Hannah Massey

by Catherine Cookson

  But why didn’t she like this kind of thing? These were her people. She had been brought up amongst them. In the main they were good solid people, working hard and playing hard, like now, the way that suited them. She had found from experience that you couldn’t judge by accents, smooth tongues, or by clothes, yet this noise and bustle from table to lip, depressed her. She remembered Florence once saying to Dennis during one of their…queer arguments, ‘The working classes need stimulating today more than they ever did, for there’s very little natural gaiety left in them. And is it to be wondered at? What in their lives stimulates gaiety? They had to have the gin shops in the last century, and just as badly they need the clubs in this.’

  So what was the difference between the working man being stimulated in a working-man’s club or other men in a smart restaurant or a nightclub in London. As Florence had said, natural gaiety was like inborn holiness, it was very rare. At one time people had said that she herself was naturally gay, but she would never be naturally gay again, and she didn’t want to be stimulated into being gay. What did she want? Some hole, perhaps, or quiet place into which she could crawl, and stay there until she died. She understood why animals sought solitude when they were wounded, there to die, if not in peace, alone with their agony. Yet if she felt like this why had she come back at all? Certainly her home was no hole in which to hide, more like a market place, or, more appropriate, a stage where all the emotions were up for viewing.

  She was brought back to the present by Shane saying, ‘That’s over. Now we’ll have a dance. Come on.’ He pulled at her arm.

  ‘But they haven’t started yet.’ She was reluctant to leave her seat.

  ‘They will in a minute. Let’s go to the other side.’

  ‘Go on,’ said Hannah, ‘an’ take the floor.’ She was desirous of seeing her daughter being viewed, not as one of the crowd, but as one standing out from the crowd. And this would be achieved only if they were first on the floor.

  And so for the next two hours the entertainment went on; dancing, ballad singers, community singing and comic turns, one following hard on the other. And during this time they were joined by Barny. Also during this time, Hannah had consumed three double whiskies and three glasses of Guinness, and now she was mellow. Her eyes dancing, her lips ever parted, there had flowed from them joke after joke. Most of them against herself as a Catholic, and the Church as a whole. For was it not known that the best Catholics always told jokes against their creed? It was a way of proving that they were thick with God who also had a sense of humour. Above all, it proved that nobody could entertain like Hannah Massey when she got going.

  Rosie had just started on her second gin when Jimmy asked her to dance.

  She looked up at him, saying, ‘But it’s a twist they’re playing.’

  ‘Well, who says I can’t do the twist. Listen to her!’ He looked around the group at the table. ‘She thinks it’s only in London they can do the twist. Come on with you.’ He tugged her out of the chair as if she were a child and pulled her through the crowd of tables to the dance floor, where already there were couples wriggling and contorting amid jeers and calls from those seated at the tables.

  ‘Come on, let’s make for the far corner and I’ll show you who can do the twist.’ Jimmy was at an amiable point of fullness and in high fettle, and he went into the dance like a big lumbering carthorse, and at the sight of his efforts Rosie, in spite of herself, began to laugh. When her body began to shake, she put her arm round her waist and cried, ‘Oh, Jimmy! Jimmy, stop it.’ But Jimmy, like his mother, knew when he was being amusing and her laughter only encouraged him to redouble his efforts, and not only because of Rosie but because now he was attracting attention from the tables in the far corner of the room.

  Rosie was standing with her back to the wall as Jimmy contorted himself before her, and it was as she turned her face sideways that she looked towards the end of the bar counter and to where a woman was standing talking to a man. The woman was wearing a fur coat which was open, showing beneath a tight-fitting yellow wool dress. But it was not the dress that Rosie was looking at, but the woman’s face, a long, narrow face with thin, red lips. She was hatless and her hair was dyed a pale mauve and dressed in a youthful style with a fringe which made her appear rather ludicrous.

