Serialised Chicago May, Alcester (2024)

22/05/2022

CHAPTER SIX
The Blackbird Club was buzzing with pre-theatre diners who liked to eat well. Harry, the barman, served some of the best hot pastrami mash, topped with golden-yoked fried eggs, in town and his Martinis were legend. Seated in his favorite spot, at the rear of the club, Eddie watched Alice lead her young charge down the central aisle to his booth. May was aware of all eyes turning as the two women passed by each booth. Alice shot her a sly smile, revelling in the stir the two glamorous women were making. Alice stopped beside Eddie’s table. She opened May´s fur to reveal the stylish, pale emerald dress that perfectly matched the young girl´s eyes and fitted her slim figure like a glove.
Alice raised a white-gloved hand as if presenting her to Eddie. ‘Well? What did I say?’ she said proudly. ‘She scrubs up real neat.’
Eddie looked at May. ‘Alice, brung you up to speed?’
May looked at him, perplexed. ‘Speed?’ She turned to Alice for help. There was a whole new language she would have to learn and fast.
‘I told her the routine. She’s game.’
Eddie fixed May with a warm smile that made her flutter inside. ‘You ready to earn some real American dough?’
She smiled prettily in return. ‘You betcha!’

The bar of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel was the grandest place May had ever seen. At Alice’s request, the porter seated them in a corner shaded by palms. As if by magic, a white-jacketed waiter appeared at their side and Alice ordered a martini for herself and spring water for May. Then the two women surveyed the room, but with very different eyes.
May drank in the space, flushed and thrilled. If Alice hadn’t said it was a hotel, she would have thought they had entered a royal palace. Not for the first time since she had landed in New York did May feel her breath taken away.
Having seen the room a hundred times, Alice was surveying the customers with a practiced eye. She homed in on a man in his mid-forties, seated alone at the bar. From his suit and briefcase she picked him as a travelling salesman, most likely from out of town. She leaned over to May and confided in a low voice, ‘Don’t look now, but that’s our john.’
May watched as Alice slipped a long filter cigarette from her diamond-encrusted case, then shimmied over to the man and asked him for a light. A couple of minutes’ conversation later he had joined them, beaming broadly, at their table. They were now into the round of drinks that Bob had ordered for them and he was becoming expansive, focusing all his attention on May.
‘An actress an’ all,’ he said in his high mid-Western whine. ‘I ain’t never met a real actress before.’
‘So you said, Bob,’ said Alice wearing her false smile.
Warming to the game, May was happily trying out her new Irish-American accent. ‘But surely, Bob, with all the travelling you do...’
‘Oh sure,’ he said with a peacock grin, ‘I’ve met plenty of girls. Some might have said they was actresses, but hell - pardon me,’ he apologized, touching May’s hand. ‘They was none of them on Broadway!’
May feigned a modest blush. ‘It’s only a very small part.’
‘But I bet you’ll be great!’ Bob gushed. ‘Let’s drink to success!’ He waved at the waiter, ‘The same, buddy.’
Alice watched as May smiled shyly and fluttered her eyelashes. She looked at the tiny gold watch on her wrist. ‘Goodness, is that the time? We have to go, May.’
‘Oh gee, really?’ Bob’s dismay was genuine. ‘You can’t. I’ve just ordered drinks.’
‘You have mine, Bob. I really have to go.’
‘Do you have to go as well, May? I kinda like talking to you,’ said Bob, looking at May like a lost dog looking for a home.
May glanced at Alice. ‘Well..’
‘I guess you don’t have to go,’ Alice said. ‘They’re not expecting you.’
Bob’s smile was from ear to ear. ‘That’s settled then.’
Alice rose. She kissed May lightly on the cheek. ‘See you later.’ Then, with her lips so close to her ear May could feel Alice’s warm breath, she whispered, ‘Kill.’

