A Sister's Promise

by Anne Bennett

  Kevin was delighted to see the familiar face of his grandfather, and not at all worried when he told him he was in hospital. He was relieved, and more so when his grandfather told him he had to stay there for a little while and only one thing worried him.

  ‘You won’t let my grandmother come and visit me will you?’ he pleaded.

  ‘Well, now, Kevin, I don’t know if I can rightly do that,’ Stan said awkwardly. ‘I mean, she is flesh and blood, after all.’

  Kevin was so crestfallen at the news that even in the hospital he wouldn’t be safe from his grandmother that Stan mentioned his request to the doctor before he left and was surprised by his response. ‘If you are right, and this woman’s arrival from Ireland has worsened Kevin’s condition, then her visiting him could undermine any treatment that he might be undergoing. And, as the care of the patient is paramount here, if this woman visits the hospital she will be blocked from the wards.’

  ‘You don’t know how much better that makes me feel,’ Stan said.

  The doctor smiled at him. ‘Your face gives you away,’ he said. ‘Don’t fret. Your grandson is safe here.’

  As the doctor watched Stan walk away, he felt a wave of sympathy wash over him. Sickness, tragedy, even death were part and parcel of his job and yet he felt that the little boy now in his care had suffered so grievously already he vowed to do all in his power not only to restore him to full health and strength, but also under the guardianship of his grandfather.

  Stan couldn’t quite keep the hint of satisfaction out of his voice as he told Biddy that she wouldn’t be allowed to visit her grandson. She didn’t believe it, said she had never heard anything so ridiculous in her life and set off for the hospital immediately to challenge this ruling. However she found herself face to face with Matron, a formidable woman, who had had her orders from the doctor and was carrying them out to the letter.

  Biddy was outraged and went home via the presbytery where she complained bitterly to Father Monahon. He had known nothing about the collapse of Kevin, but assured Biddy there must be some misunderstanding and that he would go himself to the hospital to find out what was what.

  The hospital staff had been given no instructions about the priest and so he was allowed to see Kevin. Even he was shocked to see how thin and wan the child looked. His eyes seemed huge in the gaunt, pinched face and they grew ever bigger and wider as he looked at the priest he had always been a little nervous of.

  ‘Well now, Kevin,’ the priest said heartily. ‘What’s all this?’

  ‘Dunno, Father.’

  ‘Collapsing at school I was told.’

  ‘Yes, Father.’

  ‘Did you feel unwell?’

  Kevin could have said he had never felt right since the day he had learned that his parents had died, but he didn’t know how to put that into words and he was too weary to try, so he shrugged and said, ‘Not specially.’

  ‘Had everyone worried, you know,’ the priest said, as if it had been Kevin’s own fault.

  He didn’t know what to say to that other than, ‘Yes, Father.’

  ‘Your grandmother in particular is very worried.’

  He saw the shudder pass through Kevin’s body and it irritated him. He went on, ‘She came along to see you and they wouldn’t let her in – some notion or other that it might disturb you. Well, I am going to see about that this minute, for I have never heard such nonsense.’

  Kevin’s eyes grew wider than ever. ‘No! No!’ he yelled.

  ‘Kevin, don’t be so silly,’ the priest snapped. ‘And really, this is not a matter for you to decide. You are just a small boy and not equipped to make judgements. That is for your elders and betters, and whatever strange aversion you have to your grandmother, you will have to overcome it, for I’m sure when I speak with the doctor he will see how ridiculous the whole thing is.’

  Kevin was sure he would too. Few adults seemed to care about the things that bothered children. There was a sudden roaring in his head at the dread of seeing his grandmother in the room, and he opened his mouth and began to scream.

  The priest leaped up from the side of the bed crying, ‘Stop this, Kevin! Stop this nonsense!’

  The next minute he was almost knocked on his back as the doctor pushed past him, and when he saw the child in the grip of terror, he knew that whatever the priest had said or done had brought this on, and so while he prepared a syringe for the child, he said through gritted teeth, to the nurses that had followed him into the room, ‘Get him out of here.’

