Chapter Eighteen

On the day of the night of the murder of Charles Henry McGuire – a Friday – police throughout the city had been occupied in the exasperating task of escorting a horde of demonstrators from Argyll Street, up into Renfield Street, along Sauchiehall Street, and back again; two or three thousand men marching abreast, shouting slogans and chanting songs of a derogatory character aimed against the forces of law and order.

The forces of law and order, none too chuffed, had been culled from several different divisions to flank the army of the unemployed and smother on the spot any outbreaks of violence that might happen to occur. Behind the demonstrators, like a buffer, came another wedge of the boys in blue and behind them again a rank of beautiful mounted horse any one of which – horse not rider – would have made a grand centrepiece to a family dinner, served with peas, potatoes and a dash of gravy browning. The intention of the marchers was to disrupt traffic, make a whale of a noise and draw as much attention as possible to the fact that there were a hundred and twenty thousand men out there whose wives and children were slowly starving to death on the Westminster dole. The coppers were not unsympathetic to the cause but they, the coppers, had seen just too much of the underside of life to be entirely free of cynicism and knew that no matter how tough things got for the wives and kiddies back home publicans and bookmakers would continue to grow fat on the crumbs that fell from the table not of the rich but the poor.

Sore heads and aching feet did not make for vigilance late that Friday night, particularly as the pubs were packed, the shebeens doing a roaring trade and not a tart between Scotstoun and Saracen Cross was left stranded for long without the attentions of a gentleman friend. The brawling brown wind that blew warmth and a false taste of spring up the valley of the Clyde may have had something to do with it, but the consensus of opinion under the blue lamps was that the buggers were simply making hay before – to mix a metaphor – the roof fell in with a vengeance and the government cracked down again.

What then was one corpse more or less, another stabbing, another victim of the senseless sectarian rage that no right-minded citizen could properly put a name to, that was just part of the unholy game that the Glasgow keelies played one with the other and all for one.

If Charles Henry McGuire had been found hanging on the monument at Gorbals Cross or face down in a pool of blood at Eglinton Toll then a wee bit more fuss might have been made, more attention paid to the nature of the crime and the apprehension of the criminal. But McGuire was not found on his own patch. He was found at half past five o’clock in the morning huddled on waste ground behind the Marine Social Club in Vine Street across the river in the former burgh of Partick. Naturally the constable who found him hadn’t a clue who he was. The detectives who were summoned to the scene were no wiser but, given that the corpse had been stripped of all means of identification, surmised that the motive was probably robbery and nothing more sordid or sinister.

What the bookmaker had been doing in Partick on a blustery Friday night in January was a mystery that was never solved. Perhaps he had been taking bets on another bookie’s turf or sampling the rare vintages that were offered in the pubs west of the river. Perhaps he had a secret love nest in that part of town, though neither his current girlfriend nor his wife would wear that theory and were all for elevating Chick to sainthood as far as the interrogating officers were concerned.

Nobody could explain how McGuire travelled to Vine Street. No witnesses came forward to place him on a bus or tram, no cabby willing to swear that he had taken him on as a fare. Nobody in the pubs remembered him; which wasn’t really surprising since Friday night did tend to induce amnesia in a lot of folk, a condition somehow exacerbated by the appearance of inquisitive police officers, in or out of uniform.

Certainly nobody had noticed the Singer Senior Six that had prowled into the bottom end of Vine Street at approximately five past midnight or had seen the driver and his companion open the upright boot, or what the boot had contained, or what had been done with what the boot had contained. There had been no cry, no groan from what the boot had contained to catch the attention of the citizens of Vine Street, for what the boot had contained had been dead for an hour or more and had bled all over the tarpaulin in which O’Hara and Tony Lombard had wrapped it back over the river in the vicinity of Chandler Street where, in fact, the deed had been done.

Poor old ostentatious Chick: he lay unclaimed on a slab in the Marine Division mortuary for the best part of forty-eight hours during which period the medical examiner concluded that death was due to a series of eleven stab wounds to chest and neck, specifically a penetrative intrusion deep into the plural cavity and a slash that had all but severed the internal carotid artery thereby causing the victim to drown in his own blood. Lacerations to hands and wrists, together with tearing to the sleeves of overcoat, sports jacket and shirt suggested that the victim had endeavoured to defend himself and may even himself have been armed. The point was moot. No weapon connected with the murder was ever traced. The chap was dead and that was that.

