Miss Carter's War Page 25

  ‘No way, Tony, I’ve finished with all that. I’ve decided I’m no good at it. I had the love of my life when I was young. I’ll never match him. And I’m not going to try any more. I’m middle-aged, I’ve got my pupils, I’ve got you two dear friends, all my good causes, and now a lovely home. What more could a girl need?’

  ‘There you are, my lovely,’ Donald said, hugging her and grinning at Tony. ‘Never mind our bolshie friend there. As the Tories told us, “We’ve never had it so good.” ’

  Chapter 34

  But what Harold Macmillan had actually said was, ‘Most of our people have never had it so good.’ Marguerite and Tony knew from their school that there was a whole swathe of the population that was not benefiting from this affluence. The people left out were able to see on their new tellies how the other half lived. The underclass that Miss Scott had warned about, coming out of the secondary moderns, disappointed and ill-educated, were now in their thirties and forties. The subsequent chaos brought about by half-heartedly converting to the comprehensive system had produced yet another generation of the inadequately educated. Those who had suffered and fought in a vicious war and then worked for a better more equal world were in their fifties and older, exhausted and disillusioned; whilst some were acquiring houses, cars, holidays abroad, others were left behind. Many of them were angry. This was not how life was meant to be.

  Suddenly the era of kaftans and beads and peace and love seemed to have evaporated and in its place was a period of wanting more, and to hell with anyone who stood in the way of getting it. Poor besieged Heath tried to put an end to a succession of strikes by awkward appearances on television where he appealed to the nation’s public spirit to agree to a pay freeze.

  Whilst juggling all that, he managed to get Britain in as part of the European Economic Community. Marguerite insisted on them toasting the event in the best champagne, consumed with titbits of English Stilton cheese, German sausage and Italian bread dipped in Spanish olive oil.

  ‘No more wars, boys. That’s it. We’re united.’

  Tony snorted, ‘Well, apart from the odd skirmish in Vietnam, Korea and Israel and troops on the street in Ireland.’

  ‘I’m talking about with our neighbours across the Channel. There will be no more European wars; and best of all, I’m no longer part French, part English. I’m European and I love it.’

  She served Chicken Kiev as a main course. ‘A gesture of peace to our Communist friends.’

  Donald and Tony were full of admiration for her cooking as they dug their knives into the chicken and released the garlic butter wrapped inside.

  ‘Brilliant. You clever little Delia Smith.’

  Marguerite went into the kitchen and brought out an empty carton.

  ‘Tah rah. Frozen!’

  ‘You’re kidding.’

  ‘I’m not. It’s a whole new wonderful world. More champagne?’

  After a few celebratory glasses Tony went into one of his periodic working-class angsts.

  ‘Mmm, it’s all right for some. While we are quaffing champagne what about the miners?’

  Donald groaned.

  ‘Oh God, here we go. He’s going to tell us about the Battle of Saltley Gate – again.’

  ‘You two wouldn’t understand. You have to be working class. It was one of the most moving moments of my life, seeing those Yorkshire miners marching over the hill to join the picket. Twenty-five thousand men, women and children crowding the streets chanting, “We are the people.” We had to close the bloody gate against the blackleg lorry drivers, didn’t we?’

  Donald prompted quietly, ‘And Arthur Scargill—’

  ‘And young Arthur Scargill in his donkey jacket, red scarf and baseball cap climbed up on the urinal and said it was a victory for the working class. Wonderful. I wept with pride.’

  ‘Well you’ve always been partial to brick shithouses,’ said Donald.

  Tony gave him a withering look.

  ‘This is not funny, Donald. These are my people. Their communities and their whole way of life are threatened.’

  Marguerite calmed him down.

  ‘Well, they got their way. Heath’s gave in. So all’s well that ends well.’

  She, as did Tony, despite all his triumphalism, knew that was not so.

  The stark truth of the tightening of the country’s purse strings was brought home to them by its effect on the elderly Ethel and Bert. They had been made redundant fifteen years earlier, not long after Marguerite and Tony’s visit to Oldham.

  ‘Fancy word, ent it, son? I looked it up. It means no longer needed or useful.’

