by Joanna Larum
“Shall we go on with the story?” Nana asked, once Victoria had delivered her message and got herself settled in the bedside chair.
“Oh yes!” Victoria answered. “I want to know if you found Simon that terrible night. But don’t tell me any more if it’s going to upset you.” Victoria had a feeling that the search for Simon hadn’t ended happily and she was worried about how much this narration was going to upset Nana Lymer. It wasn’t fair of her to try and force her grandmother into discussing events that had been so traumatic for her, not just to satisfy Victoria’s curiosity.
“I’ve told you before, pet, all this happened a long time ago.” Nana reassured her. “It’s still very sad, but the old adage that time is a great healer is very true. Mankind wouldn’t have survived if people never got over sad events and couldn’t carry on with their lives, now would it? But, where had we got to?”
“Granddad Sam had collected Jenny and Alice from his house and brought them to the shop so that they would be safe from the pig butcher. You, Peter and Granddad Sam were going out again to search for Simon and William. The snow had stopped and the wind had dropped, so it was going to be easier to search.” Victoria hadn’t missed a word of her Nana’s tale.
“You are a good listener! It’s very flattering that you are so interested in what an old woman has to say.”
“So, back to my tale,” Nana continued. “Sam, Peter and I set off once again to search for William and Simon. The weather had definitely taken a turn for the better and it was possible now to see very clearly because of the full moon shining in the sky. A thought came unbidden to my mind; this was what they called a ‘hunter’s moon’. How apt that phrase was didn’t become clear until later and then it became as clear as the night sky. It was still exceptionally cold and the harsh frost was making the millions of stars glitter like ice in the black sky.”
“One or two people were now out in the streets because the conditions had improved, but they were still hurrying along to get home out of the bitter cold. They were more easily halted now, so that Sam could ask them if they had seen William and Simon and conversation was now possible because the air was so still and the noise of the wind had abated.”
“The answers were still all negative. No-one seemed to have seen William and Simon earlier in the evening and every negative answer increased the words in my head which throbbed along with my heartbeat. ‘He’s dead, he’s dead’ echoed in my head with every beat of my heart and my legs walked to the same beat, marking out my fear and terror as we traversed the streets.”
“I think Sammy could feel the fear emanating from me because he took hold of my arm and half-led me along. Peter was once again conscious of my mood and slipped his hand into my other hand, so that we trudged, linked, along the roads.”
“We reached the market place which looked so strange minus its stalls and crowds of chattering shoppers and I made to cross it to get to the Red Lion so that Sam could go inside and ask after Simon again, but Sam held me back. He had seen what I had missed as I trudged, wrapped up in my misery, and he pointed to a figure which was searching through the rubbish left by the stallholders when they had rapidly abandoned the market at the onset of the storm.”
“I stood still and waited hand-in-hand with Peter while Sam went over to the market cross and talked to the figure. He soon came back with the first sighting of William and Simon that night.”
“‘The tramp’s seen them tonight,’ he said. ‘Come and listen to what he has to say.’”
We all walked over to where the tramp waited, his hands full of the detritus of that day’s market. He confirmed what Sam had said.”
“‘Oh aye, I saw them, lassie. Yon lad’s the one who lost his arm to the Hun. Him and the little one came out of the Red Lion when it had just started to snow. I remember them ‘cos I asked him if he had any spare change, but he told me to go to hell and work for it. I’d thought he might have been a bit freer with his brass like, him knowing what it was like to suffer.’”
“I realised then that the tramp was standing rather precariously on one whole leg and one stiff wooden leg and remembered his story from my childhood. He’d lost his leg in an accident in the ironstone mines on the Cleveland Hills and life obviously hadn’t been kind to him since. Now the poor old bugger was outside on one of the coldest nights I had ever known, trying to find food to keep himself alive. But his next words pushed all thoughts of his problems out of my mind.”
