Sir Pompey And Madame Juno

by Martin Armstrong

  SIR POMPEY

  AND MADAME JUNO

  and other Tales

  by

  MARTIN ARMSTRONG

  Contents

  SEA VIEW

  THE CONTESSA

  NANNY

  THE NOVICE

  ON PATROL

  SIR POMPEY AND MADAME JUNO

  THE PARASITE

  AUNT HETTY

  A ROMANTIC TEMPERAMENT

  THE MATCHMAKER

  STILL WATERS

  THE FISHERMAN

  AN EXPLOSION

  MY POOR DEAR UNCLE

  Sea View

  Miss Witherspoon shook a duster from the open window of the double bedroom. Fluffy clots of dust floated away on the air like grey snowflakes: one of them, the largest, was suddenly caught by some fragment of breeze and whirled surprisingly upwards, higher and higher and out of sight. It was Saturday afternoon. She had just finished preparing the double room for the lodgers who were coming on Monday for a month. They would fill the house – the double room, the little bedroom at the back, and the sitting-room downstairs. Miss Witherspoon looked forward to their arrival with mixed feelings – pleasure at the prospect of the three guineas a week and whatever she might make out of the catering, and a vague discomfort at the thought that for a month she would cease to be mistress in her own house. They would loll on her chairs, turn back the tablecloth and put inkpots on the table, and sometimes even move the furniture and ornaments for all the world as if the place belonged to them. Secretly and resignedly Miss Witherspoon always resented the arrival of even the best of lodgers.

  Sea View was a corner house. Its narrow front looked on a street that ran back, past shops and the Wesleyan Chapel, to the station; but the side of the house, divided from the asphalt pavement by a little strip of garden, gave on a road that ran parallel with the sea and was screened from it by the houses opposite. It was on to this road that Miss Witherspoon looked now as she lingered at the bedroom window, the duster still in her hand. Then, pushing up the sash a little higher, she leaned out. The window, as she pushed it up, had given a shrill, aggressive neigh and attracted the attention of a middle-aged gentleman in white tennis-shoes who was walking past on the opposite side of the road – obviously a summer visitor. He glanced up, stared for a moment, and went on his way, fumbling in his mind for the description – the obvious description – of the impression he had just received: the shrill, mocking neigh, the square of open window, and the strange creature that had popped out of it. For Miss Witherspoon was strange, very strange to look upon with her long face halved by the solemn trunk-like nose and crowned by a rakish wigwam of hair which looked as if it had been elaborately dressed years ago for some dinner-party and never taken down again. Yes, strange beyond measure! At the turning of the road the middle-aged gentleman threw up his head with the gesture of one who has solved a problem – ‘Punch and Judy Show, by Gad!’

