Following Sammy’s advice, not so much because she thought it was good advice, but more out of desperation, because, when all was said and done, it was all she had, Cissie set out early on Monday morning to set up the stall.
She didn’t usually bother working on a Monday, trade at the beginning of the week hardly made it worthwhile, but part of Sammy’s suggested plan was that she should do everything she could to make the stall seem as viable a business proposition as possible. And every little helped, every penny she could show the stall earning would help her to state her case more convincingly.
After making sure that Fat Stan was keeping an eye on her stock – thieving hands didn’t only come attached to the arms of ragged street urchins, City gents were just as liable to let bunches of roses slip up the sleeves of their expensive, cashmere overcoats – Cissie put the next stage of the plan into action.
Taking her courage in her hands, she went along to the telephone box by the station entrance and dialled the number on the business card that the silent man had given her on the previous Friday. As she waited for someone to answer, Cissie’s hands shook, but not nearly as much as her voice shook when she had to speak.
‘Hello,’ she stammered. ‘Is that Mr Clayborne? Mr Peter Clayborne?’
It was.
‘Aw…’ She paused, closed her eyes and swallowed hard. Remember what Sammy had said, she told herself. Come on. Remember.
‘Are you still there?’ the voice on the other end asked.
‘Me name’s Cissie Flowers,’ she blurted in reply. ‘I wanna come and see yer. Please. If yer’ve got the time, like. I wanna talk to yer about me pitch outside the factory. In Aldgate.’
That wasn’t how she had meant it to go at all, but, astonishingly, Clayborne didn’t seem to mind that she sounded like a jibbering idiot. He was actually agreeing, without any question, to see her in his office that very afternoon.
As she replaced the receiver, Cissie didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
‘Yer look like yer’ve been pole-axed, girl,’ Fat Stan kidded her good-naturedly, as she stepped out of the telephone box. He had grown almost fond of young Cissie Flowers in a funny sort of way. She was a bloody nuisance to him, but he had come to accept her as being the innocent party in all this. After all, he didn’t suppose it was her fault that Turner had taken a shine to her – she certainly hadn’t thrown herself at him, not like most of the silly little tarts he took up with.
When Cissie didn’t respond quick as a flash with a saucy bit of backchat, Fat Stan frowned. ‘Everything all right?’ he asked solicitously.
‘Yeah. I think so.’
She wandered along from the kiosk to the newspaper stall, a vague expression clouding her face, and, taking Stan by the arm, she pulled him out of earshot of Bernie, whom, although she wasn’t sure why, she still didn’t trust.
‘Stan,’ she whispered, pulling him down closer to her. ‘Guess what? I’ve got an appointment to go and see that property developer bloke this afternoon.’
Fat Stan raised a single furry eyebrow. ‘Have yer now?’ he said, flashing a look over her head towards Bernie. ‘The property developer, eh?’
Cissie was so nervous about the impending meeting that, for the rest of the morning, she scarcely took any notice of the few customers who stopped at the stall. What she did notice, all too plainly, was how the time dragged. She could have sworn that the church bells had been deliberately slowed down, just to make her feel worse. All she wanted to do was go and see this Clayborne bloke, say her two penn’orth, and get out of there. She wasn’t feeling very optimistic about her chances of persuading him of the value of Sammy Clarke’s plan, and so she just wanted the bad news over and done with.
The only thing which distracted Cissie from her clockwatching was practising the little speech which Sammy had written for her to recite to Clayborne. She went over and over the words in her head, repeating them as though they were a prayer of supplication. Sammy had insisted on her being word-perfect, explaining how important it was for her to know exactly what she was going to say, so that she wouldn’t get herself all confused and wind up wasting the opportunity by failing to make her point.
Cissie had agreed with him about that, she had agreed with him about all of it. Not because she thought it was all such a great idea, but, as she had already acknowledged, she hadn’t been able to come up with a better one.
This really was her last chance.
Sammy had printed the speech, neatly and clearly for her, on a sheet of lined paper torn from the back of one of his ledgers, and, by nine o’ clock Friday evening, Cissie had it off pat, she knew the speech by heart. But Sammy had said he wanted to be really certain and, much to Lil’s loudly voiced disgust, he had been in and out of number seven to practise it with her, reappearing in their kitchen at all sorts of inconvenient times during the weekend, even snatching the odd five minutes whenever the shop was quiet.
