Rosie’s War

‘Well, that ain’t a very nice greeting, is it?’ Frank stuck his boot over the threshold to prevent John shutting him out. He stared at his old business partner although just one of his eyes was on the man’s face and the other appeared to be studying the doorjamb. Popeye, as Frank was nicknamed, had never let his severe squint hold him back. ‘Just come to see how you’re doing, and tell you about a bit of easy money heading your way, John.’

‘I told you years back that I ain’t in that game no more, and I haven’t changed me mind,’ John craned his neck to spit, ‘I’ve got a wife and family, and I don’t want no trouble.’

‘Yeah, heard you got married to Doris Bellamy. Remember her. All used to hang about together as kids, didn’t we?’ Frank cocked his head. ‘Gonna ask me in fer a cuppa, then?’ He nodded at the tea in John’s unsteady hand. ‘Any left in the pot, is there, mate? I’m spitting feathers ’ere …’

‘No, there ain’t.’ John glanced to left and right as though fearing somebody might have spotted his visitor. ‘Look … I’m straight now and all settled down. Don’t need no work.’ As a last resort he waggled his bad leg at Frank. ‘See … got a gammy leg since we got bombed out up the other end of the road.’

‘Yeah, heard about that, too.’ Frank gave the injury a cursory glance. ‘Thing is, John, that bad leg ain’t gonna hold you back in your line of work, is it?’ He shifted his weight forward. ‘You owe me, as I recall, and I’m here to collect that favour.’

‘Owe you?’ John frowned, the colour fleeing from his complexion. Even so, he was confident that what he was thinking wasn’t what Frank Purves was hinting at. John reckoned that Popeye couldn’t know anything about that, ’cos if he did the vengeful bastard wouldn’t be talking to him, he’d be sticking a knife in his guts. Lenny’s actions had started a feud between the Gardiners and the Purveses that Popeye knew nothing about. But one day he would and when that day came John wanted to get in first.

‘When you chucked it all in you left me high ’n’ dry with a pile of labels I’d run off. Never paid me for ’em, did yer? Plus I had a fair few irate customers waiting on that batch of gin.’

John’s sigh of relief whistled through his teeth. He ferreted in a pocket and drew out some banknotes, thrusting them at Frank. ‘There! Go on, piss off!’

Frank looked contemptuously at the two pounds before pocketing them. ‘I’m in with some different people now. They’re interested in you, John. I been singing your praises and telling ’em you’re the best distiller in London. They ain’t gonna like your attitude when they’ve stumped up handsomely to sample your wares.’

John’s jaw dropped and he suddenly reddened in fury. ‘You had no right to tell a fucking soul about me. I don’t go blabbing me mouth off about you doing a bit of counterfeiting.’

‘Yeah, well, needs must when the devil drives, eh?’ Frank leaned in again. ‘Lost me son, lost me little bomb lark business ’cos me employees crippled themselves. A one-armed short-arse and a fat bloke wot got nobbled in France. Ain’t saying they aren’t keen but, bleedin’ hell, they’re a fuckin’ liability.’ Frank finished his complaint on a tobacco-stained smile. ‘Got nuthin’ but me printing press to fall back on.’ He glanced over a shoulder. ‘Need a few extra clothing coupons, do you, mate?’ He gave John a friendly dig in the ribs. ‘That’ll put you in the missus’s good books. Get herself a new frock, can’t she? Get herself two if she likes.’

‘You forging coupons now?’ John whispered, aghast.

‘I’m forging all right, just like I was when I run off all them dodgy spirit labels for your hooch.’ Frank’s lips thinned over his brown teeth. ‘We need to talk, mate … seriously …’

John knew he’d never get rid of Popeye until he’d let him have his say. And he didn’t want the neighbours seeing too much. Popeye lived the other side of Shoreditch but he had a certain notoriety due to his ducking and diving. Not that you’d think it to look at him: Popeye had the appearance, and the aroma, of a tramp. ‘Just a couple of minutes; they’ll all be in soon fer tea. Don’t want no awkward questions being asked,’ John snarled in frustration.

‘Right y’are …’ Frank said brightly and stepped into the hall.

John pointed at a chair under the parlour table by way of an invitation. He limped into the kitchen and quickly poured a cup of lukewarm tea with a shaking hand. ‘There, get that down yer and say what you’ve got to.’ John glanced nervously at the clock, dreading hearing his wife’s or his daughter’s key in the lock.

