Late Night on Watling Street Page 5

  “Through the air-holes,” I said, “I’m not lifting the lid.”

  “Did you run into the blooming pond for it?” he said, looking at my muddy legs.

  “I’ll bet you’d get your feet wet,” I said, “for half a dollar.”

  That quietened him, and off we went to Dr Bryce’s. Felix rang the bell, and he kept his finger on it that long that I almost ran off with the others, for I knew Paddy was a very funny chap. Then Felix dashed off. But I held my ground, for I wanted the money.

  The door opened and there was the maid with a little white cap on her head.

  “What did you ring like that for?” she said.

  “It wasn’t me,” I said. “It was them others.”

  “What do you want?” she snapped.

  “Is Doctor Bryce at home please?” I said.

  “Who wants him?” she said.

  “I want him,” I said. “I’ve got a dragonfly for sale.” “A dragonfly?” she said.

  “That’s right,” I said, showing her the tin. “I believe he’s crying out for them. He extracts the poison for ointment. This is a large one. He’ll get a lot out of it.”

  She seemed interested in what I told her.

  “Come in,” she said. “Sit there while I take it to him. He’s just having his tea.”

  I sat down on a horse-hair chair in the waiting room. A blob of dried mud fell off my clog on to the polished floor. I expected Paddy to come running in any minute and kick me out. But as time went on I got a bit more confidence, and I began to think over how much I’d accept. She must have been gone a good ten minutes, when at last I heard her coming back and I jumped up.

  She held out the tin: “The doctor says thank you very much for letting him see it,” she said, “but he doesn’t wish to purchase it.”

  My face went red, but I took it, without a fuss. “Oh, that’s quite all right, thank you. I can easily get rid of it. Good afternoon.”

  I didn’t know what to think. It was certain he did buy them, but for some reason he didn’t want this one. My mates were waiting down the street for me, and Felix yelled: “Hast touched?” I wasn’t going to admit I hadn’t, so I just put my thumbs up, and dodged off the other way for home.

  I didn’t say a word to a soul about it, until I caught Lionel Walker at the street corner one evening, a few days later.

  “Remember what you said about doctors buying dragonflies?” I said. “Well, I took a beauty to Paddy Bryce, but he didn’t buy it.”

  “He didn’t!” said Lionel. “That’s damn funny. What did he say?”

  “It wasn’t him I saw,” I said, “it was his maid. She took it in to him whilst I waited. Then she brought it back and said he’d no wish to purchase.”

  Lionel thought all this over for a full minute, fingering his chin at the same time. Then he turned to me and said in a whisper: “How long were she gone?”

  “A good ten minutes,” I said, “or happen more.”

  “The blooming thief!” cried Lionel. “He were drawing all the poison off while you were waiting”

  It seemed to me then that Lionel was speaking the gospel truth. I suddenly remembered how uneasy the maid had looked when she brought me the tin back.

  “How did it look, Billy, when you got it back?” he said.

  “A bit limp,” I said, “now you come to mention it.”

  “That removes all doubt,” declared Lionel. “Listen, that artful rogue was stealing all the poison out of thy dragonfly, lad, whilst tha sat there in the waiting room— thy heart full of trust for the medical profession. And, when he’d got what he wanted, he gave it thee back, an’ said he’d no wish to purchase.”

  Well, these clever folk can say what they like about there being no poison in a dragonfly, but we know different. And in no time that story was all round the neighbourhood about how Doctor Bryce had stolen the poison from my dragonfly without paying up. And the name “Poison Pincher” stuck to him to his dying day, for where I come from folk don’t forget such things in a hurry. Not that it affected the size of his practice, mind you, unless it was to increase it, for as Mrs Winny put it: “A chap as crafty as that cannot help but be a good doctor.”

  Taddy the Lamplighter

  Through the dense narrow streets where I lived as a boy, there came every evening a man called Taddy the Lamplighter. A bunch of us lads would be huddled round the lamp-post at the corner of Alley Brew, shoving close up to each other for warmth, and telling ‘Pat and Mick” tales in the darkness while waiting for him.

