The Camberwell Raid (30 page)

‘And thank goodness you called in and told Daddy about that van,’ she said.

‘Oh, Freddy does show a bit of sense sometimes, Rosie,’ said Cassie, ‘and we’ve all got to be grateful for that.’

Rosie laughed, and away went Cassie and Freddy then, on their bikes. They stopped at Tommy’s house and there they found Boots and Polly talking with the whole family. Alice, David and Paul were still up and still a little shaken, but visibly happy that the nightmare was all over. Vi was glowing with relief, and greeted Cassie and Freddy with hugs and kisses. Boots had recounted their part in the events, and Tommy shook Freddy’s hand Vigorously and gave Cassie a grateful smacker.

Miller, overpowered after a titanic struggle, had been taken away by the police along with his partner, Dorothy Amelia Carstairs, who’d been known as Ginger all her life, and had come to a point where she hated the penniless aspect of her life with her feckless parents. With the help of Miller, a known criminal, she had planned the bank robbery, even though she despised him. But she despised the whole human race, and would have been much happier if she’d been born a tigress.

Inspector Carson had thanked Boots and Polly for their help before departing with the rest of the police and their prisoners. He had also asked Boots to thank the young man, Mr Brown, for having discovered the whereabouts of the van.

Cassie and Freddy left to cycle home at last.

Boots asked Tommy and Vi if they’d suspected one of the crooks was a woman, and Vi said well, she had begun to have suspicions after an hour or so. There was something odd about that one’s movements, and the look of her waistcoat, and about the fact that
she
wore very small shoes for a man. Also, she never said anything, the man did all the talking. Yes, there was something funny about her. Nothing funny at all about a female like that, said Tommy. Vi said she meant funny peculiar, and that if nobody minded, what she’d like as soon as she’d got the children to bed was a pot of hot tea. Would Polly and Boots like to share it with her and Tommy?

‘Thanks, but not for me, Vi,’ said Boots, ‘it’s time I went back home.’

‘Time that I did too, old things,’ said Polly, ‘time for you and your family to have your home to yourselves again. Shall I drop you off, Boots?’

‘I’d appreciate that,’ said Boots.

‘Thanks ever so much, and you too, Polly,’ said Vi.

‘Spoken with feelin’ for both of us,’ said Tommy. ‘Pop in anytime you like, Polly, we keep open house for all our best friends.’

‘Polly, you’re a lovely person,’ said Vi.

Polly, quite touched, said, ‘I’ll tell some of my pupils that, those who think I’m a dragon.’

‘Goodnight,’ said Boots, and left with Polly.

‘Well, old sport?’ she said on the drive back to his home.

‘I’m thinking what a help it was, Tommy and Vi and their family keeping their heads, and Cassie and Freddy calling in,’ said Boots.

‘I imagine Vi died a thousand deaths,’ said Polly, unusually sober. The night was very fresh now, her coat collar turned up. ‘I hope she doesn’t suffer delayed shock tomorrow. By the way, I thought I helped a little myself.’

‘I haven’t forgotten that, Polly,’ said Boots.

‘Bless the man, he’s remembered to give me a mention,’ murmured Polly, coasting down Red Post Hill, headlamps on.

‘Not only for tonight, but for other occasions,’ said Boots.

‘My word,’ said Polly, coming to a stop outside his house, ‘you’ve known a crisis or two in your time, haven’t you?’

‘One or two,’ said Boots.

‘I suppose you realize I like sharing them with you?’

‘We’re old friends now, Polly,’ said Boots.

‘Don’t I know it,’ said Polly. ‘D’you think it’s worth a celebration?’

‘What kind of celebration?’ asked Boots.

‘Need you ask?’ said Polly. ‘Let’s drive into town and stay at the Savoy for the night. We could start with champagne and then do what comes naturally. Well, for God’s sake, we don’t want our friendship to grow so old that we’ll need a book of instructions on how to do what comes naturally, do we?’

‘If we do,’ said Boots, ‘get one with illustrations.’

‘I’ll order it for my eightieth birthday,’ said Polly. ‘Do you still make love to Emily?’

‘Ask me another,’ said Boots.

Polly smiled wryly.

‘The next time I get any change out of you will be the first,’ she said, and Boots got out of the car.

‘Goodnight, Polly, and many thanks,’ he said.

‘Ye gods,’ said Polly, ‘after an evening like this, and all my palpitations, don’t I even get a kiss, you stinker?’

‘You deserve one from all of us,’ said Boots.

‘I don’t want one from all of you, I want one from
you
,’ said Polly, face turned up. Boots bent his head and kissed her. Much to her pleasure, it wasn’t a peck. It was a full-blooded kiss. ‘Thanks,’ she said when it was over. With another wry smile, she said, ‘Do you sometimes wish I’d disappear?’

‘Never,’ said Boots.

