by Joan Fleming
The shell of a man lay, bright-eyed, against his pillows. By means of one of the inventions he had already drawn back the curtains and though the window-sill was not quite low enough to allow him to actually see the river, he could see what kind of morning it was.
So much of him was dead that his eyes seemed abnormally bright sparklers. “Lo, son. Wotcha!”
“Wotcha, Dad!”
“One of them Bo-oing crashed, all on board dead.”
“Go on! Where?” Joe looked out of the window, down on to the mist.
“Guatemala.”
“I say, I say!” he murmured absently (copying Silas); anything about an old woman battered to death in Kensington, he wondered. But there wouldn’t be time; no one would have found her yet. And anyway, they didn’t tell you about these acts of violence on BBC. radio very much, might make people scared, spread alarm and confusion. “I say, I say!” he picked up an Evening Standard which had fallen from the bed-table, glancing at it whilst murmuring, “When do you reckon Mum will be back?”
“Today, maybe. Isn’t it fine, Joe, isn’t it fine, our Betty with two kids at one go!” The cripple could still smile.
Joe stroked his chin like some elder stroking his beard.
“Or don’t you think it a good idea, dragging two more innocents into this vale of tears?” his father quizzed.
“Makes no difference to me,” Joe returned sternly, un-equal to light conversation today. “What time’s Mum coming?”
“You going to meet her at the air terminus?” his father asked eagerly.
He scowled. “Not bloody likely,” he returned. His father was not worried, he knew his Joe. His bark, to coin a phrase, was a lot worse than his bite. He was compelled to put on this parent-hating act, if he did not do so, he could not tolerate living at home, he would have gone off on his own somewhere long ago. So for pride’s sake he swore and looked sulky and banged about the place, left his room a great deal more untidy than any pigsty, told them nothing about what he did during the day or night and behaved most of the time like a dissatisfied lodger.
They didn’t mind, they not only put up with it, they would have been disturbed had it been otherwise; they loved him.
“But what time’s the plane?”
“She’s not let me know yet, I reckon she’ll telephone. But you’re on evening shift this week, Joe boy.”
He nodded. “But I’m busy today; haven’t time to meet Mum!”
“Okay. Okay. She’ll get a taxi. Our Betty’ll miss her but I’ll be glad to see her back!”
So would Joe … except that the “guest room,” in other words, his mother’s own room, could hardly be occupied with its present tenant; there would have to be some explanation, and he was certain that there wasn’t going to be. That was the worst thing about one’s parents, and others’ too, as far as he had heard. They always had to know the why and wherefore of everything. Joe had his pretty well trained by now but there were some things that had to be explained, not many, he knew, but the girl in his mother’s room was one. If she had had any gear, had carried a hand-bag, or a hand-grip of some sort, it might be easier, but she patently did not; furthermore, she was upper class, and that in itself would have to be explained, and couldn’t.
So would Joe … except that he would have to go out soon and buy an evening paper, on the stands by ten-thirty, to see if the thing in the Kensington block of flats had been discovered … or not. And if not, there would still be the worry. Except that he knew for certain it had happened; W. Sledge had been so near to it for so long; everyone knew him, knew about this fearful streak of violence and yet, with it all, that yellow streak too, that made Sledge sick and vomiting whenever he had really lost his temper or nerve. A frightening friend for anyone to have, but a fascinating one; siphoning off all the fundamental craving for adventure in those more homely than himself.
And besides, look where W. Sledge had got himself, no company director could have done better in the short time …
Joe sighed heavily: “Yeh, I’ve a lot to do.”
He was sitting at the kitchen table, spreading marmalade on his thick slice of bread when she skipped in lightly and closed the door behind her; she was carrying her fun-fur coat, so she was clearly on her way. He cut her some bread and shoved the butter and marmalade across the littered table.
“I’ve left the room just as I found it,” she whispered.
“So you’re off, eh?”
“Um, but I want some paper and a ball-point pen. Have you a notebook to spare?”
“Notebook?”
“Any old kind of notebook would do.”
“Mum’s got a newish one she hardly ever uses …” he was fumbling about in a kitchen drawer and finally brought out the red-backed exercise book.
“Will this do?”
“Fine, if I’m going to do some market research. What about a pen?”
“How do you mean—market research?”
“Going from door to door, asking the housewife questions.”
“How does that help anybody?”
“Well, by the time I’ve done this block of flats from top to bottom, or bottom to top might be better, I’ll know something about who lives here.”
“I can’t see how that’s going to help you find your boy friend.”
“Can’t you? Well, I can’t help that.” She snatched the ball-point pen from him with satisfaction, putting it carefully in the middle of the exercise book. “Suppose it runs out?” she said.
“You’ll have to buy another, won’t you?”
“What with? Milk bottle tops?”
Heavily, like the ancient “horse leach who hath two daughers crying give! give!” he fumbled in his hip pocket and brought out a pound note. No, a ten shilling note, which he handed across the table.
“Christ! You’re a saint! The only saint Bogey!”
