The Children of Lovely Lane

by Nadine Dorries

  Lily had heard a great deal about Amy. After all, she was Mrs McConaghy’s only niece, and with them having no children of their own, it was only natural they should take a special interest in her. But there was something in Mrs McConaghy’s tone, a catch of concern in her voice. Lily wasn’t sure she ever wanted to meet her in the flesh. Her reputation had run ahead of her faster than the boyfriend had raced down the path when her parents had caught them on the new bouclé sofa.

  ‘Here, take this as your Christmas box,’ Mrs McConaghy said as she slipped an envelope into Lily’s hand. ‘And I got the cook at home to make two Christmas cakes, so that I could bring one in for you. Don’t you fret, it didn’t cost me a thing apart from the ingredients, so don’t be worrying about that.’

  Lily was too spellbound to be fretting about anything. It was the very first present she had received in her entire life and she blinked as the tears burnt at her eyes. Mrs McConaghy took the lid off the cake tin and all Lily could do was blink. It was iced and in the middle there was a hand-made figurine of two skaters on a frozen blue lake. Around the edge were miniature trees covered in little red bows. Lily briefly pictured the expressions on Joe’s and Katie’s faces when she took it home. But she was quite sure this could not be happening and that in a moment Mrs McConaghy would say that there had been some mistake.

  ‘Are you sure this one is for me?’ she asked as she looked up from the tin.

  Mrs McConaghy’s hands flew to the gold crucifix around her neck and she rubbed it between her finger and thumb as she replied. ‘Yes, and that’s not all, either. You have been a hard worker this year, Lily and, well, Sister tells me you work like a demon at home too. So I thought you deserved a bit of a treat.’

  Lily looked at the envelope with suspicion until Mrs McConaghy said, ‘Go on, take it, it’s for you.’

  She wondered what Sister Therese had told them. She hated pity more than anything. Sometimes a neighbour would stop her on the landing at Clare Cottages and in a sympathetic voice would ask if there was something she needed. There were things Lily needed, but no one could give her a set of parents who could remain sober for longer than four hours. Or who thought more about their kids than they did about their next pint of Guinness. No, Lily was on her own. She never called upon the help of neighbours. She would manage.

  Lily blinked at Mrs McConaghy like a lamped fox. She had no idea what to say. She hadn’t been worried about the cost. She had yet to absorb the fact that Mrs McConaghy was being so kind and had given her a present.

  ‘It’s got candied peel in it that I dried and made myself,’ said Mrs McConaghy. ‘I smelt of lemons for days. Did you not notice?’

  Lily hadn’t noticed a thing. She was amazed that Mrs McConaghy made something called candied peel. It sounded delicious, even though she was not entirely sure what it was. They had never had a Christmas cake at home, although she’d seen them standing to cool on the kitchen windowsills of her neighbours’ homes. ‘I’ll do that one day,’ she had whispered to herself one morning in October as she’d walked past Mrs McGuffy’s and inhaled the smell of molasses and fruit and warm Christmas spices.

  She stammered out a thank you, then placed her basket on the desk and quickly peeled back her birdcage cover. She had to stop herself from snatching the cake. She wanted to place it inside her basket as quickly as possible and then she would know for sure it was hers. Mrs McConaghy lifted it out of the tin. She had wrapped it in greaseproof paper tied up with string. Lily’s heart beat like a trapped bird in a cage as she feared that Mrs McConaghy might change her mind and ask for it back. In a flash, she slipped the cake into her basket and fastened the cover back over it. Relieved that it was now really hers, she looked up and smiled.

  ‘Well, we don’t see that smile very often. And to think, all it took was a fruit cake. Sure, I would have brought one in before, had I known.’

  ‘The kids will love it, Mrs McConaghy.’ Lily’s voice sounded strange even to her. She wanted to get out of the office and away. She could not relax in the knowledge that the kids at home could really have this until she was on the bus. ‘Thank you. Thank you very much,’ she stammered.

  ‘It was them I made it for, Lily. Oh, I know you’ll have a slice, but I wanted the little ones to have a treat and I also knew that it would mean a lot to you. I like to help where I can.’

