‘Oh my giddy aunt!’ she screamed, lashing out with her handbag and thumping little Paddy on the chest. ‘Get that disgusting thing away! Look, look, you’ve got a rat on your shoulder!’
She raised her arm to hit him with her handbag again and this time she was aiming straight at his head. Worried that Max might be hurt, little Paddy staggered backwards. The woman was now puce in the face and her voice had risen to a shriek, the veins on her neck bulging as she stepped towards him, her handbag flailing in the air.
‘Frank!’ she screamed at the top of her voice. ‘Oh, Lord, I had no idea it was this bad, they’re everywhere, overrun this street is. I have to tell Frank, you disgusting beast!’ And without another word the woman turned and ran down the road, apparently unaware that Kitty was right behind her.
He wondered if Kitty, like him, wanted to laugh at the sight of the woman retreating, but Kitty had disappeared as quickly as she had arrived. The nets on Annie O’Prey’s window quivered as little Paddy opened his knapsack and, without the need for instruction, Max hopped straight in. Annie’s nets dropped again and, with a quick glance, Paddy checked that there was no one else in the street before turning to face the wall, unbuttoning his short trousers and relieving himself against Maura and Tommy’s house.
Little Paddy placed one hand on the wall as he leant in and felt the cool brickwork against his forehead. He had just seen the ghost of Kitty, for far longer than was usual, had been thumped with a handbag by a strange woman, Max had almost been killed with a swing from the same bag – and he hadn’t even got down his own street to the bombed-out wasteland yet. Something about it all made him feel just so sad and he knew it was Kitty. She had appeared because she’d sensed he was frightened, and he had instinctively known that. Why did everything have to change, he thought, as he buttoned his trousers back up, ready to run around the entry to the back gate and tell his mam everything. None of it would be news his mother wanted to hear.
Then he heard a voice and, looking up the street, saw Auntie Kathleen seeing Nellie off from number 42. Her granddaughter would be off out with the girls. They would gather together and divide into groups, each taking a street, where they would knock on doors and ask, ‘Can I push your baby up and down the street, missus?’ They would reassemble at the wasteland, comparing knitted bonnets and judging the prettiest babies whilst their mothers rinsed out enamel buckets that lived under the kitchen sink, changed the dirty Napisan water and filled washing lines full of fluffy white terry towelling squares before they peered over the walls to check whose were the whitest.
Kathleen saw little Paddy and made Nellie wait. She called out to the boy, ‘Hang on there, little Paddy, love,’ and disappeared back inside. Seconds later she was back and thrust something into Nellie’s hand. The girl waved to Paddy who ran down the street to meet her, his bag firmly held so as not to jolt Max about.
Nellie grinned as he approached and Nana Kathleen exclaimed, ‘Thank God we caught you, Paddy! I was keeping something for you. I was only thinking at mass this morning how I haven’t seen you all week. Is your mam well? Maggie Trott was asking, only we haven’t seen her since she came to the meeting about the carnival. She’s not been out for a natter or to have her leaves read.’ Before he could blink, she continued, ‘Jerry left without the time to eat his toast so will you have it?’ And without waiting for an answer, she thrust a slice of bread the size of a house brick into his hand.
‘Go on, Paddy,’ she said, ‘you’ll be doing me a favour. I hate throwing good food in the bin.’ And Paddy immediately forgot about his encounter with Margaret Wright. The melting butter and jam were calling out to him and, within seconds, butter was dribbling down his chin.
‘Ah, God, that’s lovely that,’ he said as he licked his lips and grinned up at Kathleen.
The sound of Nellie’s laughter wiped from his mind the harsh and deeply worrying words the woman had spoken and the message he was meant to deliver to his mother. For a brief moment the sheer sweetness of last summer’s strawberries erased his worries about the unpaid rent, but the sight of Peggy running across the road in her slippers, calling Kathleen, soon reminded him. Scamp was hot on her heels and she didn’t appear to notice little Paddy at all.
‘Kathleen, can you do me a favour and lend me two and six? Big Paddy’s been that sick, we’ve had short weeks and, honest to God, I haven’t a potato for the kids’ tea or a drop of tea in the house.’
