Birmingham Rose (10 page)

‘Well – I’m not sure about that,’ she said. ‘I’d have to think about it, wouldn’t I?’

Alfie immediately took this as a refusal. He ran after her awkwardly in his cement-caked trousers. ‘Well tell me your address then – or I might not see you again. We finish here today, see.’

‘Court eleven, Catherine Street,’ Rose called over her shoulder to him. ‘Got to go or I’ll be late. Tara, Alfie.’

It was a tiring day. She ran back and forth to the markets with messages amid the seething activity in the echoing building hung with the skinned sides of animals. There were so many invoices and bills to be sorted out that she was not much in the office until the afternoon. When she finally came back the short distance up Bradford Street and along the side street to Lazenby’s she saw that the lights were on and the place looked quite warm and inviting.

Upstairs Mr Lazenby was standing in the main office with Jo Perks from the meat market. Miss Peters had already left, her desk cleared and immaculate. Michael still seemed to be concentrating at his desk.

‘Hello stranger,’ he said, looking up. ‘They’ve certainly kept you on the go today haven’t they?’ He closed the ledger and tidied a few sheets of paper. ‘Well – that’s me done. I’m off to the Adam and Eve for a quick one.’ Rose smiled as he smoothed back his shiny black hair and put his jacket on. She knew it would be more than a quick one. ‘Tara. See you in the morning, kid!’

‘Bye,’ Rose said, smiling after him. She watched him walk jauntily to the top of the stairs. Just before he disappeared down them he turned and raised his thumb to her with a smile, and she grinned and waved at him.

Jo Perks and Mr Lazenby were standing sorting through a pile of slinks – the hides of unborn calves which Lazenby’s also purchased from the markets. They went to make fancy wallets and purses.

Rose looked at her table to see if there were any jobs that needed doing, and then began to get ready to leave. Her feet were very chilled and tired and she thought longingly of soaking them in a pail of hot water when she got home.

But as she made to go Mr Lazenby called over to her. ‘Rose – if you wouldn’t mind hanging on a minute till I’ve finished with Mr Perks. I’ve got a couple of things need sorting out.’

Rose nodded and waited as Mr Lazenby showed out the dapper figure of Jo Perks, carrying a couple of the rolled-up slinks that hadn’t come up to scratch.

‘Come here a minute, Rose,’ Mr Lazenby said in his polite but brisk business voice.

He stood back to let her into his office, where the light was already on, making it look completely dark outside. He closed the door behind them.

With rather odd enthusiasm he said, ‘I tell you what. Since we’re out of hours, you sit in the boss’s seat. Go on, for a bit of a joke like. Yes, that’s right my dear. Go along and sit yourself down!’

Rose walked round to the big chair behind Mr Lazenby’s desk. It had wooden arms and a shiny leather seat. She looked uncertainly at Mr Lazenby, who stood the other side of the desk. His worn black jacket was unbuttoned and as he leaned down to rest his weight on his hands on the desk, the flaps of the jacket swung outwards making him look enormously wide.

Rose began to wonder if he’d been drinking. She’d never seen Mr Lazenby looking so animated. But he was normally a very abstemious man – known for it in fact. His soft cheeks had more colour in them than usual and he kept tapping his fingers restlessly on the top of the desk.

‘There are a couple of invoices I’ll need first thing,’ he said once Rose was seated on the slippery chair, which smelt rather sweaty, like Mr Lazenby. ‘Since you’re so good at writing, you can write these ones out yourself. How about that?’ he said.

He opened one of the desk drawers and produced a wodge of forms, then handed Rose a pen. ‘This one’s for Clark’s, so write in the name up there – you know how to do it,’ he said, pointing with a grubby finger. He gave her details of the address and Rose slowly wrote them on the invoice sheet in her very neatest handwriting. Mr Lazenby watched over her shoulder.

‘Very good,’ he said, and Rose jumped because the voice sounded so close to her.

‘Now – the next bit,’ he said.

Rose sat with her heart beating fast. She was beginning to sweat under her arms. She didn’t know what Mr Lazenby was up to but he was making her most uneasy. She just wanted to get the job done and go home.

