by Annie Murray
‘Go on, you lot,’ Rachel shouted to the younger children. ‘Out from under my feet or you won’t get your tea.’ There was a delicious smell of frying bacon in the room.
Tommy could feel his sister’s eyes on him. Her pale, strained face was beginning to look a little bit better now as well, though her hair was long and straggly. She looked exhausted. She’d helped out at the market a couple of times now, but a day there really seemed to take it out of her. He wished he could help her but he did not know how to.
‘Shame I – can’t – give you – a ride,’ he said.
Melly forced a smile, carrying the tea over to the table, and sat with him. ‘That’d be nice. Couldn’t I squeeze in? Where’d we go, eh?’
‘France?’ he said. ‘South of – France.’
‘Ooh,’ Melly said. ‘Bit of sun . . . But they can’t go that far, can they?’
‘Course. It’s a – bike. Can – go any – where.’
He told her what the man had said about the day at Manchester. He was excited. He didn’t know how far Manchester was but he liked the idea that he might go there.
‘Well,’ Melly said. ‘You’ve got to get to work first – that’s far enough. D’you think you can?’
His stomach twisted with dread. It was frightening enough to drive all the way into Birmingham.
‘You gonna – just – stay home – now?’ he asked.
Melly looked up at him over her cup, seeming startled. ‘Stay home? You mean – not work? No! Mrs Pearce says I can work in her shop three days a week – and there’s the market.’
He wondered if she was going to cry because she looked down suddenly and he saw her swallow hard, even when she hadn’t taken a mouthful of tea.
‘But – what about – you – being – a nurse? Don’t you – want to?’
It took her a moment before she could look up and there were tears in her eyes. ‘Yes.’ She wiped the tears away. ‘I’m not . . . I don’t know any more.’
Tommy sat helplessly.
‘Let’s put – a – record on,’ he said. His little collection of records was growing, week by week.
Melly brightened and got up. ‘“Little White Bull”? I’ll do it.’
Hearing the music, Ricky, Sandra and Alan came charging back in singing ‘Little White Bull!’ at the tops of their voices.
‘Flipping hell, Melly – did you have to?’ Rachel said, seizing the handle of the frying pan as the kids danced about. ‘Just keep out of my way, you lot.’
Forty-Five
For a few weeks, Melly kept going in to help on the Rag Market. She didn’t want to, not at all. She’d liked the market as a child, all the bustle and excitement and things for sale. But now, having to go out and spend all day among crowds of people, having to smile and be helpful, cost her more effort than anyone else could have imagined. She wanted to like it, but she didn’t.
She knew what Dad was after. He didn’t want to be there on Saturday afternoons because he was really yearning to be at the Villa ground watching the game. So he’d much prefer her to be there instead.
When they set off to pick up Gladys that morning Melly was not in the best of moods, full of a sudden anger. It was as if her emotions, when they arose, were heightened, stirred up in a way she had never known before.
Got me right where you want me now, haven’t you? she raged inwardly at her father as they drove off. But it’s not what I want! That’s not my life – it’s yours! She didn’t say a word as they drove across town, she was seething so much.
‘Go in and get her, will you?’ Danny said, pulling up outside.
Melly slammed the car door as hard as she could and stormed along the entry. Ethel Jackman was hanging washing in the yard. She turned, unsmiling.
‘Oh, you’re back, are you?’ she said. ‘Not that that’ll do any good.’ She jerked her head towards Gladys’s house.
‘Morning, Mrs Jackman,’ Melly said, trying not to sound too sarcastic. She didn’t realize what Mrs Jackman meant at first. ‘Nice to see you too,’ she muttered.
Instead of finding Gladys bustling and ready, she was sitting at the table, leaning her head on her hand. Melly could see at once that all was not well. There was a nasty, damp, musty smell in the house and she had never seen Gladys looking this way before. She was unwell and there was a sagging, defeated look to her which chased away Melly’s anger.
‘Auntie? What’s happened? You look bad. And what’s that pong . . . ?’
‘Upstairs,’ Gladys said. Her tone was flat, resigned.
