Briefly he told her that he had moved from place to place over the years, sleeping wherever he happened to stop.
She shook her head and looked him up and down, particularly inspecting his clean-shaven jaw and noting his brown hair was tidy. ‘You don’t look too bad on it.’
He realized she had misinterpreted. ‘Oh, I’ve rarely slept in the open, I always get proper lodgings.’
‘But how do you afford it?’
‘I work, the same as anybody else. The only difference between me and them is that I don’t like to stay in one place for too long.’
She was forthright. ‘Well, you’d better bloomin’ stay long enough to see the rest of your family. They haven’t half missed you.’
Duke glanced awkwardly at the man to whom they had both been talking, who had gone back to examining his feet. He leaned close to Beata’s ear and mouthed quiet reluctance to walk away. ‘I can’t just leave him to it.’
Knowing that Gussie would be the first to offer help, Beata turned to the man from Aberdeen. ‘I can’t promise you a bed for the night but you’d at least be dry and warm – and we could see to those plates of meat.’
He cocked his head and extended a grubby hand. ‘Thank you very much, I accept. My name’s Andrew, Andy.’
Beata introduced herself, then, suddenly remembering that she was supposed to be meeting Maddie, she clamped a hand over her mouth and bade the men stay here, telling Duke especially not to move a muscle whilst she limped off to fetch her sister.
At first annoyed at being left to stand here so long on painful joints, Maddie was totally converted by the news that Duke was in town and the pair of them hurried back to make sure their brother did not slip away again.
* * *
Gussie might show sympathy for the man with sore feet – she was too overwhelmed at the sight of her long-lost brother to complain about the stranger – but Mick was most put out, especially when the answers to his interrogation quickly revealed the other’s politics.
‘Jesus, Mary ’n’ Joseph, what’s she doing bringing him into my house? He’s a blasted Communist, for pity’s sake!’ This, when Beata had gone to show Andy where the lavatory was and she herself was in the scullery pouring water into a bowl to bathe his feet.
‘How can you tell just from looking at him?’ his wife replied mildly, smiling at Duke, who had settled himself unobtrusively into a corner.
‘He said he was wid the NUWM – dat’s only another name for Commies!’ Mick’s Irish accent always came to the fore when he was aggravated. ‘Chroist, she’ll get us put on the black list. He’ll have to go!’
Carrying the bowl of water, Beata wove her way through numerous bodies, side-stepping a boisterous child and saying in her calm, quiet manner, ‘He has nowhere else to go.’
‘That’s true.’ Andy entered as they were still debating. ‘The kindly burghers of York were less than welcoming.’
Everyone had to listen carefully to unravel the accent.
‘Can’t ye try the workhouse?’
‘Mick!’ scolded his wife.
Andy gave a bitter laugh. ‘I could if I wanted to break stones in the morning.’ He strode over a child’s prostrate form and returned to his seat.
Mick was impatient, ‘Well, is dat so bad if it gives you a bed and a meal? We’re all poor. I’m unemployed too.’
‘You don’t know what poverty is.’ The Scotsman gave a contemptuous growl. ‘This is a palace compared to the hovels where I come from. I know mothers who dread their children waking up in the morning because they’ve naught for them to eat – and I mean absolutely nothing – have tae let them sleep as long as they can so they won’t start to cry from the hunger pains.’
Gussie intervened, her blue eyes compassionate. ‘When is it since you last ate, love?’
‘Ach, I’m fine. Folk have been very generous tae us along the way. I’ll not take food from those who nae want to give it.’ He stared levelly at Mick.
Gussie insisted on him having a cup of tea and a slice of bread and butter at least, providing her brother with the same. Taking discreet bites, Duke remained quietly in his corner, feeling unwelcome under Mick’s eye.
Beata placed the bowl of hot water before Andy and advised, ‘Soak your tootsies in that while you’re having your tea.’
With his wife and two sisters-in-law devoting themselves to the grubby stranger’s care, Mick fell silent and lit his pipe.
Later, when Andy had eaten and his feet had had sufficient soaking, Beata tended his blisters, applying salve and bandaging them up so that he could continue the march. Not until the younger children had gone to bed did anyone ask how things had got so bad in his region.
