London Belongs to Me

by Norman Collins

  ‘You look tired,’ he said. ‘Just you go and sit down and leave this to Doris and me.’

  Mrs Josser pursed up her lips.

  ‘I’m stopping here,’ she said.

  ‘In that case perhaps you could give me a couple of clean towels,’ he asked. ‘Just to save the sheets, you know.’

  He went to the bed and stood over Mr Josser.

  ‘Do you mind sitting round this way a bit?’ he asked. ‘The light’s better.’

  Then he beckoned to Doris.

  ‘Come over here,’ he said. ‘I shall want you to hold things.’

  Mr Josser tried vainly to protest.

  ‘Leave it… to… the morning,’ he began, ‘I… don’t… want… Doris… to… have… to…’

  ‘Quiet please,’ Bill told him. ‘This won’t hurt. It’s only iodine.’

  He felt Mr Josser’s back like a masseur and, just below the point of the shoulder‐blade where the thin back fell in again, he painted a little medallion with the iodine. It stood out startingly bright on the pale flesh, like dark blood. Doris wondered suddenly if she were going to faint.

  Then Bill returned with the hypodermic syringe, and filled it from the little bottle.

  ‘This’ll be just a prick,’ he said. ‘You’ll hardly feel it.’ And pinching up the skin between his thumb and forefinger he thrust in the needle.

  ‘Didn’t hurt, did it?’ Bill asked.

  Mr Josser shook his head gratefully.

  ‘And the rest’s easy,’ Bill went on.

  He took up the forceps again and went over to the saucepan where the other, the aspirating, syringe was being boiled. This syringe was an altogether bigger and more formidable affair than the first one. It had a needle like a dagger. It seemed impossible that Mr Josser could endure having it thrust into him.

  Bill caught Doris’s eye.

  ‘Can’t hurt,’ he said, understandingly. ‘I’ve given him a shot of something.’

  He prodded the dark medallion with the point of the needle and waited for Mr Josser to complain. Mr Josser, however, continued to sit there, staring in the direction of the fireplace, unnoticing.

  Then, spreading out the skin between the first two fingers of his left hand, Bill thrust the needle right home. There was something brutally deliberate about the whole performance. A severe professionalism had set in and it was obvious that the idea of sensitive protesting flesh didn’t concern him in the least. All that he had in mind was the needle, and the way he wanted it to go. This time there was nothing in the syringe when the little circle of brown skin was punctured. But as Bill drew back the plunger, the small glass cylinder became filled with a straw‐coloured fluid. It was as though the tip of the hollow needle had somehow landed into a pot of freshly brewed weak tea.

  Bill said, ‘Ah.’

  It was, as remarks go, thoroughly unrevealing and non‐committal. But at the same time it was involuntarily. It confirmed what for the past hour Bill had been doubting – that there was any fluid there at all. He now felt himself a wizard among diagnosticians, and he got ready for the next part of the operation.

  First of all he removed the syringe altogether. Then he crossed over again to his conjurer’s table and came back with a large jam‐jar‐looking thing fitted with tap and with a length of rubber tubing attached to one of them, and a still larger syringe. And there was more to it than that. He had a small suction pump in his hand as well. It was a chunky, solid piece of work that might have belonged to a garage or a workshop. Bill gave one or two vague sucks at the air with it to satisfy himself that the instrument was working properly and then attached it to the spare tap on the jam‐jar and began to pump out the air. He gave twelve strokes and the thing was ready. There was now forty pounds pressure in the jar, and it was going to be applied to the inside of Mr Josser’s lungs.

  ‘Can you pass me the jar?’ he asked Doris.

  He reached out his hand without even looking at her. And Doris passed the suction jar without looking at Mr Josser’s back. She felt sick. Very sick. And she had seen enough. She was dimly aware that Bill was connecting a dangling piece of tubing to the tap on the jar. The piece of tubing was connected to her father. Then Bill turned the other tap ever so little and more of the same straw‐coloured fluid came splashing into the jar. The level in the jar surged up leaving a little scum of froth on the sides. Bill adjusted the tap and the rush dwindled to a trickle.

