The Favourite Child

by Freda Lightfoot

  Despite the huge difference in their background Edward discovered, quite by chance, that he actually had a great deal in common with Jinnie. She might always come out of her corner with fists raised, ready for a fight, but underneath she was shy and vulnerable, afraid of making mistakes, just as he was himself. And they both felt the lack of a father’s love in their lives, Jinnie because she’d no idea who he was, Edward because no matter how hard he tried to please Simeon, he always failed.

  He found it easy to talk to her because she was so warm and understanding, cheekily amusing and yet kind and sympathetic. Edward told her how school had bored him and she didn’t think this in the least odd, rather a perfectly normal state of affairs having been at odds with her own teacher because she took so many days off. ‘They was always sending the truant officer round, if he could find where we were living, that is. As if I cared about school when I’d a sick mam to take care of.’

  She also seemed to find it perfectly reasonable for him to have a chip on his shoulder for being the son of a mill manager, looked down upon as working class by those with parents who got their money from rents and land or some notable profession like medicine or the church.

  ‘The parents of my school chums rarely earned their comfortable incomes through trade, or from anything which could remotely make their hands mucky,’ he explained. ‘So I always felt the odd one out, picked upon as the one who didn’t fit in. Added to which, I wasn’t the brightest boy in the school. Bella should have been the boy and given the education. Certainly she thinks so.’

  ‘Were you bullied?’ Jinnie asked, dark brown eyes wide and frightened in her pale face. Edward strove to maintain the image he’d created of himself, one of coping, of being able to deal with whatever life threw at him, but as he looked into that melting gaze, what he read there caused his heart to judder with shock.

  This girl didn’t think any the less of him for being bullied. She didn’t give him pitying glances as Mrs Prudy’s daughter did, nor blame him or think it was his own fault he got beaten, as his father had when one Christmas holiday the young Edward had tried to explain away a black eye and various bruises. Jinnie simply wrapped her loving arms about his neck and hugged him. In that moment he knew that he loved her, and would do so to the end of his days. She was the sweetest, kindest, most loving creature he’d ever met, beyond his lovely sister, and he thanked his lucky stars that she’d fallen across his path that day.

  The first time he kissed her was at the Deansgate Picture House during a romantic interlude in a Mary Pickford film. Jinnie thought she might faint clean away, she went that weak inside. There’d been moments in her past when Billy Quinn’s attentions had stirred some need in her but she’d never experienced anything like this. They’d sit holding hands in the dark, blissfully aware of each other’s closeness; do a bit of canoodling when the gas lights were turned down but although Jinnie gently encouraged him to be more adventurous, Edward was a real gentleman and never went beyond what was proper. To her complete astonishment, he actually appeared to respect her. She’d never experienced anything like that with Billy Quinn, ever.

  ‘I d never hurt you Jinnie,’ he whispered to her in the dark, his hand gently stroking her knee. ‘I think I’ve fallen madly in love with you, do you mind?’

  ‘I-I’m not sure.’ Flushed with love herself, Jinnie longed for him to pull her into his arms and have his wicked way with her right there on the cigarette strewn floor, but because he thought so well of her, she never let on how she felt. She behaved as he wanted her to behave, like a lady. Even so, Jinnie worried about what he’d say if he knew the truth about her, how she’d had a back street abortion, slept with Billy Quinn since she was twelve, had even acted as a bookie’s runner for his illegal street betting ring. Oh, but she didn’t want him to find out, not ever. He wouldn’t respect her then would he? Or love her even a little bit. He’d treat her as she deserved to be treated, like dirt.

  ‘Get your coat on madam,’ Mrs Ashton announced one morning. She was already togged up in her own ankle-length, fur-trimmed number with a velvet toque pulled well down over her frowning brow. ‘We’re off out.’

  Jinnie had been sitting in the front parlour with no one to talk to but the aspidistra, so was more than ready for an outing; though why the woman should wish to take her anywhere, she couldn’t imagine. As they hopped aboard a tramcar at the corner of Derby Road and settled into their seats, Emily asked why it was that she didn’t have a job and Jinnie struggled to explain.

