‘Daniel’s here, Mr Carlton.’ Daniel beamed at her. Kim had always been gruffly kind, brisk, but with time for everyone, never asking questions. Even let him talk. He shuffled, deliberately slow.
‘Delivery van outside, plus all that stuff from before, do you want it all moved now?’ he asked, the face all innocence. Pip blew his nose noisily.
‘Yes, if you’ve time. Yes, yes. You get off, Kim. You wanted to go early, go on, good girl.’
She went, the embarrassment of Daniel’s cool regard lost in her haste to get upstairs, clean up a bit, put on her face and go shopping for Christmas. All that she had heard overtook her own unease. She was alive with the knowledge she had just acquired, full of pity, flattered to be the confidant. It made her feel wiser and stronger. She tidied the living-room, noticed the dust on the surfaces as she stuffed away magazines and Tom’s toys. Stopped for a moment, puzzled before moving on, shaking her head. She had been there when Margaret Carlton was found. Calling Margaret’s name to no response, entering the door of that pristine bedroom, full of stale air, unmoved by breath, she had known without further test that Margaret was dead, had not lingered to inspect that lined little face never yet seen without lipstick, but had raced instead for the other room. Minutes later, safe in early morning sunlight which made it all so harmless, she had ventured a brief, further look, but could not recall, not now, not then, anything resembling a yellow duster.
Enough: she was sorry and she was late. In view of other people’s problems, tragedies rather than woes like her own, she felt surprisingly good. Anger and anxiety fizzled out of her. The thought of confiding or complaining, being weak all over again, drifted downhill like the breeze-blown rubbish in the street outside. Whatever there was, she would cope.
Kim put on her yellow coat, a bargain from the market and very short. Leg warmers, bright as the lipstick. Teetered past the shop on her way to the bus. She missed the hungry eyes following her through bright, misted windows, watching like a hawk.
Daniel found enough to do around the caring chemist’s for at least half an hour a day. On a good morning, Kim made him tea and sometimes he acquired things to eat. He did a further half-hour down the road for Mrs Beale, but although she thanked him and gave him apples, she never paid, didn’t believe in it, she said. Nor did Mrs Kennel in the dress shop, although Ahmed in the off-licence lent him videos and gave him the occasional free can of lager. They provided well for him, the whole Parade, with supplies or generosity, but only Mr Carlton and Kimberley Perry actually gave him money. Margaret, the all-time fixer, had fixed that. Money, she said, he needs money. Which was strange since there was no need. Whatever he said, whatever he did, he was bound to this dispensary as surely as if he had been tied, would have done whatever he was asked, but how mean of Pip to forget to pay. He had come to rely on it. Neither could Pip ever see how Daniel needed smiles, for instance, as well as cash occasionally for the sweat of his labours. Even recognition of their mutual manhood would not have come amiss. Pip would not talk about drugs the way Daniel liked to talk about drugs. Dan was fascinated: he learned from his own condition. He knew a lot about Pip and quite liked the idea of how little Pip knew of how much he watched.
‘No, not in the back dispensary,’ Pip said sharply.
‘Why not? You’ve forgotten these.’ He pointed to a pile of boxes, ‘And there’s no room for them out here.’
‘The back room’s not for storage,’ Pip responded angrily, ‘and I didn’t forget.’
‘Oh, yes, your favourite place. You like it in there. No records in there. It’s like one of those priest holes. Do you know, I saw you in there the other night. And the night your missus popped her clogs. Oh, no, the night before. No, I’m wrong. You were looking out of the window. In the morning, early. Very early. I like getting up in the dark.’
Daniel meant nothing sinister by this: it was merely a thought which popped into his mind to dwell for a second, without any real association between one winter’s night when someone had died and the next. Daniel was used to death: most of his peers were dead and the timing of any death soon became a blur. Margaret was someone he regretted without mourning, since he was incapable of mourning. He knew Pip ignored him the way he did not ignore other customers and for the moment he wanted to be seen. All these words were no more than a longwinded attempt to jog Pip’s memory on the subject of money. Only a pound coin here and there, but every little helped.
