‘I didn’t notice Gladys Hobday was a laugh a minute.’
‘Well, as a circus performer, she takes herself very serious.’
‘You still in love with her?’
‘Hardly,’ said Dan.
‘What d’you mean, hardly?’
‘I’ve gone off her,’ said Dan.
‘All the same, something’s still got to be done about givin’ your gels a proper mother. Mrs Brooks is bein’ useful, but it’s not enough. You’ve got to get married.’
‘Tilly, I told you, Elvira said a great big “no” in capital letters.’
‘Never mind that,’ said Tilly, ‘leave it to me. I’ll arrange something.’
‘Will you?’ said Dan.
‘Yes, I’ve been thinkin’ about it,’ said Tilly. ‘Meet me outside the town ’all on your way ’ome from work tomorrow. You leave your work at ’alf-past-twelve, don’t you? Well, you could be at the town ’all by a quarter to one. Meet me then.’
‘Blimey Bill,’ said Dan, ‘are you goin’ to get Gladys Hobday there?’
‘Just meet me,’ said Tilly. ‘You can tell Mrs Brooks you might be a bit late gettin’ in. She won’t mind.’
‘Listen—’
‘That’s all, Dan Rogers. Them gels are callin’ you.’
* * *
Dan arrived at the Southwark town hall in the Walworth Road just before fifteen minutes to one the following day, Saturday. Tilly was waiting for him, looking modestly fetching in a linen dress and a nice hat.
‘Now what?’ said Dan. ‘Where’s Elvira?’
‘We don’t need ’er,’ said Tilly, ‘we’re goin’ in to see the registrar or ’is clerk, and arrange for him to marry us as soon as possible. Someone’s got to make sure Bubbles and Penny-Farvin’ have married parents, and that someone’s me. Otherwise you’ll just carry on as if everything in the garden’s lovely. Once we’re married we’ll see what we can do about gettin’ over the problem of the gels bein’ born out of wedlock, like findin’ someone in the East End who can supply us with birth certificates for them, even if they cost you a quid apiece. Birth certificates showin’ you and me as their parents.’
‘Could you say all that again?’ asked Dan, looking as if her egg saucepan had caught him a wallop.
‘I could, but I ain’t goin’ to,’ said Tilly. ‘You need me, Dan Rogers, and so do your little angels.’
‘I won’t say I don’t,’ said Dan, ‘but you sure you know what you’re doin’?’
‘Yes,’ said Tilly. ‘We all ought to do one good deed in our lifetimes.’
‘You’ve thought serious about what you’re takin’ on?’ said Dan.
‘I’m takin’ on two little gels that need a proper mother, and a bloke who needs a decent wife,’ said Tilly. ‘And if you turn out to be a decent ’usband, you might get to see me in tights and spangles.’
Dan laughed.
‘Well, I fancy you, Tilly Thomas, and that’s a fact,’ he said. ‘This way.’ He took her arm and led her into the town hall in manly fashion, which was only right and proper, and saved Tilly having to knock him out and drag him in.
Saturday high tea, always a favourite with Chinese Lady and her family, was over. Boots, looking casual in his weekend cricket shirt and grey flannels, answered a ring on the doorbell.
‘Good evening, sir,’ said the caller, a tall slim boy nicely dressed and devoid of pimples, ‘are you Mr Adams?’
‘By the grace of God or the imps of perdition, yes, I am,’ said Boots. ‘My parents also had something to do with it.’
‘Oh, well put, sir,’ said the boy. ‘I’m the first son of my own parents, I’m Peter Clark. I’m in my last year at West Square School and a friend of your daughter Rosie, who’s at the girls’ school, and a ripper, sir. But she said she won’t allow me to take her out unless I first called to introduce myself to her mother and father. I think I’ve got to have your approval. I’m just turned sixteen and can honestly say I don’t have a police record.’
Boots let a smile show, a smile more resigned than whimsical. He saw this boy as the first inevitable step towards losing Rosie, a lovely and endearing girl, whom he had always regarded as particularly his own. But nothing was unchanging, nothing ever stood still, apart from entrenched affections. In a few years, Rosie would be a young woman, looking outward, not inward, and thinking, as all young people did in time, of a life of her own, a home of her own, and a family of her own. He and Emily could not keep her for ever, any more than they could keep Tim.
