Mulligan's Yard

by Ruth Hamilton

  The dog allowed himself to be dragged along on the length of washing-line that served as a leash. He was fed up, because he knew he smelt wrong, yet he sensed something at the end of all this rope, perhaps a bone or a meat pie, so he went along with it.

  Diane was already disguised in so far as she was wearing other people’s clothes, items culled from washing-lines earlier in the day, some of them not quite dry. She cut a strange figure in her over-long skirt, baggy jumper and headscarf. Danny Duffy wore his usual, rather scruffy garments together with his dad’s flat cap, which was pulled low over his eyes. Far from promising to blend in with their environment, the pair looked like something from Oliver Twist, underfed, weirdly dressed and a mile or two short of clean.

  The next few minutes were a blur of frantic activity. The dog did his duty, pausing only to cock a leg against a washing-board. He bit several ankles, barked shrilly, got mixed up in a sheet. He was still wearing this item when he left the building by the rear door, his lord and master in hot pursuit.

  Diane did not get as far as the counter. As ill-luck would have it, Maddie failed to bite either of the Misses Walsh, who guarded their interests throughout the riot, finally emerging from behind their counter to make a citizen’s arrest.

  Diane hung from Miss Tilly Walsh’s clenched fists, each of which had found purchase on the shoulder of the ‘borrowed’ jumper.

  ‘I’ve seen her afore,’ announced Mona, ripping the scarf from Diane’s head.

  ‘Me and all,’ responded Tilly. ‘She’s from the temple, should know better, but her’s never been up to much good.’ She glanced at her sister. ‘Give that lot the first-aid box.’ She nodded towards the customers. ‘Then you’d best fetch Wotsisname.’

  ‘Mulligan?’

  ‘Aye,’ said Tilly grimly. ‘For summat as serious as this, we go right to the top.’

  Diane felt the blood draining from her head towards the floor.

  ‘This were meant to be a robbery, weren’t it?’ Tilly asked.

  Diane swallowed hard.

  ‘All dressed up and nowhere to go,’ continued Tilly. ‘Disguised, I’d say. Even the bloody dog didn’t look right. And it’s made off with somebody’s sheet into the flaming bargain. Well? Nowt to say for yoursen?’

  Diane watched Miss Mona as she left the wash-house to fetch the boss.

  ‘You were after my takings and all these ladies’ purses, weren’t you?’

  The customers had sorted themselves into an audience, two ranks, tallest at the rear.

  ‘Thou shalt not steal,’ said Tilly. ‘And you a laudator and all. Just you wait till Mr Wilkinson gets a grip of you, girl. It’s a commandment is that one about stealing.’

  The audience, having transformed itself into a congregation, muttered about the young, about sin and about Ada Carter’s double flannelette sheet.

  ‘Well?’ Tilly shook the child. ‘Any more dumb insolence out of you, and I’ll give you a good smack.’

  The gathering shouted words of encouragement. Its members would have liked nothing better than to watch Miss Tilly Walsh tanning the backside of somebody who had disturbed washday. Washdays were sacred. They were for gossip, flasks of tea, the cleaning of clothes and household linens; most of all, washdays were a chance to get away from home and all its problems.

  The whole place fell silent when James Mulligan arrived. Big burly housewives strode back to their business, while the scrawny ones, strangely braver, hung on to watch the show for a few more seconds. When no great drama occurred, they, too, scuttled off to sinks and washboards.

  ‘Well?’ James Mulligan raised an eyebrow.

  Mona, behind the great man, touched his sleeve tentatively. ‘Her and a lad come in with a dog,’ she said. ‘Like I said before, they were after money.’

  ‘Were you?’ he asked the child.

  Diane gulped again. For a reason she could not have expressed in a month of Sundays, she was unable to lie to this man. It was as if he could see through the stolen green jumper and right into her sinful heart.

  ‘Well?’ He tapped a foot on the flagged floor. ‘Give her to me,’ he told Miss Tilly.

  ‘What about Mrs Carter’s sheet? What about clothes what has to be washed again ’cos of all the black stuff on the dog? I mean, they shouldn’t get away with it, should they?’

