Authors: Jenny Telfer Chaplin
Nellie’s words sank into Meg’s already sore, troubled
brain. For the rest of that memorable day and far into the night, as Meg tossed
on a sleepless pillow, the words kept on hammering their relentless message at
her.
Early next morning Meg barely had time to sip at the
cup of hot, sweet tea Nellie handed her before Nellie said: “Well? Reached any
decisions yet? At least ye’ve had time to sleep on it …”
“Sleep on it! Sleep on it did you say, Nellie? With all
this on my mind?”
Nellie waved her sister’s words aside with a dismissive
gesture. “Hmph! Ye’ve probably had a hell of a lot more sleep that me. Ah wis
up and doon the hale night attendin tae that mewlin brat o yers.”
Meg bridled. “Her name is Becky, if you don’t mind, not
mewling brat.”
“Listen, hen, Ah don’t give a damn whit her bloody name
is, but whit Ah dae care aboot is this … ma man Rab could come roisterin back
frae the high seas ony day noo. Ye’ll hae tae be weel clear o ma hoose before
then. Surely ye can understaun that?”
Meg sighed. “I know, I know, so you don’t need to keep
harping on about it. As to my own instincts … I’d love to stay on here with wee
Becky, but I know I can’t. It’s impossible.”
“Impossible is right. At least that’s somethin we can
baith agree on. Too bloody right it’s impossible. Right, noo we’ve settled
that, what exactly is it that ye’re plannin tae dae for tae keep yer ain body
and soul together? No tae mention haein the means tae go slippin me the odd
half-croon backhander for looking efter yer wee b… er for feedin and clothin
yer wee Becky.”
Silence greeted this and Nellie went on: “Ye’ll need
tae get a job o some kind and the good God above alone kens whit that will be.
For there’s one thing for certain sure, ye’ve certainly buggered up yer chance
o iver reachin the giddy heights of social superiority o being a schoolma’am.”
“Nellie, would you please, please stop going on about
my lost chances? If anyone on this planet earth is aware of what a horrendous
mess I’ve made of my life it is me. When I think of how easily men can wriggle
out of their paternal responsibilities I could weep from now till Kingdom
Come.”
“Aye, ye were right stupid aboot that scunnersome lout
that left you to fend for yersel with a bun in yer oven. Ah’ve been lucky wi ma
Rab. He works his fingers tae the bone slavin away on the high seas on that
boat jist tae feed and clothe oor squad o weans. Never a cross word passes his
lips even if every time he gets back Ah’ve got another new bairn waitin for tae
greet its faither. Aye, one mair mouth tae feed disnae bother him, and ye can
thank yer lucky stars for it, otherwise Ah’d no hae been able for tae take wee
Becky aff your hands. Aye, a man among men, that’s ma guid man Rab.”
Meg pressed her lips together for the sake of peace as
she thought of her picture of Rab – a drunken, womanising, controlling man; the
seafarer home from the sea with money in his pocket and ‘rarin to go’ on his
usual jaunts to the many houffs and pubs of the City of Glasgow.
After a short silence Nellie shook herself. “There’s
ower much tae dae this morn for tae stand here bletherin. Whit in God’s name
kinda job dae ye hope tae get?”
Meg frowned and chewed her lip then quite suddenly her face
cleared.
“I think I may just have stumbled on an answer.”
Nellie stared at her sister, a look of disbelief on her
face. “Ye really think that woman would gie ye a job? Why on earth would she?
Let’s face it hen ye’ve nae experience nor qualifications for tae work in a
haberdashery, or any other dashery for that matter.”
Meg gave a rueful smile. “If we’re being totally honest
I’m not qualified for anything at all now, am I? But the thing is, Miss Martin,
the elderly lady who owns it, she and I struck up quite a rapport when I used
to buy some oddments in her shop while I was at the college in Dundas Vale.”
Nellie rolled her eyes to heaven. “Listen, hen, Ah
don’t care what it was that ye struck up the auld biddy, but Ah still don’t see
why in God’s name she would gie ye a job. She’s no yer fairy godmother nor
naethin is she?”
Meg waved aside her sister’s words. “I became quite
friendly with Miss Martin. I think she just needed someone to talk to. She used
to tell me about her old mother and –”
Nellie snorted. “Fascinatin stuff!”
Ignoring her sister’s sarcasm, Meg went on: “Anyway be
that as it may, the point is she once said, since I had a lovely speaking voice
and compassionate manner, if ever I found teaching a class of unruly children
was not to my liking she would be more than happy to give me a job. So there
you have it! I’ve made up my mind. I’ll go and see her.”