  Tony had been up several times to offer financial help but it was resolutely refused.

  On his last visit Tony reported that Bert particularly seemed very low. Marguerite suggested that Tony invite them to have a little holiday in London. Ethel was too daunted by the idea of the big city, but Bert accepted the invitation. It was agreed that he would stay in Marguerite’s flat to avoid any discussion of sleeping arrangements, the subject of Tony’s sexuality still being taboo. Donald would be described as a pal sharing Tony’s flat to help with the mortgage payments.

  Having never been further than Manchester, Bert was gobsmacked by London, especially their flats. The ornate, camp opulence of Tony and Donald’s home and the spare modern elegance of Marguerite’s had him shaking his head in wonder.

  ‘Dearie me, look at you smartarses. It’s what you see in’t pictures. Hollywood an’ all that. Ye’ve dun reet well, son. Ye ’ave an’ all.’

  Whilst Marguerite and Tony were at work, Donald took Bert to see the sights. They made an odd couple. Bert in his flat cap and muffler, with his ancient three-piece suit a little tighter now, and Donald also in a suit, but his had bottom-hugging bell-bottom trousers and was worn with a fitted silk shirt and tie. They visited all the places that Bert had read about. Buckingham Palace of course, where they watched the changing of the guard. The clattering horses, the immaculate uniforms moved the old man to tears.

  ‘It makes yer proud, lad. Proud to be British.’

  Knowing that an IRA bomb had recently gone off outside the Houses of Parliament made Bert a bit shaky as he adjusted the time on his waistcoat pocket watch to that of Big Ben. He nevertheless insisted on wandering up to Downing Street to have his photo taken on the steps of No. 10 to show to Ethel. The policeman on duty outside the door smiled when Bert muttered, ‘Bastard, yer bastard,’ as he looked at the Prime Minister’s front door. Donald assured Bert that Londoners were not in the least fazed by the threat of terrorist bombs, but even he was disconcerted when they saw on the news that night that one person had been killed and forty-one injured in an explosion at the Tower of London, half an hour after they left it.

  When Donald suggested he should go to the Royal Opera House to see him dance, Bert looked embarrassed.

  ‘Oh nah, not fer me, lad.’

  Tony snapped, ‘Don’t be bloody ridiculous, Dad. How do you know it’s not for you? You’ve never been.’

  Bert looked shamefaced at Donald.

  ‘No offence, lad – sorry. But I don’t want to let you all down. It’s posh, is’t ballet. I’ve got owt to wear and I’ll feel like a spare prick at a wedding.’ His hand shot to his mouth. ‘Oh beg pardon, luv – no offence.’

  Marguerite chuckled.

  ‘Don’t worry, Bert. It’s a word I’m familiar with.’

  ‘But yer see what I mean. I don’t know how to behave in company.’

  Marguerite thought that Bert could have learned a lesson in bravado from Jimmy, but there was an honesty about the man who could not pretend to be other than he was.

  Donald persisted, ‘I would really love you to see me work, Bert. You can wear what you like. I’d be very happy to have you there to see me doing my job.’

  ‘Oh well – if you put it like that, I better give it a go.’

  Marguerite contemplated offering to take him shopping for a new suit but decided that that would make him more uncomfo
rtable. Instead she washed and ironed his shirt and surreptitiously cleaned some stains off his waistcoat with Thawpit, hanging it in the garden to get rid of the pungent smell.

  On the day of their outing Bert was very nervous. He was obsessed with cleaning his boots properly, rejecting Marguerite’s white all-purpose shoe cream as useless. Eventually he became so anxious that Marguerite went out and bought the two brushes, a yellow duster and black Cherry Blossom shoe polish he said were essential for the operation. Marguerite watched as he laid some newspaper on the floor and, removing the laces from his boots, sat in his darned woollen socks in the armchair. He opened the wingnut of the polish tin, and with one of the brushes applied dabs of it in small circular movements into every nook and cranny of the gnarled boots. This operation took about five minutes. Then he picked up the first boot and with the other brush used strong sweeping movements to bring up the shine, aided by an occasional delicate spit. Finally he applied the yellow duster with light, caressing swirls, to bring the radiance to perfection. There was sweat on his upper lip and his cheeks were red with the effort when he came out of his trance-like concentration to beam at Marguerite.

