The Talisman (17 page)

Before Edward could answer, Dora swung into the kitchen, wearing a cheap perfume that filled the room, and bright red, high-heeled shoes. Her breasts were pushed up into a new type of bra, and her flowered blouse was open at the neck to display her cleavage. Her blonde hair was fluffed out into the latest fashion, and she was wearing the full war paint.

‘You off, are you? Don’t suppose you’re going up west are you, only I could do with a lift?’

Edward buttoned his coat, eager to be gone, and shook his head. Dora kissed her mother’s balding head and then opened a drawer in the untidy sideboard. ‘So you’re Eddie. Well I never, you grown up a real dandy, that’s for sure. Looks ever so nice, don’t he, Ma? Hang on, I’ll walk wiv ya. I’m almost ready.’

Edward watched her open a leather box, take out his mother’s gold and pearl necklace and clasp it around her neck, looking into the mirror above the fire. While she fixed the earrings she caught him looking at her, and she flicked her tongue over her painted lips, smiled at him with a coy, sexy pout. ‘You recognize this, do you? It was yer mother’s, she left it to me in her will, didn’t she Ma? I never have it off, do I? It’s just lovely.’

Edward’s stomach churned. Emotions he had thought himself incapable of feeling were beginning to surface and he had to get out. But Dora wasn’t letting him off the hook that easily – she caught his arm and teetered on her heels, clip-clopping beside him down the concrete stairs. ‘Stinks here, don’t it? Terrible, I’m only here ’cause of Ma, otherwise I’d be in my own place, I got enough put by for a nice flat, but until she pops off I have to stay. Only fair really, all the others are married now, with kids, and they got their own problems . . . You got a girl, have you, Eddie? I bet you have, nice-looking boy like you, and yer ever so tall, taller than yer brother by a couple of inches. Oh, he’s been ever so hard done by, did me mum tell you? Poor bugger, just one of those types, isn’t he? Walks into trouble.’

Having nothing better to do, Edward went all the way into the West End with Dora. She kept up a steady flow of chatter, and as they neared Mayfair she asked Edward if he would like to have a drink at the club where she worked. ‘It’s ever so nice, and very exclusive, lots of Yanks in there, but they are really nice blokes, you know, not just servicemen but officers.’

Edward found himself sitting at a small, seedy bar in a drinking club close to Berkeley Square. The club had only one main room, fitted out with tiny, two-seater tables and a couple of booths. There was a dance floor the size of a postage stamp, and crammed into a corner was a three-piece band. Dora seemed to be the ‘head girl’, all the other ‘hostesses’ were younger by a few years. Edward watched her circulating among the tables, chatting with everyone and ordering champagne. He could see the girls were hookers, but he reckoned they were reasonably expensive ones, since they were all well dressed. Dora herself had changed into a slinky evening gown which was cut very low at the neck, and it showed off his mother’s necklace very well. She constantly checked her lipstick in the wall-to-wall mirrors.

After a couple of drinks Edward decided to call it a night. He was bored and the music annoyed him. He was just about to leave when Dora sat down with a glass of what looked like champagne. She leaned over and whispered that she was drinking ginger beer, although nobody knew it, but she had to keep sober for the clients. A swarthy gent in a flash tuxedo with red cummerbund joined them, and Dora introduced him as her manager.

Johnny Mask took a good look at Edward and smiled his flashy smile, showing two gold-capped teeth. Edward seemed familiar to Mask and he asked if they had met before, but the upper-class twang to Edward’s voice confused him.

Edward wanted to get out now, the seedy little club was beginning to grate unbearably on his nerves, and he was wary of the sly-faced Johnny Mask. Dora walked him to the exit and clung to his arm, her sickly-sweet perfume becoming even more cloying. ‘Why don’t you come back later, Eddie, place doesn’t liven up until two or three in the morning. These are just a few regulars, we get all sorts later on – types you’d more’n likely mix with these days – you know, high-class . . . An’ out at the back, through the mirrored doors just by the bar, there’s a private card game goes on. You come back, lovey, you’ll like it, I could show you a nice time.’

Edward had to unwrap her fingers from his arm. She disgusted him, and yet he couldn’t help but find her attractive. She had a beautiful figure, and even though she was no longer a young girl she was still very pretty in a common way.

