Catherine was startled. ‘No, he wouldn’t. How did you know?’
Bridie shrugged. ‘Men make the worst of patients. I nursed my own father. Was a blessing when he went - just to see his face free of the pain, like a little lad sleeping again.’
Catherine sniffed. ‘I feel that bad I never got to see him again. Left home last summer and never went back for Christmas, even though my aunt wrote and told me he was ill. Now I know I should have.’
‘And where is home?’
‘Jarrow, Tyneside.’
‘Well, there you go,’ Bridie declared, ‘that’s the other end of the country. He wouldn’t have expected you to go all that way just for a day or two’s holiday, now would he?’
Catherine crumpled the letter harder. ‘My mother did. Said Grandda lost heart after I went - off his food, showed no interest in anything ‘cept when a letter came from me. Blames me for him going downhill so quickly - though she could never stand his guts when he was alive.’
‘Does she say all that in the letter?’ Bridie asked in concern. ‘That’s a terrible burden for you, so it is.’
‘Not exactly word for word,’ Catherine admitted, ‘but I can read between the lines.’
‘Well, maybe you shouldn’t.’ Bridie was forthright. ‘Maybe your mother’s trying to comfort you by saying that your grandfather thought so much of you.’
The thought had not occurred to Catherine and she was reluctant to believe it.
‘She wants me to go back for the funeral, but I couldn’t possibly. The expense - and the time off work - I’ve too much to do. And what good would it do? He’s dead and gone. I’d be more use lighting candles for him and praying down here.’
She looked at Bridie for reassurance. The woman nodded and patted her hand.
‘Of course you would. I’m sure if you write and explain, your mother and father will understand.’
Catherine quickly looked away. The mention of her father made her suddenly anxious. But then it struck her that, to this stranger, she was a normal, respectable woman with an ordinary family. How wonderful it was to be seen in such a light. It made her the more determined not to return to Tyneside and open up all the old wounds of past shame and failure.
‘I’ll send money, of course,’ Catherine brightened, ‘help with funeral costs.’
Bridie nodded and murmured about her being generous and thoughtful. Catherine felt a wave of gratitude. Shortly afterwards, Bridie said goodbye and went on her way. Catherine sat on wondering at how she had told this near stranger so much so quickly. She supposed it was because Bridie McKim had been candid about her own circumstances, treating her as if she were a long-lost friend.
As she made her way back to her lodgings, she wondered if she had been too hasty in confiding in the woman. After all, she was one of the laundry workers, and Bridie might be as garrulous as Hettie Brown or Lily for telling others her business. But there was a warmth about the red-headed woman that had reminded her of her grandma, Rose, and attracted her at once. Her pleasant Irish voice had brought back memories of old John’s tales and made her think of her grandfather with affection, banishing the numb disbelief at his death.
The thought of Bridie’s kindness fortified Catherine to write to Kate, explaining that she would not be coming home for the funeral.
Chapter 26
As summer came, Catherine made the most of the long evenings and fine Sundays to roam the cliff tops and rolling countryside of the South Downs. The regime at Hastings was liberal compared to Harton or Tendring, with more time off. Yet she tried not to make comparisons with the previous summer when she had had Lily as companion, not liking to admit how much she missed her former friend. She felt bad about not replying to Lily’s letter and now it seemed too late.
Determined not to dwell on the past, Catherine took swimming lessons and went each evening to the open-air bathing pool at St Leonards, invigorated by the chilly water after the heat and noise of the laundry. At work, she noticed Bridie McKim among the others, with her quick tongue and infectious laughter, and wondered how she could have overlooked the woman before.
Bridie was deferential but friendly, enquiring after her family and the funeral. Catherine kept to herself how Aunt Mary had written in high dudgeon that Kate had squandered on drink half the funeral money that Catherine had sent. Catherine was unsure of the Irish woman, regretting now that she had confided in her so readily. But if she was distant to Bridie, the woman did not seem to mind and continued to amuse her fellow workers when Matron was out of earshot.
