A Nest of Singing Birds

by A Nest of Singing Birds (retail) (epub)

  She took one and was immediately filled with energy as on the previous day. She decided that her first priority must be to put things right with her family so she sent a note to the school asking for Gerry to be excused and kept him home. They set off. Maureen and her father would be at work so she went first to visit Sarah and Helen, finding no difficulty in managing the three children and the pushchair on and off tramcars.

  Sarah was hanging out washing in the garden and welcomed her warmly, then called Helen who came in with Dilly. The little girls played happily with Rosaleen’s toys and Gerry was given paper to draw on while the mothers sat round the kitchen table with cups of tea.

  Anne said immediately, ‘I’ve come to apologise. I’ve been a fool trying to keep up appearances but I’ve been to the doctor now and I know what’s wrong with me.’

  Helen and Sarah looked at each other and Helen took Anne’s hand. ‘What is it, love?’ she said gently.

  ‘The doctor called it postnatal depression,’ Anne said. She was amazed when Helen and Sarah said simultaneously, ‘Thank God.’

  ‘We were afraid that you had the same as your mother,’ Sarah said. ‘You’d gone so thin. I think everybody thought it but it was only the other day that Helen and I admitted it to each other. We haven’t said anything to anyone else.’

  ‘I’m sorry I’ve worried people,’ Anne said. ‘I was just in a world of my own with these awful moods. I was thin because I was too tired and miserable to eat.’

  ‘I know it must have been terrible,’ Sarah said, ‘but it’s such a relief that it’s not that other thing. We haven’t known what to do. We didn’t know whether you’d been told or not.’

  Later Eileen and Margaret called in on their way to the shops and Anne felt humble and grateful at the generous welcome she received from everyone.

  ‘I thought people would have fallen out with me,’ she said. ‘I know I’ve offended everyone. Mona Dunne told me my fortune at Christmas.’

  ‘Take no notice of Mona,’ Eileen said. ‘She tried some of her straight talking with me but she didn’t get very far.’

  ‘The irresistible force met the immovable object,’ Margaret said, laughing. She and Eileen left, promising to call back later, and Helen and Sarah organised lunch. Helen spoke about the death of King George VI and Sarah reminded Anne about Mabel, the ardent royalist they had worked with.

  ‘I wonder if she’s crying about this the way she cried about George V,’ Sarah said.

  ‘Or about the Abdication,’ Anne reminded her. ‘Poor Mabel. I wonder what happened to her?’

  ‘Probably still nursing,’ Sarah said. ‘What about Kathleen O’Neill? How’s she going on?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Anne confessed. ‘I couldn’t be bothered answering her letter and she didn’t send a Christmas card. I’ll have to write and explain. God knows how many people I’ve offended, Sar.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Sarah comforted her. ‘Those who care about you will just be glad you’re all right again, or on your way anyway.’

  Eileen and Margaret came back and the conversation was general. No one dwelt on Anne’s illness but she was comforted by their affection and enjoyed their company.

  Sarah walked with her to the tramstop. ‘It’s only one tram to Mum’s,’ she said. ‘I go nearly every day.’

  Sally was out at the cinema with Peggy but Cathy was delighted to see Anne. She knew all the details of her troubles so no explanations were needed. Cathy took Anne in her arms and kissed her warmly. ‘You’ve had a bad time, pet,’ she said. ‘But you’ve just got to take care now and get really well. You mean so much to all of us, and of course John most of all.’

  Anne managed without being too specific to make it clear that she and John were united in dealing with the illness, and although Cathy said nothing plainly either, Anne knew that she was relieved.

  They talked about Mick’s wedding and about Cathy’s daughter Kate in America. Sarah had told Anne that Kate had been divorced and was planning to remarry and Cathy said with a sigh, ‘I never thought there’d be a divorce in our family but Grandma says she’s not surprised.’

  ‘I think divorce is quite common in America,’ Anne said. “With people who are not Catholics anyway.’

  ‘Yes, but Gene was such a nice fellow. I’m ashamed that our daughter brought such trouble to him and his family. I never thought she’d do this. Our Mary was flighty when she was young like Kate was but she’s been a good faithful wife to Sam. I hoped Kate would be the same.’

