by Anne Bennett
Violet made an impatient movement with her head. ‘I’m grand, Doctor.’
The doctor knew she wasn’t grand, but he hadn’t time to go into it. The young woman needed attention and fast; the pads were saturated with blood and he had to find out why. He washed his hands quickly, glad that Violet had had the foresight to have water boiling, before extracting a large pair of scissors from his bag. ‘I’m going to have to cut some of the clothes from her,’ he told Violet. ‘I want to disturb her as little as possible, at least until I’ve located the source of the bleeding.’
Violet nodded and she unbuttoned the coat. When it lay open she heard the doctor give a whistle at the blood pumping from somewhere, soaking the side of Lizzie’s jumper. Without further ado, the doctor, anxious now, sliced up the jumper and vest from hem to neck with his scissors, and Violet saw the gaping hole in Lizzie’s side. ‘God Almighty!’ she cried in shock. ‘What’s happened to her, Doctor?’
‘She’s been stabbed, Mrs Barlow.’
‘Stabbed! Surely not?’
‘I’ve seen enough stab wounds to know,’ the doctor said grimly. ‘Could I have some of that water in the basin? I need to get this cleaned up before I stitch it.’
‘But…but…Doctor, who would stab Lizzie?’ a shocked Violet asked.
‘That’s a question she might be able to answer,’ the doctor said. ‘But she can thank God for that thick coat. Whoever did this meant business and that coat probably saved her life, but still, she’s lost a fair bit of blood already.’
The doctor cleaned the wound carefully with cotton wool and Violet stood ready with a clean bowl for him to drop the soiled pieces into. She saw plainly, once the wound was washed clear of blood, where the knife had sliced through the skin.
She felt rather sick suddenly, and the doctor, noting the slight movement she made, glanced up. ‘All right?’
Violet chided herself. This was no time to think of her own sensibilities. ‘I’m fine, Doctor,’ she said.
‘Good woman,’ the doctor replied, admiring Violet’s pluck. ‘Now, if you get rid of that cotton wool and stand at her shoulders. It is Mrs Gillespie, isn’t it?’
‘Aye, Doctor, Lizzie Gillespie.’
‘Well, stand there and hold on to her shoulders, but gently. I’m going to stitch the wound now and it might rouse her. It’s important that she lies still, so if she starts to move you hold her tight. Okay?’
Violet smiled a little, feeling it strange hearing ‘okay’, that Americanism, from the doctor’s lips. But she answered in kind. ‘Okay, Doctor.’
There wasn’t much to smile at after that, because gentle though the doctor undoubtedly was, Lizzie did come round and began to thrash and try and dislodge Violet’s hands holding her down, turning from side to side. At one point her back arched and the doctor swore. And then Lizzie’s arms began to flap about madly and Violet pleaded, ‘Lie still, Lizzie. Please, lie still. It’s me, Violet, and I’d not hurt you for the world, you know that.’
Lizzie became quieter and the doctor nodded approvingly. ‘Go on.’
Violet went on. She told Lizzie about finding her in the yard and the shock it had given her and about sending for the doctor, and all the time Violet talked, Lizzie lay still and listened.
Later, she was to tell Violet she lay in a sort of semiconscious state and, with Violet inadvertently helping her, tried to piece together what happened after she left the factory. But from when she’d bumped into the large black shape she could remember nothing.
The doctor finished and snapped off the thread. ‘Now,’ he cautioned Violet to hold steady. ‘I must dab the wound all over with iodine and it will sting. But it will also stop infection.’
However, Lizzie made no movement, though her face grimaced in pain and her eyes flickered open. ‘Hallo, Mrs Gillespie,’ the doctor said, and because he saw that her glazed eyes looked frightened, he went on, ‘You’ve had a bit of an accident.’
‘Accident,’ Lizzie repeated.
‘That’s right,’ the doctor said. ‘And your good friend Violet sent for me.’
‘Violet?’
‘Aye, cock, I’m here,’ Violet said, and because she was so agitated and worried she went on, ‘Some bugger stabbed you. Who was it?’
Lizzie couldn’t comprehend it. ‘Stabbed?’, and she looked at Violet aghast. ‘Stabbed!’
