by Nancy Revell
Bobby nodded and smiled. ‘Mam’s mentioned you in her letters.’
Agnes poured their tea. ‘I’m guessing yer ma got a bit of a shock, you just turning up?’
‘You can say that again,’ Dorothy answered for Bobby. She raised her eyebrows at Agnes and took a sip of her tea. ‘Which is why we’re here. It’s a little bit crowded in Gloria’s flat and I remembered Polly saying that you might be looking to rent out the top room.’
‘I am indeed,’ Agnes said.
‘You can have the money upfront,’ Bobby said, pulling open his duffel bag in search of his wallet.
‘Oh, don’t be bothering with that tonight, hinny,’ Agnes said. ‘Besides, you might be doing a midnight flit when you hear the twins start up in the early hours.’
Bobby smiled. ‘There’s not a lot stops me sleeping.’
Agnes asked Bobby a few polite questions about his life in the navy, the war in general, his brother Gordon and the reason for his medical discharge. It didn’t take long for her to get a take on Gloria’s lad and she was pleased to see he clearly took after his mam and not his dad. He would fit in with the rest of the household.
Sensing that Agnes felt happy with her new lodger, Dorothy finished off her tea. ‘Well, I better get myself off.’ She stood up. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’
‘Where’re you going?’ Bobby asked, as he too stood up.
Dorothy laughed but still found she couldn’t look him in the eye. ‘I’m going back to tell Gloria that her son, who has just disappeared out of her life as quickly as he reappeared, is now lodging with Agnes, so there’s no reason to worry, as mothers are wont to do when their sons go off in a strop.’
‘I’ll walk you back there,’ he said, ignoring the jibe and grabbing his cap.
‘Don’t be daft, I’ll be fine,’ Dorothy said, waving her hand to show her dismissal of Bobby’s offer.
‘No,’ Bobby said. ‘I’m walking you back there. It’s dark and it’s late.’
Dorothy huffed. ‘Women are emancipated now, Bobby. We can look after ourselves. We work, we weld, we earn our own money. Times are changing.’
Bobby made a puzzled expression and touched his left ear. ‘Didn’t catch a word. Deaf as a post on that side.’
Dorothy rolled her eyes.
Bobby looked at Agnes. ‘I won’t be long.’
Putting on his cap, he stuck out his arm to show that Dorothy was to go first.
Agnes heard Dorothy repeating her diatribe word for word as she walked down the corridor and out of the house.
‘And don’t pull that I’m deaf as a post one on me,’ she said as they stepped out onto Tatham Street.
Agnes saw that Bobby manoeuvred around Dorothy so that he was on her right side, next to the road. She couldn’t help but watch them as they walked up the street – Dorothy in her painted-on red dress and Bobby in his smart navy uniform, his thick woollen coat flung over his shoulder. She heard Dorothy say something about Emmeline Pankhurst and didn’t he know about the suffragettes?, then Bobby, bending his head, saying ‘Pardon?’
As they moved off into the darkness, she heard Dorothy let out a half-strangled sound of pure exasperation. Agnes wandered back into the house with a smile on her face.
It was a true saying: you never knew what was just around the corner.
Chapter Fifteen
When Bobby woke at six o’clock the next morning it took him a few seconds to realise where he was. It felt alien to be in a bed that felt huge compared to the narrow bunk beds he’d slept in for years, just as it was to wake up alone, with no other bodies within arm’s reach tossing and turning and snoring or shouting out in their sleep. Sardines in a can – or rather, in a ship. His sleep that night after returning to number 34 Tatham Street had been fitful, which was hardly surprising. Never in a million years would he have guessed he’d come back home to find that his mam was divorced from his dad and shacked up with another bloke – and that she’d had another child. He and Gordon had a little sister.
And then there was Dorothy – that crimson dress, those curves, those dark eyes like daggers and those full lips. She reminded him of a beautiful thoroughbred filly, trotting back and forth, tossing its mane and looking down its long, regal nose.
