The Stars Look Down Read Free

coppers for schoolin’, they were just crookin’ their houghs. They squatted in silence. Bob Ogle, marrow in the Paradise foreshift, stroking the narrow head of his whippet bitch, nodded to Davey. Slogger Leeming said:
    “How, then, Davey?”
    David said:
    “How, again, Slogger?”
    The others looked at him curiously, identifying him with Robert, his father, who had brought them out. They saw a pale-faced boy dressed in a shoddy suit he had out-grown, a cotton muffler and heavy pit clogs because his boots were in pawn, with hair that needed cutting, thin wrists and work-big hands.
    He felt their scrutiny upon him, and sustained it calmly as, with his chin thrust well out, he walked towards Number 19, which was Joe’s house. Above the doorway of No. 19 was a notice irregularly painted:
Agent Flyaway Cycles. Undertaking. Boards kept.
David went in.
    Joe and his dad, Charley Gowlan, were at breakfast: a china bowl was on the wooden table full of cold pot pie, a big brown teapot stood beside it, a tin of condensed milk punched open, and a raggedly hacked loaf. The clutter of the table was unbelievable; the whole house—two rooms joined by a perpendicular ladder—was cluttered. Dirt, disorder, food in plenty, a roaring fire, clothes flung everywhere, dishes unwashed, the smell of living, beer, grease, sweat, a dirty blousy comfort.
    “Hulloh, lad, how are ye this mornin’?” Charley Gowlan, with his night-shirt tucked into his trousers, his galluses hanging loose over his fat stomach, his bare feet in carpet slippers, shoved a big bit of meat into his big mouth. He waved the knife in his big red fist and nodded agreeably to David. Charley was always agreeable: never anything but friendly, ay, a matey beggor, Big Charley Gowlan, the check-weigher at the Neptune. Well in with the men; well in with Barras. Willing to turn his hand to anything, from housekeeping—since his wife was dead these three years—back to rabbit dodging or salmon poaching up the Coquet.
    David sat down and watched Joe and Charley eat. They ate with infinite relish: Joe’s young jaws champed methodically, Charley smacked his fat lips as he knifed out the rich jellied gravy from the pot pie. David couldn’t help himself;his teeth watered painfully, a thin trickle of saliva ran into his mouth. Suddenly, when they were nearly done, Charley paused, as at an afterthought, in his knifing at the bowl.
    “Would ye like te scrape the pot, lad?”
    David shook his head: something in him made him refuse. He smiled.
    “I’ve had my breakfast.”
    “Ah, weel. If ye’ve had yor bait.” Charley’s small eyes twinkled slyly in his big red face. He finished the dish. “An’ how does yor feyther take it now we’re like to be beat?”
    “I don’t know.”
    Charley licked his knife and sighed contentedly.
    “A heap o’ trouble it’s been. Aw diddent want it. Heddon diddent want it. There’s none ov us wanted it. Meykin’ trouble ower backskins and a happenny ton raise. Aw said from the start it was no gud.”
    David looked at Charley. Charley was the men’s check-weigher, a lodge official, and well in with Heddon the Union agent from Tynecastle. Charlie knew it wasn’t just the backskins, nor the halfpenny rise. He said thoughtfully:
    “There’s a lot of water in Scupper Flats.”
    “Watter!” Charley smiled: a broad omniscient smile. His work never took him inbye; he checked his tubs upon the surface as they came screeching to the bank. He could afford to be omniscient. “The Paradise always was a wet beggor. Watter’s been there mony a day. An’ Scupper Flats is like to be no worse than the rest o’t. Yor feyther’s not feared ov a drop watter, is he?”
    Conscious of Charley’s slow grin, David sat hard upon his indignation. He said indifferently:
    “He’s worked in it twenty-five years, he oughtn’t to be feared of it.”
    “That’s reet, that’s reet, aw know all aboot it. Stick up for yor dad. If you doan’t then God knows who