The Lights of London (15 page)

Albert squeezed her chin between his fingers,
pressing hard on her jawbone, forcing her head back against the wall. ‘Don’t fuck about with me,’ he hissed, his breath coming in thick, vaporous clouds.

‘Honest, I didn’t get what you said.’ She tried a smile. ‘I must be going mutton, eh, Albert? She braced herself, ready for the blow that would probably be her reward for such impudence.

Albert looked into Marie’s crudely painted and powdered face and saw his mother. His heart raced and his mind filled with loathing.
‘Where’s Tibs, you stupid whore?’

‘I can tell you, Albert,’ came a rough, wheedling parody of a girlishly feminine voice from behind him.

Still keeping a tight grip on Marie’s aching face, Albert turned his head and looked over his shoulder at the dumpy figure standing under the light at the far end of the alley. He smirked nastily. ‘Lily Perkins, I might have known.’

Albert let go of Marie, hooked his thumbs under his armpits, spread his long fingers across his wide, muscular chest and swaggered towards the woman who would have sold her own child for the price of a few glasses of rough-house gin – had her taste for the stuff not prevented her from ever carrying a baby to full term.

‘So,’ he growled, looming over her. His head was tipped to one side so that he was staring down at her from under the brim of his hat. ‘You reckon you know where Tibs is, do you?’

Lily smiled carefully, all too aware that he was capable of turning like the wind. ‘You should’ve come to me first, darling,’ she said in the same wheedling voice, the one she usually reserved for punters. ‘I’d have been glad to have helped you out. Glad to. And glad to have brought that Tibs down a peg or two. Always
reckoned she was something special, that one. The runty little baggage.’

Some of Albert’s other girls, who had all been as tight-lipped as Marie, stood across the street, staring at the sickening sight of Lily Perkins cosying up to the man whom, if he hadn’t knocked most of the courage out of them, they’d have happily run through with a butcher’s boning knife.

Marie hurried over to them, feeling safer with a bit of distance between her and Albert. Still shaking, she swiped roughly at the tears that were burning her cheeks. ‘If that big-mouthed trollop lets on about Polly I’ll bloody do her, I swear I will.’

They gave out a subdued cheer as Lily was given her turn at being shoved against the wall. Albert, not a man to waste words, poked her hard in the chest. ‘Where?’

‘There’s no need to get rough.’

‘I
said
, where?’

Lily’s lips thinned with displeasure. He was supposed to be grateful. ‘Further down the Highway,’ she said sulkily. ‘Towards Rosemary Lane. Been hanging round there for about a week now, rot her heart.’ She affected an unattractive sneer. ‘They reckon she’s gonna try and sing, if you don’t mind.’

‘Sing? If you’re lying to me, Lily …’

‘I swear on my life. That conniving little mare’ll be there tonight. You mark my words.’ She flashed a defiant look across the street to where the others were straining to hear how much she was blabbing. ‘Everyone’s been talking about it.’ She spat viciously. ‘In fact, it makes yer bilious. It’s all anyone’s been talking about. And …’ she swung her shoulders in what she thought was an appealingly girlish way, ‘so they say, it’s meant to be her big night tonight. The first time on stage.’ She stuck out her bottom lip, pouting
like a disappointed child. ‘You know, Albert,’ she whined, ‘I don’t understand why you bother with her. Not when you’ve got the likes of me working for you. Not when …’ Her words trailed away and she stamped petulantly. ‘Are you listening to me, Albert?’

He wasn’t. ‘Nobody crosses me. Nobody. I’ll give her working for someone else.’

Albert turned away and strode off towards Rosemary Lane. His pace quickened and he broke into a trot.

Lily pulled a face at the other girls. ‘That’s right, Albert, get a move on.’ She hitched up her skirts and started after him. ‘The acts are all such rubbish, they say the place’ll be closing down soon. And with the way that soppy little trout squawks and squeaks she might just do the job and shut it down tonight. Albert, wait.’

Albert ignored her.

Unused to moving at any speed other than a stroll, Lily stopped running and slumped against the wall to get her breath back. ‘Watch yourself,’ she managed to holler after him. ‘By all accounts the governor there’s a right dozy sort who couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudden, but he’s got a guard dog. I don’t want you getting yourself hurt.’

