“Hello, old cock,” I said.
“Morning, squire,” said Philip.
“Oh, hell,” said Pete.
“Now then, Bairn,” I said.
“There's none left, you know. I ate it all. I left him a bit,” he said pointing at his brother, “but then you have to, don't you? Your own flesh and blood.”
“Ne'r mind. I'll have a cup of tea instead. So you're all right then,” I said to Philip.
“Oh, yes. In the pink. Ready for the Christmas ale-up. And yourself?”
“Oh, you know, up to my neck in terrible, complex, emotional problems involving responsibility, the honourable outcome of which depends on my possessing a peculiarly strong sense of values certified correct by the
Observer
--- problems which, however, I feel will be solved, though impermanently, by taking generous dashes of the festive beverage. In short, I still fulfill my civic duties as Urban District Council Ale-Cart.”
“Your mother tells me you've been getting on rather well with Janet.”
“You could say that. I'll give you the uncensored low down when we retire to the strains of Stan Getz. You do understand, don't you, Mrs C?”
“You lads! Two sugars, Victor?”
“I should give him a smack o'lug,” said Pete.
We took our tea into the living room. Pete put on a record, we lit up, and sank back into the big armchairs.
“There's nothing like Nowting,” said Pete, wriggling deeper into his chair. Thin winter sunshine filtered in through the windows. The fire raced in the Baxi grate.
“What's the story, then?” asked Philip.
“About Janet?”
“Get on,” he said derisively. “You know you're dying to tell us.”
“Well,” I said. “At the moment, I'm not allowed to see her. By order of her mother.”
“Every stricture tells a story,” said Pete.
“Oh, 'ell,” said Philip.
So, anyway, I told them. I told them the facts. Correct in every detailâexcept that although I told the truth, it wasn't true. None of it. It was a story, a series of events which had nothing to do with what I, as a person, felt. I was unable, in front of two people who knew me better than most, to let them know me at all. I presented them with a picture that fitted with what they knew of me, and I realized that what they knew of me was based on happenings, not confessions. Whatever I confessed to them about this present thing would be unconsciously judged in the light of their past experience of me. So I was trapped by the engineering of my own self-designed character build-up. I was a load of surface laughs, incapable of communicating my reality.
The next day, Philip and I walked out of town and up Vinegar Hill. When we got to the top, past the place where the sailless windmill is, past Glover's market garden, we sat down on a rusting harrow and looked down on the town and the river. The day was light grey and still. The rose hint of sunshine was somewhere about. Skeletal woods were pale brown on the horizon. We smoked for a while.
“I'm glad it's Christmas,” I said. “Aren't you?”
“I am,” said Philip.
“I always enjoy Christmas. You know, the lads all together, Christmas Eve with all our folks getting kalied together. Everybody liking each other for a change. Know what I mean? And, of course, the thing is, the real basic thing is, that we, the lads, we
always
like each other. It's funny, we've all turned out differently as far as jobs and things are concerned, but we're always the same when we meet. Ron's a clerk, you're a doctor, Geoff's a bread roundsman, Mick's a teacher. But whenever we're all together, like Christmas, there's no side to it, no edge to it. You know what I'm trying to say?”
“Yes. It's a good time,” said Philip. “What do you think, spoons, about Christmas Eve? Outies first with the lads, then all back to our house where the old folks will be cutting the rugs into strips?”
“Of course. What else?”
“Hey up, have another cig.”
“Ta. Hey, look at them geese.”
A skein of geese flew high up across the sky. The sun had melted the higher reaches of the day's cold air, lightening the landscape almost imperceptibly.
“That's Christmas,” I said, looking at the geese. We lit up.
“Except,” I said, “this year it's going to be pretty crappy for me.”
“Because of Janet?”
“Yeah. Apart from buggering it up with the dance part, I feel really bad about what happened with Stella. I really do. Awful.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah.”
“Surprising.”
“You don't believe me, do you?”
