‘Yes.’
‘Well, somehow, I don’t think you’re wide enough awake to appreciate it at this minute.’
‘You don’t?’
‘No, I don’t, lass, so I’m gona leave it, because I want it to do you credit, an’ I want you to do it credit. Do you see what I mean?’
She smiled gently at him as she said, ‘Not…not quite, Sep.’
‘No, no, lass, you’re too tired. Well, things’ll be different this time the morrow night. You have an easy day of it the morrow; you take Lucy out and go have a look round the shops and walk down to the sands, it’ll do you good. Then put your best frock on the morrow night, and after you’ve sent Lucy up to bed early on I’ll show you what I’ve got for you. It’s the prettiest thing.’ He shook his head slowly as if he was seeing something in his mind’s eye. You know, Emily, I didn’t realise that I had a taste for bonny things. It’s come on me gradually, sort of seeped into me that I like to own things, not big things like furniture, and stuff, but small things, precious things, and’—he put his arm out now and grabbed her round the waist - ‘an’ things like you. Oh aye, you’re the most precious thing I’ve ever seen in me life. Aw, Emily, can you guess how happy you’ve made me, an’ how happy you’re going to make me? This last few days I’ve realised I haven’t lived, not really. I haven’t had anything out of life that’s really been good. Aw’—he jerked his head now as he hugged her to him—‘there’s good an’ good. That lot of ranters, they would class themselves as being good, but that isn’t the good I mean. You know what I mean, don’t you?’
‘Aye, Sep.’
‘You know the little book I gave you out of the secret drawer? Well, the line in that bit of poetry keeps sticking in me mind, an’ you know, it gets truer every day. How does it go? Existence is the time it takes for the shingle to be wet.’
Existence is the time it takes for the shingle to be wet.
He shook his head slowly.
‘You know, Emily, there’s a lot in that, a tremendous lot, in fact there’s everything in it. A whole life is over in just the time it takes for a wave to wet the shingle. Whoever wrote that must have thought long an’ deep. Don’t you think so?’
‘Yes, Sep.’
‘Aw, lass, I see you’re dropping on your feet. Go on, up to bed, but afore you go give us a kiss.’
He pulled her onto his knee and, his arms tightly about her now, he kissed her, and the smell of beer wafted up her nostrils. But, as she had said, she wanted nothing on tick and so she kissed him back. Then she did a strange thing, she thought it strange even at the moment but it was to seem much stranger still when she thought of it later in life, for having reached the door at the bottom of the stairs she ran back to him and, flinging her arms around his neck, she pressed her lips tightly to his, even indecently, she imagined. And such was his pleasure and surprise that there was moisture in his eyes as he watched her turn and hurry towards the staircase door and disappear behind it.
Six
It was quarter to nine the next morning when Jack knocked on the back door, and when Emily opened it he looked at her apologetically and said below his breath, ‘I had to come, me ma sent me.’
‘What is it?’ she asked quietly.
‘She says you’ve got to send Lucy back or she’ll have the pollis on you.’
‘Does she? Well, you go back an’ tell her to get the pollis right away ’cos if she doesn’t I will. Then I’ll let them see what her lodger has done to our Lucy. An’ you tell her from me that when she went out she knew what would happen to our Lucy. She went out on purpose, and undoubtedly was well paid for it, you tell her that from me. Now remember every word I’ve said, Jack.’
When he stood staring at her, she said, ‘Is there anything more?’
‘Aye, but…but she didn’t tell me to say this, but I think you’d better know, Emily. Tim Pearsley says he’ll get you for what you did to him last night.’
She swallowed deeply before she said, ‘Will he? Well, I’m goin’ to tell you something, Jack. I’d do it again and more if he comes within arm’s length of me.’ Her voice dropping now, she asked, ‘Did I cut him bad?’
He nodded at her. ‘Me ma said you could have taken his eye out.’
‘It’s a pity I didn’t.’ She sounded at this moment braver than she felt for she was thinking, Eeh, if I had!
