The Branded Man Page 12

  In the kitchen, she said to Marie Anne, who was sitting close to the oven door, ‘You’d better get upstairs and start packing your things, for you’re for the road tomorrow. Which road, I don’t know. That’ll depend mostly on you.’

  Marie Anne was standing up now and again she started, ‘I’m not going into—’

  ‘All right. All right,’ put in Sarah, flapping her hand almost in Marie Anne’s face, ‘I’ve heard that till I’m tired: you’re not going into a home. Well, from now till tomorrow morning you can mull over it and tell me where you want to go, either to the station, or…well, where else I don’t know. Only go on now.’

  Marie Anne went out almost at a run and Cook asked quietly of Sarah, ‘She’s picked on a home then?’

  ‘Yes. Yes. I’ve never heard of it before, but I’ve got to find it tomorrow and take her there. The minister’s wife has a hand in it.’

  ‘What do they call it?’

  ‘Well, it’s a fancy name all right, and I suppose it suits the condition that she’s in, I mean Marie Anne. It’s called Mary Ping’s Home for Distressed Women.’

  ‘What!’ The word came high from Cook’s throat. ‘Mary Ping’s? Oh my God, no!’

  ‘What is it? Where is it?’

  ‘You might well ask, but haven’t you heard of Mary Ping’s? You’ve been in this end of London long enough.’

  ‘No, I haven’t heard of Mary Ping’s.’

  ‘It’s a noted house for fallen women, and from what I’ve always been able to gather they’re mostly off the streets with their bellies so full no back-street old girl could get rid of it for them. Whores, the majority of them. Oh, here and there will be a decent enough lass who finds it’s a choice of there or the workhouse. Well, believe me, from what I hear about it, give me the workhouse. Mary Ping’s! And you’ve never heard of it? It’s a joke: You’ll end up in Mary Ping’s.’

  Sarah flopped down onto a chair and her voice was very low now and tired sounding as she said, ‘She wouldn’t do that if she knew what it really was; she wouldn’t do that, I mean, her up there.’

  ‘Well, apparently she’s done it, and through religious quarters an’ all. Oh, Mrs Delia is noted for her good works. She has collections every now and again in the chapel for the barefooted lot, but whether the money ever sees boots I don’t know, nor does anybody else, except at Christmas when they bring in some urchins off the streets and dress them in somebody’s cut-me-downs.’ Cook now leaned across the table and touched Sarah’s arm, and with almost a plea in her voice, she said, ‘You can’t let her go there.’

  When Sarah said nothing, Cook went on, ‘Go early in the morning and see for yourself. It’s a big house behind iron gates and a high fence. They would let you in, likely, if you were to say you had come to make arrangements about the girl.’

  Sarah turned her gaze up to Cook as she said, flatly now, ‘I’m worried sick about her. If only she’d go back home and brave her mother. But that’s the last thing she’ll do, and she thinks her grandfather and brother will die of shame when they know what’s happened to her. Yet they both sound lovely men, and I’m sure they would take it in their stride. But she won’t have it. She’s strong-willed, you know. Oh aye, she’s headstrong in some ways, and she’s just as likely to go out of here tomorrow on her own and end up in some cheap hotel, and from there what? Only God knows.’

  ‘She couldn’t go on without you, Sarah, and she knows it. She thinks the world of you, and rightly so, because you’ve been more than a friend to her. So she’ll do what you say in the end.’

  ‘Oh no, she won’t, at least about going back home. No, I can’t bend her that way.’

  Both Sarah and Cook turned to where Clara was washing up dishes in a bowl set in a shallow stone sink, for she was saying, ‘Wouldn’t your sister take her in in the meanwhile?’

  ‘Oh.’ Sarah smiled at the young girl as she said, ‘Me sister, Clara, has ten bairns and the oldest is eleven. They live in a tenement, and the tenement is part of a court, and there’s courts and courts, and this one is a court! It’s four-storeyed, and Annie lives on the third floor. Mind, she’s lucky, she has four rooms, although two of them are just like boxes; but every drop of water has to be carried upstairs from the tap in the yard. And there’s four water-closets down there too, and they have to serve the whole of that court. So that’s the picture of where me sister lives, Clara; but it was nice of you to think along those lines.’

