‘It’s in the sideboard,’ said Jessica.
‘What?’
‘Your present.’
Maggie sniffed, picked up a sausage that had fallen by the wayside, rubbed it on her apron. ‘No presents until after lunch,’ she reminded Jessica. The defluffed sausage was placed in a pan with its brothers. ‘That’ll teach you to try and make a break for it, English pig,’ chided Maggie.
Jessica sat up in her makeshift bed, sipped her tea and thanked her lucky stars. She had Maggie, that lovely, humorous lady who would give her a big hug once the sausages were sizzling. She had Monty, the wonderful old sailor who had managed to make geography interesting, who had painted word pictures of far-away places with magical names.
‘Your present’s too big to wrap,’ said Maggie with her head in the oven.
‘A bike?’
‘Wait and see,’ advised the Irishwoman. She stood up, pushed the dyed hair away from her eyes, opened her arms wide and demanded Christmas kisses.
Physical contact often brought tears to Jessica’s eyes. She missed her mother every minute of every day, even while thinking of other things, even when playing with her dog, listening to the wireless, or doing her homework. Maggie’s touch, though gentle and full of love, served only to remind Jessica that Mam was away, that she might die.
Monty came in, newly shaven and wearing a white shirt with a dark tie and navy trousers. ‘They’re on their way,’ he announced, a thumb jerking towards the ceiling. ‘She’s been yelling at him for half an hour – he’s lost his tie-pin, cufflinks and God knows what else. Happy Christmas.’ He kissed Jessica first, then Maggie.
‘No presents till after lunch,’ grumbled Jessica.
Offstage, Eva’s voice floated none too gently down the stairwell. ‘A shave? Call that a close cut? What did you use – a butter knife? I’ve seen shorter bristles on a bloody hedgehog.’
Jessica laughed. She was safe. There was Eva, there was Jimmy. She had Monty and Maggie, she had friends at school, her beautiful, devoted Sheba. Yes, she had many blessings to count.
Katherine Walsh rode her brand-new bicycle up and down the Northern Road. Wrapped tightly in a new scarf and an old coat several sizes too small, she tried to come to terms with gears, bigger wheels, a taller saddle. She reached Moorside Park, turned, and set off homeward again. Mam was up to her eyes in stuffing and gravy, while Dad, newly immersed in carpentry, was testing his Christmas tool set and making a great deal of noise in the garage. With one thumb already bandaged, Bernard was also trying out some interesting language.
When the bicycle skidded, Katherine steered into the swerve, her reaction instinctive and completely correct. But the bike hit a small stone and sent Katherine hurtling against a garden wall. She had read about people seeing stars, but had never taken the meaning literally. She blinked, sat up, found herself worrying about the new bicycle, which must have cost a good fifteen pounds. Houses across the way wobbled, steadied themselves, then shook like inanimate victims of a huge earthquake.
People walking home from church hove into view. They clustered round the fallen girl, identified her, sent one of their number to fetch the Walshes. Then a path opened and John Povey bent over her. Katherine remembered that he had been invited for Christmas dinner. ‘Katherine?’ He placed a hand on her forehead. The girl moved her lips to speak, but her tongue felt thick and stupid. Colours merged, voices echoed, sleep beckoned.
‘Katherine?’
She opened her eyes and smiled up into a beautiful face. The angel in white spread her wings and folded them over Katherine’s prostrate form. There was birdsong, there were mountains poking snow-tipped crests into a sky of palest blue. ‘Come home,’ whispered the angel. ‘Come home to me.’
* * *
Jessica seldom had headaches, but she took an aspirin and went to lie on Maggie’s bed, well away from the hustle and bustle of giblet gravy and mince tarts. Eva and Maggie were arguing the merits of brandy butter set against the more traditional appeal of white sauce. Jimmy, after failing to find his tie-pin, cufflinks and new handkerchief, had dragged a willing Monty out to the Starkie for a pre-lunch pint. Even here, on the first floor, Jessica caught snatches of a heated discussion about flaky and shortcrust pastries. Too many cooks? One would certainly have sufficed.
