Two Women

by Martina Cole

  ‘You’re like me mother. Think your shit doesn’t stink, you do. Well, you stink all right, you stink, you’re a fucking . . .’

  He was coming; she felt his body shudder, felt him relax his hold on her hair, thanked God it was all over.

  She rolled away from him, her body aching and tired. Wendy was still crying and automatically she went to pick her up, thinking that now he had had what he wanted he would leave her alone.

  She was wrong.

  The blows were heavy at first but nothing Susan couldn’t handle. She was sitting on the side of the bed, her hands over her face, trying to deflect the worst of them. Barry’s fists were clenched until he was all white knuckles and gritted teeth, his handsome face stretched into a horrific mask of disgust. This more than anything made Susan frightened.

  He had reached the point where he didn’t care anymore. Anyone could be hurt now, even the child.

  She ran into the smaller bedroom and crouched down by Wendy’s cot, covering herself as best she could with her arms. He kicked her, punched and abused her until he was tired and Susan was a bloody crumpled mess. Finally the anger left him and Wendy’s cries penetrated his rage. He could hear a banging noise and thought for a split second that the sound was coming from Susan, that she was banging her feet on the floor.

  Then he realised it was coming from the back door. His mind registered that fact and he relaxed. If it was Old Bill they would have come to the front.

  He looked down at his young wife. She was in a mess, he realised. Going to the window of his own bedroom he looked out and cursed softly under his breath. It was Doreen, in her nightie and holding a large frying pan.

  ‘I know you’re in there, you bastard. Leave that girl alone and come out here now. I’ll fucking fight you, you gutless ponce!’

  Wendy’s cries were echoing in his head. As he walked past the baby basket he felt an urge to kick it, kick it across the room and down the stairs and finally shut the little fucker up.

  Instead he pushed it hard with his foot, making it slide about two feet. Wendy was not impressed. She cried harder and louder.

  Doreen was screaming now at the top of her voice.

  ‘You give me that baby, you bastard. I can hear her. Where’s Susan? What you done to her? I’ve phoned Old Bill, mate, they’ll be here in no time.’

  He went back to Susan. She was still on the floor and he saw for the first time that she wasn’t moving. Suddenly fear crept into him. He thought for a moment he had killed her.

  He ran down the stairs and opened the back door. Pushing Doreen out of the way he rushed out into the night, Doreen’s voice following him as he ran down the alley at the back of the houses. Fear lent his feet wings.

  He saw that lights were on in all the houses and cursed Doreen for waking everyone up. It never occurred to him that it might have been him who’d woken them all. Him shouting, the baby screaming, and it was all Susan’s fault.

  Doreen rushed into the bedroom and picked up Wendy. She checked the child over gently as she tried to calm her. Sue’s bedroom was next to her own so she’d heard everything as clearly as if she was in the room. She knew what had happened and was frightened for her friend. Once she had sorted out the child and calmed her she went to look for Susan.

  When Doreen saw her on the floor, her face unrecognisable and blood sprayed all over the child’s cot and the walls, she felt a moment’s hatred so intense she was glad Barry had gone. She did not know what she might have been capable of doing to him at that moment.

  Susan was conscious but obviously concussed. She was trying to grope her way to the wall to lever herself to her feet. She was covered in blood, some of it rust-coloured where it had dried, other cuts still bleeding.

  ‘Oh, Susan, Susan love. What’s he done this time?’

  Doreen’s voice was shocked.

  Placing the baby on the floor by the door, she attempted to get Susan up, help her through to the bedroom, get her lying down on something soft. It took her what seemed like hours. Susan couldn’t co-ordinate her movements; she was walking as if she was wearing astronaut’s boots, lead-lined and heavy as a car.

  Doreen picked up a now quiet Wendy. She put her in the basket by the bed then glanced fearfully back at her friend. Susan’s body was one big bruise, from her face down to her feet. Doreen knew she needed a doctor, needed hospital treatment. She wished she had phoned the police now. They would have got help, maybe stopped the worst of the beating by arriving.

