Workhouse Child

by Maggie Hope

  Half an hour later or thereabouts, Lottie found herself at the top of Eliza’s street. She had not meant to call on Eliza, she told herself, it had just happened. But as she was so near … If someone mentioned they had seen her to her friend, Eliza would wonder why she, Lottie, had not called when she was only a few steps away. And most likely Thomas was out somewhere. If he was in, she would simply face him coolly and pretend yesterday had not happened. She was still dithering when she heard Peter’s voice close behind her.

  ‘Lottie? How nice to see you! Are you coming for your tea at our house?’

  ‘Oh, Peter, you made me jump. I-I was just out walking and I found myself here. I was thinking of something else. No, I’m not expected …’

  ‘Well, for goodness sake, there’ll be enough for an extra one, I’m sure.’ He held out his arm. ‘Howay, then, I’m inviting you.’

  ‘Well, what option do I have?’ Lottie laughed and put her hand on his arm and they marched down the street.

  ‘I’ve brought a visitor for tea and she’s fair clemmed, I’m warning you, Eliza,’ Peter called out as he banged the door to behind them.

  Eliza came through from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron.

  ‘Lottie!’ she exclaimed. ‘I was just thinking about you. Come on through and we can talk while I finish off the meal.’

  ‘I don’t want to put on you,’ Lottie murmured. ‘If you haven’t enough I don’t mind.’

  ‘Nonsense, we can always squeeze in one more. Any road, Thomas isn’t here so we have enough and to spare.’

  ‘Thomas isn’t here?’

  Eliza was leading the way into the kitchen and so didn’t see the look of disappointment on Lottie’s face.

  ‘No. He had to go to Newcastle last night. There was a wire for him from Brownlow. That’s the barrister who has taken him on. It came yesterday morning but Thomas was out for a walk. He didn’t get in until late and so had to go practically straight out again for the night train. They needed him to start straight away.’

  Eliza laid an extra place at the kitchen table. This house had a dining room but it was rarely in use except at Christmas. The kitchen was the hub of the house, as it had been in her mother’s house.

  Peter came in from the backyard and washed his hands under the cold water tap. ‘I’m hoping to get a slabstone sink installed,’ he told Lottie. ‘With a proper drain to the outside. They are the latest thing. The committee are considering it.’ The house was owned by the union and rented out at a concessionary rate to Peter as an official. Lottie listened but the words did not register. For a moment she thought she was going to faint. She sat down at the table quickly and murmured something in reply. As Eliza and Peter talked on, she sat quietly, though her thoughts were in turmoil. She jumped when she realized that Eliza was addressing her.

  ‘Lottie? Are you all right?’

  ‘Aye, yes, I am,’ she said and picked up her knife and fork and attacked the plate of Irish stew before her. Thomas hadn’t even said goodbye. Had he thought she was a loose woman for letting him have his way with her? Maybe he had. If he hadn’t time to come himself he could have sent a lad with a message or even a telegram. He would have done if she meant anything to him, she thought miserably. She chewed stolidly on a piece of meat, then swallowed and took a drink of water.

  ‘Lovely stew,’ she said. She could feel the lump stuck halfway down to her stomach. ‘I didn’t know Thomas was going so soon,’ she went on, unable to keep off the subject of her lover.

  ‘Oh no, he wasn’t,’ Eliza replied. ‘No, they needed him, I told you. I don’t know why. No doubt he will tell us when he writes.’ She looked keenly at Lottie’s flushed face and remembered her old fears that there might be an attachment between her son and the girl. But no, how could there be? They had been practically children the last time they spent any time together.

  ‘Thomas said he met you yesterday,’ she remarked casually.

  ‘Yes. In Wharton Park it was. I had been working all morning and I was out for some fresh air.’ Lottie bent her head and ate a forkful of carrot. That went down easier.

  Little more was said. When the meal was over Lottie helped Eliza with the dishes. Peter had to get back to the office for a meeting and Eliza was busy seeing to little Anne’s bedtime.

  ‘I must get back, I don’t want to be caught in the dark,’ said Lottie. ‘Thank you for the meal, it was grand.’

