That Bloody Callan
by Mab
'Callan' was a British espionage/drama series made in the late nineteen-sixties.
That's another cup of tea poured out, and Gert stows the money away, leans out the hatch of her stall, and watches that bloody Callan head down the road. Man on a mission he is, straight as a soldier in his overcoat and precisely tucked-in scarf, looking very respectable. Bet he uses spit and polish on those shoes, Gert thinks sourly.
He's got a good set of shoulders, she acknowledges. Still, she's not one to be swayed by strong, straight shoulders or a good-looking face. Lily went that route and she paid for it. Gert prefers what she has. It's not flash but she's not beholden to anybody and she's not getting smacked around every second night either. There're no more customers right now so she turns to the everlasting washing up, her hands sinking into lukewarm water. They get sore, but that's life for you. Gert never has been afraid of work, and work on her feet, thank you very much, not on her back like some in her family.
That bloody Callan. Not hide nor hair of him all this time, and then up he pops asking after Lonely. Her lips press together. He gets Lonely into trouble when he's around and he gets him into trouble when he's not. She grants 'Mr Callan' the dubious credit of keeping Lonely out of small mischief when he's about. When he's not, Lonely's small mischief adds up like pennies in a jar, like it always does, and she's worried that useless solicitor's put Lonely wrong about how much porridge he'll do.
He's a hard man, that Callan. Lonely's always saying so, with more than a hint of pride, but luckily Gert doesn't have to depend on her nephew as a judge of character. Callan's got that look – she knows it and she likes to keep away from it. She's met his sort before, and whether they're hard through and through, or whether they've got a soft patch somewhere, they're all trouble. Callan – he's got his soft patch, and it's Lonely, God knows why. Maybe he's the sort that likes having a soft patch, worrying at it like someone poking their tongue at a bad tooth, checking that they're still more or less human. She remembers another hard man with a soft patch. Ted Billings. There's a man she hasn't thought about for years. Had a cat, did Ted. Soft as butter over it. Rumour had it that he cried when it died; course, it died with its head and ribs stoved in after two men went after Ted in his flat.
"Cup of tea,love?" Gert turns and pours it out, adds milk and sugar with a careful hand, takes the money. She shakes her head. Lonely's no cat. (And if he was he'd be the mangy, flea-bitten, smelly one that steals food off your plate and stares sulkily at you with the remains still matted in its furry jaws.) Still, she wishes that Callan hadn't turned up. That bloody Callan.
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