The Boarding-House

by William Trevor

  ‘I was round at the desk sergeant’s last evening,’ Nurse Clock said, smiling, to Mr Scribbin, ‘on a different matter altogether. She has a nice little room for you there. I said you’d be over to see it.’

  ‘Who broke my records?’

  But Nurse Clock said she didn’t know who broke his records and repeated what she had already said.

  Mr Bird, for his part, did not ever again seem to materialize in the kitchen. Mr Bird lived in the mind of Mr Obd and Mr Obd spoke to him, savaging him with his tongue. Sometimes he filled Mr Obd’s small room with his murmuring and his sly grinning, and Mr Obd would jump up and down, extremely angry.

  ‘I am busy, dear,’ Nurse Clock told Mrs Maylam. ‘No time for your chat today. Lift up your skirt now for our little jab. Have the bowels moved this morning?’

  ‘My God, you’re evil,’ replied Mrs Maylam. Obediently, she exposed her flesh for the injection. ‘You’ll burn in hell. Nurse Clock.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ said Nurse Clock.

  A year before his death Mr Bird had written:

  Nurse Clock (50) has been with me now for fifteen years. She is quite an asset to the house, as on the occasion when Mr Venables caught his hand in a window and required instant medical attention. I met Nurse Clock distraught on the streets of this area, in the spring of ’49. I was walking slowly and was approached by her with a request for a direction. She claimed to be lost, having been walking about for some time. She had a brusque manner and I saw that she was a woman who immediately interested me. I explained that the road she was seeking was quite some way away. ‘Let me draw you a simple map,’ I added, leading her to a seat by a bus-stop. We drifted into a casual conversation, during the course of which she inquired of me if I knew or had heard of Sir James and Lady Lord-Blood. I had, of course, the twain being notorious in the neighbourhood for the extraction of money from obese matrons. We talked further, in the course of which conversation I related to Nurse Clock the nature of my livelihood in Jubilee Road. Within a week she had called around at Number Two and requested to see me. Today she practises happily in SW17, riding about on a cycle. She is no longer brusque in her manner but has acquired quite an effecting sweetness. Nurse Clock has morbid interests. She is a woman I would fear were it not for my superior position.

  ‘What do you want?’ cried Mr Obd. ‘Who is there? Is this the traitor Bird?’

  Nurse Clock frowned on the other side of Mr Obd’s door. Before replying she sought about in her mind for some reason for this second question of his: why should he imagine that Mr Bird could possibly be knocking on the door of his bedroom? She had heard of Africans drinking. ‘Root beer,’ she murmured to herself, having read about the stuff.

  ‘Please go away,’ cried Mr Obd. ‘What do you want now? Tome Obd is a ruined man.’

  ‘Root beer,’ said Nurse Clock. ‘Put it away, like a good chap. Mr Obd, you have been in there for two days.’

  ‘It is surely Nurse Clock.’

  ‘Only Nurse Clock,’ said she, reminded of the times when she had spent an hour or so rapping on the door of Bishop Hode’s airing cupboard. It must be a thing of the times, she thought, this creeping away behind locked doors. ‘We are worried about you, Mr Obd. We have not seen you since Sunday.’

  ‘Go away, Nurse Clock. Tome Obd is planning things out on paper.’

  ‘I have a tray here for you, Mr Obd. Fish fingers and salad, a cup of strong tea–’

  ‘Tome Obd will eat nothing till his people are freed.’

  ‘Come on, Mr Obd.’

  ‘No, no, I will not come on.’

  ‘There is a good play on the television, Mr Obd.’

  ‘Please to be on your way. It wearies this old African to talk.’

  ‘You are not old, Mr Obd.’ She thought immediately that this might be the trouble, that Mr Obd might feel that he was getting on too fast, that his youth was past and had been wasted. Women with the menopause often had this complaint. ‘I have never thought of you as old, my dear. Somehow, you know, I always looked upon you – well, next to Miss Clerricot – as the baby of The Boarding-House.’

  ‘I am forty-four. Is it my skin that makes me look younger? How can a man of forty-four be a baby? Make sense, woman.’

  ‘I only meant you were junior in years to others. To Mr Venables and Mr Scribbin and Major Eele and Mr Studdy.’

