by Pip Granger
Auntie Maggie was just talking to Uncle Bert about what to do with me, on account of the fact that I was knackered and about to fall asleep on the floor if we didn’t watch out, when I heard a peculiar high-pitched wail and the crash of a chair hitting the floor. My eyes flew open to see Mrs Robbins hurtling across the room, hat tilted across one eye, as she made for the cafe door in a terrific burst of speed. There was no sign of concrete now. I followed the direction of her mad charge and saw, framed in the doorway, the Mangy Cow. She was looking around as if trying to spot someone. She caught Kid’s eye and jerked her head sharply towards the door. He was about to get to his feet, had his bum off the chair, when Mrs Robbins hit the Mangy Cow on her blind side and at speed. The Mangy Cow went flying sideways, knocking over a table and several chairs before she hit the deck in a glittering shower of breaking glasses and plates. The words ‘Cat fight!’ flew around the room quicker than a startled sparrow and a crowd gathered in seconds. I managed to crawl under a table and had a clear view through a pair of dark drainpipe trousers.
Mrs Robbins had taken the Mangy Cow completely by surprise and it took her a moment to get her wind back. Mrs Robbins put those few seconds to good use and was gouging any exposed flesh she could reach with one hand, tearing out blond hair by its dark roots with the other and sinking her gnashers into the Mangy Cow’s arm. I could see her face clearly from under my table, and it had a glazed, crazed look only made human by the black hat that was still hanging on with the aid of a hatpin. I almost felt sorry for the Mangy Cow, but then I remembered how hurt Jenny had been when her dad left, and I found myself cheering on Mrs Robbins along with the rest of the crowd. You get sort of caught up in it somehow, especially if you’re on someone’s side. And there was no question whose side we were on. Not a single, solitary voice was raised for the Mangy Cow, not one.
Still, she didn’t seem to need any encouragement once she got her breath back. She let out an ear-piercing scream, heaved Mrs Robbins off her and flipped her on to her back. She was astride her chest before you could spit, and her fists were pounding away at Mrs Robbins’s head and shoulders. I couldn’t bear to watch that bit, and before I knew it, I’d squirmed out of my hiding place, through the drainpipes and was hauling at the Mangy Cow’s arm. Then, when that didn’t work, I kicked her really hard in the side and managed to knock her off Mrs Robbins.
Suddenly, the forest of legs surrounding us parted to reveal an elegant pair of narrow Italian shoes and a smart pair of trouser legs, accompanied by a solid set of brogues and rumpled tweed. One Italian arm reached down and tenderly moved me aside and a tweedy set picked me up and carried me away, stroking my hair and shushing as we went. The smell of T.C. was the final straw. I cried my heart out.
Luigi set about untangling Mrs Robbins from the Mangy Cow.
Unfortunately, Mrs Robbins had got her second wind and was busy trying to gouge out the Mangy Cow’s left eye. She squirmed and wriggled like mad, but Luigi hung on, talking quietly into her left ear as he did so. At last she began to quieten down and Luigi was finally able to lift her up to her feet. Harsh, howling sobs seemed to be wrenched out from deep, deep down inside Mrs Robbins. Luigi simply held her against his chest very tightly and muttered soothing noises into her hair.
The party broke up soon after that. Hissing Sid was found cowering at the back of the kitchen and a rather tattered Mrs Robbins was delivered into his care. Although, as Madame Zelda said, ‘How the hell he’s going to be any use is beyond me. He can barely stand by himself. Still, I s’pose he’s got to try. He can hardly leave poor old Luigi holding her up for ever, can he? She is his wife after all, poor woman.’
While everyone was milling about, trying to find Hissing Sid, I saw Kid help the Mangy Cow to her feet and try to brush her down a bit. She was covered in shattered glass and bits of fish paste sandwich. She slapped his hand away hard, and if looks could’ve killed, the entire roomful of people would’ve been flat on their backs, legs in the air and as stiff as boards. Everyone else was busy with Mrs Robbins and I don’t think anyone saw them leave.
‘You don’t normally encourage violence at a funeral, even round our way,’ Auntie Maggie said later, ‘but what do you do if one of the fighters is also the chief mourner? I ask you. I mean, you can’t sling the chief mourner out of their own do, now can you?’ And of course it was agreed that you couldn’t.
