CHAPTER 44
In deference to both our numbers and to the age that had made itself so evident, we eventually travelled down by train. York station was being cleaned up, but it was still draughty, and I was glad to find our seats on the shiny new train. So very different from those journeys in my youth and to be honest I realised that the destination this time was of a very different kind.

Susie was bubbling away, and I had spent the whole morning arguing her out of wearing stupid shoes. In the end, it was Valerie who played the trump card, promising her a trip to some shop or other I had never heard of, and I had a short moment of utter wretchedness. That was the sort of shop I would have visited with my own Tricia, perhaps even my own...

No, Gerald. Not now. This was a day for smiles and hope.

We rattled down through Doncaster and Peterborough, Susie glued to the window, showing how little time she had actually spent anywhere other than York, and Valerie “treated” us to a cup of what was called tea but was in reality a rubbish tea bag on an odd foil hook, resting in a paper cup of tepid water. I shuddered at the price, and grimaced at the taste, but said nothing.

London seemed to go on forever, mile after mile of brick and concrete, so much of it covered in stupid scribbles of paint, and we kept stopping, starting again, stopping, starting, only to stop again, and then all of a sudden we were under a roof and the train was alongside a platform that seemed to go on forever. Valerie helped me with my luggage without being asked, which I found slightly insulting, but I stepped down from the train, settled my cap, and tried to take it all in.

It was so long ago that I had last been here, bicycle and all, and apart from it being even dirtier than I remembered, there was little change visible until we reached the end of the platform and a cursory ticket inspection. The ticket hall, Susie called it a concourse, was heaving, but Matthew was there with a smile and a hand, along with Rodney.

Old. Old and worn, a stick to support him, but then a smile, only slightly off kilter, and I really suspect it was Susie’s influence, but I could do no less than step forward to hug him. He whispered softly “Welcome, Ginge, be most welcome” before releasing me to shake hands with the ladies. He stood up almost as straight as I remembered.

“Dear ladies! Gerald here did not inform us he was bringing his friend’s sister as well!”

Valerie blushed, Matthew roared, and I just smiled. My friend was still with us after all.

Matthew led us out of the station, and it was disgusting. There were drunks everywhere, most of them tramps by the look of them, and a long line of men leaning against the wall on the other side of a complicated pedestrian crossing. Every now and then some passer-by would slip them something, or get something from one of them, and often there would be a quick hand-to-mouth movement. Matthew caught my stare.

“As observant as ever, dear boy? Drug dealers. Many of them secrete their purchases in their mouths, in case the constabulary decide to feel a collar”

“But it’s so open!”

“Welcome to the Metropolis, dear boy. Now… Yes!”

One of the black taxis pulled up to the kerb, yellow sign switching off, as we piled in to a remarkably spacious cabin.

“Highgate, my man!”

“Where, guv?”

“The High Street, by the Duke’s Head. I will direct you from there”

Matthew turned back to us. “Rodney keeps a small pied-a-terre in Highgate, nothing too grand, for when he is in town. Rather closer than Patrixbourne, don’t you know”

That man laughed gently. “And a rather easier journey for you than that one with the bicycle, Gerald?”

“Aye, I will give you that one! Fair terrified me, that did. Happen I were right lucky running into that copper in Canterbury”

“Sadly departed, dear boy, like so many of our generation. Now, do tell me about these charming ladies you have brought with you, but only in the most salacious detail, if you please”

The ladies in question were giggling happily at the attention. Valerie put a hand to my arm, sat as we were on the bench seat. “He always like this?”

“Well…” I managed, before being interrupted by Matthew.

“Dear ladies, Rodney is indeed habitually jocund, but it was not always thus. Young Gerald here---“

“Young?”

“Dear boy, I have at least two years on you. As I was saying before callow youth found it necessary to interrupt—“

“You interrupted me!”

