by Millie Gray
“Thocht you and me were goin’ doon to see Sandy?” Bella reminded Rachel as she swallowed Carrie’s last chip and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
“We certainly are,” Rachel uttered determinedly as she wheeled round on Bella. “And Carrie here can chum us down the road. And while we go in to settle Sandy’s hash she can get herself down to the docks.”
“Oh God, Rachel,” Bella gasped. “Surely ye’re no wantin’ her to throw hersel’ in?”
“Of course not. What I want her to do is tell that Will…”
Rachel couldn’t finish her statement since Sam came rushing in, flung himself on a chair, began to attack his dinner and mumbled, “Sorry I’m late, Ma.”
Both Bella and Rachel looked at the clock. Right enough, Sam should have been in fifteen minutes earlier.
“But somethin’ big has happened,” Sam continued as he grabbed the sauce bottle. “Jist wait till I tell ye.”
Rachel held her head. Was she losing it or something? Only last night Hannah had confessed she had something so world-stopping that she simply had to tell Rachel, and now here was Sam saying the same thing. Whatever it was Hannah and Sam had to tell her, it would have to wait till she’d straightened Sandy out. So all she replied was, “Tell me all about it the morn, son.”
It only took twenty minutes for Rachel to quick march Bella and Carrie to the front door of Sandy’s shop. When they arrived, Rachel indicated curtly to Carrie that she should go on her way and tell Will that she couldn’t go to the ball with him. Carrie hesitated, hoping her mother might change her mind about taking out a Mutuality Club, but the only response she got from Rachel was a firm shake of the head. This left Carrie no alternative but to leave her mother and aunt and cross the road to where she would have to pass the Leith Provident shop window where the lilac dress was still on display.
Once Carrie reached the window she stopped and stared lovingly at the lilac creation. Why, she wondered with tears in her eyes, was the dress still there? Tempting her. Even mocking her.
Mother and aunt watched her from a distance. “Is there nae wey ye can get her that frock, Rachel?” said Bella sadly. “She fair wrings my hert, so she does.”
“Your heart, Bella?” Rachel sighed. “Honestly, I would have sold my soul to get her that ball gown. But right now I can’t even afford to buy her a pinny.”
As soon as the door bell tinkled, Sandy came into the front shop and his customary mourning face lit up when he saw who it was. “Thank heavens ye’ve come, Bella. Awa ye gang ben the hoose. There’s three there needin’ washed and shrouded.”
Bella was only too grateful to escape from the row that she knew was brewing and needed no second telling to go and get on with the laying-out.
“And noo, Rachel,” said Sandy, beaming, as soon as Bella was safely in the back shop. “Ye’ll be weel pleased, awfae pleased, wi’ the wey things went yesterday. Best funeral Leith has seen in mony a lang year.”
Rachel opened her handbag and fished out the eighteen pounds the Pearl agent had given her that morning. Flinging the three fivers and three pound notes at Sandy, she screamed, “You knew I was only joking when I said to send him away in your show-coffin. And I said only one floral tribute – not three. Didn’t I, Bella?”
Bella, who had surreptitiously been listening behind the door, made no response except to turn the water tap full on, so that she could hear nothing more than the water as it splashed into the sink.
“Bloody traitor,” Rachel hissed to herself as she watched Sandy pick up the money she had just thrown at him.
“Nae need for ye to fash yersel’ aboot the flooers, Rachel,” said Sandy complacently. Then, adopting his most pious look, he motioned Rachel to a chair. “Noo just ye calm doon till I tell ye aw aboot the big bug’s funeral that I did just afore Gabby’s.”
“What the hell has that got to do with me and the predicament I’m in?”
“If ye’d just haud yer wheesht, I’ll tell you. The faimily – real toffs they are – said to put their faither’s floral tributes oot in the Garden of Rest and I did just that – but I gied them a wee detour first.”
Rachel looked puzzled and wondered if there was some truth in the rumour that Sandy was beginning to lose the plot. Quite unaware of Rachel’s concern, Sandy went on. “Sent them up to your hoose, so I did, so aw yer snobby neebors could get an eyeful.”
