by Sam Michaels
‘How dare you speak to me like that.’
‘Oh, I dare. Now get out!’
Miss Capstone took in the thunderous look on Mrs Blundell’s face, and obviously deciding that it might be better to retreat, left the room. The door was slammed behind her. Taking a deep breath, Mrs Blundell returned to Sissy’s side. Her tone instantly changed. ‘I’m going to take a look, dear. I think we’re getting close now.’
Sissy closed her eyes as Mrs Blundell peered between her legs.
‘Yes, as I thought, you’re crowning. The baby is on its way. Now, try not to push until I tell you to.’
Sissy held her breath. She wanted to bear down but she’d been instructed not to. ‘I must… I have to, I can’t help it,’ she cried.
‘Quick breaths, Sissy, pant, dear… The baby is coming out a bit slowly. If he’s got ears like his father, he’s probably got stuck in there,’ Mrs Blundell said with a chortle.
If Sissy hadn’t been in so much pain, she might have laughed too. Jack did have enormous ears that stuck out, but it endeared her to him even more. She’d often joked with him, asking if his head spun round and round if he got caught in a strong wind.
‘Right, push again, but gently,’ Mrs Blundell instructed, and shortly after she smiled. ‘Ah yes, well done.’
Suddenly, the pain subsided, and Sissy felt numb as her child slithered into Mrs Blundell’s waiting hands. She’d done it. Her baby was born.
‘Here she is… you have a perfect baby girl,’ the woman said as she cut the cord then warmly handed Sissy her bloodied child.
Sissy felt exhausted but overwhelmed with motherly love for the tiny baby in her arms. She held her immediately to her breast and the baby instantly began to suckle. ‘Can you tell Jack to come in please?’
‘Not just yet,’ Mrs Blundell replied as she busied herself between Sissy’s legs. I need to clean you up a bit first. Oh no!’
‘What’s wrong?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Er, nothing, dear… just relax. You… um… have a little bit of tearing, that’s all. I just need to fix you up a bit.’
Sissy felt reassured and held her daughter close, admiring her thick mop of black hair, just like her own. Her ears were squashed so it was difficult to tell, but she didn’t think the child had inherited her father’s ears, or his wonky nose. Mind you, Jack’s nose was only wonky because it had been punched so many times.
‘Oh, my darling, you’re so beautiful,’ Sissy whispered and gently kissed the top of her baby’s head. As she gazed at her daughter in amazement, the sheets underneath her began to feel wet and warm. ‘What’s going on, Mrs Blundell? I feel a bit strange.’
‘Nothing… nothing at all… you’re bleeding. It happens sometimes. Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.’
Mrs Blundell’s tone was higher-pitched than normal, and the urgency in her voice caused Sissy to panic. She’d heard of women haemorrhaging and bleeding to death after childbirth. She wasn’t a believer like her neighbour Miss Capstone, but suddenly she found herself praying to God to spare her for the sake of her newborn baby.
Mrs Blundell suddenly pulled a blanket over Sissy and rushed out of the room mumbling something that Sissy didn’t quite catch. Through her confusion, she instinctively knew her life was in danger and wondered if Mrs Blundell had fled in fear. Had she been abandoned to die alone? ‘Mrs Blundell, come back,’ Sissy shouted feebly, her strength sapping as blood spewed from her womb.
*
When their door flew open and Mrs Blundell appeared, Jack jumped to his feet again. ‘Has Sissy had the baby?’
‘Yes, but you’d better come in, and hurry.’
Jack heard the urgency in the woman’s voice. Pushing her none too gently to one side, he dashed into the room. ‘Sissy… Sis… it’s me, love, Jack. Can you hear me?’ Jack stared down at his wife’s pale face. Her eyes were closed, and he noticed her lips had a blue tinge.
‘Let me move the baby,’ Mrs Blundell said, taking the child from Sissy’s breast and laying it down beside her.
Jack briefly saw that the baby was a girl, but his eyes quickly returned to Sissy. ‘What’s wrong with my wife?’ he demanded to know.
