The Women of Lilac Street

by Annie Murray

  ‘Hello,’ Rose said. ‘Haven’t seen you about in a while.’

  ‘Hello – and hello, Lily, love,’ Susanna said, smiling at the little girl. She was her usual rather reserved self but she did seem distracted. She looked very hot and flustered.

  ‘Just back from work?’ Rose asked as they turned into the street.

  Susanna said that she was.

  ‘How’re you all keeping, then?’ Rose asked questions quickly so that Susanna could not ask her any. She couldn’t help noticing that Susanna was overdressed for the weather, in a rather thick navy cotton dress and a heavy cardigan buttoned over the top. Her cheeks were very round and pink. All of a sudden, Rose couldn’t help noticing, Susanna seemed portly. Her body was quite substantial and her face had thickened up as well.

  ‘Oh, we’re all right,’ Susanna assured her with determined cheeriness. ‘You know, going along as usual.’

  ‘Well, that’s good. Have you got a date with David yet – for the wedding?’ Rose asked in a friendly, teasing voice.

  ‘Not yet. Next year, we hope.’

  Susanna was the same, reserved young woman, Rose thought. Just . . . bigger. As they said their goodbyes, Rose watched her walk away. If she didn’t know better, Rose realized, she’d have said Susanna was expecting. But that just wasn’t possible! Not Susanna – such a dutiful, religious girl. No, it couldn’t be. Rose narrowed her eyes, watching. Although Susanna seemed bulky at the front, she wasn’t walking like someone carrying a child. Her gait was brisk and unencumbered.

  ‘Well, she’s getting a bit plump,’ she said half to herself. ‘Maybe it’s because she’s happy.’

  Would she become plump and rounded once she was with Arthur?

  Panic seized her again, as it kept doing. Oh, God, she thought, leading Lily into the house. I’m the one who’s expecting! She couldn’t carry on avoiding it. I must be two months gone, she calculated. Harry mustn’t notice. Nor Arthur – not yet.

  In her heart of hearts she was almost sure that the baby must be Harry’s, but she didn’t want to believe it. Her mind wrestled with the problem.

  How can I possibly be sure? Maybe I got it wrong and it is Arthur’s? Anyway, whatever happens, Arthur will be the father now. He’ll love it, bring it up. It’s his baby in my heart.

  And there were the thoughts she could not admit aloud, even to herself. If the child turned out looking just like Harry – well, Arthur would never be able to see, would he?

  Fifty-Nine

  Phyllis stood just to one side of her front window, from where she could look out from behind the net curtain. She was perspiring in the humid day and she wiped a hand across her pink face.

  Everyone in Lilac Street seemed to be going about their normal business. Phyllis saw Rose Southgate pass in front of her, in a pretty blue frock, with her little girl beside her. A queer fish that one, Phyllis thought. She watched Rose move out of sight with her shopping bag.

  Even though it was getting on for a month now since she had had her encounter with Ethel Sharp, Phyllis was still on edge, was constantly looking out for her. She kept going to the window, many times each day, just to make sure that there was no one there, that Ethel wasn’t standing across the street watching her house, taking revenge, spreading rumours. It had become an obsession. Her dreams were full of blood and violence.

  We just need to get this baby over with, she thought. That’s taking it out of me. I can’t rest easy until it’s all settled. I hope to God Nancy keeps her word about it. There were so many ifs and buts, far too many details to worry about.

  She turned her back to the window and looked at her front room, her pride. Everything shone with care and elbow grease, the coal scuttle, the fire-tongs and clock, all her hard-won ornaments, her badges of ownership and respectability. Phyllis clenched her fists, thinking of Ethel. Nothing and no one was going to break into the castle of security she had built first with James and then on her own. It was all hers, her standing in the neighbourhood, her children, her things. No one was going to spoil it.

  ‘Mom?’ Dolly’s sleepy voice broke into her thoughts. She appeared still in her nightdress, her long hair hanging down, looking like a little girl, except for the smooth, contradictory curve of her belly. She was big now, ripe. ‘What’re you doing in here? You’re always looking out of the window. What’s so interesting about out there?’

  Dolly made as if to look herself, but Phyllis pulled her back.

  ‘Don’t you go showing yourself, Dolly,’ she reprimanded her.

  Dolly tutted. ‘I feel like a prisoner.’

