Yes, Mama

by Helen Forrester

  Alicia agreed in a very subdued voice, ‘Yes, Mama.’ What could a bastard be? She glanced up at Elizabeth whose complexion was slowly returning to a reasonable pink. ‘Do you feel better now, Mama? Would you like me to get you some fresh tea?’ she asked, anxious to make amends.

  ‘No, thank you. I’ll rest in my chair for a little while.’

  ‘Then I’ll take the tray back to Polly.’ She looked contritely at her mother. ‘I’m truly sorry, Mama, to distress you.’

  Her mother did not answer; her mind was in a tumult. She had never before faced honestly the fact that, despite the restricted life Alicia led, sooner or later, she was likely to learn of the scandal her birth had caused. The neglected child was now a young woman, and Elizabeth prayed that she never asked Humphrey what a bastard was.

  VI

  A very puzzled Alicia took the teacups off the tray and put them into the kitchen sink. Then she turned to Polly making pastry at the big square table in the middle of the kitchen.

  ‘Polly, what’s a bastard?’

  The rolling-pin stopped dead. Polly raised startled eyes to Alicia’s solemn little face. She had not heard the young man’s remark on New Year’s Eve, so she did not know what had sparked the question. She looked down at the pastry and carefully gave it a long slow roll. Then she said honestly, ‘It’s a kid wot don’t have no real papa.’

  Alicia’s eyes widened in surprise. She approached the table and gazed up at Polly’s averted face. ‘But, Polly, when we were out on New Year’s Eve, that drunk young man called me a bastard – and I’ve got a papa.’ Her lips trembled, as Polly continued to roll the pastry. ‘And he made it sound wicked – and he was rude about Mama. He frightened me, Pol.’ The last words were entreating as she begged for reassurance.

  Polly turned to the girl, forcing herself to smile, as she inwardly cursed Elizabeth for not, in some way, preparing Alicia to face her illegitimacy. She said cheerfully, ‘Anybody as called you that is only tenpence to a shillin’. You poor kid – don’t you worry your head about it. The Master ‘as you in this house, so he’s your papa all right – all proper and legal.’

  Alicia clicked her tongue fretfully, and then fumed, ‘Well, I don’t understand why he should be so rude about Mama and me. Is it really wicked to be one? And how can anybody not have a proper papa?’

  ‘It’s not wicked to be one,’ replied Polly firmly. ‘Kids can’t help being born. What happens is sometimes people fall in love and maybe they can’t get married – no money or somethin’ – but a baby comes. And that baby is called a bastard. It’s proper sad and it’s real hard on the kid’s Mam. But the baby isn’t wicked – the nice name for him is a love child – somebody special, like.’

  Poor Polly hoped she had laid the matter to rest and she lifted her pastry carefully into a piedish. But worse was to come.

  ‘I didn’t know you could have a baby without being married!’ exclaimed Alicia, her high, white forehead wrinkled by her complete confusion. ‘I don’t even know how babies come, except I’m sure they don’t come in the doctor’s bag – they’d smother in it.’

  ‘You don’t have to be married,’ Polly floundered. ‘Hasn’t your Mam ever spoken to you about it?’

  ‘No.’ Alicia heaved a sigh. ‘Should she? She nearly fainted when I asked her what a bastard was. She didn’t tell me.’

  I bet she didn’t, thought Polly sourly. Aloud, she said, ‘Well, it int a word that ladies use.’

  ‘How do babies come, Polly? Ethel at school says she saw a cat have kittens once – and she really believes that babies come the same way. She said it was awfully messy. She said that Fluffy opened up between her legs and the kittens squeezed out – and there was blood and things.’ Her voice faltered, and she looked appealingly at Polly as if she hoped Polly would deny it.

  Better she knows, thought Polly. She had heard Elizabeth talking to Humphrey about the necessity of Alicia going to Blackburne House School, so that she was educated enough to be a governess, if she did not marry. And in Polly’s opinion, governesses needed to know as much as housemaids did, since they were just as vulnerable to unwanted advances. Why hasn’t the bloody woman said something to her about men? Polly cursed. Now she had the job. That Ethel should’ve kept her mouth shut.

  ‘She’s right,’ she blurted out. ‘Oh, aye, she’s right.’

