It wasn’t an underwear drawer she’d opened, though. It was filled with old receipts, clothing tags and odd buttons but they weren’t what caught her eye. On top of the detritus was a pile of cards. The top one, Isla saw was a Valentine’s Day card, it wasn’t old either by the looks of it. The bundle was tied together with a ribbon. She stood looking down at it, her fingers twitching to pull the ribbon. She knew she shouldn’t untie it, because if her gran had a secret admirer she didn’t want to talk about then that was her business. She hovered uncertainly as her conscience went to battle with curiosity.
Curiosity won out, and she pulled the ribbon. There were six cards in total she counted before opening the one that had initially caught her eye. She scanned the text. The card was from a chap called Charlie Callahan. Isla’s eyes widened. Was it the Charlie her gran had met at the dance with Clara? If so, he lived in Australia these days and very much wanted to come and visit Bridget. It was him, Isla was sure of it, but she didn’t get the chance to ponder the card any longer because Bridget snatched it from her hand. Isla jumped, she’d been so engrossed in what she had been reading she never heard her coming.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’
She knew she’d gone beetroot at being caught. ‘I’m sorry Gran, I know I shouldn’t have opened them but I was putting your washing away and, well, I saw the cards, and I couldn’t help myself. I am sorry.’ She attempted to lighten the situation. ‘I know it’s none of my business, but it’s not every day you discover your gran is getting Valentine’s cards.’
Bridget sat down heavily on the edge of her bed still clutching the card to her as though she were frightened Isla might try to take it off her. ‘You’re right, it is none of your business.’ Her expression was conflicted as she debated whether or not to tell her more. She knew her granddaughter only too well, and once her curiosity was piqued, as it was now, she would be like a dog with a bone until she got an answer. She sighed and patted the bed beside her. ‘Sit down and I’ll you about Charlie and me.’
Isla did as she was told and listened as the story unfolded.
Chapter 27
1957
Bridget knew that supper, when the band was packing up and the tea and coffee being served, would be the only opportunity she would have to talk to Charlie properly. She was in two minds. In one respect she wanted the night to hurry up so she could find out more about him, and in the other she never wanted it to end. She wanted to dance with him forever. Eventually, though, when she thought her feet would surely drop off, the band finished and supper was announced.
Charlie told her, while she balanced her cup of tea and afghan biscuit in her right hand, that he was from further up the coast, Westport. It was work that had brought him to Bibury and he had started a fortnight ago at the Barker’s Ridge Mine, just as Clara had guessed.
‘It’s not a bad wee place, Bibury, so far as small towns go. I’ve lived in worse.’ Charlie gave her a rueful smile before popping his biscuit in his mouth.
Bridget didn’t know what to say to that, she’d lived here her whole life and sometimes felt she lived in a hick town where nothing much ever happened. The magazines she read gave her glimpses of the big wide world and she felt trapped, or at least she had until tonight. At this moment in time under the glare of the hall lights, she thought Bibury was the best place on earth to live.
It was only last Saturday afternoon, though, that she’d been convinced Bibury was the dullest place in the whole of New Zealand. She and Clara had taken themselves off down to the local Milk Bar. They sat sipping at their chocolate shakes wondering where all these Milk Bar Cowboys they kept reading about in the papers were. How come they never roared up to the Bibury Milk Bar on their motorbikes, with their slicked-back hair and rebellious attitude that made the staid townsfolk frown at what was becoming of the young people of today?
The two girls sighed with frustrated boredom and began to plan their escape to the Big Smoke, where things actually happened. They sat there in their booth, the red vinyl seats carved with the initials of teens who had gone before them and lamented their lot. What they would do for accommodation or work when they got to Christchurch they didn’t know, but the very thought of running away livened up what had been amounting to a dull Saturday afternoon.
Now, Bridget thought nibbling daintily on her chocolate iced biscuit as she looked up at Charlie from beneath her lashes, the small world she occupied was suddenly full of thrilling possibilities.
