Читать книгу Carnival - Compton Mackenzie - Страница 8

Table of Contents

SHORTLY after her eighth birthday Jenny was puzzled by an incident which, with its uneasy suggestions, led her to postulate to herself for the first time that mere escape from childhood did not finally solve the problem of existence.

She had long been aware of the incomplete affection between her parents; that is to say, she always regarded her father as something that seemed like herself or a chair to be perpetually in her mother's way.

She had no feeling of awe towards Mr. Charles Raeburn, but rather looked upon him as a more extensive counterpart of Alfie, both prone to many deeds of mischief. She had no conception of her father as a bread-winner; her mother was so plainly the head of the house.

In the early morning her father vanished to work and only came back just before bedtime to eat a large tea, like Alfie, in the course of which he was reprimanded and pushed about and ordered, like Alfie, to behave himself. To be sure, he had liberty of egress at a later hour, for once, when in the midst of nightly fears she had rushed in the last breath of a dream along the landing to her mother's room, she saw him coming rosily up the stairs. He made no attempts to justify his late arrival with tales of goblin accidents as Alfie was wont to do. He did not ascribe the cracked egg appearance of his bowler hat to the onset of a baker's barrow. He seemed so far indifferent to the unfinished look of his clothes as not to bother to lay the blame on the butcher's boy. Her mother merely said:

"Oh, it's you?"

To which Mr. Raeburn replied: "Yes, Flo, it's me," and began to sing "Ta-ra-ra—boom—de—ay."

Even Ruby O'Connor, who, in earlier days at Hagworth Street, used to quell Alfie with terrible threats of a father's vengeance, gave them up as ineffective; for the bland and cheerful Charlie, losing the while not a morsel of blandness or cheerfulness, was fast becoming an object of contemptuous toleration in his own house. He was a weak and unsuccessful man, fond of half-pints and tales of his own prowess, with little to recommend him to his family except an undeniable gift of humorous description. Yet, even with this, he possessed no imagination. He was accustomed to treat the world as he would have treated a spaniel. "Poor old world," he would say in pitying intention; "poor old world." He would pat the universe on its august head as a pedagogue slaps a miniature globe in the schoolroom. He never expected anything from the world, which was just as well, for he certainly never received very much. To his wife's occasional inquiry of amazed indignation, "Why ever did I come to marry you?" he would answer:

"I don't know, Floss. Because you wanted to, I reckon."

"I never wanted to," she would protest.

"Well, you didn't," he would say. "Some people acts funny."

"That's quite right."

Hers was the last word: his, however, the pint of four ale that drowned it.

Jenny at this stage in her life was naturally incapable of grasping the fact of her mother throwing herself away in matrimony; but she was able to ponder the queer result that, however much her mother might be annoyed by Charlie, she did not seem able to get rid of him.

Alfie, with his noise and clumping boots, was an equally unpleasant appendage to her life, but for Alfie she was responsible. In whatever way children came about, it was not to be supposed they happened involuntarily like bedtime or showers of rain. Moreover, mystery hung heavy over their arrival. Edie and Alfie would giggle in corners, look at each other with oddly lighted eyes, and blush when certain subjects arose in conversation. Human agency was implied, and all that talk of strawberry-beds and cabbage leaves so much trickery. Alfie, bad habits and all, was due to her father and mother being married.

But why be married when Alfies were the result? Why not close the door against her father and be rid of him? And take somebody else in exchange? Who was there? Nobody.

One foggy afternoon early in January, Jenny came back from school to the smell of a good cigar. She did not know it was a good cigar, but the perfume hung about the dark hall of Number Seventeen with a strange richness never associated in her mind with the smell of her father's smoke. She was conscious, too, from the carefully closed doors both of the parlor and the kitchen, that company was present. The voice of a polite conscience warned her not to bang about, not to shout "Is tea ready, mother?" but rather to tread discreetly the little distance to the kitchen and there to await developments. If Alfie and Edie were already arrived by a punctual chance, she would learn from them the manner and kind of the company hid in the parlor.

