Paradise Court (3 page)

Frances nodded. The heat began to send her into deep thought. She remembered the note Jess had sent to the chemist's shop the day before yesterday. ‘Dear Frances,' it read. ‘Come and see me on
Saturday afternoon. I need to talk to you. Love from your sister Jess.'

She'd gone along, puzzled and fearful Jess had been with the Holdens for three years or more, with no trouble, no complaints. Like everyone else, she had to work hard, but that didn't trouble their family. They'd all been brought up to work. No, it couldn't be that, Frances had opened the iron gate and trodden up to the tradesmen's entrance with increasing worry. She rang the bell. Jess herself came flying down the corridor to answer the door. Frances went in, spent ten minutes with her sister, listening hard.

Then, feeling leaden and slow, she'd come back home on the tram. Now she heard her father's heavy footstep on the stair. Ernie still worked quietly and methodically in the kitchen. Duke came in.

‘Joxer's behind the bar for ten minutes,' he said. He sighed and sat down. ‘Is there any tea up here?' Duke was practically teetotal and never drank beer or spirits when he was working. Ernie heard, came through for the kettle and took it away to fill it at the tap. ‘Good boy,' Duke said.

Frances was still crouched by the fire, but the toasting fork lay on the hearth neglected. The firelight caught her face, flickering shadow then warm red light across it. There were glints of red-gold in her light brown hair. ‘Dad,' she sighed, then stopped.

Duke sat in the chair behind her. ‘Trouble?' he guessed.

She turned and saw the lines on his face, the years of hard work. She could hardly bear to be the bringer of bad news. ‘It's Jess,' she said quietly. She'd promised, she reminded herself. She was the oldest sister and she took the family's troubles squarely on her own shoulders. She would have to tell him. She looked up again at the light of the fire flickering over her father's face.

He looked down at her and guessed the truth. ‘She hasn't, has she?' he said sadly. There was no need to go into any details; he just knew.

‘She has.' Frances nodded.

Duke sat and looked for a long time into the fire. ‘And?' he prompted at last.

Frances swallowed hard. ‘She wants to know will you take her back?' she said. ‘Jess asked me to ask you, can she come home?'

Duke soon went downstairs again to take over from Joxer at the bar. He had given no definite answer to Frances's anxious question on her sister Jess's behalf.
‘Don't rush me,' he said. ‘Jess has got herself into this mess. She ain't the first and she definitely won't be the last.' He went straight down and gruffly told the cellarman to get off home. He served beer to his customers in his usual steady way. So, his third and troublesome daughter was in a spot of bother. He wouldn't be pushed into a rash decision, he'd told Frances. Maybe she could come home to have the child, maybe not. But then he thought of the gutter women, clutching ragged bundles to their thin chests, who sold themselves for sixpence to put bread in their little ones' mouths. He saw them down the dingy back courts, white-faced flotsam of the city. No daughter of his must come to that. Duke held a glass up to the light and polished it for a third or fourth time.
‘Fill ‘er up.' Arthur Ogden was into the slurred phase of his night's drinking. ‘Make it ‘alf an' ‘alf.' He grinned across at Sadie Parsons, who seemed to his bleary gaze to be a golden angel in a halo of gaslight. She stood by the door, having just come in, heralded by a gust of sharp, cold air.
‘About time,' Duke called sharply to her. ‘Where you been till this time?'
‘I been at Maudie's like I said.' Sadie took off the tartan beret perched jauntily on the back of her head, walked over and threw it down on the shiny bar top. She ducked under the counter to join her father amidst the bottles and barrels. ‘Remember, I said I
was going to Maudie's house.' She gave him a bright, conciliatory peck on the cheek.
‘Yes, and missed all the chores,' Duke grumbled. ‘Hettie had to make supper with no one around to lend a hand.'
‘What about Frances?' Sadie settled unconcerned on to a high stool behind the bar. Her bright, thick hair tumbled in a loose plait to her waist, chestnut brown against her white blouse. She was the prettiest of the Parsons girls, with all the shine of undimmed youth. Her face was a small triangle of pleasing features; dark eyes widely set and heavily lashed, a small, straight hose and soft, full mouth whose pouts and smiles would soon storm the stoutest hearts. And she flitted between school and friends' houses and home with a carelessness that her sister Frances had never had, an innocence long since gone from Hettie's life, and the delicate beauty shared by all the sisters, Jess included. ‘I thought Frances would be here,' she repeated. Her father was in a bad mood about something, so she must sit and humour him.
‘She had to go to see Jess,' Duke said, short and sharp. ‘It's too much to get Hettie to do everything, what with her going out again at night.'

Sadie nodded. ‘I'm sorry, Dad, I never thought.'

‘You never do, you young ones. That's your trouble. Just you wait till you're finished with school and working in the rope factory down the road. See how you like it.' He grumbled on. The rope factory was his worst threat, but he was serious in his own mind about being stricter with Sadie, to make up for the mistakes he'd made with Jess. Jess had always been headstrong, and look now! If she could get herself into trouble as easy as this, without Sadie's looks, think what might happen to the youngest girl in a year or two!

