Ragamuffin Angel

by Rita Bradshaw

  ’Course, he’d wasted nearly ten minutes at the Grand before they had told him she didn’t work there any more, but as it happened it had worked out to his advantage when he’d followed his inclination to call at the house. If he had been a couple of minutes earlier she wouldn’t have been back from her shopping and he’d have missed her. As it was he’d spotted her at the far end of the street just as he’d got to the house and had been able to nip in the doorway next door.

  Dan was humming a popular refrain from a couple of years back – ‘Alexander’s Ragtime Band’ – as he entered the premises of Ferry and Foster’s, and he was still humming when he left some two or three minutes later, but within a second the humming was cut off as he came face to face with John on the pavement outside.

  ‘Hallo, little brother.’ It was a term John had taken to using since the family altercation on Christmas Day and was always spoken with a covert sneer. ‘Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed the day, aren’t we? Lost sixpence and found a shilling?’

  Dan looked straight at him but he didn’t answer. He had no intention of telling John his business and they both knew it.

  ‘You on your way back?’

  Dan nodded but he still didn’t speak. John, of all people! He had wanted to hold on to the magic a few moments longer before he stepped into the office and lost the glow. There were a hundred and one ways to make life unpleasant at work, and since Christmas Day, and even more so since New Year’s Eve, John had used them all. If it wasn’t for Art he’d have thrown in the towel days ago. He had always been sensitive to atmosphere, and with John and the twins on one side and Art and himself on the other, each day had taken on the quality of walking blindfolded through a minefield.

  They had turned into High Street West and had just passed Lambton Street before John spoke again, and then his words were spoken in such a casual, almost pleasant tone, that the full import didn’t register with Dan for a moment or two. ‘Has she got a whoremaster or does she please herself who she opens her legs for?’

  ‘What? What did you say?’ Dan’s voice seemed to be torn from his throat and his big fist came round like a shot, stopping just an inch or so from John’s face. And then his fingers opened and he grasped the collar of John’s overcoat, hauling his brother on to his toes as John endeavoured to prevent himself being strangled.

  ‘Let up, let up, man.’

  ‘Let up?’ It was a slow growl and now Dan, careless of the horrified glances of the lunchtime shoppers, shook John like a rat, his eyes narrowed and emitting a black light as he said, ‘You ever, you ever talk about her again like that and I’ll kill you, I swear it. Do you hear me, John? I’ll kill you.’

  ‘All – All right. . . Man, you – you’re strangling me – Give over, man.’

  ‘I’ll kill you, John, and take whatever comes.’

  ‘All – right.’

  John was turkey red now and choking, and after one final shake Dan let his brother drop back down on to his feet while still keeping his hand on his collar as he said, his face thrust close, ‘You’re a dirty-minded little runt, you always have been. You come within six feet of her and I’ll do for you.’

  Any reference to John’s lack of inches normally brought his hackles up and had him as aggressive as a fighting cock, but there was something in Dan’s face today that tempered John’s reply, although his teeth were clenched and his eyes slits as he bit out, ‘Don’t be daft, man, I don’t want her. More trouble than they’re worth, the lot of them.’

  He wanted her all right. The knowledge was a burning coal in the pit of Dan’s stomach. And Connie had been right on New Year’s Eve – John had wanted her mother too. He had seen the truth of it register in his face when Connie had spoken. ‘You stay away from her, John.’

  ‘I told you –’

  ‘Aye, you told me.’ And now there was no vestige of the easy-going brother or long-suffering son in Dan’s countenance as he ground out, with quiet certainty, ‘I’ll make you wish you’d never been born, so think on, John. Think on.’

  They stared at each other for a moment more, their mutual hate a live thing, and then Dan turned, walking swiftly round the corner into William Street and leaving John where he was, his body pressed up against a shop wall and his eyes as cold and hard as black marble.

