The Leaving Of Liverpool (20 page)

He laughed curtly. ‘That’s easier said than done.’

‘Everything’s easier to say than to do.’ She fished in the pocket of her pink jacket. ‘I’ve got eight dollars you can have. You could get a bus part of the way.’

‘I don’t want charity.’ He scowled and turned away. ‘You can keep your money.’

‘You ate the breakfast,’ Anne gently pointed out. ‘That was charity.’

‘I wish I hadn’t now,’ he said churlishly. ‘Don’t bother looking for me in the morning. I won’t be here.’

‘It’s up to you. I’ll look for you all the same. Goodbye, Bobby, and good luck.’ She put the eight dollars on the bench and shoved it towards him. She’d hurt his pride, but it was good that he still had some left.

 

‘I’ve been watching you,’ Lizzie Blinker said when Anne went in. ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that, pet. One of these days you might come to some harm.’

‘Did he pick up the money?’ Anne asked. ‘I gave him money, but he refused to take it, so I left it on the bench.’

‘I’ve no idea. Once I saw you come away, I stopped watching. Have you had any breakfast?’ Breakfast was the only meal Lizzie prepared - servants made the others - but it kept her in touch with her roots, she claimed. ‘When I was a kid in Manchester, most of the time there wasn’t anything for breakfast. When there was, it was only bread and dripping.’

‘What was bread and dripping like?’ Anne had asked.

‘In those days, it tasted delicious, but I doubt if it would now.’ Now, she made pancakes and cinnamon toast, scrambled eggs and hash browns. There was always loads of fruit on the table and jugs of juice. ‘What would you like this morning, pet?’ she asked.

‘Everything,’ Anne replied. ‘I’m starving.’

Together, they walked into the long kitchen with its black tiled floor and white marble tops. There were yellow, slatted blinds on the windows, making the room appear sunny on the dullest of days, and a stove with six black rings that turned bright red when the electricity was switched on. In her worst nightmares, Anne sometimes dreamed that someone was pressing her arm against one of the rings: she could even smell her flesh burning. The table was a round slab of marble supported by a single black support; it always reminded her of a mushroom.

‘My friends would like to know how you manage to eat so much, but still stay as thin as a beggar’s broomstick.’ Although Lizzie had been in America for nearly thirty years, she hadn’t lost her Manchester accent.

‘She dances the fat off, Ma, that’s how.’ Herbie came into the kitchen wearing a bright yellow sweater and white pants. He was perfectly turned out, but his room would be in a terrible state, littered with all the clothes that had been rejected. He kissed them both.

‘Then I’d better suggest my friends take up tap-dancing. ’

‘What are we doing today?’ Anne asked Herbie. She often forgot.

‘Silly girl!’ Herbie said fondly. ‘We’ve an audition in two hours, haven’t we? It’s for that new Broadway show,
Roses are Red
. . . ’

‘And violets are blue,’ Anne sang.

‘Sugar is sweet,’ said Lizzie, smiling.

‘And so are you,’ Herbie finished. ‘Both of you,’ he added with a brilliant smile. ‘I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.’

Lizzie put a pot of coffee on the table, two cups and saucers, a sugar bowl and a jug of cream. The china was eggshell-thin with a gold rim and had a pattern of tiny rosebuds. Herbie poured two cups: black for him; four sugar lumps and a dash of cream for Anne.

‘Today’s the twenty-first of June,’ Lizzie remarked as she made the pancakes, looking slightly incongruous in the exquisite lace negligeée that had probably cost the earth in Bloomingdale’s or one of the other expensive shops she frequented. ‘That means it’s Midsummer, the longest day. When I was little it always made me feel a bit sad, knowing that from then on the nights would get darker and before you knew it, we’d all be sitting in candlelight and there’d be nothing else to do but go to bed.’

Herbie pretended to yawn, something he always did when his mother reminisced about her childhood. She saw the yawn and told him he didn’t know how lucky he was. ‘You and your sister have never wanted for anything. It’d do you good to go short now’n again.’ Herbie’s sister, Mabel, was married with two children and lived in Washington where Kurt, her husband, did something very important in the White House.