He started with surprise that she should know his name but she held up the milkman’s chit: “Mrs. Bogey, week ending April 4th” …
He said: “Call me Joe!”
She started to laugh but stifled it at once. “Joe Bogey! It isn’t true.”
“It’s a Huguenot name,” he murmured.
“Huguenot! You’re joking!”
He looked contemptuous.
“Very posh!” she whispered. “Joseph Bogey, Esquire, Fiery Beacon, London, SW3. And I see you have a telephone too!”
“Why not? We’re priority because of me Dad.”
“Priority, whatever next?”
He looked meaningfully at the electric clock.
“Yes, I’m on my way.” She pushed the large remaining bit of bread into her mouth and jumped up, mumbling: “I’ll be seeing you, then.”
Would she? He wondered. Superficially he felt a great indifference as to whether he would or whether he would not be seeing her.
She leaned towards him, she smelled nice somehow, her breath was nice; was she making a pass at him? No, she was leaning forward for him to hear better: “Thank you for this ten bob. It means I can have a meal of some kind.”
“Haven’t you any money at all, kid?”
She shook her head and her mouth tightened again as at some memory.
“But that won’t last!”
“No, I bet it won’t!” He was impressed, at least, by her sense of purpose; he felt she meant business, whatever that business was.
“When did you say your Mum was coming back?”
“I didn’t say,” he grunted.
She said: “Well, I’ll be seeing you,” and tripped out quietly, shutting the door behind her without a sound.
But like the Cheshire cat, inexplicitly smiling, she was back:
“My name’s Frances Smith.”
“Can’t you think up a better one than that?”
“My Dad’s a country gentleman in the Midlands. I thought that would annoy you. He communicates best with horses … I said with horses!”
“Sh …sh!”
“My Mum, not being a hors
e, left him.”
“Ho yeh?”
“She’s a bolter, that’s what he calls her, which was what probably attracted my Dad to her in the first place. Not all bolters are horses, har har! She’s living with what was a terribly good-looking RAF type on a barge in Amsterdam; has been for years, but golly, he’s old. As a matter of fact, they’re both getting old now …” She sketched with her finger on her own face, the lines on their faces. “It’s loneliness keeps them together more than love.” She looked and was dreamily wise, her face falling into sadness momentarily. “They went to Amsterdam in the full flower of their passion, tra la, to escape from their friends; well, they escaped from their friends all right but now they’re darned lonely, if you ask me.”
“I didn’t ask you.”
“No, you didn’t, that’s why I’m telling you. I was ten when she went for the last time. So you see there is plenty of reason for me being a Problem Child.”
“Ho, you’re one of those!” Joe succeeded in looking sophisticated and drummed his fingers on the table top to show how uninterested he wasn’t. “Do you go and see them, then?”
“Not unless she sends me the cash. Sometimes she comes to see me …”
“Look, I don’t believe a word of it.”
“All right, don’t. I thought I would reward you with the information, as you hadn’t asked anything.”
He said: “Are you going to start at the top or the bottom—your market research, eh?”
“Right down in the basement, if there is one, I should say. I should get a list of people living here from the maintenance men or man.”
“You’ll have a job, I’d doubt if they have a list, as you call it.”
“Then I’ll just have to have a go without one. Farewell, Joe Bogey.”
“But when will I be seeing you?”
“Depends.”
“Tar-ra, then …”
CHAPTER III
“COR!” HE SAID out loud. The cheek of her! She wasn’t beautiful, she wasn’t even pretty. But she was different; different from other girls in that she had something to say which wasn’t dead ordinary; he had never met a girl who ever said anything worth listening to. In fact, girls weren’t made for listening to … and she was, well, alive, sort of.
In view of the expected return of his mother, he fetched the empty feeding cup from his father’s room, tidied up the kitchen and washed up, leaving things as his mother would hope to find them. He threw the bedclothes over his bed, then banged about, opening and shutting drawers.
“What’s up, son?” his father called from his bed.
“Lost my pullover.”
“Which one?”
It was the black V-necked one with the large white phosphorescent B on the back, which he usually wore under his zip-fastened shower-proof jacket. He went into his father’s room, looking around to see if it was lying about. Then he thought he remembered: “I’ve left it at work.”
Outside the door he leaned over the retaining wall and looked down into the rough patch where the cars were parked. He had not left his pullover at work, but something like it, in that he had torn it off because of the car heating, and thrown it in the back of the Jag before setting out as chauffeur with W. Sledge the night before.
The inhabitants of Fiery Beacon were great Jag owners; they were frequent changers-of-cars but one could reckon on half a dozen Jags parked there in the night. At present he could see only two and in the place which W. Sledge occasionally claimed as his own when he didn’t put it in the underground park there was no car parked at all; this was not too surprising as he was usually off on his morning’s pimping by nine o’clock. The missing pullover, however, would make a good excuse for calling at his flat.
Downstairs, immediately below, was Mr. Owland, a retired waterman who would come up and play chess with his father. So first call was there: “Mum’s expected back today, Mr. Owland, but we don’t know when, so Dad’s got no dates and would be pleased to see you anytime after they’ve done him.”
