by Claire Peate
“You mean like producing stencils for graffiti artists to deface the neighbourhood?” Robert looked at me, eyebrows raised.
“Fine, OK, that was all my doing! Damnit will you stop pulling me up on everything.”
“I’m only saying … you should give yourself some credit for having a brain all of your very own. You came up with the skip idea. You made the final decision on me as a lodger and so Amanda and my dad ended up together. You improved on Da Notorious Baron’s graffiti and ended up permanently helping him out. Seriously, Edda, you should give yourself a break.”
“Fine. I’m a genius.” I said sarcastically. But, inwardly, I felt a little bit better about myself.
“So…” Robert ran a hand along the edge of the bench, “Eustace said something about your boyfriend Guy being upset?”
“He was never my boyfriend,” I said. “And yes, I finished with him. But as he wasn’t my boyfriend, that doesn’t mean much.”
“It just means you gave him the brush off and you don’t want to see him again,” Robert said.
“Something like that.”
For a moment we sat and looked straight ahead at the garden.
“So you finished with the poncy artist?”
“He wasn’t an artist,” I said. “That’s one of the things I was trying to tell you last night.”
“When you jumped me and started kissing me.”
I pursed my lips together. “When I sat on the edge of your bed and gave you a goodnight peck on the cheek.”
“Funny,” Robert was still absorbed in bench-examining, “I remember it quite differently.”
“You must have been dreaming.”
He looked up at me and he was smiling.
“Anyway,” I said, hideously embarrassed, “it doesn’t help us to work out what we should do.”
Robert shrugged. “Why should we do anything at all?”
“Oh. I just thought we should do something. We can’t not do anything can we?” The idea of uncovering what we had about Eustace’s Brockley empire and then just leaving it had never occurred to me. Why should it, the Famous Five never left the treasure on Kirrin Island just for jollies…
“What good would it do to act on what we know?” Robert said.
“Well, because if we do nothing then Reg is going to be thrown out of his launderette, because he thinks he’s in trouble with the Council, and because Eustace’s deal is going to look unavoidable. He’ll be pushed out of Brockley just like Dino has been from his kebab shop…”
“Maybe.”
“Yes, maybe. But also Brockley would be overrun with bay trees.”
“So?” Robert said.
“And unsuspecting residents would have their front gardens dramatically altered.”
“Again: so?”
“And Babs’ grandson would be forced through art college,” I said. “So many people are caught up in Eustace’s neighbourhood empire, including me. I’m forced to garden for him and I’ve been given a garden and paints as a sweetener. I can’t very easily duck out now that I have so much in terms of an obligation to him.”
“True enough.” Robert now agreed. “So what are you going to do about Eustace Fox?” He leant back on the bench and took a sip of coffee.
I stared at the desolate back garden for inspiration. “I don’t know. That’s why I need Beth. Can’t I wait for Beth to return my call and then she can tell me what I should do?”
“Edda, Beth is going to take about four-and-a-half hours just listening to all the messages you left her. If we wait for her we’ll be waiting forever.”
“Urgh. OK then, we could go to the police,” I said, throwing my hands in the air.
“And how do you know they would believe you?”
“We could tell them that we interviewed Reg from the launderette. And I could take along this Farrow and Ball colour chart to explain about all the shops being the same…”
“Edda you’d end up blabbing and you’d tell them about you being in the guerrilla gardening group wouldn’t you? And then they’d nick you.”
“No. Yes. Probably. Oh pants, I couldn’t go to the police could I? I’d probably tell them about the stencils and Da Notorious Baron. And then they’d throw away the key.”
We sat in more contemplative silence.
“What about,” Robert finally said, “what about we tell the police about Eustace Fox’s evil empire, but do so indirectly. So we grass him up, but we don’t get ourselves into trouble.”
“You mean we write the police an anonymous letter?”
“No. We tip the police off South London-style.” He said the words in a flourish of pride.
“We mug them?”
“Edda, you’re an idiot.”
“And you’re being obtuse!”
Robert stood up. “You don’t even know what obtuse means.”
