Stories
This is a collection of stories, some previously published under the name Paul Williams. I hope to add more after I have dug them out.
(My novel, The Ceramic Cottage (by McEvoy Williams), is available on Amazon Kindle for £1.99/$2.57. Half price offer coming soon. More details on The Ceramic Cottage page of this site.)
(My novel, The Ceramic Cottage (by McEvoy Williams), is available on Amazon Kindle for £1.99/$2.57. Half price offer coming soon. More details on The Ceramic Cottage page of this site.)
Take Good Care of My Baby
‘♫Take good care of my baby,’ Vince began singing. The manager, Philip (never 'Phil'), adopted a pained expression.
‘Do you have to, Vincent?’ he asked.
‘Leave the boy alone,’ said Jean. ‘You’re always singing that Italian song.’
‘That’s in an entirely different category,’ said Philip. ‘Haven’t you read the sign above the shop? Harrington’s High Class Dry Cleaners. Singing American pop songs could ruin our reputation. This is Kensington not … not…’
‘The Bronx?’ supplied Vince, who had recently seen an American gangster film.
‘Well, yes, that will do,’ Philip grudgingly agreed, unable to conceal the hint of a smile in response to Vince’s much broader one.
‘And what’s the difference between an old Italian song and a new American one?’ asked Jean.
‘If you don’t know that,’ said Philip, putting on his coat, ‘you should be working in Woolworth’s. I was with the army in Italy when I was Vincent’s age and I was taught that song by a famous Italian tenor. I’m off to lunch now. If he wants to sing any more songs like that make sure he does it out the back.’
As he left he absent-mindedly began singing Bella Ragazza delle Trecce Bionde for the umpteenth time that day, in his usual questionable Italian accent.
‘Don’t take any notice of him,’ Jean laughed when he had gone. ‘He quite likes you really.’
‘Are you sure? I sometimes get the impression he’s frightened to be in the same room as me, at least when we’re on our own. Does he think I’m going to beat him up or something?’
‘Oh, I know he has some funny ways but when you arrived last month he said you seemed like a pleasant boy, and he told off the last trainee for wearing drainpipe trousers but you seem to have got away with it. He could be quite nice if he wasn’t such a snob. I think he puts on airs because he’s a bit lonely.’
‘Isn’t he married, then?’ asked Vince.
‘He was once but it didn’t last. It’s a shame because he’s quite good looking really, and he’s still fairly young even if he talks as though he’s in his fifties.’
‘I do like him.’ He blushed. ‘What I mean is, he doesn’t seem to hold it against me because I was in Borstal.’
‘Well, he knows Mr Harrington’s views about helping the disadvantaged… Sorry,’ she stopped herself, ‘that sounded awful, didn’t it? Why did they send you to Borstal?’
‘A couple of other kids at Barnardo’s took me shoplifting a few times. They were my mates so it was difficult to say no. I wasn’t very good at football so I had to show I wasn’t a poof.’
‘So you haven’t got any parents?’
‘I suppose I have somewhere but I never met them. They probably only met each other the once!’
‘Well, there was a war on,’ she smiled sadly, ‘and maybe they didn’t survive to come and get you. If you want you can come to Highbury to see us. Have you made many friends in your hostel?’
‘There was Jim but he’s moved on now.’
‘Never mind, I don’t think you’ll be alone for long and that face will be your fortune. But I suppose a lot of people have told you that.’
‘No, not really,’ said Vince.
‘And you keep very smart considering you never had a mum to look after you…’
She was interrupted by a customer, then several more arrived in quick succession.
Philip knew that they probably laughed at him behind his back and he didn’t really blame them. He was in his mid-thirties but if anything was even more socially awkward than when he was eighteen. He had spent his lunch hour mortified by his earlier display of snobbery, exaggerating his offence in his own mind the longer he thought about it. He had belittled a perfectly amiable young man, one who had probably been alone all his life. Philip knew that was something they had in common, not that he could ever explain it to Vince. And just because we have been bullied is no reason to bully others in our turn, though in practice that often seems to be what happens. More bizarre was the way we sometimes try to hurt the last person we really want to.
When Vince returned from his lunch Philip was in the back, and remained there pretending to sort through some racks of clothes. Vince eventually entered with a suit that someone had just brought in.
‘I’m sorry about earlier,’ Philip timidly said at last. ‘I actually quite like the song you sang.’
Vince smiled. Oh, why did he have to smile? That smile had been a joy and a torture ever since they had started working together. Without having time to think, Philip found himself putting out his hand and touching Vince’s cheek. As if this were not enough his other hand, as though possessing a mind of its own, gently, almost imperceptibly, brushed the front of Vince’s drainpipes. The whole thing lasted a second but it was unmistakable. He registered Vince’s look of surprise, then fled.
‘I have a sudden migraine,’ he said to Jean as he took his coat and left the shop.
He expected the police would come for him that evening at the latest. When they did not come he began to think of the other possibilities. Blackmail? A beating by some thugs from Vince’s hostel? Or perhaps Vince would simply report it to Mr Harrington and Philip would never work again. He knew he could deny the incident, that it would be his word against a former Borstal boy, but he shrank from the idea of branding Vince of all people a liar. In a strange way he still hoped that Vince, who seemed to have remained kind and trusting despite his disadvantages, would hold a good opinion of him at some level.
He found the courage to go into work the next morning, Jean’s day off, and to his surprise Vince was there. He was not hostile so much as quiet, and they avoided each other’s eyes for that first hour. Otherwise they functioned in an embarrassed sort of way. At one point Vince seemed about to say something but thought better of it. Then, just after ten, two policemen entered. Philip braced himself. So this was it. Disgrace, probably prison followed by joblessness and poverty, would now be his lot.
‘Does a Vincent Clarke work here?’ asked one of the policemen.
Vince emerged from the back room.
