"Come in. It's two floors up and away at the back. Not a grand place, but home, don't they say, is where the heart is." He gave a brief humourless guffaw.
Every sense in Geraldine told her to go no further. She hesitated, almost as afraid now to escape as to stay. Outside was the dingy alley again, the narrow unsavoury street, the curious eyes, the leaning figures. Inside were only two curious eyes, and after all, they belonged to the father of Thomas Betts.
As though he read her hesitation, he turned sharply. "Coming?"
There was something rather frightening in that single word. It was not a question so much as a reminder.
"Yes," said Gerry, following him. She added resolutely, "I want to know about Tom."
They were traversing a dark passage now. At the end of it was a door. The man in front of her opened it and went in. After a moment Gerry followed.
The room was incredibly ugly, more like the exaggerated setting on a stage than real life. There was a bare, dirty window, a packing case for a table, a narrow bed with an unwashed rug.
The man was watching her in thin amusement. "Not pretty, is it? Not the sort of place you'd want—for Tom." "You are Tom's father?"
"Yes."
She looked at him quickly, trying not to make it a distasteful look. He was thin and rather rat-like. He had eyes that slid away from your glance, a flaccid chin, an irresolute mouth.
"Not exactly home sweet home," he repeated. Then: "I believe, Miss Prosset, you have taken quite a liking to my Tommy."
"Yes, I am fond of him." She spoke stiffly, hoping he would accept it as formality and not for what it really was —fear.
He was watching her objectively, his eyes narrowed.
"Do you reckon Tommy will like this place?" He waved his arm around him, bringing to her attention again the stained walls, the low ceiling, the cluttered unpalatable air.
He crossed to the window and beckoned her over with a curt nod. With a sick feeling she obeyed the rough gesture. She looked down with him into a labyrinth of alleys similar to this alley, to garbage tins standing drunkenly with their lids half off.
She glanced again to Tom's father. It was apparent he was a little though not very intoxicated. In that look, quick as it was, she gathered that he would be essentially common in taste and gross in appetite. She shivered a little as the realization of what Tom certainly faced in his future struck inwards at her. She knew how difficult it was to part a child from a parent. Discussing the subject of Thomas one night, the Professor had told her as much. "Paternity is a nine-tenth law, Geraldine, it's almost all-powerful. A roof over the head and some food for the stomach and it's hard indeed to part a child from its parent."
But why was Tom not here now, then? She turned away from the tins and asked Betts.
"I've been sick." His voice had achieved a whining note.
"The Child Welfare said they'd mind him for me."
"Yes," said Gerry, still a little puzzled, "he's at Mount
Clifford."
"You've been there?" The question came sharply, shrewdly.
Gerry hesitated. "I was there this afternoon." She added, "Thomas did not mention you."
Except that she was afraid to look at him for more than a second at a time Gerry could almost have believed that there was a flash of relief on his face. She wondered why.
"Poor Tommy," resumed the man's whine, "he knows what he's coming home to. But what else can I provide, Miss? I tell you I've been sick."
"You're better now. Perhaps you'll be able to improve things." She knew her voice sounded hopeless and helpless. She had never felt more hopeless in her life. How could this unsavoury creature improve anything?
"Perhaps I could, too—if I had the money." He looked at her significantly. There was no denying that look.
Suddenly Gerry saw it all, the reason for the letter, the intention behind her visit here.
She saw again the half-drunken state of him She knew in what direction any money he got for Tom would go.
"No," she said firmly, "it could never be made any better." She moved with sudden decision towards the door.
Quick as a flash he was there before her and standing in front of it. "You're right," he said thickly, "it's not a place for a kid and it couldn't be any better, so why not leave him there?"
"Where? Where do you mean?" She looked at the man in confusion.
"At the Home, Miss—with the Welfare—with anyone who wants to take him. I could, if I was treated right, make it very easy. I could say I was still too ill. I could sign myself right off the list as regards young Tom."
"You mean—give him up?"
Again the whine in the voice. "It would be hard, of course—a man's own flesh and blood. But it's him we
have to think about, haven't we, Miss? And you love him, don't you? I saw that in the letters."
"What letters?"
"Tom to his mum. 'Miss Prosset this', 'Miss Prosset that,' he wrote. Or"—seeing a change in her face—"tried to write. You could see the idea in his head."
Geraldine took a deep breath. "Mr. Betts, what is all this?"
The answer, though she knew it before he uttered it, took away her breath. He said harshly, realistically, unemotionally, "I'm giving you a chance to -buy Tom."
"You're mad. I couldn't have him. I—I'm not married."
"A nice girl like you!" For a brief moment the eyes lost the greedy look and were lascivious instead.
Geraldine withdrew a pace, and he grinned.
"You might be one day," he resumed oilily, "and in the meantime he'd be better cared for than in a place like Cowry Lane. I'd like him here, Miss, but you can see for yourself—"
It would have been quicker, thought Gerry drearily, for her to have settled in the beginning for the improvement to the room. Now Betts had gone even further. Failing in his first plan, he wanted a price for his son.
