‘Well,’ Sam said, ‘he was nice. He gave you twenty pounds, mum. I saw it on the shelf after he left.’
Judy smacked him across the face, though the blow lacked her usual gusto. ‘I told you to keep your mouth shut about that, didn’t I?’
‘I’ll leave home,’ he said, ‘if you do that again.’
‘I can’t wait.’
Pam felt as if she herself had been struck. ‘You mean he slept with you?’
‘Doesn’t matter to you, does it?’
‘Oh no. Certainly not.’
‘He looked as if he was dying with misery,’ Judy said after a while, ‘so I asked him to share our supper. One thing led to another. He was too upset for me to be of much use, but I managed to soothe him in the end, which is probably why he was so generous. He needn’t have been, for all I cared.’
‘Twenty’s a lot of money,’ Sam said.
Pam had nothing to say except: ‘When did he leave?’
‘Three days ago. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he came back. Men usually do, before they go away for good. They hate you, but can’t leave you alone.’
‘Aren’t all men different?’ Pam asked.
‘Yes, they are. But they’re all the same, as well.’
Pam stood. ‘Burn the letter if you find it. That’s what I’ll do with it, after all.’
Judy took it out of the drawer. ‘You’d better have the bloody thing.’
She put the envelope into her handbag. ‘Thank you for holding it.’
‘No hard feelings?’ Judy seemed miserable, and it wasn’t necessary in the least, Pam thought, saying: ‘No, none, really,’ though finding it difficult to say anything comforting. ‘We’ll be off tomorrow, or the next day at the latest.’
‘Are you sure about going away with Tom?’
‘Absolutely.’
She cleared the table. ‘That doesn’t sound very sure. It’s too definite. See me before you go, though. I’ll want a goodbye kiss and a hug.’
Pam went upstairs thinking how gloomy the place was, but on going into her room felt a tremor of affection for her refuge. She put her bag down and lit the fire, no time between the first hiss and pushing in the match-flame. There was a smell of ice and decaying whitewash. A noise next door caused dread till she remembered who made it. When he put on the radio there was music. The house seemed inhabited and safe. She set a kettle on the stove. Under her happiness was an apprehension that she could not explain. There was no reason, which made it worse. She breathed deeply and became calm, yet the anxiety persisted.
She took George’s letter from her handbag, and began to read. ‘You are a prostitute, and I’ll get my own back for all you’ve done to me. I hung around waiting to see you, but you had gone off with that bastard, whoever he is. I spotted you, and you wouldn’t look at me, but I’ll get you for it, doing it on me after all I’ve done for you, and looked after you all these years. You don’t know right from wrong, or you went off your head, I don’t know which. Or you just wanted to lead a life that you’d hankered for all your life. Or maybe you’d been doing it before you left, while I was at work. I didn’t know. I wouldn’t, would I? How could I? But I do ask myself why we had to be married twenty years before you show your true colours. I can’t think why, and I wonder if you can. I do know though that if you want to come back you can, and I’ll forget all about what you have done to me. I love you, you know that, and always shall. I always did, didn’t I? I only want to live with you because life’s not worth living without you. I don’t know why, but it isn’t. I haven’t told Ted (Edward) yet that you’ve left me, but I said you had gone to stay for a time in London. So when you come back he’ll never know you’ve been away. I wouldn’t like him to, even though he is nineteen now. He won’t think much of me if he gets to know. So if you come back it’ll be the same as it was, except I’ll take you out more. There’s a new nightclub just opened down town, and we can go there. Business is good at the moment, I don’t know why because it doesn’t seem good everywhere else. I’ve got a new secretary and she’s a real worker and looks after things fine. So how about it? If you give me a ring I’ll be down to fetch you, or you can come up on the train if you like. I don’t mind. You always did as you liked. I can’t wait to see you again. It seems years, but it’s not much more than a couple of months. You’d do well to come back though, I’m telling you, because if you don’t you’ll be leading the sort of life that’ll do you in, because I know you, and when it does don’t come crawling back to me. That’s why I say you’d better come now, because that’d be best, and try to make up for all you’ve done, because if you don’t I’ll give you no peace. I want you back, I know that, and you know it, and if you don’t you ought to, so you have got to come, and if you don’t, me and my brothers will come and give you a good talking to, and you know what that means. And if we see that bloke of yours he won’t be much to look at after we have finished with him. He can’t do what he’s doing to our family and get away with it. He’s playing with fire doing what he’s doing to us, so if you’ve got any sense and don’t want anything to happen to you or him you’ll pack up and get the next train north, and if you’ll phone me beforehand I’ll be at the station in the car to meet you. Believe me, it’ll be the greatest day of my life because I love you and have never loved anybody else, and never shall. So pack up and come back to me, there’s a good girl. I’ll be waiting for you. I’ll never love anybody else. Love. Love. Love. George.’
The paper shook. Better to have followed her instinct and burned it. She understood why Tom had wanted to do the same with his trash. George would not accept that there was no going back, nor know that she did not live in his world anymore.
She shivered from cold. His letter paralysed her spirit. Anguish set her trembling because he was part of a trap from which escape was impossible. She had gone from him, but his refusal to realize just how far terrified her. The singlemindedness that had set him up in business was now beamed on her, threatening to pull her back into his tyranny and madness. His hungering drive would last for ever. She didn’t know where to go. She was her own free self, but he would drive her from any safe place.
She took a carving knife out of the drawer, and ran her finger along the blade too lightly to cut the skin. It would thrust itself into her. She was afraid, and put it back, intending to throw the vile thing away, or give it to Judy with other belongings that she wouldn’t take with her. She would deal with George without a knife. The shriek of the kettle startled her back to the life she had forgotten. Music on the other side of the wall reminded her. They would start getting their few things together, and be away by tomorrow. She dreaded any unexpected delays.
She made two cups of tea and took them to his room. He leaned over a sheet of paper, still wearing his overcoat and hat. She wasn’t sure he had heard her. His pen shaped a black curve to join a half-line of dots and angles, symbols fixed as if they had been cut out with scissors and stuck there.
‘Keeps me warm,’ he said, ‘coming into a freezing room. It seemed natural to light the stove, draw the curtains, and copy a sentence as if I wanted to send a letter to my mother or my grandmother. Maybe I’m writing to myself. It’s like learning for the first time, straight from the heart.’
She stood and watched. ‘What does it mean?’
He read the translation. ‘Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who has kept us in life, and has preserved us, and has enabled us to reach this season.’
‘Beautiful.’ Her hand was on his shoulder for comfort. ‘We want a new life, and a new way of seeing things – or a new way of looking at the old things that gives them fresh warmth and love.’ She had felt it for as long as she could remember, but had never told herself until now.