One Snowy Night

by Rita Bradshaw

  ‘I think you had better leave while you still have a car,’ Ruby suggested, hiding her embarrassment as best she could when the waifs and strays took up a concerted deafening chant of, ‘Mean as muck, no good luck,’ as they retreated a few feet.

  ‘It was very nice to meet you.’ He smiled, as though unaware that the commotion the children were making had brought out some of their mothers. The women were now adding to the hullabaloo by yelling at their offspring whilst taking a keen interest in the grand vehicle themselves, and not least its owner. That a toff, and a handsome one at that, was chatting to one of Mrs Duffy’s lodgers who he’d clearly picked up one way or another, was a tasty titbit to chew over.

  Aware that her name would be mud in certain quarters, Ruby just wished he would go. There was nothing these old wives liked better than to get their knife into someone, and the gossip this incident would generate would go on and on until some other poor mug came into the firing line.

  She smiled back, a tight smile, and said, ‘Goodbye, Mr Forsythe,’ before turning and walking away. As she opened Mabel’s front door she was praying he would have the good sense to drive off without delay, and she closed it without looking round or waving.

  Leaning against the wood she strained her ears for the sound of the car’s engine, and as Mabel appeared from her front room-cum-bedroom where she’d obviously been peering out behind her nets, Ruby said, ‘Has he gone?’

  ‘Aye, he’s gone, but who the heck is that? I thought you were going to one of your suffrage meetings. I’ve been worried to death for the last hour or so with it getting so late.’

  Mabel sounded like her mother, but the landlady’s tone was anxious rather than disapproving and it softened Ruby’s voice as she said, ‘I’m twenty years old, Mabel, not two, besides which it’s only half-past six and broad daylight outside.’

  ‘That’s as may be, but you never know these days. Things aren’t like they were before the war, sorry to say.’ This was one of Mabel’s favourite sayings, covering everything from the milkman arriving late and the disgraceful – in her opinion – rise in hemlines, to the state of the country under the new Labour Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald. On taking office in January he had stated that there could not be a social revolution overnight, thereby alienating Mabel for good who had expected immediate benefits for the working class. ‘So?’ She eyed Ruby with a look that said she meant business. ‘Who’s the gent?’ Then she added, ‘Come into the kitchen and have a cuppa.’

  Resigning herself to the inevitable, Ruby followed her landlady without protest and over a cup of tea filled Mabel in on the afternoon’s events. Mabel listened without interrupting, but as Ruby finished speaking, shook her head. ‘Them lot out there will never believe he’s not your fancy man. You know that, don’t you? Why on earth didn’t you let him drop you off a couple of streets away so no one was any the wiser?’

  In truth, Ruby hadn’t thought of it, but her voice indignant, she said, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong so why should I?’

  ‘All right, all right, don’t have a go at me. I’m only looking out for your best interests, lass. Mud sticks, that’s all I’m saying, and you know what they’re like round here.’

  Same as they were everywhere. ‘He only brought me home.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Mabel pursed her lips and hitched up her ample bosom with her forearms. ‘In a car. A great big one an’ all. And him dressed like a gent. All that’ll add fuel to the fire. Flaunting it, that’s what they’ll say. Not content with being some rich man’s floozy, she’s shameless with it. He’ll be married with a couple of bairns by morning, you mark my words, for why else would a gent take up with a working-class lass if not to have a bit on the side?’

  ‘He’s not married.’

  ‘That won’t matter to them. The truth has little to do with it, believe me.’

  ‘Oh, Mabel.’

  ‘Now, now, don’t look like that. What’s done is done, and if owt’s said to me I’ll set ’em straight, believe me. Gossiping old biddies, the lot of ’em.’

  Considering that Mabel enjoyed nothing more than a tasty bit of tittle-tattle this was a bit ripe, but Ruby was too downcast to see the funny side of it. Standing up, she said, ‘Thanks for the tea, Mabel.’

  ‘That’s all right, lass, and if this Clarissa person sends her car for you on Thursday I suggest you’re ready and waiting. What time did she say?’

  ‘Pearson’s collecting me at eleven o’clock.’