Martha, McGuire’s wife, reported him missing late Sunday afternoon, identified the corpse mid-morning Monday and tearfully provided enough detail for the CID to decide that this was an opportunist murder and that theft was the only motive; a natural error given that Mr McGuire’s wallet, fountain pens and wristlet watch were missing and that he hadn’t so much as a brass farthing in his pockets when found.

At the request of officers west of the river, Southside Division made a few enquiries among the Gorbals lads and grilled the amiable John James Flint, Chick’s second-in-command. No charges were forthcoming, however, not even in respect of illegal bookmaking, and the case was handed back to where it properly belonged, out of sight and out of mind in dear old distant Partick.

If any of McGuire’s boys nurtured funny ideas about who might have done the dastardly deed they prudently kept their mouths shut. ‘Flinty’ Flint had let it be known that it would be business as usual in the old homestead and no more nibbling away at the Italians’ territory. In fact, Flint was installed in Chick’s squeaky swivel chair in the office off the Paisley Road before the first greyhound leaped from its trap on Monday evening. And that was more or less the end of the story – except that on the following Friday Tommy Bonnar and his two little ‘nephews’ were buried side by side in the Southern Necropolis, official victims of nothing more dramatic than a tragic accident.

Sober and solemn in dark suits and black alpaca overcoats, most of Tommy’s friends and acquaintances attended the committal.

Afterwards they solemnly shook hands with Tommy’s father who had taken time off work to be there and to thank them all, especially young Mr Manone, for looking after Tommy down through the years.

It was all rather moving, really, though nobody quite managed to shed a tear; nobody except Alex O’Hara who, for some odd reason, found that without his boyhood rival to browbeat, bully and bait, the world was curiously empty and by no means a better place.

*   *   *

Patsy Walsh knew nothing of this. He had departed from Glasgow Central on the night train to London at ten minutes past eleven o’clock on Friday, January 9th, which, as it happened, was almost exactly the moment when Charles Henry McGuire was breathing his last. Patsy was in Paris, installed in a flea-bag hotel in the Marais, before McGuire was identified and, passport stamped and papers in order, was tramping the streets in search of honest employment at precisely the time Tommy Bonnar’s coffin was being lowered into the ground.

The Hallops, on the other hand, knew about everything, and understood practically nothing. They hemmed-and-hawed about turning up at the funeral, were still hemming-and-hawing when the first clod hit the coffin lid, still tucked away in the windy heights of the Sunbeam Garage trying to decipher what it all meant and how it would affect them and deciding, ostrich-like, that if Mr Manone didn’t actually see them then Mr Manone might forget that they had ever existed and that the whole thing would blow over once and for all.

Lizzie Conway and her girls had more to occupy them than the rumours that tripped through the Gorbals, though Polly at least harboured a few dark thoughts about the nature of coincidence apropos the murder of the bookmaker and what role, if any, Dominic Manone might have played in it.

Lizzie was still on cloud nine, still dazed by love.

Appearances by Bernard Peabody were no longer confined to Friday nights, nor were the girls shuttled out of the kitchen when Mr Peabody arrived, for he, Bernard, seemed to regard them with something of the same fondness as he regarded their mother. His injured right hand had been stitched and was healing well and, in the interim, he had all but mastered the tricky art of filling out forms with his left and would, when Lizzie pressed him, demonstrate his cleverness by making neat little drawings – a house, a mouse, an apple tree – with his rent-book pencil on the back of the Evening Citizen for which he received by way of reward a big bosomy hug from the woman and enthusiastic applause from Rosie and Babs.

Against the grain of the times, there were indications that things were showing signs of improvement for the Conways.

Mr Feldman had arranged an interview for Rosie in a famous Glasgow bookshop, the sort of establishment that lay so far beyond Lizzie’s ken that it might have been situated on the moon. Far from putting up an objection, as Mr Feldman had feared she might, Rosie’s mother was delighted and gave her whole-hearted approval and support.

Babs too had been elevated, moved out of the CWC counting house into an office on the second floor where, on a brand-new Underwood typewriter, she hammered away at letters rather than invoices.

At first Babs could not imagine why she had been promoted or why Miss Crawford and Mrs Anderson suddenly began to treat her if not as an equal certainly with a measure of respect. She was even permitted to enter Mr MacDermott’s office now and then and saw with her own eyes the big new Hobbs safe, identical to the one that reposed at the bottom of the Clyde, and a newly glazed window protected by four stout iron bars through which not even Patsy Walsh could have squeezed himself.

Naturally she reported her promotion to her mother and discussed its implications with Polly and eventually concluded that Dominic Manone was responsible and that he had arranged it not to reward her personally but, rather, to please and impress Polly.

