Ivy Crumpsall opened the door of number 1 Paradise Lane. She stepped into the street, held a finger to her lips.
‘How is he?’ asked Joseph.
She shook her head. ‘Not long now.’
‘The books.’ He pushed them into her hand. ‘You will get them back, all of them. These were all I managed to carry.’
She lifted her head. ‘You’re a good man, Joseph. I don’t know a right lot about your religion and your way of doing things, but I think we’ve the same God.’
‘There’s only one,’ he said softly. ‘Christians and Jews share Him. Keep your faith, Ivy.’
‘Aye.’
Her eyes had begun to cloud with age, and rings were appearing round the irises. He saw the fear behind the calm exterior, felt so much sympathy that it almost cut through him. ‘May He be with you now, Ivy.’
‘I need Him, Joseph.’ She loved this man. Everyone who knew the Heilbergs felt affection for them. Unlike many in his trade, he cared about the folk who pledged with him, often went out of his way to visit a house before selling on an item that had outstayed its date.
‘Can we do anything for you? Ruth will come down if you wish.’
‘I know, lad. I’ll send for you if I need you.’
He stepped back, cast an eye over the frontage of Derek Crumpsall’s house. ‘How many times did she come to my shop?’
He had spoken no name, but she knew he referred to Lottie. ‘Just before the war were over, yon daft Yankee bought an outfit for our Sal. Red, it were, with a fur trim. Lottie marched it off quick smart to that shop of yours, never let our Sal go out in it. Peter Quinn looked after your shop while you were away, didn’t he?’
Joseph nodded. ‘An honest man. I trust his soul is resting.’
‘Well, he took the outfit and gave Lottie money. Next news this other little lass is at chapel in our Sal’s coat. Eeh . . .’ She shook her head. ‘Lottie Kerrigan were bad through and through.’
Joseph remembered Ruth’s words. ‘No-one is completely bad, Joseph. Everyone has a little of God in his heart.’
‘What about Hitler?’ he had asked his wife.
‘That was a sick man,’ she had replied.
Had a whole country followed a maniac, then? Were all Germans blind and stupid? Ruth had even found an answer to that question. According to Ruth Heilberg, the Germany of 1930 had been desperate. In desperation, the people had followed the only star in its ascendency. As that particular star had not been David’s, the Reich had wiped out several million Jews. One question that had never been answered by Ruth was, ‘Why the Jews?’
‘Joseph?’
‘I beg pardon, Ivy. I was thinking.’
‘I asked did you want to see Derek.’
He nodded. ‘Yes. I shall come and sit for a moment.’
Joseph Heilberg took one of Derek’s books and sat by the bed of the dying man. He allowed the volume to fall open at random, read out a paragraph about African animals.
‘Bigger than the Indians,’ breathed Derek.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘The elephants. Can’t be trained as easily. A rogue on his own can do a lot of damage.’
Joseph smiled, took hold of Derek’s emaciated hand. ‘When I go to Africa, I shall not talk to a lone elephant. I shall talk only to elephants who have company.’
Derek’s features stretched into a smile that made a death’s head of his face. ‘If you do ever go, bring some photos for our Sal.’
‘Ah, this I will do, Derek. I most certainly will.’
Ivy went into the back garden, looked over the fence at her old friend Rosie Blunt. ‘Is our Sal all right, Rosie?’
The small white head nodded. ‘Playing snap with that daft lump of mine. She thinks he’s letting her win, but he’s not. Twenty-odd year that man’s needed glasses, only he won’t admit it.’ Rosie glanced over her shoulder, approached the fence. ‘How’s Derek?’
‘Morphine,’ replied Ivy.
‘Eeh, lass, I’m that sorry.’
‘So am I. Joe Heilberg’s with him. Doctor’s coming again later on. I think . . .’ She drew an unsteady breath. ‘I think you’d best find some excuse to send our Sal round to see her dad before bedtime. Derek might not be here come morning. And ta for letting our lass stop with you tonight while Maureen’s at her evening blessing.’
‘She’ll be praying for Tom Goodfellow to see the light and marry her. And she’ll say one or two for your Derek, love. Any road, Ivy, I’ll send Sally across to you for sugar. Do you want me to come and sit the night with you after I’ve settled Sally in bed?’
Ivy gazed sadly at the little woman. ‘If you’re well enough to miss a night’s sleep.’
‘I’ll bring me knitting. And some stout. It’ll be a long night, Ivy.’
‘Not long enough, Rosie. Not long enough . . .’
‘I think she knew,’ pronounced Ivy. ‘She’s deep, is our Sal, takes it all in and says nowt. Only the last thing she said to her dad were about hoping he weren’t in any pain, like.’
