2003 - A Jarful of Angels Read online

  “The drink have addled her brain. Pity for Fatty, mind. He’s got no life, poor little dab. That father of his isn’t up to much either, he’s a right nasty piece of goods.”

  “Fancy,” said Mrs Bunting slurping her tea, “they come and took Mrs Prosser’s cooker last night.”

  “Her new one?” Nan sniffed. She had no truck with cookers. They were new-fangled nonsense.

  “Had a win on the horses, so she says. She only paid the deposit. Never made no more payments. The man from the Gop come to take it back.”

  “Dopey ‘aporth. Don’t know what she wants a cooker for, she can’t cook to save her life. All packets and tins with her.”

  “Well, there was all hell up. The man come at teatime. She was cooking Albie’s tea.”

  “Hotting up a shop pie, if I know her.”

  “Crying she was, begging the man to wait until the tea had finished warming.”

  “Up to her eyes in debt.”

  “Where’s your Iffy?” Mrs Bunting said.

  Iffy sat tight under the table, closed her eyes and held her breath.

  “Oh, out with Bessie Tranter somewhere.”

  “I seen Bessie and Mrs Tranter in town, in the Penny Bazaar. Iffy wasn’t with them,” said Mrs Bunting.

  Iffy hoped that they wouldn’t lift the tablecloth and find her out. Fingers crossed. Eyes shut. Count to ten.

  “I s’pect she’s out with Billy then.”

  They didn’t look under the table.

  “She’s like her father, that Bessie, mind. The spit of him.”

  “No mistaking where she come from.”

  Bessie didn’t look like her father at all. He was bald and limped. He had false teeth that clattered and chattered when he walked.

  “I was behind Dulcie Davies coming up from town on the bus. There’s a whiff off her.”

  “Filthy rotten, she is.”

  “Like a bucket of last week’s whelks.”

  Dulcie Davies was a lunatic. She lived in Iron Row. There were lots of lunatics in the town. Grancha once told Iffy that if ever Mr Hitler had invaded England and got as far as their town he would have taken one look at some of the daft buggers in the valley and run like hell.

  “Something I meant to ask you, I’ve had a bit of trouble with mouth ulcers again. Don’t suppose I could have a little drop of that holy water, just to dab on them.”

  “Ay, course you can. I’ll just get you some.”

  Iffy put her hand across her mouth. She wanted to shout out, “Don’t drink it, Mrs Bunting!” but she couldn’t.

  “Damn, it’s strong stuff that water.” Mrs Bunting made smacking noises with her lips.

  The two old women talked for hours. Iffy was stiff as a poker by the time she got out from under the table and she hadn’t heard anything interesting at all.

  The Catholic cemetery was at the top of a long steep hill overlooking two valleys. It was the burial place for Catholics from miles around. The climb was arduous, the road winding away up out of the town. Will passed the last of the houses, a few straggling pigeoncots and a row of dilapidated sheds. The road narrowed, the bends grew sharper, the climb steeper. At the top of the hill there was a wonderful view down into the next valley, but he didn’t stop to look. He pushed open the high wrought-iron gates and stepped into the cemetery.

  It was a long time since he’d been there, but his feet knew the way, he’d walked this path many times in his darkest dreams.

  The wind was keen and rain clouds were banking above the distant hills as he went on through the cemetery. An old man was kneeling in front of a grave, his head bowed. As Will got closer the man stood up and made the sign of the cross. When he saw Will, he smiled. It was the old man from the Italian café in town. His eyes were damp with tears, his lips quivering with emotion. He hurried away towards the gates. Will looked down at the grave. Fresh flowers had been placed there, deep-red tulips and white rosebuds. He read the inscriptions.

  Lucia Maria Zeraldo. Aged seven. Tragically taken from us.

  The second inscription read:

  Rosa Maria Zeraldo. Mother of Lucia, wife of Luca.

  She had died less than three months after her child.

  Will shivered as he took the last few steps.

  The grave was overgrown and he had to break the stranglehold of weeds and ivy from the headstone. He pulled at them until his hands were chafed and sore from the effort.

