Not All Tarts Are Apple Read online

  About the Book

  NOT ALL TARTS ARE APPLE…

  At least, that’s what seven-year-old Rosie finds out at school one morning. ‘You haven’t got no proper mum and dad. Your mum’s a tart’, she is told by her friend Kathy Moon. And with this, Rosie’s safe world – her home above the cafe in Old Compton Street, watched over by her devoted Uncle Bert and Auntie Maggie – is turned upside down.

  A cafe in post-war Soho is a strange place to bring up a child. Rosie is used to being with a motley group of grown-ups – Mamma Campanini at the deli, Madame Zelda (Clairvoyant to the Stars), Sharkey Finn (a clever lawyer, but bent as a two-bob watch), Paulette (French Lessons) – and the mysterious Perfumed Lady, who makes an appearance from time to time. Usually the worse for drink, she laughs a lot and wears clothes like a princess. She brings Rosie presents – silver shoes and glittery jewellery and satin ribbons. Rosie thinks she is her fairy godmother. But she is, of course, Rosie’s real mum … and one day, might want to reclaim her.

  Not All Tarts

  Are Apple

  PIP GRANGER

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowlegments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Version 1.0

  Epub ISBN 9781446437940

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS

  61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA

  a division of The Random House Group Ltd

  RANDOM HOUSE AUSTRALIA (PTY) LTD

  20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, Sydney,

  New South Wales 2061, Australia

  RANDOM HOUSE NEW ZEALAND LTD

  18 Poland Road, Glenfield, Auckland 10, New Zealand

  RANDOM HOUSE SOUTH AFRICA (PTY) LTD

  Endulini, 5a Jubilee Road, Parktown 2193, South Africa

  Published 2002 by Bantam Press

  a division of Transworld Publishers

  Copyright © Pip Granger 2002

  The right of Pip Granger to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 0593 047958

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

  For my husband

  Ray

  Acknowledgements

  My heartfelt thanks to

  Jean Burnett for nagging

  Jill Nicholson for listening

  Nancy Norton for the computer

  my agent, Jane Conway-Gordon, and my editor,

  Selina Walker, for their help and advice

  1

  I can’t remember when I first went to live with Auntie Maggie and Uncle Bert. Rumour has it that I lived with my mum for the first few months of my life, but that she nipped into the cafe one day to borrow a few quid and somehow managed to leave without me. It seems that I have always been surrounded by the warmth of the kitchen, the smell of food cooking and the murmur of punters’ voices rising and falling above the hiss and bubble of the urn.

  I was blissfully unaware that Maggie and Bert were not my real mum and dad. Or at least, I knew and I didn’t know, if you see what I mean. I had been at school some time before I understood that I had a real mum somewhere. It was that cow Kathy Moon who spilled the beans one day in the playground. We were in the first year of the juniors by then, so I was seven. I can hear it now.

  ‘You haven’t got no proper mum and dad, you haven’t,’ in that slippy slimy voice she used to use. ‘Your mum’s a tart.’

  I didn’t know what a tart was then, but I did know I didn’t like that Kathy Moon saying it about my mum, whoever she was. I hit her and made her nose bleed and I didn’t care.

  Auntie Maggie and Uncle Bert were called up to the school but only Auntie Maggie went. Uncle Bert had to keep the cafe open and so he got Mrs Wong in to help. Auntie Maggie put on her best dress and Granny’s brooch and her good shoes and took me by the hand and sailed in through the school gate like royalty. Right there in the playground she gave me a big, smacking kiss. ‘Don’t you worry, love. I’ll sort it out. You run along and play.’

  Of course, up until then I hadn’t been worried at all, because I hadn’t really twigged that anything was wrong, although I should have got an inkling on account of the dress and Granny’s brooch. After that, though, I really was worried and tried to follow her into the building.

  I suppose I was working on the theory that if I just hung on to the hem of her best moleskin coat, everything would be all right. Auntie Maggie had that effect on everyone. Just stay within the shadow of her mighty bulk and everything would be all right. Trouble was, I had competition: several dogs had followed us into the playground and were also trying to hang on to the hem of Auntie Maggie’s coat. That moleskin always attracted lots of dogs. As far as I was concerned that was its charm, that and the feel of it. Of course I didn’t know that hundreds of lovely little moles like the one in The Wind in the Willows had had to give their all to make it. Once I discovered this terrible truth, I never really felt the same about it. Anyway, I was soon shooed away and the door was slammed on several noses, including mine. I just had to wait, my apprehension growing.

  The bell went and we all lined up in our classes. Miss Welbeloved (who wasn’t) was on duty. This meant that we had what felt like hours of shuffling in our lines and putting our arms out and touching each other’s shoulders to go through before she was satisfied with the precision of our spacing and the straightness of our lines and the silence of our tongues and feet. Meanwhile, the wind was whistling round that playground, turning our noses red and our knees blue. I shall never forget the rawness of that day or the agony of waiting. I had never considered the possibility of Auntie Maggie and Miss Giles, the headmistress, meeting. Now that I realized it was inevitable, I was very worried. What was worse, it had dawned on me that they would be talking about me.