  Part Four

  1914

  Love And War

  Chapter Eighteen

  The first eight weeks of the New Year were trying and troublesome ones for England. The grim prospect of war enveloping Europe was looming larger, Ulster was teetering on the brink of its own civil war, militant suffragettes burned down two Scottish mansions and a parish church as the women’s campaign to be heard grew more aggressive, and strikes were sparking all over the country.

  It was a time of unrest, uncertainty and dissatisfaction, and over it all were brooding the darkening storm clouds of ‘the war to end wars’. But for Connie and Dan, caught up in the wonder of their burgeoning love, it was a season of ecstasy and weightlessness.

  That first evening at the King’s Theatre, when they had laughed and talked and Dan had dared to draw her arm through his – ostensibly because of the difficult progress along the pavements coated in ice and snow – on the short walk home from Crowtree Road to Walworth Way, had been but the first of many such outings together. January and February had seen them visiting the antiquities gallery and art gallery in the museum just off Borough Road; wandering among the tropical plants and cages of foreign birds in the Winter Garden at the rear of the museum; enjoying more excursions to the King’s Theatre, along with the Palace and the Empire, and the Villiers Electric Theatre – Sunderland’s first purpose-built cinema.

  Connie felt as though she had known Dan always, that there had never been a time when he hadn’t filled her thoughts and her vision with breathless excitement, and yet. . . She was frightened too. Frightened that the bubble would burst, that the dire warnings of Mary – frequently expressed – might just come true.

  But when she was with him, his hand clasping hers, oftentimes her arm entwined through his when they were walking and his body so close she could feel his hip moving against her, on those occasions she felt nothing could ever separate them.

  He hadn’t kissed her for weeks – five whole weeks – and although she knew that that was how gentlemen behaved when they respected the lass, she had begun to think he perhaps didn’t care for her the way she did him, in spite of all his attentions which seemed to indicate otherwise.

  And then, one Saturday evening in early February, when they were strolling home in the bitterly cold frosty air after an afternoon of fun and laughter spent skating on the frozen lake in Mowbray Park and eating roast potatoes and hot chestnuts purchased from the brazier man, Connie had almost fallen headlong on the icy pavement. She had slipped several times during the afternoon too, but then they had been surrounded by myriad whirling figures and noisy bairns skimming over the frozen lake, and it had been different. Now there was just the two of them in the glittering darkness that turned even Union Street into something magical, and as his arms went round her he pulled her into him, crushing her against him until she could feel his pounding heart as though it were her own.

  She had dreamt of this moment for weeks, lived it, tasted it, but the reality – as his lips took hers in a kiss that was fire and passion – was a million times better.

  How long they stood there, her head flung back against his arm and their mouths straining for deeper intimacy, Connie did not know. All she knew was that when eventually they drew apart something had been said that could never have been voiced by mere words. He had touched each contour of her face, his fingers gentle as he had said, ‘Oh, my love, my love. Do you care for me even a quarter as much as I love you? Do you know what these last weeks have meant to me? Do you? They have been beyond my wildest dreams,’ and then they had kissed again, tenderly this time, and he had held her as though she was precious and priceless.

  Yes, he had said all that, Connie told
herself on the first Monday in March when she awoke in the early hours and lay snuggled beneath the bed covers with just Mary’s snores disturbing the silence, and she believed he had meant it – she did. So why, why, hadn’t she been able to bring herself to tell him about the second most important thing in her life after him – her fledgling business? She had wanted to. A hundred times it had been on the tip of her tongue to tell him about the property in Holmeside which, on Mr Watson’s advice and with the bank’s substantial backing, was now hers. But if she had there would, of necessity, have been further explanations. Explanations that would have had to encompass the letter, Colonel Fairley’s degrading treatment of her, everything. And she didn’t want to talk about such ugliness.

  She had discussed the matter once or twice with Lucy. during their Tuesday afternoon teas which had now become a regular occurrence, but her friend had been careful to venture no opinion as to whether she should inform Dan of the full facts relating to her decision to leave the Grand. Dan had accepted her account that she wanted a change and was looking for something new, and, in the meantime, helping out a friend of a friend who had required the services of a temporary housekeeper. She had told him this in the first week of their acquaintance and the subject hadn’t risen again except for the odd casual remark easily deflected.

