The Urchin's Song (26 page)

He forced his mind away from the mental picture of Jimmy’s boot driving again and again into a man’s face until it was an unrecognisable bloody pulp, and all the while his brother and Patrick and Patrick’s henchmen laughing like a bunch of loonies, and now he repeated, ‘He’d get away with it. He’s got away with a lot worse.’ And he felt the twitch in the side of his jaw that worked his eye and made his mouth rise up at the corner flare into life for a moment before he scrubbed at his face with his hand.

Josie closed her eyes for a moment. There was something in the back of her mind nagging at her. ‘Have you heard from Da at all in the last few years? Has he been in touch with Duffy?’

‘No. No, I told you. Da told Patrick he was signin’ on a ship. That’s one of the reasons Jimmy feels like he does. He thought a bit of Da. Don’t ask me why, ’cos as far as I remember all Da did was knock the hell out of us, but anyway,’ Hubert shrugged, ‘there it is.’

‘Don’t go back tonight, Hubert.’ Josie put out her hands and gripped those of her brother.
Her da had been scared of the water.
She remembered that now. Why hadn’t she remembered before? But then she’d only been a wee bairn of five or six that warm summer’s night down at the dockside when she’d been begging outside one of the waterfront pubs as usual. Her da and one of his cronies had passed quite close by but she’d melted into the shadows before he’d seen her; his usual greeting on such occasions being a skelp of the lug along with a command to get her backside home, as though he hadn’t ordered her out begging just hours before. The other man had been trying to persuade her da to do something, she couldn’t recall his words or what it had all been about now, but she did remember her da saying, ‘Never. Never, man, an’ I don’t care if it’s easy pickin’s. You’ll not get me on a boat, even one in dock, for love or money. I like me feet on solid ground an’ there’s an end to it.’
Her da had said that.

‘I’ll be all right. No one knows I’m here.’ Hubert had let his hands remain in hers but his voice was determined.

‘Hubert, Da would never have gone off without a word to anyone, and I don’t believe boarding a ship would enter his mind. He didn’t like the water, he was frightened of it.’

‘What’s that got to do with anythin’?’

‘Well, Duffy said Da told him he was signing on a ship.’

‘You’d just put the law on ’em both. Likely he thought he might go down the line an’ it was the lesser of two evils.’

‘He wouldn’t. I just know he wouldn’t.’

‘Josie?’ Gertie put a hand on her sister’s elbow.

‘Don’t you see?’ Josie swung from one puzzled face to the other. ‘Patrick Duffy bought a whole host of alibis for the night he and Da came for me and Gertie, and with Da out of the way there was no one who could prove he’d been in Newcastle. It was my word, that of a twelve-year-old bairn, against a dozen or more folk.’

‘Oh come on, what’re you sayin’?’ Hubert shook his head, his tone openly scornful.

‘Da was the key, don’t you see? The police would accept I know my own da, but someone accompanying him could be more doubtful. And Duffy got hurt that night, burned on his legs and maybe his hands. He would have been mad. You know his temper, Hubert. He’s got a nasty streak.’

Nasty streak? Hubert thought of some of the things he had witnessed in the last few years. Nasty streak described a normal man and the little Irishman wasn’t normal. And those first weeks with Patrick - he
had
had something wrong with his hands. He hadn’t been able to do much, and he’d been constantly swearing and cursing. ‘You’re sayin’ . . . ?’

‘I’m not sure what I’m saying, but if Duffy did away with Da . . .’ Josie’s eyes moved from Hubert’s face to Gertie’s white one. ‘He could have. He’s capable of it, isn’t he?’

This last question was directed at Hubert, and now the young lad nodded dazedly. ‘Aye. Aye, he’s capable of it all right, but his own mate? An’ why take on me an’ Jimmy?’

‘Guilty conscience?’ No, that wasn’t right, Josie thought. Duffy was without conscience. Oh, she didn’t know all the ins and outs but the more she thought about this, the more certain she was that Duffy knew more than he was letting on about her father’s disappearance. They had always been so sure her da and the lads were together somewhere, and if her da had been alive, that’s what would have happened.

She looked at Hubert and saw his eyes were fixed on her. ‘You’re wrong, Josie. You have to be.’ He swallowed, and then made an impatient movement with his hand as he added, ‘An’ that’s by the by for the minute anyways. I came to put you on your guard. What are you goin’ to do?’

