Ruby

by Marie Maxwell

  He stared at her but this time instead of seeing Ruby and Johnnie he saw George and Babs Wheaton: the people who had been so good and kind to him; the people who had rescued him and given him a life away from the den. They were the ones he was hurting and he couldn’t do it to them.

  He jumped up and went back outside. Leaning against a tree, he breathed deeply, trying to get some air into the bottom of his sickly lungs as he’d been taught. It helped clear his head a little and lessened the pain of his excruciating headache.

  At the same time a second plan started to form. It would be too easy to let Ruby off scot-free, and if he was going to be homeless and jobless he would need money, and he wanted it from Ruby Blakeley. The one who started the whole thing. The one who had caused his house of cards to topple.

  ‘Come on then, little Maggie. This was just a game. Let’s go back. But you did like my den, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ she sniffed hopefully.

  ‘Good. You mustn’t tell anyone about it, though. Now, we’ll go and get my bike and take you home but I have to go to the phone box. We have another game to play first. It’s called How Loud Can You Scream?’

  ‘What about the wild animals? Won’t they get us?’

  ‘No. I’ve got special powers, but I’ll carry you, just to be sure.’

  Derek Yardley carried the little girl to where he had left his bike. He placed her on the handlebars and then went a longer way out of the dense woods so Maggie would lose her bearings. He didn’t want anyone ever finding his secret place.

  After propping his bike up against a tree he put the girl down, took her hand and cautiously crossed the road to the layby that was at the entrance to a quiet lane, where there was a line of tied cottages and a phone box.

  ‘I want you to sit on the grass right there and don’t move until I call you. And then I want you to scream really loudly down the phone to your mummy.’

  He smiled at the irony and fumbled in his pocket for his diary where he had written all the details he had for Ruby.

  He dialled the number for the Thamesview Hotel.

  ‘I want to speak to Ruby Blakeley,’ he said, confident in his plan. But Ruby wasn’t there. He didn’t know what to do next. He needed money to get away.

  As he flicked through his diary, trying to decide what to do, he saw Maggie stand up and wander towards the road.

  He flung the phone-box door open. ‘Maggie, come back, come back here!’ he shouted as loud as he could, but instead of stopping she ran. Straight into the path of a car.

  Yardley didn’t know what to do. He started to go towards where the child lay in the road, but when the driver got out he panicked and ran back over the road, jumped on his bike, took one last look over his shoulder and then rode like the wind back into the woods and back to his den.

  When he got there he laid down on the lumpy mattress, pulled the cover over himself and savoured the excruciating pain of his headache.

  It was his punishment.

  Babs and George Wheaton were waiting down by the gate at nearly midnight when the police car pulled up outside.

  ‘Your daughter is safe but she’s got a few cuts and bruises so she needs a check-up at the hospital tomorrow. She was hit by a car, but luckily it was someone on the lookout for her so it was going very slowly. She needs some other checks as well, but as you’re a doctor … ?’ The policeman conveyed exactly what he meant with those few words.

  There was a queue of well-wishers outside the surgery who, after fearing the worst, were all waiting to see the little girl brought safely back home.

  As the car door opened, so Babs, trying to pretend she wasn’t crying, snatched her up and hugged her as tightly as she could. She had never felt such fear in her life.

  ‘Mummy’, Maggie cried, ‘Yardley was all horrid and not nice. We went to his den in the woods but I didn’t want to sleep there in the dark. It was smelly and dirty but the nice lady washed my face and wrapped me in her blanket.’

  ‘Let’s go inside into the warm and then you can tell us all about your adventure,’ George said with a smile.

  Once indoors, the two police officers explained as much as they knew: that one of the tenants at the cottages had helped the driver tend to Maggie and then taken her indoors to his wife before using the phone box to call the police. No one had seen Derek Yardley.

  ‘Did he hurt you? Yardley, I mean – did Yardley hurt you?’ Babs asked nervously.

  ‘No, he carried me so the wild animals couldn’t hurt me.’

  ‘And where’s Yardley now?’ George asked, looking at the policeman standing in the doorway. ‘Why didn’t he bring you all the way home?’