  He pushed a hand into his pocket, withdrew some coins and tossed them on to the counter. ‘If that is not sufficient, be good enough to let me know.’ He wrenched Diane from Tilly’s grip, then marched her across the yard and into his office.

  Dumped without ceremony into a leather chair, she studied the floor. It was brown. Most floors were brown, usually oilcloth, but this one was tiled in small squares, like very posh flags. She couldn’t look up. There were two rugs on the floor, both red with light brown bits in the pattern. There was a desk with thick wooden legs. Slowly, she raised her eyes to look at the top of the desk. It was very neat, just a few papers, some pens, a pair of ink pots and a square blotter.

  ‘Look at me.’

  He was seated at the desk. He wore a black coat, a grey waistcoat and a very dark blue tie. She could not look at his eyes. Behind him, the window was dressed with maroon curtains and a green blind at half-mast. She glued her eyes to his chin. It was strong and square, with a little dent in the centre.

  ‘Diane?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why?’

  She shrugged listlessly. It was over and she had failed. If the police found out, she might get put away. Then Joe might well starve. Diane could not quite bring herself to worry about her grandmother.

  ‘There has to be a reason,’ he said quietly.

  The door opened. Diane felt cold air fanning her ankles.

  ‘Later, please, Miss Burton-Massey.’ He waited until the intruder had gone. ‘Tell me,’ he persisted. ‘Who looks after you? Didn’t I hear that you live with your grandmother?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Who cooks, Diane?’

  ‘Me.’

  ‘Because your grandmother has no heart.’

  ‘Aye.’ Questions, questions. They wanted to know everything or nowt, only started taking an interest if you were in trouble for trying to take something off them. ‘I’ve already told you about six month ago – folk have got to eat.’ Let them come for her – she had had enough.

  He watched her face. She was older than the hills, cleverer than the Blarney Stone, a woman-child with no hope, no pattern to build on, a past worth forgetting, a future already darkening. ‘What am I to do with you? This is my yard, Diane. All the buildings in it, including the inn, are mine. It is my duty to protect those who work here from thieves and vagabonds like yourself.’

  She felt almost hypnotized. Were she to live in Ireland among folk with voices such as this, she’d be in a permanent stupor. Even though he was telling her off, even though the tone had an edge to it, she wanted to stay and hear more. No, she wasn’t hearing it, not really. She was feeling it, letting it flow through her like warm cocoa, silky, smooth, comforting.

  ‘Diane?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Are you hearing me?’

  She went for the truth. ‘Not really. You’re putting me to sleep.’

  A smile tugged at his mouth, but he bit it back. ‘You’re a thief, child. A common thief. Listen to me, please. The women whose money you meant to steal are not rich. You steal from them and you steal from their children. How do they buy food? Will they have to become thieves so that their families might thrive? The disease called theft is very contagious – that means it spreads. So, while you use their money, they are forced to take someone else’s. Am I clear?’

  She was listening now. ‘Yes.’

  ‘So, what are your immediate needs?’

  She had never thought about any of this before, had never worried about those she deprived. The main driver behind Diane’s behaviour was a picture in her mind, an image of Joe with his little crooked legs and his thin white face. Feeding her
brother, getting clothes and shoes for him and for herself – these necessities had been the mothers of Diane’s inventiveness. ‘Food for our Joe,’ she replied thoughtfully.

  ‘And fuel? Who pays for coal?’

  She raised her chin. ‘If we can’t buy it, I pinch it.’

  He saw the defiance colouring her cheeks. ‘You cannot continue like this. Eventually you will be caught, then you will spend years in a variety of institutions. Who will care for your brother when that happens?’

  She folded her arms. This was all very well – she even agreed with the man – but what was the alternative to stealing? ‘All right.’ Her voice was low. ‘So can you tell me how we manage on parish pennies and a few bits from the temple? What would you do if you got up in a morning, no coal for the fire, no bread, no milk? And if you had a little brother, could you look him in the face and tell him that he’d just have to get on with it and starve to death?’

  He tapped on the blotter with his fingers. ‘How old are you?’

  ‘I’m eleven – just.’

