II
Tom and Jack and Lennie still slept in the cubby, but Og and Magog had moved indoors. The three of them lay in the dark, without sleeping.
“Say, young Len,” said Tom at length, “what was you after, letting Monica get mixed up with that Pink-eye Percy?”
“Me? What was I after? How could I be after ’er every minute. She snapped my ’ead off if I looked at ’er. What for did you an’ Jack stop away all that time, an’ never write a word to nobody? Blame me, all right! But you go ‘avin’ ’igh jinks in the Never-Never, and nobody says a word to you. You never did nothing wrong, did you? An’ you kep’ an eye on the fam’ly, didn’t you? An’ it’s only me to blame. ‘F course! ’Twould be! But what about yourselves?”
This outburst was received in silence. Then a queer, sullen snake reared its head haughtily in Jack’s soul.
“I shouldn’t have thought she’d have cared for Percy,” said he.
“No more would nobody,” replied Len. “You never know what women’s up to. Give me a steady woman, Lord, I pray. Because for the last year Monica wasn’t right in ’er mind, that’s what I say. It wasn’t Percy’s fault. It was she made ’im. She made ’im as soft as grease about ’er. Percy’s not bad, he’s not. But women can make him as soft as grease. An’ I knows what that means myself. Either there shouldn’t be no men an’ women, or they should be kept apart till they’re pitched into the same pen, to breed.”
Tom, with Honeysuckle Lucy on his conscience, said never a word.
“Is it true that Percy’s got a wife already out east?” asked Jack.
“He say he has. But he wrote to find out if she was dead. At first he said he wasn’t to blame. Then he said he was, but he couldn’t marry her. An’ Monica like a wild cat at us all. She would let nobody write an’ tell you. She went over to Reds, but Easu had just got married, an’ Sarah Ann threatened to lay her out. Then she turned on Percy. I tell you, she skeered me. The phosphorus came out of her eyes like a wildcat’s. She’s bewitched or something. Or else possessed of a devil. That’s what I think she is. Though I needn’t talk, for maybe I am myself. Oh, mates, leave me alone, I’m sick of it all. Lemme go to sleep.”
“What did she go over to Easu’s for?”
“God knows. She’d been nosing round with Easu, till Ma got mad and put a stop to it. But that’s a good while since. A good while afore Easu married the lovely Sarah Ann, with her rows o’ cartridges on her forehead. Oh Cripes, marriage! Leave m’alone, I tell you.”
“Funny she should go to Easu’s, if she was struck on Percy,” said Jack.
“Don’t make me think of it, sonny!” came Len’s voice. “She went round like a cat who’s goin’ t’ have kittens, an’ nobody knew what was amiss with her. Oh Jehosaphat! Talk about bein’ born in sin. I should think we are. But say, Jack! Do you suppose the Lord gets awful upset, whether Monica has a baby or not? I don’t believe He does. An’ I don’t believe Jesus either turns a hair. I don’t believe. He turns half a hair. Yet we get into all this stew. Tell you what, makes a chap sick of bein’ a humain bein’. Wish I grew feathers, an’ was an emu.”
“Don’t you bother,” said Jack.
“Not me,” said Len. “I don’t bother! Anyhow I know all about the parsley bed, ’n I don’t care, I’d rather know an’ have done with it. ‘S got to come some time. I’m a collar-horse, I am, like ol’ Rackett said. All right, let me be one. Let me be one, an’ pull me guts out. Might just as well do that, as be a sick outlaw like Rackett, or a softy like Percy. Leave m’alone! I’ve got the collar on, an’ the load behind, an’ I’ll pull it out if I pulls me guts out. That’s the past, present an’ future of Lennie.”
“Where is Rackett?”
“Hanged if I know. Don’t matter where he is. He wanted to educate me an’ make a gentleman of me. Else I’d be nothing but a cart-’oss, he said. Well, I am nothing but a cart-’oss. But if I enjoys pullin’ me guts out, let me. I enjoys it all right.”
Tom lay in silence in the dark, and felt scared. He hated having to face things. He hated taking a long view. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof, was his profound conviction. He hated even to look round the next corner.
“Say, Jack,” came Lennie’s voice again. “You always turns up like a silver lining. I got your cheques all right. Fifty-seven pound. That’s only a pair o’ socks, that is, compared to Gran’s store. I had to have a laugh over that stockin’, you’re the angel that stood in Jacob’s doorway an’ looked like a man, you are. I’d love it if you’d come an’ live with me an’ Ruthie.”
But Jack was thinking his own thoughts. It had come over him that it was Easu who had betrayed Monica. The picture of her wandering across like a cat that is going to have kittens, to the Red’s place, and facing that fearful, common Sarah Ann, and Easu grinning and looking on, made his spirit turn to steel. Pink-eye Percy was not the father of that baby. Percy was as soft as wax. Monica would never have fallen for him. She had simply made use of him. The baby was Easu’s.
“Was the baby a girl or a boy?” he asked.
“A girl.”
“Did it look like Percy?”
“Not it. It didn’t have any of Percy’s goo-goo brown eyes or anything. Ma said it was the spitten image of Harry when he was born.”