The House By Princes Park

by Maureen Lee

The conversation turned, as it often did, to rumours that the fighting would soon end. After all, someone said, the Battle of Amiens had just been won, mainly by Australian and Canadian troops, and there’d been only 7000 casualties on their side.

  ‘Only seven thousand!’ someone else remarked sarcastically.

  ‘There’s been ten times that number before now.’

  Olivia hardly listened. She held her hand against her breast and, through the pocket of her apron, could feel Tom’s ring pressing against her palm. For the hundredth time that day, she went over the events of the previous night.

  ‘What’s the matter, Olivia?’ said a voice. ‘You look as if you might cry.’

  ‘Nothing.’ She couldn’t see him any more. His face, so clear all day, had suddenly become a blur. The hairs on her neck prickled and she felt convinced something was dreadfully wrong.

  It wasn’t until the following day, after a sleepless night, that she learnt that Thomas O’Hagan was dead. The ambulance train had been passing over a bridge that had been heavily mined by saboteurs operating behind Allied lines. Not everyone had died when the bridge exploded and the train and those on board had plunged into the river below.

  But Tom had and, for Olivia, it was the end of everything.

  She sighed and wriggled uncomfortably on the bed. She was perspiring freely and the clothes felt damp. The contractions were only minutes apart, painful, but bearable.

  Suddenly, she felt her stomach heave and she no longer had control of her body. There were a series of violent spasms, followed by a cloud of pain, so savage that she nearly fainted. Then the heaving stopped and she felt empty.

  ‘It’s a girl,’ Madge cried triumphantly.

  ‘A girl!’

  ‘A lovely girl, very dark. I’m cutting the cord. Do you want to look at her, Olivia?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Olivia whispered. She half closed her eyes and saw a creamy-skinned baby being picked up by its feet. Madge gave the plump bottom a sharp slap, and the baby responded with an angry howl. ‘She looks fat.’

  ‘No, she’s just right. She’s a fine, healthy baby. I’ll clean you up, then take her downstairs, make a bottle of tepid water and give her a cuddle. She deserves it after all that effort. Is there a name you want to call her?’

  ‘I never gave a thought to names.’ She half saw Madge wrap the baby in a sheet and put her in a basket, then she lay back and allowed herself to be washed and patted gently dry. The bedclothes and her nightdress were changed, her hair quickly combed.

  ‘I’ll make us both a cup of tea in a minute,’ Madge muttered. ‘I need one as much as you.’ She picked up the basket and made her way carefully downstairs, leaving an exhausted Olivia warmly tucked in bed with only a feeling of soreness as a reminder of her ordeal.

  She lay, watching the sharp line between light and shade creep across the wardrobe with its dusty suitcases on top as the sun gradually disappeared from sight. The singing had stopped. The children had gone indoors. The world seemed to have paused for breath and Olivia paused with it.

  She had just had a baby!

  Tom’s baby. His daughter.

  And now she felt oddly incomplete. She had to see Tom’s daughter so as always to remember what she looked like. Otherwise, she would wonder until her dying day.

  It hurt, getting out of bed, going downstairs, not making a sound in her bare feet. The basket was on the floor in front of the living-room fire. Olivia saw a tiny foot appear and kick away the sheet. Another foot appeared, followed by a little flower-like hand. The baby was making faint chirruping noises, like a bird. Madge was humming to herself in the kitchen as she prepared the bottle.

  Olivia crept into the room and knelt beside the basket. The baby was naked and, oh, she was so pretty! Dark curly hair, dark creamy skin, rosebud mouth, a perfect nose, not squashed like some babies. Her limbs were smooth and round, unwrinkled. The baby regarded her calmly with big blue eyes, though she’d been told that babies couldn’t focus for weeks.

  ‘You’re beautiful,’ Olivia whispered. She put her finger inside the diminutive hand and it was gripped with surprising strength. As the flesh of the mother touched that of the child, Olivia shivered, and the parts of her that she had thought had died with Tom, became magically alive. She knew then she would never bring herself to give up her daughter. Never!

