The Widow in the Bye Street Part 3

'It's in that b.l.o.o.d.y box you're sitting on, What more d'you want?' A concertina plays Far off as wandering lovers go their ways.

Up the dim Bye Street to the market-place The dead bones of the fair are borne in carts, Horses and swing-boats at a funeral pace After triumphant hours quickening hearts; A policeman eyes each waggon as it starts, The drowsy showmen stumble half asleep, One of them catcalls, having drunken deep.

So out, over the pa.s.s, into the plain, And the dawn finds them filling empty cans In some sweet-smelling dusty country lane, Where a brook chatters over rusty pans.

The iron chimneys of the caravans Smoke as they go. And now the fair has gone To find a new pitch somewhere further on.

But as the fair moved out two lovers came, Ernie and Bessie loitering out together; Bessie with wild eyes, hungry as a flame, Ern like a stallion tugging at a tether.

It was calm moonlight, and October weather, So still, so lovely, as they topped the ridge.

They brushed by Jimmy standing on the bridge.

And, as they pa.s.sed, they gravely eyed each other, And the blood burned in each heart beating there; And out into the Bye Street tottered mother, Without her shawl, in the October air.

'Jimmy,' she cried, 'Jimmy.' And Bessie's hair Drooped on the instant over Ernie's face, And the two lovers clung in an embrace.

'O, Ern.' 'My own, my Bessie.' As they kissed Jimmy was envious of the thing unknown.

So this was Love, the something he had missed, Woman and man athirst, aflame, alone.

Envy went knocking at his marrow-bone, And Anna's face swam up so dim, so fair, s.h.i.+ning and sweet, with poppies in her hair.

III

After the fair, the gang began again.

Tipping the trollies down the banks of earth.

The truck of stone clanks on the endless chain, A clever pony guides it to its berth.

'Let go.' It tips, the navvies shout for mirth To see the pony step aside, so wise, But Jimmy sighed, thinking of Anna's eyes.

And when he stopped his shovelling he looked Over the junipers towards Plaister way, The beauty of his darling had him hooked, He had no heart for wrastling with the clay.

'O Lord Almighty, I must get away; O Lord, I must. I must just see my flower, Why, I could run there in the dinner hour.'

The whistle on the pilot engine blew, The men knocked off, and Jimmy slipped aside Over the fence, over the bridge, and through, And then ahead along the water-side, Under the red-brick rail-bridge, arching wide, Over the hedge, across the fields, and on; The foreman asked: 'Where's Jimmy Gurney gone?'

It is a mile and more to Plaister's End, But Jimmy ran the short way by the stream, And there was Anna's cottage at the bend, With blue smoke on the chimney, faint as steam.

'G.o.d, she's at home,' and up his heart a gleam Leapt like a rocket on November nights, And shattered slowly in a burst of lights.

Anna was singing at her kitchen fire, She was surprised, and not well pleased to see A sweating navvy, red with heat and mire, Come to her door, whoever he might be.

But when she saw that it was Jimmy, she Smiled at his eyes upon her, full of pain, And thought, 'But, still, he mustn't come again.

People will talk; boys are such crazy things; But he's a dear boy though he is so green.'

So, hurriedly, she slipped her ap.r.o.n strings, And dabbed her hair, and wiped her fingers clean, And came to greet him languid as a queen, Looking as sweet, as fair, as pure, as sad, As when she drove her loving husband mad.

'Poor boy,' she said, 'Poor boy, how hot you are.'

She laid a cool hand to his sweating face.

'How kind to come. Have you been running far?

I'm just going out; come up the road a pace.

O dear, these hens; they're all about the place.'

So Jimmy shooed the hens at her command, And got outside the gate as she had planned.

'Anna, my dear, I love you; love you, true; I had to come--I don't know--I can't rest-- I lay awake all night, thinking of you.

Many must love you, but I love you best.'

'Many have loved me, yes, dear,' she confessed, She smiled upon him with a tender pride, 'But my love ended when my husband died.

