Goodnight Lady (43 page)

A woman with a young child on her arm walked across the road. Hawking deep in the back of her throat, she spat in Kerry’s face, the spittle running down her cheek and on to her fur collar.

‘You filthy bitch, coming here for your darkie! Don’t think we never saw you.’

Kerry was waiting for the woman to move when the man who had shouted at her came out of his house carrying a chamber pot. He threw the contents towards Kerry. A small amount hit the bottom of her coat and her shoes. Looking into the man’s face, seeing the hatred there and all around her, she began to run, dropping her bag on to the pavement as she went. Never before had she felt such malevolence. Never before had she experienced anything so utterly shaming and humiliating. She ran until she was in the High Street, staring around her like an animal being chased by a pack of hounds, her eyes wild. She carried on running until she came to Victoria Park.

Sitting on a bench, she cried, bitter tears that seemed to wrench her whole frame in two. Wrapping her arms around herself, she caressed her belly underneath her ruined coat.

She had had such good news for him, such a secret. Now she could tell him nothing because he was gone.

Bleeding and beaten he had left, but if he was bleeding he was still alive. This thought, amongst so many other bad ones, comforted her.

If he could bleed, he was still alive.

At that moment in time, she hated Briony more than she had ever hated anyone or anything in her life.

 

It was late and the journey home from Southend-on-Sea had tired Briony out. Sitting alone in her small sitting room, she sipped a steaming cup of tea. She was supposed to go to the club tonight, she was supposed to go to the houses, and she was supposed to be seeing a man called Joey Vickers about some very cheap liquor. Eileen’s blank face was haunting her. She looked at the photograph of Benedict. Bernadette had been right in a lot of respects. You didn’t know where your heart was going to lie. The fact that his father was Henry Dumas, a skunk, a piece of filth in Briony’s opinion, didn’t stop the feelings she had for the son she’d borne him.

How many times had she heard people say, ‘If I could have my time again, I’d do it all differently’? Well, she wouldn’t really, because as bad as it all seemed now, it had been the means of her son coming into the world. Of Benedict’s very existence. Although he was away from her, was in a different house, living a life she could only glimpse through Sally, he was still her boy. One day he would know that, when the time was right.

She drank her tea and poured herself another cup. The room was quiet, the house too. She was enjoying the peace when Cissy tiptoed into the room.

‘Can I get you a bite?’

‘No, thanks all the same. Sit down a second, Cissy. Take the weight off your feet.’

Cissy sat beside the fire and glanced ruefully at her swollen legs. ‘Look at them, like legs of pork!’

‘If they’re bad, you should take the doctor’s advice and keep off them now and then. There’s plenty of help coming in now. You don’t have to take the brunt of the work any more.’

Cissy blew out her red mottled cheeks, making a rude noise. ‘What’s that silly old bugger know, eh? I can’t sit around all day, I’d go off me head...’ She bit her lip. ‘I’m sorry, Bri, that just came out.’

Briony laughed. ‘You don’t have to watch what you say to me, Cis, I was just thinking about her meself.’

‘How was she? All right?’

Briony nodded. ‘Yeah, she seemed to like it there. It’s really lovely, Cis, the view from the place is gorgeous. I’ve never really seen so much water before. I know we used to swim in the cut when we was kids, but this was different. Clean-looking and deep green. It was lovely. And the smell! I tell you now, I felt like staying there meself. Getting away from it all. Never coming back here.’

Cissy made a loud noise.

‘I can just see you now, in an early dotage, sitting on the prom in a bleeding bathchair. Listen here, Briony, you’ve got a lot of bother at the moment, I know that. You ain’t been yourself since all that with Ginelle. That threw you. I watched you change. But even if you did leave this place, left London even, you’d soon be back. You’re a woman who needs aggravation, you bloody well thrive on it. Otherwise, why the hell would you have opened up your houses? Look at this week. You’ve had no Tommy to back you up yet you’ve sorted out Eileen, in between running your clubs and your houses, of course.’

Cissy’s voice was full of admiration. ‘Me, I couldn’t organise the proverbial piss up. Don’t sell yourself short, and don’t get maudlin. Get drunk if you want, let off a bit of steam, but don’t let it all get you down now. I don’t like seeing you depressed. Somehow, if you’re not right, then the world around you don’t seem right.’

