The referee’s whistle sounded again.
‘Half-time’s up, Nick,’ said Dumpling.
‘Come on, Freddy,’ called Cassie. She arrived at his back and pulled him away from Rosie and Annabelle. She also delivered a warning little kick. Freddy accepted it manfully, knowing it was for standing too close to Rosie.
Nick, not quite sure what to say to Annabelle, made do with, ‘Well, have a nice Christmas.’
Annabelle gave him a slightly scornful look, supposing the reason why he’d acted as if he’d only just met her was because he didn’t want his girlfriend to know, whichever girl it was. It had to be either the girl called Meg or the one called Julie. It couldn’t be that jolly plump girl, could it? She was the one who’d monopolized him these last several minutes. Help, could it possibly be her? She was jolly all right, but a pumpkin of a girl.
‘You’re getting left behind,’ she said.
‘So I am,’ said Nick, and smiled at both young ladies. ‘So long,’ he said, and followed his team back on to the field.
‘Rosie, are you and Annabelle goin’ to stay and watch?’ asked Cassie.
Rosie looked at Annabelle. Annabelle was in a dither.
‘Well, just for a few minutes,’ said Rosie and she and Annabelle watched as the Rovers kicked off for the start of the second half. Rosie, still highly tickled about everything, put the question that Annabelle wanted to ask. ‘Is Nick’s girlfriend here?’
‘Pardon?’ said Cassie, and Alice, next to her, gave Rosie a look of curiosity.
‘Your captain, Cassie, is his girlfriend here?’
‘Oh, Nick doesn’t have a girlfriend,’ said Cassie. ‘He knows lots, but he doesn’t ’ave anyone special. Mind, he’s a bit gone on Norma Shearer.’ Norma Shearer was a Hollywood film star. ‘But I don’t think he’s got hopes. Well, I don’t suppose he could afford her, not Norma Shearer.’
Annabelle wanted to spit. She’d been lied to about him having a girlfriend. Rosie, however, was smiling.
Alice, suspecting that this striking fair girl had developed an interest in her brother, said, ‘Nick’s funny about girls. He doesn’t believe in gettin’ seriously attached till he’s earnin’ quite a bit more than he is now. He says a feller shouldn’t go steady with a girl till he can treat her to something more posh than a seat in a cinema.’
‘Crikey, Alice,’ said Cassie, ‘I didn’t know Nick ’ad those kind of principles.’
‘They’re not principles,’ said Annabelle in an impulsive outburst, ‘they’re rhubarb.’
‘Yes, who wants something more posh than a cinema seat?’ asked Rosie.
‘I’ve just said, Nick’s funny about that sort of thing,’ remarked Alice, ‘and I can’t see him gettin’ serious about any girl yet. Not for a couple of years, anyway, and not with the pride he’s got in his principles, even if they are a bit funny.’
Oh, the rotten devil, we’ll see about that, thought Annabelle. I’ll give him principles. I’ll give him fib to me about having a girlfriend. How could he do that? Crikey, I’m a woman scorned. Oh, you wait, Nick Harrison, I’ll make you wish you’d never been born.
‘Rubbish!’ yelled young Fanny. Herbert Briggs had missed an open goal. ‘Call yerself a footballer?’
Annabelle laughed. Rosie looked at her. Aunt Lizzy’s eldest daughter seemed to have made a recovery.
They left after a few more minutes, saying goodbye to Cassie and the other girls.
‘Well, ducky?’ said Rosie.
‘He doesn’t have a girlfriend,’ said Annabelle.
‘Just principles,’ smiled Rosie.
‘I bet,’ said Annabelle. ‘No, I think he’s just scared that he’ll get the sack if he starts walking out with me. He’s scared that Uncle John will demolish him with thunder and lightning. D’you know what he calls Uncle John?’
‘Tell me,’ said Rosie.
‘God,’ said Annabelle.
Rosie shrieked. ‘God? But he’s just an old growler.’
‘Rosie, what did you think of Nick?’
‘Dishy, lovey,’ said Rosie.
‘But what a rotten devil, telling me he had a girlfriend.’
‘Well, I suppose that’s what comes of being scared of God,’ said Rosie. ‘Come on, let’s go to Brixton now and buy some Christmas presents for our nearest and dearest. You can think about the best method of slaying your devious Romeo on the way.’