  ‘Gentlemen alone are much the least trouble,’ Miss Witherspoon was reflecting as she gazed abstractedly after him. Then she glanced obliquely across to a gap in the row of houses opposite through which a narrow vertical slice of sea and seashore was visible, barely enough to justify the name of the house. That glimpse of the sea never failed to thrill her. Looking at it she inhaled the breath of freedom, the sense of an escape from her restricted life into a world larger and more serene. To-day the sea was ashen grey. Thin lines of white glided towards the shore and, farther out, white plumes danced upon the greyness – white horses, Miss Witherspoon called them. If only it was fine during the month they were here! The weather made all the difference when you had lodgers. Neither sea nor sky was very promising now, and she lowered her eyes to the little strip of white-railed garden immediately under the window. The garden was at its best: roses, flame-coloured snapdragons, and a great hedge of blue Canterbury bells. The cherry-tree by the gate was over long ago, of course: little pallid, indigestible cherries showed among the leaves. Togo, no longer at his best nowadays, sat on the little gravel path with his front paws tucked under him. His black fur was ruffled and brown at the edges like an old sealskin. Not exactly a credit to the house, poor dear! Miss Witherspoon could see his whiskers radiating straight and white on each side of his black head. It was to be hoped the new lodgers didn’t mind cats. A sudden guffaw of laughter – young men’s laughter – came from the corner of the house where the road turned down towards the station. There was always a group of young men standing there on Saturday afternoons and Sundays. Miss Witherspoon could see them from where she stood, on the footpath just beyond her privet hedge. They were chatting together as usual – what in the world did they find to talk about so much? – and the one who had laughed pivoted round on his heel, his hands in his trouser-pockets, as if driven round by the force of his laugh. Miss Witherspoon pulled down the window and, mechanically picking up a feather which lay, moulted from the eiderdown, on the varnished boards that edged the carpet, she went out of the room and downstairs to the kitchen, thinking wistfully of the young men. How remote they were from her again nowadays; far out of her reach; away in another world, although they stood every Saturday and Sunday two yards from the corner of Sea View. It was funny how things changed your outlook. The War, for instance! Before the War she had regarded young men as her natural enemies. She was afraid of them and she hated them. The thought of them standing there on Saturdays and Sundays just outside her windows made her nervous, so that on these days she stayed indoors as much as possible. And surely they were different in those days – so rough and noisy and rude. She was always having trouble with them. If it wasn’t one thing it was another. Either she would catch one grabbing, as he went past, at her cherry-tree and tearing off a cherry or two and a great bunch of leaves, or she would be annoyed by another looking over the fence and making atrocious noises at Togo in the garden. ‘Leave the cat alone!’ she would shout from the window, and the young man would slouch off with a final supreme caterwaul which, she felt, was intended not for Togo but for her. Once, happening to pass Piper, the police sergeant, near the church, she had stopped and asked if the young men couldn’t be prevented from congregating just outside her house; but he had been disinclined to do anything, ‘unless, of course,’ he said, ‘you can give some actual case – bad language, or obstruction of the public way, or damage to property.’ Unfortunately, on that occasion, Miss Witherspoon could make no specific complaint. They were just a nuisance, she said.

  ‘Why, they’re all right,’ Piper had answered benignantly: ‘not bad young fellows, most of them, Miss Witherspoon.’

  Miss Witherspoon smiled to herself now as she recalled it. What a fuss she used to make about things in those days. And yet Piper was quite right: she was sure of it now. They couldn’t really have been very different from the young men of nowadays. What a state she used to get in over those cherries. Once, when she had caught them stealing them on two successive days, she had determined to deal with the thing herself, and on the following Saturday she had marched boldly up to the group at the street corner.

  ‘Which of you was it,’ she said, ‘that took my cherries?’

  They all stopped talking and stared at her, half embarrassed and half amused.

  ‘There’s no good denying it,’ she said. ‘I saw you, on Wednesday and on Thursday too.’

  Then a clumsy-looking youth grinned. ‘Now Tommy, own up!’ he said. ‘There’s no good trying to look innocent.’

  Miss Witherspoon followed his glance. ‘Which is … which is Thomas?’ she asked in a voice that shook a little.

  ‘Thomas’ delighted them. ‘Now, Thomas! Step up, Thomas!’ The whole party clamoured for Thomas. Miss Witherspoon thought she detected him – a fat boy with blue eye
s.

  ‘You!’ she said, taking a step forward.

  ‘No, not’im!’ ‘The next!’ ‘No, the next!’ ‘To the left!’ ‘The one behind ‘im!’ Every one was ready with directions.

  Miss Witherspoon glanced helplessly from one to the other. She was trembling. Her small spark of courage was out. ‘Very well!’ she threatened in a final attempt at dignity. ‘I shall complain to the police.’

  And for weeks after that she would hear them on Saturdays and Sundays outside her window:

  ‘Lend us your bike to-morrow, Joe?’ ‘I can’t.’ ‘Very well, I shall complain to the police.’

  ‘How’s Nellie Watson, Jack?’ ‘Mind your own business.’ ‘Very well, I shall complain to the police.’

  ‘Give us a light, Bob.’ ‘Haven’t got one.’ ‘Very well, I shall complain to the police.’

  It became a nightmare. Even now Miss Witherspoon shrank into herself at the thought of it. Yes, she had found life difficult in those days, she reflected; like a cat living among a lot of dogs.

