Coronation Summer

by Margaret Pemberton

  Kate cut him short, her eyes glinting fire as, speaking to Leon but staring at Deborah Harvey, she said categorically, ‘No, Leon. I think this is something I should handle.’

  It was Carrie who saw Leon’s body freeze with a completely new kind of tension and who realized that the hideous scene had taken on a whole new dimension. ‘Blimey,’ she thought to herself, deciding, like Billy, that she, too, should be taking her leave, ‘Kate and Leon are going to be falling out next if Kate isn’t careful. Why on earth did she override him like that? He’s more than capable of handling Miss High and Mighty Harvey, and he’s the one that’s being got at, after all.’ Aloud she said, ‘I’m off. ’Bye Kate. ’Bye Leon.’ She didn’t say goodbye to Deborah Harvey. She knew what Deborah Harvey’s opinion of market traders was. Heavy-hearted at all the problems Kate was having to deal with, she let herself out of the house, fairly sure that Billy would soon be following her example.

  It was deep dusk now, and St Mark’s spire was dark against a sky pin-pointed with faint stars. She hesitated at Kate’s gate. Danny would be at the boxing club and Rose would be doing her homework. If she didn’t return straight home she certainly wouldn’t be missed. Glad that she’d bothered to slip her swagger-coat on for the short walk from her house to Kate’s, she turned up its collar against the now cool air and set off in deep depression in the direction of Magnolia Terrace and the heath.

  Beryl gave herself a last look in the mirror of her kidney-shaped dressing-table and then ran eagerly down the stairs. She’d had a long, lingering bath, lying with a face-pack on amongst as many bubbles as she could coax from a packet of Hollywood-style foam bath. She’d rinsed her hair with lemon-juice when she washed it, ironed and re-ironed her lace-collared blouse and yellow circular skirt and now, with mascara on her eyelashes and California Poppy perfume dabbed on the insides of her wrists, she was ready for the world. Or, more precisely, for the Embassy Boxing Club.

  ‘Where you goin’ love?’ her dad asked as, with no sight or sound of Mavis, he sat listening to the radio, the plate of doorstep, corned-beef sandwiches he’d made for himself balanced on the arm of his armchair, a steaming pint pot of tea by his feet.

  ‘The boxing club.’ Beryl hesitated. She loved her dad dearly and under normal circumstances, seeing as how her mum wasn’t home and he was in on his own, she would have asked if he fancied going to the club with her. Tonight wasn’t normal circumstances, though. Tonight she wanted Zac Hemingway to notice her, really notice her, and she’d be too self-conscious to help him do so if her dad were with her.

  ‘The club?’ Ted Lomax’s eyebrows rose high. ‘What on earth is the attraction there, pet?’

  Beryl had never fibbed to him in her life, and didn’t do so now. ‘There’s someone there I like, Dad,’ she said, blushing.

  Ted Lomax’s interest in where she was going, and why, which until then had merely been cursory, instantly deepened. He pushed his plate of sandwiches a little to one side, turning in his chair so that he was facing her properly. ‘A boy? One of the older scouts?’

  Beryl’s blush deepened. ‘No, Dad. He’s a boxer, a proper boxer. He’s ever so nice, honest. You can ask Aunt Carrie if you like. She likes him, and so does Gran.’

  Ted wasn’t sure that his mother-in-law’s opinion counted for much. If Miriam was asked who’d written Shakespeare’s plays, she’d have been stuck for an answer. Carrie, though, was another matter. Carrie had a sensible head on her shoulders. Even so, when it came to Beryl’s welfare he didn’t intend trusting anyone’s judgement but his own. He eyed his plate of sandwiches and pot of tea regretfully. He’d been looking forward to enjoying them while listening in to a football match. However, if he was going to go down to the club to check out the young man Beryl was interested in, he might as well walk down there with her.

  ‘Just a mo, pet,’ he said, rising to his feet, ‘and I’ll get my jacket.’

  ‘There’s no need for you to come with me, Dad!’ Beryl’s cheeks were scarlet with mortification. What if her dad began grilling Zac Hemingway as if it were an understood thing that Zac was interested in her? She’d die! She would just die! And anyway, if her dad’s idea of a suitable boyfriend for her was a boy scout, he’d have ten pink fits when he laid eyes on Zac!

