Bless ’Em All

by Allen Saddler

  Sometimes an ‘old vic’ came around, a fat old bugger with two chins over his dog collar who looked as if he drank holy water. He’d asked Bert if he had any plans for the future, and Bert just made a wry face. ‘Oh, don’t think it’s all over,’ the vicar had said. ‘God still has a purpose for you.’ In the end he’d had to tell him to piss off as he was getting on his nerves.

  The food was all right but not very exciting. When he thought of the stuff he used to nick from the hotels, slices of duck and cream pastries that Edie used to wolf down, looking guilty, like a child. Once he got a whole cold tongue, calf’s liver that went down like strawberries, pâté and a bloody goose down his trousers; now they kept asking him about his ration card. Edie ought to have brought it in. It looked as if he’d stopped smoking, mainly because he couldn’t get any fags. It had been agony for a week, but now he had got used to it, although it left a void in his life. He had started carving things out of bits of Perspex. He did a ring first, which he gave to one of the nurses, and the other nurses ribbed her about it, but now he was making little pistols and daggers and trying his hand at a Spitfire. It might develop into something if he did them for Christmas crackers.

  He could get himself to the toilet now and had developed a technique for getting in and out of the bath, although it had been better when the nurses did it, but they wouldn’t always be there, and he couldn’t see any particular thrill in Edie soaping him down. He wondered how they were getting on at number seventy-seven. Bunty, and Mrs Bennet, cantankerous old cow, and that snooty couple on the top floor. Oh Christ, there was that bloody old vic again, looking more miserable than ever.

  ‘Bert,’ he said. He’d never called him Bert before. ‘I’m afraid I am the bearer of bad tidings.’ Hell. Had he found out that there was no God after all? ‘There was an indiscriminate raid last night. Bombs were just dropped without thought or reason. One of them was a direct hit on your house.’

  ‘Number seventy-seven?’

  ‘Yes. Unfortunately all the occupants were in their beds. They could have gone to the shelter, but they decided to take their chances. Your wife was one of the victims. I am most dreadfully sorry. The Lord will smite those who offend him.’

  ‘Eh?’ said Bert. ‘Edie? Gone?’

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ said the vicar and started muttering prayers.

  ‘Sod that!’ Bert said angrily. ‘That’s not going to bring her back. You and your bloody church make me sick. What can you do, eh? Just stand there and let people get killed? Hasn’t your God got any control over anything? He’s supposed to be powerful, made the earth and everything in five days or something. Why doesn’t he look after it?’ He heard himself sobbing. ‘Edie. What had she done, eh? Why sort her out?’

  ‘I know how you must feel,’ said the vicar. ‘And I wish I had some answers. I know that in times like these we begin to question our faith.’

  ‘Sorry, vicar,’ said Bert. ‘It’s not your fault. But … it don’t make sense, do it?’

  ‘It is hard to see a pattern in all this,’ said the vicar sorrowfully. ‘It’s not God who is killing people. It’s men, who have turned away from Him.’

  Bert Penrose was a heap of dejection. A man with a comical Charlie Chaplin moustache, a raving sexual appetite, now disabled, relying on his wife to pull him through and now finding that this prop had disappeared.

  ‘What am I going to do now?’ he said.

  Bernard shuffled into line with the other men. There must have been ten of them. Talk about the long and the short and the tall. There were all sizes. Hardly any of them looked a bit like him. They were tall and thin, short and fat, smart and ragged. Some were wearing suits, some overalls. They all looked wary, as though they wished they hadn’t been drawn into this pantomime. Nobody spoke. He was shoved into the line by a policeman, who then walked up and down like he was inspecting them. The bulbous man next to Bernard smelt of beer and farted loudly. Nobody laughed. It wasn’t that sort of occasion. Bernard wondered who they were going to bring in. Surely not the Tcherny girl? That would be disastrous. Surely he was entitled to a solicitor. He had tried to ring Maurice but had got no answer. Not that Maurice would have been much help.