Still, we'll be friends, dear friends, dear, tender friends; Love with its fever's at an end for me.

Be by me gently now the fever ends, Life is a lovelier thing than lovers see, I'd like to trust a man, Jimmy,' said she, 'May I trust you?' 'Oh, Anna dear, my dear---- 'Don't come so close,' she said, 'with people near.

Dear, don't be vexed; it's very sweet to find One who will understand; but life is life, And those who do not know are so unkind.

But you'll be by me, Jimmy, in the strife, I love you though I cannot be your wife; And now be off, before the whistle goes, Or else you'll lose your quarter, goodness knows.'

'When can I see you, Anna? Tell me, dear.

To-night? To-morrow? Shall I come to-night?

'Jimmy, my friend, I cannot have you here; But when I come to town perhaps we might.

Dear, you must go; no kissing; you can write, And I'll arrange a meeting when I learn What friends are doing' (meaning Shepherd Ern).

'Good-bye, my own.' 'Dear Jim, you understand.

If we were only free, dear, free to meet, Dear, I would take you by your big, strong hand And kiss your dear boy eyes so blue and sweet; But my dead husband lies under the sheet, Dead in my heart, dear, lovely, lonely one, So, Jim, my dear, my loving days are done.

But though my heart is buried in his grave Something might be--friends.h.i.+p and utter trust-- And you, my dear starved little Jim shall have Flowers of friends.h.i.+p from my dead heart's dust; Life would be sweet if men would never l.u.s.t.

Why do you, Jimmy? Tell me sometime, dear, Why men are always what we women fear.

Not now. Good-bye; we understand, we two, And life, O Jim, how glorious life is; This suns.h.i.+ne in my heart is due to you; I was so sad, and life has given this.

I think "I wish I had something of his,"

Do give me something, will you be so kind?

Something to keep you always in my mind.

'I will,' he said. 'Now go, or you'll be late.'

He broke from her and ran, and never dreamt That as she stood to watch him from the gate Her heart was half amus.e.m.e.nt, half contempt, Comparing Jim the squab, red and unkempt, In sweaty corduroys, with Shepherd Ern.

She blew him kisses till he pa.s.sed the turn.

The whistle blew before he reached the line; The foreman asked him what the h.e.l.l he meant, Whether a duke had asked him out to dine, Or if he thought the bag would pay his rent?

And Jim was fined before the foreman went.

But still his spirit glowed from Anna's words, Cooed in the voice so like a singing bird's.

'O Anna, darling, you shall have a present; I'd give you golden gems if I were rich, And everything that's sweet and all that's pleasant.'

He dropped his pick as though he had a st.i.tch, And stared tow'rds Plaister's End, past Bushe's Pitch.

O beauty, what I have to give I'll give, All mine is yours, beloved, while I live.'

All through the afternoon his pick was slacking, His eyes were always turning west and south, The foreman was inclined to send him packing, But put it down to after fair-day drouth; He looked at Jimmy with an ugly mouth, And Jimmy slacked, and muttered in a moan, 'My love, my beautiful, my very own.'

So she had loved. Another man had had her; She had been his with pa.s.sion in the night; An agony of envy made him sadder, Yet stabbed a pang of bitter-sweet delight-- O he would keep his image of her white.

The foreman cursed, stepped up, and asked him flat What kind of gum-tree he was gaping at.

It was Jim's custom, when the pay day came, To take his weekly five and twenty s.h.i.+lling Back in the little packet to his dame; Not taking out a farthing for a filling, Nor twopence for a pot, for he was willing That she should have it all to save or spend.

But love makes many lovely customs end.

Next pay day came and Jimmy took the money, But not to mother, for he meant to buy A thirteen-s.h.i.+lling locket for his honey, Whatever bellies hungered and went dry, A silver heart-shape with a ruby eye.

He bought the thing and paid the shopman's price, And hurried off to make the sacrifice.

'Is it for me? You dear, dear generous boy.