Rachel relaxed somewhat lower into the chair. “So I’ve only got that bloody Chippendale casket to cough up for?”
Sandy looked carefully all around the room. Then a sly smirk crossed his face. “D-d-dinnae ken h-hoo to tell ye this, Rachel,” he stammered, hardly able to keep his laughter in check. “But ye see, yer faither wasnae in the Chippendale.”
“Wasn’t in that coffin?” Rachel howled, catapulting herself out of the chair and covering her face. “So he’s no dead after all,” she muttered, collapsing on to her chair again.
“Oh, but he is! Very deid,” Sandy chuckled.
“So he’s no been cremated then?” Rachel asked, becoming suddenly aware that Gabby’s posh coffin was now back on show.
Sandy shook his head. “Oh aye, that’s been done an aw. Ye see, when I got hame efter seein’ you, I had a wee word with your Auntie Anna.”
Rachel’s eyes bulged and all she could do was shake her head pityingly. Here was yet further proof that Sandy was indeed losing it. Not only was he talking to his past customers, who were all dead, but they were now answering him back.
“And,” Sandy continued, quite unaware that Rachel was panicking, “she said that I should grant Gabby his last wish – and send him awa in an orange box.”
“An orange box!” Rachel exclaimed, leaping out of the chair once again. “You put my father away in an orange box?”
“Well, er, no quite,” said Sandy, weighing his words. “Ye see Outspan an’ Jaffa are baith oot o season, so I had to knock up something close to it frae some balsa wuid.”
Rachel’s jaw dropped but Sandy seemed oblivious and carried on serenely. “So when I had him safely boxed in that, I had the boys take him ower to the crematorium early yesterday – and then I sent oor show-piece,” Sandy now gestured at the mahogany coffin, “up to your hoose.”
Rachel didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but she did manage to articulate the right question. “So I only owe you seventeen pounds because I gave you eighteen the now.”
Sandy shook his head. Rachel grimaced, thinking, “I should have known it was all too good to be true.” She then braced herself for Sandy’s answer, but all he did was to take two fivers from the money she had flung at him and hand them back to her.
“What’s this?” she asked with a puzzled frown.
“Just a wee somethin’ to help keep yer feet clear while yer waitin’ for yer first pey – sorry – salary.”
“You mean it only cost me eight pounds to see the back of Gabby?”
Sandy shook his head again. “Naw. Three pounds twa shillings and fourpence, but wi’ double faimily discount I’ll settle for three quid.”
Rachel was speechless. She wanted to thank Sandy effusively, but the words stuck in her throat.
“An’ here,” Sandy added. “I want ye to tak this ither fiver and go ower to the Provi and buy yourself a new winter coat. That pony-skin ye’re wearing is that auld they widnae even tak it in at the knacker’s yaird.”
“Buy a new coat? But why?” asked Rachel in utter perplexity.
“Cos yer Auntie Anna and me think that Gabby should dae what he never did in life – pit a warm coat on yer back.”
“Cannae do that, Sandy,” Rachel sobbed, jumping up and kissing him lavishly on each cheek. Then she turned and raced out of the shop.
“Where the hell is she awa to in sic a hurry?” Sandy asked Bella, who by now had sneaked back into the front shop.
“Och,” Bella sobbed, rubbing her nose vigorously with the back of her hand. “Rachel’s just awa to tell Cinderella she can gae to the ball.”
CHAPTER 15
DOUBLE BOUNCE
The day after Rachel heard the good news from Sandy about the cost of Gabby’s funeral, she had started work at the Queen’s Hotel on Princes Street, taking over from the woman she was to replace. At the interview she had insisted on the stock-takers doing their job in the presence of herself and the outgoing holder of the job, Dorothy Clyde.
Rachel had worked under Dorothy before and knew that every time there was a stock-taking due Dorothy would bring in bottles of spirits that she’d bought from an off-licence to bolster the stock. As the years rolled by, more and more bottles had to be brought in, and over the last few years Dorothy had even been forced to enter into a sale-or-return arrangement with a licensed grocer in South Queensferry Street in order to keep the stock-takers and hotel management fooled.
