The Rocking Stone

by Jill Rutherford

  He was so happy and proud of that job. His pride had been returned to him. He had money for the pub and could talk about his job to his mates. I think he embellished it a bit, but why not.

  And he kept that job. I’d been afraid they would sack him once they realised how useless he was at odd jobs, but he must have done something right. There’s a lot a wife doesn’t know about her husband and vice versa. Maybe that’s just as well.

  But unemployment had taken its toll on Tom. He looked a lot older than his late thirties. He was as thin as a stick and his lovely thick, black curly hair had thinned out and was turning grey. He had the look of a defeated man about him. But after getting his job he got his sparkle back and his face lit up and he smiled again. It was wonderful to see. Everything had taken its toll on me too. Thin like Tom, although I could accept that, but it was my hair, my pride and joy that made me cry. It was cut by Mrs Mallow, ‘practically short’, as she’d say, and washed in carbolic soap. Whenever we had some spare cash, I’d buy some vinegar and pour it over my freshly washed wet hair to try and give it shine. Some hope! But most other women had the same problem and I didn’t look in the mirror much.

  *

  Finally, the depression ended. We were all employed and beginning to realise that we could enjoy life again, that someone or something wasn’t going to snatch it all away from us. And then, like some bad joke, war was declared. We were at war with Germany. I couldn’t believe it. I was dazed for days. Mrs Mallow was particularly badly hit. ‘Not again,’ she shouted when she heard. ‘We’ve only just finished fighting the war to end all wars. My husband died for us to have our freedom and now we are at war again.’ It was pitiful to see. I wondered how much more we all could take.

  And there was another thing to think about – Dudley! As soon as I’d heard the news, he’d jumped into my mind. He loved the army and war. If he was ever going to return it would be now. Images popped into my mind unbidden: him, in uniform, walking around a corner and bumping into me, accidentally on purpose, as he used to do. He’d start messing with me again, making my life impossible – or worse. I couldn’t see any reason why the passing of the years would have made him a better person.

  I had to talk to myself seriously. ‘Look, Kate,’ I’d say out loud when no one was around, ‘he’s too old to be in another war.’ But then I’d think he’d manage to wheedle himself in somehow: he was good at that. I was terrified he would appear again but as time went on there was no sign of him and for that, I was eternally thankful.

  Then, to my amazement, it became clear that the war was bringing us lots of benefits. Emergency factories were built on the trading estate bringing work for thousands and thousands of people. They were government or military factories making munitions, machinery and goodness knows what else that were needed to help us win the war. Also, as resources grew scarce and utility became the watchword, my sewing business prospered. With the men off fighting in the war, women were employed in the factories. For many of them, it was the first time they’d had a job and a wage of their own and many were determined to spend some of it on themselves. The clothes shops were full of utility drabness for we were not encouraged to waste anything or buy anything that cost a lot to produce, either in materials or labour. So, women came to me with their new-found wages and I made pretty dresses and coats and anything else that was needed. Things they couldn’t buy in the shops. There was a good business going on at the market with stalls selling pretty material at quite high prices, but nobody complained or asked where it had come from. Everyone was just happy to have fashionable patterns to buy with their new wages and they brought them to me as my reputation and reliability for good work grew. Meggie helped me a great deal, especially as her sewing skills increased. I was totally and utterly spoilt with four wage packets coming into the house, which meant I could choose the kind of sewing I wanted to do. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  As the war went on, Jimmy joined up and then Frank and Sam did too. I was terrified for their safety, but it was something they all felt they had to do, so I didn’t discourage them. Meggie decided to join the land army when she was eighteen. Poor Meggie, she wasn’t keen on the hard, physical farm work, but she kept her humour and I was pleased she was out in the world making new friends. When she came home on weekends she was a picture of health and I could see the budding of the young woman she would become. I was proud of my Meggie. She was beautiful, well, I would say that wouldn’t I, but it was true. She had a nice nature to go with her looks and reminded me of my mother.

  ‘I’m proud of our children,’ I said to Tom one night as we were getting into bed.

  ‘Me too. I don’t think I have the words to say just how proud I am.’