She closed her eyes and spread a cold flannel across her forehead. Maggie’s answers to a headache involved a cold compress over head and eyes, a hot water bottle on the stomach. This will send the blood away from your head and stop the pain,’ she was wont to say. ‘Drawing blood to the stomach aids digestion, too.’ If the aforementioned remedies did not work, syrup of figs was the next port of call. Headaches, in Maggie’s ever-changing book, had two sources of origin: the eyes, or the bowels. Jessica was quite lucky, as her occasional headaches were blamed on studying. Which was just as well, because syrup of figs had been known to make way for the dreaded castor oil, a curse which should never be visited upon any God-fearing child. Iron jelloids and spoonfuls of malt were bad enough …
‘My head,’ said a voice like Jessica’s own, though the vowels came out a little bit squashed. Jessica walked down a street she had never seen, one of those posh places with grass verges and trees. There were telegraph poles, too, and a red phone box outside one of the houses. Jessica looked inside her little handbag and searched for a tape of Aspros. Someone else needed the aspirin, cold head and warm tummy treatment, it seemed.
This was a special place. This was a special day. A giant seagull bounced along on air currents; it came closer. ‘Hello, Jessica,’ it said before flying off down the road. Even while asleep, Jessica knew that she was dreaming. Seagulls did not speak; they certainly sounded nothing like Mam. Seagulls squawked and hovered about looking for fish and scraps.
She woke refreshed, with the headache just an unhappy memory. Eva hovered with a cup of tea. ‘Bossy Boots says if you don’t want your dinner, she’ll plate one up for you and keep it for later.’
Jessica grinned. ‘I don’t know why you two keep arguing,’ she said. ‘Really, you’re the best of friends.’
Eva sniffed. ‘He’s arrived home medicated. Monty’s all right, but my daft bugger’s been at the whisky. Jimmy and whisky are not what you might call compatible.’
The girl in the bed heard Eva’s words, noticed a quiver in the voice. ‘Don’t be upset, Auntie Eva. He’ll get sober when he eats something.’
‘Aye, well, he’d bloody better.’
When Eva had left the room, Jessica tidied the bed, washed her hands and began to walk downstairs. Everyone stopped talking. The cuckoo clock did its job, announced three o’clock before letting the bird re-enter its nest. There had been a bird in the dream, hadn’t there? Why could a person never remember dreams properly? Why had Eva’s voice shaken? Was there bad news? Why was the house so quiet?
In the rear living room, Maggie was leaning casually against a sideboard that almost groaned beneath platters of meat, plates of mince pies, an enormous Christmas cake. Eva, Jimmy and Monty were seated at the table.
Jessica looked from one to another, saw faces that were deliberately impassive.
‘We’ve decided you can have a quick look at your present before we start,’ said Maggie.
Jessica smiled broadly. There was a new bike in the front room, a red one, she hoped. ‘Are you sure?’
Eva nodded. ‘But hurry up. I’m that clemmed, me stomach thinks me throat’s been cut.’
Jessica laughed and went off to claim her Christmas surprise.
‘She’s all right.’ John placed Katherine on the sofa. Bernard and Liz hung back, coats still fastened, scarves hanging from their necks. ‘They would have kept her in if they’d been really worried,’ John added.
Liz had forgotten all about dinner, but the smells reminded her. ‘Can she eat?’
Katherine didn’t want food. Getting out of hospital had not been easy. People in white coats had wittered on about concussion, had taken X-rays, had thumped her knees with littl
e hammers. Now, she had to be watched for symptoms like vomiting or falling asleep suddenly. Her bike was leaning against the table and it seemed to be in fair condition – of the two of them, the bicycle had come off best.
‘I’ll … er … go and make the gravy,’ said Liz. Christmas had to happen. She didn’t want it, would have preferred to sit with her beloved daughter, but there was a guest and Christmas was, after all, a fixed feast.
John poured sherry for Liz, whisky for himself and Bernard. ‘I’ll keep an eye on Katherine,’ he promised. ‘You two go and do whatever needs doing.’
Bernard, who had had enough of carpentry, decided to help his wife in the kitchen. Within ten minutes, he had been expelled with a grim warning about interfering where he wasn’t wanted.
