The Flower Girl Read online

  The Flower Girl

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Copyright

  For Anne Williams with my sincere thanks

  Chapter 1

  April 1933

  The crowd gawped openly. Some actually gossiped animatedly amongst themselves, not even bothering with the nicety of hiding their loud whispers behind the shield of raised hands.

  But it would have been a high-minded person who would have blamed them too harshly for their behaviour because, in truth, no one had seen anything like it. Not in Linman Street, Poplar, anyway. As Cissie Flowers’ elderly neighbour, Ethel Bennett, said to Dick, her husband, the turnout for Davy Flowers’ funeral was more suited to a king than to an East End barrow boy. And, for once, Dick didn’t find himself disagreeing with the old bat.

  Ethel, her elbows stuck out in defence of the prime spot she had established for herself at the front of the crowd, was going to get to the bottom of this if it was the last thing she did. For a start, where had all those wreaths come from? That’s what she wanted to know. But it wasn’t only nosiness that drove her curiosity, Ethel believed she had the right to know. After all, hadn’t she been Cissie Flowers’ next-door neighbour since the day the girl had moved in six years ago? A full two weeks before her wedding day, as Ethel Bennett never tired of telling people. And another thing: who were all those well-off looking blokes standing around like they owned the place? It was all driving Ethel barmy.

  Even the pong from the Cut, growing riper by the minute in the baking morning sun, didn’t stand a chance of driving her back indoors – the nearby crossing over Limehouse Cut, where Upper North Street became Bow Common Lane, hadn’t been nicknamed Stink House Bridge for nothing – because if she dared turn her back for a moment, Ethel was worried that she might just miss an important clue. But the smell really was bad. Although it was only the middle of April, it felt as hot as any summer’s day and the stench from the water was at its most choice, the vapours rising from its oily surface and wafting along the cobbled sidestreets like steam coming from a pan of rancid soup. The stink had grown so powerful, in fact, that some of Ethel’s less strong-stomached neighbours had gone scurrying back inside to watch the proceedings from the safety of the other side of their window panes.

  But what they saw next had even the most odour-sensitive amongst them popping back out of their street doors like rabbits from their burrows at twilight.

  Ethel and the others watched, open-mouthed, as a procession, led by a tall, top-hatted man, turned off Bow Common Lane and entered their narrow little street, the cobbles of which were being strewn with barley straw by a young boy trotting ahead of them, to ensure that any sounds were deadened to a dull, deferential thud.

  The soberly dressed man moved slowly forward; his measured strides setting the pace for the four glossy jet horses pulling the glittering glass-sided hearse, which bore a brass-handled mahogany coffin and the mortal remains of Davy Flowers. The animals’ carefully oiled hooves were bound and muffled in leather pads, which had been buffed until they shone almost as brightly as the gleaming patent harness and the blue-black plumes which nodded between their brushed and clipped ears. As if that wasn’t impressive enough, next came the cars, a whole polished line of them – too many of them even to fit into the street.

  Ethel Bennett shook her head in wonder and dug her husband, Dick, in the ribs at the sight of them. There looked to be at least half a dozen cars queuing back to Upper North Street, just to ferry the mourners to Bow Cemetery — a walk of surely no more than thirty minutes for even the most infirm amongst them – and that was without all the private cars that had been parked halfway along Bow Common Lane since first thing. And as for the wreaths, they were bringing even more of the things. Strapped to the roofs, boots and bonnets, the floral tributes made the vehicles look more like mobile flower stalls than cars.

  Admittedly, Davy had been a florist, his house at number seven was always full of fresh blooms, everyone knew that, but there were more flowers piled on to those cars than anyone in the neighbourhood would ever have believed unless they had seen them for themselves.

  As word got round and people heard the whisper about what was going on in Linman Street, the crowds of sightseers grew by the minute, as did the general opinion that this turnout made even the publican Charlie Brown’s funeral last year seem mean by comparison. And that had been an East End event of such grandeur that it had been reported in all the newspapers. And so now it wasn’t only Ethel and Cissie Flowers’ other neighbours from Linman Street who were curious, the crowd was buzzing with unanswered questions.