Breakfast finished, Herbie decided it was time they practised for the audition. He and Anne danced out of the room, along the corridor, past the paintings that had so intrigued Levon and into the mirrored foyer where their whirling, dazzling figures were endlessly reflected, as if they were in a ballroom as big as the world, full of dancing couples identical to themselves. On their way back, Christina, the maid, came out of Herbie’s bedroom and told him he should be ashamed of the mess he’d made. Christina, who was black, had been with the Blinkers for a quarter of a century and never hesitated to speak her mind. Herbie just waved and danced by, and Christina smiled. Despite the fact he’d been dreadfully spoiled, he had such a sunny personality that everybody loved him.

‘You’ll wake the master,’ Christina called after them. She always referred to Mr Blinker as ‘the master’ in a terribly sarcastic voice that really annoyed him. ‘He’s still in bed.’

‘Who cares?’ Herbie shouted back.

They finished the dance with double outward pirouettes back in the kitchen where, having kept in touch with her roots by making breakfast, Lizzie had left the dirty dishes for Christina.

Anne went to her room to get changed for the audition. Through the window, she saw the bench that Bobby Gifford had occupied was empty. She hoped he was already on his way to Los Angeles. Further down the park, well out of sight, were the Hoovervilles, the hastily built shacks that housed the unemployed and their families, named after President Hoover who’d done nothing to help them. She’d only seen them once and they made her want to cry.

Shall I call Lev and tell him about the audition? she wondered. Or wait and see what happened? Wait and see, she decided, though it would be lovely to hear his voice warmly wish her luck. Trouble was, it was something else that made her want to cry because she missed him so much. It was all right living with the Blinkers, but it didn’t compare with the months she’d spent with Lev and Tamara before the baby had come along, spoiling everything, reminding her of a time that she mostly managed to forget.

Since she’d met Lev, she’d felt no need to retreat to a world of her own and felt perfectly safe. But she’d found the presence of the baby in the apartment disturbing. She hadn’t wanted to look at him, was scared to see whom he might resemble. It had been a relief when the Zarians had moved to Brooklyn and she’d come to live with the Blinkers, though she hadn’t dreamed it would hurt so much to be separated from Lev.

It was the third time they’d been to the same theatre to audition for the same show. First there’d been about thirty couples, next fifteen. Now there were only five and a final decision would be made that day. Herbie had been touching wood all week in the hope they’d be hired. Their names would go on the posters after the two main stars: Eric Carrington, who was British, and Patricia Peters. It was Herbie’s dream to see their names in lights one day. Anne hoped for the same thing, but mainly for his sake. All she wanted to do was dance and it didn’t matter where. When she was dancing, she forgot everything. She just allowed herself to be swallowed up in the music and the mesmerizing sound of their feet tapping on the floor.

As usual, Herbie managed to arrange it so they went on last, a position he insisted was an advantage. After the other four couples had had their turn, a young, rather harassed young man called Jerry, who seemed to be in charge of things, took them on to the stage and shouted, ‘Herbie Blinker and Anne Murray, Mr Abel.’ Conrad Abel was the producer. He was sitting five rows back in the darkened theatre, a small hunched figure, his face merely a white blur.

‘What key do you want, darlings?’ the pianist enquired when the music, ‘Toot Toot Tootsie Goodbye’, was placed in front of him. He had beautiful silver hair and was dressed entirely in purple.

‘C,’ said Herbie. ‘We’ve marked where we’re going to sing and where to speed up towards the end.’

Herbie squeezed her hand, the pianist began to play, and they danced like two people possessed, putting everything they had into the routine they’d been practising for weeks. Anne was never happier than when she danced and it showed in her radiant face and sparkling eyes. She didn’t worry that she would take a false step, and her confidence was communicated to Herbie, who often felt nervous on such occasions.

‘Thanks,’ Jerry said when they’d finished, only slightly breathless. ‘If you’d like to sit in the green room with the others, I’ll let you know Mr Abel’s decision.’

