A Liverpool Song (49 page)

‘I’ll say this. You can’t keep binding yourself flat with crêpe bandage. For games and PE, you have to unwind yourself anyway and wear a bra. Across in the boys’,
their eyes are out on stalks every time you leap for the ball. It’s something you have to live with, I’m afraid.’

Helen burst into tears and sank into a chair.

‘Right,’ Kate said. ‘I’m going for help. You sit there and howl while I do the talking, as per bloody usual.’

Mary was in the kitchen. She had done enough extra shifts to gain a day off in lieu, and was using the opportunity to do some cooking and baking for the freezer. ‘Ah, Kate,’ she
said. ‘I can tell by your face that something’s going on. Is it school?’

‘Sort of.’ Kate perched on a stool. ‘My sister, who as you know looks twenty-five and gorgeous, is winding half a mile of crêpe bandage round her bust to flatten it.
She’s in pain, Mum. When it’s PE or games, she goes in the toilet and unwinds, puts a cotton bra on, then tries not to look at the boys’ windows because they’re all staring
at her and drooling like hungry dogs. She can’t keep the bandage on through sport, because it shows through those horrible perforated or aerated or whatever stupid tops we have to
wear.’

Mary sat. ‘Poor kid. Where is she?’

‘In our study crying and hiding her assets. Even lads in Ian’s class are asking will she go on a date – thirteen, they are. Some in the sixth are running a book on who will get
to second base first with Helen Sanderson.’

‘Second base?’

‘Breasts. First base is kissing, second is bust, third is girl touching boy, fourth is God help us.’

‘Oh dear.’ Mary swallowed a chuckle. She remembered similar trouble, though she had never been as wonderfully statuesque as her younger daughter.

‘Then there are men in the street, grown men who practically knock themselves out on lamp posts staring at her.’ She paused. ‘Mum, I don’t want to frighten anyone, but I
worry about her getting attacked.’

‘Rape?’

Kate nodded. ‘I never let her walk home alone. Ian’s started to come with us, because he hears smutty talk in the boys’ school. Her name’s written all over walls in the
showers and loos. Like Helen, Ian’s tall, so he’s quite a good bodyguard. Mum, why are boys so gross?’

Mary sighed. ‘It’s a phase.’

Kate blew a raspberry. ‘A phase? Then why do adult men lose all sense of direction when they see her? We can’t do anything any more, can’t go anywhere. Do men ever grow up? Do
they?’

‘Well, your father didn’t, thank goodness, but he’s not predatory. And men always look at women, sweetheart. Even the best of them will stop and stare when they see someone as
beautiful as Helen. I’ll go and speak to her, and your father will have a word with your headteacher. Don’t tell her about your father going to the school. But I won’t have Helen
upset just because she’s a stunner.’

‘Stay cool, Mum. She’s fragile.’

Mary washed and dried her hands. ‘Trust me. I’m a nurse.’

Upstairs, Helen’s mother stood on the galleried landing and listened while her baby girl wept. The baby girl was fifteen, Ian was thirteen, and the senior daughter was seventeen going on
forty. Kate was as pretty as a picture, but she was tiny, gamine and lively. Helen possessed the stillness that men loved, the gentleness, the softness of body into which a male longed to immerse
himself, the placid facial features seen in many a valuable oil painting. She seemed biddable, innocent and perfect. She was what most stupid men wanted, so she was vulnerable.

A man of character would choose Kate. No. That was wrong, because the reverse was more likely to be the truth; Kate would do the choosing and would achieve partnership, whereas Helen was likely
to become a decorative item picked out and adorned to illustrate a man’s success. Yet she was an academic, a linguist, and a very capable student.

Mary knocked and opened the door. ‘Helen?’

‘Mum.’

‘Kate told me. Now, look at me. Look at me, sweetheart.’

Helen looked.

‘I want the roundness to disappear from your shoulders before you develop a hump on your back. I want you tall and straight in a well-fitted bra that shows off your figure. You are what
you are, so embrace it with pride.’

‘I hate it.’

‘Tough. I hated being small, but I didn’t buy stilts. I got on with it, love. Let them look, but don’t let them touch. Walk tall. Show off your figure and let them see what
they can’t have. I have a police whistle downstairs, and don’t be afraid to use it. If anyone gets too close, you can perforate his eardrum with one blast.’

