Dream On

by Gilda O'Neill

  Ginny picked up Ted’s plate and carried it to the sink. She turned on the tap and looked over her shoulder. ‘I suppose it’ll be easier to understand when we’ve got kids of our own.’

  Ginny winced as she realised, too late, that she’d gone and blurted it out. Instead of preparing him gently as she had intended, of speaking to him about her dreams of them having a baby, a proper family of their own, and getting him used to the idea, she’d just gone and said it. She could have bitten her tongue off. She’d mucked it up. She was so stupid.

  Ted picked up the paper and folded it neatly. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I never meant—’

  ‘Look. You’ve got on me nerves enough tonight already. Now what did I tell you?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ted, I—’

  ‘Don’t sorry me.’ Slowly, he rose to his feet and walked over to her. ‘I asked you a question. What did I tell you?’

  Her mouth was so dry she could barely get the words out and the cold, hard edge of the sink was digging into her back. ‘Not to talk about having kids.’

  ‘And what did you just do?’

  ‘I didn’t mean—’

  ‘You didn’t what?’ Ted grabbed hold of a handful of her hair and jerked her head back.

  ‘I didn’t mean anything,’ she gasped through the pain, desperate not to let the plate slip between her fingers and drop to the floor. That would only make him angrier.

  Ted drew back his fist and slammed it full into her cheek. ‘I told you last time. Why don’t you just keep that mouth o’ your’n shut? That’s another black eye you’ve made me give you.’ He stared at her already swelling face and blinked rapidly as though he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. ‘Look what you’ve made me do, you stupid cow.’

  Ginny opened her mouth to apologise, but said nothing when he yanked her hair even harder.

  ‘Now, you ain’t gonna start making no noise and wake me mother up an’ all, are you?’

  Ginny gave a tiny shake of her head. Why was she so stupid? She felt so ashamed of herself. She’d done it again. Why did she have to go upsetting him all the time?

  Careful not to pull away from him, she stretched her arm behind her and put the plate gently on to the wooden draining board. Then, biting her lip to stop herself screaming out in agony, she let him drag her out of the room and up the stairs by her hair.

  Chapter 4

  1946

  ‘TED . . .’

  ‘Yeah?’ He sounded bored. He could never see the point in talking after sex.

  ‘Have you read about them GI brides?’ Her voice was soft and cajoling.

  ‘What about ’em?’ Ted stretched his arms above his head and drummed his knuckles rhythmically on the headboard. Here we go.

  ‘They’re going to special camps to learn about what it’s gonna be like in America. Before they leave to go over to be with their new husbands.’ She sighed longingly. ‘Can you imagine what it must be like? Fancy having to learn about a whole new way of life because it’s so different from this rotten hole. They’ve got everything over there. Just like you see in the films. It must be smashing.’

  ‘You got something to complain about, then?’

  She gasped at the stupidity of his question. ‘Are you kidding? With this new rationing lark it’s as bad as it was during the sodding war. It’s freezing cold out; there’s no coal; and I’m telling you, I’m sick and tired of bloody queuing for every single thing I want. And at least when the war was on there was a bit of fun.’

  A slow smile spread over Ted’s face. ‘I thought we just had a bit of fun.’

  Dilys snuggled up to him. ‘We did, but . . .’

  ‘But you want some more little presents?’

  ‘Well . . .’

  Ted threw off the covers and, unselfconsciously naked, he walked over to the wardrobe he shared with Ginny and pulled open the door.

  ‘There’s no rationing when you’re with me, darling. Help yourself.’

  He picked up his jacket from the floor and patted the pockets to find his cigarettes and matches. ‘But don’t be too greedy, eh?’

  Ted hadn’t even finished speaking when Dilys, also naked, was beside him on her knees, raking through the pile of things that had been half hidden by the hems of her supposedly best friend’s dresses.

  ‘These are lovely, Ted,’ murmured Dilys, tearing open a packet of stockings and draping the shiny lengths of nylon over her arm. ‘Really lovely.’

  Carefully she put them to one side and dived back into the treasure store.

  Her face was glowing with covetousness as she reappeared with a square-shouldered bottle of scent. ‘Is this really the proper gear?’ she breathed.