Kathleen sighed inside, but smiled outwardly. ‘Of course I have, Peggy. Now, do you want to come into ours for a cuppa? I’m just giving your little Paddy some bread I was about to throw out because our Jerry didn’t eat his breakfast.’
Paddy grinned up at his mam, his face smeared with jam and butter, his eyes alight. Peggy’s stomach grumbled so loudly they all heard it and Nellie looked at her gran, with pleading eyes.
‘I’ve more where that came from if you’ve room for a slice of toast with the tea too.’ Kathleen, large and round, eyes twinkling through her glasses, betrayed not a hint of irritation.
Peggy had known kindness like this from Maura every day of her married life and had sorely missed it, but now she felt self-conscious. ‘Well, if you have the time, Kathleen…’
‘I do that, so come on away in. Alice,’ she shouted over her shoulder to her daughter-in-law, ‘put that kettle back on before you go to Cindy’s.’ And then she remembered what she had seen as she had stood at the door with Nellie. ‘It’s Alice’s hair day,’ she said by way of an explanation, as though they didn’t know who Cindy was. ‘Now little Paddy, who was that woman you were talking to?’
‘What woman?’ asked Peggy.
‘She said she’s the police and she’s moving into Maura and Tommy’s house.’
The two women looked at each other, their faces the picture of shock. ‘Are you sure she said that?’ asked Kathleen.
‘Aye, I am,’ said Paddy. ‘Mam, she said you had to wash the nets and clean the step and there was something else too…’ Paddy frowned and thought hard. ‘Oh yeah, he said, no more playing on the wasteland, no more thieving – and something about a fence.’
‘Paddy!’ Nellie, waiting for him to cross the road to the side of the wasteland, called his name from the kerb as Kathleen and Peggy looked at each other, horrified.
‘Well, the cheek of her! Was she calling us thieves, then?’ Peggy looked wounded. ‘That woman needs to wash her mouth out. Who the hell did she think she was talking about?’
‘Little Paddy, did you get a name, love?’ Kathleen’s voice was urgent, pleading and coaxing all at the same time. ‘Did the woman say who she was at all?’
Little Paddy took a deep breath. ‘She did.’ There was silence. Kathleen dared not speak again and she placed her hand on Peggy’s arm to silence her. The event had occurred not five minutes since and if they gave little Paddy enough time it would come to him, eventually. So they stood, they waited and little Paddy blinked and frowned; he looked back across the road, he pursed his lips and then, as if a light bulb had been switched on inside his head, he blurted out, ‘She told me her name is Mrs Wright and her husband’s name is Frank.’
Paddy also wanted to say that he had seen Kitty and Kitty had been trying to tell him something, but the look of complete horror that now crossed his mother’s face and the tears that sprang to her eyes made him think twice.
‘Dear God, can my life get any worse?’ Peggy blurted out. ‘Kathleen, it’s Frank the Skank who’s moving next door to me! Jesus, I think I’m going to faint.’
‘No, no you’re not, you just need a bit of breakfast. Get inside,’ Kathleen ordered Peggy, and then she called down the hallway, ‘Alice, knock on to Shelagh with the mop and you need to run to Cindy and tell her you have to cancel your hairdo. This is an emergency. We need the women round for a powwow; I may even have to read the leaves for we’ve got a big problem to sort out. Off you go, kids, and thank you, Paddy, you’re a very clever boy.’
Paddy grinned with pleasure. Nana Kat
hleen had said that in front of Nellie and everyone knew how clever Nellie was.
Peggy turned to face Kathleen. ‘You know who it is, don’t you?’
Kathleen pushed Peggy along towards the kitchen. ‘I do, he shopped the bizzies who were in on helping us on our docks and got them sacked – and not only that, not one of them can get a job because the minute Frank hears about it he has a word with whoever is taking them on. Some of them have left the police and are trying to get work elsewhere, but he has eyes in the back of his head and he finds out somehow. He’s a bad, bad egg that man. Jerry has told me that the men who work with him are the only people who dislike him more than we do.’
Peggy wasn’t listening; she had sunk deep into the well of her own despair. ‘I’m doomed,’ she wailed. ‘I’d rather throw myself in the Mersey than live next door to him; ’tis the only thing left to me, Kathleen.’
