A Christmas Wish

by Lizzie Lane

  Chapter Thirteen

  Magda

  At the dog track James Brodie took great delight in buying Magda jellied eels and boasting of how he knew a man who knew a man who knew everything there was to know about racing, most particularly dog racing.

  ‘He gave me a formula, he did. That’s a way of working out which animal is going to win.’

  Seemingly the formula only worked for the friend of a friend, not for her uncle.

  ‘Never mind. Enjoy your jellied eels. Tell me what you’re going to do now you’re soon to be a young lady and leaving school.’

  ‘I’m not leaving. Not exactly. I’ve won a scholarship.’

  ‘Well, there’s a wondrous thing. So tell me about this school of yours.’

  She told him about her one true friend, a girl called Susan Barnes who had ginger hair and a freckled face.

  ‘I wish I could do more for you,’ he said once she’d finished. ‘Now wouldn’t it be a fine thing if I could lay a few pounds on the next race and give the proceeds to you to put towards your future. Trouble is I’ve got the dreams of a toff and the money of a pauper. In fact I’ve only got two bob left.’ He eyed the single coin sitting in his sweaty palm.

  ‘How about if I were to place a bet?’ Magda suggested.

  ‘You can’t. You’re too young.’

  ‘But you could put it on for me, couldn’t you?’

  ‘Of course I could. A tanner will do if you’ve got that.’

  ‘I’ve got a bit more than that.’

  She pulled out the half a crown Aunt Bridget had picked from her husband’s pocket and given to her.

  ‘Half a crown. Can I choose the name?’

  ‘Well,’ he said laughing. ‘Why not? You can’t be doing any worse than what I’ve been doing.’

  He took her to where the dogs’ names for the next race were listed on a chalk board.

  Magda looked down the list. ‘That one,’ she finally said. ‘Fruit Fancy.’

  ‘Any particular reason for that?’

  She shook her head. ‘Not really, except that I do know somebody who runs a greengrocery barrow in the square. Or used to rather. He moved away.’

  He patted her cheek, grinned, shook his head and ambled off to place her bet.

  Magda tucked into the last of her food.

  ‘Fancy your chances, girl?’

  She looked up into the face of Bradley Fitts. He was older than her so naturally taller. He also looked more like a man, his clothes natty and not bought off the Jewish tailor who had a stall in the market where he took orders and showed off his cloth.

  He was eyeing her as though seeing her for the very first time – and liking what he was seeing.

  ‘I’m here with my uncle.’

  Even to her own ears she sounded nervous. She knew that was not the way to sound with Bradley Fitts. You had to front him out; not easy when he was that much taller, that much broader and flanked by the Sheldon boys.

  Bradley flipped two fingers under the brim of his hat, which sent it further back from his face.

  ‘You’ve certainly grown into a looker, Magdalena. Lovely looking in fact.’

  His eyes swept over her before lingering on her face.

  Magda felt her face getting hot.

  Bradley leaned closer. ‘I don’t like you being ’ere, Magdalena. And I don’t ever want to see you ’ere again. Unless you’re with me that is. Got it?’

  Bradley Fitts wouldn’t know it, but his manner reminded her of Aunt Bridget. From the moment she’d arrived beneath that roof, she’d been bullied, starved, slapped and intimidated. But that was when she was younger.

  Her eyes flashed, her temper flared and she stood up close to him, her anger spitting up into his face.

  ‘Just you listen to me, Bradley Fitts. You have no right telling me what I should or should not do, and who I should be with. You do not own me and you never will. Now get out of my way. I want to see who’s won the last race.’

  Her legs were shaking as she pushed past him to find Uncle Jim, but she felt big and brave.

  Behind her the eyes of Bradley Fitts burned with indignation, following Magda Brodie until she disappeared in the crowd.

  ‘One hell of a brush off,’ said one of his friends.