  Stung, Phyllis snapped, ‘Well, I should’ve thought staying in’s a small price to pay!’

  The baby was due in early August and last week Phyllis had instructed Dolly to give up her job and stay in the house until it was all over.

  ‘That’s when you’ll really get to a size. You’d best stay out of sight.’

  ‘Well, what about us?’ Rachel had asked. ‘Do we still have to wear all this blooming stuffing round us?’

  ‘What you’ve got to do,’ Phyllis emphasized, standing leaning over the table where they were sitting, ‘is to put yourselves out and about even more. ’Specially you, Rachel.’

  ‘Why?’ Rachel said huffily. Dolly’s sisters had had more than enough of the whole business.

  ‘Because you’re the one who looks the most like Dolly. Lots of ’em say they can’t tell you apart. So you go out in the morning – ’specially the weekend – wearing one frock and a hat. Later on you’ll get changed – into something Dolly’s been wearing – and go and put yourself about out there again. And put some chalk on that mole.’

  Susanna looked shocked. ‘Mom, that’s – well, it’s very deceiving.’

  Phyllis’s lips twisted with bitter amusement. ‘You’ve just noticed, then? We’ve got to finish this, now we’ve started. It’s just got to be done and you’ve all got to keep your traps shut.’

  As usual they had agreed and obeyed her. It had all gone this far – what were they to do?

  Now, with Dolly in front of her, complaining that she was hungry, Phyllis, for almost the first time, allowed herself to take in that within her daughter’s belly there was a child growing. When she had had her own babies she had felt fulfilled and triumphant at her own capacity to give life and at the fierce love she felt for them. It had been the greatest time of her life, by far. She had felt like a queen. And James had taken great pride in her fertility, though they both agreed four was enough. But until now she had not allowed her mind to follow the reality of the situation, that inside Dolly was her grandchild. She felt a twist of almost overwhelming longing inside her. But no! They couldn’t keep it here. Mustn’t. She pushed her feelings away.

  ‘Well, if you’re hungry,’ she said brusquely, ‘go and have something to eat.’

  ‘I’ve had enough,’ Babs panted. She and Aggie were out in the street skipping, taking it in turns to run in and out and jump over the long rope. ‘I’m all sticky and I need a drink of water.’

  ‘Come on, then,’ Aggie said. ‘Ann – keep an eye on May, will you? I’ll be back.’

  It was stiflingly hot and the children, who had just broken up from school, were already in holiday mood. As Aggie and Babs ran into Aggie’s yard they nearly ran full tilt into someone coming out of Eliza Jenks’s house.

  Aggie raised her eyes gradually, seeing first a pair of big, dusty boots, above which were faded black trousers topped by a magnificent belly, thrusting against a white-ish shirt. This was topped off with a faded black jerkin. His sleeves were rolled to display forearms bristling with curling grey hair and, on his left arm, a long colourful tattoo. At the top was a big, fleshy face and balding head with curly tufts of grey hair over each ear. Blue eyes looked at her very amiably, over the pinkest pair of cheeks Aggie thought she had ever seen. They were smooth and shiny as apple skins.

  ‘Eh – canny on theya! You nearly ’ad me orva!’ was what he said, in an accent so strange that Aggie took a f
ew seconds to take in what he meant.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said, meaning it.

  ‘Ah should think you are!’ he chuckled. ‘Well, noo I’ve met yee, yee can gissies a bit of advice. Should Ah come and live heor, in this canny good lady’s house?’

  Aggie and Babs looked at each other and giggled. He looked such a jolly, well-disposed person.

  ‘Yes,’ Babs said. ‘You should. That’s what I think.’ And they both got the giggles again.

  Eliza Jenks, Mary Crewe’s sister, came out into the yard then, looking more cheerful than she had in a long time. Her grey eyes were full of amusement.

  ‘Well, Mr Gates,’ she said.

  ‘That’s me,’ the man chuckled infectiously. ‘Mr Gyets from Gyetshead. You’ll think that’s a jork, but it’s not.’

  ‘A jork,’ Babs whispered to Aggie. ‘I think ’e means a joke.’

  ‘D’you want to take the room?’ Eliza said. She had cleaned the place up spotless to make sure she could rent it to someone.

