This Lovely City

by Louise Hare

  ‘It’s not the same.’ The words croaked out.

  ‘Why? Because everyone’s half-undressed? Is that what makes it more acceptable?’

  ‘Yes. I suppose that’s it.’ He waited, expecting her to get up and leave. ‘And I’m more than half undressed.’

  She stood up and he breathed out in relief. ‘You make a good point.’ She smiled and he only blinked but her blouse was on the floor before he realised she’d unbuttoned it. ‘It’s only fair, I suppose.’

  ‘Rose, that’s not…’ The words dried up on his tongue as she unzipped her skirt, his body betraying him as she kicked it off and stood before him in just her black lace brassiere and knickers.

  ‘You’re a grown man, aren’t you? I thought you liked me.’

  ‘Yes, but, I mean—’

  ‘And you’re doing nothing wrong if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s not as if you’re married.’

  ‘You are,’ he said, in case she’d forgotten. Every inch of his skin was tingling, only partly from the steam which, much to his shame, was not the only thing rising.

  ‘Frank doesn’t deserve me.’ She reached across him to pick up the bar of soap. ‘He barely even notices me these days as long as there’s food on the table when he gets in from work. Then he’s straight out to the pub and by the time he gets home… Well, let’s just say that even when he’s in the mood he can’t always do much about it. Can’t even get me knocked up! Probably just as well under the circumstances.’

  He watched, fascinated as her hands began to work the soap into a lather. Once satisfied, she placed her palms against his chest and massaged the soap into his skin. He gave up any pretence of wanting to run away and let her lift each arm in turn, her hands slipping across and under. She was thorough, watching him as he tried to remember how to breathe normally.

  ‘Did you have a girl back in Jamaica?’ she asked, pushing him forward so that she could do his back.

  He shook his head. ‘I kissed a few but usually they were more interested in my brother. They all liked a man in uniform, you know, and I was just a boy next to him.’

  ‘You’re a virgin?’

  His face burned and he turned his head away.

  She rinsed the suds from his skin and pushed him back. ‘How old are you again?’

  ‘Nineteen.’ His breath choked off the last syllable as her hand reached lower, stroking the soap along his inner thigh. ‘I’m just waiting. For the right girl.’

  ‘And am I the right girl?’ She took hold of his cock in her hand. ‘Don’t answer that.’ She released him and he let go of the breath he’d been holding. ‘You’re clean enough. Chop chop!’ She held out the towel for him.

  He clambered, ungainly, from the bath and let her wrap him up tucking the towel tail in at his waist before putting her arms around his neck to kiss him. She tasted flowery, like scent. Her tongue was pointed and insistent and he felt helpless as she took his hand once more, leading him this time to the bedroom.

  This then was the marital bed, clearly still in use even if just for sleeping as she claimed. On one side the table held an eye mask and a bottle of fancy-looking lotion; the other was scattered with loose change and a folded copy of the Daily Express.

  Rose pushed him down onto the bed and kissed him again, moving his hands to her breasts. He did as he was told, struggling with the fastening of her bra and grateful she finally reached back and unclipped it with one hand. She didn’t seem bothered by his incompetence, rather she seemed to enjoy issuing instruction and he followed each one with growing enthusiasm. He’d not even thought that he should be more careful, that if Rose were to fall pregnant then everyone would find out what he’d done, not just Frank.

  As soon as it was over he felt his ecstasy wash away in a wave of shame. What on earth had he been thinking? He should have left as soon as he realised her intentions. Hell, he should have listened to Sam and never come round. He’d ended up on Frank’s side of the bed, his head on a pillow that smelled of men’s cologne and hair pomade. Guilt twisted his gut like a corkscrew.

  ‘Was it that bad?’ Rose asked. She lay on her side, watching him.

  ‘It was incredible.’ The words fell flat but he didn’t know what else to say.

  She didn’t respond and when he looked at her she had turned on to her back and closed her eyes. He lay himself back and stared at the ceiling for a while until he felt his heart rate return to normal. She still hadn’t moved and so, unsure whether she was actually asleep or just pretending, he stole out of the bedroom in search of his clothes.

