The House of Women

by Catherine Cookson

  She ignored her daughter’s question.

  As the bus took them past Bog’s End, past the bottom of Brampton Hill and to the new council estate, she wished they had come by car; although her driving a car, she imagined, would have emphasised their superior position and so would preclude his understanding that he or his parents would have to support the child.

  Peggy rose first to get off the bus, and as she followed her, Lizzie wondered how she and the boy had first met, because he would have gone to a school nearby, whereas Peggy went to Brixton Road Girls’ High School. Of course there were the clubs and there was the school dance at Christmas. Here she recalled that Peggy had been very excited after the dance. She’d had a lovely time, she’d said. Yes, the school dance. She had invited Charlie to accompany her as her partner, but at no time had she become excited over Charlie, because she had been brought up with him, played with him since they were babies. There was, it seemed, nothing exciting about Charlie. No, this was likely why the other one, whoever he was, appealed to her.

  ‘What street is it?’

  ‘It’s…it’s called Clover Close.’

  Clover Close. Her chin jerked up. ‘You know the number?’

  ‘I…I think so. Seventeen.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘I’m sure.’ The last words were almost a covered growl, and Lizzie answered in like manner, saying, ‘Well, how have you come by being so sure of the address? Have you been here?’

  ‘No, I haven’t, but he wrote to me.’

  ‘And you wrote back, I suppose?’

  ‘Yes, I did.’

  Number seventeen was in the middle of a row of identical houses. They were newish, and looked like a row of barracks. They stood before the door for a moment before Lizzie raised her hand and knocked.

  It was opened by a young girl of about Peggy’s own age. She looked from one to the other, then glanced back down a short passage as she enquired, ‘Yes?’

  ‘I am…I am Mrs Hammond. I would like to see your mother or father.’

  ‘Hang on.’ The girl did not actually close the door but pushed it a little forward, and they heard her running down the passage.

  It was a full two minutes before the door was pulled open and a man in his shirt sleeves, black-haired and dark-eyed, aged about forty, looked at them, and he, too, said, ‘Yes?’

  Lizzie drew in a long breath before she said, ‘You are Mr Jones, and I think you know why I’m here.’

  ‘Come in.’ He pulled the door wide and they passed him, and as he closed the door behind them they waited, then followed him down the passage and into what appeared to be a kitchen-cum-living room, for the table was set roughly for a meal.

  Besides the girl, there was a woman in the room and the man said, ‘This woman says we should know why she’s here. Well, we didn’t up till a few hours ago, did we?’

  The woman wagged her head now, saying, ‘No, we certainly didn’t.’

  ‘I told you last week, if you’d only listened,’ at which interruption, the woman turned around and half raised her hand to the girl, saying, ‘Shut your mouth, Minn.’

  Not one of the three people was appealing to Lizzie. She wasn’t class-conscious, she often told herself, but there were some and some and there were limits; and she would put these people just below the limit. Common was the word. But still there were many nice common people; in fact, she knew quite a few.

  The man now said, ‘Well, sit down; it’ll cost you the same.’ And then he added, ‘And you, lass…two for the price of one.’

  Oh, so there was a joker here. Lizzie took her seat but it was some seconds before Peggy slowly lowered herself down into a chair some distance from the table, and she watched the man and woman now seating themselves. But the young girl remained standing near the fireplace, her hand outstretched towards the mantel as if for support. And yet she didn’t appear like a girl who needed support; she looked perky.

  The man was staring hard at Peggy, and then he suddenly said to her, ‘So you say my lad’s got you into trouble, do you? That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?’ His tone was no longer jocular.

  Peggy stared back at him. She was unable to answer. Her throat was dry, her stomach was trembling. She had the desire to cry; at the same time she wanted to shout at him and say, ‘Yes, he did; but I don’t want anything more to do with him.’ But her mother was answering for her, at least she was asking the question: ‘Has your son admitted to this?’

  ‘No; why should he?’ It was the woman speaking now, and Lizzie quickly answered her: ‘Simply because, madam, he has given my daughter a child,’ she said.

