Red Monologue
A grey world—cities, faces, grime—but two colours made their rare appearance: bloody red and asphyxiation blue. Spring, 1918: both gruesome shades were present in London’s hovels and had struck down the hardworking with fevers and coughs. The greatest of mysteries: How had Mrs Jim Dawson been felled by the Spanish flu?
The squalid shack was filled with the drifting sounds of boisterous children, laundering women, loitering men, many unemployed catcalling the loose women whose ankles flashed beneath bright, tattered hems. A quiet time, by the slum’s standards, Catrin Dawson reflected, wiping sweat from her brow with a weak hand. The employed were at the factories; the men would return for supper soon. And when Jim did. . . . Oh, there he is …show more content…
I’m no saint, but I’d not expose them to—” Coughing.
Icily, “You’ll recover.”
“The Blue Death already shows in my face, Jim.”
“Christ. . . .” She heard him slump against the door, then, “I’m getting the apothecary.”
“And pay him with what?” she gasped. “Save the farthings: send the boys to school.”
“Catrin. . . .”
“Promise me!” she begged, sputtering blood.
“I cannot be as selfless as you.”
“You don’t want to bind yourself to a deathbed oath!” she screeched. “Lie to me then!”
“Stop this foolishness! You take pride in resenting me, as if I were robbing you of life!”
“When have I ever lived? Or laughed since marrying you, Jim? There’s nothing so cruel as to be rendered a shadow. So of course I take pride in what I’m going to do for Little Jim, for Tommy.”
“Silence, woman!”
She was struggling to sit up now, too weak to manage more than wriggling and choking. “How can I be silent with my last breaths? Promise me, for the boys. . . .”
“I’ll reason with you later; right now, you’re plain delusional,” Jim spat.
By the time he’d returned with a borrowed axe, his wife had collapsed by the side of the bed, hands clasped as if in prayer, the canvas covers soaked with
The squalid shack was filled with the drifting sounds of boisterous children, laundering women, loitering men, many unemployed catcalling the loose women whose ankles flashed beneath bright, tattered hems. A quiet time, by the slum’s standards, Catrin Dawson reflected, wiping sweat from her brow with a weak hand. The employed were at the factories; the men would return for supper soon. And when Jim did. . . . Oh, there he is …show more content…
I’m no saint, but I’d not expose them to—” Coughing.
Icily, “You’ll recover.”
“The Blue Death already shows in my face, Jim.”
“Christ. . . .” She heard him slump against the door, then, “I’m getting the apothecary.”
“And pay him with what?” she gasped. “Save the farthings: send the boys to school.”
“Catrin. . . .”
“Promise me!” she begged, sputtering blood.
“I cannot be as selfless as you.”
“You don’t want to bind yourself to a deathbed oath!” she screeched. “Lie to me then!”
“Stop this foolishness! You take pride in resenting me, as if I were robbing you of life!”
“When have I ever lived? Or laughed since marrying you, Jim? There’s nothing so cruel as to be rendered a shadow. So of course I take pride in what I’m going to do for Little Jim, for Tommy.”
“Silence, woman!”
She was struggling to sit up now, too weak to manage more than wriggling and choking. “How can I be silent with my last breaths? Promise me, for the boys. . . .”
“I’ll reason with you later; right now, you’re plain delusional,” Jim spat.
By the time he’d returned with a borrowed axe, his wife had collapsed by the side of the bed, hands clasped as if in prayer, the canvas covers soaked with