by Nancy Revell
‘To be honest, Rosie …’ Peter said. He looked jaded and a little defeated. The moment had come. He had been dreading it. Truly dreading it. The scene he’d known would have to be played out was now taking place, and it felt more than a little surreal. ‘… I don’t know what I’m going to do.’
And it was true. DS Miller had no idea what he was going to do. Or what would happen next. All he knew was that he felt a degree of relief. Finally, it was out in the open.
‘I know what I should do as someone who enforces the law.’ He didn’t need to say that he should report the bordello to the authorities. That Rosie and Lily should be arrested for running an establishment of ill repute, and, more importantly, a place that was illegal.
‘But,’ he started to waffle, ‘… sometimes it’s hard.’ As the words stuttered out of his mouth, all he could think of was that he didn’t want to be saying this. He had only ever wanted to whisper sweet nothings into this woman’s ear.
Had only ever just wanted to be with her.
God, he had wanted to marry her.
Have her as his. But that dream had been demolished. He had been living in cloud cuckoo land, and now he had been brutally chucked out of the nest and was having to sit up, dazed and confused, and face up to the reality of the situation.
Rosie looked at Peter. Neither of them moved an inch. The rain was getting heavier. Random thoughts went through Rosie’s head: the pie would be getting wet if they stood there much longer. All of Agnes’s hard work for nothing.
Rosie forced her mind back on track. She tried to interpret Peter’s words. She wanted to shake him and ask what he meant. What was he going to do? Did he realise that it wasn’t just her life he would be ruining, but Charlotte’s as well? An innocent in all of this.
Rosie knew that she should tell him about Charlotte. Make him understand – beg him to understand. She should tell him about the events that had brought her to where she was now. Her parents’ deaths. That Charlotte would be sent to an orphanage, or the care home run by the nuns. That she had done what she had done not for her own survival – but to save her sister.
Surely he would understand?
Surely this would stop him reporting her and Lily to the police?
She should throw herself on his mercy. Explain why she had done what she had done. Why she now did what she did.
Rosie opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. She tried to say the words, but she couldn’t. Something steely and obstructive inside her was stopping the begging words from coming out. She couldn’t do it. Couldn’t bow down and beg for mercy. Especially to a man.
Flashes of her uncle Raymond on top of her as she gasped for air, aged just fifteen … Him threatening to do the same to Charlotte if she didn’t let him do what he wanted … The years of working as a girl at Lily’s … Being forced to hand over money in exchange for her uncle’s silence last year … the repeated threat of exposure and, worse still, the unspoken risk he posed to her sister.
And then the moment she’d had her face held over a live weld and nearly died.
No.
She was never going to beg for any man’s mercy.
Never.
Rosie opened her mouth again. ‘Peter,’ she said, without anger or shame, and with not a hint of contrition.
‘You have to do what you think is right. It is your choice. It is your decision what you do. I cannot – will not – do anything to try and stop you or influence you.’
She took a deep breath and spoke the next words with a tremor in her voice.
‘All I want to say to you is that I am sorry I lied to you. I’m sorry I was not honest about my other life – but everything else I shared with you was true.’
Peter was standing, rain now dripping down the edges of his trilby. Rosie looked into his eyes and thought she saw tears forming.
‘Most of all, though, I am sorry for lying to you about how I felt. That was the hardest and most painful lie I have ever had to tell, because – and I think deep down you knew this – I did want to be with you … I loved being with you … When you tried to kiss me that evening, I didn’t want to stop you …’
Rosie took a deep breath and told herself to be strong. ‘When I told you that I didn’t want to be with you – that was a lie. I wanted to be with you more than anything – but I knew I couldn’t because of what you have now found out … and so I lied.
‘Peter, do what you have to do. But know that I lied for a reason. I was falling in love with you. And try as I might I have not been able to force myself to fall out of love with you.’
With that, Rosie turned and walked away into the darkness of the night.
And Peter stood, still holding the pie, watching the woman he had also not been able to force himself to fall out of love with, walk away.
Chapter Fifty-Six
When Rosie got home that night, she quickly changed and went straight to the bordello. As soon as she was through the front door she found Lily and asked her to come for a chat in the front office. Lily could see by the look on Rosie’s face that whatever she wanted to tell her was serious.
‘George – George!’ Lily called out, poking her head around the door of the reception room and finding her fiancé. Since they had announced their engagement, there had been great excitement in the house; it was something the girls couldn’t easily forget as Lily was enjoying wearing her enormous diamond ring every minute of the day; there had even been speculation that she wore it in bed.
George took one look at Lily’s face and knew something was up.
‘Coming, my dear.’ He pushed himself off the piano stool. He had been tinkling away, teaching himself a new tune. As he joined Lily out in the hallway, he looked at her and asked, ‘What’s up?’
‘I don’t know,’ Lily said, opening the door to Rosie’s office. ‘But I think we’re about to find out.’
‘Bloody hell.’ Lily had reverted to her East End twang. ‘I knew that man was trouble from the start. Bloody, bloody, bloody …’
George took another drink of the cognac Rosie had poured out for them all before she broke the news that Peter knew about the bordello.
