1926 was the year of the General Strike, but Adams Enterprises, under the wily management of Sammy Adams, youngest entrepreneur in Walworth and Lambeth, was doing very well. All the Adams brothers worked in the business, and so did two of the wives, Emily and Susie. There was just one dark cloud on the horizon – the impending trial of Gerald Ponsonby. Boots had been the one responsible for catching the murderer, and Ponsonby hated Boots and, indeed, the entire Adams family. He was determined to get his revenge and make them suffer.
When a dapper, quiet, but rather odd lodger turned up at Doreen Paterson’s house, nobody thought anything was amiss. It never occurred to Doreen – who worked for Boots in Adams Enterprises and thought him just wonderful – that the strange lodger might be plotting the downfall of the irrepressible, outrageous, and larger-than-life Adams clan.
Cover
About the Book
Title Page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
About the Author
Also by Mary Jane Staples
Copyright
Dear Ronald,
I hope this letter will reach you. I am having it smuggled out for posting. I am, as you see, in Pentonville Prison, awaiting trial for murder at the Old Bailey in June. You know my predilections, they’re identical with yours, and you know too how you and I have always suffered hostility and interference due to that for which we have a common liking. You were wise to leave Nottingham and exile yourself in France when the Nottingham police began an investigation into the disappearance of some silly girl. In not going with you, I now find myself the victim of an infernally hostile and interfering busybody, a man named Robert Adams, who struck me senseless and delivered me to the police. If I’m found guilty of shortening the useless lives of a few girls whom I saved from growing up fat and commonplace, I shall be hanged.
Accordingly, I ask you, my dear brother, to return to England and do what I am sure you will wish to do in the event of my enforced demise. That is, to avenge us, for whatever is done to one of us is done to both, as we have always agreed. It will be too dangerous for you to visit me in prison, even if you were allowed to, as I’ve been asked questions about the missing Nottingham girl on the grounds that I answer the description of the man the police wish to interview. Wait for the trial and the verdict, and in the meantime find out all you need to about Robert Adams and his family. I do know he has two brothers, with whom he runs a business somewhere in Camberwell, but I believe they are all better known in Walworth. He may have other brothers, and he may have sisters. I suggest you find lodgings in Walworth and begin your enquiries there. Robert Adams has a daughter, by the way, a young girl who would photograph very prettily. In the event of a guilty verdict, I shall go to the scaffold consoled by my conviction that you will attend to Robert Adams and other members of the brood.
I don’t think I need tell you that as we’re identical twins you must change your appearance, since there are people in Walworth who would see me in you. This letter may be my goodbye. If so, I wish you freedom from the interference that will have brought me to fatal misfortune. But we will remain one, you and I. Gerald.
MAY, 1926.
The country was falling apart.
The General Strike was on.
The trade unions had said they’d no wish to call it, and the Government had said it would be calamitous if they did. The coal-miners’ union said make some concessions, then. The Government said we’ll set up a commission. We’ve had some of that, said the miners, and out they came at midnight on the first of May. All other trade unions followed.
They’ve all gone barmy, said the cockney women of London, fearful that they wouldn’t even be able to buy bread for their families.
Everything seemed to come to a stop, except public utilities such as water and gas. Factories were suddenly silent, trains ceased to run, and so did trams and buses. Newspaper presses closed down and delivery vans disappeared from the streets of towns and villages. Belligerent strikers roamed around London, some with the Red Flag hoisted high. Unfortunately for their cause, that got up the noses of the general public.
‘Bugger the Red Flag,’ said cockney housewives when they found that even milk deliveries had disappeared from their doorsteps.
The Government, controlling huge resources, went into action. So did the people. Volunteers poured forward to drive trams, buses, trains and vans, and to get essential services going. Fights broke out. The public joined in, siding for the most part with the volunteers. From Government printing presses issued a one-sheet informative newspaper called The British Gazette. It was the brainchild of Winston Churchill, Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Non-union workers did what they could to keep some factories going, but were hampered by a lack of raw materials. People got up earlier than usual to walk to their places of work. Business, however, was still badly affected, and country people didn’t think much of a strike at this time of the year. Well, country people saw the first week of May as a time for celebrating the arrival of summer, even if summer had a fit of the sulks and refused to turn up. Come to that, there were some street kids in Walworth mostly of the little girl kind, who liked to do a bit of dancing round a maypole erected on waste ground near Rodney Place. This year, a daft trade unionist, having looked up the rules of a building workers’ union, declared that the erection of a maypole could only be carried out by a union member. Which couldn’t be done, on account of the strike. Little girls cried and blew their wet noses on their frocks, and six hefty housewives sat on the bloke and stuffed his book of rules down inside his trousers where it would do the most damage. It hurt him as well. But the maypole went up and the little girls danced around it.
There was one boss who’d seen the strike coming and had taken precautions. That was Sammy Adams, the driving force behind Adams Enterprises, Adams Fashions and Adams Scrap Metal. He’d never favoured strikes. He believed in hard work, initiative, competitiveness and making good use of one’s brainbox. Everyone had a brainbox, but not everyone made proper use of what nature had gifted. Sammy believed in using his to the full. He also believed in paying a fair wage, but expected every employee to earn it. Twenty-four, he had striven since his formative years to make a name for himself, and had acquired a talent for looking ahead.
At the moment, Adams Fashions had a highly important contract to fulfil, a contract for supplying ladies’ wear to Coates of Kensington. Coates had branch stores all over the South of England. There were mouth-watering profits to be made, providing nothing happened to muck the whole thing up. Late delivery would cost the firm a packet, and Sammy was dead against that kind of thing, which was ruinous and also painful to a businessman of his standing.
