In a Class of Their Own (4 page)

“You?” Rachel said incredulously, as she took out the second batch of chips and put in another.

“Aye, me! An’ afore I could reply he just cairried on, sayin’, ‘An’ ye’ll tak it hame wi’ ye an’ I’ll ca’ by later to your hoose for my hauf and ye can dae what the hell you like wi’ the ither hauf’.” Johnny paused, waiting for Rachel to react, but she didn’t, so he went on. “Struck dumb, I was. And when I managed to speak I says to him, ‘I’m nae thief. It’s against my religion to get caught thievin’.”

Rachel began dividing the chips on to the plates before scraping some margarine on to the bread: one slice for each child and two for Johnny.

“Well, Rachel, I cannae get caught breakin’ the Commandments. I just cannae.”

Still making no comment, Rachel emptied the last basket of chips on to a plate for Johnny. Opening the scullery door, she called the children through for their tea.

All four dashed in from the living room to take their places at the table. Johnny ignored Rachel’s instructions to sit down and went on with his harangue. “Then he says, ‘It’s like this, Johnny. Either we cement oor arrangement, or I’m gonnae hae to chairge ye wi’ the theft of this bleeding liver and it will be in aw the papers that ye’re a greedy black-marketeer and then ye’ll either be hung …’” Here Johnny stopped and sobbed, but the children were too busy gorging themselves to notice his distress, “ ‘… or ye’ll end up in Saughton afore bein’ shipped oot to join Montgomery in North Africa.’ So. Rachel, whit else could I dae ither than say, ‘Look, sergeant. Haud aff till I gang hame and speak tae ma Missus’.”

The following evening, Sam and Carrie were playing Cowboys and Indians in the Empty Room. It was really the second bedroom of the house but had no furniture in it, nor any linoleum on the floor. However, Sanderson chintz curtains tied back with red silk cords adorned the windows.

Sam, who had found a better use for the silk cords, now had Carrie securely tied to a chair and was doing a war dance around her. She in turn was quite happy to be captive, and played the role well, widening her violet eyes and sniffing loudly. Happy enough, that is, until Sam, brandishing a large pair of scissors, advanced closer to her, chanting, “I’m Big Chief Sweeney Todd.”

“Mammy, Mammy!” she cried loudly. “Come quick! He’s gonnae scalp me. Really scalp me.”

Rachel was busily bathing Alice in the washing tub in the scullery but stopped abruptly when Carrie’s screams penetrated the kitchen. Carefully, however, she lifted the baby out of the tub and placed her safely on the floor before rushing to Carrie’s aid.

“Sam, Sam! What in the name of heaven is going on in here?” she yelled, bounding into the bedroom. “And why d’you always have to have this lassie bawling her head off?” She paused. “Here – that’s surely no my Jenner’s Sale tiebacks you’ve got there?” she shouted.

Sam nodded. Rachel snorted and shook her head in exasperation before grabbing him fiercely. “Don’t you realise they curtains and tiebacks are to fool the neighbours? Stood for four hours in a blinking freezing queue to get them,” she continued as she dunted him mercilessly on the shoulder. “And here’s you using them for bloody ropes.”

Without hesitation, Sam began to untie Carrie, but in doing so only succeeded in tightening the cord around her neck.

“Mammy, Mammy! He’s chokin’ me now,” Carrie cried out, as she started to turn blue.

The next thing Sam knew was his head rocking, as Rachel’s open hand whacked his ear. Still sobbing loudly, Carrie was led by her mother into the scullery, where she wiped her nose piteously with the back of her hand, looking about her at the same time in the hope of seeing signs of the tea being prepared. But there was no pot of porridge bubbling on the cooker. No bread was waiting to be spread with the twopence-worth of roast dripping that Carrie had been sent for to the butcher’s when she had come in from school. The thought of roast dripping sprinkled with salt and spread on fresh bread made Carrie lick her lips, reminding her that she was hungry – very hungry. “Mammy,” she whined. “I’m starvin’.”

“Aye,” Rachel replied absently as she picked Alice up to rub her dry.

“Mammy, did you no hear me say I’m hungry?”

“I heard you. And you’ll get your tea in a wee while. Now then, Alice, you’re all clean and beautiful again. Off you go and play ben the house.” Rachel thrust a yellow wool-tufted rag doll with shirt-button eyes into Alice’s hands.

“But I’m starvin’ hungry, Mammy,” Carrie wheedled.

“Aye, Carrie, I know you are. You’ll get your tea in a wee while.”

“Bit could I no just hae a wee piece on white jam the noo?”