‘Look at us,’ Frank chirped, watching John fidgeting to ease his position. He pointed at his left eye. ‘There’s me with me squint and you with yer gammy leg.’ He guffawed. ‘Don’t hold yer back, though, John, do it, if you don’t let it?’ He grinned wolfishly. ‘Bet you still manage to show Doris yer love her, don’t you? Bit of a knee trembler, is it, balancing on one leg on the mattress?’ He winked. ‘Gotta get yer weight on yer elbows.’ Popeye leaned onto the tabletop to demonstrate, rocking back and forth on his seat. ‘I’ve got meself a nice young lady works in the King and Tinker, name of Shirley.’ He paused. ‘Your daughter’s called Rosemary, if I remember right. Heard you’d got a grandkid; so young Rosie’s given up the stage, has she, and got married now?’ Popeye paused to slurp tea.

‘Fuck’s sake, you got something to say, or not?’ Agitatedly, John snatched Popeye’s cup of tea off him. He’d been about to throw it down the sink but knew if he disappeared into another room, Popeye might decide to follow him. And he was desperate to get him out of the house, not further into it.

‘So what’s the nipper’s name? Rosie call her after her mum, did she? Prudence, God rest her, would have liked that, wouldn’t she, John?’

‘Me granddaughter’s name’s Hope,’ John ejected through his teeth. ‘She’s a lovely little darlin’ and I don’t want her coming back home and having you scare the bleedin’ life out of her with yer ugly mug.’ John grimaced at Popeye’s dirty clothes and the greying stubble on his face.

Frank ran a hand around his chin, understanding John’s look of disgust. ‘My Shirley’s always telling me to smarten up. Perhaps I should.’

‘Sling yer hook before they all come in!’ John had almost jumped out of his skin at the sound of next door’s dustbin lid clattering home.

‘Right, here’s the deal.’ Suddenly Popeye was deadly serious, mean eyes narrowed to slits. ‘I know this outfit what’s deep in with anything you like: dog tracks, bootlegging; pimps ’n’ spivs, they are. Based over the docks—’

‘I get the picture,’ John interrupted, having heard enough. ‘You’re out of your league and you’ve promised ’em stuff you can’t deliver. Ain’t nuthin’ to do with me, Popeye. I’ve paid you up. That’s us quits.’

‘It ain’t me who’s got to deliver on this occasion, it’s you, mate. I’ve run ’em off a nice line of girly mags in the past and I’ve been doing their booze labels. Trouble is they’ve got no bottles of Scotch to stick ’em on. Their distiller got his still broken up by the revenue men a while back.’

‘Well, let yer big mates buy him another one.’ John hobbled to the door and held it open.

Popeye ignored the invitation to leave and sat back comfortably in his chair. ‘’Spect they would do that, but trouble is the fellow what knows how to use it’s doing a five stretch. So I told ’em I knew how to help them out.’

‘Right … thanks for the offer of the work. But I ain’t interested. Ain’t even got me still now.’

‘Now, I know you ain’t destroyed it, John.’ Popeye pulled an old-fashioned face, crooning, ‘Don’t you tell me no lies, now. Might not be down in the cellar … where is it?’ He jerked his head back, gazing at the ceiling. ‘Attic? I reckon since you moved here you’ve stashed it away all neat and tidy, ain’t yer?’

‘I got rid of it when we was bombed out of the other place.’

‘Don’t believe you for one minute. It’s here all right … somewhere …’ Popeye glanced around thoughtfully as though he might set off in search of it.

‘Get going; we’re done here.’ John yanked at Popeye’s sleeve to shift him.

‘Don’t think so, mate.’ Frank ripped his arm out of John’s grasp. ‘If you don’t sing along they’re gonna want their cash back, ain’t they?’

‘What?’ John tottered back a step, apprehension stabbing at his guts. ‘What fucking cash?’

‘The cash they give me, to give to you.’ Popeye shrugged. ‘I told them you’d need an advance to buy stuff to get going so they give us a monkey up front.’

John licked his lips. Five hundred! That was a serious sum of money. ‘Well, you’ll just have to give it back, won’t yer?’

‘Can’t … do … that …’ Popeye warbled. ‘Make me look like a right prat. Anyhow, I ain’t got it.’ He sniffed. ‘Needed some readies meself so I had to use it to keep someone sweet. You know the old saying: rob Peter to pay Paul, but John’s getting it in the end.’ He gave a wink. ‘You know I’m always good for my word. Never once not paid you up, have I?’

John swallowed noisily. ‘Sounds like you’ve got some explaining to do then when they come looking for you.’