The match ended in a draw. Dumpling said that was what came from not picking her as centre forward. Fanny said, typically, it was just the result of playing like a lot of rubbish boxes. Cassie said she’d have something to say to a certain right half with two left legs, and Freddy moved quickly out of her way. Danny asked Dumpling if he could sit next to her on the tram home. Not likely, said Dumpling, not after what’s been happening in me mum’s parlour just recent. Suppose it happened on the tram, she said, and the conductor came up and saw? I suppose we’d have to invite him to the wedding, said Danny. Stop getting barmy ideas about weddings, said Dumpling.
Alice, on arrival home, informed Ma that two girl cousins of Freddy Brown had turned up at the match, and that they’d interested themselves in Nick. Well, said Ma, I don’t care whose cousins they are, we don’t want them interesting themselves in your brother, and you all know why. It’s enough, she said, that we have to tell certain stories to all your friends, and our neighbours too, without having to tell the same stories to new friends that might get a bit special to you and Nick. Still, never mind, she said, perking up, we won’t have the shadow of sorrow hanging over us for ever, just for one more year and a bit, and perhaps not as long as that if Pa gets good conduct marks.
Ma could get a bit repetitive about the shadow of sorrow, but if repetition was boring it always had a wise edge to it. Nick knew that, because he’d had to tell stories to Annabelle, a girl whose peaches and cream look had suddenly reappeared in Brockwell Park. He wondered if a similar reappearance would happen. He didn’t think so. Not only was the meeting accidental, but she had given him a very cutting look just before the start of the second half.
What a lovely girl, though.
Chapter Fourteen
MA TOOK A good look at Sunday morning’s newspaper before sitting down to breakfast. Not a word about the jewel robberies caught her eye, and she might have expressed loud disgust that the cops hadn’t nabbed the robbers if the day had been other than a Sunday. As it was, they all went to church later that morning, which gave Ma a chance to ask the Lord to think of Pa, much more of a gentleman than a common burglar.
In the afternoon, they went to see Pa. On the way, Amy said old Mrs Munton, a neighbour, was being buried tomorrow. Nick said not before time, she’d been dead a week.
‘I think I might just go to the funeral,’ said Ma.
Ma liked a good funeral, especially a royal one. Pa had taken all of them to see the funeral of Queen Alexandra in 1925. There were thousands on the streets, Queen Alexandra having been beloved of the people, according to Ma, but Pa managed to get his family as far as the Mall. There, the people were six deep on either side. When the cortege came in sight, a deep hush settled on the crowds, and even young Fanny, four at the time, stopped fidgeting. Soldiers lining the route bowed their heads, their arms reversed. Pa took his hat off and held it reverently against his chest. Ma had her handkerchief out. Drums beat the Funeral March, and the cortege with its coffin rolled slowly by, pulled by bluejackets. Women cried and Ma blew her nose as respectfully as she could. The late Queen’s sons followed the coffin.
What a lovely funeral, said Ma, now let’s go and have hot pie and mash somewhere. Pa said he didn’t think they’d get any at Buckingham Palace, only black pudding because of the funeral. Ma said don’t make that kind of a joke on a sorrowful day like this, so Pa took them to Joe’s Pie and Mash Shop off Covent Garden. He paid for the meal with a ten-bob note, which he extracted with a flourish from a very posh-looking leather wallet. Ma asked him in a whisper where he’d got it from. Pa said that’s fu
nny, my love, just where did it come from? Ma knew all right, and she also knew why Pa had got them through to the Mall. It was where a lot of posh and well-heeled mourners would be. Ma gave him a whispered earful about it being the most disgraceful thing he’d ever done, considering he’d done it at Queen Alexandra’s funeral. Pa said his hand must have slipped, and that, anyway, the dear old biddy had probably been too busy settling down in heaven to have noticed. Just wait till I get you home, Albert Harrison, said Ma. Still, she enjoyed her pie and mash. So did everyone else.
The prison warders in the main looked as tough and hard-bitten as most of the convicts, but some could show a bit of humour. Inside the gates, the warder inspecting the contents of Ma’s large cake tin said, ‘’Ello, ’ello, what’ve we got ’ere, Mrs Harrison, goodies for yer naughty ole man?’
‘Excuse me,’ said Ma, ‘it’s not your place to be disrespectful.’
‘Beg yer pardon, I’m sure, missus.’
‘So you should,’ said Ma, always on her dignity in this place.
In the visitors’ room, the convicts present looked grey and put-upon. When Pa came in, he looked bright and breezy. He bowed to Ma before he sat down.
