looked thoughtfully before him and said in a calmer tone:
`But I'm in no hurry. They can wait. I don't fancy tying myself up to one woman, you
know.'
He imitated with his mouth the act of tasting and made a wry face.
`Must get a bit stale, I should think,' he said.
Little Chandler sat in the room off the hall, holding a child in his arms. To save
money they kept no servant, but Annie's young sister Monica came for an hour or so
in the morning and an hour or So in the evening to help. But Monica had gone home
long ago. It was a quarter to nine. Little Chandler had come home late for tea and,
moreover, he had forgotten to bring Annie home the parcel of coffee from Bewley's.
Of course she was in a bad humour and gave him short answers. She said she would
do without any tea, but when it came near he time at which the shop at the corner
closed she decided to go out herself for a quarter of a pound of tea and two pounds of
sugar. She put the sleeping child deftly in his arms and said:
`Here. Don't waken him.'
A little lamp with a white china shade stood upon the table and its light fell over a
photograph which was enclosed in a frame of crumpled horn. It was Annie's
photograph. Little Chandler looked at it, pausing at the thin tight lips. She wore the
pale blue summer blouse which he had brought her home as a present one Saturday. It
had cost him ten and elevenpence; but what an agony of nervousness it had cost him!
How he had suffered that day, waiting at the shop door until the shop was empty,
standing at the counter and trying to appear at his ease while the girl piled ladies'
blouses before him, paying at the desk and forgetting to take up the odd penny of his
change, being called back by the cashier, and finally, striving to hide his blushes as he
left the shop by examining the parcel to see if it was Securely tied. When he brought
the blouse home Annie kissed him and said it was very pretty and stylish; but when
she heard the price she threw the blouse on the table and said it was a regular swindle
to charge ten and elevenpence for it. At first she wanted to take it back, but when she
tried it on she was delighted with it, especially with the make of the sleeves, and
kissed him and said he was very good to think of her.
Hm!...
He looked coldly into the eyes of the photograph and they answered coldly. Certainly
they were pretty and the face itself was pretty. But he found something mean in it.
Why was it so unconscious and ladylike? The composure of the gyes irritated him.
They repelled him and defied him: there was no passion in them, no rapture. He
thought of what Gallaher had said about rich Jewesses. Those dark Oriental eyes, he
thought, how full they are of passion, of voluptuous longing!... Why had he married
the eyes in the photograph?
He caught himself up at the question and glanced nervously round the room. He found
something mean in the pretty furniture which he had bought for his house on the hire
system. Annie had chosen it herself and it reminded him of her. It too was prim and
pretty. A dull resentment against his life awoke within him. Could he not escape from
his little house? Was it too late for him to try to live bravely like Gallaher? Could he
go to London? There was the furniture still to be paid for. If he could only write a
book and get it published, that might open the way for him.
A volume of Byron's poems lay before him on the table. He opened it cautiously with
his left hand lest he should waken the child and began to read the first poem in the
book:
Hushed are the winds and still the evening gloom,
Not e'en a Zephyr wanders through the grove,
Whilst I return to view my Margaret's tomb
And scatter flowers on the dust I love.
He paused. He felt the rhythm of the verse about him in the room. How melancholy it
was! Could he, too, write like that, express the melancholy of his soul in verse? There
were so many things he wanted to describe: his sensation of a few hours before on
Grattan Bridge, for example. If he could get back again into that mood...
The child awoke and began to cry. He turned from the page and tried to hush it: but it
would not be hushed. He began to rock it to and fro in his arms, but its wailing cry
grew keener. He rocked it faster while his eyes began to read the second stanza:
Within this narrow cell reclines her clay,
That clay where once...
It was useless. He couldn't read. He couldn't do anything. The wailing of the child
pierced the drum of his ear. It was useless, useless! He was a prisoner for life. His
arms trembled with anger and suddenly bending to the child's face he shouted:
`Stop!'
