Sisters Three

by Jessica Stirling

  ‘Who is that woman anyway?’ Babs heard herself say.

  ‘My sister.’

  ‘An’ who are you?’

  ‘My name’s MacGregor, ma’am. I’m a policeman. I’ve come to serve warrant on your husband, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh,’ Babs said just as Jackie, whistling unconcernedly, appeared from behind the petrol pumps, holding young Angus by the hand.

  * * *

  It was dark now and the street lamps had come alight, shop fronts blazed and even the dingy pubs looked warm and inviting in the chill wintry haze. Football supporters spilled from side streets jeering and rough-housing or trudged in the direction of tram stops or waded through the traffic heading for the Clutha or the Bon Accord or some other favourite pub. They jostled the women shoppers on the pavements and crabby old widows, flighty young girls and wives burdened by poverty and child-rearing had sense enough to clear out of their way for on Saturday afternoon their men folk were numbed by football and a thirst for hard liquor and cared nothing for common courtesy.

  Polly had been raised in streets like these but had remained oblivious to the scars that gender and class can leave on ordinary people. It was only after she’d moved out to Manor Park Avenue that she’d come to realise how much difference money could make and had begun to resent the heartless industrial machine that ground men down until there was nothing left but a few rare sparks of courage and endurance. Her mother had endured, of course: her mother had struggled bravely against the odds all her born days until, thank heaven, she’d shaken off the chains of poverty by marrying Bernard Peabody.

  Tony had taken the main road into Ibrox via the proud old weaving town of Paisley which had staunchly preserved its independence through every phase of boom and slump. Heading east now, he turned off into the parkway and the harsh street lights were abruptly screened by trees and the sedate Presbyterian mansions of Belville Road.

  Tony hadn’t said a word since he’d steered out of the field behind the racecourse. Polly occupied the rear seat as a rule but tonight she sat up front. The family Alfa had been traded in when the first anti-fascist riots had broken out and a few hotheads and Clydeside Bolsheviks had stoned Italians in the streets and smashed up their cafés and fish restaurants. Jackie had found them a nice Triumph Dolomite to replace the Alfa and Tony said he preferred it. Polly didn’t care one way or the other for neither she nor her sister Babs had ever learned to drive.

  She watched the trees loom behind the pleasing curve of high iron railings. In the park in the half dark she saw a man with a dog, two small boys playing with a rubber football, a couple kissing behind a chestnut tree, and the town was replaced by an air of rustic seclusion. She caught the thumb and forefinger of her glove between her small sharp teeth and tugged off the glove. She dropped it into her lap and let it lie there. She put out her hand and spread her fingers on the leather seat. The car was moving slowly, ornate street lamps and the lamps in the porticoes of the mansions marking Tony’s face with light and shadow in a queer, lazy, dreamlike rhythm.

  He took a hand from the steering wheel and covered her hand with his.

  ‘Will you come in with me tonight, please?’ Polly said.

  And Tony, loyal Tony, answered, ‘Sure.’

  * * *

  Jackie Hallop had hardly changed since Babs had first clapped eyes on him nine years ago. He had been leaning from a ground-floor window when the Conways had arrived in Lavender Court packed into the back of a Sanitation Department van along with their few sticks of furniture. He had been wearing nothing but an undervest that had shown off his pale, undernourished body to worst advantage and had given Babs – ‘Blondie’ he’d called her – a real good eyeful of all he’d had to offer which then as now hadn’t been much.

  Anything less like husband material would have been hard to imagine even for someone as young and impressionable as Babs had been in those days. During the erratic course of their courtship, however, Jackie had proved to have plenty of steam in his boilers and his willingness to spend money and enjoy a good time had eventually lured Babs into sacrificing a girl’s most precious possession. Then, like many a girl before her, she had wound up pregnant and married to a guy she hardly knew, a guy who made his living renovating stolen motorbikes in a junk yard off the Calcutta Road.

  Dominic had done all right by Jackie, however, and Jackie had done all right by Dominic. Regular exchanges of money between them kept the relationship cordial. However good Jackie and his brothers were at managing the salon, at home her husband could be a sore trial at times.

