A Wise Child

by A Wise Child (retail) (epub)

  ‘Bad luck to have to endure all that as a kid,’ he said casually. ‘Then to have to suffer the effects in adult life. Being sterile is one of the worst things that can happen to a fellow, isn’t it?’

  Sam gaped at him. ‘Sterile? Me?’ he stammered. ‘I’m not sterile. I’ve got a lad nearly ten.’

  ‘A stepson?’ Dr Doyle said, looking flustered.

  ‘No. Me own son,’ Sam shouted.

  The papers slipped from the doctor’s knee and he bent to retrieve them. ‘Sorry,’ he muttered. ‘I’ve got it wrong. Misread the notes.’ He gathered up the notes and left hurriedly and Sam sat staring after him, his thoughts in a whirl. Before he could recover from the shock and begin to think clearly, Dr Fairbrother arrived.

  ‘I fear my young colleague was too hasty in his assumptions, Sam,’ he said smoothly.

  ‘I’m not what he said,’ Sam growled. ‘I don’t pick up women in port, like, but me and me wife—’ He turned away, his face red with anger and embarrassment.

  The doctor said blandly, ‘Of course, of course, my dear chap. Just a little misunderstanding.’

  He told Sam that they had been studying a group of natives. ‘They are apparently virile men yet they father very few children and the tribe is dying out,’ he said. ‘We thought we might find a link with white men with poor backgrounds, although of course your deprivations cannot compare with what the natives have endured – constant gross malnutrition with the resulting bone malformation and ulcers and endemic diseases carried by flies.’

  ‘I never had nothing like that,’ Sam muttered.

  ‘Of course. Will you tell me again about your childhood illnesses? Just as a matter of interest, you understand.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sam said. ‘I was sick sometimes, I suppose, but I felt pretty bad most of the time, hungry and cold and that, but I just got on with it.’

  ‘I understand. And when you were at the reformatory?’ the doctor said.

  ‘I had pleurisy but I got over it. I was days in an open boat, torpedoed, when I was fifteen and I got over that and all. There’s nothing wrong with me,’ Sam growled.

  ‘Of course,’ the doctor said soothingly. ‘Your rash has almost cleared and your temperature is down too.’

  ‘So, I’m ready to go, then?’ Sam said.

  ‘Nearly,’ the doctor said. ‘I’m sure you are anxious to return to your wife and child. A boy, isn’t it? What’s his name?’

  ‘Thomas. We call him Tommy,’ Sam said.

  ‘And how old is he?’

  ‘Ten in November,’ said Sam.

  ‘So you’ll miss his birthday? A shame but I suppose that often happens in seafarers’ families,’ the doctor said.

  He stayed talking to Sam, drawing him on to tell all about Tommy’s cleverness and the letters he wrote to his father.

  ‘This teacher keeps him after school or in the dinner hour and learns him sums and how to talk and that,’ Sam said proudly and the doctor said that Tommy must be an exceptional boy.

  Later Sam said to Jimmy, ‘The old doctor’s all right. Got some manners, like, and talks sense. Not like that other soft get, Dr Doyle.’

  His shock and outrage had been soothed by Dr Fairbrother’s swift response, but later when he was alone, they returned. For the rest of the day and the following night he thought of nothing but Dr Doyle’s words.

  He meant that all right about me, he thought grimly. He just never seen that in the notes about Tommy or he wouldn’t of said it. The old fellow was just smarming me over. The implications of what he had been told filled his mind until he felt that he was going mad. Tommy could not be his son and Ellie had tricked him.

  All these years of boasting about Tommy to his mates and bragging about the home Ellie had made for him and all the time it was a lie. Tommy was another man’s son, and Ellie who seemed so straight and honest and loving had just been using him.

  He avoided Jimmy and the doctors and found a secluded corner of the garden where he retreated like a wounded animal. On Dr Fairbrother’s orders he was not disturbed and one of the doctors played backgammon with Jimmy to keep him away from his friend.

  All night Sam tossed and turned and by the following morning his temperature had risen alarmingly and he was delirious.

  ‘He keeps shouting out for his wife and the lad,’ Jimmy told Dr Fairbrother.

  The doctor ordered cold compresses to be applied to Sam’s temples and his body sponged down, without comment, but he was furious. He sent for Dr Doyle.

