The Children of Lovely Lane

by Nadine Dorries

  There was only one woman who could help. Sister Therese.

  ‘If I don’t have help, I don’t think they will allow him to come home, and he is looking so well,’ Lily explained.

  Sister Therese listened but looked concerned. ‘Lily, Joe’s condition is because of the way your mother treats him. Do you not think it might be an idea if we let the hospital staff decide what is best for him?’

  ‘No!’ Lily raised her voice to Sister Therese for the first time in her life. ‘Katie and I are managing, you know that, and when she goes to the school, I will manage just as well. Joe isn’t a baby and from September he will be with you in the boys’ school.’

  ‘Now, isn’t that the truth,’ said Sister Therese. ‘Well, there is no ward sister ever threw a nun out of a hospital, so I shall call in this evening after Mass and visit. I will make sure they know that there is someone helping you, and you know, Lily, don’t you, that I always will. Joe will have a good lunch down at the school every day, I will make sure of that.’

  ‘I don’t know how I am ever going to be able to thank you enough for all you do for us.’ Lily’s voice broke with emotion.

  ‘Come on now, stop. We are too busy for that. ’Tis you who does all the work and deserves all the praise. I’m keeping Katie here after school to feed her. One of us will bring her across when I know it’s time for you to arrive home from work. That’s one less job for you to worry about. And next Sunday, we shall visit Joe together. Maybe they will let him back with us then.’

  Lily breathed a sigh of relief. Saved from the ward sister and her probing enquiries. ‘We couldn’t manage without you, you know,’ she said.

  ‘Child, I have never known you to miss a Sunday at Mass, and do you know what that tells me? That you understand family. We are all one family, God’s family, and every Sunday you come to his house, we all do, and we are as family to one another. I help you and will do so until the day the good Lord calls me, because that’s what families do.’

  Lily also found unexpected kindness elsewhere, in Mrs McConaghy.

  ‘Use the phone to call the ward,’ she pushed Lily one day. ‘I want to know how the little lad is, never mind anyone else. Don’t let Mr McConaghy see you, though,’ she whispered. ‘Ring when he’s down the steps on the floor.’

  This did not make Lily feel uncomfortable. Joe was her priority. ‘Thank you, Mrs McConaghy, that’s very kind of you.’ It was heartening to know that Mrs McConaghy was on her side, worried for her.

  ‘That’s quite all right. I’ve only met the little lad once, but sure, he has the face of an angel.’

  Lily remembered the day. It had been her week off, a few weeks before Joe was admitted. His chest had been bad, her mother was chain-smoking and Lily was sure this made his coughing worse. So she’d pushed him out in the old pram and taken him to see where she worked.

  Mrs McConaghy had spotted her and came running down the steps. She clucked around Joe like a mother hen.

  ‘How do you do it, Joe?’ Lily said to him as they walked back home. ‘Every woman is putty in your hands. God help the girls when you grow up.’

  Joe was always quiet when his breathing was bad. Talking took far too much effort. He had turned his face to the River Mersey and the ships being unloaded. ‘I want to be a docker, Lily,’ he’d croaked.

  Lily smiled. Not in my lifetime, she thought. There is better for you out there, Joe. But to his face, she replied, ‘You will. Just like your da.’ She could have bitten her tongue off. No one had seen his da for weeks and she knew in her heart that they were never going to again. It had only taken him fourteen years and a few hours of being sober, but the penny must have finally dropped: if he left home, he would get to keep his pay packet to himself and wouldn’t have to share it with his drunken wife. The next payday, he was off.

  ‘Go and find the bastard, your stepfather! He’s on the docks somewhere,’ her mother had screamed when she became aware that her husband was not just lost but gone.

  But there were five thousand men working on the docks and Lily guessed he could have gone as far as Seaforth. ‘He’s gone, Mam, and he isn’t coming back,’ she said. First her father had gone. Now Katie and Joe’s father had left too. It seemed he’d never got over the threat from Lockie, telling him what would happen if he ever used his fists on Lily again. It was as if the wind had been taken out of his sails. ‘He’s gone, and we know how that works, don’t we, Mam? He won’t be coming back.’ There was a determination in her voice that caught her mother’s attention and from that moment on her stepfather’s name was never mentioned again.

