by Emma Hornby
‘Lass …’
‘And what of the morrow?’ she forced herself to whisper. ‘You’ll leave, shall have to. You don’t belong to me, Daniel. You’re promised to Lizzie. Nowt can or will change that. Were I to take thee in my bed … I’d not have the strength to let thee go. I’d not have the strength to live with my sin of betrayal against her, the dearest friend I’ve ever known. We can’t. It can never be.’
‘But … the coal merchant. I thought—’
‘I said nay to Edwin for me, Daniel, not you. For I can’t wed unless for love, not again.’ She nodded when he frowned quizzically. ‘Aye, that’s right. I didn’t love Nathan in t’ beginning. Glory be to God, I grew to, but what if I hadn’t? What then, if he’d lived and discovered the truth? That’s no basis for a sound marriage, is it? I could never put another – put myself – through that again.’
‘Like me with Lizzie?’ He covered his face. ‘Why haven’t I your backbone? Why can’t I be honest with her, call the whole thing off, be with thee?’ Slowly, he lowered his hands. ‘I’m going to do it.’
‘Do what?’
‘Tell Lizzie how I really feel.’
‘But … you can’t. You’ve a duty, will break her heart, you said so yourself— Daniel, wait!’ she cried as he brushed past her and strode from the house. ‘Lad!’
He paused outside Mrs O’Brien’s. Turning towards a frantic Laura, who had followed him across the cobbles, he nodded, and she sagged in relief, believing he’d seen sense. Then: ‘I must.’
To her horror, she could only watch as, lifting his arm, he rapped purposefully at the family’s door.
‘Can I speak with Lizzie?’
‘Oh, er … ’Tis rather late, lad—’
‘Please, Bee. It’s important.’
The Irishwoman frowned slightly. Then she nodded and stepped aside.
Having followed him in, Laura scanned the kitchen’s sea of occupants – spotting Lizzie, she made a beeline for her, skirting past Daniel before he could reach her first. ‘Lass …’
‘What’s all this in aid of?’ Lizzie looked from one to the other. ‘Has summat happened?’
Daniel nodded. ‘Aye. You see, it’s like this—’
‘The shop!’ Laura burst out in her desperation, cutting him off. ‘I, I have the brass, lass. I’ve enough to buy summat outright, I do, and, and me and Daniel couldn’t wait to tell thee the good news.’ She turned her head to plead at him with her eyes. ‘Ain’t that right, lad?’
‘I …’ He stared back in stunned confusion.
‘Come next door, lass, will thee, and I’ll explain,’ she told an equally stupefied Lizzie.
The girl and Daniel followed her wordlessly to number five. Inside, Laura set the kettle to boil then sat facing them at the table. She took a deep breath to steady her racing heart, though it did nothing to quieten the lambasting of herself in her head. What had she done? However, she’d had no choice, none. She couldn’t have let Daniel blurt a confession, shatter Lizzie’s heart. She’d plucked at the first thing to come to her mind: that blasted money. There was no going back on her declaration now. She had to tell them.
‘Love? Lad?’ Lizzie pressed finally, flicking her eyes at them in turn. ‘Will one of youse please tell me what in heaven is going on?’
Folding his arms, Daniel raised an eyebrow to Laura in agreement.
She drew in another deep breath and began. She explained about her dreams, of Adam and her father’s whisperings of the initials. How Lizzie’s passing remark about their latest cake last week had sparked a long-forgotten memory, a possible clue to the mystery of the missing brass, that on impulse she’d journeyed to Bolton to find out if she was right.
‘You mean you’ve really found it, the loot them brothers were searching for?’ asked Lizzie in wonderment.
Laura nodded. ‘Three hundred and fourteen pounds, eight shillings and sixpence.’
‘Wha—?’ her friend croaked.
‘Aye. So there you have it. We’ll start looking around for premises next week, if you’d like?’
‘If I’d …? Oh, love!’ She leapt up, tears spilling, and threw her arms around Laura’s neck. ‘I’d like nowt more. Nowt at all!’
Gripping on to her friend, Laura hid her face in her shoulder and closed her eyes in despair.