  As quickly as water rushed from a burst pipe the laughter rushed out of Rosie’s body. Her mouth fell agape and she closed her eyes, but only for a second. When she opened them again it was to see that the woman, following her companion’s gaze, was looking at Jimmy. Rosie remained still, fixed against the wall as if she were nailed there: If she made no movement the woman wouldn’t see her and she would be able to get out. Her heartbeats pumping against her ribs vibrated through her head and seemed to cut out the blaring sound of the band. Without moving her eyes, she saw that the woman wasn’t amused at Jimmy’s antics. She wouldn’t be, she wouldn’t be. She prayed that Jimmy wouldn’t call to her but would be satisfied with his own exhibition. But Jimmy did call to her. He held out his hands and cried, ‘Come on, Rosie, girl. Shake a leg.’

  As the woman came slowly forward, Rosie kept her eyes fixed on Jimmy.

  ‘Well, hello there. Fancy running into you.’

  Rosie turned her head slowly and looked at the face before her, and as she looked she wished she had the power to strike the woman dead; yet it was to this woman she owed the fact that she was in Fellburn at this moment.

  ‘Well, if this isn’t a bit of luck…Come on, say something, don’t look so surprised.’

  The band stopped amid loud applause, and a special kind of applause from the people sitting near for Jimmy, who, puffing and blowing, came towards Rosie now, saying, ‘You’re a fine partner.’ As he finished speaking he stopped and looked at the woman. He looked her up and down before turning to Rosie, saying curtly, ‘Come on…come on, girl.’

  ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us?’

  Rosie’s chin made a wobbling movement. ‘This…this is my brother, Jimmy. Miss…Miss Lang,’ she was stammering.

  ‘Please to meet you.’ The woman inclined her head towards Jimmy, and he inclined his, too, but he did not speak.

  Definitely Jimmy was puzzled. He might have more brawn than brain but he was no fool where women were concerned, and he was asking himself how in the name of God their Rosie had come to know a Flossie like this one, and an old worn one into the bargain, not one of the smart new types that you couldn’t tell from respectable lasses.

  ‘Well, it looks as if I’m on me own. Can I join up? I was with a fellow, but I can’t see him about.’ She looked around. ‘He’s scarpered.’

  Rosie, half turning away and speaking to Jimmy in an undertone, said, ‘Tell me ma I won’t be a moment and…and bring me bag, will you, Jimmy?…I’ll be in the saloon.’ She lifted her hand in a despairing motion and pointed to the door just to the right of her.

  Jimmy made no reply, but he cast another glance at the woman before turning away, and he had gone some distance across the floor when Rosie running after him caught hold of his arm and whispered urgently, ‘Don’t…don’t say anything to me ma, will you not?’

  ‘Where’s she from?’ His face looked dark, no vestige of laughter on it now. ‘How in the hell did you get to…?’

  ‘Jimmy…Jimmy, go on, I’ll try to explain later, but…but don’t say anything to me ma about her, will you?’

  ‘I’m not a bloody fool altogether.’

  He turned away and Rosie went back towards the woman. Passing her without speaking, she walked towards the door, then into the passage, and through another door and into the saloon.

  There were only three couples in the room, which made it almost empty, and going to the corner farthest from the door she sat down, and the woman, following after her, took a seat opposite to her. She took a packet of cigarettes from her bag and she lit one before asking in a flat, sulky tone, ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘I told you. My brother.’

  ‘Huh! Your brother.
Honest…? Well, he’s some beef, isn’t he?’

  Rosie looked down at the polished table. She picked up a drip pad and bent it back and forward between her hands, and as she did so the woman leant forward quickly and said under her breath, ‘Aw, come off it, you don’t have to be afraid of me; at least you should know that. ’Cos remember if it wasn’t for me you’d likely be getting dressed up…or the reverse, for your first night among the dusties this very minute…an’ I’m not kiddin’.’

  Rosie closed her eyes and swallowed, then asked, ‘Why are you here, Ada?’

  ‘All right, straight answer to a straight question. I came along to find out what you did with the ring. That’s all.’

  ‘The ring?’ There was surprise, yet relief, in Rosie’s tone.

  ‘Yes, the ring.’

  ‘I…I pawned it.’

  ‘I guessed you would, not having anything on you. Well…’ She drew on her cigarette, then blew out a thin stream of smoke before she said, ‘I would like the ticket. That’s all, so you needn’t look so damned scared, you needn’t be afraid of me.’

  Slowly Rosie slumped against the back of the seat. ‘How…how did you know where to find me?’

