“Come on, off we go, you pain in the ass! About-face…”
We run away… I think I saw some kind of strait-laced sort… somebody from the Yard… we keep up the pace a little while… stop for a breather… I’m pooped with my bundle… I’m positive he was the fuzz… he was walking his beat in front of the National Gallery… I fill the kid in about my fear… the news thrills her! What marvellous fun! She wants me to point out some others… she’d like the whole square to be crawling with them… every last inch… under the doors… detectives hot on my heels… ah, I’ve become interesting… and don’t forget the hoodlums… she’s got to have some of those, and famous ones at that… I’m supposed to pick them out in the crowd… I must know scads and scads considering how spooked I am, my big secrets!… Plus she doesn’t give a damn about me… Come on, let’s go, Ferdinand! She’s calling on my services… This’ll teach me to shoot my mouth off to a little girl… The little snotnose’s already working on a few ideas… wondering whether this wasn’t some sort of Frenchmen’s game, lying in wait for each other on street corners… just like in Nick Carter!*… Or in The Mysteries of New York? She’s not one bit scared off… I’m the yellow belly with the jitters… she slipped ahead of me anyway… or shot ahead is more like it… dashing this way and that… her short pleated skirt fluttering up… what sturdy muscular thighs! Little devil! My creeps meant big laughs for us… one catch: I was really losing steam… I was the packhorse in this little routine, with my enormous cargo, a whole factory load of gear!… And she kept me talking too, I had to spin out, concoct yarns… she was a real bully, that pain in the ass… endless adventures till I was blue in the face… why was I being shadowed like that? How many crimes had I committed?… I added a few to the list to hold her interest… otherwise she’d have cleared the hell off, ditched me… you could bet on that… heartless… once she’d escaped I’d never set eyes on her again… Keeping her hooked with my heebie-jeebies was a real song and dance…
We might have gone over to sit in the church nearby, St Martin’s… or in the National Gallery… or walk back up to the Leicester… or the square where Curlers hung out… the weather was wonderful, delightful… that last suggestion was reckless… off the deep end!… Just a stone’s throw from the clink… and yet I was dying for a little gander at their ugly mugs, their dirty behind-the-scenes deals… the pimps going in and out… the shifty surroundings of the hole in the wall… maybe they were under surveillance!… And it smelt like a set-up? It’s settled! I can’t stand it any more, I’ll take my chances! My curiosity gets the better of me! I charge ahead… I station myself a stone’s throw from the sidewalk… right under the tree in front of the statue… I shush the kid, tell her not to move a muscle… from there we had a great view of the bronze Shakespeare… we could check out all the action, not miss a single thing on the sidewalk… The little ploys of the ladies in full swing… and one by one I recognized them… by the way they went at it, snapping up their tricks… Little Sweetheart… Gertrude… Finette… Mireille, Gendremer’s old lady in her plum dress… the whole crew in action!… I recognized each and every one… and they were doing great business, pirouetting around, snagging Tommies by the armload… whole armies at a time, hot and horny! Non-stop! This was the right time of day! Five o’clock! A few hours of leave!… Wave after wave of privates… streaming in from all four corners… stampeding towards happiness… Business at full blast!… Hortense over there giving her line… Maryse… Reseda… Ninette too, a ball of fire… plus two-three others… the girls working by the hour… the little gang without a worry in the world, babbling, blabbering… laughing their asses off… As far as the fuzz goes, nothing to report!… This corner of the Empire bar is a hangout for stoolies, absolutely safe as far as I could tell… Just Bobby Rooster, as he was called, the district’s flatfoot, taking up space… in front of Lyon’s… a harmless guy… a friend… In short, business was booming, terrific, going great guns… Cascade might have been glad, considering he owned practically the whole stable… what’s it add up to by now? Twenty-five girls? I made a rough count… naturally, it got me dreaming… the girl could see clearly… I couldn’t spell it all out for her… not for her young ears… she was just a kid, even though she was quick-witted, mischievous, you name it, precocious of course, but still not streetwise… it wasn’t possible… the more I kept mum the more intrigued she grew… she wanted to know what was going on between the ladies and the strollers… all those servicemen out on the town, what was with all their little spats?