by Maureen Lee
“He thinks if we spend all our savings she’ll realise we love her just as much as we did Ian.”
Sally continued coming to William Square, sometimes bringing Kate Colquitt with her. Flo and Kate got on like a house on fire. “You should have had kids, Flo,” said Bel, who usually managed to be there when visitors came.
“You would have made a wonderful mother.”
It was a bitterly cold January afternoon, a month after her twenty-third birthday, when Kate turned up alone at the launderette. “I hope you don’t mind. I finish work at four.” She made a nervous face. “Norman’s off with a terrible cold and he’s moved in with us for a while so me mam can look after him. I don’t feel like going home just yet. I can’t stand it when both of them get on to me.”
“I don’t mind a bit, luv.” Flo sat the girl in her cubbyhole and made her some tea. Once she’d warmed up, she’d let her loose among her ladies, who’d soon make her forget her troubles. “What do they get on to you about?” she asked.
Kate raised her shoulders and heaved a great sigh.
“Norman wants us to get married and me mam thinks it’s a grand idea. He’s so sweet. I can’t remember a time when he hasn’t been around, yet . . . oh, I dunno. It’s worse now Grace is engaged—she’s four years younger than me. Mam keeps saying I’ll be left on the shelf, but I’m not sure if I care. I’ve started training to be a State Registered Nurse, and I’d like to finish before I settle down. In fact, sometimes I think I wouldn’t mind staying single like you, Flo.”
She made herself useful, helping to untangle washing that had knotted together in the spin-driers, and getting on famously with the customers. She was still there when Flo was about to turn the Open sign to Closed, and Hugh O’Mara came in wearing the leather coat that had taken three months to save for, and which Nancy strongly disapproved of him wearing for work.
“Hugh!” Kate cried, her face lighting up with pleasure.
“I haven’t seen you in ages.”
He appeared equally pleased to find her there. They sat on a bench, heads together, engrossed in conversation, and when the time came for Flo to lock up, the pair wandered off happily, arm in arm. A few days later, Kate turned up again, then Hugh arrived as if it had been prearranged. The same thing happened the next week and the next, until Flo got used to Tuesday and Friday being the days when Kate came to help untangle the washing, was joined by Hugh, and they would go off together into the night. She watched, entranced, as the looks they gave each other became more and more intimate. She realised they were falling in love, and couldn’t have approved more. Her son would never find a prettier, nicer, more suitable wife than Kate Colquitt. She felt sure that even Nancy would be pleased when she was told. So far, everyone except Flo was being kept in the dark.
As the months crept by they were still in the dark. It was obvious to everyone in the launderette, including Mr Fritz, that the young couple were mad about each other, but Kate was too scared to tell her mam. “She never liked Hugh much. She said there was something not quite right about his background.” She asked Flo how people got married in Gretna Green.
“I’ve no idea, luv,” Flo confessed, exasperated. She badly wanted to interfere, to tell them to get a move on, but held her tongue.
“Martha suspects Kate’s got a secret boyfriend,” Sally remarked one day. Apparently there were nights when Kate didn’t get home till all hours and refused to say where she’d been. Poor Norman Cameron was doing his nut.
Flo wondered if Kate was more scared of Norman than of her mam. “He’d kill any man who laid a finger on her,”
Sally had said once. Perhaps she was scared for Hugh. Or maybe she was enjoying the clandestine nature of the affair, just as Flo had enjoyed her illicit meetings with Hugh’s father all those years ago.
Secrecy must have run in both families, the O’Maras and the Clancys, because Kate and Hugh continued to see each other for over a year before everyone found out and all hell broke loose.
Flo had been out of bed barely five minutes when there was a pounding on the door. She opened it, still in her dressing-gown, and Sally came storming in, her normally placid face red with rage.
“Why aren’t you at work?” Flo said, in surprise. Sally had been working full-time at Peterssen’s the confectioner’s to help with the wedding expenses, which were turning out to be horrendous. She wondered why her sister was so angry. Had Jock gone off the rails again?
Grace was getting married on Saturday—perhaps she’d called it off or, even worse, perhaps Keith had.
