Part Two, Chapter 4 - A Kind of Loving

I

comes another Christmas. The day we shut the shop for the holidays Mr Van Huyten has a little chat with me and tells me how pleased he is with the way things have worked out. It's nice to know you're giving satisfaction somewhere, anyway, I think. Mr Van Huyten gives me a Christmas bonus of five pounds and I go out and blue three-ten of it on a powder compact for Ingrid.

On Boxing Day Chris and David invite us over to celebrate their first wedding anniversary. It doesn't seem possible that it's a whole year since they got married, and still, when I think of all that's happened to me ... The Old Man's full of corny jokes about the first seven years being the worst and. they've only another six to go. They laugh this off like they do the way the Old Lady's always talking about the kids they'll be having, though there isn't a sign yet. I wonder if they're having trouble in this direction and then think they've only been married a year anyway and when they have kids and how many is their business and nobody else's. It's typical of the Old Lady, though. First she couldn't wait to get Chris married and now she's all agog to be a grandmother. I don't know what she'll pester about after that. Me, I suppose. She'll be dropping hints in my direction any time. Not that I'd mind if I could find the right girl and be sure she was the right one and not just a passing fancy like Ingrid. It seems to me being married must be something special if you can look as happy as Chris and David do after a year of it. As it is, seeing the way they are only shows up the difference between the way I thought of Ingrid a year ago and the way I am with her now.

One morning in January there's a letter by my plate when I come down to breakfast. I recognize Ingrid's writing on the envelope and as I sit down and pick it up I feel the Old Lady watching me through that second pair of eyes she has in the back of her head.

'From your girl friend?' she says.

'What girl friend?'

'What girl friend?' There's the sizzle of the eggs as she breaks them into the frying pan. 'That lass you're knocking about with,' she says. I think for a minute she's seen me with Ingrid, then she says, 'That lass 'at sent you the card for your twenty-first and bought you the cigarette case.'

'Oh, that. That was months ago.'

'Don't you see her nowadays, then?'

I don't know how much she knows. You can never be sure with the Old Lady. 'Oh, on an' off. We're friendly like.'

'Well then, what are you goin' all round the houses about it for?' she says. 'Are you ashamed of her or summat?'

She turns round and I keep my face down over my cornflakes. 'I just don't want you to get the wrong idea, that's all.'

She turns her face away again and splashes fat over the eggs.

' What sort o' wrong idea?'

'That it's serious or anything.'

She shakes her head. 'I don't know how it is wi' young fowk nowadays; they don't seem to know their own minds. Just want to play fast an' loose with one after the other. In my young days we either courted properly or left it alone.'

She brings the frying pan over from the cooker and lifts the eggs out on a knife - one on to Jim's plate and one on to mine. She shares the bacon out as well, then puts the pan back on the cooker and turns the gas off. She picks her cup up and has a drink of tea, watching the two of us tuck into the bacon and eggs.

'It's different now,' I tell her. 'Times change. You know what they say nowadays - Play the field before you get married and you won't want to after.'

"There's a lot o' fowk got married quicker than they thought they would through playin' t'field,' the Old Lady says.

I haven't liked this conversation from the start and I like it even less the way it's going now, so I shut up and say no more. The minutes tick away as we go on eating, and after a while the Old Lady says, 'Well — aren't you goin' to open your letter?'

'Read the letter, Vic, there's a good lad,' Jim says; 'then you can tell us all the news.'

'You'll get a good clout if you don't hold your tongue,' the Old Lady says;' and there's a bit o' news for you!'

Jim's sitting with his back to her and he pushes his tongue down between his bottom teeth and his lip, tucks his chin down into his neck, and rolls his eyes.

'I can read it on the bus,' I say, trying not to grin and bring the Old Lady down on Jim. 'It isn't important.'

'It can't be,' the Old Lady says, real dry, 'or she wouldn't have bothered to write to you.'

Well, she does her best, but I'm not having any, and the letter's still sealed in its envelope when I leave the house and walk down the hill to the bus stop. I'm pretty mad with Ingrid for sending it and starting all that with the Old Lady and I wonder why she couldn't ring me up if she wanted to tell me something. I open the letter at the bus stop.

'Dear Vic,' she says, 'I've been off work today with an upset stomach and as I shan't be going back tomorrow (Thursday) I shan't be able to come out to meet you. My mother's going out, though, and you can come up to our house if you like. You know where I live. Just come to the back door and knock. Love, Ingrid.

