Night Over Water (41 page)

“Have you ever been poor yourself?” Margaret asked.

Mrs. Lenehan laughed. “Smart question. No, I haven’t, so maybe I shouldn’t shoot my mouth off. My grandfather made boots by hand and my father opened the factory that I now run. I don’t know anything about life in the slums. Do you?”

“Not much, but I think there are reasons why people gamble and steal and sell their bodies. They aren’t just stupid. They’re victims of a cruel system.”

“I suppose you’re some kind of Communist.” Mrs. Lenehan said this without hostility.

“Socialist,” Margaret said.

“That’s good,” Mrs. Lenehan said surprisingly. “You may change your mind later—everyone’s notions alter as they get older—but if you don’t have ideals to start with, what is there to improve? I’m not cynical. I think we should learn from experience but hold on to our ideals. Why am I preaching at you like this? Maybe because today is my fortieth birthday.”

“Many happy returns.” Margaret normally resented people who said she would change her mind when she was older: it was a condescending thing to say, and often said when they had lost an argument but would not admit it. However, Mrs. Lenehan was different. “What are your ideals?” Margaret asked her.

“I just want to make good shoes.” She gave a self-deprecating smile. “Not much of an ideal, I guess, but it’s important to me. I have a nice life. I live in a beautiful home. My sons have everything they need. I spend a fortune on clothes. Why do I have all this? Because I make good shoes. If I made cardboard shoes I’d feel like a thief. I’d be as bad as Frankie.”

“A rather socialist point of view,” Margaret said with a smile.

“I just adopted my father’s ideals, really,” Mrs. Lenehan said reflectively. “Where do your ideals come from? Not your father, I know.”

Margaret blushed. “You heard about the scene at dinner.”

“I was there.”

“I’ve got to get away from my parents.”

“What’s keeping you?”

“I’m only nineteen.”

Mrs. Lenehan was mildly scornful. “So what? People run away from home at ten!”

“I did try,” Margaret said. “I got into trouble and the police picked me up.”

“You give in pretty easy.”

Margaret wanted Mrs. Lenehan to understand that it was not from lack of courage that she had failed. “I’ve no money and no skills. I’ve never had a proper education. I don’t know how I’d make a living.”

“Honey, you’re on your way to America. Most people arrived there with a lot less than you, and some of them are millionaires now. You can read and write English. You’re personable, intelligent, pretty.... You could get a job easily. I’d hire you.”

Margaret’s heart seemed to turn over. She had begun to feel resentful of Mrs. Lenehan’s unsympathetic attitude. Now she realized she was being given an opportunity. “Would you?” she said. “Would you hire me?”

“Sure.”

“As what?”

Mrs. Lenehan thought for a moment. “I’d put you in the sales office: licking stamps, going for coffee, answering the phone, being nice to customers. If you made yourself useful you’d soon be promoted to assistant sales manager.”

“What does that involve?”

“It means doing the same things for more money.”

To Margaret it seemed like an impossible dream. “Oh, my goodness, a real job in a real office,” she said longingly.

Mrs. Lenehan laughed. “Most people think of it as drudgery!”

“To me it would be such an adventure.”

“At first, maybe.”

“Do you really mean it?” Margaret asked solemnly. “If I come to your office in a week’s time, will you give me a job?”

Mrs. Lenehan looked startled. “My God, you’re deadly serious, aren’t you?” she said. “I kind of thought we were talking theoretically.”

Margaret’s heart sank. “Then you won’t give me a job?” she asked plaintively. “All this was just talk?”

“I’d like to hire you, but there’s a snag. In a week’s time I may not have a job myself.”

Margaret wanted to cry. “What do you mean?”

“My brother is trying to take the company away from me.”

“How can he do that?”

“It’s complicated, and he may not succeed. I’m fighting him off, but I can’t be sure how it will end.”

Margaret could hardly believe that this chance had been snatched away from her after only a few moments. “You must win!” she said fiercely.