Lil had fumed and spluttered, tutted and sighed, while she watched Sammy coaching and encouraging Cissie as though she were a schoolgirl learning verse for a recital competition. In Lil’s opinion, Sammy Clarke had nothing of any interest or use to offer anyone in their household, and she would have preferred it if he had kept away from all of them.
By Sunday evening, Cissie felt she could have repeated the words in her sleep. But, with her nerves in such a state, she had to make really sure there would be no mistakes, and that was why she was going over it, time and again, as she stood at the stall, counting the long hours until her appointment with Clayborne.
In the end, she became so mesmerised by the sound and rhythm of the words that, if it hadn’t been for Fat Stan hollering along to her to get her skates on, she would have missed the meeting altogether.
Less than ten minutes after Stan’s reminder, Cissie found herself hovering shakily in the doorway of a sparsely furnished, windowless office situated above a printer’s shop in a dank, cobbled courtyard close to Fenchurch Street station.
When she had first pushed open the door, Cissie had been shocked to find that there was no one else in the room except the silent one of the pair who had so upset her on the previous Friday.
‘Come in, Mrs Flowers. Sit down. Or do you prefer to be called Prentice?’
The man had a surprisingly cultured voice; nothing like his roughly spoken companion who had done all the talking on Friday.
‘Flowers’ll be fine,’ she said, warily. ‘And you’re… ?’
‘Clayborne. Peter Clayborne. Now won’t you sit down? Please.’
He was so polite. It didn’t make sense. Not after the way the other man, who had had so much to say for himself at the stall, had spoken to her.
And why wasn’t he there? Or even some sort of assistant, or secretary, or someone? And him mentioning her actual married name, rather than Davy’s nickname; it all had the effect of further unsettling Cissie, as if she wasn’t nervous enough as it was.
She hesitated, then feeling ashamed of her childish reticence, she hurried across the office, aiming for the single vacant chair set at the side of Clayborne’s desk. But before she could reach her goal, she tripped over the mean square of mat that provided the only floor covering in the entire room, and went crashing into the side of his desk.
Clayborne shot out a steadying hand, but it was too late. As if in slow motion, Cissie slipped gracelessly to the floor.
She cursed herself under her breath. She had to compose herself, present herself as someone with a good business idea, an idea that was so good, he would feel he was really losing out if he passed it up. But here she was, acting like a gawky twelve-year-old, having to be helped to her feet after falling arse over elbow, and flashing her stocking tops at him into the bargain.
With a strained little smile, Cissie let go of his hand, noting, even in her confusion, how soft and smooth it felt against her wrist – more like a woman’s than a man’s – straightened her hat, and lowered herself demurely on to the chair.
‘Are you all right?’
Cissie nodded dumbly. Her cheeks were burning.
Clayborne eyed her quizzically. ‘You seem quite flustered, Mrs Flowers. I hope I’m not the reason.’
‘No. No,’ she insisted, shifting herself forward to the very edge of the chair. ‘I ain’t flustered.’
‘Make yourself comfortable, please,’ he said, his expression turning to one of barely concealed embarrassment as she wriggled around, pulling her skirt decorously over her knees.
‘So,’ he continued, with a gulp, ‘you wanted to see me.’
Cissie said nothing, the words just wouldn’t come. What had Sammy told her? Seem shrewd, positive. That’s it. That’s what she had to do.
She nodded enthusiastically, demonstrating the cheerful ease that Sammy had suggested would present a good impression for the meeting. In fact, she nodded very enthusiastically indeed, far more so than she’d actually intended. Her head wagged up and down like a demented chicken pecking for com. God she felt a fool. Why couldn’t she just do it like they’d planned? The way Sammy had told her to?
‘And it was about… ?’ Clayborne prompted her. He now looked almost as alarmed as she felt.
She nibbled the inside of her cheek and tugged anxiously at her fringe. She had to stop nodding.
‘About the stall,’ she eventually managed to mumble.
It was as though saying those three words triggered something in Cissie and prompted her into action. Quite suddenly she was transformed from being a bumbling idiot into a jabbering one. She just couldn’t stop the words pouring out of her mouth.
