He Called Me Son (The Blountmere Street Series Book 1) (7 page)

‘Did they get the leftovers?’
 
I asked.

‘I shouldn’t have thought so,’ Fred replied.

‘They should’ve saved their time.
 
Who would want to see some old bloke scoffing grub, and not get offered anything, even if it was only a biscuit.’
 
Angela was scathing.

Upstairs, one room led into another, all looking out on to the gardens or the river - wide and winding its way on forever.
 
How could one person need so many rooms, even if he was a king?

We continued walking along a gallery that all at once seemed chill.
 
Like every room in the Palace, paintings of strangely dressed men and women looking serious and important, stared down at us.
 
Some had a faraway, mysterious look and the ones of Old Henry scared me.
 
Our Old Man had been bad enough, but he hadn’t chopped anyone’s head off.

‘This place is supposed to be haunted by one of Henry’s wives.
 
She walks along here at midnight screaming.’
 
Angela whispered, trying to be dramatic and frighten me.

‘How can she scream if she’s had her head cut off?’

‘Don’t ask me.
 
I’m only telling you what the guide said.
 
How am I supposed to know what ghosts do?’

‘I don’t know if I should have liked to live in these times.
 
What about you, Fred?’
 
Lori asked, before a fight could develop between Angela and me.

‘I’m not certain.
 
The Elizabethan period would have been an exciting one for a sailor.
 
I think I should have liked to have sailed with Sir Francis Drake or Sir Walter Raleigh.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t have liked to live when Henry was alive,’ Angela said, frowning at the portrait of a girl who was probably about her age.
 
‘I’d hate having to wear one of those dresses and a stupid hat.
 
I wouldn’t have liked not having electricity. Candles are all right, but I reckon you’d soon get fed up with them.’

For once I had to agree with her.
 
I couldn’t imagine life without
Dick Barton
and cowboys and Indians.
 
I liked living right here and now, where I had everything I wanted: a bob for school dinners every Monday, a tanner for Saturday Picture Club, a Meccano set, a Bible and Spam once a week.
 
Best of all we’d swapped the Old Man for Fred.

On the bus back home, Angela sat next to Lori in case she sicked up, which meant Fred sat next to me.
 
We talked about Hampton Court.

‘I’ve got some history books about the Tudor and Elizabethan periods in my room at home.
 
I’ll show them to you if you like.’

‘Thanks.’
 
I was interested all right, especially now we’d been to a real palace.
 
I doubted anyone in Blountmere Street had been there, but I wouldn’t say anything to Dennis and Herbie about liking old buildings or anything like that.
 
I’d still act like a dunce when Mrs Colby gave us a history lesson, although I’d already memorised Old Henry’s dates, and the names of his six wives.
 
I didn’t want to be thought a sissy like Harry Billings, who wore glasses, and had his hair parted in the middle and smarmed down.
 
Every lesson he asked questions and nodded and said “thank you so much” to Mrs Colby when she answered him, and he never looked at the rude pictures that got passed around the class.

‘Do you think Henry ever felt guilty for what he did?’ I asked Fred.
 

‘Henry deserved to feel guilty, but often we load guilt on ourselves that doesn’t belong on our shoulders at all, especially after people have died.’
 
He squeezed my arm, and I knew he was talking about me and Dobsie.
 
If I hadn’t tried to go so high; If I’d slowed the lizzie sooner, he wouldn’t have been killed.
 
If I hadn’t suggested we went up The Common in the first place he would still be alive.

‘It wasn’t your fault, lad.
 
Everyone has to take responsibility for their own actions,’ Fred said.
 
He took hold of my hand and pressed it hard.
 

The sky was striped pink when we passed The Common, and the playground looked lonely with shadowy arms stretched across it.
 
This time, though, it was easier with Fred sitting beside me, holding my hand.

Chapter Seven

Lori didn’t usually knock before she came into our kitchen.
 
She had a key to our front door and usually barged straight in - that was after she’d popped her head round Fred’s door “to pass the time of day”.
 
But today she tapped at our kitchen door, coughed a rippling little cough and waited, though the lavender water she was wearing had already wafted into the kitchen.
 
She twisted her hands together, and Fred stood behind her, sort of grinning, but I could see red blotches on his neck and on his scalp where his hair didn’t grow.

‘Well, come in the two of you,’ Mum said.
 
‘Since when have you had to be invited?’

Lori coughed again, and she and Fred sidled to the table, where I was making a crane from my Meccano set and Angela was threading some beads she had got for her birthday on to a string.
 
Although Mum indicated some chairs for them to sit on, they kept standing like the statues on Lori’s sideboard.

‘Is anything wrong?’ Mum asked, and Angela looked at me, putting her finger to her temple, winding it round and round, mouthing ‘They’ve gone nutty.’
 

‘
It’s … well …’ Fred began.

