‘Come on,’ Catherine said quickly, ‘we’ll go to the sweetshop on the way home, get some pear drops.’ They were Maisie’s favourite. The crying subsided a little and Catherine linked arms with the girl and set off briskly.
By the time they reached the sweetshop, Maisie was quiet again. As they drew near to home, Catherine felt sick with dread at confronting her mother.
On the steps, Maisie said between sucks of her sweet, ‘Just a wee nip to keep out the cold. A wee nip for Kate and a poke of sweets for Maisie. Our little secret.’
Bridie, who had been out at the hairdresser’s, was sitting at the table sewing. Catherine went barging into Kate’s bedroom, where she was resting, and began pulling out drawers. Tuppence raced in, barking.
‘Where do you hide it?’ she demanded, searching through her clothes.
‘What you doing?’ Kate asked in alarm. ‘You’ve no right—’
‘You’re drinking again,’ Catherine accused, ‘buying whisky with my money! How could you? And taking that poor lass into that terrible place, an’ all. Not to mention my dog!’
Suddenly she found it, an almost empty half-bottle of whisky, pushed inside a slipper under the bed. She brandished it at Kate.
‘How long have you been back on the bottle? I must be green as grass to think you’d got over it. You lied to me - and Bridie. You promised . . .!’
Kate heaved herself off the bed. ‘Don’t go all holy,’ she said scornfully. ‘You’re hardly little miss perfect with your lady friend here.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Catherine demanded.
‘You and her - grown lasses sharing a bed. It’s not natural.’ Kate shot Bridie a withering look as she stood behind Catherine, open-mouthed at the argument.
Catherine went puce with indignation. ‘You and your filthy mind. We used to share a bed, remember? It’s no different.’
Kate snapped, ‘There’s a world of difference. I’m your mam.’
‘And that’s what Bridie is to me,’ Catherine retorted, ‘like a mother. So don’t bring her into this. You’re the one at fault.’
‘Oh, am I?’ Kate blazed back. ‘And is it my fault I’m stuck here on me own all day with daft Maisie and having to clean up after that wild dog?’ She shoved Tuppence out of the way. ‘You’d never have noticed if the lass hadn’t told you. Never says a word all day long, then spills the beans about our little drink.’
Bridie cried, ‘You’ve been taking my girl into pubs? You wicked woman!’
‘She enjoys herself,’ Kate defended. ‘At least the folk in there pay her some attention - more than she gets round here.’
‘How dare you?’ Bridie raged, barging past Catherine. But Catherine caught her arm.
‘No, I’ll deal with her, you see to Maisie.’
She could hear the girl whimpering in the background. She pushed Bridie towards the door and shut it behind her. She faced Kate as calmly as she could.
‘This can’t go on. It’s my house you’re living in, remember. I’m the one paying for it all, and I’ll not have you drinking away my wages like Grandda did yours.’
At this, Kate capitulated, her shoulders sagging in defeat.
‘I’m sorry, lass, I cannot help it. I need a little bit of comfort to get me through the day.’ She gave a bleak look. ‘I’m fifty with nowt to me name. I never see me husband - I’m a fish out of water here, yet I’ve nowt to gan back for. I need some’at to do, Kitty, not just making the tea for you and your friend. I need to work. I’m better when I’m graftin’. Find me some’at to do, hinny,’ she pleaded.
Catherine leant against the door, at a loss as to what to do. A moment ago, she had been ready to throw her mother out, force her back north. She was Davie’s problem, not hers. But looking at the forlorn woman hunched on the bed, she knew she could not wash her hands of Kate. She would give her another chance.
‘Give me a few days to think it over,’ Catherine sighed.
‘You’ll not send me back to Jarrow?’ Kate whispered.
Catherine shook her head.
Kate gave a trembling smile. ‘Ta, Kitty, you’re a good lass.’
Catherine braced herself. ‘But you and Maisie aren’t to go anywhere near the Penny Luck again. Promise?’
‘Aye,’ Kate agreed, wiping her eyes with her sleeve.
