“Without any stretch of the imagination whatsoever,” said Phillip, flipping a pebble into the black mud of the foreshore, “the Romans would never have invented the catapult.”
Hetty tried not to smile. How like Hughie he was, at times. But no, she must not smile. Phillip’s misbehaviour was a very serious business.
Nothing in the holiday at Whitstable seemed to have gone right. More than once Hetty had declared that it was the last time she would come away with Phillip again, without his father. They were sitting on the shingle, near a wooden groin, above a stretch of thick black oozy mud. Perhaps it was because there were no sands to play on that he found so many mischievous things to do. He was a very unkind little boy indeed to have stolen Doris’s dolly: to have stood it up against the groin, and deliberately shot at it with his catapult.
A pebble shattering its face had shattered Doris’s life. She sobbed in her mother’s arms.
“I don’t care,” he said, with a peculiar smile on his face. Why did he do such things?
“You are so dreadfully unkind to Mother!” said Mavis. “She does everything for you, too.”
“You don’t seem like my son any more!” said Hetty.
“I’m not, I’m very glad to say.” Again the skull-like grin on his face.
“I shall tell your Father when we get home.”
“If I ever go home again, you mean.”
With these words, Phillip got up, and walked away, in the direction of the docks, feeling dark despair jangling with a desire to destroy himself. Mummie, Mummie!
Hetty wished she had not listened to her brother Joey, but gone with Liz Pickering to Dovercourt instead. The trouble was, she had already engaged the rooms.
Everything was indeed wrong at Whitstable, for children. The apartments were in a side-street, near the red-bricked basin, or harbour. They faced north. The landlady looked as though she, too, had faced north all her life. Her expressionless face—her decamping husband had taken the natural expression off it—was like the food she served. It was not like being at the sea-side at all. Only at high tide was the black ooze hidden. Hetty reproached herself for ever having listened to Joey, who had sung the praises of the Thames estuary, particularly Whitstable and its suburb of Tankerton.
*
Joseph Turney, traveller for the Firm of Mallard, Carter & Turney Ltd., law stationers, printers, and lithographers, had had a big new order in the town, which had so surprised Mr. Hemming, the manager, that he had not believed that this fool of the family, as he regarded Joseph Turney, had not made a mistake. Mr. Hemming had shown scepticism on his face, thus antagonising the more the amiable and single-minded youngest son of the Chairman; and when the order for complete sets of ledgers, quires of blotting paper, a gallon bottle of Stephens Ink, reams of business headed writing paper, half a dozen bound copying-books, a press, a dozen gross of manilla envelopes with other quantities and qualities of the same, in best laid paper, had come in, Joey was triumphant. Whitstable shared in the triumph.
It was a very fine place, bracing and little known, declared Joey; the North Sea airs were health-giving; it was full of ozone, which was good for the hair. Apartments? He would find out. He did. And thither Hetty had gone for the annual fortnight at the seaside.
Phillip had bicycled all the way down, starting at six o’clock on his romantic journey. He was still a little apprehensive of possible malcontents waylaying him as he pedalled over wooded Shooter’s Hill into the early morning sun, but body exercise soon reduced the doubts of the mind. He enjoyed himself greatly along straight Watling Street from Dartford to Strood, past heated cornfields to the valley of the Medway, over the water to Rochester by the low black wooden bridge—fishing boats and barges with brown sails beyond—up again to the heights of Chatham, and down the long stretch of road to Sittingbourne, while the sun climbed over his head and swung higher over the downs on his right, leaving the wide flat grey expanses of the distant sea on his left. Then a rest in the dusty wayside grasses munching mutton sandwiches as he watched finches dusting themselves in the chalky dust of the road, and listened to the dry bleats of sheep on the short pastures over the hedges. Onwards to Faversham!
