Yes, Mama

by Helen Forrester

  Elizabeth had left the room, while the doctor conducted a physical examination of his patient. Now Dr Willis rose from his chair by the couch and announced that he would go to explain to her what Humphrey could eat. From under heavy grey eyebrows, he looked down at the exhausted man on the couch. ‘Have you a manservant to help you to bed?’ he inquired.

  ‘No. I’ll send for my son-in-law.’ It was an effort to speak. ‘Probably my brother – Harold – come from Manchester.’ He paused to get his breath. ‘I can stay here for a couple of days, if necessary.’ The pain threatened again and he winced.

  Dr Willis took some cushions from an easy chair and gently propped the patient into a more upright position. ‘Carefully, Sir,’ he warned. He turned to drop his stethoscope into his Gladstone bag.

  ‘Willis, I need your help.’ The request was barely a whisper.

  ‘Of coure, sir. What can I do for you?’

  ‘Tell Mrs Woodman that our son, Edward, died at Ladysmith. Letter – under the shawl here.’

  ‘My dear fellow! I’m dreadfully sorry! Of course, I’ll tell her. And we were all so thankful last month to hear that the town had been relieved. How very sad for you.’ He again looked keenly at Humphrey. ‘Was that the cause of the chest pain?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘My deepest condolences. Would you like me to send for the Reverend Browning and your daughter? I have an errand boy who could go on his bicycle.’

  ‘Please, do.’

  ‘May I see the letter – so that I can be more precise when talking to your poor lady?’

  Humphrey nodded, too exhausted to find the letter for him.

  Dr Willis felt round under the shawl and found the crumpled missive. As he read it, he moved slowly towards the bell-pull to call Fanny. ‘Rest quietly, sir. I’ll deal with this. Indeed, the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away,’ he added piously.

  When Fanny showed him into the morning-room, Elizabeth was seated in her favourite chair by the window. Fanny brought him a straight chair and set it close to Elizabeth. He was a tall, elderly man, a product of Edinburgh Medical School, and when Elizabeth turned inquiringly towards him, he surveyed her puffy, overly red cheeks and bloodshot eyes with professional assessment. She smelled of port wine.

  Fanny turned to leave the room but the doctor indicated, with a discreet gesture, that she should stay. If Mrs Woodman fainted or went into hysterics, he felt he might need help. He put down his bag and sat down.

  Elizabeth’s beringed hand was resting on the padded arm of her chair, and the doctor took it in his. ‘I’m pleased to tell you, dear Mrs Woodman,’ he began, ‘that Mr Woodman will recover quite well, if he takes care now. He must stay in bed. And when he is well enough to go outside again, he must never go in cold or blustery weather.’ He smiled. ‘I’ll send in a bottle of medicine later. See that he takes it whenever the pain threatens.’

  Elizabeth inclined her head and thanked him. A glass of brandy followed by two of port had created a comfortable euphoria. The doctor sighed. ‘I have, however, some very sad news to impart.’

  Since she had just been assured that Humphrey would recover, Elizabeth could not think what news the doctor might consider sad, so she smiled slightly. Fanny, however, standing quietly behind her chair, stiffened. With insight and compassion, she again saw Polly’s stricken face. Master Edward! It had to be.

  Dr Willis told Elizabeth as gently as he could about her son.

  Elizabeth did not faint. She sat suddenly very upright. ‘Why did not Mr Woodman tell me himself?’

  ‘The news was the cause of his heart pain, I believe.’

  ‘I see.’ She was breathing rather heavily and took a moment to let it subside. Then she said, ‘To die of typhoid in a foreign land is dying for one’s country, is it not, Doctor?’

  ‘Indeed it is, Mrs Woodman, and you may be proud of your son. Disease causes more deaths in the army than actual fighting does – and our men know, when they go forth, that they have to face both enemies, both deadly.’

  The doctor continued to sit and pat her hand, expecting tears to burst forth any minute. But they did not. Finally, he told her of the arrangement with her husband that his delivery boy would take a message to Florence and her husband. Then he added, ‘My daughter attends Blackburne House and I seem to remember her telling me that your daughter’s there. Would you like me to send for her, as well? I’m sure that you’ll wish your maids to remain with you, and not go on messages.’

  She looked around her rather helplessly. ‘Yes – um – yes, I would, if your boy would take a note to her Head Mistress. Fanny, where are you, Fanny?’

