The Children of Lovely Lane

by Nadine Dorries

  ‘Elsie, we are at the bingo, not on retreat,’ said Biddy, exasperated, as she eyed the Bible.

  ‘You know I can’t win a penny if I don’t have everything with me,’ whispered Elsie. ‘I have me lucky bloomers on too – you know, the ones with no elastic at the bottom of the legs. Helps me to get on and off the stool easier. They don’t cut the blood off at the top of me legs if they slide up. I felt faint once.’

  ‘Would ye help me off with me coat?’ Biddy put her arm out straight and gripped the table. ‘I thought you were getting here a bit earlier. Did you do what I asked?’

  Elsie grabbed at the cuff of Biddy’s coat and began to tug. ‘I would have been here ages ago, but Miss Bone Grinder wasn’t happy with her room and I had to make up the guest room for her. The one the visiting consultants use. I thought Matron would kick up a fuss, but, no, not a bit of it. She let her pick whatever room she wanted. Imagine that! I always keep that room for when Dr Gaskell has one of the big nobs from the TB committee staying, but now it’s Assistant Matron’s.’

  ‘When is her first proper day?’ asked Biddy as she changed hands and held out the other arm.

  ‘Eyes down, ladies!’ shouted Al, the caller. ‘Does everyone have a full set of books? Beryl is coming round now, so if you are feeling that little bit extra lucky tonight, buy another couple of books. I’ve kissed each one as a bonus, you lucky ladies.’

  Beryl, showing off her beehive hairdo and enormous bosom, minced past the end of the tables with the bingo books held aloft in her hand, looking more like a magician’s assistant than the woman who worked as a cleaner by day and a bingo-hall attendant by night.

  ‘That’s a Playtex bra she’s wearing,’ said Elsie disapprovingly as she finally removed Biddy’s coat. ‘Makes the nipples stick up and out.’

  ‘What in the name of God are you talking about, Elsie?’ asked Biddy as she folded her coat and slipped it under the desk.

  ‘Beryl, the caller’s assistant. Look at her.’ Elsie nodded without any subtlety whatsoever towards Beryl’s breasts as she passed them.

  ‘Extra books, ladies,’ Beryl purred in an affected voice. ‘Sixpence for one, a shilling for three.’

  ‘I saw her in T.J. Hughes yesterday, buying two. They have them in from America. A bit too in-your-face if you ask me. If anyone is feeling an extra bit lucky, it must be Al, because I can’t see any man around here with the money to throw away on Playtex bras – and not one but two! It’s him what’s bought them. She never got the money for them from her Sidney. They’re definitely carrying on, those two. Fancy taking money from a man to buy a bra.’

  ‘It’s not the bra he’s giving her money for, Elsie. And besides, you’re only jealous,’ said Biddy. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from Beryl’s breasts. They looked as though someone had blown them up. They stuck out at the ends in two firm points. She looked down at her own. They rested on one of her extra belly folds. ‘No matter how much money I had,’ she said to Elsie, ‘it would take more than a Playtex bra to do anything with my pair. I doubt a crane would work.’

  ‘And eyes down, it’s number four, the number of teeth on a whore.’

  ‘Talking about your missus, again, Al?’ a woman shouted from somewhere in the direction of where Hattie was sitting.

  Al grinned and, rolling his eyes, continued. ‘And it’s all the sixes, clickety-click.’

  Both ladies looked down at their books; only Biddy placed a cross in a box.

  ‘Anyway, Bone Grinder, she’s ready for action,’ Elsie whispered. ‘She’ll be out and about in the hospital very soon, if you ask me.’

  Al had called four numbers and Elsie hadn’t got a single one. She motioned for Beryl to bring her an extra book for the next game and extracted her purse.

  ‘Did you copy anything from the note she sent to Matron?’ asked Biddy, who’d just got legs eleven.

  ‘Dirty Gertie, number thirty,’ Al called.

  ‘That your mother-in-law then?’ shouted Hattie, who loved to flirt with the caller, the only woman in the hall not to have realized that Beryl had beaten her to it.

  ‘Ooh, don’t spoil my evening, Hattie,’ shouted Al. ‘I’d rather have to put up with a vicious dog than my mother-in-law. At least a dog lets go.’

