Scarborough Ball (Scarborough Fair Book 2)

by Margarita Morris

  “You’re leaving?”

  “I’m emigrating to America.” Her words came out in a rush.

  I stared at her blankly, not fully comprehending what she had said. “You’re what?”

  “Emigrating,” she said, more slowly this time. “You know, leaving good old Blighty and going to live in the land of opportunity.” She made it sound like the Promised Land.

  “But I don’t understand. How? Why?” My head was spinning with questions. How long had she been planning this? It all seemed so out of the blue. I knew Ruby was ambitious and wanted to go places, but this was such a shock, I couldn’t take it in.

  “I’ve had an offer of work,” she explained. “In a fashion house in New York. I’ll be starting as a seamstress but I hope to work my way up to be a fashion designer. Oh Lilian, I’m so excited. Please say you’re happy for me.”

  “Of course I’m happy for you,” I said, although I found it impossible to inject much enthusiasm into my voice. I was reeling too much from the shock. “But how did you even find out about the job?”

  “The lady who owns the shop where I work has a cousin in America and she arranged everything for me. Lilian, I know this must come as a bit of a surprise, especially after...” she trailed off. “But please understand that this opportunity means the world to me. I have to take it.”

  “But I thought you liked Scarborough.” I was starting to sound like a petulant child.

  Ruby sighed. “Well Scarborough is a lot nicer than Leeds, I’ll give you that, but I don’t want to stay here forever. It’s just...too small and provincial and I want to see the world. But I will miss you Lilian, you know that, don’t you?”

  “I’ll miss you too.” And I meant it. “When do you leave?”

  Ruby looked sheepish. “Actually, I’m leaving today. I’m taking the train to London and then travelling on to Southampton. The boat leaves in three days’ time.”

  “So soon?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  I stared at her in stunned silence.

  “Please say something, Lilian.”

  “I...” A lump was forming in my throat and I couldn’t speak. I had come here to tell her about Billy but what was the point now? There was nothing she could do to help me or him.

  Ruby put her arms around me, enveloping me in a cloud of Lily of the Valley perfume.

  “I’ll write,” she said, “and let you know my address when I get there. And you must send me a photograph of you and Billy on your wedding day.”

  I nodded. “I need to go now,” I said, making up an excuse to get out of there. “Mother will wonder where I am.”

  “Of course.”

  Ruby walked back downstairs with me and waved me off. “Look after yourself,” she called.