  I didn’t like
my worlds mixing much when I was seven. School was school and home was home. Bumping into your teacher outside school was like meeting a Martian on the bus. Martians should stay in their flying saucers, I thought, and teachers should live in cupboards with the chalk and the board rubber when not actually in use. They had no right to turn up in the greengrocer’s or on the pavement outside Frenchie’s like ordinary people.

  Well, my auntie Maggie in school was like that. Auntie Maggie was just too big for it, and far too jolly and loud. Jolly and loud weren’t encouraged in school. Screeching, yelling and laughing till you wet your knickers were just about tolerated in the playground or in the street but not in the school building.

  Not that Auntie Maggie wet her knickers; not ever, I’ll have you know. But she did laugh and shake like a jelly mountain and she had a booming voice and fingers like sausages all covered in glittering rings. Miss Giles was thin and old. She had dead straight, greying hair that she yanked sideways and anchored with enough ironmongery to sink a small ship. Her hair would not dare to fly about in wisps in the wilful way that Auntie Maggie’s did. Miss Giles wore a woollen tweed skirt – always the same one – and a succession of lumpy cardigans and grey or mustard blouses the colour of sick that did up firmly at the neck and the wrists. During assembly in the school hall she sat on the stage, legs planted so far apart that we saw she wore long, pink or white directoire knickers that pinched the mean flesh above her knees in a vice-like grip. Try as I might, I could not imagine Miss Giles and my beloved auntie Maggie together.

  We filed into class. I’m not sure what I was expecting to happen but I knew I was expecting something: the world to stop turning, a mighty explosion, school to disappear in a puff of smoke. What I wasn’t expecting was for that two penn’orth of Gawd ’elp us, Enie Smales, to trail in with a message from Miss Giles for me and Kathy Moon to present ourselves in her office.

  My heart was hammering and my knees were like jelly as we walked in silence along those cream and institution-green corridors. That wet weekend Enie was smirking. She knew trouble when she smelt it and, being merely the messenger, had the superior air of one who was not involved. I knew then why the mortality rate among messengers is said to be so high; it’s to wipe that superior smirk off their chops. We arrived at the door and Kathy and I looked at each other, faces white with terror.

  The scene in the office was hard to take in. Miss Giles was sitting behind her desk and Auntie Maggie was standing, red in the face. She seemed to take up all the space in the office that was not already claimed by desk, filing cabinets, bookshelves and Miss Giles. Miss Giles had shrunk and, incredible though it may seem, appeared to be cowering behind her desk. A cowering Miss Giles was a reassuring sight to me. Whatever was going on, it looked as if my auntie Maggie was on top of it.

  Auntie Maggie took several deep breaths, letting them out slowly. Then she spoke. ‘Rosie, you first. Tell us exactly why you belted young Kathy here and made her nose bleed. The truth now, no lies.’ The last came as a bit of a surprise to me. I had never had occasion to lie to my auntie Maggie in my life. I realize now that this was because I was never really afraid of her, despite her having something of a temper. She had an enormous capacity for compassion and understanding, but of course I didn’t know that then. I just knew that I never lied to her and that few people did, and if they did, she saw straight through it, so it was a waste of time anyway.

  I darted a glance at Miss Giles, who seemed to have recovered a bit now Auntie Maggie’s attention was elsewhere. She was sitting rigid behind her desk, eyes glittering, mouth set like a rat trap. My heart did a terrified somersault in my chest under that hard, unforgiving gaze. I turned back to the reassuring presence of Auntie Maggie and addressed myself to her. It was safer, somehow.

  ‘We was in the playground, see, and me and Patsy and Jill was playing skipping and Kathy came up with Sandra and that and started yelling things at me so I hit her.’

  Miss Giles started to speak, voice sharp like a bacon slicer. ‘Whatever Kathy said, there is absolutely no excuse—’

  Auntie Maggie turned a gaze on her that would have shrivelled the English Channel to a puddle. She didn’t actually say, ‘Shut yer gob.’ She didn’t have to. Miss Giles shut her gob.

  Auntie Maggie turned back to me, her voice gentle. ‘What did she yell at yer, luv? Don’t be afraid. Speak up like a good girl. It’s all right.’

  I believed her. If Auntie Maggie said it was all right, then it was all right, but part of me had nagging doubts about being too explicit in front of Miss Giles. So I compromised and mumbled, ‘She said I had no proper mum and dad and that me mum was a tart.’

  The bacon slicer cut in again. ‘How dare you use that word? I simply will not toler—’ Once again she was switched off by a glare from my magnificent aunt.