Settling back with one of Maddie’s cigarettes, he said, ‘It’s due to the men who rule us, and it’s going to be a hundred times worse if we allow them to get away with cutting our dole money. There’s another march not far behind, from Jarrow. What’s happened there is a travesty.’
‘Ah yes,’ nodded a solemn Maddie, rubbing her painful knuckles. ‘I’ve read they’ve had dreadful unemployment there. Eighty per cent at one time, wasn’t it?’
Andy leaned forward. ‘I’ll bet you didn’t know that the fascists are at the heart of it.’
‘Here we go,’ muttered Mick, but was ignored.
‘And that most of the steel you use is produced by Germany?’ Seeing their bewilderment, Andy gave a canny nod. ‘No, I thought not. Doesn’t make sense, does it? Our tonnage is cheaper yet the Government imports millions of tons of the German stuff, at the same time as shutting our steel mills.’ At their further bafflement he grew even more animated, ‘And let me give ye something even more difficult to palate: not only have British steel makers been pocketing a subsidy from the Government to encourage them to produce more, they’ve been taking a backhander from the Nazis to produce less.’
The listeners gave a unified gasp. ‘But why?’
‘I’ll give ye three guesses.’ For answer Andy patted his pocket, though it did not jingle for it bore not a farthing.
Reared in a conservative household, Beata and her sisters were wary about accepting this extremist’s view; could not believe their own appointed ministers would be involved in such a criminal act. It sounded absurd, after crushing the Germans in war then to boost their economy at the expense of British industry.
‘Have ye heard of the shipping magnate called Runciman?’
‘President of the Board of Trade,’ chipped in Mick, puffing morosely on his pipe.
‘That’s right, our Board of Trade, so why has he given Nazi firms preference and prevented the building of a steel plant in Jarrow?’
It was a question no one could answer and there followed an awkward silence.
In the end, Gussie sighed. ‘Ah dear, there’s things I’ll never understand if I live to be a hundred. Would anybody like some cocoa before bed?’
* * *
The next day, after a light breakfast and sincere thanks, the Scotsman resumed his march, his host much relieved to be rid of such a bad political influence.
‘The tramp’ll be going as well, I trust,’ growled Mick to his wife when the others had gone to school and work.
‘Do you mind!’ Clearing the stack of breakfast pots, Gussie rebuked him. ‘You’re speaking about my brother.’
‘Look at the cut of him, woman! We’ll be having to fumigate the house after he goes.’
‘That’s very charitable from someone who used to live in Bug Junction.’
Her husband spluttered at being so abused, but Gussie only laughed and the argument was to end then as Duke materialized as if from nowhere, wearing his greatcoat and hugging his small bag of belongings.
Mick turned away, muttering under his breath about Duke being ‘like bloody ectoplasm, creeping through closed doors while you’re trying to have a conversation…’
‘Sorry, I don’t want to be in the way.’
‘You’re not!’ said his sister kindly. ‘And you can take that
coat off right now. I’m going to find a comfier place for you to sleep tonight.’ He had previously shared the front room floor with Andy.
Assessing Mick’s mood, Duke said he didn’t want to outstay his welcome.
But Gussie insisted he remain. ‘You’re going nowhere till we hear everything you’ve done in the last six years.’
Persuaded, he untied the string that acted as a belt and shrugged off his heavy coat. Mick turned up his nose at the musty odour and lit his pipe.
‘I can only stop a few days.’
Continuing with her baking, Gussie said, ‘You can’t go until your other sisters have had a better opportunity to speak to you. We couldn’t say much with a stranger being in the house. We’ve all missed you.’
Duke confided that he’d missed them too.
‘Have you seen anything of our Clem?’
Immediately he clammed up. Duke had never forgiven his eldest brother, not just for the thrashing, but for the betrayal in merging with Eliza. However, he did not say this to Gussie, but just shook his head.
‘Joe?’
He shook his head again but this time asked, ‘How is he?’
‘He’s in the army, Father’s old regiment.’
