Perseverance Street (7 page)

This took care of one of Bannister’s questions. ‘Really? When did this sale take place?’

‘Let’s see.’ Penn flicked over a couple of pages. ‘I did the auction myself. Saturday, April the seventh.’

‘And where did it take place?’

‘Well, we find that house content sales are always best done in the actual house – as was this.’

‘So, the people who came to the house would be able to walk all around the house to view the furniture and stuff?’

‘More or less. We do ensure that we have several of our own people on the premises for security reasons.’

Bannister looked down at his notes. He had no more questions written down, just one in his head. ‘Do you have a list and description of the items you sold? And who you sold them to?’

Once again Penn flicked through the file. ‘I have a list of all the lots up for sale, plus the amounts they sold for and the names and addresses of some of the buyers – the ones who required delivery. Anyone who paid cash for a lot which they could take away themselves were given a cash receipt and not required to give any details. The descriptions we have here were all for our own benefit simply so that we could identify them. They aren’t detailed unless the lot was particularly expensive. There weren’t too many valuable antiques in Lark House, I’m afraid.’

Bannister
tried to picture Lily’s house. Just one thing stood out in his mind. ‘Was there one of those clocks that hangs on a wall? A fairly old one.’

Penn ran his forefinger down the list. ‘Yes, antique wall clock. Sold for seventeen pounds ten shillings – cash. No name or address I’m afraid.’

‘Do you have a description of the clock?’

‘Sorry. It was the only one for sale so we didn’t need to describe it precisely.’

‘Can
you
remember what it looked like? I mean, if I brought you a photograph?’

Penn gave his question some thought then shook his head. ‘Sorry. I’m not sure I can. There were so many lots in this sale that I probably didn’t look at it for more than a couple of seconds – I doubt if I’d be able to identify it if you stuck it in front of me. I do a lot of house content sales. For me to remember an individual lot it would have to be fairly special.’

‘But you did sell an antique wall clock in Lark House?’

‘Yes, we did.’

Bannister thanked Penn for his trouble and went out to his car planning on asking Lily where her wall clock came from. It was unlikely that she’d have paid seventeen pounds ten shillings for
it. Money such as that seemed beyond Lily Robinson’s means, but he had nothing else to go on.

It
was ten thirty in the morning, nine days after Lily had given birth to Christopher. An ambulance delivered the two of them back to 13, Perseverance Street in Leeds. There was still bunting hanging across the street from the VE Day party the previous Sunday. Before the driver got the back doors open a small crowd had emerged from neighbouring doors. Mainly women who would normally be sympathetic to Lily’s plight, and dying to take a look at the new-born child. Not this lot. Hilda Muscroft had done an expert job in spreading her poison. She was the first to call out as Lily stepped from the ambulance.

‘Where’s your Mickey, then?’

Lily looked at her, wondering at such a question. Surely they all knew that Michael was missing. The disgust on their faces took her aback. In that instant she knew she’d be getting no sympathy from any of this lot. Quite the opposite by the look of it. She turned her back on them and walked to her door with Christopher in her arms. Hilda called out again.

‘Nowt ter say to us, then?’

She turned back to face the women and shook her head. ‘What do you want me to say?’ Her voice was still weak from her ordeal.

‘I asked
where yer boy was. What have yer done with him?’

Lily’s voice gathered strength. ‘What?’

‘You heard.’

‘Michael’s missing.’

Her reply provoked a dissatisfied rumbling from the women, who moved towards her as she fumbled for her keys. The ambulance driver took them from her and opened her door, ushering her inside and taking her bag in for her.

She thanked him and wondered if she ought to apologise for the rudeness of her neighbours; neighbours with whom she’d been on good terms until all this; neighbours who had rallied round and supported her when Larry died. The driver asked if she’d be all right now. She said she would so he left her to it.

Lily glanced through the window to see that the crowd had largely dispersed, leaving only Hilda Muscroft talking, animatedly, to a couple of women, occasionally pointing at Lily’s house. Albert Pilkington approached and paused by the gossiping women who tried to engage him in their conversation. Albert pulled a face, shook his head at them, and walked on. A possible ally, thought Lily; although maybe a short-lived ally. She’d noticed Mrs Pilkington in the crowd.