  ‘What else would you expect me to have?’ he asked, flopping back on to the tangle of bedclothes. ‘Dig a bit deeper, there’s some chocolates in there and all.’

  Dilys was in heaven. Sitting there, rooting through the packets and cartons, she was the picture of a spoilt child on Christmas morning, unwilling to share her booty with her less pushy brothers and sisters.

  ‘Oi, Dilys! Watch how you handle them boxes,’ Ted warned her, his eyes narrowed against the smoke from his cigarete. ‘I’ve gotta sell that lot.’

  She flashed a worried look at him over her shoulder. ‘Not all of it?’

  He laughed, recognising his own greed in hers. ‘No. But don’t go too mad. I’ve got a living to make, remember.’

  Dilys held up the nylons again, admiring their sheen against the pale March sunlight that was filtering through the freshly laundered lace curtains – the same lace curtains that, only a few days before, she had stood on her street doorstep watching Ginny rehang after she had washed them and cleaned the windows.

  She touched the nylon to her cheek and gave a little moan. She loved nice things. She deserved them. And she would have them, no matter what the price.

  With her lids half lowered and her lips pressed into a sultry pout, Dilys crawled over to the bed on all fours. She then slinked her way across the bed until her naked body was draped across Ted’s. Slowly she ran her fingertips up and down the inside of his thigh. ‘Ted,’ she murmured into his ear, ‘will you take me to a club tonight? So’s I can wear me new stockings and that lovely scent?’

  Ted rolled her off him, propped himself up on his elbows and looked down at her flushed, eager face. He reached across her and ground out the stub of his cigarette in the pink cut-glass pin tray that had pride of place on Ginny’s dressing-table. ‘D’you think I’m made of money?’

  ‘Well, ain’t you?’

  ‘No.’ He dropped back on to the pillows. ‘Anyway, how about you earning some money for a change? You ain’t done a day’s work since you lost your job last year.’

  ‘What? D’you really want me to go out all day like Ginny?’ She sounded horrified.

  ‘At least Ginny’s bringing home wages.’ He clasped his hands behind his head. ‘That girl’s done all kinds of jobs since Bloom’s closed.’

  Dilys was having trouble keeping up with this new turn of events. ‘But, Ted, who’d keep you company?’

  He grinned up at the ceiling. ‘There’s that to it, I suppose.’

  This was more like it. He was obviously having a joke with her. ‘This is my job now.’ She giggled, crawling back on top of him and grabbing him between the legs.

  ‘That’s enough of that, Dilys,’ he said, lifting her hand away.

  ‘But, Ted—’

  ‘You’ve gotta go, I’ve got business to see to.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Don’t start whining, Dilys. Anyway, Ginny’ll be back from work soon.’

  ‘She’ll think I’ve been over here helping Nellie for you, like she always does. And Nellie won’t give us away. You know she likes me better than Ginny. We have a laugh. And I don’t walk around the place with a face like a kite and keep tidying up round her all the time.’

  ‘Ginny don’t bribe her with a bottle of the hard stuff every couple of days you mean
.’

  ‘You give me the bloody stuff to give her!’ Dilys fumed.

  ‘Look, Dilys, I reckon even Ginny’d be suspicious if she finds us both up here stark bollock naked. Now come on.’

  ‘But why d’you even bother with her, Ted? Why—’

  ‘Look, don’t give me earache about it again, Dilys. She’s me old woman. Right? And while it suits me to have her live here, have me shirts washed, the place kept nice and be looked after—’

  ‘But if you got rid of Ginny, I’d look after you.’

  ‘Yeah. Right. Course you would.’ Ted snorted in contemptuous disbelief. ‘You can’t even look after yourself. Now, come on, Dilys. Play the game, girl. Get yourself dressed and get moving.’

  What Ted didn’t add was that he wanted her out of there before her brothers got in from work. Sid and Micky might have been a good ten years younger than Ted, but they had earned themselves reputations for being a tough pair of bastards and Ted wasn’t about to start messing with them.

