‘Let go of me, you knobhead,’ said the kid, struggling now, but his skinny limbs were no match for the strength of Shaun.
‘Mr McCarthy, what on earth do you think you’re doing?’ Leni’s voice from behind his shoulder arrested his movement.
‘This little swine had his hand in your till,’ yelled Shaun, thinking that she didn’t sound very grateful considering he’d probably saved her week’s takings. About ten pounds in her case.
‘He’s my Saturday boy,’ shrieked Leni.
‘Yeah,’ Ryan affirmed, swinging from side to side to break free of the hold on his collar.
‘Saturday boy?’
‘Yes, it’s his first morning. Let him go, Mr McCarthy.’ Leni slapped Shaun’s hand and his fingers sprang open.
‘Why the hell didn’t he say?’ snapped Shaun.
‘Maybe he would have if you’d given him a chance.’ She addressed Ryan. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yeah,’ he nodded. ‘I’ll carry on putting the change back in, shall I?’ and he gave Shaun a pointed look of annoyance.
‘Please,’ said Leni, giving him a comforting rub on his arm as he walked past her. Then she turned to Shaun and for the first time, she wasn’t smiling.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘I thought . . .’
‘It’s fine,’ said Leni. ‘Crisis averted.’
‘Where did you get him from?’
‘He called in to see if I had a job.’
‘Where does he live?’
‘Why all the questions, Mr McCarthy?’
‘I’ve seen him before and I can’t place him.’
Leni sighed. ‘He’s from somewhere near Wombwell.’
‘Bit vague.’ Shaun called across to him. ‘Where are you from?’
‘Near Wombwell,’ replied Ryan, not looking up.
‘Whereabouts near Wombwell?’ Shaun pressed. The boy was being deliberately unclear and there had to be a reason for that.
‘Sort of just outside it.’
Shaun made an intelligent stab at a guess. ‘You’re from Ketherwood, aren’t you?’
Ryan’s head jerked up. ‘No,’ he said. But the upward inflection gave him away.
That’s why I know his face, Shaun groaned inwardly.
‘Tell me he’s not one of the O’Gowan lot,’ he said to Leni. ‘I knew I’d seen him before. Although I bet I haven’t. I’ve probably seen one of his brothers because they all look the f . . . same.’
Leni opened her mouth to answer, but Shaun didn’t leave her space to.
‘You wanna get rid of him now before you come in one morning and your stock is all gone.’
Then Ryan ran forwards, butted between Shaun and Leni and addressed them both, his head turning from one to the other.
‘Yes, I am from Ketherwood. I knew if I said I was from there, you wouldn’t give me a job. And yes I am one of the O’Gowan lot but I’m not like them. I won’t end up in prison or selling drugs. I want to make something of me’sen. I’ve never been in trouble with the police, you can check.’
No one said anything and Ryan took it that his speech had fallen on stony ground.
‘Aw, I’ll get my coat,’ and he turned away.
‘You’ll do no such thing,’ said Leni. ‘You’ll carry on sorting out that change if you want a job.’
Ryan turned back to her and the corners of his lips lifted in gratitude, then he went over to the till.
‘You’re mad,’ said Shaun, raking his large hand through his short greying hair.
‘Sometimes you have to give people a chance. They don’t always prove you wrong, Mr McCarthy. None of us is perfect.’
Shaun lifted his hands in surrender and his blue-green eyes flashed as big a warning to Leni as his next words did. ‘Don’t come running to me when it ends in tears. But if there is any damage or thefts on my land, I’ll come straight here for him.’
And then he was gone, muttering the O’Gowan name under his breath.
Chapter 44
By eleven-thirty that morning, Harvey was stir crazy.
‘Shall we go out into the sunshine? Have tea in a café somewhere?’
Molly huffed. ‘You’re supposed to be resting.’
‘I have been resting and I can rest again when I pop off,’ said Harvey, hoisting himself out of the chair. ‘But I can’t sit here and watch another Columbo.’
‘There is a little teashop I sometimes go to,’ said Molly. ‘It doesn’t have any outside seats yet but it’s very nice.’
‘Then lead the way,’ said Harvey. ‘I’ll even pay.’
