Farewell To The East End

by Jennifer Worth

  The downstairs door opened, and two grubby children tumbled upstairs, pushing, shouting, laughing. ‘Now shut yer noise, an’ siddown, ’ere’s yer beans on toast, and don’t get it all over yerselves.’

  She tried to eat a bit herself, but it made her feel sick. Oh no – another sign! Can’t be much doubt. She’d have to see the doctor, she would.

  After she’d packed the children off to school at two o’ clock, she had to get some grub in for the evening. She went to the corner shop, the one she’d known since childhood, the one her mother got tick from when there was no money and no food in the place and a brood of half-starved kids. Well at least she wasn’t always living on the breadline, not like her poor mum – at least she could feed her kids and not do without herself. Bill earned a good wage, and his job was secure, thanks to the Trade Union. She bought some more bread and half a pound of bacon. They could have fried bread and bacon this evening, then on reflection she added a large tin of beans. Well, at least they get some good food, bacon’s more than she ever got when she was a kid, she mused. The two toddlers were restive and excited to be out, so she took them for a bit of a walk, not too far because she was tired, and she didn’t want to go past the bomb site where the meths drinkers hung out. They scared her. She went down the street where she had played as a child, but it depressed her – all the windows boarded up, signs of demolition at the far end. Wearily she made her way back home.

  Four o’ clock and the brood would be home. She steeled herself for the rush and the noise. She prepared a large quantity of beans and bacon and fried bread. ‘Now get that inside yer, an’ go out an’ play. An’ take ve babies with you. I’ve had ’em all day, an’ I’m just about up to here with ’em.’ She raised her hand to her neck to indicate how high. The children gobbled down their food, and rushed out.

  Hilda settled down to a quiet cup of tea and Woman magazine. It was the only time of day she got any peace – when the bigger children took the little ones off her hands. An hour later she thought, it’s getting dark. The kids’d better be in. She went to the window and yelled down the street. No children in sight. They’ll be on that bomb site, I’ll be bound. I’ve told ’em not to. It’s not safe. You wait till I get my hands on ’em, little devils. Muttering and grumbling, Hilda trudged off to the bomb site and gathered up her brood, cuffing each of the bigger ones round the ear as she did so. ‘You jes’ wait till I tells yer dad you’ve been down ’ere,’ she shouted. The boys grinned and made rude faces and dodged out of her reach.

  It was nine o’clock by the time they were all in bed, the four little ones in the bedroom, the two older ones in the cupboard – a decent-sized cupboard, she and Bill had agreed when they took the room shortly after the war, almost as big as another room. We can put all our junk in there, they had said, laughing.

  Now it was full of kids! Still no Bill. What’s happened to him? She sat down with another cup of tea and another fag.

  At 10.45 she heard the front door bang and heard Bill singing down below. Her heart leaped – he’s got good news – she jumped up to get another cup for him. He’d like a cup of tea before his meal, and then he could tell her the news. The door opened slowly, with Bill clinging to it. He swung into the room and leaned heavily against the wall, staring vacantly at her. Oh no, not drunk, she’d have to be careful, treat him gently, no questions, no chatter, she didn’t want his fist in her face. Mrs Hatterton had got her nose broken only last week. But Bill’s not like that, not really. She sat him down and took off his boots.

  ‘Like some bacon and beans, eh, ducks?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Cup o’ tea?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘’Ow about a nice bacon sandwich, ven?’

  ‘Vat’s more like it.’ His eyes brightened a little.

  She went to the gas stove on the landing, made two rounds and brought them to him. He hadn’t eaten all day and devoured the first ravenously.

  ‘Nice cup of tea to wash it down?’

  He nodded. He was beginning to look more like himself.

  He’ll be all right after a good night’s sleep. No trouble. You just need to know how to handle a drunk man, then you get no trouble. But her Bill wasn’t like that anyway, wouldn’t hurt a fly, but still you never knew, when the drink was on them. She went into the bedroom and pushed two children over to the far side of the bed so that there would be space for their father to lie down. She led Bill into the bedroom, quietly undressed him and held the chamber-pot for him to have a jimmy riddle. The pot was so full she had to go downstairs to empty it, and when she returned he was sprawled sideways across the bed, his feet and legs around two sleeping children.

