A Family Affair

by Nancy Carson

  She risked a glance behind her as she ran. The man had fallen back, lumbering in his efforts to chase her. She ran on, her breath coming in gulps. When she reached the Bush Inn she looked behind her again. The man, whoever he was, had turned back, returned to his park bench, very likely picking up her clothes and things along the way. Now she had nothing else to wear, no soap to wash herself with, no toothbrush to freshen her mouth.

  This was ridiculous. She would give anything for a hot bath now and the luxury of a clean, comfortable bed. Where on earth did she think she was going when she left the Jolly Collier in such a huff of obstinacy? There was nowhere she could go. Nobody would have her. In any case, it would be unfair to ask anybody to. She stood awhile getting her breath back, peering into the dim shadows of Blackacre Road. But at least she was warmer now after her escape.

  She wondered what time it was. Folk were still coming out of the Bush. Maybe it would be better if she went home and threw herself on the mercy of her mother and Jake. Well, maybe it would, but she was not about to. Another idea had come to her.

  Zillah Bache.

  She would go to Zillah. Zillah would be happy to put her up for the night. Tomorrow, she could find some lodgings, pay for them out of the money in her purse.

  So she tramped to High Street where Zillah lived opposite the Loving Lamb. Carefully, she avoided George Street and hid her face from anybody who walked in her direction. She would not use the side streets after her scare with the strange tramp, but keep to the main road where folk were more likely to be, where the street lamps offered some protection. At last she came to Zillah’s small terraced house. She walked up the entry and knocked on the back door.

  But the house was in darkness. No candle flickered, no oil lamp burned.

  Of course, Zillah would be in the Four Ways, supping beer with Annie Brown.

  Clover went back down the entry and sat on the front door step. If only she knew the time she would know roughly how long she might expect to wait. The wind continued to blow the rain in her face so she stepped back into the entry for shelter.

  After about three-quarters of an hour, Clover looked out and saw the unmistakable bulk of Zillah waddling along High Street from the direction of the Four Ways and the Bethel Chapel. So as not to scare her Clover stepped onto the footpath in plenty of time and greeted her.

  ‘Why, it’s Clover, as God’s my judge,’ Zillah exclaimed. ‘What brings yer out on a filthy night like this?’

  ‘I took your advice and told mother I was in trouble, Zillah. She threw me out.’

  ‘Her threw yer out? On a night like this? Heartless bugger! Her wants hoss-whipping. Look at yer, you’m soaked through. Why, you’ll catch yer jeth. Come on in and get warm and have a nice cup of cocoa or summat.’

  Zillah fumbled in her pocket for her key as Clover followed her up the entry, never so glad of the offer of warmth and hospitality.

  ‘Goo in, my wench,’ Zillah said when she’d unlocked the door, ‘while I light the lamp.’ Still in her coat, she felt along the mantelpiece, found a spill and lit it from the glowing embers of the fire. From that, she lit an oil lamp and trimmed the wick to stop it smoking and placed it on the table that overlooked the window onto the back yard. ‘Here, let me tek yer coat.’

  Clover peeled off her wet coat and handed it to Zillah. ‘Thanks, Zillah.’

  ‘I bet your frock’s all wet an’ all, eh?’

  ‘Yes, it’s a bit damp but it’ll soon dry out.’

  The enamelled kettle was standing on the hob of the fire grate. Zillah lifted it to determine how much water remained and sat it in the embers of the fire, which shifted among a flurry of sparks that were drawn up the chimney.

  ‘Dun yer want some cocoa?’

  ‘Tea will be fine if you’re making tea,’ Clover replied.

  ‘And we’ll have a drap of whisky in it an’ all, to warm we up, eh?’

  Clover smiled.

  Zillah spooned tea in her teapot and rummaged through her cupboard at the side of the grate. She withdrew a half bottle of whisky with a look of triumph.

  ‘Jake gi’d me that,’ she said proudly. ‘Yer mother knows nothing about it though.’

  ‘Jake’s all right,’ Clover said. ‘But what he ever saw in my mother, I’ll never know.’

  ‘An ailing business waiting to be nurtured, I ’spect. Money to be med. That’s what Jake sid. That’s what he wanted.’

