Changing Patterns

by Judith Barrow

  Mary leaned back and put her hand on Jean’s arm. ‘You’re shaking,’ she said. ‘Are you sure you’re okay, you and Patrick? You’re sure it was for the best, you moving back?’

  Jean knew all along she’d go back to Patrick. She wouldn’t give him the opportunity to get involved with Doreen permanently. She brushed Mary’s hand away and stood up. ‘It’s better for Jacqueline.’

  ‘Is it? You sure about that, Jean? She’s still upset. She saw our Patrick with that woman, she sees the way the two of you blow hot and cold. Worst of all she saw him hit you.’ Mary twisted around so she could see Jean as she stood in front of the kitchen window. ‘She thinks you might leave her dad again. She knows there’s something still going on. And if there is any chance you’ll split up with him, surely she needs to know.’

  Jean flushed. ‘And leave the field open for that cow next door? You must think I’m soft.’ Hadn’t Mary enough to worry about, single, pregnant and virtually homeless? ‘I’ll deal with it my own way, thank you, and you can be sure he’ll not get away with all this scot-free.’ But would this baby make a difference?

  ‘Anyway.’ She tilted her head towards next door’s wall. ‘I didn’t come here to talk about that.’ Even though it plagued her day and night. ‘I came to tell you Patrick’s been in a fight.’ The horror of seeing his face when he walked through the door the day before suddenly returned. ‘His face is a right mess.’

  ‘Oh no.’ Mary suddenly looked scared.

  ‘A right mess but he says he’s all right.’ She grimaced. ‘He tells me the other bloke looks worse.’ A thought flashed into her head – suppose it was Dennis Whittaker? What if he’d confronted Patrick? She looked fearfully at Mary. ‘You don’t think it was her husband, do you?’ That would open up a whole new can of worms.

  ‘What?’ Mary opened her eyes wide. ‘No, definitely not. I saw him pass the back gate this morning and he looked fine.’

  ‘So it can only be something to do with George Shuttleworth?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Mary held her hands over her stomach.

  There was nothing they could say to make one another feel easier. There was trouble brewing from all directions.

  Chapter 61

  ‘I can’t keep him.’ Doreen Whittaker stood on the doorstep, shabby in an old grey raincoat. She was shivering, her face pinched and white and the hair escaping from her headscarf was lank and greasy. ‘We’re leaving. Dennis won’t let me keep him.’

  If only Patrick could see her now, Jean thought, adjusting the paisley scarf on her head. ‘What do you want me to do?’ She glared at Doreen. Rage closed her throat, made it difficult to breathe. Trust him to be out. ‘It’s nothing to do with me.’

  One of the cotton-padded wire pipe cleaners which she used to curl up her hair overnight was sticking in her neck. She surreptitiously pushed it back under the scarf.

  ‘If you don’t take him, he’ll go into care or something.’ Doreen’s shoulders slumped. ‘I can’t…’ She took a huge gulp, still refusing to meet Jean’s eyes. ‘I can’t keep him, I have to be with my husband.’ She held out the baby. ‘Please.’

  ‘Shame you didn’t think of that before you threw yourself at mine.’ Jean ignored the desperation in the woman’s dark-ringed eyes; hardened her heart to the tiny bundle inches away from her. She looked to see if any of the neighbours were witnessing this debacle. There was no one around but who knew how many were hiding behind their curtains. She hunched her shoulders against the bitter cold. ‘I want you to leave.’ She nodded towards the gate. There was still a sparkling of frost on the path that the sun wasn’t strong enough to shift.

  She repeated her earlier words and tried to ignore the baby’s whimpering. ‘Look, this is nothing to do with me, nothing at all.’ She stepped back into the hallway. ‘I’m shutting the door now. You’d better get that child home.’ Why say that? It wasn’t as if she cared what happened to the brat. Even as she thought it, she knew it wasn’t the baby’s fault he’d been born into all this. He was innocent, an unwanted child. Without looking at the woman she began to close the door.

  ‘Please?’ Doreen stopped it from shutting with the flat of her hand. The baby cried louder.

  Angry, Jean swung the door open. The woman fell forwards and was only stopped by Jean catching hold of her. In an instant the baby was thrust into her arms and Doreen had half turned away.

  ‘Whoa there, madam.’ Holding the child to her, Jean clutched at the woman’s coat. ‘Just one minute. Where the hell do you think you’re going?’

