Fanny McBride Read online

  Grabbing up the bucket she returned it to the scullery, then going to the bedroom door she knocked and called, ‘Hi there! It’s time you were on your way.’

  A clear, decisive voice answered her, saying, ‘I’m up.’ And as she went back into the scullery she muttered to herself, ‘Aye, you would be.’

  When the bedroom had held nine of them lying top to toe in two beds, the morning routine had been to wallop them awake with the flat of her hand. Even when in later years the girls had been relegated to a bed in the corner of the kitchen and the lads were great lumps of fellows, she had still taken pleasure in belabouring them awake. Now, Phil had the whole room to himself like a gentleman. There…that was the word that had always raised the barrier between her and Phil. It was a foreign word, at least in this house, for who in his wildest dreams would imagine that anyone who was the product of McBride and herself could fancy himself a gentleman? Not that the word was ever mentioned by either her or Phil, but he was so different from every other member of her brood that to her mind nothing else fitted him.

  Philip came into the kitchen, doubling in the neck of an old shirt he always wore while he washed, and he glanced towards the window as he remarked, ‘It’s a nice morning.’

  ‘Aye, it’s all right.’

  This daily polite reference to the weather irritated Fanny. None of the others had done it. ‘What’s to eat, Ma?’ they had called. ‘For God’s sake! Ma, put me more bait up.’ Or Jack daring to say, ‘Come on, fat old Fan, get a move on!’

  But this…‘It’s a nice morning. It looks like rain. I think we might have frost.’ God in heaven! It got on her nerves. Yet she supposed she should be thankful that that was about all he did say in the mornings, for she got more than her share of talk some nights when he attempted to put her and the entire world to rights.

  As Fanny put the frying pan on the gas ring, Philip returned to the bedroom, and ten minutes later when he emerged he was dressed in a blue serge suit and white shirt and collar. His fair hair was watered and for the moment was lying flat, and his face looked as clean, Fanny thought, as a freshly singed chicken. This son’s looks never ceased to cause her to wonder. From where did he get his grey eyes and heavy, curved eyebrows? Not from McBride or her. And he had a nose on him, too, bigger and straighter than the stubs that ran in the family. He was better looking than any of them, especially when he laughed, which wasn’t often, and was the only one of her brood that touched on six foot. Yet if the truth be spoken, she would swap him this minute for any one of them. God forgive her! What was she thinking? She was ungrateful, that’s what she was. He was here, wasn’t he, and none of the others would ever come back, for they were married and were scattered about the country far and wide—all except Donald and Florence, and they never put their noses inside the door unless they were after something. She’d get what she deserved if she wasn’t careful, for if Phil was to leave her now what would she do? Who would she work for? Who would there be to wait for coming in? She was an ungrateful old slut, that’s what she was, and she prayed the Virgin would turn a deaf ear to her ravings. Phil was a good lad…he was only a bit too fancy for her, and shouldn’t she be proud of that? He wasn’t like the others, ignorant or upstarts. Hadn’t he gone to night school? Hadn’t he come out of the yards and got himself a job in an office, the Borough Treasurer’s at that? And wasn’t he forever reading his books and learning? The bedroom was like Paddy’s market with his books. And hadn’t he got himself a lady? Well, anyway, a fancy piece who served in Binns. Not that she had seen her, for it wasn’t likely that he’d bring her near the door; but Mary Prout said she had seen her, in fact she knew of her, for the girl had once worked in the same office as her niece, Monica.

  Fanny placed the breakfast before her son, and as she did so, another worry born of Mary Prout’s gossiping reared its head and attacked her. What if he were to come in some night and tell her he was going to be married? Aw!…she went to the hob and lifted up the teapot…she was always going up the street to look for trouble, and them what looked, the devil saw they found.

  She was just about to pour herself out her fourth cup of the morning when a faint tap came on the door, so faint that she wondered if it was a knock at all, until Philip, raising his head, said, ‘There’s someone there.’

  Shambling across the room, she unbolted the door and pulled it open to stare down in some surprise on the child in the hall.

