He stood looking around at his little kingdom. He had so many plans for change and improvement, so many exciting projects to undertake and then something always happened to remind him of his place in the world. He was glad most of the men who worked for him were out and about the city. They’d all have to be informed of this trouble but for the moment he’d enough to handle. He refused to allow today’s upheaval to destroy the new life he was making for himself. They’d handle whatever came and go on. What else could you do?
With a last volley of pats against the old horse’s neck, Jem pushed himself away and continued walking towards the space he’d designated the office which consisted of two wide comfortable horse stalls. The dividing wall between the two stalls had been removed and a wooden floor laid down to allow John Lawless to manoeuvre his wheelchair around the space.
Jem’s business was blossoming. The demand for the services he offered increased daily. The taxi part of the business was in great demand. Then there were the people who wanted his horse and carts to help them move house. He also offered a delivery service for local businessmen that was in great demand. These were sidelines that had developed from his jarvey business. He’d been forced to put an actual telephone exchange in as the telephone calls quickly overpowered the original phone line. He now had staff trained by the GPO to handle the volume of telephone calls the business received every day.
“Well, Jem,” John Lawless sat tall in his wheelchair in front of the wide, high telephone-exchange switchboard, his big fists clenched on the arms of his wheelchair, “this is a fine state of affairs, isn’t it?”
“Where are your womenfolk?” Jem looked around frantically. He couldn’t remember who was scheduled to cover the phones today. John’s wife Sadie and his two daughters were often around the livery. Clare, John’s eldest, was a post-office-trained telephonist.
“I telephoned the house and warned them to stay away. I was worried sick they’d walk into the middle of this mess.” John sighed, his massive chest heaving. “I’d kill the first man who tried to lay a hand on them.”
“I know exactly how you feel. So does every man in The Lane.”
“There’s going to be murder out there.”
“I know.” Jem could do nothing but agree. “I hope you asked Sadie to warn Ann Marie to stay away.” As well as being a business advisor and investor in Jem’s business, Ann Marie was conducting an in-depth study of the history of Jem’s livery building. She was in and out of the place, frequently at a moment’s notice.
“Of course I did, but I’m going to telephone them again. It looks like this is going to make me late home.” John picked up a long cable and prepared to insert it into one of the sockets in the switchboard. He pushed the earphones in place over his ears, plugged the cable into the socket and pushed the mouthpiece into place. He prepared to dial the number of Ann Marie’s house, now his home too, on the rotary dial.
“Good man. Where’s the lad?” Jem needed to talk to Jimmy Johnson. He should have been here at the secondary post before the telephone exchange.
“I’m here.” Jimmy Johnson stepped out of a dark alcove at the back of the livery office. The poor lad would be a handsome youth if he ever raised his head from his chest. Jimmy had dirty-blond hair and pale-blue eyes but his sharply defined features must have come from whichever of Tim Johnson’s many ‘wives’ had birthed the lad.
“Have you heard what’s going on out there?” Jem asked.
“Yeah.” Jimmy hung his head in shame. There was no escaping his family name, it seemed, no matter how hard he tried to improve himself.
“I have to ask you . . .” Jem felt the red blush running up his face. It was no kind of a thing for one man to ask another. “Have you ever laid with any of the women your brother or father brings around the place?”
“No!” Jimmy’s head snapped up at the question. His blue eyes practically shot flames. He felt his stomach roil at the very thought of touching any of the unfortunate women that fell into his brother’s clutches.
“Have you ever lain down with a woman?” Jem thought the flaming red that mantled the cheeks of all three men should have lit the office like a lamp.
“No.” Jimmy understood the necessity of these questions – but he didn’t have to like them.
“Fair enough. Will any of your family tell them where you are, Jimmy – if they ask, that is?”
“No,” Jimmy said quickly. “Not because they want to keep me away from trouble. They’ll all keep their mouths shut because the others would kill them for telling the authorities anything.”
