Mother’s Ruin

by Kitty Neale

  ‘I suppose so,’ she said, walking into the hall.

  Andrew followed her, and as Ruth went into Sadie’s bedroom she kept her back to him, her arms folded defensively as she gazed out of the window. He had been cursing himself since last evening. Ruth was right, he shouldn’t try to interfere in their lives. She had brought Sally up on her own, and had made a good job of it, but instead of praising her, he had called her selfish. In his desire to help Sally he had hurt Ruth.

  He went up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I had no right to call you selfish.’

  She turned, eyes moist as she looked up at him. ‘I’ve done the best I can, but I’ve been thinking about what you said all day. Sally offered to look after my mother when she had her stroke and she’s never complained. But maybe you’re right, maybe it isn’t fair on her.’

  ‘Ruth, I had no right to interfere, and if Sally is happy to look after her grandmother, that’s fine. If she isn’t, my offer of financial help, enabling you to stay home, stands.’

  ‘I really don’t want to take your money, Andrew, but I suppose it’s only fair to ask Sally how she feels about it.’

  ‘Good, and now that we’ve sorted that out, can we be friends again?’

  She smiled up at him, and once again Andrew saw the girl he remembered. The memories flooded into his mind, of holding her, touching her, and before Andrew knew it he had bent down to kiss her.

  Ruth didn’t resist, her lips soft as her arms slipped around his neck, and when the kiss ended, Andrew continued to hold her in his arms. ‘How about dinner again tonight,’ he whispered, ‘and this time we won’t talk about Sally.’

  When her parents returned to the room, Sally saw her mother smiling happily. ‘Andrew has asked me out to dinner again,’ she said. ‘Is that all right with you, Sally?’

  ‘Of course it is. As usual I have nothing planned, but I’m thinking about offering healing at the hall again.’

  ‘Good idea. It’ll do you good to get out of the house.’

  ‘Right,’ Denis said, ‘I’m off, and Tommy, it’s about time you packed that train set away. It’s taking up too much room on the floor and someone might step on it.’

  ‘No, leave it out, Tommy,’ Angel demanded.

  ‘No, it might get broken.’

  ‘Course it won’t.’

  ‘I’m putting it away,’ Tommy insisted, beginning to pull the track apart.

  Angel jumped up, kicking the engine in the process. As it fell to its side Tommy glared at her, red-faced with anger. ‘You did that on purpose!’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Yes, you did,’ and standing up he gave Angel a shove. She fell backwards on her bottom, Tommy looming over her as he yelled, ‘Don’t touch my train set again!’

  ‘I will if I want,’ Angel cried as she scrambled onto her knees, and snatched the engine, poised to throw it. ‘Angel!’ Sally shouted. ‘Don’t you dare!’

  ‘That’s enough, lassie,’ Andrew said as he swiftly picked up his granddaughter. He took the engine from her hand, handing it to Tommy. ‘Now then, Angel, what sort of behaviour is this? Tommy was kind enough to let you play with his train set, and instead of thanking him, you try to break it.’

  ‘I want a train set too.’

  ‘I don’t think you deserve one. Now say sorry.’

  ‘No.’

  Andrew sighed, and placed Angel back onto the floor. ‘I’ll leave you to sort this one out, Sally, but I think this little girl deserves a smack.’

  ‘Yes, and she’ll get one if she doesn’t apologise to Tommy.’

  Angel’s eyes flicked around the room, and seeing all their stern faces, she said, ‘Sorry, Tommy.’

  Tommy said nothing as he dropped to his knees, once again packing away the train set.

  ‘Have you had a nice birthday?’ Ruth asked, as she bent to help him.

  Tommy kept his head lowered, but Ruth noticed a quiver in his shoulders. ‘Oh, love, it’s all right. Angel didn’t mean it,’ she said, pulling him into her arms.

  ‘I don’t care about the train. It’s me mum. It’s me birfday and I want me mum.’

  Ruth rocked the child and, glancing at Denis, she saw that he too looked distressed. She didn’t have much time for the man, but when all was said and done, he had just lost his wife. However, Tommy was her main concern and she had yet to talk to Denis about taking the boy on permanently.

