A Daughter's Duty (6 page)

‘Well, you could go out tonight. There’s nothing to stop you. I feel better tonight so it’s a good chance for you.’

‘But what about the twins?’ Rose was torn. By, it would be lovely to get out, but no, it wasn’t possible. She couldn’t leave her mam for all those hours, she couldn’t. ‘No, Mam, I’ll not go.’

Sarah sighed. To be honest she didn’t know how she would manage with Mary and Michael, and even if Alf came back, which was unlikely before midnight, he was no sort of help. ‘I’m sorry, Rose, I really am. I’m a right burden to you.’ Sarah’s lower lip trembled as she said it.

‘Look, Mam, if you’re sure you’re all right for an hour, I’ll just go for a walk. That’s all I need, some fresh air,’ said Rose. ‘I’ll go to the library, it’s still open. I’ll get a nice romance and read it to you. And later on we can listen to Saturday Night Theatre on the wireless. That’ll be grand, won’t it?’

Sarah nodded, though she turned her face to the wall to hide her tears. She was dying, she knew it and didn’t care for herself. But what was going to become of her bairns she didn’t know. Not just the little ones but Rose, her beautiful daughter. Oh, God, was it really as she suspected? Was Alf interfering with her? Oh, no, surely not? It was just her own nasty mind, that was all it was, her illness, this terrible thing growing in her neck, this parasite sucking away her life’s blood. It was just that which was making her imagine things. Dear Lord in Heaven, it must be.

As Marina turned into the main road she saw Jeff and Brian already waiting for the United bus which went to Spennymoor and the rink. Brian’s face lit up; he was so obviously pleased to see her it went some way to easing her feelings, bruised from Charlie’s neglect. But Brian said nothing, simply nodding his head to her, and it was Jeff who spoke.

‘Now then, Marina. By, you put Lana Turner in the shade, you do. Did anyone tell you you could have been a film star? Your hair looks a treat done up like that.’ As it was a black dark evening and the only light was from a dim old gas lamp which was on the opposite side of the road, and since she had the shawl collar of her coat up around her head, Marina just grinned.

A few more people joined the queue. They stood silently waiting, hands stuffed into pockets, chins tucked down in their coats. It was bitterly cold, frost forming on the road. Only the irrepressible Jeff larked about, repeating jokes from the wireless, laughing his rich belly laugh until some of the queue relaxed too and laughed with him.

‘… an’ so Bobby Thompson said he knocked on the door of Buckingham Palace and Mrs Queen opened the door and she said, “Why, it’s little Bobby. How are you, Bobby?”. An’ I said, “Nicely thanks, Lizzie, is your Geordie in? Only I was in London to see Montgomery and I thought I’d call”.’

‘“He’s round the back building a pigeon cree, Bobby. Just go round, he’ll be that pleased to see you –”’

Jeff broke off suddenly as he caught sight of Rose over the road by the light of the street lamp and forgot all about the joke as he gazed over at her.

‘Rose?’ Marina called. ‘Rose? Is that you?’

Rose, who carried a basket over her arm with a library book in it and a newspaper-wrapped parcel redolent of fish and chips, paused and looked over to the bus stop. ‘Oh, hallo, Marina. Hi, Jeff. Brian,’ she said and nodded to the boys. She felt as though they were from a different world, a younger world somehow.

Marina glanced at Jeff, who for a change seemed lost for words. He was sweet on Rose, why hadn’t she realised it before? ‘Come on over a minute,’ she said. ‘We’re just going to the dance at the rink only the bus is late as usual.’

‘Well, I have the supper in the basket,’ Rose answered hesitantly.

‘Come on, a few minutes won’t make much difference to it. Anyway, you can shove it in the oven for a minute or two,’ Marina encouraged her. Seeing Rose had brought back the good times they used to have together. She didn’t know what had gone wrong and wanted to build bridges. She felt a small surge of triumph when her friend crossed the road.

‘You should have been coming with us, man,’ Marina said. ‘It’s Saturday night after all.’

‘Aye,’ said Jeff, recovering somewhat and assuming an American accent. ‘You and me could cut a rug, baby. We’d show them all how to jive.’

‘I can’t, Mam’s poorly, I can’t leave her for long,’ Rose answered. She gazed at him and even in the darkness looked forlorn, but only for a moment. Then she threw up her head and grinned, determined to be cheerful. ‘Anyroad, if we were going to jive I’d have to teach you first!’

