by Jessie Keane
‘Fine. So what you been up to at the widow Tranter’s, then?’
Charlie choked on a mouthful of best bitter.
‘You what?’ he spluttered.
‘You heard. People are talking.’ He didn’t mention Betsy, he didn’t want to land her in a screaming match with Charlie. He knew his brother well. Accuse him of anything, and he’d kick off like a mad bastard.
‘Who?’ asked Charlie, slapping his pint back down onto the mat.
‘No one in particular,’ shrugged Joe. ‘There anything going on then? Anything I should know about?’
‘What, you think I’m poking the old biddy?’ Charlie was half-laughing, but in his heart he was hating himself for it. It diminished everything that had passed between him and Rachel, cheapened it.
‘She’s not that old,’ said Joe, in a perfect echo of Betsy’s words.
Charlie picked up his pint and looked his brother square in the eye.
‘There’s nothing going on, bruv. Nothing at all.’
27
Cornelius was outside the Windmill the following week, waiting to see her again, beautifully turned out as always, devastatingly handsome, wearing his blue-striped Old Etonian tie.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ said Ruby angrily.
‘What’s up, kid?’ asked Vi, signing busily, smiling, being her charming, infinitely desirable self while Ruby stood there, her heart in her mouth at the sight of him, feeling like a moody, truculent child.
‘He’s married, Vi. That’s what’s up.’
Vi stopped signing and stared at her friend. Then her mouth tilted up in a smile.
‘Ruby,’ she said. ‘He’s in his thirties. He’s rich. He’s good-looking. Can you really say you were surprised?’
‘Well, no. Not really. I suppose,’ said Ruby unhappily. ‘I just hoped . . .’
‘Hoped what? That he was going to fall on his knees and propose marriage to you?’Vi snorted and carried on signing programmes for the adoring stage-door johnnies clustered all around her. ‘Honey – it’s just fun. That’s what you should treat it as.’
Fun.
But it wasn’t fun to Ruby. She’d fallen for the bastard.
‘And listen,’ said Vi, lowering her voice, ‘if you want them to marry you, here’s what you do. Choose an ugly one, not a looker. Keep your legs together. Act the nervous virgin and you might, just might, get one of the really big boys up the aisle.’
Cornelius came over. He was holding a programme. ‘I don’t suppose you’d sign this for me?’ he asked Ruby in his beautiful, cut-glass voice. His blue eyes looked slightly wary.
‘I ought to tell you to roll it up and stuff it straight up your arse,’ she returned.
‘I’m sorry if I hurt you. I was trying to be honest. I want to see you again.’
Ruby said nothing for a long moment. Then she said: ‘What’s her name, your wife?’
‘Ruby – darling . . .’
‘Don’t “darling” me. Tell me her name.’
‘Vanessa.’
‘And what’s she look like?’
‘Nothing like you.’
‘It was a shock, you know.’
‘I know. I’m sorry.’
‘This can’t go anywhere.’
‘I know. Still, I want to see you again.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘Fuck off.’ And walked away.
He was back the night after that, and the night after that, and again on Saturday, drawing the eyes of every woman around him like he always did.
‘You may as well talk to him,’ said Vi. ‘You’ve had a miserable face on ever since you threw him over. What’s the sense in making yourself sad like this?’
‘But he’s married.’
‘So what?’Vi shrugged. ‘Some of mine have been married too. They don’t expect too much and they treat you like royalty. You get all the good stuff, the gifts and the fun, while poor bloody wifey gets the dirty socks and the bad moods.’
Ruby thought about that. She’d take bets that Vanessa didn’t wash socks, but she understood what Vi was saying and it even made sense. She should treat the whole thing lightly, not behave like a love-struck schoolgirl. Vi did well with furs and jewels from her married admirers; enjoyed the fun, left the rest of it to the wife. And maybe Vi had it right.
‘Am I forgiven yet?’ he asked, coming back again with the programme to sign. She took out a pencil and scrawled her name across the front cover. Then she smiled. All right, he was a practised charmer. Probably a philanderer, too. But she could play this game. It might even be fun, just like Vi said it was.
