by Ron Butlin
Yes.
Gripping her suitcase even tighter, she stepped down onto the street – only to stumble almost at once on the cobbles, and nearly fall.
It was unbearable in the full sun, dizzying almost. Sweat trickled into her eyes and down the side of her face. She wiped it clear. Her blouse stuck to her back. An awkward dash across the tramlines . . .
The first bench was taken. So was the next. And the next.
Lifting and placing each foot . . .
Breathing in, then breathing out . . .
Wiping the sweat from her eyes. Wiping again and again.
All but dragging her suitcase along . . . its arm-wrenching heaviness . . . thump, thump onto the pavement every few steps . . .
Somewhere out of the sun. Somewhere to sit down. Mackie’s was too far. Jenners Tearoom? Once inside the store she’d be able to take the lift all the way up to the top floor.
Only, it would mean crossing Princes Street again. It would mean trekking over the uneven cobbles, picking a safe path between lumbering trams that came in both directions. She’d have to struggle through more pedestrians, keep her balance on the shuddering tangle of tram lines that twisted and turned as they caught at her heels.
A few minutes’ rest, nothing more.
Then she’d be fine.
Dashing across the front of a stationary tram, and behind another one heading in the opposite direction towards Calton Hill. A van hooted at her, but she paid no attention.
She stepped up onto the pavement. Jenners, at last. The large shop window glared back at her, a harsh cascade of blinding sunlight and raw colours —
Pressing her forehead against the pane of sun-heated glass. Counting to twenty, slowly. Then counting again. Not until she felt she was again standing on solid ground did she continue her journey. The entrance was several yards ahead.
Stepping onto the next paving stone, and the next . . .
She had a special compass trembling and swaying inside her, of course. Doing its best to guide her. One more step, one more . . .
By the time she managed to stagger out of the sun and into Jenners doorway, it was all she could do to lean against the wall for a moment.
The red-brown marble felt so deliciously cool against her back, the solid stone taking the weight of her exhaustion.
Sweat was now streaming down her face, her neck, her back. Noise clamour brakes horns voices people people people. Surging in and out the doorway, shopping bags knocking against her, feet stumbling against hers, against her suitcase. Knocking it over. ‘They’ll have it in here . . . said we’d meet at four . . . and some linen for the . . .’ Faces staring into hers: ‘Are you all right, missus?’
So many rips in the near-transparent curtain that’s fallen between her and the city she’s known all her life.
People people hectic sky staring sun dizzying blue . . .
A hot wind, such a hot rushing wind springing up out of nowhere, tearing the blameless sky to shreds. Too sudden voices. Too abrupt laughter. Everything too close. Then too far away. The street rushing again rushing again rushing again . . . The hot wind wrenching the arched stonework above, the marbled pillars buckling first to one side, then to the other . . .
The air already sucked out of the next moment and the next . . .
When Maggie opened her eyes, she found she was lying in Jenners’ doorway, a man’s shiny black shoes planted firmly on the ground right beside her cheek. Strangers brought to a standstill were gazing down at her. Over their shoulders she could see the top of the Scott Monument set against a calmness of sky.
‘White as a sheet, the poor woman.’
‘Some water, someone.’
One of the faces leant closer, becoming a patch of shadow shielding her from the sun’s glare, asking if she was all right?
Did she want to sit up, maybe?
Someone had taken her shoulder.
No. No. No, she screamed back at them, but couldn’t make the words come out, not even a whisper.
Asking if she wanted to put her head back, to lean against the wall?
No. No. No.
Asking if she wanted to come inside where there was a chair?
No. No. No.
Someone took her arm and began helping her to her feet.
no. no. no.
If only she could shout the words out loud. If only the people could hear her. If only she could remain peacefully stretched out on the floor of Jenners marbled entrance. Resting there, resting as on layer upon layer of the earth itself – each layer in turn bearing her weight and giving her the peace she longed for and wished could go on for ever.
Meanwhile she’d been helped into the shop . . . helped into a heavily upholstered chair . . . a glass tumbler rattled against her teeth . . . water dribbled down her chin.