  Doris glanced across at Bill. He had eased his bent back a little and was resting the jar on a folded‐up pillow.

  ‘This is where we take it easy,’ he said. ‘This takes some time.’ He put his spare hand on Mr Josser’s shoulder. ‘You’ll feel better almost any minute now.’

  Then he looked round at Doris.

  ‘Take her into the other room,’ he said to Mrs Josser, ‘and tell her to sit with her head between her legs for a bit. Then she’ll feel better, too.’

  It was two‐thirty in the morning now, and Bill was sitting propped up in one of the two armchairs in the Jossers’ front room with his feet up on the other one. He had Doris’s coat across his knees. And not because he was cold but for quite another reason he pulled it up to his chin and rubbed his cheek against it.

  ‘Three pints of fluid… no cardiac collapse… patient breathing comfortably… and I shall see Doris at breakfast,’ he was telling himself sleepily.

  Chapter XXV

  1

  Connie had just had the thrill of her life. And all of it through the crack in her bedroom door which had just happened to be ajar at the right moment.

  She liked having her door a bit open because it kept her in touch with what was going on in the house. Even if she herself were less private, there were recompenses. Like this afternoon, for instance. She’d heard one of the doors on the floor below open and shut itself and she’d thought that it was Mrs Josser pottering about at something. But as soon as she listened to the footsteps, she knew that they weren’t Mrs Josser’s. They weren’t even a woman’s. So they must belong, she realised to Mr Todds, the dull hard‐working young man who was on night‐shift at the power station. There was no rule so far as she knew why he shouldn’t move about in his own house if he wanted to, but a sixth sense, a kind of supernatural hunch, told her that there was something unusual going on. And when she heard the footsteps ascend the stairs instead of going down them she felt sure that she was on to something. Very neatly she hid herself behind the curtain.

  The footsteps – was she only imagining it, or did they really sound muffled? – came on up the stairs and paused for a moment outside the door. Actually paused there, as though Mr Todds was going to pay her a visit. But he didn’t come in. He just stood there, and Connie could almost hear him doing nothing. She remained quite still where she was, behind the thick curtain with the red plush pile hanging in folds all round her. Then she heard her name called. And it was called twice, quite distinctly. ‘Miss Coke. Are you there, Miss Coke? Is anyone about?’ But it was called so softly that she knew that she wasn’t meant to answer. Knew that nobody was meant to answer. And, in any case, she couldn’t very well come out now. She didn’t want Mr Nobby Nightshift, whatever he was up to, imagining she spent her time playing peep‐bo with herself behind the curtain.

  And it was just as she had expected. When she didn’t answer, he went on. It was perfectly plain that he’d never had the slightest intention of coming in anyhow. Mrs Boon’s was the door he was really making for. And when he reached it, he knocked quite openly and stood there waiting as if expecting someone to open it for him. But it was a very subdued kind of knock. The kind of knock that you wouldn’t hear unless you were actually inside the room – or straining your ears to listen, like Connie.

  And that wasn’t all. Wasn’t even the most important part. The big interest, the real hanky‐panky stuff came in now. She heard Mr Todds knock a second time. And then she heard him open the door and close it again. He was still standing there on the landing, and it was obvious that he’d simply s
tuck his head in the room to see for himself. After a moment, she heard him move across to the other door, Percy’s door. And the same performance went on. He knocked, waited, knocked again, and then looked inside.

  Risking everything, Connie stuck her head round the fringe of the curtain and took a peep. She was just in time to see Percy’s door closing.

  Mr Todds, sneak‐thief, was inside.

  As soon as he got into the room, Mr Todds turned the key in the lock behind him, and got busy. He began straightway searching through the things in the cupboards, in the hanging‐places for clothes behind the bit of cretonne, in the dressing table. He was very quick and expert about it. But somehow not in the least hurried. He took as long as he wanted to take about everything. When he was examining Percy’s clothes, for instance, he first of all ran his eye rapidly along the lot of them like a second‐hand wardrobe dealer, then he felt them over to see if there was anything in any of the pockets and, finally, he carried one pair of trousers over to the window to see them by a better light.