‘Gawd forbid!’ mocked a skinny little woman, standing next to Marie, her face a thick mask of powder and paint that did little to disguise her advancing years. ‘We wouldn’t want our stinking bully of a pimp getting himself hurt, now would we, girls?’

Bartholomew Tressing touched the bottom of the cheval glass with the tip of his silver-topped cane, setting the mirror just so, to enable him to see the full effect of his outfit: the elegantly cut suit, the immaculately white tie, the beautifully lined opera cloak and the perfectly steamed and brushed silk topper.

The years, not to mention his life of ease and privilege, had been kind to him. Still handsome, despite his almost sixty years, and with regular help from his routine doses of medical cocaine, he was still full of vigour despite the increasingly progressive symptoms of his sickness.

He fancied something distinctive this evening. It was, after all, a rather special anniversary: ten years since the police and the press had finally believed that the murderer had simply disappeared, like the spectre some, at the time, had actually believed him to be. Just thinking about what fools they had been made the doctor wonder about the world. How could people survive with such feeble brainpower? They had actually suspected his own daughter of causing the deaths of those harlots. A well-bred young lady such as Celia.

But now that episode was closed, was confined to a past that might just as well have been a cheap novel he had picked up for a moment’s amusement – like so much else in his life.

He stretched his lips into a becoming smile and acknowledged his reflection in the glass with a tip of his cane against his hat.

He would tell the others: tonight it was to be the East End.

Teezer shivered down into his shapeless black topcoat as he and Buggy made their way through the riverside back streets towards the Old Black Dog. ‘I’m telling you, Bug, it’s her. You see if she don’t look familiar.’

‘And I’m telling you she’s nothing like her.’ Buggy dismissed him. ‘You say it about every sort who’s taller than five foot that you set eyes on. You, Teezer, are becoming obsessed. Just because you’ve seen a few posters saying there’s a tall one and a short …’

‘No, Bug, it’s more than that. She’s been hanging around the place. I’ve caught sight of her a couple of times now.’

‘Yeah, after you’ve swallowed about a gallon and a half of purl,’ he muttered. ‘In fact, with the amount you knock back, it’s a wonder you ain’t seen the Prince of Wales and the Archbishop of Canterbury into the bargain.’

‘I heard that.’ Teezer cuffed him – none too gently – round the back of the head. ‘Now if you shut up for once and listen, instead of keep bunnying on all the time, maybe you’ll learn something. Think about it.’ He spoke very slowly so that Buggy could take in the lesson. ‘There’s you, what don’t stop gobbing off all the time, and you are the worker. And there’s me, what philosophises with the best of them over the world’s problems, and I am the governor.’ Teezer nodded, pleased with himself. ‘See?’

Buggy ploughed on as though Teezer hadn’t said a word. ‘We’d drunk a fair bit that night remember, and …’

Teezer gave up with his attempts at teaching and tried another tack instead. ‘Look here, Bug,’ he said, slapping his hand over Buggy’s mouth. ‘She was tall, right? You’ve already agreed that?’

Buggy, wide-eyed, nodded.

‘Well so’s she.’ He spoke quickly; even with a hand over his trap, Buggy was quite capable of mumbling his two penn’orth. ‘I’ve been studying her this past week when she’s been hanging about the Dog. And it’s her I’m telling you.’

Noticing Buggy’s face was turning a bit red, Teezer removed his hand.

‘Well I ain’t noticed no resemblance. I think you’ve just …’

‘That’s ’cos you’re always pissed and you don’t listen.’

‘No, you’re just trying to convince yourself, Teeze. You’ve been going on and …’

‘Me
going on?’

‘Yeah, you …’

‘Just shut it, Buggy, will you? Just hold your noise for once, and wait and see. All right?’

‘You only had to say, Teeze, I mean, anyone can take the hint if …’

Teezer shook his head and did his best to close his ears.

Tibs fumbled around in the dingy little room beside the stage, trying to sort out some light for her and Kitty. ‘Blimey, hark at her!’ she giggled, as the sound of the ‘serious’ soprano, who was the warm-up act for the girls, came rattling through the wall. The woman’s special selling point was her talking dog, which took the tenor parts, and if it came to a toss-up, the punters preferred his efforts every time.

‘Sounds like a rusty nail being hammered in. But Bonzo’ll start soon and drown out the old bat.’

Tibs flared a match. ‘Bugger. Them sodding rats have been at the candles again.’ She struggled to light the nibbled tallow. ‘When we’ve made our fortune, Kit, we’ll have proper gas lamps, eh? There, that’s better.’

