Paradise Court

by Jenny Oldfield

  He shook his head, staring down at his hands. ‘Is that all you think of, Sadie Parsons? Cycling out into the countryside when we’re at war with Germany, and to cap it ill there’s been a terrible murder of someone we’ve both known ever since we can remember? Is that all you think about?’ He got up quickly and flung open the door.

  ‘No it ain’t!’ Her retaliation was too slow. Charlie was already halfway down the gloomy corridor. ‘Who d’you think has been taking stuff up to the O’Hagans all week? I been up and down them stairs like a jack-in-the-box, and I tell you something, Charlie Ogden, I ain’t never seen you up there offering no help!’

  Hot tears sprang to her eyes as she stormed off up the court. For all his reading and studying, Charlie missed the obvious things. It was true, Sadie never saw him reach out to help others. He grumbled and dreamt a lot, but he never put himself out. But neither could she bear to argue and think badly of him. It was like making cuts into her own flesh; painful and disfiguring. Sadly she went back to help her sisters.

  ‘Cheer up, Sadie!’ Jess cried. The bar shone from top to bottom. She put the finishing touches to the bread and butter and pastries that lined the bar top. ‘Put a good face on it for Pa’s sate. Don’t let him think you’re sad to see Rob go. We gotta be happy for him!’

  Sadie nodded and pulled herself together. ‘What d’you want me to do, Jess?’

  ‘Go over to Henshaw’s and fetch Ernie, will you. I said I wanted him home early, but it seems like he forgot. And when you find him you can help him spruce himself up a bit for the party.’

  Sadie went off to look for her brother while preparations continued. The sisters brought down huge plates of cold pressed beef, veal and ham pie and fruit tarts. Duke fussed with the bungs and chocks under the barrels in the cellar, and even Joxer showed up in collar and tie instead of his usual bare neck and scarf. At six o’clock, people began to stroll in off the street to a liquid welcome and tables heaped with food.

  ‘Just like good old Teddy’s Coronation feast, ain’t it?’ Annie Wiggin declared. She was first over the threshold in a new hat and her old boots. As far as Annie was concerned, a parry was an invitation to reminisce. She went up to Duke and settled herself at the bar. ‘You remember that, don’t you? We had steak and kidney pie and boiled beef, as much as we could stuff. And we had Bass beer, gallons of it, all paid for by the King himself. I went down the chapel for my dinner that day, and then across to Stepney to see Dan Leno and good old Vesta Tilley. Was you there, Duke?’

  He leaned on the bar; the ice with Annie well and truly broken. ‘Not me. I was up to me ears here, serving drinks to the whole of bleeding Southwark it seemed like.’

  ‘Them was the good old days, wasn’t they, Duke?’

  ‘What was good about them? Your old man had just buggered off and left you, I seem to recall. We was all struggling in them dark days.’

  Annie nodded. ‘Well, fancy you remembering that.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  She smiled, weighing her words well. ‘The time when my better half departed this life.’

  ‘Course I remember. He owed me half a crown,’ Duke said.

  ‘Your Pattie had just passed on and all, and that sister of yours, Florrie Searles, was living here. She came to lend a hand in your hour of need, according to her.’ Annie took a long draught from her own special pint pot.

  Duke smiled at Annie. ‘Florrie ain’t that bad, believe me. A bit loud for some people’s liking, but her heart’s in the right place.’

  Annie grunted. ‘A voice like a bleeding foghorn. And she treated them poor kids like they was in the bleeding army and all!’

  ‘She never meant no harm.’

  ‘Do this, do that, bleeding parade ground . . .’

  The pub was filling up and Duke went off to serve his customers, leaving Annie to bad-mouth his sister to her heart’s content. Another strong-minded woman in the street had been one too many for the likes of Annie and Dolly Ogden. ‘Arthur, come over here!’ Annie called. ‘I ain’t seen nothing of your Charlie lately.’

  Arthur shuffled across, one fist grasping a huge slice of veal and ham pie. ‘Why, what you want him for?’

  ‘To catch some rats for me. They’re all over the bleeding place again, since young Tommy O’Hagan hopped it. As if they didn’t have enough on their plates. He ain’t been seen for weeks, not since that poor girl was murdered. He was a dab hand at rat-catching, he was.’