  We smiled at each other and to my consternation, a few tears welled up.

  ‘There, there,’ he said. He put his arm around my shoulders as I snuffled into my hankie. I was the first time we’d had contact like that for years.

  ‘Proud,’ he said again. ‘We did good. We brought up our children well, despite everything. And do you know what, Kate?’

  I shook my head as I blew my nose.

  He pulled me a little closer. ‘Not one of our children has gone down the mines. We did it, Kate. We promised each other before we were wed that none of our children would be miners and none of them are. You know, I’m proud of us too. Very proud.’

  ‘Me too,’ I said through tears. ‘Oh, me too, Tom. So proud.’

  *

  Mrs Mallow and I were alone in the house as she dozed in her armchair in front of the fire. She did a lot of that these days as the war dragged on. The coal was damp and not giving out any heat. The smell from it caught in my throat. I hated that. It reminded me of my mother when she told me about the Albion pit disaster and of how, afterwards, she could never stomach the smell of damp coal burning.

  I went out to the coal house and brought in a bucket full of coal and laid it in out in the hearth to try and get it to dry out so that we wouldn’t have damp coal the next day. It happened like that sometimes. The coal came from the coalman damp or wet and in the cold weather it took an age to dry out.

  I was a bit bad tempered about it and went into the cwtch to make a pot of tea hoping it would warm us up. I heard Mrs Mallow get up and groan, but then she often did as her back gave her gip. As I was putting the tea in the pot I heard a loud thud that echoed around the room. I turned quickly, spilling the tea as I looked back into the living room. Mrs Mallow was lying in a heap on the floor. I stood frozen for a moment, not sure of the reality of what I was seeing, then pulled myself together. Slowly, I went to her expecting the worst and, I’m ashamed to say, I hoped it had come at last. That I would be free of her.

  I bent over her, and gently pushed her onto her back. Her eyes shot open and I jumped in shock. Her look was confused at first and then became focused as she stared up at me. I felt sorry for her then and took her hand in mine. ‘Stay calm, now,’ I said. ‘I’ll get the doctor.’

  She could hardly breathe but found the strength to squeeze my hand. I was amazed at the strength of her grip. And then she just ceased to be. Still. No movement. Eyes staring. Mouth slack. Her last thoughts unsaid. She had gone into that other world she so fervently believed in: the world of her God. I kneeled back and looked down upon her and to my surprise, instead of feeling the relief I thought I’d feel at her death, I just felt empty. I saw a lonely, rather pathetic figure. A woman I’d lived in the same house with all these years, yet who was a stranger. What had she been thinking before death claimed her? I closed my eyes and concentrated on the now and not the past. She was dead. My nemesis was dead.

  I stood up and looked out of the window over our scrub of a front garden trying to adjust to this new dimension. I turned around and looked at her again and went over and checked for a pulse. I had to make sure. There was nothing. No sign of life. I closed her eyes for her and went back to the window.

  I felt a calm take
me over, a settlement of emotions that I could now put to rest. I felt relieved and liberated. For the first time in my adult life, I felt at peace, my own person. I’d waited a long time for this moment. I don’t know how long I stood there, getting used to it. A pleasure started to creep up from my feet until it filled my whole body, and then the guilt set in. I let it linger for a while and then pushed it out. I needn’t feel guilty. I’d done my best. Other people influence your life and whatever had happened between her, Tom and me, it was all of us that had contributed to the outcome.

  Mrs Mallow had put on weight over the years and was much too heavy for me to lift, so I went unhurriedly into Mr and Mrs Farmer’s next door. Mr Farmer and one of his sons came and lifted Mrs Mallow to her bed. We sent for the doctor to get the death certificate. He came straight away and declared her dead of a heart attack.

  ‘One life has ended, doctor,’ I said, ‘but there will be another who was born at the very moment she died who will take her place on this earth. Life is a wondrous thing.’

  ‘Yes, the circle of life and death, Mrs Mallow. I see it every day,’ he said wearily.

  ‘Like a rondo,’ I answered rather wistfully, and he nodded and looked at me strangely. Maybe he thought, how does a woman like me know a word like that? But I knew many things I kept to myself. Things I’d learned through books, vocabulary I practised in my head but dared not use in daily life for it would have ostracised me. I had enough sense to know that people didn’t like know it alls, especially in a woman.

