Charity

by Lesley Pearse

  Janice said it was eggs that made her bad, but it was Mrs Cod who couldn’t bear the smell of bacon.

  ‘Charity!’ Mrs Cod’s big hand touched her shoulder. ‘What’s wrong? This isn’t like you. You’re as white as a sheet.’

  ‘A tummy upset.’ Charity managed a weak smile. ‘I had a pain in the night and it’s just come back.’

  ‘You’d better go and lie down then,’ she said. ‘Go on, I can manage.’

  Lying on her bed Charity faced up to what was happening.

  She was five weeks overdue and that attack downstairs had been morning sickness, however much she hoped otherwise. Now she thought about it, her breasts were tender, something she remembered her mother complaining about when she was expecting James.

  The prospect was too awful to contemplate. If she confided in anyone it would soon get back to Miss Hawkins and she knew she’d get the sack immediately.

  She got off the bed and went over to the window. The big chestnut tree at the bottom of the playing field was shaking in the wind, golden leaves fluttering down like scraps of paper from a bonfire. A group of boys in shorts and singlets running round the grounds reminded her sharply of Hugh.

  ‘Just keep calm,’ she told herself as she turned away and opened the drawer to take out her writing paper. ‘You aren’t the first girl in the world to get pregnant out of marriage, and he loves you.’

  Chapter Ten

  ‘There’s a letter for you, Charity,’ Mrs Cod yelled over the roar of the potato peeler.

  Charity’s heart leapt. She dropped the porridge pan she was scouring into the sink with a clatter and ran into the kitchen, tearing off her rubber gloves.

  ‘A boyfriend?’ Pat enquired, her long face bright with curiosity as she peeled apples for pies.

  ‘It’s over there!’ Mrs Cod nodded her head in the direction of a work surface by the door. She was rolling out pastry on the table, her red face frosted with flour. ‘Miss Hawkins brought it in.’

  Charity snatched up the familiar blue envelope.

  ‘Aren’t we going to hear who it’s from?’ Mrs Cod asked as Charity disappeared back into the scullery.

  ‘She don’t share anything with us these days,’ Pat said teasingly. ‘Our little Swot’s got herself a fella!’

  Although Charity heard the women’s familiar banter her mind was only on Hugh’s handwriting. Trembling with excitement she pulled out the single sheet of paper and leaned back against the sink.

  But as her eyes scanned the lines, her legs seemed to turn to jelly and an involuntary gasp of horror escaped from her lips.

  She read it through again, sure she must be mistaken, but as his words slowly sank in, the colour drained from her face.

  It was hot and steamy in the scullery, but all at once she was shivering.

  ‘Come on, out with it.’ Mrs Cod’s voice seemed to come out of nowhere. Charity glanced up and saw the woman standing in the doorway, her hands on her wide hips. ‘Anything to tell us?’

  ‘No.’ Charity shoved the letter into her pocket. ‘It’s nothing.’

  ‘Not bad news, is it?’ The older woman moved nearer, a frown of concern on her big florid face.

  Charity wanted to scream, knock pans round the kitchen, cry in someone’s arms, but she could say nothing – at least not until she’d thought it through.

  ‘No, it’s all right.’ She turned back to the sink, willing Mrs Cod to clear off and leave her. ‘Just a note from someone who worked at the pub this summer.’

  The morning seemed interminable as she tried to bottle up her grief. She avoided contact with the other women, knowing that one affectionate remark, any attempt at drawing her out, would make her confess everything.

  But as she reached her room at two-thirty, the pain of rejection hit her. She fell on to her narrow bed and sobbed until the tears ran dry.

  ‘But why, Hugh?’ she whispered. ‘Why did you say all those things if you never meant them?’

  She read the letter again, trying desperately to make his words sound less final.