“‘Yon pig butcher was talking to them, outside the pub. He had followed them out of the Red Lion. I wondered if he’d been fighting recently, cos he looked a right mess, with one of his ears bandaged up and a scratch across his face.’”
“Sammy glanced at me when the tramp spoke of the pig butcher, but I kept my face expressionless although that wasn’t a difficult thing to do. I was frozen to the bone because the night was so cold and the tramp’s words sent an icy torrent of fear coursing round my body, finishing by impaling my heart with its icy spikes. What the tramp said next stopped my heart completely.”
“‘The men shouted at each other and then they went off together down Station Road towards the docks. The poor little lad had to run to keep up with them and he was crying as he ran.’”
“My legs failed me and I sank down onto my knees on the snowy, icy road. I couldn’t get back up, so I stayed there and lifted my face to the sky, praying that my baby wasn’t dead, that he was alive and unharmed, but I knew within myself that this was a vain hope. There was no Divine Being listening to my prayers that night, ready to deliver my child back to me. Simon was dead and I knew it. What the tramp had said had sealed his fate and all I could hope for was the chance of finding his little body so that I could take him home, before I laid myself down and stopped breathing.”
“With strong but gentle hands, Sam lifted me back onto my feet and turned my face towards the docks. Then he released me and walked back to the tramp, speaking with him and then handing something over which the tramp looked at in astonishment.”
“‘Thank you, lad. God bless you. I hope you find the little one soon. It’s not a night for a bairn to be out of doors, although I’d leave his father to rot in the cold.’”
“The tramp limped away as Sam re-joined Peter and I.”
“‘What did you give him?’ I asked, amazed at the fact that I could sound so normal when my whole world had turned upside down.”
“‘Just some money.’ Sam answered. ‘The poor old bugger needs it more than I do. I worked in those mines when I was a young lad and I know what a hard life it was. And I came out of it whole and counted myself lucky to do so. He’s suffered for years and it isn’t right that he should be outside in this weather, scavenging for food and with no home to go to. Added to all that, he’s the only person who’s been of any help to us tonight. Are you ready to move on now, lass? Yon bloke said they headed towards the docks when they left the Red Lion.’”
“‘They headed for the warehouses, Sammy.’ I insisted. ‘They weren’t going to the docks, there’s no reason for them to go there. Dennison lured William to the warehouse, I know it. For some twisted reason of his own, he wanted William and Simon to go to the warehouse where he tried to rape me last week.’”
“‘Yes, I agree with you. For whatever reason of his own, he wanted William to go to the warehouse with him. I think it was just sheer bad luck that Simon happened to be with William at the time and so he took them both. I can’t for the life of me work out what it is that Dennison wants though. That’s got me beat.’”
“‘I can, Sam.’ I said. ‘I know what the pig butcher wants. He’s told William that it wasn’t rape and he wants to show William where it happened. It’s all twisted lies because that’s the way Dennison looks at the world. William is daft enough to believe what Dennison was saying, so he’s gone to the warehouse with him, taking my baby into danger. I’ll kill William if Dennison’s hurt one hair on my baby’s head!’”
“My voice had risen again as the
thought of William being so stupid and risking Simon’s well-being seemed to have brought me back to life. I was desperate to get to the warehouse, not only to save Simon, but also to wreak my revenge on both men who had made my life a misery. Sam’s voice cut through my thoughts.”
“‘Simon will be fine. Don’t you worry about him, Bia, not even the pig butcher would harm a child. Come on, the sooner we can get to the warehouse, the sooner we can get Simon safely back home.’”
“I didn’t want to waste time arguing with Sam because time was of the essence in this quest to get my child back, so we set off for the warehouse, walking more quickly now that we weren’t searching the road as we walked. Peter was still holding on to my hand, although he hadn’t spoken since we had left the tramp and I could feel him trembling as we walked along. I wasn’t sure if he was trembling with the cold or if it was because he had understood what the tramp and Sam and I had said and he was fearful over what had happened to Simon. Simon was his best friend. They played together and talked to each other as equals, although Peter had always looked on himself as Simon’s protector as well as mine. If the pig butcher had hurt Simon, there was a good chance that Peter would want to exact revenge. Life was going to get a lot worse for Dennison if he had injured my baby, both Peter and I would be demanding our pound of flesh from him.”
