by Val Wood
‘Oh, it isn’t the same without reading the whole chapter,’ he claimed. ‘Maybe we’ll read it later, shall we?’
‘Good idea,’ Jenny agreed. ‘Maybe before bedtime, or will you get too excited?’ She appeared to be asking Rosie, but was actually looking at Susan, who was clearly unimpressed by this charming boy. Jenny wondered why she had taken against him.
‘I won’t get excited,’ Rosie began, but was cut off when Molly and Louisa came into the room.
‘I’ve found some duck eggs under ’hedge,’ Molly complained, holding two dirty eggs in her hands, ‘but Louisa says they’ll have gone off and we can’t eat them.’
‘No, you can’t,’ her father said, and went to take them off her. ‘They’ll have been there for weeks. You know that ducks go off lay in winter.’
Molly shrugged away from him and dropped one of the eggs on the flagged floor. It broke and a stink of sulphur rose up.
‘You see!’ he said. ‘Now give it here.’
Molly threw the other egg on the floor in front of him and began to wail.
‘Oh, Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,’ Robin began.
‘Humpty Dumpty had a great fall,’ Louisa continued, and Molly began laughing through her tears, whilst Peggy hurried off into the scullery to get cloths to clear up the mess.
‘Happy days,’ Jenny said to no one in particular as Aaron scooped up Molly and sat her on his knee in the chair by the fire, and they continued with the nursery rhyme. Then she turned to Susan. ‘I don’t think you need have any worries,’ she murmured. ‘It seems to me that the boy might be a good influence on Molly.’
Susan heaved out a breath. ‘I wish somebody was,’ she muttered. ‘She’s beyond me.’
‘It’s not Molly’s fault, Susan,’ Jenny said softly. ‘No amount of chastising will change her. It’s simply a misfortune of birth that she’s not the same as other children, and no one’s to blame.’ She looked up at Jack as she spoke, and intercepted an ice-cold stare at his wife that made her shiver. I wonder how they’ll survive in their own place without the distraction of all the family here, she thought, but it’s unreasonable to expect Mother and Father to deal with their marriage difficulties. That’s something Jack and Susan have to work out for themselves. Till death us do part, she thought. She gave a deep inward sigh. Definitely not for me, thank you very much.
The wind became stronger and sleet came down heavily as they ate their midday meal; Jack checked on the fire in the parlour, putting on more logs and coal to make a big blaze, whilst Aaron built up the fire in the range. When they’d finished eating they both got up to put on their coats before going outside again.
‘I’ll need to chop some more logs,’ Jack said. ‘It’s a constant job.’
‘Can I help?’ Robin asked. ‘I’ve never done it before but I could try.’
‘Dunno about that,’ Jack muttered. ‘What will your ma say if she turns up and you’ve got toes missing?’
Robin didn’t realize that Jack was being sarcastic and he responded seriously that she might say that he’d been careless.
‘You were splittin’ logs afore you were ten,’ Aaron reminded Jack. ‘Every lad should learn.’
‘Aye, every country lad. Don’t suppose town lads need to,’ Jack retorted.
‘Oh, they do,’ Robin said earnestly. ‘I’ve seen them, and bringing coal up from a cellar.’
‘From a cellar?’ Susan commented. ‘So you’ve always lived in a town, have you?’
Robin nodded, but it seemed to Jenny that he suddenly looked uneasy. ‘Yes,’ he murmured. ‘Or a city.’
‘Aye, well mebbe,’ Jack said. ‘But I’m not doing it right now; we’ve plenty for ’time being. I’ve got ’livestock to feed first.’
‘I’ll give you a hand,’ Aaron said. ‘Then I’m off down to Paull, see who’s about.’
‘You were there last night,’ Peggy admonished him. ‘Your daughter’s come to see you.’
‘Oh, aye. Sorry,’ Aaron said apologetically, grinning sheepishly.
Jenny laughed. ‘Go on,’ she said. ‘We’ll chat later and you can tell me all the gossip when you come back. Here.’ She reached for her bag and took out a small packet of something sweet-smelling and pungent.