‘Did he say anything else?’ Lily demanded. ‘How much does he know? Does he know how many girls we have here? How long we’ve been going for?’
Rosie looked flushed. She had barely had time to digest this new turn of events herself. All she knew was that she’d had to get here as quickly as she could and tell Lily. This affected Lily’s life as much as it did her own. She had a right to know straight away. Rosie just hoped to God that Peter wouldn’t do anything tonight if he was going to turn them in.
‘No, he didn’t go into any detail,’ she said, racking her brains and going over every word they had exchanged, ‘just said that he “knew”.’
There was silence as Lily walked round the large desk and pulled open one of the top drawers, where she kept a spare packet of Gauloises. After she took a cigarette out of the packet and lit it with the large silver lighter that was kept on the top of the desk, she exhaled smoke, put a hand on Rosie’s shoulder and squeezed it gently. This was not the time for blame, although she could bloody well strangle Rosie for ever becoming friendly with probably the straightest copper in the whole of the Borough Police. No, they had to pull together, and work out the best solution to the dire situation they now found themselves in.
Rosie put her hand on top of Lily’s and squeezed it in return. She could feel Lily’s ring against the palm of her hand.
‘Well,’ George said, ‘I think the first thing we have to do is to put your ledgers somewhere they can’t be found.’
Lily paced the room, cigarette in one hand and in the other her large glass of cognac.
‘Yes, good thinking, George. Can you deal with that?’ she asked, taking a slug of her drink, followed by a puff on her Gauloise. ‘And I think we’ll tell the girls that we’re going to close shop for a week or so until we can work out what we’re going to do. At least then
we don’t have to worry about having the girls here, or that they’ll be nicked. They’d probably get off with a slap on the wrist and a fine, but it would be the humiliation that would be the worst for them …’
‘And the fact they would never get another job anywhere else once it came out about their work here,’ Rosie added.
Lily continued to smoke; as she did so she kept looking at her engagement ring. ‘Mmm,’ she pondered for a moment, ‘… you wanting to make an honest woman of me, George, might just give us a bit of an advantage here.’
Within the hour the girls had been assembled. All the clients had paid up and gone home. Any other men seeking the services of the bordello were politely turned away with the explanation that there were problems with the plumbing and the bordello was going to have to close for the next few days – possibly the next week, if it was as big a problem as they thought.
Lily and Rosie were honest with the girls about the reason the business was suddenly closing its doors as they had agreed between them that everyone connected to the bordello needed to know the truth.
‘But what about those of us who live here?’ Vivian asked. She looked gutted. Life had been getting really interesting since Maisie had come on board, especially now the wedding fiasco was slowly receding into the background and it looked as though Maisie was going to stay.
Lily looked at Vivian. She knew she had nowhere else to go to. She originally hailed from Liverpool, but had shown no desire in the past year she had been here to return to her home town.
‘Why don’t we have a chat about that when Maisie and Kate get back? We can put our heads together and work something out,’ she said.
At the mention of Kate, Rosie felt awash with guilt. This was the last thing she wanted for her old schoolfriend. She had brought her here to help her, not get her arrested and put behind bars. And, besides, where would she go? Back on the streets? Back to her old ways?
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Friday 21 November 1941
The next morning when Rosie went into work she had dark rings around her eyes, evidence that she had barely slept a wink.
‘Rosie looks a bit rough today,’ Dorothy said under her breath to Angie. ‘Haven’t seen her like this since all that trouble she was having with her uncle.’
Gloria, next to them, had been thinking the same. ‘I agree,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ll have a chat and see what’s up and if there’s anything we can do.’
As they all worked through the morning shift, Rosie’s mind kept looping around and around.
When Kate and Maisie had got back last night – Maisie from her trip to the Grand, and Kate from working late at the shop – they had all sat around the kitchen table with Vivian. The rest of the girls had already gone home and the small red light at the back of the house had been switched off.
It had surprised Rosie that Kate didn’t seem too perturbed by everything. She wasn’t sure if it was because Kate didn’t feel that she had any other option other than to stay, or because the thought of being hauled off by the police was nothing new for her. George seemed to think that, if the place was raided, they would not be able to find anything to charge Kate with. But, you never knew, especially with her previous misdemeanours.
Maisie, however, could not hide her anxiety. Rosie had a feeling that Bel’s half-sister might already have felt the pull of her collar in London, and that was why she appeared more than keen to remove herself from the situation. Maisie said she would sleep on it and work out what she was going to do in the morning.
Vivian, on the other hand, seemed pretty resolute about staying. It was clear she did not want to go back to the Wirral, and in her words, spoken like a true Mae West, was ‘willing to take her chances’.
Lily and George had gone off for a walk for an hour. Rosie suspected they had gone across to the Ashbrooke sports and social club for a chat. They weren’t regulars there but George was a member and they occasionally popped in for a quick drink.
When they returned they had told them that – as a newly engaged couple – they were going to live together in the house in an effort to give it some semblance of a ‘normal’ family home. And that, instead of children, they had lodgers in the form of Vivian and Kate – and Maisie, of course, should she choose to stay.
