Through The Storm

by Maureen Lee

  ‘I’ll be thirty soon,’ she said grimly.

  A boy of about five came running up and grabbed her arm. She shook him off impatiently. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I wanna go home, Mam,’ the boy whined. ‘I’m cold.’

  ‘We’ll go home as soon as Georgie’s got changed and Sister’s given me the clothes to wash. Now, go away. Can’t you see I’m talking to someone?’ The boy obediently departed.

  ‘How many kids have you got?’ asked Jimmy.

  ‘Just the two. Billy’s six and Georgie’s eight. They’re a handful, the pair of them, I can tell you, particularly since we moved in with me mam and dad after we lost our house in Tennyson Street in the raids.’

  ‘Here we are.’ Sister Gabriel came panting towards them with a large, bulging drawstring bag.

  ‘Well, I’ll be off,’ Jimmy said with alacrity, worried he might get landed with carrying the bag. ‘Dominic’s grandad is working in the garage across the road. I’ll pop in and let him know what the score was.’

  ‘Tara, then,’ Theresa said laconically. Her lads had both appeared as if by magic at her side and were quietly waiting for her to leave. They seemed to be well-disciplined boys, Jimmy thought approvingly, and anything but a handful, unlike Dominic and Niall who were swinging on a goalpost.

  ‘See you at the semi-final in two weeks’ time,’ he called to Theresa as he went to collect them.

  ‘D’you think he’d like to come to one of my parties?’

  Rita Mott stared at Jack Doyle’s retreating back. He was giving Niall a piggy-back and Dominic was hanging onto his arm describing the match they’d just won.

  ‘I doubt it very much,’ said Jessica. ‘He’s not the partying type.’

  ‘Are you sure he’s not your feller?’

  ‘I’ve told you a dozen times, Rita, he isn’t. I haven’t got a feller – I mean, a fellow.’

  ‘I wouldn’t want to make a move on a mate’s feller, like, it wouldn’t be nice,’ Rita said virtuously. ‘I don’t half fancy him, though. Has he ever mentioned me?’

  ‘Not that I can recall.’ If only the poor woman knew, thought Jessica. Jack loathed Rita Mott. He considered her a bad influence on Penny. They’d discussed her the previous Saturday morning when he’d turned up to help as promised and Rita had gone off to lunch in Chester with a flash-looking individual in a red sports car.

  ‘She’s got a husband away fighting in the war,’ Jack spluttered, outraged, ‘yet she flaunts herself around the garage in that negligy thing …’

  ‘Négligé,’ corrected Jessica.

  ‘Whatever,’ Jack said impatiently, ‘and she goes out with other men. It’s disgusting.’ He unscrewed the rusty top off a bicycle bell and poured oil inside.

  ‘Don’t be such a prude. Not everyone’s got such high morals as you, Jack.’ Jessica looked at him sideways and was pleased when she saw him go red. Jack Doyle could be a tiny bit hypocritical at times. ‘Rita’s terribly lonely.’

  ‘A lot of women must be lonely with their men away,’ he said testily.

  ‘Maybe they’ve got families, children. Rita’s got no-one. All she wants is friends.’

  ‘Friends!’ Jack guffawed. Penny, sitting on her blanket outside the office, guffawed with him. ‘That chap in the red car looked a bit more than a friend to me.’ The man had slapped Rita’s bottom as she got in. ‘It’s not good for Penny being stuck with a woman like that all day.’

  ‘Penny and Rita love each other,’ Jessica said calmly, ‘and personally, I like Rita very much. She’s generosity itself, and you know what they say, “Generosity covers a multitude of sins”.’

  ‘Since when have you been so understanding?’

  Jessica pumped up a tyre and looked deliberately vague. ‘I’m not sure. There was a time when I would have disapproved of Rita, but perhaps as you get older you learn to accept people’s weaknesses as well as their strengths, particularly when you discover yourself to be far weaker than you thought.’

  Jack went even redder. Jess saw and smiled – if she was weak, then so was he. She sensed he felt resentful that she was making herself out to be a better, a more understanding person than he was. He must have decided to change the subject. ‘How many bikes have you got now?’ he asked.

  ‘Ten,’ Jessica replied proudly. ‘I sold three last week – and I did a few small car repairs. I made enough for the rent and nearly four pounds over.’

