The Sandwich-man
A bitingly cold afternoon towards the end of January. Six sandwich-men
trudged along the Strand, urged by the cutting wind to more rapid
movement than is general with their class. On the board of the last man
which was slung over his back were the words, "Look at the man in
front." On the board which was at the back of the man in front, to
which your attention was directed, was "for Warmth And Sunshine Try
Cox's Bitters." The legend was repeated all along the six. It almost
seemed as if it must be a joke, of a grim order, to compel such
unfortunate wretches to stare for hour after hour at such advice, on
such a day. One had only to glance at them to see how much they stood
in need of both warmth and sunshine; yet the chance seemed extremely
slight that they would have an opportunity of trying Cox's bitters.
Some of the passers-by, who were in better plight than the six in the
gutter, seemed to be struck by the fact that a jest might be intended,
and where there were two of them together, they commented on it to each
other.
"Poor beggars!" said one of the passers-by to the acquaintance at his
side. "It's pretty rough on them to make them carry about a thing like
that, when they're pretty nearly at death's door for want of the very
things which, according to their own showing, are so easy to get."
The words were heard by someone who happened at that moment to be
passing them--a woman. Possibly, as is easy in London, the sight is
such a common one, she had been unconscious that the sandwich-men were
there. When she heard the words she glanced at them to see to what they
might apply. As she did so she started and stopped, as if she had seen
something which had amazed her. The sandwich-men passed on, none of
them had noticed her; they were probably too far gone in misery to
notice anything, each kept his unseeing eyes fixed on his fellow's
back.
The woman stood still, seemed to hesitate, went on, then turned and
looked after the retreating sandwich-men. She seemed to be asking
herself if it would be possible to catch them up, they were already at
a distance from her of perhaps fifty yards. Then, as if arriving at a
sudden determination, she moved quickly after them. Yet, although she
walked so quickly, it was some little time before she caught them up,
so that she had an opportunity to consider whatever it was that was
passing through her mind. At last she was abreast of them again; was
passing them; she scanned the last man, the fifth, the fourth, and,
with much particularity, the third. Behind the others was probably all
of life that was worth having, if it had been worth having to them; it
seemed scarcely likely that the scanty, broken fragments of what
remained of it could be worth anything to them. Theirs would probably
be a continual tramp through the gutter, or its equivalent, to the
grave.
But with the third man in the line it was different. He was young. In
spite of the grotesqueness of his attire--he was clad in ill-assorted,
ragged and tattered oddments of somebody else's clothing--there was
something in his bearing which suggested that he was still a man. These
others were but torsos. And although the hair beneath his greasy cap
stood in crying need of both a barber and a brush, and there was an
untrimmed, unsightly growth upon his cheeks and chin, a shrewd observer
might have ventured on a small wager that if his hair had been cut and
trimmed and he had been shaved and washed, he would not be altogether
ugly.
One thing was noticeable, that though the woman stared at him he took
no heed at all of her--he did not take his eyes off the man in front of
him; and that although the woman kept step beside him in a manner which
the others began to mark. All at once, as if moved by an overmastering
impulse, she stretched out her umbrella and touched him on the
shoulder.
"Hullo!"
That was all she said, but it was enough; he turned his head. At the
sight of the eyes which glanced at her out of that dreadful face she
started again, not without excuse. This was the face of one of those
men of whom society has good reason to go in terror. Desperation was in
every line of it; something like madness was in the eyes. This was the
face of a man who had suffered much, and who, if opportunity offered,
would stick at nothing to get even with those who had made him suffer.
He looked at the woman with, at first, no sign of recognition in his
glance. Then, a muscle moved; something came into his eyes which had
not been there before; all at once the fashion of his countenance was
changed. He stopped, bringing those behind him to sudden confusion. He
turned, the better to look at her; beyond doubt this was a woman of
nerve, or she would have shrunk from that which was on his face. One
felt that if, in that first wild moment, he had not been impeded by the
boards which bound him, he would have laid violent hands upon her, and
she would have fared ill.