  ‘You damned young fool,’ he said. ‘We could lose this man thanks to your loose tongue and think what that would mean to my hospital. He came here recovering from a slight fever and the officers on his ship knew that. Why the hell didn’t you read the notes properly?’

  ‘But the tests. His semen,’ the young doctor stammered.

  Dr Fairbrother made an impatient gesture. ‘The notes showed he had been married and the child born the same year. Are you a complete fool? I drew my own conclusions and so should you have done. You could even have established whether he knew of the sterility before blurting that out.’

  ‘But I looked through the notes afterwards. There was no date of birth,’ Dr Doyle said defensively.

  ‘You could have established that quite easily by discreet questioning, as I did,’ Dr Fairbrother said cuttingly, ‘but discretion is not your strong suit, is it?’

  Sam’s temperature dropped again and he gradually recovered. He lay in bed surly and uncommunicative and on Dr Fairbrother’s orders he was not questioned again, although the tests continued.

  In all the many questions no one had asked Sam about the illness on the trip after his marriage and Sam had thought they were only interested in childhood illness.

  Had he realised that his swollen neck during that illness meant that he had mumps, and known that mumps in an adult male could cause sterility, so much heartbreak for himself and Nellie could have been avoided.

  Dr Fairbrother arranged that Sam and Jimmy returned home on the first available ship. Dr Doyle also returned on the same ship, but he avoided Sam as he had done since his gaffe.

  Sam was silent and morose throughout the voyage, his mind dwelling constantly on his problem. The thought of Ellie and Tommy was always in his mind. He never doubted that the doctor was right, and Tommy was not his child, but how could he have come so close to another man’s son? He thought of Tommy as a baby clinging to him, his arms around his neck and his soft cheek pressed to his rough one.

  Then when Tom was a bit older, standing beside him again with his arm round his neck asking questions and eagerly listening to Sam’s tales of his voyages. Trotting along beside him holding his hand and saying proudly even to strangers, ‘This is my dad.’ At this point Sam’s pain would feel unbearable and he would groan and cover his face with his hands.

  He often recalled an old Irish flower seller who lived at the other end of the street saying as he and Tommy passed hand in hand, ‘God love him. Sure he’s the core of your heart, sir.’ And it was true, Sam thought. It was still true. He couldn’t stop loving Tommy.

  And Ellie. His little Ellie. He thought of their childhood days, two neglected children clinging together for comfort, but then as he thought of his marriage he felt bitter anger at the way it had been so quickly arranged.

  No wonder they called me Soft Sam, he thought. I just went into it blindfold, made up that I could look after her again and all the time she was tricking me. Palming off her baby as mine when she knew it wasn’t.

  Who was Tommy’s father? Could it be Charlie West or was it someone she’d been walking out with when she was in service?

  Sometimes he felt that his head would burst with these thoughts. His memories of the fellows in the Volley skitting at him, his vague feelings that something was wrong. That Ellie was keeping something from him. The way she looked at old Janey sometimes when the old one came out with some queer remark.

  It was old Janey what put Ellie up to it, he thought. I hat
e that old one. I’ll have her outa the place the minute I’m home. Home. Could he go home? I’ll kill the whole lot of them when I see them, he thought. Janey, Ellie, Charlie West. They’re all in it together. Making a fool outa me, thinking I’m just Soft Sam, but I’ll show them.

  All except Tommy. Tommy had been tricked same as he had, poor little lad.

  Yet sometimes softer thoughts invaded Sam’s mind. Thoughts of Ellie standing in her bright kitchen welcoming him home, his chair ready with Woodies and matches beside it. The good meals and Ellie sitting across from him in front of the fire, smiling at him as she darned his socks.

  The days out with Ellie and Tommy. The Overhead. New Brighton. Then Ellie lying in his arms, loving him. Suddenly he would feel sure it was all a mistake. True there had been no more children but the nurse and the doctor Ellie had gone to thought that was because of women’s troubles. They could be right and that fellow in Freetown wrong.

  Sam’s mind swung back and forth wondering what he should do when they docked but eventually he decided he must go home. He must have it out with Ellie, and if it was that Charlie West break him in two, yet in his heart he knew that he was going home because he was desperate to see Ellie and Thomas again. He could sort his mind out better when he saw them and maybe even go to see that Dr Wilson Ellie saw.