She stared at him, and it was a few seconds before she said, ‘If it’s me and Gertie they’re waiting for, we obviously can’t go back to Vera’s tonight. My . . . my agent was going to take us out to dinner later on so I’ll have to explain the situation to him.’ And at Hubert’s involuntary movement of protest, Josie added, ‘He’s not from these parts, Hubert, and he won’t say a word to anyone if I ask him not to, so there’s no harm in him knowing. Gertie and I will have to book into a hotel or something. Oliver will help with that, and then we’ll go back in daylight to Vera’s. They aren’t going to wait for us for ever, are they?’

‘I shouldn’t think so but they’re scared of Patrick - even Jimmy is, though he’d never admit it. Do you have to go back there at all?’

‘I don’t suppose so.’ Josie’s lips pursed in thought. ‘I could send a message to Vera to pack our things and bring them to us. A note or something.’

‘Be careful what you say.’ There was fear in Hubert’s voice. ‘Don’t mention me or anything like that. If it fell into Patrick’s hands . . .’

‘Oh, Hubert.’ Josie forgot about her own situation as she read the panic in his eyes. ‘If you’re so scared of him, why won’t you come with us? You could, right now. You don’t have to go back to wherever you live. You could be free of Duffy for good.’

‘Jimmy--’

‘Jimmy’s chosen his own road,’ Josie cut in, her voice harsh. ‘And you know it. But you’re different. You’re not like them.’

‘It’s not just Jimmy.’

‘Then what?’

He wished he could unburden himself, really unburden himself to Josie, but he couldn’t. The thing was, no one ever walked away from Patrick, and on the rare occasion someone had been stupid enough to try they’d been found floating face down in the docks sooner or later, mostly sooner. A sudden rush of terror gripped him, and his voice trembled as he said, ‘Nothin’, nothin’, I just can’t, that’s all. Look, I’ve told you now an’ I’ve got to go, all right? I . . . I’m glad you didn’t shop me an’ Jimmy, Josie. I didn’t think you’d do that somehow.’

Josie said again, ‘Oh, Hubert,’ but now in a voice strangled with tears, and the three of them were hugging again, Gertie openly crying, when Michelle Bousquet appeared in the passageway with her ladies from their
Living Statue
act. The ladies in the tableaux appeared to be almost nude, their bodies heavily covered in lacquer, and always caused a stir with the audience and more than a little collar adjusting and clearing of throats with the male fraternity, so now the effect of these well-proportioned, nubile creatures on Hubert was immobilising. He became transfixed, watching them pass with stunned eyes and an open mouth, and then blushed furiously when Michelle herself - a buxom, sleek-haired Parisian - turned and winked at him before she closed the dressing-room door and they were left alone again.

‘You see what you’re missing by not throwing your lot in with Josie?’ Gertie said wickedly, smiling up through her tears at this ‘baby’ brother who was a good eight or nine inches taller than her.

‘They . . . they were . . .’ Hubert’s voice failed him.

‘They weren’t, actually.’ Josie was grinning now, she couldn’t help it. ‘Although it looked like it.’ And then her face straightened as she said, ‘Promise me one thing. Promise me you’ll think about what I’ve said, about you coming to London and staying with me and Gertie. We’re leaving with Oliver Hogarth, my agent, from Central Station at two tomorrow. If you want to come, be there. That’s all you have to do. I’ll sort everything, I promise. I hate the thought of you going back to . . . all that.’

The boy hung his head for a moment, then muttered, ‘It’s no good. You don’t understand.’

‘Promise me you’ll think about it.’

‘Aye, aye all right, I promise.’

He was already backing away from them as he spoke, and the answer had been too quick - they all knew it. What could she do? What could she say that she hadn’t already said? All this time and now he was going to vanish again, but knowing Hubert and Jimmy were with Duffy, and that no one had seen hide nor hair of her da since that time in Newcastle had made everything a hundred times worse.
He was only twelve.
Twelve! But a streetwise, sharp, old twelve over whom she had no jurisdiction.

‘Hubert!’

Her cry went into empty air. He had already disappeared.

‘And you suspect this man, this Patrick Duffy fellow, is responsible for your father’s disappearance?’

Oliver had been sitting looking at her for the last moments in stupefied silence, so Josie was quite glad he had found his voice at last. She suspected their dinner conversation was not quite along the lines he had expected or desired.

