One
It was less than a month after Davey’s funeral that the friendship between Katie and Sammy caused the first squall in the otherwise normal life of the household. Bill was up in the playroom having his daily half-hour with his daughter. He had picked her up and was once more extolling her progress at modelling. Nell and Bert, with their new baby, had been brought up to view his daughter’s latest masterpiece. It was quite a good clay copy of a stuffed poodle the child had got in her stocking and to which she was very attached.
Bill stood at one side of the low table and pointed his finger towards his wife and said, ‘Now don’t tell me, Mrs B, that has come about by chance, or that somebody’s helped her, because she was just sticking the bits on when I came in.’
‘I never said a word.’ Fiona spread out her hands as she looked at her friend Nell. ‘And yes, it’s a very good copy. Who’s arguing with you, Mr B?’ She stressed the name.
‘Well’—Bill was addressing Bert who was bouncing his ‘gift from God’, as he called his new son, up and down in his arms—‘she always has a query in her voice. Oh, to the devil! Come on, pet, let’s downstairs. I’ve been in this house for over an hour and nobody’s asked me if I have a mouth on me.’
‘I did ask you if you wanted a cup of tea,’ Nell put in now, ‘but you said you wanted something stronger right away. Did you have it?’
‘Yes, I had it, missis. But now I’d like a cup of tea.’
They were all laughing as they made for the nursery door; but it was pushed open before they reached it, and there stood Mark. His face looked tight and his head was bobbing as he said, ‘Dad, there’s ructions going on in the recreation room. As you know, my room’s above that and I can’t concentrate. It’s Willie and Katie again, but more Willie by the sound of it. Something should be done with him, he’s getting beyond it.’
‘Have you looked in?’
‘No, I haven’t, because had I done so I would likely have used more than my tongue. I’m getting fed up with that crew. There’s no peace. How d’you expect me to work?’
Bill’s head drooped, Fiona turned hers to the side, but neither of them said anything. Yet, on the landing the glance they cast at each other told of their combined thoughts: there were plenty of corners in this big house that Mark could go and be on his own. But Mark had a bedroom to himself, and what was at one time a dressing room adjacent was now his study; and you couldn’t expect a young man studying for exams to go and find a quiet corner, if he had a study all his own, now could you?
The commotion in the recreation room, which was at the far end of the downstairs floor, reached them as they descended into the hall. There they were met by a glee-faced Mamie, who exclaimed loudly, ‘Oh, they are fighting, fighting like billy-o. And Sammy tipped Katie up and threw her onto the ground.’
‘Wh…at!’ Bill and Fiona spoke simultaneously. Then they were all hurrying along the corridor. And when they burst into the recreation room Willie was yelling, ‘Why did you keep it to yourself all this time? You could tell her, why not me?’
Seemingly unaware of the visitors, Sammy replied, ‘I’ve only recently told her. And why I didn’t tell you was because I wanted to keep some things to meself. D’you understand? No, you wouldn’t; you’re too thick-headed. You’ve had it too easy, you have.’
‘Here! Here! Now, look here! What’s all this about?’ Bill put Angela down onto the floor and, turning to Sammy, he demanded, ‘What’s happened? And why has he had it too easy? And what have you been keeping to yourself that he thinks he should know?’
Sammy’s face was scarlet, his mouth was tight, then bitterly he said, ‘I’ve always kept Thursday nights to meself.’
‘Yes. Yes, lad, I know.’ Bill’s voice was meant to have a calming effect. ‘You went to confession on a Thursday night, always; you still do.’
‘Yes, I still do, but confession doesn’t take up all Thursday night: I did something else after, which I’ve kept to meself.’
‘Well, whatever this was, did your dad know?’
‘Yes, he knew, and he said it was right: a fella should have something to himself, a space like, where you haven’t to give an account of what you’ve been doing or whom you’ve been talking to.’
Bill nodded quietly now, saying, ‘Yes. Yes, I understand that. Well, it’s no use asking you, is it, what else you did on a Thursday night?’
‘Yes, you can ask.’
‘Now! Now!’ Bill’s voice changed. ‘Don’t you use that tone to me. You know me and I know you.’
