by Peter Cocks
My heart was in my mouth as we crunched up the drive. The only other car visible was a silver-blue vintage thing that looked like an old jet. “What sort’s that, Soph?” I asked, slightly embarrassed by my ignorance.
“It’s a Bristol,” she said. “He’s mad about them. They used to make planes in the war. Bombers. Fighters. You should ask him.”
“Nice one.”
We walked round to the back of the house, where a bigger lawn stretched down to a lake where swans were swimming. A couple of peacocks strutted across the grass, snaking their necks down and pulling up worms.
Sophie opened the back door and pinched my bum as I entered a cloakroom lined with green wellies and shooting jackets. A pair of lazy red hounds jumped off their bed when they heard us and showed their appreciation by licking Sophie’s hand, barking and jumping up at her.
“Hello, babies,” Sophie cooed. “Eddie, this is Starsky and Hutch.”
“Nice dogs,” I said. I didn’t know enough about dogs to say anything more about them. Actually, they scare me. “What breed are they then?”
I stroked the smooth coats without much enthusiasm.
“Hungarian vizslas,” Sophie said. “Mum breeds them.”
The dogs showed their appreciation by sniffing my nuts and returning to their beds as if they had decided I was no threat to them. They were right. My nuts had shrunk by three sizes and I had never felt less of a threat to anybody.
Sophie led me into the kitchen. It was vast, practically the size of our old flat, with flagstones on the floor and one of those cookers that looks like it should be in a restaurant. Something that was simmering on top smelt really good and my stomach rumbled.
“Hungry?” Sophie asked.
Before I could answer, a woman came into the room. I guessed she must have been around fifty, but her hair was straight and blonde, and made her look ten years younger. She was tanned and beautifully dressed in soft grey and black, which looked expensive. She wasn’t wearing anything revealing, but there was enough on show for me to see that she still had an impressive cleavage. She was definitely fanciable for an old girl.
Definitely.
She squealed and put an arm around Sophie.
“Mum,” Sophie announced, “this is Eddie.”
Sophie’s mum stood back and took me in. “Soph’s told me about you.” Her voice was warm and the accent South London. When she smiled, she looked a lot like Sophie. Good teeth.
I shook her hand. “Only good things, I hope. Pleased to meet you, Mrs Kelly.”
“Cheryl,” she said. “Of course they were all good. We wouldn’t want Sophie hanging around with bad lads, would we? Can I get you a drink, Eddie? Sophie, get him a drink.”
“Beer?” Sophie asked.
I nodded. Anything to calm the nerves. Sophie handed me a San Miguel from the big American fridge and I took a glug.
“Where you from, Eddie?” Cheryl asked.
“New Cross originally. I live in Greenwich now – well, Deptford, really.”
“Me and Tommy were in New Cross for a time when we were first married,” she said.
“Bit rough now,” I said, not knowing what else to say.
“Always was.” She smiled. “You living with Mum and Dad?”
“I’m afraid they’re both dead,” I told her. “I’ve got a flat.”
Cheryl Kelly’s face softened immediately. She stepped towards me. “Ah, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to put you on the spot, babe.” She hugged me, the wool of her dress warm and soft. “We’ll look after him, won’t we, Soph?”
Sophie looked at me over her mother’s shoulder and rolled her eyes, giving me the thumbs-up – like I’d given the old sob story and had got the right reaction. Sophie’s mum squeezed me again and kissed my cheek, and from that moment I knew I liked Cheryl Kelly almost as much as I fancied her daughter.
“Now, why don’t you go in and see your dad while I get dinner on the table?” said Cheryl. “He’s been dying to see you all morning, Sophie.”
The good feelings I had from meeting Cheryl evaporated on the spot.
TWENTY-SIX
The guv’nor wasn’t quite what I had expected either.
Sophie took my hand and led me out of the kitchen into a big entrance hall, which smelt of cigars and furniture polish. A girl was cleaning out the fireplace. She visibly brightened when Sophie walked in.
“Hey, Daska,” Sophie said.
