Dave stood at the doorway, grinning. A shiny black top hat was pushed down over his curls, a red ringmaster's tailcoat around his shoulders. He brandished a megaphone in his hand and his dark eyes glittered.
“Roll up, roll up,” his voice took on an electronic drone as he lifted the contraption to his lips, “for the greatest show on earth. It's the new art of the future folks, made by our proletarian hands for the delectation of your upper crust eyeballs. Scenes to dazzle and amaze! Sights that can even make you think! We've used more ink here than on the tattooed lady's torso, more sets of brains than the two-headed lamb. You've never seen anything like it, ladies and gennelmen, step right this way. You'll be amazed! You'll be astounded! You'll be AGOG!”
We had strung Chinese lanterns across the tiny mews, and on the cobbles below, a line of people snaked down towards Portobello Road. The spectacle had been planned down to its finest details, which was why Jenny and I were now standing in our showgirl outfits, yellow and blue plumes of feathers rising from the jewelled tiaras on our heads, fishnet tights and tap dance shoes and the longest false eyelashes over our electric blue eyes. We were holding trays full of Spanish Cava for the guests to take when at last El Diablo Dilworth allowed his impatient audience through the door.
Between us, in the entrance hall, stood a large, stuffed tiger. It stared ahead with glassy eyes as the Ringmaster finally stood aside, an expression that was at odds with those on the faces of our guests.
What greeted them was a room like something from Alice in Wonderland. Distorting mirrors lined the walls, fairylights twinkled among them, illuminating posters for the circus and all manner of strange, spotted, striped and large-fanged beasts, including a two-headed lamb. Dave had managed to borrow the lot from a friend he had made, a dealer in the Red Lion arcade named Cedric, who had once been in the circus and now made a living out of taxidermy. It was a fortuitous friendship, for nothing could have encapsulated better Chris's theories of the British. All the vaudeville of yesteryear was here for them to gawp at – all the better to throw the artists’ own work into stark relief.
They had to turn right through the hallway into the first of two rooms, which would once have been the stables part of the Mews house. Chris and Dave had ripped out everything from them, whitewashed the walls and polished up the cobbled floors, so that there was a big, clean space to hang the work, at odds with the cramped confines of the circus hallway.
In the front room were Chris's huge cityscapes, rendered in Cubist-influenced geometry and dark shades of black, blue and grey, punctuated by cool yellow and mauve. Somehow they seemed at once ancient and modern; the smoked ruins of the Blitz turned into fairytale landscapes, surrounded by the weird Futurism of the emerging new buildings. His more figurative studies of people – an old man sat in a drab café eking out a cup of tea; women out shopping on Portobello standing on the corner for a gossip – seemed to segue nicely into Toby's jazz stylings.
The last thing they would see, in the room beyond, was Dave's work. This was far angrier and seemed to go beyond art and into a kind of on-the-street reportage. Unlike Chris and Toby, who suggested how you might feel about their images, Dave confronted you with his. He was an avid photographer and had amassed vast collages of local life, including some scenes from the race riots, Mosley's rallies and the racalist graffiti painted on the walls, which were juxtaposed with photos taken in mushroom clubs, of people dancing, singing and laughing.
Out of these images came paintings of policemen with their batons flying, Mosley raising his arm in a Hitler salute and coloured men crouched down and cowering, under slogans such as ‘Know your rights’, ‘Declaration of Human Rights’ and a newspaper headline from The Kensington Post saying, ‘Will good intentions pave the road to Notting Hell?’
They were all rendered in thick black, grey and red oils and looked really harsh. But among them were smaller paintings of the dancing, laughing people, in yellows, browns and oranges that seemed to fill up the room with light. Dave positioned his photos and newspaper cuttings amongst them, giving a running commentary on the two lives of Ladbroke Grove.
It wasn't long before the place was heaving with all sorts of people, from art college buddies to newspaper reporters, lecturers, beatniks, and bohemians of all stripes. Jenny and I spent most of the evening running up and down the stairs to what she had accurately described as the hobo kitchen, where the bottles of Cava lay in a sink covered in water and a rapidly diminishing block of ice.