‘Vincent Clarke, I’m arresting you on suspicion of theft. Anything you say will…’
Several emotions engulfed Philip in quick succession. His first reaction was one of relief that the police were not on the mission he had supposed. This lasted only a few seconds as he realised that Vince might still be involved in criminal activity. Then it dawned that Vince was about to be carted off and would probably never return to the shop. Mr Harrington was big on reformed delinquents but would be unforgiving if he thought his faith had been abused.
‘When was this supposed to have been?’ asked Vince at last, clearly shaken.
‘January 1958.’
‘But that was four years ago when I was fifteen. I thought that was all dealt with.’
‘Not the Mars bar from the newsagents on Fulham Road,’ said the copper with a look of triumph. ‘We’ve checked the paperwork. That one was never taken into consideration.’
‘But I thought they were all covered.’ Then something dawned on him. ‘I know what this is about!’ He turned to Philip. ‘Three months ago someone at the hostel walked in on me and Jim…’ He stopped himself, …‘Claimed they saw me and Jim in a compromising position. They withdrew their statement in the end. PC Plod here couldn’t get over that.’
Philip put off absorbing this fully until later.
‘You can’t seriously want to arrest Vincent for stealing a Mars bar when he was in an orphanage?’ he protested. ‘He’s turned his life around since then.’
‘And a packet of Polo mints,’ said the more junior policeman, consulting his notes.
‘Well, I hope something’s deducted for the holes!’ said Philip. Vince smiled and looked at him in surprise at the joke, as though seeing him in a new light, or rather another new one.
Protests were in vain. Everyone knew that the sentence was unlikely to be heavy but PC Plod, as Vince called him (though Philip thought Javert would have been more appropriate), was obviously intent on getting a couple of ounces of flesh if he couldn’t get the full pound.
‘I’ll see you keep your job here,’ Philip called to Vince as he was escorted to the car.
‘Are you sure, sir?’ said Plod. ‘You surely don’t want that sort working with you?’
Vince turned and winked as the car door was opened.
‘Thanks Phil, you’re a diamond. Let’s go for a pint when this is over.’
‘♫Take Good Care of my Baby’, Philip started singing, and Vince laughed as the car door was slammed on him.
Back in the shop Philip phoned Mr Harrington, who was not only a councillor and a magistrate but, as Philip knew, in the same Lodge as the Chief Constable. Mr Harrington was gratifyingly outraged when he heard about Vince’s arrest and promised to pull some strings. Overwhelmed with relief, Phil (for it would be Phil from now on, he decided) cheerfully carried on with the song he had started earlier, even though he did not know all the words.
…♫ Be just as kind as you can be.
And if you should discover,
da da da da da da da,
Just send my baby back home .. to .. me.
Take Good Care of My Baby
‘♫Take good care of my baby,’ Vince began singing. The manager, Philip (never 'Phil'), adopted a pained expression.
‘Do you have to, Vincent?’ he asked.
‘Leave the boy alone,’ said Jean. ‘You’re always singing that Italian song.’
‘That’s in an entirely different category,’ said Philip. ‘Haven’t you read the sign above the shop? Harrington’s High Class Dry Cleaners. Singing American pop songs could ruin our reputation. This is Kensington not … not…’
‘The Bronx?’ supplied Vince, who had recently seen an American gangster film.
‘Well, yes, that will do,’ Philip grudgingly agreed, unable to conceal the hint of a smile in response to Vince’s much broader one.
‘And what’s the difference between an old Italian song and a new American one?’ asked Jean.
‘If you don’t know that,’ said Philip, putting on his coat, ‘you should be working in Woolworth’s. I was with the army in Italy when I was Vincent’s age and I was taught that song by a famous Italian tenor. I’m off to lunch now. If he wants to sing any more songs like that make sure he does it out the back.’
As he left he absent-mindedly began singing Bella Ragazza delle Trecce Bionde for the umpteenth time that day, in his usual questionable Italian accent.
‘Don’t take any notice of him,’ Jean laughed when he had gone. ‘He quite likes you really.’
‘Are you sure? I sometimes get the impression he’s frightened to be in the same room as me, at least when we’re on our own. Does he think I’m going to beat him up or something?’
‘Oh, I know he has some funny ways but when you arrived last month he said you seemed like a pleasant boy, and he told off the last trainee for wearing drainpipe trousers but you seem to have got away with it. He could be quite nice if he wasn’t such a snob. I think he puts on airs because he’s a bit lonely.’
‘Isn’t he married, then?’ asked Vince.
‘He was once but it didn’t last. It’s a shame because he’s quite good looking really, and he’s still fairly young even if he talks as though he’s in his fifties.’
‘I do like him.’ He blushed. ‘What I mean is, he doesn’t seem to hold it against me because I was in Borstal.’
‘Well, he knows Mr Harrington’s views about helping the disadvantaged… Sorry,’ she stopped herself, ‘that sounded awful, didn’t it? Why did they send you to Borstal?’
‘A couple of other kids at Barnardo’s took me shoplifting a few times. They were my mates so it was difficult to say no. I wasn’t very good at football so I had to show I wasn’t a poof.’
‘So you haven’t got any parents?’
‘I suppose I have somewhere but I never met them. They probably only met each other the once!’
‘Well, there was a war on,’ she smiled sadly, ‘and maybe they didn’t survive to come and get you. If you want you can come to Highbury to see us. Have you made many friends in your hostel?’
‘There was Jim but he’s moved on now.’
‘Never mind, I don’t think you’ll be alone for long and that face will be your fortune. But I suppose a lot of people have told you that.’
‘No, not really,’ said Vince.
‘And you keep very smart considering you never had a mum to look after you…’
She was interrupted by a customer, then several more arrived in quick succession.