  ‘I know two girls who are divorced,’ Anne said. ‘I think it was almost impossible for people like us, before the war, and they both said it’s still difficult, but women can get Legal Aid now and that helps.’

  ‘Money’s not the problem with Kate,’ Cathy said. ‘Still, as Grandma says, at least she isn’t making a mess on her own doorstep.’

  ‘Grandma was great,’ Anne said. ‘So kind yet so practical.’

  ‘She always is,’ Cathy said. ‘She’s had a hard life, Anne, but a happy one. But then, we all have our ups and downs, don’t we? Let’s hope it’s going to be plain sailing for you and John from now on, love.’

  Anne and the children had tea with her, then they went on to see Maureen and her father who would now be home from work. Anne still felt energetic and marvelled at the power of the small tablet.

  Maureen opened the door and hugged Anne but she said nothing. Anne realised that she was crying.

  ‘Mo, what is it?’ she said fearfully but Maureen released her and took out her handkerchief. ‘I’m sorry, love,’ she said. ‘I know what’s been wrong with you. Sarah’s grandmother has just been here.’

  She took the baby from the pushchair and led Anne and the other children into the kitchen. Anne’s father was standing on the hearthrug and she went into his arms. ‘Anne, my chick, why didn’t you tell your old dad?’ he said and she burst into tears.

  ‘I didn’t know, Dad,’ she sobbed. ‘I thought I was going mad.’ There were tears in Pat’s eyes too but he took out his handkerchief and blew his nose vigorously. ‘Never mind, queen,’ he said. ‘We’ll just have to get you right. Get some flesh on your bones. It must be the poor food. Women never had troubles like this in my day.’

  ‘You just never heard any women’s talk, Dad,’ Maureen said. ‘Do you want to hold Julie?’ He took the baby and Laura and Gerry went to stand beside him and talk to him.

  Anne and Maureen sat down together and Maureen told Anne that Grandma Ward had called on her way home from the pictures to tell them what had happened.

  ‘I wanted to go to see you,’ Maureen said. ‘I knew there was something wrong but I thought you didn’t want us to interfere.’ She looked embarrassed. ‘I wondered, well, I thought – it might be something to do with you and John.’

  Anne said nothing and Maureen went on, ‘I thought he might have talked to his mother so I went there to see her. I just said we were worried and they said they were worried too and Mrs Ward said she’d go to see you.’ She smiled. ‘I said I didn’t want to interfere if you didn’t want to tell us, and she said, “Don’t worry, girl. I’ve got a thick skin.”’

  ‘Anything but,’ Anne said. ‘She’s very kind and very tactful. I wasn’t glad to see her at first, I must admit, Mo, because I was so down and the place was a mess, but afterwards I was so glad she came.’

  ‘I should have grasped the nettle,’ Maureen said ruefully, ‘but we’ve never been a family for interfering. Not that I think Mrs Ward interfered,’ she added hastily.

  ‘I was to blame,’ Anne said. ‘I hid it from everyone, even John, and it wasn’t fair. Especially with him. He’d have realised but he was working such long hours seven days a week and I was always asleep. I was going to bed at eight o’clock. I couldn’t get enough sleep!’

  ‘Are you tired now?’ Maureen asked.

  ‘No, I’ve got these amazing tablets. They’re like monkey glands,’ she said. ‘I still feel I could clean a house.’

  Julie ha
d fallen asleep and Laura and Gerry were tired so Maureen drove them home. John was there and helped to put the children to bed, then he and Anne sat together on the sofa while she told him of her visits.

  ‘I felt guilty because people were worried,’ she said. ‘Helen and Sarah thought I had the same disease as Mum but I wanted to keep quiet about it. Maureen thought there was something wrong between us.’

  ‘Maureen was near the mark,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, but the main reason I tried to bluff them was because I didn’t want anyone to know about us. I was all mixed up.’

  ‘Never mind, everything’s all right now,’ he said. ‘Do you know what happened to me today? I went in to see the manager and he said the board had decided to offer me a job. A new thing. Personnel relations, they call it. It’s a salaried position.’

