Spoils of War (38 page)

‘I’ll walk her home.’ Conveniently forgetting Bethan’s instruction to Liza to telephone her for a lift, Peter pulled a comb from his pocket and ran it through his hair.

‘And if she allows it, you may kiss her. One small kiss on the cheek not on the lips and absolutely no more. No touching – no fondling – no sleeping – nothing! That is the way things are done in this country. Liza is a lady, not a camp trollop. She is also Mrs John’s daughter.’

‘Adopted daughter.’

‘Same thing. I don’t want any complaints. Here,’ he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out another two half-crowns. ‘Just in case. Bus fares, coffee, ice creams – they can all add up.’

‘You will look after Mama?’

‘You don’t have to ask. And Peter, remember, no touching Liza.’

‘What if she touches me?’

‘She won’t, she has a boyfriend.’

‘A new one,’ Peter muttered darkly, jingling the coins in his pocket as he ran down the stairs.

‘So what do you want to do, Ronnie?’

‘I
want
to do nothing. I’d like nothing better than to see that runt of a brother of ours rot in jail for the next fifty years but I suppose you had better go down to Spickett’s first thing tomorrow to see if they can arrange bail for him. I dread to think what it’s going to cost. After all the warnings you and I have given him, I thought he’d have had the sense to keep his fists to himself.’

‘Me go to Spickett’s, not you?’

‘It’s quite simple, just ask for Mr Spickett, explain the situation and he will deal with everything.’

‘And the café?’

‘You’d better keep Tony out of there for the time being. In fact if you can’t find him a job in either of the kitchens away from the public, tell him to lie low until this is cleared up one way or another.’

‘You don’t want to see him?’

‘If I saw him, I’d hit his head off his shoulders.’

‘That leaves only two of us running the restaurant and café.’

‘I’m aware of that.’

‘You did say I could come to you for advice.’

‘All right,’ Ronnie softened his tone as he realised he was taking his anger out on Angelo, who was entirely innocent. ‘In my opinion you should run the restaurant because it takes a bit of panache to serve the crache with their meat-and-two-veg lunches, and morning and afternoon teas. Let Alfredo handle the café. And before you say another word, I know both of you are going to be working flat out, but short of pulling Roberto from school, which you’ll do over my dead body, I can’t think of any other solution. In the meantime, look around the staff, pick out the ones you think you can trust and watch them closely. Maybe – just maybe – you’ll strike lucky and find one up to managing the café one or two nights a week to give you and Alfredo a break.’

‘You and Will still intent on giving Luke a job when he comes out of the pit? Because if you aren’t, perhaps he and Gina can help out.’

‘Ask him what he wants to do. Now he’s a family man I can’t see him eager to work evenings.’

‘I’ll do that, Ronnie.’

‘Is that it?’ Ronnie pulled a packet of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and offered Angelo one.

‘Apart from Mama. When are you going to call up and see her? She talks about you and Billy and Catrina all the time. She thinks about Diana and she wants to help …’

‘And she comes to see us here twice a week. I meant it when I said I didn’t want to see Tony again, Angelo. I’ll never forgive him for what he did to Diana. And while he’s still living with Mama I won’t visit Danycoedcae Road.’

Angelo gripped his brother’s shoulder as he left the table. ‘Do you want me to let you know what’s happening with Spickett’s and Tony.’

‘You can telephone the garage. I’ll be there all day tomorrow.’

‘How’s it going?’

‘Better than the café business, by the look of things.’ Ronnie left his chair. ‘Do me a favour, go in the kitchen and say hello to Dino and Megan so Megan can give you a slice of the cake she’s been hoarding for visitors.’

‘Pleased to, then I’ll relieve Alfredo in the café.’

‘Life’s all go, isn’t it?’

‘Especially when you don’t want it to be,’ Angelo agreed thinking of Liza and their ruined afternoon.

‘You’re sure you’ll be all right?’

‘Feo, I have eaten more than any person has a right to in the last two days. I am tucked up in a comfortable, clean bed, I have a fire and a book and you have told me three times that you will be back soon. What more can I want?’

‘I love you.’ Taking Masha’s hand, he looked into her eyes, stooped and kissed her forehead.

