Her Turn to Cry

by Chris Curran

  And in a moment that left her breathless the sick feeling that had been lodged in her stomach turned into something else. A burst of rage, hot and raw as a flame. She had tried to keep her head down and it had got her nowhere. Maybe she needed to confront this thing head on. And Sid was at the centre of it; she was sure of that. She needed to go and see him.

  As soon as they were back inside she grabbed the phone book and looked up the number of Cora’s theatrical agency. Without allowing herself to think about what she was doing she dialled the number, breathing easier when the call was answered by a young woman who must be Cora’s assistant. She remembered Sally’s imitation last night of Richie’s posh tones and twisted her own voice into a female version. ‘I’m following up on Mrs Sergeant’s lunch meeting yesterday.’

  ‘Oh yes, about the Val Doonican Show?’

  This might be easier than she’d expected. ‘That’s right. I’m Mr Doonican’s assistant, and I need to meet with Mr Sergeant himself today.’

  ‘Oh.’ The girl was flustered. Had she made a mistake and given herself away? She didn’t speak. ‘He’s on stage tonight, and Mrs Sergeant isn’t in the office at the moment.’

  She made her voice impatient. ‘Where’s he appearing?’

  ‘The Camberwell Empire but—’

  ‘That’s fine. I can see him before the show. Please call the theatre and get a message to Mr Sergeant to expect me and tell the stage doorman to make a note of my name. It’s Miss Jones, Charlotte Jones.’

  ‘OK, Miss Jones, but you should talk to Mrs Sergeant first.’

  ‘I’m sorry, we’re in the recording studio for the rest of the day. Can’t be disturbed. I’m sure it’ll be fine. I only need half an hour or so.’

  She threw the phone down on the hall table as if it had burnt her fingers and collapsed on the sofa breathing hard. Fatty ambled over to lay her head on Joycie’s knee, giving a tiny whine.

  ‘Oh Fatty, baby, what have I done?’

  When the phone rang she jumped up expecting it to be Cora, furious at the deception, or even Bill with more threats. She didn’t dare speak.

  ‘Joycie, are you there?’ Just Marcus. ‘I phoned the mag and they said you’d called in sick.’

  She let out a long breath. ‘It’s all right, she’s back, Fatty’s back.’ When she’d explained it all he said he’d try to get home early. ‘But I thought your dad was in town and you were meeting him this evening.’

  ‘It’s only a drink at his club. I can put him off.’

  Joycie spoke quickly; she didn’t want him to know where she was going until it was too late. ‘No, don’t do that. I’m fine, we’re both fine. Just having a lazy day in together.’

  ‘All right, but I’ll keep it short and get back as soon as I can.’

  When he’d rung off she forced herself to eat a sandwich, feed Fatty, and write a note:

  I’m sorry, Marcus, but I lied to you. I’ve gone to see Sid at the Camberwell Empire. Can’t go on like this looking over my shoulder all the time. If they can kidnap our dog and get into our back garden I need to do something to finish it. Don’t worry I’ll be quite safe.

  I love you, Joycie XXX

  The letter was for Marcus, of course, but in the back of her mind there was also the thought that it could be useful evidence if anything did happen to her. Because, whatever she had said to him, she wasn’t at all sure she would be safe.

  ***

  Joycie had never performed at the Camberwell Empire and she couldn’t remember her dad and Sid being on the bill there either, but it was so like all the other old theatres they had worked that it seemed familiar.

  Stone steps leading to heavy oak doors studded with small bevelled windows that showed glimpses of the dark foyer; the tiny cage-like box office to one side and posters for old shows in glass-fronted frames on the other. When the bulbs in the dusty chandelier were switched on the place would be all sparkle, but in the half-light of a grey summer evening it looked shabby.

  She paid for the taxi and walked round to the stage door. Here there had been no effort to make the place glamorous. A plain wooden door and, inside, brick walls painted dull yellow over a grubby floor. But still Joycie felt that old pang of excitement as she stepped inside. If there was any magic left, this was where you could feel it.

