Clara glared at him. ‘Is this all because of that old tramp? It is, isn’t it? You know something about him you’re not telling.’
Harry stabbed his meat with his fork. ‘It’s nothing to do with him. Now, I’ve said what’s happening and that’s an end of it.’
Patience intervened. ‘Clara pet, just eat your dinner. We’ll all have a walk in the park later.’
Clara bit back words of protest. Harry avoided her look. Only Jimmy seemed pleased and, with a grin of triumph at Clara, tucked into his food.
That afternoon, they took a tram to Heaton and walked around the park until the rain came on again. Clara found no enjoyment in her parents’ banter about the passers-by or in listening to the brass band playing under the bandstand. She was full of annoyance that her planned day out had somehow been spoiled by the argument between Vinnie and the stranger. On the way home, she insisted on calling at the Lewises’ to tell Reenie of the change in plan.
‘Don’t be long,’ Harry warned.
To her disappointment only the parents were in the tiny upstairs flat.
‘Reenie and her brothers are out — what you call — the hiking, ja? Marta explained. ‘They went on bus with YS.’
‘YS?’ Clara frowned.
‘Young Socialists. Walking, picnic, talking.’ Marta laughed. ‘They come back late, I think. Here,’ Marta pulled her into a seat, ‘you sit down and I fetching cup of tea.’
Oscar put down the book he was reading and nodded in greeting. Soon Marta was back with tea and biscuits. Clara told them about the wedding invitation. There was a quick-fire conversation between the parents in German, then Marta shook her head.
‘It’s not right, I think. Reenie cannot go. The Watts are not sending the invitation?’
‘No,’ Clara admitted, ‘but Mr Craven says they are laying on the spread.’
‘The spread?’
‘The wedding meal,’ Clara explained. ‘Danny Watts is one of his boxers and he’s marrying a lass from the south, so her family cannot arrange it. Danny’s mam’s a widow so she cannot afford a big party — that’s why the Cravens are doing it all.’
Marta looked perplexed. ‘But Danny and his fiancée — they choose who comes, ja?’
‘Aye, but if Vinnie Craven says we can go, then Danny’s not ganin’ to say no,’ Clara answered.
Marta had another exchange in German with her husband, this time more heated. Finally Marta shrugged. ‘It is up to Reenie, I think. If she wants, she can go.’
Clara felt relief. ‘Please tell her to come. It’s at half past eleven — St Michael’s. Then dinner at the Cravens’. She can come round to ours first. And if she needs a hat, I can lend her one out the shop.’
Oscar went back to reading his book while Marta and Clara drank tea and chatted. Realising she could not sit there until the others got back, Clara reluctantly got up to leave.
‘Ta for the tea, Mrs Lewis, and tell Reenie I’ll see her the morra.’
Marta insisted that she take their umbrella against the rain to protect her hair. ‘You don’t want frizzy for the wedding,’ the woman laughed.
Clara hurried on down the street. With the umbrella low over her head, she did not see the man until she almost bumped into him. She gasped to see the tramp standing in her way. Up close, he looked a fraction younger, his blue-grey eyes through the cracked spectacles intelligent and alert.
‘Clara.’ He spoke her name slowly, deliberately, as if he needed practice.
‘What do you want?’ she asked sharply to mask her fear. ‘Why are you hanging around here?’
He stared at her for what seemed like an age, then put out his hand to touch her arm. She jumped back, shaking the umbrella at him, showering them both with spray.
‘Leave me alone!’ she shouted.
He backed off quickly. ‘Yes, yes, I’m sorry.’ Again she detected a foreign accent. He sounded a bit like Oscar Lewis.
Clara stepped off the pavement and edged round him.
‘Please, Clara,’ he said more urgently, ‘tell your father I need to speak to him.’
‘What for?’ Clara asked, still moving away.
The man seemed lost for words, shaking his head. Clara turned and began to hurry into her street. He called after her. ‘Tell him the clock-mender wants to see him. He has something of mine — I want it back. Tell him, Clara!’
‘Go away!’ she called over her shoulder. She ran the rest of the way home. Pausing in the doorway to the flat she glanced round, expecting the man to be pursuing her.