  At seven-thirty, Sally put both children to bed whilst her mother got ready to go out. When Andrew came to collect Ruth at eight, Sally watched them leave and was about to settle in front of the television with her gran, when someone knocked on the door.

  ‘Bloomin’ hell, me favourite programme is just starting,’ Sadie complained.

  ‘I’ll see who it is,’ Sally said, her stomach knotting when she saw who it was. ‘Go away, Arthur.’

  ‘Sally, please, I want to talk to you.’

  ‘We have nothing to say to each other.’

  ‘Please, just hear me out for five minutes.’

  ‘No,’ she said, making to close the door.

  His hand stretched out, holding the door open. ‘I won’t leave until you agree to listen to me.’

  Sally could see that he meant it and her mouth tightened. ‘All right, but five minutes, and no more.’

  ‘Can we talk in private?’

  ‘All right, I suppose we can use my gran’s room.’

  Sally stood back to let Arthur in and as he followed her into Sadie’s room, she turned abruptly, her arms crossed defensively.

  Arthur’s eyes held an appeal. ‘Sally, won’t you give me another chance?’

  ‘I can’t. I could never trust you now.’

  ‘I’ll never do it again, I swear I won’t. Please, Sally, don’t throw our marriage away over one mistake.’

  ‘One mistake! You slept with Patsy more than once and from what I saw that first time, you loved it.’

  He flushed, lowering his head. ‘If you hadn’t left me, it wouldn’t have happened again.’

  ‘Oh, so now it’s my fault that you couldn’t keep your hands off of her!’

  ‘No, I didn’t mean it to sound like that, but when you left, Patsy was there, and she kept on throwing herself at me.’

  ‘Huh, and you couldn’t say no?’

  ‘I know now that she lied to keep us apart, but at the end of the day it was just sex, that’s all. It meant nothing.’

  Sally found her fists clenched, nails digging into her palms. Whilst she’d been crying night after night, he’d been fine, sleeping with Patsy and having a good time. She felt sick at the thought of Arthur touching Patsy, of the intimacy they’d shared. ‘The sex may have meant nothing to you, but as far as I’m concerned you betrayed me, and our marriage. Just go, Arthur.’

  ‘Sally, please, I love you.’

  ‘Love! You don’t know the meaning of the word. Just get out. I’ll never forgive you, Arthur, and as far as I’m concerned, our marriage is over.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Sadie said sharply, as she came into the room.

  ‘Nothing, Gran. Arthur is just leaving.’

  ‘Sally . . .’ he began.

  ‘I said get out,’ she yelled.

  Arthur shook his head, but then swung round to leave, and when Sally heard the door closing behind him she flung herself across her gran’s bed, giving vent to her feelings, the pain of his betrayal still unbearable.

  She felt the bed dip beside her, and then her gran’s hand stroking her hair. ‘Come on, love,’ she cajoled. ‘If you carry on like this, you’ll make yourself ill.’

  ‘Oh, Gran, I can’t bear it.’

  ‘Can’t you find it in your heart to forgive him?’

  ‘No, I can’t. Every time I think of him with Patsy it turns my stomach,’ Sally croaked, cuddling closer to her gran. The pain was still there and she began to wonder if it would ever go away.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  On Monday, Laura’s funeral was a
sad affair, and to Andrew the bright, sunny, June day seemed incongruous. The sky should be grey, as grey as his mood. There weren’t many in attendance, just himself, Denis, Ruth and a few neighbours.

  Andrew rose to his feet as the service ended and they left the small chapel to see scant floral tributes laid on the ground outside.

  ‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ a woman said, and Andrew turned to look at her.

  ‘Thank you, and thank you for coming. I’m sorry. I don’t know your name.’

  ‘It’s Jessie, Jessie Stone, and like Nelly over there, I live in Candle Lane.’

  ‘Well, thank you again for coming,’ he said before Jessie moved on to offer her condolences to Denis.

  Andrew walked over to Ruth, saying quietly, ‘I still think that Tommy should be here.’

  ‘It was his father’s decision to send him to school, but I must admit, it feels strange that the boy has no idea that his mother is being buried today.’

  ‘Denis seems to think that he’s too young to understand.’

  ‘I doubt that. Tommy is astute for his age. Still, we’d best make our way back. Sally has laid on a little spread.’