Before Mrs. Lenehan could reply, Harry appeared, looking like a sunrise in red pajamas and a sky blue robe. The sight of him made Margaret feel calmer. He sat down and Margaret introduced him. “Mrs. Lenehan came to get a brandy but the stewards are busy,” she added.

Harry pretended to look surprised. “They may be busy, but they can still serve drinks.” He stood up and put his head into the next compartment. “Davy, just bring a cognac for Mrs. Lenehan right away, would you please?”

Margaret heard the steward say: “Sure thing, Mr. Vandenpost!” Harry had a way of getting people to do what he wanted.

He sat down again. “I couldn’t help noticing your earrings, Mrs. Lenehan,” he said. “They’re absolutely beautiful.”

“Thank you,” she said with a smile. She seemed pleased by the compliment.

Margaret looked more closely. Each earring was a simple large pearl inside a latticework of gold wire and diamond chips. They were quietly elegant. She wished she had on some exquisite jewelry to excite Harry’s interest.

“Did you get them in the States?” Harry asked.

“Yes, they’re from Paul Flato.”

Harry nodded. “But I think they were designed by Fulco di Verdura.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Mrs. Lenehan said. “Jewelry is an unusual interest for a young man,” she added perceptively.

Margaret wanted to say
He’s mainly interested in stealing it, so watch out!
But in fact she was impressed by his expertise. He always noticed the finest pieces, and often knew who had designed them.

Davy brought Mrs. Lenehan’s brandy. He seemed able to walk without staggering despite the tossing of the plane.

She took it and stood up. “I’m going to get some sleep.”

“Good luck,” Margaret said, thinking of Mrs. Lenehan’s battle with her brother. If she won it, she would hire Margaret—she had promised.

“Thanks. Good night.”

As Mrs. Lenehan staggered off toward the rear of the plane, Harry asked a little jealously: “What were you talking about?”

Margaret hesitated to tell him about Nancy offering her a job. She was thrilled about it, but there was a snag, so she could not ask Harry to rejoice with her. She decided to hug it to herself a little longer. “We started off talking about Frankie Gordino,” she said. “Nancy believes that people like him should be left alone. All they do is organize things like gambling and... prostitution... which do no harm except to people who choose to take part in them.” She felt herself blush faintly: she had never spoken the word
prostitution
aloud before.

Harry looked thoughtful. “Not all prostitutes are volunteers,” he said after a minute. “Some are forced into it. You’ve heard of white slavery.”

“Is that what it means?” Margaret had seen the phrase in newspapers, but had vaguely imagined that girls were kidnapped and sent off to be chambermaids in Istanbul. How silly she had been.

Harry said: “There’s not as much of it as the papers make out. There’s only one white slaver in London—his name’s Benny the Malt. He’s from Malta.”

Margaret was riveted. To think all this was going on under her nose! “It might have happened to me!”

“It could have, that night you ran away from home,” Harry said. “That’s just the kind of situation Benny can work with. A young girl on her own, with no money and nowhere to sleep. He’d have given you a nice dinner and offered you a job with a dance troupe leaving for Paris in the morning, and you’d think he was your salvation. The dance troupe would turn out to be a strip show, but you wouldn’t find that out until you were stuck in Paris with no money and no way of getting home, so you’d stand in the back row and wiggle as best you could.” Margaret put herself in that situation and realized that she would probably do exactly that. “Then one night they’d ask you to ’be nice’ to a drunk stockbroker from the audience, and if you refused they’d hold you down for him.” Margaret closed her eyes, revolted and scared to think what might have happened to her. “Next day you might walk out, but where would you go? You might have a few francs, but it wouldn’t be enough to get you home. And you’d start thinking about what you were going to tell your family when you arrived. The truth? Never. So you’d drift back to your lodgings with the other girls, who at least would be friendly and understanding. And then you’d start to think that if you’ve done it once you can do it again; and the next stockbroker would be a little easier. Before you know it you’re looking forward to the tips the clients leave on the nightstand in the morning.”

Margaret shuddered. “That’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever heard.”

“It’s why I don’t think Frankie Gordino should be left alone.”

