The Business

by Martina Cole

  He also knew that this was the daughter who had caused more fights than Joe Bugner, and who was pregnant by poor Jason Parks. Jimmy was of the opinion that Jason was not capable of the act of rape, but he also conceded that no one knew the truth of any situation except the people who were there at the time. But he had also heard that this girl had a rep so large it made the Bayeux Tapestry look like a hanky.

  But her face, she was like a painting. Her skin was flawless, her eyes were huge and were a deep-blue, so dark they were almost indigo. She was extraordinary-looking and, as she gazed at him with that quiet, steady stare she had, he actually felt himself begin to blush.

  She smiled gently. ‘Hi. I’m Imelda, Mel.’

  Jimmy shook her hand, marvelling at how small and delicate it was.

  ‘Hello. I’m Jimmy, Jimmy Bailey.’

  He said his name, as always, with a certain pride because it was now so well known in certain circles.

  ‘I know who you are.’

  Then, turning from him as if he had somehow ceased to exist and smiling at her mother she said quietly, ‘I need some money.’

  Mary looked at Jimmy briefly, then she said quickly, ‘Give me a few minutes to see Jimmy out and then we’ll talk, OK?’

  Imelda grinned then, and Jimmy felt his heart constrict at just how lovely she was.

  ‘I need some money now, Mum, the baby is on its way.’

  ‘Hey, I can drive you to the hospital if you want.’ Jimmy felt a real panic at the thought of a baby arriving in the next few minutes.

  ‘I have hours yet, and I would much rather go by myself if you don’t mind.’

  Jimmy was amazed at her calmness, at how cool she was. He knew that most women were blown away by the imminent arrival of their child, of a real live person. He was not sure how he was supposed to react to her.

  He saw how heavy she was, at least her tummy was anyway. Other than that she looked like a little bird. She was wearing a purple smock top, and from the side the child was very apparent; from the front, she looked just like any other young girl. Though he had a feeling that most young girls did not have her eyes; they were almost like an ancient’s, as if she knew everything in the world there was to know. He assumed that her predicament might have something to do with that.

  Jimmy knew Imelda was classed as second-best now. Like all the girls who had their babies without the benefit of marriage, she would be automatically classed as a second-class citizen. It was unfair really, because if they had an abortion their lives were automatically back on track, and no one would ever know that they had ever been pregnant. They automatically got a second chance at life, at being respectable. He had to admit though, he admired the girls who kept their kids, unless they dumped them, of course, like his fucking mother had him.

  ‘I’ll drive you, relax. Get your coat, Mary.’

  He felt the tension between the two women, felt the fear that was emanating from Mary, and saw how pale her face had become as she waited for her daughter’s permission to accompany her.

  ‘Can I come? Please, Mel.’

  She was almost begging and suddenly Jimmy felt as if he was watching something really private and personal, something not quite nice, something reprehensible. He guessed that Mary was being held to ransom somehow.

  Imelda shrugged. ‘I don’t give a fuck, do what you want.’

  Jimmy could hear the indifference in the girl’s voice, he had only ever heard that kind of vicious indifference in one person’s voice once before. His mother’s.

  His mother had never had any kind of interest in anything or anyone except herself, and her life, to his knowledge.

  Jimmy felt the same dead vibe from this beautiful girl that he had felt from his own mother, the few times he had been in her company that is.

  Mary was putting on her coat and, smiling in a friendly way, he walked them both through the house and outside to his waiting car. He drove a gold Daimler Sovereign and he was a little bit disappointed that no one acknowledged the beauty of it. But given the daughter’s labour, he supposed he could overlook their being underwhelmed just this once.

  As Jimmy drove to the hospital he could not help noticing that the two women, who were so alike physically, did not exchange one word during the whole journey.

  Now, he was not an expert on female behaviour, and he did not pretend to understand them, but even he thought that the birth of a child should have been greeted with at least a small spurt of excitement.

  As he drove to the hospital, the awful silence between them seemed to grow, until when they finally reached the hospital he felt physically relieved to see the back of the pair of them.

  Three hours later, after a quick and uneventful labour, Jordanna Dooley entered the world. She was not held by her mother until twenty-four hours after the birth. Imelda had waved the child away, and insisted on being taken to the day room so she could have a cigarette in peace. The day room had a phone, and the phone had guaranteed Imelda the outside world, and the outside world had provided her with the drugs she needed to cope with her new-born baby.

  So her grandmother had held Jordanna instead, gently talking to her and falling in love with her. Mary had hugged the child to her, and she had known then that without her in the picture, this poor little girl would be destroyed without a second’s thought by her own mother.

  Jordanna didn’t cry like the other babies, it was as if she already knew, even at such a tender age, that her mother was not really interested in her.

  Book Two

  A truth that’s told with bad intent

  Beats all the lies you can invent.

  - William Blake, 1757-1827 ‘Auguries of Innocence’

  Who can find a virtuous woman? for her

  price is far above rubies.

