by H. E. Bates
She ran one finger of her glove along the iron rim of the bridge. A little snow stuck to her glove and a little shower of it fell from the bridge. From the far side of the bridge three small boys ran up the steps and over the top and down the other side, laughing. They said something about the old woman but she did not hear it. At that moment the door of the station master’s office banged and the station master came out on to the platform, stamping his feet in the snow, with a porter. There was very little luggage on the platform and no crates of pigeons. A moment or two later she saw the white smoke of the approaching train.
She stood there without moving as the train came in: three coaches, and the engine, as always, behind. It did not halt for more than a few moments. Looking down from the bridge she saw the young man from Warren Street get out of the train. He was carrying two suit-cases, and with him was the young woman. Mrs. Cartwright saw the young woman look up. She looked rather excited and she smiled. It might have been herself arriving thirty years ago, looking up and getting her first sight of Evensford: except that there had then been no smile, no excitement and no one to meet her.
The train began to move out again, and a few moments later the platform was empty. She walked down from the bridge and round to the front of the station. She was just in time to see the man from Warren Street putting the two suit-cases into the only taxi that met the trains at Evensford, and to hear him say, ‘Oh, it’s cold and miserable. Better to ride’. She heard the sound of the young woman’s voice laughing in reply and then the crackling sound of the taxi wheels in the crisp air as they moved over the frozen snow. As she watched the taxi disappear, leaving the short street empty, she knew suddenly how simple the solution to everything was: to be loved and to be wanted, to want someone and be wanted, ever so little, in return. She was struck again by the awful force of little things: a taxi on a cold day in the snow, an empty street in a strange town in the rain.
She walked heavily down the street in the snow. She stared at her feet, absurdly floppy in the goloshes that were too big for them. Her face was practically hidden by the big untidy scarf and there were patches of snow on the fur coat where she had leaned against the bridge.
The three small boys who had run over the bridge waited for her as she came down the street. They crouched down by the station wall, pressing snow-balls in their hands, and they had another pile of snow-balls already made, on the ground. In the reflected light of the snow their faces were eager with excitement.
As she came within range, not seeing them, looking down at her feet, walking as if she did not know where she was going, they pressed the snow-balls harder in their hands, laughing now.
‘Get ready,’ they said. ‘Here she comes.’
A Note on the Author
H. E. Bates was born in 1905 in the shoe-making town of Rushden, Northamptonshire, and educated at Kettering Grammar School. After leaving school, he worked as a reporter and as a clerk in a leather warehouse.
Many of his stories depict life in the rural Midlands, particularly his native Northamptonshire, where he spent many hours wandering the countryside.
His first novel, The Two Sisters (1926) was published by Jonathan Cape when he was just twenty. Many critically acclaimed novels and collections of short stories followed.
During WWII he was commissioned into the RAF solely to write short stories, which were published under the pseudonym “Flying Officer X”. His first financial success was Fair Stood the Wind for France (1944), followed by two novels about Burma, The Purple Plain (1947) and The Jacaranda Tree (1949) and one set in India, The Scarlet Sword (1950).
Other well-known novels include Love for Lydia (1952) and The Feast of July (1954).
His most popular creation was the Larkin family which featured in five novels beginning with The Darling Buds of May in 1958. The later television adaptation was a huge success.
Many other stories were adapted for the screen, the most renowned being The Purple Plain (1947) starring Gregory Peck, and The Triple Echo (1970) with Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed.
H. E. Bates married in 1931, had four children and lived most of his life in a converted granary near Charing in Kent. He was awarded the CBE in 1973, shortly before his death in 1974.
Discover other books by H. E. Bates published by Bloomsbury Reader at
www.bloomsbury.com/hebates.
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For copyright reasons, any images not belonging to the original author have been removed from this book. The text has not been changed, and may still contain references to missing images.
First published in Great Britain in 1943 by Jonathan Cape
This electronic edition published in 2016 by Bloomsbury Reader
Copyright © 1943 Evensford Productions Limited
The moral right of the author is asserted.
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eISBN: 9781448215133
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