Missing Person (2 page)

‘I wasn’t actually thinkin’ of goin’ to Camberwell Green, not this afternoon I wasn’t.’

‘Well, we can still go,’ said Cassie, ‘it’s nice and sunny. Get one of your mum’s cushions for me to ride on.’ She always rode astride Freddy’s carrier with a cushion under her bottom on the grounds that if she didn’t it left her bottom with a pattern all over it. Freddy, of course, asked how could she know that, because she couldn’t see it. I’ve never seen me own bottom in all me life, he said. Never mind that, said Cassie, I just know when me bottom’s got a pattern on it. ‘Come on, Freddy, let’s go straight away.’

‘I ain’t goin’ to any pet shop at Camberwell Green,’ said Freddy.

‘Yes, you are,’ said Cassie.

‘Not to buy a parrot, I’m not,’ said Freddy.

‘Yes, you are.’

‘No, I ain’t, and me mind’s made up definite,’ said Freddy.

He should have saved his breath, because five minutes later he was cycling along the Walworth Road towards Camberwell Green, with Cassie perched on the cushioned carrier.

CAMBERWELL GREEN ON
this skittish May afternoon was a moving picture of people and shoppers, a mixture of lively cockneys from the immediate area and lower-middle-class families from the upper reaches of Denmark Hill. The mixture was good-natured and as breezy as the weather. Saturday afternoons always represented a cheerful beginning to the weekends, when most people had some money in their purses or pockets and a visit to the pawnbrokers on a Monday morning was happily distant as far as hard-up cockneys were concerned.

There was a family in the pet shop, where birds chirruped in their cages, white rabbits nibbled in their hutches, and hamsters sniffed in search of goodies. Robert Adams, known to his family and friends as Boots, had his wife, son and daughter with him. Thirty-three, an ex-sergeant of the Royal West Kents, he had an excellent war record and distinguished looks. Tall and long-legged, he was in a grey suit. He invariably wore grey, either of a medium or charcoal shade, and very little about his appearance suggested he had been born a cockney and known years of hardship during the time he had lived with his mother, sister and brothers in the heart of Walworth. As for his speech, all its cockney elements had been drummed out of him while he was receiving a grammar school education. Those were the years
when
the street kids called him Lord Muck. Now he was the general manager of the thriving family firm, Adams Enterprises Ltd, founded by his brother Sammy, a businessman of drive and initiative.

His wife Emily, formerly the girl next door, was a thin woman of thirty-one her peaky looks offset by her wealth of dark auburn hair and her brilliant green eyes. Their son Tim was a lively eight-year-old, and their adopted daughter Rosie was a sparkling fifteen. With hair the colour of ripe corn, deep blue eyes, and extraordinarily enchanting looks, Rosie was a young girl who already had the air of a young lady. Life was a delight to her. She loved Emily, her adoptive mother, and she loved Tim. But it was Boots, her adoptive father, who meant most to her. Boots she adored. However, she had never made the mistake of being sugary, clinging or possessive. She had always been a girl of fun to him, a talkative and teasing daughter.

They were in the shop to buy a hamster for Tim, who had declared, in so many words, that his life wouldn’t be worth living without one. I don’t like the sound of that, said Boots. Nor me, said Emily. It’s doleful, said Rosie. We’d better buy you one, said Boots. Crikey, I’ll live for ever if you will, Dad, said Tim. All right, lovey, said Emily, let’s go and make sure you live for ever.

They were inspecting several of the smooth-haired little rodents all sniffing around in a wooden hutch.

‘They’re doing a lot of twitchin’,’ said Tim, who had his dad’s dark brown hair and grey eyes.

‘That they are,’ said the proprietor. ‘If they weren’t all of a twitch, they’d be goners. The more they twitch, the healthier they are. It’s their noses, y’know, young ’un. They’ve all got well-bred noses, that lot. They come of well-bred parents. That’s mum there,
and
that’s her old man. And that’s Toots, that’s Tilly, that’s Totty and that’s Tipsy. Likes his drink, that one.’

‘Would you like one that goes to a pub, Tim, or one that stays at home?’ asked Boots.

‘Eh?’ said Tim.

‘What a question,’ smiled Emily. ‘Typical of your dad, Timmy.’

‘Oh, I don’t know, Mummy,’ said Rosie, fetching in a spring coat of royal blue and a round white hat. ‘I mean, if Tim fancies the one called Tipsy, he’ll want to know if he has to take it to a pub or not.’

‘You and your dad, what a pair,’ said Emily. ‘Is your mind made up yet, Tim lovey?’ Emily was still a recognizable cockney. ‘I think you’ve got your eyes on Tipsy, ’aven’t you?’

‘I’d have to teach him not to drink beer,’ said Tim.

‘No beer,’ smiled the proprietor, ‘just strong water.’

