‘She’ll be hours if she’s gone into Newcastle,’ Carol joked and scooped up Laura from exploring a flowerbed.
‘You’ll come again then? And bring Laura?’ he asked, his usually stern face unsure. Carol thought he had aged a lot, his hair and moustache quite silver, his eyes sagging in the once confident face.
How had she been able to hate this ageing man so much? Then she remembered the injustices he had done to her. She wanted to scream all her angry questions at him. Why had he not been able to love her like he did Fay and Simon? What had she done that had been so terrible? Why could he not have delighted in her company as he now did in Laura’s? Instead she said bitterly, ‘Why the hell should I? You didn’t even come to her christening!’
They stared at each other as if across a chasm, neither prepared to cross it first. Carol saw his face harden once more into set, uncompromising lines. That stubborn jaw was so familiar. Her father would never admit he was wrong about anything; he would die rather than show such a sign of weakness.
So she turned to go, annoyed with herself for coming. It had been a futile mistake.
‘Carol. Wait.’ She heard the uncertainty in his voice and glanced back. She could see him struggling. Finally he said in a stumbling way, ‘I’m sorry we fell out like we did. There are things, well, I wish I hadn’t said. You know it’s not easy for me to admit that but, anyway, I’m glad you came today.’
It wasn’t much, but Carol knew how difficult it was for her father to humble himself to her and she felt that terrible knot of anger and bitterness inside her ease a fraction. In the past she had always been quick to speak before thinking, had never been lost for fighting words to fling back at him, but now she could think of nothing adequate to say. So she had merely nodded and turned away, her eyes stinging with tears.
But it was the beginning of a cautious reconciliation. She allowed her parents to make a fuss over Laura on subsequent occasions, but Mick would never go with her to see them. She did not blame him; she knew the hurt that her parents’ snobbishness had inflicted on him.
After a couple of months, Carol found herself enjoying working again. Val was doing a booming trade in bridal hire and Carol, under Val’s guidance, discovered she had a talent for dressmaking and did most of the alterations. She enjoyed the bustle of the shop and meeting the young women who came to plan their spring weddings. At lunchtime she would meet Kelly and go for a sandwich at Dimarco’s.
‘How’s Laura getting on at school?’ Paul Dimarco called over the counter one day. Laura’s biggest treat was to go to the cafe for a Knickerbocker Glory served in a tall glass with a long spoon. Paul had dark good looks like his father, whose photograph hung above the counter - a young soldier in uniform standing beside his Italian parents outside their cafe in Whitton Grange.
‘Grand, thanks,’ Carol smiled. ‘She brought back her first reading book this week. And the paintings she’s doing are fantastic.’
Paul chuckled. ‘Tell her if she can read the whole book to me she can have a free ice cream on Saturday.’
Carol could have gone on talking about her daughter all day, but she sensed Kelly’s restlessness and stopped herself. Kelly and Sid were still childless, although Carol knew they had been trying for a baby for years. For a while Sid had persuaded Kelly to finish work, blaming her for doing too much, but Kelly had just got bored sitting around at home waiting for Sid to come off shift and had got herself a job at Proud’s travel shop.
Kelly gave Paul a bold look. ‘And what do we lasses have to do to get a free ice cream?’
Paul was used to her flirtatiousness and laughed it off. ‘Be under six years old,’ he teased back, wiped the table and moved on swiftly to chat to another customer.
‘I can’t understand how Lesley got her hands on him,’ Kelly said, stirring her coffee dreamily.
‘Because she’s canny.’ Carol gave her friend an impatient smile. ‘And you’re happily married too, remember?’
‘No harm in just looking,’ Kelly grinned.
‘He must be twice our age,’ Carol whispered.
‘He’s thirty-nine.’
Carol raised her eyebrows.
‘Val told me.’ Kelly looked smug. ‘She’s known him ever since he moved from Whitton Grange when the pit closed. They’re a story and a half, the Dimarcos.’
‘Well, you can tell me another time,’ Carol said, stubbing out her cigarette. ‘I’ve got a bridesmaid’s dress to finish before I collect Laura.’
