The Cuckoo Child (29 page)
Satisfied, she began to let her thoughts wander aimlessly and was on the very verge of sleep when something so strange occurred to her that she shot up in bed once more, staring through the uncurtained window at the clouds scudding across the moon.
Why
had the butcher’s back gate been open, when even the scuffer had remarked that he always kept it locked? The dustmen would have visited hours earlier, and Mr Rathbone himself had removed his striped apron and the starched collar of his shirt, so as far as he was concerned his working day had been over. She knew what shopkeepers were like from her friend Phyllis’s mam. Once the shop was shut, they would do all the necessary tasks and then take themselves off to their own quarters. Either Mr Rathbone had left the gate unlocked by mistake, which seemed unlikely since he had said nothing about it when he found her on his doorstep, or he had left it unlocked because he was expecting a visitor.
Why
had the butcher’s back gate been open, when even the scuffer had remarked that he always kept it locked? The dustmen would have visited hours earlier, and Mr Rathbone himself had removed his striped apron and the starched collar of his shirt, so as far as he was concerned his working day had been over. She knew what shopkeepers were like from her friend Phyllis’s mam. Once the shop was shut, they would do all the necessary tasks and then take themselves off to their own quarters. Either Mr Rathbone had left the gate unlocked by mistake, which seemed unlikely since he had said nothing about it when he found her on his doorstep, or he had left it unlocked because he was expecting a visitor.
A visitor! What a fool she had been not to have realised earlier that the unlocked back gate was important. If she had hung around at the mouth of the jigger, she was now sure she would have seen Ollie, and clearly enough to identify him too. Then she remembered that Corky might well have been keeping an eye on the premises, might have seen what she had missed. She really must come up with some excuse to leave Aunt Myrtle next day and find Corky and tell him everything that had happened, because although it was annoying that she had missed seeing the butcher’s visitor earlier, they now had a very real clue. When Mr Rathbone expected someone to come calling after the shop was shut, he left the gate unlocked. After the caller had left, he would relock the gate; Dot remembered the rasp of the key turning in the lock when Ollie had left on the night of the burglary. So if Corky – or whoever was on watch – tried the door and found it locked, they would know that they need not wait; but if, on the other hand, it was unlocked, then their lookout would not be wasted.
Dot lay down again, but though she tried to compose herself her mind was full of racing thoughts and possibilities, and despite the comfort of being gloriously alone in a very large bed, it was a long while before she slept.
Corky had intended to go straight round to Virgil Street just in case Mrs Cartwright found another lodger for the little boxroom, but when he was sitting up in the shed and eating his breakfast of bread and jam he changed his mind. He wanted, above everything else, to seem like any other young lad who had come up from London in search of work and such a lad, he knew, was unlikely to look for lodgings until he had paid employment of some description. He would have liked to get work which would leave him a certain amount of freedom since it was plainly imperative to be able to keep an eye both on Church Street and on the butcher’s premises but in August, with the schools shut, he imagined that local lads would already have bagged all the delivery jobs, especially if they owned bicycles. He had had quite a bright, idea though: he would suggest to a score of small shops that he might deliver for all of them whenever they sold something which was too heavy for a housewife to carry home unaided, and that way he would have a good deal of freedom, be able to pick and choose whether he would work or not, yet still have some money coming in.
Accordingly, he finished his breakfast, hefted his carpet bag on to one shoulder, and set off into the misty morning. He went straight to Heyworth Street and walked slowly along the pavement, eyeing each shop speculatively as he passed. There were an enormous variety of establishments: several fishmongers, butchers, bakeries, greengrocers, drapers, boot makers and the like and, of course, the inevitable corner shops, usually presided over by a motherly woman who sold just about everything. When he reached the pet shop he stopped to look longingly in the window; it would be lovely to work there, getting to know the fat rabbits in their cages, the parrot dancing on its perch and shouting for peanuts in a harsh croak, and the gloriously wriggling puppies which rolled and yapped in the window, too intent on the game they were enjoying with each other to notice a boy with his nose squashed to the glass. Reluctantly, Corky moved on and very soon came to the dairy. It was a large building, and even had it not been clearly labelled Corky would have known it was a dairy by the lowing of a cow and the farmyard smell which emanated from the passageway down the side of the premises. Milk has to be delivered and the man who drove the horse needed boys who could pop to each house to deliver the milk that had been ordered, Corky reminded himself. Whilst he was with Mrs Perkin, it had often been he who had been despatched with an enamel jug into which the milkman’s boy would pour whatever quantity of milk Mrs Perkin wanted. Yes, dairies needed boys all right and the dairy was a possibility, as was the large Co-op a little further along. Corky knew there were frugal women in every community who shopped once a week at the Co-op, giving large orders to be taken home by the delivery boy.
