The Thursday Friend Read online

  ‘Has he ever asked you to go with him?’

  ‘No. How could he? It’s for men. And you know what happened last year. I went to Cornwall with Mrs Wainwright. You remember?’

  They nodded at each other, and Janie said, ‘Yes, you said you’d rather do a month’s stint with my gang than another day with her. Yes, I remember. But anyway, about this other thing. You’ve got to do something about it, because something’s happening to you: you’ve lost your colour and your spunk. You mightn’t be like me, with plenty of get-up-and-go, but you were never a doormat; and that’s how he’s treating you.’

  ‘Oh no, dear, no. It’s . . . well, I was just wondering if you knew if this was usual or not.’

  ‘Yes, it’s usual, I should imagine, with queers; but he married you and you shared the same bed for more than a year and, as Eddie often says, he was damn lucky to get someone like you, because he’s no oil painting. Oh, he’s got a pair of long legs on him, I’ll admit, but he’s got a face that would sour milk at times, and he can give you ten years. By the way, what about his people . . . that aunt and uncle who live in Worthing? Have you seen them recently?’

  ‘No; because, as I’ve told you before, they didn’t approve of his choice. As his dear aunt said to me, on the quiet of course, they were both surprised that their dear Humphrey, who up till then had showed no tendency towards marriage, should take someone so young, and she had glanced at my hair and stopped herself from saying, “with blond hair and likely bleached.” No, I think we’ve been half a dozen times; but, as you know, he goes practically every weekend now, well, he has done over the past two years, because his uncle, who’s getting on, is not at all well.’

  ‘Well, what do you do with yourself? You don’t always come here at the weekend.’

  ‘No. I fill in: I go for walks; and I’m writing again. You know I used to dabble in children’s stories.’

  ‘Oh.’ Janie moved her head impatiently. ‘You don’t want to carry on with anything like that. That’ll keep you by yourself, if anything would. You want to get out and about. You know something, Hannah?’ Her head moved slowly up and down. ‘You can’t have looked in the mirror seriously for years. I used to envy you, you know, your looks. I had what Eddie calls poisonality, but you had really what it took, and you still have, although it’s lost its colour. Does he take you out? I mean, do you eat out and things.’

  ‘Oh yes, sometimes we go to a restaurant.’

  ‘Sometimes. Well, what does he do the rest of the week?’

  ‘Every Thursday is definitely his night out because he plays bridge with Hobbs and Brown and another man. Apparently they’ve done so for years. They’re all in some club.’

  ‘Well, what about Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday?’

  ‘Oh’ – Hannah’s head now moved impatiently – ‘I suppose in that way we’re just like everybody else, Janie. As I told you, we discuss work and what we’ve done during the day, and we often did the crossword in bed, but not any more, of course.’

  ‘Oh, my God!’

  ‘Janie, please!’

  ‘All right. All right. But look’ – she stabbed a finger at her sister – ‘you came here to tell me something. Now you’ve told me something that’s most unnatural, and so I’m putting it to you straight: If he isn’t a homo, does he like women’s clothes?’

  ‘Oh, Janie; stop it!’

  ‘Sit down. Sit down. You know me, at least you should do by now. There must be something wrong with the fellow.’

  ‘No, there isn’t, Janie; and I . . . well . . . he’s none of those things. It was explained to me by a priest. But then I came to you . . . well, to . . . to ask . . . Oh!’ Hannah put her hand over her eyes now but was immediately startled by Janie s voice exclaiming, ‘You’ve been to a priest?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘A Catholic one?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘My God! What did he tell you?’

  ‘He . . . he was very nice. He told me not to worry because some men were born . . . ’

  ‘Yes, go on: they were born what?’

  ‘He called it celibate. He said Humphrey was wrong: he should never have married, he should likely have been in a monastery or somewhere, or been a priest or something like that.’

  ‘Or something like that be damned!’ Janie was on her feet. ‘Anyway, what possessed you to go to a priest?’

