‘I don’t see why he should,’ Cathy retorted. ‘He’s happier now than when he was young, and he didn’t have an easy life when they lived over the shop. God knows he’s far happier now than when he was there with that horrible old mother of his.’
‘Yes, but he’s had to adapt himself and I think he’s done it very well,’ Sally persisted. ‘If things had been different, you would have had to be the one to change and you wouldn’t have liked that, would you?’
‘I certainly wouldn’t,’ Cathy said with a grin. ‘Our Mary would have taken it in her stride but I’d have hated it.’
‘That’s what I mean. Greg’s had to change and you should make allowances for that. Josh says he’s very well liked at work although as soon as he opens his mouth they can tell he’s different. You should see that John appreciates his father and treats him with respect, Cathy.’
‘They’re very fond of each other,’ she said defensively. ‘Eldest sons always clash a bit with their fathers.’
‘Yes, but sometimes it only needs a word to keep the peace,’ said her mother. ‘I don’t want to interfere, love, but you know I worry so much about all of you.’
‘I know you do, Mam, but honestly there’s no need to worry about John and Greg. You should just see the pair of them with that crystal set they’re building.’
‘That’s all right then.’
And Sally spoke of other matters, but later, as they sat together having tea, Cathy suddenly said, ‘Has Sarah been making out there was a row about Sheldrake or something?’
‘No, she didn’t,’ Sally assured her. ‘She didn’t even know what Sheldrake was. She asked me, and I put two and two together and made five, as usual.’
‘I know what a worrier she is though,’ Cathy said. She looked quizzically at her mother. ‘I don’t know who she inherits it from.’
They both laughed, then Sally said seriously, ‘The trouble is, she sits there so quietly and you don’t know how much she’s taking in. D’you know, I said Josh had started going for a pint and something to eat at Saturday dinner times, and she said, quite the thing, “He’ll probably keep on then.” You could have knocked me down with a feather.’
‘She was right though,’ Cathy said. ‘Once Josh starts anything, he keeps right on. He’s not a man for change, is he?’
‘That’s what I mean. Nobody’s said that to Sarah but she’s just weighed him up in her own quiet way.’
‘I can see we’ll have to watch what we say in front of her, especially if she’s going to repeat it.’
‘Now that’s not fair, Cath. The child wasn’t carrying tales, only asking me about something that worried her,’ Sally said, but Cathy still looked vexed.
Within a few days the schools closed for the summer holidays and with no homework to worry about, John was able to spend more time with his grandfather. Greg and Lawrie rented an allotment and while Greg was at work, John spent hours of the long sunny days there helping his grandfather.
Sometimes he went with Lawrie to meetings of the unemployed, held during the day because the men had long empty hours to, fill. There he heard harrowing tales of the treatment of men and their families by the hated Board of Guardians.
With his heart swelling with indignation John listened as gaunt, ragged speakers told of having the pittance they received reduced on one pretext or another by well-fed men revelling in their power over the destitute men and women humbly petitioning them.
Lawrie was not a councillor but for many years had worked to try to help the destitute, and knew many influential people who also tried to ameliorate their conditions. Often he promised to write a letter or see someone to try to have a case reviewed, but he always warned that there was little hope. There were so many in the same situation.
Often John saw his grandfather furtively slip some money into a man’s hand with the face-saving words, “Just till things get better. You can do the same for me someday.” To John, the most heartrending aspect of all this was the way the desperate men tried to cling to their self-respect in spite of the humiliation they suffered at the hands of arrogant officials. He longed to have the power to help them.
After one such meeting Lawrie raged to John about the injustice of these terrible lives lived only a stone’s throw from wealth and luxury, and his lifelong ambition to change matters.
‘I remember when I first came ashore, lad,’ he said, ‘I was scandalized when I saw the crowds of barefoot hungry children in Liverpool. I thought that surely if rich and powerful people knew about them, they would do something. That’s what I tried to bring about at first, but they just didn’t care John, even when they knew.’