  Eleven and going on fifty, he mused. ‘I shall not inform the police as long as you comply with certain conditions.’

  She sat rigidly still. ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘I must speak to your grandmother.’

  Diane almost cried out, but she managed to overcome the urge.

  ‘How old is she?’ he asked.

  ‘Very old,’ she answered. ‘She must be going on sixty.’

  Yes, sixty would be aged to a child of eleven. ‘And she never gets out of the bed?’

  She shrugged. ‘She goes down the yard, gives herself a bath in front of the fire one night a week. But she’s not been out of the house for years.’

  It was time to introduce himself to Diane’s grandmother. It was time for Diane’s grandmother to be introduced to her granddaughter’s way of life. Something had to be done. He stood up. ‘Come with me,’ he said firmly.

  Diane left her chair. ‘Where to?’

  ‘Number thirteen John Street,’ he answered. ‘In my car. We shall arrive in style, my dear.’

  They entered the house together. There was a tiny vestibule, then a small parlour through which they had to walk to reach the kitchen. Furniture in this ‘best’ room was sparse – just an old table, two straight chairs and a black horsehair chaise. The kitchen was warmer, certainly fuller. It contained a large dresser, a central table, some chairs, a rocker, a black range fire and a bed under the stairs. In this tumbled item sat a woman with hard eyes, greying scraped-back hair, a mouth set in a rigid line, a faded blue shawl clutched at the throat with a large safety-pin.

  ‘This is Mr Mulligan,’ said Diane, after a few tense, silent seconds.

  Ida Hewitt’s hands clasped each other on the greasy quilt. She did not encourage visitors, was certainly not in the habit of allowing drunken Irish gamblers into her house. ‘What do you want?’ she snapped. ‘I don’t remember asking you to step inside.’

  ‘You could hardly invite me in when you don’t leave your bed,’ he replied easily. He sat at the table. ‘Mrs Hewitt,’ he began.

  ‘I don’t know why you’ve let him in, Diane,’ said Ida.

  ‘She brought me in, since I fetched her home, you see.’

  Ida looked from Diane to him, from him to Diane. ‘What’s going on?’ she asked eventually.

  ‘If you will listen, madam,’ he said slowly, ‘then I shall tell you.’

  Ida Hewitt almost growled, but she felt something in the air, a threat, almost. Diane had a face on her like a week of wet Mondays, all damp, downcast eyes and quivering lips.

  ‘You have no work, I take it?’ he asked.

  The woman in the bed looked up to heaven for guidance, her eyes snagging on a pulley-line of washing that was not at all clean. ‘How can I work when I’m like this?’ she asked. ‘The road I am, I’m lucky to carry on breathing.’

  ‘Mrs Hewitt, Diane is resorting to methods of acquiring the wherewithal . . . methods that are not honest.’

  Ida fixed her gimlet stare on Diane. ‘You what?’

  ‘Not to put too fine a point on the matter, Mrs Hewitt, Diane is stealing.’

  ‘Never.’ The woman pulled herself higher with a show of alacrity that was remarkable in view of her supposed condition. ‘We are members of the Temple of Light, Mr Mulligan. Our faith does not allow stealing.’ She glared at the child. ‘Tell him. You tell him, love.’

  Diane said nothing.

  ‘She does not earn all the money and food she brings home,’ said James Mulligan. ‘There is very little work for a child of her age. At eleven, she should be concentrating on her education. Outside school she ought to be playing games, not trying to work out how to feed her little brother. This cannot continue, Mrs Hewitt. If it does, I shall take steps to have her and her brother removed from your care, since you are clearly unfit to look after them.’

  Ida’s skin darkened to a deep shade of magenta. ‘How dare you?’ she snapped. ‘How dare you come over here to my country,’ she beat her breast with a closed fist, ‘my country, and tell me how to carry on? Where were you lot when my lad died in the mud, eh? What did your country ever do to save the world?’

  He gazed into the flames for at least thirty seconds. The only sound in the overheated room was provided by Ida’s rasping breaths. ‘I was there,’ he said softly. ‘As for my countrymen, many fell in the fighting alongside your son, Mrs Hewitt. Not all of us sat at home drinking beer and chewing the cud.’ He turned his head with excruciating slowness and met her fierce gaze. ‘Oh, I was there, all right. And now I am here, looking to the welfare of your son’s children while you lie there waiting for death.’

