The Night Brother

by Rosie Garland

  They said we’d not make a farthing, but Ma is forged of steely stuff and has proved them wrong. She gives neither short measure nor employs the long pull. A pint is a pint to the very drop. She never raises her voice, nor needs to. At closing time she glares at the clock. That’s all it takes for every glass in the room to be raised, every mouthful drained. By ten past the hour she slides the door-bolts into place and turns down the gas, with not so much as the shadow of a dog remaining under the tables.

  For all that Ma will have no truck with nonsense, the walls of The Comet bulge with mysteries. Some are simple to plumb. Ma refuses to speak about Papa, a moustachioed fellow who hangs above the bar in a picture frame, only pointing to the black riband looped around the corner. That, I understand. Some things are less easy to explain: why Ma takes to her bed three days in every month; why my beloved Uncle Arthur only drops by when she’s laid up.

  Then there are my nightmares. I can’t understand why people talk of sleep as a welcome undoing of strife and woe. They must mean something else entirely. I am hag-ridden. I tell no one of the night-voice that shrieks so piercingly the whole street ought to hear. I dare not. I tell no one how I wake with fingernails grimed as black as soot, knots in my hair and scraps of bacon rind wedged in my teeth. I dare not.

  The only person with whom I share my stories is Papa, behind his glass. Sometimes I wish he’d speak one word, give one nod of encouragement, but his face is stiff. He keeps my secrets well.

  At school, I hunger for mathematics and its security of two-times-two-equals-four; prefer geography and the massive consistency of mountains. Even the most determined friend despairs of my inability to engage in games of make-believe and I am left to the click of my abacus. What they cannot know is that I cling to logic with the dogged desperation of one drowning. I strive to make Ma smile.

  Every night she stares as I undress, as though searching for something she does not want to find. I wonder if the removal of my petticoat will reveal me to be a bat, ready to squeak and burst out of the window.

  ‘Don’t you stir,’ she says.

  ‘No, Ma.’

  ‘You stay right there.’

  ‘Yes, Ma.’

  She sits on the bed, stands up, sits again. It makes me dizzier than physick. At last, she leans close and I thrill that tonight she may kiss me.

  ‘I know you,’ she whispers, the words crawling into my ear. ‘You’re waiting for me to look away for one minute, aren’t you?’

  ‘No, Ma,’ I say.

  ‘Liar,’ she replies, exhaling heat upon my face. ‘I know what you’re thinking. Everything. Before you think it. I know you better than you know yourself.’

  ‘Ma?’ I don’t understand. I never do.

  ‘You can’t fool me. Don’t try,’ she hisses.

  ‘I won’t,’ I promise desperately. I close my eyes. Green lights dance behind my eyelids. The next time she speaks it is from further away.

  ‘I am watching. Always.’

  ‘Yes, Ma. Goodnight, Ma,’ I mumble as drowsily as I can manage.

  The door clicks shut. I shake my head from side to side, but her words stick fast and refuse to tumble out on to the pillow. I climb out of bed, kneel under the picture of Jesus and Mary and press my palms together. I beg them to send me to sleep and not wander in wild dreams. They look down at me with sad expressions, pointing at their fiery hearts, eyes reproachful. Their insides are burning too, but they don’t complain. Not like me.

  From below come the sounds of The Comet: clink of glass, rumble of voices, the percussion of Ma’s footsteps drumming back and forth. I stare at the ceiling until my eyes grow used to the dark. Tonight, perhaps, I will be spared.

  It begins small, as always, like a dray rumbling over cobbles three streets distant. Street by street the thunder draws closer, gathering speed and vigour. I clap my hands over my ears to stave off the din, but the commotion is from inside, not out. The shadows thicken and in their depths I spy the glint of monstrous eyes, the flash of leviathan teeth, ready to devour me.

  Edie. I’m here, roars the fiend. Let’s go out to play.

  ‘No!’ I howl, but the wail is trapped within the confines of my head. ‘I can’t hear you! I won’t!’

  I strain to get away. If I can stir so much as my little finger, I will win and the beast will be vanquished. But all that is Edie has shrunk into a marble, tiny and lost.

  You used to be so much more fun. Don’t you remember the fireworks?

  ‘No.’ It is a lie and I weep with the wickedness of telling it.