  Dear Charity,

  I’m sorry, but I have to break it off with you. My mother found out from Rob’s mother that you’d been staying at the cottage and she went ape. At first I thought she might calm down and forget about it. But she’s threatened to write to the school and tell them about us, unless I promise to stop seeing you. I don’t want you getting the sack on my account and anyway, Mother’s right, it wouldn’t work out. I’ve got years of studying ahead of me and I’m too young to go steady. It was a great summer, we had a lot of fun and I’ll never forget you. But I can’t go against my parents, not now. Sorry, I hope you aren’t too upset.

  Love, Hugh.

  Bitterness rose up in her as she analysed exactly what he was saying. Faced with the possibility of his parents’ cutting off their financial support, Hugh found he didn’t care tuppence about the girl he said he loved. She was just a kitchen maid, an embarrassment, an unnecessary burden.

  If he’d meant only half of the things he’d said back in the cottage, he could’ve suggested they pretend to break it off and meet in secret. But it was clear he wanted nothing more to do with her. She would figure in his boasts to friends as the girl he bedded in the summer hols, along with how many pints of beer he drank in one night and the escapades of the other student bar staff. But he didn’t love her, now or then.

  Alone in her room, six weeks after she had said goodbye to him, she could look back and see pointers which showed that his feelings had never run as deep as hers. His letters had never been as passionate as hers, and until that day at the pool he’d never spoken of the future. Even his farewell wave didn’t have the same sadness as her own.

  Everyone always said men only wanted one thing. While she’d been looking at love and marriage, his mind had just been on sex.

  She couldn’t go back downstairs to get her tea at five. If anyone saw her swollen eyes they’d guess.

  Lying on the bed staring at the ceiling she knew she had to leave. If she stayed until her pregnancy was obvious she’d get the sack anyway.

  But how would she manage? She’d been relying on Hugh’s help. Fear brought a fresh flood of tears and although she tried to think calmly all she could see was her stomach growing larger and larger until the baby arrived.

  A woman at the baths in Greenwich had once talked about visiting someone to get rid of an unwanted baby. That was the answer! But how would she find someone?

  One thing was certain: there was no one here at Bowes Court who would know such things. She would have to go to London.

  The pain inside her welled up until it consumed her. There was no one up here to hear her sobs, no one anywhere that truly cared. She had trusted him, given him everything she had to offer and now she was rejected.

  ‘I’m having your baby,’ she cried as she held Hugh’s photograph to her heart. ‘Do you know what you’ve done to me?’

  Sleeping on her problems didn’t ease the pain, but in the early hours she came up with a plan. She would say she was going for an interview for a job on her day off, then come back and announce she was handing in her notice.

  She was glad now she hadn’t told Hugh about her pregnancy in her letters. If he didn’t want her without knowing his child was growing inside her, he certainly wasn’t going to help her now.

  ‘Are you quite sure this is what you want?’ Miss Hawkins looked at Charity’s handwritten notice, then back at her face.

  She had heard Charity’s story that she’d landed a job at an insurance company in London and how she intended to find a room in a shared flat with some other girls, but somehow it didn’t ring true. Was she making it all up?

  It was Charity’s expression that worried her. There was a dead look in her eyes, no warmth in her smile. Where was the excitement that young girls usually showed when they were on their way to a more thrilling job?

  ‘Quite sure,’ Charity said evenly, avoiding the housekeeper’s direct glance. ‘I get lonely here
and I want some new experience.’

  Then Miss Hawkins remembered those letters. For the whole first year the only ones Charity got were from Mr and Mrs Charles. But since the holiday there had been three or four from a different source. Maybe Charity had found herself a boyfriend during the holidays, as Mrs Cod suggested. But it wasn’t her business to pry.

  ‘I’m sorry to see you go, Charity.’ Miss Hawkins was sincere about this, she liked the girl. ‘You’ve been one of the best workers we’ve ever had here and all the staff will miss you. But if this is what you really want, then I can’t stop you.’

  Charity longed to tell Miss Hawkins what she really wanted. For Hugh to write again and say it was all a big mistake and he still loved her. Or that she’d wake one morning and find the pregnancy was a false alarm. But no one could give her those things. Leaving was the only way to keep her good name.

