‘We’ll need to line up some girls as dancing partners for the men,’ she said with a meaningful glance at Baz.

‘Easy enough,’ he replied with a cocky grin, ‘a few of the girls who work at Edie’s laundry’d be up for the task.’

‘Yes,’ Val nodded, she was aware some of Edie’s girls moonlighted as hookers, ‘but they don’t all have to be on the game. We want this to be a legitimate club, not just a brothel.’

‘Sure.’ Baz’s response held a touch of the ‘nudge-and-a-wink’.

Betty’s eyes darted between the two, although not wishing to appear naïve she was careful to disguise her surprise. So she’d be playing piano in a brothel. Goodness, she’d better not let her mum know. Then she smiled to herself. Mind you, there’s a heck of a lot Mum doesn’t know already, she thought.

‘I mean it, Baz,’ Val said in all seriousness, ‘I want this club to be run along legit lines as much as possible. Good booze, good music, singing and dancing, a social club, you get my drift?’

‘Of course,’ Baz replied, matching her seriousness, although a slightly arched eyebrow was a bit of a giveaway.

‘The main problem is the venue,’ Val said with a frown. ‘Where the hell are we going to put this club?’

‘Don’t give it another thought, Boss.’ Baz leaned back in his chair, hands behind head, the picture of confidence. ‘I’ve got the perfect place. Just five miles out of town. We’ll need a hundred quid up front and it’ll be ours for the taking.’

Baz had a plan.

CHAPTER NINE

‘There you go, mate.’ Baz slapped a wad of ten-pound notes down on the kitchen table. ‘A hundred quid up front, more than enough to get you and Vera and the kids settled down south. What do you say?’

Ned Parslow stared at the money sitting on the scarred old wooden table. He and his wife rarely saw this amount in cash. The payments for their produce usually came in the form of a cheque, a long-overdue cheque at that, and after being banked the sum was immediately paid out to their various debtors with cheques of their own.

Vera, seated beside her husband, grabbed the notes. ‘I’ll look after that, love,’ she said.

‘No, no, hang on a minute,’ Ned protested, but it didn’t stop his wife clutching the wad of money to her chest. Vera wasn’t about to give up easily.

‘What are these people who want to hire the place gonna do with the actual property?’ Ned asked Baz. ‘You say they want to rent the buildings, but what about the farm? I won’t have my place going to rack and ruin.’