He did not think any of the hairdressers, or barbers, would need a boy for any particular purpose and neither did he intend visiting boot makers, but bakers were a possibility. He had seen lads with heavy wickerwork trays on ropes round their necks going from door to door selling loaves, and though he did not much fancy the job he supposed that if all else failed he would have to have a go.
Having seen how the land lay, he decided to try half a dozen of the smaller shops first, including two fishmongers, three butchers and a greengrocer.
The first butcher was a cheery little man with a bulbous red nose and very few teeth, but his shop was crowded and he was clearly a favourite with his customers, all of whom kept shouting out to him as they waited patiently to be served. Corky decided he would like to work for Mr Speed but when he reached the counter and asked if there were any jobs going, such as delivery boy, Mr Speed shook his head. ‘Me customers aren’t the sort to buy a baron of beef,’ he said regretfully. ‘Come Christmas I’ll need a lad, what wi’ turkeys the size of hostriches and hams what are a quarter of a pig, just about, but in the summer me ladies come in, pick what they want, and carry it off. Sorry, young feller.’
The other butcher had a similar response and the first fishmonger said, rather sourly, that with half the kids in the neighbourhood owning stirring carts and happy to deliver anything and everything for a ha’penny or so, there was little point in his employing anyone. Corky had seen the stirring carts, which the local kids made from broken-down orange boxes and old pram wheels, and left the shop feeling truly dispirited. But he had still to try the bigger shops, which were probably the best bet of all.
He was heading for the dairy when someone hailed him and he heard footsteps pattering rapidly behind him. He turned and there was Dot, pink-faced and breathless. She clutched his arm and pulled him round to face the opposite direction. ‘Corky, I’m that glad I found you. Let’s nip down Minera Street where it’s a bit quieter and we can talk. There’s a good deal you ought to know . . . oh, and I’ve just realised I dunno your new address.’
‘I haven’t got one yet,’ Corky said, rather ruefully, as they turned into the side street. ‘I’ve been trying to get a job of some sort because if Mrs Cartwright asks me where I’m working – and she’s bound to – then I want to be able to give her a straight answer. Only it ain’t so easy to get work in the school holidays, not with every lad in Liverpool eager to earn a few pennies.’
‘Ye-es, but you know you’ll be lodging in the same house as Nick,’ Dot pointed out. ‘Just give me the address so’s I can come and find you if there’s important news to tell.’
‘Yes, but I’m
tellin
’ you: I’ve not been there yet and she could have let the room or simply not like the look of me,’ Corky said, rather crossly. ‘Then you’ll go round there and ask for me and she won’t know who the devil you’re talking about.’
tellin
’ you: I’ve not been there yet and she could have let the room or simply not like the look of me,’ Corky said, rather crossly. ‘Then you’ll go round there and ask for me and she won’t know who the devil you’re talking about.’
Dot glared at him. ‘I’m not a complete idiot, you know,’ she said reproachfully. ‘I’ll ask for Nick, of course. Now, will you kindly give me the address or do I have to knock you down, kneel on your chest and get it out of you that way?’
Corky sniggered. ‘Some chance,’ he said derisively. ‘Still, if it’ll make you happy, it’s number twenty-five Virgil Street – between Great Homer and the Scottie, you know – and even if Mrs Cartwright can’t give me a room, Nick reckons most of the houses along there have a lodger or two, so mebbe I’ll end up in Virgil Street anyway, if not at number twenty-five.’
‘Right,’ Dot said. ‘Now listen carefully, Corky, because what I’m going to tell you is really important and may well make it easier to keep an eye on old Rathbone.’
She began her story, but had only got as far as her uncle not wanting to lose his job with Rathbone when Corky interrupted her. ‘That means he’s a worker short, if only for a couple of days,’ he said excitedly. ‘I won’t let on I know but I’ll ask him if there’s any way I can help and mebbe he’ll let me do your uncle’s job, just till he’s fit again,’ he added hastily.
Dot pulled a doubtful face. ‘Me uncle shifts carcasses at the slaughterhouse, puts them into Mr Rathbone’s van and unloads them t’other end into his cold store,’ she said. ‘I think it’s grown man’s work, Corky, because no matter how strong you are, you haven’t got the height. A big carcass . . . well, it ’ud drag on the ground, wouldn’t it?’
Corky gave the matter some thought, then nodded. ‘I guess you’re right, but there’s no harm in trying,’ he pointed out. ‘Maybe he’ll fetch the carcasses himself and leave me to mind the shop or tidy up, you never know.’