Kelly looked at her friend in disappointment. She would have liked to stay and gossip about the Dimarcos and drink more coffee and eye up the proprietor. Carol was no fun these days; all she cared about was bridal dresses and darling Laura and rushing home to be there for Mick. Kelly’s stomach twisted with resentment. Where was the rebellious Carol with the dyed orange hair and black make-up who had thought nothing of running off to London in the seventies? Now her hair was back to long brown waves and her green eyes shone in an unmade-up face. She looked more like a schoolgirl than she had at school, Kelly thought and glanced away to be met by her own sallow reflection in the wall mirror.
‘I’ll see you in here tomorrow then,’ Kelly said and began to clear up their cups. But after Carol rushed off with a wave at Paul Dimarco, she settled back into the mock leather bench seat and caught Paul’s eye. ‘I’ll have another coffee, please,’ she smiled and flicked her red fringe out of her eyes.
Carol worried about Kelly and Sid. It had been a while since they had all gone out together socially, but last week had been Mick’s thirtieth birthday and she had organised a party for him at the Welfare. The place had been full of family and friends and there had been a nice buffet and a disco with lots of nostalgic seventies hits, but Carol had not enjoyed it. The men had stood in sombre groups at the bar talking about the overtime ban at the pit and Charlie had fulminated about the new NCB Chairman, MacGregor.
‘He’s stirring things up with the union, not consulting us about matters. He’s even talking about encouraging foreign investment in our mines.’
Sid and Mick had begun to argue about the hit list of seventy-five pits that NUM President Arthur Scargill had warned were threatened with closure.
‘It makes nee difference to us, Mick man!’ Sid had said. ‘Brassbank’s got millions of tons of coal in reserve - it’ll not affect us. Pits have been closing for decades. They get worked out and the pitmen move on.’
‘But what if they start closing pits that have still got plenty reserves in them, like Arthur says?’ Mick worried. ‘Just say they’re uneconomic and close them anyways? Then where do Durham pitmen move on to?’
‘Well, it’s not going to happen here. Super pits like Brassbank are the future of mining. There’ll be jobs here till we’re long dead and gone, they’ve told us that.’
Sid slurped his beer. ‘Haway, birthday boy, let’s get the beers in.’
Carol had tried to get Sid on to the dance floor with Kelly, but he seemed more interested in working his way through the free kegs of beer, while Kelly flirted with his friends in the corner. Then she had found herself in the middle of another crisis, trying to calm down a furious Lotty who had found her precious daughter wrapped round a young miner in a committee room upstairs. Linda had been marched home in tears and Carol had missed Mick’s speech and the cutting of the cake. When she had gone outside to stand under the chill November stars and smoke a peaceful cigarette, she had seen Kelly sneaking off with someone.
She was so preoccupied with worrying about Kelly’s marriage that Carol did not notice at first what was happening under her nose at home. Linda, who was now working part-time at the pit canteen, was constantly round at their house. There was nothing new in this, as she spent more time with them than at home these days and loved to mother Laura, but as the weeks drew nearer to Christmas, Linda began to offer to babysit more and more rather than go out, which made Carol suspicious.
She was seeing the young miner she had met at Mick’s birthday party, but
he always arrived after they went out and was gone before they got back from their night out.
‘Why don’t you want us to meet him?’ Carol teased. ‘Is he too respectable?’
Linda had blushed. ‘I want you to, Carol, but Dan’s shy - not one for company.’
‘Where does he live?’
‘Whittledene.’
‘With his family?’
‘Aye, but he’s getting his own flat shortly. Stop asking questions, Carol, you’re worse than Mam.’
Carol tried talking to Mick about the mysterious Dan.
‘Do you see him at work?’
‘No, he’s on a different shift - never set eyes on the lad.’
‘Do you know his family?’
Mick shook his head. ‘They’re not from the village. Sid says they’re not a mining family at all.’ He laughed at her concerned face. ‘Carol, you’re getting as nosy as me mam. Who would’ve thought you’d worry about such things.’
That night they had planned to take Grandda Bowman out for a drink but had arrived to find him full of cold and not wanting to leave his fireside. It looked so cosy and inviting that Mick suggested, ‘Let’s gan home and cuddle in front of our own fire, eh?’
