The Cockney Angel (15 page)

‘Pa,’ Irene said, laying her hand on his arm. ‘Think about this.’

‘Yes,’ Emily added, bristling. ‘How dare you speak to my Josiah in that way? It’s not fair. He’s been very kind to Ma and me.’

‘I should hope so,’ Billy said calmly. ‘He’s your husband, and if he don’t treat you right I will want to know the reason why.’

Clara struggled to her feet. ‘Billy, that’s enough. I won’t have you upsetting Emily in her condition, and she’s quite correct in what she says. Josiah has been very good to me and I am comfortable here.’

Billy eyed her with surprise written all over his face. ‘What are you saying, my dove?’

‘That I will come home when the time is right. Emily needs me more than you do, and I won’t desert her. Irene will look after you, won’t you, dear?’

Irene nodded her head and she tightened her grip on his arm. ‘Of course I will. Come along, Pa. Let’s go home.’

Ephraim had been sitting silently all this time but he stood up suddenly, clearing his throat. ‘I think you should leave, sir.’ He made for the door but found his way barred by his brother. ‘Stop grinning like a fool, Ras. Get out of the way.’

‘I don’t see why I should. I haven’t been so
entertained
since you slipped on the ice outside the shop and broke your leg.’

‘Idiot!’ Ephraim pushed him aside and he beckoned to Billy. ‘Come, sir. Allow me to show you the door.’

Irene felt her father’s muscles tense beneath the tweed material of his jacket. ‘We should go now, Pa.’

‘Yes, my dear,’ Clara said firmly. ‘I will stay on for just as long as necessary. You must manage without me for a while.’

Billy frowned and he shook off Irene’s restraining hand. ‘I see how it is. You have been won over by all this luxury and comfort. Our home is not good enough for you now. I will leave, but with sorrow in my heart.’

‘That’s not fair, Billy,’ Clara murmured with tears in her eyes. ‘But you won’t change my mind. It’s a mother’s duty. I’m staying with Emmie until the baby comes.’

‘Please, Pa,’ Irene entreated, tugging at his arm. ‘Come with me.’

‘A fine welcome home,’ Billy muttered. ‘I return with ample funds and I am greeted with coldness and disdain.’ He made to leave the room with a dramatic flourish of his arms. ‘I have restored the family fortunes and this is how I am treated.’

Irene kissed her mother on her thin cheek. ‘Don’t worry, Ma. I’ll look after him.’

Clara watched her husband stalk out of the room and she sighed. ‘I know you will, ducks. He’ll come round, I know he will.’

Josiah tapped his spoon on the tabletop. ‘Let us finish our meal like civilised people.’

Ephraim hesitated in the doorway. ‘Shall I see them off the premises, Father?’

‘Sit down, boy,’ Josiah said, shaking his head. ‘I think my father-in-law can find his own way out. Goodbye, Irene. You are welcome to call whenever you feel you must.’

‘Ta, Josiah. I’ll remember that.’ Irene hurried past Ephraim and almost bumped into Erasmus, who was waiting outside the door.

‘He’s gone,’ Erasmus said casually. ‘He walked out of the house without so much as a backward glance. I’ll escort you home to the pickle shop.’

She shot him a suspicious look. ‘I don’t think a draper’s son should look down on them as sells pickles and sauce for a living. We’re both in trade. You’d do well to remember that, and I can find my own way home, ta very much.’ She swept past him, snatching her bonnet and shawl from the hall stand and she let herself out of the house. She hesitated for a moment, standing on the pavement and glancing up at the elegant façade of the draper’s house. If she were to be completely honest, part of her envied Emmie living as she was in such a
grand
dwelling, although the price she was paying for her rise in status was perhaps too great. She turned in the direction of home and caught a glimpse of Pa’s nattily dressed back disappearing round the corner into Wood Street. She set off after him, breaking into a run. If she did not stop him, he would most likely head straight for Blue Boar Court or some other gaming house and lose what was left of his winnings.

As she had feared, Billy strode past the shop and turned into Cheapside. She caught up with him just as he reached Blue Boar Court. ‘Pa,’ she cried breathlessly. ‘Don’t go in there and gamble it all away.’

Billy’s angry expression softened and his lips curved in a smile. ‘Don’t worry your pretty head about me, darling. I’m on a winning streak. I can’t lose.’

