‘Wrapped and at the back of my wardrobe,’ was Hilda’s reply.
‘We have to get it to Crosby.’
Hilda tutted. ‘How? We’ve no car. Keith and Eileen have it.’
‘I don’t know how, do I? Borrow a couple of bloody donkeys or some roller skates. We’ve still got trains and buses.’
‘They don’t always run to timetable.’
‘Hilda, for God’s sake—’
‘No!’ shouted the usually soft-spoken woman. ‘For Eileen’s sake, we must stay away. Hasn’t she enough trouble without worrying about her mother turning up out of the blue? And Phil needs to be told before we start to give away his work.’
‘That was supposed to be your job. When it comes to painters and the like, I don’t know me Laughing Cavalier from me Whistler’s Mother. Find our Phil, Hilda. Find him now. He has to be told that we’ve had his drawing framed. Go on. I’m off out for an hour. See you later.’ Nellie leapt to her feet, pulled on a coat and rammed a woollen hat almost all the way down to her eyebrows. Hilda Pickavance could manage on her own. Hilda Pickavance should have managed on her own weeks ago, and Nellie was off to visit her friend.
Carrying a small torch, Nellie made her way down Willows Lane until she reached the Edge. Her decision to make an ally of Elsie Openshaw had been made some months earlier. It had been a case of irresistible force and immovable object; as a team, they were monumental. Elsie was happiest when Nellie was at Willows, and she was currently sad because Eileen was due to return soon with Keith, while Nellie would be needed in Crosby.
‘Open up, queen – it’s only me.’ The door was pulled inward by Elsie. ‘I think God forgot to light the fire tonight,’ Nellie continued. ‘I’m froze right through to the bone. He might be having a few days off with it being near Christmas.’
Elsie opened the door to her pristine shop and greatly improved living quarters. ‘Whatever are you doing out and about at this time? Get yoursen up to my fire. I’ll make you a cuppa and get you a slice of parkin.’
Nellie removed her outer garments and watched the large woman as she bustled about. Elsie was clumsy and prone to accidents, but she was cleaner, and she had new teeth that actually fitted. Some people imagined that she had suffered a 180-point turn in the personality department, but the truth was simpler. She smiled because she had comfortable teeth. A sliver of pain pierced Nellie’s heart. Oh, Kitty, we could have done so much for you and the babies. Like Kitty, Elsie smiled in a bid to display new mouth furniture. And in order to match the smiles she needed to be pleasant, so she was pleasant. Well, for most of the time.
‘There you go, Nellie. Cup of tea and a nice chunk of cake. Right. To what do I owe the pleasure of your company, missus?’
Nellie shrugged. ‘I’m not sure.’ She knew the secret now, understood how to keep Elsie onside. The woman was a gossip, so no one ever confided in her. Little by little, Elsie Openshaw had become Nellie Kennedy’s confidante. While helping the woman to clean up house and shop, the visitor had let drop small, unimportant pieces of information about herself, her family and the new owner of the Willows estate. ‘Don’t say a word,’ had always been the final request and, true to her one and only friend, Elsie had kept her mouth shut.
‘You’ve not walked all the way down from yon for nothing in pitch black, Nellie Kennedy. I can tell with your face, any road. With a frown as deep as that, you favour the Town Hall clock just before it strikes midnight.’
‘You’ll miss me,’ Nellie said. ‘When I go back to look after Miss Morrison, I mean.’
‘Course I’ll miss you. I missed bloody toothache when I had them all pulled.’
Nellie chewed thoughtfully. Elsie’s baking was rather hit and miss; the parkin was a definite miss. ‘I could ask Miss Morrison,’ she said. ‘We’d both be working, because, on paper, we could each be responsible for her twelve hours a day.’
‘You what?’
‘After Christmas, come with me to Crosby. I reckon our Eileen’ll be stopping here with Keith and the lads, so I’ll be in Liverpool for the duration.’
‘What about me house and me post office?’
‘Somebody will see to all that.’
Elsie considered her options. She could stay here and be safe, but lonely. Or she might be able to spend a few months or years in Nellie’s company. Yet Liverpool was a mess. The chances of being bombed here, in Willows Edge, were negligible, while the house in which Nellie and her granddaughter would be living had already been shaken right down to its footings. ‘Eh, I don’t know what to say, lass.’
