glide down from the altar steps. She heard the words on his lips. ‘Dominus vobiscum. Domin—Domi——’
She opened her mouth, raised her head slightly. The priest stood before her, looking down at her face. She was the last communicant. He held high the chalice, placed the bread upon her tongue, saw her long face tremble, some tears roll down her face. ‘Dominus vobiscum—Domin——
She held her mouth open, did not move—motionless. She cried there silently, and the priest saw, then turning, walked back up the altar steps.
A sob broke from her, and quickly she closed her mouth, bowed her head, and it rested heavily upon the brass rail. The altar boy came down and under his surplice his collar shone, face shone, hair glistened in the light. He came through the little gateway, and went up to her, put an arm through hers, whispered in a somewhat frightened voice: ‘Come, please.’
Mrs. Fury rose, went with him, passed those bowed heads. He saw her to her seat, saw her seated, looked hard at her for a second or more, then glided noiselessly back to the altar. The mass began.
The boy knelt on the bottom step, the priest stood towering over him. In the benches two heads were raised. The boy’s voice sounded flute-like on the air.
‘Suspicius dominus sacrificium de manibus tuis ad lorem ad gloria ad nominus sui ad utilitatem quoque nostrum——’
Mrs. Fury sat erect in her seat. She watched.
‘Oh, God! I can’t! I can’t pray,’ she said into the emptiness of her seat, rose to her feet, clung to the bench, looked round, hurried from the bench, genuflected quickly, went down the aisle. Nobody looked. She went out in silence.
It was light. She sat down on the wooden bench.
‘I couldn’t! Oh, God! I couldn’t! I tried! I did try. He knew I tried. He understood me. Denny understood me.’
She got up and walked back to Edcott Court. Many workpeople passed her by. A milk-cart rattled along. The first tramcar screeched and rattled its way towards the suburbs. The world around her began to swim. She reached the Court. On almost every stair she paused, as though she were counting them—one—two—three—four.
‘No! It’s impossible. It couldn’t be. I won’t give up hope. I won’t! It’s—oh, Denny, wherever you are I am, I don’t—I won’t! Oh, God, I won’t believe it.’
She closed her door, looked at things in the room. The table, the chair, the small dresser, the altar, the mantelpiece, the muslin curtains. She sat down heavily on the bed. Doubled up, she suddenly slept.
The clock ticked. The woman snored. Edcott Court began to shake under the rushing tide of sound. People went up and down the long flights of stone steps. A basin clattered on the landing. A child shouted from the area below.
It grew lighter. A baker knocked at Mrs. Fury’s door. Eight o’clock. A letter came under the door. A postman banged. A butcher called, went away unanswered. Nine o’clock, a boy hammered on the door, cried: ‘Greengroceries.’
The woman slept. Car
s and lorries roared below. Trains shunted. Ships’ sirens blew. A man shouted into the building: ‘Special edition.’ A woman rushed down the stairs, a man behind her. ‘It’s Titular, the name is. I told you all along. Running in the two-thirty.’
Some dead ashes moved in the grate. It was ten o’clock. A girl hummed a tune, nursing a baby. Seated on the lower stairs, she began to sing to the child: ‘It’s a long, long trail a’ winding.’ A dog barked defiantly.
Towards eleven Mrs. Fury woke up. She lit the fire, and whilst the kettle boiled, began to tidy the room. She made herself some breakfast, and then went out.
‘Even Mrs. Gumbs is away,’ she said, as she went down to the street.
She turned in the direction of the shipping office. Outside the stationer’s shop she saw a poster announcing: ‘Another liner torpedoed. Heavy death roll feared.’ Another poster read: ‘Famous Comedian Divorced. Heavy damages.’
When she reached the offices she stood for a minute or two watching people streaming in and out of the swing-doors. The doorman walked up and down in front of the building, slapping his one arm against his thigh. He smiled at everybody. His shadow danced before him in the morning sunshine. Men, women and girls came out. Some laughed, some chattered gaily, some were silent, even studious of expression.
Mrs. Fury climbed the steps. Always she had had a horror of these enormous doors that swung in and out with an air of wild abandonment, and as she had always done she now waited until a little group of people were on the point of entering. Her reflection swept by as the glass moved, and she found herself inside, the group about her fell away, scattered and were gone from sight.
There were many women there. She recognized a face, a hat, a coat, a voice. Some clustered round a notice-board.
‘We regret to announce that all hope is now abandoned, and it is feared that H.M.T. Ronsa sank with all hands in a few minutes.’
They read, and did not read—saw and did not see. They drew closer together, mumbled, talked loudly, stared into each other’s faces.
‘It’s only twenty-four hours ago. I don’t believe what it says on the board.’
‘What’s the name there?’
‘Where?’
‘There.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Such scribble.’
