The Penguin Book of the British Short Story

by Philip Hensher

  ‘It needs an answer. Ten words prepaid.’

  Then it couldn’t be a New Year’s greeting. Her heart stopped beating. It could only mean one thing; her shop had been burned to the ground. She jumped out of bed.

  ‘Slip it under the door and I’ll write the answer and slip it back to you.’

  The envelope was pushed under the door and as it appeared on the carpet it had really a sinister look. Miss Reid snatched it up and tore the envelope open. The words swam before her eyes and she couldn’t for a moment find her spectacles. This is what she read:

  ‘Happy New Year. Stop. Peace and goodwill to all men. Stop. You are very beautiful. Stop. I love you. Stop. I must speak to you. Stop. Signed: Radio-Operator.’

  Miss Reid read this through twice. Then she slowly took off her spectacles and hid them under a scarf. She opened the door.

  ‘Come in,’ she said.

  Next day was New Year’s Eve. The officers were cheerful and a little sentimental when they sat down to dinner. The stewards had decorated the saloon with tropical creepers to make up for holly and mistletoe, and the Christmas tree stood on a table with the candles ready to be lit at supper time. Miss Reid did not come in till the officers were seated, and when they bade her good morning she did not speak but merely bowed. They looked at her curiously. She ate a good dinner, but uttered never a word. Her silence was uncanny. At last the captain could stand it no longer, and he said:

  ‘You’re very quiet today, Miss Reid.’

  ‘I’m thinking,’ she remarked.

  ‘And will you not tell us your thoughts, Miss Reid?’ the doctor asked playfully.

  She gave him a cool, you might almost have called it a supercilious, look.

  ‘I prefer to keep them to myself, Doctor. I will have a little more of that hash, I’ve got a very good appetite.’

  They finished the meal in a blessed silence. The captain heaved a sigh of relief. That was what meal-time was for, to eat, not to chatter. When they had finished he went up to the doctor and wrung his hand.

  ‘Something has happened, Doctor.’

  ‘It has happened. She’s a changed woman.’

  ‘But will it last?’

  ‘One can only hope for the best.’

  Miss Reid put on an evening dress for the evening’s celebration, a very quiet black dress, with artificial roses at her bosom and a long string of imitation jade round her neck. The lights were dimmed and the candles on the Christmas tree were lit. It felt a little like being in church. The junior officers were supping in the saloon that evening and they looked very smart in their white uniforms. Champagne was served at the company’s expense and after supper they had a Maibowle. They pulled crackers. They sang songs to the gramophone, Deutschland, Deutschland über Alles, Alt Heidelberg, and Auld Lang Syne. They shouted out the tunes lustily, the captain’s voice rising loud above the others, and Miss Reid joining in with a pleasing contralto. The doctor noticed that Miss Reid’s eyes from time to time rested on the radio-operator, and in them he read an expression of some bewilderment.

  ‘He’s good-looking fellow, isn’t he?’ said the doctor.

  Miss Reid turned round and looked at the doctor coolly.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The radio-operator. I thought you were looking at him.’

  ‘Which is he?’

  ‘The duplicity of women,’ the doctor muttered, but with a smile he answered: ‘He’s sitting next to the chief engineer.’

  ‘Oh, of course, I recognize him now. You know, I never think it matters what a man looks like. I’m so much more interested in a man’s brains than in his looks.’

  ‘Ah,’ said the doctor.

  They all got a little tight, including Miss Reid, but she did not lose her dignity and when she bade them good night it was in her best manner.

  ‘I’ve had a very delightful evening. I shall never forget my New Year’s Eve on a German boat. It’s been very interesting. Quite an experience.’

  She walked steadily to the door, and this was something of a triumph, for she had drunk drink for drink with the rest of them through the evening.

  They were all somewhat jaded next day. When the captain, the mate, the doctor, and the chief engineer came down to dinner they found Miss Reid already seated. Before each place was a small parcel tied up in pink ribbon. On each was written: Happy New Year. They gave Miss Reid a questioning glance.

  ‘You’ve all been so very kind to me I thought I’d like to give each of you a little present. There wasn’t much choice at Port au Prince, so you mustn’t expect too much.’