  *

  Not long after Joe was discharged – into the persuasive hands of Sister Therese, who had accompanied Lily as promised – spring arrived, without fanfare or warning. Liverpool simply woke up one morning and there it was. The swallows flew in, the sun shone and the trees burst into bud. Lily walked to the bus stop with a new bounce in her step. Her feet were dry and the westerly breeze lifting off the Mersey was milder, allowing the sun to warm her skin. And Joe was home. Her mind wandered, as it often did, to her final conversation with Dr Mackintosh at the hospital. ‘I hope we don’t see you in here again, young man,’ he’d said to Joe. Lily had smiled and thanked him. She thought the doctor’s eyes had seemed to hold an entirely different message, but she knew she was being fanciful.

  The feeling of new life and wellness that spring had brought evaporated for Lily as soon as she entered the office. She was finding the flirting between Amy and Lockie almost intolerable. Not because she held a shred of remorse or envy, but because Amy’s behaviour made it hard for Lily to leave work on time and get back home to Joe. Amy was responsible for some of the work now that the plant was getting busier, and whenever Amy didn’t finish her tasks, Lily had to do them for her.

  ‘If you don’t take me out somewhere special tonight, Lockie,’ Amy trilled, ‘you won’t get another chance and that’s for sure. It’ll be our last date.’ She swung around in her chair and pouted her red lips at Lockie.

  Lily watched as Lockie grinned. Amy had done it, she had got what she wanted, and Lockie was completely smitten.

  ‘You will be sorry later that you challenged me, Amy.’ He laughed. ‘I’ll be back at six to pick you up.’

  Amy looked delighted as she swivelled back round in the chair. It had all worked to plan. Of course, she hadn’t slept with Lockie again since. If she’d been lucky and hadn’t got caught out, she would have no need of him. Nonetheless, she had made sure that first night was witnessed and noted.

  ‘God, I am so sick of this place, aren’t you?’ Amy whispered so that Mrs McConaghy couldn’t hear her.

  ‘I’ve been here for almost four years now, you’ve only been here for weeks, how can you be so bored?’ Lily replied.

  ‘Because of this, that’s why.’ Amy picked up the order ledger she had been working on and let it bang back down on the desk. Dust flew up and filled the air. ‘I swear to God, I’m going to go crazy if I don’t get out of here soon.’

  ‘And how do you think you can make that happen?’ asked Lily. ‘This place will be yours when your aunt and uncle retire.’ Her irritation at the way Amy and Lockie carried on in front of her had made her bolder than she had ever been before.

  ‘Not on your nelly,’ said Amy with grit in her tone. ‘I’m not spending a day longer than I have to in this filthy place. I am worth more than spending my days in this hole, Lily.’

  Lily leant back in her chair and sighed. ‘It’s time for me to make the tea,’ she said.

  Not once had Amy offered to make the tea. Lily didn’t mind. Filling the urn, swilling out the leaves from the huge brown earthenware pot, washing the cups and saucers, it all gave her time to think. She concentrated hard when she was working on the accounts, so making the tea let her stretch her thoughts to other things. Like Joe’s health, the disappearance of her stepfather, and her mother’s new abode, which appeared to be the pub.

  Mrs McConaghy always brought t
he milk back when she went out to buy the cakes. It was her daily indulgence and Lily knew that she ate one on the way back. The crumbs, which adhered to the corners of her mouth, were a dead giveaway. Lily wondered if, by the size of her, it was only one she indulged in.

  ‘Is it that time already?’ Mrs McConaghy said as she looked up at the large clock over the doorway. ‘I’d better be fetching the cakes or they will have all gone. Sayers is becoming a very popular little shop these days.’

  Lily dried the cups and, leaning against the draining board, folded her arms and waited for the urn to boil. She was deep in thought, irritated with herself and the fact that the face of Dr Mackintosh continued to appear from nowhere when she was least expecting it. On the page of a ledger. In the frame of the window. At the front of her mind as she made the tea.