‘Take your time.’ Such kindness in the man’s voice, such concern – she could hardly hold back her tears. A woman had placed an arm around her shoulders.
‘You’ll be all right in a few minutes, lass.’
The gentlest squeeze. ‘Right as rain.’ Another squeeze. A smile. ‘If you’ve a phone at home we can call someone. Your husband, maybe?’
She jerked into sitting upright.
‘No phone in the house. I’ll be fine. Just the heat.’ She tried to smile. She didn’t want the woman to withdraw her arm, not yet. So, so comforting even if only for a few more minutes.
‘You’re a bit peely-wally though. Maybe coming down with — ’
‘You’re very kind. Both of you.’
‘Should be at home, feet up, with a magazine, the radio on and him bringing you tea and cake.’
Around her, the noise had quickly built up until it was the same Saturday pell-mell rush all over again. Men and women, their bags and their children, pushing to get in, pushing to get out, pushing to reach the counters, the ringing tills.
She was helped out of the chair. ‘Thank you.’
Shaky, but standing. She’d survived the fainting. She’d survived the kindness.
‘My man’s at the football and — ’
She told them she’d be getting a tram home. It wasn’t far. Just down to Newhaven. She’d be fine now. Totally fine. Really.
‘Well, if you’re sure you’re okay, lass . . . ?’
As steadily as she could, she walked out of the department store and back into the glare of Princes Street, setting off in the direction of the tram stop opposite Waverley Steps.
Then a miracle happened.
‘Maggie!’
Getting a tram home? She had no home. She kept walking. When she reached the stop – what then? Somewhere to stay Somewhere to stay Somewhere to stay . . .
‘maggie!’
She looked round. Bleach-bottle blonde, pillar-box red lipstick, cheerful and friendly. It was her sister-in-law.
The older woman stood directly in front of her: ‘Remember me?’ She was joking, of course.
‘Oh, Jean! Hello there. I’m – I’m — ’
Jean glanced down at the suitcase: ‘Are you coming, or going?’
‘I don’t know.’
The two women looked at each other.
‘It’s true, Jean. I really don’t know if I’m coming or going!’
Which made them both laugh out loud.
Ten minutes later Maggie was being treated to afternoon tea at the North British. Busy restaurant, chattering on all sides, waitresses in black starched uniforms, comfortable seat, a two-tiered cake stand – scones at the bottom and an upper layer of fancy cakes. There was a dish of glistening wet-yellow pats of butter, three kinds of jam, honey and clotted cream. No ration problems here. Two pots – one for tea, one for hot water. Linen napkins.
Her sister-in-law had her own small business as a quality baker, making cakes and confectionery to order. Not unti
l some years later, when Jean could finally afford to give up the rented one-room flat where she did her baking and lease proper shop premises in Haymarket – practically the West End, after all – was her professional status finally acknowledged by her mother-in-law. Until then she was always referred to as Jean, Billy’s wife, who does us a nice cake when the pair of them come round. Her hair was too blonde, her lips too red and her accent . . . too Dalry.
‘Another brandy snap? Some cake? Let’s hope it’s just twae yer eating fer!’ Jean nodded towards the few remaining crumbs on Maggie’s empty plate.
‘Wonderful to see you again, Jean. You’ve no idea.’
Her sister-in-law smiled. ‘Feeling mair like yersel, are ye?’
‘Yes, thank you. A bit shaky back there with the heat and — ’
‘Billy telt me whit happened. Ye poor woman! Throwing their ain daughter oot on the street. I’m scunnered, fair scunnered! Whit a shameless pair o — ’
‘It’s my own fault, Jean. If I hadn’t let myself be — ’
‘Dinna talk daft. That’s the wey men talk, but we ken better. See, Maggie — ’
‘I feel so – so ashamed. When he drove me back home – afterwards, you understand? – he hardly spoke a word, just dropped me at the end of my street,’ she paused. ‘After all his talk and his promises, suddenly I was nothing. That look on his face as he drove off . . . A smile right enough, but like he was glad to be rid of me . . . So much dirt he’d scraped off his — ’
‘Maggie, dinna let yersel — !’
