She's Out (15 page)

J
ulia kissed her mother’s soft powdery cheek and then stepped back, holding up the goldfish. ‘I got you a present.’

Mrs Lawson smiled and gently stroked Bates the cat. Well, I’ll have my time cut out watching that Bates doesn’t eat it.’

‘We used to have a fish bowl somewhere, didn’t we? I remember it.’ Julia searched in the kitchen and eventually found it, filled it with water and tipped in the fish. Then she
carried it into the drawing room. Her mother was still stroking Bates, sitting in her wheelchair, a cashmere shawl wrapped round her knees. The room was oppressively hot, the gas fire turned on
full.

‘So, how are you?’ Julia said as she sat down, peeling off her sweater.

‘Oh, Mrs Dowey takes good care of me and her husband still looks after the garden.’

Julia could think of nothing to say so she got up and looked over a stack of bills placed in a wooden tea-caddy on the sideboard. ‘Are these for me?’

‘Yes, dear. I was going to send them to your accountant as usual but as you’re here . . .’

They were the usual telephone, gas and electricity bills, Mrs Dowey’s and her husband’s wages, and bills for repairs and maintenance to the house. Julia even paid for the
groceries.

‘You know, dear, if this is too much for you . . .’

Julia turned the wheelchair round to face her. ‘If it was I’d say so. Besides, who else have I got to look after?’

‘I always hope you’ll meet someone nice, marry and settle down. It would be nice to have a grandchild before I die.’

Julia smiled, touching her mother’s wrinkled hand. ‘I am trying, Mother, but you know my job – it’s always taken precedence over my personal life.’

‘You look very well, dear.’ Changing the subject deftly, Mrs Lawson smiled sweetly. Will you be staying tonight?’

‘No, sadly I can’t. I’ve got surgery this evening.’

‘Ah, yes, of course. Perhaps a cup of tea?’

Julia nodded and stood up. She was so tall that the low ceiling felt as if it was pressing on her head. ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’

‘That would be nice, dear, thank you.’

Julia stood at the window and wanted to cry. Everything was exactly as she remembered it, as she had always remembered it. Nothing had changed for years. Only her mother had got older and more
frail, softer, her voice light and quavery. Nothing else had changed. It always seemed so strange that her mother never noticed how different she was. Didn’t it show? Couldn’t she tell?
‘I’ll make the tea.’ Julia left the room and Mrs Lawson turned to stare at the solitary goldfish swimming round and round in the empty glass bowl.

‘We should get some green things for the fish, shouldn’t we, Bates? He seems very lonely.’

Bates dozed, Mrs Lawson continued to stare as if hypnotized while the fish went round and round. ‘Poor little soul,’ she whispered.

Angela let herself in, hating the smell that always hung in the air – babies’ vomit and urine. ‘I’m back, Mum,’ she yelled as she dropped her
bag.

Mrs Dunn was making a half-hearted attempt to iron, feed the two kids and cook all at once. She was a tired-looking woman: everything about her was tired – her face, her hair, her clothes
and, worst of all, her eyes. They seemed devoid of any expression.

‘Where’ve you been?’ It came out as a single sigh, the iron thudding over the drip-dry shirt that always creased.

‘Working.’

Mrs Dunn thumped the iron back on its stand. She pulled more semi-damp clothes from the wooden rail, tossed them into an already laden basket, switched off a steaming kettle and took an empty
Mars Bar paper out of her youngest son’s mouth, all in one slow, tired swing.

‘Here’s a tenner for you.’

‘Put it in the tin on the sideboard. Eric’s going crazy – you don’t pay any rent or anything towards the food, we don’t know where you are, when you’re coming
in, you treat this place like it was a hotel, you use the phone. There’s been call after call for you.’

‘Who from?’

‘I don’t know, that girl Sherry? John at the ice rink? I’m not your social secretary. Where’ve you been?’

Angela sat down, kicking her heels against the table leg. ‘Ester Freeman gimme a job for a night
– just
waitressin’.’

Mrs Dunn moved slowly back to the ironing. ‘I’ve told you not to mix with her, she’s no good, she’ll have you on the game next. Eric said he wouldn’t be surprised
if you’re not on it anyway.’

‘Eric would know, wouldn’t he? He’s a pest, a dirty-minded, two-faced shit. This is your house and he has no right to ask me to pay rent in it.’

‘He does if he’s paying the bills, love, and he is. And don’t speak about him like that.’