‘I’m boarding just off the High Street on River Road, with a Mrs Jessop. She runs a clean house and the lad I share with keeps himself to himself, so it suits me fine.’
Bridget knew Mrs Jessop. She was a widow who was well thought of in the community and her establishment respectable. ‘Do you get your meals included then?’
‘I do, yes, and my washing. She’s not a bad cook either. Her steak and kidney pudding is almost as good as my mum’s.’
Bridget smiled.
‘What’s it like working at the mine?’
‘Ah, its dirty work alright, and it’s not for the claustrophobic but it’s the lads who make the job. They’re a good bunch. Tom Collins, who’s been giving your friend a turn around the floor, has been a good mate to me and taken me under his wing. What is it you do with yourself?’
Bridget filled him in on her job and was telling him about her family when Clara came over with a plate heaped full of sandwiches and sausage rolls. They would not be going home hungry. She introduced Tom to her. Bridget recalled having already met him at Clara’s house a while back now when he’d called round to pick her brother up. After her brother and Tom had left, Clara had flopped down on her bed with her hand on her heart and a daft look on her face and refused to move for half an hour. She smiled at the memory as she said hello.
The two men grinned at each other in silent acknowledgement that they were both having a good night, as Clara offered the plate round. The sausage rolls smelt yummy but Bridget was not going to run the risk of pastry sticking to her lipstick so she opted for an egg triangle sandwich instead. The foursome stood chatting amicably about the latest Marilyn Monroe film coming to the Town Hall next week, until Bridget spotted Jean tapping at her wristwatch. She then held her fingers up to demonstrate five minutes before pointing in the direction of the carpark. Bridget knew if she didn’t do as she was told, it might be the last time she got to attend a dance or even leave the house after 6pm for a very long time.
‘We have to go, Clara.’
Clara’s face fell, but she looked up at the clock and saw that Bridget was right. She too had no intention of breaking her curfew and spoiling her chances of going on a date with Tom.
Charlie pulled Bridget aside. ‘I’ve really enjoyed myself tonight, Bridget, and I’d like to see you again.’
‘I’d like that too.’
‘Perhaps I could call for you one night in the week, we could have a fish and chip supper?’
Bridget wanted to say tomorrow night was as good a night as any but she didn’t want to appear too forward. ‘Tuesday would be good.’ She knew it would feel like eons between now and Tuesday but after church in the morning, she would spend the afternoon rehashing the night’s events with Clara. Then it would be time to iron her clothes for work in the week. So, at least tomorrow would whizz by, and Monday she’d be at work so the day would pass fast enough. ‘I live on School Road, it’s the road the schoolhouse is on, no surprises there! You just follow River Road where you are staying to the turn off and we are at number twelve.’
‘Tuesday night at six o’clock then?’
‘It’s a date.’ She smiled hoping she didn’t look too eager but if she did, well, she simply couldn’t help it. He was wonderful, he was everything she had ever dreamed about on those long boring afternoons when she wondered what would become of her, living here in Bibury.
‘Happy Valentine’s Day.’ Charlie leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek. She desperately wanted to turn her head so tha
t his lips could meet hers instead, but she was sure she could feel Biddy Johnson’s disapproving eyes upon her.
‘You do know that Charlie you were mooning over is Catholic, don’t you?’ Jean said as Colin held the door of the Holden open for Bridget and Clara. Until then, Bridget had felt like Cinderella must have felt, having to leave the dance and her Prince Charming behind. Around them, the carpark was a cacophonous noise of horns honking, laughter and shouts of goodnight, the pungent smoke of cigarettes floating heavily past on the cool night air. At her sister’s words, though, Bridget’s stomach plummeted because if what she was saying was true then unlike Cinderella, she might not get her happy ever after.
