A HANDFUL OF STARS An enthralling story of poverty, passion and survival: one of the Tyneside Sagas

by Trotter, Janet MacLeod

  ‘You could wheel me in a chair,’ she insisted. ‘Please! Just for a look.’

  The nurse went off to consult and returned with the young doctor who had spoken to Clara the previous day. He agreed that she could go for a few minutes. It took a huge effort for Clara to move from the bed to the chair, so feeble were her legs, but she set off in triumph for the baby ward. She passed a large ward full of the insistent cries of the newborn and glimpsed rows of tiny cots in a sunlit room.

  Two corridors away, she was wheeled into a smaller room. Heat hit her as soon as they entered. Beyond a glass screen she could see that three of the six cots were occupied by tiny babies swaddled tightly and wearing knitted hats. One of them bleated softly.

  The matron pointed to the far one. ‘There she is, Mrs Craven. You can’t go any closer in case of infection.’ Immediately, Clara detected hostility in the woman’s voice and wondered why.

  Clara pressed her face against the glass, her heart stopping at the sight of her daughter’s minute crinkled face under her woollen cap. She had an unhealthy yellowish hue and lay so still that Clara feared she was dead.

  ‘She’s not moving,’ she said in agitation, putting out a hand on the glass. ‘Is she breathing?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Matron. ‘Now you mustn’t fuss.’

  ‘I should be feeding her,’ Clara said in frustration. ‘Why can’t she be brought to me? I’m full of milk.’

  ‘She’s far too small and weak to latch on yet,’ the matron explained. ‘We’re feeding her with a pipette. You’ll just have to be patient; not something your lot are used to,’ she muttered.

  Clara ignored the baffling jibe. She longed to stroke her daughter’s cheek. What a strange creature she looked, like a wizened old man. Then Clara felt disloyal for having such a thought. A minute later the matron was ordering her to be returned to her room. She sank back into bed completely exhausted from the effort.

  ‘What’s that woman got against me?’ she asked Nurse Brown.

  ‘You’re a bit notorious,’ she answered dryly. ‘Everyone knows you were involved in the battle of Clayton Street — it was in all the papers. Matron MacCarthy’s a member of the Labour Party. Doesn’t approve of you.’

  Clara fretted. ‘She won’t take it out on my daughter, will she?’

  Nurse Brown gave her an offended look. ‘We’re all dedicated to our work here whatever our beliefs,’ she snapped.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Clara said quickly, ‘I didn’t mean—’

  ‘No? Well, think before you speak, my father used to say,’ she said reprovingly and marched from the room.

  The following day, Clara expected no visitors because of Mosley’s arrival. She imagined the great rally taking place on the Town Moor and how Vinnie would be in his element. So it was to her great surprise that Vinnie turned up that evening with Dolly.

  At once she noticed his angry mood. He gave her a perfunctory kiss and stood back.

  ‘Police stopped Mosley coming,’ he said bitterly, ‘said they couldn’t guarantee his safety. Had to cancel the rally.’ He glared at her as if it was somehow her fault. ‘After all that bother in Clayton Street.’

  ‘Oh, Vinnie, that’s terrible,’ Clara sympathised.

  Dolly chipped in. ‘They made a real song and dance about you going into labour after all the fighting.’

  ‘Aye,’ Vinnie agreed, ‘chief copper kept using that as an excuse. As if it was all our fault and not the bloody Reds!’

  ‘Well, it was six of one and half a dozen of the other,’ Clara commented.

  Vinnie gave her a sharp look. ‘Whose side are you on?’

  ‘Don’t be like that,’ Clara said in dismay. ‘You shouldn’t need to ask.’

  ‘No I shouldn’t. But you weren’t just there to support the Women’s Section like you said, were you, Clara?’ he accused her. ‘Jimmy tells me you went cos you wanted a story for your precious newspaper.’

  Clara flushed. How dare Jimmy! Yet she could not deny it.

  Dolly gave her an indignant look. ‘Jellicoe sent flowers to the house — the cheek of it! Vinnie sent them straight back. You were supposed to have stopped working weeks ago.’

  Vinnie’s voice rose. ‘And Cissie’s not best pleased either. She thinks you used her — got her to take you under false pretences. Then you didn’t even stick with her like you were supposed to — if you had none of this would’ve happened.’

