September Starlings

by Ruth Hamilton

  I sipped politely from my Susie Cooper cup, gave Gerald a stern look as he weighed up the possibilities of a stool on which he might climb and reach the porcelain figurines.

  ‘So, you’re in purdah, I take it?’ She wasn’t quite laughing at me, but there was something in her tone that made me feel foolish for hiding away from Tommo all over again.

  ‘Yes.’ It was no use, she would never understand.

  ‘What the hell for? Why don’t you just off-load the bad bugger, cut him out of your life? I can do it for you if you like.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I planted the cup in its delicate saucer, noticed that my hostess had mixed up her fruits, as I had a grape pattern on one piece and a lemon on the other. They were beautiful things, lovely to hold and to behold. ‘I’ve already had the same offer from Dad’s lawyer. He wanted to contest the will, said he had some flimsy evidence of Dad’s change of heart.’

  She sighed explosively. ‘Sometimes, Laura, you get right up my nose. Why don’t you do something?’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Anything. Just something. You let things happen to you, just sit there and wait for life to arrive. It’s not a bus you know, not something that runs to a timetable.’

  ‘I’ve never known a bus to be on time anyway,’ I quipped. I placed the baby on my shoulder, winded him, hoped that he hadn’t done one of his wet burps. ‘There are two children now, you know,’ I reminded her unnecessarily. Gerald had picked up a heavy crystal ashtray, was trying to balance it on his head. ‘Put it down,’ I said crossly.

  ‘Babies are happenings,’ she replied. ‘I’m talking about you and the rest of your life. What about it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ My older son placed the ashtray on the floor and attempted to stand in it. At home, he had been as good as gold, but now, just a few yards from his own territory, he was behaving like a thorough brat. ‘Get out of that,’ I ordered stiffly.

  ‘Leave him alone,’ said Anne. ‘Everything’s insured.’

  ‘Even the stuff that’s not paid for?’

  ‘Especially the stuff that’s not paid for. Look. You’re twenty-three and you’ve a head on your shoulders. Why don’t you go to night school and pick up a few qualifications?’

  She was annoying me, had plainly joined the up-and-coming brigade of women who considered motherhood and housekeeping to be a crime. ‘I’m happy,’ I said lamely.

  She shook her head, but every hair remained fastened down, adhered strictly to the swept-back style that she had favoured of late. ‘You’re scared to death. Get out of that dreary flat, find an interest, forget Tommo.’

  I dropped my chin, inhaled, raised my head and looked straight at her. ‘Stop being so damned superior, Anne. I never wanted an education, never needed to be anything except content. Motherhood’s no picnic, but it’s a challenging job.’

  ‘And not a permanent one. You’ll be redundant in fifteen years. What then?’

  The rein on my patience snapped. ‘How the hell am I supposed to know what’ll happen in fifteen years? Do you think I’ve a crystal ball at the bottom of the nappy bucket? There’s no way that you can be sure of anything, either. Oh, you’re all talk now, ready to take on the world and all its rolled-up bits of legal documents. No-one questions you about the rightness of your decisions. But do you really want to spend the rest of your days up to the neck in mucky divorces, boundary fences and all kinds of broken promises?’

  ‘Touché.’ She crossed the small space between us, mopped some baby-sick from my shoulder, sat down again with all the grace of a dancer in Swan Lake. ‘I admit that I set great store by education and achievement in the workplace. It’s as if I’m watching you drift, though, and I do worry about you. So many women finish up alone these days, husbands dead or disappeared, no way of earning money in a dignified way and—’

  ‘What dignity?’ I demanded, my hackles rising. ‘How can anything be dignified when one person’s paying another to dance to a certain rhythm? I see no difference between the woman who scrubs steps and the woman who types letters. They both do a job, get paid, go home, spend the money.’

  ‘Yes, but one of them has clean hands,’ she replied quickly.

  ‘So what? She might have been typing dismissal notices or threatening letters from one mogul to another. There’s nothing clean about labour of any kind. You do the job and ignore the consequences if you want to stay sane.’