  ‘It is still Nurse Clock surely? What age are you, Nurse Clock?’

  ‘Now, now.’

  ‘I cannot hear. I asked what age. I cannot hear your answer.’

  ‘My age is my affair. In fact I am in my fifty-first year.’

  ‘You will not get married now. Nurse Clock.’

  ‘I would not wish to, Mr Obd.’

  ‘Do you have a fellow?’

  ‘No, Mr Obd, I do not have a fellow.’

  ‘I would truly ask you to come out with me if it were not for the work I must do.’

  ‘You’re a scream, Mr Obd! Come on now, like a good man.’

  ‘You would not come out with old Tome Obd? You would not be seen on a black arm?’

  ‘Heavens above, I did not say that for a minute. I can tell you that in my profession–’

  ‘Are you a professional man?’

  ‘Well, woman. You know quite well who I am. I am a medical nurse, Mr Obd.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘I cannot stand here, you know.’

  ‘It is surely a pity you do not have a fellow. Nurse Clock. Does it make you sad to remember that you do not have such. Do you not get sex, Nurse Clock?’

  ‘That will do now. My advice to you is to open up this door and come out immediately.’

  ‘I am on hunger strike. The badman Bird knows that. Ask him why Tome Obd is on hunger strike. Tome Obd must do his duty. Ask the man Bird.’

  ‘Mr Obd, how can anyone do that? Don’t you remember that Mr Bird died?’

  ‘Mr Bird is in this room. I can see Mr Bird. Mr Bird is in golden raiment, smiling upon us. Talk to Mr Bird in your prayers. Surely you say a prayer?’

  ‘You are light-headed for want of food. I have seen all this before. I know it, Mr Obd, you are going to make yourself ill.’

  ‘I am going to die.’

  ‘No, no. Not at all.’

  ‘Was Mr Bird your fellow? Are you sorrowing now that he is in here with me in glory? I often wondered if you had sex with this man Bird. You must cleanse yourself–’

  ‘Mr Obd, that is outrageous. I came up here to help you; all I get is dirty abuse. Take those words back now.’

  ‘Mr Bird knew all the time. “Alas, Tome Obd,” he said. Mr Bird saw to it as soon as he had the golden clothes wrapped round him –’

  ‘Get it into your head, Mr Obd, that Mr Bird is dead. Put away the beer and have some wholesome food. You are doing your constitution no good. It’s terrible to hear you talk so.’

  ‘Mr Bird–’

  ‘Mr Bird is dead and gone. We have put Mr Bird to bed with a shovel.’

  ‘Please not to shout at me. I was here that night, sitting in the lounge-room downstairs. I turned the television off. I did not know that as soon as he entered heaven he would set about my private life–’

  ‘Oh, nonsense.’

  ‘My lady-friend said she would put the police on me. The big Alsatian dogs of your English policemen would gobble old Tome Obd up. Is that what you want, Nurse Clock?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Surely it is so? What better death for an old African? But it is not to be.’

  ‘Of course it is not.’

  ‘Why is it not?’

  ‘Well, naturally, such a thing–’

  ‘I must tell you why it is not. Tome Obd must tell you. His people await Tome Obd with the law, but he in the meanwhile, while the rain rains and the sun beats down on the heads of his people, must tell you now why Alsatian dogs shall surely not tear black flesh from the black bones of old Tome Obd.’

  Nurse Clock was restive. ‘Shall I come in?’ she said. ‘You can eat thi
s up while you tell me the story.’

  ‘Stay where you are! My lady-friend said the police were coming if again I brought her flowers. She handed me my letters, all unread. She had never read a letter Tome Obd wrote in all her life. She had not wished to, those were her words. And in any case she could not read his African handwriting. Do you know how many letters there were?’

  ‘How could I, Mr Obd? How on earth could I know how many letters you have written to your lady-friend?’

  ‘I have been writing letters to my lady-friend for twelve years. She has never read one of them. One thousand two hundred and forty-eight letters. She handed them all back to me, being unable to decipher a single one.’

  ‘Heavens, Mr Obd!’

  ‘Is that not sad indeed?’

