‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said breathlessly, ‘I overslept.’ Her hair was standing on end and her coat was haphazardly flung about her shoulders. Running her hands over her hair to flatten it, she shrugged the coat on, buttoned it up, and grinned at Rosie who hadn’t the heart to chastise her. Then taking charge of little Adam, who had woken up crying, she pushed the pram along at a furious rate, chattering incessantly about nothing in particular and making baby noises all the way down the street. Rosie couldn’t get a word in. But she didn’t mind. Peggy was here and they were on their way out. For the moment, that was all that mattered.
The market was busy. Pushing their way through the shoppers, they made straight for the tea rooms; the very same place they had sat on the day Rosie went to meet Adam off the train. She recalled it now, and her spirits fell. In her mind’s eye she could see his face, that strong handsome face, and the wonderful smile that fell away at her news.
‘Would you believe it?’ Peggy plonked herself on the opposite chair. ‘I’m buggered if I ain’t talking to myself!’ She gave Rosie a gentle kick under the table. ‘Hey! I might as well not be here at all.’
Rosie was startled out of her reverie. Looking up, she gave a small laugh. ‘I’m sorry, Peg,’ she apologised, ‘I was miles away.’
‘I could see that.’ She eyed Rosie with concern. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’
Before Rosie could answer, the waitress arrived. She was a young surly-looking creature with sharp painted nails and long tendrils of black hair floating about her neck. ‘Yurs? What can I get yer?’ Rosie ordered tea and Peggy asked for a strong black cup of coffee. Without a word the waitress turned away, frantically scribbling on her pad.
‘Miserable sod!’ Peggy stared after her.
‘Happen she’s got sore feet?’ Rosie suggested.
‘A sore bloody head more like.’ Tearing her gaze from the waitress, she turned her attention to the baby. ‘Who’s a little beauty then?’ she cooed, tweaking his fat cheek and groaning when he began to cry. ‘Bugger me. Everybody’s miserable today,’ she remarked, frantically rocking the pram. In a moment he was fast asleep. ‘Never could handle kids. They always cry at me,’ she confessed with a chuckle. ‘Must be my ugly mug.’
‘Peggy?’
‘Yes?’
Rosie was about to confide in her when the waitress returned. ‘One tea… one strong black coffee,’ she said sourly, sliding the cups along the table. ‘You shouldn’t really bring carriages in here. The boss don’t like it.’ She stared disapprovingly at the pram.
‘Well now, that’s a bloody shame, ain’t it?’ retorted Peggy. ‘’Cause the carriage goes where we go.’
The young woman was astonished. She gawped at Peggy, then at Rosie, then shrugged her shoulders and muttered something under her breath as she walked away. After that she kept her distance, though she occasionally glanced at Peggy sourly.
‘You were saying?’
Rosie sipped at her tea, wincing when it burnt her lip. Replacing her cup on the saucer, she mused for a while, acutely aware that Peggy was waiting for an answer. Presently, she summoned the courage to tell, her, ‘I’m pregnant again.’
‘Bloody Nora!’ Peggy sighed heavily. ‘But you didn’t want no more, did you?’
Rosie shook her head. ‘I don’t mind having babies,’ she admitted, looking fondly at her son. ‘It’s the making I don’t much care for.’
‘What? You mean… having it with Doug?’
Rosie smiled. Peggy had never been known for her tact. ‘That’s exactly what I mean,’ she said. ‘I know I shouldn’t feel that way, but every time we… you know… I can’t help but wish things were different.’ It was so good to have Peggy to talk to. With her Rosie didn’t have to pretend. ‘I still cringe every time he touches me.’
Peggy sighed. ‘I ain’t much help, but… well, I don’t see what else you can do. Have you tried denying him his rights?’
Rosie laughed. ‘It’s easy to see you’ve never been wed. I’ve tried it once or twice, but it’s difficult to justify it for too long. And anyway, it’s easier to keep him happy than it is to live with the rows and long faces. The lesser of two evils, if you know what I mean.’
‘Hmph!’ Peggy pulled a face. ‘There’s you fighting it off, and there’s me can’t get any at all.’ When she saw that her attempt to lighten the situation had little effect on Rosie who was genuinely troubled, she frowned. ‘I ain’t much use to you, am I, gal?’
