Vera & Eddy's War
by
Sam Smith

Chapter One

Pre-War: Histories & Meetings

 

Vera Lucy Avery was born on June 6th 1914. Lucy was her mother's maiden name, and she was called Vera after an aunt.
      Whereas her mother, father and sister, Doll, were all dark, Vera had white blonde hair. As a toddler she was so tiny that her father, Ned, was able to stand her in a biscuit barrel on the bar.
      Her mother and father had acquired the Globe Hotel because Ned had been head groom to the Strubins up on the moors. Strubins was a self-made man, had made his money digging diamonds in South Africa. The Strubins had wanted Ned to go with them to the mines in South Africa. Vera's mother, though, having been pregnant with Doll, hadn't wanted to go. So, as they had with all their other staff who had not wanted to go with them, the Strubins set Ned up in his own business.
      Vera's mother was a beautiful woman of Italian descent. She had thick black wavy hair and deepset hazel eyes, was tall and slender. Before her marriage to Ned she had been a lady's maid, having started as an under nanny in service. And she was artistic. Mrs Strubins had once asked her to make floral arrangements for the dining room as Dame Clara Butt, the opera singer, and many other theatricals were coming for the weekend.
      "I want you to do something unusual," Mrs Strubins had told her.
      "Let me do just what I want," Vera's mother had said.
      "Tell the gardeners, Helen, that I said you're to have whatever you like."
      Vera's mother, though, did not go near the gardens; she went to the fields and picked ripe corn, wild poppies and cornflowers. From those she made the table pieces. All the weekend's visiting artistes praised her originality.
      Before the Strubins, Vera's mother had been maid to Lady Coventry. Lady Coventry had been a flirt. Vera's mother had kept watch on her assignations - out of affection and concern. One day she heard Lady Coventry cry out and dashed to her rescue. One of the men had tried to kiss her.
      Vera's mother was an innocent.
      Most of their first customers at the Globe Hotel were Australian troops - billeted on them during the Great War.
      Although Ned had tried to enlist in the Royal Navy he had failed the medical - they had said that he had too much fat around his heart. Yet when he was drunk Ned could do a Cossack dance.
      He was a big strong man who liked a fight. Forty-six inches around the chest unexpanded, he saw himself as a real John Bull. During the Great War he had tried to enlist again and again, and each time he had been rejected.
      When Vera was five her mother and father sold up the Globe Hotel and moved to the Palk Arms in Ellacombe. The Palk Arms had the reputation of being a very rough house. The first week there, the customers put Ned to the test. He threw three headfirst down the six steep front steps. He had no trouble after that.
      Vera and her sister, Doll, were both sent to Dalminio's, a private school in Abbey Road. Doll fared better than Vera. Vera had to wear glasses. Her retinas were almond-shaped instead of circular, so that, without glasses, she saw too much - stars looked like moons. Even so, Vera was a compulsive reader - and she did not help her eyes reading by candlelight: they had no electricity in the top two floors of Palk Arms.
      On leaving school, Vera became a hairdresser, began her apprenticeship in Sidney Smith's - a salon in Union Street, just around the corner from the bottom of Market Street. Her mother and father had to pay a premium of £25 for her to become an apprentice. Her own hair was a frizzy blonde with reddish lights.
      Mr Smith was a thin man, unfailingly polite and kind. He had been wigmaker to old bald Queen Mary. He taught Vera and Rene wigmaking.
      Rene's parents had been regulars at the Palk Arms, had brought Rene to sleep there most nights with Vera. They had grown up together. Mr Smith called Rene 'Miss Sarah'. That gave Vera and Rene the giggles. It did not take much to give Vera and Rene the giggles.

