Charlie

by Lesley Pearse

  ‘Did you –?’ Charlie stopped short, she couldn’t bring herself to ask if that meant prostitution.

  Rita half smiled. ‘No, I didn’t sell myself, if that’s what you’re thinking. Though there were several sugar daddies. The clubs I worked in were the very smartest places in London, you’d have soon lost your job if anyone found out that’s what you were doing. I moved on from cigarette girl to waitress and then to hostess. I learned how to get big tips, and worked myself up to the smartest club of all, the Astor.’

  ‘Did you make lots of money?’ Charlie asked.

  Rita nodded. ‘All at once I had it nearly all. I was earning enough to send money home, I got this flat and furnished it, and I bought myself lovely clothes. I called myself Suzie, had dozens of admirers, and life was one long party. The only thing which was missing was my parents’ approval.’

  ‘They didn’t like you working in a club?’

  Rita grimaced. ‘I didn’t dare tell them that. They thought night-clubs were Sodom and Gomorrah! I made out I was a receptionist in a fashion house. But that made no difference to their attitude to me, they took the money I sent, but they still wouldn’t forgive me.’

  Charlie sighed. She knew only too well what it was like to want approval and affection. She could identify entirely with Rita.

  ‘I suppose that was the real reason I became determined to find a rich husband,’ Rita said sadly. ‘I thought that would bring them round and make them proud of me.’

  She went on to speak about the parties at country houses to which she and the other girls from the club were invited to make them swing. It made Charlie smile, as it was all very reminiscent of films she’d seen during the Sixties, pretty girls with bouffant hair-styles, false eyelashes and sparkly dresses, dancing on tables and around fabulous swimming pools.

  ‘I met Ralph at one of these parties,’ Rita said. ‘He might have been sixty, but he was gorgeous, charming, rich and a widower. I made up my mind to have him, without even finding out a little more about him, or the woman he was with.’

  Charlie’s eyes opened wider as her friend went on to describe a weekend in Paris with Ralph, the first time she’d ever been abroad. Then the subsequent nights away in country hotels, the dinners, flowers and presents he lavished on her.

  ‘He said he loved me, but looking back I suppose I ought to have had more sense than to think a man like him would want to marry a club girl less than half his age,’ she chuckled. ‘It’s amazing how deaf and blind girls can be when a wealthy, attractive man showers them with affection. I didn’t even care that he was still seeing that other woman. I thought it was only a matter of time before I knocked her out of the running.’

  ‘Was he engaged to her?’ Charlie asked.

  ‘Not as far as I knew. But even if he had been, I was so determined I wouldn’t have let that deter me. Several girls in the club warned me about her, they said she was a dangerous woman to cross, but I just laughed it off.

  ‘Then one night in January of 1965, she came into the Astor Club and ordered me out into the powder room. She told me in no uncertain terms that I was to drop Ralph, or I’d be very sorry. Like a chump I slapped her round the face and told her Ralph had said she was like a sack of shit in bed. He didn’t, of course, he was far too gentlemanly to speak of intimate things to another woman. She left without another word, so I believed I’d won.

  ‘Around a fortnight later when I’d almost forgotten about that incident, I came out of the club late one night and a black Bentley was waiting outside. The driver got out and said Ralph wanted to see me urgently, and he had been sent to take me to his country house. I never smelled a rat. In fact I was convinced Ralph intended to propose to me, and spent the whole journey wishing I was wearing something more glamorous than my black dress and that I’d had my hair and nails done that morning.’

  She paused for a moment. ‘It must have been about half past two when we drove up to the house,’ she said in little more than a whisper. ‘I was surprised it looked a bit dilapidated, not the grand place I’d expected.’

  Charlie noticed then that Rita was getting agitated, she was picking at the bedclothes, and her eyes didn’t seem to be focusing on her any more. She wanted to hear the rest but she was afraid Rita was getting too upset.

  ‘Don’t go on if it hurts,’ she said. But Rita continued anyway, unaware now that she was still speaking. She’d slipped back in time, reliving every moment of that terrible night, just as it happened.