Polly was not so sure.

Polly was in a low state, not depressed, not even bored, just curiously restless and impatient. She had expected more attention from Dominic Manone. She was disappointed that he had not been in touch with her again and could not help but feel that somehow she had been used and had become more embroiled than she might care to admit in Dominic’s cloudy affairs.

The fact that she had turned into a thief and had pilfered money that her daddy had stolen from the Manones did not trouble her. The fact that she had lied and engaged in several small, almost random betrayals did not even enter her head. She was caught in an eddy and as she waited for something novel and exciting to happen, something to do with Dominic, she trundled through the days in a state of inexplicable agitation.

And the year, as years will, moved on.

*   *   *

It had been a busy Wednesday evening in the Conway household.

Rosie’s Sunday-best skirt had been sponged and ironed, each separate pleat rendered sharp as a knife blade. Her blouse was brand-new, best quality, purchased with fifteen shillings that Polly had voluntarily donated to the communal chest, money taken out of her savings, so she said; a claim that only Babs had reason to doubt.

There was a new hairband too, a mottled brown ribbon that Lizzie had bought for herself some months ago but that so lent itself to the image that she envisaged for an aspiring bookseller that she insisted on giving it to Rosie and insisted on her daughter wearing it to the interview at Shelby’s in spite of the fact that Rosie thought it made her look like the Lady of the Lake.

Babs had come through with shoes; nothing fancy but a reasonable fit after a knob of newspaper had been squeezed into each toe.

Rosie’s hair had been washed, dried, brushed, titivated into this style then that, inspected, rejected and recast until, at long last, Lizzie was satisfied that her youngest was an object to be proud of and that whatever other reasons Shelby’s might find for rejecting her it would not be her appearance.

It was after nine, a late hour mid-week for the Conways, before a knock sounded upon the landing door; a tentative knock, seemingly quite timid.

Babs wondered if Jackie had come out of hiding and had cooked up a valid excuse to lure her away from Mammy’s apron strings and engage in a bit of what had best be designated as ‘courtship’ down in the back close, a procedure that would take about five minutes if Jackie’s previous performances were anything to go by.

Lizzie wondered if it might be Bernard dropping in unexpectedly, although he had told her that he wouldn’t see her again until Friday. And Rosie, who hadn’t heard the sound, of course, but had noticed the family’s alertness, became tense, for she hadn’t forgotten that night not long since when O’Hara had barged in and threatened them or what O’Hara had done to her down in the backs, or – come to that – what she had thought of Alex O’Hara before she had been taught a lesson in common sense.

It was left to Polly to answer the door.

She had no thoughts, no agenda of her own, no reason to suppose that the late-night caller would have anything to offer her by way of diversion.

‘Auntie Janet? What are you doing here? Is it Gran? Is Gran poorly?’

She came in from the landing with jerky little steps, turned to her right and entered the kitchen as if travelling on a wire. She wore her workaday overcoat, an old tartan scarf and a clam-shaped felt hat. Her frizzy red hair stuck out from under the hat like flames from a broken gas mantle and her normally pallid complexion was mottled not with face powder but by tears.

Rosie, who had been basking in front of the fire in bodice and knickers, hastily covered herself with a shawl and Lizzie, astonished, stood frozen by the table, a towel in her hands.

‘Janet?’ she said. ‘Janet, dearest, what’s wrong?’

The tears that had apparently flowed freely not too long ago had dried up and Janet’s manner was dry and hot now, like an ungreased griddle left too long on the stove. ‘I’ve been robbed,’ she said. ‘I’ve been stolen.’

‘Stolen from, surely?’ said Rosie, not intending to be heartless.

‘Stolen, stolen from?’ Janet said, her voice rising. ‘What does it matter what way you put it? I’ve been robbed, it’s all gone, every penny, every pound scrimped an’ saved over the past twenty years, nothin’ left but a few coppers in the bottom o’ the tin, all the rest of it has disappeared.’

‘Robbed?’ Lizzie put down the towel and moved to comfort her sister. ‘Did somebody break in? Did they hurt Gran or…’

‘She’s fine. She doesn’t know. I didn’t tell her. Questions. Questions. It would only have led to questions, more questions. I’m sick o’ questions. I’ve been robbed an’ I know who done it.’ She elbowed Lizzie aside, and pointed. ‘She done it, your precious daughter done it. She took it. I seen her.’

‘Get bloody stuffed, Auntie,’ Babs said. ‘I never touched your cash.’

‘Cash! See! She knew it was cash!’