  The lettering was faded now, eroded by many winters. He slumped forward and had to rest his hands against the headstone for support.

  For the first time in years he spoke her name out loud. “Rhiannon.”

  He had never been able to hear the name without a cold band gripping his heart in a vice. He had never been able to say it before.

  “Rhiannon!” His voice echoed loudly among the graves.

  He had been a husband for only a few years. And it had all been wiped away one cold, merciless November night when all his joy had turned to grief. He had held her hand, had brushed his lips across her bruised head. Her eyes had closed, dark lashes falling across her cheeks like shadows. Her fingers had gripped his own nicotine-stained fingers as though she would never let go.

  He thought of the old Italian, who made his regular pilgrimage to the graves of his own wife and daughter all these long years. He would know what it was like, living the half life of those who had lost their greatest love.

  The name on the gravestone wobbled through his brimming tears.

  Rhiannon Louisa Sloane. Aged 25 years.

  Oh, Christ. That night when she’d been taken ill, collapsed with a brain tumour, he’d been…he’d been…He couldn’t bear to think of it. He had betrayed her utterly.

  He bent his head and wept properly for the first time, while the rain fell like a benediction of nails on his neck.

  Fatty took the lid off the box. The head of the statue sparkled in the sunshine. He lifted it out and laid it gently in his lap.

  All the green moss had been scrubbed away with a bar of Fairy soap that Iffy had stolen from home. Fatty had dug the mud and dirt out from the nostrils and ears with his penknife. Now the head was as white and smooth as a new candle.

  He turned it over in his lap. The stone hair was carved into a tight cap of curls around the head. He turned it back over. The nose tilted upwards towards the sky. The eyebrows were raised, the white lips smiled a secretive sort of smile. They were pretty lips.

  “You’re lovely,” said Fatty.

  He bent over and kissed the statue full on the lips.

  Iffy blew out through her nose and looked the other way. Disgusting.

  “It’s just a stone head, Fatty.”

  “I’m gonna give it back to her,” he said, laying the head tenderly back in the box.

  “To Carty Annie?”

  “No!”

  “What do you mean then?”

  “I’m gonna sneak in there,” he said pointing towards the Big House, “and I’m gonna stick it back on…they say she comes looking for her head. P’raps she’ll be at peace then.”

  “You’re mad! What if you get caught?”

  “You can’t get done for mending something, can you? I’m doing her a favour.”

  “You don’t even know who she was.”

  “Carty Annie knew her. That’s why she kept the head.”

  “Where did she get it from?”

  “She found it down in the grass by the river. She reckoned old Medlicott went berserk, smashed the head off and threw it over the wall.”

  “Why?”

  “Carty Annie said he was in love with the girl – that she was having a baby by him – only she wasn’t.”

  “She wasn’t having a baby?”

  “No, she was having a baby.”

  “You just said she wasn’t!”

  “No. Listen. She was having a baby, but it wasn’t old Medlicott’s, it was somebody else’s who she was in love with. Old Medlicott found out and went nuts.”

  “He didn�
��t chop her head off in real life though, did he?”

  “No. Carty Annie said she thinks they took the baby down to the home for bad girls.”

  “What happened to her?”

  “The baby?”

  “No, the girl.”

  “They sent her back to where she came from.”

  “Where was that?”

  “Spain. It’s dead sad, isn’t it?”

  Iffy didn’t answer him. She was sick of the stupid head and his daft ideas.

  Fatty stood on the step of Iffy’s house in Inkerman Terrace, hopping up and down, bursting with excitement.

  “Guess what, Iffy! The puppies have been born!”

  “Honest?”

  “Yep! And one of them looks just like Barny! You wanna see them?”

  “Will Mr Sandicock let us?”

  “No, course he won’t, but they’re out in one of the old sheds, there’s a way to get round the back and see them through the window. Come on, I’ll show you!”

  “I’m not going in the grounds, Fatty!”

  “You don’t need to, come on,”

  Fatty led the way, skirting the walls of the Big House until they came into the cover of trees alongside some outbuildings.

  “Up there!” Fatty said, pointing to a window that had bars on it but no glass. “I’ll climb up first and take a decker, she’s used to me, she don’t bark any more when she sees me.”