However, he had looked ahead, seen the trouble signs and accordingly taken precautions. Adams Fashions were stuffed to the roof of a rented warehouse with materials and fabrics all relevant to the manufacture of ladies’ wear and all purchased well in advance of the General Strike. Sammy, in fact, had practically cornered the market in fabrics as far as the London rag trade was concerned. And as his factory in Islington employed seventy non-union seamstresses, production was up to schedule, if not in advance. His East End workers were unshakeably loyal to him and his brother Tommy, their manager. They received bonuses for extra effort, something unheard-of in East End factories, especially in the sweatshops. Sammy’s seamstresses kept very quiet about it. He didn’t want irate competitors making arrangements to blow the factory up.
As it was, a number of his competitors, those who also employed non-union labour, were already discovering they’d only be able to keep their factories going by purchasing materials from Adams Fashions. The Lancashire supply mills had been shut down by the strike, and London wholesalers were depleted. Tommy had begun to accept enquiries and orders for stocks over the phone. The price per bale, he said to one more enquiring competitor, was five quid.
‘It’s what?’
Tommy repeated the price.
‘Listen, Tommy Adams, if that’s the thieving price Sammy’s put on the goods, tell him to measure his bleedin’ self for a coffin.’
‘What’s ten per cent extra except to cover ’andling charges?’ said Tommy. ‘And a bit of allowable profit?’
‘Ten per cent my backside, it’s nearer twenty.’
‘Sammy’s got to live,’ said Tommy.
‘So have I. I don’t go for havin’ my throat cut by Sammy.’
‘It’s a hard life,’ said Tommy.
‘It’s harder when someone’s crucifying you. But I’ve got to have that stuff.’
‘Pleasure,’ said Tommy. ‘COD, of course.’
There was a strangled cry of pain at the other end of the line.
Sammy’s personal assistant, the former Miss Susie Brown, now Mrs Sammy Adams, informed him she was shocked at what he was doing to his competitors.
‘Sammy, it’s just not decent.’
‘Still, it’s good business, Susie.’
‘It’s profiteering.’
‘Same thing, Susie.’
‘It’s not Christian,’ said Susie, a lovely blue-eyed young wife of twenty-one.
‘Well, as you know,’ said Sammy, ‘business ain’t quite the same as goin’ to church, Susie. I’m as religious as the next man—’
‘No, you’re not,’ said Susie. ‘Sammy Adams, you know I didn’t hold with you buying up everything you could lay your hands on. I’ve just been speakin’ to that nice Mr Ross of Shoreditch. He says by this time next week he won’t have a single yard of material left in his factory.’
‘Poor old Georgie Ross, what a cryin’ shame, Susie. I’ll have to buy him out.’
‘No, you won’t,’ said Susie, ‘I’ve arranged to let him have all he wants from the warehouse.’
‘Well, good for you, Susie. What price did you ask?’
‘The price we paid.’
‘Now, Susie, don’t say things like that. Things like that give me a headache.’
‘I repeat, the price we paid,’ said Susie. ‘Of course, there was ten per cent for storage costs and five per cent for handling charges.’
‘Susie, you caution, consider yourself me favourite personal assistant,’ said Sammy. Susie was a caution. They’d been married a month, and he’d said a few private words to her during their honeymoon in Devon.
He began by saying, ‘Susie?’
‘Yes, Sammy?’
‘I want to tell you something.’
‘Yes, Sammy.’
‘You’re beautiful, did you know that?’
‘Oh, yes, I do know, but it’s nice you know too.’
‘I’ve got a certain feelin’, Susie, that you’re beautiful all over.’
‘Well, yes, I am, Sammy.’
‘Mind, I haven’t seen you all over.’
‘Oh, dear, I am sorry, but never mind, you can take my word for it.’
‘Seeing we’re married, Susie, don’t I have the privilege of—’
‘Some hopes you’ve got, you shocker, if you think I’m goin’ to do a Lady Godiva act for you.’
‘Have I asked you to, Susie, have I asked you to sit on a horse in your birthday suit?’
‘Not yet you haven’t,’ said Susie, who had discovered that Sammy, an electrifying businessman, was also an electrifying lover. She laughed.
‘What’s funny, might I ask?’ enquired Sammy.
‘You are, Sammy love. All right, I’ll let you see me in my birthday suit, when we turn out the lights in our bedroom tonight.’
‘You might not believe it, Susie, but I can’t see in the dark.’
‘Oh, dear, can’t you really, Sammy, what a blow. Still, here we are, sitting on the cliffs, and you can see the beautiful view, can’t you?’
‘Susie, you saucebox.’
‘Same to you, Sammy love,’ said Susie.
Sammy never got any change out of speaking to her, privately or otherwise.
Today, the third day of the strike, Susie was at the Camberwell offices and he was at the rented factory in Islington. His faithful seamstresses were being intimidated by strikers. He’d received a phone call from Tommy and had travelled immediately from Camberwell to Islington.
Gertie Roper, his loyal charge-hand, was very upset. A thin woman, Shoreditch-born, she was the kind of gutsy person Sammy liked. She was a worker, an honest and efficient one, and she earned every penny of the extra he paid her for being in charge of the machinists. There was very little Gertie wouldn’t do for Sammy and Tommy to ensure productivity was of a kind that meant the firm would make money. She didn’t at all mind that Sammy made money. That was what bosses ran a business for, to make money, otherwise there wouldn’t be any businesses. But she had her reservations about some bosses, particularly those who ran the East End sweatshops and paid their seamstresses a pittance. She was a Bolshie as far as they were concerned. Sammy Adams was a different proposition. He was a corblimey lovely boss, and Gertie had a cockney woman’s frank affection for him. To her two growing sons she had lately been handing out advice and warnings.
