‘I must go,’ she said quietly, ‘before they call the police out for me.’
‘I’ll walk you back across town,’ George insisted, seeing that she would stay no longer.
They walked together through the wintry streets as the last of the revellers wove their way out of the closing pubs. ‘You will think on what I’ve said, Maggie?’ George urged. ‘I want you with me - always.’
Maggie felt a desperate thrill at his words but quite torn as to what to do. ‘And what if I decide to stay?’ she murmured from within the folds of her shawl.
George stopped and pulled her round to face him. His look was determined. ‘Then I’ll go anyway, even if you won’t come with me. I’ll not stay in this town and watch you live with another man - a man twice your age.’ Then he bent and kissed her with a desperate passion, as if he could will her to choose him.
The taste of his kisses was still on Maggie’s lips when she entered the house in Sandyford. John and Millie were waiting up for her anxiously.
‘Where’ve you been, you little bugger?’ Millie exploded. ‘We’ve been worried sick. And you without a coat in this cold. We thought you’d be found frozen to death. Mr Heslop’s been out looking for you all evening.’
Maggie could not look at them. ‘I’m sorry to make you worry,’ she mumbled like a scolded child limping towards the fireside to warm herself. ‘I’m very tired and I’d rather not talk about it.’
‘Well, listen to the cheek of it!’ Millie exclaimed.
‘Thank you, Millie,’ John said swiftly. ‘You get yourself to bed.’ His look silenced any further protestations. Maggie tried to follow her, but John stood in her way.
‘Maggie, where did you go?’ he asked once the old woman had gone. ‘Have you been to Susan and Jimmy’s?’
She looked directly into his concerned eyes but could not tell him. It had been a pure accident running into George as she had, but he would not see it like that. Then she began to wonder if it had been an accident. Perhaps something inside her had led her to him, a part of her that had been searching for him all along and would have gone on looking for him until she had found him.
John saw the brightness in her eyes and felt a leaden weight in his stomach.
‘You’ve seen Gordon, haven’t you?’ he whispered in horror, his hands clenched. ‘Have you, Maggie?’
She nodded, hating herself for inflicting this pain on him, but unable to lie. ‘He wants me to go away with him.’
‘Away?’ John echoed incredulously.
‘Abroad.’
She expected him to protest and denounce the idea, accuse her of being wicked and ungrateful. But he did not. His shoulders sagged and in that moment he looked his age, old and grey-faced and bent with years of hard work.
‘But you’re married to me, Maggie. Doesn’t that count for anything anymore?’ he asked wearily.
Maggie gulped. ‘I know I’m married to you!’ she burst out. ‘Why else would I have come back?’
The look he gave her was more than she could bear. She ran from the room and bolted upstairs to the refuge of her room, giving way to searing tears. Whatever she did, Maggie realised in desperation, she was going to hurt one of them. Unresolved in her own mind as to what to do, she fell into an exhausted sleep.
***
The tense atmosphere spoiled Christmas and John spent his time down at the mission, out of her way. Susan brought the children over on Boxing Day, but it only served as a painful reminder of how Christabel was missing and would never visit Sandyford again. Maggie felt as if she had been bereaved once more, yet her sorrow was compounded by frustration in knowing that Christabel lived, close by but for ever out of reach.
She confided in her sister about her encounter with George.
Susan clucked and shook her head, but to Maggie’s surprise she did not tell her what to do.
‘Well, after the mess I made of my marriage, I’m not going to lecture you about yours. I can understand you being upset now that you can’t see your bairn, but Mr Heslop’s been that good to you, Maggie, to all of us.’
‘I know,’ Maggie said, seeing no way out of her dilemma, ‘but it’s George I love!’
‘Well,’ Susan said, putting a comforting hand on Maggie’s shoulder, ‘it’s only you can decide. But you should make your mind up quickly and be done with it.’