  It was the same when he came to the dressing table. He was so cool that he might have been rummaging through other people’s drawers all his life. He inspected everything – the jumble of fancy ties, the bottles of hair lotion, the steel‐and‐spring chest expanders, the packet of art photographs hidden away at the back. And he evidently didn’t think anything of any of them. It wasn’t until he got down to the second drawer that the quiet Mr Todds, the borough servant with the good references, came on something that took his fancy. And that was the blue glass Lady from the radiator of the hot Bentley. It was love at first sight. He grasped it, handled it lovingly, and held it up to the window so that the light shone through the robes and seemed to kindle them. Then, without pausing for a second to consider whether it was wrong or not – whether it was stealing – he thrust her head downwards into his side pocket, and went on poking about. There was something else in the drawer below that interested him just as much – and that was the pair of silver coach lamps that Percy had removed and kept. Mr Todds took them up and inspected them. Evidently, like Percy, he had a taste for expensive knick‐knacks. But he didn’t keep the coach lamps. After he had finished fondling them, he put them back again.

  Even after he’d been right through the dressing table, drawer by drawer, he wasn’t satisfied. He went over to Percy’s raincoat which hung on a hook all by itself beside the wash‐stand, and thrust his hand into the pockets. He found one oddment that made him pause. And that was Percy’s cosh. He evidently liked it almost as much as he liked the blue glass Lady. Because after one or two tries with it in the empty air just to see how heavy it was, he pinched that too.

  Finally with one last quick look round to make sure that he hadn’t left anything out of place, he leaned his weight against the door so that the catch would come back quietly – it was obvious that he knew all the tricks – turned the key and stood there listening for a moment. When he didn’t hear a sound, he opened the door a crack and listened again. There was still silence. That was good enough. Without more ado, he stepped out, closed the door behind him and went downstairs again.

  Smart eh? Smart nothing. He hadn’t even worn gloves. There were fingerprints everywhere for anyone who was looking for them. And – though of course he didn’t know it – there was Connie behind the curtain watching him as he came out on to the landing.

  She was nearly swooning from the suspense.

  When Mr Todds’ own door – the only door that he had any right to open – had closed after him, Connie came out from her hiding‐place. She was hugging herself with excitement. To have a sneak‐thief under one’s own roof was a piece of luck that didn’t come to everyone. And to be right on top of him – that was the real fun. And at the beginning, too. It might lead anywhere. Even into the police court, with Connie in the witness‐box instead of in the dock, and the beak congratulating her on having caught her man red‐handed.

  She turned a number of schemes over in her mind and then chose the simplest. She got her handbag and taking out a sixpence – it was lucky that this should have happened in a week when she could spare it – she went over to the light and scratched a cross in the middle of His Majesty’s right cheek. Then she laid the sixpence scratch downwards on the mantelpiece and left it there. There was nothing like marked money for trapping smarties.

  ‘You whistle, Dukey boy, if anyone comes for it,’ she said to the canary.

  Not that she really liked leaving her room wide open for Mr Todds to prowl about in. If he was the sort of easy‐fingers who wasn’t above pilfering from people like the Boons, how did she know that her own pink satin shoes would be safe? She was in no doubt about what the Boons had in their rooms because she’d taken the liberty of having a little innocent look around once or twice herself, when there had been nothing else to do.

  And if Mr Todds was after that sort of stuff, he’d take anything.

  2

  And Percy?

  He was out at the back, polishing a car, at the time. But his mind wasn’t on his job.

  ‘If They come for me,’ he was thinking, ‘I’m not stopping here. I’m getting out. I’ll go some place. They’ll have to start looking if They want to find me. They’ll need bloodhounds. And fast cars. They’ll have to draw a cordon. And you won’t catch me waiting for Them. If They come for me, I’m not stopping here.’

  He paused for a moment and straightened his back. The car that he was at work on glistened where the wash‐leather had been over it. It might just have come out of the showroom. But there was a hell of a lot of it still to be done. The far side still had the spray from the hose congealed all over it. The car was an American; and, like most things American, it seemed a bit larger than life‐size.