“So much for us,” she said, popping the cork on another bottle. “We're just glorified scullery maids in these stupid outfits. That's all our contribution to this bloody prole art struggle amounts to.”
I held up a tray of empty glasses and watched her pour the bubbles in, pouting like she was screentesting for Roger Vadim. Her figure was so va-va-voom it made me feel like an underdeveloped child.
“But still,” I said, “it's pretty exciting isn't it? I mean, the amount of people who've turned up…”
Jenny wrinkled her nose.
“I suppose it rather is,” she conceded. “I had no idea Dil knew so many different kinds of creatures and some of them look seriously rich. Ringmaster is right, isn't it? He's got them all right where he wants them.”
I had spent a lot of time with Jenny in the run up to the exhibition. As Jackie had gone off to fruit-pick her way around France for the summer, she was the only female company I'd had and I'd started to get used to her idiosyncratic ways. She never made further mention of her faux pas in my bedroom. Instead she seemed to be constantly bestowing on me gifts of perfume, make-up and silk scarves, as well as making good her promise of buying my screenprint designs for far more money than they were worth. She was so determined we were going to be the best of friends that it was starting to seem like we were.
“But you wait,” she said, finishing off the bottle, “'til we open our shop. We'll have them waiting on us for a change then. See how they like it.”
The idea that had been budding on the night we first met had now turned into something of an obsession for Jenny. I let her get on with thinking it, knowing that it could never become a reality. After all, we were back at college in another few weeks – when would we ever have the time or the money to open a shop?
“Yes,” I joined in with the game, “and there'll be none of this fake Champagne then either. It will be Moët & Chandon all the way.”
“Exactly.” She tossed her feathered head imperiously and led the way back downstairs.
Fed up with lingering in the hallway, we wove our way through the throng, past the lions and tigers and into the gallery, so we could take all the action in. Jenny gave me a wink and ducked into Dave's room with her tray, while I circulated in the front, offering fresh glasses and trying to work out who was who amongst the chattering mob.
I saw Toby, talking to a couple of men bearing cameras and notebooks, and my heart skipped a beat. They were the press, they had to be. Chris in another corner, talking to a man in a Thirties suit and horn-rimmed spectacles, and a black-clad aesthete with the pale eyes of a Russian soldier. Other artists, I reckoned. A woman who looked like a dowager Duchess in fox furs, examining the paintings through pince-nez, probably a collector and hopefully as well-heeled as she appeared. A plethora of young men attended by serious-looking women in turtle necks and slacks, all making earnest comments about what they were seeing and how it was affecting them. Fellow students, probably penniless. The conversation roiled around me like waves.
I felt a hand on my arm.
“This is brilliant, ducks, I can't believe it. Your Toby's a genius – and I love the little circus on the way in.”
It was my next-door-neighbour Lenny, all spruced up to the nines, this time in emerald green.
“You look fab in all your feathers.” He leant over my tray and gave me a peck on the cheek. “I can see all that hard work paid off.”
“Thanks Lenny.” I offered him one of my few remaining glasses of Cava. “Isn't James w
ith you?” I was both curious and apprehensive about meeting the man responsible for making all those weird sounds. Toby had explained to me that it was James who made the music and went looking for bands to produce. Lenny had a straight job at the bank that probably paid their rent.
“He's just gone through there.” Lenny nodded towards Dave's room. “I'll introduce you when he comes back. He's been having a hard time with his work recently, poor love, this is just what he needs to get out of the house and mingle. With some people who have a few ideas of their own for a change.” He took a sip of the drink, arching his black eyebrows as he did.
“Hmmm, let's see if I know anyone here.” He scanned the room, eyes narrowing, then moved in closer to me and spoke in a low whisper.
“See her there?” He nodded towards an Amazonian blonde wearing what looked suspiciously like genuine Christian Dior and smoking a cigarette in an ebony holder. “That's Winston Churchill's daughter that is. She likes to slum it round here, you know. She's a fan of,” he raised his eyebrows, “dark meat. Quite a few of them like that, as you probably know. Can't say I blame them. It's better than all that stiff upper lip they're used to. Stiff upper lip and loose drawers, dear.”