  Lily made O-shapes with her mouth. She had never known Mrs McConaghy to help anyone before now. She had seen grown men walk down the steps of the plant in tears, in the early days before Lily had assumed charge of calculating the weekly wage packets. If a man was paid short and challenged Mrs McConaghy, he always lost.

  Unbeknown to Lily, Sister Therese had told Mrs McConaghy all about the children and Lily’s situation at home. She no longer needed to be asked twice. The less she saw of Sister Therese, the better.

  ‘Here, don’t you go forgetting the envelope. Put that in there too, to keep it safe.’ No one had asked her to give that to Lily. That had been entirely her own idea. She had looked into her own heart for that little treat and the joy she’d got from putting the ten pounds into an envelope and giving it to Lily had been like no other pleasure she had ever known. She felt alive for the first time in a long while.

  At first, Lily thought it was a Christmas card. The office wall was covered in cards from customers and traders. Some of them had been addressed just to Lily herself, with lovely messages of appreciation, and she had so wanted to take them home, to show to Joe and Katie, to decorate their barren house at Clare Cottages. But Mrs McConaghy had pinned them up on the wall with all the others. As Lily picked up the envelope, it occurred to her that it felt flimsy, not firm enough to be a card. ‘What’s this?’ she asked.

  Mrs McConaghy beamed from ear to ear and looked towards the door. The furnaces were still firing and it would be another hour before her husband and brother-in-law appeared.

  ‘Look, open it now, would ye. There are some shady characters around at this time of the year and I don’t want ye opening it on the street or the bus.’

  Lily opened the envelope and almost fainted as she extracted the twenty brown ten-shilling notes. ‘Mrs McConaghy, is this for us?’ she gasped.

  ‘No,’ replied Mrs McConaghy. ‘It isn’t for “us”. It’s for you. For a new pair of shoes and for some clothes of your own. They have some lovely little red boots with a furry lining in that shop in St John’s market for two pounds and two shillings. If you ask, they might knock the two shillings off.’

  Never in a million years would Lily spend two pounds on herself. Not when there was Joe and Katie to see to first. Joe had no shoes. He would be first. ‘I don’t know what to say,’ she said again.

  ‘You are very special to us, Lily.’

  Lily noticed Mrs McConaghy’s cheeks were burning red and her eyes were bright and sparkling. She had partaken of a few sherries during the day. A bottle had stood open on her desk and she’d drunk to a prosperous new year with every trader who had called into the plant. Her eyes were misty.

  ‘I don’t know how we would manage without you, Lily. ’Tis just a sign of my appreciation. Sometimes I think you are better than family to me. My own niece, Amy, won’t come near the place.’

  Mrs McConaghy had gone from a reluctant acceptance to being terrified of losing Lily, but it had taken three long years to get to this point. This was the first time she had properly acknowledged Lily’s importance, and now she was suddenly better than family. Lily knew how valuable she was to the business. If she left tomorrow, they would struggle and be thrown into a tizzy of incomprehension. Both Mr and Mrs McConaghy’s health had deteriorated over the past three years and they had aged rapidly as a result.

  ‘And this, Lily, is for you, but you cannot open it until Christmas morning.’

  Mrs McConaghy held out a flat package wrapped in coloured tissue and Lily was truly speechless. Wide-eyed, she lifted the basket cover again and slipped the parcel inside.

  ‘Thank you.’ Her words were
little more than a whisper.

  ‘No, Lily, it’s me who should be saying thank you. Now, off you go.’

  Lily was determined to make the ten pounds spread as far as twenty and keep every penny a secret from her parents. She’d have to. Once they knew she had it, the lot would disappear within hours. She fought the urge to want to make them proud of her with pragmatism. She knew exactly how they would spend it. The horses at two thirty in the bookies. The pub at three. Pie van at five. Back to the pub and home at midnight. Shouting and fighting. Sick of the sight of each other. Every penny gone. And the following morning, neither would remember a thing. Lily knew this. It had happened before.

  She had asked her stepfather for some of her wages back for food, after he had ripped the packet from her one Friday night and disappeared straight out of the door.

  ‘I don’t know where your money is,’ he’d said. ‘Don’t call me a liar or you’ll get the back of me hand.’

