Clara had seemed disturbed by the mention of Patsy’s year of birth. Was that significant?
And if she was indeed her mother, why had Clara abandoned her as a child? Why had she walked away? Had she been married to this Rolf Matthews and reverted to her Christian name, or should Patsy assume that they’d never married and she herself was in fact illegitimate?
Yet much as she longed to know the answer to these questions, Patsy felt her mouth go bone dry, her tongue stick to the roof of it and her heart quicken it’s beat as it always did when faced with the reality of her quest.
She was ashamed to admit, even to herself, that she was afraid. Why was that?
Was it because she didn’t know if she could ever forgive Clara for the callous act of abandoning her? What kind of mother would do such a thing? Or because the course of her entire life might be decided in the next few moments, and Patsy didn’t even know if she was ready to cope with that? She couldn’t find the words to describe the turmoil she felt inside. Far easier to brazen things out and pretend it didn’t matter. Oh, but she would like to know, and to understand.
‘Did you ever marry or have a child?’ The words came out in a rush, of their own volition, and Patsy counted the beats of her heart as she waited for the answer.
Clara was gazing right through her, as if she were seeing something else, someone else entirely. Patsy felt a chill between her shoulder blades. What would she say? What was she about to learn?
But all she did was give a small, tired smile. ‘Marriage wasn’t exactly my thing,’ was her enigmatic reply, which wasn’t an answer at all.
More firmly, Clara continued, ‘But we were talking about you, Patsy. I really do want to know more about you so that I can understand you better. Where were you born? Do you recall anything of your early life, dear, before you were taken in by your foster parents?’
Patsy bit back her disappointment, could think of nothing more to say as this was a question she couldn’t answer, even if she wanted to, because she really had no idea. Had she been born in Southport, or somewhere else entirely? And even if she and the Higginson sisters did come from the same place, what did that prove? Nothing. Not for certain. Nevertheless, Patsy made an instinctive decision not to mention her own tenuous connection with the town, not at this juncture. Not until she was certain she could cope with all that might follow such a revelation.
‘I must have been born somewhere, I suppose,’ she said, attempting to appear unconcerned, and managing only to sound flippant.
‘Don’t you know?’
‘I’d need to check my birth certificate.’
‘Ah, and you don’t have one,’ Clara accurately guessed. ‘That’s the war for you. Papers going missing all over the place. Is that what happened?’
‘I wouldn’t know, would I, being too young at the time?’ A sharp retort accompanied by a sidelong glance of pure insolence. Patsy was rapidly backing off from the whole idea of taking this interrogation any further. She’d got absolutely nowhere, only useless stuff about Paris, and was no nearer to knowing whether Clara was ever married.
Clara was frowning. ‘You should pursue it, though. There must surely be a record somewhere, in a church register perhaps. I could find an address for you to write to, if you like? Or have you done that already? What about your parents, or rather your foster parents? Have they tried?’
There was a painful silence as Patsy desperately sought escape. She wouldn’t mind having such an address, being able to check official records, but surely had that been possible the Bowmans would have done it already and packed her back off to wherever it was she came from.
She closed the drawers on the fruits, flowers and bows, snap, snap, snap. ‘Why don’t I rewind those reels of ribbons you’ve used? They’re in a proper tangle now.’
‘I suppose they are.’ Clara looked down at them bemused, knowing when she was beaten. The girl had clammed up tight, as always. ‘And I shall put on the kettle and make us a nice cup of tea.’
As Patsy listened to Clara humming softly to herself while she rattled tea cups and brought out the tin of biscuits, she decided that patience was not really her forte, being more the impulsive, jump in with both feet kind of person herself. But, oddly echoing Annie’s thoughts, she recognised that she was going to have to acquire some. She really didn’t feel ready to confront Clara with what she suspected, to lay bare her hopes and dreams and risk seeing them demolished by the wrong answer to her probing questions. Not quite yet.