‘It’s like this, yer see,’ she began, waving and flapping her hands to emphasise her babbling. ‘Flowers are never gonna be a thing of the past, are they? I mean, people are always gonna want beauty in their lives. They always have and always will do. Even when they’ve got almost nothing in their purses, they’ll always find a few coppers for a little bunch o’ sweet violets. But I know what yer said, well what yer mate said, about things being modern and smart and that, so I’ve thought about that. And I reckon I could be a real credit to yer outside that place. I could go for the posher sort o’ trade, see. Where there’s plenty o’ money, even in these hard times.’
She laughed wildly. ‘Who ever heard of a poor posh person, eh?’
As she spoke, Cissie shifted even further on to the edge of her chair – it was a wonder she hadn’t slipped off altogether.
‘I get some good regular orders already, yer know.’ She had now bent forward, and was pointing at him. ‘And I could do orders for all sorts of places. Offices, hotels even. I’m full of ideas. There’s loads o’ ways I could make that stall look really classy. And flowers! I know more about flowers than—’
Cissie stopped as suddenly as she had begun. She had run out of words.
So, that was it. The best she could do. Now it was up to him.
She sat bolt upright and waited, staring at Clayborne, willing him to tell her that everything would be all right after all. And that even if she had made a complete fool of herself, he knew it was only because she was so nervous, and that he didn’t know why he hadn’t realised before what a brilliant asset to his offices it would be if he let her keep her flower stall pitched outside.
But Cissie wasn’t stupid, even if she had just acted as though she was. She knew it wasn’t going to be like that. It was all over. She’d had her chance to say her piece and she’d messed it up. She could see from the look on his face that Clayborne thought she was barmy. Why hadn’t she just said the words she’d practised? The words about profit and costs and overheads. The words that Sammy had explained to her and helped her with.
Clayborne shook his head, he had a grim, sorrowful expression on his thin, pallid face. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mrs Flowers. Very sorry. The stall obviously means a lot to you—’
‘Not just to me, Mr Clayborne,’ she cut in urgently. ‘It’s what I do to earn me living. For me family. I’ve got two little kiddies at home. They depend on me. I’m a widow. Then there’s Lil, that’s Davy’s mum…’
Clayborne pushed back his chair and stood up. He walked to the far end of the long, narrow room and stood by a door in the back wall that faced the door through which Cissie had entered.
He leant against the door-frame and began speaking in a slow, firm voice. ‘I would like you to listen to me, Mrs Flowers.’
‘What?’ Cissie demanded angrily. ‘Listen to you telling me yer gonna take away the only chance I’ve got of feeding me kids? Listen to you telling me yer gonna ruin me?’
‘No,’ Clayborne said bluntly. ‘Not ruin you.’ He shifted slightly to one side as though he were making himself more comfortable against the door jamb.
‘What are you saying then? Tell me that, eh?’
He raised his hand authoritatively. ‘If you’ll just hear me out, Mrs Flowers. Please.’
Cissie shrugged feebly, she was tight-lipped with helplessness. ‘What choice have I got?’
‘Maybe more than you think.’
Cissie listened, stunned, as Peter Clayborne outlined an offer which, had anyone told her he would be making, would have had her laughing in their face. But here she was, listening to him with her very own ears.
‘Let’s get this right,’ she said, leaning forward as though she was having difficulty understanding him. ‘You’re telling me that when yer knock down that old factory and put up this new office place, yer gonna let me rent one of the shops on the ground floor?’
‘That’s right, Mrs Flowers.’ Clayborne looked and sounded relieved, as though he’d managed to get something off his chest that had been stuck there like a fishbone. ‘And very fine shops they’ll be too. Curved plate-glass windows. Bronze handles on the doors. All the latest fitments. Very attractive. More like Paris than London.’
‘Well,’ Cissie snorted derisively, ‘that’s all right then, ain’t it? So long as they’re flaming attractive.’
She shook her head disbelievingly as her final glimmer of hope fell away as surely as petals from a dead rose.
‘Can yer tell me, Mr Clayborne,’ she went on, stifling back the tears of disappointment and rage, ‘how exactly yer reckon I’m supposed to afford the rent on some posh shop with curved sodding windows and bronze bloody handles?’
‘I’m sure we can come to some sort of arrangement, Mrs Flowers.’
