This Lovely City

by Louise Hare

  ‘Sam locked the door, that no good…’ Lawrie shook his head.

  ‘Sam? Hmmm. You like this girl then?’

  ‘Yes.’ Lawrie lowered his voice, unsure how far it would carry. ‘The thing with Rose, it was just, it was a mistake, you understand? I never meant for it to happen.’

  ‘I understand completely. You know, you just slip over and land upon her and next thing you know.’ Aston cackled as he mimed what he imagined Lawrie and Rose had been up to.

  ‘All right, laugh at me all you want but help me get out of this,’ Lawrie begged. ‘It’s Evie I like, not Rose. I’d happily never see Rose Armstrong again.’

  ‘Well, isn’t that nice to know!’

  The woman in question appeared, as if things weren’t going badly enough already. The only person left to turn up who could make Lawrie’s predicament any worse was Rose’s husband.

  ‘Rose, I’m sorry. I—’

  ‘Why you apologising?’ Aston interrupted. ‘Is she not the one got you into this mess?’

  ‘I only meant to let Evie down gently.’ Rose stepped around Aston as if he weren’t there ‘She holds such a candle for you, darling, and it seemed kinder to put her out of her misery.’

  Darling? ‘Rose, maybe this is all my fault…’

  ‘Most likely,’ Aston muttered.

  ‘… but I never meant for what happened to – happen. I didn’t turn up at your house for that. It just – things got out of hand. You understand?’

  Rose stared at him, the smile fixed to her face like it had been welded on.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated. ‘But, you know, you are married.’

  She laughed and looked down at the floor. ‘You know, you are right about that. Imagine if my husband were to find out what you did. That I invited you round in good faith, to help you out. And you took advantage.’ The words were brittle, the shine in her eyes giving her away.

  Aston cursed. ‘Woman, you crazy? You want him to come over here lookin’ for murder?’

  ‘My husband is a very jealous man. You found that out already.’ She shot Lawrie a look so sharp that he felt wounded. It was the first time she’d admitted to knowing that it was Frank who’d given him the black eye on that very first night in London.

  ‘Come on, Rose, please!’

  She turned back the way she came, her heels hammering against each step as if she wanted to cause damage.

  ‘I never shoulda listened to you!’ Lawrie hit the wall. ‘What now?’

  ‘Boy, you better run after her. She gets her husband ’round here, all hell’s like to break loose,’ Aston warned.

  ‘What about Evie?’

  ‘I’ll wait right here and if she come out I’ll tell her that you’re sorry and that you’re an idiot.’

  Lawrie paused. ‘You can’t tell her where I’ve gone. Don’t mention Rose’s name at all.’

  ‘The bitch’s name will never cross my lips. Cross my heart.’

  He left Aston there watching guard as he sped downstairs and out of the house just in time to see Rose turn the corner. He sprinted after her.

  ‘You stay away from me or I’ll scream.’ She didn’t look up when he drew level, just quickened her pace.

  ‘Why, Rose? I’m sorry, I really am, but did you think we could just carry on behind your husband’s back?’ He waited but she didn’t say anything. ‘If you weren’t married, things would be different,’ he lied, crossing his fingers behind his back. ‘Then we’d both be free.’

  ‘And Evie is free. Is that it?’ She looked up and he saw that she was only just holding back tears. ‘Is that all it is? ’Cause I could leave Frank. I’d leave him tomorrow if I could but I’ve nowhere to go.’

  ‘Then you picked the wrong fella in me.’ He forced a laugh. ‘I got nothin’, Rose. No money, renting a tiny room in a house, just a single bed. I can’t look after you, Rose, not as well as Frank does.’

  ‘Money isn’t everything. He’s never at home. Just eats the food I put in front of him and goes out to the pub. All them years worrying that he might not come back and now I wonder if I’d not have been better off if he hadn’t.’ She gasped and covered her mouth with her hand. ‘Oh God. I never dared say it out loud before.’

  ‘You just say that because you think he doesn’t care about you. Maybe you do still love him.’ Lawrie was grasping at straws, he knew, but if he could just calm her down and send her home wanting to save her marriage instead of end it then he might be safe. ‘And maybe he does still love you, just doesn’t know how to show it.’