  Clara was shocked by his vehemence. ‘Well Cissie’s changed her tune — she was all for me going.’

  Dolly joined in. ‘To think you put the bairn in danger just on a selfish whim and to please that Jellicoe. What were you thinking of ?’

  ‘I was thinking of publicity for the movement here in Newcastle,’ Clara said defensively.

  ‘Aye, you got them publicity all right — the wrong sort,’ Vinnie snapped. ‘And now the rally’s off.’

  ‘You can’t blame me for that,’ she protested. ‘It was the violence. I wasn’t the one kicking lads to a pulp on the streets. I thought Blackshirts were supposed to be disciplined?’

  ‘They are,’ Vinnie barked. ‘But it was no Sunday school outing, Clara. Luckily for you and that daft Willa, our lads weren’t shy in using their fists to defend you.’

  Clara was shaken. She had never seen her husband so furious and it was all directed at her. Dolly was perched on the edge of a chair full of disapproval. She had not even asked how Clara or the baby was. Clara swallowed down tears of indignation. A nurse put her head round the door.

  ‘Is anything the matter?’ she asked.

  Vinnie changed in an instant. ‘No, thank you, Nurse,’ he smiled.

  The woman hesitated, and then disappeared, closing the door. Clara and Vinnie looked at each other, chastened. Clara was the first to relent.

  ‘I’m sorry about Mosley not coming, Vinnie. I know how much it meant to you.’

  Vinnie sighed. ‘I can’t deny it’s a setback, but we’ll not let our enemies have the last word. We’ll organise something else.’

  ‘Is Cissie very cross with me?’ Clara asked uncomfortably.

  ‘You know Cissie,’ he grunted, ‘speaks her mind. Says you’re selfish for putting your newspaper story before loyalty to the party.’

  Clara felt hurt. ‘Has this spoilt things between us and the Bell-Carrs?’ she asked.

  Vinnie’s look was rueful. ‘I doubt it. I told her you were young and naive, but not disloyal. She’s not the kind to hold a grudge.’

  Dolly grew impatient, insisting she wanted to see her new granddaughter. She led Vinnie away. The next time Vinnie came to visit he was more his old self and Clara put down his angry behaviour to the disappointment of the failed rally. The newspapers were full of how the anti-fascists had disrupted the event and been victorious over the local BUF. Clara was shocked to see Benny Lewis described as one of the former’s leaders and quoted as saying it was a great triumph for the Left and for democracy. But Vinnie was bullish.

  ‘Our numbers have gone up since the battle of Clayton Street — they’re joining in droves. And you know why? Cos of the Red menace. Decent people don’t want them terrorising our streets. We’re the only ones standing up to them.’

  By the next week, Clara was recovering and her energy returning. Vinnie wanted her home. She was impatient to go home too, yet did not want to leave Sarah behind. The baby was not thriving. She had put on no weight and seemed uninterested in feeding. The hospital, however, said there was nothing Clara could do and sent her home. It was a tearful wife that Vinnie came to fetch. Once home, she was engulfed in a feeling of anti-climax. She should have been a new mother revelling in the job of nursing her baby, yet she had nothing to do except fret.

  She lived for the brief hour each day when Vinnie drove her to the hospital to see their daughter. Whenever Clara saw her, the baby lay listless and quiet. She hardly ever cried. It was Dolly who suggested they should have Sarah baptised.

  ‘Just in case the worst happens,’ she said bluntly.


  The hospital chaplain conducted the simple ceremony, with just Clara and Vinnie in attendance. Clara held her daughter for the first time and felt a flood of emotion for the helpless, trusting infant in her arms. She could not bear the thought that this might be her one and only time — that it was possible Sarah might not survive — and wanted to hold on to her for ever. Vinnie stood close, his jaw tight and his eyes shining with tears. The service was over in minutes but Matron MacCarthy took pity on Clara and let her hold on to her baby until Vinnie coaxed her to hand her back.

  ‘I can’t bear it, Vinnie,’ Clara wept into her husband’s shoulder.

  ‘She’s a Craven — a little fighter,’ Vinnie said savagely. ‘She’s not ganin’ to die.’

  Chapter 28

  Each time they visited and found Sarah still alive seemed a small miracle. After witnessing Clara’s distress at the baptism, Matron allowed her to hold Sarah and feed drips of milk from the pipette into her tiny rosebud mouth. Tears streamed down her face as she watched her baby splutter and struggle to drink the milk.

