The Bells of Bow (7 page)

‘How ’
bout
the tea?’ Evie screamed back at her. ‘Make it yerself. I ain’t got the time.’

Babs slapped the flat of her hand down into the washing-up bowl, sending a greasy spray of lukewarm water jetting across the floor. ‘Well, if yer want yer dinner things washed up, yer gonna have to tell that no good Albie Denham to get yer a bleed’n maid, ain’t yer?’

‘Oi, what’s all this row about?’

The sound of their father’s voice silenced both girls immediately; they knew better than to upset him after he’d been drinking. He stood in the kitchen doorway, his shirt hanging out of his trousers, his braces dangling round his knees.

‘Can’t a bloke even have a kip in his own front room of a Sunday afternoon without you pair shouting and hollering like a pair o’ bloody fishwives?’

‘It’s her,’ snapped Babs. ‘She’s a rotten, lazy cow.’

‘Me? You was the one what started it,’ Eve shrieked back at her.

‘Shut up!’ Georgie hollered above both their voices. ‘Now, what’s all this yer was shouting about Albie Denham?’

‘Nothing,’ said Babs, staring down at her feet.

Evie lifted her chin haughtily in the air. ‘If yer must know,’ she said, ‘I’m going out with him tonight.’

‘Aw no you ain’t, my girl.’

‘And why’s that then, Dad? You gonna stop me?’

‘If I have to.’

‘Don’t make me laugh.’ Evie folded her arms and tapped her toe impatiently on the thin, dull red lino that covered the kitchen floor. ‘Anyway,’ she demanded, flapping her hand in the air, ‘what you got against Albie Denham?’

‘As if you don’t know.’ Georgie hooked his braces up over his shoulders. ‘As if the whole of the bleed’n East End don’t know. They’re no-goods, the lot of ’em. Him with his flash clothes and his shiny motors, and his old girl with all her diamond rings. Never done a stroke o’ work in their life. None of ’em. Crooked bastards. And his old man’s just as monkey as his mother. If they X-rayed the whole lot o’ that family they wouldn’t find a stroke of work in any one of ’em.’

Evie strode furiously across the little kitchen and stood right in front of her father, her face like thunder as she glowered up at him. ‘Just hark who’s talking.’ She paused, hardly able to form the words. ‘I know what it is, yer jealous of him, ain’t yer? Just ’cos he’s made something of himself and not wound up a useless drunk like you.’

Babs grabbed hold of Evie’s arm and swung her round. ‘Shut up, Eve. That’s enough.’

‘I ain’t even
started
yet,’ hissed Evie, turning back to face her father.

Georgie hung his head. ‘Yer wouldn’t talk to me like that if yer mother was still around,’ he mumbled pathetically.

‘You, you’re a hypocrite just like her!’ Evie screeched at him, jerking her thumb in Babs’s direction. ‘No wonder yer can’t look me in the eye.’

‘Evie, shut up, please! Don’t talk to Dad like that.’

‘No.
You
shut up, Babs. What does he know about what Mum’d have let us do? If it wasn’t for him, Mum’d never have left us in the first place.’

Babs sat down on one of the hard kitchen chairs and stared at the floor, wishing that her sister would just be quiet and leave it alone before she said something they might all regret.

But Evie couldn’t stop herself, not now; she had to carry on shouting. She didn’t care who could hear her or what they thought, or what pain she caused. She considered herself too badly hurt for any of that to matter. And so it all come blurting out. ‘We might have been little but we heard yer rowing the night before she left us. Did yer know that?’ She spat the words at him. ‘And who could blame her for going? Just look at yer. You ain’t had a shave for days and yer stink o’ beer. I bet she couldn’t stand the sight of yer, just like I can’t. Yer make me sick just looking at yer.’

‘I never used to be like this.’ Georgie said the words so softly the girls could barely hear them. ‘Not till she run off and left us for that bloke down the market.’

‘Don’t give me that.’ Evie’s voice quavered as she fought back the tears. ‘If it wasn’t for you, me and Babs’d still have Mum here with us now. And everything’d be … Everything’d …’ The tears won and began flowing down her cheeks. ‘Aw, just get out of me way, can’t yer.’

Georgie moved placidly to one side as Evie stormed out of the kitchen. They heard her crash her way up the uncarpeted stairs and almost smash the bedroom door as she swung it back on its hinges.

‘She’ll calm down in a minute, Dad,’ said Babs softly. ‘Fancy a cup o’ tea?’

Georgie sank down in the carver chair that stood by the stove and nodded.

‘I’ll see if Evie wants one.’ Babs went to the bottom of the stairs to call up to her sister. ‘Wanna cuppa, Eve?’