  She hadn’t felt so bad about it all when Mr Watson had still been negotiating on her behalf, but since the matter had been signed and sealed some five weeks before she had become increasingly disturbed. She should have told him then, the very day she had become the mistress of the rundown three-storey property which had been operating as a somewhat seedy café for years. Connie twisted under the covers and drew in her breath on a long hard sigh.

  And she couldn’t pretend to herself any longer that her reason for not doing so was purely because of the repugnance she felt at mentioning the circumstances of her departure from the hotel. It was more than that. Oh, Dan . . . His name was laden with self-recrimination. How could you love someone and yet not trust them? She was horrible, she was. She should trust him; he was fine and upright and honourable, and yet. . . She didn’t, not wholly. He was a Stewart, wasn’t he. The Stewarts had hated her mother, the name Bell had been like a profanity to them, and if she told him about the letter and what the Colonel had tried to do he might just believe she was. . . loose. Immoral. Following in her mother’s footsteps. Even that she had encouraged the Colonel to behave as he did. And she wouldn’t be able to bear it, she wouldn’t, if the look on his face changed and the light in his eyes died.

  But she was going to have to tell him her true position soon, once the baker’s shop and tea-rooms opened. Mary had left the Grand on the day Connie had signed the contract, and since then both girls – along with Mary’s two oldest brothers who had been laid off from the pit since Christmas and were desperately glad of the existence wage Connie paid them each week – had been hard at work renovating the dilapidated interior of the premises. Mary’s brothers had been invaluable in ripping out all the old furnishings and taking up the rotten wooden boards on the ground floor, whilst Connie and Mary had cleared the basement and painted the walls and ceiling before scrubbing the dirt and filth of years from the huge flagstones that made up the floor.

  The two upper floors had been filthy but empty, having been used as living accommodation by the former owners, and beyond stripping the walls of layers of faded wallpaper and then scrubbing them – along with the grimy floorboards – they had left them alone. It was imperative to get the basement – wherein the proposed bakery would be housed – and the ground floor – which would consist of the shop and tea-rooms – ready first. She was having nightmares about the expenditure to date and they needed to start making money.

  Once cleared, they had found the basement and ground floor quite spacious, being some 65 feet in depth and 25 feet wide, and once the plumber had made a hole in the existing lead pipe and wiped the new joint into place with his moleskin, fixing a brass tap on the other end of the new pipe in the basement, the supplementary water supply was established. Similarly, the gas man extended the gas pipe from the small kitchen to the rear of the ground floor down into the basement, and once everything was established Mary’s brothers built several provers – cupboards with a little gas jet at the bottom – out of wood for the bread and tea-cake dough, and the big ovens were brought in along with the other equipment.

  The ground floor, Connie had decided, would be arranged and furnished in recherche style, the well-stocked shop at the front leading to a pretty tea-room, very tastefully fitted, and beyond that the kitchen. The scheme of decoration in each portion was artistic and harmonious, the counters being fitted with white marble slabs and the walls panelled with the same material to a certain height, whilst the floors throughout were laid with an effective design in red mosaic tiles. It was clean and bright and modem, Connie thought now as she saw it all in her mind’s eye, and with the tables and chairs for the tea-room being delivered in two days’ time everything was nearly ready.