‘I thought I’d better tell you, Emily, ’cos…’cos he means it. He’s a nasty piece of work, I don’t like him, no more than you did.’ Then he added, ‘I’ll have to be away else I’ll be late for school.’
‘Wait a minute.’
Hurrying back into the kitchen she took tuppence from the housekeeping tin that stood on the end of the mantelpiece, and when she put it into his hand, he said, ‘Eeh! Ta, thanks, Emily,’ then backing from her, he said, ‘Ta-rah then,’ but paused a moment before turning to run down the backyard and said, ‘You’ll look out for him, won’t you?’
‘Don’t you worry about me, Jack. An’ thanks for comin’. Go on now.’
Having closed the door and returned to the kitchen she stood near the table nodding to herself. Let him try anything an’ I’ll go straight to the pollis. Or Sep will see to him, aye, he will. He said he would this morning afore he went out. ‘Don’t you worry about Lucy,’ he said. ‘You’ll have no more trouble from that dirty swine, I’ll see to that. I’ve got a bit of power in the docks you know. At least at my end, what I say goes, and if there’s anybody questions it I just go to the dock office and I see the boss. Him and me get on well together. He knows I do a good job, an’ I’m a fair man, so don’t you worry any more about that dirty bas…devil.’
But she did worry about him; he stayed in her mind all the morning, putting a weight on her spirit. Her biggest worry had been Lucy, and now that should be over for hadn’t she sent Lucy out to school this morning from this very house looking happier than she had seen her in her life before. So let Tim Pearsley start anything, just let him …
Sep usually came in for his dinner between ten past and quarter past twelve. She had made a pot pie for him. He loved pot pie; he could eat a whole one himself with a pound of steak and kidney in it and the top crust as well.
She gave Lucy a portion of the pie together with potatoes and cabbage when she came in from school.
At half past twelve when Sep still hadn’t arrived she opened the oven and placed a large basin over the plate on which lay more than half of the pudding. Then standing gazing towards the kitchen window that looked onto the yard she muttered aloud, ‘It’ll be as dry as sticks if he doesn’t hurry up.’
At one o’clock she was sitting alone staring out of the window, her hands gripped tightly in her lap. Something was up, something had happened; in the usual way he’d be back at work now. She felt sick. She had told herself that he might be working through; sometimes when the boats had to be turned round quickly, especially the iron-ore boats that came from Bilbao, they did a double shift and worked right through the night. But he would have let her know; he always did. He would send one of the dock lads with a message and a request for some bait.
She was still sitting with her eyes fixed on the window when there came a knock on the front door and she swung round so quickly that she ricked her neck.
When she opened the door and saw a man in a blue serge suit and a white shirt and high starched collar, and by his side a uniformed man whom she knew to be a dock policeman, she gasped, opened her mouth wide, then closed it, but didn’t utter a word.
‘Can we come in a minute?’ It was the man in the blue serge suit who had spoken, and she pulled the door wider and let them into the front room, where they stood now looking at her. And again it was the man in the blue serge suit who spoke. ‘I…I take it you’re Mr McGillby’s housekeeper?’ he said.
She moved her head once, her eyes never leaving his face.
‘Well, I’m afraid we’ve…we’ve got bad news for you, lass.’
She swallowed deeply in her throat, then gri
pped it with her hand, but still she didn’t speak.
‘There’s been an accident on one of the boats. A sling of props gave way. One of them…well, it caught Mr McGillby on the back of the neck and he went over the side. He…he wasn’t drowned, it was the blow, sort of a million to one chance. Props, well, props are falling every day, men get knocked out with them, but…but this one, well…it broke his neck.’
She didn’t know how she had arrived in the kitchen. She was again sitting on the chair that was facing the window and it was the policeman now who was talking. He was saying, ‘There now, there now, you’re all right.’
She stared up at him. She wanted to say something. Her thoughts were jumping one over the other, and one, jumping higher than the rest, caused her to gasp and choke as she said, ‘He…he didn’t work…on…on the prop boats.’