… Just why was I so interested in what was going on over there, sitting here gawking away?… What were those ladies’ names? Where’d I know them from? I told her they were French ladies who were meeting their godsons… wartime was always like this… the ladies were decked out pretty flashy for godmothers… they really stood out against the khaki… those rainbow-flaring frills… they caught your eye… ten-twenty chiffon butterflies fluttering from one sidewalk to the other… Business pennants… most of all the hectic flurry… the starting gun goes off at five… and such great gusto!… Such a crush! An incredible mob!… Smiles all around! Fatso Godard in front of the Queen pub, in his grey derby, green spats, beautiful carnation, he also was keeping his eye on the rumpus… Fatso Godard, one greedy son of a bitch… as far as I knew he ran a good dozen hustlers between Tottenham and the Cecil pub! A sharp cookie!… A whole lot worse than Cascade when it came to money… He didn’t cut you a break on a single penny… I’d heard he was supposed to join up, go off to war pronto… So what the hell was he still doing in this neck of the woods spying on his tramps? He ought to have been hauled off by now, so why wasn’t he? I was going to cross the street and ask him, pull his leg… on second thoughts it’s pretty chancy… I thought it over, and kept cover… I think that he’s just following his usual routine, a slave to habit, that’s all… and he’d still be there keeping tabs, spying on his bitches until his train blew its whistle pulling out of the station… Lots of pimps are like that… I was afraid he’d spot me, that he’d also come over to shoot the breeze… Wasn’t the time for that… I huddle farther back… Most of all I don’t want the girl showing herself… Right at that instant all hell breaks loose… The whole scene a total madhouse… the ladies clear the hell out, scattering in all directions, ditching their soldier boys… pandemonium… I watch the cop on the corner everybody knows about… I can see his helmet in the distance… a ballbuster probably… one-eyed Pedro the accordion player on lookout at the corner of the Bragance pub, he’s the guy who tips the gang off… he picks up his gizmo, starts it mooing, that’s the signal, he rips into a rendition of ‘A Long Way to Tipperary’… at the first note the ladies race, bound off… scrambling every which way to the tune… shooting off in all directions… lighter than air, taking wing… the police van shows up for a raid… that’s what the panic’s all about… switching sidewalks… switching feet… How they zip past sting, those dragonflies!… A quadrille on the asphalt!… A genuine street ballet! Go to it! Here comes the next cop onto the scene… passes real peaceful-like through the bustle… calf eyes… it’s OK… doesn’t bat an eyelid… he’s a cop, right… but this is all just for show, going through the motions, nothing more… respect for the uniform… Virginia wants me to tell her… wants to know what’s rattling me… Why’re all the people running away? What’re they shouting to each other?… Most of all she wants to know their names… how about that lady?… And the other one?… I try to remember them all… they’re just too many… hell, are there ever!… There’s Flora… Raymonde… Ginette… Bobichon… Dream Fly… Glass Ass… true, I kind of know them all… they all spent time at the Pension… But I spot somebody over there who just slays me, none other than Arnold, oh brother! Out for a stroll! Mr Great Smoocher in person… On the sidewalk across the street, in fact chatting with the fuzz… I thought he’d left weeks ago!… Had to report to Dunkirk according to the word out on the street… He was sporting a boater… another change of outfit… the pimps in tho
se days wouldn’t be caught dead in anything but grey derbies…
“Let’s go, enough!” I shatter the spell. “Now we’ve got to get a move on, kid!…” I’m talking to my girl, my little vixen… “Enough loafing! We’re a team, child! Let’s get on with our errands! Or else you’ll see what your uncle does! Whizz! Whizz! The whip!”
