The Fancy (20 page)

“Queensdale Road! That’s nothing, hardly out of my way at all. Let go the blankets or I’ll drop them. Come on, I’ll take you home.”

He strode ahead, while she trotted beside him, still protesting. Presently he slowed down his athletic stride, but he noticed that she still took two steps to his one. She had tiny, useless ankle-bones that skittered under the weight even of so slight a body. They talked about the factory for a while, and then walked in silence. He knew very little about her outside the factory. Once or twice he had brought his stool up beside her at tea-time, but they had only talked about the news or
how it would soon be Christmas, or, more recently, what a long time It seemed since Christmas and hadn’t it gone in a flash.

She was wearing a grey coat with a nipped-in waist and a full skirt. Her small feet looked chunky in ankle socks and flat shoes as they moved unobtrusively beside his. He had a sudden impulse to tell her that he had a rabbit at home called Wendy, but instead he said :

“D’you live with your people?”

“Yes,” she said.

“What, mother and father, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Just you alone, or have you got brothers and sisters?”

“No, “she said. “We’ve got to cross here and go down that road on the right. That brings us into Queensdale Road. I’m afraid you’re going to be awfully late. Do give me the blankets now. I can easily manage them just that little way.”

“If it’s such a little way, it won’t make much difference to my being late,” said Edward. On the corner of Queensdale Road, she stopped and said again, “Let me take them now. You could turn off here and get down into the High Street.” Edward walked on, pretending not to hear, because he wanted to see where she lived.

Queensdale Road was a cul-de-sac, ending in a corrugated iron fence topped with spikes. Wendy lived at the end near the fence, in a little house with a grey slate roof, flush on to the road like a miner’s cottage. Edward could not see much else about the house, except that the front window showed chinks of light at the sides of the curtain.

“You ought to have a better blackout than that, living so near the railway,” he said, resting the blankets on his hip while Wendy fumbled in her bag.

“I know,” she said, “isn’t it awful? I had such trouble fixing it up, but every time anyone draws it, it seems to get torn.” Anyone being her father, who cared nothing for air-raid Wardens, though a great deal for German bombers, and always turned out the impossible to believeI s.light at the main when an air-raid warning was on.

Wendy opened the door and stood aside for Edward to put the bundle down in the hall. He stepped back on to the doorstep, and she made no move either to invite him in or show him out.

“Well, goodbye,” he said. Although they called each other Ted and Wendy at the factory, somehow they had not been able to since they had left it. They were more like people just introduced than people who had spent nine and a half hours together six days a week for six months.

A door opened and Wendy’s mother came into the hall, flustered at sight of Edward, whom she took for the Wardens again.

“Oh dear,” she began.

“This is Mr. Ledward, Mother.” said Wendy. “From the factory.
I bought those blankets I told you about at Ringers today and he’s carried them home for me.”

“Well, that
is
nice,” said Wendy’s mother, coming forward with her old-fashioned walk that looked as if she had no feet, “How do you do, Mr. Ledward? I’m sure it’s very nice of you to help Wendy.” He noticed that she kept looking behind her at the closed door, as
if
she were afraid of something. She spoke in a low voice and Wendy answered her in the same way, so that Edward found himself almost whispering, too. They were like three people talking outside a sick room, and Edward wondered if it were Wendy’s father who was ill.

Suddenly Wendy said : “Why don’t you come inside and shut the door? It’s quite cold. Mother. I think the least we can do is give him a cup of tea before he goes home, don’t you?” They both glanced swiftly at the closed door.

“I don’t see why not,” said her mother, hesitantly.

“Oh, no really,” murmured Edward “Please don’t bother. I wouldn’t dream,——”

“Yes, you would,” said Wendy. “I’m sure you’d love one. Anyway, it’s the least we can do after you carrying those blankets all the way home, isn’t it, Mother?”

“I—er—yes, of course, dear,” said Mrs. Holt, with her eyes and her mind on the door. Whatever had come over Wendy to risk such a suggestion? Surely she was not going to take him into the living-room? There had been circus enough last time when Dad had come down from his bedroom to find the War Savings lady in there. She blushed now to think of the way he had carried on, as if the poor lady were trying to rob them. That had been bad enough, but he would be even worse with a man, because he thought all men were after Wendy, and to take him into the sitting-room where Dad was settled with the evening paper! It was sheer madness. Whatever would
this
Mr. Ledward think?

