Coming Home to the Four Streets

by Nadine Dorries

  Mary had felt anger bubbling up inside her and blurted out, ‘Mam, I’m almost sixteen. You and Da were married when you were sixteen. I’m old enough to make my own mind up. I love him, Mammy, and you chose Da.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I did, but when I chose your father, I didn’t choose a bloody villain, did I? I chose a docker who isn’t afraid of honest hard work, now why can’t you just do the same? I wanted better for you,’ she wailed. ‘I thought taking the veil would be good for you. Haven’t you had enough of looking after kids? Aren’t this lot enough for you? I thought I was saving you from this.’

  Mary felt her anger slowly rise like bile in her gullet, but her response was calm and steady. ‘No, Mam, that was you. Not me. No, not me.’ She shook her head from side to side.

  Mary could see that Deirdre was thinking, plotting, then her mother’s eyes narrowed as a thought struck her. There was one question, one fear that had to be resolved there and then. ‘How long has this been going on? Has he had his way with you? Has he? Tell me right now?’

  Mary clenched her teeth together and looked down at her nails, bitten to the quick and cracked from hard work. Deirdre felt a panic rising. ‘Oh, Holy Mother of God! Mary, I’m asking you, how many times has Jimmy O’Prey kissed you? How far have you gone? Jesus, tell me you aren’t pregnant?’ Deirdre was almost at screaming pitch.

  Mary looked up at her mother, unable to stop the tears from flowing now. ‘Mam, what do you mean, how far?’

  Now it was Deirdre’s turn to look embarrassed. ‘Mary, you and me, we need to have a little talk about things for, honest to God, you don’t understand. A few words followed by a few minutes with a scally like Jimmy O’Prey, they can ruin your life forever. You are never to be alone with him ever again, do you hear me? That’s how accidents happen.’

  Like most of the women on the four streets, Deirdre loved a drama and that day she had one all of her very own. ‘God, my nerves are shot, I’ll be down at Dr Cole’s at this rate. Who would have thought it? You, kissing Jimmy O’Prey and in broad daylight too! The shame of it if anyone had seen you. Mary, you promise me now that you will never see him again, because if you do I’ll have to tell your da and he won’t be happy, I can tell you. There will be trouble, Mary.’

  Mary looked up and saw her brother outside the kitchen window, laughing openly at her discomfort, his hands and face pressed against the glass. He was too short to reach, which meant one of her other brothers was likely on all fours in the yard and Malachi was standing on his back. He had no shirt on and his vest was streaked with dirt, his face mucky and smeared. It would be her job at the end of the day to make sure each one of them was washed and scrubbed in the metal bath. She thought of her da and she knew he would indeed have been angry if he’d been the one to catch her with Jimmy. He was always giving out about Jimmy O’Prey, using his stints in prison as a warning and an example to his own sons.

  Deirdre started putting lipstick on in the mirror over the fireplace. Her face was white, her hand shaking. She’d spoken to Mary through the mirror. ‘You don’t understand, Mary, your life can change for the worse with a lad like Jimmy O’Prey. Would you want to be knocked up, married to a jailbird not because you wanted to, because you had to? The shame of it, can you imagine? It would kill your father – and me, never mind him!’

  Deirdre wasn’t one for curlers during the day. She was one of the most frequent visitors to Cindy’s, the hairdresser on the parade, and was a disciple of the new order, sleeping in curlers at night and backcombing during the day. Her hair was short, bleached blonde with dark roots at least an inch long, and it seemed to Mary that no matter how many afternoons her mother spent in Cindy’s chair, whilst Mary watched the children and prepared the tea, the roots were always there. Now Deirdre snapped the cap back on her lipstick, extracted her compact from her handbag and began to wipe the pad over her nose. She regarded her plain daughter.

  ‘Never see him again, do you hear me, Mary? Never! If you only knew how miserable your life would become if you got yourself hitched to a boy like him.’

  Mary felt lost, could her life be more miserable than it was already? How on earth could that be possible?

  ‘Right, now get into the wash house where I know you will be safe from the likes of that scallywag and keep yourself busy. The washing is nearly done in the copper, so rinse and mangle it and get it on the line for me before the weather changes. I need to speak to Kathleen so I’m off to number 42.’

