As for her being kept a prisoner and not being allowed out of the place, Sam steadfastedly lied, insisting that he knew nothing at all about that, so they’d have to ask her or Fred about it.
He was trying to convince them that he was being a good father but even so he’d jibbed at the idea of going round to Cavendish Road and collecting Trixie’s things. Maggie had stood up to him, though, and insisted that he should do it. ‘She’ll never be going back there again and we can’t afford to lose all her clothes,’ she’d argued.
Much as he’d have liked to give Maggie a bloody good hiding for answering him back as well as for jabbering to the police about him, he thought it was better to wait till it all blew over. Once Trixie was out of hospital he’d sort the pair of them out.
Trying to control his temper wasn’t easy. At the boozer he discovered that Fred had put himself in the clear by spinning a yarn about what had happened that made it look as if he was the one who’d been misled. As a result, Sam found he was regarded as the villain and everyone was giving him the cold shoulder.
He didn’t like drinking on his own at home. Anyway, there was no peace to be found there. Cilla was forever hollering and her crying and high-pitched screaming made his head ache. Maggie said there was precious little she could do to stop her because she was missing Trixie so much.
She’d even had the nerve to ask him if he would look after Cilla the day she went to bring Trixie home.
‘Take her along with you. If you can’t shut her up, then how the hell do you think I’m going to be able to?’
‘They won’t let kids into the ward, as you know,’ Maggie told him.
‘Then leave her with someone the same as you’ve been doing when you go to visit at the hospital.’
‘That means the O’Malleys, since they’re the only ones she’ll go to and you keep telling us not to have anything to do with them because they’re Catholics.’
‘You have, though; neither of you take a damn bit of notice of what I say.’ Sam scowled.
‘I don’t like to be bothering Ella and Ivy all the time.’ Maggie frowned. ‘They’ve been very good but I know it puts them out and since it’s a Saturday afternoon they’ll have Jake home from work. It will only be for about an hour so surely you can manage to take care of her for that length of time.’
Maggie had nagged away so much that in the end he agreed that he would look after Cilla.
‘Stick her in her cot, then, and I’ll sit in the other room and read the paper till you come home,’ he promised. ‘With any luck she’ll go to sleep, but leave a biscuit or something that I can give her to shut her up if she starts yelling.’
As luck would have it, Cilla was sound asleep by the time Maggie was ready to leave. Sam made himself comfortable stretched out in his armchair with a bottle of his favourite beer and the newspaper. Before he knew it, he was also asleep.
When he woke up Maggie and Trixie were home. Trixie looked washed out and as thin as a rake and her throat was still bandaged. Maggie helped her in and made her sit down. Then she began fussing round her like an old hen, telling Sam to get off his backside and put the kettle on because Trixie was still so weak that she needed a cup of tea to get over the journey home from the hospital.
‘Now you sit down here in your dad’s chair and take it easy,’ she told Trixie, ‘and I’ll go and see if Cilla is awake, although I think she must be still asleep she’s so quiet.’ She smiled. ‘Wait till she sees you’re home! She’s missed you so much, she’s never stopped asking for you.’
The next minute it was as if all hell had been let loose. Maggie was screaming her head off at him ‘Where’s Cilla?’
For a minute he hadn’t known what she was on about. ‘In her cot where you put her before you went off out, of course. Where else would she be?’
‘She’s not in her cot; so what have you done with her, Sam?’ Maggie advanced menacingly towards him, her eyes wide, her face contorted with fear and rage.
‘I haven’t touched her,’ Sam said, backing away from her as far as he could in the cramped kitchen.
‘You wicked old devil, you’ve never cared about her, never even liked her. If you’ve done her any kind of harm . . .’ she gulped as he pushed passed her and went into the bedroom to see for himself.
He couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw that Cilla’s cot was empty. ‘How the hell did she manage to get out of there?’ he asked, passing his hand over his head in a gesture of bewilderment.
