Angel Read Free Page A

than the mean streets into which the crescents and terraces dwindled and which lay nearer to their own homes. Naked gas-jets burned in little corner shops, but the rows of yellow brick houses were dark: lights burned in those front parlours, behind the fern-tables and plant-pots, only on Sundays. Coal carts and brewers’ drays clattered by, but there were no carriages. The sickly smell from the nearby brewery the girls had grown up with and did not notice.
    â€œWill you tell us some more tomorrow?” Polly asked, stopping by the railings of their little front garden.
    Angel often felt jolted when the girls stopped at their gate; partly, from having forgotten them; partly, from having to transfer herself too suddenly from Paradise House to this mean district with its warehouses and factories and great brooding gas-holder.
    â€œI might,” she said carelessly. They opened the gate and said goodbye to her; but she had gone on her way already, holding her cloak about her and hurrying along, full of her own strange thoughts again.
    Halfway down Volunteer Street was a row of shops: a fish-and-chip shop from which children were running with hot, greasy parcels; a newsagent’s; a chemist’s where light from the interior glowed feebly through three glass bottles of red and green and violet liquid and coloured the bowls of senna pods and sulphur lying in the window. Next to the draper’s and the last in the row was the grocery shop; there, Eddie Gilkes, the delivery boy, was packing up an order on the counter, weighing sugar into pink bags. The wedge of cheese beside him was covered with his dirty finger-prints. The saw-dust on the floor was scuffed about now at the end of the day.
    Angel ignored Eddie’s greeting and went through the door at the back of the shop. The dark lobby was stacked with boxes. There were jars of pickles and a cask of vinegar at the foot of the stairs. The smell of bacon and soap pervaded the upstairs rooms, Angel’s cold, stuffy little bedroom and the bright living-room where Mrs Deverell was leaning towards the fire making toast.
    A crochet-work cloth was spread over the green chenille one and the light shone down on the cups and saucers on the table. The room was overcrowded and it was difficult to push between the table and the other furniture, the horsehair sofa, the chiffonier, the treadle sewing-machine and the harmonium. Photographs covered every surface. The chimney-piece was draped with ball-fringed velvet and a bead fringe hid the incandescent gas-mantle.
    Mrs Deverell shielded her face from the fire with one hand, but her cheeks were rosy. The room was very hot. “You’re home late,” she said.
    â€œI wasn’t in any hurry.”
    â€œYou missed your Auntie Lottie. You know how she looks to find you here. I reminded you it was her Wednesday.”
    Angel parted the curtains and leant her forehead on the steamy window.
    â€œOh, it’s hot in here. I don’t know how you can bear it.”
    She longed to be walking in the country in the cold air and darkness. The reality of this room exasperated her; she turned her back on it and closed her eyes. She did not dare to stuff her fingers in her ears to shut out the sound of her mother’s voice. She had forgotten her aunt’s visit and was glad to find she had escaped it. On such occasions she always felt herself brooded over, her mother’s sister watching her so intently; too intently questioning her, about her friends and the school, particularly about the school, for which the aunt helped to pay the fees. The two sisters were tremendously impressed that Angel had escaped the board-school at the corner of the road. “Say something in French,” they would urge her. Roughly and sulkily, Angel complied. They did not know that her accent was atrocious—as it would remain all her life.
    â€œAllons, enfants de la patrie!
    Le jour de gloire est arrivé.
    Contre nous de la