Mary Ann's Angels

by Catherine Cookson

  Rose Mary stared up into Miss Plum’s face. Then she looked at David, and David looked at her. Whereupon David, after a moment, turned his gaze towards Miss Plum again and made a sound that was much too loud for church. The sound might have been interpreted as, ‘Gert yer!’ But, of course, David never said any such thing. He just made a sound of protest, but it was enough to put Miss Plum into action. In one swift movement she unloosened his fingers from the end of the pew and, inserting both her hands under his armpits, she whisked him across the aisle, plonked him none too gently on the wooden pew, then sat down beside him.

  David made no more protesting sounds. He gazed up at the straight profile of his teacher, stared at her for a moment with his mouth open, then bent forward, to see beyond her waist, to find out what Rose Mary was up to in all this. He was now further surprised to see his sister, miles away from him, kneeling, with her chin on the pew rail staring towards the high altar. His brows gathered, the corners of his eyes puckered up. He was very puzzled. Rose Mary wasn’t doing anything. He gave a wriggle with his bottom to bring him farther forward, when a hand, that almost covered the whole of his chest, pushed him backwards on the seat, making him overbalance and bump his head and bring his legs abruptly up to his eye level.

  When Rose Mary, from the corner of her eye, saw Miss Plum push their David and knock his head against the pew, she almost jumped up and shouted out loud, but, being in church, she had to restrain her actions and content herself with her thoughts. She hated Miss Plum, she did, she did. And David wouldn’t know anything about the mass. He wouldn’t understand what Father Carey was saying, and he wouldn’t be able to sing the hymn inside hisself like he did when he was with her…Wait till she got home, she would tell her dad about Miss Plum. Just wait. She would get him to come to the school the morrow and let her have it. Plum, Plum, Plum. She hoped a big plum stone would stick in her gullet and she would die. She did, she did. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

  Father Carey was kneeling on the altar steps. ‘Our Father Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.’ She had taken their David across there all because of Annabel Morton, ’cos last Sunday when Annabel Morton had punched their David under her coat so nobody could see, David had kicked her and made her shout out…‘An’ forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us.’ Miss Plum had blamed her and she wouldn’t believe about Annabel Morton punching David and she had been nasty all the week. Oh, she did hate Miss Plum. Their poor David havin’ to sit there all by hisself, all through the mass, and it would go on for hours and hours. Father Carey was talking slow, he was taking his time, he always did. ‘I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth.’ If her dad wouldn’t come down and go for Miss Plum the morrow she knew who would. Her Grandad Shaughnessy would. He would soon tell her where she got off. Yes, that’s who would give it to her, her Grandad Shaughnessy. ‘I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church.’ And Father Carey would likely go on about the Holy Ghost and the Trinity this morning; when he started his sermon he forgot to stop, although he made you laugh at times. Oh, she wished the mass was over. She slanted her eyes to the left, but she couldn’t see anything, only the bowed heads of the other three girls who were filling up the pew now. If she raised her chin and stuck it on the armrest she had a view of Miss Plum, but there was no sign of David. Poor David was somewhere down on the kneeler yon side of Miss Plum. Well, it would serve Miss Plum right if he started to scream.

  Rose Mary brought her head slowly forward and she looked to where the priest was mounting the steps towards the altar. But she wasn’t interested at all in what Father Carey was doing, for forming a big question mark in her mind was the word WHY?…WHY?…Why hadn’t he screamed? Why wasn’t their David screaming? He always screamed when he was separated from her. Perhaps Miss Plum was holding his mouth.

  She jerked round so quickly in the direction of her teacher that she overbalanced and fell across the calves of the girl next to her.

  When a hand came down and righted her more quickly than she had fallen, she caught a fleeting glimpse of its owner, and now, staring wide-eyed towards the altar again, she wondered how on earth Miss Watson had got behind her. Miss Watson was the headmistress. Miss Watson usually sat at the back of the church in solitary state.

