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I did not laugh at the suggestion but looked down at his head and replied slowly, "Thanks, Sam, I'll remember. Who knows?"

Now I must go back to Mollie. She had played quite a part in my life and she was to play even a bigger part. The simple reason I didn't see Mollie any more was that she had married. Not Jackie, but a very respectable man, a greengrocer, a Mr. Arkwright. He was fifteen years older than her and had not been married before, and he didn't like me.

It was really laughable when I thought of it, for whatever blame there was attached to Mollie's past he put it down to my influence. There was evidence of my sinning but none of Mollie's. I cannot think that she'd had any hand in forming this opinion, but apparently she could do nothing to alter it, and when she had to choose between becoming Mrs.

Arkwright and respectability, which position I am sure she never dreamed would be her luck, or keeping our friendship, Mollie, being human, chose Mr. Arkwright. She tried to soften the blow by saying he was a bit fussy like and wanted her to himself for the time being. She had laughed and nudged me, but I couldn't see the funny side of it. I had met Mr. Arkwright three times, and he did not hide his opinion of me. In Mr. Arkwright's mind I was one of the fast pieces left over from the war. Moreover, when I had a drink I laughed a lot, which only proved to the greengrocer that he was right in his opinion of me. So Mollie and I no longer met in the back room of the Crown on a Saturday night. Nor had I been invited to the wedding. The excuse given me was that it was to be very quiet in the register office. And I wasn't invited to her new home. I liked Mollie; next to my mother, I think I loved her. She had been good to me, she had been my stay in my time of trouble, and her rejection of me hurt more than a little. It absolutely amazed me that she, of all people, could allow herself to be dominated by any man, and it seemed that she was paying a high price for her respectability. But that was the way she wanted it.

Then this particular week, because I had felt so miserable and down, I paid a visit to the Crown on a Friday night, which I had never done before. I had my week's wages on me intact as I had just left the doctor's. It was half past six when I entered the back room and I noticed immediately that most of the people present were not the Saturday night crowd. There were only one or two that I knew, the remainder being strangers.

I sat down next to a woman called Mrs. Wright. She was always a bit of a sponger and soon she was telling me her woes, and I was paying for her drinks. After my third whisky, one of which was a double, I stopped listening and I began to talk. I told her about my job at the doctor's, my clever daughter who could write poetry, which, I assured her, she would one day see in the papers, and I told her about my dear friend who had a farm Sam's small holding At this point we were joined by a man and a woman from a table near by. The man I had seen before.

I did not know his name but I knew that he often looked my way. He talked a lot and he laughed as he talked, but his wife had little to say. He stood a round, and then it was my turn. Someone went to the piano and we all sang. And this was the setting when the door opened and Mollie and her man came in. I was facing the door and I saw her immediately, and with the past lost in the thick vapour of four whiskies I hailed Mollie loudly, shouting, Oo! oo! there, Mollie Oo!

oo! " She turned immediately in my direction and after a moment's hesitation she lifted her hand and waved. Then her husband, turning and looking at me for a moment, deliberately took her by the arm and led her to the farthest corner of the room.

Well, who did he think he was? That was deliberate, that was. He wouldn't let her come across, wouldn't even let her speak to me. Who did he think he was, anyway? I threw off my drink.

"What'll you have?" It was the man standing the round again. I looked at him and blinked, and in the act of blinking all my merriness seemed to vanish. I didn't like this man and I didn't like his wife, and I didn't like Mrs. Wright. I had spent a lot of money on her tonight and I didn't like her.

"I'll have a whisky large," I said to the man.

"You won't, you know, unless you pay for it." It was the wife speaking, and I turned sharply on her and said, "I haven't seen you handing out much."

"Well! Come on, Dickie. That's the limit, that is." She pulled her husband's arm, and I mimicked, "That's right go on, Dickie. Go on before you stand your turn."

"Now, now." The man's tone was soothing, and I flung my hand wide and said, "Oh! get yourself away or she'll hammer you when she gets you in."

Mrs. Wright started to laugh, but I didn't join in. The piano had stopped and people were looking towards our corner, and although the words were whispered I heard a voice saying, "You shouldn't take it unless you know how far to go. It's shameful. She'll turn nasty now."