They waited in the green room with the other four couples for what seemed like hours, but was no more than a few minutes, Anne discovered later. Fingernails were chewed, feet studied, legs crossed and uncrossed. No one spoke. One young man rushed out to be sick. Two lives would change for ever as a result of Conrad Abel’s decision. They’d come so far and might never come this far again. The man who’d been sick returned. He reminded Anne a bit of Bobby Gifford with his thin face and haunted eyes, and she traitorously hoped he and his partner would be picked.

The door opened to admit Jerry and everyone tensed. ‘Mr Abel would like Herbie Blinker and Anne Murray to stay,’ he announced. ‘The rest of you can go home. Thanks for coming.’

A young woman jumped to her feet. ‘But that’s not fair.’ She was more than averagely pretty with smooth brown hair and blue eyes. ‘Mr Abel promised us we’d get the parts.’

Jerry groaned. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Rosalind Raines and this is my partner, Flip Ungar.’ She indicated the young man who’d reminded Anne of Bobby Gifford. ‘He promised me, last night, he
promised
.’

‘Well, I’m sorry, Miss Raines, but Mr Abel didn’t mention either of you.’

‘The stinking bastard,’ the girl spat. ‘He
promised
.’

‘The trouble with Mr Abel,’ Jerry said as he led Anne and Herbie back to the stage, ‘is that he can’t keep his trousers buttoned. Them’s the times he makes promises that he don’t mean to keep. Anyway, I’m the stage manager, so we’re gonna see a lot of each other from now on. With Eric Carrington and Patricia Peters starring,
Roses are Red
is sure to be a really big hit.’

‘We’ve done it, Anne!’ Herbie threw his arms around her. ‘We’re gonna be on Broadway.’

 

‘So, you’ve had a boy at
last
!’ Irene snorted. She limped across the sun-drenched room and peered at the baby in Mollie’s arms. ‘The nurse told me on the way in. A copper called late last night to say you’d gone into labour. Our Tom had asked him to. I didn’t sleep a wink thinking about you and praying you’d have a boy.’ She chucked the baby under his wrinkly chin. ‘He looked a tough ’un. What did he weigh?’

‘Eight pounds, two ounces, and I didn’t care whether I had a boy or a girl, Irene, and neither did Tom,’ Mollie said firmly.

‘Men prefer sons,’ her mother-in-law stated as if it had been carved in stone, a truth never to be denied.

Mollie didn’t bother denying it. She just knew Tom couldn’t have loved their daughters, Megan and Brodie, more had they been boys.

‘What are you going to call him?’

‘Joseph, but Tom’s already started to call him Joey.’

‘Joey’s the gear.’ She settled in a chair beside the bed. ‘What sort of time did you have, luv?’ she enquired, her voice throbbing with sympathy.

‘All right.’ Mollie winced, remembering. It had been anything but all right. In fact, it had hurt like blazes and gone on for hours, but it was fatal to tell that to Irene, who would then go through her own four labours, every one of which would have been ten times worse than anything Mollie described. Her sisters-in-law, Lily and Pauline, were just as bad, competing with each other for the worst experiences, the most stitches, the longest labours. Gladys was all right. She was married to Enoch and the youngest of the three. Since Mollie had married into the Ryans, Gladys had become her best friend after Agatha.

‘I’ve brought you some oranges,’ Irene announced. ‘Jaffas.’

‘Thank you very much.’ Mollie was starving, not for oranges, but for fish and chips soaked in vinegar, preferably wrapped in newspaper. They tasted better out of newspaper than on a plate.

The baby sneezed. ‘God bless you,’ Mollie murmured. The sneeze must have woken him and he opened his big blue eyes and stared at her vacantly. He was a crumpled little thing with a button nose. ‘He looks worried about something,’ she remarked, kissing the nose.

‘Probably worried where his next meal’s coming from. Boys are hungry little buggers, never off the breast. Our Tom was the worst. I had to learn to cook with one arm for a whole year after he was born.’

‘Really!’ Mollie took everything her mother-in-law said with a great pinch of salt.