The Bonny Dawn Page 2

  Joe Lloyd had been waiting on Stockwell Hill for more than half an hour now, sitting in the same spot he always occupied. The grass at this spot was worn away and the ground hollowed into a scoop where, years ago, his father had raked the earth away with his bare hands to make him cushy. He hadn’t been four years old when his father had first brought him to the top of Stockwell Hill, and early in the morning at that; not at four o’clock, no, not as early as that, but around about seven. And it was something for a youngster to be got out of bed and dressed and walk all this way at that age. It had taken them a solid hour on that first walk, but on their last they made it in twenty-five minutes. The last time his father and he had climbed to this point of contact with God, as his father had once called it, the last time they had come up here was just three days before he was killed. Joe felt no pain now that his father was no longer with him; there was only an emptiness, and this was enclosed within some chamber deep in the private part of his mind. You could not go on feeling and suffering as he had done without something dreadful happening, such as going mad. At one time he had thought he would go mad. His mother had said, ‘Come out of the pit; that will help.’ But he had refused. Among other things, he had inherited certain principles from his father. His father had not been like some pitmen, yelling down the work that sustained him in life. So he had said to his mother, ‘No; what was good enough for Dad is good enough for me.’ It was strange, he knew, that he should say this, and he knew his mother, too, considered it strange.

  It was usually said from the opposite direction: it was usually the father who said, ‘What is good enough for me should be good enough for you.’ He had nothing against the pit: he could leave the pit the morrow if he wanted to; but he didn’t want to, and this was strange, too, because he loved the light, he loved the dawns and sunsets. He did not so much care for the high noons and the blaze of the day, but he liked the shadows when they were pale and fresh in the morning, and he liked them when they were tired at night.

  They had sat side by side at this very spot that last day, and his father had talked to him about women. He had spoken to him gently about women. There were other ways to talk about women and Joe knew this already: he had learned a lot in the six months he had been at the pithead. His father had said quietly, ‘I’m not going into details now for I guess you know as much about that side of it as I do; you young ’uns do, the day. Aw, but I think they always did. Woman’s the great curiosity shop of life. You wouldn’t be a lad if you didn’t start groping that way from early on, so we won’t go over old ground. But I’d just like to say this, lad, and I’m saying it from experience an’ things I’ve thought out, things that have always been difficult to put into words. Yet now, on a morning like this, they are clear in me mind, and this is one of them, lad. When you go looking for a wife—not just for a lass mind, that’s different—when you go lookin’ for a wife try to see her as she’ll be, say…five years on. You’d do better still if you’d try for ten. Now this sounds easy, but it isn’t, lad. It’s a very difficult thing to do, because if you’re looking for a wife you’re half in love already and it’s gumming up your eyeballs. One tip I’ll give you. Never take a lass who says she can’t stand a liar, for you can bet your life she doesn’t know what the truth is. When they’re emphatic about things like that, look out. Look for some gentle streak in her, but don’t be misled if she goes all goofy over dogs. By! I’ve seen some bitches who love dogs.’ At this, they had both laughed, they had fallen on their backs and laughed, and when they sat up the tears were running down their cheeks, and his father had pushed him with his thick squat hand and, light with his laughter, he had fallen over again, and there had ended the one and only session of talking about the facts of life.

  His father had been a wonderful man. Wonderful was the only word that seemed to fit him. He had been a gentleman…gentle, the kind that meant tender, yet he could be firm and indomitable about some things. He had been that about not letting his wife go out to work. She had suggested it only once, and Joe remembered his father saying, ‘You’ve got a husband, a bairn and a house, and if these can’t keep you goin’, lass, then there’s something wrong.’ It was the quiet way his father had said this that closed the subject for good. His mother had adored his father. Had, was the word; she could obviously adore him no longer.

