Two Women

by Martina Cole

  As she walked on to the ward in Whitechapel Hospital she saw exactly how the land lay.

  ‘How you can waltz in here after what you caused, I don’t know, Susan.’ Debbie was all self-righteous anger and the usual histrionic tears.

  ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, shut your trap, Debbie, and tell me what the score is?’

  She placed her hands protectively across her pregnant stomach and said dramatically, ‘He threw her down the stairs - chucked her with all his strength. It was awful, Susan. I’ve never seen them go at it like that.’

  A nurse walked into the little side ward and Debbie switched to the official story.

  ‘She just went flying. I reckon she caught her heel, and with the drink she couldn’t do much to help herself.’ She smiled at the nurse, an Irish girl with hips like a steam liner and merry blue eyes. ‘This is me sister, Susan.’

  The nurse smiled back.

  ‘The doctor will be in soon. Your mother seems better. Her OBs are stable and she has no real physical injuries. Broken bones, you know. Though she will be sore when she does wake, it was quite a fall.’

  Susan nodded, unsure what to say.

  ‘Shall I get yous a nice cup of tea?’

  They both nodded and smiled once more and she left the room. Debbie rolled her eyes up to the ceiling.

  ‘I feel like one of them dogs you see in the back of cars. Nodding and smiling all the time. I wish they’d all fuck off and leave us alone. I can’t be bothered to make conversation.’

  ‘They mean well, Debs. Where’s Dad?’

  Debbie shrugged.

  ‘He went off with Barry just after the police left and they took Mum off in the ambulance. I assumed they were coming here like. But knowing the old man he’s out on the piss. Jamesie is fuming. He thought I should go home and leave them all to it. Fucked off, he did, and left me to cope with it all.’

  Susan felt sad for her. What with the baby, she didn’t need this added aggravation. Then an icy hand gripped at her entrails.

  ‘Did Barry say they were coming here then?’

  She tried to keep her voice light.

  ‘I don’t know. He called up to the balcony and me dad went down to him. Then he got in the car and I ain’t seen him since.’ Debbie started to cry. ‘I’ve been here all night on me own.’

  Susan felt the fear mounting inside.

  Barry had been strange the night before. He had been kind, considerate. She had missed him when he had gone, and considering all he had put her through over the years that in itself was strange. Yet she had felt for the first time in years as if he cared about her, really deep down cared. Whether it was just as the mother of his children she didn’t know. She assumed it was that. But whatever the reason it had felt good. Made her feel better about herself. As if it made her a proper person somehow, made her real. Proved she existed.

  She should never have told him about her father and what he had done. Now she would have not only her mother on her conscience but also her father because Barry, upset and self-righteous, could easily have killed him or left him half dead somewhere.

  Violence, violence, always violence. Would she never get away from it? Would her children have to live with it as she had?

  Debbie watched the change of expression on her sister’s face and sighed.

  ‘Did Barry know about what happened?’

  Susan nodded.

  ‘You told him, I suppose?’ This was said with the usual aggression and Susan lost her temper. Forgetting about her mother lying behind the curtains of the bed, she bellowed, ‘Why shouldn’t I have told him, eh? Unlike you I don’t find my father trying to have sex with me remotely normal. I know that probably shocks you, Debs, but that’s me, ain’t it? I’m weird like that.

  ‘I’m of the opinion you should only have sexual relations with people who ain’t your relations, if you get my fucking drift.’

  Debbie dropped her head down on her chest.

  ‘Are you going to look at Mum?’

  Susan shook her head.

  ‘Not yet, I can’t cope with all that yet.’

  Debbie snorted.

  ‘’Course you can’t. Not you, Mrs Big Brain. Mrs Analyse Everything.’

  Susan didn’t answer her, she knew Debbie was hurting. She only wished her sister would realise once and for all that their unhappiness stemmed from their upbringing. They had never learned to love properly, any of them. Love was always expressed by sex, a sexual act, sexual innuendo.