  ‘I assure you, I did or said nothing,’ the priest said as he was led away. ‘One minute I was talking to the child and the next he was yelling his head off.’

  He was yelling no longer, for the sedative had done its work and Kevin had lapsed again into a drug-induced stupor. The doctor knew that from that point on, the priest would be another on the banned list of visitors.

  Almost a week after Kevin’s admittance to hospital, Molly was given the day off from school because it was the Silver Jubilee of King George V. She visited Kevin in the hospital, which was festooned in red, white and blue, and in festival mode.

  ‘They say we’re having a party and that,’ Kevin told his sister. ‘And a concert.’

  ‘You going?’

  ‘Nah. Don’t think so,’ Kevin said. ‘I don’t feel like it.’

  Molly understood, for there had been things planned in Erdington too. She had met Hilda on the road a few days earlier and she had advised her to go and enjoy herself. ‘Your mom and dad wouldn’t want you like this,’ she’d said assuredly. ‘You mustn’t feel bad about having a bit of fun now and then.’

  ‘I know that, Hilda,’ Molly had answered. ‘And maybe in time I will be able to do this, but just now I am too full of sadness to think of anything else. I really am poor company for anyone these days and I am best on my own learning to cope with everything. Anyway, if I had been breaking my neck to go, do you think for one moment my grandmother would let me? She has a poor view on anything that might spell enjoyment for me. God, I have to fight tooth and nail to visit Kevin.’

  ‘What does your grandfather say of all this carry-on?’

  ‘Very little,’ Molly said. ‘There’s no point because it would do no good and anyway, if he does say anything she is worse to me afterwards.’

  ‘I feel that sorry for you, bab.’

  ‘Hilda, I feel sorry for myself and that doesn’t help either,’ Molly said candidly. ‘And I am afraid that the Jubilee celebrations will have to go on without me.’

  One Thursday afternoon over a week later, Molly returned home from school to find a social worker in the house, filling in forms with her grandmother. The visitor looked up and smiled as Molly entered the room.

  ‘Aren’t you the lucky girl then, going to live far from this dusty city?’ she said.

  Molly didn’t feel the slightest bit lucky and she had to know whether there was any sort of viable alternative, even if Biddy punished her afterwards. Just lately she had begun to think an orphanage in Birmingham would be preferable to going anywhere with her horrid grandmother. At least then she might be able to see her granddad and Kevin sometimes.

  ‘But, you see, I like Birmingham,’ she said, ‘Couldn’t I stay in an orphanage here?’

  The social worker laughed a little before saying, ‘Well, you are a funny one and no mistake. Most children wouldn’t choose an orphanage if they had any choice in the matter, but you wouldn’t be offered a place anyway.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because our orphanages are already bursting at the seams,’ the social worker said. ‘They are for children who have no one. They have either been abandoned by their parents or the parents are dead and there is no one else to care for them, while you on the other hand—’

  ‘Have a home waiting for you,’ Biddy said, cutting in. She continued with a malevolent sneer, ‘Get used to it, Molly. I’m stuck with you and your brother and you are stuck with me.’

  Molly knew she was ri
ght and at first she told herself that she was the lucky one, because in a year she could be working and then she could save and get away from the woman, come back to Birmingham if she liked. But then, how could she leave Kevin totally unprotected? She knew that she could not do that. When they escaped her clutches they had to do it together. She sighed as she realised she was looking at years and years of putting up with verbal and physical abuse, scorn and ridicule.

  However, when her grandfather came home from a meeting he had had with Kevin’s doctor at the hospital, he had more news, which he told them over tea that evening. It had been decided that when Kevin was well enough to leave the hospital, he would be delivered into his grandfather’s care and left there. The medical staff had said, in their opinion he needed people he knew and loved around him, and taking him from the familiar would be detrimental to his health. Not even the Catholic Church had the power to overturn that ruling and Stan was hard-pressed not to show his blessed relief at the decision, though he felt heartsore that nothing similar could be done to save Molly from Biddy’s clutches.