  Jimmy McGregor was not offended by Sam’s moroseness and chattered about his affairs as they neared port. He told Sam that he had backed off in Canada on a previous voyage. ‘You should’ve seen me book. The things I’d been logged for,’ he laughed. ‘I got over the border from Canada into America and I gorra ship to Southampton. I said me book had got pinched and I got another one, so I’m in the clear.’

  Sam said nothing, only stared glumly at the floor, but Jimmy went on undeterred.

  ‘You should’ve seen the Judy I picked up in Southampton. Real hot stuff she was but I wanted to get back to the ’Pool and me mates. I think she fell for me. She folleed me to Liverpool.’ He preened himself and Sam glanced at him.

  Jimmy was a squat, ugly little man and Sam thought briefly, she must be hard up, but he was not really interested.

  ‘She might be waiting for me when we dock,’ Jimmy went on. ‘She liked the ’Pool, but she might’ve gone back to Southampton be now.’

  ‘Probably has,’ Sam growled.

  ‘Aye, we’ve been away a long time,’ said Jimmy. ‘Thought we was set there for a good long holiday but the way he suddenly turned and couldn’t get rid of us quick enough. Must’ve had his eye on someone else.’

  Sam said nothing and Jimmy wandered away but he was back beside Sam when the ship docked in Liverpool.

  ‘Look over there, Sam,’ he said excitedly, ‘there’s that tart I was telling you about. There, the red-haired one with the sort of cloak thing and a big ’at.’

  Looks a real tart, a bit of no good, Sam thought, but he said nothing.

  ‘I told you she was struck on me,’ Jimmy said complacently, but when they went ashore the girl put one arm through Jimmy’s arm and the other through Sam’s.

  ‘I’m froze,’ she said smiling up at Sam, ‘should we go for a drink?’

  Sam had decided to confront Ellie as soon as he arrived home but suddenly he wanted to postpone the interview and he turned willingly into the pub. The girl, whose name was Madge Kenyon, she told Sam, ordered brandy and feeling suddenly reckless, Sam ordered the same.

  ‘Aye why not?’ Jimmy said cheerfully. ‘We’ve got a hell of a lot of drinking to catch up on, haven’t we, Sam?’

  Sadness had settled on Sam again and he longed to go home but Jimmy had bought the first round so he felt obliged to stay until he had bought his round. The brandies were trebles and by the time Sam had drunk the second, quickly followed by a third and fourth, he had abandoned all thought of returning home.

  It was Friday night and the public house was full, mainly with seafarers and dockers, and Sam and Jimmy bought drinks for all around them. At the end of the night, when Sam, Jimmy and Madge were equally tipsy, willing hands helped them into a taxi and they drove off to the sound of drunken cheers.

  ‘See you in the Volley, tomorrer,’ Jimmy and Madge shouted as the taxi driver hauled Sam from the cab and propped him up against his door. He knocked on the door before driving away.

  Nellie only knew that Sam’s ship would dock at the South End docks and she had expected him to arrive via the Overhead Railway at any time from early morning. There were no other local men on the ship so she had no one to ask but when Sam had not arrived by ten o’clock at night she sent Tommy to bed, promising to call him when his father arrived.

  When she heard the taxi and the knock on the door she went to open it but Sam pushed it open and fell into the room, knocking her back against the wall. Tommy had fortunately run downstairs and between them they managed to get Sam on to the sofa.

  They were engulfed in a reek of brandy fumes and Tommy said in amazement, ‘He’s drunk, Mam. Me dad’s drunk.’

  Nellie only nodded as she untied Sam’s neckerchief and unbuttoned his shirt.

  ‘Get that zinc bucket, lad,’ she said. ‘He’s not used to brandy. He might be sick.’

  She felt stunned. Nothing like this had ever happened before. Other men might call into the pub on their way home and stay for hours but Sam had always come straight home, knowing that she and Tommy would be eagerly waiting to see him, and eager to see them.

  He must’ve fell in bad company, like, she told herself and determined not to blame Sam until she knew what had happened. She wondered briefly if she should send for her brother to help her to get Sam to bed but quickly decided against it. This must be kept from everybody except herself and Tommy.

