Chapter Eighteen

‘Is Frank not here then?’ Janet McKerlie peered into the corners of the drawing-room and clutched her handbag as if she feared that it would be wrested from her. ‘Is that not why you’ve brought me here, for to meet Frank?’

‘Janet, sit down,’ Lizzie said.

‘I should be at the kirk, y’ know,’ said Janet.

‘Yes, of course you should,’ Polly said, ‘but for one Sunday evening I’m sure you won’t be missed.’

‘Oh but I will, I’ll be missed all right.’

Polly guided her aunt towards one of the chairs that Dominic had placed in a half-circle around the fireplace. He hadn’t told Polly why he had chosen to bring them all together on a blustery Sunday evening but if there was one thing that Polly had learned in her sessions with Mr Shadwell it was the value of patience, of waiting for the answers you wanted to hear.

Jackie had been sent over the river to pick up Lizzie and Rosie while Charley Fraser, in the Wolseley, had navigated his way through the streets of Laurieston and had arrived on Janet McKerlie’s doorstep only ten minutes late. She – Charley reported later – had come sweeping out like a damned duchess, swanking to all the neighbours or, more accurately, to the bunch of snotty-nosed kids that gathered, gawping round the big car at the kerb. Charley said he’d almost expected her to ask him for a handful of coins to throw out, like largesse at a wedding, but after she’d wigged him off for keeping her waiting she perched herself in the centre of the rear seat, popped a peppermint Imperial into her mouth and said not one damned word until he’d off-loaded her again in Dominic’s driveway.

Once inside the mansion Janet had refused to relinquish her overcoat and hat, had refused to use the toilet at the end of the hall, had been as stiff and quivering as a greyhound in a trap at the prospect that the man she loved, Frank Conway, was waiting for her behind the drawing-room door. And when he wasn’t, when all she found was what she’d been promised – her sister, her nieces and Dominic Manone – she’d entered a state of stubborn recalcitrance that would have put a mule to shame.

She refused a glass of sherry wine, tea, coffee or the delicious shortbread fingers that Mrs O’Shea had drummed up that afternoon. She refused to meet her sister’s eye or, when invited to do so by Babs, to admire the handsome room which was even larger and more sumptuously furnished than Janet’s sole experience of ‘class’, the Laurieston church minister’s manse where Wednesday night prayer meetings were conducted for spinsters and widows. Apparently she also refused to accept that Frank Conway wasn’t tucked away behind one of the old pieces of furniture waiting to spring up like a jack-in-the-box and sweep her into his arms.

Lizzie cherished no such silly illusions. Rosie and she sat side by side on the sofa, nibbling shortbread and sipping sherry, both watchful and cautious. They’d left Bernard at home in a raging sulk. He had demanded to be told precisely what Dominic was up to but as Lizzie pointed out, the only way to find out precisely what Dominic was up to was to do precisely what Dominic requested and turn up in Manor Park Avenue at seven p.m. on Sunday.

Polly had seldom seen her husband so at ease. For the best part of a week he had been purring like a cat that knows where the cream is hidden. She had seen little of him. When he had come home he had spent much time with the children, showing them a degree of attention that was almost, if not quite, smothering.

Polly had an inkling of what might be in the wind. Tony had told her that Dominic was in process of pulling off the biggest deal of his career and she had a feeling that her husband was tying up the loose ends of their life together and meant what he said about leaving. She felt no sadness at the prospect, no despair. Sprawled belly-down on the bed upstairs, she had wept after Tony had left her, wept because she felt guilty at last, horribly, tormentingly guilty at what she had done to Dominic and what she would do to Tony, and how much she would miss the excitement of living with a secret that was so intimately, so intimidatingly her own.

She watched her husband seat himself in one of the wing chairs and, his hands in his trouser pockets, stretch out his legs.

‘I’m sorry,’ he began, ‘sorry that I had to bring you here when I’m sure we all have better things to do.’

‘Dominic, please?’ Rosie spoke up.