Edwin John Dart was born in Kingskerswell on February 6th 1910. He was named after his father and his grandfather. Kingskerswell was a small village midway between Torquay and Newton Abbot.
      Eddy caught pneumonia as a baby, had it twice more before he was six years old. His mother was unable to look after him, so he was sent to live with a doctor and his family.
      When Eddy was four years old, his father had gone away to the Great War in the Far East. After staying with the doctor's family, Eddy was sent to Chudleigh - at the head of the Teign Valley - to live with his Grandmother Gill. His mother worked as a taxi driver and barmaid to pay for his keep. He was the only child.
      Also at Granny Gill's were two of his cousins from London. Their mother, Aunt Lydia, was a peculiar yellow colour. The school she had been teaching in had been blown up in a zeppelin raid and the plaster dust had stained her skin.
      The school at Chudleigh was full of farm boys. Eddy had to fight or go under. Whenever his mother found out that he had been fighting, she gave him a hammering. Her own brothers were still frightened of her. She sent Eddy to ballet classes.
      Eddy's grandfather, Gill, was a carter. Eddy went with him, hauling lumber from Haldon moor, or taking the turnstile from Chudleigh to Taunton races and bringing it back again.
      Eddy's father came back from the war in the East, was immediately sent to Ireland with the Black and Tans to subdue the rebellious Irish. When at last he arrived home, Eddy went down to meet him at Chudleigh station. His mother also took along two other boys Eddy's age - Mill Millman and Tucket. Had Eddy's mother not pointed Eddy out, his father would not have known which of the three boys was his.
      Eddy was ten years old when he went to live with his mother and father in Newton Abbot, at 34, Buller Road. He was sent first to a school run by nuns, then - when he was eleven - to Bell's, the Church of England school. His father, like his father before him who had been a master potter, returned to work in the pottery. Eddy's father was a handler - he put handles and spouts on the teapots - while his brother Fred made the shapes.
      Eddy's father suffered recurring bouts of malaria and shellshock, came out in sweats. Eddy gave up ballet lessons, took to throwing lumps of turf at the local policeman, chucking pepper in church, and was taught to box as his father had been taught before him.
      When Eddy was fourteen his mother gave birth to a boy, Jim. When Eddy was fifteen she gave birth to a girl. Eddy began playing in a band.
      Eddy had always enjoyed knocking a couple of sticks about a tin, had progressed to a skittle drum. A few older lads had started a dance band in Newton Abbot. Frank Andrews played the piano, Dick - an older man who worked on the railway - played the fiddle; and Dick Sanders - an ex-soldier from the Great War - played a one-string fiddle with a horn on it. Timo Gilpin was the West of England cornet champion and came from a musical family.
      The band's only one-step was 'Pasadena'. All the others were quicksteps - 'I'm one of the nuts of Barcelona' and 'Valencia'. They were also competent enough in the 'Lancers' and the 'Valleta'.
      New Year's Eve found the band playing in Bickington village hall. Eddy was at the dance. The drummer was taken ill. The set of drums were there - a one-sided big drum, a one-sided side drum and an assortment of percussion; as well as a box of odd instruments, such as a swanee whistle for waltzes, a whistle full of water for birdsong; and a clog box, triangle, etcetera. They asked Eddy to stand in.
      That night Eddy proved himself just about competent; and, although he was still only fifteen, the band took him on. His mother was a bit doubtful, but he was allowed to go, and was paid eight bob (shillings) for playing from eight until two in the morning. Hunt balls went on until three.
      Eddy was fascinated by the fiddle player, who he knew had a wife and children. But the fiddle player wasn't on the stage half the time. He would play a couple of tunes, then disappear outside with a woman. And Timo Gilpin always had a small barrel of beer beside him. Neither he nor Dick Sanders would play without one; it was included in the price.
      Eddy got himself another evening job; at the cinema, creating sound effects behind the screen. A German orchestra played there. It was all one family except for the drummer who was called Reece, an ex-RAF man. Reece had a complete set of tympani; and it was he who taught Eddy all the tricks of the trade.
      The band dropped the cornet player - he got too fond of the beer - and they went from strength to strength, were out playing almost every night. Friday nights they played Chudleigh, the next night Staverton, the next Stoke Gabriel, then Landscove, Denbury, Ipplepen. The band had a following that travelled in coaches. And in every village hall two tables were set aside for the old farmers who played nap card games for money throughout the evening.
      Eddy's baby sister had been born with a hole in her heart. She only lived until she was eleven months old. His mother died. She was forty two. Six months afterwards, his brother died. The doctor said that he had simply pined away.
      Eddy and his father moved into lodgings in St Marychurch Road, Milbur, just outside Newton Abbot. Following his mother's wishes Eddy had entered an architect's office. Evenings he played the drums in the dance band; weekends he went fishing.
      When Eddy was seventeen, he was playing in the band in Ford Hall, Newton Abbot. A boxer from London kept thumping Eddy's bass drum every time he passed it. Eddy threatened him. He was threatened back. They agreed to settle it in the ring. The fight was to be part of a charity programme in the Palace Hotel, Torquay. During the days before the fight Eddy was backed by several people. And, unknown to Eddy, his father watched the fight. Eddy won, made himself a bit of money.
      Eddy disliked working indoors. Realising that, because he didn't have the connections, he would always be an office boy, Eddy left the architect's office to become a mason.

