Avalanche of Daisies (37 page)

‘I only thought …'

‘I don't pay you to think,' the Skibbereen said, harshly. ‘I'm the brains behind this outfit an' don't you forget it. Ever. I give the orders, you do as you're told. You're just a gofor. Expendable, that's what you are. Two a penny. Common as muck.'

‘I only offered,' Vic said stiffly. But he was talking to his boss's back.

‘We're still working for you, ain't we?' Phossie asked. ‘I mean …'

‘If I want you,' the Skibbereen said, ‘I'll call for you.' And left with a flourish.

‘Now look what you've done,' Phossie said.

Victor was burning with anger and humiliation. ‘Don't you start,' he warned. ‘I've had enough for one evening.'

But Phossie opened his mouth to speak again, ‘I told you there'd be trouble …'

‘Christ Almighty!' Vic roared. ‘Hain't I had enough? Shut your stupid fucking face!' And he turned and stormed out of the house. He had to put a distance between himself and degradation, to get up and go.
Anywhere. It didn't matter where. The car was waiting by the kerb. There was petrol in the tank.

He was halfway to Ipswich before he could think coherently and realised where he was going. How dare he put me down like that, he raged. I'm the best worker he's ever had, worth all the others put together. I ought to leave him, here and now. I would too, if it wasn't for the money. It wouldn't take much after being treated like that. I could set up a warehouse job just as well as he does. Better probably. Thass just a matter of getting contacts. Thass all 'tis. Getting contacts. Once I can do that there'll be no stopping me. I know all the ropes. I hain't green no more. Shan't get conned a second time the way I was over them ol' sheepskin coats. I learnt my lesson there. The road stretched before him, long and dark and full of possibilities. He wasn't going to be put down like that, ever again. There had to be a brickworks somewhere that would sell off old stock. This time he'd search until he found one. And then he'd give the Skibbereen the heave-ho.

It was morning by the time he reached the first brickworks on his list and he was unwashed, unshaven and unfed. But he squared his shoulders, pulled up his coat collar to hide the grime on his shirt, and set off to find the foreman.

He was a total waste of time and effort. ‘Bricks?' the man said, looking round at the piles in the yard. It was beginning to snow and the wind was lifting the little flakes and tossing them about, so that the space between the two men was speckled and full of confusion. ‘You're joking, mate. We ain't got enough to go round. Gold dust bricks are. Anyway it's all government contracts now. We can't sell 'em private, even if we wanted to. More than my job's worth, that'ud be. Whatcher want 'em for?'

‘Build a house.'

‘You a builder then?' the foreman asked, looking at Vic's overcoat. ‘Don't look like one.'

‘Buyin' for a friend,' Vic explained.

‘Try the dumps,' the foreman said. ‘There's plenty a'
them
around. Where they put all the pieces. Bomb clearance an' that.'

Vic muttered that he might well.

‘Tell you what though,' the foreman said, flicking his cigarette end into the nearest unfrozen puddle. ‘Bricks is a thing a' the past.'

Vic pricked up his ears. Something new. Something to supersede bricks. It could be just the thing he was looking for. ‘Yes?' he asked.

‘Straight up,' the foreman said. ‘Once this lot's over, it's all going to be pre-fabricated houses. You mark my words. They got 'em already. Delivered in cardboard boxes they are, straight from the factory, the whole kit an' caboodle. 'Course you still have to dig foundations, plumbing an' electrics an' that sort a' thing, but then you just open the boxes, fit it all together, and four hours later, Bob's yer uncle, there you are, brand-new house, kitchen, bathroom, fitted cupboards, roof, every mod con, ready to walk in.'

It sounded wonderful. One in the eye for the Skibbereen. ‘Thass just my style. Where can I get them?'

‘You'll have to wait a couple a' years,' the foreman warned, amused by his eagerness. ‘They ain't come on the market yet. Still experimental. Try the dumps. That's my advice.'

It was such a disappointment that Victor could feel his face freezing. ‘Well thanks for your time,' he said, stiffly. ‘I 'predate it.' And he trudged back to his car. His feet were so cold he couldn't feel his toes and if he didn't have something to eat soon his stomach would think his throat had been cut.