  Arthur considered the job in terms of family income before he dismissed it out of hand. ‘He’s too busy studying,’ he replied.

  ‘La-di-da!’ She looked around for someone else to take up her offer, and spotted Ernie, head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd. Say what you liked about Ernie, he was twice as reliable as all the other little ikeys put together. There he was, still looking down-in-the-mouth about Daisy, sitting by Walter Davidson. Annie hopped off her stool and went to proposition him for the rat-catching job.

  Soon the pub thronged with neighbours and friends, all come to give Robert a good send-off. At last he made his grand entrance, coming downstairs in full uniform, shining from head to foot. Every button sparkled, every lapel and epaulette sat pressed and straight on the khaki jacket. His shiny boots clicked on the stone floor, his flat army cap sat fair and square across his forehead. Duke grinned at him across the room, then carried on serving pints.

  Surrounded by friends from the dock, attracting the attention of the girls, Robert was in his element. The uniform made him seem special in his own eyes too, as if he’d been training his body for years to fit its rugged lines like a glove. Less than a week ago joining up had seemed like the best of a bad job; an idea that caught him at a low ebb. Now it began to offer adventure and excitement, and to invest him with a clean-cut courage over and above the tough image he’d adopted on the streets and in the gym. He glanced with contempt at Chalky, Syd and Whitey, who had drifted in for the free drink, and made a disparaging remark about them to Walter Davidson.

  Whitey Lewis sat with his arm around Amy Ogden. He’d got well in with her and a couple of her old friends from Coopers’. Chalkey, on the other hand, ignored them. It was the first time he’d been seen out and about since his defeat down at the gym. He sat slumped forward over his beer, collar up, cigarette hanging from his mouth. He’d seen but ignored Robert’s entrance. Memory of his disgrace in the boxing ring still seemed to weigh heavy. His stooping look was a new thing, although the bruising Robert had inflicted had almost faded.

  ‘Bleeding cheek, showing his face round here,’ Walter said to Robert. ‘You want me to go over and tell him to push off?’

  ‘Leave him be. It ain’t no skin off my nose.’ Robert had risen above Chalky White and his gang. He circulated, glass in hand, enjoying his last hour of freedom.

  Charlie Ogden came, and Sadie was happy. Even Frances sat in a corner with some friends from her classes, though she’d been tactful enough not to invite the women from the suffragette meetings. Their table was quiet and respectable, the least rowdy of the lot, discussing the successful case brought against Teddy Cooper by Miss Amelia Jones. Frances herself had stood up in court as a witness and described the accused’s actions on the night of the window-smashing. Her evidence had helped bring about a conviction. ‘It ain’t right though,’ Frances complained. ‘They find him guilty of assault and let him off with a footling little fine. They take Amelia herself to court for smashing a window and they give her six months in Holloway. Call that justice!’

  The others agreed. ‘Lucky little swine,’ Rosie Cornwell said. She’d just given up her good job as a typewriter in Swan and Edgar’s office to train as a nurse for the war effort; a pretty, round-faced girl with light brown hair braided into a coronet around her brow.

  ‘Hers was a crime against property,’ Billy Wray pointed out. ‘His was a crime against the person. It’s obvious which one they think is more serious, ain’t it? Besides, he’s a boss.’ He spoke quietly, stating the obvious with deadly
effect. ‘They could get away with murder without too much trouble, believe you me.’

  Frances shuddered. ‘Don’t say that.’ She’d heard the rumours, spreading like wildfire around the streets, fanned by Dolly Ogden. No one had seen much sign of Teddy Cooper since the murder, even at Coopers’ Drapery Stores. People there said the police had paid him a visit and questioned him. It was only a matter of time before the arrest.

  ‘Why not? What did I say?’ Billy didn’t live locally enough to have heard the rumours. His interests were political, not personal, with his long history in the hunger marches of 1908 and 1911. ‘Starved to Death in a Land of Plenty’ was his banner. Tittle-tattle wasn’t up his street, but he noticed Frances shake her head and go pale.

  ‘Nothing. The girl who got murdered up at the Palace lived down our street, that’s all. They say Teddy Cooper’s a suspect.’

  ‘Him and five hundred others,’ Rosie reminded her, and steered the talk in another direction.

  Robert stood at the bar now, grasping his father’s hand. ‘Time I was off, Pa.’

