I cleaned those steps and the rage within my heart warmed the cold water. I did them very badly—I know that—and I am not sorry. If step cleaners were less conscientious it would be a good thing for them, and “larn” householders to be content with the scrubbing brush. I was given threepence for the job and then with a sudden, kindly thought, the mistress added another penny.
Fourpence! The first fourpence I had ever earned by manual labour. It was a proud thought, but my hands felt horribly stiff all the same. I noticed other cleaners at work about the district—the vogue lingers in the suburbs, and gives opportunity to women on the road to earn a few pence. But I had had enough of Hackney. There was no hope of work for me there, and I could not go back to the Shelter for a second night’s lodging. Adventure called me farther on; and I did a rash deed. I spent twopence of my fourpence on a tram ride to the Angel.
It now became pressingly apparent that something urgent must be done. To begin with, I was very hungry; more hungry than I had been for years. Material considerations of this sort do not usually affect women of the middle-class—food descends like manna at stated intervals, often to be grumbled at. But to a woman without a home, with only the streets as a permanent abiding place, food (with sleep) is the main interest of existence. I stood at the top of the Pentonville Road and wondered how I should get a meal. And then inspiration seized me. I went into a tobacconist’s and bought two boxes of matches; it would be a strange thing if I could not make at least fifty percent profit.
I learnt very much in my first essay as a street saleswoman. The same principles apply to this as to other branches of commerce. You must find a new angle of approach. It is worse than useless to stand in the gutter, a pile of matchboxes in your outstretched hand, an anguished look upon your stony face; such tactics merely irritate. The passerby reasons that if he buys a box, a whole pile will still remain, and his few pence will do but little to mitigate the whole sum of your misery. No, the secret of success is this: stand on the pavement—if you are quiet and well-behaved the police will not interfere with you—your matches in your pocket, keep a sharp look out and choose your man. Then, when you see a likely victim, bear down upon him with a bright smile and a cheery word, and a hundred to one you will land him. That afternoon I did quite well. I sold my matches for fourpence each, a net profit of sixpence, and then, heedlessly rash, I went to an eating house and gorged on sausage and onions.
There are quite a number of matchsellers who have not thought out their technique at all, but continue, day after day, at the same pitch, with the same hopeless look of wretchedness. The older hands have developed a sturdy kind of cheeriness. One old lady of my acquaintance has evolved a heavy jollity that carries all before it. She is one of the privileged few who are admitted to some of the West End bars, and she always sells her wares. She is wise enough to insist that the purchasers shall keep their matches. It rankles in the mind of the most generous man if he is continually called on to hand over money—even the smallest sum—without value received. This consideration is by no means regarded by all the merchants of the kerb. There is an ill-tempered woman in the West End who audibly curses any customer who takes matches in return for money. She has a fine flow of invective and it is amusing to hear her, but, broadly and generally, the method cannot be recommended.
There are a certain number of women who, day after day, sell matches. Others like myself take it up as an odd job to help them over a bad stile. It is astonishing, however, that so many manage to make some sort of a living, though very few achieve even the semblance of a home. For the outcast has no abiding place; and always, in hot or cold weather, when it is wet and when it is dry, there remains the eternal problem—where and how to get a bed.
That particular problem was pressing on me acutely when I came out of the eating house. I went to the nearest Labour Exchange and went through the same performance as at Hackney. There was no chance of my getting a place as cook, but they gave me the address of a flat near Rosebury Avenue, where a charwoman was required. It was one of those sad-looking flats which seem to be furnished in a monotone of drab. The lady of the house was drab also, even her little baby daughter was of the same depressing hue. She gazed at me with a cold, appraising eye, and I realised she did not regard me as a human person; I was merely someone to do the dirty work. Well, I did it. I laboured hard for over an hour. I swept the flat, I washed the kitchen and the passage, beat the mats and shook a fair-sized carpet out of the window, cleaned the knives and peeled some potatoes. During the whole hour I was never left one moment alone. The woman stood and watched me, and I could feel suspicion oozing from her every pore. Suspicion that intrinsically I was a thief and only wanted opportunity to pocket a potato, secrete a knife, or make away with the carpet.
I have always understood that it is an unwritten law for an itinerant char to be offered tea, and secretly I hoped my employer would observe the tradition. Vain illusion, absurd expectancy!