  ‘And what will you do?’

  ‘It’ll be like union work. You know I’ve been the spokesman for fellows with problems and I’ve been representing them at the management meetings? It’ll be official now.’

  ‘Your grandad would be pleased,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sure he would,’ John said eagerly. ‘I’ve tried to carry on his work, Anne, although it’s different now. The problems are different. We’ve got what he fought for, security from the cradle to the grave, but there are other things now that need to be put right.’

  ‘Will it mean very long hours?’ she asked but John shook his head. ‘No. The hours should be regular.’

  ‘And no meetings?’

  ‘Only very occasionally,’ he said. ‘I must have been mad to work those hours. I think I was making it a sort of substitute because I’d made such a mess of things here. And keeping myself out of temptation,’ he added wryly.

  ‘It certainly wasn’t because we needed the money,’ Anne said. ‘That drawer’s full of wage packets. I’ll have to sort it out and take it to the bank.’

  John kissed her. ‘Practical Anne,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to discuss my motives?’

  ‘No. We’ll look forward, not back,’ she said firmly.

  Anne continued to take the yellow tablets but she soon realised that the energy they released had to be paid for with exhaustion the next morning. It could be cured by another tablet but she thought of the doctor’s words about addiction so put the remaining tablets away for emergencies and managed without them.

  This was easier because the family closed ranks around her. Every day she was visited by or visited one of her own family or John’s and everyone prepared delicacies to tempt her to eat.

  ‘I feel like a turkey being fattened for Christmas,’ she joked to John but she appreciated the affection and concern shown by everyone.

  Anne heard Barty’s voice occasionally but only caught glimpses of him until she was out walking one day with John and the children. They saw Barty with a woman and a small child and John said, ‘I think Con’s right. He calls Barty the married woman’s friend. Says he never has a girl of his own but always has a married woman friend. Probably feels safer that way.’

  ‘Barty was very good to me when the girls were born and very competent,’ Anne said.

  ‘Yes, I think he’s a good fellow, but Con thinks he lives in a fantasy world,’ John said. Anne said no more but thought ruefully, I probably gave him the fright of his life that night, getting down to details when he probably wanted a grand romantic scene and the great renunciation. She still felt grateful for his friendship which had helped her through her dark days.

  John was best man at Mick’s wedding in March and Anne and John, Sarah and Joe, and Mick’s parents and grandmother all travelled to York for the wedding. It was a bright, sunny day and Anne felt that it marked the end of winter and of her months of misery.

  At Easter Fred held his usual party and Anne felt that she had never enjoyed it so much. I suppose you have to know sadness before you can really appreciate being happy, she thought.

  Bridie was there with her family and two additions. Danny and Teddy had both brought girlfriends and Bridie whispered to Anne, ‘Just think. I could be a grandmother in a few years’ time!’

  Dom and Des were now courting two sisters who were at the party. ‘You’ve got the hearts of lions taking these two on,’ Fred told them. Anne thought her father looked sad and guessed that he was thinking of Terry who was still in Canada so she carried Julie to him. His face brightened as he took his favourite grandchild.

  ‘By God, she gets more like your mum every day,’ he said.

  ‘She’s like her in character too, Dad,’ Anne said. She often thought of her mother singing as she went about her housework as Julie sat playing with her toys and crooning softly to herself.

  Bridie and Carrie both urged Anne to visit them and she promised that she would. ‘I’ll be able to get round to see everyone now the weather’s better,’ she said. ‘And Gerry stays to school dinners.’

  ‘It’s a pity you live so far away from everyone,’ Carrie said. ‘Especially with the others living near each other and not far from your dad and us.’

  Pat, who was sitting near her, agreed. ‘Aye, you wouldn’t have got so bad if you lived near. But we’ll be keeping an eye on you from now on, girl.’

  ‘I’d better watch my step then, Dad,’ she laughed.

  ‘That’s more like it,’ Fred exclaimed. ‘That’s the way. Happy Annie. Not crying and starving yourself. Dwindling away.’

  Theresa took his arm. ‘And that’s like you, Dad,’ she said with a grimace at Anne. ‘Come and pour beer. The fellows are dying of thirst.’