  When the doctor had gone, Mrs Farmer called round. ‘Yoo-hoo,’ she said, knocking and coming in. ‘Would you like some help laying her out, Mrs Mallow?’

  She saw the relief in my eyes. For years, I’d been dreading having to lay her out when she died. I had not seen any part of Mrs Mallow’s body except her hands, face and lower legs, in all the time we’d lived together. She had seen all of me in minute intimate detail, but had kept herself private. I didn’t want to be intimate with her, even – especially – in death.

  Mrs Farmer was a sensitive woman and understood this without me having to say anything. ‘You sit there, Mrs Mallow,’ she said. ‘I’ll go and get Mrs Thorpe to help me. We can take care of everything. Just prepare me a bowl of hot water and some towels and rags. We’ll make her beautiful for her Maker.’

  I cried then, because of Mrs Farmer’s kindness and understanding and not because of Mrs Mallow. I’m not sure if she understood this or not. Either way, I was so, so grateful to her.

  When Tom came home and heard the news he just nodded. ‘Been expected for some time now,’ he said as he sat down in his armchair and looked over at her empty chair. He stared into the space around it for a while and then got up.

  ‘I’d better see her. I’d like to be alone.’

  ‘Of course,’ I replied. ‘I won’t disturb you. She’s been laid out. Mrs Farmer and Mrs Thorpe did it.’

  ‘Oh,’ he said looking at me, questioningly. But he just nodded and went into his mother. He stayed in there for over an hour and the tea I’d made went cold. But I knew he’d deal with her death in his own way. He had loved her and needed this time alone.

  He came out with his head bent over like an old man. ‘Do you want some tea, Tom?’

  He shook his head. ‘I’m going for a walk up the mountain. I don’t want any dinner.’ His eyes filled up with tears and he couldn’t say any more. He glanced at me as he picked up his jacket and I saw something in that look. What was it – pain? Yes, but something more. Regret? Yes, that’s what I saw: regret and apology. It was only a glance but I’ll never forget that look. Oh, Tom. If only!

  I went out into our front garden at dusk, worried about him, and looked up at the rocking stone. Tom was sat there, motionless. There was nothing I could do to help him, so I went back indoors and didn’t see him until midnight and he came home smelling of beer, but not drunk. He went straight up to bed and never was another word said between us about our life with his mother.

  Tom was heartbroken, but I was free.

  Mrs Mallow had been paying into the Prudential towards her funeral costs for years. The woman from the Pru, Miss Ridge, came every Saturday afternoon and took Mrs Mallow’s pennies from her and marked her book. ‘You don’t need to worry about my funeral,’ Mrs Mallow would say intermittently. ‘I can afford a decent send off.’

  It was important to her, so we got the best funeral her money would allow and added a bit more in from our own pockets. She’d had no luxury in her life, so we gave her a luxurious coffin. It had white satin lining and was highly polished elm wood with brass handles. Dressed in her Sunday best, she looked the epitome of a woman of substance. It would have pleased her. And Tom insisted on hiring a car to take the family to the church, even though it was only a couple of minutes walk away. ‘She’d be tickled pink, mun,’ he said. ‘I owe it to her. A good send off.’

  Mrs Mallow lay on her bed in her coffin for over a week while we sorted out her funeral. Tom went in every evening and spent time alone with her, but I stayed away from that room. I couldn’t sleep either during that time. I felt her presence more as a dead body than I had in life. She still dominated me and the funeral couldn’t come quickly enough for me.

  I found relaxation sitting on the Rocking Stone, letting my mind go blank and breathing deeply. I went there every day Mrs Mallow was awaiting her funeral and I felt re-energised and relaxed each time. I had no idea how long I sat there. Sometimes, someone would walk by and stop for a chat about nothing in particular. I enjoyed that, anything to stop me thinking about Mrs Mallow’s remains.

  When the day of the funeral finally arrived the undertakers carried her coffin down our steep steps. I was afraid they’d drop her but after a few dangerous wobbles they got her down to the hearse in one piece.