'PS. Don't come before 7.30 because she's not going out till seven.'

Now I like this very much. I've never been in Ingrid's house but they're sure to have a couch or a comfortable chair, and it'll be a lot cosier than the park.

II

'I couldn't ring you up because Mother didn't go out all afternoon,' Ingrid says. 'So I scribbled the letter and pretended I wanted a little walk for some fresh air to give me a chance to post it.'

'You haven't told your mother about me, then?' I say.

'Well, no, I haven't. I mean, it's not as if we were ... well, courting, is it?'

'No., .no, it isn't.'

'Your parents don't know about me, do they?'

'Well they do and they don't. I mean they saw your birthday card and they know a girl bought me the cigarette case; but they don't know how often I see you or how it is between us.'

Ingrid blushes a bit. 'I should think not.... That's the trouble isn't it? I mean, we couldn't tell anybody how it is, could we?'

'As far as anybody else is concerned - anybody who happens to see us out, I mean - we're just friends who go out with each other now and again.'

She says nothing to this, but looks into the fire, reaching out once, out of habit I suppose, to pull her skirt down over her knees. She's showing quite a lot of leg actually, because her skirt's on the short side and you sink right down into the velvet cushions in these chairs of theirs.

It's the dining-room we're in. I suppose they're like us and don't use the front room every day. This room's cosy, though, with this, leather three-piece suite and a fitted carpet in rust. There's a console TV on one side of the fireplace and a little wireless on a table on the other. Ingrid's ma must be a Royalty fan because there's a big coloured photo of the Queen in her Coronation outfit on the wall over the fireplace. There's a good fire and I'm feeling nice and comfortable and I've taken my jacket off and hung it on one of the dining-chairs.

I think Ingrid's a bit excited at having me here while her mother's back's turned because she's in a sort of lighthearted nervous mood and she laughs a lot. Or she was doing before we started talking about how it is with us and now she's gone a bit quiet, as if it's started her on studying, while she looks into the fire. I was just thinking before this that I'd have to get up and kiss her any time now. And the way we are, cosy and private for the first time, who knows what might happen then? I look at the shape of her under this pale pink blouse and I want to look at her properly. I want to find out if my hands have been telling the truth about how lovely she is.

I stand up to get a fag out of my jacket. As I get the cig case out of my inside pocket I pull some more stuff out with it: my comb and wallet, and a little book of pin-ups that took my fancy in a shop where I was buying fags a day or two since. Ingrid's just got up to straighten the curtains and there's no hiding this book from her because she sees it there on the floor with this bint on the front revealing all. The next minute she's bent down, got it, and jumped away as I try to grab it back.

'C'mon, gimme.'

She laughs.' No. I'm going to look and see what a dirty-minded old thing you really are.'

She gets behind her chair and I know if I want the book I'll have to chase her and take it off her. I'm a bit red, but I'm not going to make a song and dance about it, so I sit down in my chair and light my fag. When she sees I'm not bothering she comes round and sits down and starts to turn the pages. She seems to get real interested, having a real good look at every picture, just like a lad might do, and once or twice she gives a little giggle, when she comes to one she thinks is a bit more saucy than the rest, I suppose. I go over and sit on the arm of her chair and look down over her shoulder. I get a funny kind of thrill looking at pictures like these with her and I can feel the blood in my throat and my hands aren't steady.

'I don't know how they can do it,' she says, 'standing in front of a photographer like that.'

'I don't suppose they think anything of it. It's a job. Exploiting their natural assets, you might say.'

'I'll bet there's some carrying on.'

'Now who's being dirty-minded?'

'Well if you were taking photographs of women like this all day wouldn't you feel like it? Now you can't pretend you wouldn't.'

'Well, I'm not used to it. And anyway, I don't know where' you drop on jobs like that. There'd ha' been some sense in it if me dad had apprenticed me to one o' these blokes.'

She gives my leg a dig with her elbow. 'Go on with you!'

She turns the pages. 'She's lovely, though. Isn't she firm!'

'No nicer than you,' I say, and I'm glad she can't see my face because my cheeks are on fire.

' Get away,' she says.' You don't mean that.'

'I do, though. I think your figure's every bit as nice as hers.'

'Look at her bust, though. I'll bet she doesn't even need a bra.'

I have to swallow a couple of times before I can speak. 'Well, I think you've got ... got lovely breasts. I've always thought so.'

'Shut up,' she says. 'You'll make me blush.' And I can see her coming up pink about the ears and neck.