  Andrew took Ruth’s arm. He’d be leaving tomorrow, but so much had been left undone. He was worried about Tommy and as Denis was drinking heavily, he wondered what sort of future his nephew would have. At least the boy had Ruth. Tommy clung to her, and in time he felt that Ruth would in some ways become a surrogate mother.

  ‘Ruth, as I’m leaving tomorrow, will you have dinner with me again this evening?’

  ‘Yes, of course I will.’

  He squeezed her hand and then after a short journey they were pulling up in Candle Lane, walking into the house to see a lovely spread on Ruth’s kitchen table. Andrew looked at the neatly-cut sandwiches Sally had prepared, but found he had no appetite.

  A hand touched his arm, and he saw that Sadie had come to his side, her voice soft. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t there, love. I’m feeling much better nowadays and could have gone to the chapel, but as usual I’m being mollycoddled. I tried to talk Sally into going, but she insisted on staying here with me.’

  ‘She worries about you,’ Andrew said, his mood low. ‘I wish I’d shown more concern for my sister.’

  ‘She’s in a better place now, love.’

  Andrew found no consolation in Sadie’s words. Guilt still plagued him. He suspected it always would.

  An hour passed, then Jessie Stone left along with another woman from the lane, but Nelly Cox stayed behind to help with the clearing up.

  ‘There’s hardly a sandwich left,’ Andrew said, managing a smile for Sally. ‘Thanks for the lovely spread, lassie.’

  She smiled back at him, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes. His daughter was unhappy, Andrew knew that, but because Sally had insisted that her marriage was over and wouldn’t let him intervene, he felt helpless. Ruth told him that it was for the best, that Sally would eventually get over it, and he hoped that she was right. In the meantime he’d learned his lesson about keeping in touch, and was determined not to make the same mistake again. Somehow he would see Sally regularly, despite the difficul- ties and distance between them.

  ‘I need a drink,’ Denis said. ‘I’ll see you later.’

  Unsurprised, Andrew nodded, and in this instance he felt that he needed a dram of whisky too. ‘I’ll come with you,’ he said, calling goodbye.

  Sally was glad of the help as they cleared up. Heavy on her mind was her father’s departure tomorrow. She was going to miss him. In the short time that he’d been in her life she had come to love him, Andrew being everything that she had dreamed of in a father.

  It was strange to think that she had paternal grandparents and a brother, and Sally wondered if she’d ever meet them. She had wanted to ask her father, but in the early stages of their relationship she still found herself a little reticent.

  ‘Did you see the way Jessie Stone scoffed the ham sandwiches?’ Sadie said. ‘If her mouth had been a bit bigger she’d had shoved them in two at a time.’

  ‘Yeah, I saw,’ Nelly said. ‘She’s a greedy cow, but enough about Jessie. I’ve got something to tell you.’

  ‘Spit it out then,’ Sadie urged.

  ‘I’m moving into Osborne House the day after tomorrow.’

  ‘Oh, Nelly,’ Sally said sadly, ‘Candle Lane won’t be the same without you.’

  ‘I’ll be sorry to leave, but the lane won’t be standing for much longer.’

  ‘Nelly, I’m gonna miss you,’ Sadie said, and reaching into her apron pocket she pulled out a handkerchief, dabbing at her eyes.

  ‘Gawd blimey, you’re crying, Sadie.’

  ‘Of course I ain’t. I’ve just got something in me eye.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Nelly said, ‘and pigs might fly. I didn’t know you cared.’

  ‘Who said I do?’

  Nelly chuckled. ‘We go back a long way, you and me. If I remember rightly, you moved into the lane just before our Queen’s Coronation.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s right, and a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then.’

  ‘It has, Sadie, it has,’ Nelly said. She sat down opposite Sadie and the two of them started reminiscing with Ruth chipping in now and then.

  After an hour, the old lady rose to leave. ‘Nelly,’ Sally said, ‘I’ll come to see you in Osborne House.’

  ‘Yeah, I will too.’

  ‘Are you sure about that, Sadie? They might take one look at you and not let you out again.’

  ‘Maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea. At least I wouldn’t be a burden to Sally.’

  ‘Don’t say that, Gran. You’re not a burden and never will be.’