  ‘There, lass. See yer face in ’em now.’

  ‘Beautiful,’ she said. And meant it.

  There was one more ritual he needed to enact before he had the confidence to venture into the alien territory of the Royal Opera House. To ‘perform his ablutions’. He rejected completely any idea of taking a newfangled shower, preferring ‘a good wash down’ at the sink. Accustomed to the lack of privacy when using the scullery at home, he left he door of the bathroom open so Marguerite was able to watch when he got to his shaving regime.

  First he attached a leather strop to a towel hook. Then he took a cut-throat razor from a satin-lined box. ‘It were my father’s,’ he shouted through the door. Holding the leather belt outstretched with his left hand, he slashed the razor up and down on either side of the blade to sharpen it. Then, from a wash bag, he took out a well-worn round brush and a box of shaving soap and smothered his lower face thoroughly with the foam. He picked up the razor and, holding it elegantly in his right hand, his little finger crooked like a duchess with a teacup, he stretched his skin with the fingers of his left hand and oh so delicately ran the blade down, flicking the foam he gathered into the sink. His elbows raised, his stance was that of a conductor feeling his way through a Mozart symphony. The foam removed, he rinsed, then re-lathered and went through the whole performance again, only this time lifting his nose and earlobes to get into the corners.

  The spell was broken only once when he nicked his skin and whispered, ‘Shite.’ After splashing his face with water, spluttering and gasping, he took a bottle of some potion and patted it on, whooping and hopping up and down as it stung. ‘Bloody hellfire.’ A dab on the nick with some sort of pencil was applied, and he turned, shining, to Marguerite.

  ‘Will ah do, lass?’

  ‘I’ll say, Bert. You’re a real – what was that phrase? – bobby dazzler.’

  ‘Hold me hand tonight, will yer, luvvy? I’m a bit feert. I’ve on’y been in’t theatre once. To see panto at Oldham Empire when I were a lad, an’ I didn’t think much to it. All them men dressed as women and girls pretending to be lads.’

  When the three of them entered the Opera House Foyer, Bert was gripping Marguerite’s hand, but it gradually slackened when he realised everybody was much too preoccupied to bother with him, and anyway, they were such a motley crowd he had no reason to feel out of place. They ranged from a bearded man in a red satin-lined opera cloak, to an orange-haired boy wearing garish make-up and attired in what looked like a diamanté dress over billowing trousers. She had to pull Bert along, so fascinated was he by the babbling mêlée. As they walked into the auditorium he stood stock-still with his mouth gaping open. Marguerite had been there many times but now, seeing it through his eyes, which had been starved of wonderment, she too was awed by its magnificence.

  ‘Come on, you two. You’re holding everyone up.’ Tony was touched to see his father so transfixed. And thus he remained throughout the performance of La Fille mal gardée.

  When Donald made his first entrance with a display of dazzling pirouettes and leaps, Bert turned to Marguerite.

  ‘That’s norr our Donald, is it?’

  And after one particularly fine series of turns he muttered, ‘ ’Ow the bloody hell does ’e do that?’

  When he realised he was permitted to clap during the performance, and even cheer, no one was more vociferous than he. All inhibition gone, he stood up and putting two fingers in his mouth gave piercing whistles after the famous clog dance, beside himself with joy that this homely footwear, that meant drudgery to him, could be made to be so funny and clever.

  After the umpteenth curtain call and the throwing of flowers, hoarse with cheering Bert flopped back in his seat. He shut his eyes.

  ‘Ah didn’t know suchlike existed.’

  When Donald joined them at the café after the show, Bert stared at him wide-eyed saying nothing.

  ‘Well, Bert. What’s the verdict?’

  After several attempts to find the right words, he said, ‘Er – er – them kecks were a bit saucy.’

  Donald looked disappointed. Chin quivering, Bert suddenly stood and folded him in his arms. Patting his back as if he were a baby, he murmured, ‘Bloody brilliant. I was proud, son, proud that you and our lad—’

  They all looked at him. He sat down abruptly and began toying with his fish and chips.

  ‘I’m not a bloody fool, you know.’