  At first Molly did feel slightly resentful and was saddened that she would be leaving her little brother behind, but then she decided it was better for both of them. She knew he would be all right with their grandfather. Meanwhile she only had to look out for herself and she was of the opinion that that would take all her time and energy.

  Biddy had a momentary pang too that she wouldn’t have the boy to bully, but then she told herself she had never liked boys much anyway. She did have Molly, who was the image of her bold and wilful mother, and she would make the child pay and dearly for her mother’s transgressions until she wished she had never been born.

  Molly and her grandmother were due to leave on 21 May and the time left in Birmingham passed in a blur to Molly, especially as Biddy kept her hard at it. Each morning she had to get up first. Biddy gave her an alarm clock to ensure she did this. Her first job of the day was to clean the grate and lay and light the fire. That had always been her father’s job, even long before her mom took sick, and when he had lit the fire he would bank it with slack for safety. Then, when her mother got up, she would poke it well and put some nuggets of coal on it before calling Kevin and Molly, and so the room was always warm for them in the morning.

  Molly decided very early on that she would rather clean the whole kitchen than the grate. It took skill to lay a fire that drew properly and lit first time. Biddy boxed her ears on a couple of occasions when the damned thing had gone out on her. The point was she couldn’t watch it because she had to make the porridge for breakfast, which she could never linger over because she had to make the beds and wash up the breakfast things before she left for school.

  After school, she would be presented with a shopping list and when she had hauled the stuff home, she had to cook the evening meal. How she missed Hilda at those times, for her lively encouragement, ready sense of humour and the way she could make Molly smile, even when she had been worried about her mother. Molly often wondered bleakly if she would ever smile again.

  And when the meal that Biddy carped about and criticised had been eaten, Molly would clear away and wash up, and then Biddy would produce a basket of mending. She taught Molly to darn, sew on buttons and turn up hems, and there was always plenty for her to practise on in the long evenings.

  Any homework Molly did secretly in the bedroom by the light of a candle. It meant she was almost constantly tired, but she didn’t bother saying anything, knowing there would be little point.

  Saturday was particularly tiring, for as well as a big shop, there were the beds to change and the washing to do. When the wet and heavy clothes were hauled from boiler to sink, and her fingers rubbed raw on the wash board, it all had to be put through the mangle and hung out on the line.

  Molly hated the wet and miserable days when it had to be hung inside, for she knew it would take ages to dry and, as Biddy would not let her iron on a Sunday, there would pile of ironing waiting for her on Monday after school. On good days she would start this chore after she had given the house a good clean. Clothes for Mass, for Biddy and herself, had to be ironed and left on the picture rail to air if they were still not completely dry, and then the shoes had all to be cleaned. Molly would often be nearly sobbing with weariness by the time that she was able to seek her bed.

  That last Saturday Biddy went into the station to see about the tickets and, despite the mountains of things Molly had to do, she said to her grandfather, ‘I’m popping next door. I can’t leave without bidding Hilda goodbye.’

  ‘You do right,’ Stan said. ‘The woman is worried about you. She stopped me in the street the other day and was asking about you. She would value a visit.’

  Hilda was delighted to see Molly, though she saw the black bags beneath her tired, sad eyes in her bleached face, and her heart turned over. She made a cup of tea and produced a tin of biscuits, and Molly felt the saliva form in her mouth, for she was nearly always hungry.

  Hilda saw her expression and she said, ‘Tuck in, girl. You look as if you need feeding up. I know one thing: your mother would hate seeing you this way.’

  ‘You have known Mom always, haven’t you, Hilda?’ Molly said.

  Hilda nodded. ‘From the day she and Ted moved in after the wedding.’

  ‘Didn’t they have a honeymoon?’

  Hilda shook her head. ‘Few people did then. Your father did have a few days off and used the time to do up the house a bit and get the garden tidied up, and Nuala and I were the very best of friends from that first day. I promised your mother that I would look after you if anything happened to her. She asked me just before she was taken to hospital.’ Hilda went on, adding sadly, ‘I feel right bad that I have been unable to keep that promise.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, Auntie Hilda,’ Molly said. ‘There is no help for it, I know that now. At least Kevin is all right and I will survive it. It is only a year until I leave school and then once I have a wage, I will save, however long it takes, and come back here just as soon as I can.’