‘Ah!’ he said. ‘Sorry,’ and lifted himself forward slightly in the chair so that Rosie could read his lips more clearly. ‘Better?’

‘Yes.’

The little interruption did not disturb his rhythm, Polly noted. He smiled at Rosie and inclined his head as if to thank her for drawing attention to his negligence, then continued, ‘It would be daft to pretend that none of us in this room aren’t interested in Frank Conway and it’s to tell you about Frank Conway that I’ve got you all together.’

‘Where is he? Why isn’t Frank here?’ Janet demanded.

‘He isn’t here,’ Dominic said, ‘because at this very moment he’s on a boat bound for New York. In other words, he’s gone back to America. He will not return to Scotland.’

‘Because of the war?’ Rosie asked.

‘Partly,’ Dominic said, ‘but rather, I fancy, because he didn’t get what he wanted over here.’

‘An’ what was that, Dominic?’ Babs said.

‘He wanted me to co-operate with him on, shall we say, a get-rich-quick scheme cooked up by my father in Philadelphia. Now I’m not, as you all know, averse to making money but there were elements in Frank Conway’s proposal that, candidly, disgusted me.’

‘What elements?’ said Rosie.

‘A reasonable belief that profits from the enterprise would wind up financing members of the Nazi party,’ Dominic said. ‘Mainly for that reason I elected not to accept the proposal and refused to participate in it.’

‘Nothin’ wrong with Sir Oswald Mosley,’ Janet broke in. ‘He’s a good-lookin’ man an’ a member o’ the nobility.’

‘Dear God!’ Babs put a despairing hand to her brow.

‘This wasn’t to fund the Blackshirts, Janet,’ Dominic said. ‘The money was intended for Germany.’

‘Some o’ Adolf Hitler’s ideas…’

‘Auntie,’ said Babs, ‘shut up.’

‘Don’t you talk t’ me like that, not after what I’ve had to put up with.’

Dominic raised his voice a little. ‘Ladies, please, there’s no need for argument. The fact of the matter is that Frank Conway has gone as suddenly as he appeared and I can assure you that none of us will hear from him again.’

‘I will,’ said Janet. ‘I know I will.’

‘Well,’ said Dominic, holding up a hand to silence Babs’s protest, ‘well, perhaps you will, Janet, but I wouldn’t count on it.’

‘Did you know who he was?’ said Rosie. ‘Did you know he was my Daddy?’

‘Not at first,’ Dominic said. ‘He passes himself off under the name of Edgar Harker now. I took him at face value. It was only latterly that I learned his true identity.’

‘Did he tell you who he was?’ said Lizzie.

‘No.’

‘Why didn’t he come to see us?’ said Rosie.

‘He isn’t that kind of father,’ said Polly. ‘Babs and I encountered him face to face, quite by chance. I didn’t recognise him, nor did Babs. He was less than paternal, Rosie, believe me. He’s a thoroughly unpleasant man.’

‘I’ll go along with that,’ said Babs. ‘Struck me as a right bastard.’

‘Aye,’ said Lizzie, quietly, ‘perhaps he always was.’

She glanced up at Janet but the woman offered no defence of the phantom with whom she had been in love for so many years. She sat on the edge of the chair, clutching her handbag. Life for Janet McKerlie had stopped over twenty years ago, Polly realised. Perhaps, though, that was the way Janet wanted it and dreary habit and false hope were all she needed to sustain her to the end of her days.

‘I know,’ Dominic went on, ‘that some of you may be disappointed that he made no effort to meet you while he was in Scotland and are inclined to blame me for not informing you that he was alive and back in Scotland. But it seemed the most sensible thing to do at the time. Why? Because the police were aware of his presence and might even have arrested him, which would have been a disaster for all of you.’

‘Yeah, and for you too, Dom,’ Babs said.

‘Probably,’ Dominic admitted.

‘Is that why you chased him away?’ said Rosie.

‘I didn’t chase him away. He went of his own volition.’

‘Back where he came from?’ said Rosie.

‘Yes.’

