by Mary Gibson
Perhaps her remorse hadn’t sounded sincere, but she hadn’t meant to be funny.
‘Well, sometimes they do. Aunt Sylvie’s chucked me out and I’ve got nowhere to stay tonight. So, the last laugh’s on her.’
‘I’m sorry, love. Can you go to a friend?’
Kate nodded.
‘That’s good. But you can’t work with your arm in this state.’
‘Oh, it’s all right, really. I can still use me hand!’ Kate wiggled her fingers and kept her face rigid as pain shot up her arm.
Miss Dane looked doubtful.
‘Why don’t me and Conny swap?’ Kate caught Conny’s eye. ‘I’ll teach her how to solder and then I’ll do her cleaning afterwards.’
‘Conny? Solder?’ Miss Dane shot a sceptical look at the young girl, who was vigorously swinging the broom over an already-clean patch of floor.
‘Why not? She’s been practising with the irons in her own time, ain’t you, Conny?’ Kate winked at the girl, who jumped to attention.
‘Oh, yes, Miss Dane. Kate’s already taught me ever such a lot!’ she said, with a secret smile.
‘I suppose it won’t hurt to train her – just for when we get absences. But are you up to the cleaning as well, Kate?’
Kate gave a disbelieving, wide-eyed stare.
‘Silly question, there’s not much you can’t tackle, is there? All right, get to work, the two of you.’
Conny was delighted with her sudden advancement but spared a thought for Kate, who was setting out the irons, solder and flux for her.
‘You can come home with me tonight, if you got nowhere else to go.’
But Kate knew the offer was meant to be refused. Where would she sleep? And besides, she didn’t fancy another fight tonight fending off Conny’s stepbrother.
‘Thanks, Conny, but I’ll find somewhere. So, here’s your soldering iron. Did you get any practice last night?’
‘Too right I did. And I reckon me stepbrother come off worse than your Janey. But, honest, the offer’s there if you want – it’d only be a blanket on the floor, but it’s better than the streets.’
Perhaps it would be, but Kate wasn’t that desperate yet. Besides, she thought there was one person who might take her side.
*
As it was Saturday, the factory closed at dinner time, and that afternoon, Kate hurried back to East Lane. She peered along the street and when she was sure neither Aunt Sylvie nor her cousins were about, she knocked on the first house in the row. Aunt Sarah opened the door.
‘Oh. You’re alive, then. I heard the screams all the way down the lane. You’d better come in.’
Her aunt lived in one ground-floor room, sharing a scullery with Polly, a girl who occupied the downstairs front room with her baby. Polly was unmarried, but not the only one in the lane to find herself in that predicament. She wasn’t shunned as much as might have been the case in the more respectable streets. A family of ten shared the top two rooms and the garret. It was a noisy, smelly house and Kate didn’t want to ask, but she had little choice.
‘Aunt Sylvie’s chucked me out. Can I sleep in the scullery till I find somewhere?’
‘Pity you didn’t pull out the knife and stick it in her! Done us all a favour. I’ll make us some tea.’
She hadn’t said yes, but she hadn’t said no and Kate sat down, hopeful. Aunt Sarah would never be pushed into anything, which was probably why she clashed so severely with her bullying elder sister. Kate looked around the room, which was the equivalent of the kitchen in Aunt Sylvie’s. There was a single bed against the wall, a chair by the fireplace and a small deal table under the window overlooking the backyard. In the scullery Kate heard her aunt moving slowly around, looking for a second cup and saucer. She didn’t entertain much. She came back with the tea things on a tray and a plate of the perennial rock-like jam tarts.
‘Thing is, Kate, if the landlord found out you was staying, he’d evict me for subletting. He done it to Mrs Freeman two doors down and she ended up in the workhouse. I can’t afford to lose me room, Kate.’
‘Course not. Don’t trouble yourself, I can sort meself out,’ Kate insisted, trying not to think of a night under one of the railway arches. ‘I’ll just finish me tea and be off.’ She drained her cup.
‘Now, don’t take offence. Sit down, for gawd’s sake. I wouldn’t stoop to her level and see me brother’s girl on the streets. You can stay till Monday, that won’t hurt. Polly won’t tell on me.’
