Paid Servant (7 page)

“But I thought … ”

“You thought!” she continued. “You thought you made a child, so you're liable to think anything else, but don't you twist my words, Mr Man.”

“I don't quite understand all this,” I said, puzzled. “I thought you were objecting to the child altogether, Mrs Bentham. By the way, what is it, a boy or a girl?”

“A girl,” she replied, and suddenly her face lost its stern look. “Some women ought to be shot. Fancy walking off and leaving a helpless little thing like that.”

As if on cue, the pram shook on its springs, and the coverings became agitated as the infant vigorously thrust its arms and legs about. Mrs Bentham hurried over to the pram and bent solicitously over its occupant, making soft mother noises to it. Her husband stood up, looked over towards me and shrugged his shoulders, still apparently mystified by the eternally illogical behaviour of women, even after eighteen years of marriage.

“Oh, she's wet. Fetch me a napkin from the case, will you, Jim?” she said, without looking up. He went to the cases in the recess, but soon returned empty-handed.

“There's none there.” He hurried outside to see if there were any dry ones on the line.

I watched the woman as she attended the infant, cooing to it in that pleasant jabberwocky women through the ages have used on such occasions. She presented so natural a picture of motherhood that I asked: “What do you expect me to do about this, Mrs Bentham?”

She continued her ministrations for a few moments, then straightened up with the damp napkin in her hand. Dropping it on the floor near the pram she folded her arms across her breast and replied: “I don't want you to do anything, really. I only want him to admit that it's not his child. He knows it's not his, and I want him to admit it.”

“But he has said quite clearly that he was intimate with the girl. So even if she had other men, the chances are just as much in favour of him being the father as anyone else. Don't you agree?” I asked.

“That sounds fine,” she replied, “but I know what I'm talking about. You see … ” There was the sound of Mr Bentham's approaching footsteps and she stopped speaking. I had the feeling that she was about to make some further disclosure and wished he had not returned so quickly. He entered the room with a pile of damp napkins in his hand.

“They're still wet,” he said, “but maybe I can dry them over the heater.”

“Do you want to give the child pneumonia?” she asked him, with some trace of annoyance in her voice. “I think that chemist at Aldgate is open all night; maybe you could take the bus and get some there.”

“Okay,” he replied, and took his coat from among several outer garments hanging from hooks on the door. He seemed eager to be gone, to have a few moments' respite from this unfamiliar and complicated situation. She remained quite still until she heard the bang of the street door behind him, then, with a smile at me, she said:

“Would you get up a moment, please?”

I stood up, and she casually removed the fitted rubber cushion from the chair to disclose several neatly folded napkins which had been sandwiched between the fabric-covered seat platform and the cushion.

“I put them there this morning, keeps them warm that way,” she said, and selecting one, she replaced the cushion.

It was now obvious she wanted to tell me something which he was not supposed to hear. She went again to the baby and applied its clean napkin to the accompaniment of cooing noises. Finished, she sat opposite me.

“You know,” she said, “he's a good man, but he's stubborn. Somehow he's got this idea into his head that it's his child and he won't let go.”

“Now, please, Mrs Bentham,” I intervened, “let's be fair about this. I'm not taking sides in this matter, but your husband has been away from you for about two years and he admits to having an affair with the woman. It is just his misfortune that she became pregnant. Nobody can expect you to be pleased about it, but whether the child stays here or not, if the girl says that he is the putative father and he admits it, he will be legally responsible for its maintenance.”

“What was that you said?” she inquired. “What do you mean by putative?”

“It means that he is supposed to be the father, or reputed to be the father.”

“Oh, I thought it had something to do with ‘puta', you know, it's Spanish; would fit this case, don't you think?” The laughter was back in her voice, deep and generous.

‘Bright girl,' I thought, ‘very bright girl.'

“You don't understand,” she continued, “I'm not cross with him for going with a woman. After all, I didn't expect him to be an angel. What man ever is?”

“Then is it because she is a white woman?” I asked.

“Oh no,” she replied, somewhat impatiently, “her colour doesn't bother me. She's a woman, isn't she? It's just that you men are always so sure of yourselves, always so damned sure. His child, pah! Sure he wants a child, don't you think I know that. I've been married to him for eighteen years and I know he's been disappointed because we haven't had children. And so am I. Don't you think I want children, too? His child! His child! How about me?” She stood up suddenly and went over to look at the sleeping infant, then sat on the bed beside the pram.

“I know that all these years he's been blaming me for not giving him children. He never said anything, mind you, but I knew. I could see it in the way he never forgets to buy birthday presents for his sisters' children, so I knew he wanted some of his own. I worried about it for a long time. I even thought that he might some day leave me for someone who could give him children. But he's a good man, Jim is.

“When he first left Jamaica to work in Trinidad, I had to stay behind for sixteen months, before I could join him. I was much younger then, and used to go with a crowd of friends, you know, dances and parties and things. Well, one night after a party I slipped up; you know what I mean, and the next thing I knew I was pregnant.—God, I was frightened. If Jim had found out he might have killed me, or left me. I didn't even like the man, specially. Just one of those unlucky things and the first and only time I ever went with another man. Jim had been gone five months when it happened, so I couldn't tell him it was his, you see?

“Nobody ever knew about it except my mother, God rest her soul! I didn't even tell the man. My mother gave me the money and I got rid of it. So you see, I know this isn't Jim's child. My trouble happened after I had been married for years to Jim, and there's nothing wrong with me. Now, do you understand? And he calmly brings a child to me and says, ‘this is mine' and expects me to be pleased about it. Suppose it was the other way round and I had come to him with a child, do you think he would have accepted it?”