  ‘Here, Ma’am.’ Fanny came swiftly from behind her.

  ‘Bring my writing case.’

  The doctor rose. ‘I’ll just look in on Mr Woodman again. Someone should sit with him for the next few hours.’

  Elizabeth nodded agreement, and she scribbled a note to Alicia’s Head Mistress and then folded it up. ‘Where’s Polly?’ she asked Fanny.

  ‘She were took poorly, Ma’am. I think it were her stummick.’

  ‘Dear me!’ exclaimed Dr Willis, as he picked up his bag. ‘Would you like me to see her?’

  ‘No, thank you,’ responded Elizabeth stiffly. ‘See Dr Willis out, Fanny, after he has looked at the Master again.’ She held out her hand to the doctor and he shook it.

  ‘I’ll send in a draught which you yourself might be glad to take at bedtime,’ he promised her. She was much too quiet, he thought; she should be shrieking like a steam locomotive. But, then, perhaps she was too drunk to realize completely what had happened. ‘I will come again tomorrow morning,’ he assured her. ‘In the meantime, if there is a recurrence of the pain, please do not hesitate to send for me.’

  When Fanny had closed the front door after the kindly doctor, she hesitated as to whether she should go back to her mistress or go to Polly.

  She sprinted silently up the stairs to the top floor.

  Polly was curled up on her narrow, iron bed, a bundle of sobbing misery. Fanny flew to the bedside and knelt down by her. ‘Aye, I’m sorry, luv,’ she said as she gathered the weeping woman into her arms. ‘There, Pol. There, there,’ she crooned.

  After rocking her backwards and forwards for a minute, as if she were a child, Fanny urged her to get up and wash her face. ‘The Mistress’ll want us both, and she mustn’t know, luv. She mustn’t never know what was up between you and Master Edward.’

  ‘I don’t care if she does.’

  ‘You got to care, Pol. Or you’ll be out on the street without a reference.’

  ‘I don’t care. I want to die.’

  ‘Come on with yez. Think of our little Allie. What’s she goin’ to do without you? You’re her Mam, really; it’s you who loves her. And she’ll be home in twenty minutes or so – Doctor’s sendin’ a note for her – maybe he thinks the Master won’t live.’

  At this, Polly slowly sat up and wiped her eyes with the back of her hands. ‘She loved Eddy,’ she said brokenly. ‘He was forever sendin’ her little presents. Aye, he were a lovely man.’ The tears burst forth again.

  Fanny got up off the floor and went to the washstand. She poured some water from the flowered pitcher into the bowl, took up a flannel and wetted it. ‘Wipe your face, luv. You got to go down.’

  Still crying, Polly obediently took the flannel and washed her face. Fanny handed her the towel.

  After drying herself, she staggered up off the bed and went to a small mirror on the wall. She hastily pulled out her hairpins and redid her hair.

  ‘Where’s your cap?’ Fanny asked, hunting round the pillow for it.

  ‘Get me a clean one out of the cupboard.’ Polly was struggling, now, to quell the storm of grief within her.

  When Fanny returned to the morning-room, Elizabeth asked irritably where she had been. ‘I’ve been ringing the bell for ages,’ she complained.

  Lying glibly, Fanny told her that she had had to attend to the butcher’s delivery boy
at the back door and that Polly was now making a sponge cake and dare not leave it in the middle. ‘Would you like to lie down a bit, Ma’am? Polly or me’ll watch the Master. I’m proper sorry about the young Master, Ma’am.’

  ‘Thank you, Fanny. Ask Polly to make some coffee and bring it to the library. And make up the library fire.’

  ‘Yes,’m.’ Fanny helped to heave her out of her chair and, teetering slightly, she went into the hall and through to the library. There, she peered down at her husband. He appeared to be sleeping, but his cheeks, drained of their usual ruddiness, were wet and a tear had got caught in his moustache.

  ‘I should be crying, too,’ thought Elizabeth vaguely. ‘But I can’t. I’ve seen so little of him – and he was always so dull, not a bit like Charles.’ She sat down by the embers of the fire, and thought of the three miscarriages which had followed Edward’s birth; they had left her weak and depressed. She decided fretfully that probably Edward had been happier with his nanny than with her.

  Down in the untidy kitchen, Polly mechanically set a tray, including a cup for Humphrey.