  Mary had known that Deirdre couldn’t wait to tell the women about what had just happened. It would have been a crime for them to witness it for themselves, but not to hear the embellished version from Deirdre. The fact that Deirdre had caught her and Jimmy kissing in the entry would spread across the four streets like a bush fire before teatime. Deirdre would be the centre of a drama, elicit the sympathy of the other woman for the cross she had to bear, the trauma of such a near miss and praise for the way in which she had averted a potential disaster.

  Once the morning chores were over and the potatoes for tea peeled, the women of the four streets spent most of the day in and out of each other’s homes, vacating one kitchen to reassemble in another, discussing something, anything – the murder of the priest, the price of fish, the state of Peggy’s front step, the number of men taken on in the pen that morning – whatever it was that had occurred since the previous day. No one, though, ever gathered in Peggy’s. Even women who had nothing were particular about which ashtrays they flicked their ash into, whose chipped cups they drank their tea from.

  Mary hadn’t waited for Deirdre to leave for Kathleen’s; she’d dashed back down to the wash house, slamming the door behind her, wondering where Jimmy had gone. She could see no way out, no escape from the drudgery that was her life, which felt so much harder than it had even before Jimmy had first spoken to her. Jimmy had unexpectedly stepped into her life and from that moment on she had begun to dream and, for the first time, felt truly alive. She wondered, could she get the washing done before Deirdre returned and then head up to the bombed-out wasteland? That was where Jimmy would wait for her, she was sure.

  It was where Jimmy, a handsome nineteen-year-old, had first spoken to her, smiling down at her with an impish grin on his face and stealing her heart in an instant. His cap was low over his eyes, his smile full of mischief and promise. Jimmy did not lead the dull and boring life that Mary did and it showed. The air between them felt charged and so the clandestine meetings had begun at the back of the Anchor pub, behind the bins. They’d sit on the wall at the back of the bottle dump and Jimmy talked whilst Mary listened. He told her about all the bread vans he had robbed and the parties he had catered for in the four streets.

  ‘No one would ever have had a party if me and Callum couldn’t run so fast,’ he’d said and told her of how they were behind all the shop deliveries which had gone missing, the minute the driver stepped into the shop and took a cup of tea. Jimmy wooed her, he impressed her, he stole her heart and, when he’d kissed her for the first time, she never wanted him to stop. In those six blissful weeks before Deirdre caught them kissing in the back-entry, Mary had fallen hopelessly in love with Jimmy O’Prey.

  They managed one more meeting before Jimmy was sentenced. She had Malachi to thank for that too. ‘He wants to meet you at the back of the Anchor right now, he has summat to tell you,’ he’d whispered so no one could hear and then shouted, ‘Chase me, Mary, bet you can’t catch me!’ and then run out of the back gate. After a startled moment, Mary had set off after him. She didn’t care what happened next, or even if Deirdre came running after her – Jimmy had sent for her.

  Callum had been standing with Jimmy, waiting for her, under Annie’s instructions. ‘I don’t want Deirdre Malone in here again, giving me hell, so don’t let him out of your sight,’ she had ordered Callum. ‘That woman makes me laugh, she does, never out of Cindy’s, all high and mighty – she’s Maura Doherty without the brains, that one, and her daughter is lucky that our Jimmy paid her a
moment’s attention. The cut of the girl! She isn’t even pretty, a right plain Jane.’

  Mary had been irritated that Callum remained with her and Jimmy and didn’t move into the Anchor. As if he could read her thoughts, Jimmy had said, ‘Would you look at him, he’s me bodyguard. Taking me for my last pint, or so he thinks.’

  Jimmy had laughed and Callum respectfully turned away, but not before he apologised, saying, ‘Sorry, Mary. I’ll be waiting by the back door, Jimmy.’ True to his word he’d ambled across the backyard and stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets, looking as though he would rather be anywhere else.

  ‘Callum thinks I’m going down tomorrow,’ Jimmy had told a stricken Mary, ‘but I’m not. I always manage to wind the jury around my little finger.’

  Jimmy hadn’t kissed Mary within sight of his brother; instead, he’d turned to her and flicked her ponytail, saying, ‘I’m sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused you, Mary. My mam gave out something wicked after your mam went to see her. And I mean, Jesus, it wasn’t like we were official or anything, was it? I mean, we was both only having a bit of fun. It’s the nineteen sixties – you’d think it was the dark ages the way your ma carried on.’