‘Listen, you grubby ’orrors, either you grow up like yer dad or like Mister Sammy Adams, or I’ll put both of yer through me mangle. Either you’re goin’ to be real men or ’orrible ’ooligans, and you ain’t goin’ to be any kind of ’ooligans, you ’ear me? Mister Sammy and yer dad was both as poor as church mice once, but they still grew up to be real men, and so will you, the pair of you, or through me mangle you’ll go and come out flat all over. You got that?’
‘Yes, Ma.’
‘All right, then, now go and wash yer faces and stop tryin’ to pull the cat’s tail orf.’
Gertie was also fond of handsome Tommy, the factory manager. He always lent an ear to the girls and their problems, and their problems were usually to do with family poverty. It was no wonder she was in an upset state today, for the strikers had not only made it difficult for the seamstresses to get into the factory, but were now threatening to smash all its windows unless the women joined the strike. Bert, her husband, was out there, trying to calm the strikers down. Bert was Sammy’s maintenance man and also the factory’s Jack-of-all-trades. Sometimes he could hardly believe he was actually taking home a regular wage of two pounds five shillings a week. That on top of Gertie’s charge-hand wage of twenty-one shillings a week meant they were beginning to feel rich. It also meant they felt they could afford something better than their shabby little flat-fronted dwelling in Shoreditch. Sammy advised them to buy a decent little house in a decent street. Get a mortgage, he said, don’t pay rent, not if you can afford a mortgage. Rent’s money down a drain, he said. The thought of herself and Bert, and their four children, having a house of their own turned Gertie giddy.
She was beginning now to get steamed up about the strikers. Everyone in Islington and Shoreditch, the strikers included, knew that Sammy and Tommy Adams were good bosses. What sense was there in breaking up the factory of good bosses? What good would it do the workers? Gertie might have sent for the police had she not believed in the East End principle of encouraging coppers to mind their own business.
There was a large blackboard outside the factory. On the blackboard was a boldly chalked announcement.
Bert was in charge of the bucket. A well-known figure, he was giving the impression that he himself was out on strike. As an ex-docker, he had felt he had to make some gesture, and Sammy had said right, look after the bucket and make known the seamstresses are working to help support the miners’ families, which is a sight better than coming out.
The strikers kept listening to Bert. They also kept interrupting him. Now, finally, they’d told him to get the factory shut down or else. Non-union workers were all scabs. They wanted quick action before any rozzers turned up.
‘It ain’t my job to get it shut down,’ said Bert, ‘and it wouldn’t make sense, anyway. The miners are goin’ to get ’alf everyone’s wages, plus the same amount from the guv’nor, so stop shovin’.’
The strikers became stroppy. One of them aimed a kick at the bucket. It turned over and clanged about. Coppers spilled from it.
‘In ten seconds, mate, we start smashin’ the winders,’ shouted a striker.
‘Don’t talk daft,’ said Bert.
‘Watch yerself, Bert,’ said another man, ‘yer beginnin’ to sound like a bleedin’ blackleg.’
‘You ever call me a blackleg,’ said Bert, ‘and I’ll break your back.’
Inside the factory, Gertie was talking to Sammy and Tommy.
‘I’m goin’ out there meself,’ she said, ‘I ain’t ’aving them set about Bert. ’E’s me old man, the only one I’ve got, and I want ’im all in one piece when ’e gets ’ome this evenin’.’
‘You stay here,’ said Sammy. He had addressed the strikers once, half an hour ago. He’d said nothing about the fact that his factory was a non-union shop, he simply pointed out that the business gave regular work to over sixty seamstresses, none of whom had any complaints, and that it wouldn’t help the miners or anyone else if they all walked out. It would damage the business and probably result in cancelled contracts. That would mean laying off more than half the women. If that was what you blokes were after, he said, you’d better send a spokesman into the factory and tell them so. But watch out your spokesman doesn’t get his legs broken. The girls ain’t partial to bad news. The strikers said that what they were after was workers’ solidarity. Well, have a meeting about it, said Sammy, and try to come up with something that won’t cut Gertie Roper’s throat. Gertie’s the girls’ spokesman. The strikers muttered and growled, and Sammy left them to deliberate. Now, however, it was all too obvious the strikers weren’t going to be satisfied until the factory was shut down. ‘Tommy, we’ll have to go out and read ’em the riot act. Bert needs help.’
‘Time we gave him some, then,’ said Tommy, a tall and stalwart young man of twenty-six. ‘Time too we thought about callin’ in the coppers.’
‘Not on your life,’ said Sammy. ‘People round here have got a kind eye for Adams Fashions. Kind eyes round here, Tommy, turn sour if the law’s called in. Come on.’
He and Tommy went outside to stand shoulder to shoulder with Bert, who was facing up to prospective violence. A large man, newly arrived, received a whispered word or two from a striker. He gave Sammy the once-over.
‘’Ello, you’re Sammy Adams, are yer?’ he said. ‘You’re the bleedin’ boss, are yer?’
‘Dead right, I’m the bleedin’ boss,’ said Sammy, ‘and I’ve got one man on strike, Bert Roper here.’
‘’E looks like a bleedin’ bosses’ man to me.’
