With Love From Ma Maguire

by Ruth Hamilton

  Her own side of the business thrived, though the landlord had stepped in and put the rent up as soon as he heard of this new scheme. But even after she’d paid three shillings a week on top of her domestic rent, Philly had more than enough for herself, the old girl and Patrick to live on. Of course, the newly reformed Mother Blue insisted on earning her keep and she often left the baby with Edie so that she could push the handcart round the streets. The real reason for this, thought Philly, was that Mother wanted an opportunity to show off her new look, a look that was indeed original and quite startling. Apart from the wig, Mother Blue had acquired an exceptionally large set of dentures from a rag and bone man, swapped for a few old clothes and a broken metal fire-box. These terrifying teeth were on display at all times, for the simple reason that the old lady could not close her mouth when they were in position. During meals, Mother’s ‘furniture’ went into a pocket because she could manage a great deal better without it cluttering up her small mouth. At night, the offending items sat on the scullery window sill, grinning hugely in a glass of water until morning came, whereupon they would be wedged once more between permanently parted lips.

  But however odd the old soul looked, she had certainly done the business a lot of good by travelling further afield with the cart, thereby advertising Ma Maguire’s Cures over a wider field and attracting more custom to the shop. Edie, Mother and Philly had to stay up late many a night while Arthur minded the babies, so great was the demand for various tonics and potions.

  As time passed, Philly got her looks back, though she never quite regained the youthful sparkle she’d displayed before the illness. But she remained a fine-looking woman, more mature now, given less frequently to bouts of temper. In School Hill she was highly respected, while in Delia Street itself, she was undisputed queen. It seemed that her brush with death had been a mellowing experience, for she became kinder, more thoughtful and appreciative of her neighbours and clients. Yet even now, the occasional glimpse of an Irish paddy was sighted when she tackled a neglectful mother or a delinquent child. Such was her quiet power, that a mother only had to threaten a child by saying, ‘I’ll send you down to Ma’s,’ for the young person in question to hesitate and review his attitude. Yet although she was not averse to telling others how to rear their offspring, Philly’s handling of her own son continued far from perfect. For this she was universally forgiven, because had she not almost lost him at birth? And she was, at least, more reasonable now, easier to approach, more patient and forgiving.

  So it was a very surprised Delia Street that witnessed Ma Maguire’s outburst at the end of August. Both she and Freddie had worked late and were ready to close when a carriage pulled up at the door. As the mill owner climbed down on to the pavement, those who recognized him doffed caps and stood open-mouthed while he entered Skenning Freddie’s shop. Within minutes, Mr Swainbank was on the pavement again with Ma behind him, her voice gathering strength and volume as she spoke. ‘Examine your leg? And why should I be doing that when I’ve been refusing to visit the really sick? Don’t you dare come here! I’ve told you before, the servant can pick up your medicines—’

  ‘But I wanted you to have a look . . .’ He seemed amazed, almost afraid of the tall woman who pursued him relentlessly to the edge of the flags.

  ‘I don’t do treatments any more, not even for my neighbours. Except, of course, in cases of extreme emergency where a doctor cannot be afforded. You, Mr Swainbank, can afford a doctor!’

  ‘The doctor is no bloody good!’

  ‘Well, that is no fault of mine! I cannot be stopping my business just to look at your leg, sir. You have no privilege here. This is our patch – yours is down the road among all that filth and grease . . .’ Her voice began to rise even higher in pitch and those who recognized the old symptoms backed away towards their own doors. ‘See here, Mr Swainbank. See what did I save for you.’ She reached into her apron pocket and pulled out a paper package. ‘These are splinters taken by me from the feet of your child slaves. I could light the fire with them, so I could! This large one here . . .’ She held up a particularly vicious-looking item. ‘This was wedged for three weeks in the heel of a child who dared not stay at home for fear of his mother starving. In the end, he was forced to have me cut it out of him and I have never seen so much poison before.’

  He looked around at the silent crowd. ‘Do you have to make a scene?’ His voice was steely. ‘Can’t you act like a rational human being for once?’

  ‘Get out of my street! Go on!’

