I
The March wind went shrieking over the Midland Plain. Under a sky as rapid, ragged, and tumultuous as a revolution, all the standing water, the gathered thaws and rains of February, filling the dykes and spreading over innumerable fields, was ruffled and whitened, so that the day glittered coldly. There was ice even yet in this wind, but already there were other things too, shreds and tatters of sunlight, sudden spicy gusts, distant trumpetings of green armies on the march. Unless you were one of the patient men of the fields, following the great shining flanks of your horses across the ten-acre and already hearing the sap stirring, you did not know what to do in the face of such a wind. It was up to all manner of tricks. “Grrrr! Get indoors and stay there!” it would go screaming. “Poke the fire! Whe‑ew!” And it might send a lash of hail after you. But then not quarter of an hour later, it might be crying “Come out, come out! The year’s begun,” promising primroses, and spilling a little pale sunlight down the road. The moment you did go out, however, it would give a sharp twitch, darkening the sky again, and with a long Whe‑ew Grrrr! would sting your cheeks and set your eyes watering. A most mischievous wind.
Away it went, across the central plain of England, until at last it pounced upon those three little industrial towns, Gatford, Mundley, and Stort, that are known as the Triangle, and more recently, since the towns gave themselves up to the mass production of cheap cars, the Tin Triangle. There are very few towns in this island so close together as Gatford, Mundley, and Stort, and a stranger might easily imagine they were all one town. On the other hand, there are hardly any other towns that seem farther away from anywhere else: Gatford jostles Mundley and Stort, and Mundley and Stort creep closer to one another; but the three of them appear to be almost as remote as a constellation from any other place of importance. Those short nonstop runs on the railway from Gatford to either Manchester or Birmingham always seem miraculous; and when that daily procession of brand-new cars, shiny saloons or chassis with drivers perched on boxes, slides away down the London Road, it strikes the visitor as a most hazardous enterprise, an adventure. The Trianglers themselves, too, regard this daily departure of new Imperial Sixes and Lumbdens and Baby Sceptres as part of a great adventure. Nowadays cars pour out and money pours into the Triangle. It is said that J. J. Lumbden, the son of old Lumbden who kept the bicycle shop in Cobden Street, Gatford, is worth nearly half a million and steadfastly refuses the most gigantic offers from America. The Sceptre people are building yet another factory between Mundley and Stort. And nobody can say there is anything tinny about the Imperial Six, the pride of North Gatford and Stort, where every other man is a mechanic. There is hardly a schoolboy in the Triangle, even in South Gatford, where there are detached villas and tennis clubs and boulevards, who does not groan with impatience, to think he is wasting his time with stuff about Magna Carta and Rivers of South America and Adverbs when he might be working in one of the car factories, swaggering out at half past five, very black and knowing. Useless to talk to the Triangle about bad trade and what might be done with the unemployed; it never knew such days before; Gatford is nearly twice the size it was twenty years ago, and Mundley and Stort, invaded by mechanics from every part of the Midlands, are growing visibly, at the rate of so many new little red bricks per fine working day. These are adventurous times for the three towns. The March wind, itself supremely adventurous, pounced upon them with glee. Here, it seemed to shout, was something better to play with than naked fields and branches and thin tremulous sheets of water.
It swooped down and charged the steady swarm of cars, the trams that lumber from Gatford to Mundley, Stort to Mundley, Gatford to Stort, the buses that dodge and hoot at and overtake these trams. It whipped off a loose tile and even a chimney-pot here and there. After seeking out any tattered posters on the hoardings and turning them into drums, it rounded up all the odd pieces of paper in the streets and compelled them to join in a witches‚Äô Sabbath. This most mischievous wind then found an open window on the second floor of a building in Victoria Street, Gatford, sent some papers skimming from the table to the floor, and compelled a certain gentleman, who had been staring at some figures and now found himself shivering, to look up and speak crossly to his companion and employee. This is Mr.¬ÝRidvers, but when he is in this tiny office he calls himself the Triangle New Era Cinema Co., and it is from here he controls the destinies of The Tivoli Picture Palace, Gatford, The Coliseum Picture House, Mundley, and The Royal Cinema, Stort, the only three cinemas of any importance in the district.
