by Annie Murray
In the middle of the service, just after they’d blasted out ‘Hail the Day that sees Him rise!’ at a rousing volume, Dolly felt very hot and sick, lights danced at the edges of her eyes and during the following prayer, blackness came down over her. She crumpled, landing half on the seat and falling forwards, slumping over the back of the row in front.
The next thing she knew, she was being held up in her seat by Susanna and Rachel on each side of her.
‘Dolly?’ Susanna nudged her.
‘Let me get out of here,’ Dolly begged queasily. All she wanted was to lie down somewhere cool. The room was swimming round.
With all the eyes of the congregation swivelling towards them – the minister was already in the pulpit waiting to preach – the three of them stood up. As they squeezed past Mom, Dolly saw her making fierce faces at them which meant, Stop attracting attention to yourselves . . . But it couldn’t be helped. Dolly was desperate to get out and afraid she might be sick there in the church.
‘Oh, Dolly!’ Susanna erupted as Dolly sank groggily on to the steps. It was such a relief to be outside.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered, head down. ‘I didn’t feel it coming on. It just all went dark suddenly. Ugh – I feel horrible.’
‘I expect it’s your condition,’ Rachel remarked unsympathetically.
‘Rachel!’ Dolly heard her sisters bickering in hissing whispers over her head. ‘For heaven’s sake keep quiet.’
‘You’re just worried that David’ll find out,’ Rachel said.
‘Well, of course I am! What the hell would his family think?’
Dolly, feeling sick and guilty, started to cry. ‘I never meant for it to happen. You know I didn’t. And now it feels as if everyone’s staring at me and thinking I’m . . . I’m dirty and loose . . .’
To her surprise, Rachel softened, and Dolly felt her sister’s arm round her shoulders. ‘The one who wants seeing to is the dirty man who did this to you – it’s not your fault, sis.’
‘Well, not much anyway,’ Susanna said impatiently. ‘Going out on the streets at night . . .’
‘Stop it, Suz!’ Rachel’s voice rose a bit too high. They all froze. They could just hear the minister’s voice now, rising and falling inside. ‘Look, you stay here and see David – come back with Mom. I’ll take Dolly home in a bit. You don’t look too good.’ She squeezed Dolly’s shoulders.
‘I don’t feel it,’ Dolly said. ‘I feel really sick. I wish I could have a drink of water.’
But there was none to be had.
Susanna went back in to join their mother and when Dolly had recovered a little, Rachel helped her make her way home. It was a nice feeling, Rachel being kind.
‘I’m really scared,’ Dolly confided in her as they went along. ‘I don’t want a babby, Rach. What am I s’posed to do with one at my age? I’ll be chained to it for life then. But what if I tried to get rid of it . . . ?’ She shuddered. ‘Mom’d kill me. I don’t think I could go through with it in any case.’
Rachel nodded. You heard stories, truly horrible ones.
‘You will be with me, won’t you, sis?’ Dolly looked into Rachel’s lovely dark eyes. ‘I’m so scared, I can’t sleep at night thinking about it. I don’t know . . .’ She spoke in a small voice. ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen. And Mom keeps saying all these odd things . . .’
‘I know,’ Rachel said. ‘I mean, who’s this Nancy she was talking about? I kept asking and she clammed up, said we’d know soon enough.’
‘She said she’s her sister,’ Dolly said. ‘But where’s she been all this time? Why didn’t we know about her?’
‘I think,’ Rachel said, ‘after dinner, we’d better get Mom to tell us exactly what she’s got in mind.’
They were walking along the Moseley Road, talking over their troubles, when a stooped, scruffy figure who had been moving towards them stopped in their path.
‘You look a pair of nice young ladies,’ she said in a gravelly, insinuating voice. Dolly saw a face looking at them which it would have been hard to put an age to. The woman’s hair, lank stuff hanging out around her hat, was of a sickly, greyish yellow colour. Her teeth, the few remaining, were brownish, and she peered at them through narrow, calculating eyes.
‘Where do you two young lovelies live them, eh?’
She reached out a hand and gripped Rachel’s forearm tightly.
