The Hiding Place (7 page)

Jump, Private Gauci! Jump I say! I’ll have your guts for garters! Attennn-shun! And Marina stands to attention, wobbling gently on the squeaking springs.

Fran won’t play this game: she always gets court-martialled. She is drawn to the wooden pallets leaning against the outhouse. She crawls behind them, crouching in the dark triangle of
space between the moist brick and timber. Raindrops cling to the surface of each plank; the wall at her back is glazed with slime; two yellow eyes stare at her from low down on the ground. Fran has
met this dog before, out on the street. She puts her clenched hand out to his nose, as our mother taught her to, and after a moment he gives it a bored lick. He is quaking and smells of rotting
earth. Fran sits next to him, manoeuvring his heavy brown head on to her lap; the dog lets out a low grumble as he settles into her warmth.

Fran runs her hand along the rough matting of his coat. If he were her dog she would give him a good brushing. She puts her face on his muzzle. And a bath. Through the gaps in the planks she
watches her sisters: they’ll be at her for something any minute now. Your Fault are the words she hears most, although she knows, she knows it never is. Fran puts the feather Celesta gave her
into her mouth, holding it like a cigarette, and inhales, exhales. She tries it out on the dog, sliding the quill between his pink chops, but he shakes his head vigorously, gives another low groan
and settles again in her lap. Fran turns over the flap of his ear, and whispers into the pink of it.

London’s burning London’s burning London’s burning London’s burning.

~

Celesta stands on the doorstep and shivers in the rain. She watches Marina and Rose playing their new game: they bounce on and off the soaked chairs, falling into the weeds.

Tally ho! Bombs Away!

Soon their legs are smeared with mud and seeded grass. Celesta tries to sort it out in her head, what they will do for tea tonight, where they will sleep. Inside the house, the
Jackson children crowd the living room: the big lads with their legs hanging over the sofa and their strange appraising looks; the girls so hard and thick-set, with their ratty hair; the grey-faced
toddlers crying. Endless children, too many for Celesta to count – but they match us in number.

~

Shit’s sake, Donny, your end, your end!

The yard door swings open: Mr Jackson is home from work. He crabs in backwards, dragging an upended slab of iron which used to be someone’s fireplace; Donny, his partner,
is attached to the other end. Marina and Rose jump together into one armchair, watch silently as the two men grunt and curse and scrape their way across the flags.

My fucking toe, Don. Let up! Slipping, boy, watch now! The fireplace drops with a clang on the concrete, and the two men stand above the ringing and stare at it. Job done, Arthur Jackson wipes
his hand along his forehead. A tide of rusted orange melts slowly down his brow. He turns his blue eyes on Celesta.

Hello there. You from across the road?

Celesta tries to smile at him but can’t manage it: his voice is soft now, not at all what she expected. Tears leap behind her eyes.

Come for tea? he says, patting her lightly as he shifts past her on the step. He moves into the house, followed by Donny. They make a big play of wiping their feet on the matting inside the
door; Arthur like a stallion about to charge, Donny’s hands pressed against doorframe as if he’s jumping into the Abyss. His boots are no cleaner at the end of this performance. Celesta
hears Arthur Jackson’s voice behind her, echoing in the bare hall.

We’ve got guests then, Alice?

Alice appears from the living room. There follows a tangle of whispers and gestures. The boy Donny loiters in the kitchen, twisting his rat face on Celesta, then back to Alice
and the story she is telling. Celesta squirms under scrutiny. She keeps her back to all of them, but Alice’s drone still reaches her, the words running up her spine:

Out with some bloke . . .
abandoned
that child . . . God knows where
he
is . . . Celesta suddenly remembers Carlotta and Salvatore. She calls to her sisters to get their coats.

~  ~  ~

They’ve put a thick gauze dressing on my hand – it reaches up to my armpit, nearly – and another sheath in layers across my face, each one thin as an
insect’s wing. Everything is nice under this: soft and dreamy. I wish my mother could have a bit of it; she is so stony and sharp and clear, sitting there on that plastic seat. She’s
holding my hand, what will become known as my ‘good hand’ – as if the other one was somehow wicked and got punished for it – and she’s listening, as much as
she’s able, to the doctor. I’ve lost a fair bit of hair too, but as there wasn’t much there to start with, no one seems bothered. They say a new baby’s hair falls out
anyway, a few weeks after it’s born. What’s left of mine will, that’s for certain.