Alice came to the kitchen door, her face still and calm, hiding her resentment at being told to cancel her hair appointment. The waters ran deep with Alice and no one ever knew what she was thinking. ‘I’ve knocked on. Is it true?’ she asked.
Kathleen nodded her head as she herded a crying Peggy past her.
‘Frank the Skank?’ Alice asked. ‘Didn’t he get promoted to sergeant because he grassed on the dock police?’
Peggy turned to her, stricken. ‘Yes, yes, he did and they are moving in next door to me, into Maura and Tommy’s house!’ Peggy almost shrieked the last words as tears sprang to her eyes.
Kathleen rolled her own eyes and shook her head. ‘Alice, is there a drop of brandy in the press? Peggy needs it in her tea. Jesus, if it’s true, we all need it, for there’ll be no more hauls from the Morry. I mean, that’s not robbing – Conor gives it to us and it’s up to him what he does with his cargo. Isn’t it?’
Alice smiled. ‘Not quite, Kathleen, he lists it on the manifest when it’s being unloaded and the dockers count it off short.’
Kathleen waved her hand at Alice. ‘Oh, I know that, I know, but it’s not as if it’s anyone’s livelihood or the crown jewels, is it? I mean, he buys it cheap and sells the leftovers and no one gets hurt, Alice. Not so with the likes of Jimmy O’Prey. Now, when he gets home – which is any day soon, so Annie tells me – that’s who Frank the Skank should be worried about. He’s turned into a real bad lad, he has.’
Kathleen shook her head. Every family depended on the hauls that came up the dockers’ steps. Every wedding, christening, party, birthday and bit of a do was, in some part, courtesy of Captain Conor and the odd crate that fell of the back of any of the other ships. It was the means to dignity, to happiness and survival for the large Catholic families who depended on the docks and the measly wages of the dock board to earn a living.
‘Frank the Skank moving into the four streets is very bad news, Alice,’ Kathleen said, ‘so we have to stop this happening, somehow. We need to get our heads together and this will be down to the women to sort.’
The back gate clicked and Shelagh’s footsteps and those of the other women close behind her sounded on the cobbles in the yard. Shelagh would have knocked on to Deirdre, Deirdre to her neighbour and so on down the line it went. Even those who didn’t or couldn’t answer the call would knock onto the next kitchen to let them know the white smoke was rising, so everyone to Kathleen’s house.
‘Line up the cups, Alice,’ said Kathleen. ‘Brandy in first.’ She took a large gulp herself, straight from the bottle, just as the back door opened.
‘By God, it must be bad news,’ said Shelagh, her eyes opening wide, ‘the cut of you. You have the brandy out already?’
‘You’ve no idea how bad it is,’ said Kathleen. ‘Frank the Skank and his wife are moving into Maura and Tommy’s house!’ And as she began to measure the brandy into the cups, Maggie Trott came into the kitchen.
‘Oh, that is bad news for all of us,’ exclaimed Maggie and they all turned to look at her.
‘Do you know them?’ asked Alice.
‘Oh, I do,’ said Maggie, ‘and Frank the Skank is a nasty piece of work.’
Peggy staggered and Alice caught her before she fell, then Maggie eased her into a kitchen chair.
‘That’s it for me,’ wailed Peggy. ‘My life is over and done, it can’t get any worse than this.’
Kathleen placed a cup in her hand. ‘Here, drink this, queen, get it down you.’ Peggy knocked back the brandy in one and pushed herself up from the chair.
‘Peggy, where are you going?’ asked Maggie Trott as she walked towards the door. Peggy turned around and looked at the women now assembled in the kitchen, some with babies in arms, some carrying a plate with biscuits they had made that morning. Peggy looked at their faces, their hands, work-worn, like her own. But each one of them had a husband in work and their rent was paid – they were safe. No one missed the rent, for the street would provide food if a family ran out. On cold nights, shovels of coal would be donated to a family that had none, but the rent, that was a different matter altogether, everyone paid the rent.
‘Peggy, are you all right, love?’ asked Maggie Trott. ‘You’ve taken your curlers out.’