  The women in the hall roared with laughter at the joke they had heard Al tell so many times before. It wasn’t just about playing the bingo, although that was exciting enough. The women met in the hall for a laugh, for the craic. Something to keep them going through the days of never-ending, repetitive, hard, physical work.

  ‘Line!’ A shout rang out and the hall filled with the sound of groans from thwarted would-be winners.

  ‘One more number and I would have had that,’ said Biddy. ‘I was nearly there. I feel lucky tonight, I do.’

  ‘Would you do the honours, Beryl, please, and check that line. I need a drink,’ shouted Al as he picked up his pint of Guinness and let it pour down his neck, closing his eyes in ecstasy.

  Elsie took advantage of the gap in the calling. ‘I copied as much as I could. Here, I couldn’t really understand all the writing, but I did me best.’ She took a sheet of paper out of her bag with her purse and thrust it at Biddy before locating her sixpence.

  ‘It’s a line, Al!’ shouted Beryl as she handed over the half-a-crown prize money. ‘And don’t spend it all at once,’ she said to the lucky lady as she minced away towards Elsie with her extra book.

  ‘Who was that?’ asked Elsie.

  ‘I couldn’t see,’ Biddy replied. ‘One of the women down at the front.’

  ‘The kitchen girls are down there tonight,’ said Elsie. ‘Like they need any luck. Not one of them leaves St Angelus with an empty bag. It’s no coincidence their kids are the fattest on the street. Saw one of them taking home a whole tray of jam sponge only last week.’

  ‘I don’t begrudge them that,’ said Biddy. ‘After all, they work for a pittance. You forget how well paid you and I are, Elsie.’

  Elsie harrumphed, but she couldn’t argue. She and Biddy had worked their way up to the top of the pile. Making sure no one toppled them was a constant pressure, yet the army of St Angelus domestics below them had little idea how much they owed to the united forces of Dessie, Elsie and Biddy.

  ‘Settle down, ladies,’ shouted Al. ‘We are off again. Two fat ladies!’ he called, and Biddy and Elsie marked their books.

  ‘What those kitchen women don’t know,’ Elsie said, ‘is that it’s us being one step ahead of everything what keeps their jobs safe.’

  Biddy was reading the note Elsie had copied from Matron’s office. ‘Keep your eye on my numbers, Elsie,’ she snapped as she read. When she’d finished, she folded the sheet in half and, opening her handbag, slipped it in.

  ‘Is everything all right, Biddy?’ asked Elsie.

  ‘Well, it’s nothing that can’t be sorted, but ’tis a fact, the biggest threat to our jobs is putting herself to bed right now, I’m guessing, in the accommodation corridor.’

  The shout ‘House!’ pierced the air and they looked across and saw Hattie waving her book around.

  ‘Bring your book to the front, please, Hattie,’ shouted Al. ‘I need to see a full house for meself.’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake. Did she buy her books from the Holy Mother herself or from Sandra at the door?’ said Elsie. ‘She wins almost every week.’ Each woman played to win, but no one liked it when someone they knew was repeatedly lucky. Harmony on the streets was achieved by virtue of the fact that they were all equal. Everyone struggled to the same degree.

  ‘I’m calling in to Dessie’s on the way home to show him this letter,’ said Biddy. ‘Are you coming with me?’

  ‘I can’t, Biddy. I would, but Jake has had to go and help one of his aunties in Bootle and Martha is on her own. Said I would call in on me way back. She’s really feeling the pregnancy now. Getting bigger every day.’

  Biddy felt a pang of jealousy. With none of her children living at home, all of them having flit
ted and none of them having been in contact for years, she never saw her grandchildren. Biddy was as alone in the world as Emily Haycock, she just hid it better because, unlike Emily, Biddy’s job as housekeeper at the school was of little importance in the hierarchy of St Angelus.

  ‘What auntie? I never knew he had an auntie in Bootle,’ said Biddy, who was always suspicious of behaviour that was out of the ordinary.

  ‘He said she was at the wedding. You would have seen her. There were loads of them. That’s the problem with weddings today, full of widows and men with false legs or arms or wearing eye patches.’

  ‘We can’t help the effect of the war, Elsie. Nothing we can do about that.’

