Tickets, Please! | Page 3

of
sight of the crowd. And they knew each other so well. So they warmed
up to the fair.
After the dragons they went on the horses. John Joseph paid each time,
she could but be complaisant. He, of course, sat astride on the outer
horse-named 'Black Bess'-and she sat sideways towards him, on the
inner horse-named 'Wildfire'. But, of course, John Joseph was not
going to sit discreetly on 'Black Bess', holding the brass bar. Round
they spun and heaved, in the light. And round he swung on his wooden
steed, flinging one leg across her mount, and perilously tipping up and
down, across the space, half-lying back, laughing at her. He was
perfectly happy; she was afraid her hat was on one side, but she was
excited.
He threw quoits on a table, and won her two large, pale-blue hatpins.
And then, hearing the noise of the cinema, announcing another
performance, they climbed the boards and went in.
Of course, during these performances, pitch darkness falls from time to
time, when the machine goes wrong. Then there is a wild whooping,
and a loud smacking of simulated kisses. In these moments John Joseph

drew Annie towards him. After all, he had a wonderfully warm, cosy
way of holding a girl with his arm, he seemed to make such a nice fit.
And, after all, it was pleasant to be so held; so very comforting and
cosy and nice. He leaned over her and she felt his breath on her hair.
She knew he wanted to kiss her on the lips. And, after all, he was so
warm and she fitted in to him so softly. After all, she wanted him to
touch her lips.
But the light sprang up, she also started electrically, and put her hat
straight. He left his arm lying nonchalant behind her. Well, it was fun,
it was exciting to be at the Statutes with John Joseph.
When the cinema was over they went for a walk across the dark, damp
fields. He had all the arts of love-making. He was especially good at
holding a girl, when he sat with her on a stile in the black, drizzling
darkness. He seemed to be holding her in space, against his own
warmth and gratification. And his kisses were soft and slow and
searching.
So Annie walked out with John Joseph, though she kept her own boy
dangling in the distance. Some of the tram-girls chose to be huffy. But
there, you must take things as you find them, in this life.
There was no mistake about it, Annie liked John Joseph a good deal.
She felt so pleasant and warm in herself, whenever he was near. And
John Joseph really liked Annie, more than usual. The soft, melting way
in which she could flow into a fellow, as if she melted into his very
bones, was something rare and gratifying. He fully appreciated this.
But with a developing acquaintance there began a developing intimacy.
Annie wanted to consider him a person, a man; she wanted to take an
intelligent interest in him, and to have an intelligent response. She did
not want a mere nocturnal presence- which was what he was so far.
And she prided herself that he could not leave her.
Here she made a mistake. John Joseph intended to remain a nocturnal
presence, he had no idea of becoming an all-round individual to her.
When she started to take an intelligent interest in him and his life and

his character, he sheered off. He hated intelligent interest. And he knew
that the only way to stop it was to avoid it. The possessive female was
aroused in Annie. So he left her.
It was no use saying she was not surprised. She was at first startled,
thrown out of her count. For she had been so very sure of holding him.
For a while she was staggered, and everything became uncertain to her.
Then she wept with fury, indignation, desolation, and misery. Then she
had a spasm of despair. And then, when he came, still impudently, on
to her car, still familiar, but letting her see by the movement of his eyes
that he had gone away to somebody else, for the time being, and was
enjoying pastures new, then she determined to have her own back.
She had a very shrewd idea what girls John Joseph had taken out. She
went to Nora Purdy. Nora was a tall, rather pale, but well-built girl,
with beautiful yellow hair. She was somewhat secretive.
'Hey!' said Annie, accosting her; then, softly: 'Who's John Joseph on
with now?'
'I don't know,' said Nora.
'Why tha does,' said Annie, ironically lapsing into dialect. 'Tha knows
as well as I do.'
'Well, I do, then,' said Nora. 'It