‘Fares please, any more fares’. I raised my left hand holding the six penny piece and the conductor took it, saying ‘Where to?’ ‘Euston please’ I replied. ‘I need another tuppence then’ came back the voice. I delved into my duffle coat pocket and felt what loose change I had before retrieving a penny and two half-pennies, which I then handed to the conductor and her machine, with two turns of the handle, whirred out a ticket, which she handed to me. Somehow, I remembered my manners and said ‘Thank you’, not that she heard me. She was already half-way up the stairs, her loud voice almost singing the words ‘Fare please, any more fares’.
I had got up early and excited. Barry had sent me a postcard the day before with the simple message. ‘Meet me at Euston tomorrow. My train arrives at 11.12. Don’t be late!’ Barry xx’. I hadn’t seen him since the Sunday two weeks before. ‘I’ve got a job at Baddesley Hall, near Coventry, that’ll take the best part of a month and I’ve got a servant’s room for the duration, plus food thrown in’. He sounded as excited as I wasn’t at the thought of not seeing him for such a long time.
We had met a few months before at Cliff Wilson’s 21st birthday party. I arrived late, expecting from what Cliff’s mum, Monica, had said, ‘a small affair’. In the event, the house was packed and, on seeing me, she said ‘I didn’t know Cliff had so many friends’ and shrugged her shoulders, as if to show me that she was powerless and was dreading every minute. She gave me a hug and a kiss and, as she turned back towards the kitchen, a voice behind me said ‘You’re the chosen one then? Phoebe is it?’
I turned and stood for a moment, taking in a young weather-beaten face, 20 or 25, I wasn’t sure which. He extended a hand, which I took, and said ‘Barry… Barry Mason, Cliff’s mate from his days at Latimer ’. ‘You’re a mason, a stone mason. I’m trying to remember what else Cliff told me about you’. He leaned in close to my face and I could feel his warm, sober, breath as he spoke. ‘I’m sorry, I’m having trouble with hearing you. Let me get you a drink and we can find somewhere quieter’. I screwed my face up involuntarily, as if to say ‘You must be kidding?’
He took my hand and led me through the faces and bodies filling the through-lounge and dining room. I recognised most of them and a few clearly expected me to stop, but Barry was taking me somewhere and, not wanting to make a scene, I went with him. After all, what could he do in a house full of people? One scream from me would be enough. The garden wasn’t that large but it did have an arbour with a bench at the far end, facing away from the house, overlooking a wildlife pond. Barry sat me on the bench, saying as he did ‘Don’t go away. I’ll go and get you that drink. Lemonade, no ice, right?’ ‘Thank you’ I answered back. Clearly, Cliff had told Barry who I was and I wanted to know just how much Cliff had told him? If he’d mentioned my scar I’d kill him!
After one sip of my lemonade I stared directly into Barry’s eyes and said ‘What did you mean by “the chosen one” back in the house?’ He looked at me, clearly surprised. ‘You must know Monica sees you as the future Mrs. Cliff Wilson’. It wasn’t a question and I took it for what it was – a statement of fact. I laughed, spraying lemonade over the front of Barry’s white Double-Two shirt. ‘Whaat? Why am I last one to know this?’ ‘The word is that Cliff is going to propose in a bit, in front of everyone, going down on bended knee and everyone is expecting you to say “yes”’.
‘Why are you telling me this. Surely, don’t you think Cliff would have discussed this with me before doing something so stupid?’ ‘Love does strange things to people’ Barry came back. ‘What’s you’re interest in all this? Has Cliff asked you to be his Best Man?’ ‘You got it in one. I said to him she doesn’t sound like the kind of woman, with her views and all that, who’ll walk down an aisle’. ‘My views?’ I heard myself say. ‘Clem says you’re a member of the Party, a unilateralist and want equal rights for women’. ‘He’s never complained’. ‘Well, he thinks you’ll move to the Right with a couple of kids and a house to run, and doesn’t that happen to all Lefties the older they get?’
My response was to swing to my right with every ounce of weight my body had and push Barry off the bench and spilling his glass of what turned out to be red grape juice all over his lap and up his polo shirt front as he fell. ‘Whaa the fuck’ I heard him say, as I stood up and with my left foot took a well aimed swing between his legs. Luckily for him, his hands were quicker than my foot, so no damage was done. ‘Nice to meet you Barry’ I said as I stepped over him and went in search of Cliff.