“Right, Meg. For the love o God dae it sooner rather
than later afore the auld biddy changes her mind. Eh no?”
***
Miss Petronella Martin was absolutely delighted with
her new assistant. Not only did the desperate-for-paid-work Meg Spence treat
her employer with the respect and deference due to an astute business woman of
the social calibre of Petronella Martin, Meg with her careful vowels, absence
of the Glasgow glottal stop, neat appearance, and pleasant manner also charmed
the customers which was excellent for repeat trade.
However, there was one thing on which they could not
see eye to eye and this morning Miss Martin in a quiet spell between customers
launched yet again on her favourite topic.
“I’m only saying it for you own good, my dear Meg. It
just isn’t natural, or even healthy, for a lovely young woman like you, with
all the proper social graces, to spend all of her free time cooped up in that
one room in your boarding house. You really do need to get out more. Go places,
do things, meet people of your own age and social position. Perhaps even be
introduced to some eligible young bachelors of good social and financial standing.
Do face the facts, my dear Meg; you surely don’t want to end up like me, a
spinster of the Parish, with neither husband nor child to call my own.”
If Miss Martin ever met Nellie and her coarse speech
and manners what on earth would she think? Oh My Lord, if she ever found out
about Becky I’d be out of a job quicker than a flash. And as for meeting
eligible young bachelors … well … my one adventure was, as it turned out,
neither eligible nor a bachelor. I don’t think I’m ready to try that again for
now.
“Are you all right, my dear?” Miss Martin peered at
Meg, inches from her face, and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“Oh, yes, sorry, Miss Martin. I was miles away. But
yes, I did hear what you were saying. You think I should get out more – escape
from time to time from the confines of my poky little room.”
Miss Martin sat back and nodded. “So you were listening
after all. Well now, about that room in your boarding house … I’ve been meaning
to talk to you about that. Recently I’ve been giving a lot of thought to your
living conditions. A room in a boarding house with who knows what unsavoury
characters to be met at the common meal table is not really suitable. Here is
what I’ve come up with … just an idea, of course … but one which I think could
well be of interest to you and advantageous both financially and socially. So
let’s have our morning tea and I’ll explain matters to you in detail.”
***
It had been a long, tiring, and indeed rather stressful
day at the haberdashery … and not least on account of Miss Martin’s detailed
outlining of her so-called master plan to have Meg leave her ‘socially
unsuitable’ accommodation and take a room at Miss Martin’s home.
On Meg’s way back to her lodgings her employer’s words
were still ringing through her head as she mentally considered the advantages
and, yes, the very real possible disadvantages of such a move, involving, as it
would, helping with the care of Miss Martin’s elderly mother. The more she
thought about it the more Meg was inclined to accept the kind offer even with
the strings attached.
Yes, Meg thought. In many ways it would suit me very
well. But there’s no need to make up my mind for a while yet. After all, once I
commit myself to such a scheme that’s me locked in.
As Meg quickened her steps along the darkening city
streets she thought: Strange that remark Miss Martin made about my meeting up
with unsavoury characters at the lodging house.
The elderly spinster was more accurate than she might
have guessed. It wasn’t only at the communal dining-table there was danger from
unwelcome advances. It would not be the first time that Meg had been harassed
and ogled by another tenant in an upper hallway. Even in the street on her way
from work she had been accosted by men appearing from otherwise deserted
alleyways.
In allowing her thoughts to dwell on this troublesome
aspect of her daily life, Meg felt she was in danger of losing the meagre
self-confidence she had managed to dredge up after the debacle of her fall from
grace and the horrendous trauma of having given birth to an illegitimate child.
Perhaps what her sister Nellie had said, in her usual less than ladylike
language, that as a ‘fallen woman’ she was indeed sending out the wrong signals
to, “randy, gaspin for it, dirty auld men.”
Meg was unsure what these real or imagined signals
could be. However, being a lone, unaccompanied, obviously unattached, yet
fairly presentable young woman living in a lodging house that was perhaps
giving out an unintentional come hither look. Of course, those were the wrong
signals the never ending stream of commercial travellers and other such casuals
who passed through the rooming-house thought she was sending.
That night at the evening meal while firmly ignoring
the lustful stares of her known tormentors Meg instead listened politely to the
conversation of the new arrival across the table from her.
He proved to be a most interesting dinner companion
with tales of his travels and amusing anecdotes. Alone at the table when the
others had left, he bashfully and with boyish naivety confessed: “I’m a lay
preacher. I don’t generally let this fact be known to casual acquaintances. I
suppose I fear that because I’ve found God it makes me, in some people’s eyes,
a sort of latter day goody-goody mama’s boy.”