At last (for he had studied the route on his map) he found himself turning off on the road to Whitstable, while distant guns boomed in the heat, and the wide flat sea drew nearer, with smoke-trails everywhere on the dull horizon. Father had cycled here in the past, and had told him of the lightships to be seen on a clear day from the higher ground before the turning; but Phillip had seen nothing in the haze; and now he was feeling the fierce beat of the sun through his cricketing hat, which he had promised to wear against sunstroke. The road shimmered in front, in the distance; the flint dust danced in the heat, as he pedalled on, in the grilling heat of August. At last, disappointed with everything, he got off the Swift, gritty all over, dust in his eyes from motorcars, and surveyed the port of Whitstable, with its smell of old fish and hot engine oil, and dirty streets. The “sands” were oozy black mud! What a hole! It was a swizz! It was not the real sea-side. It was not a proper holiday. It was muck. Mother was a fool for listening to Uncle Joey, with his donkey-laugh and walrus moustache, and silly stories about people’s socks and feet.
Nothing went right. On the first morning Phillip cut his foot on a bit of broken glass in the black soft mud. Then a beach acquaintance took him out in a boat, to fish for flat-fish. The boat, a small one, bobbed up and down so much, and together with the smell of the old dried lugworms on the seats made him sick. Medicinal brandy, from a chemist’s shop, made him feel better. Never again!
He went fishing, with lugworms and eel-hooks, in the red-bricked basin, or harbour. Slinging out his lead, the baited hooks on brass paternoster to follow, he got hooked in the hand, and by a big eel-hook, too, Hetty took him to a doctor, who worked it through the flesh, cut off the barb, and withdrew the sneck bend backwards. It was a beastly holiday, it was all Uncle Joey’s fault, it had turned out just as Father had prophesied! But Mother had not listened to Father’s advice. He had been to Whitstable, and knew what sort of a place it was! Instead, she had listened to Uncle Joey, the fool of the Turney family. Just fancy, after every bathe, you had to go home and have a bath, with soap, to take away the dirt of the so-called sea!
“Well, it’s always best to be on the safe side, Phillip.”
A woman told Hetty that the black mud was contaminated by sewage from London; and while she remained loyal to Joey, she did feel that, if this was true, Joey might have told her before she booked the rooms. Anyway, that did not excuse Phillip’s behaviour in the very least.
“I hardly know what the world is coming to! Anyone would think your family were your deadly enemies, sometimes, to hear the way you speak, Phillip.”
“You all are,” he retorted, “only you don’t know it.” He felt himself twisted as the gut tied to the fish-hooks, as black as the mud of the shore, and hopeless as broken glass. Oh, why had they not gone to Hayling Island: then, across the sea, he could have thought of Helena Rolls in the clear blue waters around the wooded Isle of Wight, swimming in the waves with Milton, so happy together—he and Helena might have been brother and sister, even twins.
Hetty stared at the frowning face of her son. What had changed the dear little child he had been, years ago, before Mavis had come? Could her coming have put his nose out of joint? Or was he born selfish, like—like Dickie, in some of his moods? Why did Phillip go out of his way to do, and say, such needlessly hurtful things to himself, such unkind things to his sisters and mother? It was not his true nature, she knew; and yet—ah well, she had given up everything for her children, and so they expected everything from her. That was her fault. If you give all to others, they come to look down on you in the end.
“My son, if only you could see your face now! I think you would be shocked.”
“Perhaps I wouldn’t, you know,” he cried, flinging himself away, and trudging off along the shingle.
“Don’t pan
der to him, Mum.”
He had been such a dear little child, so helpful, so eager to learn, so anxious to please Dickie, in the first years of his life, Hetty told herself, once more, as they went home by train the next day. There had been a tremendous thunderstorm on the afternoon of the last day; Phillip had been out in it, returning soaked through, yet with colour in his cheeks. The storm had cleared the air for the time being; but more was to come, so it was decided that he should ride in the train, at least part of the way home, to Dartford. He had spent the last evening trying to mend Doris’s doll with fish-glue, which was something in his favour. Of course she had never meant to tell Dickie; it would only upset things more; and he had been punished enough in his life already.
Ah well, she thought, her hope rising with her courage, seeing him happily reading The Boy’s Own Paper in the seat opposite: perhaps it was, after all, but a phase, and he would grow out of it.
