A Mersey Mile

by Ruth Hamilton

  She hadn’t been so thoroughly angry or confused for many a year. It was partly connected to the engagement ring, she supposed. It meant a lot, because it was from Frank, but it was also part of Ellen. She could not have accepted that particular ring at this particular time. Might she have accepted a different one, a new one? Perhaps a new one might have been less meaningful, and she might have given him a chance to put his mother in her place.

  Deep down in her core, well below the emotional stuff, she knew she had done the right thing. She’d watched poor Ellen doing her best, cleaning and baking because Mrs Moo was coming. How much longer might Ellen have lasted without the old cow in her life? What might the dreadful woman have done to Cal’s chances of recovery? Cal’s main problems were undoubtedly physical, yet his state of mind needed to be positive if he were to make the best of any chances that might come his way.

  For the whole night, she vacillated between despair and righteousness. Frank was the love of her life and she had chased him off. Again. Cal was her twin, and he deserved to be protected from a situation that might easily have become unhappy. And if Frank walked out on his mother for Polly’s sake, that, too, could well have been uncomfortable. Oh, how she wanted him; oh, how she despised the woman who had given him life.

  The card school had broken up hours earlier. Cal’s attendant had put him to bed, and Frank had promised not to bother her in the near future. She wanted to be bothered. No, she didn’t. Yes, she did. How could she manage to entertain two diametrically opposed opinions? Was she one of those schizophrenics who didn’t know who they were or what they believed in? Why did life have to be so bloody complicated? Both pillows would be wet with tears by morning. And the bed had become a very lonely place.

  Frank Charleson fared no better, while his mother, suffering already from chocolate withdrawal, was hauled over coals hotter than hell, and neither slept for hours after he’d finished with her at about two o’clock in the morning. ‘This is not my fault,’ she said repeatedly. ‘Those people are just not civilized.’

  ‘Not your fault? Not your fault?’ He mimicked her voice. ‘ ‘‘You run that very basic cafe on Scotland Road, don’t you?’’ Why didn’t you just hit her in the face and have done with it? That poor girl has a twin brother in a wheelchair, and her best friend – my wife – is dead. You were the same with poor Ellen, criticizing her cooking and baking, hinting that the flat seemed difficult to keep clean, rubbing your knife and fork on a napkin before shunting food round the plate. You insulted my wife. You enjoyed causing her pain.’

  ‘I have high standards, that’s all.’

  He laughed, though the sound arrived hollow. ‘You ran barefoot from the Rotunda all the way to town on a regular basis, and you got thumped for stealing and shoplifting. Your mother was a washerwoman, and your dad cleaned windows. What’s the difference?’

  ‘I got out, Frank.’

  ‘Hmmph.’

  ‘Well, I did get out.’

  ‘On my poor father’s back, yes. He was the one who taught me not to hear you. He was a good dad. You are a selfish, greedy, overweight, lazy, nasty woman.’ Frank seldom lost control, but his temper seemed to have slipped its leash on this occasion. ‘I came back here after losing Ellen because you were ill. You said you were ill and I, very stupidly, believed you. There’s nothing wrong with you unless Cadbury’s is a disease.’

  She turned on the tears.

  ‘Too late and too unreal, Mrs C. I love Polly Kennedy. When she met you again, she feared for her future with me. She even feared for her disabled brother because of the trouble you caused Ellen. Now, listen for once in your stupid little life. I am going to marry her. But first, I have to get away from you. The business books are in my desk, and everything is up to date. Collect your own rents and arrange your own property repairs. I have other plans.’

  He left the annexe, but she followed him. ‘All this is yours now, Mother. You’ll be able to live the life you deserve, I suppose. Tomorrow, I leave your house.’

  ‘But you mustn’t. I can’t manage the business—’

  ‘Then employ someone who will, because I am done here.’

  ‘Where will you go?’ she cried.

  ‘That’s for me to know and for you to wonder about.’

  Norma stumbled onto a sofa. ‘How can you be so cruel?’

  He glared at her. ‘Look in the mirror if you want to find my teacher.’

  Norma folded her arms. ‘I speak my mind, that’s all.’