‘He’s not my dad.’

‘No, he isn’t, thank Christ, or we’d have no roof over our heads. Eric’s taken you on.’

Angela snorted, looking around the dank kitchen. ‘Yeah, I’m sure. This is a dump, it always was, and it’s got worse over the years. You should complain to the council –
you got every right, you know. There’s empty flats either side, they’re moving everyone else round here. You’d be up for a new place, five kids, no husband.’

Mrs Dunn banged the iron. ‘Now, don’t start. I know you always start like this. Just because you’ve got nothing in your life you got to have a go at me! Well, just stop it or
you’re out on your ear.’

Angela sighed. She hated being home – hated everything about it – even more since Eric had taken over as ‘man of the house’. He was half her mother’s age and
constantly made moves on Angela, but her mother refused to believe or take any notice of it, fearful that if Eric was confronted he would walk out on her.

‘So, where have you been?’

‘I just told you. You don’t listen to what I say. I went to Aylesbury.’

‘Oh, yes, Ester Freeman.’ Mrs Dunn suddenly sagged into a chair. ‘Don’t go back to working for her, Angela, she’s no good. I just don’t know what to do about
you, I really don’t.’

Angela got up and slipped her arms around her mother. ‘Mum, I’ve got a boyfriend, I was sort of working for him in a way. He’s asked me to go and live with him. He’s got
a nice house and—’

‘Oh, just stop it, Angela, you make up stories all the time. What man is this now? That copper? It was all in your head and she’s got you back at it, hasn’t she?’

Angela shrieked, ‘
No.
Why do you always think I’m on the game? I’m not, and I never was. I just used to clean for her!’

Mrs Dunn put her head in her hands. ‘I don’t know what to do with you. You won’t go back to school, you got no qualifications. How you gonna get a job with no qualifications?
You tell me that.’

Angela stuck out her lower lip. Since she’d been picked up after the bust at Ester’s, she’d had a string of part-time jobs. Nothing kept her interested for more than a few
weeks and the pay was bad in all of them. She’d been a waitress, a barmaid, a clerk, a trainee at two hair salons, part-time sales girl in numerous boutiques and she’d even helped out a
few market-stall owners at Camden Lock. But in reality she was just drifting around and she knew it. She didn’t know how to stop it and in a way she had hoped Mike would guide her – but
he just fucked her, like everyone else.

‘I dunno what to do, Mum. Nothin’ seems to work out for me.’

Mrs Dunn kissed her daughter. She was such a pretty girl: her thick hair hung in a marvellous Afro spiral cascade and she was a pale tawny colour with big, wide, amber brown eyes. ‘I want
you to go and talk to your old teachers, see what they say, maybe get on some government training course. You can’t just live your life wanderin’ from one part-time job to another, you
got to have a purpose.’

‘You mean like you?’ Angela said sarcastically, and saw the pain flash across her mother’s face.

‘No, what I don’t want is for you to have a life like mine, I wouldn’t want it for my worst enemy.’

Angela started to cry. She just felt so screwed up, with nothing in the future. She knew Mike didn’t want to see her any more – he hadn’t for a while now. ‘I’ll go
and see them tomorrow, okay?’

Mrs Dunn smiled and suddenly all the tiredness evaporated. ‘Just stay away from Ester, that woman’s a bad influence.’

Angela nodded and went upstairs. She packed her bag, stuffing anything that came to hand into it. She’d had enough, she was leaving. She heard Eric come in so she never even said goodbye
to her mother – she could hear him shouting and yelling at her in the kitchen.

She had no place to go. She called Mike at home but his wife answered so she put the phone down. She had no place to go but back to the Grange. She knew she shouldn’t have told Mike about
the women but she hadn’t thought about the repercussions. She just wanted somewhere to stay until she sorted herself out. Maybe when she told Mike he would help her, find a job for her. Then
she’d come back to London.

By the time Dolly returned it was after nine and she was still carrying the white rabbit. Ester was waiting in the hall as she had seen Dolly’s arrival from the bedroom
window.

‘Did you have a nice day?’

‘Didn’t you ask Julia? Here, she got the fish, you get the rabbit.’ Dolly threw it at her and walked slowly up the stairs as Connie wandered out of the kitchen.

‘I got some stew on.’

Dolly looked at her. She had cotton wool stuffed up her nose, which was swollen and puffy, both eyes were black and she was crying. ‘What the hell happened to you?’

