The Deserter's Daughter

by Susanna Bavin

  At the end of Mass, she loitered in her pew, heartbeats cramming her chest as she avoided the stares coming her way from those filing out. Mrs O’Malley leant over her, all beady black eyes and stale breath.

  ‘I noticed you didn’t go to Communion. Can’t say I’m surprised.’

  ‘I couldn’t. I had breakfast with Mam to encourage her to eat.’

  ‘So much for repentance in the Jenkins household.’ Mrs O’Malley sailed righteously on her way.

  ‘Well, Carrie Jenkins, you’ve come for a little talk, have you?’ Now Father Kelly was leaning over her, vestments ballooning.

  Her fingers curled around the edges of her shawl. ‘Do you know the trouble that friend of yours caused?’

  He straightened and stepped backwards, as if making room for a thunderbolt to smite her.

  Her hand scrambled across her mouth. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know I was going to say that.’ She hadn’t even known she was thinking it, but she was. It was roaring round in her head. Father Kelly’s friend had blabbed in the pub.

  ‘I don’t expect you to point the finger, Carrie Jenkins.’

  ‘I didn’t mean it.’ Yes, she did. ‘I’m here about—’

  She couldn’t look him in the eye, but she mustn’t drop her gaze because that would look like she was in the wrong. She fixed her eyes on the tiny red lines that gathered on either side of his nose, lines that said he never had to put his hand in his pocket in a pub.

  ‘Mrs Shipton came to see me after seven o’clock Mass,’ he said. ‘Beside herself with fury, so she was, and I had to warn her to watch her tongue or else I’d be hearing the whole lot over again in confession.’

  ‘You haven’t cancelled the wedding, have you? Only I’ve yet to speak to Billy.’

  ‘Do you want me to speak to him, child?’

  ‘No – thank you. We just need to sort it out.’

  ‘Wouldn’t it be better to postpone things a wee while? You wouldn’t want to make your mammy appear in public so soon, and her just revealed as a deserter’s widow.’

  Her muscles stiffened. ‘You can’t blame her for keeping it secret.’

  ‘I’ll expect to hear her confession before she sets foot inside God’s house as the mother of the bride.’

  Talk about pointing the finger. Carrie bolted for the door. She didn’t trust herself to speak. As for Mrs Shipton beating her to it by going to seven o’clock Mass, the thought took her breath away. Did Billy know? Of course not. He would never have let his mam go this far. Calling it off yesterday had been an aberration on his part. Mrs Shipton had lost her rag and he, shocked to the core about Pa, had got swept along by her outrage.

  Oh, Billy. Carrie flung the message out to him from the depths of her heart. It’ll come right, love. Don’t fret. It’ll come right.

  It had to.

  Ralph spent the morning sizing up pieces of furniture in a grand house off Palatine Road in West Didsbury. He already had a buyer in mind for that colossal mahogany display cabinet with the plate-glass doors, while that pair of rosewood whatnots and the Regency chiffonier would soon sell in the shop. Taking his leave, he strolled around Marie-Louise Gardens, taking swift drags on a cigarette. Not that he was the type for poncing around admiring flower beds, but he enjoyed the feeling of being his own man. A spot of business, then a few minutes to himself. He wasn’t some lackey who had to hotfoot it back to the shop.

  Joseph Armstrong and Son. He wasn’t keen on that ‘and Son’. As a lad starting out in the business, he had longed for it and had swelled with pride the day the words were painted over the shop, but that was a good few years ago now. Armstrong and Armstrong would be better, though nowhere near as satisfying as plain Ralph Armstrong.

  The old man’s retirement couldn’t come soon enough for Ralph. He had been banging on about it for long enough. Even before the war, he was saying he didn’t intend to die in harness like his father and grandfather; and during the war, on the couple of occasions Ralph had been home on leave, he had seemed more determined.

  ‘It meks you think, this blasted war does, dragging on like this, meks you realise what’s important.’

  That certainty – certainty! What a joke. But at the time, that certainty had freed Ralph to make promises he might not now be able to keep.

  And if he didn’t keep them …

  He threw down the fag end on the gravel path and ground it beneath his heel. He felt like grinding his father underfoot too.