‘I’ll never ask anything about your wife again,’ she said. ‘Not ever. OK?’
‘OK,’ he said, and she put her hand on his arm and he led her away to the waiting taxi. Ruby forgot all about her promised meeting with Betsy.
Betsy was at home, upstairs, that same evening. She and Mum had made fairy cakes, and Betsy had taken a plateful of the delicacies upstairs and placed them on her bedside table with a warm pot of tea and two of Mum’s best china cups, all ready for nine o’clock when Ruby was going to call round.
She sat there, buffing her nails, until nine thirty. She ate one of the fairy cakes at a quarter to ten. At ten o’clock her mum poked her head round the door.
‘Ruby not coming?’ she asked.
Betsy shrugged like it was of no importance at all, but hurt and resentment and jealousy burned in her like hot, acidic bile. Ruby would be with Vi, of course, laughing, drinking, living the high life while she, Betsy, sat here like a fool, patiently waiting.
‘It doesn’t look like it,’ she said, slipping a hand under the cosy to feel the pot. It was stone-cold.
‘She must have forgotten,’ said Mum, coming in and sitting on the bed.
How could she have forgotten? This was important. Betsy had been looking forward to this for days. She had baked the cakes especially. And to think she had been covering for Ruby in her lies to her family, supporting her in the fiction that she was doing volunteer work at the salvage centre. If Ruby’s lot really knew what was going on, they’d be livid. And Ruby’s preoccupation with Vi and the Windmill would be over.
Over.
The word clanged around Betsy’s head. She had only to say the word, and Ruby’s attention would be focused on her once more, not Vi. They would be close again, like they were before.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Mrs Porter, seeing how dismal Betsy looked. ‘I’m sure she’s just mixed the days up or something.’
‘Yeah,’ said Betsy. ‘Probably.’
But she was thinking that really, Ruby had just better watch her step.
28
The whole thing about the Post Office van robbery had died down and might have been filed as a dead case, if elderly Bob Julius hadn’t been on his way to the shop one day and seen Rachel Tranter walking the same way with a dog, his dog, on a length of rope hobbling beside her.
‘Hey!’ he called out, crossing the road and planting himself in front of Rachel.
The dog knew him. It wagged its stumpy tail, and its big ugly mug split open in a grin.
Rachel stopped walking and stared at this grey-haired wheezy little man with his watery blue eyes, heavy jowls and cod-like mouth.
‘That’s my dog,’ he said indignantly.
‘What?’ Rachel was eyeing him in confusion.
‘It’s my dog. Bruiser. Here, boy.’
Bruiser surged forward. Rachel pulled him back.
‘What’s happened to him? He’s limping.’
Shit, thought Rachel. ‘It isn’t your dog. You’ve made a mistake. It’s my dog.’
‘You think I don’t know my own dog? I brought Bruiser up from a pup. He went missing months ago.’
‘I told you. You’ve made a mistake. This is my dog,’ said Rachel, and now she could see a part-time War Reserve policeman coming towards them from the direction of the shop.
Shit, shit, shit.
It was Alvin Paisley, the bank teller. Sh
e knew him, they nodded if they passed in the street. He was a prissy self-important idiot, always immaculately dressed, with a stupid little Hitler moustache and beady eyes, and she knew he looked down on her because she’d been married to dodgy, conniving Micky Tranter.
He was neat as always, in grey twills and a dark blazer, wearing his helmet with POLICE written large upon it, and his panniers and gas mask, and a whistle.
She stepped around the old man and hurried on. But the dog was yanking her back, craning towards him.
‘Come on,’ said Rachel, yanking the dog’s rope, starting to panic.
Then the old chap saw the teller with his police helmet on.
‘Help!’ he shouted. ‘Police! Help!’
Ah, fuck, thought Rachel, and Alvin Paisley hurried forward.
‘What’s the trouble here?’ he asked. He nodded to Rachel, his lip curling slightly.
Oh yes, they knew each other. She knew he was a skinny buttoned-up little prude who only ever used his hands to get his dick out for a piss. And he knew that she had been married to Micky Tranter, whose gang of thugs had run the streets around here.