“Hello, Sophie, how are you?” Daska grinned. Her accent was thick and sounded Polish or something.
“I’m good, thanks. This is my friend Eddie. Is Dad in there?” Sophie pointed to a door off the hall. Daska nodded and then smiled at me, like we were all part of some big, happy family.
The room that Sophie took me into was long, bright and airy, looking out across the garden. The floor was covered in what looked to me like antique rugs and there were paintings, mostly modern, on all the walls, like a gallery. There was a big, wooden desk stacked up with art books and cigar boxes, and beyond the desk, sitting on a black leather sofa, was Tommy Kelly.
He wasn’t nearly as tall as I’d imagined. In my mind, I’d built up an image of a gorilla of a bloke, but when Tommy Kelly stood up he was no taller than me, maybe five nine or ten. When he saw Sophie, his tanned face broke into a big smile, showing expensive white teeth.
“Hello, baby,” he said, grabbing Sophie in a bear hug and kissing her. I could see that his body was compact and strong, but softened by the yellow cashmere sweater that was now wrapped around Sophie, owning her. Sophie kissed him back, then wriggled from his embrace, tickling his ribs with her polished fingernails. He let her go, putty in her hands.
“Daddy, this is Eddie.” Sophie looked towards me. I was rooted to the spot.
Tommy turned his attention to me, the smile fading a little. “Eddie?” he said.
“Eddie Savage,” I said. “Pleased to meet you.”
He looked at me for a moment. His eyes were bluish, but pale. His hair was gingery blond, quite long, and swept back from his forehead. He was neat and immaculately groomed with a tidy goatee beard. He had an expensive smell about him, like leather and cigars and lemons all mixed together. When he finally held out a hand for me to shake, it was warm and soft. Not the manly crushing I was expecting.
It was as if he had nothing to prove.
“Any relation of Billy Savage?” he asked. “Camberwell? Light-heavyweight?” His accent was also South London, but faint, and the edges had been polished off.
“Not as far as I know,” I replied, already feeling like he could see right through me. “I’m a bit short of relatives.”
“Really? Why’s that?”
I looked across at Sophie, aware that I was trotting out the same old story. “My mum and dad passed away,” I said. “They were both only children, so I don’t have any uncles or cousins or anything.”
Tommy nodded. “Mine were both brown bread by the time I was fourteen. It can be a bit lonely, can’t it? Less aggro at Christmas, though.” He gestured over to the sofa. “Come and sit down.”
He turned down the volume on the flat-screen TV that was tuned to Sky’s History Channel. Black-and-white images of Winston Churchill and fighter planes flashed across the screen. He tugged at the creases of his trousers and sat down, examined the toes of his brown suede shoes. They looked as if they had never been worn outside.
“So, how do you get by, Ed?” he asked. “You know, without your mum and dad.”
“Dad…” Sophie said, with that reproachful whine only teenage girls can make.
“It’s OK, Sophie,” I said. “I don’t mind, Mr Kelly. I was left a little bit of money, so I’ve got a flat. I’m still at college for a while, but during holidays and stuff I duck and dive a bit. I help out on a market stall.”
“Good way to learn the ropes, on the market,” Tommy said. “Done it myself. Do you know anything about art, Eddie?”
He pointed at a large, abstract picture, which took up most of
the wall in front of us. To me it looked like a big red rectangle with an orange oblong painted in the middle.
“I don’t, really,” I said.
“It’s a Rothko,” he said. “One of the great American artists of the twentieth century. What do you think it represents?”
I shook my head. Didn’t want to make a prat of myself by having a stab in the dark. “I don’t know.”
“Me neither. All I do know is that the longer I look at it, the more I see. I get a feeling off it, like I know what Rothko felt when he was painting it. Amazing, isn’t it?”
I nodded, not wishing to disagree, but I could feel the sweat trickling down between my shoulder blades. He was making me nervous … more nervous than I was already.
“That’s how I judge things, Ed,” he told me. “I don’t listen to opinions. I take a good old look and work out how I feel about it. In here.” He patted his stomach.