‘Bert Roper’s his own man,’ said Sammy, ‘don’t make any mistake about that. He’s come out. I asked him not to. It made no difference. He’s out, and it’s causin’ me considerable inconvenience. I’ve been a worker, man and boy, all me life, and I can recognize when workers are committin’ fatal suicide. I hope you’re followin’ me.’
‘You’re a ponce,’ said the large man, ‘and it’s suicide for yer fact’ry if you don’t shut it down.’
Sammy eyed him sorrowfully. The bloke was a pain in the neck. Sammy knew the type. They thrived on trouble, not being able to relate to uncomplaining workers. The large size of this one didn’t intimidate Sammy, whose dealings with all kinds of people had given him a maturity that belied his twenty-four years. Further, he had a good pair of shoulders and a hard fist.
‘I hear you’ve got some idea about smashin’ all our windows,’ he said.
‘Yer bloody right we ’ave,’ said the large cove, ‘and that’s just for starters. Take a butcher’s at me brothers’ ammo.’
Several hands were raised to show bricks and half-bricks.
‘That’s not very friendly, mate, nor reasonable,’ said Tommy.
‘See here, cully,’ growled the large man, ‘me and me brother unionists ain’t been brought up to be reasonable on account of bein’ victimized from the age of one.’
‘Yer bleedin’ right,’ said a striker. The mood was ugly now. People were looking on from a distance, waiting for the fireworks to begin. ‘We gave ’em ten seconds to shut the fact’ry down ten minutes ago, and they ain’t taken a blind bit of notice. Time we let fly.’
‘Lay off, mates, you still ain’t makin’ sense,’ said Bert. Lean and sinewy, he could take care of himself and hand out a few wallops while doing so.
‘Sod makin’ your kind of sense!’ bawled another striker, and he chucked a brick. It smashed the office window. Flying glass showered around Gertie, watching from the window. A sliver cut her face and drew blood. That did it, as far as Gertie was concerned. She rushed into the workshop as more bricks were thrown. Strikers charged, and Sammy, Tommy and Bert were suddenly in a fight with several of them. Out came Gertie, seamstresses pouring after her, yelling and shouting, slats of wood in their hands.
‘I’ll give yer try to knock me ’ead orf!’ yelled Gertie, and led the charge of her petticoat brigade into the fight. She smote the capped head of a man.
‘Oh, yer bitch!’
‘You bleedin’ ’ooligan, who’s a bitch?’ Gertie bashed his cap. Then the seamstresses, at least thirty of them, were all at work. The large man couldn’t believe his eyes. His brothers couldn’t believe what was happening to their heads. Down came the slats of wood, whacking and thumping. What the hell was going on? Workers against workers, one lot in skirts? It shouldn’t be allowed. Who’d got a rule book?
‘Give over, yer crazy female, or I’ll pull yer drawers off!’ bawled a conked striker to a young, smiting machinist.
‘Oh, yer common sod, I ’eard that,’ cried the girl. ‘Did you ’ear it, Mrs Biddy? ’E said ’e’ll pull me drawers off. ’Ere, take that!’ She conked him again, and so did the woman backing her up, a Mrs Biddy. The striker fell over. Mrs Biddy, a buxom woman, trod on him.
The seamstresses and Gertie were fighting for the factory, for their jobs and for their bosses, and the bulk of the strikers couldn’t make head or tail of this development. The rest of them, a small mob led by the large man, were at Sammy, Tommy and Bert, who were doing what they could to hold them off. But Gertie and a dozen seamstresses were at the backs of this mob, clouting them.
‘I ain’t believin’ this,’ panted one man, as his cap was knocked off and his head whacked.
Onlookers across the street gawped and gaped. Crikey, what a punch-up, what a corblimey free-for-all. A woman shouted.
‘Go it, gels! Up the workers!’
A policeman’s whistle sounded from way down the street. The onlookers melted away by instinct. The large man disentangled himself from the mêlée, roared at Sammy that he’d get him, and then made himself scarce. The strikers followed on his heels. Coppers’ whistles were always bad news.
‘Disappear, girls,’ said Sammy, and Gertie and her machinists poured back into the factory.
When two bobbies arrived on the scene, all was quiet. Outside the factory, only Bert was visible, standing beside the bucket, the righted blackboard behind him. He attended to the coppers’ questions. No, no real trouble, he said, just one window that got broken accidental. Sure? What happened to your face, then? Walked into that ruddy blackboard, said Bert. One bobby recommended that the factory should be enclosed within a strong wire fence, with entrance gates that could be locked. It might help to stop your face walking into blackboards, Mr Roper. Bert said a wire fence would make the factory look an unfriendly place, and the boss, Mister Sammy Adams, was against that kind of thing. The other bobby wanted to know what sort of an accident it was that had broken the window. Funny you should ask that, said Bert, I was just about to mention I broke it meself. I was shifting the blackboard and it fell against the glass. Dear oh lor’, said the bobby, how unfortunate. You sure there’s been no trouble, Mr Roper? Nothing to complain about, said Bert. Well, call the station next time you’ve got nothing to complain about, said the bobby, keeping his face straight, and he and his colleague left.
Sammy would have dealt with the coppers himself, but he had a black eye and some sore ribs. Tommy had a painful knee and a bruised jaw. Bert came in to report his conversation with the coppers, and suggested he’d better do a night watch in case the large bloke and some of his brothers turned up when it was dark. Sammy, nursing his eye with a cold wet flannel, said, ‘No, you might get done over, Bert. We’ll ask the station for a couple of bobbies and pay for the service.’ Then he and Tommy went from the office into the workshop to see how the girls were. The girls were at their machines and going it.