‘But what about the other rich men you know, Grandad, who took the soup out at night?’
‘Aye, I’ve met plenty of rich men who do care, lad, and people like the Rathbones have worked for generations for the Liverpool poor, but it’s the system that’s wrong. That’s what’ll have to change. Never forget what you’ve seen here, John. Get a good education and speak up for them that can’t speak for themselves.’
‘I will, Grandad, I will,’ John promised as though he was taking an oath.
Lawrie and Greg worked hard on the allotment, helped by the women and children of the family, and large crops of vegetables were produced there. A local greengrocer bought enough to cover their allotment expenses then after both families were supplied and some given to neighbours, there was still a surplus.
John and his grandfather often piled this into the wooden cart which John pulled down to the dilapidated houses near the docks.
On the way Lawrie would tell the boy to wait outside a butcher’s shop while he went in, returning with several newspaper-wrapped parcels which he thrust into the cart.
Whenever possible they went through the back entries so that the vegetables could be delivered unobtrusively. The parcels of meat handed over with them often brought tears from the recipients.
‘Just a few ribs or a bit of meat to flavour the veg,’ Lawrie would say quietly as they were handed over. The emaciated children clinging to their mother’s skirts watched eagerly. Years later, under a foreign sun, one of them spoke to John of his grandfather with deep respect and affection.
‘He was solid gold,’ he said. ‘It wasn’t just what he gave us but the way he did it. Me poor mam had to beg and be made little of by the fellers on the Board of Guardians for the bit they allowed her that cost them nothing, but she used to say, “God bless Lawrie Ward. They knock me down but he picks me up and puts me on me feet again. He’s one of us, and he leaves himself short to help us, but he always makes you think you’re doing him a favour taking it. There’s decent people left in the world, Thank God.”’
The man’s words were no surprise to John. Even as a young boy he recognized his grandfather’s goodness and sensitive concern for the despairing people he tried to help. Always he insisted that John should raise his cap to these ragged men and use the prefix “Mr” when speaking to them.
‘It’s important, John,’ he explained. ‘It’s the contempt some people treat him with that destroys a man, far more rapidly than hunger or poverty. I’ve been with them to the Board of Guardians and seen it, and I lived through it myself years ago, lad, so I know.’
Sometimes John spoke of these matters to his mother, knowing that she agreed with his grandfather and that she had tried to fight for justice by joining the Suffragists when she was young.
‘Your grandad’s always been like this,’ she told him. ‘No matter how little he had, he would always find someone worse off to help. Grandma used to go mad because he’d give away his carry out, and his penny for the tram, and walk home from the south end docks in pouring rain.’
‘Grandma said the other day we should just do what we can to help people by doing what’s next to our hands. Grandad was talking about Parliament when she said that.’
‘I know. She’s got no time for politics, but she practises what she preaches. Everyone goes to her for help if they’ve
got someone sick or they’re in trouble, but help from the likes of her isn’t enough, John. The very poor are as badly off now as they were before the war.’
‘Do you think things will ever change, Mam?’
‘Of course they will,’ Cathy said cheerfully. ‘Now that women have got the vote. Women understand more about being short of money for food and coal and clothes, and if Miss Rathbone can make Parliament pass the Family Allowance Bill, that will make all the difference to mothers.’
During these holiday weeks when John was free of the restrictions of school and homework he felt that he saw unemployed men everywhere he went, even when he was not with his grandfather. Lawrie’s own fervour blinded him to the dangers of speaking so freely to an impressionable young boy like John, and no one else was aware of the problem.
It seemed that the closer John drew to Lawrie, the greater the gulf became between his father and himself. After John had been to a meeting with his grandfather, he spoke at home about the shame the unemployed men felt when they ran out of Benefit and had to apply for relief tickets.
Greg said sharply, ‘There’s no reason for them to feel ashamed.’
