She had discovered that the mattress had holes in it where the prickly horsehair poked through, and the two blankets were so threadbare that she would freeze to death in winter. The little gas fire in the chimney breast and the single gas ring standing on the tiled hearth, her only means of heating and cooking, gobbled up the shillings. Tonight she had no money left to feed the meter nor herself, and she was glad that she hadn’t Ricky with her, after all. She couldn’t have let him go hungry.
As usual when she thought of her son, she was assailed by the acute agony of losing him. It was bad enough during the days, but nights were worse, when she woke a dozen times, her eyes streaming because she had been dreaming of Ricky, her innards aching at being so far away from him. It was only a matter of fifty miles or so, but it might as well be hundreds. But her baby would be properly cared for, Cissie assured herself; Bertram would make sure of that, because Ricky was his insurance for the future.
Jen had told her to wait a year before she tried to snatch him back, and surely by then she would be in a position to provide for him. He would be completely on solids by then, and they would sit together at a table and . . . oh why couldn’t she stop building castles in the air and face reality? Her stomach was rumbling emptily, and she would willingly have taken cheese from a mousetrap if there had been such a luxury in the room. She couldn’t carry on like this, and her landlady would be expecting her to pay two weeks’ rent in the morning. The stylish clothes had stopped her from asking anything in advance, though she had looked dubious when her new lodger had said she would settle at the end of every fortnight.
What was she to do? Cissie wondered, hopelessly. If only Phoebe hadn’t been in America . . . Phoebe! When she had been in the same financial straits, she had kept the wolf from the door by selling herself to men. Cissie pondered over this. Could she possibly bring herself to do that? If it was the only way . . .
She lifted her handbag and went over to the cracked mirror above the mantelpiece. Taking out the garish lipstick she had bought for fun when she was out with Dorothy Barclay one day, she was about to apply it to her mouth when her hand halted. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t let a stranger paw at her, not even to get money to pay her rent and buy food. Flinging the metal container from her in disgust at herself for even thinking of painting her face to get a man, she flopped down on the bed and gave way to tears. She couldn’t live with herself if she turned prostitute. She would have to tell her landlady in the morning that she couldn’t pay for the room, and she’d likely be thrown out on the street. That would be the end of her, for there was no Jen here.
She sobbed until she was exhausted, then, out of the blue, she remembered her brother. Tommy’s ship was based in Leith! Why hadn’t she thought of it before? It was over two weeks since she had seen him, though, and he would be on the high seas again by this time. She’d be wasting her time trying to look for him. No! Anything was worth trying, in her present predicament.
Rising unsteadily to her feet, Cissie took her coat and hat from the cupboard and crept down the stairs. As she turned out of Pilrig Street into Leith Walk, she realised that the docks would be full of ships, and she had no idea which one to look for.
There had been a problem with the loading – the dockers asking for extra money for handling asbestos and the owners flatly refusing to negotiate – so the ship had been held up for well over a fortnight. First Mate McGregor had been angry when the captain went home to Grimsby to see his wife, for it meant that he was left in charge and didn’t have time to visit Cissie again. He’d let the skeleton crew take turns to go ashore in the evenings, but he had only left the ship once, and it was time he had some more time off.
He was whistling as he swung down the gangway in his go-ashore clothes with two of his shipmates, and grinned when one of them gave a low whistle. ‘Look at that dame! I fancy my chance with her.’
They all looked at the woman who was walking towards them, head down, and the other man said, ‘Ach, she’s dolled up to the nines. I wonder where she got that frock? It must have cost some poor bugger a pretty penny.’
Tommy let out a roar of laughter. ‘The buggers that take up with dames like that can’t be poor, and she wouldn’t look at the likes of you two. This is a job for an officer.’
Swaggering in front of them, he wished he could see her face. He hadn’t planned on having a woman tonight, just a couple of pints, but this was no ordinary pro. She had a lovely body, and he didn’t care what she looked like. ‘Are you looking for me, gorgeous?’ he asked.
Her head snapped up. ‘Oh, Tommy!’ she cried, and started to weep noisily.
