Beggar Bride

by Gillian White

  The two-day silence was difficult to explain away. She had to make out that her phone had gone dead.

  Just wait till Ange gets home!

  Good God, anyone would think she was having a ball.

  Fabian’s quick temper, hostile and unkind, has unnerved her. When he is angry his brown eyes darken to the black of wet slate, but why shouldn’t she be nervous over Ffiona’s threatening behaviour? Was it so unreasonable of her to suggest that the first wife might have bumped off the second, in the circumstances, hell, she’s entitled to ask questions, isn’t she? Fabian scares her. He’d looked at her as though he despised her. Honesty and Ffiona both detest her and the last thing Ange needs now is enemies. If she hadn’t discovered she was up the spout she’d call this whole thing off, and, of course, there’s the question of the one thousand pounds a week paid straight into the current account she’d opened with ten pounds borrowed from the DSS. Four thousand a month… that’s forty-eight grand a year, an awesome-sum, and what is more, the whole suggestion was Fabian’s, Ange just went along with it. On the first day of every month Ange’s account is going to register a deposit of four thousand pounds!

  It is a miracle, a dream come true.

  More than she’d ever hoped for.

  And Fabian won’t even miss it!

  Life is so bloody unfair.

  No, no, now is not the time to divorce Fabian and quit as they originally intended, this is a far far better way to accumulate record sums, they must hang on in here no matter how unpleasant matters might be. So when she gets home this time she is going to have to persuade Billy to hang fire, to put up with this mess just a little bit longer—change the plans just a smidgeon, two years perhaps, instead of just weeks—and in that time they’ll save enough to put down a good deposit on a little house somewhere in the country and live with their two children in peace and tranquillity. That’s not too much to ask, is it?

  Old, slow-footed women muttering to themselves as they drag along to the shops, idle, unemployed yobs on the corners, bedraggled young mothers with bags full of shopping, all remind her that she must endure, that in the end it has to be worth it. All these people, and Ange and Billy and Jacob, too, are just so much living foam, created and driven by unseen winds and empty of enterprise. But where there is nothing you have to create something, all you need is a dream that is powerful enough.

  She doesn’t feel powerful. She’s puffing by the time she reaches the stairs.

  What the hell? Ange stops dead, Billy’s face is a mess of cuts and bruises. Untidy black stitches seem all that hold his eye in its socket. His right arm is up in a sling. Ange feels sick with fear. ‘Jesus! Where’s Jacob?’

  ‘Jacob’s OK. He’s next door.’

  ‘What’s happened? Why didn’t you phone me and let me know about this?’

  ‘Because I couldn’t get to the bloody phone, could I? Not like this. I’m not Houdini. I couldn’t have dialled AND got the money in.’

  ‘Couldn’t Tina have gone?’

  ‘Tina’s got her hands full here with the two kids, cooking and feeding them and putting them to bed and everything else I couldn’t frigging well do.’

  Ange catches her breath in a sob. ‘Oh Billy! My God, you look like death.’

  ‘I feel like bloody death. Two cracked ribs as well. I’m lucky to be alive at all, that sodding madman next door’s got the strength of a bloody gorilla.’

  ‘Ed?’ Ange swings round. ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘In custody. Where else? But they’ll let him out. They always do.’

  Ange follows the limping Billy through to the kitchen where she automatically fills the kettle and turns it on. Her kitchen is spotless, quite unlike she normally finds it when she comes home from being with Fabian. Most times she has to set to and clean the whole flat, Billy is so hopeless at it. She wears rubber gloves for the job these days, afraid that someone will notice her work-red hands. Someone—Tina—has done a good job, guilt, most probably.

  ‘Billy,’ says Ange, her irritation overriding everything else now she knows Billy’s not mortally wounded. Now she knows Jacob is safe. ‘Why the hell did you go and get yourself involved?’ Ange stands with her hands on her hips, solidly, like a demand, like a grip.

  Billy takes over, using his left hand to drop two tea-bags into the mugs and managing to wince as he does so. ‘What was I supposed to do? Just sit here and listen to her being battered?’

  ‘Couldn’t you fetch someone else?’