Both women turned from the fire and looked at the still figure beneath the window. Apart from some slight movements in the region of his chest, he looked as if he were dead already. ‘Last time he spoke were to Joseph Heilberg,’ continued Ivy. ‘Joe told me after – they’d been talking about elephants.’
‘Eeh, this lad of yours has always loved animals,’ said Rosie. ‘Dotes on that cat, he does. He’d have had a dog but for yon Lottie. You know, it makes no sense to me at all, this. His wife’s beggared off, he’s not long to live, and there’s Sally to think about. Where’s God been while all this were going on? On His holidays in blinking Blackpool?’
Ivy, mellowed by the stout, nodded sleepily. ‘The road I see it, Rosie, is that we gets born and we puts up with it. God’s there, you know. He’s give us all these things to use like coal and gas. But He never tells us how to go about getting our hands on these things, like. Same as the Garden of Eden. Eve sees this apple, thinks it looks good, has a taste. God put it there. All God’s gifts has a dark side. If we want coal and gas, we’ve got to find a way of getting it, a way that doesn’t kill people like it’s killing our Derek. God’s give us the brains, so we’ve to use them.’
Rosie stared admiringly at the Speaker of Worthington Street. If only Ivy Crumpsall had been a bloke. If she’d been a man, she’d have sorted Westminster out right down to washing, ironing and telling the Germans they’d best not try again or else. ‘What time did the doctor say, Ivy?’
‘Midnight.’ She glanced up at the newly mended clock. ‘I gave him that clock, you know. When it broke down, he had it mended, then it stopped again. Three or four times it’s been back to the shop. Then he realized as how Lottie were overwinding it on purpose to spoil the spring. She told him once that having my clock in her house made her feel as if I were supervising her all the while. Mind, if I’d been in charge of her, she’d happen have changed some of her mucky, slapdash ways.’
The front door opened, causing a draught to enter the kitchen. ‘In here,’ called Ivy.
Maureen Mason entered the room. ‘I couldn’t sleep, girls. Is Sally next door?’
Rosie nodded. ‘Fast asleep in our back bedroom, cat and all. Is yon clock right, Maureen?’
‘Yes. Going on midnight.’ As Maureen finished speaking, the Town Hall chimes drifted through the night and into Paradise Lane.
‘Doctor’ll be here in a minute,’ said Rosie.
Another draught announced a second caller. Tom Goodfellow walked in, stopped for a split second when he saw Maureen, then stepped over to the bed. ‘Still asleep, I see. Has he woken at all?’
‘No,’ chorused Ivy and Rosie. Ivy blinked, wondered which invisible force had prompted her neighbours to leave their homes in the middle of the night.
‘His breathing’s very shallow.’ Tom pulled a chair to the bedside, lifted a waxy hand from the coverlet, felt for a pulse. ‘His heart’s failing, Ivy,’ he said. ‘I think he’s slipping away.’
Derek’s eyelids flickered, then he drew in so much oxygen that it had to rattle its way down into clogged lungs. ‘Thank you,’ he murmured. ‘All of you.’
Ivy, Rosie and Maureen joined Tom at the bedside. The man from number 4 rose and gave his seat to Derek’s mother.
‘Derek, lad,’ she whispered. ‘I do love you. You’ve been the best thing in my life.’
He smiled, and there were no lines of pain above the large blue eyes. ‘Mam. See to her. You’re old . . . soon be with me.’ He sighed, coughed weakly. ‘Tom, Maureen, Rosie. Keep her. Whatever . . . keep our Sal. She’s a good girl. Lottie. Keep Lottie away from Sal. America. No, no. Sal stays here. She’s your Sal now. I’m giving her to you.’
Ivy’s body was racked with sobs. She clung to her son’s fingers, tried to hold on to him, even though she wanted him to go into peace. ‘I love you,’ she kept repeating. ‘We all love you.’
Tom turned away, dabbed at his face with a large handkerchief.
Rosie, who could bear no more, carried the kettle to the scullery and turned on the single brass tap. Thirty-three, that lad was. And here she stood, well gone twice his age, filling a kettle at the slopstone. Never before had she known all the neighbours to gather in one place at midnight – except during the
Luftwaffe
’s little expeditions, of course. It was as if God Himself had reached out to draw Maureen and Tom into this house, as if they had to be there. She raised her head to the ceiling. ‘Back from Your holidays, then?’ she mouthed. Yes, God was here, all right. He was the love that still emanated from what was left of Derek Crumpsall.