*
When they got home, Phillip saw at once that Father had put another bolt on the front door, and a second one on the back door. Soon afterwards he learned from next door that burglars had broken into Mr. Pye’s house during that family’s absence at the seaside; the burglars had lived quietly in the upstairs rooms for a fortnight, sleeping in the beds with their boots on. They had turned out all the cupboards and drawers, scattered the things about on the floors, and made messes in every room. Phillip was startled to hear of the messes they had made—even in Mr. Pye’s bed, just before they had left, by way of the fence into the Backfield: but somehow, he felt, apart from the messes, it kind of served Old Pye right.
Chapter 26
WHITE CHRISTMAS
IN the following winter there was a heavy fall of snow, making the Hill a place of joy for the young: while the old kept to their houses, before blazing coal fires. Phillip was cold, too, as he swotted in the kitchen at night, for the Oxford Local Examinations being held all that week at school. He wore his overcoat for warmth, despite the fire in the range.
On the last day of the exams, a Friday, Richard opened the trapdoor in the downstairs lavatory floor, and invited his son to follow him down the portable wooden steps into the foundations of the house. The way was lit by the jagged flame of a candle, which seemed vainly to be trying to give light against the cavernous blackness of the place.
Moving forward slowly, Phillip saw the ’cello, which had split its belly in the damp of years, standing against a brick support to the floor above. Voices mumbled beyond. He felt like a burglar, in a Sherlock Holmes story. Above was the Bank of England.
“Ah, here it is, Phillip,” said Father. “You take it, my boy, and enjoy yourself on the Hill. The old runners are a bit rusty, but they will soon be bright, if I know anything about it! Exams do take it out of one, as I well remember, though I was only a bit of a boy at the time. Now go on the Hill and enjoy yourself, but be careful of the iron railings. We do not want an invalid on our hands this Christmas!”
This was Richard’s way of showing his concern for his son. He had always been afraid, with both wife and children, of what he called sentimentality.
Phillip and Desmond travelled fast down the slope from the sheepfold, almost to the bottom where the big golden birch tree stood just inside the iron gates leading to Charlotte Road, east end. Scores of sledges were in movement. In the frosty air the cries of Olley-olley-olley! travelled over the pressed snow, echoing from the dull flats. Many and varied were the sportsmen and their vehicles. There were heroes on toboggans and sleighs—the real thing, not home-made—who slipped at a great rate down the incline, taking the bump a third of the way down in flying style, and rushing on to the bottom, hardly slowed before the gates; but steering upon the ice-laid path, shot through the narrow space, and gathering speed, hurtled on down Charlotte Road and round the corner—Olley-olley-olley! look out, get out of the way!—scrunch and slap and sway, laughter as precarious balance was maintained—then, triumph! The red and blue barber’s pole, leaning out of Hawkins’ shop, fifty yards short of the railway station, was the record run that year. The grand ones, of course, lived in Twistleton Road; Milton was one of their party.
At night the cries seemed to come fainter, in an arctic whiteness of dim stars and frosted street-lights, as black travelling objects moved upon all the slopes of the Hill. Father gave permission to go out again after supper. Oh, wonderful! Father liked Phillip’s eldest cousin Hubert Cakebread, who now was with the Firm, and put Phillip in Bertie’s charge, with Gerry. Boys, go to it, and enjoy yourselves, he said. What had come over Father?
Richard was reading the Sherlock Holmes’ stories again. He had got the pale blue Strand Magazines from the drawer in Phillip’s bedroom, and was back in the past, in the winter of 1894-5, when the moon turned blue, and the wild geese flew over the Hill from the Thames estuary, on their way south.
“Yes, it was a unique winter, the great freeze-up of ’ninety five, Hubert. With luck, we may see the Aurora Borealis again this year. It’s cold enough. Well, you boys are only young once. But take care of yourselves!”
“Yes, sir, we will! Trust us!”
There was a ring of the front door bell. Desmond, wrapped in woollen muffler and helmet, gloved and gaitered, completed Phillip’s happiness. If only the snow would hold over Christmas!
It thawed one day; then more snow fell, to cover the old tracks; and frost took the pink-streaked thermometer, hanging on the brick wall by the front door, to eight degrees below freezing. It was Christmas Eve.
