Shilling a Pound Pears Page 5

  “You’ve never seen this chap in the black leather jacket before, Hilary?”

  “Don’t think so. He wasn’t the sort you’d remember—you know how some of these people all look the same. Same clothes, same hair cuts—”

  “I wish it hadn’t happened.” Richard sounded worried. “Something tells me we haven’t heard the last of this business.”

  “Why?” Hilary licked some butter from her fingers. “I should think he’d keep well out of the way after the pasting he got.”

  “That’s just it. He might be angry enough to watch out for us and try to get his own back.”

  “Fusspot,” Hilary scoffed. “Even if he does, we’ll know him next time, and be ready for him. He caught us unawares—that’s why it happened.”

  “Next time, I’ll get him,” Jojo said darkly. “If you hadn’t hung on to me, Hilary, I’d have got rid of him for you. Peter just did what I would have.”

  “Jojo, the Giant Killer,” Barbara said, rudely. “You couldn’t knock the skin off a rice pudding.”

  Jane leaned over and pulled Jojo back from aiming a piece of cake at Barbara. “Stop it, Jojo,” she commanded. “We’ve got too much to talk about to waste time like this. Hilary—” she turned to her cousin. “There’s a problem.”

  “What? Couldn’t you find a good route to the wholesale market?”

  “That’s the least of it,” Richard said grimly. “I made the run in just over half an hour, and it shouldn’t take any longer in the morning—no traffic to speak of at the time we’ll be going. it’s much worse than that.

  Jane looked crestfallen. “it’s my fault, Hilary.” she said awkwardly. “I forgot something important.”

  Hilary looked at her long face, and pushed her plate away.

  “Well?”

  “It’s money. In all the rush of getting Yossell settled with his ticket and everything, I forgot to ask him for money to do the buying tomorrow. We can’t sell stuff if we haven’t got it to sell, and we can’t get it to sell if we haven’t money to buy it. And I forgot to ask Yossell for some. We’re up the creek without a paddle. I’m awfully sorry Hilary.”

  “Well, you are a right nit!” Stephen exploded. “You’re supposed to be the financial wizard, and you go and forget something like that! Honestly!”

  “Shut up, Stee,” Richard said sharply. “It isn’t Jane’s fault any more than it’s ours. We should have thought of it, too.”

  “What are we going to do?” Hilary asked blankly. “I looked at the stuff in the shed, and there’s hardly enough to cover one side of the stall. Most of the boxes are empty.”

  “Yossell said he had a good day on Saturday,” Jane agreed miserably. “That’s why. He just about sold out.”

  “So where do we go from here?” Richard said. “Any idea, Hilary.

  “Can we get credit? I mean, will the wholesalers let us have stuff and pay for it the next day after we’ve sold it?”

  “I shouldn’t think so,” Richard said. “I mean, why should they. They won’t know any of us by sight, and they’ll only have our word for it that we’ll be back.”

  Philip leaned across the table. “Could we give them a cheque, one with the next day’s date on it? I’ve heard Daddy talk about doing that when a bill’s come in the day before he’s got the money to pay for it.”

  “You can’t do that,” Jane said. “For one thing we haven’t got a bank account, and for another, we haven’t got a cheque book.”

  John stood up, and rubbed his nose diffidently. “Then I suppose we’ll have to finance it ourselves.”

  “What with?” Jane said crossly. “The only money we’ve got is the money I’ve got from Aunt Mary’s money order—and that’s for food for us for the next month. I can’t use that. Suppose we don’t get enough back from what we sell to replace it? I’m not taking that sort of chance. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “I already suggested that,” Richard said, “and Jane won’t hear of it. And she’s quite right. We can’t take any chances with that money—the folks would be furious if we did, and then didn’t have enough to feed you little pigs properly.”

  “Pig yourself,” Philip said equably. “You’ve eaten seven pieces of toast. I’ve counted.”

  John’s soft drawl cut across the conversation. “I wasn’t meaning that money. Look.”