In 1933 Vera was nineteen years old. She had many boyfriends. Norman Weed thought that he was Vera's only boyfriend. She was with him in the Empire Cinema when she first saw Eddy.
      Eddy and Sissie were sitting in the row in front of her and Norman. Norman watched the film - 'The Singing Fool' - while Vera studied Eddy and Sissie. They were supposed to be the best looking couple in Newton Abbot.
      Eddy was tall, had a straight nose, a thin black moustache and pale blue eyes. Sissie had auburn hair. Throughout the film Eddy and Sissie quarrelled: Vera thought that they might both be very good-looking, but they weren't half bad-tempered.

Ron Pouilly was now playing in the band with Eddy. One night Eddy discovered that Ron was going to take Sissie out after they had finished playing. So, during the break, Eddy sneaked out of the dance hall and down a back street to where Ron had parked his car - an MG sports. Smashing a milk bottle, Eddy jammed it under his front tyre.
      What a rotten sod I am, Eddy thought to himself. I should've stayed and knocked his block off.
      A few days later, Ron told Eddy that his tyre had been punctured in three places.
      "What rotten sod would play a dirty trick like that?" Eddy said.

The back of Sidney Smith's looked down on Pimlico. One of Vera's customers was a mousy little girl. Her boyfriend drove a grocer's van. While she had her hair done, the boyfriend would wait out back in the van. One day Rene grabbed hold of Vera.
      "Quick! Quick!" She dragged Vera upstairs to the back window. From there they could see down into the van's cab. The boyfriend was masturbating.
      After that they, giggling, watched out for him. And every day, while waiting for his girlfriend, he masturbated.
      They made their shampoo in that upstairs back room - boiling up buckets of pure soap and adding scent. At first those doing it had kept an eye out for the boyfriend, had called the other girls over when he had arrived. In the end they got sick of it. One day they opened the window and emptied a bucket of hot shampoo over him. That was the last they saw of him.

Sissie's parents owned a fish and chip shop in Newton Abbot. Sissie's mother was the guiding force, bossed Sissie's father about. One Sunday afternoon Sissie started to nag Eddy like her mother nagged her father.
      Eddy knocked Sissie over the living room sofa and walked out.

 Mr Smith sold out and moved to Bournemouth. A Mr Dingle took over the shop. Up until then most of Vera's customers had come from the Palk Arms. If she worked late Mr Smith would give her a day off in lieu. Mr Smith had been polite to her pub customers. They, however, were not the kind of customers Mr Dingle wanted.
      Mr Dingle was a fat man with a little moustache. On taking over the shop he immediately put the prices up. What with that and his being rude to them, soon Vera's customers would not come into the shop. They asked Vera to do their hair for them at home. So, not wanting to lose her customers, she did their hair after work in the Palk Arms bathroom.

