Martha's Girls

by Alrene Hughes

  ‘Mercy me,’ whispered Martha as she watched Goldstein support the girl in taking hesitant steps as though she had only lately gained the use of her legs. Sheila, who had been sitting on the rug in front of the fire cracking nuts, heard the horror in her mother’s voice and joined her at the window.

  ‘Who is it, Mammy?’

  But Martha was already out the door, having paused only to shout upstairs, ‘Peggy, come quickly!’

  Martha ran to the girl’s side and supported her, so that between them she and Goldstein practically carried her into the house. Peggy was in the hallway as they helped the girl over the threshold.

  ‘What’s happened, Mammy?’ Then in a moment her eyes took in Goldstein and the weight he and her mother were carrying.

  ‘Mr Goldstein, is this—’

  ‘Yes, Peggy, this is Esther.’

  Instinctively, they took her into the kitchen and settled her in Robert’s chair close to the warm range. Irene drew up a chair close to Esther and held her hand, all the time speaking softly to her, explaining where she was and introducing everyone, knowing that Esther understood little of what was said, but hoping she might sense the kindness surrounding her. Meanwhile, Pat made tea and prepared a plate of turkey sandwiches. Peggy went off to look for a warm dress and cardigan. Sheila sat opposite Esther and smiled their welcome.

  In the sitting room Goldstein was as close to tears as Martha had ever seen a man. ‘Forgive me, Mrs Goulding, I did not know what to do. I am her uncle, but it is not enough … I could not …’ He stopped wringing his hands and held them open. ‘I brought her to you.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ said Martha. ‘It was the right thing to do. We’ll see to her, don’t worry.’

  ‘She arrived in Belfast early this morning off the Liverpool boat. Some passengers, a business man and his wife I believe, had become concerned for her, because of the state she was in. She had no luggage and didn’t respond to their questions, so they took her to the harbour police. She had a scrap of paper with my address on it in her hand.’ He paused then as though remembering the sequence of events. ‘The police arrived at my house and asked me to identify her. I do not know … I could see the suspicion in their eyes. I tried to explain she was probably my niece. I have never seen Esther, you understand, I left Poland many years before she was born. And of course, to the policemen my accent sounded, you know …’ He struggled to explain. ‘I could have been a German for all they knew. I told them right away that I was Polish, but…’ His voice trailed off again.

  ‘But they must know your shop and you’ve papers, I’m sure,’ said Martha.

  ‘Oh, yes, but at seven in the morning with two policemen in my house and a young woman in a distressed state … I don’t know … I became confused.’ He paused and shook his head as if to rid his mind of what could have happened if at that moment the young woman had not lifted her head, looked at him through eyes that were identical to his sister’s and whispered ‘Shalom’.

  ‘She is my niece, I told them. They were kind men at heart and maybe they understood something of what she had been through. Since then she has not said a word. I did not know what to do. Then I thought of you and your girls.’

  Just then Pat put her head round the door. ‘Excuse me, Mammy, I’ve made her something to eat and a drink of tea, but she won’t touch them and I’m sure she’s starving.’

  Goldstein stood up. ‘I think I know why.’

  In the kitchen, Goldstein spoke to her in Polish. At the mention of the word ‘Kosher’ she looked quickly at her uncle. He nodded and Esther brought the turkey sandwich to her mouth and began to eat.

  Meanwhile, Peggy ran her a bath adding some of the Yardley freesia bath salts Irene had given her for Christmas. She laid out towels and hung a blue flannel dress of Sheila’s (guessing she was closer to Sheila’s size than any of the other sisters) and a beige cardigan of her own on the hook behind the door. When Esther emerged from the bathroom she was certainly cleaner, her cheeks had regained a little colour, but Sheila’s dress was hanging loosely on her and still she said nothing

  ‘I think she probably wants to sleep. I’ll take her upstairs and she can lie on my bed.’ Peggy returned five minutes later. ‘Fast asleep, I don’t think she’s slept properly for days.’

  ‘Mr Goldstein, why don’t you leave her here, she’ll probably sleep for hours,’ said Martha. ‘You could get a bit of sleep yourself. Come back later.’

  Goldstein knew that Esther couldn’t be anywhere better than under Martha Goulding’s roof. So, with much shaking of hands and thanks he took himself back up the Antrim Road.

  *

  As twilight fell there was a rap at the kitchen window and Jack and Betty came in to wish their neighbours a Merry Christmas.

  ‘How was your dinner?’ Betty asked.

  ‘Very good,’ said Martha, ‘especially the excellent vegetables!’

  ‘There’ll plenty more where they came from in future,’ said Jack lighting his pipe. He said no more until he had sucked and sucked so that the tobacco in the bowl began to glow and the room filled with the aromatic mix of Old Holborn. ‘I’ve decided to dig up my garden to grow my own vegetables. Mind you, I’m likely to have that many carrots, potatoes and the rest, that I’ll need the help of a few neighbours to make sure they don’t go to waste, if you get my drift.’

  Betty smiled encouragement at her husband. ‘Tell them about your other idea, Jack.’