Connie snivelled and went back into the kitchen just as Kathleen was coming down the stairs. ‘Boyfriend, if you can call him that, whacked her one.’

Kathleen passed Dolly, raising an eyebrow at Ester. ‘Well, who gave you the bunny?’

Dolly washed her face and hands. She heard Julia returning and went downstairs, when the doorbell rang. Ester came hurrying out from the kitchen. ‘I’ll get it. You
go on in and sit down and have your dinner, Dolly.’ She swung open the front door to see Angela huddled on the doorstep.

‘What do you want?’ Ester snapped.

‘Oh, please, Ester, I’ve had to leave Mum’s house. It was terrible and I had no other place to go.’

‘Well, you can’t stay here, you can sod off.’

Dolly walked further down into the hall. ‘What’s this?’

‘It’s Angela, she’s come back. I said we don’t want her here.’

‘Well, she can’t go back at this hour. Let her in, we’ve got enough rooms.’

Ester stepped aside and Angela said, ‘Thank you very much, Mrs Rawlins,’ giving Ester a snooty look.

‘There’s some stew on so put your bag in a room and come into the kitchen,’ Dolly said, smiling. She headed into the kitchen.

Ester gave a half smile. There was no way that Dolly could get the two hundred grand back now: it would have gone straight through from her bank into Ester’s overdrawn account.

Julia was already sitting at the table, helping a still tearful Connie serve up the stew. They heard Gloria returning and she banged in from the back yard. She was filthy, and went straight to
the sink and ran the taps over her hands. ‘I brought me gear from the house.’

They all concentrated on the food, and the scraping of their knives and forks was accentuated by the silence.

Dolly cleared her throat. ‘Right. Things have changed since last night. I’m not taking on this house. I’m sorry, but I’ve had time to think and I reckon it’ll be
too expensive to do up and as it had such a bad reputation I think I’ll go back to my original plan and open up a smaller place back in town.’ She placed her knife and fork
together.

‘You should have told me this morning, Dolly,’ Ester said.

‘I’m telling you now. I want my money back, Ester.’

‘Well, if you’d told me this morning that might have been possible but you’re too late now. I put it in the bank.’

‘You can take it out again, can’t you?’

‘No. I’m bankrupt and they gave me the deeds of the house. They were holding them as collateral. I’ve still got about three hundred grand to pay off, but they won’t cash
a cheque for a tenner right now.’ Ester looked dutifully crestfallen and her voice took on an apologetic whine. ‘I’m really sorry, Dolly. Like I said, you should have told me this
morning.’

Dolly’s face tightened. ‘If you’d told me you were bankrupt I’d never have walked out without getting my money.’

‘But you did and now there’s nothing I can do about it. The house is yours, Dolly, lock, stock and barrel.’

Dolly pursed her lips. ‘You really stitched me up, didn’t you, Ester? I should have known there’d be some hitch. I really walked into this one, didn’t I?’

‘With your eyes open, Dolly, I never pushed you. I told you to think about it, if you recall. Now there’s nothing I can do. But we’re all here, we can all lend a hand, get this
place up and rolling.’

Dolly clenched her hands. ‘You any idea how much this will cost to get fixed up?’

‘No, but we can start getting estimates in tomorrow. Local builders are cheaper than up in London.’

‘And how do I pay them?’ Dolly said quietly.

Ester flicked a look at Julia, shrugging her shoulders. ‘Well, they give you grants, don’t they? Unless you’ve got more dough stashed away.’

Dolly got up and fetched a glass. ‘Any wine left from last night?’

Ester sent Angela to get a bottle from the dining room. All the women were looking at Ester, then back to Dolly as if at a tennis match.

Dolly followed Angela out, and went into the drawing room, where Angela was at the desk, reading a stack of newspaper cuttings. When she saw Dolly, she tried to stuff them back into the drawer.
‘I couldn’t find any wine, Mrs Rawlins.’

‘It wouldn’t be in a drawer, would it, love?’ She pushed past Angela and opened the drawer as Angela backed away from her. She flicked through the cuttings, headlines about the
murder of her husband, headlines about the shooting of Shirley Miller – and the diamond raid, then folded them and picked up her handbag.

‘What you staring at me like that for?’ she demanded.

Angela stuttered, ‘I’m not, I just – just didn’t know about all that.’

‘What? That I’d been in prison? You knew, they all know. Now go and get the bottle. Try the dining room, dear.’