'Course, I couldn't swear to it, like ... I mean ...'

'I know what you mean,' she says. 'You don't have to go into details.'

I bend over her and lift her face up to mine. I kiss her but she doesn't respond much. 'I wish we could,' I say.

'Could what?'

'Go into details.'

'You want a lot, don't you?'

I keep my face down, talking soft into her ear as she goes on turning the pages of the book, pretending to look to the end. Then I take the book off her and put it away. I go round the front of her chair and pull her to her feet by both hands and kiss her again. There's still not much coming back; and I thought she was in a frisky mood. I'm mad for her now, though, and I'm sure she can feel my heart pumping away against her. I've got one hand between us, holding her through the blouse.

'You know how I am about you, Ingrid,' I say, spreading my feet to balance us.

"That's the trouble,' she says. 'I don't know.'

'Nobody's ever got me this way before,' I tell her, and it's no lie.

'But you don't always feel like this, do you? And then you're not bothered about me.'

I'm a bit ashamed. What can I say to her?

'I don't know how I do feel half the time,' I tell her. 'I've never been through this kind of thing before. I know I must seem a louse at times, but I don't mean to be, and I'm not like that really. It's just that sometimes I feel rotten about it all and then I think it's not fair to either of us to carry on ... I did try to break it off, y'know, when I found out it wasn't the same as I'd thought

'But I came running after you ...'

I'm not liking this. We've managed pretty well without talk before, because I thought we both knew just how it was, and Ingrid seemed to have decided to make the best of it, even though it wasn't what she wanted. But at least tallcing does give me a chance to make some excuse for myself and show her I know how she must feel even if on the outside I just seem selfish and out for my own ends. The trouble is there's two sides to everybody and Ingrid brings out all the worst in me instead of the best.

It's hard to say, the mood I'm hi just now, but I reckon I owe her the chance if she wants to take it. 'D'you want to pack it hi?' I say. 'I reckon I can't blame you if you do.'

She seems to think about it for a few seconds, standing close up to me and looking at the floor by my feet. Then she says, 'No, I don't want to pack it in.' And when she lifts her face and kisses me there's everything in it that she was holding back before.

I start to unbutton her blouse up the front and she doesn't object to this because it's no more than we've done before. It's only when I start pulling it free of her skirt that she puts her hand over mine to stop me.

'What's wrong?'

'Somebody might come.'

'You're not expecting anybody, are you?'

'No, but you never know.'

'Lock the door.'

'I already have.'

'Well if anybody does come you can pretend you were in the bath or something,' I tell her, saying the first thing that comes into my head.

'Oh, Vic...'

'C'mon, Ingrid, c'mon.'

'It's nothing, you know, really.'

'Not to you. You're a girl. It's a lot to me. I think about nothing else sometimes. I lie in bed and imagine ...'

'Well I can't do it while you're here. You'll have to go out."

'Oh, c'mon. I'll do it for you.'

'No, I can't, Vic, honest. You'll have to go out.'

'Okay, then,' I say, thinking you can't expect everything at once. 'I'll go up to the bathroom.'

'It's round the corner at the top of the stairs. You'll give me time, won't you?'

I look at my watch. 'It's half past now. I won't come back till twenty to.'

She switches on the standard lamp by the television set and douses the main light. Then she goes to the fireplace and stands with one hand on it, looking down into the fire.

I go out and along the passage and up the stairs. The carpet's thick under my feet. The house isn't big but I'm impressed by the furnishings. It seems Mr Rothwell must have spent a load of dough making it comfortable for Ingrid and her ma while he's away on his travels. The bathroom has pink walls with black tiles to about chest height. Our bath at home stands on four cast-iron rests like animals' feet but this is one of the modern boxed-in efforts, in black to match the tiles.

I wonder how I'm going to pass the next ten minutes and then I catch sight of myself in the glass over the washbasin and decide my hair needs combing; so I spend a bit of time on that, easing the waves in with my fingers till it's just right. Then I wash my hands with the piece of blue scented soap and hold my hand under my mouth and try to smell my breath. It's not a very good method but I'm not bothered because I don't think I have any trouble that way. I put the lid down over the lavatory and sit down. My watch shows another five minutes to go. I sit down and think about Ingrid downstairs and wonder just what she's doing. All at once I remember the Old Lady saying something to me a long time ago after I'd been in some kind of scrape -I can't remember just what it was. But I remember she said, 'Never do anything you'd be ashamed of your mother knowing about,' and I'm thinking Oh, Christ, if she could only see me now, because if it depended on what she's told me - or the Old Feller for that matter - I'd still be thinking you got babies by saving Co-op Cheques and that there isn't any difference between men and women except women grow their hair longer and don't have to shave. And then I get to thinking what a funny business it all is, this sex and blokes going mad over women and doing all sorts of daft things because of them. And it's been the same since the world began and now here I am and it's my turn and it makes you wonder where it'll all end.

