by James Hanley
‘Well! I’ll have to meet him to-morrow, anyhow. I’ll have lots of things to do to-morrow.’ No doubt of that. For one thing, his mother, indifference or no indifference, would say, ‘You must go to your duty.’ That couldn’t be avoided. Upon compliance depended everything. No member of the Fury family who neglected his duty could be expected to live under the same roof. Then he would be expected to call and see his sister, and the little boy, and Joe Kilkey. He smiled under the bed-clothes. They wouldn’t ask him to see Desmond. That was out of the question. That big brother was outlawed from the Fury clan for good and all. ‘I think I’ll take them all to see the bioscope,’ he said under his breath. He had a vision of his father sitting by the fire in the kitchen, busily engaged scraping grease from the soles of his boots. With this picture still in his mind he fell asleep. In the next room the voices still went on—though they had died down to a whisper. About two o’clock in the morning, these, too, ceased, and number three Hatfields lay secure under silence at last.
CHAPTER II
Hatfields is one of a number of grey, dingy-looking streets crowded together on the dock-side in North Gelton. Here the Fury family had lived for over thirty years. Some ten minutes’ walk from this street along the main King’s Road brought one to the Avon Park, a small recreation ground. This oasis in the industrial desert had been laid down by the powers that be in Gelton in order that the citizens should have some harbour of escape from the thickly clustered streets. Men and women could sit there in the quiet of the evening and indulge in contemplation and reflection. Children could play on its gravel paths, but not on the grass. It consisted of half an acre of land fenced in by iron railings painted a bright green. There was the grass lawn upon which no foot might tread, two or three bushes, and some twenty benches. These were always occupied. Winter or summer there was always somebody to grace the Avon Park with his presence. On this bright June evening the recreation ground was full. Every bench, excepting one standing near to the gate, was full of people, old and young. On the paths excited children played, their raucous voices filling the air. Old men tapped their sticks, young men with nothing better to do leaned lazily on the railings and watched the grass grow. Although the bench near the gate had only two people sitting on it, a man and a woman, and although there were people who would have liked a seat, there seemed for some reason or other an objection to sitting on that bench nearest the gate. Maybe the very attitude of its occupants prevented this. These two people had ten minutes ago entered the gardens carrying on an animated conversation, which, as they drew nearer, seemed to be of an argumentative nature. They had seated themselves at the extreme end of the bench, and from that moment had maintained a dignified silence. Looking at them, one realized that any invasion of that silence would be met by a resentment, if not a truculence, already apparent by their very demeanour. It seemed, therefore, that these two people had best be left alone. The air was alive with the cries of children, the laughter of men and women, but these two people stood outside it all. They were very much taken up with their own thoughts, having lapsed into deep contemplation upon a subject which they had discussed so audibly as they came through the gate. No two people were less alike. The woman was tall, thin, and wiry. She had a long white face, a perfectly shaped nose set between a pair of eyes remarkable not only for their deep brown colour, but for the very restlessness they mirrored. Looking at them, one was conscious of the restless spirit behind them. Her hands, long and thin and very red, were resting upon the back of the bench. She had her back to the man and was leaning over the bench watching some children playing in the park behind her—at least she appeared to be watching them. She wore a long black coat almost reaching the ankles, but not hiding the black shoes which encased a pair of feet that must long have protested against imprisonment, for here and there the leather bulged as though the shoes were too tight for her. On her head she wore a plain grey straw hat in which was pinned with a brass brooch a single feather. She looked intelligent, proud, and the features, but for a certain queerness occasioned by the hard mouth, were not without charm. If she removed her hat one could see a head of thick black hair, slightly grey and parted in the middle of the head. The man was of medium height, slight in build. He wore a blue serge suit, a hard hat, a black silk scarf round his neck, and a pair of highly polished brown shoes. His hands were large, ugly, and gnarled. There was a large five-pointed star tattooed on his left wrist. Compared with the woman, his features were quite ordinary. He had a thin face, large eyes, a bulbous nose, and a heavy mouth which never seemed to be fully closed, so that he gave you the impression of always being on the verge of an exclamation. His hair was quite grey under the black hat, closely cropped, and his moustache, grey and drooping, did not help to enhance his very ordinary appearance. One could tell at a glance that he was a man with a sense of humour. Deep in contemplation now, he yet at the same time suggested content, peace, whereas the woman suggested only restlessness. These two people were Mr. and Mrs. Fury. They had walked over from Hatfields, still continuing an argument that had begun in the kitchen. The woman every now and again looked at the clock set over the entrance gate. It seemed that at any moment she would get up and go home. That was the impression she made. There were things to do. The man hardly moved. She fidgeted upon her end of the bench. Suddenly the silence was broken by the man, who remarked gruffly, ‘Well, have you thought about it, Fanny? But for Christ’s sake don’t let anything I say upset your plans.’
He pulled out a pipe, lighted it, and was soon sending clouds of blackish-blue smoke into the air. He put his hands in his pockets, stretched out his legs on the path, and assumed an attitude of complete repose. He evidently was in no hurry.