  ‘Well if you’re sure I’ll have your cards and a reference ready on Friday.’ Miss Hawkins sighed. ‘But if you change your mind, you’re quite welcome to stay.’

  It was very odd saying goodbyes. She felt little emotion, even though every one of the kitchen staff had come to mean a great deal. She went through the ritual of taking their addresses and small gifts, promising she’d write as soon as she was settled, knowing she would never contact anyone again.

  But the oddest thing of all was leaving by the front door. In a whole year she’d never been out that way and it seemed strangely symbolic that her last memory of Bowes Court should be stepping out of the brightly lit hall into darkness. All this school meant to her was Hugh, and she was never going to see either of them again.

  As Charity came up the steps from the underground at Hammersmith she felt as if she’d arrived in a different country. Although it was nearly eleven at night it was bustling with people, and so noisy she was instantly intimidated. Traffic roared around the Broadway, there were cafés and restaurants still open and music blasted out from at least five public houses.

  ‘Could you tell me the way to Shepherd’s Bush Road?’ she asked a couple of girls. They were dressed as if going dancing or to a party, their hair up in beehives, coats open to show sparkly dresses.

  ‘You ain’t going to the Palais with that lot, are you?’ one giggled, looking down at Charity’s case and holdall.

  ‘No I’m looking for a place called Greystones,’ she said, not understanding what the girl meant by the Palais.

  ‘Dunno where that is.’ The second girl blew a bubble of gum thoughtfully. Her eyes were heavily lined with black, giving her a menacing look. ‘But this is Shepherd’s Bush Road.’ She pointed to the road round the corner where much of the traffic was heading.

  ‘It’s a long bleedin’ road,’ the other one volunteered.

  Charity thanked them, picked up her case again and as she turned the corner saw the Palais for herself. Dozens of girls just like the ones she’d spoken to were making their way in there and even more men, all in suits with winklepickers and slicked-down hair. She had to step into the road to get past them all and she saw it was a dance hall, with men on the door wearing dinner jackets and bow ties.

  Had she not been so exhausted and strung out by the day’s events, she might have felt a twinge of excitement at coming to such a busy place, but instead all these people out enjoying themselves heightened her sense of isolation.

  She had a picture in her head of Greystones girls’ hostel as a place something like a hotel. She’d got the number out of the classified telephone directory. Four other hostels had said they were full, so when she’d heard this one had a spare bed she booked it there and then. But as she made her way along the road and saw one long terrace of tall, dilapidated houses, her expectations slowly shrank. The basement rooms she glimpsed below the level of the railings were grim. Some were kitchens which evoked memories of Easton Street in Greenwich; in others she could see little more than a flickering television and the legs of people watching it. But even those rooms which had tidy, closed curtains held that air of poverty she once thought she’d escaped for good.

  Drunks staggered across the busy road; teenage boys stood in groups, cigarettes dangling from their lips, collars turned up against the cold wind. From time to time music wafted out from an upstairs window.

  Finally, just when she thought her arms would break with the heavy case, she saw Greystones House. If there had been any alternative she would have turned back.

  She hesitated at the steps up to the front door, knowing instinctively this was a bad place. Someone had broken one of the glass panels in the front door and it had been replaced by a hastily tacked on sheet of hardboard. A glance down into the basement showed a group of girls watching television in a gloomy, smoke-filled room, but it was too late and she was too tired to go another step.

  Tentatively she rang the bell. A strong smell of cabbage was wafting out and with it the sounds of music and people shouting. When no one came she rang again.

  ‘All right, I’m coming!’ a voice yelled out and seconds later the door opened.

  Charity stepped back in alarm at the apparition in front of her. The woman was grotesque, enormously fat with bulging dark eyes and greasy hair loose on her shoulders.

  ‘Yes,’ she snapped.

  ‘I’m Charity Stratton.’ Her voice wavered. The woman was wearing something akin to a navy uniform, but it was so stained with spilt food she could have been an inmate of a lunatic asylum. ‘I rang earlier.’

  ‘Fine time this is to arrive,’ the woman said, opening the door marginally wider. ‘I thought you’d changed your mind.’

