THE BONDAGE OF LOVE (13 page)

someone, at one time, had read the book and likely loved it; for in the margin he had written:

I too have done a brave thing;

But a braver thing still I have done, I haven't spoken of it.

A new batch of books had been thrown on to the shelves near the archway.

They looked a poor lot, and he liked going through poor lots;

it was here that you found the treasures. There were regulars who came here, but never spoke to each other: they were out for the same thing, first

editions. And yet he had never heard of anyone finding one. But an early edition of any kind was valuable.

There had been children in the house where these particular books came from.

They hadn't been scribbled on, but they were well-thumbed, and some pages were torn. He laughed as he read a

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rhyme in one of the books and at the way it had been set out;

Fix It He said the clock wanted taking to bits And when I did it he nearly had fits.

Funny, People never say what they mean;

Fancy Making such an enormous scene.

He was still smiling at the scene the little rhyme presented to his mind, when, his hand picking up another book, he almost said aloud, never! But yes, it was. Yes, it was. What edition was it? Oh, the ninth. But,

nevertheless, it was a find, and it was volume three, so there must be two other volumes here somewhere. My! My! Lord Chesterfield's Letters To His Son. He had read bits and pieces here and there about him whilst reading up about conditions in England leading up to the Napoleonic battles. He rubbed his fingers over a page. It was the original paper all right, beautifully thick and deckle-edged, and which had browned in part with age. Oh! Good!

Good!

He put the book under his oxter; he wasn't going to put it down: there was a wide boy along there and he was a searcher too. He now thumbed quickly

through the rest of the books on the shelf, but to no avail.

But there was a higher shelf. There could be some up there. Mr. Fenwick might sort out all his utensils but he didn't do anything about the books he gathered. His head went back as his

hand went up to the higher shelf. Then his whole body was arrested, for in the mirror set at an angle, seemingly above him from where he stood, he saw a passing face. It was Mamie's. What was she doing here?

She was supposed to be doing rehearsals at school. His hand came down from the upper shelf and he moved a step to where he could get a better view of her. He was seeing her back now. She was at the paper counter, but there was no-one serving there: Mr. Fenwick seemed to be on his own this evening.

Then his mouth dropped into a gape and he moved his head a little to the side. Now he could see all of her. She had picked up a thick magazine and was moving along the counter to where the evening papers were stacked. And that which she did next kept his mouth agape, for with a quick movement she placed a magazine in the middle of the paper, then bent it double. Now she was standing next to a taller girl. He could see her profile: it was her friend Nancy. Then he saw Mamie do something that made him gasp aloud: her right hand hovered close to a standing grid that held Mars bars. Polos and such. Then, before he could blink, he saw her twice slip a handful of

packets taken from the grid into the open school bag of the girl standing close to her. And at this, the girl turned and walked slowly down the shop and out of it. But Mamie waited at the counter until Mr. Fenwick had

returned from serving another customer. Then, as she passed some money to him she also presented the paper lengthwise. He watched Mr.

Fenwick nod at her, and then she walked out.

Shoplifting! Dear God! And she was supposed to be at. Oh! There was

something fishy here. He now dived into the shop to where Mr. Fenwick was about to attend to another customer, and pushing his find at him, he said, "I

... I found this. I'll be back in a minute. I'm... I'm waiting for Ka Miss Bailey, she's to meet me here." He gulped.

"Will you tell her I'll be back in a minute? I've just remembered something."

"Yes. Yes, indeed. Master Love. I will give her your message. Yes.

Yes. And you found something? My! My! Let me have a look. "

Sammy did not wait for Mr. Fenwick's comment on his find, but hurried out of the shop and was just in time to see the two girls disappearing round the end of the long street to where there was a cross road. And when he reached it, there they were, going down Pembroke Avenue and acting like silly little kids, pushing at each other.