  There was a shuffling outside, and the door opened. The plain-clothes man who had interviewed him led in a tall grey-haired man who looked vaguely familiar. The man looked distinguished, almost aristocratic, but there was something not quite right, as if he were playing a part, like an actor in country-house comedies or courtroom dramas. The detective led him along the row of men, who all stood stock still with stolid expressions of piety and respectability on their faces. There was a slight strain in the air, however; something important was going on here. When the man came to Bernard he gave Bernard a long, hard look. It suddenly came to him, in a flash of horror, that this distinguished-looking man in a long Melton overcoat was, in fact, the hall porter at Claridge’s, the very man who had tipped him off about the gin and tonic parading as lemonade. He had seen Bernard in the bar with the actress; probably saw them leave together. Bernard settled his face into a stern scowl. The head porter had made his decision. He stepped forward and touched Bernard on the arm.

  ‘You sure, sir?’ said the detective.

  The hall porter nodded. He didn’t bother to go any further down the line.

  ‘Thank you, gentlemen,’ said the detective, and the men filed out. Bernard was left until last and was accompanied out by a policeman. Then it was back to the little room again. This time the questioning was not so polite.

  ‘So you didn’t know this lady, but you left together from Claridge’s, after talking and drinking with her for around thirty minutes.’

  ‘I felt sorry for her,’ said Bernard. ‘She was out of work.’

  ‘But you said you didn’t know her.’

  ‘I didn’t want to cause her any trouble. You know, with these well-known people scandal soon gets around.’

  ‘And where did you go when you left the hotel?’

  ‘Look,’ said Bernard, ‘this is a bit embarrassing. The fact is that she asked me for money. She was flat broke. I gave her a fiver and put her in a taxi. Please don’t blow it about. It won’t do her career much good, will it?’

  ‘I don’t think it’ll do it any harm, sir. She’s dead.’

  ‘Dead? Good Lord. How? Was it an accident? A bomb?’

  ‘No, sir. She seems to have been strangled in her own flat.’

  Bernard was shocked. ‘Really? Well, I’m blowed.’

  The detective looked at him quizzically, as though he was evaluating his performance. ‘How can we verify your account of putting Miss Grainger in a taxi?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Bernard, scratching his head with bewilderment. ‘That’s what happened. All I can say.’

  ‘I don’t think it will be enough,’ said the detective quietly. ‘You see, there is evidence of a similar attack on a Miss Rosa Tcherny at your house in West Ealing.’

  ‘Oh that. That was just larking about. Women like it, you know. The rough stuff.’

  ‘Do they?’ said the detective. ‘Or is it you that likes the rough stuff?’

  ‘Look,’ said Bernard earnestly. ‘I’m no angel, but strangling people, that’s not my line. I could have had it off with her, but … The fact is, close up, I didn’t fancy her.’

  20

  ROSA arrived early at St Paul’s. It was strange that it was still standing in the midst of the general devastation. It stood proudly, surrounded by blasted buildings, water pumps and shattered shops. The other outpost that had survived was the Old Bailey, less than a quarter of a mile away. If these two pillars of the Establishment had gone it would have, in some way, been significant. The fact that the symbols of religion and law were still intact was reassuring.

  It was a bright day towards the end of March, and the pigeons, to whom one day was the same as any other, scavenged in the churchyard for discarded sandwiches, bits of stale cake and biscuit crumbs. There were lots of people on the steps
, as it was a popular meeting point. There was always a policeman around and people giving out religious tracts. There were also plenty of older men, looking dazed but defiant, wearing their Great War medals as though they were lucky charms against anything that might happen in the present. Rosa couldn’t help wondering what had happened to Bernard. He was a thoroughly unpleasant man, but she didn’t want to be responsible for him being arrested or something. If that happened she would have to go to court, and if that happened Bernard was bound to say that she led him on, then she would be in the papers as a scarlet woman, a tease who led men to the point of excitement and then screamed at the last minute. She wondered what Maurice would think of it all. He wouldn’t want Green’s mixed up in a scandal. If it had been up to her she would have let it go, but she knew that her parents were right to insist that she reported the incident.

  There was a religious nut with a placard: ‘Be sure your sins will find you out.’ Rosa shivered. Would there be anything in the papers? She walked down the steps and bought the Evening News from a newsboy. She skimmed through it. No sign of Bernard. ‘A new lead on dead actress’ was the headline.

