In Pursuit of the English - Doris Lessing [75]
As the doors slammed Flo shrugged and said: ‘Oh, well, she’ll think different when she’s got kids herself and no room to move and she can’t ever go out or nothing.’
‘How about a doctor for Mrs Skeffington?’
‘My Lord, are you crazy, do you want her to go to prison?’
‘She might die.’
‘She won’t die. There’s a time for doctors. Mrs Skeffington’s managed without, and good luck to her, and I didn’t think she had that much fight in her, she’s such a lady and all. I’ll give her that. But you call a doctor now, sweetheart, and you’ll do for her, you will really. I’ll go up again and see what I can do for help. You stay here and if I need you I’ll call.’
When Flo went. Rose came in. ‘I’m going out now,’ she said. ‘This would happen, just when I want to be happy and not think about anything. Can you hear?’
From above us came the sound of moaning.
‘Of course.’
‘Yes. I know you can. But I don’t want to. I’ll see you later.’
Soon afterwards Flo came to say Mrs Skeffington was asleep for the night. And Rosemary had been given a tablespoon of whisky to keep her quiet. We both made trips upstairs to listen outside the door; and Miss Powell made trips down. We couldn’t hear anything. Miss Powell said she had arranged to call a friend of hers who was a nurse, if anything went wrong. Flo approved of this; nurses weren’t doctors: they were friendly, they were women, they understood.
When Rose came back at midnight, soft-faced and smiling and happy, she seemed a visitor from another country. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘so that’s all fixed.’ She sat down in my big chair, and began to make herself comfortable. In five minutes she had changed herself from a pretty girl into a plain woman. First, straddled in the chair, she stripped the corset-belt from under her petticoat. Then she undid her brassière, and removed the carefully-bunched cotton-woo! with which it was stuffed. She stuck a cigarette in the corner of her mouth – a thing she would rather die than do in public – so that, with her eyes screwed up against the smoke she looked like a wise old sardonic woman. Finally she took a comb from her black packed hair, and reflectively scratched her scalp with it. No man present: she could be herself.
‘Have a good time?’
‘What do you think?’
‘Where did you go?’
‘The pictures. I didn’t care where we went, so long as I was with him. He wouldn’t talk to me at first, not a cheep out of him. I didn’t take any notice; I talked nice about whatever came past, so to speak. Then, after the pictures he look my hand and squeezed it ever so hard.’ She showed me, with satisfaction, and creased red flesh on her wrist. ‘And he said, look if you’re going out with me, you’re not going out with other men, see? I said; Going out with you, am I? Haven’t noticed it recently. He said. As far as I’m concerned, you’re coming out with me. So I smiled, secret-like, and played I didn’t care either way. Then, when he got mad, I looked at him straight and said; No fooling now. You’re not playing me up again, understand? Then I patted his cheek, like that …’ Rose patted the chair in a brisk maternal way. ‘I said; I’m telling you straight. If you don’t want me, there are those who do. You can take it or leave it. When we got to the gate, he kissed me proper …’ She smiled, and immediately her face dimmed to worry.