The child stopped for an instant, had a spasm of fright and began to scream. He
jumped up from his chair and walked hastily up and down the room with the child in
his arms. it began to sob piteously, losing its breath for four or five seconds, and then
bursting out anew. The thin walls of the room echoed the sound. He tried to soothe it,
but it sobbed more convulsively. He looked at the contracted and quivering face of the
child and began to be alarmed. He counted seven sobs without a break between them
and caught the child to his breast in fright. If it died!...
The door was burst open and a young woman ran in, panting.
`What is it? What is it?' she cried.
The child, hearing its mother's voice, broke out into a paroxysm of sobbing.
`It's nothing, Annie... it's nothing... He began to cry... '
She flung her parcels on the floor and snatched the child from him.
`What have you done to him?' she cried, glaring into his face.
Little Chandler sustained for one moment the gaze of her eyes and his heart closed
together as he met the hatred in them. He began to stammer:
`It's nothing... He... he... began to cry... I couldn't... I didn't do anything... What?'
Giving no heed to him she began to walk up and down the room, clasping the child
tightly in her arms and murmuring:
`My little man! My little mannie! Was 'ou frightened, love?'... There now, love! There
now!... Lambabaun! Mamma's little lamb of the world!... There now!'
Little Chandler felt his cheeks suffused with shame and he stood back out of the
lamplight. He listened while the paroxysm of the child's sobbing grew less and less;
and tears of remorse started to his eyes.
Counterparts
The bell rang furiously and, when Miss Parker went to the tube, a furious voice called
out in a piercing North of Ireland accent:
`Send Farrington here!'
Miss Parker returned to her machine, saying to a man who was writing at a desk:
`Mr Alleyne wants you upstairs.'
The man muttered `Blast him!' under his breath and pushed back his chair to stand up.
When he stood up he was tall and of great bulk. He had a hanging face, dark wine-
coloured, with fair eyebrows and moustache: his eyes bulged forward slightly and the
whites of them were dirty. He lifted up the counter and, passing by the clients, went
out of the office with a heavy step.
He went heavily upstairs until he came to the second landing, where a door bore a
brass plate with the inscription Mr Alleyne. Here he halted, puffing with labour and
vexation, and knocked. The shrill voice cried:
`Come in!'
The man entered Mr Alleyne's room. Simultaneously Mr Alleyne, a little man
wearing gold-rimmed glasses on a clean-shaven face, shot his head up over a pile of
documents. The head itself was so pink and hairless it seemed like a large egg
reposing on the papers. Mr Alleyne did not lose a moment:
`Farrington? What is the meaning of this? Why have I always to complain of you?
May I ask you why you haven't made a copy of that contract between Bodley and
Kirwan? I told you it must be ready by four o'clock.'
`But Mr Shelly said, sir--'
`Mr Shelly said, sir... Kindly attend to what I say and not to what Mr Shelly says, sir.
You have always some excuse or another for shirking work. Let me tell you that if the
contract is not copied before this evening I'll lay the matter before Mr Crosbie... Do
you hear me now?'
`Yes, sir.'
`Do you hear me now?... Ay and another little matter! I might as well be talking to the
wall as talking to you. Understand once for all that you get a half an hour for your
lunch and not an hour and a half. How many courses do you want? I'd like to know...
Do you mind me now?'
`Yes, sir.'
Mr Alleyne bent his head again upon his pile of papers. The man stared fixedly at the
polished skull which directed the affairs of Crosbie & Alleyne, gauging its fragility. A
spasm of rage gripped his throat for a few moments and then passed, leaving after it a
sharp sensation of thirst. The man recognized the sensation and felt that he must have
a good night's drinking. The middle of the month was passed and, if he could get the
copy done in time, Mr Alleyne might give him an order on the cashier. He stood still,
gazing fixedly at the head upon the pile of papers. Suddenly Mr Alleyne began to
upset all the papers, searching for something. Then, as if he had been unaware of the
man's presence till that moment, he shot up his head again, saying:
`Eh? Are you going to stand there all day? Upon my word, Farrington, you take things
easy!'
`I was waiting to see... '
`Very good, you needn't wait to see. Go downstairs and do your work.'