‘You are going to see your other wife.’

‘She is not my wife any more and I only need to see her for a few minutes. I have some papers for her.’

‘I understand.’

‘It is only business, Masha. She knows that now you are here, there can be no going back for either of us but I can’t simply walk away from my responsibilities. She has my son to bring up and it is my place to make sure they have enough money to live on.’

‘Your other son, how old is he?’

‘Four.’

‘Would this other wife of yours think it strange if I wanted to meet him?’

‘No. She told me before you came that I could bring Theo here, but she wouldn’t come herself. She’s too afraid that she’ll like you. And as she said it would be strange for you to be friends.’

‘Theo – it is English for Feodor?’

‘It’s short for Theodore, almost the same. We haven’t talked much about my life here, Masha, but I own some shops as well as this house. That’s how I made my money.’

‘Peter said when he saw this house that you were rich.’

‘Not rich, but I have enough to keep both my families,’ he murmured wryly, ‘and I have made a will dividing everything I own between you and Peter and my other son. Should anything happen to me this house is in your and Peter’s name and there will be enough money for you to live on.’

‘What will we do with a house here when we go back to Russia?’ She saw him hesitate. ‘We are going back – you promised …’

‘I promised that we would talk about going back to Russia, Masha, and we will.’

‘You will come back with me? You must, I gave my word to the politruk …’

‘I won’t lie to you, Masha. I don’t want to go back because I am sure they would put me in a camp. You and Peter too if you came with me.’

‘You wouldn’t think that if you’d met the politruk. He spoke so well of you, Feodor. He knew everything you had done in the war, how brave you’d been, all about the medals you won …’

‘I’m sure he did, but I have a lot to do at the moment, Masha, with the business and the house. Your idea of returning to Russia needs more thought and discussion than I can give it at the moment but I will promise you one thing. By all that is holy to me, I swear, Masha, I will never allow us to be separated again.’

Contented, she lay back on the pillows. He picked up her book from the bedside table and smiled as he handed it to her. ‘You and your fairytales. I might have known.
Stepan Timofeyevich Razin and the Peasant Revolt.
And how many witches, hobgoblins, giants and monsters is he going to meet in these stories?’

‘I don’t know because I am only halfway through the first and he has only met evil boyars and corrupt henchmen of the Tsar.’

‘I will return very soon.’ Looking back at her, he closed the door softly, walked down the stairs and picked up his keys from the chest of drawers. Looking around, he decided to check the kitchen. The guard was in front of the stove and the back door was locked. He pushed aside the curtains in every downstairs room and rattled the window catches. They were all fast. There was nothing wrong. Everything was neat, clean, tidy and in its allotted place, yet he still felt uneasy. As if something was about to happen – something bad. But what?

‘Masha,’ he climbed halfway up the stairs and called to her. ‘I could ask Mrs Lane to sit with you.’

‘You think I’m a baby that can’t stay alone for a moment? When you come back, please bring me tea.’

‘Would you like a cup now?’

‘No, but it would be nice in an hour or two.’

Running back down the stairs he stood in the hall. He couldn’t control his feelings; they were frightening – and oddly familiar. Then he remembered. He had felt this way once before. When Masha had told him she was pregnant. He had confided in his mother who had always taken such feelings as portents of disaster. Both of them had been concerned that something would happen to Masha when she was giving birth. That either she or the baby, or both, would die. But instead of the tragic scenarios they’d envisaged, the entire village had been razed and he and Masha had been separated. An event totally beyond the realms of anything he or his mother had been able to conceive.

Trembling, he steadied himself on the newel of the stair post. It was only a feeling and probably the result of coming to terms with Masha and Peter’s reappearance in his life. He wasn’t used to good fortune – or happiness – that was all. Checking that he had his keys he left the house and locked the door securely.

Five minutes later he stood outside his shop at the foot of Penuel Lane and looked up. A light was burning in the living room of the flat. He pictured Alma there, reading a book or listening to the radio, the slow soft smile he loved playing at the corners of her mouth.