  Then the War came; and with the coming of the War the young men gradually thinned away and soon there were none on Saturdays and Sundays standing at the corner of Sea View. It almost seemed as if Providence had stepped in where the police sergeant had refused to interfere. Miss Witherspoon was aware of a relief, a sense of freedom. Now she could go in and out of her house at any time, free from hostile and sarcastic observation.

  And Miss Witherspoon went out and in now much more often than formerly. Life about her was transformed. Every one had become busy and very serious. There were meetings of all kinds to be attended – bandage-rolling parties, Red Cross classes, special services at the church, and soon all the business of ration tickets. Life for Miss Witherspoon became very much alive. It was really great fun.

  Then a dreadful thing happened. A soldier called one day – a responsible person. Perhaps he was an officer, but Miss Witherspoon did not know how to distinguish an officer from a common soldier. He wanted billets.

  ‘Billets?’ Miss Witherspoon did not understand.

  ‘Well, accommodation, lodgings, for soldiers.’ He explained the customary arrangements.

  Miss Witherspoon was appalled. But it was impossible, she explained. She lived alone. She couldn’t possibly have the house full of men. Besides, the work would be too much; and her rooms had been redecorated only this spring. No, really: she was sorry. Her fear gave her a stubborn asperity that had more effect than she realized. The officer was lenient. He would see, he said, how the total accommodation available worked out, but he noted against her name and address that she had room for six, in case …

  Six? Miss Witherspoon gasped. But three was the most she had room for. ‘I’ve never had more than three lodgers,’ she said, ‘except once when they brought a baby.’

  But the officer genially waved these ideas aside. ‘It’s not like peace time, you see. It’s simply a matter of floor-space. Now you’ – he worked out a little sum in his notebook – ‘could take six comfortably: eight at a pinch.’

  Eight! Much the same as if the whole street-corner group had taken possession of her house. The mere thought of it ruined her peace of mind. But gradually at the bandage-rolling parties and the Red Cross classes it came out that one after another of her acquaintances had agreed to billet soldiers. Billets! Billeting! The strange new words were to be heard at every moment. They became for a while the most significant words in the language. Mrs. Coleman had no less than a dozen coming. ‘Talk about sardines!’ she exclaimed to Miss Witherspoon, throwing up her hands. ‘Still, we must do what we can.’

  And in most of them, Miss Witherspoon discovered, apprehension was tempered by the sense of novelty and adventure and the wish to do what they could. In a day or two Miss Witherspoon herself had caught an exalted, almost reckless mood. She too, she felt, must do what she could for the War, and her mind began to face the probability of the six soldiers’ arrival. She would have to be strict with them from the first: that was the only way. She had gone the wrong way to work with the young men at the street corner: that was how they had got the upper hand. She lifted her chin and squared her jaw as though the enemy was already on the scene.

  Two days later, the billeting officer called again. Two battalions were coming. They were short of billets as it was. ‘Very sorry, Miss … er … Miss Witherspoon. Four in the big bedroom: two in the small one.’ And three hours later the soldiers arrived in the town.

  She caught sight of them first from an upstairs window, a large party with an officer at the head of them marching down the road from the station. From time to time they halted and the officer detached a few men from the head of the column and directed them to their appointed billet. Then the rest of the party, diminished after each halt, moved on. When she heard them halt outside Sea View, Miss Witherspoon’s heart leapt to her throat. From behind the curtain she watched the officer detach six men, send two back and call out two others, and as she hurried downstairs a loud rap sounded on the knocker. She braced herself for the ordeal and opened the door.

  The officer was the same one as before. Behind him crowded red, sweating faces, khaki caps pushed far back, khaki shoulders laden with great square packs and the muzzles of rifles rising vertically a few inches to the right or left of each face.

  ‘Miss Witherspoon, isn’t it?’ asked the officer, scanning his notebook. ‘Here they are, Miss Witherspoon. Six. I’ve chosen quiet ones for you.’

