Angel Read Online Free PDF Page A

were not waiting at the gate and she had no one to talk to, no one to take to Paradise House, so the only real part of her day was missing. She walked slowly through the foggy streets and when she reached home went straight upstairs to the living-room. Her mother was sitting by the fire, making toast, as usual, but she did not look round or speak when Angel came in. She waited until the bread was golden, turned it on the fork, and then said smartly, to conceal her trembling: “I want to talk to you, my lady.”
    â€œWell?” said Angel warily. She prepared to insulate herself against some shock. Although she could not guess what was going to happen, all day long she had felt threatened, felt that she was being drawn nearer each moment to some experience which might be utterly disastrous to her. She watched her mother taking the toast off the fork and spreading the butter carefully, frowning as if she were groping for a way to begin her complaint. Finding none, she pitched into the story somewhere past its beginning, so that at first she was unintelligible to Angel.
    â€œYou can picture what I felt like. . . . I never had a turn like that since your father died. ‘I just don’t know what to say, Mrs Watts,’ I said. Stuffing her Gwen and Polly’s head with such a conglomeration of lies I couldn’t credit. Saying wicked things of your own mother. Married beneath me, did I? Just let me tell you this, my girl, if your father hadn’t of built up this business like he did, we’d have been in the gutter by this time. So good he was, too, that I’m glad he was spared what I’ve been through today.”
    She began to cry, and by this time Angel had gathered something of what she was saying and was turned to ice. She faced blankness, despair, and longed for death, seeing no other end.
    â€œYou wicked, wicked girl!” Her mother cut off her sobbing and began to storm again. She was not nearly done. “To make up all those lies about a place you’ve never been to, nor ever likely to; but to go on as if you had some right there. And telling those innocent children; day after day, they said. Putting on such airs. Taking it on yourself. Oh, it was a treat for me, I’ll tell you; hearing all about that. She’s been a good customer, too. And friend. And now I just hope I never see her again, not so long as I live. How can I ever hold my head up, knowing all that she’ll have to say among the neighbours? There never was a tongue wagged like hers. I know her. I remember when I was in the Chapel choir with her. I don’t forget what she said about my own sister. But you!” Her grief suddenly gave way to vexation. She leaned towards Angel and hit her face. “I would rather have seen you dead at my feet than let you bring this disgrace on me.” Then she stepped back, feeling ashamed, seeing the mark of her hand across the girl’s cheek.
    Angel had said nothing. She turned her back for a moment, waited for some strength to come to her legs, then managed to walk from the room.
    Her mother ran after her and when Angel had locked herself in her bedroom, drummed her fists on the door; for she had not had what she wanted, an explanation. “Why did you? Why?” she sobbed.
    There was no explanation, and Angel on the other side of the door in the dark cold room was silent. She felt strangely outraged; as if her mother had violated her.
    She had no matches to light the gas and she began to undress in the dark, unlacing her boots and pulling off her black woollen stockings, leaving her clothes in a heap on the floor. She thought that her mother had gone downstairs to the shop, but she would not risk opening the door. “How dare she!” she whispered over and over again as she stumbled about the room, braiding her hair.
    No light came into the bedroom. There were no street-lamps to shine in, for it was at the back of the building and the window was