I deliberately wait two minutes over the ten I said before I go down. Then my legs are like jelly on the stairs.

III

A few days after, the first real snow of the winter arrives. It falls during the night and by the time people are up and getting on their way to work the snow ploughs have been busy clearing the roads. The snow lasts for nearly a fortnight and even after it's gone there are still grubby patches of it in the fields and the corners where nobody walks. And it stays cold. In fact it's colder than when the snow was here. Everything gets frozen up and the way the frost bites at you makes you wonder if it'll ever turn warm again. This is the worst time of the year for open-air courting and Ingrid and I mostly go to the pictures on our night out. But now and again we just have to go into the park, even if it's only into a shelter. Nights like this, when your hands are like blocks of ice, I think about their comfy dining-room and the fire and the couch. But we never get a chance like that again.

And now something's changed. One time I'd never have thought of going all the way with Ingrid, like a bloke short of money wouldn't think of robbing a bank. It'd be just asking for trouble. But since I've seen her and know just what she's like, how gorgeous she really is, there's always temptation like a little chap sitting on my shoulder and whispering in my ear, 'Go on, find out what you want to know. Twenty-one years old and you've never done it with anybody. You've gone so far, why not go that little bit further? It's okay, thousands are doing it all the time, and she's willing.' Well, one night when the freeze is suddenly over and everything's mild again we go to our old spot under the trees. This little chap is extra persuasive and it seems like either him or a mate of his is talking to Ingrid as well, because it happens. I don't have to force her or even persuade her really; she seems as ready as I am; and it's not till after that we stop and think about it.

'It'll be all right, Vic, won't it?' she says in a whisper.

'What? Course it will.' How the hell should I know? I'm thinking. It had better be, that's all.

'But we won't risk it again, will we?'

'No; I'll get something.' When I'm in the mood again I'll see about getting something. I don't know just how. I can't see myself walking into a shop like buying a packet of fags. But I can ask Willy and he'll know. Just now I couldn't care less if we never do it again. Now that it's over I'm wondering what all the fuss is about and wishing we'd played safe and had our fun without any risk like we've always done.

But a couple of days later I'm all for it again and feeling quite a lad about it. I. feel like a proper man of the world with a willing bint laid on like this. So I keep an eye open for Willy, but somehow now I want him specially he doesn't seem to be about. One night I set off to call for him and see if I can catch him that way. I've only ever been to Willy's house once and I didn't like it. It's a terrace house hi a ropy street off Gilderdale Road where there's always a crowd of snotty-nosed kids hanging about with their britches' behinds hanging out. Willy's brothers are a crowd of roughs and always on the booze and his ma's a bit of a slut. My mother's broad-spoken and all that, but she'd have no room for Willy's old lady and her mucky ways.

A kid comes out of an entry bawling as I go up the street. He's maybe five or six and real grubby. It's the way he's blubbing, though, that gets me. I mean kids are always roaring about something but there's crying and crying and this kid sounds real heartbroken. I've never heard such misery in a kid's crying before and it fair turns me over.

Willy isn't in when I get to their house and I ask his mother if she knows where he is. 'Nay lad,' she says, standing on the step with her arms folded over this mucky apron, 'how should I know? He never tells me where he's goin'. Have yer tried t'pubs he usually goes to?'

'I haven't tried anywhere. I came straight here.'

'D'yer know which they are?'

'I know one or two places he likes a drink.'

'Aye, well try them. Or he could ha' gone fo t'pictures. Spends half his time in t'pictures, our Willy does. He'll ruin his eyesight afore he's finished. I've told him so time an' time agen.'

'I'll have a look round, then.'

'Aye, you do that, lad.' She eyes me up and down, looking at my clothes. I can tell she doesn't remember seeing me before. 'War it owt important yer wanted him for?'

'Oh, no. I'm a mate of his. I haven't seen him for a bit so I thought I'd look him up.'

She nods. 'I see. Aye, well you go an' look in one'r two pubs. You'll happen run across him.'

