The Fifteen Streets

by Catherine Cookson

  Two more hands stretched out and, gripping John’s braces, they hauled him on to the plank again, where he lay still with Peter Bracken bending over him. A great stillness was pressing down on him. It was the stillness of the dead of all time. In it there was no regret, no pondering, no desire, no recrimination, no feeling whatever; it was void, because it held no thought.

  He looked towards the upturned boat; he watched Katie’s hat, mounted on a crest of frothing bubbles, rise and fall, bobbing round and round the swirling boat, like the earth round the sun. Peter Bracken’s tearing sobs came to him, and he did not wonder at them. Nor, when he turned towards him was he surprised to see a very old man. Time passed and the receding tide showed the shining mud about the planks on which they stood.

  Men were walking cautiously along the planks now. First, Peter Bracken was helped back, and when the men said, ‘Come, lad,’ John allowed himself to be led back to the timbers, one going before him and one behind, steadying him as though he were a child.

  The timbers were thick with men, soundless men. John walked alone now, and they made a path for him. Closing in again after him, they followed him to the bank, where the sobbing and wailing rose and fell like the waves of the wind.

  Three people were standing apart at the foot of the bank, and when John stopped and looked at them, the stillness began to lift from him. The first impression to penetrate it was that his father had his tick back worse than ever. This was followed by the painful realization that his mother was a little old woman, and her not yet fifty, and that Molly would never be Katie. They looked at him, and the sobbing on the bank seemed hushed.

  Then from the middle of a group of women, David’s voice rose, crying, ‘Christine! I want Christine!’ and the stillness was lifted completely from John; and a name passed through his brain like a tearing flame . . . Dominic!

  He threw up his head as if sniffing a scent, and his eyes swept the crowded bank from one end to the other. But from where he was standing below it, it was impossible to seek out anyone from the broken front line of the crowd.

  A path was miraculously cleared for him when, turning suddenly from the agonised stare of his parents, he rushed up the gangway. Across the main road was a rise of grassy ground bordering the New Buildings. He made straight for it. Now he was looking down on the congested road, and there in the far distance, on the very outskirts of the crowd, he saw Dominic’s head. It was hatless, and the fitful sunshine was turning the hair to gold. Whether Dominic had seen him John did not know, but as he tore along the comparatively clear ground Dominic’s head disappeared; and when John reached the spot, Dominic was gone.

  To a woman of the fifteen streets, John said only one word, ‘Dominic?’ and she pointed to the disused workmen’s hall: ‘He went round by the back of there, lad.’

  When he reached the back of the hall John caught sight of Dominic . . . he was running across the middle of the field used by the chemical works as a dumping ground for their foul-smelling residue. The field was a mass of small mounds, and Dominic was leaping like a kangaroo over them.

  As John raced over the field the distance between them lessened appreciably, and when he came out on to the Cleveland Place road, there was Dominic, not twenty yards ahead, disappearing round the corner of the tram sheds.

  They were both on the main road now, and the people struggling back to the fifteen streets called to John, ‘Stop lad! . . .’ ‘Give up, lad! . . .’ ‘What’s done’s done . . . think of your mother.’ And when men’s arms went out and tried to hold him he brushed them off like flies.

  As they neared the fifteen streets Dominic was lost in the dense crowd awaiting news from those who had been down to the slacks. But John knew that Dominic would make for the stackyard at the top of the streets; here, in the maze of stacked timber he would hope to escape. He was right; he saw Dominic mount the wall and disappear.

  John did not jump the wall, but stood on its top—his desire was teaching him cunning. He could not tell which way Dominic had taken, and once on the ground it would be like searching for a needle in a haystack; but from up here he should see Dominic’s head as he moved between the stacks.

  It was some minutes before John detected it, for Dominic’s hair was in tone with the seasoning wood. Dominic had paused to glance behind, and John was off the wall, running swiftly and noiselessly, not in Dominic’s direction but to the right of him. Dominic was making for the railway line at the end of the yard and he’d get him there.

