‘Oh, that might be part of it, Bill, but it’s more than that. From what she said, it’s religious mania, and that in a twisted sort of way, too.’
‘Well, I can tell you one thing, love: if she doesn’t tell Bert the night I will in the morning, and tell him to get cracking. There’s nothing to stop them going to the registry office on Monday if it comes to the push. You know, there’s one thing you can say for this lower middle-class avenue, and that is, there’s always something going on.’
‘Why stick on the lower?’
‘Because that’s what it is. There’s a lot of pretence along this street, you know. Look at our dear Mrs Quinn. And there’s the two redundant managers further up. You said yourself you were invited to one of their coffee mornings.’
‘Well, I suppose they could still afford a cup of coffee.’
‘Aye, I suppose so in that case; but what about that bloke at the top inviting us to a meal and suggesting at the same time we take a bottle.’
‘Well, if I remember rightly, we didn’t get a second invitation after your refusal of the first. You know, you are an uncouth individual at times.’
‘Look, Fiona’—he again pointed at her—‘don’t use that word on me. I’m a bigmouth and I’m brash but I’m not uncouth. I know you were smiling when you said it but I still don’t like it.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry, Mr Bailey.’ She went to turn away and he got hold of her none too gently and pulled her tight against him, saying, ‘An’ don’t take the pet. And that means, ever, because if I can’t speak me mind to you, then I’m all at sea.’ And his smile widening now, he went on, ‘And me rudder’s gone and me outboard engine’s bust; I didn’t bring any oars and there’s a leak in the bottom of the boat. Dear Agony Aunt, what must I do?’
‘Oh, Bill Bailey!’
‘Don’t spit at me when you say my name like that.’ He made great play of rubbing his hand across his mouth. ‘Anyway, you say that Nell’s going to let you know how things go when she gets back. Well, that could be all hours. But we’ll wait up. And there’s a certain way we can fill in the time, isn’t there, Mrs B?’
She pressed herself from him, saying, ‘You know, with all these other things on your mind, I’m amazed at the space you reserve for that one thing.’
‘Well, what’s life for, love, if not for that?’
‘Oh you!’ She thrust him away none too gently, and as she went out she said, ‘I’m going to have a bath, and I don’t want to be disturbed for the next hour. Will you inform the crew?’
‘I’ll give you half an hour, woman. That’s long enough for any bath and titivating.’
When she had gone he sat down at the desk and for a few moments his mind dwelt on Nell’s situation; but then he was back to the main happening of the day, and once again he was experiencing the feeling that had arisen in him when Sir Charles Kingdom informed him who was behind his present troubles. But added to it now was an emotion he hadn’t experienced before, and it was fear. Fear of that woman; and this in itself was frightening, for never in his life could he recall being afraid of a man.
Chapter Six
It was Willie’s birthday, Tuesday April the first. Two more things had happened to Bill’s men in the intervening time. One: Jos Wright’s allotment had been stripped and trampled flat. And Jos being a leek fanatic, this had really depressed him. As he said, they could have mugged him and he wouldn’t have minded so much.
The second incident had to do with Morris Fenwick’s pigeons. It was known among the pigeon fanciers in the district that Morris had great hopes for one of his birds winning the continental race. But in the middle of the night before the special day the birds had been let out from their lofts at the bottom of the garden, and Morris and his wife had been woken up with the flutter they made as they circled the house.
What Morris and no-one else could understand was how the birds had been let out, because the coops had been locked, for it wasn’t unknown that attempts could be made to steal prize pigeons, or, as some vandals had done of late, to kill them. It would seem in this case that the interlopers had had keys to fit the locks.
In both cases the police had been informed; Sir Charles Kingdom, too, had been informed and by a very angry Bill who had promised him that just one more thing, just one more, and he would go back to the police and spill the whole story. What Sir Charles had said, was, ‘Don’t do that, Bailey. As I said, I’ll make everything good; but don’t do that, not at this late stage because you’ll spoil your own chance if you do.’