  She didn’t call him a liar, but she got the back of his hand anyway.

  ‘You little bitch, just because I’m not your own father, you think you can speak to me any way you want. Look down your nose at me. Keep your money from me, me who puts a roof over your head. You ungrateful little madam.’

  And then she felt the force of his hand. Felt the wall against the back of her head and a fistful of hair being ripped from her scalp. Then it was over.

  Despite her headache, she had still arrived at McConaghy’s on time. That was the day Lockie took one look at her and then flew to the pub and pinned her stepfather to the wall. ‘One more time. Once more, old man, and I will kill you with my bare fists, do you understand that, you snivelling, stinking coward?’

  Lily’s stepfather had shaken and cried like a baby, but it had worked; he hadn’t hit her since. A man whose brain was almost pickled in alcohol and who forgot most things did not forget Lockie’s warning.

  Lily fastened her coat. She was reluctant to let go of the handle of the basket, in case it, along with the cake, her money, her present and her birdcage cover, should disappear. She had so little of her own, the birdcage cover was important to her.

  ‘Thank you again, Mrs McConaghy.’

  Without knowing why, and for the first time ever, she reached up and kissed her boss on her Coty-smelling powdered cheek. For a fraction of a second, she wallowed in the sensation of being hugged by a motherly figure. She inhaled the warm, perfumed smell, felt the pleasure of another’s arms around her shoulders, noticed the prickly down against the side of her face. For a moment, she wanted to cry. A strand of hair began to tickle her cheek and she felt Mrs McConaghy giving her the faintest squeeze.

  ‘Do what you have to do to have a good time, for all of you,’ said Mrs McConaghy. ‘I don’t mind how you spend it. Whatever way makes you happy. Merry Christmas, Lily.’

  *

  ‘Where has all that coal come from in the shed?’ her mother exclaimed later that night when she opened the door to scratch around for a few lumps at the back and was met by a black mountain.

  Lily had called into the coal merchant’s immediately she’d alighted from the bus. The coalman was busy, told her everyone came in for extra fuel once the Christmas money started to arrive.

  ‘I never heard him shouting. Did he deliver to everyone? Who’s paid for that?’ Her mother stood staring down at the heaped shovel in her hand, as though she couldn’t quite believe it. ‘Jeez, the coalman has turned into fecking Father Christmas.’

  Lily didn’t respond. If she told her mother she had money for coal, she would want to know what else she had money for. And it didn’t stop at the coal. The cupboards were filled with food, and for half a crown Lily had bought a turkey late on Christmas Eve in St John’s market.

  ‘And where did the money come from for that?’ her mother asked on her way out to the pub. ‘What the hell is going on around here?’

  Lily knew that as it was Christmas Eve, her parents would be out until later than usual. They would stagger into St Chad’s at midnight and then straight back into the pub after Mass until the early hours.

  ‘Mr and Mrs McConaghy gave it to me,’ she replied with a clear conscience. It was not a lie; they had, in a way. Lily was aware that her mother would assume that Sister Therese had been involved and that any chance of selling the turkey in the pub would be thwarted as a result.

  Lily had taken the children with her to the market. Joe was pushed along in his old pram, to carry the turkey back, and Katie held on to the side. They had been amazed by the noise and the sawdust. By the messenger boys whizzing past them on bikes with huge wicker baskets on the front, and by the bright overhead lights and the calls of the traders attempting to offload the last of the turkeys and sprouts before dark.

  Mrs McConaghy’s ten-pound present made the difference between a cold, miserable Christmas and a warm, comfortable one. Lily even managed to buy a small present for each of the children without them knowing.

  With Joe and Katie finally asleep and tucked up in bed, Lily slipped out to midnight Mass. She knew Sister Therese would expect to see her there and would miss her if she wasn’t. She heard her parents arrive in the back of the church as the pub spilled in through the door. ‘What am I doing here? I’m not even a Catholic,’ she heard someone shout in a drunken slur. It sounded like her stepfather. She died inside and, looking up at the cross, asked one question. Why?

  ‘Lily!’ Sister Therese called above the crowd outside as Lily hurried through it to make her way home. ‘I have presents back at the convent. I will pop them in in the morning after Mass. Where are your parents?’