  Mr Gates looked around the yard. ‘Are the neighbours aal reet?’

  Aggie and Babs nodded. ‘I live over there,’ Aggie pointed out importantly. ‘That’s my mother.’

  Jen had just come out into the yard and caught sight of Aggie with the stranger. Curious, and a bit protective, she came over.

  ‘Yee this one’s mutha?’

  Jen squinted at him, then nodded, starting to smile. You couldn’t not smile at the sight of Mr Gates.

  ‘You coming to rent off Miss Jenks?’ she said.

  ‘Aye – ahm thinking of deein tha.’ He eyed Jen’s swollen belly with sympathy, but didn’t say anything. ‘Seems aal reet heor. Ah’ve had a canny good welcome.’

  As he was nodding his head, Jen understood that he was moving in, even though she could not make out much of what he was saying. She and Eliza Jenks both stood smiling.

  ‘There’s nothin’ left fre me in Gateshead, so ah thought ahd myek a fresh start heor, see.’ He grinned at their bemused faces. ‘Yee divvent knaa what the hell ahm saying, dyer? It’s leik a foreign cuntry doon heor!’

  By this time Aggie saw that Nanna had come out and was listening in to the conversation, but she shook her head in bewilderment and went back inside again, though she was smiling.

  Everyone wished Mr Gates welcome and when Aggie went in, Nanna said, ‘I’ve had more luck making sense of a Frenchie than that. Is he moving in?’

  ‘Looks like it,’ Jen told her. ‘I s’pose we’ll get used to him. Any road, he looks a cheerful sort and goodness knows, we could do with a bit of that around here.’

  Sixty

  All the gossip that week was about Mr Gates. As the newest resident and being different, foreign almost, in everyone’s eyes, all the tittle-tattle centred round him. Mrs Peters next door was very nosey and saved the others the effort of asking questions. By that Sunday morning she had most of the basic facts and was full of importance sharing them around.

  Jen met Edna Peters outside at the tap at the beginning of what promised to be another stiflingly warm day. Jen wasn’t overly fond of Edna, a small, sharp-faced little woman with faded blonde hair, but she was curious about what she’d found out.

  ‘He must be a widower, I think,’ Edna said, waiting with her bucket as Jen filled an enamel bowl of water. ‘He’s on his own and he’s got some grown-up sons – one’s away in the navy, that he did say. Not that you can make out much of what he’s on about.’

  ‘It’s a big step, moving down here like that,’ Jen said, grasping the heavy bowl, resting it on her belly. She nodded her head at the tap. ‘I can’t turn it off – you come and fill yours.’

  ‘I s’pose it is,’ Edna agreed as the water splashed into her bucket. ‘I mean, he ain’t young. Must be well on the wrong side of fifty. I just hope there’s nothing – well, you know. Nothing he’s got to hide, like.’

  ‘By the sound of it,’ Jen said, ‘there’s not so much work up there as there is down here – and let’s face it, there ain’t that much here. I’ll have to go – this is doing my back in.’

  She waddled back to the house. Freda was downstairs now as well.

  ‘I couldn’t sleep, it’s that warm,’ she said, flexing her still-fragile arm. She had had the plaster removed and was trying to pretend that it was all completely better.

  ‘I know,’ Jen said, getting the kettle on. ‘It’s going to be sweltering in here today.’

  ‘That one canting again?’ Freda said, nodding out towards Mrs Peters, in the yard.

  ‘Ar – as ever.’

  ‘So what did she say, then?’

  Aggie and Babs played out all morning and Mr Gates called a cheery greeting to them, but otherwise they didn’t take very much notice. He went out for some time, causing speculation about whether he was a churchgoing man, but no one knew anything for sure.

  By the time dinner was over and Aggie was getting the others ready for Sunday school, and so far as she knew, Mom and Nanna were both fast asleep. Jen was tired out from working every hour she could at the fried fish shop. But she didn’t complain; she just went out and got on with it.

  ‘Shurrup bossing,’ Ann said grumpily as Aggie nagged her and the boys to get a move on. ‘You ain’t our mom!’

  ‘Just shurrit yerself,’ Aggie retorted. ‘It’s all right for you – I have to do everything round here.’

  ‘Have we got to get Lily?’ Silas asked, shoving his feet into Ann’s cast-off pumps which were now his.