‘It’ll just be for two nights, I promise,’ Kate said, knowing the risk her aunt took was high, though she wouldn’t want a hug or even thanks for it. ‘At least now I’m not with Aunt Sylvie I’ll be able to keep all me wages. Twenty-two bob a week, all to meself!’
‘And how far do you think that’ll go?’
‘But I’ll get an extra six bob when I’m eighteen,’ Kate added hopefully.
Aunt Sarah shook her head. ‘You’ll need more than you think for a room and your keep. I can’t manage it on just me Southwell’s money. You’ll have to take in home work like me, or do cleaning, else you’ll starve, gel.’
But Kate wasn’t daunted. She was strong, quick and, more importantly, her youthful confidence hadn’t been knocked out of her as it had Aunt Sarah. ‘I don’t mind taking on extra work. I won’t be skivvying for Aunt Sylvie – it’ll feel like I’m on holiday! I’m just worried about finding a room. Do you know of anywhere I can try?’
‘I’ll look around for you. But if it comes to it, you might have to swallow your pride and ask her to take you back.’ Aunt Sarah’s face twisted in disgust. ‘But if it was me, love, I’d rather sleep on a park bench.’
Kate spent a couple of uncomfortable nights on the stone scullery floor, wrapped in Aunt Sarah’s large coat. On the first night, as she lay awake with her wounded arm throbbing, trepidation fought with elation at her unforeseen freedom and she wondered about Aunt Sarah’s circumstances. For so long, Kate had dreamed of being rescued by her father – once his business had become successful. But what of her aunts? They had never seemed to expect anything from him, even though they all lived on the sharp edge of poverty. Archie Goss must be something very special, to have deserved such unquestioning loyalty and love from those two tough-hearted women. She gave herself a luxury which she’d learned to ration. She conjured a waking dream, screening it on the cream distempered ceiling – a flickering moving picture of her father’s return.
*
Kate left Aunt Sarah’s early Monday morning, carrying the tin box under her arm. She thought she would search for lodgings on the way to Boutle’s. There was a room to let in Abbey Street, but fleas were jumping off the rugs and Kate made her excuses to the landlady, hurrying out of the place, scratching at her ankles. Long Lane looked more promising. Interspersed between the business premises were a number of houses with rooms for rent. She tried several, but they were all being let out as two or three rooms and far too expensive. She searched among the terraced houses in Wild’s Rents during her dinner break, finding several single rooms, but with rents so high she’d struggle to find food and coal money. It looked as if Aunt Sarah was right – if she didn’t want to starve she’d have to beg Aunt Sylvie or earn more, and she wouldn’t beg.
She came back to the soldering room in a state of barely suppressed panic. Her arm was still throbbing, but when Miss Dane told her she could carry on with cleaning tomorrow, she insisted she’d be well enough to start soldering again. Piecework would save her. Tomorrow she would solder twice the tins she normally did and then she’d be all right.
At the end of the day, she walked with Conny into a grey evening of thin drizzle. She hadn’t mentioned her plight again, but now Conny asked, ‘Did you find anywhere to rent?’
‘Oh, yeah. I got a room in Dockhead.’ She hoped her smile didn’t look too false, for she felt her lip tremble as she lied.
Conny looked pleased. ‘Oh, I am relieved. I didn’t like to say it but me stepmum wasn’t too happy when I told her you mig
ht be coming to stay.’
‘Conny! You shouldn’t have said anything – the last thing you need is upsetting her, the old cow.’ She squeezed Conny’s hand and told herself to feel grateful that she had no evil stepmother or aunt to contend with now. Her only hardship would be a night on the streets, and it seemed preferable.
She’d had nothing to eat since breakfast and was so hungry she felt sick. She turned down Decima Street, heading for the dining rooms attached to the Methodist Central Hall. She could get a sixpenny supper there, which would leave her with only half a crown till payday. She hung about outside for a while, knowing she should save her money and just buy a bun. But the smells of sausages, tomatoes and onions sizzling away were too tempting and she went in. The dining rooms were bright and welcoming, and as she ate her sausage and mash, she compared it to teatime in Aunt Sylvie’s, where the food would certainly be worse quality. She would have had to cook it, wash up and suffer Stan’s jibes about her red face or Aunt Sylvie’s moaning about her cooking skills. She was far better off here. The one thing she regretted losing was her old refuge in the garret.
