Poppy Day (36 page)

‘I still can’t get used to it,’ Olive said. ‘Having time to walk about and shop – not queueing for hours for everything. Just not ’aving the war on.’ Things had returned, in so far as they could, to normal. Bert was one of the fortunate ones who had his old job back at the rolling mills. The three girls had all squeezed into one room to let him have a bed, although Sis would soon be gone, and the house had settled into a routine again.

‘It’s lovely, ain’t it!’ Sis was truly full of the joys of spring and everything else too. ‘Ooh – this time in two weeks! Let’s hope and pray none of us go down with the influenza.’

‘There’s a lot bad with it,’ Olive said. ‘No good thinking about that.’ She made a wry face at Jess. ‘Come on – let’s go an’ put ’er out of ’er misery.’

They spent a leisurely few hours combing through the rag market and along the shops, looking at bolts of cloth, hats and shoes, weighing up what Sis had already and what would need to be bought. When it came down to a choice between two materials, Olive favoured a plain lilac cambric.

‘Oh no!’ Sis protested. ‘I’d look like a flaming nursemaid or summat in that. Look – what about this? It’s really pretty – for a spring wedding.’

She ran her hand over a soft lawn with a pattern of honeysuckle and roses on it. Jess smiled. Despite Sis’s desperation to get married, she’d said she wasn’t going to do it in December, oh no. It had to be in the spring with flowers and sunshine. Jess could immediately imagine Sis in the floral material, flowers, or perhaps even a little tulle veil in her hair . . .

‘Oh Auntie!’ she cried. ‘That’s Sis to a tee.’

Their eyes met for a moment and Jess knew they were both thinking the same thing: Louisa. It was just the pretty, romantic sort of stuff Louisa would have chosen.

Olive fingered the price label. It wasn’t too expensive: Sis had made quite a simple choice.

‘It’ll be easy to work with, that will,’ Jess cajoled her aunt. In the end, Olive nodded.

As the morning progressed, Sis chose a pretty straw hat which she could decorate with flowers, and settled for a pair of second-hand shoes, white, with a ribbon bow on the front.

‘They’re a bit scuffed.’ She eyed the toes of them.

‘We can stick some whitener on ’em,’ Jess encouraged her.

‘They’re ever so comfy.’ Sis was clearly delighted with them. ‘Must’ve been pricey new.’

‘I could do with a sit down,’ Olive said, after all these deliberations. ‘Let’s treat ourselves to a cuppa tea and a bun.’

As they sat together chatting and sipping tea, Jess looked at her aunt. If there’s one good thing, she thought, that’s come out of Ned leaving me like he did, it’s me and Auntie getting on again. That tension between her lover and her family which had torn at her for so long was gone now. She felt a great surge of affection for the stout woman in front of her with her worn face and hands. Her sad past. As Sis chattered on about Perce and the house they were going to rent together in Balsall Heath, Jess thought, she’s been my only real family, Auntie has. I owe her everything.

‘My treat today,’ she said, handing over the money for the tea. ‘Since you’ve got to put up with me about for a bit longer yet.’

‘Oh—’ Olive hauled herself up from the table. ‘That’s awright, bab. I shan’t like an empty ’ouse, that I shan’t.’

They ambled down along Spiceal Street and Sis, catching sight of the flower ladies, surrounded by their bouquets and all yelling in raucous competition, moved on to the subject of what sort of posy she was going to carry. Jess was just about to remark that she’d already have flowers in abundance all over the dress, when she noticed Olive was no longer walking beside her. She turned.

‘Auntie?’

Olive had stopped and was standing quite still, one hand laid over her heart. Her eyes were stretched wide with an expression which Jess read as pain, and she hurried back to her.

‘You feeling poorly, Auntie?’ she asked, frightened. She took Olive’s arm and her aunt didn’t shake her off.

Sis came rushing back too. ‘What’s up, Mom?’

‘Over there . . .’ Olive was staring across towards a fruit and veg stall.

In that second Jess understood that her face was full not with pain but with fear. They followed her gaze and Jess saw a thin, stooped old lady in a black coat and hat. She was buying spuds and the stallholder was tipping them into her carrier for her. They could only see her in profile, but Jess made out a sharp face with a pointed nose and slack, yellowish skin.