‘No, lass, we know that, we haven’t got to the bottom of it yet. He had gone to see somebody, I understand, on one of the boats just afore knocking off time. We’ve got to go into it. Nobody seemed to know what really happened. The buzzer had gone and they were all making for the dock gates. The last men to see him said he was talking to a chap called Pearsley, and they know nothing more after that but that the sling must have given way.’
She heard herself give a loud cry, then she saw the floor come up and hit her.
It was the policeman again whom she saw when she opened her eyes. She was lying full length on the mat now, but it was the man in the serge suit who said, ‘Take a drink of this, lass.’
A few minutes later she was once more sitting on the chair. Her body was trembling from head to foot, and her mind was repeating one name, Pearsley, Pearsley, Pearsley.
It was right then, Jack’s warning. He said he would get her, and as the saying went, there were more ways than one of killing a cat. He had killed Sep. Oh no! No! No, Sep couldn’t be dead; it was impossible. She had seen him go out of that door at six o’clock this morning. She had put his breakfast bait into his hand and he had kissed her.
‘Who is Mr McGillby’s nearest relative?’
‘What?’ Her head was back on her shoulders, her mouth was open and she gazed up at the man.
‘Who is his nearest relative? Do you know?’
‘He…he has a sister. She lives in Dock Street—a Mrs Blackmore. That’s the only one I think.’
‘She’ll have to be informed. Have you anybody who can come and stay with you?’
‘No, no, I don’t want anybody.’
‘Well, we’ll have to leave you now, lass, there’s things to be seen to.’
Suddenly she was gripping the policeman’s arm. ‘But where is he? Where have they put him?’
‘They took him to hospital but…but they couldn’t do anything. He’s in the mortuary there.’
She moved her head slowly. She couldn’t take it in, she couldn’t believe it; and what was more strange still, she wasn’t crying. She couldn’t cry, her whole body seemed to be frozen, numb.
‘We’ll have to go now, lass. Sure you’ll be all right?’
She moved her head once and as they went towards the front room the man in the blue serge suit turned and said, ‘We’ll inform his sister. She’ll come along and see you, lass.’
She didn’t nod now, she just stared at them. Sep hadn’t liked his sister, he had hated his sister, he had never invited her to the funeral, nor would he let her in that day to the tea. He had said that she was a no good, lying, slovenly bitch and nothing more than a dock whore; he had actually said that about her. And now she would come and take over.
An only relative.
The house, everything, everything that had been Sep’s would be hers.
She stood up and supported herself against the kitchen table, her hands behind her. She pressed her buttocks tight against it as she gripped the edge. This beautiful house, this house that she loved, and every stick in it, this house that she had looked after for years. She could hardly remember a time when she had lived in Creador Street, even when she had lived there she had dreamt about this house at nights, about being able to work full-time in it. And then lately she had known that it was hers. Sep in a way had already given it to her; she was to be married to Sep. It was hers.
No, no, it wasn’t. She turned slowly now and pressed the flat of her hands on the table and bent over it. She wasn’t married to Sep; as the man had said, she was his housekeeper. She couldn’t claim stick or stone in it. But did it matter? Did it matter now that Sep was dead?
And why had Sep died? That’s what she should be asking herself. He had died because of her really. If she hadn’t hit Tim Pearsley with that poker Sep would never have gone for him.
Yes, yes, he would. It was the marks on Lucy that had made him angry…Lucy. If it hadn’t been for Lucy, Sep would be alive. If she hadn’t insisted on bringing Lucy here…But if she hadn’t what would have happened to Lucy? Oh dear God! Her mind was in a whirl, what was she going to do? Oh Sep. Sep. Suddenly she had a deep overwhelming longing for him, she wanted to feel the toughness of his arms, the hardness of his chest, to put her face against his neck. She had felt a certain kind of security when she had put her face against his neck and he placed his hand on her hair.
What was she to do now? Would that woman turn her out?
Of course she would turn her out.
No, no, she wouldn’t; she wouldn’t be as bad as that.
‘Don’t be so daft: of course she’ll turn you out.’
