No. 4. MR. JOHN MASEFIELD

Down Lupus Street there is a little pub, And there there worked a little bright-haired maiden, Mornings the furniture she had to scrub, Evenings she’d walk about with pewters laden; But still she sang as did the birds in Eden: In fact you would have said that there was no More cheerful barmaid in all Pimlico. She had eleven brothers and a sister, A mother who had rheumatism bad, And when she left o’ mornings how they missed her, And when she stayed o’ Sundays weren’t they glad; No other help or maintenance they had, So that their mother often said, “God pink ’em, Lucky for them Flo makes a decent income.” “If ’t wasn’t for Flo’s fifteen bob a week, Me and them brats would not know where to turn, For some of ’em ain’t old enough to speak, And none of ’em ain’t old enough to earn, And as for ’er bright merry japes, why, durn My bleedin’ eyes, if we’d no Flo to quirk us, I’m sure we’d soon be droopin’ in the workus.” “It’s only Flo’s ’igh spirits keeps me goin’, The way she sings ‘My Pansy,’ it’s a treat, And also ‘All a-blowin’ and a-growin’,’ Our Flo is fair top-’ole, she can’t be beat. So give three cheers for Flo, it’s time to eat; Mary, you just run out and fetch some jam, And Bill, take down the pickles and the ham.” So the years passed, so Florence earned the money, And all the throng were happy as could be, No air could blench or stain her cheeks so bonny, No labour weigh upon her heart so free, She was, in short, as chirpy as could be; Until at last came Fate in Fate’s own time, And ravelled her in the dark nets of crime. Crime is the foulest blot on our escutcheon, Crime draws mankind as the moon draws the tides, Crime is a thing I’m rather prone to touch on, Crime is a clanking chain that grins and grides, A lure, a snare, and other things besides; If crime should cease, I should not then be able To furnish Austin with my monthly fable. One foggy night it happened there were drinking Within the bar a crowd of all the boys, ’Erb Gupps and Nixey Snell and Snouty Jinkin, And Noakes with several friends from Theydon Bois Visiting Pimlico; they made a noise With call for booze and anecdote and curse, And as the night wore on the row got worse. “Wot sher,” “Wot ho,” “I don’t fink,” “Blast yer eyes,” “That was a good ’un,” “Cheese it,” “’Arf a mo,” “Ten pints of ’arf an’ ’arf,” “There ain’t no flies On Nixey,” “Your’re a —— welsher, Joe,” “A quartern more, miss,” “—— lie,” and so They kept it up with rapid thrust and answer, In phrases neatly measured for a stanza. Even when they yelled and fought, Flo did not mind, She did not mind, for she was used to this, Even when to sottish amorousness inclined They called her “Floss,” or “Flo,” instead of “Miss”; But when at last drunk Snouty snatched a kiss, She felt her cheek flame with a flaming flame, She felt her heart scorch with a hell of shame. All the air howls when storms scourge the Atlantic, All the wide forest shakes when falls the boar, A wounded whale is often very frantic, And jealous lions have been known to roar Almost as loud as breakers on the shore; But all these are tranquillity and rest Compared with what went on in Florrie’s breast. Red in her soul shame set its blazing seal, Black in her heart strong hate swirled round in torrents, Blue in her eyes the lightning shone like steel, White on her lips rage mingled with abhorrence; Against a barrel’s back leaned Barmaid Florence, Watching with grinding teeth and eyeballs rolling, Drunk Snouty who was belching forth “Tom Bowling.” There while the boozers rocked in song obscene, She stood like a tall statue marble-still, And first she moaned, “I am smirched, I am no more clean,” And then she rasped, “By God, but I will kill That lousy stinkard, yes, by God I will.” Fate flung the dice of Doom, her buckler buckled; Life shrank, grew pale; Death rubbed his chin and chuckled. So it draws on to closing-time; men go By twos and threes; Flo washes pots and glasses, Ranging them on the shelves in their degrees, Wipes the wet counter dry, turns down the gasses; And, locking up the doors, the portal passes, Grasping with fervour of a frenzied bigot Inside her muff a mallet and a spigot. There Snouty was, fumbling his way along Towards the bridge, blind-tight, alone and grunting, And as he lurched he sang a maudlin song, A foolish song beginning, “Baby Bunting, For rabbit-skins your father’s gone a-hunting,” And as Flo heard the melody undroughty, She whispered, “Cripes, I’ll bunt you, Mr. Snouty!” So they went on, he foremost, she behind, Until they got to the Embankment wall; He leant against it; swifter than the wind She smashed her wedge into his head, and all His brains spattered the stones in pieces small. “My kiss,” she hissed; then with a sudden shiver Fled, tipping tools and Snouty in the river. And like a fleet slim panther she did fly Through the webbed streets of silent Pimlico, Faithful the white stars glimmered in the sky, Over the Lambeth bank the moon hung low, A great round golden moon as white as snow. Death cursed; Life smiled and murmured, “She will live, The police will fail to track the fugitive.” And the high stars looked down and saw her enter The doorway of her home in the dark street, Happy to think the cops would never scent her, Proud for the godlike swiftness of her feet. Cheek to her pillow cried she: “Yes, ’twas sweet.” But God behind God’s curtain cogitated About another end, and all things waited.

