Georgia (70 page)

‘What’s up, Max?’ Jack Levy squinted up at him through his glasses. ‘Can’t stand the heat any longer? She’ll re-sign with us. They always do. We’ll just have to offer her a better deal.’

‘I think I’m through with deals,’ Max said. ‘Sometimes they leave a nasty taste in your mouth.’

Chapter 27

The newspaper lay crumpled amongst empty sherry bottles, chip papers, cold cups of tea, and congealed greasy plates, hardly an inch of floor exposed from bed to window.

The stained china sink smelled like the lavatory he’d used it as, draining-board groaning with burned saucepans and jagged-edged empty cans.

The frayed brown curtains were no longer opened. The small table in front of the window strewn with pointers to a period of wealth. An empty whiskey bottle, a cigar box, the remains of an Indian takeaway meal thick with mould and a dead potted plant.

Dust, paper and food scraps were everywhere. Vomit lay on the floor just feet from where he lay huddled on his bed. The stench of himself, the vomit and rotting food combined to make the air unbreathable.

Only the wall covered in Georgia’s pictures had any semblance of order and light.

He was sweating, so hot he felt he was on fire. But he knew soon the shivering would come back and nothing would warm him.

Drink couldn’t help now. Nothing could blot out the misery. No heat, money, drink or food. Trapped, sick and helpless.

Why was it that his mind had cleared now? Ever since that day when he was knocked down and robbed, the grey mist which stopped him hurting and thinking had vanished.

How long ago was it when those newspaper men came here? A week, two, maybe a month. He remembered putting a fiver in Mrs Dooley’s hand and persuading her to clean up for him though.

‘Fancy her being your daughter,’ she kept saying as she swept the floor and changed his bed. ‘She should pay to put you in a home, you aren’t capable of looking after yourself.’

Mrs Dooley wasn’t the only one who treated him like a celebrity then. Someone left a bag of clothes on his doorstep, another neighbour brought him over a pot of stew. Every day the mail brought letters of sympathy, some with money inside them. Mrs Dooley was glad to clean for him. It gave her an opportunity to ask questions, she even referred to him as her ‘poor old gentleman friend.’

So many visitors knocked on his door, offering invitations to their houses, sympathy, help and understanding.

Down at the pub they all wanted to drink with him, they didn’t refuse to serve him in the café, everyone said how badly Georgia had treated him.

A taste of what it must be like to be her. A person people wanted to meet. He felt like shaving again, taking baths, eating proper meals, for a while drink hadn’t been so necessary.

Church wardens came round and talked of re-housing him in a nice little flat. A lady down the road knitted him a blue pullover. Even the kids along the road began to smile at him.

A hundred pounds seemed fair enough at first. He didn’t know he’d been cheated until Adams made off with thousands. In that first week it had been enough to be important and know at last the public had turned against her.

The sickness had started the night he read just a few lines in the
Evening News
. A picture of the bitch standing by a flashy car, wearing a white mini skirt.

‘You can read the true story tomorrow,’ she said.

That night even whiskey didn’t help. A small voice kept whispering in his head, telling him things he didn’t like. Later it turned to a gnawing pain in his stomach, just where she stabbed him. The nightmares came back too. Visions of him grabbing her, smooth skin under his hands, a rounded arse in front of him surrounded by harsh net petticoats. An act which until then he’d blotted from his mind.

It was Mrs Dooley that brought in the paper the next morning. The fat slut stood in his doorway, hands on hips, her hair in curlers, mouth like an angry red gash.

‘You bastard!’ she screamed at him, flinging the paper in disgust. ‘You filthy bastard! You’ll rot in hell for what you did to her, and I’d gladly get you there a little quicker!’

Funny that Georgia’s retaliation didn’t make him mad. He just lay there crying, remembering.

Was it that mention of St Joseph’s convent that made him think of her tiny, bony back, lacerated and weeping? What prompted the memory of guiding her down the pavement on her first bicycle, holding the saddle and urging her to steer and keep pedalling? Holding her on his shoulders to see penguins at the zoo. One hand under a smooth, soft tummy as he taught her to swim.

Peter too. Sharp, clear pictures of him eating Christmas lunch with them. A red paper hat resting on his blond hair, talking about cricket, laughing at Brian’s stories about people in the office. The good feeling at having male company.