‘How’s your royal self, queen of me heart?’ he said.
‘Sufferin’,’ said Ma, ‘specially as I’ve been thinkin’ of the funeral of poor Queen Alexandra and how you committed what you shouldn’t ’ave.’
‘Water under the bridge, old lady, water under the bridge,’ said Pa, taking affectionate stock of his daughters. Up came one of the watchful warders to see if the cake tin was lethal or innocuous. Nick, holding the tin, took the lid off to disclose a Christmas fruitcake baked by Ma. The warder informed her that if her better half had taught himself to go in for baking cakes as good as hers, he’d have made a different name for himself.
Ma said, ‘I’ll thank you not to make them kind of remarks about Mr ’Arrison, who’s only here on account of bein’ unfortunate. He’s never been a common criminal in all ’is life. And where’re you goin’ with that cake, might I ask?’
‘Well, you know the rules, Mrs Harrison,’ said the warder. ‘We’ll have to cut the cake open. There’s a chance a hammer and chisel might’ve accidentally fell into it when you were doin’ the mixin’.’
‘I hope you’re not casting aspersions, Mr Lorrimore,’ said Pa.
‘I hope so too,’ said Ma, ‘I’ve never let anything fall accidental into any of my bakin’.’
‘Well, we’ll take a look,’ said the warder, and off he went with the cake.
‘It’s upsettin’, what you have to put up with, Pa,’ said Amy.
‘Good on you, Pa, for not letting them get you down,’ said Alice.
‘Serve ’em right, Pa, if you pinched their watches,’ said young Fanny.
‘You Fanny,’ whispered Ma in outrage, ‘that’s aggravatin’ talk, that is, and I don’t want any more of it.’
‘Bless your heart, Fanny,’ said Pa, ‘your appropriate speech was bravely spoken, but slightly upsetting to Ma.’
‘There’s something else I don’t like,’ said Ma, and lowered her voice to tell him that in future that kind friend of his was only going to give her enough to pay the rent. If she hadn’t been getting ten bob a week from the lodger, she wouldn’t be able to feed her family properly. Pa’s cheerful look lurched a bit, and he seemed very put out. He glanced at Nick. Nick said not to worry, they’d manage somehow. Yes, up to you, Nick, to see Ma doesn’t get too worried, said Pa. Ma said she was thinking about selling a few things, including the piano. Pa looked shocked.
‘I’ll have to make a firm request to you not to do that, Mabel,’ he said. ‘Didn’t I mention before that the family joanna’s a valuable heirloom and antique?’
‘With a Queen Anne birthmark,’ said Alice.
‘More like my birthright,’ said Pa.
‘Part of the family, Pa?’ said Nick.
‘Quite so,’ said Pa. ‘So I put it to you, my son, should a man’s family birthright be sold when it’s dear to him? I’ll rely on you to see Ma doesn’t slip it to some rag and bone merchant who might come knocking. There’s its valuability to consider, d’you see.’
‘Valuability, right,’ said Nick.
The warder brought the cake back then, in its tin. The tin looked larger on account of the cake looking smaller. It was in quarters neatly fitted together.
‘Passed all correct for consumption, Harrison,’ said the warder.
‘It doesn’t look all correct to me,’ said Ma, ‘it looks all shrunk.’
‘Have to inform you, Mrs Harrison, that hard labour convict 43789 ain’t allowed a cake all to himself.’
‘It’s a pleasure, Mr Lorrimore, to concur,’ said Pa, ‘and in any case, I’ve never been one to keep the good things of life all to myself, apart from Mrs Harrison, of course.’
‘What a caution,’ said the warder, departing with a grin. Alice and Nick were positive the prison staff really did like Pa. Well, the Hackney coppers had never shown any hard feelings at failing to nab him when his hand was in someone else’s pocket.
The visitors’ room was now full of gaunt bony convicts talking to their next of kin out of the corners of their mouths.
‘Albert,’ whispered Ma, ‘what did you mean about our piano’s valuability?’
‘Keep it in the family, Mabel old gel, that’s what I mean,’ said Pa. ‘It’s my birthright and my hope for the future.’
‘Crikey, Pa,’ said Amy, ‘you’re not goin’ to spend your future playin’ the piano in the streets like an organ-grinder and ’is monkey, are you?’
‘That he’s not,’ said Ma firmly, ‘he’s goin’ to drive a corporation water-cart or a furniture van. Or a coal cart.’