‘Come in, young man, come and meet Rosie’s mother, and her grandparents. And her brother.’
He introduced the boy to the family, then went to find Rosie. She was upstairs, in her room, getting ready to go out and spend the evening with Lizzy’s eldest daughter Annabelle, her adoptive cousin and best friend.
‘Who was that at the door?’ she asked, her fair hair burnished from brushing, and he thought how extraordinarly enchanting she was for her age.
‘Your young man,’ he said.
‘My what?’
‘A young gentleman called Peter Clark.’
‘Who?’ said Rosie.
‘Peter Clark.’
‘Oh, Peter,’ said Rosie. ‘What’s he up to, coming here?’
‘I think he’s up to the prospect of taking you out, providing your mother and I approve,’ said Boots. ‘He explained the position.’
‘What position?’
‘That you said you wouldn’t let him take you out until he’d met us and we stuck an approved label on him.’
‘Oh, that,’ said Rosie. ‘That was only to put him off. Daddy, he’s only another boy.’
‘Well, that’s how it goes, doesn’t it?’ smiled Boots. ‘One more boy meets one more girl?’
‘Daddy, I hope you’re joking, I hope you haven’t said he can take me out. He hasn’t grown up yet. Boys don’t grow up until they’re at least twenty-one, and then it’s still a struggle for some of them.’
‘Well, this one seems a nice young man,’ said Boots.
‘Crikey, whose side are you on?’ said Rosie.
‘I’m on the side of what comes naturally, poppet. You can’t fight it, and parents can’t fight it. Life for the young should be fun, Rosie. Enjoy it.’
‘Daddy, I enjoy every moment of my life, so stop thinking I need to go out with young boys.’
‘So what are you going to do, now he’s here?’ asked Boots.
‘Oh, all right, now he’s here I’ll take him with me to Aunt Lizzy’s and show him to Annabelle. She knows him too, and he’s more her age than mine. Daddy, you shocker, trying to pair him off with me.’
‘Fell flat on my face, did I?’ said Boots.
‘Well, none of us are perfect all the time, are we?’ said Rosie, and laughed. A little later, she took Peter with her to Aunt Lizzy’s to palm him off on Annabelle. Rosie, who had her own ideas about her future, was already one too many for boys of sixteen.
Tuesday evening. The shareholders of Adams Scrap Metal Ltd were all present in Sammy’s office. Tommy and Vi, Sammy and Susie, Boots and Emily, Lizzy and Chinese Lady, were seated around Sammy’s large desk. Sammy was in the chair, and he opened the proceedings.
‘Friends, shareholders, brothers, sisters-in-law and so on—’
‘I’m not so on, nor’s Mum,’ said Lizzy.
‘Beg pardon, Lizzy, a small oversight in me address,’ said Sammy. ‘Consider yourself importantly included, and Ma as well. It’s my pleasure to have brought us all together on an occasion which could rightly be called auspicious, seein’ it might result in a highly profitable transaction for all concerned.’
‘He’s off,’ said Tommy.
‘Yes, and suppose Boots gets started as well?’ said Lizzy.
‘Well, with Sammy, you only ’ave to put up with him usin’ twice as many words as he needs to,’ said Tommy. ‘Boots’ll say a lot less, but we’ll have to watch every one of his words.’
‘Order,’ said Sammy. ‘Now you all
know why we’re gathered together in the sight of the lord of business, which is St Peter—’
‘Don’t be irreverent,’ said Chinese Lady.
‘I note that, Ma,’ said Sammy. ‘I’m just pointin’ out you’ve all got copies of Johnson’s proposition in front of you. I can tell you I’ve made ’em iron out every paragraph, which means the moment we concur and sign, Johnson’s are committed to make immediate payment for the shares, a payment which you all know amounts to forty thousand lovely smackers.’
‘I’m against it,’ said Chinese Lady.
‘We ought to listen first, Mum,’ said Lizzy.
‘I don’t want to listen,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘all the talk’s goin’ to be about money. We’ve all got enough, and we don’t need more.’
‘It’s your privilege, Ma, to vote against the motion,’ said Sammy. ‘I take pleasure in lettin’ everyone know Johnson’s proposed fifty per cent payable on signature, and the balance in six months, and that actin’ on everyone’s behalf, I hit them over the head in a manner of speakin’. This forthwith brought forth—’
‘Can you say forthwith brought forth?’ asked Emily.