‘What’s so precious about the back room anyway?’ he grumbled. ‘Not as if you have to make up any of your own stuff, not this day and age anyhow. You can get it all in packets. Kept you away from the missus, I s’pose, but not a problem now, is it? No need to stay out of Kim’s way. Quite fun to bump into. Slowly.’
He stooped over a pile of boxes, laughing a little, straightening the sides, about to continue. Then he felt a blow to the back of his skull, a dull, heavy, stiffening blow, delivered by an iron fist. A bloodless shock, a hand pressing his neck into the dusty floor; words hissed into his ear.
‘Shut up, shut up, shut up. Shut it, you piece of scum, you bastard …’
Tombo scuffled home from school with a large hole in his nylon satchel. There was also a large hole in his trousers and he was not sure which he should explain first, that or the graze on his forehead. He was numb with misery. Today had been one of those days when his own credibility in the playground had failed, not there, but on the way home, when they had seen his vulnerability. He should not have boasted about Dad’s car coming to school, had them waiting as he waited, jeering, then fighting. Daddy was supposed to meet him, Mum had said, and he had promised. Failing which, she had said, come home with someone else if you can, try not to go alone, and if I’m not back go and wait with Uncle Pip in the shop. He had not believed there would be a ‘failing which’, but he was alone, skulking down the back service road like a thief. Dad was a bastard, a bum, a stinker, a sodding, sodding …
There was absolutely nothing he wanted to do, nothing at all, and no one he wanted to see. So profound was his misery that the odd cut and bruise did not matter and even the dark service road presented no threats. He was walking down the back of the Parade rather than the front purely in order to avoid any contact with Mrs Bosom or Mrs Bum, who might just enquire why he had run away from their party. Mum had explained, but he knew they would ask him direct. There were few enough children actually living in Herringbone Parade for him to stick out like a sore thumb, only enough of them to field one dreadful party, and he felt as if the graze on his forehead was the colour of scarlet. But slowly, the quiet worked some sort of calm. Even traffic was distant here, and the wind and rain had died away to a solid cold. Tombo, delaying the time he would have to go and wait in the chemist if Mum was not back, took three steps forward and two steps back, looking round at last for anything to absorb his rage.
The ground at the back of Herringbone Parade was good for nothing but storing the tall rubbish bins which frightened him a little because they were big enough to hide a man inside and he always imagined being placed in there, head first with his feet tied together. One way they might have dealt with him at the party. The bins were full, only half the garbage bags had been taken away carelessly that morning, leaving stray bits to dance in the wind. They often did that, the rubbish men: got fed up halfway through if it was cold and left their task for the next day so the service road was never swept clean. These were things he noticed, the high spots of the week. Nearing his own home again, Tombo found rubbish dropped in the street: they were often careless like that. A torn sack gnawed by a dog leaving a trail of bones. Something of interest at last, near his own back door; a bent-up wire coat hanger, maybe two, formed into a ring with wire crossing over the top, making it look rather like a skeleton hat. The contraption projected from a knotted bag which had once sealed it, and the careful covering somehow added to its value. Tom thought at first the thing was the framework for some sort of helmet, looked around and put it on his head. The wire sat comforta
bly: he regarded it as a find, slightly ashamed of himself to be so delighted, as well as curious to see what on earth he looked like. Really, he knew he was too old for make-believe, all those silly pretend games, but he liked the hat all the same and knew he would keep it. Things collected had a way of becoming more precious than anything given, because then you were burdened with the effort of saying thank you. He made a little feint towards a bin, growling; then looked around for somewhere to see himself transformed into a fierce space invader. Or a soldier, if he stuck in branches and made himself camouflage. The glazed window of his own back door was probably nearest and he trotted towards it, ready to examine his own blurred reflection in privacy, hide the hat in the torn satchel and only then go round to the front for a boring hour by the counter if she wasn’t ready. Already he was reconciled to tellings off, excuses, tedium.
But not yet. His foot on the step contacted something hot and his heart flew into his mouth. Tombo almost stepped on the figure huddled there, leapt backwards in a jolt of fear and prepared to run, until he heard the figure moaning. But retreating more slowly to a safe distance, even in the dark, he was suddenly reassured by something familiar, a scent, a familiar slouch which told him not to be afraid, for himself at least.