‘Yeah, stabbed. Done for you an’ all, the doctor said, if it hadn’t been for your coat.’
The doctor, seeing Lizzie’s mind trying to come to terms with all this, motioned to Violet to be quiet and spoke to Lizzie. ‘I will put a dressing over the wound for tonight,’ he said, ‘in case it should weep, and I’ll come back tomorrow to attend to it.
‘Now,’ he went on, ‘I noticed the bump and slight graze on the back of your head, but are you injured anywhere else?’
Lizzie hesitated. Since she’d come to, she’d been aware of stickiness between her legs and the fact she had no knickers on, but she didn’t want to mention that yet, and so she said, ‘No, Doctor, I don’t think so.’
But Doctor Taylor had seen the pause and he said, ‘Are you sure, Mrs Gillespie? There’s nowhere else you were hurt?’
And Lizzie held his eyes. ‘No, Doctor.’
She was extra glad she’d said this when the doctor went on, ‘You realise I’ll have to inform the police?’
Even Violet jumped at that. She’d never had police at her door and didn’t want them now, and nor did Lizzie. ‘Is it necessary?’
‘I think so,’ the doctor said. ‘We can’t have a madman with a knife taking advantage of the blackout to hurt, maim and kill people.’
‘But all I can remember is a huge black shape that I collided with,’ Lizzie protested. ‘After that it’s a blank till I woke up here.’
‘Even so,’ the doctor said. ‘I’m bound to mention it. But not tonight, because I’m going to leave you a draught to help you sleep. Are you going to stay here?’
‘Course she is,’ Violet put in. ‘Where the hell else would she go? She can share the bed with me—that’s if you can make the stairs, Lizzie?’
‘Yes, but Barry…’
‘Barry can have the settee,’ Violet said decisively, and went on with a grim laugh, ‘God knows, it might be all he’s capable of when he comes in. Now, it’s decided, Lizzie. And you need someone on hand in case you need owt. Don’t she, Doctor?’
‘It would be advisable.’
‘There y’are, settled,’ Violet said. ‘I’ll pop a hotwater bottle in the bed now to warm it up, and I’ll go next door for your nightdress and stuff and get you all comfy in the bed. Snug as a bug in a rug, as my old mother used to say, and with what the doctor gives you, you’ll sleep like a baby till morning.’
It was as the door closed on the doctor that Lizzie remembered her knickers. God, if they should be lying in the yard somewhere the doctor’s flashlight might pick them out and then he’d be back, would insist on examining her and telling the police, and she said to Violet, ‘Did you see anything else in the yard?’
Violet knew what she was asking. ‘There was your handbag,’ she said. ‘And your knickers.’
‘Oh, thank God.’
‘So, he…’
Lizzie nodded. ‘I have no memory of it, but there is stickiness between my legs.’
‘And why else would he take your knickers off anyway. You didn’t want to tell the doctor?’
‘No,’ Lizzie said firmly. ‘I want to forget it ever happened. I’m not telling the police and I want no one in the yard to know either. They’ll have enough to talk about with me being stabbed without having that to gossip about as well.’
‘I agree with you, bab,’ Violet said. ‘And don’t you worry, I’ll not say a word.’
The policeman had to interview Lizzie in the bedroom because Violet said she wasn’t fit to be up. Lizzie had no desire to get up. She seemed to be affected by a feeling of lethargy, so that opening her eyes and talking to the policeman was almost too much of
an effort.
It was an effort to no avail as well, for Lizzie could tell them little.
‘You’re sure it was a man?’
‘I assumed it was a man. From what I remember, my last memory is of a large black mass that I bumped into. The darkness was dense.’
‘And this man—person—did not speak?’
‘Not a word.’
The policeman leant back and looked straight at Lizzie. ‘Mrs Gillespie, have you any enemies that you know of?’
‘No, none.’
‘Your husband is…?’
‘Overseas,’ Lizzie said. ‘And my children are in Ireland with my mother.’ Lizzie gave a sigh. ‘Violet and I usually go to work together, but Violet hasn’t been in for over three weeks. She’s had bronchitis.’
‘So, all your workmates knew you’d be alone?’