  14

  Evie woke just after two that Friday morning, unable to fall back asleep no matter how many times she turned, or how many sheep she counted. She read a chapter of her book but that didn’t help. All she could think about was Lawrie. And how she still hadn’t told him the truth.

  Just before five she gave up and crawled out of bed, padding across to the window and pulling back the curtain. The street was silent, the street lights casting their amber glow. It was a cold night, not spring like at all. She heard a click from below, from the house next door as Lawrie left for work, and slunk back behind the curtain so that he wouldn’t see her.

  She felt like a traitor. A spy and a liar. Guilt burned acidic flames deep in her gut, a constant pain that she only now realised she had been managing ever since the night of the party. Rathbone’s discovery, the lying to Lawrie, all of it was fuel to the fire, Evie’s grand hopes for the future turning black and charred the longer she kept her silence.

  ‘Your aunt wrote,’ Ma told her at breakfast. ‘She’s definitely keen to come up this summer. That’ll be nice, won’t it?’

  ‘Lovely.’ Evie pulled the crust off her dry toast even though she knew her mother would berate her for not eating it.

  ‘Well, don’t get too excited. I thought you said the other day that you wanted to see Gertie. Between you and me, I did mention that with a bit of luck there might be wedding bells sometime soon. Don’t you think?’ Her mother’s laugh grated on Evie’s fraught nerves.

  ‘I don’t know, do I?’ Evie was too tired to care if Ma took offence. Sod’s law that right now she felt like if she laid her head down she’d be fast asleep in seconds.

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t be surprised. I mean, it’s been almost a year, Evie. Ellie down the street married her young chap after only six months!’

  ‘If you mean Ellie Walker then she was in the family way and she had no choice,’ Evie reminded her. ‘And I’ve learned my lesson, remember?’

  ‘I wasn’t implying any different. Just, you know, maybe it’s time you put some pressure on. Told him to get a move on.’

  ‘Ma, can you just leave it! Lawrie will ask me to marry him if and when he’s ready.’ She wanted to get up and leave the room but she’d only be making trouble for herself. Better to wait it out and let Ma get the last word in.

  The silence stretched out until Evie began to think that maybe, for once, her mother had decided to pay attention to her daughter’s words. She was about to excuse herself from the table when her mother spoke once more.

  ‘Something’s wrong. What is it?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She looked away.

  ‘Evie, don’t lie to me. You look like you haven’t slept in a week. Nothing’s happened with Lawrie, has it?’

  Evie stared at her mother in surprise. Since when had Ma cared so much about Lawrie anyway? ‘No, Ma. Only what with everything that’s happened the last week… I’ve been thinking that I should tell him the truth. About why I really went to Devon.’

  ‘Absolutely not.’ Ma put her mug of tea down heavily on the table. ‘Why would you do such a stupid thing? It was nothing to do with Lawrie then and it’s got nothing to do with him now. You made one little mistake, that’s all.’

  ‘It wasn’t a little mistake, Ma, that’s the point.’ Evie gave up on her toast, the bread a day past its best anyway. ‘I had a baby. If she’d lived—’

  ‘But she didn’t. Evie, you c
an’t destroy your one chance at happiness because of this.’

  ‘But it’s not fair to Lawrie. And who’s to say that he’d break it off? He might forgive me.’ Might. If only she could be certain; she would have told him everything months before.

  Ma laughed, a dark, guttural sound without mirth. ‘Evie, have I not taught you better than that? A man will never look past a woman’s indiscretions, no matter how long ago. D’you want to end up like me? Alone and unwanted?’

  ‘You’re not alone,’ Evie muttered. ‘You’ve got me.’

  ‘Yes. I have you.’ Her mother pressed her lips together as if trying to stop the flow of words, knowing they would wound, but to no avail. ‘Don’t you understand? You’re my darling girl but you’re also the reason why I’m on my own. Why no man worth his salt will come anywhere near me. And if that baby had lived then you would have ended up just like me.’

  Evie’s chest tightened. ‘Her name was Annabel,’ she said.

  ‘You were lucky,’ her mother said, her voice hard as granite. ‘I know you were upset at the time but if you’d kept her then you wouldn’t be sitting there arguing with me about whether a boy might want to marry you. You’d be resigned to life as a pariah. Trust me, you’ve had a lucky escape.’