I found Cliff sitting on the sofa in the bay window, his hand resting on Sally Michael’s left knee as her left hand kneaded the inside of his right thigh. He looked up and said ‘I was about to come and find you. Mum said you’d gone off with Barry. He may be one of my best mates but I wouldn’t trust him with you for a minute.’ He turned to Sally and said ‘Both Commies’ and nearly fell across her lap as he spoke with a hint of a snigger, making sure to get a good look down her cleavage as he did. I put out a hand, which he took, and pulled him to his feet. ‘You’re pissed and it’s not four o’clock. You need to sober up. There’s no way I’ll say “Yes” to a drunk’. Luckily, Monica had the sense to put the upstairs out of bounds. It helped having a toilet at the back of the garage. I had stayed over enough times to know where I was going and Monica, bless her, treated me like a member of the family, as if, then it hit me, as if I was ‘a member of the family’. I liked a good shag and Cliff was happy to oblige, nothing fancy but it worked for me and it seemed to work for Cliff.
Cliff fell on the bed and was out cold by the time his head hit the pillow. I laid down beside him and said to myself ‘What are we going to do with you Cliff?, wanna-be Labour councillor, MP, with me in tow’. Back then there were enough CP voters to swing a few wards in our town, The constituency too, so I would make a good wife. I could see that and I understood why he wanted to marry me and I quite liked the idea… well I had until Barry arrived on the scene. There was something about Barry and knowing he was also in The Party only increased the attraction. I remember looking at Cliff, sleeping beside me, and thinking that less than an hour before I’d met a twenty-something man and here I was, beside his best friend, who I would have said ‘Yes’ to, wondering what he’d feel like?
I got up and went downstairs, found Monica and took her outside, which is how Sally ended up looking down the stairs at me as I pushed her up. ‘He needs you I promise’. I heard Sally say ‘Cliff’ as she opened the bedroom door. Behind me, for the second time that day a voice, this time one I recognised. ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ I looked at Barry and said ‘That’s the future Mrs Cliff Wilson. I rather like her and she comes with a good pedigree: her dad’s Secretary of the Borough Labour Party and her uncle, on her mother’s side, is Alderman Harry Watts, Chairman of the Hospital Board’. Barry stood beside me looking up the stairs. I went on ‘Sally works in the Registry Office, Births Deaths and Marriages, as an Assistant Registrar. Everyone knows her. She’ll make a good MP’s wife.’
It was an hour before Sally came and found me and Monica, who smiled and went into automated organiser mode and clapped her hands. ‘Party’s over everyone. Time to go home. Cliff sends his apologies’. Then she turned to Sally and me and said ‘Which one of you’s staying?’ ‘Sally’ I quickly replied. ‘Barry’s staying in the box room if you’re interested?’ Monica said to me, winking as she did.
I found Barry in the kitchen tackling the washing up and stacking used paper plates and cups into a bag. ‘Here, let me help with that’ I said, taking the bag from him, then Monica joined us. ‘Well, I think we’ll all remember today’ she said and we mumbled our agreement as we flicked soap suds at one another, laughing as we did.
When I got home the next afternoon, my sister Sharon’s first words were ‘What happened?’ ‘Sally Michael happened, that’s what’I replied. Not quite the truth but good enough for me.
I had climbed into the single bed with Barry knowing more about him after eight hours than I did about Cliff after two years. Cliff had been a vanity thing at first. He kept telling me how attractive I was and that he agreed with what I said, well, most of the time, but the Communist Party was never going to win power, so I should join the Labour Party, where I could get elected and make a difference - that was his plan and he had it all mapped out. By thirty he was going to be the local MP, and I believed him.
Barry, on the other hand, wanted to work for the Ministry of Public Works repairing and maintaining historic monuments. The better he was the more peripatetic the work. He was already moving about and he was honest enough to tell me straight away that his mobility tended to complicate relationships. I took this claim on his part as a challenge - if anyone could prove him wrong it was Phoebe Weller.
A FOOTNOTE. Sometimes a story gets away from me and I end up using several paper bags instead of one. This was such an occasion. Robert.
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