  The room began to settle down once again as Hattie made her way back to her seat, but not before she’d caught sight of Biddy and Elsie and thrown them both a raspberry. ‘Shame you aren’t sat with me, ladies. Missed out on a drink, you did there. Always generous with me winnings, I am.’

  Elsie and Biddy grimaced back.

  ‘That’s not all you’re generous with, is it, Hattie,’ said Biddy.

  But Hattie didn’t hear as she slipped back into her seat with her neighbours and workmates from the hospital kitchens.

  As they turned the pages of their book to begin the next game, Biddy pondered on the contents of the note Elsie had copied. She had done well. It was a letter written by Miss Van Gilder to Matron about hospital staffing. Next to the words domestic staff she had written the words agency, efficiency, cost-effective, electric floor-cleaners. Biddy had no idea what an agency was, but she didn’t like the sound of it at all.

  ‘I can feel it in me water, we are going to have trouble on our hands with this new assistant matron,’ she said to Elsie.

  They were a formidable team when it came to dealing with trouble, but Biddy knew, as useless as she thought most men were – and personal experience had played a huge role in influencing her opinion, her husband and sons included – she could achieve only half as much without the cooperation of Dessie.

  She didn’t really enjoy the rest of the game. The word agency ate away at her and she wanted to discuss it with Dessie as soon as she could.

  Elsie didn’t enjoy the game much either. While she had been watching Biddy’s card, number thirty-two had come up, but Elsie had failed to mark it. She had been busy lighting a ciggie and putting her bag back down and trying to see what was on her own card when she heard one of the other women shout out, and the moment was gone.

  ‘Was that house?’ Biddy asked. ‘That was bloody quick. Must have got nearly all of them.’

  ‘I don’t know, can’t see.’

  And then they heard Maisie Tanner. ‘Isn’t that great, everyone, it’s Doreen!’ And the tin roof almost blew off as everyone began to cheer and clap and whistle, even fickle Hattie Lloyd.

  *

  ‘Oh God, she would have killed me if she’d known,’ Elsie said to her daughter, Martha, as she sat down in her kitchen an hour later. ‘The house was hers. I was supposed to be watching the numbers, but Doreen got it instead.’

  ‘Ah well, that’s nice, Mam. Doreen deserves it. You did Doreen a good turn there. She hasn’t worked for weeks, she could do with the money. Don’t tell Biddy, then,’ Martha said as she poured them both some tea. ‘How much was the prize?’

  ‘It was only two pounds, but she would have found it useful. God, I feel awful. I panicked. I could have told her and she could have claimed it because her number was called first. She would have bitten me head off though, and that’s a fact. Maisie Tanner sent round a hat and we all put a shilling in and Maisie gave that to Doreen at the end of the night. She was a mess, Doreen. In floods of tears. You should have seen the state of her, but I think she was happy too.’

  ‘It’s no wonder she still gets a bit tearful. Thank goodness Matron kept her job open for her, though. Poor Doreen, imagine if she’d had to go and look for another one after all that. Sometimes Matron is her own worst enemy, don’t you think, Mam? Everyone thinks she’s as tough as old boots, but she is a good woman for all that.’

  Elsie nodded. She knew Matron better than most. ‘How long will Jake be then?’ she asked.

  ‘He will be on the bus now, I guess. His aunt’s moved into one of the new tin houses and she wanted him to put up a curtain rod.’

  ‘When that baby arrives, you make sure he’s not at everyone’s beck and call,’ said Elsie. ‘He can stop doing favours for people when he’s a dad. Which reminds me, could you ask him to pop into mine after work tomorrow? There’s water on the floor under the kitchen sink and I cannot for the life of me work out where it’s coming from,’ Elsie added without a hint of irony in her voice.

  ‘Mam, I’m going to ask Auntie Biddy to be a godmother to the baby. Her and Uncle Dessie. What do you think?’

  Elsie put her cup down and thought for a moment. ‘I think that would make her day, Martha. Biddy always needs to be fussing about someone. I feel sorry for her, but I can never tell her that. Not one of her kids contacts her. You do that, Martha. Your baby can have two nanas in one street for the price of one.’