‘Say nothing,’ Nellie advised. ‘The old lady hasn’t been consulted yet, though I do know she loves company. It’s my belief she would have keeled over months ago if she’d been left on her own. Anyway, I’m going to take the lads over to see their mam tomorrow. With luck and a good following wind, we should make it there and back in a day.’
Those words would haunt her for years.
A very rigid version of Philip Watson perched on the end of his bed. Glowing cheeks were the only reaction to Hilda’s opening remarks, because he didn’t know how to feel or what to say. He’d never been any good at anything, had he? Reports from school declared him to be a bold, stubborn boy with no desire to learn, while the cops in the Scotland Road area were seldom surprised by his attempts to pervert the course of justice. ‘They’re just scribbles,’ he murmured eventually. ‘I’m not one of them soft girls who go in for art and stuff.’
Hilda was prepared for that one. ‘All the greats are men, Philip. Michelangelo, da Vinci, Botticelli—’
‘And Watson?’ At last, he grinned. ‘Naw. It’s just something I do when I’m not helping out with Mr Collins. I’ve no bike, I don’t ride horses, so I have to do something.’ He was glad that the school was full. Like many evacuees, the Watson boys were not in full-time education, since Miss Pickavance had been judged good enough to fill the gap. She had their work sent down from the school, and sent it back to be checked from time to time by the head teacher. ‘See, Miss Pickavance, our Bertie’s got Pedro, and our Rob’s up to his eyes in the rotation of crops, so I had to find something to do.’ He stared hard at his hostess. ‘You took it, didn’t you? You took the pad and pretended you hadn’t.’
Hilda nodded.
‘Why?’ he asked.
She took a deep breath. ‘I showed your work to a lecturer from Manchester College of Art. He lives in Bolton, he wants to see more, and he wants to see you.’
Phil concentrated on his breathing for a few seconds. ‘And the ink drawing?’
Hilda laughed. ‘Everyone’s favourite. It’s framed for your mother. Young man, you are incredibly talented. You can make your living through your art. Not yet, not while the war is on, but later. Your eye for detail is amazing.’
‘Why didn’t you say something before?’ he asked after another lengthy pause.
So Hilda explained about waiting until he was ready, about her fear of embarrassing him. There was a new quiet in him, a need for privacy. ‘I felt I had to leave you to it, but now I am absolutely convinced that you are gifted beyond the norm. And you can’t own a gift, Philip. It’s lent to you for your lifetime, but you have to pass on the results to the rest of us. Writers, composers of music, actors and painters – these people share what they have, what they know. Many artists died young and in poverty, because they worked full time on their talent and others reaped the benefit.’
‘So it’s a curse as well as a gift.’
This was another Watson moment. Hilda should have become used to such events, because each of Eileen’s boys had hidden depths. Mel’s were on display, but she was female and unafraid. Boys were so vulnerable and terrified of criticism that they hid their light under any passing bushel. It’s a curse as well as a gift. That a street urchin should have such perception was amazing. ‘I am so proud to know you, Phil, to have been a witness and a friend to you and your brothers. Robin loves the land and knows more than many grown men when it comes to arable far
ming. Little Bertie’s a natural horseman, while you, dear boy, are an artist.’
Phil blushed. ‘Have you any ink? I used it all.’
‘You have ink. I bought it as one of your Christmas gifts. Do you need it now?’
‘Not really. I can do the Mr Collins asleep sketch any time.’
‘Shall I get it for you to copy? It’s upstairs.’
He shook his head. ‘I’ll just do it from memory.’ Tapping his forehead, he grinned broadly. ‘I keep them all in here,’ he explained. ‘Let’s face it, there’s plenty of room. And I can do it better this time. Thanks.’
‘For what?’
‘For pretending not to notice when I pinched all your uncle’s stuff out of the roof. If that hadn’t been there, I might never have found out how much I like drawing and painting.’ He would be a man; he would do what needed doing this very moment. After jumping to his feet, he crossed the room and kissed Miss Pickavance clumsily on the cheek. ‘Thanks,’ he mumbled again. ‘Without you and this place, I might never have found out about myself.’ He left the room at speed.
