Dear Frank,
thank you for your welcome letter and for Dickie’s keep all of which I received safe and for which I thank you, I was sorry to hear of the loss of your visit. I do not think I would have known either what to do if I had received a visit like that in a wrong name, but “all’s well that ends well” and “who knows” but that you may have the luck of another visit sooner than you think seeing that Megan will not be able to go much longer, I will be at home Wednesday if you would care to come but Johnny has wrote me that Evie is not to be taken out of this house until he comes to fetch her himself so I don’t think you will be able to take her, and perhaps its as well seeing she is so tiresome at times. The weather is more settled now isn’t it, it looks as though summer has come at last.
So here it was!
Dear Millie,
I’m sorry, but I really must have an explanation of your letter. Am I to understand that I am no longer allowed to take Evie out at all? If that is what Johnny is now saying, then he has changed his mind, for not long ago he wished me to take her as you know. If I am now forbidden to take her there must be a reason for it, and I must know the reason. It sounds as though I am no longer trusted. Am I no longer trusted? Your letter makes me very uncomfortable.
Dear Frank,
I cannot for the life of me understand, why it is that you, all of a sudden, have taken such an interest in Evie, and I would not like to be bad friends with you or you to take any offense with this letter, but I must say that the sooner you lose that interest, the better our friendship will be. In fact I don’t see what it has to do with you, as Tom and I keep and feed her and she gets taken out now of an evening, and as she was left in my care I am responsible for her.
As soon as I received this letter I flew down to Megan. Little Rita and her terrible twin-sister Gwen, weekending from Cardiff, were sitting on the steps in the sunshine whispering together over some pebbles they had laid out between them. Absorbed in their sorcery they did not look up. Megan opened the door.
“You were quite right!” I exclaimed, as I followed her into the front room. “They won’t let me take Evie out at all now!” I flourished the letters in her face. “Not at all! Millie says that Johnny’s written her to say that neither I nor anyone else may take her out of the house until he fetches her himself. I don’t believe a word of it! He never said such a thing, did he?”
“I don’t know,” said Megan, gaping at me.
“You don’t know! You must know! Did he ever say such a thing to you?”
“He never said it to me, but he might have said it to them.”
“But why? Why? What for?”
“So as not to upset them, perhaps,” said Megan dimly.
“Upset them!” I shouted. “All this bosh about not upsetting people! He’s not to be upset! They’re not to be upset! The only one who doesn’t matter is the poor bloody dog! What happens to her is of no consequence, I suppose?” Megan goggled at me. “But I don’t believe it! I don’t believe Johnny ever said such a thing! I don’t believe they had a letter from him at all!”
“Yes, they had a letter, because they told me so when I was up there last Sunday. But they never showed it me.”
I glared at her.
“You were up there! What did they say?”
“They never said nothing.”
“They must have said something.”
“No, they never said nothing.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! Did you all sit there like mutes?”
“They never said nothing,” Megan chanted.
“Do you mean the subject never came up at all? Not even about Johnny’s refusal to sell her?”
“No, they never said nothing so I never said nothing.”
My head was spinning round.
“Did you see Evie?”
“Yes, I saw her.”
My voice broke a little as I asked:
“How was she?”
“She was all right.”
“And nothing was said about her or me at all?”
“No.”
I gave it up.
“Look here,” I said. “When are you going to see Johnny again?”
“It’ll be about a fortnight before the next visit comes.”
“Can’t you ask for an earlier one on compassionate grounds? I want to go with you.”
“I’ve just had one. They wouldn’t give me another so soon.”
I stared at her.
“Do you mean you’ve been again since I last saw you?”
“Yes, I went yesterday.”
“I see.” Beyond her shoulder, through a gap in the rep curtains, the two children were visible crouched together like witches over their pebbles on the sunlit doorstep. I brought my terrified gaze back to her with an effort. “Well, I must really ask to go with you on the next official visit. It’s essential for me to see Johnny now.”
“They said they was coming next time.”
“The beasts!”
Megan studied me silently. Then she said:
“What does it all matter? It’s only a dog.”
For a moment I gazed at her speechlessly.
“Even a dog has a right to its life.”
“There are more important things to think about.”
She meant, presumably, the infant forming in her belly. I picked up my hat and walked out of the house without another word.