  ‘There’s not much work about for girls like me. Employers take one look and turn up their noses. Once yer on a downward slide, there’s no way back. I tried one or two places but give up in the end.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ Emily tutted, as if she could single-handedly cure economic prejudice. ‘There’s always work to be had, if you look hard enough. And where exactly do you live when you are not begging favours from your betters?’

  Jinnie squirmed with discomfort. ‘No place that I’d want to go back to, if I’m honest.’

  ‘Then we must find you somewhere better, something more appropriate. Life isn’t difficult unless you make it so,’ Emily admonished her, unclipping her purse and taking out a florin to pay the twopence fare. ‘As I said, I’m no fool Jinnie Cook. In my view your layabout way of life simply encourages immorality and promiscuity and it’s time you received the right sort of supervision, perhaps went down on your knees and expressed penitence for your wicked ways.’

  ‘Nay, I never did owt wicked in me life, not knowingly anyroad,’ Jinnie countered, and Emily cast her a sideways smile of satisfaction, pleased at having finally flustered her quarry.

  ‘It all depends how you define wickedness.’

  Jinnie simply looked perplexed by this, privately wondering how Emily would have held off Billy Quinn, if she’d been half starved and in his clutches.

  Emily took her to the Ebenezer Mission Home for Orphans. It was a dark, forbidding building with rows of windows looking out on to the street like blank black eyes. It seemed to Jinnie very like a reformatory or a workhouse. She felt her knees quake with fear as she stood in a tiny, brown-painted office and listened to Mrs Ashton discuss with the woman in charge what was to become of her.

  Jinnie was to sleep in a dormitory with fifty other girls and would work in the laundry, bleaching and scrubbing to earn her keep. Or so the warden, a large woman swathed in dark purple velveteen from neck to ankle, informed her in stentorian tones. Not that anyone asked Jinnie’s opinion on the matter. It was as if she didn’t exist; didn’t have ears, brain, or a tongue in her head to express views of her own. What hope did she have of getting a government to listen to her voice, vote or no vote, if she couldn’t even get a word in edgewise with two old women?

  The thought, inspired by her long conversations with Edward, drove her to speak up. ‘Hold on, have I no say in the matter?’ Jinnie began, only to have her arm grasped so fiercely by the purple dragon, she wouldn’t have been surprised if the woman had clapped her in leg irons. The next minute, Mrs Ashton had pressed a threepenny bit in her hand, told her to be a good girl and that she would be well taken care of, then sailed out through the door. The sound of it clanging shut behind her would, Jinnie was certain, stay with her for ever.

  Billy Quinn never gave up. Like a dog with a bone, once he’d got his teeth into something, he kept them there, tearing and gnawing away until he’d got to the core of it. So it was with the matter of Jinnie. For weeks now he’d been searching for her, had all his mates keep an eye out for her but, mystifyingly, there hadn’t been even a hint of a sighting. No one had the first idea where she might be hiding. But he knew she couldn’t hide for ever. Not from him. And now, at last, his luck had changed.

  His chat with Sadie had been quite enlightening. She’d certainly come to rue the day she’d decided to interfere with Billy Quinn’s arrangements. The last he’d heard of her, she’d taken her two black eyes and broken ribs back to Bolton, where she’d be well advised
to stay.

  Now Len Jackson had got word on the street that Jinnie had been spotted going into the Ebenezer Mission. Taken there only yesterday by a well-dressed woman. Some do-gooder no doubt.

  ‘Is he reliable, this source of yours?’

  ‘So far as I know. Want me to go and knock on the door and ask?’

  Billy growled his displeasure and said he’d see to the matter personally. He was looking forward to seeing the expression on young Jinnie’s face when he found her.

  Bella was quite unaware of Jinnie’s changed circumstances. Once the girl had settled comfortably into her new surroundings, she’d quickly become absorbed back into her normal routine. In fact, she’d hardly set foot inside the house on Seedley Park Road during the last day or two. It didn’t trouble Bella that Jinnie hadn’t been in evidence the previous evening because she knew Edward had gone into Manchester on some errand for their father, and rather assumed that Jinnie had gone with him.

