Two Women (34 page)

He also saw how Susan automatically deferred to Roselle, assuming she was someone of importance in Barry’s working life. It would never occur to her to be spiteful or jealous of the other woman, Susan was too nice for that.

He also realised Roselle would have been expecting a right bitch with a gob like the Dartford tunnel and a self-righteous attitude. That was the way he’d always described his wife, after all.

Walking towards the two women he felt as if he was moving through heavy swirling water.

Roselle smiled at him sarcastically.

‘Barry, your wife’s just popped in to see you.’

She turned to Susan and smiled once more, this time genuinely.

‘Lovely to meet you at last, Mrs Dalston. Do stay for a drink. I’ll be in the bar to introduce you to everyone.’

Susan smiled at the glamorous woman and nodded.

‘Thank you. Thanks very much. I’m ever so sorry to trouble him at work like this . . .’

Roselle interrupted her.

‘Don’t be so silly. See you again soon.’

She walked away, her tight little bottom wiggling in an exaggerated fashion. Barry looked at his wife, his scruffy dilapidated wife, and felt hatred boil within him for what she had done.

‘What you fucking doing here?’

Susan reacted as if she had been punched.

‘I had to come, Bal, I’m at the end of me tether. I ain’t got a bean - you ain’t been home. I ain’t even got any electric.’

Barry turned and saw the receptionist watching them, an interested expression on her face. Then all the hostesses seemed to want to go to the toilet. All sashaying past on clouds of perfume, eyes alert. Checking out a legal and finding her wanting. He knew they’d all thought he had a wife like the other doormen. Nice-looking women with their cars and their houses and their holidays. What they were seeing in Susan was themselves if they weren’t careful.

A defeated-looking breeding machine.

They all knew about Susan’s life because they had taken the course they had, prostitution, to stop the same thing happening to them.

Grabbing her arm, he forced her out on to the street.

‘Go home, Susan, fucking coming here and showing me up! Look at the fucking state of you.’

She looked at him and snorted through her nose in disgust.

‘Is that all that’s bothering you, that I look a mess in comparison to a load of old brasses?’

He didn’t answer her.

‘Listen here, you, I might not be fucking Joan Collins. How could I be even if I wanted to? I have three kids and another on the way, enough debt to keep a small banana republic going, and on top of all that I have an old man who thinks more of his work associates than his own kids. I have no food, no electric and no help. I’m sorry if I look a scruff bag, Bal, but what you give me don’t fucking stretch to shopping for anything other than cheap cuts of meat and bargain basement clothes.’

She was crying now and annoyed at herself for letting him upset her so much.

Barry took a ten-pound note from his pocket and gave it to her. If he got shot now he could still go out with Roselle. After Sue’s inopportune entrance he needed to see Roselle as soon as possible to put over his side of the story.

Susan stared at the money in disbelief.

‘Is that all? A tenner?’

He didn’t answer her. He needed the rest for his night out with Roselle. Susan was defeated already. Looking at him, she shook her head in disbelief.

‘You’re a selfish bastard, Barry. I ain’t even had the money for Junior Disprin for the baby and you don’t bother to come home and see we’re all right. I’m living on a fucking shoestring and look at you. New clothes, hair freshly cut and highlighted.’

She stabbed one finger into his chest.

‘Your kids have been waiting night after night for me to give them the lousy twenty-quid deposit they need to go to France, and what do you do? You go on the missing list. What about this child I’m having, Barry? What shall we do with this one, eh? Another fucking mouth to feed and you ain’t feeding the three you’ve already got.’

He still didn’t answer, just stared at her. Willing her to go away. She looked so perplexed, so baffled by his attitude, that he felt like crying. Surely she could see how it was for him, a wife who looked like a bag lady coming to his place of work obviously looking for money. She was making him look bad. Deliberately making him look bad. She was trying to blackmail him.

Then Roselle came outside and told him he was needed at one of the tables to sort out a difficult customer.

He walked back into the club and pushed Roselle through the door before him. Then, turning to Susan, he bellowed at her, ‘Get home, you silly bitch. I’ll see you in the morning.’