  That was the last time I ever saw her.

  ~~~

  The next day the storm had blown itself out, leaving a grey drizzle hanging over the town. I trudged to work, not knowing if Billy would be back and the cinema would reopen or if he was still being held by the police. And Ruby’s news had left an empty, hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach. I envied her being able to just leave and put the events of New Year’s Eve behind her.

  Walking along Foreshore Road, the sight of the newspaper headline almost caused me to cry out. ARREST IN FRANKLIN MURDER. My heart skipped a beat. Had they actually charged Billy with the crime? I fumbled in my purse for some change and bought a copy. The newspaper boy was used to me by now, I’d bought so many newspapers in the past week.

  “There you are, Miss,” he said as he handed me the paper. “Looks like they’ve got ’im. We’ll all be able to sleep better in our beds now, knowing the murderer’s been caught.” He gave me a smile. I mumbled something incoherent in reply and hurried to the Futurist.

  I shut myself in the ticket booth and read the front page story as quickly as possible, practically intoxicated with relief and astonishment. Billy hadn’t been charged. According to the article, the police had charged an American called Mr Harry Doyle. There was a grainy black and white picture of him and I recognised the man who had caused the disturbance at the party, the one who had come looking for Mr Franklin and had made threats against him. Mr Doyle had been apprehended in London, on his way to Liverpool Street station. Witnesses at the ball had confirmed Mr Doyle’s aggressive behaviour (indeed I had said exactly the same thing to the inspector myself) and a couple of people had reported that Mr Franklin and Mr Doyle were business rivals. Mr Doyle was due to appear at York Crown Court in a week’s time.

  In the inside pages there was more coverage of the accused and his relationship to the murder victim. I devoured all the details in an effort to assuage my guilt. According to the newspaper the two men had been involved in an ongoing feud. They had been active in the bootlegging trade back in Chicago during Prohibition, distilling whiskey and selling it illegally on the black market. Unnamed sources claimed that Theodore Franklin owed Harry Doyle a lot of money. And Harry Doyle was a man with a violent reputation. The newspaper implied that he was probably responsible for unsolved murders back in his home city of Chicago. Although they didn’t actually use the word, they made it plain that he was a gangster.

  I tried to take some consolation from knowing that Mr Doyle was a known criminal, but it didn’t alter the fact that the wrong man had been arrested for a crime he hadn’t committed.

  As I sat in the ticket booth, the whole messy situation started to crystallise in my mind. Things had changed since yesterday. So far I had avoided going to the police, partly because I didn’t want to implicate Ruby. But with Ruby gone I saw things in a clearer light. I knew what I had to do. I would go to the police and confess to killing Theodore Franklin but I would simply leave her out of it. I would say that after we had both done our auditions I went back on my own and that was when things got out of hand. I didn’t know why I hadn’t thought of that before. I felt as if a huge burden had been lifted from my shoulders and I couldn’t wait to get to the police station and throw myself on the mercy of Inspector Dixon. But I had to go before Billy arrived. I couldn’t see him otherwise I would lose my nerve. I pulled on my coat, picked up my handbag and stepped out of the ticket booth, only to run into Mr Thompson.

  “Ah, Lilian,” he said. “Are you going somewhere?”

  “Well, I...” I didn’t know what to tell him. I could hardly say I was just popping down to the police station to confess to a killing.

  Mr Thompson looked serious for a moment, then said, “Could you step into my office please?”

  Bother, I thought to myself. Just when I had made my decision to go to the police station, Mr Thompson had to appear and ruin my plans. I nodded and followed him into his office.

  “Please, sit down.” He indicated the chair opposite his desk, the very same chair that Mr Franklin had been sitting in when I’d first seen him. Mr Thompson sat down on the other side of the desk. I waited for him to speak.

  “Billy will be here shortly,” he said. “He apologised for his absence yesterday. I told him I quite understood and not to worry about it. I understand his interview in London went rather well, but I’m sure he’d like to tell you about that himself.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” I said. And I truly was. There was no need for all of Billy’s plans to fall apart just because of me.

  Mr Thompson leaned across the desk and smiled. “I understand the two of you plan to marry, so no doubt you’ll be going with him when he starts his new job in London.”

  I looked at Mr Thompson and for the first time saw a kindly father figure, someone whom I could trust. I didn’t know why I hadn’t seen that in him before. I took a deep breath. “The thing is,” I began, “something happened at the New Year’s Eve ball at the Grand Hotel. Something involving Mr Franklin. I...”

  Mr Thompson put up a hand and stopped me. “It seems to me,” he began, “that you haven’t been quite yourself since the death of our American visitor.”

  A tear ran down my cheek. “That’s b
ecause...”

  “I’ve observed you,” continued Mr Thompson, not letting me speak, “poring over the newspaper every day in the ticket booth.” I didn’t realise I’d been so obvious. “You jump whenever anyone mentions his name.”

  The tears were falling freely now. Mr Thompson looked a little startled but then pulled a spotless handkerchief out of his breast pocket and handed it to me. I dabbed my eyes and blew my nose. I must have looked a dreadful sight. Eventually I managed to bring my tears under control.

  “You know,” said Mr Thompson, “when I was fighting in the war I saw men do terrible things to each other. Nerves were frayed and tensions ran high. At moments of extreme stress we can’t always be in full control of our actions.”

  I looked at him and wondered what he was trying to tell me. He couldn’t know what had happened that night at the Grand Hotel but how much did he suspect?

  “I hope,” he continued, “that you won’t let the past ruin your life. You and Billy have a great future together. Don’t throw it all away.”

  I wanted to ask him about Harry Doyle, the man who had been charged with Mr Franklin’s murder. As if Mr Thompson had read my mind he said, “The justice system in this country is fair. The man they’ve charged won’t be convicted if he didn’t do it. Innocent until proven guilty, remember.”

  I nodded my head slowly, taking in his words. Innocent until proven guilty.

  “Now, why don’t you go back to work. Billy should have arrived by now.”

