by Anne Bennett
She was nervous enough of Paul as it was, for she wasn’t used to mixing with doctors. She seldom had reason to call one, for they cost money and few would speak to the likes of her anyway. But now this fine, upstanding doctor man was wanting to marry their Carmel.
She knew she had to meet him, but wished he wasn’t quite so fine and, more than that, she wished that he hadn’t to see the hovel Carmel was reared in.
‘Is Daddy in, Mammy?’ Carmel asked as they neared the house.
‘Why surely, child, and waiting to welcome you like the rest of us.’
Carmel suppressed the exclamation of disbelief and asked instead, ‘Is he sober?’
‘Of course,’ Eve said in a high voice, as if she thought it odd that Carmel had to even ask such a thing. ‘He’s looking forward to meeting you…and…and…your young man too, of course. Now come away in. You must be worn out and famished with hunger.’
‘We have food, Mammy,’ Carmel said. ‘Lots of it. We stopped at the shops and stocked up.’
Carmel saw her mother’s shoulders sag in blessed sheer relief and she knew if they had brought nothing with them, someone would have had to go without in order that they be welcomed properly.
‘I’ll unpack it and you will see,’ she said. ‘And then we will prepare a meal fit for a king. Just wait till I take off my coat.’ She spun round as she spoke and came face to face with her father.
Immediately, she felt as if she had a leaden weight in her stomach and her mouth was so dry she was having trouble swallowing. She felt like she had as a young child when on more than one occasion she had wet herself with fear. Her father was dressed in greasy trousers and a check shirt that had seen much better days and which strained to fasten across his large and flabby belly. He had the sleeves rolled up and the reddened arms protruding from it matched the red of his thick and bulbous face, with his wide cruel mouth, squashed nose and eyes as cold as ice.
‘So,’ said the hated guttural voice, ‘have you brought your fancy fiancé?’
‘Y-Yes, Daddy. He…he’s b-behind you.’ Carmel hated herself for stuttering and betraying her fear, especially when she saw her father was amused by it.
Paul hated hearing it too, and he stepped in front of Dennis. ‘I am Carmel’s fiancé,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘My name is Paul Connolly and I am very pleased to meet you.’
Dennis ignored the hand. He looked at it as if it were an object of disgust and then growled out, ‘Is she up the duff?’
Carmel gasped in dismay as Paul said, ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘You heard,’ Dennis said contemptuously. ‘Simple enough question. I asked you if her belly was full?’
‘Daddy,’ Carmel cried in desperation and even Eve said, ‘Ah, Dennis, give over, do.’
‘Shut your mouths, the pair of you,’ Dennis commanded and he turned again to Paul. ‘Well?’
‘I assure you…’
‘Is she or isn’t she?’ Dennis said. ‘That’s all I want to know.’
‘No, she is not.’
‘Then why the bleeding hell are you marrying her?’
Paul found it hard before this objectionable and belligerent man to talk of love and devotion and so he said instead, ‘I care deeply for Carmel and I wish to marry her.’
Dennis shook his head. ‘She ain’t your sort,’ he snarled. ‘Look around you. This is where she comes from, what she is deep down. You best go back and find one of your own set if you have a yen to marry at all. People like you don’t marry the likes of us.’
Carmel gave a cry of anguish and Paul, seeing her distress, put his arm around her and led her away through the door.
‘I can’t expect you to put up with this,’ Carmel said, as Paul strode across the yard and turned into the lane. ‘We were wrong to come. We should have stayed in our little fantasy cocoon and pretended all in the garden was rosy. And now you know where and how I was dragged up. If you want nothing more to do with me, I will understand.’
Paul stopped, turned Carmel round and gave her a little shake. ‘Look at me!’
‘I hardly dare.’
‘Why? Don’t tell me it is because of anything that brute of a father did or said?’
‘Don’t you care?’
‘Of course I care,’ Paul burst out. ‘I care a great deal that he still has the power to terrify the life out of you.’
