The Liverpool Trilogy (63 page)

The apple pie finally found its way to the oven. Having a gas cooker was one of the pleasures of life in this house, as was the garden, where autumn had arrived to colour trees red, gold and
brown. She could still feel his hands on her body. Daffodil and tulip bulbs needed planting, but the fortnightly gardener would see to all that. And her mouth felt bruised. A piece of ham had
produced the basis for pea and ham soup, one of Miss Morrison’s favourites. And the ham would do for sandwiches. She wanted no more babies, since four were enough for anyone, but she needed
comfort, closeness, fulfilment, excitement. That was selfish. If she gave in, she would be indulging a need that would be better ignored.

It wasn’t a case of if. It was when. Because she understood with blinding certainty that the mating ritual would continue, and that she would inevitably be worn down, as she wanted him as
badly as he wanted her. For the sake of her daughter, Eileen Watson would postpone the event for as long as possible. But it would happen. Wouldn’t it? Or might someone else fill the void in
her soul?

It was Saturday. Keith rounded up the three boys and stood them in a line at the bottom of the staircase. The youngest was in a fairly good mood, as he had a pony, but the
other two were bored. There was nothing to do. The rest of the evacuees were not yet here and, even when they did arrive, there would be miles and miles of wind-whipped fields between Willows and
the other farms. Home Farm was nearby, but the Dysons wouldn’t be taking anyone after all, as their spare bedrooms had been commandeered by Land Army girls.

‘There’s nothing to do,’ moaned Phil for the umpteenth time. ‘No shops, one pub, no trams. It’s like being dead.’

‘How do you know?’ Keith asked. ‘You’ve not been dead. Yet.’

‘Is that a threat?’ the oldest of Eileen’s boys asked.

‘Call it a promise.’ Keith folded his arms. ‘This is the deal. Saturdays, as long as everything here is up and running, I take you to town. You can go to the Lido or the Odeon
for a matinee while I shop and so forth. Any thieving, fighting or messing about, and I’ll drop you at the police station myself.’

Bertie declined with thanks. He’d been here only a day, and he was intending to move into the stables for a few hours. ‘Pedro has to know who I am. So I’ll sit with him and
read comics.’

‘Right.’ Keith studied the other two. Like the young one, they were good-looking, and they gave the impression that butter wouldn’t melt. But he had their measure, as Eileen
was very open when it came to describing her sons. What had she written?
They look like little angels, but the devil lives in their shoes.
‘One foot, one boot or shoe out of step,
lads, and it’ll be the junior prison.’

They glanced at each other. Neither had the slightest intention of tolerating any more of this. They followed Keith out to the car. Today, they would find out the lie of the land. During the
coming week, money would be acquired by fair means or foul. After that, Liverpool in all its glory would be waiting for them. They hadn’t said anything to their younger brother. When it came
to secrets, Bertie was as much use as a bucket with a large hole in its base.

‘So how do you like your new home?’ Keith asked as he drove down the lane.

‘All right,’ answered Rob.

‘Big,’ Philip added. Having been held prisoner for long enough in Rachel Street, he was not prepared to allow the situation to continue. He and Rob had mates at home, and someone
would take them in. War? Apart from a few soldiers and sailors passing through, there’d been no sign of it. It was almost as if some conspiracy were going on, a plan to keep the
Kennedy/Watson clan out of circulation for a year or two.

‘Bertie likes the pony.’ Keith began the descent into Bolton. ‘He’s as happy as a sand boy. Perhaps I should look for a couple of horses for you?’

Philip was ready for this offer. ‘We’d rather have bikes,’ he said. ‘Second-hand would do as long as they work.’ Forty miles wasn’t far. If he could get his
bearings for the East Lancashire Road, a new route designed and built to connect Liverpool and Manchester, he and Rob could be as good as home. ‘If we had bikes, we could visit the other
farms.’

Keith, as yet not fully aware of the dogged determination of his passengers, took what they had said as a positive sign. They were preparing to settle, and that was good enough for him.
‘Forget the picture house for today, then. Let’s go on a bike hunt, get a bit of dinner, then you can have a walk round while I do my own shopping.’

In the rear of the car, two intelligent and calculating boys smiled at each other. The plan was working like a dream.