The trouble was that Patsy had discovered she really quite liked living here on Champion Street. She was growing used to market life and the people involved in its day to day running, for all she was careful to keep herself at a safe distance from them all. She really had no wish to leave, and she would certainly have to do so, if she asked that all important question and received a negative response.
One morning while Patsy was listening to At the Hop by Danny and the Juniors on Hall’s Music stall, the door of the booth opened and Fran Poulson slipped in beside her. ‘What are you listening to? Oh, that one. Quite jolly. Nice beat. I’ve asked Alec to put Great Balls of Fire on for us, bit more snaz to Jerry Lee Lewis, don’t you think?’
Patsy was startled by the older girls sudden appearance but secretly pleased by it all the same. She said, ‘I like Little Richard too. Bit of a wild card though.’
Fran grinned. ‘Like us, eh? That’s what I am, a wild child. You too, in a different way. Oh, listen, I just love the way he says Great Balls of Fire with that little hiccup in his voice.’
They listened to a couple more songs then the door of the booth opened again. This time Alec’s head appeared, a wry grin on his face. ‘I hope you’re behaving yourself today, Patsy. No more broken records?’
She felt warm colour suffuse her cheeks. ‘I’m short of an arrogant head to break them on.’
Alec chuckled. ‘Anything else I can get you two girls?’
Fran said, ‘I’ll take the Jerry Lee Lewis, what about you Patsy?’
‘Sure, I’ll have one too.’ Not wishing to feel left out.
As Alec slipped the 78 into a bag and passed it over, he said in a friendly fashion, ‘Got yourself fixed up with a record player then, Patsy?’
‘Yeah, sure,’ she lied, wanting the ground to open in case Fran started asking awkward questions. But she should have known better. Fran wasn’t interested in her. Her attention seemed to be entirely elsewhere.
‘Spit it out,’ Patsy said, as they strolled out of the shop back into the side aisle of the market hall. ‘I can see you’ve got a problem. I’m an expert, I can recognise the signs.’
Fran considered. ‘Let’s have a coffee.’
The two girls went to Belle's café and had a large Nescafe each with half an inch of froth on top. They chatted easily enough, mainly about music and clothes. Patsy admired Fran’s nails, saying she wished hers could grow as long, ‘Not that Annie approves of nail varnish,’ she laughed.
‘Take no notice. Do as you please, I always do.’ Fran looked at her more closely for a second. ‘You could be quite pretty, if you tried.’
‘Do you really think so?’
‘I like the ponytail. But don’t ditch the Alice band completely, it’s kinda cute and boys love that. You’re lucky to be a natural blonde. I have to give my hair a bit of help. You should wash it every day in a lemon shampoo then it’d stay that way.’
Patsy purred to herself, feeling older and more sophisticated for being engaged in girl talk with sexy Fran Poulson.
No mention was made of any problem, and Patsy didn’t like to ask again. Something was definitely eating Fran, though. Despite the chat, she seemed vague and distracted. Maybe something to do with that married chap rumour had it she was running around with.
After about half an hour, Fran looked at her watch and stood up. ‘I’d best get back to the stall or Mam’ll kill me. Nice talking to you, Patsy. See you around.’
‘Yeah, right.’ Feeling a warmth inside, P
atsy watched her go. She felt cheered by the encounter, as if she’d taken the first steps in a new friendship. But then she remembered she wasn’t supposed to be making friends, since Annie might be about to ask her to leave.
Which brought her right back to her own problem.
What had she learned so far? That Clara had never married, but had neatly avoided the question about a child which Patsy saw as significant. She drew in a deep breath, knowing that she needed to think it all through very carefully before taking her quest any further.
Instinctively, Patsy felt the need to discover more evidence, perhaps from the elusive housekeeper, if she could be found. Or from her grandmother’s private papers. It might help give her courage to ask that ultimate question, if she was more sure of her facts.