Sammy’s head drooped and a muttered ‘Sorry,’ came from his tight lips. Then looking at his stepson, Bill said, ‘What’s this all about, Willie?’
‘Only because I was going with him.’ Katie’s voice was quiet, even flat, and they all stared at her in silence until she went on, ‘Sammy suggested I should join a club or take up a sport of some kind, tennis or some such. And I said to him, he was the one to talk, he didn’t take up anything, he didn’t even like football or cricket. And it was then he told me and said I could go with him if I liked, on Thursday night.’
‘Go with him? Where to, Katie?’ Fiona was standing by her daughter now, and Katie looked up at her as she said, ‘The Fickleworth Sport and Leisure Centre.’
Fiona glanced at Bill, whose face was stretching. He was looking at Sammy again. ‘You’ve been going to the Fickleworth Centre?’ he said.
‘Aye…yes.’
‘How long for?’
‘On two years.’
Bill nodded. ‘You went after you’d been to confession?’
‘Yes, that’s what I did.’
‘What have you taken up?’
‘Judo.’
‘Judo!’
‘That’s what I said, and a bit of karate. And I thought Katie could take karate up because it’s self-defence if she’s attacked or anything. You never know. You do it with the flat of your hand, like this,’ and he demonstrated.
‘Wait a moment! You didn’t…you threw her on her back.’
Now Sammy was bawling again, ‘I was showing her what to do; and I didn’t hurt her. Did I? You learn to throw at judo and learn to fall. And I helped her to fall.’
‘My! My!’ The two words came from the open door where Mark was standing. He was looking at Sammy and, nodding at him now, he said, ‘True? You do judo?’
‘Yes; yes, Mark, I do judo.’
‘All right. All right. Don’t get your hair out. I was just going to say, it’s a good thing. There’s a fella in my form, he has a black belt. Are you in the Newcastle club?’
‘No, I’m not in the Newcastle club, Mark, I’m in the Fickleworth Centre.’
‘But that’s…well, that’s in Bog’s End.’
‘It isn’t in Bog’s End.’ It was Bill speaking now. ‘It’s on the south side of Bog’s End, and it’s a very fine place, let me tell you.’
‘Nobody’s arguing with you, Dad.’
‘No, they’re not,’ Fiona put in now, ‘so don’t you start. Well now, may I say something?’ But even as she spoke she knew how silly the question would sound. ‘Why are you making all this fuss? I think it’s a marvellous thing that Katie should take up a defensive sport.’
‘It isn’t a defensive sport; they’re all cissies!’
‘Now, now, now.’ Bill’s hand went out towards Sammy. ‘Hold it! Hold it, both of you. As for you, Willie Bailey, you’re an ignoramus, and so is anyone else who says that karate and judo are for cissies. Football is and cricket is. Oh yes, cricket is, compared with them. Yes, definitely. But we’re not on about the merit of games, are we, Willie? It’s because you’ve got the pip that Sammy dare ask Katie to go along to the Centre. Now, in a way, I can understand that, because he hasn’t asked you.’
‘I have. I did months ago. But I didn’t tell him where or what. I asked him if he would like to take up fencing or such, and he laughed his head off. Another cissy game, you know, fencing. And Katie’s told me she’s always wanted to take up fencing.’<
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Bill lowered his head. Yes, Katie would. But foils would be no good to Katie if she ever got into one of her rages again; it would have to be sabres. And he knew a bit about fencing himself. He had done some a few years ago, but hadn’t stuck at it. It was too complicated, your feet and all that. He looked at Sammy again and asked quietly, ‘What else d’you do?’
‘I took up fencing first. I still do a bit now and again. But there’s always a crowd waiting their turn.’ He nodded at Bill now. ‘It might be near Bog’s End, but it’s well attended, not only by them that come from that end either. And I know three who have left the Newcastle club’—he now bounced his head towards Mark—‘and joined the fencing at the Centre.’
‘It’s a fine place.’ Bert spoke for the first time. His child was lying quiet in his arms now, and he repeated, ‘It is, it’s a fine place. It’s done more good for this town than anything else: it’s made decent citizens out of hooligans.’