“How often have I to tell you to speak proper and that white jam is condensed milk?” Rachel retorted, testing the temperature of the water she had just washed Alice in. She smiled, thinking it was just warm enough and, lifting up a pile of dirty washing from the floor, began putting it into the tub to steep.

“Okay then, so could I have a piece on that condensed …?”

Sheer exasperation made Rachel interrupt. “See, Carrie! You were fed last night and you’ll be fed tonight in due course, but right now I’m too busy for making blooming pieces.”

“But, Mammy,” Carrie began once more.

Before she could go on, Sam bounced through the scullery door, having speedily recovered from his punishment. “Mammy, I’m stervin’! Can I no hae a piece?” he pleaded, running his finger round the top of the condensed milk tin and making sure it dipped into the milk before sticking it in his mouth.

Rachel turned just in time to see Sam suck his finger. Without a word of warning she smacked his hand away from the tin before grabbing it and putting it on the top shelf above the window. “See this, you two wee pests,” she yelled, “you’ve got appetites like bloody vultures. And as I told you last night,” she went on through clenched teeth, “you’ve no any God-given right to expect to be fed every day. Some of us …”

Sam, who wasn’t paying any attention, interrupted. “Mammy,” he said, “Why are ye walkin’ up and doon and then lookin’ oot o the windae?”

“Aye, what are you lookin’ for, Mammy?” added Carrie.

“For some bloody peace, would you believe!”

“Peace, Mammy? But why?”

“I’m just lookin’ for your Dad comin’.” Rachel craned her neck to get a better view out of the window.

“You dinnae usually look oot for him.”

“Too right, Sam. But I’m looking for your useless Dad coming the night. So will you just be bloody quiet?”

Carrie scrambled on to the bunker so that she too could look up the back lane. “Mammy,” she cried. “Here’s our Daddy comin’ noo. There’s somethin’ awfae wrang wi’ him. He cannae walk right.”

“Neither he can. Fair buckling he is,” Rachel said gleefully before she clasped her hands and looked to the ceiling. “Oh, thank you so much, God, for answering my prayers!”

“You prayed for Daddy to be ill?” Carrie asked tearfully as she jumped down. “I’m awa to help him.”

“You stay right where you are, my lady. And Sam, don’t you dare go out neither.” She grabbed hold of both children. “You two’s the bane of my life. Aye on about being bloody hungry. So I’m trying …” Rachel halted mid-sentence and loosened her grip on the children because the outside door had opened and Johnny, pale and gaunt, staggered in.

“Oh, Daddy, are you awfae no weel?” Carrie whimpered.

“Dinnae tell us ye’ve a sair back again,” said Sam shaking his head dolefully.

“Carrie! Sam!” Rachel shouted. “Bide here and don’t take another breath until I tell you.”

Turning to Johnny. “C’mon now, son. You’re going to be all right. Here, let me help you ben the scullery.”

Johnny’s mouth opened and shut like a fish. Gasping, he tried to form words, but Rachel gestured to him to keep quiet. Then the two of them staggered into the scullery and the door was slammed shut.

“Sam, did you see that there’s nae porridge pot on the gas?”

“Is there no?”

“Naw. And it’s Thursday – so we should be getting porridge and a drippin’ piece.”

Sam shrugged. “Maybe Mammy meant it and we’re no gonnae get fed every day.”

Carrie was about to answer when there came a loud knock at the outside door.

“Will I answer the door, Mammy?” shouted Sam as he went over and flung the outside door wide open.

“Yer Daddy in, son?” asked the big police sergeant who framed the doorway.

“Naw,” Sam replied. “He’s awa to North Africa to get shot.”

Rachel rushed out of the scullery and, grabbing Sam by the scruff of the neck, thrust him backwards across the room.

“Yer man hame?” the sergeant asked.

“Aye, he’s ben the scullery,” Rachel replied, pointing towards the door.

The scullery door slammed again on the twins and Sam commented bitterly, “Oor Mammy’s a stinkin’ shopper. Handed oor Daddy ower to the polis, she has.”

“I ken. But what can we dae”

“Rescue him! Whit else?”

The children were still hatching their rescue plan, part of which would mean Sam attacking the policeman by jumping on his back while Carrie grabbed him round the legs, when the sergeant emerged from the scullery with a bulging kit bag that he swung on to his shoulder.

“Weel done, Johnny lad,” he said with a chuckle as he opened the outside door. “On Monday I’ll gie ye the order for next week.”

Carrie and Sam, who had now been joined by Hannah, looked questioningly from one to the other as the sergeant peered warily into the dark passageway to ascertain there was no one hanging about. Then, quickly and quietly, he made off into the night.