*
It was quite odd to have a man she didn’t know at all moving into her house, Carla thought, but it would have felt a lot stranger had it been Rex Parkinson instead of Will Linton. The more she thought about Rex, the more she was glad he had been so stubborn on the rental price.
She had thought about asking Will if he wanted a hand moving in, then stopped herself because she knew she should keep her distance. But Carla, being Carla, found herself outside on the drive asking if he needed any help, and he gratefully accepted, as long as she left the heavy stuff to him, he said.
He didn’t have a great many things to move in with. She wondered if, like her, he had walked out of his old life with only the bare essentials, ready to start afresh. She presumed from their conversation yesterday that he was newly separated or divorced. She noted that when he carried in the massive armchair, he managed it without any exertion. He might not have had bulging muscles in his arms, but he was obviously very strong.
‘I need to get a bed and a sofa and things but I wanted to see where I ended up living and how much space I had first,’ said Will, explaining why he had so little furniture. He looked embarrassed. Carla wanted to jump in and tell him that there was no need.
‘Would you like me to make you a cup of tea or coffee?’ she asked.
‘Thanks, but I’ve got a kettle and I’ll put it on here and get acclimatised to my new living quarters.’
‘I’ll leave you to it then,’ she smiled. ‘Oh, here are your keys. And your rent book. And your list of do’s and don’ts.’
He looked slightly stunned.
‘Joke,’ she said, her turn to be embarrassed, admonishing herself for being too familiar. She was probably coming across as a total loon.
His face broke into a smile. ‘Phew,’ he said. ‘I’ve stayed in enough boarding houses on jobs with those sorts of lists pinned to the back of the door to last me a lifetime.’
He was an attractive man, thought Carla. Crinkles around his eyes that aged him but in a good way. Cheerful grey eyes.
‘Well . . . thanks,’ said Will, taking the book and keys and thinking it was good to be in the presence of a female who smiled. He realised then that Nicole had never once made him a cup of tea or coffee in all the years they had been together.
*
Half an hour later Carla set off into town to buy a present for Theresa’s birthday but the road into the centre was jammed with cars because there was a food fair on in the market. Carla took the first opportunity to double back up the road. Maybe she would find something in that lovely teashop on the corner.
She was thrilled to find Molly in there and not alone but with a gentleman, the one she had been talking about, who was ill, she presumed. He was very thin and had dark crescents under his eyes but he was working his way through an enormous piece of chocolate cake. Carla noticed that there was a young lad helping Leni today. He was walking very slowly towards Molly’s table with two cups of coffee.
‘Oh good morning, Carla,’ said Molly. ‘Harvey, I’d like you to meet a friend of mine. Harvey, this is Carla. For some strange reason we always seem to turn up here at roughly the same time.’
Harvey stood and extended his hand. ‘Goodness and beauty gravitate towards themselves, I always think. Good morning, Carla,’ he said. ‘Charmed to meet you. Do join us. We’re having coffee and cake.’
‘Yes, and I’m not sure that triple chocolate g
ateau is on your diet sheet,’ tutted Molly.
‘Then I must have picked up the wrong one,’ replied Harvey, casting a wink in Carla’s direction.
Carla couldn’t help smiling. How long did Molly say they’d been apart? And yet they looked like a couple. She wondered if people who saw her and Martin thought of them as a couple. Then again, who would have seen them? She couldn’t think of the last time they had been out together – for dinner, lunch or even for a coffee or a walk.
‘And Carla, I’d like you to meet the newest addition to my staff,’ said Leni. ‘This is Ryan. He’s our Saturday lad.’
‘Nice to meet you, Ryan,’ greeted Carla. Ryan nodded shyly by way of return, obviously not enjoying the attention.
The table next to Molly’s had a half-eaten scone on it and a teapot.
‘Mr Singh is in the loo,’ said Molly. ‘How strange we should all be here today.’
‘He’s in a very good mood,’ smiled Leni. ‘He’s had a letter from his daughter.’
On cue, Mr Singh emerged from the toilet, jolly-faced as usual.
‘My goodness,’ he said on seeing Carla. ‘We are meeting here yet again.’
‘We’ve fallen into the same orbit around the teashop,’ laughed Carla.
‘Yes, well you can laugh, but I believe that happens,’ said Mr Singh, retaking his seat. ‘I have three times been on holiday to different places and met with people whom I knew. Quite extraordinary.’