Maureen Mason fixed her eyes on Derek’s stilled hands, allowed the tears to flow unchecked down her lightly rouged cheeks. She had prayed for him in church. She had begged God to take this man into His arms. Soon, his spirit would fly away into everlasting glory. Maureen wept not just for Derek, but also for his mother and his daughter. A hand grasped her shoulder. ‘Buck up, old girl,’ said Tom Goodfellow.
‘I will,’ she promised. ‘In a minute, I’ll be all right.’
Tom studied her face, found her vulnerability touching. With furrows in the thin film of make-up, she looked childlike, innocent. ‘We’ll have to do our best for Ivy and for Sally.’
She nodded.
‘And for ourselves, too. We must build a wall of support and take strength from each other.’
‘I know.’
A terrible sound filled the room, a crackling groan that came from the man in the bed.
‘It’s the death rattle,’ whispered Maureen. ‘Stay here, Tom. Let his mother see him out.’
He pulled her into his arms, placed a hand behind her head and drew her in to his shoulder. Her whole body shook as the dreadful noise continued. She could hear Ivy, too, tried not to listen as the old woman sobbed her sorrow while this beloved son made his final exit. It never occurred to her that she was being held by Tom Goodfellow. He was just a shoulder, just a warm place where she could hide safely for a few moments.
Rosie stood behind Ivy, age-gnarled hands resting lightly on her friend’s trembling back. ‘Let go, lass,’ she whispered. ‘There’s nobbut pain for him this side. He’ll cross over now.’
And he did. A final whisper of air left his lips in a small sigh, then it was all finished. His face relaxed, looked nearer to normal than it had in months. Ivy stood up, folded her boy’s arms across his chest, intoned the Lord’s Prayer.
The doctor came in. ‘Am I too late?’
Tom nodded, pulled himself together. ‘Only a little. He’s been gone just a matter of seconds.’ Unlike the cavalry in the western films, this poor, tired doctor had failed to save the situation. ‘There wasn’t a great deal you might have done, doctor.’
‘I know. I came just to ease the pain. But he’s out of it now. Mrs Crumpsall?’
Ivy swivelled on the spot, stared at the man as if he were a stranger. ‘Oh, doctor,’ she said eventually. ‘Rosie were just about to make a pot of tea. I’ll find you a nice cup and saucer, because I brought some of my own, you see. Been a funny day for this time of the year, hasn’t it?’
The doctor nodded, recognized the signs of shock. ‘Will you take a little tablet for me, Mrs Crumpsall? It’s only a tonic.’
She thought for a second. ‘Yes, I reckon I might. Been run down a bit just lately.’
While the doctor checked Derek for signs of life, Ivy sat staring straight ahead into the fire. ‘She shouldn’t have done it, you know,’ she announced after a minute or so.
‘Who?’ asked Rosie.
‘Lottie. She shouldn’t have broke my clock. Our Derek just died, you know. With having no clock, I can’t mark the minute. He were born at twenty-two minutes past four in the morning, a Thursday, it were. In 1914. You should know the minute when your son dies. But I don’t, because Lottie broke my clock.’
‘But the clock’s all right now,’ said Maureen. ‘It’s mended, Ivy.’
The doctor drew Tom to one side, told him how to organize the funeral. There was nothing wrong with the clock, though the old woman’s mechanism was becoming a source of worry. ‘Watch her,’ he said, a thumb jerking towards Ivy. ‘She’s not a well woman. Nothing specific, just wear and tear. Keep an eye on the old girl, please.’
Ivy took her tablet, snored on a ragged horsehair sofa while Tom, Maureen and Rosie washed the body. They dressed Derek in his demob suit, pushed a snapshot of Ivy and Sally into the breast pocket. Rosie paused to make yet another pot of tea, saw dawn approaching over the Parry Rec. It was only then that she thought about all that had happened during the last few hours. At the time, she’d ignored it. But now, as plain as the daylight behind the horizon, she remembered that Tom Goodfellow had wept noiselessly while Derek was being prepared.
She emptied the teapot, poked old leaves down the slopstone drain, rinsed three cups. Ollie had cried on several occasions. She could see him now weeping over every dead child she had borne. He was a bloody nuisance in many ways, but he was very much a man. Sometimes, when she was threatening to batter him for drinking or for going on about leeks he had never grown, she had to fight a strong urge to forgive him.
She opened the caddy, found a spoon, wiped the wetness from her face. There was something about men who cried. It was because they’d nothing to prove, she thought. The majority of males would rather die than be seen weeping, but Tom Goodfellow and Oliver Blunt were members of a blessed minority.
Rosie entered the kitchen, warmed the pot, brewed. Ivy would wake soon, would face the first day without her son. But at least Tom Goodfellow had stopped weeping. He would be here, no doubt, when Ivy woke. Yes, he would be here.