  Anne’s nails were manicured and coated with a pearly-pink varnish. She tapped them on the arm of her white leather chair, glanced at Gerald who was trying to pluck strands from the sheepskin rug, finished her coffee. ‘You should join the Labour Party and go for a seat. A purist like you ought to be gracing the halls at Westminster.’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘Then what are we going to do with you?’

  I didn’t like the ‘we’. The nuns used to say ‘we’ when one of us had been naughty – ‘We aren’t doing our best today, are we?’ – and it made me feel like a child again. This was my cousin, a woman who was exactly the same age as I was, with the same background, the same colouring, mannerisms, build. ‘You sound like a bloody public-school prig?’ I reminded her, not for the first time. ‘And I am not the poor relation who gets visited by you on the odd occasions when you’re not changing the world. Anne, I love Frank. Just being with him is enough for me. I don’t want to plan a future without him. When the boys are older, I’ll get some work and contribute to the family income.’ I paused, timed the final barb. ‘You see, I shall work to live, whereas you live to work. There’s no-one special in your life, no-one who loves you the way Frank loves me. Don’t judge me by the false standards you acquired in the corridors of so-called learning.’

  She plucked an invisible speck from the skirt of her suit. ‘As I said earlier, you’re an orator. Use your abilities and get out of that blinking flat. I just cannot understand why you shiver and shake in there just because Tommo’s in the vicinity.’

  No-one except Frank would ever know how deep my fear was. And I didn’t want her pity, couldn’t just sit there and tell her that it had always been rape, that I hadn’t known the difference between rape and loving until Frank. If I’d talked about Tommo’s near-impotence, about his frustration and his cruelty, she would have taken up the cudgels there and then, would have found my husband and … Whatever, she could have achieved little. ‘You don’t know the half of it, Anne.’ Divorce papers? He would have set fire to them and posted them through our letter box.

  ‘Then tell me.’

  ‘No.’

  She gazed at me as if she were trying to work out a difficult crossword puzzle. ‘Does Frank know all the details?’

  ‘Not all of it, no.’

  ‘So.’ She inhaled, sighed heavily. ‘Only you and Tommo know the score.’

  I shrugged. ‘Only I know. Tommo … he doesn’t think about what he does, seems not to remember everything. Blind rage, it’s probably called. Anger that’s both shortsighted and amnesic.’ I had said enough, rose to leave, settled Edward in my arms.

  ‘He’s dangerous?’

  ‘Well, of course.’

  She followed me, placed a flat palm on my back. ‘Anyway, I wish you would get it all off your chest. The police should know, the medical people—’

  ‘What for?’ I turned on my heel, faced her squarely. ‘The girl knows, remember? The girl he assaulted? She got hurt by him, she recognizes how disturbed he is. I can’t stand up against him, not alone. He’s charming, funny, attractive – he’d make me the laughing stock of Bolton.’

  Her head shook slowly. ‘Not with the other case. People won’t have forgotten that he was charged with rape – they all seem to believe the theory about smoke and fire. There are two of you who have suffered through that man, even if the other one has fled. The police keep records, you know. We could have a quiet talk with a detective, make sure that the force is watching out for him.’

  It was as if I had to go through it all again, because I had pondered such m
atters for a long time. ‘No use. If Tommo gets wind of anything, he’ll blow again, just go up like a time bomb. And the law won’t be interested in a tale that’s almost three years old. After all, I ran off with his brother, had another baby. No. I just can’t talk about it.’

  She walked to the window and stood still, tall and willowy, so sure of herself. But the shoulders drooped slightly after a moment or two. ‘I’m sorry, Laura. Just then, for a couple of seconds, I tried to put myself in your shoes. You’re right. Tommo will have to offend again.’ She swung round, stared at me with eyes that were big and sad. ‘I just hope you’re not the next item on his agenda. Funny, it’s taken me all this time to realize what you were up against—’

  ‘But I’ve said nothing, explained nothing and—’

  ‘No need. I can feel your story, Laura. It’s standing right here in this room, but it’s not between us any more.’ She sniffed, walked towards me and took Gerald’s hand. ‘The other stuff – all that mithering about your own career – I’m sorry if it offends you, but I meant all that, you know. The boys are lovely and Frank’s great, but you are so important. You’ve skills and talents and they must be used. Of the two of us, you were always the cleverer.’