  There was no room for her, so she spent the night in a chair, wrapped in a coat.

  She roused herself at six and went down to get some water. She made a pot of tea and buttered some bread, then she quietly shook Bill. ‘Come on. You’ve got to get off to work,’ she whispered so as not to wake the children. He struggled to his feet, sober, but somewhat the worse for wear. They sat at the table together. She lit a Woodbine, stuck it in his mouth and pushed his tea and bread towards him.

  ‘You’re a good girl, ducks,’ he muttered, drawing on the fag.

  ‘Well? What happened yesterday?’

  ‘Happened? I got pissed, that’s what.’

  ‘No, afore vat. At ve Council.’

  His mind slid backwards, and he groaned.

  ‘Nuffink. Zilch. Gotta wait.’

  ‘Wait! We’ve waited five years. I thought we was top of ve housin’ list.’

  ‘We are. But we still gotta wait.’

  ‘Why?’ she said savagely.

  ‘Too many kids, vat’s why.’

  ‘How d’ya mean? They said all the kids ’ave to move to better, ’ealthier places.’

  ‘I know. But we got too many. Council has to provide a four-bedroom ’ouse for two adults an’ six kids. An’ vey only builds two and fhree-bedroom places at the moment.’

  ‘But we can manage with three bedrooms. We’ve only got one an’ a cupboard here.’

  ‘I tells ve bloke vat, but it makes no difference. It’s rules – bloody rules.’

  ‘I don’t believe it. Vis place is fallin’ down.’

  ‘I told ’em so, an’ vey say as what it’s not Council property, so it’s not ve Council’s responsibility. We ’ave ter ask our landlord for repairs.’

  ‘Fat lot of use that’ll be. Look, let’s get vis clear. Council has three-bedroom houses, but we can’t ’ave one ’cause we got six children?’

  ‘That’s abou’ it. We’re stuck. Now I’ve gotta get off. Can’t be late today.’ The front door slammed, and footsteps hurried down the street.

  THE ABORTIONIST

  Hilda sat at the wooden table and lit another fag. She was stunned. Foremost in her mind was the suspicion that had been nagging at her for three weeks. What a blessing she hadn’t told Bill! Only yesterday she thought she would have to, and then go to the doctor. Not now, no siree, no bleeding doctors. She’d see Mrs Prichard, who was well thought of in the area. She’d enquire in the corner shop. Someone would know how to find her. Hilda got the children up and packed them off to school, paying little heed to their demands and squabbles. Her mind was planning what she would have to do – the sooner the better, every day would count.

  Discreet enquiries led her to Mrs Prichard. She had to be very careful. Back-street abortions were quite common in those days, but the practice was illegal, and both the client and the abortionist could be prosecuted if caught and would face a prison sentence if convicted. Every precaution was necessary.

  Mrs Prichard and her daughter lived in a better class of house on the Commercial Road. To the police, local doctors, church and social workers, she was a herbalist, specialising in potions, known only to the mystics, for the cure of hay-fever, gout, arthritic knees and so on. Her front room was filled with bottles and phials. Her premises had been inspected several times by the public health authori
ties, who had found her remedies and treatments to be harmless, if ineffectual. Evidence of the more lucrative side of her business was nowhere to be seen. She had learned her trade from her mother, who had been an abortionist since the 1880s, and when the old lady died Mrs Prichard had inherited the equipment which had been stolen from a hospital about fifty years earlier.

  Mrs Prichard was a well-upholstered lady. She wore smart suits and several gold chains over her ample bosom. Her face was heavily made up, and her eyebrows, plucked until nothing was left, were replaced by a thin pencil arc, reaching high into her forehead. Her hair was a colour that no woman of her age could hope to retain and was elaborately coiffed and curled. She greeted Hilda with a smile, and listened to her story sympathetically. When she spoke her voice was falsely genteel, an accent beloved by character actresses.