The chess board came out and war was declared at one minute past three o’clock. Katherine watched and listened, smiling when her father cursed after losing a precious piece.
She leaned back and closed her eyes, found herself drifting again.
‘Katherine?’ Bernard’s voice was full of concern.
‘I’m not asleep,’ she replied. She watched the angel as it glided past, its wings outstretched in a perfect line. The darker figure floated along, a guardian angel to the guardian angel. They were both going home, onward and upward.
‘We’re there,’ said the female, pale hair streaming in her wake like silk highlighted by sunset. ‘Bye, bye, Katherine.’
Katherine sat up, opened her eyes and smiled. Everything was all right at last. ‘I’ll have some dinner, please,’ she called.
‘That’s my girl,’ whispered a voice from somewhere else. ‘Oh yes, that’s my girl.’
Jessica pushed open the door and stepped into the front parlour. In an effort to conceal Jessica’s gift, heavy curtains had been closed to shut out the meagre light of a December afternoon. She felt her way past the sofa, pulled back the curtains and found a red bicycle leaning against the window-sill. ‘It’s beautiful,’ she called to the people in the living room.
She squatted down to look at bright, spoked wheels, felt the saddle, counted three gears. No-one had followed her right into the room, yet she suddenly felt someone’s eyes on her. It would be Maggie, she decided, picturing the Irishwoman standing in the doorway with a self-satisfied smile decorating her face.
In an easy chair by the fireplace, Theresa Nolan allowed silent tears to wash her face. This was the daughter she had abandoned, the one she had tried not to love right from the start. A new bicycle, a nice house, twenty thousand pounds invested by a man who might have been her father. What use was all of that without closeness?
The tears slowed. Lucky to be alive, lucky to have Jessica, Theresa calmed herself. For months, she had deliberately widened the already spacious chasm between herself and Jessica. This child was so wonderful, so lovely, that she must never grieve for a dead mother, must never feel hurt. Now, here Theresa was, alive and kicking after sailing through surgery so new, so dangerous, so innovative …
‘Oh, it’s wonderful,’ breathed Jessica. ‘All shiny and new.’
Theresa, too, felt shiny and new, just like her daughter’s bike. The TB had righted itself, but the heart had finally threatened to stop, turning Theresa into a frequent visitor at Death’s dark gates.
Jessica spun a pedal, pressed the brake lever, ran her fingers along a spoke.
‘Jessica?’
The girl remained perfectly motionless until the pedal stopped spinning. ‘Mam?’ she gulped.
‘Yes, it’s me.’
Slowly, almost afraid for her sanity, Jessica turned and looked at the figure in the chair. She swallowed twice and remained where she was, steadying herself by holding on to the edge of the sill.
‘It’s really me, love. All mended, no TB and my heart’s a sight better.’ The child was so beautiful: tall, straight. And that hair – a film star would kill for it.
Whitened knuckles were pressed against the child’s even, perfect teeth. ‘You didn’t die. Every day, I prayed that you wouldn’t die.’ It occurred to Jessica that she might still be asleep, that the bicycle and Theresa could be parts of some very intricate dream.
Unable to speak, Theresa shook her head. After clearing her throat, she managed an explanation of sorts. ‘I had an operation on my heart. They sewed it back together again. I’ve even come home in an aeroplane. You have to be well to fly.’
‘Oh.’
Theresa smiled tentatively. ‘Dr Blake was there during the operation. He helped out.’ How many men could say that they had literally touched the heart of their beloved? ‘I have missed you so much, Jessica.’
The girl dashed across the room and threw herself at her mother’s feet. ‘I can’t believe it. Oh, I can’t believe that you’re here.’
The door was closed softly by someone in the hall. For several minutes, mother and child simply held one another, sometimes touching, sometimes pulling or pushing away to examine a face, a hand, a pair of eyes, the fall of a lock of hair. They talked then about the missing months, about mountains, convalescent homes, algebra, Mother Olivia’s temper, Auntie Ruth, Irene.
‘Will you be my bridesmaid?’ Theresa asked.
‘Oh yes. Oh yes, please, Mother.’ Jessica grinned. ‘I’m a bit too old to call you Mam.’
‘Then Mother it is.’
‘When will you get married?’