‘What d’you want to know for?’ Rachel said. Dolly could see her shuddering, trying to pull her arm away. ‘What’re you doing?’ The woman was staring horribly at her.
‘You have a certain look about you,’ she said. Her mind seemed to drift for a moment and she looked away. Then she went on, ‘I’m looking for someone and you look the sort of nice young ladies who could ’elp me. No one else’s given me what I want yet.’
‘Get off my sister,’ Dolly said sharply. She felt panicky. The woman looked a bad lot and even worse was the stink of her, a ripe mixture of long-unwashed clothing and drink.
‘I’m looking for a lady by the name of Hetty – used to be Hetty Barker – lives round ’ere somewhere if I ain’t mistook. Would you know anyone called Hetty?’
‘No,’ Rachel said truthfully. ‘We don’t. Now let go of me, please!’
‘Can you spare a penny or two, you pretty young ladies?’ the woman whined. ‘Or a tanner if you’ve got it . . .’
‘No!’ Rachel said, pulling away abruptly. ‘We’ve no money on us. Just leave us alone, please. Come on, Dolly.’
Dolly followed gladly and the woman slid away, cursing.
‘Wants locking up, she does,’ Rachel said crossly, rubbing her arm. ‘Nasty slimy thing. What’s she want to go asking us for? The woman could be anywhere, whoever she is.’
The girls cleared the meal away. Phyllis had had a nice joint of beef cooking slowly all morning and a mountainous number of potatoes. Dolly was looking a good deal better now she had some food inside her. She and Rachel forgot about their encounter on the Moseley Road for the moment and over dinner they talked about church gossip and this and that.
‘Mom,’ Rachel said as they were clearing away. Rachel always seemed to be the one who had to voice things that no one else particularly wanted to. ‘Look – what happened this morning . . . Dolly’s scared – and the rest of us . . . I mean, what’re we going to do?’
‘Right,’ Phyllis said. Any day now Dolly was going to start showing. She was four months gone already. ‘Fill the teapot, Rachel, and while we have a cuppa, I’ll tell you. I’ve said nothing before because the less said the fewer tongues will wag. No, Charles – it’s no good thinking you can just disappear. You’re part of this family too.’
‘But what am I supposed to do?’ he shrugged, sitting down again. During the service he had sat stiffly beside one of the other lay preachers, trying to look as if all the females of his family were people he’d never seen before. ‘It’s nothing to do with me. I didn’t get her into the mess she’s in and it’s . . . Well, it’s women’s business.’
‘No –’ Phyllis said, leaning towards him with a look that made him sink back on to the chair again. ‘It’s all of our business.’
Rachel brought cups to the table and the teapot in its cosy. Dolly sat slumped, looking ready to go back to sleep.
‘What we’re going to do is this,’ Phyllis said, lowering herself grandly into her chair and sitting up very straight. ‘We’re going to hide this child. No one is ever going to know . . .’ She held up a hand as they all tried to ask questions. ‘First of all, I’ve written to my sister, Nancy.’
They all stared, agog. Dolly was wide awake now they were finally going to hear something.
‘Nance lives on a farm near Coventry. Come the time Dolly’s due to have it – a bit before – we’re going on a holiday visit down there. Dolly can have it there . . .’
‘But does she know about the babby, Nancy – whoever she is?’ Rachel asked. Things were going almost too fast for them to keep up.
‘She does n
ow. We haven’t seen each other for years but she’s written back saying she’ll help me out. She’s a good sort, our Nancy – always was.’
‘I don’t keep it?’ Dolly half whispered, her face showing a terrible tension. ‘I don’t have to? I thought you were going to make me.’
‘You’ll keep it over my dead body,’ Phyllis said. ‘We can’t have some bastard child in the family – not this family. Ho, no – it’s going to be gone, well away from here. Now look – the important thing is what we do now. Very soon, Dolly’s going to start getting bigger.’
She looked at her other daughters, pausing for effect. ‘Remember what I told you? We’re all in this together. You two – when Dolly gets big, you’re going to get bigger with her.’
Thirty
A shower of rain sent the children tearing back to the house. The horse pulling the milk cart lowered his head against the deluge and the milkman tugged his cap further down as the road began to shine with water. Aggie ran, half dragging May, who was holding her hand.
