sUnwanted Truthst Read online

  ‘You look terrible, Gal. Your face and your eyes, they’re all red. Have you been crying?’

  ‘Charlie – for God’s sake, don’t you know the date? It’s the 14th of January, as if I could ever forget. My ulcer’s been giving me gyp as well. The pain’s been unbearable, even with the tablets. You’ll have to help me with the dinner.’

  ‘Don’t – don’t upset yourself, Gal.’

  ‘I can’t help it Charlie. I did something terrible today – unforgivable. I don’t know what came over me. I just couldn’t help myself.’

  Jenny waited open-mouthed for her father to ask what it was. What would she say? She strained her ears.

  ‘You’ll hear from the hospital soon, Gal, then you’ll be fine. What’s for dinner?’

  Alice had never been fine. All her teeth had been removed on her twenty-first birthday in an attempt to cure her stomach pains. By twenty-five, she had been in every hospital within a five mile radius of her home, for ailments ranging from diphtheria to in-growing toenails, and everything in between. ‘Mile End Hospital, Bethnal Green Infirmary, London Hospital Whitechapel, oh, and I nearly forgot St. Bart’s. I’ve been in them all,’ she would say as if listing holiday destinations. Then after a full description of the ailment which had led her to each one, would add, ‘But there’s always someone worse off than yourself, that’s what I say.’

  Alice had lived with her parents and younger brother, in three rented rooms; part of a terrace that lay to the south of Roman Road. At fourteen, she was working fifty hours a week as a pattern cutter. ‘There’s many a time I’ve seen rats as big as cats, and bigger, in that factory at Aldgate,’ she told Jenny on numerous occasions, stretching out her arms as if her words weren’t enough of a description.

  Charlie’s family occupied the whole of a house that stood directly opposite Alice’s. Whenever he returned home on leave, he would see her sitting squashed between his half sisters and brothers, eagerly anticipating his latest tales from the empire.

  By 1934 Alice’s health had improved. With a group of fellow Sunday school teachers, she went on a five day holiday to Brussels, bringing home a brass paper knife with the Manneken Pis shaped as the handle. In 1940 at the age of thirty-three, she married Charlie Porter.

  ‘He’s been all over the world, but he came home and married me,’ Alice would say.

  Charlie would then add wistfully, ‘Mind you, those Anglo-Indian girls, with their pale skin and dark almond eyes, beauties they were, beauties.’

  Jenny scrambled to the top of her bed.

  ‘How’s my girl today?’ Charlie poked his head around her bedroom door.

  ‘Better. I’m getting up for dinner.’ Jenny wanted everything to be normal again, how it was before this afternoon.

  ‘That’s my girl.’

  Jenny slid into her slippers, and attempted to tie the cord of her dressing-gown around her waist; but her earlier strength had deserted her. She picked her book up from the floor and shuffled into the sitting room.

  The armchair under the brass standard lamp in the corner was either empty or occupied by Charlie. The ceiling above was the colour of strong tea. Charlie sighed, sank into the cushions and lit a cigarette. Jenny sat at his feet and undid the laces on his shiny leather shoes. Usually, she only needed one tug to remove each shoe. But today several were necessary. She toppled backwards with the second shoe in her hand.

  ‘That’s better,’ sighed Charlie lifting his feet onto a leather pouffe. Jenny replaced his shoes with slippers, and stretched out on the rug in front of the fire. She supported her head with her hands, and waited. Any minute now, she thought, until what she looked forward to every evening, would begin.

  Charlie cleared his throat. ‘Nepal,’ he said.

  ‘Kathmandu,’ she answered.

  ‘Burma.’

  ‘Rangoon.’

  ‘Fiji.’

  ‘Suva.’

  ‘Jamaica.’

  ‘Kingston.’

  Suddenly, Charlie reversed the order.

  ‘Vaduz.’

  ‘Liechtenstein.’

  ‘Ankara.’

  ‘Turkey.’

  ‘Seoul.’

  ‘South Korea.’

  ‘Colombo.’

  ‘Ceylon.’