Carol had agreed at once and they had returned to find the lights out downstairs. Coming in through the kitchen, they thought the sitting room was empty, until Mick snapped on the lights to find Linda and her boyfriend illuminated on the Dralon settee, struggling to do up buttons.
Carol stared at them and then at Mick’s shocked face and burst out laughing.
‘Well, I don’t think it’s funny,’ Mick spluttered. ‘It’s the last time you take advantage of us like that, Linda. You’re supposed to be looking after Laura, not having it off on our settee!’
Linda was a flustered puce, but the lean-faced Dan stood up aggressively and said, ‘The bairn’s fast asleep. And from what Linda tells me, there’s a lot worse gone on on this settee than what we were doing.’ He turned and glared at Carol.
She blushed to think he was referring to her giving birth on their couch and was suddenly cross with Linda for telling this stranger such personal details.
‘Linda!’ she chided.
Linda sparked in defence. ‘Well, don’t you get so high and mighty all of a sudden. You were no angel with our Mick. All the village knew about you going off with him when you hardly knew him.’
Mick sprang forward. ‘Don’t you speak to Carol like that, do you hear?’
Dan gave a harsh laugh as he reached for Linda’s hand and pulled her away. ‘Linda’s right. Even I knew Carol was easy.’
Carol gasped in shock at the insult and gave him a blazing look. There was something familiar about him ...
‘That’s it. Get out, Dan Hardman!’ Mick thundered. ‘Get out before I give you a good kickin’!’
Dan sneered, ‘Think you’re so hard, you Todds, don’t you? Well, you’re a bunch of tossers!’ He pulled Linda with him. ‘Come on, you’re not stopping here. I’ve had enough of sneaking around trying to avoid your precious family. From now on we go out in Whittledene with my mates.’
Linda looked frightened and undecided. The petulant jut of Dan’s chin and his resentful eyes triggered a memory for Carol.
‘Dan Hardman? Aye, I remember you now. You’re Vic’s cousin. You were at his wedding.’
She saw him flush at the reminder. Then, he had been pimply and gauche and had wanted to tag along with her and her friends. He had been only fifteen and she had not let him; he had taken offence. But that was no reason to be so insulting to her and the Todds now.
Carol said quickly, ‘Don’t let him bully you, Linda. You don’t have to go with him at all. You know you can stay with us any time you want.’
For a long moment Linda agonised between rushing to Carol and hugging her tight or going with her boyfriend. She loved Carol, had thought she was wonderful since the time she’d come into the family and stirred it up with her punk rock and her forceful ways. But she was in love with Dan. He was glamorous because he wasn’t one of the village lads and he had a car and friends who had money, and he had a lovely body and was making a fuss over her now, wanting her to come with him. She wasn’t going to be made to feel small by her over-protective brother.
‘I’m going with Dan,’ she said defiantly and tossed her long fair hair.
Carol was reminded of herself for an instant and put out a restraining arm to prevent Mick from stopping his sister going.
‘Let her go,’ Carol said quietly. ‘But Linda, you know we won’t turn you away any time you want to come back.’
‘She’ll not be coming back,’ Dan snarled, grabbing his jacket, and pushed Linda out of the room.
Carol found Laura shivering on the stairs and was instantly worried about how much the child had overheard.
‘Why was Daddy shouting?’
‘It’s nothing, pet.’ Carol bundled her back to bed but lay awake that night anxious at what had been said in the heat of the moment.
The next day, Lotty sought her out at the shop, beside herself with worry.
‘Is Linda at your house? She’s taken her things and gone. I’m that worried!’
Carol left work early and went round to be with Lotty.
‘She’ll be back in a few days - she’ll miss her home comforts too much,’ Carol tried to reassure her distraught mother-in-law.
‘Charlie’s furious. He might not have her back.’
Carol thought ruefully how similar this was to the rift with her own father. But the difference was, Carol knew, that however much Charlie Todd disapproved of his daughter’s carrying on, he would never cast her out of the fold. For although her father-in-law was not a man to be crossed, he was staunchly loyal to his own kind and he loved his family above all.