  He headed back to Chorlton on the tram, jumped off at the terminus and cut along leafy High Lane and past the smart houses on York Road. Pausing on the corner of Wilbraham Road to let an ice-cream seller cycle past, he looked diagonally across the wide street to where Armstrong’s enjoyed a corner plot, an excellent site. Times were when the mere sight of the family business had made him puff out his chest. Now he felt more like flinging his hat in the gutter and grabbing his hair in clumps.

  The other shops in the parade had canvas awnings that were pulled down this morning to shield against the sun, but not Armstrong’s. The others looked like they were batting their eyelashes, but Armstrong’s stared straight out at the world, making JOS. ARMSTRONG & SON all the more obvious.

  Joseph bloody Armstrong. He should be growing dahlias and brushing up his crown green bowling by now, preferably a hundred miles away so that he couldn’t stick his nose in when Ralph set up the auction room.

  The auction room.

  He had expected to have it up and running by now. And his associates had expected it too.

  He crossed the road. His stride, quick with vexation, ate the ground as he approached the shop. Not only was it double-fronted, it also had a large window round the far side. It was a bloody crime how useless Dad was at putting together window displays, but he was too stubborn to let Ralph or Weston take over.

  The brass bell jingled as Ralph opened the door. In the middle of the impressive array of walnut and satinwood, Sheraton and Hepplewhite, fruit stands and candelabra, marble clocks and fine china, stood Adam, looking relaxed, his jacket unbuttoned, its front pieces pushed out of the way so he could stick his hands in his pockets, his trilby smothering the head and torso of a bronze figurine of Nelson. Ralph could cheerfully have stuck Lord Nelson where the sun didn’t shine. He didn’t like others muscling in on his patch, and he liked his brother least of all.

  Adam was passing the time of day with Mr Weston. And that was another thing: he needed to get shot of Weston every bit as much as he had to get rid of Dad.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked bluntly.

  Adam looked round. ‘Good morning to you too.’

  To his horror, Ralph heard himself utter a gruff humph that made him sound like Dad. He shook hands. Had Adam noticed? Old Weston faded discreetly among the porcelain with his duster.

  ‘So what are you doing here? Not like you to make social calls in working hours. Left the waxworks to rot, have you?’

  Adam’s brown eyes hardened, an expression Ralph liked to provoke.

  ‘They’re men, just like we are.’

  ‘Not like me!’

  The palms of his hands went clammy at the mention of his brother’s patients, though calling them patients was stretching a point, made them sound like they were human and they certainly didn’t qualify for that description any more. Better to shoot them and put them out of their misery.

  ‘I dropped in to see if Dad was free to join me for a bite to eat,’ said Adam, ‘and to make sure he’s still coming to the garden party.’

  Garden party? Freak show, more like. Waxworks on parade. And if Dad thought it so ruddy marvellous that ‘our lads’ were receiving what Adam called groundbreaking treatment, why didn’t he pack in the shop and go to Brookburn as one of Adam’s volunteer lackeys? Then they would all be happy.

  ‘And is he free?’ Ralph asked.

  ‘Haven’t seen him. He’s gone out.’

  Ralph drummed the top of a pedestal table with his fingertips. ‘It must be important for hi
m to abandon ship while I’m out doing a valuation. What’s he doing? Chasing a bargain?’

  ‘In a manner of speaking.’

  Ralph’s senses sharpened. ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘You won’t know yet. Dad didn’t hear about it until after you’d gone. Mr Weston has been telling me.’

  ‘Heard what?’

  ‘That woman he’s interested in – Mrs Jenkins. It turns out her husband was executed for desertion. Dad’s gone round to offer his condolences.’

  ‘Pay his respects to a bloody deserter?’

  ‘You know how he feels about Mrs Jenkins. This will be a difficult time for her. Put yourself in her position.’

  ‘I’d rather not, especially with the old man sniffing round.’

  ‘It could be what tips the balance in Dad’s favour.’

  ‘Are you suggesting she might marry him?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure that’s what he had in mind when he brushed his bowler and trimmed his moustache. The old man setting up in happy retirement with the new Mrs Armstrong, leaving the business in your capable hands – that would suit you, wouldn’t it?’