‘Aye, but I get on with all the people I work with.’
‘You enjoy the work?’
‘No, I hate it, but I like the money. Most of the women are like Violet and myself and we all get on. Most of the men we work with are young lads, or those getting on a bit, or else they’re handicapped in some way.’
‘Hmph. It might be worth interviewing them informally anyway,’ the policeman mused. ‘So, you walked home alone in the blackout?’
‘Aye. My torch batteries had given out that morning.’
‘You haven’t had anyone move into the area lately that you’ve had words with?’
‘No.’
‘You see, Mrs Gillespie, I don’t think this was a spur-of-the-moment crime. Whoever attacked you seems to have been lying in wait for you.’
Lizzie shook her head. ‘I can’t think of anyone that would do such a thing.’
‘If you do think of anything I’d be obliged if you’d contact me. My name is Inspector Lomas,’ the policeman said, handing her a card. ‘In the meantime, the number of beat officers are being increased and they are being warned to be extra-vigilant. It’s all we can do with nothing to go on.’
‘I understand, I’m sorry.’
‘It’s hardly your fault, Mrs Gillespie. But if you think of something…’
‘I’ll contact you, I promise.’
But when the inspector had gone, Lizzie lay and thought about his words. She thought back to every chance remark she’d made, any complaint or rebuke, however mild. Oh, this is ridiculous, she told herself. No one can examine their life like this. Why did the man attack her? She didn’t know; the police didn’t know. Maybe she’d never find out. But what if he came back to finish the job? The doctor said the coat had saved her; maybe next time she wouldn’t be wearing a coat.
When Violet said she was to stay with them until she was better, she was relieved. She had no desire to live by herself, though she insisted on moving into the attic and letting Barry back into his own bed. The doctor said she’d hardly be fit for work for weeks yet, and Lizzie was glad. It crippled her just to stand and she couldn’t wear proper clothes because of where the cut was. She knew the factory had been informed of what had happened to her, and this had been verified by the police visit.
‘Are you going to write to Steve?’ Violet asked her the following afternoon.
‘Not about this,’ Lizzie answered. ‘What good would it do? It would worry him and it’s not as if he can do anything about it. I’m not telling Mammy and Daddy either, because they’d only fret.’
‘What about Steve’s mother?’
Lizzie gave a sigh. ‘I’ll have to tell her eventually, but I’m not able for Flo yet awhile. She’ll be round here fussing and moaning and won’t be in the house five minutes before working out that it was somehow my fault.’
Just over a week after Lizzie’s attack, on 14th February, Violet got the all-clear to return to work. Lizzie didn’t want Violet to go anywhere at all and knew she would be more afraid and feel far more vulnerable without Violet downstairs. Although she knew the women in the yard would be in and out and would do anything for her, it wasn’t the same as having someone in the house all the time. She couldn’t say any of this, though, it would sound extremely selfish, so when Violet asked her if she felt all right about staying by herself, Lizzie scoffed gently at her concern. ‘I’m a big girl now,’ she said. ‘I’ll be grand and the neighbours are golden, you know they are.’
Violet knew they were. When they’d heard about the attack on Lizzie they had been appalled, and they’d all felt very sorry for her. They had each been in to see her and offered their help if she needed anything, so Violet was able to start back at work with an easy mind.
The slightest thing still seemed to tire Lizzie. She started going downstairs through the day when Violet began work, but only to sit in a chair, because it was agony to stand and she couldn’t get dressed because even underwear caught. The doctor told her not to even try until her wound had healed over. ‘The last thing I want is for you to get an infection in it,’ he’d said. So Lizzie stayed in her nightdress and dressing gown and slippers all day.
She knew she really should get a message to Flo, despite her initial reluctance, because two weekends had passed now and she always went over every weekend and would often see Flo and her sister at Mass. Flo would write and complain to Steve, if she hadn’t already done so, Lizzie thought, and I can do without a sermon from him on how to treat his mother.
The point was, she didn’t know if she was strong enough yet to cope with Flo, and she was sitting there one morning thinking about it when there was a knock on the door.
Immediately, her whole body stiffened. She wouldn’t answer. Who would it be? No one knocked in these courts. No one, at least, that Lizzie would want to see.