‘Ooh, thanks, love,’ he beamed. ‘Rotterdam Shag, my favourite baccy. I won’t be more than an hour or so.’ He headed off, the children disappeared into the parlour and Jenny stood up to help her mother with the dishes. Then Susan got up too.
‘I’ll see to ’dishes,’ she said, and Peggy looked at her in astonishment. ‘You and Jenny go and have a chat. I don’t mind, honest.’
‘If you’re sure? Are you feeling up to it?’ Peggy unfastened her apron before she changed her mind. ‘That’ll be nice. Come on, Jenny. Let’s sit in ’parlour and catch up with what you’ve been up to.’
They hoisted Emma and Rosie out of the chairs by the fire; Molly, Louisa and Robin were sitting on the floor playing pick up sticks and the younger girls joined them.
‘They play well together,’ Jenny murmured. ‘I’ve said to Susan I don’t think she need have any worries about the boy.’
Her mother nodded. ‘Susan’s a bit on edge at ’minute, as we all are since she lost ’baby.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘If anything, they don’t squabble when Robin’s there. The trouble is,’ she dropped her voice, ‘Molly tends to monopolize him and wants him to play only with her. He listens to her and explains things to her; he’s very patient.’
Jenny watched the children before speaking. ‘I think he’s more used to being with adults than with children,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘How many children do you know who shake hands with an adult on first meeting them?’
‘None,’ her mother said.
‘I don’t understand why his mother would leave him; and why here? He doesn’t have a Yorkshire accent – has he said where he’s from?’
‘They came from London, so he said. Though he’s also mentioned Manchester, and Eastbourne, and Brighton,’ Peggy added, ‘so they’ve been around a lot. Don’t seem to have stayed in any one place for long, and he told me that they were always moving on. But it’s a mystery why they should turn up here, unless they were visiting someone.’
‘Do you have a deck of playing cards?’ Jenny heard Robin say. ‘I could teach you how to play Patience.’
All the little girls laughed. ‘Patience,’ Emma said. ‘That’s not a game! That’s what you have to have, that’s what our ma says.’
Jenny turned back to her mother. ‘Sorry,’ she murmured. ‘What did you say?’
‘About what?’
‘About where they’d lived.’
‘London and Manchester—’
‘Yes, and where else?’
Peggy thought. ‘Erm, Eastbourne and Brighton. Why?’
‘Oh, I just wondered.’ Jenny thought for a minute. Something stirred in her mind. What was it she was recollecting? Then she murmured again, ‘He’s definitely spent time with grown-ups. Only an adult would teach a boy to play Patience, but why?’
‘No idea,’ her mother said. ‘Who has the time to do such a thing?’
‘Somebody with time on their hands? Or maybe so that he could entertain himself.’ You might think it could be a grandparent, Jenny pondered, but not one like my parents, who are working people. Somebody retired, perhaps, or not in regular work. They sometimes had gypsy children in the school where she taught and they were sharp and knowing and intelligent, but not all could read or write and she doubted that Patience would be the kind of card game that their parents would play.
She looked across at him now. He wasn’t from gypsy stock, that was for certain: fair-skinned and that reddish, brownish hair; he could almost be a brother or cousin to the girls.
Her mother was speaking, asking what she would be doing for Christmas. Was she staying with friends? Who was cooking Christmas dinner? ‘We’ll have most of ’family here on Boxing Day,’ Peggy went on. ‘We’ll all be to-ing and fro-ing between each o
ther’s houses, I expect; your aunts and uncles and all of ’bairns.’
And that’s precisely why I won’t be here, Jenny thought. I know I’m being selfish but it’s like being with the Spanish Inquisition. All the aunts want to know why I’m not married with a houseful of children and the men eye me up and down and wonder why I haven’t got a man in tow and what’s wrong with me.
‘I’m meeting a group of friends at the Maritime Hotel in Hull. We’ve booked a table. We’re all independent and don’t have to rush off anywhere. In fact I’ve booked a room.’ She thought her mother looked rather forlorn, so she added, ‘And the day after Boxing Day I’ll come home and help you eat up all the extra food you cooked and didn’t eat, and as everyone else will have gone home you and I and Da can have a nice cosy time together.’
