Larkinland Read online

  The only crime is being born, all the rest is self defence

  Seren is the book imprint of

  Poetry Wales Press Ltd

  57 Nolton Street, Bridgend, Wales, CF31 3AE

  www.serenbooks.com

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  Twitter: @SerenBooks

  © Jonathan Tulloch, 2017

  The right of Jonathan Tulloch to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  ISBNs

  Paperback – 978-1-78172-395-1

  Ebook – 978-1-78172-396-8

  Kindle – 978-1-78172-397-5

  A CIP record for this title is available from the British Library.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted at any time or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the copyright holder.

  The publisher acknowledges the financial assistance of the Welsh Books Council.

  Printed in Bembo by TJ International, Cornwall.

  As ever for Aidan and Shirley

  Acknowledgements

  Many thanks to Robert Kirby, a top man who never gives up, and to the Royal Literary Fund, who help me and so many other authors.

  PART ONE

  1.

  The landlady drew back frayed floral curtains. ‘This was Mr Bleaney’s room.’

  Barely space for two, Arthur Merryweather stayed in the doorway. He could see it all from there anyway: narrow bed, naked bulb dangling like a hangman’s noose, chair bereft of its desk. The fourth room he’d been shown that afternoon, and not much worse than the others. ‘How much?’

  ‘Two pounds a week. In advance.’ A shrewd look behind the landlady’s horn-rimmed glasses as she took in the cut of the gentleman’s jacket and tie, the trilby in hand, the educated voice, his Antler suitcase. ‘Three quid makes you all-in. Laundry, bed and breakfast, and any little extras. My gentlemen find all-in most convenient.’

  Merryweather poked his head further into the room. Not even a hook behind the door, he’d only missed the ashtray – some kind of garish seaside souvenir saucer. ‘I’ll take it.’

  ‘There’s no dogs. Or lady visitors. Not that I’d need to tell a respectable-looking gentleman like you that, Mr Merryweather.’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Glendenning.’ She means I’m ugly, he thought, as the pound notes were plucked away and secreted into the blue housecoat before he’d barely got them out of his wallet.

  ‘Where did you say you worked again, Mr Merryweather? Just for my rates book.’

  ‘The university.’ The blank look told him she didn’t know the town had a university. Well he hadn’t either until a few weeks ago. Had barely even heard of this place beached on the mudflats at the end of the railway line like a brick seal with a woodbine in its gob.

  ‘Thought maybe you were in the insurance game.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m not in the insurance game.’

  ‘You’ve got an air about you.’

  ‘I shall be working in the library. At the university. I’m a librarian.’ In the last word, his stammer, held back until now, partly revealed itself.

  Adjusting a hair roller, the landlady scrutinised him as though trying to work out if a stammer was a good or a bad sign in a lodger. ‘Never had no librarian before. Been teachers and clerks, and a scoutmaster. Commercial travellers in the main,’ she said. ‘One of my current gentlemen is in fur. Then there’s Mr McCoist what does the seaside trade, fancy goods, you know, Scotch chap. We’ve a third in at present, travels in semi-precious stones but we hardly ever see him. He’s in Leeds or Manchester more often than not. Since the coronation he’s been that busy; well everybody wants their own jewellery now; you know, tiaras and such. And of course there was Mr Bleaney, him what had your room before. But I’ll let you get settled in, Mr Merryweather. Bathroom’s at the end of the landing. Mr Bleaney took his tub on a Sunday night, so if that suits. Washing’s Monday, naturally.’ Miss Glendenning’s momentum took her down the landing to the banister before she doubled back on silent feet. After listening at the door for a while, she gave the ghost of a knock and re-entered. ‘What would you say to a nice cup of tea?’

  ‘I’d say, I’d prefer a horrible one,’ Merryweather didn’t say. Instead – ‘Lovely.’

  ‘Milk and sugar?’

  ‘Please, two.’

  The librarian waited until he could actually hear her descending the stairs before sighing with relief. He was mad to have accepted. This Glendenning woman (Miss – my arse), this blowsy, two-thirds slattern was exactly the kind of landlady he’d promised himself to avoid like the clap. Straight from the pages of Punch magazine. The way she’d stared at him on the doorstep should have been warning enough. No doubt she’d listen in on guests with a glass pressed against the wall, stare through keyholes until she went boss-eyed.