I stood up. “Yes I do. It means ‘fat’.”
He tried to respond but he was laughing too much, so I just affected a superior look and besides, the conversation had to come to an end: Babs was hanging on the garden wall and watching us.
“All right there, me darlin’s?”
“Babs!” Robert wiped his eyes and pulled himself together. “Babs you are just the person I wanted to see right now! Can Edda and I come over to your place?”
The newly lit fag fell out of her open mouth: Babs’ Christmases had come all at once.
“’e’s on ’is way.” Babs came back into her kitchen and put the phone on the cradle. “’e’s bin working down Deptford way, so I’d give ’im ten minutes. Now then, darlin’s, tea is it or shall we go for somethin’ stronger? What time is it? Ah it’s nearly midday ain’t it? What about a gin?”
Babs’ kitchen looked like something frozen in time from the 1970s. Robert and I were seated on an orange plastic banquette surrounded by orange and brown wall tiles. The floor was beige, the melamine kitchen units were beige and the walls were beige. The only decoration was the enormous collection of wall-mounted plates commemorating the Royal Family. And, above a giant gold-edged plate of Charles and Diana was mounted the biggest and most frightening machine gun I had ever seen. It was attention-grabbingly huge: matt black with an ominously long silencer that stretched out towards a plate of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson.
“’s a Mac10. Got it from the Peckham Reds last year when we took ’em down.”
I whirled round to see who had just spoken. In my anxious state I hadn’t noticed the shaven-headed Tyrone at the kitchen door.
“’Roney! You’re back quick.” Babs flew across the room and planted a kiss on her grandson’s cheek.
“Jason nicked a BMW last night, we’ve bin ridin’ round in that.”
“Oh my boy!” She patted him on the chest, “An’ how’s little L’Oreal?”
“She’s doin’ fine, Nan. She ’ad her first chip last night.”
Babs clapped her hands together in delight. “You bring your little girl round ’ere this weekend. I’ll put on a nice roast. Get some more chips in for ’er if she likes ’em. Bless ’er!”
“’s’up wiv you?” Tyrone dragged an orange bench seat to join us in on the banquette, yanking his crotch pretty much in my face before he sat down, beneath a plate of Prince Philip looking confused.
“I’m fine, thanks. And we’re here because Robert has a proposition for you.” I said, coming over all Joanna Lumley.
“You what?”
“Custard cream, darlin’s?” Babs passed the biscuits round on an Eternal Beau plate.
Robert took a deep breath. “Well, Edda’s got herself into some trouble.”
“Who da fuck is hurtin’ you?” Tyrone instantly switched to ‘angry’ and bit savagely into his custard cream. “’Cause no one ain’t gonna hurt none of my friends.” He finished the biscuit and then got out an enormous flick-knife from the pocket of his baggy jeans and started to clean his nails with it.
A little part of me felt completely charmed by Tyrone’s sentiment and I had the
fight the urge to put a hand on his knee and say, “Awww, thanks.” But the fear of being stabbed managed to stop me.
“Well,” Robert had captured Babs’ and Tyrone’s attention – and mine too, he still hadn’t told me what his plan was – and he played it for all it was worth. Slowly he slid apart his biscuit and ate the cream filling. There was no option but to kick him under the table and mouth: bloody well hurry up.
“OK. It’s like this, Edda has fallen in – through no fault of her own – with Eustace Fox?”
“Edda!” Babs was horrified. “I thought you said you was no friend of that man.”
Robert held up a hand. “He approached her and she thought she was doing the right thing.”
“But I wasn’t,” I added helpfully. “I’ll tell you how I got into this mess with Eustace Fox, shall I? And then you can tell us all about your big plan that you still haven’t told me about,” I said, pointedly, and Robert nodded in agreement.
Babs shuffled onto the banquette with us. “Go on then, darlin’, knock us all out.”
“Fuck me!” Babs said when I told her about the chandelier-lit basement of the Working Men’s Club. “Bastard!” as I came to the part about the hoarding of police signs. “Arsehole,” she muttered, lighting another fag, as I came to the part about Eustace’s boyfriend being employed as the Head of Planning at Lewisham Council. And then, when Robert took over and revealed what we’d found out about the pushing out of Brockley businesses the expletives tumbled from her like water from a waterfall.
