Pack Up Your Troubles

by Anne Bennett

  ‘Are you sure?’ he asked the man.

  ‘Course I’m sure, man. My missus gets it. Gets five bob for each kid ’cept the eldest, till they’re fourteen, like. It comes in an order book. D’aint your missus tell you owt about it?’

  ‘No she didn’t, the cow.’ If she had have done Brendan would have given her less and she’d known that. She’d taken money off him, money he’d near sweated blood for, when she’d not needed it, because she was getting fifteen shillings from the bloody Government. Well, she’d pay for cheating him like that. He’d make her sorry she’d ever been born.

  Maeve was still downstairs when Brendan came home that night, glad the winter was nearly over at last. She hoped now she’d be able to clear Jamie’s cough for it had persisted through the winter months, not helped by the dampness in the whole place.

  There were supposed to be big changes planned for the whole country. Everyone was going to be better off and healthier, it was said. Family allowances were just part of it. There was to be a health service so that you wouldn’t pay to visit a doctor or a dentist, and prescriptions and spectacles were to be free too. Maeve thought it would be wonderful if it happened. Then perhaps she could get the doctor to give Jamie something and not have to pay for it.

  It had been a depressing winter really, and most women were fed up to the back teeth with rationing and restrictions, which was why the Housewife’s League had become so popular. It had begun with just a few hundred members and swelled to thousands. Maeve had read all about it in Alf’s paper and listened to the report on Elsie’s wireless as the women converged on Westminster, complaining about bread rationing and the threatened abolition of dried eggs. They spoke for every woman in the land and Maeve felt a sense of empathy with them. She heard the chants of others in the background and wished she could have joined them on their pilgrimage to London.

  Suddenly Maeve heard Brendan’s boots on the cobbles and she glanced up at the clock, surprised that he was home so early, and as he came in the door, she could see that though he was drunk he wasn’t staggering. Yet he was angrier than she’d seen him in a long while. She knew she was going to catch it again, but try as she might she couldn’t think of anything she’d done recently to inflame him so.

  His face was blotched bright red and purple, his mouth turned down in a sneer, his eyes glittered with malice in his face and the whites looked red in the light from the flickering fire. Maeve was scared. She’d been scared many times before, but she realised she was bloody terrified by the look of Brendan now.

  She felt her legs tremble and tried to infuse some determination into her weary and frightened body. Why the hell should she have to put up with being knocked senseless because something had annoyed her husband? Well, she wouldn’t – not any more. If she couldn’t fight him she’d run. She’d get past him, at least into the yard, and if he reached her there she’d yell her bloody head off, and she thanked God she hadn’t undressed.

  Before she could move, though, Brendan was upon her. He’d seen her eyes flicker towards the door, and guessing her intention, blocked her way out with his body while both fists punched at her face and body and she staggered under the blows.

  ‘And that’s just for starters, Maeve Hogan,’ Brendan said, holding her tight with one hand and unfastening his belt with the other. ‘I’m going to flay every stitch you have from your body before I’m done. You’ll think twice before you cheat me again, you lying whore.’

  ‘I didn’t, I haven’t.’ Maeve knew it was no use. She felt the first lash across the shoulder-blades and gasped as the power of it cut through the thin cardigan covering the even thinner dress to her body underneath. ‘What have I done?’ she cried. ‘For God’s sake, Brendan.’

  ‘Family allowance, that’s what. You lying, thieving sod . . .’ And the belt cut into her right and left.

  Maeve twisted and turned and tried to escape him, but the lashings went on and Maeve’s screams were coming from deep within her.

  ‘Stop it!’ cried a voice suddenly from the stairs, and Grace stood there in one of the full-length winceyette nighties her grandma had made before she left Ireland. Her golden hair was in two plaits down her back, her feet were bare and the sight of her checked Brendan. He stopped with his arms raised.

  Maeve was in agony, but her worry was all for her daughter. ‘Get away,’ she said. ‘Go back to bed. Go on.’

  ‘You heard your mother, girl,’ Brendan snarled. ‘This is no place for you.’