  They now both worked in the docks, with George, their dad, who had managed to wangle them in there. And the boys couldn’t have been happier. The physical work suited the pair of them well; not only were they built like a pair of muscled-up oxen, but doing dock work had meant that they could avoid the threat of conscription – something that preoccupied most young men and their families now that the war was over and joining up all seemed such a complete waste of time.

  No, Ted definitely wasn’t interested in upsetting those two. He always liked the odds to be very much in his favour whenever he got a bit rough with someone. So he wasn’t going to start advertising the fact that he was knocking off their big sister. Especially as the arrangement suited him so very well just the way it was.

  Ted was a man who had developed quite a need for women. Not a liking for them, definitely not that, but a real need to have them do as he said, a need to have them submit to him. He was only interested in women who kept very much in their place – and that could be the bedroom, or the kitchen, he didn’t mind which – and Dilys popping over of an afternoon suited him very nicely. For the moment at least. He got his end away whenever he fancied it – which was most of the time – and his old mum got a bit of help round the house. Not much help, it had to be said, but enough to keep her quiet until Ginny got in of a night.

  Ted reached out for his jacket again and fumbled around until he had found his wallet. He slipped two pounds from a fat wad of notes and handed them to Dilys, who took them without protest. ‘Now will you shut up and get dressed? And take one pair of stockings and one bottle of scent. And then get your arse down them stairs and peel the spuds for me mum, or whatever it was you was meant to have been doing all afternoon. And then bugger off and be indoors when your family gets in like a good little girl.’

  Dilys scowled sulkily. Peeling spuds! She’d have to get things better organised than this or he’d have her scrubbing the bloody floors next.

  As Ginny turned into Bailey Street, the sight she always dreaded confronted her. There, in a pool of light from the gas lamp, she saw Ted, all booted and suited and rubbing the early evening dampness off his windscreen. He was going out again. And it was Friday. She’d be lucky if she saw him again before Monday morning. And that was being optimistic. If only she could handle him a bit better. Make him care more for her. Make him less angry with her. Try and get him to share her dreams . . .

  She pinned on a smile and broke into a trot. He hated her to be miserable and was likely to accuse her of nagging if she wasn’t grinning from ear to ear whenever he saw her. If she could at least have a quick word with him, maybe he’d stay in.

  Maybe.

  ‘Ted!’ she called with a cheery wave.

  ‘All right?’ he said, straightening up. He tossed the cloth he had been using into the passenger side of the car and wiped his hands on his handkerchief.

  ‘Sorry I’m a bit late,’ she puffed, ‘but I’ve been doing that bit of overtime, because I know Nellie’s had her heart set on a new wireless. So I went and put a deposit on one. For her birthday.’

  Ted looked at her for a long moment. Sometimes he really wondered if she was taking the piss with all her kind little thoughts and all her concern for Nellie. Surely she must have known that his mum now felt nothing more than contempt for the pathetic doormat she had let herself become.

  But who cared, so long as she kept the place nice and did as she was told? And, it had to be said, she wasn’t too bad at the other, considering she was his wife. Good little figure. Pretty face. And a lovely pair of pins. If he wasn’t in such a hurry . . .

  ‘Ted? Is something wrong? You’re staring.’

  ‘Eh?’

  She looked into his eyes and lifted her gloved hand to her cheek as though she was using him as a looking-glass to reflect the blemish she was sure he was staring at. ‘Have I got a smudge or something?’

  ‘No.’ Ted walked round to the driver’s side and got in. ‘Don’t wait up,’ he said, then slammed the door and drove off.

  Ted whistled softly, a short, high note followed by a lower, longer one – the prearranged signal for Al to let him in.

  ‘Hurry up, Al,’ he grumbled, as the young man fiddled around with the locked gate. ‘It’s brass monkeys out here.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Ted. You know me. I’m nervous,’ was all that Al could offer by way of defence.

  ‘You’re what?’ Ted tutted irritably. ‘We’ve been doing this for how many months now? And you’re still acting like some bloody big girl.’ Ted reached through the bars of the gate and held out his hand. ‘Give it here. Come on. Or we’ll have the sodding dock coppers on our backs.’