Six months rolled by; Flo earned her wonted wages, The family consumed its usual food. Had nothing changed I’d not have penned these pages; But evil generally brings forth good; Briefly I’d have it to be understood One day a pavement-preacher’s casual sentence Hurled Flo into abysses of repentance. So the sky fell; there came a hand of fire That seared her soul with consciousness of sin, Her soul was all one yearning of desire For God; she felt like jumping from her skin; Like hell in a through-draught she burnt within. “Mother,” she said, “here is my this week’s sub., I cannot go on working at the pub.” The mother swooned; the children joined in prayer That Flo should not decide in such a fast time; But the fierce heavens cried beer was a snare And skittles was a most immoral pastime; So that that evening for the very last time She washed the pots and locked the “Fountain” door, As she had done so many nights before. Next day she went out early without warning Down the wan street; and later in the day, That is to say well on into the morning, She sent a District Messenger to say That she had definitely gone away To join the Battersea Salvation Army. “Swipe me,” her mother moaned, “the gal’s gone barmy.” Barmy or not, she certainly had gone. In her low attic poor old mother wep, “She kep the home up, little Florence done, We was so happy in the home she kep; ’Twas mean of her to hook it while we slep; I’ll larn her yet to take me by surprise, I’ll do her in, —— ’er —— eyes!” But Flo was meanwhile getting fur and furder. Safe in the barracks in the Bilsey Road, Aching to make atonement for her murder, She said she wished to take up her abode There permanently; stabbed by her inner goad, She very quickly rose to the direction Of her new comrades’ Social Effort Section. She visited the mothers in the slums, And daily rescued suicidal wretches, She helped the young with their addition sums, And washed the infants’ clothes and mended breeches; And when she broke a plate or dropped some stitches, None ever heard a hasty word from Flo, The most she ever said was, “Here’s a go!” Work or no work, her heart was always merry, Heaven had washed her heart and cleansed her eyes, Adjutant Flo, the Barmaid Missionary, Was the adored of every sex and size, They said that she had strayed from Paradise, And every week her saintly reputation Led many sinning souls to seek salvation. Death laughed; Life winced; for in the neighbouring borough Old mother dwelt and bided her own hour, Whetting a carving-knife with motions thorough, Practising stabs of accuracy and power. The scythe must fall, and then must fall the flower, The day must die and then must sink the sun, And all things end that ever have begun.

All the crowds crowd in Battersea’s Green Park; The deer are fed, the ducks quack on the water; On the trim paths the Sabbath-resting clerk Walks slowly with his wife and son and daughter, Or seeks the grass where orators breathe slaughter, Some singing hymns to variegate their turns, Or waving flags with portraits of John Burns. Middle the plot there brays a brazen band, Peaked caps, red jerseys, other things of blue; And when they cease behold a figure stand, A bright-haired wench who wears those garments too. She preaches truth as few but she can do Concerning drink and cigarettes and betting, So that the mob must listen though they’re sweating. “S’welp me, it’s hot.” “Yes, s’welp me, so it is.” “Ain’t it a shame the pubs ain’t open Sundays, Just as they be Tuesdays and Wednesdays, Liz, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Mondays, To close the —— up on just this one day’s ’Bout the worst thing the —— law has done.” “Yus, so it is.” “Gorblimey, wot a sun!” But though the high sun spilled a raging heat, They could not go, they had to stay and hear, So tense her accents were, her voice so sweet. “Crikey,” says Bill, “she’s a ’ard egg, no fear.” Says Sam, “By Gosh, I’ll drop the —— beer.” “You won’t.” “I will.” “You won’t.” “What will you bet?” “A ... no, by gum,’ere comes a Suffragette!” It was a Suffragette with purple banner, Handbell and bag of many-coloured bills, At once in her inimitable manner She draws the crowd; the space around her fills, While Flo’s grows empty; soon her pitch is still’s The solitudes of the Antarctic Ocean, For even the band had shared the crowd’s emotion. Not a man trod her corner of the Park, A quarter-mile around the place was void, Only her voice to one lost mongrel’s bark Rang on, and still, as with sound texts she toyed, She did not seem the slightest bit annoyed. But Life shrank low, and greedy Death did dance, For here at last had come old mother’s chance! Old mother had been hiding ’hind a tree, Old mother who had sworn the end of Flo, Weapon in hand she stole up stealthily Towards the daughter who had grieved her so. “Aha!” she cried, “you little bitch, Ho, ho, I’ll pay you out now for your vile desertion ...” In Flo’s plain blouse she made a neat insertion!

Flo fell, she fell, did Barmaid Flo, she fell; The carving-knife was sticking in her back, And as she fell she cried out, “Well, well, well, What is the motive of this base attack?” But her old mother shrieked aloud, “Alack, This was my child, this was my little child, O, I must cover her with blossoms wild.” So sought she underneath the elms and oaks, Garlic and dandelions, peonies And cabbage-wort and sprole and old-man’s-mokes, And lillikens and dinks and bitter-ease, And mortmains that the hind in autumn sees In places where the mist lies on the hay And all the land is frozen with the May. And with her arms full, poor old mother staggered To her poor child there dead upon the grass, “My little Flo,” she whimpered, “I’ll be jaggered I don’t know how it ever come to pass, I don’t know how I done it, little lass; Whyever did I sharp that carvin’ knife And let out all my lovely darlin’s life?” “She wor a merry grig, wor little Flo, She kep the family goin’ nicely, she did, There never was a wheeze she didn’t know, She always pinched us anything we needed; Cripes, but I cannot tell why I proceeded, Just ’cos she left the family to starve, My pretty Flo’s sweet darlin’ back to carve.”

And so she brought the flowers to her dead, And piled them on her feet and face and breast, Flo lay there still as down the blossoms shed, A heavenly angel lying down to rest, A downy bird at evening on its nest, A cloud, a moth, a wave, a steamer, or Almost any other metaphor. “Good-bye, my little Flo,” said poor old mother “You had your faults, I willingly admit, Yet I am, taking one thing with another, Sorry for my rash act more than a bit, But still, I do not want to swing for it. Mum is the word, least said is soonest mended.” So mother left the Park, and all was ended.