by Anne Bennett
‘I was not!’
‘Keep your voice down,’ Mary hissed. ‘Mickey wants to go back to sleep.’
‘I don’t,’ Jamie stated and he looked at his father full in the face. ‘I’m not a bit tired anymore.’
Eddie gave a quiet chuckle. ‘That’s too bad, old man,’ he said. ‘Because I’m exhausted. I’m away to my bed now and you’re to lie down in yours and go back to sleep.’
‘But …’
‘But nothing,’ Mary interrupted with a sharp whisper as she laid Mickey down again. ‘Lie down this minute and we’ll have no more nonsense.’
Jamie, with a huge exaggerated sigh, threw himself down in the bed. ‘I won’t sleep,’ he declared.
‘Well, stay awake then,’ Mary retorted. ‘But be quiet about it for if you wake Mickey up again, I’ll brain you.’
Bridie was still sitting up in her bed and Mary doubted that, while Jamie’s claim that he’d never sleep was a false one, Bridie would close her eyes again that night. ‘Come on downstairs,’ she said to her. ‘Give the wee ones time to get off. We’ll have a drop of tea to settle you.’
‘Oh no, Mary,’ Bridie said. ‘You must be tired out, I’ll be fine. Go on down.’
‘No, I’m grand so I am,’ Mary said. ‘Eddie needs his bed, he has work tomorrow, but I’m grand. Come on now.’
Bridie was glad to follow her sister, for she knew she’d be too afraid to sleep left alone.
The room downstairs was in darkness and like an icebox. Mary lit the gas lamps and poked up the fire, banked with slack for safety, and threw on some nuggets of coal before putting the kettle on to boil.
‘Soon be warm,’ she told her sister, who was still shivering from the cold as well as her bad dream. ‘And a drop of tea puts new heart in a body.’
It did too, Bridie agreed just a little later, as she warmed her hands on the cup and let the heat from the fire, now blazing merrily, toast her cold tense body. She felt sufficiently calmer to tell Mary of the nightmare.
‘Abortion is murder plain and simple,’ Bridie said after she’d recounted the awful details to Mary, ‘I didn’t need a nightmare to show me that. But if I think about the other option, I know I could not go through with it. I was so ashamed when I knew you were telling Eddie. How could I cope with others watching me and judging me with my belly stuck out and no wedding ring on my finger?
‘So, though I don’t go against the Church’s teachings lightly, or the law of the land, I’ve still decided on going for an abortion, Mary – it is the only way forward for me.’
Mary let her breath out slowly so that Bridie couldn’t see her relief. After the horrific nightmare she’d described, Mary wasn’t at all sure which way Bridie would jump. Abortion was known to be dangerous but, Mary thought, the only answer and she vowed she’d pray to Jesus and his Virgin Mother to keep Bridie safe.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Three days after Bridie had arrived in Birmingham, Aunt Ellen minded the boys for Mary. She thought Mary was taking Bridie to the Bull Ring, but instead they were making for a house in Varna Road, to see a woman called merely Mrs M, who’d promised to cure Bridie’s ‘little problem’ with no trouble at all, if someone had ten pounds to pay her with.
Bridie insisted on paying. She had plenty of money still in the knotted handkerchief and she didn’t want Mary to pay any more out for her. Eddie, while thankfully in work when so many weren’t, wasn’t paid much and she had no wish to be a financial drain on them. ‘When this is all behind me, I’ll get a job and pay for my keep,’ she promised Mary as they alighted from the swaying tram.
Mary just smiled. After Bridie had told her of her decision, she’d contacted Ivy O’Farrel, three doors up, who’d found herself pregnant with her tenth child when she couldn’t feed or clothe the nine she had. Her man had been out of work for five years, and to try and rear another child on the pittance she had to manage on each week had filled her with panic.
She’d said not a word to her husband but, pawning her wedding ring for the money, had stolen away one day to Mrs M when her husband had taken himself back to Ireland to bury his mother. Some neighbour women were the only ones she’d told. They’d looked after her, cared for her children, and kept their mouths shut about both. Mary had been one of these in the know and so Ivy was the one she confided in about Bridie’s problem. Ivy had made all the arrangements.
‘Best get rid of the old man for the night,’ Ivy had said. ‘She can hardly share the attic with the kids. And you’d best cover you mattress with summat – I bled like a stuck pig.’