  But that inbred East End rule had stopped her. You don’t call Old Bill in for anything. It just isn’t done. People sorted things out for themselves. Though how Susan was to sort this out she had no idea.

  Going to the phone, Doreen picked it up and rang Kate and then June, though why she bothered with her she didn’t know. But she felt that, seeing her daughter, June might just feel pity enough to get Joey to sort Barry out. Though Doreen did not hold out much hope.

  Then she phoned a moody doctor from her days on the game. He was there within the hour.

  Barry had stolen a car. It was a flash one, a pale blue Zephyr with a radio and an eight-track cassette. He drove around for a while, listening to Elvis singing ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight?’ and feeling sorry for himself.

  Then he had an idea. He stopped at a phone box and rang Joey. The phone was answered immediately.

  ‘What you done to my Susan now?’

  Joey’s voice was slurred and menacing. ‘June’s just left in a cab to go round your fucking drum. That ponce Doreen’s been on the blower.’

  ‘I had to give her a dig. Listen, I’ve had a marvellous idea to get back at that wanker Georgie Derby. You want in? You want to give him some or what?’

  There was a threat behind his words. He was talking as if Joey wasn’t up to retaliation but, knowing the amount of drink his father-in-law had consumed earlier, he knew he would rise to the bait.

  ‘What you talking about? ’Course I want to give him some . . .’

  Barry interrupted. ‘Then get ready and I’ll pick you up. You’re going to love this, mate, fucking love it.’

  He put the phone down and made his way to Joey’s flat. When they had finished tonight, no one would ever take either of them for a ponce again. Tonight was to be the making of his rep, Barry’s rep. He was going to make himself into a legend.

  With Joey’s help, of course. His father-in-law was about to enter into an unholy alliance tonight which would keep the two men bonded together from now on.

  Barry was sure of that.

  Georgie Derby was a good husband and father who genuinely loved his wife and kids. He had married late in life and his children were doubly precious to him as was his young wife.

  Georgie was asleep in bed, his wife cuddled into him. The three children - Maxine, seven, five-year-old little Georgie and baby Caroline, two - were all sleeping soundly.

  Georgie was dreaming about a big black dog that was trying to get to him and his family. In the dream the dog was vicious with huge fangs he knew could crush his children’s heads. Then suddenly the dog began to spit out flames. He could smell the burning, hear a loud crash as they consumed him, the dog breathing more and more flames out of its mouth.

  He woke then as his wife’s screams became louder and saw what she was screaming about. The house was on fire - his home was on fire. It was a nightmare come true.

  Leaping from the bed, he pulled his wife to her feet and tried to get her through the bedroom door. She was petrified, unable to move, screaming at him to get her children, save the babies. Rushing from the room, he clapped one hand across his face. The landing was filled with black smoke but by feeling his way he managed to get to his screaming children and carry them back to the main bedroom.

  His wife Natalie had the window open and the neighbours were all outside calling up to reassure them they had phoned for help. All they could do was wait. His youngest daughter, an asthma sufferer, was coughing badly, her little ribcage heaving as she fought to get her b
reath.

  As Georgie looked out of the window, willing the fire brigade and ambulance service to hurry, he saw Joey and Barry. Standing by a big blue car they waved to him nonchalantly.

  He realised then what had happened and felt fear tighten like a steel band around his chest. They would have killed his children. They would have taken innocent lives for money. As hard as he was, and he was a hard man, he would never in a million years have done anything like that.

  But he knew then that, hard as he was, he wasn’t hard enough to retaliate because that would put his children and his wife in more danger than ever.

  Joey McNamara was undoubtedly a force to be reckoned with. Georgie had known that, but had thought that his association with the Winters would have put something like this on to the back burner. Now it seemed they were after war, and he wasn’t sure it was a war either of them could win.