  Duke gave his son’s hand one firm shake. He felt choked with pride. In his uniform, Robert looked the perfect son, the conquering hero. ‘The girls will go and see you off, Rob. Me and Ernie will say goodbye here.’ He wouldn’t trust his voice to say more.

  Robert nodded.

  Hettie came downstairs with his trenchcoat over her arm, while Jess went out to hail a cab. She too said goodbye on the doorstep. ‘There’s Grace to see to,’ she said quietly. ‘The little beggar’s hungry again. Look after yourself, Rob. We’re proud of you.’ She looked up into his face and squeezed his arm.

  So Robert set off for Victoria with Hettie, Frances and Sadie, waving farewell to the old life.

  ‘G’bye, Ern! Look after things here while I’m gone!’ he yelled. The horses clipped smartly up the street, the old cab swayed along. Crossing the main thoroughfares in the early autumn evening, they came to the sluggish grey river. They passed high over the water along London Bridge, over the slow barges. Victoria’s mighty façade, with its great ribbed awning of iron and glass, greeted them as they spilled from the cab. The station platforms thronged with uniforms; soldiers with rifles slung across their shoulders, sailors with their kitbags. All the faces looked brisk and hopeful, of young men embarking for battle, making good farewells.

  Robert slung his own bag down on a bench and turned to the women. ‘That one’s mine.’ He pointed to the mighty engine, its funnel gently hissing steam.

  Hettie ignored a small convoy of wounded men crossing a faraway platform, some on crutches, some carried on stretchers. She smiled bravery. ‘Write and tell us how you’re getting along,’ she reminded him. ‘And there’s no need to tell you again to make sure and look after yourself, is there?’

  ‘You too, Ett.’ Robert gave her a quick hug. ‘And keep an eye on the O’Hagans.’

  ‘Try and stop me.’

  ‘She’s a one-woman Sally Army,’ Frances put in. She took Robert’s hand, clasping it in her own small, gloved ones.

  ‘Well, say a prayer for old Daisy then,’ Robert said to Hettie, one foot on the carriage step.

  She nodded. ‘I already did.’ The train door slammed, Robert leaned out of the window.

  ‘Go give him a kiss, quick!’ Frances said to Sadie, who ran and reached up to his cheek. She clung on to his coat for a second, before the great iron wheels began to turn. Robert’s face drew away into the distance. He raised his cap and waved, then went and sat in his carriage, with its smell of musty heat. The train left the station, shuttling between the backs of tall houses, through black tunnels, out into the open countryside, where shadows fell deep and the place names were hazy with steam and yellow flowering shrubs.

  Annie Wiggin lingered until after most guests had left. The food was picked over, all the free beer drunk. Robert’s departure had signalled the end of the party, of course. ‘Like Hamlet without the bleeding prince,’ she said to Dolly. ‘Ain’t you lucky your Charlie’s too young for this lark?’

  She ambled out on to the pavement in time to see a flat-topped police car drive up. She noticed its soft rubber tyres with their smart white rims, its dicky-seat at the back crammed with three coppers in full uniform, besides the sergeant and his mate sitting comfortably inside. They all climbed out and looked up and down Duke Street. Trouble, she thought, and nipped back inside the pub for a ringside view.

  To her surprise, the coppers actually followed her into the bar in single file, then fanned out across the room. Everyone stood stock-still, as if posing for a photograph. Joxer and Duke looked out from behind the bar.

  ‘Wilf Parsons?’ the sergeant asked. ‘We want to talk to your boy.’

  ‘He just left.’ Duke’s voice was strained, but he returned the policeman’s stare. ‘He enlisted for France. You won’t find him here.’ Whatever Robert had been up to would pale into insignificance beside that.

  ‘Your boy, Ernest,’ the man continued.

  Duke breathed out, almost scornful. ‘Well, there’s been some mistake there. Ernie’s . . .’

  ‘No mistake,’ the officer barked. He took a creased cloth cap from a pocket and held it up for inspection. Jess gasped and took a step towards it. ‘This belongs to him, don’t it?’ He stuffed it back into his pocket without waiting for a reply. ‘We already identified it through witnesses. He was seen, you understand. This is his cap, all right. We found it at the scene of the crime.’

  Jess backed off, feeling herself go faint. The sticky sensation of blood on her fingers came back to her with redoubled force. She looked round wildly to see where Ernie was. The policemen watched her like hawks.

