Saturday's Child

by Ruth Hamilton

  The room relaxed, as if the very walls sagged with relief. The issue of Miss Hulme was not raised again. By the time they had settled the dog in an old wash basket containing a khaki blanket, no-one had sufficient energy to deal with anything further.

  Magsy and Beth went home, while Roy Hardcastle went into the business of finding bedding for Skinny-Bones.

  Half an hour and two more army blankets later, the bitch was ensconced in a corner of the kitchen. She had always been here; her memory of times past slipped away in the warmth that surrounded her. She was in the right place, the best place. And nothing else mattered.

  Six

  Hesford was a robust little village, its main street cobbled and flanked at each side by sturdy, square houses built of rectangular stones. On a slope that reached onward towards the mountains, its pavements were steep enough to warrant occasional steps, stumbling blocks for many a playing child, the curse of young mothers with prams.

  There was just one gap in this monotonous arrangement, another square, a space containing Knowehead, a four-bedroomed detached house of Accrington brick. Most of its curtains remained closed, although it seemed to watch the road constantly from one particular upstairs pane, yet another oblong shielded by thick lace. Everyone knew about the shrivelled crone labelled Miss Katherine Moore – and God help anyone who forgot the ‘Miss’. Like the sky, the birds and the weather, Miss Moore was always there, was threaded through the continuum of life, a supervisor, an onlooker who chose not to take part in Hesford’s small daily ongoings.

  She sat there when the new people moved into the shop opposite, watched the young bride in her full-skirted white frock, the groom in a suit too shiny to be new, his withered mother in winter coat and close-fitting blue hat. Change. Katherine Moore hated change. She hated most things, really, was a bitter person whose small view of the world kept her narrow, unaccepting.

  ‘Bloody fool,’ she snorted when she watched the new Mrs Barnes moving into the shop, ‘marrying a man old enough to be her father.’ Miss Katherine had never married; no man had come up to her rigidly set views of correctness, her idea of her own place in society. No mere mortal had ever pleased Katherine’s father, whose temper had been unpredictable even on the best of days.

  She sighed. ‘And I am another fool.’ The voice, unused to exercise, croaked its way out of a parchment-dry throat. There was no-one with whom she could converse. That stupid girl would be downstairs, no doubt, was probably entertaining one of those young yokels who sneaked up the path from time to time. ‘I should have got out of here,’ she muttered, ‘should have left him to rot.’

  But she hadn’t gone, had waited, instead, for Father to die. Had she abandoned him, he might well have left his paltry legacy to a charity, a home for worn-out horses or foxhounds. Damn him, anyway. How much he had lost, how little she had received after years of drudgery, ‘Yes, Father, no, Father, of course you are right, Father.’

  Katherine had never owned a mother. Mother had died on the day of Katherine’s birth, had left Father angry in his grief. In his turn, Bertram Moore had created an ill-tempered daughter, one who had grown up knowing little of love or forgiveness.

  She turned her head and gazed at a blank wall. Had she been able to see through plaster and masonry, Miss Katherine Moore’s eyes would have lighted on the roof of a mansion, a solid pile with seven bedrooms, servants’ quarters and several acres of land. Father had imbibed it, had converted it to liquid – whisky, gin, brandy. Chedderton Grange was now a school for young ladies, a place where the daughters of the privileged enjoyed an expensive and thorough education.

  As a daughter of the privileged, Katherine was angry. Now in her seventies, she had enjoyed a limited period of learning dealt out by a series of governesses and tutors whose main function had been to bed her father or to join him in drink, depending on their sex and inclinations. Miss Farquar-Smith had left under a cloud and with a large belly; Mr Collins had finished up in hospital, had died of a bleeding ulcer caused by alcohol; Miss Bellamy, whose vices had embraced both of Father’s hobbies, had been taken away in an ambulance, her demented screams rending the air as she was dragged on board.

  And here sat the daughter of the landed gentry, a small servant girl her only companion, her days spent fastened to a window through which she saw little, enjoyed nothing. It was the unfairness of it all that drowned her spirit, though she congratulated herself on needing no alcohol to dampen her soul. Alcoholism ran in families, and she did not intend to follow in her male parent’s unsteady footsteps.

