Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky (71 page)

Moreover she had come in in the middle of a picture, and the children behind her kept on kicking her in the back. Each time those sudden love-sick lurches came, she felt she could barely keep still, but must get up and walk away somewhere – but where? However, she manfully stuck it out for an hour and a quarter. Then, after a succession of lurches increasing in pain and frequency, as though the ship of her lovelorn condition had entered even rougher water, together with a
cold feeling all over her body, she sprang impulsively from her seat and left the theatre.

But you cannot walk away from sorrow like that. And in any case there is nothing in the world more dreary, damping, and obscurely perturbing than to come out of a cinema in the afternoon to a noisy world. And she did not want any tea, or know where she was going. And it was bitterly cold again, with the wind in the east. She walked into Lower Regent Street and up towards Piccadilly.

And in the murky dusk of evening, it was a turbulent and terrifying spectacle which met her eyes and smote her ears. She had never seen so many desperate buses, and blocked cars, and swarming people, in her life. In all the teeming, roaring, grinding, belching, hooting, anxious-faced world of cement and wheels around her it really seemed as though things had gone too far. It seemed as though some climax had just been reached, that civilization was riding for a fall, that these days were certainly the last days of London, and that other dusks must soon gleam upon the broken chaos which must replace it.

And what place had she in it all? And where was she going now? Back to ‘The Midnight Bell’ to talk to Bob? No – no Bob ever again. The horrible New man – John – instead. At this thought her heart sank down again; she felt she was being drowned in the flood of passing people and savage traffic; and her soul cried out for aid in its darkness. Oddly enough it came.

‘Ella!’ came a voice from behind her, and she turned and was staring at Bob.

F
OR A MOMENT
they simply stared at each other, in the stream of people passing them each way, she looking with fright into his dark eyes, and he looking down at her with a sort of diffident concern and suspense.

‘Well, you, of all people. . . .’ he said. . . .

‘But, Bob, I thought you was gone to sea,’ she said.

She could say nothing else, seeing this strange, lovely and comforting ghost from a lost world.

‘No. I don’t go till next week,’ said Bob. ‘Well, this is fine. What’re you doing down here?’

‘I’ve been to the pictures,’ she said, like a scared child answering examination questions – so impressed, so awed was she by his presence.

‘Well, let’s go and have some tea,’ he said, taking her arm, and leading her away stupefied. ‘You’ve got time, haven’t you?’

‘Yes. There’s plenty of time.’

‘I know the times all right,’ said Bob, ‘I’ve cut it short enough plenty of times.’

‘So have I,’ said Ella, but she felt a bitter pang at this reference to their old companionship, in the fetters from which he was now mysteriously free, but to which she was still bound in loneliness.

‘You’ve got more than half an hour,’ he said. They were now in Piccadilly itself, and she had no idea where he was leading her.

‘But, Bob, why did you leave so sudden?’ she said.

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I was waiting for the chance you know. An’ it just come along.’

‘But you ought to have let me know, Bob. I was ever so hurt.’

‘Were you? I’m sorry Ella. I hoped you would be in that day. I was going to write to you in any case.’

‘Oh, Bob, you weren’t!’

‘Yes, I was, Ella. Honest.’ And he seemed so sincere and friendly as he looked down on her, that she almost believed him.

‘I wouldn’t forget you,’ said Bob. ‘Let’s go down here.’

And he led her into the doorway of a little lunch-and-tea restaurant which was reached down some dark stairs.

There was only one other customer in the dimly-lit, fancifully decorated little dive, and they sat at a small table
covered with a red, checkered cloth. They were served by a lady-like looking person in green. The one other customer left, and she was alone with Bob. So in these strange surroundings, and at so strange a time of day, she had been destined to spend her last moments with the man she loved.

‘But where are you
going
, Bob?’ she said, as they waited for their tea.

‘Me?’ said Bob, ‘I’m going to Iceland first of all.’ And he smiled at the oddity of his destination. ‘We’re sailing Wednesday.’

‘
Iceland
, Bob? What a funny place.’

‘Yes. I have been to most places, but I never been up there. But it’ll all be new. I was very lucky to get it.’

‘Of course I suppose I’ve never really thought of you as a sailor, Bob.’