CHAPTER SEVEN
May led Bob down the dimly-lit hotel corridor, her trembling legs hardly able to support her. With her heart pounding in her chest, she turned the key in the lock. She turned to Bob, who was standing in the doorway, grinning nervously.
‘Thank you, Bob.’
Bob glanced at his watch. ‘Would you look at that? I missed my train.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry. That’s all my fault.’
‘There’s one later...’ He paused, looking this way and that along the corridor. ‘I guess...I guess I couldn’t wait in here?’
Despite her own nervousness, May’s heart went out to him. He suddenly looked like a small boy, asking a favor he desperately wanted, but didn’t expect to get.
She pretended to deliberate his request. ‘Well, I suppose...of course, come in,’ she smiled.
Bob stepped inside eagerly, in case she was about to change her mind.
‘Can I take your coat?’
‘That’s okay,’ he said, and produced a brown paper package from his pocket. ‘Scotch?’ he asked, offering the package to her.
May shook her head. ‘I really don’t like the taste of that. But you go ahead,’ she encouraged. ‘Let me take your coat,’ she said again, knowing that was the first thing she should do.
‘No, I really won’t stay.’ He took the top off the bottle. ‘Good health.’ He took a pull on the bottle and swallowed hard, then wiped the back of his hand across his lips. ‘I...er...’ he began and faltered.
‘Yes?’ May encouraged, nervously.
‘Well, I know I said back there, in the bar...’ he continued haltingly. ‘Well, I sorta implied that I...well...I...Darn it, the truth is, May, I ain’t never cheated on my wife Marybelle. Not never in fifteen years.’
May felt a warm swell of relief wash over her. For the first time that evening, her smile to him was genuine. ‘I’m sure glad to hear that, Bob.’

The woman and two young children in the photograph smiled out at her. ‘They’re lovely. You have such a beautiful family. You’re very lucky, Bob,’ May said, handing the photograph back to Bob who was seated on the bed beside her.
‘Yeah, yeah,’ he agreed, taking another slug from the bottle, which was now half empty.
‘You must miss them though. Traveling about like you do.’
Bob nodded morosely, turning the family picture round and round in his fingers. He turned to her, his face sad and plaintive.
May looked at him, concerned. ‘What is it, Bob?’
‘I’m out of a job, May. Two months now...’ He continued, his voice breaking, ‘Haven’t had the guts to tell Marybelle.’
‘Oh Bob...’ She took his hand in hers as the tears rolled down his cheeks, and stroked the back of it with her fingers.
‘Ten years,’ he said suddenly, bitterness stifling the tears. ‘Ten years I worked for them. Ten years they sucked the blood out of me...And now what..? I got ten lousy bucks to my name...I was going to the track when I met you...’
‘The track?’
‘The dog track...Thought if I could pick a winner Marybelle wouldn’t have to know. Leastways not for a while.’
‘No, Bob. You can’t do that. What if you lose?’
He turned to her, eyes glistening with tears. ‘Throw myself in the river.’
May pulled back, shocked. ‘Bob! You have a lovely wife. Two lovely children. You can´t leave them to fend all on their own! You can beat this, Bob,’ she said urgently. ‘You can beat this for them. I know you can.’
His eyes never left hers, as if in some way he could draw the strength he saw in her face into his own body. ‘Yeah..? You really believe that, May?’
‘I do!’ she said passionately. ‘I do..! But the first thing you have to do is go home and tell her. Tell her everything. It’s nothing to be ashamed of...She´ll understand.’
He continued to gaze at her, wiping his cheeks with the sleeve of his overcoat.
‘Now go,’ she said gently. ‘Go straight home and tell her.’
He looked at her for a long moment. ‘You’re a wonderful young woman, May,’ he said. ‘An angel,’ he said, his voice thick with gratitude.
May smiled. ‘I don’t know that the Good Lord would agree... Wait.’ Taking her purse from her pocket, she took out a five dollar bill and slipped it into his hand. ‘Here.’
‘What’s this?’
‘Take a cab. So, you don’t miss your train.’ She straightened his tie and smoothed down the collar of his coat. ‘Your family’s waiting for you, Bob McLeish.’
He smiled sadly at her, regretful. ‘You’re a wonderful girl, May. You deserve your name in lights. I´m sure I´ll see you up there someday.’
May smiled guiltily. Bob leaned and kissed her on the cheek. She opened the door. He swayed out into the corridor and turned to her one last time.
‘God bless you, May. God bless you.’
She watched him make his way unsteadily down the darkened corridor. As soon as she closed the door, the doors of the wardrobe were flung open and a furious Alice burst out, stumbling into the room aching from being cooped up inside the cramped space for so long.
She glared at May, her face red with anger. ‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at!’ she yelled.