  ‘Hallo,’ she said. ‘And what are you after?’

  The child moved her head with adult politeness. ‘I’m Marian Leigh-Petty from upstairs.’ She stressed the Leigh.

  ‘Well, I know that. What is it you want?’

  Fanny was in no mood to bandy words with a child this morning, and with this one in particular, for the little madam had passed her in the hall numerous times during the last fortnight without as much as a ‘Hallo’.

  ‘My mummy says would you be kind enough to let her have a shilling for the gas?’

  The words came round and full from the small, pert mouth and were delivered with the suggestion of a demand, and they caused Fanny to think, I’d like to lay me hand across her backside, I would that.

  ‘Wait a minute, I’ll see…Oh! Come in,’ she cried, ‘there’s a draught. Come in—put a move on now!’

  The child did not jump at Fanny’s sharp order, but moved slowly into the room, where she stood for a moment looking round her, her face expressing her impression as her eyes went swiftly from the two battered leather armchairs up to the cluttered mantelpiece, then down again to the dresser at one side of the fireplace, over the tattered couch at the other, then onto the rumpled bed in the far corner, finally coming to the table and Philip.

  Her eyes lingered on Philip, and he stopped eating and said kindly, ‘Hallo.’

  ‘Good morning.’

  My God! Fanny opened her purse. He’d met his match in politeness, anyway. ‘There.’ She held out a shilling, and the child, turning from her fixed contemplation of Philip, took it, saying, ‘Thank you’; then without more ado turned towards the door.

  ‘Here!’ exclaimed Fanny, ‘where you going? What about the coppers or the sixpences or whatever you want change for?’

  The child turned again and gazed solemnly at Fanny. ‘I didn’t want change…it was a loan. My mummy will pay you back…she will, she promised.’

  For once Fanny found no retort ready to roll off her tongue…the manner of this creature amazed her. She had met some bairns in her time, but for coolness this one took the cake—she was as sure of herself as a priest. In silence she watched the departure of her early visitor. Then turning towards Phil, her observations on the matter were checked, for there he was having his work cut out to stop himself from laughing. Now if it had been Jack she would likely have let out a roar against herself and they’d have raised the roof, but Phil’s idea of humour and hers didn’t usually click. So all she said was, ‘D’you find it funny?’

  He swallowed and looked down at his plate. ‘Yes, a bit. She was so cool.’

  ‘Cool! Damn cheek, I’d call it. I’ve seen the last of that shilling, I bet … Fancy’—she turned and stared towards the door—‘sending to borrow a shilling, and her sailing into the house the day they moved in like a delicate-nosed lady on a muck heap, and nobody seen hilt nor hair of her since.’

  ‘Doesn’t she go out at all?’ asked Philip.

  ‘I haven’t seen her, and there’s few get past me.’

  On this Philip took a long drink from his cup, then wiped his mouth on his handkerchief, clean and white and still in its square.

  ‘I’ve seen the lass and the lad. The lass goes off to work somewhere, she leaves here at half-past seven, and the lad still goes to school. That ’un’—she nodded towards the door—‘goes to school an’ all, but I should imagine there’s little they can learn her.’

  ‘Mother.’

  ‘Aye, what is it?’ She turned towards the table, where Philip was now standing straightening his tie. That was ano
ther of his oddities, this mother business. Never ma.

  ‘What is it?’ she repeated.

  ‘I think I should tell you I’m thinking of making a move.’

  It came just as quickly and as casually as that. Trust Phil to startle your bowels into action. She’d had the feeling all night and more so since she rose that something was going to happen. She had felt it in the weight of her body, it was achy and tired, depressing her. She could always go by the weight of her body.

  She did not make any comment, but her thick, podgy hand moved slowly to her chest, and her fingers, pushing the buttons of her blouse apart, sought the warm, comforting feel of her breast and remained there as she stared at him.

