by Anne Bennett
She felt rather than heard the relief flood through David’s body as he said, ‘You mean that?’
‘Every word,’ Kate said. ‘I said that I liked you, and I still do, but there is a part of me that more than likes you. I think Susie was right when she said that liking a person at first was more important than loving them.’
‘Love can grow out of liking.’
‘I know,’ Kate said, in a voice little more than a whisper. ‘I think maybe that’s what’s happening to me.’
‘Oh, Kate,’ David said, his heart swelling with love. He knelt down by Kate’s chair and took her hands in his and stroked her fingers gently. She had opened her heart to him; he was touched that Kate had told him so honestly all about her cousin. And yet, though he hid it well, he was suddenly almost consumed with jealousy. It was far from reasonable, but he was resentful that this Tim probably knew more about Kate than he ever would.
This all-consuming love he had for Kate had come unbidden into his life; he had felt as if he’d been hit by a sledgehammer the first time he had seen her at the Friday-night dance. He and Nick had been going along fairly happily in their bachelor lives, and he had dated a fair few girls who had been nice enough. But no one had stirred him like Kate. ‘You only want her because she is so remote and unobtainable,’ Nick had said when he’d confided in him. ‘It’s the thrill of the chase. If you were ever to get her, you’d very likely not want her. Anyway, I haven’t time to waste on people like that. I much prefer her friend, Susie. That’s who I am going to pursue.’
And he had, of course. Now he and Kate were closer than they had ever been and so he tried to push the jealous thoughts away. He had to build on what he had, but slowly, for Kate’s feelings for him were tenuous as yet. But the nub of resentment against this man, Tim Munroe, persisted, and he had the sudden desire to crush Kate to him and stake his claim somehow; show her how much he loved and wanted her. He controlled himself with difficulty and, instead, lifted her fingers and kissed them one by one. Then, getting to his feet and drawing Kate into his arms, he felt her melt against him as their lips met.
‘Ooh, you and David, I can hardly believe it,’ Susie said the next morning as she settled herself in the tram as they made their way to work. ‘And, he actually said he loves you?’
Kate’s smile was broad and her eyes sparkling as she nodded her head vigorously. ‘He did. Isn’t that wonderful?’
‘I’ll say,’ Susie said. ‘And what was your reply?’
‘Tell you the truth, I didn’t know what to say,’ Kate said. ‘I was completely stunned. I mean, it is special to say you love someone, isn’t it? I mean, it isn’t something you say to everyone?’
Susie smiled. ‘Some boys do,’ she said. ‘But David isn’t like that. So, you didn’t say you loved him back or anything?’
Kate shook her head. ‘Not exactly, and there was little time to say any more because Sally and Phil came in. They disturbed us in a clinch as it was.’
‘What bad timing.’
‘Yes, it was,’ Kate agreed. ‘They brought the cold of the night in with them and were glad of the fire. We sat around it talking for a bit and then, despite the fact that Phil and Sally had had Sunday tea at Phil’s mother’s, everyone was suddenly starving hungry, and so I ended up cooking bacon and eggs for everyone and then we played cards together. It was a good night, but it gave us no private time together.’
‘So, when are you seeing him again?’
‘Tomorrow,’ Kate said. ‘Gracie Fields is on at the Aston Hippodrome and David asked me if I wanted to go. Of course I said yes.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Susie said. ‘Nick mentioned it. It’s a good line-up too because Tommy Trinder is on as well – and Max Miller.’
‘He is funny, that Max Miller,’ Kate said. ‘And I love the funny walks he does, but some of his jokes embarrass me a bit.’
‘You’re easily embarrassed, that’s all I can say,’ Susie said unsympathetically.
‘I can’t help that,’ Kate protested. ‘And I am still going and looking forward to it.’
‘Not surprised,’ Susie said. ‘I fancy going there as well. I’ll mention it to Nick and see what he says.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Kate said, knowing she would feel much more relaxed if the solid presence of her friend was in the next seat. ‘And,’ she added, ‘David has asked me up to meet his family next weekend.’
