The Angel in the Corner - Monica Dickens [141]
‘Nothing, except to say that you should have told me. Why didn’t you, Joe? Were you afraid?’
‘Afraid?’ He tossed back his hair. ‘I’m not afraid of anyone.’
‘It explains so much. The doctor took it for granted, I suppose, that it was pneumonia, because he knew she had it, but I’ve never been able to understand how she could have been better, and then suddenly snuffed out like that.’
‘Now you know. I killed her.’
‘Don’t say that.’ Virginia got up quickly and went to him. Her head was aching from the blow of his hand. She felt dizzy and uncertain of herself, but she knew that she had to straighten this out now, because they could not go on with the bitterness of it between them. ‘It wasn’t your fault. Joe, please don’t look like that. Don’t be wretched about it. I can see what you must have been through, thinking it was your fault, but it could have happened to anybody.’
‘If they were drunk enough,’ he said bitterly. ‘Stop making excuses for me. Of course it was my fault. I probably broke the poor little beggar’s neck, only that lousy doctor was too sure of himself to notice it. You can tell the police that. Oh, yes, you’ll have to tell them. They’ll get me for murder – manslaughter at the best. Have poor little Jenny dug up and argued over. You read about it in the papers. “Baby exhumed. Father charged.” ’ He laughed bleakly. ‘Make a lovely little scandal, won’t it? Hellish good for trade. This will be the only pub in London.’
‘How could you think I would ever tell anyone? This is between you and me, Joe, and I’ll never talk about it even to you, if you don’t want. Talking about it won’t bring Jenny back. It’s best forgotten.’
She held out her hand, but he pushed her away. ‘Grow up,’ he said. ‘Stop forgiving me. Stop being so bloody noble, and talk like a human being. Curse me. Accuse me, as you’ll accuse me all your life. Every time you look at me, you’ll think: That man killed my baby! That’s what I think of myself every time I look in the glass. How do you think I like living with that? How will you like living with me now that you know?’
He was breathless and shaking. He clenched and unclenched his hands, and his eyes were dark pits of anguish. He stood looking at her for a moment while the tap dripped unconcernedly into the silence. Then suddenly he sagged, his arms hung limply, and his face crumpled. ‘Jin –’ he said, and she thought that he was going to cry. ‘You’ll go on with me, won’t you? This isn’t the end? I can’t live with myself if you don’t go on with me.’ He reached out for her. His drunken face was weak and quivering, his hands clutched at the air. She could not touch him when he looked like that.
‘Of course I’ll go on with you,’ she said. The words sounded empty and hopeless.
‘Come here.’ He lurched towards her. ‘Come here when I tell you. Don’t back away like that, damn you – come here! You belong to me. You’re my wife, that’s all you’ll ever be. God damn you, don’t look so disgusted. You think you’re too good for me, don’t you. I could kill you when you look at me like that, you damn ladylike –’ He grabbed the hatchet and threw it at her.
In a split second she saw it coming, and raised her hands too late. She felt no pain as it struck her. She fell across a chair and rolled to the floor, and as she lay there with her arm tangled in the overturned chair, she felt the warm blood tickling her face like a feather. The blood was in her eyes and she could not see, but she heard Joe stumble past her, and heard the shot and the crashing bottles. Then silence, until Lennie’s screams brought people running, and the Olive Branch was full of noise and voices.
Chapter 16
It was the kind of story that makes the front page of the newspapers: a one-day sensation, read with pleasurable horror and easily forgotten. After Mrs Benberg read the story, she had spent all the following days at the hospital, making a nuisance of herself until she was allowed to see Virginia. She continued to make herself a nuisance to