In his showy penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park, Eddie lay back on his black leather sofa holding his sides with laughter. Alice sat beside him, a smile playing about her crimson lips, seeing the funny side now. May stood before them sheepishly, eyes cast down, feeling deeply humiliated.
‘You’re supposed to fleece the guy, not pay his cab fare!’
May looked up, her eyes beginning to regain their natural fire. ‘I couldn’t take his money. He was so sad. He was going to jump in the river.’
‘He was probably shooting you a line’, Eddie grinned. ‘You’ve been had, doll.’
Alice joined in the humiliation. ‘All you had to do was get his clothes in the closet. I’d have done the rest.’
‘It’s not right anyway,’ May said defensively. ‘It’s stealing.’
Eddie rose and took May’s chin in his hand. May flinched away instinctively. Eddie held her chin firmly.
‘Hey. It’s all right. I ain’t gonna hurt you. I don’t hit broads...Where do you think you come from, May? A frigging palace? You wanna wind up like them bums sleeping in shop doorways?’
May wrenched her face from his grip, angrily, her eyes flaring. ‘I could have! You stole me money! I’d done nothing to you! I could have froze to death that night! And I’d done nothing to hurt you!’
‘You’re a sucker,’ Eddie said sharply. ‘Suckers hurt everybody.’
He crossed to an elegant mahogany bureau, opened the top drawer and took out the purse he had stolen from her.
‘Here. You want this? It’s still got all your Mick money in it. Go out there. See how far it gets you...Take it...’ He held the purse under her nose. ‘But if you go, don’t come back.’
May looked at the purse, tears stinging her eyes. Alice was looking at her, impassively. She had seen the way Alice lived, glimpsed the life she was being offered. It was the kind of luxury she had dreamed of for so long. She could have it, and for what? Just a little deception. A little dishonesty. Hadn’t she done worse back in Ireland to make her escape?
‘Or do you want in, May?’ Eddie said gently, and smiled his special smile.
May looked at him, then nodded, ‘I’m in.’

IF YOU’VE ENJOYED READING THESE 7 CHAPTERS, YOU CAN READ THE REST OF THE BOOK FROM AMAZON, WATERSTONES, BARNES AND NOBLE, OR WALMART, AS AN E-BOOK, OR IN PAPERBACK.
I WILL BE SHORTLY PUBLISHING EXTRACTS OF MY NEW BOOK, ‘ISLAND OF DREAMS’, WHICH WILL BE PUBLISHED THIS DECEMBER.

21/05/2022

CHAPTER 6 & 7 TOMORROW
Where May sets off on her life of crime, to become ‘Chicago May - The Queen of Crooks’.

FAYE – REVIEW FROM BOOK BLOGGER
One of my favorite books of the year! Loved it!
I love New York and I loved May, willing her to make the right choices, but enjoying her wild and vulnerable lifestyle. Set in the 1920s you can't help but be swept back in time and live life alongside May. A wonderful read and a book that will stay with me for a long long time! One for the keep shelf!

15/05/2022

CHAPTER FIVE

It was Joe who found her. In his job he had seen them many times before, but it never got any easier. There was always that same gut-churning feeling deep inside, mingled with sadness and a hopeless sense of waste. Mostly they were fished out of the Hudson or the East River, but occasionally, like this one, they fetched up in an alley indistinguishable from the garbage. Easy pickings for the rats. She was lying face down, half-naked, and momentarily Joe was jolted by the tangled mass of strawberry-blonde curls. With a shiver of dread he turned the young girl over. It was not her. He felt a rush of relief, and then suddenly very stupid. He had seen her off on the train. By now she would be safe with her folks in Virginia. As he stood guard over the lifeless girl, waiting for the body wagon to arrive, he thought of her. The eyes. The smile. Which he would never see again.