  She remembered her father grabbing at her tits and Debbie’s tits, saying how big they were getting, not his little girls any more. No one thought it was wrong, his talking about them as if he owned them. A real father would never discuss his daughter’s attributes.

  Now Debbie was caught up just like Susan with a man who was like Joey in every way. A man who used her and took her as and when he wanted. Gave her a slap when he decided she needed one, talked of and treated her like something he had found on the bottom of an old shoe.

  It did not take an Einstein to realise they were broken people, living broken lives. Coping in their own way, giving the impression of being in control to the outside world. After all, they mixed with people who would not find their behaviour strange, they mixed with people like themselves. Other broken people who laughed at everything life threw at them, finding humour in the worst possible circumstances. And when one crisis was over, they blundered helplessly into another one.

  ‘Debbie, I think we should ask the hospital if they had anyone brought into casualty last night. Barry wasn’t pleased with the turn of events, I can tell you. For all he is himself he finds Dad’s preoccupation with sleeping with me hard to take. It makes him angry, and when Barry Dalston is angry anything can happen.’

  Debbie’s eyes were round. The enormity of what Susan was saying was just sinking in.

  ‘You don’t think . . . Barry wouldn’t . . . Would he?’

  Susan shook her head.

  ‘I really don’t know, mate. I don’t know what to think.’ Debbie jumped up from her seat and screamed at her, ‘Why did you have to tell him, Susan? You must have known what it would cause.’

  The nurse walked in then with the tray of tea and smiled at them both. Her Dublin accent was strong as she informed them happily, ‘Your father’s here, just talking to the Doctor. He’ll be in soon.’

  ‘Is he all right?’

  The nurse shook her head.

  ‘Well, obviously he is very concerned about your mother but he’s here now. I’ve told him you two are here as well and that pleased him.’

  She pulled back the curtains from the bed and Susan finally saw June. She looked awful, her skin livid, her breathing strained and shallow. Joey walked in. He was tidy, shaven and in clean clothes. He looked almost respectable.

  The nurse decided to leave the family together. But first she looked at the two women and said gently, ‘I know this is a stressful time but if you could keep your arguing down . . . there are other patients here, all very ill. And your mother may be able to hear you, you know.’

  Joey looked at his wife and sighed.

  ‘She looks rough, don’t she?’

  ‘Where have you been? What were you doing with Barry?’

  Susan’s voice was low now; all the fight had gone out of her.

  ‘He wanted a hand to collect a debt before he went away. Gave me a bar to do it.’

  Susan nodded. She could not avoid seeing the pleased look cross Debbie’s face.

  She drank her tea and was quiet. Fifteen minutes later Susan left the hospital. The concerned husband and daughter were making her stomach turn.

  Inside, although she was glad Barry had not done anything to her father, she was also strangely disappointed.

  ‘You’re getting as bad as that lot.’

  She spoke the words out loud and the people in the bus queue stared at her strangely. But Susan was too tired and too upset to care.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Roselle looked around
the club. Satisfied everything was running smoothly, she decided to go up and talk to Ivan. This conversation was long overdue.

  As she walked out to the foyer she saw Barry laughing with one of the new hostesses, a skinny northern girl with almond eyes and sallow skin. She had definitely been touched with the tar brush somewhere in her family line. Roselle stood observing them, and saw Barry put an arm across the girl’s shoulder and cuddle her to him.

  It was the action of a man with intimate knowledge of the woman in front of him and Roselle felt the anger only a betrayed woman can really feel. Especially as she knew the girl had supposedly just got over a bout of ’flu and had been off work for a week recuperating.

  Roselle wondered now what form that recuperation had taken. Barry and she seemed very close.

  The girl’s name was Marianne. There were very rarely last names with hostesses, and the names they did give were usually made up. One girl called herself Starlight, and another, for reasons that were self-explanatory, called herself Miss Lovelace. But Marianne seemed to be catching the attention of all the men and Roselle wondered why. True, she was pretty, in a girlish spotty way, but nothing special. Roselle guessed that she offered the ultimate and that was usually a good reason for seeing a girl on her way.