Evie appeared on the tiny, unlit landing; she was wearing her hat and jacket. ‘No thanks,’ she answered tersely, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. ‘I’ve decided to go out early.’

Babs stood to one side to let her past. ‘Don’t be too late, Evie,’ she said quietly. ‘Remember it’s work in the morning.’

Evie waited till she had opened the street door before shouting down the passage loud enough to ensure that Georgie would hear, ‘I hardly think I’ll be working in that rotten workshop much longer, do you, Babs?’

‘Evie,’ Babs pleaded. ‘Keep yer noise down. Please.’

‘What’s the matter, Babs, worried that gossiping old cow over the road’ll hear?’

‘I couldn’t care less about her, I just don’t want yer getting Dad going, that’s all.’

‘Well, perhaps he won’t have to put up with me for much longer. ’Cos now I’m seeing Albie Denham, I don’t reckon I’ll stay a machinist in no poxy dress factory. Albie’s got class, yer see. So I’ll be leaving here soon, and I won’t be around to upset none of yer no more.’

‘Do us a favour and leave off, Eve,’ Babs said wearily. ‘Yer really getting on me nerves.’ She rubbed her hands over her face; she didn’t know what to do, but she knew it was pointless to try and argue with her sister. She shook her head and sighed. ‘Just leave off.’

‘No,
you
leave off, Babs.’ Evie was shouting even louder now, her fists tucked tight into her waist. ‘D’you know what’s really sad? You’ve got the chance to get on, just like me, ’cos his mate Chas really fancies yer. But yer too scared to take a chance. Just like you always are.’

Evie stepped out into the street and slammed the door behind her with an almighty bang, making the photograph of her and Babs as identical cuddling five-year-olds jump off its nail in the hall and go crashing to the ground.

Babs closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath before bending down to clear up the broken glass. She held out the bottom of her apron and dropped the shards into it, then picked up the photograph. It hadn’t been damaged but it looked forlorn and faded without the shiny covering of glass. The clips and wooden backing were still intact so she hung the now dull picture back on the wall and then walked slowly, head down, back to the kitchen. She stood in the open doorway and looked at Georgie slumped in the chair by the hearth, his legs stuck out in front of him, flicking half-heartedly though the Sunday paper.

‘All right, Dad?’ she asked softly.

Georgie folded the newspaper back on itself. ‘Full of bloody war again,’ he muttered furiously, his lips tight. ‘What’s wrong with people? Yer’d think they was looking forward to it.’

‘D’yer wanna go in the front room and have the wireless on?’ Babs asked over her shoulder as she wrapped the pieces of glass in an old blue sugar bag and put it in the rubbish bucket outside the back door. ‘I can do the washing up later on,’ she said.

‘No,’ he sighed, tossing the newspaper onto the floor. ‘You go in and listen if yer like.’

‘Tell yer what, I’ll turn it up so we can hear it in here, shall I?’

‘I said
no
,’

The anger in his voice made Babs flinch. ‘Sorry, Dad, I only thought—’

‘It don’t matter. It’s that Evie – she’s got me right hot and bothered. Just like her bloody mother, she is.’

Silently, Babs reached over and took her darning mushroom and a grey woollen sock down from the crowded mantelpiece. She sat down at the table and started mending the hole in its heel. She was going to suggest that they might take their chairs and go and sit out in the street instead, but she thought better of it considering his frame of mind and knowing that he was still recovering from one of his boozy lunchtime sessions in the pub.

Georgie carried on speaking, although he seemed hardly aware of Babs sitting there sewing. He wasn’t really addressing his daughter at all. ‘I’ve always said it,’ his words dripped venom, ‘there’s needy and there’s greedy, and then there’s the no-good sods like your no-good mother and that fancy no-good feller of hers. Just like that no-good bastard Albie Denham and the rest of his stinking family.’

Babs sat quietly darning, trying to lose herself in the rhythm of working the grey thread back and forth while Georgie ranted and raved about life’s injustices. Gradually his bellowing subsided and was replaced by loud alcohol-induced snores as he lay back in the chair, his mouth open, a line of drool dribbling onto his unshaven chin.

When she was sure he was sound asleep, Babs put the mended sock in her apron pocket ready to match up later with its partner in her Dad’s tallboy and stood up. She put the darning mushroom back on the mantelpiece then picked up the newspaper, folded it neatly and put it on the table close to Georgie’s chair.

‘Right,’ she said to herself. ‘No point sitting about. Someone’s gotta do it.’