Philip knew that they probably laughed at him behind his back and he didn’t really blame them. He was in his mid-thirties but if anything was even more socially awkward than when he was eighteen. He had spent his lunch hour mortified by his earlier display of snobbery, exaggerating his offence in his own mind the longer he thought about it. He had belittled a perfectly amiable young man, one who had probably been alone all his life. Philip knew that was something they had in common, not that he could ever explain it to Vince. And just because we have been bullied is no reason to bully others in our turn, though in practice that often seems to be what happens. More bizarre was the way we sometimes try to hurt the last person we really want to.
When Vince returned from his lunch Philip was in the back, and remained there pretending to sort through some racks of clothes. Vince eventually entered with a suit that someone had just brought in.
‘I’m sorry about earlier,’ Philip timidly said at last. ‘I actually quite like the song you sang.’
Vince smiled. Oh, why did he have to smile? That smile had been a joy and a torture ever since they had started working together. Without having time to think, Philip found himself putting out his hand and touching Vince’s cheek. As if this were not enough his other hand, as though possessing a mind of its own, gently, almost imperceptibly, brushed the front of Vince’s drainpipes. The whole thing lasted a second but it was unmistakable. He registered Vince’s look of surprise, then fled.
‘I have a sudden migraine,’ he said to Jean as he took his coat and left the shop.
He expected the police would come for him that evening at the latest. When they did not come he began to think of the other possibilities. Blackmail? A beating by some thugs from Vince’s hostel? Or perhaps Vince would simply report it to Mr Harrington and Philip would never work again. He knew he could deny the incident, that it would be his word against a former Borstal boy, but he shrank from the idea of branding Vince of all people a liar. In a strange way he still hoped that Vince, who seemed to have remained kind and trusting despite his disadvantages, would hold a good opinion of him at some level.
He found the courage to go into work the next morning, Jean’s day off, and to his surprise Vince was there. He was not hostile so much as quiet, and they avoided each other’s eyes for that first hour. Otherwise they functioned in an embarrassed sort of way. At one point Vince seemed about to say something but thought better of it. Then, just after ten, two policemen entered. Philip braced himself. So this was it. Disgrace, probably prison followed by joblessness and poverty, would now be his lot.
‘Does a Vincent Clarke work here?’ asked one of the policemen.
Vince emerged from the back room.
‘Vincent Clarke, I’m arresting you on suspicion of theft. Anything you say will…’
Several emotions engulfed Philip in quick succession. His first reaction was one of relief that the police were not on the mission he had supposed. This lasted only a few seconds as he realised that Vince might still be involved in criminal activity. Then it dawned that Vince was about to be carted off and would probably never return to the shop. Mr Harrington was big on reformed delinquents but would be unforgiving if he thought his faith had been abused.
‘When was this supposed to have been?’ asked Vince at last, clearly shaken.
‘January 1958.’
‘But that was four years ago when I was fifteen. I thought that was all dealt with.’
‘Not the Mars bar from the newsagents on Fulham Road,’ said the copper with a look of triumph. ‘We’ve checked the paperwork. That one was never taken into consideration.’
‘But I thought they were all covered.’ Then something dawned on him. ‘I know what this is about!’ He turned to Philip. ‘Three months ago someone at the hostel walked in on me and Jim…’ He stopped himself, …‘Claimed they saw me and Jim in a compromising position. They withdrew their statement in the end. PC Plod here couldn’t get over that.’
Philip put off absorbing this fully until later.
‘You can’t seriously want to arrest Vincent for stealing a Mars bar when he was in an orphanage?’ he protested. ‘He’s turned his life around since then.’
‘And a packet of Polo mints,’ said the more junior policeman, consulting his notes.
‘Well, I hope something’s deducted for the holes!’ said Philip. Vince smiled and looked at him in surprise at the joke, as though seeing him in a new light, or rather another new one.
Protests were in vain. Everyone knew that the sentence was unlikely to be heavy but PC Plod, as Vince called him (though Philip thought Javert would have been more appropriate), was obviously intent on getting a couple of ounces of flesh if he couldn’t get the full pound.
‘I’ll see you keep your job here,’ Philip called to Vince as he was escorted to the car.
‘Are you sure, sir?’ said Plod. ‘You surely don’t want that sort working with you?’
Vince turned and winked as the car door was opened.
‘Thanks Phil, you’re a diamond. Let’s go for a pint when this is over.’
‘♫Take Good Care of my Baby’, Philip started singing, and Vince laughed as the car door was slammed on him.
Back in the shop Philip phoned Mr Harrington, who was not only a councillor and a magistrate but, as Philip knew, in the same Lodge as the Chief Constable. Mr Harrington was gratifyingly outraged when he heard about Vince’s arrest and promised to pull some strings. Overwhelmed with relief, Phil (for it would be Phil from now on, he decided) cheerfully carried on with the song he had started earlier, even though he did not know all the words.
…♫ Be just as kind as you can be.
And if you should discover,
da da da da da da da,
Just send my baby back home .. to .. me.
The Sign of the Rat
Eddie carefully counted his money before leaving for the pub and was relieved that he could afford a couple of rounds as long as he bought the cheapest beer for himself. Justin, he knew, would have his usual Stella. Reassuringly expensive, the advert called it, but Eddie didn’t find it reassuring at all.
Eddie wished he could be more like Justin. Eddie knew he was a plodder, only just managing to see his way through university with a lot of hard work, whereas Justin was sailing through with the minimum of effort. Eddie could only just make ends meet, while Justin always seemed to have money to flash about, largely through the series of little schemes he always had on the go. Eddie found it difficult meeting new people, while Justin had loads of friends and seemed to know the right things to say in company. Eddie sometimes wondered why Justin hung around with him, though someone had suggested it was because they looked so similar and it was typical of Justin to want to be friends with someone who looked like himself. Not that anyone was ever likely to confuse them, for Justin was usually in the latest designer gear while Eddie’s only recent clothes purchase had been from Primark.