She stood outside the club. It was raining now and bitterly cold. She stuffed the ten pounds into her pocket and turned away. The road was dark and busy. People were pushing past, ignoring her.

Turning back, she looked through the glass-fronted double doors of the club and saw Barry deep in conversation with Roselle. He looked so smart. He was wearing a new suit, his hair was immaculate and she realised he’d also had a manicure. His hand had felt softer than hers as he’d thrust the money at her.

Looking at him, head inclined towards the little woman in the red spangly dress, the way he talked to her, handsome face earnest, Susan realised what all the dressing up and grooming himself was for.

He wasn’t having his usual leg over.

Barry was in love.

While she was sitting at home worrying herself sick, he had been spending all his money on that little woman with the beautiful clothes. Opening the door of the club Susan stepped inside once more. Warmth hit her like a blanket. Her chapped cheeks smarted. Barry and Roselle turned towards the draft of cold air and saw her standing there once more.

Barry looked at her as if she was nothing, beneath his notice. Walking towards her, he grabbed her roughly by the arm and pushed her back on to the street. Then he began to drag her along the pavement. People stood watching them, amazed.

Susan forced him to let go of her.

‘You rotten bastard! No wonder we ain’t seen hide nor hair of you. There’s us lot thinking you was off on your usual skirt chasing and all of a sudden we find you’ve gone up market.’

He stared at her again and she could see that she had pushed it as far as she should. Barry had a short fuse at the best of times and tonight he was practically ready for blast off. He shoved her hard in the chest, his hands brutal against her soft body.

‘Fuck off, Sue. I’m warning you, girl, don’t make me lose me temper.’

He shoved her again and this time she lost her balance and fell into the road. A black cab skidded to a halt and a passer by helped Susan to get up. She was crying now. The cab driver leaned across from his seat and shouted through the open window, ‘Sober yourself up, woman,’ before driving off with a stream of obscenities floating behind him.

Susan stood forlornly in the busy street. Her attempt to get Barry to cough up some money had gone horribly wrong. All she had wanted was a few quid to tide her over, that was all. Instead she had been humiliated and abused for doing what she had every right to do. She knew she had upset him but didn’t he ever think about her? Didn’t she and his kids even come into the equation?

She watched him shrug and felt a moment of stunning hatred for him. It was so intense she could practically taste and feel it. It was rising inside her like a big black cloud, seeping out of her pores and into the very air around her.

‘All I wanted was money for the kids’ school trip, Bal, not the last two pennies off your eyes. I had to come up here on the tube using three quid I skanked off poor Wendy. If I hadn’t found you at work I’d have had to walk home so I had enough to buy food. Yet you treat me like a fucking leper, like I’ve done something wrong.’

‘Go home, Susan, before you get hurt. I ain’t in the mood for all this tonight.’

He shoved her hard in the chest once more and she nearly lost her balance. Out of the corner of her eye she saw people from the surrounding buildings looking on.

A pretty girl with a long black wig and high heels watched them from the peep show doorway, a smile on her face. She obviously thought Susan was trying to get into the Hiltone and the bouncer was removing her. It would be a funny story, a bit of light relief.

‘You bastard, Barry. Well, I ain’t going until you give me some more money.’

The next punch caught her in the jaw and Susan felt her legs go. Like a boxer she staggered back, trying to keep on her feet, her head a blaze of white pain as she felt her jaw click back into place.

Holding it she screamed at him, ‘That’s your answer to everything, ain’t it, Barry? A kicking. Well, fuck you. I don’t care any more.’

She was crying now, snot and tears mingling on her face.

‘I just don’t care. My kids need money and I’ll fucking go in there and do a night’s work if I have to, to get it. You’re not the only one who can work Soho, mate.’

Roselle listened to the woman through the glass doors. She was seeing a new side to Barry Dalston and did not like it one bit. Opening the door she walked over to Susan. Taking her arm, Roselle gently led her into the club and up the stairs to the offices above.

Hostesses had left their tables and the bar to watch the little kitchen sink drama out on the street. One of them, a large blonde in a tight black sequinned dress, passed Susan a bunch of toilet roll to wipe her face.