Theresa shrugged. ‘There’s no hurry. I don’t have to go at anything in a rush, because I have time. Before we went away, we didn’t know whether … Never mind. Stephen found someone who would perform this operation.’ She laughed aloud. ‘Trust me to be special, eh?’
Jessica nodded mutely. Mother had always been special. ‘Are you my Christmas present?’
‘Yes, love. Too big to wrap, like the bicycle. I’ll never know how Eva and Maggie kept this secret.’ She paused. ‘Just as I expected, you’re turning out to be a grand girl. You’ve never given anyone the slightest amount of trouble. How many girls would accept the idea of a new stepfather just like that?’ She clicked her fingers.
‘Well,’ replied Jessica, speech slowed as if by deep thought. ‘Somebody has to keep him clean. And he has a lot to answer for, like making my mother talk so posh.’
They fell about in the manner of two schoolgirls with a fit of the giggles, nothing to laugh at really, yet tickled to the marrow by the sheer silliness of themselves.
The door opened softly. ‘Are you two daft buggers going to have some dinner? Only my Jimmy’s that starved – he’s halfway through his tie.’
The result of this statement sent mother and daughter into further peals.
In the doorway, Maggie Courtney and Eva Coates clung together, each acting as life support to the other. They cried and laughed, watched the antics of the mother and the daughter.
‘Like two puppies,’ Eva managed.
‘Exactly,’ said Maggie. ‘Young and happy. Exactly as they should be.’
APRIL 1965
The Corner House waited at the junction where it had sat for almost forty years. Because of its position in life, the title was correct, yet the building’s frontage had no corners. Its ‘eyes’ were positioned where right angles were the norm, as if a pair of giant knives had dropped from the heavens to slice off the usual joints, making rooms a slightly crazy shape because of this odd positioning of windows. The square bays twinkled, each tiny oblong of leaded glass throwing off the sun haphazardly, the old, flawed panes attempting to do impressions of faceted diamonds.
One eye was closed, the other open. The winking window, created by a dropped blind, sat at one side of an arched porch, while its wide-awake brother overlooked a rose garden. Buds were erupting on almond and cherry trees, laurels continued to drop and grow their everlasting foliage, blackbirds fussed in the branches of a white lilac, tulips nodded, daffodils curled and folded their petals to make way for the gaudier emblems of summer.
Inside, a small feast had been prepared behind the blind-covered window of the dining ro
om. Platters of sandwiches queued alongside cakes, tarts and quiches. A salad bowl rested between silver servers, while jelly and cream took pride of place. The new ones, the expected invaders, were each a quarter of a century old, yet their passion for childish puddings had not abated.
The sitting room, dust-free and contented, boasted an almost intact crystal chandelier, a collection of comfortable seats, an open fireplace and a TV. Wicker chairs with plumped-up cushions furnished a small, sun-filled conservatory. In the kitchen, a clock dropped confident ticks into near-silence. The damped-down coke oven sighed softly into its chimney; rows of ill-matched plates covered a dresser; pans hung from a pulley line.
At the top of the stairs, an oriel bay soaked up light and scattered it across the landing and down the flight. At peace with itself, the house creaked gently, waiting quietly, its breath held against a future that had always been uncertain. But they were coming. The red carpet was down, the flag had ascended its pole, paint and wallpaper were present, correct and new. Soon, soon, there would be laughter and noise.
On the erosion at Blundellsands, two men gazed across water over which Viking ships had once travelled to invade and populate the land just north of Liverpool. They turned simultaneously and walked south, each with his hands clasped behind his body in the manner of the Queen’s husband.
John Povey, the already wild grey locks made crazier by a skittish breeze, took the part of pacemaker; Bernard Walsh, whose trilby had already made several breaks for freedom, wore the hat pulled so severely downward that it looked like an integral part of his facial structure. ‘They might not like each other,’ he mumbled. ‘They could be opposites by now. Mind, opposites are supposed to attract.’
‘What?’ roared John, back-pedalling to look at his slower friend. He saw Bernard’s lips moving, but heard nothing. Bernard’s words had travelled off towards Formby, while John’s hearing was muffled by mobile air scuttering in from the water.
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