  ‘He thinks we have a normal marriage. We have a nice holiday every summer. He sees me in my fancy clothes and thinks I’m having a ball.’ Rose laughed. ‘He hasn’t a clue!’

  ‘Where does he think you are tonight?’

  ‘Dunno. We were supposed to be going out for dinner in town. He’d promised and he ditched me to play golf in Wimbledon. He says he needs to hobnob with the bosses if he wants to get ahead at work.’

  They reached the bus stop and Lawrie shifted his weight awkwardly from foot to foot. He wanted to run back to the house and go to Evie but he wasn’t convinced that it was safe to leave Rose.

  ‘What you said before,’ he began, interrupted as the bus pulled up. Typical, the one time it came straight away was when he just needed another few minutes. Rose didn’t seem to have heard him, jumping on board. He went after her, following her upstairs. He had to be absolutely sure that she wasn’t going to have another change of heart.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she asked as he sat in front of her. ‘I don’t need you to escort me home, you know.’

  ‘Sorry, I just – I need to make sure that you’re not going to say anything. To Frank.’

  ‘Ah.’ She bit her lip and looked him in the eye. ‘You think you get off that easy?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Lawrie shook his head. ‘I never meant for you to think…’

  ‘You never think!’ She was almost shouting now. ‘What is it with men? Do you think this was just a bit of fun for me? I brought you to my home. To the bed I share with my husband. You thought that meant nothing?’

  ‘I didn’t know,’ he protested, his voice low in compensation for hers. ‘I never expected what – happened. I didn’t go to your house expecting anything other than a bath and a clean shirt. I promise you.’

  He looked around but the upper deck was blessedly empty. They were almost at Clapham Common already. He checked his watch carefully, not wanting her to notice. It had been fifteen minutes since he’d left the party.

  ‘Go away, Lawrie.’ She shook her head in disgust and turned away from him. ‘I can’t bear to have you near me.’

  She looked smaller now, young, her cheeks smeared grey where she’d wiped mascaraed tears away. She’d keep quiet, he was almost sure of that. With his thoughts already turning back to Evie, he stood and rang the bell. ‘I am sorry, Rose,’ he said over his shoulder.

  He trudged down the stairs, glad they’d made it no further than the stop opposite the tube station. He could run across the road and with luck a bus would come in the next few minutes to carry him back home.

  The bus came to a halt and, as he put his foot out expecting to strike the ground, he felt a shove in his back, stumbling off the back of the bus.

  ‘What the hell?’ He turned to see Rose’s furious face as she followed him onto the pavement.

  She lifted her hand and he watched it happen, her hand moving slowly through the air as it made its way to his cheek, the palm slapping him, quite hard for a woman, he thought.

  ‘Rose?’

  It was more a bark than a shout and at first Lawrie thought that the sound had issued from his own mouth. But no. Rose turned to look and Lawrie was horrified to see that Frank Armstrong was right across the road, red-faced and furious. A bus pulled up on the other side of the road, Lawrie’s bus back home, blocking him from view.

  ‘Oh God.’ The colour had drained from Rose’s face. ‘Lawrie, get out of here. I’ll sort this
out.’

  ‘I can’t just leave you.’ The words came out of his mouth but his brain told him to run away as fast as his feet would move. ‘What if he…’

  ‘Just bloody go, would you?’ She shoved him, hard. ‘Stop trying to be a hero. He won’t lay a finger on me, he won’t dare.’ She pushed him again.

  Lawrie looked over his shoulder but when he turned back it was too late. Frank was right in front of him, his fist pulled back. Lawrie managed to lift an arm in front of his face, bracing for impact.

  ‘Stop it, Frank!’

  He heard the thud of the connection and fell backwards, his head bouncing off the metal of the bus stop sign. It was the last thing he remembered until waking up in hospital the following morning.

  21

  Lawrie woke up early, even though he hadn’t set his alarm clock – or had a job to go to, the realisation weighing heavy upon him once the memory swam back into his sluggish brain. It took more than the usual effort to will his body upright, treading on Aston’s hand as he swung his legs out of bed.

  ‘The hell?’ Aston sounded as if he’d only been half asleep himself.

  ‘Sorry. Forgot you were there.’ Lawrie lay back down, his head spinning. He’d drunk too much the night before and every thought took an effort to catch hold of, like trying to spear slippery pickled onions from a jar of vinegar.

