‘I’ll never stop hoping, but I can’t do anything. Anyway, how could I look after him when I’m tied to the shop all day, and all evening? Oh God, Tommy, he’ll soon be three, and he wouldn’t know me supposing he saw me.’
‘Aye, it must be hard to bear, but us McGregors can face up to anything.’ He looked at her with his eyebrows raised. ‘Cissie, don’t you ever feel life’s slipping you by?’
‘What d’you mean? I’ve got a good job, a good house and lots of friends . . .’
‘Customers? Are they really your friends?’
She considered for a moment. ‘I’d say most of my regulars are friends, like you were with Mrs Barbour.’
‘Is that enough? A woman your age – you’re only twenty-eight, you should have a man about the place.’
‘Are you thinking of giving up the sea and coming to help me?’ she teased.
He frowned. ‘I’m serious, Cissie. You’ve been married, you must miss having a man in your bed?’
Recalling Bertram’s sadism, her eyes darkened. ‘I prefer being by myself, and anyway, I’m still married.’
‘That doesn’t stop some women taking another man.’
‘I don’t want another man!’
‘All right, don’t fly off the handle at me.’
‘What about you? You’re a year older than me, isn’t it time you were thinking of taking a wife?’
Tommy gave a deep sigh. ‘I’d like fine to have a wife and bairns, but what girl would want to marry a man she’d only see three or four times a year?’
‘Have you ever had a girlfriend?’
‘A few, but nobody special.’
‘You’ll meet the right one some day, Tommy, and when you do, don’t let happiness slip through your fingers. Ask her if she’s willing to marry a seagoing man, and if she loves you enough, she will.’
‘You’re good at handing out advice,’ he laughed, ‘but not so good at taking it.’
They went to bed when they’d had a cup of tea, and Cissie lay thinking over what her brother had said. If she’d been completely honest, she would have told him that there were times when she wished she had someone to love, someone to love her; not for the physical side – she didn’t think she could face that again – just to know he was there for her to turn to. Apart from the man whose mother had cancer, she had met no one she really liked, and she had only been attracted to him because he reminded her of Hugh Phimister.
In the morning, Tommy had the porridge made before she got up, and insisted on drying the dishes for her afterwards. ‘I’m practising for when I’m married,’ he joked.
‘I meant what I said last night, so just remember.’
‘Yes, ma’am. I’ll put a notice on my chest, “Wife wanted for this lonely sailor”, and thousands’ll be knocked down in the rush.’
‘Och, you.’
‘I’ll not have time to come back before we sail, and we’re bound for New Zealand this time, so it’ll be a good while before I see you again.’
Tommy left when Cissie opened the shop, and she was still smiling at the picture of him with a placard on his chest asking for a wife. In spite of all his joking, he would make some girl a very good husband.
It surprised Cissie how quickly the weeks sped past. It seemed that she had no sooner written out one lot of cheques than it was time to write another, and 1928 was on her before she knew where she was. Her sales of sweets had gone down a little since some of the factory workers and dockers had been paid off, they couldn’t afford luxuries now, but the tobacco side was still much the same. The men wouldn’t do without their cigarettes even if their wives went short of housekeeping money. Since it was cheaper, some of them had taken to making their own, so she always had to have a good supply of the packets of papers and the little roller machines that they needed.
When a large van drew up outside one forenoon, she heaved a sigh of relief, because she had almost run out of fives of Woodbines, the best sellers of all. ‘The usual place,’ she told the driver without looking round from tidying a shelf, for he knew she kept her extra stocks in the back shop. When she realised that he hadn’t moved, she turned to ask him if anything was wrong, but the words dried up in her mouth. It wasn’t the usual delivery man, it was the last person on earth she had ever expected to see.
Their eyes locked, man and woman stood motionless for a moment though it seemed like an eternity to her, then he set the carton down on the floor. ‘I never thought I’d see you again, Cissie.’