‘More use than you think. To be honest, Peggy, I don’t know what I’d do without you. Just talking helps.’
‘I suppose I’m a good listener if nothing else.’
The two of them lapsed into silence, Rosie’s mind on the past and Peggy thinking about the future. ‘When’s the baby due?’ she wanted to know.
‘September.’ Rosie had to smile then. ‘It’s the price I paid to get him away from his mam.’
‘Not a bad swap, eh?’
‘I don’t regret it. Oh, I bitterly regret other things. But not this baby.’
‘What’s playing on your mind then?’
Rosie shrugged her shoulders. ‘Same as before, I expect. I’m Doug’s wife, and I’m having his second child. I’ve made mistakes and I’m not likely ever to forget that. But if I’m to live any sort of peaceful life, I’ll have to accept my lot.’
‘Ain’t you happy at all?’
‘Oh, yes.’ She caressed her son’s small hand. ‘There’s him, and there’s the little one on the way. And I’ve got my own front door key. Isn’t that what most women want?
‘But not you, eh?’ Peggy reached out to cover Rosie’s hand with her own. ‘You still love him, don’t you? Adam, I mean?’ Rosie forced herself to smile. ‘Least said, soonest mended,’ she said brightly. ‘Now then… will you be godmother to this one?’ she patted her stomach.
‘’Course I will! I’ll be proud to be godmother. But it means I’ll have to buy another new outfit,’ she moaned, feigning weariness. ‘Have you noticed how there’s so much more choice now that clothes-rationing is finished? Anyway, you wouldn’t want me to wear the same outfit for the christening next week, and then again for the new baby’s christening, would you?’ she asked cheekily. ‘Godmothers have to set a good example.’
Her son’s christening had caused more rows between Doug and Rosie than she cared to mention. ‘I’m sorry, Peggy,’ she said now, ‘but Doug’s cancelled next week’s christening.’
‘Cancelled!’ Peggy was obviously disappointed. ‘Why?’
‘I wish I knew. He just told me he’d been to the church and stopped it. He wouldn’t say why. And he hasn’t decided on a new date.’
‘You mean he just went out and put a stop to it, without talking it over with you first?’ Peggy was appalled.
‘You wouldn’t be so shocked at that if you knew him better. Doug Selby doesn’t believe in consulting anyone, least of all his wife.’ She smiled wryly. ‘But then, there’s always his mother. It wouldn’t surprise me if she’d had a hand in it.’
‘I thought they weren’t talking?’
‘So far as I know they’re not. But if I’ve learned one thing since being wed to him, it’s that he can be very deceitful.’
‘But why would he cancel the christening? And how do you feel about it?’
‘I was furious!’ Rosie recalled the night he came home to tell her. It was midnight. He was drunk, and angry, and something else that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. He seemed secretive, gloating somehow. ‘We had a vicious row. I told him exactly what I thought about him doing that behind my back. I even threatened to go and see the vicar myself. But he went mad.’ Instinctively she put her hand to the side of her face. It still hurt. ‘He’s not the easiest man in the world to talk to.’
‘You mean he hit you?’ Peggy had seen the way Rosie subconsciously touched her face. ‘The bastard!’
‘Like I said… least said, soonest mended. The christening’s off, that’s all I know. When I tackled him ab
out a new date, he mumbled something about having the two babies baptised together. I think there’s more behind it than that, but he wouldn’t give me an explanation.’
‘Well, I suppose, if the truth be told, having the two baptised together isn’t a bad idea. It would cut the expense anyway.’ She laughed. ‘Bugger him! There goes my excuse to buy another outfit!’
‘You’re right. It would make sense, I suppose.’ Rosie agreed. ‘But he could have avoided a row and talked to me about it first. I would have gone along with that.’
‘Have you asked him? About me being godmother, I mean?’
‘No. But you’re my best friend, and I can’t think of anyone else who would love the children more. Besides, I can’t see how he could object to that.’
‘Well, I’m here when you want me. Like I say, I’d be really proud.’
‘Right! Now that’s settled, sup up and we’ll have a browse round the stalls.’ Somehow, everything always seemed much easier after she’d confided in Peggy.