  Joe moved his buttocks in the mould of earth. Only three years had passed and she was thinking of marrying again. He couldn’t believe it. The thought still made him sick. A fortnight ago he had first guessed what she was at when he came up on her giving tea to Mr Bishop, the grocer from the high town, and he had wanted to push his fists in Mr Bishop’s face. Yet, prior to this, he had always liked the man. After his father went, Mr Bishop had been very good to them.

  But to have him in the house in his father’s place, that was a different kettle of fish. It was because this thought was still troubling him that he had come over from their village of Johnson’s Cross into South Scardyke a week gone Saturday night and looked in at the club: he was wanting company, for his mother was no longer his company. If he had sat with her or taken her to the pictures her mind would have been on Mr Bishop. He knew that. So he had made for the club and there had met up again with Sandy Palmer and his lot. Sandy Palmer, Ronnie Fitzsimmons, Clarky Leach, Charlie Talbot, all the lads who had gone to school with him. He was the only one from his class who had taken to the pits and he knew that they thought he was soft on top for doing this.

  At school, because of the difference in their height, he had been a little afraid of Sandy Palmer, and now three years later, Sandy had put on another four or five inches. He was six foot two if he was an inch, whereas he himself had remained practically static. He was five foot four and a half, and he knew that, like his father before him, he would remain five foot four and a half. But he was no longer afraid of Sandy Palmer. Yet that wasn’t strictly true. He had a certain feeling about Sandy, a feeling that warned him that it was better if they didn’t meet, if their paths didn’t cross. And perhaps they wouldn’t have crossed again if he hadn’t seen young Brid Stevens. He remembered her just faintly from their school days, just faintly because she had altered so much. Her eyes were grey and her forehead wide, and her hair was long and thick and swung away from her back as she danced. It was brown when it lay still, but it was gold when it moved. Her thighs were firm and her breasts were high and her face was kind, and she was all of an inch taller than him.

  He had been to few dances. When he was fourteen he had gone to the club and one of the women had given some of the lads lessons. She had shown them how to waltz and foxtrot, and he had rather liked her. The club was just beginning then, but soon others came and before long there was nothing but rock ’n’ roll. He had never liked rock ’n’ roll. He didn’t like to see girls wriggling like worms on the one spot. He thought they looked like corkscrews that never went through the corks. So when he had asked Brid Stevens to dance and without a word she had stood in front of him and started to wriggle, he had looked at her, then put his arm about her waist and taken her off surprisingly into a clumsy one-step. But in this he had not been able to cover the length of the room before they were pushed and knocked and joggled by the writhing bodies of the jivers. It was jive now, and he had brought ridicule upon them both because he couldn’t do it.

  During last week he had been to George’s Coffee Shop twice and met Brid there. Then, without any dating being done, they had met again last night at the club, and as he looked at her he had tried to visualise what she would look like in five years’ time or, say, ten. But he couldn’t see her then, he could only see her now, and he knew that he wanted her, wanted her as his father must have wanted his mother, and he said to himself, as his father would have done, ‘Now, no nonsense, go slow and careful, and don’t frighten her off.’ It was odd that he should think this way about her, because she was a regular at the club. She was seventeen and she knew Sandy Palmer and his crowd, and yet he knew that if he put a foot wrong she w
ould be gone. Not out of the club, or South Scardyke, but out of this world that they were both tentatively entering.

  At this moment he thought of his father with great tenderness and he got to his feet and looked over the brow of the hill towards the main road, and as he did so he said to himself, ‘God, let her come.’ And it was as though God had heard him, for instantly he saw a dark shape running along the main road. It disappeared from the sight of his straining eyes for a second behind some shrubs, and when it appeared again he had the urge to run to her as would a little lad who had not yet reached the self-conscious state of knowing he was no longer a lad. He remained still, watching her shape bounding towards him through the gathering light. And then she was standing a short distance from him, so that he had only to put out his hand with his elbow bent to touch her. She was gasping, and he could feel her hot breath on his face; even the warmth of her body came to him, she stood so close. For a moment he reverted to the naturalness of a child and said, ‘I thought you weren’t coming. Yes, I did.’

