In a Class of Their Own (18 page)

“Mammy,” exclaimed Sam, “you’re no gonnae believe this, but Jack Henderson, the guy that runs Restalrig Juniors, thinks the Hearts are really interested in me.” He stood back and gave a lofty kick at an imaginary ball.

“I know,” said Rachel. “He’s been here.”

“Did he tell ye hoo I’m the guy with the golden feet that’s gonnae go to Tynecastle?”

“He did. And I told him to think again – because you’re bloody well not.”

Sam stopped showing off his footballing prowess. “You what?” he exploded. “But it’s what me and my pals are aw dreamin’ o and I’m the only yin that’s made it.”

“Look here, Sam,” his mother said, poking vigorously at the fire. “It’s all for the best. I’m only trying to make sure you don’t get hurt. It’s to protect you.”

“You think ye want to protect me?” Sam howled, making Rachel wince. “Oh, naw ye dinnae! Ye only want Hannah to succeed. Ye dinnae want
me
to be a success cos ye dinnae like men.” Sam now screamed directly into his mother’s face. “I ken that. An’ that’s nae aw. Ye didnae really like my Daddy and that’s why ye flung him oot.”

Rachel shook her head in despair. “Sam Campbell, how can you say that? I didn’t put him out. He left of his own accord.”

Sam’s only response was to laugh derisively – which had Rachel realising that she might well lose control of the situation. She retaliated by brandishing the poker at Sam.

“And never once since the day he left has he ever tried to put his foot back in that door. It was me – all alone – that went out to work – and work bloody hard I did – to clothe you and feed you.”

Sam guffawed sardonically. “Ye feed me? That’ll be the day. It’s me that’s broke my back to feed the hale crowd of ye.”

Rachel knew that what Sam said was absolutely true. Sam was a true Leith keelie – a boy who lived by his wits, a laddie she could always depend on to make a bob or two and keep them all fed. Sam’s eyes were roving round the room until his gaze settled on Hannah. “Here, whit are ye daein’ wi’ my wee dug?”

“Sam,” Carrie intervened. “Tiny’s ill. Awfae ill.”

Hannah shook her head. “She’s more than ill now. Look.”

Sam took Tiny into his arms and sat down on the settee with her – silently stroking her silky coat in an effort to ease her rasping breath. She responded by putting out her small pink tongue and licking his fingers. Then her little tail gave one last wag, a final salute to her master and friend. Then they all understood that the tiny dog had loved Sam just as much as he loved her. They loved one another for what they were. Each had a need that the other fulfilled. The whole family stood and stared in a hushed silence at Sam and Tiny, aware that Tiny had somehow held on for Sam to reach home before she exhaled her last breath. Carrie went over and sat down next to Sam. “We’ll bury her in the garden, Sam,” she said. “In my special flower plot. Tiny loved the garden and if you really try hard you’ll always be able to see her running there – playing, jumping, barking.”

Sam didn’t speak. His whole body shook with sobs as he constantly stroked Tiny’s lifeless form. Carrie lifted her hand to pat Sam’s bent head, while Alice came over and sat down on her knee and Paul hung himself around her neck. Time ticked away very slowly until eventually Sam muttered, “I loved her. I really loved her, Carrie. Oh aye, from the tip of her tiny nose to the end of her tiny tail. Really I did.”

Carrie’s tears splashed on to Sam’s hand as she cuddled him.

Rachel looked long and hard at the four children on the settee before silently turning towards the scullery. Hannah shivered uneasily. There were times, like tonight, when she felt that she was the outsider. She was Mummy’s girl. The other four were a band apart and all she could do was follow Rachel into the scullery. “Don’t cry, Mam,” she pleaded as she went over to Rachel, who sat twisting her hands in her lap. “Sam didn’t mean it.”

“Maybe not – but he’s right,” her mother remarked, lifting a towel to dry her eyes. “Oh, Hannah, however did this all happen? Why did it all go so wrong?”

“What d’you mean, Mam?”

“Just that all of you are so completely different from other folk’s bairns. There’s you for a start, aiming to be a missionary in Africa. There’s Carrie wanting to tap-dance her way to Hollywood. There’s Sam wanting to make his living kicking a ball around Tynecastle.”