She boiled some fresh water and finished the washing up. Then, when she had put all the dishes away, had wiped round the sink and draining board and was satisfied that the kitchen was tidy, she sat down at the table to have a look at the paper. Neither she nor her twin usually bothered much with the papers, and the news on the wireless always made them groan; as far as they were concerned the only thing worth listening to was the dance band programmes. But what with all the talk about Germany, she decided maybe she would have a little look this evening, just to see what all the fuss was about.

She spread the paper out on the table and slowly turned the pages. Dad was right, she thought, it was full of talk of war; she really hadn’t realised how serious it all was. Why hadn’t she? she wondered. There’d been plenty of talk, of course, but she’d dismissed most of it as scaremongering only worthy of the likes of the more gossipy of the elderly neighbours. But perhaps it was time she did start taking it seriously. Almost everything in the paper seemed to be about gas attacks and air raids. And the pictures, nearly every one was of men in uniform.

Babs swallowed hard as she looked closely at the grainy black and white photographs; some of the men were so young, not much older than Micky Clarke by the look of them, just like the boys from the streets around Grove Road who’d all rushed to join up, most of them boys that she and Evie had been out with at one time or another. Maybe Evie was right as well, she thought. Maybe it did make sense just to go out and enjoy yourself, no matter what. Say there was no tomorrow, what would it matter then if she went out with Chas, or even Albie Denham himself? What was the point in behaving yourself if the whole bloody country was going to be blown to bits or gassed to death?

Now even more depressed than she’d been after rowing with Evie, Babs closed the paper and went over to refill the kettle. That was always the answer, she laughed humourlessly to herself. ‘Have a cup o’ tea – that’ll save you from Hitler’s bombs.’

Babs made a full pot and poured two cups.

‘There’s a cup o’ tea for yer there, Dad,’ she said touching him on the arm. She soon wished she’d let him go without; almost the moment he opened his eyes he was back to moaning about the Denhams.

‘I don’t know what’s got into her,’ he complained. ‘What’s she wanna get herself hiked up with that moody bastard for?’

‘He might not be moody, Dad. Yer don’t know for sure.’

‘What, coming from that family? I know I ain’t been much of a dad, but I have got some feelings, and I’m worried about Evie, Babs. Right worried.’

She crouched down by his chair. ‘Listen to me, Dad. Evie’s always been a bit wild, we both have at times. But she ain’t daft. She knows how to look after herself. Anyway, she’s only having a good time. What’s the matter with that?’

‘I suppose yer think yer mother was only having a good time and all.’

Babs stood up. She went over to the sink and grabbed its cold, hard stone edge. Keeping her head bowed and her back to Georgie she said quietly, ‘That was spiteful, Dad. There was no need to say that.’

‘Yer right, I’m sorry.’ Georgie ran his hand through his thick, greying, though still glossy dark brown hair and down over his unshaven chin. ‘I’m a bit out o’ sorts, that’s all, girl.’

‘Yeah. Course.’ Babs went to say something, then hesitated. She stood silently for a minute. ‘Well,’ she said briskly, the moment past, ‘I’ll be going up now. I’ve gotta put me hair in pins for work in the morning.’ She turned to face him. ‘Don’t fall asleep in the chair again, will yer? Yer’ll give yerself a bad back.’

‘No, I won’t,’ he said smiling weakly. ‘Yer a good kid for worrying about yer old dad.’

Babs smiled back at him, her own effort even fainter than his.

Georgie grasped the arms of the chair and stood up. ‘I thought I might have a walk down the Drum for a quick half before I get meself up to bed.’

‘I ain’t got no money for yer, Dad,’ Babs said quickly, knowing that she had her bus fare for the week, the shopping money for food and very little else.

‘Don’t need none,’ said Georgie, inspecting his unshaven chin in the overmantel. ‘Jim and Nellie said to pop down and clear the tables for ’em. They’ll see me all right for a drink or two.’

With her hair set in pins ready for the morning, and with her dad and sister both out, Babs couldn’t think what to do next. She didn’t feel like reading any more of the paper and there was nothing on the wireless worth listening to. The house was still and silent.

She flopped down on the bed and lay listening to the sounds coming from the street below. Even though it would soon be dark there was still the happy laughter and shouting of children playing outside, making the most of the warm, late summer evening, while their mothers sat on their stone window ledges or on chairs they had fetched from their kitchens, exchanging the news and gossip of the day. The lively noises coming from outside made the silence inside the house seem even more depressing. Half-heartedly she levered herself up onto her elbows, deciding whether she could summon up the energy to get dressed again and go down to join her neighbours; but she couldn’t be bothered. She couldn’t even be bothered to turn on the lamp. She just flopped back down onto the pillows, pulled the eiderdown over her legs and lay there in the gradually darkening room trying to remember when she had last been entirely alone.