Though he had never got on with his father, who had always made him feel like a failure, Duke was nevertheless glad for Joe and looked impressed. ‘Does he ever come to see you?’
‘As much as he can. If you stay for a decent while you might see him.’ Gussie looked at her husband, who had pulled a face at this suggestion.
Duke saw the grimace too. ‘Oh, maybe. I’ll certainly hang around to see Beat and Maddie again, though.’
Gussie said, ‘Mims’d love to see you too. I’ll write to her and see if we can get her to come.’
* * *
Mims did indeed show great keenness to come, as did Joe, who was conveniently stationed in York at the moment. With Beata and Maddie returning at their first opportunity to enjoy a deeper conversation with Duke, it was pointed out that this was the first time they had all been together since Father’s funeral.
‘Well, we’re not all here,’ corrected Maddie, and immediately every mind went to Clem.
The group nodded and murmured, reminiscing for a while about their parents and other dead relatives.
Things in danger of becoming maudlin, Gussie chuckled at Duke. ‘Eh, do you remember at Mother’s wake when you cut all the cherries off Aunt Wyn’s hat and tried to eat them?’ Her stepchildren thought this hilarious, both young and old laughing.
Beata groaned at the mention of that particular relative. ‘Oh, don’t mention Aunt Wyn. This job finishes next week and I haven’t been able to find another. If I’ve nowhere to live I’ll be forced to go back there. I was hoping I’d be spared till after Christmas.’
Gussie solved the dilemma. ‘If it’s a bed you’re after you can stay with us.’
‘Yes, I’ll soon be moving on.’ After only a week, Duke seemed restless already.
‘I didn’t mean you have to go,’ Gussie rebuked him. Used to a full house, she was adept at juggling beds and bodies. ‘There’s room for you both.’
Beata gratefully accepted, and, with no job forthcoming, moved into her sister’s house a week later, from then on having to exist on the funds she had put by for Christmas.
Before then, however, an extraordinary event occurred.
No previous hint of the relationship in the press, it was a great surprise to everyone to read on that first day of December that the King had proposed to an American divorcee. Gussie proclaimed this most unsavoury, agreeing with every disapproving word in the newspaper and saying Mrs Simpson was not the sort of woman to be queen. Obviously those in higher authority thought so too, for by the sixth a grave constitutional crisis had arisen and on the night of the eleventh the family was crowding round the wireless to hear the King make his abdication speech.
In the stunned atmosphere that followed the broadcast, pondering over the sensational event, Beata yearned for a man who might sacrifice everything out of love for her. Never far from her thoughts, Tommy’s laughing face sprang to life. For a few moments, history was rewritten and she saw him by the fire in the chair opposite hers, a couple of children playing on the rug between them …
‘I was never right struck on him anyway.’ Gussie’s censorious voice cut into her daydream as the radio was turned off and household life resumed. ‘Always had a sly look about him. And I certainly don’t like that hussy he’s taken up with.’
Beata smiled at her sister’s prudish attitude, but agreed in part. ‘I think the Duke of York’s more fitted to the bill, not so much of a gadabout. A happy family in Buckingham Palace, that’s what we need.’ Oh, what she would give to have one.
But she had almost given up hope of that. What chance was there for someone who was plain, plump, with a gimpy leg, and in service – at least she would be if she could find a job. Time and again she had gone into town to scour the notices in the labour exchange and to visit the servants’ registry but had found nothing.
Amid blustery showers she limped in again the next day, to the same useless result, the only moment of interest occurring when she passed the Mansion House and witnessed the proclamation of the new monarch – three kings in one year, it was all rather surreal.
What was very real was the lack of money in her purse. Of course she still had the train fare that Aunt Wyn had grudgingly donated but she couldn’t spend that. It was ironic really, the shops were reporting their best Christmas ever and the rest of the country beginning to emerge from the Depression, but she herself had not a penny to spare on gifts.
Still it turned out to be as nice a Christmas as she could ever recall, being at Gussie’s and watching the youngsters open their presents, her brother Duke being persuaded to stay and see in the New Year with them before he eventually succumbed to his wanderlust and left at the end of January with instructions not to desert them so long in future.