I suppressed a giggle and indicated the dowager Duchess.
“What about her?”
“Lady Millicent Maybury,” he said, “notorious lesbian.” He caught the look on my face and chuckled. “Honestly dear, you can't get a member of the upper class who isn't kinky. You want to be careful of who you're hanging out with. Oh look, here comes your Toby.”
“Lenny,” said my husband, reaching over to shake hands, “how excellent to see you. It's been a while hasn't it?”
“Too long, Toby, too long. But I can see you've been doing all right for yourself,” said Lenny, winking at me. “And an exhibition, too. No wonder we haven't seen you.”
“Were they journalists you were just talking to?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Toby's face was alight with excitement, “Kensington Post. They're going to run a review in their art section this Friday. And not only that, I've had two other galleries asking me to come in and see them and I think I might even have made a sale with that old lady there in the fox furs.”
“You deserve a drink,” I said, looking down at my tray so as to avoid Lenny's eye and therefore a fit of giggles. “Only, I see there's none left. Hang on a minute, I'll go and see if there's any more upstairs.”
“Ain't she lovely?” I heard Lenny say as I moved towards the door.
I clattered up the stairs and came to a halt at the kitchen door.
There was a little old couple sitting at the table. Not like the dowager duchess or the rich people Lenny had pointed out, but a sweet old man with a walking stick between his legs and a tiny little lady in her best navy blue suit and hat. Normal-looking people. The last kind you would have expected to find here.
The man looked up as I entered. He was about sixty, I would have guessed, wearing a battered pea-jacket over a pair of cords that had seen better days, a peaked cap on top of a wide, round face that looked oddly like a weather-beaten baby's. A totally innocent pair of blue eyes and crinkly, gap-toothed smile. He fished his walking stick out to one side and leant on it to hoist himself to his feet, a motion that gave me a sudden pang, a memory of Pa.
“Hello,” he said in a gentle rumble, traces of a country accent. “Is that Jenny?”
“No, I'm Stella,” I said, “Toby's wife.”
He looked puzzled so I added: “One of the other artists downstairs.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, the smile returning to his face. “Well I'm Cedric, and this is my wife Mya. David said we could sit up here. I hope you don't mind, but it's a bit crowded for us down there.”
He offered me his hand and it closed around mine, big, warm and rough. There was an infinite air of gentleness about him and at once I realised who he must be, the man who was so good with animals.
“Cedric,” I said, “you're the one who lent Dave all the circus things?”
“As right, girl.” His smile deepened. “He's all right is David. Got an old head on young shoulders, he have. He reckon I'll have a whole new lot a customers after they seen this show. I hope he's right.”
“Oh, how nice to meet you.” Impulsively, I sat down opposite them. “And you too, of course,” I said to Mya.
Mya smiled sweetly. She looked like a little bird. There was something that felt familiar about her.
“Those are all the memories of our youth down there, dear,” she said. “We met at Billy Bolton's circus, Cedric and I, on Bournemouth seafront in the spring of 1923.”
Cedric shuffled back down into the seat next to his wife and took her hand, smiling at her as if they had only just met. All of a sudden I felt tears prick at the back of my eyelids. It was because he reminded me of Pa, I supposed. Or maybe it was because they were still so obviously in love. I said a silent prayer that Toby and I would still be like that in another thirty-six years.
“He was a lion tamer, did you know?” Mya continued. “He was twenty-four when we met but already a hardened veteran. The Lion Boy they called him.”
“As right.” Cedric nodded. “England's youngest lion tamer I were. Only ten-year-old when I run away to join the circus. They tried to put me in an orphanage, but I weren't having none of that. Got to be with my animals, I have.”
“Gentle as lambs they were with him,” Mya agreed. “The most ferocious lion, the biggest tiger, you couldn't imagine it dear, but they were like pussycats to Cedric.”