‘She… she’s haemorrhaging and I’m sorry, there’s nothing more I can do.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Jack asked confused. He took Sissy’s limp, scrawny hand in his, and held it to his cheek. ‘Sissy… wake up, darling. You’ve had a little girl… She’s gorgeous, just like you.’
The baby was quietly gurgling by Sissy’s side, but Jack had hardly noticed her as he was engulfed in concern for his wife. Slowly, Sissy’s eyes half opened.
‘She’s awake… Mrs Blundell, she’s all right. Sissy, it’s me love… you’re going to be fine.’
His wife smiled a soft smile, her voice barely a whisper as she said, ‘Call her Georgina, and always tell her how much I loved her. Give her my ring, Jack, make sure she…’ Then, her eyes closed again, and her head rolled to one side.
‘Sissy… don’t leave me, darling… please… We need you. Georgina needs her mum… You can’t go,’ Jack begged, as tears began to roll down his rough face. But it was too late. Sissy would never hear his pleas and Georgina would never know her mother.
*
As Georgina Garrett lay next to the dead body of her mother, a few streets away, Billy Wilcox, a lad of four, was absorbed in the task of pulling the legs off a spider. Several doors down from Billy, Molly Mipple had been born six months earlier to an impoverished family, and was kicking her tiny legs, crying with hunger. Soon, all their lives would intertwine with devastating consequences.
2
It was early evening when Jack’s mother, Dulcie, finally came to sit in the comfort of her chair in front of the hearth, pleased that the warm August weather meant she didn’t need any coal for a fire. She had just about managed to find the money to pay the rent, but there was little remaining, and she worried how she would feed them both for the rest of the week.
As was usual these days, Percy was deeply unconscious in an alcohol-fuelled slumber, sprawled inelegantly across the chair opposite hers and snoring loudly. He was a short man, a little over five feet tall, and nowadays as thin as a rake. She doubted he’d be wanting any food. He’d much prefer to fill his belly with ale, but her stomach grumbled at the thought of bread and cheese. She knew there was a small stale crust left in the kitchen, but the cheese had been eaten the day before.
Percy slapped his lips together in his sleep, and she stared at him as the hunger in her stomach was replaced by a deep hatred and resentment towards the man she had once loved.
She rubbed her aching feet and sighed deeply, her heart heavy with shame. Where once Percy had supported them, she was now left to be the breadwinner, and with no education or knowledge of anything other than running a home, she’d been forced into selling herself. At forty-five years old, she wasn’t as firm or attractive as many of the younger single mothers who worked the labyrinth of filthy, run-down streets, but there were still men who fancied the older woman.
To her surprise, she’d found it was often the younger gentlemen who would pay for her services. They knew she’d have the experience and skills to teach them a thing or two. She could tolerate the young men, especially as most of them got the deed done quickly, but it was the old men who turned her stomach. With their rotten teeth and bad breath, instead of lifting her skirts and parting her legs, she’d rather stick a knife in their chests. She had little choice though, and just hoped her neighbours, and more so her son, would never discover how she kept a roof over their heads.
Percy broke wind, and Dulcie turned her face away from the vile smell, then turned back to look at him with disgust. She thought his guts must be rotting. She wished he’d drink himself to death or have a fatal accident. He’d fallen off the railway bridge twice before and had once been hit by a horse and cart outside the pub, but the old git had survived, much to Dulcie’s dismay.
It seemed to her that only t
he good died young, like her first husband, Boris. She felt a lump in her throat at the thought of him. He’d been killed in an accident at work when a kiln had exploded in the steelworks, just months after Jack was born. She’d been left devastated and penniless, but Percy had willingly taken her and her son on, and up until a couple of years ago, had provided well through poaching and stealing.
Compared to most of the families in this part of London, she’d thought her life with Percy had been charmed. She wasn’t burdened with several children’s mouths to feed, and Percy’s ill-gotten gains had comfortably furnished their home. She’d kept a good figure, and her chestnut hair hadn’t greyed. But her bones were feeling age creeping in, which left her joints aching and her hands beginning to gnarl prematurely. Dulcie tutted to herself. Who’d have thought it would have come to this? Where once she had looked down her nose at prostitutes, now, at her time of life, she was one of them.
