It was as they walked along the esplanade later that Charlie realised his beloved was already making plans for their future. Renting a small villa for the rest of their life was not what Lily had in mind; they must strive to own their own place, even if she had to go and earn a wage herself. Alarm bells had sounded at her pronouncement, though a sentimental Charlie told himself that once Lily was settled and holding their little baby, she would soon change her mind.
Conveniently for the young couple, Mannion succeeded later in selling the house on Rosemount Terrace and had found one just down the road from where Bertha lived. It meant he was anxious to be rid of all Grand-mama’s old furniture from the sitting room, as most of it wouldn’t fit in their smaller place. He could take his time and choose the modern, light, Edwardian furniture that was fast appearing in the Grange Road shops, as there would be only three of them in the household.
Lily was fast despairing of her intended, who seemed to be a bit stingy when it came to how much they could spend on their home, chose the best that was on offer from the sitting room, including a Chinese reproduction cabinet, complete with the eggshell china that Lawrence had once brought back from his ‘China run’ as a present for his great aunt, and a black German piano. None of this had gone down well with Hannah, who was loath to see any of it go. In all of this Charlie kept his counsel; it was wiser to be that way.
Chapter Fourteen
With the nuptials over, Lily and Charlie found themselves in the same position that both of them had been in nearly ten years before. Mannion, flush with funds from the sale of his mother-in-law’s rambling house, had paid for an overnight stop for the happy couple in the Scarisbrick Hotel, an elegant building built in 1881 and situated on Lord Street in Southport.
It had been a slow trundling train ride from Liverpool after the wedding ceremony, though quite exciting for Lily, as she usually travelled in a horse and carriage to Southport. They alighted at the seaside town’s station, dressed in their best and feeling rather nervous as they walked arm in arm across the road to the hotel. It was getting dark on their arrival, only time to eat a light supper in the elegant dining room, then turn in. To say that the pair were nervous was perhaps an understatement; both were remembering with not a little aversion, what they had both been through.
Lily, the first to use the bathroom at the bottom of the corridor, sat in her white bridal nightdress and dressing gown, on the edge of the maroon, satin covered bed. She was full of trepidation and couldn’t meet Charlie’s eyes, when ready with his soap, towel and flannel he brushed passed her to the bathroom. She felt even more dismay after he returned, now dressed in a pair of blue striped pyjamas, with a white cord tied at the waist and a pair of leather slippers. She fell into a fit of giggles; he looked like a little child, who was coming to his mother to have his hair brushed. All he needed was a teddy bear.
To scowl at her flippancy could have put a grave dampener on their honeymoon. After all, Charlie had just given himself a talking to in the bathroom, reminding himself of the repercussions that could occur if he had a nosebleed and she was probably feeling as nervous as he. He drew her gently under the bed covers and began to caress her throat and neck with tiny kisses, taking his time and wondering as he did so why he was being so gentle, when already his member had enlarged in response to her proximity.
Lily lay passive, making no attempt to help him disrobe her, with no answering sighs or movement in response to his. Then he wondered, as he noticed by the light of the outside street lamp that had found its way through a crack in the curtains, why she had her eyes closed and a distasteful looking grimace on her face? He drew back startled by what he saw, but not before he had an untimely ejaculation, which had left her lovely nightgown splattered in a nasty smelling goo.
Horrified by what had happened and seeing Charlie lying back on the bed, clutching at his now naked manhood and moaning gently, too embarrassed to open his eyes and look at his beloved, Lily leapt from the bed shrieking that she must get a doctor to come and tend to him.
“Won’t someone come and see to my husband!” she cried, once she had managed to turn the lock on their bedroom door and had run into the corridor, where concerned fellow guests who had heard the noise in consternation were gathered in readiness to help in any way. It took all his strength and a dogged insistence, after covering his naked parts with his dressing gown, to drag her back into the bedroom again.
It had taken a while to calm poor Lily down, but with loving assurance that there was no need for him to see a doctor, as it was all a natural process in an effort to aid procreation, they slept together fully dressed in their night attire until morning arrived, when nothing more was said on the subject. Lily refused to get changed in front of him, dashing off to the bathroom in an effort to conserve her modesty and after breakfast, before catching the train back home again, they wandered along the bustling Lord Street, before watching people enjoying their holidays on the Southport sands.
Back in Mersey Mount, Lily fluttered about trying to make her nest with the aid of a few more rugs on top of the red and black linoleum downstairs, carpet runners at each side of their metal framed bed and trying to find places for the many vases, crockery, cookery books, canteens of cutlery and household linen received as wedding presents from friends and family. Charlie went back to the development office, a married man and well satisfied.
Lily was the stuff of his dreams and, judging by the little gasps of pleasure he heard whilst straddling her smooth, pert body in their marital bed, she had relaxed and become a willing marital partner. He also found that she could cook well, was adept in household management and always had a tasty dish on his return from work. Life was good and perhaps it would have stayed like that, but in August 1906 Charlie was asked to be part of the crew that was taking a submarine to Scapa Flow to see how it performed under the deep waters of the natural harbour, situated as it was between sheltered islands in the Orkneys.