Rachel hesitated. “And I’m just terrified of finding out what Paul and Alice will want to do. Sure as hell it won’t be packing biscuits in Crawfords or bottling whisky at VAT 69 – that’s for sure.”

“But, Mam,” said Hannah so softly that it shook Rachel, “we’re only doing what you told us we must do. To think for ourselves. To aim for the skies.”

Rachel closed her eyes. Hannah was telling her what she already knew – that she’d brought her children up to think for themselves and have ambition. Now they were doing precisely that, she felt threatened. And they could be heading out of control – or at the very least out
of her
control.

The pawnshop that Rachel mostly patronised was situated in the Kirkgate. You would slink in by the entrance door with a carefully secreted brown paper parcel containing anything – blankets, curtains, candlesticks, clocks, coats, your man’s dress suit – in fact, whatever wasn’t perishable; and if the pawnbroker thought there was any value in your worldly goods you could sneak out a couple of minutes later by the back door into Coatfield Lane with a bob or two to see you through till Friday.

As Rachel made her way that day in January of 1949 along Charlotte Street and into the Kirkgate, she thought how ironic life was. Here she was on her way to “Uncle’s” and she wasn’t wanting to pawn anything. That day she desperately needed to buy and was feverishly hoping she’d bump into someone she knew so that she could tell them loudly she was on her way to the pawnshop, not to get money, but to bargain for some other poor sod’s unredeemed pledge.

She squirmed a little as she admitted to herself that her impending action would appear to most people foolhardy at least. Folk like her sister-in-law, Saint Ella, would think the purchase she was about to make with this month’s rent was an obvious sign that she was back to her manic depression. But she was perfectly well and this buy would be an investment – an investment that would mean she’d never again have to scrape around for the four pounds to pay the rent on the twenty-eighth of every month. Indeed she could hardly restrain herself from shouting aloud that her trick had worked and a letter had arrived by first post this morning inviting her to attend for an interview

As luck would have it, she’d been scanning the
Evening News
last Friday in a quiet moment at work when she had seen the notice:

Manager required for a respectable pub in the Leith area of the city.

Excellent wages of at least six pounds per week.

Successful applicant must be honest, hardworking, and presentable.

Apply in writing to Box 1643.

Now Rachel knew quite well that they were looking for a man. No woman ever managed a pub. She might run one that her family owned, but not manage one for someone else. Yet the thought of a wage of
six pounds a week
was just too tempting for Rachel, so she chanced her luck and applied in writing to the given box number.

Planning her strategy came to a halt when she reached the entrance to the pawnshop. She looked around and tutted to herself. Why wasn’t there at least one person she knew hanging about? If she’d been pawning something, there would have been at least two or three of Saint Ella’s clypes hanging about. She sighed, thinking if she only had the time she would have hung around till one of them came by but, being in a hurry, she ran up the entry steps two at a time. Once at the top of the stairs she went straight into the shop and made her way over to the selling counter.

Waiting for attention, Rachel noted that the two members of staff- the male owner and his woman assistant – were closeted in the secluded booths serving those who came in to pawn their treasured possessions. She peremptorily rang the bell on the counter however, and the owner looked up and signalled to his assistant, Betsy, that she should leave her customer and attend to a potential buyer.

“Er, that pony-skin coat over there?” Rachel said casually.

“The yin ye tried on last week to gie yer mind a treat?” chuckled Betsy, pushing her grey wispy hair back and wiping her nose with the back of her hand.

“Aye. You said you would let it go for three pound fifteen.”

“Did I?”

“You most certainly did. So let me try it on again.”

Betsy, with the aid of a long-handled hook, lifted down the coat from the rail. “Belanged to yin o they actresses that come to the Gaiety, it did.”

“So I believe,” Rachel replied as she tried the coat on. “You said she was the one that worked with Armundo the magician till he was bowled over by young Chrissie that worked down the stair in the pork butchers?”

“Aye. See, when he saw hoo Chrissie could toss no just yin but a hale string o Bowman’s black puddings ower her shoulder and up on tae a hook, he just couldnae wait to let her juggle his equipment.”

Rachel buttoned up the coat and flipped up the collar. “Could take it off your hands for three pounds ten,” she offered, running her hands over the sleek pelts.