‘But the things he said, the way he was…I can’t…’
Paul held tight to Carmel’s hands and looked deep into her eyes. He said, ‘Right, let us establish here and now that you were right: your father is a bastard of the first order and a bully as well. No one should ever let a bully win. He is hitting out the only way he knows and trying to drive a wedge between us, which is exactly what my mother tried to do, using different methods. We cannot allow either of them to do that.’
He pulled Carmel into his arms. ‘I love you, Carmel,’ he said, kissing her tenderly. ‘Please believe me. My life is nothing without you. Will you come back with me now and face your father with your head held high? You have no need to fear him any longer. He has no power to touch our lives in any way.’
Carmel knew that Paul was right and she gave a brief nod. They returned to the house, hand in hand, and she noticed her brothers and sisters looking at her with a kind of awe and suddenly wished she could lift them from this place, give them somewhere where they could be carefree children.
At least, she thought, they could have plenty to eat that day and she was pleased to see that while she had been away from the house, her mother had been busy making a meal from the things they had brought.
Though the food was good, there was tension and apprehension in the air. Dennis demanded that they ate in silence. Only he could speak, and this was usually to pull someone to pieces or make fun or yell at the children or Eve. Carmel remembered it well.
Everyone seemed to breathe easier when Dennis went out to the pub as usual. The children began to chatter and laugh, and were very interested in the tales Paul and Carmel told first about life at the hospital. When they got on to the plans they had for their marriage the following summer, the children were spellbound.
Siobhan and Carmel washed up in the scullery while Eve put Pauline and Edward to bed and settled the others at the table to do their homework.
Siobhan said, ‘Did you see Mammy’s face when you were talking about your wedding? I am sure she would give her right arm to be able to go. I will be sixteen by then and I’m sure I can see to things for a few days.’
‘What difference does that make?’ Carmel demanded.
‘Haven’t you learned yet that the Duffys don’t make plans or have ideas? There’s little point. I mean, think about it, Siobhan. Even if Mammy had the clothes to wear and she could gather up the fare, do you think our father would be agreeable to it? Do you think that he would wave her off with his blessing and a smile of approval decorating his face for once in his life?’
‘No,’ Siobhan said, with a sigh. ‘Bloody shame, though.’
‘I agree,’ Carmel said, and added with a grin, ‘and if Mammy heard you she would wash your mouth out with carbolic.’
And then, suddenly sorry for her sister, she went on, ‘Look, Siobhan, I am taking Paul to see Sister Frances tomorrow at lunchtime and I will have a word with her and see if she can think of something. I’m promising nothing, mind, so don’t tell Mammy yet. Sister Frances might be a nun, but I don’t know how hot she is in the miracle department and I think that is what we need here.’
The following day, Sister Frances considered the problem of Eve seeing her daughter married. When Carmel told her that Siobhan was more than happy to see to things if her mother did this, she nodded her head slowly.
‘I think that is a very good idea.’
‘But, Sister Frances, my father would never allow it.’
‘Well, it would certainly help me if he could be persuaded, for it would not be fitting for a nun to travel alone and I suppose I am invited to this wedding too?�
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‘Of course, Sister,’ Carmel said. ‘I’m surprised you even had to ask, but I was also going to ask your sister, Mrs Mackay, who spoke to you for the job I had in the hospital and got the ball rolling in the first place.’
‘And don’t you think your mother would feel it, you asking your teacher and a former work colleague and her getting no invite at all?’
‘I know, Sister, and yes, she is bound to but I don’t see—;’
‘Unless there is a drastic change between now and the date of your wedding, there is no way my sister, Eileen, will be able to be away from the house overnight,’ Sister Frances said. ‘She has her mother-in-law living with her now, for her mind is wandering. A neighbour woman looks after her while Eileen is teaching at the school, for the old woman cannot be left, and as things stand at the moment, she would be unable to come to your wedding. That means I would have to travel alone, unless your mother was to come with me.’
‘Sister, even if it were remotely possible, Mammy has no suitable clothes,’ Carmel said.