  “How do you mean, she’s used to you?”

  “Cos I been coming for ages to get to know her, so’s when she had the pups she wouldn’t be afraid of me.”

  Iffy thought that animals always loved Fatty, so did kids unless grown-ups interfered and told them not to bother with him.

  “How you gonna get up there?”

  He tapped the side of his nose and winked. Then he disappeared back into the bushes and came out pulling two wooden pop crates behind him. He put one below the window and stacked the other one on top of it. Then he climbed up on top of them. He was just tall enough to look in through the window.

  “Hello, old gel…we’ve come to have a look at your pups…beautiful they are too, I brought Iffy to see ‘em…Iffy won’t hurt them. She’s nice.”

  Fatty jumped down from the crate.

  “Have a look, Iffy. See if you can guess which one I want.”

  Fatty gave her a leg up onto the crate. He had to steady the crates for her.

  At first she couldn’t see much at all. She screwed up her eyes and peered into the darkness. Then she saw! In one corner of the shed a big black dog lay curled on a pile of old blankets. She stared at Iffy with soft brown eyes.

  Iffy was afraid she’d bark and that Mr Sandicock would come running, but the dog just whined at her. When Iffy’s eyes grew used to the dimness she saw the pups. Five little humps of fur lying close to the mother dog’s belly. Their little tails were wagging, their wet noses snuffling.

  They were really beautiful. Four of them were dark like the mother but one of them was the exact colour of Barny, and it was the most lively one of them all. It would suit Fatty.

  “Can you guess?” Fatty asked.

  “Yep! The brown wriggly naughty one! When you gonna ask if you can have him?”

  “They got to be about six weeks old before they can leave their mam.”

  Then, with a crash, Iffy fell off the crate.

  Fatty grabbed her and she put her finger to her lips, “Someone’s come in the shed,” she hissed.

  “Stay still,” Fatty whispered. “Get up against the wall in case they look out of the window.”

  They flattened their bodies against the wall. Iffy could hear her heart beating and hoped that whoever was inside couldn’t hear it knocking against the wood.

  They kept quiet and listened. The sound of angry voices came through the window.

  “Take a look at them, you half-baked clot! Get her covered by a bloody black Labrador! It wasn’t a bloody black Labrador that covered her or I’m a bloody monkey’s uncle!” said Mr Sandicock.

  “Honest to God! It was, mun, I watched them at it!” said Dai Full Pelt.

  “I’ll tell you what, Dai, I want my bloody money back! I paid you good money to get that bitch covered by a pedigree and what have I got? A litter of bastard mongrels!”

  Fatty nudged Iffy and whispered in her ear.

  “Told you so. You watch. They’ll give them away when they’ve been weaned.”

  “Honest to God, Mr Sandicock, it was a black Labrador. On my mother’s life!”

  “On your mother’s life! Your mother’s been dead for years. You must be a bloody dull bugger! You couldn’t tell a black Labrador from a bloody polar bear. I want my money back!”

  “P’raps you can sell them a bit cheaper, Mr Sandicock.”

  “Sell them! You can sell pedigrees, Dai! Mongrels are two a sodding penny. These you’ll have to bloody give away. I’ll leave that up to you, you stupid bloody article, you.”

  “Told you,” Fatty said, grinning. “And when they’re old enough I’m gonna ask for one. I’m saving up for a lead and a collar.”

  He would ask too. Fatty wasn’t afraid of anyone or anything. He’d be dead lucky to have a pup all of his own.

  They waited until the voices died away, checked that no one was about and scuttled off back up the lane.

  Bessie had five shillings to spend, and Iffy was going with her to buy sweets, but when they got to Morrissey’s shop the blinds were pulled down on the windows, so they went for a walk to pass the time until he opened up.

  Iron Row was narrow and dark, it wasn’t a proper street just four little cottages joined together. They would have been pretty if they’d been whitewashed, but they were caked with black dirt and moss grew from the cracks in the walls. There were slates missing off the roofs and the chimneys were crooked.