‘Oh God alive . . . It is – it’s ’er . . .’ Jess felt Olive sag as if she was going to collapse, and grasped her arm more tightly under Olive’s, feeling her trembling. Her face had gone sickly white, perspiration breaking out on her forehead.

‘Who?’ Sis was staring across wildly, not understanding.

‘It’s that woman,’ Jess said. ‘Doris . . .?’

‘Adcock,’ Olive added, her eyes still fixed on her. ‘She’s there – I ain’t imagining ’er, am I? She really is there?’

‘That lady in the black hat?’ Sis frowned. ‘You sure it’s ’er?’

‘Yes . . . oh . . .’ Olive gave a moan, a hand going to her mouth.

‘My God, Auntie—’ Jess squeezed her aunt’s arm fiercely. ‘What in God’s name did she do to yer?’ She was appalled to see Olive, so strong, so brave, reduced to this by the memories of this woman’s cruelty. She saw that no one has power like that of an adult over a child.

Olive shook her head. ‘Just the sight of her . . . Oh, I feel bad.’

Sis handed her mother a handkerchief and Olive mopped her forehead.

Jess felt as if she was swelling inside with rage and indignation.

‘We’ll go and give ’er a talking to, that’s what we’ll do.’

‘No!’ Olive said faintly. ‘I can’t . . .’

‘She’s just an old woman,’ Sis said.

‘So what if she’s old – what excuse is that?’ Jess was on fire. ‘You might be frightened of her, Auntie, but I’m certainly not. Come on – she’s moving off. We’ll lose ’er else.’

The old woman had begun to shuffle off with her walking stick along towards St Martin’s Church, her lips seeming to move in an endless mumbling patter as she did so. Jess pulled the others along, following until they reached a less crowded little spot near the church gate, and released her aunt’s arm.

‘Oi – you. Missis!’

The old woman took no notice so Jess tapped her on the arm and she stopped abruptly. In that second Jess saw two watery eyes peering at her from under the hat brim with a steely hostility. Startling, horrible eyes with their double pupil, giving her the cold, glassy look of a cat.

‘Doris Adcock?’

‘Who’re you?’ She squinted at Jess.

‘You deaf? I said are you Doris Adcock?’ Jess experienced almost a sense of ecstasy rising in her. Her fury was so strong, so complete, her body so taut with it, there was a kind of perfection in it. It was the most soaring emotion she had felt in a long time and she was ready to knock the old crone into the day after tomorrow.

She saw the old woman nod reluctantly. The whites of her eyes were a sludgy yellow, lips mean and crinkled as pastry cutters.

‘D’you know who this is?’

She heard Olive say, ‘Oh Jess – no . . .’

Doris turned and looked at Olive with a vague bewilderment. Olive quailed under her gaze, gripping Sis’s arm.

‘This is Olive. Olive Tamplin, she was. From your old neighbourhood. Remember?’ Jess had her hands on her hips. She wasn’t speaking loudly, but she could hear the menace in her own voice. ‘Had a sister called Louisa. Their mom was called Alice. Alice Tamplin. Bet you remember her awright, don’t yer?’

There was a horrible moment as recognition seeped into the old woman’s expression, a look of unguarded malice which narrowed her eyes and contorted her face.

‘Yes.’ She tapped the stick vehemently on the ground. ‘The babykiller.’

Jess heard Olive give a whimper just behind her, and for a moment she had an urge to tighten her hands round Doris’s scrawny throat and crush the life out of her.

‘And you thought it was your business to follow ’er children and hound them, torment them until they was too frightened to live in that neighbourhood so they moved on, and even then yer’d still follow ’em and spread yer poison about them until life was hell for them. A worse hell than it already was without their mom because you saw to it she was locked up and the key thrown away!’

Jess had her face right close up to Doris’s. She could hear the woman’s whispery, agitated breathing, but her eyes looked back as cold as stones.

‘Have you got children, Doris?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well you never should ’ave!’ Jess spat at her. ‘Nature should’ve dried your womb up before it let you breed any more of you. You’re a cruel, vicious bitch and you made life hell for my auntie for no reason. You just had nowt better to do than be cruel and make life as rotten as possible . . .’

