His companion agreed. ‘You’re jumping the gun a bit, aren’t you?’
‘We think ahead – months ahead,’ Olga insisted. ‘Look at profit margin. Decide what you afford to give for little book belonging each customer. Little book is dividend for Christmas. When they spend, you put some pennies in Christmas book. From you, Matt, they can get some free vegetables and fruit for Christmas table. From you, Terry, some meat.’
‘What about you, Olga?’ Terry asked.
‘Ah yes. About this I am thinking for weeks now. My dividends will be toys I buy wholesale – cars for boys, dolls for girls. Every time they buy the coal bricks, the paraffin, the pots or pans, I mark book.’
Terry whistled. ‘Clever girl. So we have a chance against the Co-op.’
Olga blushed. Sometimes, just sometimes, Terry Openshaw was a little too generous with his praise for tonight’s hostess. ‘Well,’ she concluded, ‘as there are so few here, we need to carry this business over until next month. Perhaps you two gentlemen might go to the pub? Me, I am taking Leo to meet again Alice and Dan and Frank. He needs education.’
The two men stood up. Matt Gibson needed little persuasion when it came to a pie and a pint, though the butcher looked slightly crestfallen. Matt shook his head; Terry had no chance with Miss Russia. Russia was a cold, heartless country, and this daughter of Russia kept herself very much to herself. Beyond these meetings and her acquaintance with the recently arrived Alice Quigley, she had no social life. They left.
Alone, Olga picked up her beloved puppy. ‘I am too old for loving a man, but I have you, Leo.’ She glanced at the clock. He would still be there. Standing before the mirror, she softened her hair by taking it down and tying it more loosely, allowing the usually pinned-back fringe to cover her forehead by dipping the comb into a jug of water to help the process. A few side curls were similarly encouraged, and the results were pleasing. ‘I am now looking younger,’ she advised her reflection. Yes, he would still be there . . .
Leo emitted a high-pitched woof – he wanted his walk.
‘Soon, soon, baby.’ A little powder, coral pink lipstick, sandals, no ladders in her stockings. ‘Leo?’
The little dog cocked his head to one side.
‘Your mama is stupid. Who will look at me? I am too old.’ She picked up her pet and whispered in his ear, ‘He is older than I am. Let’s take our little run first.’ Terry Openshaw? Olga chuckled, because Terry hadn’t a hope in hell.
After their short expedition, Olga and Leo arrived at Alice’s house. The visitor tapped before admitting herself into the hall. This, she had discovered, was customary in these parts if the door was not locked. Frank immediately took over the care of Leo, leading him through the kitchen and out to the rear garden in search of mischief. Olga could hear the two men talking in Dan’s room, so she went in search of Alice, who wasn’t on the ground floor.
The visitor climbed stairs up to the first storey. The sewing room was empty, as was the spare room, but she finally found her friend in the room at the front of the house, the master bedroom, which would have been shared by Dan and Alice had the poor man not suffered such ill health. Olga stood in the open doorway. ‘Alice?’
The mistress of the house didn’t turn round. ‘I was born in this room,’ she said.
‘Oh, yes?’
‘Yes. On the day my mother turned forty. It was April, 1913. The eighth day of April.’ At last, Alice swivelled and faced Olga. ‘Can you hear it?’
Olga paused and listened. ‘I hear nothing unusual.’
Alice nodded. ‘Just me, then. Frank doesn’t hear it, Dan doesn’t, and Peter’s said nothing. So it’s just me now.’
‘And you are hearing?’
‘A baby. It cries, then it stops. Real babies wind down, don’t they? They mutter for a while, build themselves up to a scream, then get tired, but they still moan. When they’ve moaned for a bit, they slow down and stop unless they’re in pain. But this one goes silent right in the middle of a scream, as if a switch has been turned off. I hear it nearly every day now.’
‘Not in night?’
Alice shrugged. ‘Sometimes. But it’s as if the baby doesn’t want to disturb me. It knows me. It likes me. God, what do I sound like? Go and put the kettle on, love.’
‘Yes, yes, I go down and make tea for all.’
