Bye Bye Love (15 page)

Scarlett was in a breathless blur of excitement. The band kept up the intoxicating beat, different boys asked her to dance and she was whirled round with various degrees of skill. She forgot all about Brenda, Jonathan and her sore feet. There was only the rock and roll and her own vibrant body. When the music finally stopped, she felt as if she were coming down to earth from a different planet.

‘Why are we stopping?’ she asked her partner. She couldn’t remember what his name was. Maybe he hadn’t told her.

‘End of the set,’ he said.

All around her, people were shouting for more. Scarlett joined in loudly.

But the singer just waved in acknowledgement, thanked them and left the stage.

‘Drink?’ Scarlett’s partner asked.

‘Yes, please!’

Now she thought of it, she was parched. She gulped down the half pint of lemonade he brought her in one go. Then she decided she’d better find Brenda.

Her friend was sitting with a Teddy Boy in full rig—draped jacket, drainpipe trousers and bootlace tie.

‘Having a good time?’ she asked.

Scarlett flopped down on the chair beside her. ‘Am I! I want to go dancing every week for ever!’

‘Told you,’ said Brenda with cheerful satisfaction.

‘…and can you do fish and rice and one of those steamboat things for Saturday night?’ Jonathan asked.

‘Ah, yes, Mr Jon, that no problem,’ the Chinese storekeeper said.

Of course it was no problem. The Chinese could get you any sort of supplies or services you might need, and Jonathan had the best trade goods going—British army stores. By some quirk of the system, he was issued with seven days’ worth of meat plus the Friday fish, which left a day’s supply of tinned steak and kidney and corned beef each week, which the Chinese were eager to get their hands on. Catering for a party was easy with such riches.

This week it was another twenty-first. One of the nurses—June, the small fierce one—was arranging it for her friend. In effect, this meant asking Jonathan to do the catering while the rest of the men brought the beer. All June had to do was to ask everyone who wasn’t on duty, put up some decorations and have a whip-round for the present.

The party food set in motion, Jonathan went about finishing lunches for the day. His kitchen here was pretty primitive. He cooked on wood-burning stoves which were a devil to control, temperature-wise, and his pastry had to be rolled out on dampened flour sacks to keep it even slightly cool. It was a far cry from the cold marble surfaces of the patisserie in the Ortolan. But he liked it here. The strangeness had worn off. The heat, the humidity, the lush vegetation, the Chinese and Malay people were all familiar to him now. He felt at home.

‘Hey, Jonno—!’ Another of the nurses stuck her head round the kitchen doorway.

‘Hello, Irene. What’s up?’

‘Can you be an absolute angel and do me an omelette for a special patient?’

‘For you, Irene, anything.’

‘You’re a darling.’

‘I know.’

‘Coming for a drink in the NAAFI this evening?’

‘Yeah, when I finish the birthday cake.’

‘Ooh, cake. Wonderful. I adore your cakes. I would marry you for your cakes.’

‘You’ll have to join the queue.’

Irene gave a tragic sigh. ‘Story of my life. I’ll send an orderly for the omelette in about ten mins, OK?’

‘Right you are.’

Whistling, Jonathan checked the huge pot of spuds that his Malay kitchen porter had peeled, made sure the bacon and onion pudding was steaming properly and stirred a great vat of gravy. The patients could rely on getting good solid English cooking to help them get better. All was well with the world. If it weren’t for the letters from Scarlett that still arrived every week, he might have begun to wonder whether Southend still existed. It was so far away, and he had done so many new things since he’d left, that England seemed like a different world, vague and insubstantial. Only a continual gnawing sense of loss kept him linked with it, the feeling that, without Scarlett, something of himself was missing.

‘I
T’S
all right, don’t worry. I’ve found another job,’ Victor said, as Scarlett came in from another boring day’s work on an assembly line.

Scarlett dropped her bag on a chair. It was hot outside and the flat was unbearably stuffy. She went over to the kettle. As usual, her father had not bothered to fill it up after he had used it. She banged it down on the gas ring. She was far too cross to be pleased with him for finding work.

‘Well, thank goodness for that. I can’t think why it was so hard. It’s high season, after all. Everyone’s crying out for bar staff.’