“I wasn’t convinced by Sam’s statement that Dennison wouldn’t have hurt a child. I had seen into Dennison’s eyes when he had tried to rape me that afternoon in the warehouse and I knew that not only was he an animal, but also that he was crazy. I had seen the mind behind those eyes that afternoon and I knew that it was twisted and black. He was capable of so much evil and wouldn’t be fazed by the idea of murdering a child.”
“I stumbled as we set off for the warehouse and would have fallen again if I hadn’t been supported on both sides by Sam and Peter. Sam cradled my arm as though I might collapse at any moment and Peter held on to the hand on the other side, drawing comfort from me and pouring comfort back into me. Without them both, I don’t think I would have managed to walk as far as the warehouse, although my need to hold my son burned brightly inside me. I gritted my teeth and, supported by both Sam and Peter, walked the length of Station Road and turned through the dock gates to get to my warehouse.”
Mrs Lymer paused in her tale, falling silent as her mind relived the fears she had carried that night over sixty years before. Suddenly, it all felt as though it had happened recently and she experienced the stab to the heart that she had felt when she had heard that her small son was in company with the detested pig butcher. Victoria saw her grandmother’s face drain of colour and she grasped her hand to steady her.
“Are you all right, Nana?” she asked, terrified that these memories had brought on a heart attack in the old lady. “Shall I call for the doctor or shall I go and get Mam?”
“There’s no need for you to panic, pet. I’m quite all right.” Mrs Lymer replied. “For a moment there, I could feel the pain that I felt that night and it shocked me that I could still feel the intensity of it. I thought it was all too long ago for it to affect me now, but obviously I was wrong. Be a good girl and go and make a cup of tea, will you? That’ll put heart back into me again.”
Nana Lymer smiled up at Victoria as she leapt up to do her grandmother’s bidding. Victoria was seriously worried about her and contemplated asking her mother to come up and check that she was fine and not likely to keel over at any minute, but she restrained herself, deciding that she would call her mother if Nana didn’t look any better when she took the tea upstairs. Luckily, no-one entered the kitchen while she was making the brew, so she was able to rush back upstairs the minute the tea was poured. Nana was sitting up in bed, looking pink and pretty as she always did and Victoria heaved a silent sigh of relief.
“You had me worried there, Nana,” she confessed. “You went ever so pale and I thought you were having a nasty turn.”
“No, pet.” Nana answered. “Just being a silly old woman, as your mother keeps on telling me. It took me by surprise that I was affected by the thoughts of that night, which is silly because I’ve thought about what happened that night so many times over the years and it’s been a long time since it bothered me so much. But we’ll not get much more time today to tell the story. It won’t be long before your Mam wants you to help her get the tea ready. Do you think she’ll let you sit with me tomorrow morning, because we could go through some more of the tale before Mr Vine comes?”
“I’m sure she will.” Victoria was convinced of this. “She doesn’t have to think about you and if you need anything while I’m here, I can get it for you, so it makes it easier for her. I’m sure she’ll be expecting me to stay with you all day tomorrow. I tell her I can get loads of revision done while you sleep, so she can’t complain about it.”
“The tale is nearly told, so it won’t be long before you are free to do your revision. I don’t want you failing your exams just because I wanted to tell you stories.” Nana said.
“I’m revising at night, instead of watching the television, so you won’t make me fail my exams. You can tell me your story with a clear conscience!” Victoria hastened to reassure her, wondering if it was such a good idea for Nana Lymer to be re-living that terrible past. One thing Victoria was sure of was that it settled Nana’s mind to tell what had happened. She hadn’t wandered during the night since she had started to tell Victoria what had happened to her during the First World War. With a stab of remembrance, Victoria realised that Nana had been asking for Simon the night that the policeman had found her wandering on Queen Street. Had she been so desperate to tell someone about what had happened that her mind had been trying to do it for her when she was asleep? But Nana had drunk her tea and was ready to begin again.