  ‘I have to do this. Dennis says if I’ve still got him when I get home he’ll leave on his own.’ Doreen yanked herself away and hurried to the gate.

  ‘I’ve told you, this is not my problem.’ Jean raised her voice above the baby’s cries. She was beginning to panic. It really looked as if the woman would leave. Still in her slippers she ran after her, slithering and sliding on the icy path. As Doreen quickened her steps Jean faltered to a stop. ‘I’m putting him down,’ she yelled, oblivious to the next door neighbour who, stooping to pick up the milk bottle from her doorstop, had stopped in surprise and now, still half bent, was staring at Jean. ‘Do you hear me? I’m putting your baby on the ground.’

  ‘Do what you want.’ Doreen didn’t look back.

  Jean watched until she’d disappeared around the corner.

  ‘Mum, come in.’ Jacqueline was at the front door. ‘Bring it in.’ She made a gesture, indicating the house. ‘Bring it in, we’ll look after it.’

  Oh God, Jacqueline had heard everything. Jean cursed her husband.

  ‘We’ll have it if she doesn’t want him. She’s nasty. You should have just taken it and told her to bugger off, Mum.’

  Jean heard the neighbour make a tutting sound and turned to glare at her before hurrying into the house, holding the baby at arm’s length.

  Jacqueline was arranging the eiderdown off her bed on the rug in front of the fire in the living room. ‘Let’s put it here,’ she said, leaning back on her haunches and holding out her arms.

  Jean knelt down next to her, relieved she didn’t have to hold the baby any longer than necessary. ‘We can’t keep him.’ He began to scream again, a thin helpless wail interspersed with quivering silence, as though he was listening for a response.

  ‘Isn’t he my brother like William is Linda’s?’ Intent on unfolding the blanket wrapped around the little boy, Jacqueline didn’t see Jean flinch. ‘Pooh!’ She held her nose. The stench from his dirty nappy immediately filled the room. But when she saw her mother’s look of disgust she said, ‘It can’t help it. It’s only a baby. It doesn’t know how to use the lavvy yet.’

  Ignoring the protest Jean pushed herself off her knees. ‘I’ll find some rags, clean him up.’

  Undressed, the little boy was pitifully thin, his lower body caked in excrement. Jean concentrated on cleaning him, pushing away the compassion which vied in equal measure with anger towards her husband, towards the child’s mother.

  ‘What’s he called?’ Jacqueline was sitting back watching with interest and excitement, her arms folded across her knees which she’d pulled up under her chin.

  ‘I don’t know.’ It struck her. She didn’t even know the kid’s name. She stood again. ‘I’ll find something to make into nappies. She looked around the room. A feeling of helplessness prevented her from moving. This was her worst nightmare. ‘Towels,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll cut a towel up, that’ll do.’ She nodded, agreeing with herself. ‘Nappies and starch.’

  ‘Starch?’

  ‘Reckitts’ starch. It’s good for nappy rash. I used it on you.’

  When she came back into the room Jacqueline had wrapped the now-sleeping baby in her cardigan and was cuddling him as she rocked from side to side. When she looked up at her mother she beamed. ‘See, I’ve got him to sleep.’

  Damn you, Patrick, you’ll pay for this, Jean thought. You’ll bloody pay.

  Chapter 62

  ‘Where’s Doreen?�
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  ‘They’ve gone.’ Ellen didn’t look up at Patrick. Her arms were aching but she was determined to finish sweeping the yard. She banged the head of the brush on the wall to clean it. Brick dust fell off and she swept it onto the shovel with the rest of the debris. ‘Left last night, and good riddance.’

  She put the brush behind the door of the lavatory and closed it, folding her coat closer around her, suddenly cold and tired again. ‘Why do you want to know? I would have thought you’d have learned your lesson, Patrick, you got your fingers well and truly burnt there.’

  When he didn’t answer she glanced towards him. He stood in the gateway, the baby in his arms swaddled in a grey Army blanket. She looked swiftly from him to the house next door. ‘No!’ Her hands on her hips, she said, ‘What have you done?’

  He scowled. ‘Wasn’t me. Stupid tart came round yesterday and dumped it on Jean. I’ve had a right soddin’ earful, I can tell you.’ The baby started to cry. He hugged it closer to him, jiggling his arms up and down and then said, ‘Can I come in a minute?’