  ‘That’s good,’ Jack said sarcastically.

  ‘I wonder what Den would say to all these bikes?’ Rita mused. She was sitting on an upturned box in her flowered dressing gown and her legs were clearly visible through the diaphanous lilac nightie underneath. On her feet, she wore a pair of purple fur slippers as big as cats. She was smoking, as usual, and spat out a shred of tobacco in a delicate, ladylike way.

  Jessica blinked herself back from last Saturday morning to this one. It hadn’t crossed her mind to discuss the subject of bicycles with Rita before she’d gone out and bought them several weeks ago. ‘Do you think he’ll mind?’

  ‘I’m not sure. This garage was his life. He might think bikes are a good idea or he might think they stink.’

  ‘Perhaps you should write and tell him,’ Jessica suggested.

  ‘On the other hand, perhaps I shouldn’t. It would be best if he didn’t know, ’case he’s against it. I’d hate it if you weren’t here, Jess, and I’d really miss Penny.’ Penny was fast asleep upstairs in Rita’s bright pink bedroom.

  ‘In that case, don’t mention it,’ Jessica said hastily. She’d hate it if she had to look around for another site from which to sell her bikes.

  ‘I won’t, though I usually write to Den every Monday regular and tell him everything that’s going on.’

  ‘Everything?’ Jessica enquired with a twinkle as she levered a tyre onto a rear wheel. She was making one decent bike out of two old ones.

  ‘Well, no, not everything,’ Rita conceded. She took a deep puff on her cigarette and blew the smoke out slowly. ‘I suppose you think I’m a dead horrible person, going out with other chaps when me husband’s in the army.’

  ‘It’s none of my business what you do with your life, is it?’

  ‘That doesn’t stop you from having an opinion though.’

  ‘I don’t know what my opinion is,’ Jessica said thoughtfully. She was still not sure what Rita got up to with her numerous manfriends, but suspected the relationships weren’t platonic. ‘I’ve never met Den, have I? I don’t know what sort of person he was – is.’ There was a photo of Dennis Mott on the sideboard upstairs, a quiet looking young man with prematurely receding hair.

  Rita sniffed. ‘He’s ever so nice, is Den.’

  Jessica glanced at the woman. Without her tawdry make-up, Rita had a curiously innocent face. ‘In that case …’

  ‘I suppose now you think the worst,’ Rita said gloomily.

  ‘Not necessarily. I reckon there’s something you haven’t told me.’ Jessica began to wonder why Rita seemed so eager to confide such intimacies to another person.

  ‘I was ever such a little mouse in those days, Jess,’ she said in a rush. ‘I had brown hair, I never wore make up, I didn’t smoke and I only owned one frock. I spent all me time cooking and cleaning, yet Den’d only been gone a week, when this chap drew in for petrol and asked me to go to the pictures with him and I said yes.’

  ‘Really!’

  ‘Really. We saw this dead romantic picture with Joan Crawford in. She was having an affair with a married man. Afterwards, the chap – I think his name was Johnnie – brought me back to the flat and we …’ Rita paused and gave an embarrassed grin. ‘We, you know what, on the mat in front of the fire.’ She lit another cigarette from the stub of the old one. She grinned again, no longer embarrassed. ‘It wasn’t half good. I’d always wondered what it would be like with another feller. After all, they write books about it and make pictures about it, so I reckoned there must be more to it than I knew.’

  ‘What do
you mean?’ asked Jessica, fascinated.

  ‘Do you mind me talking to you like this?’

  ‘I don’t mind at all.’ Jessica was anxious for her to continue.

  ‘The thing is,’ Rita went on, ‘when you’ve only known one feller, how are you supposed to know what’s normal? With Den, it was five minutes once a month if I was lucky. I usen’t half to feel fed up, as if I could bust, sometimes. I’d go to the pictures, and there’d be people fighting for it and killing for it, and I’d think, “What’s all the fuss about?” Then Den went away and I couldn’t wait to find out for meself.’ She sighed contentedly. ‘I discovered it was worth it, after all. I realised Den had all the right equipment, but he never learnt how to use it, not properly. That’s why we never had kids.’

  ‘I suppose everyone has a right to a healthy sex life,’ said Jessica.