The Co-op Hall dance was a roughhouse. Even so, Eddy was banned twice from it. In the 'ladies excuse me', a big brute of a redheaded Scotsman was in the habit of slamming the man in possession aside. He did it to Frank Andrews a couple of times. Eddy saw him coming up behind him. He ducked and swung around.
      "I wouldn't try that again," Eddy warned.
      "I'll see you outside," the Scotsman growled down at him.
      "Right," Eddy said.
      Ethel Stormon held onto him. "You can't go out there. He'll kill you."
      Eddy had a black trilby he wore cocked over one eye. PC Banks, the local policeman, was on the door.
      "I think you're taking on a bit there boy," he said to Eddy. "He's a big rough bugger." PC Banks had taught Eddy to box. "You goin' to have a go?" Eddy nodded.
      "Well if he gets too bad," PC Banks said, "I'll arrest him. But if you're beatin' him I won't say anythin' about it."
      Eddy was first outside. As the Scotsman came out, Eddy brushed off his trilby with one hand and banged him with the other. The Scotsman hadn't expected it, and Eddy didn't give him a chance to recover, got stuck in and down he went. As Eddy triumphantly walked away something exploded in the back of his head.
      He came to in Torbay hospital, could not understand why he was farting so much. He couldn't seem to stop; and on the back of his head was a lump the size of an egg. And still he couldn't stop farting. The doctor told him that it was because he had concussion. He would have to stay in hospital the night.
      "What did he hit you with?"
      "No idea," Eddy said, listening to himself farting.
      Frank picked him up in the morning. Eddy asked him what had happened. The Scotsman's girlfriend had hit him with her umbrella. It had had a carved cock's head on the handle.

Vera and Eddy both went to a party at Gwen Twose's house. Vera went with Norman Weed.
      The fashion for girls then was a beret over one eye and costumes - a suit with a long fitted jacket - worn with a cravat. Vera had one suit in strawberry pink, which she wore with a monogrammed cravat. Another suit she had was a mustard colour, which she wore with brown accessories. The shoes were open-toed with straps across the instep. And the hair was swept back and pulled forward into a quiff.
      Eddy went to the party with Gwen Shorts. Gwen Twose's father was a policeman and a teetotaller. He didn't allow drink in the house. The men had bottles of whisky hidden in the lavatory cistern. PC Twose said that he had never seen such a happy party.
      Vera's father hated Twose: PC Twose was too conscientious by far. Men would come rushing into the Palk Arms: "Quick Ned! PC Twose is on his way." So Ned would have to close early, at the legal closing time.
      A dedicated policeman, PC Twose would have arrested his own wife. She knew about the whisky in the lavatory cistern.
      Postman's Knock was played at the party. After a while Vera and Eddy so managed it that they kept going outside together. Vera thought Eddy a very good kisser. Eddy thought that Norman Weed had no idea what was going on.
      Eddy did not have a car, and when the party finished Norman offered Eddy and Gwen Shorts a lift home. Vera was staying the night with Gwen Twose.
      Norman first drove Eddy up to Milbur, where he was still in lodgings with his father; and, having dropped Eddy off, Norman then drove Gwen Shorts home - all the way to the other end of town.
      Thinking that Norman had only taken Vera to the party, Eddy had arranged to meet her on the Wednesday. But when he found out that Vera was Norman's girl, he sent a message to her, via Gwen Twose, saying that he wouldn't go out with another man's girl; but, if she finished with Norman Weed, then he would. Who the hell does he think he's ordering about? Vera thought.
      Vera finished with Norman Weed anyway. Norman didn't want to be finished with and followed Vera to a dance at the town hall. Eddy was there. He was drunk. It was his birthday and he hadn't had a birthday card from anyone. He hadn't even seen his father, not since the day, weeks before, when he had come home and found his father holding their landlady upside-down by her ankles and banging her head on the kitchen's stone floor.
      At the town hall, Eddy had been supposed to be dancing in a competition with Ethel Stormon. He danced every dance except the competition dance with Vera. Long John told Eddy that he shouldn't be dancing with Vera, that Norman Weed was watching them. Eddy went for a drink and Jack Ness told him that he shouldn't dance with Vera. Eddy knocked Jack down. Jack knocked Eddy down. Come the competition dance Eddy was so drunk that Ethel had to hold him up.
      "For Chrissakes stand up. You're drunk as a fart." And Ethel told Eddy that she'd been knitting him a lovely pullover, but now he couldn't have it; she would give it to her father instead.
      Vera felt sorry for Eddy. She thought, Poor bugger. He's falling all over me, so I'd better let him take me home.