  He saw his little daughter collapse in her mother’s arms and rushed to support her but he knew immediately that Caroline was dead. It was instinct, something he just knew without having to be told.

  Caroline was a sickly child, had been since birth. Now she was dead, killed by two men with no idea how much love he’d felt for his child, how much store he set on his family and their life together.

  He would kill them now, he knew that. Kill them both stone dead. He would have to. They had destroyed his child and he could not let that go.

  His home was burned out, his wife would never be the same again, and Georgie lost his zest for life all in under an hour at the hands of two men who thought they were a law unto themselves.

  But he would wait, and he would watch, and he would pay them back, he was sure of that. As sure as he was of his own name and what he was going to carve on his daughter’s tombstone.

  His wife was keening hysterically. For now he had to file away the hatred and get on with comforting her. But his memory was long and he had something on his side: time.

  Susan woke up in Whitechapel Hospital, Doreen by her side and a smiling Wendy in her friend’s arms. Susan could not move at all. Her body was racked with pain and her mind reeling from the knowledge that Barry had done this to her.

  Barry Dalston, her husband, the man she had loved with all her heart.

  ‘All right, mate?’

  Doreen’s voice was soft, concerned.

  Susan attempted to smile.

  ‘I assume I’ll live?’ It was a joke. A bad one but a joke all the same.

  ‘How’s me best girl then?’ She tried to take the baby’s hands in hers but it was too much effort.

  ‘I feel fucking awful. Has Barry been in?’

  Doreen did not answer but the flowers all over the place spoke volumes.

  ‘He knows I hate chrysanthemums, the ponce. How long have I been here?’

  Doreen smiled gently.

  ‘Four days, Sue. Don’t worry, I’ve had Babes. I told your mum you insisted before you passed out. I guessed you wouldn’t want her going to them. But Kate’s been a great help.’

  ‘Four days! I’ve been here all that time?’

  ‘Barry told them you fell down the stairs. I think they swallowed it, but I ain’t sure. No one has said anything, really.’

  Susan nodded. Forewarned was forearmed.

  ‘I’ll play it by ear. I can’t remember everything but I remember enough.’ Her voice was sad. ‘I expect he’ll be in later, all sweetness and light.’

  Doreen shook her head.

  ‘That’s just it - they arrested him yesterday for murder and arson. They arrested your father and all.’

  Susan’s eyes widened, her pain forgotten in the surprise of Doreen’s revelation.

  ‘Who have they murdered then?’

  ‘A bloke called Derby’s youngest daughter. She died in the fire of smoke inhalation.’

  ‘How old was she?’

  Doreen could not keep a tremor from her voice.

  ‘She was just two years old, Sue, a baby really.’

  Susan nodded then, a sad, lonely gesture. Neither of them spoke again. There was nothing they could say. They were both filled with their own thoughts, with disgust and a terrible pity for the bereaved family. Finally Wendy started to cry and Susan looked at her as if for the first time. Pulling herself up in the bed, she took her child in her arms and held her so tight the baby cried even harder.

  Through her pain Susan realised she was fighting a war, one she could not win but in which she might just carry a few battles for her child. Barry, she knew now, was capable of anything, anything at all, to further his own ends. That included sacrificing an innocent child.

  Two days later he was released without any charges and a few days after that Georgie Derby was found with his throat cut. Once more, it seemed, Joey and now Barry had literally got away with murder.

  Susan for her part was treated like royalty by her now repentant husband but when she realised she was pregnant again she felt an urge to kill herself. He was over the moon, seeing it as a sign they must stay together, be a family. Susan saw it as another nail in the coffin she had placed herself in.

  Because she knew now that Barry was capable of anything, and anything with Barry meant just that.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Susan was sore, very sore. It seemed as if her whole body was screaming, even the nerve endings. She caressed little Barry’s head and wished for the millionth time that Barry Senior would die.