‘What’s strong water, Dad?’ asked Tim, enjoying the pleasure of lingering over his choice.

‘The kind that comes out of a tap and stands up in a glass,’ said Boots.

‘Yes, that’s the stuff,’ said the proprietor.

‘There you are, Tim,’ said Rosie, ‘it’s the kind that comes out of our own tap.’

‘I bet I could teach Tipsy to drink that,’ said Tim, at which point Cassie and Freddy entered the shop.

‘Well, look who’s here,’ said Emily. Cassie and Freddy were both well-known to the family. Freddy’s elder sister, Susie, was married to Boots’s youngest brother, Sammy, and Cassie’s eldest sister, Annie, was married to Freddy’s brother, Will.

‘Hello there,’ said Boots, whom Cassie regarded as an uncle. Freddy also saw him more as an uncle figure than a once removed brother-in-law.

‘Oh, ’ello, Uncle Boots, how’d you do, Auntie Em’ly and ev’ryone, what a nice day, I’m sure,’ said Cassie with enthusiasm.

‘Oh, how’d you do, Cassie,’ said Rosie, smiling, ‘how’d you do, Freddy, you’re together as usual.’

‘Yes, I’m still Freddy’s best mate,’ said Cassie. Freddy rolled his eyes. ‘We’ve come to see if there’s any live talkin’ parrots. Queen Mary’s got hundreds, did yer know that, Uncle Boots? She keeps them in a conservat’ry at Windsor Castle.’

‘Where they talk the roof off,’ said Freddy. Rosie laughed. Everyone liked Cassie and Freddy.

‘You’re lookin’ very pretty today, Cassie,’ said Emily, who wouldn’t have been as thin as she was if her appetite had been healthier.

‘Yes, I’m pretty most days,’ said Cassie, ‘me dad says so. Doesn’t Rosie look nice, Aunt Em’ly? Rosie, ’ave you come to buy a talkin’ parrot too?’

‘Well, no, Cassie, I haven’t,’ said Rosie, ‘we’ve got Tim and Daddy. They do nearly all the talking in our house, and I don’t think they’d like competition from a parrot. We’re here to help Tim choose a hamster.’

Tim was offering a finger to the little creatures, all of which had had a sniff and had turned it down. The proprietor, having heard there was a possible customer for a parrot, brought a caged specimen to the counter.

‘One talking parrot,’ he said.

‘Freddy, look,’ said Cassie excitedly. It was a colourful specimen.

‘What is it, a bob’s-worth of parrot?’ asked Freddy.

‘Gertcher,’ said the parrot.

‘Crikey, it talked, I ’eard it,’ said Cassie, and advanced on the bird. It cocked an eye at her.

‘Gertcher,’ it said again.

‘Mind your manners,’ said Rosie.

‘It’s a nice colour,’ said Emily.

‘Dad, what about my hamster?’ asked Tim.

‘I’m gone on Tipsy myself,’ said Boots.

‘Can I have it, then?’

‘All yours, old chap,’ said Boots. ‘And a hutch as well,’ he said to the proprietor. ‘And a bottle of hamster beer until we get it teetotal.’

‘Dad, the man said not beer,’ protested Tim, ‘he said strong water.’

‘Daddy, you’re a yell,’ said Rosie.

‘An amateur comic, more like,’ said Emily.

‘Gertcher,’ said the parrot.

‘Freddy, it really talks,’ said Cassie.

‘Yes, but if that’s all it can say, ask if it can read and write,’ said Freddy.

‘Oh, can it, mister?’ asked Cassie of the proprietor.

‘Not yet,’ he said.

‘I hope it’s not backward,’ said Rosie.

‘Bright as a button,’ said the proprietor, transferring Tipsy to a new hutch.

‘I just want one that talks,’ said Cassie. ‘Me and Freddy can teach it to say poetry, like
The Pied Piper
.’

‘Not if I can ’elp it,’ said Freddy.

‘Mister, how much is it?’ asked Cassie.

‘It’s a five-bob bird, believe me,’ said the proprietor, ‘but I’ll sell it to you for three-and-six.’

‘Crikey, three-and-six?’ breathed Cassie in shock. ‘Freddy, is ’e serious?’

‘Are you serious, mister?’ asked Freddy, and Boots and Emily exchanged smiles.

‘Well, I wouldn’t call three-and-six serious,’ said the proprietor, ‘I’d call it a bargain, and I can find you a cage for four bob, fully furnished.’

‘Freddy, ’e’s makin’ me feel faint,’ said Cassie. ‘
Mister
, me and Freddy’s only lookin’ for a shilling one.’

‘Sell you six packets of birdseed for that,’ said the proprietor.

‘Crikey, I bet I could buy six packets from Queen Mary for a penny if I went to Windsor Castle,’ said Cassie. ‘Well, she knows me dad. Well, I think she does, I think they met once. Mister, I suppose you don’t ’ave a talkin’ parrot for just a shilling, do you?’