My mother looks round the ward: we’re all babies here, but she doesn’t care about any of the others, not even Luca, who is in the corridor wrestling with Eva’s gold locket. Eva
doesn’t have much feeling for small children yet (and certainly doesn’t know their strength: she will find a deep red score on her neck later, where Luca succeeded in ripping the chain
from her throat and stuffing it into her mouth).

My mother’s eyes are like two stars in a frosty sky: it’s as if she can see the future. She looks through the soul of the doctor sitting on the corner of my bed, and decides to trust
him. He talks of third degree, skin grafts, plastic surgery.

The outlook is favourable, he says to my mother. He has a white coat and a stethoscope, and his hair is neatly parted on the left. He looks like a boy she used to know. He puts his lovely long
hands over my mother’s veined fists.

It’s amazing what they can do these days. These new prosthetics are marvellous, he says gently.

My mother nods as if she knows what he’s talking about. She feels very weary. But I won’t die: that’s all that matters to her now.

We just have to be careful about the shock, he continues.

Oh, I’m alright, she says.

He means the shock
I’ve
had, but he looks at her for a long time and considers the possibility that I’m not the only casualty.

There’s not much you can do here, he says finally. Is there someone you can stay with tonight?

I’ve got five other kids, says my mother.

He looks at her face. She doesn’t look old enough, he thinks; she can’t be much over thirty.

They’re with a neighbour, she starts to say, but then a nurse pulls the curtain back and behind her stands a woman in a raincoat. My mother’s new x-ray vision has warned her of this
apparition. Next to the woman stands Eva, mouthing something unintelligible. One look from my mother, and Eva joggles Luca lightly back down the ward and through the swing doors.

You’ll be the social worker, I expect, my mother says, turning in her chair and smiling acidly. The woman takes a notebook out of her handbag.

~

They’re with a neighbour. Jackson, I think – maybe Johnson. We’ve only been there a month. Haven’t got a clue, love. He’s claiming Assistance at the moment.
Merchant seaman. No, it’s not a Spanish name. Gauci. No, GOWCHEE. I never left her! Go on then, bloody well file it. I’ve told you once – you deaf or what? My kids are perfectly
safe, Thank You Very Much. They’re with a neighbour.

~

They’re not.

Celesta has told Mrs Jackson, in her grown-up voice, that they’re going for tea with their Aunty Carlotta.

Are you sure? says Arthur Jackson, ’Cos we’ve got plenty, haven’t we, love? He turns to his wife, who holds a dirty potato over the sink; she cuts busily, each twist of peel
sending a splash of muddy water into the air.

It’s chips, mind, warns Alice Jackson, and pointing the peeler at Celesta, Do you lot eat chips?

Celesta takes Fran’s hand and moves to the kitchen door.

No, I don’t think we do, Mrs Jackson. But thank you very much for your hospitality. Will you tell my mam we’ll be at Carlotta’s?

Mr Jackson is afraid he’ll forget the name. He takes a folded envelope from his shirt-pocket, pats himself all over in search of a pen.

Just write down the address for us, Sweetheart, he says. Celesta won’t stop moving now, calls out from the step.

Don’t worry, my mam knows where it is.

Mr Jackson stands in the kitchen. He’s finally found his pen, tucked for safety behind his ear. He licks his lips as he bends over the greasy envelope. Carla? Charlotte?
Celina? The names run through his head.

Now. What was the name, Alice?

Celesta, she says firmly.

Oh aye. Celestia.

He writes this down in capitals.

~

We
do
eat chips, Cel. We do! Marina is persistent.

Shut up, says Celesta under her breath. She grips Fran’s hand tighter.

I want chips too! yells Rose.

You shut up an’ all, Celesta says, feeling their noise scraping away at her thoughts. She tries to remember where Salvatore and Carlotta live. She has to picture it. It’s round the
corner from their church.

She leads her sisters (but not the dog, who skulks behind them until Rose aims a stone at him) through the Jacksons’ yard and into the street. They can’t help crossing the road for a
look at their house. Celesta peers through the letter box, and the living room looks perfectly ordinary. She presses her face against the thin slit, pushing the sprung flap further open with her
thumb, and feels a draught on her eye. Beyond the living room, it’s dark; the door that leads into the kitchen looks as if it’s been painted black. She gets a sudden smell of wet, of
ash: like Bonfire Night.