  She slipped the nightdress off her shoulder, reached down and picked up her baby, cradling her in her arms. ‘Are you thirsty, darling? Would you like a drink?’ She put the child to her breast and she began to suck noisily. Olivia smiled and began to sway from side to side.

  ‘Olivia! Oh, no, dearie. No!’ A shocked Madge had come into the room with the bottle. She sank into a chair. ‘That’s torn it,’ she groaned.

  ‘Oh, Madge!’ Olivia cried, eyes shining. ‘I remember now what Tom looked like, just like his daughter. And Madge. I’m going to call her Ruby. It was Tom’s grandmother’s name. Ruby O’Hagan.’ She stroked the soft cheek with her thumb. ‘Don’t you think that’s lovely?’

  ‘Lovely,’ Madge agreed, sighing.

  She was slightly unhinged. The emotions that had been supressed for months bubbled to the surface. She couldn’t stop smiling as she nursed her baby hour after hour, cooing, stroking and kissing, marvelling at her fingers, her toes. Entranced, she watched the blue eyes gradually close as Ruby fell asleep.

  Eventually, Madge told her sharply to put the child down. ‘You’re wearing her out. She needs rest. And so do you. You’re much too excited.’

  ‘I’m happy, that’s all, happier than I’ve been in ages.’ Olivia reluctantly laid the sleeping Ruby in the basket. ‘I want to keep her, Madge,’ she said quietly.

  ‘I thought as much.’ Madge’s lips tightened.

  ‘I think that’s best, don’t you?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what’s best, Olivia.’ Madge looked sober, not a bit her cheerful self. ‘Whether you keep her or not, either way misery lies. Keep her and you’ll have to find somewhere to live, not easy with a baby, even less without a husband. Little Ruby will grow up without a dad. You’ll need money, but with a baby you’ll find it hard to get a job. You can’t go back to nursing. You’ll feel trapped. You might come to resent Ruby for ruining your life. You might start thinking, “If only I hadn’t kept her, everything would be fine”.’

  Olivia shuddered. ‘Tell me about the other way?’

  ‘With the other way,’ Madge continued, ‘You can go back to nursing, pass your exams, maybe get promoted. You’ll have friends, money, nice clothes, enough to eat. You’ll be respected. You might get married, have more children you won’t be ashamed to call your own.’

  ‘You make that way sound so much better,’ Olivia cried.

  ‘I hadn’t finished, dearie. Despite all the good things, you’ll never forget your little girl. Every time you see a child of Ruby’s age, you’ll wonder how she is, what she looks like now she’s four, ten, twenty. You’ll wonder where she is, how she is, is she being properly looked after? Is she happy? Is she sad? Does she ever think about her mother, her real mother? You might try to find her, even if it’s only to have a little look to set your mind at rest.’

  ‘Oh, Madge! How do you know all this?’

  ‘I’ve made the same speech a dozen times before, dearie, that’s how. I’ve another young lady coming at the end of May and I’ll probably be making it again.’

  ‘What do you think I should do?’ The idea of being free, able to do anything she wanted without the burden of a baby was tempting. But the thought of giving up Ruby was intolerable.

  ‘Don’t ask me, Olivia. I don’t even know what I’d do in the same position. It’s a decision for you and no one else to make.’

  In the early hours, Ruby, in her basket on the floor beside her mother’s bed, woke up and began to howl and still howled after she’d been fed and her nappy changed. Olivia was rubbing her back when Madge appeared in an emerald green dressing gown.

  ‘If you were in rooms, there’
d be people hammering on the walls shouting for you to keep the baby quiet.’

  ‘What’s wrong with her?’ Olivia asked fretfully.

  ‘Nothing’s wrong. She’s behaving like a perfectly normal baby.’

  ‘But why is she crying, Madge?’

  ‘Maybe you haven’t brought up all her wind.’

  ‘She’s burped twice.’

  ‘She might want to burp three times.’

  Ruby fell asleep and woke up at six for another feed. Olivia fed her. There was something almost sensual about the sound the baby made as she sucked on her breast. A thrill of emotion swept through her, almost as intense as when she’d made love with Tom.

  ‘We’re starting on a big adventure soon, you and me,’ she whispered. She could look for a job as a housekeeper, say she was a widow.