  The door opened. ‘Ready for your dinner, Miss Moore?’ asked the girl.

  The girl was pretty in a rather loud way, large brown eyes, home-permed hair, the complexion coarsened by ruddy cheeks, a sure sign of healthy country living. Katherine noticed the insolence in her tone, a message that spoke volumes about activities below stairs. This one would be pregnant soon, no doubt, would pick names out of a hat until she decided which bumpkin she should trap. ‘I am not hungry,’ she replied.

  ‘Cup o’ tea, then?’

  ‘Later, thank you.’

  A slight raising of the servant’s shoulder conveyed a nonchalant attitude. She had to go. Katherine sighed. Here she sat, three score and ten already achieved, with a few months added on for good measure. How many of these girls had she been through in recent years?

  ‘But you’ve got to take your tablets,’ wheedled Phyllis Hart. She wanted to be off, needed to grab a couple of hours before returning to tidy up Miss Katherine for the night.

  ‘My arthritis is slightly better today.’

  Phyllis could not have cared less. This miserable old devil deserved the pain – she never spoke a word of thanks, never offered a smile. In fact, if the biddy were to smile, her dried-up face might well snap into two pieces.

  ‘I’ve got to get back to me mam, miss.’

  Katherine nodded. The chit did not want to get to her home – she probably had an assignation with some spotty youth, a plan to give herself away yet again to anyone with the price of a chocolate bar. ‘Then go,’ she said.

  Alone once more, the crippled woman picked up her sticks and dragged her aching body across the landing into a rear bedroom. From here she could see her back garden, was able to focus on the summer house. A wooden structure, it was built around a chimney breast of brick, so it was possible to keep a fire going on cool evenings. It had a porch all round, three rooms and a primitive kitchen. ‘I’ll do it,’ she stated aloud. ‘I shall make sure that the place is weatherproof, then I shall advertise.’ She was sick to the core of feckless young women. It was time to hire someone more mature, a female who could be on the spot and on call at all times. She would advertise in the Bolton Evening News, would get a woman from the town. Said woman could live in the summer house – it could be furnished with bits and pieces from the attic of Knowehead.

  Sighing, Katherine sank onto a spare bed. Her life was pain and pain was her life. The tablets took the edge off the misery, but only death offered a promise of complete release. Trapped upstairs within easy reach of the bathroom, she had not visited the ground floor of her own house for almost a year. Soon, it would be Christmas. Christmas would mean little but more misery, as the girl’s visit would be brief, just a few sandwiches and a flask of tea to last all day. This was no way to live.

  ‘You have two choices,’ she informed herself. ‘You can take all the tablets in one go, or you can hire live-in help.’

  For a reason best known to her subconscious, she opted for the latter. The urge to continue alive in this valley of unhappiness remained strong even now. It was not yet time to die.

  Rachel Barnes could not work herself out at all.

  She had a wonderful new husband who would probably worship her for ever, a kind mother-in-law, a shop and a house with plenty of space, acres of space when compared to the hovel she had shared with her parents and siblings. Yet she managed to be lonely.

  ‘You’ll get used to it, love,’ Dot had told
her on several occasions. ‘Everything takes time.’

  Rachel wondered. There was something about a big family, she concluded, and she had taken it for granted for too long. How badly she had wanted her own room, how often she had needed to jump the queue for a quick morning swill in the scullery sink.

  But she missed the music, the fights, the constant flow of emotions and ideas that emanated from her father, her mother, from the other girls, from Thomas, who was now Grogan-Higgins. There were few secrets in the Higgins household, because privacy was a luxury enjoyed by none when such a crowd lived in conditions so close, so crushed.

  It was the silence, then. Even at work, Rachel’s world had been noisy, the clatter of spinning mules, the shouting of comrades who, rendered half deaf by exposure to machinery, were boisterous when tramping homeward in the evenings. This place was so quiet. Even when the shop was busy, folk spoke in muted tones until they arrived at the front of the queue waiting to be served.