  ‘Extraordinary. Your lady-friend–’

  ‘No longer. No longer the lady-friend of Tome Obd. She Is a white lady, you understand, well-born. Babies she shall have by one other man. She said this to me. She said she did not care to receive flowers from the black hands of a faithful man. She did not care for the telephone calls I often made, much of them from this very house, from the coin-box in the back hall. No flowers, no calls, no letters any more. What must Tome Obd do? I asked my ex-lady-friend that and she said she could not know, how could she know, just as you said so a minute ago. Everyone is saying that to the faithful African. “Let us talk this through,” I remarked to my ex-lady-friend and I made to sit myself down. “Find yourself an African girl,” cries she. “Leave me alone, go with an African girl.” Well, I do not like African girls; I do not like their hair. I began to say this, being patient in my explanation. “Go now,” she said. “And if you come again I shall report the matter to the police authorities, citing you as a nuisance.” Then I looked up at the ceiling and I saw Mr Bird with a trumpet, whispering down: “Alas, Tome Obd!”’

  Nurse Clock said nothing. She placed the tray with the fish fingers and the salad and the cup of tea on the floor, and fixed her right eye to the keyhole. She could see nothing because the key was in the lock on the inside. She sighed, and drank the tea.

  ‘Mr Bird is not like that now,’ went on Mr Obd. ‘He who made heaven and earth, He who sits in glory–’

  ‘Shh. That’s enough now. Put away the old beer, or measures will have to be taken about you, Mr Obd. We cannot have all this, you know. Go to sleep for a while, and when you wake up you will feel a better man. Open the door then and join us in the dining-room for breakfast. Nobody shall say a thing.’

  ‘Nurse Clock, why do you keep talking about beer?’

  She sighed. Once she had seen a man with delirium tremens; on television recently she had seen men and women who drank methylated spirits.

  ‘You are not drinking methylated spirits?’ she called through the door.

  ‘Tome Obd is going to burn you all in your beds,’ he replied.

  24

  Studdy left The Boarding-House at eleven o’clock, banging the hall-door loudly behind him. He walked with a jaunty step, moving a little faster than usual because the tang of the air suggested it. A cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth and his face was newly shaven. ‘That’s a great day,’ he remarked to a passing postman, and the postman agreeably acknowledged the observation.

  He made his way from Jubilee Road to Peterloo Avenue, down to where the shops were, where all the local business was transacted. He passed the Jasmine Café and paused to watch the Misses Gregory placing trays of iced cakes in the window. He passed the corner public house where Mrs le Tor and Major Eele had repaired to that night, and later he approached and did not pass the public house he himself frequented.

  ‘That’s a great day,’ said Studdy, sitting down at a small table and glancing about to see if there was a newspaper anywhere. ‘A bottle of Guinness’s stout,’ he added.

  On that morning, September 22nd, Studdy drank by himself and passed the time of day with the barman, and later complained to the landlord of the barman’s insolence. He had intended to walk a little farther, to make arrangements with a decorator about the painting of the attic room, but the matter slipped his mind and when he returned to The Boarding-House he had achieved only the exercising of his limbs and the purchase and consumption of a pint and a half of stout.

  Later, in the dining-room of The Boarding-House, Studdy sat down to a mutton stew and afterwards was served with stewed apple and pale baked custard. He called Gallelty to his table and spoke to her about the stewed apples, saying that there were stalks in them. ‘Mr Studdy complains about the stalks,’ she reported to Mrs Slape. ‘Cloves,’ said Mrs Slape. Tell him to leave them on the side of his plate.’ But Studdy had consumed the cloves and sent an order to Mrs Slape that apples in future were to be presented without them.

  ‘Stalks in the stewed apple,’ said Studdy conversationally to Nurse Clock as he left the dining-room.

  She smiled with sweetness at him, thinking what a scandalous man he was, noting the mark that had remained on her tablecloth because in passing he had leaned a knuckle on it. Nurse Clock drank an after-lunch cup of tea and felt, more or less, at peace with the world.

  That morning, while Studdy had been drinking, while Nurse Clock had been apologizing to Mrs Maylam because of the bluntness of her hypodermic needle, Mr Obd had come out of his room. He had gone straight to the kitchen and had asked for an egg, which he had eaten at the kitchen table, whipped up in a cup of milk. Afterwards he had eaten mutton stew and stewed apple and had behaved quite normally, sitting quietly.