‘Don’t cry, Mam.’ This was terrible. Until today, Eileen Watson hadn’t been able to remember some details of her husband’s death and the ensuing
funeral, but it had all flooded back while she prepared to leave the home she had shared with him. ‘Mam?’

‘Leave me a minute. Go and give Freda Pilkington your gran’s best frying pan and a couple of pillows. I promised. Go on now.’

Alone, Eileen sat halfway up the stairs. She remembered him singing ‘
and when they were only halfway up, they were neither up nor down
’ while taking his children to their
beds. He had been a good dad and a wonderful husband. His right hand was callused from the repeated use of his docker’s hook. A powerful man, he never hurt a fly.

In her mind, she opened the door. Three of them stood there, caps in hands, blood on their fingers. A trio of big, burly men stood and cried like babies while she sank to the floor, a very young
Bertie clutched to her chest. The men’s faces were clear at last, and she even recalled two of their names. After they left, she became a wooden doll. Time after time, her mother said,
‘You stayed where you were put, so we had to remember to shift you.’

His mates sat the final vigil. They drank beer and used the coffin top as a resting place for their glasses and bottles. That was the right thing to do, because they were including him.

He was a big man, and his coffin filled the front room. She touched the wood. The lid was nailed down, because he was so badly injured. Warm wood. She could feel it now. Inside the warmth, he
was probably cold. They walked behind him all the way to St Anthony’s, where he had been baptized and educated. His mother was hysterical. She died three weeks later.

The church was standing room only. Hundreds of people, and the dockers wept again. She’d always remembered that bit, but now she saw the hole. They put her Laz in a great, yawning hole.
Worms. Flowers. Philip, Rob and Mel crying, Bertie held in his grandmother’s arms. Eileen hated the sun for daring to show its face. Trams ran, birds sang, children played nearby. It should
all stop, but it didn’t. Dinners to make, ships to load and unload, bets to be placed in the ready hands of Nobby Costigan. She wanted to scream, but the priest was here, purple vestments,
black biretta, open prayer book.

‘Mam? Mam?’

Without. In the house, in the street, in her heart, she was without him. The space inside her body and soul felt bigger than the grave in which her beloved man had been placed. ‘Hello,
love. Did you give Freda the pan?’

‘Yes.’

‘And the pillows?’

‘And the pillows.’

Only now did Eileen realize that she was weeping.

‘Have you remembered all of it, Mam?’

‘I think so. This is where we lived, Mel. This is where I had my babies and where I was when he died.’

‘You’ve let go,’ Mel said. ‘To let go, you had to remember all of it, not just the church bit. My dad was a lovely man, and you hid yourself away for safety’s sake
so that you could carry on looking after us. I suppose it was quite sensible in its way.’

‘There’s nothing sensible about making myself go a bit mad. Now, on your bike and go to Miss Morrison’s. I’ll give the keys in, and see you later.’

‘Are you fit to be left?’

Eileen laughed. ‘It’s not me that’s unfit; the real daftness is next door. I have to go and do three rounds with Kitty, because Mam and Keith are coming for her on Monday or
Tuesday. I don’t know whether she’s fed the kids. They were as black as sweeps the last time I saw them, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they got taken away from her. I mean,
we’ve loads of poor people round here, but she’s in a class of her own when it comes to filth. I bet she’s sold all the funeral clothes. There’s nothing for her here,
nothing for any of us. But will she listen?’

‘No,’ they both chorused.

Mel kissed her mother, wheeled her bike into the street, and left her old life behind. With her usual positive attitude, she looked forward, never back. School would be nearer, Mam was going to
be safe, while the rest of her family lived beyond the reach of danger.

Eileen pulled herself together. It was time to go. Without another glance at her home, she walked out, locked the door on her past and put both keys in her bag. This was going to be the hardest
bit, because Kitty’s decline had worsened since yesterday, when Mam had left for Bolton. Neighbours had been alerted so that the three young ones might be captured, fed, watered and cleaned,
but Kitty was the biggest worry. If her mind had gone, Willows Edge would never cope, since they weren’t used to her dirty ways and knew nothing of her history. There was also the probability
that, in unfamiliar territory, the woman would panic even more.

But there was no one in the house. The smell was unbelievably bad, and the movements of rodents could be heard even now, in daylight. ‘God help us,’ Eileen whispered. ‘But most
of all, help poor Kitty.’