  The shop was wonderful. It had two distinct sides – one for ironmongery, the other for general groceries, sweets, tobacco and newspapers. Frank looked after the hardware, while Rachel and Dot, firm friends from the start, worked opposite him at a long polished counter.

  Behind the shop there was a large living room, a scullery and a washroom with its own toilet. Never before had Rachel or Dot enjoyed the luxury of indoor sanitary arrangements. Upstairs, three bedrooms and another bathroom completed the living quarters. Rachel and Frank had a large bedroom, while Dot, who had turned the second bedroom into a sitting room for herself, slept in the smallest, just space for a bed, a chest of drawers, a chair and a makeshift wardrobe with a curtain instead of a door. Dot, anxious not to interfere, lived a life as far away as possible from her son and his wife. She cooked, cleaned, worked in the shop, then listened to the wireless in her own room.

  Rachel felt guilty. Christmas was almost here, and all she wanted was to be with Mam and Dad. There would be few presents, yet John and Sal would provide the yearly jigsaw, a puzzle of many parts that would take up the whole kitchen table for days, its presence forcing the family to take meals while perched on the edge of the beds in the front room. The melodeon would be on hand, carols would be sung, two chickens would be stretched to feed the whole happy band. Irish potato cakes, soda bread, pounds and pounds of potatoes, the favourite filler of many Irish bellies.

  ‘This is your family now,’ Rachel advised herself aloud on several occasions. But it wouldn’t be the same, could never be the same. She simply had to get used to it, and that was that.

  Then she noticed the house across the way, was suddenly keen to know about the inhabitants, the lack of movement, and she stopped thinking about herself.

  Phyllis Hart offered the story while buying two slices of boiled ham and a small Turog loaf. ‘She’s a miserable old woman,’ the girl announced to a shop that was empty except for herself and Rachel. ‘Has to take pills for her arthritis.’ The girl sniffed. ‘And she pays rotten wages, too.’

  Rachel weighed the ham. ‘Will she have Christmas with her family?’

  ‘She hasn’t got no family.’

  ‘No-one at all?’

  Phyllis raised a careless shoulder. ‘Me mam says she used to be posh. They had a big house a few miles away down in a dip – you can’t hardly see it unless you climb up on a roof, like. It’s a school now.’

  Rachel passed the merchandise across the counter, dropped money into the till drawer, handed out the change. ‘So she’ll be all alone on Christmas Day?’

  ‘I’ll go in to give her some dinner, like, but she doesn’t want nobody, really. She just sits at that window all day.’ Phyllis pointed across the road. ‘That one there. She’ll be staring at us now. There’s not much happens round here what she doesn’t know about. But she says nowt. Get blood out of a stone easier than words out of her, me mam says.’

  Rachel decided that this was a shame. That very evening, while sharing a meal with Frank and Dot, Rachel announced her intentions.

  ‘But you can’t do that, love,’ exclaimed Dot. ‘From what you say, she can’t hardly walk. How’s she going to get here?’

  Rachel smiled sweetly at her husband. ‘Frank can carry her.’

  Frank dropped his fork, depositing a shower of pickled red cabbage in his hotpot. ‘You what?’

  ‘Carry her,’ Rachel repeated.

  Frank glanced from his wife to his mother, back to his wife. ‘I can’t go dragging a woman across the road,’ he cried. ‘She could have me up for assault.’

  ‘Aye,’ agreed Dot, ‘and from what I’ve heard, she likely will.’

  Rachel grinned, the width of her smile announcing that she was confident of her ability to twist Frank right round her little finger – plus five times round the block. She would be happy, she would. Anyone would be happy with Frank Barnes.

  He tutted, lowered his gaze so that he might avoid that vision of perfection, clouds of dark hair tumbling to shoulders he had kissed, eyes of brightest sapphire, skin smoother than silk. And the way she responded, uninhibited, joyful, unselfish. He knew that he was beginning to blush . . .

  ‘Frank?’

  He studied his plate. ‘What?’

  ‘She shouldn’t be on her own, not at Christmas.’

  Dot tried not to smile. She knew that these two were enjoying each other, though she did her best not to listen to the sounds created by lovemaking. Let them be like this for always, she begged inwardly. She knew that Rachel was about to get her own way, but she would offer no further counsel.