‘Where did he come from?’ Rosie persisted. ‘And why did he leave us in the lurch in the first place?’

‘Things got too hot for him,’ Lizzie said. ‘He thought he was in debt to the Manones – he wasn’t as it happens – an’ went off to fight in the war.’

‘Is that really true?’ said Babs.

‘I’m not sure,’ Dominic said. ‘I’ve a suspicion he may have joined up and then deserted. I really cannot say. All I do know is that he turned up in Philadelphia soon after the war with a new name and went to work for my father.’

‘Is that where he’s gone back to?’ Lizzie said.

‘Yes,’ Dominic said. ‘Philadelphia, possibly New York.’

Polly said, ‘Did he take his wife with him?’

‘I expect he did,’ said Dominic, unruffled by her question. ‘He married again, you see, more than once for all I can tell. Bigamy, however, is the least of your father’s crimes. He was a danger to all of us, believe me, and it’s better for all of us, especially you, Lizzie, that he’s gone.’

‘Is this supposed to clear the air?’ said Babs.

‘I hope so, yes,’ said Dominic.

‘Does it? Mammy,’ Polly said, ‘does it?’

And Lizzie, with a little sigh, said, ‘Yes.’

*   *   *

At first she thought he had cost her the baby, that rough handling had restored the natural blood flow; that she had deceived herself, that all would be well when the bruises faded and she would be just as she had been before. She had sworn Dougie to secrecy and because he loved her in his fashion, he’d said nothing to Tony about Eddie’s visit and had busied himself with running off a fortune in fine forged notes.

It was audible all the time now, the insatiable click-clack-click of the paper feeder, an accompaniment to the strange little pulses inside her. When she carried Dougie’s lunch out to the stables or fetched him coffee she could feel the vibrations reaching up through the soles of her feet into her thighs and belly, shaking the tiny foetus inside her womb; felt that she’d become part of a device that would deliver her up as sharp and well-defined as the Britannia on a five-pound note. Then she would come out into the yard, breathe the fresh spring air, let the country wind soothe her, relieved that Eddie’s brutal love-making had not cost her the child, that the child within her had survived.

There was money now, much money. Neatly stacked bundles of banknotes. Two hundred notes to a bundle. Each bundle bound with a strip of thick brown paper. She knew, of course, that it was not real money. But it looked and felt like real money. Perfectly authentic. She contemplated the money in a pleased, vague sort of way. Recompense for all the suffering her mother had undergone. Payment for her suffering too, a thin and brittle strand that bound her still to her father. Soon she would have her money. Money would free her to retrace the steps she had taken to get here. With Eddie. With her lawful wedded husband. Or not.

Tony was working hard now. He was over the stables with Dougie for much of the day. Dougie had shown him how to check each sheet of notes with the big magnifier, what to look out for, and the rate of wastage had dropped to almost nil. He, Tony, operated the guillotine by hand. He spread the notes to let them age, gathered them, counted them, bundled them as efficiently as any bank clerk, stored them in cardboard cartons.

They had a smell, those old new notes, a fine distinctive bouquet. Tony would pause to sniff one or, now and then, hold one out to her as if it were a tulip or a rose, would smile at her and wink. The money had brought him out of his sullen mood. He did not seem to mind that she would not allow him into her bed or be tempted into his. She told him that she was unwell, just a little unwell. He was tactful and solicitous – and busy. Busy with the money. Busy completing the job that Dominic had given him to do.

Once every two or three days he drove the Dolomite down to Breslin to stock up on groceries and once, just once, a Civil Defence volunteer had wandered up to the farmhouse to conduct an unofficial census of all those residents who still needed to be supplied with gas-masks. The machine had been switched off, sheets and plates swiftly removed and hidden. Dougie had come out of the stables in his overalls and had been charm itself to the volunteer who had drunk coffee and chatted and inspected the three gas-masks in an off-hand manner and had gone off again, quite satisfied, without realising that a man with a loaded rifle had been stationed in the attic window and that any sign of suspicion or alarm might have resulted in one volunteer less in the Breslin Civil Defence unit.

