The Girl From Number 22 Read Free Page A

get back to that lovely comfortable rocking chair she’s got.’
    ‘Yeah, I often think of that chair,’ Ada said, well aware she was rubbing her mate up. ‘In fact, I’ve promised to buy meself one when I’ve got the money. I’ve seen the one I’d like, in the window of that furniture shop on Stanley Road.’
    Enough was enough, Hetty thought as she pulled on Ada’s arm. ‘Come on, there’s a good girl. And if yer behave yerself, I’ll take yer along to that shop one day, and I’ll ask the kind man if yer can have a little rock in it.’
    Ada entered into the spirit of things. Clapping her hands in glee, and speaking in a childish voice, she said, ‘Oh, thank you, Mummy. Can we go there now, Mummy? I’ll cry if yer won’t take me there today.’ Stamping one of her feet in temper, she went on, ‘I’ll tell Daddy on yer when he comes in from work.’
    Eliza watched the smaller woman pulling the larger one away, promising she’d buy her a lollipop if she stopped crying. And the old lady had a smile on her face as she closed the door. She lived alone, but her life wasn’t lonely, thanks to the wonderful neighbours she had.
    ‘I’m not having that sheet of ribs, Ronnie Atwill, yer can give it to some other poor sucker.’ Ada jerked her head back in disgust. ‘That poor bloody sheep died of starvation, there’s no ruddymeat on his bones. I feel so sorry for him, if I’d known when his funeral was, I’d have gone to it and taken a bunch of flowers.’
    Hetty opened her mouth to say ribs didn’t come from sheep, but she noticed the spark in her neighbour’s eyes and kept quiet. The butcher was used to Ada, and he’d give back as good as he got. And the customers in the shop would get a laugh out of the confrontation.
    ‘Do yer really feel sorry for the sheep, Ada?’ Ronnie asked. ‘If ye’re that partial to lamb, why don’t yer have some nice lamb chops?’
    ‘I don’t want no bleeding lamb chops, I want a sheet of healthy-looking ribs, with bags of meat on them.’
    ‘What have yer got against pigs, Ada?’
    ‘Dirty buggers, pigs are. Have yer never seen the way they wallow in dirt? Ugh, I could be sick at the thought of it.’
    Ronnie’s young assistant, sixteen-year-old Barry, had two customers in front of him, and when he’d asked them what they wanted, they’d told him to leave them for a while to give them time to make their minds up. They lived in the next street to Ada and Hetty, and many’s the laugh Ada had given them. So there was no way they were going to leave that shop until the matter of the ribs was sorted out. And the young lad thought of the saying that if yer couldn’t beat them, join them, and he folded his arms and leaned back against the chopping block.
    ‘Yer wouldn’t be inconsiderate enough to be sick in me shop, would yer, Ada?’ Ronnie asked, laughter in his blue eyes and a rosy glow to his cheeks. ‘If yer did that, I’d have to close the shop while I cleaned the floor, then yer’d get no chops, no ribs, just sweet Fanny Adams.’
    ‘I’m fussy where I’m sick, Ronnie Atwill, thank you verymuch. And why did yer go all round the world, bringing Fanny Adams into it, instead of just saying I’d get bugger all?’
    ‘Because I don’t swear in front of ladies, that’s why. And to get back to what your feller’s having for his dinner tonight, would yer consider having a sheet of bacon ribs, even though yer think pigs are horrible?’
    Ada shook her head. ‘Not on yer life, I want a sheet of lamb’s ribs and I’ll stand here until I get one.’ She winked at one of the women whose back entry door faced hers. ‘It’s coming to something when yer can’t have what yer want, isn’t it, Dora?’
    ‘Ye’re right there, queen, no doubt about it,’ said Dora. ‘I was only saying to Helen as we walked here that the world isn’t what it was years ago. Didn’t I, Helen?’
    Helen wasn’t going to argue when her neighbour was twice the size of her, and