  She was roused from her wandering thoughts by the sound of the urn bubbling.

  ‘Come on, Lily,’ said Amy. ‘I’m gasping for my tea.’ She came and stood beside Lily and shovelled three spoons of sugar into her cup. ‘I don’t know what’s up with me,’ she said. ‘I can’t stop eating sugar and I’m going mad for cake. I have to stop, though; this skirt wouldn’t fasten this morning.’

  Lily looked down as Amy showed her the undone button on the waistband of her skirt. ‘You have a waist the size of a wasp, Amy,’ she said. ‘It’s unnatural to have your skirts so tight. It’s just your body objecting, that’s all.’

  A worried look crossed Amy’s face. ‘That had better be all it is,’ she said.

  Before Lily could answer, the door to the office swung open and a bowler-hatted man in his forties strode in. He looked anxiously about the office.

  Lily saw the blood drain from Amy’s face. ‘Ben! What are you doing here?’ she gasped.

  ‘I saw your aunt leave. I’ve been waiting outside. I have two minutes and I’m not going to waste a second, Amy. First, don’t you ever go to my house and speak to my wife again, do you hear me?’

  Lily stood stock still with the teapot in her hand. The atmosphere in the office was tense and she didn’t dare move.

  The noise of the men on the processing floor, the sound of the compressor and the banging on the benches could be heard loud and clear as Amy struggled to speak.

  ‘I didn’t,’ she whispered.

  ‘Yes, you did. There is only one person that I know of who fits the description of a tart.’

  Lily took in his smart suit and his bowler hat. His tie was dark and crisp and his shirt was as white as the snow which had plagued them that past winter. In his hand he held a tan-coloured briefcase that concertinaed at the sides.

  ‘I needed to speak to you.’ Amy had found her voice.

  ‘No, you did not, and you never will again. I never want to set eyes on you, you little whore. How dare you go with your whining lies to my wife! Set foot near my door again, Amy, and you will regret it. You and the rest of your common family. You don’t want to cross me, Amy. Do you understand?’

  Amy nodded.

  The full pot in Lily’s hand began to weigh her arm down. The musky smell of the tea leaves in the scalding water assailed her nostrils. For a fleeting second she wondered whether she should throw the pot at the man. Or call for Mr McConaghy to come up from the floor. But she was rooted to the spot.

  As quickly as he had arrived, he was gone. The bell above the door jangled violently as he stormed out.

  Amy, as white as a sheet, turned to check that the door to the processing plant was closed. Turning back to Lily with her eyes full of tears, she whispered, ‘Lily, you won’t tell anyone about that, will you? Not even Lockie. Definitely not Lockie.’

  Lily put down the pot and walked over to Amy’s side. ‘Of course I won’t. Here, don’t cry. Why was he so angry? God, I’ve never met such an unpleasant man. Amy, I was scared for you. He’s not a man to be crossed.’

  Amy collapsed into her chair and wiped her eyes. ‘Oh, don’t I know it. The bastard. He didn’t tell me he was married, Lily. I thought the woman who opened the door was a cleaner.’

  Lily suppressed a smile. The wife thought the heiress to a processing plant was a whore and Amy thought the wife of the businessman was a cleaner. Takes one to know one, she thought, then mentally slapped her own wrist for thinking such things.

  ‘He lives in Woolton, in a big house. I met him in the bar of the Grand. Told me he was single. A man about town and of considerable substance, he said. He’s in the shipping business. Import and export, whatever that means. I believed every word he said and we were having just the best time, Lily. He said he loved me and everything. Then, one night, something awful happened and he just never turned up again. So I thought I’d got it wrong and I went back to the bar to find him, and my parents were giving out at home, threatening to throw me out, and I went every night, Lily, but he never came back. I never heard a word. He didn’t say a thing to me. Nothing.’

  ‘You poor thing,’ said Lily as she handed Amy her cup. ‘Your auntie will be here in a minute with the fancies, so dry your eyes, quick. If she sees you crying, she will want to know why. It’s a good job she never saw him coming up the steps.’