It would be so much nicer to be working somewhere down on the sea front in this sunny weather. Waitressing or selling ice creams was far more pleasant work than assembling parts for electrical goods, but it was only for the summer and it didn’t pay so well. One of them had to have a regular income.

‘They all want pretty girls behind the bar, don’t they?’ her father said. ‘Here, give me that kettle. I’ll go down and fill it.’

Scarlett flopped down at the table, seething. She stared out of the window at the ugly street. Pretty girls, indeed.

‘What they want is people who are sober,’ she said out loud, hardly caring whether he heard her or not.

They also wanted people who could get to work on time, add up correctly and not drop things. You only had to take one look at her father to know that he wasn’t going to be the world’s best employee. In the old days at the Red Lion, Victor would not have dreamed of taking on someone in the state he was in now. She heaved a sigh. At least he had got something, but how long was it going to last? They had been here so often now, and the gaps between jobs were getting longer each time.

‘Where is it, anyway?’ she asked, as Victor came in with the kettle.

‘The Oaks.’

‘Oh, yes, I know.’

She and Jonathan had been there on that last wonderful leave before he’d gone off to Malaya. It was quite a large place, a bit on the rough side, with a big room at the back where they had new bands and skiffle groups performing. She was so involved with remembering that evening that she didn’t ask just what sort of job her father had got there. At least he was working again, that was the main thing. She would now have enough money left over at the end of the week to go dancing. She told Brenda the good news the next day.

‘Oh, well, that’s good, I suppose. Only my Phil said his mate Alan’d like to make up a foursome, so you won’t have to pay anyway,’ Brenda said.

‘You know I don’t like foursomes,’ Scarlett told her.

She had been on two or three before that Brenda had set up, and had always ended up having to fend off some awful boy with sweaty hands.

Brenda looked annoyed. ‘I don’t know what you’re saving yourself for. Your precious Jonathan’s not going to know, is he?’

It was true. What was more, Jonathan’s letters were full of girls’ names. He wasn’t going out with any of them, and he always said how much he missed her, but sometimes she felt he was slipping away from her.

‘No, but—’

‘I think you’re daft. Look at all those gorgeous men you’ve turned down. That Pete, for a start. He’s got to be the best dancer on the floor of a Saturday night, but you won’t go out with him. I would, if he asked me.’

‘Well, you’re not me, are you?’ Scarlett snapped.

Brenda responded by sulking for the rest of the day.

It wasn’t till the weekend that Scarlett realised her father wasn’t working as a barman. During the week she was always up and out before he was even awake, so she had no idea what he was doing during the day. But on Saturday she didn’t get up till later, and was surprised to see him stirring as she was about to leave for Mrs Sefton’s shop.

‘You’re early,’ she said to him.

‘Yeah, well—got to be in by ten.’

She didn’t have time to find out more, but as she walked down the road to the shop she wondered if her father had landed a cellar man’s job again. He would have to be earlier for that, so that he could see to the pipes and the casks before opening time.

‘You’re looking cheerful, dearie,’ Mrs Sefton said as she went in. ‘Had a good time last night, did you?’

‘Wonderful! I never stopped dancing all evening.’

Mrs Sefton shook her head. ‘And here you are, all ready for a day’s work, and you’ll be out dancing tonight as well, I’ll be bound.’

‘You bet.’

‘My, my, what it is to be young and full of energy. I was able to do that once. Not any more. Now then, dearie, there’s a lot of tins to be fetched in.’

Scarlett carried cases of baked beans and fruit cocktail through from the shed in the back yard where Mrs Sefton kept her stock. Yet again she thought about getting a better paid Saturday job. Mrs Sefton hadn’t put up her wages since she was fourteen. But she did let Scarlett buy some foodstuffs at cost price and often gave her ends of ham or day-old bread.

‘Your dad’s got another job, then?’ she asked as Scarlett stacked the shelves.

‘Yes, at The Oaks. I’m wondering if he’s got the cellar man’s job. It’ll be good if he has. He’ll earn more.’

And it would be good for him, she thought, though she didn’t say it. He’d have more pride in himself.