‘No?’ said Bob, and their tea came. ‘You be mother,’ he said, and she poured it out.

‘But when did you decide, Bob?’

‘Oh, I don’t know. It’s been on my mind a long time. I wasn’t doing much good here.’

‘Weren’t you?’

‘No. It wasn’t leading anywhere. And maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a landsman.’

‘Weren’t you?’ And as she stared at him it seemed that there was some truth in this, for he seemed now, to her fond eyes, like some creature that belonged neither to land nor sea, but to some beautiful and remote plane above mortality.

‘Is that clock right?’ she said. ‘I mustn’t be late.’

‘No. It’s fast. You’ve got ten minutes or more.’

Ten more minutes, and she was never to see him again. A feeling of coldness came over her, and her hand trembled as she lifted her cup to drink. Friendly and sympathetic as he was, he had no idea of her state. How could he? She suddenly remembered how the Mrs. had once remarked that ‘the girls would all be after Bob,’ and she saw how perfectly true this was. Any girl with eyes in her head would be after him. How then had she, a plain insignificant girl without
any of the resources of others, ever dared hope to that she might make an impression upon so unique and shining a being?

‘Then what are you doing with yourself at the moment, Bob?’

‘Oh. I’m making do. It’s only a few days now.’

She did not press her questions, as it was too painful. But she could not help wondering about the whereabouts and present mode of life of this unusual character wandering alone about London, and loved so dearly by her.

‘You left all your books behind.’

‘Did I? I believe I did.’

‘Don’t you want them?’

‘No – I don’t want them.’

‘Not all your wonderful History books?’

‘No. I don’t want them. You have them as a present from me.’

‘Thanks, Bob. I’m in your room now, you know.’

‘Oh – are you? I’m glad of that. You always wanted that room, didn’t you.’

‘Did I? I used to hear you moving about at night.’

‘Did you? I used to hear you sometimes.’

‘They’ve got the new man in my room, now.’

She knew she was exacerbating and tearing at her wound, but she could not stop herself. She had never had any idea that she loved him like this. As she looked at him now, in these last few moments, it seemed that he was transfigured with almost unholy attractiveness – physical attractiveness – that was the point – sheer physical attractiveness. It was at that moment, perhaps, that she made up her mind about Mr. Eccles. For she had a glimpse, forsaken as she was, of something in Bob and in the depths of her own being which put Mr. Eccles on a level of sacrilege to which she could not, with her youth still on her, descend.

‘Have they?’ said Bob. ‘What’s he like?’

‘Oh, he’s all right. Not as nice as you.’

‘Well – I’m glad of that.’

‘Nor as nice looking.’

‘Well – that’s good too.’

‘Oh, Bob, you shouldn’t have gone and done it,’ she said, her heart at last speaking.

‘I’m sorry, Ella. But there’ve got to be changes everywhere, haven’t there.’

She could stand this no longer. ‘Come on, Bob,’ she said. ‘Let’s go.’ And she rose.

It was darker and colder than ever outside, and they had to walk into Regent Street, where he was going to see her on to her bus. He took her arm as they walked along, and they had very little to say. She was only just keeping her teeth from chattering and she had an extraordinary feeling as though he was leading her along in the crowd not to her bus but to her execution, silently sympathetic with her bravery, himself moved by her ordeal. Perhaps he knew after all. And, indeed, it was a form of execution, for her farewell to him was going into the darkness for ever from the shining yet unattainable world she had glimpsed.

‘Will you write, Bob?’ she said.

‘Yes. I’ll write. If you’ll answer.’

‘Oh – I’ll answer all right,’ said Ella. ‘And talking of writing –’ she added, and opened her bag and looked for her letter to Mr. Eccles.

‘Yes?’ said Bob.

‘You might post this for me, Bob,’ she said, and she felt she formally handed him the tribute of her love.

Bob looked at the address. ‘Mr. Eccles – eh?’ he said. ‘Is he still as mad about you?’

‘Maybe he is. I don’t know.’

‘You just haven’t any use for him?’

‘No. He was too old, after all, Bob. And I am young, aren’t I?’

‘Of course you are.’

‘And he was ever so silly, too. Look, Bob, that’s my bus if I run for it.’

‘Yes, it is. Perhaps you’d better. . . .’

