In a Class of Their Own (5 page)

“And where the hell have you been?” demanded Rachel, who knew full well that Johnny had either been at the chapel speaking to Father O’Hara or down bleating to his mother.

“Doon at ma Maw’s.”

“How is Granny?” asked Hannah, who was desperate to defuse the situation.

“Fine.”

“Aye, so she should be. After all, she managed to offload you on to me.”

“In the name o heaven, Rachel, gie it a rest,” protested Johnny wearily.

“Oh, life a bit hard for you then?” said Rachel with heavy sarcasm. “No easy now for the bairns either. Aye, Carrie was just wondering when she …”

“No on aboot haein’ pork chops again?”

“Naw. Nor egg and chips,” said Rachel advancing threateningly towards Johnny. “She was just wanting a piece – ye ken, some bread and jam. But I told her – you had to be an orphan to get bread and jam for your supper.”

Johnny had the grace to blush and step back before uttering, “I’m
entitled
to dae whit I like with ma ain pocket money.”

“Entitled? Now there’s a funny thing! Our Hannah here, she was wondering why the nuns are
entitled
to six loaves of bread tomorrow for the orphans – two from you, two from your mother and two from Ella – when
she
won’t be entitled to even a crust in the morning.” Rachel stepped forward again and Johnny backed away to the wall.

Hannah’s large, soulful blue eyes widened in fear, and she began to twist the tresses of her blonde hair with growing agitation. “But, Mam, I didn’t …” She began to protest – but Rachel turned and silenced her with a warning glare.

“It wasnae ma faut the sergeant gettin’ moved.” said Johnny, trying once more to put distance between himself and Rachel, this time by edging sideways.

“The sergeant is no the half of it,” replied Rachel, menacingly swinging her hatchet in the air.

“Please, Mammy, let me take the axe,” begged Hannah tearfully. “It should be in the glory-hole. It really should.”

“Maybe it should or … maybe …”

Johnny flinched as Rachel brought the axe closer to his face. “Are you mad or somethin’, wumman?” he croaked.

Rachel was now so near that when she spoke Johnny could feel the spray of her breath as it hit his face. “Mad? Of course I’m bloody mad. You callous swine! Why, oh why, do you always put everybody and yourself before my bairns?”

“I dinnae!”

“But you bloody well do. All hail-fellow-well-met with the Union lads. The humble benefactor to your church’s bleeding orphans. And you know I just will not tolerate anybody, especially you – their useless father – taking the food out of my bairns’ mouths.” Rachel shook the hatchet again. Johnny began to lower himself to the floor in a bid to protect himself. “Aye,” said Rachel in exasperation, “I should put this in your thick skull, but know something?” She now pulled his chin forward with her left hand. “You’re not even worth swinging for.”

Johnny sighed with relief and Rachel continued. “As a matter of fact, why the hell do you not just get out of here and leave us to fend for ourselves.” Wearily she let the axe drop, and Hannah scrambled to pick it up and put it safely away.

Johnny took a moment or two to recover and when he did he nodded before saying, “Aye, I think ma gettin’ oot o here wid be for the best.”

“For whose best?” demanded Carrie, who had got out of bed when the raised voices had awakened her.

Without another word Johnny started to pack his few belongings into a pillow case – his work clothes, shaving brush and razor. Then he went into the bedroom and took his Home Guard greatcoat off the bed where Alice and Paul were sleeping. But before leaving the house for the very last time, he hesitated, wanting to look at his children yet being unable to look any of them in the eye. All he could mutter was, “Can ye no see? I just cannae tak ony mair? It’s a maitter o time till she does for me.” With that he stepped into the stair and out of their lives. Rachel kicked the door shut behind him as if to confirm the finality of the deed.

“Why didn’t you stop him, Mam? Dad leaving us means we’ll be … destitute.”

“Destitute?” shouted Rachel. “Know something, Hannah? I think you read too many books.”

“Mebbe she does,” said Sam thoughtfully. “But yin thing’s for sure. If she means we’re gonnae be poor – even poorer than poor – then I’m thinkin’ she micht be richt!”

**********

The next eighteen months were indeed hard on the family, but they all pulled together. Rachel seized any paid work she could get. At one time she had four jobs simultaneously, though all naturally carried meagre wages. She was washing stairs, cleaning houses, working early shift in the local bakery and doing the back shift as dispense barmaid at the Queen’s Hotel. The older children likewise pitched in. Hannah found work after school in the shop that recharged the radio accumulators, while Sam and Carrie, lying about their age, took milk and newspaper delivery rounds.

They were just beginning to feel that they could cope and were anticipating that life would get better when six-year-old Alice, the youngest of the family, became ill. Very ill indeed. She would cough and cough – and then cough again. After a long silence there would come a long whoop – a dreadful sound that none of the children had ever heard the like of before. The whoop would last so long that it would cut off Alice’s breathing and her face would turn blue. Whenever that happened Rachel would dash over to Alice and lift her up tenderly. She would then put the index finger of her right hand down Alice’s throat and hook out the horrible green phlegm that was choking the life out of her child. Once the phlegm was removed Rachel would put Alice on to her shoulder and rhythmically pat her back, murmuring gently, “There, there, my dear. It’s all right.”

At those times there was nothing Sam, Hannah or Carrie could do except stand, stare, gulp and pray – “Please, God, make Alice breathe again.” And God had always answered their prayers, but even so their little sister would lie there like a limp rag doll and huge silent tears would roll down her cheeks.