  And Grace wanted to do just that. When the row began she’d wanted to wriggle down in bed and put the blanket over her and her hands over her ears and pretend it was happening to someone she didn’t know and care about.

  But she told herself that was all she’d ever done. Even as far back as before the flight to Ireland, the time her father really laid into Kevin, all she’d done was wet her knickers. She could have run next door for Elsie as soon as it began. She doubted either of her parents would have noticed her.

  But that was understandable perhaps as she was small. But since she’d come back, she’d allowed her father to beat Kevin, and then to beat her mother so badly that she’d given birth to a stillborn baby. And still she lay in bed, shivering in fear and allowing her bullying father to tear into her mother again.

  But as the screams went on this evening, she’d forced herself to get up and creep stealthily down the stairs. Then, before she could frighten herself into running back again, she’d opened the door and stepped into the room. She saw the clothes her mother had on lay in shreds across her back and shoulders and even across her breasts where the belt had curled round. Much of her body was exposed and blood was seeping from the raised purple weals, and Maeve’s face showed the agony she was in. Grace was suddenly furiously angry, and knew she wasn’t going to walk away. Not this time.

  ‘Leave her alone!’ she screamed.

  ‘Want a taste of it yourself?’ Brendan sneered, and he raised the belt threateningly. ‘Come on then, miss.’

  ‘No! No!’ Maeve screamed, but Grace faced her father seemingly unafraid and said, ‘You do that and I’ll go straight to Dr Fleming.’

  It had been Dr Fleming she’d gone for the night her mother had fallen in the yard, and she’d found him a nice, comfortable sort of man. He’d chattered away to Grace as he’d driven her back to Latimer Street, phoning for an ambulance before he left. He was only able to make a very brief examination of Maeve, but he’d seen her battered face by the light of his flashlight and seemed annoyed about it.

  ‘Never let this happen to you, Grace Hogan,’ he’d said sternly. ‘You can come to me at any time. Do you understand?’

  She hadn’t been able to make a reply then, for the ambulance had arrived, but it was good enough to throw this at her father now. ‘He said to tell him if you ever hit me.’

  ‘Go away to bed, little girl,’ Brendan said sneeringly as if she’d not spoken, and he pushed her hard so that the stair door flew open and she fell back on to the bottom steps. He raised the belt again and she flew at him, clawing uselessly at his powerful arms and he smiled, he actually smiled as he held her from him with one hand and beat her mother with the other, and Maeve was so terrified that he’d lash at Grace with the belt, she just stood there and took it, though her body bounced with each stinging blow.

  Grace twisted from his grasp. ‘You’re evil!’ she screamed at her father. She didn’t know what to do. Would Elsie come in? Without a doubt, but could she stop him? Anyway, Grace could hardly run into the yard in her nightdress, and her father probably wouldn’t let her anywhere near the door.

  She glanced round the room, her eyes lighting on the poker. ‘Stop it!’ she screamed again, grasping it and brandishing it above her head. ‘Stop it or I’ll bloody brain you.’

  She saw her father turn to face her, and she saw his mouth open in surprise and he laughed. She realised in that moment that he wasn’t totally sane. He enjoyed inflicting pain and he’d go on doing it. She felt sick, but knew too
that if she didn’t hit him, he could kill her mother, and if she didn’t attack him with all the strength she had in her, she’d never get another chance.

  Brendan never thought his daughter would have the courage to carry out her threat and in the back of his mind, he thought he’d teach her a lesson or two when he’d done with her mother. Grace saw the look on her father’s face, and, trembling for herself, brought the poker down powerfully. She saw fleetingly the mocking disbelief change to startling realisation as if in slow motion. Then the poker caught him with a resounding crack to the left side of the head and he fell to the floor.

  ‘Oh God, Grace, what have you done?’ Maeve cried.

  ‘Mammy, he would have killed you if I hadn’t stopped him!’ Grace screamed, and her mother held the distraught child in her arms, though every movement pained her greatly.