For his first date with her, Eddy was to call for Vera at Dingle's. He had promised not to be drunk. But that Saturday afternoon he went out with Frank Andrews in his Austin Seven. A tiny bricklayer called Sam Avery went along with them. Sam had asthma.
      Starting with a drink at the Union, Saturday lunchtime, they then took a few more drinks with them to a Torquay United soccer game. From there, they went to Sam's house, down in Upton, for a cream tea. Sam's father said that they were some relation to Vera's parents. At opening time, Frank, Eddy and Sam went for a few more drinks. Eddy told them that he had to meet Vera to take her to the dance up at the Co-op Hall.
      Vera was waiting at the back of the shop for him. The Salvation Army band was playing there - it was their regular pitch. Eddy had on a pair of plus-four trousers like golfers wore in those days. Just as they pulled up the car, Sam said he felt sick.
      "Don't be sick in the bloody car," Eddy said and bundled him out the door. Sam fell smack in the middle of the Salvation Army band and puked.
      Vera looked none too pleased.
      Eddy and Frank picked Sam up, wiped off the worst, and stuffed him back in the car. Vera got in, and they drove up to the Co-op Hall. Inside the hall, it was very hot. As he danced with Vera, Eddy felt himself becoming ill. Sam had recovered by this time, had cleaned himself up, though he still stank like a pig.
      "I've got to go outside," Eddy told Vera. "I feel bad."
      Outside the hall was an archway. The dustbins were kept under there. Eddy knew that if he wasn't quick he would shit his pants. Pulling down his plus-fours, he balanced over an empty dustbin. But no sooner had he sat over the dustbin than he was sick, as well as shitting himself. And the more he was sick, the weaker he became, and the further he slid down the dustbin.
      PC Banks came out for a breath of air.
      "My Christ! What a stink!" He peered under the dark archway. "Who's that?"
      "It's me," Eddy said.
      "Who's me?"
      "Eddy."
      "Bloody hell! Jesus! What the hell you doin' of?"
      "I'm drunk," Eddy said. "And I can't get out of this dustbin. But I haven't got down to where it is yet."
      PC Banks pulled him out; and, feeling better, Eddy had a wash. Then he went back in to find Vera. But she would have nothing more to do with him.
      "First and last," she said.
      First and last of many.

The following week, Eddy was playing in the band in the Newton Abbot Liberal Club. Norman Poke was the pianist. He was a solicitor's clerk and a bit of a Mary-Anne. Norman Weed came in a side door with his henchman, Long John, a tall Cockney plasterer. With his back to the dancers, and facing the band, Norman Weed unbuttoned his jacket to reveal an army Colt.
      "If you don't stay away from Vera," he told Eddy, "I'll bloody use it." Norman Poke had stopped playing.
      The band missed six beats.
      Norman Weed left by the side door.
      "Somebody else play the bloody drums," Eddy said. "I'll kill the bastard. Coming in here threatening me with his bloody gun."
      "I wouldn't push him," one of the band warned. "The silly bugger's daft enough to pull the trigger."

What with working at Dingle's during the day and at home on her own customers in the evenings, Vera was dog-tired. A jeweller's shop came up for rent in Alexander Road, just along from the Palk Arms. Borrowing the money for the driers from her mother, Vera set herself up in business. And to get herself established she worked from nine in the morning to nine at night. The shop was rented from Lewish, the fish people. Vera called it 'Maison Vee's'.

