Seven Days' Leave Page #4

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I'd wonder he needed to be brought!

Oh, he had only just arrived and

he was bewildered by the great city!

Is he coming?

Oh, he has come. He is up there!

I told him that I thought I had

better come and break the joyful news!

Kindly get them to go away!

Ladies, I think this happy

occasion scarcely requires you!

I also am going instantly.

I'd thank none for their company

if my Alfie was at the door!

A good son, Mrs Dowey, to

have written to you so often!

There she is, Dowey my friend, waiting

for you, with your letters in her hand!

Don't you recognise

your loving son, Mrs?

I'm pleased I wrote so

often. Let's see those!

Nothing but blank paper!

Is this your writing in

pencil on the envelope?

Where'd you get em?

I'm a charwoman. I picked the

envelopes out a wastepaper basket,

and changed the addresses.

Don't you burn them letters,

Mister! -They're not real letters!

They're all I have

I thought you had a son!

I never had a son, nor a husband...

nor anything.

I just call myself Mrs,

to give me a standing.

Well!

You're past my seeing-through!

What made you do it?

It was everybody's war, except

mine. I wanted it to be my war, too.

You'll need to be plainer. Yet

I'm blamed if I care to listen

to you, you lying old trickster!

-You're not going, already!

Yes. I just came to give

you an ugly piece of my mind!

But you haven't given it to

me yet! -You have a cheek!

You wouldn't drink some tea? -Me?

I tell you I came here for the

one purpose of blazing away at you!

You could drink some tea

while you were blazing away!

Now then out with it! Sit down!

Go on, you old sinner!

It's true that my name is Dowey!

-Enough to make me change mine!

I've been charring and charring

as far back as I can mind!

I've been in London these 20 years!

Well, skip your early

days! -And then...

When I was old, the war broke out.

How could that affect

you? -That's it mister!

It didn't affect me! It

affected everybody but me!

The neighbours looked down on me.

Even the poster on the wall, of

the mother saying, "Go, my boy!",

leered at me...

Sometimes I cried to

myself in the dark!

You wouldn't have a cup of tea? -No!

Sudden-like, the idea came

to me, to pretend I had a son!

Why you old criminal!

What in the name of Old Nick, made you

choose me out of the whole British Army?

Maybe... it was because

I liked you the best!

Now, now, woman!

One day, I read in the

newspaper, look what it says here!

In which he was assisted,

by Private K. Dowey,

42nd Highlanders, Black Watch.

Well... I expect that's the only

time I was ever in the papers!

I didn't choose you for that alone. I

read a history of the Black Watch first,

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