  Eliza watched her walk rapidly up the street, a small figure with her shawl over her head, for an evening breeze was blowing from the north-east. Then she went in and closed the door.

  It was just as well Thomas was working away in Newcastle, she told herself, for she was beginning to realize that Lottie did have feelings for him. It was not, she told herself, that she thought her friend was not good enough for her son. But he had his way to make in his profession, hadn’t he? Perhaps in a few years’ time when both Lottie and Thomas were established and she could say, ‘my daughter-in-law, the authoress’, or ‘my son, the barrister’. But many things could change in a year or two. He might meet someone else, for instance.

  Lottie went back to her little house, where it was not until she was safely behind the closed door that she felt able to relax. She sat down in the tiny kitchen without bothering to light the lamp, for there was a little light coming in through the window from the moon. It was cold, for the fire had died away to grey ash, but she didn’t feel it. She had shed a few tears behind her shawl on her long walk back but now she merely felt numb. After a while, she went into the front room, which she had made her bedroom, preferring to use the upstairs room as a workroom, and poured water from the jug into the basin on her washstand and splashed it on her face and arms. Then she went to bed.

  She had to forget Thomas, she told herself. What would he want with a brat from the workhouse? He would marry a posh girl from Newcastle with a family and dowry and good-looking an’ all. From now on she would throw herself into her work. Lottie expected that she would have a sleepless night, but she was worn out with the emotions of the last two days and she fell deeply asleep.

  Thomas was thinking fondly of Lottie as the night train clanked its way slowly up the line to Newcastle. It stopped at all the little stations in between and seemed to him to take an interminable time to get to the point where it crossed Stephenson’s railway bridge over the Tyne and puffed to a halt in Newcastle Central Station.

  He was fond of her, oh yes he was. But did he love her? He wasn’t sure. She was a sweet little thing and clever too, the way she had educated herself against all odds, and she had talent: hadn’t she had a book accepted for publishing? That was an achievement, was it not?

  He would write to her soon, he thought as he climbed down from the train and walked along the platform and out of the imposing stone entrance designed by John Dobson, as most of this area of Newcastle was. First, though, he had to find his lodgings, and tidy himself up ready to present himself at the chambers of Brownlow, Brownlow and Snape as soon as he could manage it.

  As it happened, Thomas was caught up in the excitement and novelty of his work in the big city. He had been a pupil in chambers in London and so was familiar with the work, but somehow everything was slightly different in this northern place. He also found himself invited to the homes of his colleagues – the elder ones that is – and to social events with the younger ones. Yet he intended to write to her, he thought one evening, as he struggled with his bow tie before the mirror in his rooms. Except that tomorrow he had been invited to the races by Robert Pyle, a pupil in chambers. So the letter would have to wait.

  Eighteen

  Lottie walked along to the pillar box at the end of her road and stood before it for a moment, looking down at the card she had written to Eliza and Peter. In it, she apologized for not going to see them for a few weeks.

  ‘I’ve been so busy,’ she had written. ‘What with my column for the Post and my novel, which I hope to have finished by November, when The Clouds Stood Still i
s published. Still, I hope to come to see you next weekend, if that is all right by you.’

  She had considered asking after Thomas but somehow couldn’t think of the right words. Anyway, Thomas would have got in touch with her if he were at all interested. That day had been a lie; he had simply wanted her. She was just another lass who had been taken down by a lad – didn’t it happen all the time? Lottie slipped the postcard into the pillar box and turned to walk home. As she walked, the tune of an old song ran through her head, over and over; she couldn’t get rid of it.

  Oh, don’t deceive me, oh, never leave me,

  How could you use a poor maiden so?

  Well, she would not go begging to Thomas, she would not indeed. Lottie lifted her head, marched up to her door and let herself in, and soon she was hard at work at her desk. She did not need a man. Hadn’t she managed without one up until now? Let ignorant people look on her as a poor spinster unable to get a man. She thought of the loathsome Alf Green, who had taken her down when she was nobbut a little lass. No one else was going to get the chance.

