London Belongs to Me

by Norman Collins

  ‘No ties on earth,’ he repeated.

  Chapter LVIII

  Connie had been upstairs crying.

  Just sitting there, on the end of the bed, howling her old eyes out. Perhaps the accident had upset her more than she realised. Perhaps she had really got a claim against the motorist. A nice comfortable maimed‐for‐life sort of claim running into four figures. She stopped crying for a moment while she thought about the noughts. And then she started again when she remembered Percy. She was in a thoroughly upset feeble state when she could cry about anything. And hadn’t she known Percy since he was so high and hadn’t she always liked him for his funny cheeky ways? Loved him like a son in fact. Of course she had loved him. And his mother, too, for that matter. They had almost been like sisters the two of them. To be lying at death’s door in hospital and have your only son sentenced while you lay… Well, if Mrs Boon was strong enough to stand it, she wasn’t. Throwing herself forward on the bed she cried louder than ever.

  And it wasn’t only Mrs Boon she cried for. She cried for all the strong beautiful young men who were going off to France to be killed. She cried for their wives and their children. She cried for the Poles. She cried for all the shopkeepers who were going to be ruined, and she cried for the Queen Mother. She cried for Mr Josser because he was taking Percy’s verdict so much to heart and she cried for Mr Puddy who had always been so lonely anyhow. She cried for herself thinking how near to death she had been, and wondered why God allowed so much unhappiness to happen.

  It wasn’t nice at her age to be reminded of the grave. It frightened her. What she needed here and now was comforting. She wanted someone who would say, ‘Thank God you’re all right, Connie, me old dear! Whatever should I have done if you’d gone under?’ But there was nobody who cared that much. Nobody who cared at all in fact. And that was what gave Connie the cold shudders. It knocked nine‐tenths of the fun out of being alive if there wasn’t anybody to care if you were dead.

  The nearest thing that she’d got as a friend was Mr Josser. He was a shoulder of sorts to cry on to when times were bad. And Mrs Josser, too. She could be difficult admittedly. But Connie knew how to handle her all right. Given patience, she could get anything out of her she wanted. On the day when Connie had got back from the hospital after her accident Mrs Josser had brought her up some thin bread and butter and a boiled egg done just the way she liked it.

  But Mrs Josser wasn’t there at the moment – Connie had peeped in earlier to see. And Mr Josser was out rent‐collecting. Mrs Boon was in hospital. And neither Mrs Vizzard nor Mr Squales were exactly what you would call shoulders.

  Then she remembered Mr Puddy. He was better than no one. At least, he’d be someone to talk to. He could breathe.

  What was more, he could cook. Living just one‐half floor below him, she had often wondered what else he could do. There couldn’t be time though for much, she reflected. It was one little mess after another going on to the gas‐ring.

  It was a fish night to‐night. Unmistakably herrings. She could just picture them, like small oily mermaids, some with soft roes as smooth as custard and the others with hard ones like hundreds‐and‐thousands. Not that she wanted a share of something that wasn’t hers. If she’d wanted fresh herrings she could have bought a couple. And after she’d roped in the kitty from the insurance, she could have them by the truck‐load, almost by the catch, if she felt that way inclined. All the same, to a poor lonely woman with no girl friends and a bruised thigh they did smell something more than somewhat.

  She got up off the bed and made up her face from the oddments of rouge and cold cream in the various little jars in the cardboard chocolate‐box. Then she re‐frizzed the bang of hair in front. And finally she dabbed herself behind the ears, on the back of her hands and under her chin from a nearly new bottle of ‘Midnight Desire’ that one of the young ladies had carelessly left behind at the night club. Finally she went upstairs and knocked timidly at Mr Puddy’s door.

  He was in his shirt‐sleeves and carpet‐slippers when he answered her knock. At any time, roused only with difficulty, and particularly averse from interruption when eating, he stood there solid, immobile and resentful. But also impatient. And his impatience was what betrayed him. He was eager, fanatically eager, to get back to his fried herring.

  ‘Gub id,’ he said. ‘Gub id and shud the door.’

  It was the first time that Connie had ever been in Mr Puddy’s room by invitation. But she noticed at a glance that all the old things were wrong with it. It was a woman’s hand that was missing. In short, there was no one to arrange the flowers.