  Alicia was so startled by this revelation that she knocked the recipe book off the table.

  ‘You mean women – we open like that?’

  Polly piled apple slices into the tart she was making. She looked up with a small grin. ‘Yes, chook. Don’t be scared. It’s as natural as anything.’

  ‘But doesn’t it hurt? Babies are quite big.’

  Polly rested her floured knuckles on the deal table. ‘It does a bit – not much,’ she admitted. ‘And you forget about it when the kid’s in your arms.’

  Alicia recovered herself slightly and bent to rescue the cookery book from the floor. She laughed nervously, as she straightened up. ‘You’re teasing me, Polly, and in a vulgar way. How could a baby get inside its mother, in the first place?’ she asked, as she sat down on a stool.

  Holy Mother, save me! I’m lost, thought Polly anxiously. Aloud, she insisted, ‘I’m not teasing, luv. It’s God’s truth.’

  Alicia still doubted her and was angry; Polly should not tell such stories when she had asked a serious question. “Well, how do we get there?’ she demanded.

  Polly sighed and lifted more pastry on to the wooden pastry board, ready for rolling. At least they had got away from the direct subject of bastards. I think you should ask your Mam,’ she advised.

  ‘Oh, Polly!’ Alicia exclaimed crossly. ‘You know she never talks to me about anything much.’

  Polly swallowed and then nodded. Here I go, she fretted. ‘And I hope I don’t lose me job if the Missus finds out.’ She paused in her rolling and was quiet for a moment, ad then she began, ‘Well, you know as I was married once and had a little baby? And he died?’

  ‘Yes.’ Alicia was tremblingly alert now. ‘I’m sorry he died.’

  ‘Well, I loved our Pat, me hubbie, somethin’ terrible.’ She heaved a sigh at the memory of him, though, with no photograph to help her, she could not always remember his face clearly. She leaned on her rolling-pin and cleared her throat. ‘When you love a person like that you don’t mind what they do to you – you don’t mind ’em touching you anywhere.’

  Demonstrating with her floured hands, she explained very simply, and Alicia listened, wide-eyed and nervous, yet not frightened. This was what all the mystery was about, this simple action. And when she thought about the world around her, it was a logical explanation.

  ‘It feels lovely,’ Polly finished up, ‘and you and your hubby are happy afterwards.’

  Alicia sat shyly examining her fingernails, and then she asked, ‘Do you and Edward feel happy like that?’

  Polly had picked up a piece of pastry to cover her apple tart. Paralysed by the question, she stood staring at Alicia, while the pastry drooped and stretched. A slow red flush went up over her forehead and down her neck.

  ‘Now, our Allie!’ she protested, giving Alicia her baby name.

  Alicia grinned mischievously. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t ask personal questions. But I thought you must be feeling awful with his being in the war in South Africa – if you do love him.’

  Polly gulped and closed her eyes, so that Alicia should not see her agony of mind. Then it burst from her. ‘Oh, I do, luv. I worry all the time.’

  Alicia slipped from her stool and impulsively wound her arms round the back of her nanny, leaning her head on the maid’s bent back. ‘Oh, Polly, I’m so sad for you. I love him, too. It makes me feel sick to think of Africa.’ She sighed. ‘Being a soldier is a dreadful life, isn’t it? When you think about it – having to kill other men before they kill you. It must be terrible for Mama.’

  Polly turned round and, despite her floury hands, she clung to Alicia.

  S
o rarely did Elizabeth say much to either ofthem that neither realized that she did not know that her son was in South Africa. Edward wrote to her about once a quarter and never to his father; no mention was made in his letters of where he was, in case the missives fell into enemy hands. He also sent little notes to Polly, care of her sister, Mary, who now had a decent house provided by the City Council, where the postman delivered daily. He signed his notes only with his first initial. Polly treasured them, and it was she who had told Alicia that she was fairly certain Edward had been moved to South Africa – last time he was home they had agreed on a code word by which he could tell her approximately where he was.

  The apple pie which Polly had been making was not a great success, because Polly forgot to put in the cloves and cinnamon. Alicia forgot that Polly had not exactly explained how she came to be called a bastard, though a small, nagging apprehension remained with her.