One hot night, restless and overtired, Catherine went for a walk in the moonlight. Down the hill, she skirted the hunched silhouette of the ruined castle and passed the entrance to St Clement’s Caves. She liked to imagine eighteenth-century smugglers hauling their booty up the narrow lanes of the old town in the dark, and making for the dank caves. She had paid her tourist sixpence to see round them on a crowded Sunday afternoon, but on a starry night she fancied she could see ghosts in the shadows and hear the scrape of their boots as the warm wind raked over the shingle. Wending her way down the main street past timber-framed houses and the weather-boarded Bull Inn, she breathed in the smell of the sea and pretended she was keeping a tryst with a darkly handsome smuggler down on the shore.
Catherine walked from the harbour along the promenade to the very end of St Leonards resort. Taking off her shoes, she padded across the sand to the water’s edge and cooled her feet in the rippling sea. She was startled by laughter, and spun round in alarm. Two figures lay under the promenade wall. In the moonlight she could see them nestling in each other’s arms, suppressing giggles. A few yards further on, another couple were stretched out on the sand, and beyond them another. She had stumbled into the midst of courting couples cooling off in the night breeze.
Suddenly, she felt achingly alone. There was no one to put his arms about her and hold her in the dark, to soothe her sleeplessness. She thought of the men she had kissed and held hands with, and wished for one of them now. It was nearly a year since she had lain in the tall reeds on Mersea Island with gentle Alf. She had no idea where he was, but she wished with a passion that he were with her at that moment.
Snatching up her shoes, Catherine hurried from the beach and its lovers, and fled back to her lodgings. She slept badly, but by the next day had determined to change her circumstances. Hastings was where she wanted to stay, so she would look for a flat of her own and fill it with beautiful possessions. If she could not have company then at least she would have comfort. She was earning a good salary and had saved more than enough to make the down payment of a month’s rent in advance.
Within a week, Catherine had found a pleasant one-bedroom flat on the ground floor of a large house in Clifton Road. It would be her own place of sanctuary, not a room full of borrowed furniture that reminded her of the tenements of her childhood.
The same week, she joined the local tennis club and went there on Wednesday evenings and Saturday afternoons. To her surprise, she improved rapidly and soon others were asking her to make up foursomes. With her new-found friends she was relaxed and gregarious, and would regale them with anecdotes about the laundry and its eccentric staff. In a game of mixed doubles Catherine met an insurance agent called Maurice.
He started to call on her and take her on sightseeing trips in his toffee-coloured Morris Minor. They went as far afield as Brighton and the fig orchards of West Tarring; took picnics by tranquil rivers where mahogany-red cattle grazed the rich pasture. They visited the Norman castle of Herstmonceux. Maurice would not allow Catherine to pay for anything.
‘I could, you know,’ she offered. ‘I earn a fair salary.’
‘Won’t hear of it,’ Maurice declared. ‘You’re some girl. Beautiful, talented and rich - just the sort of heiress I’m looking for,’ he teased.
Catherine laughed, captivated by his flattery.
>
Maurice was not keen on walking, preferring to motor about in his prized possession, but he was genial company and she allowed him to choose where they went. As summer wore on, he talked more of what they would do after the tennis season was over, as if it was taken for granted that they would carry on courting. Catherine did everything to please him, even taking out a life insurance policy that he recommended. There was only one thing she would not do.
‘Come on, Catherine,’ Maurice cajoled at the end of one picnic, as they lay kissing on the edge of a ripe cornfield, ‘a little bit more -just for me.’ He slipped a hand inside her open blouse and kissed her cleavage.
Her heart began its familiar hammering at his deft touch. ‘No, Maurice.’ She pushed his head away gently. ‘I told you, not that.’
‘Come on,’ he laughed, ‘you don’t have to tell everything to your priest. You’re a grown woman - I can hear your heart beating, darling. I know you want to.’