Either Sally didn’t hear the question or she ignored it.
“You knew, didn’t you?” she said, loudly and accusingly.
“Knew what?” Flo stammered.
“About Kate and Hugh, soft girl. Nancy O’Mara passed the launderette on the bus last night and she saw them come out kissing and canoodling, so you must have known.”
“So what if I did?”
“You’re a bloody idiot, Flo Clancy, you truly are.
They’re cousins!”
“I know darn well they’re cousins. What’s wrong with that?”
“They’re Catholic cousins. The Church forbids that sort of thing between cousins.” Sally was staring at her sister belligerently, as if Flo had committed the worst possible crime. “I hope they’re not planning on getting married or anything daft like that.”
“They are, actually, once Kate plucks up the courage to tell her mam. It’s not illegal. As they don’t know they’re related, under the circumstances it never entered me head that anyone would care.”
“Holy Mary, Mother of God.” Sally groaned. “Not care! You never heard anything like the commotion that went on in our Martha’s last night. Stead of going home, Nancy went straight to Kirkby, then Martha sent for me.
We had to turn Norman Cameron away as we didn’t want him listening to private family business. Me and Nancy had left before Kate came home. Christ knows what Martha said to the girl. And what’s Nancy supposed to tell Hugh?” She groaned again. “Why the hell didn’t you do something to stop it, Flo?”
Flo gave a little sarcastic laugh. “Such as?”
“I don’t know, do I?”
“I suppose,” Flo said slowly, conscious of her own anger grating in her voice, “I could have said ‘Sorry, Hugh, but you’re not to have any romantic notions about Kate Colquitt, because the truth is, I’m your mam, not Nancy, which means you’re cousins.’ That might have stopped it, and I’m sure everyone would have been dead pleased, particularly Martha and Nancy.”
Sally’s rage subsided. “I’m sorry, luv. Our Martha got me all worked up. I hardly slept a wink all night, but I shouldn’t have blamed you.” She looked curiously at her sister. “Did you ever think about telling him when he got older?”
Flo had thought about it a million times. “Yes, but I decided it wouldn’t be fair. It might do the poor lad’s head in, knowing the truth after all this time. He’d feel betrayed. All the deceit, all the lies. He might never want to see either me or Nancy again, and he’d be the one who’d suffer most.”
Sally shivered suddenly. “It’s cold in here.”
“I’m used to it. I’ll turn the fire on.”
“What are we going to do, Flo, about Kate and Hugh?”
“Leave them alone, do nothing. Let them get wed with everyone’s blessing.”
“Come off it, Flo. You must be out of your mind,” Sally said resignedly.
“I’ve never felt saner.” Flo’s voice was cold. “You, Martha and Nancy are nothing but a bunch of hypocrites.
You pride yourselves on being great Catholics, yet you’re quite happy to let me son be lied to all his life.
Martha and Nancy caused this mess and I don’t see why Hugh and Kate should suffer. Anyroad, marriage isn’t out of the question. Perhaps they can get a dispensation?” She couldn’t understand the need some people had to interfere in other people’s lives. The young couple had fallen in love in all innocence, and they
were perfect for each other. She was desperate for them to be left alone, not be parted over some silly rule that couldn’t even be explained to them. Kate was a nice girl, but she was weak.
Once Martha got to work on her, Flo couldn’t imagine her holding out.
“I suggested a dispensation,” Sally said tiredly, “but Martha and Nancy nearly hit the roof. How would they explain the situation for one thing? It’s not just the parish priest who gets involved, it can go up as far as the bishop.
And it means Hugh and Kate would have to know the truth.”
“But, Sal,” Flo tried to convey her desperation to her sister, “we’re the only ones who know they’re cousins.
It’s not against the law of the land. If all of us kept our traps shut, Hugh and Kate could get married tomorrer.”
To her relief, Sally looked more than half convinced.
“There might be something in what you say,” she conceded.
“I’ll go straight to Kirkby and see our Martha.”