  ‘Oh, but I said I would.’

  ‘Aye, I know you did.’

  ‘Well’—she was still panting—‘I’m here.’

  She had moved back from him, and the distance returned the meeting to some normality.

  ‘You’re not too soon.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No, it’ll be up any minute.’

  ‘Will it?’

  She turned to look towards the sea, but she couldn’t make it out. It was as if it wasn’t there. But she knew she had only to run down this hill to reach the edge of the tide. Everything was grey and violet. The grey she knew to be the water, the violet the sky. She felt strange, a bit weird, elated. She had the silly desire to laugh.

  ‘Come and sit down. You put a coat on; that was sensible. Look, there’s an armchair ready-made.’ He pointed to the place where he had been sitting. ‘I’ve warmed it for you.’

  When she sat in the hollow she made a sound, half laugh, half exclamation of amazement at finding the earth so comfortable. She pressed her back into the shape.

  ‘I’ve never been up so early in me life.’

  ‘No?’ He was now sitting on his hunkers by her side, and they were staring at each other full in the face.

  ‘No. It was four o’clock when I got up. The alarm scared me to death. What time did you get up?’

  ‘I’ve never been to bed.’

  ‘What!’ Her chin was drawn into the soft flesh of her neck.

  ‘No; I missed the last bus and I walked.’

  ‘Aw.’

  ‘Aw, nothing. I think I missed it on purpose, just to give meself an excuse. I like walking.’

  ‘But what is it? It must be three…four miles from our place to your place.’

  ‘Four and a half. But I didn’t go all that way, I came here.’

  She screwed round in the earth. ‘You mean you’ve been here all night?’

  He nodded, his lips tight and his eyes bright.

  ‘No!’

  ‘There’s a bit of a cave down yonder; it’s as warm as toast at this time of the year. Me dad and me spent many a night there.’

  ‘Your dad?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What did your mother say?’

  ‘Oh, she got used to it; she didn’t mind. She used to laugh and say we were no more than a couple of bairns.’ His face sobered. ‘He’s been dead three years now.’

  ‘Your dad?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m sorry. But you still come and sleep out in the cave?’

  ‘Now and again. Not very often, except like last night. It seemed silly to walk the rest of the way home and then come back.’

  ‘Did you think I’d come then?’ She was looking towards the sea.

  ‘I hoped you would.’ He too was now looking towards the sea; and he exclaimed excitedly, ‘Look at the colour. See it spreading along, like hot jam slipping over the edge of the table?’

  ‘Yes; yes.’ She could see the picture of his description more clearly than the deep blushed horizon, and yet she said, ‘What an odd description for the rising sun.’

  ‘Me mother spilt a basin of warm jam she was putting into tarts one day and it ran right along the edge of the kitchen table. I never see that streak of colour unless I see that jam spreading over the whole place.’

  She cast her eyes swiftly at him. He was new, nice, delightful somehow. She hadn’t known before that she wanted to hear someone talk in this fashion, and yet why else had she gone to the coffee bar on the Monday night following the first Saturday she had seen him? That was only a week ago, a week last night. She must have seen him before when they were at school because he had told her he remembered her, although she couldn’t remember him. But from the moment he had asked her to dance and Sandy Palmer and Clarky Leach and the rest had bustled them because they weren’t jiving, she had wanted to see him again. She had liked the sound of his voice right from the start. She was sorry that he wasn’t as tall as she was, having always told herself she would never go out with a boy who wasn’t as tall as herself. But he looked nice somehow, and the way he held himself brought his eyes on a level with her own. Perhaps, she thought, it was the way she did her hair that made her appear taller than him, but she really knew it wasn’t. When she was dancing with him his head looked big, big enough to fit a man much taller, and his shoulders looked as though they belonged to a six-footer. He had a wave in his hair that started at his brow and disappeared over the crown of his head. His hair was fair and one part where the wave caught the light looked blond. His eyes were a hazel colour, and they looked kind, soft and gentle. They were different from Sandy Palmer’s and he used them differently. He did not keep them looking down the front of your dress or on your mouth until your hands sweated.