‘Well, it would hardly be soddin’ stocks an’ shares, would it?’ Babs said.

Rosie piped up. ‘Maybe it is just lost.’

‘Lost! It’s not lost. She took it, that bitch stole my dowry money.’

‘Dowry money!’ Babs and Polly exclaimed in unison.

The girls exchanged glances. Janet, quick as a viper, saw it. She pulled out a kitchen chair, perched herself upon it, folded her hands over her handbag and straightened her spine, trying for dignity.

Lizzie said, ‘Are you gettin’… I mean, have you actually got a man?’

‘No, I don’t have a man right now. That doesn’t mean t’ say I’ll never have a man again. When the right man turns up I’ll have the money for to marry him. I’ll not be losin’ my chance because I’m in debt.’ She closed her fists on the handbag. ‘Go on, laugh if you like. Daft Auntie Janet, her an’ her dreams.’

‘Nobody thinks you’re daft, dearest,’ Lizzie, said soothingly.

Babs grunted, ‘Naw, not really.’

‘Twenty years it’s taken me t’ save that money. Doin’ wi’out this, denyin’ myself that. Twenty years an’ now it’s all been taken from me.’

Crouched beside Janet, plump knees spread, Lizzie said, ‘I’m sorry for your loss, but what makes you think my girls know anythin’ about it?’

‘Saw them in the cupboard.’

‘You did not,’ said Babs.

‘So that is what was hidden in the cupboard,’ said Rosie.

‘As well you know,’ said Janet.

Rosie propped her chin on her hand, fascinated by what her aunt had divulged. ‘How much was there?’

‘Three hundred an’ twenty-four pounds.’

‘My God!’ Lizzie sat back on her heels.

‘If ever anythin’ happened to our tenement,’ Janet said, ‘it would have bought Mammy an’ me a place for to live.’

‘Unless your dream-boat came along first,’ said Babs. ‘Fat chance!’

That was the key, the catalyst, the detonator, the very last straw.

Janet jerked her head. ‘What do you know about it? What do you know about livin’ in that house wi’ that woman an’ never havin’ a man? Aye, you’ll have a man, no doubt. You’ll have plenty o’ men chasin’ after you, wi’ that blonde hair and those – those things stickin’ out on your chest. All I ever had was what was left after Lizzie went off wi’ her flash Harry. Never a thought spared, never a thought spared for me.’ The hat slipped, releasing a spray of coarse hair that bobbed and chivvied on her brow. ‘Where’s my money? Why’ve you taken my money?’

‘Babs didn’t take it,’ Polly said. ‘I did.’

‘You?’

Polly got to her feet. She felt no guilt just the dead weight of retribution lying upon her and weariness at the prospect of having to explain to her aunt why it had been necessary to have cash and why she had thought that the money was rightfully hers. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I discovered it by – by accident one day a month or so ago. I thought, I honestly thought it was cash that my father had hidden away.’

‘Frank?’ said Janet. ‘What does he have to do with it?’

‘Nothing, apparently,’ Polly said. ‘If I’d known they were your life savings I wouldn’t have touched them.’

Janet blew out her lips, jerked her head in her sister’s direction. ‘Do you believe that, Lizzie? Do you expect me t’ swallow such a cock-and-bull story?’

‘It might be the truth,’ said Lizzie.

‘Frank’s money?’ Janet shook her head, and uttered a croak of mirth. ‘Frank never had any money, not a tosser of his own. Frank Conway? Hoh! I’ll tell you about Frank Conway. He didn’t steal from the Eye-tie. He didn’t join up to escape Carlo Manone. He joined up for to escape you, Lizzie. To escape you an’ that litter o’ babies that was takin’ up all your time an’ attention so there was none left for him, poor soul.’

‘You liar!’ Babs said. ‘Daddy would never leave us.’

‘Would he not, but?’ Janet went rattling on. ‘Frank’s money under the floorboards? Don’t make me laugh. He came t’ me for money. He came t’ me up at the house an’ I gave him everythin’ we had, every penny we had. Precious little it was but it was his for the askin’, all his for the askin’.’

‘He went to you?’ said Lizzie. ‘Why did he go t’ you?’

‘Because he knew I’d do anythin’ for him.’ Janet tilted her chin. The hat slipped, almost fell off. She would not spoil her moment of triumph by snatching at it, however. ‘He knew I loved him.’

‘You?’ said Lizzie, without scorn.