“I believe you believe you feel awful, but I wonder whether basically, subconsciously, it's really true.”
“Cheeky sod.”
“I know you.”
“So my mother says.”
He laughed.
“But you know what I mean,” he said.
“I know. But I've thought about it. And that's an understatement for a start. I really feel different this time.”
“So what's going to happen? Is her mother going to relent?”
“God knows. She was going to shoot Janet along to the doctor for a check up when she suspected I stayed with her. I talked to Janet on the phone today (she has to creep out of the bloody house and ring from a phone box) and I think she's either convinced her mother that I wasn't there or her mother daren't admit to her husband that she thinks I was. Anyway, I'll have to see. It's for her mother to make a move. And really, of course, I'm still not sure of how Janet feels. I know all about the fact she's been seeing me since September or whenever it was and she's said various things which have made me feel ten feet tall, but you never know, do you?”
The sky greyed over again. The birds had gone. Across the river, miles away, the city lay on its back, smoking up into the afternoon. I thought how much I wanted to be there, with Janet.
Janet telephoned me the next morning. She was her usual self, unemphatic, distant. She told me that her mother would allow her to see me for two hours the following afternoon, Christmas Eve, while her mother did some last-minute Christmas shopping. For two hours. If I could make it, that was. If I could manage it.
“Mother,” I said, “any ideas on what I could buy Janet for a Christmas present?”
“Ooh, I don't really
know
, Victor. I mean, have you anything in mind yourself?”
“Why do you think I asked?”
“I've no idea what you could get her, at all. How about some bath cubes? They're always nice.”
“Mother, I always give my Nanna bath cubes. Do me a favour.”
“Well, what can you afford?”
“Not much.”
“Stockings?”
“I don't know her size.”
“A scarf?”
“I don't know.”
“Well,
I
don't know.”
“No,” I said. “I think I'll have a wander round the town. See if I get any inspiration.”
Cravens was the town's electrical shop. They sold records, top- twenty stuff, and the occasional LP, Cliff Richard or Mantovani or
South Pacific
. I looked in the window. Four or five LPs were on display, and one of them was the Ella Fitzgerald record I had listened to with Janet months earlier across the river. I went in.
Long, high, grey, wet, two o'clock Portland Street slanted away into the rain. The Christmas decorations shone coldly through the muzzy haze above and detached from the bustling, determined huddle of scuttling, spiteful, dawdling, intense, last-minute present-seekers. Their self-absorbed self-boundaried faces formed an undulating, egocentric, pudgy sea above harsh, damp raincoats. Invisible steam from gaping mouths and rain-smelling flat-hats augmented the penetrating drizzly greyness.
I was standing outside the department store in Victoria Square on the corner of Portland Street waiting for Janet and her mother. Traffic hummed round and round the War Memorial. I tried not to anticipate how Mrs Walker was going to be. Even harder not to anticipate how Janet was going to be. I knew how I wanted her to be, but I didn't dare think it.
“Now then, bastard face,” said Arnold's voice.
Oh, crap and death. I turned to where his voice came from. He and about seven others had just propelled themselves through the swing doors and onto the pavement. Among the rest were Gwen and Hilary. They were all round me.
“Now then, Arn,” I said. “Now then, everybody.”
“ âLo, Vic,” said Hilary.
“What you doing over here, then?” asked Arnold. “Is the band playing tonight?”
“Yes, Arn, as a matter of fact. But I won't be a lot of good at the moment, will I?” I made a movement with my bandaged hand.
“Where's the gig?”
“Kelvin Ballroom.”
“Are you off?”
“Possibly. I'll get paid regardless. We'll get the full rate.”
“Taking anybody?”
“Like who?”
“Well, like Janet?”
“Sod off, Arnold.”
“You're not seeing her anymore, then? Her mam's clamped down, hey?”
“Arnold, mind your own business, will you?” I took out my cigarettes and gave him one. I didn't want to have this lot round when Janet and her mother showed up, all knowing looks and all.