  I can’t waste time chatting. Time presses. Let me in.

  I fight to stay awake. The creature surges forwards, opens its jaws. Claws drag me into darkness and I do not rise again.

  The next morning I wake with a fog of unknowing between my ears. My first thought is: Where am I? The second: Who am I? Gradually, the room resumes its familiar shape. This is home and I am in it. I lie abed, half-breathless from last night’s dream of bruised knees, slammed doors, thumped door-knockers and racing away. The curtain sways. The window stands half-open. Last night Ma closed it tight.

  My hair is sticky with spiders’ web and I’m wearing muddy boots and britches. I daren’t let Ma see me like this. Before I go downstairs, I clean the boots and take the scrubbing brush to my hands. I stand before the mirror at the top of the stairs and rehearse my smile in preparation for breakfast. My face looks back, pallid and starved of sleep.

  ‘Did you sleep well?’ Ma asks as I pull my chair to the kitchen table.

  ‘Yes, Ma,’ I lisp and stretch my deceitful grin to the tips of my ears.

  I am shepherding the last bit of porridge from bowl to mouth when Nana lays her hand on my forehead.

  ‘You look a bit peaky,’ she says.

  I butt into the broad warmth of her palm. Half the porridge slips from the spoon back into the bowl. Her tenderness is my undoing.

  ‘Yes, Nana.’ I yawn. ‘It was that dream again: where I jump out of the window and get into all sorts of naughtiness.’

  Her hand makes peaceful circles across my brow. My eyelids droop.

  ‘Dreams,’ she murmurs, half-statement, half-question.

  I am more than halfway back to sleep. ‘I never know why I wake up with dirty hands and feet.’ The delicious massage ceases abruptly. ‘Nana?’ I mumble.

  I winch open my eyelids to see Ma shooting my grandmother a look of such blazing fury I am surprised she does not incinerate on the spot.

  ‘Cissy,’ says my grandmother in a soothing tone. ‘It’s only right. Let me tell—’

  ‘Not a word,’ rasps Ma, shaking her head. ‘Unless you wish to look for alternate lodgings.’

  ‘Cissy! I am your mother!’

  ‘And as long as it is my name upon the licence, you will abide by my rules. Remember who does everything around here. Everything!’

  My spoon hovers between dish and lips. What species of imp prompts the next words I do not know.

  ‘Uncle Arthur,’ I pipe.

  ‘What?’ growls Ma, her eyes wide as saucers.

  ‘He helps.’

  She lets loose a cry that could split firewood. ‘He does nothing, do you hear?’ she screams. ‘I work my fingers to the bone and he swans in once a month!’

  I bow my head and let the storm rage. I think her ungrateful, but I’ll never be the one to say so. Uncle Arthur is a pearl of a man. Without him, who knows how we’d manage when Ma takes to her bed, regular and reliable as the full moon.

  Life continues on its confusing path.

  I grow into a swallowed voice of a girl. I speak when I am spoken to and often not even then. Ma says sufficient for the two of us, sharp as thistles and as bitter. I gulp down my words before they are born and they wedge in my throat like stones. If I lay my hand on my chest I feel them grinding together, locked up tight.

  As soon as I’m old enough to stand without hanging on to the furniture Ma has me collecting glasses and washing them too, for she scorns the idea o
f squandering cash on a servant. I learn quick not to break one, having no desire to increase the number of times she takes out her wrath on my backside.

  Year follows year until I reach my twelfth birthday. It is a proud day indeed, for I carry a jug of beer from the cellar without spilling a drop. It makes Ma happy. And when Ma is happy, well, so is everybody else.

  Our customers have their little ways. There’s the temperance man who disappears for a fortnight at a time, only to reappear with a famished look, ready to spring to the defence of his porter at closing time. There’s Old Tom, who takes the same seat by the fire and woe betide anyone who tries to purloin it. There are the pipe-smokers, teeth stained brown as the benches they sit upon. There’s the bearded fellow, white stripes running from the corners of his mouth and lending him the appearance of a badger.

  And there’s the charming man.

  The hair on his head is black, but his eyebrows and moustache are copper-red, adding a streak of spice to his features. I find it difficult to like a man whose head disagrees with his face. Whenever I pass through the bar on one errand or another, he grabs me around the waist and pulls me close, squeezing out what little breath I have to spare. Every time he does so Ma ticks me off.

