Six Against the Yard

by The Detection Club

  He looked very uncomfortable and went off upstairs.

  Louie came down to me about an hour later. She was bubbling with excitement as she told me the whole story all over again.

  ‘I can do it, you know, Polly,’ she said. ‘I can do it! I know I can. These new kids to-day aren’t the war-tired lot who wanted to be sung to sleep. They can stand a bit of noise, a bit of the old stuff. I’m going to do it. Oh, Duck!’ she said, and threw her arms round me. ‘Oh, Duck, it’s going to be all right!’

  We both had a bit of a cry, I remember.

  We started talking about the arrangements, how to raise her fare and what to do about her clothes and so on, and then I said:

  ‘I’ll look after Frank.’

  She looked at me and I saw her openness disappear. It was as though a shutter had been drawn down inside her eyes. She looked at me warily.

  ‘Frank’ll come with me,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t want to be left at home. You can understand it. I shan’t mention it to Mr. Ferris—you know how difficult these new managers are—but Frank can come up and stay at different digs. He’ll keep quiet, Polly, he’ll keep quiet.’

  ‘Now look here, my girl,’ I said. …

  I talked to her for two hours by the clock and had lunch late for everybody and in the end she agreed with me. She had to see it.

  ‘He’ll be difficult,’ she said. ‘You know what he is, Polly.’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ I said, ‘and that’s why it’s suicide to take him. If I had my way I’d keep him under lock and key the whole engagement.’

  She nodded gravely. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But we couldn’t do that. He’d get out. You don’t understand him.’

  ‘You put your foot down,’ I said.

  There were tears on her cheeks when she gave me her promise.

  Half an hour later he’d got round her again.

  There were fourteen days before she had to go to Manchester and we had time to get busy. She had to rehearse and we had to get her clothes. I think we both realised how much depended on it. It was the last chance, you see; the last life-line.

  I made up my mind I’d see to Frank. I tried arguing with him. I tried pleading. In the end I tried to bribe him. It wasn’t until I thought of frightening him that I got him to listen to me at all, and then I saw how it was going to be. He’d agree with me, they’d both agree with me, they’d both promise, and then I’d find him brushing up his best suit and taking some of the money we’d scraped together for her stage clothes to buy himself a couple of fancy shirts, old and horrible though he was.

  I saw him beating me and I got the idea of him as a vice more clearly in my head. I had a father once who used to drink, and all that business came back to me as I struggled with him and I struggled with Louie. There was the same cunning, the same promising and going behind your back, and the same utter hopelessness of it all.

  Once when she was out he came down and sat on my kitchen table and laughed at me.

  ‘You’ve tried to separate us all your life, haven’t you, Polly? You’re not going to do it, d’you hear. I made her. I put her where she was and she’ll never do anything without me. We shall be together at the end. She’s been a bitch to me, Polly, but I’ve stuck her … and I’m going to stick to her. And if we go down together, well––––’ he nodded his little round head, ‘—well, we go down together, see?’

  ‘Yes, you’re a millstone all right,’ I said.

  He looked surprised.

  ‘A millstone? I’m her lifebelt.’

  And I could see by the way he said it that he’d deceived himself and he believed it.

  It was then, as I lifted the suacepan off the fire and put it on to the draining board, that I began to make up my mind how I was going to kill him. It was a question of who was going under, you see; him, or all of us together.

  It’s not easy to kill someone in your own house if you don’t want anybody to know. I didn’t see how I was going to do it, and the need was so great it became a nightmare to me, growing more and more desperate as the days approached and I saw him and her, too, making little sly preparations to get him to Manchester.

  If he’d only let her have her chance without him! Just a start. But he wouldn’t, and I had to hurry.