  ‘Make a good strong cup for yourself as well,’ Fanny instructed her. She had been to the coal cellar and had a full coal scuttle in one hand. Her sackcloth apron and her hands were black with coal dust. ‘Put a drop of the cooking rum in it,’ she advised Polly, as she crossed the kitchen. ‘Keep yer goin’, it will.’

  Still sobbing, Polly nodded agreement.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I

  ‘Polly! Polly!’ Alicia sped down the area steps and pushed open the heavy back door. ‘Polly! What’s happened? Why am I sent for?’ She slammed the door behind her to keep out the chill March wind, and slung her satchel on to the floor. She pulled off her hat. Her face was more than usually pale and was wet from the rain through which she had run.

  Polly put down the kettle which she was filling at the sink and quickly skirted the big deal table. She took Alicia by the elbow and ushered her towards the kitchen range. ‘Come by the fire, duck, and get warm, and I’ll tell you.’

  In the heat of the fire, Alicia struggled out of her damp coat and looked at Polly.

  ‘Polly, you’ve been crying. Something awful’s happened. ‘what is it?’

  Polly sank down on to a wooden chair, her starched apron poofing out in front of her. She put an arm round Alicia’s waist. ‘It’s Master Edward, luv. He died at Ladysmith – caught the typhoid during the siege.’

  ‘Oh, Polly!’ Alicia gasped in consternation. ‘Oh, Polly, Polly!’ She put her arms round her nanny’s neck and buried her face in her shoulder. ‘And we’ll never see him again?’

  ‘No, duck. Try not to grieve, luvvie. He were a soldier, and he were brave; so we have to be brave like him.’ Her voice quavered and broke; she wept unrestrainedly.

  Alicia cried with her. ‘He wasn’t just my brother, he was my very best friend,’ she moaned. ‘And he’s gone.’

  Ever since their conversation over the apple pie on the subject of bastards, Alicia had understood the relationship between Polly and her brother, and, after her first burst of tears, she tried to comfort her nanny. She patted Polly’s bent back, and whispered, ‘Dearest Polly, I’m so sorry for you. It must be terrible.’

  The young girl’s understanding made Polly jump. She pushed Alicia gently a little back from her and looked into the concerned light grey eyes. ‘God bless the poor little lamb,’ she thought, and hugged her close again, as she sniffed back her tears. ‘Aye, Allie, dear, I could wish myself dead.’

  ‘Oh, no, Polly. What would I do without you? And we have to help Mama – just think what she must be feeling! I’d better go up to her.’ She took her handkerchief out of her blouse pocket and wiped the tears from Polly’s lined face. Polly looks so old, she thought with a pang, and she feared suddenly that she might lose her, too.

  As Polly slowly got up from her wooden chair, Alicia turned away and blew her nose. ‘Has anybody told Papa? And Florence and Charles?’ she inquired.

  Polly sniffed and swallowed. ‘Aye, and that’s another thing,’ she said, and told Alicia about Humphrey’s heart attack and that Dr Willis was sending a message to Florence.

  Alicia looked at her as if she had seen a ghost. ‘And Mama?’ she stammered.

  ‘She’s all right. She’s sittin’ with your Papa. I don’t think she’s cryin’ or anythin’.’

  ‘She’s probably tipsy,’ Alicia thought unhesitatingly, and she glanced despairingly around her; she felt hemmed in.

  She heaved a great sigh and said courageously, ‘Look, Polly, dear. Everybody’s going to need to eat, so you make lunch – you’ll feel better if you’re busy, I think. Make enough for Florence and Clarence. And I’ll go to see Mama and Papa.’ She wiped her nose again and it shone red in the firelight.

  Polly nodded. ‘You’re right, me little duck; you’re a good little girl. You go to your Mam.’

  ‘What’s Fanny doing?’

  ‘She’s bin makin’ up all the fires, because the wind’s cold today, and now she’s changin’ the sheets on the Mistress’s bed and puttin’ in hot water bottles to warm it. When the Reverend and Miss Florence come, we’ll get the Master up to bed – he’s in the library at present. And Fanny’ll make up the bed in the dressing-room for your Mam so she’ll be close by.’

  As she picked up her damp hat and coat, Alicia felt reluctant to leave the safety of the warm kitchen, but she said quite firmly to Polly, ‘I’ll go up and see them.’ She could not imagine her bad-tempered, taciturn father lying sick. He never spoke to her, except to reprimand, and she wondered what to say to him, what to do.