‘Bless me soul, Mister Adams,’ said Gladys, an established hand, ‘where’d yer cop that fancy mince pie? You ain’t been in a fight, ’ave yer? Mister Adams, I’m surprised at yer. And what’s happened to Mister Tommy? ’E’s lookin’ all bruised. You ain’t walked into a wall, ’ave yer, Mister Tommy?’
‘Something like that,’ said Tommy.
‘You ought to look where yer goin’,’ said Gertie, a piece of lint and sticking plaster covering the cut on her cheek. ‘Walls is dangerous. Look what one’s done to Mister Sammy.’
Mrs Lilian Hyams, designer exclusive to Adams Fashions, came out of her drawing office. A war widow, her exceptional talents as a designer had brought her offers from famous fashion houses. She had turned them all down. Sammy and his electrifying approach to challenges had fascinated her when she first met him. But it was more than that. Sammy alone had had faith in her designs at a time when she was flat broke and desperate. He had offered her a contract on the spot. It pulled her up from the gutter of poverty to become an overnight rival of established designers. She used the professional name of Mimi Dupont. That was Sammy’s idea. She knew all three Adams brothers. They were Gentiles who had broken into the rag trade and broken it wide open, with Sammy leading the way. Lilian, extrovert and talented, put her grateful heart and soul into all her work. As far as she was concerned, only an elephant could drag her away from Adams Fashions, and even then she’d only go kicking and screaming.
Now she regarded Sammy with a whimsical smile.
‘Sammy, is that you hiding behind a shiner? My life, is it?’
‘I admit to being injured,’ said Sammy, dabbing his shiner again, ‘but it ain’t fatal, and Bert and Tommy are still alive.’
‘I saw it all from the office,’ said Lilian.
‘Best place,’ said Tommy, ‘it was dangerous outside.’
‘Mister Tommy, we feel for yer,’ said the young seamstress who’d given a good account of herself. ‘I wouldn’t go near ’ooligans like that meself.’
‘I heard that, Maggie,’ said Sammy. ‘I seem to have a picture in me mind of certain machinists interferin’ in the argument that was takin’ place outside. I’m against you ladies carryin’ on like that. It’s highly risky and liable not to do you much good, either. I ought to be layin’ down the law and remindin’ you I don’t hold with ladies participatin’ in argumentative punch-ups. But I won’t, seein’ it was a rescue act. Only don’t do it again, in case some of you charge me for wear and tear. Do I remark you’re sufferin’ wounded wear and tear, Gertie?’
‘Slightly, yer might say, Mister Sammy,’ said Gertie. ‘We don’t recall no punch-up, not us, yer know. It was just that we wasn’t goin’ to stand for the fact’ry bein’ smashed up.’
‘I see your point, Gertie, even if one of me optics is a trifle bunged up,’ said Sammy, and seamstresses giggled.
‘I’ll bring a shotgun tomorrow,’ said Lilian, looking eye-catching in one of her own creations, a beaded peach-coloured straight dress with a scalloped hem. Her silk-stockinged legs showed to her knees. Just thirty, she was unable to take on the popular flat-chested look of the flappers, for she had an old-fashioned figure. That worried her not at all, since most men were against straight lines, and none of the Adams brothers had ever suggested that as a designer of flapper fashions she ought to do something about flattening herself.
‘No shotguns,’ said Tommy.
‘I should worry about blowing a few heads off?’ said Lilian.
‘It’s against the law,’ said Tommy, and Lilian laughed. She was a happy woman, and she had a good relationship with the seamstresses. Their rushing charge from the factory had exhilarated her. They were all characteristic of East End women, hard-working, resilient and fiercely loyal to their kind. They were afraid only of themselves and their husbands being out of work. That fear was a stalking spectre in the minds of most people in the East End. Working for Sammy Adams kept that spectre at bay for these women, and their action in beating off the militant strikers had been a demonstration of a different kind of loyalty, an unusual one among East End workers. It was a loyalty to their bosses.
Lilian knew that Sammy and Tommy were aware of it.
Sammy arrived back in his Camberwell office just after three o’clock, in time to receive a cup of tea and some biscuits from Doreen Paterson of the general office.
Doreen, taking a look at him, said, ‘Crikey.’
‘Something bothering you?’ said Sammy.
‘Mister Sammy, did you know you’ve got a black eye?’
‘Have I? Unfortunate if it notices.’
‘Did it ’appen at the factory?’ asked Doreen.
‘We had a bit of an argument with some of the strikers who’ve decided to picket non-union workshops,’ said Sammy. ‘It’s a diabolical liberty and saucy as well, but the factory’s still workin’.’ His left eye was swollen, his ribs tender.
‘It’s awful, the fights that are goin’ on,’ said Doreen. ‘The strikers are so bad-tempered about the way people are standin’ up to them. I just ’ope you won your fight, Mister Sammy, and that the other bloke’s got two black eyes.’
‘It hurts me to say so, Doreen, but I think the other bloke just had a grin on his face.’ Sammy took a welcome mouthful of the hot tea. ‘You havin’ trouble gettin’ to work and goin’ home?’
‘Well, it’s bothersome gettin’ on a tram or bus,’ said Doreen, ‘but I’m managing. Shall I send Ronnie out to buy you a piece of raw steak?’ Ronnie was the office boy.
‘Too late,’ said Sammy, wishing his bunged-up mince pie hadn’t happened.
‘Well, you’ve got me deepest sympathy, Mister Sammy,’ said Doreen, and departed to inform the general office girls that he’d returned from Islington with a shiner.