‘Leave that to me,’ Sister Frances told her confidently. ‘We have had some really good quality clothes given in for the missions just lately. There is a costume there would be just the thing for your mother. In fact, it would fit few others. Most people are taller and have more flesh on their bones than Eve. I think too she should have a good haircut.’
Carmel gaped at her. Was she mad? Where in the world was her mother to get the money to have her hair done? The Duffys did not go to the hairdresser’s as a matter of course.
‘Don’t look so astounded, Carmel,’ the nun said. ‘You know Minnie Doherty that owns the hairdresser’s in Main Street?’ Well, her son had the whooping cough so bad the doctor had him admitted to the hospital. The child was very ill and many times we thought we might lose him, but in the end we pulled him through it and I think his mother would be only too pleased to do a favour for me. I mean,’ she went on with a merry twinkle in her eye, ‘it isn’t as if I will ever have need of a Marcel wave, is it?’
Paul smiled broadly at the thought, but Carmel was too concerned to find anything amusing. ‘Look, Sister,’ she said, ‘it’s all right going on about costumes and hairdos and all, but aren’t we talking a lot of tommy rot here? I mean, can you see my father allowing my mother to go anywhere in the first place?’
‘It might need a bit of work right enough.’
‘A bit of work?’ Carmel burst out incredulously. ‘I just can’t see—;’
‘We might have to involve Father O’Malley,’ Sister Frances mused as if Carmel hadn’t spoken. ‘You had intended to see him while you were here, I suppose?’
Carmel hadn’t thought of making a special journey to see the priest, but she knew he had great influence, even with her father.
‘We’ll go up together,’ Sister Frances said emphatically, ‘and put it to the man straight.’
Carmel knew that even with the priest on their side, it still mightn’t work. Dealing with her father most of the time was like trying to handle a raging bull. And then, as she had confided to Lois, she didn’t know whether she wanted her mother to attend the ceremony at all.
Though she was more tolerant of what her mother had to put up with than when she had been living with it too, she doubted whether better clothes and a haircut would make Eve that different. Surely she would still be the same downtrodden, feeble person, frightened of her own shadow? However, as Carmel couldn’t share these thoughts they had to be pushed to the very back of her mind and she gave herself up to enjoying the visit with the nun she had always got on so well with, glad to see that Paul appeared to like her too.
When Paul excused himself after the meal and Sister Frances had a few moments alone with Carmel, she took hold of her hands and her eyes were shining, ‘My darling girl, I am so happy for you. Paul is a fine man and I am sure will make you a marvellous husband.’
‘Thank you, Sister,’ Carmel said. ‘I hadn’t thought to marry anyone, you know. I thought to remain single all my life, but when I met Paul…’
‘You wouldn’t have been happy single, Carmel,’ Sister Frances said. ‘You have too large a heart and too loving a nature. One of the nuns once asked me if you would think of taking the veil as that is another route into nursing, but I didn’t even bother posing the question to you as I knew the answer. I think I said something like you would make a good nurse, but a very bad nun. Now your path is set and soon you will be a married woman.
The priest found he too liked Paul Connolly, who spoke with just the right respectful tone as he gave an account of himself and his plans for the future. He thought that Carmel had done well for herself in becoming engaged to him, better than she could have hoped, considering her lowly beginnings.
He listened as Sister Frances told him of her invitation to the wedding the following summer, and how she had intended to go with her sister, who now would probably not be able to go. She went on to say Carmel would love to have her mother with her on her wedding day.
‘I can quite see that any girl would want that,’ Father O’Malley said. ‘However, that maybe problematic. You wouldn’t think of getting married here?’
‘No, Father, not really,’ Carmel said. ‘I feel at home in Birmingham now and there is the problem of Paul’s relations and how to accommodate them all if they were to come here. I wouldn’t be able to house all my family either, of course, but if it were only Mammy and Sister Frances, then I am sure they can stay at the convent on the Hagley Road, no distance from me at all.’
‘Ah, but who is to see to things if your mother was to go away?’ the priest asked.