  Auntie Maggie turned to Kathy and in a mild tone enquired, ‘And you, Kathy, do you agree with what our Rosie says? Did you say them things? The truth now, no point in lying. Seems as there was plenty of witnesses. We don’t want to have to haul ’em all in, do we?’

  Kathy shuffled her feet and looked at the ground. Her ears were red as she whispered, ‘I never … I never said them things. Honest, I never.’

  Indignation welled up in me. I opened my mouth to call her a liar but got no further before Auntie Maggie’s voice broke in quietly but firmly. ‘Be quiet, Rosie, you’ve had your turn. Now, Kathy, that’s not really true, is it, love? There’s no need to be afraid. Nobody here thinks you’re bad and nobody is going to get upset, are they, Miss Giles?’

  She didn’t trouble to wait for a reply. ‘No, nobody’s going to be cross. We know that little girls don’t really know about things like that. They just repeat what they’ve heard. We know that. And don’t you worry, we won’t ask you who told you these things. We just want to know what you said to our Rosie, that’s all. Now, did you or did you not say that Rosie’s mum was a tart?’

  The dread word hung in the atmosphere like a fart in church; but no one dared acknowledge it and it was refusing to go away. Auntie Maggie’s bejewelled sausages reached out and gently cupped Kathy’s chin. She pulled the girl’s scarlet face up and looked straight into her eyes. Kathy’s pretty brown ones suddenly filled with tears. I watched, fascinated, as this eyeball-to-eyeball contact went on. Neither Miss Giles nor I dared to breathe as the silent messages passed between Kathy and my aunt.

  At last, Kathy nodded. ‘Yes, yes, I said it,’ she admitted in a faint voice.

  The headmistress and I breathed out noisily and Auntie Maggie beamed down at the soggy Kathy, awash with tears now. She let go of the small chin and fumbled in her bag for her handkerchief. Her voice was hearty. ‘Have a good blow, dear, and wipe those pretty eyes of yours. See, it wasn’t so bad, was it? Now off you go, the pair of you. What’s done’s done. It’s time to make up and forget all about it.’

  That was when Miss Giles made her big mistake. Her sharp voice cut into the cosy atmosphere Auntie Maggie had created around the three of us. ‘May I remind you, Mrs Featherby, that I am the head here and that whatever Kathy said to Rosa’ (they always called me by my real name at school) ‘there is absolutely no excuse for her behaving like a barbarian in my school – or anywhere else, for that matter.’ She turned to me. ‘You, Rosa, will miss your playtimes, games and painting for the next week and let that be a lesson to you to keep your fists to yourself.’ She turned back to Auntie Maggie. ‘And can you deny that Rosa’s mother’s morals leave a lot to be desired?’

  There was a dreadful pause as Auntie’s benign expression changed to one of thunder.

  Auntie Maggie looked at the headmistress, then very quietly told us to go back to class as Miss Giles and she had things to talk about. We scrambled for the door, fumbling with the knob in our haste to get out. We knew that Auntie Maggie was dangerously close to blowing and we wanted to be as far away as possible when she did.

  How can adults be so stupid? Miss Giles didn’t seem to see the danger as she rose
to her feet with the triumphant air of one who had just wrested victory out of the jaws of defeat. The silly woman had no idea, no idea at all.

  I never did find out what took place in that office after we left, although not long afterwards Miss Giles was quietly moved to a church school in a less colourful part of the borough and retired a few years later.

  What did come out of it all, though, was that I had the first inkling that my safe and cosy world was not as safe as I thought, and that Maggie and Bert were not my real mum and dad.

  That night, I wet the bed. I carried on wetting it, night after night. It wasn’t long before Auntie Maggie woke me one morning, took in the now-familiar soggy sheets and my woebegone countenance and called a family conference.

  2

  It had always been my job – as soon as I was tall enough to reach it, that is – to turn the ‘Closed’ sign to ‘Open’ in the mornings. Almost as soon as the key turned in the lock, the cafe door would open and a steady trickle of early morning punters would come in for their breakfasts. Bacon, egg, fried bread, bangers, fried tomatoes and, for the discerning, fried mushrooms would flow effortlessly from Uncle Bert’s hands.

  Auntie Maggie stayed out front, dispensing teas, coffees, observations about the weather and an endless stream of opinions about juicy bits of local news. I would eat my breakfast at the corner table, then Auntie Maggie would leave the teas and coffees to Mrs Wong while she took me to school. Once I was safely delivered to the playground, she headed for the market and Ronnie’s stall to order the day’s veg.

  Sometimes she would nip in and out of various shops, picking up odds and ends as she needed them. The last port of call was always the newspaper shop, where she picked up Bert’s Daily Mirror and had a chat with old Mrs Roberts before returning to the cafe. By then the breakfast rush was over. Uncle Bert would settle down with his paper, his beloved pipe and a cuppa for a well-earned break before the dinner trade piled in.