  She had dressed in her only suit, navy blue and straight-skirted, a plain silk blouse under the jacket. Her hair was twisted and lacquered into a French pleat. The doorman wasn’t the old codger she’d been hoping for but a young lad with a Beatle fringe and as he looked up she saw something spark in his eyes. She still looked too much like Orchid. She lowered her head, pretending to search her bag for something, and making her voice into a commanding snap. ‘Miss Jones, Charlotte Jones, for Mr Sergeant please. He’s expecting me.’

  Thank goodness: he must have decided he’d made a mistake and flipped open a book on the desk in front of him. ‘Oh right, yeah. Dressing room three just through there, Miss.’

  The dressing rooms were close enough that the doorman would hear her if she needed to shout for help, although she told herself Sid wouldn’t dare to touch her. She was someone these days, not a little girl dependent on him for her wages and those of her dad. He might have set Bill on her, but he wouldn’t dare to do anything openly.

  A pause and a deep breath, willing her hands and knees not to quiver and her voice to stay firm. She knocked on the door and called, ‘Mr Sergeant, it’s Charlotte Jones, Mr Doonican’s assistant. You’re expecting me.’

  His stage voice, loud and hearty, the northern accent exaggerated. ‘Come in, love.’

  He was sitting, as she’d expected, at the dressing table, in a paisley patterned dressing gown, like a cut-price Noel Coward. He turned and flashed his professional comic’s grin. The grin died. His eyes widened and for a blink she saw fear flit across his face, before he replaced it with a false smile.

  ‘Joyce my darling, how lovely to see you but I can’t talk right now I’m …’ A crack of laughter. ‘Oh, I see, you’re Miss Jones, are you? Clever girl.’ He slapped his palms on his knees. The laugh turning into a long chuckle.

  Joycie stayed where she was, one hand behind her on the doorknob ready to pull it open if she needed to. ‘I’ve come to ask if it was you who set that bloke Bill on me, and why.’

  Sid moved his chair round to face her. In the harsh light he looked old and worn, much more so than when she’d seen him at Irene’s funeral.

  ‘Cora told me about that,’ he said. ‘You being pestered by someone, but we can’t understand it. Why would anyone want to scare you? And why on earth do you think it might be us, darling?’ By the end of the speech he was breathless and his final few words came out on a wheeze. His face was mottled with red and purple, his lips almost blue.

  ‘I’ve been looking into the past and I think you were frightened about what I might find.’

  He coughed and shook his head, trying to get the breath to speak. Joycie waited, realizing that she had only planned those first two sentences and had no idea where to go from here.

  Finally Sid took in a rattling breath and said, ‘Look, Joyce love, I admit I’ve been a bad boy. Always was one for the girls. Couldn’t help myself when I was younger. I’m older and wiser now and I’ll never forgive myself for the way I treated my poor Cora over the years. She didn’t deserve it.’ He looked down and brushed a fleck of cotton from his dressing gown before saying almost to himself. ‘But it was harmless, you know, just a bit of fun.’ When he looked at her again his faded brown eyes were glassy.

  ‘So you call what you did to me when I was fourteen harmless fun, do you?’ He started to say something, but she spoke over him. ‘You attacked me. If Dad hadn’t come in and stopped it I dread to think how far you would have gone.’

  He stretched his hands out towards her, palms open in surrender. ‘I’m so sorry about that, my love. Trying it on with you was unforgivable. But I just couldn’t help it; you were so lovely. I can’t tell you how grateful
I am that your dad stopped me making an even worse fool of myself. But you must know I would never have done anything to hurt you.’

  A hot, hot, gush of rage that made her want to slam her fist into his fat, smiling face. Instead she tightened her fingers on the door handle until they tingled and thrust her other hand into her pocket. ‘But you did hurt me and it still hurts.’

  He was looking down again, shaking his head, his voice almost a whisper. ‘If that’s true then I apologize. I honestly didn’t realize.’

  ‘And what about the other girls? The ones who didn’t have a dad to save them?’

  When he spoke again his voice was firm. ‘Look, I can understand why you’re angry with me and I can only say again how sorry I am. I’ll never understand why Cora put up with me for all those years. Thank the Lord I’m too old for that kind of stuff now, but I did betray her more than once. You must believe me though, Joyce my darling, it was only with girls who were willing.’