“We didn’t see another soul after we had left the tramp,” she continued. “I think the whole population of the town was at home, snug in their houses out of the bitter cold and with no mind to wander outside again on a night like that. The streets were deserted and it looked very strange when I was so used to seeing them thronged with people going about their business. There weren’t even any sailors on shore leave from the ships tied up at the docks, even they preferred being warm on their ships to tramping around a frozen town.”
“The night was now so clear that the stars alone were shining brightly enough to cast shadows of their own and the moon was almost too bright to look at. The stars were so sharp in that black sky, they looked as though you could pluck them from their moorings and use them as knives. It was as I thought about this that I wished I had thought ahead and brought a knife with me, so that I could use it on Dennison if he had harmed my baby. Then I remembered that I had a knife in the cold store inside my warehouse which was for cutting the large hunks of meat that came off the ships, so that I could convey them more easily to the shop. I hoped that my deduction that Dennison had taken William and Simon to my warehouse was correct, because it meant that I had a weapon ready to hand in there and I intended to use it. If he had taken them to his own warehouse, then I would be bereft of weapons. I determined that if we discovered that Simon and William weren’t in my warehouse with Dennison, then I would collect the knife from the cold store and take it with me to Dennison’s warehouse.”
“The warehouse door was locked when we got to it, almost as though it was only doing its normal job of being a place to store food safely, but I knew better. I knew that my baby lay dead inside that place and that the pig butcher was waiting inside there for me to find him. He knew I would come looking for my child and he was in there, waiting patiently for me to turn up. William, I was sure, was still alive, but I knew deep within me that Simon was already dead. So, in a way, I was more prepared than either Sammy or Peter for what we were going to see once we got inside the warehouse.”
“Sam tried to force the lock on the warehouse door when he realised that he couldn’t open it, but Peter stopped him by putting his hand on Sam’s arm and then gesturing for h
im to stand to one side. Peter clasped both his hands together, held them out in front of his body and then brought his joined hands down onto the lock with an almost gargantuan force. It was more than the lock could take and it splintered away from the door, the heavy metal crashing to the floor.”
“The warehouse door stayed closed but then, before anyone could put out a hand to push it, it slowly swung open and revealed the scene inside. The interior of the building was lit by a lamp which stood on a table at the far side of the warehouse and there was a man standing next to it. In a chair to one side sat another man. They were both illuminated by the lamp and both recognisable. The pig butcher was the man standing and William was the figure sitting on the chair. In a little heap on the floor in front of the table lay a tiny form, its arms spread out and its head facing the far wall. Even though I couldn’t see his face, I knew this was my baby and I felt my heart sink down through my body to my feet as I realised that he was definitely dead. All my predictions had come true.”
“I moved forwards as though I was wading through a river, it was so difficult to walk. The blood in my veins had turned to ice as I looked at my baby and every step I took seemed to send these ice spicules through my veins, stabbing me in hundreds of places inside me. I could hear each of my heartbeats as I crossed the warehouse floor, the sound of them so loud I couldn’t hear Sam and Peter as they entered the warehouse behind me. The pig butcher and William were both silent, staring at me as they waited for my reaction to my baby’s death.”
“As if in a nightmare, I managed to cross the floor until I reached Simon and then I collapsed onto my knees next to his tiny body. The hand that lay nearest to me was totally relaxed, the little fingers slightly curled, looking as though they would flex at any minute and prove that Simon was alive. I lifted the slight body and cuddled him to me, but his head flopped over backwards away from me as I held him. The pig butcher had broken his neck. He had snapped it as easily as snapping a twig and with as little compunction.”