She stayed for as long as seemed decent without buying anything else and left as night was falling. Her feet took her in the direction of East Lane. She stood outside Aunt Sarah’s door and before she could stop herself, she’d knocked. But hearing her aunt’s ‘Hold on, I’m coming!’, she changed her mind. Dodging into the yard of nearby Peabody Buildings, she peeped around to see Aunt Sarah on her doorstep, looking up and down the lane before shaking her head and shouting to the empty street, ‘You kids! I know where you live!’
Kate simply couldn’t risk getting her aunt thrown onto the streets. And, ashamed at her own weakness, she turned away, taking another route to the river. The drizzle had stopped but her coat was damp and the air chill. She faced the truth that there would be no warm bed for her tonight.
Kate comforted herself by remembering Aunt Sarah’s judgement that a bench would be preferable to living at Aunt Sylvie’s. ‘You’ll be all right,’ she told herself. ‘Things could be worse.’
She emerged at East Lane Stairs. The dark expanse of the slow Thames spread out before her. By now, gas lamps had been lit and on the far bank a few strands of golden beads reflected in the water. But here at the top of the stairs, all was in deep shadow. Looking quickly over her shoulder, she descended the slimy stone steps to where rows of lighters had been tied together. Their long, low hulls bobbed in jostling pairs, making it hard to judge their positions. She hesitated on the final step, then, holding her breath, she jumped. Panicking in mid-air, she thought she’d missed the lighter’s edge, but her toe caught it and she stumbled forward, grabbing a rope, which just stopped her from tumbling into the water. Kate wriggled underneath the tarpaulin and, tunnelling her way like a blind mole into a mound of sacks, she made herself as snug as she could be in a bed that lurched alarmingly at every tug of the tide. She shut her eyes tight as the lighter bumped against its neighbour with thuds so loud she was sure the hull must burst open. She shivered. Pulling scratchy sacks up around her chin and easing muscles tensed rigid against the cold, she let the river’s steady rhythm rock her into a fitful sleep.
*
She woke to the squawking of gulls. Uncurling her stiff limbs, she stuck her head above the tarpaulin and saw birds wheeling around a passing barge. The sun rose, brightening the barge’s dull ochre sails to deep red. The smell, as it came nearer, revealed its fishy cargo. A crewman standing on deck spotted her, waved and shouted: ‘Who was too drunk to get home last night?’ He grinned and she waved back eagerly, glad to see a friendly face after her lonely night on the Thames. She needed to move quickly now, before the wharfside workers started arriving.
Groaning, her joints protesting, she straightened up and was about to jump onto the stairs when she spotted two dockers peering over the river wall.
‘Oi, what you doing down there? You’re trespassing!’ one shouted as they began running towards the stairs.
Grabbing her tin box, she leaped up the stairs and collided with the nearest docker, a lanky chap with a long reach. She dodged him, skidding as he tried to grab her, then set off at full pelt.
‘Let her go, Arthur!’ the other laughed as the lanky docker pursued her. ‘She’s like a bloody greyhound, you’ll never catch her! My money’s on Blackie!’
Kate shot a look back at him, her dark curls flying as she ran. ‘You backed the winner!’ She grinned, before hurtling into Channel Row and the streets beyond.
Her lighter bed had been carrying a smelly load and, she suspected from the docker’s comment, a dirty one too. Her aunt hadn’t forbidden her to visit and so she made Aunt Sarah’s her first port of call.
Polly answered the door, her baby propped on her hip.
‘I’ve come to see me aunt. Sorry if I got you up.’ Polly gave her a curious stare, but stood aside to let her into the passage.
‘That’s all right, I’ve been up ages. He’s had me awake half the night!’
‘He’s bonny,’ Kate said, pulling a face at the baby, who was so large she thought he must be eating poor Polly alive.
‘I don’t think your aunt’s awake, though. It’s a bit early, ain’t it?’
But Aunt Sarah was up, still in her long nightdress and not expecting visitors. As Kate opened the door her aunt yelped, putting a hand to her heart. ‘Kate! What you doin’ here so early?’