  ‘What about Pauline Shaw? I bet she wasn’t willing.’ She hated her voice for trembling. He didn’t speak; just shook his head as if he’d never heard the name. So she said, ‘Pauline Shaw, from Clacton. Mrs Shaw’s daughter.’

  His hand went to his mouth, rubbing his lips, and although he continued to shake his head, she was sure he knew who she was talking about. A shaky laugh. ‘Blimey, Clacton, we haven’t been back there for years. Wasn’t Mrs Shaw’s girl your mate?’

  ‘Yes, and she got pregnant the summer after my dad died. When you were appearing there.’

  Sid flopped back in his chair with a heavy sigh. ‘I see. So she got herself knocked up, and she’s told you it was me, has she? Well why wait all this time to come out with it?’

  ‘She hasn’t told me or anyone because the chances are she’s dead.’

  The blue tinge was beginning to ebb away from his lips, the purple in his cheeks to fade back to red. He either knew already or just didn’t care. ‘I’m sorry about that, but it’s got nothing to do with me.’

  This was hopeless. She took a long breath, trying to organize her thoughts. ‘I don’t believe you, but we both know I can’t prove you tried it on with Pauline. Nobody can now. And you must know there would be no point in me going to the police about what you did to me. So I can’t understand why you feel the need to scare me.’

  He sighed and began to stand, holding onto the dressing table to lever himself upright. ‘OK, I’ve had enough now.’ A coughing fit seized him and he sank into the chair again, leaning over and gasping for breath.

  When he finally tried to speak she didn’t give him time. ‘Is it something to do with my mum? Is that what you’re so worried about?’

  ‘This is madness, Joyce. You’re not going to try and blame me for that now, are you?’

  ‘I only know you seem to have something serious to hide. Otherwise why would you need to get someone to follow me, watch me, steal my dog?’ It was all going wrong. She felt out of control. ‘Just tell me the truth, Sid. The truth about it all. That’s the only thing I want.’ She hated the pleading note she could hear in her own voice.

  The door behind her banged against her back.

  ‘Hello, hello. Who’s in there? Sid, what’s going on?’

  Cora’s voice, and the door handle rattling against her fingers. Joycie stepped back to let her in.

  Cora’s face was glossy under the make-up, her eyes hard, and Joycie couldn’t stop herself from flinching back from her furious stare. ‘I thought it had to be something to do with you,’ she said. ‘That idiot girl in my office, letting you sneak your way in here.’ She looked at Sid, her face softening. ‘Are you all right, love?’

  His breath was loud. ‘It’s fine, Cora. No harm done. Poor Joyce is a bit upset that’s all.’ Joycie could almost believe he was concerned about her when he smiled over at her and wheezed, ‘I can understand why you can’t forget what happened with your mum, darling, but you should let it be.’

  Cora went to him and smoothed his wispy hair. ‘You relax now and take it easy, love. Let me deal with this.’

  She grabbed Joycie’s arm, her fingers biting into the soft flesh above her elbow. ‘Now, look, this is not on. I don’t care how famous you are you’ve no right to behave like this. Lying about being someone else, accusing people of all sorts.’

  Joycie went to speak, but there was too much swirling around in her head and she couldn’t find the words. She felt sick and everything looked distorted, as if in a dream; a nightmare.

  Cora moved back into the corridor and Joycie found herself there too; whether pushed by Cora or of her own volition she wasn’t sure. Cora spoke in a hoarse whisper. ‘Sid’s not well. Surely you can see that. I can’t let you upset him like this.’

  ‘All I want is to know what really happened to my mum. Just tell me everything and that’ll be it. You don’t need to see or hear from me again.’

  Cora stood back and folded her arms. Her eyes were slivers of blue ice almost hidden in thick folds of flesh. ‘I’ve told you. I’ve told you all I know. Your dad got drunk as a skunk that night and was crying and raving for hours. Sid wouldn’t tell me everything he said, but we guessed something had happened between them: something nasty. And that’s why Sid sent me round to your lodgings. And – well – you know what I found.’