He ran a finger up her stockinged leg and squeezed her thigh, pressing himself forward again and kissing her lips. Catherine felt her resolve waver. He excited her and part of her yearned to give in to the sweet longing inside. But always, when she got to this point, the image of Kate copulating with her unknown father forced itself to mind. It made her queasy and fearful. Never, ever, must she make such a stupid ruinous mistake.
She shoved Maurice from her and sat up. ‘No! I don’t want to - and I do have to tell the priest everything at confession.’
He looked at her with pleading brown eyes. ‘I can tell you don’t love me - not the way I love you.’
‘I do,’ Catherine protested, feeling confused.
‘I’m mad about you, girl,’ Maurice said, holding her face in his hands and covering her with soft kisses like butterflies. ‘If you really loved me, you’d show it by making love. That’s all we’d be doing, darling, just loving each other. I’ll be careful. I’ve come prepared.’
Catherine felt a surge of alarm. What did he mean by ‘prepared’? He must have some sort of contraception. But that was forbidden too. It was a sin akin to murder, the priest said.
‘Stop it.’ She pushed him away again and scrambled to her feet. ‘I want you to take me home, please.’ She hated the way she sounded like a whining child.
He looked suddenly annoyed. ‘You don’t know what you’re missing, girl. You and your stuffy religion - it’ll stop you being happy - all this guilt and no fun. Well, it’s not for me.’
‘Don’t talk about my religion like that. We Catholics know how to have fun as much as you Protestants - maybe more so,’ she answered in agitation. ‘But I’ll not put my soul at risk just to give you a few minutes’ gratification.’
‘Is that all you see it as - my gratification?’ Maurice asked with a wounded look.
‘Well, isn’t it?’
‘Course not. I love you. I’ve told you enough times, haven’t I?’
Catherine looked at him helplessly. ‘If you really loved me,’ she said quietly, ‘you wouldn’t push me to make love to you - not until I want to - not until we’re—’ She broke off in embarrassment.
‘What?’ Maurice demanded.
‘Married,’ Catherine whispered hoarsely.
He stared at her, then laughed shortly. ‘Oh, marriage.’ He said it as if it were of no consequence. ‘What an old-fashioned girl you are, after all.’
Catherine reddened. ‘What do you mean, after all?’
Maurice picked himself up and straightened out his clothes, adjusted his tie. ‘I got the impression at the club that you were - well, you know - one of those girls that was up for a good time.’
‘I-I am,’ Catherine stuttered.
He glanced at her. ‘No, I mean, modern. Available.’ He stressed the word. ‘As a matter of fact, all the chaps at the club thought that. You shouldn’t give out such signals, Catherine, if you don’t really want it. Get you into real trouble. If I wasn’t such a gentleman . . .’
She gawped at him, quite speechless.
‘Never mind,’ he said brusquely. ‘Get in the car and I’ll take you home.’
Tears flooded her eyes as she groped to gather up the remains of the picnic. What had she done to earn such a reputation at the tennis club? She had never led anyone on. Maurice, of all people, knew that she was chaste. It was so unfair! She swallowed tears of anger and hurt as she fumbled to close the picnic basket. But she was too upset to speak as Maurice started the car and drove back down to Hastings. She sat feeling wretched, knowing that this brief summer affair was over.
When the car drew up outside her house, Maurice leant over and, for a wild moment, Catherine thought he would kiss her.
‘Better do up those buttons,’ he said, glancing at her blouse as he opened the passenger door. As she fumbled to do them up, he sat waiting for her to get out, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel and whistling a tune.
She scrambled out and slammed the door, a mumbled thank you dying in her throat. The car roared away, leaving her staring numbly after it. Only later, when she dragged herself into the large bed in the corner of her spacious sitting room, still fully clothed, did she realise she had left her picnic basket in the back of his car.