Melly hurried upstairs. It took only a moment to see what had happened. Gladys slept in the bigger bedroom on the middle floor and the door was open. A huge section of the attic floor – her ceiling – had collapsed, right on to her bed. Parts of it were still hanging, a mess of plaster and flimsy batons. The floor and bed were covered with muck, all stinking of damp. She ran back downstairs.
‘God, Auntie – when did that happen?’
‘Yesterday. After that shower of rain.’ Gladys leaned forward and coughed until her eyes watered. ‘The roof’s leaking – bad. I came and slept down here. If the bed had still been up there . . .’ She didn’t finish but they exchanged looks.
‘You can’t stay here, Auntie. I’m going to get Dad. This house is a wreck. You’ll have to come and stay with us.’
For once Gladys didn’t argue. She brought a bundle of her things and Melly sat behind her in the car. But she was adamant that she was coming to the market even though she sounded as if she should be in bed. Though she had spread in her later years into an imposing matron, Gladys seemed shrunken today. Melly looked at the back of her head as they drove, the faded hair pinned up roughly and held with combs, and, with a pang, suddenly saw her as an old woman.
Gladys perked up a bit when they reached the market.
‘Better get weaving,’ she said, before a bout of coughing bent her double.
Melly helped both of them set up. Now that she was home, she had learned the new routines of the business. Danny had expanded, taken to the road, not just getting clothes from jumble sales and working men’s clubs. Now that Tommy had his own car, Danny could set off before dawn to his suppliers.
Tonight, after market day, there’d be a pint or two in one of the pubs nearby, the Drover’s Arms or the Adam and Eve in Bradford Street. Gladys always went for a tipple as well. Tomorrow, Sunday, was a day off. Monday was the day for doing the accounts, Tuesdays – a trip out for stock, often to London now. On Wednesdays Danny set off by five in the morning to Somerset for sheepskins from the companies he traded with – Morland’s and Bailey’s and Draper’s. Thursdays and Fridays were spent mending and preparing stock.
Business was going well, with occasional setbacks. Last Tuesday when he got home Danny had erupted, fuming, into the house. He had struck a deal on a whole lot of ‘cabbage’ as the seconds were called, with a manufacturer in the East End, stowed it in the car and walked round the corner to another firm. When he came back from the second place, the car was empty. Someone had broken in and pinched the lot.
‘They must’ve been watching me,’ he raged. ‘I’d locked the flaming doors. That’s London for you – it’d never happen in Somerset. Bastards.’
They had a double pitch in the Rag Market now with a big sign over it: DANNY BOOKER, SHEEPSKINS AND LEATHERS, SLIGHT SECONDS AT BARGAIN PRICES. The leather and sheepskin coats hung on hangers from rails. Danny surrounded the racks with netting to stop customers coming in through the sides, slipping on a coat and making off with it. Each coat had a label telling the customer what was wrong with it – a small but mended tear, a stain, a patch of slightly mismatched leather . . .
Melly glanced across every so often to see if Gladys was all right. She seemed to be getting along as usual, in between bouts of coughing.
Melly worked automatically, hanging the clothes, recognizing most of them because they had needed some repair – a button sewn on here, a rough hem trimmed with the Stanley knife and re-s
titched. Some of the coats were returns from Rackham’s department store. The manufacturer would make fifty-five or sixty coats for an order of fifty, to cover the number which had mistakes and problems – the ‘cabbage’. Danny bought these up to sell them on. He had both gents’ and ladies’ coats to sell, and Gladys was selling more secondhand men’s clothes again now.
They were soon busy. Melly dealt with the ladies who came in. She found she could tell, just by looking at someone, what size they were. She was good at finding them something to suit and complimenting them.
Despite wishing she was somewhere else, Melly was not having a bad day. They had one sheepskin coat that had been left on hot pipes in a plastic bag, back in the winter. It had so much plastic impregnated into the leather that they thought no one would buy it. But one of the other market traders came in for a chat and spotted it.
‘You can’t be serious – who’s gonna buy that? Look at the state of it, Danny!’
Melly saw her father sizing up the lad, who was in his late twenties and worked on a hardware stall across the market.
‘Well,’ Danny shrugged. ‘It’ll keep you as warm as any coat we’ve got here. And it’s a fraction of the price – best bargain you’ll find. It’s no good waiting ’til next winter, mate – someone else’ll’ve had it by then.’
