Read Online Vacant Possession by Hilary Mantel - Free Book Online Page B

sang a few of his favourite hymns, and he shook hands all round. He would be returning, he said, by the road to town which had brought him here some ten years ago; as if Calvary had an exit route. He turned up his face. A stray shaft of autumn sunlight gilded the waxen tip of his nose.
     
    “The heart’s gone out of things,” Sholto said. He kicked at a stone and dug his hands further into his pockets. “It will dull our wits, trying to pass for normal.”
    They were walking in the grounds, their numbers diminished. “Do you think you can pass?” Sholto asked her. He looked at her keenly. “You might, Muriel. I might pass, if I don’t fall down and foam. Crisp will pass. But Effie—never.”
     
    “After all, Muriel,” they said. “Look at all the stuff we’ve taught you. You know how to do your shopping. You can count your change. You can use the telephone.” Muriel nodded. “We’ll find you a place,” they said. “A nice little flat with a warden. You’ll be a free agent, you can come and go as you please.” They patted her hand. “You’ll have lots of support. The social worker will call and see you. And you know how to make your meals.”
    Muriel thought: When I get out I shall get out, just let those wardens try; Four and twenty social workers baked in a pie.
     
    Sholto said: “When you get out of here your aim should be to get as far away as possible from all those people who are going to treat you as an abnormal person. You have to get away to where nobody knows your face. You don’t want a pack of people around you who are going to say, oh, you know, you mustn’t expect too much, she comes from there . You don’t want people making loopy signs at every trifling embarrassment. You want to get right away. Get a fresh start. Get treated on your own merits.
    “If you let the Welfare house you they’ll tell all the neighbours that they’re to keep an eye out. Is that any way to start life? Everybody makes mistakes, but as long as they’re watching you all your mistakes will be put on file. You want equal treatment, don’t you? You want to merge into the crowd. Not to be pointed out in the public library as that cove who has fits. Not people coming up helping you all the time. Stuff them, I say. If I want to lie in the gutter and foam at the mouth it should be my entitlement. What are gutters for?”
     
    The odd letter came, here and there. Tales drifted back from the outside. “Crisp is walking the streets now,” Sholto said bitterly.
    “I thought you didn’t want nothing from nobody, Sholto.”
    “No, he doesn’t,” Effie said timidly. “But he’d like a little residence.”
    “Philip got a council flat,” someone said.
    “How did he like it?”
    “He hanged himself.”
     
    Sholto was a man of very good sense; wise and lucid, and ready for anything, except for the days when he sat on the floor, holding his head. “What they claim,” he said, “is an ongoing beanfeast, flats, nurses, jobs, day centres. But if you want to avoid all that you’ll have no trouble at all. There aren’t enough to go around.”
    “They’re going to close this place,” Effie said. “What will happen to me? Where will I go? What will happen to my bedside mat? It’s all I’ve got.”
    “You get money given you,” Muriel said.
    “Of course, I shall have the Civil List.” Effie cheered up. “I’ll see you right, everybody.”
    Hunniford Ward was closed. Effie got desperate, crying frenziedly and pulling at her hair. “Look, we’ll all keep in touch,” Sholto said. He wrung her hand. “Me and you, Muriel, the Reverend Crisp. We’ll go on trips together. We’ll have donkey rides and such. We’ll hire a little bus and go to places of interest.”
    Effie blew her nose, consoled a little. The next day she came running up, her face alight; the greatest animation seen on her features since 1977, when she set fire to a cleaning lady. “Giuseppe is back,” she said, “that was thrown off