  Mabel sighed. ‘I dare say the curtains’ll be twitching however nimble you are, and the bairns will report back to their mams anyway. The little beggars don’t miss a trick.’

  Leaving the kitchen, Ruby climbed the stairs slowly, the beginnings of a headache causing her temples to throb. She was just about to go into her room when a ‘Psst’ behind her made her turn. Bridget beckoned to her with a finger to her lips, and as Ruby followed the other girl into her room, Bridget closed the door behind them carefully before she whispered, ‘I don’t want Mrs Duffy to hear.’

  ‘Hear what?’ Ruby had had enough for one day.

  ‘About Ellie.’

  ‘Ellie?’

  ‘Aye. Mrs Duffy’d never have her back if she knew, not that that’s likely to happen anyway, but just in case.’

  ‘Bridget, what’s happened to Ellie?’ Suddenly she was frightened; Bridget’s face was unusually solemn.

  ‘It’s him, that bit of scum she took up with. My friends had their suspicions about that fella Daniel shares a house with and his lass, but they weren’t sure, but now there’s no doubt. Daniel and his pal are running that house as a brothel and they’ve got the two lassies on the game, Ellie and Daisy. Flo, that’s one of my pals, said it’s common knowledge now.’

  ‘No.’ Ruby’s heart was banging so hard against her chest she put a hand on her breast. ‘No, I don’t believe it. Ellie wouldn’t.’

  ‘Well, she has, lass. I wouldn’t have told you if I wasn’t sure. And apparently that Daniel is older than he looks, getting on for forty, Flo reckons, and that’s not all. He’s got a wife and bairns in Middlesbrough he ran out on years ago and he’s mixed up in all sorts of things besides the whoring. Flo knows a bloke who’s pally with a mate of Daniel’s and this mate said Daniel’s a nasty piece of work.’

  ‘Nice sort of friend to have.’

  ‘Aye. Well, anyway, he – this bloke Flo knows – said by all accounts Daniel isn’t someone to get on the wrong side of. I thought I’d put you in the picture ’cause I know you were thinking of calling on Ellie some time but I wouldn’t, I really wouldn’t, Ruby. He might be there.’

  Ruby looked at Bridget in amazement. ‘Bridget, if what you’ve heard is right then there’s even more reason for me to go. I’ve got to get her out of there.’

  ‘And what if he turns violent?’

  ‘I’ve got to see her.’

  ‘She’s completely under his spell, you know she is. Look what she was like when she was living here. It was all Daniel this and Daniel that, the sun shone out of his backside as far as Ellie was concerned.’

  ‘If he’s forcing her to do that, she might be feeling different now.’

  Bridget shook her head. ‘You’re barmy, right barmy.’ She stared at Ruby. ‘Look how he was the day Ellie left. He told you to keep away then, threatening you with goodness knows what. You’ll put yourself in harm’s way and for what, lass? ’Cause I tell you now, Ellie won’t leave him and if she tried he’d give her what for.’

  ‘I’ve got to see her,’ Ruby said again.

  Bridget shrugged her shoulders, and then as she looked into Ruby’s dark, pain-filled eyes, she gave a great sigh. ‘Oh, what the heck, I’ll come with you. You can’t go alone, lass, take it from me. I’ll see if a couple of me pals’ll come with us, safety in numbers an’ all that. They liked Ellie when she used to hang around with us before Daniel got his claws in her.’

  ‘I can’t ask you to do that.’

  ‘You’re not askin’.’ Bridget patte
d her on the arm, an unusual gesture for someone who was not in the least demonstrative. ‘Like I said, I think you’re barmy but I’d like to think someone’d do the same for me if I was in Ellie’s shoes.’ They continued to stare at each other for a moment longer before she added, ‘I’ll have a word with me pals and see if any of ’em’d come along, all right? But whatever, I’ll come. If he knows folk have got your back it’s something.’

  ‘Oh, Bridget. Thank you.’ Bridget was Irish through and through, warm-hearted and straightforward. Travelling to and from the workhouse together and living in the same house the two girls had got friendly to some extent, but this was beyond what Ruby would have expected.

