Читать книгу Ploughman of the Moon - Robert William Service - Страница 16

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One day I said to my father: "Papa, I'd like to go into a bank."

"Why, my son?"

"Because they have lots of money, I'll be sure of my pay. Also one gets all the holidays there are—and then some."

He beamed his agreement, for banking had been his own job. So, selecting his shaving day, he dressed up with his Winston Churchill hat, his sprigged waistcoat and his lavender spats, and we went off together to his old bank. There he introduced me to clerks of his youth who had risen to position and power. My application was made, and soon after a certain branch wrote to say that they needed an apprentice, and would I present myself.

The office was only two miles from home and the way lay through a lovely park. Here would be a healthful walk for me; while the bank itself, situated in the vicinity of a slum, looked humanly interesting. Standing at a corner, it had all the allure of a licensed establishment; indeed, it was frequently taken for one by the drunken dockers of the neighbourhood. It was, then, with favourable consideration I interviewed the Manager and Accountant. The first was big and ruddy, the second small and pallid. Both won the seal of my approval, and I decided that here was where I belonged. But there emerged what seemed an insuperable obstacle. The bank did not take apprentices under fifteen and I was just fourteen. The rule was definite. What was to be done? The Manager rose to the occasion. "You look a good sixteen," he said. "I'll take you up to head office and get their consent. Then you'll be the youngest apprentice in the service."

So next day I accompanied him to Edinborough, where in a74 staid old square was a stately building that had been the heart of the bank from time immemorial. It had an air of fruity permanence that appealed to me. I felt it was worthy of me. Scotch banking was said to be the best in the world, and here were bankers so sagacious they looked like owls. It thrilled me to think that one day I should look like that. So I was exhibited and duly sanctioned. They did not say: "Ha! a worthy addition to the staff," but I imagined they were thinking it, and that they were really proud to welcome me to their ranks. As soon as we reached the street, however, the Manager dropped me like a hot potato. He gave me a bun and his blessing and directed me to the station. Then he bustled off, looking very happy. I got the impression he had a girl friend in the city, and this was a diversion in an otherwise dull life.

My salary was to be twenty pounds a year for five years, but no increase was promised after that. And in fact in my seventh year I was still getting a hundred dollars a year for my services. I did not complain, however. It paid for my clothes, my lunch and left me a fair amount of pocket-money. At first it was wonderful to gain so much, but latterly it hardly seemed adequate.

The great thing was that the work was easy. I always had a prejudice against hard work, or indeed any work. I would rather do little for poor pay than strain myself for a big salary. So here I was well-suited. I would get down to the office at half past nine in the morning. There would be half an hour for lunch; then a walk to the chief office to collect the clearing house cheques. I would take an hour to this, walking, so that I might pocket the pennies allowed me for carfare. At four by the clock I would lock the front door and go home. And there were the holidays. It seemed we were always having them, especially Bank Holidays which no one else had.

But though I was justified in pocketing my carfare, an early experience in the bank convinced me that honesty was the best policy. Sometimes toward the end of the month I would find myself a little short of cash, so I would borrow a few shillings from my stamp box, making it good on pay-day. This was a reprehensible proceed75ing of course, but was frequently practised by juniors. It was so well known that the Accountant used to advise me the day before he proposed to check up my stamp account, giving me time to make good any deficiency. One morning I arrived very late at the office, to find a strange man there. I did not like the look of him and was in nowise reassured when he gazed at me grimly through steel-rimmed spectacles. He had a dirty grey beard and a peevish expression. He gave me no greeting but looked up sourly at the clock.

"Mr. Sleeth, the Inspector," whispered the Accountant. I felt a heart vacuum. Old Sleeth was the most dreaded of all the inspectors, mean, malicious, vindictive. As I looked at that grim visage I thought of my stamp account. I knew it was about five shillings short. I was caught. He lost no time, pouncing on me like cat on mouse. "Here, my boy, I'll have your stamp box."

