Anyone Who Had a Heart (33 page)

The big bruiser called Malcolm had a glossy black skull and a ring through his nose. Even without the ring he would have still got the nickname the Black Bull. Like the animal that had given him his nickname, Malcolm was built like one. Tony knew him well. Heavy meat meant Malcolm didn’t move that fast so when Tony decided he was going to borrow Victor’s E Type for the weekend, there was sweet FA the Black Bull could do about it.

‘Hey, Tony!’

Tony couldn’t hear what Malcolm shouted as the nearside wing of the car grazed the Black Bull’s kneecaps, though he could guess. What the hell! He was practically family now with Victor – even if it was via Michael rather than Roberto. At least that’s what he told himself as he wound down the window and sniffed the fresh air. Sod it! He’d run the missus around in it this weekend and the whole
family
would have a whale of a time. What happened when he got back to London would be another matter. And he’d have to go back. His life might depend on it.

IT WAS GOOD
to be back in Sheppey. The salty properties in the air were not described as bracing for no reason and, despite bad memories, Marcie felt childishly excited the closer she got to home.

‘I can’t believe that I still think of this as home,’ she said to Michael. ‘Funny how I can’t quite get it out of my mind that I’m coming home even though I live in London.’

‘Home is where the heart is – and the people you love most,’ said Michael.

Rather than phoning the presbytery and dragging Father Justin away from sinking cupfuls of tea and gobbling wedges of home-made cake, Marcie had sent a telegram.

Her grandmother was waiting at the gate when she arrived. Marcie sucked in her breath at the sight of Rosa Brooks. When had she grown so old? The figure in black seemed even smaller than on the last occasion she’d see her. She’s shrinking with age, she thought and was saddened.

Rosa Brooks had insisted she understood why Marcie was taking her daughter to London. ‘You have
your
own life to lead,’ she’d said plaintively. ‘Besides, this is England, not Malta.’

The sight of her grandmother now made Marcie feel guilty at taking her daughter away. She knew without asking that her grandmother was hurting, though wasn’t sure what she could do about it.

Garth came out of the cottage, pushing past Rosa Brooks while skipping up and down like a five-year-old.

‘Marcie! You’re back!’

He continued to skip, his arms flapping at his sides like a pair of dodo’s wings. His clothes were cleaner than when he’d lived with his mother and he smelled of fresh soap and had his hair neatly cut and combed.

It seemed to Marcie that his stay in the institution hadn’t traumatised him in any way.

‘How are you, Garth? Glad to be home?’

‘Yeah! Me and Arthur like it here.’

Marcie mouthed the word Arthur questioningly to her grandmother.

‘His friend.’

Marcie nodded. The look in her grandmother’s eyes explained everything. Garth had an invisible friend.

Rosa’s deepest wrinkles were around her mouth and her eyes, so that when she smiled they seemed to spread over her face.

Her smiles were all for her granddaughter and her great-granddaughter. Joanna gurgled with delight on seeing her great-grandmother and went willingly into her arms.

While dallying with the child, Rosa raked Michael with her deep dark eyes, taking in everything about him. He received a smile which accompanied a questioning look in her eyes.

‘Do you require a bed for the night?’

The question took both Marcie and Michael by surprise. Michael declined saying that he had business to attend to in London.

He’d been buying up vacant shop lots and letting them out for weekly rents. According to him nobody seemed that interested in commercial letting. ‘It may take a few years, but eventually I’ll clean up,’ he said, the light of enthusiasm shining in his eyes. ‘Come on. There’s a lot of demolition and rebuilding going to go on in London. Once I’d explained how it was, the financial backing came easy.’

‘The banks must love you,’ Marcie had said.

‘Them and others,’ he’d answered. He’d been cagey about his financial backer, the sleeping partner he sometimes referred to, though he insisted it was all above board. ‘My backer likes to keep a low profile. In fact I haven’t even met him yet. I was contacted via a solicitor.’

Aware of his manner, Marcie didn’t pry. She was
glad
he was doing so well without the assistance of Victor Camilleri.