He buttoned his coat and asked her how much she charged, saw the hurt look on her face and smiled. But she tossed back her head and said that if he was a real nice gent she might give him one for nothing. He may look posh, but he shouldn’t forget that she knew where he came from, and more’n likely he couldn’t afford her anyway.

Edward cocked his head to one side, then pulled her close and whispered, ‘Nothing is free, sweetheart. Get your coat.’

Dora wanted him, not like a ‘punter’ – she wanted him, so she went over to Johnny Mask and took him aside. ‘Listen, this toff, he could be useful – you know, bring in his friends? You want me to make him a happy boy?’

Johnny looked over at Edward and gave Dora’s arse a slap. ‘Go to it – tell him he’ll get a special membership price if he helps with the cash flow down here . . .’

Johnny Mask’s flat was a monument to bad taste – full of glass and Formica, the new rage. The furniture was Art Deco – there were dreadful satin drapes and bowls of wax fruit everywhere, a grubby white carpet and a huge radio.

Dora danced over and switched the radio on. She smiled at Edward. ‘You like jazz, Eddie? I like the soft, quiet kind, not all those bleedin’ trumpets. Come on through, it’s fantastic, isn’t it?’

The bedroom was even worse, with purple drapes around the bed, which was flanked by statues, and behind the drapes a mirror. Dora lay back on the bed and pulled a cord. ‘See, isn’t it something? And guess what – you gotta promise me that you won’t let on I told you – the mirror, well, it’s two-way glass. He gets people here, huddled behind it, watching the sessions.’

Edward walked around the room, its seediness and decadence exciting him. Dora giggled and began doing a striptease in time to music, throwing each item across the room as she removed it. Naked, she lay back and stretched, then sat up and leant on her elbows, her face sweet and childlike. ‘Well, come on, if you’re coming . . . I’ve not got all night, and Johnny don’t like me doin’ too much “voluntary work”. I just said you was an old friend, that you’d bring us a lot of business. Johnny wants new customers, you know, with class and cash. They’re always easy for us. Only trouble is the bleedin’ poor ones, they always cause problems.’

Edward folded his clothes neatly on the satin-covered chair and leaned, naked, against the bed.

‘Oh, I knew you were lovely but not this good, yer got a body on yer that’s just perfect, just beautiful. Come here, I’m going to enjoy this one.’

Slowly, he lay against her soft, pink body, and had reached for her before he realized that she was still wearing his mother’s necklace. He shut his eyes, clenched his teeth, feeling sick, and his head throbbed.

‘What’s the matter, lovey? What’s the matter, darlin’ – you’re not gonna pass out on me, are yer? Come here, come an’ let me hold you, just don’t be sick, not on this nice bed.’

Instead of Dora he could see his mother, hear her, the way she would hold him and rock him in her arms. He didn’t know what to do, he could feel it all churning up inside, and he wanted her to shut up. But she kept talking, talking . . . He grabbed the necklace and tore it from her neck, rolling off the bed. ‘You don’t deserve to wear this, you cheap tart, you slut – give me the earrings, give me . . . Give!’

She wriggled away, cramming herself against the headboard, hands to her ears. ‘Ah, no! What you doin’, what you doin’? It’s mine, I was give it, yer mother give it us, it’s the truth, Eddie – I swear it, yer mother give it to me!’

He crawled up the bed and grabbed her, close to him, snatched off one earring then the other.

‘You bastard, they’re mine, I’ll have you for this – I will, I’ll bleedin’ have you, you bastard!’ She slid off the bed, grabbed one of her high-heeled shoes and went for him. He slapped her so hard she fell across the room. Her mouth bleeding, she was up like a little tigress, screaming at the top of her voice. He caught her and slapped her face, first one way, then the other, until she was crying, begging for him to stop. Weeping as he punched her, he banged her head against the headboard until she nearly blacked out. She was convinced he was going to kill her, and she held her hands over her face to protect it, but the next moment he gathered her gently in his arms and was kissing her, lovingly, and she stopped crying. ‘Don’t hurt me, Eddie, please don’t, please don’t, I’ll make it right for you, you’ll see, you’ll see.’

He made love to her and she played along, pretending, kissing his shoulders, his neck, his ears . . . Suddenly she wasn’t acting, it was for real, and she could feel it. To be excited was, for her, something new. She could turn any man on, do any amount of tricks, but she had learned to block it out of her mind. But she lost that with Edward, for the first time in years, years of being screwed by so many men she couldn’t even remember how many, let alone their names. This boy made her feel clean, unused and fresh, and she lay in his arms crying her heart out.