  It wasn’t like him to sound so unsure. ‘Course.’ Mary was right when she said it was one thing after another in this family. She led the way to the back door and held it open. ‘Get in front of the fire, you look frozen. That child shouldn’t be out without proper clothes on.’ Undoing her scarf, she pulled it off and shook her hair free.

  ‘It’s all he’s got. The stupid cow left him at our place like this.’

  ‘I’ll find some old stuff of William’s in a minute.’

  She went to the bottom of the stairs. She avoided the spot where Hannah had lain. She always avoided walking there. What happened that morning was something she’d have to live with for the rest of her life.

  ‘Mary?’ Anxiously, she threaded her fingers together. ‘Can you come down a minute?’ Ellen glanced at Patrick, noticed how he gently uncovered the baby to let the flames warm him. She wouldn’t have believed how sensitive he could be. ‘Mary?’

  ‘What is it? For goodness sake I’ll be down in a minute.’

  Ellen nodded. She stood still watching the baby. He wore a grey woollen romper suit. His little legs were rosy as he gradually warmed up. ‘I’ll get those clothes in a minute,’ she said.

  The voice from the wireless filled the silence: Labour politician Herbert Morrison sees the Festival as a means of giving the British people a symbolic pat on the back for their postwar achievements and sacrifices. And Gerald Barry, the Festival’s director general, claims that the Festival will prove a ‘tonic to the nation’.

  ‘Must be bloody joking.’ Patrick glowered at the wireless. ‘Pompous bugger. Here they go again, getting it all wrong. We need a festival like a hole in the bloody head, state the country’s in.’

  ‘State you’re in, more like.’ Ellen looked anxiously towards the bottom of the stairs. Come on, Mary, she urged silently. ‘You’ve enough to worry about without griping about the bloody Government, Patrick.’ She turned the wireless off. ‘Mary!’

  ‘God only knows what I’ll do.’ He clumsily arranged the baby in his arms. ‘You any ideas?’

  ‘No.’ She watched him struggle. ‘There’s only one thing you can do, you know that,’ she said. ‘You’re going to have to throw yourself on Jean’s mercy and ask her if she’ll look after him. You’ve no choice.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Mary stepped down from the last tread. She stopped when she saw Patrick with the baby.

  Ellen swept her arm around. ‘See?’

  ‘I can see.’ Mary buttoned her thick cardigan over her wrap-around pinny. ‘I just don’t believe it.’

  ‘I don’t need a soddin’ lecture.’

  ‘Then you’d better leave,’ Mary said sharply. ‘You’ve a talent for bringing trouble on yourself, Patrick, but this time it seems you’ve dragged us all in it. Is that what I think it is?’

  ‘Doreen’s baby,’ Ellen said. ‘She’s dumped him on him.’

  ‘But they’ve gone.’ Mary looked bewildered. ‘They left yesterday.’

  ‘So I bloody hear.’

  ‘I’ll look for those clothes.’ Ellen almost ran up the stairs, glad to get away from the row that seemed to be brewing.

  Mary fixed him with a stare. ‘How’s Jean taking this?’

  ‘Like I said to Ellen, I’ve had a right ear-bashing.’

  ‘Poor you.’ She didn’t even try to cover up the sarcasm. ‘Better than another kind of bashing, I guess.’

  ‘Okay, okay. You’re having a right dig today, aren’t you?’ Patrick flushed, uneasy under her stare.

  ‘First chance I’ve really had.’

  ‘I’ve said I’m sorry to her. Right?’

  ‘You know what I’m talking about then?’

  ‘Come on, sis, I know I was wrong. It’ll not happen again.’

  ‘If I remember rightly, Dad used to say the same thing.’

  ‘I’d cut my right arm—’

  ‘Don’t.’ Mary’s voice was cold. ‘Don’t say it. I told her to leave you for good, you know.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Next time you raise a hand to her, I’ll make sure she does.’

  ‘I’ve told you, there won’t be a next time.’

  ‘Good.’

  The baby began to cry.

  Mary moved towards the two of them, her arms instinctively held out. Then she lowered them. Patrick had to deal with this on his own. ‘Has he been fed?’