  ‘After the car knocked me down he went away really fast on his bike.’ The little girl turned the corners of her mouth down. ‘He’s horrid, I don’t want him to live here any more.’

  ‘He won’t, darling, I promise. It’s all right now.’

  ‘Can I see Scruffy?’

  George and Babs exchanged looks over her head. Neither of them needed to say a word.

  Thirty

  Ruby was upstairs in the flat recovering from her life-threatening haemorrhage and trying to understand everything that had happened during the previous weeks. Her brain was still a bit befuddled from all the medication, but she kept thinking about it over and over and torturing herself with blame. It had been so dramatic she still palpitated thinking not only about what happened, but also what could have happened. And if the unthinkable had happened to Maggie, it would have been her fault. Now she was going to have to live with that.

  By the time she had recovered consciousness after her collapse Gracie was at her bedside waiting to tell her that Maggie had been found and she was alive and well. The child was scared and clingy, but miraculously nothing irreparable had happened to her. Yardley hadn’t hurt her physically, although he had badly frightened her.

  When she heard what had happened to Maggie, Ruby had intended to tell George and Babs about what Yardley had done to her, and she had been about to do just that when she had collapsed, but even if she had told them at that moment it would have been too late to save Maggie. Now it was her dark secret and she was going to have to keep it; after failing to speak out at the right time she could never disclose it now.

  Despite an intensive search the police hadn’t found any trace of Yardley, or his den in the woods; everyone feared the worst for the mentally fragile man.

  ‘Hey, Ruby, you’ve got a visitor,’ Gracie shouted up the stairs, interrupting her dark thoughts. ‘Shall I send him up?’

  ‘Depends who it is?’ Ruby said as loudly as she could, knowing full well it was Johnnie Riordan. She was expecting him and she had invited him.

  The bunch of flowers came in the door first.

  ‘Hello there, Red. How are you feeling? The shiners are impressive; do any boxer proud!’

  ‘Bit by bit I’m improving,’ she smiled. ‘I can laugh now without thinking my chest is going to burst open. The ribs are so painful and the arm’s going to be in plaster for a while, but I’m OK really.’

  Ruby was ensconced in Aunt Leonora’s old chair with her feet up, and her plastered arm was propped up on a cushion, but she’d drawn the line at the blanket Gracie had offered her. They was no denying that she was pale and poorly, and the bruises were still evident, but she’d put on some lipstick, patted some powder around her black eyes and let Gracie brush and shape her hair.

  ‘So, I got your cryptic letter via our Betty and I even managed to figure out what you meant. I could have been a code-breaker in the war.’

  ‘Did Betty know it was from me? I hoped typing the envelope would stop her from wondering about it.’

  ‘Well, it did and it didn’t. It never occurred to her it was personal so she decided I was in trouble and gave me gyp for it!’ He laughed and looked at her. ‘I’m not in trouble, am I?’

  Ruby looked at him and felt the familiar lump in her throat. A part of her wanted him out of her life for ever, b
ut another part wanted to be with him for ever.

  ‘No trouble … well, not that I know of, anyway,’ Ruby replied lightly. ‘I just had no other way to contact you and I thought we still had unfinished business. Imagining I was going to kick the bucket made me think about my life and all the things I should have organised, and in a way that included you!’

  Johnnie went over and sat on the arm of the sofa opposite Ruby.

  ‘Imagining you were going to kick the bucket made me think as well. I really thought that was it for you, and when I turned up here, happy as Larry, to see you and Gracie told me what had happened I felt quite sick and I couldn’t even go to visit you.’ He looked at her intently. ‘What did happen? Gracie seemed to think your fiancé was somehow involved.’

  ‘Let’s leave it that I tripped. It’s not important now and Gracie shouldn’t be gossiping.’

  ‘She wasn’t gossiping, she was upset, but yes, let’s leave that for the minute. Unfinished business, you say? Does that mean there’s going to be a finish for me? Is that what this is all about?’

  ‘I suppose it is. There has to be, with things as they are,’ she said sadly. ‘A wife and children means there’s no going back.’

