Winter of the World

‘Yes, I’m sure. Try not to end up in hospital yourself.’

He was leaving her in the best hands, he decided. He kissed her cheek and returned to the fray.

The police had changed their tactics. The people had repelled the horse charges, but the police were still determined to make a path through the crowd. As Lloyd pushed his way to the front they charged on foot, attacking with their batons. The unarmed demonstrators cowered back from them, liked piled leaves in a wind, then surged forward in a different part of the line.

The police started to arrest people, perhaps hoping to weaken the crowd’s determination by taking ringleaders away. In the East End, being arrested was no legal formality. Few people came back without a black eye or a few gaps in their teeth. Leman Street police station had a particularly bad reputation.

Lloyd found himself behind a vociferous young woman carrying a red flag. He recognized Olive Bishop, a neighbour in Nutley Street. A policeman hit her over the head with his truncheon, screaming: ‘Jewish whore!’ She was not Jewish, and she certainly was not a whore; in fact, she played the piano at the Calvary Gospel Hall. But she had forgotten the admonition of Jesus to turn the other cheek, and she scratched the cop’s face, drawing parallel red lines on his skin. Two more officers grabbed her arms and held her while the scratched man hit her on the head again.

The sight of three strong men attacking one girl maddened Lloyd. He stepped forward and hit the woman’s assailant with a right hook that had all of his rage behind it. The blow landed on the policeman’s temple. Dazed, the man stumbled and fell.

More officers converged on the scene, lashing out randomly with their clubs, hitting arms and legs and heads and hands. Four of them picked up Olive, each taking an arm or a leg. She screamed and wriggled desperately but she could not get free.

But the bystanders were not passive. They attacked the police carrying the girl off, trying to pull the uniformed men away from her. The police turned on their attackers, yelling: ‘Jew bastards!’ even though not all their assailants were Jews and one was a black-skinned Somali sailor.

The police let go of Olive, dropping her to the road, and began to defend themselves. Olive pushed through the crowd and vanished. The cops retreated, hitting out at anyone within reach as they backed away.

Lloyd saw with a thrill of triumph that the police strategy was not working. For all their brutality, the attacks had completely failed to make a way through the crowd. Another baton charge began, but the angry crowd surged forward to meet it, eager now for combat.

Lloyd decided it was time for another report. He worked his way backwards through the crush and found a phone box. ‘I don’t think they’re going to succeed, Dad,’ he told Bernie excitedly. ‘They’re trying to beat a path through us but they’re making no progress. We’re too many.’

‘We’re redirecting people to Cable Street,’ Bernie said. ‘The police may be about to switch their thrust, thinking they have more chance there, so we’re sending reinforcements. Go along there, see what’s happening, and let me know.’

‘Right,’ said Lloyd, and he hung up before realizing he had not told his stepfather that Millie had been taken to hospital. But perhaps it was better not to worry him right now.

Getting to Cable Street was not going to be easy. From Gardiner’s Corner, Leman Street led directly south to the near end of Cable Street, a distance of less than half a mile, but the road was jammed by demonstrators fighting with police. Lloyd had to take a less direct route. He struggled eastward through the crowd into Commercial Road. Once there, further progress was not much easier. There were no police, therefore there was no violence, but the crowd was almost as dense. It was frustrating, but Lloyd was consoled for his difficulties by the reflection that the police would never force a way through so many.

He wondered what Daisy Peshkov was doing. Probably she was sitting in the car, waiting for the march to begin, tapping the toe of her expensive shoe impatiently on the Rolls-Royce’s carpet. The thought that he was helping to frustrate her purpose gave him an oddly spiteful sense of satisfaction.

With persistence and a slightly ruthless attitude to those in his way, Lloyd pushed through the throng. The railway that ran along the north side of Cable Street obstructed his route, and he had to walk some distance before reaching a side road that tunnelled beneath the line. He passed under the tracks and entered Cable Street.