The man walked heavily towards the door and, as he went out of the room, he heard
Mr Alleyne cry after him that if the contract was not copied by evening Mr Crosbie
would hear of the matter.
He returned to his desk in the lower office and counted the sheets which remained to
be copied. He took up his pen and dipped it in the ink, but he continued to stare
stupidly at the last words he had written: In no case shall the said Bernard Bodley
be... The evening was falling and in a few minutes they would be lighting the gas:
then he could write. He felt that he must slake the thirst in his throat. He stood up
from his desk and, lifting the counter as before, passed out of the office. As he was
passing out the chief clerk looked at him inquiringly.
`It's all right, Mr Shelly,' said the man, pointing with his finger to indicate the
objective of his journey.
The chief clerk glanced at the hat-rack, but, seeing the row complete, offered no
remark. As soon as he was on the landing the man pulled a shepherd's plaid cap out of
his pocket, put it on his head and ran quickly down the rickety stairs. From the street
door he walked on furtively on the inner side of the path towards the corner and all at
once dived into a doorway. He was now safe in the dark snug of O'Neill's shop, and,
filling up the little window that looked into the bar with his inflamed face, the colour
of dark wine or dark meat, he called out:
`Here, Pat, give us a g.p., like a good fellow.'
The curate brought him a glass of plain porter. The man drank it at a gulp and asked
for a caraway seed. He put his penny on the counter and, leaving the curate to grope
for it In the gloom, retreated out of the snug as furtively as he had entered it.
Darkness, accompanied by a thick fog, was gaining upon the dusk of February and the
lamps in Eustace Street had been lit. The man went up by the houses until he reached
the door of the office, wondering whether he could finish his copy in time. On the
stairs a moist pungent odour of perfumes saluted his nose: evidently Miss Delacour
had come while he was out in O'Neill's. He crammed his cap back again into his
pocket and re-entered the office, assuming an air of absent-mindedness.
`Mr Alleyne has been calling for you,' said the chief clerk severely. `Where were
you?'
The man glanced at the two clients who were standing at the counter as if to intimate
that their presence prevented him from answering. As the clients were both male the
chief clerk allowed himself a laugh.
`I know that game,' he said. `Five times in one day is a little bit... Well, you better
look sharp and get a copy of our correspondence in the Delacour case for Mr Alleyne.'
This address in the presence of the public, his run upstairs, and the porter he had
gulped down so hastily confused the man and as he sat down at his desk to get what
was required, he realized how hopeless was the task of finishing his copy of the
contract before half past five. The dark damp night was coming and he longed to
spend it in the bars, drinking with his friends amid the glare of gas and the clatter of
glasses. He got out the Delacour correspondence and passed out of the office. He
hoped Mr Alleyne would not discover that the last two letters were missing.
The moist pungent perfume lay all the way up to Mr Alleyne's room. Miss Delacour
was a middle-aged woman of Jewish appearance. Mr Alleyne was said to be sweet on
her or on her money. She came to the office often and stayed a long time when she
came. She was sitting beside his desk now in an aroma of perfumes, smoothing the
handle of her umbrella and nodding the great black feather in her hat. Mr Alleyne had
swivelled his chair round to face her and thrown his right foot jauntily upon his left
knee. The man put the correspondence on the desk and bowed respectfully, but
neither Mr Alleyne nor Miss Delacour took any notice of his bow. Mr Alleyne tapped
a finger on the correspondence and then flicked it towards him as if to say: `That's all
right, you can go.'
The man returned to the lower office and sat down again at his desk. He stared
intently at the incomplete phrase: In no case shall the said Bernard Bodley be... and
thought how strange it was that the last three words began with the same letter. The
chief clerk began to hurry Miss Parker, saying she would never have the letters typed
in time for post. The man listened to the clicking of the machine for a few minutes
and then set to work to finish his copy. But his head was not clear and his mind
wandered away to the glare and rattle of the public-house. It was a night for hot
punches. He struggled on with his copy, but when the clock struck five he had still