  I stumbled out of Mr Thompson’s office and saw Billy standing by the ticket booth. I ran into his arms. He picked me up and swung me around.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked, noticing my red eyes.

  “It’s...it’s nothing,” I said. “I was just worried about you yesterday. But Mr Thompson told me that your interview went well and now I’m really happy for you. It’s been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster, that’s all.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I got the job at British Pathé. They want me to start next month. So we need to set a date for the wedding.”

  “What about your mother?” I asked, remembering the way she had treated me at the police station.

  Billy looked me squarely in the face and said, “I’m a grown man and I will decide my own future. Mother will just have to put up with it.”

  I had a choice. I could tell him the truth and call the whole thing off. Or I could take Mr Thompson’s advice, bury the past, and take my future as Billy’s wife. I made my decision.

  “What about the twenty-third of February?” I said.

  “Sounds perfect.” He kissed me then on the lips and I hid the truth about Theodore Franklin in a locked box at the back of my mind where I vowed never to look.

  With the date for the wedding set, there was no time to lose and the sewing machine was once again pressed into action. Aunt Ellie took Mother’s old wedding dress and altered it for me, raising the hem and taking it in at the waist. She designed a headdress and veil with a piece of old lace and some artificial flowers. Julia and Betty were both thrilled to be my bridesmaids. We married in St Mary’s church where my parents were married, overlooking the South Bay. It was a cold day, but one of those bright, crisp days when the winter sun shines out of a cloudless sky. Mr Thompson gave me away and then we had a wedding celebration at The Three Mariners where Mother made sure that Mrs Drinkwater had enough sherry inside her to take away her sharp edges. Two days later we travelled to London to start our new life together.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Sounds started to penetrate Rose’s consciousness. Footsteps, murmured voices, a trolley with a squeaking wheel. A rasping noise, like sandpaper on wood. The rasping sound waxed and waned in time with her breathing, and then she realised, it was her breathing. Why was she making such a dreadful noise? Rose made a humongous effort to open her eyelids which felt as heavy as lead. When they opened the light was so bright, she screwed them tight shut again and then opened them more cautiously. Now that she was regaining her senses, she recognised a familiar smell: a certain disinfectant. She’d been here before. The hospital.

  Her first thought was, I’m alive. I didn’t fry to a crisp in that fire at the nightclub. Her second thought was, Mum’s going to kill me. Andrea would never let her leave the house again after this. Her fears were confirmed when her mum jumped up from the chair beside the bed and grabbed hold of her hand.

  “Oh my God,” said Andrea, “thank goodness you’re awake! You can’t imagine how worried I’ve been. What on earth were you doing in that burning building?” Rose tried to say something but Andrea was on a roll and didn’t pause for breath. “Why didn’t you leave when everyone else got out? You could have died.”

  I didn’t stay there out of choice, thought Rose, but how to explain to her mother what had happened? “Sorry, Mum,” was all she could think to say for the moment. She turned her head to try and take in her surroundings. She was in a small ward with six beds in it. Nurses were bustling around, seeing to the other patients.

  “You suffered smoke inhalation,” continued Andrea in a scolding voice. “If they hadn’t found you when they did, I dread to think...”

  “I’m okay.” She didn’t feel okay but she couldn’t handle her mum going off the deep end right now. There was something blocking her nose and it was irritating her. She put a hand up to her face and felt two ends of a rubber tube running into her nostrils.

  “Don’t pull that out,” shrieked Andrea. “You need all the oxygen you can get right now.”

  Rose let her hand fall back onto the bed. It was tempting to just say she was tired and pretend to go back to sleep but she needed to know what had happened to Dan. The last thing she remembered was him coming to rescue her and then the window overlooking the dance floor exploding and a raging heat, like the fires of Hell, consuming the projection room.

  “Do you know what happened to Dan? Is he all right?”

  Andrea’s face was stony, but then a voice on the other side of the bed said, “Why don’t you ask him yourself?”

  Rose turned to see her great-uncle David and, beside him, Dan in a hospital dressing gown. David was carrying a huge bunch of yellow roses.

  “I just went to visit Dan on his ward,” said David, “and the nurse in charge said it was fine for him to come and see you. He’s not in quite as bad shape as you are because he wasn’t in the projection room for so long and didn’t get so dehydrated.”

  Dan leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “Good to see you,” he said.

  “You too.”

  “I brought you these,” said David, holding out the yellow roses.

  “They’re beautiful, thank you.”

  David spoke to Andrea. “I think we should go and find a vase for these flowers, don’t you? Leave the young people on their own for a moment or two?” Just then Rose loved her uncle more than ever.

  Andrea pursed her lips and gave Dan a warning look as if to say, don’t get her into any dangerous situations whilst we’re gone, then she picked up her handbag and said pointedly, “We won’t be long.” David led Andrea out of the ward, turning to give Rose a wink before they disappeared from view.

  Dan sat on the edge of the bed and took her hand.

  “What happened?” asked Rose. “I don’t know how we ended up here. The last thing I remember was the window exploding and the room filling with smoke.”

  “It seems,” said Dan, “that Chris -”

  “Who’s Chris?”

  “The motorcyclist on the Harley-Davidson.”

  “Oh, right.”

  “Well, apparently Chris alerted the fire officer in charge that I had gone up to the projection room to rescue you. Otherwise they wouldn’t have found us so quickly and things might have turned out rather differently.”

  “And what about Max? What happened to him?”

  Dan laughed. “Scarlett actually came up trumps for once in her life. She made him fall down some stairs at the Grand Hotel and got her dad to call the police.
Max is under arrest for drug dealing and illegal possession of fire arms. He won’t cause us any more trouble.”

  “Good.” Rose yawned. She was still very tired.

  “You should get some sleep now,” said Dan. “I’m being discharged this afternoon and there’s something I need to do, but I’ll come back and see you tomorrow. Promise.”

  Rose drifted off into a sleep that was no longer filled with the threat of drowning or being burnt alive.