  - Proverbs 31:10

  Chapter Nine

  1981

  Mary watched as Jordanna ate her dinner and, as always once the child was within her orbit, she finally relaxed. She saw the bruises on the girl’s little arms, knew that she had been picked up bodily by her mother at least once, then thrown violently onto a bed, a sofa or a chair, but that was par for the course where Imelda was concerned. She took all her anger and her frustration out on her little daughter. She did it knowing that there was not a lot anyone could do to stop her. She had the trump card; she was the mother and that meant everything to the people involved in her daughter’s shitty life.

  Mel was a fucking nightmare, she didn’t want the poor child, but she was determined that no one else was going to get her either. She used her as leverage, mostly for money. Imelda always needed money; no matter how much money she had, she always needed more.

  She was a junkie and that was a junkie’s life. The pursuit of money, easy money, so they could begin the pursuit of their drug of choice. Mel also used the child for the guaranteed Social Security money she collected every Monday from her local post office. She also used her daughter for the Family Allowance money she was entitled to, and which she cashed on a regular basis to buy drugs.

  Imelda believed the money was hers, for her own personal use whenever she needed an extra hand-out of some kind. Her social worker was so deluded by Imelda’s hard-luck stories that she even blagged money off of charities for her, and she also ensured her daughter’s utility bills were paid. The social worker had never in her life experienced anyone like Imelda, and it showed. She was so impressed with Mel’s hard-luck stories, and the insight into a junkie’s lifestyle, that she would forgive her anything.

  Any money Imelda accrued from the people she scammed went straight to her dealer. She even entered methadone programmes to keep the social workers happy, make them believe that she was really attempting to sort herself out. She would then sell the methadone around the local pubs, and buy the real deal with the proceeds. It was a cycle of despair, and her little child, her little money cow, was stuck in the middle of it.

  Poor Louise Parks was at her wit’s end. Mary herself felt such sorrow for her grandda
ughter’s lifestyle, but even more so, at times, for Louise Parks. Imelda would promise Jordanna could stay with her nana Parks, and then Louise would give Imelda the money she required. The little girl would then be delivered, would settle into a routine, would be happy and secure once more. Then Imelda would arrive at some point at Louise’s house, with no warning whatsoever, and she would take the screaming child away with her. Mary knew how that felt, because Imelda did the same thing to her on a regular basis. Sometimes she would have the girl for weeks, months even, and then, in a space of ten minutes, she would be removed from all the safety and regularity that should constitute a small child’s life. She would be dragged back to a filthy bed in a filthy flat, and she would be surrounded by people who were not exactly pillars of the community.

  Mary would watch from afar as the little girl she loved would gradually disappear further and further into herself, until she stopped talking, or communicating in any way.

  Mary would ring the social services and tell them what was happening, and they would tell her the same thing. Jordanna was OK, she was being fed, and she was with her mother. A mother who was trying so hard to get herself together, and who was trying to make a life for herself. The inference being that she, Mary, was actually the cause of her daughter’s phenomenal hatred, and her daughter’s addiction. They would then go on to say that maybe, if she was not so critical of Imelda, she might experience a complete revelation. They told her that a filthy home did not mean that the child was not loved. That the absence of clean clothes and regular meals did not constitute a bad mother. They asked Mary if maybe she was expecting too much of her daughter, and that it might be her demands that were the cause of her daughter’s problems.

  It was a fucking scandal the way the social services allowed that child to be treated, how they allowed her to live. The little girl was in a constant state of terror, was unable ever to relax, was without any kind of love from her mother. They might tell her that a dirty house was not enough reason to remove a child, that the people who visited the flat were invited there and were her daughter’s guests. She was told that she should try and build some bridges with her daughter instead of trying to take her child from her. That Mary’s repeated accusations of neglect, and criticism of her daughter’s parenting skills and her chosen lifestyle, were not doing anything for her daughter’s self-esteem. What fucking self-esteem? Mary wanted to ask them. Her daughter would fuck a tramp if it got her enough money for a fix. Her daughter manipulated them all, and they allowed her to, they allowed her to indulge herself on a regular basis. The social workers were the reason her daughter was such a fucking skaghead, they enabled her to do what she wanted and gave her the means to bully her child and her family. Social workers saw Imelda’s addictions as an illness. Mary tried to explain that her daughter was a user, a user of people, a user of anyone who she felt might further her career, not just a user of drugs. But it was as if she was talking to a fucking brick wall.

  She felt as if she was the only person who could see just how withdrawn Jordanna was. Could see how unhappy the little girl was, and how lonely and how distressed she was at her mother’s neglect of her, and the viciousness that she had to endure on an almost daily basis from her mother.

  What was it with these fucking people? Did they not have qualifications, degrees, did they not see how fucked-up that poor little child was, or how she blossomed when she was away from that fucking leech of a mother and her so-called friends?

  Or did they just choose to ignore her dramatic weight loss when she returned to her so-called home, and the sudden fits of shaking when she was forced back there by her mother? When she wasn’t even allowed to say a goodbye to her granny, who she had been living with for weeks, sometimes even months.

  Jordanna would be dragged out of her bed amid a volley of foul-mouthed accusations. Or taken from the dinner table, dragged and pulled like a doll, her little face terrified and her screams echoing off the walls. Mary herself, the mother of the drugged-up lunatic at her door, would then be forbidden to ever see the child again, she would have to stand there silently as her daughter accused her of everything from sexual assaults on the child to turning her daughter against her.