As she was listing the items on the form she suddenly felt Mr Lazenby’s hands moving round her and cupping her breasts. She gasped out of shock and discomfort because he was pressing her quite hard. She sat quite still, completely unable to think what to do. What on earth had come over him? This was a mistake – a terrible mistake. Mr Lazenby must realize it in a minute and stop touching her. She thought her heart was going to burst it was beating so loud, and her hands had gone clammy.

‘Stand up,’ Mr Lazenby ordered. His voice sounded polite still, but had a hard, unfamiliar edge to it. He pulled her up by moving his hands under her arms and he steered her away from the chair. Rose obeyed, bewildered. She was very afraid, but she couldn’t think what else to do. The building around them had gone quiet.

After that, quite silently except for his breathing, which sounded loud and fast, he pulled her against him. She was still facing the desk, the impassive blotter, the penholder and the set, smiling faces of his children. He moved up and down against her buttocks, fitting himself close to her.

He began grabbing at her clothes, the green cardigan and soft white blouse. He lost patience with the buttons and she heard the blouse tear apart at the front. The image of Miss Smart’s face as she had ripped Rose’s bloomers that day filled her mind for a second. At least then she had understood what was happening.

‘Stop it, Mr Lazenby – please,’ she begged, her voice turning high like a little girl’s. ‘I don’t like this. Please stop and let me go home.’

She turned her head and felt a plunging sensation of revulsion at the sight of him behind her. He didn’t look like Mr Lazenby any more. His eyes were half closed and seemed to be rolled up into the lids so he looked all peculiar, as if he were in a trance. And his tongue was sticking stiffly out of his mouth towards her ear.

‘What are you doing?’ she shouted. ‘Help me somebody – please. Please!’

She tried to get his hands off her, but as if prompted by her cries, Mr Lazenby shoved her to the floor, cold against her breasts and stomach as she writhed and kicked. She felt his knee in her back pinning her to the floor, and twisting round she saw he had unbuttoned his trousers and was rubbing himself with his hand, fast up and down. He pulled off her underwear and stockings, pausing to caress himself with one hand as he did so. She knew she didn’t have the strength to get away from him. She put her arms flat on the floor and laid her head down so she didn’t have to see his face with its self-absorbed expression or his horrifying, swollen member.

He pushed her skirt up and made her move her legs apart. She had never taken her clothes off in front of a man before, not even a doctor. She pressed her eyes shut at the shame of it. Tears squeezed from her lids on to the floor. She thought at least she hadn’t got her monthly to add to the humiliation. She knew that what Mr Lazenby was doing must be what she had heard her father do so often to her mother, but it didn’t prepare her any better for what happened next.

He gradually forced one of his fingers up inside her so that she squirmed and cried out in shock and pain.

‘Oh . . .’ Mr Lazenby gave a low groan. ‘Young, tight.’

They were the only words he spoke until he’d finished. Quickly he climbed on her and forced hard up into her from behind and she screamed and then whimpered at his repeated movements. Each time he pushed into her she felt a terrible stab of pain somewhere deep in her guts. Her hipbones and ribs were grinding hard against the floor with the weight of him on top of her and she was finding it hard to breathe. She lifted her head, sobbing and trying to take in gasps of air so her mouth dried out. It took some time before he managed to finish, and he came at last with a loud, relieved cry.

When he had stumbled off her he buttoned himself up again and watched as she slowly pulled herself off the floor and found her clothes. The wet ran down her legs as she stood up and her tears wouldn’t stop coming. She didn’t look at Mr Lazenby when she was clothed again. She began to walk mechanically to the door.

Mr Lazenby gave a little cough. ‘Er – Rose, just a minute,’ he said.

She forced herself to look round and saw he was bringing his wallet out of his jacket.

‘I’ve been thinking. You’ve done your best since you’ve been here,’ he said in his normal courteous voice. ‘But I’m not sure this is really a job for a lass. I’ve decided to let you go and get a lad in like we’ve always had. It’ll be for the best I think.’

He was holding out a pound note to her.

‘Here – take a couple of weeks’ pay. And if you need a decent reference you can rely on me, you know that.’

He came a little closer, holding the money out as if he was trying to tempt a dangerous animal. Rose quickly snatched the note, backing away from him again.

He unlocked the door and she went slowly down the stairs and out into the freezing evening, holding in her hand a larger sum of money than she’d ever earned at once before.