They began to run. ‘All right, Bob. Don’t you worry. You write. And don’t forget to post that letter.’

‘No. I won’t . . . Well, good-bye, Ella.’ The bus had stopped and the people were getting off and on.

‘Good-bye, Bob. . . You must kiss me, you know, as it’s good-bye for good.’

And with an effrontery which she marvelled at afterwards, she put up her face, and kissed him.

‘Good-bye, Ella.’

‘Good-bye, Bob.’

With these words in her ears, she was climbing the steps of the bus, which was already snarling away, and she did not look back to see him wave.

It was a rather pale, but as ever neat and spruce Ella, who came down to the bar that evening to begin her work, and no one would have suspected her of being any less cheerful than usual, as the customers came in and ordered their drinks. It was ‘Good evening, Miss’ or ‘Good evening, Ella,’ and ‘Good evening, Sir’ or ‘Good evening, Mr. Er –’ just as usual. They all came in telling her how cold it was, and she agreed, shudderingly clasping her hands and smiling.

Not that her customers ever suspected her of having any private worries – or even of any private thoughts. And not that they would have been impressed by them if they did. They would have known unconsciously that the vast total burden of life in London is distributed upon all pretty indiscriminately – is shouldered by each in his own way – and that ‘worries’ were nothing unusual on this planet, in a girl behind the bar or anywhere else. They had enough ‘worries’ themselves.

At about nine o’clock, however, under the stimulus of a few drinks, the burden of life, for them at any rate, grew rather lighter, and as usual they became a little ‘fresh,’ and she was made the butt of their friendly irony and arrogance. As usual she was up to them, and was seldom at a loss for a reply to throw back over her shoulder as she got them their drinks.

If anything had happened to Ella, then, which made her a different Ella to the Ella who had served in the same bar, months back, when Mr. Eccles had not appeared on the scene,
and she was calmly living her daily life with Bob as an eternal fixture, it was not observable by the gentlemen, or the Governor, or the Mrs., or any of the staff.

And, indeed, what had taken place in those dull months? Nothing, really, whatever – nothing out of the common lot of any girl in London, if you came to think about it. She had had an elderly admirer, (what girl has not been in such a dilemma at some time or another?) about whom she had not been able fully to make up her mind. Nothing in that. A connection of hers had been ill – a stepfather whom she disliked, and there had been domestic troubles. Nothing in that. She had been depressed by the fogs and the cold – who had not? She had looked for another job, but it hadn’t come to anything – an ordinary enough occurrence. She had had what the gentlemen in the bar would have called a slight ‘crush’ on the waiter. But that was not the first time a girl had a ‘crush’ on a man she worked with. You soon get over that. No – seen from an outsider’s point of view she was lucky if she had nothing more to grumble about, and the gentlemen committed no error in tact in joking with her and teasing her just as usual.

And on no occasion did she give the smallest suspicion that she required special treatment – and indeed it never flashed across her mind that she did. She was too busy, among other things. A little while before closing time the crowded bar became rather more hilarious than usual, owing to the rambling absurdities of an exceptionally intoxicated little man, who had been drinking himself to stupefaction under Ella’s chiding yet friendly eyes. He liked Ella, he said. And she was a damned clever girl, too. ‘
Exactly
,’ he said when she said anything. She was clever. Ella had often found that it was not difficult to acquire a reputation for cleverness with those who were drunk, for she had only to say the most commonplace things, for which they in their fuddled and groping minds had been long searching, and, lo, they were proclaimed with vinous rapture as shrewd, cutting, universal, solemn, awe-inspiring verities. Thus to-night she had happened to remark that too many cooks sometimes spoiled the broth. ‘
Exactly!
’ said the bemused man, and later became so silly that he was
led away amid laughter, still protesting that she was Clever.

Then came closing time, and the new man, in stentorian tones, amazing in so small a man, began to call ‘
All out!
’ ‘All right, but you’ll have to hurry,’ she whispered conspiratorially, as she always did, to her favourites who begged for a last drink. And ‘Good-night, Sir!’ she cried, ‘Good-night,’ and wiped the bar and tidied up roughly (ready for next morning) in the same old way. And she felt the draught coming in from the opened doors, as she always did.