They arrived at the pub almost simultaneously and Eddie was surprised when Justin insisted getting the first round in. Eddie, the nervous friend anxious to please, was usually the first at the bar. Eddie noticed the wodge of notes Justin took from his pocket.
‘Had a bit of luck?’ Eddie asked.
‘Just a bit more money for old rope. That Chinese guy whose dad’s a millionaire gave me a hundred quid to write his essay for him.’ He laughed when he saw the expression on Eddie’s face. ‘Sorry, it’s a sin isn’t it? I suppose you’ll worry about it all evening.’
Eddie was silent as they found a table. He didn’t approve of some of the things Justin got up to but in an odd way he admired his boldness. Justin told him his latest joke about the nun and the camel and then looked more serious.
‘I’ve got a favour to ask,’ he said, obviously confident that he would not be refused. ‘How would you like a week in Paris, train ticket, board and lodging, all paid for?’
‘You’re joking!’ said Eddie.
‘Not a bit of it. My Aunty Rose lives there. She married some banker though he’s been dead since before I can remember. She has an apartment on the Place des Vosges. She wrote to me a couple of months ago asking me to go over, God knows why after all these years. Lonely, I suppose. I said I couldn’t manage it till the end of term and yesterday she sent me the train ticket for the first week in July.’
‘So what’s that got to do with me?’ asked Eddie.
‘Well, I can’t go. Fiona Blakeman’s asked me to join her on her dad’s yacht and I’m not going to turn down Fiona Blakeman for Aunty Rose, she was always a miserable old bag despite all her money. The trouble is I can’t afford to offend her so I thought you could be me for the week. Don’t worry, she hasn’t seen me since I was twelve. She fell out with my mum about something and my mum’s dead now so they can never make up. It looks like I’m in for a few bob when she snuffs it if I play my cards right. She’s got no kids of her own.’
‘You mean you want me to pose as you?’ asked Eddie, horrified.
‘Why not? I can give you a crib sheet about the people she’s likely to mention and about a couple of things we did the last time I saw her when I was a kid. By the way, she’s into Chinese horoscopes. She remembered when I was born and reckons I’m a Rat.’
‘Well, we all know that!’ laughed Eddie, then added an apologetic, ‘Sorry.’
‘Don’t apologise,’ said Justin enthusiastically, ‘that was witty by your standards. If you can keep that up she’ll be convinced you’re me. I looked up Rats and they’re supposed to be sharp, funny, quick witted, clever and charming.’ He paused to look at Eddie with the first hint of doubt. ‘They’re also supposed to have excellent taste, so I’d better lend you some clothes too.’
Eddie remained reluctant but after a few pints he was persuaded. He regretted it the next morning when he was sober but a promise was a promise. Besides, a free week in Paris was not to be sniffed at. His only foray into France had been a few hours in Calais and his only other foreign trip an off-season week in Benidorm.
In the fortnight before the trip Justin filled him in on family details and gave him a photograph of Rose taken ten years earlier. He also wrote down the characteristics of the Rat so that Eddie could consult them.
The trip started off swimmingly. Eddie was able to recognise Rose at the Gare du Nord before she saw him. He was impressed by her flat and did not find her the miserable old bag Justin had described. Before they went for a stroll he looked up the characteristics of a Rat again. Charming and funny. While out he told Rose how beautiful and elegant she was looking, which went down very well, and told her the joke about the nun and the camel, which didn’t, but she laughed all the same and said it was probably an age thing. On a couple of occasions he failed to answer to Justin but he gradually picked it up.
The following day Rose told him that she was visiting a friend and asked if he minded being left to his own devices. Consulting the crib sheet he saw that Rats were seekers of knowledge, and told her he would spend the day visiting museums.
While out he wondered if it was possible to think oneself into having the characteristics of particular signs, in other words to think himself into being Justin. Now he thought about it, he would have to do this if the thing were to work. He already felt himself slouching less as he walked along in Justin’s stylish jeans and shirt and noticed a couple of admiring glances. A girl at college had told him that if only he had more confidence he would actually be considered the better looking of the two. Yet as he was walking along the rue de Rivoli an incident happened that reminded him just how unalike Justin he was. An American tourist dropped a twenty euro note and Eddie immediately picked it up and handed it to the man. A similar incident had once happened when he had been out with Justin, who had hastily put the money in his own pocket. ‘You have to seize your chance,’ Justin had said scornfully when he saw the shocked look on Eddie’s face, ‘otherwise you’ll always be a loser. Let’s face it, the guy looks wealthy enough. He probably won’t even know he dropped the tenner. How can it be wrong if he doesn’t even know he lost it?’
That evening Rose said that she wanted to take him for a ride in the country the following day, Sunday. It was only when they were in the car that she informed him that they would actually be visiting a friend of hers, the same friend she had visited the day before.
He lived about thirty kilometres outside the city and he and his family were having a celebration. Until then Eddie had assumed the friend was a woman. He was introduced to Marcel, an amiable widower with an abundance of children and grandchildren in attendance. Eddie could not help noticing that Rose and Marcel were more than just friends and was pleased for them both. Everyone was very hospitable and a couple of grand-daughters in their late teens seemed to take a shine to Eddie. It was a wonderful, balmy day and the food and wine were as delicious as they were plentiful. As Eddie conversed and joked with them in his schoolboy French they all laughed and said how charming he was. He wondered how long he could keep it up. But for this week you are Justin, he told himself. Keep remembering that and all will be well.
Rose looked a little pensive during the drive back to Paris and it was not until they were having a nightcap that she revealed what was on her mind.
‘I wanted to introduce you to Marcel and his family, that’s really why I invited you. The truth is, Justin, we intend to get married soon. I know that might come as a shock to you.’
‘But why should it? I’m really pleased for you.’