When the senior manager at the Queen’s sent for Rachel to offer her Dorothy’s job, on her own terms, she had suspected things were now so far out of control that Dorothy would probably do a runner. Instinctively she knew Dorothy must have been quite desperate to have gone the length of giving in her notice – because leaving the Queen’s would be a sore miss for her. Dorothy revelled in the affluent standard of living that the Queen’s had provided and was very grateful that, through her highly creative bartending, she had also been able to send her two children to prestigious fee-paying schools.
As soon as the stock-takers had finished their work, Rachel became quite upset, since without any warning they promptly called in the police and a distraught Dorothy was now in custody. That left Rachel having to convince herself that there was no way she could have taken over, other than by insisting on a full stock-taking. If she hadn’t, Dorothy would have walked away scot-free while Rachel, who also had two children to educate, would be left to explain the discrepancies. Unless the senior management duly understood that it was all Dorothy’s mess, she herself might end up doing time. And that was certainly not an option for Rachel, who would never contemplate jeopardising her children’s well-being. She sighed, reluctantly conceding that her children’s welfare had been the only reason she had never carried out her frequent threats to murder both Gabby and Johnny.
Because of all the carfuffle at the Queen’s, it was past four o’clock in the afternoon by the time she got home. A deep feeling of relief suffused her when she entered the house. This place was her home, where she always felt safe. Yet even those stout walls couldn’t entirely alleviate the guilt she felt about Dorothy. Lifting the poker to stir up the fire, she argued to herself over and over that there was never any question that her children and their needs would have to come first. And, okay, she might occasionally, like Dorothy, do things to boost her income that weren’t strictly honest, but she always had the wit to balance the books somehow or another and so satisfy the management.
Having poked up the fire, Rachel set about redding up everything for the children coming home. Once satisfied, she sat down at the table with a cup of strong tea and began to mull over the events of last week. Thinking of Gabby and his funeral brought a smile to her face, and when she thought how wonderful Carrie was going to look in her lilac ball gown that night she almost shouted with glee. Indeed she only just managed to stifle her cry of excitement when the door opened and in waltzed Hannah.
As usual, Hannah was dressed in her navy blue staff nurse’s Burberry coat with her nurse’s hat neatly secured to her long fair hair by four hair grips – and looking at her daughter Rachel fairly bristled with pride. Hannah had more than met Rachel’s dreams for her. Yes, she thought rather smugly to herself, all the sacrifice of putting her Hannah through the nursing had been so worthwhile. And she just knew that one day Hannah would be Matron at the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh where she’d been trained and was now the proud recipient of the Pelican badge. Rachel didn’t even have to close her eyes to imagine what the future held. All she had to do was to look at Hannah as she was today.
“Mam,” said Hannah with a smile that lit up her whole face, “I’ve something to tell you.”
“You’ve been offered a Staff Nurse’s job at the Royal?”
Hannah shook her head. “I never applied to the Royal.”
“You didn’t. And why not?”
Hannah took a deep breath. “Because I’m going to live on Benbecula.”
“Benbecula? Where the hell is Benbecula?”
“It’s a remote wee island in the Outer Hebrides.”
“The Outer Hebrides!” Rachel exclaimed. “But what on earth for?”
“Mam, I’ve met a man. A fisherman.”
Rachel’s mouth fell open and all she could do was gape at her daughter.
“We’re to be married and then we’ll go and live on his croft.”
“Just a minute, Hannah! Are you saying I sacrificed all of the others, so you could be trained as a nurse, and now you’re going to throw it all up to marry a fisherman?”
“Yes, because I love him, Mam.”
“Love? For heaven’s sake, Hannah, whatever would a Bible-punching Wee Free know about love?”
“He’s not a Wee Free.”
“That doesn’t matter up there. All the Protestants there are Holy Willies that insist that they are the head of the household and that their wives must submit to their every demand.”
Hannah sat like a marble statue as Rachel raved on. “And you just wait till you’ve spent the Sabbath among them,” she mocked. “No working, no laughing, no nothing but reading the Bible all day and going to the church not once but six times.”