  ‘And I am speaking mine. You don’t like it, do you? One rule for you, and another for the rest of us, it seems. Well, Polly speaks her mind, as do the rest of them down there. You are known as Old Cow or Mrs Moo. Many people hate you, Mrs Charleson. They know your beginnings, and they don’t appreciate the airs and graces.’ He walked away. ‘And don’t follow me upstairs,’ he called.

  Only now did Norma Charleson break down genuinely. She had no one. Her husband was dead, her son was on his way out of her life, she’d had no time to make friends up here . . . Christine Lewis. All she had in her life was Christine Lewis, whose daughter would have been so suitable for Frank. He was an idiot. He should be looking to marry up, not down. What could she do? Oh, what could she do?

  Upstairs and still in a fury, Frank crammed his clothes into suitcases. Among articles awaiting washing, he found Polly’s knickers and pictured her sliding down the door jamb as she watched him donning them. ‘My trophy,’ he said, packing them into a carrier bag alongside other items that needed to be laundered. ‘I’ll get you back, madam. You shall be reunited with our underwear and with me. This isn’t over.’

  He lay on his bed and thought about Polly. He remembered their teenage years, afternoons at the swimming baths, table tennis at church youth clubs, dances, concerts, trips on the ferry over to the Wirral, just the four of them at that stage, Polly and Ellen, himself and Cal. Polly had been difficult to read, because she acted daft and hid her emotions, but he’d seen regret in her eyes when she’d turned down his first proposal. ‘I should have persevered.’ Yet he knew it would have made no difference, as Polly Kennedy’s mind had been made up.

  He rolled over and hugged a pillow. She’d turned him down for Ellen’s sake, because she’d known that Ellen adored him. Polly was a selfless girl who set great store by her friendship with Ellen. She could not have broken her best friend’s heart for all the tea in China and all the coffee in Brazil.

  ‘But she’s broken mine for Cal’s sake. She didn’t want my mother within a mile of Cal, and I can see why. But I’ll dig us both out of this pit and make a happy marriage if it kills me.’ Where would he live? He didn’t know. What was more, he didn’t care.

  Eugene Brennan knew that if he didn’t get out of this place, he’d go completely crazy. After a couple of days punctuated only by faint echoes of tedious Gregorian chant, a doctor visited him, giving him a rare opportunity to communicate. ‘You are keeping me here against my will,’ the priest blustered. ‘Why? Why am I in this terrible place? The silence is murder – nobody says a word. This is solitary confinement. Prison cells are bigger than this hole.’

  The visitor was infuriatingly calm and uninterested. ‘You’ll know about prison cells, of course. You gave up your free will when you injured that child. In order to keep you safe, we have certified you insane. As soon as you are through this controlled withdrawal, you will be transferred to a psychiatric facility.’

  ‘Controlled withdrawal?’

  ‘The drugs are helping you.’

  They were doing no such thing, because he wasn’t taking them. ‘I need a bath,’ he snapped. ‘My clothes are ready to crawl off my back.’

  ‘And you’ll get a bath when you become less aggressive. We have to keep the good brothers safe, and your behaviour hasn’t been exactly exemplary.’

  It was a waste of time; the doctor didn’t give a moonshine for this patient.

  Father Eugene Brennan’s second visitor was a solicitor. He wasted no time in coming to the
point. The child had survived after a considerable amount of surgery. Billy Blunt was on the mend, though he was tormented by dreadful nightmares and seemed slightly withdrawn. ‘His parents have sought legal advice, and they are being encouraged to bring a civil case against you and the Church. Financial compensation will be sought.’

  ‘What?’ the priest roared. ‘The boy’s a thief.’

  ‘He’s seven, small for his age and affected by your behaviour.’

  ‘Whose side are you on?’

  ‘I’m paid to be on yours. They say you kicked him.’

  ‘I fell over him.’

  ‘Witnesses will say you kicked him. So an insanity plea is our best course. The prosecution will also send doctors to assess you and they may well find you competent for trial. The Church has decided that you must answer, by the way, so you will not be spirited off in the night. You have one chance of avoiding court, and that’s by proving mental instability. There’s quite an uprising in the Scotland Road district. Father Foley is back, and St Columba’s parishioners are insisting that he makes sure you face justice from the dock. Just be grateful it’s not a murder charge. You broke the boy’s ribs and an arm, punctured a lung and damaged one of his kidneys.’