She heaved herself to her feet painfully, tied the belt around her dressing gown loosely, crossed to the fire and lifted the poker. She’d not be attacked so easily a second time, she decided. She was surrounded by people. If she hollered loud enough someone would come, especially in view of what she’d suffered already. But if she never went near the door it would be safer still.
She carefully pulled the curtain aside and she saw Father Connolly step back from the door into the yard and look up at the windows. She gave a groan. Oh God, anyone but him. Father Peters was a kindly man, but Father Connolly hadn’t a kind or considerate bone in the whole of his body.
And yet she couldn’t leave him stood in the yard. She walked heavily to the door and drew back the bolts and turned the key in the lock.
Father Connolly looked at how Lizzie was dressed, in her nightwear and at this hour of the morning. ‘Are you not well?’ he asked, walking past her into the room. ‘One of my parishioners spoke of an accident of some sort and said you weren’t back at work after it yet, and that you were living with a neighbour, and I find you here in your nightwear.’
Lizzie knew she’d have to tell him and so she said, ‘It was no accident. I was attacked, Father, twelve days ago, on my way from work.’
‘Flo didn’t say anything when I asked her last Sunday.’
‘I haven’t told her, Father,’ Lizzie said. ‘I didn’t want her fussing around me, I wasn’t well enough. At first I slept most of the time.’
‘But why were you attacked?’ the priest asked. ‘Did you know your attacker?’
‘I wouldn’t know, Father,’ Lizzie said. ‘With the blackout, together with the thick fog, the night was as black as pitch. I didn’t see who it was, but he seemed to be waiting for me in the yard.’
‘Why you?’
‘I don’t know. The police are baffled too.’
‘It’s not some man you’ve encouraged?’
‘God, you priests are all the bloody same,’ Lizzie spat out, too angry to care. ‘I was attacked and somehow I must be to blame.’
‘I never suggested…’
‘You may as well have. It was an insinuation,’ Lizzie retorted.
‘Calm yourself,’ the priest said sternly. ‘This does no good at all. Maybe a cup of tea?’
The glance Lizzie threw the priest shoul
d have rendered him senseless on the floor, but holding her stomach and walking bent over to ease the pain in her side, she did manage to pour more water into the kettle from the bucket and put it back on the gas before turning back. ‘He didn’t just push me over, this man,’ she said. ‘Didn’t just slap me about a bit. He stabbed me.’
‘Stabbed you!’ the priest repeated, horrified.
‘Aye, stabbed me. He meant business all right. The doctor said I probably wouldn’t be here today if I hadn’t been wearing a thick winter coat. As it is, I had to have fifteen stitches in my abdomen.’
‘Why didn’t you send for me?’
‘I didn’t need you,’ Lizzie said bluntly. ‘I needed a doctor and they informed the police.’
‘Police!’
‘Aye,’ Lizzie said. ‘The way it was explained to me, they can’t have a madman with a knife terrorising women in the blackout. They’ve put more men on the beat now too, so I understand. They think this man, whoever he is, might have another go at me when he knows he’s failed.’
‘And you have absolutely no idea who he was?’
‘I’ve already told you, no, none at all,’ Lizzie said. ‘The police have nothing to go on.’
‘And how are you feeling now?’ Father Connelly asked, accepting the cup of tea Lizzie gave him.
Lizzie wondered if she should admit to terror. An all-consuming, petrifying fear, deeper even than any other fear she’d had in the air raids, for this attack was personal, for her alone and by a person unknown to her. But no, she decided, she’d admit to no such weakness before this man, and so instead she said, ‘I’m still a little sore and have been advised by the doctor not to wear proper clothes at the moment. It’s uncomfortable anyway because of where the wound is, but more importantly he said it could cause infection.’
‘Oh, I see,’ said the priest, and Lizzie knew he had been wondering. ‘It must have been a terrible ordeal for you, though?’
‘I’d rather not discuss it any more, Father,’ Lizzie said firmly, and was surprised when the priest just bowed his head.
‘As you wish, Lizzie, and it’s best if you can try and put this whole distressing business behind you,’ he said, draining his cup and getting to his feet.