At first he was reluctant, knowing that he would have to face up to his demons by enduring prolonged periods in an underwater craft, which would probably set off his breathing problems. Suffice to say that since his exposure to the bracing air of Scotland, his chest and lungs, or whatever it had been that had caused his wheeziness, had not been a subject of concern.
The remuneration if he were to go on the sea trial was excellent, no doubt because of the secret nature of the exercise, the dangers that it could possibly involve and the fact that they would be away from Liverpool for more than a few days. Besides that, it was rumoured that there was a distinct possibility the vessel might be moored at Longhope, a place that Charlie had always wished to visit and the crew would be allowed ashore.
He was away for four days, long enough for Lily to miss him and wait up in her nightie in case he returned. She had grown used to his presence in the still of the night, listening to his even breathing and feeling his warm body next to hers. What a revelation her wedding night had been! How was it that she and Roland had experienced such difficulties, when now she found the whole coupling thing with Charlie as easy as falling off a log? During the time that he was away she visited her mother, who had become bedridden because of her excessive weight. She also helped with the cooking and cleaning in her parents’ Carlton Road household, in order to give her sister Mabel a bit of a break.
Charlie, full of trepidation as the vessel submerged into the narrow isthmus of water off the mainland of Orkney, with it’s conning tower disappearing from view, suppressed his terror as the lights went dim. He counted the minutes, as the captain barked his orders, after viewing through his periscope for hazards out of sight, then heartfelt relief when the craft floated to the surface. He was rewarded for his sufferance with a bracing walk along the anchorage wall at Longhope, where two Martello towers and a gun battery had been used in earlier years for protection from foreign privateers.
During this time, Lily had an inkling that she and Charlie might have made a baby. She felt sick most mornin
gs, disliked the smell of the coffee that her mother liked to drink, hadn’t seen her monthly visitor for a while and looked a little pale and wan when she surveyed herself in her dressing table mirror. She desperately wanted it to be so, if only to be able to hold her head up high amongst her sisters, who had probably viewed her with pity over the years. The person to talk to then was Bertha. No use asking her mother on all things birds and bees, as her mother still had her feet planted firmly in the moral strictures of Victorian times, but Bertha, having given birth to three of Lawrence’s children, could be relied upon to give her sister chapter and verse.
Once again, Lily was struck by the gruesome details involved in producing a baby for the next generation. Though she wondered if Bertha was exaggerating in an effort to scare her as perhaps she was still feeling slightly antagonistic, but to say that the seed that Charlie had planted would make its way through the place where she passed water in at least eight months time, seemed to be a bit of a fabrication. Didn’t a doctor cut you down the middle and take the baby out? She was sure that she had heard that story whilst eavesdropping outside her Grand-mama’s sitting room door.
Charlie was delighted to hear of the possibility of him becoming a father, when he returned from his baptism of fire around the islands of Orkney. A baby, the ultimate act of a couple in love and would celebrate their union. It would be worth all the fear that he had felt when the submarine had first dived under the waters, just to know that he was doing it for his beloved and their child.
A baby girl, delivered the following April, confirmed what Bertha had told her when Lily gave birth the natural way, not via a cut to her belly. They decided to call their offspring Isabel, who turned out to be a colicky child who could cry for hours on end.
Lily, tired from the disturbed nights, anxious days and a wish that she could have her slight figure back again, was more than a little grumpy and not in a receptive mood when Charlie told her one evening after work that he couldn’t cope with the sea trials and must look for something new. His fear of being trapped inside a ‘cigar tube’ had come to the fore and his nightmares during his sleeping time were causing bouts of nerves.
“Your nerves, what about my nerves?” Lily had exploded, handing the wailing child to Charlie and storming into the kitchen, where she had been about to warm a bottle of milk for Isabel. “I don’t think you know what you’re talking about. Try looking after that one all day and all night. We’ve got the christening next Sunday, I’ll be mortified if she shows me up in front of the family.”
“I’m sure I would rather look after Isabel than stare death in the face every time I step aboard a floating coffin. I’ve made my mind up Lily, I’m going to pack it in.”
The serious tone in his voice as he followed her into the kitchen made her realise that Charlie wasn’t joking. Not known for discussing his feelings, as it wasn’t a manly thing to do, he must have been bottling it up for ages, as he had carried out four sea trials since the transfer from his office job.
“But it’s such good money, Charlie. How are we going to manage if you give up such well paid job?” Lily took Isabel from him, pushing the bottle teat into the child’s mouth and sitting down suddenly on a kitchen chair.
“We’ll never be able to afford one of those new houses that they are building in Tranmere, if you decide not to continue with the job.”
“So being able to buy a house is more important than my health, Lily?” His spirits plummeted as he searched her inscrutable face for an answer. It would seem it was so.
“We can’t live here for the rest of our lives, paying rent to a landlord that can’t even be bothered to fix that slate on the roof when you asked him too. No, we have a good amount in our bank account and it won’t be long before can afford to put down a deposit.”