When a still-dazed Lizzie had finished her tea and left for home, Laura put her head on her arms resting on the table and burst into bitter tears. ‘See now what you’ve made me do?’ she cried to Daniel.
His voice was low with disbelief. ‘You went there alone? Are you insane? Owt could have happened to you, the child. What if Dotty Cannock had seen thee?’
‘It didn’t. She didn’t.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I tried to earlier, was desperate for advice. But Edwin turned up, then … Why did you do it? Why did you threaten to tell her? And now, to halt your confession, I’ve gone and promised her summat I can’t provide. You’ve forced my hand in this, you! Just what am I going to do?’
Thrown by her distress, he came to kneel in front of her, his face wreathed in concern. ‘What is it? What’s wrong? Were what you told Lizzie an untruth?’
‘Oh nay. I have the funds, all right.’
‘Then I don’t understand—’
‘I’ll not touch it, lad, can’t! It’s dirty money, that’s what. So much destruction has been wreaked for that haul. I don’t know why on earth I took it, weren’t thinking straight. I want no part of it, nay never!’
‘Laura, Laura.’ Daniel lifted her up to force her to look at him. ‘Listen to me. All that’s happened was wrought by the greed of man. The money itself ain’t played a part in any of it, it’s not. The Cannocks owe thee this. Nay, hear me out,’ he told her when she made to argue. ‘What that trio put you through. All you suffered at their hands. Then there’s the child. Yours and Nathan’s.’
She lifted her eyes to his with a frown. ‘What about it?’
‘They’ve left that innocent babe in yon belly fatherless. Does it not deserve summat back? Take the brass and use it wisely, make a success of your life, for its sake as well as your own. Call it compensation for the child.’
‘No amount could ever be enough! Anyroad, however you dress it up, it’s still wrong. It ain’t the Cannocks’ money or mine, is it? They stole it, remember?’
‘But there’s no way of ever knowing who it belonged to or where it came from. The brothers were vague. They mentioned only that their target was miles away. They could have lifted it from anywhere; a different county, even.’
‘It’s still not right, lad. I feel awful just thinking about taking it.’ A thought occurred and she nodded slowly. ‘Perhaps I could hand it in to the police. They’d surely be able to trace the owners—’
‘Don’t talk daft, Laura. It would raise too many questions. You’d have to give them at least some details to work on, and what d’you think would happen? You want to chance them linking the money – linking thee – to the Cannocks’ deaths, do you? Nay. It’s too risky. You’ve the babby to think of.’
For an age, Laura was silent. Finally, she raised her gaze to meet his.
‘Well?’
‘All right. All right.’
‘You’ll use it?’
‘I ain’t got much choice, have I? Besides, I can’t very well let Lizzie down, now. Mind, if I do agree to this, I need two promises from thee. The first is you must put from your mind telling Lizzie what you almost did earlier. Promise me, lad,’ she pressed when he sighed. ‘You’ve made your bed; you can never breathe the truth to her, it’d break her heart.’
His tone was flat with sadness. ‘Aye.’
‘As for the second thing.’ She nodded decisively. ‘Before I touch a single farthing of that brass, I need you to take a little trip to Breightmet, too …’
CHAPTER 27
HAVING TAKEN A day off from the market, Laura and Lizzie had spent the morning and most of the afternoon trawling Manchester’
s streets. So far, their search for premises had yielded little success. Either the location wasn’t right or the asking price was ridiculously high – the latter issue due more in part to the fact they were women, Laura suspected. One look at them, mere females with no head for business, and most owners immediately thought to try their hand at overcharging them.
‘Swindlers, the lot,’ Lizzie announced dully as they walked away from yet another landlord who had tried his luck. ‘I don’t reckon we’ll ever find owt, love.’
A despondent Laura reluctantly nodded agreement. ‘It makes me so angry that they’ll not take us seriously. Ain’t our brass as good as anyone else’s?’
Our brass. Except it wasn’t, was it? She’d stolen it, just as surely as the Cannocks had in the beginning. The thought niggled, but Laura pushed it away with a frown. What was done was done; there was no going back on her decision now. Her vow to Lizzie, that they would realise their dream after all, was more important than mere conscience.
‘I bet, had Daniel accompanied us, we’d not be having such a rotten result,’ Lizzie pointed out, and again Laura was wont to concur. ‘Actually, love, speaking of Daniel …’
‘Aye?’