She turned round, shielding the guttering flame with her hand, to see Kitty huddled in the corner, her face a picture of pale terror behind the make-up that Tibs had insisted on plastering on them both before they left the lodging house. ‘What’s up, darling?’ she asked, setting the candlestick down on the floor.

There was no furniture in the little room that had once been part of the landlord’s quarters, it was simply a
holding pen where the next act on the bill could wait. As the previous act was usually booed off the stage within minutes, the following turn had to be ready and waiting to get on before the audience turned nasty. ‘You ain’t scared of rats, are you, Kit? Not a great big girl like you.’

Kitty shook her head. ‘I can’t do it, Tibs. I’m sorry.’ A fat tear brimmed over and plopped on to her cheek, making a watery trail through the pink powder. ‘And it’s not just the thought of going out there, it’s …’

‘What?’ Tibs folded her arms round Kitty’s waist. ‘Tell me.’

‘It’s him. Jack Fisher.’

‘I don’t understand, darling.’

‘He scares me. Him and that cosh and his dog.’

Tibs laughed with relief. She’d really thought Kitty was going to back out and a double act wasn’t much cop if there was only of you. ‘You’re worried about Fisher? He’s as soft as butter, that one. All his tough stuff was just a show. And as for that dog of his …’

‘So you mean he won’t look after us? What if that Albert …’

‘Bloody hell, Kit, d’you want it all ways?’ Tibs had only known Kitty for a week, but she’d never before met anyone who was so easy to manipulate in some ways, but so bloody stubborn in others. If she hadn’t needed her to keep Fisher happy she’d have dragged her down to the river and chucked her back in with the sodding fish. ‘Kitty, love,’ she said, trying to keep the exasperation from her voice, ‘course he’ll look after us. He’s a feller, ain’t he? Never known one to resist looking after a pretty ankle yet, darling. And I reckon between us we’ve got the prettiest set of ankles in the business.’

Kitty closed her eyes, as though the dark would take it all away. How had she let herself be talked into this? She sighed wearily. She knew exactly how. At the
beginning of this long past week Tibs had persuaded her, with the gradual sneaking power of a dripping tap, that going on the stage would be absolutely nothing to worry about. All she would have to do was stand behind Tibs, miming and jigging about a bit. And almost imperceptibly Kitty had found herself giving in. Tibs was skilful, had carried out her campaign in stages, issuing little suggestions and reminders. Putting it to Kitty – oh, so casually – that she had said how much she had wanted to repay Tibs for her kindness and to make amends for not helping when that brute had beaten her up. Then Tibs had moved on, had played on another of Kitty’s weaknesses and she had allowed herself to be sucked in, seduced by the thought of the almost clean, dry bed that Jack Fisher was willing to pay for –
every night
– in the common lodging house.

Then there was the food. This time Kitty’s sigh was pathetic. She’d had plenty of that all right – almost as much as she could eat. Every day.

It had all made sense at the time, but now here she was, paying the price. Not only going on stage, but for all she knew, putting herself in danger from some sort of madman. Maybe two.

It was just like the nuns had told them in the home. No one ever gets something for nothing. You always have to pay in the end.

At the front of the stage the room was gradually filling up with its nightly quota of jeerers and critics. The appalling standard of the acts was still enough of a novelty to ensure that, for the first half-hour anyway, the room would be full, and Fisher had given himself an added advantage by opening up a full hour before any of his local rivals. But once that hour was up, even the most hardy of audiences would begin to thin and more
sophisticated entertainment – well, entertainment which was intentionally funny – would be sought. It was that time of the evening that Fisher had grown to dread. But tonight he would stun them all with his double act. He’d get them on early on the bill, then have them back on to finish the first half, and back again to open and close the second.

The girls were going to knock the punters’ socks off!

Teezer wasn’t happy. He was meant to be here getting a good look at the girl in the new double act, but the seats were nearly all taken. What was the point if they had to sit right at the back? ‘This is your fault, Buggy,’ he fumed, ripping off his hat. ‘You made us late.’

‘My fault? But Teeze, it was you what insisted on going to old Bob’s to get yourself a shave and a haircut.’

‘Buggy …’

‘It was. You said you wanted to look neat and tidy, so’s when you found her she’d think you was all respectable and …’