When Olga had left the room, Alice sat on a padded stool at the dressing table. Since moving back to Penny Lane and into the house where she’d been born, her periods of otherness had become more intense, while their frequency had increased. The click of the front door, a curl of smoke from Dad’s pipe, the accompanying scent of Virginia tobacco, the muted sounds of children at play – all these she heard, inhaled, almost saw. But only almost. Apart from Dad’s bit of smoke, there had been no real visions so far.
‘Is that me crying?’ she wondered aloud. ‘And why do I stop so suddenly?’ This room held the answers, of that she felt certain. She wanted to see Dad, to talk to him, because he would have some answers. As for Muth – she wouldn’t know the truth if it sailed up the Mersey on a Viking ship with a full crew. ‘Am I hearing the sound of a baby not yet born, Dad? And will that child die minutes after birth? If you’re here – and I know you are – please tell me.’
The crying had stopped for now. It seldom disturbed her in the night, and she slept well in this room. She slept like a baby . . . Like a baby.
‘Are you from the past, from now, or are you unborn?’
‘I am here now with tea.’ Olga approached the dressing table and looked into her friend’s reflected eyes. ‘You are troubled, Alice.’ She placed a cup and saucer on the Utility dressing table. ‘Milk no sugar is you, sugar no milk is me.’
‘Am I going insane, Olga?’
The Russian removed the cube from between her teeth and placed it on her saucer. ‘If you are insane, God must help the rest of us. You the sanest person I am know.’
‘You don’t need the “am”, just the “I know”.’
‘I know.’
‘Are you taking the wee-wee, Olga? Oh, and you look different.’
‘Do I?’
Alice turned on the stool. ‘Hair pretty, pink lipstick and nice sandals. Is this for Peter?’
When no reply arrived, Alice asked again, ‘Is it for him?’
‘Is for me. I was having traders’ meeting, but everyone gone in pub talking about poor Vera. Now, this baby you are hearing – is he crying now?’
Alice shook her head before turning to face the mirror once more. She began to tremble. ‘Olga?’
‘Yes?’
The seated woman swallowed audibly. ‘When you put my cup and saucer down on the dressing table, was this here?’ She pointed to a bottle of California Poppy. ‘It isn’t mine.’
‘There was nothing there,’ Olga murmured.
Alice felt the blood draining away from her face. During the war years, perfumes had been scarce, and women had been forced to choose between lavender water, Midnight in Paris, and California Poppy. On the few occasions when Alice had seen her in that time, Muth had reeked of the last of those three options. ‘But I don’t think she wore it when we lived here.’
Olga remained silent.
‘It’s all getting a bit too . . . real for me. Take it away and put it in the outside bin, please.’ She didn’t want to touch it. ‘Olga, please take it away.’
Olga left with the offending glassware.
Right. This was all becoming rather intrusive and daft now. It made no sense. A baby, noises, some scents, fair enough, but a bottle of California Poppy? It – he or she – was growing stronger. ‘If he can move things in the real world, he has true power.’ How did she know the baby had done this, and that the baby had been, was, or was going to be male? Perhaps the bottle of perfume was from another source – from Dad? Was Dad connected to the crying child?
A slim, blue-grey and transparent ribbon appeared in the corner of the room. Weightless, it floated towards the ceiling, and Alice coul
d smell the rich odour of tobacco from America. Dad had brought the bottle, hadn’t he? Why hadn’t she seen its arrival? Why had he allowed it all to happen in the presence of Olga? Olga was possibly here as witness, and Dad was trying to tell his daughter something important. ‘I know she caused your death, but did she actually kill you? Dad, did my mother murder you with poison or something? I need to know how bad she really is, and only you can tell me.’
The smoke disappeared. How she wished he could stay and talk to her. He probably had answers to questions she hadn’t yet thought of.
Olga returned with her pup. ‘Alice? This is Leo, named from one of Russia’s greatest writers. You didn’t meet him properly last time we here, because you were finishing curtains for Mrs Vernon.’
Alice held out her arms. ‘He’s beautiful.’
‘Like Frank?’
‘Yes. He’s very like Frank. Is he trained?’
‘Almost. Sometimes, he leaves me small gift, but we are talking about these things, and he is trying to learn. Good boy, he is.’ She waited a moment. ‘Would you like me to stay here with you tonight?’