  As she watched him stalking around the little house, face red with rage, body taut as a watch spring with suppressed aggression and his mouth constantly spewing obscenities, she pictured him in his coffin. This picture had become her lifeline. Sometimes, as she hoovered or cooked or looked after the three kids and had a nice day without him, she allowed herself that pleasant daydream.

  The police would knock on the door, and instead of asking her where he was and taking him in for questioning they’d stand on the step, their hats in their hands, faces solemn as they informed her that her husband, the father of her three children, was dead. Sometimes he’d died in horrific circumstances, depending on how much she hated him at the time. He was slain by a crossbow bolt through the heart or shot in the head. Once she even daydreamed he had been burned alive, that one had scared her, but mostly she imagined the police telling her he had died in a car crash. No other car involved, of course, he just drove accidentally into a tree.

  If she was really in a good mood she would imagine then that he had insured himself and she came into a large amount of money. The daydream would then take on movie star proportions as she pictured herself, miraculously slim and beautiful, and the kids turned out like fashion plates. Travelling the world and being chatted up by David Bowie and Mick Jagger . . .

  At this moment though the daydream was destroyed as she realised that Barry was talking to her. Well, talking at her would be more accurate.

  ‘Look, Bal, it ain’t our fault you are in shtook. The kids are hardly to blame, are they? Let me make you a nice cuppa and a bacon roll, eh? Give you a chance to calm down a bit, think a bit more clearly. If push comes to shove you can have me tom to pawn, all right?’

  He looked at her with contempt.

  ‘Shut the fuck up, Sue. Don’t start winding me up, I warn you.’

  She closed her eyes in distress. She really could do without this today. Wendy was nine years old tomorrow and wanted a party. If Barry launched himself at her at any point tonight Susan would be marked and have to suffer the pity of all the other mothers tomorrow.

  She knew what was wrong with him. He was skint again and owed money to everyone. Since the death of Davey Davidson, Barry and her father had been in limbo. Bannerman was retiring and going abroad to live. He had paid off his two main debt collectors who had promptly blown the money, expecting to be offered jobs by all and sundry. This had obviously not happened. Over the years they had fallen out with everybody who might have been interested in employing them. Even bouncing was out because their reps preceded them and no one wanted the hag, tho
ugh Barry had been offered a door job in a hostess club. A come down as far as he was concerned.

  Susan knew also that since the death of Derby’s daughter and her own hospitalisation eight years ago, he and Joey had been put at a distance by the local people. They were tolerated but no longer liked. She knew this bothered Barry a lot, and that he blamed her for it.

  Strange it was his beating of her that day which made people hate him even before they heard about the child. He and Joey had been attacked late one night by men armed with baseball bats. They were both seriously injured and never knew who’d ordered it though Susan privately thought it was Bannerman, his way of getting his own back on them and also of placating the Winter brothers.

  Susan knew much more than her husband guessed. Her mother kept her up to date on everything, she made sure of that. She wanted to know what to expect, and if possible when to expect it. She had to defend herself and the kids as best she could.

  As she made the tea and the bacon roll, she hoped he would calm down. He had already upset the kids and picked on Doreen, telling her she was banned from his house. Doreen left without an argument but the very fact she had been there annoyed Barry. He hated her because she saw through him.

  Doreen was the expert on men. She should be - Christ knew she had had enough of them. The thought made Susan smile. Her friend’s current squeeze was a young Greek waiter from up West, apparently. Doreen told Susan about their love life in graphic detail, making her roar with laughter. Even June had warmed to Doreen when she had seen how comical she was. Doreen could make a joke of anything and anyone. Especially men.

  She was back on the game, needing the money now that the kids were getting older and because of her debts. At times Susan was tempted to live like her: take Social Security, moonlight in the Smoke, and do what she wanted when she wanted. It sounded bloody good to her.

  ‘Are you going to take all fucking night to sort that out or what?’

  Barry was behind her. She could hear the Blue Peter theme tune and hoped the kids would watch it quietly.