A night of carols, heard near and far, of familiar echoing cries of the speeding crews, Olley-olley-olley! Hern the grocer—who was there with his girl-assistant, the tall dark young woman who called for orders every morning—told Phillip that the cries came from the Frenchmen who rode in the bicycle races round the Fordesmill track. Allez-allez-allez! they urged on their racing compatriots. Mr. Mundy, the vicar, gloved, gaitered, and muffled to the nose, to whom Phillip repeated this statement, suggested that it was perhaps older than that: it was the crier’s Oyez-oyez-oyez! The Redskins of North America had the same cries. At this Hubert Cakebreak, who was invariably polite, as his Father had been, asked if Oyez should be pronounced Oi! as carters and others still cried to attract notice in the London streets.
“A very good point, that: I must send it to ‘Notes and Queries’,” said Mr. Mundy, and Phillip felt proud of Hubert’s knowledge, proud that the splendid Milton had heard, too, what his cousin had said.
At nine o’clock the boys had promised to return; and Hubert insisted that time was time, and Uncle Dickie had been very decent in allowing him out, so home they ought to go. One last run down the road was suggested, all four up, from the top of the gully. Too dangerous, said Hubert, but they might try it from the sheep-fold. Four up! They were bound to come off at the bump! They did, amid much laughter; and now it really was time to go home.
Father was pleased that they were back, with five minutes grace, he said, looking at his watch. Mother was making cocoa for everyone in the kitchen. Aunt Dorrie was there, the place was crowded, with his sisters and cousins, and Desmond. Cake and cocoa, what more could anyone want?
Phillip took a plate and cup down to Father, in the armchair in the sitting room, reading The Speckled Band. He had hung the Japanese lanterns across the ceiling, and the girls had stuck holly all round the walls, and on the pictures. There was one piece of mistletoe, on the bracket of the gas lamp hanging from the ceiling, a very tiny bit, tied to the tap, of all things. How could anyone get under it to kiss, though of course no one would want to, in his house, thought Phillip. A daring thought came to him: under the table! Not with anyone else in the room, of course. And with only one person, Petal. But Petal had left immediately after Grannie’s death, to live in Brighton. He often thought of Petal, and what had happened during the funeral in the summer. He, with Mavis, Doris, Kimberley, Tommy and Petal, had been left in the front room, to be quiet, when the carriages had left for the cemetery; they had gone down to see Gerry, at Aunt Dorrie�
��s house in Charlotte Road. They had played hide and seek. They had gone into the attic, and Gerry had even climbed on the roof. It had been great fun. Then he and Petal had found themselves in the front room, sitting on chairs opposite to one another, having reached “home” while the others were still creeping about upstairs looking for them.
“My Father said that if Kimberley had been the son of a white father and a black mother he would have been coffee-coloured. Is it all a joke, really, I mean, about Kimberley being——”
“Well, hardly a joke,” Petal had said. “Daddy admits he did it with our house-girl, but then you see a black boy might have been there first. They start very young, often at ten years old.”
Thrilling words, made the more so by Petal speaking so coolly, as though she was talking about music. A thick brassy feeling gripped him. A picture of Jack Hart came to him, a sort of spider-feeling. Before he could think not to speak, Phillip said, looking across to Petal, who was sitting back in her chair, “Have you ever done it?”
Petal shook her head. She looked at him as he looked at her.
“I haven’t, either. Shall we try, one day?”
Petal nodded. Phillip’s throat felt dry. Then caution made him say, “You won’t tell anyone I asked, will you?”
Petal shook her head. She looked very pretty, when her cheeks were faintly pink.
And that was the end of it.
Phillip stopped by the children’s coat-rack outside the lavatory door, and thought of Petal’s face, as she had sat in the chair, nodding.
It was Helena Rolls he really loved, all the same; though he never could think of her as he had of Petal. Helena was his ideal. Oh, if only Grannie had not died, then he would have gone to St. Simon’s Garden Party, perhaps in fancy dress as a Zulu, with black face and arms, and sandalled feet, a top-knot of feathers in his hair, carrying cow-hide shield, knobkerry, assegai, bracelets, and cow-bell.
Young Phillip Maddison Page 40
