Alfie (14 page)

It’s funny how soon somebody you know can disappear in a street. You go to the corner and look and there seems about half a dozen ways they could have gone. And there’s buses and that going by, and you think how they might easily be on one of them. And you begin to stare at people, thinking some old woman might be the one you’re looking for.

There wasn’t a sight of little Annie anywhere.

Know what? – I was that choked when I went back and saw her custard on the table that it was a good ten minutes before I could get down to scoffing it! 

It’s turned eleven one Sunday morning and I can hear the old church bells ringing, and there I am, bringing up an extra shine to my black shoes with the corner of a blanket hanging off of the bed. I look round my little gaff and I’ve got to admit it looks a right dump since little Annie went. But I do feel at home in it, and I don’t care what anybody says, that’s the main thing. I mean all I ask of the pad I live in is that I know where everything is; that there’s room round the walls to hang up my suits and that it don’t have too many funny smells. Even though my place now looks so untidy, I know where things are, but when Annie was here I had to keep asking her where everything was. She kept moving things round and taking my clothes off of chairs and putting them in drawers.

Know what, I think sausages taste best if you eat ’em straight out the frying-pan. You seem to lose the flavour once you keep moving food from one thing to another. 
Besides that, I like eating as I’m cooking – it’s more healthy. And it gives you a chance to chew your food longer – standing up.

Mind you, I will admit I could have missed her around the place for the first few days, especially when I came home of an evening and opened the door, and instead of a nice warm shining room with the smell of cooking there would be this cold stale room with lots of dirty dishes on the table. But same as I used to tell myself – in twenty minutes, mate, you won’t know the difference. Nor did I. The fact is, I’m not really cut out for that sort of life with a woman. The next thing they expect you to start passing the salt or sugar or something, instead of reaching out for it themselves. I hate anything like that. When I’m down to my grub I like to keep my eye on my own plate and forget everybody else.

On top of this, they start asking you questions: ‘What would you like for your evening meal?’ Now who wants to think about what he’ll want to eat in a few hours’ time? Then they say: ‘Will you have your eggs boiled or fried?’ All things like that, making a simple life complicated, where you have to think. She was even asking, ‘What time will you be back?’ Now that is one thing that do get on my wick.

Leave all that stuff out. I’ll tell you the real trouble. I’ve had time to think it over these weeks: Annie was turning my little gaff into a
home
. I mean a home for herself as well as for me. Now a home’s a very funny set-up. A very funny set-up indeed. It’s really a place for people who’ve got some kind of a private
need
for each 
other, if you follow me. I ain’t got a
need
for anybody. My home is
outside
four walls – not inside. So in fact Annie was infringing on my liberty, if you see what I mean.

So there you are. She can be the best little bint in the world but if she infringes on your liberty, I mean of mind as well as of body, it just ain’t worth it. Leastways that’s how I look at it, because once a bird has taken your liberty away, she’s taken
you
away. You might as well be a bloody performing dog because you’re doing what she wants and not what you want, and I’d sooner be what I am, a mongrel roaming around the streets, if you see what I mean.

Know what, I was chatting Perce one day, telling him how I’d slung little Annie out, but not giving him the real details – I mean, he wouldn’t cotton on to the real thing no matter what I told him – when he came across with a stroke that shook me. ‘Here, I’ll tell you something,’ said Perce, ‘did you know that Sharpey kept trying to pull Annie when you were out?’ I said it wouldn’t surprise me. ‘Them Sundays you went out,’ he said, ‘he used to call round on some pretext or other and try to lap it up, but it seems Annie wouldn’t wear him. He kept making out to her what a dead villain you was. But she just didn’t want to know. She even kept the door locked against him.’ Then it struck me that must have been why he put the poison in for her in the pub. Mind you, I never mentioned it to Sharpey. What good could it do? Forgive and forget. And after all, thinking it over, I didn’t want her back. 

I mean she was too good for me, little Annie, toiling away like she did made me feel uncomfortable at times. So that in the end it was a relief to get rid of her. I mean, when you get down to it, the average man must know in his own heart what a rotten bleeder he is, he don’t want someone good around to keep reminding him of it. That’s why a good bloke will always prefer to marry a real bitch. It means he’s doing his purgatory on earth. Every time she does the dirty on him he’s got another reason for looking up to heaven.

I’ve started tidying up the place because I’m expecting a visitor. But you’d never guess who it’s going to be. At least I don’t think you would. There’s a quiet little knock on the door and I go and open it. She’s standing there in her blue C & A coat, with her handbag, a little BOAC bag and her basket.