‘And Hitler,’ she whispered. Had the war not happened, Phil Watson might well have followed his peers to the docks. Even the illest of winds carried some good news. Well, she had done her duty, and it had been a pleasure. The wildest and naughtiest Rachel Street boy had turned out to be the best. ‘Never judge a book by its cover, Hilda,’ she told herself. ‘And never judge a boy by his sins. I wish those two policemen could see his work. As Nellie might say, that would wipe their eyes good and proper.’
With the exception of rickshaws and bicycles, Nellie and her two older grandsons had used almost every form of land transport known to man. They travelled by horse and cart, a train, two buses, one tram and a filthy delivery van. They were now staring at part of their beloved city. Smoke and dust filled the air. Steam struggled through heaps of brick and slate that had, until now, been family homes. Underneath all this, there would be bodies.
‘Bloody hell,’ Nellie breathed. Distance and countryside quiet had made the war almost unreal, because the fortunate residents on the Willows estate heard and saw nothing at all. ‘We don’t know we’re born,’ she whispered. In an effort to keep the boys cheerful, she chivvied them along. ‘Come on, lads. I can’t wait to see your mam’s face when you give her that drawing, Phil.’
Phil stood as if frozen.
‘What are you doing?’ Nellie asked.
‘Remembering.’ His tone was sombre. When he got home – yes, it was home – he would commit to paper what he saw today. Slates slipping and shunting to the edge of a roof; behind them, a hole through which a feeble flame struggled in its search for oxygen. On the pavement, two ragged little boys chewing on bread, their movements automatic, expressions fixed, souls depleted. Everywhere, bricks and roof tiles and shattered glass. Two shocked children breaking bread in a scarred city. What had they lost? Were they brothers? Where was their mother? Somebody would come for them soon, surely? Phil committed their faces to memory. The sky was dirty. Perhaps the sun shone behind layers of bitter smoke. ‘Gran?’
‘What, love?’
‘I’m glad Bertie didn’t come. This would have given him nightmares for weeks. Is Rob all right?’
‘He will be.’ She shouldn’t have come. She was a stupid woman—
‘Mrs Kennedy?’
It was him. It was the doc, the one she had clobbered, the bloke whose arm had been wrenched from its socket by a couple of old dockers. He was offering them a lift to Crosby. Rob was looking a bit green round the gills, while Phil was simply staring, taking it all in. This wasn’t right.
‘It’s a long walk,’ Tom told her. ‘Get in. My wife will have my lunch waiting.’
‘Thanks,’ Rob yelled. He had seen enough. ‘Come on, Gran. I don’t fancy walking seven miles.’
The boys sat in the rear seat, Eileen’s Christmas gift clutched to the artist’s chest. This meant that Nellie had to place herself next to the driver, the very man who had awakened Eileen’s lonely body, who had probably pushed the girl into the arms of Keith Greenhalgh. Mind, the marriage was a good one, so Dr Tom Bingley had merely hastened the inevitable. She studied him. He was as black as a chimney back, and something akin to the colour of blood stained his hands. ‘Where’ve you been?’
‘To hell,’ was his quiet reply. ‘I couldn’t just sit there in Crosby when I could hear what was going on. I’ve been among the dead, the barely alive, the young and the old. You shouldn’t have come back here.’
‘But it’s Christmas.’
‘Yes. The Germans know it’s Christmas, too, Mrs Kennedy. They imagine us sitting round our hearths with the children’s stockings hung and waiting, so they bomb us. The young among us look to the sky for reindeer and a sleigh. Instead, they get Heinkels and tons of shrapnel. I did what I could. We all did what we could. But the people, including the walking wounded, are so unbelievablybrave. I dressed the hands of a man who had prised off two fingernails in order to dig out his family, and he felt no pain.’
‘Did he get the family out?’
‘Oh, yes. Except for his wife.’ He swallowed. ‘If that happened to Marie, I don’t know what I’d do, Mrs Kennedy.’
So the rumour was true, then. It had come from Gloria, had been filtered through Mel, then via Eileen. But this was no game of Chinese whispers. He was back with his wife. ‘Good lad,’ she said softly.
‘Is she . . . all right? Eileen, I mean. Is she happy?’ he asked.
‘She is. And expecting.’
