by Ros Franey
‘Let’s at least ask them!’ Beatrice pleaded.
It was the sensible thing to do, of course, but now I was bursting to tell her my brainwave after bumping into Miss Blessing this afternoon. First, I described my meeting with her and Edwina near the Arboretum after Nana was banished to the yard, and how they had fussed over her (though I may not have said that Edwina was in Canada now). ‘Their mother lost a similar dog called Wendy – imagine, Bea, it must be meant! They said they would take her. Nana would be happy; Mrs Blessing would be happy; and I’d be a little bit happier because I could at least visit Nana! They actually offered, Beatrice!’
‘Are you sure, Annie? Really?’
‘Yes. They loved her.’
‘Why did they offer? You weren’t giving them a hard-luck story, were you, about us?’
I fidgeted uncomfortably. ‘No. It wasn’t long after it first happened, that’s all. Come on, Bea, would I want to get rid of her?’
Beatrice looked at me hard. ‘I suppose not,’ she admitted. ‘But you mustn’t go blurting our business all over town.’
Because it was urgent, and we had no way of actually getting to Mountsorrel to ask Auntie Vera, Beatrice finally agreed we could try the Blessings first. The problem was that I had no idea where Miss Blessing and her mother lived. They weren’t from St Ann’s. They lived a long way away, I thought, which was no help at all.
But Beatrice knew what to do. ‘The Mission will have a record. Of course they will! She plays the harmonium and teaches Sunday School. It’ll be in the register. We’ll go and look tomorrow.’
The following evening after homework, we slipped out of the house and made our way to Golgotha. Beatrice had to be wrapped in two flannel vests and a muffler because she still wasn’t supposed to go out on account of the shadow on the lung situation, but we had no time to lose: Mr Holley might come for Nana as soon as Beatrice was well. It was Wednesday and lights shone through the thick diamond panes of the Mission windows. Beatrice said there would be Senior Bible Study, so we could sneak in unnoticed.
We climbed the steps to the side door. ‘Follow me,’ Beatrice instructed. ‘Don’t speak unless you’re spoken to, and whatever you do, don’t gasp or titter or anything. I may have to be’ – she smoothed down her coat and straightened her hat – ‘inventive.’ Then she pushed open the door and we marched in.
The nave was lit by a single light from the chancel, making it even gloomier than usual. From a small room off to one side, we could hear the murmur of voices. Beatrice turned left and walked up towards the vestry, where she knew the records were kept. Behind the heavy curtain at the vestry doorway, a second light was burning and we entered to find Mr Wilkinson, the Verger, seated at the vestry table, bent over some papers. What was he doing here at past six o’clock? I could feel Beatrice hesitate in her step. This was not what we had bargained for.
‘Good evening, Mr Wilkinson,’ she said. I noted with admiration that her voice had its usual even, friendly tone. ‘How are you?’
The Verger looked up in surprise. ‘Ooh, Miss Lang,’ he said, as startled to see us as we were to see him. ‘And Miss Annie, too. Good gracious. Are you here for the Bible Study?’
‘Not this evening,’ replied Beatrice firmly. ‘As a matter of fact we’ve come on a little quest.’
‘A quest, eh?’ He removed his spectacles and peered at us more closely. ‘And what sort of a quest would bring two young ladies to the Golgotha Mission so late on a Wednesday evening?’
Beatrice smiled and removed her gloves. ‘Well, it’s like this, Mr Wilkinson, we need to see Miss Blessing, and we don’t know where she lives.’
‘Miss Blessing? The young lady who plays the harmonium? Ho well.’ He seemed to fall into a reverie. ‘I played the harmonium myself, once,’ he told us. ‘Said I could do it again when our good Miss Higgs became Mrs Lang and was unable to fulfil her duties in that respect. Such an excellent woman, Agnes Higgs. I remember her when she was Miss Blessing’s age, when the family lived around here, you know. She and her sister nursed their mother single-handed until she died. It was a sad business, a very sad business. I was pleased the Good Lord called her to marry Mr Lang, a happy outcome to her afflictions.’
