Bye Bye Love. Patricia Burns

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ of her way. ‘Mum, wait—!’

      Then she stopped short. Of course it wasn’t her mother. Her mother was—

      The whole happy day came crashing down around her. Her mother was dead. She would never see her again, never hear her voice or feel her arms around her. She was gone. Scarlett collapsed onto the step and wept, her grief all the more bitter for having been almost carefree only a few moments ago.

      ‘Scarlett? Scarlett, what’s the matter, what is it?’

      Scarlett just shook her head and cried all the harder. How could Jonathan understand? The pain of it tore at her.

      An arm came round her shoulder.

      ‘What is it? Was that your mother? We can catch up with her, Scarlett. We can find her. It’s not too late. Come on, I’ll help you.’

      ‘No, no—’ Scarlett tried to shake him off. ‘It’s not…her. She…she died. On C-Coronation day.’

      ‘Oh, Scarlett…’ his shocked voice was close to her ear. ‘I’m so sorry.’

      He didn’t tell her to stop crying. Instead she felt his other arm go round her and gently pull her towards him. Helplessly she sobbed on his shoulder while he patted her back and hordes of happy holiday-makers swirled past them.

      At last she subsided into sniffs and hiccups. She pulled away from him.

      ‘I’m s-sorry.’

      ‘It’s all right.’

      ‘I’ve spoilt your day.’

      She couldn’t bring herself to look at him.

      ‘No, you haven’t. It’s been a super day. Look…er… p’raps you’d like to go home now?’

      Home. Home was the Red Lion. Scarlett shook her head.

      ‘What, then?’

      She didn’t know. She couldn’t stay here on the pier, not now, but neither did she want to go back to the Trafalgar.

      ‘I don’t know.’

      ‘Come on.’

      Jonathan stood up and held out his hand. Scarlett let him pull her to her feet. Together they made their way towards the tram station.

      CHAPTER SIX

      ‘I ALWAYS thought there was something a bit dodgy about him,’ Jonathan’s mother said as she sat over her breakfast tea.

      ‘There’s always going to be something wrong, ain’t there?’ his father said. ‘Stands to reason. Man his age, if he ain’t got a place of his own, there’s a reason why.’

      He wiped the last of the fried egg from his plate with the last of the fried bread and sat back with a sigh of contentment.

      ‘That was first class, Jonny lad. Done to perfection. You ain’t got any more out there, have you?’

      ‘Nope, but there’s toast coming up,’ Jonathan called from the kitchen.

      He came into the living room with the toast rack and placed it on the table in front of his parents. The big main room of the flat had three large windows looking out over the estuary. Morning light flooded in to show off the ornate dining table and chairs, the large new three piece suite, the glass-fronted cabinet filled with china ornaments, and the modern electrical goods. There was a television in pride of place in front of the suite, its purple screen dead now as programmes didn’t begin till the evening, a large wireless on the sideboard, tuned to the Light Programme, and a record player on a side table with a huge pile of dance band records stacked beside it.

      Jonathan’s mother helped herself to toast and spread large dollops of butter and marmalade.

      ‘Well, yes, there was sure to be something,’ she said, returning to her original topic of conversation, ‘but with this one it’s everything. To start with, his timekeeping’s useless. I don’t think he knows how to tell the time. When you tell him he’s late, he gives you that daft vague look of his and says, “Oh, is it that already?” as if he’s no idea. I could kill him, I really could.’

      Jonathan ate his own toast, a feeling of doom settling uneasily in his stomach. She was talking about Scarlett’s dad again. What if they gave him the boot? What if he and Scarlett then moved somewhere the other end of the country? It would be terrible.

      ‘He does know how to keep the beers,’ his father said, swigging down his tea. ‘I’ll give him that. Trouble is, he’s too darn fussy. Throws stuff away! I caught him getting rid of nearly a gallon yesterday. Said it wasn’t good enough. “It’s good enough for our customers,” I told him. “They’re not here to taste the quality, they’re here to get pissed. You mix that in with the next lot and it’ll be quite all right. They won’t notice anything wrong with it at all.” You should of seen his face! You’d’ve thought I’d asked him to strangle his grandmother.’

      ‘He was famous for his beers when he had his own place. People used to cycle out from Southend just to drink at his pub,’ Jonathan said.

      Both parents looked at him as if they’d only just realised he was there.

      ‘Who told you that?’ his mother asked. ‘That girl, what’s-her-name?’

      ‘Scarlett,’ Jonathan reminded her, regretting having opened his mouth. He knew just what she was going to say next. And she did.

      ‘Blooming stupid name to give a kid.’

      Jonathan said nothing. He’d already had this argument with his mother several times.

      ‘And you know what I said about her,’ she went on. ‘You’re not to hang about with her. Staff are staff. They’re not for consorting with.’

      She glared at his father as she said it. He took a sudden deep interest in the racing pages of the newspaper.

      Jonathan felt sick. How could she compare what he felt for Scarlett with his father groping the barmaids? But it was no use even trying to explain. She wouldn’t understand.

      ‘You’re far too young to be going around with girls, anyway,’ his mother said. ‘You’ve got plenty of friends, you should be with them, off sailing or something. Who are you watching the carnival with?’

      ‘The gang,’ Jonathan said.

      It was true, he was going with his schoolfriends, but Scarlett was coming along as well. It would be the first time she would see the carnival. They planned to walk along to Westcliff and watch from the cliff gardens.

      ‘Well mind you’re back by seven. We’re going to be chock-a-block here tonight and we’ll need you to collect glasses,’ his father said.

      ‘Yes, right,’ Jonathan agreed.

      Really, they only ever wanted to know where he was when they wanted his help or didn’t approve of who he was with. Most of the time they couldn’t care less. Which was quite useful because ever since that first trip up the pier, he had spent practically СКАЧАТЬ