She heard a tap on the front room window and knew it would be Jack. He was the only person who knocked on the window instead of the door. Her hips felt stiff as she pushed herself up from her chair, and as she passed Percy she gave him a kick in the shins. The good-for-nothing so and so wouldn’t feel it in his state, she thought, and she plastered a smile on her face to greet her son.
She opened the door but was surprised to see Jack holding a bundle that looked like a baby. She studied her son’s face. His puffy, red-rimmed eyes told her all she needed to know. ‘Come in, Son,’ she said, opening the door wider and trying to get a glimpse at what he held.
‘Sissy’s dead, Mum. She died minutes after having the baby.’
Dulcie gently took the child from her son’s muscular arms. The baby, who had started to cry, was wrapped in a cut-off from an old patchwork quilt, which she recognised as one she’d given Sissy months earlier. ‘Does the baby have a name?’ Dulcie asked, attempting to hide her emotion. She could see her son’s heart was breaking, which broke her own.
‘Georgina… it’s what Sissy wanted,’ Jack answered, his voice beginning to crack as he was obviously doing his utmost to hold back his tears.
‘That’s lovely, a girl then, and she looks just like her mum,’ Dulcie answered softly, and rocked from side to side in a bid to calm the child. It didn’t work. Georgina continued to cry incessantly, hungry for her mother’s milk.
‘I dunno what to do, Mum. She needs a feed…’
Dulcie chewed her lower lip as her mind turned, but then struck by an idea she said, ‘Don’t worry, Jack, I know someone who might be able to help. There’s a jug of ale in the kitchen. Go and pour yourself a glass. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
Dulcie left her house and hurried along the narrow street with the wailing baby in her arms. She could ill afford to feed Percy and herself, let alone this poor little mite, and a wet nurse didn’t come cheap. However, if her idea panned out, she wouldn’t have to part with a penny.
Fifteen minutes later Dulcie was in the roughest part of town. This was an area where no person of good virtue would dare to frequent. Women hung out of windows with their bosoms on display, vying for business, while others were drunk, vomiting openly in the filthy streets. In a dark corner behind a cart, Dulcie glimpsed a woman bent over with her skirt up, a punter behind her, trousers round his ankles as he pounded hard for his pleasure.
This wasn’t the sort of place where Dulcie felt comfortable carrying a small baby. She held her granddaughter protectively close to her and tried to muffle the child’s screams in the hope of avoiding any unwanted attention.
The sun was still high in the sky. Dulcie was grateful, as she would have been worried if it had been dark. A short, skinny man with bare feet and a bent back walked towards her. His leering eyes unnerved Dulcie and she could see he was trying to peer at the child she held. He stood ominously in front of her, blocking her path. If she hadn’t had been carrying Georgina, she wouldn’t have given a second thought to kneeing him in the crotch.
With an evil sneer, he licked his lips, nodded towards the baby and then asked, ‘How much?’
‘This child is not for sale,’ Dulcie said firmly, then sidestepped the man and marched on. It was no secret that in these streets, any desire could be bought for the right price, but it turned Dulcie’s stomach. It wasn’t unusual for a prostitute to fall with an unwanted pregnancy, then sell the child on, no questions asked. Dulcie didn’t believe it was something any woman wanted to do, but the desperation of poverty forced them into it. Gawd knows where those helpless babies ended up, or what they went through, Dulcie thought, and shuddered. She reckoned the women would be better off killing their babies – something she suspected her friend Ruby had recently resorted to.
She had seen many young women turn to drugs or booze to numb the pain and block out the memories of what they’d done. Some went out of their minds and ended up in institutions, a fate worse than death, and it was something she didn’t want to see happen to Ruby. The girl was only sixteen, with bright ginger hair and a sprinkling of freckles across her nose. Her fair skin was the colour of porcelain, so when she’d turned up on the streets one day her purple and yellow bruises had really stood out.
Dulcie had taken her under her wing and learned that Ruby was homeless after running away from her abusive father. Her mother had died when Ruby was seven, and her father had forced her into his bed to fulfil the role of his wife. When he’d filled her belly with a child, he’d beaten her until she miscarried, then thrown her out to fend for herself.