  ‘Don’t be silly, love,’ Ted said with what he thought was sweet reason. ‘If you’ve got your eye on a chap, I want to make sure he isn’t a wrong ’un, don’t I? I can’t have my best girl bein’ messed about.’

  ‘But he doesn’t know I’ve got my eye on him!’ Beryl protested, certain other people’s fathers didn’t behave so ultra-protectively. She certainly couldn’t imagine her Uncle Danny taking such a line with Rose, and she knew that though Daisy Emmerson was the apple of her dad’s eye, Leon Emmerson would never, but never, embarrass her.

  Ted, not for the first time, was in a quandary. If she didn’t want him to go with her, then he didn’t want to force his company on her; on the other hand, if there was a bloke in the offing, it was his fatherly duty to make sure he was the right kind of a bloke. ‘I’ll only pop in the gym for five minutes, pet,’ he said, trying to find a compromise, ‘then I’ll go downstairs for a drink. Your grandad will be in The Swan, I expect. I haven’t seen him for a chat all week.’

  The elation and sense of anticipation that had been singing along her veins a few minutes earlier was now almost completely gone. And then, faintly, but growing louder with every second, Beryl heard the familiar rat-a-tat-tat of her mother’s high-heeled shoes ringing out on the pavement.

  ‘Mum’s coming!’ she said with a relief as vast as if Mavis were a troop of cavalry. ‘Mum’s met Zac! She’ll tell you he’s all right!’ and not waiting to find out his response she dashed out of the house, narrowly avoiding running full tilt into her mother as she did so.

  ‘Steady on, love!’ Mavis said in high good humour. ‘Anyone would think there was a fire!’

  Beryl ignored this remark. ‘Dad’s in,’ she said breathlessly. ‘I think he’s a bit lonesome.’ And with this telling bit of information she ran off in the direction of Magnolia Hill, her yellow skirt swirling like a banner in the thickening dusk.

  Mavis bit the corner of her lip. She could have done without Ted being in and waiting for her. She’d had a glorious afternoon and now came the hard part. She’d have to tell Ted about it. ‘Hello love, I’m home,’ she said unnecessarily as she stepped over the doorstep, wondering just what his reaction was going to be when she told him she was going to be working in Soho – and especially what it was going to be when she told him the identity of her new guv’nor!

  ‘’Ello gal,’ Albert Jennings said to his favourite granddaughter as she paused to get her breath at the top of the stairs leading into the gym. ‘’Ow are you today, my pretty?’

  ‘I’m fine, Grandad,’ Beryl said truthfully, her eyes on the open doorway behind him. The speed-ball was being hammered, but she couldn’t see by whom and there were several regulars working out with weights and skipping ropes. None of them, however, had a shock of barley-gold hair or laughing grey eyes. ‘Are you just arriving, or leaving?’ she asked, knowing that it didn’t matter which, for her grandad wouldn’t make her feel self-conscious in front of Zac Hemingway. He wouldn’t know how.

  ‘I’m leavin’ now all the excitement’s over,’ Albert said, fumbling in a pocket of his baggy trousers for a packet of tiger nuts. ‘Though I’m only leavin’ as far as the public bar.’ He proffered the bag of nuts. It was an offer Beryl, mindful of her new lipstick, declined. ‘I’ll be safe in there ternight,’ he confided with a conspiratorial wink. ‘Yer gran worked the stall today an’ she doesn’t ’ave enough energy left to follow me over ’ere.’

  Normally Beryl would have been amused by her grandad’s attempts to make himself out to be henpecked and hard-done-by, but now all she was aware of was that he wouldn’t be leaving the gym if Zac were there, nor would he be leaving if there was still hope Zac was going to put in an appearance. ‘What excitement, Gra
ndad?’ she asked, her heart beginning to pound in sick dread. ‘Jack’s new boxer hasn’t been and gone, has he? I haven’t missed seeing him work out, have I?’

  ‘Blimey, pet!’ Albert rocked back on his heels slightly, genuinely startled. ‘Since when ’ave you bin interested in boxin’?’

  Beryl flushed. ‘I’m not really.’ It was true. It wasn’t boxing she was interested in. It was just one particular boxer.

  Albert chuckled and fumbled in his pocket for another handful of tiger nuts. ‘Then it’s just as well you missed all the excitement, because I don’t fink you’d ’ave liked it. Poor old Jumbo is flat out and yer Uncle Danny is raisin’ the roof. ’E says ’e only wanted Zac to spar with Jumbo, not knock ’im sideways into the middle of next week!’