Coronation day. All over the nation there were excited preparations to celebrate the crowning of a new king – George VI. Red, white and blue bunting rippled and flapped along Catherine Street in the bright spring morning. Union Jacks billowed out from the sills of some of the houses, and as it was a day off work for everyone, the road was more full of people than usual. Already the inhabitants of the street were setting up trestle tables along the pavements, to be laid later with white cloths and heaped with plates of food for the street’s celebration party. George and his little band of followers were tearing in and out of the courts in their draggle-arsed shorts, pretending to be aeroplanes with a lot of roaring sound effects and getting under everybody’s feet.

In Court 11 most of the women were inside hastily icing platefuls of tiny sponge cakes and slicing bread for the little triangular sandwiches which would grace the tables later on. Old Lady Gooch declared, breathing heavily as she went to inspect what was happening in each house, that she’d made a ‘rich fruit Dundee – one of me best’. Her large bloodshot eyes ran over every contribution to make sure everyone was doing their whack and that there’d be enough to go round in the afternoon. She was still wearing her working clothes. The dressing up would come later and the pawn shops had been rifled for suitable clothes, some of which had not seen the light of day for months or longer.

The happiest person in the court that day was Grace Lucas. Not only was she to leave school that summer, but she was ecstatic that there was another coronation so soon after the last. Now she’d got over her grief at the death of her beloved King George V and the startling abdication of his successor Edward VIII, she was ready to throw herself wholeheartedly into the occasion. She had trimmed the edges of her frock by hand with strips of red, white and blue, and decorated a straw hat in the same colours with elaborate ribbons and bows. With it pulled on over her straggly brown hair, her pale, sweet face was almost pretty. Even Sid had noticed and commented that he’d never seen her looking such a ‘fine lass’ before.

‘Rose – you can’t miss coming this afternoon,’ Grace entreated her sister, who was scraping the last hardening crust of white icing out of a mixing bowl. ‘It wouldn’t be the same without you. You’re not thinking of the neighbours are you?’

‘Bit late for that isn’t it?’ Rose said sourly. ‘I’m just not in the mood, that’s all, and I need a rest. I cleaned that blooming pub from top to bottom yesterday and I could do with a lie down. I don’t feel right.’

Grace’s and Dora’s eyes met and Grace shrugged. She couldn’t get close to Rose any more. She felt like crying when she looked at her older sister standing by the table. She was wearing an old dress of Dora’s which they’d shortened together and tucked up at its wide, loose waist. Her belly was straining forward with the unmistakable curve of pregnancy. She was having to lean more than usual towards the table to accommodate the shape of the child. Her hair was hanging limply down her back and around her face. Grace couldn’t help thinking – with the realization of how aware Rose must be of it too – that she looked just like a miniature, black-haired version of her mother.

‘Leave her,’ Dora said rather irritably. She was tired, being now seven months pregnant herself, as well as having had to deal with all the goings-on over Rose.

‘I’m going to go and see how they’re getting on outside,’ Grace said a bit huffily. Her mother and sister had an understanding nowadays that she definitely was not part of.

She went out into the street to look up and down at all the busy preparations. She saw someone coming towards her along the street and for a few seconds she couldn’t place who it was. Then she was back across the court to the house as fast as she could move.

‘Rose!’ she shrieked. ‘He’s here again!’

Rose looked up lifelessly. ‘Who?’

‘That bloke – Alfie – the one who come before. He’s got flowers this time.’

‘Oh no,’ Rose said. Dora and Grace could both hear the panic in her voice. ‘Don’t let him see me, for God’s sake.’ She was wiping her hands so hurriedly that she fumbled and dropped the cloth. ‘Go and tell him I’m not here again. Tell him I’ve gone away or something.’ And she was off upstairs.

Grace managed to reach Alfie as he was coming into the court. ‘You looking for Rose again?’ she asked, thinking what kind eyes he had and how funny his hair looked all sticking up like that.

‘Is she here?’ Grace could hear the combined hope and nervousness in his voice. ‘I’d really like to see her – if she’ll let me.’

At that moment young Harry waddled up and stood staring at this strange man who had appeared. He had wide blue eyes and a fat tummy. And he had nits and was forever scratching busily at his head.