The Traitor

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‘Welcome to my home. Do come in,’ Joyce said, adding a little curtsey.

‘Hello. Pleased to meet you,’ Polly’s mum said.

‘All right, sweetheart,’ said Polly’s dad.

Overcome by her own self-importance, it wasn’t until Polly’s parents stepped inside the house that Joyce noticed their clothes. Polly’s dad, Dickie, was the spitting image of the character Boycie out of Only Fools and Horses.

Dickie was wearing blue jeans, tan shoes and a tan leather jacket and instead of sounding extremely upper class, which Joyce had imagined, his voice had a strong south London lilt to it.

Jenny, his wife, also had jeans on. With her knee-high boots, short fur jacket and short blonde hair, she reminded Joycie of the famous singer, Lulu.

Joycie was mortified. She and Stanley were all done up to the nines and Polly’s parents were dressed as if they were off to some seedy strip club.

‘Now, would you like a drink or something?’ Joyce asked in her ultra-posh voice.

Dickie slapped Joyce on the arse and winked at Jenny. ‘I’ll have whatever’s on offer, you little raver!’

Back in south London, Eddie waited until he heard Stuart snoring before he opened the rest of his letters.

It was Johnny, his little mate the screw, who had got hold of a torch for him. Ed wasn’t a great sleeper at the best of times and the torch had proved to be a lifeline for him, because he sometimes read under the covers well into the early hours.

The letter from Dougie earlier had upset Eddie immensely. Doug’s wife, Vicki, had been Jessica’s best friend. Ed had introduced them years ago at a party and they’d been inseparable ever since.

Truth be known, Eddie was honoured that Vicki was naming her child in memory of his wife, but seeing it written in black and white brought everything back that he’d tried so hard to move on from. Over the last couple of months, he’d hardly thought about Jessica’s death, but reading that letter had done him up like a kipper.

Eddie put his hand under his bunk. He’d Sellotaped the torch underneath, so nosy screws like Carter couldn’t find it. He could see that one of the envelopes contained a Christmas card, so he opened that first.

Hello Ed.

Hope you’re doing OK, bruv? I hate the fact we’ve fallen out. We went through so much together and I want to make things right between us. Please send me a VO so I can visit you in the New Year.

Happy Christmas,

Ronny

Ed looked at the front of the card and smiled. Ronny had always had the brains of a rocking horse and only he could send a card with the words ‘May your Christmas be jolly’ scrawled across the front whilst Eddie was sitting in clink for murdering his wife.

Everybody else had just sent letters, apart from two, who had sent cards inscribed ‘Thinking of you’.

Eddie was down to his last two letters now. He knew from the writing and the air-mail sticker that one was from Gary and Ricky, who were currently on holiday, and he decided to save that until last. He loved hearing from his sons. He’d had a right go at them for not telling him that the O’Haras had turned up at Jessica’s funeral. Raymond had made him see sense and Ed had soon after made it up with both of them.

In prison, lots of things got blown out of proportion. Living your life in a goldfish bowl wasn’t exactly easy and lags had far too much time on their hands to mull things over and get paranoid. That’s why that poor sod had hung himself recently when he hadn’t heard from his old woman. The unfortunate bastard had convinced himself that she was having an affair with his brother.

Ed put Gary and Ricky’s envelope to one side and studied the other. The handwriting was kind of unique and professional and the postmark was from Southend-on-Sea. Eddie ripped it open. He had no idea who the letter was from, but guessed by the handwriting that it had to be a woman.

Hi Eddie,

I hope you don’t mind me writing to you, but I just felt that I had to.

Firstly, I would like to say how upset I am by what has happened to you. I understand your predicament more than most as, in a way, I obviously played a big part in it. I have read all the press coverage and I would really like to help you. I am willing to stand up in court on your behalf. I would love to come and visit you so that we can have a proper discussion about this. If you do not want my help and do not reply, I will not think any less of you.

My thoughts are constantly with you.

Take care,

Mrs Smith x

Eddie knew immediately who the letter was from. He’d called himself Mr Smith when he’d hired Gina, the private detective, and he knew that by using the same name, she was talking in code.

He read the letter again. Gina had fancied him rotten – he had known that at the time.

Eddie lay back on his bed and smiled. He couldn’t wait to ring Larry, his solicitor. Gina had been, and obviously still was, under his spell and if Ed could keep her sweet, she could be the difference between him doing fifteen years or seven.

Frankie stood in the corner of the O’Hara’s living room. Apart from her dad’s old friend Patrick Murphy, she didn’t know a soul and she felt as out of place as a cat in a dogs’ home.

Even though she loved Jed, Frankie wasn’t at all comfortable with the gypsy culture. In her opinion, the women were rough and common, spoke in a language of their own and there had already been one big punch-up. One youngish mum had accused another bird of stealing her gold and, seconds later, had started walloping her with her baby buggy.

As the argument between the two women started up again, Frankie’s eyes scanned the room for Jed. He was nowhere to be seen, as usual.