The snowfall was thickening. The Humber already had a white dusting and the apprentice standing by the bonnet was wearing a mottled cap and white tweed
shoulders. ‘This yours?' he asked, as Vic swept the worst of the snow from his windscreen.

It was a chance for Vic to vent some of his ill humour. ‘Hain't you got work to do?'

The boy wasn't abashed. ‘Don't get shirty,' he said. ‘I come to ask you sommink. You works for the Skibbereen, don'tcher.'

It was a statement, not a question and could be answered with a nod.

‘I seen you in the pub,' the boy went on, gazing at the bonnet as if it were the font of all truth. ‘Last month. Blue Boar.'

‘So?'

‘My uncle's got a few things might interest.'

A break. Could it be? Now and so easily. ‘Oh yes. What sort a things?'

‘Butter. Eggs,' the boy said casually. ‘Side a' bacon. Turnaround Farm. Two miles down the road. You can't miss it.'

‘I'll call in,' Vic said, equally casual.

Which was how he drove back to London with a boot full of dairy produce and two sides of bacon, singing all the way. Now Mr High-an'-Mighty Skibbereen, sir, you'd better watch out.

It took him the rest of the day to sell off the goods. He knew there were plenty of restaurants in the West End that bought on the black market but he had to be careful to avoid the ones that were already supplied by the Skibbereen. It was past midnight before he got to bed and by then he was totally exhausted but he'd done a good job and made a healthy profit. There was no sign of Phossie so he had the house to himself. Despite the dust and dirt of the bedroom and the intense cold of the night, he slept the sleep of the justified.

The next evening, washed, shaved, dressed in his best suit, fed to capacity, and with his last half dozen eggs and half a pound of butter in the glove compartment, he drove to New Cross.

It was a clear night so the blackout wasn't as much of a nuisance as usual, but, even so, he drove down the New Cross Road slowly and carefully, avoiding the tramlines so as not to crack the eggs. He hadn't seen Barbara for weeks, so the food was something of a peace offering and had to be perfect.

A tram loomed past him, like a great dark ship, whirring and clanking, and it occurred to him, a bit late, that she might be at work. He ought to have sent her a letter or a postcard, to warn her he was coming and arrange things properly. Still not to worry, he'd knock on her door first and see if she was there and if she wasn't he'd park outside the depot and wait for her there. He could handle it. Smiling to himself, he drove towards Woolworths and the flat.

Like everyone else, he'd heard rumours about the New Cross rocket but he hadn't given them much attention. Rockets were two a penny these days. You heard them going off all the time but, of course, when you heard them, they were over and they'd fallen on someone else, so you soon forgot about them. Suddenly being confronted by that huge bomb-site gave him quite a turn. Bloody hell! he thought, slowing to look at it. That
was
a bad one. It occurred to him that Spitfire must have seen it. Now he remembered that she'd moved to her aunt's flat and looked along the road to see if the aunt's flat was still standing, and was relieved to see it, with curtains at the windows, and smoke coming out the chimney, perfectly all right and perfectly normal. Bit close though, he thought, looking back at the space. I shall have to sympathise. And he parked the car and picked up his presents.

Barbara had had a bad day. It was dark and cold, there were more rockets than she could count, and her passengers had been full of gloom and depression.

‘Them things are beginning to get on my wick,' one old lady confessed, after a particularly loud explosion.
‘Bleedin' Jerries. Pardon the French, dear, but they just go on an' on an' on. Never any end to 'em. Just when you think you got 'em licked they come up with summink worse. An' our poor lads out there fighting the beggars. It don't bear thinking about.'

But how do you stop a thought once it's in your head? Barbara remembered Steve all through the day, aching to have him home, racked with anxiety in case he was hurt, fraught with the terrifying knowledge that he could be killed just as easily as Norman and Betty and that there was nothing she could do to prevent it. The sound of those double explosions, echoing and reechoing across the London streets, pushed her back again and again to the nagging, brutal fact that she would rather have avoided – that good people were killed in this war every single day and in the most evil ways. She yearned for her brother, for Betty, for all the other dead and dying she'd seen on that November morning. By the time her morning shift was over, she was aching with grief.

