The Most Precious Thing

by Bradshaw, Rita

  Mindful of all his da had to put up with at home, David’s voice was benign when he said, ‘It’s no use you taking out your anger at what they’ve done to Amos by having a go at our Walter, Da. It was daft, you sounding off at Tom earlier, and wouldn’t the owners and the rest of them just lick their lips to hear you two coming to blows? Eh?’

  Ned surveyed his two sons with narrowed eyes before pulling his grimy cap - the colour long since having been consigned to the onlooker’s imagination - down on to his forehead. His head moved in a series of small jerks before he said, ‘Aye, well, that’s as mebbe. Anyway, it’s done now an’ I’ve no intention of goin’ to Tom Burns cap in hand, if that’s what you’re suggestin’.’

  ‘Would we, knowing you?’ David’s grin brought forth a reluctant smile from Ned. ‘Anyway, Tom is all right, not like some of ’em who are nowt but boss’s lackeys. He don’t hold a grudge, Tom.’ David didn’t add here that before he’d left the colliery earlier that day he had made it his business to inform the deputy of Amos’s circumstances and how his father was feeling about his old friend. And Tom, a small upright bullet of a man who was a lay preacher in his spare time, had listened without comment before saying, ‘Aye, I thought somethin’ was gnawin’ at his vitals. He’s a good old boy, your da, Dave, so rest assured, no offence taken.’

  Ned thrust a box of vegetables and fruit into David and Walter’s hands. ‘Here.’

  Both the brothers knew it was their father’s way of apologising for his rancour, and this was further reinforced when Ned drew a piece of brown paper out of his pocket and said, ‘Sit yerselves down, the pair of you, an’ have a smoke afore you leave. Our Lillian picked up these tabs after they’d had a meeting in the office this week, an’ a few of ’em only half gone.’

  David shook his head. He wanted to get home, besides which he had told his sister time and time again she was endangering her job at the firework factory by hanging about after there had been a meeting with the bigwigs in the office and nipping into the room to empty the ashtrays into her bag.

  As his father carefully peeled back the paper to display the heap of cigarette stubs, David said, ‘I’m for home, man, and thanks for these,’ he nodded to the box in his hands. ‘Carrie said to be sure you and Mam come round tomorrow for the lad’s birthday party. You and Renee and Veronica as well, Walter.’

  ‘Aye, I know all about it, our Veronica’s been on about nowt else for weeks, when she bothers to come home, that is.’ Walter grinned at his brother. His daughter spent more time at David and Carrie’s than she ever did in her own home, and he couldn’t blame her. He only wished he could do the same. He had always thought his mam was a bitter pill, but Renee could match her any day.

  Walter’s smile faded as he watched his brother wind his way out of the allotments, the odd man here and there who was still working on his patch in the mellow August evening raising his hand or calling a greeting across the rows of vegetables and runner bean canes. He didn’t know what he was going to do about Renee. And then he caught the thought, self-derision fierce as he followed it with, don’t kid yourself, man. There’s nowt you can do. She’s made sure of that. She covered her tracks better than any Indian scout, did Renee. And really he had nothing to substantiate his suspicions, only the fact that from being ravenous between the sheets she’d turned into a virtual nun the minute she’d found out she was expecting Veronica. But he didn’t believe that, knowing his wife like he did. If he wasn’t getting it, who was? Because he’d bet his last farthing someone was. Someone at that damn factory, like as not. His hands knotted into fists.

  ‘Lucky so-an’-so, ain’t he?’ Ned had followed his son’s eyes, but there was no resentment in his tone when he said, ‘He’s got himself a gem with his lass, has our David. They might have got off to a shaky start in that one room at the Back of the Pit, but she made damn sure they didn’t settle there. First that move to Monk Street an’ then Dock Street. Natural homemaker, Carrie is.’

  ‘I wish a bit of it had rubbed off on her sister.’ Walter’s tone was bitter.

  Ned slanted a glance at his son out of the corner of his eye. ‘Aye, perhaps you do, lad, but there’s worse off than you. Look at Alec. Thought he’d have it all plain sailin’ when he married Margaret, but there’s her lost one babby after another an’ sufferin’ with what the quack calls nerves now. She never was no oil paintin’ but she’s skin an’ bone an’ lookin’ as old as yer mam these days.’

  ‘Aye, well, I’ve no sympathy for Alec,’ Walter said tersely. Alec’s wife might be highly strung and look like the back of a tram, but at least his brother knew where she was twenty-four hours a day and who she was with. All this supposed ‘overtime’ that came Renee’s way was a sight too convenient in his opinion, and he didn’t believe she’d bought the trinkets she produced now and again either. In the last nine or ten years since Veronica had been born, she’d been playing him for a fool. He’d bet his life on it. Proving it was something else.