In Torquay, Eddy was told that Norman Weed was after him. All Vera's other boyfriends had been frightened off or beaten up by Norman. He was known as The Terror of Ellacombe, was thickset and heavier than Eddy, and he too used to box. Eddy, though, wasn't much bothered, looked upon Norman as only a rough-and-tumble fighter. So it was with Eddy that Vera went to the Ambulance Ball at the Town Hall.
      At half-time Vera and Eddy went for a drink in the packed bar downstairs. Norman Weed and the Cockney plasterer were there. Long John had on a red shirt. He saw Vera and Eddy and came over for a chat. Norman came up to Long John.
      "You don't want to talk to a thing like her."
      Norman had downed a few drinks. He was wearing a dinner jacket and a stiff-collared shirt. Eddy had on a new black suit with a polka-dot tie, and a shirt he had bought in London.
      Having realised what Norman had said, Eddy went marching over to him. Norman had his back to Eddy. Long John was facing him. As Eddy reached them, Long John gave Norman the nod. Norman turned and hit Eddy. Eddy went crashing over five tables. His eye thumped so much that he thought, at first, it had been knocked out.
      Norman usually only had to hit anyone once for the fight to be over. But Eddy got up off the floor, started to pick up a table to brain Norman with. Vera was quaking.
      The dance was being run by the landlord of the Torbay Inn. He grabbed hold of Eddy, told him to get Norman outside. Eddy had once boxed at the Torbay Inn. He told the landlord he could only see out of one eye.
      "Never mind that," the landlord told him. "You can still beat him."
      "I'm not finished yet," Eddy called out to Norman. "Outside."
      Vera stayed inside with Rene. The rest of the dance followed Norman and Eddy onto a patch of grass beside the Town Hall. PC Banks kept order, watched to see fair play. Eddy started to remove his shirt. Norman tore the sleeves off it. Eddy wasn't pleased, swore at Norman. Norman piled in. Eddy ducked off to one side and hit him under the heart. He had learned to do that with a stronger opponent. And whenever Norman charged at Eddy, Eddy dodged aside and jabbed Norman under the heart.
      Unable to hit Eddy, Norman roared with frustration, tore his own dinner jacket apart and chucked the two halves away. When the stiff-collared shirt followed, Eddy could see the dark bruise under Norman's heart. He hit him there again. And again. Come the end, Eddy had to pick Norman up to knock him down. Norman tried to crawl up Eddy's legs. Eddy punched him down.
      Eddy was bruised, his shirt armless. Back in the Town Hall, he had a drink. Vera wanted to be taken home. Eddy would not go. An hour later PC Banks sent someone to fetch Eddy: Norman hadn't come around. He was still lying out there on the grass, cold as marble with a large black patch growing around his heart. Norman's brothers arrived. Eddy's friends went out to see them in case they cut up rough. Norman's brothers took him to the hospital. Not until late that night did he regain consciousness.

At last, Vera was free of Norman Weed. But now Eddy wanted to be serious, and Eddy had only to look at a man for that man to stop talking to Vera. Eddy had replaced Norman as the kingpin of Ellacombe. So now Vera had to dodge Eddy.
      That summer, Eddy was playing every evening in a band at St Marychurch town hall for a man called All White, who came from Ireland. He was a champion dancer, wore white tails, had fair, curly hair and looked a bit of a dude till you came to weigh him up. Then you saw he was six foot two.
      On finishing work, Vera used to go alone to the dance. While Eddy played, Vera had a lovely time. Eddy Coraline and many others danced with her. She was never short of partners. Then all of a sudden Eddy Coraline stopped dancing with her; and no-one else asked her to dance.
      Eddy had been watching her - all cool and proper while she had danced past the band, then as soon as she'd reached the far end of the hall, where she thought Eddy couldn't see her, she had been all over her partner.
      Vera found out that Eddy had warned all the men off. She told him that she wasn't having any of that and walked down to the Spa ballroom. Eddy didn't see her for about four weeks.
      Vera went on her own to a Town Hall dance. Ron Pouilly was playing in the band. All the girls were mad about him. He asked Vera if he could take her home.
      Vera had on a new dress. It was apple-green pan velvet, off the shoulders, with an edging of fur around the bodice. After the dance, she waited outside the Town Hall for Ron. It was raining. Gladys Stormon came along. She asked Vera who she was waiting for.
      "Ron Pouilly."
      "Oh you won't get home with him," Gladys said. "He's got a caravan out Maidencombe. All the girls go out there."
      "Oh," Vera said, "I'm off." Gladys decided to go with her. The rain was bucketing down.
      Just then, Robin called to them from his car. He was a commercial traveller. Gladys fancied him. Vera knew him from her shop. As they were crossing the road to him, George Berry came along. He was a friend of Eddy's. George was very wealthy. His family owned the mills at Buckfastleigh.
      George and Robin agreed to see both girls home. Vera was staying at Molly Dawes', one of the girls who worked for her. It was a ruse to avoid Norman Weed, who was still haunting the Palk Arms.
      Robin's car only had two doors. Gladys got in the back with George. Vera sat beside Robin.
      "Straight up Milbur Downs," George told Robin.
      "I'm not going up Milbur Downs," Gladys said.
      Robin turned to her. "Boy, oh boy," he said. "Are you two going to be bugged tonight."
      That was the first time Vera had heard the word 'bugged'. Neither of the girls had realised Robin was so drunk. In the back, Gladys got hysterical, demanded to be let out of the car, screamed and kicked.
      As they came to the harbour Vera glimpsed a man standing by the cockle stall.
      "There's my father! Dad! Dad!" she yelled out the window. Robin stopped the car, opened Vera's door, put his foot in her back and sent her sprawling into the mud. Gladys was thrown after her, and the car drove off.
      The rain was still pelting down. Picking themselves up, Vera and Gladys dragged themselves over to the shelter of William & Cox's doorway. Gladys fainted.
      "Oh don't faint," Vera said. "I don't know what to do." Gladys eventually recovered and they started walking home.
      Gladys lived at Torre and so could walk home along the main street. But Molly Dawes lived up the Braddons. The arrangement was that Vera would meet Molly at the top of the creepy steps and then they would go in together so that Molly's mother would think they had chaperoned one another. Molly was man mad. Freezing cold, leaking wet, Vera waited, and waited. Molly arrived at about two o'clock. Vera then had to tell her all that had happened.