  Rita giggled. ‘That’s a funny way of putting it. One of me chaps said I was a nympho … nymphy …’

  ‘A nymphomaniac.’

  ‘Is that good or bad?’ Rita asked anxiously.

  Jessica wrinkled her smooth white brow. ‘I’m not sure. Probably it’s only good if you’re married to another nymphomaniac, otherwise you’d spend your life in a constant state of frustration.’

  ‘Do you still think I’m a terrible person?’

  ‘I never did in the first place.’

  ‘Are you sure, Jess?’

  Rita had obviously been suffering from a guilty conscience and was anxious for Jessica’s blessing or seal of approval on her rather unconventional lifestyle.

  ‘I’m positive,’ Jessica said firmly. ‘A person’s morals are entirely their own affair, no-one else’s.’ Which was, she thought, a surprising statement from someone who wouldn’t have passed the time of day with Rita Mott only a few short years ago if she’d even suspected the way she carried on.

  Rita looked relieved. ‘Anyroad,’ she said, ‘I thought if I crammed as much of the “you know what” into the time Den’s away, I’d get enough to last the rest of me life.’

  ‘I doubt it,’ said Jessica. She glanced at her watch. It was nearly one o’clock and she had two bikes to see and make offers for that afternoon. She began to tidy the workshop.

  ‘I doubt it, too,’ Rita said with a coarse laugh. ‘Though you never know, Den might learn a few tricks while he’s away.’

  ‘What happens if he doesn’t?’

  ‘Christ knows! I’ll just have to try and teach him a few tricks meself, won’t I?’

  Sean Doyle, Jack’s son, got married on the first Saturday in December. He came home from the RAF camp where he was stationed in Lincolnshire on a forty-eight-hour pass, along with six of his mates who formed a Guard of Honour when the newly married couple left St James’s Church.

  Brenda Mahon had done wonders with five yards of cheap taffeta lining to make a dress for the bride. Alice Scully, a tiny waif of a girl with pale fair hair and huge blue eyes, was determined to have a white wedding. Her borrowed veil was held in place with a red velvet band and she carried a small bouquet of red roses. The hem of the dress trailed the floor in order to hide the ugly boot which Alice was forced to wear to disguise her deformed leg.

  ‘I hope you know what you’re doing, son,’ Jack Doyle muttered to himself as he stood outside the church whilst the photographs were being taken. Alice was an orphan with five younger brothers and sisters she was determined to take care of. Despite her delicate appearance, inside she was as hard as iron. It meant his Sean, only nineteen, was taking on a wife and five growing children. Even so, Sean looked serenely happy throughout the ceremony. Jack had never dreamt his charming, idle son had so much character.

  ‘Aren’t they a proper picture, Dad?’ His daughter, Eileen, squeezed his arm. ‘Alice looks like a fairy off the top of a Christmas tree.’

  ‘They make a lovely couple,’ Jack said gruffly. ‘How are you, luv? You’re looking a bit pale.’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Where’s Nicky?’

  ‘Our Sheila’s got him. You know what she’s like the minute she sets eyes on a baby.’

  ‘I’ll be along to the cottage tomorrow to tidy up the garden and take a look at the Brussels sprouts,’ Jack promised. He went most weekends, mainly to keep an eye on her. ‘They should be ready in time for our Christmas dinner.’

  The reception was held in Sheila Reilly’s house. After a quick sandwich and a fairy cake, most of the men departed to the King’s Arms. Despite the cold, Sheila left the front door wide open so the neighbours could pop in for a glass of sherry and a piece of wedding cake – seeing as virtually everyone in the street had contributed something towards the cake, this seemed only fair. Aggie Donovan, in her element, was put in charge of the cake to make sure it went round.

  Guests spilled out onto the pavement. It was a brilliant December day with a touch of frost in the air, but the clear yellow sun seemed to convince everyone it was not really all that cold.

  Nan Wright, her dress on back to front, dragged her old body as far as the front door and found she could go no further. She sat down on the step, enveloped in a hazy, happy dizziness and wondered what was going on. ‘Is the war over?’ she asked when the lovely red-haired lady from across the street whose name she couldn’t remember brought her something to eat.

  ‘Not yet, dear,’ said Jessica Fleming.

