by Maggie Hope
‘Geordie? Geordie! Have a look here, this van’s been broken into. The door’s not shut properly. Geordie!’
The voice invaded her dream, her lovely dream where she and Michael and Mary were at the seaside, sitting on the sands listening to the sound of the sea. Michael had a shell to his ear. ‘I can hear the sea, Rose,’ he was saying. He held the shell out to her and she put it to her own ear but she couldn’t hear the sea or anything at all except for a man’s voice. He was shouting but she couldn’t make out what it was he was saying.
‘Shut up, will you?’ she said to him. ‘I want to listen to the sea.’ But somehow her voice didn’t come out right.
‘Hey, Geordie man, there’s somebody here,’ said the voice. ‘It’s a lass by the look of it. She looks drowned. I hope to hell she’s not dead.’
‘Be quiet!’ said Rose. ‘I’m listening!’ This time she was heard.
‘Nay, lad, she’s not dead,’ Geordie observed. ‘But I reckon she’s not far off it. Run along to the office and telephone for an ambulance, will you?’ He went down on his knees beside Rose, felt her head, and she muttered something again. She was cold, dangerously cold, he thought, yet her forehead was hot. ‘Can you hear me, lass?’ he asked. ‘Are you hurt?’
She didn’t answer but turned full on to her back, and threw her arms out at him. He caught them and held them.
‘Hey now, pet, hold still,’ he said, more to himself than her. ‘I’ll lift you on to the couch.’ He gathered her up and she fought him or tried to, her arms and legs going wildly.
‘Get off me, Dad!’ she cried.
‘I’ll not touch you, lass,’ the man said mildly. He found a blanket in the wardrobe and wrapped it round her, then stood watching her, waiting for the ambulance. She was just a young lass, he thought, not much older than his own Jenny, at school the day. This one was as white as snow and he could hear her breathing, laboured and rasping. How in the world had she got into this pickle?
Chapter Twenty-five
‘I can take them back with me any time I bloody well like!’ Alf thumped his fist on the table and his teacup jumped in its saucer. He glared at his sister who had risen from her seat opposite him, features working in agitation.
‘Oh, no, you cannot!’ she said.
‘An’ who’s going to stop me, eh?’
‘I am.’
Alf laughed. He picked up his cup and took a swallow of the dark, strong tea, then wiped his lips with the back of his hand. Elsie stared at him. She had gone white when he said it but now she was more in control of herself and her lips were set in a thin line as she waited for what he would say next.
‘They’re my bairns, I can do what I like.’ He thought of Mary. By, she was the image of her sister, she was, and growing up as straight as a ramrod. She was just of an age now an’ all …
Elsie did not reply at first. She had been prepared for this day for weeks, had rehearsed what she would say to him over and over when the twins were in bed in the evenings. Ever since that dreadful night, the one when Rose had gone. That was the only way she allowed herself to think of that night; she had blocked out the worst of it. At first she had had nightmares and woken up in a turmoil, shaking and sobbing. But gradually they had stopped. Elsie had told herself every day that it hadn’t been her fault, none of it had been her fault. Anyway, everything she had done had been for the sake of the twins. And besides, she hadn’t really done anything, it was all down to her brother. She had only tried to help Rose when she lost her baby; that and protect the twins from what was happening, of course.
‘If you take Michael and Mary away from me, I’ll tell the child welfare people what happened. The police an’ all.’
There, she’d said it aloud. She’d said it in her mind often enough. Elsie got up from the table and moved a few steps towards the door almost without thinking. Alf could be violent, oh, yes, she’d seen that even when they were children together. And then, that last horrible night – an image of Rose falling, her hands to her stomach, came unbidden, but Elsie closed her mind to it.
‘No, you would not! You were in it up to your neck. You helped.’ Alf glared at her but he wasn’t seriously disturbed by her threats. He could control their Elsie, he was sure of that. Always had. A weak woman was his sister.
‘I’m taking them and be damned to you,’ he said. ‘You might as well get their things packed. Where are they anyroad?’
‘At school. Where else would they be at this time of the day? An’ why aren’t you at work on a Monday?’
‘I’ve taken a shift off to come for me bairns,’ Alf said comfortably. He sat back in his chair and gave a superior smile.