Fluffy white clouds were sprinting across a lake of blue sky. Spring was flowing into summer and the holidaymakers were returning to the beaches at Sheerness and Leysdown. Families were out in force buying candy floss and sticky rock from the ramshackle booths along the seafront in Sheerness. In Leysdown the young crowd would be gathering outside the cafés and amusement arcades, boys leaning against motorcycles or scooters swigging Pepsi or Coca-Cola. Girls wearing short skirts giggling together whilst trying
not
to look interested in the boys.

Thoughts of Leysdown brought a lump to Marcie’s throat. Leysdown was where she’d met Johnnie. It seemed a lifetime ago now. So much had happened, including his death. Sometimes she awoke in the middle of the night after dreaming that it had never happened, that he was still alive. This usually happened when a motorcycle was revving up in the street outside, though when she looked she could never see one.

Johnnie was still alive in her mind though he’d been buried nearly two years ago. Things had changed so drastically in such a short time. Alan Taylor was gone and so was his daughter. And Michael had come along.

* * *

No longer afraid that Rita would pounce out on her and call her names, Marcie went for a stroll along the seafront the next morning. Lulled by the warm sun and the fresh air, Joanna fell asleep. Garth came to keep her company. There was something oddly oppressive about his presence. It may have been something to do with him being the catalyst with regard to Rita, her father and the burning down of the boutique.

‘The lady in red is watching over you,’ he said suddenly, his mouth full of candy floss.

Marcie stopped pushing the pushchair.

‘The woman who used to sit under the tree in my grandmother’s garden?’

He nodded before once again immersing his face in a cloud of cotton candy.

It wasn’t the first time that Garth had mentioned the woman she now accepted was her mother.

Marcie resumed her walk. ‘Who said so?’

‘Albert.’

Albert seemed to be responsible for a lot of things. Garth was a little clumsy and sometimes knocked things over or spilt food and drink. He always blamed Albert for doing so. Marcie wasn’t so sure he was acting dumb. He always said it with a twinkle in his eyes.

The crowds along the prom were a happy band; mums and dads, kids, toddlers, babies and dogs, all tripping along the prom and glad the sun was back.

She glimpsed the faces of young mothers like herself. Kids were a big responsibility and could make your heart or break it. If her mother was still alive she wondered whether she ever thought of her. If she was dead, she wondered if she had regretted leaving. Either way she hoped she’d been loved and, if her mother was dead, hoped she was looking down on her. She too would look down on her child should anything dreadful happen.

‘I’m really glad the lady in red is watching over me,’ she said after some thought. ‘It’s nice to think that even when you’re dead you can still protect those you leave behind.’

‘And before,’ said Garth. ‘Mothers look after you before you’re dead.’

‘Of course. Mothers always look after their children.’

Halfway home it suddenly struck her. He’d said that mothers look after you before you’re dead. How did he know that the vision he’d seen was her mother? She racked her brain, trying to remember if she’d ever suggested the woman was her mother. She had not. She was absolutely sure she had not. She then remembered what her grandmother had said. She said that if she ever found her mother she did not want to meet her again. She’d said it as though her mother was still alive.

The weekend was working out well though she
couldn’t
help worrying about her grandmother. She seemed tired and on some occasions a little distant.

Marcie caught her sitting before the fire, her chin in her lap and her eyes closed. Her frail hands – skin as thin as rice paper and speckled with brown spots – hung lifelessly over the chair arms.

Marcie knelt at her grandmother’s side. ‘Gran?’

The hooded eyes flickered before fully opening. Her smile was vapid. Realisation dawned. Her grandmother was not well.

‘Have you been to the doctor?’

Rosa Brooks shook her head and sighed listlessly. ‘What for? I am suffering from old age. That is all.’

Her dark eyes held the blue ones of her granddaughter. Something – perhaps a sudden thought – seemed to flash there. Marcie knew instinctively what the problem was. Rosa Brooks was feeling lonely.

‘Have you spoken to grandfather lately?’

The old woman smiled. ‘We speak every day. I tell him that I miss him and will be glad when we are together again.’

The forthright way her grandmother spoke of her dead husband touched a raw nerve. Even death had failed to sever the bond between her grandmother and her grandfather. Other marriages were far from convivial; her father’s for a start.