  What was he letting himself in for, he wondered as he switched on the light. The unshaded bulb turned the box room into a police cell, and showed that the chair was rickety, and the wallpaper peeling. A splintered star marked the door where a high hook must have hung. The librarian grinned grimly. Obviously hadn’t been strong enough for the rope when it all became too much for the last poor bastard who’d lived here. One supposed one ought to unpack.

  A male cough on the landing. One of the other lodgers? The man in fur perhaps, or the seaside trader. Maybe a rare visit from that other one. The traveller in semi-precious stones – whatever the hell that meant. A floorboard creaked. A snatch of bumptious whistling: La donna e mobile. Perfect, some garrulous tosser come to intrude himself on the new arrival. Why did that always happen? The librarian waited for the inevitable knock. But none came. The whistling stopped, a more distant floorboard creaked and then nothing. Merryweather waited until the coast was clear before opening the door a crack to peek out.

  ‘All aboard the skylark,’ grinned the stocky cretin in a string vest standing on the landing. Hairy shoulders, daffodil bulb nose, he was almost as bald as Merryweather himself. Peering at the new lodger, the cretin’s grin froze in confusion. ‘Bleaney?’ he faltered in bewilderment. The librarian opened the door more fully, allowing a flush of light from the bulb behind to illuminate his head. ‘Oh, sorry, I thought you were… Strange that. You must be the new bod, eh?’ Back to his jovial self, the cretin gave a mock bow. ‘Greetings, fair traveller and welcome to the enchanted isles.’

  ‘Afternoon,’ the librarian conceded.

  ‘So, she’s finally taken a new prisoner, eh,’ the friendly pratt continued, taking the librarian’s hand before he could withdraw it. He had the grip of a warm swamp. ‘That room’s been empty for weeks. Another body snatcher are you?’

  ‘Beg pardon?’

  ‘Blimey, but you’re honoured. She must have shown dozens of people round; none of them passed the test. Asked for it myself. Even offered a bit more of the old moulin rouge. Room with a view, you see. Mine looks over next-door’s yard. Their outside bog fair whiffs on a summer’s night. You can smell it in yours on a hot day but not as bad.’

  ‘Well, better get unpacked,’ said Merryweather, freeing himself from the swamp at last. Far from taking the hint, the windbag edged closer. The bugger will have his foot in the door in a moment, Merryweather reflected.

  ‘I’m in fur, what’s your load?’

  Just a moment’s pause. ‘Books.’

  Sweat beaded the other’s forehead as though he was indeed dressed in fur instead of a string vest. ‘The old Encyclopaedia Britannica, eh?’

  ‘Well, amongst others.’

  ‘Not my bag. Too much shoe leather. Listen, fancy a pint after tea? I’m
off to a bit of a posh do later but I can always squeeze in a jar with a mate.’

  Merryweather’s lie was smooth with a lifetime of wanting to be alone in a world forever forcing itself on you. ‘Sorry, I’ve work to do.’

  ‘Oh. Until tomorrow then, maestro. Here at Chez Glendenning you’ll find we inmates stick together. Which was why it was such a shock when doo-dah upped sticks without so much as a by your leave. Don’t bother knocking, old man, my door’s always open to chums. Name’s Teesdale.’

  ‘Merryweather.’

  The man in fur grinned at the dour-faced librarian. ‘Are you joking?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, there’s a nice little local up the way, Merryweather, The Shoulder of Mutton, but you’d better come with me first time to show you mean no harm; don’t want the natives putting you in a pot.’ A bray of laughter. ‘By the by, word of advice,’ Teesdale made a pantomime of checking for the proximity of the landlady. ‘Make sure she doesn’t do to you what she did to Old Bleaney, him who had that room before. Then again, maybe you might want her to.’

  ‘What can you mean?’

  ‘Put it this way, start worrying when she asks about gardening.’ Teesdale winked over the fat finger plugged to his bulbous nose, then burst into another bray of laughter during which Merryweather finally made good his escape. Practically had to shut the door in the chatty bastard’s face. As if Miss Glendenning wasn’t enough, one of his fellow lodgers was a bad Music Hall turn.