  ‘Please,’ Rachel begged.

  Frank plucked up his courage and faced her. She was a right little madam, cheeky, outspoken, adorable. There she sat, a finger placed in the centre of a plump lower lip, her eyes riveted to his face, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. ‘I’m having nowt to do with it,’ he announced with the air of a man who pretends to be in charge. ‘If you want her here, then get on with it. But I’m not carrying nobody.’

  She had won. Rachel picked up a shive of soda bread and dipped it in gravy. She would deal with the details later, would persuade Frank to help her with Miss What-ever-her-name-was. As she finished her food, she made up stories about the old woman, imagining her abandoned at the altar, or engaged to someone who had perished at the front in the First War.

  Dot picked up the dirty dishes and went to fetch apple crumble from the kitchen. As she poured custard into a glass jug, she wondered briefly about Ernest. He would be alone at Christmas, she supposed. Happen that would teach him a lesson, she pondered as she carried the pudding through. There’d be nobody for him to scream at, no target for his sticks. But no, folk like her husband didn’t learn lessons. They marched in orange sashes, threw stones at Catholic statues, defiled churches, hated their neighbours.

  Back at the table, she shared out the pudding. ‘Thanks,’ she said quietly.

  ‘What for?’ asked her bemused son. ‘You made the food, Mam.’

  ‘For letting me live here – both of you.’

  Rachel’s laugh, as light as any crystal chime, floated through the air. Frank, his eyes wet, grabbed his beloved mother’s hand. ‘Don’t mention it,’ he answered, ‘because we’re kind to old ladies at Christmas – aren’t we, Rachel?’

  The laughter ground to a sudden halt. ‘Dot’s here for always,’ she answered solemnly. ‘She’s not come just for Christmas.’

  Dot picked at her crumble. If she got any happier, she would surely burst.

  Ernest Barnes had decided to be heartbroken. As a result, the neighbours had started to be good to him. Also, since he was now without a skivvy, he was forced to push himself onward, thereby discovering that he remained quite strong in spite of his disability, that he could get down the yard, could manage to boil potatoes and vegetables, was able to cope with most things with the exception of shopping.

  His shopping was done by Magsy O’Gara, an Irish Catholic with a no-nonsense attitude to life, a beauty whose features deserved committing to
canvas. Too young for him and from the wrong side of the religious divide, she walked in and out of his life on a daily basis, was beginning to disturb his sleep. He was tormented by dreams of her, nightly scenarios in which he took the upper hand, in which he was young and whole again.

  He lived for the unmistakable sound of her footsteps in the narrow hall, could tell immediately when Lily Hardcastle took it upon herself to become a poor replacement for the younger woman. Magsy floated; Lily plodded.

  In spite of his growing affection for Magsy, Ernest refused an invitation to spend Christmas with her and Beth. To use a Catholic as a servant was one thing, to break bread under her roof another matter altogether. Orange could not sit down with green – that was one of Ernest’s extra commandments. And yet . . .

  Well, he would see her, because she had promised to plate a Christmas dinner and fetch it across for him. He had refused an invitation from the Hardcastles, too. He felt uneasy in the presence of Lily Hardcastle, because she looked at him ‘funny’, as if she remembered Dot’s screams, as if she saw right through him, as if she knew that the poor abandoned husband he pretended to be did not really exist. Well, she didn’t matter; all that he needed was to see Magsy O’Gara on Christmas Day. That would be the best present of all. In fact, it would probably be his only present.

  Lily Hardcastle had always taken Christmas seriously, but the lethargy which had visited her since September was still upon her. She couldn’t be mithered with it. However, guilt sat heavily on her shoulders, so she relented quite late in the day, made a couple of puddings, a cake and some sticky toffee. Roy was a beggar for toffee, as were these daft bloody dogs whose presence made the house smaller than ever. She shoved the toffee in a tin, stuck almond paste on her cake and threw a couple of threepenny bits in her puddings.

  Lily eyed the youngest of her three sons. ‘Listen, you,’ she said, ‘you have to get rid of these pups. I keep falling over them – they’re getting in me road.’