‘Why you –’ Jeff advanced on her and took hold of her arm, lifting his fist in mock threat. She leaned back.

‘Mind, man, I’ll drop the supper!’ she warned. The bus, ten minutes late by now, was coming at last, and the headlights picked out the four of them, laughing and jostling each other, set apart from the queue as it surged forward to meet the bus.

‘Rose! What the hell are you doing? Get yourself over here this minute unless you want a belt on the ear!’

Jeff dropped his hand and all four of them turned to see Alf Sharpe standing on the corner, under the light. They could tell he was raging mad. Rose seemed frozen into immobility for a long second, the grin still on her face. Then, ‘I have to go,’ she muttered and walked across the road to her father, head down, chin buried in her collar.

‘If I catch you with your hands on my lass again, I’ll swing for you!’ shouted Alf as he grabbed her arm and pulled her behind him. Rose, aflame with embarrassment, realised he was just drunk enough not to care who heard him and felt like sinking into the ground with mortification as her friends, forgetting the bus now, stared at her and her father in consternation and the rest of the queue muttered to each other.

‘We weren’t doing anything!’ Jeff burst out. ‘Leave her alone!’

‘No, you randy beggar,
you
leave her alone!’ shouted Alf.

‘Come on, Jeff,’ said Brian, catching hold of his arm as though he feared his friend was going to start across the road to confront Alf Sharpe. ‘Come away, he won’t touch her. The bus’ll go, man. Look, let’s just go.’

Jeff allowed himself to be drawn on to the bus at the tail end of the queue, his face red, while Alf stood there under the street light and simply glared at him the whole time.

‘Come on, Dad,’ Rose said, ‘the fish’ll be cold for me mam’s supper.’ But he kept on standing there and all the passengers watched them as the bus pulled away from the stop and set off along the main road, springs groaning and with a loud grating of gears. Jeff and Brian had turned round in their seats; Brian was saying something to his friend who looked suddenly like a young schoolboy whipped for something he didn’t do. Rose looked away. She couldn’t bear his humiliation, let alone her own.

‘You never thought about that when you were carrying on with that lad, did you?’ her father was saying.

‘Oh, Dad, I wasn’t carrying on, I was just talking to Marina and the boys. They were at school with us, that’s all.’

‘Oh, aye. I know who they are, them two, they work at the pit. Useless an’ all, the lot of them. I have to watch them young lads like a hawk. Do you know, I caught one of them taking a cigarette and a couple of matches in the other week? And do you think I don’t hear them, with their filthy talk and jokes about the lasses? Why, if you heard them you wouldn’t speak to them again, I’m telling you. No, howay. How you could have left your mam on her own, I don’t know.’ He grabbed hold of her arm again and hustled her up the street, his grip biting into her soft flesh.

‘You’re hurting me, Dad! Leave me be, I’m coming,’ she protested, though what she really wanted to do was shout, ‘What do you care about Mam?’

‘Aye, an’ I’ll hurt you a lot more if you shame the family with one of those lads,’ he replied, nodding his head grimly as he pushed her up the yard and flung her into the kitchen.

‘Is that you, Rose?’ called her mother and Rose, regaining her balance, realised that her father had not come in himself but was stumping off down the yard again. She put the basket down on the kitchen table.

‘It’s me, Mam,’ she answered and unwrapped the fish and chips, putting them on a plate and into the oven to heat up a little while she pushed the kettle on to boil and spooned tea into the pot, all the while fighting back tears of anger and humiliation.

‘Did I hear your dad?’

‘No, Mam, he’s not here,’ Rose replied, and only then did she rub her arm, wincing as she felt the extent of the bruise.

‘Have you brought us chips, our Rose?’ Michael and Mary rushed out of the room where they had been playing on the mat beside Sarah’s bed.

‘Aw, I thought you would both be full up with birthday cake,’ said Rose. Their faces fell. ‘I’m only kidding, of course I brought you some chips. Now come on, you’ll get them when you’re both washed and in your pyjamas, ready for bed.’

‘Just a cup of tea for me, Rose,’ Sarah called, and Rose put her head round the door. Her mother lay back on the pillow, face white and exhausted, eyes red-rimmed.

‘Will I make you a cup of hot cocoa instead of the tea?’ Rose coaxed.

‘Anything you like, pet.’ Sarah closed her eyes as though the short conversation had been too much for her. She felt so deathly tired.

‘He’s a right blooming tyrant!’ Jeff was saying. It was half-time at the rink and he was sitting with Brian and Marina at the coffee bar which was tacked on to the end of the dance floor.