‘Come in, Lily,’ I said to her. She walked into the room very shyly, trying not to look round. You can see she’s never been in a gaff like this in her life. ‘You’re a bit early, gal,’ I said.

‘I didn’t want to be late,’ she said, ‘I caught an early train. Is he coming?’

Lily love – you look nothing, but you know what – I could bleeding cry for you and your sort. Talk about warriors – talk about soldiers, give me a little Mum with three kids and living respectable if a bit in debt and she’ll put them all to shame for bleeding guts. I find I’ve got to watch myself lately, I get these funny strokes of feeling coming over me.

‘He said he’d be here about twelve o’clock,’ I said. 
‘Why don’t you take your coat off. Make yourself at home.’

I helped her off with her coat. Her hands felt very cold. ‘Are you worried?’ I said to her.

‘A bit,’ she said. ‘But it’ll be all right.’

Here, talking about some wives and their husbands and families – there’s a bloke I know called Tim Townsend, a transport boss, married and has a family of five, all growing up, when his wife has to go in hospital with a cancer. Of course she’s left it too late. She ain’t been thinking of herself. Now it’s the day before she dies, see, and he’s driven round about two o’clock to have a chat with her. ‘Tim,’ she says, ‘you haven’t had your lunch, have you, I can tell it by your cheekbones. Now you see you get some or you’ll worry me.’ He told me she had a long rabbit about him and his lunch as though she had nothing else on her mind, and that the day before she kicked the bucket. Now do you see what I mean?

‘You look all dark under the eyes,’ I said.

‘I didn’t sleep so well last night,’ she said.

I’ll bet you never had a wink, I thought.

‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ I said. ‘He’s a proper skilled man, works at a hospital or something. They reckon there’s nothing to it. It’s like having a tooth out, only it don’t hurt. Here, what have you got in the basket?’

‘I had to make an excuse,’ she said, ‘so I said I was visiting Harry as usual. I hope nobody finds out.’

‘People only know what you tell ’em,’ I said. Quite false, but I thought it would serve for there and then. 

‘I’ve written and told him I have a cold and it seems better not to go in case I give it to him,’ she said.

It brought old Harry back to mind when I saw the jar of home-made marmalade, the calves-foot jelly and the biscuits. Come to think of it, there was some kind of peace in my system in those days in the san.

‘Will you get rid of them for me?’ she said.

‘I’ll use ’em up one way or another,’ I said. I began to take the things out of her basket. Down at the bottom I saw an envelope sticking out. ‘There’s a letter here.’

‘It’s from young Phil to Harry,’ she said.

I looked and saw the squiggly writing on the outside. I didn’t know what to say. She put it into her handbag.

‘Is there a—?’ she said.

‘You mean a toilet?’ I said. ‘Sure, it’s on the landing. Here, I’ll show you. Come on.’ I took her out to the W.C. on the landing. I was glad I’d given it a cleaning that morning. Then I went back into the room.

Just fancy, Lily, old Harry’s wife! And it was funny how I’d got myself involved there. I’d gone out to the sanatorium one Sunday, see, just to let them have a proper look at me. I mean they’d only seen me in captivity, they hadn’t seen how I looked when I was really dressed up; and somehow I’d got that bit attached to them all. Here, a funny thing happened. There’s this little Gina, see, what I was so intimate with. Know what, when she saw me all dressed up she didn’t want to know. I mean, you could have understood it if it had been the other way about – I had been dependent on her and I no longer was. But now it’s Gina who don’t want to know, so that’s another of those little things turn out quite the opposite to what you expect.

Now I’ve had a nice hour or so – except for this cool interlude with Gina – and I’m just going off when old Harry asks me am I going Maidenhead way back, so that I can give Lily a lift in my car. As a matter of fact I’m not, 
I’m going back by Wokingham and Ascot. But just to please him I say I could go back that way.

Now it’s one of the worst mistakes you can make – going out of your way to oblige somebody. It’s very rare I do it, but whenever I do you can bet something is sure to go wrong. I’m not cut out for that boy scout lark, because if ever I do a good deed it always seems to rebound on me. The funny thing is, Lily doesn’t want to come in the car either. I can tell it by the look on her face. So we both agree just to oblige old Harry, lying there in bed. Never oblige a sick person – no good comes of it.