  From a distance you could see the flicker of his light, held high in the air—fixed in a metal holder at the tip of his long pole—and we would all go silent as he drew near, and our eyes would watch upwards as he turned on the tap with a poke of his pole. The gas would hiss and he would thrust the torchlike tip through the glass door at the bottom of the lamp, and then, at the instant of the bright gaslight exploding over us, we would scatter with cries and cheers of “Hooray! Good old Taddy!”

  Taddy always looked serious, but he seemed to enjoy our applause just the same. He would give a squint at the light, see if it was what it should be, whilst Ollie Baker, a serious-minded sort of lad, would always say something: “A champion light there tonight, Taddy!” To which Taddy would usually nod: “Aye, it is that an’ all!” Or if the light were not so good Ollie would say: “Not up to the mark tonight, Taddy!” And Taddy would shake his head and sigh: “Them ‘ometers must be low, me lad.” Then on his way he would go, and Ollie, who was the leader, would decide what game we should play, perhaps “Jumpy o’er back” or “Ride or kench”.

  One cold December evening there was a very light fall of snow—not enough for snow fights, but enough to make “a slur”. This was a slide about two feet wide and twenty-five feet in length, starting at the lamp-post and running down the steep pavement of Alley Brew. In swift file we skated down, Ollie leading, and our clog-irons* quickly brought up a slippery glass-like surface. And just as we were tiring a bit, Art Baines spotted Taddy’s light.

  “Quick!” he whispered, “let’s lay a blind slur for Taddy!”

  I could see Ollie wasn’t for it, but all the others agreed that quick, that he didn’t try to sway them. We dropped down on our knees, and with our caps we coaxed a thin coating of snow over our slur. And when it was hidden we got in our usual position by the lamp, and we watched old Taddy as he came along.

  His two flat feet slopped up the Brew† in the snow, and by some lucky chance they kept just at the edge of the slur without stepping on to it. We had expected him to go arm over tip at every step, but he hadn’t, and now we watched in silence as he lifted his pole to nudge the tap. Then, just as he was about to pop the torch up the lamp, he moved a foot—and that did for him. He let out a squeak, and in a flurried attempt to recover his balance as his foot slipped, he jerked his other foot on to the slur.

  Poor old Taddy—his shout for help was drowned by our laughter and yells as we watched him slide backwards, his pole in the air, and faster he went until he fell flat on his face. And even then, stretched out, he went on sliding, while we ran off with yells and shrieks. But I think we all felt a bit ashamed.

  After waiting by the chapel for twenty minutes, and there being no sign of Taddy coming to light his next lamp we got anxious.

  “We’ll hatta go back an’ see,” said Ollie.

  There were about nine of us, and with Ollie in the lead we cautiously made our way back.

  “Look!” I whispered, “the owd chap’s lying where he fell!”

  And sure enough he was, down on the snowy pavement, his pole swung some feet away. He wasn’t unconscious, but he was groaning. We went to help him up, expecting him to curse us, but instead he began moaning about the lamps.

  “Me lamps!—all me lamps are out!—an’ I’ve busted me arm an’ carn’t light ‘urn.” His right arm hung limp. “Tak’ me watch outa m’pocket,” he said. I put my hand in his waistcoat pocket and pulled out a big watch. “All but eight o’clock,
” I said.

  “Oh, good grief,” cried Taddy, “folk won’t be able to see their way about without me lamps. I’ll get sacked—I will for a surety.”

  Ollie stood before the old man:

  “We was the instigators, Taddy,” he said solemnly, “an’ it’s up to us to see that thy lamps are lit. But first we gotta take thee to Doctor Paddy Bryce to have thy arm fixed.”

  “Nay, nay,” said Taddy, brightening up—“the lights come first! I can have my arm fettled afterwards.”

  We all marched round with Taddy and his pole, some supporting him, because he felt weak, and others competing for the job of lighting the lamps—which meant a few gas mantles were broken by our excited and inexpert hands. Then we took him to Paddy Bryce’s. We gathered outside the doctor’s and discussed the situation while he was inside.

  “It’s not his lighting-up job as is the problem,” said Ollie, “but his knocking-up job in the morning.”