She hadn’t known Charlie was Catholic and nor did she care in the slightest as to what denomination he was. She knew however, it would be a different story where her parents were concerned. She could recall her older brother showing interest in Fiona Mulligan when she was home from boarding school one holiday. Bridget had only been ten at the time, but she still remembered her brother’s romance had been squashed like an ant underfoot before it had a chance to begin. Thus, she did not rate her chances with Charlie were her parents to get wind of the fact that he too was Catholic. She sent up a silent prayer in the hope it wasn’t true and that Jean was just being spiteful.
Even if it were true, it wouldn’t stop her seeing him, she thought, feeling a flare of rebellion for the second time that evening. And there was no way she would give her sister the satisfaction of thinking that she had something over her.
‘Does it matter what religion he is?’ she asked affecting an air of coolness.
Jean shrugged. ‘Not to me, I couldn’t give a fig who you date, but Mum and Dad will, mark my words.’ She turned to her boyfriend. ‘Colin, you said he’s a nice enough chap, honest and a hard worker.’
He nodded.
‘But they won’t give a monkey’s, Bridget. All they’ll see when they look at him is that he’s not one of ours. If he has any plans to call for you, then you’d better hope Dad decides he must be alright because he’s working in the mine and doesn’t ask which church it is his family attends.’
Ah, so Colin knew of him through work even though he was a pencil pusher and not a miner. He would know then, it must be true – Charlie was Catholic. It had never entered her head to ask him. In the darkened back seat Clara reached over and picked up her hand giving it a squeeze, as she mouthed, ‘It’ll be alright.’
Bridget hoped more than anything that she was right.
Tuesday night could not come fast enough and the minutes of each hour seemed to drag until at last six o’clock rolled around and Charlie knocked on the door as he’d promised he would. Bridget’s heart leaped, she’d been chewing her nails, running through a thousand possible reasons as to why he might stand her up. As she got up from her seat, her father waved at her to sit back down while he went to open the front door. She’d mentioned to him more than once what a hard worker Charlie was, and how Colin had said that he was very well thought of by the lads at the mine. She was praying that that would be enough to win her dad over. He might have worked in the mine’s accounts department, but he had a deep-seated respect for the men who ventured underground. He knew the peril they were placed in on a daily basis.
Bridget sat on her hands to stop her biting her nails right down to the quick. She could see her mother untying her apron in the kitchen. She flashed her a reassuring smile, as she too went to greet this potential beau of her daughter’s.
A voice hollered down the stairs, ‘Bridget, I can smell Arpege! If you have been helping yourself, I won’t be responsible for my actions.’
Bridget squirmed, she’d had a teensy squirt, not that she would ever own up to it. Besides, Jean had no right to get shirty with her, not after what she’d done on Sunday night. Her sister had only gone and tiptoed into her bedroom when she was sound asleep and unwound one of her hair rollers because she was short one. Bridget had had to go to work on Monday morning with a straight piece of hair in amongst her waves. She’d not been happy but Jean was unrepentant. Now, she didn’t reply and hoped her sister wouldn’t come down the stairs and see that she’d borrowed her cardigan and shoes without asking too! If she did, there really would be fireworks.
‘Bridget! Don’t keep Charlie waiting.’ Her mother called and Bridget shot out of her seat, quickly smoothing her skirt before she rushed to the front door. She was glad to be making her escape before Jean got hold of her, and she was pleased that Charlie had obviously passed muster. No way would she stick around and give her parents a chance to change their mind. Her father was standing in the doorway pipe in hand, ‘Don’t be late back.’ He directed to Charlie who was not looking as self- assured as he had at the dance. Bridget’s heart went out to him.
‘No sir, I’ll have her home by ten o’clock. You have my word.’
This was met with a nod.
Oh, how embarrassing, Bridget fumed, she was sixteen, very nearly seventeen, and she had to be home by ten o’clock! It was ridiculous especially now she was working and contributing to the household. Still, she knew now was not the time to debate her archaic curfew because she’d be the one who’d come off worse for it.