‘What do you want?’ he hissed at the figure from the safe distance of six feet. The form on the steps groaned, moving slightly, the groaning turning into a singsong sound of despairing pain, ‘Oh God, oh God, oh God.’
‘Daniel!’ Tombo said louder, moving closer. ‘What’s the matter? Don’t be silly, what’s the matter? Stop playing about, you scared me.’
‘My head,’ Daniel slurred. ‘My head. Someone kicked my head. Hurts. Can’t properly see. Hurts.’
‘Who kicked your head? Where? Out here, just now?’ Tombo had approached, touched Daniel’s shoulder, looking over his own, conscious of danger. Daniel did not answer, resumed the keening moaning, his hands across his chest, rocking himself to and fro. As Tom touched, he shrugged him away. Tom withdrew his hand as if he had touched a live wire.
‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Wait just here. I’ll get help. Wait.’ Daniel merely grunted: Tom thought he saw him shake his head. He ran to the end of the service road, round the corner, panting up to the door of Mum’s shop, pushing between the shelves on his way to the counter where two people stood waiting. Shocked to find Mum not there, immediately visible, he stumbled behind the counter, forgetting his excuse-me’s, and thrust his head into the dispensary, holding the doorframe with both hands. ‘Mr Carlton, Mr Carlton, you gotta come quick. ’S Daniel, not well, very poorly.’
Pip turned briefly, then turned back. ‘No children in here, Tom, you know that.’
‘I know, I know, but you gotta come. Quick. You could go through the back. Daniel, I said. You know, Daniel.’
Pip smiled over his head, out to the two women waiting at the counter. He shrugged his shoulders in a what-can-you-do-with-them? gesture. They smiled back. ‘Yes, I know Daniel,’ he said gently, condescension lacing every syllable. ‘And there’s nothing wrong with him, nothing at all. He was in here a minute ago. One of his turns, Tom, old boy, nothing to worry about.’
‘There is, there is … you gotta come and see.’
‘No, Tom, can’t you see I’m busy?’
Tom turned to the waiting women with a look of appeal. They smiled back. ‘I should come out of there if I was you,’ one of them said, irritated by being kept waiting. ‘You heard what Mr Pip said.’
Tom had heard, clearly. And seen the ingratiating smile on Uncle Pip’s face, which he returned with a look of hatred, a look which bounced back off the granite of that smile. He turned to go, pushing past the women again, so that one of them tutted in disapproval. Halfway to the door, slower this time, he heard Pip’s voice hail him back.
‘Tom, here, if you want to be useful, take Dan his prescription. Shouldn’t let you have it, but I don’t think you’ll eat it. That’s all he wants. Addict, you know; very sad,’ he added in an undertone to the women. The hand was extended beyond the dispensary door, holding aloft a white carrier bag. Tom had seen this before, carried it once or twice. Daniel, he knew, collected this every day, but the bag he took was heavier than he remembered. He gripped the slippy plastic and ran.
Perhaps, he thought later, Mister was right and that was all Daniel had wanted. Back round the corner, into the dark, stunning dark after all the lights of the Parade. Daniel still there, himself full of breathless explanations. ‘He won’t come, Danny, he won’t, got your prescription.’ Daniel laughing, unbelievably laughing, a funny, sobbing sound. ‘What should I do, Daniel, come upstairs with me, we’ll just wait for Mum …’ and then, both of them blinded by the flashing lights of Dad’s car, slewing to a halt where they stood. Daddy, with whom he had been so angry, getting out, saying ‘I’m sorry, son, I’m sorry, couldn’t get to school …’ and Tombo, standing his ground for a second or two, unable to prove his point by waiting, running towards him, awash with words. He stumbled over his lines, rushed them, pointing backwards and forwards, round the corner in a storm of explanation, then back to his friend. Father detached son and they both approached. Daniel watched them, boy with father in hand, a unit which excluded him completely and one of them a copper to boot, spoke his first articulate words. A poetry in lonely hatred.
‘Piss off, why don’t you? Just piss off. I’m fine.’