But the street was empty and he was gone.
Chapter 3
Late that night, Clara lay awake listening to her parents arguing. She could not make out their wrangling, but she had never heard them like this before. They hardly ever disagreed and if they did, it would end swiftly in teasing and laughter. But this was serious. Her father was denying something, her mother was tearfully accusing. Snatches of suppressed shouting vibrated through the wall of her bedroom.
‘. . . I blame you!’
‘. . . won’t come to that.’
‘What if he’s said something?’
‘. . . your fault too!’
‘You promised me . . . have to sort it out!’
‘All right, all right. . .’
‘. . . turns up at the wedding . . . never forgive . . .’
‘Stop crying, woman!’
‘Don’t touch me!’
Clara wished she had said nothing about the man’s confronting her in the street earlier. Her parents had been quite upset. Harry had wanted to rush out and look for him, but Patience had shouted at him not to go and make things worse. When Clara had asked her mother to tell her what was going on, Patience had snapped, ‘It’s none of your business! That nebby nose of yours will get you into trouble.’
It was so unlike her mother to rebuff her that Clara had retreated to her room and stayed there. But Patience had not come in to make up or explain.
Clara could not sleep. The door to her parents’ bedroom opened then banged shut. She heard her father rushing downstairs and slamming out of the house. Next door she could hear her mother weeping. What could have caused such upset between them? Had her father done something shameful? What was it that Patience wanted Harry to sort out? The only thing she could imagine her mother being so angry about was finding out that her father had been unfaithful.
The terrible thought hit her. What if her father had had an affair with another woman? Maybe the foreigner was something to do with this woman — a father, a husband? He had come back for vengeance, to make her father pay. Clara sat up in alarm. She had to know.
Tiptoeing out of the bedroom, she knocked on her mother’s door.
‘Mam,’ she called quietly, ‘are you all right?’
She heard sniffing, then, ‘Yes. Go back to bed.’
Instead, Clara pushed open the door and slipped through. Patience was sitting in the dark at the window in her kimono, staring out, her face ghostly pale in the glow of a street lamp.
Clara went to her. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing!’ Patience hissed. ‘I told you, go back—’
‘I’m not a bairn anymore,’ Clara interrupted. ‘I heard you and Dad arguing.’ Patience hung her head. Clara put her arms round her. ‘Has he done something wrong?’ She hesitated then pressed on. ‘Is it about another woman?’
Patience gasped. She grabbed Clara’s wrists and dug in her fingers. ‘What do you know? Has that man told you more than you’re letting on?’
‘Ow, Mam!’ Clara winced, trying to pull away. ‘That hurts.’
‘Sorry,’ Patience said at once, letting go. ‘But you must tell me.’
‘I’ve told you everything,’ Clara insisted. ‘It’s you that’s keeping things in the dark.’
‘Your father’s done nothing wrong,’ her mother answered quickly. ‘It’s all a mistake.’
‘But it’s to do with that man?’ Clara questioned.
Patience cried,
‘No! I don’t want you to mention him again, do you hear?’
Clara stood back. Her mother quickly relented and grabbed her hand.
‘Oh, my darling, I’m sorry. I don’t blame you for asking. But your father will sort it out — he always does, doesn’t he? So you mustn’t worry.’
‘Worry about what?’ Clara asked in confusion. ‘If Dad’s taken something belonging to this man—’
‘But he hasn’t!’ Patience cried. ‘No, the man was lying.’
‘Who is he, Mam? Tell me that at least.’
Patience let out a long, shuddering sigh. She wiped her face on her silk sleeve and forced a smile.
‘Oh, he’s just a vagrant like your father said. Trying to get money out of us to pay off a gambling debt or some such story. Your father’s too soft by half — wants to pay him off. That’s probably what he’s doing right now.’ Patience held out her arms to Clara. ‘You mustn’t worry about it, pet. We were being silly arguing over it.’
Clara was not sure she believed her mother, but was happy to accept her embrace. They held each other and Patience rocked her back and forth, smoothing her hair. Clara could feel the dampness on her mother’s cheeks from her tears and squeezed her tighter. She hated to see Patience unhappy.