  Taddy combined his job of lamplighter—which was very low paid—with that of knocker-up. Although a number of workers used the new-fangled alarum-clock, the majority relied on Taddy. Not only for the human touch but also because Taddy did not merely waken you, he took it as his responsibility to actually get you up. Many with clocks had been known to overlie, but that had never happened to one of Taddy’s customers.

  “Folk ‘ull miss their work,” said Art Baines.

  To us, at that time, this seemed the worst thing that could possibly happen to anybody. We all went very quiet, and deadly serious. And when Taddy came out of the surgery, his arm bandaged beneath his topcoat, it was to confirm our fears:

  “I’m done,” he said. “I carn’t use my right hand, an’ I’ll not have strength enough in my left to whack with my knocking-up pole. There’ll be eighty-three families miss their work tomorrow—unless a miracle happens.”

  “Give us the names an’ lend us the pole,” said Ollie, “an’ we’ll knock ’um up for thee.”

  “No use,” said Taddy with a shake of his head, “I keep all the names an’ times in me head. An’ besides that, they every one expect their one special call. They won’t get up without it. I’ve gotta bully some an’ coax others, an’ so on.”

  Ollie turned to me: “Let’s volunteer to go with him in the morning, eh, Bill?”

  “It’s a late morning,” put in Taddy eagerly. “My first customer isn’t till haw’ past four. I could give you both a shout at twenty-past. You could whack an’ I’d call.”

  Half-past four didn’t seem so late to me, but with them all looking at me I had to say I would. But I was uneasy at what my mother would say about being wakened at that hour. To my surprise, however, she agreed with the idea, and since my father was on the night shift at pit I didn’t have to worry over him.

  The thought of so many families depending on me to get them up worried me out of my sleep, and when Taddy called I was already awake, and I ran downstairs in my bare feet. In two minutes I was dressed and out in the street with a butty in my hand.

  “Ollie should be here in a minute,” said Taddy, “so we’ll give Harry Foster a call while we’re waiting.”

  He handed me a long bamboo pole that had an end made of a fan of flexible wires, and when we got to Foster’s I stood looking at the upstairs window, and waiting for Taddy to give me the signal.

  “Right, me lad,” he said, “let him have a tattoo of nice sharp raps, but not too heavy.”

  Feeling nervous, but willing, I tapped the wires against the window.

  “Nay, nay, that’ll never do!” snapped Taddy. “Sharp raps but not heavy ones.”

  The next time I did better, and when I had finished Taddy called up.

  “‘Arry!” ‘Arry! it wants a minute to haw-past.”

  I heard Harry let out a sigh: “What time did tha say it were?”

  “Haw’ past four. Nice morning, ‘Arry, a topcoat warmer than it was yes’day. Snow’s done it.”

  He waited, listening for Harry’s footsteps on the bedroom floor. When he heard them clomp heavily he nodded: “I can trust Harry—he’ll not go back to bed. But some of ‘um jump straight in again once me back’s turned.”

  The next customer was Steve Duckley, and Taddy had a change of tactics here. Ollie who had now arrived, was told: “Keep smattering till tha hears a voice.”

  Ollie almost rapped the window in, and both of us laughed because we could hear Steve’s snoring above the sound of the wires.

  “Steve!” growled Taddy, “Steve, you flamer—wilt’ waken up!”

  “Aw … aw …” grunted Steve.

  “Come on,” said Taddy, “we’ll leave him for a few minutes an’ go across to Miss Spood who works at the chemic’ factory.”

  He warned me as I held the pole: “Very gently, me lad —like it were the breeze playing ont’ glass.” Then, after my very delicate tapping he called softly: “Are you awake, Florence? It’s twenty minutes to five, my dear, an’ it’s a petticoat warmer till it was yes’day.”

  Florence replied, “Yerss!” And as we moved to the next house Taddy explained: “That girl needs coaxing. She’s very sensitive—a sharp word would turn her back into bed for the day.”

  The next customer was a miner called Jack Beezer, and I was shocked at the language he used on Taddy. He cursed him for all he was worth, and refused to get up. We went to another customer and then returned to Jack:

  “Tha’s missed the first winding,” shouted Taddy, “an’ tha’s missed the second, an’ I’ll bet tha misses the third.” Then he whispered to me: “Keep tapping an’ don’t stop till I tell thee.” I kept at it, though when Jack jumped up with a roar I ran away.