‘Pity you’re not getting them then, isn’t it?’ Elsie flared, reacting immediately. ‘You stink of rum. Do you think if I call the polis he’ll let you take two canny bairns with you? If you’re not careful you’ll be losing your job an’ all. If you went down the pit smelling of drink like that you’d be out on your arse before you knew what you were at. You an overman too. The bosses wouldn’t stand for it.’
‘I know what I’m doing. I don’t drink when I’m going to work, never you fear!’ Alf was stung into replying. The grin had left his face and he jumped up from his chair and took a step towards her. ‘And you’d better watch what you’re saying, our Elsie, or I’ll bat you one!’ He was angry because he had twice gone down the pit this last week with drink in him. Luckily he had not been caught nor had he made any serious mistake, but he knew the risk he had run.
Elsie cringed back towards the door. ‘Don’t you dare lay a hand on me!’ she cried. ‘I’ll have the polis here so fast you won’t know what’s hit you – I’m telling you!’ And looking at her determined face, he knew she meant it.
‘Don’t be so gormless, Elsie. You know as well as I do that if you go to the police we’ll both be had up for murder. You’re as guilty as I am, don’t you forget it, and you’ll hang along o’ me, see if you don’t.’
‘Do you think it’ll make much difference to me, Alf? If you take the twins away, I’ll have nothing left to live for. An’ at least I’ll have got it off me conscience. I tell you, if it wasn’t for those two I’d do meself in. They’re all I’ve got, they’re everything in the world to me now.’ Her voice was hard, bitter, he knew she meant every word she said. They stood face to face, glaring into each other’s eyes, and his were the first to drop.
Alf changed abruptly then. He stepped back to the fireplace and took a cigarette butt from behind his ear. ‘Aw, howay, our Elsie, I’m not going to hit you. You just get me all riled up, that’s all.’ There was a brass holder on the hearth, kept filled with rolled newspaper spills by Michael. Alf took one and lit the cigarette butt from the fire. He inhaled deeply, then cupping the butt in an open fist considered what to do.
He didn’t know what had got into his sister, she was putting up more of a fight than he’d expected. But he wanted the twins. Mary in particular. So he tried another tack.
‘Elsie, you don’t know what it’s like for me, coming home to an empty house all the time,’ he said, full of self-pity. ‘Now my Sarah’s gone –’
‘Aw, go on, don’t come the old soldier with me,’ said Else, completely unmoved. ‘I know you were only too glad when Sarah died, got out of your road. And God only knows what you got up to with Rose.’ This was the first time she had admitted, even to herself, that there had been anything unnatural in his relationship with his eldest daughter. This row had brought it all to the surface from where it had been buried deep inside her. She’d let the lass down, she knew that all right. For the sake of the twins.
Alf was staring at her open-mouthed, she noticed. He began to bluster.
‘What do you mean? I haven’t –’
‘No, of course you haven’t,’ she broke in contemptuously. ‘Never touched me when I was a little ’un either, did you? You forget how well I know you, Alf Sharpe.’
‘Eeh, Elsie, you want to wash out –’ he tried again.
‘
Shut your mouth!’ she shouted, shocking him into doing just that. ‘You can get out of my house too. Get out now and don’t you ever come back or I swear by God in Heaven I’ll have the law on you. And don’t think I won’t!’
‘Now, Elsie, don’t be hasty. Consider what you’re doing,’ he said, trying to calm her down. But she was in the grip of a turmoil of emotions, past considering anything except that she wanted him out, and before the twins came home at that. Never wanted him back either. She was close to breaking point, he realised. Alf was not a clever man but he was not slow either. He saw that if he persisted with his claim to the twins now he wouldn’t be able to stop her from going to the police.
‘Calm down. Calm down, man. All right, I’m going,’ he said urgently. He moved towards the door and she stepped out of his path. He glanced at her warily as he did so. Her face was a blotchy red, her eyes wild. She was panting as if she had been running.
Alf opened the door and went out into the yard and she followed him as though she didn’t trust him not to turn back as soon as she looked away. They were both silent but the silence between them was more eloquent than the row they had just had and fraught with danger.
At the gate he paused, was about to say something more when they were hailed by Mrs Todd. She was leaning on her own gatepost, watching out for what she could see. ‘Catching a breath of air’ she called it.