‘I really think you mean that,’ she said, looking at him intently. ‘I thought you’d be annoyed. The thing is Marcel has a big extended family as you saw. You must have had hopes I’d leave you quite a lot in my will, what with being one of my few relatives until now. You were born under the sign of the Rat, and Rats love money. I don’t hold that against you, it’s just the way things are. And quite apart from your expectations, you must probably think a romance at our age is ridiculous.’
‘No, I think it’s cool. They seem like a very pleasant family.’
‘Yes, I sensed you liked them. Maybe you remember what a dried-up old thing I was the last time you were here. I thought I’d never get over your Uncle Victor’s death and assumed happiness was over and done with. All that changed when I met Marcel last year. And you know, you’re also much nicer than I remember you. I know you were much younger then but there was something in your character I was nervous about. What I’ve decided to do is to give you a gift now in lieu of leaving you something in my will. I know you’re a student and it would probably be more useful to you now.’
Eddie hoped that, whatever the gift was, it would not be too heavy to carry back to Justin. Rose got up and went to her desk. She took out a cheque book.
‘I thought thirty thousand euros,’ she said.
Eddie suddenly felt guilty. How could he be part of this subterfuge? Justin didn’t deserve a penny. But you are Justin, he again reminded himself. Think and act as Justin the Rat would think and act. He had promised Justin that he would do that, after all.
‘That’s incredibly generous of you,’ he said, seizing the moment as Justin had always told him he should, ‘but if you don’t mind, could you wait and give it to me in cash? It’s just that I’m not sure if my bank will take a French cheque, at least not without some sort of kerfuffle.’
‘No, I don’t mind,’ she laughed. ‘We can go to my bank tomorrow.’
‘It really is very generous of you,’ he said again when she sat down.
‘I didn’t think you’d be that pleased,’ she smiled. ‘It must only be a fraction of what you expected.’
‘I never expected anything,’ said Eddie, truthfully enough.
‘And will you be coming back for the wedding? You were quite a hit with Marcel’s family this afternoon.’
‘Oh yes,’ said Eddie, ‘I’ll definitely be back for that.’
‘Marcel and I are buying a place near Nice to live in after we get married. You’d be more than welcome to come and stay with us there any time you want a bit of sunshine.’
‘It sounds wonderful,’ Eddie assured her. ‘I’ll really look forward to it… Oh, by the way, I’ve recently moved. You’d better have my new address and phone number.’
‘Write them in my address book,’ she said. ‘Don’t forget to cross out the old ones.’
She handed him the book and Eddie dutifully crossed out Justin’s details, putting his own in their place.
But as he had half-expected, remorse set in almost immediately and he spent much of the night worrying. What was he turning into? Another Mr Ripley? Besides, what if Justin wrote to her thanking her for having him? In normal circumstances such courtesy from Justin would have been highly unlikely, but in this case he would still have his expected legacy to think of. She would see that the address he was writing from was still the same. Eddie cursed himself for not thinking of that the evening before. But it was his own dishonesty that shocked him the most, and he hoped it was not simply fear of being found out that prompted the decision he made.
Over breakfast the next morning Rose started to discuss their trip to the bank. He finally plucked up the courage to say what he knew he had to.
‘I don’t think we’d better do that,’ he said hesitantly. ‘You see, I’m not really Justin at all. My name’s Edward… Eddie. Justin couldn’t come so he asked me to take his place.’
She looked at him for a moment, then smiled.
‘Oh, I know that,’ she said. ‘I must say, I’m still a bit disappointed in you. You’re clearly an honest person who couldn’t keep up a lie for long, but you’ve just told me another lie. I’ve no doubt Justin asked you to come in his place, but we both know he’s not here because he couldn’t come but because he didn’t want to waste a week on a boring old woman. He still clearly has expectations of me though.’
Eddie said nothing.
‘It’s typical of Justin’s arrogance to concoct a ridiculous scheme like that and think he could get away with it,’ Rose went on. ‘I wasn’t absolutely sure but there was something about you that made me think you couldn’t really be him, and I don’t just mean physically. Your genuine pleasure at my happiness clinched it for me. I looked in your passport while you were taking a shower last night.’
‘I suppose it was a bit hair-brained,’ Eddie conceded. ‘I expect you want me to go now. I’ll see if they’ll change my ticket for me.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ she laughed. ‘We have to take that trip to the bank this morning, and if you’re feeling so guilty I’ll let you take me out for dinner this evening. There’s so much I’d like to know about you.’
The Lighted Window
Night after night I had passed the house and studied the lighted square of the window.
It was not the only such square, or rather oblong, of light in that terrace of Georgian houses. What stood out about this particular front-room window was not that it was brighter than the others, nor even that it was one of the few with net curtains, but the interior was so different. The other houses in this now chic Islington street had long since been given an expensive minimalist makeover. What one usually saw through these windows were large modernist oil paintings, sleek leather furniture and few ornaments except one or two obviously expensive pieces that looked like something out of a gallery. This was two or three years into Tony Blair’s tenure, the era of ‘Cool Britannia’. A few times, when passing later than usual, I caught sight of a dinner party in full flow and, if the sash-window was slightly open, I could even hear snippets of conversation. ‘This is the last of the bottles we picked up from a small place in the Ardèche,’ one effusive lady had enthused, ‘there’s nothing like it with lamb.’ I noticed that the ground-floor curtains were rarely drawn in these more affluent households, as though the occupants were eager to let the world witness, and be awed by, their elegance.
The front room of number twelve could hardly have been more different. There was an old-fashioned mirror over the fireplace, an ancient light fitting that looked like a glass fruit bowl suspended by three chains, a mid-twentieth century sideboard, a radiogram and a heavy, battered, armchair and settee. On the wall facing the window, above the sideboard, there was a print of Constable’s The Haywain. Sometimes I saw the occupant, a small old lady, seated in the chair looking into the corner that was obscured from my vision, almost certainly at a television. Sometimes she seemed cheerful enough and once or twice was even laughing at whatever she was watching. On other occasions she looked fairly sad and once, as she peered over something, an old photo album perhaps, she appeared to be crying. The one thing she had in common with the influx of new rich was her failure to draw her curtains. I found this curious, as in my experience older people, at least English ones, usually shut out the world the moment night falls and lights are switched on. There was a street light right outside the house and sometimes she looked up as she saw me passing, her gaze lingering momentarily.