They stayed there, hugging in the chair, watching the clouds breaking up in the night sky.
‘Look, there’s the moon,’ Patience murmured, breaking off from her soft humming. ‘Bright as a new penny. And the stars. I love stars the best. Don’t you just want to grab as many as you can and keep them?’
Clara nodded, reassured by her mother’s change of mood.
Patience went on. ‘It’ll be good weather for the wedding after all. Everything’s going to be just fine.’
Clara yawned. ‘I hope Reenie comes too.’
‘You’re sleepy. Go back to bed,’ Patience told her.
‘Can I stay in your bed till Dad gets back?’ Clara asked. ‘Please.’
Patience relented and they snuggled down together. Despite her efforts to stay awake, the next thing Clara knew was her father bending over and kissing her forehead. It was the middle of the night, and moonlight was streaming directly into the room like a searchlight. Both her parents were smiling down at her.
‘Dad?’ Clara said, stirring.
‘Everything’s all right,’ he assured her.
‘The man?’ Clara asked.
Harry nodded. ‘He’ll not be back, don’t you worry.’
‘But—’
‘Time to go back to your own bed, pet,’ Patience whispered. ‘We’ve all got a busy day ahead.’ She leaned over and kissed her daughter too.
Clara climbed sleepily out of bed and padded across the room. At the door she heard Harry say, ‘Sleep tight, my bonny.’
Back in her own room, Clara felt fully awake between the chilly sheets. She got out again and reached for her diary. Taking it to the window and pulling back the curtains, she could see to write by the bright moon without putting on the light. She began to write up the day’s events, then stopped.
She felt awkward describing the moment she had stood next to Frank, her heart banging like a blacksmith’s hammer. And she did not know what to write about the foreign vagrant. Part of her feared him and the hold he seemed to have over her parents, and part of her felt sorry for him. She had looked into his tired eyes and seen a yearning there, a flash of human spirit that seemed at odds with his neglected appearance.
She closed the diary. She would fill it all in later, the details of this strange day, when she was not so tired. In the margin of the exercise book she wrote, Tonight there was a penny moon and a sky full of stars. That would remind her of it all.
Taking the diary back to bed, she fell asleep clutching it under the covers.
Chapter 4
To Clara’s delight, Reenie turned up in her best Sunday frock just before eleven on the bank holiday. The early morning mist had cleared into a bright hot day. Clara wore her favourite china blue dress and Patience had helped pin up her long hair.
‘Makes you look all grown up,’ her mother had said, smiling tearfully and kissing her head.
Her father was singing sea shanties in the bathroom while he shaved, as if nothing had happened the night before. Patience too seemed in such a good mood that she took little persuading to let Reenie choose a hat from the display in the shop.
‘I don’t need a hat,’ Reenie protested in embarrassment.
‘Yes you do,’ Clara insisted with her mother, as they dragged her downstairs.
After trying on half a dozen, Reenie said, ‘Enough. I’ll have the red one.’
‘No, not red,’ Patience cried. ‘A straw hat with a nice ribbon like Clara’s is what you want.’
Reenie submitted to the straw hat.
‘You look really bonny in that.’ Clara admired her friend.
‘Turn heads, you will.’ Patience winked. ‘Proper little Mary Pickford.’
Harry called to them to hurry up or they would be late. He linked arms with Clara and Reenie and did not stop talking all the way down the High Street towards St Michael’s. To Clara he seemed over-exuberant. She caught a whiff of whisky on his breath. He never drank in the morning, ever. Clara wondered what had really happened the previous night. Despite all his assurances, perhaps her father still feared that the stranger would turn up at the wedding and cause a scene.
He caught her eyeing him and smiled. ‘This is going to be a grand day for us all,’ he announced. ‘Vinnie Craven’s fixed everything.’
‘Harry!’ Patience warned.
‘What, my bonny? I’m just saying, Vinnie’s seen to it that our children have been invited after all. And the lovely Reenie. Quite right too!’ He laughed loudly. ‘Yes, Vinnie’s the man.’
