by Sheila Riley
The people who lived around here might not have much, but they had their pride and they did their best with what little they had. Darnel had grown rich on their hunger for anything that would relieve their grim existence in this bomb-scarred port, and never failed to remind them of his ability to come up with expensive goods still on ration.
‘I was expecting a delivery, and it isn’t where it should be,’ said Darnel. Evie’s eyes trailed to the cellar door and then to the fire before the penny dropped. She knew why he’d burned her books now. Darnel was vindictive. Her suspicions were confirmed with his next words. ‘You refused to take in the delivery, didn’t you?’ It wasn’t really a question, Evie knew. It was an accusation. More likely, the reason he burned the valuable work she had strived so hard to produce. His delivery was obviously contraband. Booze. Cigarettes. Ration books. The valuables he hid down in their cellar could put him in Walton gaol for years. Stuff that people who worked all the hours God sent could not enjoy unless they had the readies – because money was the only language Darnel understood.
‘Nobody called today, and nothing was delivered.’ She lifted a defiant chin, wanting nothing to do with any of his dodgy black-market schemes. She couldn’t trust herself to look at him – if she did, she might crack him over the head with the brass tongs she still had in her hand.
‘I’ll put a left hook on that chin if you don’t lower it,’ Darnel warned and Evie, knowing he meant every word, turned to her mother who gave a slight warning shake of her head.
‘Come and keep me company at the table, Leo.’ Her mam was sitting at the table by the open sash window, fanning herself with the News of the World, and her eyes darted a silent warning. ‘Let’s have the wireless on, listen to Family Favourites.’
‘You don’t want to see him for what he is, do you, Mam?’ Evie’s shaking voice was barely above a whisper. Everybody knew Darnel was a crook who enticed people with his money. Then cowed them into dependency. Well not me, Mam. Not me. She would rather spit in his eye. But that would mean sinking to his level. And it would be a cold day in hell before she sank that low.
‘Evie…’ Her mother’s green eyes were pleading, but Evie had a stubborn streak.
‘You expect me to back down to this bully?’ Evie said as she headed to the kitchen door. Darnel took the seat near her mother and dashed away a buzzing bluebottle. She flinched, causing a satisfied grin from Darnel and a slow shake of her mother’s head. His amusement was plain to see when he pulled a fat cigar from a silver case.
Flash bastard… Evie thought. She’d seen men with families who had to work every hour in grease and grime, bad weather and worse. They shared match-thin hand-rolled cigarettes on a pin, just to get that one last puff. Cigars, an unheard-of luxury, were beyond the prospects of dock and factory workers who occupied Reckoner’s Row’s line of neat terraced houses.
‘We don’t need a lodger, Mam.’ Evie’s voice became a high-pitched squeak. ‘You’ve got the job in the pub, and as soon as I’ve finished my course, I can hang up my mop bucket and get a secretarial job at Beamers. They pay decent money and my tutor said she’ll give me a good reference.’
Having worked as an office cleaner at the electrical works since she left school at fourteen, Evie longed to climb the ranks to office clerk. To better herself. To save the money to bring her siblings home from Ireland. And to hell with Leo Darnel!
Her mother’s eyes implored her to be quiet as Darnel picked up the Sunday newspaper and rustled it noisily, drowning out the wireless and the heartfelt messages to families of soldiers still serving abroad. Evie swallowed angry tears of injustice that threatened to spill onto her bruised cheek. The spiv would have to go before the authorities came sniffing around and they all ended up on the street. Hurrying out to the scullery, Evie’s tears fell on to the huge piece of meat he had supplied the day before
Preparing the tray, which her mother had borrowed from the Tram Tavern and had conveniently forgotten to take back, she heard him passing through on his way to the lavatory down the yard. This was her last chance to try and talk some sense into her mother. Quickly, she filled the tray and elbowing the door open, she hurried back into the kitchen.
‘Mam,’ she pleaded, brushing away the tears once more, ‘we can’t go on like this, walking on eggshells when he’s around. Talking in hushed voices when he’s resting his eyes.’