The helpful Shirley had offered to investigate the matter through Mrs Matthews’s solicitors. They’d agreed that Patsy would send her a forwarding address, once she was settled, which she’d done quite early on. She’d written twice more during the last few weeks. Patsy had hoped to hear something by this time but all she’d received from the neighbour so far was a short note bearing a few cautious sentences, naming no names, presumably in case anyone else, the sisters for instance, should open the envelope and chance to read it.
‘My source is not being particularly cooperative, but I haven’t given up hope yet of finding the information we need. I’m seeking advice regarding how best to tackle the problem. Try to be patient.’
There it was again, that word, patient. The note wasn’t even signed, which seemed to show excessive caution on Shirley’s part but Patsy appreciated her efforts.
Every morning she would watch for the post. Sometimes she’d wonder if she should telephone and try to find out that way what was happening back in Southport. But she couldn’t quite pluck up the courage to do so.
She’d give Shirley a few more weeks, Patsy decided, and then if there was nothing further, she would indeed telephone. There’d be no harm in that, surely, so long as she chose a moment when the Higginson sisters were out of the house, otherwise they’d be curious about who she was ringing.
Nothing could be achieved in a hurry, Patsy reminded herself. Were Shirley to find something, the housekeeper for instance, visits would need to be arranged, documents or letters studied. It would take time to ascertain the facts, to prove the case one way or the other, and it must be done carefully, without raising alarm or suspicion.
And if it should all turn out to be a false trail, nothing more than coincidence and gossip, and Clara was not in fact her mother, then far better to move on, however, painful, rather than have everyone know she’d even considered such a crazy notion.
In view of all this uncertainty, Patsy decided that lovely as it was talking to Fran, and much as she might fancy Marc Bertalone, she must take care not to become too involved in case she did have to leave. That way she could at least keep her pride intact.
What Patsy dreaded most of all was rejection.
Sighing, she tucked her new record under her arm and set off back to the hat stall to finish her n shift, swamped yet again by a sense of deep loneliness and insecurity.
But there really was no alternative. She must simply be patient and wait for news. In any case, right at this moment, she couldn’t even say what she hoped the outcome would be.
Chapter Fifteen
Patience never had been one of Molly’s strong points, and she’d really had a bellyful with those two obstreperous daughters of hers. If it wasn’t one, it was the other. Now, even Ozzy had turned awkward.
Nobody listened to her any more.
And as if she didn’t have trouble enough at home, now there were problems with the market. The re-election had taken place and Belle Garside was firmly established as the new Market Superintendent, holding meetings and throwing her weight about left, right and centre. She planned to put all the rents up for a start, which was bad news so far as Molly was concerned. And for others, such as the Higginson sisters, for whom she knew money was tight.
Molly had learned all of this from her friend Winnie Watkins. Not that Winnie was on the market committee, but little escaped her notice.
‘What’s more,’ Winnie was saying to her now, ‘traders will be expected to pay for a full fifty-two week year, irrespective of whether they choose to trade in every one of those weeks, and every stallholder must personally attend at least one week in every month. It’s the farmers’ wives I feel most sorry for, who come only when they have produce to sell. They’ll have to pay whether they attend or not.’
‘Well, we don’t want a half empty market,’ Sam Beckett reasonably pointed out. ‘And those with the best positions pay the most, which is surely fair enough.’
Undeterred in her condemnation of her enemy, Winnie went on, ‘I suppose you’ve heard that if regulations aren’t followed, suspensions or fines will be imposed?’
‘I heard that too,’ Sam acknowledged with a sigh. He’d been quite friendly with Belle in the past so was cautious in his condemnation of her now.
‘Nay!’ Molly said, aghast and far less reticent. ‘That’s not right. I don’t like the idea of fines. That’s not right at all.’
‘It’s right enough. She’s a powerful lady now, is our Belle.’
Big Molly grudgingly envied her that fact. She couldn’t even control her own family, let alone a whole bleeding market. ‘Course, Belle got away with it because she had charisma and sex appeal. All the men wanted to sleep with her, though they might claim only to be interested in her ideas.