‘Grand day, isn’t it, Elsie?’ she remarked by way of a greeting, though she was looking curiously at Alf. Elsie agreed that it was, though her eyes hardly left her brother.
‘I see you have a visitor again,’ Mrs Todd went on and smiled at Alf.
‘Yes. You know my brother Alf, don’t you?’
‘Oh, ’course I do. It’s not that long since he was here. Come to see the twins, have you, Mr Sharpe? Pity they’re at school the day.’
Of course they were at school, Elsie thought savagely, wishing to high Heaven that the woman would go inside and mind her own business. Some of her feelings must have communicated themselves to Mrs Todd for she shifted her stance and folded her arms in front of her, the smile slipping.
‘Well, I’ll have to be getting the washing in,’ she said, and even took a few steps into her yard before turning back. ‘By the way, Elsie, I meant to say before – was your Rose visiting the other day? One day last week it was I thought I saw her. I remember thinking, done well for herself has Rose. She was in a handsome little car an’ all and with –’
‘You saw our Rose? You couldn’t have done!’ The breath was knocked out of Elsie, the words hardly louder than a whisper. Alf had gone white. He had been showing his impatience with the women’s chitchat but now he was all attention.
Mrs Todd shrugged, pleased she had remembered. ‘I’m sure I did,’ she insisted. ‘I was going to the fish shop. Me an’ the old man likes a nice bit of haddock for supper now and then, you know, and I had to stop at the top of the rows for this car and when I looked in there was Rose, as large as life. Do you mean to say she didn’t come to see you? Mind, nothing those young ’uns do surprises me these days. Are you all right, Elsie? You’ve gone a funny colour. There’s a lot of that flu about these days –’
She broke off as Alf took hold of his sister’s arm and hustled her up the yard and back into the house.
‘How bloody rude can you get?’ Mrs Todd asked herself crossly, and went back into her own yard and began feeling the washing on the line to see if it was dry enough to iron.
Inside the next-door kitchen brother and sister stared at each other.
‘I thought you said she was dead when you left her in the dene? Hidden, you said she was, covered over. It would be weeks before anybody found her. That’s what you said, wasn’t it?’ Elsie’s voice was rising out of control. She was shaking with fear. He caught hold of her by the upper arms and shook her roughly.
‘Pull yourself together, woman, you’re hysterical. What the hell’s the matter with you?’ He pulled her over to an armchair, pushed her into it and stood over her. ‘Keep your flaming mouth shut, do you hear me?’ For Elsie had started to moan. She was rocking herself backwards and forwards in the chair, hands clasped in her lap, fingers working convulsively against each other.
‘At least if she’s not dead we cannot be had up for murder,’ she said, almost to herself. She took not a bit of notice of Alf. It was as if he wasn’t there, so he pulled back his arm and slapped her hard across the face. Her head went right over the arm of the chair with the force of the blow. She stopped moaning and stared up at him, eyes wide, her hand held to her face.
‘Now you listen to me,’ snapped Alf. ‘The old biddy couldn’t have seen Rose, could she? Because, like I told you, she’s dead. Dead and gone. I left her hidden in Shotton Dene, didn’t I? An nobody could have found her. If they had, it would have been in the paper, wouldn’t it? Stands to reason.
‘Now, go and wash your face before the bairns get in from school. And don’t you ever forget: if you breathe a word of anything that happened, you’ll lose those kids as sure as eggs is eggs. They’ll go into a home, and you and me, dear sister … you and me will hang in Durham gaol.’
Alf stood back, his hands on his hips, breathing heavily. All the effects of the rum he’d drunk earlier were gone now, and he was as sober as a judge. Gradually Elsie took hold of herself. She took a hankie out of her pinny pocket and blew her nose, then felt her cheek gingerly with her fingertips.
‘There was no call for that, Alf Sharpe,’ she said. ‘You hit me that hard it’s a wonder you didn’t break my jaw. Now I suppose there’ll be a bruise and I won’t be able to get out at all for what people will say.’
‘Well, you brought it on yourself,’ he replied. Now that she was calmer he could afford to relax a bit. ‘I’m telling you – go on as though nothing has happened. Nothing has happened anyroad. Say you fell against something if anyone asks about your face. And think yourself lucky you can keep the twins. At least for the time being. I’ll be going now. I might as well go to work the night.’