  ‘Well, I thought he would give a sort of explanation.’

  ‘And he did. By God! he did. Anyway’ – Janie shrugged her shoulders – ‘why am I asking why you went to a priest when we both had thirteen years under those bloody nuns?’

  ‘Oh, Janie, please! Now just think: at one time you were jolly glad to be at the convent; it got you away from home and Mama and Papa.’

  ‘Oh, yes, yes; Mama and Papa.’ Janie pushed a group of dirty mugs to one side of the table before bending towards Hannah and saying, ‘Your trouble and mine, Hannah, both stem from dear Mama and Papa. Remember the day when I dared address Papa as Dad, and then wanted an explanation why I shouldn’t? The other girls all called their fathers Dad, not Papa; we weren’t in the Victorian age any longer, and, too, why not Mam instead of Mama? Talk about snobs. If there was ever a pair they were, and you know it. I got out.’ She put her head back and let out a high, merry laugh. ‘Do you remember the day I got out?’

  Hannah was smiling back at her sister, nodding her head, saying, ‘Oh, yes; I’ll never forget it. I can see you now coming in that dining room.’

  ‘Yes, I can see myself, and Mama saying, “You’re late. Where have you been?” and my saying flatly, “With Eddie Harper, the barrow boy, as you call him. And he’s not a barrow boy any longer; he’s got a fruit shop and a flat above, and I’m going there to live with him. I’m twenty years old and if you try to bring me back then I’ll come back, but pregnant. You believe me!”’

  The tears of laughter were running down Hannah’s face and she spluttered, ‘And Mama fell flat on the floor.’

  ‘Yes; and it was a real faint this time, not a Victorian lady’s smelling-salts stunt. And I remember looking at you. You were all eyes and mouth and I said to you, “As for you, young ’un, stand up for yourself.” But you didn’t, did you? Anyway, you couldn’t. They kept you at school until you were seventeen and brought you home when Nellie walked out one day. I laughed about that until I was sick; but not when I realised you were being used as an unpaid servant. You wanted to go in for nursing, didn’t you? But no, they wouldn’t even let you take a secretarial course. That would’ve cost money. Why they sent us to a private convent school, God only knows. Prestige, I suppose, to have one up on the neighbours. But you know, you never told me what made you go to night school to learn secretarial work. What was it? You must have been about twenty then.’

  At this Hannah wiped her eyes and said soberly, ‘You made me, Janie.’

  ‘Do the secretarial course?’

  ‘Well, in a way, because I told Mama that if I couldn’t learn a trade of some kind then I would likely follow you and do what you had done, walk out and go to live with another barrow boy. In any case I’d go and live with you.’

  ‘You didn’t!’

  ‘Oh yes, I did; and so I had all those months at night school. Of course, then Mama died and the new freedom was marvellous, until Papa said he was going to marry again. And then it seemed to be heaven-sent when Humphrey took an interest in me. Quite honestly, Janie, I must admit I jumped at him. I think I would’ve jumped at anyone at that time, but I jumped at him because I loved him. He was so . . . well, gentlemanly.’

  ‘Yes, not a bit like my Eddie.’

  ‘Your Eddie’s all right. I’ve come to like and admire him more than a little; from what you’ve told me he doesn’t only look after you and his family, he cares for his own folk, and the
y’re spread all over the place.’

  Janie sat down again, and they both stared at each other for a while until Hannah said, ‘Well, I feel much better now than when I came in.’

  ‘But your opening up, has it solved any problems? What’re you going to do?’

  ‘Well, you know that he won’t let me go out to work. When I once asked him plainly why, his answer was that he didn’t want me to be exposed to clerical louts. I could do work at home, but that was all. And so I made up my mind I’d have a go at writing stories for children; not about po-faced ones, but about those more like your little tribe.’

  ‘Oh, thank you very much. Thank you very much.’

