The Gambling Man

‘But they’ll be expectin’ us. It won’t be Sunday for them if we don’t go up; they’ll all be there.’

‘Aye, they’ll all be there.’ His voice trailed away on a sigh and he turned and went into the bedroom while Janie and Jimmy exchanged another look and Jimmy said under his breath, ‘Something’s wrong. I twigged it right away.’

‘You think so?’ Janie whispered back.

‘Aye, don’t you?’

‘Well, I did think he was a bit quiet, but when I asked him he said everything was all right.’

‘Aye, that’s what he says, but there’s something up. I’m tellin’ you, there’s something up.’

When, in the middle of the night, Janie was again woken from her sleep by Rory’s voice, not mumbling this time but shouting, she hissed at him, ‘Ssh! ssh! Wake up. What is it?’

But he went on, louder now, ‘I’ll make it up to you, I will . . . I know . . . I know, but I couldn’t.’

‘Rory! Rory! wake up.’

‘Five pounds. I had it, I had it. You’re to blame.’

‘Rory! do you hear me?’ She was trying to shake him.

‘Wha’? Wha’?’ He half woke and grabbed at her hands, then almost at the same time threw her aside, crying, ‘What was the good of two of us doin’ time! I’m not goin’ in there, so don’t keep on. You won’t get me in there, not for five pounds, or fifty. Five clarty pounds. Five clarty pounds. If I’d had the chance I’d have put it back, I would. I . . . would . . .’ His voice trailed away and he fell back on the pillows.

Janie sat bolt upright in the bed staring down through the darkness, not on to Rory but towards where her hands were gripping the quilt . . . That was it then. That was it! It should have been as clear as daylight from the beginning.

She saw John George’s face through the grid saying, ‘Tell Rory that, will you? Tell him I didn’t take the five pounds.’ And what John George was actually saying was, ‘Tell him to own up.’ She couldn’t believe it, yet she knew it was true. He had let John George, his good friend, go to that stinking place alone. It was true he couldn’t have done much about it at first, but after he regained consciousness in hospital he must have known. That’s why he hadn’t asked for John George. It should have been one of the first things he mentioned. ‘What’s the matter with John George?’ he should have said. ‘Why hasn’t he come to see me?’

No, she couldn’t believe it, she couldn’t. But she had to. She now turned her head towards the bulk lying beside her and instinctively hitched herself away from it towards the wall. But the next move she made was almost like that of an animal, for she pounced on him and, her hands gripping his shoulders, she cried, ‘Wake up! Wake up!’

‘Wha’? What’s-it? What’s-up? What’s wrong?’

‘Get up. Get up.’

As he pulled himself up in the bed she climbed over him, grabbed the matches from the table and lit the candle, and all the while he was repeating, ‘What is it? What’s the matter?’

The candle lit, she held it upwards and gazed down into his blinking eyes.

‘What’s up with you? You gone mad or something?’

‘Aye, I’ve gone mad, flamin’ mad; bloody well flamin’ mad.’

She sounded like Lizzie and her grannie rolled into one. He pushed the clothes back from the bed but didn’t get up, he just peered at her. ‘What the hell’s up with you, woman?’

‘You ask me that! Well, you’ve just had a nightmare an’ you’ve just cleared up somethin’ that’s been puzzling me for a long time. You! Do you know what I could do to you this minute? I could spit in your eye, Rory Connor. I could spit in your eye.’

He now leant his stiff body back against the wall. He’d had a nightmare, he’d been talking. He was sweating, yet cold, it was always cold on the river at night. With a thrust of his arm he pushed her aside and got out of the bed and pulled his trousers on over his linings, but didn’t speak; and neither did she. But when he went towards the door to go into the other room she followed him, holding the candle high, and she watched him grab the matches from the mantelpiece and light the lamp. When it was aflame he turned and looked at her and said quietly, ‘Well, now you know.’

‘Aye, I know. And how you can stand there and say it like that God alone knows. My God! to think you let John George take the rap for you . . .’