‘You tell me; you were the one supposed to be looking after her,’ Maggie retorted accusingly, remembering all his threats about putting her away in some sort of mental home.
He raised his hand to slap her one for answering him back, and then he let it drop to his side. He knew that at the moment he was the one who was in the wrong and it was best not to antagonise Maggie any more.
‘She can’t have got far,’ he muttered. ‘She must be here somewhere, hiding under the bed or in one of the cupboards.’
‘Why on earth would she do a thing like that?’ Maggie questioned. ‘Not unless you’ve been threatening her while I’ve been out,’ she added suspiciously.
‘I never set eyes on her. I was in the other room reading my paper the whole time you were out.’
‘You mean you didn’t look in on her even once to see if she was all right,’ Maggie said accusingly.
‘What an earth for? She was quiet, for a change, so I stayed where I was.’
‘Drinking beer, studying the horses and snoring your head off like you were when we came in.’
As they continued to bandy words, levelling accusations at each other, Trixie began looking in the kitchen and then the bedroom to see if she could find Cilla.
‘You come and sit down before you collapse,’ Maggie scolded. ‘We’ll find her; she must be here somewhere because I wouldn’t have thought she could open the door. She never goes outside on her own so she’d be too frightened to try and do that but, if she has, then she can’t have gone very far.’
Their search was fruitless; she was nowhere to be found. Maggie went and knocked on the doors of the other people living in the house but none of them had seen her.
‘It’s no good, we must go to the police,’ Maggie said in alarm as she pulled her coat back on.
‘Hold your horses, we don’t want the scuffers sniffing round here again,’ Sam protested.
‘It looks as though we’ve no alternative. We’ve no idea where she is or where to start looking.’
‘The speed she walks at she won’t be far away,’ Sam argued stubbornly. ‘Ask around. People will be bound to have noticed her if she’s out in the street on her own.’
They searched for half an hour but without any success. Maggie wasted no more time. ‘Are you going to go along to Hope Street and tell them that she’s been missing, possibly for the past couple of hours, or shall I?’ she demanded.
Sam hesitated, trying to think of a way out of it. He’d had more than enough of being interrogated by the police. ‘Are you sure we’ve looked everywhere?’ he prevaricated.
‘We’ve even looked inside the wardrobe and under the beds,’ she reminded him, ‘so where else is there to look?’
‘What about round at the O’Malleys? Do you think she might have gone there?’ Trixie suggested.
‘Don’t talk so silly, luv,’ Maggie said in an exasperated tone, shaking her head. You know she could never find her way from here to Horatio Street on her own.’
‘Why not? She’s a lot brighter than you think. When she woke up and you weren’t here and she found herself all alone she might have thought that was where you were and decided to look for you.’
‘She wasn’t left here on her own, your dad was here,’ Maggie said sharply.
‘Yes, I know that, but if he was fast asleep and snoring his head off and not taking any notice of her when she called out then . . .’ Trixie’s voice trailed off as there was a knock on the door.
‘Who the hell is that?’ Sam gr
owled. ‘It doesn’t sound like the police.’ He pushed past them and opened the door and the next moment they heard a man’s voice, one that set Trixie’s pulse racing.
‘Who the devil are you and what do you want?’ she heard her father demand.
‘It’s all right, Sam; he’s a friend of Trixie’s, so ask him to come in,’ Maggie called out, rushing over to the door. ‘Come on in, Andrew.’
‘This is my friend, Andrew,’ Trixie told her father who was still regarding the stranger hostilely.
‘Friend? How long has this chap been your friend?’ Sam asked suspiciously.
‘I helped Trixie when she was put in charge of the Christmas money,’ Andrew explained.
‘Oh, you’re the one who did that, are you!’ Sam scowled angrily remembering the frustration he’d felt because he couldn’t get his own hands on it.
Realising that his reaction to Andrew was far from friendly and how annoyed he’d been because she had refused to let him look after the money, Trixie tried to change the subject before he said anything to upset Andrew.