  ‘Yes – so hurry up,’ Aggie urged. ‘Come on, May.’

  It was oppressively hot, the sun right overhead and casting very little shadow. Babs was already on her way, a young brother in each hand. ‘See you down there!’ she called.

  Mrs Southgate was waiting at the door with Lily. She seemed ready to go out, with her straw hat and cardigan on, and she closed the door behind her as she handed Lily over.

  ‘There you go, dear. She’s been ever so impatient, waiting for you.’

  Aggie stared at Mrs Southgate and thought she was the one who looked impatient. Lily was quiet and if anything looked a bit sad. It seemed a long time since their cosy afternoons by the fire with the poems and Mata Hari.

  Rose Southgate seemed disconcerted by Aggie’s hard stare. ‘Is there anything wrong, dear?’ she asked.

  All the things Mrs Southgate had said she would do and hadn’t welled up in Aggie. The sewing was the thing she felt most bitter about. Her heart was hard with disappointment and she felt defiant.

  ‘Are you going to pay me for taking Lily to Sunday school?’ she dared ask. After all, she thought, Mom needed the money and how was it different from the other errands?

  Mrs Southgate’s face flushed with annoyance. ‘Oh, no – I don’t think so. I don’t really think that’s polite of you, Aggie. After all, you’re going to the church yourself and it’s not really what you’d call a job, is it? Have a nice time, Lily,’ she said and walked off as fast as she could.

  ‘Huh,’ Aggie muttered, watching Mrs Southgate’s slender form speed away from her. ‘Feels like a job to me. Oh, for goodness’ sake, where’s Silas gone now?’

  There was a hiatus as Silas ran back in for his marble collection. He only had six marbles so far but they had to go everywhere with him.

  Mrs Southgate set off in the opposite direction to them. Aggie thought she must be going to see Mr King. Again, she felt that sinking sense of betrayal. Why was Mrs Southgate going about telling people she was Mr King’s fiancée? It didn’t make any sense, but it added to the growing feeling that she couldn’t trust Rose Southgate.

  A figure came towards them on the shaded side of the street. Aggie was surprised to see that it was Mr Southgate, wheeling his bicycle with his fishing rods tied along the side of it. He was walking hurriedly, with an intense look, his eyes fixed on the far end of the street, where his wife had just disappeared.

  ‘Dad!’ Lily called to him. Aggie could see she was upset that he hadn’t noticed. Both of her parents’ minds w
ere full of too many other things these days.

  Harry’s head turned. He looked shocked to see her there. ‘See yer later,’ he said carelessly, and hurried on.

  Aggie turned to watch him. As she did so, she saw Mrs Best appear at her front door, her eyes following Harry as he moved up the road. Mr Southgate stopped at his house, leaning the bike against the wall for a moment. He carried the rods up the entry, and seconds later, reappeared without them, jumped on to the bike and rode off fast along the street.

  Inside, Jen Green was having a lie-down, but was still wide awake. She had hoped for a nap, but felt restless and the babies inside her weren’t quiet either. Limbs jostled about under her ribcage.

  ‘Settle down, you little so-and-sos,’ she whispered, shifting on to her left side to try and get comfy. It was no good on her back; she couldn’t seem to breathe properly.

  As usual her mind was going round and round, fretting about money and making ends meet. Mr Price was a kind man and she was truly grateful to him for giving her work, but her wages didn’t amount to all that much. That and her mother’s tiny widow’s pension and the little bits the kids brought in were all they had to go on at the moment. Thank goodness they’d been able to move and save on the rent! And Mom was on about going back to work soon. She swore she’d be able to manage. Jen was worried to death about her, but she was that stubborn. And soon these babbies would arrive . . . What was she going to do then? She’d be unable to work, at least for a bit, and they’d all be crammed into this rotten little house like wasps in a bottle.

  She felt tired to her very bones with the struggle of it all. So tired and so worried. She felt as if the flesh on her face was pulled tight with it all the time, the worry and tension. And she missed Tommy with a constant ache inside her. Not that he had been able to bring in much either, not for a good while. His health had finished him, however hard he’d tried. She smiled, sadly, picturing him, his laughing face, always ready for a joke. But the illness had eaten away at him, removing him from her. The thought that she’d never see him again would knife through her, suddenly, the pain fresh and raw every time.