Over the next few days, Flo tried to ring Sally several times from the telephone in the launderette, but either there was no reply or Jock said she was out somewhere, busy with arrangements for Grace’s wedding. There was no sign, either, of Hugh or Kate. She prayed that Hugh wouldn’t be annoyed or get into trouble if she rang him at work, but when she did, she was told he hadn’t been in all week. Desperation turned to frustration when she realised there was nothing she could do. She thought of going to Martha’s, or to Clement Street to see Nancy, but she didn’t trust herself not to blurt out the truth if there was a row.
She had bought a new outfit for Grace’s wedding: a pale blue and pink check frock with a white Peter Pan collar, a white silk beret and gloves, and high-heeled linen shoes. On the day, she went through the motions, chatting to the guests, agreeing that the bride looked like a film star in her raw silk dress. She did her best to get Sally on one side and pump her for information, but found it impossible and came to the conclusion that her sister was avoiding her. She wanted to know why Martha wasn’t there and what on earth had happened to Kate, who was supposed to be a bridesmaid.
The ceremony had been over for twenty-four hours, the newly wedded couple had already landed safely in Tenerife to start their fortnight’s honeymoon when Sally came to William Square to tell Flo that, at the same time as Grace had been joined in holy matrimony to Keith, in another church in another part of Liverpool, Norman Cameron had taken Kate Colquitt to be his wife. It had been a hastily arranged ceremony, with an emergency licence, attended by only a few friends. The bride wore a borrowed dress. They were spending two days in Rhyl for their honeymoon “Martha made me promise not to tell you,” Sally said.
“She thought you might turn up and make a fuss.”
“Since when did I ever make a fuss?” Flo asked bitterly.
“I let her tread all over me. I let her ruin me life, just as she’s ruined Kate’s.” She thought of Hugh, who must have felt betrayed when he heard the news.
“You’re exaggerating, Flo. Norman has loved Kate all his life. Now his dreams have come true and they’re married. He’ll make the best husband in the world.”
Perhaps Norman’s dreams had been nightmares, because the stories that reached Flo in the months and years that followed scarcely told of a man who loved his wife.
Kate Colquitt, now Cameron, had become pregnant straight away. Late the following November she gave birth to a daughter, Millicent. Flo hadn’t set eyes on Kate since the girl had walked out of the launderette on Hugh’s arm just before Easter. She felt hurt at first, until a dismayed Sally informed her that Norman hardly let his new wife out of doors. “She can go to the local shops and to church, but no further. I can’t think why, but he doesn’t trust her. Perhaps he knows about Hugh O’Mara, but Kate ‘was single then so what does it matter?’
On impulse, Flo decided to go and see her niece at the maternity hospital. Afternoon visiting was from two till three so she arranged for the woman who did the morning shift at the launderette to hang on until she got back.
“I’m off to see me niece in hospital,” she said proudly.
“She’s just had a baby, a little girl.”
“Would you like to see the baby first?” the nurse enquired, when Flo asked where she could find Mrs Kathleen Cameron.
“That’d be nice.”
The hospital bustled with visitors, mainly women at this time of day. “That’s her, second row back, second cot from the end.” The nurse’s voice dropped to a whisper: “I wouldn’t want anyone else to hear, but she’s one of the prettiest babies we’ve ever had.”
Flo was left alone to stare through the nursery window at the rows of babies. Some were howling furiously, their little faces red and screwed up in rage. A few were awake but quiet, their small bodies squirming against the tightly wrapped blankets. The rest, Millicent Cameron among them, were fast asleep.
“Aah!” Flo breathed. She was perfect, with long lashes quivering on her waxen cheeks, and a little pink rosebud mouth. Hugh had probably looked like that. She wondered if he’d also had such a head of hair: masses of little curls, like delicate ribbons. I never even knew how much he weighed, she thought. She pressed her forehead against the glass in order to see better. “I wish you all the luck in the world, Millie Cameron,” she whispered. “And I tell you this much, luv, I don’t half wish you were mine.”
She left the nursery and went to the ward, but when she looked through the glass panel in the door, Martha was sitting beside Kate’s bed. Flo sighed and turned away.