She clutched his hand. ‘At least give me some of it so that I can buy in more stock. We need food, and Arthur is—’

Billy’s brow darkened. ‘What about Arthur?’

‘His dad threw him out of the house and he’s been sleeping under the counter in the shop.’

‘What? Are you telling me that you’ve spent nights alone with him?’

‘No, Pa. You don’t understand. Artie is just a friend. He wouldn’t lay a finger on me.’

‘He’s a man and you’re a pretty girl. I won’t have it, Renie. I’ll do worse to him than his father did if I catch him hanging round you, and that’s the truth.’

‘Artie’s working for Vic and Wally. Please don’t say anything, Pa. If you make a fuss they’ll send him on his way or they’ll set their toughs on him. He doesn’t deserve that.’

‘He’s a fool, and he should keep away from the gaming tables. He’s got himself into this spot of bother and I won’t have him involving you. He’d best not bother you any further, Renie, or he’ll have me to deal with.’ Billy rapped on the door and waited, tapping his foot. The door opened a crack and a clay pipe stuck out, exuding puffs of blue smoke. ‘Who’s that knocking? State your name and business.’

‘It’s Billy Angel. Let me in, Blackie.’

The door opened just wide enough to allow a man of Billy’s size and stature to pass. He paused on the threshold, taking a leather pouch from his pocket and extracting a golden sovereign which he pressed into Irene’s hand. ‘There, poppet, that will keep us going for a while, and when I double my money I promise to buy you a new gown and a bonnet with scarlet ribbons.’ He blew her a kiss and disappeared into the narrow passageway. The door closed with a bang, leaving Irene standing on the cobblestones staring at the gold coin in
the
palm of her hand. It would be enough to restock the shop and pay the rent, but it was frustrating to know that Pa had taken at least this much and probably double the amount to squander on the gaming tables. She did not have much faith in winning streaks, and she knew from experience that sooner or later Pa’s luck would run out.

She closed her fingers around the coin and set off for home. As she trod the all too familiar path from the gaming house to the corner of Wood Street, she tried to think of a way to shock Pa out of his complacency. She was painfully aware that his addiction to gambling was out of control, and if he continued this way she was certain he would end up in prison. His involvement with the Sykes brothers was becoming too intense for him merely to walk away, and now Arthur seemed to be heading down the same path. By the time she reached the shop, Irene had made up her mind to have it out with Pa the moment he returned home. She would force him to face reality; if he did not stop gambling they would lose their livelihood and their home, and Ma would have no alternative other than to live in Josiah Tippet’s house as a permanent poor relation.

Billy did not return home that night or the next, and neither did Arthur. Irene paid Yapp,
who
seemed disappointed that he had no excuse to close her down. Danny on the other hand had a wide grin on his face as he brought in fresh stocks of pickles and sauces. He left Irene with a cheerful wink and he waved to her through the window as he loped off behind Yapp’s cart.

She opened the cash box and counted out the remaining coins. There was enough to pay the rent and she would be able to purchase food, coal and candles for a few days, but only if she was careful. She drummed her fingers on the counter as she waited for the customers to trickle in through the door. The shop in which Ma had worked so diligently for as long as Irene could remember had kept them from starving when Pa had failed to bring home any money, but the profits were small and there was not enough space to allow for any expansion of trade. Life with Pa had always been a see-saw of ups and downs. Luck, she decided, was a fickle mistress. Suddenly the familiar surroundings closed in on her like a prison from which she feared there was no escape, and tonight she would have to face Inspector Kent, with absolutely nothing to tell him.

In the shadow of the great cathedral of St Paul’s, the churchyard was dark and
forbidding
. It was a moonless night and Irene could barely make out the pathway. She moved silently between the looming shapes of shrubs which swayed in the wind and made rustling sounds as though someone was hiding behind them, ready to pounce. Surrounded by warehouses on the south side and large business premises to the north, the churchyard was a green oasis in the daylight, but an altogether different place on a dark night. It would be so easy to imagine that restless spirits rose from their graves to walk the gravel paths bemoaning their loss of life. Within reason, Irene had never been afraid of the living, but the uneasy dead were another matter altogether, and now she was on tenterhooks, jumping at the slightest noise.

