I Shall Not Want

by Norman Collins

  “Thanks be to God for saving me,” he was repeating over and over again. “Thanks be to God for saving me.”

  And as he said it, he was aware that the presence—compound of the Reverend Ephraim Sturger, Eliud Tuke and the great Jehovah of old—was still with him.

  Still with him, and probably always would be.

  Chapter XXXI

  The Opening sale was over ; and the January Sale, too. The windows were discreet and dignified again. There were no more balloons and no free teas. But nevertheless John Marco Limited was still full. For a whole-mile radius around Tredegar Terrace every woman who set out with the light of purchase in her eye turned instinctively in the direction of this mammoth monument of temptation.

  And then came away flattered and gratified. Simply to step into the central hall with its brass work and its galleries was to enjoy life on a larger scale. There was intoxication in it. The bright canary-coloured paper in which the parcels were wrapped, the bright canary-coloured vans which delivered the stuff, and the two page boys in their bright canary-coloured uniform, at the main entrance—they were a later idea of John Marco’s: he blamed himself bitterly for not having had them there for the opening ceremony—all added to the gaiety of the thing and made the spending of money seem fun, and not something serious. Everything about the place was so wantonly luxurious that it made even quite frugal, economical little women wanton and luxurious, too.

  Not, of course, that the shop was cheap to run like that. The yellow vans, the coach-builder had pointed out, would have to be re-painted every twelve months; and the two dwarfish page boys had to change their costumes as often as a diplomat, even though Mr. Hackbridge had instructed them to spread a sheet of newspaper beneath them before they sat down anywhere.

  There were other extravagances, too; extravagances that shocked the lean heart of Mr. Skewin and the acid eye of Mr. Lyman in the Counting House. There was the Floristry Department, for example. It occupied one entire bay in the ground floor, like a gaudy, scented sub-colony of Kew. John Marco would not have it filled with chrysanthemums and marguerites and bunches of corn flowers that people could afford to buy. Flowers like that, he argued, could be bought at any street corner. Instead, there were sprays of white lilac out of season, and hot-house mimosa, and orchids that were like sin set in a vase. And naturally half the stock was left unsold every night. It had to be carried away by the bucketful to be disposed of to the staff, and to anyone else who would buy it, at the sheerest rubbish prices. John Marco knew all about this of course. He had a daily report from all the departments put onto his desk at nine o’clock every morning, and it was always the Floristry that was on the wrong side of the sheet. And on the fourth or fifth occasion on which Mr. Lyman’s long, thin finger hovered over the Floristry deficit John Marco only laughed at him.

  “Put the whole thing down to advertising,” he said. “That’s what it is really. Brings the women in. That’s what’s wrong with men like you, Lyman. You don’t understand women: you’ve got no experience of them.”

  And Mr. Lyman, who had four daughters and supported his wife’s sister as well, smiled obediently and said, “Quite so, sir.”

  But the daily reports were not John Marco’s only contact with the business. There was his regular morning tour as well. This began at ten-thirty, as soon as the morning’s post had been gone through, and even during those early months it had already assumed a kind of awful significance, like a Captain’s inspection on a ship. The sight of John Marco, with Mr. Hackbridge walking beside him like an adjutant, was one of the alarms of living; after he had passed, the assistants began behaving like human beings again.

  It was on one of these occasions as he was entering the Millinery Saloon, with his shop manager pounding heavily after him across the thick, pile carpet, that he saw Eve Harlow again. She was very different by now from the girl whom Mr. Hackbridge had enjoyed bullying in those early days when he had been engaging staff. Her dark hair was now piled high on top of her head like a fashionable lady’s. And her dress was smarter. She had somehow contrived to make herself a woman about town on fifteen shillings a week. He stood there looking at her and wondered how it was that he had not noticed her before: she had been working for him for over six months and during that time he had never thought of her apart from the eighty or ninety other identical young ladies who streamed into the shop at eight forty-five every morning making it a seraglio, and out of it again at seven-fifteen every night, leaving it like a tomb.

  The department was empty at that moment—hats are not the kind of things that are bought in a rush as soon as the stores are open—and, as he watched, he saw Eve Harlow, this assistant from another department, go up to one of the models marked “Exclusive”—it was a piece of black velvet nonsense for which they were asking two guineas—and take it down from the bright nickel stand where it was hanging. She held it for a moment in her hand, and then, going over to the mirror on the table opposite, she arranged her hair first this way and then that and finally set the hat on top of it, standing there admiring herself like a lady in front of her own dressing-table.

  Mr. Hackbridge was only half a pace behind John Marco, but when he saw what was happening he thrust out his chin and stepped forward.

  “Disgryceful!” he said. “Disgryceful!”

  But John Marco raised his hand and stopped him. He wanted that picture in the mirror in front of him to remain. The small body leaning forwards, the arms that were still lifted to the head, the slim neck over the black silk dress, the pre-occupation and eagerness of it all, fascinated him. The abandoned wickedness of trying on one of the firm’s hats was nothing less than sheer revolution; but somehow the way in which she was doing it was at once feminine and desirable. It reminded him again how womanless his own life seemed sentenced to be.