  Why was the funeral of an ordinary street trader so elaborate? That’s what they all wanted to know. And, more intriguing, where had that pretty young widow of his got the money from to pay for it all? Although the East End of the 1930s wasn’t exactly awash with spare cash, the Flowers family had always done all right for themselves, everyone knew that, as well as they knew most of the rumours about how they managed it, but, even if the rumours were true, this funeral was more than a case of just doing all right. This was big-time stuff. And surely even the best of penny policies wouldn’t have stumped up for this little lot. And if it wasn’t the insurance company paying, then who was?

  There was another, more discreetly asked question going around the crowd: what were so many ‘faces’ – the well-known hard men, familiar to most people by sight and reputation if not personally – doing with their fancy, bleached and painted girlfriends amongst the mourners at a bloke like Davy Flowers’ funeral?

  As Ethel Bennett said to those around her, Davy Flowers’ laying-to-rest would be the talk of the East End for a long time to come or she was a monkey’s uncle.

  Suddenly all speculation was momentarily forgotten.

  The whispering stopped and was replaced by gasps – of both admiration and contempt – as Cissie Flowers herself appeared in the doorway of number seven. Even in mourning she looked lovely. Small and slim, and, as always, smartly turned out. Her thick black fringe, cut in exactly the way that Davy loved, rested just above her blue eyes, showing discreetly beneath the brim of her hat. She looked straight ahead, apparently neither seeing nor hearing anyone or anything around her.

  Gladys Mills from number four, shook her head sadly. ‘Just look at her will you, Em, God love her,’ she sniffled into her handkerchief. ‘That girl don’t know what’s hit her. She looks like she’s been pole-axed, poor little mare. She’s too young to be a widow. Too young. It ain’t right.’

  ‘The grief ain’t too terrible to stop her wearing a new hat though, I see,’ Ethel Bennett hissed at her husband through tightly pursed lips, nudging him savagely in the side for being stupid enough to dare look at their pretty young neighbour without sneering.

  Dick, as usual, ignored her, cocking a well-practised deaf ear to his wife’s moaning. But that didn’t deter Ethel from carrying on.

  ‘Someone’s paying for this little lot, you mark my words.’ She nodded meaningfully towards the group of prosperous-looking men stand
ing smoking on the comer of the street outside Clarke’s general shop. ‘And there’ll be plenty of ’em sniffing around that little madam before that old man of hers is even cold in the ground, you just see if there ain’t.’

  ‘Mind out, Ett.’ Gladys Mills straightened her worn felt hat, and stepped forward, pushing Ethel firmly to one side. ‘Me and Ernie wanna get past, if you’ve finished your criticising and gossip-mongering, of course. Cos some of us,’ she added curtly, ‘know how to show respect.’

  Gladys turned to her husband. ‘Come on, love. Now Cissie’s out here, we’ll be getting ourselves in the cars soon, I reckon.’

  Ernie Mills exchanged a brief half-smile of sympathy with Dick Bennett at his misfortune to be married to the likes of Ethel, then, taking Gladys by the elbow, he guided his wife along the road towards the end of the line of cars.

  ‘Pretending they ain’t interested,’ Ethel snorted. ‘They don’t fool me. Everyone wants to know where that little madam got all this dough from. Everyone. And you ain’t telling me them pair are any different.’

  She folded her arms across her coarse-aproned chest, and tapped her foot belligerently. Gradually, a look of realisation spread over her wrinkled features. ‘Here, I bet them Millses know already. I bet they know who’s stumping up for this little lot and that cocky cow Gladys is sodding keeping it to herself.’ She tutted, furious that others might be in the know when she wasn’t. ‘There’s more to this than meets the eye, Dick Bennett, you just see if there ain’t. I’d lay money on it.’