But Wendy was saying, “Come on, then. D’you mind coming into the kitchen? It’s warmer there,”

“Yes, he could come into the kitchen,” breathed Mrs, Holt more hopefully. It was so long since they had had anyone to the house, it would be quite a treat to have a little company. “We could all have some tea in the kitchen.” They could have another cup later on with Dad, and he need never know.

“It’s very kind of you, Mrs. Holt, but I really ought to be getting along,” Edward was terrified of disturbing whoever was so ill behind that door, They stood in the dark hall like three conspirators plotting anarchy, and when Wendy finally overcame old-fashioned an alonghis hesitation, they tiptoed past the door as if they were on the way to the Vaults of the House of Commons,

Once safely in the kitchen with the door shut, everyone breathed more freely, although there was hardly room for the three of them to
move in the tiny room. Mrs. Holt spoke in a normal voice, and Wendy began to hum softly as she turned up the flame under the kettle and reached in the cupboard for cups, which she could do without moving. There was nowhere to sit, so Edward leant against the flap-table with his legs crossed and his arms folded, trying to appear at ease. Every now and then, Mrs. Holt would glance towards the door, as if she expected to see the Frankenstein monster walk through it

“I got the fish, Mother,” said Wendy, calculating how strong she could make the tea and still leave enough until Saturday. “it’s in my string bag over there.”

“I’ll just wash it then, shall I?” said her mother, peering about for it without putting on her glasses, “and put it on the stove, otherwise we shall be late with your Dad’s supper and that would never do.” She tried to imply a
beloved
figure stamping home from work and bellowing jovially for the attentions lavished on him so willingly by his women. That would be too bad,” she said brightly, her face betraying just how bad it would be. She took her gold-rimmed oval spectacles out of the bag that dangled at her waist, and in three paces was at the scullery sink.

Wendy made the tea and poured out with a great show of domesticity. “Sugar? We’ve got lots,” she lied, prepared to
drink
hers unsweetened for the sake of hospitality. Mrs. Holt brought in the fish, dripping through the colander on to the floor and Wendy put it on to boil. Both she and her mother gave their souls for fried fish, but Mr. Holt had once read an article saying that frying destroyed nourishment and they had had it steamed or boiled ever since. Of all the truth and nonsense that he read in the paper and frequently decried, certain things like this stuck in his brain and became a ruling passion. Sometimes it worked the other way : he was so incensed by what he read that he went all out for the contrary. No carrot was allowed near the house since the Ministry of Food had started their campaign.

It was quite a party in the kitchen. They all stood close together, and sipped their tea, and nodded and chatted. Edward leaned against the flap-table, Wendy against the stove, with the steam from the fish saucepan dampening her hair, and her mother, who was built all in one piece and the wrong shape for leaning, stood by the window with her little finger well crooked, feeling very social. Edward was telling them about his rabbits. Most interesting it was, and drew from Mrs. Holt tut-tuttings and exclamations of “Well, I say!”

Wendy wondered what the other girls would say if they could see her entertaining Edward. She knew they liked him, although they laughed at him and called him indelicate things behind his back, but they had no idea what he was really like. No one had ever heard him talking seriously and interestingly like this ; at the factory he was always making jokes. She herself scarcely ever spoke to him about anything but work, but perhaps now that he knew her better they would
have some interesting conversations. It would be nice if he sometimes brought his stool to her end of the bench at tea-time, because she had nobody to talk to at her end except Ivy, who despised her, and Sheila, who was always shouting up to Dinah at the other end. True, she had Grace opposite her, who talked untiringly on the fascinating subject of housekeeping. Wendy liked to hear people talk about their homes impossible to believeI s. and compare them with what she would have, but Grace overdid it. She had a way of opening her eyes very wide at you, as if she would hypnotise you into listening. Wendy had once spent nearly an hour in a kind of coma induced by the saga of Grace’s linen cupboard, and had come to to find that the other girls had finished the engine and left for the next bench, while her hands had been lying idle among the rockers. Edward, now, was what you would call clever, and Wendy admired clever people because she knew she was not clever herself.

