Martin Edwards - All the Lonely People

As he was lighting the gas on the cooker he caught sight of half a sheet of paper resting against the coffee pot. A note from Liz. Scrawled in her flowing hand, it said: Missed you again! I’ll be at the Ferry Club by eleven. Come over why don’t you?

Her easy assumption that he would come running after her angered him. During their time apart, he had found it easy to forget that the centre of Liz’s universe was herself. Screwing up the piece of paper, he fed it vengefully to the gas flame. But he didn’t bother to deceive himself. When Liz called, he had always followed. Sometimes he was afraid he always would.

The Ferry Club was hidden at the heart of a maze of side streets behind Lime Street Station. Harry walked past empty burger bars and curtained Chinese restaurants, shuttered shops and barricaded redevelopment sites whose walls were covered with fly-posters advertising a political rally at the Pierhead. As the minutes ticked away towards eleven, Liverpool was quiet. Even the Ferry looked almost discreet as he approached. No neon lights, just a notice confirming that Reginald Anthony Gallimore was licensed pursuant to Act of Parliament for singing, dancing and the sale of intoxicating liquor, plus a yellow placard pinned to the door which said that Angie O’Hare, Hit Recording Artist, and Russ Jericho, Popular Comedian, were starring tonight.

At the entrance, a drunken tramp was about to pick an argument with a couple of bouncers, mean and muscular in their ill-fitting dinner suits. Their sniggers suggested they were hoping that he would provoke them into violence. A sign by the pay desk said MEMBERS AND BONA FIDE GUESTS ONLY — BY ORDER, but when Harry handed over his money he was allowed straight through with no questions asked.

The interior of the club was a raucous contrast to the desert calm of the city streets. The queue at the bar was three deep and dozens more people sat at tables grouped in a semi-circle facing the stage. Drinking, talking, a few even listening to the Popular Comedian, a flabby elephant of a man who was tossing old mother-in-law gags out of the side of his mouth in a treacle-thick Scouse accent.

“Y’know, I’m not saying she’s ugly,” Harry heard him mutter, “but I’ve seen better faces on clocks. And the size of her! Bleeding hell, she could eat a banana sideways. Y’know, I reckon she could sing a duet on her own.”

Now and then members of the audience got up and walked straight in front of the act to the bar, but no one seemed to care, least of all Russ Jericho. It gave him the chance to paper over the cracks in his act. When a fat girl in a mini-dress plodded by he interrupted a racist joke about a bald Pakistani to say, “Last time I saw an arse like that, it was being whipped by Lester Piggott.”

Harry’s gaze travelled around the room. Glittery pillars supported a plasterboard ceiling on which pin-point lights flickered in rotation, red, green and blue. Two overhead fans whirled in a doomed attempt to dispel the fug of cigarette smoke and cheap scent. Young girls chatted to each other, feigning not to stare at the leather-jacketed lads sinking pints in silence near the door. Within easy reach of the bar, painted women in short black skirts and fish-net tights watched out for men who might pay for the pleasure of their company.

Liz was nowhere to be seen. Harry stifled a grunt of irritation and looked at his watch. Five past eleven. Perhaps she would be along in a minute. He decided to buy a drink and as he waited for service he reflected that the Ferry hadn’t changed much since his last visit with her. They must have been married eighteen months then and he had already discovered the fascination which clubland held for her; as with so much else, he didn’t share her point of view. The place had probably not been cleaned in the meantime, but in the dim lighting you couldn’t tell.

Harry’s turn at the bar coincided with a scabrous punchline about a lunatic and a lesbian. Harry ordered a pint of Ruddles from a barmaid with dyed blonde hair that was dirty brown at the roots. Large spiky hoops hung from her ears like offensive weapons. Her blouse was cut low, her fingers were heavy with rings. As she took Harry’s money, she stared over his shoulder.

“Froggy, at last! Where were you?”

A small man jostled past Harry, catching his elbow and causing him to spill some of the beer that the blonde had poured a moment before. Without a sideways glance or an apology, the newcomer said in squeaky indignation, “Had things to see to, didn’t I?”

“The boss was chasing after you. As soon as he turned up, her ladyship threw a fit. God knows why, he wasn’t back as late as he said he would be. Anyway, you should have been here at half nine, so if he’s searching for someone to kick, you’re favourite.”

The man had protruding eyes and a forehead wrinkled as if with the effort of years spent making up excuses. It was a petty rogue’s face, of the sort Harry encountered every day of his working life. Standing by his shoulder, Harry caught a whiff of a foul smell, distinctive even in the Ferry’s murky atmosphere.

After a pause for thought the man said, “Anyone asks, Myra’s been took sick. They’ve rushed her into hospital and I’m only just back from the Royal. Okay, Shirelle?”

The barmaid shrugged. A bulging eye twinkled at her as a new line of self-defence evidently occurred to the man. “And I’ll keep me mouth shut about yer job at the Apollo. Promise.”

Shirelle tossed her blond mane in contempt. The earrings jangled with menace, but she spoke resignedly. “All right, I’ll cover for you. Now sod off.”

The small man blew her a kiss and shoved back through the crowd, vanishing from view. Liz still had not turned up. Harry spotted a trio of young girls slinking through the double doors at the other side of the concert hall. Off to the disco. Liz loved to dance and it occurred to him that she might be jiving the night away. He followed the girls downstairs. On the dance floor half a dozen women were swaying to the beat thudding from head-high speakers in each corner of the room. The dancers gazed into space, while the strobes painted them in ever-changing colours. Liz was not amongst them. Harry took a long draught from his glass and went back upstairs, in time to hear Russ Jericho wind up his act with a mumbled platitude about a terrific audience. The applause was patchy and Harry didn’t join in.

A compere in a black velvet suit with flecks of dandruff sprinkled like snowflakes around the shoulders strutted on to the stage. As he gabbled about the quality of the entertainment, more people gravitated towards the bar. Harry scanned their faces in the hope of seeing Liz. No luck.

He turned to the man standing next to him, a stocky figure sales-rep smart in jacket and tie, and said, “I’m looking for a woman. Tall, dark, she… ”

The man interrupted him with an ironic wink. “Aren’t we all, pal, aren’t we all?”

Harry finished his drink in silence. Where was she? The old frustration at her thoughtlessness began to burn within him: had she stood him up? For all he knew, she might be at the Demi-Monde or Huskisson’s with some new bloke she’d just picked up. Of course, he should blame himself for succumbing to the temptation of her note like an addict craving for another fix.

“Well, that’s enough from me,” said the compere and a slurred voice from the audience bellowed assent. “Now is the moment you’ve all been waiting for. The highlight of our show, our very own hit recording artiste.” He rolled off the last word with a Gallic flourish before rising to a new crescendo: “Yes, ladies and gentlemen. The enchanting. The talented. The lovely. The one and only — Miss Angie O’Hare!”