  ‘I’m not sayin’ I’ve got sympathy for him, lad. He made his bed years ago an’ can’t quibble about lyin’ on it, but I do feel sorry for the lass. All them times she’s bin expectin’ an’ then losin’ ’em afore her time. You’ve got your Veronica, an’ David his lad; it must rub it in a bit, especially with our Lillian only havin’ been married two minutes an’ announcin’ she’s expectin’ the other night. That’ll be an end to me tabs,’ Ned added reflectively, shaking his head as the thought struck. ‘After havin’ been waitin’ for Isaac to set the date for the last umpteen years, she’ll waste no time in producin’ one after the other if she has her way. Four, she said she wants. You ought to have seen his face.’

  Walter wasn’t interested in seeing his brother-in-law’s face. ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t lose his job like the couple of million unemployed then,’ he said sourly. ‘They might think they’re set up nicely now through waiting and saving, but it could change with the wind.’

  ‘Mebbe, but Isaac’s a canny lad. He’s managed to get through the Depression this far without bein’ laid off. Likely he can weather the storm.’

  Walter’s voice was dry when he said, ‘And his da being the foreman at the works might help.’

  ‘Aye, there is that, lad.’

  David was whistling to himself as he walked home along the warm dusty streets towards Dock Street. Hearing him, one could be forgiven for thinking the sound was motivated by happiness or inward satisfaction, but this would have been wrong. It was a habit. Right from a little lad, however bad the situation at home between his parents or Alec and himself, he had whistled outside. It was his way of informing the world that everything was all right with him, thank you very much, and that he wouldn’t appreciate any enquiries even if it wasn’t.

  There was the usual motley collection of bairns playing out late in the streets, engaged in the sorts of games he’d played. He passed a group playing hitchie dabber with boot polish tins filled with soil, apart from two little girls who obviously had a relative who worked at the glassworks, judging by the round pieces of mottled glass with a pattern on the top that they were proudly holding aloft. Mount-a-kitty, diabolo, swinging round the lamp posts with washing line ropes - nothing changed, David thought. One lad had just presented the lass of his choice, a snotty-nosed tyke with matted blonde hair, with a sherbert dab, and the look on the little boy’s face brought back a memory from the past.

  He’d been all of seven years old when he’d given Carrie his Saturday penny for Mr Errington’s merry-go-round. The old man had lived along the back lane by the Co-op in Charles Street and had had a mobile roundabout pulled by a pony. He’d charged a penny a ride, and the five-year-old Carrie had been all wistful blue eyes as she’d watched the other bairns have a go. Her face had lit up when he’d put the money in her little hand but, if he remembered right, Alec had told on him that night. His mam had informed him that if he was daft enough to give his penny to the likes of Carrie McDarmount then he obviously didn’t want it, and so it would
be stopped forthwith until she thought he’d come to understand the value of money.

  David paused, turning to look back to where the little girl was now shyly offering her small beau some of the sherbert.

  His mam. Even then he had known she couldn’t stand the sight of him. Not that she’d been over keen on Walter or Lillian either, but they had never answered her back like he used to and so had escaped the worst of her rages. And now she was making his da’s life a misery again, since the talk of war had died down.

  They’d all thought they were on the up and up a couple of years ago, when news had filtered through to the powers that be that Germany was building up her armed forces. The government had got windy, with the result that working pits all over the country had been expanded and re-opened, and the shipyards and armament factories like Armstrongs and Vickers had started getting busy again. All of a sudden, amid increasing rumours of conflict with Germany, miners were back on full time, even the ‘troublemakers’ like his da and Sandy were taken back. But it hadn’t lasted, damn it. The last six months things were as tight as they’d ever been. Huge stocks of coal were lying dormant and the shipyards were on short time. Miners were getting laid off every day, and those who weren’t were getting fewer and fewer hours. And to hear his mam go on, you’d think his da was the sole cause of the slump.

  The sherbert dab apparently finished, the little girl darted off into the open doorway of what was obviously her home, leaving the lad staring after her, crestfallen, kicking disconsolately at the kerb with his boot.

  Poor little devil. David wanted to walk back and tell the wee boy that faint heart never won fair lady and tomorrow was another day, but he didn’t. He had enough problems of his own. He turned again and walked on.

  There was bad feeling down the pit about whether the deputies should be taken on to the management side entirely. Every miner was hotly against the idea because deputies were responsible for safety down the mine, and there had already been a steep rise in injuries and deaths in the last years - the owners paid scant attention to improving working conditions. Feelings were running high and David thought they could be called out on another strike over the issue. And he didn’t want that. Damn it, a strike was the last thing he wanted. Carrie was already bringing in more than he was now that they were cutting back on the shifts again, and he didn’t mind admitting it was driving him nuts. He pulled off his cap and rubbed it irritably over his hair once or twice before replacing it on his head.

  At least Carrie didn’t show him up by going out of the house to work and telling all and sundry she was the main breadwinner like Renee did. By, he felt for Walter, he did straight. Renee had been a stroppy little madam before she’d got the job as forewoman at the firework factory, but the last five or six years she’d been so full of herself you’d have thought she was one step down from royalty. And she had no time for the bairn, even when she wasn’t working. No wonder Veronica lived and died at their place. She was a nice little thing, Veronica, even if she did drive Matthew mad by following him about like a puppy.