‘Yes,’ replied the woman, ‘I am still thinking about what you said. Did you think I should forget how significant you made it?’ She laughed, but did not turn round.
‘Don’t think I’m joking, Fanny,’ said Mr. Fury. ‘I was never more in earnest.’
‘Aren’t you always in earnest?’ she shot back at him. ‘This sudden desire to go to sea is not new. Indeed no! I’ve felt it all along. I’ve seen it. I’m not blind. The pity of it is that you didn’t go when you first got the itch. That’s what I regret. Instead, you calmly inform me that unless I agree to give up my son you’ll go off. Denny, for God’s sake have no qualms about it. If you think I am going to accept that, you’ve made a mistake. Besides, it’s a mean advantage to take. If you were a young man I shouldn’t mind. But to suddenly announce your desire to go off at the age of sixty comes as a surprise, naturally. You will tell me no doubt that I was the cause of your giving it up.’ She turned round and looked at him, smiled, and it was not without bitterness, and then turned her back upon him again. The man knocked out his pipe. The silence was broken, therefore the smoking of a pipe seemed quite out of place, at least to Mr. Dennis Fury, who held that a pipe can only be smoked properly when one is content. Somehow the waters of content had flowed over his head. He looked at his watch. There was that pint to have at ‘The Star and Garter,’ a traditional ritual that must be observed whatever the cost. Putting the pipe away, he moved up nearer his wife. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’m in earnest. You can choose between the boy and me. Nobody was more surprised than I when he turned up again. I thought he would have sense to keep away. After the trouble he’s caused. Come to think of it, I have every right to say this. I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings, and I never have. I have always been contented.’
‘What a bitter truth!’ said Mrs. Fury. ‘Well, go on.’
‘I’ll be contented now. But not with him in the house. For the love of Christ get this out of your head—this crazy idea that Peter is still a boy. He isn’t. He’s a man. He’s eighteen now. You can’t have your cake and eat it. Hanged I am if I understand. After all that’s happened—you hang on—you hang on’—he spoke these words through closed teeth—‘you hang on like grim death. You think that everything will come right in the end. But what is everything? What is
right? That we should waste our years away just to please our children. To have the satisfaction of thinking we’ve still got them—they’re still ours. Still our children. Don’t be daft, Fanny. You’re always crying out for peace, yet you haven’t the patience to be content when it comes along. Make no mistake at all. If that fellow has the same feelings for us as he had five years ago, then I’m a bloody Frenchman. Well, I’m not going into any pasts or looking into any future. I’m looking at now—this day and this minute, and I’m making up my mind on a subject which must be gnawing the heart out of you. Be reasonable. Let the lad go. Be honest! Ask him straight to his face if he is content, if he likes being at home. You’ll get your answer soon enough. But I rather think you’re afraid to ask that. It might be so true for you. Understand this. I said I’m going away. It won’t take me five minutes to get a ship.’
‘Get your ship and go,’ replied the woman. She spoke quite calmly, without trace of anger or disappointment. It was almost as though she had momentarily expected it.
‘All right,’ replied the man. ‘I’ll skip off for a wet. Maybe you can think over things better when I am gone.’
He got up and without another word left the park. She followed his retreating figure with half-closed eyes. Then she completely relaxed, and made herself more comfortable upon the bench. An old man joined her, and soon the rhythmic tapping of his stick began to beat upon her brain. She, too, got up and went off. She walked quickly towards Hatfields. Another argument, and an unfinished one. They were all like that. No doubt Denny was thinking over the matter, sitting before his historic pint of beer in ‘The Star and Garter.’ As she passed up the back entrance of Hatfields the woman paused, stamped her foot, and exclaimed, ‘I’d like to fly.’ Then she passed into the house. Her son was sitting at a table, busily engaged in making a rope mat. He looked up as she entered and said, ‘Hello, Mother.’
‘Hello,’ she said, and sat down without removing her clothes. She looked at the figure of an old man seated in a black high-backed chair. This man was her father, a cripple; an affliction made even more terrible by a stroke with which he had been seized some three years previously, and which had left him quite deaf and dumb. Mrs. Fury looked at the figure. The son, wearing only blue trousers and a sailor’s jersey, left off his job, and looked from one to the other. ‘Are you unwell, Mother?’ he asked, but without the slightest trace of concern in his voice, to which the woman replied, ‘Unwell? What ridiculous questions you ask.’ She looked him full in the eyes and said, ‘Do you know that your father is going to sea again?’
‘Dad going to sea? What for?’
‘That’s what I asked him. He told me that if you remained here he would go.’ She got up from the chair, and went to the table. She leaned across it, and took her son’s hands and said slowly, ‘Peter! You have done outrageous things, but you are still my son. Do you understand? My last child! I told your father he could go.’ She looked into those deep, full eyes, brown like her own, and realized at once the impression she had created. Suddenly she went round the table, bent down and threw her arms round her son. ‘Peter! You mustn’t go. Do you understand? You are all I have.’ Her head was almost touching his flushed face.