Fortunately Sis came strolling in during her lunch break to tell her she'd be a bit late for the meeting that evening and to ask if she'd nip across to the flat to pick up her blue file. ‘You still got the key, ain'tcher?'

Barbara said yes so wearily that Sis looked at her with concern.

‘Bad day?' she asked.

‘Too many rockets.'

‘Never mind,' Sis comforted. ‘It's Thursday. Dreamers and schemers day. See you at the meeting. Keep yer chin up. Don't let the buggers grind you down.'

So Barbara struggled on through the rest of the day, keeping her chin as high as she could, and at last the long shift was over and she could get ready for the evening and cut across to Sis's flat and hunt for that blue file. She lit the fire ready for Sis's return and washed the breakfast things and tidied the newspapers
into a pile, and then it was only the file to find and she could be off. At that moment the doorbell rang.

She was too weary to feel surprised or pleased that it was Victor on the doorstep.

‘Oh,' she said flatly. ‘Thass you.'

He was so thrilled at the sight of her, bright and bold in her scarlet sweater and the navy-blue slacks she used to wear at the Saturday hop in Lynn, that he forgot about the rocket. ‘Brought you a little present,' he said, holding out the carton of eggs and the butter.

She recognised the value of the gift but she hadn't got the energy to respond to it. ‘Thanks,' she said in the same flat voice. ‘You'd better come in then I s'pose.' It was too cold to stand and talk on the doorstep.

He followed her, worried by how down she was. ‘You all right?'

She said yes, but it was as if she hadn't heard the question.

‘Thought you'd like to go to the pictures,' he offered as she led him up the narrow stairs.

‘What?'

‘Pictures,' he repeated. ‘You an' me and the others. That's Thursday.'

She'd forgotten that Thursday used to be their night out. ‘I got to look for a file,' she said as she led him into the kitchen.

He put his presents down on the table and tried a joke. ‘Oh well then, if you got a file to find, I'll tek Betty an' leave you behind. Hark at me! I'm a poet an' I don't know it.'

‘I'd rather you didn't talk about Betty,' she said, and now her voice was cold. ‘If you don' mind.'

‘Oh my!' he said, his face bold with the success of his joke. ‘Don' tell me you're a-gettin' jealous. Not of our Betty. Naughty, naughty!'

She was stung, suddenly and to such rage it made her shake. ‘You're so stupid!' she roared at him. ‘No, I hain't jealous. You just leave her right out of it, thass
all. Right out of it!' And when he grinned at her annoyance, ‘You hain't to talk about her! I won't have it!'

He wagged a finger at her, still teasing. ‘Naughty, naughty!'

It was too much. ‘Oh!' she roared at him. ‘You're so stupid. You're so bloody stupid. She's dead. Don't you understand? Dead! I shan't never see her again.'

Now he was confused but he fought back automatically. ‘Don't holler at me, gal,' he bristled. ‘It hain't my fault. I didn' kill her.'

‘I never said you did. Just don' talk about her.'

‘But how did she … ? I mean …'

‘That bloody rocket,' she shouted. ‘
Now
d'you understand?' And she burst into tears.

Tears he could cope with. He hadn't watched B movies all those years for nothing. He sat her down, produced a clean handkerchief, gave her a shoulder to cry on, found her a cigarette and lit it for her. ‘I'm ever so sorry,' he said. ‘That's awful.'

She cried for a very long time. ‘First Norman and now her. There'll be nobody left. An' they're planning Christmas as if everything were normal. I can't bear it. We're going to have a goose with one leg, if you ever heard of anythin' so ridiculous.'

He couldn't see why they didn't get an ordinary goose with two. So she explained what it was, smiling for the first time that evening. ‘Thass a leg of mutton with some stuffing in it,' she said. ‘Heather's trying to cheer us up.'

‘Tell you what,' he said impulsively. ‘How about if I got you a real goose?'

She was impressed by such an offer. And tempted. A real goose, she thought. Imagine that! A real goose an' apple sauce. A proper Christmas dinner. That
would
cheer them up. ‘Could you?'

‘Oh yes,' he said with just the right blend of modesty
and importance. ‘I got contacts. I could bring it over Christmas Eve.'