Betsy glanced at her boss, who imperceptibly shook his head. “Ken something, Rachel?” she went on. “Ye look a million dollars in that coat, so I think we should pit the price up, no doon.”

Rachel laughed derisively and began to unbutton the coat. This time her reply was directed towards the boss. “Three pounds ten is all I’ve got and I know this coat’s been hanging on your wall so long that Chrissie has no only done a country-wide tour tossing the Great Armundo’s caber, but she’s been twice in the pudding club as well.”

“Maybe so, but it’s a business we’re running here – no a flipping charity,” said Mr Cohen.

“Aye, you tell her, Mr Cohen! And ken this? If she went up the toon she wouldnae get a coat of this quality under four pounds in the second-hand shops there. I mean, even here in Leith, she wouldnae get it for under three pounds twelve and a tanner.”

“Done!” said Rachel, banging the money down on the table and starting for the door.

“No want it parcelled up?” Betsy shouted as she got out a large sheet of brown paper and then cut off a couple of pieces of string.

Rachel turned and fixed her gaze directly at Betsy. “I’ve waited all my bloody life for a coat like this. So if you don’t mind, we’ll no bother parcelling it up in blinking brown paper. We’ll head straight for the front door with it on us!”

Rachel’s hand hesitated on the gate of the imposing Victorian villa. If the rumour she’d heard last night was true, then it might be better to forget all about this job interview and stick to being dispense barmaid up at the city’s Queen’s Hotel. It was true she was sick and tired of getting home at two or three in the morning, but the Queen’s was, after all, the most prestigious hotel in Edinburgh and the wee scheme she had going with one of the chefs, who liked a dram or two during his shift, meant she got a share of the food he pauchled. She sighed, thinking that was true enough, but there was the fact that Hannah had now been accepted for training – at the Royal Infirmary no less – and the terms of her nursing contract stated she had to live in. That in turn meant that all the care of Paul and Alice at night would fall on Carrie. Rachel came to the conclusion that there was nothing else for it but to ring the bell. After all, the thought of Carrie being in charge of the house till three in the morning was the stuff nightmares were made of.

The maid showed Rachel into a plush, ornate drawing room that breathed the words
nouveaux riches.
Standing there was Paddy Doyle, a handsome, rather over-dressed, portly man approaching sixty. In her experience most men of his age were either thinking of retiring or – if they were working-class – physical wrecks.

“You’re a woman!” he exclaimed before she could introduce herself.

“So it says on my birth certificate,” replied Rachel, offering her hand.

Still open-mouthed, Paddy motioned Rachel to the settee and sat himself down opposite her. “I’m sorry, but the job you’ve applied for is not really for a woman,” he began, speaking in a strong Irish brogue.

“And why ever not?”

Paddy sighed. “Look, Mrs Campbell, I’m going into a business I’ve never been in before.”

“Like taking over Myles Dolan’s bar on the Broad Pavement?”

“You knew that and yet you’ve still turned up for the interview?”

Rachel nodded, conveniently omitting to tell Paddy that the story was all over Leith – she’d heard it not only from Gabby, who drank there, but also from her upstairs neighbour, Grace, who had the story from her Tommy, who naturally would never be seen in such a den of iniquity. Well, not when sober anyway.

“As you’ll know, it’s a tough pub that. Aye, the customers there are sailors, thieves, vagabonds, old whores and drunkards.”

Rachel silently indicated her agreement to this.

“And what I want to do is bring in a bit of class. You know –
some finesse.”

At that Rachel relaxed and sank back into her settee. She knew that if it was class and
finesse
he was looking for, then he need look no further than herself. As Betsy had noted, she really did look a million dollars in her pony-skin coat, complemented by her high-heeled shoes, leather handbag and her
piece de resistance -
the jaunty brown hat that she was wearing at a perky angle. No one could deny she was both elegant and classy.

“Aye,” drawled Paddy thoughtfully as he scrutinised her. “But if I did give you a chance at the job – and I’m making no promises till I’ve seen the others – I couldn’t possibly pay you
six
pounds a week.”

“Why ever not?”

“Because you’re a woman!”

“But if I do the job, and do it really well, I need to get the going rate?”

“No, no! You see, there’s another barman works there. He’d like the manager’s job, and if I put you in over him that’ll be enough for him to swallow without being paid less than you.”