‘What have I told you about that mouth of yours running away with itself?’ Her mother’s eyes darkened, and Evie felt a cold hand turn her racing heart to ice. She was beaten. Her mother was onto a good thing and would not let Darnel go in a hurry.
What’s the use? she thought. Mam was hardly going to take her side over his. But Evie knew she must try and make her see sense, for both their sakes. ‘Are you going to let him treat us like dirt under his shoe?’ she asked, banging the tray so hard on the table it made the cups rattle and upending the salt cellar.
‘You’re not saying that when you’re eating the good food he brings in,’ Rene countered, absent-mindedly throwing spilled salt over her shoulder. ‘You get on my nerves, the pair of you.’
‘What’s got you spooked, Mam?’ Evie asked, plucking the skin on her fingers, sensing her mother was holding something back. ‘You don’t usually give in to him so easily.’
‘Leave it, Evie,’ Rene warned. ‘There are some things I can’t talk about… things you wouldn’t understand.’
‘By God, he’s got you well trained, Mam.’ Evie slowly shook her head – something wasn’t right. Rene Kilgaren wasn’t the kind of woman who scared easily, and certainly not by the likes of Darnel. No, Evie suspected her mother had something more troubling on her mind. Why else would she be so blasé about the way the spiv treated her eldest daughter?
‘This has nothing to do with Leo,’ Rene answered. ‘All I can say is, ask no questions and I won’t have to lie.’ Rene’s face, still handsome if somewhat lived-in, was now pinched with worry. Evie recognised the expression. She had seen that look often when Da had been home on leave too long and they had no money.
‘He needs locking up, Mam,’ Evie said. ‘He’s as crooked as his own front teeth.’
‘He’s got a good heart,’ Rene answered. Out of habit she pinched the lit end of a half-smoked cigarette, putting the remains on the mantlepiece next to the clock for later. Evie knew her mother was trying to distract her from asking too many questions when she raised the volume on the wireless. ‘Did you forget Leo bought this wireless, when you were singing along to Vera Lynne?’
‘If he paid for that wireless, I’ll eat me hat,’ Evie snorted. ‘If he’s so generous, why won’t he let you have the money to bring Jack and Lucy back? This is their home, too, remember.’ Rene picked up the cigarette she had just extinguished and re-lit it. Evie could tell she was nervous for some strange reason.
‘I can’t bring them home just yet – and I do want to, believe me.’
‘Throw him out, then.’ Evie countered, hands on hips.
‘I can’t, I need his rent money – and never you mind what for,’ Rene said quickly. They were so engrossed in their exchange they didn’t hear the back door quietly close. Then, more quietly Rene said, ‘Evie, if anything ever happens to me, just remember, I could not burden you with the ugly truth.’
‘I will never trust him,’ Evie said imagining her mother was still talking about Darnel. ‘I’ve seen his runners taking the betting slips from hard-up housewives, traipsing down back alleys, rummaging in their pinny pockets for an extra penny or two. If they haven’t got the cash, he lets them have the bet on trust – with a huge interest charge thrown in for good measure!’
‘It’s up to them if they fancy a flutter,’ Rene defended Darnel. ‘He doesn’t put a gun to their heads. Anyway, it’s not him I’m talking about.’
‘Then who?’ Evie asked angrily.
‘That’s enough, Evie.’ But Evie wasn’t listening. She was getting into her stride.
‘Why is he lodging in a dockside bac
kstreet when he can afford all these luxuries? What about his smart house in Formby, by the sea?’
‘He’s got to be here, near his work.’ Rene knew he could not bear to sever all ties with the busy port he grew up in. Nor could he bear the wife he’d left behind.
‘It’s no use trying to get through to you, Mam, not when you’re in this mood.’ She would never throw Darnel out. The expensive presents he brought home kept her sweet.
‘Evie…’ There was a note of caution in her mother’s tone that told Evie she should say no more. Women who made men look small around the tough, dockside streets did not go unpunished.
‘He’s the lodger. He’s got no right…’ The slightest nod of her mother’s head was a warning that reduced Evie to silence. All her life she’d been told to keep her eyes open and her mouth shut. Say nothing. No matter what she saw.