May lay with her eyes tightly closed trying to stop the world spinning. It felt like she was dying, but she was warm and comfortable. Part of her felt like she was in heaven. The other part felt like she was in hell.
Slowly she opened her eyes. The room she was in was still spinning, but she could take enough of it in to see that she was in paradise. The bed she had slept in was huge. The sheets were so soft she felt she was lying on a cloud. A large canopy over her head was hung with pale pink and ivory drapes whose pattern matched the wallpaper in the large bedroom. The whole room was like something out of a fairytale.
May struggled to recall the evening before. Slowly images began to filter back into her mind. She remembered hurting her ankle jumping from the train, the long perishing, painful trudge back to the city, the warm club and Eddie’s grin. And the drink, the harsh, bitter drink. It must be the drink that was giving her this dream.
She became aware of a sound from the adjoining room. She looked down at her swollen ankle, which had been expertly bandaged. Tiptoeing across the soft, warm carpet she peered warily through the open door and gasped in surprise.
A huge black woman wearing a black dress, white cap and pinafore was dusting the ornaments in the spacious living-room.
‘Morning!’ the woman called. ‘Beautiful morning.’
Nervously, May emerged from her hiding place and stood in the doorway, staring at the room in amazement. The large living room was decorated in the same color scheme as the bedroom, giving the sumptuous apartment an overwhelmingly feminine touch.
The black woman was looking at May. ‘You sure had a good sleep,’ she said kindly.
‘Where am I? Am I dreaming?’
The black woman’s huge body shook with a gale of laughter. ‘No! You in Miss Alice’s apartment.’
May suddenly remembered the hard-looking, attractive blonde in the club. ‘Where is she?’
‘She coming over soon. There’s fresh coffee in the kitchen,’ the maid added, nodding towards a door on the opposite side of the room.
Still half convinced she was dreaming, May entered the open door leading to the kitchen. At least she assumed it was a kitchen, for the woman had called it that, but she had never seen anything like it before. The whole room was bigger than the entire croft where she had spent the first sixteen years of her life.
A round, gleaming, ivory-colored table with six matching chairs dominated one half of the room. The other half was devoted to a state-of-the-art kitchen.
May ran her hand over the smooth cold marble surfaces and pressed her cool fingers to her temples. The wall cupboards contained sparkling crystal glasses and white china crockery prettily decorated with a pink flower motif. She approached the bulky white, cupboard-like structure standing alone. Tugging on the metal handle, she opened the heavy door and blinked at the cavernous, glowing interior stuffed with weird and wonderful foodstuffs of every conceivable kind. A voice behind her made her start.
‘You surfaced.’
Alice was standing in the doorway, resplendent in a full-length fur with matching hat. In her arms she carried a miniature, manicured white poodle with a pink bow on top of its tiny head. May flushed guiltily.
‘Oh, I was...er...How did I..?’ she stammered.
Alice smiled. ‘You were whacked. We put you in here. I slept over at Eddie’s...You eaten?’
May was still in a daze. ‘Eaten?’ she repeated lamely.
‘Yeah, you know, like food?’
‘No, no,’ May replied. The thought of food suddenly made her stomach turn. ‘I, er...I’m not...’
‘I’ll fix you breakfast,’ said Alice, gliding into the kitchen and thrusting the dog and her fur into May’s arms. Businesslike, she turned a k**b on the cooker, then took a tray of eggs and a jar of cooking oil from the open refrigerator.
The little dog in May’s arms made her suddenly remember with a stab of dread. ‘Mick!’ she exclaimed. ‘Me dog, Mick. What happened to him?’
‘He’s okay,’ Alice replied reassuringly. ‘We left him with Harry. Don’t worry, he won’t wind up in the club sandwich. One egg or two?’ she asked, cracking an egg onto the grill. She looked at May. ‘Two. You need fattening up.’
May watched as Alice cracked another egg onto the grill. The transparent, glutinous placenta slowly turned white and opaque, around the deep yellow yolk. The smell of egg and oil hit May’s nostrils. She retched and dropped the dog and fur onto the floor, clutching her mouth and stomach in panic.
‘In the bathroom,’ said Alice calmly, indicating the doorway.
May hobbled into the living room, looking about her wildly.
‘There!’ cried the maid, pointing to a door May hadn’t noticed before. She headed for the bathroom, but it was too late. The entire contents of the Blackbird’s Club Special landed in a messy, multi-colored heap onto the pristine carpet.
Alice appeared. ‘Sorry Bertha can you clean that up, please?’ She looked at May, who was standing horrified at what she had done. ‘I’ll run you a bath. You smell like a stable.’
At the door to the bathroom, she turned back to May. ‘Come on. Gotta make you look like a princess, if you’re going to work for Eddie.’