  ‘We’ll have less of the “madam”‘—the woman was nodding at her—‘I’m Mrs Jones, if you please. And what if he says he hasn’t been with her? It could be anybody; there’s been others after her. There’s a lad next door, I understand.’

  ‘Nonsense! They are like brother and sister; they were brought up together. He’s a different type.’

  ‘Oh. Oh. A different type from what? Eh?’ It was the woman on the attack again, the mother of the son defending her brood, and she half rose from the chair. ‘You want to be careful what you say.’

  Lizzie swallowed. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘what I meant was, Charlie is a quiet kind of lad; he’s never bothered with girls.’

  ‘No; perhaps because he had one close at hand.’

  ‘Shut up!’

  All eyes in the room were immediately drawn to Peggy. She was sitting straight up on the edge of the chair. ‘Charlie Conway is a different type from your son. It was your son Andrew who…who…well, he is the father. I have never known any other boy. I was never out with a boy until I met him last Christmas at the school dance. And from then he…he followed me. He came to the school and…and set me home time and time again.’

  ‘He did, Ma. I saw him, I mean waiting at the school gate, and once I saw them going across the field to…’ interrupted Minn.

  ‘Will you shut your mouth, our Minn!’

  ‘Why should I? Because he’s your bright-eyed boy? He couldn’t do any wrong, could he, but me…’

  ‘Be quiet, Minn!’ It was her father speaking to her now; and the girl looked at him, her eyes blinking as if to ward off tears; but her voice held no tears when she said, ‘You know what I’m saying is true. It’s always been our Andrew, our Andrew, our Andrew. Our Andrew’s going to the Grammar School…Our Andrew’s been picked for this…Our Andrew’s been picked for that.’

  When the woman swung round in her chair her husband cried, ‘Enough! Enough! And she’s right. She always is, you know.’ He grinned now, then, looking at Lizzie, he said, ‘Families. Families. Well now, the thing to do is to get the lad in and confront him with this, isn’t it?’ He looked over his shoulder again to his daughter, saying, ‘Go and fetch him. He’ll be in the shed seeing to his bike.’

  ‘I bet he isn’t; I bet he’s skipped.’ Minn interjected.

  A movement from her mother caused the girl to run from the room. And the father, sitting back in his chair and folding his arms, said, ‘Nice kettle of fish. He was all set to go places, you know. He could have an’ all; he’s bright. Oh, he’s bright. Good at art an’ figures. I could see him being a draughtsman or an accountant. They’re the blokes that make the money, the accountants. But if he’s going to be lumbered with a bairn, well, that puts a different complexion on it, doesn’t it? He won’t be able to stay on at school.’

  ‘He will!’ His wife interposed now. Her lips pouting, she repeated, ‘He will.’

  ‘And who’s going to support the child, eh?’

  ‘What’s the matter with you, man? You’re taking it already that it’s his.’

  ‘Well, what d’you think?’

  ‘Why should he support any child? They’ve got money.’ She was looking at Lizzie now. ‘Your people own the Funnell garage and showrooms, don’t they, off the market place, so you’re not without a penny.’

  ‘That is quite beside the point at the present
moment’—Lizzie’s voice was stiff—‘but what is very much to the point is that my daughter is not going to bear an illegitimate child; she must be married.’

  The husband and wife looked at each other as if Lizzie’s words had come as a shock to them, which apparently they had, because Mrs Jones, leaning slightly across the table now towards Lizzie, said, ‘He’s only seventeen; he’s too young to take responsibility like that.’

  Like a flash Lizzie came back. Her hand swinging round as though to embrace Peggy, she retorted, ‘And so is my daughter too young to take the responsibility of a child without a father and the ensuing disgrace that child will have to bear all its life; not forgetting how people will look on its mother.’

  It was at this moment that the door opened and Andrew Jones entered the room. He stopped just within the doorway, but a push from his sister, who wanted to get in, caused him to take two quick steps forward, and at the same time to turn an angry glance down on her. Then he was looking at Peggy.