‘Well … that’s why we need to speak to Miss Blessing now,’ said Beatrice gently. ‘On account of … of playing the harmonium.’
‘I told them I could do it,’ he repeated. ‘But the good Pastor Eames said no. He said “young blood”, he said.’ The old man’s expression clouded. ‘“Mr Wilkinson,” he told me, “There is a time to play the harmonium and a time to be silent.” Ha ha. He meant well, I’m sure. I felt the Good Lord call me to play the harmonium again.’ Mr Wilkinson thumped his gnarled fist against his waistcoat buttons. ‘But Pastor Eames saw differently. Well … Then the Lord sent us the sublime Miss Blessing.’ He gazed mistily ahead of him and sighed.
‘I wonder,’ Beatrice began again, ‘whether you could possibly help us to look in the Mission register, Mr Wilkinson?’
‘The register?’ Mr Wilkinson recollected himself and focused on Beatrice. ‘Miss Lang wants to consult the Mission register, does she?’
‘If you would be so kind?’ said Beatrice, and dropped her gaze demurely.
‘The harmonium is the domain of Miss Blessing. But the Mission register is the domain of the Verger,’ pronounced Mr Wilkinson distinctly. ‘Miss Lang, granddaughter of Our Founder, Pastor Eames, wishes to consult. She must seek my permission.’
‘Of course,’ Beatrice murmured. ‘That is why I am here, Mr Wilkinson. If you would be so kind. As I said, it’s – it’s about the harmonium.’
‘You may speak to me about the harmonium.’
Beatrice gave him a level stare. ‘N-not this harmonium, Mr Wilkinson. It’s to do with a kind offer Miss Blessing made about playing, er—’ I could see panic briefly cross her face, ‘… somewhere else. For charity,’ she added, hopefully.
He glared at her. ‘And what would you have done, Miss Lang, had I not been here at six o’clock on a dark Autumn evening?’
Beatrice said nothing.
‘Ha! It cannot be that you came at six o’clock in the hope that you might be able to consult the Mission register without asking? Unimpeded? Eh?’
I was getting fed up with this. I thought about ‘unimpeded’, a word I had not heard before, and had a picture of centipedes and millipedes crawling across the Mission register. Then I heard myself say with as much politeness as I could muster, ‘We had to have tea and finish our homework first, Mr Wilkinson. We didn’t mean to come so late. It just took that long.’
They both turned and looked at me. Mr Wilkinson seemed to focus on me for the first time. ‘We’re very sorry to have disturbed you,’ I added hastily, remembering I wasn’t supposed to speak. ‘We don’t want to waste your time.’
‘Of course not,’ said Mr Wilkinson. ‘Of course not.’ He fumbled in his pocket and took out a bunch of keys large and small, from which he slowly selected the very smallest and fitted it into the table drawer. The register was a large, shabby green ledger with dark crimson edges to each page and thumb indentations down the side for the letters of the alphabet. Mr Wilkinson’s knobbly finger faltered its way to the ‘B’ slot and he turned to the opening page. The register must have reached right back to the beginning of time, as it contained many Bs, each of which had to be considered as he ran his finger slowly down the list, whispering the names to himself as he did so. On something like the eighth page, and almost the last B on the list, he came to Miss Mildred Blessing. We, peering over his shoulder, were ahead of him and I had almost memorised the address before he found it. Miss Blessing lived in West Bridgford, I saw with dismay – right on the other side of the City. Beatrice took a pencil and paper from her pocket and wrote down the address at Mr Wilkinson’s dictation. After listening respectfully to a further homily about the necessity for this information to be kept in confidence under lock and key, delivered as he peered at us over the top of his spectacles,
he informed us that had we not been the grandchildren of the good Pastor Eames he would never have divulged the address so readily. We were duly grateful, standing with our hands clasped in front of us and our heads bowed. Then we left, and walked sedately out into the street, not speaking or breaking step until we were safely out of sight of the Mission.