She sat down, still holding Christopher, and never in her life had she felt so alone. Her own mother had died when she was a baby, her father had been unknown and she’d been brought up in various children’s homes. Larry’s middle-class parents had totally disapproved of him marrying her; convinced that she’d trapped him into marriage by getting herself pregnant.

In truth
her pregnancy had been the result of two very good friends having too good a time in the Crown and Mitre one evening and ending up in bed at her lodgings in Leeds. Her friends considered that her becoming pregnant had worked more in Larry’s favour than hers as there was no way she’d have married him otherwise. Larry had always fancied her like mad and proposed the evening she told him she was pregnant. She wasn’t at all sure it was what she wanted.

‘I didn’t tell you for that,’ she had said. ‘I told you because … well because I thought you should know.’

‘So, what are you going to do?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘So, marry me. You and I get on OK, don’t we?’

‘We get on great, Larry. Always have, but …’

‘But what?’

‘Well, apart from anything else you live in a nice house in Roundhay and I live in lodgings in Meanwood. You work at a bank and will probably end up a manager. I work in Marks and Sparks selling underwear. Me getting pregnant is no foundation for marriage.’

They were in Roundhay Park, standing by a lake. Ducks were heading their way hoping for breadcrumbs. Larry was staring at them, hoping for inspiration. All he could come up with was:

‘If it’s any help I actually love you, Lily.’

Lily probably knew that already. What she didn’t know was the strength of her feelings for him. Were they strong enough to endure a lifetime of marriage?

‘And
I’d make a good dad.’

Lily also knew that to be true.

‘And if I married you I’d hardly need go chasing after other women like some husbands do.’

Lily smiled. Larry was a great friend but not a womaniser. She and he had got together because she felt more comfortable with him than with any other human being. He made her laugh and he had a strong shoulder to cry on. He put his arm round her. It wasn’t an arm she would ever shrug off.

‘I know you don’t love me like I love you – that would be impossible. But I know you love me a bit.’

‘Do you now?’

‘Yep. I can tell by the way you’re letting me hold you. Come on, right now, who would you rather marry than me?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe I haven’t met him yet.’

‘Hmm.’ He tried another tack and murmured into her ear. ‘This er, this baby of ours. Did you enjoy making it?’

‘I believe I did. Having said that I’ve never done it before so I’ve got nothing to compare it with.’

‘Oh, take my word for it. It doesn’t get any better.’

‘Oh, really? There speaks a man of the world. How many girls have you done it with?’

‘Including you?’

‘Yes.’

His lips moved silently for several seconds as if adding up a long list. ‘You mean properly, like we did?’

‘Yes.’

‘Altogether … one – including
you.’

She laughed with relief that they’d broken their ducks together, as it were. Why would she be relieved? Why did she want to be his first? They sat down on a lakeside bench and stared at the water silently for several minutes. Afternoon sun glinted on the water. It took her another week to say yes to him. But by that time she was as sure as she could be of any man. Not that she’d known many men. He wasn’t Errol Flynn but he had too much going for him for her to say no.

The memory of that had brought a smile to her face. It was still there when a shattering of glass brought her back to reality. A brick had come through the window, missing her and the baby by inches. Still holding him she ran to the door to see a neighbour’s boy running away. Hilda Muscroft was standing in her doorway with arms folded, laughing. Lily stepped into the street and shouted at her, angrily.

‘That brick nearly hit the baby! What’s so funny, you brainless woman?’

Hilda just went on laughing. Albert Pilkington appeared and walked towards Lily. ‘Now then, love. What’s up?’

Lily turned and looked at him. ‘Would you hold my baby, Albert?’ she said.

Albert took the infant. Lily marched across the street to the still-cackling Hilda. ‘You think harming babies is funny, do you?’

‘You should bleedin’ know. You did fer your lad! That’s what the coppers think, anyroad, an’ there’s no smoke without fire, that what I say!’

‘What?’