  Madge appeared again, much later, this time wearing a hat and coat. ‘I’m going out a minute, dearie. I won’t be long.’

  Olivia dozed, the baby in her arms. Madge came back and made a cup of tea. She’d hoped she would offer to look after Ruby while she had a proper sleep, but Madge made no such offer. Perhaps she was making a point instead – this was how it would be when she and Ruby were on their own with no one to help.

  Midday. She’d bathed her baby, marvelling again at how perfect she was, how beautiful. Ruby made cooing sounds and waved her arms. Olivia dried her, dressed her in the new white clothes Madge had bought, hugging her tightly. ‘I love you,’ she said. ‘I love you so much.’

  There was a knock on the front door, followed by Madge’s footsteps in the hall, then whispering that went on for a long time. Then the whispering stopped and someone came upstairs, not Madge, because the tread was too heavy. Her heart did a somersault when her father came into the room. Madge must have sent him the promised telegram.

  Olivia wasn’t sure if, for the briefest of seconds, she glimpsed a softness in his stony eyes when he looked down on his daughter nursing her tiny, dark-haired baby.

  Father and daughter stared at each other across the room, neither speaking. Olivia kept her eyes on his, willing the softness to return. If only she could talk to him, he might offer to support them, come and see them, bring her mother.

  Instead, her father strode across the room and tore the baby from her breast. Ruby whimpered and Olivia heard someone give a thin, high-pitched scream that seemed to go on and on and on as if a single note was being played on a violin.

  Then Madge seized her shoulders and shook her hard and the screaming stopped. ‘RUBY!’ Olivia screamed as her father and her baby vanished from the room.

  ‘Shush, dearie. It’s for the best. It’s what you asked of me, isn’t it?’

  But that was then, and this was now. She loved Ruby with all her heart, she wanted to keep her. Even so, Olivia made no attempt to leap out of bed and try to get her baby back. Afterwards, during the dark weeks that followed, she wondered, horrified, if in some secret, horribly selfish, part of her mind, she didn’t want Ruby after all, that she was relieved she’d been taken away.

  Now, though, she felt only desolation and despair.

  It was the second occasion the little Ford Eight had made the long journey from the south to the north of Wales. This time, there was a baby in a basket on the back seat who made not a sound for most of the way. The driver had almost reached his destination when it began to cry. Instead of stopping to give it the bottle Mrs Cookson had prepared, Daffydd Jones pressed his foot harder on the accelerator. Nearly there.

  He recognised the white convent when it came into sight, perched on a hill three miles from Abergele. He had been before. The Mother Superior knew him, but not his name. Daffyd Jones wasn’t a Catholic, he had no truck with Papist nonsence, but the convent was also an orphanage and had agreed to take the child if it was a girl. Arrangements had been made elsewhere in the event his daughter’s bastard turned out to be a boy.

  The small car groaned its way up the hill and seemed to breathe a sigh of relief when it stopped outside the convent’s thick oak door. He got out, pulled the bell, and returned to collect his tiny passenger whose cries by now had become screams of rage.

  An ancient nun, as curved as a question mark, was waiting for him, nodding, like a puppet, when he came back and handed her the basket.

  She nodded at him to come inside. He refused, saying gruffly, ‘I’ve to give you this.’ He handed her the scrap of paper Mrs Cookson had given him. ‘After all, what harm will it do?’ she’d said.

  Tipping his hat, he bade the nun goodbye. She nodded again and closed the door.

  Daffydd Jones watched the door close and wondered why there were tears in his eyes.

  Inside the convent, the nun peered at the paper. Her eyes were old, but she could still see, particularly when it was nice, clear print like this.

  ‘Ruby O’Hagan,’ she read. Well, at least the child had a name, even if the poor, wee mite had nothing else.

  Emily

  Chapter 2

  1933–1935

  The Convent of the Sisters of the Sacred Cross near Abergele was renowned for its orphan girls, all superbly trained by the age of fourteen to enter the world of live-in domestic service. They could sew the neatest of seams, embroider, cook, clean, launder, even garden. They were respectful, healthy, extremely moral, highly religious, and had perfect manners.