No sooner had the door closed than all three children scampered into the scullery. Simultaneously they all pulled up sharply. Carrie’s mouth gaped.

“Wid ye look at that!” said Sam in amazement.

There, displayed on the table, sat the rear quarters of a large pig chopped into roasting joints. Beside them lay a row of pork chops – enough to feed an army – and in front of those half of a roughly-hacked lamb’s liver that spewed blood everywhere. And to complete this astonishing gastronomic exhibition, there was an enormous five-pound tin of New Zealand butter.

“Where did aw this come from, Mammy?”

“None of your business, my lady,” Rachel snapped at Carrie.

“Here, does this mean that I can gang intae school the morn and tell aw the boys that my Daddy’s no a coward? That he’s noo the heid o the Leith Black Mairket!” Sam asked hoarsely, adding – as he grabbed the front of his trousers – “Oh ma God! Ah think I’m gonnae pee masel’.”

“You’ll no tell nobody nothing!” Rachel shouted, lifting Sam by his jumper again and shaking him so vigorously that a thin dribble trickled down his leg. “There’s no one to be told a word about what’s going on in this house.”

Johnny, who was bent over on a chair wringing his hands, just shook his head. “Yer Mammy’s richt, son. You cannae tell onybody that yer faither’s a common thief - an’ no prepared to be rationed like ither folk.”

Carrie was upset at this and sidled over to him, whispering, “It’ll be all right, Dad. You’re a Catholic and my pal Bernie says that Catholics, nae like us Proddies, can dae awfae things. Then aw they need tae dae is confess. An’ then God forgives them and lets them intae heaven.”

“That reminds me, Rachel. I met Father O’Hara in the street the day so I telt him aw aboot this.” Johnny nodded his head towards the spread of food on the table.

“Have you lost your marbles, Johnny?” said Rachel in utter disbelief.

“Nae problem. Father O’Hara’s very discreet.”

“Oh aye. And what did he tell you to do?”

“Just to let ma conscience be ma guide.”

Rachel’s response was to dump the frying pan on to the stove and fling the twopence-worth of roast dripping into it. “Will it be one pork chop or two you’ll be wanting?”

“Well, if I’ve got to keep this up I’ll need the strength. So I’d better hae twa chops and a wee slice o liver.”

“Just the one slice of liver?” Rachel asked mockingly.

“Aye, I’m nae wantin’ to be greedy. And here, Rachel, ye wouldnae mebbe hae a bittie tomati or ingan to be gaun wi it?”

“Naw, no the day, Johnny son,” Rachel responded sweetly. “But once I’ve sold what we cannae use, I’ll get you all the garnish you’ll ever want.”

Johnny jumped from his chair, grabbed Rachel by the arms and birled her around so that they were facing each other. “Sell aff aw whit we cannae yaise? Naw. Naw, Rachel, ye cannae dae that.”

“Why for no?” Rachel demanded as she pulled herself free.

“Cos I swore to Father O’Hara that if I did go in wi’ yon sergeant I’d hand in twa pork chops and a couple of slices o liver to the Chapel Hoose on my wey to work the morn!”

When yet another row began between Mam and Dad, Hannah felt the fear seep into her. There was simply no way she could stop her throat muscles tightening and her stomach churning. The rows were so frequent and violent now that she knew it was just a matter of time before something dreadful would happen.

Although only going on eleven, Hannah was very astute and was sure that the deterioration in Johnny and Rachel’s relationship had started when that bent sergeant had bullied her father into stealing the food from the Cold Store. It was true the family was now better fed and enjoyed the benefits that arrived when Rachel sold the excess food on the black market – but it was all at the price of her father and mother drifting apart.

The sergeant had grown increasingly bold and greedy – every week demanding that more food be stolen. Naturally tongues wagged; and eventually someone (and Hannah suspected it was Johnny under the guidance of Father O’Hara) wrote an anonymous letter to the Chief Constable. Suddenly the sergeant was assigned to desk duties under the strict supervision of his Inspector and his replacement at the Cold Store proved to be an incorruptible God-fearing Presbyterian. Unfortunately Rachel had reached the same conclusion as Hannah and when the family found themselves back in grinding poverty, all the harder to bear after the luxury of plenty, Johnny’s name was perpetually on the receiving end of Rachel’s caustic tongue.

The row of two hours ago had resulted in Johnny storming out of the house. Hannah knew she had to get everybody to bed before he returned. If not, Rachel would do what she was expert at – restarting the argument from where it had broken off. The added problem that night was Rachel’s insistence on getting everything ready for the morning. She was viciously chopping sticks for the fire on the glory-hole’s stone floor when the door opened and Johnny entered.