  Mary had gasped, his words like an arrow that pierced her heart. Not official? But she thought that they had been. He had asked her to come to the house when Annie was out at the bingo, had kissed her a hundred times and she could remember every one. Not official?

  ‘If – if they… How long will you be gone for…?’ She’d had no idea what to say next, shocked by his disowning all that had passed between them as just a bit of fun.

  ‘Oh, don’t be worrying about me.’ He’d been looking towards the door of the Anchor, obviously wanting to get away to the bar. ‘If I do go down, it won’t be for more than a year at the most.’

  She’d tried to speak, but the rock that had lodged in her throat stopped her.

  ‘Come on, Jimmy, let’s go inside before you get Mary into any more trouble. Mary, your da, he’d be down here if he knew.’ And Callum had walked over and taken his brother by the elbow to lead him away.

  ‘Will I wait for you?’ she’d asked, but she was speaking to Jimmy’s back. He hadn’t so much as touched her. The pub door opened and Jimmy had been swallowed by the noise and the smoke.

  Callum had marched over to her. ‘Mary, go home,’ he’d said and she felt instantly ashamed of the tears that were rolling unchecked down her cheeks. ‘He’s my brother, but he’s a baddun, he’s half-mad and everyone knows it. There’s no taming Jimmy. Go and find yourself a nice fella, one who deserves a lovely looking girl like you.’

  And as Callum had walked away, her humiliation was complete when Malachi and some of his friends appeared above the wall and her brother had called out, ‘Our Mary’s been chucked, our Mary’s been chucked,’ and they all ran away, chanting. That had been over a year ago and still there was no sign of Jimmy’s return, and every day she waited.

  *

  Malcolm walked out of the post office to find Biddy waiting outside. ‘Did you send it?’

  ‘I did and I have the receipt to prove it, here, look.’

  Taking the sheet of paper from his hand she opened it out and read aloud, ‘Awaiting your arrival. Please advise. Will inform Ena. Jerry Deane needs a favour. Is that it?’

  ‘It is and he will know exactly what it means. I don’t mind doing this, Biddy, but I’ve told you, not a drop of it is coming anywhere near the Seaman’s Stop.’

  Biddy didn’t answer. She would cross that bridge when they reached it.

  ‘I think it might rain,’ he said, looking up at the sky.

  ‘I hope not,’ said Biddy. ‘I hate the rain, I do. It gets into my bones.’

  Malcolm looked at her with concern; Biddy was the closest he had to a mother and, if truth be known, he felt better for having sent the telegram to Captain Conor. His own mother would have told him to do the same. He could see with his own eyes that things were not as they had once been: Biddy was ageing and dockers with big families were getting poorer, as the dock board squeezed wages to make even bigger profits and fewer ships came into port.

  ‘You know, Biddy, some of those women in homes where the men aren’t being taken on must be out of their minds with worry, so concern yourself not, I was happy to send the telegram – if it helps out around here, it was the right thing to do. Now, shall we go to the café on the end of the parade for a cuppa.’

  Biddy smiled. ‘Good idea. And while we are there, I’ll pop into Cindy’s and get an appointment for Saturday. The best hairdresser in Liverpool, she is.’

  Biddy linked her arm through Malcolm’s as they walked down the Dock Road and Malcolm tucked her arm closer into his side. ‘And you, Biddy, you’re the best friend a man could have. I couldn’t have asked for anyone better to have my back like you do. You remind me of Mam.’

  ‘Oh, give over, you,’ she said as she swung her handbag forwards and whacked him on his protruding belly. Malcolm gave one of his rare laughs.

  ‘So you aren’t cross with me about Mary, then?’

  ‘No, I’m not at all. That was a perfect bacon butty. You’re right, Mary is going to make my life so much easier. I don’t know why I’m so stubborn, sometimes.’

  Biddy felt her heart fill with fondness. ‘I never thought I’d hear you admit that. But you must understand Malcolm, I’m always right and if you doubt me, there’s always Kathleen to read your tea leaves for confirmation. Oh look, there’s Cindy waving through the window. Get me an Eccles cake to go with that tea and I’ll be five minutes.’