  Their duet continued until Charlie ran out of countries or capitals. He said that Jenny was the only child in her school, and probably in the whole country, who knew the name of every capital city from Australia to Zanzibar. If dinner was delayed Charlie would relate one of his army exploits, which Jenny relished long after Alice had grown impatient of yet another tale. They were usually sparked by a word, which reminded Charlie of a person or event. Each story embellished with the name and rank of the soldier involved.

  ‘Charlie, would you pierce this tin for me.’ Jenny looked up from her book. Her mother was leaning against the door surround holding a tin of peas.

  ‘Captain Pearce, now he was a man who knew how to command, I remember when we were out on patrol one night. There was a rustling in the undergrowth. We all thought it was bandits, but no, it turned out to be a black panther didn’t it? Killers they were – even took kids. We saw its eyes burning like hot coals in the darkness. Ready to spring it was, but quick as a flash Captain Pearce drew his revolver and shot it dead. By God, we had some good times back then.’

  ‘Charlie, the tin,’ said Alice wearily.

  ‘What’s that book you’re reading Jenny?’ Charlie asked as he returned to his chair.

  ‘It’s about Rome. We’ve been doing Romans at school, so Miss Bruce dropped it off for me. I’ll read you some… the boys grew up to be very strong and clever and they decided to build a town on the spot where the shepherd had found them. But they had a big fight about who should be in charge. Romulus overpowered his brother Remus who died. So Romulus became the first king of this town which he named Rome.’ Jenny looked up. Her father was asleep.

  A wooden table covered with a check tablecloth and laid with three dinner plates, was carried from the kitchen, by Alice at one end, and Charlie at the other. They placed it in front of the fire.

  *

  ‘That was lovely, Gal,’ said Charlie when he’d finished soaking up the gravy on his plate with a chunk of white bread. He pulled a large handkerchief from his trouser pocket and with one wipe removed the drips from his mouth and chin.

  Jenny watched her mother like an anxious parent, as she picked at a tiny piece of liver in the centre of her plate.

  ‘Can’t you eat any more, Gal?’

  ‘Not today, Charlie.’

  From the wireless that stood high on a table behind the standard lamp. Wilfred Pickle’s voice was loud and clear.

  ‘What’s on the table, Mabel?’

  2

  February 1953

  A blanket of smog surrounded them as they emerged from Whitechapel Underground Station and turned left into Brady Street. ‘I can’t see, Dad.’

  ‘Put your scarf over your nose and mouth, and tie it tight,’ Charlie’s muffled voice came through the suffocating gloom. He tightened his grip on his daughter’s hand.

  They strode in silence through green-tinged swirls. A dark shape collided with Charlie, the woman muttering her apologies. An amber halo of light appeared, suspended in the darkness. As they walked closer they could see it was a lamp attached to an even blacker arch. Their footsteps echoed in the tunnel. Jenny wished that someone else would bump into them, as it seemed that they were the only people alive in the whole world. A whistle screeched and wheels thundered overhead, obliterating everything.

  Re-entering their silent world, indistinct lights flickered in mid-air. As they strode nearer, they heard muffled voices, and the tinkling of a piano. A door was flung open, illuminating the pavement, and releasing laughter. A man stumbled in front of them, reaching out to steady himself on a lamppost.

  ‘Joe, Joe Carberry,’ said Charlie.

  The man straightened himself, lifted his cap and placed one hand on Charlie’s
shoulder.

  ‘Good to see you again, mate. I heard your old man’s sick.’

  ‘I got a telegram this morning. He’s been going downhill for a while.’

  Jenny saw her father mouth a word to the man, who said, ‘My old man had it in the gut. It always gets them in the end.’

  ‘It does that,’ said Charlie.

  ‘Best drayman we had at Mann & Crossman, he was. No-one had his touch with the horses. Well, you look after yourself, Chas.’

  ‘Who’s that?’ asked Jenny as they walked away.

  ‘Granddad worked with him at the brewery for years.’

  ‘Are we nearly there?’

  ‘Not far now.’

  At the corner of a bomb site, dark shapes huddled together, leaning against the remains of a wall. Men’s voices, indistinct in the murkiness, shouted across at them; a woman’s laugh and the smash of a bottle. Jenny bit her lower lip and gripped her father’s hand. The dark mass of a tenement building loomed. A left turn brought them into Finnis Street and up the steep steps of number 132.