But the boards did bind him. With them there he could do nothing but
stand and stare. She met his gaze unflinchingly. Not only did she show
no sign of concern at the threat which was in it, something in the
expression of her own face suggested that it occasioned her positive
pleasure. Certainly she could not have been more completely at her
ease.
"Take those things off and come with me."
The man glared at her as if he wondered if his senses were playing him
a trick.
"Come with you?"
It was an interrogation conveying, it would seem, a world of meaning.
She smiled; at sight of the smile the gleam in his eyes grew more
pronounced, his face more threatening. But she was in no way troubled.
"You heard what I said; you're not in the state in which you were when
I saw you last; but in case you didn't quite hear I'll repeat it. I
said, 'Take those things off and come with me.' And be quick about it,
please, if you don't want to have a crowd collect and mob us; you see
they're gathering already."
There was a momentary, very obvious, hesitation, then he did what she
requested--he took the things off, meaning the boards which were
suspended from his shoulders. When he had them off he put a question:
"What shall I do with them--shall I bring them with me?"
From the purse she took out of her handbag she chose a coin, speaking
to the man behind him:
"There are five of you, there's half a sovereign; that's two shillings
apiece. Take these articles back to their owner, and explain that the
gentleman who was in charge of them has been called away."
She hailed a taxicab; at her suggestion he got in first, she followed,
and the cab drove off towards a destination the driver alone had heard.
The five remaining sandwich-men followed it with a chorus of thanks;
one of them exclaimed, "Good luck, old pal! I wish I was in your
place." He was a very old man, quite probably in the seventies, small
in stature, nearly bent double as if shrivelled by the cold. For some
cause his words, uttered in shrill, quavering tones, seemed to amuse
the bystanders. A crowd had gathered, a heterogeneous crowd which so
quickly does gather in a London thoroughfare; the five remaining
sandwich-men were explaining to the people, as best they could, what
had happened. In the taxicab nothing was said; the passengers were a
queerly assorted pair, offering even a more striking contrast than
when, on that first occasion, they had been alone together in the motor
in the park. Then it was she who looked at him; now it was he who
looked at her.
She sat in her own corner of the cab, her glance kept straight in front
of her, so that she never looked his way. He, on the other hand, never
took his eyes off her; it was perhaps as well she did not see them,
they were unfriendly. His grimy hands were clenched in front of him; to
judge from his expression they might, in fancy, have been clenched
about her throat; no one watching him could have doubted that he was
capable of such an action; this was rather a savage animal than a
civilised man.
The cab crossed Brompton Road into a street on the other side, and
after one or two turnings drew up in front of a small house which
formed one of a terrace of old-fashioned villas. The woman paid the
cab, opened the door with a latch-key, ushered the man into a room of
fair size, comfortably furnished, a bright fire made it seem a
veritable haven of refuge after the inclemency of the weather without.
For the first time she spoke.
"Come to the fire and warm yourself; I should think you must be cold."
He echoed her last word with a very different accent.
"Cold!" He said it again in a tone of voice which was indescribable; in
the word as he uttered it there was a whole dictionary of meaning.
"Cold!"
"Have a drink?"
She was moving towards the sideboard on which there were bottles and
glasses.
"The last time I saw you I had a drink at your expense, though I'm
always paying for it."
"The world doesn't seem to have been using you very well since I met
you last."
His speech was not a reply to hers.
"At least you have courage."
"Women of my sort have to; experience gives it to them. Without courage
where should we be?"
"I wonder where you are sometimes even with it. Do you know that you've
scarcely ever been out of my thoughts more than an hour or two at a
time since we parted?"
"That's very nice of you."
"You think so. I've told myself over and over again that when I did get
within reach of you--that's just the trouble, I've never quite been
able to make up my mind what I'd do to you. I've told myself I'd kill
you; in some of my happiest moments, in imagination, I've been wringing
your neck; it was a delicious sensation."
"For you?"
"For me."
"Very well, then, give yourself that delicious sensation in real
earnest--wring it. Here I am, quite close, ready to make things easy; I
promise that I'll do nothing to keep you from wringing it to your
heart's content." She had gone right up to him. He drew himself up
straight, with a look upon his face as if he were about to take her at
her word; but he stood still. Observing his indecision, she laughed.