  Then, still with that ridiculous, expensive hat perched on her head, the girl glanced round for an instant, and saw John Marco standing there. She did not move, and the three of them stood looking at each other. It was John Marco who spoke first. He said something to Mr. Hackbridge and then turned and continued his tour of the other departments.

  Mr. Hackbridge advanced majestically towards the girl.

  “Take it off,” he said. “Take it off at once.” He paused deliberately for effect and added quietly but menacingly: “Mr. Marco wants to see you in his office at closing time.”

  He thought of saying something biting as well about what comes of taking on assistants who can’t produce references. But he suppressed the remark. Miss Harlow would understand perfectly well what that kind of summons implied; and it had been rather clever of Mr. Marco to give her the whole day to think about it.

  In any case it was the last two-guinea hat that she was ever likely to handle.

  At seven-fifteen Eve Harlow went slowly up the main staircase and stood outside John Marco’s door. It seemed strange to be doing so when everyone else was going down the staff staircase at the back. And they would all be climbing up that endless flight of cement steps again to-morrow morning; they were all respectable, reliable young ladies who could be trusted.

  She raised a hand that trembled a little and knocked on the door.

  John Marco was standing with his back to the fireplace when she entered. He was holding the catalogue of one of the wholesale firms in his hand.

  “Sit down,” he said, and went on reading.

  Then, when he had finished, he put the catalogue behind him and looked at her. He looked at her so long, in fact, that she stirred a trifle self-consciously. She found herself wishing that he would tell her that she was dismissed and be done with it. But still he went on looking. It was almost as if all the time he were thinking of something else.

  “How old did you say you were?” he asked at last.

  “Nineteen, sir,” she told him.

  Nineteen! That was the age which Mary had been when he had first defied convention and walked home with her. He had been a different man then. He wasn’t even a man at
all any longer, he was a company now, something at the top of note-paper and on the side of vans; and a name in fancy capitals doesn’t have any feelings, any emotions. All that a name like that can think about is growing larger and becoming better-known, more talked-about. And all the time that was happening and his name was growing, there would be these girls of nineteen appearing around him. They would be slight like this one, a little timid and uncertain perhaps; and with a gay taste in hats. And he would have to stand back and watch them as they made mistakes and fell in and out of love and finally went off in the arms of other men.

  He turned towards her again and let his eyes run up and down her. She seemed so young, so very young, sitting there; the curve of her cheek, her hands folded in her lap, the small close ears that the upward sweep of her hair disclosed—these were the very spirit and essence of her age.

  “What made you want that hat?” he asked suddenly.

  “I only wanted to see what it looked like,” she replied.

  “And were you satisfied?” he persisted. “Was it worth it?”

  “It was a beautiful hat,” she said simply.

  He paused. The wall between them seemed higher than ever now. It was as though at nineteen she were ageless and would go on being young for ever, while every year that passed would leave his prime receding from him, till finally he hadn’t the strength any longer even to climb the wall and find what lay hidden on the other side.

  He left the fireplace and sat down in the big revolving chair.

  “Would you like to have that hat?” he asked.

  “Why, yes,” she said in surprise.

  “Then you’d better take it,” he said. He was no longer looking at her: he was fiddling with the gold pencil in his hand. “Have it, and wear it Sundays. Wear it when you go out in the Park.”

  To his surprise she did not answer; and when he looked up at her he saw that she was crying. Not noisily and vulgarly; but like a lady, with her handkerchief close up to her eyes concealing it.

  “Thank you,” she said at last.

  He was brusque again by now.

  “Perhaps if you’ve got a nice hat of your own you won’t want to go trying on the firm’s property,” he said.

  “I promise it won’t happen again,” she answered.

  She got up and began to go across the room to the door. But when she reached it, he called her back.

  “Just one moment, Miss Harlow,” he said.

  She turned nervously. Was this then what he had been keeping in store for her? Was he going to dismiss her now that he had made her a present of the detestable hat?

  But what he said was quite different.

  “What do you get paid?” he asked.

  “Fifteen shillings a week, sir,” she answered.

  He paused.

  “Would you like to come out to-night?” he asked. “Somewhere fashionable where people are wearing that kind of hat?”

  ii

  The Criterion when they got there was noisy and vivacious. There was hubbub in the air, and sparkle; and everyone in the place had that gratified, excited feeling that comes of sitting down to dine in the very centre of the world.

  John Marco himself sat at a table in the corner and stared over the cover of the wine-list at his companion.

  She looked younger than ever sitting there; she looked, in fact, the youngest thing in the whole room. By comparison most of the other women seemed just a little faded and full-blown. The woman at the next table was a large-bosomed creature all tangled up in white lace: she was being archly fascinating with a little man who was scarcely more than half her size. And beyond her was a lady with a lot of jewellery and dyed hair, philosophically awaiting the inevitable moment of seduction. John Marco let his eyes wander over them and returned to Miss Harlow.