  ‘Well, you’d told him you lived in Newcastle, but that time I was out with you—the time I tipped you off, remember?—I saw you posting a letter. It had the name Fellburn on it; so…well, I took a chance and came down yesterday and my God I can understand you saying you lived in Newcastle, because this is a dump if ever there was one…Talk about the last place God made. And the customers! Good God! Customers! They can’t make up their minds. Anyway, I found out where you lived this afternoon and I was going to look you up…but here we are. Well now, that’s my story, so what about the ticket, Rosie?’

  ‘I haven’t got it.’

  ‘Aw, now, fair’s fair. Don’t come that line with me. Look, I mean you no harm. I’ve proved it, haven’t I? I risked something when I put you wise, I’m telling you. Now come on, all I want is the ticket…By the way, how much did you get on it?’

  ‘Ten pounds.’

  ‘Christ! What? You telling me the truth?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The bugger only gave you…?’

  ‘That’s all I asked.’

  ‘Are you barmy?’ The woman screwed her face up at Rosie, ‘Well, I suppose you are, that’s why I was sorry for you. I could see right away you hadn’t any sense, not for this game, you hadn’t. But God almighty! Ten pounds! Do you know what that ring’s worth…? Five hundred to say the least.’

  Rosie’s eyes stretched wide and her jaw sagged, and the words came out in awe. ‘Five hundred? But why did he give it to me if it was worth all that?’

  The woman shook her head slowly. ‘Have you asked yourself why he gave you all the grand furniture and clothes, eh? Why a mink stole, eh? Why? Because they were all part of his stock in trade, and that ring was the biggest draw. I’ve lost count of the times he’s had it altered to fit different fingers. It’s part of his bank, that ring, and the centre diamond is worth God knows what. Do you know where that stone came from?’ She pulled a face in enquiry at Rosie. ‘A tiara. The dame that lost that tiara has sleepless nights even now. There’s one thing I’ll say for you, you had some nerve to go to his pocket and take it.’

  ‘He’d given it to me. When we first met he gave it to me. It was a sort of…’

  ‘A wedding ring. Yes, I know. Oh, God almighty! You know, Rosie, you make me want to vomit just to listen to you. Still, I suppose,’ she spread out her hands on the table, palms upwards, ‘if it wasn’t for the innocents he’d be out of work. But it’s hard to believe the likes of you are still born in this day and age. But now,’ she leant her body halfway across the table, ‘about the ticket.’

  ‘I haven’t got it, Ada. I’m telling you the truth, I tore it up.’

  The woman remained still for a time as she stared into Rosie’s face, then slowly moved back until only her hands were resting on the edge of the table. ‘No kidding?’ she said.

  ‘It’s the truth.’

  ‘Well, you didn’t think you’d get away with that, did you? What if he had found you? You might have smoothed things over by giving him the ticket.’

  ‘I didn’t know the ring was so valuable. Honest…honest.’ Rosie rubbed her hand across her mouth where the beads of perspiration had gathered, then whispered, ‘Did he send somebody down?’

  ‘Yes, he did; he sent Scottie to Newcastle on Saturday night. He came back on Tuesday saying he’d drawn a blank. It was when I heard this that I thought I’d take a trip meself and see if I’d have any better luck…in Fellburn. I had to get out of his way, anyway, because he threatened to put Dolan on to me. He guessed I’d tipped you off in the first place. He’s no fool, is Dickie, and I didn’t fancy meeting up with Dolan. I saw the last girl Dolan handled. She was out of business for a long, long time, so I said to myself, “Ada, you’re due for a trip. You find Rosie and she’ll tell you, out of gratitude like, where she pawned the ring.” Because I knew, as he did, that was the only way you’d get the money. Lord! If you could have seen him when you didn’t come out of that shop. He was watching out of the window all the time. I must say you put on a good show. If you had sauntered on the beat like you did that morning you’d have been made, and him and you would have lived happy ever after. You had got a good ten minutes start before he thought of looking in his pocket. The ring was the last thing he took off you, wasn’t it?’

  Rosie bowed her head.

  The woman laughed, a thin confined laugh. ‘Same old pattern,’ she said; ‘but none of them had the nerve to go to his jacket. You must have done it like lightning, you weren’t in the bedroom a couple of seconds.’

