The Long Walk Home

by Valerie Wood

  Simon shrugged. ‘Where are you staying? I’ll come over, only not tonight. I’m busy. When are you going back?’

  It was her turn to stare at him now. ‘I’m not going back,’ she whispered. ‘There’s no one and nothing to go back to. I’ve come to stay with you, Simon. I need help.’

  Mikey could hear only half of the conversation, but he could guess by the way the girl – Eleanor, was it? – clasped her hands together and by her agitated manner that she was in some kind of trouble, and his mind raced to think of how he could help, for he had an intuition that Simon wouldn’t want to.

  ‘You can’t stay with me,’ he heard Simon say. ‘It isn’t suitable. You’ll have to go back.’

  Mikey came forward. ‘She could stay one night, Simon,’ he said. ‘Bridget is there. She’d be safe enough.’

  ‘This is nothing to do with you.’ Simon turned on Mikey with such ferocity that he was startled. ‘You don’t realize what kind of family we come from. She would be shocked at the way we live. Besides,’ he added, and his lips were surly, ‘our father might come looking for her. If Eleanor found me then it wouldn’t be difficult for him and he’s the last person I want to see.’

  ‘He won’t. He can’t.’ Eleanor’s voice trembled and Mikey took a step forward. ‘He’s in trouble, Simon. He might even be in prison.’

  ‘What?’ Simon’s face flushed with astonishment. Then he started to laugh. ‘In prison! How marvellous. How absolutely marvellous. In prison, with all the people he hates. All the villains and the petty little clerks who have had their fingers in the till.’

  ‘You’re horrid!’ Eleanor shrieked at him. ‘Have you no pity? No compassion?’

  Simon put his face close to hers. ‘No. No I haven’t! He made my life a misery. I can’t remember him ever being kind to me. Why should I think of him with anything but hatred? If you’d told me he had died I would have been pleased.’

  Eleanor had gone white. ‘I can’t believe what you’re saying. He has been strict with us, but he’s our father!’

  Simon lifted his shoulders in dismissal. ‘You’d better go home to Mama. I feel sorry for her, of course. The shame and all that. But I expect he’ll provide for her, and you. The house is safe, I suppose? You’ll both be able to live there. You just won’t be able to socialize with anyone.’

  Mikey watched them both. Simon wasn’t in the least concerned, but Eleanor looked desperate. There’s something more, he thought. Something she hasn’t yet told him.

  ‘Mama isn’t at home,’ she said in a low voice. ‘She’s left Father.’

  ‘Huh,’ he said irritably, though he looked shocked. ‘Good for her. I don’t know how she lived with him.’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ she said. ‘She had already left before Father was arrested. She has gone off with a man. They’re going to live in Canada.’

  Simon’s face turned puce; he looked like someone who had taken a vicious blow. ‘What?’ he said in a low voice. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Mama is going to live with someone else as man and wife. That’s why they’re going to another country, where no one knows them.’

  ‘My mother!’ His words were whispered, but there was underlying anger. ‘How could she? The shame of it!’ He suddenly raised his voice and there were tears in his eyes as he yelled, ‘Adulterous bitch!’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  It was nothing to do with Mikey yet he felt he had to intervene. He had seen the shocked expression on the girl’s face as she took a sudden breath and staggered as if she might fall.

  ‘Watch your language, Simon,’ he said. ‘You shouldn’t speak like that about your mother.’

  ‘Keep your nose out of it, Quinn,’ Simon snarled. ‘It’s got nothing to do with you.’

  ‘Quinn?’ Eleanor turned to Mikey, an expression of puzzlement on her face.

  ‘Yes, miss.’ In spite of himself, and the situation, Mikey couldn’t help but grin.

  ‘The rabbit boy!’ she breathed.

  ‘Yes miss,’ he said again.

  Eleanor swallowed. The boy her father had sent to jail – or at least it was because of her father that he had gone to prison. A young criminal, he had called him, who deserved to be taught a lesson, and now her father might be languishing in the same prison cell.

  ‘What?’ Simon said. ’What’s going on?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Mikey said. ‘Just that I once met your sister.’

  ‘You can’t have done.’ Simon was scathing. ‘How could she have met the likes of you?’