  Jack checked his pipe, risked pressing the tobacco a little tighter and puffed again to make it catch. ‘I’ve a mind to get a few chickens too.’ He smiled his pleasure.

  The entire Goulding family avoided each other’s eyes.

  ‘Sure Jack, you’re famous for having a way with birds,’ said Martha.

  *

  Twilight had given way to the night and candles were being lit when there was a knock at the door. Peggy jumped up. ‘I’ll get it.’

  Harry Ferguson came into the room like a man who was not only expected, but whose appearance was eagerly anticipated.

  ‘Good Evening, Mrs Goulding, and a very Merry Christmas to you.’ He shook her hand and swept the others with a smile. ‘I won’t interrupt your evening.’ He went on, ‘Just thought I’d return the shirt you lent me.’ He handed over a brown paper parcel. ‘All washed and ironed.’

  ‘That’s very considerate of you,’ said Martha. ‘Stay a while, why don’t you?’

  ‘No I couldn’t. I’ve just brought you a wee present. I hope you enjoy it.’

  Martha took the tin from him. ‘Am I to open it now?’

  ‘Of course, you can even eat it now, if you like.’

  ‘Goodness me!’ exclaimed Martha as she gazed at the beautifully iced Christmas cake. The thick royal icing was peaked into a snowy landscape across which two Eskimos raced on a sleigh towards Father Christmas and around the edge the words ‘Merry Christmas’ were written in red and finished with a sprig of holly.

  ‘You made it yourself didn’t you, Harry?’ said Peggy.

  ‘Oh yes, you’re a baker aren’t you?’ said Martha. ‘Well, what a wonderful present. Now you’ll have to stay while we all taste it. Sheila, get Mr Ferguson a chair.’

  ‘Please, call me Harry.’

  The cake delighted everyone.

  ‘It’s very rich,’ said Martha.

  ‘Is there a bit of sherry in there?’ asked Betty.

  ‘The marzipan is just the right thickness.’

  ‘And so almondy.’

  After a while the conversation died a little and Peggy opened up the piano lid and began to pick out the opening bars of ‘Away in a Manger’. Very softly in the candlelight someone hummed, a voice added the words. On the second verse more voices joined in. The last notes died away and Peggy moved quickly into the next song. Jack led the singing of ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’ with gusto and Martha was the only one who heard the quiet knock at the door. Goldstein had returned.

  ‘Esther’s been asleep since you left,�
�� explained Martha in the hallway. ‘We keep looking in on her, but she hasn’t stirred. I’ll go up and check on her again.’ She opened the door to the sitting room. ‘Come in and join us.’

  Jack’s singing had gone from bad to worse. He was stuck on the names on the rest of the reindeers and the others were shouting out as they remembered them. He had just finished the song amidst loud cheering, when the door opened and Martha led Esther into the room.

  Goldstein stood up and took her arm and, with her eyes still on the ground, she whispered to him.

  ‘May she have a drink of water?’ he asked.

  The water was fetched with a piece of Harry’s Christmas cake. She drank and nibbled a little. Again she spoke and Goldstein translated. ‘She says to thank you for your kindness and she cannot believe she is here with her uncle and his friends.’ Esther gave a half smile. Then slowly, with Goldstein translating, she told her story: ‘I left Warsaw on 26 September …’

  The night we sang at the Grosvenor Hall, thought Peggy.

  Chapter 14

  Snow! It arrived in dark clouds that settled over the city as though they could go no further with such a heavy load. From the Cave Hill across the Lough to the Holywood Hills it fell through the night in thick white flakes as big as half crowns. It seemed on that Sunday morning in early January that the people of the city rose late from their beds. The snow had deadened the usual early morning sounds by which they registered the new day and the blackout curtains had kept the light from their bedrooms.

  Martha, who slept at the front of the house, was the first awake disturbed by the sound of children’s excited laughter in the street outside. Bernard Murray already had a good slide going. He climbed up the hill a little then launched himself down the middle of the road, body and feet turned at right angles and skimmed across the slippery surface for twenty yards using his arms stretched out from his side to keep balanced.

  ‘Come on youse uns!’ he shouted. ‘The more we use it, the slippier it’ll get.’

  From the kitchen window, waiting for the kettle to boil, Martha marvelled at the transformation in the garden. The wind had blown small drifts here and there; at the back door it was a foot high covering the steps. The branches and twigs were heavy and thick with it. On the path were the prints of a bird this way and that as it searched for food. There’d be no church for her this morning; she hadn’t the footwear for the twenty minute walk there and back in thick snow.

  By midmorning, with no sign of a thaw, Peggy had disappeared into the shed at the back of the house and after much shifting of its contents she emerged triumphant, hauling behind her the Joanmount Flyer. The other sisters who had been working as a team in the garden to build the biggest snowman ever, left him without a second thought, his tiny unfinished head at his feet.

  Sheila clapped her mittened hands in delight. ‘It’s Daddy’s sledge!’

  ‘I didn’t know we still had it,’ said Irene. ‘Do you remember how he made it for us when we were small?’

  ‘Mammy didn’t allow us to go on it by ourselves.’

  ‘Now, Robert, you’re to promise me that you will always be in control of the sledge.’ Peggy did a passing impersonation of her mother at her most protective.