‘How sweet,’ she said a little mockingly, ‘because I don’t intend to.’ She slipped into gear and drove away.

Emily was in the hall when Boots entered the house.

‘That woman,’ she said.

‘Polly?’ said Boots.

‘Well, who else?’ said Emily, green eyes snapping. ‘I’m goin’ to tell her one day to stop tryin’ to make you her prize possession. And what d’you mean by running about all over the place with her and leavin’ me and Chinese Lady in the dark? We’re not children, I’ll ’ave you know, you should’ve told us what a dreadful time Tommy and his fam’ly were havin’. Are they really all right? Lord, imagine it, those two disgustin’ people keepin’ them prisoners in their own house. It must’ve been a nightmare for Vi, thinkin’ what might ’appen to Alice, David and young Paul.’

‘It was a nightmare for all of them, Em, but Vi and the children stood up to it like the King’s troopers, according to Tommy,’ said Boots.

Eloise appeared then. She ran at Boots and hugged him.

‘Papa, ’ow good, you’re back at last,’ she said.

‘Not without gettin’ an earful,’ said Emily.

‘Earful?’ said Eloise.

‘Yes, and he’s goin’ to get another one from his mother,’ said Emily.

Which Boots did. Well, Chinese Lady wouldn’t have been herself if she hadn’t delivered a few matriarchal admonishments into his hearing apparatus. Eloise noted, however, that he took them all without looking in the least discomfited. He was very distinctive in his way, her English father, even if he wasn’t a nobleman like Rosie’s father.

Their long evening lengthened more for Cassie and Freddy by reason of having to acquaint the Browns with the sequence of events, and then Cassie’s dad. Mr Brown, Mrs Brown and Sally could hardly take it all in, and Mrs Brown said that if she’d known what was going on she’d have had a chronic fit in her own kitchen, and her husband would have had to tidy her up. She didn’t like to think, she said, that something quite wicked had been happening with the weddings only a few days away. She hoped Freddy and Cassie wouldn’t get their names in the paper, because if they did the whole of Walworth would turn up at the wedding, and young children could get trampled.

‘Yes, that’s just what could come from Freddy being a hero,’ said Cassie, ‘but I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again, Mrs Brown. Now I’d better get home to me dad. Thanks ever so much for the loan of your bike, Sally. Freddy and me both hope you have a lovely weddin’, same as ours.’

‘Bless you, Cassie,’ said Sally.

‘Oh, a pleasure, I’m sure,’ said Cassie.

‘I’ll take you home,’ said Freddy.

‘Oh, thanks, Freddy beloved,’ said Cassie, ‘sometimes you’re really nice.’

‘Well, I’d like to tell your dad all the news meself,’
said
Freddy, ‘he might get a story like Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves from you.’

In bed eventually, Vi whispered, ‘Give me a cuddle, Tommy.’

‘Give you six and a bit more, Vi,’ said Tommy, and took her into his arms. He had a feeling his Vi was going to have a good cry at last, but she didn’t.

‘Oh, I feel safe now,’ she breathed, her warm body pushing close.

‘Girl in a million, you are, Vi,’ said Tommy. ‘I’m not unadmirin’ of Em’ly and Susie, or of me sister Lizzy, but you’re the best, and I’m that proud of you I could decorate you.’

‘What, hang medals on my jumper?’ said Vi.

‘Sev’ral,’ said Tommy.

‘Oh, I don’t want any medals,’ said Vi, ‘I don’t need any, I’ve got you and the children.’ She thought for a moment, back to the nightmare when she’d been praying for Tommy and the children and had realized how much she cherished her everyday life with them. ‘Still, there is something I’d like.’

‘Name it,’ said Tommy, ‘and you can have it twice over.’

‘Tommy, I don’t want to be greedy, once will be enough,’ murmured Vi.

‘What once?’ asked Tommy.

‘Just you and me,’ said Vi.

‘Vi, you sure, after all you’ve been through?’ said Tommy.

‘Well, I’m wide awake,’ said Vi, ‘and we ought to do something nice to pass the time.’

‘That’s my girl,’ said Tommy.

Vi sounded just like her old self a few minutes later
when
she said, ‘Oh, my nightie, where’s it gone?’

‘D’you mind if we don’t look for it right now?’ said Tommy, and Vi, of course, didn’t mind at all.

In bed with Boots, Emily said, ‘I’m goin’ to stick pins in that woman.’

‘What woman?’ asked Boots.

‘As if you didn’t know,’ said Emily.

‘Polly, you mean?’

‘Of course I mean her,’ said Emily.

‘Seems a pity to do that to a family friend,’ said Boots.

‘Fam’ly friend?’ said Emily. ‘Don’t make me laugh. I could divorce you just from the way you let her look at you.’

‘What way is that, Em?’ asked Boots, switching off the bedside light.