‘I suppose I’ll have to be making tracks too,’ sighed Beata, gossip having reached her ears that Wyn was most put out that she had not yet returned.
But just as she had packed her case a raging blizzard swept into being, leaving roads impassable in Yorkshire and disallowing her to get further than the outside lavatory.
Wearing a miserable expression, Beata looked out at the world of white. ‘Oh what a shame. I won’t be able to get back to Aunt Wyn’s now, will I?’ And, grinning widely, she took her suitcase back to her room.
But the stay of execution was brief and within weeks she was on her way back to Southport, the journey taking several hours.
‘Where’ve you been all these months?’ said Aunt Wyn by way of greeting at her weary arrival in the mid-afternoon. ‘We’ve had to pay Margaret to come in more often – and we’ve had to sell the geese. We couldn’t manage them on our own.’
Well, that was one less chore, thought a tired Beata, disgusted that Wyn had not enquired after Gussie’s welfare. ‘Sorry, Aunt. I had other people to see to. Anyway, I’ve brought something to show you.’ She fished a document out of her case. Mainly to still her aunt’s suspicions but also to gratify her own curiosity she had acquired a copy of Ethel’s will, what she found there making her even angrier, for the largest beneficiary turned out to have been Wyn herself, hence the air of mischief as she handed it over now. ‘I thought you might be interested.’
Yet even its presentation could not shake her aunt’s insistence that she had received less than everyone else. ‘It’s all legal jargon!’ Wyn flicked her hand dismissively and thrust the will back at her niece. ‘Anyway, forget that, I’ve got something important I want to ask you.’
Shaking her head at the old woman’s intransigence, Beata folded the document away, then paid attention.
‘You know that letter I sent you, asking when you were coming back? Have you still got the envelope?’
Beata frowned. ‘That’s a long while ago, Aunt. It’ll have gone in the bin – Oh, hang on I think I
wrote a shopping list on the back. It might be in my coat.’ Not the tidiest of women, her pockets were full of such rubbish.
‘Can you go look?’ urged Aunt Wyn.
Beata went off to rummage in every pocket and returned with the crumpled envelope, at the sight of which Aunt Wyn crowed in delight. ‘Wonderful! The stamp’s got Edward’s head on and it’s sure to be worth something in the future, now he’s abdicated.’
Her niece felt swamped by despair, but had no time to dwell on it for at this juncture the reverend gentlemen began to arrive for their weekly session and, even before unpacking her case, she was dispatched to make sandwiches and a pot of tea. To her pleasure, though, she found Margaret here, the cleaning woman having been assigned extra work, due to Beata’s absence, and the sandwiches already made. All Beata had to do was carry the tray in.
Uncle Teddy was not in bed today, his health quite steady, and everyone was congregated in the living room.
Coming amongst them with a plate, Beata listened to their discussion, first the weather, then the political climate. Their tone had changed somewhat since last she was here.
‘Have you heard the latest?’ The Reverend Mr Love bit into a ham sandwich, spitting bits of it with his outburst. ‘This Hitler chap’s demanding back the colonies that he said we stole from him after the war!’
‘Oh, he’s just getting silly now.’ Another erstwhile admirer swiped the air in disgust.
‘It is rather worrying, though,’ said Father O’Kelly sipping his tea. ‘All this rearmament. I get the feeling the Germans aren’t too keen on paying off the rest of their war debt.’
Teddy refused to believe it. ‘It’s just a show. Hitler knows we’d beat him; we’ve still got the largest navy in the world.’
‘They’ve changed their tune,’ said Beata to Margaret, once back in the kitchen. ‘They were big fans last time I was here.’
The other had little time to respond for, hearing them talking, Wyn came in. ‘Margaret, I forgot to tell you, now that my niece is back we won’t require you beyond your usual hours.’ She looked at the clock. ‘You may go now but I’ll pay you to the hour.’ ‘That’s very generous of her,’ muttered the cleaner to the niece, ‘there must be at least a minute to go.’
A Different Kind of Love Page 70