  But as Hannah looked across at her sister she knew she was pleased at the idea, and when Janie said, ‘They’re good kids, all of them, and we’re trying for an addition: he wants another boy. Three of each, he wants,’ Hannah exclaimed, ‘Oh, Janie! Janie, you’re the limit.’

  ‘Oh, Hannah! Hannah.’ They both laughed at the mimicry, and Janie, getting up, said, ‘Let me get this kitchen cleared and prepare some lunch for the tribe; then we’ll go down to the park and fetch them back.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing, not with me you won’t, because I’m off now, believe it or not, in search of a publisher.’ Hannah lifted her bag from the floor and, tapping it, said, ‘In there is a very well typed children’s story. It’s for five year olds, and I’ve done little drawings to accompany each piece.’

  ‘Let me have a look.’

  ‘No. No, look; I’ve got a thing about that. I saw an advert in the paper yesterday. It said Martin Gillyman, Publisher of odd books and buyer of rare ones.’

  ‘Publisher of odd books and buyer of rare ones! Sounds someone dippy to me; real publishers don’t advertise like that.’

  ‘Well, this one does. And it was because it sounded so unusual that I’m going to try my hand with him.’

  ‘Well, I wish you luck. I’ll be interested to know the result.’

  ‘You shall. You shall.’

  ‘Anyway, where’s this one situated?’

  ‘Oh, it’s in Bloomsbury, I think.’

  ‘Oh, Lord! you’ve some way to go.’

  ‘Well, I’ll get the tube to Tottenham Court Road and step right out into Bloomsbury, or near enough. Anyway,’ she added, on an almost sad note which she found impossible to keep from her tone, ‘I have nothing else to do with my time. Mrs Fenwick sees to the house, as she did long before I came on the scene. In her eyes I’m sure I’m an intruder, and again and again she’ll remind me she first saw to Mr Drayton immediately he stepped into London from that Worthing.’ She smiled, ‘It’s always that Worthing, or that Brighton, or that Kent, where she used to go hop-picking at one time; that was when she was young, if ever she was young.’

  As Hannah, now buttoning up her light grey coat, made for the door, Janie said, ‘How are you off for money? I mean, we’ve never spoken about that. What’s he like with his purse?’

  ‘Oh, he’s not bad, I suppose. Well, he sees to all the bills and everything.’

  ‘Housekeeping an’ all?’

  ‘Oh yes. You see, he’s always done it; I’ve just got to ask and he’ll give it to me.’

  ‘You’ve got to ask? Doesn’t he give you an allowance?’

  Hannah aimed to sound amusing as she said, ‘Now who’s going back into Victorian days? Allowance indeed! Anyway—’ She put out her hand and squeezed Janie’s, saying, ‘You always do me good. I should’ve come and had a talk with you weeks ago, months ago.’

  ‘If you want my opinion there should be no need for you to come and have a talk with anybody if things were as they should be, natural. Wait till Eddie hears of this.’

  ‘Oh, no! No, Janie! Please don’t tell Eddie.’

  ‘All right. All right. Don’t get yourself upset; I won’t.’

  Hannah stared at the tall thin woman who was so unlike herself and she knew that that would be the first thing she would speak of when her husband came into the house: she could hear his voice now, punctuating each sentence with bloody hell! or the bugger! and she wondered how it was that they had been so different in their choice of men and that now she could even envy Janie her Eddie.

  They embraced warmly at the front door and kissed, and the last words Janie said, softly, were, ‘I worry about you, you know. Funny, but I always have. You need looking after.’

  ‘Oh! go on.’ Hannah walked smartly away, but when she came to the end of the terrace she turned and lifted her hand, for she knew that Janie would still be standing watching her.

  She came out of the tube at Tottenham Court Road, walked along the main thoroughfare, then, seeing a policeman on duty at the end of a side street, enquired of him if he could direct her to Jason Gardens.

