Last Orders (23 page)

I watched Amy lean back, without Ray leaning forward this time, and dip her hand again, briskly, into the bag and throw. You felt they both wished they hadn’t stuck that bag between them. Then Amy picked up the bag and started crumpling it into a ball and brushing down her skirt as if she was about to stand up, and just before she did, Ray reached out and clasped her far shoulder, then shifted his hand to the back of her neck, the fingers reaching under her hair, just like they’d done into his own collar. As if he’d been meaning to do that all along, or something like it, but it was only her moving to get up and him not having another chance that pushed him to it. Then Amy hesitated for a bit, her head sort of wriggling against Ray’s hand. Then she got up like she’d meant to, and Ray jumped up too like he was on a spring and they started walking back towards the car park.

I hunched down in my seat but I don’t suppose they could see me, with the reflections on the windscreen, if they were looking anyway. It was like just for a moment they’d been two younger people and now they were two older people trying to act their age. It made them look funny. But I suppose if you were going to look funny, this was the place to do it. Amy dropped the balled-up paper bag into a litter bin and Ray flicked his fag-end a few feet in front of him and stepped on it. They walked separately, like people being careful to walk separately, as if they just happened to be on parallel courses.

I suppose it can happen a lot here. Visitors crossing paths. Time to spare, burdens to share. Regular lonely-hearts’ club.

They passed maybe four or five car-widths to the left of me and this time I ducked right down, nose to the passenger seat, acting funny too. Then I lost them as they passed out
of sight behind the back of the van. But I watched in the wing mirror, and I had a clear view of the main gate out of the side window. It’s one thing about a van, you can see over the roof of a car next to you. I heard an engine start and a bit of reverse gear, then I saw the camper creeping out towards the gate, past the little ‘Out/In’ bollard with its arrows pointing. The turn to go back was left. The other way took you out of London: Ewell, Epsom, Leatherhead. I watched Ray brake, flash his indicator and turn right.

You shouldn’t judge. What you learn in this business is to keep a secret.

I said I felt about as Lucky as I’d ever felt. Being Lucky.

So he said, smiling, he felt about as Jack as he’d ever been, or was ever going to be. About as sweet jack all.

Then he looked at me and I thought, just for a second, He aint saying it’s down to
me
? Like when they first brought him in here, before the op, before he
knew
, and I felt everyone looking at me sort of special, like I was the man of the hour. Ray’ll swing it, Ray’ll fix it. All Jack needs is a dose of his old mate Raysy. And while we’re at it, we’ll take a bet on the surgeon doing a top-notch job.

I thought, It’s a terrible burden having all this luck.

But he looks at me as if he can see how he’s putting me on the spot, when it’s not me who ought to feel on the spot, it’s him. And he says, like he’s shaking his head at what I’m thinking, ‘I’ve come to terms, Raysy,’ slow and firm. He says it again as if I haven’t heard. ‘I’ve come to terms. It’s Amy I’m thinking of.’

Which makes me hold my eyes, wide open, on his as if I’m lost if I so much as blink.

He says, ‘I’ve come to terms, but I aint squared up with Amy.’ I look at him. I don’t move an eyelid. ‘I don’t want to leave her in the lurch.’

I say, ‘It’s not your fault that you—’

He says, ‘It’s not that. I aint played straight with her.’

I look at him. He looks at me.

He says, ‘It’s money I’m talking about. We was all set up to buy that place in Margate, weren’t we? Westgate. And the whole world thought this was cos Jack Dodds had finally
seen the light and decided to start a new life. And everyone thought it was a crying shame that just when he did, he finds out there aint going to be no more life.’

I say, ‘Including me, Jack.’

He says, ‘Including you. Including Amy. Except what everyone don’t know is I had to sell up or fold up. That’s why I did it. What the whole world don’t know is I took out a loan to save the shop five years ago, and it comes up in a month. Wouldn’t have been no problem. I sell the shop, sell the house, buy a little bungalow in Margate, a little tinpot bungalow, and I scrape through on the difference, just about. Except now it’s all off, aint it? All bets off, eh?’

He looks at me like I should know best.

I say, ‘Why not’ve sold up five years ago and paid yourself what you went and borrowed?’

He says, ‘Cos then I had to make a living, didn’t I?’

I look at him.

He says, ‘I’m a butcher, Raysy. That’s what I am.’

I keep looking at him. It’s him and it’s not him. It’s like he’s been hiding. He says, ‘It’s something I aint got to do now, make a living.’