  John reached the end of the stacks and waited, his eyes darting back and forth to the last three openings—it would be from one of these that Dominic would emerge. He came out of the middle one, running swiftly; and pulled up a few yards from John. His mouth was open and his jaw was moving from side to side. The brothers surveyed each other, John’s eyes sending out streams of diabolical hate, while in Dominic’s the hate was mixed with fear.

  John did not say, ‘You killed them . . . Katie and Christine, and now I’m going to kill you,’ nor did Dominic say, ‘It was an accident’; without any word they closed, and John, like a raving bull, smashed his fists into Dominic’s face. From the start, Dominic was handicapped by his raincoat, but fear made him hit back desperately. It also made him aware that he could not stand up to the blows being levelled at him; so he used his knee. Bringing it up sharply, he rammed it into the lower part of John’s stomach, and as John bent double Dominic ran back down the opening through which he had come, only to be brought to a stop by the cries of men coming through the jumbled stacks. Assuming that the men were after him, he decided to carry out his first intention of taking to the railway. But when he turned once more there was John, at the opening of the stacks.

  Blindly, Dominic rushed at him, using his fists and his feet; but it was as if John had set up a guard of flaying hammers, and soon all Dominic could do was to protect his face with his crossed forearms. He was pinned against a stack, and long after he ceased to fight John’s fists pounded him, and he seemed to be kept on his feet only by the succession of lifting blows. At last, Dominic’s knees gave way and he slid on to his side. John stood above him, gasping; then, using his foot, he pushed Dominic on to his back, and only then did he become aware of the crowd gathered about them.

  Exclamations came from all sides. ‘My God!’ ‘Leave him be, lad; he’s had enough.’ ‘God Almighty, I think he’s done for him!’

  On hearing the last remark, John wiped the blood from his face with a sweep of his hand, and stared down on Dominic . . . Was he dead? No, he mustn’t be dead . . . Not this way, this easy way. He was going to die in the gut. He would drag him there, to the spot where they went down, where Katie’s straw hat went round and round. The tide would be low, so he’d throw him down the steep incline of mud. He would be conscious and would claw at the mud as it slowly sucked him in. But—he looked up from Dominic and stared glassily at the faces of the men—they would stop him. Yes, if he attempted to do it now. Well, he would beat them; he would take this thing home. He moved Dominic again with his foot . . . He wouldn’t let him out of his sight, and in the night he’d get him to the gut. If he had to drag him every inch of the way he’d get him to the gut.

  The exclamations came to him again, more shrill now, for the women had joined the men, after forcing open the stackyard gates.

  ‘Oh, Jesus, have mercy on us! he’s killed him. God Almighty, it’ll be a hanging job!’

  It’ll be a hanging job! . . . The cry reached Mary Ellen, standing on the outskirts of the crowd, surrounded by a group of women, all with tear-stained faces, and all urging her, in one way or another, to return home . . . ‘You can do no good, Mary Ellen.’

  ‘You must think of yourself and Shane.’

  ‘Yes. Shane’s lying back there bad, the shock’s been too much for him . . . Come on, lass.’

  Mary Ellen stood quiet in the centre of them. She wasn’t crying, there was no liquid left in her body to form tears. Her body was dry, it had been burnt up, and the flame was
now going to her head . . . If these women didn’t get out of her way, she’d scream. She must get to her lad. He had killed Dominic, so she must be with him. To her, this seemed to be the end of a long waiting—Katie was gone; Dominic was dead; and there was only John . . . He had done what he said he would do—John always meant what he said. Now there was nothing else to wait for.

  Mary Ellen knew that the agony within her was screaming to be set free. The agony was wide and deep, reaching into the bowels of the earth. In an odd way, she felt herself one with the earth . . . the dirt, the mire, and the richness. The scream of agony was tearing around in the dry emptiness of her body, and swiftly, in a spiral, it was mounting to her head. Once it was there, she would be free, for when it escaped from her lips she would feel no more . . . at least, not with any feeling she would recognize; once she screamed, she would be changed for all time, for madness would possess her.