  He stretched out his wrist, and took off the rather handsome gold watch that adorned it. “I got this for my birthday. it’s mine—no one can object to what I do with it, can they? It’s worth ten pounds at least.”

  “You wouldn’t sell it,” Jane gasped. “You can’t”

  “I don’t mean to sell it,” John said calmly. “Just pawn it.”

  “Pawn it?” Hilary stared at her cousin.

  “Some of us at school last term did that.” John was a little embarrassed. “It’s a long story, but one of the boys in my form needed some money in a hurry.”

  “The one who ran away?” Jane asked.

  “Mmm. As I say, he had to get home in a hurry, and none of us had enough to lend him the fare. So we pawned our watches. There was a shocking row when the Head found out—” he smiled reminiscently, “but it was all right in the end. Anyway, Higgins sent the money back to us, and we got our watches back, so it can be done, even by kids like us. Why not now?”

  “It’s a thought,” Richard said carefully. “I’m not very keen on the idea, but it’s no worse than asking for credit, really, and we’d do that if we thought we’d get it, wouldn’t we?”

  Almost at the same moment, Stephen and Philip shot away from the table to rush up to their rooms. When they came back, Stephen dropped a pair of gold cuff-links, a gift from his father, in front of John, and Philip put his most treasured possession, a transistor radio, beside him.

  “They ought to raise a bit, too,” they said, and sat down again.

  “I’ve got a watch,” Hilary said, and took it off and lay it beside the boys’ offerings.

  “Look, this is all very well,” Jane said. “It isn’t a bad idea, I suppose, but where do we find a pawnshop open at this time on a Sunday? We need the money by five o'clock tomorrow morning!”

  “I’ve thought of that,” John aid, looking at their suddenly crestfallen faces. “Higgins.”

  “Who?” Stephen said.

  “The chap who left school in such a hurry last term. He’s a decent type. His parents had had a row, you see, and he thought they were being silly. I mean, his father had written to him saying they were going to separate, and that’s why he had to go home in a hurry— to stop them being so silly.”

  “Did he manage it?” Hilary asked with lively curiosity.

  “Oh yes. They usually listen to him.” John dismissed Higgins’ family problems airily. “The point is his father is a jeweller. And they live in London. If I went to see him, I dare say his father would oblige. I mean, why shouldn’t he?”

  “Where do they live?”

  “Near Regent Park.” John fumbled in his pocket for a little address book. “Here it is. Bickley Mansions, near the Baker Street gate to the park. Shall I 'phone him?”

  Richard gnawed his lip, and looked at Jane and Hilary, his eyebrows raised in interrogation.

  “It’s our only chance, Hilary said.

  “I suppose so.” Jane sounded unwilling. “I don’t like the idea, but—”

  “I’ll 'phone him now,” John said, and held out his hand to Jane. “Got fourpence for a 'phone call?”

  They washed up the dishes while they waited for him to come back, silent and a little worried. After he had been gone half an hour, Jane got restless.

  “For heaven’s sake,” she said anxiously to Hilary, who was getting worried herself. “Where did he have to go to make a call? He’s been gone long enough to make sixty telephone calls.”

  “Maybe the box at the end of the road is out of order,” Richard said comfortingly. “Or maybe there was a queue or something. He won’t be long.” But he was a bit worried himself, as the time
stretched out to nearly an hour.

  By the time John sauntered back up the steps, there were seven anxious faces watching for him through the window of the living-room. As he came in through the front door, they descended on him in a mass.

  “Where have you been?” Jane wailed, almost in tears, so relieved was she to see him. “What happened?”

  John looked surprised. “Were you worried? I’m sorry. It’s just that I thought it was silly to waste fourpence on a 'phone call. I used the money for bus fare instead. There’s a penny change. Mr Higgins drove me back to the end of the road.”

  “You idiot! Why didn’t you tell us?” Jane nearly shook him, she was so angry now.

  “So I’m telling you now. Here.” He put his hand in his trouser pocket, and pulled out a wad of bank notes. “Twenty pounds. Will that be enough?”

  Hilary pounced on the money with a squeal of joy.