She could just make out a bench close to the wall and she went to sit down before her knees gave way beneath her. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up with each unfamiliar sound, and she caught her breath as she heard the unmistakeable crunch of approaching footsteps on the gravel. She drew her shawl around her head, covering her face so that only her eyes remained exposed as she pressed herself back against the hard wooden slats of the seat. As the figure drew nearer she breathed a sigh of relief. There was no mistaking the determined stride and upright silhouette of Inspector Kent.

‘Miss Angel.’ He took off his top hat and sat down on the far end of the seat, leaving a space between them.

‘Yes, Inspector.’

‘Have you anything for me?’

‘No, not yet.’ She stole a sideways glance at him as he sat ramrod stiff, staring straight ahead of him into the darkness. She could just make out his stern profile with his dark hair swept back from a high forehead, emphasising an aquiline nose and a resolute chin.

He turned to stare at her as if sensing her close scrutiny, but his expression was drowned in the deep shadow. ‘Nothing at all?’

‘I haven’t seen Arthur since he went to work for the Sykes brothers. He hasn’t come home.’ She paused, realising how that sounded. ‘I mean, he’s been staying at the shop, sleeping under the counter, because his father threw him out.’ She bit her lip. Why was she explaining this to him? He was almost a complete stranger, so what did it matter if he got the wrong impression about her relationship with Arthur? He probably thought she was no better than she should be anyway.

‘Do you think he has run away?’ He spoke in a conversational, almost matter of fact manner, and Irene was shocked to realise that this was exactly what she had been thinking.

‘I don’t know.’

‘But you think that it might be true?’

‘It’s possible,’ she admitted reluctantly.

‘If he has we will find him,’ Kent said in a low voice. ‘It will not go well for Greenwood.’

‘I don’t think he would leave without telling me.’

‘I hope for his sake that he has not, but this isn’t a game, Miss Angel. I want to put the Sykes brothers behind bars before they initiate gang wars that will inflame the whole of the East End. I want information and I need to have it soon. If Greenwood has absconded I will have to enlist the help of someone else who is known to be close to the Sykes brothers.’

‘I hope you don’t mean my pa. He may be a gambler, but he’s not a criminal and he won’t peach.’

‘He mixes with the gang members and that puts him very definitely on the wrong side of the law.’

She rose to her feet. ‘You’re so wrong. My pa is a good man at heart. He wouldn’t hurt a fly and he isn’t involved with Vic and Wally.’

Kent remained seated, his face a pale oval in a shaft of moonlight that had filtered through a ragged tear in the clouds. ‘You seem to be on familiar terms with them.’

‘I’m not. I mean, everyone round here calls them by their first names. I grew up knowing
them
as Vic and Wally; it don’t mean that we’re bosom friends.’

He stood up. ‘Keep it that way, Miss Angel.’

‘So what now? You haven’t told me what you want me to do. Wasn’t that the sole purpose of our meeting?’

‘It was, but with Greenwood gone there is nothing further for you to do.’

He was about to walk away but she caught him by the sleeve. ‘You can’t leave me in suspense. I want to know what you’re planning.’

He paused, eyeing her coldly. ‘That is police business.’

‘It’s mine if it concerns Pa. What are you going to do? Please, you must tell me.’

Chapter Eight

‘GO HOME, MISS
Angel. There is nothing more you can do.’ Kent strode off along the path heading towards Old Change Lane.

Following him, Irene broke into a run. ‘You can’t leave it like that.’

He stopped, turning his head to give her an inscrutable look. ‘I should never have involved you. I have no further need of your services.’

‘What! You dragged me into this and now you say you have no use for me?’

‘Do you mean to tell me that you want to be a copper’s nark?’

She shook her head vehemently. ‘No. I never said that. Don’t twist my words, Inspector. You’re wrong about Arthur running away; he’d never do nothing like that.’

He did not look convinced. ‘My men are on the lookout for him. He might have given us the slip, but he will be found and then he will be charged and sent before the magistrates, who will decide his guilt or innocence.’

‘He is innocent; I’m telling you that for nothing. But it’s my dad I’m worried about.
If
you point the finger at him the Sykes brothers won’t show any mercy. My pa will end up at the bottom of the river with a lead weight tied round his neck.’

‘Then it’s up to you to persuade him to keep better company. Goodbye, Miss Angel. I’m sorry we had to meet under such dire circumstances.’ He strode off leaving Irene standing alone in the shadow of the great dome of St Paul’s, staring after him. His tall figure disappeared into the gloom and the sound of his footsteps died away, leaving an unearthly silence to close round her.