The New Year came and went and the dark, dreary days of January crept by. Maggie sent a message to George that she was uncertain what to do, but in the meantime she would not embarrass John by visiting him. A letter came back, full of tenderness, saying he would wait for her and continue to lay his plans for emigration.
Maggie tried to occupy herself once more with plans for the home and she resumed a working friendship with Alice, though both were too upset to mention Christabel. The hollow emptiness Maggie felt at the loss of her daughter grew more unbearable as the weeks passed. She could not stop herself imagining what Christabel was doing and even thoughts of starting a new life with George could not prevent her dwelling on the girl. She would gaze endlessly at a photograph that Alice had taken of Christabel at the seaside, as if staring hard enough would bring the image to life in her hands. Christabel was watching enthralled as a troupe of players performed on the promenade, her small elfin face full of wonder and delight...
John saw how his wife tortured herself but he seemed unable to comfort her as he had once done. Their affectionate, intimate friendship had been blighted by the loss of Christabel and the threat of Gordon’s emigration and John saw no way of winning Maggie back. So he stayed out of her way, throwing himself into his work as a salve for his hurt feelings, spending long hours at the shop and then at the mission.
Finding herself alone in the evenings, Maggie turned to her old friend Rose Johnstone and found a measure of consolation. The two women slipped easily into their old friendship. Increasingly, Rose came round to visit Maggie or she would call at Rose’s neat flat in Heaton to read and talk together as they had in the past. They argued only once, when Rose told her she would be a fool to give up everything for George Gordon.
At once Maggie was defensive. ‘You’ve never liked him, so why should I listen to you?’
‘Because you’ve got so much to stay for - a comfortable home, your work, a kind husband—’
‘Christabel was my only reason for staying,’ Maggie cut in. ‘What is the point of anything here without her?’
Rebuffed, Rose never spoke of Maggie’s future again.
By early spring the home was almost ready to open. Staff were appointed and Maggie spent most of her time attending to last-minute details. The first residents were to be admitted in mid-March. As the date neared, Maggie felt a strange premonition that something momentous was about to happen, though she could not tell if it was good or bad. Since the time as a child when she had foreseen her father’s death, she had smothered these insights into the future, dismissing them as fey nonsense instilled in her as a child by her dear grandmother. But she found herself pacing the house anxiously, increasing the tension between John and herself beyond endurance.
‘Perhaps I should move out of the house,’ she offered. ‘I can see how unhappy I’m making you. I could stay at Rose’s until …’
But John was swift to protest. ‘Please, Maggie, don’t do that. You know I don’t want you to go anywhere. I just wish Gordon would go and leave us in peace.’
She saw his anxiety but it only served to irritate her. ‘Why do you still want me here when I’ve brought you nothing but heartache?’ she asked impatiently. ‘Can’t you just let me go, John?’
He looked at her in misery. ‘I love you, Maggie, it’s as simple as that. But I won’t beg you to stay.’
He left abruptly and for the next two days they did not exchange a word.
Then it came. A message from George: his passage was booked in a fortnight, when the spring voyages began. He would earn his passage by loading and unloading cargo at the various ports.
Maggie wen
t to find him, unable to stay away any longer.
Chapter Thirty-Two
George was triumphant at seeing Maggie as he came off his shift at the quayside, but she refused to go back to his gloomy lodgings.
‘I’d like to see Hibbs’ Hill again with you,’ Maggie said on impulse, hoping that visiting their old home might help her see things more clearly and come to the right decision. They caught a tram across town and from Scotswood climbed up towards the farm. Much of the mediocre, semi-derelict land on the fringe of the countryside had been turned to cultivation during the war; a patchwork of small vegetable plots divided by battered fences and advertising hoardings.
Finally they reached the steep slope up to their old cottage. Maggie was out of breath and her back was throbbing by the time George pulled her up the path. They stopped outside the gateway and peered at their former home.
