Part 3 (2/2)

Morning came; the working-folk were early astir. Lean men and pale women, carrying their kettles and food-satchels in their hands, beat the slippery pavements with their wooden shoes. Doors and windows flew open; life began; every one walked with a busy air, knew where he was going; and they vanished here and there, through a big gate or behind a narrow door that shut with a bang. Carts with green stuff, waggons with sand and coal drove this way and that. Fellows with milk and bread went round; and it grew to a din of calls and cries, each shouting his loudest.

And he loafed. n.o.body looked at him, noticed him or wanted him. In the middle of the forenoon, a young lady had stared at him for a long time and said to her mother:

”What a huge fellow!”

He had heard her and it did him good. He looked round, but mother and daughter were gone, behind a corner, and stood gazing into a shop full of bows and ribbons.

It began to whirl terribly in his belly; and his stomach hurt him so; and his legs were tired.

The streets and houses and all those strange people annoyed him. He wanted to get away, far away, and to see men like himself: workers without work, who were hungry!

He looked for the narrow alleys and the poor quarter.

Out of a side-street a draycart came jogging along. Half a score of labourers lay tugging in the shoulder-strap or leant with all the force of their bodies against the cart, which rolled on toilsomely. 'Twas a load of flax, packed tightly in great square bales standing one against the other, the whole cart full. The dray caught its right wheel in the grating of an open gutter and remained stock-still, leaning aslant, as though planted there. The workmen racked and wrung to get the wheel out, but it was no good. Then they stood there, staring at one another, at their wits' end and throwing glances into the eyes of that big fellow who had come to look on. Without saying or speaking, he caught a spoke in either hand, pressed with his mighty shoulder against the inside of the wheel, bent and wrung and in a turn brought the cart on the level. Then he went behind among the other workmen to go and help them shove. They looked at him queerly, as if to say that they no longer needed his help and had rather done without him. The cart rolled on, another street or two, and then through the open gate of the warehouse. The labourers looked into one another's eyes uneasily, moved about, pulled the bales off the cart and dragged them a little farther along the wall. Then they tailed off, one by one, through a small inner door; and he stood there alone, like a fool. A bit later, he heard them laugh and whisper under their breaths. When he was tired of waiting, he went up the street again.

n.o.body, n.o.body, n.o.body wanted him!

He ground his teeth and clenched his fists. In the street through which he had to go, on the s.p.a.ces outside the hotels sat ladies and gentlemen toying with strange foods and sipping their wine out of long goblets.

They chattered gaily and tasted and pecked with dainty lips and turned-up noses. The waiters ran here, there, like slaves. Those coaxing smells stung like adders and roused evil thoughts in his brain. His stomach fretted awfully and his empty head turned.

He hurried away.

In a street with windowless house-fronts, a street without people in it, he felt better. He let his body lean against the iron post of a gas-lamp, stuck his hands in his trouser-pockets and stood there looking at the paving-stones. Now he was d.a.m.ned if he would take another step, he would rather croak here like a beast; then they would have to take him up and know that he existed.

The boys coming from school mocked him; they danced in a ring, with him, the big fellow, in the middle. They hung paper flags on his back and sang:

Hat, hat, Ugly old hat!

It serves as a slop-pail and as a hat!

He did not stir.

Yon came a milk-maid driving up in a cart drawn by dogs. He got a gnawing in his arms, a spout of blood shot to his head and he suddenly felt as if something was going to happen. Just as she drove past, he put his great hand on the edge of the little cart, with one pull took a copper can from its straw, put it to his mouth and drank; then he sent the can clattering through the window of the first-best house, till the panes rattled again.

Looking round--as if bewildered and set going, roused by what he had done--he caught sight of the frightened little dairy-maid. A mocking grin played on his cruel face; he flung his rough arm round her little body and lifted the girl out of the cart right up to his face in a fierce hug.

The boys had fled shrieking. He felt two pairs of hands pulling at his sleeves from below. He loosed the girl and saw two policemen who held him fast and ordered him to go with them. They held him by the arm on either side and stepped hurriedly to keep pace with his great strides. They looked in dismay at that huge fellow, with his wicked eyes, and then at each other, as if to ask what they should do.

They came to a narrow little street, with n.o.body in it, and stopped at a public-house:

”Could you do with a dram, mate?” they asked him.

He looked bewildered, astounded. They all three went inside; and each of them drank a big gla.s.s of gin.

The policemen whispered something together; the elder wiped the drink from his moustache and then said, very severely:

”And now, clear out; hurry up! And mind your manners, will you, next time!”

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