  As the days went by, Lottie did succeed in putting Thomas Mitchell-Howe out of her mind. She was immersed in her work. She rose early in the morning and wrote for two hours before breakfast; then, after a rushed cup of tea and a slice of toast, went on until mid-afternoon. The pile of typescript grew into a respectable heap on her desk. She tended to work straight on to the typewriter, doing only a few notes by hand first, for her training at the Durham Post had stood her in good stead.

  She was working steadily away at about ten o’clock one morning when she was interrupted by a knocking at the street door. Pausing for a moment, she cocked her head. No one knocked on her door, since she had made it plain to her neighbours that she hated to be disturbed. Lottie had started typing again before the knock was repeated. Annoyed, she made her way downstairs and unlocked the door, and there on the doorstep stood Eliza.

  ‘Good morning, Lottie,’ Eliza said pleasantly. ‘Can I come in?’

  Without waiting for a reply, she stepped over the threshold, past Lottie and directly into the kitchen-cum-living room.

  ‘Of course you can,’ murmured Lottie. She glanced out into the street before closing the door. Dolly, the old pony who pulled Eliza’s trap as she visited her patients, was chewing contentedly on the contents of a nosebag. Eliza was intending to stay a while then.

  ‘It’s nice to see you, Eliza,’ said Lottie, as she followed her friend into the kitchen. ‘I’ll put the kettle on, we’ll have a cup of tea.’

  ‘Only if you have the time,’ Eliza replied. ‘I know you must be busy. It’s such a long time since you came to see me.’

  Lottie blushed. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I know it’s true. But I have been busy.’

  ‘Too busy for your old friends, eh?’

  ‘I was planning to come this next weekend,’ Lottie murmured. She made up the fire and settled the kettle on top of it, then got out cups and saucers.

  ‘You don’t look very well, Lottie. Is something the matter?’ Eliza gazed at the younger girl. Lottie was pale, and behind her spectacles her eyes were dull and there were dark rings around them. ‘Your eyes look sore,’ she went on. ‘You must be straining them, Lottie. You should be careful. You know your eyes are weak.’

  ‘No, I’m fine, really,’ Lottie protested. ‘Maybe I’ve just sat too long at the typewriter, that’s all.’

  ‘No you’re not,’ Eliza declared. ‘Are your menses all right?’

  ‘I-I don’t know …’ Lottie faltered. She had not even thought about her monthly periods. Maybe they were late, now that she did, but she had often been irregular.

  ‘I bet you’re not eating properly,’ said Eliza. ‘Don’t be daft, Lottie, you cannot neglect yourself like this. Sit down and have your tea. I’ve brought some of my own gingerbread, that’ll do you good. You’re thin as a lathe, lass.’

  Lottie obediently drank her tea and ate a piece of Yorkshire parkin. ‘How is the family?’ she asked. ‘Peter and little Anne?’ She paused before adding, ‘Have you heard from Thomas? How is he getting on?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t hear much from him, he’s so busy, you know. Just like you, when I think of it.’ Eliza favoured Lottie with a direct stare. ‘You have to make time for your friends, Lottie. Otherwise you’ll find yourself without any.’

  Suddenly Lottie felt sick. Mumbling something, she fled out into the yard and vomited into the drain that ran down the centre. Panting, she slowly stood up straight and wiped her mouth with her handkerchief.

  ‘Now then, Lottie, howay in and sit yourself down. I think you have some explaining to do.’

  Eliza was standing in the doorway. Lottie hesitated for a moment and then walked towards her, feeling a bit dizzy.

  ‘I must have eaten something that disagreed with me,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t think so, Lottie, my girl,’ Eliza replied.

  They went into the kitchen and Lottie sank down on a chair. Her friend followed and sat down opposite her.

  ‘Who was it?’ Eliza asked. ‘By, there’s always some swine willing to take a lass down, there is an’ all.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Lottie.

  ‘Come on, you’re not the young lass brought to me by Bertha all those years ago. You know very well what I mean. How long since you had a period?’