  ‘I’ll miss her.’ Clara had turned from the sink, and Sarah and Cook exchanged a warm glance as they said almost simultaneously, ‘So will we, lass. So will we.’

  ‘She has no side, not like some, and she was learning me words.’

  Again there was the exchanged glance; then Sarah rose quickly from her chair, saying, ‘I’ll be away up to her.’

  As she made for the door Cook said, ‘Bring her down for a bit of supper. I got four fresh herrin’ today from the fish-woman.’ …

  As Sarah opened the door and went into the room, Marie Anne turned from lifting a case from the bed and, putting it on the floor, she said quietly, ‘I’m all packed.’ Then going to Sarah, she looked into her face, saying, ‘I have been thinking, Sarah: if you would help me to get a room, a furnished place, I…I could find work of some kind; with the money I have I’d manage somehow.’

  ‘Come and sit down.’ Sarah pulled her onto the edge of the bed and put her arm around her shoulder, and said very quietly, ‘That’s a good idea, a very good idea, but it will take money. How much have you got?’

  ‘Altogether, eighteen pounds five shillings.’

  ‘What!’ Sarah’s arm dropped from Marie Anne’s shoulder. ‘Eighteen pounds five shillings? I thought the last you had was about five pounds or so.’

  ‘Yes; but Grandpa put some paper money in his last letter, and so did Pat; and I didn’t tell you because I was keeping it a secret. Well,’ her head bowed, ‘I…I wanted to buy you a present, but I wanted to find out first what you wanted most.’

  ‘Oh, love! Oh, me dear!’ The arm was about her again, hugging her close now. ‘Oh! God bless you for the thought. But eighteen pounds five shillings! That’s a lot of money. Next door, she knows nothing about it?’

  ‘Oh no, no. She informed me when I first came that if my grandfather sent me money it must be put into her keeping, because, she inferred, most servants were thieves.’

  ‘She did, did she? Well! Well! I can only say it would be a clever thief that could pick her pocket. Anyway, leave everything until tomorrow. Now, I might have to go out early on me own, but I’ll be back; and from there…well, we’ll work it out. Come on now downstairs for your last real meal in this house. Cook has got some fresh herring. Let me tell you something.’ She nodded into Marie Anne’s face. ‘They’re goin’ to miss you down there, especially Clara ’cos you are the only other young thing in this house. Yes, Clara’s goin’ to miss you, as we all will.’

  ‘Oh Sarah, please.’

  ‘Now stop it. No more tonight; leave it till tomorrow morning. Come on.’

  Mary Ping’s Home for Distressed Women was situated at the end of a long street that had once housed well-to-do merchants. It was a flat, grey-stone, barrack-looking establishment without the relief of tree or grass.

  The woman porter who had let her in through the iron gate now led the way into a large hall. The floor was tiled, and at each end two women were scrubbing it. When they glanced up at Sarah their expressions were similar and portrayed total weariness.

  The woman, who was walking ahead of her along a passage, now turned to her and said, ‘You wanted to see who?’

  ‘The mistress of the house, the matron…whoever.’

  ‘The matron?’ The woman laughed. ‘Don’t you know her name?’

  ‘No; I only know that she’s expecting somebody in this morning.’

  ‘Oh, another of ’em. You her mother?’

  ‘No, I’m not her mother.’ It was almost a bark and the woman turned on her and said, ‘Don’t you
use that tone on me, missis, unless you want a smack in the gob.’

  They stared at each other, before the woman moved on again, and at the end of the passage she thrust open a door and cried, ‘Betty! Take this woman to the waitin’ room; she’s for Miss Frank,’ and without more ado she turned on her heel and walked back up the passage. And there was the said Betty standing in front of Sarah, a wide grin on her face and her stomach so large that it seemed as if it would overbalance her.

  ‘Why, hello!’ she said. ‘So you’re for Miss Frank, are you? Come in. Come in an’ join the club.’