  The thought of Matthew deepened David’s frown. He and the lad were chalk and cheese, he knew it, even though he’d always fallen over backwards to try and be a good da to him. Maybe he’d tried too hard. Bairns weren’t daft, they sensed what was what. Or perhaps it was Carrie’s love for the lad, which almost amounted to obsession at times, that had put a wedge between him and Matthew. Certainly the lad would never be disciplined if it was left to his mother. If Carrie had fallen for a child of his, would that have made a difference? Provided a balance perhaps? But it hadn’t happened.

  David thrust the sick feeling of disappointment aside, telling himself, as he always did, that they’d have their own child in time. They were still young; Carrie was only twenty-six, after all, and he was nearly twenty-nine.

  He didn’t acknowledge here that much as he wanted to be a father, it was the bond a bairn from their union would bring that was paramount in his desire to impregnate his wife. If he had examined the feeling beneath the natural longing for his own child, it might have brought to the surface the constant but deeply buried worry that one day Carrie would leave him for someone she really loved. Someone she hadn’t had to marry. And this same brooding subconscious unease coloured his thoughts about her work, to the point where it had become a bone of contention between them on occasion.

  ‘Yoo hoo! Mr Sutton!’

  As he turned the corner of Zetland Street into Dock Street, David became aware he’d been called a couple of times without it registering. He turned, waiting for the big meaty woman who was panting after him and smiling as she reached him. ‘Sorry, Mrs Mathen. I was miles away.’

  ‘Hope it was somewhere a mite better than these parts, lad. That’s all I can say.’ Mrs Mathen put a hand to her heaving bosom and gasped a couple of times. ‘I just want you to tell your Carrie our May loved them things she did for the bairn. With them strugglin’ like they are, our May’d got nowt for the babby an’ it made all the difference, your Carrie sendin’ them little matinee coats an’ all. She’s a marvel, your lass. You tell her that from me.’

  ‘I will, Mrs Mathen.’

  ‘I said to my Nobby the other night, she’s a marvel, Carrie Sutton. If anyone deserves to get on in this life, it’s that lass.’

  David was keeping the smile on his face with some effort now.

  ‘An’ he agreed with me, so he did. There’s them that say an’ there’s them that do, Nobby said, an’ that lass is a doer, God bless her, an’ as bonny as a new morn into the bargain. An’ that lad of yours, spotless as a new pin, he is. You never see him runnin’ around with his backside hangin’ out like some I could name.’

  David was edging away now. ‘I’ll tell her--’

  ‘An’ her doorstep white as snow. Says a lot about folk, does that.’

  ‘I have to go, Mrs Mathen. My dinner’s waiting.’

  ‘What? Oh aye, aye, lad, you go. You go. But mind you tell her what I’ve said.’ Mrs Mathen hitched her enormous breasts with her forearms as she spoke. ‘She’s a marvel sure enough.’

  As David walked on, the old woman’s words were ringing in his ears. Mrs Mathen was right, Carrie was a marvel and none knew that better than he did. When the home work from the firework factory had dried up in the worst of the Depression, Carrie had already realised she had a knack for knitting and crocheting new items from old woollen garments she picked up at the Old Market for the odd penny or two and then unravelled. The compliments she’d received about Matthew’s clothes had prompted her to try her hand at some modern fashion items for women, which she had then asked Renee to show to the girls at the factory. When everything had been snapped up like hot cakes, Carrie had taken it upon herself to approach a couple of the big shops in Bishopwearmouth to see if they were interested in selling her wares. The result of this had been a regular income which had proved a godsend, enabling them, with Carrie’s careful budgeting, to get straight and pay off all their debts.

  Once this had been accomplished, they had moved out of the increasingly cramped conditions at Brooke Street and into two rooms and a scullery which had seemed like paradise. A further move, two years ago, had brought them to their present accommodation, a two-up, two-down terraced house in Dock Street with its own privy and washhouse.

  Oh aye, Carrie was a marvel all right, and it wasn’t only Mr Mathen who had noticed how bonny she was either. David hitched the box of vegetables further under his arm as he reached his own doorstep and he was frowning. He didn’t like the jealousy that reared its head when he caught a covert glance at Carrie from another man and read what they were thinking, but it was something he didn’t seem able to get over.

  He stood for a moment without making any move to enter the house. He was daft, a nutter. Why else would he let the very qualities which made her so special come between them time and time again? True she was bonny and warm and kind, but to his knowledge she had never so much as looked at another man, so why did he allow t
he inner questioning and doubt to get to him? Her work, first for the firework factory and then the clothing enterprise, had been to benefit them as a family, he knew that at heart. And where would they be without it? Would he rather they were still stuck in Brooke Street living hand to mouth just so he could say he was her provider?

  David couldn’t truthfully give himself the answer to that question because it would have been yes. Instead he reiterated for the thousandth time how he hated seeing Carrie work every minute God sent, her hands often knotted with cramp at the end of the day and her eyes sore. He made a sound low in his throat which could have signified anything.