All Through the Night

by M. P. Wright

  I returned to St Pauls, picked up some fresh clothes from my digs and spent the next two days at the home of my aunt Pearl and uncle Gabe, Vic’s mother and father. We consoled each other at the loss of our kin, we sobbed, we held each other and we reminisced. I drank rum to ease the physical pain I felt and to mask the torment that I had been responsible for my cousin’s death.

  Without a body to mourn and bury, Gabe and Pearl refused to believe that their son was dead. I wished that I possessed their conviction, but my heart told me otherwise.

  It had been nearly a week since my neighbour, Marjorie Pearce, had taken Truth to her sister’s in Portishead. I needed to go and pick the little girl up then take a drive to Porlock. I left Gabe and Pearl’s home without saying goodbye just as dawn broke and returned to my digs on Gwyn Street. I bathed, shaved and cleaned my teeth, changed into my grey herringbone suit then walked the short distance to Loretta Harris’ home. I stood outside the door of her ground-floor flat on Brunswick Street and waited for an age before plucking up the courage to knock. She opened the door to me, her face cut and bruised, and wearing a sling supporting her right arm. She greeted me warmly on the doorstep then, once I had come in off the street, proceeded to slap me repeatedly across the face.

  For her, the grief upon hearing the news of Vic’s disappearance and death was almost as painful as that of her deceased and much loved husband, Carnell, who had been tragically taken from her so many long months ago. She bellowed and bawled at me in the hallway of her home for another ten minutes. Then we cried and held each other until there were no more tears to sob. We sat at her kitchen table and drank tea and I explained the events of the last two weeks in their entirety. When I’d finished talking, Loretta got up out of her chair, walked across to kitchen drawer and returned with my car keys. She placed them on the table then looked at me and smiled.

  “Come on, honey, let’s go take a drive.”

  Loretta joined me on the short journey to collect Truth from Mrs Pearce in Portishead. We left Bristol on a beautiful sunny July morning, me driving Carnell’s old Cortina again, and headed out of Bristol. Twenty minutes later we were driving along a remote coastal road and arrived at the address my neighbour had given me. Loretta waited in the car and I walked up a stone path across a well-maintained lawn and garden to the door of a small bungalow. An elderly lady who looked as if she was the twin of my neighbour opened the door, greeted me and welcomed me into her home.

  Marjorie Pearce was stood behind her sister in the hallway. She smiled and embraced me in her frail arms then took me by the hand and walked me through the kitchen and out of the back door into the garden. Sitting on a tartan blanket in the middle of the lawn, with the sun caressing the back of her long blonde hair, was Truth. Mrs Pearce let go of my hand and patted me gently on the back, then returned to the house. I stepped on to the lawn then slowly walked across the grass and cautiously sat down next to the little girl.

  When Truth realised it was me, she flung her arms around me and didn’t let go for the next half an hour. I let her keep hugging me. I think I needed to be held more than she did. Heck, the kid had proved to be tougher than I ever could be.

  Two hours later, after a lunch of ham and cucumber sandwiches and a bucketload of tea, Truth, Loretta and I left Mrs Pearce and her sister and started on the long journey down to Porlock in north Devon. Truth and Loretta sat on the back seat of the Cortina. We listened to music on the radio, we sang, we laughed, and I tried to hold it all together.

  We arrived at Benny’s garage just after six thirty that evening. I pulled the Cortina into the forecourt and we all got out and walked down to the garden at the back of the garage. At the garden gates we were greeted by Claude, the Irish wolfhound. It was his barking that alerted Estelle and Cecile to our arrival. After the briefest of greetings, Estelle and I sat in private in her sitting room and I broke the news of Benny’s death. We sat in that room until well after dark, and I held my good friend’s widow in my arms while she sobbed inconsolably. It was just after eleven when I finally spoke of the promise I’d made to Benny back at the Hunters Lodge inn, regarding Truth and bringing her to Estelle for safekeeping. Estelle remained silent as I explained. When I had finished speaking, she got up out of her seat and rested her hand on the back of mine. The only words she said to me before leaving me alone in the room were simply, “Thank you.”