‘No. See, I’ve never been frightened of it, Olga. It’s been more of a nuisance, really. Like when I came to your shop that first time and saw – well, you know what I saw on that back wall. But here, in this house, I’m nearer to something or other.’
‘Nearer to start of your life, then.’
Alice stood and paced about. ‘It’s like I’m being prompted by somebody else, somebody stuck in this room. He’s never gone through to the next level.’
‘Your batya? That what I named my father. Batya is Russian for daddy.’
‘I don’t know. I’ve absolutely no bloody idea, and that’s the truth. See, I don’t look into the future or the past. I don’t stand staring until something from Russia barges into your shop. It just arrives. There’s no control; I have no say in what comes to me.’ She stood still. ‘It’s someone else working through me, telling me stuff. And like a wireless, I get a better signal through an aerial. This room’s the aerial.’
‘It is all very strange, Alice.’
‘Don’t I know it?’ She passed the puppy back to her friend. ‘You go, Olga. Pop in and see Dan, but knock first to make sure he’s decent.’
The daughter of Russia, a possible Tsarina, descended the flight. Leo wriggled in her arms. ‘You want to try? Very well, this we do now, but be careful, baby.’
He managed two stairs, but then went into freefall until he reached the hall. Olga ran down and retrieved her precious puppy. Sitting on a step, she cuddled him until a pair of legs arrived on the scene. ‘Peter?’
‘Come on,’ he answered. ‘Leo’s fine, and I’m done here for today. Let’s go for a walk, eh?’
‘Yes. A walk. This is good idea.’ She took the first steps towards her future. A Russian aristocrat and a nursing home orderly held hands once they reached open land at the bottom of Penny Lane. Affection was, indeed, the greatest equalizer. And Leo, walking proudly at the end of his lead, seemed happy for them.
Nellie and Martin worked together as smoothly as a well-oiled machine. Perfectly capable of calculation and change-giving, Nellie realized how far Muth had hammered her into the ground.
‘She undermined you.’
Nellie made a mental note; she would ask him later about that word.
When the paper boys and the on-the-way-to-work purchasers had cleared, the pair sat on stools and enjoyed a brew. Nellie grinned. ‘I think if any more customers had said how pleased they were to see you back, you’d have gone mental.’
‘I would, but oh, I’m glad to be home; I’ve missed you, Nell. You’ve always made me laugh. And it was great having a good old cuddle last night.’
She blushed. ‘It was. Anyway, have you thought about how we’re going to set about finding our Claire and our Janet?’
‘We’ll have to make a plan about that. But I’m sure we can get a private detective without too much trouble.’
She touched his face. ‘Right, you’re in charge. I’m going to put the stew on the hob. See you later.’
Martin grinned. He was home. He was back where he belonged. And Liverpool was by no means the biggest city in England. All marriages were recorded, weren’t they? And all births. The girls would be found.
‘Martin?’
‘What, love?’
‘Shall I go on a diet?’
He laughed quietly. ‘No. I like all the ballast.’ She would be quiet for a few minutes now while searching the dictionary for another new word. He loved her just the way she was; fat, thin or in between, she was his Nellie.
Harry Thompson didn’t hesitate. With their father in prison and their mother in a coma, the Corcoran lads needed looking after. They were wild, they were out of favour in the community, but they were Vera’s, and they’d seen the attack. Tony, at sixteen, was the leader. Twelve months older than his brother Neil, he was cock of the walk, and he had led his sibling into a great deal of mischief. ‘We don’t need to stop with you,’ he told Harry. ‘We’ve got our own house, and we’ve both left school, so we can see to ourselves. We can cook a bit, and––’
‘And what about money, eh?’ Harry asked.
Neil agreed with their host, though he kept his head down and said not a word. He didn’t want to live where one of his parents had tried to kill the other. And he liked Mr Thompson.
Harry went in for the jackpot. ‘Look, if you stop running about like a couple of wild apes, I can get the two of you apprenticeships. Just think – you could both be working towards a trade when your mum comes home. There’d even be a few bob in your pocket – not big money, but a wage you’ve earned instead of stripping lead off roofs, eh?’