  He was a tall boy for his age. His hair was cut short but it was thick and dark. His eyebrows, too, were dark, as were the eyelashes; his blue eyes were large and set well apart. His nose was in proportion to the length of his face, which was longish and pale in comparison with his dark hair, and on first glance he could have appeared promisingly handsome, except that his mouth was full-lipped and slack. It hung now slightly open.

  ‘Well!’ His father was addressing him. ‘No need to make any introductions, is there? I suppose you know why she’s here?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Come off it, our Andy,’ and the interjection caused the mother to half rise from her chair. With her finger thrust out towards her daughter, she said, ‘Another word from you and you know what you’ll get. Anyway, go on! Get out of the room.’

  When her daughter didn’t move she turned and, almost glaring at Lizzie, she said, ‘You know what I think? I think it’s a damned cheek you coming here and blaming him…’

  ‘Shut up, will you, Carrie!’ The man now turned and, looking straight at his son, demanded, ‘Have you been with this lass?’

  The straight question obviously shook the boy: he blinked rapidly, pulled his mouth to one side and bit on his lip, and seemed about to speak when his father said, ‘All right, that’s evidence enough. The thing now is, what’s to be done about it? You’re a bloody fool. You know that? Your career’s gone to blazes, whatever it was going to be, because the situation is this: if you don’t marry her’—with a jerk of his head he indicated Peggy—‘they’ll make you stump up, an’ that means leavin’ school and gettin’ a job.’

  ‘He’s not going to.’

  James Jones turned his head slowly and looked at his wife, then as slowly he turned again to look at his son and continued to speak to him: ‘The choice is up to you. But at this stage what I think should be done is to let you two youngsters have a talk about it. I don’t know whether the lass wants to marry but her mother seems intent on it.’ He spoke as if neither Lizzie nor Peggy were in the room. Then, getting to his feet, he said, ‘Now, take the lass into the front room.’

  His wife, too, was quickly on her feet, saying, ‘They can’t go in there, it’s in a mess.’

  ‘Well, it shouldn’t be in a mess, woman.’ He was a tall man and, towering over her now, he ended, ‘If you’d get off your backside instead of looking at that bloody telly at night…Oh! What does it matter. Come on, you two.’

  He walked to the kitchen door and pulled it open, then waited and watched Peggy slowly rise from her seat; but when Lizzie put in, ‘I think I should be…’ he said, ‘Stop thinkin’, missis, at least for her. She’s old enough. They’ve had a try and she’s carryin’ a bairn, so she should be able to think for herself. Come on.’

  The impatient movement of his head seemed to jerk the two young people past him and out of the room, across the passage and into the sitting room.

  And Peggy saw straight away that it really was in a mess. As her granny would have said, it had never seen a duster since they were made. There were papers on the floor, two ashtrays lying on a cheap coffee table were full of cigarette ends, and there was a smell in the room suggesting damp or lack of air.

  After the door closed on them they stood well apart, not looking at each other, and as he walked towards the window she said in no small voice, ‘We’re supposed to talk this out, so let’s get it over with.’

  This brought him quickly about and, looking at her, he said very quietly, ‘It wasn’t all my fault; you were ready and willing.’

  ‘I wasn’t! You told me there was a horse there and a young neglected pony.’

  ‘Well, there used to be.’

  ‘There might have been, but they hadn’t been there for a long time.’

  ‘You…you didn’t need much persuasion.’

  She turned her head away from him and looked towards the brown-painted door. He was right, he was quite right; she had been curious, she had wanted to grow up. She’d had an unease in her for a long time, part of it brought about by her wanting to get away from home and her father. Oh, she didn’t like that man, she had never liked him. But after that first time with Andrew, when she had thought she would die, why had she gone back again? And then a second time, and a third and a fourth? Yes, why had she gone back again? And then he…he had dropped her and not only with a baby, he had just dropped her. She really had no intention of uttering the next words because they were common-sounding and she had heard her gran and great-gran say them, but now she heard herself speaking them: ‘When you got what you wanted, you disappeared, you ran off,’ she said.