‘Could feel the shame of it burning into me as I went up our front steps.’
‘But, Maggie, ye shouldnae feel — ’
‘Let me say it, Jean. I’ve not talked with anyone. Once I knew I was . . . well, you know what I mean . . . Anyway, when I tried to tell Mum and Dad . . . they were even worse. Their disgust, like I was the lowest of the low. I went to the YW that night and — ’
‘Ye should’ve cam tae me. I’d hiv — ’
‘I couldn’t bear to see anyone. I wanted to be where no one knew me. Next morning I went to Lewis.’
‘Whit?’ Jean’s cry of surprise silenced the nearby tables. She continued in a low voice, ‘Lewis? What in God’s name possessed ye tae fetch yersel there?’
Maggie shrugged. ‘Relatives, but I didn’t know them, never even met them before, and so I thought everything would be — ’ She shook her head. ‘Truth is, I wasn’t thinking straight. I should’ve written to them first and saved myself the trip.’ Managing not to cry, she told her sister-in-law about the hundred thousand welcomes she’d received.
Long before she was finished, Jean’s hand had reached across to cover hers. ‘I tell ye, Maggie, I hope thae Callanders burn in Hell.’
‘That’s an awful thing to say.’
The older woman shrugged and took out a packet of cigarettes. ‘Smoke?’
‘No thanks.’
Jean lit up. ‘Some family you’re frae! Even my Billy – and he’s the best of thon heartless brood – willnae want tae hear we’ve met. So I’ll no be telling him.’ She took a draw of her cigarette. ‘Yer gang ahead wi it then?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Hmm.’ She paused to tap off some ash. ‘Well, I’m glad tae hear yer no thinking o some back street butcher or of daein it yersel wi gin and knitting needles.’
Maggie had managed to put away two slices of chocolate sponge, a nut-tasting cake with yellow icing and two scones with butter and strawberry jam. Feeling so much better than earlier, she licked the tip of her forefinger and dabbed at the cake crumbs.
‘Which reminds me, Maggie, when yer time comes, promise me ye’ll no be seeking refuge in the airms o Christ?’
‘What?’
‘Promise me you’ll book intae a proper nursing home. Promise me, Maggie. You’re no gang tae be yin o those poor women doun on their hands and knees scrubbing the church flagstones right up tae the last minute, then getting tied tae a table tae gie birth. I’ve heard some awfae stories. We’re no having merciful sisters saying you and yer sinful bairn are gang straight tae hell and gien ye both a taste of damnation in advance. We’re no letting that happen. How are ye fer money, by the bye?’
‘Fine for the moment. Something in the Post Office.’
‘Good. And where are ye biding?’
‘Back at the YW, I suppose.’
‘Well, I know a place – in darkest, slummiest Dalry,’ Jean said, imitating her mother-in-law’s put-on posh. ‘It’ll dae fer the time being. All right?’
‘Jean, I can’t — ’
‘Not good enough fer you?’
‘No, I don’t mean — ’
‘That’s that sorted then. And . . . the man?’
Maggie shrugged. What was there to say?
Jean ground out her half-smoked cigarette. ‘He can burn as weel.’
Jean’s small bakery turned out to be an Aladdin’s cave just off the Dalry Road. Maggie stepped from the grim, cobbled side street of stone-faced tenements straight into a one-room oriental palace where the oven-warm air was drenched with the scents of cinnamon, cinnabar and cloves, with the sweetness of melted chocolate and icing sugar. Like King and Queen, a large gas cooker and a generously deep kitchen sink ruled over an assembled court of shelf upon shelf of flour tins, spice racks, glass jars of raisins, currants, almonds, dried orange and lemon peel . . .
‘I’m a black-market baker,’ she joked, ‘either that or I’d be stuck daein scones and naethin but!’
The sitting room/kitchen of Jean’s small ‘single end’ flat was for her baking work only, but she’d fitted up the snug, cabin-sized boxroom at the back as a restroom, should she ever feel like putting her feet up. Instead of a bed there was the luxury of a Louis-the-Something chaise longue. Some blankets and a spare cushion were kept in a small trunk whose flat lid doubled as a side table. For Maggie, it was perfect.
