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  BILL BAILEY’S LOT

  Catherine Cookson

  Table of Contents

  The Catherine Cookson Story

  Bill Bailey’s Lot

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Epilogue

  The Catherine Cookson Story

  In brief:

  Her books have sold over 130 million copies in 26 languages throughout the world and still counting…

  Catherine Cookson was born Katherine Ann McMullen on June 27th, 1906 in the bleak industrial heartland of Tyne Dock, South Shields (then part of County Durham) and later moved to East Jarrow, which is now in Tyne and Wear.

  She was the illegitimate daughter of Kate Fawcett, an alcoholic, whom she thought was her sister. She was raised by her grandparents, Rose and John McMullen. The poverty, exploitation, and bigotry she experienced in her early years aroused deep emotions that stayed with her throughout her life and which became part of her stories. Catherine left school at 13, and after a period of domestic service, she took a job in a laundry at Harton Workhouse in South Shields. In 1929, she moved south to run the laundry at Hastings Workhouse, working all hours and saving every penny to buy a large Victorian house. She took in gentleman and lady lodgers to supplement her income and took up fencing as one of her hobbies. One of her lodgers was Tom Cookson, a teacher at Hastings Grammar School, and in June 1940, they married. They were devoted to each other throughout their lives together. But the early years of her marriage were beset by the tragic miscarriage of four pregnancies and her subsequent mental breakdown. This took her over a decade to recover from, which she did, often by standing in front of a mirror and giving herself a damn good swearing at!

  Catherine took up writing as a form of therapy to deal with her depression and joined the Hastings Writers’ Group. Her first novel, Kate Hannigan, was published in 1950. In 1976, she returned to Northumberland with Tom and went on to write 104 books in all. She became one of the most successful novelists of all time and was one of the first authors to have three or four titles in the Bestseller Lists at the same time.

  She read widely: from Chaucer to the literature of the 1920s; to Plato’s Apologia on the trial and death of Socrates (she said that here was someone who stuck to his principles even unto death); to history of the nineteenth century and the Romantic poets; to Lord Chesterfield’s Letters To His Son and the books and booklets that abounded in her part of the country dealing with coal, iron, lead, glass, farming and the railways. She disliked it when her books were labeled as ‘romantic.’ To her, they were ‘readable social history of the North East interwoven into the lives of the people.’ For the millions of her readers, she brought ‘an understanding of themselves’ or perhaps of their dear ones. Her stories do not bring in a realism in which the worst is taken for granted, but a realism in which love, caring, and compassion appear, and most certainly, hope. ‘This type of realism does exist,’ Tom Cookson said of her writing. There is nothing sentimental about her writing; she is unrelenting in the strong images she invokes and the characters she portrays. They were born of her formative years and her personal struggles. Many of her novels have been transferred to stage, film, and radio with her television adaptations on ITV, lasting over a decade and achieving ratings of over 10 million viewers.

  Besides writing, she was an innovative painter, and she believed that her father’s genes fostered the strength to work hard, but also, in rare moments of freedom, to strive to better herself. Catherine was famed for her care of money but had given much to charities, hospitals, and medical research in areas close to her heart and to the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, who set up a lectureship in hematology. The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust continues to donate generously to charitable causes. The University later conferred her the Honorary Degree of Master of Arts. She received the Freedom of the Borough of South Tyneside, today known as Catherine Cookson Country. The Variety Club of Great Britain named her Writer of the Year, and she was voted Personality of the North East. Other honours followed: an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1986, and she was created Dame of the British Empire in 1993. She was appointed an Honorary Fellow at St. Hilda’s College, Oxford in 1997.

  Throughout her life, but especially in the later years, she was plagued by a rare vascular disease, telangiectasia, which caused bleeding from the nose, fingers, and stomach, and resulted in anemia. As her health declined, she and her husband moved for a final time to Jesmond in Newcastle upon Tyne to be nearer medical facilities. For the last few years of her life, she was bedridden and Tom hardly ever left her bedside, looking after her needs, cooking for her, and taking her on her emergency trips, often in the middle of the night into Newcastle. Their lives were still made up of the seven-day week and twelve or more hours each day, going over the fan mail, attending to charities, and going over the latest dictated book, with Tom meticulously making corrections line by line, for Catherine’s eyesight had long faded in her 80s.

  This most remarkable woman passed away on June 11th, 1998 at the age of 91. Tom, six years her junior, had earlier suffered a heart attack but survived long enough to be with her at her end. He passed away on 28th June, just 17 days after his beloved Catherine.