Even Tyrone had put down his knife.
“I knew it!” Babs spluttered. “I knew it was organised, all that closin’ of shops and businesses an’ the openin’ of them posh new places with them fancy dwarf trees out front and the same sort o’ feel about ’em! I knew it was linked! An’ it’s ’im: that Eustace Fox. So bleedin’ obvious now, ain’t it?”
Tryone went back to cleaning out his nails with the knife blade. “This bloke,” he said, after a moment’s silence, looking up straight at me, “What do you want to ’appen to ’im?”
“Pardon?” I looked at Robert who had the answer, apparently. But before Robert could answer Tyrone continued.
“I mean, like, you was talkin’ ’bout this man what puts acorns in the pockets of ’is enemies an’ maybe he oughta see what that’s like. To ’ave it done to ’im.”
“Erm...”
“But we ain’t got no acorns and I don’t know where we’re gonna get acorns from. They don’t ’ave no acorns down on no market that I ever saw. Do you ’ave acorns?”
“Erm. No. No I don’t have acorns. And I don’t really want acorns in his pockets. Although … I do have something.” I suddenly remembered something and fished in my pocket, leaning over to Tyrone. “You could put this in his pocket.”
“Edda that’s not part of my great and splendid plan…!” Robert interrupted.
“Who da fuck is Paul Amos?” Tyrone, very slowly, read the plaque. “‘In memory of Paul Amos?’ Did Eustace Fox ice this Paul Amos bloke?”
“No – not as such,” I said. “Well, he sort of did. In a way. He iced the memory of Paul Amos.”
“Fuck dat!” Tyrone nearly fell of his chair. “How’d he do that? Is he some kinda scientist bloke? Ain’t no one gonna ice my memory, no way man. No fuckin’ way right there.”
“OK.” I held my hand out and took back the plaque. “I think perhaps no icing of people…”
“I can get him. I can stab the bastard, I could?”
“No. Really. Thank you,” I said. “It’s really so nice that you’re offering to kill this man for me and I’m really touched that you’d do it, but I don’t think that’s the answer.”
“Fuckin’ right dat’s de answer! Da Fox guy needs fuckin’ icing! He needs a fuckin’ bullet in his fuckin’ head. Sorry, Nan.”
“Can I butt in?” Robert interrupted the circus. “I do have a plan.”
We fell silent.
“OK, well, I think we should basically out Eustace Fox. I think we should tell the police?”
“Fuck dat!”
“Ty-rone!”
“Indirectly – we should tell the police indirectly,” Robert soldiered on, “using the skills of the people around this table.” And then, seeing we were still non-plussed, “Using Da Notorious Baron and Da Notorious Sidekick, here.” He gestured to me.
“Go on then, darlin’.” Babs pushed the Eternal Beau his way. “Knock us all out. What’s yer big idea? What do you want us to do?”
Once Robert had told us exactly what his Big Plan entailed, and Babs, Tyrone and I had enthused about it, it took us all afternoon to bring it about. At five Babs put a dinner on for all three of us: egg an’ chips good for all a yer, darlin’s? While around the table Tyrone, Robert and I wordlessly set to work on the sheets of card. Da Notorious Baron had roughed out sketches based on ideas we’d discussed from Robert’s Big Plan and, using my craft knife and Tyrone’s flick-knife, Robert and I cut out, and improved, the stencils. When any of us spoke it was to work ideas, discuss the drawings and amendments to them. Robert and Tyrone side by side, me opposite and Babs flitting around: oh that’s good darlin’, I like ’er, that bloke’s just like real life, ain’t it clever what you do?