  ‘I fell over him.’

  ‘Two or three times?’

  ‘And you’re my lawyer? Go away and find me somebody sensible.’

  ‘Gladly.’ The man shuffled his papers, pushed them into a document case and left. When he had gone, nothing happened; no key turned, no hooded head showed at the grille. Brennan listened and waited for a few seconds; the brothers had a tendency to creep about in their open-toed sandals. He pushed the door outward, looked left and right. The main door to the outside world and freedom was at the right side down a long corridor. He had no key. As this was a facility for alcoholics, all doors would doubtless be locked.

  Like a good boy, he closed the door silently and sat in his hard chair reading the missal. Let them think they could trust him with an unlocked door; he knew the way out and, for the moment, that was what mattered. He jumped up and opened the door fractionally. This way, the monks would see that the door was clearly open and that the incumbent had remained in his cell by choice.

  When a hood finally appeared at the door, Father Brennan was mouthing silent words from his prayer book. He continued to read after the door was locked. If one of them lingered, he needed to look good. To finish his little performance, he took a rosary of brown wooden beads from his pocket, kissed the figure of Christ and began to count his way round the decades. They could stop fearing him. He would be good, would win a bath and, perhaps, a walk in the grounds.

  He was going to escape.

  Ida Pilkington (sweets, newspapers, tobacco and everybody’s business) was in cahoots with Harriet (Hattie) Benson, who was fruit and veg with some cooked meats and canned goods. At seven in the morning, Ida was at Hattie’s door. There was a problem. In truth, there were several problems, one of which was parked upstairs in Ida’s second bedroom above her shop. Situated as they were one each side of Polly’s Parlour, the two women kept a couple of eyes on Polly and Cal.

  Hattie, just back from the wholesale market, opened the shop door. ‘I’m thinking of going into bread and milk,’ she announced apropos of nothing at all. ‘And a bit of cheese.’ She noticed her friend’s face. ‘Eggs. I might do eggs. What’s up, Ida? You look like you lost a quid and found a penny. Get in here while I sort my stock. What’s up?’ she asked again.

  ‘Don’t ask.’ Ida squeezed her large body into the shop. ‘Here, let me give you a hand with that lot. I’ll put the King Eddies over here, and the Pipers next to them. Ooh, Hat. I’m that upset, I keep regurgitating.’

  ‘Well don’t regurge yourself on me spuds. That sack there’s for Polly’s stews and pies, so leave it where it is. Right. What’s up?’ Hattie asked again.

  ‘It’s him.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Him. He’s back.’

  ‘What, Brennan?’

  ‘No. Polly’s him.’

  ‘Frank Charleson?’ Hattie asked.

  Ida stopped in her tracks. ‘What’s been going on when I wasn’t looking?’

  ‘Oh, nothing much.’ Ida never missed a trick, but she was behind the door on this one, Hattie realized. ‘Look, Ida. We both have things to do. You should be selling newspapers already, and I—’

  ‘There’s a lad helping me,’ Ida said. ‘Now, this has to be a secret.’

  Fruit and veg stared hard at tobacco and newspapers. Where secrets were concerned, Ida was as much use as a colander with oversized holes. ‘The lad’s a secret? Why is the lad a secret? You’re making no sense at all.’

  Ida puffed out her cheeks. ‘I wish you’d listen, Hattie. He’s hid up my stairs in the back room.’

  ‘I’ll listen when you stop talking broken biscuits. Who’ve you got hidden upstairs? If it’s the lad, how can he sell stuff from up the dancers?’

  The older woman straightened her spine in preparation for a momentous delivery. ‘Greg Johnson. Realizes he’s made a mistake, and he’s come back for Polly. I’m in a right pickle, Hattie. I acted automatic, like.’

  Hattie sat down abruptly on her behind-the-counter stool, while Ida lowered her bulk into the shoppers’ chair. ‘Hell’s bells,’ Hattie said.