  Mr Puddy sat down. He was still puzzled, distinctly puzzled.

  ‘God to go on,’ he explained. ‘Geddig gold.’

  ‘But of course,’ Connie assured him. ‘You go right on just as though I wasn’t here. I can have my supper any time.’

  There was another herring – a third one – on the dish in front of him. Mr Puddy tried to shield it with the evening paper. He had never felt so tenderly towards any fish as he felt now towards that last herring.

  ‘Well,’ he said at last. ‘Dell me whad’s ub.’

  Connie drew her chair a little nearer. Nearer to him and nearer to the table.

  ‘It’s your advice I want,’ she said. ‘I… I wanted a man to turn to.’

  Mr Puddy shifted in his seat when he heard the words. There was something distinctly flattering in the first part. He had always prided himself on his advice. But the second part alarmed him. He’d been a widower long enough to know the perils of that state.

  ‘Ubb,’ said Mr Puddy to show that he was listening, but not actually committing himself.

  ‘Well, it’s like this,’ Connie began. ‘There was me quiet as a wren going quietly to work, when suddenly out of the darkness a great big Daimler…’

  Mr Puddy listened and ate. Ate and listened. But the more he listened, the slower he ate. Towards the end he was just playing with his food, his eyes bulging. And no wonder. The incident in Jermyn Street had become transformed into something that was worth listening to.

  ‘…flat out with the driver bent low over the wheel and…’ ‘’Ow did you see id if id was behind you?’ Mr Puddy asked.

  ‘In… in a shop window,’ Connie told him. ‘That’s it… I saw its reflection. I tried to leap out of the way but before I could do a thing…’ She broke off for a moment. ‘Oh, my,’ she said. ‘Don’t those herrings smell delicious. You go on before the other one gets cold.’

  ‘What habbened then?’ Mr Puddy demanded.

  He returned to his meal as he said it. The fish was at the difficult stage now. Only tiny white fragments were left clinging to the ingenious spring framework of fine bones. It was really a full‐time job now. And he had lingered too long. The little bits of fish were stone cold and he pushed the plate away from him.

  ‘Like the other wud?’ he asked. ‘I’ve fidished.’

  It was while Connie was toying with the cold herring that she took stock of Mr Puddy. Caught earlier he might have been quite a fine man. There was still plenty of him. But he wasn’t exactly the lean cowboy type any longer. And his breathing seemed to get in the way of other things. Like his footsteps, it was slow, heavy, deliberate and sounded as though it might stop at any moment. But there was good sense inside him. He was emphatic about one thing. And that was the hopelessness of trying to get money out of insurance companies unless you had a lawyer to represent you.

  ‘You mide as well give id ub,’ he said. ‘Simbly give id ub. Inshuradce is hobeless. You want subwud smard to rebresend you.’

  He shook his head sadly while he was speaking. Apparently for years he had been coming off second‐best in encounters with the Pearl and the Prudential and Lloyds.

  ‘But who?’ Connie asked. ‘They’re just as bad themselves, some of them, the solicitors. Wheels within wheels, you know.’

  Mr Puddy nodded. He knew.

  ‘Whad’s wrog with Mr Bargs?’ he asked. ‘He did his
best for Percy.’

  ‘And where’s Percy now?’ Connie demanded.

  ‘Where he ought to be,’ Mr Puddy answered. ‘Where id’s saver for other people.’

  That turned the conversation on to more general matters. Mr Puddy liked talking when he was in a mood for it. It was a great restorer of self‐respect, was talking. And murders had always been his favourite subject. Next to food, violent death was the one thing that kept him happy and contented.

  The Jossers’ clock downstairs struck six and Connie rose reluctantly.

  ‘Duty calls,’ she said. ‘On with the dance.’

  Mr Puddy got up and pushed his chair back.

  ‘Sabe here,’ he said.

  On the whole he was rather glad that Connie had looked in on him. Glad that she had been in an accident, too. It had given them something to talk about.

  But Connie wasn’t moving. She was looking at a faded enlargement over the mantelpiece. Against a background of pampas grass it showed a large dark woman with a flat sad face.

  ‘Was that Mrs P.?’ she asked.