‘Oh, lor’, I couldn’t,’ said Vi, ‘but Sammy’s managed it.’
‘My arguments,’ said Sammy, ‘brought forth an amendment which entitles us to collect in full immediately. That’s if the meeting votes for the sale.’
‘Excuse me,’ said Vi, ‘but don’t I understand Johnson’s have been makin’ losses? I mean, if they have, where they goin’ to find the money to pay us?’
‘Bless me ears,’ said Sammy, ‘was it Vi who said that, Tommy?’
‘Yes, and out loud,’ said Tommy.
‘Good question, Vi,’ said Boots.
‘My feelings exactly,’ said Sammy. ‘I compliment you, Vi. The money’s comin’ from Johnson’s directors, not their profit and loss account, and if it doesn’t the sale’s null and void.’
‘Carry on, Sammy, we all like null and void,’ said Susie.
‘I’m against it,’ said Chinese Lady, very suspicious of null and void.
‘Noted, Ma,’ said Sammy. ‘Now, there’s been some natural worry about what might happen to our scrap metal employees if Johnson’s take over, particularly certain employees close to the fam’ly.’
‘Like Freddy,’ said Emily.
‘And his dad,’ said Lizzy.
‘And Freddy’s brother Will,’ said Emily, ‘he works for the scrap metal company too.’
‘All taken care of,’ said Sammy. Boots smiled, knowing Susie had fought for her family as much as Sammy always fought for his. ‘It so happened that our old friend, Eli Greenberg, was in a bit of a fix. Mrs Greenberg, his lady wife of a few years, was treadin’ on his plates of meat about buyin’ a small South London brewery as a business for his three stepsons, which purchase would’ve damaged his wallet fatally. So I negotiated to do him a good turn by takin’ up the proposition myself, leavin’ Eli to inform his trouble and strife that he’d been beaten to the deal by an interferin’ interloper. Yours truly, ladies and gents, is now the owner of a brewery, havin’ laid down half the purchase price and half in three months time, when I hope I won’t be as poor as I am now.’
‘I’m against it,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘I didn’t bring any of me fam’ly up to take to drink, which is what ownin’ a brewery means.’
‘Oh, it’s all right, Mum, I’ll see to it that Sammy doesn’t drink any of what he brews,’ said Susie. ‘And I know why he bought it.’
‘Yes, there’s good jobs there for Susie’s dad, and her two brothers, Will and Freddy,’ said Sammy. ‘I’ll be havin’ an encouraging word with them once the proposal to sell the scrap metal company has been voted for, which I hope it will be or the sacrifice of me hard-earned money to buy the brewery will be what you’d call heart-breakin’.’
‘It’ll still make a profit,’ said Boots.
‘I appreciate Boots havin’ faith in me,’ said Sammy, ‘seein’ we all respect him as our Ma’s eldest. Might I now suggest we get on with puttin’ the motion to the vote?’
‘Before we do, Sammy, I’d like to make a few points,’ said Boots.
‘Go ahead,’ said Sammy.
Boots questioned what lay behind the proposed purchase, since Johnson’s had been losing money regularly. He produced figures relating to balance sheets. He questioned why a firm, running a business at a loss, should want to purchase an identical business, since the Adams company was only making a small profit and the market generally was depressed. Further, Johnson’s were conducting their company in a very odd way, selling only inferior quality stocks. Their yards held plenty of first-class scrap metal which they weren’t offering for sale.
‘How’d you know?’ asked Sammy.
‘From visits to their yards,’ said Boots.
‘Boots, you’ve been goin’ the rounds of their yards?’ said Susie.
‘I must say Boots shows a bit of sense sometimes,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘which is always a nice surprise to me.’
‘Granted, old lady,’ said Boots, evading answering Susie. If, he said, Johnson’s acquired the Adams’ yards, was it for the purpose of also acquiring and holding the best of Adams’ scrap? In their position, how could they afford to? The Adams’ yard would immediately become loss-making.
‘Still,’ said Tommy, ‘why should we worry? We’ll have shared out forty thousand quid by then.’
‘I’m against it,’ said Chinese Lady.
‘My feeling is that Johnson’s are hoarding,’ said Boots.
‘Well, Boots,’ said Sammy, ‘as Tommy’s just pointed out, why should we worry?’