Then Dominic had come out to Blackstone. He had inspected the machinery again, had peeped into one of the cartons and had pocketed the tally slip that Tony had ready for him. Exact count: £63,430. Almost thirteen thousand notes. And enough paper in stock to print thirty thousand more.

Dominic had taken one of the bundles with him and, before leaving, had walked across the field for a bit with Tony, talking to Tony and, though she had spied on them through the telescope, Penny could not make out what they were saying, if they were talking about her or money or war.

Late that same night Tony came to her bedroom door, knocked upon it and asked if she would let him in. And she did. And he made love to her again.

They lay together afterwards, naked in the warm night air, smoking cigarettes, and Tony said, ‘What’ll you do when all this is over, Penny?’

‘I will take my money and go back to New York.’

‘Not Austria?’

‘No, there is nothing for me in Austria.’

‘Don’t you want to marry a high-ranking officer of the Wehrmacht?’

‘A German? No,’ she said, then again, more emphatically, ‘No.’

‘You don’t believe in backing winners?’ Tony asked.

She leaned on an elbow and stared down at him. ‘Do you think that they will be winners,’ she said, ‘truly?’

‘There may not be any winners at all,’ Tony said.

He transferred the cigarette to an ashtray on the bedside table and put his hands on her shoulders. She lowered herself an inch or two until her breasts touched his chest. Her nipples were sensitive and her breasts seemed heavier, though that, she realised, might just be her imagination. The bruises that Eddie’s thumbs had left were no more than subtle shadows.

Tony said, ‘You don’t want to marry at all, is that it?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I would marry if the right man came along.’

‘Hah! The old story,’ Tony said. ‘The old, old story.’

‘What is?’

‘Waiting for Mr Right. You could wait all your life for Mr Right.’

‘Then perhaps I will – wait all of my life,’ Penny said.

She suspected that she could force him to a decision, for behind his moodiness, beneath his toughness Tony Lombard was a sentimentalist who would not let her go, not if she was carrying his child. And it was Tony’s child. She was eight or ten weeks into pregnancy and had been with no other man in that time.

‘What are you smiling at?’ Tony said.

‘I did not know that I was smiling.’

He shifted his weight, drew up his knees a little. He had a broad chest, hairy but not ugly, broad shoulders too. ‘So you wouldn’t want to marry a guy like me?’

‘A guy like you?’ Penny said.

‘Me,’ Tony said. ‘Get married to me.’

‘Are you asking if I will marry you?’

‘Yeah, I am.’

‘When this is over?’

‘As soon as this is over, yeah.’

‘Will you go away?’

‘We’ll both go away,’ Tony said, ‘if that’s what you want.’

‘It is what I want,’ Penny said. ‘Somewhere far away.’

‘Fine,’ Tony said. ‘Why don’t you marry me and we’ll clear out together?’

‘I would,’ she said, ‘but Eddie…’

‘Eddie? What the hell does Harker have to do with it?’ Tony said. ‘He isn’t your husband, not legally.’

‘You are right,’ Penny said. ‘I suppose you are right.’

‘So you will marry me?’

‘When it is over,’ Penny said. ‘When it is all over here, yes.’

‘That’s good enough for me,’ said Tony and drew her down upon him and cautiously kissed her lips.

*   *   *

It came as a surprise to Lizzie, and something of a shock, to see Dominic’s motorcar draw up at the kerb outside the living-room window and, a moment or two later, to find her grandchildren on the doorstep. She was nonplussed by her son-in-law’s appearance on a Sunday afternoon, curious as to why he’d come. The fact that he’d left Polly at home in Manor Park suggested there might be trouble brewing between them.

‘Don’t look so perturbed, Mother-in-law,’ Dominic said. ‘We’ve had lunch, if that’s what’s got you hot and bothered.’

‘You’ll have tea then?’

‘No,’ Dominic said then, sensing Lizzie’s agitation, instantly changed his mind. ‘Please, yes.’ He inclined his head towards the kitchen. ‘Where’s Bernard?’