  ‘I had to come up from Sussex,’ Charity said weakly, afraid to actually step over the threshold. ‘I’m sorry if I kept you up.’

  ‘Come in then,’ the woman snapped again, then as wild laughter came from upstairs she turned back. ‘Stop that row you lot, and one of you come down here and see to the new girl.’

  Charity picked up her case again and slipped in. She was appalled by the place; even the air seemed to be filled with grease and nicotine. The hall was painted a murky green, scuffed at elbow height, grease marks at shoulder. The carpet had been patterned but it was reduced to a dull brown by countless feet.

  ‘I’m Miss Gullick.’ The woman looked back at Charity with a look intended to freeze. ‘I’m the warden and while you live here you abide by my rules. As you’ve left it so late tonight I’ll take all your particulars in the morning. Just give me the advance rent now and you can get off to bed.’

  ‘How much is it?’ Charity had to focus only on the thought of bed, otherwise she might have burst into tears. She hadn’t expected a welcome exactly, but a bit of friendly warmth would be a help.

  ‘Three pounds, five shillings. That includes breakfast and a cooked tea. I don’t give any reduction if you choose not to eat it.’

  As Charity took out her purse, a big dark-haired girl appeared on the stairs. She wore jeans and a striped sweater and she looked Charity up and down as if she had three heads and four legs.

  Something warned Charity not to let either of these people see how much money she had. She pulled out three pound notes and five shillings in change and quickly put the purse back in her bag.

  ‘Take her up now, Joan,’ Miss Gullick said and looked sharply at the other girl. ‘She’s in your room. Make sure she knows the rules and don’t go teaching her your bad habits.’

  Charity lay in the lumpy, narrow bed too scared even to sleep. She hadn’t expected to share a room with three other girls, especially girls who viewed her with such suspicion. The room smelt of sweat and feet, the sheets were grey with careless washing and she hadn’t dared to check on the mattress for fear of finding something worse. Even now in the darkness the girls were whispering and giggling and she knew it was directed at her. Despite her promise that she wouldn’t cry, she couldn’t control herself and an audible sob slipped out.

  ‘It gets worse,’ Joan called out. ‘You wait till you see the breakfast!’

  Charity turne
d on to her stomach, sliding her hand under her pillow to make sure her purse was still there. This place was dangerous and she must get out of it as quickly as possible.

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘Someone’s taken my cardigan,’ Charity ventured nervously to Miss Gullick.

  Charity had been at Greystones for ten days and it was a hellhole. Once a gracious family home with servants living in the basement, now all semblance of family life had gone and the rooms were stark and cheaply furnished. Twenty-four girls shared six bedrooms, with only two bathrooms between them. She heard Miss Gullick telling someone on the telephone that it was ‘a home from home’ and it made her wonder what sort of home she’d been brought up in.

  The dingy basement held the dining room, the kitchen and what passed as a sitting room. This had a small television with very bad reception, about twelve fireside chairs with scratched arms and damaged webbing beneath the worn cushions, and a radio which was on all day and evening too.

  Four bedrooms on the ground floor, with bars across the window because girls had been known to go out after eleven at night that way. Two on the first floor, of which one was Charity’s, and the bathrooms and toilets. The top floor was Miss Gullick’s domain and no one dared, or wanted, to go up there.

  The baths were always filthy because the girls were supposed to clean them after use, but never did. The toilets were even worse, and one day Charity found that someone had done her business on the floor.

  It was odious. Evil smells from the toilets, over-cooked cabbage and girls who hadn’t the slightest idea of personal hygiene, mingled with constant noise. Shouting, crying, radio and television and from outside the barrage of traffic which kept her awake at night. She had given up trying to eat the stodgy, flavourless food as soon as she found work as a waitress in a small restaurant nearby.

  Charity was speaking to Miss Gullick by the ‘Office’ in the basement. In reality it was merely a store-room full of giant tins of baked beans, tinned fruit and washing powder. Presumably it had got its name because it housed a tall stool at a small bench under the barred window and Miss Gullick kept her records here.