‘You look very happy today, Mr Singh,’ said Carla, giving him the opportunity to show off his news.
‘Ah well, I have a letter from my daughter.’
‘How lovely,’ said Carla, infected by his jollity. ‘I didn’t know anyone wrote letters any more.’
‘She rings on the telephone,’ he replied. ‘But she knows her papa likes letters, so every month she writes to me too.’ He sat down with a groan of contentment and took out an envelope from his pocket.
Molly watched Mr Singh holding up the letter, savouring the shape of it. She recognised that wonderful anticipation. When they were courting, Harvey would send her notes in the post, even though he lived just a short bus ride away. He knew she read his letters over and over again. She wished now she had kept them, not been persuaded by Margaret to burn them in the garden in a bid to rid her heart of his spectre. It hadn’t. It had only served to make her wish she hadn’t destroyed them. All that remained was that postcard that said . . .
‘Wish you were here, papa-ji’ said Mr Singh, in complete synch to Molly’s thoughts. ‘She always writes that on the back. I wish she were here, but at the same time I want her to spread her wings and take flight in the world. Like your Anne. Doesn’t it make you proud, Leni, that your daughter, like mine, is living, really living, life and seeing the world?’
‘Oh my, yes, it does,’ agreed Leni.
‘Have you travelled much, Pavitar?’ asked Molly.
‘I always liked to travel very much with my wife,’ replied Mr Singh. ‘But not now. I don’t want to travel alone.’
Molly drew from that that Mr Singh was a widower. She wondered if it was worse to be alone for so many years and be acclimatised to it, or suffer the shock of losing a partner late in life. She and Harvey had once made plans to travel all over the world when they could afford it, see the Northern Lights, drift on the canals of Venice, visit the Vatican, climb the Statue of Liberty, have champagne at the top of the Eiffel Tower. She had crossed a couple of these off her list, but it wasn’t the same going with her sister and Bernard. Life with Harvey had been feast and famine – depending on whether his gambling paid off. It was mainly famine.
‘What can I get you, Carla?’ asked Leni.
‘I’ll just have a coffee, I think, but give me two minutes. I want to look for a present for a friend of mine first.’
Carla started at the nearest cabinet, next to the wall of postcards pinned up in a higgledy-piggledy fashion to hide the missing top corners where the stamps once sat.
In the third cabinet, Carla spotted the ideal present for Theresa: A scarf woven with scenes from Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff’s glowering face filled one end, the other – Catherine Earnshaw sporting some wild bed-hair. There was even some wrapping paper covered in small Top Withens buildings, the sky mean and moody behind it. Perfect. Theresa could take a little bit of Yorkshire with her when she went to New Zealand.
Carla carried on looking, though, fascinated by the things to buy. There were new things since the last time she had been: a set of china mugs featuring Dickens characters, coloured paperclips in the shape of Jane Austen’s profile, a tiny bookshelf filled with all the books Agatha Christie had written in perfect miniature, a ‘writers block’ notepad that looked as if it had been made out of a chunk of wood, bracelet charms made from old typewriter keys. And – joy of joys – the most gorgeous journal in the world, replicating the cover of Hard Times, by Charles Dickens. It was exactly what she needed to record her plan of action to get her life back into some semblance of order.
‘Found anything you like?’ asked Molly. ‘I could buy everything in this shop.’
‘I’m going to have the Hard Times journal, the Top Withens roll of wrapping paper and the Heathcliff scarf, please.’
‘Certainly,’ smiled Leni. ‘I’ll get them ready for you whilst you’re drinking your coffee.’
‘Heathcliff. What a bastard he was.’ Harvey’s voice filled the teashop.
‘For goodness sake, Harvey,’ hissed Molly. ‘Keep it down.’
‘Well he was,’ said Harvey, refusing to be hushed. ‘I never understood why they always picked the good-looking actors to play him in films. He was an absolute psychopath. Quite the most unpleasant character I’ve ever read.’
‘I totally agree,’ said Mr Singh, excitedly accentuating his words with a waving finger. ‘Laurence Olivier, Timothy Dalton, Ralph Fiennes – all very striking men.’
‘And Cliff Richard. Don’t forget Cliff Richard,’ put in Leni.
‘I think you mean let’s forget Cliff Richard,’ said Harvey.