Exhausted, they curled around each other, and he rested his head on her belly.

‘Eddie, you believe me if I tell you that was special, honest it was. I got so used to doin’ it, it’s like makin’ a cup of tea, I got so I don’t feel nothin’, but you’ve just changed all that. Will you kiss me? On the lips, like you was my boyfriend?’

He held her head in both hands and kissed her lips, looking into her eyes, and she reached for him, pulled his head down and kissed him over and over again. ‘I don’t kiss, ever, I never let ’em kiss me, that sound weird? They don’t mind, yer know. I say, “You can kiss me fanny, me arse, but me lips are me own” . . . you want that necklace, them earrings? Take ’em, it was worth it.’

He was up and out of the bed, dragging his trousers on, and as he looked at her his eyes were so blank and unemotional he frightened her all over again.

‘You angry? What’s the matter with yer?’

Edward pulled his shirt on, grabbed his jacket, and at the same time he shoved his bare feet into his shoes, put his socks into his pocket. He had been paid by Lady Primrose and now a tart was paying him – he hated it, and he had to get out before he really hurt her.

‘What did I say? You want your mother’s necklace, don’t you? Eddie? Eddie, why don’t you say something to me?’

He picked up the necklace and put it in his pocket, and she drew the satin sheet up around herself. She tried to touch him, but he moved away.

‘Eddie, will I see you again – you’re comin’ back, aren’t you? Tell me it wasn’t just a one-night stand, I wasn’t just that, was I?’

He was at the door, yanked it open and then changed his mind. He turned to look at her, still draped in her sheet. ‘How much do you pay Johnny Mask?’

Dora stammered out that she gave him twenty-five per cent, but there was more to it than that, she earned from the club, she was more than just one of the girls. ‘I’m not just a tart, Eddie, I own part of the place. Johnny’s my manager.’

Edward smiled and walked out, and Dora slumped on the bed and curled up like a baby. Johnny found her there two hours later and hit the roof – he’d had God knows how many customers asking for her, and here she was, kipping. She had all day to sleep. He slapped her around, and she took it, picked up her clothes and walked towards the bathroom. ‘Is it that swish fella, the one with the face like a gyppo that you bin half the night with?’ he yelled to her retreating back. ‘Gawd ’elp us, anyone can see what’s he’s worth – fuck all – he’s just a punk that’s learned to speak with a posh voice. You stupid?’

Dora went into the bathroom without answering. She knew she was stupid, but she also knew that Eddie would be back – she knew it.

Edward caught a tram to the East End, with his mother’s necklace and earrings in his overcoat pocket. The guilt clung to him; he wanted to see her grave. He swallowed constantly, using all his self-control to block out the grief that was building up inside him. The closer he got to the cemetery, the worse it was.

When Alex was informed that Nathan, ‘the Chimp’, had been killed in the Blitz, he shook his head in despair. Why was it that every time he trusted anyone, felt for anyone, they were taken from him? Dr Gordon had given him the news, half expecting trouble, while the two warders watched at the open cell door. Over the weeks they had grown fond of Alex, had come to sympathize with him, and he had given them no trouble. This, along with the doctor’s report, persuaded the authorities to allow Alex to be taken, at long last, to see his mother’s grave.

Dr Gordon repeated over and over that they were trusting Alex to behave. The two guards that Alex had grown used to accompanied them.

The green security van with the tiny slit windows drove slowly across London in the early dawn. Alex stared through the small aperture like a child. He was scared – everything looked so different.

Twice they were held up by workmen redirecting traffic around huge bomb craters in the road. Alex took everything in, and his realization that a war was raging while he was incarcerated shamed him.

At the cemetery Edward paid off the cab driver, refusing his offer to wait, and watched him drive away. He wandered among the tombstones for quite a long time, looking for his mother’s grave. Then he stood still, closed his eyes and, when he opened them, he walked directly to her, sensing where she was buried.

The necklace felt as though it was burning in his pocket. No one had told him what to do, he just seemed to know, as he slumped to his knees and began to dig with his bare hands at the soil to the edge of the white cross. He dug a deep, narrow hole, blackening his hands and nails with the soil. His breath heaved in his chest as he took from his pocket the gold necklace and tiny earrings. He wrapped them in a clean white handkerchief, knotted it, then placed it in the earth and filled the hole.