Dulcie did her best to protect the girl and would steer her away from the customers she knew had a liking for wanting to rough up the women, but it hadn’t been long before she’d noticed that Ruby was trying to hide a growing bump in her stomach. She’d had a quiet word with her and found that Ruby was distraught, fearing her secret would be discovered and she’d be sent to the workhouse. Dulcie felt sorry for the girl but, struggling herself to make enough money to live on, she could only offer a shoulder to cry on.
Less than a week ago and well into her pregnancy, Ruby disappeared, but then she’d turned up again two days ago, her stomach flat. She refused to discuss the fate of the baby, but Dulcie noticed her demeanour had changed. Where once she’d been a chatty young woman with a wicked sense of humour, she was now mostly silent, her eyes veiled in a darkness that Dulcie couldn’t penetrate.
Ruby lived in the basement of a shared house at the end of the street. It was decrepit, with the roof caved in and the stairs to the upper level broken. Dulcie thought the whole house looked unsound and had never been inside, but she had to speak to Ruby and hoped to find her in. She took a deep breath and braced herself for what she may find, then slowly walked down the stairs that led to the basement door. It was open, so with trepidation, she stepped inside.
As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she searched for Ruby. Several people were scattered, asleep on the dirty floor. Flies buzzed around, and Dulcie was sure she saw a rat the size of a cat scuttle around the edge of the room. Bile rose in her throat at the stench of soiled bodies and human excrement. She spotted a woman huddled in a corner with a small child by her side. She didn’t look old enough to be the mother, though the grime covering her face made it difficult to tell.
‘I’m looking for Ruby,’ Dulcie said quietly to the woman.
The woman pointed to a doorway. Dulcie had to step over an unconscious boy, dressed in rags and probably drunk. He couldn’t have been any older than about five or six, but this wasn’t an unusual sight in these slums. She tried to block out the image of the horrors of his life, then nervously walked through the doorway that led into an even darker room. As she struggled to focus, she wondered how living in these conditions could be worse than the workhouse, but she reasoned, at least these vagrants, prostitutes, drunks and orphans had their freedom.
‘Dulcie.’ She heard her name in the gloom and instantly recognised Ruby’s voice.
Ruby climbed up from the pile of rags she was sitting on. ‘What on earth are you doin
g here?’
‘Looking for you,’ Dulcie answered. ‘I need your help.’
‘Yeah, well, we all need help, but you’ve got to help yourself down here,’ Ruby said dismissively.
‘Listen, Ruby… I know you’ve not long birthed a child, so you’ll still have your milk. This baby has lost her mother and needs feeding.’
‘No… No… I couldn’t feed my own, so I ain’t feeding that one.’ Ruby turned her back and went to walk away.
‘I’ll make it worth your while,’ Dulcie called in desperation.
The girl spun back on the heel of her clogs and walked towards her. ‘Is that right? How much are you offering?’
Dulcie had thought about it and knew the measly sum she could afford wouldn’t be enough. However, she’d quickly formulated a better idea and now said, ‘Come and live with me. I have a nice house in a decent street. You can’t stay here, Ruby, it’s disgusting. Feed the baby, and I’ll make sure you get food and shelter. You won’t have to walk the streets, and you’ll have a clean roof to sleep under.’
‘I’m not sure, Dulcie… I don’t deserve anyone’s charity, not after what I done. This is my punishment for killing my… It’s God’s will.’
Even in the murkiness of the room, Dulcie could see Ruby’s green eyes were glistening with unshed tears. ‘Don’t be daft. You did what you had to do, and no god would want any young woman living like this! And anyway, it’s not charity. I need you… this baby needs you. Please, Ruby, come home with me.’
Ruby pursed her lips, and for a moment, Dulcie thought the girl might burst into tears, but she didn’t and instead nodded her head.
‘Good, now let’s get out of this shithole.’ Dulcie couldn’t get away quick enough, and she and Ruby made their way through the grime and back towards Dulcie’s house.