  ‘Well, what did you expect me to do?’ Rosie glanced fiercely upwards as she asked the question.

  ‘Oh, I just expected you to make a run for it once you got in the street, then go to the Salvation Army or something, anywhere that would get you home. Except the police station; I didn’t expect you to go there after I warned you.’

  ‘I nearly did.’

  ‘It’s as well you didn’t, kid, for he would have got you. If he had done time he would still have got you. Dickie’s vindictive, I’ve seen it. An’ he’s scared of jail…’

  ‘Be quiet!’ Rosie was looking towards the door through which were coming Jimmy and Shane, their faces set. She knew what had happened. Jimmy had brought Shane with him to confirm his opinion of the woman their Rosie knew.

  Ada, following Rosie’s gaze, turned her head slowly towards the approaching men. Her look was lazy, confident. ‘Another brother?’ she mumbled through her teeth.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’ She pulled herself up straight, and looked at Shane as he came to the table, and as Shane stared down at her, she said, ‘Rosie’s brother?’

  ‘Yes, I’m Rosie’s brother.’

  The woman laughed. ‘Any more at home like you two?’ She moved her head in Jimmy’s direction, then looked back at Shane.

  ‘Two more,’ said Shane; ‘and me mother’s a big woman an’ all.’

  ‘No kidding?’

  ‘No kidding.’

  ‘I’d like a drink,’ she said.

  ‘Come on, Rosie.’ Jimmy lifted his head in a beckoning movement to Rosie, but looking pleadingly at him she said, ‘I’d like a drink an’ all, Jimmy. Would you bring two gins?’

  Jimmy hesitated for quite some time, then sucking in his lips he went to the bar counter at the end of the room for the drinks. Shane remained standing gazing down at the woman, taking in the nipples of her breasts imprinted sharply through the dress, the length of uncovered knee crossing the other and the tightness of the dress where it pulled in under her stomach. He said to her, ‘Staying long?’

  ‘It all depends.’

  ‘How did you get in here?’ her asked her. ‘It’s members only.’

  ‘A gentleman friend brought me.’ Her eyes narrowed and her face became grim. ‘And don�
�t you be so snotty.’

  ‘Shane…look, Shane. Go on, please. I’ll come along in a minute.’

  ‘I’ve plenty of time. I’ll go when you do.’ Shane was now carrying a good few drinks and he looked and sounded stubborn.

  When Jimmy came back to the table bringing the two gins and no drink for himself or Shane, Rosie said to him, ‘I won’t be five minutes, Jimmy, I’ll join you in five minutes.’

  ‘I’ve told her we’ll go when she goes, not until.’ Shane nodded at Jimmy.

  At this Rosie bounced to her feet saying under her breath, ‘Look, Shane, leave me alone. I’m not a child. Now get yourself away. And you an’ all, Jimmy. You don’t want me mother to come in here looking for me, do you?’

  At this pointed question the men exchanged quick glances, and Shane said, ‘All right, all right, but if you’re not back in five minutes, ten at the outside, we’ll come for you.’ He nodded significantly at her. And Jimmy repeated like a parrot, ‘Aye, we’ll come for you.’ He, too, nodded at her before turning away.

  ‘Who do they think they are, anyway?’ The woman pulled the glass of gin towards her and gulped at it.

  ‘They didn’t mean anything,’ said Rosie.

  ‘Oh, don’t start to consider my feelings or I’ll cry.’ She knocked the bottom of her glass twice on the table. ‘And look, you’re not getting rid of me until I know where I can lay my hands on that ring.’

  ‘I can tell you the name of the shop; it was Gomex’s.’ The woman’s eyes stretched wide, and there came into them a gleam that looked like a smile. ‘Gomex’s?’ she said. ‘Well, fancy! How did you know about him?’

  ‘What do you mean? I didn’t know anything. I…I used to pass the shop coming from the office, that’s all. It was quite near the office.’

  ‘Well, for your information you hit on one of the biggest transferrers…that’s a nice term, isn’t it, transferrer, one of the biggest in the business. I bet he put two and two together and hoped you would die before you got that ring out again.’ She paused. ‘Did you put your own name and address on it?’