  Clover nodded. ‘Serve her right if he left her, the miserable bitch.’

  ‘So tell me what happened – what her said when you told her.’

  Clover related everything. She told how she subsequently went to the park, how she got colder and wetter in the rain, how she fell asleep to find a vagrant watching her, how he chased her, how she lost her spare clothes.

  ‘If I can just stay here tonight, Zillah, I’ll find some lodgings tomorrow. Maybe the rain will’ve stopped by then.’

  ‘Lodgings be buggered!’ Zillah exclaimed. ‘Yo’ll stop here. Yo’ll need looking after in your condition. Who d’you think’s gunna keep thee?’

  Clover smiled through her anguish. ‘Well you can’t keep me, Zillah.’

  ‘Well, somebody has to, else it’ll be the workhouse. Anyroad, yo’ve always bin that kind to me, young Clover. And I as good as reared thee, remember? I’ll not see thee wanting.’

  ‘Oh, Zillah…’

  ‘Why, that Mary Ann, the evil sod,’ she added contemptuously. ‘I could crown her. Her need go to church. Wait till I see her in the morning. Her’ll get a piece of my mind.’

  Clover shook her head. ‘No, Zillah. Don’t get into trouble on my account. You know what she’s like. She’ll probably sack you as well.’

  ‘Good. ’Cause I can get work anywhere, me. Why, at the Four Ways they’d have me there like a shot, I reckon. I got no fear of Mary bloody Ann.’

  ‘Then let me pay you some rent,’ Clover suggested, leaning over to reach her basket.

  ‘There’s no need,’ Zillah protested.

  ‘Yes, there is.’ Clover smiled in thankfulness at Zillah’s infinite kindness. She rummaged in her basket, past her shoes. ‘Pass me the oil lamp, Zillah.’

  Zillah handed it to her.

  Clover held it over her basket, then looked up in disbelief. ‘Zillah, my purse has gone. It had all the money in it that I’ve been able to save…That tramp must have had it while I was asleep on that bench. What shall I do now? I’ve got nothing at all.’

  Clover stayed. Zillah’s house was hardly the height of elegance and luxury but it was no worse than what she and Mary Ann had endured before Jake and Ramona came along. Zillah was bold enough to tell Mary Ann exactly what she thought of her for evicting Clover but, when Zillah admitted the girl was lodging in High Street with her, Mary Ann evidently saw fit not to sack her for fear of hurting Clover more.

  Zillah rummaged around and found a brass ring in one of her drawers. She polished it up and gave it to Clover, knowing that she was about to seek employment.

  ‘Wear this, my flower,’ she advised. ‘Wear it like a wedding ring. They’ll be more inclined to gi’ thee a job if they think as yo’m wed.’

  Clover smiled and thanked her as she slipped it on her finger.

  She found a job; in Neal’s Cake Shop in the town. She admitted she was pregnant and would only be able to work till the New Year.

  By the beginning of November, Ned Brisco learnt that Clover was no longer living at the Jolly Collier and that she was working in a cake shop. Eventually, he found her and, leaving work early one afternoon, waited for her to come out at closing time.

  ‘Ned! Fancy seeing you,’ she exclaimed when she saw him.

  ‘I heard you was working in a cake shop in Dudley town. It wasn’t that hard to find you.’

  ‘So how are you?’

  ‘I’m all right. What about you, though? I heard you’re not living at the Jolly Collier any more.’

  ‘I’m pregnant, Ned,’ she said flatly. ‘Can’t you tell? My mothe
r doesn’t take to daughters and stepdaughters that get pregnant out of wedlock.’

  ‘I heard you was having a baby, Clover,’ he admitted. ‘I guessed that’s why you left the Jolly Collier. Is it that swine’s baby you’re having? That Tom Doubleday’s?’

  ‘Are you going my way or not?’ she replied, avoiding his question.

  ‘Yes, I can give you a ride home.’

  ‘Thanks. So how is your mother, Ned? Is she keeping well?’

  ‘Yes, she’s pretty well. And Father. He was asking about you the other day…Look, there’s the motor. Come on, I’ll help you up.’