‘Aye, an’ I proved it too. Proved it plenty o’ times.’ Janet tugged the hat from her head and, waving it as if it were a grenade, swung towards her sister. ‘All those times when you were swelled up who do you think kept Frank happy? Eh? Do you think he stayed wi’ you because he loved you? God, he never loved you. He loved me, Lizzie. It was me he loved an’ it was me he’d have come back for.’ Her lips pursed in a bitter little pout. ‘That’s who I was savin’ for. He’s the one. He’s the man. I never gave up the hope he’d come back an’ take me away. I never gave up hope.’ She got up, small and shabby but with swagger. ‘Now, where’s my money, girlie? I want it back.’

‘You can’t have it back,’ said Polly. ‘I’ve spent it.’

‘Lyin’ bitch,’ said Janet.

‘You leave her alone,’ said Lizzie, rising too. ‘You can say what you like about me but I’ll not have you sayin’ those things to my girls.’

‘Thieves, that’s all they are. Thieves an’ whores.’

Lizzie’s blow was more of a punch that a slap. It rocked Janet but did not silence her. She staggered, crumpled against the edge of the table, and went on talking, her voice not dimmed but strengthened.

‘My man, he was,’ she said. ‘My man. My money.’

‘Prove it,’ Babs shouted. ‘Yeah, prove it, you stupid old cow.’

‘I believe her,’ Rosie said.

‘What the hell d’ you know about it, dummy?’ Babs shouted.

‘Alex O’Hara told me about Dad.’

‘O’Hara, that – that toad!’ Babs shouted. ‘I suppose he’s been up this old hag an’ all.’ She leaped towards her aunt. ‘Did you take O’Hara to your bed an’ all? Aye, an’ who else, I’d like to know?’

‘None else,’ said Janet, very still now. ‘Only him. Only Frank. There was never any other man to match him. I wisht he’d come back.’

‘Well, he isn’t comin’ back,’ Babs yelled. ‘He’s dead. He’s dead an’ thank God for it.’

Lizzie sighed. ‘Don’t say that, dear.’

‘Right, my money?’ Janet said, holding out one thin, hard hand.

‘I haven’t got your money,’ Polly said. ‘I told you. I spent it.’

‘Not all of it,’ said Babs, scowling.

‘Yes, all of it,’ said Polly. ‘I gave it to someone. I gave it to him just the way you say you gave it to Daddy. To help him get away.’

‘A likely story.’ Janet rubbed her cheek, for the flesh had begun to swell a little and had turned bright red. ‘It’ll have gone to Manone. Manone. Hoh! He took you t’ the fair, Lizzie, didn’t he? Payin’ him money all those years when there was nothin’ to pay for.’

‘An’ you let her,’ Babs said. ‘Dear God, you let her.’

And Polly said, ‘Yes, I gave it to Mr Manone.’

That stopped her, that brought her up short. Smugness vanished from her eyes in an instant. ‘What?’ Janet said. ‘What are you tellin’ me?’

‘Paid back to Dominic Manone,’ said Polly.

‘But you said…’

‘Ah, yes, but I’m a born liar, Auntie Janet, aren’t I?’

‘You said…’

‘I gave it to Manone, all of it.’

Babs laughed. ‘So why don’t you ask him to give you it back?’

Janet turned. ‘Is this true, Lizzie?’

‘I don’t know. I expect it is,’ Lizzie said. ‘If the girls say it is then…’

‘Bye-bye nest egg,’ said Babs.

‘But – but it’s my money.’

‘Not any more it ain’t,’ Babs said.

‘I’ll – I’ll – I’ll report you all t’ the polis.’

‘No, you won’t,’ said Lizzie. ‘You can’t.’

‘Aye, but I can.’

‘And tell them what?’ said Polly. ‘Tell them about Dominic Manone?’

‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Janet,’ Lizzie said with an odd, almost protective note in her voice. ‘It wouldn’t be sensible to drag Mr Manone into our family squabble.’

‘My money, my savin’s…’

‘Gone,’ said Rosie, very distinctly, ‘like my daddy. Gone for good.’

‘And,’ Polly said, ‘you’ve only yourself to blame.’

*   *   *

It had been years since the three Conway girls had clambered into the niche bed beside Mammy all at one time. It seemed a natural thing to do, though, after the crisis that Aunt Janet’s visit had incurred and the doubts that trailed in the wake of her revelations; a sign of unity that Lizzie hadn’t the heart to reject.

She wore her nightgown and had stuck a few paper curlers in her hair. Rosie too was dressed for bed but Babs and Polly had only kicked off their shoes before, rather sheepishly, they slid on top of the blankets and settled themselves at the foot of the mattress.

