To Have and To Hold. Anne Bennett

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СКАЧАТЬ turban and what appeared to be a giant nappy on his lower half. As the friends watched in horrified fascination, two girls stepped forward, shed their shoes, and stood one his chest and one on his abdomen. The man made no sound and he seemed not to either feel the girls’ weight, nor the nails they could clearly see were pressing into his skin.

      Eventually, the girls got off and money as thrown into the bowl by the nailed bed by impressed onlookers. The man got up and came over to the nurses.

      ‘Any of you lot like to try? Promise I won’t look up your skirts.’

      ‘Carmel might fancy a go,’ Jane said with a smile at the repugnance on Carmel’s face.

      ‘Carmel would not—oh, no, definitely not,’ Carmel declared vehemently. ‘I think it’s just, well, just awful.’

      The man shrugged as Lois pulled her away.

      Carmel wasn’t that keen on the man tied in chains either, but was quite willing to stay around to see he got free in the end and was unharmed, though the others eventually got fed up.

      ‘He won’t even try until there is at least a pound in the hat, and that could take ages yet,’ Lois said.

      ‘Have you ever seen him get out?’

      ‘No, I haven’t personally.’

      ‘I have,’ Jane said. ‘But just the once.’

      ‘How?’ Carmel asked, for the man was trussed up like some of the chickens she had seen hanging from butchers’ stalls earlier that day.

      ‘I don’t know,’ Jane admitted. ‘He had a cloak around him. Didn’t take him long, I do remember that. People say it’s a swizz, but you can examine the chains and all if you want. He doesn’t mind.’

      ‘Well, I don’t fancy waiting around any more tonight.’ Sylvia said. ‘And the musicians will be setting up soon, I should think.’

      ‘Music,’ Carmel said. ‘That’s more my kind of thing.’

      ‘Oh, you’ll like it, all right,’ Lois said. ‘It’s from your neck of the woods—the first stuff they play, anyway— jigs and reels and that, and then they go on to the songs from the music halls that everybody knows.’

      ‘I don’t.’

      ‘You will when you’ve been here a bit,’ Sylvia put in.

      They went past the stilt walkers, still striding effortlessly around the market, and past Jimmy Jesus again, urging the people to repent and then their souls would be as white as the driven snow, washed by the blood of the Lamb. There were a few catcalls from some of the lads and a bit of jeering, but generally people seemed to tolerate the man very well. Carmel was glad, for she thought he had a very gentle voice and manner about him.

      By now the accordion players were just setting up in their corner.

      Lois said, ‘I don’t know what’s the matter with me, after that tea and everything. I must have worms because I could just murder a baked potato.’ She indicated a little man nearby with an oven shaped not unlike Stephenson’s Rocket, which Carmel had seen pictures of.

      ‘It’s just because you can smell them,’ Sylvia said. ‘They always smell lovely, I think.’

      ‘I don’t care what it is,’ Lois said, ‘I am buying one anyway. Anyone else want one, or are you going to let me be the only pig?’

      ‘Let me buy one for each of you,’ said a male voice suddenly.

      Lois swung around. ‘Paul!’ she exclaimed, and gave the man a hug before introducing him to her friends one by one. ‘Sylvia, Jane and Carmel, this is my cousin Paul.’

      ‘God,’ said Jane in an aside to Sylvia, ‘why haven’t I got cousins like that?’

      ‘Having them as cousins is no good,’ Sylvia replied, as the man in question and Lois went over to the hot potato man. ‘Did you see that dazzling smile he cast your way, Carmel?’

      ‘I can’t say I noticed,’ Carmel said.

      ‘You must be flipping blind then,’ Jane put in. ‘I really don’t know what’s the matter with you.’

      ‘I’ve told you, I’m not interested in men.’

      ‘God, Carmel, you must be mad,’ Sylvia protested. ‘I’d be turning somersaults if a man as dishy as that one smiled at me like he did you.’

      ‘Well, that’s you, isn’t it?’ Carmel retorted. ‘I don’t feel the same, that’s all.’

      ‘Carmel, we’re not talking of marrying the man, just having a bit of fun, and no harm in that either,’ Sylvia said. ‘After all, none of us can get married for years anyway, if we want to finish our training.’

      ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Jane said. ‘It depends on whether a better offer comes along. A man like that wouldn’t have to try very hard to entice me from the charming clutches of Matron.’

      The girls laughed but talk about Paul had to cease there, for he and Lois were approaching. Carmel found the potato surprisingly tasty. The music was good too and made her foot tap. The only thing that spoiled it for her was seeing the shambling women, clutching their spoils, children trailing behind them, leaving the market as the hawkers began packing away.

      She turned her face resolutely away from the sight and didn’t mention it at all lest the others be irritated by her. They tried to get her to show them a jig or a reel, but she would never show herself up like that and especially not with Paul’s eyes fastened on hers so intently.

      By the time the music-hall songs were being played, the hot potatoes were all eaten and everyone was belting out the songs, Paul had somehow arranged it so that he was right next to Carmel. He might as well have been invisible for Carmel took no notice of him at all.

      Eventually, in a lull between tunes, he said, ‘I believe you and my illustrious cousin are room-mates?’

      Jane, hearing this, gave Sylvia a nudge, she nodded and they moved forward into the crowd, taking Lois with them.

      Carmel answered, ‘That’s right.’

      ‘And this is your first visit to the Bull Ring she said?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Well, what do you think of it?’

      Carmel shrugged. ‘It’s all right.’

      Paul smiled. ‘Just all right?’

      ‘What d’you want me to say?’ Carmel cried. ‘It’s good. I’ve enjoyed it.’

      ‘Have you anything like this where you come from?’

      ‘No, not really.’

      ‘You hail from Ireland, Lois said?’

      ‘That’s right?’

      ‘Which СКАЧАТЬ