Aled stood and looked around thoughtfully. ‘The asking price?’
‘Fifteen hundred pounds, freehold. I think you’ll agree it is very reasonable for a place of this size.’
‘It would have been two years ago.’
‘The slump can’t last, Mr James.’
‘No, it can’t, Mr Arnold. I’ve just comes from the United States and I’ve seen first-hand what’s happened there since the Wall Street crash in twenty-nine. It can only be a matter of time before we hit a full economic depression here. In my opinion it’s going to get a great deal worse before it gets better. It will be years before this place is worth fifteen hundred pounds again. I’ll give you eight hundred pounds for it. Cash.’
‘That’s ridiculous …’
‘Cash,’ Aled repeated. Growing up in abject poverty had made him cautious with his money. He had placed the bulk of his fortune in gilt-edged banker’s drafts because they were portable, independent of the commodities markets and easy to realise in any country in the world. ‘You or the bank – and, from the way you operate, I guess the bank before you bought it from the directors – have had time to repair and repaint this place since it was repossessed, which means buyers aren’t queuing up. If you accept my offer, there’ll be a hundred pounds extra in it for you in cash, if the contracts are signed within a week.’ Geoff Arnold reddened and for all of Arnold’s mixture of sycophantic fawning and arrogance Aled wondered if he’d insulted him.
‘Nine hundred pounds is less than I hoped for, but you’re right, it has been on the market for some time,’ Geoff agreed.
Aled looked at him carefully. ‘I’m sure we’ve met …’
‘And I’m sure we haven’t, Mr James. I’ve never done business with an American before.’
Aled didn’t enlighten him but he made a mental note to ask Anna about Geoff Arnold when he saw her that evening. He walked to the window. ‘I’ll need a builder, a good one who can work quickly. Can you recommend one?’
‘But the building is in excellent condition,’ Geoff Arnold protested.
‘It’s not suitable for what I want.’
‘You don’t intend to reopen it as a hotel?’
‘You just told me the last owner went bankrupt.’
‘He did.’
‘In which case, wouldn’t it be rather foolish of me to repeat his mistake?’
‘If you intend to change the use of the building you’ll need the council’s permission,’ Geoff warned.
‘I didn’t expect things to be that different this side of the Atlantic,’ Aled said with a ghost of a smile.
‘May I ask what you intend to do with the place, Mr James?’ Geoff ventured.
‘Open a nightclub.’
‘I don’t know what it’s like in America, but you’ll not only need to get the council’s permission, you’ll also need a licence –’
‘That won’t be a problem, Mr Arnold.’ Aled wondered how much it would cost to ‘buy’ Geoff Arnold. It had cost him two thousand dollars to buy a New York estate agent. But it had been a worthwhile investment. He had made a fortune from the agent’s tip-offs about property people had been anxious to offload when they suddenly and unexpectedly found themselves on the verge of bankruptcy.
Geoff Arnold watched Aled stride across the floor to the head of the staircase. ‘George Powell is just about the best builder around here.’
‘Where do I find him?’
‘Loudoun Square.’ Geoff Arnold took a notepad from his pocket and scribbled a note. ‘This is his address and telephone number.’
‘Thank you, Mr Arnold.’ Aled pocketed the piece of paper. ‘I’ll engage a solicitor tomorrow.’
‘May I suggest my own?’
‘You can suggest him, but I won’t engage him to act for me until I’ve met him and checked out his credentials.’ Aled looked around the first floor. ‘The sooner the contracts are exchanged and the alterations made, the sooner The Ragtime can open her doors.’
‘The Ragtime, Mr James?’
‘It was the name of my club in Harlem in New York. It did well enough for me to want to keep the name.’ Aled opened his cigar case and offered it to Geoff. ‘On second thoughts, Tiger Ragtime might be better in honour of the Bay. What do you think?’
‘I think both names sound well.’
Aled made his way down to the ground floor and opened the doors to the largest room again. ‘You’ll be here six weeks from now, Mr Arnold, enjoying a drink and watching a first-class variety show. Wind up the paperwork within a week and I’ll throw in twenty pounds’ worth of chips with your invitation.’