  There was a pair of briar pipes for the captain, half a dozen silk handkerchiefs for the doctor, a cigar-case for the mate, and a couple of ties for the chief engineer. They had dinner and Miss Reid retired to her cabin to rest. The officers looked at one another uncomfortably. The mate fiddled with the cigar-case she had given him.

  ‘I’m a little ashamed of myself,’ he said at last.

  The captain was pensive and it was plain that he too was a trifle uneasy.

  ‘I wonder if we ought to have played that trick on Miss Reid,’ he said. ‘She’s a good old soul and she’s not rich; she’s a woman who earns her own living. She must have spent the best part of a hundred marks on these presents. I almost wish we’d left her alone.’

  The doctor shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘You wanted her silenced and I’ve silenced her.’

  ‘When all’s said and done, it wouldn’t have hurt us to listen to her chatter for three weeks more,’ said the mate.

  ‘I’m not happy about her,’ added the captain. ‘I feel there’s something ominous in her quietness.’

  She had spoken hardly a word during the meal they had just shared with her. She seemed hardly to listen to what they said.

  ‘Don’t you think you ought to ask her if she’s feeling quite well, doctor?’ suggested the captain.

  ‘Of course she’s feeling quite well. She’s eating like a wolf. If you want inquiries made you’d much better make them of the radio-operator.’

  ‘You may not be aware of it, Doctor, but I am a man of great delicacy.’

  ‘I am a man of heart myself,’ said the doctor.

  For the rest of the journey those men spoilt Miss Reid outrageously. They treated her with the consideration they would have shown to someone who was convalescent after a long and dangerous illness. Though her appetite was excellent they sought to tempt her with new dishes. The doctor ordered wine and insisted on her sharing his bottle with him. They played dominoes with her. They played chess with her. They played bridge with her. They engaged her in conversation. But there was no doubt about it, though she responded to their advances with politeness, she kept herself to herself. She seemed to regard them with something very like disdain; you might almost have thought that she looked upon those men and their efforts to be amiable as pleasantly ridiculous. She seldom spoke unless spoken to. She read detective stories and at night sat on deck looking at the stars. She lived a life of her own.

  At last the journey drew to its close. They sailed up the English Channel on a still grey day; they sighted land. Miss Reid packed her trunk. At two o’clock in the afternoon they docked at Plymouth. The captain, the mate, and the doctor came along to say good-bye to her.

  ‘Well, Miss Reid,’ said the captain in his jovial way, ‘we’re sorry to lose you, but I suppose you’re glad to be getting home.’

  ‘You’ve been very kind to me, you’ve all been very kind to me, I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve it. I’ve been very happy with you. I shall never forget you.’

  She spoke rather shakily, she tried to smile, but her lips quivered, and tears ran down her cheeks. The captain got very red. He smiled awkwardly.

  ‘May I kiss you, Miss Reid?’

  She was taller than he by half a head. She bent down and he planted a fat kiss on one wet cheek and a fat kiss on the other. She turned to the mate and the doctor. They both kissed her.

  ‘What
an old fool I am,’ she said. ‘Everybody’s so good.’

  She dried her eyes and slowly, in her graceful, rather absurd way, walked down the companion. The captain’s eyes were wet. When she reached the quay she looked up and waved to someone on the boat deck.

  ‘Who’s she waving to?’ asked the captain.

  ‘The radio-operator.’

  Miss Price was waiting on the quay to welcome her. When they had passed the Customs and got rid of Miss Reid’s heavy luggage they went to Miss Price’s house and had an early cup of tea. Miss Reid’s train did not start till five. Miss Price had much to tell Miss Reid.

  ‘But it’s too bad of me to go on like this when you’ve just come home. I’ve been looking forward to hearing all about your journey.’

  ‘I’m afraid there’s not very much to tell.’

  ‘I can’t believe that. Your trip was a success, wasn’t it?’

  ‘A distinct success. It was very nice.’

  ‘And you didn’t mind being with all those Germans?’

  ‘Of course they’re not like English people. One has to get used to their ways. They sometimes do things that – well, that English people wouldn’t do, you know. But I always think that one has to take things as they come.’