  ‘Count your blessings, Sadie. You’re lucky to have a loving family.’

  ‘I know, Nelly, I know.’

  Sally walked Nelly to the door where the old woman paused. ‘Sally, I know it’s none of my business, but I was hoping to see you and Arthur back together before I left.’

  ‘There’s no chance of that, Nelly. My marriage is over.’

  ‘Are you sure, love? Are you sure that you really want to spend the rest of your life without Arthur?’ and with that comment, Nelly continued on her way.

  It was nearly eight o’clock and Andrew was zipping his bag. He was packed, ready for his journey home in the morning, and now, glancing at his watch, he saw it was time to take Ruth out to dinner. Denis was upstairs drunk, sleeping it off, but Andrew suspected that he’d be off to the pub again as soon as he woke up.

  Andrew walked next door, Sally answering his knock. ‘Come in, Dad. Mum’s nearly ready.’

  He stepped inside, and then paused to lay a hand on Sally’s arm. ‘Listen, lassie. I know I’m leaving, but I’m on the end of a telephone. If you need anything, just let me know. I’ll ring you often, and as soon as I can, I’ll be back to see you.’

  ‘You’re coming back?’

  ‘Of course I am. It won’t be for a while as I’ll have a lot of work to catch up on, but as soon as I get the chance, I’ll come down to London again.’

  Sally was about to speak, but then Ruth appeared on the stairs. ‘Hello, Andrew. I’m ready.’

  Andrew smiled up at her, thinking how lovely she looked, and then turned to speak to Sally again. ‘I’ll be round to see you before I go.’

  ‘All right. Bye, Dad,’ she said, but Andrew could see the strain on her face.

  As they left the house, Andrew took Ruth’s hand. There was a growing intimacy between them, but so far she hadn’t mentioned his offer of financial help. ‘Ruth, have you asked Sally how she feels about looking after her gran yet?’

  ‘Yes, and she was adamant that she doesn’t mind.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure. Now can we please drop the subject?’ Andrew sighed heavily. He had done nothing for Ruth, or his daughter, and it weighed heavily on his mind. ‘I feel I should be helping you in some way.’

  ‘For goodness’ sake! Not again! As I
told you before, I chose not to tell you about Sally. So will you stop trying to salve your flaming conscience.’

  ‘That isn’t what I’m trying to do.’

  ‘Andrew, I’m sorry. Look, it’s your last evening in London so let’s not fall out.’

  ‘All right, Ruth, but can I just say that if you need anything, anything at all will you let me know?’

  ‘If it will make you feel better, then yes, I’ll do that.’

  They reached the restaurant and after ordering their meal, Andrew said, ‘I hate to see Sally so unhappy. She tries to hide it but I can see it in her eyes.’

  ‘Me too, and I could kill Arthur for what he’s done to her.’

  ‘He wants her back.’

  ‘There’s no chance of that. Arthur was unfaithful, and worse, Sally caught him at it.’

  ‘I have a feeling she still loves him.’

  ‘He doesn’t deserve her,’ Ruth said as the first course arrived and after a few mouthfuls she changed the subject. ‘Are you still going to tell your parents about Sally?’

  ‘Yes, of course. I’ll tell my son too. Secrets have a way of coming out, and meeting you again has proved that.’

  ‘How do you think they’ll take it?’

  ’I don’t know. My parents will be shocked, and I’ve no idea how they’ll react. As for Donald, I’ll just have to wait and see.’

  ‘Sally is going to miss you.’

  ‘As I told her, I’ll come back to London as soon as I can, and it won’t only be to see Sally.’

  ‘Won’t it?’

  ‘I want to see you again too.’

  ‘Really?’ she said, her face going pink. ‘Yes, really.’ And as Andrew said these words, he knew he meant them.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  On the train to Scotland the next morning, Andrew felt torn in two.

  It had been a difficult parting. He had hated saying goodbye to Sally, Angel too, both of them breaking down in tears as he left. He was amazed at how quickly he had come to love them. Yet he had to return to Scotland; his life was there, his parents, and his son.

  Andrew’s thoughts turned to Ruth, and he examined his feelings. There was no doubt that the spark was still there, and he was sure she felt the same, but with him in Scotland, and Ruth in London, there was little chance of their relationship going any further.