When Bill had asked him what he meant by that he got no answer for the line went dead…
But now it was Willie’s birthday. All the April Fool tricks that could be played had been played on him and by him. Excitement in the house was at a high pitch waiting for the party to begin at half-past five, when Bill would join them, and also Bert.
It was a special day for Bert. He hadn’t been to work, for he was getting ready for his wedding to Nell on the morrow. But now here they all were, ten people sitting round the table: Fiona at one end, Bill at the other; Sammy Love to Bill’s right hand and Willie to his left; next to Willie was Roland Featherstone, and opposite him Katie; Bert’s seat was next to Katie, and opposite him was Nell; next to Nell sat Mark, and opposite Mark, to Fiona’s left, was Mamie.
The children had got through sandwiches, sausages on sticks, a variety of small cakes, ice cream and jelly. Now they were waiting for the cake to come; and when Fiona paused in the doorway holding her son’s birthday cake topped with nine fluttering candles, there was a concerted cheer from those at the table. And when she placed it on the table before Willie, he looked up at her and said, ‘Oh, Mam; it’s a big one. Where’ve you kept it?’
‘Never you mind. Aren’t you going to blow the candles out?’
His face glowing, Willie puffed twice and the candles were snuffed out; and Katie’s calling across to him, ‘Look what it says; it’s got writing on all sides,’ caused a stretching towards the cake and pointing now as different ones read out the words: ‘Happy Birthday’; and then again ‘To Dear Willie’ which was written on the top.
‘Well, go on and cut it, man,’ said Bill; ‘We’re all waiting just to see if your mother’s a better hand at making a cake than she is at brewing coffee.’ And he now nodded towards Roland, saying, ‘She burns the water when she makes coffee, she does.’
‘She doesn’t, Dad! It’s you, you want it so thick,’ countered Mark.
‘You would take her part, wouldn’t you?’ Bill was nodding down the table at Mark when Fiona, looking at Willie, said, ‘Give your dad a piece of cake, will you, Willie, to keep him quiet.’
As Willie placed a piece of cake on Bill’s plate he said, ‘It’ll take more than that, Dad, won’t it, to keep you quiet?’
‘Never a truer word spoken, laddie.’
His eyes still on Bill, Willie asked, ‘What’s it taste like, Dad?’
Bill chewed on the cake for a moment, then nodded, first at Willie then down the table at Fiona. ‘Lovely!’ he said. ‘The best she’s ever made.’
Fiona smiled back at the man sitting at the head of the table. She knew that her husband had no sweet tooth and that one thing he disliked was fruit cake; but there he was, munching away and grinning widely.
Everyone had been served, and Willie, looking across at his friend, said, ‘You like it, Sammy?’
‘Aye.’ Sammy nodded. ‘It’s good; not scrimped on the fruit,’ which brought a laugh from the company.
The ceremony of the cake over, Fiona now pointed to the two pyramids of crackers in the centre of the table. They were the leftovers from Christmas and she said so, then told Willie to pass them round.
With each motto being read out there was the accompanying laughter. First, Nell. When she hesitated to read hers, Mark said, ‘Well, go on,’ and Bill added, ‘What’s keeping you?’ And Nell, pink in the face, looked at Bert and read, ‘You will shortly meet and marry a handsome man and live happy ever after.’
‘And that’s true. That’s true, Nell.’
‘Aw! Bill, man.’ Bert’s head was wagging.
But when Mark read his: ‘I’m a little fairy flown from the wood, may I join your party if I promise to be good?’ and added in baby talk: ‘Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder where you are? Up above the earth so high like a diamond in the sky,’ Willie and Katie fell about.
Then one and another cried at Bill, ‘Read yours! What’s the matter? Read yours!’ But he pulled a face, saying, ‘They’re daft things,’ and crumpling the tiny piece of paper, he thrust it into his pocket, which for a moment caused a silence to fall on the table until Bill said to Sammy, ‘What’s yours say, Sammy?’
‘It’s daft an’ all.’
‘I know. They’re all daft, but what does it say?’
‘Look.’ He handed it to Bill, who read out, ‘You’re a man after my own heart; don’t break it.’