  The flagstones in Iron Row were loose and a smattering of black mud sloshed up over Bessie’s new socks. They were nice socks, shiny white cotton with two pale-pink bands around the tops.

  Bessie made it worse by rubbing it. She said her mam would kill her, but she always said that. Her mam hardly ever even told her off.

  A skinny brown dog with three legs followed them and tried to sniff up Bessie’s frock. It belonged to Mrs Maloney who lived down in town. She had a husband called Custard Lungs although no one could remember why.

  Bessie squealed as the dog’s nose disappeared up her frock.

  “Sniff, sniff, sniff,” went the dog.

  “Eek, eek, eek!” went Bessie.

  She ran round and round in circles trying to get away from him but he thought it was a good game and carried on until he got giddy and fell over. He hopped away down the Row, peeing as he ran.

  Two girls came out of the second house along and stood on the step looking them up and down, especially Bessie. They raised their eyebrows at her posh clothes. Done up like a dog’s dinner she was, even for playing out.

  Iffy thought they looked a right rough pair of bruisers. They were twins. Red-haired and white-skinned with thin pale-pink lips like kittens.

  Bessie stared back at them.

  “Don’t stare, Bessie! Look the other way.”

  Bessie always gawped and it made people mad.

  “Oy, you! You dropped something!” one of the girls shouted as they drew level.

  Ifyy didn’t look round, she wasn’t going to fall for that old trick.

  Bessie did.

  “Too late, the flies are on it!” yelled one of the girls. They laughed and pointed and stuck out their tongues.

  Bessie glared at them.

  “Keep it shut, Bessie! Just keep on walking.”

  “What do they mean, the flies are on it?”

  Iffy spoke between clenched teeth, staring straight ahead, “They mean you’ve just shit.”

  “Ugh! You dirty filthy pigs!”

  The girls were already halfway down the Row.

  Iffy pulled Bessie roughly by the arm, “Run, Bessie!”

  Bessie was ho
peless at running and the twins were hot on their heels. Iffy looked behind her. Their pink eyes were deepening to red, sharp teeth, fists like bananas. The Price twins!

  “Shit!”

  She’d heard of them. Rosalind and Rosemary Price – they were nutcases – they’d even beaten up Mervyn Prosser. They were gaining on her and Bessie by the second.

  Then, suddenly, they stopped dead in their tracks.

  “Go on, piss off back up your own end! You carrotty pair of bastards.”

  Iffy recognised the old woman as soon as she saw her because she’d met her once with her nan outside the wet fish shop in town. Disappointed, the twins hotfooted it away, back up the Row.

  Iffy nudged Bessie, and whispered, “That’s Dulcie Davies.”

  “Who?”

  Iffy knew loads more people than Bessie did because Bessie’s mam hardly spoke to anyone.

  “Dulcie Davies! She’s a lunatic. She used to do it with sailors for money and she pees in milk bottles.”

  “Ugh.”

  Iffy thought it would be hard to pee in a milk bottle.

  “Once she took all her clothes off in the Black Prince and danced a hornpipe.”

  “She never did! She’s about ninety. Come on, let’s go.”

  Dulcie Davies stood on the step of the last house squinting down the Row towards them. Fatty had told Iffy that she ate live eels and fish eggs and sucked raw fish heads like they were sweets. Fatty said he’d seen her and that if you cut open her belly it would be full of millions of tiny fish that had hatched out from all the eggs she’d eaten.

  Iffy knew they were trapped: the twins were behind them; Dulcie was in front. She walked on quickly, telling Bessie to look the other way, but they weren’t quick enough. Dulcie Davies came off her step and came towards them. She walked sideways like a crab. She stopped in front of Iffy.

  “Come in, pretty girls, and give an old lady a hand to light the fire,” she said, and before they had a chance to run she snapped her bony hand over Iffy’s wrist.

  “Don’t go in!” Bessie said.

  Dulcie Davies held on to Iffy tightly and though she was nothing but a bag of skinny bones, she was very strong. Iffy grabbed hold of Bessie’s sleeve and tried to drag her along too, but Bessie wriggled her arm out of her fluffy bolero and was off and running, her skinny pins going nineteen to the dozen.