The kitchen was empty. No tea was laid. Over her stole an extraordinary sensation of misgiving. She felt as if she were standing at the foot of a ladder watching Alfie about some mischievous business.

Presently Ruby returned from the scullery, like a sudden draught.

"However did you get in so quiet?" asked the newcomer. Then Jenny remembered the street door had been open.

"Who's in along of mother?"

"That's right. Be nosey."

"Tell us, Rube."

"I can't tell what I don't know."

"But you do know," persisted Jenny; "so tell us."

"D'you think we all wants to poke in where we isn't wanted, like you, Miss Meddlesome? How should I know?"

"Well, I told you yesterday what teacher called Edie, so tell us, Rube; you might tell us."

"There isn't nothing to tell, you great inquisitive monkey," Ruby declared.

Then there was a sound in the hall of a man's voice, a rich voice that suited somehow the odor of the cigar. Jenny longed to peep round the kitchen door at the visitor, but she was afraid that Ruby would carry on about it. A moment or two's conversation, and the street door slammed, and when her mother came back from the kitchen, Jenny was afraid to ask bluntly:

"Who was that?"

Instead she announced:

"We did sewing this afternoon. Teacher said I sewed well."

"You sew on with your tea," said Mrs. Raeburn. "And wherever can Edie and Alfie have got to?"

A week or two afterwards Jenny returned to the same smell of cigar, the same impression of a rich and unusual visitor, but this time the parlor door gaped to a dark and cold interior, and when Jenny followed Ruby into the kitchen, he was there, a large florid man, with a big cigar and heavy mustache and a fur coat open to a snowy collar and shining tie-pin.

"And this is Jenny, is it?" he said in the cigar voice.

Jenny kissed him much as she would have kissed the walrus he slightly resembled; then she retreated, finger in mouth, backwards until she bumped against the table by which she leaned to look at the stranger, much as she would have looked at a walrus.

Her father came in after a while, and his wife said:

"Mr. Timpany."

"Eh?" said Charlie.

"Mr. Timpany, a friend of father's."

"Oh," said Charlie. "Pleased to meet you," with which he retired to a chair in a dusky corner and was silent for a long time. At last he asked:

"Have you been to Paris, Mr.... Tippery? Thrippenny, I should say."

"Timpany, Charlie. I wish you'd listen. Have you got cloth ears? Of course he's been to Paris, and, for gracious, don't you start your stories. One would think to hear you talk as you were the only man on earth as had ever been further than Islington."

"I was in Paris once some years back—on business," Charlie remarked. "I think Paris is a knockout, as towns go. Not but what I like London better. Only you see more life in Paris," and he relapsed into silence, until finally Mr. Timpany said he must be going.

"Who's he?" demanded Mr. Raeburn, when his wife came back from escorting her visitor to the door.

"I told you once—a friend of father's."

"Ikey sort of a bloke. He hasn't made a mistake coming here, has he? I thought it was the Duke of Devonshire when I see him sitting there."

"You are an ignorant man," declared Mrs. Raeburn. "Don't you know a gentleman when you see one? Even if you have lost your own shop and got to go to work every morning like a common navvy, you can tell a gentleman still."

"Are you bringing in any more dukes or markisses home to tea?" asked Charlie. "Because let me know next time and I'll put on a clean pair of socks."

Mrs. Raeburn did not bring any more dukes or marquises home to tea; but Mr. Timpany came very often, and Charlie took to returning from work very punctually, and, though he was always very polite to Mr. Timpany when he was there, he was very rude indeed about him when he was gone, and Jenny used to think how funny it was to wait for Mr. Timpany's departure before he began to make a fuss.

Vaguely she felt her father was afraid to say much. She could understand his fear, because Mr. Timpany was very large and strong, so large and strong that even her mother spoke gently and always seemed anxious to please him. And looking at the pair side by side, her father appeared quite small—her father whom she had long regarded as largeness personified.