Lizzie glanced sideways at her then shook her head. ‘Nay, forget it.’
‘Lass? If there’s summat tha wants to tell me …?’ Laura urged gently, though inside she’d turned into a quailing mess. Her friend knew. She’d overheard her and Daniel through the wall when they had discussed their feelings for one another in Laura’s kitchen, that’s what this was. Dear God, what was she to say, do? Lass, I’m that sorry …
‘Well, it’s just that … I, I don’t think—’
An almighty bellow pierced the still air, cutting Lizzie’s speech short – the women turned in confusion in the direction from which it had come.
‘What on earth was that?’ gasped Laura, grateful beyond words for the distraction – as was Lizzie, she was quick to notice, if her friend’s flush of relief was anything to go by. However, she was obliged to ask, ‘Sorry, tha were saying?’
‘Nowt, love. It’s nowt, honest— Eeh!’ Lizzie added on a squeak when the beast-like shout rang out again. ‘What is that racket?’
‘I don’t know but, by, it’s enough to waken the dead in their graves.’
Their curiosity getting the better of them, they set off at a trot to investigate.
‘Mother of God …’
It had been six months since she’d seen him last, since she’d sought him out to inform him of her father’s passing. The sight of him now conjured up every ounce of her old hatred and more.
‘Is that …?’
Choking on a cry, Laura nodded. ‘Bridget and Millicent! The swine, I’ll kill him!’
‘Love, nay, you mustn’t!’ Lizzie said as she made to dash into the fray. ‘The babby, remember?’
Though Laura halted, knew she was right, she couldn’t contain a growl of frustration. ‘But … I can’t just stand here and do nowt! My uncle will murder the pair if summat’s not done, and fast!’
Lizzie bit her lip, then: ‘Wait here,’ she instructed, before crossing the street.
Ambrose Todd paused in his brutal action of raining blows on to the two women sprawled on the flagstones at his feet to snarl at Lizzie’s approach. ‘You keep your stinking nose out, whore, else you’ll get some of the same,’ he slurred with drink-fuelled menace, brandishing a mammoth fist. ‘You’ve seen nowt.’
‘I’ve seen enough, you bullying owd sod, yer!’ Lizzie yelled, taking another hesitant step forward. ‘Just you leave them be.’
‘Ay aye, or what, for that sounds very much like a threat to me?’
Lizzie silently stood her ground and, after a long moment, Ambrose muttered a curse with a dismissive sweep of his arm.
‘Oh, I’m bored of this, anyroad. Shift, you snivelling pair of bitches, get out of my way.’
Aunt and niece scrambled from his path and he stalked past, lumbering off in the direction of home.
The moment he’d disappeared Laura rushed to assist the women. Millicent cried harder upon seeing her; Bridget, though dry-eyed, was ashen and shaking uncontrollably.
‘Eeh, loves. What has that wicked divil done to youse?’ she asked brokenly, helping the Irishwoman to stand whilst Lizzie aided Millicent. ‘Are you badly injured?’
‘No, no,’ Bridget murmured, reaching up to touch a tender spot on her cheek and wincing. ‘Nothing’s broken, colleen. ’Tis all a misunderstanding, aye—’
‘That was no misunderstanding, Bridget. He was pummelling the life out of the pair of youse, for God’s sake!’ Laura snapped, incensed at her uncle’s evilness and his maid’s blind loyalty still. ‘What occurred, at all?’
‘An employee from the yard came to the house to fetch Aunt Bridget,’ Millicent explained between snatches of sobs. ‘He said as how the master had arrived at work roaring drunk and that no one could get sense from him or get him to go home to sleep it off. I’d not let her go alone, and the two of us went to collect him. He left with us quietly enough but, midway, he turned nasty and struck Aunt Bridget. She fell, and I threw myself over her, to shield her, like. His fists were determined to find her, even if he had to get through me to do it, and oh, he’d not stop, Laura. He’d just not stop, just kept punching and punching and punching …’
‘All right, lass. It’s all right.’ Laura was trembling with pent-up fury. She put a supportive arm around the distraught girl’s shoulders and made to lead her and her aunt towards Ebenezer Court, but the latter pulled back. ‘Nay … Bridget, you cannot be serious …?’
