by June Francis
Kitty felt better now she was going and said cheerfully, ‘Thanks for your help. I’ll see you out.’
They walked to the front door and Rita paused in the hotel doorway and gazed out at the rain. ‘I hope this isn’t set for the summer.’
‘Me too. But I should think the weather’s more important to you in the seaside trade.’
‘You’re right there.’ Rita held out a hand. ‘It’s been nice meeting you, Mrs Mcleod.’
‘And you too. Goodbye, and thanks again.’
Kitty watched until the other woman had walked halfway down the Mount before turning and going inside. She found John in Reception. ‘You’re going to think me quite mad,’ she blurted out, ‘but that woman – I thought she was Celia for a minute.’
‘You’re going crazy, woman! She doesn’t look a bit like Celia.’
‘I know,’ said Kitty ruefully. ‘And her name isn’t Celia, but she had the same colour eyes as Katie and there was something about her …’ She paused before adding, ‘She works in a hotel in Southport and used to live near Scottie Road.’
‘Who works in a hotel in Southport and lived near Scottie Road?’ asked a cheerful young voice.
Kitty jumped out of her skin and turned to look at Katie. ‘Where’ve you been?’ she said in a vexed voice. ‘I could have cooked dinner the time you’ve been.’
‘Exaggeration,’ said Katie, her hands full of bags. ‘I’ve been for my birthday presents and to see the Queen Mother.’
‘So have Eileen and I!’ Kitty’s flaxen brows furrowed. ‘Why didn’t you wait? You could have been a help to me. Eileen had a fit.’ She stared at Katie and was happy with what she saw. Her cheeks were flushed a becoming rose colour and her eyes sparkled with health. She hadn’t done a bad job of bringing her up.
‘Poor Eileen,’ said Katie. ‘That explains a lot. Does it mean she’s not quite there?’
‘I don’t know!’ replied Kitty with a sudden anxious quiver to her voice. ‘I know next to nothing about epilepsy. Now go into the kitchen and peel the potatoes.’
‘OK.’ Katie gave her a thoughtful look and did as she was told.
Kitty turned to John who said, ‘Stop worrying. That woman wasn’t Celia. Why call herself by a different name if she was?’
‘She said she’d lost her memory.’
‘Then what are you worrying about? She’s probably forgotten all about Katie in that case!’
‘Can a mother forget her own daughter?’ There was anguish in Kitty’s voice.
John pulled her into his arms and rubbed his chin against her hair. ‘You should have told her the truth years ago, Kit.’
‘It’s too late now,’ she said in a dull voice.
He was silent and she lifted her head and looked at him. ‘How’s Eileen?’
‘OK, I think. Like you, I know very little about epilepsy.’
‘I could kill Annie for not telling me what to expect there,’ muttered Kitty. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘About what exactly?’ John’s tone was cautious.
‘At the moment – Eileen. If she has a fit in front of the guests, she’ll frighten them. I’m going to have to keep her in the background and see what Annie has to say when I write to her. And what if she knows about Celia and blurts it out?’
‘Poor kid.’
‘That’s what she said, that Miss Turner!’
‘Forget her,’ said John firmly, his arm slipping from her shoulders as the door opened and a man with a suitcase entered. John switched on his smile. ‘Good afternoon. May I help you?’
Still upset, Kitty left him and went in search of Eileen but her mind was still on the mystery of Miss Turner who so strongly reminded her of Celia.
‘You’re looking down in the dumps, Ma,’ said Mick, taking his dinner out of the oven and sitting down at the table later that day.
‘I’m perfectly all right,’ said Kitty, wondering how she could begin to tell him the truth about Katie. But she couldn’t, so instead told him about Eileen.
The kitchen door opened and an angry-faced Ben stood there. ‘Sarah’s outside. She told me to tell Mick she’s bloody waiting for him! What have you to say for yourself, brother?’
Mick’s expression was inscrutable as he hit a bottle of H.P. sauce with the heel of one hand. ‘I haven’t made any arrangements. Ask her what she wants.’