‘Holy mackerel!’ exclaimed Beatrice as we clutched each other in triumph, wheeling around the pavement and almost collapsing into the gutter. ‘That was an effort – even for me!’
‘The sublime Miss Blessing!’ I imitated Mr Wilkinson’s quavering voice.
‘Dirty old man!’ expostulated this entirely new sister of mine.
Then we recollected ourselves and walked briskly off into the night. So far, so good.
For the rest of that week, I hurried home from school each day with my heart in my mouth, fearing that I would find Nana gone. But whether because of Beatrice’s theory that nothing would happen while she was off school, or perhaps Daddy was taking his time ‘seeing to it’, to my enormous relief she was still with us on Friday evening. Each night since Beatrice’s catastrophic news I had been down to collect her after the family had gone to bed. I had paid her the greatest attention, wanting to seal every detail of her into my memory, from her old fur-coat smell to the scratchy, rough pads on her paws. But I didn’t cry for her: I was too intent on saving her life for that.
On Saturday afternoon, Beatrice and I sat nervously in my bedroom, studying a map of the city. She had drawn me a sketch-plan of the roads I must walk down from the West Bridgford bus stop to Miss Blessing’s house. At first she had wanted to come with me, but I managed to persuade her that I was more likely to succeed if I went alone.
‘I’m older,’ she argued. ‘Miss Blessing and her mother will take me more seriously.’
‘But I know her,’ I said. ‘I’m sure she’ll believe me because she trusts me. And her mother might feel we’re being too pushy if we both turn up on her doorstep.’
Beatrice reluctantly accepted this, though I was less certain of it myself. I couldn’t get out of my head the impression, the last couple of times I had seen her, that Millie Blessing had gone off me for some reason. She had clearly been making an effort not to show how annoyed she was; yet in all our earlier dealings I had felt easy and at home with her – as if we were allies. It was in this spirit I would appeal to her now. I felt, with Fred not at home, that Nana was my dog and that I alone must save her – which wasn’t really fair, because I would never even have found out where to go if it hadn’t been for Beatrice. Anyhow, this part of the Plan was my job. Bea was to guard the fort at home and say, if asked, that I had extra hockey.
‘You’ve got the address?’
I nodded.
‘Which buses are you getting?’
‘The 40 down St Ann’s Well Road. Number 5 to West Bridgford.’
‘Where do you change?’
‘At the centre.’
‘Dog biscuits?’
I held up my games bag. ‘I’m carrying them in this,’ I told her proudly, ‘to make it look more like I’m going to hockey. Oh … and I took her rug from the kennel. I don’t want her to be without anything she knows.’
Beatrice pulled a face. ‘I hope it’s clean.’
‘It’s all right. It’s got to have her smell on it.’
‘If they’re not there …?’ Beatrice looked at me. We hadn’t considered this when we made our Plan.
‘I can wait awhile,’ I said, after thinking for a moment. ‘I’ll keep walking around the block.’
‘Don’t wait too long. You mustn’t be coming home on your own in the dark. You won’t have Nana with you then. Find a phone box. I’ll stay here this afternoon and I’ll be sure to answer if you call.’
I nodded, stifling a horrid sad feeling at the idea of coming home without my beloved dog. Writing this now, I don’t think either of us considered the possibility that the Blessings might say they couldn’t take Nana. I suppose we just had to deal with one thing at a time.
When there was nothing more to be said and the whole wretched journey couldn’t be put off any longer, Beatrice and I took Nana’s lead, and went down into the yard.
Nana stretched and wagged her tail in a circle when she saw us, and yawned with her special creaky excited throat noise, which she made whenever she saw people with her lead and their coats on. I hooked the lead on to her collar as I had so many times before and we trooped down the back steps and turned left. The plan was for Beatrice to wait with me at the bus stop and then return home, but as the Number 40 came into sight she suddenly announced she would go with me as far as the centre. I was more grateful to her than I cared to say.