  According to Rosie, Babs’s deaf but outspoken little sister, Jackie fancied himself as Peter Pan, just a boy who refused to grow up. But Peter Pan had never got up to half the things that Jackie got up to, especially in the bedroom where Babs and he joined in raptures so careless that both May and April had been conceived without forethought and if nature had been able to keep up with the hectic pace there would have been three or four more babies to add to the heap.

  Though he spent more on clothes in a month than the average man earned in a year, Jackie still retained such a boyish appearance that unwary folk assumed he was either innocent or daft and even his daughters had already begun to suspect that there was something odd about Daddy. And they had their names to prove it.

  ‘April, May and June!’ Rosie declared in her clicky, deaf person’s voice. ‘Dear God, Babs, it is as well for Angus that he was not born in August or September or you would have been saddled with an Auguste or a Septimus. Have you stopped now, by the way? Have you put a sock on it yet?’

  Fortunately Rosie didn’t know the half of it. It wasn’t Jackie’s organ of generation that needed muzzling so much as his mouth for when he became excited or upset he would prattle on and on in a quasi-American drawl that made him sound vaguely like the film star James Cagney.

  On that particular Saturday Jackie arrived home at a quarter past seven. The crunch of the Ford’s tyres on the gravel and her husband’s voice seemed to merge even before the car braked to a halt. Ranting, he entered the kitchen by the back door, paused long enough to lift the lid on the pan that Babs had left simmering on the gas stove, then came on through the hall, ranting again. He fired several remarks in the direction of his son who, fed, watered and wrapped in a blue woollen dressing-gown, was lying tummy-down on the rug in the lounge looking at the pictures in Motorcycle Weekly. Then, without waiting for Angus to respond, he danced through the hall into the bathroom where, in the absence of a nursemaid, Babs was bathing the baby while May and June, dressed in pink dressing-gowns and floral slippers, observed.

  The baby was having a high old time of it playing with a big yellow sponge while Babs, kneeling, supported her and tried to direct suds to unreachable parts of the plump little body.

  Red-cheeked, straggle-haired, Babs was smouldering with resentment at having been summarily dismissed as soon as the copper flashed his ID, not politely requested to make herself scarce, mark you, but hastily escorted off the premises by Dennis as if she were an accomplice instead of the innocent wife of an innocent man.

  ‘… and told that bugger where to get off. He wouldn’t have been throwin’ his weight around if Dominic had been there, I can tell ya. Dominic would’ve told him to stuff his so-called warrant up his…’

  ‘Jackie!’ Babs rolled her eyes in the direction of the girls.

  ‘Well, yeah, point taken.’ Jackie touched each of his daughters on the crown of the head as if conferring a blessing. ‘But I mean t’ say, it’s the truth, Babs, ain’t it? Got no respect for an enterprisin’ businessman, these guys. Jeez-zus…’

  ‘Jackie!’

  ‘Well, they ain’t. It’s bloody Percy Sillitoe an’ his new broom sweepin’ clean at police headquarters. Coppers runnin’ scared if they don’t make enough arrests old Perce’ll have them back directin’ traffic at Tolcross. Sure, our new Chief Constable might’ve put the fear o’ God into the Irish and the Bolshies and got rid o’ half the wild men o
ut o’ the gangs but Jee – I mean, cripes – we’re not that breed o’ person, not me an’ not Dominic, so why are we bein’ persecuted?’

  ‘Are we being persecuted?’ Babs said.

  ‘We’re honest citizens. We pay our taxes an’…’

  ‘What did he want with us?’

  Jackie fell silent for several seconds then said, ‘Nothin’.’

  ‘I thought he was wavin’ a warrant for your arrest.’

  Jackie laughed. ‘My arrest? What the heck would they be arrestin’ me for?’ He looked down at June. ‘Why would they be takin’ your Daddy in, honey?’

  June shook her head and May, not to be left out, shook hers too.

  Angus and the girls had known no life but that of the bungalow. They had never suffered hunger or cold or bullying, had never lived in fear of anyone or anything, which was all well and good when things were running smoothly but what would she tell her children, Babs wondered, if Daddy was snapped up by the jaws of the legal system? How secure and self-assured would her children be if they had to trail up to Barlinnie prison on visiting day to peer at Daddy through the bars?