  Biddy could see that Ena was under the dryer and Deirdre Malone was sitting on the pink seat with a towel around her shoulders. When the bell jangled out over the shop door as Biddy opened it, the smell of perming solution and hair spray assailed her nostrils as she called out, ‘How’s our Mary doing?’

  Cindy placed her fingers over her lips. ‘Sshh,’ and pointed to Ena, who was fast asleep under the dryer, head back, mouth open, top teeth hanging down.

  ‘She will fit in just fine,’ said Biddy, in a whisper, ‘and I’ve no doubt she’ll enjoy the extra money.’

  ‘Do you want an appointment, Biddy?’ asked Cindy, opening the book. And then, dropping her voice even further, ‘I don’t suppose Malcolm has heard anything from Captain Conor? Poor Ena is out of her mind.’ Cindy nodded towards Ena. ‘She hasn’t heard from him for months.’

  Biddy shook her head. ‘Malcolm has just sent a telegram thingy. With a bit of luck we should hear something soon.’

  Malcolm, heading towards the café, felt good. The clouds had dispersed, the threat of rain had gone, Mary had come to work for him, the sun might just be here to stay, Captain Conor would know he was needed and sail in – everything was going to be just fine.

  Chapter Seven

  Tommy poured the drinks whilst Maura slipped the paper knife into the top of the blue airmail letters and laid them flat on the top of the table, smoothing them out with the palms of her hands, wondering which one to read first.

  ‘Let’s be starting with Sister Evangelista, shall we?’ she said. Tommy saw the look of pleasure and anticipation on Maura’s face as she scanned the pale blue paper. It made him feel happy and it struck him that the letters from home gave them almost too much pleasure and highlighted how little of note happened in their daily lives.

  ‘Well, imagine, Sister says they are choosing the Dock Queen attendants for the carnival this week, and she says that if Angela was at the school still, she would definitely have been chosen for the chief one, given how much effort she had put into controlling her temper of late. Well, I never, wouldn’t Angela just have been delighted?’ She couldn’t help the disappointment creeping into her voice and looked towards Tommy.

  ‘Don’t,’ said Tommy as he pulled the stopper from the top of the whiskey bottle and began to pour it into the glass. ‘And don’t be telling our Angela neither,’ he said. ‘She hates this bloody school she’s in – and I swe
ar to God, that effort to control her temper was short-lived. She’s done nothing but complain since we moved here.’

  He handed Maura her glass, half-filled with a generous helping of the warm amber liquid, to soften the sharp edge of his words. Maura took a sip and, placing Sister Evangelista’s letter to the side with a heavy heart, picked up the next one. She would savour each letter as she went.

  ‘This one is from Malcolm from the Seaman’s Stop. God love him, he says that the streets aren’t the same without us and he would throw a party if we would return home for the carnival.’ Maura sat back and placed the letter on the table. ‘Well, would you fancy that? Malcolm doesn’t even go to the pub! He drives Biddy to distraction, for she loves a Guinness. She’s been like a mammy to him since his own mammy died and poor Ena has ended up in his doorway more times than enough, three sheets to the wind. You’d think he would want to go and join them, wouldn’t you.’

  Tommy and Maura both blessed themselves with the sign of the cross and Tommy’s eyebrows rose as his glass reached his lips. ‘What else does he say? Does he write what kind of party would he throw, would the drink be free?’

  ‘He says the work on the docks is drying up, that only half a pen is being taken on each day, there aren’t as many sailors staying as there were.’ Maura tutted as one hand flew to the crucifix around her neck. ‘Tommy, it sounds bad, doesn’t it?’

  Tommy shook his head. ‘It must be bad if Malcolm has written to you. He was always a quiet one and keeps himself to himself. His da worked for the dock board. That’s how they got that big house over the road from the pub. Good money he earned. What does Kathleen say? Go on, read that one next; she might give us more of a clue what’s going on. Is there news of Jerry? Any wins on the gee-gees? Has he been to the footie? Who’s taken my place in the darts team? Does Jer still think Bill Shankly is the second coming?’

  Jerry had been Tommy’s closest friend, a friendship bound closer than brothers by the joint knowledge of a deadly deed. Neither man had ever spoken of the night the priest had been murdered and both were present, but it hadn’t saved poor Kitty – and that was a sin they had to carry, the murderous end of the guilty priest.