‘Out in the back,’ said Lizzie, ‘digging more holes.’

‘Shelters?’

‘Aye,’ said Lizzie, ‘More shelters.’

She turned her attention to her grandchildren. Much as she loved Stuart and Ishbel she was less at ease with them than with Babs’s brood, particularly Angus whose enthusiasm for mischief seemed more natural than the little Manones’ polite reserve. If she had spent more time with them she might have detected in Stuart a sadness that had no explanation and might have recognised in Ishbel some of her sister’s prissiness.

‘They’re getting big,’ Lizzie said, lamely. ‘Aren’t you getting big, Stuart?’

‘Yes, Granny, I think I am.’

‘Thank you,’ Ishbel said.

‘Thank you,’ Stuart repeated.

There was more discussion about food and drink for neither child seemed willing to give offence by expressing a preference.

Lizzie came close to losing patience for she felt uncomfortable at having her son-in-law in her house without Polly and Dominic’s elegant clothes and polished manners made everything here seem shabby.

She went into the kitchenette and put on the kettle. Though the back door was closed she could hear the rasp of a saw and someone, Mr Grainger probably, shouting orders. She had no idea what was going on and Bernard hadn’t seen fit to tell her. Some new development in neighbourhood plans to thwart Hitler’s bombs perhaps, or an argument about how much of the back lawn should be dug up to plant vegetables.

Dominic drifted into the kitchenette. Stuart and Ishbel remained at the table in the living-room. They looked bored, Lizzie thought, bored with being so well behaved. She recalled the clamorous life of the tenements, small rooms packed with unruly children, noise and fuss and quarrelsome voices, riotous games and impromptu free-for-alls. Though she liked Knightswood sometimes she felt the loss of … of what? Something she couldn’t put a name to, a sense of endeavour and endurance, of energy and rebellion, qualities that Polly’s children sadly lacked.

‘Lizzie,’ Dominic said, ‘what did Bernard say when you told him that your husband – that Conway had gone back to America?’

‘I don’t think he believed me.’

‘Would you like me to have a word with him?’

‘Is that why you came today, Dominic?’

‘Yes, that’s why I came. Also, to let you see the children.’

‘That’s a funny thing to say,’ said Lizzie.

‘I feel sometimes that you have not seen enough of them.’

‘It’s not your fault,’ Lizzie said.

‘Ah, but it is,’ said Dominic. ‘Bernard’s outside?’

‘Aye, he is.’

She watched him open the door and step down on to the mud-slicked path that ran the length of the cottage row. It was, she supposed, as strange a world to him as Manor Park was to her but her son-in-law was too confident, too polite to let his distaste show. She had known from the first that by condoning Polly’s marriage to this man she would in time lose her daughter – and that was exactly what had come to pass. She watched Bernard emerge from a slit trench ten or fifteen yards from the back door. Mr Grainger was in another trench forty or fifty feet away and the neighbours were shouting at each other, not angrily but with friendly raillery. Each had a spade, each had a cigarette hanging from his lips and Dominic, groomed like a tailor’s dummy, stood between them, watching and waiting with a patience that Lizzie found unnerving.

She closed the back door with her foot, poured milk from a bottle into two clean glasses and carried them into the living-room.

‘There you are now,’ she said. ‘Drink up.’

‘Thank you, Granny,’ Ishbel said.

‘Thank you, Granny,’ said Stuart.

*   *   *

‘I’ve arranged an appointment for you with the Housing Officer of Breslin District Council,’ Dominic began without preamble. ‘Next Wednesday morning, ten a.m., at the Burgh hall.’

‘Housing Officer?’ said Bernard. ‘What do we want with him?’

‘Nothing,’ said Dominic. ‘He’s interviewing for the post of deputy and I’ve suggested that you’d be an ideal candidate. Four sets of references have already been filed in your favour. I don’t think there will be a problem.’

Bernard stuck the spade into the ground and leaned on the handle. He took the cigarette from his mouth, contemplated the wet end for a moment, tossed it away. ‘Am I being sacked from Lyons and Lloyd’s?’