  ‘Stop annoying the customers,’ she growls.

  ‘She’s not bothering me,’ he replies.

  One evening, after a particularly onerous spell of cuddles and pinches, I retreat to the privy. The night-soil collectors emptied the bucket the previous evening but it retains the fruity stink of human ordure. I consider the smell preferable to his unwanted attentions. There is no point in wasting a visit, so I hitch my skirt around my middle.

  I hear a light cough, more of an apology.

  The ginger-faced man slides into the doorway and hovers there. I stretch out my hand to pull the door shut, but he braces his foot against it.

  ‘I’ll make sure no ill befalls you,’ he says in his soft, polite way.

  I want to tell him to turn around and leave, but something in the way he speaks smothers my protestations. I have the sensation of a pillow stuffed with goose down being held tenderly over my face.

  I tug my skirt over my knees. It is tricky to keep my balance at the same time as preventing the hem from trailing in muck. My insides shrivel. I cannot go while he is watching. I pull up my drawers as modestly as I am able.

  ‘I didn’t hear you tinkle,’ he says, the loveliest of smiles lighting up his face.

  ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ I whisper. ‘I don’t need to.’

  ‘Oh, but you do,’ he purrs. He doesn’t shift aside to let me pass, nor does he lift his protective gaze from me for one instant.

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘But you must.’ His voice is as sticky as barley malt. ‘Ah!’ he breathes. ‘You’re afraid someone will barge in, aren’t you? I’ll tell you what. Let your old friend help you. I’ll fight off any rough fellows who come this way.’

  I can neither move nor speak.

  He waggles his fingers, fanning the sickly air. ‘I’ll be your lookout. Carry on.’

  A cry for help twists my innards. ‘No.’ It is less than a squeak. Barely an exhalation.

  ‘Do it,’ he says, a fraction sharper. ‘Now.’

  I sit down so quickly I crack my tailbone on the seat. I watch him turn very slowly until he takes position with arms folded, gazing towards the beerhouse door. I raise my petticoats, lower my bloomers. My body clenches. I tuck my chin into my chest and stare at the ground between my knees in the hope that I can block him out. I know he’ll not release me until he is satisfied.

  Whether it is my prayer or merely an urgent need to pass water, but liquid splashes into the bucket. I didn’t know it is possible to feel such relief. It gushes on and on as though it’ll never stop. I tear a scrap of paper from the string, wipe myself and rearrange my clothing. When I raise my head, he is staring right at me, beatific grin in place.

  ‘That’s better, isn’t it? I took care of you, didn’t I?’

  I do not reply.

  He stretches out a hand. ‘Here, little miss. Ups-a-daisy. Don’t want you falling in, do we now?’ he says sweetly.

  I struggle to my feet without the aid of his proffered hand. He chuckles at my refusal of help, shoves his fists into his pockets and saunters back to the bar, whistling. I trudge behind. I could have shouted for help. I could have screamed, You lied! You looked! A single word would have broken the spell. I stayed silent. I’m not sure why. What I am sure of is that this must be my fault.

  It is impossible to speculate how long I might have continued in this muddled state.

  Two weeks later, I traipse downstairs at breakfast-time to discover that Ma has retreated to her room, bedridden by her fearsome and unexplained women’s ailments. At school, I daydream that luck will smile; that Arthur will come through the door at the very moment Ma is shouting at me. I picture him stepping into the fray and calming her wrath. She’ll listen to her brother; she has to. She’ll lay her head upon his shoulder and promise she’ll never be angry, never again.

  The moment the bell rings I race home. As soon as I open the door I know he is there. Some pleasurable tickle in the air betrays his presence. I dash into the kitchen and am swept into his arms.

  ‘Princess!’ he roars.

  ‘Was ever a mother so blessed,’ says Nana.

  In feature and bearing Uncle Arthur and Ma are more alike than two bottles of beer set one next to the other. My mind supplies the unkind observation that one is bitter, one mild. I thrust the thought aside hastily.

  ‘How about a stroll to pick blackberries?’ says Arthur, kissing me till I giggle. ‘If that doesn’t strike you as the most boring idea in the world.’

  ‘Never,’ I gasp.

