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Chapter 14.
I spent the afternoon in a daze and completely despondent. I was not even cheered up when at about five o'clock, Lopey turned up outside Smokey's. I left the sanctuary of my bedroom where I was not doing very much to join him on the pavement.
"Mission accomplished, boss!"
"Shh," I said, looking nervously to right and left. It was a beautiful balmy evening. Sometimes working in a bar, it's easy to forget there's a world outside.
"It was a piece of cake. We left the car on bricks," he said proudly.
"I don't know that I want to hear about the detail," I muttered, looking for the undercover police I now imagined to be hiding behind every plastic chair.
"Just as we were finishing, he spotted us. The others legged it with the wheels but I hung back and hid. He chased after my mates and I took the opportunity to nip up to his room and get the telescope."
I looked at him in shaky admiration.
"He's got pictures of her all over the room but he wasn't using a telescope, it was a video camera with telescopic lens - a real find."
"Did you, er, get any tapes while you were there?"
"No way! I'd got the real money in the equipment. I wasn't going to hang about."
I looked straight at Lopey's but got back the steady stare of the truth from his small brown eyes as he ran his fingers through the long black hair he had inherited from his Spanish ancestors.
"It was a good haul - it seems a shame to charge you for the job," he said," ... but well we did have a deal."
I couldn't be bothered with feeding him sly drinks all evening so gave him some notes of the realm of Queen Elizabeth for his pains and he went away happy.
Half an hour later we were open again and Ron was yelling at me for depressing the customers and suggesting I should take the rest of the night off - unpaid of course.
I was wondering whether to take him up on the suggestion when a little head popped up over the bar and a pair of very blue eyes stared unwaveringly at me.
"Mummy said you'd play football with me again this evening."
I looked at the little man and wondered what his mum was doing and why she didn't want him around.
While Tommy waited outside, I went to tell Ron I was taking his advice and would see him the next day.
"I'm still thinking about Gerda for the floor show," was all he said.
"She'd be pretty good, I reckon, if you paid her enough wages for a square meal three times a day. It would fatten her up!"
The thought of paying her decent wages left him in some mental anguish; which cheered me up a bit.
Tommy was outside and we made our way to the park.
The football we played was more leisurely than before. We both had other things on our minds. I asked him where his mum was but he wasn't saying.
"She said thanks for the flowers, they were lovely. Did you pick them yourself?"
"No, I bought them. One day I will pick them for your mum myself. Would you like that?"
Tommy nodded.
"You're not like my other dads. They never wanted to see me - only mum."
I looked down at him as he shuffled the ball between his feet, head lowered, not looking up at me. I wanted to see the smiling face of the last time we had been at the park but knew that neither he nor I would manage it this evening.
"How would you like an ice-cream?"
"Yeah, that would be great."
We walked along the path to the ice-cream van and then sat quietly on the bandstand watching the sun go down eating them.
"When is your mum expecting you back?"
"She said she'd telephone you."
I patted my pocket reassuringly to show I was carrying communication.
"What would you really like more than anything else in the world," I asked, expecting him to say something like a new bicycle or the latest electronic games machine.
The sky was turning crimson above the skyscrapers. Little spirals of cloud escaped from the huge billowing banks reminding me of the wisps of Jennifer's hair.
"I'd like to be safe and see my mummy happy," he said suddenly.
His voice rang with the sincerity of a host of church bells.
"What would you like, Mister Barry?"
I thought for a while of all the things that there were to be had in this world - holidays, motorcars, property, power and position. Somehow they just didn't seem important.
"I would like the same, Tommy... I would you to be safe with your mum and for you both to be very happy."
Jennifer didn't call as she'd promised so I took Tommy home anyway. The sun had gone down and it was past his bedtime. He insisted that I left him at the corner.
"It's what my mum said!"
I watched him to the door partly to make sure he got safely inside and partly to catch a glimpse of Jennifer. I felt confused and sad. I wanted to help but didn't know how. She had her own life to lead but I knew I wanted to be a part of it despite the inconvenience and dangers caused by her past relationship. What did she really want and why did she push me away?
Should I respect her wishes or try to persuade her that together we'd be stronger? The questions seemed endless. They chased around in my head like fireflies dancing around a flame.
When she ushered Tommy inside the apartment, she had a towel around her head like a turban as if she has just had a long shower.
I went back to Smokey's and wished it felt like home.
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