  Billy’s voice rises to a shout. ‘Who, Ange? Come on, just tell me who. Who in this goddamn place would hurry forward to help some other tosser in trouble?’

  She tries to reason. ‘Billy, we have talked about this before, many times. Tina has to deal with…’

  ‘It’s different when it’s happening, Ange, Christ, you know it’s different!’

  ‘But we can’t cope with our own problems, Billy, let alone Tina’s, not when she keeps inviting the bastard back!’

  ‘I know I know I know. Don’t go on.’

  ‘He could have killed you…’

  ‘But he didn’t.’

  ‘But he could’ve.’

  ‘Shut up, Ange. For Christ’s sake, shut up!’

  Together, at last, in harmony again and Billy is quite overwhelmed when she tells him about the money. Wealth beyond dreams.

  ‘What? Now?’

  Ange nods, smiling.

  ‘The money’s in there right now?’

  Ange’s smile turns into a manic beam.

  ‘We can go and get it out in the morning?’

  ‘Yep. We can go and get it out when we like.’

  ‘Christsakes, Ange… Awesome.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ grins Ange.

  ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  ‘You didn’t think it would work, did you, Billy? Be honest.’

  Billy shakes his head. ‘Not like this. Not so quick as this.’

  ‘We ought to make a plan,’ says Ange, ‘so we know what our new aims are. We don’t want to waste it, after all. This is for Jacob and you and me and the baby, this is our whole future.’

  ‘We’d really be in the shit if we got done now, Ange. We’d both go down.’

  ‘Don’t spoil it, Billy. We’re not going to be caught. It’s all going to plan, if only you hadn’t gone and messed yourself up like this. Better than I ever thought…’

  Billy rips the top off another can of lager—he can manage that OK with one hand—and rolls his eyes to the ceiling with joy, his bad eye weeping redly. He dances a war dance round the flat, more like a crazy hop, while Jacob watches with wide eyes, mouth wide open, gawping anxiously at his bandaged dad. Perhaps now is the time to point out to Billy that it will take at least two years to save the money they need, that this way will be far simpler than going for a quick divorce and trying to blacken Fabian’s name with lies. Already Ange has wised up about some of Ffiona’s difficulties, Fabian’s not that easy to cheat, he’d fought all the way and won.

  And look what happened to Helena.

  Ange attempts to explain it all as simply as she can.

  ‘What?’ As the truth dawns, Billy gapes, grey-faced and desperate. ‘You mean I’d have to stay here for another two years living like this while you… I hate my life here,’ he says darkly. ‘Why couldn’t I buy a van with some of the money?’

  Damn him, he’s not listening. ‘Billy, if we were careful, at forty-eight grand a year we could come out with nearly a hundred thousand. Just think, a hundred thousand for two years’ work…’

  ‘And the baby?’

  ‘The baby would have to be brought up as Fabian’s, just for the start, don’t you see?’

  ‘You swore you would stay with that git for just two weeks! Then it turned into a couple of months. You said…’

  ‘I know what I said. But that was before Aunty Val came up and before I knew I was pregnant. For God’s sake, Billy, you must see that this is a better idea and much less risky.’

&nb
sp; ‘And after two years? What then?’

  ‘After two years I’ll just disappear. Simple. There won’t be any money left in the bank, we’ll move it all to another account as we go along. I don’t see how anyone would find us.’

  ‘But by then you’d have his child,’ says Billy, looking on the black side as usual. ‘You’re talking about a powerful bastard. He’d hardly give up his child without making a sodding good effort to find him.’

  ‘Well then, I’d tell him,’ says Ange. ‘I’d let him know that the baby was never his, so finding us wouldn’t be worth it. And they can prove these things these days, with DNA.’ And if Ange recalls the sight of Fabian’s face in anger, if this image of his hard, penetrating eyes flashes before her now, then for sanity’s sake she quickly dismisses it.