  ‘Then Zac’s gone?’ Disappointment roared through her, so intense she was almost on the verge of tears.

  ‘Wasn’t much fer ’im to stay for,’ Albert said cheerily. ‘Not with Big Jumbo well an’ truly out of it an’ Jack nowhere to be found.’ He popped a tiger nut in his mouth. ‘Leon wasn’t ’ere, either. ’E’s got problems at ’ome I expect, young Matthew still not ’avin bin found. An’ Charlie and Daniel weren’t ’ere. Daniel’ll be listenin’ to the football on the wireless. Gawd knows what’s kept Charlie ’ome, but whatever it is, ’e chose the wrong night fer it! ’Emingway stopped Jumbo dead in ’is tracks in a way I’ve never seen before in my life. A couple of rounds of Fancy Dan classy punching and nifty footwork and then, wham! A left ’ook from out of nowhere that ’ad killer instinct written all over it. It ’it Jumbo square on the chin and that was it . . . Jumbo was down on the canvas, out cold fer the first time ever, and your Uncle Danny was throwin’ a pink fit.’

  Miserably Beryl thrust her hands deep in her cardigan pockets. With hardly anyone else in the gym, save for her uncle and her grandad, she’d missed a perfect opportunity of bringing herself to Zac Hemingway’s attention. ‘Do you think he’ll come back, Grandad?’ she asked, a small flame of hope spurting into life. ‘It’s not very late yet, is it? He might come back in the hope Jack will have turned up. Or he might come back to make sure Big Jumbo is all right, because I’m sure he didn’t mean to hurt him.’

  Albert regarded his soft-hearted granddaughter fondly. What she was doing in a boxing gymnasium, he couldn’t for the life of him think. She certainly didn’t have the first clue as to what boxing was about. ‘Why don’t yer come downstairs with me, pet, an’ ’ave a ginger ale?’ he suggested companionably. ‘Yer’ll know if Zac ’Emingway does come back, because the Snug door opens out on to the stairs an’ it’s always ajar.’ He tucked her arm into his. ‘An’ yer can tell your old grandad when yer goin’ to start to do a bit o’ courtin’. Me an’ yer gran ’ad bin married a year when we were your age. No sense in messing abaht, I said to ’er. If you don’t snap me up sharpish, someone else will!’

  Beryl hesitated for a second. From inside the gym she could hear her Uncle Danny shouting to a schoolboy bantam-weight. ‘When the right lands, yer weight should be shifted to yer left foot!’

  She sighed. There was no sense in staying in the gym if Zac wasn’t there. ‘All right, Grandad,’ she said, kissing him affectionately on his leathery cheek. ‘Let’s have a drink together and you can tell me about all the ladies who took such a shine to you before Gran got you safely up the aisle.’

  Carrie walked aimlessly over the tussocky grass of the heath. The moon was high and though there were no street lights other than the distantly flickering gas lights of Blackheath Village, she had no difficulty in avoiding the many clumps of gorse that grew on the eastern side of the heath, or the occasional gravel-pits roughly filled with war debris. She lifted her face to the night breeze. In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the heath had been the haunt of highwaymen who had used the gravel-pits to hide out in, making sorties from them to rob stage-coaches making their laborious way up Shooters Hill, then the main route out of London towards Dover and the coast. One cottage, half-hidden in one of the heath’s many dells, was reputed to have been the home of the infamous DickTurpin. Carrie wondered wryly if there had been a Mrs Turpin and, if there had, if her life, too, had been an unexciting round of washing, cleaning, cooking – and being taken for granted.

  She sighed, changing direction slightly to avoid the dark shape of someone taking a dog for a walk. She knew why she was feeling so down-in-the-mouth, for she and Kate had always reacted to each other’s worries as if they were their own, and at this precise moment in time there was certainly plenty to worry about. Even when Matthew was found, as God willing, he soon would be, she knew her friend’s problems wouldn’t be over. She would always have to cope with barbed, ignorant, racially prejudiced remarks – and with the ongoing difficulty of having a child who enjoyed an education and, for most of the year, lifestyle, far more privileged than that enjoyed by his brothers and sisters. He would also, when he was twenty-one, inherit the fortune bequeathed to him by his Harvey great-grandfather. It was a potentially very divisive situation within their family, one that could very easily lead to jealousies on the other childrens’ parts, and Carrie knew that such a prospect caused both Kate and Leon much concern.