  After breakfast the next morning, Loretta and I prepared for the journey back to St Pauls. Before leaving, Estelle, Cecile and Loretta sat in the kitchen while I took a moment to be with Truth. With the sun high on our backs, we left the house and walked back across the buttercup-lined meadows we had walked on with Benny less than two weeks previously. Truth held on to my hand the whole time. It was in those fields that I explained to the little girl that the men who had caused her so much pain and fear were no longer around. That Paxton and his cronies were gone and would never return. Truth listened to every word I spoke without asking a question or uttering a sound. I then told her that I was going to leave her with Estelle and Cecile and that she would not be returning to any kind of orphanage again.

  The news hit Truth hard. She held on to me and cried and pleaded for me to take her back with me to Bristol. I explained to the child that it simply wasn’t possible and that if I did the authorities would soon find out where she was and take her away from me. Truth, unwilling to accept what I had told her, ran back to the house in floods of tears. I followed after her, my eyes welling up with so much water that I could barely see.

  Loretta had thrown off her sling and chosen to drive back in the Mini she had loaned me to get down to Porlock. She said her farewells to her relations and to Truth, then walked down to Benny’s garage and drove the little car up to the forecourt and waited for me there. Estelle and Cecile hugged me and Estelle told me that she would be in touch with good news very soon. I looked at Truth, who was standing close to Cecile. I leant forward towards her and reached out my hand, but Truth backed away behind Cecile. I straightened myself, and Estelle touched me on the arm and smiled at me.

  I kissed Estelle on the cheek then bid my farewells to my friends and walked out of the kitchen, through the garden and back up to forecourt to where Loretta was waiting for me. As I was about to get into the Cortina, Truth came rushing up behind me and threw her arms around my waist. I bent down on one knee and took the little girl in my arms and embraced her while she cried and squeezed at my back with her tiny arms. Finally, she drew herself away from me, reached down for my hand and pushed something into my palm then closed my fingers around the object. She wiped at her face with her hands then smiled at me. Before I had a chance to thank her she had turned and run back down the forecourt and into the garden, back to Estelle and Cecile.

  I got into my car, looked down at my hand and opened my fingers. Sitting in the middle of my palm was the sixpence-coin ankle bracelet Cecile had given to her. A gift to keep away the juju was what the old woman had told me it was for. Something to keep the dark spirits at bay. I turned the key in the ignition and drove off. The talisman burned in my palm and never left my hand while I made the long journey home.

  Six weeks passed without word from Estelle. I returned back to the gym each day. I cleaned my office and the changing rooms, I swept and scrubbed the gymnasium floors and the ring, then I sat at my desk drinking Mount Gay rum and got slowly more drunk day by day. Nobody came looking for my services to undertake any enquiry business and I sure as hell didn’t go looking for work. My wounds healed, I paid my rent and I took one shopping trip into Bristol to buy myself some new shoes, shirts, a couple of pairs of trousers and a new raincoat, courtesy of Ida Stephens. I’d stashed away a little of her money at home before I left with Truth, just for emergencies. To offer up some sense of normality I put on a brave face and spent a little time each day in the company of my uncle Gabe, aunt Pearl and Loretta. My family knew that I was hurting but went along with the façade. When I’d had my fill of them all I’d return to my digs on Gw
yn Street to hide away from the world and thought of nothing but my cousin Vic and the little girl, Truth. At night I slept very little, and when I did drop off in a drunken haze I was visited in my dreams by the ghosts of my past.

  Then, on a rainy Thursday afternoon in mid-September, while I was bumming about at the gym on Grosvenor Road, I received a phone call from Estelle Goodman. Her call to me was brief. Estelle could hear the sadness in my voice as we spoke. She offered me some consolation by explaining that Truth had quickly settled and that she was doing fine. Then, in no roundabout fashion, she told me to smarten myself up, get a good night’s sleep and meet her at Southampton docks the next day at 1.30 p.m.