‘I did, and all she said was she wants you!’ He dropped his rucksack on the floor by the door with a heavy thud. ‘Hadn’t you better go and speak to her?’ he snarled.
Mick placed the bottle on the table and licked sauce from one thumb. ‘Go and ask her again what she wants.’
‘Will I hell! I’m not your lackey.’ Ben slumped on to a chair and took out a packet of cigarettes. ‘I’m bloody fed up.’
‘You can put them away and have your dinner and stop swearing,’ murmured Kitty. Picking up Mick’s plate, she addressed him. ‘And you can go outside and speak to that young madam. I don’t know what the pair of you are playing at.’
‘I’m not playing at anything,’ said her eldest son, and blew her a kiss as he left the room.
Kitty put one plate in the oven and took out another to place in front of Ben. ‘You tuck into that and forget women,’ she said emphatically. ‘Not everyone’s meant to get married.’
He stared at her from tragic eyes and could only toy with his food. His heart ached with love but he was also seized by a sense of outrage. How could his brother do this to him? How could Sarah? He wished he could do something to make her sit up and see that he was worth ten of Mick. His brother would never be faithful. He’d had loads of women whilst Ben had been true blue to Sarah even after she had married.
‘You’re not eating,’ said his mother.
He pushed the plate away. ‘I’m not hungry.’
‘“Faint heart never won fair lady”,’ she said roughly. ‘Forget what I said before and think of how you can get her back.’
‘I’m trying,’ he said grimly.
Kitty sat down opposite him and filled two cups from the teapot. ‘Eat up, son,’ she said in a coaxing voice, ‘and I’ll tell you something that’ll make you laugh. I had a visitor today and almost convinced myself she was Celia.’
He dropped his fork. ‘You’re joking! I mean – what d’you mean, you think she was Celia? She either was or wasn’t.’
Kitty rested her chin in her hands. ‘John thinks I’m neurotic,’ she said dolefully.
‘You probably are,’ said Ben, taking up his fork and picking at his food. ‘You always have been where Katie’s concerned. You should have told her years ago who she is.’
‘Don’t say that!’ protested his mother, through gritted teeth. ‘It’s what John says and it doesn’t help at all.’
‘OK,’ he murmured. ‘This Celia?’
‘She called herself Miss Turner. Rita Turner. And works in a hotel in Southport. I never thought to ask the name of it.’
Ben forced himself to concentrate on what his mother was saying. ‘You should tell our Mick.’
‘I can’t! I don’t feel up to explaining the whys and the wherefores, why I did what I did and why I’ve never told him.’
‘There’s always been the chance it would come out.’
‘So why didn’t you tell him?’ parried Kitty.
Ben shrugged. ‘It wasn’t my secret, and it was what you wanted.’
‘And you know why!’ She leaned closer towards him. ‘There’s still a stigma to illegitimacy. I don’t want her being ashamed of who she was and I still think I was right to do what I did. She’s turned out well, hasn’t she?’
‘Yes, but …’ Ben hesitated. ‘If you’d told Mick, he might have gone looking for Celia, they could have got married and then Katie would have been legal.’
‘It’s too late to think like that,’ said Kitty crossly.
Ben did not think so. If Mick and Celia got together again it would leave the way clear for him and Sarah. What a thought! Suddenly he found his appetit
e and the discontented droop to his mouth lifted. ‘What if you’re right, though, Ma? And this Miss—’
‘Turner.’
‘– Miss Turner is Celia? What if she comes back?’
‘Don’t even think it!’ There was utter dismay in Kitty’s eyes.
Ben was about to say sorry when the door opened and Mick entered. ‘I told her to come back later,’ he said.
Immediately Ben forgot about Miss Turner. ‘I hope you’re not playing Sarah along?’ he snapped.
‘Why should you care?’ Mick’s eyes fixed on his brother’s face and his gaze was intent. ‘She hasn’t exactly treated you like the bee’s knees.’
Ben’s hands curled into fists and he leant across the table, growling, ‘Has she said anything to you about me?’
Mick said mildly, ‘Keep your hair on. Do you think I’d be spending my time with a woman listening to her talk about you? Grow up! Where’s my dinner, Ma? I’m starving.’