  ~~~

  As soon as the doctor had given him the all-clear and said he could go home, Dan hurried out of the hospital. It wasn’t his favourite place in the world. Not after his dad’s car accident and the days Ryan had spent in a coma, and Dan’s own spell in hospital when he’d nearly drowned after the boat capsized. It was a huge relief to see Rose and to know that she was going to be all right, but he didn’t want to spend any longer than necessary in there, especially with Andrea emitting hostile radiation waves. He guessed he’d failed the reliable-boyfriend test yet again. David was a good bloke though.

  His own mother had visited him that morning. Fiona had been contrite, saying that she knew she’d been drinking too much recently and neglecting him. He’d had to reassure her that what had happened at the Futurist was not her fault. She had wanted to stay with him all day and drive him home herself, saying she would cancel her evening yoga class. One of the women on her beauty therapy course had recommended the yoga class as a stress-buster and Dan had thought it sounded just what she needed so he had persuaded her to go. He could make his own way home. Besides, it would suit him if the house was empty when he got back. There was something he needed to do.

  Dan caught the bus back to Greylands Park Drive. There was no motorcyclist hanging around. Dan didn’t expect to see Chris ever again. If the guy had any sense he wouldn’t hang around Scarborough.

  He opened the door and stepped into the house. Silence greeted him. Just what he’d hoped for. He checked the kitchen and lounge, but they were both mother-free zones. He went upstairs and knocked lightly on her bedroom door. No response. He pushed open the door, went straight to the wardrobe, found the jewellery box and replaced the diamond bracelet. Then he returned the jewellery box to its place, closed the wardrobe door and went back onto the landing.