Lime Street Blues (40 page)

‘Why can’t we go to the christening?’ Mavis wanted to know, her little green eyes sparkling with annoyance.

‘Because I don’t feel like it,’ Rita said, folding her arms as if that was the end of the matter, but Mavis was having none of it.

‘That’s not a proper excuse.’

‘It’s a perfect excuse. I don’t feel like going and that’s all there is to it.’

‘But I want to see the new baby. I wouldn’t mind seeing Jeannie, either, come to that. I haven’t met her since your dad’s funeral and then we hardly spoke. Of all your friends, I like her best. That Marcia one really gets up me nose.’

‘That’s just too bad. You can’t go, so there.’

‘I can go on me own. Jeannie addressed the invitation to us both. See!’ Mavis waved the envelope in front of Rita’s nose. ‘Rita McDowd and Mavis Maguire, it says here.’

‘You’re not using the car.’

‘Then I’ll go on the bloomin’ train.’

‘I might not allow you the time off.’

‘I might remind
you
, madam, that I’m allowed time off. I’m not a bloomin’ slave. Next Sunday I’m going to Jeannie’s baby’s christening. You can like it or lump it, I don’t care.’

Rita sighed and stared out of the window of the house in Primrose Hill. The rain was coming down in buckets as it had been doing for days. ‘I hate driving in the rain,’ she said pathetically, realising that she’d lost. You’d never think she had her name in lights above a theatre in Haymarket, the star of a new musical,
Dusk in the City
, that had received rave reviews. Her own performance had been described variously, as ‘scintillating’, magnificent’, and ‘utter perfection’, yet here she was letting herself be messed about by an ex-lavatory attendant.

‘I’m the one who drives, ain’t I?’ Mavis, knowing that she’d won, said in a softer voice. ‘Anyway, the rain might’ve stopped by Sunday. If not, you can sit in the back and go to sleep.’

The church was packed with much the same crowd that had been at Ace’s christening. Jeannie had asked the widows of Dr Bailey and Kevin McDowd to be godmothers. ‘I don’t think there’s any rules about that sort of thing,’ she said to Lachlan. ‘This time, we won’t have a godfather. A fat lot of use Fly has been to Ace.’

Chloe Rose Bailey, two months old, screamed her angry head off throughout the entire service, the screams rising to a shriek of outraged horror when the first speck of water touched her black, curly hair. Her exhausted mother wasn’t the only one to feel relieved when they were able to leave the church and make their way back through the pouring rain to Noah’s Ark in a procession of cars.

Jeannie virtually ran into her daughter’s bedroom, wanting to fling her into the cot. Instead, she gritted her teeth and laid her carefully down in her frothy christening gown. Chloe’s face was bright red with rage. Her fists punched the air, her feet drummed against the mattress.
She’d lost one of her white satin booties, but Jeannie didn’t care.

‘There you are!’ Mavis came in, followed by Ace and a reluctant Rita. She bent over the cot. ‘Hello, Chloe,’ she cooed. ‘Why are you crying, darlin’? Can I hold her a minute?’

‘Help yourself.’

The minute Chloe found herself in Mavis’s plump arms, she stopped crying and fell asleep. Jeannie was impressed. ‘You’ve certainly got a way with children, Mavis.’

Ace, who would be two in June, was anxious to point out his baby sister’s attributes to the stranger. ‘She got a nose,’ he said, ‘and a mouf.’

‘So she has,’ Mavis agreed, ‘though they’re not as nice as yours.’

‘She cwies all night,’ Ace said importantly.

‘I bet you never did, darlin’.’

Watching, Rita felt the urge to be sick. She didn’t dislike babies, they were necessary for the continuance of the human race, but she couldn’t understand why people went all soppy over them.

‘Chloe’s a nice name,’ she said to Jeannie in an attempt to appear interested.

‘
I
think so. Lachlan wanted to call her Lucky, but I told him to get lost.’

Rita looked jealously at Chloe, warmly ensconced in Mavis’s arms, and hoped she wasn’t getting ideas again about being a mother. It was why Rita hadn’t wanted to come. At the last christening, Mavis had contented herself with just looking at the baby. This time, she’d actually got her rotten hands on it.

Mavis said, ‘You go and look after your guests,
Jeannie. Enjoy yourself. You too, Rita. I’m fine here.’ She sat down on a white upholstered chair.

‘Are you sure?’ Jeannie looked quite keen on the idea. ‘Come on, Ace.’

‘Wanna stay with Mavis.’

‘The more the merrier.’ Mavis held out an arm and Ace tucked himself inside it. ‘I’ll tell you a story, shall I?’

‘Please!’

Rita left the room as resentfully as she’d entered it.