I rounded on the unknown speaker, yelling, "Yes, I'll turn nasty if you dont mind your own bloody business."

"Here! here! quieten down." It was the old woman Wright pulling at me, and I pushed off her hand. Who did the lot of them think they were?

They were all looking down their noses at me. I was a bad lot because I'd had two hairns. But there was Mollie over in that corner who had slept with a different man every week for the first year of the war she had told me so herself and now she was so respectable she wouldn't look at me1 wasn't good enough.

I was in the middle of the floor before I knew what I was up to and could not stop myself from advancing towards her.

"Hallo, Mollie."

"Hallo, Christine."

"Long time since... since we met, eh?"

"You'll have to excuse us, we're in company." It was the husband talking, and I was about to turn on him when Mollie put out her hand towards him and said in the old tone that I recognized, "Leave her be and let her sit down."

"Not likely, you're not starting this. I've told you, and on it I stand firm."

~ "Oh, firm Mr. Arkwright. Oh, goody, goody. Mister bloody Arkwright."

I heard a voice chanting and it didn't seem to be mine.

"Here! here! Now come on." It was the barman, and he was standing at my side with his hand on my shoulder trying to steer me away. But I flung him off, crying, "You keep your hands to yourself, I'm sitting here."

I went to take the seat near Mollie, when, as if risking his life to spare his wife the contamination of my touch, Mr. Ark- wright stood in front of her. I looked him in the eye for a second, then my arm swept outwards and my hand brought him a slap across the face that resounded round the room and in some way brought me deep satisfaction, so much so that I went to repeat the action with my other hand. Then I was knocked backwards and would have fallen but somebody caught me, and when I was upright again I seemed to be surrounded by hands and faces, and I kept moving my head this way and that to get a look at the man as I yelled, "Who d'you think you are, anyway, tin pot little greengrocer?

Specked apples and rotten oranges in tissue paper," "Outside!

outside!"

"Take your hands off me."

"Get!" I was flung through the side door into the yard, and I seemed to bounce off the opposite wall. Then within a second I was back at the door hammering with my fists and yelling, "You take me money, you've taken it for years, you dirty lot of swine. Who do you think you are?"

How long I shouted and pounded on the door I dont now, but when a heavy hand came on my shoulder and pulled me round and I faced the policeman I was past being intimidated. I can't remember what he said but I know that I disliked him, and I know that I swore at him and tried to knock him on his back. What followed is hazy. There were two policewomen, and one said, "If you dont stop shouting I'll throw a bucket of water over you." I remember this quite clearly. I remember shouting at her,

"You try it, you Blue-Beat Betty." I also remember telling myself to give over, but the shouting was in my head and I had no control over it. Then I can't remember what else happened before I fell asleep, only that I continued to hate the greengrocer.

When I awoke I thought I had died and gone to hell. There was a blinding pain in my head that prevented me from opening my eyes. But it was the smell that first suggested hell. I've always been allergic to the smell of urine, it has the power 228

to make me vomit. So the combination of the pain, the smell, and my bemused thinking suggested that I had died and was getting my deserts.

I believed in my childhood, that whatever you disliked in this life, in the next you were given an overdose by way of payment for your sins, and my belief hadn't changed much. And then I opened my eyes.

Never, to my dying day, will I be able to forget that moment. I had experienced the feeling of shame. Yes, I knew what shame was, flesh-curling shame, but this was something beyond, something deep and searing.

I looked up at the stone walls that enclosed me. At the top of one wall there was a small barred window. My dull, sleep- laden eyes moved down to a wooden structure in the corner. It was a lavatory pan. Next to it was a seat and a well-scrubbed wooden table. I looked down on the bed on which I lay. It had neither head nor foot, it was merely a platform with a mattress. I raised myself up and sat on the edge of it, and the "Oh! God' that escaped from my lips was an agony-laden sound to my ears.