  As the mass went on the awful thought of Miss Watson behind her kept Rose Mary’s gaze fixed on the altar, except when she was getting on or off her seat to stand or kneel, when her head would accidentally turn to the left. But she might as well have kept it straight, for all she could see past the bodies of her schoolmates was the tall, full figure of Miss Plum. No sight, and what was more puzzling still, no sound of their David …

  The mass over at last, Rose Mary came out of the pew in line with the others, genuflected deeply, then looked towards Miss Plum. But Miss Plum’s profile was cast in marble, in fact her whole body seemed stone-like. A push from behind and Rose Mary was forced to go up the aisle, and she daren’t look round, for there at the top stood Miss Watson. She bowed her head as she passed Miss Watson as if she, too, demanded adoration.

  Outside, she waited, her eyes glued on the church door. All the girls had come out first, and now came the boys…but not their David, and not Miss Plum. The grown-ups appeared in a long straggling line, and among them was Miss Watson, but still no sign of Miss Plum. Rose Mary could stand it no longer. Sidling back into the church, she looked down the aisle, and there, standing next to Miss Plum and opposite Father Carey, was their David, looking as if nothing had happened. The priest was smiling, and Miss Plum was smiling, and they were talking in whispers. When they turned, David turned, and they all came up the aisle towards her. And when they reached her Miss Plum looked down on her and said, ‘David’s been a very good boy, and he’s going to sit with me every Sunday.’

  Rose Mary sent a sweeping glance from Miss Plum to David, then from David to Father Carey, and back to Miss Plum. She was opening her mouth to protest when the priest said, ‘Isn’t that a great favour, David, eh?’ He had his hand on David’s head. ‘Sitting next to your teacher. My, my. Everybody else in the class will be jealous.’ He now looked at Miss Plum, and Miss Plum at him, and they smiled at each other. And then Miss Plum said, ‘Goodbye, Father.’ She said it like Annabel Morton said things when she was sucking up to somebody. Then she went out of the church.

  Rose Mary, now grasping David’s hand, looked at the priest, and said softly, ‘Father.’

  ‘Yes, Rose Mary.’ He bent his head towards her.

  ‘Father, our David doesn’t like being by hisself.’

  ‘But he hasn’t been by his—himself, he’s been sitting next to Miss Plum, and liked it.’

  ‘He doesn’t like it, Father.’

  ‘Now, now, Rose Mary. David’s getting a big boy and he must sit with the big boys, mustn’t you, David?’ The young priest turned towards David, and David grinned at him.

  Rose Mary contemplated the priest. She liked Father Carey, she did, he was lovely, but he just didn’t understand the situation. She now jerked her chin up towards him, and whispered, ‘Father.’ The word was in the form of a request that he should lend her his ear, and this he did, literally putting it near her mouth, and what he heard was, ‘He can’t talk without me, Father.’

  Now it was Rose Mary’s turn to lend him her ear and into it he whispered, ‘But he doesn’t talk now, Rose Mary.’

  Now the exchange was made again, and what he heard this time was, ‘He does to me, Father.’

  Again a movement of heads and a whisper, ‘But we want him to talk to everybody, don’t we, Rose Mary?’

  ‘Yes, Father…oh yes, Father. But…’

  The priest whisked his ear away, straightened up and said, ‘We’ll have to pray to Our Lady about it.’

  ‘But I have, Father, an’ she hasn’t done anything…Perhaps if you asked her, Father.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’ll ask her.’ Father Carey drew his finger
s down his nose.

  ‘When?’ She could talk now quite openly because their David didn’t know what it was all about.

  ‘Oh, at mass in the morning.’

  ‘The first mass, Father?’

  Father Carey’s eyebrows moved slightly upwards and he hesitated slightly before saying, ‘Yes. Yes, the first mass.’

  ‘Could you make it the half past eight one, Father?’

  The priest’s eyebrows rose farther; then his head dropped forward as if he was tired, and he looked at Rose Mary for a moment before saying slowly, ‘Well, if you would like it that way, all right. Yes, I’ll do it at the second mass.’

  ‘Thank you, Father.’ She bestowed on him her nice smile, the one that had earned the unwarranted title of angelic, then she finished: ‘An’ now we’d better get home, ’cos me mam worries if we’re late. We’ll have to run, I think.’