‘Now,’ Lizzie said, ‘I want the truth. Where’s Janet’s money?’

Polly said, ‘I gave it straight to Patsy Walsh.’

‘Why?’ said Lizzie.

‘Because I thought the Manones might try to kill him.’

‘He robbed the warehouse, I take it?’

‘Yes,’ said Polly, ‘but got away with nothing.’

Lizzie said, ‘Did O’Hara threaten him?’

‘No, not exactly,’ Polly said. ‘After what happened to Tommy Bonnar, though, I was afraid the same thing might happen to Patsy.’

‘How did you stumble on Janet’s savings?’ Lizzie asked.

Polly hesitated. ‘Pure accident.’

‘Tell her,’ Babs said. ‘It’s all out now in any case.’

‘I was looking for a place to hide Babs’s – our share of the robbery.’

‘Your share?’ said Lizzie.

‘My share,’ said Babs. ‘She never had a share.’

‘When I discovered money hidden under the boards in Gran’s house,’ Polly said, ‘I naturally assumed it was Daddy’s.’

‘So you just took it?’

‘Yes.’

Lizzie heaved a sigh. ‘Has he gone now, this boy?’

‘I think he’s in Paris.’

‘You just wanted rid of him, didn’t you, Polly?’ Lizzie said.

‘I suppose I did.’

‘Did you give him all Janet’s money?’ Lizzie asked.

‘I bloody hope not,’ said Babs.

‘Half,’ Polly said. ‘I put the rest into a bank account.’

‘You didn’t tell me that,’ said Babs. ‘Where’s the bank book?’

‘I’ve hidden it.’

‘Where?’

Polly gave an embarrassed shrug. ‘Back of the wireless set.’

Rosie giggled. ‘And I thought it was just Victor Sylvester.’

Lizzie said, ‘You’ll have to give it back.’

‘Like hell we will,’ said Babs, ‘not after what Janet done to us.’

‘Janet didn’t do anythin’ to us,’ said Lizzie.

‘You don’t seem very surprised at what Auntie told us,’ said Rosie.

‘I’m not. I knew he had someone else,’ said Lizzie. ‘I’d a notion it might be Janet but I didn’t want to have to face up to the truth.’

‘She’s a right cow,’ Babs interrupted. ‘Imagine lettin’ you pay the Manones for all these years an’ never sayin’ a word.’

‘How could she?’ said Lizzie. ‘She was waitin’ for Frank to come back.’

‘Alex O’Hara says somebody else took the Manones’ money,’ said Rosie.

‘You an’ O’Hara seem to have been very bloody chummy,’ said Babs.

‘It was a while ago,’ said Rosie, ‘when I still thought he liked me.’

‘Well,’ Lizzie said, ‘I’m relieved things are out in the open at last.’

‘For all the good it’ll do us,’ Babs said.

Lizzie put an arm around Rosie, and said, ‘I’m goin’ to marry Bernard. He loves me an’ I love him. I’ve been feelin’ guilty about goin’ off an’ leavin’ Janet to cope wi’ Mother – but I think I’ve got over it all of a sudden. So that’s one problem solved.’

‘One problem?’ said Babs. ‘What about us?’

‘Will we go with you,’ said Rosie, ‘to Knightswood?’

‘You will,’ said Lizzie. ‘Your sisters won’t.’

‘Wait a bloody minute,’ said Babs. ‘Are you sayin’ that Polly an’ me are to be kicked out in the street just because you want to marry this guy?’

‘It’s not goin’ to happen right away,’ said Lizzie.

‘I mean, are you punishin’ us?’ said Babs. ‘Anyhow, why can’t we come with you to Knightswood? Bernard wouldn’t mind.’

‘No, but his mother would,’ said Lizzie. ‘The house isn’t big enough for six of us. Besides, I’m sure you wouldn’t want to leave your friend.’

‘What friend?’ said Babs, frowning.

‘Your friend downstairs,’ said Lizzie.

‘Jackie? My God! Jackie’s not…’ Babs paddled her legs in frustration. ‘You are, you’re punishin’ us, for God’s sake.’

‘I’m not,’ said Lizzie. ‘I’m just doing what I want for a change.’

‘And the debt to Dominic Manone?’ said Polly.

‘There is no debt,’ said Lizzie. ‘Never was a debt.’

‘Dominic doesn’t know that,’ said Polly.

‘He will,’ said Lizzie. ‘He will when you tell him.’

‘Me?’

‘Aye,’ Lizzie said. ‘You.’

