Blindness

by Henry Green

Another roar came from the football crowd, an angry sound. A dog had been barking monotonously for ever so long.

“But, June,” he shouted, to the wood, “June, what do you—June, I—June . . .”

But there was no answer, and he began feeling his way down the ride. How strange it all was, what could she mean? One’s head felt in an absolute turmoil, one didn’t know what to think.

He felt ill.

*****

Heavy clouds lay above the house, mass upon mass. From the garden rose a black tangle of branches with showers of wandering twigs. And on these would hang necklaces of water-drops caught from the rain, shining with a dull light. Over the river in the dark pile of wood there showed frightened depths of blue, untrusting patches of it, lying here and there. The grass on the lawn was sodden, beaten to a lake of pulp. But over everything was a freshness of morning and of rain that had gone by, and there was a feeling that the trees and the house and the sky were washed, and that this day was yet another page, that there were more to be, so quiet it was.

She came down the stairs, pausing at the hole on the ninth step, and entered the kitchen, a song on her lips. The room was filled with a wet, grey light that made it kind, and she was happy, so that she thought of sweeping the floor. Father had been much better lately, those pains of his had gone, and perhaps he had been drinking less. How would he be to-day? It was not good for him, all the gin he drank, but he could not help it. How nice it was this morning. She was sleepy, so sleepy. A wonderful dream last night, about a young man who had made love to her, with blue eyes. Poor John. But it was dusty in here. She went to the cupboard under the stairs and took out the broom.

The broom swept a wrinkle of dust across the floor, with matches and crumpled paper and dried mud thrusting along together in it. She hummed contentedly and thought about her poor John. Her poor John who had no eyes. Blindness would be a terrible thing to come upon you, and he was so brave about it, always talking as if it were nothing. You couldn’t help liking that in him. Oh, it was so wonderful this morning, and he was wonderful too. He was a gentleman, just as they themselves were for that matter, it was birth that counted, besides he hadn’t treated her as anything else but the same as himself. But there was no going on with him. It wasn’t as if times weren’t difficult enough just with her own set of troubles, his into the bargain were too much. Though if she had gone with him it would have been a score over Mrs. Donner. And what would have become of Father then? He had been so much better lately, quite different from what he had been before. Where was Minnie? And she hustled the dust through the door, driving it into the air in a fan-shaped cloud till it settled on the grass round the flakes of mud and the paper and matches which sat there taking a first look round.

Now there was no nonsense about George. How those cows did eat, all day long, and when they weren’t eating they were chewing over again. And George had been quite nice lately. He had even said something, rather surly and rude, and she had been rude back. At any rate it was a beginning. Funny George, he was so powerful, his hands looked as if they could hurt you so, not like John with that awful face always screwed up with his scars; you were frightened of him in a horrid way. John was clever right enough, but there wasn’t much to those clever ones. While George could do anything with those hands. The beech tree looked very big this morning, with the damp lying on his trunk in sticky patches. But the weather was clearing, and it felt so fresh this morning. There were the chickens to feed. Roses, roo-zez, all the way.

Getting some grain out of a cupboard in the kitchen, she went to the hut and let the chickens out. The cock was quiet and dignified this morning, rather sleepy. But as soon as he was in the yard he challenged the world and then scratched over a stone. The hens at once began to bustle about anxiously. When June scattered the grain they hurried to each fresh handful, while the cock asserted himself in the intervals of eating. She laughed at them as she always did, and cried “Chuck, chuck,” and they clucked back with choking voices.