‘Not me … you.’ Popeye nodded slowly. ‘This is where they’ll head. You don’t cross people like that, John. You should know that.’

‘They come here looking fer me I’ll call the Old Bill and tell ’em everything, especially that you’ve just tried to blackmail me to get involved in counterfeiting.’

Popeye came to his feet in quite a sprightly fashion considering he was over sixty and overweight. ‘Now, that ain’t wise, talking like that, John. I’ll pretend I never heard it.’ Popeye walked up to the smaller man and eyeballed him as best he could, before strolling out into the hallway. ‘Right … be seeing you then. You come to me next time; only fair … my turn to make the tea. Say, end of the week and we can make arrangements to put the still up in my basement if it’s likely to cause ructions with your Doris. Give the missus my regards now, won’t you?’

‘Fuck off.’ John slammed the door after Popeye and ground his teeth when he heard the faint laughter coming from the other side of the panels. He paced to and fro then went upstairs as quickly as his limp allowed. He found the steps in the airing cupboard and positioned them beneath the loft hatch. A few minutes later he poked his head into the cool, dark roof void, his heart thumping so hard he thought it might burst from his chest.

He’d promised Rosie on his life that he’d never make another drop of moonshine. Doris had no idea that he ever had run an illegal still. Nobody had known, other than his daughter and his business associates. Now Popeye had blabbed his business about, God only knew how many people were aware he’d once risked a spot of hard labour.

John hauled himself into the loft, wincing from the effort, and approached the dismantled still covered in tarpaulin. He crouched down and peered at the tubes and funnels and receptacles. Suddenly he smiled wryly. The contraption had survived the bombing, having been wedged in the corner of the cellar with a cover over it. Now he was wishing that the bloody thing had been in the loft of his old house, and been smashed to smithereens with the roof. But the hundred pounds in his Post Office book had come courtesy of this little beauty. And that money was being saved up for another little beauty, and one day she’d thank her granddad for buying her presents. John felt his eyes fill with tears as he put the hatch back in place. He’d do anything for his little Hope, and protect her with his life, if need be.

CHAPTER SIX

‘Insult my Irene again, you bitch, and I’ll wipe the floor with yer.’

Rosie spun about to see that Peg Price had sprinted down her front path to yell and jab a finger at her. The woman must have been loitering behind the curtains, waiting for her to return, Rosie realised. On the walk home her surprise meeting with Gertie, and everything they’d talked about, had been occupying her mind and she’d not given her run-in with her rotten neighbours another thought.

Rosie contemptuously flicked two fingers at the woman’s pinched expression before pushing the pram over the threshold and closing the door behind her.

A savoury aroma was wafting down the hall from the kitchen, making Rosie’s stomach grumble.

‘That you, Rosie?’

‘Yeah. Sorry I’m late.’ Rosie carried on unfastening Hope’s reins, thinking her father had sounded odd. But she gave his mood little thought; she was too wrapped up in counting her blessings. And she was determined to work for the London Auxiliary Ambulance Service. If she got turned down, as Gertie had, she’d try again and again until she was accepted.

Rosie cast her mind back to the time when the female ambulance auxiliary had entered their bombed-out house and with a simple joke made her laugh, then tended to her father with brisk professionalism. Rosie had been impressed by the service, and the people in it. But her baby daughter had taken up all her time and energy then. Now Hope was older, toddling and talking, and Rosie had the time to be useful. She wanted her daughter to grow up in peacetime with plentiful food to eat and a bright future in front of her. Wishing for victory wasn’t enough; she needed to pitch in and help bring it about, as other mothers had throughout the long years of the conflict.

From the moment Gertie had recounted how the ambulance crew had battled to save her baby’s life, Rosie knew that’s what she wanted to do … just in case at some time the baby dug from beneath bomb rubble was her own.

John appeared in the parlour doorway wiping his floury hands on a tea towel.

Lifting her daughter out of the pram, Rosie set Hope on her feet. The child toddled a few steps to be swept up into her granddad’s arms.

‘How’s my princess?’ John planted a kiss on the infant’s soft warm cheek.

In answer Hope thrust her lower lip and nodded her fair head.

‘See what Granddad’s got in the biscuit tin, shall we, darlin’?’

Again Hope nodded solemnly.

‘Don’t feed her up or she won’t eat her tea,’ Rosie mildly protested, straightening the pram cover. She watched her father slowly hobbling away from her with Hope in his arms. Lots of times she’d been tempted to tell him not to carry her daughter in case he overbalanced and dropped her. But she never did. Hope was her father’s pride and joy, and his salvation.