Peggy smiled. ‘Oh, I’m so pleased, and your da will be too. And you do know, don’t you, that you can bring a friend with you at any time?’
She had said the same thing every year since Jenny had left home, and Jenny said again, as she always did, ‘I do know that, Ma, but there’s no one special that I’d want to bring.’
But then she remembered Dorothy – or Delia as she now called herself – and wondered how on earth she had managed not to mention her name.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
It was on the return journey to Hull that Jenny began to put two and two together and remembered who it was who had mentioned Brighton. No one around here would know much about the seaside resort on the Sussex coast. A young Prince of Wales had infamously made the fishing village a fashionable resort a hundred years before, and with the coming of the railways the coastal town had become popular with London day trippers; that in turn led to the building of hotels and theatres and made the town even more attractive.
It was a long way from the north of England, but Delia had been desperate to get away from her parents and would have wanted to travel to where they would never find her. But it must surely be a coincidence, Jenny mused. From his accent the boy was definitely from the south, but still …
She couldn’t think straight. It was such a long time, ten years or more, since she and Delia had been close. They’d done everything together: romped in the playground, walked home from school, strolled by the estuary whenever Delia was allowed out … she didn’t have the freedom that I enjoyed, Jenny remembered. She always had jobs to do, serious work: cleaning the cottage, cooking, tending the vegetable garden, feeding the goats and hens – well, I fed our hens too, of course, but it was never my sole responsibility.
Both Jack and I had to help out on the farm, Jack because it was expected that he would work there when he left school, and me because it was assumed, wrongly, that I would eventually become a farmer’s wife. But school work and playing with friends was of paramount importance too, for us, and our parents knew that, but it wasn’t the same for Delia. She wasn’t allowed any opinions and her free time was strictly curtailed.
And then she remembered that if she called for Delia she wasn’t allowed into the cottage if Mr or Mrs Deakin was there. I had to stand on the doorstep and more often than not I was told that Dorothy – Delia – couldn’t come out until she had finished whatever it was she was doing.
But why did she run away? What was the final hurt that made her decide that she couldn’t stay at home any longer but must plough her own furrow, to use a farming term? Jenny had often worried that her father might have beaten her; quite often she had a bruise on her legs or arms. She sighed. Perhaps one day she might tell me.
Jenny had thought of walking from the train station to her rooms in the park; it was a pleasant walk along the Spring Bank and not too far, but as she left the concourse she saw that it was sleeting hard and it was quite dark so she decided to hire a cab and was home in just under fifteen minutes.
Bliss, she sighed as she climbed the stairs, which were dimly lit by gaslight from a ceiling lamp in the hall, unlocked her door on the first-floor landing and reached for the box of matches that she kept inside the door to light her own lamp. She turned up the wick and as the flame glowed brighter she glanced around in satisfaction at her living room with its comfy sofa, the fireplace where she had left the grate filled with paper, kindling and coal ready to light, her table covered with a chenille cloth with a space to place the lamp, the ornaments on the side dresser, the paintings on the wall and her precious bookcase filled with her favourite books.
She was a neat and tidy person and everything was in its place. ‘I love to visit my family, but I don’t think I could ever live with anyone else again,’ she murmured. ‘It would upset my equilibrium.’
It wasn’t until she had changed from her travelling clothes into something more comfortable, put on her slippers, and eaten the bread and ham her mother had insisted she should bring home, along with a bag of shortbread biscuits just made that morning, that her thoughts drifted back to the boy.
‘Where was I with that?’ she mumbled, breaking into the habit she had of talking to herself. ‘What was the connection?’
She sipped a cup of tea, nibbled on a biscuit and stretched her feet towards the fire. I don’t think there is one, she decided. Delia didn’t say that she had lived in Brighton, just that she had played in a theatre there. Perhaps his family were Londoners and they’d been to the coast for holidays. Then she sat forward. But why did they arrive in such an out of the way place as Paull? Even people from Hull don’t know where it is.