  ‘Oh, Jason Gardens. Jason Gardens.’ He pulled on his lower lip, then said, ‘Oh, now, I think you’ve got a bit of a walk, miss. Do you know where the British Museum is?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I do.’

  ‘Well, it’s near there. I’m not sure exactly where, but someone will direct you if you ask them, I’m sure.’

  She thanked him. They smiled at each other.

  She found Jason Gardens before she reached the British Museum, and she was surprised to find it was made up of private houses, some three storeys, others two, but all well built and of a period long gone, for there were half-moon fanlights above some of the doors and nearly all had an iron-railed approach up three broad steps, at the top of which, on some, were placed urns full of scarlet geraniums, trailing nasturtiums and other seasonable flowers. Number 4, she noted, was slightly different. There were no urns, but in the place of one was seated a life-size stone dog. It, too, definitely was from another age, for the stone was very weathered.

  On the wall to the right of the door was a brass plate stating simply, ‘Gillyman: Publishers’. Why she smiled as she looked at the plate she did not know; it was only later she was to remember she had done so. She looked for a bell. There was no sign of one, but there was a letter box, and to the left of it a large brass doorknob.

  The door opened easily and there she was standing in a small hallway with, facing her, a door with a sign on it saying ‘Private’. To her left was another door, by the side of which was a bell with a notice saying ‘Ring and Enter’. This she did.

  Slowly she opened the door, only to remain stock-still and staring into what she imagined to be a warehouse.

  ‘Come in! if you’re coming in, and close the door.’ The words were precise, but at the moment she couldn’t see from where they were coming.

  She turned and closed the door, then stepped gingerly between books piled in heaps on the floor and set in front of racks already full of others. She had taken five steps before she saw the owner of the voice. He was sitting behind a large, heavy mahogany desk, which was clear except for one stack of neatly piled books, and an opened book which he was apparently reading.

  ‘Hello!’ he said.

  She stared at the man for a moment before she said softly, ‘Good morning.’

  ‘Well, sit down. Pull that chair up.’

  She turned and looked behind her and there, its back legs stuck among more books, was a chair which she now pulled forward and then sat down upon, and they looked at each other. What she saw was a face topped by a mass of almost white grizzly hair. His face was long and clean-shaven and she noticed that his mouth was very large and full-lipped. He wasn’t wearing a jacket and the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up above the elbow, and she further noticed and with some amazement that the shirt looked as if it were a silk one – white silk.

  ‘Well, what can I do for you?’ The voice startled her, and she blinked rapidly and muttered something that she could hardly hear herself, and at this he said, ‘You want me to buy some books from you?’ Then, before she could
answer, he added, ‘You’re very young and you don’t look as if you’ve had a bereavement and have come to ask me to clear your house of all the rubbish.’ The large head nodded violently now. ‘That’s what people call books, you know, rubbish, rubbish. It angers me. Well now, why are you here? What do you want?’

  ‘I . . . ’

  ‘Yes, yes; go on, my dear, go on. I’m not an ogre and I’m not going to bite you and although you’re very pretty, I would say beautiful, yes, beautiful, especially your eyes—’ he was smiling widely now and showing two complete rows of short white teeth; then he went on, ‘there has been no time as yet for me to have unseemly designs on you.’

  She couldn’t help it, she let out a burst of high laughter: he was the funniest man she had come across, not only in looks but in what he said. When she quickly took her handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her eyes, saying, ‘I’m sorry,’ he came back with, ‘Sorry for what? You’re the brightest spot that’s happened in this day, because I’ve come across nothing exciting’ – he flicked his hands towards the ordered books to his right – ‘and your laugh goes with your eyes. Funny, that’ – he leant further across the table – ‘you laugh with your eyes, yes. So few women laugh with their eyes. I hadn’t noticed that, you know, but David pointed it out to me. Oh, what am I talking about?’ His head was shaking again. ‘Let us get down to business. You know something?’ His finger was wagging gently at her. ‘You’re a mesmerist.’