  Not knowing all the inside business really was driving Ethel to distraction. It wasn’t as though she hadn’t done her best to find out what was going on. Since the day of Davy Flowers’ accident, Ethel had pulled every single stroke she could think of to glean information. She had spent hours on end hanging around the corner shop, but neither Sammy Clarke, the pink-cheeked grocer, nor his customers knew a thing, or at least they said they didn’t. She had haunted the stalls of Chrisp Street market until she was sick of the sight of potatoes and greens – but again to no avail. And she had sat on her front window ledge until her backside was numb keeping a watch on the comings and goings at number seven. She had even tried slipping inside the Flowers’ street door a couple of times, when visitors or well-wishers had called to pay their respects. But despite all her efforts and all her attention to every whisper and rumour of the past few days, she had had no luck whatsoever.

  But probably the most annoying thing for Ethel Bennett was that since Davy Flowers’ sudden death, his widow, Cissie – Ethel’s very own next-door neighbour! – had said nothing to her. Not a single, solitary word. She had appeared now and again at the street door to let someone in, her face as white as a ghost’s, her eyes hollow, but her mouth had remained tightly shut whenever and whatever Ethel had called out to her.

  It had all so infuriated her that Ethel had even speculated to Myrtle Payne from number nine, whose nosiness almost equalled her own, that Cissie Flowers had lost her mind, because she certainly didn’t seem to hear or see anything when Ethel spoke to her. Cissie hadn’t even thanked her, Ethel told Myrtle by way of proof of the girl’s insanity, when she’d pointed out to her that, if she didn’t want to show herself up, her street doorstep could do with a bloody good scrub before the funeral.

  Myrtle Payne had tutted and shaken her head in appropriate disapproval of such typical bad manners, because, being Cissie’s other immediate neighbour, Myrtle felt just as put out that she and her Arthur weren’t privy to the full strength of what was going on. Although she too had made every effort to find out, and had even almost managed an unwitting coup when she had asked a stranger banging on the Flowers’ street door who he was and what he wanted. He had just had time to reply that he was a friend of Davy’s from the wholesale flower market at Covent Garden and had come with bad news about an accident, when Lil, Davy’s mum, had come to the door, shouting the odds at the bloke about how she didn’t appreciate being woken up from her afternoon kip. Myrtle had told Ethel later that even though she was only trying to be neighbourly, asking the stranger what he wanted and whether Lil wanted her to come in to help in any little way she could, Lil had just glared at her, had pulled the man into the passage and then slammed the street door right in her face.

  That definitely hadn’t pleased Myrtle, especially as she was sure that Ethel, no matter how often she denied it, had been watching the scene of her humiliation through her net curtains. As Myrtle had said to her Arthur, while he was making her the cup of tea she had insisted she needed in order to recover from the shame of being treated so badly, those Flowers were getting just a bit too big for their boots.

  And now there was this turnout, with all the wreaths and horses and cars. All right, so the feller was dead, but Myrtle couldn’t see that that was any excuse for showing off.

  * * *

  When the sombre-paced cortege eventually reached the cemetery gates, it was just after eleven o’clock.

  Cissie stepped from the car and shivered.

  As she walked along behind the priest, her gaze fixed on his dusty, swishing skirts, the sun beat down on her neck, sending trickles of sweat running down her back and making her dark clothes cling to her body. Yet she felt icy cold, chilled through to her very bones.

  Matty and Joyce toddled along wordlessly beside her. At just four and a half and three years old, Cissie had decided that her children were too young to know the details of what had happened to their father, and she hoped and prayed that they were also too young to understand what was going on today. But still she squeezed their hands tightly, drawing them closer to her, as they came to a halt on the mat of lurid artificial grass edging the bare earth of the open grave.

  Cissie closed her eyes and swallowed hard. This was it, they were really going to bury him, were going to sink him deep and alone into the cold, dank ground. She screwed her eyes tighter as the pain of remembering his touch flooded through her body.

