J. Farjeon - The House Opposite

In the most life-like guise of a pancake he could assume, Ben cogitated.

‘’E won’t come ’ere, ’e’ll go up the road,’ ran his thoughts, ‘but if ’e does come ’ere ’e won’t git in, ’cos if ’e rings it won’t ’elp ’im and ’e don’t know there’s a winder hopen at the back, and there ain’t no hother way—well, is there?’

The slamming of the front door answered him.

‘Golly! ’e’s in!’ gasped Ben. ‘’Ow the blazes—?’

But this was no time for theorising. The old man was certainly in, and just as certainly he was coming up!

‘’Ere—stop thinkin’,’ Ben rounded on himself, ‘and do somethin’!’

What?

Well, you could stay where you were and hope—that was one thing. Or you could rush out with a roar, pretending you were a madman or a murderer—that was another. Or you could dart quickly up to the third floor—that was another—only you’d have to do that at once because the stairs at the top of the first flight were already creaking, which meant that in another moment the stairs at the bottom of the second flight would start, and when anyone got round the bend of the second flight they’d spot you. Or you could say to yourself, ‘Wot ’ave I done, any’ow? ’Oo’s ’e, any’ow? Boo!’ And wait, calm like.

Ben chose the last idea. He chose it largely because he was too late to choose most of the others, but even if the choice had been forced upon him by circumstances he came to the conclusion that it really was the best one. For, after all, what was he afraid of? The old man, if he possessed the right to warn him away, had not done so yet, and when it came to a direct battle of wits Ben’s weren’t so bad. Anyway, your brain worked better in the open than in a cupboard.

‘Seven more, and ’e’ll be ’ere,’ Ben counted the steps. ‘If ’e don’t tread clear of No. Five ’e’ll git a jump!… There she goes … Good, ’e’s swearin’ … Three more … One … Now ’e’s up—’

The door was shoved open. A figure stood in the doorway.

It was the old man all right.

‘So! You are here!’ he cried, glaring.

‘Well, I’m blowed!’ answered Ben.

‘What are you doing?’

‘No ’arm.’

‘I’ll judge that, my man! Answer me! What are you doing?’

For the first time Ben had authority for saying that he was the caretaker, and for the first time he had no inclination to make the statement. He didn’t mind lying himself, but he wasn’t so ready to involve other people. If the old man had got in with a latch-key the house presumably belonged to him; and if the house belonged to him, then it couldn’t belong to the girl; and if it didn’t belong to the girl, then he couldn’t really be her caretaker, could he? Well, there you were!…

‘ Are you going to answer me, or aren’t you?’ demanded the old man.

‘Lummy, don’t you ’ urry one?’ retorted Ben. ‘I’ll tell you why I’m ’ere, guv’nor. I come in ’ere ter eat a bit o’ cheese, and fahnd it rather ’ard.’

Now the old man looked at him sharply.

‘Try speaking a little more clearly?’ he suggested.

‘’Ow’s this fer clear?’ returned Ben, and brought the revolver from his pocket.

To Ben’s disappointment the old man did not jump. Instead he darted forward with amazing nimbleness and snatched the weapon from Ben’s hand.

‘You rascal!’ he barked.

‘Go on,’ responded Ben indignantly. ‘You got my cheese. And, come ter that,’ he added, ‘I want it!’

‘Bah!’

‘Where is it?’

‘Do you think I can worry about your bit of cheese, you fool? Clear out this minute, or I’ll have the police after you.’

‘Yus, but—’

‘Do you hear? Or must I speak more plainly, too?’

Ben’s indignation increased. Fair’s fair! He had given the old man his pistol, and he wanted his cheese … But, all at once, his indignation began to yield to another emotion. What was the old man doing with the pistol?

‘Nah, then!’ muttered Ben. ‘We don’t want none o’ that!’

‘Don’t we?’ answered the old man, and raised the little weapon.

‘I know it ain’t loaded!’ blustered Ben, now terrified.

‘You know a lot,’ replied the old man.

And fired.

Ben died promptly. He fell down, he was buried, and he went to heaven. That he did insist on. As a matter of fact, there was a bit of an argument about the heaven, and just as he was explaining to a sort of Noah with wings that he had always kept his mother, and that one couldn’t help one’s face, the Noah with wings dropped him from a cloud and sent him hurtling back in an empty room he’d known years and years ago, and where he had once stood before an old man with a pistol … where he had once stood … before an old man with a pistol …

‘And the next time,’ said the old man with the pistol, ‘I will hit you!’

Ben ran. There are moments when there is nothing else to do—when violent movement becomes the sole object of existence, as also the sole guarantee of its continuance. He had died once. He didn’t want a second death so soon after the first. The memory was too horrible.

The old man was standing between Ben and the doorway. A mad position if the old man wanted Ben to get out through the doorway; and not even the revolver was going to make Ben choose the only other egress, the window! That would merely provide an alternative route to the winged Noah. But then the old man was mad, Ben was now convinced of it. So he closed his eyes and dashed past the madman with a roar and shot beyond him into the passage. By the time the old man turned, Ben was half-way down the flight.

The stairs assisted him down the second half. No escalator could have assisted him better. They seemed to join in the race and run with him. They rolled him across the few feet of passage at the bottom and deposited him on the next flight, and the next flight caught him and carried him on as though it were a relay race. Having won it, the stairs threw him away unceremoniously at the bottom. Then he paused, and startling, violent reaction set in.

His terror did not disappear. That had come to stay, and it may be stated here that, throughout all its risings and fallings during the succeeding hours, it never wholly went. It formed a solid, cold background to all he endured, advancing, receding, advancing. But into the terror other emotions entered, forming queer mixtures that produced astonishing actions, and one of these other emotions entered now. It was red anger. Anger, against the old man, anger against the world, anger against the Universe! Why had he, Ben, been marked for this sort of thing? What had he done? He hadn’t asked to be born! As a matter of fact, if anybody had consulted him he would have answered very definitely, ‘I don’t think!’ And he had been good to his old mother. For five years he had sent her three shillings a week, and once he’d sent her ten shillings when someone had told him he’d won a competition. If it had been true he’d have sent her another ten shillings and some cough mixture. And that little kid of his had seemed to like him a bit that night before she died … Wasn’t he no good at all but to be frightened and chased, and shouted at?

‘I’ll beat ’im—I’ll show ’im!’ muttered Ben. ‘I’ll ’oodwink ’im!’

And, opening the front door swiftly, he closed it with a loud bang. But when it banged, Ben was still on the inside.

There! That’d do it! The old man would be down in a few seconds—Ben could hear him now—and when he got to the hall he would conclude that Ben had gone. But Ben wouldn’t be gone. No, he would be waiting in a cupboard at the back of the hall. A nice, roomy cupboard, which Ben had marked for an emergency. You could lie in it or stand up in it. The first thing you did in a house, if you had Ben’s experience, was cupboards.