‘Cissie?’ he gasped, taking hold of her elbow.
‘I’ve been all round the docks looking for you,’ she sobbed, collapsing against him, and he waited until his two smirking shipmates were well out of earshot before he turned her round to face him. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with you, or why you’re here, but I’d better get you to the station to catch a train back to Dundee. You can tell me what’s wrong the time we’re waiting.’
‘I’ve left Dundee. I’m living here.’
With the intention of taking her to the hotel he presumed she was staying in, he hailed a taxi which had just dropped off two staggering sailors, and his spirits hit rock bottom when he saw where Cissie told the driver to stop. The other terraced houses in the street looked quite respectable, but this one hadn’t seen a lick of paint since the year oatcake, and the wooden door was chattered at the foot as if mice had been at it. This was no hotel! He let her go in first, and she had only put her foot on the first step of the stairs when a middle-aged woman came out of a side room, sleeves rolled up, mouth pursed, eyes flashing.
‘No men visitors allowed,’ she ordered, folding her arms.
‘He’s my brother,’ Cissie gulped.
‘I’ve heard that one before.’
‘Aye, and you’re hearing it again!’ declared Tommy, his narrowed eyes daring her to say anything else.
They carried on up, and as soon as Cissie took him into her room, he sat down with her on the bed. ‘Let’s hear it.’
Her voice was hopeless as she told him why she was no longer living at Panache, and when he learned that Bertram had believed the lies Elma had concocted, he thumped his fist against the wall. ‘By God, if I had him here, I’d break his bloody neck! I’ve a good mind to go to Dundee tomorrow . . .’
She grabbed his arm. ‘No, no, Tommy! You’d only make it worse, and he’s not there anyway. He’s taken Ricky away – with her! And I don’t know where they are.’
‘You mean – he’s keeping Ricky from you? But he can’t do that, Cissie.’
Swallowing painfully, she said, ‘He took the pram from me and locked me out. I went back the next morning but Elma and Mrs Gow wouldn’t let me take my baby, and Bertram laughed at me when I went to his office.’
‘Could you not have got Phoebe to help you?’
‘She’s in America with Richard, and Bertram had told his friends not to have anything to do with me. Jen Millar was the only person I could go to. I don’t know what I’d have done if she hadn’t taken me in.’
‘Oh, God!’ Tommy groaned. ‘I’m sorry I caused you all that trouble, Cissie.’
‘It had nothing to do with you,’ she sighed. ‘He wanted rid of me anyway, and you staying the night was just the chance he was waiting for. If it hadn’t been that, he’d have found something else. Jen told me to leave Dundee, and I couldn’t get a job, and I wouldn’t be able to look after Ricky even if I had him here with me.’
Looking round him with an expression of distaste, Tommy said, ‘Is this the only place you could get?’
‘It’s the cheapest I could get, and I’ve no money, and I went down to the docks on the chance your ship was still . . .’
‘Didn’t you think what could happen to you down there?’ Tommy said, grimly. ‘It’s a good thing it was me that picked you up. God almighty, you’re surely not as desperate as to go looking for
trouble?’
‘I couldn’t be more desperate. I’ve had nothing to eat for two whole days, and two weeks’ rent’s due in the morning. I was scared I’d be thrown onto the street again. I did think of trying to get a man to pick me up, but I couldn’t face it, and I was just looking for you. I was going round and round, and two men did try to – but I got away from them.’
He gathered her in his arms when she gave a low moan, and rocked her for several moments until her heart-rending sobs stopped. ‘Look, Cissie, will you be all right till I go out and buy something to eat?’
He returned in ten minutes with two bundles of fish and chips and a bottle of lemonade. ‘I was thinking the time I was waiting to be served,’ he said, as they opened out the newspaper wrappings. ‘I could maybe get you a job, and a place to live, and all.’
Her tear-ravaged face brightened. ‘Could you, Tommy?’