  I grinned. ‘Then talent will out. Have you ever tasted my banoffee pie?’

  ‘Banoffee … ee,’ shouted Gerald happily.

  ‘I’ve a talent with bananas and boiled condensed milk. So I’m not completely wasted, am I?’

  ‘Banoffee!’ yelled Gerald.

  She hugged me and I felt like a little girl again. We were standing next to a wall on Chorley New Road and my mother was at home waiting for me, waiting to curse me for meeting my cousin. ‘Thanks, Anne.’

  ‘What for?’

  I detached myself, collected Gerald’s sticky hand, worried fleetingly about all the cream and white, all the dirty fingermarks. ‘For being there after school finished.’

  She laughed. ‘I’ll always be here, kid.’

  I made banoffee pie that week, despite the fact that it was a troublesome recipe. The two men in my life loved this pudding, though Gerald was wont to spread it all around a bit. The recipe involved boiling unopened tins of condensed milk, a dangerous process that required constant vigilance throughout 2½ hours. But at least I had to be there, at least I could pretend that I wasn’t skulking behind my own door like a scared rabbit.

  Gerald and I baked the ‘blind’ case, sliced the bananas, waited for the alarm clock to sound. ‘When it rings,’ said Gerald, ‘we can have the banoffee … ee.’

  I fed Teddy, changed him, tried yet again to make the flat look decent. The explosive chair and the sagging sofa never looked good, no matter how hard I brushed and pummelled. Gerald hung over the clock, willed it to mark the moment when the toffee would be ready. When it finally sounded, he capered about and jumped from foot to foot until the toffee was cool enough to handle.

  There were not too many accidents with the whipped cream, although much of the border had been ‘Geralded’. We placed our accomplishment in the centre of the table, sat down and watched Jackanory.

  ‘Is Daddy coming?’ asked my son.

  Sometimes, I felt like a terrible fraud. One day, this little lad would find out his true identity, but until that time arrived, I went along with the charade. ‘Soon.’

  ‘Banoffee … ee.’ he sang. ‘Toffee … ee, banoffee … ee.’

  I looked at the clock. Frank had said that he would be early, because he was bringing some yellow fish from the market. It was to be an altogether yellow meal, what with the haddock and the banana pie.

  The doorbell rang. ‘I can go,’ announced Gerald.

  ‘No. Stay here with Teddy. Watch the television and make sure that you don’t dip your fingers in anything. Especially anything in a round dish in the middle of the table.’

  At the bottom of the stairs, I paused, remembered that I hadn’t looked through the window. ‘Hello?’ I called cautiously.

  ‘Mrs Thompson?’ It was a man’s voice, one I didn’t recognize.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Police.’

  A lot of things can go through your mind in just a tiny fraction of time. My mother was dead, Anne was hurt, Uncle Freddie had keeled over, Frank had been in a car accident. I opened the door.

  ‘May we come in?’ There were two of them, and one was female.

  I froze. The man had removed his helmet, and I knew that the police became extra-polite when delivering bad news. ‘Tell me,’ I said at last. ‘My little boy … he’s only two, but he … he understands things. Tell me here, downstairs. What’s happened?’

  The woman touched my arm. She had a hooked nose that made her fierce, and soft brown eyes that made her gentle. ‘I’m afraid it’s your husband, Mrs Thompson.’

  I swallowed. ‘Tommo? What … which one?’ I had two husbands and one of them was hurt or dead. I had two husbands and this policewoman’s face was swimming about in water and it wasn’t even raining. ‘Tell me!’

  They stepped into the narrow hallway, and we were all squashed together like people in a lift. ‘He’s dead,’ said the man. He had a mole on the end of his nose. It had three bristly hairs growing out of its centre.

  ‘Who is dead?’ I heard myself ask.

  ‘Your husband,’ said the female. ‘Come on, let’s go up and look at your little boy.’ She sounded as if she were talking to a child. And her face was still misty round the edges.

  ‘Which husband?’

  They glanced at one another. ‘Have you more than one husband, Mrs Thompson?’