‘Young Rosie did well, trying to break it up like that. That fight lowered the tone something awful.’ Paulette, like everybody else, didn’t know what to say. People were not supposed to fight at a funeral, everyone knew that, but what were you supposed to do if the chief mourner forgot the rules and socked her husband’s ex-girlfriend?
‘I shouldn’t think that eventuality is covered in the official handbook. Luigi was a brick, especially as he had just got a public drubbing. That Betty is a fool, but then it was ever thus with women and their ruddy hormones.’ Bandy was sitting at the counter, cigarette holder waving about in one hand and a gin and tonic steady as a rock in the other. Silk and gin didn’t mix, so it didn’t do to splash the precious stuff about, according to Bandy.
‘It was everyone’s nerves,’ Sugar said sadly. ‘Poor Jenny was only a little girl. She should have had a life. If you think about it like that, you can see why it all got too much for that poor woman. Seeing that Cowley creature must have been the last straw. Did you notice that not a single bloody soul from her family did the honours? Sid was too busy getting pissed with the lads and her mother and mob couldn’t wait to get away; practically had sparks flying from their heels. We’ll have to be good to her and hope she dumps that wretched Sid somewhere along the way, when she feels up to it.’
‘Bert, Rosie here’s almost gone. Time we got to our beds, I reckon.’ Auntie Maggie waved her hand at the dirty crocks, overflowing ashtrays and trampled sandwiches covering every available surface of the cafe. ‘Best leave this lot for tomorrow.’
There was a chorus of ‘We’ll help’ from the remaining mourners and everyone went their separate ways, agreeing that it had been one hell of a funeral.
T.C. was talked into stopping the night on the settee in the little living room round at St Anne’s Court, so he and Uncle Bert took it in turns to carry me home. I was far too sleepy to walk, ungluing my eyes only when Uncle Bert passed me over to T.C. As I flopped over his shoulder in what he assured me was a fireman’s lift, I could have sworn I saw someone flitting in and out of the shadows. I stared harder at the last spot where I’d seen movement. Surely the shadows were darker in Frenchie’s doorway, and was that a brief flash of a white hand?
My eyes were sore from staring into the darkness all the way home, but nothing else moved.
32
I was excused school the next day and got to loll about in bed until Sugar and Bandy were up. I loved spending mornings with those two. Their starts were always so leisurely, like something out of a Hollywood film and just as shiny. Sugar would be first up, and would float into the kitchen in a cloud of cologne and silk pyjamas. On cool mornings he wore his lotus blossom dressing gown. He favoured Chinese silk slippers, black with a gold pattern. He’d stand at the little gas stove, chatting to me as he spooned coffee into the pot, added water and set it on the ring.
‘God, I’m cream crackered today. Give me a solid night’s work with a bunch of squabbling actors any day over a do like yesterday’s. All that naked emotion, dear; so tiring. Bandy’s snoring like a warthog. Do warthogs snore, do you think?’ He didn’t want my opinion, so he didn’t wait for it. ‘You know, I think they might. Imagine a warthog with a cold, or a ninety a day fag habit like Bandy’s. It’s enough to make anyone’s sinuses kick up, I should think.’
When the coffee was perked, little spurts of hot water bubbled into the little glass dome in the lid. I loved waiting for that first spurt. Meanwhile, Sugar would be laying a tray with a linen tray cloth, embroidered with hollyhocks, delphiniums and other flowers all growing round a lady in a large crinoline frock and
what Sugar called a ‘poke’ hat, whatever that was. I’d never heard of poke hats before. Sugar had done the embroidery during the air raids in the war. He never said how he got the linen and silks. He’d point out little blips in the running stitches and say, ‘That was when Park Lane copped it, and that one there was Bond Street. You could feel the ground shake it was that close. Look at that stitch there – shot straight out it did, like a dog’s leg at a lamp-post. I used to put ’em right. Then I thought, no, I won’t; if I leave ’em that way, I’ll remember. And I do too.’
Sugar would carefully pour the coffee into a warmed pot made of fine white china decorated with a thin gold trim, then he’d add a white and gold cup and saucer and a small plate to the tray. A matching jug of milk and a bowl of sugar lumps followed. Silver sugar tongs, in the shape of twined lizards, their feet clawed to grab the sugar, were buffed up and added to the sugar bowl. A silver spoon was placed in the saucer. A linen napkin, in a ring also made of silver lizards, came next. A slightly warmed croissant, wrapped in a fresh napkin, with butter and strawberry conserve in little glass bowls was the finishing touch. Bandy’s breakfast was ready to be served. That over he’d be back, ready for a small cup of bitter black coffee and a chinwag.