  Diane was transfixed. Nobody ever took Gran on; nobody ever took Mulligan on, either, so here was an interesting situation. As the tension grew, the child almost forgot her crimes. The reason for the Irishman’s presence was no longer significant. Daggers were drawn and both contenders seemed keen to see blood.

  ‘You’ll not take mine away from me,’ Ida whispered.

  ‘Is that a challenge, Mrs Hewitt? I do have some clout in this town, some influence. My father may have been a drinker and a fool, but I was not cast in the same mould. However, I did not come here to explain myself. The purpose of my visit is to inform you about Diane’s behaviour. She is worried sick about her brother. She steals to feed him and you. Now, I have no idea regarding the nature of your illness, so I shall send a doctor to look at you.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing.’ Ida was shaking with temper.

  ‘As you wish.’ He stood up. ‘But if you will not see a doctor, I shall go straight to the Town Hall and advise the appropriate department about the situation in your house.’

  The front door opened, clattered into the closed position. ‘Diane?’ called a thin voice.

  ‘In here, Joe,’ she answered. Her younger sibling’s arrival appeared to have fractured the tension.

  Yet when the boy entered, James Mulligan sat down again, the movement almost involuntary. He had seen many such children in his time, but none had stood so close to him. Joe was very small. He had white skin, dark hair and frail, bowed legs. The smile, though, was huge. The lad ran to the bed and handed some coppers to Ida. ‘I did three steps, Gran. And I went for Mrs Hardcastle’s powders and for Mr Hardcastle’s baccy.’ He turned and looked at the visitor.

  ‘Joe?’ James threw him a penny. ‘Would you do me the great kindness of watching my motor car?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Thanks, sir.’ He dashed out as quickly as deformed limbs would allow.

  Ida stared malevolently at James.

  Unmoved by her expression, James returned the cold gaze with interest compounded by a deepening frown. ‘His legs will not get strong if he’s cleaning steps and running messages all the while. So.’ He leaned an elbow on the table, cupped his chin in the hand. ‘What do you intend to do about Diane and Joe?’

  ‘Why should you care?’ Her tone continued defiant.

  ‘It must be in
my nature.’

  The sarcasm did not go astray. ‘You just get out,’ she yelled.

  ‘That’s a strong voice coming from such a weak woman.’

  ‘Get out,’ she repeated.

  Diane gulped. Things had ceased to be merely interesting: she was starting to feel a little shaky, knees wobbling, stomach fluttering. It was like a big boxing match, two adults staring one another in the eyes, each trying to be powerful enough to knock sparks off the other. But these two didn’t need to try. There was more to be said, more to be done. She imagined that the air in the kitchen was filled with unspoken words waiting to be plucked and thrown from one to the other and back again.

  ‘The doctor will visit you on a Friday evening,’ he said, his voice ominously low. ‘I cannot be sure which Friday, as he is a busy man. If you refuse to see him – and I’m sure you need medical help if you cannot get out of bed – then I shall take this matter to the highest authority.’

  Ida’s chest was heaving with barely contained rage. ‘Please yourself,’ she barked, ‘but the Lord will provide through the Eternal Light.’

  He shook his head. ‘No. Diane will provide through shoplifting.’

  ‘Irish pig,’ she answered smartly. ‘What would you know?’

  ‘Enough,’ he said. ‘I know enough.’ He knew that Diane was suffering, as was young Joe. He saw that this woman had vigour, far too much fight for a person who had stayed in bed for almost five years. She was probably very unhappy, possibly depressed and out of sorts in a general sense, but the children had to come first.

  ‘You’re a Catholic.’ She delivered this as statement rather than as question.

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Then you’ll not know about the Light.’ Her delivery of the last word ensured that the receiver would be aware of its initial capital.

  ‘Ah, but I have, indeed, heard about the sect.’

  ‘Sect?’

  He raised a shoulder. ‘Religious group, then.’