‘I never saw any woman eat a man more with her eyes like she does you,’ said Emily. ‘It’s disgustin’.’

‘Chinese Lady would probably say it’s unlegal as well, Em.’

‘She’d be right,’ said Emily. ‘If it ’adn’t been such a shockin’ evening for the fam’ly, I’d have told that woman not to cross our doorstep again. I can’t think why Chinese Lady likes her – ’ere, what’s going on? Oh, no, you don’t – oh, me gawd, the sauce you’ve got when I’m feelin’ like I want to spit.’

‘Did you know you’ve been acquiring a couple of pumpkins these last months, Em?’ said Boots.

‘Oh, you common beast,’ breathed Emily, ‘you’re not first thing decent.’

Boots laughed.

Emily cuddled up. It was one thing to want to spit, it was another to be made a fuss of, even if it
wasn’t
first thing decent. It made her feel she was still exclusive.

In their own beds, Lizzy and Ned, and Susie and Sammy, slept in blissful ignorance of the dramatic events.

YOUNG PAUL WOKE
up crying the next morning, but Tommy and Vi performed a miracle of parental reassurance, and Alice treated him to a generous dose of sisterly affection, and even gave him sixpence out of her savings for his money-box. Since Paul, even at only four, seemed to be taking after his Uncle Sammy in his fondness for his money-box and what was in it, parental reassurance and sisterly generosity brought him out of his bed with a smile on his face.

Vi, having made a strong effort last night, with Tommy’s help, to put the nightmare out of her mind, was about to begin preparing breakfast when the phone rang. She had just entered the kitchen. Tommy was already there. They looked at each other.

‘Tommy, who could that be?’ she asked.

‘I’ll go,’ said Tommy.

Boots was on the line.

‘Seen your morning paper, Tommy?’ he said.

‘Oh, Jesus, it’s not all over the front page, is it?’ said Tommy. ‘We ’adn’t thought about the papers, and I don’t think anyone’s picked ours off the mat. yet We’ve been sortin’ out headaches.’

‘Well, there’s a hell of a lot about you and your family in our daily,’ said Boots. ‘The next thing you know, you’ll have reporters on your doorstep, and photographers as well. Chinese Lady is against all that.’

‘So am I,’ said Tommy.

‘Take the day off, then, all of you,’ said Boots. ‘It’s Good Friday tomorrow, anyway, and the schools break up today, don’t they? Go somewhere far away in the car, and don’t come back till it’s dark. The police have released all details to the Press, and you’re on the wireless as well. And don’t hang about, chum, get out of the house as soon as you can. Just tell the kids it’s a treat for them. Freddy’s got a mention too.’

‘What about you?’ asked Tommy.

‘Unfortunately, self as well, and Polly,’ said Boots. ‘So I’m giving my tribe a run down to Cuckmere Haven for the day in the car. They’re all running about getting ready. You start running about yourselves.’

‘We ’aven’t had breakfast yet,’ said Tommy.

‘Well, hurry it up,’ said Boots.

‘I think I’ll take your advice, Boots.’

‘Exactly how are Vi and the kids?’ asked Boots.

‘Nearly as good as new,’ said Tommy. ‘See you and your lot at Cuckmere Haven, eh?’

‘You’re welcome, Tommy, and the weather looks fair,’ said Boots. ‘Edwin’s off to work and taking Chinese Lady with him. She’ll spend the day shopping in the West End.’ Boots rang off.

‘Sammy? Sammy, come down here this minute.’ It was a demanding call from Susie. Sammy, who’d just finished dressing, came out of the marital bedroom. Daniel, from his own bedroom, let his treble voice be heard.

‘Crikey, what you done now, Dad?’

‘I’m innocent,’ said Sammy. Down he went to the
kitchen
. Susie, apron on, had the morning paper in her hand.

‘You won’t believe this,’ she said, and showed him the front page story. Sammy took it in like a man whose business had grown suicidal legs and jumped off Beachy Head.

‘I don’t believe it,’ he breathed.

‘I said you wouldn’t, but it’s there, Sammy, in black and white.’

‘Ruddy O’Reilly,’ said Sammy, ‘am I dreamin’? Those two crooks, one of them a peculiar female woman, parked themselves with their lousy gun on Tommy and his fam’ly?’

‘I’m glad I didn’t know,’ said Susie, ‘I’m glad that when I did, five minutes ago, it was all over. I’m goin’ round to see Vi as soon as I’ve got Daniel and Bess off to school. I’ll take little Jimmy with me. Heavens, what Vi and Tommy must’ve gone through, thinking about their children. And, Sammy, look at all the names mentioned. Boots, Vi, Tommy, Polly Simms and Freddy. Freddy was actually the young man who got in the way of the thieves just as they were leavin’ the bank, and the one who found where the van was. Sammy, why weren’t you there?’