He wanted to cry out, ‘Don’t! Stop it! Don’t do that!’ but the words froze in his mouth. He could not speak. Gently he forced himself away from the attention of his mother. He folded his arms, and said, ‘Dad is only joking, and if he isn’t he is only being ridiculous at his age. It’s laughable. But now I see why he did not shake hands.’
‘But I did not refuse,’ the mother said. He saw the expression upon her face, he saw clearly too this pathetic effort, this pathetic and desperate reaching out of her love. She was afraid. ‘How Mother is changed,’ he thought. ‘She commands no more. Only pleads.’ His homecoming had been awkward—it revived the memories of the past, and of that scene at the docks. Shame returned and he battled desperately to climb above it. But now seeing her like this it was even more awkward. Pleading to him. It was humiliating. It made him feel callous, brutal. ‘Mother,’ he said. ‘Don’t take any notice of what Dad says. Please don’t.’ He got up from the table and went out into the hall, returning with his outdoor coat and his shoes. He put on the shoes whilst he said, ‘I’m going out now. I’ve watched Grand-dad from half-past five.’
‘You see, Peter? I never say no, now. I never say anything. I am quite content really. I mean, I never asked you where you were till midnight last night. You see, I don’t interfere. But your father asked and I said to him, “Peter promised me something twelve months ago, and I don’t believe he will fail me.” That’s what I said last night. That was what we were talking about when you came upstairs.’ The son said nothing. There seemed nothing to say. He was free now. He was not going to be caught in that net again—that net of her love, and hope, and belief. He had had quite enough of that. A pathetic net, hollow and worn. Before she had commanded—now she begged. Was his mother really trying to catch his father in it, and not him, later—was she? In that poor net. ‘I’m afraid,’ he said in his mind. ‘I’m afraid, and she’s afraid; we are both afraid. Even now she hates—hates to leave hold of me.’
‘Mother,’ he said, ‘dear Mother! Stop thinking about this now. Don’t talk about it. If you have feelings so have I, and I have been made to know that I have feelings. Let Dad talk to me. It will be a change, won’t it? Since ever I was born I’ve heard nothing but wrangling in the house between Dad and you. Now you keep out of it. Any talking to be done he can do, and so can I. You go off as you arranged. Understand? Don’t even worry yourself about me, or about Dad. Anyhow, I don’t believe a single word he said. Honest, I don’t. He would never do it. Really, he’s too soft-hearted, Dad is. He would have gone long ago if he had really wanted—but he never did—and he knows it. All he wanted was everybody out of the house—even Granddad, but he never told people straight out. That’s what you were talking about last night?’ he concluded.
Mrs. Fury nodded her head. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That’s what we were talking about. But now get off. I don’t want to keep you, I’m sure.’ She smiled up at her son.
‘Stop talking like that, Mother. Stop it.’ Peter struck the table with his fist.
‘Don’t do it. It makes me feel unutterably mean, and I have no right to think it. After all, everybody makes mistakes. You did—and I did—we all do.’ He watched the working of the muscles of the woman’s face. She hunched her shoulders. It gave one the impression that at any moment she would burst out into a fit of the most hysterical laughter. He went up to her—held her hands. ‘Dear Mother! you have been good.’ Then he touched her ear with his mouth.
‘Listen! am I the only one who knows about this Mrs. Ragner transaction?’
She gripped his hands and held them in a vice-like grip as she replied almost in a whisper, ‘Yes. You are the only one I told. I mean, it’s my affair, and in a way yours.’
‘Don’t be cruel to me. Don’t be cruel to me,’ he suddenly shouted in her face. He picked up his coat and left the house. Mrs. Fury remained quite rigid where she stood.
Peter Fury walked quickly away from Hatfields. In the next street but one his married sister lived. It was to see her that he was now hurrying. ‘I must talk to Maureen about Dad. It’s really bad, and not fair to Mother: Dad is getting on his high horse.’ There were other reasons why he wished to see her. There was her child just twelve months old—there was Joseph Kilkey. When he reached the Kilkeys’ door he lifted his hand to knock, but stopped suddenly to listen to the peculiar sound that seemed to come from the parlour. Mr. Joseph Kilkey was standing in the middle of the parlour floor swinging a child in his arms, as he sang, ‘Tiddley-iddly-tiddley-iddly hi ti-tiddley iddly hi ti.’ Peter Fury rapped on the window, at the same time pressing his nose against the glass. ‘Open the door,’ he called through. The man hurried out into the lobby.
‘Well! By God! Well! By God!’ He laid the child over one shoulder, and with his free hand grasped Peter
’s arm, pulling him into the house. ‘Well, I never! This is a surprise. Maureen’s out at Confession.’ Peter followed the man into the kitchen. Joseph Kilkey pulled out a chair, saying, ‘Sit down! Sit down.’
