Trust Me (11 page)

‘Granny’s right,’ Susan said. ‘It is, and I’m sure the school here is just as nice.’

Dulcie’s lower lip trembled. ‘But I liked Lee Manor, and you.’

Susan found she had a lump in her throat. She had known this visit wasn’t going to be easy, but she hadn’t really prepared herself for what this tragedy meant personally to Dulcie. ‘Well, I still care just as much about you,’ she said. ‘I’ll come to see you if you want me to. Maybe I can go and speak to your new teacher too, so she knows how clever you are, how about that?’

Dulcie nodded, and her eyes looked a little less bleak.

Susan got out her purse and pulled out a shilling. ‘Now, suppose you and May go and buy an ice-cream,’ she suggested. ‘I need to have a little chat with Granny, and I can’t stay very long this time because my father is meeting me in an hour. While you’re gone you can think about anything special you want to tell me.’

Maud gave Susan an appraising look as Dulcie left. ‘You’re a real nice woman,’ she said. ‘I bet that snooty headmistress of your’n don’t know you’ve come down ‘ere.’

Susan smiled at the old woman’s intuition. ‘No, she doesn’t. But Dulcie was always a bit special to me, Mrs Taylor, and like I said to Dulcie, I liked your son too. I wanted you all to know you had my support, and if there’s anything I can do to help, just ask.’

Maud jiggled her teeth up and down thoughtfully. ‘Can you help wif the Welfare?’

‘How do you mean, getting extra money for the children?’

‘No, I can sort that out meself. I’m scared they’ll take the kids away from me. Could you put in a good word?’

‘I’ll do my best,’ Susan said. She could see for herself that this house with its gas lighting and lack of bathroom wouldn’t be considered ideal. But it was Mrs Taylor’s age which was the real problem, and the fact that Reg wouldn’t be tried for some weeks yet. ‘I’m sure I can convince them it’s better for the children to stay with you at least till the trial. But I can’t make any promises further than that.’

She meant if he got life, or worse still was hanged. But she couldn’t say that.

‘PC Hewitt said that the coroner said Anne’s injuries were consistent wif a bad fall and ‘itting ‘er ‘ead on the wall at the bottom of the stairs,’ Maud said, her eyes filling up with tears. ‘But even if they didn’t find no other injuries, like she’d been given a pasting by Reg, there was still the fingermarks on ‘er neck, and the coroner couldn’t say if she were pushed, thrown or just tripped and fell.’

Susan reached out and patted her arm. ‘I know he didn’t push her or throw her,’ she said firmly. ‘He thought too much of his children to do that, however angry he was with Anne. We have to trust the lawyers to make the jury see that.’

‘But everything’s stacked against ‘im,’ Maud said sorrowfully. ‘Anne were a cow, she were carryin’ on wif someone, she taunted ‘im she were going to take the kids away from ‘im. ‘E even looks like a thug. ‘Ow the ‘ell can we get round that?’

‘I have every faith in British justice,’ Susan said more firmly than she felt. ‘I shall speak up for him if I’m given the chance.’

Maud smiled. ‘Gawd, I feel better for you comin’ round.’

Dulcie accompanied Susan down to the High Street later on. May had returned to her skipping game. Over tea and fruit cake, it had been decided that they were Susan and Maud now. Maud had spoken of her apprehension about the funeral on Monday – she had no wish to go herself and she didn’t feel the girls should be put through it either. But Anne’s uncle who lived out at Crayford was arranging and paying for it, and as he was sending a car over for them she supposed there was no way out of it. Maud had explained briefly how this same uncle had inherited Anne’s father’s money, and Susan felt that he might be trying to make amends, and also that it could be beneficial to the girls in the long run to meet their great-uncle.

‘Daddy never let us play in the street,’ Dulcie said suddenly. ‘Do you think I should tell Granny that so she stops us?’

Susan felt as if her heart was being squeezed. It was too bad that this little girl felt she’d got to try and hold on to all her father’s old standards, on top of everything else she had to cope with.

‘I think you and May will be happier if you can play outside,’ she said carefully. ‘Granny’s house is very small after all, and she’s a bit old for little girls running around making a lot of noise. But maybe you should speak to Granny about it and make rules, like not going beyond your street. That’s what grown-ups call a compromise.’