He had been interrupted before he could finish what he intended to say: that men who tried hard to find work should feel no shame because there was no work for them, but John misunderstood and brooded sullenly on his father’s words. He thought his father harsh and unsympathetic and avoided mentioning the unemployed before him again.
This meant that Greg was quite unaware of the depth of John’s feelings on the subject, feeling only vaguely uneasy about the boy.
‘John seems to spend an awful lot of time with your dad, Cath,’ he said. ‘They’re doing wonders on the allotment but I think John should spend more time with his own friends.’
‘That’s the trouble,’ she said. ‘You know John’s not like Mick. He has dozens of friends but John just has a few close ones, and they all seem to be missing just now. Jimmie Brady’s gone to Ireland to stay with his grandmother for the holidays, and Joey Sutcliffe has gone to work on a farm with his uncle. Poor Sammy Roche is dodging the other lads, I think, until this scholarship business is settled.’
‘There must be other lads he can play with, surely?’
‘Who?’ she demanded. ‘There’s no one of his age in this street, and the boys from his class are all in their own gangs. It doesn’t worry John.’ And Greg said no more on the subject.
Chapter Three
Most of the houses in Norris Street were occupied by relatives of Mrs Parker because for many years, whenever a house became vacant, she “spoke to” the landlord to ask for the tenancy to be given to one of her daughters or other relatives.
Cathy had innocently applied for the tenancy of number twenty while Mrs Parker was busy with a daughter who had given birth to triplets, and had always felt that she was treated as an outsider, resented by Mrs Parker and her clan.
Whenever possible she escaped from the house in Norris Street, either to take the children to play in the park or to her mother’s house in Egremont Street. She encouraged Sarah to make her friends among her classmates or the children in Sally’s street. Friendship with children who lived in Norris Street could mean becoming involved in family feuds, some of them stretching back many years.
Mrs Parker disapproved of the Redmonds’ baby carriage which was the only one in the street, but Doreen Bates who lived a few doors away from them braved the matriarch’s wrath to ask if she could wheel Kate in the carriage.
At twelve years old, Doreen was a quiet, sensible girl, who loved to sit on the step nursing Kate and watching over other young children who played near her. Cathy felt that Kate was safe with her, and several times during the school holidays Doreen set off for Newsham Park, wheeling Kate in the carriage and surrounded by a crowd of children of various ages, including Sarah and Mick. Parcels of jam sandwiches were tucked in the bottom of Kate’s carriage, and bottles of water to which pennyworths of lemonade powder would be added later. The children spent happy hours playing games supervised by Doreen or rolling down a grassy hill.
On one red letter day, they met Lawrie as they trooped down Boaler Street, and he bought penny ice cream cornets for the nine children with Doreen, and a tuppeny ice cream sandwich for her “because she’s the boss”.
‘Eh, she’s a born mother,’ neighbours would say sentimentally when Doreen set off with the children, but Cathy listened to them with cynicism. More and more she hated living in Norris Street, and the gossiping and backbiting that went on there.
She had been pleased when Grace Woods had congratulated John on passing the scholarship until she heard later that Grace had said that it would make John even more bigheaded. Cathy had been bitterly hurt and avoided her neighbour as much as possible after that.
She did her housework quickly and went to her mother’s house in Egremont Street, only returning in time to prepare the evening meal before Greg returned from work.
Egremont Street was wider and the houses larger than in Norris Street, and Cathy felt that there was not the same feeling of living in each other’s pockets or the same sense of being always under close and hostile scrutiny.
Many of the people of Egremont Street had known Cathy all her life and took a genuine interest in her and in her children. She always had a sense of coming home when she turned into the street.
One day towards the end of the holidays she went there as soon as she had hung out the washing she had risen early to do. John’s friends had returned and he had gone to play cricket with them but Sarah and Mick walked beside the baby carriage. Cathy wheeled it round to the backyard and Sarah and Mick ran in to see their grandmother then went off to play with their friends.
Sally welcomed Cathy with a smile and immediately stood up to take a letter from behind the clock.