  She looked out of the window at the street. It occurred to her that she felt more sympathy for Amy than she would have expected. She almost felt the shame of her humiliation. She wondered whether this was because Amy’s sheltered and privileged upbringing had left her so unprepared that when an unpleasant surprise did befall her, she received special consideration simply because she was unused to things not going entirely her way.

  She took her handkerchief out from her sleeve and held it out for Amy, who appeared to have none of her own.

  ‘I just went to the house to see if he was there and waited to catch a word with him, I swear. I thought something bad had happened to him.’

  Amy burst into fresh tears and Lily had no idea what to say to comfort her. She was distraught. Just as Lily put her arms around her, the bell jangled again and Mrs McConaghy bustled into the room with her arms full.

  ‘Heavens above, what on earth is going on here?’ she demanded as, having deposited the cakes on the table, she rushed to Amy’s side.

  Lily responded without a second’s hesitation. ‘Amy isn’t feeling very well, Mrs McConaghy. She has terribly painful monthlies.’

  Mrs McConaghy began to fret. ‘Oh, Amy, you poor girl. ’Tis the most awful thing, the curse we women have to bear.’

  Lily thought of the time she herself had really had unbearable monthlies, so bad it had taken all her effort to sit upright, but Mrs McConaghy would never have known.

  ‘Would you like to go back home to your bed?’

  Amy nodded. ‘Please, Auntie,’ she said and, playing along, placed her hand on her abdomen. If only what Lily was saying was true, she thought. She would have taken all the pain in the world to see her monthly return and take away the anxiety she was now feeling every minute of the day. Standing quickly, too quickly for someone in pain, she made her way to the door.

  ‘Your coat, Amy,’ said Lily as she lifted it down from the hook and followed her to the door.

  As they stood at the top of the steps, Lily wrapping Amy’s scarf around her neck as though she were Katie, Amy whispered, ‘You won’t say anything, will you?’

  ‘Never, Amy. Of course not. I can keep a secret.’

  ‘That’s my girl, Lily. We have to stick together, eh?’

  Lily nodded. She was still none the wiser, but she knew there was something deadly serious Amy was keeping from her.

  22

  Matron had asked Emily to attend a meeting in her office at 9 a.m. sharp. Emily was never late and arrived on the dot.

  ‘Miss Haycock, come in, sit down.’ Matron had opened the door herself. It felt to Emily as though she had been hovering on the other side, waiting for her.

  Matron and Emily had not always seen eye to eye. Matron had regarded Emily, a nurse she herself had appointed to the hospital, as a traitor when she’d gone on to apply for the director
of nursing job. She worried that it would be only a matter of time before Emily was after her job.

  ‘Come along, into the office, quickly.’ Matron appeared agitated. ‘Miss Van Gilder won’t be here for half an hour, but I suspect she will arrive early. She always seems to be one step ahead of me. Part of me thinks she will guess I have invited you early.’

  ‘Goodness, what is the matter?’ said Emily as she headed towards her usual chair, on the opposite side of Matron’s desk. A thrill shot through her. It was clear that Matron was now finding Miss Van Gilder tiresome, just as everyone else in the hospital was. This was welcome news.

  Blackie lifted his head in the basket as his tail wagged in recognition of Emily. Deciding she was worth getting up for, he stretched his aching body, yawned and padded over for a stroke.

  ‘My, haven’t we come a long way,’ said Emily, who remembered the times she’d come to Matron’s office with food in her pocket, just in case she needed to ward him off.

  It was too much effort for Blackie to walk all the way back to his basket, so he flopped on to the carpet instead, his head resting on Emily’s foot.

  Emily removed the biscuit from her pocket that Biddy had given her for Blackie. She now carried them as a treat, not armour. It had taken the best part of a year, but it seemed to Emily that the moment she had won Matron over, Blackie had followed suit.

  ‘Elsie is bringing in the tea,’ said Matron, ‘while we take a look at this.’

  She handed Emily a document. It was six pages long and Emily scanned the individual headings.

  Main corridor. Ward block. Theatre block. Maternity. Kitchens. The list went on and on.