“I can offer you the use of the hayloft to hide in, Jimmy.” Jem sighed. “I don’t think they’ll pull the place apart but, if they do, you’re on your own.”
“What else is new?” Jimmy shrugged with false bravado.
“No need to take on like that, lad,” John Lawless snapped. “We’ll help you all we can but we have our own feckin’ skin to cover, you know.”
“I know.” Jimmy was ashamed of himself. These men were offering him more than his own family ever had. “I apologise.”
“No need, lad.” Jem cuffed Jimmy gently. “We’re all upside down with this malarkey.”
“I’ll keep out of sight,” Jimmy promised. He’d plenty of experience hiding himself away until the coast was clear.
“Fair enough.” Jem watched the lad take his seat in front of the bench they’d set up to hold the telephone equipment. “If you see trouble coming use the hand-grips to get yourself up to the loft. I’ve stashed the ladder out of sight.”
The iron half-moon hand-grips served as a quick way up to the hayloft. Jem’s uncle had put hand-holds in along the walls of the livery. It meant you could get up and throw hay down from anywhere around the hayloft. The lads who worked for Jem loved swinging up to the loft using the iron handles.
“I’d better get out there.” Jem looked down at John. “This is a hell of a bloody mess.”
“All we can do is grin and bear it, Jem.” John tittered madly, then snorted through his nose, making a sound like a sick donkey.
“Jaysus!” Jem punched John’s shoulder.
“Sorry, sorry, I didn’t really mean that.” John’s shoulders continued to shake. “I got a sudden attack of gallows humour.”
“As long as we don’t end up swinging from the gallows, we’ll be all right,” Jem said over his shoulder as he walked from the office. He made his way, reluctantly, towards where Conn stood in the open doorway of the livery.
“What’s going on out there now?” Jem stared out into the courtyard.
“There’s going to be trouble, Jem.” Conn was sheet-white. “It seems some bloody fool out there,” he jerked his head in the direction of the crowd, “has decided that there is no need to take the time needed to put up canvas. It seems there’s no need to spare the blushes of the likes of us.”
“They want to do it in the open courtyard?” Jem looked around the open space. This wasn’t the first time The Lane had been invaded by health visitors but they had at least had the decency to erect tall canvas tents to use as examination rooms. “Are they mad?” He noticed a man he knew – Garda Collins. “Stay here,” he said, walking away from Conn.
Jem walked over to the police officer. “Garda Collins,” he said, “do you happen to know who is in charge around here?”
“Some bloody toffee-nosed twit who doesn’t know his arse from his elbow.” Barney Collins forgot himself enough to state his opinion clearly. He almost groaned aloud when he heard the comment leave his own lips. Some things were better left unsaid. Still, Jem Ryan was a good sort. He wouldn’t be reporting a slip of the tongue.
“What seems to be the problem with setting up the tents for their examinations?” Jem asked. “It wouldn’t be the first time this lot have set up house here in the courtyard.”
“The man in charge doesn’t want to wait until the tents can be delivered and set up. He doesn’t see the need for any kind of privacy.” Barney Collins left it
at that.
“They can’t seriously expect us to allow some ham-fisted individual to handle our . . .” Jem wasn’t quite sure of a sufficiently polite term for a man’s sexual equipment.
“Fishing tackle,” Barney Collins whispered with a blush.
“That’ll do, thank you. These men can’t seriously think we’ll allow them to examine our ‘fishing tackle’ in public for the world and all his neighbours to see. There are children running around The Lane, for heaven’s sake! Have they no sense!”
“It would appear not.” Barney Collins had sent one of his officers running for someone with more braid on his uniform than Barney carried. It was a blessing that the Pearse Street Garda Station was only a short distance from The Lane. This lot would not deign to speak, or indeed listen, to someone like himself. He’d already tried to talk some sense into them. “The children will have to be examined as well.” Barney saw Jem stiffen, but what could he do? The law was the law.