  Catherine Cookson’s Books

  NOVELS

  Colour Blind

  Maggie Rowan

  Rooney

  The Menagerie

  Fanny McBride

  Fenwick Houses

  The Garment

  The Blind Miller

  The Wingless Bird

  Hannah Massey

  The Long Corridor

  The Unbaited Trap

  Slinky Jane

  Katie Mulholland

  The Round Tower

  The Nice Bloke

  The Glass Virgin

  The Invitation

  The Dwelling Place

  Feathers in the Fire

  Pure as the Lily

  The Invisible Cord

  The Gambling Man

  The Tide of Life

  The Girl

  The Cinder Path

  The Man Who Cried

  The Whip

  The Black Velvet Gown

  A Dinner of Herbs

  The Moth

  The Parson’s Daughter

  The Harrogate Secret

  The Cultured Handmaiden

  The Black Candle

  The Gillyvors

  My Beloved Son

  The Rag Nymph

  The House of Women

  The Maltese Angel

  The Golden Straw

  The Year of the Virgins

  The Tinker’s Girl

  Justice is a Woman

  A Ruthless Need

  The Bonny Dawn

  The Branded Man

  The Lady on my Left

  The Obsession

  The Upstart

  The Blind Years

  Riley

  The Solace of Sin

  The Desert Crop

  The Thursday Friend

  A House Divided

  Rosie of the River

  The Silent Lady

  FEATURING KATE HANNIGAN

  Kate Hannigan (her first published novel)

  Kate Hannigan’s Girl (her hundredth published novel)

  THE MARY ANN NOVELS

  A Grand Man

  The Lord and Mary Ann

  The Devil and Mary Ann

  Love and Mary Ann

  Life and Mary Ann

  Marriage and Mary
Ann

  Mary Ann’s Angels

  Mary Ann and Bill

  FEATURING BILL BAILEY

  Bill Bailey

  Bill Bailey’s Lot

  Bill Bailey’s Daughter

  The Bondage of Love

  THE TILLY TROTTER TRILOGY

  Tilly Trotter

  Tilly Trotter Wed

  Tilly Trotter Widowed

  THE MALLEN TRILOGY

  The Mallen Streak

  The Mallen Girl

  The Mallen Litter

  FEATURING HAMILTON

  Hamilton

  Goodbye Hamilton

  Harold

  AS CATHERINE MARCHANT

  Heritage of Folly

  The Fen Tiger

  House of Men

  The Iron Façade

  Miss Martha Mary Crawford

  The Slow Awakening

  CHILDREN’S

  Matty Doolin

  Joe and the Gladiator

  The Nipper

  Rory’s Fortune

  Our John Willie

  Mrs. Flannagan’s Trumpet

  Go Tell It To Mrs Golightly

  Lanky Jones

  Bill and The Mary Ann Shaughnessy

  AUTOBIOGRAPHY

  Our Kate

  Let Me Make Myself Plain

  Plainer Still

  Bill Bailey’s Lot

  Bill Bailey, the rugged Liverpudlian, was now a fully-fledged Tyneside building contractor, as staunchly loyal to his squad of workmen as they were to him. He had also met and married Fiona, a young widow with her own loveable family, to which she and Bill shortly added with the adoption of the orphaned Mamie.

  Life was good, but the economic climate was growing distinctly cloudy, and it was vital that Bill land the contract of a major development scheme. Competition was fierce, and when his men came under attack, Bill was sure that someone was out to spoil their chances for the job.

  Meanwhile, there were ructions on the domestic front. One of their children, Willie, acquired a new friend, Sammy Love, and although Fiona had grave doubts about this formidable lad and his colourful language, it was Sammy—and his father—who would make a vital contribution to the lives and fortunes of Bill Bailey’s lot.

  This is a novel that conveys much warmth with the well-drawn characters of Bill Bailey and the captivating Sammy Love.

  Copyright © The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust 1987

  The right of Catherine Cookson to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  This book is sold subject to the condition it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form.

  ISBN 978-1-78036-032-4

  Sketch by Harriet Anstruther

  Except where actual historical events and characters are being described, all situations in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.

  Published by Peach Publishing

  To all the nice women who loved Bill Bailey

  and haven’t come across him yet:

  Don’t give up hope;

  He’s kicking around looking for just someone like you.

  Oh, he won’t mind really what you look like;

  It’s your Paw-son-al-ity that’ll get him.

  Just keep in mind what his mother used to say:

  One way to a man’s heart is through the oven door.

  Chapter One

  ‘Get up those stairs.’

  ‘Mam! Mam!’

  ‘Don’t “mam” me. Get up with you.’

  ‘It…it was only a little swear, Mam, it wasn’t a big one.’

  ‘Yes, it was a little one, but one of the worst little ones.’

  ‘Oh, Mam! Don’t smack me. You’re hurting my legs.’

  ‘That’s nothing to what you’re going to get. Get in that room there!’

  Fiona Bailey pushed her eight-year-old son into his bedroom, and when he jumped on to the side of the bed and sat on his hands, she said, ‘Get your things off.’

  ‘I…I haven’t had my…t…tea, Mam.’

  ‘And you’re not going to get any tea; you’re going to bed.’

  ‘Oh! Mam, Mam, I’ll not say it again.’

  ‘No; I can assure you you won’t say it again.’ She now grabbed her son by the shoulder and, twisting him around, she pulled off his coat, dragged his pullover over his head, then said, ‘So do you want me to take your trousers off or are you going to?’

  ‘Oh, Mam.’ The tears now were washing Willie’s face. ‘I’ll…I’ll never say it again. I…I promise. It was only once.’