His first idea was to go and grab them, and from this distance he could do just that. But then, where were they going? And what were they going to do with their spoils? Oh my goodness! Mrs. B would go mad when she heard about this. As for Mr. Bill, Lord! But that girl had been acting strangely for a long time now: everybody in the house seemed to be fed up with her. But shoplifting! And so expertly done, it was obviously not the first time. No, that was the result of experience and practice. He saw again, in his mind's eye, the taller girl lifting the flap of her school bag to allow Mamie to drop in her spoils. Well, he would get to the bottom of this. And if he didn't wring her neck for her, someone at home would. They were walking up Woodbine Grove now. Well, Woodbine Grove went nowhere. It ended in a narrow piece of wasteland, beyond which was a larger building and, attached to it, another house. A joinery business was carried out here. It was through the gate leading to the house that, in the lessening daylight, he thought the girls had disappeared.

Before crossing the space he paused, and when he reached the gate and gently pushed it open, his hand came in contact with a heavy iron chain with a lock on the end, which suggested that this gate was usually kept closed.

Slowly now, he went up by the side of a blank wall, then into a large yard that was partly illuminated from a window at the far side of a door.

Quietly, he passed the door, to stop to the side of the window.

There were curtains down each side of it, but they hadn't been closed.

Slowly bending forward, he looked into the room and if his mouth had given evidence of his surprise at what he saw through Mr. Fenwick's mirror, now it simply gaped open, for he was looking on to a table on which was spread an assortment of chocolate bars. Polo mints, and small cards to which were pinned brooches, ear-rings and such. The woman was moving them around a table as if sorting them out, smiling as she did so and talking. He could hear her voice, but not what she was saying. Then the expression "Good God!"

came from his lips as he

saw Mamie, who was standing at the far side of the table, lighting a

cigarette and doing it deftly. When he saw her draw on it and puff out the smoke, he could contain himself no longer. It seemed that he sprang from the window, kicked the door open and was into the room in one leap. And he so startled the occupants that they almost fell to the floor. One staggered back against a cupboard, crying, "What! Oh!

What d'you want? Get out! Get out! "

"I'll get out all right, and you'll go with me, missis. You bloody, dirty bitch, you." Inside himself, he seemed to be back in Bog's End, for now he was spewing out words that he had not used for years.

"By!

Mamie, you've got something to answer for, and you will. "

"I won't! I won't! I'm not coming back. She'll go for me; they'll all go for me. I'm going to me grand father's. I hate you! I hate you all!"

"You'll go to your grandfather's all right."

He was about to grab her when the woman came at him with fists flying.

But turning on her, he brought his arm up swiftly and the next minute she was on her back. Mamie was disappearing through a door at the far end of the room; and when he, too, rushed through it, he was surprised to find himself in a broad stone-paved passage, the other side of which he straightaway surmised as being the end wall of the factory.

At the same time a man dropped a box he must have been carrying through the door, in order to grab at Mamie by the neck of her coat and drag her through the doorway.

Without hesitating, Sammy rushed into the room, to stop dead at the sight of what he was now gazing upon. But it was a momentary flash only before the man, having thrown Mamie to one side, came at him and knocked him sideways with a blow to his shoulder.

What followed was pandemonium. Someone screamed, "Shut that bloody door!"

Then another man came at him, only to find his head knocked backwards from a blow under the chin, and then to double up when a foot came into his groin.

Sammy had learned some time ago that the gentle art could be anything but gentle, when circumstances demanded. And now, indeed, circumstances

demanded, for yet another man came at him. He had actually laid him on his back when the bottle hit him on the side of the head. Had the man's aim been true he would have gone down immediately; it knocked him dizzy and he reeled, but it was enough. It was when he hit the floor face downwards and felt his arms wrenched behind him that he came to fully again. And then his legs were bent back from the knees and tied together. When he was kicked onto his side, and his mouth opened in a yell of pain, it was choked by a gag of net cloth.

He was lying against the wall now and looking towards the table over which hung a green shaded light, similar to those he knew were used in newspaper offices. He could see a man gathering up little bags from the table and throwing them into a box, while another carefully picked up glass tubes. He couldn't see where these were put, but recalling his

first glimpse of the table, he guessed what had been afoot in this room.