The man held it against him. ‘The worst of it’s on the back – so it ain’t me who’d see it, is it?’
Melly could see he was tempted. He was a bony lad, no flesh on him.
‘You look as though you’d feel the cold,’ she cajoled him.
‘I do,’ he said. ‘How much?’
‘A tenner to most people – but for you . . . Melly – go over to your auntie and see if ’er’s got any ten-bob notes, will you?’
‘All right.’ She was quite glad of an errand. It wasn’t a cold day, but she still got chilly standing about.
The smell of frying onions drifted across the market, making her feel that her morsel of toast at breakfast had been a long while back. Her tummy gurgled. She could hear the man selling china in full voice as she went over to Gladys’s pitch at the back. In spite of her bad mood, she smiled. He was one for entertaining – juggling the crocks and doing tricks with them up his arms. There was a knot of people gathered around him and his baskets of sets of crockery, one of which he was holding up in front of the crowd.
‘Right – who’ll give me six pound for the lot? Eh – all this in ’ere – look at it! It’s a bargain!’
‘I bet them cups’ve got no handles on ’em!’ someone shouted from the crowd.
‘What? This is the best, this is – willow pattern. Look – straight from the works. Beautiful, that is! No one give me six for it? No? What about five pound ten? Come on – I’m robbing meself ’ere – taking the bread out of my children’s mouths!’
No one took up this offer, either.
The moment came that everyone had been waiting for.
‘All right – my last offer – a fiver? Just a fiver?’ There was a pause as he looked round with persuading eyes. ‘What – no one’ll give me a fiver! Aaaagh!’
Swinging the basket round, he hurled it with full force against the wall. There was a great smashing and tinkling as the contents crashed to the floor and gasps and laughter came from the crowd.
Melly smiled. Anyone who’d been around the market any time knew that he always made up a basket or two out of all the broken crocks for this very purpose. It was just a shock to anyone who didn’t know.
There were a few people round Gladys’s stall. She saw two Indian men, both very young looking, trying on suit jackets.
Gladys found she did a good trade with men who had come over from India and Pakistan, having to kit themselves out with clothes to go to work. The men always tried on jackets by thrusting their arms right up in the air into the sleeves. Gladys said it was because they were used to putting clothes on over their heads.
‘Auntie,’ she said. Gladys left the men for a moment and came over. ‘Dad says have you got any ten-bob notes?’
Gladys fished in the purse at her waist where she kept her takings and brought out four ten-shilling notes. ‘These do?’
‘Here.’ Melly handed her two pound notes in exchange. She lingered, in no hurry to go back. She knew the market man would come back for his coat. ‘I had that lady from Sutton Coldfield come again today. “Oh – price is no object,”’ she mimicked.
Gladys chuckled, chestily. ‘Right. That’s why she’s here shopping on the Rag Market!’
‘She’s got a right smell under her nose! Dad’s just flogging that coat with all the plastic in it, I think.’ She saw Gladys blowing her nose, one eye on her customers. ‘You all right, Auntie?’
‘I’ll be all right. While you’re here though, bab, fetch me a cup of tea, will you? Hang on – let me see to these two.’ She went over to the two Indian men who seemed about to buy the jackets.
Melly stood waiting, lapsing into the hazy, empty-headed state that often seemed to come over her these days. Nearby, a man was selling belts and watches, talcum powder and towels. She drifted off in her mind, thinking about the routine in the hospital, on A3. The thought did not fill her with panic any more. It just made her feel sad.
She was miles away and jumped as she heard Gladys’s voice.
‘Look who’s here!’ She sounded much cheered up. ‘I can’t remember the last time I set eyes on you, bab! Back in Brum for a bit, are you? Come and say hello to our Melly. She was at the hospital – being a nurse. But she’s had to jack it in . . .’
Melly felt her stomach tighten and her pulse race. She hated anyone else talking about her and what had happened. Cheeks burning, she looked round and found she was staring into a pair of blue, familiar eyes. Reggie Morrison.
For a second she was thrown completely. She was twelve years old again and in love. Her legs went weak.