I say, ‘So you never – saw no light?’

He says, ‘No, Raysy.’ I don’t believe him. ‘And no new life, eh? Not for me.’

He looks at me.

I say, ‘How much?’

He says, ‘Seven large ones when I took it on. Now they’ll want nearer twenty.’

He sees me whistle silently.

He says, ‘We’re not talking bank managers. It was a special sort of a loan. A private loan.’

I say, ‘Not Vince?’

And he laughs. He tips back his head and cackles so it
hurts him and I find myself reaching for a paper bowl, I find myself looking at his call-nurse button. ‘Vince?’ he says, half choking. ‘Vincey wouldn’t’ve lent me money if I was dying, would he?’

I say, ‘So who?’

He says, ‘Vincey wouldn’t’ve forked out for the shop, would he? He wanted me to sign on at the supermarket.’

‘So who?’

‘One of his mates, from the early days. One of his – business pals. Rough stuff, you understand.’

He looks at me like he’s in for a scolding.

I say, ‘You’d’ve been better off taking a long shot on a two-year-old. You’d’ve been better off coming to Uncle Lucky.’

Even as I say it I see which way the wind’s blowing.

He says, ‘Would’ve been a big ’un, Raysy. Where would I have got the ante? But it’s funny you mention that.’

He looks at me, starting to smile, so I nip in quick. I say, ‘You told Amy about all this?’

He shakes his head.

I say, ‘You going to?’

He says, ‘That’s a tricky one, aint it? What I’m hoping is I won’t ever have to, there won’t be no need. It’s funny you mention her.’

He pokes with his finger at the empty paper bowl I’ve been holding all the while. He says, ‘You look like you’re begging, holding that.’

I put the bowl back where I got it.

He says, ‘I don’t know what she’s going to do. I mean, when I’m— She might want to stay put. She might want to go ahead with that bungalow anyway. It aint kiboshed yet, it could still go through. Either way, I don’t want no debt-collector
knocking on her door. I don’t want her finding out she’s got twenty grand less than she thought she had.’

It’s like he wants me to tell him the solution.

He says, ‘That’s a nest-egg, aint it? Twenty grand. That’s what they call a nest-egg.’

I say, ‘So, for all she knows, it was just you seeing the light too. It was just you going for a new life. Glory hallelujah.’

He looks at me as if I’d know the answer to that too.

He says, ‘Some things are best not known.’

I say, ‘Why Margate?’

He says, ‘I don’t want to leave her in the lurch. I want to see her right.’ And his eyes shut suddenly, the lids drop in that heavy way, as if it’s more than he can do to keep them open, like he’s nipped out for a moment without saying and left me guessing.

Then he opens his eyes, as if he never knew he’d shut ’em.

I say, ‘So what do you think she’s going to do?’

He says, ‘Depends. Maybe you’d know what she’s going to do.’

I look at him.

He says, ‘I need a winner, Raysy. I need a winner like I’ve never needed.’ He lifts his right arm slowly off the bedcover. What with the tubes going in it, it looks like he’s not lifting it but it’s being lifted, like the arm of a puppet. ‘And I’ve got the ante this time.’

He moves his hand towards the bedside cabinet and opens the little drawer, the drawer with his few odds and ends in it. His hand shakes. He struggles with the drawer and I half go to help him but I know it wouldn’t do to help him because there aren’t many things he can still do for himself.

He takes out his wallet. I’ve never seen Jack Dodds’ wallet look so fat.

He says, ‘Here, have a look inside. Back compartment.’

He hands it to me. I take it and flip it open while he watches me. I don’t see no photograph. There’s a great wodge of notes.

He says, ‘There’s a thousand smackers. Eight hundred in fifties and a bunch of twenties.’

I look. I rub the top note with my thumb. I say, ‘You’ve got a
thousand
, cash, in this place?’

He says, ‘Who’s going to take it, Raysy?’ He looks around at the other beds. ‘These poor bastards?’

I say, ‘So where did you—?’

He says, ‘Be telling, wouldn’t it? Take it out. Count it.’

I shake my head. ‘I believe you.’

He says, ‘Never my strong point, was it?’

‘What?’

He says, ‘Sums. Rithmetic. Never had it up here like you.’ He gives his head a little lift like he’s trying to nod at his own skull. He says, ‘Take it out anyway. I need a winner.’ He looks at my hand on the wallet. He says, ‘It’s Doncaster coming up, aint it? First of the flat.’

I think, And all things being normal, I’d be there.