Catherine saw from the earnest look on Kate’s face that she meant to try, but deep down she doubted whether her mother could ever keep such a promise.
Chapter 34
‘Beautiful house, isn’t it?’ said a woman in passing. ‘Shame to see it go to rack and ruin like that.’
Catherine looked round, startled out of her reverie and embarrassed to have been caught peering through the railings at the neglected gardens and house beyond. She had first noticed it on her way to work months ago, when the falling autumn leaves had revealed a red-brick mansion with a quaint turret and large shuttered windows. It looked mysterious and beckoning with its ‘For Sale’ sign at the gate, as if challenging her to explore further.
‘Yes, a shame,’ Catherine murmured. ‘Surprised no one’s bought it yet.’
The woman shook her head. ‘My uncle used to deliver tea there,’ she confided. ‘Belonged to a man who’d made his money in India - had foreign servants, Uncle Vic said. That’s the trouble, you see. House that size needs plenty servants and no one wants to do that sort of work now, do they?’
Catherine nodded at the woman and made to move off.
‘Course, you could run it as a boarding house, I suppose,’ the stranger commented.
Catherine looked at her startled, then realised the woman had not meant her in particular. But all that day at work she could not rid her thoughts of the idea. She was drawn to the place’s fading grandeur. The house of a wealthy gentleman. It was crying out to be loved and nurtured back to life. A mansion so similar to the ones in her childish daydreams that it almost seemed as if fate had led her to its gates.
Stop being so fanciful! Such a house was far out of her reach. But a little later she was speculating again as to how many bedrooms it had and how many lodgers it could take. Kate could look after the place and there would be residents to keep her company. It was too far out of the town centre for her to sneak out to the pub as she could now, and Catherine knew she was still nipping into the Penny Luck.
Only yesterday she had found a cough medicine bottle filled with whisky in the kitchen cupboard. When confronted, Kate had denied it was hers and gone into a rant about Bridie, saying she had done it to get her into trouble.
‘All lies, you old soak,’ Bridie had scoffed, only riling Kate the more.
Catherine knew she had to get her mother away from town and out from under Bridie’s feet as soon as possible, if their household was to survive. Before the day was out, she rang the estate agent’s office and made an appointment to see The Hurst.
On the Saturday, she took Bridie with her to look around. Catherine was captivated by its sweep of daffodils up the drive and its mature trees that would make it secluded in summer.
‘Look, it’s got a tennis court,’ Bridie exclaimed. ‘Think of the tennis parties we could have!’
The agent led them through a series of grand rooms on the ground floor.
‘Smells a bit musty,’ Catherine said cautiously, peering into the gloom of the drawing room, with its gaping fireplace.
‘Just needs a bit of a spring-clean,’ Bridie declared.
‘Quite so,’ said the agent. ‘It’s been empty for over a year. This is the way to the billiard room.’
‘Billiard room?’ Bridie squealed. ‘More parties!’
‘How many rooms altogether?’ Catherine gulped, as they followed him back into the hall. Two large china urns depicting exotic birds still stood either side of the large central stairc
ase.
‘Fifteen. It’s what you’d expect of a gentleman’s residence,’ the agent said, ushering them upstairs.
Catherine could imagine how grand it must once have been. It still smelt of faded cigar smoke and vinegar polish; of dried roses. She half expected to see one of the Indian servants dressed in a vivid turban, emerging with a silver tray and tea set. In mounting excitement, she followed the agent, clutching Bridie’s arm.
They lost count of the bedrooms. The kitchen was antiquated, with a huge old black range, but there was a separate butler’s pantry, a cook’s sitting room and a system of bells to call for service, which still worked.
‘We can ring for Kate to bring us up tea and toast in the morning,’ Bridie joked.
‘If you want it poured over your head, you mean,’ Catherine snorted.
‘Oh, Catherine, it’s a dream house, so it is. Maisie will love the gardens - and so will Tuppence. Say you’ll buy it!’
Catherine tried to quell her own excitement. There seemed so much work to be done. Panes of glass were missing or broken in half a dozen windows, and at least three of the rooms had pails and saucepans catching drips from the leaking roof.