  This afternoon, as on many another, she was busy catching up on her ‘ladies’. She’d witnessed the direst of poverty, had advised on varicose veins, prolapsed wombs and the dangers of septicaemia, as well as extracting promises of better behaviour from several drunkard husbands and treated the usual assortment of sore throats, bad coughs and the ubiquitous head lice.

  Bella was inwardly convinced that all these everyday ills were worsened, if not actually caused by prolific child bearing; by the burden of large numbers of children that seemed to crowd every house; by wearing the poor mothers down to the point of starvation, exhaustion, bad health and even death. If there was indeed some way to prevent such disasters, she would certainly like to hear of it.

  She again visited Mrs Stobbs and was comforted to find young Lizzie on the mend, almost restored to her old cheerful self. Bella was delighted.

  ‘I said that tonic would do the trick,’ Mrs Stobbs beamed. ‘Now, ‘ow about that other little matter what I mentioned the other day. Have you found out - you know - what’s what?’

  ‘Not yet, I’m afraid. But I’ll keep trying, I promise.’ Bella wondered whether to take a chance with their old family doctor, though had little hope that he would be prepared to talk to her, an unmarried woman, so had kept putting the moment off.

  The problem went clean out of her head when she arrived back home later that afternoon to find the house in turmoil. Bella heard the din the moment she entered the hall and found Mrs Dyson and Tilly unashamedly listening outside the parlour door.

  ‘What on earth is going on here?’ The pair had the good sense not to answer but scurry back to the kitchen before they were given their marching orders.

  This time it was Edward who was railing at his mother while Emily sat weeping and thrashing about like a woman demented. Simeon stood helplessly looking on, saying nothing as usual. He hurried to Bella the moment he saw her approach.

  ‘Don’t get involved,’ he warned, drawing her to one side. ‘Something to do with that waif and stray you picked up. She’s gone, and Edward is upset. He seems to be blaming Mother for not keeping a better eye on her.’

  ‘Jinnie gone? Oh no, where?’

  ‘Nay, don’t ask me, I’m just the master in this house. I know nowt, and I recommend that line of action for you too. Least said, soonest mended eh? We did what we could for her, after all. Now she’s gone back to her own sort.’

  ‘Her own sort? And what sort would that be exactly, Father?’ Bella felt outraged by his nonchalant attitude. Perhaps she didn’t know her father after all.

  ‘Now then, don’t get on your high horse with me, lass. I fed and watered her, took her in off the street and what thanks did I get? None.’

  ‘It’s not long since you were accusing me of helping only for the sake of her gratitude.’

  ‘I swear I am not responsible for what that girl does!’ Emily inaccurately cried, wringing her hands in a nice dramatic flourish. ‘I merely took her out for a walk in the fresh air, for the benefit of her health, that’s all.’

  Bella grasped her mother’s hands in an effort to calm her. ‘Where? Where did you walk, Mother? What exactly happened? Did Jinnie run off? When did she go?’ She could almost see the battle taking place in Emily’s head over whether to reveal all or fabricate a tale that might suit better. ‘It’s vital we learn the truth, or she may be in danger from those who put her in hospital in the first place.’

  She heard Edward’s gasp at the very moment she recognised her error in almost blurting out the truth. Bella hastened to rectify her mistake. ‘I mean, there are those who’d not be averse to putting the blame for the accident on Jinnie, instead of the other way about. They may well be prosecuted for allowing the horse to cause a riot in the streets.’ It sounded a feeble explanation but seemed to be accepted nonetheless.

  Edward stood before his mother, his distress evident in every line of his tense body, in the clenching of his bony, boyish fists. ‘Bella’s right, besides which, where would she go? Surely not back to the squalor she came from. Tell us the truth Mother. I expect no less of you.’

  Tears ran down puffy cheeks. ‘I did it for you, my darling boy. She’s no good for you. A trollop. No better than she should be, I’ll be bound.’

  ‘That’s pure prejudice, Mother, and you know it. Not everyone without money is a thief or a harlot. Besides, I’ll be the best judge of what’s good for me. You’ve picked and chosen my friends for me long enough, most of them failures. It’s time I had some say of my own. Where did you take her? I insist that you tell me.’