In the aftermath of the bombing raid, it had seemed that John’s badly injured leg might have to be amputated. Sunk in self-pity, he’d talked of wanting to end it all, until his little granddaughter had been taken to see him in hospital and had given him a gummy smile. At the time, Rosie had felt pity and exasperation for her father. In one breath she’d comforted him and in the next she’d reminded him he was luckier than those young servicemen who would never return home.

John carefully set Hope down by her toy box and started stacking washing-up in the bowl.

‘You stewing on something, Dad?’ Rosie asked. Her father was frowning into the sink and he would usually have made more of a fuss of Hope than that.

‘Nah, just me leg giving me gyp, love.’ John turned round, smiling. ‘Talking of stew, that’s what we’ve got. Not a lot in it other than some boiled bacon scraps and veg from the garden but I’ve made a few dumplings to fill us up.’

‘Smells good, Dad,’ Rosie praised. ‘Sorry I didn’t get home in time to give you a hand. We had a nice walk, though.’

‘’S’all right, love. Enjoy yerself?’ John enquired, running a spoon, sticky with suet, under the tap. ‘Anyhow, you can help now you’re back. There’s a few spuds in the colander under the sink. Peel ’em, will you?’

Having filled a pot with water, Rosie sat down at the scrubbed parlour table and began preparing potatoes while filling her dad in on where she’d been. ‘First I went to the chemist and got your Beecham’s Powders.’ She pulled a small box from the pocket of her cardigan and put it on the table. Her dad relied on them for every ailment. ‘Then I took a walk to Cheapside and bumped into an old friend from the Windmill Theatre—’

‘You’re not going back there to work!’ John interrupted. ‘If you want a job you can get yourself a respectable one now you’re a mother.’ He had spun round at the sink and cantankerously crossed his wet forearms over his chest.

‘I don’t even want to go back there to work, Dad,’ Rosie protested. ‘Gertie doesn’t work there now either. She’s got a little girl a bit older than Hope. The two kids had a go at having a chat.’ Rosie smiled fondly at her daughter. ‘Made a friend, didn’t you, darling?’

‘Gertie? Don’t recall that name,’ John muttered, and turned back to the washing-up.

Rosie frowned at his back, wondering what had got his goat while she’d been out. But she decided not to ask because she’d yet to break the news to him about the employment she was after and she wasn’t sure how he’d take it.

‘Gertie was one of the theatre’s cleaners. She left the Windmill months before me.’

‘Mmm … well, that’s all right then,’ John mumbled, flicking suds from his hands. He felt rather ashamed that Popeye’s visit had left him on edge, making him snappy.

‘I am getting a job, though, Dad.’

‘Ain’t the work I’m objecting to, just the nature of it,’ John muttered.

‘You didn’t mind the money I earned at the Windmill Theatre, though, did you?’ Rosie reminded him drily, dropping potatoes in the pot.

‘If you’d not been working at that place you’d never have got in with a bad crowd and got yourself in trouble,’ John bawled. He pursed his lips in regret; the last thing he wanted to do was overreact and arouse his daughter’s suspicions that something was wrong.

‘I got into trouble because of the company you kept, not the company I kept,’ Rosie stormed before she could stop herself. It was infuriating that her father still tried to ease his conscience by finding scapegoats. In Rosie’s opinion it was time to leave the horrible episode behind now. They both adored Hope so something good had come out of bad in the end.

The slamming of the front door had John turning, tight-lipped, back to the sink and Rosie lighting the gas under the potatoes.

‘What’s going on?’ Sensing an atmosphere, Doris looked suspiciously from father to daughter.

‘I was just telling Dad that I saw an old friend from the Windmill Theatre. The poor woman has had dreadful bad luck. A couple of years ago their house got hit and she lost three of her young sons.’

Doris crossed herself, muttering a prayer beneath her breath. ‘She was lucky to get out herself then.’

‘She was very lucky, and so was her husband and eldest boy,’ Rosie said after a pause. She knew Doris could act pious, so she wasn’t going to mention that the three children had died alone. Her stepmother would have something to say about neglect despite the fact that her own daughter-in-law and grandson rarely came to visit her because they were never invited.

‘Didn’t realise it was bad news you got from your friend,’ John said gruffly by way of apology. That terrible tale had momentarily edged his own worries from his mind.

Doris’s sympathy was short-lived, however, and she was quick to change the subject. ‘Just got caught outside by Peg Price; sounding off about you, she was.’ Doris wagged an accusing finger.