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘Look. It’s coming up.’

  ‘Oh, it’s bonny. Oh, it is.’

  ‘An’ you’ve never seen it afore?’ His voice sounded excited, as if he were displaying to her something magical which he himself had created.

  ‘No.’ She was looking to the horizon, now entirely taken up with the blaze of colour erupting over the line of the sea.

  As the sun rose with seeming speed she kept exclaiming, ‘Oh! Oh!’ She had for the moment let the wonder of the dawn supplant the feeling of being alone in the early morning with this boy. She knew that she was experiencing surprise, a beautiful surprise. She had not wanted to see the dawn but she had wanted to be here with this boy in the early morning. But now the dawn was showing her its worth and she became still under the wonder of it. It was so beautiful it was in a way painful, and she wished for a moment that she needn’t look at it. As the glow rolled the grey mist back from the sea, almost it seemed to her very feet, she felt filled with an odd choking feeling. She was different somehow…she felt clean, washed, like. The dirt of life with which she was daily surrounded, and to which she was forever closing her eyes and stopping her ears, was receding. This light was like a great wet flannel wiping her mind clean.

  ‘I never get used to it, never. It’s always new. You know something?’

  ‘No.’ Her voice was dreamy.

  They were both staring ahead now, their eyes resting gently on the picture before them.

  ‘I think doctors must be daft. They mustn’t really be thinking straight.’

  ‘Why? How d’you make that out?’

  ‘Well, just look. If they were to put sick people, especially those sick in their minds, if they were to put them somewhere so they could see the dawn every morning, I can’t see but that they wouldn’t be cured in next to no time.’

  ‘It might frighten them.’

  ‘The dawn?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I think it might.’ She moved her head slowly while continuing to stare towards the great spreading glow. ‘I’m afraid of the moon.’

  ‘You are?’

  ‘Yes, I used to scream at it when I was little. So perhaps this wouldn’t do everybody good, ’cos…well, it makes you t
hink, like.’

  ‘Yes; yes, it does.’ He brought his eyes on to her. He knew he had been right about her, and the intensity of his gaze brought her head round to him.

  She was pleased with herself. She was talking, and not about silly things, like Janet and Nancy did in the office. She was pleased to think she knew that the dawn would frighten some people, for she had never realised that she knew this. Yet she had always known there was a different kind of talk from that which she heard at home, and at the office. Nancy and Janet talked of nothing but dress and lads…and babies. It was the latter that made her feel the most awkward. She never wanted a baby, never. She had never wanted lads either—well, not until this last day or so—for when she thought of lads she thought of Sandy Palmer or Ronnie Fitzsimmons, and then her thoughts would shift to her mother and father, or her Uncle John, who was Sandy’s father and not really her uncle at all. She just called him uncle because they had lived near each other for so long. She said now, ‘It would do Sandy Palmer good to come and see this,’ and immediately her face lost its light. Why couldn’t she leave Sandy Palmer out of this? She hadn’t wanted to think of Sandy Palmer.

  ‘Yes, it would that. You live near him, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, three doors away. It’s strange, but we used to live three doors away from them in the old town, too, afore we moved.’

  ‘Do you like him?’ He asked the question without looking at her and she answered it without looking at him.

  ‘No.’

  ‘He likes you.’

  She did not answer, but she looked into the blaze of colour until it dazzled her. She too had thought Sandy Palmer had liked her, had wanted her for his girl. She had never wanted to be his girl and her mother had warned her: ‘You keep away from Sandy, don’t have any carry on. Mind, I’m tellin’ you.’