  ‘Aye Martha, don’t fret I can sit two of them on it with me.’ Martha had joined them in the garden and spoke aloud her husband’s words. ‘Rest assured, they’ll come to no harm.’

  ‘You remember, Mammy, the fun we had on this sledge?’

  ‘Indeed I do, a fine sledge built by a carpenter for his children. Now I wonder how you’re going to spend the day.’ She raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Come with us, Mammy, it’ll be great,’ pleaded Sheila.

  ‘Ach away on with you, I’ve plenty to be doing here without risking my neck up the Carr’s Glen! I presume that’s where you’re going.’

  Half an hour later in their warmest clothes, the girls had left the houses far below them and reached the top of the Ballysillan, where in summer the meadows were full of clover and cowslip and heavy with the sound of insects. This morning, it was more like an Alpine village with dozens of figures trekking up and sliding down the slopes on makeshift sledges.

  ‘It’s just like ‘Heidi!’’ exclaimed Sheila.

  One or two groups had recognisable sledges, but others were sliding down on tin trays or bits of wood. There was even a tin bath. They found a space at the top with a clear run fifty yards below.

  ‘I’m the one who found it, so I’ll go first,’ said Peggy.

  ‘Have you forgotten it’s a two-man sledge?’ said Irene. ‘And I’m the eldest, so I’ll go down with you.’

  ‘Suits me,’ said Pat. ‘I’m not sure whether I want to do this at all.’

  ‘Don’t be such a scaredy ba,’ said Sheila. ‘You and I’ll go down together next. I’ll be at the front.’

  Peggy lined the sledge up. ‘You see this?’ she said, holding up the tarred rope fastened to the sledge like reins on a horse. ‘I’ll use it to steer.’ She braced her feet on the cross bar. ‘Now get yourself on, Irene. Quick as you can!’

  Irene sat on the wooden slats behind Peggy, glad that she’d worn her work trousers. She held on to Peggy’s waist, but couldn’t quite figure out where to put her legs. She felt the sledge begin to move beneath her. ‘Wait, Peggy, wait!’ But with Peggy, whether it was songs on the piano or sledging on snow, there was no stopping her once she’d made up her mind. The sledge tipped forward and Irene saw below her what looked like a sheer drop. She had the oddest sensation that she was about to fly over Peggy’s head and land in front of the sledge as it careered ever downward. Her legs were stuck out at acute angles and it was all she could do to keep her feet off the ground. Suddenly, she had the weird sensation of lifting off into the air. Too late she realised that her backside had left the sledge. For an instant it was only her grip on Peggy’s waist that prevented her from flying down Ballysillan unaided. Then the sledge lifted to meet her crashing down. The breath was knocked out of her and they were rushing headlong again. Snow spraying in her face … eyes squeezed tight … mouth open, but she couldn’t catch another breath. Once more she rose in the air over a bump and back on to the slats with a thud … then a sensation of turning sharply, the sky twisting above her … a sudden jarring that turned her sideways and dumped her in a white pit, her mouth full of snow.

  She was aware of shouting all around her and that high pitched laugh of Peggy’s when she became over-excited. Hands pulled her to her feet. She shook her head free of snow and felt an ache at the base of her spine as she put weight on her legs. Then she was laughing too. A group of boys had gathered round them, pulling her and, more importantly, the sledge from the snow drift that Peggy had steered them into.

  ‘My God, I’ve never seen anything like it!’

  ‘What a speed!’

  ‘Where’d ye get a sledge like that?’

  Back at the top of the slope, Pat and Sheila waited anxiously having witnessed the reckless progress of the Joanmount Flyer. Pat cupped her hands around her mouth and screamed, ‘Are you all right?’ and was glad to see first Peggy, then Irene wave back.

  Sheila on the other hand yelled, ‘Hurry up! Bring it back for our go!’

  ‘Are you mad?’ asked Pat. ‘That thing’s dangerous!’

  The boys pulled the sledge back up, hoping, no doubt, to get the opportunity to have a go themselves, but Sheila had other ideas.

  ‘Right, Peggy, my turn.’

  ‘Look,’ said Peggy, ‘aim for the right of where we went down. It looks a bit less bumpy over there. You could probably slow it a bit as you get near the bottom by pulling it to the right in an arc. You see those boys down there? How they’re slowing down, sort of sideways into the snow?’

  Sheila nodded. ‘Yes I see. I can do it and if it goes wrong I’ll just fall off into the snow.’

  ‘You won’t have time to think about that,’ laughed Irene.

  ‘Come on, Pat!’ Sheila climbed on the sledge. ‘Get
behind me.’

  ‘I can’t!’

  ‘Yes you can. It’ll be great!’

  ‘Go on, it’s really good,’ said Irene.

  At that moment Pat saw a familiar figure coming towards them, pulling a sledge almost as big as theirs. He raised his hand and called out. Instantly, Pat was on the back of the sledge, shouting in Sheila’s ear, ‘Right! Go! Go!’

  Sheila pushed off and they went hurtling down the slope leaving Jimmy McComb, a lonely figure at the top, disappointed again.