  “He’s a good lad is Jack,’ said Taddy. “He allus pays me eightpence a week: fourpence for knocking him up an’ fourpence for being cussed by him.”

  Twenty minutes later when we were passing Beezer’s, Jack was waiting at the door with a pint pot of tea for Taddy. The busiest time was from five-thirty to six-thirty, and after that Taddy relaxed, bought a newspaper, and added an item of news to his greeting:

  “Twenty-to-seven, Sarah!” Pause. “I see they’ve nabbed that chap who chopped up his wife—he were in lodgings at Blackpoo’.”

  Taddy had very sharp eyes and he kept a constant watch for people going back to bed, and if there were no light downstairs he would go back and investigate. Nobody escaped.

  At seven o’clock he let Ollie and myself go, saying that he could manage the remaining few without using his pole, and so, excited and slightly tired, we ran off home.

  But as the days went on to weeks—and Taddy’s arm seemed to get worse instead of better—the job, though interesting, lost most of its excitement. The other lads would go lighting the lamps, but none of them could be relied upon to get up at just after four in the morning, so that the job fell to Ollie and myself all the time.

  Then when it seemed that we were destined to go round with Taddy for the rest of our days, it chanced that we bumped into Doctor Bryce one morning—when he was coming out of Ogden’s, where the eldest daughter had been having a bad time over her first confinement. He was a very surly chap when sober and it seemed that he was about to pass us without speaking, were it not that he spotted Taddy’s arm in the sling.

  “What the devil’s the matter with you?” he asked. “It’s over a month since I told you to give that arm plenty of exercise.” And being a blunt sort of a chap he grabbed Taddy’s arm out of the sling and began to shake it violently up and down: “That’s healed grand,” he said, “so you keep it on the move—or I’ll clout your lug if I catch you dodging.”

  Ollie and myself saw it all. The minute the doctor walked off Taddy put his hand out for the knocking-up pole.

  “An’ I should damn well think so!” snorted Ollie.

  “Taddy,’.’ I said, “you’re a false ‘un!”

  “I were lonely,” said Taddy sadly. “It’s a lonely job. You lads were such company for me, I didn’t like to be left on my own again. I hope you’re n
ot mad at me. Goodbye.”

  As we watched him trudge up the street Ollie said: “Poor chap, his working days are numbered.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “They’ve invented street lights that light themselves,” said Ollie, “an’ them cheap alarum-clocks will soon be all the vogue, so that nob’dy ‘ull want a knocker-up.”

  I half-believed what he said about the lamps, but I could not believe what he said about the clocks. I thought about it walking home in the dark morning, and I could not imagine that any right-minded person would choose to be roused by the noisy racket of a cheap alarum-clock in preference to Taddy’s sensitive window-tapping and his understanding of how folk feel when they’re wakened up. By contrast the tin clock seemed a horrible way of being woke up, and I should have been right shaken had I known that it would triumph as swiftly as it did over old Taddy.

  The Key of the Cabinet

  “Now here you are,” said my mother, putting the coins down on the edge of the dresser, “your Friday fourpence.”

  “Could I have my Saturday sixpence at the same time, Mam?” I said. “It ‘ud save you the trouble tomorrow.”

  “It’ll be no trouble,” she said, “if I have it to give. Off you go.”

  I went to the door and out into the street. There was something gloomy about February, even on a Friday. Christmas was well behind you, marble and top-and-whip season not in yet. I set off for Ma Enty’s shop to buy some everlasting toffee.

  I was halfway down the street when suddenly I heard a loud bang from the street corner. I went running up to see what it was when I saw my mate, Ernie Egan.

  “Wut was that, Ernie?”

  “Ned Anderson striking off a key.”

  “Gerroff,” I said. “ ‘Strike the key’ season hasn’t started.”

  “Go an’ see,” said Ernie. “It’s just broke out all over the place. Lads are goin’ mad. I’m off to find m’own key.”

  I ran to the street corner as three more bangs sounded. I saw half a dozen of my mates on the swing and others loading up. Each one had a key, a hollow key, fastened to a length of string, with a long nail tied to the other end. I went and stood beside Ned Anderson, who was just loading up.