‘Come on!’ she urged. ‘We’re gonna get soaked!’
When the soggy children peeped into the kitchen, Aggie saw that Rose Southgate was there by the table with Nanna and Mom. Lily was perched on a stool. There was a pungent smell of onions.
‘Hello, Mrs Southgate,’ Aggie said gladly, though she was still trying to swallow her disappointment that Mrs Southgate seemed to have forgotten all about her promise to teach her embroidery.
‘Oh – hello, Aggie. I’m just lending a hand again today. I expect Lily’d like to come and play with you now.’
Aggie held her hand out to Lily. She felt happy – it was almost as if Mrs Southgate was becoming a member of the family. Even Mom seemed to be getting along with her.
It was almost the end of the Easter school holidays, and Jen Green was starting to feel a bit better.
Things had been made a lot easier for her by the fact that now, almost every day, Rose Southgate turned up of a morning saying she would help Freda with the dinners. Freda Adams was to begin her job at Sawyer and Hewlett’s next week and Rose said she’d fill in until Jen was feeling better. The pair of them would order Jen to go back to bed.
‘I can’t just keep on going to bed!’ Jen protested at first.
‘Why not?’ Rose said. She seemed so delighted to help and Jen, at first reluctantly, had to admit that Rose was not snooty like she’d thought.
Jen hadn’t put up much of a fight because she was feeling so wretched. When she went up to bed, her head would be spinning with worries about Tommy. She lay picturing him in his hospital bed and aching for him to be home, for things to be different. Often she cried, desperate at the thought that he might never come home again. How would they make ends meet? And she was so ashamed at the thought of her old mother going back into the factory at her age, with her seized-up joints.
But by God, it was a relief to lie down; an unheard-of luxury!
And she had to admit that it was mainly thanks to Rose Southgate. Freda said she thought Rose was lonely.
‘She ain’t got no family – just her and the girl and that husband of hers, and by the sound of things he’s as married to his fishing rod as he ever is to her.’
Now Jen felt able to be up and about again, they could manage without Rose, strictly speaking. But she had come to the door again that morning, with Lily, saying, ‘Well, here I am – all ready to roll my sleeves up.’ She looked surprised to see Jen. ‘Are you feeling a bit better?’
‘Yes, ta. I can manage now. Just in time. But it’s been good of yer to help.’
‘Oh,’ Rose faltered. ‘Only – I don’t mind lending a hand. If you’d like?’
‘Come on in!’ Freda called from the back.
Jen shrugged. ‘All right then – if you want.’ There was still something about Rose that she didn’t feel quite right about, but she couldn’t put her finger on it exactly. Something closed and, she thought, hard to fathom. But the odd thing was Rose and her mother seemed to have become quite fond of each other. Rose had bought those shoes for Aggie, which showed a kind heart. And she had certainly lent another pair of hands – and that was saying something.
It wasn’t long before the rain stopped and Aggie and the others were back outside. Soon she saw Babs, in among some of her brothers up the street. Babs caught sight of her and came running along, grinning as usual. She was dressed in boys’ clothes, a baggy pair of shorts and a dark green shirt, but she didn’t seem to care.
‘D’yer wanna come and play tag, Aggie?’ she yelled. Babs did most of her communication at the top of her voice. Aggie put it down to living with so many loud boys.
‘What about May and Lily?’ Aggie said. May had pottered over to a puddle and Aggie could see that at any moment she’d go and fall over in it and get them both into trouble.
Babs looked back at the careering, leaping, dodging mass of Skinner brotherhood and screwed up her nose. ‘Best not. They’ll flatten ’em, that lot will.’
Aggie was just about to suggest some more sedate game they could play with the little girls, when something caught her eye. Lurching along the road was Mad Mary Crewe, with her sad little bundle in her arms.
‘Hey,’ she nudged Babs. ‘You know what I was saying about spying and that? D’you wanna do some?’
‘Yeah!’ Babs enthused, then looked puzzled. ‘What d’you mean?’
‘What about finding out where she’s going to?’
‘Follow Mad Mary, you mean? What about May and Lily?’