He looked down at his key ring, singling out the key to the front door, but he couldn’t bring himself to use it. Lifting his hand he closed it into a fist and knocked hard. Moments later he heard a door opening and a familiar light step run down the stairs.

‘Charlie?’ Alma smiled as she brushed her thick red curls away from her face with her fingers, her green eyes glowing with surprise – and love – at the sight of him on the doorstep. ‘Have you forgotten your key?’

‘I couldn’t bring myself to use it.’

She ran up to the flat ahead of him. ‘Mary, Mr Raschenko’s here, would you mind sitting in the kitchen for a while?’

‘Of course not, Mrs Raschenko.’

‘If you’d like some tea, I could ask Mary to make it,’ Alma suggested as the girl left them. She couldn’t believe how much progress Charlie had made in such a short time. He looked well and strong, almost the man she had married before the war.

‘No, no tea thank you.’

She opened the sideboard and pulled out a bottle of vodka.

‘You kept it?’

‘For visitors.’ She turned and looked at him as if she hadn’t seen him in years rather than days. ‘Bethan told me about your wife, and I have seen your son.’

‘You’ve met Pasha?’

‘Not met, seen, and only from a distance. I was driving back from the Treforest shop in the van with the driver. He almost collided with the car in front of us when he saw him. Charlie, you must be so proud. Such a fine tall boy and he looks so much like you.’

‘Yes, he does, but he doesn’t think like me.’ There was a hint of warning in the throwaway remark. ‘How is Theo?’

‘Well, happy, busy, looking forward to seeing you whenever you can spare the time, and that isn’t a complaint.’

He sat as he had done once before, on the edge of the chair that had been his, formal and upright, like a guest.

‘You’ve come to tell me that you can’t leave Masha.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I knew before she came, Charlie. It’s like I said, she has no one except you and you would never leave her, not now you’ve found her again after so many years.’

‘She has suffered so much pain, so much hurt, I couldn’t add to that by leaving her a second time.’

‘And I wouldn’t want you to.’ She looked into his eyes, ice blue – sometimes cold but now warm with love. ‘What kind of a life could we have together knowing that it would be at the expense of Masha’s happiness?’

‘You understand. I knew you would.’

‘I love you, Charlie, I’ll never stop loving you or love anyone else …’

‘But I want you to …’

‘No! I won’t and I don’t want to.’ There was finality in her voice that brooked no argument and he respected it. ‘And I promise that I will bring Theo up to love and respect you – and Masha – as your wife.’

Leaving the chair he walked over to the window. Turning his back on her he opened the curtains and looked down on the elaborately-carved fountain in front of the shop, consolidating his thoughts into words as he traced out the curves and lines in the stone.

‘I didn’t only come to say goodbye but to talk about the business. I know you haven’t wanted to but I have done some things that you need to know about. When I went to the solicitor’s to sign the papers for the house I made a new will and a settlement. Seventy per cent of the business is now yours, including the freehold of this flat and the shop.’

‘No, Charlie, that is too much.’

‘It is not enough. I may have started the business but you were the one who built it up during the war into what it is today. I looked at the bank statements. Alma, I had no idea that you had made so much money. By right you should have all of it but I have kept back thirty per cent to keep Masha and myself. Mr Spickett has drawn up the papers and you have to sign them. Seventy per cent is yours but there is a condition. I haven’t put it in any of the documents but I want you to make a new will cutting me out and leaving everything to Theo. Promise me you’ll do that? Without a father living with him he will need all the security money can give him.’

She nodded dumbly.

‘The house in Tyfica Road, the remaining thirty per cent of the business and a third of the money in the savings account I have kept and willed to Masha and Peter on my death. Don’t worry, I am in very good health,’ he said drily, ‘and I have no intention of dying just yet but with a family as complicated as the one I’ve made for myself, it’s as well to take precautions. Mr Spickett has been very helpful; he has given me his word that there are no legal loopholes in the arrangements. No one can alter anything if I should die, and it doesn’t matter that our marriage wasn’t legal as I made you a full business partner before the war.’

‘Will you still work in the business?’

‘I thought the Cardiff shop could be expanded. If you don’t mind I could manage that and leave everything else to you.’

‘So, we’ll still see each other?’