  Aston had been drinking with Derek in the kitchen when he got home just after midnight, still dwelling on his near encounter with Frank Armstrong. Everything was against him at the moment apart from Evie. The way she’d taken control of the situation, stopping that cab when he had been paralysed with indecision. He was sick and tired of Frank Armstrong getting the best of him.

  ‘You know this can’t go on, you comin’ and goin’ as you please.’ Lawrie reached for the whisky bottle. ‘I get married soon and then what? You think Evie’s goin’ make up the sofa for you to sleep on? I tell you now that she won’t.’

  ‘Look, I just need somewhere for a few days. I had a place sorted but it fell through temporarily is all. You know how grateful I am.’ There was that Bayley grin, Aston’s calling card. The way he’d escaped trouble his whole damned life. Now it just turned Lawrie’s mood sourer.

  Derek yawned. ‘Christ, you two are like an old married couple. I hear my bed calling. Lawrie, let me know tomorrow if you want to take me up on that offer. I got a delivery coming in the morning.’

  ‘What offer?’ Aston asked, as soon as Derek had closed the door behind him.

  ‘I lost my job,’ Lawrie told him. ‘Derek offered me some extra deliveries.’

  ‘What?’ Aston sat up. ‘What happen?’

  ‘Guess.’ Lawrie’s laugh was bitter as he poured whisky into Derek’s dirty glass and drank.

  ‘That copper?’ Aston kissed his teeth. ‘Man, that is not good. What Evie say?’

  ‘Nothing. I ain’t told her yet.’

  Another cowardly action. He’d paid for dinner, for an extra round of drinks, even though he knew that he should be being careful. Sid had been impressed by him, he could tell, and that didn’t happen all that often. It was a nice feeling and he’d been happy to open his wallet to prolong it and worry about the consequences later. Besides, it was still so easy to tell himself that it wasn’t permanent. Donovan had said so, that if they caught the real killer then Lawrie would be in with a chance of getting his job back.

  ‘This delivery of Derek’s. Legit?’

  Lawrie laughed again. ‘What d’you think? I got no choice. Weddings don’t pay for themselves and since Evie fell out with her mother I can’t exactly ask old Agnes for help.’

  ‘She tell you why they fell out?’ Aston poured another two fingers into each of their glasses.

  ‘No. I think she was goin’ to tell me tonight but we ran into the Armstrongs, of all people. Ended up runnin’ away like a little boy.’

  Aston bent down, looking under the table.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Lawrie pushed back his chair to see.

  ‘Just checkin’ is all. Makin sure you still got two feet ’cause it seems to me like you don’t want to put even one of them down where that girl is concerned.’ Aston burst into cackling laughter. He was drunk, Lawrie realised, not that he was sober himself.

  ‘You don’t like her, that’s fine, but it don’t change what I feel about her. She’ll tell me in her own time.’ He slung back the rest of the whisky and stood. ‘I goin’ to bed.’

  ‘You make sure she do tell you,’ Aston called after him. ‘That girl’s got a secret and I would bet good money that you won’t like it when you find out what it is.’

  That morning, as Lawrie lay there, looking up at the ceiling with its web of cracks, the yellowing paint which hadn’t been touched up in a decade or more, he suddenly remembered Moses’s revelation, the girl on Oxford Street. He’d meant to throw it in Aston’s face the moment he saw him but after the attack on Johnny’s house, with everything else going on, he’d completely forgotten.

  ‘Who’s Elaine?’ he asked now, rolling onto his side.

  ‘What?’ Aston’s eyes opened but he didn’t move. ‘I don’t know any Elaine.’

  ‘Fine, maybe Moses got her name wrong. Pretty woman you was seen with on Oxford Street lookin’ all cosy. You remember now?’

  ‘Oh.’ Aston sat up, looking shameful. ‘I been meanin’ to tell you ’bout that.’

  ‘So you got secrets of your own? Go round pointing fingers but you just as bad.’

  ‘No, man. It’s not like that. I’ll tell you it all now, how’s that.’ He reached out and poked Lawrie’s arm, like it was all a game.

  Lawrie said nothing, waiting.