  The waste ground between the tracks and the canal seethes with brambles.

  ‘Keep an eye out for trains, eh?’ he says. ‘Let’s get you home with both legs attached.’

  We wave to the folk as they rattle past. Those in third class wave back. The grand folk in first class do not.

  ‘They can sneer all they want,’ says Uncle. ‘They’re not having blackberry pie for their supper.’

  The first few berries explode under my fierce fingers.

  ‘Pick them, don’t throttle them,’ he advises. ‘They’re not your enemy.’

  After a while I manage better and show off the tin proudly for inspection. He nods approval each time. The berries tantalise me deeper into the bush, the next always better than the last: bigger, juicier, each drupelet as inviting as liquorice. My mouth waters.

  ‘Can I eat any?’ I ask shyly.

  ‘Of course you can. Go for the ones that burst when you touch them. They’ll go off before we can get them through the front door. But they’re fine to eat now. How’s that for a plan?’

  We beam at each other. Brambles brush my face and snag my pinafore. I yelp as I prick myself. He takes my hand to inspect the thorn.

  ‘Close your teeth around the tip. Don’t bite or it’ll snap and you’ll never get the blighter out.’

  I do as instructed. It is like kissing my finger.

  ‘Now, spit.’

  Simple as that, it is gone.

  I study my palm. ‘It’s not even bleeding.’

  He smiles. ‘They don’t go deep. Only a problem if you leave them and they fester.’

  Even with the handfuls I stuff into my mouth, the tin fills with remarkable alacrity.

  ‘Done already?’ asks Uncle, peering at my hoard. ‘Let’s be getting off, then.’

  ‘We don’t have to,’ I say, stabbed with disappointment. ‘There are thousands. Look, I can carry them in my apron.’

  ‘They’ll stain. Blackberry juice is the very devil to get out. Don’t make work for your ma.’

  We pick our way up the siding. In my mind’s eye, Ma sits up in bed, remarking how much better she feels. Even though the sun beats down on my head, clouds may as well have pulled a curtain across the sky. I clutch Arthur’s hand.<
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  ‘Who’ll make the pie?’ I whisper. ‘You or Ma?’

  ‘You’re stuck with me tonight, Edie,’ he says. ‘Though I’m sure your ma makes better pastry.’

  ‘Mm,’ I murmur, spilling some of the berries. They tumble across the pavement like soft marbles. ‘They’re dirty!’ I sob.

  Uncle kneels and begins to pick them up. ‘Nothing a rinse under the tap won’t sort out.’

  ‘It’s your fault!’ I wail, far more upset than I should be.

  ‘Ah well,’ he says mildly.

  He returns the rescued fruit to my tin. The kitchen is empty on our return and my spirits rally. Uncle gets started on the pastry, rolling a sheet so vast it swamps the dish. I glance at the door, afraid that Ma may clump into the kitchen and knock him out of the way. The afternoon ticks away. When the pie is slumbering in the oven, he sits beside the range and fills his pipe.

  ‘You keep looking at the clock, Edie.’

  ‘Do I?’

  He pulls me close. ‘My little pickle. I could gobble you right up.’ He nuzzles my neck, presses his eye to my cheek and flutters the lashes. ‘Here come the butterflies!’

  ‘Don’t! No!’ I squeal.

  He draws away. ‘Want me to stop?’

  ‘Never.’

  I make a special effort to smile, which eases some of the clutching of my heart. He pats his knee.

  ‘How about a story?’ he asks.

  ‘It’s not bedtime.’

  ‘Who knows what’ll be afoot by then.’

  I clamber on to his lap and cling to his arm, solid as oak beneath the shirtsleeve. ‘A story, please. Yes. Now,’ I gabble.

  As he reads, I run my finger across his stubbled chin, revelling in his perfume of tobacco and fresh sweat. He smiles and on an impulse I throw my arms around his neck and squeeze.

  ‘Careful, child,’ he says. ‘I can hardly breathe.’

  ‘Yes you can,’ I say. ‘You’re as strong as a bear. You can take any amount of hugging.’

  I burrow into the broad sweep of his chest and imagine a home where he lives all of the time. A home where his shirt warms next to the hearth and a pipe of tobacco stands by. My throat tightens. Each mouthful of air has to negotiate its way past a stone lodged there.