“Listen,” I said, making sure everybody else was talking enough not to notice what I was about to say, “How long are you and this mob likely to be hanging round here?”
“I dunno. Why?”
“Any idea?”
“I dunno. They've been thrown out of the Picadish. We'll probably drift to Lyons in a bit.”
“How'd you like to make ten bob?”
“Yes, please.”
“Get this lot out of here, eh? Suggest you go to Lyons now. Tell âem coffee's on you. They wouldn't want to miss out on the only time you bought a round.”
“Why do you want rid of them?”
“Do you want ten bob or not?”
“A quid?”
“Sod off.”
“Give us the money then.”
“And keep your trap shut.”
“I know why you want âem gone, Victor.”
“Get on with it, Arnold.”
They were amazed when Arnold offered to buy the coffees. As they were leaving, he called out:
“Are you coming, Victor?”
Minutes later, Janet and her mother appeared. Janet's face was blank of expression, but the blankness of Mrs Walker's face expressed exactly what she felt. She looked as though, because she was in the position of being a mother, she was having to affect a dignified annoyance, but really her sincere, amused cynicism was still functioning below the surface. The knowledge was very faintly encouraging. I did my best at smiling.
“I'm not really in favour of this, Victor,” said Mrs Walker, with a trace of briskness in her voice. “I can't really say what persuaded me to let Janet see you. Certainly there's no reason I can think of. I'll expect to see you back here at three thirty, Janet.”
“Yes, Mother.”
“It's very good of you to allow me to see Janet, Mrs Walker.”
“I know it is, Victor. Well, don't be late, Janet.”
She went into the department store. I looked at Janet, properly, for the first time that day.
“Well,” I said. “Here we are.”
She smiled faintly.
“Yes.”
“Where shall we go?”
“I don't know.”
“Janet.”
I put my arm round her shoulders.
“I've missed you,” I said.
“I've missed you, too,” she said.
“Let's not stay here any longer.”
“Yes.”
We walked down Portland Street through the wet afternoon. We didn't speak. Our hands were gripped tightly together. We walked on, not quite sure where we were going. Then I sensed something in Janet that made me stop and turn to her.
“Vic,” she said, “I love you. Now I know.”
I stared at her, not comprehending. It took me a long time to get the words out and when they came, I had difficulty in forming them.
“I'm not sure that I heard what you said.”
She brushed a strand of hair from her forehead. A gust of wind pushed the drizzle into my face.
“I said I'm in love with you, Vic. I know it now. I want to be with you all the time.”
“Of course, you don't mean that at all. It's a joke, isn't it?” I said.
“No, it's not a joke. I mean it. Very much.”
“You realize that this is unbelievable, I mean, that you finally should say that to me?”
“I don't say things I don't mean.” She squeezed my hand. “I mean it.” A shopper bumped into me. I stood to one side to let her pass.
“But why? You saidâyou knowâyou don't trust me and you didn't want it to happen and everything.”
“Well, perhaps now I do trust you. Things are different. Aren't they?”
“Yes. They are.”
“I've thought of nothing else but you since the dance.”
She smiled a little and looked away from me.
“And to be honest, for quite some time before it. I shouldn't say it, I know. It's against the rules.”
I smiled incredulously, idiotically. I couldn't stop. My whole face strained with smiling.
“You love me,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Me, Victor Geoffrey Graves, who is what he is.”
She said nothing. Then I remembered her mother.
“What about your mother's decision?” I asked.
“Just give her a little time. I think I managed to convince her you weren't there. She has to justify herself, though. Actually, we've talked a lot since that night. Things are somehow easier now between she and I, I mean.”
“Well,” I said, surprised, relieved and happy. “We can't stay here. In the street, I mean, like this. Shall we go and have a drink? Or something. I don't know. You say.”
“I don't care where we go.”
Saying good-bye, waiting for her mother to arrive, I gave Janet the Christmas present. She took it from me in silence.