‘And finally, the garden room.’ The agent led them into the glass-domed conservatory to the side of the house.
As they entered, a wall of warmth enveloped them and a pungent smell of plants. Some hothouse blooms had survived - someone must have come in to tend them - and they were already flowering in the early spring sunshine. The room led on to the small terrace and a lawn with a sagging tennis net. Beyond was a bank of rhododendrons and mature trees.
For a brief instant, Catherine was reminded of the view from Ravensworth Castle, the sweep of lawns and bushes rolling away from the aristocratic mansion. A Ravensworth in miniature. She blinked hard. A ridiculous comparison, of course, but how she longed to possess such a place! At that moment, she desired it more than anything she had ever wanted before. Kitty McMullen, owner of a gentleman’s residence. She would pay for a busload of her old neighbours and school friends to come from Jarrow just to see it! Then there would be no more scoffing and turning up their noses. How they would regret ever excluding her from their games . . .
‘Catherine?’ Bridie was shaking her arm. ‘The gentleman’s wanting your opinion.’
The agent was watching her with detached interest. He obviously thought she was wasting his time and could not afford it.
‘I want to buy it,’ she declared with a defiant look. ‘It’ll take a few days to get the money in place. Perhaps we could go back to your office to discuss the price?’
The man tried to hide his surprise and nodded quickly. Catherine’s heart was hammering at her recklessness. It would take every penny of her savings to put down the deposit and she would have to cash in the insurance policies Maurice had got her to buy. She might be paying off the mortgage with all her salary for evermore, but she would do it.
Bridie was spluttering with delight and gabbling plans all the way down the hill to town.
‘Once we’ve shifted the dirt and given it a splash of paint it’ll look like a palace. Everyone will want to stay at The Hurst - we’ll get quality folk, so we will. And Kate’s used to lodgers. She’ll love being the lady of the manor. No time for the drink. And we can get the groceries delivered, so there’s no excuse to be popping into town. Oh, girl, we’re going to have such a time!’
It took over a month for the finances to be put in place and the sale completed; weeks in which Catherine’s nerve almost failed her. She must be quite mad to be saddling herself with a run-down mansion, bargain though it was, wiping out her hard-earned savings that, over the years, she had put by, earning good interest, for ‘a rainy day’. She had always been so cautious with money, fearful of being reduced to the plight of those who had no option but to knock on the workhouse door. Now here she was gambling it all on a dream.
But then she thought of how this venture might be the saving of Kate and a new beginning for them all. It was only lowly Kitty of the New Buildings who was afraid of taking on such a place. Catherine McMullen, senior officer of Hastings Poor Law Institute and member of the tennis club, had no such qualms. The Hurst was a fitting home for such a professional woman.
So, just before she turned twenty-seven, Catherine became the sole owner of a home that could have housed half of William Black Street in Jarrow. The day they moved in and set to work scrubbing down walls and floors, Catherine thought of her friend Lily Hearn. So often in the past they’d had conversations about their future dreams, of marrying rich men and living in luxury. She was the only one Catherine had ever confided in about her yearning to discover her father and the privileged world that should have been hers.
As Catherine fell into bed that night, aching all over from the back-breaking cleaning, she knew Lily would have understood her obsession to possess The Hurst. It went beyond a craving for security. It was as if she were fulfilling the destiny that was snatched away from her even before she was born. She was a Pringle-Davies, an owner of property, a respectable middle-class woman. And she had done it all without the help of any man - father or husband.
Chapter 35
It was summer before The Hurst was in any state to open its doors to boarders. The boiler had to be replaced, and Catherine and Bridie scoured the auction rooms for second-hand furniture to furnish the bedrooms. For the first time in over two years Catherine had the luxury of her own bedroom - a beautiful room at the front of the house, with a view over the garden. She slept with the curtains open so that she woke gradually in the early light to the sound of birdsong and watched the dawn filter through the trees. It was the most tranquil part of the day, just her and the birds and sunshine on leaves. But at the end of each month Catherine had nothing left in the bank and she still had to pay the lease on the maisonette in Laurel Street. She sublet it and placed advertisements in the local newspapers for lodgers for The Hurst.