  The bed groaned as Merryweather sat, but it wasn’t just the springs creaking. The librarian was laughing. His high shoulders shook; his crabbed ribs ached. Dispatch from the edge of the known world, he imagined penning this evening’s letter to his successful friend, have accepted a steerage in the third circle of hell…

  ‘Here we are; nice cup of tea.’ Once again not waiting for her knock to be answered – a house rule? – the landlady entered rump first bearing a pair of teacups. The housecoat and hair rollers had been shed; about half a bottle of fragrance added. With no lock he’d have to think of a way of at least wedging the door. Blocking the keyhole too. ‘Do you mind me asking you something, Mr Merryweather; do you like gardening?’

  ‘Gardening?’

  ‘Yes, gardening. Are you green-fingered at all?’ Mechanically, Merryweather obeyed the landlady’s gesture to join her at the window, and found himself looking down over a piece of waste ground slowly being devoured by the drizzly late afternoon. A couple of rods of weed barely contained by a crooked fence – a symposium of thistle and litter. Beyond that, the road. ‘Mr Bleaney really took my bit of garden in hand,’ she said. ‘He was going to grow a bed of lobelias this spring, put in crazy paving, chop down that horrid thorn tree. Yes, he had ever such a lovely front garden planned.’ Although it was now April barely a leaf showed on the hawthorn. ‘I find a man much happier with a hobby, don’t you, so if you want to…’

  ‘I don’t usually have the time for gardening.’

  ‘Really?’ Miss Glendenning appeared genuinely shocked. To hide his mounting irritation, the librarian took a sip of tea. Surprisingly refreshing. ‘There now, you needed that, didn’t you, Mr Merryweather?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘You were spitting feathers, weren’t you, as Mr Bleaney used to say. Now, we have tea, what you might call dinner, at six o’clock on a night, so you’re just in time. Chop and chips tonight. Special treat.’

  ‘Ah, not tonight.’

  The landlady’s perfume engulfed the librarian like a radioactive cloud as she edged along the sill towards him. ‘I do the chops in Worcestershire sauce.’

  ‘The thing is, I’m meeting some colleagues for d-dinner.’

  In such a small room it was perhaps inevitable that two people turning from the window at the same time should brush against each other, but the librarian got the distinct impression that Miss Glendenning had done nothing to minimise their contact. More than just a hint of bosomy, perfume-sodden blouse in the momentary press. ‘Oh, Mr Merryweather?’

  ‘Miss Glendenning?’

  ‘My room’s just down the landing, opposite the bathroom.’ Reaching the door, she turned. ‘There’s one other thing I ought to mention.’ Her voice dropped conspiratorially. ‘I don’t know if you’ve met him yet.’

  ‘Whom?’

  ‘Mr Teesdale.’

  ‘I have.’

  ‘Well if I were you, I wouldn’t spend too much time with him. Can’t always take him at his word. Rather common actually. If you believed everything he said, you’d think he was a real top boy, and do you know, when he says fur, I’ve reason to believe that he really means hides. Animal skins, tanning, glue products, that line of trade. Even Mr Bleaney couldn’t stand him, and that’s saying a lot.’

  As Miss Glendenning descended the stairs, a burst of bonhomieous La donna e mobile came whistling from the depths of the boarding house.

  Once here, I may never emerge again, Merryweather planned writing in his letter.

  2.

  At the click of the front door behind him, Merryweather’s spirits lifted. Such a strain talking to strangers; almost as bad as talking to acquaintances. He strode down the path that formed a causeway through the rising tide of thistle and rubbish comprising Miss Glendenning’s ‘bit of garden’. If this was ‘taken in hand’ what price ‘left to fucking seed’? An evening alone stretched reassuringly before him. ‘Oh, Mr Merryweather?’ the landlady called from an upstairs window. ‘The door is locked at ten o’clock on weekdays.’

  ‘It’s Saturday,’ replied the librarian.

  She’d already closed the window.