The atmosphere in the little kitchen was conducive to another cup of tea all round. Wendy wished she could offer something to eat, but they had no biscuits or cake, and although there was plenty of bread, you couldn’t swindle butter as you could tea. Edward, who had been about to say that he really ought to go, was started off again about the rabbits by his second cup. No one had ever shown such a gratifying interest in them before ; even people like Dick Bennett, who were in the Fancy themselves, only listened in order to be able to talk about their own stock.

“Oh, I
do
wish I could see them!” Wendy said. “They sound so sweet!”

“Pretty dears——” chorused her mother.

“I tell you what,” said Edward, looking from one to the other enthusiastically, “you ought to come along and see them one day. Wendy and I could pick you up after work, Mrs. Holt, and take you along. Or, no—it would be too dark. You’d have to come on a Sunday, any Sunday—I’m always there. Why don’t you? This next Sunday, if you like.”

“Oh, I’d love to!” said Wendy spontaneously, and Mrs. Holt looked as wistful as if it were a treat of the first order. “D’you think we could—? “she began.

“Of course!” said Edward heartily, thinking she was doubting him, not herself. “Do come this Sunday. You ought to come soon, because I’ve got a litter just at the perfect age—like toys, you’ll think they are. And wait till you see my Masterman! I’ll guarantee you’ve never seen a rabbit like that in your lives. And he’s tame, too, Wendy. You can have him in your arms and do anything you like with him.” In his enthusiasm, he was raising his voice.

“It would be lovely!” Wendy and her mother looked at each other with shining eyes.

“Say you’ll come on Sunday, then?”

“Yes, we will.” Wendy nodded eagerly. It really seemed for a a moment as if they could, but in the next moment, while they all stood there smiling, delighted with each other, the door from the hall was wrenched open and in the doorway stood a little man with baggy knees and a shock of white hair standing off his head like a cockatoo’s crest. His face was working, and so was his voice.

Wendy took a step nearer to her mother, and Edward looked for a place to put down his cup, and, finding none, went on holding it awkwardly. The three in the kitchen stood transfixed as if they had been found in each other’s bedrooms. For the life of him, Edward could not think what he had done wrong, yet he could feel the sense of guilt creeping over him.

Mr. Holt was shouting as if hp were in the Albert Hall instead of two feet away from his panic-stricken audience. “What in the name of all the saints in Heaven? … mean nothing to you that I should perish of starvation before you’ll lift a finger … as God sees me, this is my house, and I will not—I will not, I say, have it used as a ho clapped a hand to his forehead. p alongtel … I will not —!” There were a lot of things he would not, but one thing he would, and that was to know who, in the name of all that was just and holy, was Edward.

Edward had never been so embarrassed in his life. His one thought was to get away, but the gabbling, gesticulating figure stood between him and freedom. There was not even room to retreat from it, so he had to stand in the line of fire smiling foolishly, with the cup and saucer held before him like an offering.

“Father——” Wendy stepped forward when he paused for a long, whistling intake of breath. “Father, this is Mr. Ledward from the factory—he carried some things home for me.”

“We were just having a cup of tea, as it’s so cold out,” put in Mrs. Holt, with her instinct for fanning the flame. She burst into tears as it leapt forth at her. Mr. Holt began to jig up and down in his rage. With only a vague idea of what he was angry about, he had already worked himself up to the pitch of only knowing that he was angry. It didn’t matter what he said, but he said everything, and went all out for hysteria. Edward began to wonder if he were quite normal. So this was why they had whispered in the hall.

Suddenly Mr. Holt leaped aside and stood with quivering knees and arm outflung towards the front door. It was obvious whom he meant, and Edward was only too thankful, with an apologetic glance at the other two and a few uncertain passes with his cup, which eventually landed it on top of the stove, to make for safety. Wendy was close behind him, hurrying him on. She was almost in tears.

“I’m so sorry,” she kept saying, “I don’t know what you’ll think. I’m so sorry!” Passing him, and turning to look up at him with her hand on the doorknob, she said : “You’d better go” —as if anything could have stopped him. The noise continued from the kitchen, where
Mrs. Holt was still cornered. Edward racked his brain for something to say to show Wendy how sorry he was for her and that he did not think it funny, but nothing came. And he did think it funny : dashed funny!