  The girls made ideal housemaids, nursemaids, cooks, seamstresses. Well adjusted and apparently content with their lot, they had been brought up, if not with love, then with kindness. Physical punishment was strictly forbidden in the convent.

  Their education was confined to subjects that would be of use to girls whose role in life would be to serve others until they eventually married a man from the same class as themselves, usually another servant. Apart from domestic skills, they were taught to read and write and do simple arithmetic. They learnt a smattering of history and geography. It was considered a waste for the girls to study science, literature, art, current affairs, or politics. No one was likely to ask a servant girl what she thought of the situation in Russia or which Shakespeare play was her favourite, though she could, if asked, recite the catechism, reel off the names of the last ten Popes, sing several hymns in Latin, and accurately describe the fourteen Stations of the Cross which she had made every Good Friday for as far back as she could remember.

  There were applicants anxious for a convent girl from as far away as London, though the girls mainly went to wealthy Catholic homes across the Welsh/English border: Cheshire, Shropshire, Lancashire. Occasionally, a girl stayed and took the veil.

  Until they left, the girls spent most of their time within the confines of the convent. They were taught there. They went to Mass in the tiny chapel in the well-tended grounds, the service taken by a priest from a seminary twenty miles away. If the girls were ill, unless it was something contagious or requiring surgery, the young patients were cared for by the nuns themselves.

  On Sunday afternoons, they went for a walk in the quiet, secluded lanes, proceeding in a crocodile, two by two, seeing only the occasional car or cyclist.

  Twice a year, on a nice day in spring or autumn, when there were few holidaymakers about, the older girls were taken to the sands at Abergele, marching through the small town, fascinated by the shops, amazed and slightly scared by the traffic, particularly if a single decker bus drove by, chugging smoke from its rear. They had never seen so many people and tried not to stare at the women with uncovered heads and bare legs, lips painted red for some reason. So far, men had hardly featured in their lives. The priests who took Mass were old. For a long time they had assumed the world to be peopled mainly by women. Yet here were young men, strange creatures, with deep, loud voices. Some even had hair on their faces which the girls took to be an affliction and said a quick prayer. And there were boys, with short trousers and scabby knees, who grinned and shouted at them rudely, even whistled. The girls, in their antiquated brown dresses and long white pinafores, walked demurely past, hands clasped, eyes fixe
d on the girl in front, as they had been taught.

  The convent might have been considered a gloomy place, with its stone walls and stone floors and high, cavernous ceilings. Cool in summer, freezing in winter, the furniture was sparse and as plain as the food. There were no adornments apart from holy pictures, statues, and numerous crucifixes that hung on the white-painted walls. Nor was a clock evident, but someone, somewhere, must have known when to ring the bells, indicating it was time for classes, time for meals, time to pray.

  However, the presence of so many children, obviously happy, despite their tragic backgrounds, dispelled any gloom the occasional visitor might have felt when they entered the big, oak door.

  ‘Cannon fodder,’ said Emily Dangerfield to her sister, Cecilia, Mother Superior of the convent, one breezy day in March. Trees could be glimpsed through the high window of the always chilly office, the long branches curtseying this way and that against the bright blue sky. ‘You’re producing cannon fodder.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that one day my girls will be shot out of guns?’ Reverend Mother smiled from behind her highly polished desk. She’d had the same argument with Emily before.

  ‘You know what I mean,’ Emily said crossly. ‘The girls are being raised for one purpose only: to serve others, do their washing, cooking, cleaning, wait on them hand and foot. You’re like a factory, except your products happen to be human.’

  ‘What do you suggest I do with them?’ Reverend Mother smiled again. She rarely lost her temper, but was secretly annoyed. What did Emily know about running an orphanage? ‘Encourage them to become actresses, doctors, playwrights, politicians? How many do you think will succeed after they’ve been let loose into the world on their own? Our girls have no family. We ensure they have the security of a home where they will be made welcome and be of use to others.’

  ‘Of use!’ Emily laughed shortly. ‘You make them sound like chairs. I saw a picture a few years ago, Metropolis, all about a mechanized society. It reminded me very much of here.’