  ‘That’s it, run along. Goodbye, David.’ The priest patted David’s head. ‘Goodbye, Rose Mary.’ He chucked her under the chin; then with a hand on each of them he pressed them towards the church door, and then for a moment he watched them running down the street, and he shook his head as he thought, Dear, dear. It was as Miss Plum said, she had her work cut out with that little lady. It was also true that the boy would make little progress as long as he had a mouthpiece in his sister. And what a mouthpiece, she’d talk the hind leg off a donkey. He re-entered the church, laughing.

  Rose Mary walked down the street and away from the church in silence, and the unusualness of this procedure caused David to trip over his feet as he gazed at his sister instead of looking where he was going. Then of a sudden, he was pulled to a stop, and Rose Mary, bending towards him, said under her breath, ‘Father Carey’s going to tell Our Lady to ask God to make you speak the morrow mornin’, he’s goin’ to tell her at the half past eight. And you will, won’t you, David?’

  David’s eyes darkened, and shone, his smile widened and he nodded his head once.

  Rose Mary sighed. Then she, too, smiled. That was that then. Everything was taken care of. If things went right he should be talking just when they reached their classroom.

  Getting on the bus, Rose Mary reminded David, in no small voice now, that it being Sunday they’d have Yorkshire pudding and if he liked he could have his with milk and sugar before his dinner; then she went on to explain what there would be for the dinner, not forgetting to pay stress on the delectability of the pudding. Following this she gave him a description of what there was likely to be for tea at Gran Shaughnessy’s. By the time they alighted from the bus the other occupants had no doubt in their minds but that Rose Mary and David Boyle had a mother who was a wonderful cook, a father who could supply unstintingly the necessities to further his wife’s art and grandparents who apparently lived like lords. And this was as it should be, otherwise she would have indeed wasted her breath.

  Chapter Three

  Lizzie Shaughnessy looked at her daughter from under her lowered lids. When they were alone like this it was always hard to believe that her Mary Ann was a married woman and the mother of twins, for she still looked so young and childlike herself. It was her small stature that tended towards this impression, she thought.

  Lizzie knew that her daughter was worried and she was waiting for her to unburden herself, and she knew the substance of her worry: it was the child. She joined on another ounce of wool to her knitting, then said, ‘Do you know what they’re going to do with Peter?’

  ‘Send him to boarding school,’ Mary Ann said.

  Lizzie slowly put her knitting onto her lap and, turning her head right round to Mary Ann, said, ‘Who told you?’

  ‘Nobody, but I guessed it would come. I remember years ago Tony saying that Mr Lord had a school all mapped out for the boy.’

  ‘But neither Tony nor Lettice wants to send him away to school.’

  ‘I know that, but he’ll go all the same; they’ll send him because that’s what Mr Lord wants. He always gets what he wants.’

  ‘Not always,’ said Lizzie quietly. And to this Mary Ann made no rejoinder, for she knew that one of the great disappointments in her mother’s life, and Mr Lord’s, was when his grandson and herself hadn’t made a match of it.

  ‘The old man will be the one who will miss him most,’ Lizzie went on. ‘But it amazes me that he can put up with the boy; he’s so noisy and boisterous and he never stops talking…’

  Mary Ann got up from her chair and walked to the sitting-room window, and Lizzie said softly, ‘I’m sorry, I wasn’t meaning to make comparisons. You know that, oh you know that.’

  ‘Of course I do, Ma.’ Mary Ann looked at her mother over her shoulder. ‘It’s all right. Don’t be silly; I didn’t take it to myself, it’s just that…’ She spread out her hands, and then came back to her seat and sat down before ending, ‘I just can’t understand it. He’s not deaf, he’s certainly not dim, and yet he can’t talk.’

  ‘He will. Be patient, he will…You…you wouldn’t consider leaving him with us?’

  ‘Corny’s been at you, hasn’t he?’

  ‘No. No.’ Lizzie shook her head vigorously.

  ‘Oh, don’t tell me, Ma. I bet my bottom dollar he has. He thinks that if they were separated, even for a short time, it would make David talk. It wouldn’t. And Rose Mary wouldn’t be able to bear it. Neither would David, they’re inseparable. At any rate, the doctor himself said it wouldn’t be any use separating them.’

  ‘You could give it a trial.’ Lizzie had her eyes fixed on her knitting now.