I show her…
Ah! But she doesn’t want to obey! She wants us to stay right where we are and keep looking… she’s having too much fun!… She’s just knee-high to a grasshopper!… She doesn’t want to pull herself away from the banter… the ladies’ little games… She wants me to tell new stories… about the big secrets and all that… where those people live… whether Curlers is with the ladies?… In short, umpteen no-no questions…
“Come on,” I go, “let’s start walking! I’ll start talking when we get farther away…”
What a girl she was! Curious as a cat!… She drove you nuts in the end! I’m all for sitting back for a short break… the weather was absolutely enchanting… A rare event in these parts… mustn’t miss it all… Leicester’s a pleasant spot… not heaven on earth but even so an oasis of green smack in the middle of traffic, as it were, right at the spot vehicles cram in on each other in hair-raising bottlenecks, and the racket is deafening, all the buses crisscrossing… plus the mob, horses, bikes, the Piccadilly whirlpool… we’re satisfied with our patch of grass and the birds… My adorable Virginia was a fairy charming the sparrows, practically the second we sat down… they landed in small flocks… for a little crust of bread they flitted about… perched on her hand, pecked… the boys next door in the St Augustine boarding school also showed up cheeping, but they were pillagers, spending their break throwing rocks and yanking pigtails… the girls at the school were almost as young as Virginia… maybe not so savvy… but in any case their skirts were just as short!… People filled the benches all around… no empty seats in the oasis!… Recess for all ages! Secretaries snacking… mothers with tots bouncing in baby carriages… and little dirty old men, Peeping Toms pretending to read their newspapers… three-four Tommies and secretaries dozing against the bandstand… Virginia wouldn’t give me any rest, I’d hooked her too badly on my big secrets… she refused to have anything to do with me if I stopped talking to her… she fidgeted on the bench… her pretty golden thighs so muscular… people were looking at her, no helping that!… She got noticed real easy… a bitch from hell if I put up any fight… I can’t win, I’ve got to keep talking! Make stories up if I have to! For her this whole business was some wildly wacky adventure… And she was demanding! A little bully! Her imagination fired her up… in the end she was riding me too hard!
“I give up! I give up!…” I said. “Virginia!”
I begged for mercy… at first she didn’t really believe me, I’d been making such a pathetic effort… she razzed me pretty hard… I’d be smart to change the subject… move on to something a little more serious… not one bit imaginary!… And it worked like a charm… Didn’t her uncle every now and then ever bring up the masks?… I was sort of fishing around… just to see what I’d come up with… Sosthène was a great guy but he was kidding himself… in my opinion he wouldn’t last against the gas… and it’d probably be a total fiasco… plus the risks were very high… I wasn’t going to bring up the Vegas, the Goa dances, our fourth dimension… the poor darling would have got scared… or run away… or walked off laughing hysterically!… It wasn’t worth the trouble!… I didn’t press the point about her uncle, about how I thought he was off his rocker… his crafty pet crazes… his pranks with his gas taps… Walking and talking at the same time was running me off my feet… we sat down in a corner of Lambeth Square… I kept my thoughts to myself… I sat there on the bench muttering, talking to myself… Truth is, I was wiped out… this happened to me more and more often… Psst! Psst! Psst! Somebody goes right into my ear… I jump… turn around… It’s Curlers! Canard’s old lady!
“Well, well,” she goes, “look at you, fathead! You into raising babies now?”
“Me?”
I don’t get it.
“What about her?”
She points to the kid… lifts her dress… True, her short skirt came up almost to her thighs… she’d got big… well-built, muscular, golden, you name it…
Couldn’t help but catch your eye… it had caught Curlers’s… I cut her off.
“And so what about Canard?” I said.
She’s surprised.
“He’s at the front!… didn’t you know? The guy’s been there a week already! Would you ever have believed it? A good-for-nothing deadbeat, wasn’t he, no kidding! Rolling out of bed at five in the afternoon!… Didn’t show any more get-up-and-go for shooting craps in the bars either… he had a cushy deal with me, you better believe it!… Good-natured, no trouble or anything… a fucking pansy if you ask me! Plus with his varicocele… he was declared unfit three times!…”
She showed me what Canard’s equipment looked like, using both hands to give an idea how swollen up he was… big as a cauliflower…
London Bridge Page 17
