The Midwives of Raglan Road

by Jenny Holmes

  Gladys nodded. ‘And to cap it all, Dorothy won’t hear a bad word about Myra, even though it’s common knowledge that the marriage was rocky from the start, thanks to poor Myra’s habit of weeping and wailing and running to her mother over the least little thing.’

  ‘I didn’t realize that,’ Hazel said quietly. She paused to consider the new picture this presented, then went on.

  ‘I do like John,’ she confessed shakily. ‘And I was sure he liked me too …’

  ‘But?’

  ‘He blows hot and cold. One minute he writes me a note asking me out to the pictures, and I went. He promises to take me out again, but then he goes to ground and I haven’t seen hide nor hair of him since before Christmas.’

  ‘Poor you,’ Gladys commiserated. ‘I can see that he’s got you hooked.’

  Hazel bridled. ‘No – I don’t intend to be at anyone’s beck and call.’

  ‘Definitely not.’ Gladys was firm, setting down her cup and leaning earnestly forward as she counted on her fingers the reasons that Hazel should stay away from John Moxon. ‘Firstly, he keeps you dangling and no decent man would do that. Secondly, we know he gets into fights, which means he has trouble controlling his temper. Thirdly, he throws his money away on gambling—’

  ‘Stop!’ Hazel pleaded. ‘I know all this but I still can’t stop thinking about him.’

  ‘Oh, dearie me.’ When she realized how seriously Hazel was smitten, Gladys heaved a sigh.

  ‘Every morning I get up hoping that today will be the day he’ll be back in touch. As a matter of fact, I’m on the point of knocking on his door to find out what’s wrong.’

  ‘No, you mustn’t do that.’ Gladys was adamant. She thought for a while, trying to put herself in John’s shoes. ‘Setting all that to one side – the gambling, the broken promises and the fights – maybe it’s just too soon.’

  ‘Don’t say that, please.’ The ghost of Myra reared up once more and couldn’t be banished.

  ‘Yes, that’s it. All this is to do with John losing his poor wife. That’s why he’s acting the way he is.’ The conclusion satisfied Gladys and she sat back in her chair. ‘Take my advice, Hazel, and think no more about him.’

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Next morning, the sluggish winter daylight didn’t creep through the chink in Hazel’s curtains until well after eight o’clock. It was a Sunday and she luxuriated in the knowledge that she could lie in until at least nine, when she would stop listening to the patter of raindrops gusting against the windowpanes and get up and tidy the top drawer of the tallboy in the corner of the room. She would separate stockings from brassieres and petticoats and establish a system that satisfied her need for order.

  She was still in her nightdress carrying out this task when she heard Miss Bennett call her name from the foot of the stairs.

  ‘Miss Price, are you there? There’s someone here to see you. Shall I send him up?’

  Hazel opened her door and peered out. ‘I’m not decent,’ she called back, wondering who would visit at such an odd time. ‘I’ll be down as soon as I’m dressed.’

  John! For a split second she thought it might be him then quickly dismissed the idea. Perhaps it was her father, come to see how she’d settled in. Or else the husband of one of the ladies from her clinic, to announce the inconvenient fact that baby was on its way. In which case, she’d better hurry.

  Quickly she slipped into her most practical outfit of slacks, jumper and brogues then ran a brush through her hair. She grabbed her coat and an umbrella just in case then rushed downstairs to find Norman, ashen faced, wild eyed and soaked to the skin, waiting for her in the hallway.

  She saw straight away that something was badly wrong. ‘Whatever is the matter?’ she gasped.

  ‘It’s Sylvia,’ he muttered. ‘She’s gone missing.’

  ‘Not again!’ Hazel’s heart sank. ‘What do you mean – missing?’

  ‘We went to bed as usual last night but when I woke up this morning she’d clean vanished.’ Norman caught his breath and the words tumbled out.

  It was clear to Hazel that he’d run here all the way from Nelson Yard in the pouring rain. ‘All right, take your time. Did you check with Aunty Ethel to see if Sylvia got up early and paid them a visit? Or with Nana and Aunty Rose?’

  ‘She wouldn’t do that. She’s not even on speaking terms with any of them, remember.’ Driven to distraction, the muscle at the corner of Norman’s mouth twitched as he ran a hand through his thick brown hair. ‘It’s happened again, hasn’t it?’