Then on down the six flights of concrete steps, which he chose rather than the lift because he descended with as much noise and clatter as he could make, to the seventeenth floor back and S. Ledge’s private residence.
He admired Amrita, W. Sledge’s mistress, because she was so breathtakingly beautiful but that was all. He had been in bed with her once only and had found it as dull and heavy-going as trying to eat his way through a roll of second-rate cotton-wool. Her promise, however, was beyond praise and though he knew it to be all eyewash, his heart gave a small thud of appreciation when she opened the door, after having carefully observed him through the magnifying precautionary peep-hole which had been let into the flat door at her own special eye-height. To put his own eye to the hole W. Sledge himself was obliged to bend his knees, being nearly two feet taller than Amrita.
Her sari was a miracle of misty blue with, below, the tight short bodice sleeve covering the shoulder and the top of one brown arm with gold metallic material. Though she may have carried out the usual woman’s tasks with broom, vacuum and soap flakes, she never showed the slightest sign of it. Not for her the slatternly appearance first thing in the morning. The wind caught her sari and blew it against her with ravishing effect and she smelled fabulously Eastern.
“Sledgey at home?”
She shook her head.
“Mind if I come in a minute?”
She opened the door wide and he entered.
The flat was an essay in interior decorations as far as Joe knew but was in fact a conglomeration of elaborate Indian-cum-European-isms and the chairs were only just chairs, one tiny distance from actual cushions on the floor.
“I left my pullover in his car last night. Black with my initial on the back, all lit-up white, seen it?”
She shook her head.
“Lost your voice, have you?”
She laughed a little, then her face went serious, worried even.
“What’s up, Amrita love?” Not for the first time Joe’s mind was on the mystery of that tight golden sleeve under the sari: was it part of a vest, or what? how far did it extend? Amrita was not one clumsily to let you watch her undress; she would retire gracefully and call to you when you were allowed to enter her room, to find her lying naked on the bed. But seriously, was it a whole garment or only one quarter of a garment? He wasn’t even listening for her answer when she surprised him by saying something in her dove-like voice.
“He is not well …”
Joe dragged his mind back from his immediate thoughts.
“I didn’t think he was. What’s wrong?”
“He’s been sick, you know how he is. He will never tell me but I know, he’s been in some kind of trouble. If you were with him last night you must know.”
“Not me.”
She looked sad, hanging her head and murmuring, “You will not tell me, of course.”
“Where is he now?”
“He went out early, long before daylight, didn’t come to bed at all; he has gone to have something done to the car, I think, because I think I heard him telephoning the night watchman at the garage where he sometimes goes, where he bought the Jag, early, and asked if it was all right to bring it.”
“Yes,” Joe agreed; “I didn’t think he was well. He was very sick in the car last night.”
“No fighting?”
Joe shook his head. “Not that I know of.”
“He didn’t sleep all night; I promise you … he didn’t come to bed; he sat in here and sometimes he got up and went to the bathroom and was sick.”
“If he’s been sick all that often likely it’s a tummy upset, food poisoning, eh?”
“I have given him much milk, he lives on his nerves that boy; one day he will go mad perhaps and kill me.”
She had said that before, it was of no interest. Sadly she knew that her remark would produce no reaction, she often complained that one day she would leave Sledge but that did not ring a bell with anyone either; always they look
ed but did not listen. Joe simply went: “Um!”
“I have lived more than eighteen months with him and he tells me nothing, ever, for a year and a half!”
Joe thoroughly sympathised with his friend there; a beautiful apathetic bird was just the job, exactly what an up and coming young man required, asked no questions and always said yes, in fact yes was the only significant word she could be guaranteed to utter.
“When he gets in one of his tempers, he beats me,” she said, head down but looking up at him through her fringe of lashes.
“You need it, I daresay,” Joe returned darkly, shocked slightly but not going to show it. He sensed a distinct loosening in the threads that held the Amrita – W. Sledge relationship together. One of these days old Sledgey was going to come home and find the bird had flown. He wondered whether he should warn him or whether it would precipitate one of Sledge’s frightening rages. But he added kindly: “Getting sick of him, are you?” Phrasing his question in the manner of anyone of his set, aware that the question they were asking was of a personal and delicate nature. It sounded much better than a plain, straightforward, blunt question: Are you getting sick of him? It was gentler and felt less like a question.
Anyway, she didn’t answer but simply shrugged.
“Well, tell him I called.” He waited for some response, there was none. “Well, tar-ra, then.”
He enjoyed clattering down the concrete steps to the eighth floor. It would have been a super experience if the staircase had been made spirally, as well it might, but no doubt the builders knew all about the fun you could have, whizzing round and round a spiral staircase until you couldn’t stand up. They had meanly constructed the staircase round a narrow well beside the lift shaft and service area, with small landings every dozen steps and no light beyond the occasional bracket, so that lingering on the staircase was not attractive.