‘I slept at me mate’s, didn’t want to outstay me welcome, so I thought I’d come here for a wash.’
‘Well, you bleedin’ need one. The state of you! Have you seen yourself?’
She looked in the mirror above the mantelpiece. Her face was black, as were her hands and clothes.
‘Where d’you sleep, in the coal cupboard?’ Aunt Sarah asked. ‘If your father could see you now, he’d be mortified. What a disgrace.’
Kate felt unjustly condemned for untidiness and snapped back, ‘Well if he was here, I’d have been living with him and then I wouldn’t be such a disgrace!’
‘Take off your coat.’ Aunt Sarah ignored her comment. ‘I’ll see if I can get the worst off. Get yourself in the scullery and boil a kettle!’
When Kate judged herself presentable enough to please even her father, she joined Aunt Sarah. Breakfast was tea, bread and jam. Her aunt was never short of jam, as she often smuggled out the odd pound of strawberry or blackcurrant from Southwell’s jam factory.
‘Wherever your mate put you last night, you can’t turn up for work looking like a chimney sweep every day, Kate. You’ll have to find somewhere else.’
*
No doubt Aunt Sarah was right. But the lighters were the best she could find during the following week. The different cargos made for different beds, but the sacks of peanuts were too noisy and the nets of coconuts too lumpy. When, after three nights, Kate couldn’t face another on the Thames, she had an idea. Arriving at Boutle’s, she went first to the cloakroom in the basement and tucked the tin box in her locker. The cloakroom was a new benefit, hard won by the workers’ association, and had been converted from a storeroom. Before that the women had hung their coats by their benches, so that they were covered in soot by the end of each day. The cloakroom had a fresh coat of green paint and beneath the rows of lockers were long benches. It had struck Kate that a bench here would be a comfier bed than a lighter.
That night after the final shift had clocked off, she slipped back into the factory while Cecil the watchman snoozed in his box over a mug of rum-laced tea. She was so relieved to be somewhere safe and warm that she almost relished a night on the hard bench. Slipping through a basement window she’d wedged open earlier, she dropped into the corridor near the cloakroom. The place was different in the dark and she felt along the tiles till she found the door. The cloakroom seemed less welcoming now, and the sounds filtering in from the steam room made her jump with every hiss. She lay on the bench, her coat for a blanket, and sought sleep, but there was nothing here to lull her. No gently rocking Tham
es, no sighing tide. She felt lonelier than ever. She sat up and reached into her locker. Taking out the tin box, she felt a wave of sadness wash over her. This was her whole life. Feeling the contents rather than looking at them, she clasped the piece of soap, stroked the rolled towel, then she drew out her mother’s rosary and, letting it run through her fingers, she let silent tears fall.
*
After each night in the black bowels of the factory with its creaks and hisses, Kate couldn’t wait to get to Aunt Sarah’s where, for a brief hour, she felt like a normal person who lived in a house and not out of a tin box.
One morning, without warning, Aunt Sarah announced, ‘Anyway, I’ve found you a room.’
‘Really!’ Kate broke into a smile. No more freezing, filthy lighters or dark basements for her. But her aunt put up a hand. ‘Don’t thank me too soon, you ain’t gonna like it…’
‘If I can afford it, I’ll like it.’
‘It’s ten shillings a week…’
‘What! That’s a bit steep. I won’t have enough to live on!’
‘Well you ain’t found anything cheaper, have you?’
Kate shook her head. ‘I’ll just have to go cleaning,’ she said, calculating how much extra she’d need to earn.
‘Thing is, love, the reason you might not like it ain’t so much the rent – it’s the place next door to her!’
There was only one her that Kate knew of. She groaned. ‘Well that’s no good, is it?’
‘No need to snap at me. You don’t have to speak to her, do you?’
‘Sorry, Aunt Sarah, but I don’t want to be reminded every day—’
‘You sound just like your father.’
If she hadn’t known better, Kate might have taken that for a criticism of him.
‘I’m not like him. Everyone says I take after Mum.’
‘Don’t matter now. But I tell you one thing, it’ll drive her mad, if she’s got to look at your face walking past her window every day!’
‘All right, I’ll go and see it.’ The idea of irritating Aunt Sylvie appealed even more than the prospect of a warm bed.