After making his bed, Bobby made his way down to the kitchen, where he left what he reckoned would be enough cash to cover a week’s board and lodging. He didn’t want anyone to think he expected any kind of preferential treatment simply because he was Gloria’s son. He’d said as much to Agnes last night after he’d returned from walking Dorothy back to the flat and had found a sandwich and a cup of tea waiting for him on the kitchen table. Agnes had told him in her soft Irish accent that she had no intention of treating him any differently to any other lodger she might have. And, she’d added, when he’d nodded at the much appreciated supper, she would have provided sustenance to anyone who had turned up on her doorstep after a long journey. ‘Especially one of our brave boys who’s been risking life ’n limb for his country ’n has, thankfully, made it back home alive.’ The sadness that came into her voice had reminded Bobby that his new landlady had lost a son in this war and a husband in the one before.
Quietly unbolting the front door and carefully shutting it behind him, Bobby stood for a moment looking at this part of the east end, which was to be his new home. As he walked down Tatham Street, seeing it for the first time in the early-morning light, he looked at the parallel rows of three-storey terraced houses. Smoke had started to billow out of a few of the chimneys. He caught a glimpse of an old woman in a floral nightgown pulling back a heavy blackout curtain, before his attention was diverted to a large grey cat running across the tram tracks and darting down one of the side streets. He pulled up the collar on his navy coat; it might be the start of spring, but there was still a bitter nip in the air.
Reaching the Borough Road, he looked left to his mam’s flat. He still couldn’t quite believe she’d not only booted their father out – finally – after all these years, but that she’d also divorced him. Why, he couldn’t help thinking, hadn’t she done that years ago?
Crossing the road and turning left down Norfolk Street, he thought about the man who had replaced his father. He hoped his mam hadn’t jumped from the frying pan into the fire with this Jack Crawford. The name rang a bell, but then again Crawford was a common name in these parts. He’d been so distracted by Dorothy, he hadn’t paid him much heed, but lying awake in bed and replaying his homecoming in his head, he’d thought more about his mam’s new fella. The way he’d stood with his hands on her shoulders – was he simply being protective? Or controlling? Had his mam exchanged one nasty bastard for another? And if she had, what about Hope? Was she having to endure the same hell that he and Gordon had?
Reaching the top of Norfolk Street, he turned right down High Street East, joining a growing stream of flat-capped workers heading to the docks. The smell was strong. The salt in the air was pungent. He would guess the tide was high. Walking along Low Street and seeing the old steamer at the ferry landing, he jogged to catch it before it left. Paying Stan, the old ferryman, he walked to the side railings and looked out towards the mouth of the Wear. It was good to feel the undulating wash of the river under his feet; the slight rocking of the deck made him feel at home. His reasons for joining up might not have been driven by a deep yearning for a sailor’s life, but he had grown to love it all the same, and now, as he looked out to the North Sea, he knew he was going to miss it.
Bobby knocked on the yard manager’s office door. If his mam hadn’t already told him and his brother in her letters about a woman called Helen Crawford, he would have presumed this was the secretary come in early to catch up on some work for her boss.
‘Sorry to bother you, Miss Crawford,’ Bobby said, trying not to startle her. She looked engrossed in a large draftsman’s drawing that was spread across the width of her desk. There was a huge ginger cat curled up in a basket on the floor next to her chair.
‘Gos
h!’ Helen looked up, surprised at seeing a sailor in the doorway of her office. ‘You gave me quite a shock there.’ She glanced up at the clock. It had just gone seven. ‘No one’s usually about at this time. In the yard, yes, but not here in admin.’ She scrutinised the handsome seaman standing in the doorway. He looked harmless.
Bobby looked at his mam’s friend and thought she had done a good job of describing her. Very beautiful, with that subtle air that seemed inherent in those who were brought up with an education and no worries about money. He’d thought it strange his mam was chummy with a woman from the moneyed middle class, but it seemed they had become quite close over the years.
‘Please, come in.’ Helen waved him in.
Bobby walked into the small room and stopped in his tracks as the marmalade-coloured tomcat suddenly came padding over towards him and rubbed up against his leg.
‘How can I help you?’ Helen was curious. Every minute of every working day at the yard might be spent building ships, but it was actually quite a rarity to see those who sailed in them in the yard.
