Say Goodbye to the Boys by Mari Stead Jones Page B

towards Ceri’s house.
    At her front door she said, ‘George Garston – really? What would he be doing up there?’
    â€˜Counting his assets.’
    â€˜I went out with David Garston. He had this posh accent – after that school he was sent to. Our school wasn’t good enough.’ We talked for a while, about school. Wasn’t Emlyn Morton like a little cherub, remember how he used to organise everybody – usually into trouble? And old Mash. And that woman who taught Biology and used to spit in her hankie every five minutes. Until Ceri’s father opened the window above us and said, ‘Would you mind resuming the conversation at some other time? It’s eleven o’clock!’ I kissed her and arranged to meet on the promenade at two, and went home thinking about the Biology teacher, Miss Julius, and how I’d never seen her spit, had I? My forgotten past. I gave no thought to the noises in the Market Hall, but they came back to mind in the morning.
    Laura woke me. She was fresh from chapel, her hat still on her head. ‘Outside the hall. Maldwyn Street,’ she was saying. ‘It’s terrible. That Mrs Ridetski who keeps the hairdressers. Found her dead this morning, first light. On the pavement. Thrown herself off the hall!’
    Police Constable Hughes had found her. It looked as if she had jumped from the roof of the Market Hall. She was wearing a skirt and jumper and a raincoat. Her hair was in curlers. She had been dead for some hours. Liverpool Street knew all the details, but were more curious than sorrowing: Lilian Ridetski wasn’t local for a start, and she had a reputation.
    â€˜People used to call there,’ said Annie Owen who lived next door to us. She looked straight through me.
    â€˜If she wanted to do away with herself why didn’t she go to the river?’ Ned Edwards the postman who lived opposite remarked.
    And Laura, speaking to no-one in particular, said, ‘Not much charity about this Sunday morning’, and closed the door. ‘Philip – you knew her didn’t you?’ I nodded. She made a mess of pouring the boiling water into the teapot. ‘Nice woman, was she?’
    Soft, fat fingers dealing out the cards. The rippling laugh. Very nice, I said, and we stared at each other until she told me to eat my toast.
    I called at Emlyn’s house. Down at the boat, Idwal Morton said. ‘You’ll have heard the news, Philip?’
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    Idwal was wearing a navy blue suit that shone with age, even a collar and tie, as if he had been out somewhere. ‘Dead before she ever hit the ground. They can tell, you know.’ His trembling hands gave him a problem as he lit a cigarette. ‘Dirty work,’ he added. With the sun on him he looked the colour of putty, and there were beads of sweat on his forehead and along his upper lip, although the air was cool. ‘It’s alleged somebody broke into her shop last night. Living room ransacked.’ Velvet cushions piled high on the sofa. ‘It’s a case of murder certainly. The CID are coming in by the busload.’ He made it sound so amusing. ‘I wonder what the citizens of this mean city will make of it?’
    When I told him I was going he said, ‘There will be questions asked – an exposure of intimacies. If you listen carefully you can hear the knocking of knees among the more gregarious of our men about town.’
    He never looked at me as he said it. When I reached the corner he was still standing there at the foot of the steps, as if he was uncertain which direction to take.
    In a tiny square off the promenade there was a statue of King Edward VII sitting on a throne. Money from the will of an eccentric spinster had placed it there, its blank and baleful eyes staring at the estuary. ‘God Save the Prince of Wales’, the inscription read at the base, but it was a town joke, target for seagulls and pigeons. There was a big