  They both looked over at the heaving throng visible through the windows of the public house, already shouting out their orders for drinks.

  ‘Are you all right, Lily? Are you managing?’ Sister Therese’s heart nearly broke. If she could have one prayer answered tonight it would be for someone or something to make Lily smile. To share her burden and lift the weight from her shoulders.

  ‘I am, Sister. I am managing well.’

  For the first time, Sister Therese believed her.

  *

  Lily woke earlier than was usual on Christmas morning. She had been roused in the early hours by her parents’ noisy return home. She wondered how they had found their way or even remembered where they lived. She heard her stepfather try to use the bucket and miss as the sound of his steady stream of urine hitting the wooden floor filled the air. She had done her best to clean the kitchen before she left for Mass. She would have another mess to clean when she rose. Now she wanted to make sure the kids woke to a clean, urine-free kitchen, a roaring fire and a delicious breakfast. She had bought bacon and eggs in the market and she would fry bread in the fat that was left in the pan.

  The sulphur glow from the street lamps slipped into the room and the air was cold. She looked down at Joe. His breathing was even. The side of his sleeping face had taken on a marmalade glow. There was still the faint wheeze but no rattle. His thumb was placed firmly in his mouth and the arm of a well-worn teddy, all that was left of Lily’s once beloved bear, was clutched in his hand.

  Lily stroked his wispy blonde hair back from his face and, bending down, kissed his cheek. The lone arm of the teddy smelt pretty bad and she wondered if she might persuade him to throw it on to the fire to say thank you to Father Christmas for his toy train. She wished she had some paper to wrap the train in, to enhance the excitement, delay the surprise.

  Joe began to stir.

  ‘Stay asleep, little fella,’ she whispered into his hair. ‘I’m going to light the fire. Sleep for a bit longer.’

  Happy to have heard Lily’s voice, with his free hand he grabbed on to her finger and, like he had as a newborn, he grasped it tight. Within seconds he was once again relaxed as he flipped from wakefulness into a deep sleep.

  Lily had bought hair ribbons and colouring pencils for Katie, as well as a hand mirror and a bar of sweet-smelling soap. A toy train and books for Joe. She had also purchased a Cad
bury’s bar of chocolate each, a Satsuma and some nuts. Conscious that she had nothing to wrap it all in, she decided that just before she woke them, she would place two little piles at the foot of the bed.

  It had been hard enough buying the presents in the first place. With her heart pounding, she’d left Katie with Joe in the pram while she ran around the perimeter wall of the market, where the non-food stalls sold their wares. It took her no more than ten minutes and when she’d passed a fruit-and-veg stall, she bought the fruit and nuts and asked the vendor to place them in the paper bag with the toys.

  ‘How many kids you got, love?’ the fruit-and-veg man had asked.

  ‘Two,’ she replied. Not realizing that he thought they were hers.

  ‘You must have started early, queen.’ He laughed. ‘Here, I’ll throw in a few extras. Closing in half an hour, I am.’

  She couldn’t get her change back from him quick enough, keen to return to her siblings and the pram.

  ‘Didn’t mean to cause any offence, love,’ he shouted after her. ‘Merry Christmas.’

  Now, on Christmas morning, with the bedroom door open, the light from the fire in the kitchen lit up the room and warmed it through within minutes. Lily knew it was a dreadful waste of money, but she couldn’t help it. She wanted to make it a nice morning for Joe and Katie.

  She placed the presents at the bottom of the bed and then listened for the snores of her mam and stepdad. They were sound asleep and she just hoped that as the pubs were closed today, they would behave and not take their bad heads out on them all.

  ‘Wakey, wakey!’ She laughed as she tickled Katie. ‘Come on, monkey, wakey, wakey!’ And then to Joe, ‘I think Father Christmas has been and left you something at the bottom of the bed.’

  There was no further need to try and wake them. It was as though they had both received a shock. They sat upright together and then the room was filled with screams as, wiping the sleep from their eyes, they scrambled to the end of the bed, hardly able to believe what they were seeing. It was the first Christmas morning they’d woken up to presents.