‘Lord love you, Mabel,’ said Pa, ‘didn’t I tell you I was thinking of forming a business partnership with Alice and Nick?’
‘What sort of partnership?’ asked Ma, suspicion writ darkly on her brow.
‘I’m working on it, if you get me,’ said Pa.
‘I’ve got you all right,’ said Ma, ‘and you can forget it. There’s not goin’ to be any business partnerships, nor sellin’ old baskets like you mentioned before.’
‘Old Masters,’ said Nick.
‘Same difference, if I know your Pa. As for the piano—’
‘Don’t sell it,’ said Pa, ‘use these fivers to keep you going.’
Talk about quickness of the hand deceiving the watchful eye of authority. Without either of the warders spotting even a glimmer of movement, two folded white fivers suddenly came into being, only to disappear as Pa slipped them under the biscuit tin. Ma then put on an act of inspecting the pillaging job that had been done on the cake, and another disappearing trick took place, inside the waistband of Ma’s skirt.
‘Lovaduck, good old Pa,’ said Fanny.
‘Wait a bit,’ whispered Ma, ‘where’d you get them from, Albert?’
‘Ah,’ said Pa, and winked.
‘Now, Pa,’ said Alice.
‘Good as the real thing, Alice my pigeon,’ murmured Pa.
‘Lord give me patience,’ breathed Ma, ‘they’re duds.’
‘Pa, you shocker,’ said Alice.
‘Crikey, and we went to church this morning,’ said Amy.
‘Lord bless you,’ said Pa.
‘You need a cure, Pa,’ said Nick.
‘He’ll get one when he’s home,’ said Ma. ‘I suppose you made them, did you, Albert ’Arrison?’
‘That’s a very hurtful remark, Mabel, considering they cost me four fags,’ said Pa.
‘Don’t answer me back,’ said Ma. ‘That’s been half the trouble, me lettin’ you answer me back and also lettin’ you have your own way a lot too much. Well, let me tell you, Albert ’Arrison, when you come out, everything’s goin’ to be done my way, not just for your own sake, but for the sake of your son and daughters that want to live honest lives.’
‘Mabel, who could want that more than me, their affectionate dad?’ said Pa. �
��Don’t the girls look souls of honesty, and doesn’t Nick look a young man born to make an honest name for himself? Haven’t I slipped you a little oof so that you can buy them some honest Christmas presents? All I’d like to say is that I don’t want their honesty to leave them poverty-stricken.’
‘Crikey, no, I don’t want to end up poverty-stricken, Ma,’ said Fanny, ‘I’ll probably only ’ave one pair of shoes and one pair of knickers.’
‘You Fanny,’ breathed Ma, ‘d’you want a clip, talkin’ about knickers in ’ere, you saucy girl? As for you, Albert, look what your kind of honesty’s done for your fam’ly. If it wasn’t for Alice and Nick earning wages, we’d been in the workhouse, specially now your so-called ’elpful friend is ’ardly bein’ ’elpful at all.’
Pa’s cheerful look took another lurch.
‘I can’t take kindly to that,’ he said.
‘Don’t fret, Pa,’ said Alice, ‘we’re managing, and at least while you’re in here the law knows you’ve got nothing to do with these jewel robberies.’
‘Yes, that’s nearly a blessin’,’ said Ma, ‘it makes Pa nearly look honest and ’ard done by.’
‘A kind of alibi for your integrity, Pa,’ said Nick.
‘Well, my son,’ said Pa, ‘I can fairly claim I’ve got integrity.’
‘And your family piano,’ said Nick, and Pa gave him a glance.
‘Yes, we’ll make sure we keep the piano,’ said Alice, and Pa slipped her a glance too. Alice smiled. Pa coughed.
‘Bless you, my children,’ he said.
‘Bless you too, Pa,’ said Amy.
‘H’m,’ said Ma.
When the family left a little later, they wished Pa a merry Christmas and a happy New Year. Pa said with a bit of luck it might turn out a very happy New Year. Pa was cooking something up.
When the family arrived home, Nick had a good look at the fivers. They seemed all right to him. So Alice also had a good look. She couldn’t find any fault.
‘Not that I know much about what’s dud and what’s genuine,’ she said.
‘Nor me,’ said Amy.
‘Lovaduck,’ said young Fanny, ‘if no-one knows much, Ma, we could be rich for a bit. Well, till they’re spent.’
Pride of Walworth Page 21