I walk off down the street and she watches me from the step. I haven't gone far when she calls me back.

'It's just come to me,' she says. 'I believe he did say summat about havin' a game o' billiards. D'yer know where t'saloon is?'

I tell her yes, and I'll try there first. Then I go off, thinking she doesn't care a damn where Willy is as long as he isn't hanging about under her feet. I wonder what it must be like to have a mother like that and think I'll take mine every time, even if she does want to know a bit too much at times.

There's a flight of wooden stairs to the billiard saloon which is on the corner of Cooperative Street across from the market place. If you're up there on a market day you see out across all the tarpaulin roofs of the stalls to the glass roof of the covered market-house. I rind Willy in his shirt-sleeves playing on one of the four tables under the big shaded light.

'Howdo, Willy.'

'Ah, Vic, me old cock sparrer. How ist?'

'Pretty fair.'

Willy finishes chalking his cue and bends down to take his shot. 'Come for a game?' he says.

'No, I was looking for you. I've been up to your house. Your mother said I might find you here.'

' Owt special on your mind?'

'No, I just thought I'd see what you were doing. I haven't seen you for a while.'

'Right enough,' Willy says.

There's four or five other blokes in the room and I don't know this lad Willy's playing with. They're playing snooker. Willy makes his shot and sends balls clickety-clicking all over the place.

'I'll just show Fred here the way home an' then we'll adjourn for ajar, eh?'

This lad called Fred gives a guffaw. 'Tha won't show me t'way home wi' shots like that, Willy,' he says.

'Ah,' Willy says, dead-pan, 'it's not how good you are but how much fun you get out of it. I get a lot more fun than tha does, because tha plays to win an' I don't give a bugger either way.'

I unfasten my raincoat and light a fag and sit down to wait for the game to finish. This lad trounces Willy and Willy grins and winks at me as he puts his cue up in the rack.

'Right, now for that jar. Are you comin', Fred?'

I'm glad when Fred says no, he's stopping for another game, because I want Willy on his own. We go downstairs and into the Crown next door. It's a quiet night and we nearly have the place to ourselves. We drink for a bit and talk about one thing and the other before I get to the point.

'Willy, when you get yourself fixed up with a bird - you know, on a sure thing - where d'you get your tackle from?'

'Oh, ho!' Willy says. 'That's it, is it?'

You have to lay it on thick for Willy so I say, 'I've got a bint lined up an' she's all ready for it; only I don't want to take any risks.'

' How about letting me in on it,' Willy says. ' Share an' share alike, y'know.'

'She's not a bag, Willy. She just likes me, that's all. I've been working on it a bit now.'

' What's her name? Do I know her?'

'No, she doesn't live round here — Anyway, that's all I need and I'm set up.'

'Lucky dog," Willy says.

'Where d'you get fixed up? Have you any on you now?'

'Smatter o' fact I'm right out at the moment. But you can buy 'em. Just walk into a shop an' ask for 'em.'

'Which shop?'

'Oh, any chemist's. Doesn't your barber flog 'em?'

'I don't know.'

'A lot of em do.'

'Anyway, my barber's a pal of the Old Feller's.'

'Well there's plenty o' places.'

'Suppose you go into a chemist's and a bird comes to serve you?'

'So what? She knows what they're for just like anybody else.'

'I couldn't ask a bird, Willy. I'd be embarrassed.' I take a pull at my pint. 'Look, Willy, if I give you the brass will you get some forme?'

'But what's to stop you gettin' 'em for yourself? You've got to do it sometime, haven't you?'

'I don't think I could do it, Willy. I'd be scared they might ask my age or something.'

'Well, you're old enough.'

'Aye, but it'd be embarrassing.'

'Aw, there's nowt to it.'

I'm getting a bit suspicious the way Willy's hedging and beginning to wonder how much of him is just talk.

'Who was the first bint you ever had it with, Willy?'

'Oh, a bint you don't know.'

'When was the last time?'

'The other week.'

'Aye, in your flipping imagination, Willy, I know.'

'Why don't you mind your own bloody business?' Willy says.

I'm grinning as I reach for Willy's empty glass. 'C'mon, let's have another.'

IV

'Did you get anything ... you know ...?' she says.

'No. I went downtown on Saturday but I couldn't bring meself to go into a shop an' ask.'

'We'd better not... you know ... go so far, then, had we?'

'No, we won't go so far.'