‘I must return, colleen. He’ll have a blue fit if I don’t. We’ll … we’ll be all right, now. He’ll be away to his bed shortly and—’
‘Oh, must we, Aunt Bridget?’ Millicent’s thin face was a picture of misery. ‘Can’t we go back with Laura and Lizzie, just forra little while at least?’
But the Irishwoman shook her head: ‘Best not, love. Sure, don’t fret so. There shan’t be any further trouble the day.’
Laura and Lizzie could only watch on helplessly as the two of them bade them a quiet goodbye and sloped off down the street.
‘You think they’ll be all right, love?’ asked Lizzie worriedly.
Laura wiped away angry tears with the back of her hand. ‘I don’t know. Lord, I hate him so much I can taste it.’
Yet what could she do? She couldn’t very well storm round there and confront her uncle, could she? She had the child to think about. Nor could she drag his maid and her niece from that hell pit and to the safety of her house with brute force. Bridget just couldn’t, or wouldn’t, see. And Millicent would never leave her aunt with him. There was no way to help, none. That wasn’t to say it made the truth any less painful or frustrating.
She’d been in regular touch with them both since Millicent had revealed Ambrose’s abuse, had been to meet them every Sunday at church, desperate to know how they were faring. He might have ordered his maid not to seek her out but couldn’t control them crossing paths at the Lord’s house. Nor did he himself step foot there so he would never know. Bridget, however, was still wary, albeit she did her best to hide it. Though she always greeted Laura with the same enthusiasm, it was clear the strain was getting to her lately: her eyes had lost a little of their usual sparkle and a sadness now lurked behind her smile.
Brave young Millicent had revealed to Laura that her uncle was still paying her unwanted attention but that he hadn’t upped his depravity and gone so far as touching. Yet. She insisted she was coping but said that Ambrose’s increasing rages were worsening – likely owing to his financial stresses, Laura surmised – and that he was drinking heavily. For how much longer they all could carry on like this, she didn’t know. Something would have to give, and soon.
She and Lizzie had begun making their way home when the premises facing her uncle’s business suddenly caught her eye; Laura slowed, eyes thoughtful. Motioning to Lizzie to follow, she made her way across.
It was a greengrocer’s. A vacant greengrocer’s. Boasting a double-fronted window and with a house above, it was in a prime position.
A very prime position indeed, Laura thought to herself, glancing to the coal yard. Her mouth hardened. She nodded once.
‘Eeh, love.’ Lizzie bit her lip uncertainly. ‘Is tha sure …?’
‘More than I’ve ever been of owt in my life,’ she breathed, eyes like steel.
Laura made enquiries first thing the following morning.
This time, she was prepared – she took Daniel along. As she’d suspected, it proved a much more successful outcome owing to his presence.
The property, they learned, was to be sold by private contract. The owner was relocating abroad and desired a smooth and speedy sale. After taking a thorough look around the place, she and Lizzie sat down to discuss matters.
‘It’s norra bad price he’s asking. The condition and fixtures are sound. It shouldn’t take too long or be too much work to convert it into a confectioner’s. A few ovens and a new sink in the area out back that will be the kitchen, shelving space in the main room to display the cakes … I think that’d do us just fine for now. As for the four rooms upstairs, well, they’re ready to move into right away. So, lass? Are you happy for us to go ahead?’
Lizzie laughed in rapturous joy – she’d fallen completely in love with the shop the moment they stepped inside. Then her radiant smile wavered and she released a small sigh. ‘Love, about its location … Are you absolutely certain you’re not for regretting it? Your uncle—’
‘Shall be sick with rage and envy and disbelief … And I’m going to enjoy every damn minute of it,’ Laura told her with quiet passion. ‘But it’s not just about revenge, lass. It’s our dream, remember, becoming a reality. It is perfect. Better than owt else we’ve looked at. It’s like …’ She took her friend’s hands and squeezed them and her voice was thick. ‘It’s like it’s meant to be, you know?’
‘Aye.’ Lizzie’s own eyes were bright with deep emotion. ‘Oh, Laura, we’re really doing it?’