  As her mind ran to meet the scream, she heard it. It seemed to lift her and the women from the very ground. But it wasn’t her scream; it was Nancy Kelly’s. And it was mixed with laughter . . . the terrible laughter. The women covered their ears, but Mary Ellen stood listening. Then she thrust wildly at the bodies hemming her in, and forced her way through the men to the space where John stood, and Dominic lay with Nancy Kelly kneeling by him, pulling at his torn and bloodstained clothes, and crying, ‘Dominic! Dominic! Don’t be dead! I’ve kept me mouth shut, Dominic . . . I did what you told me.’ She pulled at him, trying to shake life into him again. ‘Dominic, you must marry me when the bairn’s born . . . I’ve been a good girl, Dominic, I did what you told me.’

  Nothing but her screeching voice could be heard; the crowd was as silent as the stacked piles of wood.

  The blood pounded into John’s head. Dominic, the father of the bairn! The swine! The god-damn, dirty swine! Reaching down, he grabbed Nancy and flung her to one side. Then he was on top of Dominic, crying out as he beat his fists into the inert, blood-covered face, ‘You dirty swine! And you put the blame on . . .’

  His words were lost as the men tore him aside. Fighting, they bore him to the ground, and so many held him that only his eyes were free to move.

  As one of the men shouted to the others, ‘Look slippy there! Get him away, can’t yer!’ John heaved in an effort to free himself . . . If they got Dominic away they’d hide him. Why didn’t he finish him off when he had the chance! He writhed and struggled until the uselessness of his efforts was borne upon him, and he suddenly became still. Well, wherever they took Dominic he’d find him! Oh, Katie! Katie!—he closed his eyes to shut out the men’s faces as sorrow overwhelmed him.

  When the men released him and he got to his feet, he saw his mother. She was picking at a button of her blouse, her eyes, dead in her white face, staring at him.

  When he said, ‘I’ll find him,’ she remained silent; then she turned and walked slowly away, and he followed her; and the crowd closed in behind, like a gigantic funeral procession.

  12

  The Aftermath

  There was no door in the fifteen streets that was closed to John; for three days he had walked in and out of the houses, into bedrooms, some tidy in their bareness, some a mass of jumbled old clothing and mattresses, and some indescribable in their squalor. He saw nothing of the conditions, he looked only for a concealed form; under beds, in cupboards, in rooms where the sick were lying, and where weary hands would reach out in a vain effort to give him comfort. He spoke to no-one, and he trusted no-one; he knew that in this time of trouble the people of the fifteen streets were united in one huge family to protect him, as they thought, from himself. So he did not search systematically, but after searching the houses at the lower end, he would suddenly double back to the top or middle streets, and houses he had searched but a short time before would be gone over again. No harsh word met him; even if he stalked in on a family eating he would be greeted soothingly.

  He had one assistant in his search: Peggy Flaherty. Her fat, wobbling body hugged by coats, she would accompany him at odd hours of the day, most of the time talking away at him: ‘Never give up, John. We’ll get him yet. By God! we will an’ all . . . He needn’t run off with the idea he can escape you, can he lad? And he’ll not get out of these buildings.’

  Often, in his darting from one place to another, he would leave her behind; but she would be guided to the house where he was. And again she would tag along after him, nodding knowingly to the groups of people gathered in the street. Only at night did she leave him alone for any length of time, for then he paraded the main road.

  John knew that Dominic would be in no fit condition for days and that it was practically impossible for him, up to now, to have made his escape by the stackyard, for since the breakthrough, the gates were doubly locked, and there remained only the wall as a means of exit that way. So for two nights now he had watched from the main road. The night policeman, on his beat, would stop and talk to him, the darkness wiping away his officialdom: ‘Is it worth it, lad? You know what will happen, don’t you? You’ll get time, if not the other. Anyway, how do you know he’s not already gone? By what I hear, he’s likely in hospital. If it hadn’t been for your sister saying the little lass loosened the boat, we should have been on to him ourselves. And you can count yourself lucky, you know, one of us wasn’t on the scene when you got at him. So don’t look for trouble, lad, and get yourself home to bed.’