‘Oh,’ said Susie. She was well aware that Kate thought that going to see one’s family was tantamount to becoming engaged, and so she went on: ‘Will you go?’
‘I suppose so,’ Kate said. ‘I did hesitate, but you are always telling me that meeting the parents means very little these days. Anyway, it will please David.’
‘And that’s important, is it?’
‘Of course it’s important,’ Kate said. ‘I owe him something. No one has ever said that they loved me before.’
EIGHT
Kate was interested in where David’s family lived. He had told her they lived in Chudleigh Street, which was just off Reservoir Road, in an end-of-terrace house. As they walked up the road, she saw that the houses were smallish, but not as small or as squashed up as some she had seen. When they came to David’s house, instead of going to the front door, which opened almost directly on to the street, he took her down a small entry by the side of the house. ‘This is the back way,’ he said. ‘It’s the door we usually use.’ The entry led to a scrubby garden at the back, where Kate had a glimpse of an outside toilet and a coal shed, and then David was opening the door into the kitchen.
His mother was lifting something out of the oven, and she straightened up and turned when she heard them come in. ‘Hallo, Ma,’ David said, and the smile on Kate’s face died as the woman’s small dark eyes, which had settled like currants into her podgy red face, looked her up and down almost in a disparaging way. Her mouth seemed like a discontented slash across her face, and Kate felt her head lift slightly as she stared back. David’s mother was very plump, her round, red face surrounded with a frizz of hair, which had once been brown but was now liberally streaked with grey. She had an apron tied around her ample waist and her sleeves rolled up to reveal bulging, slightly pink forearms that reminded Kate of a couple of large hams. She pushed that image quickly from her mind.
David seemed unaware of the chilled atmosphere and, because the woman was David’s mother, Kate resolutely fastened another smile on her face as the woman eventually said, ‘Hallo, it’s Kate isn’t it? Our David’s young lady?’
It was a lacklustre welcome, and Kate had the distinct impression that the woman David had introduced as his mother, Dora, wasn’t a bit impressed that she was David’s young lady. ‘Yes,’ she said as she shook the woman’s hand. ‘My name is Kate Munroe, Mrs Burton. I’m very pleased to meet you.’
‘Where is everyone, Ma?’ David said as he removed his coat and helped Kate with hers.
‘Your father and Lawrence went for a drink after dinner,’ Dora said.
‘Why did they slope off to the pub? I told them I was bringing Kate to tea.’
Dora sighed. ‘You know they go for a drink every Sunday. I’m sure your young lady understands that.’
Before Kate was able to say anything, David said truculently, ‘It’s not the point whether Kate minds or not. Surely to stop in one week wouldn’t hurt them?’
‘I suppose they didn’t think you’d be here so early,’ Dora said. ‘I certainly didn’t. You said you were going for a walk.’
‘We did, didn’t we, Kate?’ David said, putting an arm around her as he did so. ‘But it was far too cold to be out long.’
‘I should think so,’ Dora said, moving to the fire and giving it a poke. ‘Cold enough to freeze a penguin’s chuff, as your father is fond of saying. Come up to the fire and I’ll make us all a cup of tea. Kate can tell us all about herself … because he,’ she said to Kate, jerking her head in David’s direction, ‘never tells us a thing.’
‘That’s because you’ve neve
r shown the slightest bit of interest,’ David said rather bitterly; though he was gentle enough with Kate as he led her to the settee in front of the fire and sat beside her. Kate was glad of his presence, though a little concerned about the undercurrent in the house. Dora, her lips pursed even tighter, had gone off into the kitchen, but she saw that lines of strain still furrowed David’s brow. If he had asked her, she would have said she was glad that she only had his mother to contend with, and that she didn’t care a jot that his truant father and brother were at the pub. However, he didn’t ask her; he didn’t say anything at all and neither did she as they sat side by side, the only sound in the room the crackling fire and the ticking clock.