Rosie shrugged, refusing to take the bait. Doris would always make it plain she felt burdened by the duty of sticking up for her.

‘Saw somebody else with a long face.’ Doris gazed at her reflection in the mantel mirror and started pushing the waves back in place in her faded brown hair. ‘Nurse Johnson was in civvies down Petticoat Lane.’ Doris looked at the little girl crouching on the floor. ‘You’d think she’d pop in once in a while to see how Hope’s getting on.’

‘I expect she’s too busy,’ Rosie said succinctly. Doris enjoyed bringing to her attention that she’d caused enmity on several fronts.

Rosie hadn’t spoken to her midwife since the day she’d broken the news about withdrawing from the adoption. At the time Rosie had thought that the woman seemed to take it quite well. Trudy had listened to her explanation, then said the sort of things that Rosie had been expecting to hear about being surprised and disappointed. Ever since, if they met out walking a brief nod was the most Rosie got from the woman. Rosie couldn’t blame Trudy Johnson if she had felt bitter about what had happened.

‘Going upstairs to put a brush through me hair before we have tea.’

Once his wife had gone out of the room John said, ‘Didn’t mean to snap earlier, Rosie; just that I worry about you, y’know, grown up though you are.’ He pulled out a chair at the table and sank onto the seat. ‘God knows we’ve had to cope with some troubles these past few years.’

‘Not as much as some people, Dad,’ Rosie said pointedly, to remind him of Gertie’s catastrophe.

‘I know … I know … but you’re still my little girl, however old you are. And I won’t never stop worrying about you and Hope s’long as I’m drawing breath.’

‘You’ve no need to worry, Dad, I’m able to look after myself and Hope now.’ After a short silence Rosie saw her father seemed to have gone into a trance, staring into space. ‘What is it, Dad?’ She sat down opposite him and rested her elbows on the tabletop. ‘You seem odd … thoughtful. Something up?’

‘Nah, just this leg getting me down,’ John lied. He forced a smile. ‘Wish you could meet a nice young man, dear.’ He took Rosie’s hands in his. ‘You need somebody to care for you, ’cos I ain’t always going to be around. Robbie likes you, y’know, and he’s not short of a bob or two … or a couple of pork chops.’

Rosie tutted in mock exasperation at her father’s quip. Robbie Raynham was the local butcher, and at least fifteen years her senior. He was pleasant enough and not bad-looking but Rosie didn’t like him in that way. She didn’t like any man in that way. Rosie knew Doris often sent her to get their meat ration in the hope the smitten butcher might slip a little bit extra in for them in return for the promise of a date.

But Rosie didn’t have any interest in marriage or men. Since she’d been dragged into an alleyway then thrown to the ground and raped, a cold dread had replaced any longing she’d once had for an exciting romance and a husband. Love and affection were saved for her daughter; all she wanted to do was keep Hope safe and make plans for her future.

Rosie took a deep breath and blurted, ‘I’m going to apply to join the London Auxiliary Ambulance Service.’

John gawped at his daughter as though she were mad. ‘Why?’ he eventually asked.

‘Because it’s an important job needs doing.’

‘Being a mother to that little girl’s an important job needs doing,’ John replied pithily. ‘Ambulance work’s too dangerous. You’ll be covered in blood and muck.’

‘I was covered in blood and muck when the Café de Paris got bombed and again on the afternoon our house was wrecked. I’m used to it now.’

John had the grace to blush as he recalled how she’d nursed him and dressed his wounds till they could get help on that dreadful afternoon.

‘Dad, d’you remember how that auxiliary helped you that day?’

‘’Course …’ John muttered. ‘And I was grateful to her, but that don’t mean I want you taking them sort of risks.’ He pointed a finger. ‘She were a lot older than you, for a start …’

‘Her colleague who helped you up the stairs wasn’t. And she was driving the ambulance, if you remember. She looked to be in her twenties, like me …’

‘Don’t want you doing it, Rosie …’ John began shirtily.

‘I’m going to apply,’ Rosie said firmly. ‘Hope’ll be fine in a nursery. I’m going to the WVS tomorrow to see if they can sort out a place for her.’

‘If you’re determined, me ’n’ Doris can see to the little ’un between us.’ John sounded affronted.

‘I’d like her to make some more friends,’ Rosie answered diplomatically. ‘She had a lovely time playing with Gertie’s little girl.’

‘Time enough fer that when she’s older. I’ll mind her.’ John sounded stubborn. He’d always been very protective of his granddaughter but suddenly after Popeye’s visit it seemed more important than ever to keep a close watch on Hope.