God! What was she letting her little sister do? Mary thought. What if something went wrong? What if she should die? Oh God, she’d want to die herself.
‘What’s the matter?’ Bridie said, bringing Mary’s thoughts back to the present. Mary gave herself a mental shake. No way could she let Bridie have a hint of the doubts swarming through her mind. ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘I’m just a bit nervous.’
‘You’re a bit nervous,’ Bridie cried incredulously. ‘I’m bloody terrified, if you want the truth.’
Mary wasn’t surprised, though she said nothing, and she linked her arm with Bridie’s and gave her a squeeze.
Mrs M was a tall, rather gaunt woman. Her grey hair, scraped back into a bun, made her face tight and strained, her eyes almost slanted, her nose pinched, her lips thin and hollows in each of the ruddy-coloured cheeks. Bridie smiled at her nervously while thinking she had a neck as wrinkled as a turkey cock and said, ‘I’m …’
‘I don’t need to know who you are, where you live, or anything about you,’ said Mrs M in a thin, sharp voice. ‘Brought the money?’
Bridie nodded and held out the notes, which Mrs M held to the light before accepting them. ‘Now,’ she said, more amenably, ‘how far on you are?’
‘Two months,’ Bridie said. ‘At least I’ve missed two periods now, but my third would be due now any day.’
Mrs M nodded. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Should be a piece of cake. Some silly buggers leave it too late. Daren’t risk it then, see?’
Bridie said nothing and Mrs M turned to Mary. ‘You with her?’
‘Yes, I’m her sister.’
‘Don’t need to know that. Don’t need to know anything other than the facts. Safer that way, see?’
‘Yes. I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t matter,’ Mrs M said. ‘I’m glad the poor bugger’s got someone with her. Wait here,’ she indicated the room she’d ushered them into, ‘and I’ll take your sister upstairs.’
Bridie followed behind the woman’s tall figure as she led her from the room and mounted the stairs. With her heart in her mouth she entered the bedroom.
The woman pulled a screen towards her and said, ‘Take your clothes off behind here from the waist down and lie on the bed. There’s a blanket to cover yourself with.’
Bridie did as the woman told her, but as she lay on the rubber sheet on top of the bed, she began to tremble from head to foot.
‘Scared?’
Bridie was startled; she hadn’t heard the woman come back into the room. She nodded.
‘No need,’ Mrs M told her. ‘Done this hundreds of times. And I’m clean. I’ve just been to scrub my hands. You get some dirty bitches in this business.’
Bridie watched her fearfully. She had her teeth clamped tight together to prevent them chattering and her insides were turning somersaults. ‘Bring your knees up, darling,’ Mrs M told Bridie. ‘Relax now, ’cos I’m going to have a feel around inside you.’
Bridie’s eyes widened in horror and shock. ‘Don’t look like that, duck,’ Mrs M said, ‘got to feel where to put the bleeding knitting needle.’
‘Knitting needle?’ Bridie repeated in a voice that trembled with fear.
‘Where were you born?’ Mrs M said scornfully. ‘You want rid of a baby, right?’ And at Bridie’s brief nod, she said, ‘Well, how the Hell did you think I was going to get rid of it – sing it a bleeding lullaby?’
‘I don
’t know, I didn’t think.’
‘Well, don’t think now either and let me get on,’ Mrs M said impatiently and, afraid to do anything else, Bridie raised her knees and parted them and felt Mrs M’s fingers slide inside her while she writhed and squirmed in embarrassment.
‘Right,’ Mrs M said at last, ‘seems fairly straightforward, any road. Now you’ll feel a dull pain when I stick the needle in. Be obliged if you don’t make much noise. Don’t want the neighbours getting suspicious.’
‘No,’ Bridie said, wondering at the warning. She could cope with a dull ache, anyone could. But what she found hard to cope with was the sharp and agonising pain across her middle. It made her gasp and brought tears to her eyes but, mindful of Mrs M’s warning, she uttered no sound, though she bit her lip till it bled. Mrs M was pleased, however. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘All over now. Go home and rest, you’ll bleed a bit but after that you’ll be as right as rain again.’
‘Thank you,’ Bridie said, weakly wondering if she would be able to straighten up with the pains shooting through her. But she had a great desire to be away from this place and this woman who made money out of other’s misery.
