by CL Skelton
‘Work?’ they said together. ‘You meaning a job?’
‘Yes. Work. A job.’ He grinned in spite of himself, wondering how they imagined people like himself to live.
‘Oh, no, lad. There’s nothing uv the kind uv work your sort would want around here. Just the Harbour and the fishing, and the arcades and cafés down this end. Nothing for your sort.’
The young man nodded. He’d have to find that answer on his own, it was clear. ‘Thank you anyhow,’ he said. ‘I’ll look around.’
‘You won’t find anything down this end,’ they said again. He smiled, and as the venerable Mabel came, brows lowering, through the door, he reached into his trouser pocket for his three and sixpence, and paid out the one shilling and threepence for his meal. She took it, unsmiling, and rang up the cash register.
‘Excuse me,’ he said.
‘Umm?’
‘That placard,’ he said.
‘Now what about that placard?’ she said with strained good nature.
‘I want it,’ the young man said.
‘You want the placard now?’ she repeated after him.
‘Yes. What do you want for it?’
There was a moment’s confused silence. ‘For the placard?’ she said. ‘What do I want? Look, lad, I don’t sell placards. What would I be selling that for?’
‘Because I want it. And the sign outside. How much for the pair?’ She stood with her rouged face impassive, but for her lowering, red-painted bottom lip. The young man was conscious of the listening ears at the tables all around. He would have to make the next move, for Mabel would no doubt stand there with lowered jaw forever. He reached into his inner jacket pocket and withdrew his wallet, a gesture that aroused a murmur of curiosity from the attentive room. Thinking quickly, with rash impulse, he withdrew a note and extended it, ostentatiously large, to the woman.
‘Five pounds!’ she exclaimed. ‘For that thing?’ Her voice rose to a shriek of amazement, and there was a quick muttering about the room.
‘A deal then?’ he said quickly.
‘Sure,’ she said, ‘if you’re as mad as that.’ She took the proffered note quickly. ‘And here’s hoping there’s more where you come from.’ She laughed disdainfully and waved a hand towards the faded advertisement. ‘Take it lad, it’s yourn.’
‘And the sign,’ he pursued, ‘the sign as well.’
‘Take them both,’ she said, laughing to herself as she folded the large note. ‘Five pounds for that rubbish,’ she muttered again, her voice echoing delight at her bargain and genuine disgust at his foolishness.
‘Splendid,’ said the young man. He strode across the room, suddenly lithe and athletic, and wrenched the tattered card from the wall. He tucked it under his arm and walked to the door, turning to salute the fishermen with a grin. Then he went out into the wet darkness and, with a sound that was audible within the café itself, he reached strong young arms to the old wooden sign and tore it from its mountings on the wall. Then he tucked the sign, too, under his arm, and strode, laughing, into the windy night.
The moment the door closed behind the young man, the attentions of the room, hitherto discreet and diverse, came to a sudden focus on his empty chair. There was a brief silence, in which eyes wandered from the chair to the one-armed fisherman in the blue cap, who had become, suddenly, an authority.
‘Well, now,’ said a fat, cheerful man in a thick-knit grey jumper, who had until now been apparently unaware of the whole event. ‘What’s t’ make uv that?’
‘Reeght queer, if you ask me,’ answered the pipe-smoker. He tapped ash into a cheap metal ashtray and looked to the man in the navy-blue hat.
Mabel intervened. ‘Daft,’ she said, still showing her disgust. ‘Got more money than sense and plain daft with it. Imagine putting out five pounds for rubbish like that.’ She sniffed, slipping the note into the bottom tray of the brass register.
‘Rubbish or not, you seemed happy enough to sell it,’ the man in the blue hat said over his cup of tea. Mabel sniffed, slammed the drawer shut and retired through the battered door to the kitchen. Immediately the conversation in the room brightened and spread to include all aspects of the young stranger, his appearance, his manner, his accent.
‘Now what d’ye make uv that,’ one said. ‘First he wants a rooming house an’ a cheap one at that. Then he wants work on t’ fish quay. Then he flings fivers about like they’re going out uv style.’
‘A fool and his money are soon parted,’ said the pipe-smoker.