  ‘Hello, Cis,’ said Charlie as the door opened. Jenny put her hand above her eyes against the brightness.

  ‘Alice not with you?’ the woman said.

  ‘She’s not been so good lately.’

  Jenny recalled her parents’ conversation earlier that day.

  ‘We’ll have to go up there pretty sharpish, Gal, according to Josie. I’ll leave work early.’

  ‘I’m not well enough to go, Charlie. There’ll be enough of your family there, as it is. It’s Friday, so you could take Jenny with you. Dad would love to see her if he’s not too far gone.’

  From the tone of her mother’s voice, Jenny had thought that bad health was not the only reason for her staying behind.

  Unburdening themselves of coats, hats, scarves and gloves, they were ushered up two flights of creaky stairs into a dimly-lit room. Another woman sat on a stool in the corner, and a dark cloth covered a lampshade in the centre of the room.

  An old man lay propped up on pillows on a wooden bed. An enamel bowl sat on a table beside him. He turned his head.

  He’s not Granddad Albert, Jenny thought. Her granddad was a smiley man with a prickly moustache, who smelt of stables. She remembered the last time she had seen him. He had hoisted her onto his shoulders, pretending she was on a horse. ‘Gee up, gee up,’ he had said, as he thrust his shoulders into the air. This man was not Granddad.

  Charlie pushed Jenny forward. ‘Kiss your granddad. Kiss your granddad,’ he repeated. Jenny bent forward. Her lips brushed his yellow skin. A skeletal hand reached out and touched her hair. The man’s toothless mouth opened slightly, but no words came. She drew back.

  ‘You’d better go downstairs, Jenny,’ the woman spoke softly from the shadows. ‘I want to talk to your dad.’

  Jenny turned and ran from the room.

  *

  ‘Here she is.’ Four pairs of female eyes looked up as Jenny hesitated in the doorway of the sitting room crowded with unfamiliar relations. Three men stood huddled together in a cloud of smoke around a table covered with beer bottles. In the fireplace stood an electric barred fire, and a black cloth was draped along the mantelpiece. In the centre was a marble clock, with a framed sepia photograph of a man in uniform, on each side.

  ‘Sit down here, Jenny, I won’t bite,’ said the woman nearest the fire, patting the sofa beside her. Jenny sat sandwiched between two sturdy women, each wearing identical wrap-over blue floral aprons.

  ‘You know who we are, don’t you?’ asked the woman to Jenny’s left.

  ‘Yes, you’re my aunts,’ she whispered.

  ‘I’m Aunt Josie and that’s your Aunt Cissy,’ she nodded to Jenny’s right. ‘We remember when you were a baby, don’t we, Cis?’

  ‘Yes, and look at her now.’ Jenny felt the first aunt’s eyes looking her up and down. ‘Must be all that sea air.’

  Two more women were seated opposite. Jenny assumed they must be more aunts. They started whispering. They were dressed the same as the other pair, except for lines of metal curlers peeping out from under their headscarves. Jenny thought it must hurt to have them pinned to their heads, and smiled as she imagined what would happen if she was to put the large magnet in her “special box” near them. She bent her head, stared at the buckles on her shoes and strained her ears.

  ‘Charlie and Alice are so proud of her; she’s got lovely dark curls.’

  More whispers from the opposite sofa, too indistinct for Jenny to decipher. She looked around. She assumed that the three men around the table were her uncles, but they didn’t ask her if she knew who they were. The one with a moustache was speaking.

  ‘I’ve heard the twins have scarpered again.’

  ‘You should leave well alone there, Ernie. They’re trouble those Krays; always have been, always will be,’ said the one with his back to Jenny.

  ‘Charlie’s been good to me; always uses my cab; tips well too.’

  ‘We know why, don’t we?’

  ‘Not now, Stan. Give it a rest,’ said the third, taking a step forward and raising his arm.

  ‘Remember Eric, he should be here with us now, not buried on the other side of the bloody world. Jap bastards, they might just as well have killed Ma as well.’

  Jenny watched as Ernie took another swig of beer and wiped the back of his hand across his moustache.

  ‘Cat got your tongue?’ asked the aunt called Cissy.

