Cockney Orphan Read Online Free PDF Page B

boots and socks were caked in mud,
but he had a smile on his face that was dazzling.
    ‘Mrs Spinks said I could borrow this.’ Billy lifted a bucket, talking as if he was carrying on a conversation from five minutes ago. ‘She was up by the standpipe and said she
thought I needed a wash more than she did.’
    ‘Too right you do, son.’ Ebbie nodded, wrinkling his nose at the smell drifting into the room.
    ‘You’re filthy,’ Olive wailed. ‘Oh, Billy, you’ve been on them barges, I knew it!’
    Connie leaped up from her comfortable seat. ‘Don’t say a word,’ she whispered as she grabbed the bucket from his hand. ‘I’ll get him scrubbed up, Mum,’ she
called brightly. ‘Keep the tea warm for us.’
    Pulling Billy with her, Connie hurried to the downstairs bathroom. She blessed the day three years ago, when the council had seen fit to install one in the house. It was nothing fancy, but the
large white bath and basin were accompanied by a real flushing system, not like the smelly old toilet they’d used for years in the backyard. The rabbit-sized rats that it attracted had
overwhelmed the district and after an outbreak of several unpleasant diseases all the property maintained by the council had been converted. The bathroom was unheated, freezing in winter, and the
iron window frames were already rusting. But it was the one room in the house that afforded a degree of privacy. Connie slid the bolt on the door as Billy began to peel off his clothes.
    ‘You gonna scrub me back, then?’ Billy laughed as she tipped the cold water in the basin
    ‘I just wanted to tell you what I said to Mum about last night,’ Connie replied crossly as she gathered the filthy garments.
    ‘What was that then?’ Billy sank his head into the water, splashing it noisily over himself.
    ‘I said you went off with a mate. She thinks you’ve been down the river on the barges with Joey Donelly. So I should keep to that story if I were you.’
    ‘Thanks, sis.’ Billy rubbed the bar of Puritan soap vigorously over his stick-like arms and skinny chest.
    ‘So what happened, then?’ Connie demanded, annoyed at his apparent indifference.
    ‘When?’
    ‘When do you think? When you ran off and left me.’
    ‘Con, I had to get rid of that motor.’
    ‘For your information I found a girl under all that rubble.’
    He stopped drying himself on the thin towel and stared at her. ‘You mean there
was
someone there?’
    ‘She was . . .’ Connie felt tears rush to her eyes. ‘I couldn’t help her. It was too late . . .’
    ‘Oh, Con,’ Billy murmured, putting his wet arm around her. ‘I’m sorry, I wouldn’t have buggered off if I’d known that.’
    Connie shook him off. She sniffed back the tears. ‘Well, excuse me, Billy Marsh, but I find that hard to believe. Thanks to you, her baby could have been overlooked. If it hadn’t
been for a friend of mine helping me to search, he’d probably be dead by now too.’
    ‘You mean little Baldy sitting on Dad’s lap? I wondered where it turned up from.’ Billy stood shivering in his underpants. ‘So who’s this friend of yours
then?’
    ‘Just a friend, that’s all. Now, what happened to the car?’
    ‘I ditched it.’
    ‘But you can’t drive.’
    ‘That was the least of me worries. There was no one around so I let off the hand brake and pushed it to the first bit of high water I found. What happened next was the iffy part. Jerry
suddenly appeared and the wharf went up like a powder keg. I was blown in the water, right on top of the car. Honest, Con, it was like a bog, all oil and burning wood, and it stank of petrol.
That’s what you can smell on me clothes. Somehow I got myself out.’
    ‘Billy, you could have drowned.’
    ‘I know. I don’t mind admitting it was a close call. But I’m a lucky so and so, Con, you’ve said it yourself.’
    She shook her head despairingly. ‘You’ll need all the luck going if Mum ever finds out.’
    ‘Well, she won’t,