The slap, the worry about Rose even, were forgotten. Elsie smiled, albeit painfully. ‘Eeh, thanks, Alf. You know they’re better off here with me anyway.’
He went to the door then turned and said, ‘Aye, well, you think on. Keep that bloody trap shut. If you don’t, you’ll get more than a slap in the gob.’
‘An’ I’m telling you – you touch me again and I will have the law on you,’ she retorted. ‘I don’t bloody care any more.’
Alf grinned in disbelief. As he walked out of the gate Mrs Todd was there once more. ‘Not waiting to see the twins then, Mr Sharpe? I’m sure they’ll be sorry to have missed you. They must look forward to seeing their dad, poor, motherless bairns that they are.’
‘I have to go on shift, woman,’ he snarled and strode off down the street. Sniffing, she started after him. ‘That fella has something on his mind,’ she said to her husband later in the day. ‘Something bad an’ all, I’ll be bound. He cannot look a body in the eye.’
‘You’re imagining things, woman, as usual,’ he replied. ‘Is this all I’m to get for me tea?’ He eyed the two boiled eggs on his plate with disfavour. ‘Mebbe if you took less notice of other folk and more of me you’d have time to make a man a nice meat pie when he’s had a hard shift underground.’
‘It’s washing day! I’ve been grafting all day. If you’d dig deep in your pocket and buy me one of them new electric washers I’d have time to bake. ’Til then, you’ll get what I’ve time for!’ she replied tartly.
Chapter Twenty-six
‘Brian’s gone to hospital,’ said Jeff as he came into the house he had shared with Brian and Marina since they came back from their honeymoon.
‘What?’ Marina’s heart jolted. She turned from the shiny new gas stove where she was frying liver and onions, the pan in her trembling hand, fat spattering on to the blue and white linoleum.
‘Hey!’ said Jeff. What a fool he was, coming out with it just like that. ‘Only Outpatients. He’s a
ll right, just a cut on his head. There was a fall of stone but it was a little one and it nearly missed him altogether. A bit of stone flew up, that’s all, and cut him.’
Marina put the pan back on the stove and turned off the gas, her hand still shaking. ‘Jeff, man, you gave me a fright there.’
‘Aye, I should have had more sense,’ he said. ‘Me tongue’s quicker than me brain. I’m sorry, lass.’
‘Are you sure he’s all right? Maybe I should go down there. Easington, is it?’ Marina was already untying the apron she had donned when she came in from work.
‘No, the Cameron. There was a few hurt, none badly like, but they sent some of them to the Cameron. Spreading the load, I reckon.’
Marina hesitated. The Cameron was in Hartlepool and a bus journey of a few miles. ‘Come on, I’ll run you down,’ Jeff offered, looking regretfully at the pan of liver from which there was a gorgeous smell, enough to entice any man, let alone one who’d been hard at it cutting coal all day. That was one of the good things about having his friend and his wife living in with him. He hadn’t to eat in the colliery canteen all the time if he wanted a decent meal.
‘Will you? Do you mind?’ But Marina was already pulling on her coat, pushing her feet into knee-high boots. ‘Do you not want to eat first?’
‘I’d only get indigestion, rushing it,’ said Jeff. But he took a piece of liver from the pan, dark brown and glistening and piping hot. He juggled it in burning fingers but managed to convey it to his mouth, chewing appreciatively. ‘Ooh, scrumptious,’ he said when he was able.
‘It’ll soon warm up when we get back.’ Marina was apologetic. ‘Anyway, we can give Brian a lift home. If there are a few of them and they have to wait for an ambulance …’ She went to the door and looked back at him. Jeff followed, taking out his car keys as he did so. At least he wasn’t in his black, having washed at the pithead baths.
When they arrived at Outpatients there were only a couple of miners left waiting, one with his arm in a sling which looked startlingly white against his jacket still black with coal dust. The other had a bandage round his head, a few spots of blood mixed with the black on his cheek. Marina flew to him and flung her arms around him, careless of the coal dust which flew up and would almost certainly mean her light brown coat would have to go to the cleaner’s.