  I’d let my second floor, which is very nearly self-contained, as all my places are, to Ma Pollini and her family, who had booked up a seven-week engagement on the Stuart Circuit. She was a monstrous old girl who looked like a bull. She used to be in the act herself and still kept them all together, Pa and the three boys and their wives and the two kids. I never knew a woman who was so clean. I wonder she didn’t have the paper off the wall. She spoke English all right but not too well and you had to explain things to her very carefully, but there wasn’t much her little black eyes missed and I knew I’d got to be careful with her.

  Young Ferris used to let Louie go and rehearse up at some practice rooms he had over the theatre. There were pianos there and a clever accompanist, so she was out a great deal and it was good to see her coming back bright and hopeful and to feel her pat my shoulder and say: ‘It’s going to be all right, Duck. Oh, it’s going to be all right.’

  I thought ‘Yes, by God it is, if I can get rid of this horror for you.’

  I’d begun to see him like that, like a cancer or a monstrous deformity that was dragging her to death before my eyes and taking me with her—because I knew I’d never let her down however much I argued with myself.

  While she was out I used to go up and clean her rooms in the attic and although I got used to him talking I did wonder why she hadn’t gone out of her mind. Idiotic lies—dozens of them! Continuous tales of his importance and his cleverness which didn’t even sound true. Nothing was too big for him to have done, nothing too small. I happened to mention an act I’d seen that was new to London, a fellow flinging himself down from the flies without a wire or a net or anything, and immediately he caught me up.

  ‘That! …’ he said. ‘God, that was an old trick when I was a boy. I could do it … have done it a hundred times. Though I’m an old man I could do it now.’

  I didn’t say anything at the time but it gave me the first real helpful idea I’d had.

  I went about it very slowly. It began when I started shaking the tablecloth out of the front attic window, that is to say out of their living-room window. I had to fling it wide because it had to miss the parapet, and the crumbs—I saw there were plenty of them—used to float down on to the little balcony outside Ma Pollini’s sitting-room. I knew it would annoy her, and it did. We had quite a set-to about it on the stairs and the whole house knew about it. I was apologetic because I didn’t want to lose her just then, but the next morning I did it again. There was another row and the third morning I shook the crumbs into a dust-pan as any sensible woman would.

  But the fourth morning—however, I’m coming to that.

  I am not usually a chatty woman. In my experience the less you say the less people can repeat. And if I’d been the most talkative person in the world I wouldn’t have talked to him. But I spent a lot of time with him during those four days and I did my share of talking. I talked about the Pollinis.

  ‘He’s a clever man,’ I said. ‘That act’s come on.’

  Frank rose to it as I thought he would. I knew he wasn’t too fond of Pollini. He’d tried to tap him without much success. No one, not even Frank, could tap a man who looked at you like a surprised bison and shambled off muttering ‘Don’ understand. Git th’hell outa here.’

  ‘Pollini?’ said Frank. He was sitting in his shirt sleeves, without a collar, on the back of the dilapidated old chesterfield that Louie slept on when they had a row. ‘I taught Pollini all he knows and he’s too much of a stiff to say how d’you do to me these days.’ That was the sort of statement he used to make. It had no relation to the truth at all and no purpose as far as I could see, because not even Frank could expect me to believe it.

  I rambled on. I told him I’d seen young Latte Po
llini teaching the kids.

  ‘Hand-springs!’ I said. ‘You’ve never seen such neat ones.’

  I won’t tell you what he called me. There’s no point in writing things like that down.

  ‘Look at this,’ he said, and he stood there poised at the top of the sofa looking like an organ-grinder’s monkey, the white stubble sticking out on his red face.

  ‘You be careful. You’ll hurt yourself,’ I said over my shoulder.

  ‘Look! ‘he commanded. ‘Look!’

  I straightened my back and stood there, the dustpan in my hand.

  ‘I’m looking,’ I said.

  Well, he didn’t do it. I didn’t think he would. That’s what I was afraid of. He always took wonderful care of himself. But I went on.

  Louie came in when he was telling me how he once walked a tight-rope and threatening to show me if I’d get him one. I had to leave it for that day.