  ‘Oh, my dear, what you got is stomach cramps. I sees a lot of it these days. The doctors don’t know what to do with it. Don’t know nothing, they don’t. I can’t think why they have all that training – they don’t seem to learn nothing. Can’t even treat a simple case of stomach cramps. Inflammation of the intestines, I calls it, dear. Going up or going down, it makes no difference, the intestines has a lot of work to do, and they get inflammation. Now what you need is some of my special stomach cramps mixture, dear. My own remedy, known only to myself. My dear deceased mother, who was a wise woman as ever there was one, passed the secret on to me on her death-bed. “Don’t let anyone get it off of you,” she says as she was dyin’ like. “It’s more precious than gold,” she says. “Them doctors don’t know nothing about it,” she says, and then she expired, leaving me with the secret.’

  Mrs Prichard wiped her eye and sniffed sadly as she went over to a counter. She took several bottles off the shelves, and with a measuring glass and a great deal of care, and with one eye shut, squinting against the light, she filled a bottle. Hilda was most impressed.

  ‘That will be two guineas, dear, and worth ten of anyone’s money, I can tell you. Now take a tablespoonful night and morning for five days. It will make the stomach cramps worse at first, but that is a sign that the potion is working, so don’t stop taking it, will you, dear? It’s got to get worse afore it gets better. If you don’t get any bleeding, come back to me next week. My dear mother left me on her death-bed with other secret remedies for stomach cramps, known only to myself.’

  Mrs Prichard pocketed the two guineas. Smiling and solicitous, she showed Hilda to the door.

  ‘Now remember, dear, this is for stomach cramps. Mrs Prichard treats all sorts: headaches, migraines, ingrown toenails, flatulence, tennis elbow and stomach cramps. If anyone asks you, this potion is for them stomach cramps, which you ’ave been suffering of.’

  Hilda took the potion as directed for five days. The taste was so revolting that it made her retch with each dose, and the pain in her stomach was intense. The third day she developed violent diarrhoea and vomiting, and spent most of the night in the outside lavatory. She sat curled up with pain on the rough wooden seat, trying not to cry out as the fluid poured from her. This’ll get rid of it, she thought, and good riddance. In the morning she looked hopefully for signs of blood – but there were none. For three more days she put up with the pain and nausea and diarrhoea, trying to pretend to Bill and the children that nothing was wrong, but by the sixth day she was forced to admit that it had all been to no avail. She had lost no blood. She was still pregnant.

  Hilda felt weak and shaky when she returned to Mrs Prichard, who in contrast looked splendid. Her hair had been newly dyed and was piled up on her head in layers of curled sausages. Her make-up was even thicker than before, and her lips and fingernails were a vivid red.

  ‘Oh, my dear. These naughty cramps. Sometimes they really have to be swept away with a new broom. My dear mother always used to say that, if the cramps don’t go with the old trusty broom, you’ve got to get out the new. Now it’s up to you, dear. Do you want me to get out my new broom to sweep them clean away? I will have to come to your place, of course. Can’t be done here. I ain’t got the premises. And my daughter will have to come with me. I need her as my trusty assistant, you understand. And there must be no one around, no children nor husbands nor nothing like that, you understand? The decision is yours, dear.’

  Hilda gulped, and felt sick.

  ‘Will it hurt?’ she murmured.

  ‘Hardly a prick, my dear. I will give you a potion, my mother’s secret mixture what she gave me when she was a-dying. It numbs the senses.’

  ‘Is there no other way?’

  ‘If the potion for cramps don’t work, my dear, it means it’s a real sticking, stubborn sort of cramp, and the only way is a new broom.’

  ‘All right. When can you do it?’

  ‘Wednesday morning. And it’ll be twenty guineas. Ten guineas now, and ten when I’ve done. You won’t regret a penny, my dear.’

  Hilda went to the post office and drew out twenty guineas from the War Time Savings Account she had guarded so carefully to buy new furniture when she and Bill got their new place. She returned to Mrs Prichard, who took the money with ‘You won’t regret a penny, my dear. Till Wednesday.’