‘Some sort of arrangement?’ she repeated, stressing each word as though it were in a foreign language. ‘Some sort of bloody arrangement?’
As she rose to her feet and strode towards him, Cissie was in too much of a temper to notice how he hurriedly grasped the door handle behind his back as though blocking the way to the room beyond.
‘What would you wanna come to some sort of arrangement with the likes o’ me for?’ she demanded, jabbing her finger at his face.
Clayborne now looked as terrified as she had felt when she had first entered the office.
‘Because I think a woman like you could go far,’ he burbled, his chin tucked so close to his chest that he could barely speak.
‘Aw, do you now? And what’d be in it for you if I did go far as you so bloody well charmingly put it?’
Clayborne frowned as though the answer had, for the moment, escaped him. He thought for a bit then nodded; something had come to him. ‘It’s my age,’ he said as though that were a plausible explanation.
‘Your age?’ Cissie now sounded more confused than angry. ‘What the hell’s that gotta do with the price of cod?’
‘Let’s just say it’s a whim.’ He smiled weakly. ‘You remind me of myself when I first started out as a raw young man with hardly a button to my name.’
Clayborne tipped his head to one side, and raised his eyebrows in what he intended to be an appealingly friendly gesture, but which only served to further infuriate Cissie.
‘For a start,’ she yelled, ‘from the state of this dump it don’t look like yer exactly rolling in it. So what would you know about going far?’ She began jabbing her finger at him again. ‘And as for yer age, you ain’t exactly no granddad, now are yer? Yer can’t be no more than bloody thirty years old.’
Cissie moved even closer, and her finger was now making contact with his chest. ‘I wouldn’t trust you, Mr Clayborne, as far as I could flaming well throw yer, and that wouldn’t be very far, yer great long streak of nothing.’
Clayborne responded to her insult with another feeble attempt at a charming smile. ‘You’re a young woman after my own heart,’ he beamed manically. ‘Full of spirit. I like that.’
Cissie could feel herself twitching with temper at his audacity. What was wrong with some men? ‘Are you married, Mr Clayborne?’ she asked, staring up into his watery hazel eyes.
‘I am, as a matter of fact, but I don’t see what that has to do with anything.’
‘Aw, but I think you do, Mr Clayborne. And d’yer know what? Yer don’t have to say another word, cos I know exactly what yer gonna say next. Ain’t that strange?’
Claybome frowned anxiously. He’d been cornered by a madwoman.
‘Yer gonna tell me how you and yer wife don’t get on like yer used to. Am I right?’
Cissie was now very close to him, so close that she could see the sweat beading on his forehead.
‘No. No. You’re not right,’ he said hurriedly. ‘In fact, you have entirely the wrong impression of me, Mrs Flowers. Absolutely entirely wrong. I never intended you to get that impression, I assure you.’
Cissie stepped away from Clayborne and looked him up and down. She didn’t bother even to try to hide her contempt. ‘You ain’t the only one who’s ever made me that sort of offer, yer know, and yer probably won’t be the last, but I’m telling yer this for nothing, Mr Peter Clayborne, I ain’t gonna say yes to no one what makes me that sort of offer. Not ever. Got it?’
‘I really must insist,’ Clayborne said, darting a nervous glance over his shoulder at the door. ‘You’ve completely misunderstood me. And,’ he added, his voice rising to a frantic whine, ‘I would like you to know, that this offer has a time limit.’ He was speaking quicker and quicker as though he were being timed against the clock. ‘And I need to have your answer tomorrow as to whether you will be taking up the offer of the shop lease.’
‘Yer don’t give up easy,’ she sneered. ‘I’ll give yer that.’ With a final flick of her eyes up and down his tall, besuited body, Cissie turned on her heel and walked purposefully over to the door by which she’d entered.
‘So, I’ll expect to hear from you tomorrow then?’
‘I wouldn’t put no money on it if I was you, mate.’
She grasped the handle, pulled open the door and looked round at Clayborne, who was still jammed up tight against the door opposite.
‘There’s just one thing I’d like to know.’
‘Yes?’ he replied eagerly, in the desperate hope that she had changed her mind.
‘Why are yer guarding that door like that? You got yer bleed’n old woman in there or something?’