She sat up slowly and, swinging her legs from the bed, she attempted to stand and reach her clothes hanging from the chair. But her head swam, her legs buckled under her and Mrs M pressed her onto the bed. ‘Sit awhile,’ she said. ‘Take it steady.’
And Bridie took it steady after that. A few minutes later, she felt ready to move though when she descended the stairs, they swayed in front of her eyes. When Mary saw her white-faced, trembling sister almost stagger into the room, she turned on Mrs M fiercely. ‘What have you done to her?’
‘Got rid of her kid. It’s what you wanted, ain’t it?’
‘She’s ill.’
‘She’s in pain,’ Mrs M retorted sharply. ‘What the bleeding Hell did you expect? She’ll recover. Take her home and see to her.’
Mary would have had more to say on the subject, but she saw that Bridie needed to be back home and tucked in the bed she had ready for her.
Bridie, in fact, remembered little of the journey back, except that every jerk of the tram sent pains shooting through her and that it seemed to take an eternity.
When they alighted at Bristol Passage, Mary cautioned, ‘Now try and walk straight and upright, for God’s sake. You’re white enough to convince anyone interested enough that you were taken bad in the Bull Ring, but walking doubled over might be more difficult to explain.’
Bridie knew that Mary wasn’t being unsympathetic, just practical, so she linked arms with her sister and with her support got inside the front door with no mishaps.
But once inside, Bridie leant back on the door with a sigh of sheer relief. ‘Can I have any more linen pads?’ she asked. ‘The one you gave me was soaked through before we left the tram.’
‘Right,’ Mary said briskly. ‘They’re in the press in my room. Go on up. Bed is the best place for you anyway. I’ll bring you up a cup of tea and a hot-water bottle for your stomach in a jiffy.’
‘Am I In the attic?’
‘No,’ Mary said. ‘In my bed. Eddie will stay at his mother’s tonight. I’ll put the word around that you were taken ill at the Bull Ring and that I’m looking after you. Eddie will tell his mother you’re not well and lodge with her for the night.’
‘Ah, Mary, I’d not want to put you all out.’
‘Will you be quiet, Bridie. We’ve discussed it already and this was the easiest way. To get rid of the children would have to involve Aunt Ellen. Stop worrying yourself; Eddie knows all about it.’
Bridie felt too weak to argue further so she let herself be led upstairs. When she pulled back the sheets on the bed she noticed it was packed with towels. The hot tea was comforting, but the hot-water bottle was a godsend. Bridie had slept little the night before through nerves and suddenly felt incredibly weary and closed her eyes.
When Mary saw her sister sound asleep, she went around to relieve Ellen of her children. But when she heard that Bridie had been taken ill and had to be brought home, she insisted on keeping the children a little longer. ‘You’ll have your hands full enough,’ she said. ‘And if the girl doesn’t soon rally, have the doctor in.’
‘Yes, I will.’
‘And while we’re on, girl,’ Ellen said, ‘there’re some questions I want answered.’
Mary saw the steel in her aunt’s eyes so to give herself time to think, she said, ‘I have to get back to Bridie.’
‘You said she’s asleep,’ Ellen said. ‘And best thing for her. You can bide for a few minutes and tell me why you lied to me.’
‘Lied to you?’
‘That’s what I said,’ Ellen told her grimly. ‘You said young Bridie was coming across for a wee holiday. I wondered at it when in the summer she said she hadn’t time to go to town, not even on Fair Day. But I thought now, in the wintertime, with the farm work not so heavy, maybe Francis and his son had stepped in to give the girl a break. That’s what Bridie led me to believe when I spoke to her anyway.
‘But now I know that’s not the case at all, because I had a letter from Sarah this morning. She knew nothing about any holiday, nothing about anything, for Bridie left in the middle of the night. She only knew she was here because she said where she was making for in the letter she left her.
‘Shabby trick that, girl, however fed up she was. And you must have been in on it too. And, from the tone of the letter, your mother thinks I knew as well. She seems to think I enticed the pair of you here, engineered the whole thing, and I’d like to know what’s going on.’
‘And I’d like to tell you,’ Mary said earnestly, ‘but it’s Bridie’s tale. Take it from me though, she had good reason to leave and in the manner she did. I hope she’ll tell you all about it soon.’