  Sarah passed the grinning girl to enter a room where at least ten women were at work, and her entry immediately stopped their chatter and it was obvious to Sarah that they were all in different stages of pregnancy. Four of them were sitting at a table busily sticking something together. She couldn’t make out what it was except that it was flat and to do with paper. One was sitting at a treadle machine. Another was sewing what looked like hessian aprons. Others were hemming babies’ napkins, while yet more were seated in the far corner of the room, although she couldn’t take in what they were doing, only that most of them were grinning at her.

  ‘How’s the world outside, missis?’ one called to her. And another heavily laden girl laughed as she said, ‘You’re new, aren’t you? Which Holy Joe’s group do you belong to?’ while a woman at the table addressed the other saying, ‘Have you ever seen anybody as flat as that in your life? Not even a little bun in her oven.’

  Sarah had been about to follow the laughing Betty when one of the women came out with a mouthful of blasphemous curses that absolutely shook her, for the girl was probably no more than eighteen years old.

  Being Sarah Foggerty and having been brought up with a houseful of male Foggertys, she had been used to damns, bloodys and buggers. Such words punctuated their daily speech. But when the name of Jesus and the Cross and his Mother all rolled into one came flooding from those young lips, bringing giggles and laughter from the other occupants of the room, Sarah could stand no more. She turned on the girl who was not more than a yard or so away from her and she cried, ‘Shut your filthy mouth! You young whore, you!’ Then casting her infuriated glance over the rest of those present in the room, she cried, ‘When I came in here, I expected to be sorry for you. But I can see you’re all where you belong and you deserve no better;’ and now she rounded on Betty who, surprisingly, was no longer laughing and she said, ‘I don’t want to go to your waiting room; I’m leaving.’

  ‘Well and good, missis.’ Betty now led her back to the door, and standing there for a moment she looked into Sarah’s face and said, ‘You’ve made one mistake, missis: we are not all where we belong; we’re just making the best of a bad job. Phyllis has a dirty mouth—it’s a pity—but it’s the only way she can vent her feelings. It compensates, like, for being kicked from dog to devil.’

  Sarah had the uneasy feeling that this young girl was putting her in her place and her voice was now low as she apologised. ‘I’m sorry. This set-up has come as a bit of a shock. You see, I was to bring a young girl here whose people won’t have her, but…but now I can’t do it, even if she would come.’

  The young woman looked at her intently for a moment, then said, ‘Aye, well, I understand. Has…has she been dropped? Oh, what a damn silly thing to say? Why would you be here if she hadn’t? Anyway’—the smile returned to her face—‘I wish her luck, wherever she lands. In any case, she’d have been one too many here: it’s only supposed to take thirty, and we’re thirty-two so far.’

  ‘Goodbye,’ said Sarah now, and the girl answered, ‘Goodbye, missis.’

  Missis. It was nice to be called missis; but she’d never be a missis.

  As if she had known that this particular visitor would be leaving very soon, the woman who had shown her in was standing by the front door, and she preceded Sarah down the gravel drive, unlocked the gate and let her through without either of them speaking a word, not even of farewell …

  Sarah did not return to the house straight away. Instead, she boarded a horse-bus which would take her further into the East End, and when the conductor shouted ‘The Priory’ she alighted.

  Some distance along the street she passed a set of iron gates which led to the House of The Brothers of St Peter the Rock, and further on she passed The Church of The Blue Virgin. She was always amused by the nickname given to this street—The Holy Walk—because at the far end was the Convent.

  A narrow cut led into a densely built-up area and to a quarter known as The Courts.

  As she crossed the yard of Ramsay Court a man was shovelling ash, piled up in the corner of the yard, into a high-sided cart, and a woman was on her hands and knees scrubbing the brick floor of the second in the row of closets. She turned and glanced at the newcomer, then sat back on her haunches and called, ‘Hello there! You’re early.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Barnes,’ Sarah called back; ‘I’m up before me clothes was on.’

  They laughed together before Sarah entered the second door of the block of flats and immediately sidestepped two small children playing in the small dim hallway, and bending over them, she said, ‘You shouldn’t play behind the door.’

  The second flight of fifteen stairs took her to her sister’s flat. She was puffing as she pushed open the door marked ‘3’, and brought a cry from numerous children and a loud ‘Good gracious! This time in the mornin’?’ from her sister Annie.

  ‘Oh! Those stairs.’