Other things wafted back. Georgia coming into the bedroom in her nightdress, with a tray of tea for him and Celia, her stocking under her arm.

‘I waited as long as I could.’ She had that expression on her face that always made them smile. Wide-eyed, mouth trembling, a please-don’t-be-cross face that worked everytime. ‘Seven o’clock isn’t that early?’

Once they’d put sugar mice in her stocking, tiny dolls, pens and pencils. That last year it had been makeup and stockings and a silly false nose and glasses she wore most of the morning.

Why was it now when he needed the grey mist, it didn’t return? Sharp memories like Georgia sitting by his knee. The Christmas tree filling the room with the scent of pine, the fire banked up. Celia in a blue costume. Georgia in a tartan dress with a lace collar. He could see that book on photography she gave him. A shiny red and black jacket, the spine two inches thick, one he’d intended to buy for so long.

‘Mum didn’t give me the money.’ He could hear her soft voice shaking with excitement, feel her lips on his cheek, her arms round his neck. ‘I saved it up myself.’

He knew when the reporters came back he would get no sympathy. He cowered in his bed listening to them scrabbling round the house, terrified they would burst in. He heard neighbours shout things outside the window.

‘Come on out you pervert! We’ll show you how we deal with rapists round here.’

Just enough strength to push a chair under the door, then stumble back to bed, hoping they wouldn’t hurtle a brick or a fire bomb through his window. His chest, legs and stomach ached, but the worst hurt was inside his head.

How many times was it that he read that newspaper? Twenty, thirty? He lost count.

‘I don’t know why he changed that night,’ he read. ‘One moment he was my dad, the sweetest, kindest man alive, the next like an evil stranger. Everything I knew about men came from him. I loved being in the car with him, holding his hand when we went for walks. The way he hugged me when he came home from work. He knew everything. He helped me with my homework, he taught me to swim. He clapped when I danced and sang. My mum and dad were the best parents anyone could have. I had nothing to rebel against. I felt loved. I didn’t even mind when he got drunk and came up to the party. Everyone thought it was funny. I told him to go to bed after Peter had gone. But that’s when he changed.’

It wasn’t a nightmare after all. He really had done those things which haunted him. Soon the police would come for him. They’d lock him up, maybe even beat him. If only he had enough money to put in that meter, to turn the gas on and wait for oblivion.

Someone was insistently ringing the door bell. He heard Mrs Dooley shout to one of her children to answer it. Deep, male voices, too low to hear what they were saying.

‘He’s in that room,’ Mrs Dooley’s Irish voice boomed out. ‘He hasn’t shown his face for nearly two weeks. But he’s in there all right, more’s the pity. Filthy bastard, you can smell him from the hall.’

‘Has anyone got a key?’ The male voice was crisp and tough, the sort of voice belonging to someone with authority.

‘Don’t think so.’ Her voice was coming closer as if she was walking down the stairs. ‘The landlord was supposed to be coming over to heave him out in a day or two. He hasn’t even been out to use the toilet. God knows what you’ll find in there.’

He buried his face when the rapping on the door started again. Was it night, or merely the dim light?

‘Mr Anderson!’ That strong voice again. ‘Mr Anderson, open the door or we’ll have to break it down!’

He was sure it was the police. Reporters didn’t threaten violence. He screwed up his eyes, huddled further under the blanket and waited, too sick and weak to make any protest.

A thump and a splintering noise and they were in.

‘Bloody hell.’ P.C. Blake clamped one hand over his nose and waved to his partner to open the window as he moved over to the bed. Cautiously he pulled back the thin blanket to find Anderson staring up at him blankly.

‘Are you all right mate?’ he asked, his stomach churning.

There was no reply. Just those pale frightened eyes looking at him, a haggard, almost shrunken face glistening with sweat, flecks of white foam on his blue lips.

‘Get an ambulance,’ Blake turned to the younger man standing gasping by the window. ‘Warn them about the conditions. Book a fumigator afterwards.’

As the constable rushed back gagging to the door, Blake’s professionalism got the better of revulsion. He lifted one scrawny wrist from the sopping bed and felt for a pulse. ‘You’ve got yerself in a right state,’ he said. ‘It’s hospital for you.’

‘I’m sorry for what I did,’ Brian whimpered. He tried to sit up, but he was too weak. ‘Will I go to prison?’