But should I? Evie thought rebelliously. This man was nothing to her and she didn’t want to stick around to see him rule her mother with fine things… An easy life was seductive to a woman who had nothing, she supposed, but she didn’t have to stay around to see it.
‘You wanna watch that mouth of yours, girl.’ Darnel’s voice accelerated Evie’s heartbeat immediately and she spun around. How much had he heard?
Enough, if that grim expression on his face was anything to go by. She would have to brazen it out, even though her legs didn’t feel strong enough to hold her.
‘And why do I have to watch what I say?’ she countered, picking up the boiling hot earthenware teapot. If he lifted one finger to her again, he would regret it for the rest of his life.
‘Go and see Connie.’ Her mother, sounding defeated, lowered her head and stared at the floor. Her voice was barely audible as she added, ‘She’s got a spare room.’
‘But Mam…’ Darnel’s firm grip on her arm silenced Evie. The action told her he had won. He had got his way. Stunned by her mother’s betrayal, Evie glared at both of them, repulsed.
‘Evie.’ Her mam didn’t look at her. ‘There’s a small suitcase on top of the wardrobe.’ Her mother’s conquered tone spoke volumes, her words a sharp slap.
Devastated, Evie took the stairs two at a time. Her own mother had disowned her. Even as she bundled up what few possessions she owned, Evie willed her mother to come into the small back bedroom and tell her it was all a misunderstanding. But she didn’t.
‘Keep your bloody suitcase, Mam,’ Evie said to herself as she filled a pillowcase with her few measly belongings. ‘You never know when you might need it.’ She would see her day of both of them. ‘I’ve been looking after myself for years, it makes no difference now.’ Wondering how a mother could choose a man over her own kids, she didn’t look back at the sparsely furnished bedroom before slamming the door shut behind her.
‘I wouldn’t stay here if you paid me,’ Evie shouted as she reached the bottom of the stairs. Nor would she beg Connie for a room. Evie would find a place of her own. ‘When he tires of you and you haven’t got someone fetching and carrying for you, it will serve you bloody well right, Mam!’ Her fiery words carried through the closed kitchen door as Evie hurried down the narrow lobby. Grabbing the brass doorknob she had polished that morning she gave the front door of the three-up three-down redbrick terraced house a hefty slam.
The narrow street was teeming with noisy kids. Boys in short trousers were swapping bits of shrapnel left over from the war, while young daredevils cooled off by diving from the bridge into the grotty canal. Every front door was open, except theirs. Darnel didn’t like fresh air – or neighbours calling in for a natter. Breathing in the dusty heat, she couldn’t recall the last time their front door stayed open until bedtime, like everybody else’s.
‘Evie, your nose is bleeding!’ Danny Harris, hurrying down the steps leading to the bridge, stopped when he got to Evie’s gate. He leaned on the granite post of the gate she had just opened and his deep authoritative voice gave Evie cause to cover her face with her hands. Film-star handsome and tall as a door, Danny was a sergeant in the King’s Own, and the last person she wanted to see right now.
Feeling bedraggled, she noticed his indomitable mother, whose thick leg-o’-mutton arms were tightly folded across a stately bosom, keeping watch from her front gate. It was common knowledge Ada Harris thought her family were a cut above the Kilgarens and she made no secret of her disdain.
‘Ten out of ten for observation, soldier.’ Evie’s feeling of irritation turned to humiliation as she fumbled for her handkerchief, while trying to ignore Leo Darnel’s voice carrying down the lobby and through the closed front door. His furious expletives were proof he hadn’t yet finished this fight.
‘Here, let me help,’ Danny said, putting down the heavy-looking kitbag that had been slung over his shoulder as if it weighed nothing. Evie felt a rising panic. She didn’t want Danny mixed up in her fight. Breathing hard, she straightened her back, lifted her chin and said the hardest words she could muster.
‘You can mind your own bloody business and keep walking.’ Her words, spoken with plausible conviction, dampened the pitying expression that flittered across his handsome features and gave Danny no choice but to back off, probably believing she meant every syllable. Evie’s blue eyes were wide with fear.