  Ralph pushed back his shoulders. Damn right it would. Damn right. Him – and his associates.

  Chapter Eight

  ‘More money than sense, some folk,’ Mam had said about Mrs Randall’s crazy paving; and Carrie, pausing with one hand on the garden gate as she checked the number on the front door, could see what she meant. She had never seen crazy paving before and she wasn’t impressed. Useless for teaching your daughters hopscotch.

  She hurried up the path between clumps of marigolds and snow-in-summer, drawn like a magnet to the good-looking front door with its gleaming brass numbers and circular stained-glass window, but at the last moment she veered round the side of the house in search of the kitchen door, where she knocked and waited.

  No one came. Try again or walk right in? She tried the knob. The door was unlocked, so she stepped into Mrs Randall’s kitchen, famous the length of Wilton Lane for its electric cooker, an item Carrie had vaguely imagined as being surrounded by a golden glow. It looked pretty much the same as a gas cooker, though there was barely time to feel surprised as the kitchen door was thrown open and a well-dressed lady planted herself in the doorway.

  ‘What time do you call this? – Oh! Who are you? How dare you enter my house?’

  ‘I’m Carrie Jenkins, ma’am, Mrs Jenkins’ lass.’ She spoke quickly before Mrs Randall could send for the police. With a bosom that size, she probably had the lung capacity to summon them all the way from Beech Road with a single bellow. ‘My mam’s poorly, so I’ve come instead.’

  She held her breath. Had word of Pa penetrated as far as the dignified houses on Edge Lane? Would Mrs Randall sling her out on her ear?

  ‘This is highly irregular.’ Mrs Randall touched a hand to her old-fashioned pompadour. ‘But I suppose it’ll have to do. You may hang your shawl on that hook.’

  ‘Thank you.’ If she could keep the job open for Mam, it would be one less thing to worry about.

  ‘You’ll find everything you need in the broom cupboard. You may start in here.’

  Mrs Randall walked into the hallway, which was as big as a room, with a vast hallstand with hat pegs and a mirror on top and cupboards underneath; a smaller cupboard bearing a rubbery-leaved plant; a dinner gong; and an umbrella-stand containing more sticks and brollies than Mrs Randall, her husband and brother could possibly use, even if they all took one of each.

  There was wood everywhere – doors, floor, staircase panelling, furniture – and all of it shone. Carrie felt a burst of pride. Mam couldn’t have signed her name more clearly if she had carved it into the skirting board.

  Pride soon dissolved, however, replaced by bubbling frustration. Mam had often talked about Mrs Randall’s attractive house with its ornaments and paintings, but Carrie found no pleasure working here. Mrs Randall followed her round, criticising everything she did and making her do things again even though she knew there was nothing wrong with her cleaning. It took longer than Mam’s normal hours too, not least because Mrs Randall made her get out the library brush and dust the books, which she knew for a fact was one of Mam’s Tuesday jobs, and why the blessed things wanted dusting anyway was anybody’s guess when they were kept in bookcases with glass doors, but she didn’t object for fear of losing Mam her place.

  At last she was finished. She washed her hands in the scullery, cupping water into her palm and splashing the back of her neck, which afforded her a moment’s refreshment. Taking her shawl from the peg, she went to present herself for payment, snatching a glance in the hallstand mirror and twitching a couple of strands of hair into place. Her face was flushed and she felt sticky after all that polishing and rug-beating in this heat. She had never realised how demanding Mam’s job was. She had thought that, because of the long hours she put in at the shop, Mam had it easy, but that wasn’t the case at all.

  To cap it all, Mrs Randall announced that today would be docked from Mam’s wages.

  ‘But that’s why I’m here,’ Carrie spluttered. ‘To do the work for her.’

  Mrs Randall uttered a condescending laugh. ‘I don’t think a slip of a girl can offer the same standard of work as a grown woman with years of experience.’

  She opened her mouth, then stopped. Was Mrs Randall within her rights? ‘Well, dock some of the money if you must, but not all of it. That’s not fair.’