‘Forget about Alf Sharpe, Jeff,’ Brian advised. ‘Don’t let him spoil the night for you, man.’

‘But you know what he’s like at work! We can do nowt right for him. He’s just not normal …’

‘He’s all right with the others, they reckon he’s fair.’ Brian looked at Marina, who was sitting nursing her coffee cup pensively. Tonight wasn’t turning out as he’d thought it would. Instead of showing her a good time she was having to listen to Jeff’s troubles. Still the band was going back on to the stage. The saxophonist tootled experimentally and nodded to the others and they broke out into the ‘Twelfth Street Rag’.

‘You dancing?’ Brian stood up as Marina nodded and he held out his hand to her. They threaded their way on to the floor. He glanced back at Jeff guiltily. ‘Come on, there’s plenty lasses dying to dance this one!’

His friend nodded moodily and Brian shook his head in exasperation, but the music was compelling and he whirled Marina round in a quickstep, making his way to the centre of the floor where a few other couples were starting to dance. Marina marvelled at how different he was on the dance floor. So much more confident.

‘I can’t do this,’ she objected, though she was following him.

‘Aye, you can,’ he encouraged her, ‘anybody can. Just let yourself go with the music, I’ll guide you.’

They danced until they were out of breath. He was a natural, sure of his every move, different from the Brian she thought she knew and not in the least bit gauche. The music changed to a progressive barn dance and they stood in a big circle, going from partner to partner. She caught a glimpse of Brian holding a girl firmly in his arms and she was laughing up at him, saying something or other. He was popular with the girls, she realised, as a dancer at any rate.

‘Now then, Marina, you glad you came?’ It was Jeff bearing down on her, lifting her off her feet as he swung her round, smiling brilliantly, his depression seemingly forgotten.

‘Put me down, you daft ha’porth,’ she cried, and he laughed and was off to the next girl in line. Well, at least he seemed to have forgotten his troubles for the minute, she thought, hearing him laugh at something the girl said. But she couldn’t forget the scene with Rose and her father and couldn’t understand it either. It had really disturbed her. Maybe tomorrow she would call on Rose. Never mind what her friend’s father said, he couldn’t stop Rose being friendly with a girl, could he? Marina had a pang of doubt. Rose was so nervous of him, perhaps he could. Well, she’d see.

The next day there was a fall of snow and everyone began to talk about a white Christmas. Marina beat up Yorkshire pudding to go with the beef ration which was roasting slowly in the oven, a nice piece of brisket because you got more for your rations when you took a cheaper cut. And then she peeled the potatoes and mixed mustard and did all the other fiddling little jobs which went towards making a Sunday roast dinner.

‘I’m just going to pop along to see Rose,’ she said to her mother when everything was ready.

‘Oh? I thought you two had fallen out,’ Kate commented. For a minute it looked as though she was going to say something else, looking troubled, but all she did say was, ‘Go on then. Mind, be back for two o’clock. You know the men will be home from the Club by then, wanting their dinners.’

Marina pulled on her coat, for there was a sharp nip in the air, and slipped along the ends of the rows to her friend’s home. The house looked deserted somehow, the bedroom curtains above the yard drawn and the kitchen ones open only enough to admit the minimum of winter sunshine. Marina paused, uncertain, but then she lifted a hand and knocked at the back door. After a minute or two it was opened by Michael, who stood half behind the door looking up at her.

‘Is Rose in?’ she asked and he nodded.

‘Who is it, Michael?’ Rose’s voice came from somewhere inside the house.

‘Marina Morland,’ he called, without taking his eyes away from Marina or opening the door any further.

‘Well, can I come in –’ she was saying when Rose came to the door.

‘For goodness’ sake, Michael, let her in,’ she said and opened the door wide. Marina, whose imagination had been running riot since the scene at the bus stop the evening before, gazed anxiously at Rose for any signs that her dad had used her badly but there was no bruising, no black eye.

‘Hi, Rose,’ she said, and then, feeling that she needed to explain why she had come round, for after all relations had been somewhat cooler between them lately, ‘I just thought I’d pop in to see you, see how your mother is an’ all.’

‘Michael, go on in the room, stay with Mam,’ Rose said. ‘And be quiet, I don’t want her wakened.’ The little boy trotted off obediently, though looking back at Marina as he did so, as if anyone being there was a novelty. Mary had come to the middle door and was standing silently, her thumb in her mouth.