  ‘You do that, ducks, and you knock on my door any time ’cos you will be welcome.’

  ‘I know that, Hilda,’ Molly said. ‘Will you sort of keep an eye on Kevin? Granddad too, of course?’

  ‘You don’t really need to ask that,’ Hilda said. ‘A poor sort of neighbour and friend I would be if I just washed my hands of them now. Your mother and father were the best neighbours to have in the world, and your mother the kindest, sweetest person, and there isn’t a day goes by when I don’t miss her. Anything I can do for any of you, I would do gladly in her memory.’

  There were tears in Molly’s eyes as she said, ‘I know how much you thought of Mom, in particular. I spotted you at the funeral, at the church, but when I looked for you afterwards, I couldn’t see you.’

  ‘No, I slipped back home,’ Hilda said. ‘I went to the church to say my goodbyes, but afterwards, I wasn’t in the mood for any party, and anyway, your grandmother was looking daggers at me and I thought it best to make myself scarce.’

  ‘That’s her normal expression,’ Molly said gloomily. ‘It is the way she looks at everything and everybody. I don’t mind the work that I have to do in the house really, though I would be grateful if she would lend a hand now and again, but it is the constant finding fault that gets to me.

  ‘D’you know, Auntie Hilda,’ she went on, ‘when I think of Mom and Dad it’s like there is a gaping hole inside me and sometimes it hurts me so bad. I sort of hoped that my grandmother might help fill it, give me a link with my mother when she was younger. But when I asked her, she said horrible things about her, hateful things. I can’t think of my mother like that anyway, and I told her that. I know Mom would have done anything for me and I really can’t think of any time when I might do something she disapproved of so much that she would never, ever forgive me.’

  ‘No, of course not,’ Hilda said. ‘It isn’t normal to do that either. I mean, children have to go their own way
in the world. It is what it is all about. You might not like the decisions they make and the people they take up with, and yes, if you are concerned enough you might say something, but if they take no notice, you don’t cast them out like some sort of avenging God.

  ‘What you have got to realise, Molly,’ she continued, ‘is that your grandmother is a very unhappy woman, because no one could be happy with all that bitterness inside them. You have got to develop the strength to rise above that. Don’t let it bog you down and destroy you too.’

  ‘I’ll try,’ Molly promised. ‘I really will try hard ’cos I’d hate to turn out like her anyway. Now I’d better go back.’

  ‘Yes,’ Hilda agreed. ‘Wouldn’t do to give that old besom reason to berate you again.’

  ‘She doesn’t need a reason.’ Molly said glumly. ‘Honest to God, she doesn’t.’

  ‘I know, lass,’ Hilda said. ‘And this isn’t goodbye, it’s just farewell for now.’ She enfolded Molly in her arms as she spoke and then pushed her away gently and said in a voice thick with unshed tears, ‘Don’t you go round forgetting us now. I’ll want to know how you are getting on.’

  ‘I will write to you,’ Molly promised. ‘I’d like to. Granddad has packed a paper, envelopes and stamps in my case already. He said rural Ireland is not like Birmingham, with a shop on every corner.’

  ‘Dare say he is right there,’ Hilda said with a slight smile.

  Her hand suddenly shot into the biscuit tin and came out with a handful. ‘Here,’ she said, pushing them at Molly. ‘Take these, and just for you, mind. Don’t you go sharing them. You are far too thin.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Course I’m sure, positive sure,’ Hilda said with a sniff. ‘Now get going before I end up blarting my eyes out.’

  Everything stood ready, bags and boxes packed, for they were leaving early in the morning.

  Molly and her grandfather went to the hospital to say goodbye to Kevin. As the day grew nearer to his grandmother’s departure, and with his grandfather’s continual assurance that he was going home with him, the child had improved dramatically. Stan had hoped the hospital might have allowed him to go with him to see Molly and Biddy off at the station.