* * *
The morning was delightful. The sun shone and, content in her friend’s company, Rosie was soon in a better mood. They wandered the market square, stopping at every stall, examining this and that and making the usual comments women do. ‘What do you reckon to this?’ Peggy asked, holding up a blue shawl with a long silk fringe.
‘You’d look like old Ma Riley in that,’ Rosie told her. The trader was so determined not to let them get away that it was a good five minutes before they arrived at the flower stall, where Rosie bought a pretty posy of lavender.
‘What am I supposed to do with this bleedin’ shawl?’ Peggy asked, clutching the unwanted garment.
‘You shouldn’t have let him talk you into it,’ Rosie chided good-naturedly. ‘Take it back.’
‘What! I daren’t go back there,’ she protested, eyes as big as saucers at the thought. ‘The bugger’ll have me buying half his stall.’
Rosie shook her head in frustration. ‘You should have said no and meant it,’ she said.
‘Oh, aye? And what about you?’ Peggy dipped her hand into the pram and drew out a ghastly red cloche hat with a broken feather. ‘Why didn’t you say no?’ Rosie had no answer to that. Instead, she smiled, and soon the two of them were laughing like children. Almost like magic, Rosie’s troubles vanished.
‘Didn’t you say it was your mam’s birthday in a few weeks?’
‘Yes.’
‘And don’t you think she’d look a treat in that shawl and hat?’
‘So she would!’ Peggy declared. ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ So it was settled; the shawl and hat were reverently placed into the largest bag and laid on the pram where they wouldn’t get squashed. Peggy offered to repay Rosie the threepence she’d paid for the hat, but Rosie declined. ‘I would have bought her a little something anyway,’ she said. And that was an end to it.
At the bric-a-brac stall, Peggy purchased a blue scarf. Ain’t it a lovely colour?’ she grinned, opening wide her blue eyes. ‘It’ll set off the colour of my peepers.’ Rosie agreed, and promptly spent fourpence on a knitted jacket for her son in the same delightful shade of blue.
They sat beside the horse trough and shared a bag of roasted chestnuts. ‘Them’ll warm the cockles of yer ’eart!’ yelled the newspaper man. ‘Fetch us one over an’ I’ll give you a kiss.’ Peggy told him to piss off, and he turned away, roaring with laughter.
Afterwards, they wandered down Ainsworth Street and into King Street. From there they returned at a sedate pace to Castle Street. ‘It’s been a lovely outing,’ Rosie declared. ‘It’s done me a world of good.’
Peggy had intended going back with Rosie for a while, but she was waylaid by her mam. ‘For Gawd’s sake keep an eye on these little sods while I go down the market, else we’ll have nothing for us dinner!’ she wailed.
Peggy argued. ‘You knew I was going down the market, Mam. Why didn’t you tell me what you wanted?’
‘I’m capable of doing a bit of shopping!’ she snapped, straightening her hat as she rushed down the street. ‘And don’t you take no nonsense from ’em!’ she cried. With that she went at a run to catch the tram, leaving Peggy and Rosie looking at each other in bewilderment.
‘If you ask me, your mam looks like a woman at the end of her tether,’ Rosie remarked.
‘She’s a crafty old sod, that’s what she is!’ Peggy chuckled. ‘I fetched her groceries from the corner shop last night, and I know she don’t want nothing at all from the market. It’s just an excuse to get away from this brood.’ By now the children could be heard causing a rumpus in the passageway, ‘Look at that!’ Peggy cried. ‘Our mam’s only been gone two minutes and I’m buggered if they ain’t fighting already!’ As she went up the steps at a run, the children scattered in all directions. ‘I’ll tan your backsides when I get my hands on you, you see if I don’t!’
Rosie thought that this was as good a time as any to make her way home. ‘I’ll see you later,’ she called, going slowly past the door and peering into the passage. There was no sign of anyone, but the excited screeches emanating from the front parlour told her there was a game of hide and seek going on. ‘No wonder your mam’s run off,’ she called. ‘I might do the same if I had that lot to contend with.’ Then she went down the street, chuckling to herself all the way.
* * *
The following Friday evening, two things happened to rock Rosie’s world a little more.