‘Good.’ He stopped at a level crossing. ‘Sometimes, we don’t know what we have until we throw it away. Marie needed help, as did I. Tell Eileen I was asking after her.’ He pulled away when the crossing barriers were lifted, drove up Liverpool Road, then stopped suddenly outside his surgery. ‘Stay here for a minute or two, boys. Mrs Kennedy, come and give me a hand.’
She waited while he unlocked the door, then followed him into his surgery. ‘What?’ she demanded. ‘Are we here for a repeat performance? I can hit your jaw for a change if you like.’ She smiled at him. ‘Pulling your leg,’ she said.
He told her about the town hall, municipal offices, a food warehouse, shops, an hotel, houses, the docks. ‘There are five railway arches down. People were sheltering, and it could take days to get the bodies out. Fires are being dealt with by people who work all day, only to come out again to man trucks and hoses at night. You shouldn’t be here. Last night was the worst so far, and I suspect we’ll be getting repeat performances. I think they got West Derby again, and Waterloo Grain House was fire-bombed and destroyed.’
‘I didn’t know,’ she whispered.
‘You’re supposed not to know, because what the populace knows, the enemy knows. They are among us, Nellie. And that’s not paranoia; it’s a fact.’
She dropped into a chair. ‘If we’d stayed at Willows—’
‘Stop it,’ he ordered. ‘I won’t have you making yourself ill because of this one mistake. What I am saying is that you must take the boys back. Stay here tonight. Keith Greenhalgh and I will put our heads together with regard to petrol. I have an allowance, and I use a bicycle when I can, so I should be able to spare a gallon. And I have patients who might donate some.’ He looked her up and down. ‘But God help you when she opens that door. She has a feisty side, as I’m sure you know.’
Nellie smiled ruefully. ‘Her dad was a quiet man, so she got her temper from me. Keith manages her.’ Keith loved Eileen, and Keith was capable of loving only one hundred per cent, but the doctor didn’t need to know that. Between Eileen and Keith there was a chemistry so powerful that it seemed to colour the air around them. Those long, long kisses they stole when they thought no one was looking, soundless word-shapes mouthed across a room, his hand in her hair, her head on his chest while they listened to the wireless. Tom Bingley had wanted Eileen; Keith Greenhalgh adored her.
‘I promise I’ll take you back tomorrow,’ Tom said.
‘Thanks. And . . .�
��
‘And what?’
‘Sorry I hit you and put the Word out on you.’
This woman had done the right thing. Eileen had been his for the taking, and it would all have been so wrong. ‘Come on, madam. Those boys probably need feeding, and you’ve a virago to face.’ He wished he had to face . . . No, he couldn’t wish, mustn’t start that all over again!
They stepped outside. While he locked the outer door, Nellie had a quick look round. Everything was standing, no gaps between houses, no dying flames. The Crosby bombs had fallen nearer to the river, and just two houses had been wiped out. She would be living here soon, but she would rather be here now and know that Eileen was safe at Willows. Mel needed looking after, as did Frances Morrison. ‘My daughter won’t let me come back till the house is all right,’ she complained.
Tom laughed. ‘It won’t fall down, believe me. It’ll be months or years before it’s finished properly. Stick to your guns. I’ll take you back to Willows, because all your things are there and the boys need a lift, too. But choose a date and tell her you’re coming back. She and her baby need to be away from here. The house is stable enough, I promise you. While it looks odd, it’s been passed as habitable by the corporation and the fire chief.’
‘All right.’ Nellie sat in the car and turned to her grandsons. ‘Your mam will kick off,’ she advised them.
‘We know,’ said Phil. ‘And we’re not bothered.’
The back door flew inward and Elsie Openshaw stepped in. ‘I’ve fetched you two bottles of Guinness,’ she cried. ‘Good for you and for the babby. How is our Maisie?’ She entered the living room. It was a tip, and Nellie, who sometimes helped Gill, had buggered off to Liverpool with two of her grandsons. The third boy was helping Collie Crawford, because Collie looked after Pedro, and Bertie liked to show his gratitude. When she got back from Crosby or wherever, Nellie would clean up Gill’s mess. Elsie, who was averse to housework anyway, had to open up the shop in half an hour, but she had promised to call in here while Nellie was absent.
That Liverpool Girl Page 24