  Merryweather had gone a few yards down the road before it occurred to him that she’d been calling down from his room. Tomorrow he’d have to make a few things clear. The rap of knuckle on pane made him turn again. Now Teesdale stood in the librarian’s room miming the sinking of a pint whilst pointing up the road in the direction of an insalubrious looking public house on the corner. The Shoulder of Mutton. Merryweather strode on. Come Monday he’d get a lock for his door, but now, time for solitude. Solitude! He felt his shoulders relax, his lungs open like trees in a gentle breeze.

  The stroll under the line of sycamores would even have verged on the pleasant if not for the piles of dog dirt one had to negotiate. The early Saturday evening queue at the trolleybus stop was long and gregarious. Working men’s club and bingo bound no doubt. Most of those waiting seemed to know each other. Was he the only one wearing a trilby? The other men either sported the cloth cap of the locale, or despite the drizzle went bareheaded. Severe short back and sides for the most part, but a whole group of starkly luxuriant quiffs: teddy boys. The women favoured headscarves, those without were young, unmarried one presumed. Lord, how primitive we remain, Merryweather mused, despite everything – William Caxton, Thomas Hardy, the invention of Jazz – we’re still just a study for 301. on the Dewey decimal system.

  Dusk began to fall like damp smoke; the trolley arrived.

  ‘Fourpence,’ the clippie said. Merryweather only had a ten bob note. ‘Broke the bank at Monte Carlo, did you?’ grinned the clippie. Holding the note up for general inspection, he called down the trolley. ‘Bloke here wants to buy the bus.’

  ‘Tell him he can have it for nowt,’ the driver called back.

  ‘I’m Burlington Bertie,’ the clippie sang.

  ‘I rise at ten-thirty,’ the driver replied not particularly melodiously.

  ‘We don’t have enough change, mate,’ the clippie winked, handing Merryweather back the note. ‘You’ll have to owe us.’

  So, Merryweather mused, that’s how things are run under nationalisation. Piercing broad acres of corporation housing, the trolleybus took the librarian down its surprisingly straight couple of miles. Working his way through the bus, the clippie sold his tickets; the passengers chatted like hens; the teddy boys told a series of ever more apparently hilarious, certainly bluer jokes. An aroma of fish steadily brewed. Not for the first time, nor the last, Merr
yweather wondered how a path begun on the primrose lawns under Oxford’s dreaming spires could have led him here at the age of thirty-three. His best friend, and chief correspondent, was already a successful novelist; other acquaintances were rising eminent in their fields: barristers bound for the bench, journalists, even a scribbler of detective stories; and here he was bouncing on a trolleybus. When had he chosen this life; made the momentous decision bringing him here and nowhere else in the great, big world? Fate, it seemed, was itself a trolleybus, carrying you where it must, following the wire laid down by some po-faced town planner in destiny’s district council offices. Next stop a semi with a little wifie up the duff and one kiddie in the pram already? No, not that, never that. The librarian hid his grin in a cough. ‘You all right, love?’ the nearest headscarf asked.

  ‘Quite, madam.’

  There were a few titters, as much from the raising of his trilby as his accent.

  ‘Not from round here, are you lover?’ the headscarf asked.

  Merryweather cursed himself for being without his usual shield of a newspaper.

  Fortunately, an altercation at the back diverted attention. Jeers and catcalls. ‘I’ve told you lot before,’ the clippie was shouting at the teds. ‘No ticket, no travel.’

  A clear, high-pitched voice pealed above the disturbance: ‘Calm down, pops, no need to lay an egg.’ Merryweather turned to look at the speaker. It was one of the teddy boys. Baby face lined with some slum scrofula, he was a real short arse. Were many of the local people likely to be stunted? Lack of nutrition, coalmines and so forth, one supposed.

  ‘Don’t you sauce me,’ the clippie said. ‘It’s a criminal offence, you little bugger – you got on here with no intention of paying.’

  ‘He hasn’t got a ticket.’ All eyes followed the short arse’s finger jabbing towards Merryweather. ‘Why aren’t you chucking him off?’

  At the next stop, the teds were thrown off, but as the trolleybus started again, Merryweather could see them sprinting under the wire in pursuit.