It was shabby and dilapidated, with boarding at one window where the glass had never been replaced. The garden they had tended so lovingly was overgrown with thistles and weeds and the ground was a mulch of last year’s leaves and rotten, unpicked fruit. At first sight, Maggie thought the cottage must be uninhabited, but then the front door swung open and a small, barefoot child emerged in a ragged dress, her hair matted and face filthy. She was probably about three or four, Maggie thought, Christabel’s age. She had a sudden chilling thought, that this was how her daughter might have looked had she managed to struggle on alone at the cottage, emaciated and dull-eyed by extreme poverty.
George saw her look of horror and steered her quickly away. They walked along the edge of a ploughed field, the trees still bare under a steel-grey sky.
‘I’ve never had the courage to come up here before,’ George admitted.
‘Neither have I,’ Maggie answered, shivering in the chill air.
George put a warming arm round her. ‘It’s not the same here anymore, Maggie. Coming here’s brought that home even more strongly. It’s no good searching for the past, ’cos it’s gone. We should be looking to the future, lass, a fresh start in a new country; together.’
Maggie smiled at him wistfully but said nothing. She gazed back over the distant town with its packed streets and thought of its teeming humanity going about their everyday chores, trying to survive as best they could. Below lay the silver-grey ribbon of the Tyne, cranes stooped over its waterfronts like huge birds of prey. She felt attached to the view before her. How could she ever describe to George that she was bound to its river and its low-lying hills and its rows of brick houses by strong cords of familiarity that stretched deep into her childhood? Over there lived Susan and Jimmy and the children, and Rose Johnstone and John and Alice Pearson, and all the other people with whom she shared this common bond of belonging beside the Tyne.
And it came to Maggie with a force like a westerly wind that whenever she looked at the scene before her, she would think of Christabel, living her life close by, up the Tyne valley.
‘I can’t go with you, George,’ she whispered. ‘I’m sorry.’
He turned to scrutinise her face and saw his own sorrow mirrored there.
‘Why not?’ he demanded. ‘Don’t lose your courage now, Maggie!’
She shook her head. ‘Oh, Geordie, I need courage to stay. It’s the hardest thing in the world to let you go again.’ Her grey eyes were full of tenderness as she spoke in a quiet but clear voice. ‘I belong here, among these streets, beside that dirty river. And there are so many things here need putting right that I feel I can help with, like the mothers’ home. I can’t just turn me back on them all.’
She tried to laugh through her tears. ‘Look at me, Geordie! Worn out by prison and the workhouse. I’d be no good in Canada. I’ve a gammy leg and a puny body; they’d probably hoy me overboard as scrap for the birds before the voyage ended. I’d just hold you back.’
‘No, you wouldn’t.’ George tried to fight her resolve. He looked at her in despair. ‘Is it Heslop? Are you staying just for him, a worn-out old man who probably won’t live another five years?’
‘He’s my husband,’ Maggie sighed, ‘and I would feel guilty leaving him. But it’s not just that.’ She put a hand up to his unshaven face. ‘It’s you I love, Geordie, far more than I could ever love John. There will never be anyone else in me life to make me feel like this ever.’
‘Then why can’t you come with me?’ George cried in exasperation.
Maggie took a deep breath. ‘It’s Christabel. She will always keep me here.’
‘But you can’t have her, Maggie, you told me!’
‘No, but I can never give up hoping. At least while I live here there’s hope. If I gan to Canada then I give up that hope of seeing her for ever.’
George gripped her shoulders. ‘But we could have other bairns.’
Maggie shook her head as her eyes flooded with tears. ‘I can’t have any more bairns, Geordie,’ she whispered. ‘They saw to that at St Chad’s - ripped me apart so much, I’m barren now. Christabel’s the only lass I’ll ever have.’
George pulled her to him and held her tightly, while they both wept for what they had lost and what was never to be in the future.
‘Oh, Maggie,’ George said hoarsely, ‘it would’ve been easier for us both if I’d never come back. This separation’s worse than death.’
‘I know!’ Maggie said, clinging to him.