‘A letter from our Mary,’ she said, ‘And there’s two snapshots in it too.’
Cathy took the letter eagerly. Letters from her sister, who had lived in America since her marriage to Sam Glover, were infrequent, but Sam sent a money order regularly every month with a short note.
He had always been made welcome by Mary’s parents and by Cathy when, as a gawky young man, he had faithfully but hopelessly courted Mary. He was a rich and confident businessman and Mary a widow when they met again after the war on a ship returning to Liverpool from New York, but he never forgot the early kindnesses he had been shown by Mary’s family.
‘Quite a long letter this time,’ Cathy said, but she looked at the snapshots before reading it.
They showed Mary wearing a cloche hat, her face framed in her coat’s huge fur collar, leaning against an opulent-looking car, with a big house in the background. She looked strikingly beautiful even in the black and white photograph, and Cathy glanced to where a painting of her, sent by Sam, hung on the wall.
It showed Mary’s head and shoulders, her beautiful clear blue eyes fringed with dark lashes, thick red-gold hair clustering round perfect features and creamy skin. The proud tilt of her head was just Mary as they remembered her, but did anyone else, Cathy wondered, see the hardness in those lovely eyes and in the set of her full red lips?
Perhaps Greg did. He had said quietly, ‘That’s a clever artist. He’s got the essence of Mary as well as just her appearance.’ Cathy had made no reply and he said no more. There was always a slight constraint between them when they spoke of her sister.
Now Cathy came back to the present to hear her mother saying, ‘Sam must be doing well. They’ve got another automobile, as she calls it, as well as that one.’
Cathy read through the letter quickly and put it back on the mantelpiece. ‘Not really much news,’ she said. ‘Although the letter is a bit longer, but at least we know she’s well and happy – and she keeps writing.’
‘Aye, not like the war years when we never heard a word from her.’
‘She’s different now she’s married to Sam,’ Cathy said. ‘He’s a good fellow.’
‘He is,�
�� her mother agreed. ‘He never fails to send that money although your dad won’t touch it. He puts it straight into the Penny Bank.’
‘But they must be able to afford it, and I’m sure they want you to spend it,’ Cathy said. Her mother shook her head.
‘No. You know how independent your dad is, Cath. He doesn’t think we should be kept by anyone else while he’s able to work, but he doesn’t want to hurt Sam’s feelings by sending it back. That’s why he puts it in the bank. He says it will be a little nest egg for them, or it might pay their fare if they want to come home.’
Cathy sighed. ‘It’s the other way round with us, Mam. You’re always helping us instead of us helping you.’
‘Don’t be foolish, girl,’ her mother said. ‘We’d be lost without you. All the cleaning and ironing you do for me, and sending the children to help. All the things Greg does for us too. Those are more important than sending dollars – although it’s good of Mary and Sam to think of us,’ she added hastily.
‘I miss her,’ Cathy said. ‘And I know you and Dad do too, don’t you?’
‘Yes, we do,’ Sally said with a sigh. ‘I wish she wasn’t so far away. She might as well be on the moon for all the hope we have of seeing her.’
‘Never mind, Mam,’ Cathy consoled her. ‘Who knows? Sam’s a Liverpool lad after all, and he might decide to come back here. He’d do anything to please Mary.’
‘Aye, that’s the rub,’ Sally said dryly. ‘Would Mary want to come back here when they’ve got that beautiful house there, and the two automobiles, and no doubt a lot of posh friends there too. No, I don’t see much hope of it, Cath.’
Sarah came in for a drink of water and Sally asked who she was playing with.
‘Edie Meadows, and Meg and Jane Daly, Grandma.’ Sally rose and took some biscuits from a tin.
‘Share with the girls, love,’ she said. ‘D’you know where Mick is?’
‘He’s playing with Georgie and Tommy but I don’t know where.’
‘Never mind. His stomach will bring him home soon, especially if he sees you with the biscuits.’
There is a Season Page 3