*   *   *

Early on Thursday afternoon, Miss Fyfe gave her a whisk over with a clothes brush, Mr Feldman issued a few last-minute instructions, wished her the best of luck, and waved her off to her appointment at Shelby’s.

Rosie was at an age more selfish than sensitive. Most of the unpleasantness that Aunt Janet had stirred up was almost forgotten in her excitement. She had been looking forward to the great adventure – her first interview for a job – ever since Mr Feldman had arranged it. She had even persuaded Polly to accompany her into Glasgow one evening and lead her to Mandeville Square so that she wouldn’t get lost when the day came.

The building had been impressive but the shop’s narrow ground-floor windows had revealed little, except some expensive-looking books with tinted plates laid open on a velvet cloth and, at the back, three or four shelves of leather-bound volumes. Rosie had been a mite disappointed. Shelby’s was not the jumbled, jam-packed sort of bookshop that she had envisaged and had an air of austere gentility that made it seem just a wee bit stuffy. A job, any sort of job, was not to be sneezed at, however, and come Thursday she put her doubts behind her and rode the tram into Glasgow feeling more alert and nervous than she had ever done before.

As soon as she pushed through the heavy swing door and stepped into the shop, all her doubts vanished and her nervousness was replaced by a kind of awe. Sixteen or not, a Gorbals girl or not, she knew that this was the place for her. It was quiet, so very quiet that she could almost hear the silence; not the muffled silence that she was used to but the sort of silence you could feel on your skin, tranquil, soothing and pleasantly warm, with a faint plushy odour that words couldn’t adequately describe – the aroma, the effluvia of books.

Books in profusion, more books than were held by the public libraries in Norfolk Street and Scotland Street put together, more books than carelessly crammed the barrows where Babs took her when she had a spare shilling to spend. Books here were treated as more than commodities and were granted a respect to which Rosie instinctively responded They were stacked on floor-to-ceiling shelves, individualised on wooden stands, housed in stately glass-fronted cases and laid open in display cabinets. There was hardly a soul in the long reach of the shop, as if the books themselves were the inhabitants, the citizens of Shelby’s rooms and admitted acolytes only reluctantly and in penny numbers.

One elderly gentleman in an old-fashioned Chesterfield lurked in a corner, head bent as if in prayer, a little volume bound in card open in his hands. One younger gentleman with a shock of curly brown hair down to his collar and a Raglan overcoat flung open leaned gently against a display case, carefully inspecting a huge calf-bound tome that lay open on top of the glass. And, though Rosie failed to notice him, a boy in shirt-sleeves and a canvas apron was perched on a tall ladder so far above her that he was almost lost in the shadows of the ceiling cornice.

It wasn’t consideration or a suspicion that she might be hard of hearing that brought the shop-boy down to floor level. He knew better than to raise his voice within the precincts of the bookroom. He had learned the hard way to restrain his natural exuberance and pretend that he was as well mannered if not as well bred as most of Shelby’s customers. He nipped swiftly down the ladder and was at Rosie’s side almost before she realised it.

‘Yass,’ he said in a throaty whisper, then, just in case he had misjudged the age and class of new arrival, added a reluctant, ‘madam?’

Rosie turned to face him. She arched her tongue against the roof of her mouth then, fighting a nervous slur, said, ‘I am here to see Mr Shuh – Shelby.’

‘Which Mr Shelby ’ud that be?’ the boy said.

‘Mr Oswald Shuh – Shelby?’ said Rosie, uncertainly.

She had no trouble reading the boy’s lips but she could not make out the sneering, jumped-up working-class accent that rang as false as a fourpenny bit. She would have felt more comfortable if she had, for she would have known, as Polly would have known, that he was no more socially exalted then she was, just a tad more experienced in patronage.

‘Is it fur work?’ the boy said.

He had a thin, gutter-ground face, sallow and severe.

‘I have an appointment,’ said Rosie, voice rising; so much so that the elderly gent in the corner turned and peered at her, not disapprovingly but with an air of sympathy. ‘Where is Mr Shelby to be found?’

‘Didn’t know he wus lost, darlin’,’ the boy said, then, spotting higher authority, added hastily, ‘However, if you’ll step this way, miss, I’ll see if I can … Ah, there you are, Mr Shelby. Young lady here claims she’s got an appointment with Mr Oswald.’

‘She has, Gannon,’ the higher authority said.

‘I thought he was still in London, sur.’

‘He is. I’ll do the honours. Now scuttle along, please.’

‘Sur,’ said Gannon, and was gone.

Rosie looked up at the higher authority and felt better immediately.