‘Chips?’ The estate agent looked at him blankly.
‘Gambling chips, Mr Arnold. What do you favour, roulette, blackjack, poker?’
‘I’ve never gambled in my life.’
‘And you call yourself a businessman.’ Aled smiled coldly. ‘If buying up repossessed properties isn’t a gamble, I don’t know what is.’
‘The properties are investments.’
‘Which might not pay off, Mr Arnold.’
‘This one certainly didn’t,’ the estate agent agreed.
‘I doubt there’s a businessman alive who hasn’t lost money on a venture at least once in his lifetime.’
‘The council take a dim view of organised gambling, Mr James,’ Geoff Arnold warned. ‘They’ll never grant you a licence to open a casino. Not in Tiger Bay.’
‘We’ll see.’ Aled slapped him across the back. ‘Telephone me at the Windsor tomorrow to let me know about those contracts.’
‘I will, Mr James.’
‘I’ll expect your call before midday.’ Aled angled his panama to the side of his head and stepped out into the warm sunshine that flooded Bute Street. His first day back in his home country had gone well. Very well indeed.
Judy stood on the platform of Cardiff station, clutching her platform ticket and anxiously watching the passengers stream off the incoming train from Swansea. She was terrified she’d miss David and he’d head down to the docks, book into one of the rougher doss houses and get into trouble. If that happened she felt that not only would Harry Evans have every right to be angry with her, but also Edyth for taking on too much responsibility rather than disturb her and Micah.
All the beds in Micah’s sister’s house were occupied by seamen who had been forced to stay longer than they’d intended in Cardiff because they couldn’t get a berth out. But she’d persuaded Helga to borrow the old army surplus cot she’d slept on when she’d stayed with her Uncle Jed before she’d moved in with Edyth, and put it in Moody’s room.
Helga hadn’t been difficult to win over, but Moody had. He hadn’t wanted to share his room with anyone, much less a farm boy who thought he could get a job on board ship without any seafaring experience. It was obvious to Moody that David wasn’t likely to get a berth soon, if at all. It had taken all of Judy’s wiles, and a promise that she would clean the kitchen in the baker’s for Moody three times a week while David remained in his room, to win him over.
David saw Judy before she saw him. He dropped his suitcase at his feet and stood in front of her. ‘What are you doing here?’ he demanded suspiciously.
‘I came to meet the train. Mr Evans telephoned the bakery to say that you were coming down to the Bay.’
‘I might have known Harry would interfere,’ he said angrily.
‘He was concerned that you might not find anywhere to stay tonight.’
‘That’s stupid. With all those doss houses on the docks –’
‘All those full doss houses,’ she interrupted, her temper rising at the thought of the trouble she’d taken to find him decent lodgings. ‘Haven’t you heard that trade’s slumped and hardly any ships are sailing? Berths out of the Bay, even for experienced sailors, are like gold.’
‘Did Edyth send you to meet me?’ He looked over her shoulder as though he expected to see Edyth standing behind her.
‘No, she doesn’t know you’re here. She’s out for the day,
visiting friends. I managed to find you a bed in a lodging house run by Micah Holsten’s sister. She didn’t have any to spare, but I borrowed my Uncle Jed’s camp bed and persuaded Moody to let you share his room.’
‘I’d really have trouble booking in somewhere?’ he asked, slightly mollified, when he realised that Judy must have gone to some trouble on his account.
‘There are scores of seamen trapped here who’d be only too happy to sail out on any voyage that will provide them with meals and get them to another port where they might find a job that will pay wages.’
‘In that case, I suppose I’d better thank you.’ He picked up his suitcase.
‘Don’t put yourself out,’ she retorted caustically.
‘Sorry.’ He lifted his cap and wiped his forehead with his handkerchief. ‘The train was unbearably hot and a woman in my carriage wouldn’t let me open the window because she didn’t want to sit in a draught.’
Judy glanced at his case. ‘That looks heavy. Do you want me to find a taxi?’