  The park grass, under the blossoming chestnut trees, is all speckled with daisies. The sun lies with them, in stripes and discs and spangles, resting on the warmth of the air. The blossom has drifted onto the water. Ange leaves Billy and Jacob on a bench beside the lake while she goes dressed in her best this morning—the pink suede jacket plundered from the restaurant, black leggings and her favourite flat, gold shoes—to the bank where she goes under the name of Lady Angela Ormerod.

  Tina’s almost constant presence is becoming a real nuisance. OK, she’s been a great help to Billy while Ange has been away, often picking up bits for him at Tesco, babysitting Jacob when he wants to pop out of an evening, taking his washing to the launderette and cooking him little treats now and then. Getting out, and down the stairs, is easier for Tina because Petal, her pretty daughter, is now two years old and toddling.

  It would be neurotic of Ange to imagine some extra closeness was developing between them, I mean, surely the last thing Tina wants in her life at the moment is another man. She has only just come round to realising that Ed is a pig and always will be, after years of hospital visits, beatings, swollen lips, bruises and sprains and silly excuses.

  And Tina doesn’t ask questions—like when she ordered that lingerie set for Ange, and that was good of her—she doesn’t go poking her nose in where it’s not wanted. ‘I just told her you were away on a course,’ said Billy, ‘for a few days every week, selling, and after that she didn’t seem interested to know any more. Well, she’s more concerned with talking about herself, with all her troubles.’

  It would be unkind to let Tina know she wasn’t wanted. She’s obviously lonely, stuck indoors with a demanding toddler, and nobody to talk to all day, not a friend in the world—just like poor Billy really. It’s natural that they have the odd cup of coffee together, let Petal come and play with Jacob sometimes, watch Postman Pat and The Muppets, share a couple of cans of lager. Billy says he’d go mad if he had no one to talk to and Tina badly needs company what with all her problems with Ed.

  Having said that, there was really no need for Billy to go wading into the breach during one of Ed’s drunken visits. Tina isn’t his problem. She should have come to her senses long ago and thrown the bugger out.

  Ange takes the brand-new chequebook from her patent leather handbag enjoying the click and squeak of luxury as she snaps her wallet closed. She knows she looks good, her black hair is held back with a fancy gold clip, her high cheekbones, with a touch of blusher, highlight soft, unblemished skin and her long eyelashes flutter with concentration. ‘Cash—five hundred pounds,’ she writes, and feels herself blushing, as if the money’s not hers to take, as if she expects some punitive hand to clamp itself down on her shoulder.

  But the cashier smiles at her brightly and asks how she wants it.

  Does she look as furtive as she feels? ‘What?’ asks Ange.

  The smile goes brighter. ‘How would you like the money?’

  ‘Sorry?’ How do I want it? I want it here in my waiting hand.

  ‘In tens or twenties?’

  ‘Oh?’ How stupid can anyone be? She calms her thumping heart. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I was miles away. In twenties, please.’

  It is understandable that Billy wants to go on a small spending spree today. After all, while Ange has been out and about, while her life has changed beyond belief, Billy’s has stayed as boringly the same as ever. And he’ll want some money to keep him going when she goes back at the end of this week. She’s supposed to be in Rome at the moment at some fashion fair. She bought the magazine, the Drapers Record, after she found a copy in the library and saw it was full of fashion information, the kind of thing a buyer might read. And it lists all sorts of meetings and shows and conventions, it gives Ange some useful ideas.

  Oh no!

  Surely not!

  Her mind goes blank, her hands are sweating profusely when, through a fog of horror, she catches sight of Honesty with a drab, platinum blonde standing at the adjacent counter. That must be Ffiona! Don’t worry, don’t panic, just turn round and walk away, and as terror grips her she whispers to herself, don’t run, don’t run, as she hastily disappears. Gets out of the bank, quick as lightning. Seeing nothing.

  Did Honesty see her?

  No, no, she can’t have.

  Why hasn’t Ange given more thought to the likelihood of a chance ill-meeting? Because it is just not damn well possible to think of everything, that’s why.

  By the time she catches up with Billy, Ange feels resentful and angry. She snaps at him, ‘That was a bloody close shave. We could have lost everything,’ as if it is all his fault. She thrusts the money into his hand with a poor grace. She notices his cheap, baggy jeans, his off-white T-shirt, he hasn’t bothered to shave this morning and he looks like a slob. The results of daily despair and inertia, well, whose fault is that? ‘You better get on and spend it then, now you’ve got it.’