  ‘Mind, I still think no good’ll come of it. He sees Ellie as a means of earning money for him and Flo’s not sure if it’s just her and Daisy in there or if there’s more girls – he won’t let her go. But if you’re set on seeing her . . .’

  Ruby’s face gave Bridget her answer.

  Chapter Ten

  Olive gazed at her mother in frustration. Why had she even bothered to try and tell her how things were between herself and Adam? She hadn’t meant to. She had decided weeks ago that it would be pointless and so it had proved. Her mam had come out with every platitude she’d feared she would and more besides.

  For her part, Cissy was well aware of what Olive was thinking but she couldn’t, she just couldn’t commiserate with her daughter. It would open up a whole can of worms she wasn’t ready to face and besides, what good would it do? Olive and Adam were married and they had a bairn, that was the end of it. As George had said more than once over the last months, Olive had brought her situation on herself.

  Nevertheless, her voice was gentle when she said, ‘Lass, marriage is never easy, take it from me, but you have the bairn and that’s a blessing. Now, let’s have another cup of tea before you go and there’s a slice of sly cake to go with it.’

  Olive recognized the finality of the tone beneath the softness. She stood up, her face stiff. ‘No, thanks, I need to get back and put the dinner on.’ She picked up Alice who had been playing with her grandma’s saucepans and pans on the clippy mat, bashing them with a wooden spoon and delighting in the noise she was making.

  ‘Aw, lass, don’t go in a huff.’

  ‘I’m not, Mam. Like I said, I need to get the dinner on.’ If it was late there would be hell to pay but Olive didn’t voice this. Her father was having one of his bad spells and was in bed but she didn’t go to see him, merely calling out goodbye as she put her coat and hat on and then leaving the house quickly.

  The air outside was muggy and thick with the smells of the streets as she walked home, housewives gossiping on their doorsteps as bairns played their games on the dusty pavements and in the gutters. One or two women she knew called out a greeting as she passed, which she returned smilingly, playing the part expected of her. She wondered how many other women hid behind a mask, pretending their life was normal when it was anything but, and feeling like they were going mad inside.

  But Adam wouldn’t send her mad; she wouldn’t let him. Her features tightened. Alice needed her, and no matter what happened, no matter what she had to put up with from Adam, she would make sure she was here for her daughter. She glanced down at the little girl in the second-hand pram her mother-in-law had bought for them in the weeks leading up to Alice’s birth, and a bright, happy face immediately smiled back at her, bringing a smile from Olive in return. How could she bemoan her lot when she had such a gift?

  Wrapped up in the child as she was, she didn’t notice the woman approaching her until a voice said, ‘Olive, lass, it’s been a while since I saw you last. How are things?’

  Looking up, Olive’s heart sank although her face did not betray what she was feeling. She had gone to school with Susan Hannigan as she’d been named then, and Susan had been the ringleader of a group of girls who had bullied her relentlessly about her looks. Susan had been a spiteful, nasty girl and Olive had no doubt she’d grown into a spiteful, nasty woman. Keeping her voice neutral, she said quietly, ‘I’m fine, Susan. How are you?’

  ‘I’ll be better when this is out.’ Susan patted her enormous stomach. ‘I’ve told my Bill this is the last one. Mind, I said that with our Annie and look at me. Got tiddly at Christmas and this is the result.’ She gave a cackle of a laugh. Olive remembered that sound. Susan had always been at her happiest when she was tormenting someone, usually her.

  Olive smiled and made to walk on, but Susan stepped directly into the path of the pram and then moved round to look into it. ‘Bonny, ain’t she,’ she muttered grudgingly, as though it was a personal insult for Olive to have produced a pretty baby. ‘Mind, her da’s a looker. We always used to say that Adam and Ruby looked like one of them film-star couples – him dark and tall and her blonde and beautiful.’ Hard blue eyes met Olive’s. ‘Biggest shock of me life when we heard she’d skedaddled to pastures new. How’s she doing, your Ruby?’

  Avid curiosity coated every word. Olive looked at her old enemy and now she didn’t attempt to hide her dislike of the woman when she said coldly, ‘Very well.’