“My bank account, Lily.” Charlie, unusually for him, played the head of the household, he was so worked up with agitation. “Let’s not forget that it is me who has his name on the savings book, not you and I’ll decide what we’ll do with it.”
“Please yourself.” Lily went upstairs with the baby, her body taut with anger at his attitude. So this was how it was to be in her marriage to Charlie; she’d be the little woman without a say. She felt relief when the exasperating child had stopped her crying. She’d withdraw his privileges when they went to bed, that would teach him.
Charlie, left alone with his thoughts in the kitchen, poured himself a slug of whisky that he kept out of sight in his shoe-shine box. It calmed his nerves before reporting for duty at the shipyard wharf.
It was a moonlit night in September 1908, two years after Isabel was born and Charlie stood at the dockside with his colleagues, technical observers, navy personnel and a couple of apprentices, who were anxious to sail in this wondrous vessel called HMS Bravery. The submersible was about to do its sea trials out in Liverpool Bay and they were waiting for a tugboat to pull alongside the wharf, which would escort it on its voyage out to Liverpool Bay.
Charlie was dressed in denim overalls over his navy blue guernsey, as it was likely he would be called upon to check the wiring if there was a problem. He shivered in the cool air and smiled encouragingly at Jimmy Baines, his apprentice. At nineteen, Jimmy was full of bravado on the outside, but inside was a quivering wreck.
“It’s a piece of cake, Jimmy,” he said quietly, as the lieutenant commander, who was in charge of the mission and was standing only a couple of feet away, complained loudly that someone’s head would be on the block if the tug didn’t turn up in the next few minutes. “This is my tenth time and, except for feeling a bit strange when you find yourself under the sea, you get used to it.” A bit of an understatement really, because Charlie had never ‘got used to it’ and could already feel tightness in his chest as he waited to board the thing. This was going to be the last time, he promised himself, as the tug drew closer and the order went out to climb down the metal ladder attached to the side of the deck. The very last time, even if my beloved never speaks to me again.
Chapter Fifteen
Lily looked at Charlie’s fob-watch, which he had left behind at the side of his bed. It was twenty past eight in the morning, two days since he had left again for another secret mission. He had said it would be local, the Irish Sea, Liverpool Bay, maybe along the Lancashire coast to Fleetwood. He hadn’t been sure, as this time there was supposed to be a lot of top brass involved from the navy and the operation was ‘hush hush’.
Lily was thoughtful, as she pushed Isabel along in the perambulator to her parent’s villa, the latter warmly dressed in a homemade white knitted dress and cardigan. Was it worth all her husband’s anxiety, just so they could find enough money to buy their own house? She had seen him change from a confident man, dressed smartly in the modern striped suits he liked to wear and walking along with a bit of a strut, as befitted a chap who worked in an important industry, to someone who had become rather edgy. He’d lost weight, more than he should, as his frame was thin to begin with and he’d jump at any sudden sound. He had gone back to sitting near the landing stage recently, lost in his thoughts as he stared into space across the Mersey. The biggest thing and in Lily’s mind, the most important thing, was his inability to maintain an erection when she allowed him to make love. She had hoped they would have another baby in the future, now that Isabel was a lot easier to look after and didn’t cry so much,
“So when do you think you’ll be getting your new place, Lily?” asked Mannion, once she had settled Isabel on a pillow by Hannah. They sat at the side of her mother’s bed, which had now been moved to the front room downstairs. “I had a walk along there at the weekend and it looks as if they’ll be snapped up if you don’t get a move on. Three have been sold already.”
“Yes, I know, Father. I walk that way when I’m taking Isabel for her constitutional, but Charlie is worried about losing his job and doesn’t want to tie himself down if we have to rely on his savings in the future.”
“Pooh! That shipyard has enough work
on to keep your husband going until he retires. Talk about a job for life, especially if there’s another war.”
“Another war?”
“Yes Lily, there are rumblings. You only have to read the papers, there’s a lot of speculation about them Austro-Hungarians looking for an excuse to attack the Serbians.”
“Stop frightening her, Father, what’s our country got to do with any of that lot?” Hannah passed her grandchild over, not to Mannion, who wasn’t adept at changing napkins. “Here Lily, take Isabel, she needs her soil cloth replacing.”
Another day dawned, another day when Lily wondered why Charlie hadn’t returned from his secret mission. If he was only going to Liverpool Bay, or a little further up the coastline, where had he got to this time? Perhaps she should push the pram as far as the shipyard and inquire of that nice Mr O’ Neill, who Charlie had said was an approachable fellow and ask if he had any notion of when her husband would be back.
“It’s the Bravery,” said the man guarding the gate, when Lily eventually got to the shipyard, as Isabel had been sick and she’d had to change her clothes. It seemed that every time the child had things made from milk, it would set her off again. “The friends and family are over there.”
He pointed to a small crowd that had gathered at the side of a row of office buildings. A man was waving his arms about, as if in a bit of a rage.
“What’s the Bravery?” Lily ventured, not sure whether to ask the gate man if she could enter the dock to speak to Charlie’s superior instead, as he seemed to be a bit agitated over something.
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