  Bradley threw him a warning glare. ‘Nobody brushes off Bradley Fitts. I’ll show her who’s boss, just you wait and see. All she needs is a slap or two to show her who’s in charge.’

  ‘Uncle Jim. Do you know where the twins are?’

  ‘Twins?’

  ‘My sisters. Venetia and Anna Marie. And Michael. My ba …’ She stopped. Michael wouldn’t be a baby any longer. ‘My brother too. Do you know where any of them are?’

  ‘Sure. Well, your sisters I do. They’re with my parents in Ireland. Did you not know that?’

  ‘Oh!’

  Magda could hardly believe she was hearing this.

  ‘Oh!’ she said again, her eyes brimming with tears of joy and her hand covering her open mouth.

  ‘How would it be I write the address down for you?’ he said.

  Magda was aware of her aunt’s hard scowl, but she didn’t care.

  ‘It would be very well. Very well indeed!’

  She fetched him a piece of paper and a pencil.

  Uncle Jim licked the end of the pencil. ‘Now let’s see …’

  He wrote painfully slow, forming each letter as a child just learning to write might do.

  ‘There,’ he said, eyeing his efforts with pride. ‘That’s the address of my folk – your grandparents in Ireland.’

  ‘And Michael?’

  He shook his head sadly. ‘Now that I don’t know. Only your father knows that.’

  ‘This stew’s done. Now get everything off the table.’

  Aunt Bridget brushed everything aside, crumbs and bits of screwed-up paper falling to the floor.

  Magda managed to grab the piece of paper and for a moment studied the address. Happiness welled up inside her; she now had an address for grandparents she’d been told by her aunt were dead. The twins were there. Uncle Jim assured her they were.

  That evening he told her tales of his travels and the adventures he and her father had had as boys.

  ‘Right scrapes we got up to.’

  Aunt Bridget had sat there gloomily, pretending to knit a tea cosy. She’d been knitting that same tea cosy for years, brought out to make her look industrious every time Uncle Jim came home.

  It was close to midnight by the time he’d finished, talking twenty to the dozen between bottles of brown ale.

  Eyes heavy with tiredness, Magda dragged herself up to bed.

  Jim Brodie left for sea in the early hours of the morning.

  Magda heard the front door slam and the thud of his boots gradually diminishing as he left home and wife behind him.

  Seeing as it was so early, she lay dozing for a while, thinking how kind he was and how wonderful that he’d given her the address where her sisters were living.

  The piece of paper! Where was it?

  She got washed and dressed for school quickly, and then rushed downstairs thinking she was late in lighting the fire. It wouldn’t get lit if she didn’t do it.

  The fire in the grate burned feebly except for one single piece of paper turning black then blue with flame.

  Aunt Bridget was eyeing her with a look of triumph in her beady black eyes.

  ‘No need for you to light the fire. I did it.’

  Her dark hair flew around her face. She knew what her aunt had done.

  ‘My grandparents’ address! You burned it.’

  ‘Oh, did I now!’

  ‘Yes. You did.’

  ‘Well, there’s a shame! Now you won’t be able to go over there and see them. Just as well, though. You’re old enough now to get out and find a job. It’s time you brought something into this house.’

  ‘You are a nasty, conniving, jealous old woman,’ said Magda, measuring her words in time with the slow, firm steps she was t
aking towards her aunt. ‘Some day you’re going to burn in hell for what you’ve done, Bridget Brodie.’

  Her aunt raised a threatening finger and wagged it at her.

  ‘Don’t you dare talk to me like that. Don’t you dare!’

  Her voice petered away. Her finger folded back into her palm and her hand fell to her side.

  ‘I do dare,’ said Magda, taking more steps so that her aunt’s back was finally against the wall. ‘I’m not a child any longer, Aunt Bridget,’ she said, now looking down at a woman who had been taller than Magda, bad and wickedly intimidating from her greater height. Now it was Magda who was the taller one.