  Vinnie found these visits trying and grew angry in his frustration at not being able to do anything for his daughter. It was almost a relief when he went off to London for a huge BUF rally at Olympia, taking Jimmy and five others of his troop. Clara paid scant attention to the uproar in the press when the massive meeting descended into violence. She was too consumed with worry over her daughter.

  At home, Dolly fretted that the party, and therefore Vinnie’s standing locally, had been damaged by the ruthlessness of Mosley’s Blackshirts at the London rally, but Vinnie came back buoyed up by the experience.

  ‘The press made it out to be worse than it was,’ he assured them both. ‘And no one’s going to push us around at our own meetings. We’re fighting for freedom of speech.’

  Clara felt detached from it all and wondered how Vinnie could find it so important when their daughter struggled daily for survival. Gradually, Clara noticed a difference. Each day, Sarah appeared to grow a little stronger, a little more interested in feeding. She was beginning to win her battle to hold on to life. Finally, by the end of June, even Dolly was remarking on her granddaughter’s progress; she was putting on weight and becoming more responsive. Her eyes could now focus and she made small grunting noises whenever someone came near. In the middle of July, the hospital agreed to let her home.

  Clara carried Sarah out of the hospital, clutching her close, terrified of dropping her. The matron had given Clara strict instructions on regular feeds, and that the baby should be kept calm and not handled too much. Vinnie drove them back to The Cedars, Clara urging him to drive more slowly.

  Dolly took charge the minute they got there, ordering Ella to heat up a bottle of milk so she could feed her. Clara’s milk had dried up, so she could not retreat upstairs to feed Sarah herself. She hovered over Dolly, itching to hold her daughter again. Vinnie poured himself a large whisky and proposed a toast. ‘To all my favourite lasses; Mam, Clara and bonny Sarah!’

  That night Sarah slept beside their bed, snuffling and grizzling. Clara got up to warm a small bottle of milk in the early hours. The baby took ages to drink the milk and then she brought half of it back up again, all over Clara. Sarah wailed and woke Vinnie. Too soon it was time to feed her again. After three nights of this, Vinnie told her Sarah would have to sleep in her own room.

  ‘We’ve done it all out for her and she might settle better.’

  Clara spent the next night listening out for Sarah’s cries. She woke with a start in the middle of the night and was alarmed by the silence. Rushing to Sarah’s room she peered into the cot. She was lying as still as stone. Clara prodded her hard. Sarah let out a querulous cry and Clara clutched the cot side in relief.

  In the daytime, Clara was left alone for long hours while Vinnie and Dolly went off to Craven Hall. She was grateful for the company of the uncomplaining Ella, who helped her heat up milk and wash nappies between her other chores. Vinnie came back one day to find Clara sitting in the garden with Ella, laughing and drinking homemade lemonade, while Sarah slept in the large hooded pram.

  ‘Ella, I don’t pay you to sit around gossiping with me wife,’ he said. Ella jumped up, apologising. Clara thought he was teasing.

  ‘Finish your drink.’ She smiled at Vinnie. ‘It’s the first time we’ve got Sarah to sleep all day. Ella’s got a way with her.’

  Later, Vinnie told Clara off. ‘I’ll not have Ella interfering. She’s not a nanny — she’s the cook. You’re Sarah’s mam — it’s your job to care for our daughter and no one else’s.’

  Clara gawped at him. ‘She just helped settle the bairn to sleep. It’s hard work, Vinnie,’ she protested. ‘She takes ages to feed — and she’s always being sick.’ Suddenly she was in tears.

  He softened at once. ‘Haway, lass, I didn’t mean to upset you.’ He put his arms round her and kissed the top of her head. ‘You’ll get used to it — all mams do. It’s natural for women, isn’t it?’

  Clara smothered a retort that it did not seem natural to her. It was the most fraught week of her life. She felt totally responsible for this tiny, demanding creature — saw the daily care that Sarah would need stretching ahead for an eternity. Yet she had never felt more inadequate. Clara sniffed. She would just have to get on with it, as Dolly kept telling her when she complained of lack of sleep.