  ‘Life, as you will discover, isn’t fair. Why, for example, am I being harangued by the likes of you? I suggest you leave my house immediately – before I call a constable.’

  Carrie’s concern for Mam’s job vanished in a puff of smoke. Bugger Mrs Randall. If this was how she treated her staff, Mam was better off out of it.

  She bunched her fists on her hips. ‘Go on, then. Let’s see what the law says.’

  Mrs Randall’s eyes popped wide open. ‘Now see here—’

  ‘I’ve worked hard and I’m entitled to be paid. Does the bobby pass this way on his beat? I’ll nip next door and ask.’

  Mrs Randall made a gobbling sound. ‘Oh, very well, then.’

  Carrie made a point of counting the money Mrs Randall practically flung at her; she wouldn’t put it past the woman to try to diddle her. Though she fought to keep her expression stony, inside she was boggling. Fancy her, who had been brought up to be polite and respectful, squaring up to Mrs Randall like a fishwife. Something must have got into her, because instead of meekly leaving via the kitchen door as befitted her station, she made a lunge for the front door and darted out, turning to find Mrs Randall gasping on the doorstep.

  ‘And you needn’t think you’ll see my mam again,’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t let her come back here, not if you paid her a hundred pounds.’

  She skipped away before Mrs Randall could slam the door. It was a good job the Randalls had crazy paving or she might have hopscotched down to the gate.

  Buoyed up by her triumph, Carrie headed for home with a spring in her step. Bright sunshine was bouncing off the flagstones, but merely being outside made her feel cooler after slogging away for that disagreeable woman. Further along the road, Mrs Jackson and Mrs Tilbury were coming towards her.

  She started to smile but they crossed the road. She jerked her head back. They had crossed over on purpose. Look at them now, gazing into one another’s eyes like a courting couple, anything to keep their attention away from her.

  Was this how it would be from now on? People pretending not to see, crossing over to avoid her. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, it would kill Mam if it happened to her. Carrie glared over her shoulder at the women. If there was any justice, one of them would walk into a lamp post.

  She felt a thrill of fear. Her children – would they be scorned at school? Kids could be cruel. The baby inside her, her precious first child – would he or she be made to suffer because of Pa? She felt sick at the thought.

  ‘Don’t trouble trouble till trouble troubles you.’

  Tha
t was what Pa used to say. Not that he had been irresponsible or lax, but he hadn’t taken his worries to heart. Yet he had acted in the most irresponsible way imaginable, leaving his family to face a lifetime of worry and shame. That wasn’t the Pa she knew; and yet it was what he had done. She couldn’t take it in, couldn’t accept it.

  But everyone else would accept it. They would hold him in contempt and his family would live their lives knowing the name of Jenkins was for ever tainted. Would her encounter with Mrs Randall turn out to be the last time in her whole life that she was with someone who didn’t know?

  Her shoulders curled. She pulled herself upright, but her heart beat faster and faster, out of control. It was going to explode. Was this how Mam felt? No wonder she was holed up indoors. Carrie longed to be home, safe, hidden. She put on a spurt, head down.

  Outside the house, she gathered her resources before going in. She had to be strong for Mam.

  Mam was sitting in the kitchen, elbows on the table, hands cupped over her nose and mouth. She stirred. Her hands fell away as she sat up.

  Carrie glanced into the scullery. The breakfast pots were still on the wooden draining board, and that wasn’t like Mam. They should have been put away long since. Likewise – she looked at the clock on the mantelpiece – Mam should have prepared something to eat.

  Mam’s gaze followed hers. ‘Is it that time already? You’ve been gone ages.’

  ‘Mrs Randall kept me. And I should tell you at once, she probably won’t want you back.’

  Mam let out a juddery breath. ‘She’s heard about Pa.’ She clasped her elbows, pulling her arms to her body.

  Carrie was beside her in an instant, bending so their faces were close, but Mam wouldn’t look at her.

  ‘I should have said it first – it were me. I was rude to her.’

  Mam leant away to look at her. Her eyes were fat with tears. ‘You? You were rude to Mrs Randall? I never fetched you up to cheek your betters.’

  ‘She deserved it.’

  ‘No one deserves it, and now you’ve lost me my job.’