‘All right, Melly?’ he said.
He was still walking with a stick, but he looked strong and upstanding, his blonde hair clipped short. He had on a pair of denim jeans and a white shirt, the sleeves rolled up to show muscular forearms. He looked nice, she thought. But then he always looked nice in her eyes, with his broad shoulders and kindly face.
‘All right, Reggie?’ She made herself smile. It wasn’t that she was pleased or not pleased to see him, she told herself. It just didn’t matter either way. He must be twenty-six now, she thought. She was twenty. It didn’t seem nearly such an enormous gap as when she was twelve and he had already reached the impossibly grown-up age of eighteen.
‘Yeah, I’m all right,’ he said. He smiled, looking at her and away. To her surprise she saw that he was nervous. She had always been the nervous one before.
‘You still gardening?’ She wanted to keep things light, to talk about him and not about herself.
Reggie nodded. ‘Just started at the college – at Worcester. They’re training me.’ At this, he looked happy, and proud. ‘I’m just back for a few days, that’s all.’
‘You like it then?’
‘Yeah. I do,’ he said. ‘Suits me fine – best thing that could’ve happened. And you, Melly . . .’ He looked more closely at her. His eyes seemed to drink her in. For a second a pulse of excitement passed through her, before she forced it away. For heaven’s sake. But she saw how manly Reggie’s face was these days, the jaw more pronounced. There was shyness in his eyes, but also concern. ‘Our mom said you left the hospital – that you had a bit of a . . . Well, that you weren’t well.’
Again she felt her cheeks burn red. Why did it feel so shameful to admit that you hadn’t been well? At least, that kind of not well – when it was in your head.
‘I, er . . .’ She hesitated, looking across at the lady selling her bottles of pungent perfume, Cologne de Paris. ‘I was a bit poorly. I’m all right now, though.’
She folded her arms across her, as if to protect herself. Reggie was looking intently at her, listening carefully. For a moment she felt tears prickle
in her eyes at seeing this old, familiar face, his slightly lopsided smile. But she made herself smile.
‘I’m back here for the moment, any road,’ she said, putting on a cheery tone. ‘Listen, Reggie – it’s nice seeing you but I’ve got to take Dad his money. He’s waiting . . .’
‘All right,’ he said, with seeming reluctance. ‘Ta-ra then.’
She walked fast back across the market with her head down and did not turn back.
Forty-Six
They did not go for a drink that evening. By closing time Gladys was close to collapse so they all went straight home. Given the state of her house, it was clear that Gladys was going to have to live with them.
‘She’ll have to have Tommy’s room,’ Rachel said, obviously put out by Gladys’s appearance. ‘You can go on the put-you-up down here for a few days, can’t you, Tommy?’
Gladys, to everyone’s astonishment, went to bed like a lamb.
‘She must be bad,’ Rachel said, once she was settled up there. She closed the kitchen door and turned to Danny. ‘I s’pose she’ll have to stay here for a bit, the state she’s in.’
‘She can’t go back there,’ Danny said. ‘The whole ceiling’s fallen in. It’s an absolute bloody mess. She’ll have to stop with us.’
Melly saw her mother digest this. She knew Mom was not keen on living with Gladys again.
‘Danny.’ Rachel stood with her hands on her hips. ‘We haven’t the room any more. I don’t want us to live like beans in a can again. She’ll have to find somewhere else. Soon as she’s better. Are you listening to me?’
Danny was leaning over the table, eyeing the paper. ‘Yeah – all right, wench. Yeah.’
On the Monday afternoon, Melly drifted along Harborne High Street, gathering bits of shopping: more bread, a pot of jam, buns, potatoes. A household of eight always seemed to need something from the shops.
She was glad to get out of the house. Sometimes when it was fine she went out and caught a bus, sat in a park where it was peaceful, just to get away.
It was bad enough sharing a room with Sandra again, who was always on at her for something. But Melly was the one who usually ended up chivvying Kev, Ricky and Sandra to get ready for school and walking the two youngest ones there as well. Sandra was a chatterbox and seldom stopped rattling on and Ricky was just dreamy and never got going in time. Most days he was dragging along the street still doing up his clothes.