  Lottie stared at Eliza as she realized what her friend was implying. She had been completely gormless if it was true. How long was it since her last monthly? She counted up in her head, making a mistake and starting again. Eliza watched her as the knowledge dawned on her that it was more than a month, more than two months. The remaining colour left her face.

  ‘I’m never regular,’ she faltered.

  ‘How long?’

  ‘Ten weeks, I think.’

  It had been a couple of weeks before Thomas. Thinking of it, Lottie felt a different kind of sickness. She stared at the floor, avoiding Eliza’s gaze.

  ‘Now then, Lottie, tell me who it was. He’ll have to wed you, whoever it is. Do you love him? If you do and he loves you, then you can get wed as soon as maybe. Mind, I didn’t know you were courting even, is that why you haven’t been to see us much?

  ‘We cannot get wed. I’ll bring the baby up on my own.’

  ‘On your own? Nay, pet, you cannot make a bastard of it, you cannot. It’s not the bairn’s fault. No, he’ll have to face up to it, whoever he is. You can get wed and make the best of it. Or … He’s not married already is he? Don’t say that, please!’

  Lottie shook her head. ‘He’s not married. Only he doesn’t live here any more.’

  ‘Well, we must find him. Now, do you know where he is?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Eliza was running out of patience. She rose to her feet and adjusted her nurse’s bonnet. ‘Now look here, Charlotte Lonsdale. I’m telling you now, you’ll have to find him. He’s been where he shouldn’t have been and he’ll have to pay the consequences. Is he chapel? If he is, the minister will make him do what’s right.’ She pulled on her gloves and fastened the buttons at the wrists. Eliza was angry. Angry with Lottie for getting herself into this situation and angry at her apparent stubbornness.

  ‘I have to go now, I still have half my rounds to do, but I want you to come home with me tonight while we thrash this out. It’s all right, Peter is away at a meeting, something about the National Union of Mineworkers. We’ll have the house to ourselves after little Anne is in bed. Now, be ready. I’ll be back for you about six o’clock.’

  ‘I have to work,’ said Lottie.

  ‘Be ready.’

  After Eliza had gone – sweeping out of the door, removing Dolly’s nosebag and climbing into the trap, then clicking her tongue at the Galloway and sending her trotting off along the street and all in a minute or two – Lottie sat down again, her mind in a whirl.

  ‘I am expecting a bairn,’ she said aloud but she found it hard to believe. What would she do? She panicked for
a moment but then, as her chaotic thoughts quietened, she began to make plans. She was luckier than most in that she had a profession now and it was work she could carry on with, even with a baby to look after. Surely Jeremiah wouldn’t turn her off because of her disgrace, would he? And if her books, the one going into print at this very moment and the one she was writing, made any money, she would manage a lot better than some poor lasses, turned off by their employers for their sins.

  It was all ‘ifs’, though. What if her books flopped, and Jeremiah did refuse to take any more ‘Home Notes’ from her? In some agitation, Lottie got to her feet and began tidying the place: scrubbing the kitchen table, black-leading the range and polishing the brass fender and handles of the fire irons.

  That took all of half an hour, for they had already been cleaned the day before. Changing tack, she washed and changed into her best dress and pretty jacket, which was fitted at the waist and flared out slightly over a small bustle at the back. She tidied her hair and put on a little hat with flowers on the brim and which tilted over one eye. Then she picked up her reticule, checked that she had clean handkerchiefs and her purse with enough money for a train to Newcastle, and left the house.

  ‘Lottie! How lovely to see you. What are you doing in the big city? But come in, come in do,’ said Thomas. He happened to be in the ornate entrance hall of Brownlow, Brownlow and Snape, in Potter’s Yard, a small close where most of the old houses were taken up with law firms’ chambers. He was wearing a black suit with a frock coat and a shirt with a high collar and necktie, which made him look very important and came up to the base of his ears. He was carrying a sheaf of important-looking papers under his arm. Oh yes, thought Lottie, important was the word for him, and she was intimidated slightly. Nevertheless, she walked into the hall and smiled bravely up at him.