Chapter Seven contined

                                 Chapter Seven - Life in London continued


   At the time Jane won the Beaverbrook scholarship, Jane thought that the prize was a big sum of money. But when she deducted food, rent, travel expenses, using the laundromat down the street and other expenses, she realized she'd have to be careful with her money. To take just one example, food cost a lot more in London than it did in Montreal or Fredericton.
    When the session with Doctor Bowen ended, Jane  rushed down the stairs in this building that was one of several University of London buildings scattered throughout the neighbourhood. Outside in the street, the sun shone down on the crowds of passers-by. Jane walked back to her cold room and gazed at its bare walls. Kind of depressing, she thought.
    She went outside again and went round to two or three travel offices to cadge some posters off their walls. She went into the august National Gallery and bought some small copies of paintings. Then she put these pictures and posters up on her room's walls. But the room didn't look any bigger. It just seemed a little brighter. And every time someone used the toilet down the hall, or took a bath, the noise passesd through the room's thin walls. When people or visitors to her neighbors's rooms scampered up the two flights of stairs, the walls of Jane's room shook. Meanwhile Jane could hear noise from the room of her next door neighbour, who she found out was secretary in a local government office.
    Jane decided to do most of her work outside the rooming house at one of the university's libraries.
    "Dear mum," Jane wrote to her mother back in Fredericton a few weeks later, "I've had some trouble at first adjusting to this huge humungus city. But now things atre working out and I'm doing just fine."
    One of the reasons that lifted up Jane's spirits, was a big young man from Chicago named Tom McWilliam. Jane met him and a few other Americans in a pub not far from Charing Cross.Donald was sitting in the pub, drinking a beer and smiling at something another man of his age was saying to him.
     Jane had come to this pub called 'The Arms and Anchor' because she saw a notice pinned to one of the billboards in the building where she took some of her classes. "Are you a student from North America?" the notice said. "Then come to a get-together at the Arms and Anchor pub." The notice gave the pub's address and time and date of the meeting. Jane wondered whether any Canadians would be there. She knew many Americans would show up.
     She and another young woman from Brampton, Ontario named Felicia Pratt seemed to be the only Canadians in a crowd of about 30. But soon she was talking to Don McWilliam and enjoying it.