Then, with the arrival of spring and longer days, the light was no longer on when I made my way past the house every weekday evening, usually around seven except when I was working late. And yet I was aware that although I could not see her, she could most probably see me. This supposition was confirmed one evening when, as I was passing at twilight, the window was suddenly flung up and she addressed me.
‘Excuse me, do you think you could come in and change a light bulb for me? I’ve been waiting for my son to come and do it.’
How could I refuse? When she opened the front door the passageway reminded me instantly of my foster parents’ house. There was an overburdened hallstand and a runner rather than carpet in the hallway and up the stairs, the sort with a little red stripe on either side. She took a bulb from the sideboard and presented me with a chair to stand on.
‘Oh, that’s better,’ she said when the light was finally on. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
She did not wait for an answer but left me alone while she presumably went to make the tea. As she shuffled off I realised for the first time just how frail she was. Ten minutes later she entered with a trolley bearing both tea and Battenberg cake.
‘I was waiting for my son,’ she said again after the usual questions about milk and sugar.
‘Does he live far?’ I asked.
‘Just up the road,’ she smiled. ‘I expect he’s very busy.’
This observation, along with my memory of that solitary figure watching television alone every night, told me that the son did not visit often. While she did not seem to hold that against him, I was annoyed on her behalf. No doubt the fact that I had been an orphan had something to do with it. I had ended up with good foster parents eventually, but the misery of my years up to fourteen had never left me. I had been a Barnardo’s boy, abandoned in a waiting room at Barts Hospital when I was a day old. Perhaps I felt for her because I had known loneliness too. It also occurred to me, as I sat opposite her, that I had seen her several times before. I had even spoken to her once, for I recognised her as the same old lady who, a few weeks before, had asked me to check the sell-by date on a packet of muffins when I had been in Sainsbury’s one Saturday with my wife and little son.
‘Have you lived round this way long?’ she asked, after introducing herself as Irene.
‘We moved here about a year ago,’ I supplied. ‘Ten years ago I nearly moved to a flat right opposite here but I was sent by my company to work abroad and I withdrew my offer on the place.’
‘Ah yes,’ she smiled, ‘I remembered you coming to look at that place. The lady you nearly bought it from told me you’d mentioned you’d been an orphan.’
‘What an extraordinary memory you must have,’ I laughed.
‘You looked the spitting image of someone I knew, that’s why I remembered you. I suppose you must have done quite well to have bought a place round here. It’s come up a bit since the old days.’
‘I’m doing okay,’ I assured her. ‘I’m not rich enough to buy a whole house in this area though. We have a flat on the second and third floor.’
‘That must still have cost a pretty penny round here,’ she said. ‘My parents lived in this house and I’m what they call a controlled tenant. I think I’ve seen you with your wife and little boy. You both seem quite old to have such a young child. I’m sorry,’ she hastily added, ‘that must have sounded quite rude.’
‘Not at all,’ I assured her, ‘I suspect a lot of people must think that. Aaron’s just turned four and I’m nearly forty-eight. Judith’s forty-six. We married fairly late.’
I did not tell her that I had never married before that because I somehow hadn’t had the confidence. I could hold down a job, a good job as it happened, and had been promoted several times. Yet that early loneliness, that feeling that everything was transient, had prevented me from entering into any deep relationships. It had been the same for Judith, for she had once been in the same children’s home as me and we were to meet again by chance when we were around forty. We were happy now, and immensely grateful that we had met in time to have Aaron, but we both regretted not having real relatives and felt sad that Aaron, too, would never have siblings or even cousins. There were not even any family photographs to help us put ourselves into some kind of context.
From my wallet I took out a photo of Judith and Aaron.
‘Oh, they’re beautiful,’ Irene enthused. ‘I’ve seen them walking past and in the shops sometimes. And what’s your name?’
‘Jack,’ I said.
‘Jack,’ she said approvingly. ‘I like that. A solid sort of name.’
She told me a few things about herself, about her parents having moved into the house in the thirties, about her having looked after them both in their old age.
‘But enough about me,’ she said. ‘I suppose Judith and Aaron will be wondering where you’ve got to.’
‘I suppose so,’ I said, strangely reluctant to leave. And yet, lonely as she must be, she appeared to be dismissing me, at least for now.
She got up and led me to the door. Just as she opened it she turned and put her arms around me, planting a kiss on my cheek. I was momentarily taken aback but realised it was just a lonely old lady expressing gratitude for a little company. She stepped back to take another look at me. ‘Jack,’ she smiled, as though the name tickled her.
‘I’ll call in again to see how you are,’ I promised.
‘That would be lovely,’ she said, ‘but don’t feel obliged. I’m entirely happy now, I assure you.’
She waved to me as I walked along the street, and I waved back as I turned the corner. She was smiling broadly by then and I smiled too.
When I next passed the house the following Monday, later in the evening that time, I saw that it was in darkness as it was to be for the rest of the week. On the Friday I knocked at the house next door to ask if Irene was okay.
‘She died last Sunday night,’ the middle-aged woman informed me. ‘Heart attack. Her home-help found her. The funeral’s on Monday. Did you know her?’
‘Well, sort of,’ I said.
‘She was a funny old thing. They tried to bribe her to move to another place, what with these houses being worth a fortune now, but she refused. She said she was waiting for someone who might never find her if she moved away. They almost got rid of her ten years ago but she refused to go at the last minute. Poor old soul, spent her life here with her parents until they died. Her mother was a very domineering woman by all accounts.’
