Jerking away, Madeleine shook her head, and the pain made her cry out. “I don’t want you to go anywhere near him,” she said. “He wouldn’t listen anyway.”

“Oh, he’ll listen to me. We’ve clashed many times, and he’s threatened to be rid of me – but I’m still here. That’s because I keep this club operating smoothly where previous people have almost run it into the ground, robbing him blind in the process.” She squeezed Maddy’s hand gently. “Unlike you, my girl, I’ve learned to stand up to him.” She dialed the local taxi firm. “A cab will be here in a minute.”

Madeleine kept a hold on her. “No, Alice. Leave him be for now. It was my fault for telling him tonight, after me just turning up without warning. I should have told him tomorrow morning in the light of day maybe, when he might have been more rational.”

Alice’s curiosity was growing. “Told him what? It must have touched a nerve, whatever it was, for him to blow up like that.”

Madeleine was still dwelling on Steve Drayton’s reaction. “I hoped he might be pleased,” she said, and began to sob.

Exasperated, Alice tried again. “So, what was it you told him?” Then the truth hit her like a ton of bricks. “My God! You’re pregnant!” She understood it all now. “I should have known, what with you refusing food and cutting out the alcohol. Yes, and the other week, Jack told me you’d been sick all morning.” She recalled the moment. “You’d been looking peaky of late, so I did wonder.”

Sobbing, Maddy admitted that yes, she was pregnant, but, “Steve refuses to accept that he’s the father. He’s convinced I’ve been with somebody else… called me a dirty little slut.”

“You’re well shot of him,” Alice said gently. “And don’t you worry, everything’s going to be all right.” Her face was wreathed in the widest smile. “Oh Madeleine, you’re going to have a baby – isn’t that wonderful?”

At the Emergency department of the local hospital, a nurse cleaned the cuts again and removed a tiny sliver of glass from the biggest one. She warned Maddy to only wear her stage makeup for the shortest time – to take it off as soon as possible, to allow the skin to breathe and to heal.

After a cup of tea and some biscuits, Maddy was feeling a lot better. Alice’s excitement was infectious, and by the time they’d taken another taxi to Whitechapel, where Alice lived, Maddy had promised herself that everything was going to be all right.

Alice herself was not so sure. In spite of promising Maddy that things would sort themselves out, she had a murmuring dread that more trouble was bound to come out of all this.

Yet, even now, after witnessing the violence he was capable of, neither Alice nor Madeleine fully realized the true evil that was Steve Drayton.

Four

Alice had always been a light sleeper. She couldn’t tell whether it was the sound of Maddy crying that had woken her, or whether she had just woken like she normally did, after a few short hours of sleep. Either way, she was now wide awake and concerned about the younger woman. “Poor little devil,” she yawned. “What’s to become of her?”

Taking her robe from the bedside chair, she slung it on and crept into the kitchen of her two-bedroomed flat to make a cup of tea. It was a bright summer morning, and even in this busy area of London, near the big roundabout at Aldgate East, she could hear the blackbirds calling to each other.

Coming into the kitchen, she found Maddy hunched across the table. Red-eyed and sorry-looking, the girl immediately apologized. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”

Alice laughed and filled the kettle. “Away with you! Sure, the walls are so thin, I can hear the man next door pulling on his trousers,” she joked. Looking to see if there was an empty cup on the table, she gently chided her young friend, “I see you’ve not yet made yerself a cup o’ tea then?”

Maddy shook her head.

“Hmh! Well, let’s have one together now – you’re bound to be thirsty, all the tears you’ve cried. Then I’ll make us a good breakfast. Remember that you’re eating for two now.” She bent to look at Maddy’s face. “Ye look awful, so ye do. There’s not a man this side of the Irish Sea who would want to kiss that sorry little face, and who could blame them, eh?”

Her cheeky words had the intended effect, for they made Maddy laugh out loud, even though it hurt to do so. “Well, that’s not very nice, is it?” she chuckled.

Alice gave her a hug. “Tea then, is it… with a dash of milk and one sugar?”

“Thank you – yes, I’d like that.” Heartened by this darling woman who always seemed to say the right thing, Maddy drew the dressing gown Alice had lent her tighter about her. “I really am sorry if I woke you,” she murmured.

Alice prepared two cups and opened the biscuit tin. “The thing is,” she answered cheerfully, “I’d have woken up sooner or later, and if I didn’t wake up it wouldn’t matter, would it, because I’d be dead and gone, so I would.”

“Don’t say that!” Maddy didn’t believe in joshing about such things.

It was like tempting Fate.

Having made the tea, Alice brought the tray to the table. “And I’ll thank ye kindly not to eat all them custard creams,” she warned dryly. “There’s two for you, an’ two for me. And I won’t be pleased if there’s crumbs all over the table neither.”

Her banter had done the trick, and soon Maddy was brighter. “You’re such a good friend to me,” she told the older woman, “letting me stay with you like this.”

Alice brushed away her comments, saying, “What are we going to do with you, that’s what I’m wondering. You can’t possibly go back to him – not after what he did. Like as not, if he takes another bad mood, he could finish you off. Think of the baby, my love.”

Maddy took a sip of her tea and sighed. “I’m sure he’ll be in a better frame of mind today,” she said hopefully. “When he’s had time to think, he might realize what he’s done.”

“Don’t you believe it, me darling! That’ll be the day, when Steve Drayton admits to being in the wrong. No.” Alice was emphatic. “I can’t let you go back to him, at least not until we’re certain he really wants to take care of you and the child.”

“Oh, if only he would…” Maddy said wistfully. “Tell me the truth, Alice. Do you think there’s a real chance he might come to terms with the idea of a baby?”

Alice was silent for a moment, chewing on her biscuit and washing it down with another swig of her tea. “D’ye want the truth?”

Maddy nodded. “Please.”

Leaning forward, the older woman secured the girl’s full attention before saying bluntly, “I don’t think there’s a cat in hell’s chance of him accepting the baby.”

“But he is the father!”

“Oh yes, he may be the father, but he will never admit that the child is his. And I can’t see a child playing any part in his life. You know as well as I do, he’s a bad lot – along with the other villains he keeps company with. And not a single one of them has any scruples or conscience whatsoever.”

She paused, all manner of images going through her mind; of late-night visitors to the club, shady deals and vicious arguments, often ending in violence. Steve Drayton lived in a dark world, one in which she feared Maddy might get swallowed up.

“We both know the rumors that circulate about him and his cronies, and you know what they say – there’s no smoke without fire. That’s no environment in which to bring up a child.”

“I know all that,” Maddy admitted soberly. “And I still can’t help but love him.” She was well aware of all the warnings that Alice was sending out. “I wish I didn’t love him, but I do. I want to live with him and for us to bring our child up together.”

Dear God in heaven! What would it take for the girl to see the truth about Drayton? Alice insisted, “You must stay here with me for a while, until we know for sure he wants the two of you. Will you do that for me, if only for my peace of mind?”