Round the back, someone has leaned the busted yard door against the frame, where it rocks in the wind. The girls slide around it one by one and stare at the mess.

That’s your fault, says Rose, wiggling her finger at Fran.

Shut up, Celesta moans, so quietly, it makes them mute.

The chairs and table, the rug and the chest have all been abandoned to the rain. A rough board has been nailed up at the kitchen door: the original lies flat on a patch of grass
at the far end of the garden. At the window, the net curtains hang like scorched paper; there’s a long curved crack in the glass. Celesta peers into the outhouse: a stash of crockery is piled
in the doorway and, on the toilet seat, someone – perhaps one of the Jackson boys – has put my mother’s recipe books in a neat pile. Celesta reaches in, lifts one from the top
–
Cooking with Your
New World
Oven!
– and the cover comes away in her hands. She looks at the illustration on the front, a smiling woman in a frilly apron and high heels,
and thinks it strange that everything is so burnt and yet so wet.

There’s a sound of squeaking: it comes from the blackened chairs, groaning in the wind. A spill of water on the flags is streaked with specks of charcoal. The girls in their belted
raincoats stand and watch her.

Come on, Celesta says, sick of it. Let’s go.

~  ~  ~

Frankie can’t believe what he’s just heard. It’s ridiculous. It’s so stupid, it makes him laugh out loud. The sound of his voice in the hallway is eerie;
he feels he wants to laugh again, and does, deliberately this time: it comes out high-pitched and hollow. Frankie sees Ilya coming up the stairs, clutching the glass he’d been sent for, and
the urge to put out his foot and kick him full-on, in the belly, is almost too much for my father. He’d like to watch him plummet to the bottom, preferably in slow motion. Ilya waits at the
turn of the staircase, says something low as Frankie passes. Frankie doesn’t quite catch it.

You what? he says, turning and looking at the man. Ilya holds out the empty glass. Frankie puts two fingers over the rim of the tumbler, tugs at it.

I said, Fly away home, Little Bug, and Ilya laughs then, his fingers flicking the air as he finally lets go.

Frankie clenches the glass in his fist, ready, but Ilya turns away, running up the last flight of stairs. Frankie can leave it for now, he has other things to think about. He
swings open the door at the foot of the stairs. My father hasn’t said Yes or No to Joe’s proposition: he needs to talk to someone before he makes up his mind.

The cafe is in semi-darkness, and the man behind the counter is not Salvatore – but Frankie knows him: Martineau is pouring himself a large brandy. Frankie looks at him, and then sees the
Tin on the bar, and looks again. Martineau holds out the bottle, gesturing to the tumbler in my father’s hand.

You’ll need it, he says. Salvatore appears from the kitchen. He has one arm in his jacket, moving fast for a big man.

Frankie! Ilya tell you? he shouts, sweeping round the counter, Incendio! Your house!

Martineau gulps back the drink, catches Frankie’s hot look, holds up his hands.

Not me, my friend, never. Never. Frankie feels the cafe close in around him. For the first time today he
wants
to think about my mother. He wants to be where she is. He looks at
Martineau.

Mary?

She’s at the hospital. She’s alright, Frankie! he calls to my father’s back. But Martineau can’t find the words to tell him that I’m not.

Frankie runs from the cafe, out into the street, out into the rain which courses off his glossy head. On the counter in The Moonlight sits his forgotten hat. Salvatore catches it up in his hand
as he follows Frankie to the hospital.

~  ~  ~

A slight roughness to the touch; Joe Medora sweeps his palms back and fore across the blotter on his desk, enjoying the sensation. And how smoothly Frankie took his offer! Not a
sign in his face: a shame he’s not so good at poker, thinks Joe. He’s given Frankie a day or so for a decision – the deal is very delicate.

What Joe wants is simple; he wants Marina. After all, he thinks, Marina is my daughter. He thinks, but he can’t be sure. He
is
sure: he’s seen her, he’s seen his blood
in her. He stares at the blotter, picturing Mary, and only half-registers Ilya’s soft step into the room. But Joe can’t ignore the quick snort of his laugh.