"How long do you propose to keep me waiting? Are you going to wring it
now, or--it might be rather a nuisance in such a matter to have one's
moment chosen for one--would you rather wait?"
"I'll wait."
"Good; then while you're waiting won't you come closer to the fire and
have a drink? That's whisky and soda."
She held out to him a tumbler.
"Don't you give me that."
"Why not? It's warming."
"Last time you gave me something which was--warming."
"I see." She laughed. "You're thinking this is the same as that. I
understand; or--are you very hungry?"
"Don't you ask me questions; I'll take neither food nor drink from you.
I'll pay my debt and then----"
He left his sentence unfinished. If his bearing was more than a little
melodramatic, hers was easiness itself.
"Before we go any farther--and we are going farther, so you needn't
glare at me--we'll clear that up about what you call your debt. You
think you owe me one?"
"Think! I've been in hell because of you; I'm in it still. Now I've a
chance I'm going to make it my business to give you a taste of it too."
"There's nothing so silly as using extravagant language. I found that
out long ago; and I'm a woman, and women are supposed to be inclined
that way, and you're a man."
"You're a woman? A woman!"
"Yes, I'm a woman, a woman, a woman, and all the vitriolic bitterness
you can get into your tone won't alter that. Now just you keep still
and let me talk. You've your own point of view--of course, you would
have, being a man--and I've mine; before you start paying that debt
which weighs so heavily on your chest, you'll listen to what it is.
I'll be as brief as I can, and while I'm talking I'll lay the table;
I'm acting as my own maid just now. I may remark that you and I are
quite alone in the house, so that if you do feel like wringing my neck
you need fear no personal interference. I'm going to put some food upon
the table, because I'm going to eat something, if you aren't."
Out of a drawer in the sideboard she took a tablecloth.
"Now about that debt you were speaking of; but before I talk of it, I'd
better go and see what there is in the pantry that really is worth
eating. Wouldn't you like to come and help me? There will be a tray to
carry."
She had laid the table, and now stood at the open doorway looking at
him with a smile on her face. Plainly he was in more than two minds as
to what to do; this woman was, so far, proving more than a match for
him. His tone was surly.
"I'm not coming with you."
"Aren't you? Very well, don't; stop there. I may as well go upstairs
and take off my hat and coat and make myself look decent, even if I am
to have my neck wrung directly afterwards. And then I'll go and forage
in the pantry. Until we meet again."
With a saucy little nod she paused out of the room and shut the door.
A student in pantomime would have been interested by the man's
proceedings when he found himself thus left alone, he was so evidently
at a loss. He stared, or rather glared, at the door through which the
woman had vanished; he seemed to be in doubt as to whether to go
through it and out of the house. Then his eyes moved round the room,
and stayed; as if it were all in such delightful contrast to what he
had been used to that he had to stay. He made a half-step towards the
fire, then drew back, with clenched hands and knitted brows; he would
not warm himself beside this woman's fire. Then he saw the tumbler on
the table, which she had left on the snowy tablecloth invitingly
beneath his nose; his hand moved towards that--it was harder to keep
that back, but he did. He saw, for the first time, the mirror above the
mantel; as if unwillingly he went to it; the action was significant, a
mirror had not been a necessary adjunct to his toilet for a
considerable time.
He stared at the face that looked back at him as if it were that of a
stranger, as if he found it difficult to realise that it could by any
possibility be his, as if it were incredible that the man who had been
could be the man who was now. He took the greasy cap off his head, as
if the mirror had made him conscious that it was there. No woman could
have shown keener interest in a tale told by the mirror; so absorbed
was he by his own image that apparently he could not tear himself away.
He became aware that the fire was just beneath; he stretched out his
hands to the grateful blaze, then, remembered, glanced round him
shamefacedly, moved away towards the window. How cheerless it was
without, how cheery it was within. He twisted his cap as if he would
have torn it; his jaw was hard set; his eyes looked this way and that.