  She saw the drug-crazed eyes and yet she could do nothing about it. If she retaliated, Imelda would just make her wait even longer before she got the call that told her she could visit once more, that told her to bring money. Yet Mary lived for those garbled phone calls, would go to her daughter immediately with whatever amount she demanded from her. And then she would ask her daughter, with all the humility she could muster, if she could maybe take the child home for a day or two, give Imelda a chance to rest, give her a break from the relentlessness that was motherhood. And Imelda would play the game, as Mary had known she would. She’d make her wait though, make her work for her granddaughter’s little bit of freedom. She enjoyed her power over them all. She’d insist on certain bedtimes, force Mary to agree to impossible timetables that she would not be capable of keeping, but Mary would smile and promise to keep to them, no matter what. Imelda would then tell her that the child was very naughty and very sneaky and needed a very firm hand, and she would make Mary promise to smack her if she wet her bed, or didn’t finish her dinner.

  Mary would agree to everything, as Imelda knew that she would, and she would see her daughter’s look of triumph as she once more manipulated everyone around her. She would be forced to agree with Imelda that Jordanna was a drama queen, that she needed taking in hand, and that the child was deceitful and sneaky. It broke Mary’s heart to say those ugly things about a child who was so loving and so desperate for affection that she would still run into her mother’s arms if she was asked to. That was what the social workers saw, they saw a little child who ran into her mother’s open arms and who would hope against hope that this time it would be for ever. Only to be locked back in her dirty bedroom again once the social worker had gone. Who spent hours looking out of her bedroom window, a window devoid even of a curtain. Who slept on a mattress that stank of urine and despair and that had no sheets and no real blankets, that was used by her mother’s friends, people who did not feel that it was worth taking care of.

  Jordanna’s toys were old and dilapidated because the newer ones were sold off, and was denied even the use of the toilet and, when she finally soiled herself, was beaten for being dirty and wilful.

  It was a vicious circle, and Mary didn’t know how to make it stop. She prayed to God daily that Imelda would accidentally overdose, and yet even as she prayed for it, she felt the guilt of a mother who was wishing her own child dead.

  Jordanna was two years old, and she was already wise to the world of junkies and addicts, she already knew how to judge people’s moods and how to avoid confrontations.

  As Mary smiled at the child she loved so much she saw the grime that was ingrained in her feet and ankles, the matted hair and the nose encrusted with bright-green snot. She knew that the child had been left alone in a cold bedroom for days on end, and that was why her little nose was constantly running.

  She would bath her, play with her, dress her in clean pyjamas, and read her a story. She would watch over her as she fell into a fitful sleep where she would jump nervously and moan before waking up in fear, wondering where she was, and Mary would see the relief in her eyes as she realised she was safe. Was with her nana.

  Then, after a few days, Mary would see her begin to settle down a bit, start acting like a real child. Unless the doorbell rang, or the phone, or she heard a loud noise. Then she would sit in shock, waiting for her mother to come and start the whole fucking rigmarole all over again.

  It was wrong, and the people who gave her daughter this much power over her child should be ashamed of themselves.

  ‘Come here, sweetheart. Let Nanny give you a bath, yeah?’

  Jordanna nodded. Her eyes, so like her mother’s, were shining with anticipation at the evening ahead. She was still full of trepidation, sure that this little respite from he
r life would be curtailed at any moment.

  Mary hugged the child to her tightly, and wished her daughter dead once more.

  Jimmy Bailey was fuming. He had tried to get Michael Hannon to become a silent partner in his new business venture. He had not allowed for the fact that Michael Hannon might turn him down flat, which is exactly what he had done.

  Jimmy had explained it to him quietly and succinctly, had emphasised the bonuses that would be guaranteed. He had shown him the figures that had explained how easily they would make their money back. Then he had sat back in his chair, and waited for Michael to agree to his proposal. It would be like printing money, it was such a lucrative proposition.

  But Michael Hannon had smiled nicely, then he had said ‘thanks’, but ‘no thanks’. He saw the money that was there to be made, but he had no interest in brothels, or anything that concerned prostitution, period. He had thanked him for his offer, and then they had both had another drink, and parted company no worse off than they had been before the meeting.

  But Jimmy had felt Michael’s distaste at what he had proposed, saw the slight curling of his lip as he had scanned the projected figures. He knew that even though they were good friends, Michael would always be that little bit wary of his business dealings because, like a lot of the men in their world, prostitution might be the oldest profession in the world, but that did not make it respectable. And this from a man who provided most of the drugs that were sold in the south-east of England.

  Jimmy sighed. Well, if Michael wasn’t up for it, he would go into this one on his jacksie. He had only wanted Hannon’s name on the door anyway, it would guarantee him a free ride from the Filth, and the best behaviour from his clientele, though he was known as a hard man in his own right anyway. So, he was no worse off, it was just that sneer he had detected, that unconscious little look of distaste. It annoyed him that Michael saw him as beneath him and his fucking scams.