  Aston sighed. ‘Her name’s Helene. I known her five years or so, on and off. She’s French. Came here during the war with her family. They’re Jewish. She married a fella she knew for years, old family friend, but he treat her bad. ’Bout a year or so ago I met her for a nice lunch. She’s well off, eats in those fancy restaurants that wouldn’t let me in if I weren’t with her. I had a little too much champagne to drink – I swear those bubbles make your head go funny – and I end up tellin’ her that I love her.’

  ‘You did what?’ Lawrie couldn’t imagine it. ‘She’s married, though?’

  ‘See that’s why I had to keep quiet. Her husband beat her and I convinced her to go to the police, get him arrested. She went to a solicitor and between that and some other things he did, she gettin’ a divorce. That’s where we are. Waitin’ for that to all be finalised. The husband, he showed up a few days ago, knocking on her door and beggin’ for her to reconsider. That’s why I ended up here on your floor ’stead of Helene’s warm bed.’ He lay back down and closed his eyes. ‘See, if he finds out about me he’ll make trouble. She gets to keep the house and some money. He finds out she been cheatin’ then he’ll try and take all that back.’

  ‘You were in London then, that week when I found the baby.’ Just say that you weren’t there, Lawrie begged his friend silently. Just don’t have been anywhere near here.

  ‘I was in Notting Hill with Helene,’ Aston confirmed. ‘Ask her if you like. I want you to meet her anyway. Come over next weekend. Bring Evie.’

  ‘Christ, you must be desperate if you’re inviting Evie.’ His effort at levity sank. ‘Look, I do believe you. I just wish you’d told me it all at the beginning. Too much lying. We supposed to be friends.’

  ‘I know. But Lawrie, I ain’t never felt like this before. She is the one for me.’

  Lawrie had to laugh then. Aston Bayley head over heels in love? If it wasn’t before, the world was now completely topsy-turvy.

  ‘We good?’ Aston sat up. ‘What time is it? I got me a job interview at nine. Best not be late.’

  Lawrie laid back down and closed his eyes. How had this happened, that Aston was now settling down, getting a proper job, just as everything was going wrong for Lawrie? He embraced the cold despair that was becoming far too familiar to him and fell back asleep in its arms.

&n
bsp; Aston was gone when he woke again just after ten, his head a little clearer than before. He’d meant to go down to the labour exchange but it was Friday after all. He’d not had a day of leave in months. Maybe he should walk down to the market and find out exactly how illegal this work that Derek was offering him was.

  He dressed and went out, cursing under his breath as he saw the red Morris Minor had returned. He quickened his pace as he saw Rathbone getting out.

  ‘Mr Matthews!’

  He should have stopped but he was almost at the corner. Damned if he was going to put himself out for this man after what he’d done. He heard the sound of running footsteps and speeded up but Rathbone caught him as he turned onto Brixton Hill.

  ‘Did you not hear me, Mr Matthews?’ Rathbone laid a hand on his shoulder and it took all of Lawrie’s willpower not to shake it off.

  ‘Sorry, DS Rathbone. Didn’t realise that was you.’ He stopped walking then, knowing the game was lost.

  ‘You’re not at work today?’

  Lawrie shoved his clenched fists into his jacket pockets and tried not to think about punching away Rathbone’s gloating smile. ‘I’m out of work at the moment. Thought you would know that.’

  ‘No hard feelings, eh? Donovan’s a weasel of a man anyway. Didn’t take much to rattle him.’

  He had to marvel at this man. No matter how much Rathbone tried to ruin his life, he always managed to make it sound like he was just doing Lawrie a favour.

  ‘I didn’t know you cared.’ He kicked his heel at the wall. ‘So why are you making my life miserable, eh? ’Cause you think I’ll confess just to have a roof over my head once the rent money runs out?’

  ‘Not exactly.’ Rathbone’s expression turned calculating. ‘See, I’m actually trying to help you out, son.’ There was that favour again. ‘If you’ve got no job then you can’t pay for a wedding, right? I noticed your girl’s left home. Staying with a friend, is she? I bet she can’t wait for you to get that ring on her finger.’

  Lawrie kept quiet. How the hell did Rathbone know so much about Evie all of a sudden?

  ‘Honestly, I don’t think you had anything to do with the Ophelia case, Mr Matthews, but I think you know someone who does.’ Rathbone reached into his pocket and produced a sheet of paper which he handed to Lawrie. ‘That’s for you. Call it an early wedding present.’