‘Aye well. But if you ask me, there’s more to it than that. He had a reeght peculiar look about him, that one. Clothes that didn’t fit right, and a mouthful of marbles. “Echtually, Ae need some advice, gentlemen”,’ the speaker mimicked. ‘I reckon he’s a proper spiv, that one. Up t’ no good, anyhow.’
‘Seemed pleasant enough,’ said the blue-hatted fisherman. He tapped the table with his one hand. The artificial one hung down at his side. The disability, the result of a savage encounter with a winch line, had cost him his working life, and he was ashamed of it and strove hard to keep it from showing. He was a thoughtful man, inclined not to judge others harshly, and he didn’t like the way the conversation was going.
‘Aye,’ his pipe-smoking companion said. ‘He would be that, wouldn’t he. I’ll tell you something I noticed. See the cut of his hair, reeght well shaved off, nay but a stubble it were that short. Now I can think uv just about one place where a man gets his hair cut like that.’
‘Might be just out of the Forces,’ someone put in, but he was countered easily by the pipe-smoker.
‘War’s been over near enough five years. Them that was gettin’ out are all out long since. There was a time I’d have thought the same, mind; he had that look a bit. Mind how it was, in ’46, every third lad blinkin’ about wide-eyed in a de-mob suit, looking for work. Nay, not now. And I wager he’s no professional just bought himself out, either. You can tell them a mile off, all spit and polish even in their civvies. Nay, boys, I know reeght off where he’s been last year or two.’
‘And where would that be?’ asked his companion, his eyes on his artificial hand.
‘Been inside.’
The fat man at the next table nodded sagely, and around the café there was a general murmur of interested agreement.
‘I’d put money on it,’ the pipe-smoker said, warming to his theme. ‘An’ what’s more, he’s no ordinary bloke got himself in a bit uv trouble wi’ the law. Yon’s a proper toff, son uv some big family gone bad. Worse kind ye can get,’ he added darkly. ‘Nay, Mabel,’ he said to the sour-faced hostess who had reappeared at her doorway to listen, ‘you’d be wise t’ give that one short shrift, if he shows face around here again.’
‘Bluidy rubbish.’
The pipe-smoker looked up from his discourse, surprised. His companion got clumsily to his feet, his false arm swinging loose. Painstakingly he thrust it through the sleeve of his yellow oilskin jacket that had hung over his chair back, and roughly pulled the jacket on. ‘Of all the bluidy presumptuous twaddle. You don’t none of you know from anything a damn thing about t’ lad and ye’ve well nigh got him tarred an’ feathered. As fer Mabel’s placard, well I’d pay a tenner myself ti’ see the whole damned place stripped uv all that rubbish and scrubbed clean. An’ you needn’t look offended, woman, the place is a damned disgrace. If lad shows up again it’ll be his own misfortune, nay yourn. I’m off, anyway. Happen I’d rather talk wi’ gulls.’ He stalked out into the night, leaving a chastened silence behind.
Once outside he turned on his heel abruptly and made off with a still-angry stride towards St Hilda Street. He walked quickly, cradling his bad arm against his chest as he did when he was in a hurry and, as he expected, he caught sight of the young man with the suitcase before the latter had achieved his destination.
‘Aye lad,’ he shouted into the wind, ‘hold on a moment.’ The young man hesitated, looking round, and the old fisherman tried not to let himself read an undercurrent of e
dginess into the action. He lengthened his stride and caught up with the man with the suitcase at the corner of St Hilda Street.
‘Sir?’ the other said, politely questioning.
The fisherman was amused by the formality but said only, ‘Summat come to mind, soon as you were gone, lad. Job of work needing doing. Mind now, Queen’s Street, where we was,’ he pointed back into the rainy night.
‘Yes,’ the young man answered, also peering into the darkness.
‘Well, if you go harbourwards three or four shops, and then across the street, there’s another chip shop, newer place, run by West Riding folk, come over last year. Recollect now, their lass, who was always behind the counter, up and got herself married last week and left the place. Know for a fact they’ll be needing a hand there, if’n ye’d not mind a bit of fish frying. Mind now, the wages can’t be much; not when they’re used to having family labour on the cheap.’
He looked doubtful, cocking his head to one side and studying the well-spoken young stranger in the wet street light, still uncertain what he was doing here. The young man’s face broke into one of his broad grins and his dark eyes crinkled at the corners.