14/05/2022

CHAPTER FIVE TOMORROW - [Where Officer Joe Perski finds a murdered young girl in a dark New York alley.]
On my blog on chicagomay.com, or Facebook’s Serialised Chicago May.

09/05/2022

CHAPTER FOUR

After midnight, with the arctic wind whipping down the long empty avenues, May at last limped into the heart of the city. She was cold, tired, hungry, and in pain from her swollen ankle. She looked again at Eddie’s card with the large Blackbird motif. The actual words meant nothing to her.
Down a side street she saw a taxi pull up at a brownstone, and an elderly couple get out. She hurried towards them waving the card above her head.
‘Excuse me! Do you – ?’
The couple took one look at the figure stumbling towards them out of the night, with flailing arms, and fled behind the door of their apartment block. May stopped and looked about her, forlornly. In the distance a police siren wailed. In the dead of night it was a scary sound.

Five blocks on, three taxi-cab drivers were hunched around a blazing brazier on a corner. May approached them hesitantly, holding out the card.
‘The Blackbird Club? Hang a right two blocks on.’
‘Thank you. Thank you!’ May said gratefully.
She increased her pace aware of the lateness of the night. She had no idea whether the club would still be open, or if Eddie would be there. If he wasn’t she didn’t know what she would do.Staying out all night in the sub-zero temperature could easily kill her. But she was determined not to have travelled all this way, and been through so much, to let that be her fate. The harsh life she had endured growing up in the croft had hardened her. And May Sharpe was not a quitter.