“They are demanding I place a police cordon at The Lane entrance,” Barney mumbled, looking away from Jem. “The head man has demanded the census listings for The Lane and more police officers.” He pushed a finger under his collar. “About the only good thing to come out of this is that I now have all the information I need to arrest Declan Johnson.” The Garda had removed an illegal still and quantities of illegal liquids from the Johnsons’ basement. “If you have any idea where the man is, you need to tell me.”
“If I knew where he was I’d make you a gift of him,” Jem said. Declan seemed to have more lives than a cat. The man had disappeared at the first hint of trouble.
Barney knew the people of this block of tenements. They were good, hard-working people for the most part, trying desperately to keep body and soul together. These poverty-entrenched people were being treated like animals by this crowd of ‘experts’. The entire matter was a disgrace to the system Barney upheld faithfully. This could have been handled with tact and diplomacy. Barney knew who to ask for details. There were women in here who knew where the bodies were buried. They’d be willing to talk to save their neighbours from this trouble.
“Thanks.” Jem turned away. He had to get Jimmy out before The Lane was locked down. And under no circumstances would he allow these men to put their hands on Ivy and Emmy. They too needed to leave. He’d get them over to Ann Marie’s house – somehow.
Chapter 18
“Jem, do you think there’s any chance them fools out there would listen to anything but the sound of their own voices?” Marcella Wiggins walked into the livery, her face paper white.
“I don’t know, Mrs Wiggins,” Jem sighed.
“I live over the Johnsons, you know that, Jem.” Marcella wanted to sit down and cry. She’d never seen anything so sad in her life as all those poor childer being driven from their home, poor as it was. “I’m willing to put me hand on the bible and swear that nobody living in The Lane ever did business with anyone in the Johnsons’ place. In fact, no one would step foot in the place.”
“Conn!” Jem shouted. “Slip out quietly and ask Garda Collins to step inside, discreetly.”
“Right away,” Conn said.
Barney Collins wished he could bang a few heads together. He was fuming in frustration at the blatant way this crowd of officials were ignoring the orders issued by himself and his men.
“Officer Collins,” Conn whispered, “would yeh step over the way for a minute?”
“Doyle, move this along.” Barney Collins knew Conn Connelly – he was a good lad. “Let’s go.” Barney turned away from the mess he felt powerless to handle and followed behind Conn towards the livery.
“What’s going on?” he asked when he entered. He didn’t have time for polite chit-chat. He had a job to do.
“Mrs Wiggins has something she wants to ask you.” Jem put his hand on the shaking woman’s shoulder.
Marcella Wiggins didn’t beat around the bush. “What can we do to help that lot on their way?”
“These people are here in an official capacity.”
“Is there no way of dealing with this matter quickly?” Jem put in softly.
“It’s not my place to comment on the business of the Health Officials.” He hated feeling powerless.
“You know none of the people in here have anything to do with those women of Declan’s,” Marcella snapped. “You were here yourself when we put a spoke in Declan Johnson’s wheel. We’ve been keeping a close eye on the bugger.”
Barney ran the fingers of one hand under his collar. He didn’t like discussing such things with a female. “It’s my understanding that a number of females in that . . . ahh . . . establishment, were found to be infected with a communicable disease.”
“Those two women were not from The Lane,” Marcella snapped as if that changed everything. “They conducted their business away from here. I can tell yeh that for a fact. That Declan Johnson walked those two women of his out of here every evening bold as brass. He couldn’t get any men to come into The Lane, not after the last time.”
“Mrs Wiggins, I can’t take the law into my own hands.” Barney Collins said.
“Isn’t that where we’re told the law belongs?” Marcella Wiggins snapped. “In the hands of the Garda?”
“I’ll see what I can do.” Garda Collins fixed his hat firmly on his head, straightened his shoulders and like a man on a mission marched out of the livery.