‘Let go,’ said Dominic. ‘Released sounds even better.’

‘Why?’

‘There isn’t enough business coming through the agency to justify the employment of two full-time estate agents.’

‘You’re not closing down then?’

‘No. Allan Shakespeare will keep things ticking over.’

‘Last in, first out?’ Bernard said. ‘The law of the jungle. This wouldn’t have anything to do with Frank Conway, would it?’

‘What could it possibly have to do with Frank Conway?’

‘Or Kenny MacGregor?’

Dominic paused. He was conscious of the presence of the neighbour, Mr Grainger, who was digging away nonchalantly and pretending not to eavesdrop.

He stepped closer to the wall at the end of the communal drying green. Boards were propped against it, the remains of what had once been a sweet-pea frame and a stack of turves that would be laid over the roof of the Anderson shelter that Bernard had bedded in the ground. He drew Bernard away from the slit trench and put a hand on his shoulder.

‘Fifty pounds in a plain brown envelope, Bernard? Do you take me for a idiot? No, you don’t have to report to Kenny MacGregor. I’ll do that for you.’

‘You?’

‘I’m closing the shop.’

‘I thought you just said…’

‘Not the estate agency, other things.’

‘And you want me out, is that it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Supposing,’ Bernard said, ‘I don’t fancy working for Breslin Council?’

‘It’s entirely up to you, of course,’ said Dominic. ‘I’m giving you a month’s wages in lieu of notice. I want you out of the office by Wednesday. Allan will take over any transactions that you have on hand. The job with the Council is yours if you want it. If you don’t…’ He shrugged. ‘I advise you to take it, Bernard. The pay’s a bit less but the Council needs experienced housing officers and you won’t, I’m sure, short-change them.’

‘Are you sure they will take me on?’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Dominic. ‘My friend, Carfin Hughes, has considerable influence in that quarter and he’s given you a glowing recommendation.’

‘Pretty cut an’ dried then, isn’t it?’ Bernard said.

‘Yes.’

‘Has Conway really gone back to the States?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did our friend MacGregor have to say about that?’

‘Kenny has bigger fish to fry.’

‘Bigger fish?’ Bernard chuckled, more like a cough. ‘Not you?’

‘I was never as big a fish as some people imagined me to be. In the current scheme of things I’m a minnow, a tiddler,’ Dominic said. ‘Will you keep the appointment on Wednesday, Bernard, please.’

‘Don’t have much option, do I?’

‘If you do,’ Dominic said, ‘you won’t be bothered again, not by me or by the coppers. You’ll be as safe and secure as anyone can be at this time.’

‘How safe and secure is that?’

‘I’m not a prophet,’ Dominic said. ‘I don’t know.’

‘What about the farm? What about Blackstone?’

‘Blackstone has been sold.’

‘What?’

‘Well, to be accurate it’s in process of being sold.’

‘Why wasn’t I told? My signature’s on the lease.’

‘What lease?’ said Dominic. ‘There is no lease.’

Again the chuckle, the cough: ‘By God,’ Bernard said, ‘you’re certainly thorough, Mr Dominic Manone, I will say that for you.’

‘Will you keep the appointment on Wednesday morning?’

Bernard looked down the length of the gardens. Grainger was still digging, little gouts of clayey soil spewing from his spade. Grainger was no navvy, no labourer. He was a clerk in Simpson Brown’s clearing house; clean collar, shiny suit, tramcar to work every morning; two sons of twenty-five or thirty, eight or ten years to retirement and a modest pension. Eight or ten years! God, Bernard thought, where will we all be in eight or ten years, in eighteen or twenty months for that matter? He was no prophet either yet the long-term future appeared to be as bleak as it was uncertain.

Relieved and grateful to be out of Dominic Manone’s shadow, free of his connection with the fraternity of less-than-honest men, he nodded.

‘Yes, Dominic, I’ll be there.’

‘Good man,’ said Dominic and without a word of farewell went back into the house for tea.