She was relieved when Dora came through from the kitchen carrying a tray and saying as she did so, ‘A cup of tea will see us all right. I always think it puts new heart in a body.’
She placed the tray on the small table to the right of the settee and when the tea was poured and the biscuits offered, she said to Kate, ‘Now, Kate, where do you come from? I can tell by your accent that you’re not from round these parts originally.’
‘No,’ Kate said. And she went on to tell David’s mother about living on the farm in the north of Ireland and then how she had become such close friends with Susie Mason, who had helped find her a place to live and a job when she decided to travel to pastures new.
‘A smoky industrial city must have been a shock after living on a remote farm,’ Dora said.
‘Oh, it was – even our nearest town in Ireland is very much a country one. I was very homesick at first and very glad to have the friendship of Susie and her family. Without them I would have been lost.’
‘And yet you stayed?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Kate said, ‘because I began to enjoy having so much to see and do. My home and the county I was born and brought up in is a very beautiful one, but there’s little in the way of entertainment. I had never seen a cinema or music hall before I came here, and the only dances I had attended were church socials. Another spur to my leaving was the fact that I never got any sort of wage when I worked on the farm and it is nice to have my own money in my pocket, however little it is.’
‘In fact, she described Birmingham in such a favourable light that her younger sister came to join her,’ David said.
Kate was glad that David went no further than that, since she didn’t want to explain her sister’s flight. So she just said, ‘That’s right. I have Sally living with me now – she’d only been in Birmingham a few days when she got a job in the cinema.’
‘You seem to get on very well with your sister.’
‘I suppose I do,’ Kate said. ‘It works better than I thought it might. Course, I am that much older than her, so I am used to looking after her.’
‘Maybe you could take a leaf out of Kate’s book there,’ Dora said with a wry glance at her son.
David glowered back at her as he snapped, ‘Kate said she looked after her sister, not bullied her. Therein lies the difference.’
Kate remembered David telling her that when he had been a boy he had never hit it off with Lawrence. Maybe the actual fights had stopped, but it seemed clear from David’s reaction that relations between them were still a bit sticky. She longed to ask him why, but she couldn’t really say much in front of his mother, and anyway she didn’t want to do anything to make an obviously fraught situation worse, so she said, ‘Oh, I’m no saint, Mrs Burton, and neither is my sister. She could be a right little madam when we were growing up. She was the spoilt baby for some years before our little brother James came along. He is only five now, and of course the only boy, so he was made much of and Sally had her nose pushed right out of joint.’
‘I can see that,’ Dora said. ‘David was our youngest, of course.’
The implication that he too had been spoiled hung in the air, especially when Dora went on to say, ‘One of the reasons maybe that he and Lawrence never seemed to see eye to eye.’
‘You don’t have to be the youngest to be ruined by your parents,’ David said angrily.
Kate, slightly embarrassed, decided to change the subject entirely, and so she said: ‘David was telling me the line of work he is in, an electrician. Must be very interesting.’
‘Don’t know how interesting it is,’ Dora said. ‘I just know that there’s plenty of work about. So many people are changing over to having electricity in their houses now. Course those gas mantles were so fragile. Electric light is much better – and safer too, I think.’
‘Yes, but he doesn’t do many lights now though, does he?’ Kate said. ‘He was telling me he is now mainly building wirelesses. That’s why I said it must be interesting.’
‘I never knew that,’ Dora remarked. ‘You never said.’
‘I did, Mom,’ David said. ‘You just didn’t hear. Anyway, now you know. People who once had their wirelesses run by accumulators, because they had no electricity in their houses, now want wirelesses run on the mains. In fact, there’s a great run on wirelesses altogether. And,’ he added, ‘before too long people are going to be wanting televisions.’
‘And what’s that when it’s at home?’
‘That, Mom, is moving pictures in your own home – you can plug it in just like a wireless, but even better.’
‘Never! Moving pictures in our own home,’ Dora said in awe. ‘It would be like going to the cinema. Well, if you’re right that will be just lovely, won’t it? I mean, I love a play or a bit of comedy on the wireless now, but it would be better still if you could see it. And I agree with Kate, it must be interesting work.’