Ah! Of course! She put down her cup. He wasn’t taken there deliberately; he had been in Hedon at the hiring fair and simply joined the children when they went home. He could just as well have turned up anywhere. Thorngumbald or Camerton, Burton Pidsea or Burstwick, or any of the villages round about. There’s no mystery about it – I must write to my mother and tell her she’s got hold of the wrong end of the stick.
The show was in its final week before the theatre closed to prepare for the annual pantomime. Delia had written to her agent to ask if there were any short gaps she could fill in this area, but he’d replied to say there was a vacancy in Leeds, but nothing closer.
I was lucky to find this booking, she thought as she curled up on a chair in her lodgings one evening. But what shall I do now? I have to earn some money; I won’t be paid whilst I’m not appearing even though I have the contract for the next show. Do I take the Leeds booking to tide me over?
She put her head in her hands. I don’t know what to do. I’m no further on than I was before. She took a deep breath. I must tell Jenny when I see her that I can’t join her and her friends on Christmas Day. I don’t have that kind of money to spend. Jenny has a regular salary, and although I don’t suppose it’s huge, it will be a lot more than I can earn. I really do have to sing for my supper.
She began to undress and brush her hair; her stage make-up she had removed before she left the theatre. Giles Dawson had been waiting to walk with her to their shared lodgings.
‘It’s good of you to wait,’ she’d said.
‘Not at all.’ He’d smiled. ‘Can’t have a lovely lady walking alone at this time of night.’
‘You’re very gallant, Mr Dawson.’ She’d accepted the offer of his arm. She felt comfortable with him, as she always had done with Arthur Crawshaw; there was no flirting or flippant dalliance from either of them, just straightforward friendship, which she regarded as unusual but what she was happiest with.
She’d asked him what he would be doing next. Would he be staying on with the theatre orchestra?
‘Yes, if they want me,’ he’d said. ‘What about you?’
‘Well, I don’t do pantomime, so I must find something else. There’s a vacancy in Leeds if I want to apply, but …’
‘That’s not far,’ he was quick to point out. ‘You might not want to come back to Hull every night, even if there’s a late train, but if you’re called back for any, erm, family problems you could be here the next day.’
She’d been almost on the point of telling him about her son, but she had he
ld back. What would he think of her? He would of course immediately guess that Jack had been born out of wedlock, which was true, but his view of her would then be warped.
So I didn’t, she thought as she lit a candle beside her bed and drew back the covers, but there are times when I would like to take someone into my confidence. I was often on the edge of sharing my story with Arthur, but I didn’t want to lose his friendship either.
And the odd thing was, she pondered, that he had never asked. It was as if he accepted me as I was, a young woman with a son and no husband in tow. Perhaps he was typical of theatre folk, used to the vagaries of characters who choose to hide behind a mask rather than reveal their real selves.
But what to do now? I’ll ask Mr Rogers if he’s still planning a show after the pantomime, as he told me. Of course, he might want a different cast entirely, but I’m fairly sure he won’t break my contract. He seems an honest man.
She drew her legs into bed and put her head on the pillow. I just need something to tide me over. I could apply to be a temporary shop girl, just to earn enough for my lodgings. Other ideas flitted through her mind, and she thought too of the story she must spin to Jenny when she told her that she wouldn’t be at the Maritime for Christmas Day lunch.
Unless … she suddenly sat up as a notion – a plan – broke into her meandering thoughts. Just suppose … what if …? The Maritime was a lovely hotel. It had a comfortable lounge, and a very select dining room with a grand piano; she had run her fingers over the keys when she’d been there with Jenny. She couldn’t play – she’d never been taught; they hadn’t had the luxury of a piano at home – but she knew a few notes of several songs.
Perhaps – the idea took hold – perhaps I’ll call tomorrow. Her self-esteem was often very low and she was inclined to be pessimistic, but she forced herself now to consider how she would offer such a concept, with herself as the prize.
The rain was heavy the next morning and after breakfast she asked the landlady if she could loan her an umbrella.
