My Autobiography

we entered, a most beautiful child of four with large dark eyes and rich brown curly hair: it was Louise’s son – my half-brother.
The family lived in two rooms and, although the front room had large windows, the light filtered in as if from under water. Everything looked as sad as Louise; the wallpaper looked sad, the horse-hair furniture looked sad, and the stuffed pike in a glass case that had swallowed another pike as large as itself – the head sticking out of its mouth – looked gruesomely sad.
In the back room she had put an extra bed for Sydney and me to sleep on, but it was too small. Sydney suggested sleeping on the sofa in the sitting-room. ‘You’ll sleep where you’re told to,’ said Louise. This caused an embarrassing silence as we walked back into the living-room.
Our reception was not an enthusiastic one, and no wonder. Sydney and I had been suddenly thrust upon her, and moreover we were the offspring of Father’s estranged wife.
We both sat mutely watching her preparing the table for something to eat. ‘Here,’ she said to Sydney, ‘you can make yourself useful and fill the coal-scuttle. And you,’ she said, turning to me, ‘go to the cook-shop next to the White Hart and get a shilling’s worth of corned beef.’
I was only too pleased to leave her presence and the whole atmosphere, for a lurking fear was growing within me and I began to wish we were back at Norwood.
Father arrived home later and greeted us kindly. He fascinated me. At meals I watched every move he made, the way he ate and the way he held his knife as though it were a pen when cutting his meat. And for years I copied him.
When Louise told of Sydney’s complaining about the small bed, Father suggested that Sydney should sleep on the sitting-room sofa. This victory of Sydney’s aroused Louise’s antagonism and she never forgave him. She continually complained to Father about him. Although Louise was morose and disagreeable, she never once struck me or even threatened to, but the fact that she disliked Sydney held me in fear and dread of her. She drank a great deal, and this exaggerated my fear. There was something frighteningly irresponsible about her when she was drunk; she would smile with amusement at her little boy with his beautiful angelic face, who would swear at her and use vile language. For some reason, I never had contact with the child. Although he was my half-brother, I don’t remember ever having exchanged a word with him – of course I was almost four years older than he. Sometimes when drinking Louise would sit and brood and I would be in a state of dread. But Sydney paid little attention to her; he seldom came home until late at night. I was made to come home directly after school and run errands and do odd jobs.
Louise sent us to the Kennington Road School, which was a bleak divertissement, for the presence of other children made me feel less isolated. Saturday was a half-holiday, but I never looked forward to it because it meant going home and scrubbing floors and cleaning knives, and on that day Louise invariably started drinking. While I was cleaning the knives, she would sit with a lady friend, drinking and growing bitterly morose, complaining quite audibly to her friend of having to look after Sydney and me and of the injustice imposed upon her. I remember her saying: ‘This one’s all right’ (indicating me), ‘but the other’s a little swine and should be sent to a reformatory – what’s more, he’s not even Charlie’s son.’ This reviling of Sydney frightened and depressed me and I would go unhappily to bed and lie fretfully awake. I was not yet eight years old, but those days were the longest and saddest of my life.
Sometimes on a Saturday night, feeling deeply despondent, I would hear the lively music of a concertina passing by the back bedroom window, playing a highland march, accompanied by rowdy youths and giggling coster girls. The vigour and vitality of it seemed ruthlessly indifferent to my unhappiness, yet as the music grew fainter into the distance, I would regret it leaving. Sometimes a street-crier would pass: one in particular came by every night who seemed to be shouting ‘Rule Britannia’, terminating it with a grunt, but he was actually selling oysters. From the pub, three doors away, I could hear the customers at closing time, singing drunks, bawling out a maudlin, dreary song that was popular in those days:
For old times’ sake don’t let our enmity live,
For old times’ sake say you’ll forget and forgive.
Life’s too short to quarrel,
Hearts are too precious to break.
Shake hands and let us be friends
For old times’ sake.
I never appreciated the sentiment, but it seemed an appropriate accompaniment to my unhappy circumstances, and lulled me to sleep.
When Sydney came in late, which seemed always, he raided the larder before going to bed. This infuriated Louise, and one night when she had been drinking she came into the room and ripped the bedclothes off him and told him to get out. But Sydney was prepared for her. Quickly he reached under his pillow and whipped out a stiletto, a long button-hook which he had sharpened to a point.
‘Come near me,’ he said, ‘and I’ll stick this in you!’
She reared back, startled. ‘Why, the bloody young sod! – he’s going to murder me!’
‘Yes,’ said Sydney, dramatically, ‘I’ll murder you!’
‘You wait till Mr Chaplin comes home!’
But Mr Chaplin seldom came home. However, I remember one Saturday night when Louise and Father had been drinking, and for some reason we were all sitting with the landlady and her husband in their front-room parlour on the ground floor. Under the incandescent light Father looked ghastly pale, and in an ugly mood was mumbling to himself. Suddenly he reached into his pocket, pulled out a handful of money and threw it violently to