‘We wanted to …’ Lori stopped.

‘Spit it out,’ Mum said, while Angela continued her winding action.

‘With Eileen, Fred’s wife … um … ex wife having passed away practically a year ago.’
 
Lori did a couple more coughs before looking to Fred for help.

‘Perhaps we should have waited a little longer, but circumstances have precipitated things,’ Fred continued.
 

I didn’t know what “precipitated” meant.
 
I couldn’t even pronounce it.
 
I would just have to try and make sense of the rest of what they were stuttering and stammering about.

‘So to cut a long story short.’

‘I wish he would,’ Angela whispered.

‘I’ve asked Amelia to become my wife and she’s accepted.’

‘That’s wonderful news!
 
I couldn’t think of a better matched couple.’
 
Mum was unusually quick to her feet.
 
Just as unusual was the way she flung her arms around them both.

‘So you don’t think we’ll be the centre of Blountmere Street gossip?’ Lori asked.

‘Probably, but since when did that matter?’

Lori stopped twisting her handbag strap and I realised she had been covering her left hand with her right one. ‘Would you like to see my engagement ring?’ she asked, holding out her hand.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Mum said, gazing at the half-circle of emeralds as green as the grass in Bushey Park, before darting a look at her own hand which was bare of any rings at all.

‘Congratulations.
 
We’re very happy for you both, aren’t we?’ Mum said, looking at Angela and me.
 
We both stood up and mumbled, ‘Yes’

‘When’s the wedding and where’s it going to be?
 
Will you have it here or in Portsmouth where your sister lives?’

‘We’ve decided to have a quiet wedding at a Registry Office here in London, in a month’s time.’
 
Lori paused, ‘I know bridesmaids aren’t really necessary, but you would make such a pretty one, Angela.
 
Would you like to perform the duty for me?
 
Perhaps we could call you a bridal attendant.
 
Of course, if you don’t want to …’ Before she had time to finish, Angela hurled herself at Lori, and of all the sick-making things, she kissed her.
 
‘Thanks! Thanks millions.’
 

Turning to Fred, she hugged him like she did Benjy her hamster, causing Fred to have to clear his throat.

‘What sort of dress will I have?
 
Will it be long?
 
And what colour?’

The way Angela was carrying on, anyone would have thought
she
was the one who was getting married.

‘How about you choose it yourself?
 
We can go shopping for the material and a pattern, and perhaps your mother will make it.’ Lori stopped.
 
‘I had actually meant to ask you first, Dolly, but we seem to have got a little ahead of ourselves.’

Mum, smiled a soft sort of smile.
 
‘I’d be delighted to make Angela’s dress, and a month would give me plenty of time.
 
‘What about yours?
 
She asked.
 
‘I’ll make that too if you like.’

‘I thought I’d wear a suit.’

‘I could cope with a suit,’ Mum assured Lori in her usual quiet way.
 
Mum’s eyes hadn’t looked that bright with glinty lights in them since our christening.

‘Now, Tony, I think it’s our turn.’
 
Fred put his arm around my shoulder which always made me feel proud, especially if he did it when we were out.
 

‘As you know, my son is in New Zealand, and I don’t have any family member living close who I could ask to be my best man, so I was wondering if you would take on the role?’

In contrast to Angela’s noisy and unusually lovey-dovey reaction, mine was the opposite.
 
Gulping and swallowing, I looked from Fred to Lori, across to Angela and Mum and back to Fred.

‘Do I take it, you’ll agree?’ Fred asked.

‘Yeah, sure.’

Fred gripped my hand and shook it.
 
‘While the ladies are sorting out their paraphernalia, we’ll get ourselves fitted for a couple of suits.
 
What do you think?’

But all I could manage was a strangled, ‘Smashing.’

I couldn’t wait to get downstairs to the Dibbles to tell Paula all the wedding plans.
 
As soon as Fred and Lori had left our kitchen, holding hands and giving each other dopey looks, I bolted down our stairs, tugged open our door, crossed our doorstep to the Dibbles’ one, and hammered on their front door.

‘Guess what?
 
Fred and Lori are getting married,’ I told her as soon as Paula opened the door.
 
‘Angela’s going to be a bridesmaid and I’m going to be Fred’s best man.’
 
I waited for Paula’s usual enthusiasm, but all she said was, ‘That’s nice.’
 
Her voice was as flat as the hedgehog in the middle of the High Street.

‘And the wedding’s going to be …’

‘Look, I’ve got to go.’
 
And before I could finish my sentence, she darted back inside and closed the door.

Paula wasn’t the only one who showed no interest in Fred and Lori’s wedding.
 
Dennis and Herbie hadn’t seemed to care that I was being Fred’s best man and wearing a proper suit.
 

‘My cousin had a suit and he looked a right chump.
 