‘It’s good to be home. I’m still feeling a bit weak, but I’ll be fine in a couple of days,’ she said quickly.
‘Whatever happened to you? The police wouldn’t tell me any of the details when I asked them. There wasn’t time to ask you when I came to see you in hospital and neither Jake nor Ivy seemed to be very sure.’
‘’Course they wouldn’t bloody tell you, you’re not family,’ Sam interposed quickly. ‘Anyway, I think you’d better go, whacker; we’ve other things on our mind at the moment,’ he muttered.
‘Dad!’ Trixie frowned in annoyance at his rudeness. ‘I’m sorry, Andrew, but we are all rather upset at the moment because Cilla is missing. She’s wandered off and we’ve no idea where she may have gone,’ she explained.
Andrew looked bemused. ‘Is she safe out on her own?’ he asked frowning.
‘Of course she sodding well isn’t, she’s bloody barmy,’ Sam bellowed. ‘Why the hell do you think we’re all so worried?’
‘Mum left her in her cot while she came to bring me home from hospital,’ Trixie said with an awkward little smile. ‘Mum thought she was still asleep but we’ve just this minute looked and she’s not there, and we can’t think where she might be.’
‘She must have gone outside so I’m off to see if I can find her,’ Maggie said. ‘You can help look as well, Sam. You stay here, Trixie, in case someone brings her back home.’
‘Will you be all right on your own, Trixie, if I go and help search?’ Andrew asked.
‘Of course I will. You’ll probably only be gone a few minutes. She’s not much of a walker. I think she might well have gone to the O’Malleys’ place.’
‘Come on, Mrs Jackson, we’ll go that way and Mr Jackson, you go in another direction,’ Andrew stated.
Sam looked furious. ‘Who do you think you are, giving out orders?’ he grumbled, but nevertheless he pulled on his coat, rammed his cap on his head, and followed them out of the door.
Chapter Twenty
As Andrew and Maggie reached Scotland Road they spotted Cilla on the other side of the road. She was sitting on the edge of the kerb looking grubby and dishevelled. One minute she was poking around with something in the gutter and the next looking up and down the road as if not knowing what to do.
As Andrew called out her name and waved, Cilla looked up as if wondering where the voice was coming from. Then she saw them and excitedly struggled to her feet and tried to run across the road towards them.
The scream died in Maggie’s voice as she watched in horror and disbelief as she saw a tram heading towards the small figure. Fear gave her speed as she ran across the road towards the child, in a desperate bid to get her out of the way of the tram. As she gathered Cilla up in her arms and turned to make for safety, the heel of Maggie’s shoe caught in the metal lines.
She stumbled wildly, then lost her balance and fell heavily to the ground with Cilla still clasped in her arms. The last thing she remembered later was the wild clanging of the tram’s warning bell then the terrible impact as it hit her.
Pandemonium reigned as people dashed into the road to help, then stood there, staring down at the two inert bodies that lay entwined across the gleaming metal rails, not sure what to do next.
Andrew elbowed his way to the front but even as he bent down he knew they were both injured and that it was better not to try and move them. Instead, he shouted over his shoulder for someone to send for an ambulance.
Two policemen appeared on the scene and they immediately took charge. They made the crowd move back in order to clear a way for the ambulance before taking a statement from the tram driver and several of the bystanders.
‘You coming with us, mister?’ the ambulance driver called out as Andrew remained standing there listening to the babble of voices all around him as people told each other what they had seen.
‘No,’ he shook his head, ‘I’m only a friend and it might be best if I go with the police and let their family know what has happened.’
When they arrived at Virgil Street he left the two policemen to explain to Sam Jackson, who had arrived back before him, what had happened while he did his best to comfort Trixie.
‘Can you stay here, whacker, while I go along to the hospital and see how they both are?’ Sam asked in a subdued voice.
‘Please, Andrew, I don’t want to be on my own,’ Trixie begged when she saw him hesitate.
‘Trixie, wouldn’t it be better if I went round and asked Ivy to come and sit with you?’ he suggested as soon as the door closed behind her father.