‘Where are our children?’ Lachlan asked when he and Jeannie were about to push past each other in the packed hallway, which had an eerie appeal on a day like today with the rain bouncing off the domed glass roof.

She told him the children were with Mavis, who would make a perfect nanny. ‘She’s such a lovely person too. I’d love it if she came to live with us.’

‘Why not ask her?’

‘I would, except I don’t think Rita would be very pleased.’

‘Jeannie!’

‘Yes, Dad?’ Surprisingly, Tom had turned up again. He gave an awkward little cough. ‘I was wondering if you needed any gardening done? Disraeli Terrace isn’t enough to keep me busy.’

‘It wouldn’t feel right, Dad, employing my own father, paying him a wage.’

‘It wouldn’t feel right taking money off me own daughter, so you can forget about a wage. It’s just that your hedge needs pruning badly, and a couple of your trees don’t look so healthy. Last year, your roses had greenfly.’

‘Did they?’ Their present gardener frequently let them down. He doubled as a painter and decorator, and the
work always took precedence over the gardening side. ‘I tell you what, come and see us one day when it’s quiet and we can talk about it then.’

‘I’ll come tomorrow,’ he said with alacrity.

‘Where’s Mrs Denning? I thought you two were getting married.’

‘I’m not sure if I want another wife at my time of life. I’m comfortable as I am. I thought it best to let things stay as they are with Nora – Mrs Denning.’ He blushed ever so slightly.

‘Are you feeling all right, Dad?’

‘I’m fine, Jeannie. Never felt better. Why do you ask?’

‘No reason. I just wondered.’ It was well over a year since Marcia had made the doomladen prediction that there would be another death and it had been on her mind ever since. Even now, whenever the phone rang, she half-expected it to be the news that Tom had died.

Rose watched her daughter with the man who used to be her husband and felt sick. She reached for Alex’s hand and held it very tightly.

‘What’s the matter, sweetheart?’ he asked softly. He looked rather tired, she thought.

‘Nothing.’ Whenever she saw Tom, she felt the need to reestablish who she was. ‘I’m Mrs Rose Connors,’ she told herself. ‘Alex is my husband and always will be. Tom’s part of the past. He can never harm me again.’

‘I don’t know why we couldn’t stay at Jeannie’s like she asked,’ Mavis complained. ‘You’re not the only one who doesn’t like driving in the rain. All you have to do is sit and criticise. It’s about time you learned to drive yourself.’

‘I have a show to do tomorrow,’ Rita said haughtily. ‘I need to get back tonight.’

‘We could have left in the morning at the crack of dawn. You’d’ve still had plenty of time, and at least it would have been daylight.’ She wiped the windscreen with her sleeve and grimaced. ‘I can’t see proper.’

‘If you must know, I couldn’t wait to get away. You were driving everybody mad, the way you kept drooling over that baby. It was dead embarrassing. She has godmothers, you know, but they didn’t get a look in because of you.’

‘Mrs Bailey and Sadie sat with me for ages. We had a lovely natter. Every time one of ’em took Chloe, she bawled her head off. They were only too pleased to give her back to me.’

‘Mavis Maguire, the perfect mother.’ Rita gave a sarcastic laugh.

‘That’s what Lachlan must have thought. He offered me a job as the children’s live-in nanny.’

Rita felt the hairs rise on her neck. ‘What did you say?’

‘That I’d think about it.’

She’d die if she lost Mavis. The thought of life without her occupied Rita’s horrified mind for the next twenty miles. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked after the longest silence there’d ever been between them.

‘I ain’t sure, darlin’. It’s a lovely house that Noah’s Ark, ain’t it? I like it better since they’ve had it done up. I’ve always fancied learning to swim,’ she added casually.

‘We could have a pool put in the house in Yorkshire, much bigger than the Baileys’.’

‘Mm,’ Mavis said thoughtfully. ‘You’d never believe the wage Lachlan mentioned. He’s not a skinflint, not like some people I know.’

‘If you wanted more money, Mavis, all you had to do was ask.’

‘He said I’d have a car of me own.’

‘I’ll buy you a car of your own.’

‘A Mini? I’ve always fancied a red Mini.’

‘I’ll order one tomorrow.’

‘Oh, and he said something about a mink coat for Christmas.’

Rita looked at her suspiciously. ‘Are you having me on?’

Mavis burst out laughing. ‘Only about the mink. Everything else is true – and I’m holding you to the pool and the Mini and the hike in wages. I’d love to look after those kids, I really would, but although you can be a nasty piece of work when you’re in the mood, I’d never leave you, darlin’.’

It had been an exhausting day and Jeannie and Lachlan went to bed early. The rain continued to fall in torrents. Fly, whose second marriage was on the line, had come to the christening by himself. He’d drunk too much, even for a man who could normally hold his liquor better than most. He’d been put to bed in one of the spare rooms, incapable of driving back to London.