  ‘A search warrant, was it?’ said Babs.

  ‘Naw, it wasn’t even a search warrant,’ Jackie said. ‘Even if it had been a search warrant the bastard wouldn’t found anythin’ incriminatin’ at the salon. Is she ready for dryin’ yet? Take her out an’ I’ll powder her while you serve my dinner.’ He waited while Babs fished for baby April, then he went on. ‘I think they’re closin’ in on Dominic. The woman wasn’t a copper. She was only the copper’s sister. He brought his sister along to scare me! Take more than one Highland nance and his sister to drag me into the dock, I can tell ya.’

  ‘Jackie,’ Babs said. ‘Stop it.’

  ‘Stop what?’

  ‘You’re frightenin’ the girls.’

  ‘They don’t look frightened to me. You’re not frightened, are you, sweetheart?’ May shook her head. June followed suit. ‘Here, gimme the baby an’ the big towel an’ I’ll get her into her gown. By the way, if you think I got the wind up today, think again. They’ve nothin’ on me. Let the buggers lean on Dominic if they like.’ He reached past Babs, plucked the baby from the bathwater, lifted her, dripping, into his arms and hugged her to his chest. ‘They’ve leaned on Dom before, remember. If things get too hot Dominic’ll fix them. He knows how to handle coppers. Why should I worry?’

  ‘Yeah, why indeed!’ said Babs.

  He glided away, the baby, towel-wrapped, in his arms.

  May and June trailed their father into the nursery, their feet pattering on the parquet. Babs heard the baby’s whimper then a petulant wail as her father laid her on the changing table in front of the gas fire.

  She leaned on the rim of the bath and listened to her daughters giggle at Daddy’s efforts to talcum April. Jackie might be no prize as a husband but he was more willing than most men to take a hand in raising his children. Sighing, she hoisted herself to her feet and mopped at the puddles on the lino-tiled floor with a damp towel. Luisa, the day-maid, didn’t work on Sunday: Sunday was not a day of work but a day of worship, Luisa said. Babs had no alternative but to concede the point, particularly as she had no religious belief to fall back on.

  She knew that Jackie was rattled. He couldn’t disguise it. Some time next week she would have to have a word with Dennis to find out if the tall, fair-haired policeman was chancing his arm or if the eagle eye of Chief Constable Percy Sillitoe had finally fallen on Dominic Manone and by association on the Hallops.

  ‘Jackie,’ she called out. ‘Why don’t you telephone Dominic?’

  Silence in the nursery.

  ‘Call Dominic, let him straighten it out before it gets any worse.’

  Jackie appeared in the bathroom doorway, jacket and waistcoat damp, hair ruffled. The baby rode high against his chest, one bare arm about his neck, a nappy pinned snugly about her.

  He frowned and said, very quietly, ‘Naw.’

  ‘Why not? Dominic will…’

  ‘Naw, Babs. No Dominic.’ He shook his head emphatically, making April rock in his arms. ‘Not a damned word to Dominic about what happened this afternoon, nor to your sister neither. You hear me, Babs?’

  ‘I hear you,’ Babs said meekly and drying her hands on the towel hurried through to the kitchen to serve her husband his meal.

  * * *

  The cook was Irish, the day-maid Jewish. Patricia, the little red-haired nanny, was a shy young thing from the Isle of Arran who had taken a course in Domestic and Resident Child Care and thought herself no end of a swell to be working for a well-to-do family like the Manones. There were no Italians on the staff and the bills-of-fare that Mrs O’Shea put up for Polly’s approval every Monday contained few traditional dishes though, when the Manones entertained, Mrs O’Shea could produce a magnificent tagliatelle or a cannelloni the very smell of which would make your mouth water.

  Most Saturdays the Irish woman and the girl from Arran were given the evening off. They would stroll out arm-in-arm for a fish tea at the Embassy Café before heading off to the pictures. Polly and Dominic would eat supper at the deal table in the kitchen and enjoy having the place to themselves.

  If Dominic had been looking forward to a quiet supper alone with his wife when he returned from the racetrack, however, he was doomed to disappointment. Tony was already seated at the kitchen table, making inroads into a fish pie that Cook had left in the oven.