There was a little piece of illogic there, because she was saying the child could not possibly be his, whereas if she had turned up with a child he would begin by believing it to be hers.

“I think I understand your position, Mrs Bentham; now how can I help you?”

“Oh, I don't suppose you can, really. All I wanted that man to do was admit that it wasn't his child, but I don't suppose he will. That woman will never come back, I know it, so I suppose I'll just have to look after it, that's all.”

I had the feeling she had made this decision long before I ever saw them. “But suppose she does come back, what then?” I asked her.

“I'm sure she's not coming back,” she replied with emphasis. “Now that it's here, it stays here. Furthermore, we're moving from here, to one of those new towns perhaps, where it will be able to run about and play. We've got a bit of money put by and Jim can always find work in his trade. He's a good man.”

They didn't need me here, not really. For a little while I was useful as a listening ear, or perhaps a needful catalyst to help them resolve the main part of their problem, but now they'd get on fine without me. I stood up and she brought me my bag and umbrella.

“I'm sure you both will work this out satisfactorily, Mrs Bentham,” I said, “but if there's anything else I can do, well … ”

“Oh, don't worry about it,” she replied. “I've made up my mind. But that Jim Bentham. So he knows how to make children, does he? Well all right. As of tonight that Mr Man has work to do, right here.”

And the rich laughter came burbling out of her in sweet musical waves, rolling back upon her to highlight the richness and beauty of her face and figure and the spirit of love and kindness which shone through them.

As I let myself out of the street door, I thought of Jim Bentham, probably on his way back from the chemist, and the task awaiting him. I laughed to myself. I wondered whoever coined the phrase ‘a labour of love'.

As I rode home on the bus I wondered how it would have worked out if I had insisted that the Benthams come to my office if they wanted to see me. Would they have come? And if they had, would they have felt free to speak as they did in their own home? Evidently Mrs Bentham had wanted to talk to someone about her reason for maintaining that the child was not really her husband's. Would she have done so in his presence in the rather formal atmosphere of my office? Could I establish the kind of atmosphere in my office conducive to easy, uninhibited and co-operative discussions?

The only way for me to avoid many of these night visits was to begin at source. I must so conduct myself at interviews in my office that the right atmosphere would be created and inevitably the word would get around, because at the office everything began with an interview. That's where I, too, would have to begin. I'd watched the way some interviews had been transacted, and most of them left a great deal to be desired.

In my mind I tried to review the whole sequence of interviewing which I had witnessed on several occasions, and there was very little about any part of it which could be called commendable. Most persons visiting the Area Office needed help of one sort or another, and invariably appeared looking somewhat fearful or anxious. The physical arrangements of the waiting room did nothing to relieve their anxiety. Its shape, colour and furnishings made it a striking example of the complete lack of imagination characteristic of bureaucratic planning. Pale grey walls unrelieved except by two dreary posters illustrating the increase in road deaths; hard wooden forms ranged alongside the walls and painted the same dark, unhappy brown still to be seen in the waiting-rooms of some rural railway stations; the floor was uncovered, smooth, cold concrete. In this unsalubrious atmosphere the clients waited until they were called to one of the several interview rooms.

Each of these was smaller than the waiting-room, and different in that there were no posters, and instead of forms, the furniture consisted of a table and three chairs. One of these chairs, invariably the most comfortable one, was reserved on one side of the desk for the interviewer. In one corner of each interview room was a little group of rather battered toys, probably intended to attract and maintain the interest of children who accompanied their parents. I have no doubt that this last was often successful, for I often observed small children carefully examining those toys, as if anxious to discover what it was that kept the dirty, battered little monstrosities from falling apart.

I have often wondered why it is that although women occupy most of the senior positions in these Welfare offices they have not been sufficiently revolted by the sterile and miserable condition of the interview and waiting-rooms to bring about some worthwhile improvements in them. Granted the rooms are clean, but so are laboratories and operating theatres. Much more is needed at Welfare offices where, from the very beginning, the entire process of helping must be related to the applicant's dignity and assurance. Could it be that there's something about their single-minded pursuit of a career which cannot accommodate the idea of comfort with service? Or are they so bent on being as much like men as is naturally tolerable that they deliberately favour the severe and regimented in official duties? It has been argued that Social Welfare in Britain is part of State machinery. Granted. But there is nothing which suggests that the work is less efficiently done for a little colour here and there. Welfare Offices are intended as the means by which the State can lend a helping hand to the people. The effectiveness of these officials should depend less on how much help they are able to give than on how quickly those helped become once more independent. If the very first contact with the Welfare Office and Officers helps to speed this process of independence, all the better. A bright, cheerful room with comfortable chairs can inject quite a lift into a depressed spirit, and so, even before the interview, the process of rehabilitation will have begun.

However, in the final analysis, a great deal depends on the officers, and upon their first contact with the applicant. Although quite new to the work, I had visited all of the Areas in London and, with a few notable exceptions, the pattern of interviews was very much the same. The applicant would be called or sent to the interview room, and would sit in a chair on the other side of the table opposite the Welfare Officer, who would often have some files or other documents on the table before her, as if to suggest that she was under heavy pressure. The applicant often sat on the edge of the chair, maybe unconsciously getting the message that the officer's time was valuable, and so prepared for early flight. The first step would be according to the book. The officer would produce a pre-set form, number something or other. I remembered one such interview.

“Your name, please?”

“Maria Coates.”

“Age?”

“Twenty-seven.”

“Married or single?”

Maria Coates would now put her left hand into her coat pocket. It had been resting on her knee in full view of anyone who cared to look.

“Single.”

“Address?”