  Dudley town was, as usual, teeming with folk on their way home from work. The trams disgorged one set of passengers and absorbed others. Christmas decorations were already on display in some shops and people jostled each other as they hurried along Hall Street’s narrow confines by the light spilling from shop windows. When Ned, with Clover aboard, tried to negotiate his motor car along there as well he received howls of protest from those who had to scurry out of the way to allow him to pass.

  ‘I haven’t seen you for ages,’ Clover commented when they were past the junction with King Street, away from the thick of the people.

  ‘No, well…I thought it best to leave you be.’

  ‘Oh? But I value your friendship, Ned. I’ve always valued your friendship. You know that.’

  ‘Maybe so…But it was getting on me nerves how you was always mooning over him. You could see no wrong in him. You wouldn’t hear a word said against him.’

  She shrugged and pulled her collar up. ‘I still won’t. I don’t feel any different.’

  ‘Then more fool you. I suppose it is his baby you’re carrying? You never answered me.’

  She looked at him with honest eyes. ‘What do you think, Ned?’

  He turned to look at her as he drove, trying to catch her expression in the twilight. ‘I suppose it must be then.’

  ‘But Ned…Keep it to yourself – please. I don’t want it to get back to him that I’m having his child. I don’t want him to start feeling guilty over me. He’ll have enough on his plate.’

  ‘There you go again, Clover. You’re too soft. But I wouldn’t let him have the satisfaction of knowing. Sod him. So what are you going to do? I mean, you can’t look after a baby and work. Shall you give it up? The baby, I mean. Shall you have it adopted or chuck it down a well or something?’

  ‘Ned!’ she shrieked contemptuously. ‘What a terrible thing to say. You ought to be ashamed of yourself for thinking such a thing. Of course I’m going to keep the baby. I want this baby. I’ll struggle through. I’ll manage somehow. You don’t have to worry about me…Chuck it down a well indeed! What a thing to say…’

  They turned the corner from Waddams Pool into St John’s Road.

  He shrugged. ‘Well, I didn’t know how you felt about it.’

  ‘Well you do now.’

  They fell silent for a few seconds, listening to the harsh thrash of the motor car’s engine.

  ‘You’d better tell me where it is you’re living.’

  ‘At Zillah’s. In High Street. Opposite the Loving Lamb.’

  They turned into Brown Street and a dog thought about running in front of them, but desisted just in time.

  ‘Are you happy there?’ Ned asked.

  ‘I’m grateful for Zillah’s kindness, Ned. I don’t think I’ll be happy till I have my baby in my arms…Then I’ll be happy.’ She smiled to emphasise her point.

  At the Bird in Hand, which faced the Bethel Chapel on one corner and the Four Ways on another, they turned left into High Street. Ned pulled up outside the Loving Lamb which itself looked peculiarly as if it stood in the back yard of the Bird in Hand.

  ‘But then what are you going to do when you’ve got the baby? You can’t expect Zillah to keep you. Nor a baby as well.’

  She shrugged. What he said was true. Zillah, out of the kindness of her heart, might be prepared to look after her, but it was not really fair on her. Zillah had struggled enough during her long widowhood, trying to make ends meet, trying to fend for her own children. To volunteer to support two extra burdens now was beyond what could be reasonably expected.

  ‘Marry me, Clover.’

  She looked at him aghast. Nothing could have been further from her mind. ‘Don’t be stupid, Ned. You can’t sacrifice yourself just to help me. I wouldn’t hear of it.’

  ‘Just think about it. Your problems would be solved. So would Zillah’s. You’d have a husband. Your child would have a father. You could assume respectability – well, a sort of respectability…Especially if we moved away from Kates Hill…’

  ‘You’re mad, Ned,’ she said with earnest disparagement. ‘You’re off your head. Anyway, I’d be no good for you. For a start, I don’t love you.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to love me. I don’t expect you to love me. I just want to be your husband. At the same time I’ll be a father to your child.’

  She turned to him with a look of tenderness in her eyes. He evidently meant what he said. She had no option but to admire his stupid penchant for self-sacrifice. ‘Ned,’ she said gently. ‘That would be no life for you. Don’t you see? You don’t want me, I’m a fallen woman. Around the next corner the ideal girl might be there, waiting for you. Somebody you could be happy with.’

  ‘I’d be happy with you, Clover.’

  ‘No, Ned. You’d never be happy with me. Not truly happy.’