  She saw the rusting iron gates in the beam of the headlights as the car turned into the drive. They looked as if they were almost propped against the posts rather than still being used. Huge trees hung over the drive, and branches swished over the car as they passed.

  Rita leaned forward in her seat. ‘It looks as if this place needs a few gardeners,’ she said through the glass screen to the driver. ‘It’s a bit overgrown, isn’t it?’

  ‘Mr Peterson spends more time in London than he does down ’ere,’ the driver said in a cockney accent, without moving his head to look back at her as they drew up to the house.

  Aside from a light in one downstairs window, and another in the large stone porch, it was in darkness. There wasn’t enough light to see anything clearly, all Rita got was a vague impression of a rather Gothic style; she thought it was red brick, with a great deal of creeper growing up it.

  The driver got out and opened the passenger door. As she got out he held her elbow, and he continued to hold on to it as they went up the few stone steps to the front door. It opened even before they reached it, and another man stood there. He was astoundingly like the driver, burly, with very short dark hair, wearing a similar dark suit.

  ‘Are you two related?’ she said, suddenly nervous. She knew they were in Kent from landmarks she’d noted, but she didn’t know where.

  ‘Brothers,’ the driver said curtly, and all at once the gentle hand on her elbow tightened and he was pushing her through the door.

  ‘Steady on,’ Rita said. But the moment the door slammed behind them, she realized to her dismay that this was some kind of set-up. The hall was gloomy, lit by only one wall light, there was no furniture, not so much as a hall table or carpets, and it smelled musty, as if it had been unused for years. Before she could even gather herself to protest, the sound of feet made her head jerk round to her left. Coming down the uncarpeted staircase at the side of the hall was Daphne Dexter. She wore cream jodhpurs, riding boots and a red sweater, her dark hair fixed up in a bun.

  ‘Let me out of here!’ Rita yelled in panic. ‘How dare you con me into coming here?’

  The two men each got hold of one of her arms and held her tightly.

  ‘Still the same stupid little loudmouth,’ Daphne said, and smiled sardonically. She walked right up to Rita, lifted her hand and slapped her hard across the face. ‘That’s repayment for the other night,’ she said. ‘You won’t have long to wait for the rest of your punishment.’

  Rita reeled back from the blow; if it hadn’t been for the men holding her she would have fallen. One look at the two men was enough to know they were in Daphne’s pay and likely to do anything she ordered them too. ‘Look, I’m sorry I went for you,’ she gabbled quickly. ‘You caught me on a bad night. If Ralph means that much to you, you can have him. Just let me go.’

  ‘I already have Ralph,’ Daphne said haughtily. ‘Do you really think you were anything more than a piece of fresh meat to him? Take her downstairs, boys.’

  Rita screamed and tried to fight the men off as they manhandled her towards a door further down the hall, stripping off her coat as they went. But they were too strong, and they ignored her screaming. They pushed open the door which led to some steep rough wooden stairs, one grabbed her arms, the other her legs, and they carried her down between them. Her shoes fell off and her dress rode up over her thighs, revealing her stocking tops.

  The room they hauled her down into was a cellar; like the hall it appeared to have been unused for years. One wall h
eld old empty wine racks covered with spider’s webs. The only other item was a central workbench with a large vice fixed on one side. The cellar was so damp and cold that Rita stopped screaming and began begging instead. ‘Please let me go. I’ll do anything you say. I’ll even leave London if that’s what you want. Please let me go.’

  They ignored her pleas, just hoisted her up on to the bench like a side of bacon, and while one man held her firmly down, the other tied her wrists to the bench legs with some rope.

  Daphne came down the stairs just as they were tying her ankles down too. She paused a few steps from the bottom and laughed. The laugh echoed round the empty room, adding further menace. ‘You’re quite used to that position as I understand it,’ she said. ‘So it shouldn’t bother you too much.’

  Rita lifted her head and stared in horrified fascination as Daphne produced a large pair of scissors from the waist of her jodhpurs. She advanced on Rita and starting at the hem of her black dress, began cutting it right up the front. She pushed the fabric aside disdainfully, then snipped off Rita’s suspenders, then through the band in the middle of her bra. She paused for a moment, sneering at Rita. The men both lunged forward and pulled the bra from Rita’s breasts.

