Life of Ma Parker

by Katherine Mansfield

Old Ma Parker cleaned a gentleman's flat every Tuesday. When he opened the door that morning, he asked about her grandson. Ma Parker stood inside the dark little hall and helped her gentleman to shut the door before she replied.

"We buried him yesterday, sir," she said quietly.

"Oh, dear! I'm sorry to hear that," said the gentleman in a shocked voice. He was in the middle of his breakfast. He wore a very old and untidy dressing gown and carried a newspaper in one hand. But he felt uncomfortable. He couldn't go back to the warm sitting room without saying something - something more. Then because working class people thought funerals were so important, he said kindly, "I hope the funeral went well."

"Sorry, sir?" said old Ma Parker.

Poor old woman! She looked so miserable. "I hope the funeral was a... a... success," he said. Ma Parker gave no answer. She walked slowly to the kitchen with her head down, holding the old bag with her cleaning things and an apron and a pair of old shoes. The gentleman went back to his breakfast.

"Upset, I suppose," he said aloud, taking another egg.

Ma Parker put on her apron and sat down to take off her boots. To put on or take off her boots hurt her, but it had hurt her for years. In fact, the pain was so usual that her eyes were already closed before she'd touched her boots.

"Gran, Gran!" Her little grandson stood on her knees in his boots. He'd just come in from playing in the street.

"Look what you've done to your gran's skirt, you bad boy! It's dirty now!"

But he put his arms round her neck and pushed his cheek against hers.

"Gran, give me a penny!" he asked.

"Go and play; Gran hasn't got any pennies."

"Yes, you have."

"No, I haven't."

"Yes, you have. Give me one!"

She was already feeling for the old, black purse with her money in.

"Well, what will you give your gran?"

He gave a little laugh and pressed closer. She felt his eyelashes against her cheek. "I haven't got anything," he said...

The old woman jumped up, took the kettle off the stove and went over to the sink. The noise of the water in the kettle deadened her pain, it seemed. She filled the washing-up bowl, too.

That kitchen was terrible. Most of the week, the gentleman looked after himself. That is to say, he emptied the tea bags now and again into the bin and, if there were no clean forks he washed one or two. Otherwise, as he explained to his friends, his "system" was simple, and he couldn't understand why people said it was so difficult to look after a flat.

"You make everything dirty, get an old woman to come in once a week to clean up, and it's done."

The result looked like a dustbin. Even the floor was covered with bits of bread, envelopes, cigarette ends. But Ma Parker didn't complain. She felt sorry for the poor young gentleman because he had no-one to look after him. Out of the dirty little window, you could see a big sad-looking sky, and whenever there were clouds they looked very old clouds, with holes in them, or dark like tea.

While the water was heating, Ma Parker began cleaning the floor. "Yes," she thought, "I've had a hard life."

Even the neighbours said that. Many times, walking slowly home with her bag she heard them, waiting at the corner, say, "She's had a hard life, Ma Parker." And it was so true. It was just a fact. A hard life!...

At sixteen she'd come to London as a servant. Nothing was left of her mother's home, except the fireplace in the evenings and Mother always had her washing hanging in the kitchen. And there was something - a flowering bush - at the front door, that smelt so nice. But she'd almost forgotten it. She'd only remembered it once or twice in the hospital, when she was ill.

That was a terrible job, her first job. She could never go out. She never went upstairs. And the cook was a cruel woman. She used to take away her letters from home before she'd read them, and throw them in the fire because they made her dreamy...

When that family left, she went to work in a doctor's house and, after two years there, running from morning till night, she married her husband. He was a baker.

"A baker, Mrs. Parker!" the gentleman often said. Because occasionally he listened to her. "It must be rather nice to be married to a baker!"

"A very clean job," said the gentleman.

Mrs. Parker didn't look convinced.

"And didn't you like giving the new bread to the customers?"

"Well, sir," said Mrs. Parker, "I wasn't in the shop a lot. We had thirteen little children and buried seven of them. If it wasn't the hospital it was a funeral, you could say!"

"Yes, you could, Mrs. Parker!" said the gentleman, picking up his pen again.

Yes, seven had gone, and while the six were still small her husband became ill. It was flour on the lungs, the doctor told her at the time... Her husband sat up in bed with his shirt pulled over his head, and the doctor's finger drew a circle on his back.