On the way out, she took another long look at her new great-niece. She felt tears running warmly down her cheeks, sighed, wiped them away with her sleeve and went home.
Almost two decades passed before she saw Kate Cameron and her daughter again.
The girl came into the launderette and looked challengingly at Flo. She had jet black wavy hair, wide brown eyes, and enough makeup on her coarse, attractive face to last most women a week. She seemed to be wearing only half a skirt, and a sweater several sizes too small so it strained against her large, bouncing breasts. A cigarette protruded from the corner of her red, greasy mouth, and she spoke out of the other corner like Humphrey Bogart.
“Are you the one who’s a friend of Hugh O’Mara?” she demanded in a deep, sultry voice.
Flo blinked. “Yes.”
“He said I could leave a message with you. If he comes in, tell him I’ll meet him outside Yates’s Wine Lodge at half past eight.”
“Rightio. What name shall I say?”
“Carmel McNulty.” The girl turned, flicked ash on the floor, and strode out, hips swaying, long legs enticing in their black, fishnet tights.
Flo’s ladies were all eyes and ears. “Was that Carmel McNulty?” one enquired eagerly.
“Apparently so,” Flo conceded.
“I hope that nice Hugh chap isn’t going out with her.
She’s no better than she ought to be, that girl.”
Everyone seemed to know or have heard of Carmel McNulty.
“Didn’t her last feller end up in Walton jail?”
“She was a hard-faced bitch even when she was a little ‘un.’
“I’d give my lads the back of me hand if any of ‘em dared to look twice at Carmel McNulty.’
Flo listened, appalled. In the year since Kate had got married, Hugh had never mentioned her name, or been seen with another girl. Surely he didn’t have designs on Carmel McNulty. Maybe she had designs on him. Hugh was a catch—one of the best-looking men in all Liverpool, with his own car and a good, steady job. Perhaps she was prejudiced, but Flo couldn’t understand why there wasn’t a whole line of women queuing to snap him up.
Having demolished Carmel McNulty, Flo’s ladies began to put her back together again. “Mind you, Carmel’s got her hands full with her mam. How many kids has Tossie got?”
“Twenty?” someone suggested.
“Twenty!” Flo squeaked.
“Nah, I think it
was eighteen at the last count.”
“Carmel’s the eldest and she’s had a babby to look after ever since she wasn’t much more than a babby herself.”
“She still looks after ‘em. I saw her only the other Sunday pushing a pramload of kids down Brownlow Hill.’
“You can’t blame her wanting a good time after all that.
How old is she now?”
“Nineteen.”
Six weeks later Hugh O’Mara and Carmel McNulty were married. The bride held her bouquet over her already swelling stomach. Flo went to the church and watched through the railings. It was more like a school outing than a wedding, as hordes of large and small McNultys chased each other around the churchyard.
Nancy O’Mara hadn’t changed much: she still wore her black hair in the same enormous bun and the same peculiar clothes, a long flowing red dress and a black velvet bolero. She looked as if at any minute she might produce castanets and start dancing, except that her face was set like yellow concrete in an expression of disgust.
According to a rather sullen Hugh, she loathed Carmel and Carmel loathed her. Nancy had only come to the wedding because of what people would say if she didn’t.”
“It serves you right,” Flo murmured. “If it weren’t for you and our Martha, Hugh would be married to Kate by now and everyone would be happy, apart from Norman Cameron.” Instead, Kate was stuck with a man who kept her a prisoner, and Hugh was marrying a woman he didn’t love. There was nothing wrong with Carmel: once she’d got to know her, Flo liked the girl. She was big-hearted, generous to a fault, and as tough as old boots.
But she wasn’t Hugh’s type. Flo clutched the railings with both hands. Her son was doing his best to look as if he was enjoying his wedding day, but his mam could tell he was as miserable as sin.
Flo went through the backyard of the terraced house in Mulliner Street and let herself into the untidy kitchen.
She shouted, is he ready for his walk yet, Carmel?”
Carmel appeared in slacks and one of Hugh’s old shirts, a cigarette between her lips. She looked exhausted.