This brought the laughter back again, and when Willie read, ‘You will soon be offered a high post, jump at it,’ Katie put in, ‘You could never jump a flagstone, Willie.’ And he, flapping his hands towards her, replied, ‘Oh you! Just you wait.’
There followed a desultory flatness that had to be lifted, so Willie, looking across at Sammy, said, ‘You tell them the Pat and Mick story.’
‘Aw! I couldn’t’
‘Well, you told it to me.’
‘Aye; that’s different.’
‘What’s this Pat and Mick story?’ Bill was nodding down to Willie now, and Willie said, ‘Well, Pat brought his mother over from Ireland and she was very tired; and he was a big fella, so he carried her through the town. And she said, “Why don’t you go into one of them places, Pat?” And he said, “How can I, Mother? They all say rest…yer…aunt, but there’s no place says rest…yer…mother.”’
The laughter was forced but it was loud. Then Roland’s cultured tones brought all attention on him when he said, ‘I have an uncle, in Scotland. He’s a minister in the Church of Scotland and he tells the funniest jokes. He has the congregation rolling in the aisles, so to speak, when he’s in the pulpit.’
‘You’re kiddin’?’ Bert looked across at Roland. ‘The Church of Scotland minister telling jokes from the pulpit?’
‘Yes, it is perfectly true, Mr Ormesby. People have to go very early to get a seat. His church is always full.’
‘I must go and hear him one day.’ Bert smiled across at Roland.
‘Oh, you wouldn’t need to go to church to hear him, you could hear him at a wedding or a little party. The only thing he draws a line at are funerals. But for weddings and christenings, people always invite him. He told a very funny one at my cousin’s wedding a short while ago.’
‘Well, let’s have it.’ Bill was nodding at him.
‘Oh, well, it was very funny, but it takes him to tell the jokes. Like the comedian, it’s how he tells them.’
‘Don’t be so bashful; and you’re not bashful, so don’t tell me you can’t tell a joke. Go on, let’s have that joke.’
Roland looked round the table; then his eyes rested on Fiona and she too said, ‘Go on, Roland.’
‘It’s…it’s a very odd joke.’
‘We like odd jokes.’
‘Well, you see, my cousin was being married and you know the husband always has to stand up and reply. Well, the weddings I’ve been to, the new husbands always seem very bashful and the best men who speak for the bridesmaids they’re always very dull, I mean, in their replies. And it should happen that this day the groom was very nervous and the best man, to my mind at least, pretty boring because he was reminiscing about his sporting childhood with the groom. Anyway, my uncle stood up and everyone became quiet because, you see, a lot of people there were strangers to him. He had come from far away in Scotland and this was London and moreover he had a dog collar on. Well he began by congratulating the bride and groom in a very funny way that made people titter. Then he got onto his jokes and—’ Roland bit on his lower lip and said, ‘Well, this is the one I like but it’s…well, it’s—’ He turned now and looked at Bill and said, ‘It’s not really naughty.’
‘Oh, that’s a pity,’ said Bill; and having glanced at Fiona, he went on, ‘Well, we’re nearly all grown up here, except one.’ And he nodded towards Mamie who was still munching at her second piece of birthday cake. Then he said, ‘Go on, lad. Go on.’
So Roland got on with it: ‘Well, I’ll use the Pat and Mick names,’ he said; ‘they’re easier than the Scottish ones. Well, there were these two Irish farmworkers. They were on a half-day holiday and they had to take a message for the farmer to the village a mile or two away. It was very hot and they had got halfway along the road when Pat said to Mick, “Aw, I’m not going no further, Mick.”’ Roland had dropped his southern accent and was into broad Irish. ‘“You go on,” said Pat, “and I’ll have a kip here until you come back.” “I’ll do that,” said Mick; “I don’t mind walkin’. You have your kip.” And so off went Mick to the village, and Pat lay dozing in the ditch by the roadside. Well, it was just half an hour later when he was brought with a start from the ditch because there was Mick, sitting in, of all things, a great big Volvo car. So he rushes up to him and says, “Mick, where on earth did you get that? You haven’t nicked it?” “No, no,” said Mick. “You see, it was like this. I was on me way back from the village and this young woman stopped and asked if I would like a lift, and I said, ‘Thank you very much, ma’am. I’ll be very obliged for it’s hot it is.’ So into the car I got. But she didn’t keep to the road, she turned off into a thicket and out she got and, Pat, believe me, before God, she stripped off to her bare pelt, took every stitch off her, she did, and there she was, naked as the day she was born. And she comes up to the car and she says, ‘Irish farm boy I’ll give you anything you want …’ And so…well, I took the car.”’