Briony looked into the face of her old friend. Cissy was only a few years older than she, yet she looked ancient. She was a workhouse child, had known nothing but hard work all her life. Without it she was like a fish out of water. That’s why she couldn’t bear to let a younger girl take on any of her work. She had to be needed, to earn her keep. It was something that had been drummed into her at a very early age.

‘I’m all right, Cissy, but I have a lot to think about these days. There’s been trouble with Kerry. I don’t think she’s exactly going to love me for a while. I had to do something that won’t make me the most popular sister in the smoke.’

‘What happened then?’

Briony shook her head. ‘I can’t say, Cissy love. I think that’s something best left between me and Kerry.’ And me mother, she thought, because Molly was adamant that Kerry was never to darken her doors again.

Briony had dressed carefully for her meeting with Mariah, the two women were going to look at Berwick Manor and decide if it was a viable business. Briony already knew the answer would be yes, because Mariah was shrewd. All they would do today was put Briony’s stamp of approval on it and make an offer.

She put on a deep cerise suit, the skirt full, the waistband tight. As she walked it clung to her silk stockings. The jacket was long and shapeless, cut with a square neck, and she pinned a lizard-shaped diamond and ruby brooch on to the shoulder, giving the whole outfit a touch of class. She pulled her erratic hair up into a tight chignon, pinning it carefully, though tendrils of hair escaped, framing her face with their curls. Sighing, she gave up hope of getting it smooth and put on her make-up. Finally she buttoned up her shoes and looked at herself in the full-length mirror by her dressing table. She would have to do.

It was as she was sorting through her large black handbag that she heard the commotion in her hallway. Kerry’s voice, loud and strident, and Bernadette’s more modulated tones. With a grim face she left her bedroom and walked to the top of the staircase.

‘So you’re here then? I was expecting you sooner.’

Kerry stared malevolently up at her sister.

‘You bitch! You bloody cow! You think you’re so clever, don’t you?’

Briony walked down the stairs. Cissy and Mrs Horlock watched with interest, Bernadette with fear.

‘I tried to stop her coming here, Bri, she’s out of her mind. Don’t take any notice of her...’

Kerry looked dreadful. Her clothes were mud-stained, the hem of her brocade coat looked as if it had been dragged through the dirt. Her legs were filthy, her white stockings black and laddered, her hair uncombed and tangled. She turned wild eyes on Bernie and shouted: ‘Oh, don’t try and smooth this over. This can’t be forgotten, swept under the carpet like the old man’s death! This is my business, mine! So why don’t you piss off out of it? Keep your nose out where it ain’t wanted!’

Briony walked down the stairs. She looked at Cissy and Mrs Horlock and said calmly, ‘Make some tea.’

The two women left the hallway through the green baize door, but Briony knew they would stand behind it listening. There was no way they would want to miss all this. Kerry tensed as Briony walked over to her, but Briony passed by and opened the door to the lounge.

‘Come in here and do your talking. And I mean talking, not shouting. I’ve got a headache actually, and your voice is going right through my head.’

Kerry stood uncertainly. She had expected a lot, but not this. The calmness of Briony threw her, as Briony had known it would. Kerry watched Briony disappear and had no option but to follow, with Bernadette hot on her heels.

Briony was standing by the fireplace, her immaculate clothes and hair making Kerry more annoyed with each passing second.

‘Look at you! I suppose you’ve got a red hat and all? What’s the saying, Bri? Red hat, no drawers? That certainly sounds like you, don’t it?

‘Tell me, who beat up Evander? You? I wouldn’t put it past you. You’re like a man, do you know that? You think like a man, you act like a man, no wonder Tommy Lane dumped you. It must have been like living with a queer. Two men together, only one wore a dress.’

The barb about Tommy struck home as Kerry knew it would. As she’d wanted it to. She wanted Briony to hurt, as she was hurting.

‘You’re quiet all of a sudden, normally your mouth’s going like the clappers. What’s the matter? Truth hurts, does it?’

Bernadette tried to take Kerry’s arm but she shrugged her off.

‘Leave me alone, you!’

‘Sit down, Kerry. Sit down, for Christ’s sake.’