"Now, if we cut him open here, Mrs. Parker," said the doctor, "you'd find his lungs full of white powder. Breathe!" And Mrs. Parker never knew for certain if she saw or if she imagined she saw a great cloud of white flour come out of her poor dead husband's lips...

But she had to fight to bring up those six little children. It was terrible! Then, just when they were old enough to go to school, her husband's sister came to stay with them to help things, and she was only there two months when she fell down the stairs and hurt her back. And for five years Ma Parker had another baby - and one who always cried! - to look after. Then young Maudie got pregnant, ran away and took her sister Alice with her; the two boys went to Australia and young Jim went to India with the army; and Ethel, the youngest, married a good-for-nothing waiter who died the same year little Lennie was born. And now little Lennie - my grandson...

The dirty cups, dirty dishes were washed. The black knives were cleaned with a piece of potato. The table was washed and the cupboards and the sink that had fish tails swimming in it...

He was never a strong child - never from the first. He was one of those pretty babies that everybody thought was a girl. He had silvery blond hair, blue eyes and a little freckle like a diamond on one side of his nose. The trouble she had to bring up that child! The things that they read in the newspapers that they tried him with!

But it was no good. Nothing made little Lennie get fatter. Taking him out for a long walk, even, never gave him any colour in his cheeks, never improved his appetite.

But he was gran's boy from the first...

"Whose boy are you?" said old Ma Parker, slowly standing up from cleaning the floor and going over to the dirty window. And a little voice, so warm, so close, it seemed to be inside her, under her heart, laughed, and said, "I'm gran's boy!"

At that moment there was a sound of steps, and the gentleman came in, dressed for walking.

"Oh, Mrs. Parker, I'm going out. And you'll find your money on my desk."

"Thank-you, sir."

"Oh, by the way, Mrs. Parker," said the gentleman quickly, "you didn't throw away any chocolate last time you were here, did you?"

"No, sir."

"Very strange. I left a little in the fridge." He stopped speaking. He said softly but seriously, "You'll always tell me when you throw things away, won't you, Mrs. Parker?"

And he walked off very pleased with himself because he'd shown Mrs. Parker that, although he looked careless, he was not.

The door closed. She took her brushes and cloths into the bedroom. But when she began to make the bed, the thought of little Lennie was terrible. Why did he have to die? That's what she couldn't understand. Why should a little angel child have to fight for his breath? There was no reason to make a child suffer like that... From Lennie's little chest there was a noise like something boiling. When he coughed, his eyes closed, his hands jumped and he could not lie still. But it was worse when he never spoke or answered, or even seemed to hear her. He just looked like he couldn't trust his gran'.

"It's not your poor old gran's fault, my love," said old Ma Parker, touching his wet hair. But Lennie moved his head away. He looked at her sideways like he couldn't believe his gran could hurt him. But at the end...

Ma Parker threw the blanket over the bed. No, she couldn't think about it. It was too much - she'd had too much hurt in her life. She'd managed up till now, nobody had ever seen her cry. Not even her own children. She'd always shown how strong she was. But now! Lennie gone - what had she got left? She had nothing. He was all she'd got from life, and now he was taken too.

"What have I done?" said old Ma Parker. "What have I done?"

As she said those words she suddenly dropped her brush. She found herself in the kitchen. Her misery was so terrible that she put on her jacket and walked out of the flat like a person in a dream. She did not know what she was doing. She was walking away, anywhere, like she could escape...

It was cold in the street. There was a wind like ice. People went running by, very fast. And nobody knew - nobody cared. Even if she cried, if at last, after all these years, she cried.

But when she thought of crying, it was like little Lennie jumped in his gran's arms. Gran wants to cry. If she could only cry now, cry for a long time, over everything, beginning with her first job and the cruel cook, going on to the doctor's, and then the seven little ones, the death of her husband, the children leaving her, and all the years of misery until little Lennie. She must do it. She couldn't wait any more... Where could she go?

"Ma Parker's had a hard life." Yes, a hard life, a very hard life! Her eyes began to fill with water; there was no time to lose. But where? Where? She couldn't go home. Her daughter was there. She couldn't sit on a seat in the park; people would come asking her questions. She couldn't go back to the gentleman's flat; she had no right to cry in strangers' houses. If she sat on steps a policeman would speak to her.

Oh, wasn't there anywhere where she could hide and stay as long as she wanted, nobody worrying her and her worrying nobody? Wasn't there anywhere in the world where she could cry - at last?

Ma Parker stood, looking up and down. The icy wind blew. And now it began to rain. There was nowhere.