the result of a morning’s work?’
‘It was Saltbank Row and Pilbey Street.’
‘I know damned well it was Saltbank Row and Pilbey Street, it’s always Saltbank Row and Pilbey Street on a Saturday, but what I’m saying to you is, do you mean to tell me that’s all you got out of them?’
Rory moved one lip over the other before replying, It’s always the same near Christmas.’
‘Look!’ The thick neck was thrust forward, then the head went back on the shoulders and Mr Kean directed an enraged stare on to Rory’s grim face as he cried, ‘One gives me family histories, the other festival dates as excuses. Now look, I’m telling you they’re not good enough, neither one nor the other, Christmas or no Christmas. If that sum’—he now dug his finger on to one coin after another—’if it isn’t doubled at the next collection then there’ll be a lot of barrows needed to shift their muck. You tell them that from me. And that’s final.’ Again he stabbed the coins. ‘Double that amount or it’s the bums for the lot of ’em.’
When Rory turned abruptly from the table Mr Kean barked at him, ‘Answer me when I’m speaking to you!’
Rory stopped, but it was a few seconds before he turned to face Mr Kean again, and then he said slowly, ‘Yes, sir.’
Seconds again passed before Mr Kean said, ‘There’s going to be changes here, Connor,’ and again Rory said, ‘Yes, sir.’
‘Get yourself out.’
The buttons on Rory’s coat strained as he drew in a deep breath before turning round and leaving the room, closing the door after him.
John George was standing by his narrow, high desk. A little colour had returned to his face and he was about to speak when the outer door opened and they both looked towards it and at Miss Charlotte Kean.
Charlotte was Kean’s only child but she bore no resemblance to him, being tall, extremely tall for a woman, all of five foot eight and thin with it. Moreover, she had what was commonly called a neb on her. Her nose was large; her mouth, too, was large but in proportion to her face. Her eyes were a greeny grey and her hair was black. She was an ugly young woman yet in some strange way she had just missed being beautiful for each feature taken by itself was good even though, together, one cancelled another out. Her features gave the impression of strength, even of masculinity. It was understood in the office that she knew as much about the business as did her father, yet she rarely came here. Rory hadn’t seen her but half a dozen times in four years, and each appearance had given him material for jokes in the kitchen, especially at the Sunday gatherings.
He had from time to time openly teased John George about her. John George had said he felt sorry for her, because a young woman like her had little chance of being married. His words had proved true, for here she was at twenty-eight and still on the shelf.
But there was one thing his master’s daughter possessed that he couldn’t make game of, in fact it had the power to make him feel ill at ease, and that was her voice. There was no hint of the Tyneside twang about it. This he understood had come about by her being sent away to one of those posh schools when she was no more than ten, from which she hadn’t come back to Shields for good until she was turned seventeen.
She gave them no greeting—one didn’t greet clerks —but stared at Rory before demanding briefly, ‘My father in?’
‘Yes, miss.’ Rory inclined his head towards the door.
She stood for a moment longer looking from one to the other. Then her eyes resting once more on Rory, she surveyed him from head to toe, as he said bitterly afterwards, ‘Like some bloody buyer at a livestock show.’ But he wasn’t going to be intimidated by any look she could cast over him, and so he returned it. His eyes ranged from her fur-trimmed hat down over her grey velour coat with its brown fur collar, right to her feet encased in narrow-toed brown kid boots. He had noticed her feet before. They were so narrow he wondered how she balanced on them, how she got boots to fit them. But when you had money you could be fitted from top to toe and inside an’ all, but he’d like to bet with that face her habit shirts would be made of calico, unbleached at that, no lace camisoles for her. Anyway, she had nothing to push in them.
As she went towards the door he looked at her back. It was like a ramrod, she wasn’t like a woman at all. He beckoned to John George, who seemed to be glued to his desk, and as he opened the door he heard her say, ‘You’ll be late for the ferry, I came with the trap. Come along or you’ll never get there.’
The old man always went by ferry up to Newcastle; he didn’t like the trains although he had to take one from Newcastle to Hexham. When he went on his usual trips there he generally left early on a Saturday morning. What had stopped him this time? Anyway, whatever had stopped him had also nearly stopped John George’s breath.
They were crossing the market again before he said, ‘Well now, come on, spit it out.’
‘I’ll . . . I’ll give you it back, I . . . I can give you six bob of it now. I’ll get it from home and . . . and the rest on Monday.’
‘What were you up to?’
‘Aw’—John George wagged his head from side to side—’I . . . I wanted to give Maggie something and it had to be the day, it’s the only time I can see her. I mightn’t see her again until after the holiday and so, thinkin’ he wouldn’t be in till Monday, I . . . I took the loan of ten bob out of the . . .’
‘You bloody fool!’
‘Aye, I know, I know I am.’
‘But . . . but how did you expect to put it back by Monday if you haven’t got it now?’
‘Aw well, man’—again his head was wagging—’I . . . I usually put me good suit in and me watch and bits of things . . .’
‘You usually do? You mean you’ve done this afore?’
John George nodded his head slowly. ‘Aye. Aye, a few times. The times that he goes off at the weekends and doesn’t count up till Monday. I . . . I thought I’d drop down dead when I saw him standing there.’
‘You deserve to drop down dead, you bloody fool you. Do you know he could have you up? And he’s the one to do it an’ all; he’d have you along the line afore you could whistle. You must be up the pole, man.’
‘I think I’ll go up the pole soon if things don’t change.’
‘What you want to do is to pull yourself together, get things worked out straight. Leave your Uncle Willy and Aunt Meg, he’s able to work, he’s nothin’ but a scrounger, and take a place on your own.’
‘What!’ John George turned his face sharply towards him. ‘Take the furniture and leave them with three bare rooms or tell him to get out? What you don’t understand, Rory, is that there’s such a thing as gratitude. I don’t forget that they were both good to me mother after me da died, aye, and long afore that; and they helped to nurse him the two years he lay bedridden.’
‘Well, they’ve been damned well paid for it since, if you ask me . . . All right then, say you can’t do anything about them, an’ you want that lass . . . well then, ask her to marry you and bring her into the house.’
‘That’s easier said than done. If I took her away her father would likely go straight to old Kean and denounce me.’ He now put his hand to his brow, which, in spite of the raw cold, was running with sweat, and muttered, ‘But I’ll have to do something, and soon, ’cos . . . oh my God! I’m in a right pickle . . . Rory.’
‘Aye, I’m still here, what is it?’
‘There’s something else.’
‘Aw.’ Rory now closed his eyes and put his hand across his mouth, then grabbed at his hard hat to save it from being whipped by the wind from his head. ‘Well, go on.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Another time, another time; you’re not in the mood . . . Look—’ he pointed suddenly —’Isn’t that Jimmy?’
They were passing the road that led to the Mill Dam and the river front. Rory stopped and said, ‘Yes that’s our Jimmy . . . Jimmy!’ he shouted down the lane, and Jimmy who had been walking with his eyes cast down looked upwards, then came dashing up the slope at his wobbling gait.
‘Why, fancy seein’ you, I mean both of you. An’ I was just thinking of you, our Rory.’
‘You were? Why? You another one that wants a sub?’
‘No, man.’ Jimmy laughed. ‘But I was thinkin’ that when I got home I’d ask you to come down here again. Now wasn’t that funny.’
‘I can’t see much to laugh at in that, not yet anyway.’
‘Well, it was something I wanted to show you down on the front.’ He nodded towards the river. ‘Come on.’ He again indicated the river with his head, then added, ‘And you an’ all, John George.’