  Soon she would get into a routine and find time for seeing her friends again. Willa had sent a card congratulating her on Sarah’s birth, but had not called to see her. Neither had Cissie. She would organise an ‘at home’ for her friends. But it was Dolly who pre-empted Clara’s idea by announcing they would have a belated christening party for the baby.

  To Clara’s dismay, it grew into a huge event, with large numbers of business friends and new neighbours being invited. Jellicoe and her former colleagues were pointedly left off the list, despite her plea that they be included. Vinnie had his men parking cars and serving out drinks. Patience and Jimmy were there, along with the Blakes, the Templetons and the Lockwoods. Clara, kept busy upstairs coping with Sarah, heard the party getting under way. When the Bell-Carrs made a belated entrance, Vinnie came rushing in to the nursery where Clara was changing Sarah after another unsatisfactory feed.

  ‘Bring her down,’ he said impatiently. ‘Everyone’s waiting.’

  ‘You take her,’ Clara said, holding the baby out to him. ‘I just want to put on some lipstick.’

  ‘You look fine as you are.’ Vinnie frowned. ‘You don’t need make-up.’

  Clara stalked past him, thrusting Sarah into his arms. ‘I may feel like a wet dishcloth, but I’ll not look like one in front of all those people.’

  Exhausted, she sat at her dressing table and peered with dissatisfaction at her image. She looked pale and tired, her eyes dark-ringed and her hair lank. She brushed it back and pinned it up, rubbed rouge into her cheeks and put on crimson lipstick. At least she was able to get into last year’s summer dresses; weight had fallen off her during these past weeks of worrying over Sarah. Her mother told her she was too thin. As she descended, she could hear the noisy hubbub of chattering guests.

  ‘Clara!’ Cissie cried, waving her over. ‘You look wonderful, girl.’ She embraced her as if there had been no cooling of relations since the May rally.

  Others followed Cissie’s lead and kissed Clara in greeting. Willa looked tearful.

  ‘How are you? I’ve so wanted to come and see you, but George . . .’ She was whispering, glancing round. ‘He took the whole thing rather badly. Not that any of it was your fault. But he’s not so keen on all this fascist business since that awful affair.’

  Clara squeezed her arm. ‘But we are still friends?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘Of course,’ Willa assured her, quickly disengaging as her husband appeared at her side.

  Clara looked about for Sarah. Dolly was fussing over her granddaughter more than usual, carrying her around and showing her off as the guests drank cocktails. Clara took a gl
ass of champagne from a tray Jimmy was offering around and drank quickly. She felt immediately light-headed and began talking garrulously about the baby to anyone who would listen.

  Soon, Sarah began to grizzle and then wail. Dolly joggled her. ‘There, there, what a fuss.’ Sarah went puce and screamed all the harder. People began to stare. Dolly pushed her way towards Clara. ‘Here, you take her. She must need feeding.’

  ‘It’s not time; she fed an hour ago,’ Clara answered. But her mother-in-law plonked the baby into her arms.

  ‘She needs her mother,’ she declared.

  Everyone was watching. Vinnie grinned as if he expected her to instantly calm the squalling infant. Sarah’s high-pitched wailing jarred her frayed nerves. She felt resentment surge towards the overbearing Dolly, towards Vinnie and his demandingly high standards, even towards her difficult baby. Tears of frustration stung her eyes. She clenched her jaw, refusing to succumb to the desire to weep.

  It was Patience who came to her rescue. ‘We’ll take her upstairs,’ she said, plucking the bawling baby from Clara’s tense grip. ‘Plenty of time for parties when she’s older,’ she joked.

  When they got upstairs, Clara burst into tears. ‘I don’t know what to do with her, Mam! I can’t feed her properly. I can’t get her to stop crying. I don’t get a wink of sleep!’

  Patience paced the room calming the baby. ‘At least you’ve got Dolly to help.’

  Clara exclaimed, ‘She doesn’t lift a finger! Neither does Vinnie, for all he says he’s so proud of her.’

  ‘Men are different.’

  ‘Maybes, but he won’t let Ella give me a hand either — says it’s all my job. Well, if I’d known how hard it was, I would never have bothered in the first place.’

  ‘You don’t mean that.’

  ‘I do!’ Clara railed. ‘I don’t think I even like the bairn. I worry over her all the time — but that’s not the same as love, is it?’ She threw herself on the bed and covered her face. ‘I’m hateful! How could I say such a thing?’