Lily sits there in silence as I’m driving along, and seeing how ribby she looks and thinking how it would be a nice thing for old Harry’s sake, I drive a roundabout way by the river, and on top of that I ask her would she like some tea. The thought had never struck her and she doesn’t know what to say. Now I’ve got old Ruby’s Zodiac with me, automatic drive, Windsor Grey, real leather individual seats. That’s a car you can take anywhere. So’s I’ve seen one of these big hotels and I’ve driven straight in. It’s a place with these green lawns running right down to the side of the river and little tables set out by themselves under the trees. I quite like anything like that at times. Mind you, you’re paying for the view as well as for your tea. All the little cafes about were crowded but this place is nearly empty, except for a few toffs and I see the reason why when I look at the price. It’s eight-and-six for tea, whilst the other places are only four shillings. Anyway, I lead Lily across to a nice little table by itself just near the edge of the water. 
She’s nervous, and I can see she’s never been in a place like this before. Now the waiter comes up, an old boy he is, and he gives me a look as much as to say, I know what you are. So I looks back at him as much as to say, and I know what you are. And you know what you can go and do with yourself. Nothing said, see, just dodgy looks. So he starts trying to stare me out but I stare holes in him I do. ‘We only serve the set tea,’ he says. ‘Yes,’ I says, ‘a set tea for madam and I.’

That old geezer is going to spoil the tea for me, I think. Funny, how they can knock you off your perch. Anyway, he comes back nice and steady with the tea, and I can see he’s had a change of heart, so I cools down. ‘Let me know if you need more hot water, sir,’ he says. Know what, I slipped him a couple of bob there and then. I know it’s manners to wait till you’re leaving but why delay a good impulse. It was the ‘Sir’.

Lily pours the tea and it comes out nice and strong, and what with these cucumber sandwiches, and fresh scones, whipped cream and blackcurrant jelly, I notice she’s slowly coming to life. A woman can fade away if she don’t get attention. I mean there are good things going in this life, but they never seem to get the way of women like that. She’s feeding the ducks, see, and there’s some little baby ducklings darting in and out around their mum, and as she’s watching Lily gets a nice little smile come to the corner of her mouth. There are women like that who look dead ordinary until they smile and then they kind of come up. I was quite touched by that little smile I was, and I thought to myself, she couldn’t 
have been too bad a few years ago. Anyway, I feel quite set up after that tea, what with the waiter calling me Sir and Ruby’s big Zodiac parked there in the drive. I was going to leave him another shilling but it don’t do to overdo a good thing.

I thought I’d like to stretch my legs, the day being so nice. So I’ve taken Lily for a walk along the towpath. Well we come to a quiet little spot there by the Thames, nice and secluded it is, and we sit ourselves down on the warm grass and I’m talking about Harry and how he used to be on visiting days, always watching out for her and pretending he was reading, when the next thing she gives a gulp or something and I sees at once I’ve said the wrong thing. She’s crying away, so I put my hand on her shoulder and try to comfort her. I could feel she was all of a shake underneath, and just because she’s a woman and most women would expect to be kissed at a time like that, I’ve kissed her, ain’t I.

It started out as a friendly peck on the side of her cheek, and it seemed to work its way around to a full kiss on the lips. Having lain in a bed next to her husband for months on end I couldn’t do less than kiss her, out of my friendship for him, if you see what I mean. Now, whilst I’m still kissing her I can feel her sobs going quiet, and to my surprise I senses that nature or something has started working in her. It was the last thing I expected. Then I think to myself,
what harm can it do
?
My trouble is – I’ve never learnt how to refuse something for nothing, even when I don’t need it. But what man has?

It’ll settle her little mind, I tell myself, and she must 
be badly in need of it. Harry will never know, and even if he did he’s no right to begrudge me – or her come to that. It’ll round off the tea nicely. After all, that tea had cost me nineteen shillings with the tip, not to mention the extra petrol going a long way round. It’s funny how many things do go through a bloke’s mind at a time like that. And at the same time I can feel this little man that sometimes comes on my shoulder, and he’s trying to say,
Leave it alone, Alfie
. But I don’t listen to him. What man does when he’s told, leave it alone.

Now I don’t know whether it was the fresh air, the whipped cream and jelly, the cucumber sandwiches or old Harry’s missus never having had it off with a man in all that time, but the whole job was over and done with in about three minutes flat, give five seconds either way. Not that I’d rushed it. I’d thought about her. I bet that was more than old Harry ever had. I’m not that sort of peasant. But I hadn’t dallied about too much, if you see what I mean.