  “Tell me something about yourself,” he said at last. “Did you always want to go into a shop?”

  He sat back in his chair, twirling the stem of his wineglass between his fingers. He liked watching her: she was so obviously happy and flattered by it all; and because she was happy she was pretty, too—prettier than he had ever imagined. Her hands, resting on the table, were clasped, the fingers laced together; he saw how slender they were, how small. “This is someone,” he found himself saying, “who could occupy me: someone who could drive out my other thoughts.”

  But when she had answered, he realised that he had not been listening: he had been looking at her instead. He had heard snatches of what she had been saying, but no more. There was something about a father who had died while she was still quite little and a sister who had thrown away an expensive training—as what, he could not have heard—to get married to a man who had turned out to be a rotter. And now, he gathered, there was only Eve Harlow left out of the lot of them, and the fifteen shillings a week that John Marco Ltd. gave her was the whole of the claim which she had been able to stake out on life.

  “But how damn silly it is,” he was thinking: “fancy a child with those looks having to spend her time selling petticoats to fat women who want them too tight just to be in fashion.” She would realise one day that she could do better for herself than that. And by then, perhaps, he would have lost her: she would have gone the way of the rest of them.

  Over coffee, he pushed back the table a little way from them and drew his chair closer up to hers. The small lamp in the centre now seemed to separate them from the rest of London: it left the rest of the room dim and undiscovered. They were as isolated as if they had been on a desert island.

  “Aren’t you ever lonely?” he asked. “Just living in the hostel with no home of your own?”

  “Sometimes,” she admitted.

  “And haven’t you got any plans for the future?”

  “Plenty,” she said. “Only they don’t always come out right.”

  “Tell me about them,” he said.

  But the scene around him with the lights and the waiters and the full-blown ladies and the music, and this girl before him, who seemed so young, in the centre of it all, had faded at last and vanished: it had seemed even at the time too good to continue. They had parted politely at the steps of the hostel, and he had given himself back to the shop again with its sales reports and its special display programmes and its tours of inspection. And then ten days later they were back at the Criterion again, at this same table with the same waiter bending over them and the orchestra playing the same pieces. During the interval they had scarcely spoken; but already they were strangers no more. His hand rested longer than it need have done on her shoulder as he helped her out of her coat, and they caught one another’s eye and smiled back at each other.

  And then that meal, too, slid into limbo and was lost; and once more his life revolved around Mr. Hackbridge and Mr. Lyman and Mr. Skewin. But these dinners together were more frequent now; they were what he lived for. Whenever he was not working, it seemed that he was looking over the top of a wine-glass at his companion.

  It was one evening scarcely a month after their first visit to the Criterion as the band was playing just loud enough to drown other conversation than he leant forward and addressed his companion.

  “You knew I was married, didn’t you?” he said.

  She nodded.

  “How did you know?” he asked.

  “They all know at the shop,” she answered.

  He paused.

  “And do you mind?”

  This time it was Miss Harlow who paused.

  “No,” she said quietly.

  But the brightness and liveliness had gone from her face as she spoke.

  “I thought you’d say that,” he said.

  He put his hand over her clasped ones. But her hands, he noticed, felt cold; and after a moment she withdrew them. She sat back without looking at him and began scratching aimless, idle designs on the table cloth with her finger.

  Then, because she was silent, he bent forward still closer.

  “Are you afraid of what people will say?” he asked.


  She shook her head.

  “It’s not that,” she answered.

  “Then what is it?”

  “I don’t know,” she replied. “It’s only . . . only I wanted things to go on just as they were.”

  “But they couldn’t,” he told her. “Don’t you ever think of what I feel like every time you leave me?”

  “I know,” she said. “You needn’t tell me.”

  His eyes were fixed on her now. He saw nothing but the white forehead with the dark shining hair rising above it and the shadowy lines which her eyelashes made against her cheek: her own eyes were still lowered. She had avoided his gaze ever since he had spoken.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said suddenly. “Let’s go somewhere we can talk properly.”

  iii

  It was beneath the silver bow of Eros that they got into a hansom together, and began to drive through the faint blue haze that had descended. The lights of Piccadilly shone out in front of them like the illuminations at a fair, and the pavements were as thronged with people as if a procession were expected. It was one of those moments of early night-time when all cities are beautiful and London itself becomes something ready to dissolve before the sight. A guardsman in red uniform at a street corner was like a figure stuck there by a ballet-master.

  John Marco put his arms round her shoulders and drew her to him.

  “Do you know,” he said, almost under his breath, “I think this is the first time in my life that I’ve ever really got what I wanted?”

  They did not say much, however; and he was content to sit there with all London at his feet. It was not until they had reached the park and were moving along under the shadow of the trees that she spoke to him. She gave a forced little laugh.

  “It’s funny the way things happen,” she said. “Do you know I nearly got married myself three months ago?”