She was speaking aloud, even shouting. She put her hand over her mouth. She felt she was going funny, mad. Where would she go? What would she do? How much money had she? She had nearly twenty-five shillings of her own saved up; after giving the shilling to Alice Broughton she hadn’t touched the one and sixpence since Sep had raised her wages. Then there was the odd half-crown he had slipped her now and again to go and buy herself something on a Saturday morning. She never had, she had saved it. But she had never skimped the housekeeping to save anything for herself.
The housekeeping! She took down the tin from the mantelpiece. There was six and elevenpence in it. This was the accumulated residue of weeks. She paused a moment before taking the money out and thrusting it into her apron pocket; then she went into the front room and stood in front of the bureau. There was money in there in the secret drawer, a lot of money. The rings and things had likely gone to help buy that present for her. And he had bought it last night, and she would have got it if it hadn’t have been for the do over Lucy. But she was to have had it tonight. Make yourself bonny, he had said, because it’s a bonny piece. What was it?
She could open the drawer now and have a look. But what if she came in, that woman, and saw the top open?
Go on, open it, now, quick!
It was as she actually obeyed the inner command and pulled open the drawer with the intention of pressing the button that she heard the latch of the back door being lifted, and she banged the little drawer closed, pulled down the lid of the desk and was at the entrance to the kitchen when Jessie Blackmore entered the room.
Emily saw immediately what she was up against, for the woman was actually bristling with triumph; it came over in her voice which was high and almost a screech, as she cried, ‘Well now, well now, I can see you’ve heard, an’ so you know your number’s up, don’t you, miss? An’ not afore time, ’cos only death would have opened our Sep’s eyes to you. And he’s gone, hasn’t he? I’m no hypocrite.’ She now tossed her head from side to side. ‘Nobody’ll say that Jessie Blackmore is a hypocrite. There was never no love lost ’tween him and me, but I’m his only living relative. That’s what the pollis said an’ the boss from the docks. “You, Mrs Blackmore, are Mr McGillby’s only living relative, and the young lass has taken things badly. You’d better get yourself along there,” he said, “an’ take charge. There’ll be papers and things to see to. Like a will perhaps.” Or’—she now nodded her head deeply—‘no will. Well, in the meantime I’m takin’ charge an’ you know what you can do, miss.’
‘No, you don’t need me to tell you anything, you know everything, everything there is to know about ensnaring a man. The whole town’s been talkin’ about you and him.’
‘We were going to be married.’
‘Huh! Listen to her. How old are you? Sixteen, if that, and him old enough to be your da. You were going to be married? Huh! That’s a laugh…’
‘We were, we were. As soon as I reached seventeen, we were. And nobody could say anything about us because there was nothing to say.’
‘If you told that to the cat it would scratch your eyes out…Who do you think you’re kiddin’? Livin’ here with him all these months by yourself and his wife an invalid and not being able to give him anythin’ for years…Nothin’ atween you? You’ve got a nerve even to look me straight in the face when you’re sayin’ it. Well now’—she made a deep obeisance with her head, at the same time pulling her coat off and throwing it across a chair—‘we’ll set you on your way; we’ll see you get packed and take only what’s yours.’
Emily had the urge to take her hand and slap the woman across the mouth but she knew if she did what would happen. A woman such as Jessie Blackmore would tear the hair from her head in handfuls; she had seen her like fighting in the docks, women rolling in the gutter joined together, their hands entwined in each other’s hair like the entangled horns of wild animals. She had seen a picture of animals like that once in a school book.
Slowly now she looked around the kitchen, not bidding it a last farewell but to see if there was anything of hers lying about. Then she went past the woman into the scullery and took her coarse apron from behind the door. It was a hessian apron she used when scrubbing the scullery and the lavatory outside. She had sewn two pieces of felt on it to act as kneecaps. Slowly she rolled it up, and as slowly returned to the kitchen, opened the staircase door and mounted the stairs; and Jessie Blackmore came close behind her.
The Tide of Life Page 7