  Paddy O’Hara was yanked from the pub and pressed to play his harmonica for the ever-increasing crowd outside the Reillys’. Paddy didn’t need much persuading. In fact, he would have felt hurt if no-one had asked. He tapped his way outside with his white stick, his dog Rover faithfully at his heels. Paddy was part of the ritual; the sweet quivering notes of his harmonica had accompanied every celebration which had been held in the street over many years. The men came out of the pub and stood listening, joining in the singing when it was something they knew. Nan Wright sipped her sherry and ate her cake and thought it was the most beautiful sound she had ever heard.

  At half past twelve, Jimmy Quigley came round the corner waving his stick in the air. ‘We won,’ he shouted jubilantly. ‘We won two–nil.’

  ‘Won what?’ folks demanded.

  ‘The bloody semi-final, that’s what.’ Dominic and Niall Reilly followed behind Jimmy. If everyone hadn’t known better, they would have said all three of them were drunk, even the little lads. They were grinning stupidly, as if they’d just won a hundred quid each on the pools.

  ‘What bloody semi-final?’

  ‘The semi-final of the Merseyside Junior Football Cup. It means St Joan of Arc’s are in the final in two weeks’ time.’

  ‘St Joan of Arc’s, in the final?’

  ‘I’ve been telling you for weeks, but no-one’s taken any notice,’ Jimmy said impatiently. ‘And you’ll never guess where they’ll be playing – Everton Football Ground. All the junior schools have been invited.’

  ‘Can we come?’

  ‘Can the street come?’

  ‘Are we invited?’

  ‘The whole of Bootle’s invited as far as I’m concerned,’ cried Jimmy.

  ‘I’ll just go and tell me mam,’ Dominic said blissfully. His mam had tried to insist he and Niall stay home for his Uncle Sean’s wedding and had been taken aback when both boys had adamantly refused.

  ‘I can’t let the side down, Mam,’ Dominic said in a horrified voice.

  ‘And he needs me to cheer him on,’ Niall assured her.

  The house was packed with people when Dominic went in. Uncle Sean was in the parlour, looking incredibly grown up in his uniform with his new wife hanging onto his arm. He spoilt this impression rather when he noticed Dominic in the doorway and squinted his eyes and made a horrible face. Dominic made an even more horrible face back and went in search of his mam. He found her in the kitchen where she was hurriedly cutting sarnies. ‘We won again, Mam,’ he announced grandly.

  ‘That’s good, luv.’ Sheila glanced at him vaguely. She patted his head. ‘That’s good. Would you like something
to eat?’

  Women, thought Dominic disgustedly. They didn’t seem to know what was important in the world. He helped himself to three sarnies and a big chunk of wedding cake when Aggie Donovan wasn’t looking and went to join the men outside the King’s Arms where he knew he’d be appreciated.

  ‘Jess, I’d like you to meet Kate Thomas.’

  Jessica Fleming turned swiftly at the sound of Eileen’s voice. Kate Thomas was the woman Sheila had described, albeit jokingly, as her father’s ‘girlfriend’. Jessica was aware she looked her very best that day, in her turquoise suit and matching pillbox hat with a little veil. She’d put her hair up for a change and wore the marcasite and mother-of-pearl earrings and pendant set which Arthur had bought her on their honeymoon in Paris – all her good jewellery, as well as her furs, had gone the same way as the house in Calderstones, to pay off the firm’s debts.

  ‘How do you do?’ she said with a vivid smile. No contest, a voice inside her said when she saw the tiny drab woman in her forties wearing a moth-eaten fur coat and a battered old hat. She had a nice face, shiny, as if it had just been scrubbed very hard, and clear hazel eyes. She shook Jessica’s extended hand firmly.

  ‘Kate’s the women’s overseer at Dunnings, the factory where I used to work,’ Eileen explained. ‘She gave me loads of legal advice when I had that trouble with Francis. Now, if you’ll both excuse me, I’ll take Nicky upstairs and put him down for his nap.’

  Kate Thomas smiled at Jessica. She had a lovely smile which reached her eyes and made them sparkle. ‘Eileen makes me sound very knowledgeable. It’s just that I was married to a solicitor and picked up bits and pieces of information over the years.’

  For some reason, Jessica had got the impression she was an old maid, and was slightly put out to discover she’d been married. She felt certain a man would find a widow a more attractive proposition than a spinster.