Reg returned and placed the glasses on the table and straddled a stool opposite Cindy. ‘You look lovely tonight,’ he said before he took a sip of his drink.
Cindy smiled. ‘I don’t deserve you, Reg, you are a good man.’
Reg grinned. ‘I know.’
Cindy laughed. ‘You know that ring I told you to put away until I was ready?’
Reg’s eyes opened wide. ‘Yes…’
‘Well, do you still have it?’
Reg was almost too afraid to speak. ‘Yes…’
Cindy grinned because the colour had left his face. ‘Good, because I’d like you to ask me again, sometime soon. I’m ready, Reg, to do the settling down thing. Oh, I still want to keep the salon going, for now, but I think I’ve found someone who, once she’s trained up, I’d be happy to hand my baby over to.’
Reg swallowed hard. ‘Cindy, I-I don’t know what to say, except – of course I will!’
Cindy picked up her drink and gave him a mock toast. ‘I’ll look forward to it, then, this time. So, here’s to us, Reg!’
The pub suddenly fell totally silent and for an awful moment, Cindy thought they had been overheard.
‘Aye, aye,’ said Reg, ‘have the bizzies come in?’
Cindy craned her neck around. ‘Oops, they might as well have done! It’s Gladys and she has thunder in her eyes.’
*
‘Jesus, I wish they would get a move on. I can feel the cold in my back something wicked,’ said big Paddy who had been dragged out of the pub by Eugene and was now next to Jerry as they shuffled forward. Jerry could see some activity down at the water’s edge. Too much activity. He had a strange feeling and wanted to get rid of Paddy.
‘You go back to the pub, Paddy, and I’ll send Callum in for you when the load starts rising.’ He had a suspicion that Kathleen was due back up the steps and it would take some explaining to make him understand why Peggy might be with her.
‘Well, you know where I’ll be if you need me,’ said Paddy, and before Jerry could answer him he was gone.
Turning back to the dockside, Jerry noted that the customs hall was empty. So, too, were the harbour master’s office, the administration building and the office of the meanest man on the dockside, Mr Heartfelt. A haul was a huge operation, unlike the odd bag of spuds or flour or a crate of tea or barrel of molasses. Conor had left him in no doubt that there would be sacks needing to be sliced, spilt and collected as they hung in the net, suspended from the hook of a crane that he was using to move the bigger loads out. They would store the bigger bags in lucky shed seven with the broken lock, ready to be separated and carried up in smaller loads. The rolls of fabric would be stored in the shed built into the sandstone ridge and would take a week to transfer up.
Jerry scanned the dock for a sight of the bizzies, his nerves on edge. There were none. Seamus trotted up to him silently.
‘What’s the cargo?’ asked Jerry.
‘Tea, coffee, raisins, flour, almonds, tons of material on rolls, hard nuts, potatoes, rum, ciggies, molasses, bananas, cocoa powder, weird-sounding big hams – you name it, he has it. Conor has pulled a blinder this time.’
Jerry thrust his hands into his jacket. ‘Makes a change from unloading smelted iron. You can’t feed a family on a lump of iron.’
Callum joined them bringing a message from Conor. ‘We can’t start yet; something’s going on down on the bottom but he says not to worry, it’s not the bizzies. I’ll go back down and see if he needs me for anything.’
Jerry didn’t like it at all. ‘Whatever it is, I hope it’s sorted soon; if the bizzies arrive, it’s each man for himself. Pass the word down the line, Tommy…’
Tommy didn’t like it either; each minute of delay was a risk and he hadn’t come back from Ireland to find himself up before a magistrate on his first morning home.
Chapter Twenty-eight
It was Scamp barking that had alerted Alice.
‘Kathleen, is that Scamp? It’s coming from over here, quick.’
As she walked past the Morry, Blinks whispered down from the deck, ‘Kathleen, you’re a bit old to be working the docks! Short of a bob or two, are you?’
Kathleen scowled and craned her neck backwards to look up. ‘You wait until I can reach you, you cheeky bugger,’ she hissed back up at him. ‘I’ll be telling Conor on you. He said he saw Peggy down here and she’s been missing since this afternoon. Have you seen her?’
Blinks shook his head. ‘Not since earlier and we’re just getting ready to unload. The coast is clear, but not sure how long for, so we need to be getting on before your man realises he’s been had and comes back.’
Kathleen tutted. ‘We’re just going to walk along here and see if we can find her; Alice can hear a dog barking.’
‘Be careful,’ said Blinks, ‘it’s dark now. You only have the moon and that suits us, but don’t you go slipping. Watch out for the ropes.’
‘I will,’ said Kathleen. ‘I can’t swim, but who can?’
Blinks laughed. ‘Me! So good job I can then – I’ll dive in and pull you out if I have to.’
Kathleen and Alice hurried along the dock edge, following the sound of the barking.
‘Look, there she is!’ Alice exclaimed and from the light of the moon on the water, they could see Peggy sitting on the edge, Scamp dragging her backwards by her cardigan, barking between tugs.
‘Alice, go back and fetch