‚ÄúFor God‚Äôs sake, Ethel,‚Äù he said, ‚Äúshut that window. Look at those letters‚ÅÝ‚Äîall over the damn floor. Besides, it‚Äôs cold.‚Äù
From behind her typewriter, Ethel gave him a curious sideways look. She was a girl in her twenties, with a rather flat Mongolian face, hard staring eyes, and a thick daubed mouth. “It was you who wanted it open,” she remarked. “Told you it was cold.”
“Well, I want it shut now,” he grunted, without looking up again from the papers in his hand.
“All right, all right,” and she closed the window. There was nothing respectful in her tones, and there was something downright disrespectful in the way she moved. The exaggerated thrust and lift of her shoulders gave the impression that her body was making really impudent remarks about her employer. There was a suggestion that it had the right to make such remarks and that he knew very well it had.
Mr.¬ÝRidvers examined the figures before him a minute or two longer, then stood up and threw the papers on the table. He found a half-smoked cigar in the ashtray, relit it, and pulled furiously at it, frowning all the time. Ethel watched him out of the corner of her eye with amusement. He had been in a bad mood all morning and now he was obviously very angry indeed. As a matter of fact, he was a middle-aged man who ate too much, drank far too much whisky, took too little exercise, and was plagued by an outraged liver. He had his grievances, but it was really the sudden cold lash of the wind that had now put a sharp edge on his temper.
“Well?” And there was a certain malice in Ethel’s query.
“Well nothing!” he exploded. “These returns are worse than I thought. It was Stort last week. I suppose it’ll be Mundley this week. I’d never have believed it. These flaming little pierrots are knocking hell out of the returns.”
“I told you what it would be.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, don’t start that! Never knew a woman yet who didn’t think she’d gone and told me everything. People here must have gone balmy. Pierrots!”
“They’re crowded out every night,” said Ethel.
“Yes, I know they are. I’m not silly. Even so, they oughtn’t to have knocked us like this. Damn it all, there ought to be enough money in these three towns to keep us going as usual even if they are crowded out. I’ve given ’em good programmes.”
“I don’t know about that,” Ethel replied coolly. “You know very well you cut it a bit on the renting.”
“What if I did? Matter of fact I had to cut it to show Farrow and his Syndicate a good margin. And what diff’rence does it make, what I paid for the renting. They’ve never seen the bloody pictures before, have they? Well then! No, it’s this pierrot show that’s done it. Who ever would have thought it! Talk about luck!”
“I hear they’re putting the prices up too,” said Ethel, who seemed to delight in flicking him on the raw.
‚ÄúThey would!‚Äù cried Mr.¬ÝRidvers bitterly. ‚ÄúThat means all the less money for us. Seems to me if these people spend two and four they‚Äôve finished for the week. Luck! They won‚Äôt even let me smell it.‚Äù And Mr.¬ÝRidvers made a number of sounds to express his disgust and then savagely jammed his cigar against the ashtray.
“I don’t know what you’re going on like this for,” said Ethel, who probably knew very well. “A few bad weeks won’t kill you.”
Mr.¬ÝRidvers made a large gesture of despair. ‚ÄúOh, have a bit of sense, Ethel. Won‚Äôt kill me! I don‚Äôt know what you sit there for, I honestly don‚Äôt.‚Äù
“Oh, don’t you?” cried Ethel, staring at him hard. “Well, I’m not always sitting here, am I, Mister Ridvers? Trying to turn me into a dummy or what?”