  The next day I started again, still on the Pollinis. At first I thought I’d frightened him. He sat there, morose and angry, while I did the room.

  It was then I found out about the shirts. I told him what I thought of him and I realised more and more how necessary it was for me to hurry if she was going to have her chance at all.

  He began boasting to me. ‘This time next week we shall be at Manchester. I shall tell them what she used to be like. She’s not much to look at now but I’ll put her over.’

  My heart was in my mouth and I very nearly picked up the poker and did him in there and then, and it might have been just as well in a way.

  However, I didn’t. I went on about the Pollinis and I got him interested. He even did a simple somersault for me and when he pretended that he’d hurt himself I got him a drink, and another.

  It was an extraordinary thing, but I only discovered then after all these years that he couldn’t drink. A couple made him silly. I left him sleeping.

  That was the day I had my second row with Ma Pollini about the crumbs.

  The next day I only gave him one drink and I brought it with up me. I’d told my little girl that I was doing it for his health and she didn’t think anything of it. People were always having little drops for their health in my house.

  Everything played into my hands. He’d had words with Latte on the staircase the evening before and didn’t want to hear about the Pollinis’ prowess. But I kept on. I let him have it.

  ‘Do a handspring if you’re so clever,’ I said. ‘A simple handspring.’

  He saw I was laughing at him and came and thrust his face into mine.

  ‘I can’t do it here,’ he said. ‘There’s not room.’

  ‘There’s no room big enough for you in the whole world, you old liar,’ I said.

  That rattled him. He opened the door so that he could get on to the passage and took a run, stumbled, actually succeeded in turning some sort of cartwheel, and pitched downstairs, finishing up on the half-landing between me and Ma Pollini.

  She came out and I explained to her what had happened. And she laughed. You should have seen her laugh! She’d have made a fortune on the halls just doing it. Tears poured out of her eyes and ran down the sides of her great coarse nose and she shook all over. What with the noise she made and the sound of him swearing the whole house was roused and everybody knew that old Springer had been swanking again and had nearly broken his neck doing it.

  Louie heard about it when she came in, and it made her cry.

  The fourth morning I watched Louie out of the house. I’ve never felt like it before or since. Everything seemed to be in bright colours and Louie’s old black satin coat shone like a black beetle as she went out under the porch and down the little stone yard that we call a garden and out into the road.

  I was trembling and I don’t know if I looked funny, but anyway there was no one to see me except my little girl, and she’s so busy, poor kid, she doesn’t have time to keep her mind on two things together, even if it were capable of it.

  I went slowly up the stairs and started making the bed. There was Louie’s suitcase half packed, and in a cupboard, where they thought I wouldn’t see it, there was his. It’s still there, for all I know. All packed up neatly, labelled and ready.

  He came out when I was in the bedroom and I knew by the way he fidgeted and talked about his health that he was wondering if I’d brought him up his drink. I sent him down for it.

  I’d forgotten it; that’s what frightened me. I had meant to bring it and it had gone clean out of my mind. I wondered what else I’d forgotten.

  He went off, padding down the stairs in his stockinged feet, and came back very pleased with himself. I wondered if he hadn’t taken an extra dram. He said something uncomplimentary about my little girl and I guessed she’d given him something to go on with.

  I started talking about the Pollinis and, as I hoped, the memory of old Ma Pollini laughing at him made him furious. He told me the Pollinis were a lot of stiffs. Wops and stiffs, he called them. He said they hadn’t got a trick between them that any man couldn’t do if he had his wits about him, and told me what he could do as a child.

  I was getting him where I wanted him. I went into the other room where the gas stove was and opened the window when I’d taken the cloth off the table. Then I went back to the bedroom and shook it out of there, so that the crumbs would miss Ma Pollini’s balcony.

  My heart was beating noisily and I was so long about it that I thought he’d notice something. Finally I did what I meant to do and the cloth slipped out of my hand and landed on the edge of the parapet.