Oh! God, what had I done? I next looked at the blank wooden door in the middle of which was a dark grille, and panic swept over me, the panic of being enclosed in a viewless space. I dashed to the door but didn't hammer it, for as I stood with my face and body pressed to it I heard footsteps. I stared at the grating, and behind it the little door opened and a face appeared. It was a woman's face and she seemed surprised to see my face looking at her. She did not speak, but I heard a key turn in the lock and I stepped back. I was gasping for breath and had my work cut out to prevent myself trying to dash past her.

It was her voice that steadied me. It was a most ordinary voice and she spoke as if she had come into my room at home.

"Feeling better?" she said.

I could not speak.

"Sit down." She pointed to the bed.

"I'll fetch you a cup of tea; I bet you've got a headache."

I did not sit down, but moved a space from her, and I beseeched her,

"Please let me go."

Her hand was on my arm and she said, "Your case will come up this morning; it will come up first. There aren't many. You can go straight home after that." 229 "But... but...." For a moment I was going to say, "I have a little girl," and then I changed it to, "My daughter and my father, they'll be worrying."

"They know, they know."

She was patting my arm. " She wasn't a day older than me, but her action reminded me of my mother, and it was too much for me. I broke down and sobbed helplessly. She sat on the bed beside me and talked.

"You know, you are too young to go on like this." I felt her hand lifting the tangled hair from my brow, and was brought to greater depths of crying by her kindness. Then she said, "I remember you as a girl. Oh, from quite a small girl. You used to go to St. Stephen's School, didn't you? I remember thinking that I wished I looked like you you had such wonderful hair. You still have."

Oh God, if she would only stop, if she would shout at me and go for me.

I lifted my eyes to hers and asked, "What... what will they do to me

?"

"Nothing. You'll get off with a caution and a fine. This is your first offence, isn't it?"

What a terrible sound that had, first offence. Oh, God in heaven, what had I done?

WHAT HAD I DONE?

I'd never be able to look Dad or Constance or Sam in the face . And Don Dowling? The thought brought me curling up inside.

At half past ten I was taken up some stone steps and into the court.

There were a number of people sitting behind a barrier and I knew without looking that Dad and Sam were among them. Also I knew that Constance was not present. For this, at least, I thanked God. Then across a narrow space I found myself staring at a stem-faced man with white hair and a short moustache. We recognized each other immediately. I was looking into the eyes of Colonel Findlay, and he was looking at the depraved creature who had tried to ensnare his nephew.

A policeman to the side of me began to speak, and his words filled me with terror.

"I was called to the Crown where I saw the accused battering on the side door. She was shouting and using obscene language and when I'reprimanded her she turned on me and said ..."

Oh God! Oh God!

Next the policewoman was telling the colonel how I fought and struggled. I saw a woman sitting in the seat to the right of the colonel pass him a note. I watched him read it and nod, and then he was talking to me. But I was so sick with shame and terror that I could not follow what he was saying. The only words that penetrated to my agonized mind were: 'clean this town up . disgrace and example.

"

The woman to his right passed him another note which he read somewhat impatiently before pushing it aside. And then I heard him say, "Forty shillings' and something else before he added, 'six months'. For one agonized moment I thought he meant prison, and then I realized that I was on probation to keep the peace for six months. Me, Christine Winter, who only wanted to love, was on probation for being drunk, using obscene language, and striking a policeman. Oh God! God! God!

The policewoman was taking me up the stairs once again and she held my arm gently as she said, "Don't worry about him, he must be feeling his ulcer this morning." Then there was Dad and Sam, and I couldn't look at them. I heard the police woman's kindly tones whispering something to Dad. I couldn't hear what it was, but he took my arm and led me outside, with Sam on my other side. There was a taxi waiting and I got in, still with my head bowed. And I got out with my head bowed it was still bowed when I stood in the kitchen. When I sunk slowly and dazedly into a "chair Dad's hand came on my shoulder, and I dropped my face to my hands. I heard him mutter brokenly, " I'll make a cup of tea. " As I heard him go to the scullery, I became very conscious of Sam, as if I hadn't seen him until that moment. When he drew my hands from my face I saw that he was on his hunkers, and his voice was warm and kind as he said, " You're coming up to the house with me to stay for a while. You'll be away from it all there. " :.