  She thought of going into the ABC when she saw Jimmy arrive on his bicycle. He looked flushed as he heaved it against the low wall and propped it up. She was surprised at how pleased she was to see him. She had missed his sulky face, his cocky manner that scarcely concealed the vulnerability of a young boy in an adult world. She walked down the steps.

  ‘Hello, Jimmy.’

  He seemed surprised to see her. ‘I had a letter from Mr Maurice. He said I was to meet him here.’

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I had one, too. Hope it’s good news, eh?’

  They sat together on the steps. Buses puffed around the base on their way into the City. Smart men in stockbrokers’ suits walked by with cardboard gas-mask containers around their necks, which made them look faintly ridiculous.

  ‘What have you been doing?’ she asked Jimmy.

  ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Do you think they’re going to start up again, miss?’

  ‘I hope so,’ she said. ‘I liked working there. Didn’t you?’

  Jimmy considered the question seriously. ‘Yes. I suppose so,’ he said reluctantly. ‘I miss all those books. Didn’t read them, but I liked looking at them. You know there was something in it, getting them in for people who wanted them.’

  Just then they saw Maurice approaching, looking quite jaunty, with his bowler hat and umbrella.

  ‘Sorry if I kept you waiting. Have you seen Harry around?’

  Maurice ushered them into the teashop. There were some fairy cakes and bath buns. Maurice ordered the tea.

  ‘Used to order a plate of mixed fancies,’ he said. ‘You know, éclairs, madeleines, cream horns and those coconut things with a cherry on top.’ Maurice was in good spirits, nothing like the broken man they had seen only just a few weeks ago in this very shop. ‘We’ve found a premises in Wandsworth Road. Most of the publishers have moved out of town. There won’t be much collecting, Jimmy, but there’ll be plenty for you to do. It won’t be much like the old place. It’ll take time to build up the stock, but I think we can tick over until this business is finished. There’ll be a surge in reading after the war. People will want to get back to civilized life, put all this war nonsense behind them.’

  Rosa looked doubtful. Maurice was looking forward to an end to the war that was not yet in sight. Jimmy wasn’t too pleased either. No collecting meant that he would be inside all day, no meandering trips around London, no sneaky half-hours with bread and dripping, no chance of cheeky glances with the girls on trade counters.

  Maurice gave them the address of the new place, and Jimmy realized that it was the other side of the river. It was drab over there. Just shops and houses. No interesting buildings, no bustle, no art galleries to while away an hour, no theatres with photos outside, no buskers for the matinee performance, no hot chestnuts, no life at all. Compared with being in the centre of things, Wandsworth Road was a dump.

  Maurice was explaining to Miss Tcherny about getting in touch with all their old customers, and Jimmy’s mind had already left the scene. He was watching out for his bicycle, which they hadn’t let him bring inside. It was propped up in the doorway. He went outside, just to stand by it. It was unlikely that anyone would pinch it. It was a junior size, not big enough for a man to ride off with. He glanced over to the steps. There were always people on the steps. They were a magnet. Maybe people felt safe there. Then he spotted a young girl with reddish hair. It wasn’t ginger, it was copper-coloured and straight and hung down the sides of a pale, pouty little face, with delicious lips and a button nose. At first he couldn’t believe it. It was another one of his daily fantasies, those illusions where he saw this Helen on every bus, every shop window and in a white nightdress in his dreams. He picked up his bicycle and wheeled it across the road, expecting the vision to evaporate before he reached it.

  But, no, she was still there. He went up to her. ‘Where have you been?’ he said accusingly.

  Helen sort of blushed and looked away. ‘Reigate,’ she said.

  ‘I know that,’ he said. ‘You might have told me.’

  ‘I didn’t know myself,’ she said. ‘My mum got worried, about the raids.’

  He couldn’t be cross with her for long. He was already experiencing a warm glow of relief that he had found her. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I’ve got to meet my old boss,’ she said. ‘About starting up somewhere else.’

  ‘Me too,’ said Jimmy. ‘But I’ve finished. I’ll wait for you.’