  The soldiers grinned – that same humorous grin which she always associated with the young men of the street corner. A wave of despair broke over her. But next moment the officer was gone and the soldiers were crowding in. Enormous fellows they seemed to her as she stood timidly holding the door open for them. Their nailed boots clattered like showers of heavy raindrops on her beautiful linoleum. They jostled one another in the narrow entrance, big-boned, clumsy, and made more clumsy still by the great packs on their backs. A strong fume of sweat and greased boot-leather hung about them. Miss Witherspoon could feel the heat given off by the bodies nearest to her.

  ‘Which way, Ma?’ asked the foremost one.

  Miss Witherspoon drew herself up and issued orders in her most refined accent. ‘Upstairs. Four in the big room on the right: two in the room on the left.’

  They tramped ponderously upstairs and then their footsteps seemed to spread all over the upper part of the house. They shouted to one another from room to room. ‘What-o! Struck lucky this time. Two beds in ‘ere, Joe. ‘Ow many there?’ ‘One. A little un.’ ‘Some billet, Stan!’ ‘What say?’ Then a babel of talk, footsteps, bumping and rattling of rifles and equipment. Miss Witherspoon stood in the kitchen, left hand to left cheek, listening. Her heart bled for her paint and varnish. Thank heaven she had put away all her sheets and pillow-cases, all cushions, ornaments, tablecloths – everything that could be put away.

  Presently there were steps on the stairs and along the back passage, and two of them appeared in the doorway of the kitchen. They had taken off their caps, equipment, and tunics, and stood in their grey flannel shirts, open at the necks, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows.

  ‘Can you lend us a bucket, Ma, to have a wash in?’

  Miss Witherspoon pursed her lips. ‘Ma’ seemed to her a great impertinence. ‘There is a bathroom and basin upstairs,’ she said.

  ‘Yes, but some of the other chaps’11 be using that. Got to be on parade in ‘alf an hour, see?’ They stood there in the doorway smiling and looking about them, hesitating and inquisitive, like two sheep at an open gate. She was surprised to see how different they looked now. Undressed, they were much less formidable. They had ceased to be simply soldiers: they had become individuals – two great boys. Miss Witherspoon ventured to look more attentively at the one who had spoken. He stood with his bare arms crossed in front of him. Round his middle, holding up his thick khaki trousers, he wore a broad scarlet belt decorated with a variety of brass badges and buttons. His hair was cropped close. Two mobile, d
ark brown eyes slid like bright beads in a round, swarthy face. He had a saucy turned-up nose. Yes, Miss Witherspoon saw at once that he was one of the saucy kind. She could see it in his smile too, a broad smile, half saucy, half shy.

  ‘There’s a pail there by the sink,’ she said sternly; ‘but I can’t have you washing in here.’

  ‘We can wash in the yard,’ said the soldier, the broad smile still on his face. He dropped his crossed arms and went over, with elbows turned out and a swagger of the shoulders, to get the pail. Upstairs the bath-tap roared, now audible, now inaudible across the clumping and rumbling of heavy boots and the endless chatter of raucous voices. It sounded as if all the party-walls upstairs had been removed and the place had become one great crowded hall. Miss Witherspoon still stood in the kitchen. All her home life, she realized with terror, had suddenly been annihilated; for this would go on now, she supposed, till the end of the War. She was appalled, but not quite as appalled as she had been twenty minutes ago when those six clumsy giants, one indistinguishable from the other, had crowded into her front door. The sight of these two fellows in their shirt-sleeves had reassured her.

  The pail clanked in the yard and then the backdoor latch clattered and the other soldier came in carrying the pail. He smiled at her apologetically. ‘Can I take some more water, Miss?’ he said, and turned away to the sink, lifting up the empty pail.

  It was his eyes that caught Miss Witherspoon’s attention – dark blue eyes with black brows and heavy black lashes. She glanced at him again as he stood with his back to her with one hand on the running tap. The neckband of his shirt was tucked inwards, ready for his wash, showing the white, hairless skin of his neck below the sharp line of the sunburn. His bare arm, raised to hold the tap, was white and hairless too, and when he lifted the full pail and turned round she saw a pink boyish face that blushed a little through the tan when she spoke to him.

  ‘Do you want me to lend you a towel?’ she said.