They were both quiet for a minute or two; then Harry said meditatively: “I wonder what the connection is between Frankie Gordino and Clive Membury.”

“Is there one?”

“Well, Percy says Membury’s got a gun. I’d already guessed he might be a copper.”

“Really? How?”

“That red waistcoat. A copper would think it was just the thing to make him look like a playboy.”

“Perhaps he’s helping to guard Frankie Gordino.”

Harry looked dubious. “Why? Gordino’s an American villain on his way to an American jail. He’s out of British territory and in the custody of the F.B.I. I can’t think why Scotland Yard would send someone to help guard him, especially given the cost of a Clipper ticket.”

Margaret lowered her voice. “Could he be following you?”

“To America?” Harry said skeptically. “On the Clipper? With a gun? For a pair of cuff links?”

“Can you think of another explanation?”

“No.”

“Anyway, perhaps all the fuss about Gordino will take people’s minds off my father’s appalling behavior at dinner.”

“Why do you think he let rip like that?” Harry said curiously.

“I don’t know. He wasn’t always like this. I remember him being quite reasonable when I was younger.”

“I’ve run into a few Fascists,” Harry said. “They’re normally frightened people.”

“Is that so?” Margaret found the idea surprising and rather implausible. “They seem so aggressive.”

“I know. But inside, they’re terrified. That’s why they like marching up and down and wearing uniforms—they feel safe when they’re part of a gang. That’s why they don’t like democracy—too uncertain. They feel happier in a dictatorship, where you know what’s going to happen next and the government can’t be turned out all of a sudden.”

Margaret realized that this made a lot of sense. She nodded thoughtfully. “I remember, even before he got so bitter, he would get unreasonably angry about Communists, or Zionists, or trade unions, or Fenians, or fifth columnists—there was always someone about to bring the country to its knees. Come to think of it, it was never very likely that Zionists would bring England to its knees, was it?”

Harry smiled. “Fascists are always angry, too. They’re often people who are disappointed in life for some reason.”

“That applies to Father as well. When my grandfather died, and Father inherited the estate, he found it was bankrupt. He was broke until he married Mother. Then he stood for Parliament, and never got in. Now he’s been thrown out of his country.” She suddenly felt she understood her father better. Harry was surprisingly perceptive. “Where did you learn all this?” she said. “You’re not much older than I am.”

He shrugged. “Battersea is a very political place. Biggest Communist party branch in London, I believe.”

Understanding her father’s emotions better, she felt a little less ashamed of what had happened. It was still no excuse for his behavior of course, but all the same it was comforting to think of him as a disappointed and frightened man rather than a deranged and vindictive one. How clever Harry Marks was. She wished she could have his help in escaping from her family. She wondered whether he would still want to see her after they got to America. “Do you know where you’re going to live now?” she said.

“I suppose I’ll get lodgings in New York,” he said. “I’ve got some money and I can soon find more.”

He made it sound so easy. Probably it was easier for men. A woman needed protection. “Nancy Lenehan offered me a job,” she said impulsively. “But she may not be able to keep her promise, because her brother is trying to take the company away from her.”

He looked at her, then looked away with an uncharacteristically diffident expression on his face, as if he were a little unsure of himself for once. “You know, if you want, I wouldn’t mind, I mean, giving you a hand.”

It was what she had been hoping to hear. “Would you, really?” she said.

He seemed to think there was not much he could do. “I could help you look for a room.”

The relief was tremendous. “That would be wonderful,” she said. “I’ve never looked for lodgings. I don’t know where to begin.”

“You look in the paper,” he said.

“What paper?”

“The newspaper.”

“Newspapers tell you about lodgings?”

“They have advertisements.”

“They don’t advertise lodgings in
The Times.”
It was the only newspaper Father took.

“The evening papers are best.”

She felt foolish, not knowing such a simple thing. “I really need a friend to help me.”

“I guess I can protect you from the American equivalent of Benny the Malt, at least.”

“I feel so happy,” Margaret said. “First Mrs. Lenehan, then you. I know I can make a life for myself if I have friends. I’m so grateful to you. I don’t know what to say.”