  “Enough! Plenty, I’d say! He didn’t mind—Higgins’ father?”

  “Not at all.” John sounded surprised. “I said it’d be all right, didn’t I? Oh, by the way—”

  He reached again into his capacious raincoat pocket. “He said these weren’t necessary. They’d only get in his way—” and he pulled out the cuff-links, the watches, and the little radio, and put them on the table. “Now, what do we do for the rest of the evening?”

  As Hilary said to Jane, when they were preparing for bed at a much earlier hour than usual in view of the next day’s 5 a.m. call, “Your brother is decidedly a man of parts.”

  Chapter Five

  GETTING up at half-past four in the morning wasn’t nearly as bad as Hilary had expected it would be. For one thing, Richard didn’t seem to mind, which was a comfort. Richard normally loathed getting up early, but he was already in the bathroom, shaving, when Hilary, bleary-eyed and yawning, arrived to clean her teeth and wash. He didn’t even mind being hurried, and was ready to go down and make a pot of tea for them all, long before the girls were out of the bathroom, making room for the other four boys to come and wash.

  Barbara and Jojo were delighted to get up so early. Barbara in particular was enchanted with the brightness of the morning. She kept saying, “it’s so light!” surprised to find the sun well up, and birds singing like lunatics in the old elm tree in the scrubby back garden.

  They breakfasted on tea and toast and cheese, because Hilary thought there wasn’t time for cooking anything more ambitious, and planned the day as they ate.

  For the first day it was decided that they would all keep together.

  “One we know how things’ll work out, we can make some sort of rota— no need for us all to get up at this time every day,” Hilary said, her mouth full. “We can take it in turns to got to the wholesale market. Don’t you think that’ll be best, Richard?”

  “Except that I’ll always have to go,” Richard said grimly. “I’m the only one that can drive.”

  “I’d forgotten that.” Hilary was dismayed. “I’m sorry, Richie— will you mind very much?”

  “Doesn’t make much difference if I do, does it? I’ll just have to put up with it. I don’t suppose it’ll kill me.”

  “You could catch up with sleep in the afternoon, couldn’t you, Richard?” Jane said. “I can’t see you going to bed at nine every night, the way we did last night.”

  Richard brightened. “Mmm, that’s a thought. You can cope in the afternoons by yourselves I daresay. Anyway, I’m not tired now, so we’ll worry about that side later. Look, it’s getting late. We’d better clear up and get going.”

  Somewhat to the boys’ annoyance, Richard insisted that the breakfast dishes should be washed, and the beds made before they left, because, as he said. “I’m not coming back to a pigsty here at the end of the day.” But with the eight of them, the chores were out of the way in record time, and Jane even found time to peel potatoes and open a couple of tins of fruit for lunch. “I’ll get some sausages later, and some peas in the market,” she told Hilary, “and come back early to cook it all. Then we can take turns to come back to eat. After today, p'r'aps we could take sandwiches for lunch-time, and have a proper meal in the evenings.”

  By just after five, they were ready, and piled into the old car, Hilary and Richard in the front, with Jojo on Hilary’s lap, and the other five crushed into the back. Richard had rigged a rack on the roof the day before to hold the stuff they were to buy, and with a coil of rope in the boot, to tie the boxes of fruit on to the rack, they were ready for everything.

  As the engine roared into life, shattering the silence of the sunny, quiet street, Jojo let out a wild whoop of joy. “Apples and pears and bananas! He shouted above the rattle of the old engine. “Here we come!”

  As the car turned into the main road, a boy on a bicycle suddenly appeared alongside, and called out to them, wobbling wildly as he tried to attract their attention. Hilary leaned precariously out of her window to see who it was, and grinned delightedly when she recognised him.

  “Richard—stop!” she cried over her shoulder. “It’s Peter—the boy who helped us yesterday—wait for him!”

  The car ground to a stop, and Peter came up to Hilary’s side of the car, and hung on to it with one hand.

  “Good morning!” he said breathlessly. “I hoped I’d catch you—look, I wondered if you’d like a hand this morning.”