‘You tell me all about it now,’ demanded Ellen.
Mary bit her lip anxiously. ‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘I’m really not being awkward, I just can’t, but once Bridie is better, I’ll encourage her to tell you everything.’
‘Hmph, there’s some mystery here and one thing I don’t like is mysteries,’ Ellen said. ‘But we’ll say no more about it for the moment. You’d best get back to your patient.’
Mary, glad to leave, hurried back home and went straight up to check on Bridie who she found still in a deep sleep. She put on the kettle to make herself a reviving cup of tea and toasted a couple of slices of bread in the hot coal embers for her lunch.
As the afternoon wore on, and there was still no movement from Bridie, Mary became worried. It was almost four and the daylight all but gone when she went upstairs. She lit the gas lamps first, feeling sure Bridie would feel disoriented awakening in the dark room, but as she touched her and attempted to rouse her she realised it was no ordinary sleep. Bridie was hot, burning up in fact, although her face was deathly pale. Terrified now, Mary threw the covers back and saw the blood pumping from Bridie’s body in a scarlet stream. It had soaked through the towels she’d padded the bed with and was still coming. Quickly, she ran for more towels to pack around her, but she knew her sister was in peril and hadn’t a clue what to do about it.
She ran for Ivy, who took one look at Bridie and readily agreed to fetch her aunt for her. ‘Tell my aunt nothing about the situation,’ she said. ‘Just tell her I need her.’
‘Yeah, no problem.’
‘And, Ivy, she has the weans. Can you see to them for a wee while? I don’t want them here.’
‘No, by Christ, you don’t,’ Ivy said. ‘They’ll be all right with me.’ She scurried away, glad to be away from the sight of the sick girl in the bed, with the life blood running from her and who she didn’t think would be long for this world.
Peggy McKenna was a very nosy neighbour and one who lived just doors away from Ellen. She’d been intrigued that evening to see Ivy knocking frantically on Ellen’s door. She was further interested to see that, after Ivy had been just minutes in the house, Ellen had rushed out and obviously in
a hurry, for she ran past Peggy’s window, fastening her coat, and hadn’t taken time to remove her apron.
Peggy was all set to follow her when Ellen’s door swung open again and Ivy left the house, holding Mary’s elder lad by the hand and with the young one resting on her hip, following Ellen. It was easy to trail her without being seen in the murky gloom. Peggy slunk after Ivy and, seeing her go into her own house with the children, made her way to Mary’s where she hid in a convenient entry.
Ellen thought the same as Ivy when she caught sight of Bridie. ‘What in God’s name …?’ But she knew what. She was no fool.
Mary looked up from where she was mopping Bridie’s brow with tepid water and said, ‘Yes, Bridie was pregnant, that’s why she ran from home and came here.’
‘Some butchering woman did this to her?’ asked Ellen, and Mary nodded. ‘We need to raise the end of the bed up,’ Ellen said. ‘She’s lost more than enough blood already, I’ll say.’
They used the fire bricks either side of the hearth and Eddie’s books that stood in a shelf in the chimney alcove – Eddie was a great reader – and Mary heaved the bed up while Ellen slid the things underneath. The flow of blood slowed to a trickle and then virtually stopped, but Ellen still frowned. ‘I don’t like it,’ she said. ‘The girl is as white as a sheet and yet is burning up and she’s lost far too much blood. I think she needs to go to hospital.’
Mary gaped at her. She couldn’t believe she’d heard right. ‘Ellen, she can’t. What she did … Well, it’s illegal. If she goes to hospital, she might get into trouble.’
‘If she doesn’t, she may die,’ Ellen said bluntly, and Mary gave a gasp.
‘Do you really think it’s so serious?’
‘I’ve no way of knowing,’ Ellen replied. ‘But the girl’s in a coma, with fever raging through her and that apart from the blood loss. I’ll go for Doctor Casey, he’s a good man, he’ll know what to do.’
Peggy slunk back into the shadows when she saw Ellen leave the house again. She didn’t make for any neighbour’s house though, but went towards Bristol Passage. Suddenly, Peggy knew where she was heading for: the doctor’s surgery was on Bristol Street that Bristol Passage led to. Sure enough, it wasn’t long till Ellen was back with the doctor following behind her.