  She watched him now hunch his shoulders and jerk his chin to the side as he said, ‘It wasn’t like that, not the way you mean. Yes; yes, I ran off because I…I—’ He now stretched his neck upwards and hissed at her, ‘I was frightened of this happening, as it has now. You…you were so ready, so…so…Oh!’ He turned from her and went to the window again.

  Had she been all that ready? She looked at his back. It was narrow; he looked like a young boy, not seventeen, nearly eighteen. Had she ever dreamt about him at night and wanted to be with him? At this moment she didn’t even like him. How was it she had let him touch her?…Touch her, did she say? More than touch, do what he did? How? She couldn’t face up to the fact that the person she was now was someone entirely different from the girl she had been three months ago.

  He had turned towards her again and, looking at him, she actually saw him as a young boy much less mature than she was. He had always given her the impression that he was grown up: it was his chatter, she supposed, his chatter that Charlie had once called ‘his yap from his wide open gap’. Charlie had never liked him. He had met them once coming from the stable area and had straight away endeavoured to ignore him, but Andrew had talked all the time and laughed and acted the goat. She had felt a little ashamed of him that day.

  Why was she thinking of Charlie? She had to get this thing settled. Oh dear, dear Lord, she didn’t want to get married, but there was no way out, she knew that.

  He spoke her thoughts now: ‘You don’t want to get married, do you?’ he said.

  She didn’t answer for a moment, and when she did her answer was a statement: ‘I’ve got to.’

  His whole body moved as if shrugging off his clothes. ‘Well, where would we live? We couldn’t live here,’ he said.

  ‘Oh no!’ The words were emphatic.

  ‘Well, you said before about your dad being…’ His voice trailed off, and she immediately brushed aside what she knew he was about to say: ‘He’s got nothing to do with it, the house I mean. It’s Great-Gran’s house. There’s a sort of annexe. It’s got enough rooms. They’d…they’d do it up.’

  During the time she was speaking she was rubbing her right hand up and down her thigh as if to ease away a pain, and she watched his expression change, his face brighten as he said, ‘A proper house; I mean, detached…they would?’

  ‘It isn’t detached; it’s connected by a doorway. But
yes.’ She closed her eyes for a moment and nodded. ‘Yes, in a way it’s detached. And it could be made really nice.’

  He half turned towards the window again, saying, ‘Well, I’d have to get a job and…and they are not so easy now. Dad’s on the buildings and he’s been off a month. He used to be able to walk from one job to another, but not any more. So…so that’ll be an obstacle, the job.’

  Her hand stopped its rubbing and joined the other one tightly at her waist, and her voice sounded very much as her mother’s did at times when she had to submit to something that her father wanted doing. ‘They’ll see to that too,’ she said. ‘Great-Gran said there could be a place found for you in the garage.’

  His expression took on a lightness.

  ‘Selling cars?’

  ‘No!’

  She now clapped her hand over her mouth because the ‘no’ had been so loud. Then almost in a whisper she explained, ‘Dad’s over the showrooms, he’s manager there. You’d…you’d best keep your distance from him. Anyway, you’d be put down in the grease shop to start with, under Mr Brooker…no, Mr Stanhope; Mr Brooker is assistant to the general manager, Mr Cartwright.’

  His face had resumed its usual expression. ‘Grease shop; what’s that?’

  ‘That’s what they call the repair shop.’

  ‘A greaser? Me…mam won’t like that.’

  She had a great urge to swear like Great-gran did at times and cry at him, ‘Damn your mam!’ But what she said and grimly now was, ‘What would your mam have to do with it? If…if we get married you’ll have to take on responsibility and…and you should think yourself lucky that they are considering giving you a job. Yes, you should.’ She was flapping her hand at him now. ‘Anyway, who do you think you are, Andrew Jones? You played the big “I am” a few months ago; you acted as if you were a man.’ She paused here and they stared at each other in bitterness; and then she added, ‘And you lied. You said you lived up the top of Brampton Hill and your father worked in the Town Hall.’