They all knew that Peter might already have enough evidence of their illegitimate business to have them hauled immediately in front of the magistrates, and whatever they did now to try and erect a veneer of respectability would make no difference. ‘But,’ Lily had declared, ‘best to do something rather than nothing. That’s what I say.’
And so it was agreed. George would move out of his bachelor pad, where he rarely spent any time as it was, and Vivian, Maisie and Kate would assume the role of lodgers.
When Rosie had gone back home she had felt physically sick that it was all her fault. She had caused this horrendous situation.
Throughout the night and into the early hours of the morning she had repeatedly berated herself for ever agreeing to go for a cup of tea with Peter. She knew from the start the risk she was taking – and yet she took it. And now here she was – and it wasn’t just herself who was paying for that mistake, but a whole bunch of other people who had done nothing wrong, other than want to get by and earn a living.
Her self-admonishment had continued all morning at work, and now the horn was sounding out for lunch, she was glad to be with the women. Her mind needed a rest.
‘So, Gloria,’ she asked as they traipsed over to the canteen. They all had several layers of clothes on as it was turning out to be another bitterly cold winter. ‘Are you all set for Hope’s christening tomorrow?’
Gloria grabbed the door of the canteen and swung it open as they piled in.
‘I certainly am. Not much to organise, really, just turn up with the baby at the arranged time,’ she said. ‘It’s Dorothy,’ she added, casting a look over to Hope’s godmother, ‘you should really be asking. She’s the one who’s got her work cut out.’
Rosie’s mind was feeling sluggish and tired and she glanced at Dorothy with a quizzical look on her drawn face.
‘The cake,’ Dorothy said. ‘She means I have to keep my end of the bargain and get “the biggest cake ever”. You know, like I promised when she had Hope?’
‘Ah, yes, of course,’ Rosie forced a smile.
‘Anyway, I keep meaning to ask,’ Polly said, ‘did you manage to catch Peter last night?’
Rosie felt her face turn crimson.
‘Oh, yes, yes, I did,’ she hesitated, not sure what to say. ‘He was really pleased … grateful … said all the usual things – “you shouldn’t have” and “only doing my job” and all that – but I could tell he was really, really chuffed.’
Rosie hoped Polly hadn’t picked up that she was lying, and that in reality the potato and leek pie had been like a shield between the pair of them. Rosie didn’t want the Elliots – and Agnes in particular – to know that her thank-you gift was the last thing on Peter’s mind and that it was probably ruined by the time Peter got home, thanks to the heavens opening as soon as they had parted company.
As they made their way along the queue, telling the dinner ladies what they wanted, the women looked at each other discreetly. They were no one’s fools. They knew something was up. It was too much of a coincidence that Rosie had come into work looking like death warmed up the night after seeing the man they all knew she had more than a soft spot for.
When they had settled round the table, Martha looked at Rosie and then at her friends and asked matter-of-factly, ‘The Admiral?’
Her question was followed by unanimous agreement.
Rosie was especially glad. She might as well enjoy her freedom while she still had it.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
On hearing the lunchtime klaxon sound out, Jack pulled open his desk drawer and took out his sandwiches that had been wrapped up in greaseproof paper and tied with string. Mrs Westley had told him they were a surprise when sh
e had handed him them this morning after breakfast. She told him they had always been his favourites. He was curious to know what he used to like, and was just untying her neat bow when there was a tap on his office door, which he always kept open.
When he looked up he saw an old man standing in the doorway. He was tall – very tall, in fact – for a bloke of his age. And he still had a full head of silver hair. For a moment Jack stared at the old man’s face. There was something familiar about him. Was this someone he had met recently? Or a face from his past?
‘Hello, there.’ Jack stood up, abandoning his sandwiches. ‘Can I help you?’ He moved round his desk and walked across to the man and stretched out his arm to shake hands. ‘Or, what I should really say,’ Jack smiled a little awkwardly, ‘is do I actually know you? Because if I do I apologise in advance as the old memory’s not working properly at the moment.’ Jack had learnt that it was best to just come out with it up front. It saved a lot of misunderstanding and time.
‘Aye, Jack,’ Arthur shook the proffered hand energetically, ‘you do know me. It’s Arthur Watts. I used to work with you down the docks when I was under the employ of the Wear Commissioner,’ Arthur let out a gruff laugh, ‘many years ago now, mind you. But we always stayed in touch. My grandson Tommy was dock diver at Thompson’s until recently.’
‘Ah,’ Jack said, ‘now I do know of Tommy.’ Jack saw Arthur’s face light up. ‘But I’m afraid that’s not because I remember him as such, only that I was told he’s engaged to one of the women welders. Polly, I believe her name is. Polly Elliot.’
Jack looked pleased with himself. ‘See. Nothing wrong with my present-day memory. Just the blasted past I’m struggling with.’
Arthur looked at Jack. He seemed so vulnerable. Like a man floundering around in the dark, not able to find the light switch to see where he was going.