  Late that afternoon Studdy was standing in the hall reading a notice that had recently been put through the letter-box. ‘By dad, what’s this?’ he said, looking at the strange message: The Rainbow Men are in your district! ‘Here’s an invasion from Mars,’ said Studdy to himself, and he chuckled loudly.

  He was about to set out for his second walk, again intending to visit the decorator. ‘The Rainbow Men,’ he said to Mr Obd, who happened to be entering the house; and then, seeing a parcel in Mr Obd’s arms, he asked: ‘What have you got there?’

  ‘Fire-lighters,’ said Mr Obd.

  ‘Sit down, Mr Studdy,’ said Nurse Clock, pointing to the chair beneath the coloured portrait of the Queen.

  ‘Her Majesty,’ said Studdy, looking up at it.

  ‘This is an awkward thing. I hardly know how to put it.’

  Studdy took from a pocket the machine with which he rolled cigarettes and charged it with shreds of tobacco and a piece of paper. Nurse Clock watched him. When he had completed the operation and held in his hand a creased and untidy tube, she said:

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t smoke in here if you wouldn’t mind.’

  Studdy looked at the completed cigarette. He lifted it slowly through the air, towards his head, and placed it behind an ear.

  ‘What can I do for you, missus?’

  ‘I will put it plainly: you have been writing letters, Mr Studdy.’

  ‘Letters home. Oh, definitely.’

  ‘In particular to Mrs le Tor.’

  ‘Mrs Tor.’

  ‘You wrote a threatening letter to Mrs le Tor.’

  ‘I know no one of that name. What’s come over you. Nurse?’

  ‘Did you ever know a Mrs Rush, then? A woman who used to bring Meals on Wheels to Mrs Maylam?’

  ‘How’s Mrs Maylam, Nurse?’

  ‘It’s Mrs Rush and Mrs le Tor I’m talking about. Mrs Maylam is as well as can be expected.’

  ‘That poor old lady.’

  ‘The letters are now in the hands of the police. A letter to Mrs le Tor, libellous in nature–’

  ‘I know no Mrs Tor,’

  ‘You wrote her letters, saying to come to The Boarding-House, and later accusing her of intentions because she came. You are always writing letters to anyone who comes into your head. I have you taped, Mr Studdy.’

  ‘We are partners. Nurse. We came to an agreement.’

  Nurse Clock laughed. Studdy said:

  ‘What are you laughing at?’


  ‘You’d never do a hand’s turn, Mr Studdy. You know that. You’d only be an encumbrance.’

  ‘This house is mine. Nurse. I have a half share. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Are you trying to pick a quarrel with me?’

  ‘I am giving you the facts, Studdy, so that you can hop it. Who wants a black maria drawn up outside the windows?’

  ‘I think you’ve been drinking spirits.’

  Studdy extended his head and sniffed the air around Nurse Clock’s face. ‘That’s disgraceful. Nurse, in a woman of your profession. I could report that, you know.’

  ‘You are avoiding the subject. You know quite well I have not been drinking anything. What about these women now?’

  ‘What women is it? Good night now, Nurse Clock.’

  ‘Stay where you are.’ She jumped to her feet and pointed a finger at him. ‘Your salvation is in my hands. Leave this house this instant minute and never again shall you hear a single word about your evil ways and blackmailing past. Mrs Sell wood,’ added Nurse Clock, guessing again.

  ‘Mrs Sell wood? Who’s she?’

  ‘A victim, Studdy. The police have the files laid out before them. The net is closing in. I have it from a desk sergeant: you’ll get fifteen years.’

  ‘You have betrayed me, Nurse Clock.’

  When she heard these words she felt a thrill of accomplishment. She knew then that she had triumphed, that The Boarding-House washers, that Studdy would go and would not ever return, that the aged would take their ease in the back garden, sunning themselves in the afternoon warmth.

  ‘Betrayed you? Well, that’s a funny thing to say.’

  ‘You are sub-human.’

  ‘Manners,’ said Nurse Clock, and laughed.

  For a moment there was silence in the little room. A clock ticked lightly by the bed and Studdy’s eyes were drawn to it. They later fell upon the piece of stone on the mantelshelf, under its small glass dome. ‘From the Garden of Gethsemane,’ said Nurse Clock.