  ‘Do you think we can get him upstairs to bed, lad?’ she asked Tommy and he said he was sure they could.

  ‘I’m real strong, Mam,’ he boasted but he as well as his mother was exhausted when they finally got Sam upstairs and on to the bed.

  Nellie lit a nightlight and kept it burning all night and the bucket beside the bed, as she was sure Sam would be sick, but he slept without waking until ten o’clock the next morning.

  He stumbled downstairs to drop into the chair by the fire, holding his head.

  ‘Do you feel bad, Sam?’ Nellie said timidly. ‘See if this makes you feel better.’

  She put a pint mug of tea beside him and Sam gulped from it, then made a headlong dash to the outside lavatory.

  He came back wiping his face and put his head under the cold water tap, sluicing his head and face for several minutes. ‘That’s better,’ he said, wiping himself on the towel Nellie handed him.

  He sat down again and Tommy said loudly, ‘Hello, Dad.’

  ‘Hello, lad,’ Sam said, trying to smile at the boy.

  ‘It’s the christening today and you’re the godfather,’ Tommy said.

  ‘Hush, lad, don’t bother your dad till he feels better,’ Nellie said. ‘I can send and tell them you’re not well, Sam, and someone else can do it.’

  Sam looked at their concerned faces and felt ashamed. His other problems had receded although he felt in a muzzy way that something must be sorted out when he felt better.

  ‘No, it’s all right, girl,’ he mumbled. ‘What time is it?’

  ‘The christening’s not until three o’clock and it’s only just after ten now,’ Nellie said.

  ‘I’ll be all right be then,’ Sam said. ‘I think I’ll stretch me legs. Get a bit of fresh air.’

  Without comment Nellie took a dry flannelette shirt from the drawer and gave it to him. ‘That one’s soaking,’ she said.

  ‘And you slept in it,’ Tommy said but Nellie shook her head at him reprovingly.

  Sam stopped in the act of pulling off his wet shirt. ‘Who got me up to bed?’ he asked.

  ‘Me and Tommy. We didn’t want no one else to know,’ Nellie said quietly. It was the nearest to a reproach that she had uttered and Sam’s face grew red as he hurriedly pulled the dry shirt over his head.


  Tommy seemed to take it for granted that he would accompany his father and Sam was surprised to find how much the boy had grown.

  ‘You’re very near as big as me now, lad,’ he said, as they walked along.

  ‘I’m taller than Mam although I’m only ten,’ Tommy boasted.

  ‘Aye, well, your mam was always small and dainty, like,’ Sam said.

  ‘We had an awful job getting you to bed,’ Tommy said laughing. ‘You were a dead weight. Where had you been, Dad?’

  ‘We docked at the South End. Went in for a brandy to warm us, like, and one folleed another. We come home in a taxi.’

  ‘In a taxi from the South End!’ Tommy gasped. ‘That must’ve cost something, Dad.’

  ‘Aye, I think I remember dashing him a five-pound note,’ Sam said laughing. ‘He probably got another one off Jimmy.’

  He felt better after the walk and was able to eat his dinner when he returned. Nellie had pressed his suit and laid out a clean white shirt with it but she told Tommy to get washed and changed first, then to read while she and Sam got ready.

  Lettie had made a blue dress with a white collar for Nellie and with it she wore her blue coat, now rather faded, and a new hat.

  ‘You both look real posh,’ Tommy said when they came downstairs. Nellie was relieved that Tommy was speaking in what she thought of as an ‘ordinary’ voice, instead of the improved speech taught by Miss Helsby.

  Before they left Sam unpacked from his seabag the presents he had brought home for Nellie and Tommy. He still intended to sort things out with Nellie but he found it harder than he expected. I’ll get this christening over and maybe me head’ll be better later on, he thought. Anyhow, I want her on her own when I tackle her, with Tommy out of the way.

  When they reached Bobby’s house he was introduced to Meg and she proudly showed him the baby. ‘He’s only small but I believe your Tommy was too and look at him now,’ Meg said, smiling.

  Sam’s face had darkened at the reminder of Tommy’s birth but it went unnoticed as Nellie and Meg fussed over the baby.