He was tall but not so tall as to be intimidating. He had a square-ish sort of face, a prominent chin with a cleft in it, dark wavy hair, and sported a pair of heavy tortoiseshell spectacles. Coupled with the fact that he wore no coat, the specs lent him an air of informality. His waistcoat, Rosie noticed, was ink-stained and the cloth, though expensive, had frayed a little round two of the buttonholes. His shirt sleeves were fastened with rolled gold links, however, and she guessed that he must be one of the Shelby clan.

‘Rosalind Conway?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m Robert Shelby. My father sends his apologies. He’s been detained elsewhere on business. He’s asked me to put you through your paces and report back to him.’ He smiled, taking the sting out of it. ‘Can you make me out?’

‘Yes, sir. I can read your lips fine.’

‘Surprising. Everybody tells me I’m a fearful mumbler.’

‘I do not think you are, sir.’

‘Well, that’s gratifying.’ Looking down at her he seemed momentarily at a loss, then he said, ‘We won’t bother with the office. If you come with me, I’ll take you directly to the catalogue desks and we’ll see how your penmanship shapes up.’ His put his hand against her shoulder, very lightly. ‘This way.’

She walked by his side down a carpeted aisle between display cabinets and waist-high bookcases, looking up at him.

He said, ‘I believe you come with Mr Feldman’s recommendation.’

‘Mr Feldman is my teacher, sir.’

‘Mr Feldman was my teacher too.’

‘You?’ said Rosie. ‘But you are not deaf?’

‘Abe Feldman taught me to play chess.’

‘Oh!’

‘Do you play?’

‘No, Mr Shelby, I am afraid I do not.’

They had reached an alcove towards the rear. It was protected by a carved wood arch but the shop was clearly visible from beneath it. Behind the barrier, however, were two long tables, each top inlaid with fine, pale green leather. Books were piled up on them and on the floor between. On each table were three big brass ink-stands and a rack containing pens, blotting paper, envelopes and other assorted stationery. On one table was a typewriter – an antique Oliver with keys like a spider’s legs – an embossing press and a device that Rosie recognised as an automatic numbering machine. Seated at the table was a man of about sixty. He wore a threadbare suit, a rumpled shirt, and had a small moustache the hue and texture of badger’s bristle. He glanced up and winked at Rosie through a pair of thick gold-rimmed spectacles.

‘Mr Briggs, our researcher and cataloguer,’ Robert Shelby told her. ‘If we do decide to employ you, Rosalind, it’s Mr Briggs who will train you. What do you think of that, Albert? Can you cope with a female apprentice?’

‘Male, female; can’t hardly tell the difference these days,’ Mr Briggs said. ‘Are you the deaf lassie?’

‘Hard of hearing,’ Rosie answered.

‘Huh!’ Mr Briggs said. ‘One deafie, an’ one half blind. What a pair that’ll be, eh, Mr Robert? Hardly worth more than one wage between us?’

‘I wouldn’t tell my father that,’ Robert Shelby said. ‘You might give him ideas.’ He opened a drawer in the base of the table, took out a sheaf of lined foolscap paper, placed it on the table, drew out a chair. ‘Now, Rosalind, I’m going to ask you to copy a piece from a book, a rather odd book written in Latin several hundred years ago. It’s called Novum Organum, by a chap named Francis Bacon.’ He reached to the pile by the table, plucked out a book. ‘It’s not a first edition, of course, but it’s early. Bound in vellum, this funny waxy sort of stuff. Put one of our ebony rulers across the pages to hold them down and copy the whole of the page with the tape marker in it. Can you can do that?’

‘Yes.’

‘Perhaps I should relieve you of your coat and hat?’

‘Please,’ said Rosie.

She slipped out of her overcoat and gave it, her hat and scarf to Mr Shelby. She was already studying the book’s wrinkled pages and unfamiliar type. She understood the nature of the test: her ability to make an exact copy of a page written in a language she didn’t comprehend. It was a good test, fair if difficult and indicated something of what would be expected of her if she got the job. She seated herself, selected a pen, opened one of the ink-wells. The pen-nib was brand-new, steel with a fine point. She licked it to make the ink stick.

‘I think, Mr Briggs, we should let the young lady get on with it.’

‘Aye, I think you’re right, sir,’ Albert Briggs said, then leaned over, put his moustache almost against Rosie’s ear and in a soft, tobacco-smelling breath, added, ‘Dot your tees an’ cross your eyes, lass, an’ you’ll do fine.’

Rosie hardly heard him; she had already begun to write.