He moved from the window, this time towards the door, as if he were
trying to bring himself to the sticking point, to retreat in time. He
was nearly there when the door reopened and the woman appeared.
"Now then, you really must come and help me carry this tray; it's
perfectly absurd to suppose that I can do everything while you do
nothing. My maid is out; I only keep one, and it's her day out. You
needn't eat anything; the fates forbid that I should press my food on
you or my anything. But surely you can help me to get something to eat
myself. Do you hear?"
"Yes, I hear."
"And you're not coming?"
"No, I'm not coming."
"You won't help me to carry the tray?"
"I won't."
"Then thank you very much. You know, you used to be a gentleman."
She passed out of the room with her head in the air. He let her go,
waiting, grimly, for her return, the greasy cap between his hands.
Presently she was back, bearing a well-filled tray.
"Won't you sit down? I should think even my chairs would not do you any
serious injury; but, of course, stand if you prefer it; I suppose you
can wring my neck better standing. I'm going to have some tea, the
kettle's boiling, and I feel like tea. I suppose it's no use suggesting
tea to you, but I've brought a second cup, which you can throw at me if
you care to use it for nothing else. It might amuse you to throw things
at me before you wring my neck, including the teapot and the tray."
She was laying the table while she spoke. He kept his eyes turned from
her, which was perhaps the reason why she imparted to him information
which he declined to observe for himself.
"That's a tongue; nothing of your tinned or glass things, but a
Portland and Mason; and that's a ham, a small Westphalian boned ham; I
like Westphalian ham, even if you don't; and that was a chicken at
lunch, and it's very nearly a chicken now, and there's honey, and
marmalade, and jam, and cakes, and bread, and lots of things which some
people wouldn't turn their noses up at, whatever others may do. I don't
know that I'm fond of a meat tea, or high tea, or whatever you call it,
as a rule; though after all we do have sandwiches, all sorts of
sandwiches, with tea; everybody does, so it doesn't make such a very
great difference. Anyhow, I'm going to eat meat--all sorts of
meat--with my tea this afternoon, and you can watch me. There are two
plates, and two knives, and two forks, and two of everything for two
people, and two chairs; if you should know of anyone who will do me the
honour to take tea with me, I'll be very glad of--his society. I'm
going to begin."
She had placed a chair at one side of the table in which she sat,
making as if to pour out tea; then suddenly sprang up, turning to the
man who still stood twisting his cap between his fingers.
"Do you think you're playing the noble pudding-headed hero in a Drury
Lane drama? Haven't you got sense enough to get in out of the rain? Do
you suppose I don't know you're starving? How long ago is it since you
had a square meal?"
"Didn't I tell you not to ask me questions?"
"You didn't tell me! It will need a very different person from you to
tell me things of that kind in my own house."
"Then I'll leave your house."
"No, you don't!" She interposed herself between him and the door. "I
say no, you don't; and you can glare at me for all you are worth. I've
been glared at by much more dangerous persons than you, and I still
live on. You wouldn't lay a finger on me if I'd treated you twenty
times as badly as I have done; you may think you would, but you
wouldn't; you may tell yourself that you will when you're all alone,
but you won't, and you couldn't; you're that kind of man. The devil may
get into you, but he won't get into you enough to induce you, when it
comes to the pinch, to lay violent hands upon a woman. You say you are
going to leave my house, and I say you're not. I say I won't let you;
there's a direct challenge. You won't touch me, but I shan't hesitate
to touch you. I am that kind. You understand, you are not to leave my
house without my permission; and in order that we may know exactly
where we are I'm going to lock the door and put the key in my pocket."
"You shan't do that."
"Shan't I? Well, we'll see." All at once her tone changed to one of the
most singular appeal. "Man, do you know that I've been starving, and
not so very long ago? Why, for years of my life I as good as starved;
but there have been times when I've gone without food for days
together, and known what it is to feel as you are feeling now." She
laid her finger-tips softly on his ragged coat-sleeve. "You're a much
stronger man than I supposed, but please don't be a fool; do sit down
and have some tea with me, and afterwards you can wring my neck; you'll
want lots of strength to do it properly."