‘Hugh!’ It was all she could say, but she turned away with reluctance when her next-door neighbour walked in, and she was in so much of a daze that she did not take in what was asked of her.
‘Ten Craven A, please,’ the young wife repeated, adding, with a laugh, ‘Have you gone deaf this morning, Cissie?’
‘Oh, I’m sorry, Betty.’ Conscious of her burning cheeks, she turned to the shelf, lifted one of the red-and-black packets and laid it down on top of an advertisement for Fox’s Glacier Mints.
Handing over the exact money, the other woman stole a glance at the handsome man who was looking at Cissie as if he were afraid to take his eyes off her. ‘Did I interrupt something?’ she asked, archly, winking as she went out.
After dropping the coins in her till, Cissie lifted the flap and came out from behind the counter. ‘I’ll show you where to put that,’ she murmured, recalling the last time she had spoken to him and feeling awkward and shy.
He picked up the carton and, walking in front of him on trembling legs, she pointed to where it should go. ‘You look well, Cissie,’ he said, after depositing it.
‘So do you.’ They were mundane words, and she guessed that he, too, was unable to express his emotions. ‘Did you ever get married, Hugh?’ she asked – the only thing she could think of – then wished she hadn’t. If he had, he would feel uncomfortable telling her, after all they had once been to each other, and if he hadn’t, he might think she was hoping they would get back together.
‘Aye, Cissie, I did, but it didn’t last long. I met her a year after I came to Edinburgh, and we never quite hit it off. I wanted a family and she liked a good time, so we agreed to separate after about three years.’
She was acutely conscious that they were standing less than a yard apart and prayed that he wouldn’t try to take her in his arms. Too many years had gone past, too much had happened for them to pick up where they had left off, and once he learned the truth about her, he wouldn’t want to. Besides, she wasn’t free.
The doorbell tinkled, and she tore herself away from his yearning eyes and went to attend to her business, her hands shaking as she handed two gobstoppers to the small boy and dropped his ha’penny in the till. When she returned to the back shop, she said, ‘We have to talk, Hugh. Can you come back tonight at half past nine? That’s when I close, and we can go upstairs to the house.’
‘I’ll be here, Cissie.’
As she watched him driving away, she hoped that he had not misinterpreted her invitation, and memories of being alone with him in his mother’s house came flooding back. If she hadn’t run away from him that night and gone home to find her drunken father on his own . . . Dear God, if only she had her life to live over again.
Back behind the counter, she tried not to think of the consequences of that night, but another unwelcome memory came: the awful look on her father’s face as he was led away after the trial, the glare which had told her he blamed her for everything and meant to punish her when he was set free. It was as vivid as though it had happened yesterday, yet it would be eleven years in March. But he’d been out for months and he hadn’t found her, she reassured herself, and she had other things to think about now.
Her heart had almost stopped when she saw Hugh, but it had been a pleasant shock, a welcome shock. He hadn’t changed much, just a little broader and more serious. What could she say to him when he came back tonight? He would want to know why she had left Aberdeen, and she couldn’t tell him that.
She was ve
ry distracted all day, and by eight o’clock, her excitement was at fever pitch. She kept checking her watch until, at half past, she realised that she must have looked at it a dozen times in the past ten minutes and steeled herself to stop.
Luckily, there was the usual rush in her last hour, and she was taken by surprise when her visitor arrived, pale-faced and looking as nervous as she felt. Pulling down the blind and locking the door behind him, she took him up to her kitchen.
They stood, each intensely aware of the other, until Hugh said, ‘I can hardly believe this. I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.’
‘No more did I,’ Cissie murmured. ‘Will you not sit down?’
He took a chair at the fire and waited until she was seated in the other one. ‘I was a bit annoyed this morning when another driver went off sick and I’d to take on his round as well as my own, but if it hadn’t been for that, I’d never have found you.’
She smiled nervously, not really sure how she felt about him yet. She had always believed that she had never stopped loving him, but it was a different thing now that they were face to face. She was glad to see him, but she wanted no more complications in her life. ‘You didn’t take up joinery again when you came out of the army?’