David thought of the ten pounds that Harry had pressed on him and insisted he take as well as his bank book. As Harry and Mary saw to the finances on the farm he didn’t know much about costs or prices, beyond animal feed and what livestock fetched at market, but he did know that he couldn’t afford to be extravagant until he found a job. ‘Is Mr Holsten’s sister’s house far?’
‘Half an hour’s walk, but we could take a tram part of the way.’
‘Then we’ll do that.’ He picked up his case again. ‘When did you say Edyth would be home?’
‘I didn’t,’ she replied shortly. ‘Are you serious about wanting to work on a ship?’
‘Very.’ He had to walk quickly to keep up with her as she ran down the steps that led from the platform to the tunnel that opened into the street.
‘As soon as you’ve met Mrs Brown and paid her for your board and lodging, I’ll take you across the road to meet my Uncle Jed. He’s worked on and off ships for over thirty years.’
‘He’ll find me something?’ David asked excitedly.
‘If he could find work, he’d find it for himself and his two brothers first. They’ve been living on next to nothing for months,’ she retorted bluntly.
Anna Hughes sank down on the plush sofa in the sitting room of Aled’s hotel suite before taking the glass of champagne Aiden handed her.
‘A little bird told me that you’ve put in an offer for the old Sea Breeze,’ she said to Aled who was sitting, telephone at his elbow, in the chair opposite her.
‘If that was the name of the hotel before it closed. I see the little gossip birds are flying around Tiger Bay as fast, nosy, and garrulous as ever.’ Aled shook his head when Aiden held up the bottle of champagne. ‘I’ll have a brandy. After you’ve poured it, tell the hotel staff to serve us dinner here in an hour. I won’t need you or Freddie again until tomorrow morning. You can do what you like, as long as you don’t stir up trouble with the natives.’
‘Thanks, boss.’
‘Here.’ Anna handed Aiden a card. ‘If you two boys are out for a good time, tell my girls to give you one. But we don’t give discounts, not even to friends of old friends.’
‘Thank you, ma’am.’ Aiden mixed Aled’s brandy and soda the way he liked it, with a splash of soda to ninetenths brandy, handed it to Aled on a tray and left.
‘Good boys you have there,’ Anna complimented after Aiden had closed the door.
‘Almost as good as your girls,’ Aled replied.
‘I heard that you enjoyed yourself at my house yesterday.’
‘You talked to Gertie?’
‘She’s hoping you’ll become a regular.’
‘No chance, but I might send for her sometime if I’m bored.’
‘Why not visit?’
‘You’ve a nice place, Anna, discreet, well-staffed, comfortable, but I feel more at home in my own territory.’
‘In other words, you wanted to see my set-up for yourself.’
‘And your girls,’ he replied frankly. ‘One or two of them are a bit rough, Colleen, for instance. She has a mouth on her like a colliery siren, but given less obvious clothes, better make-up, and perfume instead of scent, the others might clean up well enough.’
‘Thank you for the compliment,’ Anna retorted sarcastically. ‘What did you expect? Greta Garbo?’
‘That wasn’t a criticism, so you can smooth your ruffled feathers. Some men like a girl with a mouth like a colliery siren.’
‘Each to their own – that’s what your mother always used to say.’
‘Among other things.’
‘It’s all over Bute Street that you intend to open a club in the old hotel,’ Anna fished blatantly.
‘If everything goes to plan. The ground floor is large enough to take a small stage – or will be, once the rooms and hall have been knocked into one. The casino will go on a mezzanine on the first floor so the gamblers can watch the show in between losing their money, and that brings me to the top floor.’
‘Before we go that high, you seem very sure of getting planning permission,’ Anna commented.
‘I am, and that’s where you come in, Anna.’
‘Me?’ She looked at him in surprise. ‘I’m strictly a small-time business woman. I don’t know anything about nightclubs.’
‘Don’t put yourself down. You run a successful bordello –’
‘A what?’
‘Sorry, American word.’