  ‘No, Ma, no. I wouldn’t have one worry then, I’d have two, for I just don’t know what the effect would be on Rose Mary, because she just lives and breathes for that boy.’

  ‘Yes, that’s your trouble.’ Lizzie was now looking straight at her daughter. ‘That’s the trouble, she lives and breathes for him.’

  ‘Oh, Ma, don’t you start.’

  ‘All right, all right. We’ll say no more. Anyway, here they come…And don’t look like that else they’ll know something has happened. Come on, cheer up.’ She rose from her seat and put her hand on Mary Ann’s shoulder, adding under her breath, ‘It’ll be all right; it’ll come out all right, you’ll see.’

  ‘Gran, Gran, Peter’s got new riding breeches. Look!’ Rose Mary dashed into the room, followed by a dark-haired, dark-eyed, pale-faced boy of seven.

  ‘Have you all wiped your feet?’ was Lizzie’s greeting to them.

  ‘Yes, Granma,’ cried Rose Mary. ‘An’ David has, an’ all.’

  ‘An’ I have too, Granshan.’

  This quaint combination of the beginning of her name with the courtesy title of Gran attached had been given to her by Tony’s son from the time he could talk. To him she had become Granshan, and now it was an accepted title and no-one laughed at it any more.

  Following Peter, Sarah hobbled into the room. She was still on sticks, still crippled with polio as she would be all her days, but moving more agilely than she had done nearly seven years ago, when she had stood for the first time since her illness at the altar to be married. Behind her came Michael, refraining, as always, from helping her except by his love, which still seemed to hallow them both, and behind Michael, and looking just an older edition of him, came Mike.

  Mike’s red hair was now liberally streaked with grey. He had put on a little more weight, but he still looked a fine strapping figure of a man, and the hook, which for a long time had been a substitute for his left hand, was now replaced by thin steel fingers that seemed to move of their own volition.

  Mike, now turning a laughing face over his shoulder, asked of Corny who was in the hall, ‘You wiped your feet?’

  ‘No,’ said Corny, coming to the room door. ‘I never wipe my feet; it’s a stand I’ve made against all house-proud women, never to wipe my feet.’

  ‘You know better,’ said Lizzie, nodding across the room at him. Then she cried at the throng about her, ‘I don’t know what you all want in here when the tea’s laid and you should be
sitting down.’

  ‘Am I to stay to tea, Granshan?’

  Lizzie looked down on the boy and said, ‘Of course, Peter, but you’d better tell your mother, hadn’t you?’

  ‘Oh, she knows.’ He wagged his head at her. ‘I told her you’d likely invite me.’

  In his disarming way he joined in the roar that followed, and when Michael cuffed him playfully on the head the boy turned on him with doubled-up fists, and there ensued a sparring match, which David and Rose Mary applauded, jumping and shouting around them. It was the fact of David shouting that brought Corny’s and Mary Ann’s hands together, because the boy was actually making an intelligible sound which could almost be interpreted as ‘Go on, Peter. Go on, Peter.’

  Mary Ann’s head drooped slightly and she made a small groaning sound as her mother’s voice brought the sparring to an end with a sharp command of, ‘Now give over. Do you hear me, Michael, stop it. If you want any rough-house stuff, get you outside, the lot of you. Come on now.’

  Michael collapsed on the couch, and this was the signal for the three children to storm over him, and Lizzie, turning to the rest, commanded, ‘Get yourselves into the other room and seated…I’ll see to these.’

  Five minutes later they were all seated round the well-laden tea table. There had been a little confusion over the seating in the first place as Rose Mary wanted to sit next to Peter, and Peter evidently wanted to sit next to Rose Mary, but David not only wanted to sit next to Rose Mary, he also wanted to sit next to Peter, so in the end David sat between Peter and Rose Mary and the tea got under way.

  It was in the middle of tea, when Corny and Mary Ann between them were giving their version of Jimmy’s trombone playing, that Peter suddenly said, ‘I’d jolly well like to hear him. They’ve got a band at school, but it’s just whistles and things. Perhaps Father will bring me over tomorrow when he comes to see you, and I’ll hear him play then, eh, Uncle Corny?’