  ‘You! You! With your dark looks and them witches’ eyes. You’re just like your mother. The devil’s daughter, tempting the sons of men to lie with her, to fornicate like a dog and a bitch on heat …’

  ‘Stop that! I will be reunited with my sisters, Aunt Bridget. Their address is up here,’ she said, tapping the side of her head. ‘And you can’t destroy what’s up here!’

  ‘You’ve no money to go there. No money at all.’

  ‘Then I will get some,’ Magda shouted back.

  With that she swung out of the house, slamming the door so hard that the panes in the windows threatened to fall out.

  All the way down the road she held her head high, though her heart was breaking.

  On her way to school she cut through Victoria Square. The costermongers were wheeling their carts into position and setting up their stalls.

  As she had every time she entered the square, she looked towards the place where Danny Rossi used to juggle pears and apples, laughing and singing and telling her she could have whatever fruit she managed to grab from his juggling.

  He wasn’t there of course. He was probably away training to be a policeman. Their days sitting on the bench eating cheese sandwiches seemed a lifetime away. He’d never written, or if he had Aunt Bridget had got to the letters first before she had chance. In all likelihood she would never see Danny again.

  Despite what she’d shouted at her aunt she hadn’t had enough time to memorise the address and Ireland was a pretty big country.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Winnie One Leg

  Winnie One Leg eyed Bradley Fitts and thought how like his father he was; just as arrogant, just as cruel. Both had also shown weakness for a woman – even if only for a while. Bradley was obsessed with Magda Brodie. Reuben had once loved Winnie – or so it had seemed at the time.

  Eyes that had once burned with the passion of youth now regarded Reuben’s son with a shrewdness resulting from experience.

  She knew men very well, and she knew Reuben Fitts very well indeed. In a short-lived fit of guilt he had given her money and set her up in this place. It was her job to run the business and she had. The lump sum he’d given her following the dreadful labour she’d endured had been gainfully invested. The thing about men was that no matter they be rich or poor, many were at the mercy of their lower regions.

  It had always amazed her how many upper crust wives regarded sex within marriage as a duty, not a pleasure for both to enjoy. Sad marriages. Sad men.

  On account of this, some very influential men visited her establishment. Thanks to their advice she was a very rich woman, rich enough to plan for imminent retirement. She’d told Reuben this in writing, in the letter just handed to Reuben’s son, Bradley. The envelope was sealed. This was a matter between her and Reuben alone.

  … I trust you’ll have no objection to me retiring … in view of our shared experiences …

  He’d know what she meant. He couldn’t voice an objection because she knew too much about him. He could probably guess that she’d held on to some pretty incriminating evidence that he would never, ever wish to be revealed.

  She’d already purchased a nice little cottage in Prince Albert Mews, a place in the West End of London where she could live the rest of her life in peace under an assumed name. Alone of course, but that was the sad fact of her life. There had been no more pregnancies after that first child. There couldn’t be. Intensely able in her analysis of men, she studied this young cock that was Reuben’s son, child of a far younger woman whom Reuben had chosen to marry.

  Bradley Fitts had inherited his father’s callous disposition. The arrogance had come with being respected since an early age as the son of a frightening man.

  His tone was ugly as he counted out the money.

  ‘It had better all be here. Wouldn’t want no creaming off the top, would we Winnie?’

  Her retaliation was swift and meant to deflate him.

  ‘No. That’s why I’ve numbered and recorded the notes. So that there’s no creamin’.’

  She noticed the sudden ballooning of his cheeks as he clenched his jaw.

  Her sharp little eyes never left his face.

  Yes, Bradley Fitts. I’m an old bird and better young cocks than you have tried to outwit me.

  Her gaze dropped to his shiny shoes. The rug he was standing on had pink flowers at each corner. At the centre a huge one blossomed. She barely restrained herself from smiling. If only he knew what he was standing on.

  It had been with great joy that she’d lined out the aperture in the stone floor. Yes, there was a cashbox locked in a strong cupboard that Reuben had supplied. That was where she kept the dues rightly belonging to Reuben and from which she had fetched the sum she’d handed over to his son.