‘True,’ Dot said. ‘Look, I’ve gorra gerra move on because I left me aunt sittin’ in a queue outside the doctor’s surgery in Brougham Terrace. I reckon it’ll be an hour or more before she’s seen, but there’s messages to get done ’n’ all, so don’t interrupt no more, just let me tell you about last night.’
Corky listened in silence, but when the story was done he clapped Dot on the back and told her she was a real bright spark. ‘You’re dead right that the unlocked gate is a real giveaway,’ he told her. ‘It’ll make watching the place a whole lot easier. But why d’you think that there copper weren’t the feller he were waitin’ for?’
‘Oh, because he was surprised when the scuffer walked across the yard and joined us; his eyes really rounded,’ Dot said. ‘And besides, the constable only came in because he saw the gate was open. And he said about Mr Rathbone making a complaint at the station . . .’
‘Well I think it’s odd,’ Corky said obstinately. ‘Your aunt said they were real pally, if it was this McNamara, so why shouldn’t old Rathbone have been waiting for him? And why did he call you back? Have you stopped to ask yourself that?’
‘I dunno, but I expect he’d got some sort of message for Uncle Rupe,’ Dot said vaguely. ‘But does it matter, Corky? What I feel cross with meself over is not hanging around to see if ferret-faced Ollie turned up.’
‘Well, no use crying over spilt milk,’ Corky said, as they returned to Heyworth Street. ‘I’ve got a couple more places to try – Rathbone’s and that baker’s over there – an’ then I’ll go to the dairy and the Co-op. Surely someone could do with a lad to fetch and carry for them? Come to that, I’m not fussy. I’ll do anything to earn enough money to pay my lodgings and keep me fed. Oh, I know Nick said he’d do it, but I’d far rather be independent.’
‘Yes, o’ course you would; but I’d best get back to Brougham Terrace before me aunt gets suspicious; I can pick up a bag of spuds an’ half a pound of scrag ends on me way,’ Dot said. ‘Good luck with the job hunt!’
Dot watched as Corky disappeared into Rathbone’s shop. She contemplated following him, for now Mr Rathbone knew that she was Uncle Rupe’s niece he might well sell her the scrag cheap – if he wasn’t still furious with Uncle Rupe, that was – but some inner caution advised her against such a move. He was bound to recognise her all right and might well also remember that he had shouted at her to return the previous evening, and she had not done so. She could of course claim that she had not heard, but she had no wish to become a messenger between her uncle and his part-time employer; no, it would be wiser to visit the next butcher she passed on her way back to Brougham Terrace.
So when Dot rejoined her aunt it was with a full shopping bag and Aunt Myrtle, sitting on one of the long wooden benches, gave a sigh of relief at the sight of her. ‘I were getting real worried, queen,’ she said reproachfully. ‘I know I’ve got that old walking stick what you borrowed from Mr Hardy up the road, but I don’t trust meself to walk more’n a few paces without your shoulder to lean on, and I’m in next.’ Even as she spoke, the surgery door opened and a large, red-faced woman emerged. Aunt Myrtle got to her feet and grabbed Dot’s skinny little shoulder. ‘In we goes,’ she said bracingly. ‘Keep it nice ’n’ steady so’s I don’t go slippin’. I couldn’t do wi’ a broken leg as well as a sprained ankle.’
Because the clinic on Brougham Terrace could not supply the crutches her aunt needed, she was given a doctor’s letter and advised to go to the nearby hospital. Dot sighed wearily, knowing that such a walk, in her aunt’s condition, would be a trying one, but fortunately the doctor realised it as well. ‘Wait on the bench until you’re called, and the pair of you can get a ride in the ambulance,’ he said. ‘We don’t want you giving birth to that baby before your time, do we?’ Aunt Myrtle agreed fervently that this would not do at all, and was grateful for the offer of an ambulance ride. But poor Dot sighed with frustration, knowing that the major part of the day would have passed before she got her aunt safely home again. And she was right. The pair of them staggered into the house at half past six that evening to find that, as usual, the boys had returned and were sitting round the table making no attempt to get a meal started. They had eaten every crumb of the cake Dot had made the day before, but had not even bothered to bring in water, let alone make up the fire, which was little more than a handful of glowing embers in the grate. Aunt Myrtle seldom reproached the boys for their laziness, but today was the exception. She glared at her sons, then tipped Dick out of her favourite fireside chair and slumped into it herself, before addressing them. ‘Sammy, fetch the coal in an’ make up that fire. Lionel, fill the water buckets. And you two young ’uns can go into the parlour and ask your da what he’s up to, lyin’ there all day doin’ nothin’ while Dot an’ meself have got the messages and queued for hours at Brougham Terrace and the hospital to get me some crutches so’s I can move around the house.’
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