  ‘What the hell’s got into you?’

  So Ange has to explain.

  And then it’s round British Home Stores, Top Man and C & A buying cheap tat which Billy doesn’t need anyway, but he swears that he does. Random and senseless purchases. White trainers, pants, socks, T-shirts, and an anorak which cost fifty quid and still looks tatty.

  In front of Dixons they pause while Billy goes in to see about the cost of a CD player.

  ‘That’s just the sort of thing we can do without,’ says Ange, pulling off a set of expensive headphones and dragging him out of the store. ‘This money isn’t for luxuries, Billy, and the moment we start throwing it around…’

  ‘I thought you said this was mine. For me!’ His face twists as if to try and stop from crying.

  ‘Well it is, but…’

  ‘Well then, if I want a CD player I’ll damn well get one.’ He turns on her, erupting in anger with his blue eyes blazing.

  Oh, what the hell, what’s the point? He does need cheering up, that’s true, but so far this visit home, which she had such hopes for, has turned into a real bitch.

  ‘Do me a favour, Ange.’

  ‘Yes, Billy?’

  ‘Piss off.’

  Perhaps this has to be just part of the price.

  His voice is small. He won’t look at her. He resents her now, thinks Ange, holding back the tears. The Harper family walk home in silence but when the door closes behind them Billy takes her into his arms as you’d hold a long-lost child.

  20

  FABIAN IS ELATED.

  It is entirely appropriate, and in keeping with Angela’s sweet and slightly secretive nature, that she waits until they are at Hurleston before announcing her portentous news. A slightly longer stay in Milan than expected made Fabian value her company all the more, and now they walk through the cool, uncut grass of the water meadow down towards the river, hand in hand, the calm waters disturbed only by the plop of a rising fish or a dipping heron.

  Fabian takes her into his arms and kisses the sunwarm top of her head. She smells sweetly of apples. ‘It must have been…’ he starts, half smiling.

  ‘It must have been that night in London,’ says Ange, finishing for him, and if her memory serves her right she’d finished for him that time, too. She remembers th
e state of her aching wrist before he actually managed it. ‘You are obviously a very potent person.’

  Fabian’s smile is a broad one now. Since that first night their love life has been unspectacular, which is how he likes it. He never fails to go to sleep with his arm round Angela, and when he feels like going further he kisses the back of her neck. She responds quite beautifully with little moans, eager to please him, knowing exactly how to touch him, she waits patiently on her back until he is ready to mount her. This is one way Fabian can be sure of a good night’s sleep, better even than Benylin. He always drops off immediately, aware of Angela lying contentedly, breathing softly beside him.

  Exactly how it ought to be.

  ‘We must get you to Sir Clement Brownjohn at once.’

  ‘Isn’t he the one…’

  ‘Diana and Fergie and everyone else…’

  ‘I was going to say wasn’t he the Queen’s gynaecologist?’

  ‘I believe so,’ says Fabian.

  ‘Well isn’t he rather old?’

  ‘Experience like his is worth everything else,’ says Fabian firmly. ‘Childbirth is childbirth after all, it hasn’t changed you know.’ And he smiles at her fondly. ‘Are you quite certain?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘So when is the happy day?’

  ‘Some time in January, I think. It’s a bit hard to tell because I am always so irregular.’

  Fabian does not want to hear about that. ‘What excellent news! Wait till Mother and Father know!’

  ‘And Aunty Val. And Honesty?’ Angela cautions. ‘And the twins?’

  ‘It might take them time, but in the end they will join in our rejoicing, you’ll see.’ He will damn well make sure they do. ‘And now, how about work?’

  ‘Oh I’ll be able to keep going for a little while yet,’ says Ange with the kind of gutsy spirit he so admires. Ffiona collapsed completely on hearing she was with child. Took to her bed and hardly left it, demanding all sorts of expensive treats like caviar and giant bars of Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut. ‘Right up until the last minute, I hope.’