‘I dare say I could fry fish with the best of them,’ he said, laughing at some private joke. ‘That’s capital of you, sir. I can’t say how grateful I am.’ He glanced across the street at the friendly light of a pub with a ship’s wheel motif on the hanging sign above the door. ‘Could I stand you a drink, sir?’
The fisherman hesitated and then, catching sight of the old Hardacre sign still under the other’s arm, he tapped it lightly and said, ‘Nay lad, hang on to yer brass. You’ve spread enough about for one night.’ He turned to go and then stopped and pointed up the road. ‘Yon’s Mrs Hewitt, number eight,’ he said, indicating a tall, narrow-fronted building with a tiny garden edged by a low brick wall. ‘You can tell her Mick Raddley sent you, fer what it’s worth.’ He turned and lumbered off, his gait uneven with the bad arm slung across his chest and his head bent towards the sea wind.
Mrs Hewitt proved to be a tall, thin body whose air of cultured haughtiness appeared a professional stance. Like the woven mat that said ‘Welcome’ on her scrubbed doorstep and the white lace half-curtains on her windows, it was part of the role.
‘Yes?’ she said, narrowing the vowel delicately. ‘Can I help you?’
‘I was looking for a room,’ he said, adding quickly, ‘Mr Raddley suggested I try here.’
‘Mr Raddley?’
‘Mick Raddley. He said I should say …’
‘Indeed.’ She eyed him as frostily as ever, but something in her voice had softened. ‘I’m very much afraid my best rooms are all taken. I’m much in demand, you know. However, we might be able to find you a small accommodation. For a week. While we get to know each other,’ she added darkly. ‘Then we shall reassess.’
‘A week would do splendidly,’ he assured her rapidly, lifting his suitcase as she stepped backwards into the hallway to let him in. He was still carrying the sign, and tried now to conceal it against the sleeve of his greatcoat, knowing it would be difficult to explain.
She led him up two flights of narrow dark stairs, hung at fiercely regular intervals with small sentimental seaside prints. At the second landing she stepped towards the back of the house and opened a white panelled door. The room within, shabby in the dull grey of an overhead light, looked out on to a courtyard which revealed itself now only as a rectangle of black night bordered by thin pink curtains. She crossed to the window, tugged the curtains closed and indicated the bed, wardrobe, washbasin and small easy chair with a wave of one thin, beringed hand. On the floor an ancient square of carpet in mock-Persian design covered the centre of the room, revealing darkly-varnished floorboards at the perimeters. A small electric fire sat on the disused tiled hearth, its cord connected to a solid metal meter.
‘Breakfast at seven, tea at five-thirty; I’ll need your ration book, of course; tariff, five pounds per week. In advance.’
He was standing yet, looking bravely about the dismal room, trying to generate a homely warmth by force of will.
‘In advance, Mr …’
‘Yes, of course,’ he said, hastily reaching for his wallet. He withdrew a second fiver. One remained within the leather billfold. He extended it to Mrs Hewitt, and realized she was extending her hand vertically, as if to shake his. Quickly he transferred the money to his left and shook her hand with his right. Her fingers were dry and cold.
She smiled very slightly and said, ‘Jean Hewitt, Mr …’
He looked at her blankly, as one searching for what to say. He cradled the old wooden sign closer and then, speaking hesitantly, he said, ‘Hardacre. Sam Hardacre.’
She paused, her cold hand still in his, and bent her head back slightly. ‘Mr Hardacre?’ she said. ‘Sam Hardacre?’
‘Yes,’ he said quickly, with more assurance. ‘Sam Hardacre.’
‘Interesting,’ she said. ‘That’s a well-known name in these parts, you know.’
‘Yes,’ he said, with a sudden nervous grin, ‘so I’ve been told.’
Chapter Two
The bright red MG TC roadster roared down the narrow Driffield road, scattering dry leaves in the November wind. Despite the month, the driver, a woman in a red headscarf that exactly matched the livery of her motor car, had lowered the hood and the wind whipped up strands of curling dark hair from beneath the scarf, blowing them forward over her face. She was a pretty woman in her late forties, her creamy French complexion only slightly marked by delicate and expressive lines of age. Her brow was furrowed in thought, or perhaps concentration, as the little car nipped happily round the stone-walled curves. At the big black iron gates of a great country house, the car skidded into a turn and roared off up the gravel drive. Madelene Bisset Hardacre was coming to tea.