“So those ones downstairs,” I realised, “are your old circus companions?”
“As right,” said Cedric, “As why I learned how to do the taxidermy, so I wouldn't ha’ to leave them behind. And as seen me all right since we retired from all that. As how I earn my living these days. Always with my animals.”
“Anyway dear,” Mya put her hand on top of mine, “you'd better get on, don't let us old folks slow you down.”
The strangest feeling came over me when she touched me. A rush of disjointed memories, but memories that were like dreams, images coming in rapid succession. Grandma's bedroom, air raid sirens, fire. Pa's funeral, church, the organ playing ‘Abide With Me’. A dark avenue of trees and the noise of a toilet flushing. All of a sudden I felt faint.
“Oh my dear,” I heard her say and it sounded like it was coming from a long way away. She lifted her hand up and put her fingertips together, then began moving them over each other as if she were trying to count quickly.
Just like Grandma used to do, my own voice said in my head.
“It's all right, it's all right,” Mya said to me. “Come back Stella, it's all right.”
I looked up at her and the room seemed a bit too bright, as if I'd just woken up from a dream.
“It's all right,” she repeated. I blinked.
“Oh there you are Stella,” another voice behind me. Sharp, with an edge of practised boredom underlining it. Jenny.
“Sorry.” I turned round, still feeling as if tendrils of sleep were curling around me and I had to shake myself free from their grasp.
“Toby said you'd gone to get more drinks, but you've been gone for half an hour.”
“Have I?” I touched my forehead. It was hot, and the tiara was digging into me, something I had only just realised. As soon as I did, my temples started throbbing. Half an hour? I could have sworn I had only been here for five minutes.
“I'm sorry,” I said, “I've just been talking to Cedric and Mya here. Do you know them? They lent Dave the circus things.”
Jenny looked at me as if I was gabbling.
“It's all our fault, dear,” said Mya. “We've been diverting her with our old circus tales I'm afraid. Nothing that you would be interested in, I'm sure.”
“Indeed,” said Jenny, reaching the last bottle of Cava out of the sink and popping its cork. She placed it on my discarded tray and put it down in front of me.
“There you are, Stella,” she said
, “the rich and about-to-be-famous are waiting.”
Mya looked up at her then back at me. “You get on now dear and don't worry. You'll know where to find me when you need me.”
I still felt disorientated as I walked down the stairs after Jenny.
“I think this tiara is starting to give me a migraine,” I said, trying to explain to myself more than to her why I was feeling this way. But Jenny didn't seem to hear it.
“It's bad enough Dave hanging out with those boring old squares,” she said. “Without you getting caught up with them, too. I know they've been sooo helpful, but really. They creep me out. Especially her. Apparently she was a fortune teller, what a load of crystal balls.” Jenny shuddered.
“Anyway,” she went on, “you won't believe what Dil's up to now. A room full of bread-heads all bursting to give him their cash and he's talking to some bug-eyed monster who says he's a record producer. That's what he really wants, you know, to be a bloody pop star. This is all such a joke to him, Stella, no matter what he says.”
“Oh,” I started to say, “that'll be my next…”
“Just take a look for yourself,” she said, virtually pushing me through the hallway and into the throng downstairs.
7 MIDNIGHT SHIFT
Pete looked through the window in the door of Interview Room 3. It was him all right, still wearing that checked sports jacket and the ridiculous shoes, too long in the limb to be comfortable in the hard wooden chair he was hunched over, too much on his mind to sit still. He scraped his hand through his greasy pompadour as he spoke to the constable opposite him, his left foot jigging under the table, eyes darting up and down and around the room.
“Well,” Cooper scratched his chin thoughtfully, “that'll make life interesting. Right then, let's introduce ourselves shall we?”
He pushed the door open. Sports Jacket was still in mid-flow and the constable with him looked up, relieved.
“Thank you constable, we'll take over now.” Cooper smiled, projecting orderly benevolence in Sports Jacket's direction. “Detective Sergeant Cooper,” he said, “and this is PC Bradley. Now you are Lord Somerset's son, is that correct, sir?”
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