‘Fair enough,’ he said amiably, ‘if that’s how you feel.’ Picking up his kitbag, he gave her a smart salute before making his way down the street towards his disapproving mother. Evie knew that Ada Harris would not condone her precious oldest son fraternising with a common skivvy. Even though Ada was a cleaner in the Tram Tavern next door, she described herself as the housekeeper.
Watching his retreat, Evie brushed a strawberry-blonde curl from her pretty freckled face as a ship’s horn gave a low moan in the nearby dockyard. It sounded just how she felt.
There must be something better than this, she thought, momentarily distracted by Leo Darnel’s cronies huddled in the shadow of the bridge playing an illegal game of pitch and toss. The waterfront was crammed with people scratching an existence and making do, but she didn’t want that.
She wanted to make something of herself. Depend on nobody. She would not emulate her mother or live off the corrupt earnings of a villain. Before she closed the gate at the end of the short, tiled path, the front door opened and was slammed shut again, her mother’s voice loud and piercing – as if she was struggling to keep the argument contained.
But Evie knew that was not going to happen when the door suddenly flung open with such force it bounced off the lobby wall. She had no time to flee as Darnel launched himself down the path. His strong hand gripped her long fair hair that had escaped the doubled loop of knicker elastic, forcing her head back onto her shoulders. The pain slicing through Evie’s head and neck was nothing compared to the sudden thundering slap that caught her side-on.
‘Go to Connie,’ her mother hissed, trying to hold Darnel back ‘She’ll see you right!’
2
‘Isn’t someone going to help that poor mare?’ Connie Sharp, pulling pints behind the bar of the Tram Tavern, could hear the desperation in Evie Kilgaren’s voice over the din of Sunday afternoon drinkers.
‘If it’s not my missus,’ said a man gazing into his pint, ‘then, it’s not my concern.’
Connie thrust a pint of dark mild beer on to the bar in front of him and rang the loud clanging bell.
‘Ten minutes for you lot to drink up and bugger off home,’ she called in a voice that brooked no argument. Working a dockside pub, she had to be tough, but fair. The drinker’s attitude did not surprise Connie. She knew that local men, suited and booted, wanted to enjoy their pint in peace after a hard week’s graft on the docks, and did not involve themselves in another man’s argument. Lifting the counter flap after serving the last customer, she slipped from behind the bar, dropping it with a bang behind her.
‘Sharp by name and sharp by nature, that one,’ said a bent-nosed stevedore through a fog of Old Holborn. ‘I wouldn’t leave her ten bob short in her wages
, that’s for sure.’
Connie shot him a dagger of disapproval, but he didn’t care as he downed the dregs of his beer.
‘Mind your manners, you!’ Connie said, her marine-coloured eyes blazing as she stormed across the chequered floor and headed towards the window. With innate certainty borne of growing up in this tough port where noise, dirt and poverty were a fact of life, local lore dictated people keep their noses out of another man’s business. And for the same reason they expected nobody to poke their snout into matters that did not concern them. But Connie didn’t think like that.
‘I’m dying of thirst over here,’ someone called, rapping the bar with a silver shilling.
‘Then die quietly.’ Connie threw the words over her shoulder. ‘The bell went for the last orders of the afternoon ten minutes ago – so when you’ve snuffed it, I’ll send for your Aggie to come and cart you off.’ It was a good thing the pub closed at three each day, otherwise this lot would carry on drinking ‘til they had no money left to spend. She was sure they had hollow legs, these tough, hard-working dock workers who barracked and bantered without malice – well, most of them, anyway.
Unlikely as it sometimes seemed, she knew this was a close-knit community who had fought a war together. They’d lost loved ones, their homes, and even their children – some departing to long years of evacuation, others to eternity.
Nursing in Italy during the war, Connie knew enemy raids on the nearby docks and railways had almost brought Merseyside to its knees, especially this dockside area of North Liverpool where the life force of the country’s existence ebbed and flowed every single day.
But the local community of stout-hearted women whose husbands had gone to war staved off starvation and bowed to nobody – not even the enemy. They were not beaten then, and looking out of the window, Connie could tell by the sound of their robust jeers they weren’t broken now either.