Ben wanted to punch him in the face but knew that wouldn’t do. They weren’t kids any more. Then he thought of Miss Turner and whether she and Celia were one and the same and had a brainwave. He was going to search for the mysterious Miss Turner, and when he found her and proved her to be Celia, he would bring her back here.
The difficulty was he did not know the name of the hotel where she worked, but that shouldn’t prove impossible to find if he used his nous. For a moment he considered the upset it would cause and almost changed his mind, but then he thought about Sarah and the constant heartache he lived with and of the fury he felt towards his brother. It would be one in the eye for Mick! As for his mother, she had lied from the best of motives and surely Katie would realise that? And if it proved to be that Miss Turner was not Celia, then no harm was done and Ben would have lost nothing by searching for her but his time.
Chapter Three
Celia Mcdonald hurried in the direction of the level crossing which divided the working-class Upper Aughton Road, where she lived, from the more affluent Lower Aughton Road. The barriers were down and she waited patiently for the Southport-Liverpool train to pass, watching as it rattled over the crossing in the direction of Birkdale Station. In her mind’s eye she imagined it passing the golf course and sandhills towards Ainsdale, Formby, Crosby and Waterloo. She visualised passengers alighting at Litherland and Seaforth, and remembered the overhead railway, or Dockers’ Umbrella as Liverpudlians had nicknamed it. She pictured the line of docks as the train approached the city, the tobacco warehouse and Bibby’s factory, and could almost smell the oily odour of seeds and nuts being crushed as well as the hops and yeast from the breweries. She could imagine the Wirral coastline on the other side of the water and the ferries which crossed the Mersey. She thought of liners, tugs, dredgers, and the oil tankers going to Eastham. It was in Eastham Woods that she had walked hand in hand with Mick when they were little more than children. Today was their daughter’s seventeenth birthday.
She gazed unseeingly at the barrier, her throat aching with unshed tears, remembering that day in Cheshire when they had made love in a field. She had believed he felt the same as she did but the next morning he had gone and there had been no note, nothing. She had been deeply hurt and had almost hated him then.
When she’d realised a baby was coming, she had been devastated. She had considered getting rid of the child but had heard such horror stories about backstreet abortionists that she had chickened out and told herself that at least she had her mother’s wedding ring to wear, and lodgings in a house not far from the docks, and a job making armaments. She felt lonely, but then the baby quickened inside her and suddenly it was company for her. Somehow, she told herself, she would cope. Perhaps she would have, too, if the Luftwaffe hadn’t started dropping bombs on Liverpool and she had not met Ben, who had been just a youth then.
She had wanted to die when he had told her about Mick being reported missing presumed dead. Being angry and let down by him was one thing; his being killed was a different one altogether. Too easily she could imagine a ship ablaze and men screaming; hear the sucking sound of the sea as the vessel plunged beneath the waves, taking him with it. She did not know how she could bear that knowledge alone. In fact she hadn’t because a raid had started and Ben had insisted on her fleeing to the sanctuary of the Arcadia’s cellar with him. It was there she had given birth to Katherine a short while later, but the strain of the months before and the week-long bombardment, as well as the birth, had taken their toll. How much so she did not realise until later.
The barrier lifted and Celia walked across the railway line and on up Lower Aughton Street. It was seven-thirty in the morning and she had to be at the Seaview Hotel by eight o’clock. Her mind, though, was still in the past. She had never told the Mcleods that Mick was the baby’s father. She could not remember why now. Perhaps it was because it was all too upsetting to talk about, and perhaps because deep inside her she believed Mick’s mother knew already.
It had been obvious to Celia from the moment Katherine was born that Kitty Mcleod had taken her to her heart. Celia had been glad about that because her own nerves were in no fit state to cope with a baby, nor did she want to stay at the Arcadia being constantly reminded of Mick. His mother had always wanted a daughter so Celia decided to leave Katherine with her until she could sort herself out.