One day Jenny came home late from school and found her parents in the middle of a furious argument.

"I ar'n't going to have him here," Charlie was saying, "not no more, not again, the dirty hound!"

"You dare say that, you vulgar beast."

"I shall say just whatever I please. You're struck on him, that's what you are, you soft idiot."

"I'm no such thing," declared Mrs. Raeburn. "Nice thing that a friend of father's can't come and have a cup of tea without your carrying on like a mad thing."

"Not so much 'cup of tea,' Mrs. Raeburn. It's not the tea I minds. It's while the kettle's boiling as I objects to."

"You're drunk," said the wife scornfully.

"And it's —— lucky I am drunk. You're enough to make a fellow drunk with your la-di-da behavior. Why, God help me, Florrie, you've been powdering your face. Let me get hold of the——. I'll learn him to come mucking round another man's wife."

On the very next day Mr. Timpany came to tea for the last time. Possibly Mrs. Raeburn had told her husband it was to be the last time, for he did not put in an appearance. Ruby had gone out by permission. May was secured by a fortified nursing-chair. Alfie was away on some twilight adventure of bells and string. Edie was immerged in a neighboring basement with two friends, a plate of jam, and the cordial teasing of the friends' brother, young Bert; and Jenny, urged on by a passionate inquisitiveness, crept along the passage and listened to the following conversation:

"You're wasted here, Flo, wasted—a fine woman like you is absolutely wasted. Why won't you come away with me? Come away to-night, I'll always be good to you."

"The children," said their mother.

"They'll get on all right by themselves. Bring the little one—what's her name, with fair hair and dark eyes?"

"Jenny."

"Yes, Jenny. Bring her with you. I don't mind."

"It wouldn't be fair to her. She'd never have a chance."

"Rubbish! She'd have more chance in a cosy little house of your own than stuck in this rat's hole. You'd have a slap-up time, Flo. A nice little Ralli cart, if you're fond of horses, and—oh, come along, come now. I want you."

"No; I've fixed myself up. I was done with life when I married Charlie, and I'm fixed up."

"You're in a cage here," he argued.

"Yes; but I've got my nest in it," she said.

"Then it's good-bye?"

"Good-bye."

"I'm damned if I can understand why you won't come. I'd be jolly good to you."

"Good-bye."

"You're a cold woman, aren't you?"

"Am I?"

"I think you are."

"It doesn't always do to show one's feelings."

"You're a regular icicle."

"Perhaps," whispered Mrs. Raeburn.

Jenny stole back to the kitchen greatly puzzled. Whether the florid Mr. Timpany kissed Mrs. Raeburn before he went out to look for the hansom cab that was to jingle him out of her life, I do not know; but she waved to him once as she saw him look round under a lamp post, for Jenny had crept back and was standing beside her when she did so.

"You come on in, you naughty girl," said Mrs. Raeburn, drowning love in a copper bubbling with clothes.

"Would you like that man better than father?" Jenny inquired presently, pausing in the erection of a tower of bricks for the benefit of May, who watched with somber eyes the quivering feat of architecture.

"What do you mean?" said Mrs. Raeburn sharply.

"Would you like father to go away and never, never come back here along of us ever again and always have that man?"

"Of course, I shouldn't, you silly child."

"I would."

"You would?"

"Yes," said Jenny; "he smelt nice."

"Ah, miss, when one's married, one's married."

"Could I be married?"

"When you grow up. Of course."

"Could I have little boys and girls?"

"Of course you could if you were married."

"Could I have lots and lots?"

"More than you bargain for, I daresay," declared her mother.

"Did you marry to have a little girl like me?"

"Perhaps."

Encouraged by her mother's unusual amenity to questions, Jenny went on:

"Did you really, though?"

"For that and other reasons."

"Were you glad when you saw me first?"

"Very glad."

"Did I come in by the door?"

"Yes."

"Who brought me?"

