A Clubbable Woman. Reginald Hill
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bar.
‘Sorry, Ted, old son. Got held up a bit. Look, have a pint on me and push off now. I’ll spell you when you’ve got a Saturday.’
‘OK. And I’ll have that pint. I’ve been so bloody busy that not a drop’s passed my lips since you left.’
‘It’ll do you good. Give you an edge when they start fighting for the spare.’
‘Some hope. There won’t be much of that around now. See you, Marcus, Sid.’
Sid Hope, the club treasurer, looked askance at Marcus.
‘Nice of you to come back and give us a hand.’
‘Come off it, Sid. I did get Ted to stand in.’
‘Ted! Have you seen him at the till? He’s got some peculiar decimal system of his own. Where have you been to anyway? On the prowl?’
‘Nowhere important. Just out.’
A peal of uninhibited female laughter cut through the noise and fume of the bar. Marcus turned. Sitting in the furthermost corner surrounded by half a dozen men was the woman he expected to see after hearing that laugh. Dressed in a low-cut cocktail dress whose demure whiteness set off the gleaming black of her hair and the shining silver of her tights, she was looking up and smiling at the young man who bent over her, obviously telling a story.
The treasurer followed Marcus’s gaze and shook his head.
‘Trouble,’ he said laconically.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You know what Arthur is. He’s been hopping around like a cat on hot bricks all evening waiting for his precious wife to turn up. Finally off he goes about half an hour ago to fetch her. Decides she must have forgotten. Forgotten! Well, he’s hardly out of the place before she comes sailing in like the figurehead on the good ship Venus. And of course within two minutes of coming into the most crowded room in the county with a queue six deep at the bar, she’s sitting in the corner surrounded by drinks. Just wait till Arthur gets back.’
Sid drew a couple of pints for a complaining customer, then looked over at Gwen Evans again.
‘Mind you,’ he said, ‘what a pair of bristols, Jesus! There hasn’t been anything like that in here since Nancy Jennings went off with that traveller. And Mary James – Connon, I mean – was the only thing I’ve ever known who could have beaten it.’
‘Connie’s wife?’
‘Yes. She doesn’t get in here much now, does she? Nor does Connie for that matter. But I can remember the days. Jesus! Connie was married when you came to live here, wasn’t he, Marcus?’
‘Yes. Just.’
‘It must have been a full-time business with that one. No wonder he lost his edge after that. God, he once looked a cert for a cap. First we’d have ever had. Never been a sniff since. All for love.’
Marcus poured himself a scotch.
‘He did crack his ankle.’
‘Of course he did. I’m not really suggesting, mind you, that kid of theirs came out pretty smartly. Like Connie’s pass, they said. And the responsibility can’t have helped. But they seemed to make out all right. Didn’t see all that much of Mary after that. But it was before. Like her over there. And Nancy Jennings. Trouble.’
Marcus, his eyes still fixed on the noisy corner, ran his glass along his lower lip.
‘Are you putting forward as a general proposition, Sid, that women with big breasts cause trouble?’
‘Not absolutely. Though there’s a bit of truth in it, isn’t there?’
‘Mary Connon never caused any trouble down here that I saw.’
‘Like I said, after they married, she didn’t get in here so much. Tailed off. That’s an apt phrase if you like. She was six years older than him, you know.’
‘Still is, isn’t she?’
‘You know what I mean. She’d had her fling down here. Not here exactly. That was in the days before this bloody roadhouse came into being. Remember? We had the tea-hut. None of your polished floors. You could get splinters through your shoes if you weren’t careful. Then over to the Bird-in-Hand. No, Mary did the right thing – for her, anyway. Married someone half a dozen years younger. And stopped coming so much. Nancy Jennings, she buggered off. It’s when they marry someone ten years older than themselves and keep their wares in the shop window that the trouble starts. Here, my lad, if you’re going to have another whisky, pay for the last one first.’
‘Sorry, Sid. There it goes; and for this one too. Witnessed?’
But Sid wasn’t paying attention.
‘Here we go,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Here we go.’
Marcus had never seen anyone whose face was really black with rage, but Arthur Evans was pretty close to it as he pushed through the door. A path opened up before him. It led to the corner where his wife sat. She looked up, flashed him a quick smile, then returned her attention to the youngster who had been talking to her. But he had seen Arthur too and seemed disinclined to talk further.
With a tremendous effort, obvious to all who watched, which was about three-quarters of those in the room, Arthur turned to the bar. Marcus could almost feel the man’s will forcing his broad shoulders to turn. Then his trunk followed. And finally his legs.
Quickly Marcus thrust a glass up against the whisky optic. And again.
‘Arthur, old son, I’m in the chair. Wrap yourself round this and tell us about your childhood in the green valleys of old Wales.’
Evans took the drink in one.
‘Thanks,’ he said.
Over his shoulder, Marcus saw Gwen casually disengaging herself from the group in the corner. Exchanging a word here and there as she came, she passed easily across the room till she arrived at her husband’s shoulder.
‘Hello, dear. Going to buy me a drink? I’ve got no money and I can’t sponge off your friends all night.’
‘Where’ve you been, Gwen?’
She smiled ironically.
God, you’re a beauty, thought Marcus. Sid, in an excess of desire to share his admiration of the sight before them, kicked him painfully on the ankle.
‘Oh, I got tired of waiting, so I came on by myself.’
‘But you were supposed to be coming with Dick and Joy.’
‘Was I? Oh, I forgot.’
‘They called for you.’
‘Then I must have left.’
‘To come here? You took your time, didn’t you, girl?’
‘Do you want to quarrel, Arthur?’
She raised her voice just sufficiently to cut into the attention of those immediately adjacent to them.
Marcus looked at Arthur. Surprisingly, he seemed to be considering the question on its merits.
Finally, calmly, ‘No,’ he said.
‘Then let’s have that drink. Marcus, love, see if you can add a bit of gin to that slice of dried-up lemon which seems to be all that’s left of a once proud fruit.’
‘A pleasure, ma’am,’ said Marcus. ‘A real pleasure.’ He meant it.
Two hours or so later, just after eleven, he put the lights out in the bar. Outside he could hear the din of departure. Car doors. Impatient horns. Voices. Song.
As he passed the Gents, the door opened and a large figure fell out.
‘Marcus,’ it said.
‘Ted.