‘Have a nice time.’ Her mother smiled. ‘Oh! I can smell burning.’ She shot back in the house to sort out the chops she’d left sizzling in the pan.
‘It was nice to meet you Mr Upton – goodbye Mrs Upton,’ Charlie called over her father’s shoulder.
They set off down the path and Bridget resisted the urge to seek his hand, because she knew her father would stand and watch them from the doorway until they were out of sight.
‘Phew, thank goodness that’s over and done with.’
Charlie laughed. ‘They’re fine people, your parents. They just want to make sure their daughter is stepping out with a fellow whose worth her while.’
‘What did they ask you?’ Obviously not where he went to church, Bridget thought, relieved.
‘Oh, this and that, they wanted to know what had brought me here to Bibury and where my family came from.’
‘Well, you obviously won them over.’ Bridget smiled up at him.
Spotty chin Jim was working in the fish and chippy which was busy. It always was at this time of night thanks to the six o’clock swill at the local pub which saw the men knock their drinks back as fast as they could before closing. Jim asked after Clara, and Bridget felt sorry for him as she told him Clara was fine before asking if they could have a can of tomato sauce too.
The chips were salty, crispy and delicious but Bridget wouldn’t have cared if they were soggy. She was just happy to be sitting on the grassy banks of the Ahaura on a balmy February evening sharing a scoop with Charlie as they watched the ducks being carried along by the current. They’d talked about anything and everything and she had listened as he told her what it was like growing up in a large family of seven children.
‘There wasn’t a lot to go around in the Callahan household but we never went without either. It was just that the food had to be worked for, and we all had a task to make sure there was something to put on the table of an evening. Mum’s got a veggie patch the size of a football pitch.’
His family were not Italian as Bridget had romanticized on Saturday night, but rather a second-generation Irish Catholic family. They had put down roots first in Greymouth and then Westport, lured to New Zealand, like so many others, by the promise of a better life and the possibility of a fortune to be made. His father and his brothers, except for one who’d gone into the police force, all worked for the Westport Coal Company. Charlie though, as the self–confessed awkward, somewhere in the middle son, planned on working his way up the mining hierarchy until he got himself into a managerial role. That was what had brought him to Bibury, the whiff of opportunity.
‘Mum was disappointed when I left school. She had high hopes of me being the scholar in the family because I won a scholarship to board at St Kevin’s in Oamaru for my high schooling. I was brig
ht enough, but it wasn’t for me. I hated being sat in a classroom all day when I could see all this life happening outside through the windows. I wanted to be out there amongst it all.’ He swatted a pesky sand-fly away. ‘I got bored and I caused many a Brother to lose his hair with my antics as a result.’
Bridget smiled at the mental picture of a short fat, bald Brother, and of Charlie as a lad in shorts, a blazer and long socks getting up to high-jinx.
‘What about you then? I know that your dad is an accounts worker for the company and that you have an older sister but that’s about all. I want to know everything.’
‘Well, it’s not very exciting I’m afraid.’
‘Let me be the judge of that.’
‘I don’t know where to start.’
‘Okay, where do you come in the family, are you the middle child, youngest?’
‘I’m the baby of the family, I’ve two older brothers, who left a few years ago now and live in Christchurch with their wives and children. Mum misses them all something terrible and there’s only myself and Jean at home now. We fight like cats and dogs but there’s high hopes it will just be me hogging the bathroom soon. Jean’s angling to get Colin to put a ring on her finger before the year is out.’
‘She could do worse than Colin, he’s a nice enough chap if not a little—’
‘Full of himself,’ Bridget finished for him with a smile. ‘Just a tad.’
They both laughed, and Bridget plucked at a piece of grass. ‘It scares me, the thought of Jean leaving because then it will just be me. I sometimes feel like I am suffocating here,’ she confided.
Sweet Home Summer Page 21