‘Come
off it. Everyone round here knows yer went loopy after Larry died. No need ter do your lad in, though.’

Lily, in a rage, pushed Hilda and had the bigger woman staggering sideways and tripping over the kerb. She banged her head against a street lamp and slid to the ground, dazed and bleeding.

‘Oh, bugger,’ muttered Albert, giving Christopher back to Lily. ‘There’ll be ’ell ter pay fer this.’

‘She deserved it,’ said Lily, taking her baby back into the house.

Back inside Lily sat down in a daze. She was aware that her story sounded unbelievable but this was the first time anyone had accused her of
killing Michael
. How could anyone think that? What had she said?
Yer went loopy after your Larry died. No need ter do your lad in, though
. Is this what the police think?

She looked around the room and saw certain things out of place; not where she usually kept them. Someone had been in her home without her permission. She gave it some thought and came to the most likely conclusion. Probably the police. Suspicious of everything she’d told them, just like her neighbours. The wind blew small shards of glass into the room and she wondered what to do, how to fix it. Christopher began to cry. He needed feeding. She glanced through the broken window and saw no sign of Hilda. Good. Maybe the stupid woman would know not to make such vile remarks next time.

In her busy days after hearing of Larry’s death she’d prepared her baby’s cot and all the stuff needed for a mother to bring up a baby. He’d be sleeping in her room for the time being, then sharing with Michael. The thought brought tears flooding.

‘Oh, Michael. Where are you, my darling boy?’

After
feeding Christopher she put him into his pram and eased it down the front step on to the pavement. Lily had a desperate need to get out of her house which seemed in more danger from her neighbours that it ever had from the Luftwaffe. She had one eye on the house opposite to see if Hilda might make another appearance, but the Muscroft door remained firmly shut. In fact the Muscroft house looked empty, which suited Lily. It could stay empty for good as far as she was concerned.

It was a bright enough day to be out walking her baby. From the corner of her eye she saw curtains twitching and faces at windows. No one came to their door to ask how she was, and has Michael been found yet? Hilda Muscroft’s venomous tongue, it seemed, had been hard at work. The rumour didn’t trouble Lily too much. She had barely enough room inside her head to cope with her Michael being missing without worrying about the lies going up and down this street. Since she moved in there had always been a hint of jealousy from her neighbours, with her and Larry being the only ones in the street to actually own their own house. All the others were rented.

She walked past Quarry Mount school where Michael should be going next September. Children were playing in the school yard; hopscotch, whip ’n’ top, rounders, marbles, leapfrog and many other games she remembered, even from her own fractured childhood. She stopped to watch them and envisaged her boy playing there, running round, chasing his school friends, shouting and laughing. He laughed a lot, did Michael. He was a happy kid, never any trouble; never moaned if he couldn’t have his way; accepted her decisions with equanimity and a cheeky smile that sometimes made her give in to him. Tears were streaming down her face as she stood by the school gates. A teacher on playground duty came across to her.

‘Are
you all right, madam?’

Lily blinked away her tears and forced a smile. ‘Yes, I’m fine, thank you. Just got something in my eye, that’s all.’ It was an obvious lie but better than having to explain the truth to a complete stranger.

She pushed the pram down on to Meanwood Road, up Buslingthorpe Lane then the long drag up Scott Hall Road towards the fields where she’d often taken Michael to play with his football. Exhausted, she sat down on a bench and took in the panoramic view of Leeds city centre which, as usual, had a cloud of smog hanging over it from the myriad tall chimneys belching out smoke. Barrage balloons floated in the air, some reflecting the sunlight and looking quite decorative. At this end of the war, decoration was all they were good for.

Leeds was known as the Holy City due to this protective cloud of muck obscuring the city centre and the Hunslet engineering works from the Luftwaffe. It was a long way north and a long way inland, leaving the Luftwaffe at the limit of their range with not enough fuel to hang around searching for their target. Most of the bombers simply guessed where Leeds was and jettisoned their load. Woodhouse and Headingley had taken several hits, the city museum had been badly damaged but few, if any, bombs landed on or near their intended targets.