  Suddenly, a lark’s beautiful, warbling trills sounded high above the mourners’ heads. Cissie’s legs trembled, threatened to give way under her. She couldn’t bear it. It wasn’t right. Instead of standing there beside her with the sound of bird song filling his ears and the sunshine warming his skin, her darling Davy was being slowly lowered into the ground by dark-suited men she didn’t even know.

  Cold, grey, hopeless fear overcame her.

  Up until then, Cissie hadn’t cried. She had promised herself to remain at least outwardly composed, to do everything she could to protect her children from the hurt that was tearing her apart, but she could hold back the tears no longer.

  Why, she asked herself over and over again, as her tears flowed unchecked down her cheeks, had this happened to them? Everything had been so good. They had been so happy together. Their life had been so special. They hadn’t been like those people who moaned and went on about the bad times they were having. They had laughter, fun, good times. And she and the kids had wanted for nothing. Davy had always seen to that. He had never had a day without work, had always grafted to make sure they had everything they needed.

  In her mind, she was no longer standing by the graveside with the vicar droning on meaninglessly about a man he had never met, instead she was sitting at their kitchen table watching Davy as he listened to the news on the wireless while he was eating his tea.

  She almost smiled as she remembered how angry he would become and how he would start jabbing his fork in the air, as he explained to Cissie how, if only they’d all get off their arses and make a bit of effort as he had done, then all the bellyachers and moaners who reckoned they couldn’t find work could do as well by their families as he had done by his; and how the lazy so-and-sos would then be able to make sure that their kids not only had shoes on their feet, but that they had a good pair for Sundays too, just like his little Matty and Joyce had.

  Davy.

  Cissie let go of Matty and lifted her gloved hand to her face. Brushing her damp, black fringe from her forehead and
tucking it away under the snap brim of her velvet hat, she stared down at the brass plate screwed to the top of the coffin.

  Her poor, poor Davy. Twenty-eight years old. Such a pointless, stupid way to die. She screwed her eyes tight. Why hadn’t he seen the crates? Why hadn’t he realised they were going to fall on him? Why? How many times had she asked herself that during the past few days?

  ‘And so, as we commit the mortal remains of David Prentice—’

  Cissie’s eyes flicked open and she met the rheumy, bloodshot gaze of the ancient-looking clergyman. What was he saying? What was he talking about?

  ‘No!’ she gasped. ‘No!’

  All eyes were now on Cissie.

  ‘He wasn’t David Prentice. Don’t call him that. He was Davy, Davy Flowers. That’s what everyone knew him as, and that’s who he was, Davy Flowers. And me, I’m Cissie Flowers, Davy’s wife.’

  Matty and Joyce, scared by their mother’s uncharacteristic outburst, stared at her. Her cheeks were trailed with tears. They didn’t understand. Their mummy was crying. As one, the children began crying too, in pitiful, frightened, gulping sobs.

  Lil, ignoring her grandchildren’s distress, stepped forward and gripped her daughter-in-law’s arm. ‘All right,’ she hissed into Cissie’s ear, ‘don’t go showing yerself up in front of everyone. Just pull yerself together. People’s watching.’

  From the anxious look on his face, Lil might have been speaking those words to the vicar. He was glancing nervously about him, seeming more than a little worried about how one particular man was reacting to his performance.

  But Cissie was far too upset to notice the vicar’s discomfort. ‘You know nothing about my Davy, nothing,’ she sobbed at him.

  The vicar reached out and patted Cissie paternally on the arm. ‘What do we know about anyone, my dear?’

  Cissie pulled away from his touch. ‘Leave me alone, just leave me alone.’

  He withdrew his hand hurriedly and flashed another worried look at the powerfully built man who, despite the heat, was swathed in a voluminous black overcoat and a full-brimmed fedora. The vicar hesitated, waiting uneasily for the man to nod his approval, before concluding what he had to say as hastily as he dared. He then bobbed down and scooped up a handful of soil.