‘Mum!’

‘You need to borrow a bit of your sister’s cheek and a lot of your brother’s nonchalance. To hell with them, Helen. Listen, now. There’s a very good corsetiere in Knotty
Ash. She could make you some bras. We’ll get a couple of strong cotton ones that stop your breasts leaping about, and some pretty ones, too. You have to learn to celebrate what you are and
who you are.’

‘Like Uncle Stuart?’

‘Exactly like that. Accept yourself and love yourself. No two people are the same. He was a bit older than you are now when he told your dad about his difference. Details, Helen, mere
details and happenstance. You could have been born with an enormous birthmark on your face or with one leg shorter than the other. Your details happen to be a beautiful body and a perfect face.
Women will be jealous and men will be roughly of two types – those who would set you on a pedestal and those who will want to get into your knickers—’

‘Mum!’

‘Helen! There’s nothing wrong with plain speaking, and do remember my origins. Where I come from, a spade’s an effing shovel. Your dad’s from a cotton town where
toughness is bred in the bone, and I survived Scotland Road.’ She paused. ‘That’s not true. I survived it and I loved every minute of it. And they destroyed it, bloody
government.’

Helen dried her eyes. ‘I’ll be good.’

‘You’re always good, too good. Start biting back, Helen. There’s nothing wrong with finishing a war, though there’s plenty wrong with starting one.’

‘I’ll try. I promise I’ll try. We’ll do the bras in the long holidays, Mum. You’re right; I should be grateful. Thank you.’

This was the day on which Helen Andrea Sanderson learned how to cope. She practised putting her hair up. It suited her, but was less enticing than the free-flowing dark silk that usually hung
down halfway between head and waist. A slackened belt made her less shapely, and she found some clumpy shoes in the bottom of her wardrobe.

She found something else, too. Deep down in her core, she discovered a place she had never sought before now. Helen Sanderson was a strong girl. Because of archery, an option chosen for its lack
of quick movement, she had muscles. But beyond the muscles, there was something easily as useful; there was self-respect and a deeply buried and furious resistance. If any man touched her, she
would break his neck. ‘You can do it,’ she told her reflection. If ever a male stepped one inch too far, she would deal with him. Kate, like Mum, had a quick temper that dispersed
within minutes. Helen was more calculating than that. And these horrible shoes might inflict a lot of damage . . .

What neither girl realized was that each was already under surveillance.

Richard Rutherford met his Waterloo when a ball flew over the wire fence between boys’ and girls’ playing fields. A tiny, dark-haired female approached the divide. ‘Oi,’
she shouted. ‘You with the hair; can we have our ball back?’

He sauntered towards her. ‘Are you talking to me, Shorthouse?’

Dark blue eyes glistened. ‘No, I’m talking to myself; I’ve already been locked up for it three times, padded cell, back-to-front coat and all that. But I have failed so far to
meet a conversationalist as accomplished as I am.’ She looked him up and down. The up and the down were well separated by a substantial body. ‘What happened to your head, long
person?’

‘Cricket,’ he answered.

‘Then leave insects alone, because I think it’s made a nest in your thatch.’

He grinned. Even in the horrible chocolate-brown divided skirt and yellow top, she had style. ‘You’re Kate Sanderson.’

‘Thanks. To remember who I am, I usually have to look inside my PE kit to read the name tapes. Well?’

‘Well what?’

‘Tennis ball. We’re playing rounders, and I slogged it.’

He thought about that. ‘In cricket, that would be a six.’

‘Ah, but look what cricket does to your hair. Ball, please.’

‘Helen’s sister?’

Oh, heck, another one. ‘Yes, and she’s not for sale. We’ve decided we’re keeping her because she matches the drawing-room curtains.’

He wasn’t interested in Helen, though he said nothing on the subject. This one was another matter altogether. She answered back. Kate had what Helen lacked – chutzpah. Fighting with
this little minx would be fun, he decided.

‘Ball,’ she repeated, eyes glaring, foot tapping.

‘How much is it worth?’

Kate shrugged. ‘Not much. We have a spare.’ And she ran away.