It was almost ten o’clock and Doug wasn’t yet home. ‘Down the pub again, I expect!’ Rosie muttered as she laid the child in his cot. ‘He’ll be coming in drunk as a lord and wanting his rights.’ The thought made her cringe. ‘You sleep now,’ she murmured, tucking the blanket over tiny limbs. ‘You must have had me up and down these stairs a dozen times since I first put you to bed.’ The infant was fretful, and she was bone tired. But he seemed sleepy now, and ready to give in. ‘Shh now… mammy isn’t far away.’ She stroked his face and her heart melted. His skin felt like velvet beneath her fingertips.
On tiptoe, she went downstairs where she boiled some water and made herself a cup of tea. Holding the cup between her hands, she went to the window and stared out at the yard beyond. ‘It’s been a long day,’ she murmured. In the twilight she could just make out the cumbersome shapes of the blankets hanging heavy on the line. That morning she had gone through the house like a whirlwind; changing the bed from top to bottom and spending two hours on her knees by the tin bath, scrubbing and rubbing, rinsing and dipping those blankets, until they were as clean as the day they were bought. After the arduous task of dragging them out to the yard in the tin bath, and hanging them on the line, still dripping wet, she had then set about polishing the floor. After that she’d cleaned the windows and cleared out every cupboard where the tiniest speck of dust might be lurking.
In between, the child kept her on her feet, and later, when he was sleeping and she fell exhausted into the nearest chair, she felt the tiniest fluttering in her stomach. It could have been an attack of indigestion, or it might have been the new life flickering inside her. But it raised a touchy issue, and she grew determined to have it out with Doug when he got home. This business of the christening had been playing on her mind for too long.
The tea revived her, and she decided to do a little darning. Taking her work-basket from the sideboard, she sat in the big armchair by the fire; she hadn’t lit a fire today and now the room was beginning to feel cold. Wrapping her cardigan about her shoulders, she opened her basket and took out the little knitted coat. A pretty lemon thing with silk ribbons, she had bought it from an old woman who came round the houses selling bric-a-brac. One of the cuffs had come unravelled. It was a small repair, but somehow Rosie hadn’t found the time to mend it, until now.
In the lamplight, hunched over her work and concentrating on the tiny stitches, Rosie let her thoughts wander. ‘Is this it for the rest of my life?’ she asked herself. ‘One baby after another and waiting for him to come home night after night… ne
ver knowing what he’s thinking, and forever dependent on him?’ It was a depressing prospect. The more she thought of it, the more her dreams turned to her first love.
It was gone midnight. The little parlour was quiet with only the sound of the ticking clock disturbing the silence. Rosie’s work had slid to the floor and she had fallen into a restless slumber. Even the sound of Doug’s footsteps coming down the passage didn’t wake her. In her dreams she was troubled. In life her troubles seemed tenfold.
When Adam’s hand touched her face, she pressed her own fingers over his. When his warm mouth covered hers, she sighed with happiness and clung to him. It was only when he softly laughed that her joy was shattered. ‘Want me, do you, you brazen little bitch?’
‘DOUG!’ She stared at him with shocked eyes. ‘You frightened me.’ Instinctively she pulled away.
‘Frightened you, did I?’ The stench of booze on his breath made her reel. ‘Funny. You seemed to be enjoying it.’ The smile froze on his face. ‘Or were you dreaming of somebody else, eh? Is that it?’ His face grew hard.
He was so near the truth she could hardly breathe. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
He merely smiled, a cold calculating smile. ‘Ready for bed, are you?’ His hand reached out to touch her breast.
‘I have some darning to do. I’ll be up later.’ She stooped to retrieve her work-basket from the rug.
‘That can wait ’til tomorrow,’ he snapped, knocking it out of her hands. The contents spilled over the floor which seemed to please him. ‘Didn’t you hear me? I said I was ready for bed.’
Whether it was tasting freedom in her dreams, or whether it was something about the possessive manner in which he gripped her wrist, Rosie didn’t know. But something deep inside her made her want to strike out at him. ‘You may be ready for your bed,’ she said with surprising calm, ‘but I’m not. I’ve told you… I’ll be up when I’ve finished my work.’ She was astonished at herself.
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