Tony stared into the empty grate, while Neil swayed from foot to foot as he waited for his brother’s decision. He glanced furtively at Tony, who shrugged. Although determined to appear hard, the older boy heard the sense in Harry’s suggestion. Dad had been in prison a few times, and he’d be inside for a good few years now. He spoke for both. ‘We could give it a try. What do you say, Neil?’
‘We could.’
Harry made for the front door. ‘Right, come on. Let’s go and get your stuff, shall we?’ He stopped and turned to face the pair. ‘Just one more thing. Any fighting, and you’ll be out. You’ve seen first hand what beating people can lead to. We’ll get fish and chips when we’re done. All right? Are we all on the same page?’
They nodded.
Wondering how long their co-operation would last, Harry led them out. Only time would tell.
The shop door opened. Martin stood up. ‘Hello, Mr Turner. We thought you’d moved on and started selling from carts.’
The ice cream maker closed the door. ‘We have. Hello, Mrs Browne. I’ve come with a message from––’ The door opened, and the ‘glad to see you back’ business started up again. Geoff Turner moved to the closed flap at the end of the counter and began to scribble. When finished, the note was handed to Nellie, and Mr Turner left, bequeathing a wink and a broad smile.
Old Mrs Girling was in full flood. Elsie Stewart was a very nasty woman. She thought she was in charge of everything and everybody, including her oldest daughter. ‘And three times she sent me the wrong magazine, and my son never got his fishing paper, that monthly one. A quarter of butterscotch? A quarter? On my scales, she did me out of nearly an ounce, but she wouldn’t admit it. Glad to see the back of her. There’s nothing wrong with my scales; they were my grandma’s.’
Martin winked at his wife as he weighed dolly mixtures for Mrs Girling’s brood of grandchildren. ‘There you are, love. Half a pound, but I’ll charge you for the quarter.’
The customer smiled. ‘You’re a good one, Martin.’
With the transaction completed, he joined his wife. ‘You’re like a cat on hot bricks, missus. Where’s the fire?’
Nellie fought for breath. ‘Mr Turner – he knew all along. Geoff Turner. Ice cream, home-made. They have a telephone. They’re
in Crosby.’
‘The Turners?’
She nodded. ‘And our Claire and our Janet. Waiting. Waiting for Muth to go away from here. See.’ She passed the note to him.
He interpreted the message aloud. ‘They’ve got a house, Nell. Between them, like. Our Claire and our Janet live together with their husbands and kids. In Blundellsands. Fur coat and no knickers, as they say. God’s good, Nellie. He’s on our side – no, don’t start bloody crying, Grandma. It says here that Geoff Turner will be in his old place for an hour, and we can use the phone. Come on.’
‘What?’
‘We’re shutting the shop, queen. This is a red-letter day.’
Vera Corcoran was in a single room. She lay as still as a marble statue in her hospital bed, head swathed in bandages, facial skin whiter than the fabric wrapped round her skull. Only the slight movements of her slender chest betrayed her status as a living person. The doctors still didn’t know whether or when she would come round. And would she be right in the head if she did?
At one side of the bed, Harry Thompson and Alice Quigley sat, their eyes straying from the supine form of their neighbour to her sons, Tony and Neil, who occupied seats at the other side. ‘Will she wake up?’ the younger boy asked, his tone thickened by emotion.
‘We don’t know,’ was the answer from Alice.
‘Even the doctors aren’t sure,’ Harry added.
Tony spoke up. ‘She’s been coming to hospital for years with broken bones. I’ve heard her joking about buying a season ticket like a football supporter. She’s like that, always making fun of herself. It was her way of trying to stop us worrying. We hardly ever saw her without bruises.’
Harry nodded his agreement. ‘And you two went wild out of the house because you daren’t tackle him, so you took it out on other people. We all know why you were out of control, but Vera wouldn’t want that for you. She’d rather you got a decent trade and led decent lives.’
Tony made a sound that emerged suspiciously like a strangled sob. He rose to his feet and dived through the door.
Neil stood up. ‘Shall I go after him?’
Daughters of Penny Lane Page 8