She would not ask for it back. Catherine could not face the prospect of ever seeing Maurice again. How foolish she would feel, wondering what he might say about her. Perhaps he would pretend they had made love, so as not to lose face, and her reputation would be further tarnished. She buried her burning face in the pillow in anguish over how the men at the tennis club talked about her. Just because she made her own living, had her own flat and relied on no man, they misjudged her. Did her women friends think the same too? Did they gossip about her behind her back, jealous that she was so independent at twenty-four?
Catherine wept through the night, wondering why it was she attracted such men - married men or deceitful, needy men. There must be something wrong with her. She must be to blame - or why did it keep happening? She hit herself with her fists and dug her nails into her flesh. How hateful she was. A bastard inside and out. She would never find happiness with a man, because they would always be able to see through her. No matter how refined her speech or genteel her manners, they would always discover that beneath lurked common, foul-minded Kitty of the New Buildings, Kate’s shameful daughter. Kate! Catherine sobbed in desolation. It always came back to Kate.
In the early hours, she was seized by cramps. She doubled up in pain and could not move. By morning her period came. She missed Mass, lying on her bed curled up against the world, listening to the sounds: distant bells, a child’s voice singing, footsteps on the pavement passing by.
She dozed and dreamt she was back in Jarrow, ill in bed. The curtain lifted in the breeze and she heard the children playing in the lane, chanting a skipping game. They were calling out her name, but she could not move. Kate was shouting at her to get up and join them, but she was pinned to the prickly mattress and when she tried to call back, no voice came.
‘Miss McMullen? Catherine!’
A voice woke her. For a confused moment, she thought it was Grandma Rose, then the pain of remembrance washed over her with renewed force. She lay back and kept quiet. The caller would soon go away. But whoever it was knocked at the door more loudly.
‘Miss McMullen! Are you in there?’
A neighbour from the flat upstairs called down. ‘What do you want?’
‘I’m looking for my friend. Sorry to bother you. But would you know if Catherine McMullen’s at home? She wasn’t at church this morning and I was worried something was wrong.’
It was Bridie McKim.
‘Haven’t seen her today. Car dropped her off yesterday afternoon. Maybe she’s just having a day off. Curtains are still drawn.’
‘So I see. Do you have a key to her flat?’ Bridie asked. ‘Maybe she’s lying in the
re unconscious.’
Catherine sat up indignantly. What business was it of theirs whether she missed church or took a day off? She would lie dying in bed if she wanted to without them poking their noses in. The neighbour was answering that she did not have a key, but they could always try breaking down the door. Catherine struggled out of bed, still wearing yesterday’s clothes and hurriedly straightened out the covers.
But Bridie was cautioning against it.
‘No, no, I’ll be off. If you happen to see her, tell her Bridie McKim was here - and if she needs anything just to send a message.’
Catherine stood on the other side of the door holding her breath as she listened to Bridie walking down the hallway and closing the front door. A flush of relief was quickly followed by regret. How kind of the woman to notice her absence from St Mary Star-of-the-Sea and to bother calling. Tears stung her tired eyes. No one else in Hastings would have put themselves to such trouble.
Catherine rushed to the large bay window and pulled back the curtain. She rapped hard on the glass.
‘Wait, Bridie!’ she called. The visitor glanced round, her surprise giving way to a broad smile. Catherine beckoned her back and she waved in acceptance.
‘I was sleeping,’ Catherine explained sheepishly, as she opened the door.
‘Poor lamb,’ Bridie said in concern, ‘you look terrible - and there I was waking you with my noise. I’ll come back later.’
‘No, stay,’ Catherine insisted. She was sick of her own company and could not bear the thought of being left alone any longer. ‘Come in, please. I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘No, you won’t,’ Bridie said. ‘You’ll sit down while I do it.’
To her own amazement, Catherine meekly did as she was told. Bridie pulled back the curtains, letting the sun flood in, then bustled into the small kitchen and made tea while Catherine flopped into a big armchair.
‘Cups are in the cupboard over the bath,’ Catherine called.
‘Don’t move, I’ll find them,’ Bridie called back, humming as she went about the task.
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