I push her back on to my coat and kiss her, holding her to me full length till I seem to be sinking into her, and I'm thinking what a mug I am with it here for the asking for the first time in my life and I'm letting a little thing like bashfulness stop me.

And after it's just like it always is, as though I'm finished with it and I'll never look twice at a bint again. Only times like this, when I'm seeing things more clear than I can any other time, I feel it's like being let out of prison must be, when you think you've got a clear field in front of you and all the good things to enjoy without having something else nagging at you like it is when I can't read a book or listen to music or enjoy a picture for thinking about her and touching her and her touching me. To get really free, though, I have to get right away from her because while I'm still with her I've got that feeling that I'm just about the rottenest devil alive for treating her this way. I reckon people sometimes are just like animals, just like randy dogs having a go in the street and not giving a cuss for all the traffic belting up and down round them. Only dogs have some sense: when they finish they just walk away, and people have to talk. And I don't want to talk to Ingrid; I want to get up and walk away, free, and not have to stick around and listen to her yatter about something and nothing and say yes and no and I think this and I think the other when I don't think anything at all except I want to get away where I can enjoy being rid of her and wanting bints at all. Only, the thing is, I'm not rid of wanting bints except in that way. There is another way, and with a real bint, the sort I've always wanted, it would be this way and I'd want to stay with her and talk and laugh and maybe touch her, but tender like and soft. And when I think about that it comes on in a deep ache as I wonder if I'll ever find her.

I sit up and look round. I can see the grass sloping away to the path, and the pale line of the path and the bandstand just to be made out in the trees, and I feel suddenly so awfully lonely that I'm scared and I say the first thing that comes into my head, which is: 'Turned a bit cold, hasn't it?'

She's still lying there on the coat and I wonder what's keeping her so quiet when she usually has so much to say.

'Like to walk a bit?' I've got to be on the move. I can't stay here any longer.

She says nothing but just lies with her face partly turned away from me.

'You okay?' I ask her after a bit of this and she mumbles something that I take to be 'yes'.

'Let's walk a bit. I'm turning cold.'

She says something I don't catch and I say, 'Beg pardon.'

'I think something's gone wrong, Vic,' she says.

I catch this all right, and no mistake. My heart sort of slips sideways and there's panic like big bats flying about inside me. 'How d'you mean "wrong"?' I know very well what she means but I'm hoping I'm mistaken, just the same.

She says in a quiet voice that I know means she's dead serious, 'Something that should have happened hasn't.'

'How d'you mean it hasn't happened?' My voice is a bit rough because I can't control it properly and it's either that or letting her see how scared I am.

'You know what I mean.'

'Well, how long?'

'Ten days.'

'Ten days... That's nothing, is it?'

'It is with me. I'm like clockwork usually.'

'Not this time, anyway.' I'm surprised the way my voice sounds now. Here I am all chewed up and panicky inside and the way it comes out you'd think I hadn't a care in the world. 'C'mon,' I say, 'let's walk.'

'It's never happened before, Vic,' she says, still not moving.

' Look, how can any thing have gone wrong? How can it?'

'You know very well it can.'

'Look, people try for ages before it comes off. My sister's been trying for months and there's not a sign yet. I'm not even sure we did it properly... I don't have to go into all the details. You know.'

She sits up now but her head's hanging down and she's pulling her hanky about with her fingers. 'All I know is I'm ten days overdue and it's never happened before ... I'm scared, Vic.'

So am I. Oh, brother, am I scared! I feel like getting up and running like mad across the park, putting as much distance between me and her as I can. As if that would do any good. But still, I've got to get away from her, on my own, so's I can think this thing out without having to put a show on for her benefit. Oh, Christ, what have I got myself into!

'You're scared about nothing. C'mon, let's walk.'

'I wish I'd your confidence.'

You wouldn't want it if you could see it, old girl, I think. 'All you've got to do is stop worrying. You're probably stopping it happening by worrying about it. It's a vicious circle ... C'mon, let's go.' If I have to ask her once more I'll shout it.

She stands up and tidies her clothes. I pick my mac up and shake it and think about the number of times I've done the same thing just here. I don't know when I'm well-off, that's my trouble. There I was, happy as a lark, free as you like, and I have to go and get myself into a mess like this. And I didn't even enjoy it, really. Well never again. If this turns out all right it's the finish. And I mean that. It's the end.

Down at the gate I say to her, 'Now stop worrying about it. By the time I see you again everything'll be okay.'

