Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky Read Online Free PDF Page A

nobody knew – but one imagined by the application of the same principles as won him his nightly beer. He had, and had had for years, a small upper room in the seedy environs of Osnaburgh Terrace, and he was never in evidence until the evening. He had been to Oxford University, and was a man of letters – mostly to the papers. He wrote articles and short stories for the press, which were very occasionally accepted. He called this Turning Out Little Things from Time to Time. An enormous Thing perpetually in progress was postulated but left in the dark.
    ‘I’ll have a half of Burton,’ said Mr. Sounder.
    ‘Half of Burton?’ repeated Ella (she automatically repeatedevery order), and drew it for him.
    There was a clink of coins – a smash from the till – and a pause in which Mr. Sounder took his first sip. . . .
    The door swung open in the Public Bar round the corner, and a morose, heavy-booted customer came forward – a postman.
    Bob went on with his paper and no one spoke. . . . The postman, in the silence, could be discerned swallowing beer, with a forlorn and suspended expression, from a pint glass. . . . There was no life in the place.
    Footsteps again rang on the pavement outside; the door was flung back, and there entered a tall, violent gentleman with a long nose and wearing a bowler hat. A complete stranger. He ordered a small ‘Black and White’ and splash. He drank it in two gulps, and instantly paced out again, leaving ‘The Midnight Bell’ in the precise predicament in which he had found it.
    One apprehended for the millionth time that it was indeed a very queer life. Silence again reigned. . . .
    ‘Is that the Star you’ve got there, Bob?’ asked Mr. Sounder at last.
    ‘No, Mr. Sounder. Evening News .’
    ‘Oh,’ said Mr. Sounder, heavily, and took another sip. As he put the tumbler down there was observable in his eyes a faint but glassy gleam.
    To those (such as Bob and Ella) instructed in Mr. Sounder’s ways, there was no mistaking that gleam – or what it portended. It was the gleam of a man who has not long ago Turned Out a Little Thing. They offered him no assistance, however.
    ‘I thought perhaps you’d seen my own little contribution,’ tried Mr. Sounder.
    ‘What – have you written something in the Star ?’ asked Ella.
    Mr. Sounder returned that he could not deny the soft impeachment.
    ‘Let’s have a look,’ said Ella, kindly, and took his own copy from him.
    ‘Only a letter. I think you’ll find it on page five.’ Mr. Sounder lit a cigarette, and puffed gracefully into the air. Ella searched. ‘Here we are,’ she said, and read it through.
    Mr. Sounder’s letter dealt in a manly but rather vituperative style with the topic of woman’s hair. He personally liked it long. That much was clear from the start. Having asked to be allowed to ‘concur most heartily with M.B.L.’ (a previous enthusiast), he proceeded with sundry allusions to such themes as ‘woman’s crowning glory,’ ‘these days of close-shaven tresses,’ ‘the would-be modern young Miss,’ and ‘her Grandmother,’ which bespoke alike his fervour and irony. He also mentioned cocktails and night clubs. He thunderously signed himself ‘Harold B. Sounder’ and the bolt fell from ‘Osnaburgh Terrace, N.W.1.’
    ‘Very Good, isn’t it?’ said the amiable Ella. ‘Seen that, Bob?’
    It was given to Bob. He read it through. He also thought it was Very Good. . . .
    The favourable decision, however, was followed by a slightly awkward pause. (Two women had entered the Public Bar, and the murmur of their voices was audible.)
    ‘I fear you don’t hold with my views yourself, Ella,’ said Mr. Sounder, looking at her shingled head.
    ‘Ah – you’d like a lot of Lady Godivas knocking about, wouldn’t you, Mr. Sounder?’
    Mr. Sounder smiled, but was at a loss for a reply.
    ‘And I guess you’d be the Peeping Tom, wouldn’t you?’ she added, looking at him with the mock knowingness of the