Briony’s voice, so calm, so clear, jolted something in Kerry’s mind.

‘Don’t you tell me what to do, you vicious bitch! You’ve ruined my life. Me and Evander was going away. I had a job lined up in Paris, I was going to tell you to stick your club right up your arse. We would have been all right there, me and him. But no, you had to have him removed, taken away, like so much rubbish. Well, let me tell you something else, Briony Cavanagh, I’m pregnant!’ She laughed at the look of shock on her sisters’ faces.

‘Yes, thought that might give you a start. I’m in the club, up the duff, by a blackie. And shall I tell you something? I’m proud of it. I hope it’s as black as night! I hope it’s so black it shines! So what are you going to do about that, Bri, eh? How are you going to sort this out? You know, all your threats and all your money and all your trapping can do nothing at all because I want it. I really, really want it. Especially now you’ve driven my Evander away. It’s all I’ll have left of him, ain’t it? All that remains.’

Briony heard a loud sighing noise, and it was a few seconds before she realised it was coming from herself. It was as if Kerry had stuck a pin in her chest and she was deflating slowly.

Kerry laughed at her sister’s reaction.

‘That’s pissed all over your fireworks, hasn’t it?’ She rubbed her belly gently. ‘Never banked on that one, did you?’

Briony pulled herself up to her full height and, walking across the room, slapped Kerry hard across the face. Then she grabbed her arm roughly and shouted: ‘You stupid little bitch! You stupid little cow! You think this is funny, clever, do you? You think you’ve got one over on us? What are you, on a death wish or what?’

She threw her on to the chair by the fire, then leaning over her, screamed, ‘You’ve ruined your life, you silly mare, if you could only see it! Pregnant? I could cheerfully throttle you!’

She began to slap Kerry around the head and shoulders, holding back the urge to punch her, rip at her hair, tear her skin with her nails.

‘My God, girl, you’ve really done it this time. You’re right, I can’t help you. No one can help you now. You wonder why I stick my nose in your business? I’ll tell you why. Because if it was left to you lot, you’d fucking crumble. You’re all as thick as shit! You especially. You’ve got a talent, a voice, you had something going for you, and now that’s nothing, that’s all finished, because the day you give birth, you’re a second-class citizen.

‘I liked Evander, believe it or not, I liked him a lot. But liking him ain’t enough. With him you would have been ostracised, shut out, people would have looked at you like you was dirt! Now you’ve got all that coming anyway, and for the rest of your life. And you have the cheek to come here and tell
me
what
I’ve
done wrong. It was a pity you didn’t think of that when you was counting the cracks on the ceiling, on your back for Evander bloody Dorsey!’

Kerry looked fearfully into Briony’s face. All the dark thoughts that plagued her in the night were being spoken out loud. The truth, as she had pointed out only minutes before, did hurt. It hurt a lot.

Briony paced the room, her hands shaking in temper. Bernadette lit her a cigarette and passed it to her.

Briony pulled hard on the cigarette. By now Kerry’s white face and dishevelled appearance were making her feel sorry for her sister, despite herself. She wanted to take her in her arms and tell her everything was going to be all right. But how could she? Nothing was ever going to be all right for Kerry Cavanagh again.

‘Are you sure you’re pregnant? I mean, are you really certain?’

Kerry sat hunched in the chair. She looked very small and forlorn, her face stained with tears and dirt. She nodded her head.

‘How long gone are you? I mean, is there still time to do something about it?’

‘I don’t know, I’m over three months.’

Briony closed her eyes and stubbed out the cigarette, immediately lighting up another.

Sitting down on the chesterfield, she looked at her sister, now bowed down not just with the pain of losing the man she loved, but with the knowledge she also carried his child. A child that would be spurned because of its colour. In her heart of hearts, Briony felt a glimmer of compassion for the poor unborn child, nestled so cosily in its mother’s womb. But she had to try to save the situation.

‘I’ll arrange for you to see Denice O’Toole, all my girls use her. She’s clean and she knows what she’s doing.’

Kerry looked up at her sister. Her face crumpled then, tears gushing from her eyes, a terrible low keening sound issuing from her open mouth. Briony went to her and pulled her into her arms, hugging her close, stroking the dark head, and murmuring words of endearment.