‘You all right, love?’

Susan nodded. They were all women together now. Looking out for one of their own kind who was obviously in dire straits.

‘Come on, come up to the office, I’ll get you a cab home.’

Roselle looked at Barry as if he was something nasty she had found on her shoes. ‘Ivan will skin you for this, boy.’

She took Susan gently by the arm again and helped her up the rickety staircase. Her bulk seemed too large for the confined space and her legs were still unsteady. She felt defeated, humiliated and cold.

In the office Roselle made her a cup of coffee and poured a good measure of brandy into it.

‘I’ll send you a percentage of Barry’s wages every week, okay? I’ll clear it with Ivan - he’ll be sweet as a nut once I explain. We do it with a lot of the blokes, love.’

She was lying and Susan knew but was grateful to her for making it so easy.

‘He’ll kill me for this. I didn’t want to come here tonight. I’ve never wanted to come in one of these places, not even out of curiosity. I know Barry loves it here, loves the idea of it all, but it’s never appealed to me.’

Roselle smiled at her.

‘It is an acquired taste, I must admit, and sometimes I wish I never acquired it to be honest. But it’s a living and it keeps me all right. I wonder at times, though, what it must be like to be a married woman and sleep with one man all the time.’

Susan shook her head.

‘This is certainly preferable.’

Roselle offered her a cigarette and Susan took it gratefully. She decided she liked this woman and wondered what on earth a nice streetwise girl like her was doing with the piece of shit Susan had married.

Roselle opened a drawer and took out a hundred pounds. She counted it off a roll and Susan watched enviously.

‘Take this as a sub from his wages. I’ll tell him about it, don’t worry.’

Susan took it and shoved it into her pocket with the other ten quid.

‘He’ll break my neck because I came here but I had to. I’m practically on me uppers.’

She rubbed one hand across her belly.

‘This poor baby’s taken some punishment tonight too.’

Roselle felt a sudden urge to cry. In Susan Dalston she saw her own mother. Saw the bruised face at breakfast, the constant struggle to keep her kids fed and clothed at the expense of herself. Never a thing for her. Old before her time she had died at fifty, embracing death, happy to go. To be released from the daily grind of just existing.

Barry treated his wife the way he did because he could. Because she let him. Because she was too weak to fight him and take control of her own life. Roselle knew all about the Barrys of this world and what they were capable of, and it occurred to her then that she was practically sleeping with her father. He had been like Barry: a violent bully who saw weaker people as fair game, even his own wife and children.

‘Do you feel well enough to go home?’ she asked softly. Susan’s face was a white mask of pain. Taking a fur coat from a cupboard, Roselle smiled at her.

‘Come on, I’ll give you a lift. That way I can be sure you get home okay. Otherwise I’ll be worried about you all night.’

Susan shook her head vehemently.

‘Oh, no, Barry would go mad . . .’

Roselle interrupted her.

‘Fuck Barry, love. He works here for me and Ivan. He’ll do as he’s told.’

Susan was terrified and it showed.

‘There’s a toilet in there. Go and wash your face and tidy yourself up, I have a call to make then I’ll take you home. And I will brook no arguments, okay?’

Susan did as she was told. She always did as she was told by anyone in authority.

She had a long painful wee that made her feel as if her belly was trying to escape through her vagina. She felt a heavy pressing sensation on her pelvis, almost like labour pains, and hoped she was not in line for another miss.

She relaxed on the cold toilet seat for a few moments, forehead heavy with sweat, sickness in the pit of her stomach now. It seemed to spiral up through her body. Fear was setting in.

Barry would be livid over all this and now she wished she had stayed home and left it all to sort itself out.

Susan washed her hands in the basin and splashed cold water on her face. She saw herself in the little mirror above the wash basin. Her eyes had black circles under them, and her jaw was bruising already. She smelled. Her coat had the shaggy dog smell of old material wet with rain. Her hands were rough. Her bitten nails and stubby fingers looked obscene to her as she wiped them with the pink towel that hung on a nail by the basin.