Then he had just got to his feet and stumbled away. Tombo remembered him, all in the black, in the dark, the only visible bit of him the white plastic bag. He knew he should have stopped him somehow; dragged him back to be with them, but there was Daddy, big Daddy, forgiven in a second for the whole hours of weeping distress he had caused by being late.
Bailey was home first. Helen’s place, by prearrangement, himself armed with shopping since he liked to cook as much as she loathed it. Left to Helen, they would never eat. At least the East End was rich in markets, including Herringbone Parade, and Bailey found that cooking, mending clocks, keeping busy, was the best panacea for his current existence. Less taxing than people, who could all go hang, apart from Helen. Bailey’s loyalties had always been few, but intense.
He could tell she was well by the way she came downstairs, crashing through the front door, across the corridor, down the steps to her basement, everything flying. Bailey could visualise her long, thick hair escaping, as it did by this point every evening, from the slide which held it on top of her head, her brilliant blue coat, bought as an antidote to boredom, left flapping open. And he knew, with absolute sureness, that she had been on some expedition before coming home. The pub, probably.
Not that he minded. Each had a life to be followed but he was sometimes aware of his own vulnerability, his social isolation as compared with hers. She was aware of it too, included him as much as possible in everything she did, as generous with friends as with money and time, but he was still an outsider. When Bailey thought of this, he was perplexed, although never for long. They had care of each other and no one else did; he as vital to her sanity as air to her breathing. To have this place in Helen’s heart, that enormous love she reserved for him, was enough, but he was well aware she had room for others, too. Being jaundiced with humanity was only his affliction, his particular cancer. He hid it, since she did not seem to suffer and he had no wish to infect.
‘What was it this time?’ he asked mildly. ‘Somebody leaving, somebody getting engaged, or just Monday evening?’ She grinned, not about to say immediately. He brushed her cold, pink cheek with his own warm face, waited for her arms around him, Helen’s affection, which so delighted him but which he could not initiate.
‘I’ve got egg on my hands,’ he said, wanting to return the hugging.
‘And me on my face. Doesn’t matter.’ She shrugged off the coat.
‘I’ve only been shopping.’ There was something a little evasive about this, but Bailey did not mind. ‘Oh, and I spoke to Dr Hazel today. I promised I’d keep in touch, I liked him, you see, and he liked
me and he’s lonely. And he’s helping me with the Carlton case.’
‘How?’
‘Chloroform. He knows all about it. So does Mr Caring Carlton, I’ll tell you. Only Dr Hazel is going to write me an essay on chloroform. Did you know it was an aphrodisiac?’ She was prowling round the kitchen, sniffing, alert to the smells, excited.
‘No, I didn’t know. Why don’t you bring some home?’
‘Actually, no. And anyway,’ she added demurely, ‘I don’t think we need it.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I’m getting on, you know. Ten years older than you.’
‘And wiser, most of the time. And a better cook. You often make me feel redundant, you know. You do every bloody thing better than me. I’m a cretin compared with you.’ There was no anxiety in the tone, no teasing either, only a genuine humility. He looked to check on that, turned back to the food, smiling to himself. She had her ways of reassuring him after all.
CHAPTER SIX
DESPITE a pathological reluctance to listen, Redwood found himself almost fascinated.
‘Yes, yes, yes,’ he repeated, nodding energetically towards the tableau of faces six feet beyond. He had agreed to listen, but, as branch Crown Prosecutor, regarded Helen West as one of life’s dirty tricks. Helen had been placed under his command in the more peaceful areas of village Essex, from whence she had departed to his enormous relief, only for him to find that the promotion stakes of the Crown Prosecution Service dictated he follow. Bit of city life, Redwood, do you good. You’re bound for higher things and we have to see how you survive in the jungle. A far cry, this grubby office, from the civilisation of Branston, dull though it had been. Redwood struggled in these waters, and he knew, again with a clenching of the jaw in his pouchy face, that his survival owed much to this rebellious professional, who was never insolent, never crossed him, always deferred to him, but was never, ever entirely under his control. Never a particularly passionate man, he harboured a strong dislike for Helen that was mixed with resentment, and made worse by the fact that he needed her desperately for all the things he could not do. Such as keeping the office in harmony. A closet subversive was what she was; too clever by half and far too popular.
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