‘So, Rosie, what about that Betty, eh? I wonder if Annie knows her Johnnie’s been swiped. She’s not the kind to allow such an insult to go unremarked, you take my word for it. If Annie didn’t know yesterday, she does today, after Betty’s little announcement. The fur’s about to fly. Betty had better watch herself. Now, poppet, how’s yourself today?’
Sugar could certainly talk a lot. ‘Sugar?’ Bandy would say. ‘Sugar doesn’t confine himself to talking the hind legs off a donkey. No, the whole of bloody Derby Day’s legless by the time he’s finished with ’em. Finest bloodstock in the land and not a bloody limb between ’em!’
The good thing about him, though, was that he could listen, too. He did it very well. He said it was part of the job of being a barman. Anyway, he listened to me when I told him how I felt about Jenny and how badly I was going to miss her. He gave me a little squeeze, but he didn’t tell me not to be sad. He knew that when you miss someone, you miss them, and it’s never quite all right that they’ve gone.
Once everyone was up and able to take notice, we made our way round to the cafe to clear up. Pretty soon, a small army of volunteers had the place up and running again and we were able to open for business. Naturally, all the talk was about the funeral, the fight and Betty’s announcement that she was leaving with Johnnie the Horn.
‘You mark my words,’ Sugar told us, ‘there’ll be some unpleasantness. I can’t imagine Annie letting Betty walk off with her bloke without showing that she’s just a tad narked.’
Bandy summed up the general opinion. ‘A spot of vengeance is likely, I’m afraid. Annie’s never been one to balk at inflicting a few conspicuous bruises, possibly even the odd broken bone; just a small one, to alert the breakee to the depths of her displeasure. Let’s hope it’s Johnnie who cops it. Betty’s just an innocent, really. She isn’t the first young gal to have the drawers charmed off her and she won’t be the last.’
‘True, O wise one,’ Sugar cooed. ‘Now, are you going to get your bony arse off that chair and lend a hand with this broom?’
I asked T.C. to slap Johnnie in irons, on Luigi’s behalf, but T.C. wasn’t hopeful. ‘Unhappily, there’s no law against snaffling a chap’s lady friend, Rosie. Otherwise I’d be delighted to rid you of the fellow. Luigi may be able to go the breach of promise route, of course, but a chap’d have to be a prize wally to follow that line. Blokes are supposed to take it on the chin, not snivel like a disappointed girl. Anyway, there was no formal promise, was there? No promise, no breach. Sorry, little ’un.’ I was sorry too. I didn’t want Luigi to wind up in a fight, and although she’d dumped him I didn’t think Betty would like it either – and I was certain his mum wouldn’t.
A few days later, I glimpsed Johnnie wearing a socking great black eye and a large bald patch where a clump of hair had been wrenched out by the roots, and wondered. Rumour had it that Betty’s beautiful ivory skin sported areas of purple, red and yellow. Sugar had seen them together at Bandy’s and he said that they didn’t look good.
‘Seems that Annie did register her objections to Johnnie’s new liaison on his and Betty’s persons. She really made her feelings felt, thank you very much. We are having more than our fair share of fisticuffs lately, and from the gentle sex too.’
As the days rolled past and Luigi moped a lot and drooped about but still didn’t explode, the tension began to tell on me, so that in the end I asked him straight out what he intended to do. He looked bewildered.
‘Do? What am I supposed to do? A girl’s entitled to take up with who she likes if she’s a free agent. Betty didn’t promise me anything. I was just hoping, that’s all. You can’t slap a girl around because you had your hopes poured down the pan, now can you?’
I agreed you couldn’t, but that didn’t necessarily stop you from slapping the sneaky toe-rag who stole her away.
‘Blokes are blokes, Shorty. You can’t stop ’em from chasing girls, even if you fancy one of the girls for yourself. The best you can hope for is that the girl will fancy you enough not to let herself get caught. In this case, Betty didn’t. It’s my hard cheese. I’ll get over it. I’m a big lad now.’