‘I'm not working in no rope factory!' Sadie protested. ‘I'm gonna work in a hat shop.' She swung her legs off the stool and landed daintily on the floor.

‘Course you are,' Arthur Ogden encouraged. ‘Pretty as a picture, she is, Duke. Can't send her to work in no factory.' He hunched
over the bar and peered at Sadie. ‘Just like my Amy. She's gone into hats!'

‘She never!' Sadie went up to him to learn more. Amy Ogden, Arthur's daughter, had been a year or two ahead of her at school. She'd worked for a time on Annie's stall straight after she left, but that meant being out in the cold in all weathers and she didn't take to it. Sadie hadn't heard this latest development. ‘Is your Amy in a big store up the West End selling hats?' It was Sadie's own dream come true.

Arthur frowned and shook his head, slopping his beer in the process. ‘Not exactly. Dolly found a place for her at Coppers'.'

Coopers' Drapery Stores was at-the top end of Duke Street by the railway line. Still, it was one up from a job on the market. Sadie pictured her working with ribbon and lace. She'd be selling those huge, frothy hats you saw in Coopers' big plate-glass windows.

‘Dolly works in “Hosiery”,' Arthur explained. ‘So she got a place for Amy in “Hats”.'

‘She makes them, does she?' Sadie was still eager to know more about the latest fashions worn by the better off ladies.

Arthur nodded. ‘Top hats. My Amy puts the greaseproof band inside to stop the oil on their heads from staining the silk lining. Very posh hats, they are.' He looked pleased with his daughter's achievements and smiled sloppily into his drink. ‘Mind you, she works long hours, and it's only seven pence for two dozen hats.'

‘It's a job, ain't it?' Duke said. He wiped the stains around Arthur's glass as he kept an eye on the door. Chalky White and his gang had just come in. ‘Go up and get something to eat,' he told Sadie. ‘And no messing.'

Sadie made a face. She ducked under the counter, too late to avoid the bunch of new customers advancing on the bar.

Chalky White was well known on Duke Street and down the court, where he lived in a squalid corner in one of the cheapest rooms rented out to workmen. In his late twenties, he worked as a warehouseman on Albion Dock, but this was only a front for the many dodgy deals he was involved in. Everyone knew Chalky cheated his way along the waterfront, earned plenty, then blew the
money on the clubs and halls. He was over six feet tall, kept fit at Milo's, the local boxing club, and had a reputation for knowing how to handle himself in a fight. He was a flashy dresser and didn't mind spending the easy money on the string of women he went around with. But they didn't like his temper. ‘You never know where you are with Chalky,' they said. ‘He'd as soon hit you in the gob as give you a kiss.' They quickly dropped him, and afterwards every one had a tale to tell about Chalky's drunken rages. Yet when he was sober and dolled up for a night out, he could be hard to refuse. ‘He's got a way with him,' they warned. ‘You have to watch out.'

He swaggered in ahead of four or five mares and caught sight of Sadie. ‘Oh my, what lucky fellow's walking out with you?' he called with a low whistle. He jostled his pals with his elbows.

Sadie stopped in her tracks. She blushed and looked back at Duke.

‘Go on up,' he repeated.

‘What's the rush?' Chalky said. He leaned against the door. ‘I only want to know who's her beau. It's not one of them little ikeys hanging around out there, is it? You're too good for any of them, you know!'

Sadie blushed a deeper red. ‘I'm not walking out with no one,' she said, gathering her dignity. ‘And if I was, it wouldn't be with any of them hooligans.'

‘Quite right. Like I said, a girl like you can afford to be a bit choosy, can't she, Arthur?'

Chalky got one step bolder, reached out and took Sadie's arm. Then he advanced her with mock gallantry towards the bar, surrounded by his friends. Arthur grabbed his cap and prepared to leave. If there was trouble brewing he wanted to be well clear of it. ‘Don't ask me,' he mumbled. There was an inch of beer left in his pint glass. He gulped it down, jammed his cap on his head and called out his farewells. Duke was getting up a head of steam back there behind the bar at the way Chalky was messing his girl about. ‘Night all!' He threaded his way to the door between smoky
tables. Everyone had a wary eye on the Chalky White gang. They knew Duke wouldn't stand any nonsense.

But as Arthur scuttled out into the street, Robert Parsons came in. Quickly he sized things up, threw his cigarette to the floor and moved in on Chalky. Stockier than the glib warehouseman, but smaller by four or five inches, Robert squared up. Both his hands were clenched into fists, resting at hip height. He thrust out his broad chest and his dark moustache seemed to bristle with anger. White looked down at him, a superior smirk stretched across his thin lips. ‘Watch it, boys, I think we got trouble,' he sneered.

Sadie had backed off against the bar into the space afforded by Arthur Ogden's hasty exit. She felt hot tears of shame brim and prick her eyelids. ‘Leave off, Robert,' she pleaded. ‘He ain't doing no harm.'

‘No, and if you'd done as I told you and gone upstairs I when you was asked, we could all have been spared this I blooming circus!' Duke snapped.