  ‘Didn’t you do exactly the same? You were supposed to give me up and you didn’t. You kept me. I only wanted the same as you!’

  They’d had this same argument in the last days of Evie’s pregnancy, shouting over a different kitchen table in Devon. Ma had stormed out in the end, staying away for hours before coming back home and kissing Evie’s forehead as she lay on the couch listening to Aunt Gertie’s favourite radio programme. She’d never guessed that it could have been so easy to talk her mother around, but in the end it hadn’t even mattered.

  Ma stared at her with pity. ‘You weren’t thinking straight. You couldn’t help it, Evie. I know what it’s like. All those months with a life growing inside you, you’re supposed to feel protective, like you could never be without the child you give birth to. It’s God’s way of helping us become mothers.’

  ‘If God made us that way, why is it so bad?’ Evie whispered. ‘Do you wish you hadn’t kept me?’

  Her mother looked her straight in the eye. ‘Sometimes, yes. I do. That doesn’t mean that I don’t love you. I do. But if I’d known back then how things would turn out then I would have handed you over to Sister Mary in a heartbeat. I’d have run straight home and begged my father to forgive me. I’d have met someone else in time. Got married and had a nice house somewhere. Had children who looked like me, Evie. You just remind me of a man I haven’t seen in almost twenty years.’

  Evie bit down hard on the inside of her cheek to stop the tears from falling. ‘So you’d have been happier without me.’ Evie didn’t wait for her mother to answer. ‘I’ve always known it. Maybe that’s what happened to that baby in the pond. Her mother was someone like you, someone who decided she’d made the wrong decision.’

  ‘I shouldn’t have said what I did.’ Her mother stood up and began to collect up the breakfast plates. ‘Evie, I do love you and that’s why I can’t bear to watch you ruin your own life. Nothing good can come of telling Lawrie and he’ll never find out as long as you keep your mouth shut.’

  ‘Rathbone knows.’ She braced herself for the explosion but her mother remained silent, still standing with her back to her. ‘Ma? Did you hear me?’

  She could see the tension stiffen her mother’s body as she threw crockery into the sink, crusts and all, turning the taps on full.

  ‘How?’ She turned and leaned against the sink, arms folded. ‘You didn’t bloody tell him, did you?’

  ‘’Course not! I’m not a complete idiot. He found out that I’d been away. There was an anonymous phone call, he said. He did some digging and found the birth certificate.’ Evie could feel the sting of tears, her head aching with the effort of holding them back.

  Her mother closed her eyes, her hands gripping the counter behind her now. Evie stood up slowly, ready to make her escape. She wanted to kick herself for being so silly, for getting so worked up over a few words. Hadn’t she always known that her mother blamed her for everything that had gone wrong in her life? It shouldn’t have been a surprise to hear her say it finally but just because you knew that a blade was sharp didn’t stop it from hurting when it sliced through skin.

  ‘Did you tell him anything else?’

  ‘I told Rathbone that she died,’ Evie said. ‘I told him what happened. I mean, he’ll have to leave me alone now, won’t he?’

  ‘Yes, love. You did well.’ Ma opened her eyes and smiled briefly, barely a flicker, but enough to soothe Evie’s concern. ‘Now don’t ruin it by doing something stupid. You do love Lawrie?’

  ‘Of course,’ Evie said. ‘And I trust him. More than anyone in the world.’

  ‘Never trust a man. Not with something like this, not even Lawrie. He does love you Evie, I know he does, but if he thinks for a second that you’re not the woman he thought you were…’ Ma shook her head. ‘He’ll be gone before you can blink.’

  She walked over then, her arms outstretched, and Evie let her mother comfort her though every inch of her skin itched to run away, to leave this house and never come back. Lawrie loved her. And if she wanted him to carry on loving her then she’d do as she was told and keep her mouth shut. He was her only chance of escape.

  ‘Lyceum tonight?’ Delia asked, the second Evie walked in to the office.

