Archibald Cronin - The Stars Look Down

Stanley continued to monopolise the conversation. Laura spoke very little and Joe, though his assurance was increasing, made only an occasional and careful observation, agreeing with some remark which Stanley had made. Occasionally, while Stanley discoursed upon bridge or golf, once especially when he was detailing at some length the manner in which he had played a particular hole, Joe’s eyes encountered Laura’s across the table and the deliberate blankness of her gaze gave him a secret chagrin. He wondered what her feelings were for Stanley. She had been married to him for seven years now. She had no children. She was always extremely nice to Stanley, listening to everything he said, or was she listening? Had she no feelings at all under that cold indifference? Was she merely icy? Or what in the name of heaven was it? Stanley, he knew, had been crazy about her at the start, their honeymoon had lasted for six weeks or longer, but now Stanley was not quite so crazy. He was a little less of the dashing Don Juan. Often, in Joe’s phrase, he looked all washed out.

After the sweet, Laura left them, Joe blundering in an access of politeness to the door to open it for her. Then Stanley selected a cigar, lit up, and pushed across the box to Joe magnanimously.

“Help yourself, Gowlan,” he said. “You’ll find these all right.”

Joe took a cigar with a look of humility and gratitude. Secretly he was irked by Millington’s condescending air. Just wait a bit, he thought into himself, and I’ll show him something. But in the meantime he was all deference. He lit his cigar without removing the band.

A longish silence followed while Stanley, with his legs stretched under the table and his stomach at ease, pulled at his cigar and stared at Joe.

“You know, Gowlan,” he announced at length, “I like you.”

Joe smiled modestly and wondered what the hell was coming.

“I’m a liberal man,” Stanley went on expansively — he had drunk half a bottle of Sauterne on top of the cocktails and was inclined to be expansive. “And it doesn’t matter a tinker’s damn to me what a man is so long as he’s decent. He can be a duke’s son or a dustman’s son, I don’t care, it’s all the same to me so long as he’s straight. Do you get me?”

“Why, yes, I get you, Mr. Stanley.”

“Well, look here, Joe,” Millington continued, “I’ll go a bit further since you understand what I’m after. I’ve been watching you pretty closely this last month or two and I’ve been pretty pleased with what I’ve seen.” He broke off, switching the cigar round his mouth, inspecting Joe. Then he said slowly: “Clegg’s finito , that’s point number one. Point number two, I’ve got an idea, Gowlan, that I’m going to try you out as my new works manager.”

Joe nearly swooned.

“Manager!” he whispered feebly.

Millington smiled.

“I’m offering you Clegg’s job now. It’s up to you to see if you can hold it.”

Joe’s emotion was so great the room swam before him. He had scented something in the wind but nothing, oh, nothing like this. He went white as mutton fat and dropped his cigar on to his plate.

“Why, Mr. Stanley,” he gasped. He didn’t have to act this time, he was natural and convincing. “Why, Mr. Stanley…”

“That all right, Joe. Just take it easy. I’m sorry if I caught you unexpected. But there’s a war on, see. That’s when the unexpected happens. You’ll soon pick up the ropes. I’ve an idea you’ll not let me down.”

A wave of exhilaration swept over Joe. Clegg’s job… him!.. works manager at Millington’s!

“You see, I trust you, Joe,” Millington explained cordially. “And I’m prepared to back my judgment. That’s why I’m offering you the job.”

At that moment the telephone rang in the lounge and before Joe could speak again Laura entered.

“It’s for you, Stanley,” she declared. “Major Jenkins wants you.”

Stanley excused himself and went out to the telephone.

There was a silence. Joe could feel Laura there, he could feel her standing by the doorway, opposite him, near him, looking at him. A terrific elation throbbed in him, he felt strong, intoxicated, gloriously alive. He lifted his eyes and faced her. But she avoided his gaze and said quite curtly:

“There’s coffee in the lounge before you go!”

He did not answer. He could not speak. As they stood there, in this fashion, the sound of Stanley’s voice at the telephone came into the room.

The time of Jenny’s confinement drew near and Jenny’s behaviour was in every way exemplary. Since that Tuesday afternoon when she had told David, Jenny had been “a changed woman.” She had her little querulous moments of course — who in her condition would not? — and what she called her “fancies,” the sudden desire at awkward moments for strange and exotic forms of nourishment — more simply denoted as “something tasty.” A craving for ginger snaps for instance, since she had “gone off” bread, or a pickled onion, or soft herring roes on toast. Ada, her mother, had always had her fancies and Jenny felt herself fully within her rights in having her fancies too.

She was making a fetching outfit for the little baby girl — she was sure it would be a girl, she did want a little girlie so, to dress up nicely, boys were horrid! — and she sat night after night on the opposite side of the fire from David in the most domestic manner stitching and crocheting and fashioning the garments from the directions given in Mab’s Home Notes and the Chickabiddy’s Journal . Dreamily she planned the future of the little one. She was to be an actress, a great actress, or better still a great singer, a prima donna in Grand Opera. Her mother’s talent would unfold in her and she would have triumph upon triumph at Covent Garden with great men and bouquets scattered at her feet, while Jenny from a box would gaze tenderly and understandingly upon the success which might have been hers too, if only she had been given her chance. There were temptations here though, great temptations, and at that Jenny’s brow would crease. The scene became changed suddenly and she saw a nun, an Anglican nun, pale and spiritual with a hidden sorrow in her heart and the stage and the world cast behind her, passing through the cloister of a great convent and entering the dim chapel. Service began, the organ sounded, and the nun’s voice pealed out in all its lovely purity. Tears came to Jenny’s eyes and her sad romantic fancy took even more tragic flights. There would be no little girl after all, no prima donna, no nun. She herself was going to die, she felt it in her heart, it was absurd to imagine she would ever have the strength to have a baby, and she had always had the premonition of dying young. She remembered that Lily Blades, a girl in the Millinery at Slattery’s who was something wonderful at fortunes, had once seen a terrible illness in her tea-cup. She saw herself dying in David’s arms while with riven and anguished countenance he implored her not to leave him. A great bowl of white roses stood by the bedside and the doctor, though a hard man, stood in the background in an agony of distress.

Real tears flowed down Jenny’s cheeks and David, looking up suddenly, exclaimed:

“Good Lord, Jenny! What on earth’s the matter?”

“It’s nothing, David,” she sighed with a pale, angelic smile. “I’m really quite happy. Quite, quite happy.”

After this she decided she must have a cat because it was domestic and human and cheerful about the house. She asked everyone she knew to get her a kitten; everyone, simply everyone must search high and low to get her a kitten, and when Harry, the butcher’s boy, brought her a little tabby she was delighted. Later when Murchison’s van man brought her another kitten and Mrs. Wept on the following day sent round yet another, she was less ecstatic. It was impossible to return the two kittens in the face of her widespread appeal, and they were not very clean about the house. She had in the end to drown them, it hurt her terribly, the little helpless darlings, yet what could a girl do? However, she took a lot of trouble in thinking out a name for the survivor. She called it Pretty .