Clara saw the look of alarm Patience gave him and wondered if her father was drunk. Jimmy ran ahead, scuffing his newly polished shoes as he kicked a stone up the street, excited at the thought of seeing Danny Watts again. Clara dismissed her father’s strange remarks as over-excitement too. Soon they were filing into church, feeling important as the crowd of onlookers outside cheered and pointed at the wedding guests.
Vinnie was standing in the entrance, greeting people and shaking their hands as if he were the father of the bride. Clara noticed that the smartly dressed boys who were showing people to their seats were the lads who hung around his gym.
Vinnie gave Clara and Reenie an appreciative look. ‘What beautiful young ladies.’ He grinned. ‘Harry, you’ll have to keep your eye on them today.’
Harry grasped Vinnie by the hand and held it longer than was necessary. Vinnie nodded. ‘Everything’s sorted. Take it easy, have a grand day.’ He slapped Harry on the shoulder and gently pushed him forward.
Clara thought she saw tears glinting in her father’s eyes, but maybe it was just the reflection from the candlelight in the cavernous church. It was suddenly cool and dim after the glare of sunlight outside. She shivered. Vinnie put out a hand and rubbed her arm.
‘Not too cold, Clara?’ he asked. ‘Mam can lend you a shawl.’
‘No, I’m canny,’ she said quickly, surprised that he had noticed.
‘You are that.’ Vinnie smiled and squeezed her arm briefly before letting go.
Reenie sniggered as they took their seats and Clara jabbed an elbow at her friend. ‘Got his eye on you,’ Reenie whispered.
‘Don’t be daft, he’s an old man,’ Clara hissed. ‘Twice our age.’
It was a short service, the bride in a shell-pink satin dress and Danny looking twice as pink with pride. He was not a handsome man, his features flattened by boxing, but they both looked so happy that Clara thought them attractive. There were very few sitting on the bride’s side, while the groom’s pews were full of local friends and boxing associates of the Cravens’. Dolly Craven was dressed in a profusion of cream lace and a large black felt hat with a red feather pinned in front.
Reenie nudged Clara. ‘Look at Mrs Craven sitting up front. You
would think it was her lass getting wed. And who’s that next to her with the fur coat?’
‘Vinnie’s latest?’ Clara guessed, trying not to stare at the thin woman with the dark bobbed hair and vivid lipstick, sleek as a cat in her expensive coat. The woman caught her gawping and a smile flickered across her face as if she was used to attention.
Clara blushed and looked away. Miss Fur-coat was not a patch on her mother. Patience was the best-dressed woman in the church in a coffee-coloured dress, a matching jacket and a pillbox hat with a half-veil that gave her a chic, mysterious look. Her mother walked and held herself like a film star. Still, she could not help wondering who the young woman was. When Vinnie came to sit close beside the newcomer and give her his dazzling smile, Clara tried not to speculate about her relationship with Vinnie. Every time she saw him out with a woman it was with someone different.
Afterwards, the wedding party made its way to the Cravens’ semi-detached house on Larch Avenue. It was a good twenty-minute walk from the High Street to the new estate on the northern boundary of Byfell, which looked on to fields of ripe corn. Vinnie to-ed and fro-ed giving lifts in his Albion. The Magees and Reenie were halfway there on foot and perspiring in the heat when he stopped and ordered them all to pile into the car. Harry sat in front with Jimmy on his knee while the women got in the back, and Vinnie roared up the street tooting at the staring passers-by.
Clara and Reenie were eager to see the house, having never been to the new estate. The houses were large and spaced out with saplings planted at the edge of the broad pavements; the Cravens’ had green-painted doors and window sills, leaded windows and an ostentatious stained-glass window above the entrance. Inside, the polished floors were carpeted and there were separate rooms for dining and sitting in. Food was laid out on two solid oak tables in one room and the carpet rolled back in the other for dancing.
Vinnie’s youths were taking coats and hats up to a bedroom and assembling presents on a table in the hallway.
‘Drinks in the garden,’ Dolly called as she ushered guests through the sitting room and out through a glass doorway into a small, neat garden with a steep rockery. ‘It’s called a French window,’ Dolly said proudly, catching sight of Patience’s admiring look.
A HANDFUL OF STARS An enthralling story of poverty, passion and survival: one of the Tyneside Sagas Page 4