  As she hesitated before climbing the stairs, Polly turned from poking up the fire, and called, ‘Off you go now. They need you.’

  The idea that her parents might need her was a new one to Alicia, and again she had the uncanny feeling of events closing in on her.

  Mechanically she hung her coat and hat in the big hall cloakroom and changed into house slippers. Inside her was a hard lump of misery and she whimpered to herself, ‘Edward, Edward, I always thought – hoped – you would come home for good one day and be with Polly and me.’

  At the door of the library, she stifled her sobs and rubbed the tears from her eyes. She knocked and entered.

  Humphrey looked pitifully small under the eiderdown Fanny had brought to cover him, an object of fear, now deflated like a burst balloon. Her mother looked slovenly, with untidy wisps of hair hanging round her flushed face. Alicia went cautiously towards her and gave her a light kiss on her cheek. I’m so sad for you, Mama,’ she said. ‘Polly told me.’

  Elizabeth nodded, and said thickly, ‘What a waste – to die of typhoid.’

  ‘Yes, indeed, Mama.’

  Her mother relapsed into silence, and Alicia turned timidly towards the man on the couch. ‘How are you feeling now, Papa?’

  He had been watching her since she entered the room. He did not answer, but contented himself with a slight movement of his head, which seemed to Alicia to indicate that he was not feeling very good.

  ‘I’m so sad about Edward,’ she faltered, the tears threatening to brim over again.

  With eyes dosed, he nodded again.

  She stood uncertainly between the couple, the silence clawing at her. What should she do? She stole a glance at her mother whose head had fallen forward as if she had suddenly fallen asleep. The reek of alcohol from her was sufficient for Alicia to realize that she would get no help from her. She yearned for Florence to come, though Florence never seemed to know what to do in any circumstances; she was a flurry of muddle and uncertainties, but at least she spoke to one, and she, too, might care about Edward.

  ‘He’s my brother,’ she thought desperately, ‘and Mama doesn’t seem to realize that it hurts – it hurts most dreadfully – that he’s dead.’ In a flash of anger, she wanted to strike both parents. Her teeth began to chatter, and through it she stammered to Elizabeth, ‘I’ll see if Fanny’s done the bedroom properly for
Papa.’ And she fled from the room.

  She met Fanny coming out of the master bedroom, a pile of tumbled sheets in her arms. ‘Oh, Fanny,’ she wailed in relief.

  Fanny dropped the bedclothes and put skinny arms around the frightened girl. ‘It’s all right, Allie, dear. Everything’ll be all right in a wee bittie.’

  Alicia hugged Fanny’s small frame and kissed her on the cheek. Then she let her go. ‘Mama doesn’t seem to be very well, Fanny, so you make sure that everything is clean and neat up here, ready for Father – water in the carafe – and soap and towels – before the Reverend Browning gets here. He’s so picky.’

  Fanny knew perfectly well that Alicia meant that her mother was drunk again, so she said, ‘Don’t worry, pet. Polly and us’ll manage together, won’t we? We’ll get your Dad better.’

  Alicia nodded. She watched the tiny maid collect up the sheets from the floor, and she asked, ‘Fanny, will they bury Edward in Africa – in Ladysmith?’

  Fanny looked up, a little confused, ‘They must’ve done it already,’ she replied slowly, as she straightened up.

  ‘But he’ll be so lonely.’ Alicia looked up beseechingly at Fanny. ‘Can’t he be brought home?’

  Fanny hesitated, anxious to comfort, but not sure how to do it. Then she said, ‘He might like to lie with his friends, luv. A lot of men died at Ladysmith.’

  ‘Perhaps he would.’ Alicia managed a tremulous smile. Then her expression changed as she remembered Charles. ‘I don’t think anyone has thought about telling Charles,’ she said. ‘I must ask the Reverend Browning to send him a telegram.’

  II

  Alicia never went back to Blackburne House. Forced by circumstances, as her mother became daily more incompetent, she grew up very fast. She took over the management of the house and, under the guidance of Dr Willis, the care of Humphrey. When she wailed to Polly that everything was too much for her and that she did not know how to cope, Polly would say, ‘It’s your duty, duck, to look after your Ma and Pa. It’s a daughter’s job. Me and Fanny’ll help you.’