  ‘Something the matter?’

  ‘Aye; you could say that, Annie, something’s the matter. Have you got a drop of tea on the hob?’

  ‘Yes; it’ll be as black as the ace of spades, though. But you like it that way, don’t you? Help yourself and tell me why you are here at ten in the morning. Has she died?’

  ‘No; but I wish she had. Have you ever heard of Mary Ping’s Home for Distressed Women?’

  ‘Huh! Who hasn’t? It’s a street-woman’s house, infamous it is. Don’t tell me you’re goin’ in. It used to be a laugh, because when Father Weir tried to go in there and drag out the Catholic young ’uns I’m told they nearly stripped the clothes off him. Well, what about it?’

  ‘Just that’s where that old faggot of mine was having Miss sent. Got her minister and his wife there last night and it was settled between them. Well, after Cook said as much about the place as you’ve just done, I went to see for meself. I only saw one room full of the lasses but that was enough. Dear God, it was. Yet, as one young lass put it, they weren’t all alike, luck and upbringing had something to do with it. But the thought of Miss Marie Anne going into that place nearly caused me hair to stand on end. I needn’t have worried, because she proposes going into a furnished room and getting a job. But Annie, girl, she’ll be eaten alive, because she’s beautiful, strangely beautiful. There’s something about her face that’s fetching, and her nature too: she’s a lovely lass. Headstrong, oh aye, and with a temper, but who hasn’t? Anyway, I’ve been thinking. Are those two rooms in the attic up there still empty?’

  ‘Yes; they’re still empty, and I’ve got the key. He knocks sixpence a week off the rent for me showing people round. It’s been empty this last month and there’s only one bloke came and looked at it, but when he knew the water had to be carried up that far he said no way was he payin’ half a dollar a week for those two shanties.’

  ‘Could I go up and have a look?’

  ‘Help yourself to the key; it’s on the mantelpiece there. But in the name of God, woman, that lass would never exist up there! Every drop of water has to be humped up, and every shovel of coal.’

  ‘Well, she wouldn’t be alone, Annie, for I’d be with her. I’m heartily, heartily fed up with that woman and her meanness. I really do think the lass would shovel coal in hell as long as I was with her, for she has come to rely on me; more’s the pity, really, for I feel responsible for her and the feeling’s becoming a burden, I can tell you that.’

  ‘You mean you’d come and live up above
us?’ Annie’s voice sounded eager.

  ‘Just for the time being, anyway. But the place would have to be furnished.’

  ‘Oh, that won’t cost you all that much if you’re not going to be too particular. As you know, you can buy anything from a grand piano to a sculler boat in Paddy’s Emporium. Go and have a look.’ …

  Sarah stood in the middle of the large room with the ceiling sloping at both ends. The floor was covered with linoleum that still bore its pattern. The fireplace was an open range with an oven at one side and a hob at the other, but there wasn’t a stick of furniture in the room. She walked down its long length and pushed open the door at the far end and here immediately she saw furniture of a kind. There was a double brass bed, but without a mattress; yet the springs were firm enough. This floor, too, was covered with linoleum, and on the far wall there was a decent-sized window, as large as that in the main room. Before leaving the room she felt the brass knobs on the ends of the bed. They, too, were firm. It was a good bed.

  Downstairs once more, Sarah said, ‘Tell him we’ll have it.’

  ‘No! Just like that? Have you taken into account the lugging up of everything, coals, water and doing the washin’ in the poss-tub downstairs? An’ think of your legs at the end of the day. Mine are burstin’ gettin’ up just this far.’

  ‘Yes; you’ve pumped that into me over the years, but all we can do is try. I can’t let her go out into this city on her own; I’d have to live with meself after.’

  ‘But Sarah,’ Annie said, ‘for another sixpence or a shilling you could get a decent flat on the level and not have all the humpin’ to do.’

  ‘Well, don’t think I haven’t thought of that, Annie, but she’s only got so much money, and so have I. It won’t last us all that long, and I’ll soon have to go out on a job of sorts myself, and I’d like to think she was near someone safe when I left her, for she’s on four months gone now and there’s little chance of her gettin’ a pianist’s job, although she could carry that off, she plays so lovely.’