  ‘See much of her, do you, or would that be a bit . . . awkward?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Olive lied, her voice clipped. She wasn’t fooling Susan and she knew it. Susan was vocalizing the eagerness to know the ins and outs of what had happened that was in most people’s faces even to this day. Adam’s family and her own had closed ranks and discussed the matter with no one, but the fact that Ruby had left Sunderland on the very day she was going to marry Adam, followed by her own marriage to Ruby’s fiancé weeks later with the accompanying swelling of her stomach, had been proof enough of a scandal that would keep folk talking for years.

  Susan stared at her, and the old venom was in her voice when she said, ‘What goes round, comes round, that’s what my Bill always says.’

  ‘Really?’ said Olive icily. ‘But then your Bill never was the brightest spark, was he,’ and with that she pushed the pram forwards, the wheels narrowly missing running over Susan’s feet.

  She was shaking as she walked home, a weariness gripping her that had nothing to do with physical tiredness. She would never be free of the condemnation of what she had done and what people suspected she had done, not while she lived in these parts, she knew that, but there was no hope of ever leaving Sunderland. Adam would never countenance it for one thing, and she felt this was perhaps more because he wanted her to live under the censure of people like Susan than anything else. It was part of what he saw as her punishment. And how could she leave her mam and da anyway, or provide for herself and Alice? And part of the time, when it was just her and Alice at home and she could hide away from the rest of the world, she could cope.

  She squared her shoulders as she trudged on. Ruby had said that Adam would never forgive her for tricking him and her words had felt like a curse ever since. They were always there at the back of her mind and she knew they were true, but she hadn’t realized how living with hate, day in and day out, affected every single little thing. But it was no good belly-aching about it. None at all.

  Much later that night, when Alice was asleep and she and Adam were in bed, his snores punctuating the silence, she felt the old familiar pain in her belly and knew what was happening. She hadn’t mentioned it to a soul but she had missed two periods again and had known she was pregnant. She had told herself, stupidly she admitted now, that if she kept it to herself she might, she just might carry this baby to full term. But it wasn’t to be.

  Sliding out of bed carefully so as not to awaken Adam, she pulled on her dressing gown and pushed her feet into her slippers. This was the third miscarriage now, and she knew she had to get downstairs to the privy to deal with what would follow.

  The night was warm as she stepped outside into the yard, the moon riding high in a velvet-black sky surrounded by a myriad twinkling stars, and she felt small and alone and utterly bereft as she entered the privy, sliding the bolt behind her. The pain was st
ronger now, grinding away at her and making her gasp and moan when it reached peaks, peaks she knew were expelling another tiny little baby from what should have been the protection of her body. Tears were pouring down her face, not because of the agony she was enduring or the immense and harrowing loneliness she felt sitting in the dark in the silent night, but because of the grief she was feeling for the little boy or girl who would never see the light of day, never feel the sun on its face on a summer’s morning or snuggle into her arms when she carried it to bed at eventide.

  A tinge of pink was stealing into the sky when she opened the door of the privy some time later, spent in body and mind and as pale as a ghost. Adam would be up soon and she must get his breakfast on the table for when he came downstairs. She wouldn’t say what had happened. There was no point. He wasn’t interested in her or having another child, and there would be no sympathy for her, she knew that, just denunciation at her failure to achieve what other women hereabouts seemed to do so easily.

  She paused for a moment in the small square of yard, staring blindly upwards as she murmured, ‘You’ve won, Ruby. Hands down, you’ve won, lass, better than you could have ever imagined.’

  Somewhere not a million miles away, her sister was enjoying life with Ellie and other friends she’d made, no doubt, probably without a care in the world and certainly no guilty conscience to eat her up. And why shouldn’t she? Olive bent over a moment as her stomach contracted with an after-pain. Ruby was blameless, after all.

  It was that same day but in the evening, and if Olive had but known it, Ruby’s conscience had kept her awake all the previous night telling her she should never have let Ellie leave with Daniel Bell that day weeks ago, that she should have wrestled Ellie away from him by force if necessary. She had known he was bad news.