Mrs Susie Adams entered her husband’s office. As his wife, with a house on Denmark Hill to look after, her hours now were from ten until four instead of from nine until five-thirty. That allowed her enough time for her domestic chores, which so far she counted as a labour of love. Love at the moment was at its most exciting. Boots, her brother-in-law, teased her, of course, with questions like what happened last night, Susie? Last night? Yes, you’re wearing a blush this morning.
There her husband was, back from Islington, his head bent as he scanned letters on his desk.
‘Sammy?’
‘What is it, Miss Brown?’
‘Not that old chestnut, if you don’t mind.’
‘Ah, yes,’ said Sammy, ‘what is it, Mrs Adams?’
‘Was there much trouble at the factory?’
‘A slight argument, but the factory’s still goin’ full pelt,’ said Sammy, keeping his head down.
‘Sammy, there’s a button missin’ from your jacket,’ said Susie.
‘Fell off,’ said Sammy.
‘Fell off, my foot,’ said Susie.
‘No, off me jacket,’ said Sammy.
‘Sammy, look at me.’
‘I’m up to me ears, Susie, and all behind as well.’
‘Look at me when I’m talkin’ to you,’ said Susie.
‘Oh, well, it’s now or never, I suppose,’ said Sammy, and lifted his head to show her his damaged eye. Susie blinked.
‘Who did that?’ she asked.
‘Walked into a sandwich-board,’ said Sammy.
‘No, you didn’t. Who hit you?’
‘I didn’t catch his name,’ said Sammy, ‘just his wallop.’
Boots, his eldest brother, came in then. Two months short of thirty, he had an air of maturity, gained in advance by his time in France and Flanders. He was, however, a good-humoured man and a tolerant one.
‘Sammy,’ he said, ‘I understand you’ve been slightly damaged. Yes, I see you have. You’ve collected a beauty. What happened?’
‘All right,’ said Sammy, ‘I’ll use up some of me valuable time to tell you how our factory light brigade charged the Bolsheviks.’ He recounted events.
‘Help,’ said Susie, ‘the machinists set about the strikers?’
‘And then went back to work as if they’d only had a tea break,’ said Sammy, ‘which I suggest is what we do to earn our crusts. Any messages, Susie?’
‘Yes,’ said Susie, ‘Miss de Vere wants a report on progress, she’s worried in case the factory gets shut down.’ Miss de Vere was the chief buyer for Coates. ‘She respects how busy you are, Sammy, and said if you don’t have time to phone her, she’d like Boots to.’
Sammy managed a grin.
‘Passed to you, Boots,’ he said.
‘Yes, she’s gettin’ faint about you, Boots,’ said Susie, ‘but I won’t tell Emily.’
‘Nor me,’ said Sammy, ‘or Em’ly might injure me other optic.’
‘I’ll try to work my way out of danger,’ said Boots. ‘Production’s up to schedule, Sammy?’
‘Production is steamin’,’ said Sammy, ‘all on account of Tommy and the girls keepin’ the pot boilin’.’
‘I’ll pass the good news on to Miss de Vere,’ said Boots, and went back to his office.
‘Sammy,’ said Susie, ‘I’ll do something about your eye as soon as you get home.’
‘I’ll appreciate that,’ said Sammy, ‘I’m sufferin’ a bit of vision trouble.’
‘What sort of trouble?’ asked Susie in concern.
‘I can only see half of you,’ said Sammy.
AT THREE THIRTY, Mrs Emily Adams, Boots’s wife, covered her typewriter and put her hat and gloves on. While she had never been known as a beauty, her nose being peaky and her chin too pointed, she did have a crown of dark auburn hair and striking eyes of a swimming green. When animated or excited, she could sparkle, and people forgot that she was plain. She had an inner energy that could make her eyes look bright and lively. At the moment, she was painfully thin. She’d begun to lose weight months ago, and her Denmark Hill doctor had diagnosed anaemia. Boots eventually came to question that, and so did she herself. She thought it might be something worse. So she asked her doctor if she could consult her previous practitioner for a second opinion. He readily gave her a letter to carry to Dr McManus of Walworth, who came up with his own diagnosis after a careful examination and several questions about her diet.
‘Emily, Emily,’ he said, shaking his head, ‘you’re a sad case of starvation.’
‘Starvation?’ said Emily. ‘You’re jokin’, doctor.’
‘From your condition and from what you’ve told me,’ said Dr McManus, ‘I’d say you’re simply not putting enough food into your system, young lady.’
‘Well, bless you, doctor, for callin’ me a young lady when I’m twenty-seven,’ said Emily, ‘but I still can’t think I’ve got a starved condition.’
Dr McManus, a fatherly practitioner who had earned the gratitude and affection of countless people in Walworth, said, ‘Since I last saw you, Emily, there’s half of you gone missing.’
Emily said she knew she’d lost a bit of weight. Half of you is more than a bit, said Dr McManus. You’re starving yourself, aren’t you? Well, I admit I don’t have a big appetite these days, said Emily. Dr McManus suggested she probably had no appetite at all, and asked if anything had worried her during the last year. Emily’s own real worry had related to the possibility of a woman called Polly Simms usurping her in the affections of Boots, but not even to Dr McManus would she mention that. So she said she hadn’t had any worries she could think of, not serious worries. Well, said Dr McManus, something has caused your loss of appetite. I thought that was just my anaemic condition, said Emily. You haven’t got anaemia, Emily, you’ve got an odd complaint called anorexia.
‘Oh, my soul,’ breathed Emily, ‘is that fatal, doctor?’
‘Plainly put, it’s a dislike of eating.’