“Privilege of seniority, dear boy! Rodney is with us largely because of this man here, this comrade, this…”

He hesitated, and I caught something in his eyes. “This brother. I can call him no less. My brother here astonishes me in his ability to see so much darkness and yet not to expect it. Life has repeatedly dealt him the very worst of hands, and yet he plays them with hope and, yes, with love. Each time Rodney or I have found our spirits failing, it is dear Gerald who has brought us something to make us raise our eyes from the mire and see that there is hope in the world, offer us an opportunity to improve it. Rather like his tie, no?”

Susie looked at my collar. “Eh?”

I nodded to Matthew. “Mud and blood, aye?”

“Indeed, dear boy. Ladies, the three colours of the tie are said to represent the aims of the original force: through the mud and the blood to the green fields beyond. That is Gerald’s gift, the ability, always, to see those green fields, to strive to reach a better place. In doing so, he has never ceased to remind us of Pandora’s gift. Without his spirit, who knows?”

I muttered under my breath something about a river in February, and Rodney put his hand on my knee. “Matthew has appraised me of that, Gerald, but look at where you now are: you found someone to heal, no? You put all else to one side for the sake of a soul in need. Could Matthew and I do any less?”

I couldn’t reply to that, and left Matthew to give his final instructions to the cabby, who deposited us outside a high wall and solid-looking gates. Rodney did something with a little box, and the gates opened onto a sort of courtyard in front of a terraced house that bore little relationship to those back in York. A young girl opened the front door and bobbed a curtsey.

“Afternoon, Shelley. This is Mr Barker, Mrs Lockwood and Miss Lockwood. Major Folland you know. They will be staying with us for a few days; please be so good as to ask Henry to deliver their baggage to the guest rooms, and we will take tea on the patio”

“Yes, sir. Will you be dining this evening?”

“I rather fancy we may visit the Chanticleer. Breakfast will be at nine, but until then, we shall not require your services”

“Thank you sir. May I?”

“Oh. Of course!”

“Ladies and gentlemen, do you have any specific requirements for breakfast? Vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free?”

Matthew spotted my confusion. “Rodney keeps a modern establishment, dear boy! Young lady, from observation I believe that we are all irredeemably carnivorous. A traditional spread will be more than welcome”

“Thank you, Colonel”

My room was not the largest, but there was enough space and a view out to some wide expanse of greenery. The place we took our evening meal in was a surprise, though, all the waiters trying to make us think they were French, which a lot of them clearly were not. The food was good, and I did my best to ignore the prices. Susie succeeded at that, but not her mother, and eventually I had to laugh out loud.

“Valerie Lockwood, anyone would think you were from Yorkshire!”

She grinned sheepishly, but there was a little flicker when a waiter poured us some more drinks and she heard the word “ladies”. I reached forward to take her hand, and whispered “You’re doing well, love. I know it’s hard, but you’re doing right thing”

Her grip tightened on mine, just for a second, and then she found a smile.

“Aye. Happen your pal there is right, Gerald. You do see it clearly, don’t you? Me, I had to be dragged in kicking and screaming, but, well, I watch her now, like, and I just ask myself why I had to be so thick. I nearly lost my child through stupidity, but, well, tomorrow, that doctor, what am I going to do?”

Matthew leant across. “Exactly what you are doing now, dear lady. Acting for the best for your child, acting out of love. Chin chin!”

Valerie ducked her head, but there was still doubt there. The next morning she remained subdued, but the breakfast went down well. I wondered if her Yorkshire soul was determined to avoid waste despite her obvious lack of sleep. Tea was drunk, bacon, cereal and toast disposed of, and then ‘Henry’ drove us through horrible traffic right to the centre of everything. There were long lines of tall brick terraces, the ground floors faced with white stone, all with steps down to cellars guarded with black railings. Matthew led us to one door, a brass plate to its right, and turned to look at both women.

“Well?”

Just that word, but so much carried by it. Valerie turned to look at Susie.

“Are you sure, love? Are you sure this is the right thing?”

Susie stepped forward to hold her mother. “Yes, Mam. Never, ever more sure, not of anything”

She bent forward and kissed her mother gently on the forehead, and Valerie reached up to stroke Susie’s cheek with the back of her right hand.

“Then let’s get it done, love”