Trixie shook her head, brushing away her tears with the back of her hand. ‘I don’t want to be on my own, I feel so scared. Perhaps we should go along to the hospital as well.’
‘Nonsense! You’re not well enough to do that. I’ll go and fetch Ivy. I’ll only be gone a few minutes.’
Trixie smiled wanly. ‘Promise that you’ll come back as well; please, Andrew,’ she begged.
‘I’ll only be five minutes,’ he promised.
The five minutes seemed like an eternity to Trixie as she sat there watching the clock and worrying about what had happened. She felt it was all her fault; if she hadn’t been taken to hospital then her mother wouldn’t have had to come and bring her home and so she would never have had to leave Cilla.
Her dad had never had any time for Cilla, she thought sadly. He didn’t even seem to like her being near him which was probably why he hadn’t bothered to check and see if she was all right.
She had to admit that he’d looked upset, though, when he’d gone off to the hospital with the two policemen. She wasn’t sure whether that was because he was feeling guilty or whether he was worried about how badly hurt Cilla and her mother were.
When she heard the tap of the door and Ivy calling out to her she struggled across the room to open it, holding on to pieces of furniture because she felt so weak and unsteady on her feet.
She was relieved to see Ivy but disappointed that Andrew hadn’t come back as she’d hoped he would.
‘He was really shaken up by what happened,’ Ivy explained, ‘so Jake took him for a bevvy because he said he needed a drink to steady his nerves.’
‘Did he tell you exactly what happened?’ Trixie questioned. ‘All I know is that they were knocked down.’
‘Well, he said that he and your mum were out looking for Cilla and spotted her on the other side of Scotland Road. When he called out to her she started to try and cross the road regardless of the fact that there was a tram coming. Your mum ran to grab hold of her and her heel caught in the tramlines.’
‘And the tram mowed them down?’ Trixie gasped, holding her hand to her mouth.
‘The tram driver tried to stop and the warning bell was clanging like mad. I’m sure the driver thought your mum and Cilla would be able to get out of the way in time.’
Trixie nodded. ‘Andrew said it was all over in seconds,’ she said in a toneless voice.
‘Look, would you like a cup of tea?’ Ivy said briskly, avoiding her eyes. ‘I think we should stop talking about it till your dad comes home from the hospital. You know what it’s like when there’s an accident, it can look worse than it actually is. There may not be very much wrong with either of them,’ she said in a shaky, unconvincing voice and Trixie guessed she must be remembering what had happened to her own mother and little Nelly.
Time dragged; Ella came round and stayed for half an hour and had a cup of tea with them. Then she said she’d go along to the hospital and see if there was any news.
Andrew and Jake accompanied her but they became restless after a few minutes. Jake was prepared to stay longer and even suggested that if Ivy and Andrew wanted a break then he’d stay there with Trixie but Andrew said he must get home.
‘You can stay here with us if you want to,’ Ivy told her brother, ‘or else cut along to the hospital and see if you can get any information about what’s going on.’
It was almost an hour before Jake returned and Ella was with him when he did.
‘We left your dad at the hospital,’ Ella told Trixie. ‘Your mum has been pretty badly hurt, luv, and he thought it best if he stayed with her. Now what do you want to do, come back to our place till he comes home or wait here?’ she asked patting Trixie’s arm.
Trixie stiffened and her face grew tight. ‘Where’s Cilla?’ she asked in a strained voice.
The question floated on the air as Ella and Jake exchanged hesitant glances; neither of them seemed to be willing to tell her what they knew about her little sister.
She repeated the question; her voice rising hysterically as she looked from one to the other as she did so.
‘Cilla wasn’t very badly hurt,’ Ella told her gently, ‘but they’re keeping her in hospital overnight just to make sure.’
Trixie looked so distressed that Jake put his arm round her shoulder. ‘The doctor said that your mum holding Cilla like she did protected her,’ he said consolingly.
Love Changes Everything Page 17