Emily admitted she did toy a bit with her food. Dr McManus advised her that that had got to stop, and that if it didn’t she’d find herself seriously ill.
‘I can’t afford to be ill, doctor, I’ve got my fam’ly and my home life. I don’t have time to be ill, and I’m sure Boots wouldn’t be in favour.’
‘If I know Boots,’ said Dr McManus, ‘he’ll help to see it doesn’t happen. It may take time for you to adjust to eating three reasonable meals a day, in which case you could try eating little and often. Or you could start by tackling six bowls of nourishing soup a day, soup made from good stock, like meaty bones from your butcher, with a little solid food in between.’
‘Six bowls of soup a day? Six?’
‘Six at least, with a slice of bread and butter each time. It’s going to be a question of fighting your dislike of food in the easiest possible way.’
‘Oh, I’ll fight a good fight, if it’ll stop me gettin’ ill,’ said Emily. ‘Me ill and in bed and my fam’ly all up and about? I’d go barmy. Can I keep comin’ to see you all the time I’ve got this anex – what was it, doctor?’
‘Anorexia, Emily, and yes, you can continue to consult me. I’ll write to Dr Thompson.’
‘Well, bless you, doctor, you’ve always been kind and ’elpful to me ever since I was a little girl. Boots asked me to give you his regards.’
‘How is he?’ smiled Dr McManus.
‘He’s fine,’ said Emily, ‘he’s so healthy it’s almost aggravatin’. I just hope all that soup won’t make gurgling noises, or he’ll be sure to say something like eat a sheet of blottin’ paper first. Do I get any prescription?’
‘Yes,’ said Dr McManus, and wrote out a prescription for a medicine with a restorative factor. He gave it to her and again emphasized the necessity of putting food regularly into herself.
‘I will,’ said Emily, ‘even if it kills me – Lord above, what a daft thing to say.’
That had been nearly four weeks ago, since when she really had been fighting her odd aversion to meals. Boots’s mother, known to the family as Chinese Lady, and her second husband, Mr Edwin Finch, shared a large house with Boots and his family, and Chinese Lady had been preparing soups so appetizing that everyone was enjoying them. Anyone would think you’ve all got anexia, said Chinese Lady. Yes, I expect it’s anexia that makes us like your soups so much, said Rosie, adopted daughter of Emily and Boots. And their young son Tim said he didn’t mind having anexia a bit. Boots said it was generous of Emily to share her complaint with everyone, it helped them to qualify for a measure of soup. Chinese Lady remarked to her husband that her only oldest son still said things no-one understood except himself. Give him some more soup, Maisie, said Mr Finch. That won’t cure his tongue, said Chinese Lady. Perhaps not, said Mr Finch, but it might cure his share of the complaint. It’s not a complaint Emily’s got, said Chinese Lady, it’s just a temporary condition.
Emily smiled at her recollections.
And there was something else to smile about. She’d put on seven ounces. Entering her husband’s office, she said, ‘I’m off now, lovey.’ She always finished at three-thirty so that she could go home and spend some time with young Tim, not yet of school age.
‘Treat yourself to a large slice of fruit cake when you get home,’ said Boots.
‘Fusspot,’ she said, but gave him a warm kiss just to let him know she still liked being his wife. She also liked the fact that she didn’t have to worry now about that Polly Simms, a certain woman who’d been an ambulance driver during the Great War, had met Boots a few years ago and taken a fancy to him. Now she was in darkest Africa, or somewhere like that. ‘See you later.’
She collected her bicycle from the ground floor. She’d been using it since the General Strike began. She wheeled it over the pavement to the road, and began to cycle home. Her short skirt, not much longer than a flapper’s, showed her knees. As she reached Ruskin Park, a young bloke came out through the gate and whistled at her.
Crikey, she thought, he’s whistling at my legs. Wait till I tell Boots a saucy young whistler made my day.
Doreen put her head into Boots’s office at five-thirty.
‘Good night, Mister Adams,’ she said, ‘I’ve just got to go now.’ She was one of the staff of fourteen employees working on this floor or the top floor. The strike was causing problems that meant some employees weren’t getting away precisely on time.
‘Hop off, Doreen,’ said Boots, whose looks and whimsical good humour made him a thrill in the eyes of impressionable girls. ‘Thanks for slaving away.’
‘Been a pleasure,’ said Doreen, whose firm but susceptible bosom had sometimes known sighs and flutters in his presence. Most of the office girls had a crush on him. She smiled as she descended the stairs to the street, where she turned left towards the junction of Camberwell Green. She was nineteen. Her fashionably brief skirt of dark green whisked around her knees, her flesh-coloured rayon stockings gleaming in the early evening sunshine, her lemon-coloured jumper cosily cuddling her figure, her little straw hat sitting on the back of her shingled brown hair. Cloche hats were favourites with most young ladies these days, but Doreen thought their pudding basin effect didn’t suit her face. Actually, she had a very nice face, made the nicer by hazel eyes bright and friendly, and she had the quick ready smile of most cockney girls.
There were crowds at the tram and bus stops. Public transport was running on a limited basis, and trams and buses driven by volunteers bulged with passengers during the rush hours. Each driver usually had a protective policeman up with him, since some strikers had virtually declared war on all volunteers. Doreen, seeing the waiting crowds, decided she’d probably get home quicker if she walked, as many workers were doing every day. Her mother would be watching the clock, waiting for her to get home and to start the evening meal. Doreen’s dad had died two years ago, her twin brother and sister were both married, and she was now all her mum had.
