The Pearly Queen (34 page)

It was remarkable how Father Peter's darkly gaunt face could express the kind of reassuring benevolence that induced so much faith and devotion in his lady followers. It was a smiling benevolence he bestowed on Mother Verity one morning when she said she would like to go about her charitable work independently some days.

‘Sister, you are entirely free to come and go,' he said. ‘Just as you have been doing of late.'

‘My own personal endeavours accord with the work of the League,' said Mother Verity, whose doubts about the organization were not directed at the minister's followers. ‘They concern redemption.'

‘Splendid,' said Father Peter. ‘Go your way, sister, whenever you feel the need to. I hope, however, you will be among us when we make our distribution of clothing and footwear. It will be on a grand scale. Our collections are bearing magnificent fruit.'

‘I know, and am happy about it,' said Mother Verity, and made her way out of the Temple, leaving Father Peter sighing over her charming nature.

‘Well, I tell you what, missus,' said the Bethnal Green newsagent, ‘if there's nothing on any of the window cards with a suitable address, you might try Mrs Hitchins. I believe she's thinkin' about lettin' a couple of rooms.'

‘Do you know this lady's address?' asked Mother Verity.

‘Fifteen Underwood Road.'

‘Thank you,' said Mother Verity, elated at such good fortune.

Mrs Hitchins was a jolly person, whose only real grumble was about the fact that winning the war hadn't done the country much good, or the people, either. ‘I mean, when you think about it,' she said, leading the way up the stairs of her house. Only a few minutes conversation with the lady caller had helped her to make up her mind to let the two rooms that weren't being used. Such a nice lady. ‘All that money and all them soldiers' lives spent on beatin' that German Kaiser, an' look where it's got us. Goin' backwards, me 'usband says. We was thankful we only 'ad daughters and no sons, specially as our daughters 'as all been married since the Armistice. We're grandparents now, which we wouldn't 'ave been if they'd all been sons and all been killed in the war. Well, that's the bedroom I'm able to offer, it's at the back, and the room you can use for livin' in, it's at the front.'

Both rooms were clean and well-kept. Mother Verity had an aversion to anything that spoke of dirt and spiders, although she could face up bravely to the task of eliminating same.

‘How very nice, Mrs Hitchins,' she said, glancing around the furnished bedroom.

‘Well, I hope so, Miss Stokes, you bein' a lady, as I can see.'

As for the living room, which at present had a bed in it in addition to suitable furniture, its position could not have been better. Through its window it looked directly on to the house opposite, number fourteen.

‘May I take the rooms, Mrs Hitchins?'

‘A pleasure, I'm sure,' said Mrs Hitchins, ‘you don't mind seven an' six a week for the two? Me an' me 'usband won't disturb you, we sleep downstairs, so we won't be comin' up and down. It's only our youngest daughter that comes and stays sometimes, with 'er 'usband. Well, they live up in Essex, so they stay the night when they come at weekends, usin' the third room up here. When would you like to move in?'

‘I'm not quite sure,' said Mother Verity, ‘but I must be fair, I'll start renting the rooms from tomorrow and perhaps use them occasionally before I move in permanently.' She had a small independent income that would easily take care of the rent.

‘Oh, I don't know as I should charge you if you're not here,' said Mrs Hitchins.

‘But you must, that's only fair.'

‘You're a lady all right, Miss Stokes, and I'm that pleased to 'ave been able to oblige you.'

Mother Verity was extremely pleased to have found such suitably located rooms and to discover the landlady such an agreeable person. They settled the matter very amicably, and Mother Verity paid the first week's rent in advance, as was customary.

And Bethnal Green itself really was an improvement on Whitechapel.

‘She's home,' said Ada when she opened the door to Jimmy on Thursday morning.

‘Pardon?' said Jimmy cautiously.

‘The young madam. The roof's not fallen in yet, but it won't be long. Madam and sir arrived back with her last night, and it's sounded ever since as if there's a train engine in the house.'

‘I'd better keep out of its way, then,' said Jimmy, following Ada through to the kitchen. ‘I'm not ready at my age to be run over. You can die from bein' run over, Ada.'

‘I bet it hurts too,' said Ada. ‘Here's our young lordship, Mr 'Odges, all ready to be eaten alive.'

‘Nice and early, I see,' said Mr Hodges.