  It was obvious that he didn’t know what to do next. If he stayed and argued, then the town would be buzzing with the tale by midnight. If he walked away, she would have won. Aye, a slip of a mill girl would have defeated him and he would never again hold up his head among the workers.

  He decided to treat the matter lightly. ‘Very well. If you can’t accept having been sacked from the spinning room . . .’

  ‘Sacked?’ she screamed. ‘I was never sacked! I told you where to put the job after that poor child lost his finger.’

  He raised his cane and waved it at her. ‘You were insubordinate and unemployable.’ In spite of his fury, he could not help noticing how her eyes flashed, how her thick dark hair shone in the deep bronze of sunset. ‘You are a bloody menace, woman!’

  She grinned widely and nodded her head. ‘That’s right. And you need my powders, don’t you? So you still employ me in a fashion, for you buy what I make.’ She sighed loudly and raised her palms upwards in a gesture of dismay. ‘’Tis a funny old world now, is it not? There’s me unemployable and you employing me all the same. That’s a desperate strange thing.’

  He brought the cane down from the air with force, whipping it across her cheek and she stumbled towards the wall, a hand to her face. Yet a look of triumph shone from her eyes as several neighbours stepped forward. They were scared of him, right enough, but if he was going to hit Ma Maguire . . .

  ‘Well now,’ she muttered, her tone dangerously quiet. ‘Isn’t that the giddy limit? This is an offence, striking me in the street. Wouldn’t it look just great now if I got you prosecuted for such behaviour? And in front of witnesses too?’

  He backed away slowly. ‘You wouldn’t dare—’

  ‘Try me, Swainbank!’ The crowd gasped as she spat out his surname, for no-one ever addressed a mill owner in such a way, not within his hearing. ‘Hit me again and I’ll have the eyes from your head. Will I tell them the truth? Will I tell them that you were after setting me up in a cottage like you did with other mill women—’

  ‘That’s a lie!’

  ‘Oh, I know I’d never prove it, not in English law. But here, people know I never lie.’ She turned to the crowd. ‘He tried to buy me, wanted to turn me into a cheap trinket. Of course, he failed . . .’

  Swainbank stumbled up the step and into his carriage, leaning forward to peer through the side window. ‘You have made a dangerous enemy in me,’ he whispered. ‘I’ll have you punished, Ma Maguire.’

  ‘Don’t threaten me! They hear you even when you whisper. If anything happens to me, they’ll know where to send to get justice done. Away with you, Richard Swainbank! And watch your step tomorrow, because I have many friends in the mill and accidents can happen in those terrible places.’ She picked up her skirt and went back into the shop. Skenning Freddie pushed her down on to the customers’ bench. ‘You fool,’ he muttered as he examined her face. ‘We don’t cross swords with his kind.’

  ‘One day, Freddie. One day . . .’ She fought the tears, swallowing hard to stop herself screaming her frustration and anger.

  ‘One day what?’

  ‘The workers will turn on him.’

  He dabbed at her cheek with a cloth dipped in witchhazel. ‘And what will they do then for a living?’

  ‘Something . . . anything rather than bow to his likes.’

  ‘It’s a dream, Ma Maguire.’

  ‘Is it? I don’t think so, Freddie. They’re reading and writing now, learning to c
ount. All that education will make them clever, too clever to lie down under his dirty boots.’

  ‘Go home, lass. Go home . . .’

  She stood on the step and looked at the perplexed faces of those who trusted her, depended on her. Yet all she could see was the look on one man’s face, the great sadness in his eyes when she’d turned on him. Like a fish rising to bait, she had felt herself being pulled into the net he was casting in such dangerous waters. Yes, he must have been desperate to see her if he’d resorted to coming here, because this was not a safe place for him. Oh, perhaps he had wanted his leg looking at, but she wasn’t going to dance to the bosses’ tune, lose face among her own people. Yes, he could have been simply seeking treatment. But as Edie had said all that time ago, there was a lot more to this than just a flaming sore leg.

  Without a word to anyone, she held up her head and strode the length of the street where Edie waited to drag her into the house.

  ‘Where’s Mother?’ asked Philly, trying to keep her voice even.

  ‘Out. She’s took the big pram with one at each end. I kept them out of bed with it being warmish, thought a late walk would do them good. Sit yourself down, you’re as white as a sheet – except for that stripe he gave you.’