  ‘Oh God . . .’ Maeve felt suddenly weak. Her knees buckled under her and Grace helped her to a chair.

  ‘Is he . . .?’ the child asked.

  Maeve glanced across to her husband, lying prone and apparently lifeless on the floor, and said fervently, ‘I hope so, love, for all our sakes.’ She was sure Grace had administered a fatal blow and felt only relief that Brendan would never hurt her or her children any more. But just now there was her daughter to protect. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘you must say nothing about any of this. You heard nothing and you don’t know what happened, d’you hear?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Listen to me, for God’s sake,’ Maeve cried. ‘We haven’t much time. We’ll have to say it was an accident. We were both in bed. I heard him stumbling about, heard him cry out and came downstairs where I found him with his head against the fender. Now have you got that?’

  ‘But, Mammy, anyone would understand why I hit him. He’s evil! Bad! Wicked!’

  ‘God, Grace, will you listen to me,’ Maeve cried out frantically. ‘His family will get clever lawyers that twist around any damn words you say, and it’s the death sentence for murder, let me remind you. Maybe you would be spared because of your age, but could you imagine what your life would be like for you in this street?’ She took Grace’s face between her hands. ‘Child dear, this is the only way. Now you get your clothes on, because you’ll need to fetch Dr Fleming. Hide your nightgown because it’s got blood on it. Don’t let the others see it.’

  Grace was in a daze. She saw the crimson stain running along one sleeve and she had the urge to tear it off her and thrust it into the fire. But instead, she allowed herself to be propelled to the stairs. When Grace went for the doctor Maeve intended to bathe her face and change her clothing. She’d have to wear something with a high neck, she told herself, for it would never do for Dr Fleming to catch sight of Brendan’s handiwork, for then their story would fall apart.

  She turned from the stairs to where her husband lay, the poker beside him where it had fallen from Grace’s hand. She had to steel herself to go near him, for even dead, the man still terrified her. But to protect Grace she had to get the poker and clean the blood from it, and she leant across Brendan’s body to reach it. She saw the gaping wound oozing thick dark blood down the side of his face, matting in his hair and forming a puddle on the lino, but she hadn’t a thread of sympathy for the man. Her thoughts were all for her daughter. Then she nearly jumped out of her skin as Brendan’s eyes suddenly opened and he stared at her.

  With a cry of terror, she leapt away from him, petrified of his powerful arms that at any moment might encircle her. He wasn’t dead! She stood trembling, almost unable to believe it. The man was alive to continue to terrorise them again. Any minute she expected to see him lumber to his feet and this time she knew he would finish the job he’d started on her and then it would be Grace’s turn.

  No, she cried inwardly, I won’t stand it, not any more. Grace was right, the man was evil. She felt sick with fear and yet she was unable to turn away from the compelling eyes that seemed to bore into her, but he made no move to rise. Oh dear God, she cried silently, what should I do?

  Brendan’s lips moved, but no sound came out, just a dribble of bloody saliva that ran down his chin. ‘It’s the death sentence for murder’ – the words she’d spoken to Grace echoed in her head and yet, she knew this was her only chance to make sure he never got up again. If he recovered from this he would kill her and then God help the others growing up under his brutal tyranny.

  She shook like a leaf, but knowing what she had to do, she dropped to her knees and, grabbing a cushion from the chair, she pressed it over Brendan’s face, holding it down tightly, shutting out the sight of his startled eyes as if he realised her intention as she approached him.

  She couldn’t have held him if he hadn’t been stunned from the blow Grace had dealt him. Even then, he threshed from side to side and his back arched in protest. But she held her hands as steady and tight as a vice. It seemed an eternity she knelt there, willing him to stop fighting, terrified Grace would come down and see what she was doing, or Elsie would come to see the reason for the commotion. Eventually, Brendan lay still, but Maeve forced herself to count to fifty before she removed the cushion.

  Brendan’s eyes were still staring, his look one of surprise and his mouth agape. Maeve laid her head on his chest, bracing herself to do so, dreading even now the thought of his arms suddenly crushing the lifeblood out of her.