  Mikey stared him out. ‘I’m not in ’habit of lying, so you’ll have to tek my word for it.’

  Simon turned away from him towards his sister. ‘I can’t look after you,’ he muttered. ‘I’ve hardly enough money to keep body and soul together let alone keep you as well.’

  ‘I’ll work,’ Eleanor said in a quiet voice, but Simon laughed.

  ‘Work! You! You wouldn’t have any idea. What could you do? You’ve been sheltered all your life. You don’t know anything about the real world.’

  ‘I’m learning,’ she answered. ‘I’ve learned more in the last week than I ever knew. I thought – I thought that you’d be pleased to see me, but plainly you’re not, so I’ll leave and go back to the lodgings I was in before.’

  Simon shrugged but Mikey said quickly, ‘You could stay with us for a day or two until you think on what to do. You might be better going home,’ he added softly. ‘Staying with folks you know. There must be somebody.’

  ‘My aunt in Nottingham,’ she said on a whisper. ‘But I don’t want to go there, not whilst Mama is with—’ She stopped. How much had he heard? Did he know why Simon had berated their mother in such shocking language?

  ‘Then stay,’ he persuaded her. ‘You can share wi’ Bridget. Have you left any of your belongings at ’other place?’

  She shook her head. ‘No. I didn’t bring much with me, but I’d like to let them know where I am. The old lady was very kind to me when I didn’t have anywhere to stay.’ She looked pointedly at Simon as she emphasized that a stranger had taken her in.

  ‘Come on then,’ Mikey said decisively. ‘Cover for me, Simon. I won’t be long.’

  Simon sullenly turned away and walked back down towards the warehouse, whilst Mikey shepherded the weeping Eleanor back towards the main road.

  ‘I can understand Simon not wanting you to stop,’ Mikey told her. ‘It’s a very hard life we’re living and ’lodgings we’re at won’t be what you’re used to.’

  ‘I’ve been sleeping in a chair for the last two nights,’ she sniffed. ‘They didn’t have a spare bed, but the old lady, Aunt Marie, she’s called, said I was welcome to the chair. And her son helped me to find out where Simon might be. Someone he knew had heard of Manners.’

  ‘Had they?’ Mikey was astounded. Perhaps he was wrong after all and the company was authorized.

  She nodded. ‘Yes. Someone who used to work there but left because he felt uneasy about the set-up, as he called it.’

  Mikey was uneasy too. Tony Manners was too sure of himself, and Tully, who seemed to be involved in the business, was always taking him on one side and discussing things in whispers. Nor did Mikey like the way Tully had organized Bridget and Sam to work for him. He had managed to rescue William from Tully’s clutches, or at least he hoped he had and that William hadn’t gone to a worse fate than Sam’s.

  When Sam had told him about the two of them begging in that first year, Mikey had been angry. They weren’t begging for themselves but for Tully, who collected money from them at intervals during the day but didn’t bring them any food or drink, so that by the end of the day they were actually fainting with hunger. When the weather turned bitterly cold, Mikey saw that William was unwell; his face was pasty, his belly was swollen and he could hardly get out of bed in a morning.

  Then Mikey had remembered the Reverend gentleman in Whitechapel who had organized a soup kitchen and told him he ran a school for boys, and he determined to ta
ke Sam and William there.

  He’d whispered to Sam that he was taking them on a treat the next day, being Sunday, so they had to be up early, but not to tell the others or they would all want to come. At five thirty they rose and crept out, Mikey having to carry William as he was too weak to walk.

  It took them all morning to get there, begging lifts when they could and walking when they couldn’t, with William piggyback on Mikey, and Sam trudging determinedly beside him. They asked passers-by for directions and eventually arrived at a run-down warehouse which was filled with small boys saying prayers and singing hymns.

  They sat at the back and Sam and William looked on with interest. ‘Is this the treat?’ Sam whispered hoarsely, and when Mikey nodded he said, ‘It’s great. I like singing.’

  They stood up when the boys filed out and waited for the vicar and his wife to come towards them. Mikey reminded them of their last meeting and implored them to take the boys into their care.

  Mrs Goodhart, the vicar’s wife, gazed down on the children and gently patted William’s head. ‘This child is unwell,’ she said softly. ‘Where have you been?’

