Read Out of the Blackout for Free Online Page B

fights, the brush with the Fascists, an after-hours pub brawl in Leeds. What had been crucial here had been the domestic violence, the man and woman fighting. Had he funked it, or had it dredged from the silt of his early memories . . . something?
    He walked on, a tallish man in a not very fashionable sports jacket, good-looking in a not-too-obvious, English way, a way that had been more admired in the ‘fifties than it was in the ’sixties. Fair-haired, engaging, but somehow reserved, with the beginnings of lines of care along the high forehead and from the corners of his eyes. A fresh, well-meaning, slightly troubled boy-man.
    That was what the woman saw when she opened the door of No. 17. He had gone up to the house confidently, walked up the steps, knocked without hesitation on the door, and then waited.
    â€˜Coming! Won’t be a mo! Just got to put me frock on!’ came a voice. It was a voice that wakened no memories. Simon’s stomach remained stable. When the woman opened the door it was obvious she had been dressing after a bath. There was a smell of talcum, and her dress hung loosely on her substantial body, andwas not done up at the back. Suddenly, but not for that reason, Simon felt awkward.
    â€˜Yes?’
    â€˜I’m sorry—this is going to sound rather funny—’
    â€˜Won’t be the first time I’ve heard funny things at my own front door,’ said the woman, her sharp, ironic face surveying him coolly. ‘It’s not religious, is it?’
    â€˜No, it’s not religious.’
    â€˜Because they can be a bit over the top, in my experience. Oh, and by the way, I don’t ever buy things at the door.’
    â€˜It’s not that either. You see, I used to live here . . .’
    â€˜Oh yes?’ The woman was polite, not specially interested. A house, for a Londoner, is usually no more than a machine for living in, not a repository for sentimental memories.
    â€˜It was a long time ago, at the beginning of the war.’
    â€˜You wouldn’t have been more than a nipper then.’
    â€˜That’s right. The point is, I wondered . . . Have you lived here long?’
    â€˜Matter of five years. Bit of a draught-trap, and bigger than we need, but we’ve got Bert’s parents living with us, and it means we can keep out of each other’s way.’
    â€˜Do you remember who you bought it from?’
    â€˜People called Ponting.’
    â€˜Had they lived here long?’
    â€˜Only three or four years, as I remember. They retired to the coast somewhere. Why?’
    â€˜Well . . .’ Simon’s face had fallen with disappointment, but he began to improvise a story. ‘You see, my parents were killed in the war, and I lost touch with my relations.’
    â€˜Oh, really?’ The story made him human, interested her distantly, as something she might read in the Sunday Pictorial would. ‘You wanted to find someone who knew them, did you? Really, I don’t know . . .’
    â€˜I wonder whether the neighbours . . .’
    â€˜On that side it’s Pakis. They’d be no use, because we didn’t have Pakis then, did we? Not here. On the other side there’s people I don’t know, but they moved in after us. Have you tried the pub?’
    â€˜No. Do you think they’d know anything there?’
    â€˜Pubs are always good places to go to with something likethat. Then even if you don’t get what you want you can always have a drop of something so you haven’t wasted your time.’ She laughed with the rich laugh of someone who’s had a drop or two in her time. ‘It’s the Fox and Newt, down the end of the road. Arnold Stebbings has been there an age, I do know that, so you could do worse than try him.’
    â€˜I’ll do that,’ said Simon. ‘Many thanks.’
    â€˜Don’t mention it. Sorry I