‘Daddy hated living in Deptford,’ Dulcie said, looking up at Susan. ‘He must be really worried because we’re here now.’

‘No, he won’t be. He knows you are safe and well looked after with Granny. So don’t worry about that, Dulcie. What he’d want you to do is to try and like your new school, keep up your reading and carry on taking care of May the way you always used to. Do you think you can do that?’

‘Yes, miss,’ Dulcie said. ‘But what’s going to happen to Daddy?’

‘Why don’t you call me Susan now?’ the teacher said as she thought how to answer the question. ‘I can’t tell you what the outcome of your daddy’s trial will be, no one could. Do you understand what a trial is?’

Dulcie shook her head.

‘Well, it’s a special way of finding out exactly what happened the night Mummy died. Everyone who was involved in any way, like the police, neighbours, even me maybe because I know your family, get questioned by people called lawyers. Then the jury, that’s a group of twelve people who are specially picked because they don’t know anyone personally, listen to all sides of it all, and they decide whether your daddy did push Mummy, or didn’t. If they decide he didn’t, then Daddy will be free to come home again.’

‘But what if they decide he did push her?’ Dulcie asked, looking very frightened.

Susan sighed. It wasn’t known yet whether Reg would be charged with murder or manslaughter. She couldn’t possibly tell such a small child what the ultimate punishment for murder was, but she knew she must prepare Dulcie in part at least. ‘Then he will have to be punished, probably that will mean going to prison.’

Dulcie didn’t make any comment on this, but it was obvious she was mulling it over in her mind because her small brow was furrowed with frown-lines.

They had reached the High Street now, and Susan’s father was waiting in the car.

‘I have to go now,’ Susan said, bending down to kiss Dulcie. ‘But I’ll be back next week to see you.’

Dulcie clung to her briefly, then turned and ran home.

‘How did it go?’ Susan’s father asked once she was in the car. He looked anxious, as if she’d been on his mind for the whole hour until he picked her up.

‘I was right to go,’ Susan said. ‘They need help.’

Mr Sims gave a deep sigh, glancing round at her, dark eyes full of concern. ‘I suppose that means you’ve committed yourself to be the one that gives the help?’

‘I have to, Daddy, there’s no one else.’

Chapter Four

On a sultry day in August Susan Sims broke off from a family holiday in Broadstairs to come back to London to visit Reg in Brixton prison. She arrived just after two and stood apart from the large group of women gathering outside the prison doors, all too aware of the cold, hard eyes scrutinizing her and that the low whispers and occasional sniggers were about her appearance. She had thought her light grey suit and matching small-brimmed hat would make her inconspicuous, but they were all wearing gaudy cotton-print summer dresses, with bare heads, and to her dismay she realized her sober appearance had only defined what she really was, a middle-class, out of her depth, frightened Good Samaritan.

Glancing up at the high grey walls, she shuddered. Even in bright sunshine the prison looked bleak and forbidding. For a man like Reg who had worked outside for most of his life it had to be terrible to be locked in a cell day after day.

Susan had never imagined when she first called on the children at Maud’s home that her involvement with the Taylor family would take over her life. First she had gone with the children and Maud to St Thomas’s Catholic School in Deptford to enrol the children there, and then visited Miss Denning, the Welfare worker for the area, to make sure they had no intention of removing the girls from Maud’s care. Maud could barely read or write, so rather than take the chance that she might be manipulated or led astray by family, friends or neighbours, Susan became her adviser, secretary and confidante.

Writing to Reg to keep him informed of how his children were was all part of this, and it was a natural progression that Mr O’Keefe, Reg’s lawyer, should ask Susan to be a witness for the defence. The police had dropped the murder charge in favour of manslaughter, but O’Keefe seemed optimistic that a verdict of accidental death would be returned.

The first letter Susan received from Reg touched her deeply for it was so courteous and brave. Not one word about his own predicament, no snivelling or attempts to convince her of his innocence, just deep concern for his girls and his mother, and gratitude that Susan was helping them. Before long she found herself writing back to him far more than was really necessary, and as the weeks passed and she learned so much more about his past from both him and his mother, her admiration for him grew.

