Between Friends (9 page)

Martin had become aware of the interest her young beauty aroused in the other men’s eyes as they watched but when one young man, bolder than the rest stepped out of the crowd, tapping on his shoulder and smiling admiringly at Meg he was quite taken aback and allowed himself to be elbowed aside. He stood indecisively, astonished by the strength of his own anger, then, in the space of thirty seconds his brown eyes darkened almost to black and his fierce eyebrows swooped over his nose in a frown. Something in the way the young man had placed his large hand on Meg’s back offended him, he did not know exactly why and before the laughing Meg and her new partner had gone more than a yard or two the young man found himself pulled sharply away from her. He almost fell over backwards and Meg lurched, unsupported, against another couple.

‘’Ere mate, what’s up wi’ you?’ the young man said, his smile slipping somewhat but still good-natured for he was not yet aware of the dangerous change in Martin’s mood.

‘Nowt,
mate
, just find someone else to lark about with.’ Martin’s face was tense and quiet and those around him slowed and began to move back in anticipation. They liked nothing better than a good laugh, a good sing-song, beer glasses at the ready, or a good fight and were eager to be part of all three!

‘Now listen ere, you! I meant no ’arm to the young lady and …’

‘Right then, clear off!’

‘What’s up wi’ you …?’

‘Just clear off!’

The young man was becoming angry. He
had
meant no harm to Meg, nor disrespect. She was a pretty girl and besides it
was
Shrove Tuesday, a holiday and every man was dancing with anyone he could get his arms around!

Tom, the one who had begun it all, though he still gazed admiringly into the bright, upturned face of his partner, began to sense the changing mood of the crowd at his back and when the penny whistler suddenly stopped his whistling, he glanced
about
him uncertainly. He was just in time to see Martin duck beneath a smart, left-handed swing from some burly chap with bright red hair and he groaned despairingly. Nevertheless he placed his disappointed partner carefully amongst her friends and elbowed his way towards Martin and Meg, smiling politely and murmuring his thanks to all who moved out of his way. He shrugged his shoulders at the horrified Meg then threw himself into the fray, having not the slightest idea of what it was about. He did not care for fighting and was not, like Martin, handy with his fists but he was willing if needs be to stand beside his friend; to defend what was theirs, whatever that might turn out to be! In a few seconds both he and Martin had disappeared beneath a melée of bobbing cloth-capped heads and flailing fists for the young man who had so offended Martin had not come alone!

The uproar became more turbulent and noisy as those on its perimeter were persuaded to become involved and women danced about its edge, encouraging a sweetheart, a husband, to ‘gerron wi’ it’, all interest abandoned in the cock-chasing boys and the porridge-consuming competitors. The fiddler and the penny whistler looked at one another resignedly and shrugged for they knew it was hopeless to try to tempt to their entertainment those who were enjoying themselves in the vastly more amusing pastime of fisticuffs. The ‘Liverpool kiss’ dropped a few, noses erupted with blood and it was only a question of time before the ‘scuffers’ arrived.

Meg was pushed further and further back from the centre of the crowd as excited women elbowed her aside to get a better view. Her temper showed in her heightened colour and the blaze of the golden light in her eyes. She was furious! She’d never forgive Martin, never! What on earth had got into him picking a fight with that chap and him only asking for an innocent bit of a dance with hundreds watching! It didn’t take much to ignite Martin’s temper, true, but the chap had done nothing and would you look at Tom, usually so mild and inoffensive, happy-go-lucky even and the last man on earth to pick a fight, throwing punches like he was ‘Gentleman’ Jim Corbett himself!

She turned away and stamped her foot in frustration, almost in tears. This had promised to be such a lovely day, unexpected and therefore the more exciting and now those two great daft lumps had spoiled it for her! Martin had hinted at a surprise at Mr Hale’s though what it could be in the smelly old bicycle shop she
could
not imagine. This small diversion, before it had erupted into the rumpus it had become, had been lovely, dancing in the sunshine amidst the good fellowship of the holiday crowd and now it was ruined. They’d probably end up in gaol, the pair of them and she’d have to go home and report to Mrs Whitley that two of her servants had been arrested for brawling in the streets!

