A Girl in Winter by Philip Larkin Read Free Book Online Page B

the banisters and moved like a sleepwalker through the doorway. Katherine helped her into a small easy-chair with wooden arms, and put a pillow behind her head: this was too big, so she fetched a woollen cardigan instead. She had no cushions. Miss Green’s head rolled unstably, and then settled; Katherine shut the door and lit the gas fire, turning it up as far as it would go. She felt Miss Green’s hands, and theywere cold, so she brought a rug off her bed and spread it over her knees. Miss Green stirred feebly as if in protest. Katherine stood up, and began to set the room in order. She felt surprised it was so untidy.
    The attic was under-furnished, which made it look large: the ceiling sloped towards the window. On the side of the room opposite the door was a step up to a little curtained alcove—a doorway with no door—where there was a bed. Here she kept her clothes. In the main room were two tables—a square kitchen table, with the remains of her breakfast on it, and a small thin one along the wall, littered with all sorts of oddments—and also a large store-cupboard , two straightbacked chairs, the chair Miss Green was in, and a stool on one side of the fireplace.
    Several shabby rugs overlapped each other on the floor, dingy enough to have been ejected from other rooms of the house. The window had no curtains except those of heavy black-out material. Over the mantelpiece a few cheap postcards were pinned to form a semi-diamond, and the mantel-shelf was piled with empty cigarette boxes. On the side-table there were five or six books.
    When Katherine had cleared up the surface disorder and made her bed, she lit a gas-ring fitted to the gas fire, and poured some milk in a blue saucepan to boil, absently licking the cardboard top of the milk-bottle. Then she carried the breakfast things out to the sink, and washed those that were not greasy in cold water, bringing back a clean cup and saucer. She looked at Miss Green. The fire was beginning to warm the room.
    “I’m making you some hot milk,” she said.
    Miss Green turned her head from side to side, as if seeking to evade a dream. She said nothing. Her face was pale, almost yellowish.
    Katherine felt really rather alarmed. Obviously the best thing for her would be to go home, but equally obviously she was in no state to go. If the visit to the dentist wasgoing to make her ill for a few days, and it had surely been disastrous enough, there was no use in her staying here for an hour or two: it would mean taking her home by taxi. That would be expensive. Perhaps she ought to go downstairs and ask advice of the chemist. Since she had forced Miss Green to the dentist, instead of letting her go home as she wanted to, all the responsibility fell on her that otherwise Miss Green’s mother would have borne: really she ought not to have interfered. But since she had, it was up to her to do what she could despite the trouble and expense.
    But perhaps she would improve with resting.
    When the milk boiled, she poured it into the clean cup, holding the skin back with a spoon. Then she unsealed the bottle, crushed two aspirins, and stirred them in.
    “Here’s your milk,” she said.
    Miss Green did not reply. Katherine looked at her doubtfully, and stood by her with it.
    “Don’t you want it?”
    Miss Green murmured something, shifting her head, and her eyes half-opened and shut again, like a doll’s that is lifted and then laid back. Katherine knelt beside her and brought the cup to her lips.
    “Drink some,” she said.
    Miss Green put out her lips, and took a sip; in a moment she took another, then licked her lips as if discovering there an alien taste. She breathed more deeply. At last she brought up her hands and took the cup herself, holding it against her shallow breast.
    After five minutes she had drunk about half of it.
    “Do you feel better now?”
    “I——” Miss Green’s voice was hoarse: she cleared her throat. “I don’t feel as sick as I