‘At least she’s planning to build a proper solid row of stalls for the fish and meat market, which can only be a good thing,’ Jimmy Ramsay put in, smoothing down his blue and white striped butcher’s apron. ‘She’s even approached the council for a grant to help pay for it.’
‘Aye, and we’re all waiting with bated breath for the result of their deliberations,’ Winnie drily remarked. ‘I mean, when has the council ever given us owt for nowt?’
Big Molly wouldn’t trust the council so far as she could throw them, but she agreed with Jimmy that new stalls with proper solid roofs over the food would be a good thing. Robert and her dear daughter-in-law would certainly approve. But she could understand her friends feeling unsettled and worried. Change was in the air, costs were rising and all the stallholders were feeling anxious about the future.
Papa Bertalone wandered over during this conversation, standing quietly at the back of the group as he listened. Now he elbowed his way into the centre of the little group and lowered his voice, as if about to impart a dire secret. ‘Have you heard the latest?’
Heads lifted, glances shifted, checking they were not overheard as they waited for Marco to go on.
‘The market, it ees going to be sold!’
‘What?’
‘Sold?’
‘Don’t talk daft, Marco. How can you sell a market?’
‘It ees very simple, my friend. You sell the land to a developer, to builda more of these big high rise flats they are putting up all over the city. You no see them?’
Jimmy Ramsay rubbed his ruddy face with the flat of his hand. ‘By heck, that’s a shaker. Where did you get this from? It’s surely nobbut gossip.’
Marco Bertalone shrugged his shoulders and lifted his hands in that expressive Italian way he had, and which his son Marc seemed to have inherited. ‘I know nothing, nothing, only what Joe Southworth say. He tell me, on the QT, as you call it.’ He tapped the side of his nose. ‘And there will be a rake for Belle if she pulls it off.’
‘Rake?’
Sam Beckett cleared his throat. ‘I think he means rake-off. Are you saying that Belle will get a back-hander if she lets it go through?’
Again the expressive shrug. ‘I no understand thees back-handers and rake-offs but Belle, she sell the market she makea de big money in her pocket, si?’
The talk now became anxious, increasing in volume with everyone talking at once, until Jimmy Ramsay hushed them by off
ering to speak to Belle herself. ‘It’s no good us getting all aereated till we know the proper facts.’
There was general agreement that Jimmy should ascertain from her what, exactly, was going on, then they’d meet up again and discuss the matter further.
One by one they all drifted back to their stalls, frowns and anxious expressions still very much in evidence. They’d voted her on because they were tired of Joe Southworth, fussy and ineffectual as he was. Now they seemed to have opened up a whole new Pandora’s box of trouble.
The news certainly didn’t help Molly’s temper on this particular morning.
Raised rents, possible fines and a power-hungry superintendent who might well sell off their livelihood without a by-your-leave; and all on top of recalcitrant daughters intent on getting themselves mixed up with the wrong sort of chap, husbands who no longer did as they were told, and sons who stole your pie-making business from under your very nose and treated you like a decrepit has-been. It was enough to make a body run mad.
So when she spotted Thomas George the baker striding through the market as if he owned the bleeding place, Molly knew just what to do about it.
‘Thomas George, the leper of Champion Street, as I live and breathe.’
Thomas sighed. ‘Don’t start, Molly. I don’t like the way things are any more than you do, but there’s not a lot we can do about it. My wife and I have tried, as I’m sure you have, to keep the pair of them apart, but to no avail.’
Molly propped her hands on her substantial hips and stood four-square before him. ‘Aye, you would say that, useless lump that you are. Your family always did believe in taking the easy way out. With that brother of yours, for instance, who should have stood trial for what he did to our Lena.’
Thomas George’s face flushed a dark red. ‘That’s nonsense, and you know it. It’s tragic what happened to your sister but Howard wasn’t entirely to blame. He too has been lost to his family for years because of what happened. Now get out of my way and let me go about my lawful business.’
Fools Fall in Love Page 12