Bill now looked at Bert and said, ‘You know it well? Have you done any work there?’
‘Yes. Yes, Bill, I’ve done quite a bit of work there with young swimmers and boxing. They’ve got a fine ring.’
‘Well! Well! Well!’ Bill’s head was moving from side to side; then it stopped and he looked at Sammy again and said, ‘Did you say you still go to confession on a Thursday night? Well, we’re hearing some confessions tonight. Let them all come here.’ Again he was looking at Bert and saying, ‘You know, you are a dark horse.’
‘I don’t see how you make that out, Bill. Where d’you think I spent all my bachelor evenings? I’m not a drinker, and some of the television I found an insult to my intelligence. I didn’t waste whole evenings on that. So what did I do? I went down to the Centre and enjoyed myself: seeing hooligans off the street corner taking a pride in themselves; teaching them how to box, not to bash somebody’s face in, but to give them self-confidence and to help others. The boxing helped more that way than the swimming did, because, you know, you get nothing out of swimming, apart from pleasure for yourself. I know that.’
‘And it’s free, I understand?’
‘Yes, you understand aright, for them that can’t pay. But for the likes of our friends Samuel there and Katie and such, if they can pay they are expected to. I think it’s five pounds a year to join.’
‘Oh, we can never reach that.’ Bill was shaking his head and making an effort to put a lightness on the situation. But looking at Willie, he saw this was going to be difficult and he made the mistake of saying, ‘Let Sammy show you how it’s done. If he can toss Katie, he can toss you and then you might like to—’
‘And I mightn’t like to go, and he’s not going to do it to me. If he wants to go out with her let him go, but I’m not going to be made an idiot of.’ And at this he pushed past Nell, almost overbalancing Angela, and stalked from the room.
‘Oh, you’ve done it this time, Sammy.’
‘I’ve done nothing I’m ashamed of Mr Bill, or that I regret. I thought Katie needed…well, something, and that’s why I told her.’
‘You did right. You did right, Sammy.’ Fiona was nodding at him, and now she appealed to her daughter, ‘And…and you would like to take up something like this, Katie?’
‘Yes, Mam, I would like it very much. But I’m sorry that in a way it’s caused trouble between’—she looked at Sammy now and added—‘well, will you try to make it up with him?’
‘No. Oh, no. As me da said—’ Sammy’s head drooped now and he didn’t finish or repeat what his da had said, but the adults knew that he must have got tired at times of Willie’s possessiveness and so had talked it over with his father; and the Thursday night escape from Willie’s domination had to be safeguarded.
‘I’ll speak to him.’ They all stared at Katie, this Katie who seemed so different, for there had been a constant war raging between her and Willie since they were children. After Angela had come on the scene, there had been a respite, but it had worn thin at times. It just showed you, Fiona thought, you never knew your children, not really. She could never imagine her wilful, hot-headed, stubborn Katie apologising in any way to her brother.
Some similar thoughts were going through Katie’s mind as she went up the stairs and along the broad corridor to Willie’s room: she hesitated for a full minute before she knocked. When there was no answer, she knocked again, louder this time, and when it was pulled open there stood her red-faced, wet-eyed brother, and he barked at her straight away, ‘What d’you want?’
‘I’ll tell you if you let me in.’ Her answer was so unexpected that he turned himself about and walked back into the room. She followed, closing the door quietly behind her.
She watched him go and sit before his desk that was placed below the window. He picked up one of the three books lying there and banged it down on the desk again. And then her voice came to him, saying, ‘I’m sorry, Willie. I wouldn’t have said I would like to go if I had thought it would cause this trouble between you. And…and I can tell you, he only asked me because…well, he’s sorry for me. He’s been sorry for me for the past year or so, when Dad wouldn’t speak to me and I was in everybody’s black books. And I was feeling terrible inside because I knew I might have killed that girl and of what it would have done, not only to me, but to the family. It did enough to us all, I know, and Sammy was just sorry for me.’
He swung round now on his chair, but his voice was low as he said, ‘We’ve been close pals for years.’