When Clayborne, dry-mouthed and sweating profusely, was absolutely certain that the sound of Cissie’s footsteps on the stone stairs leading down to the street had really stopped, he ran over to the open doorway and peered down into the gloom to make sure that she wasn’t hiding in the shadows of the stairwell, lurking there, ready to catch him out. He waited a moment, then a moment longer, and then, carefully closing the door behind him, he went back into the office and opened the interior door he had defended so resolutely.
‘She’s gone,’ he said stepping into the much bigger and more elaborately furnished room which lay beyond the outer office.
‘So I heard,’ Big Bill Turner replied.
Turner was sitting there in a studded, leather wing armchair, his feet propped up on the polished brass fender which surrounded the veined marble fireplace. He was staring into the flames, his eyes narrowed against the bright heat.
Jim Phillips, the wholesaler from the flower market, was standing on one side of him, and Bernie and Chalkie, another of Turner’s bullet-headed minders, were on the other. Each of the four men had a glass in his hand.
Jim seemed far less at ease than the other three, and sipped nervously at his drink, peering watchfully at the rest of them across the rim of his glass as he raised it to his lips.
‘Did you hear everything else all right, Mr Turner?’ Clayborne asked.
Turner tapped his finger along the length of his cigar, knocking a shower of grey ash and sparks into the blazing hearth. ‘Aw, I heard all right.’ He turned his head slowly until he was facing Clayborne.
From the redness of his eyes and his slurred speech, Clayborne guessed that Turner had been responsible for drinking the lion’s share of the now almost empty bottle of scotch that was standing on the little side table.
‘And I have to say,’ Turner mumbled, ‘that I weren’t very impressed by it.’
‘No?’ Clayborne’s voice was quavering.
‘No. I pay you good money, Clayborne. Very good money. And, after that little performance out there, I’d like yer to tell me why I should.’
‘You pay me to be your accountant, Mr Turner, and—’ Clayborne had begun surprisingly confidently, thinking himself to be on safe ground, but having seen Turner’s expression change to one of almost apoplectic fury, he immediately thought better of it and shut his mouth again.
‘No, Clayborne, I don’t pay yer to be me accountant.’ Turner rose unsteadily to his feet, gripping the arms of his chair until his knuckles stood out white against his skin. ‘I pay yer to be loyal to me. Bastard loyal.’
Clayborne took a step backwards. ‘I did my best, Mr Turner.’
‘Your best?’ Turner stared at him in disbelief. ‘Your bloody best?’
He snatched up his crystal tumbler from the side table and smashed it into the hearth, sending up shards of glittering glass and beads of amber whisky sparkling and dancing in the firelight.
He wasn’t shouting, but his ominously low tone, made garbled and faltering by the drink, was enough to terrify the now quaking accountant as Turner moved closer and closer towards him.
Chalkie dodged round both Turner and Clayborne and planted himself in the doorway, blocking the only way out of the room.
‘I pay people like them over there,’ Turner said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder towards Jim and Bernie, ‘so that they can do their job. So they can make my life easier. So that I don’t have to worry meself about little details. And that takes loyalty. Understand? Any sodding trained monkey can add up a row of figures but loyalty, that takes bastard brains.’
Jim gulped down the rest of his drink and watched, transfixed by the sordid scene of fear and menace unfolding in front of him. This wasn’t a world he was used to.
Clayborne nodded. ‘Yes, Mr Turner,’ he agreed readily, ‘I understand.’ Seeing the expression on Turner’s face, he’d have said that black was white if he’d have told him to.
But Clayborne’s agreement wasn’t enough for Turner, it wasn’t even what he really wanted. It was Cissie Flowers. Cissie, the bloody woman who was making him so angry. He was furious at the way she had, yet again, slipped out of his reach. And someone was going to pay.
He walked forward, backing Clayborne against the wall, and leant over him. The accountant was tall, but Big Bill Turner dwarfed the man’s skinny frame with his own massive bulk.
‘I don’t get it,’ Turner said, spreading his hands to show his sadness. ’I’m putting me neck on the line, making deals with Plains, one of the hardest men in the East End. Buying up property so we can both cut our losses and go into a bit of legitimate business together. And d’yer know why I’m doing all this?’
Clayborne shook his head.