  ‘I know. Anyway, he’s got a job in Liverpool, didn’t like London one bit, and he’s decided he belongs with Polly. Haven’t we trouble enough on? More than half of us will miss Mass on Sunday in support of young Billy and his family, none of us knows where bloody Brennan is, now this bloke turns up out of the blue. I feel like joining a nunnery or finding a little house in a big field.’

  Hattie didn’t know what to say, and that was unusual. If Greg stayed with Ida, the whole area might know by this afternoon. Perhaps that was what Greg wanted. Ida was famed far and wide for her total lack of discretion.

  ‘What shall I do, Hat?’

  ‘Don’t ask me for a start till I’ve thought about it. We all know what Polly suffered when he walked out on her. I was glad when she got angry, cos that seemed healthy. She’s off to the hospital this afternoon with Cal, so the cafe will shut at about half past two. You know how she runs about and does jobs enough for three people. Don’t tell her today, that’s all.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘And don’t tell anybody else, either. Where is he now, the waste of space?’

  ‘Upstairs getting ready for work with some insurance firm in the Liver Building. I told him to go out the back way.’ She paused. ‘There’s something else, Hat. Cafe’s shut till tomorrow – there’s a notice on the door. Urgent family business, it says. Blinds are down, door’s locked, no brekkies and dinners today, queen. I’m wondering if she already knows he’s back. She might be hiding for all I know. Oh, I’ve no idea what to think.’

  ‘Bloody hell, Ida.’

  ‘I know. That’s why me stomach’s gone bad. If that poor girl knows I’ve got the man in my house, she’ll feel hurt. When he turned up, all I could do was hide him quick.’ She paused. ‘Urgent family business. What does that mean?’

  ‘She never closes, Ida. No matter what, she carries on.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘It has to be something big.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So either she realizes he’s back, or Cal’s taken ill, or she’s taken ill—’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Stop saying you know. We don’t know nothing. But we do. We know she doesn’t need messing about by that Greg one. Get rid of him. Tell him you need the bedroom for storage; say any bloody thing, but get shut of him immediately if not sooner.’

  ‘Well, I don’t want to be rude, do I?’

  ‘Yes, you do. Tell him to piss off sharpish.’

  ‘I can’t say that, Hattie. I try not to do that kind of swearing.’

  ‘Then I’ll come and say it for you tonight when he gets back from work. Go home and make some toast, love. That’s what I’m having. I’ll miss th
at nice get-together we all have in Polly’s of a morning, a bit of a chat before the day takes over.’ She paused. ‘How does he look?’

  ‘Who?’ Ida asked.

  ‘Who do you think – the coalman? Greg Johnson, of course.’

  Ida shrugged. ‘The same. Good-looking, but a bit shifty round the eyes. I don’t trust him, never did. His eyebrows nearly meet in the middle. Er . . . why did you mention Frank Charleson?’

  ‘Eeh, Ida, I’ve no idea. Me mind’s all over the place some days. I just thought they seemed to be getting on all right just lately. Course, he’s been a friend of hers and Cal’s for donkey’s years. Wishful thinking, I suppose. He’s one of the few good enough for our Pol as far as I’m concerned.’

  Ida opened the door. ‘What’s going to happen to us, Hattie? When we’re all split up and divided? Can you imagine any different way of living? Can you imagine life away from Scotland Road?’

  Hattie shook her head. ‘No, I can’t.’

  ‘Will we go to London and stand outside Number Ten?’

  ‘Yes, we will. Go back now, Ida. Get a bit of breakfast.’

  Alone, Hattie locked the shop door and retreated to the kitchen. Her kitchen and scullery area were knocked into one big room, and she preferred it that way, because she could hear if some early or late shopper came along. She turned on the grill, cut a couple of doorsteps and shoved them under.

  Later, as she sat chewing toast and supping tea brewed in a giant mug, she allowed her thoughts sufficient rein to wander. There’d been a moon without cloud cover the night before last and, as she’d walked back from the dustbin, she’d seen them through a bit of a gap in the curtains. So beautiful they’d looked together, like a pair of naked statues brought to life in a Scotland Road back bedroom. And Hattie had come in to sit and cry in this very chair. Frank and Polly were a match made in heaven. Oh God, she had to get rid of that rat Greg Johnson.