‘Mornin', everyone,' said Jimmy. ‘Hullo, Mrs Redfern, hullo, Ivy, did you have a good time in Devon?'

‘Heavenly, for about five minutes a day,' said Mrs Redfern, and laughed. ‘And how's our toast and marmalade boy? Give him a slice, Ivy, and I'll pour him a cup of tea.'

‘'E'll need more than a cup of tea,' said Ivy, ‘'e'll need the last meal of the condemned. Up at six she was this mornin', the young madam. Six, would yer believe, and I 'ad to get up and do a breakfast for 'er. Ate it in 'ere, she did, talkin' all the time, and jumpin' up an' down till the kitchen looked like the wreck of the '
Esperus
. I dunno that that girl's ever goin' to grow up.'

The servants' bell buzzed. Mr Hodges looked at the indicator. ‘Young madam's bedroom,' he said. ‘Kindly proceed at the double, Ada.'

‘Help,' said Ada, ‘she hasn't gone back to bed, has she?' She went to answer the summons.

‘P'raps she's broke a leg,' said Ivy hopefully.

‘You been gettin' on all right, Jimmy?' asked cook.

‘Fine,' said Jimmy.

‘My, you're browner than the family is, choppin' trees up suits you.'

‘Poor young feller,' said Ivy.

‘Now, Ivy, you've been saying things like that ever since Jimmy started to work here,' said Mrs Redfern. ‘Time you looked on the bright side.'

Ada returned.

‘What did Miss Sophy want?' asked Mr Hodges.

Ada smiled. ‘To ask if Jimmy had arrived.'

‘Oh, gawd,' said Ivy.

‘What was she doing?' asked Mr Hodges.

‘Loadin' a pistol,' said Ada.

‘Now, Ada, don't give Jimmy frights like that,' said cook.

‘What've I done?' asked Jimmy.

‘Yes, you may well ask,' said Ada accusingly.

‘It's my fault,' said Ivy. ‘Well, there she was, turnin' the kitchen upside-down and me 'aving to get 'er a breakfast. She asked if I knew 'ow you'd been gettin' on, Jimmy. So I told 'er you'd been gettin' on fine, 'specially with the girl next door, accordin' to what Ada said when we got back last evenin'.'

‘Next door? What next door?' asked Jimmy. Next door to him was only a dividing brick wall away. There was no real next door here. The houses on either side of The Beeches were the distance of a street away.

‘Now then, Jimmy, you did get on well with Clarissa March,' said Ada.

‘Oh, that girl,' said Jimmy. On Tuesday afternoon, a girl had emerged from the jungle on the far left of the property. She had a chat to nearby workmen, then made her way up to Jimmy. She was quite nice, even if she talked posh, and was just fourteen. She was interested in what was going on, her name was Clarissa March from Willow Lodge, next to The Beeches. Jimmy had a very friendly chat with her, and she said all boys ought to be doing his kind of work, because it gave them a healthy look instead of pimples. Farmers' sons didn't have pimples, she said. Pimply boys were ugh. Jimmy said if he ever got pimples he'd swop faces with a farmer's son, and Clarissa though that screamingly funny. She turned up again the following afternoon with a bag of apples, which she shared with Jimmy. She didn't mind a bit that he wasn't posh like she was.

‘You should've seen the young madam's face,' said Ivy gloomily, with Ada restraining giggles. ‘She asked me if I meant Clarissa March, and I said Ada 'ad told me it was. I feel awful that today's goin' to see you carried off to yer funeral, Jimmy. You better 'ave another piece of toast, it might be yer last.'

‘I don't see why,' said Jimmy, ‘I'm nobody, except me dad and mum's one and only son.'

‘Oh, you're the young madam's pet as well,' said Mrs Redfern, giving Ada a plump wink.

‘I saw that, Mrs Redfern,' said Jimmy.

‘Don't you worry, Jimmy, we'll send a nice wreath,' said Mrs Redfern.

‘And our respectful wishes that you'll be 'appy in 'eaven,' said Ada, who found it a lovely lark to tease him. She knew Jimmy would have his own back one way or another. You couldn't tease Percy. He just talked over it, he just didn't recognize it, he just talked and talked, he didn't half like the sound of his own voice. Not that he didn't have some likeable ways, only although he was two years older than Jimmy, he didn't seem as grown up.

‘I will make a contribution myself,' announced Mr Hodges in dignified sympathy.

‘Oh, yer poor lad, Jimmy,' said Ivy.