Richard remained where he was, watching her. She had a Leslie Caron haircut with irregular spiky bits framing her face. Her little body was perfectly proportioned, her wit was quick and clever,
and he wanted to know her. Yes, Helen was beautiful, but this cheeky monkey was his cup of tea or arsenic or whatever else she wanted to give him.

He was a late scholar, because a long fight with glandular fever followed by meningitis had stolen a huge chunk of childhood, so Richard was a man in a boys’ world. Tomorrow, his
schooldays would finally end and, if he got good grades, he would be reading law at Oxford. Rumour had it that Helen was aiming for modern languages, while her older little sister intended to read
something like politics. ‘Come to Oxford with me, Kate,’ he whispered.

She was having an argument with a girl twice her size.

‘You’re out,’ she screamed.

She would win. He knew without a shadow of a doubt that she would always win. What a waste; she would have made a brilliant lawyer.

There’d been a long lecture after a recent assembly. Boys were forbidden to leer at, salivate over, follow or make lewd comments to or about their counterparts in the girls’ school.
Anybody touching a female pupil would be summarily expelled from this fee-paying school for young gentlemen. Richard guessed that the real subject was Helen Sanderson, a girl who was probably at
the core of many damp and untidy dreams. She was lovely, almost perfect, but her sister was probably the golden girl in that household.

He retrieved the tennis ball and pocketed it. The three Sandersons always walked home together, probably because the younger girl needed guarding. Since he lived fairly close to them, he would
return the ball after school and accompany them. If Kate would allow it, that was.

In the school library, he thumbed his way through a precedent set during the Crown versus Edwin Taylor, a case of suspected fraud. Even her hair seemed alive. Edwin Taylor was a prat, but his
case had been compromised by a sergeant from CID. Entrapment. He’d like to entrap little madam in a nice, soft bed. She would be feisty. The law was an ass, indeed. Three grand, Taylor had
filched from a deaf old lady.

He gave up. Edwin bloody Taylor should have got seven years, but bad handling of evidence had set him free.

She’s not for sale. We’re keeping her because she matches the curtains.
It was possible that Kate was unused to being admired. Everybody wanted Helen; few noticed the little
firecracker by her side. It seemed that Ian and Kate acted as minders for the family’s treasure, an item that was most people’s idol. He found himself hoping that his newly discovered
prize really had no more admirers. But he might be wrong. Why on earth should he be the only one who’d noticed and desired little Katie? ‘And why would she look at me?’

The tennis ball remained in his pocket for the rest of the day. He would travel homeward in her company. Tomorrow, a barrier would come down for the sixth form summer ball. Lowers and uppers
from both schools attended, and he could only hope that she would come. Teachers’ corporate vigilance would not be aimed at Helen and her flock of admirers, since she was too young to attend.
Kate would be free of her sister. But she wouldn’t be free of him. Richard intended to fill Kate’s dance card for many moons to come. If she would allow it, that was.

Daniel Pope opened Pope’s of Waterloo in 1984. The shop was the first of the chain to be established in Liverpool North, and Mother was pleased with him. It was best to
stay on the right side of Beatrice Pope, as she could be toxic when displeased. His father, obviously under the thumb of old Beatie, as she was known to all who hated her, was Victorian by nature,
though he did not rule the roost. Their son wondered how they’d managed to create him, since he had never met people colder than his parents.

Daniel lived two lives. There was the obedient, lovable and grateful son; then there was the alter ego. The latter had been manufactured due to necessity, as without it he would have had no life
at all while still at home. Secrecy became paramount when he was a child, and he honed his skills as he reached maturity. A handsome man, he navigated his way through dozens of women, bought
second-hand jewellery about which his family knew nothing, kept two sets of books and opened a very private and increasingly healthy bank account.

Then Helen Sanderson drifted into his life. She came into the shop to buy a locket as a birthday gift for her sister. She was the most stunning girl he’d ever seen, so he allowed her a
decent discount on an antique piece acquired from the estate of a recently deceased woman. He told Helen nothing of its provenance, though he emphasized its age and the embedded hallmark. Her
uniform he recognized immediately. ‘I see you attend my alma mater,’ he said.

Helen made no reply. She had discovered that reply led to conversation, which in turn led to a request to which she had to reply in the negative. Yes, fifteen was old enough for a girl to have a
boyfriend, but this was a man of the world, a good-looking jeweller with the usual hunger in his eyes.