  ‘Or suppose They come on me sudden,’ he went on. ‘Suppose They break in when I’m having supper. Just let Them try to lay hands on me. Just let Them try. They’ll find out. They’ll learn Their lesson. They’ll get Their fingers burnt if They come on me sudden.’

  The hard edges of the Hedgehog in his pocket were sticking into him as he bent over; and the blunt points – not so blunt either – made him feel better, safer. He began polishing again.

  ‘The trouble with me,’ he resumed, ‘is I think too much. I’m getting nervey. I’m seeing things. Just let Them try to lay Their hands on me. Just let Them try.’

  Chapter XXVI

  1

  There was no longer any question about it. Uncle Henry was going mad. Always a bit odd and peculiar, he had gone clean over the edge lately. And it wasn’t even one of those comparatively simple cases of insanity where it is the little things that count. No, Uncle Henry was going big mad on the big scale. And what was more, he was doing it in public.

  The form it took was… but to get the full picture of it, it is necessary to go back to early April when Uncle Henry and Mr Chamberlain started writing to each other. Even that isn’t strictly accurate, however. Looked at dispassionately, it was a decidedly one‐sided correspondence from the start, with only two formal acknowledgments from the Downing Street end – and then nothing. In fact it was the eventual silence that got Uncle Henry’s goat. The exchange, the one way exchange, became fiery and abusive from then on. And still Mr Chamberlain kept his temper and held his tongue.

  The deterioration of confidence could be traced from the style of the letters, of which Uncle Henry kept copies in a spring‐back folder. The first one read almost like an echo of the 18th century.

  ‘My dear Prime Minister,’ it began, ‘I hesitate to approach you in person and not through the agency of the gentleman who has been freely elected by the people to represent the constituency in which I reside, but events are grave and time is fleeting. Europe, nay civilisation itself, is at this moment tottering and we look in vain for the props. Sir, you with so many calls upon your time, have no doubt to rely upon advisers. It is against these advisers that I write to warn you. They do not advise. They betray. Your own good name is at stake. At the time o
f Munich…’

  Altogether it was what Uncle Henry called a ‘diplomatic’ letter. It was a piece of Machiavellian infiltration. Relying on flattery, it contrived to get the rapier thrusts home between the compliments.

  The second letter was shorter and more terse.

  ‘Dear Mr Chamberlain,’ this one ran, ‘I note that my letter will duly be considered. But what exactly does this mean? While insults are being hurled at our heads by Franco and his Fascist minions, and Germany and Italy is arming to the teeth in readiness for the death stab, has your government done anything about it? No, sir. Your government has done nothing, is doing nothing and apparently never will do anything…’

  Even the signature was different this time. ‘Yours disgustedly’ the missive ended. From then on the gloves were off. Uncle Henry hit hard, and hit often. In one week, Mr Chamberlain got a letter from Uncle Henry every morning at breakfast time. But it was worse still when Uncle Henry switched over to postcards.

  There was a double cunning in this. In the first place, a postcard – especially when the message is written in large red ink capitals – cannot escape the eye of the recipient. And secondly, there is always the possibility that it may convert the postman as well. After all, the messages the postcards contained were simple and memorable like – WHERE IS ALBANIA NOW? IS YOUR TIN HAT BOMBPROOF? WOULD YOU GO TO MUNICH AGAIN? and IS HITLER A GENTLEMAN? One of them, in particular, stuck in Uncle Henry’s mind after he had posted it. Not one of his best possibly, it nevertheless continued to excite him. All that it said was: HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN MANCHURIA?

  It was the subsequent revelation that everybody had forgotten Manchuria, and the final discovery that half the big stores in Oxford Street were displaying Japanese‐made goods that unbalanced Uncle Henry. He started writing round to the shops, and protesting. But Oxford Street was less accommodating than Downing Street. The big stores simply ignored him. They passed his letters on to their counting‐houses, found that he had no account there and that was the end of it. Thereupon Uncle Henry threatened to boycott the whole lot, even though he had never been into any one of them in his life. And finding that this too left them contemptuous and outwardly unshaken, Uncle Henry went over to the attack. It was war. War between Uncle Henry and Oxford Street. He resolved to picket the whole stretch between the Marble Arch at one end and Oxford Circus at the other.