There was a great splutter, a clatter in Bill bringing his hand quickly to his mouth to help soften the explosion, and in doing so he upset his cup which was half full; and this seemed to accentuate the laughter. Nell was choking. Bert had his hand tight across his brow shading his eyes. Mark and Katie were both doubled up; Willie and even Mamie were smiling. Of course, they were just following the pattern. The only one who hadn’t a smile on his face was Sammy. But Roland was waving his hands, flapping them and saying between gusts of laughter, ‘It…it isn’t finished, it isn’t finished.’
‘Oh, my lord!’ said Nell; ‘there can’t be any more after that, boy.’
‘Yes, there is. There is. Listen. Listen.’ Roland was choking with laughter himself and as soon as there was comparative quiet he said, ‘When Mick said, “Well, I took the car,” Pat said to him, “You did right there, boy, you did right, ’cos her clothes wouldn’t have been any use to you.”’
Both Nell and Fiona rose from the table, but as Nell did so she brought Roland a clip across the head with her hand, gasping as she said, ‘You’ll go far, but where to I don’t know.’
‘I must get something to wipe up that mess.’ Fiona said as she passed down the side of the table.
Bill had a hand across his forehead, his elbow resting on the arm of the chair. His body was shaking, and it sounded as if he was in pain.
‘Move your carcass out of that.’ Fiona had returned and was sopping up the tea from the tablecloth. And as she did so she looked at Roland, saying, ‘You know I don’t believe a word of that parson-uncle of yours.’
‘Oh’—the boy’s face was serious now—‘it’s true, Mrs Bailey. Oh yes. If I may I’ll bring him to see you the next time he comes down.’
‘Well, I’ll believe it when I see him.’
‘And you’ll believe it when you hear him too.’
A few minutes later, seated at the table again, Bill said to Sammy, ‘I noticed you didn’t laugh at that joke, Sammy. Mamie didn’t know what it was all about but she laughed.’
‘I knew what it was all about; it was about a whore.’
The whole table s
eemed to freeze. Every eye was on him. Bill had no immediate answer, and the boy went on, ‘Women who take all their clothes off are whores. Me da says they’re bad women, and me da says a wife can be a whore, but not a mother.’
Even the gulp Bill made in his throat was audible; then he nodded at Sammy and said, ‘Yes, yes, your dad’s right in a way: mothers are precious things; wives can make mistakes but never mothers, at least from the man’s point of view. Yes, I understand your father.’
While he was speaking one part of his face seemed to be sending signals up the table to Fiona who had half risen from her seat, and also to Mark. He now glanced at Willie. Willie’s face looked blank; he knew that Sammy had blotted his copybook again. He wasn’t quite sure whether it was a four-letter word or not, but it was one that hadn’t to be used. Then all eyes, as if in relief, were turned on Bert, for he was saying, ‘I know this game; the lads in the club love it. You can all sit where you are, but we’ll have to be divided into two teams. Mrs Bailey will take that side of the table and Mr Bailey will take this side of the table that includes Sammy, Katie, and Mamie and myself. It’s to do with words. Now you have three choices, you lot over there.’ He was pointing to them. ‘You can either choose actors and actresses, or towns, or countries. The words start with A. Say you pick actors and actresses, well you must name as many surnames of actors starting with A during the time we at this side count twenty seconds. And we do it loudly. You know how to count a second: one-and, two-and, three-and…like that. We’ll get a pencil and we’ll put down how many you get. You start first, Willie, with A. And then Roland will have to take B. And Nell will have to take C and Mark D.’
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