  ‘Hang on, let’s not forget a fiancé …’

  ‘He’s not a fiancé any more. That’s finished. Look …’ she held her hand up and wiggled her fingers. ‘No ring. The beautiful diamonds had to go!’

  Johnnie walked over to the balcony and stepped outside.

  ‘Bit nippy out here without a pullover!’ He wrapped his arms around himself and hunched his shoulders as he looked from side to side at the vista of the Thames Estuary. ‘It’s so beautiful from up here. I can understand why you like working and living in this gaff. That view is fantastic. But how come you got the penthouse?’

  ‘Because this is my hotel. I own it.’ As he turned round Ruby stared him straight in the eye. It was a definite challenge so she could judge his reaction.

  ‘Blimey,’ Johnnie said after a few seconds’ thought. ‘And there was me thinking I was the entrepreneur of Elsmere!’

  ‘Not quite an entrepreneur – I inherited it – but I’ve worked here since I left Walthamstow so I know it inside out, and now I own it. Isn’t that odd? I must have done a good job for Leonora to leave it to me, mustn’t I?’

  ‘Not odd at all. There always was something special about you! How did it all happen?’

  Ruby told him the story. It both amused and saddened her that they were so comfortable with each other. She knew she could tell him anything.

  Anything but the secret about Maggie. His daughter. Not because she didn’t want to but because she’d promised the Wheatons.

  ‘Tell me about your life, your marriage and what happened to Ray and Bobbie that day.’

  He looked at her and raised his eyebrows. ‘Tall order, that …’

  ‘I know,’ she smiled sadly, ‘but we might never see each other again after today so take a seat and let’s dig all the skeletons out, eh?’

  Johnnie walked over to the sofa and sat down.

  ‘I’ve already told you about Sadie and my marriage …’

  ‘Ray and Bobbie?’

  ‘Yes, that was me. Well, not me – someone else did it – but I arranged for them to take a bit of a beating. But I gave them a pay rise when I became the boss!’

  ‘They were badly hurt, really badly, especially Ray. It wasn’t so much what happened, but your part in it.’

  ‘That wasn’t what I wanted. I used the wrong bloke. I thought I knew best, but even Bill Morgan warned me against him. They were stealing my business. Now I wouldn’t be so angry, but back then …’

  Ruby thought for a moment and then smiled. ‘And there was I thinking you’d done it for me. Ray and Bobbie warned me about you but I took no notice, so we’re quits.’

  ‘That is not fair. They weren’t right. I never did anything to hurt you. I loved you, and you ran off and never came back – well, not until it was too late. I would never hurt you.’

  Ruby stared at him and was surprised to see him turn red and look away.

  ‘I shouldn’t have said that.’

  ‘Yes, you should. There were reasons I went. I know I should have told you, but …’ She looked at him sadly. ‘Oh, Johnnie, how could we both have been so daft?’

  ‘I don’t know, Red, but more to the point, what are we going to do about it?’

  ‘Nothing. We can’t.’

  There was a subtle knock on the door and then a pause before Gracie opened it and looked around cautiously.

  ‘Safe to come in? I’ve come bearing gifts from the kitchen: sandwiches and cake. I’ve even carried up a pot of tea. Don’t say I never give you anything.’

  ‘How’s it going downstairs?’

  ‘We’re not talking about the hotel. You’re sick and resting, and I’m dealing with it.’

  Johnnie stood up and took the tray.

  ‘Thank you kindly, sir,’ she said as she bobbed in a curtsy.

  Johnnie laughed. ‘You two are as mad as each other. How did you meet?’

  The glance that passed between Gracie and Ruby told nothing and everything, and after just a moment’s pause Johnnie smiled. ‘Forget I asked. That was nosy.’

  ‘Well. Love you and leave you,’ Gracie laughed nervously. ‘Madame can ring the bell if Madame wants anything further.’ She curtsied again and scuttled away demurely.

  ‘Yes, both of you are mad. But where were we … ?’ he asked.

  ‘How trustworthy would you say you are, Johnnie Riordan?’ Ruby asked, suddenly serious. ‘I mean if I told you something really big would you blab or could you keep quiet?’

