by Maggie Ford
So it was that she and a sobbing Stephanie gathered up armfuls of clothing, jars and bottles of make-up, perfume and toiletries, all strewn carelessly outside the door, to struggle down the stairs from their mother’s flat, up the other stairs and into the stockroom. Here they piled everything in one corner until a proper place could be found for it all.
It was arranged that for the time being Stephanie should sleep on the couch in Simon’s living room.
‘It’s not ideal, but where else can she go at such short notice?’ he said so quietly and evenly that Julia felt overwhelmed by his unselfish generosity.
* * *
‘Simon, I don’t know how you feel but I can’t think about our wedding with all this going on,’ Julia said. ‘You do understand, don’t you, darling?’
‘I do understand, my sweet. Christmas has come upon us so quickly, what with everything else, as you say, going on.’
He didn’t seem at all put out, which brought relief on the one hand and on the other made her wonder why he should agree so readily.
‘I wanted so much for us to be married before the New Year.’
He drew her to him as they lay in bed, his arm tightening about her. ‘I know, my love. I did too. But it’s impossible now that you have your sister to look after. You’ve been so good to her, taking her in as you have. How can I pile more responsibility on you? It’s just going to have to be postponed.’
‘Yet again,’ she whispered against his chest.
‘Let’s just sort your sister out. Then we can make new arrangements and next time it will be definite, I promise.’
He was so understanding, so unruffled, even when Julia repeated to him all those horrid things her mother had spat out earlier. As far as Victoria was concerned there was only one decent child left in her life. ‘And that child is James,’ she’d wept. ‘James will never put me to shame as you and your sisters have, all three of you carrying on like trollops!’
‘There’s nothing wrong with Ginny!’ Julia had said indignantly. Ginny was a lovely girl, a good girl, kind and sweet and selfless, and her mother was being totally unfair to her.
‘It’s only a matter of time,’ had been the unkind reply. Julia had watched helplessly as she’d worked herself up into a rage.
‘She works for you, displaying her body before total strangers,’ Victoria had continued. ‘Isn’t that enough? I was never happy about it though I hoped she would come to her senses. But you were bent on leading her astray, dragging her down to your level. Stephanie too – if she hadn’t seen the way you were carrying on with that Simon she would never have been tempted into thinking she could do the same. Now look at her. At least I still have James. He is the only one left to me.’
At this she had hardly been able to speak for weeping. ‘At least he sets a good example of virtue. He wants me to meet his young lady though they are too young to become engaged, but she is the only young lady he has ever had. He is sober-minded and respectable like his father and I trust him as I trusted your father.’
Julia suspected her brother was not as lily white as her mother imagined, but she let that pass. In any case, Victoria had already continued on another tack.
‘As for Stephanie, I want no more to do with her. She ran to you, not me, her mother.’
‘Because she knew how you’d be.’ Julia had been unable to stop herself but had immediately regretted her words as her mother’s face twisted into an expression Julia still couldn’t get out of her mind.
‘In that case,’ Victoria had said slowly, her anger grown cold, her voice dry and harsh, ‘you may have the responsibility of her.’
Julia had been shaken and hurt by the scene She had broken down in front of Simon later as it all flooded out. He hadn’t shown any resentment, had made no comments against her mother.
All he’d said was that Stephanie would have to stay with them until the baby was born, then he’d find a little flat for her. It had made Julia angry all over again with her mother for her unfairness in persisting in seeing him as self-centred and uncaring. On the spur of the moment she found herself vowing never to speak to her mother again.
She said so to Simon, who frowned and looked suddenly sad and said quietly, ‘No, darling, you musn’t say that.’
Nineteen
‘What are we going to do when the baby arrives?’
Julia had never seen Simon so gloomy, he who usually made the best of things even when they looked hopeless.
‘She can’t stay with us for ever when the baby comes.’