  ‘What sort of things do you mean?’

  Miss Reid looked at her friend calmly. Her long, stupid face had a placid look, and Miss Price never noticed that in the eyes was a strangely mischievous twinkle.

  ‘Things of no importance really. Just funny, unexpected, rather nice things. There’s no doubt that travel is a wonderful education.’

  ROALD DAHL

  Someone Like You

  ‘Beer?’

  ‘Yes, beer.’

  I gave the order and the waiter brought the bottles and two glasses. We poured out our own, tipping the glasses and holding the tops of the bottles close to the glass.

  ‘Cheers,’ I said.

  He nodded. We lifted our glasses and drank.

  It was five years since I had seen him, and during that time he had been fighting the war. He had been fighting it right from the beginning up to now and I saw at once how he had changed. From being a young, bouncing boy, he had become someone old and wise and gentle. He had become gentle like a wounded child. He had become old like a tired man of seventy years. He had become so different and he had changed so much that at first it was embarrassing for both of us and it was not easy to know what to say.

  He had been flying in France in the early days and he was in Britain during the Battle. He was in the Western Desert when we had nothing and he was in Greece and Crete. He was in Syria and he was at Habbaniya during the rebellion. He was at Alamein. He had been flying in Sicily and in Italy and then he had gone back and flown again from England. Now he was an old man.

  He was small, not more than five feet six, and he had a pale, wide-open face which did not hide anything, and a sharp pointed chin. His eyes were bright and dark. They were never still unless they were looking into your own. His hair was black and untidy. There was a wisp of it always hanging down over his forehead; he kept pushing it back with his hand.

  For a while we were awkward and did not speak. He was sitting opposite me at the table, leaning forward a little, drawing lines on the dew of the cold beer glass with his finger. He was looking at the glass, pretending to concentrate upon what he was doing, and to me it seemed as though he had something to say, but that he did not know how to say it. I sat there and picked nuts out of the plate and munched them noisily, pretending that I did not care about anything, not even about making a noise while eating.

  Then without stopping his drawing on the glass and without looking up, he said quietly and very slowly, ‘Oh God, I wish I was a waiter or a whore or something.’

  He picked up his glass and drank the beer slowly and all at once, in two swallows. I knew now that there was something on his mind and I knew that he was gathering courage so that he could speak.

  ‘Let’s have another,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, let’s have a whisky.’

  ‘All right, whisky.’

  I ordered two double Scotches and some soda, and we poured the soda into the Scotch and drank. He picked up his glass and drank, put it down, picked it up again and drank some more. As he put down the glass the second time, he leaned forward and quite suddenly he began to talk.

  ‘You know,’ he said, ‘you know I keep thinking during a raid, when we are running over the target, just as we are going to release our bombs, I keep thinking to myself, Shall I just jink a little; shall I swerve a fraction to one side, then my bombs will fall on someone else. I keep thinking, Whom shall I make them fall on; whom shall I kill tonight? Which ten, twenty or a hundred people shall I kill tonight? It is all up to me. And now I think about this every time I go out.’

  He had taken a small nut and was splitting it into pieces with his thumb-nail as he spoke, looking down at what he was doing because he was embarrassed by his own talk.

  He was speaking very slowly. ‘It would just be a gentle pressure with the ball of my foot upon the rudder bar; a pressure so slight that I would hardly know that I was doing it, and it would throw the bombs on to a different house and on to other people. It is all up to me, the whole thing is up to me, and each time that I go out I have to decide which ones shall be killed. I can do it with the gentle pressure of the ball of my foot upon the rudder bar. I can do it so that I don’t even notice that it is being done. I just lean a little to one side because I am shifting my sitting position. That is all I am doing, and then I kill a different lot of people.’

  Now there was no dew left upon the face of the glass, but he was still running the fingers of his right hand up and down the smooth surface.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘it is a complicated thought. It is very far-reaching; and when I am bombing I cannot get it out of my mind. You see it is such a gentle pressure with the ball of the foot; just a touch on the rudder bar and the bomb-aimer wouldn’t even notice. Each time I go out, I say to myself, Shall it be these or shall it be those? Which ones are the worst? Perhaps if I make a little skid to the left I will get a houseful of lousy women-shooting German soldiers, or perhaps if I make that little skid I will miss getting the soldiers and get an old man in a shelter. How can I know? How can anyone know these things?’