  But no more would he do that. There was no heartbeat. The man was dead at last. At that realisation, the nausea rose in Maeve’s throat.

  As she vomited into the sink she told herself she’d killed Brendan for the sake of the family. She’d liberated them from a life of fear and deprivation. What shocked her most was not that she’d killed a man, but that she was justifying the reasons for doing so.

  Upstairs, Grace was dressed, but sat on the bed she shared with Bridget, her hands clasped tight between her knees, unable to stop her body shaking as reaction to what she had done set in and she rocked her body backwards and forwards in agitation. She groaned aloud but quietly, mindful of the sleeping Bridget and Jamie.

  ‘Grace, are you ready?’ Maeve called softly from the door, surprised at how steady her voice was, and then as Grace entered the room, she said, ‘Help me move your father across to the fender and then you go to Dr Fleming and tell him to come.’

  ‘Are you sure he’s really properly dead, Mammy?’

  ‘Absolutely sure, pet,’ Maeve said, glad she’d closed Brendan’s eyes and mouth before calling her daughter. She said nothing about her part in the demise of her husband. She’d explain it all later. Instead she put her arms round her daughter, gave her a squeeze and said, ‘Don’t worry, pet. Away with you now and get the doctor.’

  Dr Fleming knew the gash on Brendan’s head was consistent with being hit by a blunt instrument, and he saw clearly the bluish hue of his face that indicated suffocation but he wrote the death certificate as accidental death, thereby falling in with Maeve’s explanation of how Brendan injured himself. He also saw the bits of lint around Brendan’s mouth and noticed they were the colour of the cushions of the chairs. He made no comment and only removed them carefully with his handkerchief, in case others should be more curious as to how they got there, and he chose not to notice the damp patch on the lino.

  He knew Brendan had not died accidentally and, looking at Maeve’s bruised and battered face and swollen lip, he didn’t need to be a genius to guess what had happened in that small back-to-back house that night. As a doctor he was committed to saving lives, not covering up for those who’d taken the life of another. Therefore he was risking not only his job, but also his liberty, for it would be viewed as an offence if he were found out.

  He thought back to a comment he’d made at the hospital, just a few months earlier, when he’d remarked on Brendan Hogan getting his comeuppance. That night, as he gazed at the lifeless man sprawled over the floor, his head placed strategically on the fender, he knew he’d paid the price all right for his years of tyranny.

  He pushed any misgiving
s he may have had to the back of his mind and said to Maeve, ‘Do you need anything, sleeping tablets or something of that sort?’

  Maeve stared at him steadily and then shook her head. ‘D’you know,’ she said, ‘I think I’ll sleep better tonight than I have in a long while.’

  But, despite Maeve’s apparent calm, the doctor was pleased Elsie was in with the woman and child. She was such a sensible woman, he’d found. Alf had been sent to fetch Kevin, and the doctor was pleased about that too, but he’d arranged for the body to be collected pronto. He didn’t want Kevin to see it at all. He had an idea that he would know his father’s injury had been caused by no fender. Not that he’d knowingly put his mother in danger, but really the fewer people that knew of their deception, the better he’d like it. Despite this he was glad that Kevin was coming. He liked the boy and he was mature beyond his years and would be of great support to his mother and sister for in his opinion they were both suffering from shock that could manifest itself in various ways.

  Elsie, who knew Maeve so well, also knew she was in shock – and young Grace too – and she knew that the story given to the doctor, of their both being in bed asleep and then wakened by Brendan stumbling about, and then finding him out cold with a large gash on his head, was untrue. She was glad she was there, if only to stop either of them blurting out something that was better left unsaid.

  Elsie didn’t blame Maeve one bit for fetching Brendan Hogan one. She herself would have done it long before, and she’d do all in her power to see Maeve didn’t suffer for it. In a way she blamed herself, for she’d heard Maeve’s screams that night: they were such that the whole court would have been aware of them. She and Alf had gone early to bed, and the noise had roused her from sleep. She’d been all for going in, but she hadn’t because the house had suddenly gone ominously still and quiet.