  Philly put a hand to her burning cheek. ‘Great fool of a man! What does he want to come here for? I’ve no time to be stopping just to look at his precious leg—’

  ‘Philly?’

  ‘What?’

  Edie took a deep breath, her head shaking slowly from side to side. ‘I never had no sisters or brothers, ’cos me mam died having me and me dad popped off a few years back with the drink. So I’ve never been close to nobody ’cepting you.’ She paused as if deep in thought. ‘He was all right, me dad – when he was sober – but he put Arthur off the bottle for good, made him feel he had to go down the mission and sign the pledge. I’ve never really had a family apart from Arthur and Molly. Till you, Philly. It’s like I’ve known you all me life, like as if we was raised together.’ She plucked at her white apron, her face pink with embarrassment. ‘I love thee, lass, like I’d love a sister – and I know what you’re thinking and feeling a lot of the time. Oh, I know you’re a deep one, but it’s plain to me that you love that man—’

  ‘Edie!’

  ‘You can’t help it, Philly! You can’t stuff your feelings in a box and put the lid on them! I mean, look at me dad. A right tearaway, he was, somebody to be ashamed of most of the time. But I loved him.’

  ‘He was your father—’

  ‘He was a drunk. There was times he beat me, times we had nowt to eat with him supping the lot. I never hardly went out, for I’d nothing to wear. He was not a good man, Philly. And I worshipped the flags he stood up on. When he could stand up, like. Yet all the while, part of me hated him so much . . . ooh, I could have killed him some days. Love’s like that, Philly. What you feel for that man, all that hate . . . it’s part of it, don’t you see? You care about him—’

  ‘I don’t! Except as a good Catholic woman who’d care about any soul damned to perdition. I do not love him, Edie!’

  ‘Aye well. He certainly gets you going, same as I’ve said before. And there’s more to it than anger, a lot more. Why the hell do you think you said all that in the street, all that about him offering to set you up? It were nowt to do with shaming him, Philly Maguire! That were so’s you’d keep yourself safe, stop being tempted by him. I might not be a particular clever woman, but I know what I see and I speak as I find. There’s torment in your soul, love. He wants you and you want him. And you can’t have one another.’

  The two women stared across the space between them in silence for several moments.

  ‘Don’t worry, lass,’ said Edie finally. ‘The secret’s safe with me. And you know what? Part of me envies you, even if I have got the best husband in the world, ’cos I’ve never felt what you’re feeling now. Nobody ever made me so angry, nobody ever made me so alive.’

  ‘Even your father?’

  ‘That were different. With Arthur, there’s just been safety and kindness – I don’t think we’ve ever had a real row. Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t swap him for any man, but there’s never been a lot of . . . fire. You might not be able to feed your fire, but at least it’s been lit.’

  ‘I never asked for it. I never wanted . . . all that. It’s confusing, Edie, because I hate him for what he does to people, for his . . . arrogance towards ordinary folk. But there’s . . . oh, I don’t know . . .’

  ‘Something about him? Something you can’t put your finger on?’

  ‘Fire burns fingers. Fire’s a destructive thing. I don’t want to get consumed by it, Edie. I’ll put it out if it takes every bucket of water in the town and all my life . . .’

  ‘And I reckon it might, lass. Aye, I reckon it just might.’

  Chapter 3

  1910

  Paddy Maguire hated school from the very first day. For a start, he was expected to work and work was something which held little appeal for him. And he was forced to be obedient, because if he misbehaved the punishment was swift and severe. At the beginning, in the baby’s class, he would run home and tell everything to his mam, who would then take time off from the shop to come up and raise Cain with the teachers. She was great at that. If anybody laid so much as a finger on him, the classroom door would be flung open and there she would stand, hands on hips, eyes darting venom at the unfortunate soul who had dared to whip her precious son.

  But after a while, this had to stop. For one thing, the other children started to laugh at him and for another, his mam got wise after a session with the headmistress, a terrible woman with a passion for catechism and the ten commandments. When, after well over a year at school, Paddy had learned none of his religious lists, Sister Concepta sent for his mother and told her straight that the lad was idle, shiftless and sinful. At about this time, Mam started to treat him differently, nagging him gently about his lessons, making him recite things at home and generally siding with the school.