"I have no money," she said a little dully.
"Oh, come now, you've travelled down here especially; you even arrived in a cab; you can't expect me to believe you're dead flat. How much ready have you in that nice little purse?"
The nice little purse was an unbearable weight in her hands. She shifted it slightly and the released fingers felt frozen and numb.
She was trapped. She realized it. She felt like throwing the bag at him if only he would let her out.
"I have my hotel account to pay," she said in agitation, "I have to get back to Galdang."
"How much?" he persisted. "How much is there?" He had advanced a step. In desperation she opened the purse.
In her foolish ignorance she tried to peel off a note from the supply she had brought with her. He laughed thickly at that and, leaning across, took the lot.
"No more? No more pinned to the lining?"
"No—that's all."
"What about yourself? Any secret pockets?"
"No, I tell you. I didn't expect anything like this. I only brought what you've already got."
He must have believed her, for he came no further. Instead, he began counting the notes.
Now she would escape. Quietly but firmly she stepped forward. He allowed her to get as far as putting her hand on the door, then he swung her back.
There was a surprisingly brutish strength in the action, it was there, she thought, in his whole thin, rat-like body. "Not so fast," he said.
"You have my money."
"Yes, but I want to thank you first, Miss Prosset. I want to thank you—with a kiss."
He was near her again now, and coming nearer.
"Didn't think you'd be such a nice looker," he was mumbling thickly, "didn't expect such luck as that. Now I know why he liked you, young Master Tom."
She could smell the staleness of him. It was the same smell as the unsavoury atmosphere, the sickening alley.
As he touched her she put her hand flat against his chest and pushed hard. It was no use, he still kept coming. As the push reeled her back instead of him, he laughed.
Suddenly a
nd hysterically it came to Geraldine that if he touched her a second time he would destroy her. She opened her mouth to scream but his palm went sharply across. "Shut up," he said.
He waited, then added with a thin twist of his lips, "Besides, no one would hear you. It's the only room on this floor that's occupied and it's away at the back. I'll not hurt you. I'm not sticking out my neck, don't worry. All I want is this cash—and that kiss."
Gerry did scream then, whether anyone would hear her or not. She kicked and screamed a second, a third time—then, first below, then hurrying up the steps and turning the corner of the passage, she heard the running footsteps.
They came racing to the door. The door flew open. She had a quick glimpse of a flying figure—then Betts on the floor.
It was not a matched battle, she thought vaguely. The other man was so much bigger, broader. He wasted no time. When he hit he hit hard and he hit only once. Betts shook a dazed head and stayed where he was.
There were others in the room now. Gerry sensed ab-
sently that they must be police-officers. She heard the voice of the first man say, "No questions now, if you don't mind. She's upset."
The same voice asked, "Where is your hotel, Miss Prosset—or is it your aunt's house?"
She knew then that it would be Damien Manning who had come in, who had needed to hit Betts only once.
She told him meekly, still not looking at him.
She followed him meekly down the dark stairs and into a taxi that, narrow lane or not, had been ordered to pull up and wait at the door.
A small crowd had gathered. They eyed her curiously.
"That's her. She's the one who came in the cab. I tipped Stevens was up to something when he stepped out and spoke to her like that."
. . . Stevens?
Gerry corrected to Damien, "No, it was Betts."
He did not answer. He merely shoved her into the cab. It was, she thought painfully, only a trifle gentler than the shove he had given upstairs.
She looked at him tentatively, waiting for him to speak to her. But the fury on his face was so apparent that she was relieved when he did not.
When they arrived at the hotel he took her straight up in the lift and opened her door.
He came in after her, shutting the door behind him. He stood a long time regarding her, his expression in turn concerned, hurt, puzzled, angry.
The anger persisted, however, when the other moods had fled.
"You little fool," he flung, "you colossal idiot! In a way I could almost wish it might have happened."
"What might have happened?" She asked it quiveringly.
He stared down at her, searchingly, probingly, finding in her harassed eyes and trembling lips all the innocence in the world. He felt an unwilling largeness in his heart, an irrevocable tenderness—a reluctant but complete belief in her words.
Leaning across, he took her chin in his palm and tilted her face upward. "Are you serious?" he demanded harshly. Gerry stammered, "Yes."
He stared a while, then, uttering a low oath, he reminded
harshly, "Geraldine, you are not an infant, a child, an adolescent."
"Mr. Manning, what might have happened?"
He paused—it was a long pause—then he answered brutally, "This."
Suddenly and unexpectedly he was straining her to him —all of her—and holding her as she had never been held in her life.
There was a savagery in him, a pagan ruthlessness, he had her so tight that she could feel his quick warm breath.
Then just as suddenly she sensed an intrinsic change in the man . . . a quiet gentleness, an ache somewhere, a hunger, a need for her response.
His fingers slipped away to her sides then held her at arm's length.
Instinctively, she stood there, as the child he said she was might stand, waiting for the kiss.
It did not come. When she looked up she saw a bored detachment in his face that she could not know was only a protective mask.