  Saying nothing, Dominic slipped off his jacket and loosened his necktie. He pulled out a chair, seated himself, reached for the grappa bottle, poured a shot into a whisky glass and knocked it back.

  ‘Are the children in bed?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Polly answered.

  ‘I’ll go up to kiss them goodnight.’

  ‘No need,’ Polly said. ‘They’re asleep.’

  ‘Did you remember to collect your winnings?’

  ‘Of course.’

  She watched him pour a second shot. She was supposed to be the drinker in the family and it was unusual for Dominic to take anything before dinner. She wondered what had shaken him, if the long-legged blonde had anything to do with it, but she had more sense than to question him in front of Tony, for she was not without secrets of her own.

  She laid down her fork and knife and took the pie dish to the oven and put it inside to warm. Tony had taken off his jacket and loosened his neck-tie too. It pleased her to have both her men in the basement kitchen at the same time. Unlike the dining-room the kitchen was an intimate place. A solitary barred window looked out into a garden set higher than the basement and all you could see was a wall, an apron of grass and now and then a cat slinking by.

  She waited by the oven while the temperature gauge crept up and observed her husband and his counsellor from the corner of her eye; like brothers, yet not like brothers. She had never met Dominic’s brother, or his mother or his father; the American Manones were mere shadows as far as she was concerned. She watched Tony cut through the pie crust with the edge of his fork. He used his knife hardly at all and ate without the finicky mannerisms that Dominic had acquired.

  At length she removed the pie dish from the oven and served a helping on to a warm plate. The plates were oval and decorated with vine leaves, the cutlery silver. A fat bottle of frascati and a slender bottle of grappa stood in the centre of the table. Everything in the kitchen was the best that money could buy. Even the fish under the pie-crust was plaice and sole not the scrapings from the bottom of a fishmonger’s barrel. The potatoes had been rolled into little crusty balls, spiced with herbs, the salad bowl trimmed with thinly sliced avocado, a vegetable that her mother had probably never heard of let alone tasted.

  Polly sipped wine, ate a mouthful of fish.

  ‘How did you get back from the Park then?’ Tony asked.

  ‘Flint’s boy gave me a ride,’ Dominic answered.

  ‘Flint’s boy? Which boy would that be?’ Polly heard herself say.

  Tony looked up
at her out of the tops of his eyes but Dominic, working the pepper-mill over his plate, did not seem to notice.

  ‘Skanks, I think his name is,’ Dominic said. ‘A youngster.’

  ‘Arthur Skanks’ boy?’ Tony said. ‘He’s not so young as all that. He has a kid of his own, a girl name of Kate.’

  ‘Really!’ Dominic said. ‘I don’t know how you find out these things.’

  ‘My business to find out these things,’ said Tony, not seriously.

  ‘How old is Kate?’ said Polly.

  ‘Thirteen, fourteen,’ Tony said.

  ‘A little too young even for you,’ Polly said. ‘Is she pretty?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Tony, still not seriously. ‘Very pretty.’

  ‘She isn’t Italian, by any chance?’ Polly said.

  ‘Nope.’ Tony loaded his fork again. ‘Unfortunately she isn’t Italian.’

  Dominic gave a little huh of amusement and said, ‘It seems my wife is determined to marry you off.’

  ‘No I’m not,’ said Polly.

  She knew that he was trying to draw the conversation away from the events of the afternoon and wondered what soft, waxy secrets he might share with Tony.

  ‘All you wives are the same,’ Dominic went on. ‘You think that marriage is the answer to all your problems and you believe therefore that it should be the answer to all our problems too.’

  ‘I didn’t know you had any problems,’ Tony said.

  ‘Not me,’ said Dominic. ‘You.’

  ‘I got all the trouble I can handle without looking for a wife. What is this? Some feudal rite from the old country, you’ve got to find me a wife.’ He wiped the corners of his lips with his knuckle. Stubble showed dark on his chin, rough to the touch, Polly knew, like a cat’s tongue. ‘You don’t have to get me hitched. I don’t need hitched. I don’t even want to be hitched.’

  Polly laughed. ‘If we make another killing like we did today, we can club together and buy poor Tony a wife.’