Rachel finally stopped ranting and fired Hannah a warning glare before demanding, “Is that really what you want?”
Hannah sighed in exasperation. “But, Mam, I won’t have to put up with all that because he’s not Protestant. He’s Catholic and so am I now!”
Rachel half rose and her hand flew to her mouth. “You’ve changed your religion without asking me about it?”
“Yes. Jamie and I are going to be married in St Ninian’s Chapel at Marionville a week on Saturday.”
Rachel felt as if she was being beaten senseless. Could she be hearing right? Was it a dream? A horrible nightmare? Hannah had always been so special to her. She had always put her eldest daughter’s interest first – and here was the girl throwing away her career to marry a man who would take her hundreds of miles away. And he was a Roman Catholic and so was she now!
“Hannah,” she pleaded, “don’t do this. Don’t you realise that you’ll spend all of your life being pregnant. Catholics don’t practise … er … restraint.”
Hannah let out an excited giggle. “Mam, didn’t you hear me? I love him so I wouldn’t want him to … you know … what you said.”
By now Rachel could take no more. She leapt up and before realising what she was doing she struck Hannah hard across the face.
Taken completely by surprise, Hannah could only run a hand over her stinging cheek before she backed towards the front door. Still facing Rachel, she whispered, “Oh, Mam, it was you who taught me to think for myself. Now I’m doing it, why are you objecting?”
“Objecting? Of course I’m bloody objecting to you throwing yourself away. And if you think I’ll come and watch you do it, then think again!” said Rachel venomously before turning her back on Hannah.
“Somehow I knew that this would be how you’d take it.” Hannah sighed wearily before adding quietly, “Thank goodness I bumped into Dad today and he’s offered to give me away.”
“Give you away!” Rachel croaked as tears sprang to her eyes. “That sod gave you away years ago, Hannah.”
Hannah was silent.
“Oh, I see,” hissed Rachel. “You seem to have forgotten that. Just as you’ve also forgotten it was me, and only me, that stood between you and a bloody orphanage.”
Hannah shrugged, but still said nothing.
“Shrug all you like, my girl,” Rachel persisted, “but it won’t change the fact that is was me — who put the clothes on your back. Me - who put the food in your belly
. Me — who begged, borrowed and stole to educate you so you could think for yourself.”
Advancing towards the outside door, Rachel flung it wide open and with a dismissive nod ordered Hannah out. Before Hannah could make her escape, however, she had to stand back to let Carrie enter.
“Oh, Hannah, are you not going to wait and see me get all dressed up for the ball?” urged Carrie excitedly.
“No, she’s in too much of a hurry to collect her thirty pieces of silver,” retorted Rachel, banging the door shut on Hannah.
Carrie had wrapped her hair in a scarf so that she wouldn’t disturb it when she took her bath. The hairdresser down at Restalrig Brae had set it. She had complimented Carrie on her natural kink – and now that it was professionally set, the golden highlights that streaked her soft brown hair shone like dazzling crystals. When the girl told Carrie that she had a natural kink she’d been taken aback because Sam was always telling her that. So when she realised that the hairdresser was talking about her hair and not her nature she’d laughed out aloud. Funny, thought Carrie, as the warm suds relaxed her, how she’d always cursed having curly hair. Now that it lay in long deep waves, complementing her oval face, she was glad of those curls.
She would have loved to linger in the comforting bath with her reminiscences but, conscious that her darling Will would soon be coming for her, she got out, dried herself and went into the bedroom, only to discover Alice sitting on the bed.
“Nice frock, Carrie,” chirped Alice, running her fingers over the lilac net before picking up one of Carrie’s silver shoes admiringly.
Carrie stopped pulling on her stockings and looked quizzically at her sister. “I get the feeling that there’s something bugging you.”
Alice shook her head vigorously. “It’s nothing really. It’s just … Oh, Carrie, I’ve been picked to play the lead in the school play.”
“You have?”
Alice nodded and a broad smile lit up her face. “Yes, I’m to play chief handmaiden to the Greek god, Dionysus. You know – him that inspires poetry and music.”