Once Jean had left to go home, promising to be back first thing Monday morning, Maggie got herself settled in. A few days? A few weeks? She’d no idea, but for the time being this would be home. Her coat and scarf she hung on the back of the boxroom door, her best dress on a coat hanger that was nailed to the wall, creating a pleasing splash of blue and green against the pale-coloured wallpaper. Her two blouses went on another hanger to decorate the wall opposite. The rest of her clothes – a cardigan, two skirts, a jersey, her underwear and stockings – remained in her suitcase which she stowed under the couch. The chaise longue had gilt arm- and back-rests, and was upholstered in thick red velvet. Its remaining three legs were slender and curved gracefully upwards suggesting effortless, indeed miraculous, support; the fourth had been replaced by a weight from an old set of grocer’s scales. The couch felt quite solid and secure, however. All in all, there was a certain elegance to her new sleeping arrangements, Maggie decided – and she intended to do her best to live up to it.
That evening as she shook out the first blanket, she heard her mother’s voice: You’ve made your bed, now you have to lie on it.
‘I will,’ she heard herself reply out loud, ‘just watch me!’
Two days later Maggie saw the handwritten notice in the window of Fusco’s Fish Restaurant on Gorgie Road, and went straight in. Perfect timing. She could hardly believe her luck – the usual assistant had just been sacked after turning up drunk and two hours late, yet again. If she could start at once, the job was hers – six-day week serving from 11 to 8, with two hours off in the afternoon. Haddock and chips, cod and chips, white pudding supper, black pudding supper, sausage and chips, steak pie and chips. Pickled eggs, pickled onions. At least she’d never go hungry. Tony Fusco had been an Italian POW who’d stayed on in Scotland and ended up marrying a girl from Leith.
‘She called Maggie like you! Good name, good woman – you work good, too!’
Her nylon overalls were several sizes too big, whic
h was a real plus as they’d help keep her ‘situation’ hidden for a good while longer. The Light Programme coming from the shelf above the till helped the minutes pass, if not the hours – Music While You Work, Housewives’ Choice, Workers’ Playtime . . . By the end of her first evening, the hours had slowed down to a crawl and she was so tired that she could hardly stop the chips from leaping off her scoop before they reached the newspaper, or the fish from nose-diving onto the floor as she carried the plates through to the sit-ins. Already she was looking forward to her first Sunday off – she’d stay in bed and enjoy a double-shift of deep-fried sleep.
Grace, who worked at Fusco’s from five in the afternoon till it closed at eleven, had helped her get started: ‘Think of yer man and ram yer fish in the fryer fer a richt guid battering!’ Slow Peter worked in the kitchen; he hardly spoke but instead offered the world a permanent grin.
A few days after she’d started, Maggie happened to mention she was looking for a place to stay.
‘Yer in luck!’ Grace grinned at her. ‘Mrs McKenzie’s lodger frae across oor landing, a widow woman, passed away last night. The room’ll be going spare. If ye want, I’ll let Mrs M ken you’re interested. Ye can look in afore work the morn. If ye dinnae fancy it, no harm done. The auld soul’ll be getting carried out first thing so ye can get yersel moved straight in, same day. I’m sure Tony’ll let you off for a bit longer in the afternoon to get things sorted. A whole room tae yersel – I’m jealous already!’
When Maggie called round after ten the following morning, Mrs McKenzie apologised, saying the undertakers hadn’t turned up yet, but now that she was here Maggie might as well take a look round. ‘Dinna fear – she’s decent.’
They went into the room. Not only was it much larger than her boxroom at Jean’s, but there was a window, and a door that she could lock. Perfect.
Mrs McKenzie nodded in the direction of the sheet-covered figure stretched out on the bed. ‘She’ll be out by this evening, Miss Davies.’ Then, pointing to the gas meter beside the fire, she added, ‘Ye canna say Isa was tight-fisted – she’s left ye a good shilling’s worth!’