  He paused and pushed his empty glass away from him into the middle of the table.

  ‘And so I never jink,’ he added, ‘at least hardly ever.’

  ‘I jinked once,’ I said, ‘ground-strafing. I thought I’d kill the ones on the other side of the road instead.’

  ‘Everybody jinks,’ he said. ‘Shall we have another drink?’

  ‘Yes, let’s have another.’

  I called the waiter and gave the order, and while we were waiting, we sat looking around the room at the other people. The place was starting to fill up because it was about six o’clock and we sat there looking at the people who were coming in. They were standing around looking for tables, sitting down, laughing and ordering drinks.

  ‘Look at that woman,’ I said. ‘The one just sitting down over there.’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘Wonderful figure,’ I said. ‘Wonderful bosom. Look at her bosom.’

  The waiter brought the drinks.

  ‘Did I ever tell you about Stinker?’ he said.

  ‘Stinker who?’

  ‘Stinker Sullivan in Malta.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘About Stinker’s dog?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Stinker had a dog, a great big Alsatian, and he loved that dog as though it was his father and his mother and everything else he had, and the dog loved Stinker. It used to follow him around everywhere he went, and when he went on ops it used to sit on the tarmac outside the hangars waiting for him to come back. It was called Smith. Stinker really loved that dog. He loved it like his mother and he used to talk to it all day long.’

  ‘Lousy whisky,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, let
’s have another.’

  We got some more whisky.

  ‘Well, anyway,’ he went on, ‘one day the squadron got orders to fly to Egypt. We had to go at once; not in two hours or later in the day, but at once. And Stinker couldn’t find his dog. Couldn’t find Smith anywhere. Started running all over the aerodrome yelling for Smith and going mad yelling at everyone asking where he was and yelling, “Smith, Smith,” all over the aerodrome. Smith wasn’t anywhere.’

  ‘Where was he?’ I said.

  ‘He wasn’t there and we had to go. Stinker had to go without Smith and he was mad as a hatter. His crew said he kept calling up over the radio asking if they’d found him. All the way to Heliopolis he kept calling up Malta saying, Have you got Smith, and Malta kept saying, No, they hadn’t.’

  ‘This whisky is really terrible,’ I said.

  ‘Yes. We must have some more.’

  We had a waiter who was very quick.

  ‘I was telling you about Stinker,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, tell me about Stinker.’

  ‘Well, when we got to Egypt he wouldn’t talk about anything except Smith. He used to walk around acting as though the dog was always with him. Damn fool walked around saying, “Come on, Smith, old boy, come on,” and he kept looking down and talking to him as he walked along. Kept reaching down and patting the air and stroking this bloody dog that wasn’t there.’

  ‘Where was it?’

  ‘Malta, I suppose. Must have been in Malta.’

  ‘Isn’t this awful whisky?’

  ‘Terrible. We must have some more when we’ve finished this.’

  ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Cheers.’

  ‘Waiter. Oh, waiter. Yes; again.’

  ‘So Smith was in Malta.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And this damn fool Stinker Sullivan went on like this right up to the time he was killed.’

  ‘Must have been mad.’

  ‘He was. Mad as a hatter. You know once he walked into the Sporting Club at Alexandria at drinking time.’

  ‘That wasn’t so mad.’

  ‘He walked into the big lounge and as he went in he held the door open and started calling his dog. Then when he thought the dog had come in, he closed the door and started walking right down the length of the room, stopping every now and then and looking round and saying, “Come on, Smith, old boy, come on.” He kept flipping his fingers. Once he got down under a table where two men and two women were drinking. He got on to his hands and knees and said, “Smith, come on out of there; come here at once,” and he put out his hand and started dragging nothing at all from under the table. Then he apologized to the people at the table. “This is the hell of a dog,” he said to them. You should have seen their faces. He went on like that all down the room and when he came to the other end he held the door open for the dog to go out and then went out after it.’