‘I’d been used to working with horses all the time I was in France, and I got quite attached to them, so when I came to Edinburgh I got a delivery job, driving a cart. Then the boss bought motor vans and I learned to drive.’ He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘When I came home from the war, and Ma told me what had happened to you, I wished I could comfort you. It must have been awful, losing your husband and child that way. I went to Schoolhill to see you, but your sister told me you’d gone away.’
Her stomach was churning, yet in a way she was glad that he knew. ‘I couldn’t stay in Aberdeen, not with everybody speaking about me.’
‘I can understand that. It’s queer, though, to think we’ve both been in Edinburgh so long and . . .’
‘I didn’t come here till years after that. Phoebe and I – that’s my stepmother – we went to Dundee and got work in the mills, and we both got jobs in the office eventually.’ She purposely didn’t tell him of the deprivations they’d had to suffer while they lived in Jen Millar’s room, and went on, ‘We got a house in South Union Street, then I – married the boss’s son.’
‘Ah! I didn’t like to ask if you’d married again.’
Hugh was sitting hunched up with his elbows on his knees, his eyes on the floor now, and she said, ‘We’re separated, as well. Would you like me to tell you what happened?’
His head came up slowly. ‘Not tonight, not when we’ve just found each other again.’
There was something in his dark eyes that made her burst out, ‘We can’t start again, Hugh, we’re both still married to somebody else.’
‘I let Mary divorce me, though she’d been sleeping with other men. Couldn’t you divorce him?’
‘You don’t understand, Hugh, and I’d better tell you. My brother Tommy came to see me, and the maid told Bertram I’d had a lover in when he was in Glasgow.’
‘And he believed her?’
‘He was sleeping with her, though I didn’t know. He’s wicked, and he put me out and kept my son from me.’
‘Didn’t you try to get him back?’
‘Oh God, Hugh, I tried and tried, but it was no use.’
‘Couldn’t your friends have helped you?’
She told him about Phoebe and Richard being in America at the time, about Roland Barclay refusing to let her talk to his wife. ‘I wrote to Phoebe and Dorothy, but they never answered. Bertram’s got them all thinking I’m the bad one. After I came here, I even went to see a solicitor about divorcing him, in case I could get Ricky back that way, but he told me I didn’t stand a chance.’
Hugh rubbed his chin. ‘Would it help if I went to Dundee with you and told him I knew Tommy was your brother?’
‘It would likely make things worse. He’d say you were just another man I was carrying on with. I’ll never be free of him, Hugh, and you’d better go away and forget about me.’
‘Oh, Cissie, I could never forget you. I understand how you’re placed, but I still want to come and see you. We can still be friends, can’t we?’
‘I’d be pleased to have you as my friend, Hugh, as long as you know that’s all it can ever be.’ She could tell by the way he was looking at her that he wanted more than friendship, but she couldn’t risk it.
‘I’d better go, it’s getting late,’ he said, after a short silence. ‘Can I come to see you again tomorrow?’
‘If you like.’
Letting him out at the shop door, she murmured, ‘Hugh, I’m sorry if you thought . . .’
‘No, Cissie, I didn’t think anything, I only hoped, and I won’t stop hoping.’
‘You’ll be wasting your time.’
‘It won’t be wasted if I can see you every night.’ Giving her hand a quick squeeze, he walked away.
Had she been stupid? Cissie wondered, as she went back to the house. Should she have told him not to come back? If they saw each other every night he would likely want to kiss her, which would lead to something she wasn’t ready for, might never be ready for.
Trying to sleep, she kept thinking of Hugh, of his rugged face, his wavy hair, his brown eyes, and she knew that she still felt something for him, more than something. It would be wonderful if he and Ricky could be with her as a family – but it could never be.
Cissie’s heart accelerated the following evening when Hugh walked in, and it was beating much too quickly when she took him upstairs. She was about to tell him to sit down when he took a step towards her, and forgetting all that lay between them, she slid into his arms. ‘Oh, Cissie,’ he moaned.
