David Storey - Saville

Assuming Batty wouldn’t do anything, he hit Stringer as hard as he could on the end of his nose.

Stringer stepped back and covered his face.

‘Watch it. Watch it, Tongey,’ Batty said.

He came over with the stick, tapping the end of it now in his other hand.

‘Watch it,’ he said. He tapped the stick more slowly, glancing at Stringer and then at Stafford, not sure, of the two of them, which to go to first.

‘We’ll go on up, then,’ Colin said. It was as if then, for a moment, nothing had happened; as he turned from Stringer Colin saw him swing his arm. Stringer lunged at him with his boot and then his fist and before he could give an answer ran off calling to the foot of the hill.

Batty, deserted, stood gazing up the hill, his legs astride, the stick still in his hand.

‘Thy mu’n cop it when thy comes back down,’ he said. ‘I s’ll fetch our kid.’

He walked backwards, then turned, still tapping the stick against his hand.

‘Thy look out, then, when you come back down.’

‘Aye: thy look out,’ Stringer called from the foot of the hill.

‘Who are those two?’ Stafford said.

‘I suppose they own the village,’ Colin said. Yet he felt a strange resentment now, as if Stafford had forced him to something he hadn’t wished.

‘All bluster I suppose, then,’ Stafford said.

‘Something like that,’ he said and turned off the hill to the gates of the Park, which, like the railings to the school playground, had been removed.

Odd couples were walking along the paths inside, groups of children playing on the metal roundabout and swings.

The afternoon was overcast; grey clouds mounded over the horizon beyond the pit: a light wind blew in from across the fields.

‘That looks good fun, then,’ Stafford said and with a sudden lightness ran down the hill, clambering on the box-like rocking-horse and calling out.

Colin went down slowly; Stafford was standing on the side of the rocking-horse, swinging it violently up and down.

‘I say, get on the end,’ he said.

Colin clambered up the other side.

Another boy climbed on and Stafford laughed; he flung the rocking-horse from side to side, the metal arms knocking underneath, the boy who’d climbed on last holding to a handle, calling out.

‘Come on: rock it, Colin,’ Stafford said.

Almost mechanically now he followed Stafford’s movements; the head of the rocking-horse, hard, with beady eyes and flaring, metal nostrils, flew up and down by Stafford’s head.

A strange carelessness had come into Stafford’s movements; his coat flew up behind him, his face reddening, his eyes starting with a strange intentness.

‘Keep it going, Col,’ he said.

The boy sitting on the rocking-horse half stood up.

‘Keep it going,’ Stafford said.

The boy got off; the rocking-horse slowed.

Before its swinging motion had finally stopped Stafford had sprung down and run across to the roundabout. Several children already were swinging it round: they dropped off quickly as they felt his weight.

‘Come and give it a push,’ he called.

Another, larger boy got on. He ran at the side of the platform, pushing it round then, his legs swinging, he clambered on.

Colin watched. Stafford climbed up the metal rigging, standing spread-eagled with his feet on a spar.

‘Shove it. Shove it faster,’ he called to the boy.

The boy swung off; large, heavy, with studded boots and a torn jacket he pounded round the concrete track, the metal cusp of the roundabout clanging as it cracked against the top of the metal pole.

‘Sithee: ’od on tight,’ he said.

Stafford called out, his figure flattened against the metal spars. The roundabout clanged to and fro, swaying, the metal framework spinning round.

‘Jump on. Jump on, Col,’ Stafford called, laughing now, his head bowed, his hair flung out. His jacket billowed up behind.

Yet only moments later he was climbing down, the roundabout slowing, the boy pounding at the concrete track again.

Stafford leapt off, the roundabout swaying up.

‘Why didn’t you jump on, then, Col?’ he said. Without waiting for an answer he moved over to the swings.

Figures rose slowly, swaying on the chairs.

Colin sat on the concrete seat beside the playground; Stafford, as the swing swept out from the metal stanchions, laughed and, tugging at the chains, called out.

‘Come on. Grab one, Col. It’s going free.’

Stafford’s hair flew up as the swing swept back.

He was rising higher, crouching at the back of the swing then hanging poised, his head thrust back.

‘Col!’

He thought, then, he might have fallen, the chains falling slack, the wood seat swaying sideways, Stafford, unsure of his balance, crouching there before, with a half-nervous gesture, he carefully sat down.

He let the swing rise and fall, his legs swaying to its slow momentum, then, as the swing slowed further, finally jumped down.

‘I say, aren’t you going to have a go?’ He slumped down on the seat. He tapped his chest, sighing, and glanced around.

A group of girls, familiar to Colin from his walks in the Park with Bletchley, came slowly past. One of them called.

‘Where’s Belcher today?’ she said.

‘Who’s that, then?’ Stafford said. He ran his hand across his head, leaning forward. He smoothed his hair.

‘They’re from the Manor,’ Colin said.

Stafford got up from the bench.

‘Come on. We might as well go this way, then,’ he said.

He set off along the side of the path, kicking at the grass edges as he walked along. As he reached the girls he called across. Colin heard them laugh, one of them shrieking, tossing back her head.

Stafford, shrugging, laughed himself.

When Colin reached him he was walking in front of the girls, turning then and walking backward, still laughing and then adding, ‘Do you know a girl called Berenice, then?’

‘Not Berenice Hartley ?’

‘I believe that is her name,’ he said.

The girls had laughed again, as intrigued by Stafford’s accent as they were by this inquiry.

‘Your name isn’t Henderson?’ one of them said.

‘Jones,’ Stafford said and began to laugh.

‘Jones the butcher, or Jones the baker?’

‘Jones the lover,’ Stafford said.

‘Oh, listen to him. Honestly,’ another of the girls said.

‘Honestly, do you know Berenice Hartley?’ another said.

‘As well as I know anyone, my darling,’ Stafford said.

‘Honestly, just listen to him.’

‘I think he’s deeply in love,’ another girl had said.

‘I’m deeply in love with two or three girls at the moment,’ Stafford said.

‘Honestly, just listen to him,’ another of the girls had said.

‘I think all the girls at that school are pretty attractive,’ Stafford said.

‘And what school do you go to, glamour-britches?’ one of the girls had said.

They laughed, linking arms and leaning their heads against each other.

‘I’ve left school. We don’t go there any longer, do we, Colin?’ Stafford said.

‘Tongey goes to school. Don’t you, Tarzan?’ one of the girls had said.

‘Why do you call him Tarzan?’ Stafford said.

‘That’s Belcher’s name for him. Isn’t it, Tarzan?’ one of the girls had said.

‘He says he’s so strong , does Belcher,’ another girl had said.

They laughed.

‘You’re too young not to be at school, in any case,’ they added.

‘Well, I may drop in odd days, of course, my darling,’ Stafford said. ‘When the mood is on me, so to speak.’

‘Honestly, just listen to him, then,’ they said.

‘Isn’t there any room in there for me, then?’ Stafford said, indicating that a space might be made somewhere in the middle.