In the warm cozy interior of The Blackbird Club, ‘Society’ Eddie Young was holding court with his usual group of acolytes hanging on his every word.
‘So when this rookie cop says he’s never heard of me, I sez, I ain’t never heard of you either, punk. But your chief shines my shoes!.’
The men around him laughed heartily. Eddie had a reputation for brains and ruthlessness. It paid to stay friends with the coming men in New York’s underworld.
Eddie took a drink of his Manhattan, and then he saw her, her pale face lit from the interior lights of the club. He stood up. ‘Hey! Come in here! Charlie, open the door for the lady!’
As May entered Eddie called out. ‘Hey, come in! Come in here, out of the cold! What a neat surprise!’
May was holding Mick in her arms. She was cold, tired, emotional and frightened, but her anger overrode everything. She hobbled straight up to Eddie’s booth and stared down at him.
‘Didn’t think you’d ever see me again, did you?’ she said accusingly.
Eddie spread his arms in an open, friendly gesture. ‘Hey, I give you my card, didn’t I?’
‘Now let me think,’ May replied. ‘Was that before or after you stole me purse?’
Eddie’s voice was calm and friendly. ‘Hey, relax, doll.’
‘I want me purse,’ she said determinedly. ‘Give me me purse.’
Eddie grinned. ‘Move over,’ he said to the man sitting opposite. ‘Sit down. Take a load off.’
As May stood uncertainly. She heard a female voice behind her.
‘Who’s this?’ the tone had a trace of suspicion.
The woman was in her mid-twenties, blonde and attractive, wearing a full-length fur coat with diamonds clustered at her throat.
‘Met her at the docks today. She’d just arrived. She’s got a pretty name. Rose or something.’
‘It’s May,’ May corrected.
‘That’s right. May.’ He waved to a seat opposite him. ‘Sit down, May. You look beat.’
May hesitated, shivering with cold and anxiety. She knew she had stumbled into the company of criminals, but she was here to get her only money back. Nervously, she sat down onto the plush velvet seat of the booth.
The woman took her seat alongside Eddie, still looking steadily at May.
‘This is Alice,’ said Eddie. ‘Say hello to May, Alice.’
Alice’s cool expression didn’t alter. ‘You look rough,’ she said.
‘You hungry? Eddie asked.
Suddenly, May realized how long it had been since she had last eaten. ‘I could eat a donkey and its cart.’
Eddie called over the barman. ‘Harry, a special for the lady.’ He turned to May. ‘And what’s your poison?’
May looked across at him puzzled. ‘Poison?’
‘Harry, bourbon on the rocks for the little lady,’ Eddie said. ‘Make it a double.’
When the heavy cut-glass tumbler filled with thick brown liquid and ice cubes was set before her, May was acutely aware that all eyes were on her. Tentatively she raised the glass to her lips and heard the unfamiliar sound of the ice tinkling against the sides. She looked down at white objects floating in the glass.
‘What’s up?’ Eddie asked. ‘You never seen ice before?’
‘Of course,’ said May quickly, not wanting to appear childish. She had in fact seen some of her fellow passengers onboard ship sipping drinks with ice, but she had seen enough of what alcohol could do to people and vowed never to touch it. But this was different. Everybody was watching her. It felt like a test. One she was determined not to fail.
Eddie encouraged her. ‘Drink up. That’ll soon put the glow back in your cheeks.’
Acutely aware that twelve pair of eyes were watching her, May took a sip and spluttered as the sharp, viscous liquid hit the back of her throat. She coughed at the stinging taste of the drink rising into her nostrils, bringing tears to her eyes. She saw that everyone around her was grinning.
‘That hit the spot?’ asked Eddie with a broad smile.
Determined not to look foolish, May nodded and tried a smile in return. Raising the glass once more she took a larger gulp and felt the fire erupt in her chest. She gasped, involuntarily, taking in a huge lungful of air to try to quench the flames.
Eddie settled back and smiled to himself. It was fate. Fate had brought this special one back to him, and he wouldn´t let her slip away again. He looked at Alice and raised his eyebrows, amused. For the first time Alice relaxed and smiled. This naïve little waif was no threat.

01/05/2022

CHAPTER THREE

Pennsylvania Station took May’s breath away. It was like a palace or a vast cathedral dedicated to trains and the railway. She was gazing around and didn’t really hear what Joe said.
‘Miss Sharpe?’ he said.
May stopped dead in her tracks. ‘What?’
‘Which station in Virginia?’ said Joe. ‘Richmond, Lexington, Springfield..?’
She looked around her as if seeking inspiration from the marble walls.
Joe looked puzzled. ‘You do know the address?’
‘Yes, of course. You don’t think I’d travel halfway around the world without knowing where I’m going, do you?’
The feigned indignation in her voice convinced him. ‘So which station?’ he asked again.
‘Springfield,’ she said. It was a bright, sunny name.
‘Stay here. I’ll get your ticket.’
‘Wait. I have money.’ May dove into the tapestry bag for her purse and rummaged around, puzzled. ‘I had my purse in here,’ she said anxiously. ‘But it’s gone. I must have lost it.’
Joe looked concerned. ‘Or had it filched.’
‘Filched?’
‘Stolen.’
‘Who could have done that? I had the bag with me all the time?’
‘Your ‘friend’ at the docks,’ Joe said. ‘The grease-ball with the smile and the hat.’
‘That nice fella? No. It couldn’t be him.’
‘It’s okay,’ Joe said. ‘I’ve got money. Let’s get you on the train before anything else happens to you.’