Carmel had been expecting this. ‘All the children will be at school through the day except for Pauline, Father,’ she said. ‘And by the time I am married, Siobhan will be sixteen and is quite prepared to take time from her job and attend to things. Kathy will help her, for she will be going on for eleven. We are only talking of a few days.’
‘It will give Eve such a boost if she is able to do this,’ Sister Frances put in, ‘and help me too, Father, for it wouldn’t be fitting for me to travel alone.’
‘I have a feeling Dennis won’t see it that way at all.’
‘My feelings entirely, Father,’ Sister Frances said. ‘And that is where you come in. I’m sure you could put it to him in a way that he will find he could accept.’
Father O’Malley wasn’t at all sure. Dennis was not known for his measured responses, but it would be the best solution all round, he decided, and Dennis would have to be made to see that.
Dennis did not see it like that at all and the following afternoon Carmel could hear her father roaring well before they reached the house. She sneaked a look at Paul, longing to take up his hand, run from the place and hide till her father’s rage be spent.
As if he knew her thoughts, Paul gazing down at her gave her hand a squeeze. ‘We probably helped bring about your father’s anger this time,’ he said. ‘We can’t let your mother deal with it on her own.’
Carmel knew this, though she entered the cottage with great trepidation. Dennis had his wife pinned against the wall, his face inches from her as he yelled straight into her face.
‘Behind my back, that’s what I can’t get over. Conniving with the clergy to get your own way. Well, I’ll not stand it, do you hear? Do you hear that loud and clear, woman? You are my wife, your place is here, and here is where you will stay, wedding or no sodding wedding.’
Carmel’s youngest sister, little Pauline, was cowering under the ramshackle table with her hands over her ears, while tears streamed from her eyes. Carmel couldn’t blame her and felt a great temptation to do the same. However, she knew that wasn’t an option and she eased Pauline out carefully and, sitting down on one of the chairs, held her tight in her arms.
She was scared herself, but also too angry to be cautious as she cried over her father’s bristling anger and her mother’s loud and gulping sobs, ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if they could hear you in the town.
You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Does it make you feel more of a man to terrify women and weans?’
‘Why you…’ Dennis said, approaching Carmel with his arm raised.
‘Steady!’ Paul said. ‘If you lay one finger on her, I will knock you into the back of next week.’
‘You cheeky young bugger! This is my house and I say what goes on.’
‘Not when it involves my fiancée you don’t,’ Paul said. ‘And Carmel is right: I would be ashamed if my wife and child were as terrified of me as yours obviously are of you. What sort of a man are you anyway that thinks that frightening people is the way to live your life?’
Dennis nearly exploded. No one had ever spoken to him like that before. Carmel still sat on the chair with the shaking child clasped to her, stroking her dusty curls in an effort to calm her while she trembled for Paul and his temerity at speaking in such a way to her father. The shock of it had totally stopped Eve’s tears.
Paul almost wanted Dennis to attempt to hit him. It would have given him the excuse to trounce the man, to punish him for the childhood Carmel had endured and for what he had seen Carmel’s mother subjected to.
And yet one part of his mind knew that if he did, life might be harder for them afterwards and he wouldn’t be there to try to protect them. And it would certainly scotch any idea that Dennis might allow Carmel’s mother to go to the wedding. And so he dropped his aggressive stance and said in an almost conciliatory way, ‘Come on, man, this is no way to go on. If you are annoyed or upset, shouldn’t it be talked about, rather than you bawling at everyone else?’
Dennis’s eyes narrowed. He knew what Paul was up to and he was angry, bloody angry, and what he wanted to do was punch the life out of him. But he was not a complete fool and he knew Paul was well-muscled, young and fit. He was also aware that the man was unafraid of him and those things would make him a formidable adversary.
He stepped away from his wife and faced Paul. Eve scrubbed the tears from her cheeks with the sleeve of her cardigan before crouching and holding out her arms. Pauline pulled away from Carmel and threw herself at her mother, snuggling into her with a sigh of relief.