  ‘Where? What crime?’ Duke stared around the room.

  ‘He ain’t exactly hard to spot by all accounts. Several witnesses seen him hanging about the place just before the murder.’

  ‘Murder? What you on about?’ Duke lifted the bar hinge and stepped forward. ‘What the bleeding hell you trying to say?’

  The policemen stiffened, but didn’t move in on Duke. They waited while the sergeant explained.

  ‘We need to talk to Ernie.’ He motioned two of the men to barge past Joxer down into the cellar. ‘It’s in connection with the murder at the Palace. Bad news, I’m afraid. We got to arrest your boy.’

  Jess cried out loud and went to cling on to Annie. Annie screeched at the nearest copper; a young man with a thin moustache. Duke lunged at the sergeant, but Joxer managed to restrain him as the two policemen emerged from the cellar on either side of a bewildered Ernie.

  ‘You can’t arrest him, you bleeding idiot!’ Annie yelled. ‘The poor boy wouldn’t harm a fly!’

  ‘We got to take him down the station and ask him a few questions.’ The sergeant turned to speak to Jess, who seemed to be the only one to have come to her senses. She was stunned but quiet. ‘I’ve got to warn you though that we’ll most likely charge him and keep him in the cells. After that, you can go and visit him in the Scrubs. Got it?’

  Ernie stared at the chaos around him. Two policemen held him by the arms. In confusion, he began to struggle. One arm was wrenched up his back, the other shackled by handcuffs. He felt the cold metal click around his wrist. ‘Pa?’ he pleaded.

  Duke pushed Joxer off and stood up straight. His head was up, though his hands trembled. ‘Go with them, there’s a good boy, Ern.’

  Ernie nodded and let himself be led off.

  Duke’s head dropped to his chest. He turned away.

  ‘Ern don’t understand,’ Jess told the sergeant. ‘You got to explain things to him clear and simple. You get him down the station and explain the charge, right? You tell him he’s supposed to have stabbed Daisy to death. Then you listen to him. He’ll tell you the truth.’ She held on to the policeman’s braided cuff. ‘You hear me? Ernie can’t lie, he don’t know how. You listen to him well and good, you hear?’

  The man nodded, glad the boy was going quietly. ‘He was up the Palace that night, weren’t he?’<
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  Slowly Jess admitted it.

  ‘Shh, Jess,’ Annie warned. ‘Don’t tell them nothing.’

  Duke watched the doors swing to after the men. Only the sergeant remained. ‘There’s been a mistake,’ he whispered.

  Jess made one final appeal. ‘Ernie wouldn’t kill Daisy!’ Tears, poured down her face. ‘He worshipped the girl!’

  The sergeant sighed. ‘I’ve seen everything in this job,’ he said. ‘Most of it you wouldn’t believe unless you’d seen it with your own eyes.’ He looked almost sorry for them as he fixed his hat on his head and pulled the strap under his chin. ‘Look after your old man,’ he advised. ‘He looks like he could do with a stiff drink.’

  Annie followed him to the door, in time to see him clamber into the car, and to catch a glimpse of Ernie’s pale, bewildered face staring out from between the blue uniforms as they drove him off up the street.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ernie understood that they thought he’d done something very bad. He knew they could give him the cat or put him in prison, and he was very afraid. But his father had told him to go along quietly, and it surely wouldn’t be long before they came from home and fetched him. Probably Frances would come, when she got back from sending Robert off to war, and she would sort things out. This went through his head as the policemen manhandled him from the car into the station. The handcuffs locked both arms tight in front of him. They chafed his skin as he was wrenched this way and that down the bare corridor into a room with a table and two chairs. One high, barred window provided daylight, and an electric light shone under a green metal shade. The door banged shut. He was alone.

  Then a man he’d never seen before came in. He wore a long, pale coat and a brown bowler hat. A dark moustache hid his mouth. His cheeks were thin, his eyes set close together. He never smiled or said hello; just threw his coat across the back of one of the chairs and slammed some papers down on the table. He looked at Ernie. ‘Sit,’ he said. He turned to the policeman in uniform who’d followed him in and puffed air into his thin cheeks. Then he blew it out in a loud sigh. ‘Best get cracking on this one, Sergeant. What’s he said so far?’