Reluctantly I surrendered it. There was spiteful joy in his eyes as he took it, along with my postage book. There was pleased malice on his face as he proceeded to balance them. White and shaking I watched him. It was all up, I thought. Disgrace, dismissal, ruin. My life blasted, and all for a measly five bob. So there I stood, waiting for the blow to fall. How slow he was, how careful! I think he knew he was prolonging my agony. Then at last he finished. He laid down book and box. His manner was grimmer than ever. Yet there was no triumph in it. In fact, his face wore a distinct look of disappointment.

"Is it all right?" said the Accountant, who had been hovering anxiously near.

"No, it's no' all right. There's jist a wee matter of ..." Here he paused, looking at me searchingly for a long moment ... "A wee matter of tippence ... over." My heart gave a bound. I tried to tell myself that perhaps I had not borrowed five bob after all, or that I had paid it back in an absent-minded fit. But the affair was closed. I was saved.

And in this connection let me observe that at various times in my existence I have had the notion that I had a Guardian Angel. Perhaps most of us who survive the dangers of life have had this76 feeling, and no doubt it is illusory. But in my case it has happened so often I am inclined to yield to the idea that some one in another dimension is interested and protective where I am concerned. Oh, I know it is unworthy of a stout materialist like myself, but feeling and believing are sometimes hard to reconcile; and, though I scoff at the theory of a Special Providence, I like to entertain its suggestion of guidance and protection.

But to explain the mystery of the stamp account. That night when the others had gone I balanced my postages again. There it was, a deficit of over five shillings. Then I saw where old Sleeth had made his mistake. There were a large number of postcards used for acknowledging letters. The Inspector had calculated them at a penny each instead of a halfpenny. It was incredible he should make such a stupid mistake. But he did, and the difference just about made up my deficit. This was a lesson to me. I vowed that from then on I would be scrupulously honest—at least in small things. As a politician once told me: "Never be crooked unless you can be so in a big way."

And here I would like to say a word in favour of the Accountant who served over me for so long. With the Manager I had few contacts. He never consulted me in the management of the branch, but our relations were always pleasant and he gave me entire satisfaction. With the Accountant, however, I co-operated personally and am prepared to give him as hearty a testimonial as the one he gave me. He deserves it, for I must have been rather a trying underling. It was obvious I had no vocation for banking, and the only reason I stuck to it was that it was an easier job than any other. Curse this business of making a living! I have always regarded it as a necessary evil. Although I was in the banking business for fourteen years, I never discovered what it was all about. One of my old managers once told me I was the worst clerk he had ever known, and I agreed enthusiastically. If he had said the "best" I would have been seriously perturbed. In imagination I see a tombstone inscribed: Here lies a first-class bank clerk. But even of that epitaph I am unworthy.77

And though my work was easy, I tried to make it still easier. I dawdled over my daily errands and dreamed over my ledger. I made rhymes as I cast up columns of figures. It was so pleasant, with a big fire warming the spine. I crooked over my desk. Through the plate-glass window I could watch the cold grey street, where sailors and longshoremen met and wrangled. There were all sorts of Dickens-like characters meandering from pub to pub and an atmosphere of picturesque squalor that charmed me. I would gaze pensively from my high stool till a customer aroused me from my torpor.

Then I took to writing verses during office hours, and this was the last straw as far as my Accountant was concerned. One day he grabbed a piece of paper I was scribbling on. It availed him little, however. I saw him gazing with stupefaction at the line spaced at intervals: "But that was yesterday." It was the refrain of a three verse poem I was writing. I had the framework laid down, and all that remained was to fill in the body. Thus early was I adopting one of the tricks of the trade. My Accountant was mystified.

"What was yesterday?" he demanded with some indignation.

"That," I answered vaguely.