The journey was uneventful. Beatrice took me to the second bus stop to make sure I didn’t get lost. Then she crouched down, put her arms around Nana and told her to be good, turning away very quickly after that with a wave of her hand. Nana and I went on alone and all too soon, it seemed to me, we were walking down West Bridgford streets whose names I had learnt by heart. As we approached the Blessings’ road, I suddenly felt panic in my stomach. I took smaller and smaller steps in a kind of daze, only realising I had slowed to a crawl when I caught Nana looking up at me with a definite question on her face. The road was running past a small park at this point and I suddenly swerved into it, letting Nana off the lead when we were inside, murmuring to her that at least I could give her one last run before we said goodbye. She stood beside me for a few moments, scenting the unfamiliar air, then ambled off at a brisk trot to investigate the trees and the grass. I stood and watched her, tears falling down my cheeks. I mopped at them hopelessly. How was I ever going to manage to give her away to strangers? I turned and walked off down a wide avenue, kicking at leaves and trying to pull myself together. Of course, Miss Blessing wasn’t a stranger. And Mrs Blessing had loved her dog Wendy so much that she mourned her loss for ages. These must be kind people. Then I fell into a sort of fantasy that perhaps I wouldn’t have to give Nana up for ever. Perhaps, on losing her, my parents would realise how much they loved and missed her and after a time, when Mother had recovered from all her griping, she would agree to have her back. Not only back, I decided, but Nana would be allowed to come into the house and spend the second half of her life in the breakfast room in front of the warm range and even by the coal fire in the sitting room, and sleep on a rag rug, which I would make for her. This dream got me all the way round the park, which was not much more than a recreation ground really, Nana sometimes trotting at my heels, sometimes chasing imaginary rabbits – which we both knew to be imaginary because she sort of lolloped more than running. Eventually, I came to and told myself sharply that’s what it was: a dream. And now I must find my way out of the park at the same place I had come in, because Beatrice’s map showed only the streets between the bus stop and the Blessings’ road: I could easily get lost. This proved to be the case, and I had to walk almost twice around the park before I found the right way out. Hooking the lead back on to Nana’s collar, I led her on our way.
As we approached the house, a church clock struck four; it was later than I thought and the sun was dropping. I double-checked the house number from the address in my pocket, pushed open the gate and after taking a long shuddery breath, left over from the crying, I walked up to the front door and rang the bell.
There was no one at home.
After ringing twice more and rat-tatting at the letterbox in case the doorbell wasn’t working, I stepped back to look up at the windows and realised all the curtains were closed. It was a two-storey semi-detached house with a gate at the side. I walked around to this gate and pushed at it, but it was locked. The top half was a kind of latticework painted in peeling green paint and I could see that ivy growing on the garden wall had threaded itself into the lattice. The gate was not in use. Returning to the front door, I realised I was being watched over the wall dividing the front garden from next door. I rang the bell again, without any hope at all that someone would c
ome.
As if in answer to my thoughts, the old woman watching me over the wall called out, ‘It won’t do you any good, duck. They’ve gone.’
I turned and went a few steps towards her. ‘You mean they’re out?’
‘They won’t be back, mark my words. She said she wouldn’t be back.’
‘Mrs Blessing?’
‘Aye. They’ve gone. Left.’
‘You mean – they don’t live here any more?’
The woman shrugged. ‘Always kept herself to herself. You a family friend, are you? I’m surprised you don’t know.’
‘Don’t know what?’
‘That’s not for me to say. But there’s trouble, as I heard.’
My mind was reeling. I stared at her. ‘Where have they gone?’
‘So sudden, like. She never left a forwarding address. Landlord’d know, I suppose.’
I was struggling to take this in, ask the right questions: ‘W-When did they leave?’
‘Few days ago, maybe? Never said goodbye. Reckon she wasn’t the sort to do a moonlight flit, though. Been here years. Nice family. Hate to think who we’ll get next.’
But I had seen Mildred Blessing just last week in the street. I felt dizzy. ‘What about – what about … the other daughter? Edwina?’
The neighbour shrugged. ‘She’s the one gone to Canada, teaching, isn’t she? I don’t know about her.’
‘You haven’t her address? Or the son’s address – Eric?’