When he heard the door open the woman's voice came to him, saying, "God Almighty!" And a man's replying, "Aye, God Almighty! This is you and your bloody sideline, missis."

"Be careful who you're talking to, Johnny Hatter. My sideline has paid well before and it will again. In the meantime, get yourself into the house and clear the drawers, and not into boxes but into the travelling case. And take them to the Brunch."

"Oh, no, Mrs. Polgar. You know what the boss said before: he's got his name to think about and his business."

"If he upsets Polgar he knows what'll happen. So, get going. And you, Napier, clean this place up as you've never cleaned a room before, for when that thing down there is missing, they'll even be looking under the

flagstones."

When the door behind Mrs. Polgar closed, one of the voices said softly, "We can't take all this lot to the Brunch."

"Well, you heard what the lady said, didn't you? God! How I hate women.

Anyway, all this must be cleared, as she said, because when the boss comes back, there'll be double hell to pay. And also her bloody market stall. He should have put his foot down about that."

"It's a good cover-up, but she must have a pile stacked away just from that."

A voice broke in on the other two, crying angrily, "This is no bloody time to go on about finance.

What are we going to do with that bugger down there? "

"Well, you heard what she said."

"Aye, and she's right. He's seen the lot of us."

"Well, he won't be able to remember much. Get a dose ready; the sooner you give it to him the better. And the other one too."

"Will we leave him here?" said Breezy.

"Why did they ever give you such a nickname;

your bloody brains blew away years ago. "

There was a short silence before a voice said, "You've got the day's paper there?"

"Aye."

"See what time high tide is." There was another silence.

"One o'clock."

"Aye, well, that'll just give us time. Is that needle ready?"

When the dark shape bent over Sammy, he wriggled within his bonds. But when he felt the top of his trousers torn down and the needle jammed viciously into his buttocks his groan became audible. A voice above him asked now,

"Was it a stiff 'un?" And the answer was, "Well, if I'd given it to a horse, he wouldn't be running the morrow."

There was a swimming in his head; then his body jerked when he imagined he saw his father kneeling by his side.

"Dad! Dad!" he muttered.

"Get me out of this!"

"You walked into it, lad. You walked into it."

"I didn't. Dad. I didn't. It was Mamie."

"Yes, it was Mamie. But what you should have done was to go home and tell them first."

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"Oh, Dad. Dad. You wouldn't have done that, would you?"

"No, lad. No, I wouldn't have done it."

"Dad! Don't go away. Don't go away."

"Here's my hand. Hang on."

He felt the hand in his as he said, "I... I can't see you. Dad, I can't see you. Don't go away. I'm ... I'm sleepy. They've drugged me. This is a

drug set up. Packing it to sell in the streets. Dad. To sell in the

streets. Dad. To sell in the streets. Dad."

"Yes, lad. Yes, lad. Yes, lad."

His father was going; he was leaving him. He wanted him to go and tell Katie.

"Oh, Katie. Katie."

Then the apparition had gone and there was nothing. It was as if he had never been born . Breezy looked down on Sammy now, saying, "He's off! Now what about her?" His head jerked backwards.

"Oh well; just give her a good stiff 'un too; then leave her to the missis.

She's her responsibility."

The Gallaghers were pushed for space in all ways, but mostly in their

sleeping quarters.

In what was described as the third bedroom, but should have had the title of box room, were two bunk beds, one on top of the other. Mike Gallagher had the lower bunk and young Danny the upper.

Danny liked this room for a number of reasons. First, because he was sharing it with a brother who didn't talk, whereas when he had been in the main bedroom he'd had to take the foot of a bed; and here he could listen to his old CB radio without disturbing Mike. He loved listening to the lorry

drivers, but more especially to the police. If he could pick up the right wavelength, he could hear the police chasing the car thieves, and passing messages to one another. It was exciting.