Madelene jammed her foot down impatiently. The drive was always longer than one thought, winding at least a half-mile through tall elms and then a beech wood before one even glimpsed the house at all. It was scenic, and such driveways no doubt added to the dramatic impact of the mansion when at last it was sighted, but it was a tremendous nuisance if one was in a hurry. Madelene was always in a hurry. Today she was even more in a hurry than usual. The drive turned and dipped and Madelene, cornering hard, was confronted with a sudden splash of glorious moving colour in the centre of the roadway. She hit her brakes, skidding on gravel, and felt the rear wheels break free and come around. More angry than frightened she swung the wheel into the skid, over-corrected, swung the other way and slid, almost sedately, into the ditch.
For a moment she sat quite still, her hands on the wheel. Then she carefully patted her face, adjusted her clothing, checked that her feeling of being physically unharmed was not an illusion. After another moment she was convinced that the only damage sustained was a small ladder in her left stocking, caused by the heel of her right shoe. She switched off the ignition and turned to open her door, awkwardly heavy since the roadster was tilted at a definite angle to the left. As she turned she came face to face with a large, scaly, beady-eyed head, and she screamed.
The head jerked back like a frightened chicken’s.
‘Zut,’ said Madelene, pursing her lips and reverting to Gallic temper as always in times of stress. She was staring eyeball to eyeball with a peacock. Not just any peacock but the peacock responsible for her being in a gravelly ditch when she should be arriving to tea. Madelene abandoned the door and scrambled up on to the leather seat and over the side. She swung a vicious kick of three-inch heels at the bird, which staggered away with a noise like crackling brushwood as it dragged its heavy folded tail across the road.
‘Stupid bird.’ She thought of Harry, who treasured the ungainly glorious thing, and directed a mental kick at his posterior as well. ‘Stupid Harry’s stupid bird.’ She walked around the car inspecting the damage while her temper boiled. It was minimal, but the car was well grounded. Noel would have to come with the tractor and haul it out. Meanwhile she w
as later than ever and faced with the prospect of a further quarter-mile walk in her tottering heels to the house. Madelene sat gingerly on the bright red right front wing as she pondered what to do.
It was not unlikely that, if she simply waited, someone would come along. The driveway, being the entrance to a working, if not precisely thriving estate, as well as a family home, must see its share of farm workers, tradesmen and sociable neighbours in an afternoon. If one could simply be counted on to arrive promptly. Madelene adjusted her red headscarf and crossed her legs, glancing impatiently at the gold wristwatch Harry had given her for their ‘anniversary’. Her eyes lingered, savouring its precise detail and graceful design. The pity of having a lover was that one could never show off one’s little trophies as a married woman could. She had told the ladies of her staff that it was the gift of a particularly grateful wealthy customer. Which of course only increased their pity for her and fuelled their efforts, as perennial as they were useless, to find the widowed Madelene a husband. Madelene had been a widow since the Great War. Considering her still striking attractiveness, that time-lapse alone should indicate that Madelene was making her own arrangements. But the ladies of Driffield were not a discerning lot. Madelene sighed, thinking of them with a faint amused pity of her own.
She knew they would never quite forgive her her connections, albeit by marriage alone, to the big house at the end of this gravelled drive. It was called after the family whose name Madelene Bisset had carried since 1916, ‘Hardacres’. Not even Hardacre Hall, but simply the family name itself, aggressive and possessive, with which it had been rechristened on the exact day in the autumn of 1889 when it had been bought from the hereditary owners by the man known throughout the North as ‘the Herring King’.
The ladies who patronized Madelene’s dress shop, and patronized Madelene, called it nothing but the original name, ‘Watton Manor’, as a quiet way of keeping Madelene firmly in her place. She shrugged, wrapping her neat little fitted jacket tighter against a gust of leaf-swirling wind. Who knows, perhaps they were right. Perhaps they did not trust the Hardacres to establish the sort of dynastic firmness that is needed by those who are to be relied upon to make changes on the local map. Maps weren’t drawn often after all, and in the context of a centuries-old manor house, what were the trifling years from 1889 to 1950? Who was to say the Hardacres would not prove a mere flash in the pan, retreating with barely sixty years’ hold to leave the place once more in the hands of more traditional wealth. As things looked just now, such a possibility was not at all unlikely.