At midnight, dead on time, Chloe announced loudly that she was ready for a feed. Jeannie switched on the bedside lamp, staggered into her room, picked her up, and took her back to bed – there’d been no suggestion of keeping her with them as they’d done with Ace. The least sound woke Chloe and she associated waking up with food.

Jeannie climbed back into bed, undid her nightdress, and the baby greedily attached herself to her breast. Lachlan was fast asleep. Jeannie wouldn’t have minded
someone to talk to. It was a lonely business feeding a baby in the middle of the night. She shuffled around a bit in the hope of waking him, but it didn’t work. She cursed both him and their daughter and gave an extra loud sigh, but still Lachlan slept on.

Chloe was ready for the other breast when the telephone beside the bed rang. It was on Lachlan’s side, so she kicked him awake. ‘Phone!’ she hissed.

He grumbled something about being a famous pop idol and she had no right to kick him, before picking up the receiver.

‘Hello,’ he grunted. He listened for a moment, then shot out of bed. ‘Have you called a doctor?’ There was a pause. ‘Right,’ he said crisply. ‘We’ll be over straight away.’ He turned to Jeannie, his face stiff with shock. ‘That was your mother. Alex is dead.’

‘But he can’t be! We only saw him this afternoon.’

‘It only takes a second to die, babe. Get dressed. I’ll wake up Fly. He can take care of the children.’ He pulled on jeans, grabbed a sweatshirt, and left the room.

Jeannie didn’t argue. She put an indignant, half-fed Chloe on the bed and threw on some clothes. A perfectly sober Fly came in. ‘I’m sorry, Jeannie. Alex was a great guy. It was due to him the Merseysiders got off the ground. You don’t have to worry about Chloe. I’ve got kids of me own. I know what to do.’

The doctor hadn’t yet arrived and Alex was sitting on the settee, his head resting on the arm. He was ready for bed, in canary yellow pyjamas and a black corduroy robe. His eyes were open and his face unnaturally pale with the suggestion of a smile. He looked very peaceful.

‘He died in my arms,’ Rose had cried hysterically when she opened the door. She wore a blue quilted
dressing gown. ‘We were watching television and holding each other. After a while, I thought he seemed awfully still. I assumed he’d gone asleep. I moved away, I was going to make us some hot milk and go to bed, but he just fell on to the arm.’ She ran to the settee and kissed Alex’s still face, over and over. ‘What am I going to do without you?’ she screamed.

‘Oh, Mum!’ Jeannie pulled her mother away, guided her to a chair, and made her sit down. She stroked the soft brown hair. ‘It must have been a terrible shock.’

Lachlan was feeling for a pulse. He shook his head slightly, passed his hand over Alex’s eyes and gave a little sigh when they closed on the world for the last time. Then he went into the kitchen and returned with half a tumbler of whisky. ‘Drink this, Rose.’

‘I don’t want a drink,’ Rose shrilled. ‘I want Alex!’

‘Shush, Mum. You’re frightening the girls.’ Jeannie had only just noticed Amy and Eliza, two ashen-faced ghosts, sitting on the floor in their nightdresses in front of the dying fire. They looked terrified out of their wits.

‘Shall I take the girls to Mum?’ Lachlan asked. ‘She’ll look after them.’

‘If they’ll go. You’d better get their dressing gowns and slippers from upstairs.’

The terrified girls seemed relieved to be taken away from their dead father and hysterical mother. Lachlan had been gone less than a minute when the doctor arrived. He examined Alex briefly and phoned for an ambulance. ‘I’ll give you something for your mother,’ he said to Jeannie. ‘A sedative, very strong. It’ll make her sleep. Try and get her to take it straight away. She’ll feel better in the morning, though not much.’ He smiled wryly. ‘People get used to death eventually. Some take longer than others.’

‘What did Alex die of ?’

‘I suspect a heart attack,’ he said in a low voice, ‘but there’ll have to be a postmortem. I’ll wait for the ambulance, but then I’ll have to go. I have another call to make. In the meantime, perhaps you could get your mother into another room, away from the body. It’s not helping.’

Rose obediently took the tablet and hardly seemed to notice when Jeannie led her into the dining room. She was quieter now, resigned. She sat at the table and began to speak in a low, querulous voice. ‘We were watching one of those old black and white films. Alex loved them. We’d get ready for bed and cuddle down together on the settee. It was our favourite time of the day.’ She rambled on. They’d booked a holiday in Majorca in July. ‘As soon as the girls broke up. But we won’t be able to go now, will we?’ She looked hopefully at Jeannie, as if expecting her to say, ‘Why not?’ and that she’d only been imagining that Alex was dead. It had merely been a bad dream.