‘All right, I'll go quietly,' said Jimmy. ‘I suppose I'll 'ave to,' he added, ‘if I'm dead.'

Ada stifled shrieks, and cook laughed until her tears run.

‘You're a one, you are, Jimmy,' she said.

‘Well, I'd better go an' do some work while I'm still alive,' he said.

Ada followed him out to the terrace. ‘It's awful for you, Jimmy, bein' the young madam's pet and goin' to your doom because of it. Still, it's been really nice knowin' you.'

‘Nice knowin' you too, Ada,' said Jimmy, and took something from his jacket pocket. ‘Here, this is me deathbed gift to you.' And he put a half-pound bar of Peters milk chocolate into her hand. Ada's eyes opened wide.

‘For me, it's for me?' she said.

‘You've been a nice kind girl to me,' said Jimmy, ‘'specially while the fam'ly's been away. Mind, I'm watchin' you, young Ada, and all your sauce, I know when you're bein' larky.'

‘Jimmy, thanks ever so much for this,' said Ada.

‘Pleasure,' said Jimmy, and went down to his work, in the September sunshine. Patsy and Betsy would be going back to school next week, and Mother would probably still be absent. And on Monday he was going to start work at Mr Gibb's furniture factory in Peckham for a pound a week. He began to whistle.

The landscape gardeners were already at work, and had been since eight o'clock. They'd cleared some huge areas, each of which looked yellow. Little hills of charred bonfires showed silvery grey peppered with black. Groups of beeches, oaks and chestnuts had been left standing, so had a huge willow close to that quagmire of a pond. Farther down, the gardeners had created potential magic by ridding a large mass of high rhododendrons of unwanted saplings and parasitical undergrowth. Jimmy had learned enough from Mr Thorpe to know that that magic would appear in the spring, when the rhododendrons would burst into colour. He felt, not enviously, that when the whole job was finished, Mr and Mrs Gibbs would wake up to something really worth looking at every morning. It would be like living in the country.

He began his usual work of tidying up. That was what he'd been doing every day, tidying up. But Mr Thorpe had said to him, don't you worry, lad, tidying up's got its place in this kind of work, ground like this can't be turned over if it's not been tidied up and tree roots pulled out by a team of horses. All the burning that's been done, that's part of it too, all the ashes will be spread like potash and dug in. It won't be wasted, don't you worry.

Mrs March of Willow Lodge was in her rose garden, brimmed hat shading her face, secateurs in her hand and a trug on her arm. She was snipping dead blooms.

‘Oh, hullo, Mrs March.'

Mrs March jumped and turned. ‘Oh, it's you, Sophy,' she said, smile a little wary. The daughter of her newest neighbours was already known as a terror. ‘How did you get in?'

‘I came round the side,' said Sophy, looking healthy from the sea air of Devon and demure in a blue frock worn with a sweet smile. She had a small white cardboard box in her hand.

‘Did you enjoy Devon?'

‘Oh, jolly famous,' said Sophy. ‘Is Clarissa in?'

‘She's down in the summerhouse, reading,' said Mrs March. ‘She's going out with a friend in half an hour.'

‘Oh, jolly good, Mrs March, I'll just go and say hullo to her. I've got a little Devon cake for her. We're back at school next Tuesday, what a life. Aren't your roses lovely?'

‘Would you like some for your mother?' asked Mrs March, thinking a neighbourly gesture might perhaps save her husband's greenhouse from accidental destruction by Sophy. But Sophy was already on her way to the summerhouse. She wasn't there long. She came back, smiling winsomely at Clarissa's mother, who had cut some lovely blooms for her.

‘Oh, that's awfully kind of you, Mrs March, Mummy will love them. We don't have anything in our garden, you know. Well, we don't even have a garden, just a half-cleared jungle.'

‘You're very welcome to these, Sophy, but mind the thorns on your dress. Did you see Clarissa?'

‘Yes, thank you, Mrs March, I gave her the little cake. Goodbye.'

My, she has improved all of a sudden, thought Mrs March.

Clarissa didn't think so. Down in the summerhouse, where she'd been enjoying a gripping novel by Ethel M. Dell, she was trying to clean her face with her hankie. Sophy had plastered it with a wet mud cake. Clarissa dared not complain to her mother. Sophy had threatened to put a frog down her drawers if she did. Clarissa shuddered at the mere thought.