  He was fed up. The other children stopped calling him ‘mother’s little lad’ and chanted ‘dunce’ after him in the street, so he pulled up his socks and learned to read in a week. Within a month he had won two catechism prizes and a medal off the priest for knowing his commandments. So, having shown his hand thus far, he decided to hang for a sheep and, after discarding the many layers his mother forced her ‘weakly’ boy to wear, he came first in the flat race, third in the hurdles and would have won the three-legged as well if his partner had shown a bit of sense.

  Philly knelt nightly before her statue of the Virgin, a smile of thanks on her lips, a prayer of absolute gratitude in her heart. The boy was well at last. Hadn’t he won all the races and learned his lessons, wouldn’t he make a fine man? It had still not occurred to her that Patrick was simply taking the line of least resistance, that he would continue to do as he was told as long as it suited his needs, not one moment longer.

  The main source of trouble with the two children was Molly, which surprised both women immensely. She had been a biddable baby, a sweet and charming child with a nature as sunny as a long midsummer day. But now she was suddenly a rebel, both clogs dug well in every morning because for the first time since birth, she and Paddy were separated by their schooling. Everyone said she would ‘get used in time’, but few had made room in their calculations for Molly’s sheer determination. Time after time she escaped from the chapel school, walked the length of a main road and charged into Paddy’s classroom. If he could go to the Catholic school, then so could she.

  In the end, Arthur, a dedicated chapel man, decided to look into it. He had no real prejudices and was quite willing to allow Molly her way, but Edie stepped in. ‘You’re what? You’re letting her go to St Peter’s? Whatever for?’

  ‘Because she wants to. They said she can stop out of the religious lessons, though I don’t mind if she—’

  ‘Arthur Dobson! We’ve never crossed swords before, but we shall now.�
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  ‘But why? What’s wrong with her going to the same school as her little friend? They’ve never been apart before. Have a heart, Edie.’

  She folded her arms beneath the ample bosom and raised her eyes to heaven as if seeking divine assistance in the face of such stupidity. ‘Look, Arthur. That there lad has had his own road since birth. She’s happen cottoned on to it, thinks she can do the same by creating. Well, she can’t. I won’t have her spoiled like him, that I won’t. Little upstart, thinking she can have her own road by throwing the odd tantrum and shutting herself upstairs.’

  ‘Nay, Edie—’

  ‘Look. If she’d been a lad, I’d likely have tanned her backside before this. That’s my daughter, Arthur. I’m the mother, I’m the one as has to see to her. If we’d had a son instead, then happen you would have had more of a say. But girls is a mother’s responsibility and I’m seeing to it that she grows up decent and with a bit of respect for what’s asked of her. She will not go to the Catholic school. Not that I’ve owt against them, only you’re chapel and I’m not bloody bothered.’ She held up a hand. ‘And don’t start on about me swearing – if I were going to reform, I’d have done it a while back.’

  He sank into the wooden rocker under the window, hands folded together as if in prayer. ‘She’s unhappy, lass.’

  Edie strode across the room and banged the teapot on to its stand. ‘Unhappy? Unhappy’s a thing she’ll have to get used to. What’s down for her, Arthur? A bit of reading and writing followed by years in a mill then kids of her own to worry about. It’s a matter of discipline, I think they call it. Sooner she learns, the better for her.’

  ‘And you won’t budge?’

  ‘That I won’t!’

  Molly crept out through the back door and shut herself in the new tippler netty, tears of fury just about held back by gritting her teeth hard. Mam didn’t love her. If Mam loved her, she’d let her go to school with Paddy and all them nuns, so important they looked in their long black frocks and veils. And she’d be able to go into the church on holy days, look at the stained-glass windows and listen to the singing. Her own church was boring, just a bare room, songs about Jesus and picture slides showing drunk men coming home to hit their wives and babies. No statues, no nice smelly stuff in a big tin hung on chains, no feller in a long frock at the front giving out round bits of bread. There was little excitement at the chapel, just a bloke carrying on about drinking and smoking, as if she cared.