David nodded. ‘It’s really nice to be in at the beginning of something so exciting.’
Dora nodded. ‘He held out for doing that line of work from when he was a young lad,’ she said to Kate. ‘I thought he would follow his father and brother into the brass industry, but he point-blank refused. His dad wasn’t best pleased, I can tell you. There was a terrible to-do at the time and then his teacher at the school came to see me just a couple of months before he was due to leave and told me David had a head on his shoulders and we should get him set on as an apprentice to a trade. He had influence at a firm taking on apprentice electricians, and he said it would suit our David. Course, it weren’t as easy as that, because I had to talk the old man round.’
‘Yeah,’ David said. ‘It was the only time I remember you fighting in my corner.’
‘But why didn’t your husband want David to become an electrician?’ Kate asked.
‘Well, he’d always worked in the brass,’ Dora said. ‘Just like his father and uncles, all of them really, and then there was the money side of it, because the brass workers are paid well and David earned a pittance to start with.’
‘Yeah, but all that changed when I was out of my apprenticeship, didn’t it?’ David said. ‘With overtime I can earn more than the old man or Lawrence now.’
‘I’m glad you got to do what you wanted,’ Kate said, putting her hand out to David as she spoke. ‘You can tell how much you enjoy it, by the enthusiastic way you talk about it.’
‘I do,’ David said, ‘I don’t deny it. The old man’s all right about it now, isn’t he, Mom?’
‘He is, thank God,’ Dora said as she collected up the cups and plates on to the tray. ‘And talking of your old man, I wonder where he’s got to. I’ll wash these up anyway and maybe he will have come home by then.’
David ignored the reference to his father and said, ‘It still gets Lawrence’s goat, though, that I can earn more than him.’
‘I think you imagine that.’
‘No, I don’t.’
Dora sighed, but she said nothing further to her son and instead lifted the tray and made her way to the kitchen. Kate thought that if she put her hand out she could almost touch the atmosphere in that room. ‘I’ll give you a hand,’ she said, getting to her feet.
‘No,’ Dora said. ‘Not at all. You go and sit with our David.’
David pulled Kate down to sit beside him
as Dora went back to the kitchen, and said, ‘I must warn you about Lawrence.’
‘What about him?’
‘He’s a terrible flirt.’
‘Surely not with me – his brother’s girlfriend?’
‘Especially with you.’
‘Oh, look, David, some men are like that,’ Kate said. ‘I can handle Lawrence. Please don’t argue with him on my account.’
David smiled at her and kissed her gently on the lips as he said, ‘For your sake, I will try really hard not to.’
Suddenly Kate heard the crunch of boots in the entry and she looked at David. ‘Here they come now,’ he said. ‘And you’ll soon see what I mean about Lawrence.’
She caught a glimpse of two men walking down the yard as David drew her to her feet and held her close. Dora was still in the kitchen and Kate heard her open the door. Then she came in ahead of her husband and son, saying as she did so, ‘David’s here already with his young lady.’
Kate had the feeling that Dora had said it as a sort of warning to the two men who followed her into the room, and she could sense the tension running through David. Alf Burton, David’s father, was as tall and thin as his wife was little and plump, so that ‘Tom Tall and Butter Ball’ sprang to Kate’s mind. Lawrence was taller still, but he was so like his father that Kate could bet that Alf had looked the same as his son when he had been younger. He had a fine head of dark hair that she imagined Alf had once had, though the sparse hair left on his head now was steel grey. They had the same ruddy complexion and slightly squashed-looking nose, but Lawrence’s thin lips were inherited from his mother, because his father’s were thick and full.
She did feel uncomfortable as she saw Lawrence’s lingering, speculative eyes raking over her with such intensity. Suddenly he stepped in front of his father and strode towards them. He held out his hand and, with a disdainful curl of those thin lips, said, ‘And David’s young lady is very nice, yes, very nice indeed.’