  14

  Miss Van Gilder fastened the silver buckle on her assistant matron’s belt and then drew back the heavy curtains on the tall, mullioned windows which overlooked the frost-covered car park of St Angelus. She could tell by the painted pictures of Squirrel Nutkin that the children’s wards ran adjacent to the accommodation block. As she looked across, every now and then she would catch a glimpse of a nurse with a baby or a child in her arms, pointing out of the window to passers-by in an attempt to soothe the fretting child.

  ‘Mummy will be here soon,’ she could imagine the nurse was probably saying.

  No, Mummy would not.

  Miss Van Gilder had read only that week that there were moves to allow parents to visit their children when they were in-patients; that there was a school of thought suggesting that separating children from their mothers could do psychological harm. ‘What a lot of old rot,’ she had exclaimed out loud. She would never allow that to happen. She had been at St Angelus for just a few days and could already tell that rules needed to be tightened there, not relaxed.

  The westerly wind that blew across from the Mersey had frozen her to the bone, and the frost had been in permanent attendance from the day she’d arrived. She thought of St Dunstan’s and how she had moved from pillar to post ever since, under a cloud. When Sister Haycock had contacted her requesting a name and address so that St Angelus could ask for a testimonial, she’d been thrown slightly. It had to be St Dunstan’s. She would be safe. Matron at St Dunstan’s was too arrogant and proud. She would do anything to avoid any criticism being levelled at the running of her hospital. There were moves to force her to retire, but she was resisting. No, the matron at St Dunstan’s would not say a word. No one else would catch up with her. Not here, she thought to herself. I am too far north for anyone to know me. Not here.

  Matron had been away since she’d arrived, visiting her elderly mother, and today was to be their first formal meeting. Miss Van Gilder had not wasted her time, however, and had made it her business to visit every ward and department in the hospital and to announce, in her own special way, that she had arrived. She had only clashed with one sister, Sister Antrobus, who had quite recently been put in charge of casualty. The air had bristled with resentment the moment the two women met.

  ‘I would like to go through with you your reporting of admissions and how you allocate patients to beds, please,’ Miss Van Gilder had said.

  ‘And why would that be?’ Sister Antrobus had enquired. ‘It is done the same way it has been done in this hospital since 1932.’ She had pulled herself up to her full height. The fine, downy hair on the back of her neck prickled with mistrust.

  ‘And that, Sister Antrobus, is exactly why I would like to take a look. I am amazed that Matron has not felt the need to bring the reporting procedure into line with NHS protocols.’

  ‘And what would they be?’ asked Siste
r Antrobus. ‘We allocate patients to the wards with empty beds. It isn’t brain surgery. In the winter, we are often tight and we can have children on the geriatric wards, but we do what we have to do. Unless of course, in your role as assistant matron, you can magic up some beds.’

  ‘Why were you moved from ward two?’ Miss Van Gilder didn’t mince her words. Not a muscle moved in her face; her jaw was set, her eyes fixed on her prey.

  Sister Antrobus was speechless. Caught unawares. She had been diminished by her past indiscretion, then forgiven by Matron, but only just. Her lip wobbled, her gaze faltered. She folded her arms firmly across her chest, to protect herself and ward off any further attacks, but it was useless, she was beyond help.

  ‘Well?’ Miss Van Gilder smelt blood. Her first blow had wounded her opponent. ‘Gynae is a coveted ward. Never in my life have I known a sister walk away from gynae. Not unless she was going mad or sickening for something, or, of course, if she had misbehaved. There used to be a consultant on that ward, I saw his name entered in the book of death certificates. He’s gone too, by all accounts. A consultant and a ward sister, both at the same time. I never heard the like, but you have.’

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about. It was a coincidence.’

  ‘Too much of a coincidence, if you ask me. I will get to the bottom of it. Nothing escapes me. Now, bed reporting.’

  Sister Antrobus swallowed hard. She thought she’d been given a lucky break. That on casualty she would have the chance to heal her wounds. But the arrival of Miss Van Gilder had put paid to that and Sister Antrobus dreaded what would be the outcome if she found out.

  If Miss Van Gilder was unimpressed by Sister Antrobus, she was practically at war with the domestics.

  ‘The hospital is run like we’re one big family,’ the cook in the main kitchen had told her as she opened and closed the store cupboards.