His lips touching her brow, he held her tightly for some time before his mouth sought hers hungrily. The years fell away and it was as if they had never been apart, as if they were still the young boy and girl they had been the last time they kissed. But Cissie soon became aware that it was not the same, for Hugh was stirring up passions in her that she had never experienced as a young girl. She broke away from him breathlessly. ‘We shouldn’t be doing this, Hugh. You promised we’d just be friends.’
‘Kissing friends,’ he smiled.
She couldn’t help smiling, too, but said, as if scolding him, ‘Those were more than friendly kisses.’
‘I could tell you liked them, though.’
His dear face so close, she couldn’t hold out against him, and with a breathy sigh, she nestled against him again to return his ‘more than friendly’ kisses.
At last, he said, ‘I shouldn’t have promised anything. I could never be just friends with you, I love you too much. Is there any chance that you still love me?’
His eyes, pleading desperately for the answer he wanted, made her abandon all pretence. ‘I don’t think I ever stopped loving you, Hugh, not deep down.’
‘That’s all I wanted to know, and I’ll be quite happy just to see you for an hour every night.’
His smile, crinkling his face in the same old way, sent the same old tingles racing through her. ‘You could come for your supper on Wednesdays, that’s my early closing day, and we could have all day together on Sundays.’
He looked at her earnestly. ‘Are you really sure? You’ve no doubts?
‘I can’t honestly say I’ve no doubts,’ she admitted, ‘but I’m nearly sure.’
He thumped down in one of the armchairs and pulled her onto his knee. ‘We’ve a lot of lost time to catch up on.’
Over the next hour, they made up for the years they had been apart, keeping strictly to kissing, a little caressing and many words of endearment.
At last, Hugh said, ‘Look at the time! I’ll have to be off, but I’ll be back tomorrow.’
Some twenty minutes elapsed before she locked the shop behind him and went back upstairs with his kisses still burning on her lips. She couldn’t send him away now, she would die if she didn’t see h
im again, and in any case, she didn’t think he would let her go so easily a second time.
It was the following day before she remembered that he still didn’t know everything, and as soon as she took him upstairs that evening, she told him about her life as a spinner, about her marriage to Bertram – omitting the months he had been a night-time monster – and more about Tommy’s visit to her house and its dreadful after-effect.
‘I wish to God I’d known Tommy had found you,’ Hugh burst out. ‘I met him in a bar a while ago, and he didn’t even know you’d been in trouble till I . . .’
‘Was it you who told him?’ Cissie was astonished. ‘He said it was an Aberdeen man, but he never said it was you. If I’d only known.’
Hugh screwed up his nose. ‘He likely hadn’t wanted to tell you when he thought you were happy with your rich husband and your grand house.’
She smiled ruefully. ‘As they say in the best melodramas, “Little did he know.” ’
Their nightly meetings deepened their love for each other even more, and on Sunday afternoons they walked hand in hand on their rambles round the docks, or to the Botanic Gardens, or Princes Street Gardens. If they felt more energetic, they climbed Calton Hill to see the Napoleonic War monument, or went up Arthur’s Seat where they had a panoramic view of Edinburgh and its surrounding area. As far as Cissie was concerned, these outings made up for the short snatched hour which was all they had on other nights, but when, one Monday almost eight weeks after their reunion, Hugh became rather too passionate, she grew alarmed. If she let things go on like this, he would expect her to let him make love to her. ‘Please stop, Hugh,’ she murmured.
His voice thick, he said, ‘I stopped once before when I shouldn’t have listened to you.’ Pausing, he looked at her contritely. ‘No, my darling, I don’t want to force you, I want you to come to me willingly.’ He dropped his arms and turned away from her.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, miserably aware that she had hurt him deeply. ‘I should have known this would happen, and I can’t forget I’m still married to Bertram.’
‘Would you go back to him if he asked you?’
Waters of the Heart Page 29