  S and M caused trouble in clubs. A suck and fuck was the usual menu. Once a girl deviated from it the money came in faster, but the life seemed to catch up with them faster as well. Looking at Marianne, Roselle wondered if she took the violence on herself. She had a lot of time off and Roselle believed she might be taking customers off the roll.

  How anyone could be beaten or abused for money was a mystery to her. She had given out a few good whacks for a certain price over the years, indeed she still had a couple of regulars she saw occasionally, but to be the object of someone’s hatred seemed to her a mug’s game.

  The whore should be the one who exploited, not the other way around. If she used her brains anyway. Barry saw her watching them and moved away from Marianne. The girl walked past her and smiled smugly.

  Roselle knew her type all right, she had seen them come and go over the years. She wouldn’t last long because Roselle was going to give her the bad news soon, tell her she wasn’t what the club was looking for. That should take the spring out of the bitch’s step.

  Catriona, a large-boned African girl, was on reception. She smiled knowingly at Roselle and nodded at the door. Ivan was leaving and Roselle was annoyed, she had wanted to talk to him. As he pulled on his coat there was a commotion from inside the club, a scream and then a heavy thud. Turning back Roselle went in, followed closely by Barry.

  Marianne was on her knees trying to disentangle her hair from the long red talons of a black hostess called Lucille. She was the designated hard nut among the girls, renowned for knocking out a bouncer in Dean Street with one hefty punch. Her pretty face was criss-crossed with scars from fighting. She had a girlfriend called Lizzy who did as she was told, gave her case money to Lucille and rolled her joints for her.

  Lizzy stood watching the fight now with bright eyes. The other hostesses were also watching, but warily.

  Roselle saw Barry wade in to intervene between the two women. Picking Lucille up by her hair, he half dragged and half pulled her off the screaming Marianne. But clumps of the hostess’s hair were coming out in the process.

  ‘All right, all right, calm down, ladies.’

  Barry’s voice was jovial. But he was straining to keep a hold on the big black woman.

  ‘You fucking fuck me, girl, me take you out of here and kill you. You hear what me saying to you?’

  As Lucille screamed the words out she was kicking at the woman on the floor. Her high heels were hitting the mark each time and Marianne, bloody and bleeding, lay there, arms over her head to protect herself from more blows.

  ‘What on earth is going on here?’

  Roselle looked at the dozen women standing around the bar.

  ‘What’s she supposed to have done?’

  As she spoke she saw two customers requesting their bills and sighed.

  ‘Whoever is with them two geeks get your arses over there or you’ll be looking for another fucking club tonight. The rest of you better get yourselves sorted and back on the meat seats in case we have any more customers. Only that is why you’re all here, isn’t it?’

  Her voice brooked no argument. Even Lucille realised she had gone far enough. She liked Roselle who gave everyone a fair crack at the punters and had no favourites. As the girls drifted back to their seats and tried to calm irate punters Lucille pulled herself free from Barry’s grasp.

  ‘She been dealing in here. Bad stuff - you know, H, skag, whatever you want to call it. He giving it to her to sell. Now, Barry boy, don’t you try ’n’ deny it because the little whore tell me herself. Any dealing here is my territory and then it be only amphetamines or barbs. Stimulants. Plus a bit of puff now and again, to mellow them out.’ She looked at Roselle, eyes wide in outrage. ‘Now they all highballing - heroin and speed mixed. That be dangerous stuff. You telling me you want that in here, Roselle?’

  Barry was quiet and that told her all she needed to know.

  She poked a bleeding Marianne with one foot.

  ‘You get your stuff and disappear. You too, Barry. You’re both out.’

  He thought he was hearing things.

  Roselle already knew he did a sideline in puff. What was her problem?

  Lucille laughed then, a deep man-like sound, seeing the expression on Barry’s face. Marianne was pulling herself up from the floor. She looked very young and very bloodied.