He tore a piece of fish off with his fingers. ‘Mind, I’m not promising, but whatever happens, you’re not staying here another night. When I finish this, I’m going out to see an old friend of mine, and I’ll maybe be a wee while, but I’ll definitely be back. I’ll get you out of here, and I’ll pay off that bitch down the stair and tell her what I think of her for taking money from you for a shit-house like this.’
She smiled a little at that and they stopped talking until they had eaten every last crumb, then she was left alone, wondering what her brother had up his sleeve, but knowing that she could depend on him to come back.
It was only half an hour later when he came bursting in. ‘Right, then. Get your things packed. It’s all fixed.’
Within five minutes he was carrying the carpet bag down to the taxi he had waiting outside, but when it turned down Leith Walk, she looked at him fearfully. ‘We’re not going back to the docks, are we?’
‘Wait and see.’
She was almost sure they were, and was puzzled when the cab turned into Duke Street and drew up a little way along. Tommy led the way into a small sweetshop, where a thin, grey-haired woman smiled at him then eyed Cissie a trifle doubtfully. ‘This is your sister, is it, Tommy?’
He gave a chuckle. ‘Aye, Mrs Barbour, she really is my sister and she usually looks a bit better than this.’
Having forgotten that her face would be puffed up with weeping, her eyes red, Cissie gave a gasp of dismay, but Mrs Barbour took her through the back shop – which she clearly used as a store, though there was a sink, a chair and a gas ring in it – and up a flight of stairs outside. ‘This is my house,’ she explained, ‘and this’ll be your room. If you want to wash your face, the bathroom’s on the left. You’ll start tomorrow in the shop, so I’ll leave you to unpack your bag. Come down when you’re ready.’
Too choked to speak, Cissie nodded gratefully, and went into the bathroom before she did anything else. It was so good to be able to wash properly that she laved her face with water over and over again, and lingered over drying it because the fluffy towel felt so soft after the board-hard bits of things she’d had in Pilrig Street. She felt much better when she went into her room to hang her four dresses in the wardrobe and to lay her silk underclothes neatly in the chest of drawers. Then she stood at the mirror – a crinoline lady in an olde-worlde garden painted along the bottom – to comb her hair, not so difficult to keep since Dorothy Barclay had persuaded her to have it bobbed.
When she went down to the shop again, Mrs Barbour looked at her with approval. ‘That’s better. I can see you’re a bonnie lass now.’
Tommy hooted. ‘If I hadn’t come across her earlier on, she wouldn’t be so bonnie.’
Mortified, Cissie blushed and hung her head, but the woman said, ‘It’s all right, lass. Tommy’s told me.’
When Mrs Barbour was serving in the shop, Cissie looked sadly at her brother. ‘Did you have to tell her?’
‘Even if you had been trying to pick up a man she’d not hold it against you. I’ve known her for years, and she’s the best woman I’ve ever met.’
‘How did you get her to give me a job?’
He smiled reassuringly. ‘I told her my sister was needing a job and a place to sleep, and she said, “I’ll have her here.” I knew she would, she’s the salt of the earth.’
At half past nine, when Tommy said he should have been back on board ages ago, Mrs Barbour smiled, ‘Aye, and it’s time I closed up.’
After making sure that the shop door was securely locked, she took Cissie upstairs. ‘I hope you’ll not mind me saying this,’ she began, making Cissie wonder what was coming, ‘but you can hardly serve behind a counter in that frock. It’s more suited for an afternoon tea party. If you’ve nothing suitable, I think I’ve a couple of skirts and blouses that might fit you.’
‘I’d be very grateful for them,’ Cissie murmured. ‘You see, I didn’t think when I left – my house . . .’
‘No, no, I don’t want to hear about it. I can see you’ve come through some trouble, and I’m glad I can help you. Now, I open the shop in the mornings at half past six for the dockers, so I rise at five, but I’m not expecting you . . .’
‘I’ll manage,’ Cissie smiled. ‘It’s not the first time in my life I’ve had to get up at five.’
‘I’ll say goodnight, then. I hope you get a good night’s sleep, for you look as though you’re needing it.’