  She was slightly apprehensive regarding the wisdom of asking Mary’s mother, Ellen, a thin, shrivelled-up little mouse of a woman whose numerous pregnancies seemed to have sucked her inwards, to stand in as temporary cook. However, she couldn’t afford the wages an experienced cook was asking, and as Mary insisted her mother’s cooking was second to none, she had capitulated to her friend’s request that her mother be given a chance to prove herself. Ellen had agreed to start work each morning at 4.30 a.m., Connie and Mary joining her at 6.30 a.m. when they would all work in the bakery until the shop opened at eight. At that time Connie would retire upstairs to the shop with Mary helping both her mother and Connie as circumstances dictated. The tea-rooms would open at ten o’clock and at that point Mary would remain upstairs. By the time Ellen left at mid-day she would have baked enough produce to keep the tea-rooms and the shop supplied until they closed at 6.30 in the evening. At least that was the plan. Connie wriggled under the covers again. How it would all work out was another matter. In the meantime the two brothers would repoint and whitewash the outside privy and washhouse in the large backyard, repave the yard which was a sea of mud and broken paving stones, before turning their attention to decorating and making good what was to be Connie and Mary’s living quarters on the two top floors. But at least the roof was sound. Connie allowed herself a wry smile. Mr Watson had been most emphatic about that.

  And then the smile faded as thoughts of Dan invaded again. She would tell him tomorrow evening when he called to escort her to Art and Gladys’s for tea. It was the first time she had accepted an invitation to return to his brother’s house – although they had asked her twice before – since the disastrous episode on New Year’s Eve, but she was suddenly quite sure she couldn’t go unless she had told Dan everything. She gnawed at her lower lip and squeezed her eyes tightly shut. Tomorrow night would have to be the night. And he would understand, Dan would understand. He loved her, didn’t he?

  Dan’s love was about to be put to the test.

  ‘Read that.’ Edith Stewart thrust the sheet of paper at Dan with some force, her small body rigid. ‘And before you ask it has all been verified.’

  ‘By him?’ Dan’s voice was scathing as he jerked his head towards John.

  ‘No, not by him. By an independent personage,’ Edith snapped tightly.

  ‘An independent personage? What does that mean?’ And then, as his mother continued to gaze at him with unfaltering black eyes, ‘I don’t believe it, you’ve had her investigated haven’t you! You’ve actually dared to authorise some dirty little gossipmonger to make up stories about her.’

  ‘Mr Simmons is not a gossipmonger; he is a reputable and experienced private detective with an excellent reputation,’ Edith said icily, ‘and you ought to be thanking me for preventing you from making what would be the biggest mistake of your life. The chit has hoodwinked you, Dan, and if you weren’t so infatuated you would see it yourself.’

  ‘I’m warning you,
Mam.’

  They were all standing in Art’s parlour – Dan, Art, Gladys, Edith and John. Over the last eight weeks Edith had demanded Dan’s presence at the house in Ryhope Road at regular intervals and he had refused just as regularly, maintaining that if she wanted to see him she could come to him. And now she had done just that. But she was far from defeated, and John was positively cock-a-hoop. As soon as Dan had set eyes on his brother’s exultant face he had known it didn’t bode well.

  ‘You’re a fool.’ The cutting tone in John’s voice didn’t mask his jubilation. ‘She’s taken you for a monkey and you’re too proud to admit it, that’s it at bottom, but you won’t be able to do anything else when you read that.’

  ‘Get out.’

  The darkness in Dan’s face caused John to take a step backwards, but it was Edith’s indignant voice as she said, ‘Get out? By, it’s come to this, has it? You’re telling your own brother to get out because of that trollop’s bastard?’ that checked Dan’s advance on his brother and brought him swinging round to face his mother, and now, as Edith watched the blood flow into her youngest born’s face, she knew immediately that she had gone too far.

  Dan’s eyes were unblinking as he thrust his face down towards his mother’s and his words were forced out through his clenched teeth as he said, ‘All my life I’ve held my hand with you because you are my mother and as such deserving of respect. I watched you make Da’s life a misery from when I was old enough to take note of what went on in the house, and you’ve ruined the twins’ lives, and his’ – here he pointed to John without taking his eyes off his mother – ‘and Art only escaped because he had the guts to stand up to you. You’re a tyrant, you always have been. An egotistical tyrant, but you aren’t ruining my life like you’ve tried to do to all the others.’