  ‘If I hear of you in any of the clubs in Soho, I’ll be forced to tell them why I let you go,’ Roselle told her sweetly. ‘So if I was you, dear, I would find myself an alternative city and a new ID.’

  Her voice was smug. She knew she could see to it the girl was blacklisted. No clubs wanted skag on the premises. Heroin was for street girls and club hostesses were supposed to be a step up from them. Though once they tried H they usually ended up on the streets. It was poison. It destroyed the girls and also the clubs themselves. People on heroin became users, thieves and liars. These girls were no angels to start with. Couldn’t afford to be in their line of work. But heroin addiction gave them an added edge because the need for it became so strong. They would go case for as little as ten pounds and their lives became an endless round of fucking and scoring. Roselle had seen it so many times before.

  So she had right on her side as well as a certain amount of vindictive joy at getting her own back on two people who’d thought they could get one over on her. Well, so far as she was concerned, the man or the woman had not been born who could pull a fast one on Roselle Digby.

  She made her way up to her office. She had just poured herself a large brandy when Barry burst through the door. She had been expecting him. With her back turned, she allowed herself a half smile, before she swung round.

  ‘And what can I do you for?’

  It was a joking expression they had between them, a hostess expression that made them both laugh normally. Barry was seriously upset. She could see him trying to come up with an explanation for what he had done. Trying to justify himself and his actions.

  She felt sorry for him. He had not even taken the time to come up with an excuse before he burst into her room. She knew he cared about her deeply and that people like Barry saw caring as ownership. She also knew he needed constant reassurance of his power over women. His power to fuck them and use them. It was part of him, an intrinsic part of him.

  Roselle sat at the desk and sipped her drink, looking every bit the dispassionate observer. She knew this was what was bothering him most.

  ‘She meant nothing to me . . .’

  Roselle interrupted him.

  ‘I should think not, Barry. If she did it says a lot for me, doesn’t it? But, you see, what you failed to understand is that I will tolerate no outside dalliances. I don’t care who they’re with. I accept you might give
your wife one now and again, but apart from that you were supposed to be mine. I don’t sleep with Ivan any more, even if I have his child.’

  She watched the colour drain from Barry’s face.

  ‘What you talking about?’

  Roselle laughed, enjoying the power she had over this mindless, violent but, oh, so handsome thug. She moistened her lips with her pink tongue.

  ‘Ivan is my son’s father. He and I had a thing going for a long time. Why else do you think I have the position I do in this club? I assumed you were astute enough to suss that one out for yourself.’

  He was flabbergasted.

  ‘You mean, you and Ivan . . .’

  She nodded, smiling happily.

  ‘I was a prostitute, remember, Barry. It was my job. Ivan offered me an alternative and I grabbed it with both hands. In more ways than one.’

  She laughed raunchily.

  ‘He can’t raise a smile these days, bless him, but we still have our child in common and our business interests. You see, unlike Susan I like to be in control of my life and my work. Even when I was whoring I always made a point of being in control. I kept a little bit of me back and that’s what saw me through. It was just a means to an end with me and sleeping with Ivan, who was a nice man and a wealthy one, was certainly preferable to humping strangers day in and day out. Surely you can see the logic in that?’

  Barry was staring at her with a mixture of disgust and grudging respect. He did understand what she was saying, but that did not mean he had to like it.

  ‘I was faithful to you, Barry. I expected you to be the same to me.’

  She picked up some papers from her desk in a gesture of dismissal. Scanning them as if they were the most interesting things she had ever seen in her life. Barry stood before her, a hangdog expression on his face and no idea how to get himself back into her good books.

  Roselle looked up, her expression puzzled.

  ‘Still here?’

  He stared into her smiling face and felt the first stirrings of rage. Turning from her, he marched from the room.

  She called out gently, ‘You may as well finish the week out, I have to find a replacement and discuss it with Ivan.’