‘Yes. Yes, I know that, Willie, nobody closer. You were like brothers, and it was you who fought…well, that is, practically fought with Mam so that he could be invited to the house, because she would have nothing of him at first. It was only when he saved Dad from those would-be murderers that she took to him. But…but you stuck to him all the time. I know…I know how you feel.’ She watched his head droop and when he muttered brokenly, ‘He…he won’t have anything to do with me now, not after this, and he’ll have you.’
Her voice rose. ‘He won’t have me. All he’s doing is taking me to this place and introducing me to the karate teacher. And I think it’s a good thing to know about defence, because…because one or two of our girls have been followed. But anyway, if you won’t be friends with him again or won’t come along with us to this place, then I won’t go.’
‘Oh, you’ll have to now. You’ve started this. Well, I mean, no…well, you didn’t start this, he did. And I won’t forget he’s kept it to himself all this time. He should have told me.’
‘Yes,’ she nodded at him, ‘in a way I think he should. Perhaps,’ she tried to explain, ‘it was because the place is so near Bog’s End and he didn’t want you or the family to think he was mixing with anyone down there. You see, his father was very proud, you know, when you befriended him.’
He stood up now and rubbed the end of his thumb across his mouth before he said, ‘Did he hurt you when he toppled you over?’
‘No. But I can tell you it was a surprise; funny, really. It wasn’t being thrown on the floor, it was the way he did it. He says I shouldn’t go in for that, not really. Well, not at first; ju-jitsu is better. It’s odd’—she was smiling at him now—‘but he says it means “the gentle touch”, or “the soft touch”.’
They were now looking at each other rather sheepishly until she asked quietly, ‘Will you come with us? Because I do want to take up something outside school.’
He looked to the side as if considering; then he muttered, ‘I’ll see. But mind’—his head jerked round now—‘I’m not taking up any of those fool things.’
‘No. No,’ she quickly agreed with him. ‘You can just have a look round, as I will, the first time.’ There was another pause; then she said, ‘Come on down.’ But to this he replied quickly, ‘No, I can’t, not yet, Katie. Already I feel ridiculous. I’m always ridiculous, aren’t I? Aren’t I?’ His voice had risen. ‘When I think about it I know I am, or have been, for the way I’ve clung on to that thick-headed Irish dolt downstairs. I…I’ve put him first
in everything.’
‘Oh, he knows that and appreciates it. And, as I said before, if it hadn’t been for you he wouldn’t be here today. He’s said as much.’
‘He has?’
‘Oh yes. Yes.’ It was good to lie in someone else’s defence. It sort of made one feel better with one’s self. And now she went on, ‘He wouldn’t say it to you, but it’s come out when we’ve been going at it hammer and tongs…he and I, I mean.’
Willie was shaking his head, and so she said, ‘When you come down and go into the recreation room again, all the others should be in the drawing room. If he’s not in the recreation room, he’ll come along.’
He made no reply to this but simply stared at her; and she nodded at him and smiled, then turned about and went downstairs.
Her mother was coming out of the drawing room pushing Mamie before her and saying, ‘I am not sewing spangles on that dress. It’s a pretty dress, a party dress, and you’re only going to a party.’
‘Nancy has spangles all over hers.’
‘I don’t care what Nancy has, you’re not having spangles. I’m not putting spangles on that dress.’
‘Why?’
Fiona drew in a deep breath. She never thought there would come a time when she would dislike her adopted daughter, but over the past two years she had become a trial. Since she was small, she had always wanted her own way, but from the time she knew she had money of her own, which was in the care of her grandfather, she had become…well, the only word for it was obnoxious. She was an obnoxious little girl. And so Fiona looked gratefully at Katie when the answer came from her, ‘Because spangles make things look cheap, miss,’ she said.
‘They don’t! They don’t! Nancy looks lovely.’
‘Don’t you bark at me!’
‘Huh! You!’ The indignant figure made for the stairs now, muttering as she went, and her mutter brought a bark from Fiona, saying, ‘Don’t you dare, miss, come out with your grandfather’s piece again. I’ve told you before, if you want to go and live with your grandfather that’s all right with me and everybody in this house. So get that into your head. Any time you like I’ll pack your bags.’
The Bondage of Love Page 2