  She was so scared now she could barely breathe. She’d had asthma as a child and she feared she would have an attack again. But as Daphne laid the cold steel of the scissors on her groin, she screwed up her eyes in terror. When no pain came she opened them again. Daphne was calmly cutting up through her knickers and suspender belt; when she’d finished, she flapped the fabric back leaving Rita stark naked.

  Rita assumed then that the men were going to rape her. That was bad, though not as bad as hurting her physically. But to her surprise they bent down beneath the bench and brought out white jackets, the kind chefs wore, handed one to Daphne and put the other two on themselves.

  Apart from the absolute terror of these people getting ready for something barbaric in absolute silence, Rita was freezing cold. She tried pleading with them again, but they studiously ignored her.

  ‘The gag now,’ Daphne said, and one of the men pulled a strip of thick linen from his pocket. Rita bucked and shook her head from side to side as he tried to put it round her, but he slapped her face, shoved something which felt like a soft duster into her mouth, then tied on the gag, pulling it so tight round her head that it cut into the corners of her mouth.

  She was completely helpless now, entirely at their mercy, and when Daphne bent down under the bench and came back with a long thin knife, the kind butchers used for boning meat, Rita wet herself with fright. Her urine was scalding hot on her thighs, steaming in the cold room, and it shamed her even more than her nakedness.

  ‘Good job we planned to do it down ’ere,’ one of the men said, and picking up a bucket of water, he sloshed it over her lower half. It was icy, but Rita hardly noticed it, all she could see was the knife in Daphne’s hand and her gloating, demonic expression.

  ‘I expect you’ll pass out while I’m cutting you,’ she said in a chillingly calm voice, bringing the knife close to Rita’s cheek. ‘So I’ll explain now what we intend to do. I’m going to score your entire body with this knife, something like the way we score the skin on a leg of pork to make crackling. I’m not going to touch the parts of you which show in everyday clothes. Just that body you love to flaunt, that you use to make a living. But I’m going to make certain you never forget what happens to people who get on the wrong side of me.’

  She put the knife first on Rita’s breast, digging the point in just enough to draw blood. ‘Before we start,’ she said, ‘when this is over, don’t even think of running to the police, or to Ralph for that matter. Not unless you want something equally unpleasant to happen to your son.’

  Rita bucked furiously against her restraints. No one knew she had a child, not even her closest friends. How could this woman have discovered that?

  Daphne slapped at her thigh with the side of the knife. ‘Keep still,’ she said, ‘or I might decide to rearrange your face too. Now, as I was saying, you don’t want something to happen to your son, do you? He’s such a happy, bright kid, he showed me his train set and his pet guinea-pig. Your parents are so very fond of him too. We wouldn’t want them upset, would we?’

  Rita tried to shout, but the only sound to come from her was in her own head. Daphne began cutting then, as coldly and calmly as if she was carving a Sunday joint. She started at Rita’s right shoulder, going diagonally across her breast, down her abdomen and finishing at her left hip. The knife was very sharp and the tip only went in a little way, and it didn’t hurt very much either, not at first, despite the beads of blood popping out along the knife’s path. But by the time Daphne had made three or four slashes across her, the first wounds began to sting and Rita was sobbing.

  The two men, whose names were never mentioned, just looked on; they had cold blue eyes and thin lips. They rarely spoke and smoked incessantly.

  On and on the torture went. When Daphne had finished the diagonal slashes from one shoulder, she moved to the other. There was no expression on her face, no glee, anger or distaste, she could have merely been doing some ironing. When she’d finished with Rita’s torso, she moved on to her thighs.

  Rita wished she could pass out, her entire body seemed to be on fire and each new cut added to it, but she remained stubbornly conscious. She could see Paul’s small face dancing before her eyes, and she knew without any doubt that this fiendish woman really had gone to Felstead, the Essex village where her parents lived, and met the whole family. The knowledge that Daphne had gone to such lengths proved she fully intended to carry out her threat if Rita did go to the police.