Which was not what I was expecting at all. I didn’t know what to make of it. Most of the men I knew seemed to think that Luigi’s honour depended on clouting somebody – anybody – and the sooner the better. Auntie Maggie seemed surprised but pleased when I told her that Luigi didn’t agree.
‘Well, who’d have thought Luigi would take it so quietly?’ She beamed. ‘Still, his mum must be proud; she’s brought up a good lad there. He really did like that girl; pity she hasn’t got the sense to grab him while she’s got the chance. Never mind. Some other girl will be grateful for the opportunity, doubtless.’
Mrs Robbins was a bit scarce in the days after Jenny’s funeral but she did still wave at me from her kitchen window when I went to feed the churchyard pigeons. I would always look up and there she’d be, feeding Peter and his pals.
At school, Enie Smales got an A for a story she wrote and Miss Welbeloved decided to move her up a few desks so that she was in the top group. The trouble was, this meant that I came in after playtime one day to find Enie Smales moving her gear from her desk over to Jenny’s desk next to me. I just about put up with that, but when she took Jenny’s stuff out of the desk and slung it in the bin, I chinned her.
Miss Welbeloved’s voice was like a whiplash. ‘Rosa Featherby, what in God’s name do you think you’re doing?’
And I was blowed if I could tell her. Not only did I not know, but the blood pouring from Smales’s hooter was making me feel a bit sick.
Next thing I knew, I was choking my heart out on the staffroom chairs and Enie Smales was sitting next to me with a wet tea towel pressed firmly to her nose by a grim-faced Miss Welbeloved. ‘Ah, I see you have rejoined us, Miss Featherby. Perhaps in future you will take into account that you’re squeamish and not cause your classmate’s nose to bleed all over the place.’ She lifted the wet towel from Smales’s kisser, inspected it carefully and said, ‘You’ll do, Enie. Go and sit in the medical room while I have a word with Slugger Featherby here.’
And have a word she did, and the less said about it the better. She left me to understand that, although clearing out my friend’s desk was probably a little tactless, she expected me none the less to behave like a lady and not clock my classmates. I opened my gob to tell her that Smelly Smales was not my mate, class or otherwise, but she gave me the Glare and I kept it buttoned. I was also told that she, Miss Welbeloved, decided who sat where in her classrooms and that was final.
‘Last, but not least, Rosa, what do you think we should do with Jenny’s books?’
I thought about it for a bit. ‘Give them to her mum, Miss,’ I said.
�
��Good idea. We’ll do that then,’ Miss Welbeloved said. ‘I expect you back in the classroom in ten minutes, Rosa.’
When I finally got back to the classroom, Kathy Moon had moved over on to the other half of my desk and Enie Smales had taken Kathy’s place. Although the new arrangement was better, much better, it still felt wrong. It should have been Jenny with her bum parked at the other end of the bench and it wasn’t.
33
That afternoon, soon after I’d got in from school and been given my milk and biscuits, a slightly battered Betty came to the cafe to say goodbye. We all liked Betty, but we liked Luigi better and nobody cared much one way or the other about Johnnie the Horn – except Betty and Annie, of course, and possibly Johnnie’s mum – so it was a bit tricky.
Auntie Maggie was tight-lipped and her large arms were folded, a sure sign that she didn’t approve. She was brief but not unkind to Betty. ‘Well, dear, it’s been a pleasure, I’m sure. Good luck with your new life; I hope it works out for you. Now, I must get on.’
Uncle Bert stuck his head out of the kitchen where he was making scrambled eggs on toast for a punter. ‘Off now, are you, Betty? Well, I wish you luck. You’re going to need it with that one. Blast! Me eggs are sticking. Hope we see you round here again sometime.’ And his head popped back like a tortoise into its shell.
‘Personally, I think you’re a dozy twollop,’ Madame Zelda chipped in. ‘No offence, Betty. I’m speaking as your mystical advisor, that’s all. Johnnie will bring you very little joy, but he will leave you with plenty of trouble. Luigi’s the better bet, but I can tell that you’ll not listen. It’s your destiny, as we mystic types say. Try all you like, you can’t talk a girl out of making a fool of herself if it’s her destiny. Remember to keep a sixpence between your knees, gel, that’s my advice, but I don’t s’pose you’ll take that either.’ She gave Betty a big hug, then headed for the cafe door. ‘Got to go. I’ve got a half past four dying to be told he’ll be a star and that his boyfriend’s faithful. All bollocks, of course.’