  ‘All right,’ she said, looking at him in a wondering kind of way.

  ‘Then we can go to the pictures,’ he said.

  ‘All right,’ she said meekly.

  Rosa felt that she had to tell Maurice about her visit to the police station.

  ‘Oh dear,’ Maurice said, obviously dismayed.

  ‘My parents said I ought to tell somebody, in case it happened again.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Maurice slowly. ‘I can’t blame them for that. I don’t know what’s happening to Bernard. I should have kept more of an eye on him. He was badly let down with his wedding. The girl more or less left him at the altar. He’s not been really right since.’

  ‘I was really frightened,’ said Rosa.

  Jimmy waited while Helen took her turn in the teashop. She came out looking thoughtful.

  ‘All right?’ said Jimmy.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she frowned. ‘They’re moving to Hemel Hempstead.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘It’s out in the country somewhere. About thirty miles from London.’

  ‘And are you going to go out there every day?’

  ‘No. I’ll have to live there, won’t I?’

  Jimmy’s world, so recently recovered, was shattered once again. Everything seemed to be conspiring against him having a nice romance with Helen. ‘Well, that’s no good,’ he said. ‘Can’t you get another job? Somewhere nearer?’

  She looked earnestly at him. ‘I don’t want to go away,’ she said simply.

  ‘Well then,’ he said decisively and marched her off, holding her with one hand and his bicycle with the other. He had an argument to get his bicycle on the bus, but eventually he was allowed to stand it up under the stairs. He took Helen to his house so that he could leave the bicycle there. There was no one in, so they were soon kissing like mad, she as eager as he. When they stopped for breath he gave her a glass of cream soda and showed her how to get all the bubbles out by putting a shilling into the glass, which made a fizz and left the drink flat.

  Then they went to the Astoria, two sixpenny seats. It was still afternoon. There was an Our Gang short and a Popeye and a musical called New Moon, set in a strange part of America called Louisiana and was practically all singing. Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy sung solidly at each other and sometimes together, hardly stopping for breath. Not that Jimmy and Helen cared much what wa
s going on. King Kong could have got into the stalls, a train crash could have spilt off the screen, wild animals could have been loose; none of these events would have broken through their romantic haze.

  ‘Can you come out tomorrow?’ he asked.

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘What’s it matter? We could walk on the common or something.’

  ‘All right,’ she said contentedly.

  They took the tram and rattled along, holding hands.

  ‘I’ve got to go to Wandsworth Road,’ he told her. ‘I don’t think I’ll stick it.’

  ‘I think I’ll try to get something else,’ she said. ‘I don’t fancy Hemel Hempstead.’

  ‘I should think not,’ he said stoutly.

  The next day, a Saturday, they met on Clapham Common, which seemed to be crowded with young couples of a similar age and intention. They wandered slowly to the bandstand and then into the sparse wood, near the pond, and kissed in the dark patches, and he put his arm around her and drew her to him so he could feel her body close to his, smell her hair. The war was still on. God knows what was going to happen next. The whole town could be reduced to a brick shambles. People who had lived blameless lives could be killed, but, at this moment, everything was tender and precious. They were cut off from the world and all its troubles, cocooned in their own happiness. They had transformed a neglected piece of scrubland into a magical wood, the Forest of Arden no less. The real world was still alive, working its chemical and biological tricks on unsuspecting young people, who would have this moment of enchantment before life, in all its grimness, pushed their faces in the mud.

  Detective-Inspector Thomas knew that he was up against it with Mr Bernard Green. Attempts had been made to find the taxi that was supposed to have picked up Gloria Grainger near Claridge’s Hotel but with no result. He didn’t believe a word that Green had told him. He could smell his guilt, but proving it was another matter. In interview, with quite aggressive questioning – because Thomas knew that his best hope was getting a confession – this Green character had appeared quite unperturbed, and despite all the tricks Thomas had sprung on him he’d stuck to his story. After putting the actress into the taxi Green himself had gone home by Underground. Thomas had checked that the trains had been running, hoping that a disruption in the service might have broken the alibi. Green had got out at Ealing Broadway and walked the rest.