‚ÄúAll right, Ethel, easy, easy,‚Äù he replied, giving her shoulder a perfunctory pat, under which it squirmed. ‚ÄúBut I‚Äôve told you before. Farrow and his P.P.H. Syndicate,‚Äù he went on, with ferocious deliberation, ‚Äúare making me an offer for my three halls. You know that? All right then. That-offer-is-to-be-based-on-two-months‚Äô-returns-of-these-three-halls. The price is according. Or, if they don‚Äôt like the look of them, they won‚Äôt deal. They‚Äôll buy elsewhere. Or‚ÅÝ‚Äîwhat‚Äôs a damn sight worse‚ÅÝ‚Äîthey‚Äôll come here and build their own. And you know as well as I do what‚Äôs happened to our returns. And I ask you, who‚Äôd have thought a piebald, blink-eyed, bread-and-dripping little pierrot show, filling in time till it can get a pitch on the sands again, would have knocked ‚Äôem all silly here like that!‚Äù
‚ÄúI went out to Mundley last night to see them,‚Äù said Ethel. ‚ÄúFellow took me. Packed out they were too. It‚Äôs a clever show‚ÅÝ‚Äîbit slow in parts, ‚Äôspecially the women, but it‚Äôs clever. They‚Äôve a boy there who dances‚ÅÝ‚Äîname‚Äôs Jerningham‚ÅÝ‚Äîwho got me all right. Talk about dancing! And looks! He‚Äôs got the film fellows well beaten, that boy has. Tricky songs too.‚Äù
‚ÄúYou‚Äôre sillier than I thought you were,‚Äù Mr.¬ÝRidvers growled. ‚ÄúWith your dancing boys! They‚Äôve another week at Mundley Rink, haven‚Äôt they, after this? And then back to Gatford here again. I see they‚Äôve got the Hippodrome plastered with bills already. And I went to Billy Roberts and told him I didn‚Äôt want ‚Äôem back if possible and he owed me a good turn or two and he said he‚Äôd stiffen the terms‚ÅÝ‚Äîthey hadn‚Äôt taken it again then, you see‚ÅÝ‚Äîand make this woman who‚Äôs running the show rent it and shove all sorts of responsibility on to her. But that‚Äôs not frightened her, seemingly.‚Äù
‚ÄúWhy should it?‚Äù said Ethel. ‚ÄúI know it wouldn‚Äôt frighten me. She‚Äôs safe as houses here now‚ÅÝ‚Äîcan‚Äôt lose.‚Äù
Mr.¬ÝRidvers thought for a few moments. ‚ÄúHere,‚Äù he cried finally, ‚Äúwhere is this woman or whoever it is that‚Äôs running these ‚ÄòCompanions‚Äô or whatever they call themselves? Over at Mundley, I suppose?‚Äù
“No, she’s not. They’re all here, in Gatford, been staying here all the time and just running out to Stort and Mundley at night for the show. Her name’s Trant, and she’s staying at The Crown.”
‚ÄúYou seem to know a devil of a lot about them,‚Äù said Mr.¬ÝRidvers, facing her across the table. ‚ÄúQuite one of the pierrot fanciers, aren‚Äôt you! Must be the dancing boy. Well, don‚Äôt start any tricks, that‚Äôs all.‚Äù
‚ÄúI don‚Äôt start tricks,‚Äù she replied shrilly. ‚ÄúAnd if I did, I wouldn‚Äôt ask your permission, Mr.¬ÝCharlie Ridvers. You get your money‚Äôs worth out of me, don‚Äôt you? Start tricks! You‚Äôre a nice one to talk.‚Äù
‚ÄúOh, dry up,‚Äù said Mr.¬ÝRidvers. ‚ÄúCan‚Äôt you see I‚Äôve enough damn bother on my hands without you making trouble? I‚Äôm worried, that‚Äôs what I am, and I don‚Äôt mind admitting it.‚Äù He took down his hat and overcoat. ‚ÄúI‚Äôm going across to The Crown to have a little bit of a talk to this pierrot woman‚ÅÝ‚Äîwhat‚Äôs her name?‚ÅÝ‚ÄîTrant. That‚Äôs what I‚Äôm going to do.‚Äù
“And a fat lot of good it’ll do you,” cried Ethel. “What can you say to her? Silly, I call it.”
“Never mind what you call it. And never mind what I can say to her,” he replied, with an air of a man who had produced a crushing retort. He had no idea himself what he could say to this Miss Trant that would be of the slightest use, but he looked both knowing and truculent. “What’s it now? Half past two? Back just after three, I dare say.” With his hand on the knob, he stopped, turned round and looked darkly at Ethel. “She’s going to hear something from me, good or no good.”
“Go on then, get it off your chest,” she replied. “Perhaps you’ll feel better after that.” She gave the typewriter carriage a push so that it shot across and rang its little bell, a contemptuous, dismissing little bell.
All the way down the stairs, Mr.¬ÝRidvers told himself that Ethel was getting altogether too uppish and was not much use in the office any longer and not very much use anywhere else the way she was these days, and that it was always the same if you allowed yourself to have a bit of fun with them because the little bitches took advantage in a minute and it was time he stopped having these little games. The wind was very lively as he walked up Victoria Street, and he damned it heartily. It whistled round his legs, tried to snatch his hat, flung scraps of waste paper at him, and made him feel liverish again. At The Crown he found he had to stop at the bar and add two more whiskies, very quick ones, to the supply he had taken in during his early lunch; but they did not make his grievances seem any less or restore his lost temper.