‘Didn’t she have a son?’ I asked, remembering Irene mentioning one when she asked me to replace her light bulb.
‘Not that I know of, though now you mention it I remember one of the older neighbours once telling me that Irene had told her she had a child when she was younger. She had a fiancé who was in the army and he got killed in Malaya. Her dad dumped the kid at Barts. He was a local councillor and in those days it wouldn’t have done to have a daughter with an illegitimate child. I’m not sure I believe any of it though. Seems like a lot of gossip to me.’
It took me a few seconds to absorb this.
‘By the way, you don’t know anyone called Jack, do you?’ she asked.
‘I’m Jack,’ I said weakly. There must be a lot of Jacks in the world, but I was by now certain I was the one in question.
‘Hang on, I’ve got something for you.’
She went into the house and reappeared with a large envelope. It had my name on the front.
‘This was on her sideboard. I suppose she intended to give it to you.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Where is the funeral being held on Monday?’
‘St Jude’s, eleven o’clock.’
I thanked her and walked in the direction of home. After I turned the corner I opened the envelope. There were three photographs. One was of Irene herself in her twenties, the other of a soldier who did indeed look the spitting image of me. On the back she had written ‘Edward Stanhope, 1926-1952’. The third photograph was of Irene and Edward together, laughing at what looked like the Festival of Britain. On the back of this one she had written, ‘You were conceived that night.’
At the funeral Judith and I finally met my relatives. My nervousness about how to introduce myself was overtaken by events, for a cousin of Irene’s, almost as old as she had been, looked at me and said, ‘Good God, it’s Edward!’
And so we have quite a large and friendly extended family, and Aaron even has a couple of cousins of around his own age (well, okay, third or fourth cousins, but who’s counting?) and we keep in close touch. Edward had had a sister who resumed contact with Irene after her parents had died, and so I have come to know relatives on my father’s side too. Some of the family have given me copies (sometimes even originals) of photographs of Irene, Edward and other family members. These photos are multiplying, for we meet often and sometimes we go on holiday together in groups of varying sizes. Last year it was Crete.
My one regret, of course, is that I did not speak to my mother sooner.
Night after night I had passed that house and studied the lighted square of the window.
Night after night I had passed the house and studied the lighted square of the window.
It was not the only such square, or rather oblong, of light in that terrace of Georgian houses. What stood out about this particular front-room window was not that it was brighter than the others, nor even that it was one of the few with net curtains, but the interior was so different. The other houses in this now chic Islington street had long since been given an expensive minimalist makeover. What one usually saw through these windows were large modernist oil paintings, sleek leather furniture and few ornaments except one or two obviously expensive pieces that looked like something out of a gallery. This was two or three years into Tony Blair’s tenure, the era of ‘Cool Britannia’. A few times, when passing later than usual, I caught sight of a dinner party in full flow and, if the sash-window was slightly open, I could even hear snippets of conversation. ‘This is the last of the bottles we picked up from a small place in the Ardèche,’ one effusive lady had enthused, ‘there’s nothing like it with lamb.’ I noticed that the ground-floor curtains were rarely drawn in these more affluent households, as though the occupants were eager to let the world witness, and be awed by, their elegance.
The front room of number twelve could hardly have been more different. There was an old-fashioned mirror over the fireplace, an ancient light fitting that looked like a glass fruit bowl suspended by three chains, a mid-twentieth century sideboard, a radiogram and a heavy, battered, armchair and settee. On the wall facing the window, above the sideboard, there was a print of Constable’s The Haywain. Sometimes I saw the occupant, a small old lady, seated in the chair looking into the corner that was obscured from my vision, almost certainly at a television. Sometimes she seemed cheerful enough and once or twice was even laughing at whatever she was watching. On other occasions she looked fairly sad and once, as she peered over something, an old photo album perhaps, she appeared to be crying. The one thing she had in common with the influx of new rich was her failure to draw her curtains. I found this curious, as in my experience older people, at least English ones, usually shut out the world the moment night falls and lights are switched on. There was a street light right outside the house and sometimes she looked up as she saw me passing, her gaze lingering momentarily.
Then, with the arrival of spring and longer days, the light was no longer on when I made my way past the house every weekday evening, usually around seven except when I was working late. And yet I was aware that although I could not see her, she could most probably see me. This supposition was confirmed one evening when, as I was passing at twilight, the window was suddenly flung up and she addressed me.
‘Excuse me, do you think you could come in and change a light bulb for me? I’ve been waiting for my son to come and do it.’
How could I refuse? When she opened the front door the passageway reminded me instantly of my foster parents’ house. There was an overburdened hallstand and a runner rather than carpet in the hallway and up the stairs, the sort with a little red stripe on either side. She took a bulb from the sideboard and presented me with a chair to stand on.
‘Oh, that’s better,’ she said when the light was finally on. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
She did not wait for an answer but left me alone while she presumably went to make the tea. As she shuffled off I realised for the first time just how frail she was. Ten minutes later she entered with a trolley bearing both tea and Battenberg cake.
‘I was waiting for my son,’ she said again after the usual questions about milk and sugar.
‘Does he live far?’ I asked.
‘Just up the road,’ she smiled. ‘I expect he’s very busy.’
This observation, along with my memory of that solitary figure watching television alone every night, told me that the son did not visit often. While she did not seem to hold that against him, I was annoyed on her behalf. No doubt the fact that I had been an orphan had something to do with it. I had ended up with good foster parents eventually, but the misery of my years up to fourteen had never left me. I had been a Barnardo’s boy, abandoned in a waiting room at Barts Hospital when I was a day old. Perhaps I felt for her because I had known loneliness too. It also occurred to me, as I sat opposite her, that I had seen her several times before. I had even spoken to her once, for I recognised her as the same old lady who, a few weeks before, had asked me to check the sell-by date on a packet of muffins when I had been in Sainsbury’s one Saturday with my wife and little son.
