The Paying Guests(177)

And already something else had grabbed the attention of the room. A name had been called, and Frances had missed it. She heard the door to the court creak open, and then a slim female figure appeared. Only when the figure had entered the box, and she saw a curl of bottle-blonded hair, a pair of thinned eyebrows, did she recognise Billie Grey.

Because she had come so soon after Lilian, all that was apparent for the first few minutes was what a contrast the two of them made. She had dressed, it seemed, with no thought for the solemnity of the occasion, but might have been on her way to a teadance, in a coat of powder blue, and a close-fitting hat of pink velvet with an ostrich feather curling at the side; her cream suede gloves had scarlet beads on them that rivalled the robes of the judge. She blinked up at the gallery, and all around the court, with what Frances guessed to be a touch of short-sightedness. She didn’t seem to notice Lilian – but she saw Spencer all right; she drew her gaze back from his as if frightened. She stumbled slightly over the oath, then tittered at herself. She continued to titter as she gave her evidence, though Mr Ives guided her as patiently as he might have done a child: ‘Now, is that quite your recollection?’ ‘Just think about that remark for me, would you?’ But all he wanted was for her to confirm the statements she had made to the police regarding her relationship with Leonard, and the incident at the night-club, and Spencer’s rages and threats. Yes, she recalled very clearly that remark he had made about Mr Barber having been ‘owed a wallop’.

And what about that ‘falling out’ she’d had with him earlier in the summer. Could she remind the jury how that altercation had ended?

With another apprehensive glance at the dock, she said it had ended with Spencer striking her face and knocking out one of her back teeth. And when the boy huffed or muttered at the comment she spoke across the court to him directly – and Frances was startled to find that her tone was not fearful after all, but was chiding and faintly exasperated. ‘Well, you did do it, Spence.’

At once, she was rebuked by the judge. ‘You must not engage in conversation with the prisoner.’

‘Well, he did do it,’ she said again – with stubbornness, this time.

And whether the stubbornness was responsible, or – Frances wasn’t sure what it was. But for all that the girl, at first, had appeared so bewilderingly different from Lilian, the longer she stood there, gaining in confidence, the less unlike her she seemed to grow. She had the same wide, guileless face. Her eyes were dark and alive. Her mouth was full, though she had tried to make it fashionably smaller. Even the beads on her gloves and the feather on her hat recalled Lilian. She might just, Frances thought, have been Lilian at eighteen, Lilian unmarked by the hurried marriage, the still-born baby, the disappointments; Lilian, perhaps, as Leonard had first glimpsed her through the Walworth Road window.

Could Lilian herself see it? It was impossible to say. She was watching the girl in the level, lifeless way in which she did everything now. It was Billie who was growing flustered – for Mr Ives had finished with her and Mr Tresillian had begun his cross-examination, and he was not kind and patient, as the other man had been; he was not like John Arthur; he was sarcastic and rather savage. He had every respect, he said, for Miss Grey’s lost tooth, and a gentleman could never be forgiven for lifting his hand against a lady. But there were surely people present who could sympathise with the dismay a young man might feel on discovering that his fiancée had been going about on intimate terms with another woman’s husband. Wasn’t it true that Miss Grey and Mr Ward had been engaged to be married?

Billie widened her guileless eyes. Oh, no. That was just an idea that Spencer had got into his head.

Wasn’t it true that she had accepted a ring from him?

But he was always giving her presents; she couldn’t keep count of them. She wished he wouldn’t waste his money on her. They had been boy-and-girl friends, and she liked him well enough, but not in the way she’d liked Lenny – She blushed. ‘Mr Barber, I mean.’

Mr Barber had made her presents, too, had he not?

Well, he’d given her a few little things, ‘just to show his love by’.

And she had known that Mr Barber was married, when she had accepted those ‘little things’?

Yes, she’d known he was married. He had never been anything but straight with her about it. But his marriage wasn’t a proper one. There was no heart in it. It was all kept up for the look of the thing. – Lilian’s expression remained level at that, though once again people right across the court craned for a glimpse of her. No, Billie had never felt ashamed of herself. Lenny – Mr Barber – had said that life was too short for shame.

Too short for shame, echoed Mr Tresillian, heavily. Well, Mr Barber’s life had certainly proved to be a short one. As for shame – it was up to the jury to decide where precisely the shame lay, in this case. He wanted to remind them, however, that they were in a court of law; they might just, in the past few minutes, have been forgiven for supposing that they had strayed into a picture-theatre and had been watching the antics of characters in a so-called romance. Miss Grey had spoken of love, but wasn’t it true that her friendship with Mr Barber had in fact been of the most squalid kind imaginable? A thing of furtive meetings in parks and rented rooms?

The girl stared at him. No, it hadn’t been like that. That was making it out to be something common, but she and Lenny – They had been in love. They had used to talk and talk to each other. He’d told her all about when he was a boy and things like that. It hadn’t been their fault that the world was against them. They had been like Adam and Eve.