The Flying Goat by H.E. Bates Page A

monkeys. It’s not so bad, she thought. I had a banana yesterday. I made it last forty-three minutes. With luck I could make it last an hour.
    â€˜I’ve tried special baths. I’ve tried slimming creams and massage. I’ve tried everything,’ Mrs. Victor said. ‘It costs me a fortune.’ Children were beginning to come nearer, along the edge of the lake, drawing the gulls with them as though they were kites on invisible strings. Ducks scurried round in brown skirmishing flotillas, quarrelling, diving, tails up. ‘I’ve done everything, and this morning I went over fifteen. It’s terrible. I used to be as thin as you.’
    It’s no good, the girl thought, I’ve got to go downto the post office. If Harry sends the money I shall know it’s all right. If he doesn’t send it I know I’m done. Whatever happens, I’ve got to go down to the post office and see. I’ve got to be logical. I haven’t a job. I’ve got to be logical. During the war we used to eat locust beans. You never see them now. They said they had food value. We used to make them last a long time. That’s what I want, something to last a long time.
    â€˜So I think there’s nothing for it,’ Mrs. Victor said, ‘but to try simple starvation. I shall just starve and starve.’ She laughed a little. ‘After all it must be the oldest form of losing weight in the world.’
    The children had come very near, the gulls shrieking and wheeling above the flurry of ducks, white bread and yellow bunscraps flashing up in arcs against the bright sunshine.
    â€˜You see, it wears me out. Just sitting here now, I’m so hot I don’t know what to do with myself. I’m all perspiration. I shall have to change everything when I get home.’
    A small child holding a round sugar-shining bun threw it into the water in one piece.
    â€˜It’s so humiliating. You see, don’t you? Your friends, people staring at you. When you’ve beenthin, when you’ve had a nice figure. You see, don’t you?’
    â€˜I see,’ the girl said.
    â€˜I envy you,’ Mrs. Victor said.
    Again the girl thought, if I get up I shall fall down. She stirred slightly, feeling the emptiness of her stomach send out fainting waves of weakness. Her mind slipped into silliness. If A has two shillings between her and the workhouse and there’s no letter at the post office how many bananas must A eat before A is dead?
    On the edge of the lake a nurse stood on tip-toe and tried to regain the lost bun with the ferrule of a sunshade, regained it, and gave it back to the child. ‘Of course it’s all right. Of course they’ll eat it. They’ll eat anything.’
    â€˜I know my husband won’t like it,’ Mrs. Victor said. ‘But I can’t help it. He’ll say think of my position and so on. But it’s no use. I’ve got my own pride – I can’t look at myself in the glass.’
    Now the small child had himself begun to eat the water-soaked bun, liking it. The nurse, grey-capped, swooped down on him like a gull herself, snatching it away, startling him to tears.
    â€˜Why does she make that child cry? I can’t standchildren crying,’ Mrs. Victor said. ‘It gets on my nerves. People think because you’re fat and easy going you’ve got no nerves. My nerves are all on edge.’
    The crying of the small child against the crying of the gulls made wire-shrill discords. Nerves, the the girl thought. Nerves. Somebody had said that to her. Nerve. She remembered, saw herself mooning slowly along the street, intentionless, her mind dead. You’ve got a nerve, a voice said. Beginners on the other side of the street. When you went to the cinema this was what happened. This, as you knew, was the thing that the heroine had to face, and yet it was never mentioned. It was the most terrible thing, and in the end, by some awful