I wouldn’t want one.
 
I’ll tell you that for nothing.
 
I’d rather have a cowboy jacket with fringes down the sleeves like the ones Roy Rogers wears.
 
Anyway, your suit’ll only have short trousers.
 
You’re not old enough for longs.’
 
Dennis finished by waving his arm about, as if he was dismissing the idea of a suit altogether.
 
Herbie nodded in agreement, while I tried to force down a sensation as if a log had become jammed in my throat.
 
I hadn’t expected Herbie and Dennis to be interested in the wedding itself, but I had thought they would think I was lucky to be getting a proper suit.
 
Instead, all they did was laugh at Herbie’s silly jokes.

I would never have believed a wedding of all things would bring Angela and me closer.
 
With Paula drooping round like Sunday’s celery on Monday, and Dennis and Herbie continuing to make stupid comments, Angela and I began to talk to each other about things we would once have thought drippy.

A few days after Fred and Lori announced their engagement, as she promised, Lori took Angela to choose the material for her bridesmaid dress.

 
Afterwards Angela bounced into the kitchen as if she was on a pogo stick.
 

‘What d’you think of this,’ she asked me, untying the string from around a brown paper parcel, and carefully lifting a shimmering piece of material.
 
‘See, it changes colour.
 
Pick it up and move it round,’ she invited me.
 
‘It’s called shot taffeta.
 
We got it from Bon Marche, not that stall where Paula
Dribble
got the stuff for
her
ballet dress.’

I knew how much it meant to Angela, and I took hold of the fabric as if it might dissolve in my hands.
 
I held it towards the window and then away from it.
 
One way it became pale pink, delicate, fragile.
 
When I held it a different way, it darkened and almost sulked, becoming altogether more dramatic.
 
It was like Angela’s personality, although I’d never before thought of her as having a fragile side.

‘Gorgeous, isn’t it?’ She exclaimed, taking it from me, twirling this way and that.

‘It’s pretty,’ I replied, noticing how the pale pink made her face look softer.

‘We bought a pattern as well.
 
Look it’s got a frill round the neck and at the bottom and Lori’s going to buy me a headdress of silver leaves and silver shoes to go with it.
 
What d’you think about silver shoes?’
 
Angela asked, willing my enthusiasm.

‘They’d be nice.’

‘And a silver basket with pink roses and that white stuff old
Dribble
’s got growing in his garden, but better than his.’
 
Angela folded the material back into the paper as if she was wrapping a baby into its shawl.

‘What colour suits are you and Fred having?’

‘Fred wants navy, but Lori says he’s to have a change, so we might choose grey ones.’

‘Grey’ll look smart and go a treat with my pink dress.
 
We’ll match really well.’
 
Angela paused.
 
‘I was wondering if Dad might turn up to see me in my bridesmaid’s outfit.’

‘What would he do that for?
 
He couldn’t give two hoots about us.
 
Anyway, how would he know about the wedding?’

‘I was only wondering.’
 
Angela busied herself putting the material into a cupboard.

‘Good riddance to him.
 
We’ve got Fred now.’

Mr Bendle, the tailor, lifted bales of cloth off shelves from which cobwebs hung like the Dibbles’ lace curtains.
 
Unwinding the material, he invited Fred to feel the quality.

Taking his time over each roll, Fred rubbed the cloth between his thumb and forefinger, before dividing the material into two groups.
 
‘I don’t think these ones are quite suitable,’ he said, pushing one lot further along the workbench, and I watched as the shiny blue material I’d been eyeing slid out of reach.

‘We’re thinking of grey.
 
This one looks good.
 
What do you think?’
 
Fred pushed some material towards me, and I took the cloth between my thumb and finger and rubbed it as Fred had done.
 
‘It’s good.’

Next, Mr Bendle ran his tape measure along my arms and across my back and chest.

‘Now about the trousers for the young man?’
 
He asked.

‘Long ones,’ Fred smoothed the flat of his hand across the material.
 

A quick scowl like one of Angela’s when she wasn’t happy about something, passed across the tailor’s face, before he let the tape measure drop the length of my leg.
 
‘Isn’t he ... the young man … a little young for long trousers?’

‘Long,’ Fred repeated, winking over the tailor’s bent form.
 
I winked back.
 
A grey suit with longs!
 
A grey suit with long trousers!

‘And I’m having a grey suit with long trousers, the same as Fred,’ I told Paula the next morning, as she stooped to put a milk bottle outside.
 
I would have stood with a loud hailer at the top of Blountmere Street and announced it to everyone if I could have.
 
As it was, Paula would have to do.
 
I was banking on a better reaction from her than I’d got from Dennis, who had said he hoped I didn’t look as ridiculous as his cousin had.
 
But Paula was the same as she had been for the last couple of weeks, as if she hadn’t heard a thing I said.