‘I’m after a job,’ Bobby said, purposefully neglecting to tell her that his mother was one of her employees and a friend to boot. He wanted to get this job off his own back.
‘You’re no longer with the navy, I take it?’ Helen asked. She noticed that every time she spoke, the sailor turned his head ever so slightly to the left.
‘Medically discharged,’ Bobby said, pulling out his papers from his inside pocket. ‘Not that I agreed with the decision.’
‘Really? And why were you medically discharged?’ She didn’t want to take on someone who might end up being a liability. She looked down at the creased form he had just thrust into her hand.
‘Loss of hearing in my left ear,’ he said.
‘Ah,’ Helen said. That explained the head tilting.
‘I can rivet,’ Bobby said. ‘I did most of my apprenticeship at Bartram’s before I went to sea. I’m sure they’ve still got records …’
‘That must have been a good few years ago,’ Helen said, guessing the strapping young man standing in front of her must be in his mid-twenties.
‘It’s like riding a bike,’ Bobby said, quick as a flash. ‘You never forget.’
Helen pulled out a packet of Pall Malls and lit one.
‘And you don’t think your loss of hearing will cause any problems?’ Helen asked.
Bobby barked with laughter. ‘I reckon most of the men who work here are stone deaf. I spent two years in a shipyard – if I’d stayed another two, I’d guess my hearing would be worse than it is now.’
Helen smiled. There was truth in what he said. And she’d be happy to play down his compromised hearing. She didn’t give a jot if the seaman standing in front of her was as deaf as a doornail, the yard was desperate for riveters – and judging by the pull of his uniform around his chest and upper arms, she was sure he would be more than capable of keeping up with the physical demands of the job.
‘All right,’ she said, blowing out a stream of smoke and tapping her cigarette in the ashtray. ‘Let’s see how you get on over the next week and we’ll go from there.’ She handed him back his discharge papers.
‘That’s all I ask for,’ Bobby said. ‘A chance.’
‘Right,’ said Helen, fishing out a contract of employment from one of her drawers. ‘Fill out this form and then I’ll tell you where you can get yourself kitted out with a pair of overalls – you’ll want to keep that uniform pristine.’ Helen would have liked to add, For all the girls. She was under no illusion as to why he had worn it this morning. Still, who was she to judge; you had to use what you had in this life to get what you wanted.
Bobby quickly filled out the form and handed it back to Helen, who gave him directions to the supply shed.
‘Then you can get your clocking-on board from the timekeeper and head over to the quayside by the first dry basin. There’s a riveters’ squad there – ask for Jimmy, he’ll see you all right.’
As Helen watched the former able seaman leave her office, she wished she’d asked him why he’d chosen Thompson’s out of all the yards – especially as he’d started his apprenticeship at Bartram’s. Looking down at the form he’d filled in, she read his name: Robert Armstrong.
That name rang a bell.
It was only when Bobby was halfway through the morning shift that it suddenly occurred to him who Helen Crawford was related to. Of course – he should have realised it straight away. The dark, almost jet-black hair and striking good looks should have told him, if not the surname. It explained why Helen and his mam were so close. Why she had mentioned Helen so much in her letters. He had thought it a little odd that his mam, who was poor and working-class, would be so chummy with a rich, middle-class woman who was young enough to be her daughter.
Helen was Jack Crawford’s daughter. And Hope was her little sister too – well, half-sister, which made them all family in a strange sort of way.
He shook his head as another penny dropped. His mam had mentioned that Helen was the granddaughter of Mr Charles Havelock, which would mean that Jack was married to Mr Havelock’s daughter, Miriam, who was also well known, mainly due to her birthright and getting her picture in the local rag on a regular basis.
As he saw the glowing red nub of another rivet appear through the hole in the metal plate on the hull, his rivet gun got to work, battering it with a fast succession of blows, squeezing it flat, making it a seamless part of the ship’s metal skin. And as his arms and body shuddered in time with the pneumatic hammering, he thought his return home seemed to be getting more bizarre by the minute.