Suddenly all hell broke loose and, frightened for her own safety and that of her unborn baby, Frankie ducked a flying glass and ran from the room, screaming. Visibly shaken, she finally found Jed in the garden. He was talking to his cousin Sammy and two scantily dressed girls.

‘What’s up?’ he asked as she fell into his arms.

‘Everybody’s fighting in the lounge, Jed. I nearly got hit in the face by a glass.’

Winking at Sammy and the two birds, Jed led Frankie towards the trailer. ‘Let’s get you to bed, babe. I’m sorry for shouting at you earlier. This Christmas must be really difficult for you and sometimes I’m such a dinlo, as I forget what you’ve been through this year.’

Frankie put her pyjamas on and smiled as Jed handed her a cup of hot chocolate. ‘Thanks,’ she said gratefully.

Jed insisted that Frankie got into bed and then sat on the edge as he tucked her in. ‘You don’t mind if I go back to the party, do ya?’

Frankie shook her head. Just because she didn’t feel part of the gypsy way of life, it didn’t mean to say that Jed shouldn’t enjoy himself. Frankie kissed him on the lips. ‘You go and have fun,’ she told him.

As Jed shut the trailer door, he smirked. Have fun he most certainly would.

Still unable to sleep, Eddie switched on his torch again. He’d wanted to save Gary and Ricky’s letter, so he had something to look forward to on Christmas morning, but his insomnia had made him change his mind. Ripping open the envelope, Eddie grinned. Now he had banished the twins from his world, Gary and Ricky were his life.

As much as Ed had loved Jess, what Frankie and Joey had done was unforgivable in his fragile mind, and even though they were all he had left of his beloved deceased wife, he no longer cared about either of them. One had turned out to be a poof and the other had fallen in love with the gypsy son of his biggest enemy, so the pair of them were now history as far as he was concerned.

Ed chuckled as he began to read the letter. Both Ricky and Gary were fuckers for the birds and they always filled him in on their escapades.

The paragraph at the bottom was the moment Ed’s smile turned into an angry snarl:

PS You told us not to keep anything from you, so here goes. Rumour has it that Joey is gay and he has a boyfriend called Dominic. He turned up at …

Eddie’s pride wouldn’t allow him to read the last line. If the lags found out about Joey, he’d be the laughing stock of the poxy prison.

Ripping the letter into shreds, Ed turned off his torch. His son repulsed him, and as for that fucking Dominic, if he ever saw him again, he wouldn’t just threaten him, he would bastard well kill him.

Back in Rainham, Joyce had a look of disappointment etched across her face.

Polly’s parents were nothing like she had envisaged at all. Dickie was flash, loud and loved the sound of his own voice, and his wife Jenny was bordering on alcoholic, and was drinking her and Stanley out of house and home.

As Jenny stood up and started dancing around the room, holding her glass aloft, Stanley nudged Joyce.

‘I can’t believe you made us dress up like a pair of prized pricks to meet these two,’ he hissed.

‘I didn’t know they were going to behave like this, did I?’ Joyce hissed back.

‘I think it’s time for a toast to the happy couple. Have you got any champagne in the house?’ Dickie said in a loud, annoying voice. He didn’t just look like Boycie, he sounded like him as well.

Joyce scuttled out into the kitchen. She had been so desperate to impress the in-laws, that she’d spent over fifty quid yesterday on just two bottles of champagne.

‘Here we are,’ she said proudly, handing one to Dickie.

Dickie looked at the label on the bottle and laughed. ‘We can’t drink rubbish like this. I had to drink this shit at a party recently and it tasted like bloody antifreeze. Jenny, go to the car and get the champagne we brought out of the boot.’

Extremely drunk, Jenny picked up her husband’s keys, lost her balance and fell straight on top of the coffee table.

‘Are you OK, Mum?’ Polly asked in an unconcerned voice. She was used to her mother getting in these states. The falling over was nothing she hadn’t seen a hundred times before.

Raymond stood up. ‘Let me help you, Jenny,’ he said politely, as he picked her up off the table.

Joyce was mortified. She looked at Stanley. ‘I don’t fucking like ’em one little bit,’ she whispered.

Stanley squeezed his wife’s hand. ‘My sentiments exactly, dear.’

Less than a mile down the road from Joyce and Stanley, Frankie was unable to get off to sleep, due to the loudness of the music. She wasn’t that bothered she was just glad to be in the safety of the trailer, away from the brawling guests.

As Tammy Wynette’s, ‘Stand by your Man’ was played for about the tenth time, Frankie smiled. She had known very little about country and western music until she met Jed. ‘Stand by your Man’ was their favourite song and they’d agreed that when they finally got married, they would choose it as their first dance.

As the song came to an end once more, Frankie pulled the quilt over her head. She and Jed had certainly had their ups and downs, but she still couldn’t wait to become his wife. Frankie O’Hara had a certain ring to it, and with a bit of luck once they got married, they could buy their own place and get away from his parents.