  ‘It was,’ answered Mr Puddy, noticing the picture for the first time for years.

  ‘Don’t you miss her?’ Connie asked.

  ‘Biss her,’ Mr Puddy repeated. ‘I haven’t beed the sabe man since.’ He stationed himself in front of the photograph and stared at it lovingly. An expression of cloudy melancholy came over his eyes.

  ‘Whad a wobad,’ he said at last. ‘Whad a wobad, and whad a gook. She could gook anything, she could. Buddings. Bastry. Bobadoes. Anythig.’

  Chapter LIX

  1

  Percy was in people’s minds all right. He needn’t have worried about being forgotten.

  Take Mr Veesey Blaize for instance. Very busy man Mr Veesey Blaize. Very. But also very depressed. And not getting on with his work in consequence. Out of sorts, in fact. Decidedly out of sorts. And why? Because of Percy. This wasn’t just ordinary liverish indisposition from which Mr Veesey Blaize was suffering. It wasn’t even because of some new piece of trouble that his daughter had got herself into. It was something that went much deeper. Something had entered the very interstices of his professional soul and spread the misery right through him. There was no part of him that did not feel tired, jaded, harassed and – horrible word – failing.

  ‘Perhaps I’ve been doing too much,’ he told himself. ‘What I need is exercise. Go down to Sunningdale and get a round of golf. Always feel better after golf. But can’t manage it to‐day. Or to‐morrow. In court all day to‐morrow. And the next day… Or perhaps it isn’t that at all. Perhaps it’s that tooth the dentist told me about. Said it was poisoning me…’

  He removed his glasses and rubbed his hand across his eyes as he often did when he was thinking.

  ‘And another thing,’ he went on. ‘I ought to see the occulist. He told me to come back…’

  But what was the use of it? Golf, dentists, occulists – when had he got time for them? He knew what it would be instead. A large brandy and soda at the George, and perhaps another one at the Bodega, and back to his chambers again. This wasn’t the first time he’d felt this way, and he’d got over it. Or hadn’t he? That was just the point. Was he in as good form now as he had been six months ago? A year ago? Five years ago? Twenty years ago when he was still rising? His mind went back over the present term. Reggett v. Pawson Collieries; Charleston Investment v. Hooper; Anodyne Medicines v. Proprietary Drugstuffs, Ltd. In turn he’d been Reggett, Hooper and Proprietary Drugstuffs, Ltd. All big cases and all gone against him.

  And now Rex v. Percy Boon. Or rather Mr Justice Plymme v. Veesey Blaize. That was the unpleasant part. Somehow or other he’d contrived to set Mr Justice Plymme against him. And not only Mr Justice Plymme. But the other judges as well. The way things were he was a marked man. He was caught up in a plot to ensure that he should never plead successfully again.

  ‘We’ll win on appeal,’ he told himself. ‘Clear case of misdirection. We’re bound to win on appeal.’

  But as he said it an awful doubt came over him. He found himself remembering Reggett, Hooper, Proprietary Drugstuffs, and all the rest.

  2

  Another person who was thinking about Percy was Doris. She woke up thinking about him. It was as though a bad dream, a thoroughly bad one, had detached itself from the night and waited until morning.

  ‘I know he’s going to be all right,’ she told herself hurriedly. ‘I know he is.’

  But that was nothing to go by: it was simply what every one said. And it was silly thinking about Percy. Because really she should have been thinking about Bill. Thinking about him blotted everything else out, once she was awake properly. And no wonder. It was his last day. To‐morrow morning he was going to a military hospital up North somewhere.

  He came round for her, very smart and official‐looking in his new uniform, immediately after breakfast and they went off to Richmond together. They were lucky. Lucky in a lot of things. Lucky in being with each other. Lucky in having the whole day to themselves. And lucky in the weather. The wind had dropped, the glass was rising and the church spires and chimney pots shone and sparkled.

  It was a Sunday and other people appeared to be enjoying it, too. They were out in their numbers. Richmond was crowded with them – men smoking pipes, and old ladies, and dogs on leads, girls in tweed costumes, and nursemaids with babies in perambulators. They stretched up the hill, a bobbing, swaying mass like dancers ascending a long staircase.