It was the loveliest spring. Day after day dawned the serenest, sweetest unclouded blue, and going to and from my work I thought constantly of Evie shut up in the Winders’ back yard. Indeed, I thought of nothing else; it weighed upon my heart like some settled sorrow, and the very beauty of the weather, this springing time of the year, wrung me the more. I recalled her bright face, so eager and so gay, with the flying bird on its forehead, and the communicative looks she had fastened upon me. I remembered the strange game she had played with me in my flat and, with a pang, the last I had seen of her as she slunk, in that abject way, into the Winders’ scullery. That she had relied upon me I felt sure. That she was awaiting my return I had no doubt at all. I knew that she loved me and listened for me, that whenever a knock came at the door her tall, shell-like ears strained forward with the hope “Is it he?” Impotent rages shook me, and my mind was ceaselessly engaged in retracing the steps that had led to this impasse and seeking ways of recovery or revenge. How deeply I now regretted having sent Millie her month’s money! Well, she would get no more and we would see then where the shoe pinched! On the other hand I also regretted not having sent Johnny that five pounds he had wanted weeks ago for his tobacco; if it had opened up communication between us it might have been worthwhile, for I still found it hard to believe that he really understood what was going on, or that, if I had managed to tell him myself, I should have failed to convince him. Could I not get at him somehow with my version of the story? Books seemed to reach him; what if I sent him one and slipped a letter in? Even if it fell into official hands it could not matter. . . . I did this and, copying out the letter, posted it to him separately also as another of those unofficial communications that might or might not get through. And the beautiful days slid silently by. . . . How could I get even with Tom? Why not put the R.S.P.C.A. on to him, as I had threatened to do? He would not like that! I hovered indecisively over the telephone for some days; then I rang the Society and spoke to an Inspector. I explained the circumstances of the case and asked if there were grounds for interference. Certainly, said he; what was the name and address? But I did not give it. I knew I could not. I told myself that to draw official attention to Evie might do her more harm than good; but the truth was that I feared that nothing of whatever I hoped for from Johnny’s promises for the future could survive such an act. Nevertheless it was with a feeling of consolation that I put the receiver down, as though I had taken upon life itself a subtle revenge.
And then the most delightful idea occurred to me, and my imagination played happily with it for some days. I would steal the dog! It was perfe
ctly easy. They were all going off to see Johnny on the next visit; Evie would be alone in the house. What sweeter time to take her from them than when they were enjoying the happiness denied to me! There was that unused, dustbin-cluttered pathway at the back, the flimsy wooden gate . . . . When dusk fell—for they always made a day of such expeditions and would certainly repair to Megan’s for tea on the way home—I could slip in unobserved. Evie would not bark, she would know who it was and fly silently into my arms. What gladness! What delight! Even if she were in the house, the scullery door-latch would present no difficulty. Then I would loosen and move a stake in the fence to make it appear that the imprisoned animal had broken out and away at last. Returning from their selfish pleasures and their schemings against me they would find her gone! And they could never know. They would suspect, but they could prove nothing. I would stow her away somewhere in the country and visit her—aye, visit her at any rate!—whenever I liked. . . . Or join Johnny in Wormwood Scrubs, my imagination added, which would surely be to gain my ends in another way, for it would give me that access to him that I had so long lost, so long desired. This thought afforded me a certain ironic amusement and, recollecting my indignation over his remark about my cousin, I reflected that there wasn’t, after all, much to choose between us; he was a crook in fact and I was a crook at heart: in my case the courage was wanting. . . .
Thereafter, amid these shifting images of love and hatred, a kind of lassitude fell upon me. I forced myself away on a week’s holiday and derived benefit from it. I began to forget. The thought of Evie troubled me less and less, was more easily shrugged off; the obligation under which, it seemed to me, she had put me lost its strength. May passed, June got under way; I thought of her now scarcely at all, only when distasteful reminders called up the fading grief. Millie wrote from time to time, at first with a naïve pretense that my unresponsiveness—for I answered nothing—was accidental; then with an equally naïve request for explanation; then with reproaches for once again breaking my promises. The shoe pinches! I thought callously. Towards the end of June she capitulated; since she could no longer afford to keep Dickie she would have to give in (“how you will laugh”) and let me have Evie after all (“but I hope that this time you will keep your word and return her at the end of a week”). I had won. But I no longer wanted my victory. I no longer wanted the dog. I no longer wanted anything. The letter was easily found fault with: “Still bargaining with me . . . . still suggesting that I don’t know how to behave. . . . she’ll have to send Dickie back now and serve her right . . . . it’ll be parting with Johnny for the second time . . . . perhaps she’ll understand now what parting with him meant to me. . . .” Later on the “lady upstairs” phoned to say that Megan was going into hospital. She could have gone into the morgue for all I cared. And then I received an official visit to Johnny. Megan’s pupping, I thought. He can spare me a moment now. I won’t go! But I did.
It was a curious thing, but the moment his neat, light figure came into the room where we were all waiting, I experienced again the sensation which the sight of him managed so often to convey, of being somehow or other at fault. As I watched him standing there, searching about with his beautiful eyes, and tasted silently, though for no more than a few beats of the pulse, the happiness of being singled out by him; as I waited quietly until the eyes found their mark, and the light of recognition sprang, and the lips moved in a slight intimate smile, and then there he was, bearing down upon me with his springing gait, I felt strangely abashed and confused, so that long though I had sought and planned for this interview, I found myself with nothing whatever to say, only:
“Johnny.”
He sat down opposite me at the end of the long table.
“’Ow ’ave you been keeping, Frank?”
“All right. And you?”
He made a grimace.
“Browned off! I’m well in meself though.” Then, almost at once:
“’Ave you seen ’er lately, Frank?”