‘Cliff Richard? Surely not?’ said Mr Singh, tilting his head in confusion. ‘I can’t remember that version.’
‘It was a musical,’ Harvey replied. ‘Though with the best will in the world I can’t imagine Cliff Richard hanging a dog.’
Molly shuddered. ‘Did he hang a dog? I can’t remember that part.’
‘Cliff Richard didn’t but Heathcliff did. What’s-her-name’s dog. The sister.’ Harvey tapped the table in frustration at not being able to remember the character.
‘Isabella.’
All eyes turned to Ryan.
‘That’s it, lad. That’s the name,’ said Harvey.
‘You really do read then,’ Leni smiled at him.
‘I told you I did,’ Ryan replied, shrugging his shoulders as he unwrapped a box of small metal lapel pins shaped like old typewriters and took them into the back room.
‘But because he loves Cathy so passionately, we’re supposed to wipe Heathcliff’s slate clean,’ said Harvey in a very mocking voice. ‘Oh, you women do love a bad boy.’
Carla let loose a quiet dry laugh. She wasn’t one of those women. She had recently realised how much of a bad boy she had been living with and it didn’t make her excited in the least. She didn’t want another bad boy. Nor did she want a good boy, because that good boy might really be a bad boy after all. She’d never trust another one of them again.
‘I don’t,’ she said.
‘Me neither,’ agreed Molly and threw Harvey a disapproving look. ‘Personally, I’d much rather have a Mr Rochester.’
‘Shouldn’t we be saving this conversation for Brontë Tuesday?’ asked Carla.
‘What’s Brontë Tuesday?’ asked Harvey.
‘Every Tuesday there is a theme here,’ replied Molly. ‘It’s Brontë Tuesday next week.’
‘I can’t wait until Tuesday,’ replied Harvey putting his hands on his hips. ‘I live in the here and now.’
‘Me nei
ther,’ agreed Mr Singh, nodding his head heartily. ‘Now, Mr Rochester didn’t treat his wife very well, did he? He locked her up in an attic.’
‘I have to defend him, I’m afraid,’ Carla jumped in. ‘He was seduced by two families into marrying Bertha Mason who kept it from him that she had hereditary madness. He could have put her in an asylum but he didn’t. He kept her in the house and employed a carer. Admittedly she was a bit rubbish at keeping the door locked. Of course if you were to read Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea, you might feel more inclined to be on Bertha’s side but . . .’ Then she realised all eyes were on her and her mouth clamped shut. She wasn’t used to being the centre of attention.
‘Go on, dear,’ urged Molly. ‘I haven’t read that book.’
‘Well,’ gulped Carla. ‘Put it this way, if you like Rochester and want to keep liking him, don’t read it. He comes across as a bit of a—’ Martin. ‘He doesn’t come across well at all. In fact, he’s a bit of a git. The sympathy is totally weighted towards her.’
‘Then I definitely shan’t read it,’ said Molly. ‘I like my Rochester gentlemanly and considerate. I would rather not see him any other way.’
Mr Singh laughed. ‘Yes, I see I see. Maybe he isn’t as bad as I remember.’
‘And Rochester liked dogs,’ put in Molly. ‘He didn’t hang them.’
‘He was far from perfect though,’ said Mr Singh. ‘You have to give me that point.’
‘Girls don’t mind a little bit of imperfection,’ called Leni over her shoulder as she walked into the back room for some fragile tape. ‘Luckily.’
‘A perfect man would be far too daunting,’ added Molly, before she realised that Harvey was looking at her with barely concealed amusement.
‘Flawed heroes are good. So long as they don’t hang dogs,’ chuckled Mr Singh.
‘Well that’s got my blood flowing, all this talk of Byronic heroes,’ chuckled Harvey.
‘We should make a move soon,’ said Molly, who was aware that Harvey was getting far too animated, which couldn’t be good for him. ‘Could we have the bill please, Leni?’
‘So it’s Brontë Tuesday, is it? I hope we’ll be here for that,’ said Harvey, after swallowing the last piece of his chocolate cake. ‘I could slag Heathcliff off all day every day. Bye Ryan. Don’t let them work you too hard. Join a union and insist on plenty of tea-breaks.’
The Teashop on the Corner Page 16