' I hope so,' she says in a dull voice.' What will we do if it isn't, though?'

God, I can't think about that!

'I tell you it will be, so stop worrying.'

I've a feeling she'd like to hang about a bit longer because she doesn't want to go home with it on her mind. Maybe she's scared of giving the game away. Not like me. I should go in for amateur dramatics or something. I never knew I was such a good actor.

Well I get plenty of practice the next few days. I can't remember a worse four or five days in my life, while I'm walking about putting on the big act, pretending I haven't a care in the world, and all the time this thing's boiling inside me. I learn-how people can hide a big load of worry if they have to, because nobody, not even the Old Lady, as much as guesses there's anything wrong. All the time I'm wanting like mad to ring Ingrid up and hear her say it's come right, but I daren't for fear of hearing the opposite. I think she'll ring me anyway when it does happen; and then again I tLink maybe she won't because I might have sounded too confident about it, and why should she ring me to tell me something I knew would happen all the time? I might have to marry her. I've got to face it; if this doesn't turn out right I might have to many her. I break out in a cold sweat at the thought of it. I suppose there are places in the world where you could marry a bint who was having a kid and then call it off after. But not where I live. People do get divorced now and then, and split up, but when bods like me get married it's nine times out of ten for life. A life sentence, and make the best of it. And anyway, I don't like to think about marriage in terms of getting out of it. Marriage shouldn't be like that: it should be like it is with Chris and David; like it could be with me and that girl... the right girl... But with the wrong one ... Never again, I tell myself. If this works out I'll see her just once more to explain how I feel and that'll be the end, finis, kaput. No matter how much I might want to do otherwise.

Well, at the end of this five days, or five years to me, the phone rings in the shop and Mr Van Huyten says, 'It's for you, Victor. A young lady, I believe.' My heart's hammering as I pick the receiver up and I look round to see if anybody's listening and take a deep breath before saying anything.

'Hello.'

'Hello, is that you, Vic? This is Ingrid.'

'Hello, Ingrid. How's tricks?'

'I've been waiting for you to ring me, Vic. I thought you must be away from work or something ...'

'Oh, no, no — I've been a bit tied up with one thing an' another.' I slip my hand into my jacket and feel my heart doing the polka.

' Vic - it hasn't happened. It's over a fortnight now.'

'You're not pulling my leg, are you?' Like hell, she is!

'You know I wouldn't joke about a thing like that.'

'Well, there's still time, isn't there?'

'I suppose there's always a chance ... Look, I've got to see you, Vic. We've got to talk about it. I can't talk over the telephone. Can I see you tonight?'

'Well, I'm not sure about tonight...' I haven't a damn thing on actually, but my first instinct is to put her off.

'Please, Vic, tonight. Don't put me off, please. I've got to see you.'

She sounds to me as if she'll go round the bend if she doesn't talk to somebody, and better me than anybody else. You never know with these birds. Some of them tell their pals every damn thing.

' Okay, tonight, then. Usual time and place.'

I put the receiver down and get hold of the counter with both hands. I know as sure as God made little apples that it's not going to happen and she's pregnant.

V

' Let's get it straight, then. You're a fortnight Overdue...'

'Fifteen days,' she says.

'Okay, fifteen days. Is it such a long time? I don't know much about it, but don't women have this happen to them sometimes?'

'Some women do, but they come to expect it. I'm not like that. I told you before, Vic, it's never happened with me. I can nearly tell the date by it usually.'

'Well, maybe you're run down and need a tonic or something. Maybe you should see the doctor.'

'I've a feeling I shall be seeing the doctor before long,' she says; 'only it won't be for a tonic.'

' Whatever you do, don't get panicky. There's always a chance. There's always hope.'

We're in the shelter in the park and it's a fine warmish night with a clear sky. But we're sitting about four feet apart and neither of us feels much like going out on the grass.

'There's something else,' Ingrid says. 'I couldn't tell you over the phone My mother knows. I had to tell her.'

I feel as if somebody's planted a size ten boot right in my guts. It winds me. '.Oh, for crying out loud, Ingrid, why did you have to do a daft thing like that? Couldn't you have kept it dark a bit longer?' Oh, Jesus, now we are in trouble.

'I had to tell her, Vic. She knows as well as I do how regular I am. She started asking questions. You don't know my mother, how she can worm things out of you. I just broke down and told her.'

As long as she doesn't break down now, I'm thinking. As long as she doesn't start bawling on top of everything else.

