So let him have the yard.
And now I think that he never knew, he never knew then and he doesn't know now either. Because he'dVe said, by now, he'dVe come right out with it, today of all days. Surely he would.
I reckon he was only so cocksure and keen because that's how he's made, and because he was getting it at the time, from Mandy, in my camper. Not even guessing. But he still had me selling him that yard for a knock-down price and missing out on value for money, so I reckon that's another reason why I should keep that thousand.
Amy
And I suppose now he's given me my chance, that's what he's done. Tit for tat. Thrown it back at me. You were the one, girl, who wanted me to believe that life don't ever play so mean that you don't get a second chance, that it don't start up again just when you think it's finished.
Well, here's your chance. That feller you lived with for fifty years, the one with the striped apron and the jokes for the housewives, he was just a stand-in. And now he's gone, see, just when you thought the real Jack might be putting in a fresh appearance. Let's all go to the seaside. Funny that, pops up again just to pop off. Don't know what you've got till you miss it, do you missis? Have a bit of best end. So here's your chance, here's your life all over again. And it's never too late.
Though it's easier when you're eighteen.
He levelled up the gun, one eye looking along the barrel, the other squeezed tight, and of course I thought, One day he might be doing this for real, not tin ducks but people. Or someone might be doing it to him. There must have been a few of them that summer taking pot-shots in sideshows and thinking it wasn't such a game. But I suppose his call-up came at just about the right time, so far as he was concerned. Get me out of this, get me out of here, put me somewhere where I can start again. It's possible, after all. Facing bullets would be easier, he'd be good at it. 'Ere, Nursey, take a peek at this. I suppose I knew already he'd be better at facing some things than others.
'Have a go, have a go for the lovely lady. Three shots for tuppence.'
But I thought, like the fool I was, If he hits then we'll find a way somehow, if he misses, never.
He said you'd think they'd be able to do something, these days, you'd think they'd come up with something. They. To make dud babies whole again. As if they could wave a wand. It was the only time we ever talked about her, in that guesthouse bedroom with its fine view of the tram depot, the only time she ever came up in the conversation. Then he said did I know he'd had this idea once, it was just a stupid idea, of being a doctor.
But he said he wasn't no doctor, was he? No more, he said, than I was Florence Nightingale.
So I knew it wasn't the simple rescue operation I thought it was going to be, the simple kill or cure. Margate or bust. Because maybe you don't ever get your life over again, try telling it to June.
Which I have been these fifty years.
Best thing we can do, Ame, is forget all about her.
The ducks moved along in a never-ending row, on some hidden belt, each one painted red and white and green, but scratched and dented where shots had hit, each one with one big eye fixed open wide and its beak curled up in a smile, as if it was only too eager to be shot at again, to disappear with a ping and a clang then pop up again.
I stood behind him on the boards of the Jetty, with the lights and the noise and the crowds and the slither of the sea in the dark below, you could just feel it. The white cliffs looming towards Cliftonville. A steamer was moving out across the bay, chugging back to London, all lit up, like most of its passengers. I thought, Maybe he's thinking it too: hit or miss, kill or. Three ducks says that life aim finished yet. He seemed to take an age to fire each shot. Ping! One duck. Three more swam past, each one giving him the eye. Ping! Another duck. Ping! And after another two slipped goggling and smiling by, a third took a dive in the pond that wasn't there.
'Good shooting sir! Every one a winner! You see, folks, it can be done. They may be ducks but they don't know how to duck, do they? Any more now, any more? So what'll it be, sir? The chocs, the china or the teddy bear? Let the lady choose, shall we? The lucky lady.'
And like the fool I was I chose the teddy bear, the big yellow teddy bear. What would I want with that? Except to show the world it was my lucky day, our lucky day, and I was the lucky lady. He didn't smile, he didn't even look pleased. He just looked at me as I smiled and held the teddy bear, as if there was something he didn't understand. And now, when I remember it, I know I never hugged him, like you do, for winning a prize. I just hugged that teddy bear, laughing. I thought, Which way now? Back to the shore or on to the end of the Jetty? Maybe it should've been the shore. All the wrong choices, and him having just made three shots count. But you don't go on the Jetty just to walk half-way and then turn round again, teddy bear or no teddy bear, you don't go on without going to the end, it's what you do. And just for the time it took to walk to the end of that Jetty I felt, everything is still possible, everything is still floating, the water lapping and slapping beneath us, and I didn't notice, or care if I did, that the smile he'd put on his face now was like the smile on one of those ducks. It was only when we got to the end that I thought, This isn't true, it's only a picture, a seaside postcard, and maybe that's what he was thinking. How could I laugh and smile and act like life was a holiday? My whole stupid idea of going to Margate. The breeze was flipping my skirt. Men were eyeing me. Lucky teddy bear. I thought, Just to be free again, with just the breeze and the night and the sea and the men looking. Having your pick. As if this was your starting point once more. LambethVauxhall.
There was a strap rubbing on one of my shoes, my new shoes, so I gave him the teddy bear while I stooped down to fiddle. Maybe I just wanted to hide my face. And I think even as I handed it to him I knew what he was going to do. There he was for a moment, a grown man, on the end of a pier, holding a teddy bear, a man on the end of a pier. He looked at it for an instant like he didn't know why he was holding it, like he didn't know what it had to do with him. Then he stepped nearer the railings. And then there wasn't any teddy bear, there was just Jack. Goodbye Jack.
Ray
But I didn't put my coat on and go down to Billy Hill's. 'George, I've got a thick 'un for you.' Where I'd look a fool slapping down a thousand cash, even if they took it. Where I'd lose all credit for being a canny punter. 'So what's the game, Raysy? Looks like you've gone and won already.' And where I might be tempted to say, any case, to declare to the assembled company, all the gluttons for punishment and two-quid no-hopers, 'This is for Jack, I'm doing this for Jack. You know, Jack Dodds, it's to save his skin.' You'd have to be a fool to back a horse called Miracle Worker, you'd have to be a fool to own and train one. You'd have to be a bookie's bosom pal. Still, if Lucky Johnson here has a fancy.
I picked up the phone there and then, third ciggy on the go, and dialled a number where I knew they'd take a four-figure punt, no questions asked, even from the likes of me. Where they'd say, 'What's the asking?' And I'd say, 'A thousand, to win, tax paid.' And they'd take down my credit-card number and read me back the details without so much as a wobble in the voice, Miracle Worker, thinking, There's one born every minute, there must be harder ways of making dough.