“Unless we come to an agreement.”
She seemed to wait. I haven’t heard it yet, I said.
“I’m prepared to accept that you won’t let me go at once. But I’m not prepared to stay any longer down here. I want to be a prisoner upstairs. I want daylight and some fresh air.”
Just like that, I said.
“Just like that.”
As from this evening, I suppose, I said.
“Very soon.”
I suppose I get a carpenter in, and the decorators and all.
She sighed then, she began to get the message.
“Don’t be like this. Please don’t be like this.” She gave me a funny look. “All this sarcasm. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
It was no good, she had killed all the romance, she had made herself like any other woman, I didn’t respect her any more, there was nothing left to respect. I knew her lark, no sooner she was up out of the room she was as good as gone.
Still, what I thought was I didn’t want the no-eating business again, so it was best to play for time.
How soon, I said.
“You could keep me in one of the bedrooms. It could be all barred and boarded up. I could sleep there. Then perhaps you’d tie me up and gag me and let me sit sometimes near an open window. That’s all I ask.”
That’s all, I said. What are people going to think with boarded-up windows all over the place?
“I’d rather starve to death than stay down here. Keep me in chains upstairs. Anything. But let me have some fresh air and daylight.”
I’ll think about it, I said.
“No. Now.”
You’re forgetting who’s the boss.
“Now.”
I can’t say now. It needs thinking.
“Very well. Tomorrow morning. Either you tell me I can come up or I don’t touch any food. And that will be mur-der.” Really fierce and nasty she looked. I just turned and went.
I thought it all out that night. I knew I had to have time, I had to pretend I would do it. Go through the motions, as they say.
The other thing I thought was something I could do when it came to the point.
The next morning I went down, I said I’d thought things over, I saw her point, I’d looked into the matter, etcetera—one room could be converted, but it would take me a week. I thought she would start sulking but she took it O.K.
“But if this is another put-off, I will fast. You know that?”
I’d do it tomorrow, I said. But it needs a lot of wood and bars special. It may take a day or two to get them.
She gave me a good old tight look, but I just took her bucket.
After that, we got on all right, except that I was pretending all the time. We didn’t say much, but she wasn’t sharp. One night she wanted a bath and she wanted to see the room and what I’d done. Well, I knew she would; I had got some wood and made it look as if I was seriously doing things to the window (it was a back bedroom). She said she wanted one of those old Windsor chairs in it (quite like old times, her asking for something) which I got the next day and actually took down and showed her. She wouldn’t have it down there, it had to go back up. She said she didn’t want anything she had (in the way of furniture) downstairs upstairs. It was dead easy. After she saw the room and the screw-holes she really seemed to think I was going to be soft enough to let her come up.
The idea was I would go down and bring her up and we would have supper upstairs and then she would have her first night upstairs and in the morning she would see daylight.
She got quite gay sometimes. I had to laugh. Well, I say laugh, but I was nervous, too, when the day came.
The first thing she said when I went down at six was she had my cold, the one I got at the hairdresser in Lewes.
She was all bright and bossy, laughing up her sleeve at me, of course. Only the joke was going to be on her.
“These are my things for tonight. You can bring up the rest tomorrow. Is it ready?” She already asked that at lunch, and I said yes.
I said, it’s ready.
“Come on then. Must I be tied?”
There’s just one thing, I said. One condition.
“Condition?” Her face dropped. She knew at once.
I’ve been thinking, I said.
“Yes?” Really burning, her eyes were.
I’d like to take some photographs.
“Of me? But you’ve taken a lot already.”
Not the sort I mean.
“I don’t understand.” But I could see she did.
I want to take pictures of you like you were the other evening, I said.
She sat on the end of her bed.
“Go on.”
And you’ve got to look as if you enjoyed posing, I said. You got to pose the way I tell you.
Well she just sat there, not saying a word. I thought at least she would get angry. She just sat there wiping her nose.
“If I do it?”
I’ll keep my side of the bargain, I said. I got to protect myself. I want some photos of you what you would be ashamed to let anyone else see.
“You mean I’m to pose for obscene photographs so that if I escape I shan’t dare tell the police about you.”
That’s the idea, I said. Not obscene. Just photos you wouldn’t want to be published. Art-photographs.
“No.”
I’m only asking what you did without asking the other day.
“No, no, no.”
I know your game, I said.
“What I did then was wrong. I did it, I did it out of despair that there is nothing between us except meanness and suspicion and hate. This is different. It’s vile.”
I don’t see the difference.
She got up and went up to the end wall.
You did it once, I said. You can do it again.
“God, God, it’s like a lunatic asylum.” She looked all round the room like I wasn’t there, like there was someone else listening or she was going to bust down the walls.
Either you do it or you don’t go out at all. No walking out there. No baths. No nothing.
I said, you took me in for a bit. You’ve just got one idea. Get away from me. Make a fool of me and get the police on to me.
You’re no better than a common street-woman, I said. I used to respect you because I thought you were above what you done. Not like the rest. But you’re just the same. You do any disgusting thing to get what you want.
“Stop it, stop it,” she cried.
I could get a lot more expert than you in London. Any time. And do what I liked.
“You disgusting filthy mean-minded bastard.”