‘There are three directors running Johnson’s,’ said Boots. ‘One of them is a bloke called Berger. He’s a German who’s the London agent of a family firm called Bergers in Dusseldorf. It makes machinery.’
‘But does it matter, Boots?’ asked Lizzy.
‘It will matter if one day Germany gets short of raw materials,’ said Boots.
‘Hold on, Boots,’ said Sammy, ‘if as soon as Johnson’s take over our yards, this German firm puts in an order for all our top quality scrap, what’s it to us?’
‘I don’t think they’ll do that,’ said Boots, ‘or they’d have already bought what Johnson’s are holding. Or tried to. But there’s a limitation on certain commodities Germany would like to import. It’s a limitation imposed by the Allies since the end of the war, to stop Germany from re-arming.’
‘What do they want to re-arm for?’ asked Tommy.
‘For another war,’ said Boots.
‘Is Boots serious, Emily?’ asked Susie.
‘I think he’s got certain ideas about that bloke Adolf Hitler,’ said Emily.
‘Hitler’s potty,’ said Vi.
‘My feeling,’ said Boots, ‘is that we shouldn’t give a helping hand to the leader of a German political organization that’s as aggressive as he is. I think Johnson’s is in German hands, that their best scrap metal is being hoarded for export, and that they’re after ours and all that both firms continue to buy in. The limitation doesn’t apply to scrap metal imports.’ Boots was dealing in what he knew himself and in the information he’d had from Rachel, some of which had been passed to her by Mr Greenberg, including the fact that Berger was a representative of the family firm in Dusseldorf. ‘Let’s hang on. If the market ups in a few years, it would pay us to.’
‘Boots old lad,’ said Sammy, ‘I’m sorry to mention it, but you’re all ifs and buts. I trust you don’t mind me sayin’ so?’
‘Not if you’re sorrowful,’ said Boots.
‘No hard feelings, I hope,’ said Sammy.
‘None,’ said Boots, aware that if Sammy and others regarded the information as irrelevant, the vote would probably go in favour of the motion.
‘I don’t like any talk about that man Hitler,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘nor don’t I like selling anything to him or what he might get up to with it.’
‘Don’t lose any sleep over him, Mu
m,’ said Tommy, ‘he’s off his chump.’
‘Might I now propose we accept Johnson’s offer?’ said Sammy.
‘Seconded,’ said Tommy.
‘Tommy, didn’t I say I was against it?’ said Chinese Lady fretfully.
‘Well, you’ve got the privilege of voting that way,’ said Tommy.
‘I’ll take your votes,’ said Sammy, and addressed the shareholders individually and clockwise, beginning with Chinese Lady on his left. ‘Ma?’
‘You know I’m votin’ no,’ she said firmly, and on a slip of paper Sammy noted down the number of her shares. Fifty. Then he asked Tommy.
‘For,’ said Tommy, and on another slip of paper, Sammy pencilled in Tommy’s holding. One hundred.
‘Boots?’
‘Against,’ said Boots, and down went his holding under Chinese Lady’s. Two hundred and fifty.
‘Em’ly?’
‘Against,’ said Emily, standing with Boots, of course.
‘H’m,’ said Sammy, pencilling the number. ‘Lizzy?’
Lizzy had spoken in earnest to Ned before leaving for the meeting. She wanted his serious opinion. Ned said although he couldn’t fault Sammy as a businessman, on a matter like this he’d always side with Boots.
‘I’m against it, Sammy,’ she said.
‘Pardon?’ said Sammy, confident until then that Lizzy would be in favour.
‘Against,’ she repeated, and with the kind of smile that always made Boots think his sister richly brunette.
Ruddy hell, thought Sammy, totting up, that makes four-fifty votes against. I could be facing defeat. Me, Sammy Adams. Never mind the spondulicks, what about me pride? I’ve got Tommy’s hundred and my three-fifty, but now I need Vi’s and Susie’s. And that Susie, she’s been getting the better of me and dotting me in the eye for years now.
‘You, Vi?’ he said.
‘For,’ said Vi just a little shyly and hesitantly, because although she thought a lot of Boots and his opinions, she simply couldn’t go against Tommy.
Five hundred for our side, thought Sammy. Now, you Susie.
‘Susie?’
‘Um, er,’ said Susie, never more teasing than when she had Sammy wriggling.
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