Although Cissie was sure she wouldn’t sleep after all that had happened, the warm white blankets and eiderdown were so comfortable that she soon dropped off, and she didn’t move until Mrs Barbour tapped at her door at half past five the following morning.
‘Breakfast’s ready.’ she said. ‘It’s pouring rain outside, but it’ll make no difference to us, for the workers still need their fags.’
‘You sell cigarettes, too?’
‘And pipe tobacco and matches. I’m really a confectioner and tobacconist, but there’s not room for that on my sign, and, anyway, everybody just calls it the sweetie shop.’
Over the porridge and toast, Mrs Barbour told her new assistant about the most popular sweets. ‘I can guarantee, as soon as I get a new jar, the clove rock will go down before you can wink, and it’s not just the bairns that like it. Liquorice Allsorts, now, they don’t go so quick, a lot of folk don’t like them, but I’m kept busy making tablet.’
‘Tablet?’
‘Sugar and condensed milk and butter, and a wee drop of vanilla essence, all boiled together till it sets when it’s cold – not as hard as candy, but not as soft as fudge, and it melts in your mouth.’
‘We called that toffee in Aberdeen.’
‘Well, you’ll know it’s toffee they’re needing when they ask for tablet,’ Mrs Barbour laughed. ‘I get the fags and most of my sweeties from the wholesalers, but I make the tablet and the fudge myself before I go to bed, though now I’ve got you, I can do it any time I like. I was thinking about getting somebody in, anyway, for I’m not as able as I used to be. It’s a long day to be standing on my feet, and my legs swell up by night.’
Remembering how tired she had been after a day in the mill, Cissie hoped that her legs would stand up to it now.
‘Mind you,’ Mrs Barbour observed, ‘we can each have half an hour off for our dinner and our supper, so it’ll not be so bad.’
Cissie offered to clear up the dishes to let her employer open the shop because it was half past six already, and when she was finished, she smoothed down the skirt she had been given and checked that the buttons on the blouse were all properly fastened. Satisfied that she looked respectable, she went downstairs.
After only a week, Cissie felt that she had always been serving sweets and cigarettes. Her brother had looked in for a few minutes on her first day, and had smiled encouragingly as she weighed out some boilings for a schoolboy and handed a twenty of Capstan Full Strength to a docker with what Mrs Barbour called a ‘kirkyard’ cough and who shouldn’t be smoking at all, never mind anything as strong as that, but Tommy’s ship had sailed the following day, the stevedores having climbed down over the ext
ra pay. The best thing about her job was that she got on so well with her employer. As long as there were no customers, they talked while they dusted the big jars, and chatted companionably in the kitchen for a while after the shop closed at nine thirty. As Mrs Barbour had said, it was a long day, although they had two separate half-hours off for meals, Cissie having her dinner from half past twelve to one, her supper from five to half past, and her employer taking her breaks immediately after.
Never having had pocket money when she was a little girl, Cissie was intrigued by the items in the children’s section. Sherbet fountains and dabs; lucky bags holding tiny trinkets as well as several sweets; lucky tatties, cinnamon-covered candy that sometimes had a ha’penny inside so the fortunate purchaser could buy another; liquorice shoelaces and pipes; gobstoppers that changed colour as they were sucked; tiger nuts; bullseyes; locust beans; ‘cow’ candy, the brown cow on the wrapper being the maker’s trademark; and many others.
She had been surprised at how long Mrs Barbour waited for the boys and girls to decide what to buy with their pennies and ha’pennies, and when she mentioned it, her employer had smiled. ‘They’re still customers, supposing they’ve only a bawbee to spend.’
With the adults, boiled sweets sold best, probably because they lasted longest; candies, plain and flavoured; chocolate violets, chocolate-covered fondant with a tiny iced flower on top; coconut rolls. Mrs Barbour’s homemade fudge and tablet, of course, were steady favourites, but the most popular on Saturday nights, when people bought them to suck in church on Sunday morning, were what were marked on the jar as ‘Mint Imperials’ and were known as ‘Pandrops’ or ‘Granny’s Sookers’, which looked like thick white buttons but were peppermint all the way through.
Waters of the Heart Page 26