Peggy couldn’t reply; she could not share her secret or her shame. She looked at their faces, their worried frowns; she couldn’t tell them about the letter. It was the final humiliation. No one had ever been evicted on Nelson Street, but then, no one else had dirty nets or a fat lazy oaf for a husband who lay in his bed all day long, inventing any excuse not to work. The faces of the women she had known almost all of her life appeared distant to Peggy. She could have told Maura – she could tell Maura anything – but not Kathleen who would be disappointed with her. Not Deirdre – she would be straight down to Cindy’s and have it all over the street – and not Maggie, she would expect it.
‘Is Biddy coming?’ she asked and her voice sounded light, strange, even to her. She could tell Biddy who was kind and wise as Kathleen.
Maggie Trott was the first to answer her. ‘I doubt it. I saw her nipping into the betting shop on the parade with Ena not ten minutes since. Come on, Peggy, it’s not that bad. We will put that one in her place as soon as she arrives, won’t we, Kathleen? And anyway, how can she be moving into Maura’s? Maura has the rent book and she said she would keep it going for a year in case Tommy has made a mistake.’
Deirdre sniffed as she picked up her teacup. ‘All right for some, isn’t it? I’m surprised Maura doesn’t keep a set of rooms in the Grand Hotel and let a family who needs that house have it. I mean, she’s that la di da now since they came into money.’
Kathleen pulled out a kitchen chair and sat herself down. ‘Hush your mouth, Deirdre, you have no idea how much money Maura and Tommy have or what their plans are. Peggy, sit down again; eat your toast and stop your worrying, we will sort this.’
‘Is there no toast in your own house?’ asked Deirdre, who was silenced by an icy glare from Kathleen.
‘Come on Peggy, we’ll have a gas,’ said Maggie, but Peggy shook her head. ‘I’m all right now, and I have the copper on,’ she said and walked out of the back door, leaving them all open-mouthed. They all knew that was a lie, because Peggy had her washing line full on Monday, along with the rest of them, and Peggy just about remembered to do the wash then. She would never do one twice in a week.
*
Peggy wiped her dripping nose with the back of her hand. Her tears had made her feel hot and flu-like and the pain in her back was sweeping around her abdomen to the front. She steadied herself with her hand on the yard wall and then, when the pain subsided, made her way out of the gate, feeling as though the sky had fallen onto her shoulders as she realised that, in all the commotion, Kathleen hadn’t given her the half a crown for the children’s tea and big Paddy’s fags. She had forgotten in all the fluster of the news and the arrivals into her always busy kitchen. Peggy had written to Maura with Kathleen’s help but had received no reply and that almost broke her heart. It must be that Maura was settled in her new life and no longer had any i
nterest in Peggy or her troubles. The rent office was open until twelve, that was the reason she’d had to leave; she would need to get down there without Maura to help her and beg to keep the roof over their heads – and she had to succeed. The alternative was not worth thinking about.
*
Mary had returned home only to find the house empty and the dishes piled up in the sink. Malcolm asked her to return at four, to help him make the evening meal for the guests he was expecting. She had slowed her pace as she walked past Annie O’Prey’s back gate but all she could hear was the tinny sound of the radio on the kitchen windowsill. No sign of Jimmy being back home, or Callum, for that matter. She knew Callum had been taken on down at the docks and was under the wing of Jerry Deane.
‘Jerry is going to be the gaffer down there any day now,’ she had heard Eugene say to Deirdre the previous evening. ‘When that happens, there will be more work around here on the four streets for the likes of us. He’s got Callum O’Prey taken on every day already. The gaffer has as good as handed over.’
Deirdre had been wrapping up potato peelings in newspaper to burn on the fire and glanced from the corner of her eye at Mary, who was darning one of the boys’ jumpers. ‘He’s not a total waste of time like his thieving git of a brother, then?’ she’d said.
‘Callum? Not at all, a grand worker he is. Whatever Jerry says, goes with him. There you are, Mary, now there’s a good husband for you. Try flashing your eyelashes at Callum. He earns a full week’s wage every week.’
Now, as Mary removed her coat, she glanced up at the clock. She had been at Malcolm’s since six for early breakfast for the crew who were leaving on the morning bore at ten past eight so she had been up since half past five and felt tired and in need of her bed. But looking around the mess in the kitchen she knew it could not be left, so she rolled up her sleeves and, turning on the tap, filled the kettle ready to wash yet another bowl of greasy dishes.
Coming Home to the Four Streets Page 12