  Anne and John laughed later about that conversation, not knowing it would bear fruit that would change their lives.

  They still slept in separate rooms but otherwise they were close and loving, frequently kissing and embracing. Anne often longed to make love and knew that it was even more difficult for John to resist the temptation but fear held him back.

  She visited the doctor regularly and one day plucked up the courage to talk about the hospital doctor’s warning that another pregnancy would risk her life and only total abstinence was one hundred per cent safe.

  ‘I think there was a misunderstanding,’ the doctor said discreetly. ‘You would be given different advice now.’ He told her that sometimes such pregnancies were part of a pattern but Anne’s troubles had been caused by special factors that would not recur.

  ‘I see no reason why you and your husband cannot resume normal relations,’ he said. ‘Your cycle is regular and you understand the “safe period”.’

  ‘And if I started with another baby?’ she asked.

  ‘Should be quite straightforward,’ he assured her. ‘You’re a perfectly healthy young woman.’

  John heard the news with joy especially when Anne told him that it was now the time between her periods when she was unlikely to conceive. The children were moved into their own beds and that night Anne and John lay together, making love as though for the first time.

  ‘And to think this might have been possible months ago,’ he said. He kissed her again ardently and held her close. ‘We must make up for lost time.’

  To crown their joy, Anne’s father came to see them a few days later. ‘You know them old houses in Norton Grove, near them I built in Domingo Vale for Joe and Tony?’ he said. ‘They were built in 1906 but they’re good solid houses. I’ve bought four and I’m going to do them up. Will you have one? Rent or buy, I’ll fix you up.’

  Anne and John looked at each other with delight, then Anne flung her arms around her father. ‘Oh, Dad, thanks,’ she said fervently.

  He hugged her. ‘You’ve got a bit more flesh on your bones, chick,’ he said gruffly, ‘but I worry about you, stuck out here.’

  ‘What are the houses like?’ John asked eagerly.

  ‘Four bedrooms and bathroom, kitchen, scullery and two parlours. No attics or cellars. Little garden at the front and a big one at the back. Some war damage, cracked walls, broken slates. They’ve been patched up but I’ll do them up properly,’ Pa
t said.

  Anne and John were delighted with the house in Norton Grove even before Pat’s improvements were made. They had both lost all their earlier joy in their present house. Their new house had large rooms with delicate moulding round the high ceilings and the fireplaces and the family helped to decorate the rooms and hang curtains and pictures.

  The two parlours later became a dining room and a sitting room but the large kitchen was the heart of the house. ‘I feel at home here,’ Anne said, looking round it.

  It was similar to the Magdalen Street kitchen except that there was an Aga stove instead of an open fire and the wide window looked out on to a large garden. A sycamore tree at the bottom provided hours of pleasure for Gerry as he climbed it and for Laura and Julie on the swing which John hung from a branch.

  He had more time at home in his new job and was happy in it, although Mick told Anne that he thought John had been bought off. ‘He must have been too good as a union man,’ Mick said with a grin. ‘But they haven’t reckoned on John’s obsession with living up to Grandad.’

  Anne said nothing about this to John, and when he was downhearted because Britain tested her first atomic bomb in Australia in October 1952 she cheered him by joining the Peace Pledge Union.

  ‘I’ve read all the literature and I really believe in it,’ she told him. ‘We’ll win in the end, you’ll see.’

  Their joy in the house, and their feelings of hope and happiness, seemed to be shared by everyone as preparations were made for the coronation of the new queen. ‘The New Elizabethan Age’ the newspapers were proclaiming.

  Coronation Day, 2 June, was wet, but everyone was in high spirits especially when the news came of the successful ascent of Everest.

  Anne and John moved into Norton Grove on a sunny day two days earlier and for Anne the national rejoicing would always be associated with the start of her happy years in that house. Flags and bunting were everywhere and Laura exclaimed, ‘Look, Mummy, the flags are out for us.’

  Carrie and Fred and Bridie and Jack came to see the house and Fred exclaimed, ‘This is a good house for a party, Anne. Good big rooms, much better than those modern boxes.’