  With practised ease, Ted held the torch in his mouth and slipped the key into the lock, then switched off the torch and swung the gate open without a sound, just enough to let him edge through.

  The experience Ted had gained going on the creep during the war – breaking and entering houses and shops that might, or might not, be occupied – had stood him in good stead, and not just for sliding into Dilys’s bedroom without disturbing her mum and dad. Ted’s skills had equipped him to manage in all sorts of delicate situations.

  He shoved Al in the direction of the deserted office. ‘Move yourself, for Gawd’s sake.’

  Inside, Al pulled down the old black-out blinds that nobody had bothered to remove, checked that the door was locked securely, then turned on the green-shaded clerk’s lamp on his desk.

  Ted sat himself down in the battered, high-backed leather chair and leaned back with his fingers linked across his taut, muscled stomach. ‘What you got for me tonight then, Al? Something tasty?’

  Al went over to the window and lifted the edge of the blind, a nervous checking that the dock police hadn’t suddenly taken it into their minds to alter their nightly routine patrol.

  Ted was losing patience. ‘Look, Al, I don’t need all this. This ain’t the only dock office with a bit of bent gear to sell. I’m flaming freezing, I want a drink and I ain’t got all night. Okay? So are you gonna show me what you’ve got or shall I take myself off down the road and see what’s on offer down there?’

  ‘Sorry, Ted. It’s all that stuff they’ve had in the papers about the black market. They’ve been having all these checks.’

  Ted sat up straight. ‘When?’

  ‘Earlier.’

  ‘They catch anyone?’

  ‘Yeah, Arthur Waters.’

  ‘What, red-headed Arthur?’

  Al nodded miserably.

  ‘Don’t look so worried, Al. That’s good news.’

  ‘Is it?’ Al didn’t sound very convinced.

  ‘Course it is.’ Ted broke into a broad grin and tapped his temple with his forefinger. ‘Use your loaf, Al. They won’t be looking for any thieves tonight, now will they? They’ll think that everyone’ll have the wind up and’ll be lying low. I mean, who’d be stupid enough to go nicking when someone’s just had his collar felt?’

  Disarmed by such logic and bolste
red by Ted’s apparent lack of concern, Al did his best to impress him with his own confidence. ‘I was only being cautious, Ted, I wasn’t really worried.’

  Ted stood up and slapped him matily on the back. ’Course you wasn’t, son. Course you wasn’t. Now, let’s see what you’ve got for me, shall we?’

  When they had finished ferrying the final cartons of illicit goods through the dock gates, and round to a dimly lit street where the Talbot was parked in the shadows of a tall, bomb-damaged warehouse, Ted slipped Al a tight roll of notes. ‘Good work, son,’ he said with a wink. ‘Now, how about a little celebration?’

  Al nodded readily. He savoured the excitement of going for a drink with Ted Martin after their deals almost more than he enjoyed the money Ted gave him. Being a clerk might have brought him the kind of respect that his mum and dad approved of, but Al craved respect of a different sort: the sort that had birds ready to jump into bed with you and blokes wanting to shake your hand and be your mate. And going into a pub with Ted Martin gave Al a much-savoured glimpse of what that felt like. He scared him a bit too, if he was honest, but that was part of the thrill.

  Al waited for Ted to get in the car and then did the same. He sat there, silently watching in the shadows as Ted checked the angle of his hat in the rear-view mirror.

  ‘Tell you what,’ said Ted, turning and flashing him one of his devastating smiles as he fired the engine into life, ‘I know of a couple of right dirty sorts who’d just love to keep us company tonight. Fancy having a few drinks with them and then . . .’ Another one of his smiles. ‘Well, who knows?’

  Al nodded again. He hadn’t even been with a bird when he first met Ted, but he had certainly got the taste for them since.

  The ‘sorts’ turned out to be two flashily clothed, over-made-up girls of about twenty, who were drinking in a dodgy-looking Limehouse pub on the edges of what remained of Blitz-ravaged Chinatown. They were standing up at the bar with two tall, well-dressed men, but the moment one of the girls spotted Ted coming in with Al she nudged her friend, pointed at Ted and whispered something to her.