They kissed tenderly, desperately, then Maggie pulled away.
‘Don’t ever doubt how much I love you, George Gordon,’ she said, her voice breaking.
‘Lass, I’ll miss you!’ George replied, and turned abruptly away, ashamed to show his tears.
They hurried down the hill without speaking again and when the first tram appeared, George pushed her on.
‘It’s better if I walk,’ he told her, trying to smile.
‘Let me know where you go,’ Maggie urged as the tram jolted away. She strained to see him through the grimy window, a tall, solitary figure watching the departing tram, until it rounded a corner and he disappeared from view.
The following day she went down with a heavy cold and took to bed, unable to speak to anyone, thankful to take refuge in her room like a wounded animal. On the day that George’s ship sailed, she sat by her bedroom window and looked towards the river, imagining him going aboard with what few possessions he had; a bundle of books, the photograph of them both that Maggie had given him, taken by Alice before the war, and his army coat.
Did he gaze at the quayside while the boat slipped its moorings, she wondered, still expecting her to come at the final hour? It took all her willpower not to dress hurriedly and rush off to join him, and it was almost a relief when the terrible day came to an end and the chance of going with him was finally gone.
A couple of days passed and Maggie rallied her spirits, emerged from her room and went off to the home to help in the office. Alice was away in London until the end of the month but Maggie busied herself getting to know the staff and wandering around the house introducing herself to the young pregnant women who had just arrived. It was comforting to speak to these ordinary women and carry out mundane tasks such as making cups of tea. She told them that while they stayed there they would be able to learn new skills such as typing and book-keeping and cookery and gardening to equip them for when they left. Looking at their swelling bellies, she renewed her commitment to give them the care that had been denied her.
From that evening, she began to take meals with John and Millie again, though her conversation was confined to what was going on at the home. She avoided being alone with her husband or allowing herself to be comforted by his presence. Her feelings for him seemed to have been cauterised by the events of the past weeks, leaving her numb to his needs.
Then one day in April, John came bursting into the sitting room where she was writing letters at her desk. He was holding a copy of the morning paper.
‘Read this,’ he said, waving it at her. He had a strange look on his face and Maggie could not tell if the news was g
ood or bad.
‘What is it?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Here.’ He pointed at an inside page.
Maggie read the brief announcement: ‘Lady Felicity Pearson, wife of Sir Herbert, MP, tragically passed away two days ago while staying with friends in the south. It is believed she was a victim of the Spanish flu that raged to epidemic proportions last year. The body of the deceased is to be brought north for burial on Saturday.’
Maggie looked up at John. ‘What does this mean for the children?’ she gasped.
‘I don’t know, my dear,’ he answered gravely. ‘We can only wait and see.’
They did not have to wait long before Alice made contact. She raced back from London for the funeral and came to visit the following day.
‘Herbert is quite devastated,’ she told them. ‘They fought like cat and dog all their married life, and she was continually unfaithful, but he doted on her all the same.’
‘But what of the children?’ Maggie asked impatiently. ‘What will happen to them?’
Alice shrugged. ‘At the moment, Herbert has little thought for them. But I’m going to stay up at Oxford Hall until everything is a little clearer and arrangements can be made.’
‘Will - will I be able to see Christabel now?’ Maggie dared to ask. ‘You could bring her—’
‘I can’t promise anything at this stage,’ Alice silenced her abruptly. ‘It’s all happened so suddenly. For all I know, Herbert may decide to take the children to London where he spends most of his time nowadays. I never mentioned this before so as not to upset you, but there’s been talk of selling Oxford Hall.’
‘To London?’ Maggie echoed in dismay.
‘Maggie, we’ll just have to be patient,’ John insisted gently.
April passed in a frenzy of frustration and uncertainty for Maggie. Then, quite suddenly, after weeks of hearing nothing from Alice, she appeared at the home and sought her out.
‘Walk with me in the garden,’ she ordered, her strong-featured face alive with news she was eager to share.
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