He had never read a verse of poetry in his life and would not have been sympathetic to my efforts to scale the slope of Parnassus instead of columns of figures. For he was a son of the soil. His father was a Fife farmer, and he had lived on the farm till he was sixteen. He remained bucolic-minded. His eyes would brighten at the sight of a nice horse, and he loved to talk of crops or cattle. His ambition was to become manager of a small country branch, and his grievance was that, though he was almost forty, he was still a city accountant. But no one could have seemed less agricultural. He wore oversized morning coats that gave him the look of a beetle, while his legs were encased in tight, striped trousers. He had a pale moon face and beautiful white teeth, possibly because he did not smoke. Neither did he drink alcoholically. I do not think he had a single vice. After work he trotted home to his wife and they went walking arm in arm. Naturally they had no children.

This was the man with whom I was associated for seven years.78 He had little education but much sound sense. He was limited in outlook, but sterling and upright. He often told me I was an original, but he was tolerant. To this day I thank him for his patience to one whom he was trying to steer in the narrow path of commercial righteousness.

But to return to my poem. I polished it off without difficulty. The first verse was introductory; the second developed the theme; the third climaxed it. There were four lines to each verse and the fourth carried the refrain: "But that was yesterday." It was dead easy to do. I was smugly pleased with it, so I sent it to a boys' paper called Ching Ching's Own. Two weeks after it appeared in the correspondence column with the comment by the Editor, "You've got it bad, old fellow. But cheer up. You'll get over it." This referred to the last line which ran:

Alas! my love is false to me,

But that was yesterday.

This then was my first published poem, and I never showed it to a soul. The reason was that the Editor had hit the nail on the head. For the first time in my life I was infatuated. She was a girl called Maisie McQuarrie, the perfection of prettiness. I do not say beauty, just adorable prettiness. She had the saccharine pulchritude of an expensive wax doll: her eyes the blue of lustrous gems, her mouth like a cherry, her complexion roses and cream. She was a picture of sweetness I hardly dared gaze at, so much did it take my breath away. To the last I never had one square look at her, but the mental image that haunted me night and day was one that in glamour exceeded the reality.

Yes, I had it bad. If I met her on the street my legs wobbled and my bowels seemed to turn to water. I pretended elaborate indifference, hoping she would give me a passing glance, but I do not think she ever did. From the beginning of my infatuation to its disastrous finish I did not address a word to her. If I had spoken I would have stammered and choked. However, I never got a chance. I had to content myself haunting the street in which she lived and79 gazing up at the window I thought might be hers, hoping to see her shadow on the blind. I would try to meet her coming home from school, but when I saw her approaching I would dart in panic down a side street. All I could do was to write poetry about her, and most of my spare time was given to this. It was the poetry of renunciation and despair. I wished I could send it to her but I dared not. One piece I wrote was called Love's Lament. The first verse ran thus:

There is nothing more to say

Since my hope so vain has proved;

Only now to go my way,

I the loving, you the loved;

I to love and still to sigh,

Hoping on for brighter day....

Save the saddest word: Good-bye,

There is nothing more to say.

It consisted of the usual three verses, and there was a slickness about it that pleased me. In the second verse there was a couplet I liked:

Love's exultant roundelay

Issues in a wail of pain.

In fact I was so tickled with it, that being Scotch, I saved it up and used it on three later occasions under somewhat similar but less reticent circumstances.

However, my verse-making did not get me any further with Maisie. The only time I ever really got near to her was in church, for the McQuarrie family had a pew behind ours. So about this time my family must have been puzzled by my sudden zeal for church-going. Perhaps they thought I had got religion. No doubt I had, but my divinity was a dainty creature in a muslin dress and a hat trimmed with forget-me-nots. Never would I have missed morning service. Even on the wettest day I would trudge to church. I, who had regarded the sermon as a bore, now found it all too short. I, who had said that one could worship God best in green80 fields, and who had declared that the truest prayers were gratitude for the sunshine and the breeze, now looked forward to the moment I could take my place in the family pew. That was my bit of paradise.

Not that I ever dared look at Maisie, but her very nearness filled me with joy. I could at least smell her, for she used a faint perfume. And sometimes by squinting round I could get a glimpse of her, but I dared not do this very often. Did she notice me, I wondered? Did she ask herself who was the poetic youth with the air of romantic melancholy? He must be some one unusual, perhaps a genius. I was sorry my face was so plump and red and sucked my cheeks in to make my profile more interesting. I only hoped I was making an impression.