Sadie fled, her cheeks wet.

Duke leaned forward on the bar, his hands spread wide. He didn't mind Robert showing Chalky White who was boss if necessary, but he cast a worried eye over the empty glasses ranged along the bar top. Quickly he removed them to a safe place in the stone sink. Other customers cleared a space around the two men and an air of tense expectation spread through the room. One or two of the boys hanging about on the doorstep crept in to watch the fight.

‘That's my little sister,' Robert began slowly. His eyes swivelled from Chalky to the heavy mob ganged up behind him. He'd already clean forgotten his own flirting with Daisy O'Hagan earlier that evening. In his book that was innocent fun, whereas Chalky White was a dirty-minded lout who couldn't even keep his foul mouth and hands off a fifteen-year-old girl. His fists were raised to chest level now, thrust out in front of him. He'd fight the lot of them if he had to.

‘You don't say!' Chalky's insulting grin stiffened. He pulled at the white cuffs of his best shirt, then back went his shoulders. He
cleared his throat. ‘Now look,' he said. ‘No point taking this any further, is there?'

A disappointed sigh went round the room like a great barrage balloon beginning to deflate and sag. Chalky's mates backed off. Chalky himself thrust his hands into his trouser pockets. ‘I'll give you a fight any time you want, down at Milo's that is. But just now I'm busy and my mind's on other things.' He grinned, still casually twisting the knife. ‘And I got all my best clobber on.'

Robert's glance ran over Chalky's grey silk necktie neatly knotted between the peaks of his high white collar. He wore a dark waistcoat fully buttoned, with a fancy gold watch chain slung in two loops across his chest. A long fitted jacket over lighter grey trousers and soft leather shoes completed the outfit. It was best clobber all right. Most East-Enders would never hope to own a suit of clothes like that. If they had one once for their own wedding day, it was in pawn by now and only got out for funerals. Robert snorted in disgust. He turned on his heel Chin thrust out, he headed straight upstairs to rant at soft-headed Sadie.

Chalky winked at his mates. He turned and leaned on the bar. ‘Six pints of best bitter,' he said to Duke, staring him out without flinching. ‘And have one for yourself.'

Duke nodded. He drew from the barrel into a jug, then poured the beer with expert ease, giving each pint a good head. His own gaze was steady as he took Chalky's money. ‘You lot heading somewhere special?' he asked.

‘Up the Palace,' Chalky replied, smooth and easy.

‘Best be quick. Show's started.' Duke slammed the coins in the till and turned back. ‘They won't let you in if you're late.'

Chalky swatted the air and grinned. ‘I'm best pals with Fred Mills, the manager,' he explained. ‘He always lets us in, no bother.' He paused. ‘Reckon we can still get an eyeful of one of your girls up there without being flattened by your Robert. And very nice too.'

Duke watched the froth from the beer stick to the sides of Chalky's glass as he downed his pint. He stood his ground, like one of the cart-horses his father had driven. Scum like Chalky
didn't deserve an answer. He lived like a pig in his filthy room so he could squander all his money on women, booze and clothes. Down any court, in any tenement block, you could find a bad penny. Chalky was that penny in Paradise Court. Only when he finally swaggered out through the doors and tossed a coin to the waiting gang of boys could Duke breathe freely in his own pub.

Dolly Ogden glanced at the clock on the wall as her husband's unsteady footsteps clattered down the passage towards the back kitchen. He fell down the three steps into the room. She didn't look up again until she'd put the finishing touch to the seam on the stocking she was busy with, then she added it to the creamy pile on the table. By this time Arthur had staggered to his feet. ‘Gawd's sake, man, stand up!' she said, as Arthur flopped into the wooden rocking-chair she'd just vacated. But she sighed as she assessed his condition and gave up the struggle. Instead, she shook a pair of stockings free of the silky pile, rolled them up from the toes and tucked the top band of one around the whole roll to secure them together. Then she stacked them at the far end of the table for Amy to count.

Amy, at seventeen, found her father's drunkenness more difficult to bear. ‘He stinks of the pub!' she whispered, standing with her back to him.

‘Yes, and he's your father,' Dolly reminded her.

Amy shook her head fiercely at this lack of logic. She felt a hairpin or two loosen and a broad swathe of blonde hair threaten to fall free. She fixed it back in place. ‘How can I ever bring anyone back when he comes home in this condition?' she demanded in a high and mighty tone.

‘Why, who do you want to bring back here?' Dolly went to the fire to swing the battered tin kettle on to the hob.

‘I'm just saying
if. If
I wanted to bring someone home!' Amy said exasperated. She was a younger version of her mother, already slightly plumper than was fashionable, but with a developing sense of her own style and grace. She wore her waist nipped in tight, and made sure that her dark-blue day dress made the most of her
full breasts and hips. Her arms, which she considered too heavy, were carefully draped with full, lacy sleeves, but the plumpness showed at her wrists and ankles. Still, her blonde hair was naturally thick and wavy. She didn't need to pad it out with wire frames like some girls did.