Mrs Paterson relied on her younger daughter for company and affection, and was affectionate herself, but in a possessive way. She professed fragile health from the shock of losing her husband. Doreen, a good-natured girl, had not yet come to realize she was expected to be her widowed mum’s lifelong help and companion, although she knew she was very necessary to her at the moment. It meant friendships with young men were out of the question for the time being. Talk of young men upset her mum. Not that it was a serious matter. She hadn’t yet met Mr Right, nor anyone she was really keen on. Perhaps by the time she did, her mum would have got over her loss and become her old busy self.
Doreen crossed the junction into Camberwell Road, and hurried homewards on quick feet. A couple of horse-drawn carts passed her, full up with people who’d been given a lift. That’s what I could do with, a lift, she thought. She lived with her mum in Morecambe Street, off the East Street market. She earned twenty-one bob a week with Adams Enterprises, a nice wage for a switchboard operator. That, with her mum’s little pension, generously paid by her late dad’s old firm, just about kept them going after the weekly rent was settled.
A crowded tram passed her, and so did a young man riding a bicycle. He noted her hurried walk and her shining legs. He pulled up a little way ahead of her and waited.
‘Need some transport?’ he smiled.
‘’Ave you got some, then?’ said Doreen. ‘Like a bus tucked up your shirt?’ She hastened on. The young man followed, wheeling his bike. ‘D’you mind goin’ away?’ she said. She knew all the tricks that the lively fellers of Walworth and Camberwell could get up to when trying to pick up a girl. ‘Look, stop following me.’
‘If you’re in a hurry—’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘I thought you were,’ said Luke Edwards. ‘Like a lift on me carrier?’
Doreen cast him a suspicious look, and had to admit he wasn’t exactly repulsive. His peaked blue cap and dungarees were those of a workman, his features healthy, his smile friendly. He looked about twenty-four. I think I ought to tell him to push off, I think I should. He might be anybody, he might be what Mister Sammy Adams would call a highly dubious geezer.
‘Well, I don’t mind a lift,’ she said, ‘as long as you’re not tryin’ to pick me up.’
‘Perish the thought,’ said Luke, ‘I’ll just be pleased to give you a lift. Where’d you live?’
‘Morecambe Street, Walworth,’ said Doreen.
‘Know it like the back of me hand,’ said Luke. ‘I’ll take you there if you’d care to park your lower ’alf on me carrier.’
‘I said I’d like a lift, I didn’t say I wanted any sauce.’
‘What’s your name?’ asked Luke, taken with her.
‘I don’t tell me name to people I don’t know,’ said Doreen.
‘All right, I’ll call you Lady Vi,’ said Luke. ‘Jump aboard.’
‘Lady Vi my eye,’ said Doreen, but placed herself sideways on the carrier. ‘Oh, watch it,’ she gasped, for he was away at once, cycling strongly and whistling as he went. She tugged at her skirt, her stockinged knees bright round cups of reflected sunlight.
‘Comfy?’ he asked, overtaking horse-drawn vehicles on his way to the Walworth Road.
‘Well, I ’aven’t fallen off yet,’ she said.
‘Good,’ said Luke. ‘Um – legs all right?’
‘Yes, they’re running behind,’ she said.
He laughed, the peak of his cap shading his eyes against the slanting sunlight. He sighted something questionable in the distance.
‘Hold on to your titfer, Lady Vi,’ he said, ‘I think there’s trouble ahead.’
‘Oh, don’t get held up,’ begged Doreen, ‘I don’t want to be late ’ome.’
‘I’ll do me best,’ said Luke, and pedalled on.
He approached the corner of Fielding Street, where Walworth Road began. A tram was at a stop. A surging mob surrounded it, a mob of belligerent strikers and resisting men. The strikers were trying to board the tram to get at the volunteer driver, and the protective policeman up with the driver had his truncheon out and at the ready. Luke had to stop. The mêlée was blocking the road. He pulled up. The pole of a striker’s banner was swinging. Luke knocked it aside. Doreen, on her feet, held the bike steady, troubled little breaths escaping her. The striker, his back to Luke, turned on him, his face red and angry. Few strikers liked the fact that the public had turned against them. While most people had a deep sympathy for the coalminers, they had no sympathy at all for a strike that could shut off food from shops and medical supplies from hospitals.
The angry bloke went for Luke. Doreen quivered. Round came the banner in an attempt to knock Luke’s head off. He caught hold of the banner itself, and applied a violent jerk. The striker lost his hold, and Luke chucked the pole and banner at the man.
‘Sod yer!’ bawled the striker.
‘Watch your mouth,’ said Luke, ‘I’ve got a lady with me.’
‘Sod ’er too!’
‘Oh, yer ruddy ’ooligan!’ yelled a woman from among people on the pavement.
‘Starvin’ our kids, that’s what you’re doin’!’ shouted another woman.
‘Bleedin’ fried eggs,’ bawled the striker, ‘I got kids of me own, ain’t I?’
‘Well, they ain’t got much of a dad!’
The mêlée around the tram increased in violence. The copper aboard was blowing his whistle.
‘Come on, mate,’ said an old bloke on the pavement, beckoning to Luke. A gap appeared, Luke wheeled his bike on to the pavement and through the crowd of bystanders, Doreen following. Luke took his bike back on the road, Doreen perched herself on the carrier again, and away they went, along the Walworth Road.
‘All right, Lady Vi?’
‘I’m not Lady Vi, you daft ha’porth,’ said Doreen, legs hanging clear of the back wheel. ‘Crikey, I thought that striker was goin’ to knock you under a bus.’
‘I think he thought I was his dog’s dinner,’ said Luke. ‘Legs still all right?’