But Linda did not come home and she lost her job at the pit canteen for not turning up for work. As Christmas approached, Carol knew she must go and find her, for her absence was breaking Lotty’s heart. Mick had confronted Dan at the pit gates, but the surly young man would tell him nothing about his sister.
In the end, Carol went to Vic and asked him to find out where his cousin lived.
Vic shrugged. ‘Why interfere?’
‘I won’t if I find Linda’s happy with him. I’d be the last one to tell her what to do with her life. But it’s the not knowing. She’s cut herself off from her family and they’re worried sick.’
A couple of days before Christmas Vic phoned Carol with an address on a new estate on the fringes of Whittledene.
‘It was a bit tricky,’ Vic warned her. ‘Dan’s parents don’t approve of his living with your sister-in-law. In fact they thought a job in the pit was beneath Dan as well. Apparently he only took it because he couldn’t get anything else. So they don’t really know what’s going on either.’
Val gave Carol the day off work and she took Laura into Whittledene on the bus. The girl chattered excitedly about Santa and gawped at the gaudy street lights and the decorated shops thronged with Christmas shoppers. Carol felt a secret thrill to know how overjoyed her daughter would be when she came downstairs on Christmas morning to find a bulging stocking and the piles of presents waiting for her by their Christmas tree. Laura had helped her decorate the tree weeks ago; Carol loved everything about Christmas and couldn’t wait for all the rituals to begin.
She grew nervous as they boarded another bus and headed into the maze of Whittledene Rise Estate, wondering what she would find. After half an hour of searching for the right block of flats and asking directions, Laura was fractious and wanting to go home. Carol placated her by promising something to eat when they got to Auntie Linda’s.
Eventually she found the impersonal block of flats and buzzed on the intercom. Linda’s disembodied voice answered and, after a shout from Laura, she let them in.
Linda looked pale, her hair lank, she’d been slopping around the flat in leggings and a baggy jumper of Dan’s. The flat still smelled of fresh paint and new carpets and the
re was MFI furniture in the sitting room. But it was all quite bland and impersonal, like the estate itself; there were no homely touches or signs of Linda’s belongings save her radio cassette player by the window and a pile of Mills & Boon on the cane coffee table. The TV blared in the corner unheeded and Carol noticed a video machine beneath it. Linda was a visitor here, Carol thought, this was not her home.
She bided her time while Laura explored the small flat and gabbled to her aunt about being in the Christmas play at school.
‘I was a mouse in the stable,’ Laura said proudly.
‘That sounds like a star part,’ Linda teased, her thin face lighting up with the banter.
‘It was,’ Laura nodded. ‘I wasn’t the only mouse, mind. There were ten of us. Me and Sarah and Louise and Tracey and Mark Taylor and Gillian and Ali Jabbar and Lorraine and - I can’t remember. Who have I said?’
‘I think she gets the picture,’ Carol laughed.
‘Why didn’t you come and watch, Auntie Linda, like you said you would?’
Linda looked uncomfortable and let her long hair fall over her face.
‘Why don’t you see what’s on the telly, pet?’ Carol said to distract her daughter. Laura went and lay down on the floor quickly, not used to being allowed to watch TV so early in the day.
‘Linda,’ Carol asked quietly, ‘are you all right here?’
Linda shook out her hair. ‘Course I am. Look at this place, it’s lush. I can do what I want, get up when I want, watch what I want. Dan gets me everything, he’s a good spender.’
‘So you’re not working?’
‘Dan likes me here when he gets home,’ Linda said, as if it was something worth boasting about. ‘Anyway, who wants to work in a grotty canteen?’
Carol bit her tongue. ‘Don’t you find it a bit lonely out here?’
‘I’ve got Dan for company.’ Linda was defensive.
‘But when he’s at work . . .’
‘We’ve got a good social life - he’s got stacks of mates round here. He’s always out - we both are, I mean.’
Carol’s dismay increased. ‘And I suppose you see his family, do you?’ she asked lightly.
Durham Trilogy 03. Never Stand Alone Page 13