"The doctor."

"Did he ring the bell?"

"Yes."

"Did father know I was coming?"

"Yes."

"Was I a present from father?"

"Yes."

"Would you like that gentleman to give you a present?"

"What do you mean?"

"Would you like him to give you a li'l' girl like me?"

"Not at all; and you stop asking questions, Mrs. Chatter."

Her mother was suddenly aware of Jenny's cross-examinations, which she had been answering mechanically with thoughts far away with a florid man in a jingling hansom cab. Jenny was conscious of her dreaming and knew in her sly baby heart that her mother was in a weak mood. But it was too good to last long enough for Jenny to find out all she wanted to know.

"Why don't you send father away and have that gentleman as a lodger?"

"I told you once; don't keep on."

"But why don't you?"

"Because I don't want to."

In bed that night Jenny lay awake and tried to understand the conversation in the parlor. At present her intelligence could only grasp effect. Analysis had not yet entered her mind.

She saw, in pictures on the ceiling, her mother and the rich strange gentleman. She saw her father watching. She saw them all three as primitive folks see tragedies, dimly aware of great events, but powerless to extract any logical sequence. Lying awake, she planned pleasant surprises, planned to bring back Mr. Timpany and banish her father. It was like the dreams of Christmas time, when one lay awake and thought of presents. She remembered how pleased her mother had professed herself by the gift of a thimble achieved on Jenny's side by a great parsimony in sweets. The gentleman had offered a cosy house. At once she visualized it with lights in every window and the delicious smell that is wafted up from the gratings of bakers' shops. But what was a Ralli cart? Something to do with riding? And Jenny was to come, too, and share in all this. He had said so distinctly. If he gave mother a house, why should he not give her a doll's house such as Edie boasted of in the house of a friend, such as Edie had promised to show her some day. She began to feel a budding resentment against her mother for saying "No" to all these delights, a resentment comparable with her emotions not so long ago when her mother refused to let her go for a ride on an omnibus with Mr. Vergoe.

Good things came along very seldom, and when they did come, grown-up people always spoiled them. Life, as Jenny lay awake, seemed made up of small repressions. Life was a series of hopes held out and baffled desires, of unjust disappointments and aspirations unreasonably neglected. She lay there, a mite in flowing time, sensible only of having no free will.

Why couldn't she grow up all of a sudden and do as she liked? But then grown-up people, whom she always regarded as entirely at liberty, did not seem to be able to do as they liked. Her mother had said, "No, thank you," to a cosy house, just as she was taught to say, "No, thank you," to old gentlemen who offered her pennies to turn somersaults over railings—surely a harmless way of getting money. But her mother had not wanted to say "No, thank you." That Jenny recognized as a fact, although, if she had been asked why, she would have had nothing approaching a reason.

"I will do as I like," Jenny vowed to herself. "I will, I will. I won't be told." Here she bit the sheet in rage at her powerlessness. Desire for action was stirring strongly in her now. "Why can't I grow up all at once? Why must I be a little girl? Why can't I be like a kitten?" Kittens had become cats within Jenny's experience.

"I will be disobedient. I will be disobedient. I won't be stopped." Suddenly a curious sensation seized her of not being there at all. She bit the bedclothes again. Then she sat up in bed and looked at her petticoats hanging over the chair. She was there, after all, and she fell asleep with wilful ambitions dancing lightly through the gay simplicities of her child's brain, and, as she lay there with tightly closed, determined lips, her mother with shaded candle looked down at her and wondered whether, after all, she and Jenny would not have been better off under the rich-voiced, cigar-haunted protection of Mr. Timpany.

And then Mrs. Raeburn went to bed and fell asleep to the snoring of Charlie, just as truly unsatisfied as most of the women in this world.

Only Charlie was all right. He had spent a royal evening in bragging to a circle of pipe-armed friends of his firmness and virility at a moment of conjugal stress.

And outside the cold January stars were reflected in the puddles of Hagworth Street.