  ‘Why? So you can meet Sid and ditch me as soon as we get there?’ She’d meant it to sound jokey but her voice didn’t cooperate, the words emerging harshly from her throat. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered, taking her seat, ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’

  ‘You sure you’re all right?’ Delia tilted her head, staring intently at her friend. ‘You shouldn’t be here if you’re not feeling well still.’

  ‘I’m fine. Just tired, that’s all.’ And not in the mood for talking. She looked away, hoping that Delia would get the message. ‘Shall we go down?’

  Mrs Jones was giving out the day’s tasks to the typing pool when they got downstairs.

  ‘Nice of you to join us.’ Mildred smirked at the pair of them, even though they weren’t the last to arrive. ‘We were just saying, Evie, how sorry we felt for you.’

  ‘For me?’ Evie frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘All this business about the dead baby. My dad’s got friends in the police. He said they’ve been knocking on all the doors where you lot live. Have they questioned you yet?’

  They had all turned to stare, Evie’s face blazing with heat as she stammered out her reply: ‘It’s got nothing to do with me and, no, the police haven’t been round to my house.’

  ‘Well, that’s good to know.’ Mildred smiled once more, her eyes narrowed. ‘It would be awful if they got the wrong idea.’

  ‘What do you mean, wrong idea?’ Delia demanded.

  ‘Oh, nothing really. I was just thinking about that time when Evie was ill. None of us saw her for months! Paper says they suspect a man but I think maybe they should be looking for a woman instead.’ Mildred turned round as Mrs Jones reappeared at the front of the room.

  Delia linked her arm through Evie’s. ‘She’s full of rubbish,’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes,’ Evie agreed, but her heart raced. Surely if someone as naturally stupid as Mildred Thompson could guess Evie’s secret, then anyone could work it out.

  15

  Lawrie and Arthur arrived early at the Atlantic pub, but they weren’t the first there. Lawrie recognised quite a number of fellas already standing at the bar or seated around the table in the back room where Sonny had set himself up as chairman of whatever this was. Sonny’s face was set rigid, the most serious Lawrie had ever seen him. Before him was a notepad and pencil, and the drink that Moses passed to him looked like lemonade. Lawrie had never seen Sonny drink anything apart from beer, rum or whisky.

  He felt a nudge against his arm as he waited at the bar, look
ing over to see Johnny: ‘Glad you got home safely.’

  ‘Thanks to you.’ Lawrie winced. ‘Man, that must hurt.’

  ‘Ah.’ Johnny touched his face gingerly. His mouth was swollen, his cheek marred by a green and purple bruise. ‘Yes, Ursula was not impressed. I hope to God that bastard’s hand hurts as bad.’

  Arthur’s laugh was arid. ‘That devil is probably out there right now, telling anyone who will listen how he taught some monkey a lesson. I hear what they say ’bout me at work, and they don’ bother to check if I can hear or not. They don’ care. You think that’s the end of it? This is just the start, I tellin’ you.’

  ‘This was one drunk man with his drunker wife,’ Lawrie argued. ‘We learned a lesson: that we should stick to places we know, but there’s no reason to expect any more trouble. Nothing else has happened anywhere else.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Johnny slapped a hand against his thigh in agreement. ‘Things will settle down. Soon as they sort out this baby business. You hear what that fella say last night? I blame the newspapers, they the ones pointing the finger at us. They find the culprit and this all goes away. And I got my money on a woman. My Ursula, she loves herself a detective novel and she say to me that poisoning’s women’s business. That baby was fed something bad, the papers say. Not beaten or strangled which would be a man’s business.’ Johnny took a swig from the flask ‘That’s what Poirot says.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘This detective in Ursula’s books.’

  ‘Well, I for one would rather have a discussion with fellas like us than listen to some detective fella in a book.’ Arthur took his pint and they followed him to the head table, Moses waving them over.

  ‘Aston comin’ tonight?’ Sonny asked. ‘He knows ’bout this sort of thing.’

  Lawrie shook his head. ‘He went away for a few days. Said he was going down to somewhere on the coast. Bournemouth maybe? Then he wanted to head over to France. They go every year, the fellas he used to fly with. They like to go back and say thank you to the folk who helped them out during the war. Though from the sounds of it they just sit around drinking wine and eating cheese.’