‘Well, you tell him to come in and pay off his slate, dear. I don’t mind him running up a bit, seeing as he’s your dad, but I don’t like it getting too big.’

‘Right,’ Scarlett said, gritting her teeth. He’d told her he hadn’t got anything on tick. Why did he have to lie to her, and especially when he knew she would find out? It made her so mad.

On Sunday she finally got to speak to him.

‘So what sort of job is this at The Oaks?’ she asked. ‘Cellar man?’

Victor busied himself with rolling a cigarette. ‘Not exactly.’

‘Well, what then?’

‘General sort of stuff. You know.’

‘Just bar work, then?’

‘Yes.’

‘Only I wondered why you were going in by ten of a morning.’

‘Plenty to be done at a big place like that. You should know. It’s the size of the blooming Trafalgar.’

She couldn’t get anything else out of him. In the end she gave up. She had the weekly wash to do by hand in the bathroom downstairs before she could go out and enjoy her one day off.

Then, three weeks later, she got to find out for herself. It was Friday and Victor had been unwell for a couple of days.

‘What about your wages?’ Scarlett asked.

‘Oh, they’ll give them to me when I go in.’

‘Blow that for a lark, Dad. What about the rent? I’ll fetch it before I go out this evening.’

Victor was very reluctant for her to go, coming out with all sorts of excuses. But Scarlett brushed them aside. They needed that money and, if she didn’t fetch it, Victor would start running up a tab at Mrs Sefton’s again. She got on her bike and cycled off along the back streets towards The Oaks. It was a lovely late summer evening and it was nice just to be out of the flat and wheeling easily along. Young men coming home from work whistled after her as she passed by.

As she rolled into the car park of The Oaks, she could hear music coming out of the open doors of the big room at the back. A guitar was strumming and someone was singing
Rock Island Line
in the nasal style of Lonnie Donegan. He broke off, there was laughter and a roll on the drums, then the song started again. A rehearsal was in progress.

Scarlett parked her bike and made her way through the back corridors until she found a bar. A woman in her thirties was running a bar towel over the beer pumps.

‘We’re not open yet,’ she said.

‘I know. I’m Victor Smith’s daughter. I’ve come for his wages.’

‘Victor—? Oh, you mean Vic. The pot man.’

‘I…er…yes…’ Scarlett said, stunned.

Her dad was the pot man? That was the lowliest job in the pub. Most places employed a pensioner to do it. It involved picking up the empty glasses and emptying the ashtrays and any other dirty work going, like…and then she realised why he was working from ten in the morning. He went in to swab out the toilets.

‘Well, you’re a turn-up, to be sure,’ the woman was saying. ‘I would never of guessed you was his daughter, a bright pretty girl like you. I suppose you don’t want a job here, do you?’

‘I’m under age for bar work,’ Scarlett told her.

‘Pity. Still, I suppose you wouldn’t want to anyway. It’s hard to get decent quality staff here. I’ll go and fetch his envelope.’

She was back in a couple of minutes holding a small brown wage packet.

‘How ill is he? Is he going to be back tomorrow? Only I can’t keep him on if he’s not going to be reliable. There’s plenty willing to do his job.’

‘He’s had a stomach upset,’ Scarlett told her.

The woman made a sceptical face. ‘Stomach upset, is it? Nothing to do with whisky chasers, I suppose?’

Scarlett glared at her. The cheek of it! Her father had been really poorly.

‘No, nothing to do with them. He wanted to come in today but he wasn’t well enough,’ she stated, and reached over the bar and took the envelope from the woman’s hand. ‘Thank you. He’ll be in tomorrow, don’t worry.’

And she made off, fuming, with the landlady’s parting shot of, ‘He’d better,’ ringing in her ears. She blundered along a badly lit passage, opened a door and found herself in the music room. It looked scruffy and tawdry in daylight, but Scarlett hardly noticed. There, on the stage, was a rock ’n’ roll band consisting of two guitarists and a drummer. A home-made banner above their heads proclaimed them to be Ricky and the Riptides. But it was not that which held Scarlett’s attention. It was the guitarist who was also the singer. He was a slim young man with dark hair and a brooding face and a mouth as sensual and snarling as Elvis Presley’s. He was halfway through
Singing The Blues
and as he saw Scarlett enter the room he immediately targeted her with his dark gaze and sang to her. Scarlett was transfixed.