  But the hole in the floor. That was a different matter entirely, known to her and her alone. The money within was her money, earned from her wages by listening to the advice of the clever men who entered this house; bankers, titled gentlemen from both houses of parliament. And that wasn’t all. Besides money there was a complete record of all the illicit businesses run by Bradley Fitts. At the threat of any harm, those records would find their way to Scotland Yard.

  Neither son nor father knew of her meticulous record keeping of information as well as cash, though she had hinted at it in her letter. She knew so much about Reuben Fitts; of his business dealings, of how much money he had. She also knew that people who had upset him were rarely seen again so she’d made two copies of those records, one of which was with her solicitor. She would be safe because she’d made Reuben aware of this.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Magda 1935

  Magda was on her way to the pictures with her orange-haired friend Susan who had started a job at the brewery.

  ‘I still can’t believe it,’ Magda was saying. ‘I’ve always wanted to become a nurse or a doctor since my mother died. I knew I had to stay on at school, but didn’t think I’d be able to. Can you believe that?’

  Susan guffawed with laughter. ‘Never mind that, I can’t believe you actually WANT to stay on at school. Fourteen, and that was it for me. Love working for a living. Love earning money.’

  ‘I can understand that.’

  Susan came from a poor family. It was understandable that she wanted some money at last, at least enough to enjoy herself before she got married and had kids – which was what most girls wanted. But not Magda. Magda burned with a desire for something else entirely. Was it so wrong to lie a little in order to get what she wanted? Winnie had convinced her that it was not.

  ‘The end justifies the means,’ Winnie said to her. ‘A lot of good will come of this. Thanks to the Great War, more and more women have become doctors, and if the news from Germany is to be believed, there’ll be more women doctors in demand before very long.’

  Winnie sighed. ‘Another war to inspire human progress. Sad as it is.’

  Winnie had also informed her how come she had secured an interview and what she was supposed to say when she got there.

  ‘You don’t live here in Edward Street. This is the address where you live,’ she’d said, handing her what looked like a sheaf of examination papers. ‘And your folk are fine people already involved in the medical profession. You’re an upper class girl on paper. Behave accordingly. Oh, and tell them you’re twenty, not eigh
teen. Being the right age is important. And having the right background, and that’s been arranged.’

  It never failed to amaze her that Winnie knew such very influential people and that some of them were not quite as upright and honest as they should be.

  ‘I’d be lying,’ she’d said to Winnie.

  Winnie had fixed her with a stern expression. ‘If you wish to give assistance to a poor woman in labour, then lying is what you have to do. Imagine her dying without you being around to help her. That should make it easier.’

  It wasn’t easy, but she resolved to live with her reservations. One lie balanced out by one good deed.

  The letter had come that morning inviting her for an interview at Queen Mary’s Hospital Medical School. Money to live on would be the problem.

  Susan offered her home-grown wisdom.

  ‘You’ve got a bit of time between the interview and starting at the hospital. How about your old man?’

  ‘My father?’ Magda grimaced. ‘I haven’t heard from him in years, and neither has Aunt Bridget if she’s to be believed.’

  ‘How about your mother’s family?’

  Magda shook her head. ‘My mother was Italian,’ she said, as though that explained everything, especially the fact that the family was too distant to expect money from that quarter.

  ‘Mine was a pushover. That’s what my dad said,’ said Susan with a grin.

  When Magda got back from the pictures, Aunt Bridget was standing at the door. A tall man with greying fair hair and the look of a seaman was standing there looking awkward.

  Her aunt was saying something. ‘Lost at sea you say? You’re sure?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Brodie.’

  ‘Have you got the pay that’s owing?’

  The man nodded. ‘I have Mrs Brodie. ’Tis here, plus his payment card for his insurance with the Sailors’ Benevolent Society. There’s a fair bit to come, and what with no burial to …’