  ‘I fed him this morning. I got a bottle and some Ostermilk stuff from the chemist. He said that’s what’s used these days. But I haven’t got it with me.’ Patrick jerked his head towards the wall. ‘I thought she’d be there. I was going to give him back. Poor little blighter should be with his mother.’ He wiped his palm over his face. ‘Not with me.’

  ‘We’ve got some evaporated milk I can water down and there’s an old bottle of William’s in one of the cupboards, I think.’ Mary knelt down and opened one of the sideboard doors. She gave a small sound of triumph. ‘Here it is. I’ll rinse it out. I think there’s still some hot water in the kettle.’

  When she came out of the scullery with the bottle and the evaporated milk he looked up at her. ‘What am I going to do with a bloody kid, sis?’

  What am I going to do? she thought. I shouldn’t be drifting along not making any plans, but what else can I do? She flipped a look at him, opening the drawer under the table to find the can opener. ‘You should have thought of that … and no, I won’t,’ she said in answer to the unspoken question of his face. ‘I’m not taking him on. In case you’ve forgotten I’ll have a baby of my own soon and for now I have enough to do looking after Ellen’s two until she’s properly on her feet.’ She struggled with the can opener and the tin of evaporated milk.

  ‘One more thing – Jean said the other day you’d been in a fight? Shuttleworth?’ She kept her voice down, looking over her shoulder at the stairs.

  ‘He won’t bother us again.’

  ‘I asked you not to do anything. I asked you to leave well alone.’ She forced the blade of the can opener through the last bit of tin and prised open the top. ‘I should have known you wouldn’t be able to keep your hands to yourself.’

  ‘Well, you going to old Ma Shuttleworth didn’t work, did it?’ Patrick stood and patted the whimpering baby.

  ‘It might have, if you’d given it some time.’ Mary poured the evaporated milk and some of the warm water into the glass baby bottle and forced the rubber teat on.

  ‘She wouldn’t drop him in it with the police and I’m damn sure he wouldn’t have given himself up.’

  ‘You can’t solve everything with your fists. One day you’ll come across somebody who gives as good as they get.’ Shaking the mixture, Mary perched on the arm of the chair next to Patrick. ‘No, you do it,’ she said as he tried to pass the little boy to her. She gave him the bottle. ‘You’ll need the practice.’ She watched the little boy suck greedily on the teat. ‘God, he is hungry, poor little beggar.’ She lowered her voice. ‘
I’m worried, Patrick. George Shuttleworth?’

  ‘I told you, I sorted him.’

  ‘No you didn’t, you had a fight with him. He won’t leave it at that, you know. He’s no different than his brother was. He’ll want his revenge.’

  ‘Then I’ll be fuckin’ ready for him. But I’m telling you, Mary, he’s learned his lesson. There’s no way he’ll bother us again.’

  Chapter 63

  ‘Where is she?’ The woman stood in front of Peter, hatred etched on her face under a broad-brimmed brown hat, which had darkened on one side from the earlier rain. ‘What have you done with her?’ He tried to sidestep her but she thrust her furled umbrella across his path. ‘I’ve known Mary from the first week they moved here and I’m not shifting until you tell me where she is.’ She stood toe to toe with him, her mud-caked wellingtons pushed against his own.

  Peter looked around, helplessly aware they had attracted some attention from a few passers-by. He wished he’d gone straight back to the cottage instead of offering to wait for Gwyneth, to carry her shopping for her. ‘I am sorry—’ he began.

  ‘You will be.’ In the light from the shop window, her weather-beaten cheeks developed an unsightly red flush.

  ‘What’s all this, Mair Bevans?’ Gwyneth came out of the butcher’s shop. ‘Bullying again? What’s the matter? Had another row with your Ryan, is it?’

  ‘I just want to know what this one has done with Mary. Not seen her for months on my rounds.’

  ‘Just because he cancelled the milk doesn’t mean anything. Don’t be so bloody twp, woman. Mary’s looking after her family in England, see? Now, if you don’t mind?’ Gwyneth handed her shopping bags to Peter, who took them in one hand. ‘We’ll be on our way.’ She glanced around at the small group of people who had gathered, fixing them with a scathing glare. She linked arms with Peter as they walked away.

  ‘You know, Peter, that sister of hers must be better by now. She’s one for always wanting attention, see,’ she said. ‘I knew it from the minute I saw her years ago. Not bad, just spoiled. And, from what I saw, nobody has babied her more than Mary.’