In her excitement Aggie had forgotten about them. Lily had May by the hands, doing ‘Ring-a-Ring-o’-Roses’. For a moment she felt a rush of bitter resentment. Why was she always the one lumbered with looking after the babbies? John hardly had to do anything. He spent his time crouching near the back of horses so he could sell buckets of muck! But she was too on fire with the idea now to give it up. She eyed the house. They were all busy: a whiff of stew was beginning to seep out from the kitchen.
‘Let’s take ’em with us!’ she said and saw Babs’s face break into an excited smile. ‘Old Mary can’t be going all that far.’
But that was where she was wrong. The two of them gathered up the little girls – ‘Come on, Lily, May! We’re going to do some exploring, have an adventure!’ Lily and May looked up to Aggie and Babs and they followed without question.
‘Now. We mustn’t let her see us, all right? So if Mary, that lady up there, turns round, we just act normal, or turn and look at summat else as if we’re nothing to do with her, all right? We’re being spies and spies have to be able to be invisible and not let anyone see ’em.’
May looked uncomprehending but she took Aggie’s hand anyway and Lily gladly went with Babs.
Mary Crewe set off at quite a pace. She headed off up Lilac Street into Larches Street and turned left, storming along in her usual way, cigarette stub at the corner of her mouth, muttering to herself and almost shoving people out of her way. Larches, Kyrwicks Lane, where Mary stopped and lit another cigarette, laying her bundle down on someone’s step for a moment. Then left along Highgate Place beyond the coal wharf and on to the Moseley Road. Already by this time the little girls were finding it hard to keep up and were getting hot with the effort. May was starting to whinge at having to trot to keep up and Lily, who had stepped off a kerb and into a puddle, wetting her nice brown leather shoes, was trying very hard not to cry. Babs tried to jolly her along, pointing out the trams, horses and shops along the Moseley Road. Even Aggie and Babs were starting to tire of this game already. Aggie hadn’t had any breakfast and felt empty and bad-tempered.
Mary Crewe paused outside a big building on the Moseley Road and for a moment they thought she was going to go in, but she gathered speed again and went on. As they passed Aggie read, ‘Society of Friends Institute.’ She thought vaguely that it seemed odd to have a building especially for people who were friends. Did that mean she and Babs could go in? But she was getting too tired and fed up to think further about it. May
was yanking on her hand now.
‘Where’re we going, Aggie? I don’t like this game – I wanna go back!’
Lily was sobbing now and the sky had turned a terrible, threatening slate colour. The clouds were so low they looked as if they might tumble out of the sky.
‘Where d’you think she’s going?’ Babs said glumly. ‘She just keeps on and on. She must be walking all the way to town.’
Aggie knew they would have to admit defeat. It already felt as if they’d been out for hours. She’d never walked so far from home before.
‘I dunno,’ Aggie said. ‘I s’pose we’d best go back.’
Even as she said it, the first fat drops of rain began to plop down on them.
‘Our mom’s gonna give me a proper hiding,’ Babs groaned. ‘I’ve already had a soaking once today.’
‘Don’t like it!’ May started bawling, and Lily was snivelling with cold and fright at being taken so far from home and spoiling her shoes.
The rain came teeming down so fast and suddenly that within a few steps they were half soaked. They started running and were soon by the Institute again.
‘Come in ’ere!’ Babs yelled, leading them through the gate.
Over the windows of the grand building, to the left of the entrance, was a canopy and they all dashed underneath it. For a while May and Lily stopped crying, distracted by the sheer novelty of standing in this strange place. But they were all shivering and wet and soon the little ones were crying again.
Aggie and Babs tried to jolly them along, though Aggie’s teeth were chattering and she felt utterly miserable.
‘It’s all right, May,’ Aggie said, putting her arm round her sister’s convulsing shoulders. ‘And you, Lily. We’ll soon get home.’
But it rained for about twenty minutes and her patience wore thin. ‘Oh, just shurrit now, May,’ she said. ‘We’ve all got to put up with it so stop blarting!’
At last the clouds slouched away and the sun came out, dazzling in all the reflecting water. It felt as if they had been away for an eternity.