  No words had penetrated John’s mind since those spoken by the men when they were holding him; and it might have been that he did not hear this advice, for he made no reply. It was as though his mind, so packed with the weight of his sorrow and hate, could take in nothing more. During the first two days he did not actively think of Katie and Christine, nor yet of Mary, whom he felt to be part of his sorrow for all time, for she, in some strange way, was a partner in the guilt he was laying on himself. Because he had allowed the madness of his love to possess him, he ignored the danger in which Christine stood, and did nothing to protect her beyond ordering Katie to act as a buffer to Dominic’s advances.

  On this, the third day of the search, when the strain was telling on him, in the leaden weight of his limbs and his unsteady walk, and in his burning eyes that would close whenever he stood still for a moment, his mind, strangely enough, was beginning to sort itself out; thoughts were separating and presenting themselves, as it were, before him. He was standing leaning against the wall on the waste ground at the top of one of the streets, where he had paused for a moment during his search; and his hand moved over the three days’ growth on his face. His body felt dirty, his inside empty, and his head light. But the thoughts came, one after the other, isolated yet joined: I must stop sometime . . . if only they find them before they’re carried out to sea; if I could see Katie once again it might not be so bad. Oh! Katie! Katie . . . My father’s done for, he’ll not work again. Why am I not with my mother, she needs me? But she understands I’ve got to find him. She wants me to find him; she hates him as much as I do . . . Why doesn’t Peter Bracken look for him instead of yapping, ‘Forgive us our trespasses’. Father O’Malley says Peter is the cause of all this, and if my mother and me had done as he commanded this would never have happened.

  As if his thoughts had conjured up the priest, Father O’Malley, accompanied by Peggy Flaherty, appeared before him.

  ‘Oh, there you are, lad,’ Peggy said. ‘And here he is himself, Father . . . Away with you now!’ she added to the children who were following them.

  Father O’Malley confronted John: ‘Come into the house,’ he ordered. ‘I want to talk to you.’

  John blinked slowly and made no reply.

  ‘Did you hear me?’ demanded the priest.

  And after a short silence, during which Father O’Malley waited, and the children sniffed, and a few women added themselves to the group at a respectful distance, the priest went on, ‘This has got to stop! Who are you to take God’s work into your own hands? He will seek vengeance without your help. He has already
shown you what He thinks of you going against His Holy Will—I cannot repeat too often, that had you kept that man Bracken from your house this state of affairs would never have come about.’

  ‘It’s hopeless,’ Peggy Flaherty broke in. ‘Time and again I’ve told him to give up the search. Oh! it’s no use at all.’ She proceeded to rattle on, in spite of the priest’s gimlet eyes demanding her silence and John’s blurred and bewildered stare as slowly the fact forced its way into his mind that she, and she alone, had urged him in his search.

  There were murmurs from the women: ‘The priest’s right. There’s been no luck about the doors since that Bracken man came.’

  ‘No! nor will there be!’ Father O’Malley threw at them, effectually drowning the more considerate comment: ‘Aye, but he’s lost his lass too.’

  ‘Come!’ Father O’Malley commanded John.

  John stood for a while longer . . . the priest and Peggy, and the women, were becoming blurred: he must rest and have something to eat if he intended going on. And so, in the eyes of the women and children, strength was added to the priest’s power when John turned and obediently followed him . . .

  In contrast to John’s ceaseless moving Mary Ellen sat almost immobile in the kitchen. At odd times she would go to the front room and attend to Shane; but she cooked nothing, nor cleaned, and, like John, she did not speak. And if at times she stared at Molly, her face did not show any surprise or wonderment at the change in this daughter of hers; for Molly was ‘running the house’. She had screwed her plaits into a tight little bun at the back of her head and she wore her mother’s holland apron, rolled up at the band. Overnight, Molly threw off her prolonged childhood; she was not now a girl, but a little woman. And she was spurred on by the praise of the neighbours: ‘That’s it, hinny, you be your mother’s right hand. You must take Katie’s place now.’ They talked as though Katie had been an elder sister.