‘You’ve been there so long, you look like a movie star, you talk like a movie star, and the way you’re splashing your money around, you behave like one. When can I expect to see you in the pictures, Aled?’
‘Never. I like to keep my face out of the limelight. And, in my black heart, I’ll always be Welsh,’ he joked. ‘You run a brothel …’
‘I prefer house, and me and my girls are doing very nicely, thank you. We don’t need any business partners. I made twelve quid last night.’
He whistled. ‘You must have rolled a couple of drunks to get that much, Anna.’
‘Just one. With peculiar tastes,’ she replied honestly.
‘I have no intention of muscling in on your house, but the fact that you’re still operating means you know the right people.’
‘What if I do?’ she challenged.
‘I’ll pay well for introductions.’
‘Most of our clients are small-time. Clerks, councillors –’
‘Clerks and councillors who work for the big boys. They’ll know which politicians I can pay to jump into my pocket and those who’ll turn a blind eye. They’ll also know who I should avoid. The sooner I get my club up and running the sooner I’ll start turning profits. And these people I need to be introduced to – they may like the odd private party.’
‘Introductions and the odd private party – that’s all you want?’ she asked cautiously.
‘For the moment. There may be more later.’
‘I’ll not work for you or any man. I’m good to my girls and they’re good to me. I answer to no one except myself and I’m not about to change that for all the tea in China, Aled.’
‘I’m not going to offer you a job – just commission you to run the odd special party in the upstairs rooms in the club for selected guests.’
‘I’ll charge you full rate.’
‘I wouldn’t expect you to do otherwise.’
‘Now that’s cleared up, I can relax.’ She held out her glass. He reached for the bottle Aiden had left in the ice bucket and refilled it.
‘I also need information,’ he added. ‘There was a very pretty young coloured girl singing with one of the jazz bands at the carnival. They were dressed in gold, even the musicians.’
‘That would be the Bute Street Blues Band?’ Anna eyed him carefully. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love.’
‘I’m looking for a singer for the club. I thought I’d seen the best in America but that girl was better.’
‘She’s also respectable. And all the
men in the band look out for her. The Chinese drummer has a fearful temper, as does the Arab who plays the trumpet. The white man is pastor of the Norwegian Church, and you can’t get any more respectable than that. And the three tall West Indian Negroes are her uncles and they watch her like a hawk.’
‘What else do you know about her?’ he probed.
‘Her name’s Judy Hamilton, although I’ve heard she sometimes uses King nowadays, which was her mother’s maiden name. Her father’s a drunk and a sailor. I think she’s only seen him twice in her life, and the last time he robbed her of everything she owned. She’s nice as well as respectable. I’ve sold her a couple of evening frocks over the years. Her share of the money the band pulls in playing the pubs and clubs around the Bay doesn’t amount to much. But saying that, she hasn’t bought much off me lately. She moved in with Edyth Slater who took over Goldman’s bakery just before last Christmas; works for her too when she isn’t playing with the band. And, if it’s a band you’re after, you could do worse than the Bute Street Blues. But they’re not professional and I doubt they’d work for you full-time. Steve Chan – the drummer – runs his father’s laundry; as I said, Micah Holsten – the saxophone player – is pastor of the Norwegian Church, and Abdul and the others spend as much time at sea as they can, which isn’t much at the moment but you’d have to pay them well to make them give up the day job.’
‘I’m more interested in the girl than the band. Musicians are ten a penny, get the right musical director and he’ll knock even mediocre players into shape.’ Aled went to the drinks table and mixed himself another brandy and soda.
‘Just how interested are you in the girl?’ Anna probed.
‘Very, but only on a professional basis. I use the Gerties of this world to provide me with company whenever I need it. It’s less messy that way.’
‘You always were a cold fish, Aled. Even as a boy.’
He returned to his chair. ‘When it comes to ice in the blood, I had good teachers,’ he said quietly.
‘This club of yours. If you need any young girls, I might be able to help. I know people in the valleys who are on the lookout for ones with potential. They charge ten pounds an introduction but –’
Tiger Ragtime Page 7