The Forgotten Story Read Free

sudden lifting upon the toes like a barely suppressed skip. She talked vivaciously to him – treating him as an equal – and bent her head graciously from time to time in acknowledgment of a greeting from some passing friend.
    He noticed that many of the sailors, even those who did not know her, looked at her from across the street or glanced round as they passed. For sailors were prominent in this strange, exciting little town; dark men and lascars, Dutchmen and French. The whole town was different from any he had been in before: it was foreign and smelt of fish and seaweed and strong tobacco. It smelt of all sorts of things he had not smelt before; as they walked along amid the sun and shadow with the dust playing in whorls between the ramshackle houses his nostrils were assailed now with the odour of untended refuse from a squalid courtyard, now with the sudden strong smell of salt air and the sea. That fresh wind was like a purifier pushing through the slits of streets straight from the Channel and distant lands.
    â€˜I wonder if you’ll ever have a stepmother?’ said Patricia. ‘I have, you know. Dad married again last year. My mother died two years ago, nearly.’
    â€˜I’m sorry,’ said Anthony.
    â€˜Yes, it’s never the same. Good afternoon, Mrs Penrose; breezy, isn’t it? She’s all right in her way – Aunt Madge, I mean – she looks after Dad, but not like Mother did. Dad doesn’t love her: he married her because she was a good cook.’
    For the second time Anthony felt faintly shocked. Patricia’s outspokenness was something new to him and as fresh as the wind. A large fat seaman with some tattered gold braid round his cuffs stepped off the pavement to make way for them and beamed at the girl. Anthony stared away from the sea up, up a seemingly endless flight of stone steps climbing the hillside, with grey slate cottages running in uneven terraces from them. But Patricia’s way was not up the steps. She still went on, along the endless winding main street which skirted the whole western part of the harbour. The wind was less boisterous here and the sun more strong, but she did not raise her parasol. He wondered if it was carried only for ornament, since the handle was so long and the silk cover really so small.
    A plump little lady passed them and carefully averted her head.
    â€˜Is there anyone else lives with you?’ Anthony ventured. ‘I mean, I haven’t any other cousins, have I?’
    â€˜No. There’s Joe and Aunt Madge and me. Then there’s Joe’s brother, Uncle Perry. He came home from America last year. He’s made money and is looking round for somewhere to retire; but he hasn’t found anywhere yet. Then there’s Fanny, the scullery maid … oh, and one or two others who’re about, but they don’t live in. Are you tired? Shall I give you a hand with that case?’
    â€˜Thanks, no,’ said Anthony, overcome by the thought.
    She did not in fact press for the honour. ‘Well, we’re nearly there. Just up this hill and down the other side.’
    They climbed a short rise where the street became so narrow that the two sides seemed about to meet; the crooked bow windows of an antique shop peered fastidiously down upon two conger eels for sale on the marble slab opposite; then the street dropped again, and Patricia turned off down a short and precipitous side-way which stopped abruptly upon the brink of the harbour.
    Here, above the door of the last building on the right, there was an old and weather-beaten signboard, sorely in need of a coat of paint. On this signboard was the simple legend: JOE VEAL’S.

Chapter Two
    You entered Smoky Joe’s – as the café was universally called by its clientele – through a narrow shop door, and immediately encountered Smoky Joe himself. Indeed it was not physically possible to dine in the café, whether upstairs or down,