第52章

"An'who told yer I wasn't 'appy an'comfortable?"she inquired,"'cause yer can go an'tell 'em it's only a rumour.An'while ye're about it,yous can tell 'em I've got a good 'ome,a good 'usband,an'everythin'I want."Here she looked round the dingy room as if daring it to contradict her."An'as fer the good 'ome I came from,I wasn't wanted there,an'was 'arf starved;an'now the butcher picks the best joint an'if I lift me finger,a big 'ulkin'feller falls over 'imself ter run an'do wot I want."

Chook listened without a smile.Then his lips twitched and his eyes turned misty.Pinkey ran at him,crying,"Yer silly juggins,if I've got yous,I've got all I want."She hung round his neck,crying for pleasure,and Mrs Higgs knocked on the counter till she was tired before she got her potatoes.

The wet morning gave Pinkey a sore throat,and that finished Chook.

The shop gave them a bare living,but with a horse and cart he could easily double their takings,and Pinkey could lie snug in bed while he drove to Paddy's Market in the morning.He looked round in desperation for some way of making enough money to buy Jack Ryan's horse and cart,which were still for sale.He could think of nothing but the two-up school,which had swallowed all his spare money before he was married.

Since his marriage he had sworn off the school,as he couldn't spare the money with a wife to keep.

All his life Chook had lived from hand to mouth.He belonged to the class that despises its neighbours for pinching and scraping,and yet is haunted by the idea of sudden riches falling into its lap from the skies.

Certainly Chook had given Fortune no excuse for neglecting him.He was always in a shilling sweep,a sixpenny raffle,a hundred to one double on the Cup.He marked pak-a-pu tickets,took the kip at two-up,and staked his last shilling more readily than the first.It was always the last shilling that was going to turn the scale and make his fortune.Well,he would try his luck again unknown to Pinkey,arguing with the blind obstinacy of the gambler that after his abstinence fate would class him as a beginner,the novice who wins a sweep with the first ticket he buys,or backs the winner at a hundred to one because he fancies its name.

Chook and Pinkey had been inseparable since their marriage,and he spent a week trying to think of some excuse for going out alone at night.But Pinkey,noticing his gloomy looks,decided that he needed livening up,and ordered him to spend a shilling on the theatre.Instantly Chook declined to go alone,and Pinkey fell into the trap.She had meant to go with him at the last moment,but now she declared that the night air made her cough.Chook could tell her all about the play when he came home.

This in itself was a good omen,and when two black cats crossed his path on the way to the tram,it confirmed his belief that his luck was in.

When Chook reached Castlereagh Street,he hesitated.It was market-day on Thursday,and the two sovereigns in his pocket stood for his banking account.They would last for twenty minutes,if his luck were out,and he would never forgive himself.But at that moment a black cat crossed the footpath rapidly in front of him,and his courage revived.That made the third tonight.Men were slipping in at the door of the school,which was guarded by a sentinel.Chook,being unknown,waited till he saw an acquaintance,and was then passed in.The play had not begun,and his long absence from the alley gave his surroundings an air of novelty.

The large room,furnished like a barn,gave no sign of its character,except for the ring,marked by a huge circular seat,the inner circle padded and covered with canvas to deaden the noise of falling coins.

Above the ring the roof rose into a dome where the players pitched the coins.The gaffers,a motley crowd,were sitting or standing about,playing cards or throwing deck quoits to kill time till the play began.

The money-changer,his pockets bulging with silver,came up,and Chook turned his sovereigns into half-crowns.Chook looked with curiosity at the crowd;they were all strangers to him.

The cards and quoits were dropped as the boxer entered the ring.It was Paddy Flynn himself,a retired pugilist,with the face and neck of a bull,wearing a sweater and sandshoes,his arms and legs bared to show the enormous muscles of the ancient athlete.He threw the kip and the pennies into the centre,and took his place on a low seat at the head of the ring.

The gaffers scrambled for places,wedged in a compact circle,the spectators standing behind them to advise or take a hand as occasion offered.Chook looked at the kip,a flat piece of wood,the size of a butter-pat,and the two pennies,blackened on the tail and polished on the face.A gaffer stepped into the ring and picked them up.

"A dollar 'eads!A dollar tails!'Arf a dollar 'eads!"roared the gamblers,making their bets.

"Get set!--get set!"cried the boxer,lolling in his seat with a nonchalant air;and in a twinkling a bright heap of silver lay in front of each player,the wagers made with the gaffers opposite.The spinner handed his stake of five shillings to the boxer,who cried "Fair go!"The spinner placed the two pennies face down on the kip,and then,with a turn of the wrist,the coins flew twenty feet into the air.For a second there was a dead silence,every eye following the fall of the coins.One fell flat,the other rolled on its edge,every neck craned to follow its movements.One head and one tail lay in the ring.

"Two ones!"cried the boxer;and the stakes remained untouched.

The spinner tossed the coins again,and,as they fell,the gaffers cried "Two heads!""Two heads,"repeated the boxer,with the decision of a judge.

The next moment a shower of coins flew like spray across the ring;the tails had paid their dollars to the winning heads.Three times the spinner threw heads,and the pile of silver in front of Chook grew larger.