  ‘I could keep quiet without a doubt. I may be a bit of a fly-boy, as our Betty says, but I’m loyal. You know I am. Why? What have you done? I’m worried now …’

  ‘I need you to swear this will be our secret, that you won’t betray me whatever happens, not ever.’

  ‘You’re scaring me now, but unless you’re going to confess to being a secret mass murderer then I promise. Hand on heart.’

  ‘Do you remember when I borrowed the train fare from you?’

  ‘And you never came back or paid it back, naughty girl. Yes, of course I remember,’ he smiled. ‘I did try and find you.’

  ‘I didn’t go off to see about nursing. I went to Melton, to the Wheatons. I was pregnant. With your baby.’

  Johnnie looked at her, his expression hard to read, and she waited for this news to sink in.

  ‘What happened to it?’ he asked eventually.

  ‘I came to live here, with George’s sister, Leonora, and hid away until the baby was born. A girl. She was adopted. I was going to go back to Melton but I met Gracie and decided on a new start so I stayed here.’

  Johnnie leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees and looked at her. Again she tried to read his expression but couldn’t.

  ‘You were so ambitious,’ she continued, ‘so sure of what you wanted, and that didn’t include a shotgun wedding to a sixteen-year-old. I did what I thought was best at the time,’ she smiled.

  ‘Do you know anything about the baby?’

  ‘Everything. She was adopted by George and Babs. Maggie is five years old and their daughter. I’m her godmother. No one knows apart from Gracie.’

  ‘Does your fiancé know?’

  ‘No, he doesn’t, and I told you, he’s not my fiancé any more.’ She watched his face carefully, desperately hoping she hadn’t made the wrong decision.

  ‘Why are you telling me now?’ he asked slowly.

  ‘Because I saw your boys on the beach and I realised they’re related to Maggie and that you had a right to know. But you mustn’t do anything or tell anyone.’

  ‘I promised, didn’t I? Am I allowed to see her?’ Johnnie asked.

  ‘I have to think about that. She mustn’t know – not until she’s older – but she’s having the best life. George and Babs adore her; she is their daughter, not mine, not yours. The a
doption was done properly and they never pressured me. They did it for me and Maggie. To save her being adopted by strangers and going out of our lives for ever. See over there on the sideboard, the photo frame that’s laid down? That’s Maggie. I turned it over so you wouldn’t see it and maybe realise.’

  He stood up and reached out for the frame. Turning it over he stared at the photo for what seemed an age without saying anything.

  ‘Please don’t hate me,’ she said eventually.

  ‘How could I hate you? You did what you had to do and it was probably right at the time. I wasn’t ready for anything like that. I suppose you knew me better than I knew myself back then. But now …’ He stared into her eyes. ‘I wish we could turn back the clock in one way, but then I love my boys so I can’t regret them.’

  Ruby smiled. ‘I know that. So the skeletons are out and it’s time for you to go. I don’t mind if you want to telephone sometimes and see how Maggie is doing, but apart from that, Johnnie Riordan, I think we missed the boat several years ago.’

  They talked for a while longer until the moment came and Johnnie Riordan said goodbye to Ruby with a kiss on the top of her head and a quick wave. She said nothing as she bit her lip and breathed deeply, desperate not to cry.

  As Johnnie drove away he looked up, hoping to see Ruby on the balcony or even at the window, but she wasn’t there.

  He was supposed to be out and about checking on Bill Morgan’s various investments but he simply couldn’t face it. He couldn’t face anything to do with Bill Morgan at that moment.

  So much had happened and his head was in turmoil as he tried to understand it all as he drove back down the arterial road to Wanstead. He knew he needed to lie down and clear his head – he needed time to think – so he decided to go home instead and tell Sadie he had a headache. He hoped that would persuade her to leave him alone and let him rest.

  He let himself in the house. ‘Sadie? Sadie? Where are you?’

  He thought he heard a noise upstairs and guessed Sadie was up there with the children; he went into their bedroom and they were both asleep, but there was no sign of Sadie. He ran downstairs and checked everywhere before realising that Sadie had gone out and left the children alone.