He turned on her. His voice low and angry, he said, ‘He didn’t take the rap for me, he took it for himself. He’d have been caught out sooner or later; he’d been at it for months.’

‘Aye, he might have, but only for a few shillings at a time not five pounds.’

‘No, not for a few shillings, a pound and more. I’d warned him.’

‘You warned him!’ Her voice was full of scorn. ‘But you went and did the same, and for no little sum either. It was for your five pounds he got put away for the year, not for the little bits.’

‘It wasn’t. I tell you it wasn’t’

‘Oh, shut up! Don’t try to stuff me like you’ve been doin’ yourself. That’s what you’ve been tellin’ yourself all along, isn’t it, to ease your conscience? But your conscience wouldn’t be eased, would it? Remember our first night in this place. You nearly knocked me through the wall ’cos I mentioned his name. I should have twigged then.’

‘Aye, yes, you should.’ His tone was flat now, weary-sounding. ‘And if you had, it would have been over and done with, I’d have gone through less.’

‘Gone through less! You talkin’ about goin’ through anything, what about John George?’

‘Damn John George!’ He was shouting now. ‘I tell you he would have gone along the line in any case.’

‘You’ll keep tellin’ yourself that till the day you die, yet you don’t believe it because the other night you promised to set him up when he came out. Eeh!—’ she now shook her head mockingly at him —’that was kind of you, wasn’t it? And I nearly went on me knees to you for it.’

‘Janie—’ he came towards her—’try to understand. You . . . you know how I feel about being locked in, and I was bad at the time. I was bad. God! I nearly died. And that was no make game, I couldn’t think clearly not for weeks after.’

As his hand came out towards her she sprang back from it, saying, ‘Don’t touch me, Rory Connor. Don’t touch me, not until you get yourself down to that station and tell them the truth.’

‘What!’ The word carried a high surprised note of utter astonishment. ‘You’d have me go along the line now?’

‘Aye, I would, and be able to live with you when you came out. It isn’t the pinchin’ of the five pounds that worries me, an’ if nobody had suffered through it I would have said, “Good for you if you can get off with it,” but not now, not the way things are; not when that lad’s back there. And you know something? When I think of it he could have potched you, he could have said you were the only other one who had a key. He could have said you were a gambling man and would sell your own mother. Oh aye—’ she wagged her head now—’you would sell your real mother for less than five pounds any day in the week, wouldn’t you? Poor Lizzie . . .’

The blow that caught her across the mouth sent her staggering, and at the same moment Jimmy came rushing down the ladder. Without a word he went to her where she was leaning against the chest-of-drawers, her back arched, her hand across her mouth, and he put his arm around her waist as he looked towards Rory and said, ‘You’ll regret that, our Rory. There’ll come a day when you’ll be sorry for that.’

‘You mind your own bloody business. And get out of this.’

‘I’ll not. I’ve heard enough to make me as sick as she is. I can’t believe it of you, I just can’t. And to John George of all people. He’d have laid down his life for you.’

Rory turned from the pair and stumbled to the mantelpiece and, gripping its edge, he stared down into the banked-down fire. That he was more upset by Jimmy’s reactions than by Janie’s didn’t surprise him, for he knew he represented a sort of hero to his brother. He had never done one outstanding thing to deserve it but he had accepted his worship over the years, and found comfort in it, but now Jimmy had turned on him.

God Almighty! why did everything happen to him at once? Her, yesterday, blaming him for being married, now this with Janie; and not only Janie, Jimmy. Yet he knew that if, come daylight, he took himself along to the polis station they’d both be with him every inch of the road. But he couldn’t, he knew he couldn’t go and tell them the truth. Apart from his fear of imprisonment look what he stood to lose, his job; and not only that but the good name that would help him to get another. Never again would he be allowed to handle money once he had been along the line. And this place would go, Jimmy’s yard. Had he thought of that? He swung round now, crying at them,