  Joycie’s chest seemed to have squeezed closed. She leaned her forehead against the brick wall, but it was warm and clammy and she was sure she was about to be sick.

  When Cora touched her she flinched away.

  ‘See what you’ve done, you silly girl. You’ve upset Sid and now you’ve upset yourself. We all know what really happened to your mum, don’t we? But at the time me and Sid thought it best to say nothing and we were right. At least that way you still had Charlie. And we knew he didn’t mean to hurt your mum, so blabbing about it would have done more harm than good.’

  She had to get away from this clammy corridor, from Cora’s cloying scent, but when she tried to walk she staggered and clutched the wall.

  Cora shouted, ‘Darren,’ and the doorman appeared. ‘The young lady’s feeling faint, needs some fresh air.’

  Joycie let him take her arm. She felt as if she was walking on cotton wool, but when he opened the door and made to come out with her she managed to shake her head and say, ‘It’s all right, I’m fine.’

  Thank goodness, he dropped her arm and closed the door. She leaned back on it for a moment, breathing in the cool air. It was gloomy and must have been raining while she was inside because the street lights were reflected in dozens of little puddles. She told herself not to think about it yet. She would be all right when she got home. But as she moved away from the door a surge of dizziness caught her and she had to lean over, clutching her stomach, and throw up in the puddled gutter.

  Chapter Seventeen

  She should have asked the taxi driver to come back for her, but when she arrived she’d been so focused on what she was about to do it hadn’t entered her head. The rain started up again, heavy and steady this time, as she headed to the front of the theatre and along the road to where she thought the railway station might be. She’d find a taxi rank there.

  A car splashed through the puddles and slowed to a stop. She flinched into her jacket. Please God, not Bill, not now.

  It was the Morgan. And Marcus, flinging the passenger door open as he stopped. She stumbled round and climbed in. Her skirt clung to her and a hank of wet hair, escaping from the French pleat, trailed across her cheek.

  Marcus pulled the car away so hard she jerked back in her seat. The windscreen wipers were going fast and he had to rub steam from inside the glass with the sleeve of his jacket. When they were moving steadily again he said, his voice tight with anger, ‘What the hell are you playing at?’

  She bit her lip, the aftertaste of vomit still in her mouth. Don’t, don’t be like that, I can’t bear it. He looked over and his voice softened just a touch. ‘Why didn’t you at least wait for me? Anything could have happened to you.’


  She managed to say, ‘I got so angry about it all. Just had to do something to stop it.’

  They pulled up at traffic lights and she saw that his jaw was set hard. ‘And have you?’ he said. ‘Stopped it, I mean?’

  When she shook her head wet strands of hair plastered themselves across her lips, making her feel sick again. She pushed the hair away and groped at the clips to undo the rest, but only succeeded in bringing down another wet hank. ‘No. I was so sure Sid must have had something to do with whatever happened to my mum, but I don’t know any more.’

  ‘So did you find out anything at all that was useful?’ His voice was still tight.

  It was too much. When she tried to speak the hot tears began to pour down her cold cheeks. She didn’t try to wipe them away, just sat staring ahead and feeling something close to relief as she let the misery flood out. Marcus shot a quick look over at her and didn’t speak for the rest of the journey.

  When they got home she went to the kitchen for a glass of water then started up the stairs. ‘I’m going to have a bath.’

  She had peeled off her wet clothes and was sitting wrapped in a big towel on the edge of the bath, waiting for it to fill, when he knocked on the door. For a moment she regretted not locking it but, no, she had to talk to him. ‘It’s open.’

  Marcus perched on the toilet. ‘I’m sorry, Joycie, it’s just that you scared the fuck out of me. What were you thinking going there on your own?’

  ‘I needed to talk to Sid alone. To see his reaction.’

  ‘And did it help?’

  She turned off the taps and trailed her fingers in the water. It was too hot. ‘Not really.’ She tried to smile at him, but her chin wobbled and she looked away again, adding more cold water to the bath. ‘Cora arrived and threw me out, but I did have a few minutes with Sid and …’ She couldn’t go on.

  Marcus reached over to test the bath water. ‘It’s perfect now. I’ll leave you to it.’