  She must have passed out finally when they turned her over to do her back. She remembered yelling with the pain, yet no real sound came out because of the gag. The next thing she knew was being drenched with icy water – they’d thrown a bucketful over her.

  ‘That’s it then,’ Daphne said, and beckoned for the two men to untie Rita. She reached under the workbench and pulled out a towelling dressing-gown. ‘Put this on. I don’t want blood all over the car.’

  The men hauled Rita to her feet and pushed her arms into the garment; it was yellow with age and stank of damp. She was too dizzy to feel the pain, but her legs sagged beneath her and the men had to grab her arms to support her.

  ‘Now, remember what I said!’ Daphne said, wiping blood from her hands on to her white jacket. ‘One word to anyone, and Paul gets it.’

  Rita was still gagged, she could only nod weakly in agreement. She glanced down at herself and saw her bloody stomach and thighs and she thought Daphne might just as well have killed her.

  ‘Rita, are you all right?’ Charlie’s voice seemed to come from a great distance. ‘Don’t tell me any more, it’s upsetting you too much. Let me make you some more tea.’

  Rita hauled herself mentally back to the present. She was relieved to find herself in her own bed, sun streaming in through the window. Charlie was holding both her hands, but her face was as white as a sheet, proving that she hadn’t been dreaming and that she had actually told the girl everything.

  ‘Looks like you need the tea,’ Rita said weakly. ‘Your eyes look like piss-holes in the snow.’

  Charlie moved closer then and hugged the older woman to her shoulder. She was so deeply shocked she couldn’t speak for a moment. ‘I don’t know how you survived,’ she whispered eventually. ‘Did they take you home afterwards?’

  Rita leaned against the girl. It was a long time since anyone had hugged her and it felt good to feel bodily contact. ‘They dumped me here on my doorstep just as it was getting light. My body felt it was on fire, I’ve never known such terrible pain.’

  Charlie went off then and hurriedly made some tea. She was afraid to leave Rita on her own; reliving that nightmare was enough to push anyone over the edge.

  ‘How did you manage afterwards?’ she asked a bit later. Rita’s normal colour had come back, she was even manag
ing a few of her jokes.

  ‘It healed remarkably quickly, considering,’ she said. ‘I used to take salt baths and a sleeping pill, then cover myself with towels and get into bed. It stopped hurting as the scabs came. I used to hope that they would fall off and leave no mark, but of course they didn’t.’

  ‘Weren’t you tempted to go to the police, despite what she said?’

  ‘No. That woman wasn’t human, Charlie, she wouldn’t have thought twice about carrying out her threat. I stayed in here, eked out the few savings I had, then went through my wardrobe getting rid of all the clothes which wouldn’t cover the scarred parts of me.’

  ‘Oh, Rita! I don’t know what to say,’ Charlie said, tears running down her cheeks. ‘It makes my troubles seem nothing.’

  ‘I brought it on myself,’ Rita said stoically. ‘I hate that woman still of course, because she ruined my life. I’ll never fall in love, marry or have another child. She robbed me of my youth. All through the later part of the Sixties I used to look at the dolly birds in their mini-dresses and cry. I couldn’t go out and have fun, I’d lost my confidence. The only consolation was that my parents became nicer to me.’

  ‘You told them then?’

  ‘Oh no.’ Rita made a whistling noise as she sucked in breath through her teeth. ‘I meant because of my change of image. I went home one day in the sort of clothes I wear now and it won their approval.’

  ‘But weren’t they suspicious?’

  ‘I told them I’d started going to church,’ Rita smirked. ‘Well, it was the truth at the time. If it hadn’t been for that I might have topped myself. Anyway, they let me see more of Paul after that, in fact he used to come for weekends sometimes. That’s why I decorated your bedroom like that.’

  Charlie nodded. She thought all her questions had been answered now. ‘Does he still come?’

  ‘No, he’s got too big to stay with his big sister, he prefers his schoolfriends’ company. He’s sixteen now, at grammar school, and smart as new paint.’