She had left without saying goodbye in case they tried to stop her going. She had planned on joining the WRNS, not wanting to go back into armaments but to get completely away from Liverpool. She had intended writing to Mrs Mcleod when she was settled but instead had collapsed in the street and been taken to hospital. Nervous exhaustion, the doctor had said, and within a fortnight they had moved her out of the city to a nursing home in Southport where it had taken a while for her fully to recover. When at last she managed to return to the Arcadia it was deserted and its windows boarded up. A neighbour told her the Mcleods had gone to live in Scotland.
Celia had pulled herself together and returned to Southport where she had a friend whom she had met in the hospital. Rita had got herself a job working for the government, issuing ration books, and suggested Celia did the same. Gradually they had both grown stronger and after the war the pair of them sought employment in the hotel business. Rita had risen higher but Celia hadn’t the confidence to be the one giving orders. She only wished she had because money was something she would have liked more of, dreaming of the day she might go in search of her daughter.
What did Katherine look like? Did she take after Mick or herself? What had his mother told her about Celia? These were questions she had asked herself over and over again, and each time she came up with the same answers and did not like any of them.
A breeze blew a strand of hair into her mouth as she passed the Ribble bus station and was removed with fingers which still shook nervously when life got too much for her. She had never been able to harden herself against setbacks, heartache and pain, and so had kept herself to herself. After one bad experience she never risked getting involved with a man again. She guessed Rita was a bit that way too, although she had never said it was a man who had caused her to remain in her spinster state. Celia and Rita were not as close as they had been once but remained friendly.
She turned into the road where the Seaview Hotel was situated and hurried up a path flanked with laurel and holly bushes to a large redbrick Victorian building with revolving doors and a recently built sun lounge. She found Rita, now assistant manageress, in Reception.
‘Morning, Cessy,’ she said with a smile. ‘What have you done to the weather?’
‘Same as usual,’ said Celia. ‘Forgot to pray about it. Do you think it’s going to be one of those summers?’
‘Who knows!’ Rita handed her the pass keys to the bedrooms. ‘I got soaked the other day in Liverpool. By the way, I’ve something to tell you when you’ve finished.’
‘Something nice?’
‘Interesting. But I’ll tell you later. Old Henny’s on the warpath this morning. Must have
lost at bridge last night.’ She turned as a woman came downstairs.
Celia hurried away to hang up her coat and found the other cleaner by the broom cupboard. They exchanged hellos but Celia did not waste time listening to her stories about her husband and children that morning but started work. Later in the day she would go to the cafe off Lord Street where she helped in the kitchen around lunchtime. Sometimes, if the Seaview got really busy, she returned later in the day and helped out, peeling vegetables and washing dishes. She even waited at table sometimes, anything to make a bit of extra money, because she had a secret vice.
Celia daydreamed as she made beds and dusted, imagining what she would do if she won the football pools. First she would tell Mrs Henshall what she could do with her job, and secondly she would go in search of Katherine and tell her she never meant to desert her. Her daughter would believe her and Mrs Mcleod would be pleased to see her. She would be welcomed into the bosom of the family and they would all live happily ever after. Then every Saturday she and Katherine would have a good old root around the clothes shops and deck themselves out in the best Paris fashions, and they would certainly go on a cruise – if she could win on the pools.
If Celia won lots and lots of money she would buy her own little bed and breakfast place. It was a dream she and Rita had shared in their early days in Southport. Maybe she might even meet a man and get married. Someone like Mr Pritchard who came to stay at the Seaview with his sister towards the end of summer when the Southport Show was in full swing. He was tall and well-built with a ramrod-straight back from having been a professional soldier. He had served in India in the days of Gandhi and loved to talk about it. She imagined taking tea with him in one of the posher hotels in Southport and dancing to the music of Victor Sylvester at the Floral Hall. Then he would see her home and kiss her. He had a moustache so it might tickle. Celia smiled to herself and hummed as she hoovered.
She finished her stint, returned dusters, polish, vacuum cleaner, dry mop and dustpan to their cupboard, and went in search of Rita. As she handed back the pass keys, she asked, ‘Well, what is it you were going to tell me?’