I couldn’t work out if he was trying to tell me something – that he could see through me. I continued to stare at the painting, waiting for something to happen, and it did. The edges of the inner shape began to shimmer a little, one colour pulling against the other, and it began to live in front of my eyes. “I think I can see what you mean,” I said finally.
Tommy smiled. “You can tell a lot about someone by what they hang on their walls,” he said. “By having a good look and making your own mind up.” He clapped a hand on my shoulder and squeezed.
“Mum says lunch is ready,” Sophie called from the doorway. She had left me alone in the lion’s den for a minute. It had seemed like an hour. She winked at me. I was doing OK.
Tommy Kelly guided me out of the room, his hand still on my shoulder. “I’ll take you for a spin in the Bristol after lunch,” he said. He squeezed my shoulder again till it almost hurt. “Show you a real car.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
Lunch was smoked salmon, then a rich beef stew. I think it was French. It was made with red wine, and had a thick gravy full of tiny onions and mushrooms. Herb dumplings on top. I realized that it was the most delicious thing I had ever eaten in anybody’s house. Not that I had eaten in that many houses anyway, and those dinners had been mostly limited to fish fingers, beans and burgers.
Yes, it was definitely the best food I had ever eaten outside of a restaurant, so I told Cheryl. She smiled and told me that Tommy had made it. I was momentarily taken aback, but my comment went down well with the boss, who grinned at me and said how simple it was to make: cubed beef, bacon, button mushrooms, shallots and a bottle of cheap burgundy. He enthusiastically went through the motions of making it: browning the beef, sautéing the shallots and bacon.
“Tommy’s pretty good in the kitchen, aren’t you, babe?” Cheryl said.
Tommy shrugged. “Can’t do puddings, though, can I?” He looked at me. “Great in the pudding department, my missus.” He rubbed the small paunch that swelled beneath the cashmere. “I’ve got Cheryl to thank for this, haven’t I, darling?”
She made a few self-deprecating noises and he grabbed her leg under the table. Cheryl gave a squeal and shot him a look that made me think that they were still at it, given half a chance. I must have blushed or looked away at their moment of intimacy, because Sophie jumped in.
“Dad!” she squeaked. “Eddie’s here, you’re embarrassing him.”
“Sorry, Ed,” said Tommy.
“No, I don’t mind, honestly,” I replied. “It’s nice to see a bit of love in the house.”
They all laughed, and I covered the moment by collecting up the dishes.
“He’s well trained, Soph.” Cheryl smiled, watching me. Sophie slapped her mum playfully on the arm.
I was well trained. Well trained enough to stick a magnetic bug underneath the dishwasher when I went to retrieve a dropped fork while I was stacking. I sat back at the table, trying to look calm, my heart going like a steam hammer. Tommy Kelly poured me more wine.
“You like this plonk, Eddie?” he asked. “It’s a Rioja. Spanish.” I took another sip. “I’d like to say it came from my estate in the south of Spain, but actually Cheryl picked it up from Sainsbury’s. Should be about twelve quid a bottle and they’re knocking it out at six ninety-nine. Can’t argue with that.”
“I don’t really know anything about wine,” I admitted. “But I like it.”
“What does it taste of?” Tommy asked.
He fixed me with pale-blue eyes. Another test. I thought hard, trying to identify the sensation in my mouth.
“Wood?” I suggested.
“Very good,” said Tommy. “Aged in oak barrels. Bit of vanilla in there, too?”
I took another sip, and there it was, like the taste you get from sponge cakes. “I see what you mean.”
Tommy nodded, and looked at me for a moment while Cheryl began to dish out a rhubarb crumble. “Did you know that the first rhubarb ever sold as a fruit was just down the road from you, in Deptford Market?”
“I didn’t,” I confessed.
“Eighteen-twenty. Bloke called Myatt. Started with seven bundles. They laughed at him because up till then it had only been used as medicine. By eighteen-fifty he was shifting ninety thousand bundles a year. He stuck his Gregory Peck out. Took the risk. Had a vision.”
Cheryl poured custard on the crumble and placed a bowl in front of me.