As the women welders headed over to the canteen, they passed Jimmy and his squad sitting by the side of the dry basin where one of the landing craft being produced by the yard was being built. They all waved over.
As they continued across the yard, Dorothy suddenly clutched Angie’s arm.
‘Oh. My. God!’ she gasped.
‘Ow, Dor, gerroff, that hurts.’ Angie pulled her best mate’s talon-like hand off her arm, which was already sore from a morning of vertical welds.
‘It’s him!’ Dorothy declared, standing rooted to the spot.
Angie looked at the tall, well-built worker who was striding across the yard, biting into a sandwich.
‘Who’s him when he’s at home?’ she asked, looking at the bloke with cropped hair and a dirty face that only seemed to accentuate his chiselled looks.
‘Bobby!’ Dorothy said in astonishment. ‘Gloria’s Bobby.’
‘Blimey, Dor, yer missed out the bit about him being totally gorge.’ Angie had been subjected to every cough and spit of Bobby’s return from the moment she’d opened her eyes that morning.
Sensing someone was looking at him, Bobby turned his head to see Dorothy and Angie stood stapled to the spot, gawping.
‘Dorothy!’ he called across, a wide smile on his face, his eyes dancing with delight at seeing the woman he had spent a good part of last night thinking about. He touched the top of his head in a salute.
Dorothy turned away, avoiding his gaze. Last night, after walking her home, Bobby had refused to go back and see Gloria, refused outright, said a courteous goodnight and that it had been a pleasure to make her company. A pleasure to make her company – what era was he living in? Back in the days of Queen Victoria? She’d said exactly that to him, which had only made him hoot with laughter as he’d turned to make his way back to the Elliots’.
As Dorothy and Angie hurried into the canteen, they both apologised for jumping the queue in their eagerness to get to Gloria.
‘Did you see him?’ Dorothy asked.
‘Who?’ Gloria asked.
‘Bobby!’ Dorothy hissed into her ear.
Gloria’s head jolted. ‘Blimey, Dor, that went right through me.’
‘Bobby’s here!’ Dorothy said in disbelief. ‘He’s working in the yard.’
Gloria looked at Dorothy – surprise on her face, but not shock.
‘Well
, that’s Bobby for yer,’ she said. ‘Not one to rest on his laurels.’
The queue shuffled along.
‘But to get a job here. At Thompson’s?’ Dorothy continued to whisper into Gloria’s ear.
‘Dor, you can speak properly,’ Gloria said. ‘It’s no secret he’s my son. Or that he’s working in the yard.’ What she was a little perplexed about, though, was that Bobby had opted to work at Thompson’s. She’d have thought his first port of call would have been Bartram’s. Not only had he worked there as a youngster, but it was just a few minutes’ walk from Tatham Street – and, moreover, it would mean he didn’t have to rub shoulders with his mam every day, something she felt he’d prefer not to have to do.
‘All right, Glor!’ Muriel’s foghorn of a voice sounded out across the head of a young girl dishing out food. ‘Good to see one of yer lads back safe and sound, eh?’
Gloria smiled. ‘It is, Muriel, it is.’
‘How did yer knar it was him?’ Angie perked up. She had been listening intently to Dor’s hissing and whispering and Gloria’s nonchalant responses – and now here was Muriel putting her oar in. Bobby’s turning up really had thrown the cat amongst the pigeons. And as for Dor, well she had a bee in her bonnet that looked set to stay a while yet.
Muriel let out a loud burst of laughter. ‘The haircut gave it away, Ange. Then the name.’ She looked at Gloria. ‘Good lad yer’ve got there.’
Dorothy let out a disbelieving gasp, which Gloria chose to ignore and Muriel didn’t hear.
‘Your lads all right?’ Gloria asked.
Muriel put up both hands, fingers crossed on each, by way of reply. A shout from the kitchens saw her turn and disappear from view.
‘Dor,’ Gloria said as she grabbed some sandwiches and moved along the queue to the tea urn, ‘I wanted to thank you for last night. Getting Bobby lodgings with Agnes.’
Dorothy’s attention was on the young girl who was serving out the steak and vegetable stew. She was smiling at her, hoping to get more if she was nice. She was starving.