On his first night back at home, Tony got thrown
out
by his wife so came round to stay with his mother. His mood was ugly.

‘She locked me out! Can you believe that? The stupid bitch locked me out!’

‘Antonio!’

Tony Brooks, the hard man of London’s East End, apologised to his mother for his language. ‘Sorry, Ma. But she winds me up something rotten,’ he spouted as he paced the room.

His mother pointed to a chair. ‘Sit down, Antonio. I will make you tea.’

‘I don’t want any.’

‘Sit down anyway. You are wearing my carpet out.’

Tony obediently settled himself in one of the wide armchairs by the fire. His mother put the kettle on then went out into the back garden to cut herbs and a cabbage. Garth had taken to growing cabbages. It was the only thing he’d learned how to grow so that was all he grew. Unfortunately this meant that there were rather a lot of them. Cabbage had to be used in practically every meal and Rosa Brooks had started giving some away to the neighbours. Father Justin was also cajoled into taking one or two.

Marcie was sitting in the armchair on the other side of the fireplace giving Joanna her bottle. Her father’s eyes dropped to the baby.

Marcie perceived his expression softening before her very eyes.

‘She looks just like you when you were a nipper. Pretty. And pink.’

‘Pink? You mean like Pinky and Perky?’

Tony chortled at the very idea of her looking like one of the wooden puppets from on the telly.

‘No. You were beautiful. Just like her,’ he said, nodding at his granddaughter. ‘Christ,’ he added shaking his head in disbelief. ‘Me. A grandfather. How did I ever manage that?’

‘You fell in love with her grandmother. Isn’t that how it all started?’

He looked startled, like a tennis ball that’s been firmly batted back to the sender. ‘What? Well … It wasn’t …’

He stumbled over the words and looked uncomfortable.

‘Never mind,’ she said. On several occasions she’d tried bringing her mother into a conversation. Her memories of the woman who’d given birth to her were less than sketchy – they were almost non-existent. There was just the feeling of warm arms hugging her close. She couldn’t help wanting more, but nobody, not even her grandmother, was prepared to talk about her.

Rosa came in from the back yard, a cabbage tucked beneath one arm and a bunch of herbs in the other. She proceeded to make tea. It was an unspoken rule in this house that making tea was women’s work;
certainly
as far as Marcie’s father was concerned. He took the opportunity to ask her about Michael. ‘I mean, are you and him on the level? Is it a kosher relationship?’

Marcie smiled at his ineffectiveness to get to what he really wanted to know. She was learning how to handle him better, just like she was beginning to know how to handle most men. Never demean them or demand, but suggest things that she might want but make it seem as though it was their idea all the time. On this occasion such subterfuge wasn’t necessary.

‘If you mean are we likely to walk down the aisle, the answer to that is I don’t know.’

Michael was keen on her and she was keen on him and the sex was good and without complication thanks to the birth pills supplied by the Brook Clinic. However, being independent was better than she’d envisaged. It was never going to be easy raising a child on her own, but so far she was managing very nicely. Having a good income helped. She would always be grateful to Allegra for that. As for Michael …

Her father threw his hands into the air then brought them down to rest on his head. ‘Blimey! Imagine my little girl being married to Victor Camilleri’s son. Wrong side of the blanket of course, but still his son. You’d be a Camilleri, part of one of the most powerful families in the East End.’

Marcie bridled. ‘I didn’t say I would marry him, and, anyway, I’d be a Jones. His mother never married his father.’

Her father looked put out that such a trivial fact had not occurred to him. But Tony Brooks was not a man to be down for long.

‘You’re right, darlin’,’ he said patting her hand affectionately. ‘All the same,’ he said, his expression brightening. ‘He’s a lad likely to go places. Not so high as his brother of course who
was
born on the right side of the blanket so stands to gain most when old Victor kicks the bucket. But all the same, a good bloke for my girl to end up with.’

Marcie eyed him ruefully. ‘Not bad at all when you consider that I suspected my father had sold me into slavery.’

‘What?’ He looked dumbfounded.

‘You walked right into it.
And
you practically told them I was a virgin. Innocent, stupid and good to look at; a sweet innocent wife for that psycho Roberto. How stupid was that?’