Every so often, to have a break from the fine knifework, I would look up at my colleagues, absorbed in the shared task. Tyrone with a roll-up, bent over the Formica table and lost to his drawings. And Robert, deep in concentration, flicking his brown hair from his eyes, cutting surprisingly good stencils, slowly and methodically, unlike me with my speedy slices. And the strangest thing, as the four of us passed the impromptu afternoon together, was that it didn’t matter that Tyrone was a teenage gangster and Robert and I were … not. Because we were all together in the cause. Tyrone deferred to me for advice, Robert and I discussed cutting techniques. Babs came up with ideas and ogled Robert. For one afternoon we were a team: brought together by criminal activities. Really it was quite beautiful.
“Who is dis geezer?” Tyrone took my t-shirt off the table from where I’d been tracing out around it for a stencil.
“It’s Che Guevara.” I said.
Tyrone contemplated the print. “He looks cool. What does he do?”
“He’s dead. But he was an Argentinian Marxist revolutionary who played a significant role in the Cuban Revolution,” I said. When Robert stopped cutting to stare at me I added, “And since his death, his heavily stylised image has become a symbol of anti-establishment and counter-culture.”
Now they were all looking at me: Robert paused in his cutting, Tyrone temporarily stopping his sketches and Babs holding the frying pan of eggs.
“And I thought he was a cloth-capped Jesus until someone told me who he was.” I added.
“Now I can believe that.” Robert went back to his cutting. “Edda thought that the Cavaliers won the Civil War.”
“Da fuck man?” Tyrone picked up his sheet of card again. “You guys is talkin’ fuckin’ crazy talk.”
“’Roney!”
“Sorry, Nan.”
“Where ish thish place?” Robert wheeled round and round and I made a grab for him so that he didn’t fall over. I missed him and toppled headfirst into a sharp and prickly shrub.
“Is it? Is it? Is it one of thosh little model villages?” Robert was saying as I picked myself up. “Look atta tiny tiny hedges. Look! Look at the tiny doll hedges! Where ish thish place? Issit a model village? Tiny hedges ahh.”
“Issh fron’ garden.” I staggered towards our front door. “Hhome!”
“Is it? Is it? Is it?” he careered round the knot garden in the dark. I stumbled over to him, managed to grab him by the hand – after a few attempts – and hauled him towards what I hoped was the direction of the front door, based on hazy memory.
“Whassa time?” he squinted at the clock in the super bright hallway.
I shielded my eyes and tried to read the Dali-like clock face where all the numbers were bouncing into each other. “Eight?
Eight? I think iss eight.” I leant against the wall. “Oh, God.”
“Gin!” Robert staggered up to me. “Gin! Babs Gin! Gin!”
It was a while after I woke up that I opened my eyes. There was something pressing down on my feet. I managed, squinting, to look down the end of the bed.
“Fin!” The cat was asleep on my legs. He hadn’t slept on my bed for months – he always spent the night with Robert.
Unaccountably delighted to have my old friend back on the bed with me I gently lowered my head onto the pillow and pulled my watch off the bedside table. It was ten in the morning.
“Stop moving,” Robert said from somewhere near my shoulder. He threw an arm around me.
Robert was in bed with me.
Oh.
I was in bed with Robert. This was Robert’s room. Finley was on the bed because this was Robert’s bed.
And … I gingerly lifted up the duvet. Ah. I didn’t have any clothes on.
I lay perfectly still for a few seconds. And then I lifted the duvet again.
Neither did Robert.
Golly.
I lifted it a bit higher.
Golly!
“Edda!” The hand moved from my waist and he pulled the duvet down again.
“Sorry.”
I stared up at the ceiling for a few more moments, then I turned towards Robert and snuggled up to him, naked body against naked body, and fell asleep again.
“Morning.”
“Hi.”
Blinking the sleep from my eyes, I looked across at the tousle haired lodger.
“What time is it?” he asked.
I checked my watch. “Midday.”
“Wow!” he said, impressed. “So…” He smiled from the pillow. “Gin then?”
I could feel myself blushing. “Yes. Gin. Can you remind me what happened? I can’t quite…”
“Well we spent the day cutting stencils.”
“I remember that.”
“And Babs made us dinner.”
“I mean what happened after all that.”
“Well Tyrone left us after dinner.”
“OK...”
“And Babs got the gin out.”