  Richard leaned forward and peered at the hot face looking into the car.

  “Well, that’s very nice of you, but I think we can manage. There’s eight of us, and I don’t suppose we’ll be buying that much.”

  Peter flushed a little at Richard’s unfriendly tone.

  “I’m sure you can,” he said hastily. “it’s just that I know the market quite well—I’ve been there with my uncle quite often. He’s got a fruit stall in the Archway market up the hill. I just thought I could show you some of the ins and outs of the place. You can find things a bit awkward if you don’t know the ropes. Still, if you’d rather I didn’t—”

  “We’d love you to,” Hilary said warmly, “Wouldn’t we, Richie?”

  Richard scowled a little. Ordinarily he was a friendly sort of person, but he did tend to resent some of the young men Hilary included among her friends. This total stranger was a bit more than he was prepared to cope with at this time of the morning. But he could see that someone who knew the ways of the wholesale market would be decidedly useful, so he said, “Of course,” a little shortly, and started the engine again.

  “Lead the way,” Peter said, letting go of the car. “And don’t worry about me. I’ll keep up.”

  Once again, the car’s elderly engine coughed and rattled into life, and the little procession was off, the big old car sailing majestically along, with Peter pedalling madly in its wake. There was very little traffic about—the occasional huge lorry at the end of a long run into London from the North, a few early workers on bicycles and motor bikes and even one car full of people in evening dress, obviously on the way home after a long night out. The streets were bright in the clear early sunshine, the shops looking like people in sun-glasses, with their blinds over the windows, blank and inscrutable.

  “Where is the market, Richie?” Hilary shouted above the engine’s noise. “Is it far?”

  “Nor very far,” Richard shouted back. “Above five miles north of here—you’ll see.”

  They left the narrow shoplined streets to rattle along suburban roads edged with little semi-detached houses built in imitation Tudor style, each with a small front garden ablaze with summer flowers. They left these again to turn to the wide carriageway of one of the main arteries in and out of central London. By now, traffic was thickening, as vans and small lorries and a few private cars like their own joined them.

  “Are all these people going to the market too?” Jane asked, leaning forward to look over Hilary’s shoulder at the road in front of them.

  “Probably.” Richard put his foot down hard on the accelerator to overtake a big green van in front of them. “This market suppl
ies most of North and West London, I think— or so Yossell said.”

  On the other side of the dual carriageway, huge lorries were swaying along in the opposite direction.

  “Empties,” Richard said, nodding at them. “They’ve brought stuff up from the country overnight, and now they’re heading down to the docks to pick up loads to take back.”

  “How do you know?” Stephen asked. “Or are you just guessing?”

  Richard was scathing. “I know because any nit with half an eye can see those lorries are empty. Look at the way they sway—they wouldn’t do that if they had a big load on—and no one with any sense who owned a lorry would let it go back a hundred miles or more without a load. Don’t be dim.”

  Stephen nodded, and Philip grinned at him. “We are being the big brother this morning, aren’t we?” he murmured into Stephen’s ear. “Better leave him alone, Stee. He’s got the miseries.”

  Indeed, Richard did seem in a pretty bad mood, as they chugged up at last to the road that approached the market. In front of them as far as they could see, was a queue of cars and vans and lorries, many of them with the name of greengrocers’ shops painted on their muddy sides. Richard drew the car to a standstill, and leaned out of the window to look up ahead.

  “Blast,” he said. “We’re late, I suppose. All these people are head of us, and we’ll have to wait for them to move before we can get in and park.” He leaned back into his seat and scowled at Hilary.

  “That boy-friend of yours held us up.”

  “He is not a boy-friend of mine, as you put it,” Hilary said sharply. “He helped us out yesterday, and it was very nice of him to get up early this morning to offer to help now. Don’t be so wet. He’s harmless enough—why take such a dislike to him?”

  Richard shrugged. “I don’t dislike him,” he said. “I just don’t like outsiders horning in on what doesn’t concern them.”

  Before Hilary could answer, Peter came alongside, even more hot and breathless from his long ride.