He sat toying with his breakfast, the two of them sitting side by side on the bed at a little table. With Stephanie there they could no longer eat breakfast in the living room with any comfort.
Stephanie was still asleep. She rose later and later these days, taking advantage of her burgeoning pregnancy. Julia would creep about the living room trying to get breakfast at the little gas stove while her sister lay oblivious to the rattle of pots and plates. She’d been sleeping on the sofa these past three months and it was becoming increasingly inconvenient for them all.
Julia worried how she could sleep there in such a narrow space with her distended stomach growing larger by the week. There were many other inconveniences. Simon saw her often about the place in a dressing gown, he was banished from his own living quarters while she took a bath, and the chamber pot had to be emptied because she couldn’t or wouldn’t get herself across the stockroom to the staff toilet. As her pregnancy progressed and the baby pressed on her bladder she needed to use it several times in the night. Julia felt embarrassed for Simon, having to see Stephanie lolling in one of the two armchairs, her stomach bulging. The place wasn’t their own any more.
Their relationship was already being strained as it was. It seemed to Julia that the longer she and Simon spent together unmarried the more of a stigma it was becoming. She was sure they were being talked about among their friends in business. As if that were not enough, Stephanie’s condition was starting to make her feel a little broody. Of course, a baby was out of the question while she wore no wedding ring. Nor could they very well adopt Stephanie’s baby when it was born, for the same reason.
In the meantime she couldn’t help the feeling that their love might be growing stale, their moments of love making becoming ever less frequent. Maybe it was the pressure of business but sometimes she felt it went a little deeper than that. By the time they did marry, all the sense of newness would have gone out of their relationship and she was already grieving for the loss, as if for a real person.
Stephanie’s presence also made it impossible for them to express their natural feelings for each other. Perhaps that was all that was wrong, Julia reassured herself, nothing deeper. Once Stephanie had her baby and moved into the little flat Simon had planned for her, life would return to normal, they’d get married and start a family. Stephanie herself was depressed and often in tears. There had been no word from Jimmy Waring since the day he’d walked out on her. His name was always on her lips, her emotions alternating between ‘I loved him so’ and ‘I hate him, the bloody horrible bastard!’ Julia’s heart would thud to hear her sister, who had never used words like that, using them now.
When she wasn’t pining after the man who had wronged her Stephanie was complaining at having to give up work. ‘I shall never get another job as good as that one,’ she would lament. ‘I’ll lose my looks and my figure. It won’t ever come back.’
Julia tried hard to be encouraging. ‘Yes it will,’ she soothed, but was growing weary of her sister’s constant whining. Stephanie was beginning to remind her of their mother and her lack of courage.
At nearly seven months pregnant she now refused to go out. She had stopped going for walks with Julia a couple of months ago when her pregnancy had begun to show. Even then the winter weather had meant that the walks had not been regular. Now it was nearly April and the weather had improved but Stephanie was ashamed to be seen out. She got no fresh air and hardly left the living room so that
Simon found himself more or less confined to the bedroom.
‘The place is like a prison,’ he complained testily as he pushed away his half-eaten breakfast.
Not only a prison, Julia thought, more like a sentence with hard labour. As well as trying to manage a business she was finding her time being taken up running after her sister and her work was suffering.
‘What worries me,’ Simon was saying, ‘is that when she has the baby she might assume she can stay here, expecting us to look after them both. I’m sorry to say this, Julia, but your mother should have done something to help her. You should have stuck to your guns and refused to take Stephanie in.’
That was easier said than done. ‘How could I see her thrown out?’
‘We could have got her a little place of her own somewhere. We could have afforded it.’
‘She can’t live on her own in her condition. I couldn’t do that to her.’
‘It seems your mother could. There was a time I felt sorry for her, a grieving widow unable to cope. I wanted to help but she turned on us both. She behaved in a thoroughly self-centred manner after all you’ve done for her. Turning out her own daughter, no matter that Stephanie had done wrong, was cruel and wicked. She’s no mother as far as I’m concerned.’