  I nodded. ‘Sort of. One’s a good man and the other’s not. If the bad one’s dead, then everything’s all right. But if it’s Frank, then I don’t know … I can’t be here without Frank. He knows that, so it’s not to be him. Do you hear me? It can’t be Frank.’

  Between them, they led me up the stairs. When we reached the flat, the policeman took Gerald into the bedroom and closed the door. There was a dreadful finality in the click of that catch, as if my life had suddenly ended.

  ‘How?’ I asked.

  She placed me at the kitchen table, then busied herself with the kettle. ‘It’s suspicious,’ she said. ‘We’re treating it as a suspicous death.’

  ‘Then it must be Frank,’ I announced clearly. ‘And the killer will be Tommo.’ The room had gone red, and there was no light at the windows. Everything moved, floated about, lost its proper place in time and space. Day was night, the cooker drifted in the twilight, threatened to touch the ceiling, except that the ceiling and the floor seemed to be changing places. I fell gratefully into the arms of this new darkness, gave myself up willingly.

  When I woke, I was in a pale green room with painted walls and glass in the door. Someone sat next to me, a woman who was leafing through a magazine. On her head there was a white cap, very stiff and fastened with a sort of paperclip at the back. She was a nurse. Where were my children? What was I doing lying here like the Queen of Sheba when Gerald was longing for his banoffee pie?

  ‘Hello.’ She had dark hair and pale skin, was probably Irish, though the ‘hello’ had sounded Bolton-ish. ‘You’ve had a sedative. You were thrashing about a bit, so we had to quieten you. The doctor’s had a look at you while you were asleep, and he thinks you’ve a touch of anaemia.’

  Something menacing lurked on the border of memory. ‘Where’s Frank?’

  ‘Er …’ She glanced at her upside-down watch. ‘I’ll just fetch the lady constable. I’m sure she’ll be able to tell you more than I can.’

  The door opened to reveal my cousin Anne. She was dressed in denim jeans and an old sweater, both articles covered in spots of paint. Yes, Anne had said that she was going to paint her bedroom. Why was she here in the middle of painting? Why? ‘Laura,’ she said softly.

  ‘Where are the boys?’

  ‘In Barr Bridge with my mother and dad.’ She walked right up to the bed and clasped my hand. ‘Poor Frank,’ she whispered. ‘And my poor Laura.’

 
Chapter Seven

  By 1965, Gerald was four and Edward was two. After Frank’s death, we had moved to a small terraced house in Maybank Street, Bolton. This purchase had taken up all my savings, plus £200 Anne had ‘lent’ me. Her chances of retrieving the investment were poor, though she eventually found me some work.

  Every day, I baked. The cooker was a temperamental piece of electrical stupidity, a bulky thing with two rings at the back and a square hotplate at the front. This rectangle was really the lid of the grill, so it worked only when the grill decided to be co-operative.

  The oven was OK once I had learned where to place things. It had cold spots, hot spots and a tendency to vary in temperature from cool to hellfire hot. But I tamed it sufficiently, managed to bake my pies, cakes and scones. These were collected by a Mr Tattersall, who sold them in his shop at Tonge Moor. The children and I ate a lot of failed cakes, and the rest of my income went into maintaining our cramped home.

  Those two years had been strange, because they seemed to have changed me completely. Gone was the girl who had feared marked photographs and knocks at the door. My anger was so intense, so constant, that it burned out all the terror.

  In the kitchen, I kept the cuttings from local and national papers. They were in a tin box at the bottom of a drawer, stashed away from the clutches of my older child, as his reading age was well in advance of his chronological status. Alongside them and in the same tin were the cheques from Mother. She never visited us and I never cashed her conscience payments, didn’t use a penny of the money.

  Sometimes, when the children were asleep, I would spread the ‘mystery’ across the floor, placing the cuttings in order on the scarlet rug that fronted a two-bar electric fire. ‘LOCAL MAN FOUND IN RIVER’ said the first. Oh I remembered that day. Anne standing beside my hospital bed, her clothes shabby and paint-spattered. Two weeks I spent in there. They were talking about sending me to the psychiatric ward, but I thought of the boys and pulled out of my nosedive. Anne dragged me from the bed, forced me to dress, took me home, took time off work, fed me, dressed me.