  ‘I stand a good chance of a post in Scarborough. I’m on the shortlist.’ His eyes dropped from hers and for a minute he looked like a shy boy. ‘I’m sitting for an exam at the beginning of the year, and if I get this post it could lead to—well, anything. Perhaps one day…’ He stopped and his colour rose, flushing his fair skin.

  Her voice was very quiet as she asked: ‘Couldn’t you get to the top here?’

  ‘Hardly. And anyway, I feel I should move. And then there’s you, you want this place to yourself.’

  ‘Me?’ Her voice became high in her head. ‘Me want the place to meself? Now don’t make that an excuse.’ She wiped the air with her hand. ‘If you’re goin’, you’re goin’. You’ll go sooner or later, anyway, this place isn’t fancy enough for you.’ She turned from him.

  ‘Now, it isn’t that. That isn’t fair, you know it isn’t.’

  He sounded so sincere that she turned her head towards him and asked, ‘Well, what am I to think?’

  ‘Not that…it isn’t that. Although you won’t believe me…it’s only that I want to get away…to get on. Anyway, I could have left years ago if it was that.’

  Aye, that was true, she thought.

  ‘You gettin’ married?’ Her eyes narrowed at him.

  ‘No, I’m not!’ He said this brusquely and emphatically; then turning swiftly from the table he went into the bedroom.

  She continued to watch his movement through the open door, and when he returned to the kitchen carrying a trilby, gloves, and a mackintosh, she asked briefly, ‘You goin’ soon?’

  He placed the coat and gloves on a chair. ‘There’s nothing settled yet, I’ve got to go for interview.’

  As he adjusted his hat in the half-obliterated mirror above the mantelpiece her eyes spread over him as if she was seeing him for the last time. She watched him pull on the brim, first the back, then the front. Then the look in his eyes surprised her as he turned quickly to her and said, ‘You’ve had enough of us all these years, it’s time you had a break.’

  She stared at him. Why was he giving her this soft soap? Yet so gentle was his tone that she was forced to believe that he himself believed what he was saying and was acting on that belief. But so separated was she from this son that she could not cry out to him, as she would have done to Jack had he said the same thing, ‘Don’t go, lad…stay. I don’t want no breaks such as this. Don’t leave me alone, for God’s sake.’ Yet, if she had cried out now she felt that this one would stay whereas the other one wouldn’t have, and it was beyond her power of reasoning to fathom out why she couldn’t bring herself to ask him, but she couldn’t.

  Slowly she went to the table, and under the pretence of clearing away she moved the dishes around. ‘You’ll do as you want in the long run, like the rest of ’em,’ she said.

  She did not turn again until she heard the door shut; then almost groping her way she moved to the armchair and sat down. No muscle of her face moved; nor did she allow to reflect in her eyes the pain that was in her heart. The last of them going; not one of them left; all over the country they were spread, and hardly a word she heard from any of them. Molly, Frank, and Peggy in London; Bill and Owen, far away in Devon; Davie and Jane in Scotland; only Don and Florrie lived anywhere near, and Don had an upstart of a wife while Florrie, across the water in Howden, had seven around her and a waster of a man…And Jack? The pain in her heart increased, swamping her body, reducing it to the huge shell it was. The pain became almost tangible, a thing to be touched. Her hand pressed against her ribs and she rocked herself.

  What was life anyway? Why were you made to rear them, then have them leave you? All of them, even this one.

  All the love she had in her had been lavished on her youngest son, yet after he had left her, in spite of herself, something in her had groped towards Phil. But the feeling was bred of her mind, not her heart, for he was the last defence against loneliness—once he went she would be alone indeed, and what was more, if not actually in want, not far from it.