Julia bore his criticisms in silence. She knew he was angry on her behalf. She also knew he was right, but even so it hurt coming from him.
The plight of her sister wasn’t the only thing that concerned her these days. With the wedding now postponed indefinitely because of Stephanie’s situation, Julia was beginning to wonder if they should bother with a wedding at all. She had to agree with Simon that if her mother had been a little more forgiving, her own future would by now be settled. Couldn’t the woman see that her attitudes and behaviour were causing problems to so many others, as well as alienating her from her children?
Julia had tried to reason with her several times since Christmas but her only response was, ‘Stephanie made her bed, let her lie in it.’
‘But haven’t you any motherly feelings?’
‘In this case, I’m afraid not.’
She’d never known her mother to be so firm. ‘Don’t you see, Mummy, you’re hurting the whole family and yourself as well.’
‘Then I’m sorry but I can’t alter how I feel. You’ve hurt me with your goings on more than I can tell you.’
It was useless.
* * *
‘Julia! Help me… help!’
Stephanie’s distant scream rang through the building. Julia, who was showing several colours of crêpe de Chine to a customer, excused herself and rushed upstairs. In the stockroom she saw Betty making for Simon’s rooms. The four machinists had stopped work at the awful screams.
‘Betty,’ Julia cried as she reached her, ‘go down and take care of my customer. The rest of you,’ she added as Betty hurried off, ‘carry on with your work.’
She found Stephanie doubled up on the sofa, her arms clasped about her stomach, her face twisted in pain. Immediately Julia guessed the worst. Stephanie was only eight months pregnant. Something was very wrong. ‘Stay here,’ she cried needlessly and rushed outside to the telephone to call for an ambulance.
* * *
Stephanie lay in hospital, pale and exhausted. The baby had been a boy. The doctor and midwife had tried hard to save him but it had been a breech birth and there had been complications. The child was stillborn.
Once the ambulance had driven away, bell clanging, with Ginny accompanying her sister, Julia had torn upstairs to tell her mother. Victoria’s expression was stony.
‘I heard the ambulance, so I assumed she had started.’
‘She should have another month to go yet,’ Julia shot at her. ‘She’s only eight months and it could be dangerous.’
‘She has probably miscalculated. It would be just like her.’
How could her mother remain so calm, Julia wondered. She who for years would break down in tears at the slightest provocation. ‘The doctor who examined her confirmed there’s still just over a month to go to her full term,’ Julia went on. ‘I think you should go with me to the hospital, Mummy. She’ll need you to be there.’
Her mother’s expression seemed to harden. ‘She’s nothing to do with me. She chose to get herself in this condition. I’ve washed my hands of her.’
For a moment Julia gazed at her, stunned. Then livid anger seemed to rip through her like a knife. ‘What a wicked, wicked woman you really are!’ she burst out, making her mother jump. ‘How dare you? And if she died, which she could, would that not bother you either?’
‘I’ve told you, Julia…’
But Julia wasn’t finished. ‘I never realized what an utterly selfish person you are. You’ve been weeping for years over your loss, never allowing yourself to get over it, and expecting all of us to rally round you, help you. It’s time you had a little sympathy for others.’
Before her mother could reply she rushed on, ‘She’s your daughter, no matter what she’s done. Forget yourself for once, help her! Be there for her, comfort her. Or do you not have a single loving bone in your body? If you don’t do this, Mummy, you’ll lose us all – we’ll all see you for what you are. You’ll end up friendless and spend the rest of your life alone!’
Her voice shook so much with emotion that she had to stop, but her mother had finally become subdued, making no reply.
‘So, will you come?’ Julia asked in a steadier voice.