'How much did you tell her?'

'Well... enough

What does it matter what she told her? There's only one way to make a baby, after all. It's the oldest pastime known to man, don't they say? I think of how many blokes must have been in this pickle before me and imagine them all stretching right back to ancient times. Wherever they all are now they must be nudging one another and sniggering and saying, Look, there's another poor sod gone and got his wick wet.

'Oh, Christ... What did she say?'

'What d'you think she said? She was livid. I've never seen her so angry... I daren't tell you all she did say.'

'About me?'

'Well, can you blame her?'

So if nothing worse comes of it I've got a woman walking about thinking of me as the dirty little tyke who nearly got her daughter into trouble. I'll be lucky if she doesn't spill the beans to the Old Lady. Any day might bring a letter telling all...

' She made me have a hot bath and drink some gin. I think she wishes she hadn't now, but she was in a real flap.'

'It didn't work, though?'

'No. I couldn't stand the bath hot enough and I was sick when I'd had one glass of gin.'

'It's ... it's a kind of murder, in a way, that...'

'I suppose it is, in a way. But I'll bet plenty of women try it on, and you wouldn't have minded if it had worked, would you?'

'What's she going to do now?'

'She says she'll wait another week and then take me to the doctor's.'

'I suppose she'll want to see me then?'

'She said she'd write for me dad to come home. She says you'll have a man to face when you do come.'

'Oh, Christ, what a lousy mess.'

'I suppose we should have thought about it before.'

'But it's a bit of bloody hard luck when we get caught first time and there's people trying for ages to have kids.'

'You'll have to write a letter to somebody about it,' she says. It's the best joke I've ever heard her make but I'm not in a mood for laughing. I can't even raise a smile.

I get up and walk up and down on the concrete a bit. There's no way out, though. I've had it, sure as eggs are eggs. I take my cig case out. 'May as well have a smoke. We're not dead yet. Here ...' She takes one and we light up.

'Vic,' she says, 'what are we going to do? What can we do?'

She's upset, real upset, I can tell. I'm not the only one to have gone through it this past few days. And before that - she was carrying it around with her for days before she told me. And it'll be worse for her in one way because she'll be the one who'll have the big belly to hump around for everybody to point at and talk about. Except, of course, that once that's over she'll have what she wants - me. And a bloody fine catch I am. Maybe that's what's worrying her now, maybe she's wondering if I will marry her if the worst happens. Maybe that's what's getting her down.

I know she's pregnant. I know for sure. I know for sure I'm not going to get out of this one. I'm caught and that's a fact. Capital F-a-c-t. This is where all the dreams end, Vic Brown, No need to go on looking for that girl. You've found her, the only one you'll get now. You're trapped and there's no way out. Oh, what a fool; what a bloody, bloody fool!

So that's it. It only wants saying, and I lean my head against the roof post andJook out over the park and say it.

'Don't worry. We'll get married. That's what we'll do.'

She says nothing and in a few seconds I hear a little noise and I turn round and see she's crying.

'Don't worry, I said, we'll get married. You didn't think I'd let you down, did you? You didn't think I'd take my hook and leave you to face it all on your own, did you? I'm no bloody angel but I'm not that kind of louse.'

She's sobbing away like billy-ho now. The hanky's out and the waterworks are turned on good and proper.

'I've always wanted to marry you, Vic,' she says, 'I've often imagined how you might propose to me. And now it has to be this way. Forcing you into it. You'd never have asked me but for this, would you? I know you wouldn't. I know you don't love me like I love you.'

Well, she can't have it both ways, can she? Just like a woman to want it, though.

'I've asked you, haven't I? I've said we'll get married, haven't I?'

'You've no need to if you don't want to,' she says all at once. 'I shan't force you.'

This is a laugh. Even if she won't force me, what about everybody else? I can just imagine them all if I make so much as a sign that I don't want to go through with it. I can just see them all putting the screws on. It'd take a better man than me to stand out against all that.

'You know damn well you won't turn me down, though,' I tell her, and if it sounds conceited I can't help it. It's not much joy to me to know "she loves me. If she didn't we should probably never have got into this mess.

Me saying that turns the waterworks on in a fresh gush. 'I won't,' she says. 'I won't. I've always wanted you. You know I have.'

I turn round again and look at the park.

'Well,' I say in a quiet voice, 'now you've got me.'

And as I'm standing there I wish to God, I wish more than I've ever wished for anything else, that I'd never laid eyes on her.