John saw David in the lounge pouring stout into a glass. He leaned in close and said that he had been told by their father they couldn’t waste any more time.
‘He’s sayin’ we gotta get the fivers out before they get to be illegal, and he wants the job completed in the next few days.’
‘For fuck’s sake, John, he only got out this afternoon and already he’s throwin’ his weight around. Let’s just forget about the bloody fivers, they’re too much hassle. Besides, there’ll be loads of deposit boxes with nice jewellery in them.’
‘I know, I know, but it’ll take time to fence and sell all the sparklers, and we need the fivers to pay off Silas and Danny.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Dave, with all this new decimal currency shit the old fivers in the vault become worthless unless they’re cashed in or used by September.’
He shook his head. ‘It seems crazy to rush things, especially for pissin’ five-quid notes that will be useless.’
‘Yeah, well, Danny and Silas won’t know what’s in the bags until it’s too late, will they?’
He paused as it sunk in. ‘You crafty beggar, John.’
David limped into the kitchen. He’d poured the stout badly and spilt some of the overflowing creamy head down his fingers which he wiped on his trousers as he placed the glass down beside his mother who was washing the cutlery.
‘Use the dishwasher, Mum.’
‘Never gets between the forks, and there’s a few silver ones from your grandmother. You can’t put silver in the dishwasher.’
‘You should sell them, get some money.’
‘I might, but I’ve already got a little nest egg. Been saving all my earnings from cleaning for years – yer dad doesn’t know. God forbid he finds it – he’d be straight down the betting shop. I always saved, even my pension. It was always me that bought you boys your Christmas presents, and every time he was banged up I was able to save even more.’
‘Listen, I don’t even want to know where you’ve got it, but do you understand all this new decimal currency yet?’
‘A bit, but only cos I do the grocery shop. No more half-crowns, threepenny bits, or old pennies. Yer couldn’t buy nothin’ with a penny nowadays.’
‘Well, if you’ve got any old fivers stashed you got to change them up or use them soon as they’re gonna be withdrawn come September.’
‘No more fivers? You gotta be jokin’, gerraway with you. I got one in me purse right now. Who told you this, David?’
‘When I got my benefits the other day the lady there mentioned it,’ he lied.
She shrugged and began placing the cutlery in a drawer.
‘It’s a terrible world, and I think they’re doin’ all these changes to rob us blind. I mean eleven pence for a bloody loaf of bread.’
David smiled. The record player had stopped so he went to put another LP on. He contemplated putting on Des O’Connor hoping it would encourage the remaining few guests to leave, but he knew how much his mother disliked him so he just replayed the Elvis album.
Renee didn’t want to go back into the lounge. The smell of cigarettes and cigar smoke always brought on her asthma. She cleared up most of the kitchen and downed her stout before she slipped along the hall to her bedroom. Clifford’s plastic prison bag of belongings was on the floor. It was full of dirty socks and underwear, old denim shirts and jeans, and there were two pairs of old trainers that smelled terrible. She decided she’d do his washing in the morning, and was about to tie the top of the bag in a knot to stop the sweaty odour filling the room when she noticed a small cardboard box. She took it out and opened it to discover a bunch of letters with an elastic band round them. She cautiously looked to the door, and took the packet to the bed, pulling off the elastic band. There were a few letters from the boys, birthday and Christmas cards, and then a considerable amount of pale-blue envelopes. She had rarely, if ever, written to her husband. She never saw the point as she knew his ‘bit on the side’ visited him on a regular basis.
She opened one that smelt of violets and saw the unfamiliar looped handwriting and immediately knew who it was from. She sighed. To her the slut had always been a disgusting bitch, a woman who had been hanging on by her fingernails. Cloyingly sentimental, the letters were badly spelt outpourings of adoration for Clifford which sickened Renee. She had put up with her husband’s infidelity for many years.
Before this woman there had been others; she suspected there had even been whores. But the most humiliating discovery had been that some of her friends had been having sex with Clifford. He could never keep his dick in his pants, but now she realized how much she had chosen to ignore his unfaithfulness. She had always told herself that it was because she put her two sons first, but now they were older and mostly taking care of themselves. She had accepted the abuse, anything for a quiet life, but holding the woman’s letters made her feel wretched. She carefully replaced them in the box, then into the plastic bag. Whilst tying it tight she imagined it was Clifford’s neck.