A hand clutched her arm and she spun about, ready to give what for to whoever it was had the temerity to interfere with her, so short was her temper but a lively voice told her to ‘Look sharp, Meggie, before they miss us.’ and Martin’s laughing brown eyes and glowing face were there and she was pulled along at such speed she was in danger of falling.

‘Tom,’ she gasped.

‘I’m here,’ a voice cried from her other side and Tom’s hand gripped her left arm and as she began to laugh, her feet scarce touching the ground as they bore her along, they laughed with her.

From behind the noise of the fighting multitude died away, pierced by the sharp shrillness of police whistles. The culprits continued to run, Meg clinging to her boater and the length of her skirt which threatened to trip her up until they turned into St John’s Lane.

‘Oh for God’s sake stop!’ she beseeched. ‘I’ve a stitch in my side that’s cutting through me and I’ll lose my hat in a minute. Let me go, the pair of you!’

They all three slowed down and shrugging her arms from their grasp Meg adjusted her straw boater and pushed back the crop of curls which had become loosened in the mad flight, tucking them carelessly under her hat. Her face had become stern though her eyes could not rid themselves of the laughter. She felt she should be cross with them both for hadn’t they spoiled her lovely dance but they leaned against the wall, blowing on their grazed knuckles and grinned at her and she could not stop her mouth from forming into a wide smile. Martin had a cut lip and as his grin deepened he winced, putting his hand to it ruefully. Tom’s eye looked suspiciously swollen and there was no doubt he would have a ‘shiner’ which he would have to explain to Mrs Whitley in the morning but who cared, his expression said. He had acquitted himself well beside the more skilful fists of his friend and he was pleased with himself. He was enjoying this day, this moment and with Tom’s outlook on life that was all that mattered!

‘Will you look at the two of you! Cook’ll skin you when she sees the state of your good jackets!’

‘No she won’t, Meggie. I shall tell her she’s lovely and give her a kiss and she’ll forgive us like she always does.’ Tom’s engaging smile was perfectly confident for he knew what he said was true.

‘Don’t you be too sure me old cock sparrer.’ Martin fingered the tear in the sleeve of his jacket. ‘This cost Mr Lloyd good money and you know how she says we’ve to look smart and she can’t keep up with us growing so fast.’

‘Oh stop worrying! You’re like an old woman going on about your damn coat. Meg’ll sew it up for you, won’t you chuck? You’ll sew poor old Martin’s coat up for him, won’t you …?’

Tom began to dance round Martin, sparring and jabbing playfully with his big-jointed fists, evidently still enjoying his new found prowess and Meg could see that Martin, not yet steady after the fight in which they had just been involved would not take much to inflame again. Hastily she intervened.

‘Oh come on you two, don’t spoil a perfectly good day any further. It’s bad enough when you fight other people. If you’re going to start on each other I’m off!’

She began to walk away, her tall figure swaying slightly in the graceful, girlish manner she was developing as she matured and the two youths were suddenly, strangely, quite diverted. Her hips swung from side to side below her slender waist and her head was held proudly, the plain straw boater clinging desperately to the tumbled mass of her effervescent hair. For a moment they might have been watching a stranger, a pretty girl who had caught their eye, then she turned and grinned and she was only their Meg again!

They followed her, falling into step, one on either side as they had always done! Tall houses built a century ago leaned on each side of the road. A tram ran alongside of them, the driver clucking affectionately to the horse which pulled it and a hansom cab reined in behind, the cabbie cursing as he attempted to overtake the tram. The tram driver looked over his shoulder and grinned amiably and mouthed a word or two of ‘Liverpoolese’ and the cabbie shook his fist.

The air smelled good – a mixture of sea freshness pungent with the sharpness of tar from the rigging of the sailing vessels which were still to be seen tied up beside those of steam. A strange miscellany of aromas in which could be recognised coffee beans,
Indian
tea, citrus fruits, nutmeg, camphor and the sharp new tang of timber. All the perfumes which assail the nostrils – for the most part unnoticed – of those who live beside the great highway of water which brought them there. There would be life down there at the dockside, just as there had been in the vital enthusiasm of the crowd they had just left behind and Meg loved it, and this city in which she had been born.