  It was the first time in his entire life that Edward had stood up to his mother, and Bella watched with sympathy as Emily’s face registered shock, and then her shoulders drooped and her whole body became deflated, like a punctured balloon.

  ‘Oh, very well then. I found this marvellous place.’ Just as if she had chanced upon it quite by accident. ‘I thought it the perfect solution.’

  ‘What place?’ He wasn’t letting her off the hook, not yet.

  She put a flaccid hand to her brow. ‘Oh, my head, my poor head. Why are you all so cross with me? I found her a place at the Mission, if you must know. It’s a God-fearing place where the girl will be properly cared for and led into the paths of righteousness.’ Emily fell back in her chair, both hands now clutched to her head in a desperate appeal for mercy, her voice falling to a pitiful whimper. ‘I did it for the best. It’s where she belongs.’

  Simeon turned on his son in a fury. ‘Now see what you’ve done, you great daft lump. You’ve upset your mother good and proper and she was only doing her best for the lass. You ought to be horsewhipped, great bully that you are.’

  ‘You’re the bully, not me. It was no doubt all you’re idea to get rid of her. You’re glad that Jinnie’s gone. Both of you are. Well I liked her, even if you didn’t.’

  Simeon seemed to swell to twice his normal size as he took a threatening step towards his son, huge fists clenched. ‘Take that back, you jumped up, lily-livered excuse for a ...’

  ‘Stop it!’ Bella rushed to intervene between father and son, as she’d had reason to do many times in the past. ‘It’s no use quarrelling between ourselves. I brought her here, so Jinnie is my responsibility. I’m the one to sort this out.’

  ‘She s not your responsibility,’ Edward shouted above the tears and accusations, in a voice quite unlike his own. ‘She s mine! Jinnie and I love each other and I mean to make her my wife.’ At which point Emily let out a terrible scream and fainted clean away.

  Chapter Five

  By the time Edward and Bella reached the Ebenezer Mission, the warden informed them in stiff, official tones, that the hour was late, being past nine o’clock. Far too late to wake anyone. ‘There was a young man here earlier asking after the very same girl but I told him as I shall tell you, she is asleep and cannot be disturbed. Mind you, he was most demanding, insisted he would be back first thing in the morning. Proper ruffian he looked too.’ She sniffed her disapproval as she crossed well-muscled arms across her ample, pu
rple clad bosom, pointedly expressing her ability to see off such hangers-on with ease, should it become necessary.

  Bella, concerned by this news, asked if he had given any name.

  The warden shook her head. ‘Friend or relative, he didn’t say and I didn’t care to ask. How these gels get involved with such villains I shall never understand if I live to be a hundred. But it’s none of my business. He was wasting his time and I told him as much.’

  Edward, by contrast, possessed excellent manners and was clearly a gentleman. It took him no time at all to exercise his charm on the warden and Jinnie was brought from her bed, still rubbing the sleep from her eyes. The moment she saw Edward, she flew into his arms on a cry of delight.

  Bella hid a smile as she thought how her mother would react to this obvious show of affection. Much to her relief, there was no sign of either parent when they returned home later that night, so Bella helped Jinnie into bed and left her to finish her sleep. There’d be time enough to talk tomorrow.

  ‘I never heard owt so daft in me life. Me, married? To Edward?’ Jinnie stared at Bella, astonished disbelief on her pinched elfin face.

  ‘I’m sorry, I thought he’d already asked you. I’ve spoiled it for you, haven’t I?’

  Nay, you’ve spoiled nowt. I’m not fit to lick his boots. He’s a proper gent and me, I’m - I’m...’ Lost for words to sufficiently describe her shortcomings, Jinnie fell to the usual Lancashire epithets. ‘I’m nowt. Less than nowt.’

  Bella chuckled. ‘Oh, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that. You have some rather remarkable qualities. Determination for one thing. Stubbornness. Courage.’

  ‘Bloody minded more like.’

  ‘That too.’

  Jinnie gave a half smile and Bella came to sit beside her on the sofa. It was past midday and her mother had still not risen, so Bella was taking the opportunity for a little heart-to-heart. The two girls had lifted the green paper blind to let in whatever sunlight was available, and so that they could see out on to the soot-encrusted houses opposite.