  ‘It wasn’t once. Don’t lie. I heard you at least three times using the same word.’

  ‘Well, it was because he used it at me. He…he said he wanted to come and see our house and…and he wanted to see inside. And I…I knew you wouldn’t like him to come in.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I like him to come in?’

  Willie’s head now swung from side to side as he tried to explain.

  ‘Well, ’cos…’cos he’s from Bog’s End and…and he’s the one I made you laugh about when…when our school won and…and the nun woman ran him off the field ’cos he was tearing into everybody.’

  ‘Get your trousers off.’

  ‘Oh, Mam. Are you going to tan me?’

  ‘No. I’m not going to tan you.’

  Fiona now stood stiffly, watching her son divest himself quickly of his trousers and his pants and then struggle into his pyjamas. This done, she said, ‘Get into bed.’

  ‘Mam…I’m hungry. I…I didn’t eat much of the school dinner. I didn’t like it.’

  ‘That’s your fault. Get into bed.’

  Fiona now saw the look that she knew only too well come over her son’s face: his nostrils twitched, his lips came tightly together. And when he said in a small voice, ‘I’ll tell Mr B…Dad when he comes in. He’ll give me my tea,’ her own face stretched and her hand began to rise; but he saw the warning sign too late, for as he was about to scramble into bed, her hand caught him none too gently across the buttocks, which brought a yell from him: ‘Now I will! I’ll tell him. And…and he won’t hit me for saying a four-letter word.’

  ‘Won’t he just! He’ll wipe the floor with you if he hears just one whisper of a four-letter word.’

  The tears were sniffed loudly. He rubbed the back of his hand across the bottom of his nose as he cried, ‘There’s lots of four-letter words, like like and love, and I don’t like you and I don’t love you, and I’m going to make myself die now and you’ll be sorry.’

  As she straightened the cover on the bed Fiona said, in a much cooler voice now, ‘I don’t think I will because I just do not want anything to do with boys who use filthy words.’ She walked towards the door where she turned and, pointing a stiff finger towards him, said, ‘And don’t you dare get out of that bed until I tell you.’

  On the landing she stood and drew in a long, slow breath. It was odd, she thought, how her four children, including Mamie her adopted daughter of five, would all revert to the name of Mr Bill when they wanted him to champion them. While he was their lodger they had all called him Mr Bill. It was only since the Christmas before last, months after she and Bill had been married, that they had given him the title of Dad. And now, over a year later, she could still picture his delight and the emotion their acceptance of him as their father had evoked.

  She was passing the landing window when she caught sight of her husband. He was standing on the drive and there, right in the middle of the daffodil border, stood the awful boy who had caused all the trouble.

  Unaware of ‘the trouble caused by the awful boy’ Bill looked at him and demanded, ‘What were you going to do with that brick?’

  ‘Nowt.’

  ‘Standing opposite a window, swinging a brick in your hand and you were goin’ to do nowt with it? You were goin’ to t
hrow it through the window, weren’t you?’

  ‘Aye, I was. And I will an’ all.’

  ‘Well, you try it on, laddie, and I can tell you this for nowt, you’ll beat that brick to that window.’

  ‘Oh, aye? Well, you’d better not lay a finger on me, mister, else me da’ll wallop you. He’s a big fella, six foot three he is.’

  ‘Oh, aye? So he’s a big fella, six foot three; but you’re not a very big fella are you, and you’re ruining the daffodils. Come out of that!’ And as his voice rose his hand went out and grabbed the diminutive figure and before the boy knew what was happening to him he left the ground and landed on the drive at Bill’s feet. And still with his hold on the boy’s shoulder, Bill said, ‘What’s your name? Come on; you’ve had enough jaw up till now. What’s your name? If you don’t tell me I’ll yank you along to the police station.’

  ‘I’ve done nowt.’

  ‘Haven’t you? You’re trespassing and you were about to throw a brick through my window. That’s enough to put you along the line for some time.’

  ‘Sammy Love.’

  ‘Sammy Love? That’s a gentle name for the likes of you. Well, Sammy Love, what you doin’ here in my garden?’

  ‘Settin’ Willie home. Are you his da?’

  ‘Whose da?’

  ‘Willie’s?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, you can say I’m his dad.’

  ‘Well,’ the boy attempted now to shrug himself free from Bill’s hold, saying, ‘Leave loose of me shoulder, mister; you’ll crumple me jacket, then I’ll get me brains knocked out when I get home if it’s messed up. An’ yer hands are mucky.’

  Bill slowly released his hold on the boy’s jacket, then looked him up and down, remarking to himself that he was decently put on. But his rig-out certainly didn’t match his attitude or his tongue, both would have been more fitted to those of a ragamuffin.

  ‘Well, go on, tell me, what are you doing here? All right. You set Willie home, but why the brick business?’

  ‘Well,’ the small figure kicked at a broken daffodil lying on the path, one of the victims of his boots, before turning and looking at Bill and saying, ‘He wouldn’t take me into his house. I just wanted to see like, what it was, I mean, inside. He said his mam wouldn’t like me to go in. So I told him what I thought about his mam.’