Maud had told her how it was when her husband died. Her four older boys all callously cleared off, unwilling to give any of their wages to keep their mother and younger brothers and sisters. Reg was only an apprentice builder at that time, yet he got odd jobs in the evenings and on Sundays and managed to save the family from starvation. It was he who later paid the fares for his two sisters to go to Canada. Even after he’d married Anne, he still helped Maud out, he always made sure she had enough coal for her fire, decorated her house, and during the war when he was overseas, he sent money back for her.

A sudden surge towards the prison door startled Susan. She had expected that the large doors would be thrown wide open, but instead only a small one within it opened, forcing the jostling crowd to form an orderly line. One by one they filed in, and Susan reluctantly joined them.

A door to the left of the lobby was clearly the way in to see the prisoners. A burly warder stood behind a counter, and as the other visitors were holding up their visiting orders as they approached him, Susan copied them. The man barely looked at the orders, just nodded the women through the door as if he knew their faces. Yet when it was Susan’s turn, he stopped her.

‘First visit?’ he asked curtly.

‘Yes,’ she whispered.

He took the order from her and studied it. ‘Are you his wife or girlfriend?’

‘No, his daughter’s teacher,’ she said.

‘What have you got in that bag?’ he asked, looking down at the small shopping bag on her arm.

‘Some books, fruit and cigarettes,’ she said. ‘Is that all right?’

He practically snatched the bag from her and rummaged through it, then placed it under the counter.

‘Can’t he have it?’ she asked.

‘We’ll decide that later, when we’ve checked it,’ he said curtly. ‘Go on through there.’

The corridors and gates seemed to go on for ever and she followed the women in front of her, feeling more intimidated by the minute, for it smelled awful, of disinfectant, stale sweat and damp. Finally she came to the last door, and yet another officer asked who it was she was visiting.

‘Mr Reginald Taylor,’ she said.

‘His number!’ he snapped at her, as if this was obvious. Susan didn’t know it and had to take the letter from Reg out of her pocket to look it up.

‘Five four seven nine,’ she said.

‘Five, four, seven, nine, Taylor,’ he yelled out, and a few seconds later the same cry was repeated by someone unseen further down in the room. ‘Number twenty-five,’ he said.

That meant nothing to Susan, but someone behind her nudged her forward and pointed out numbers on each of the long line of booths ahead of her. As she walked along the narrow passage, booths either side of her, she got caught brief glimpses of men in prison grey beyond a metal grille. Each one of them had his hands up to it, desperate to touch his visitor even though the holes in the grille were less than a quarter of an inch square.

Twenty-five was empty, no one behind the grille. She sat down on the bench and waited for what seemed for ever. The seat was shiny with age and endless bottoms polishing it, names and messages had been scrawled on the walls either side of her, and she could hear a woman crying nearby, and a male voice trying to comfort her. Then suddenly Reg appeared behind the grille.

‘I didn’t think you’d come,’ he said breathlessly. ‘I couldn’t believe it when they called out my name.’

He looked much thinner and paler than when she had last seen him back in Leahurst Road. His pale blue eyes had lost the sparkle she remembered and his hair was cropped even shorter. Yet it seemed to her he looked less brutish now, but whether that was because she knew him better, or whether it was that circumstances had really altered his appearance she couldn’t say.

‘But I promised I would visit today,’ she said, trying to smile.

‘People’s promises don’t mean much to me any more,’ he said with a shrug. ‘But I should have had more faith in you.’ He smiled then, and suddenly his whole face changed, making him almost handsome.

‘We don’t get long to talk,’ he said, moving close to the grille. ‘So tell me about the girls.’

‘They were very happy last week when I saw them,’ she said, going on to describe how his mother had got one of her neighbours to make them each a new dress. ‘Miss Denning, you know, the Welfare lady, was going to take them to Greenwich Park the next day for a picnic, so they were really excited.’

‘Is Mum coping with them all right? It’s not getting too much for her is it, what with the holidays and everything?’

The truth was that Susan had noticed a decline in Maud’s health in the last weeks. She wasn’t sleeping well at night with anxiety for her son, and by day she felt she couldn’t sit down and rest in case the girls got into mischief. Her biggest fear was that the girls would be taken into care, and this had robbed her of her appetite. Her legs swelled up alarmingly in hot weather, and though she tried to hide that she found even a short walk exhausting, she didn’t fool Susan.