  Hazel held his elbow and guided him through the front door, down the steps and onto the wet pavement, out of range of Miss Bennett. ‘What has?’

  ‘You know – like before, when Sylvia took it into her head that she wasn’t going to have the baby. Don’t think I haven’t worked out what was going on when she went to Mabel Jackson.’ A chilly wind blew straight through his sodden, threadbare jacket, making his teeth chatter.

  Hazel closed her eyes and groaned. Though she didn’t want to believe it of Sylvia, she suspected that it was true. ‘Has she said something to you?’

  ‘No. You know what Sylvia’s like – she blows her top and accuses me of spying on her when all I’m really doing is trying to make sure she hasn’t sent away for any of those so-called remedies again. Then after that – silence.’

  ‘But she’s been upset?’ Already drenched, Hazel belatedly put up her umbrella.

  Norman nodded. ‘She’s been crying buckets, moping about all day. I want to help but she won’t let me near.’

  ‘But, if you’re right and Sylvia’s mind is made up – why would she take it into her head to do it now? Why not wait until tomorrow, when you’re at work?’ To Hazel it didn’t make sense, but then, on reflection, that was the point. Nothing that Sylvia did as far as her pregnancy was concerned was rational.

  ‘Don’t ask me.’ Norman paced the pavement, ignoring the curious twitching of Miss Bennett’s downstairs net curtain. ‘But what am I going to do about it?’

  Hazel was keen to reassure him that he’d come to the right person for help. ‘You mean, what are we going to do about it? First things first – we’re going to go straight back to Raglan Road and pay Mabel Jackson a visit.’

  Seeing Hazel set off at a determined march past the Victory and the green-tiled entrance to the Brinkley Baths, Norman hurried to keep up. ‘What for? You don’t think Mabel’s going to help Sylvia to … you know.’

  Why was it so hard to say the words? Hazel wondered as she fought against a strong wind for control of her umbrella. Why did the issue have to be skirted around and avoided at all costs? ‘Mabel probably won’t be the one to carry out the abortion,’ she agreed, walking in the shadow of Kingsley’s mill. ‘She knows she’d get into trouble with the police if she did. But who else would Sylvia turn to if she’s still dead set on doing it?’

  Norman took the point. ‘You think Mabel might know someone who will help her get what she wants?’

  ‘We’ll soon see.’ Hazel turned left up a narrow alley leading to Ghyll Road. They came out onto Raglan Road and within seconds were knocking loudly on the old handywoman’s door.

  They waited for a full minute but there was no reply and they were in a quandary when Doreen emerged from the nearby ginnel. Unable to resist a mystery, Betty Hollings’ busybody neighbour made a beeline for Hazel and Norman.

  ‘You can knock all you like, you won’t get an answer,’ she asserted from under her black umbrella. ‘Mabel’s not in.’

  Irritated by Doreen’s gloating tone, Hazel didn’t waver. ‘Can you tell us where she’s gone?’ she asked as politely as she could.

  ‘Where she always goes at this time on a Sunday morning, come rain or shine. It’s where I’m headed right this minute.’

  ‘To church,’ Hazel realized. ‘Come on, Norman. Let’s try to get hold of Mabel before the service starts.’

  They set off at a run, leaving Doreen to toil up the hill after them and arriving at
the entrance to St Luke’s at the same time as a straggle of worshippers for morning prayers.

  Hazel and Norman stopped at the gate and tried to pick out Mabel’s stout figure amongst them.

  Unluckily for them, Dorothy and Henry Pennington soon approached from behind. Dorothy was dressed for battle in a fox fur stole and helmet-like grey velour hat fixed in place by a hatpin in the shape of a miniature dagger. ‘Look who it isn’t!’ Her loud voice drew the attention of Philip and Barbara Baxter, halfway up the path, who stopped to listen.

  ‘Come along, Dorothy.’

  Henry the appeaser tried to hurry his wife but she shrugged him off, taking time to look Hazel and Norman up and down with an expression of scornful distaste before she continued, ‘To what do we owe the pleasure?’

  ‘She’s looking for Mabel,’ Doreen informed her, out of breath after taking the hill at twice her usual trundle.