‘She killed a babby,’ Doris croaked. ‘Murdered it with ’er bare hands. People ’ad a right to know what was living in their neighbourhood . . .’

‘But you carried on when she weren’t even there!’ Olive spoke, crying, and Sis was holding her arm. ‘On and on, never leaving us be. She was gone, our mom, and we never saw ’er again.’

‘What’s bred in the bone . . .’ Doris said. The very sight of her filled Jess with horror. She had viciousness stamped through her like a stick of rock. ‘I’d do it again tomorrer, that I would. She was a wicked woman, that Alice was . . . she walked the streets parading ’er crime. She were proud of it. Don’t tell me that ain’t evil in a woman.’

‘She was sick,’ Olive moved closer, sobbing. ‘She was poorly, our mom was – after the babby . . .’

‘Not half as poorly as you are though, Doris,’ Jess snarled. ‘Sick in the head, you are, ain’t yer? This is who you’ve been afraid of all this time, Auntie: a broken down, mumbling old biddy so eaten up with nastiness towards other people you can read it in her face. Auntie—’ Jess held out her arm and pulled her forwards. Olive was trying to calm herself, wiping her eyes with the handkerchief. ‘See – she ain’t nothing to be afraid of. She’s an evil old bitch who likes to make other people suffer.’

Doris tried to take a step back as Jess, Sis and Olive half encircled her, but there was a wall behind her. Olive stood staring into her face, taking deep, shuddering breaths. It was a moment before she could speak.

‘You made life hell for us,’ she said at last. ‘It was wrong and cruel of yer. I ’ope you rot in hell for eternity for yer wickedness, that I do. But whatever happens, there ain’t nothing more you can do to me. You’re nothing. You’re just a speck of filth and soon time’ll sweep yer away and you’ll’ve left nothing good behind yer.’

Doris was making vicious sounding mumblings, ‘get away from me, yer bitches . . . get away!’ Jabbing her stick at them, her head making little jerks which reminded Jess of her stepmother’s hen-peck nod.

Olive straightened up. ‘Leave ’er. Just leave ’er. I’ve seen ’er now and I don’t want to look at ’er no more. Let’s get ’ome.’ She took Jess and Sis’s arms and they turned away, Sis making sure they’d got all the right bags.

They had walked a little further on towards Digbeth when they became aware of a small commotion behind them. Nothing loud, but a ripple of different sounds at the end of the Bull Ring, and they turned. A couple of people were running and a little knot of passers-by was gathering round. The three of them stared for a few seconds at the little they could see of what was on the ground: what looked like a little pile of crumpled black clothing lying very still. A walking stick lay discarded nearby.

They looked at each other.

‘We killed her,’ Olive said. Her tone was of disbelief mixed with fear. Sis looked absolutely horrified. They stood stock still, watching as two of the crowd bent over Doris. A few moments later they saw she was being helped groggily to her feet.

Jess pulled on their arms, forcing them to turn away and walk on with her.

‘She must’ve come over dizzy, we never killed her.’ She squeezed each of their arms, certain, reassuring. ‘But even if we ’ad, she’d’ve bloody well deserved it.’

All the way home Olive chattered, ‘Oh Lor’ – oh my, I can’t believe it . . . And the way you carried on, Jess, I never knew you ’ad it in yer!’

‘Well I ’ave – and the way I feel about ’er I could’ve broken ’er flaming neck, the evil old cow.’

They found Polly giving the children their dinner at the table and John Bullivant was there too. His face had filled out more and he was a calmer, slightly more cheerful man though still suffering times of deep depression.

Polly looked at her mom with concern.

Olive sank down on to a chair as if none of the rest of them was there.

‘She awright?’ Polly whispered to Jess.

‘My legs,’ Olive murmured. ‘They won’t hold me.’

‘What’s happened?’ Polly demanded. ‘Did yer ’ave a nice time?’

‘We, er . . .’ Jess looked at Sis who was still holding her bags of purchases, over her arm.

But Olive had put her face in her hands and burst into tears, crying with all the abandon of a young child.

*

Later, when they were alone, Jess said to Polly, ‘There’s one more thing for ’er now. For all of us. When the wedding’s over, we’ve got to get things finished for ’er. We’ve got to find Alice.’