  Jenny was saved from replying by a sudden fit of coughing that rattled down the stairs. The whispering and laughter ceased and the talk turned to funeral arrangements.

  Her father filled the doorway. Jenny noticed that his face was red and puffy. She looked down at her shoes once more.

  Ernie stepped forward and placed his arm around Charlie’s shoulders. ‘Glad you could make it, Chas. How’s Alice?’

  ‘Not that good. She’s waiting to hear from the hospital. But you know the missus, she’s a fighter.’

  ‘She’s always been that, bruv. How old’s Jenny now?’

  ‘Seven – she started junior school last year.’ Her father then chatted to his brothers about people she didn’t know for what seemed like hours. Her aunts had forgotten about her losing her tongue, and had moved on to more interesting matters.

  ‘Who does she think she is sitting upstairs? Madam High and Mighty; she wouldn’t let me in earlier today. We are his daughters after all. We have a right.’

  ‘Of course we have; thinks she’s better than us, just ‘cos her old man owned a shop.’

  ‘I must say. I’m not a bit surprised that Doris hasn’t turned up. She’s only ever been interested in a good time. It’s a good job Ma’s not here, it would break her heart.’

  Jenny stared at the ashtrays balanced on the sofa arms, thinking they looked like miniature bonfires.

  Charlie pulled Jenny to her feet. ‘Come on, it’s time we were going.’

  Huge hands patted her head. She heard a jangling of coins. ‘That’s for you,’ her uncles said in turn, as they pressed cold metal into her hand.

  ‘Mind how you go, you can’t see a hand in front of you,’ a woman shouted as they stepped over the doorstep and tightened their scarves around their faces.

  Their footsteps echoed along the street as they strode towards the railway arch. They were the only people in the world again, and Jenny tightened her fingers around her father’s hand.

  ‘Who was that woman upstairs with Granddad?’

  ‘That’s Nanny May. She’s Granddad’s friend. She’s looking after him.’

  Jenny thought that her father had been unusually slow in answering. She remembered postcards arriving from Margate and Southend, addressed to her parents, and signed Dad and May.

  ‘Look Dad,’ said Jenny as they passed under a lamppost. She opened her right palm and several coins slid out from under her glove. She held three silver half-crowns under her father’s chin.

  ‘You’re a lucky girl, come on, we’d better hurry if we
’re going to catch that train.’

  They settled in an empty second class compartment, under posters showing yellow sands and azure skies; tempting travellers to spend their annual holiday in Bognor and Littlehampton. Charlie turned to Jenny as the train clattered over Grosvenor Bridge.

  ‘Indonesia.’

  ‘Jakarta.’

  ‘Togo.’

  ‘Lome.’

  ‘Chile.’

  ‘Santiago.’

  ‘Oman.’

  ‘Muscat.’

  ‘Cuba.’

  ‘Havana.’

  By the time the train drew in to East Croydon, Jenny was asleep.

  *

  Two days later a further telegram arrived. Charlie reached into the back of his wardrobe for a black armband which he wore around the sleeve of his coat. Jenny wondered about Nanny May. The last time she heard her name mentioned was the day after Granddad Albert’s funeral. She was reading… there are seven gates that provide an entrance to the old city of Jerusalem. The most important are the Jaffa Gate and the Damascus Gate. The city is holy to three religions… when she heard her father’s voice from the kitchen. Instinctively she put her book down.

  ‘You know, Gal, the girls aren’t happy about May keeping some of Dad’s things. You ought to have heard the things they were saying about her after the funeral. I couldn’t repeat them.’

  ‘That doesn’t surprise me, one bit. The poor bugger’s hardly six foot under and they’re arguing. That’s your sisters for you. They’d fight over the cat’s dinner.’

  Jenny thought it mean too; after all, she had been his friend.

  3

  April 1953

  Jenny peered anxiously out of the window as the coach nosed into Victoria. She spotted two black feathers poking out of a bright red hat. Doris was the oldest of Charlie’s half sisters and the closest in age. A large boned, energetic woman of forty; she had escaped the East End through hard work and a quick brain, and now owned a Victorian house in Woolwich. As well as working full-time in a local department store, she rented rooms to overseas students from the local polytechnic.