‘I’m doing it so I can look after them what work for me. Save ’em having to go out on the streets and doing one another in. And what do I get in return?’
Turner twisted round to see if Jim or Bernie cared to give him the answer. Very wisely, they didn’t. This was Turner’s show.
‘I’ll tell yer,’ Turner said, shaking his head sorrowfully. ‘Disloyalty, that’s what I get.’
He slammed his hand hard against the wall, sending the vibrations running through Clayborne’s gangly body.
‘And I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all. And know what I don’t like even more?’
Claybome shook his head again, he was going to wet his trousers, he just knew he was.
‘I don’t like you messing it up for me with Davy Flowers’ old woman.’
Turner sighed and rubbed the balls of his thumbs hard into his eyes. He was tired, angry. Why did he have to do everything? Why couldn’t he trust anyone to do their job properly? Even the simplest thing and he couldn’t trust a single one of the prats to do things right for once. His head ached.
He wished Moe was there with him.
‘That little tart was begging for it. Ready for the picking,’ he said, slowly opening his eyes to stare at Clayborne. ‘And you messed it up for me. I really ain’t very happy about that.’
Turner’s fist moved at such a speed that Clayborne didn’t even realise he’d been punched until he felt as though his left kidney had exploded. He slumped forward, and rolled on to the floor, a stream of hot urine running down his leg and puddling out beneath him.
As Turner threw himself upon him, Clayborne felt the first ten or so blows, but after that, as the blood began to flow from his mouth, his nose, and then from his ears and, by the feel of it, from whatever internal organ it was that enabled him to breathe, Clayborne fell into the blissful oblivion of unconsciousness.
All the while that Turner kicked and punched and pummelled, in a blind frenzy of hate and vengefulness that had very little, if anything, to do with the man who had become the object of his rage, Chalkie stood, arms folded, covering the doorway, watching on with a blank, disinterested stare as Clayborne was pounded to a pulp before him. And Bernie stood against the wall opposite, calmly sipping at his scotch.
Jim wasn’t made of such strong stuff, he wasn’t used to seeing such violence; the worst he had seen were the fights in the pub after work between drunken porters who would more often than not leave as the best of mates, with their arms around one another’s shoulders.
He felt the vomit rise in his throat and, rushing to the hearth, Jim spewed into the coal scuttle, the only possible receptacle in the room he could see as appropriate. Even in such a state of nausea and disgust, he didn’t dare risk spoiling Turner’s rugs.
He then dropped down into the leather armchair, plugged his thumbs into his ears and covered his face with his hands. Anything to try to block out the terrible sight of someone being kicked around like a broken toy by a man who had obviously lost all sense of reason.
Bending down to wipe the blood from the toes of his highly polished shoes with the handkerchief Chalkie had handed to him, Turner smiled with the serenity of satiation. ‘He’ll know better next time,’ he said pleasantly.
With that, he stood up, took a cigar from his inside pocket, stuck it between his lips, and stood there, with his arms outstretched for Bernie to help him on with his overcoat.
‘You, Phillips,’ he said, shrugging down into the heavy camel-haired Crombie, ‘get this mess cleared up. And you, Chalkie, you nip across and get the takings off o’ Fat Stan and get ’em down to Mile End. I’ve gotta be off. Mrs Turner’s expecting me in for me tea.’
Turner rolled his eyes and smiled fondly, as though he was dealing with slightly slow children. ‘And what’s the matter with you, Bernie? Go on, don’t just stand there. Go and get that motor started. Yer know how she hates it when I’m late.’
Bemie left without a word, quickly followed by Chalkie.
Turner walked slowly over to the fire and, crouching forward, he took a spill from the box, lit it in the flames and then touched it to the end of his cigar. ‘And don’t forget to clean out this coal scuttle, will yer, Phillips?’ he added amiably.
Turner stayed there for the moment, staring down at Clayborne who was laying beside him on the fireside rug. Apart from the blood and urine, he looked for all the world as though he was curled up for an early evening nap in front of the fire. He looked almost cosy.
With his head cocked to one side, Turner considered the unconscious man. Then he stood up, aimed a final kick hard into Clayborne’s kidneys, shook his head sadly at the man’s failings, and sauntered over to the door, leaving the room, and a grey-faced Jim Phillips to his tidying up.