  ‘What does she want with Mabel?’ a suspicious Dorothy asked over Hazel’s head.

  They were wasting precious time and Hazel was grateful to Barbara Baxter for retracing her steps to join them.

  ‘I saw Mabel go into church just ahead of us,’ she told Hazel with an understanding smile.

  Hazel and Norman thanked her, stepping off the path onto the muddy grass to circumvent Dorothy. They rushed on and caught up with Mabel in the porch.

  ‘Well.’ Mabel showed no surprise; she simply nodded as she shook raindrops from her umbrella.

  Norman interpreted the look and jumped in quickly. ‘Tell us where she is!’

  ‘Where who is?’

  ‘Sylvia, of course.’

  ‘What are you on about?’ Mabel filled the chilly stone porch with her presence. Her wide stance and steady gaze were intended to show that she wouldn’t budge for the bishop himself.

  ‘We don’t have time for this,’ Hazel insisted as Dorothy, Henry and Doreen sidled past. ‘Just tell us – did Sylvia come knocking for help?’

  ‘Oh, very well, yes, she did,’ Mabel conceded. ‘At the crack of dawn, no less.’ She nodded at Dorothy to assure her that everything was under control. ‘She’s not there now, though, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  ‘Tell us where she went.’ Norman stepped towards her with urgent intent. ‘She came to see you, then what?’

  Mabel sighed then went on in a confidential undertone. ‘If you must know, I had all on to calm her down. She wasn’t making any sense, saying she couldn’t go on another minute longer and goodness knows what.’

  ‘So what did you do?’ Hazel’s mind flew off in a new direction. Surely Sylvia wouldn’t think of ending it, once and for all?

  ‘We know this is the second time she’s acted like this and I have to admit, I felt sorry for her. Still – I don’t know whether I did the right thing or not.’ Mabel’s mouth twitched with indecision for once as several more worshippers filtered past. ‘Come with me,’ she said at last.

  She led Hazel and Norman out of the porch into a flurry of heavy raindrops and down the side of the church towards a narrow door leading into the musty, whitewashed vestry where they found the vicar adjusting his surplice and Berta White assembling her musical scores.

  ‘We’ll start the service with hymn number 321,’ Reverend Turner was telling Berta as the door opened and in blew wind and rain, soon followed by Mabel, Hazel and Norman.

  ‘Berta, I need to have a word,’ Mabel said in the voice that could not be disobeyed.

  Small, slight and prim, dressed in her usual dowdy grey dress unrelieved by frills or lace, Berta was no physical match for Mabel. But she wasn’t ready to kow-tow. ‘Not now,’ she retorted.

  ‘Yes – now,’ Mabel insisted, while Hazel and Norman held back in confusion.

  ‘Ladies, please.’ Reverend Turner tapped his watch and cleared his throat.

  ‘You go ahead, Vicar – this won’t take long,’ Mabel promised.

  So the gangling, gap-toothed man of the cloth tucked his Bible under his arm and stooped to avoid knocking his bald head on the inner doorway. He joined his congregation in the vast, gloomy edifice built with mill-owning money some sixty years earlier.

  ‘Well?’ Berta challenged Mabel.

  ‘Come off it, Berta. You know what this is about.’

  The church pianist pointed at Norman. ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘A certain person’s husband. Look a bit closer – you’ll recognize him from the wedding. And you know who this is – this is the cousin who trained up as a midwife.’

  Berta White – of all people! Never for a second would Hazel have suspected that she was tangled up in the illegal abortion trade if she hadn’t been here witnessing this.

  ‘What do they want?’ Berta demanded.

  ‘They’re after an address,’ Mabel explained, stony faced. ‘I’ve come clean over handing the girl on to you and now they want to know where you sent her. I reckon they have the right.’

  Berta shook her head and remained silent.

  ‘Was it to Drummond Road or Rawson Street?’

  ‘Neither,’ Berta said through clenched, unchristian teeth. She signalled through the open door to the impatient vicar that she was on her way.

  ‘Butler Close?’

  Another shake of the head showed Berta near to breaking point.

  ‘Where then?’ Implacable Mabel winkled out her answer.