They turned into Victoria Street and half way down came to Mr Hale’s shop, the ‘Modern Bicycle Emporium’ which was Martin’s Mecca and the start of his dream, and at the door, smiling in welcoming anticipation was Albert Hale.

Like all men who love something with a passion beyond all others he was always eager also to discuss his obsession with a fellow devotee, and also the finer points of the advancing technology, and Meg and Tom would have to wait patiently until Martin had inspected each nut and bolt of every last one of the latest models in the shop, and the wonder of the ‘Vauxhall’ motor car belonging to one of Liverpool’s wealthy, it’s engine stripped down for a minor repair in Mr Hale’s back yard!

In the dim light which struggled from the street they could make out the silent, skeletal frames of the bicycles which were Mr Hale’s main livelihood. Some were on racks above their heads, ranged along the walls in strange, threadlike shapes, their narrow structures resembling the delicate vertebrae of dozens of spiders. They were everywhere, propped against walls, leaning against one another, heaped and piled, some of them upside down and others still in the crates in which they had travelled. On shelves were saddle bags and saddles, bells and lamps and along the wall, ranged in orderly rows hung knapsacks, capes, maps and every conceivable aid which the cyclist might require.

It had become familiar to Tom and Meg during the past few months for they had been here several times with Martin as he ‘mucked about’ as they tolerantly called it, in the element he loved. They had spent hours watching and idly listening as Martin discussed with Mr Hale the merits of the ‘Napier’ versus the ‘Vauxhall’ and the chances of the former in the ‘Gordon Bennett Cup’ in July. It was an enigma to them both still for they had not yet got over their bewilderment at Martin’s passion for these weird contraptions but they were willing to be part of it, as they had always been part of Martin’s life.

Threading their way through the muddle, led by Mr Hale they
passed
beyond the curtained alcove which led from the shop and into another room which looked as though some playfully destructive hand had taken a score of bicycles and torn them apart, flinging the pieces in joyous abandon to every corner of the room. There were wheels and frames, pedals and handlebars, saddles and mudguards and all lying about like the pieces of a giant jig-saw puzzle waiting to be put together. Here again Tom and Meg were on familiar ground for it was in this workshop that Mr Hale kept his ‘spares’, the pieces he used to construct or repair a machine. On more than one occasion Tom had been ordered to shuffle them about in search of a decent spoke or brake as Martin helped Mr Hale to fit up some contrivance he was re-building.

‘How’s it going then, Mr Hale?’ Martin asked politely, though his eyes shone with excitement.

‘Fine lad, just fine. All ready then, are yer?’

‘Aye … if you are!’

‘Oh aye. I said a week or two and … well, come and see fer yerself!’

Meg and Tom looked at one another and pulled a face, mystified by this cryptic exchange, then followed the retreating backs of Mr Hale and Martin, stepping over the explosion of bicycle parts which barred their way.

‘Come through then, you two,’ Martin called over his shoulder.

Another door was opened in what seemed the endless depths of the shop and what was evidently Mr Hale’s living quarters until they came at last into a back yard. In one corner, draped lovingly with a tarpaulin was the shape of what Meg and Tom understood to be the wonder of the ‘Vauxhall’ motor car, not apparently to be revealed to their amateur and therefore heretic gaze and they were directed to the furthest corner. Here again were a myriad pieces of what had once been bicycles, from the old ‘ordinary’, the ‘pennyfarthing’ and the ‘boneshaker’, all discarded now for they were rusted and rotting away, but standing in their midst, shining and proud and leaning against one another in companionable equanimity was a tandem, it’s two leather seats polished to the shine of a horse chestnut, and a bicycle!

‘Now then!’ said Mr Hale, ‘will these do yer?’ His face was fondly indulgent as though he showed off two beloved children. ‘I ’ad to put a couple of extra coats of paint on them mudguards after you left, Martin. Well, they’d bin rusting out ’ere for months, but they turned out right well. What d’yer think to ’em?’