  Was she really Alicia Beatrix Mary Woodman? If she was not, who was she? She surreptitiously combed the dictionary in the library; it told her no more than Polly had And Polly had been quite firm that she was legally Papa’s child.

  Reading novels with a new alertness, she found there were many in which the heroine was ‘betrayed’ and often seemed to die in the Workhouse while having a baby with no husband to love and take care of it. Was that how a bastard was born? It was all very vague, except that the baby’s life was invariably very difficult.

  She never thought of asking Fanny, who could have enlightened her in a few seconds, having been born one herself and having watched the progress of Elizabeth’s love affair. Though Fanny was a dear friend, she was not, in Alicia’s opinion, very knowledgeable and Alicia had a tendency to lecture her, which sometimes made Fanny laugh.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I

  As Elizabeth grew older and her mind dulled, she rarely read more than the headlines in the newspaper. Polly and Alicia, however, read them quite thoroughly after Humphrey had put them into his wastepaper basket, both anxiously watching the news from South Africa.

  At dinnertime, when such news might reasonably have been discussed, Alicia never spoke for fear of having Humphrey snarl at her to hold her tongue. She listened to her parents’ conversation, and hearing their quarrelsome arguments made her question Fanny’s and Polly’s assertions that marriage was a highly desirable state. She herself was always thankful to escape from them to the nursery or the kitchen. She did, occasionally, share afternoon tea with her mother, and, one day, she remarked, without thinking, that it was worrisome to have dear Edward involved in South Africa.

  ‘He’s in India,’ responded Elizabeth lazily. ‘Mr Woodman remarked that the Bank was still sending his allowance there – he said that since he was a soldier, he ought to be in South Africa.’ Elizabeth had, for years, not given much thought to her stodgy elder son, of whom she had few real memories and occasionally forgot completely.

  Alicia swallowed, realizing her slip, and hastily agreed that he was probably still in Amritsar. Poor Polly! She had inadvertently nearly betrayed her. She would not have known what to say, if her mother had asked why she imagined Edward was in Africa. How could she tell her that Edward wrote letters to her maidservant? Polly would be dismissed without notice simply for receiving such a missive.

  II

  One morning late in March, when Mr Bittle’s daffodils were blowing cheerfully in the back garden, Humphrey was handed his letters by Fanny, who was waiting on him at the breakfast table. He looked through the envelopes and then quickly extracted one from the War Office. Apprehensively, he slit it open.

  Good God! Edward! Dead of the typhoid? He was as shocked as if Edward had been his most beloved son, instead of a constant irritation to him. And he’d died at Ladysmith?

  A searing pain went up his chest and neck; he could not breathe properly. And the boy had not even managed to be killed in action, dying for King and Country! That hurt. The pain leapt through him, and he had a flash of memory of a little boy bowling an iron hoop and bumping into him and his being very sharp with him for such careless behaviour. As he fought for breath, a muddled sense of guilt went through him.

  Fanny was tidying the sideboard and had her back to him. Now she heard him gasp, ‘Brandy!’

  She whirled round.

  Her master was clutching his chest, obviously in great pain.

  She whipped open the sideboard cupboard, snatched up a glass and the crystal decanter and ran to him. She slopped a little brandy into the glass, putting her arm round his shoulders to steady him. He managed to swallow a sip as he leaned against her starched apron. The pain receded slightly, and he muttered, ‘Help me – library couch. Call the Mistress.’ His speech was slurred.

  She was a tiny woman and thought he would collapse on to the hall floor, but she did manage to ease him into the book-lined room and he tumbled on to the couch. He struggled to breathe, as she shook out a crocheted shawl lying at the end of the couch and put it over him. ‘I won’t be a mo’, sir.’

  She ran out of the room, hitching up her calico skirts as she took the stairs two at a time.

  She hardly stopped to knock, as she flew into Elizabeth’s bedroom. ‘Oh, Ma’am, please come quick. The Master’s took sick.’

  Elizabeth put down her teacup carefully on to her breakfast tray. ‘Really? Where is he?’

  ‘On the couch in the library. Please hurry, Ma’am.’

  Elizabeth slowly reached for her dressing-gown hanging on the bedknob, pushed back the bedcovers and extended one fat leg. Fanny took her hand and helped her out. As Elizabeth carefully tied the cord, Fanny wanted to yell at her, ‘Hurry up, for Christ’s sake!’