‘Don’t look that way,’ Blake moved away from the man’s fetid breath. He glanced up at a picture cut from a glossy magazine. Georgia was sitting astride a cane chair, one arm leaning on the back, drinking a glass of milk wearing shorts and a T-shirt. ‘It was her that asked us to check you out. Not a moment too soon I’d say.’

‘Georgia asked you?’ Brian tried to focus his eyes. All he could see was silver buttons against blue serge as once again his bladder overflowed.

‘Welcome home,’ Sam threw open the door as he heard the lift.

‘Sam!’ Georgia launched herself towards him, arms wide to hug him. Peter was left in the lift with a suitcase.

‘I came over to make a meal for you,’ Sam said. A lump came up in his throat, making it hard to speak. Her warm body pressed against him, the perfume of her hair, her lips against his neck. ‘I felt I had to talk to you before everyone else grabbed you.’

She held him still, looking up at him, nose twitching, like a stray dog hoping for a meal, big eyes dancing.

‘It smells wonderful,’ she said. ‘But I’m being rude. This is Peter, I keep forgetting you haven’t met before.’

Peter in the flesh was far more striking than press photographs. Blue eyes alight with laughter, a rugged quality to his features. He seemed to fill the small hall; muscles straining under his thin jacket, blond hair streaked almost white by the sun, the golden tan, all gave the impression it had been achieved by a lifetime in rough country.

‘It’s great to meet you at last,’ Sam put out his hand and Peter gripped it firmly. ‘Sorry I had to drag you away from the sun, but the people at Decca were getting frantic.’

‘We understood,’ Peter grinned. ‘I should be back at school anyway.’

They had been in the Canary Islands for nearly two weeks. Georgia looked black now, the whites of her eyes and her teeth flashing against her skin. She wore a red flouncy dress that made him think of gypsy dancers, bare feet in gold sandals.

Rest and love had done wonders for her. Skin glowing, eyes gleaming, she’d even put on a little weight. There was a calmer, softer look in her eyes.

‘I still don’t understand what the panic is,’ Georgia said as she bounced inside, gazing around her in delight. ‘But whatever it is, it’s nice to be home.’

The lounge was filled with late afternoon sunshine, lighting up the vivid primary colours of her Spanish rug and turning the white settees to pale gold.

She walked round the room, just reaching out and touching things as if telling them all she was back in charge.

Sam could see her eyes flitting out to the window-boxes on the balcony, her eyes lighting up at the clusters of giant pansies, blue and purple heads nodding at her as if in welcome.

‘I kept them watered,’ Sam smiled. She was just like Katy, at heart a homemaker. Soon she would be running her fingers over ledges, making mental notes of jobs to be done. ‘Now sit down and I’ll make us a drink.’

He had to tell her tonight. Everything was moving so fast. He’d removed every possible obstacle to give him a clear field. He just had to hope no one came unexpectedly.

Peter took the glass of beer and sank into a chair, but Georgia flitted in and out of the room looking at things as Peter described their hotel and the beach.

‘This is all a bit posh,’ Georgia called out from the dining room across the hall. ‘Come and see Peter, Sam’s laid it all with flowers, and napkins. I didn’t know you were so domesticated, Sam!’

‘There’s lots you don’t know about me yet Miss Smartypants,’ Sam grinned, as he looked into see her straightening a knife here, a plate there. He too had been surprised to find a sideboard full of white bone china, polished silver cutlery in felt lined boxes and a wealth of starched tablecloths and napkins. Clearly Georgia hadn’t rejected Celia Anderson’s middle-class values. He wasn’t going to admit that he had learned his skills while working as a waiter.

‘Now, I don’t want you two to think I’m intruding on your last night together. I’ll be off later.’

‘You don’t have to go,’ Peter touched Sam’s elbow, his face full of concern that he might feel pushed out. ‘We’re both pleased to see you.’

Sam heard that deep voice, full of sincerity and knew this was a man he could respect. He wished he had time to get to know him the way he had Georgia, but there wasn’t time for that now.

‘Thanks,’ Sam grinned. ‘We’ll have lots of opportunities later to dig into each other. But first a drink and I’ll dish up. I hope you like spicy food as it’s about all I know how to cook.’

‘He’s got something on his mind,’ Peter said as Sam disappeared into the kitchen. He sat down on the settee while Georgia began sifting through records in the corner. ‘Do you think he knows something about Celia?’