  Mikey told her that the children were begging on the streets and described the conditions in which they were living.

  ‘I remember you,’ she said. ‘You’re from the north, are you not?’

  ‘I’m from Hull,’ Mikey told her, ‘but Sam and William are from Coventry.’

  ‘This is our position,’ she told him. ‘We are inundated with poor children. Our present number is over two hundred. We teach them; we have a number of volunteers who give their time, and we give the children one meal a day.’ She cast a wistful glance at William and then at Sam and said, ‘We also have four sick children in our own home and have room for one more. I can only take the little one.’

  Sam gave a gasp and clutched William’s hand. ‘William’d fret wivout me, missus. We’ve always been together.’

  ‘Your brother is sick,’ she’d said gently. ‘You would want him to be looked after, I think? Perhaps you could continue to work, Sam, and come to see him sometimes?’

  Turning to Mikey, she said, ‘It would be better if Sam stayed with you rather than come here and take his chances sleeping rough, as the majority of the boys do. We cannot accommodate them all; neither do we have sufficient money. And there is always the chance that they will get into trouble when they are alone at night. There are so many temptations when you have nothing of your own.’

  Mikey had conferred with Sam, telling him that he would look out for him, and he could always come to him if he was bothered or distressed about anything. ‘You’re a strong lad, Sam,’ he’d said. ‘But William isn’t. Shall we give him this chance?’

  Of course Sam had said yes and bade a tearful goodbye to his brother and wept most of the way home.

  Tully was furious with Mikey, telling him what great plans he had had for the boys’ future, but Mikey didn’t believe him and advised Sam to keep some of the money he earned hidden away, which was difficult as Tully searched him every evening after coming to collect him.

  Now that Sam had turned twelve he was too old to beg, for he was tall and no longer looked childlike and innocent. Younger boys had taken his place and Tully gave Sam other jobs, fetching and carrying and running errands for him, for which, thanks to Mikey’s intervention, the boy received a very small pittance.

  ‘I’m sick of your interference, Quinn,’ Tully had told him on many occasions and Mikey often wondered why he didn’t tell him to leave, though perhaps it was because he was good at organizing the men and Tully knew that if he left, Sam and Bridget would probably leave too.

  They now had rooms in a different lodging house and Bridget was there when he arrived with Eleanor. She looked very tired and was stretched out on an old sofa. She had arrived back at the house with Tully in the early hours of the morning. Mikey had heard the waggon roll up and Bridget’s door slam, for she slept in her own room these days and not with Mikey, Simon and Sam.

  ‘Who’s this?’ she said now.

  ‘Simon’s sister,’ Mikey told her. ‘She’s come to stop for a bit.’

  ‘She’s not sharing my bed,’ Bridget said sharply. ‘She’ll have to sleep on ’floor.’

  Eleanor had given a start and Mikey was sure the last thing she would want was to share Bridget’s bed.

  ‘We’ve got a spare mattress,’ he said. ‘Is that all right, Miss Eleanor?’

  ‘Coo! Hark at you. Miss Eleanor!’ Bridget jeered. ‘I hope I’m not expected to call you that?’

  ‘Of course not!’ Eleanor stammered. ‘I don’t expect anyone to call me that.’ She glanced at Mikey and was reassured by his smile. ‘It’s very kind of you to let me stay.’

  ‘You’ll have to chip in,’ Bridget told her. ‘What do you do?’

  ‘I – I have to find employment. I’ll go tomorrow and find some kind of work to tide me over.’

  Mikey frowned. ‘I thought you were stopping until you’d decided whether or not to go home.’

  ‘No,’ Eleanor said flatly. ‘I’m staying. I can’t possibly go home.’

  The rest of the day dragged by as she waited for Simon and Mikey to come back from work. Bridget went out but didn’t ask Eleanor if she wanted to go with her. She looked round the room where they all ate and slept and wondered how her brother could live like this. There was a wooden table and four battered and wobbly chairs as well as the old sofa, and a hearth where they burned wood, but nowhere to wash except at an outside tap. The ash from the fire was heaped outside the door as it was outside every other door in the court. Much the same, she considered, as where Aunt Marie and her family lived.