Many girls said to Vera: "You going out with Eddy Dart? He's got an awful reputation. He'll do you, alright."
      Vera was afraid of him. But if she and Eddy went out on their own he took her to the pictures. When he did eventually take her to some woods, she was half afraid of what he might do. But he didn't try to do anything at all. Vera was most disappointed.
      Eddy's reputation, though, was based more on his drinking than his chasing women. In his opinion those women who did, weren't worth having, and why bother with those who wouldn't? Frank Andrews used to have the women. Women liked him. Baby Face he was called. Often, after a night out, Eddy would be sozzled at three in the morning in Frank's car waiting until Frank had finished with a woman.
      Frank went out with a girl who lived up the Teign valley. She was called Crystal. She already had another boyfriend. Eddy was with them when Frank took her home. Her other boyfriend had told Crystal's father what a bad reputation Frank had. Immediately Crystal got out of the car, her father set about her with a Harry Lauder walking stick. Having beaten her to the ground, he next whacked Frank on either side of his head. Then he came for Eddy. But Eddy ducked under the walking stick, grabbed him by the balls, and down he went.
      When the village policeman saw what Crystal's father had done to her, he was all for having a go at him himself. (Afterwards, because he'd been such a pig to Crystal and no-one would have anything to do with him, Crystal's father drowned himself in a flooded quarry.)
      Frank's next girlfriend was a private nurse to an old gentleman. She was a smart piece, and a sex maniac. Frank couldn't give her enough. She said to Frank: "What about Eddy? Can't he come as well?"
      Vera and Eddy made up a foursome with Frank and his girl. They went out to Maidencombe, parted in the woods. In the woods, Vera could hear Frank and the nurse doing it. She was most embarrassed, didn't know where to look in front of Eddy. She wouldn't let Eddy do anything like that. Although, this time, Eddy did try.
      Vera told Eddy lies. At Easter, to put him off, she told him that she was going to visit her grandmother. Her grandmother was dead. That afternoon she met a boy from Sealhayne College. He had a sports car. They drove through Newton Abbot, where she had arranged to meet Eddy later that evening. And, in order to meet Eddy, she had to make excuses to the boy from Sealhayne College, because he, too, had wanted to see her that evening.
      That evening she went to Goodrington with Eddy. Frank Andrews and his girl were with them. The two pairs separated. Eddy was quiet. Vera sat up beside him on the high sea wall. Eddy asked Vera where she had been that afternoon.
      "Seeing my grandmother," Vera said.
      "You frizzy-haired, lying bugger!" Eddy gave her a wallop, which sent her flying off the wall. She landed in the sand with her legs sticking up in the air.
      From then on Vera took Eddy more seriously.