In the momentary doubt that this question posed, I recollected the confusion over identities that had occurred during our interview in the police station cell; but looking now at his rather pale and puffy face with the shadows beneath the eyes, I understood to whom he referred and that I had failed in a duty.
“No, Johnny, I haven’t.”
“I just wondered. I’ve ’ad a letter from ’er, but not for three days.”
“How was she?”
“Oh, she was doing well, she said. It was another boy, you know. They say ’e’s smashing, the nurses and that. She’s going to ’ave ’is photo took as soon as she can and send it to me. I mean to ’ave ’im christened ‘Frank.’”
“Oh thank you, Johnny. That’ll be fine.” He began to gnaw at his thumb. He had very well-shaped hands, slender yet strong, and I noticed that the nails, which he had always tended to bite, had been eaten down to the quicks. “I’m sorry, Johnny. It was careless of me. I ought to have asked after her before I came. I didn’t think.”
“It don’t matter. Only I was expecting another letter and—you know ’ow it is—you get thinking in a cowson of a place like this.”
“It must have been a worry for you, being shut up at such a time.”
“I done me nut. I applied for permission to go and see ’er, and you’d think they’d grant you a thing like that, now wouldn’t you? But, ah they’d shit ’emselves, the bastards, before they’d do anything for you!” His face was improved by the flush of this momentary choler. Megan had been granted extra visits whenever she’d asked for them; “they” did not seem to me to have behaved too badly; but I did not say so, for I did not wish to talk about Megan.
“I expect she’s all right,” I said easily.
“I expect so.”
I smiled at him.
“Well, here we are at last, Johnny. I’m pleased to see you.”
“I’m pleased to see you too, Frank.” The response was instant and warm. “And I’m sorry not to ’ave seen you before. It wasn’t that I didn’t think of you, because I did. I’ve thought of you a lot in ’ere and all what you’ve done for me. But I ’ad to try to please everyone and I couldn’t do no more than that. I done me best.”
I nodded. He was perfectly sincere, and sitting there, face to face with him, I had no desire at all, when the words fell between us, to pick any of them up. He had had his shots at me; what did it matter whether they came from the right hand or the left? I could not even remember clearly now what it was that had upset me so much, and I had an uncomfortable feeling—the sight of him conveyed it—that there was something in all this that I had missed, other realities besides my own. Now that I was with him at last, I found it difficult, even distasteful, to recall what my own reality had been.
“I’m afraid I let you down badly over that other visit.”
“It don’t matter.”
“You must have been wild with me.”
“Well, I was a bit mad at first. I thought you’d understand, see? But I’ve forgot about it now.”
“Was it very awkward?”
He grinned.
“Well, it took us by surprise, if you know what I mean. When the Governor sent for us we knew we was in for something, but we didn’t know what. I thought of a lot of things, but I never thought of that. It come back on us too quick, see? That’s where it was.”
“Yes, I fairly shot it back, I’m afraid.”
“You did an’ all!” said Johnny.
“You must have thought me a proper bloody fool.”
“That’s all right,” said he kindly. “You wasn’t to know. I saw that afterwards. Where it is, you’re always on the fiddle in ’ere, and after a bit you see everything like that, as a fiddle, and so you get to think that everyone else must see things the same way as you do.” I nodded. Then I nodded more vigorously. It was, indeed, a profound truth, and the very one that had been troubling my own mind. “I wouldn’t ’ave minded for meself, but there was me mate too. You see ’e never wanted to s
ell me the visit, ‘e was windy, but I swore it was safe and that nothing could ’appen—well, I didn’t think nothing could. So it looked bad for me, like as if I’d grassed ’im.”
“Yes, I see. Did he get into trouble?”
“No, but ’e didn’t ’alf piss ’isself.”
“How did you get out of it?”
“It was me luck. I said the first thing what come into me nut and it turned out good.”
“And what came into your nut?” I asked smiling.
“Oh, I said I was sorry for ’im ’avin’ no one to visit ’im, so I give ’im your name and address on the chance you’d come.”
“And what did the Governor say?”
“ ’E arst ’oo you was, and I said you was a good-’earted old geezer as took an interest in charity and ’elping people. I said you was known to me relatives and was always gaspin’ to do something for me.”
“And he swallowed that?” Indeed, I thought, looking at his charming, open, boyish face, who could have helped it—or at any rate have failed to welcome a reasonable excuse to probe no further?
“Well, ’e didn’t like it, but ’e couldn’t do nothing else, could ’e? After all, it might ’ave been.”
“Why, yes,” I said thoughtfully. “It already covers a number of facts.”
A momentary silence fell between us.
“ ’ave you seen Mum lately, Frank?”
“I’m afraid we’ve fallen out, Johnny.”
“Yes, I was sorry to ’ear that. She told me last time she come.”
“What did she say?” I asked incuriously.
“About you keeping Evie longer than you said and ’er flyin’ off the ’andle.”
“Well, that covers a few facts too,” I remarked with a smile.
“Where it is,” said he gently, “you made things a bit awkward for ’er, see? She ’as to live with Tom and you made things a bit awkward. That’s where it is.”
We Think the World of You Page 12