‘Gertcher,’ said the three-and-sixpenny bird.

‘Sorry, little lady,’ said the proprietor.

‘Oh, all right,’ said Cassie resignedly, ‘me and Freddy’ll just ’ave to save up for an expensive one.’

‘I’m not goin’ to,’ said Freddy, ‘but I’ve got a feelin’ I will.’

Boots, settling for the hamster and the hutch, remembered a murder trial at which he, Freddy and Cassie had all been witnesses. Cassie had faced up to the ordeal like a young trouper.

‘I think it’s time I treated you, Cassie,’ he said.

‘Oh, you treated me once before, Uncle Boots, with a box of choc’lates,’ said Cassie. ‘It was after that trial at the Old Bailey. You treated Freddy as well.’

‘That was ages ago,’ said Boots. ‘I think a new treat’s overdue, don’t you, Em?’

‘Well overdue,’ said Emily.

‘Right,’ said Boots, ‘one talking parrot and a cage, Cassie, how will that do?’

Cassie nearly fell over in her bliss, but found enough excited breath to inform Boots he’d go to heaven one day, but not till he’d lived happy ever after with his family for a hundred years. I’ll have whiskers down to my knees, said Boots. And a bathchair, said Rosie. And no teeth, said Emily. And a bald head, said Tim. Oh, no, said Cassie, you’ll still look nice,
Uncle
Boots, and with lots of teeth, and I’ll come and look after you sometimes.

Emily laughed. Rosie smiled. She could have said that if Boots needed anyone to look after him when he was old, it was going to be herself. She was attending West Square Girls School now, and sixth-formers from the adjacent boys’ school were really giving her the eye now that she was over fifteen. She wasn’t in the least interested in any of them. Her family filled her life.

‘Right,’ said Boots to the proprietor, ‘put Gertcher in a new cage, the fully-furnished four-bob one.’

‘Oh, couldn’t I call it Gertie?’ asked Cassie. ‘Is it a girl, mister?’

‘Leave off,’ said the parrot.

‘Freddy, did you ’ear that, it talked some more,’ said Cassie in delight.

‘I think it’s just told you it’s not a girl,’ said Freddy.

‘Oh, I don’t mind, I quite like boys, me cat’s a boy,’ said Cassie.

‘I wish you ’adn’t said that,’ remarked Freddy.

‘Why?’ asked Rosie.

‘Her cat’s barmy,’ said Freddy.

Cassie took no notice of that. She was watching the proprietor transferring the parrot to a new posh-looking cage that had a perch, a seed tray and a water well. Apart from trying to nip the man’s finger and having a bit of a go at the perch, the bird accepted its move without turning the shop upside-down. Once settled on the perch, it looked silently around, as if trying to decide if it had anything worthwhile to say. Apparently not, for it said nothing.

To help Cassie in her guardianship, the proprietor gave her some helpful tips plus a list of printed instructions on how to keep the bird happy and make
it
love her in four quick lessons. Cassie assured him she was easy to love, her dad said so. And I can say so meself, she said. And so can Freddy, can’t you, Freddy?

‘I ain’t listenin’ at this exact minute,’ said Freddy.

The purchase completed, including a cover for the cage, Cassie delivered kisses of thanks all round, and they all left the shop, Cassie carrying the cage. With the hood on, the parrot had gone quiet, thinking it was bedtime. Freddy took hold of his bike, which he’d left propped against the shop front, and informed his mate she’d have to balance the cage on her head for the ride home. Cassie at once set her mind to finding an alternative.

‘Well, here you are at last, we thought you must be buyin’ up the shop for Tim,’ said a new arrival. It was Boots’s mother, Mrs Maisie Finch, known to her family as Chinese Lady. Mr Edwin Finch, her second husband, was with her. He was a worldly and well-travelled man of fifty-six, and an agent for the British Government. He was desk-bound at present, working on codes and cyphers. Chinese Lady was a cockney woman, fifty-three, and like most of her kind she saw everything in clear black and white, being dismissive of all shades of grey. She had an upright walk, a resilient character, a matriarchal attitude towards her sons and daughter, and a wifely respect for her husband, who in turn regarded her as an admirably incurable Victorian, and altogether a woman he cared for.

‘Look who found us in the shop, Mum,’ said Emily.

‘Bless us,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘it’s Cassie and Freddy.’

‘Oh, how’d you do, Mrs Finch,’ said Cassie, ‘how’d you do, Mr Finch.’

‘A pleasure, Cassie,’ smiled Mr Finch, who had rubbed elbows with Walworth’s cockneys during his years as a lodger with Chinese Lady, and had come to admire their robust nature and the cheerful way they fought hardship.

‘Tim’s got his hamster, I see,’ said Chinese Lady, ‘and what’ve you got, Cassie?’