‘Have you lived round this way long?’ she asked, after introducing herself as Irene.
‘We moved here about a year ago,’ I supplied. ‘Ten years ago I nearly moved to a flat right opposite here but I was sent by my company to work abroad and I withdrew my offer on the place.’
‘Ah yes,’ she smiled, ‘I remembered you coming to look at that place. The lady you nearly bought it from told me you’d mentioned you’d been an orphan.’
‘What an extraordinary memory you must have,’ I laughed.
‘You looked the spitting image of someone I knew, that’s why I remembered you. I suppose you must have done quite well to have bought a place round here. It’s come up a bit since the old days.’
‘I’m doing okay,’ I assured her. ‘I’m not rich enough to buy a whole house in this area though. We have a flat on the second and third floor.’
‘That must still have cost a pretty penny round here,’ she said. ‘My parents lived in this house and I’m what they call a controlled tenant. I think I’ve seen you with your wife and little boy. You both seem quite old to have such a young child. I’m sorry,’ she hastily added, ‘that must have sounded quite rude.’
‘Not at all,’ I assured her, ‘I suspect a lot of people must think that. Aaron’s just turned four and I’m nearly forty-eight. Judith’s forty-six. We married fairly late.’
I did not tell her that I had never married before that because I somehow hadn’t had the confidence. I could hold down a job, a good job as it happened, and had been promoted several times. Yet that early loneliness, that feeling that everything was transient, had prevented me from entering into any deep relationships. It had been the same for Judith, for she had once been in the same children’s home as me and we were to meet again by chance when we were around forty. We were happy now, and immensely grateful that we had met in time to have Aaron, but we both regretted not having real relatives and felt sad that Aaron, too, would never have siblings or even cousins. There were not even any family photographs to help us put ourselves into some kind of context.
From my wallet I took out a photo of Judith and Aaron.
‘Oh, they’re beautiful,’ Irene enthused. ‘I’ve seen them walking past and in the shops sometimes. And what’s your name?’
‘Jack,’ I said.
‘Jack,’ she said approvingly. ‘I like that. A solid sort of name.’
She told me a few things about herself, about her parents having moved into the house in the thirties, about her having looked after them both in their old age.
‘But enough about me,’ she said. ‘I suppose Judith and Aaron will be wondering where you’ve got to.’
‘I suppose so,’ I said, strangely reluctant to leave. And yet, lonely as she must be, she appeared to be dismissing me, at least for now.
She got up and led me to the door. Just as she opened it she turned and put her arms around me, planting a kiss on my cheek. I was momentarily taken aback but realised it was just a lonely old lady expressing gratitude for a little company. She stepped back to take another look at me. ‘Jack,’ she smiled, as though the name tickled her.
‘I’ll call in again to see how you are,’ I promised.
‘That would be lovely,’ she said, ‘but don’t feel obliged. I’m entirely happy now, I assure you.’
She waved to me as I walked along the street, and I waved back as I turned the corner. She was smiling broadly by then and I smiled too.
When I next passed the house the following Monday, later in the evening that time, I saw that it was in darkness as it was to be for the rest of the week. On the Friday I knocked at the house next door to ask if Irene was okay.
‘She died last Sunday night,’ the middle-aged woman informed me. ‘Heart attack. Her home-help found her. The funeral’s on Monday. Did you know her?’
‘Well, sort of,’ I said.
‘She was a funny old thing. They tried to bribe her to move to another place, what with these houses being worth a fortune now, but she refused. She said she was waiting for someone who might never find her if she moved away. They almost got rid of her ten years ago but she refused to go at the last minute. Poor old soul, spent her life here with her parents until they died. Her mother was a very domineering woman by all accounts.’
‘Didn’t she have a son?’ I asked, remembering Irene mentioning one when she asked me to replace her light bulb.
‘Not that I know of, though now you mention it I remember one of the older neighbours once telling me that Irene had told her she had a child when she was younger. She had a fiancé who was in the army and he got killed in Malaya. Her dad dumped the kid at Barts. He was a local councillor and in those days it wouldn’t have done to have a daughter with an illegitimate child. I’m not sure I believe any of it though. Seems like a lot of gossip to me.’
It took me a few seconds to absorb this.
‘By the way, you don’t know anyone called Jack, do you?’ she asked.
‘I’m Jack,’ I said weakly. There must be a lot of Jacks in the world, but I was by now certain I was the one in question.
‘Hang on, I’ve got something for you.’
She went into the house and reappeared with a large envelope. It had my name on the front.
‘This was on her sideboard. I suppose she intended to give it to you.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Where is the funeral being held on Monday?’
‘St Jude’s, eleven o’clock.’
I thanked her and walked in the direction of home. After I turned the corner I opened the envelope. There were three photographs. One was of Irene herself in her twenties, the other of a soldier who did indeed look the spitting image of me. On the back she had written ‘Edward Stanhope, 1926-1952’. The third photograph was of Irene and Edward together, laughing at what looked like the Festival of Britain. On the back of this one she had written, ‘You were conceived that night.’
At the funeral Judith and I finally met my relatives. My nervousness about how to introduce myself was overtaken by events, for a cousin of Irene’s, almost as old as she had been, looked at me and said, ‘Good God, it’s Edward!’
And so we have quite a large and friendly extended family, and Aaron even has a couple of cousins of around his own age (well, okay, third or fourth cousins, but who’s counting?) and we keep in close touch. Edward had had a sister who resumed contact with Irene after her parents had died, and so I have come to know relatives on my father’s side too. Some of the family have given me copies (sometimes even originals) of photographs of Irene, Edward and other family members. These photos are multiplying, for we meet often and sometimes we go on holiday together in groups of varying sizes. Last year it was Crete.
My one regret, of course, is that I did not speak to my mother sooner.
Night after night I had passed that house and studied the lighted square of the window.