“Here’s your medicine crumble.” She winked. “Tommy’s full of useless facts like that.”
“So you lot have only got a few terms left at college, haven’t you?” Tommy continued.
Sophie nodded as if she was bored of hearing about it. Alongside a million other parents, he was clearly wondering what the hell his kid was going to do outside full-time education.
“What are you thinking of doing after, Eddie?” he asked.
“Haven’t really thought about it,” I said.
“You should. You seem like a bright bloke.” He looked at me, longer than was strictly comfortable. Not that I was feeling all that comfortable to start with. I felt the need to expand.
“I’m not bad with computers,” I told him. “And languages. I just haven’t had a lot of guidance, really. What with my mum and dad not being around.”
I got a tingle up my spine as I trotted out the lie because I could see Tommy Kelly was falling for it. His eyes twinkled and he patted my hand. “I don’t know nothing about computers or languages,” he said, “but it’s not held me back too much. The only computer I know how to use is this one.” He tapped his head, “but if you know your way around the things, maybe you could help me.”
He scraped the custard from his bowl and gulped down a cup of black coffee.
“Now let me show you the Bristol before I get too pissed.”
The car smelt of ancient leather and that deep, tarry oil and petrol smell you get from old garages. It was basic inside, not like a padded modern car. The dash looked like the control panel of a plane or something: black dials with luminous numbers and letters. I could feel the springs on my arse through the leather seats.
Tommy started it up and the engine roared. He looked at me and grinned as if his excitement on powering the car up never got any less. He had wrapped a thick red scarf around his neck and pulled on a special pair of driving gloves, punched with holes. When he finished it off with a checked cap, he looked like something from an old film about motor racing. The car clunked into gear and across the gravel, down the drive and away from the security blanket of Sophie and her mum. He roared off down the lane and within minutes we were on a slip joining the A-road, where Tommy really opened up the accelerator.
“Goes like a bomb, doesn’t she?” he said. “Still got plenty of grunt for an old bird built in the fifties.”
“Fantastic,” I said, not really knowing what he meant.
“I’m not a big fan of these new motors with all the bells and whistles. They’re OK for hairdressers and Flash Harrys. I prefer an older model with better upholstery and a few more miles on the clock.” He paused and glanced at me. �
�Like my missus,” he added, and roared with laughter.
I didn’t know how to respond and looked out of the window. He seemed to be waiting for me to say something.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, Mr Kelly,” I said, “but I think your wife is lovely.”
Tommy laughed again and grinned to himself, pleased. In just a few hours, Tommy Kelly had turned from a fearsome ogre into someone warm, friendly … cuddly. I almost began to forget who he was.
“The daughter’s not bad either,” he said after a moment, and I remembered again. I didn’t know the right answer, so I attempted something harmless.
“Goes without saying,” I said.
“She’s a beautiful girl,” Tommy said. “She likes you. Be nice to her.”
“I will.”
We drove on in silence, the hum of the Bristol’s engine the only music Tommy needed. My heart started beating like a drum as I fished in my pocket for a bug and tried to fix it under the seat. Tommy glanced in my direction as I shuffled around, and I adjusted my trousers and coughed as if I was uncomfortable in the seat.
“OK, so you might want something better sprung for a long journey,” he conceded. I nodded and managed to find a hold for the bug with my left hand. I wasn’t confident it was on properly, but it was the only chance I had. We turned off the A-road then back across some fields past an oast house and over a stream. In ten minutes we were back in the lane leading up to the Kelly home. As the electric gates closed slowly behind us and the Bristol purred up the drive, Tommy spoke again. This time his voice was quiet, measured, and I realized what our drive had been about.
“While we’re on the subject of Sophie,” he said, “she’s my life.”
I gulped, about to agree, but he continued.
“And anything … anything … bad you do to her, I will do to you ten times over. Get it?”
I nodded.
I briefly recalled Benjy French’s legend of the bra and the multi-storey. I wondered where Tommy Kelly’s definition of bad started. If it included kissing, I was already in the shit. I might get kissed to death.