Payment Deferred · Chapter 2 (2/2)

Mr. Marble eyed the whisky bottle. He felt he needed some, despite the fact that he had already had three or four⁠—or was it five or six?⁠—whiskies that day. He was very tired, very, very tired, and his head ached. Just as it ached this time yesterday. No, he didn’t want to think about yesterday. How his arms ached with that digging! He ought to have caught cold, too, seeing how it had been raining, but he hadn’t. Pure Scotch Whisky. Very plain on the bottle, but it was good stuff inside. God, but it was! An indescribably passionate longing to drink came over him, and he scraped his chair back from the table and fetched the corkscrew from the sideboard drawer. He drew the cork rapidly and dexterously. Not a scrap fell into the bottle. Then he found himself a tumbler and stood it beside the bottle. There was no soda-water left after last night, but he didn’t want soda-water. He didn’t want anything besides the relief that he knew a few sips of that yellow liquid would bring him. He fingered the bottle lovingly, still standing by the table. Suddenly he became aware of his children’s gaze upon him. Glad of the distraction from the drudgery of homework, they had been sitting silently watching his every movement. With a gust of fury Marble realized that it was impossible for him to drink with those solemn eyes upon him. He put the bottle down again upon the table with a thump.

“Confound you kids!” he said furiously. “Why on earth aren’t you in bed?”

Neither child spoke. The doom was close upon them again, they knew, and this time it was more than could be hoped for for another new arrival to postpone it, as had happened so miraculously yesterday. But if they kept quiet and pretended to be closely occupied with their work it might be all aright. They buried their noses in their books. Marble could only see the tops of their heads, moving a little as they pored over their writing.

“Bah!” he said. “Don’t act about like that. Shut up those books and go to bed. At once, now.”

Under more favourable circumstances they would have protested that it was not nearly bedtime yet. They should have pointed out that it was only a little after seven o’clock, and they were entitled to another hour at least. But they knew, in the intuitive manner of children, that this time the less they said the better for them. They began silently to pack up their books.

“Go to bed! Go to bed!” raved Mr. Marble.

“Don’t look at me like that, sir,” thundered Mr. Marble. He had suddenly become half hysterical with rage. He pounded on the table with the whisky bottle, crazy with thwarted eagerness. John turned his scowling face in another direction, but the expression on his face was unchanged, and served to drive his father more frantic than ever, if that were possible. He reached out and struck the boy a heavy blow with his open hand, making him stagger.

They went, without a word, but the scowl on John’s face had somehow something triumphant about it now. If he was going to be sent to bed in arbitrary fashion, he would at least see that his father lost his temper during the process. John always felt he disliked his father during these queer moods of his⁠—and the moods were becoming more and more frequent too.

The children went, and Mr. Marble sighed with relief. He dragged his armchair up to the fire, and put the small table beside it for his glass. He would wait and be quite methodical now that a drink was an immediate certainty. He poured himself out a moderate drink and tossed it off. He felt better at once, more peaceful, more safe. He refilled his glass, and set it beside him. Then he sat down comfortably by the fire and gazed at the leaping flames. This was just what he wanted to do yesterday, before that wretched boy turned up and spoilt his evening. But it was even better than yesterday, because then he had only three drinks in the decanter. Now he had a whole bottle full, which would last him for this evening at least, without any thought of stinting. It was fine not having to stint. He wouldn’t have to stint in any direction at all for another two weeks at least, thank goodness, or for a lot more than that, if only he were to change those five-pound notes. And after all, why shouldn’t he? Of course the one-pound notes were as safe as anything, but the fivers ought to be just as safe too. They wouldn’t give anything away, even if they were traced from Medland to himself. And if he took care and only cashed them at places where he wasn’t known they wouldn’t be traced at all. Anyway what did it all matter? It was silly to think that he was going to all the trouble he went to last night just to pay off a miserable thirty pounds of debts. Better to be hung for a sheep than for a lamb. Stop! Why was he thinking about hanging?

Mrs. Marble, reentering from the kitchen, saw her husband reach out greedily for the glass on the table at his side, and swallow its contents in violent gulps. Then she knew that dear Will would be unapproachable for the rest of the evening, and she would not be able to have that pleasant chat with him about what Jim had done for them that she had been looking forward to all day. Mrs. Marble was rather disappointed.