‘We can share a room again,’ Bridie suggested. ‘Then you can rent out that nice one at the front at a higher price.’
Catherine was reluctant to give up the room but Bridie was right. Within two days they had a retired major for the large front bedroom. He brought a battered old trunk and a wind-up gramophone.
‘Happy to share my record collection,’ said Major Holloway, plonking a box of records in the sitting room. Kate and Bridie rushed to look through them.
‘Never heard of half of these,’ Kate said in disappointment.
‘Opera, my dear lady,’ the major chuckled, putting one on the turntable and winding up the brass handle. They sat and listened.
‘What was all that about?’ Kate said at the end. ‘Didn’t catch a word of it.’
‘The tenor was singing in Italian, dear lady,’ said Major Holloway. ‘The language of love.’
Kate gave him a dubious look. ‘Give me a good north-country song any day,’ she sniffed, and went off to make tea.
Over the next few weeks the number of residents grew. A pale, willowy young woman called Dorothy was brought by her parents.
‘Needs to be by the sea for the air, doctor says,’ her mother explained in hushed tones. ‘The air in London’s making her ill.’ They left in a shiny black Ford, promising to visit every month. Dorothy stood forlornly looking down the drive until Catherine coaxed her back inside with the promise of cherry cake.
Two more came by July: a thin-faced piano tuner and a ventriloquist who talked to himself at mealtimes. They were joined by a retired merchant seaman, who liked to shave in the open-air, a retired cook from a boarding school and a reclusive poet who stayed in his room all day and prowled around the house at night, helping himself to food from the kitchen, to Kate’s alarm.
‘Scared me out of me wits,’ she complained, ‘sitting by the stove eating cold stew in the middle of the night.’
‘
What were you doing up at that hour?’ Catherine asked suspiciously.
‘Couldn’t sleep, that’s what,’ Kate mumbled. ‘You’ll have to tell him he can’t gan creepin’ round like a ghost.’
‘I can hardly lock him in his room.’
Kate grumbled. ‘They’re a queer lot - not workin’ lads like we used to have lodging with us.’
Catherine snorted. ‘They were just as mixed a bag as these ones. And as long as they’re all paying and not harming anyone, doesn’t matter what they’re like.’
She felt sympathy for the solitary poet, who never seemed to get anything written, for wan Dorothy, whose parents did not visit as promised, and wheezing Mrs Fairy, the retired cook, who hung about the kitchen offering to help, not knowing what to do with retirement. She felt protective towards them and tried to shield them from Kate’s impatience and Bridie’s teasing.
But it worried Catherine to think Kate might not be able to cope. After all, it was ten years since she had last taken in lodgers. She was snappy and bad-tempered in the mornings when Catherine and Bridie were rushing to work, then full of petty complaints on their return in the evening. Tom, the piano tuner, had left his false teeth in the sink; Mrs Fairy had used up all the sugar in a chocolate cake for Maisie and made the girl sick. Ventriloquist Barny had upset Harold, the poet, by practising his noisy monkey routine all morning and Harold was demanding to sleep in the tower.
‘And I think that Dorothy’s got the consumption,’ Kate warned, ‘coughing all over the place. That’s why she’s been dumped here. We’ll all die of it if you let her stay. Me father and sister Margaret died like that. Terrible business. Lass should be in the sanatorium.’
Catherine, already exhausted by a long hot day at the laundry, had to roll up her sleeves and help with the evening meal, calming tempers and charming the guests and Kate back into good humour.
Only the cheerful major seemed oblivious to Kate’s grumbles or the tensions between the other residents. As long as he had music playing on his gramophone he was happy, and turned a deaf ear to those who did not appreciate opera as much as he. Sometimes, Catherine would enjoy sitting in the conservatory on a late summer’s evening with Major Holloway listening to Puccini or Verdi and watching the shadows steal across the lawn.
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