  ‘If you must know, I sent her to a new woman on the other side of the canal – on Bridge Lane.’ A chink in the dam allowed the vital information to trickle through. On her way out of the room, she flashed a resentful look at Hazel. ‘If anyone asks, you’re not to say I was the one who let on.’

  ‘Very well.’ Hazel felt the underground network of handywomen gone-to-the-bad cling like a cobweb to her face. It made her skin crawl. ‘Which number Bridge Lane?’ she managed to ask before Berta made her exit.

  ‘Number 15,’ came the muttered reply.

  The door closed, the latch fell. Mabel’s expression behind her heavy-rimmed glasses was unreadable.

  ‘Berta didn’t give us a name,’ Norman reminded Hazel as they made their way through grimy alleys and down mossy steps towards the murky water of the canal.

  ‘No, but the address is what counts.’ She paused on the deserted bridge to look at her watch. ‘What time did you discover Sylvia had gone missing?’

  ‘Eight o’clock.’

  ‘That gives her two hours’ head start,’ she calculated.

  ‘Will we be in time?’ Norman glanced over the parapet to the stagnant water below as if he would find his answer there. The surface was stained with rainbow patches of spilt engine oil and the tow paths littered with discarded bicycle tyres and wooden crates.

  ‘Let’s keep our fingers crossed.’ Beyond the canal was a maze of back-to-back terraced streets that Hazel didn’t know well. She’d heard of Bridge Lane but had never set foot there, knowing only its reputation as a place where no respectable family would want to put down roots.

  ‘What if we do reach her in time?’ As Hazel set off again, Norman lagged behind. ‘Who’s to say she’ll listen to us? What if she won’t?’

  The questions hit home but she managed to shrug them off and carried on leading the way. ‘We’ll face that if and when it happens. First we have to find her.’

  ‘Right you are – one thing at a time,’ he agreed.

  They came off the bridge and looked to right and left along a street lined by a yard stacked high with sacks of coal ready for delivery and by a round gasometer opposite the brass foundry where Eddie worked, next door to a depot full of scrap iron – as dirty and depressing a sight as they could wish to see.

  ‘Which way to Bridge Lane?’ Norman asked a man wheeling a bike laden with old buckets and pans.

  The tinker didn’t reply but walked on doggedly with his clanking load, head down and coughing up phlegm.

  A boy in a cap several sizes too big who lounged against some iron railings provided the answer. ‘Second on your left.’ He held out a grubby hand.
‘Spare us a copper, Miss.’

  It was Norman who dipped into his pocket and shelled out some loose change then hurried after Hazel.

  If the approach promised little, Bridge Lane itself proved even worse. There was hardly a house whose windows were intact or whose gutters didn’t overflow and spout rainwater down the filthy, soot-stained walls. The pavements were cracked, the greasy cobbles worn down and strewn with litter.

  Hazel pictured Sylvia a couple of hours earlier, taking the address from Berta with a shaking hand and forcing herself to carry through what she’d started. She must have crossed the canal with fear clutching at her heart, breathing in coal dust and gas, avoiding puddles so as not to spoil her Sunday-best shoes. What desperation had driven the poor girl to make her way along Bridge Lane, or had she simply taken one look at her surroundings, turned tail and fled?

  ‘Number 15.’ Norman announced their arrival, his voice jittery.

  This house and identical ones to either side at least looked as if they were inhabited. The glass in the windows was unbroken and smoke came out of the chimneys. Blinds were down but lights were on in the downstairs rooms.

  The moment had arrived. Hazel mounted two stone steps and rapped sharply on the door. They waited. She knocked again.

  A green blind was raised and a woman appeared at the window. Seconds later she answered the door.

  Expecting to come face to face with someone of Mabel’s age and demeanour, Hazel was surprised. This woman was younger than expected and smart, with a slim figure, crimped fair hair and pleasant, even features. She wore coral-pink lipstick, a string of pearls and a bright blue and red striped dress. Holding the door fully open, she wished them good morning.

  Norman brushed aside the pleasantry. ‘We’ve come to fetch Sylvia,’ he announced.

  The door closed a fraction and a note of caution appeared in the woman’s voice. ‘I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place.’

  It was left to Hazel to elaborate. ‘Sylvia Bellamy is her full name. Norman here is her husband. We’ve been given this address.’

  ‘Who by?’ The question came quick as a flash.