‘Are you sure you want me to drop you off here? You might need help with her if she digs her heels in.’ Keith stared at the front of a house whose windows had
probably not been cleaned since the end of the Great War. The whole street was dark and dingy, but number four was spectacularly scruffy.

Nellie pondered for a few seconds. She studied the place in which she had lived and, after just three days away, found herself wondering how and why the slums were allowed to exist.
‘Right, put it this way, Keith. Most round here have become immune to her house and the state of it. For you, it’d be a shock, and you might catch something. Go and visit our Eileen,
because you didn’t give her a definite time to expect you, and I’ll see you back here about three. The neighbours’ll help me round the kids up.’ Nellie paused again.
‘Go and see her, lad. She’ll be as pleased as Punch when you get there.’

‘Thanks.’

She touched his hand for a brief moment. ‘Good luck, love. She likes you. Only she’s been a bit distracted just lately what with one thing and another.’

Keith decided to dive in at the deep end. ‘By a Dr Tom?’

Nellie’s jaw dropped before she had the chance to control it. ‘How do you know about him?’ That bloody doctor got everywhere, or so it seemed. ‘He’s married with
twins, and his wife deserves a bloody sight better than him by all accounts.’

He shrugged. ‘When she writes, I read the words she’s left out. Anyway, as you say, he’s married and I’m not.’ He sighed. ‘I know I’ve seen Eileen just
once, and for a matter of minutes, but it was the same with Annie, and there’s been no one in between. I’m one of those blokes – it either happens, or it doesn’t. Usually,
it doesn’t. I can tell from her letters she’s more than a pretty woman. So I fell headlong.’

She nodded sagely. ‘Yes. With my Eileen, it happened, whatever
it
turns out to be.’ She wasn’t surprised. Apart from her beauty, Eileen had a lovely nature when she
wasn’t riled, and that nature shone in her eyes. ‘Are you sure?’

He chuckled. ‘Aye, and for the first time in over twenty years.’

‘Go and get her, then. I’ve three mucky kids and a crazy mother to find, God and the angels help me.’ She puffed out her cheeks and blew. ‘Oh, I don’t know whether
I’m doing right. She’s not all there in her head no more, and Willows Edge might want rid. She doesn’t clean, doesn’t control her kids, can’t be bothered with
anything. The last time she got excited was when she bought her new teeth. I mean, Charlie had been dead a week, and she was more bothered about her gob than she was about him and the
funeral.’

‘Are you sure you don’t need me?’

‘When you get back to pick us up, I might find a use for you. Three o’clock, then.’ She laughed. ‘If you’re a few minutes late, I’ll understand. Love
can’t be hurried.’

‘Stop mocking me, Nellie Kennedy.’

As she stepped out of the car, she blew a perfect, if rather loud, raspberry.

Keith left Nellie and drove off. He stopped at a barber’s on Scotland Road, had a second shave and a haircut, found a couple of little shops, bought a potted plant for Eileen and a little
string of beads for Mel. He was a mere five or six miles from Crosby, but it would be a long drive, because he wanted to be with her
now
.

He travelled a route that ran parallel with the dock road, realizing how close Eileen’s ex-home was to ships and warehouses. Crosby, while further along the coast, was still next to the
Mersey. She could be hit. But she would not leave Mel, and refused absolutely to interfere with the girl’s chances of a superior education. Had he been father to a similarly gifted child, he
would probably have acted in the same way.

When he found St Michael’s Road, he was pleased to see that it was a good half-mile from the river, though that was no distance at all to an off-course plane with a load to drop before
flying home on a teaspoon of fuel. But he had to be positive. She had made her decision, and she would stick to it. These were lovely houses, the sort that lay within reach of doctors, lawyers and
business folk with old money and decent incomes. They hadn’t the potential grandeur of Willows, but they sat well beyond the pay packet of an ordinary working man.

He parked, stepped out of the car, then reached in for plant, beads and a brown paper parcel from the back seat. Eileen wouldn’t be offended, would she? She was too down to earth to take
umbrage over a few small gifts. As instructed, he walked round to the back of the house and tapped on the kitchen door. Miss Morrison was ill, was downstairs, and she should not be disturbed by the
front door bell.