“By God, Missus,” Jem said, “I think you might have started something.”
“We’ll have to wait and see.” Marcella wasn’t willing to relax until she’d seen that crowd of officious twits drive back out the way they’d come.
“Can we go down now, Auntie Ivy?” Emmy’s whisper carried around the livery.
“Stay up there for the minute, both of you!” Jem shouted. He’d known Ivy and Emmy were lying on their stomachs looking down into the livery. At least they’d had the sense to keep out of sight but trying to keep them safe was his responsibility.
“There’s ne’er a biscuit nor a drop of milk up here to go with a cup of tea, Jem Ryan!” Ivy called down.
“Hold yer whist, woman.” Jem grinned. Trust Ivy to have a pot of tea on the go. The woman was a terror for her tea. “I’ll have one of the lads climb up with a packet of biscuits and a jug of milk. If you’re very good I’ll even promise to buy you a cream cake. Now, for the love of God, will you both keep your heads down?”
“Ivy, do as Jem suggests,” Marcella barked. “The situation down here could still get ugly.” She watched one of Jem’s lads climb up the iron hand-holds, a can of milk clutched by the thin metal handle in his mouth. She could see the promised biscuits peeking out of his jacket pocket.
Ivy waited at the rim of the loft for the milk and biscuits. “The situation, as you call it, is ugly enough now, Mrs Wiggins,” she said, “but I’ll stay up here with Emmy. We’ll keep each other company.”
“Keep out of sight!” Jem shouted with a helpless shake of his head and a shrug. Ivy Murphy did things her own way and she’d not allow the likes of him to tell her her business.
“May I come in?” a soft voice called from the still-open main doors of the livery.
Betty Armstrong, the woman who had befriended young Seán McDonald, stood framed by winter sunlight. The woman’s tall upright frame seemed to be carved from ice until you noticed the pain in her eyes. The severe bun she had pulled her dark hair into showed off razor-sharp cheekbones. The bitter twist of her full-lipped mouth prevented her from being beautiful.
Betty Armstrong couldn’t believe the horror that had been visited upon the people she now called neighbours. She’d simply enquired about the need for Seán to attend school. It would appear she’d opened a can of worms. What kind of world had she come to? Didn’t these people know it was almost 1926, for the Lord’s sake? The world had fought a war – a war that the experts claimed was going to change society radically. Surely Ireland too was going to change?
“What can we do for you, Missus?” Jem
almost sighed. What now?
“If you would allow me to use your telephone, I believe I may be able to help,” she said in a soft hesitant voice. She waited a moment but, when no one spoke, continued. “I wish to place a call to Billy Flint. I thought to ask him to use some of his contacts, people in the know, and get these people shifted out of The Lane.”
“I think that’s a fine idea,” Marcella said before anyone else could react. “I’m sure he’d be glad of a reason to help you.” She gave the other woman the evil eye, letting her know she wasn’t fooling her.
“It might be for the best.” John used his strong arms to push his wheelchair over to the open livery doors. “It doesn’t look to me as if Garda Collins is getting much done with that lot of eejits. Let the woman telephone Billy Flint – if he can move this lot along, the price, whatever it will be, will be worth it.”
“Conn,” Jem ordered, “take the lady into the office and give her any help she may need.” He didn’t want to leave his place at the door. Garda Collins appeared to be rounding up the health visitors but they were objecting. The situation could drag on forever if something wasn’t done soon.
“If I wasn’t so scared, I’d laugh,” John Lawless said. “It’s like those reels of film they play in between the big pictures at the Pally. What are those policemen called?”
“The Keystone Cops.” Jimmy Johnson often escaped to the local cinema.
Jem didn’t find anything funny about the situation developing out in the courtyard. “Mrs Wiggins, do you think you could get the people standing around out there to return to their own homes?”
Ha'Penny Chance (Ivy Rose Series Book 2) Page 15