Feeling irritated and helpless, May followed Joe as he bustled along the central corridor of the train, holding May’s little suitcase in one hand and Mick under his other arm. Why couldn’t this interfering man just leave her alone? She was about to leave on a train to a place she didn’t want to go. Why hadn’t she lied that her fictitious Uncle Patrick lived in New York?
‘Here we are.’
Joe had found her a vacant window seat looking out over the platform. He stuffed the suitcase on the overhead rack and ushered May into the seat.
‘I guess the dog will have to go in the guard’s van.’
‘I can do that,’ May said hurriedly, reaching up to take the dog from him.
‘Don’t worry about the fare. You just mail it to me when you can.’ He handed her a slip of paper. ‘Here. Officer Joe Perski. Care of New York Police Department, Fifth Precinct.’
May took the slip of paper and tried to sound sincere, ‘Thanks. Thank you so very much.’
‘You’re welcome, Miss Sharpe. Glad to be of service. Enjoy your stay. And if you’re ever in New York again...’
The guard’s whistle sounded shrilly down the platform.
‘I gotta scoot.’ He smiled winningly.
May noticed for the first time he had an open, handsome face. A shame he was such an interfering busybody.
Joe hurried down the corridor and disappeared. May sprang up with Mick in her arms and grabbed her suitcase from the rack. She still had time to get off the train. Before she could take a step, she was halted by a rap on the window. Joe was outside, grinning.
‘Don’t worry,’ he called through the glass. ‘The conductor will take him to the van.’
May sat down again heavily as the train began to slowly leave the station. She waved perfunctorily in response to Joe as he walked alongside waving. When the train had gathered enough speed to leave Joe behind, May tore the slip of paper in two. She noticed the man opposite staring at her curiously, but she was past caring.

Joe Perski climbed the stairs to his second-floor apartment in almost total darkness. The single light bulb hanging above the staircase had blown and the janitor said he wouldn´t have a replacement until the morning.
As he let himself into his room, the cold enveloped him. He kicked the heating pipe hard and heard the water begin to bubble through the heavy iron radiator. In an hour the temperature in the room would be bearable. Until then he´d just have to make himself a sweet black coffee and eat the bagel he had bought at the corner deli.
Ordinarily, he would walk to the bar on 23rd which was always warm and welcoming, but this evening he couldn’t afford a beer and a plate of their tasty meatloaf. Paying the Irish girl´s train fare had cleaned him out and he´d have to borrow from his colleagues in the precinct until pay day.
Though he was happy she was out of harm´s way, he had felt sad the moment her train left the station. She had gone out of his life as quickly as she had come into it, and it suddenly seemed empty. He shook his head to clear her image from his brain. A girl like her was not for him, or this city.

Darkness had fallen before the train slowed sufficiently on a long winding bend on the outskirts of the city. As the train’s whistle blew and it began to gather speed once more, May struggled out of the end carriage door onto the rear platform, with Mick struggling in her arms. ‘Well jump, you dumb animal!’ she shouted angrily.
Mick leapt from her arms into the night. Throwing her case after him May jumped sideways and landed heavily. She cried out at the searing pain in her ankle. Winded and hurt, she watched the lights of the train disappear into the night.
She lay for a moment recovering from her fall. She knew if she didn’t move she would freeze to death by the side of the track. Well, she thought grimly, you haven´t traveled all this way to die alone beside a dusty railway line.
Taking out the card that Eddie had given her, she looked at it. She couldn’t read the words, but on it there was an image of a large blackbird.
‘Come on, Mick. We’ve got to go and get our money.’
Pushing herself up, she tested the ankle. The pain shot up to her belly. She took a deep breath, then bent down to retrieve her case. Mick jumped up at her, barking insistently.
‘No, Mick, I can’t carry you,’ she said, feeling the tears well in her eyes. ‘You’ll have to walk for a change.
She set off hobbling along the uneven track, back towards the bright lights of the city, with Mick trotting alongside.

28/04/2022

BOOK TOUR REVIEW. Daisy Hollands review of CHICAGO MAY by Harry Duffin.
Welcome to my spot on the -
Isn’t the cover of this book just so exquisite? I love it. So evocative and very appropriate for the early 1900s which is when this story is set.
This is an exciting book with really well written dialogue and likeable characters.
The story is both gripping and moving and tense in places - all of which is exacerbated when you discover that it’s based on a true story and real events.
If you like recent history (weird to think the 20th century is now fully history) this is the book for you. It has a little bit of everything. - romance, drama, jeopardy. A great read.

CHAPTER THREE - NEXT SUNDAY on chicagomay.com or Facebook Serialised Chicago May.

Serialised Chicago May

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