  Now that Doris looked, she saw that there were other figures in khaki among the crowd. But these were only early days, remember: the war hadn’t properly got going yet. Soon, quite soon, the girls in tweed costumes would be taking out the spaniels and red setters alone. All the men in comfortable‐looking country suits and those in smartish Sunday ones would have gone. And even some of the girls as well. They’d be getting into uniform like the rest of them and going away Lord knows where for Heaven alone knows how long. It was as though this spectacle of Richmond on a fine Sunday was ready to dissolve in an instant, leaving only the old ladies and the babies in perambulators behind. As though the long shadow of war was creeping up the hill ahead of them.

  Bill and Doris walked up the hill themselves because in Richmond every one walks up the hill. It is the excuse for the place, the hill. And at the top of it, there is the Park sitting there. A wide, splendid park. A royal park in a rather public way of business. Admittedly there is nothing in it to set against the Castle in the park at Windsor. But the stucco lodge on the hill is good enough. It has the squat plain look of the houses you see in early water‐colours. It is not only English, but English school. It shines away in the distance with an unmistakable touch of the Regency and an equally unmistakable touch of Chinese white. And once you’re in Richmond Park you’re inside the frame along with it.

  Bill and Doris entered the park. They became – Doris’ red coat and Bill’s khaki – just another piece of the foreground. They walked on without speaking. And, as they walked, they merged. Merged completely. They dwindled into twin spots of colour in the middle distance. Then they went under the trees. And it was dark there. The red coat still gleamed. But it was alone now. The khaki one was lost to sight completely.

  It was as though Bill had gone away already.

  3

  Connie had been thinking about Percy, too. Couldn’t help thinking about him. It was all up – that much was obvious. All up, and too sad to let her mind dwell on it. She meant to ask Mr Barks if there was even one teeny ray of hope anywhere. Because, thanks to Mr Puddy’s advice, she was one of Mr Barks’ clients herself now. Or about to be.

  Not that Mr Barks seemed in any need of further business. He wasn’t exactly standing at the front door reaching out his hand for it. Quite the contrary, in fact. Connie had expected to find him rushed, harassed, distracted by telephone calls – for such are the hallmarks of success. But what she hadn’t expected – what she openly resented – was that he didn’t even seem to want to
see her at all. At least not without an appointment. She had, indeed, to put her foot down pretty firmly in the outer office before she could so much as get herself a fair hearing.

  ‘Just you go back inside, young man,’ she said to the articled clerk behind the counter. ‘Tell him I’m an old friend of his mother’s. Tell him he’s on to something good. I’m a client, I am. Not something the cat’s just brought in…’

  She hadn’t really meant to let herself go like that. Not straight away anyhow. She had meant to do a charm school on the young man. And the bit about something‐the‐cat‐brought‐in had just slipped out despite herself. It was vulgar, and she regretted it.

  Not that it mattered. The articled clerk, looking a bit tousled and crestfallen after the second encounter, had just come back to say that Mr Barks would see her after all, if she would kindly take a seat. For a moment she sat there thoughtfully humming. Then she asked the articled clerk if he really wanted to be a solicitor or if it had simply been his parents’ idea.

  It was fortunate that she liked big men – she had done so ever since she was quite a girl – or she wouldn’t have stood for Mr Barks’ behaviour. There was no pretence about it. He was downright rude.

  ‘May cost you something?’ he said. ‘Have you got it? Can’t go to law for nothing. All costs money. Suppose we lose. Where do I go for my fees? No speculation cases here. Find some firms to do them. Not this one.’

  ‘All right. All right,’ Connie answered. ‘What’s wrong with me paying for myself if it all goes down the drain?’

  ‘May be ten guineas. May be twenty,’ Mr Barks told her. ‘Impossible to say. Suppose it’s more? What then?’

  It was an awkward question. And Connie considered for a moment before answering. She gave a little giggle from sheer nervousness.

  ‘I’d better put my cards on the table, hadn’t I?’ she asked sweetly. ‘It’s like this. If it’s more than a hundred I couldn’t pay. I just haven’t got it. It seems only right I should tell you, doesn’t it?’ She paused. ‘I’d never forgive myself if you lost money because of me. Never.’