Robert Tressell - The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

This room was about the same size as the sitting-room. At one end was a small range with an oven and a boiler, [and] a high mantelpiece painted black. On the mantelshelf was a small round alarm clock and some brightly polished tin canisters. At the other end of the room, facing the fireplace, was a small dresser on the shelves of which were neatly arranged a number of plates and dishes. The walls were papered with oak paper. On one wall, between two coloured almanacks, hung a tin lamp with a reflector behind the light. In the middle of the room was an oblong deal table with a white tablecloth upon which the tea things were set ready. There were four kitchen chairs, two of which were placed close to the table. Overhead, across the room, about eighteen inches down from the ceiling, were stretched several cords upon which were drying a number of linen or calico undergarments, a coloured shirt, and Easton’s white apron and jacket. On the back of a chair at one side of the fire more clothes were drying. At the other side on the floor was a wicker cradle in which a baby was sleeping. Nearby stood a chair with a towel hung on the back, arranged so as to shade the infant’s face from the light of the lamp. An air of homely comfort pervaded the room; the atmosphere was warm, and the fire blazed cheerfully over the whitened hearth.

They walked softly over and stood by the cradle side looking at the child; as they looked the baby kept moving uneasily in its sleep. Its face was very flushed and its eyes were moving under the half-closed lids. Every now and again its lips were drawn back slightly, showing part of the gums; presently it began to whimper, drawing up its knees as if in pain.

‘He seems to have something wrong with him,’ said Easton.

‘I think it’s his teeth,’ replied the mother. ‘He’s been very restless all day and he was awake nearly all last night.’

‘P’r’aps he’s hungry.’

‘No, it can’t be that. He had the best part of an egg this morning and I’ve nursed him several times today. And then at dinner-time he had a whole saucer full of fried potatoes with little bits of bacon in it.’

Again the infant whimpered and twisted in its sleep, its lips drawn back showing the gums: its knees pressed closely to its body, the little fists clenched, and face flushed. Then after a few seconds it became placid: the mouth resumed its usual shape; the limbs relaxed and the child slumbered peacefully.

‘Don’t you think he’s getting thin?’ asked Easton. ‘It may be fancy, but he don’t seem to me to be as big now as he was three months ago.’

‘No, he’s not quite so fat,’ admitted Ruth. ‘It’s his teeth what’s wearing him out; he don’t hardly get no rest at all with them.’

They continued looking at him a little longer. Ruth thought he was a very beautiful child: he would be eight months old on Sunday. They were sorry they could do nothing to ease his pain, but consoled themselves with the reflection that he would be all right once those teeth were through.

‘Well, let’s have some tea,’ said Easton at last.

Whilst he removed his wet boots and socks and placed them in front of the fire to dry and put on dry socks and a pair of slippers in their stead, Ruth half filled a tin basin with hot water from the boiler and gave it to him, and he then went into the scullery, added some cold water and began to wash the paint off his hands. This done he returned to the kitchen and sat down at the table.

‘I couldn’t think what to give you to eat tonight,’ said Ruth as she poured out the tea. ‘I hadn’t got no money left and there wasn’t nothing in the house except bread and butter and that piece of cheese, so I cut some bread and butter and put some thin slices of cheese on it and toasted it on a place in front of the fire. I hope you’ll like it: it was the best I could do.’

‘That’s all right: it smells very nice anyway, and I’m very hungry.’

As they were taking their tea Easton told his wife about Linden’s affair and his apprehensions as to what might befall himself. They were both very indignant, and sorry for poor old Linden, but their sympathy for him was soon almost forgotten in their fears for their own immediate future.

They remained at the table in silence for some time: then,

‘How much rent do we owe now?’ asked Easton.

‘Four weeks, and I promised the collector the last time he called that we’d pay two weeks next Monday. He was quite nasty about it.’

‘Well, I suppose you’ll have to pay it, that’s all,’ said Easton.

‘How much money will you have tomorrow?’ asked Ruth.

He began to reckon up his time: he started on Monday and today was Friday; five days, from seven to five, less half an hour for breakfast and an hour for dinner, eight and a half hours a day – forty-two hours and a half. At sevenpence an hour that came to one pound four and ninepence halfpenny.

‘You know I only started on Monday,’ he said, ‘so there’s no back day to come. Tomorrow goes into next week.’

‘Yes, I know,’ replied Ruth.

‘If we pay the two week’s rent that’ll leave us twelve shillings to live on.’

But we won’t be able to keep all that,’ said Ruth, ‘because there’s other things to pay.’

‘What other things?’

‘We owe the baker eight shillings for the bread he let us have while you were not working, and there’s about twelve shillings owing for groceries. We’ll have to pay them something on account. Then we want some more coal; there’s only about a shovelful left, and –’

‘Wait a minit,’ said Easton. ‘The best way is to write out a list of everything we owe; then we shall know exactly where we are. You get me a piece of paper and tell me what to write. Then we’ll see what it all comes to.’

‘Do you mean everything we owe, or everything we must pay tomorrow.’

‘I think we’d better make a list of all we owe first.’

While they were talking the baby was sleeping restlessly, occasionally uttering plaintive little cries. The mother now went and knelt at the side of the cradle, which she gently rocked with one hand, patting the infant with the other.

‘Except the furniture people, the biggest thing we owe is the rent,’ she said when Easton was ready to begin.

‘It seems to me,’ said he, as, after having cleared a space on the table and arranged the paper, he began to sharpen his pencil with a table-knife, ‘that you don’t manage things as well as you might. If you was to make a list of just the things you must have before you went out of a Saturday, you’d find the money would go much farther. Instead of doing that you just take the money in your hand without knowing exactly what you’re going to do with it, and when you come back it’s all gone and next to nothing to show for it.’

His wife made no reply: her head was bent over the child.

‘Now, let’s see,’ went on her husband. ‘First of all there’s the rent. How much did you say we owe?’

‘Four weeks. That’s the three weeks you were out and this week.’

‘Four sixes is twenty-four; that’s one pound four,’ said Easton as he wrote it down. ‘Next?’

‘Grocer, twelve shillings.’

Easton looked up in astonishment.

‘Twelve shillings. Why, didn’t you tell me only the other day that you’d paid up all we owed for groceries?’

‘Don’t you remember we owed thirty-five shillings last spring? Well, I’ve been paying that bit by bit all the summer. I paid the last of it the week you finished your last job. Then you were out three weeks – up till last Saturday – and as we had nothing in hand I had to get what we wanted without paying for it.’

‘But do you mean to say it cost us three shillings a week for tea and sugar and butter?’