  ‘Dad?’

  ‘Leave it, son. Nuff said, leave it there.’

  Chapter 35

  As they were all is such high spirits Marguerite suggested they take Bert to Piccadilly Circus to see the lights. They got the cabby to drive round a few times so Bert could take in the flashing signs.

  ‘That in the middle is Eros, Dad.’

  ‘Very nice.’

  Donald pointed out, ‘Actually it’s not Eros. It was put there to remember a great philanthropist, Lord Shaftesbury. It’s Eros’s brother Anteros. He was the god of selfless love.’

  ‘A bit scarce these days, eh?’ said Marguerite.

  Tony put his arm around her.

  ‘Not while you’re about, it isn’t, pet.’

  Bert pointed out of the window.

  ‘Look, that chemist is still open. It’s late, en’t it? And people are queuing to get in.’

  Marguerite suddenly shouted to the driver, ‘Stop, please stop a minute. By that Boots. Here. Here.’

  ‘I can’t stop here, madam.’

  Ignoring him, Marguerite wound down the window and, over the traffic noise, shouted, ‘Elsie, Elsie!’

  A wraithlike shivering woman turned to look fearfully at the taxi. After staring at Marguerite for a minute, she held out her hand as if to ward off a blow, shook her head and shuffled backwards, disappearing into the crowd on the pavement.

  ‘Sorry, madam, I must move on. There’s a copper coming.’

  ‘Christ. Christ. What’s happened to her? It’s Elsie, Tony. From Dartford. Remember? She’s obviously ill.’

  Tony scanned the pavement.

  ‘Are you sure it was her?’

  Donald shut the window.

  ‘Who is she?’

  ‘She was one of my first pupils.’

  Donald told the driver to take them home to Myddelton Square.

  ‘No. Please, can we go and look for her?’

  Tony pulled her back into her seat.

  ‘Mags, sit down. You’ll never find her in that crowd.’

  ‘But what was she doing there? She looked awful.’

  Donald explained.

  ‘The people queuing there are addicted to drugs. They get them on prescription. That Boots is open all night so the more desperate can get their new prescriptions after midnight.’

  Marguerite was appalled.

  ‘What sort of drugs?’

  ‘The hard stuff, I’m
afraid.’

  Bert looked baffled.

  ‘Drugs? What do you mean, son? Like medicine, is it? Are they poorly, then?’

  Tony changed the subject.

  ‘Let’s all have a nightcap in our flat.’

  Marguerite stifled her panic about Elsie as it was Bert’s last night with them and she didn’t want to spoil it. After a couple of glasses of champagne, his boots off and the waistcoat undone, he sat in the crimson velvet armchair waxing lyrical about his visit.

  ‘It’s been a reet eye-opener, I can tell yer. How you live down here. I’ve seen some wonderful sights. I’m in no hurry to go home, I can tell you. Reet hole, Oldham is now.’

  ‘Come on, Dad, you’ve got all your mates there. You like it.’

  ‘Not any more, son. It’s changed. No work for the likes of us. It’s all Pakis and wogs. They’re taking over whole bits of the town. Can’t go there any more. Not that I want to. The stink is awful.’

  The three of them stared at him, too shocked to speak.

  ‘They don’t know what a hanky is. Spitting and snotting in the streets. And they get free everything. Us white folks don’t get a look in. They’re taking all our jobs—’

  ‘Dad, stop this. I remember you saying you liked the people you worked with.’

  ‘Aye, in them days it was just a few menfolk come to do shift work. They were supposed to be going home. But then they brought all their families and crowded out our hospitals and schools and that. I tell you that Enoch Powell was right. We are swamped by them now. We should send them back where they’ve come from.’

  ‘Dad, you’re talking rubbish.’

  ‘Oh, aye, it’s all right for you down here. They’re ruining my town with their funny churches and their curries and not speaking Queen’s English. They’re taking over. The only people standing up to them are the National Front.’

  ‘Dad, for Christ’s sake, they’re thugs.’

  ‘No, they’re not. Not all of them. They talk sense. I don’t agree with violence, but something’s got to be done. And they’re the only ones doing anything. I’m voting for them next election.’