  She was hungry, not having eaten that day, and so she went out looking for food. How dreadful, she thought, if you haven’t any money at all. She could appreciate poverty more now as she watched her own precious hoard evaporating. She found a shop selling bread and bought a currant loaf and a jug of milk. The shopkeeper charged her another threepence for the jug which he said he would give back when she returned it. She sat on a bollard and drank the milk straight down and devoured the currant loaf, returning the jug within minutes. The shopkeeper made no comment on its quick reappearance, but simply handed back her deposit.

  Simon barely spoke to her when he came home from work and it was left to Mikey to ask her if she’d thought any more about what she would do if she stayed, but she felt numb and shook her head. She had been so sure that Simon, who always had ideas about most things, would help her.

  What can I do, she wondered that night as she tossed on the mattress, which was only marginally more comfortable than the chair on which she had slept the two previous nights. Not a maid, for I would require references. Mama certainly wouldn’t employ anyone without a recommendation. She wept then as she thought of her mother and how she had abandoned her. She could succumb to her grief as she was alone in the room, Bridget having gone out again, tossing a remark to Mikey that she might or might not be back that night; he had looked very sour at that and told her to be careful.

  Eleanor was glad to be alone for she felt such heavy grief, not only about her mother and the shame of her father’s disgrace but over the apparent uninterest of her brother. He was more shocked and distressed by the stain on his mother’s reputation than concerned about Eleanor’s having run away from home and being alone.

  She wiped the tears which had trickled down her cheeks and took a hard swallow. Perhaps I could be a shop girl. I’ll have to try for a high-class establishment or people will start asking me who I am and where I come from. She realized that she looked and sounded different from the working people of the docklands.

  I’ll ask Bridget in the morning; she seems to be the kind of girl who gets around and might know about such things.

  But Bridget was late home and the next morning was sleeping heavily. Mikey, Simon and Sam had gone to work and Eleanor was again left with nothing to do. She let out a breath of exasperation. Come on, she told herself. No one
is going to help you. You’ll have to help yourself. She put on her coat and hat and set forth to buy more bread. She came back, cut herself two slices and ate them, then wrapped up the remains of the loaf and left it in the middle of the table. That’s my contribution, she thought. Now I’m going out to catch an omnibus and go to see Aunt Marie. I’ll ask her advice. She’ll know what I can do.

  As she put her hand on the latch a sharp rap on the door startled her. She opened it tentatively. ‘Yes?’ she said to the man who had put his foot in the door as if to come in. ‘Wh-who are you?’

  ‘Hello, my dear.’ He had a black hat on, and now lifted it to reveal long black straggly hair. ‘I was going to ask you ’same question.’ He gave a sly grin, displaying gaps in his teeth, and stepped into the room. ‘Friend of Bridget’s, are you? Where is she? Lazy gel still in bed?’

  Eleanor swallowed. ‘Yes. Yes, she is.’ Who is he, she thought, feeling apprehensive. He was a scarecrow of a man, with narrow face, a long nose and a long black coat.

  He leaned towards her and she took a step back. ‘You lookin’ for work? I could fix you up, smart young lady like you!’

  ‘No, she’s not!’ Bridget stood at the bedroom door. She wore just her shift and her hair was all over the place.

  Tully scowled. ‘Go get dressed,’ he snapped. ‘You ain’t decent. I’ve been waiting for you this last half-hour. Time is money! And who did you say you were?’ He turned again to Eleanor.

  ‘She didn’t say,’ Bridget interrupted. ‘Don’t mess with her, Tully. She’s Simon’s sister, here on a visit.’

  Tully looked thoughtful. ‘Not staying, then?’

  When Eleanor shook her head, he pinched his lips together. ‘Pity,’ he said. ‘We could do with a bit o’ class.’

  Bridget came into the room. ‘I said don’t mess wi’ her, Tully.’ Her voice was spiteful. She’d obviously taken exception to the remark. ‘She’s a pal o’ Mikey’s. He’s looking out for her.’

  ‘Is he? A pal o’ Quinn’s, eh?’ He put his hand to his chest and gave Eleanor a sweeping bow. ‘In that case I’ll bid you good day.’