‘Know what, Lily,’ I said, ‘I quite enjoyed that.’

I had too. When a man has learnt to enjoy
that
, and knows he’s enjoyed it, and admits he’s enjoyed it, and feels thankful in his heart for having had it, then I say he’s halfway to becoming a happy man. It seemed to have taken me out of myself, as they say, relaxed me handsome. You can’t beat fresh air. ‘That was very nice, gal,’ I said, and I gave her an encouraging pat on the back. What I say is – if you enjoy a thing show a bit of appreciation.

Then I took out my best hanky and wiped the corner 
of her eyes, where there were stains of teardrops still showing. ‘My, but that’s done you a world of good!’ I said. It had too. It seemed in under five minutes she had come up quite lovely, her little face and everything, as she was lying there on the grass with the afternoon sun coming across the Thames from the west. What a marvellous tonic it can be – if people only knew it.

It must have been the first time in months that she’d let herself go. Just imagine, from early morning till late night keeping a tight hold of yourself. She starts off about seven every morning messing about and doing for her kids, scrubbing ’em, cooking for ’em, nagging ’em, and listening to ’em. Then, I expect she’s worried about the bills and making ends meet, and if she’s a spare minute she’s got to sit down and write to Harry. I’ll bet even in her sleep she must be worrying. Then comes this little off moment of pleasure from out of the blue, when she can forget all that, and all her little body’s instincts can’t believe it and come rushing out to have their two-penn’orth. No wonder her skin was all glowing white just below the eyes. Good show, Alfie, I thought.

She was quite surprised to see me so chirpy after it. From what I could gather old Harry tended to come over a bit gloomy at those times. And somehow I could imagine how he would be, thinking how he could have trimmed the privet hedge with all the energy he’d wasted. Or maybe he took it all too much to heart.

‘I bet you haven’t been with many blokes beside Harry,’ I said to her. 

‘I haven’t been with a single one,’ she said, her eyes wide open.

‘Except me,’ I said.

‘Yes, sorry,’ she said, ‘I’d forgot.’

It don’t take a woman long to forget if it suits her. ‘Well, it’s widened your experience, gal,’ I says to her. It had too, short as it was. She kept staring at me every time I said anything as though I was a little oracle or something. All in all, she was quite appreciative in her own little way.

They can say what they want about all this fun-
and-games
leading up to it, but if you ask me straight out I reckon a bloke feels at his best when he goes at it natural and doesn’t start thinking about how to prolong the pleasure. She hadn’t mentioned the word precaution and it suited me to think she knew her own business best. So we walked along the towpath together, hand in hand. I wouldn’t normally have put my hand into a bird’s hand at a time like that – I get this feeling of needing to take my bearings again, but I did it for little Lily because I had a feeling she was imagining for the moment she was walking along with old Harry.

So we got back into Ruby’s car. I drove quietly along and dropped Lily off at the corner of her street. I even gave her a little kiss on the side of the cheek as she was getting out. After all there’s little enough romance in life. She looked quite an attractive little Mum as she tripped off, and I thought to myself, that was my good deed done for that day.

About two months later I get this letter in the post 
signed ‘Lily’. Who the bleeding hell’s Lily? I thought. I know that name. It’s a very short letter and she says she’s got to see me. She’s dead scared of the neighbours and of her Mum-in-law who only lives round the next road, in case they should find out. So I drop her a quick line back and tell her to meet me at Lyons’ Corner House at the Marble Arch.

Now if little Lily had done a murder she couldn’t have been more moggadored, because there’s no way out for her. ‘What you worrying about?’ I says, ‘old Harry will forgive you if you tell him the truth.’ And she says: ‘It’s not only him – it’s his Mum and his family. They’ll all know that he can’t be the father, because he’s been lying on his back in the sanatorium this past six months.’ Then it seems there’s all her relations, and of course the neighbours, and even if Harry wanted to forgive her, he couldn’t afford to. They’ll all be whispering about how she was having it off while her poor husband was lying helpless in bed in the sanatorium. Yeh, it seems that her little life is going to come to a sad end all because of about three minutes on the grass on a Sunday afternoon when she forgot herself. ‘Blimey,’ I said, ‘thank God I got no relations to consider and I can live my own life just as it comes and goes.’ So out of kindness I agrees to help her, and lay it all on. There’s lots of these tailoring blokes around London willing to earn a crafty few quid.