A few minutes later Victoria was being helped into Simon’s new little Austin, bought only three weeks ago. She sat in silence the whole short distance to the hospital, either because she’d never been in a motor car before or because Julia’s words had shocked her into silence. Still without uttering a word she let herself be helped from the vehicle and up into the clanking lift to the floor Stephanie was on.
Outside the ward they were met by Ginny whose face told them that something was wrong. But before they could question her a nursing sister swished towards them, her face, grave and efficient but kind.
‘Ah, there you are! Who is the father?’ she went on, the briskness of her tone moderating as she looked directly as Simon.
Julia spoke for them, talking fast. ‘He’s out of the country and isn’t able to be here, but I’m her sister. I left a note for her brother,’ which she had done, ‘and he’ll be along later, I expect. This is her mother.’
‘Ah,’ the woman said quietly, leaving Julia to suspect that she had gleaned the circumstances surrounding this particular patient as she took in the older woman’s expression.
‘I’m afraid I have to tell you, my dear, that your daughter’s baby was stillborn. I’m so sorry. Your daughter is still very weak. She has had a very traumatic experience and will take some time to recover. I think it would be wise to recommend that she spend a few weeks in a convalescent home, if you agree. She is very low, and her body needs building up, you understand.’
Yes, they understood. Julia tried not to feel relief that Stephanie would be elsewhere for a while, for all she was shaken by the news.
She sat now by her sister’s bedside. Her mother hadn’t yet come in to see her. She was too distraught and was weeping in Ginny’s arms. But Julia could feel no sympathy for her, felt she deserved none. She had grown hard and didn’t care for the feeling it gave her.
Stephanie was asleep. When she finally awoke, Julia would compel her mother to come in and hold her hand. Maybe the contact would help things to get back to normal. Even if she never forgave her eldest daughter her way of life, at least she might forgive Stephanie and that was more important. The girl, like her mother, had lost something precious and needed a shoulder. As she was thinking these thoughts she saw her sister slowly open her eyes.
‘Hullo, Stephanie,’ Julia whispered. ‘How are you feeling?’ For answer her sister nodded sleepily, and Julia went on cautiously, ‘Has anyone told you anything about the baby?’ She half expected Stephanie to burst into great heaving sobs and feared this migh
t weaken her further.
Instead, her sister closed her eyes and said softly, ‘They said I lost it.’ There was a short pause, a deep sigh and then, ‘Just as well, I suppose.’
Julia wondered if she’d heard her right. But she had, and the shock almost robbed her of her voice. ‘You don’t mean that, Stephanie. You can’t mean that!’
She expected some emotional reaction, some display of anger, but Stephanie merely closed her eyes and mumbled, ‘I don’t want to talk just now. I just want to sleep.’
She never once mentioned the baby again, and with no one else willing to bring up the subject, it was as if she had never had a baby. To Julia it seemed totally unnatural for a mother not to feel the slightest sense of grief at the loss of her baby, even if it was illegitimate. Many a time she wondered if her sister didn’t perhaps grieve inside. If she did though, she kept it very well hidden.
After Stephanie had spent several weeks recuperating in the convalescent home, Julia expected her to return to live with their mother, with everything back to normal. She felt a great relief that the months of having to put her up in her and Simon’s room were over. She broached the subject with her mother the day before Stephanie was due to come home.
Her mother’s voice was hard. ‘She’s a grown woman. When she is better she’ll be able to find her own place.’
Shaken by the reply, Julia protested, ‘But she has no money, no job. How can she be expected to find enough to pay for somewhere to live?’
‘She’ll soon be back to normal, as bouncy as if she had never had a baby; no contrition, no shame, no hint of regret, still as trim as ever and foil of herself. She’ll soon find work.’
‘And meanwhile where is she to go?’ Julia queried acidly. ‘We can’t go on having her with us indefinitely.’
But her mother merely gave a shrug and turned away, the corners of her mouth pulled down, a reflection of how set her mind was. No matter what Julia said she would not be persuaded to have Stephanie back home or to hear any more about it.