The song ended with him striking a final chord. Scarlett clapped with shining enthusiasm. The singer—surely this must be Ricky himself?—gave a mocking bow.

‘Thanks, babe. Join the fan club.’

That brought Scarlett to her senses. She wasn’t falling at his feet.

‘I’ll join yours if you’ll join mine,’ she told him.

Ricky laughed. ‘Which band are you in, babe?’

‘You don’t have to be in a band to have them queuing up for you,’ she said.

The Riptides hooted and whistled.

‘That told you, Rick.’

Ricky ignored them. It was as if they didn’t exist. The only two people in the room—in the world—were Ricky and Scarlett.

‘What’s your name, sweetheart?’

‘Scarlett.’

She left the doorway and walked casually to the centre of the room, where she stood with a hand on her hip and a challenge in her eyes.

‘And please don’t say yours is Rhett. I’ve heard it all before.’

She was enjoying this. She knew she looked good and she knew she was holding her own with Ricky. At least, she was so far. There was something about him—an air of danger—that called out to her. She had to test herself against it.

‘Oh, Ashley, Ashley!’ the drummer warbled in a very bad southern states accent.

‘I’ve heard that too,’ Scarlett said without taking her gaze off Ricky.

Ricky’s brooding eyes ran over her with open appreciation.

‘What would you like us to sing for you, Scarlett?’

‘
Be Bop a Lula
,’ Scarlett said without hesitation. It was her current favourite. She listened out for it every night on Radio Luxembourg.

Ricky gave a slight nod. ‘OK.
Be Bop a Lula
it is.’

He clicked his fingers to set the beat, and counted the band in.

Scarlett stood just where she was in the middle of the floor, watching and listening. However much she tried to stay cool, she couldn’t help moving her shoulders to the beat. And, however much she tried to resist it, she found Ricky fascinating. Everything about him—his stance, his voice, the way he held his guitar, the look in his eyes—drew her in. The song flowed around her. The thud of the drum went through her chest. She fought against the spell.

The last notes died away and Scarlett gave half a dozen claps, her head to one side as if assessing the performance.

‘You’re not as good as Gene Vincent,’ she said.

‘No one’s as good as Gene Vincent. He’s the greatest. But we’re the best band singing his songs in Southend,’ Ricky claimed. ‘You coming to hear us play tonight?’

Scarlett knew she shouldn’t. It was like standing on the edge of a precipice. If she jumped she might fall, but then again she might fly. Either was dangerous.

‘I’m going dancing,’ she told him.

‘There’s dancing here.’

‘I’m going down the Kursaal.’

‘Why? We’re much better than that square stuff down there.’

‘I’m going with my boyfriend,’ she lied.

Ricky did an imitation of the famous Elvis thrust. ‘Has he got what I’ve got?’

‘All that and more,’ Scarlett said. ‘Thanks for the performance. Bye.’

She turned and walked towards the outer door, swinging her hips as she moved. She knew she looked good from the back in her tight Capri pants with her long dark ponytail bouncing on her shoulders. There was a thud behind her as Ricky took off his guitar and jumped down from the stage. He ran and slid to a halt in front of her. Scarlett felt a spurt of triumph. She was enjoying this game.

Ricky put his hand into his jacket pocket and produced a couple of tickets. He gave one to Scarlett.

‘We’re playing at the Rugby Club dance next Saturday. You might like to come along.’

Scarlett glanced at it, shrugged and shoved it into her pocket with her father’s wage packet. ‘I might. And, there again, I might not,’ she said.

Ricky gave her a knowing smile. ‘Just think what you’ll be missing if you don’t.’

‘Yeah, a whole lot of trouble.’

She stepped round him and went out of the door. Once round the corner and out of his earshot, she jumped up and down and gave a squeal of exhilaration. That had been fun! She felt alive and tingling all over, like she did when doing the rock ’n’ roll. She sang
Singing The Blues
and
Be Bop a Lula
all the way home.