  It had been hard enough to scrape along as it was, with the rent gone up to fourteen and a penny and coals and light, not to mention food. When he was gone there’d still be rent, coals, and light, and out of what?…Her bit pension. If she asked for supplementary they’d want to know what her eleven children were doing for her, and if she said, ‘Damn all!’ they’d likely make them stump up. Well, she’d ask for nothing from one of them, through supplementary or any other way. She’d never begged in her life, although, God knew, she had been near to it many a time to keep the lot of them fed, but she’d never asked for a penny for herself, and she wasn’t going to start now. Nor would she when…She wouldn’t complete her thoughts and say when she was left alone; but she continued to rock herself and press her hand against the pain, which she thought of as wind. And she told herself as she forced her temper to support her, she wasn’t finished yet. No, by God! She wasn’t. She’d find a job or something. If those pieces from the council houses who hadn’t the list to keep their bairns’ noses clean could pick up their five pounds in the factories, then surely to God there was a job for her somewhere, part-time or something, that would bring her in a pound or two. There must be…there had to be.

  Chapter Two

  It was half-past nine exactly when Mary Prout put her pinched blue-ended nose round the door and enquired, ‘D’you want anything, Fan, I’m off to the store?’

  ‘Aye,’ said Fanny; ‘you could get me a bit of bacon.’

  ‘Back?’

  ‘Back, be damned!’ Fanny’s chin jerked. ‘Streaky. Four and odd a pound for back, and the streaky over three bob! Threepence ha’penny it was afore the war, and gammon a shilling. What’s things comin’ to?’ She moved towards the mantelpiece and added, ‘How’s your leg this mornin’? And come in, don’t stand there with the door open, there’s a draught.’

  ‘Me leg’s killing me, Fan.’ Mary came to the centre of the room, her eyes on Fanny as she took her purse from behind an old chipped vase. ‘If me job wasn’t sit-down I don’t know what I’d do. Anyway, I’m goin’ to the doctor the night.’

  ‘Aye. Well, it’s about time you had it seen to,’ said Fanny. Then turning abruptly and looking at the little shrivelled woman, she demanded, ‘Do you know anything about our Phil and that lass?’

  ‘What?’ Mary blinked her small, permanently startled eyes.

  ‘You heard me.’

  ‘Well, now, it’s funny you should ask, Fan, but I did hear something.’

  ‘Well, what is it?’ Fanny’s fingers sorted out the money in her purse and her eyes concentrated on the operation as though it were of prime importance.

  ‘Well, it wasn’t about Phil really,’ said Mary, ‘it was about her. You see, our John’s Monica came in last night ’cos John wanted to know how I was with me leg bein’ so bad, and he told her to call in the lav on her way from…’

  ‘Aye, aye; get on with it.’ Fanny tossed her head like some mettlesome horse, but still concentrated her attention on the purse.

  Mary did not immediately get on with it, but surveyed her neighbour of forty years for a moment before exclaiming, ‘You under the weather this mornin’, Fan?’

  ‘For God’s sake if not mine,’ said Fanny slowly, ‘forget about me health and tell me what you heard, will you!’
r />   ‘Aye. Well now, mind, Fan, I don’t know how far it’s true. Now mind, I don’t. It’s only hearsay, and I don’t want to take nobody’s character away, for you know what Father Owen said at second Mass last Sunday about if women kept their mouths shut outside their own homes divorce wouldn’t never have been heard of and…’

  Fanny closed her eyes and Mary stopped, then muttered, ‘Oh, all right, Fan. Well, it’s just that Monica said that Sylvia, that’s Phil’s lass, had to leave their office because if she hadn’t the boss’s wife would have skelped her. She came in one day…the wife, and there was a big to-do in the boss’s office. And she didn’t come back the next day, I mean Sylvia. And then she went to work at Binns.’

  ‘Was she thick with him?’

  ‘Now, Fan!’ Mary’s eyes blinked rapidly. ‘I don’t know. Only Monica said she always seemed to have plenty of money and she didn’t do a bat of work unless she felt inclined, and they all hated the sight of her. There now, I’ve gone and told you and I shouldn’t…’cos if Phil’s fond of her he’ll marry her. But it all came out, and I wasn’t asking for it. What started it was that when Monica was setting me back home last night she saw Phil coming in here, and she said what a fine set-up fellow he was, and you’d never think he came from this quarter, and why couldn’t you get a council house, and it was a pity he was being taken for a ride by the likes of—’