  My drive down to the south coast and the port town of Southampton was made in good time. It was just after twelve thirty in the afternoon by the time I parked my car in a side street across the road from the docks. I got out and headed towards to the giant moored vessels on the dockside. After searching about for a while I eventually found Estelle, Cecile and Truth standing at one of the furthest edges of the docks. A huge passenger-carrying Fyffes banana boat, the TSS Camito, overshadowed the three of them as they stood by its side with a crowd of other people. I cut through the mingling array of passengers that were just starting to board the ship.

  When Truth saw me heading towards them, she bellowed out my name and ran hell for leather down the concrete dock and flung herself at me. I could barely recognise her. She was dressed in a beautiful yellow-flower-petal cotton dress, white ankle socks and white patent shoes. Gone was the tired, sullen face of a frightened little girl. It had been replaced with happiness and love. Truth smiled up at me then continued to hug me for all she was worth.

  I looked up and watched as Cecile and Estelle spoke. Cecile lifted her arm and waved at me, then she turned to the gangplank and slowly began to walk onto the ship. Estelle made her way along the dock towards Truth and I. Benny’s widow smiled at me then thanked me for coming. She took my hand in hers then kissed me on the cheek and assured me that everything was going to be all right.

  She reached into her handbag and showed me the tickets she had purchased for the three of them to sail out to Barbados. I felt a lump rise in my throat as Estelle stood away from me and looked down at her wristwatch.

  She took Truth by the hand and the three of us walked towards the gangplank. We stood and talked while other passengers started to berth. Truth told me about all the wonderful things she was going to do when she arrived in her new island home. She spoke of how Cecile had told her that the sun always shone and that the sea was so blue and clear that you could stare down into it and see your face beaming back up at you. She laughed and skipped at my feet with excitement. Then Estelle explained to her that it was time for them to leave. That’s when I felt my hand tighten around the little girl’s fingers. Truth looked up at me and saw the tears in my eyes. She pulled me down towards her and whispered into my ear.

  “Thank you, Joseph, thank you for being my friend and for keeping your promise. You came back for me, just like you said.”

  Then she kissed me on my cheek and I felt her tiny fingers slip from my loosening grasp. I watched as Estelle and Truth walked up the gangplank and boarded the ship. Before they were lost in a crowd of passengers, Truth turned to me and pointed with her finger above her head then shouted. “You needn’t worry about the money, Joseph. I know a man who says he’s going to look after it for me.” She smiled at me again then walked along the deck and began to climb a staircase with Estelle. I watched as they disappeared in a throng of fellow passengers then stood back on the dock and looked up above me.

  There, staring down at me from the upper deck, was Vic, his left hand resting on the top of a long, thin cane. His face now sported a thick salt-and-pepper beard and his right eye was covered with an elegant black silk eyepatch. He leant against the iron railing and raised his right arm and waved at me. I looked up at him, the tears streaming down my face. He shook his head at me as if to say, “Stop with those tears, cuz.” Then I saw the familiar mischievous smile break across his face and I watched as he put his hand to his mouth and kissed the tips of his fingers with his lips. He threw his arm out in front of him in a final farewell, then my cousin backed away from the rail of the ship and disappeared from my sight like a shadow swallowed by a cloud.

  Acknowledgments

  “When’s the next book out?” It’s a question that I was first asked during the swanky London launch of my debut novel Heartman back in the summer of 2014 and I’ve continued to be asked on a very regular basis ever since.

  Heartman’s sequel All Through the Night had, in fact, been written as a first draft long before Heartman had even hit the bookshelves. The road to getting into shape the book you now hold in your hands has been a lengthy one: one I dearly hope will have been worth the wait.

  It was always my intention to write a trilogy, three standalone novels that would feature my Barbadian “Enquiry Agent”, Joseph Tremaine Ellington, “JT”, each set roughly two years apart, starting in the winter of 1965 and coming to an end in the summer of 1969. However, as they say, “the best-laid plans of mice and men oft go astray . . .” Let me explain.

  I’m the kind of writer that likes to plan ahead. However, no amount of advance planning could have prepared me for what was to come. The original trilogy’s story arc was meticulously preplanned over a decade ago. Moleskine journals containing the minutiae of Ellington’s world were carefully mapped out, character development refined and locations spotted. Now, none of that commitment to detail actually prepares you for the process of writing the books, and it has to be said that All Through the Night wasn’t an easy book to get down on paper despite all my bravado planning.