Meg and her new-found friend laughed at this and Meg,
feeling herself to be on safe grounds with this sound, upright citizen,
light-heartedly said: “Don’t worry, Mr Lay Preacher, sir, you’re dastardly
secret is safe with me.”
On that happy note Meg headed upstairs to soak her
feet, aching after a long day standing in the shop, then to unpin and brush out
her hair. Finally she sought the comfort of her single bed in the cell-like
freezing room she now called home.
Almost asleep, something brought her fully awake and she
sat up in bed to peer round the room in the faint light afforded by the
street’s flickering gas lamp outside her window. There it was again. A sound
she couldn’t quite place.
A mouse? Oh Lord, don’t let it be a mouse.
Meg pulled the patchwork cover tight around her and
over her head and lying down again tried to get back to sleep. The sound came
again, but this time Meg, now fully awake, identified it. No mouse was big
enough or clever enough to be trying to turn the key in her bedroom door. While
she considered herself a coward, a shivering wreck of a woman when faced with a
mouse she would be damned if any lustful man would ever again ruin her life.
Meg, as she rose, was just in time to see a sheet of paper being slid through
the wide gap under her door.
This is no secret love letter, she thought. Any minute
now my bedroom door key is going to be pushed from the lock to fall onto that
paper and be slid back under the door into the grasping hand of whoever is
there.
She took hold of the key and quietly removed it from
the lock. That done, she looked round the room for anything of sufficient
weight with which to barricade her door. The rickety old chair certainly
wouldn’t fit the bill nor would the wobbly cane bedside table. If she could
possibly drag over the solid oak chest of drawers, however, that would do the
trick. Using every ounce of her strength she dragged the piece of furniture
towards the door. Before the chest was finally in place, with her bare foot she
pushed the offending piece of paper under the door and back to its owner. With
one last surge of energy the chest with a final thump was firmly in place. That
achieved, a stream of the most vile, foul language was directed at Meg from the
unseen, would-be lecher.
Even with the security of the physical barrier Meg’s
mental torture of what might have happened went on well into the early hours of
the morning. To add to her distress her tormentor was apparently in the room
next to hers with his bed seemingly on the other side of the paper-thin wall between
them. Throughout the rest of Meg’s terror-filled night he banged, knocked, and
scratched on the dividing wall to the accompaniment of drunken shouts about: “…
the f***ing whore who led a poor fellow on with her bedroom eyes … then got
cold feet when a fellow followed up on her invitation.”
When Meg came down for breakfast next morning it was
all she could do not to gag at the very thought of eating the porridge Mrs
Farley set before her. However, feeling somehow ashamed and dirty as if the
night’s escapade had indeed been an unlooked for and certainly unwelcome result
of her ‘bedroom eyes’, Meg was determined to act as normally as possible and
not let pass even a hint of what had happened. When Mrs Farley brought in the
sparsely filled rack of toast Meg noticed that for once she seemed to be dining
alone.
Almost as if she had caught Meg’s unspoken thought Mrs
Farley leaned forward and said: “It’s a pity you weren’t down quicker. You’ve
just missed that handsome new lodger of ours. You both seemed to be getting
along so well at supper last night … quite taken with you he was.”
Meg’s head jerked up from her contemplation of the
toast and the two small regulation curly knobs of butter.
“Oh, now don’t you go imagining romance where none
existed, Mrs Farley. I was merely being polite and sociable that was all. He’s
a lay preacher no less.”
Mrs Farley nodded absently. “Well, that’s as may be.
Anyway, ships that pass in the night. To tell you the truth, dear, I very
nearly missed him myself. You know how deaf I am. He had one foot out the door
when I came through. He said he hadn’t wanted to disturb me at such an early
hour especially since he wasn’t hungry and didn’t want anything to eat.
Something about a business meeting at the Trongate. All a bit of a rush and he
wouldn’t after all be spending another night with us. He’s going to collect his
little attaché case later today and would pay me then for both nights anyway.
Isn’t that really generous of him? Such a nice man, don’t you think?”
Meg gave a noncommittal ghost of a smile and thought:
Unless I’m very much mistaken, Mrs Farley, we have both seen the last of that
handsome new lodger, lay preacher or not.
On her way to work half an hour later Meg mused that
the ‘ship that had passed in the night’ while cheating the besotted, stone-deaf
Mrs Farley out of her money had at least done some good. His fumbled efforts at
intended rape had decided Meg on her plan of actions. She would accept
Petronella Martin’s offer to move into her Great Western Road home and help out
with Miss Martin’s elderly mother.
Yes, indeed. What could be better? Yes, something good
had certainly come out of something bad.
***