They climbed the breakwater and reached the harbour. There, in the slack scummy water, some lads from the Terraces were fishing for coal. With an old pail, knocked full of holes, fixed to a pole, they were dredging for lumps which had fallen off the barges in working times. Deprived of the fortnightly allowance from the pit, they were scraping in the mud for fuel which would otherwise have been forgotten. Joe looked at them with secret contempt. He paused, his legs planted wide apart, hands still bulging in his trouser pockets. He despised them. His cellar was full of good coal pinched off the pit head, he had pinched it himself, the best in the heap. His belly was full of food, good food, Charley, his dad, had looked after that. There was only one way to do it. Take things, go for them, get them, not stand shivering and half-starved, scratching about in the feeble hope that something would take a soft-hearted jump and come tumbling in your bucket.
“How do, Joe, lad,” Ned Softley, the weak-witted trapper in the Paradise, called out, propitiating. His long nose was red, his undersized skimpy frame shuddered spasmodically from cold. He laughed vaguely. “Got a fag, Joe, hinny? Aw’m dyin’ for a smoke.”
“Curse it, Ned, lad…” Joe’s sympathy was instant and magnificent. “If this isn’t my last!” He pulled a fag from behind his ear, considered it sadly, and lit it with the friendliest regret. But once Ned’s back was turned, Joe grinned. Naturally Joe had a full packet of Woodbines in his pocket. But was Joe going to let Ned know that? Not on your life! Still grinning he turned to David when a shout made him swing round again.
It was Ned’s shout, a loud protesting wail. He had filled his sack, or near enough, after three hours’ work in the biting wind and had made to shoulder it for home. But Jake Wicks was there before him. Jake, a burly lout of seventeen, had been waiting calmly to appropriate Ned’s coal. He picked up the sack and with a pugnacious stare at the others coolly sauntered down the harbour.
A roar of laughter went up from the crowd of lads. God, could you beat it! Jake pinching Softley’s duff, walking away with it easy as you like, while Ned screamed and whimpered after him like a lunatic. It was the epitome of humour — Joe’s laugh was louder than any.
But David did not laugh. His face had turned quite pale.
“He can’t take that coal,” he muttered. “It’s Softley’s coal. Softley worked for it.”
“I’d like to see who’d stop him.” Joe choked with his own amusement, “Oh, Gor, look at Softley’s mug, just take a look at it…”
Young Wicks advanced along the jetty, easily carrying the sack, followed by the weeping Softley and a ragged, derisive crowd.
“It’s my duff,” Softley kept whimpering, while the tears ran down his cheeks. “Aw mucked for it, aw did, for my mam te hev a fire…”
David clenched his fists and took a side step right in the path of Wicks. Jake drew up suddenly.
“Hello,” he said, “what’s like the matter with you?”
“That’s Ned’s duff you’ve got,” David said from between his teeth. “You can’t take it this way. It’s not fair. It’s not right.”
“Holy Gee!” Jake said blankly. “And who’ll stop me like?”
“I will.”
Everybody stopped laughing. Jake carefully put down the sack.
“You will?”
David jerked his head affirmatively. He could not speak now, his whole being was so tense with indignation. He boiled at the injustice of Jake’s action. Wicks was almost a man, he smoked, swore and drank like a man, he was a foot taller and two stones heavier than David. But David didn’t care. Nothing mattered, nothing, except that Wicks should be stopped from victimising Softley.
Wicks held out his two fists, one on top of the other.
“Knock down the blocks,” he taunted. It was the traditional invitation to fight.
David took one look at Jake’s full pimply face surmounted by its bush of tow-coloured hair. Everything was defined and vivid. He could see the blackheads in Jake’s unhealthy skin, a tiny stye coming on his left eyelid. Then like a flash he knocked Jake’s fists down and smashed his right fist hard into Jake’s nose.
It was a lovely blow. Jake’s nose flattened visibly and spurted a stream of blood. The crowd roared and a thrill of fierce exhilaration shot up David’s spine.
Jake retreated, shook his head like a dog, then came in wildly, swinging his arms like flails.
At the same moment someone on the fringe of the crowd gave a warning shout.
“Look out, lads, here’s Wept comin’.”
David hesitated, half-turned his head and took Jake’s fist full on his temple. All at once the scene receded mysteriously, he felt giddy, he fancied for an instant he was going down the pit shaft, so sudden was the darkness that rushed upon him, so loud the ringing in his ears. Then he fainted.
The crowd took one look at David, then scattered hastily. Even Ned Softley hurried away. But he had his coal now.
Meanwhile Wept came up. He had been walking along the shore, contemplating the thin ebb and flow of the furthest waves upon the sand. Jesus Wept was very fond of the sea. Every year he took ten days out of the Neptune and spent them at Whitley Bay quietly walking up and down the front between boards bearing his favourite text: Jesus wept for the sins of the world. The same text was painted in gold letters outside his little house, which was why, though his own name was Clem Dickery, he was known as Wept or, less commonly, Jesus Wept. Although he was a collier Wept did not live in the Terraces. His wife, Susan Dickery, kept the small homemade mutton pie shop at the end of Lamb Street and the Dickerys lived above the shop. Susan favoured a more violent text. It was: Prepare to meet thy God. She had it printed upon all her paper bags, which gave rise to the saying in Sleescale: Eat Dickery’s pies and prepare to meet thy God. But the pies were very good. David liked the pies. And he liked Clem Dickery. Wept was a quiet little fanatic. And he was at least sincere.
When David came round, dazedly opening his eyes, Wept was bending over him, slapping the palms of his hands, watching him with a certain melancholy solicitude.
“I’m right enough, now,” David said, raising himself upon his elbow weakly.
Wept, with remarkable restraint, made no reference to the fight. Instead he said:
“When did ye eat food last?”
“This morning. I had my breakfast.”
“Can ye stand up?”
David got to his feet, holding on to Wept’s arm, swaying unsteadily, trying to smile it off.
Wept looked at him darkly. He always went directly for the truth. He said:
“Yor weak for want ov food. Come away wi’ me to my house.” Still supporting David he led him slowly over the sands, across the dunes, and into his house in Lamb Street.
In the kitchen of Wept’s house David sat down by the table. It was in this room that Wept held his “kitchen meetings.” From the walls highly coloured allegories flamed: The Last Trumpet, The Judgment Seat, The Broad and Narrow Paths. A great many angels were in the pictures, upbearing sexless blond figures in spotless garments to the blare of golden trumpets. Light blazed upon the angels. But there was darkness too, wherein, amidst the ruins of Corinthian columns, the beasts of darkness roared, and harried the massed hordes that trembled upon the abyss.
Hung from the mantelpiece were strings of dried herbs and seaweeds. Wept knew all the simples, gathered them assiduously in their season by the hedgerows and amongst the rocks. He stood by the fire now, brewing some camomile tea in a small marled tea-pot. Finally he poured out a cup and offered it to David. Then without a word he went out of the room.