  The yellow gas lights were no longer so distant now. The dark outline of St Michael’s and All Saints Church, sited on the edge of the heath at the village’s top corner, was clearly visible, as were the black silhouettes of the trees clustering around the nearest of the heath’s many ponds. She paused. There wasn’t much point in continuing on into the village, for she couldn’t very well go into one of its many pubs when she was on her own. She pushed her hands deeper into the pockets of her coat and headed, instead, for the inky-blackness of the trees.

  The Hare and Billet public house faced out onto the heath and from where he was standing, a few yards from its brightly lit, open doorway, Zac watched Carrie’s approach with a perplexed frown. When, instead of walking off the heath and into the village, she changed direction, heading instead towards the black belt of trees and the pond, his perplexity turned to concern. What the devil was she playing at? The open heath at night was no place for a woman on her own. At first, when he recognized her in the darkness by her distinctive build and walk, he assumed she was taking a dog for a late evening stroll, and then, when he realized there was no dog, that she was on her way to visit, or to meet, someone in the village. Now he didn’t know what to think.

  ‘’Night, me old shiner!’ a Hare and Billet regular said, stepping out of the pub and walking a little unsteadily past him. ‘Next time you fight, let me know an’ I’ll be there, cheerin’ you on!’

  Zac made a suitable response and bade his well-wisher good-night. It hadn’t taken him long to establish friendly relations in the pubs of his choice. Everyone in The Swan, of course, knew him already, but he had no intention of drinking only in The Swan. It was too local. The Hare and Billet was just far enough away from Magnolia Square to be a pleasant walk and to provide drinking companions who weren’t also neighbours.

  As his recently made acquaintance weaved his way unsteadily homeward, Zac continued to stare broodingly across the narrow road towards the heath and the pond. He could no longer see Carrie, which meant she must have come to a halt within cover of the trees. There was a burst of laughter behind him as more people erupted out of the pub and into the now chill night air. Zac ignored them. When he’d stepped out of the pub a few minutes ago he’d intended making his way to the gym for a word with Jack Robson. Now, instead, he turned up his jacket collar and strode across the road and on to the rough grass of the heath.

  Carrie stared down into the dark, glimmering water overcome by an overwhelming sense of futility. Was there never going to be any more to life than the present tedium of household chores and long days spent manning her dad’s market stall in Lewisham High Street? And why, suddenly, did it seem so tedious? It never had before. Was it because she was now thirty-five, and the doors leading to choices in life, doors she could once have opened with eas
e if she had so desired, were fast being bolted and barred against her?

  Certainly the door of choice leading to a large family was one that was no longer open to her. Once she had thought she would have as many children as Kate; perhaps, as Danny loved kids just as much as she did, even more. Now she knew there would only be Rose, and Rose was fast growing into a young woman and no longer needed the same, all-consuming kind of mothering and cherishing that she had when she was small.

  There was a cracking of twigs behind her and she turned, unalarmed, expecting to see a late-night walker exercising his dog, or a Hare and Billet customer about to embark on a short cut home across the heath. Instead she saw a by now familiar figure, tall and broad-shouldered, his blond hair glistening in the moonlight as pale as barley in September.

  He didn’t speak. He couldn’t. He was too overcome with relief. She hadn’t entered the darkness of the trees to meet someone clandestinely. He could have told immediately, by the expression on her face and in her eyes, if, when she had turned at his approach, it had been in the expectation of greeting a lover. Carrie didn’t speak either. Her heart was beating too lightly and rapidly somewhere up in her throat for her to be able to do so. His face in the moonlight was all deeply shadowed angles. She was vividly aware of the razor-sharp slanting of his cheekbones and the faint hollow beneath them; the hard, exciting cut of his mouth; the tough chin, its slight cleft emphasizing the forcefulness of his face.

  As she stood in silence a yard or so away from him, the dark opaque water at her back, a blackly swaying canopy of leaves above her head, she was aware that something very strange was happening to her; something that had never happened to her before. It was as if, at any moment, she was about to step off a precipice into infinite space.

  A mere twenty yards or so away light still spilled from the Hare and Billet’s windows and open door, and the noise of laughter and shouted goodnights could clearly be heard. Was heard and ignored.