  Tom and I and the kids climbed into the shiny, black limousine and followed the hearse the few hundred yards it took to the church. Some of her cronies walked behind us. The church was packed as she was well liked and it goes to show how someone can be one person outside the home and quite another one inside it.

  The service was a simple one and we said prayers and sang a few hymns. The vicar said nice things about her and then it was time to go to the cemetery. Women were not allowed to attend the actual burial and I was pleased about that. Tom and I had put on some sandwiches and tea for anyone who wanted to come back to our house and all her lady friends from church came and we chatted about everything and anything except her, as if it was unseemly to do so while she was being put in her grave. When the men came back we tucked into the food and tea and finally, it was over. When I waved off the stragglers and closed the front door, I finally felt well and truly liberated.

  I don’t know what I expected, but I felt her passing would change something between Tom and me but our lives went on as usual. We remained separate and only came together for meals and to sleep. I did try to get closer to him, but he had a steel cover over him that I couldn’t penetrate, or he didn’t want me to. But my life became my own and I started to find myself again: the young woman who had fallen in love with a handsome young man, both of us innocents in different ways. The woman who was me before I got caught between Mrs Mallow’s dominance and Tom’s weakness: before I was ground down by poverty and events. The young woman who had been full of hope and ambitions gradually resurfaced again.

  Mrs Mallow’s bedroom was now free, so I did something for myself. Something I had always wanted. Without consultation with anyone, I sold all Mrs Mallow’s furniture and turned her bedroom into my room – a room for me. As it was on the ground floor it was originally meant to have been a room for living in, and now it was.

  On the never-never I bought a patterned carpet of dark blue and brown that almost touched the walls, a three-piece suite of brown leatherette which was all the fashion. I bought an oak table and matching chairs, something I’d always hankered after, and finally, the best of all, two large, highly polished oak bookcases, which I would enjoy filling up w
ith my own books, not the library’s, but my own. I’d never been able to keep a book before as they always had to be returned to the library and used by others. But now I had my own room, my own furniture and a place for my own books. It was heaven and I couldn’t stop smiling.

  By this time I’d given up my sewing business, my eyesight was not so good, and even with glasses, I had trouble seeing the intricate work. But I couldn’t get rid of the machine. It had meant so much to me over the years; helped us to survive the bad times. So I put its top down and used it as a small table. I polished the wood every week and kept a pretty vase on it which I filled with flowers. It looked lovely.

  *

  The war eventually ended. All the boys had married as soldiers, like so many others, afraid, although they didn’t say so, of being killed. They were demobbed one by one and all came to live in lodgings nearby with their wives. I was glad of that. They stayed close. They all got jobs again in the factories on the estate and soon we had grandchildren. We were so proud.

  So it was only Meggie, my lovely Meggie, who came home to live with us again. But she too, met a decent young man who worked in an office as an accounts clerk and was training to be an accountant. She’d done so well for herself marrying a white-collar worker. When her daughter, Sarah, was born, I was the proudest grandmother ever.

  The new families started to come to tea with me every Saturday afternoon. It became the highlight of my week. Tom too, liked their visits and made sure he was home. We’d have sing-songs and the little ones would stand on the table and sing nursery rhymes. Tom would play games with them and his eyes glinted with pleasure as he made up new ones. One game they all loved was, ‘earning a sixpence’, as Tom called it.

  ‘Now, then, girls first,’ he’d say every week. ‘Undo my laces and take off my shoes and put my slippers on for me, there’s good ‘uns.’ Our two little grand-daughters would squeal in pleasure as they rushed to his armchair. They competed with each other every week to see who could do it the quickest. We all joined in with the excitement, grownups cheering on the girls. Simple, good fun that brought us together. While the girls were trying to get Tom’s shoes off, he would pretend to sleep and the girls would try to wake him by shouting, ‘Wake up Grandsha.’ They’d shake him and then he’d pretend to snore. We’d all start shouting at him then. ‘Wake up, Grandsha, wake up, wake up.’ Sometimes, we couldn’t shout for laughing, as Tom made silly faces. They were innocent joys. We didn’t need money to have a good time.