  ‘I’m prepared to take my chance.’

  ‘But I have nothing to give in return…Nothing.’

  ‘Just by being there with me—’

  ‘No!…I’m sorry, Ned. I could never agree to it.’

  ‘Never?’

  ‘Never in a million years.’

  Chapter 23

  Clover and Ned Brisco were married on Friday 5th March 1909 in a civil ceremony at Dudley Registry Office. She had held out till the last, after months of dogged persuasion, unwilling to let Ned sacrifice himself on her behalf. Over Christmas he came bearing gifts – clothes and things, mostly for the baby – and once more spelled out the advantages for her if she deigned to marry him. In the finish, at the very beginning of March, his logic as well as his persistence prevailed. It was evident that, since Clover had given up work, it was too much of a financial struggle for Zillah to support her and Clover perceived that in any case it was not fair that she should. If her mother had helped by sending a few shillings now and again, a quarter-pound of tea occasionally, even a loaf of bread, then that might have made the difference. But nothing was forthcoming from the Jolly Collier. Not a sixpence, not a silver threepenny-bit, not a penny, not even so much as a grain of sugar. Besides, Ned argued, what did Zillah want with a screaming baby around her at her time of life? Well, he had a point there too. He told Clover again that he expected nothing from her; he accepted that she was not in love with him. He loved her, though. Enough for the two of them, he said. He had always loved her. It had always been his intention, one way or the other, to marry her. Now, she needed him more than he needed her and he was glad of it. Further refusal was madness.

  ‘And, as far as anybody else is concerned,’ he added, ‘I’m the father of the child.’

  At that she looked at him and nodded, slowly. It was her solemn consent at last.

  ‘So you agree?’

  ‘Yes, all right. I’ll marry you. But I don’t deserve you. And you don’t deserve what you’re about to get.’

  He afforded himself a triumphant smile. ‘Whether or no, we’re cutting it a bit fine. You’ve only got a day or two to go, remember.’

  ‘As if I needed reminding.’

  ‘It’ll have to be by special licence. I’ll organise it tomorrow.’

  Come the morning of 5th March, Zillah fussed around Clover like a mother hen.

  ‘Come on, put this new frock on as you’ve med, my wench, and look sharp about it. That registrar won’t wait for thee if you’m late. Then where will you be, eh? Up the creek with ne’er an
oar to row theeself with.’

  The frock was a necessary addition to her scant wardrobe now that nothing else would fit. It was like a tent, she said as she ran it up on Zillah’s trusty treadle machine, her pride and joy.

  Clover, her hair done up beautifully, pulled the frock over her head and arranged it over her nine-month belly. She peered at herself in the long mirror in Zillah’s bedroom. So this was to be her wedding day. It was a far cry from the brilliant event she and Tom had planned in those heady days of their courtship. How fortune played some cruel tricks! The white bridal gown she’d always imagined herself to be wearing remained part of a roll of satin stashed away somewhere, never destined to be fashioned into an elegant dress to fit a slender bride with a mere twenty-four-inch waist. Never would it witness the romance and glory of a resplendent wedding in a church attended by countless friends, and relations coming from far and wide.

  ‘Well, the registrar will only have to take one look at you to know why you ain’t a-getting married in church,’ Zillah commented, breaking Clover’s daydream.

  Clover chuckled at Zillah’s irreverence. ‘I didn’t think I’d be getting married at all three days ago. D’you think Ned’s daft?’

  ‘Stark staring mad. To tek on another chap’s child he must be. But he must’ve thought hard about it. For that you should be thankful, Clover. Even though he ain’t the chap you wanted.’

  Clover nodded, and more solemnly said: ‘I know. The trouble is, he can’t really afford it. He still owes a loan of two hundred. Did you know about that?’

  ‘I seem to remember some talk of a loan.’

  ‘Yes, somebody donated it through that reporter from the Herald, Julian Oakley. We neither of us know who it was. Well, it’s got to be paid back and the sooner the better. But God knows how. We’ll have to live in penury till it’s paid back, I reckon. I shall look forward to the day when I can go to the Herald offices and say, “Here, Mr Oakley. Here’s that loan repaid. Pass it on to whoever it was that was daft enough to lend it”.’