I quarrelled with my chum Silverman on her account. I used to rave about her, till one day, irritated by my dithyrambics, he said: "Oh, give us a rest. Your girl may be an angel to you, but she is human. She evacuates her bowels like yourself." I was horrified, and I hotly denied it. "No, not like me, no ..." Then I realized that the chemistry of the body applies to us all and angrily I refused to argue the point.

I mention this to show how enamoured I was, and how I put my lady-love on a pedestal. I could not bear to think of her in any carnal sense. And this went on for seven months. Then came the outrageous climax.

The McQuarries were a snooty family. They lived in Sunnybrae Crescent, whose residents disdained Roselea Terrace and sniffed as if the air of our street was polluted. Mr. McQuarrie was a high official in the railway, and their house had three stories. His wife was thin and supercilious, and he was bony of face with a choleric eye. If he noticed me at all it was as a little whipper-snapper, quite unworthy of his notice. He was always dressed very smartly, with a fine frock-coat and a shiny top-hat. Well, it so happened that one day I arrived very late for church and hurried to my place. The congregation was singing the first hymn when I pushed into my seat.81 I was conscious of Maisie looking at me in an amused way, so flustered was I. I was aware of Mr. McQuarrie directly behind me, singing lustily in a voice like a corn-crake. Then as I sat down to make the usual perfunctory prayer, I was further aware of a dreadful cracking sound. It dominated the singing; it curdled my blood! it paralyzed me with horror.... I was sitting squarely on Mr. McQuarrie's gleaming silk topper.

Will I ever forget the sickening sensation as it buckled under me, and my too tardy reflex as I rose with a startled "Oh!" I was aware of the petrified stare of its owner. He suspended his singing, looking aghast as he realized what had happened. I turned to face him. He held out his hand for the hat. I took it up, but before I gave it to him, I instinctively put my hand inside and straightened it out. I remember the big cracks and the drunken disreputable look of it. It was squashed almost flat. With a most unchristian look on his face he snatched at it. And it was then, I am afraid, I added insult to injury, for I said the thing that came into my head. As I tried to push it back into shape I stammered: "Awfully sorry, sir. Pity it wasn't your opera hat; then it wouldn't have mattered, would it?"

At that, for the first and only time, Maisie smiled. I will always treasure the memory of that smile, for I knew the game was up. At last I had made an impression, though not the one I had intended. And on my way home as I watched Mr. McQuarrie trying to look dignified under his battered tile, I realized that he would never be my future father-in-law. Then somehow the humorous side of it struck me. I laughed, and suddenly the spell was broken. I was free from the thrall of love, and how happy I was! Maisie could go to the devil now. I no longer cared for her.

And yet I must have treasured a sneaking regard, for years after, when I heard she had determined to earn her own living and was going to Normal School, I wrote a ballade about her. It happened I was experimenting in that form at the time, so I began:

You've pupil teacher turned, they say,

And at the knowledge I declare[Pg 82]

I wish I were a child to-day.

That pupil I might claim your care;

Ah, then how gladly would I fare;

Each day to your sweet presence free,

Each day to hear with eyes astare

The lesson that you taught to me.

And so on, three verses and the envoi. It was a perfect specimen of the ballade form and written mainly for practice. But, caring little, I sent it to her anonymously. Imagine then my surprise, some years later, when I saw my ballade in the poet's corner of the Weekly Herald. It was printed as I wrote it, but it bore other initials than mine. Not Maisie's either. I wondered who had stolen it. It amused me, but at that time I had switched from poetry to another of my interests and I was too careless to investigate....

I have a sudden doubt. Was her name not Daisy? It may have been. Funny how one can go off one's chump for a girl and later on hardly remember her name. Well, she was a lovely lass. I'll bet she made some man a perfect wife, but I have never regretted it was not I.