‘It’s my dog,’ said the old man quickly, not wanting Rachel to get in first. ‘He went missing and now here he is, this woman’s got him. I’ve raised him since he was a pup – haven’t I, Bruiser?’
And the fucking dog wagged its tail.
Is that all I get for bringing you back to life, you stupid mutt? wondered Rachel.
‘Well, he does seem to know you,’ said Alvin.
‘He’s friendly to everyone,’ said Rachel. ‘He looks fierce, but he isn’t.’
‘I let him out the front to do his business,’ the old man went on. ‘There was a commotion outside, a car or something. Then we heard brakes, and a thump and a shout. We ran out, we thought he must have been hit. It was blackout, accidents can happen. But Bruiser wasn’t there. Neither was the car.’
Rachel was thinking fast. Now she didn’t dare agree with the old fart, say that the dog had only been dumped on her months back; she didn’t want in any way, shape or form to incriminate Charlie. She had to stick to her story.
‘You’re imagining things, old man,’ she said to the dog’s owner. She sent a look at Alvin, and her look said, Senile, poor old bugger.
‘What’s the dog’s name?’ asked Alvin, watching her with suspicion in his beady little eyes.
‘Bruiser,’ snapped the old man.
‘Mitch,’ said Rachel, plucking a name from thin air. She had never named the dog. It was just a dog, and it had never been her intention to own one. The thing had been foisted upon her as an act of revenge by Charlie. If she ever thought of the mutt at all, it was as that damned dog. She had nursed it back to health; she didn’t like to see anything suffer. But she didn’t love the sodding thing. And it was obvious that this poor old chap did.
But she mustn’t let sentiment stand in her way. Her heart was galloping along in her chest. Her mouth was dry as ashes.
‘He’s my dog,’ she insisted, swallowing nervously. ‘I’ve had him for years.’
‘Let go the rope,’ said Alvin.
‘What?’
‘Let go of the rope. Let’s see who the dog goes to.’
‘This is stupid, I want to get to the shop before it closes . . .’ Rachel was stepping forward, dragging the dog after her.
Alvin stepped in front of her, blocking her path.
‘Let go of the rope, Mrs Tranter,’ he said sternly. ‘The dog’ll show the truth of it, one way or the other.’
Rachel eyed the two men in exasperation.
Shit, what now?
‘This is ridiculous,’ she said flatly, and made to push her way past Alvin.
He grabbed her arm. His eyes were sharp as they rested on her flushed face. And now Rachel could see to her horror that there was another policeman, a real policeman, not a reservist, on the other side of the road, and he was staring across and now oh shit oh no he was hurrying over to the little group, wondering what was going on.
‘Come on, Mrs Tranter, don’t be difficult, just let go of the rope,’ Alvin was saying.
‘What’s going on here?’ the big burly policeman asked.
‘Mrs Tranter says this dog belongs to her. This old gentleman says it’s his.’
‘It is mine,’ said the old chap, and there were tears, real tears in his eyes as he stared at his long-lost pet. ‘Aren’t you, Bruiser?’
The dog wagged its tail again, and strained towards the old man.
‘Let go of the rope,’ said the policeman, eyeing Rachel with hard eyes. Tranter. He knew that lot. Villains, thugs, spivs.
Rachel looked around at them all. This was getting dangerous.
She threw down the rope. The dog went to the old man, and jumped up and licked his face.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘Truth is, it just turned up injured on my doorstep and I nursed it better.’
‘When was that?’ asked the policeman.
‘God, I don’t know. Months back.’ Rachel looked at the old man. ‘Have the bloody thing. I’m not bothered. In fact, I’ll be glad to be shot of it.’
And she turned towards home, and walked quickly away.
29
Astorre Danieri was a major face in the East End. He was an Italian immigrant, a big solid man who’d fought his way up from a Naples gutter. He had a shock of wiry black hair and dark eyes that bulged from his deeply tanned head whenever he got excited – which was often.
‘I’m Italian,’ he would say with a shrug. ‘What can you do?’