  It was very neatly thought out, because, as I forgot to tell you, the window in the bedroom was stuck. It wouldn’t open more than six inches at the top. I had to stand up on the sill, push the cloth through and shake it with one hand.

  I went back to the other room, where he was sitting up on the end of the sofa again.

  ‘What are you looking at me like that for, Polly?’ he said.

  I pulled myself together. I couldn’t tell him that I saw him in bright colours, just like I’d seen Louie go out of the gate. I saw him in crude colours, like the printing in a twopenny comic. His shirt was bright blue and his head was smudged red.

  ‘I want a broom,’ I said. ‘I’ve dropped the tablecloth out of the window and it’s stuck on the parapet. Now if you were a Pollini …’

  He didn’t hear me, or didn’t seem to, and I was afraid I’d been too quick. But he was interested, as he always was in silly little incidental things that happened. He went to the other window and looked out. He could see the cloth about fifteen feet along.

  ‘How are you going to get it?’ he said.

  ‘I’m going to get a broom and fish it up through the window in the other room,’ I said. ‘Or get a Pollini kid to come and walk along the parapet and bring it in for me.’

  ‘Let me try with a broom,’ he said.

  I looked about for a broom, though it was the last thing I wanted.

  ‘You’ll break my window,’ I said.

  He grinned at me. ‘I’ll buy you fifty windows when I come back from Manchester.’

  I leant out of the window. The parapet sticks up about a foot over the glass and the windows are built out of the roof, dormer fashion.

  ‘I’ll get a broom,’ I said. My courage was going. I thought I’d have to try some other way. It wasn’t working out as I thought it was going to.

  I suppose I must have been silent for nearly three minutes, for then he said quite suddenly:

  ‘I suppose one of your Pollini pals would just trot along there and pick it up?’

  ‘I believe even old Ma Pollini could,’ I said.

  That did it. He swept me out of the way.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ he said. ‘I’ll get your damned tablecloth. I can do anything a Pollini can.’

  He scrambled up on the sill and I saw that he was waiting for me to pull him back. I did. That was the extraordinary thing: I did.

  ‘Don’t you dare,’ I said. ‘You’ll break your neck. You ha
ven’t got the courage.’

  He thrust his little red face into mine. ‘I’ll show you,’ he said.

  I watched him out upon the sill and saw him climb shakily on to the parapet, which was nearly a foot wide, holding his arms out like a tight-rope walker.

  ‘Don’t you dare,’ I said. ‘Don’t you dare.’ Now I’d got him there I panicked. I lost my head I screamed. I ran to the top of the stairs.

  ‘Bring a broom! ‘I shouted to nobody in particular and rushed back again.

  There was no sign of him, only the big bare room with the stove and the window open at the bottom, and far away the tops of the trees.

  I ran over to the window and looked out. He was coming towards me, holding the cloth in his arms. I screamed. I screamed and screamed.

  ‘Be careful!’ I said. ‘Be careful!’

  He came to the window and stood there swaying, holding the cloth, his little bulk blotting out most of the light. I saw his short trousers and his shoeless feet in their grey army socks standing on the slippery stucco. He put down his hand to catch the top of the window and at that moment I leant out and caught him round the ankles.

  I can hear my own voice now shouting hoarsely:

  ‘Be careful! Be careful!’

  I heard him shout and I realised that I could make up my mind there and then.

  I pushed.

  He threw his weight against the top of the window and a shower of glass fell in over me. I was still pushing, pushing with my head, my arms round his ankles.

  I felt him go. I heard his scream. Just for a moment I saw his body swing past me and then there was silence until far below in the little stone yard that we call a garden there was another sound, a sound I can’t get out of my mind.

  I stepped back from the window and from that moment my mind was clear. There was a noise on the stairs and I ran towards it, screaming, but intentionally this time, knowing what I was doing.

  It was Ma Pollini. I tried to tell her but she’d only talk in Italian and finally I pushed her out of the way and hurried on down the stairs.