I say, ‘It’s a thick ’un, Jack, a thousand quid to make twenty. A thick ’un.’

He says, ‘It’s a thick ’un.’

I say, ‘And if I put it on the wrong nag?’

He says, ‘But you won’t, will you? You can’t. Amy needs it.’

I think, Your money or your life.

He says, smiling, ‘Anyway, just think of it as the price of a camper. A thousand quid, remember? But you didn’t want to sell it, did you?’

I can’t see them anywhere. It’s like they might have gone and left me in Canterbury Cathedral. So I wander back down the aisle to where I was when Vince took himself off, in case they come looking for me, and I sit down again on the wooden seat, elbows on knees, thinking, I’m the odd one out now.

Thinking, It’s like he’s looking at me now, knowing. Better make your mind up, Raysy, better make it up quick. It’s like it wasn’t just the dosh, it was me an’ all, the two together. There’s the money, Ame, and there’s Raysy. You’ll be all right now, you’ll be all right with Lucky. Nudge, wink. I reckon you’ll see each other right.

It’s like I should’ve been him.

I sit there, keeping an eye out, but I don’t see them anywhere, so I get up and find the way out, and then I spot them, standing on the paved area, looking out for me. I think, Friends. The sky’s dark and threatening and the wind’s cold but they don’t look like they’re getting peeved. They look like they’re glad to be here together, like all’s forgiven.

I think, Maybe.

Vince says, ‘We was beginning to wonder, Raysy, we was beginning to think you might’ve got lost.’

Vince is holding a guidebook. Vic’s got the bag. I’m not holding anything but it’s like everyone can see that Raysy’s got a lot of something that aint his.

I can feel the cathedral behind me, looking at me.

Vince says, ‘We was in the cloisters. Did you clock the cloisters?’ Like I ought to have done.

I say, ‘Yes, I saw the cloisters,’ thinking, Small lies are easy.

Then we head back the way we came, out through the gateway and along the narrow streets, except we take a different narrow street from the one we came up. It’s called Butchery Lane, which is why we take it. Vince says we ought to. Then as we turn into it the rain comes pelting down. But there’s a little pub half-way along, the City Arms, and it’s open, and Lenny says a quick one wouldn’t hurt, would it?

Then he says, straight-faced, serious, sitting there in my office, hands pink and scrubbed from a day’s butchering, like he’s a special sort of client who’s come washed and ready for his own laying out, ‘As a matter of fact, Vic – I can say this to an old matlow – I wouldn’t mind being buried at sea.’

Well they must be there by now, they must have done it. Tipped him in, chucked him. For all I know, they’re halfway back again or they’re making a day of it, they’re out on a spree, donkey-rides all round, now the job’s done, down there in Margate.

But I still think this is where I should be. My own journey to make. Their journey and mine. The living come first, even the living who were as good as dead to him, so it’d be all one now, all the same, in his book. And I’ve already said goodbye to him for the last time, if not the first. Goodbye Jack, Jack old love. They can say that June won’t ever be the wiser if I missed this day with her for the sake of one last day with him, there have been missed days before, about a dozen of them once, long ago, and you don’t ever get a second chance to scatter your husband’s ashes. But how do they know she wouldn’t know? And someone has to tell her.

If she won’t be the wiser, he won’t either.

And I don’t think I could’ve done it. Stood there on the Pier, when it should’ve been the Jetty anyway, waves below me, salt in my eyes, stood there with them all watching me. You first, Amy, whenever you’re ready, take your time. Wind up my skirt. The way the day’s turned out, I’d say it’s blowing half a gale down there in Margate.

This is where I belong, upstairs on this bus. It seems to me that for years now I’ve been more at home on a number 44 than I have been anywhere else. Neither here nor there, just travelling in between. I don’t know if I could ever have
made my home in a bungalow in Margate. ‘I’m packing it in, Ame,’ he says. When I’d long since given up on him, when I’d long since thought it could never happen, when I thought, One day he’ll just drop dead there, behind the counter, in his striped apron, cleaver in his hand, and that’s how he’d want it, another carcass to deal with. ‘I’m jacking it in. Geddit?’ Ha. ‘It’s a new life for you and me, girl.’ I don’t know what caused it, what suddenly tipped him over, what blinding flash. But he looked at me as if I’d be overjoyed, as if he wasn’t looking at the woman he’d been looking at for fifty years, he was looking at someone new. He said, Margate. How about Margate?’ As if we could put the clock back and start off again where it all stopped. Second honeymoon. As if Margate was another word for magic.