Eddy began to sleep weekends at the Palk Arms. He was put on the spooky top floor, the one without lights.
      Eddy did not meet with Ned's approval. When all the others had gone to bed, Eddy would hear Ned down on the middle landing mumbling to himself - saying that that bastard up there was no fucking good for his daughter, a fucking bricklayer ... Eddy would creep out of bed and jam a chair under the doorhandle.
      Ned had liked Norman Weed even less.
      "Big-headed little bastard," he said one day to Eddy. "I hear you gave him a hammering down the Town Hall."
      "I did."
      "Did 'e? I heard he threatened you with a revolver?"
      "He did."
      "He brought the bugger in here one night."
      Eddy had heard many a tale about Ned. Most of Ellacombe and Babbacombe was afraid of him. One evening Cyril Drew, Norman Weed and a couple of others had been having a drink in the Palk Arms' back room. Ned had come in, had rolled up his sleeves.
      "Span my wrist," he said to Cyril. Cyril Drew was a plumber. Ned had wrists as thick as pork hams.
      "Biggest wrist in Torquay, Mr Avery," Cyril said, winking at the others to humour him.
      "Span my wrist," Ned said to the next.
      "Can't get nowhere near it, Mr Avery. Never seen a wrist like it."
      Ned came to Norman Weed.
      "Span my wrist," Ned said.
      "Not bad," Norman said. Ned hit him on the forehead with the flat of his hand. Norman's grey trilby hat crumpled up and Norman slid unconscious under the table.
      Ned liked horses, cards, drink, ferreting and dirty jokes. But he did not tell dirty jokes; and neither did he swear in front of women, nor allow any other man to do so. In the Palk Arms, the women drank in the secluded 'snug' room, away from the men.
      A man at Babbacombe regatta had said something rude to Vera's mother by way of a joke. Ned had hurt him so bad the man had been unconscious for three days.
      Yet, every year at Torquay regatta, it was Ned who paid for all the children from St Vincent's Orphanage and for all the boys from the Brixham Seaman's Orphanage, for one ride each on every roundabout and on the helter-skelter slide.

Vera arranged for Eddy to become a lodger at Mrs Dredge's, just up the road from the Palk Arms.
      Mrs Dredge had two boys, a daughter, and three other lodgers. One lodger was a newspaper reporter; then there was Harry, and a man from the Post Office. They all slept in one large room upstairs, like a dormitory, and they all paid one pound and ten shillings a week.
      Eddy now saw much more of Vera. Rene and Cyril Perry borrowed a car and took Vera and Eddy to Plymouth for the day. On the way back, they stopped the car and Vera and Eddy took a rug up into a dark field for a cuddle. When they got back into the car, Rene asked what the awful smell was. In the light of the Palk Arms, they saw that Vera had lain in some cow muck. Vera rushed upstairs for a bath.
      Most of Ellacombe were Vera's customers. Eddy could not stop to talk to a girl without Vera finding out about it. On a seat on Ellacombe green, Eddy asked Vera to become engaged to him. Vera agreed.
      Eddy had to ask Ned's permission. Generally, there was a game of cards going on in the middle room - police and publicans - to all hours of the night. This night, after official closing, Eddy said: "I want to speak to you, Dad."
      "What you want? Better come out into the yard."
      Eddy thought, Christ - that was where Ned took the wayward customers and belted them from one wall to the next.
      "I want to get married to Babe," Eddy said.
      "I don't know about that," Ned said, and he walked up the yard shaking his head. Eddy walked with him.
      "You're only a bricklayer. You ain't got no prospects. And we've spent all this money on her, put Babe into business over there." You haven't spent any money, Eddy thought. It was her mother's money. And up and down the yard they went. For an hour and a half.
      Vera and her mother had crept into the pantry, which had a window opening onto the yard. The pantry was as big as a room, had whole cheeses, hams and chests of tea stacked on its shelves.
      "How much you earning?" Ned asked. "I've got a lovely daughter and I expect the best for her." Vera and her mother listened in a sweat.
      " 'Course," Ned added, "I likes you better than that other one she had. But I don't know." Again, Ned shook his head.
      Eddy was fed up. When they again neared the back gate Eddy stood his distance and said: "Well it don't make a bit of difference if you say yes or no. I'm only asking you, but I'm getting engaged tomorrow whatever you say." Eddy knew that he could have cleared the gate and easily outdistanced him if Ned had taken a swing at him.
      "Oh yes. Well ..." and to Eddy's consternation Ned began to cry. "My little maid. My little darling. That's alright boy. You'm after me own heart. I'll give you my blessings. My sonny."
      When the two men got back indoors, the women were as white as sheets. Ned sent them up to bed.
      "We had better have a drink on this," Ned announced to Eddy.
      Eddy was drunk for three days.