  I believe many writers would agree with me when I say that no matter how much groundwork you put in, it is ultimately the characters who dictate where the final story takes the earnest scribe, and I was no exception to that rule. The journey I originally set out to undertake was dramatically altered as JT, Vic and the cast began to weave their magic from chapter to chapter – strangely, this allowed the characters that I have created the opportunity to take me, the writer, into places I’d not before considered and, at times, into even darker places, each mysterious, scary and unexpected. I believe this approach to the writing left me with a stronger, tighter story and one I hoped readers would approve of. All Through the Night expands both on Heartman’s original story and delves deeper into JT Ellington’s back story, offering a greater insight into both the man and his motives, and developing characters from the first book in more concise detail.

  *

  The wonderful response to the publication of Heartman has been overwhelming, and since July 2014 I have been inundated with emails and social media messages from readers of the book who are both eager to know more about Ellington’s ’60s Bristol, details on characters, where I write, my creative influences, when JT will hit the TV screens and, of course, to ask, “When will book two be out?”

  That final question, I’m pleased to say, has now been successfully answered.

  All Through the Night has hit the shelves and I nervously await the response from you, dear reader, as to whether I have succeeded in pleasing you with the next instalment of Joseph Tremaine Ellington’s “Child” trilogy. Ultimately, it has to be said that I write the kind of books I’d like to settle back with and, preferably for me, read along with a pint of best bitter at my side. The final book in the trilogy, The Restless Coffins, is well underway, and despite those best-laid plans I previously mentioned, and after a great deal of thought and soul-searching, a fourth Ellington novel, The Rivers of Blood, is in the pipeline. It will see my wily Bajan detective return, entering a bright new decade and back in Bristol, circa 1970.

  *

  All Through the Night would not have been possible without the generous assistance and support of a raft of brilliant folk. I’d like to offer my sincerest thanks to each and every one of the readers who have been in touch to say how much they
enjoyed dipping into Heartman. Writers are nothing without readers and I have been graced with a legion of readers to be proud of.

  Thanks must go out to a vast list of book bloggers, especially Abby Jayne Slater-Fairbrother, Richard Latham, Liz Barnsley, Mark Hill, Mike Stott, Ayoola Onatade and Sandra Robinson. Special thanks also to the teams of amazing booksellers at Waterstones here in Leicestershire, in Loughborough and across the UK, and to Debbie James at Kibworth Books and to Robb Norton at Foyles Books in Cabot Circus, Bristol.

  I tip my battered trilby to fellow crime writer and dear friend Richard Cox, who kindly undertook a first read-through of All Through the Night’s manuscript, offering both an author’s no-nonsense opinion and some sound advice. Thanks also must go out to another dear friend, former CWA judge and author of the wonderful Crime Scene Britain and Ireland, John Martin. Your continuing support has been invaluable.

  Gratitude by the bucket loads to fellow crime writers Ken Bruen, Susi Holliday, Nick Quantrill, Steven Dunne, Luca Veste, Anne Zouroudi and Howard Linskey, and to Steve Plews at the Gas Dog Brewery for the great ales.

  Thanks to Simon Heath and Jake Lushington at World Productions for seeing something special in both Heartman and All Through the Night and for taking a punt on a manuscript that at the time had not even found a publishing home.

  I am indebted once again to the miracle worker that is my editor, Karyn Millar, and to the very special team at Black & White Publishing: Alison McBride, Campbell Brown, Janne Moller, Thomas Ross, and my publicist, Laura Nicol. As with Heartman, they have done a sterling job in bringing the book out in such great shape. Cheers guys.

  All Through the Night is in part dedicated to my literary agent, Phil Patterson, at Marjacq Scripts. If it wasn’t for Mr P there’d be no JT Ellington. I owe you more than I can say. Thanks mate. My sincerest thanks to the rest of the Marjacq team, Guy Herbert and Sandra Sawicka, and also to my brilliant film and TV agent, Luke Speed at Curtis Brown.