They were seated, along with Gertie, at a very pleasant table in the Bridge Hotel situated in High Street West. The coaching inn had been converted from the eighteenth-century Sunderland residence of the Lambton family and was known for its good food and respectability. Oliver enjoyed the former and felt he needed to emphasise his acquaintance with the latter where his new protégée was concerned. He was well aware of his reputation, and normally it didn’t worry him a jot, but he didn’t want Josie thinking . . . What didn’t he want her thinking? He’d asked himself this several times whilst he’d waited for her to emerge from the stage door of the theatre earlier. That he wanted her in his bed? That he desired far more from her than a mere working relationship? Both were true. But he fancied - no, he
knew
- that he had to proceed carefully with this particular damsel. She wasn’t like the rest. Most of his set would doubtless laugh their heads off if they knew how he was thinking - Oliver Hogarth, the world’s greatest cynic with regard to affairs of the heart. But nevertheless . . .

‘I’m sure Patrick Duffy knows more than he is saying.’ And then Josie drew in a deep breath before adding, ‘In fact I’m convinced he did away with our father for reasons of his own, but unfortunately there is no proof. That’s the truth of it.’ She stared at him, her face almost defiant, and Oliver stared back at her in quiet amazement.

It wasn’t often he underestimated anyone - man or woman - but in the last hour as he had listened to Josie’s story over what had turned out to be an excellent meal, he’d had to admit to himself that that was exactly what he’d done regarding this particular female. She was strong, she had character and a mind of her own, and the air of innocence which sat so well with her fresh beauty and undoubted talent was not the kind of which naivety formed the base. He had had several mistresses in his time, but not one of them had affected him like this young woman who had, by her own admission, been born in the gutter and had started her singing career as a street urchin.

He cleared his throat twice before he said quietly, ‘That being the case, what do you wish me to do? From what you have told me, it would put your brother at risk if the authorities were informed of this plan to snatch both of you’ - he included Gertie in the sweep of his head - ‘but it goes against the grain for the man to assume he can behave however he feels so inclined.’

It might go against the grain for a man like Oliver Hogarth, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, to do nothing against an adversary he considered socially and morally beneath him, but then Oliver hadn’t started life in the East End of Sunderland in a two-roomed hovel frequented by rats and cockroaches and disease. Josie’s thoughts were not bitter, merely rational. Oliver had no idea of the power a man like Patrick Duffy wielded within his own community, nor of the protection that power gave him. Patrick was feared and loathed, but the respect brought about by blind terror ensured that whilst those about him might go down the line, Patrick wouldn’t.

‘No one would speak against Patrick Duffy,’ she explained, ‘they just wouldn’t. My father was a hard man and people were frightened of him, but he was scared stiff of Duffy. If you met him you’d understand why.’

‘After what you have told me, if I met him I would make sure only one of us was left breathing.’ And as Oliver saw her eyes widen, a slight smile touched the corners of his lips. ‘I might have had something of a sheltered upbringing, Miss Burns, but the last twenty odd years in the big bad world have ensured I am neither callow nor easily intimidated. I hold the opinion that certain men are like rabid dogs. The kindest thing for them and the individuals around them is to put them out of their misery.’

Now it was Josie’s turn to realise she had underestimated the man sitting watching her so calmly. She knew Oliver must be intelligent and intuitive to have reached the position he now held, but she’d had him down as one step removed from the idle rich; a womaniser, a gay blood, one of those aristocratic types with gold-knobbed canes and gold toothpicks who lived in a world where everything ran smoothly and harmoniously. But she’d misjudged him. The piercing quality to his eyes and the set of his mouth told her he hadn’t been joking in his remarks about Patrick. She saw Gertie shift uneasily on her seat and knew her sister had recognised it too.

‘I can understand how you feel but I have to think of my brother first and foremost. We’re leaving here tomorrow but he might choose to stay, and then there’s Vera and Horace . . .’ Her voice dwindled away, but then Oliver was disabused of the notion the pause was due to feminine feebleness when she raised her head and looked him straight in the eyes as she said, ‘But if it wasn’t for the safety of my loved ones I’d be only too pleased for you to meet Patrick Duffy, Mr Hogarth. I have a feeling you would deal with him exactly as he deserves.’