Astorre had his fingers in a lot of pies. He had a flotilla of informants on the streets, listening out for snippets of gossip that Astorre might find useful. A whisper came back to him that the Darke mob had been involved in the mail van robbery.
‘Ben Morrison’s been spending like a mad man,’ one contact told him.
‘Oh? On what?’
‘His missus. Big fat blonde, tits out to here. Strolling about in a mink. And he’s been in the car showrooms. Not the cheap end of the market, either.’
‘Really.’
Astorre considered this. He knew of the Darke mob, run by Charlie and his brother Joe. Ben Morrison was one of their closest cohorts, along with two others – Malcolm ‘Chewy’ Carson and Stevie Boyd.
‘What about Charlie and Joe – they been spending?’
Two hundred thou had been snatched off that mail van.
Astorre could feel his mouth watering at the thought of it. His contact shook his head. ‘Nah. They’re not stupid.’
‘But they got friends who are.’ Astorre gave a twinkling smile. ‘Let’s have a word with these friends of theirs, shall we?’
30
Ruby knew she was in love. This was first-time, head-over-heels love, and she was sure – despite the fact that he was tied to his wife – that Cornelius loved her too. He took her to dinner in fancy restaurants, then home to his London house where they whiled away the hours in bed. Her life became a whirl of enjoyment; working at the Windy, being met at the stage door by him, then being whisked away to this or that elegant, expensive destination.
She loved him.
And Vi was right: what was the point of being miserable because he was married? It was a fact of his life. This was wartime. The normal rules no longer applied. She had to just get over it. Besides, he told her that it wasn’t much of a marriage anyway. He said this as they lay in bed together, naked, upstairs in his lovely Georgian town house.
Ruby thought of her self-imposed rule: I won’t ever talk about your wife again.
But it was him who had raised the subject, not her.
She propped herself up on her elbow and looked at him. Her big golden-haired god, she loved him so much. His skin was much lighter than hers. It amused her, to lay one of her arms against his, to see the difference in the colours of their skin. His was milk-white. Hers was toffee-brown.
‘What do you mean, not much of a marriage?’ she asked. Thinking, I swore to
myself I wouldn’t do this.
But the lure of it was irresistible. She was curious about Vanessa, his wife. She couldn’t help it.
‘She hates . . . this.’
‘What?’
‘Sex. Making love. She hates it. She tries to pretend she doesn’t, but she does. I feel sorry for her most of the time, having to do it.’
Ruby thought about that. ‘Well, she doesn’t have to.’
He turned his head. The blue eyes held hers.
‘Yes, she does. She wants children. Well, we both do. Desperately. Of course we do.’
At least he’s not telling me they don’t share a bed any more, thought Ruby. At least he’s not lying to me. But her chest tightened with pain, as if a blow had been inflicted.
‘But you’ve been married five years, isn’t that right?’
‘Yes. Five years.’
‘And she’s not . . . ?’
‘She had a miscarriage in the first year,’ he said. ‘After that? Nothing.’
Ruby swallowed hard past a lump in her throat. This was horrible, painful, talking about Vanessa having sex with him. But it was like a scab – she just had to pick at it.
‘She’s small,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘Vanessa,’ he said. ‘She’s too small, it hurts her. She complains I’m too big.’
He was big. But too big? No. She didn’t think so. When he was in bed with her, they seemed perfectly matched in every way.
‘But she’s so desperate to have a child,’ he sighed. ‘Well, we both are.’
‘So she keeps on with it, even though it hurts?’ Now Ruby was feeling sorry for Vanessa too.
He nodded.
‘That’s awful.’
‘I know. She does it because she sees it as her duty. But every time, I see the pain in her eyes, and she denies it when I ask her. I say, “Do you want me to stop?” But she never says yes. Sometimes I can’t even do it at all with her, I can’t bear to have a woman who’s so obviously doing it against her will.’
‘You poor thing,’ said Ruby. It was tragic.
‘That’s why I’m so lucky to have you, my darling,’ he said, turning to her, running his big hands down over her hips. ‘You make up for all of it.’