  Her mistress stood unsteadily by the bed. Her head ached abominably. ‘What happened?’

  ‘He can’t breathe, Ma’am, not proper, that is. He were holding ’is chest.’

  Herded by a distraught Fanny, Elizabeth staggered to the door and stumped downstairs. When she entered the library, she found Humphrey lying slumped against the raised curve of the end of the couch. His eyes were closed; his breath was coming in irregular gasps.

  His wife stood over him, trying to gather her wits together despite her throbbing head. ‘What’s the matter, Humphrey?’

  ‘Get Willis – heart attack.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes. Quickly.’ His voice faded and he moaned.

  Fanny was fluttering nervously in the background. She turned to the mahogany desk, picked out a piece of notepaper from the stand and laid it on the blotting pad. ‘Here you are, Ma’am,’ she said to Elizabeth.

  Like a sleepwalker, Elizabeth went to the desk. Fanny dipped a pen into the silver inkwell and handed it to her. Obediently, Elizabeth wrote. She recollected that she had not had to call Dr Willis since Mrs Tibbs had been taken ill. Mrs Tibbs had died, she thought dully.

  ‘I’ll run with it, Ma’am.’ She hesitated, and then inquired, ‘Shall I ask Polly to come up – to be with you, like?’

  Elizabeth looked indifferently at the suffering man. She felt far away from the proceedings, as if she were watching a boring play. In answer to Fanny’s question, she said mechanically, ‘Yes. Ask her to bring up a glass of brandy – two glasses.’

  Polly arrived very speedily with the brandy and suggested that she should watch her Master, who seemed more comfortable after the restorative, while Elizabeth got dressed for the doctor’s visit.

  Elizabeth tossed down her glass of brandy at a gulp. Then, feeling a little stronger herself, she agreed to go and dress.

  Polly did not dare to sit down in front of the Master of the house, so she stood at the foot of the couch, hands clasped tightly in front of her, alternately glancing at the sick man and then through the lace curtains, to see if the doctor’s carriage was coming.

  She was surprised when, in a whisper, Humphrey addressed her, his eyes still closed. ‘Polly.’

  ‘Sir? Are you feelin’ better, sir?’

  ‘A little. Polly, I have to break it to yo
ur Mistress that Master Edward died at Ladysmith. I want you to be here, in case she faints – that is, if Dr Willis hasn’t arrived by the time she comes down again.’

  Polly swayed on her feet, as if he had struck her. Strength seemed to run out of her and she thought she would faint. Edward, dearest Edward. She clutched at the edge of the desk behind her.

  Unaware of the distress he had caused, Humphrey lay perfectly still and tried to breathe normally, as the pain threatened again. The only sound in the room was that of a fly buzzing on the windowpane.

  Polly did not answer Humphrey. She could not. She simply stood, trembling from head to foot, trying not to scream or sob, for fear the stricken man before her noticed.

  Fanny knocked on the door. When she received no reply, she opened it cautiously. She was still panting from her fast run to Dr Willis’s. ‘Aye, Polly, I thought the Mistress would be here. Doctor’s comin’ now.’ Then as she saw Polly’s evident anguish, she asked in alarm, ‘What’s up?’

  Polly fought to keep her senses. ‘Fanny, watch the Master till the Missus comes back. I got to go upstairs.’ She pushed past the little maid to the hall. Holding hard to the banister, she went quickly up the two flights of stairs to her narrow bedroom next to the day nursery. She flung herself on to the bed and let blackness roll over her.

  Humphrey was vaguely aware of the verbal exchange between the maids, but his need to rest was paramount. As long as someone was there to deal with the hysterics he expected from his wife, he did not care.

  III

  Dr Willis consigned Humphrey to bed indefinitely. He promised a bottle of medicine and ordered a light diet. ‘And no cigars.’

  At the latter instruction, Humphrey’s eyes shot open. ‘Surely, Willis, I can smoke?’

  ‘I have found that my patients’ bouts of pain are much reduced, if they don’t smoke,’ the doctor declared firmly. ‘You may have whisky and an occasional glass of wine. I shall, of course, come in each morning.’