  Hilda spent the next few days in an agony of doubt and indecision. Had she done wrong? Should she go through with it? She could cancel the whole thing and just have the baby. But the thought of a seventh baby in that horrible flat filled her with such dismay that she thought anything would be better. Should she tell Bill? She didn’t know. Men are so squeamish, perhaps he’d rather not know. Then again he might start blabbing to his mates at work, and then, who knows where it might get to. Next thing they’d have the Law knocking on their door. She decided not to tell him.

  On Wednesday, Mrs Hatterton opposite agreed to have the two little ones for the day, and the older children had all been sent to school with instructions to have school dinners and not to come back until four o’clock. Hilda waited with pounding heart. She had carried up several buckets of water, laid out clean towels and sheets and provided a few rolls of cotton wool. She didn’t know what else to do. The waiting’s the worst, she thought. There was a knock on the door at nine thirty, and she nearly jumped out of her skin, though she had been expecting it.

  Mrs Prichard and her daughter entered. The two women were soberly, even drably, dressed in brown mackintoshes. They both had their hair wound up in curlers with a headscarf tied over the top, which was a common sight amongst East End women. They carried wicker shopping baskets from which protruded cabbages, leeks, turnip tops and brussel tops. They looked exactly like a couple of housewives coming back from market. It was a disguise to fool the police.

  ‘Now, dear, the sooner we get on with this, the sooner it’s over. Let me see your premises.’

  Mrs Prichard mounted the rickety staircase going up from the foul-smelling hallway and wrinkled her sensitive nose in disgust.

  ‘I’m not surprised, dear, that you wants to get rid of these stomach cramps.’

  She looked round Hilda’s rooms with a professional eye.

  ‘Can’t use the bedroom. We’ll have to do it on the kitchen table. I will need some hot water. Where’s the gas-stove? On the landing! That won’t do. The hot water must be ready and in here. Now, can we lock the door? No? Why not? The door must be locked from the inside. Find the key. Ah, is that it? Good. Now clear the table. Draw those curtains; we don’t want any prying eyes, do we, dear? Now dear, drink this. It’s my mother’s potion to numb the senses – and climb up on that table. Miriam, put that bucket there, and that bowl there, put those towels here, and get those sheets under her buttocks. I wants you to hold the knees against the chest, and to keep them there whatever happens.’

  Miriam was a large, silent female, and she grunted her acquiescence.

  Trembling, Hilda drank the potion as instructed and shakily climbed onto the table. She lay down in what is known medically as the ‘lithotomy position’, with her buttocks at the edge of the table, her legs drawn upwards and spread a
part. Her head was spinning. A silky voice penetrated her hazy mind.

  ‘Have you got the other ten guineas, dear? A professional person can’t be expected to carry out professional duties without due payment.’

  ‘On the shelf, in the brown pot,’ Hilda answered thickly. Miriam went to the pot and took the money.

  Mrs Prichard delved amongst the leeks and brussel tops and produced her instruments. They were exceedingly old and made of rough, unpolished steel, virtually impossible to sterilise – if, indeed, Mrs Prichard ever made any attempts at sterilisation. They consisted of a few ancient surgical instruments, such as forceps, dilators, curettes and a Higginson’s syringe.

  ‘Just a little prick, dear, you’ll hardly feel a thing,’ Mrs Prichard cooed, as she inserted her fingers into the vagina. Hilda felt no discomfort. This is going to be all right, she thought. The drug she had taken made her feel light-headed and sleepy.

  Mrs Prichard glanced at her and muttered to her daughter, ‘Keep her firmly in that position and have the towels ready.’ She felt with her fingers until she thought she had located the cervix. She hissed, ‘Keep her still now,’ and with the forceps she grabbed the cervix and pulled it towards her. Hilda felt a pain like a knife stabbing her body, but she managed to suppress a scream. Holding the cervix quite firmly Mrs Prichard took one of the dilators and attempted to force it through the closed cervix, with no success. ‘Too big,’ muttered the abortionist and reached for a smaller dilator, which she pushed hard against the cervical orifice. Edna felt pain like burning knives tearing her body apart. She opened her mouth to scream, but a towel was thrust in, pushing her tongue backwards and nearly choking her.