She swayed a little, but he did not offer a supporting arm. The light he had switched on when they came in seemed to be blinking crazily, the room spinning around.
She closed her eyes on the daze and when she opened them he was gone.
CHAPTER XXIII
GERRY was awakened by the clatter of a breakfast trolley in the corridor. It stopped outside her door; there was a knock and the maid wheeled it in.
There had been no meals required, only the room, and Gerry leaned up on one elbow to tell her this.
"It's all right," smiled the girl, "gentleman in thirty-seven arranged for the service. Said you'd be tired." She looked at Gerry critically.
"Thank you," murmured Gerry, feeling embarrassingly
rested and alert. She watched as the girl transferred the covered dishes to a small table. She saw she was laying it for two.
As soon as the maid departed she jumped out of bed and washed and dressed hastily. She just had time to flick the comb through her hair when Damien came in.
"Up?" he said, surprised. "I quite expected to find you reclining gracefully among pillows, victim of a bad shock."
"I am not shocked and I have no suitable clothes for graceful pillow reclining," returned Gerry.
"No? We must remedy that." He said it carelessly, casually, but Gerry flushed at his use of that plural "we".
"No need to," she flung back just as airily. "I'll have no occasion to wear them."
He was standing at the window looking down on the early morning traffic.
"I think you will," he said.
She looked at him inquiringly, but when he turned, his face wore that protective mask of detachment it had worn last night.
"I'm hungry and thirsty," he stated-banally. "Will you serve and pour?"
She did so rather tremblingly, wishing now she had remained in bed. There at least it did not matter if your limbs were water.
They ate and drank in comparative silence, then, "Finished?" he asked, and when she nodded he put the table to one side and rang the bell.
The maid came back and removed the dishes. Damien talked lightly about the weather till she went.
Taking out his cigarettes, he lit and began to smoke one. He smoked for a few minutes.
"Well?" at last he said.
Gerry made a helpless gesture of inquiry, and impatiently, irritably, he prompted her.
"The explanation of yesterday's episode, of course, Miss Prosset. The why and the wherefore. We'll start right from the beginning. We'll start with that letter from Mr. Betts."
She caught the emphasis on the name and looked up, puzzled.
"Why do you say it like that?"
"Because he is Stevens, not Betts."
"That's what those men in the street said last night"
"They were right."
"Then—then where is Betts?"
Damien took his time as before. He flicked ash into a tray, he adjusted his tie, a cuff-link, then he said laconically, "Betts is dead. Oh, no, no need"—one brow rising at the quick concern on her face—"to look so distressed, my dear Geraldine. It was, I truly believe, an act of God on behalf of young Thomas. Like his friend Stevens, Betts was poor stuff."
"They were companions then?"
"If companionship exists in men of their plane, yes. Perhaps it would be better to say birds of a feather, part of the same cog in a wheel. But why am I doing the talking? This is your explanation. Pray proceed, Miss Prosset. We were up to the time you received that letter. Now go ahead."
"How did Betts die?" interrupted Gerry, not heeding him. "Does Tom know he is an orphan? What will it all mean now?"
Suddenly, she was aware of a pain in her wrist, and looked down. Manning had leaned forward and taken firm hold of her hand. Sharply, he prompted her, "I said this was your explanation, Geraldine."
She waited for him to release her, then complied sulkily. She knew enough of Damien Manning now to know that he would not countenance disobedience in boys—or a woman. Unwillingly but inevitabl
y she did what he said.
"When the letter came I was hopeless—listless—at the end of everything—" she told him.
He looked at her searchingly. "Wasn't there anybody at all you could turn to?"
After a moment Gerry said, "No."
"I see." The words were dry, non-committal, they expressed nothing. He added in a tone that matched his look of bored detachment, "Please go on."
"At once," said Gerry, "I knew there was something, at least someone, left, and that he was Thomas." She paused, then, "That's all there is to tell."
For answer he began shooting questions sharply at her. "What train did you take?"
"The early one. I caught the lobster bus from Breffny." "Had you already planned to do that when we were speaking on the phone?"
"Yes."
"Did you come straight here?"
"I was fortunate. The first hotel was able to take me. I got settled in, then I rang the Mount Clifford Home and they said I could see Tom. I was a little puzzled when he did not speak of his father's visit, but then, of course, Mrs. Bethel was there as well."
Manning did not comment on Elliott's mother. He said, "Betts had never visited Thomas, so even had you asked Tom he would have had nothing to tell you."
A little tremulously Gerry whispered, "How will he react to his father's death?"
"There will be nothing painful to it, of that I am certain. Children have long memories of unkind things as well as kind."
Gerry shivered.
"Even to a small boy," continued Damien, "it will mean release." He shrugged.
Gerry waited a moment, then inquired, "How does Stevens come into all this?"
Instantly Damien frowned. "I am doing the cross-examining, Miss Prosset. What happened when you returned from Mount Clifford?"
"I took a cab to Cowry Lane."
"Was that the address on the letter?'
Spiritedly, Gerry flung, "You must know that yourself, seeing you found me there."
Will You Surrender? Page 18