The only other thing that Rachel could do for Alice was to put the kettle on the cooker, along with her biggest pot filled with water, and let them boil furiously. The scullery then became a steam chamber that brought some relief to Alice’s breathing. On this occasion, however, after one of the severe coughing fits they were all certain she would never breathe again and Rachel screamed, “For Christ’s sake, Alice, don’t die on us. If you do, I’ll kill you stone dead myself, so I will.”

Hannah was so frightened, she yelled, “Mam, what Alice needs is a doctor.”

Rachel wheeled round on her. “D’you think I don’t bloody know that?”

“Then why are ye no sendin’ for yin,” demanded Sam, picking Alice’s doll up from the floor. Just for a moment he held it tight to his chest before gently tucking it in beside his sister, who was now propped up in the old easy chair in one corner of the scullery.

“Look, Sam,” explained Rachel, her voice cracking with sobs. “Don’t you understand that before a doctor puts his foot over the door I’d need to cross his palm with silver? And because I haven’t been able to work for ten days now I’ve only got one sodding penny left – and I need that for the gas.”

“But surely, Mam, a doctor’ll come when a bairn’s as ill as Alice,” argued Hannah.

“Listen, all of you, and listen good – not only will they no come but they’ll no even let the hospitals take the sick bairns in either,” Rachel retorted, clattering the empty soup pot into the sink and filling it again with water. “Oh aye, that’ll be the day – when a doctor doesnae demand his half-crown first.”

“Some bairns get takken in,” said Sam quietly, leaning over to turn off the tap his mother had forgotten about.

“Aye, at twelve o’clock at night. It’s only at midnight that they take in the sick bairns no doctor has seen.”

Rachel carefully poured some of the water from the pot before lifting it out of the sink and replacing it on the gas ring. She didn’t strike a match though because the gas wouldn’t light without another penny going into the meter. “Dear Lord,” she said, looking tenderly on Alice, who was now fast asleep. “Do I use my last penny now? Or wait till she gets bad again?”

All her life Carrie would remember the long silence broken only by Alice’s rasping breathing. No one spoke. They were all terrified of what would happen to Alice if there was no steam to help her breathe.

After what seemed an eternity, Rachel sank down on a chair and lifted up the bottom of her apron to mop her face. Trying hard to control the panic that was racing uncontrollably through her tormented mind, she eventually announced, “Right. There’s nothing else I can do – at eleven o’clock tonight I’ll take Alice down to Leith Hospital.”

Hannah looked at the clock and swallowed hard. “But Mammy,” she said fearfully, “it’s only four o’clock. Eleven o’clock is years away. Alice needs help now!”

Ignoring Hannah, Rachel went on. “Aye, I’ll take her down to the hospital and stand in the queue along with all the other paupers.” Here she lowered her voice to a whisper, “And I just hope, I do, that they’ll take Alice in.” She hesitated and sniffed loudly before gulping, “… as a … 
charity
case.”

“But how’ll you get her there? It’s at least a thirty-minute walk away,” asked Hannah, who knew that six-year-old Alice was so ill she was quite unable to walk there. And she also knew full well that, much as Rachel would want to, she couldn’t possibly carry Alice all that distance.

Rachel shook her head and bit her lip. The time ticked slowly by and the children felt almost deafened by the silence that pervaded the room. Then a slight smile began to appear on Rachel’s face and a brightness sprang into her eyes as she jumped from her chair and ran from the scullery into the bedroom, which lay completely empty except for the old pram that Rachel had pushed her five children in. She’d meant to give the pram to poor Mrs Wilson upstairs but there was something about it, with its battered old hood and wobbly wheels, that reminded her of happier days – those times when Alice used to be propped up at the top end of the pram and Paul, legs dangling over the side, deposited at the bottom, while Carrie and Sam hung on to the handles – those long-gone days when Hannah skipped up the road in front of them all and lack of money had been her only worry.

Rachel wheeled the pram out of the bedroom and into the scullery. “Right now!” she said emphatically. “We’ll give it a real good wash, dry it, put a pillow and blankets inside and, if Alice curls up her wee legs, that’s how we’ll get her down to the hospital.”

Hannah grinned before asking, “Will I put the last penny in the meter then and light the gas again?”

Rachel nodded. “Aye, let’s go full steam ahead.”

Relief soaked into Carrie. She sidled over to Alice, lifted up her clammy hand and kissed it. “Everything’s going to be fine noo, Alice. Our Mammy’s her old self again.”

Sam, who was also awash with relief, sniffed and pushed out his chest. “Ye’re bluidy richt, Carrie. Oh aye, we mightnae win this blinkin’ war but at least noo we’ll hae a fighting chance.”

At exactly eleven o’clock Rachel lifted Alice and wrapped her in a blanket, remembering to raise the pillow before laying her gently into the pram. Hannah opened the outside door to let her mother out. Rachel paused for a second. “Now,” she whispered, eyeing each of her children in turn. “You know you are
not
to answer the door to anybody.” Then, looking straight at Sam, “And don’t
you
do anything you shouldn’t do while I’m out.”

Carrie, Hannah and Sam all nodded. Rachel turned to go but halted again. “You do all understand, don’t you, how important it is that nobody knows I’ve left you alone?”

“But how’ll anybody ever find oot?” Carrie bleated. “Most people don’t even ken Daddy’s left us.”

Rachel shook her head in annoyance. “Look, I’ve enough to worry me this night without you reminding me about your blooming useless deserting father.”

Hannah opened the door further and, as quietly as possible, Rachel wheeled the pram into the street where she had to face the ferocity of the stormy night. She bent her head towards the relentless gale that buffeted and shrieked all around her. For a moment she felt quite astonished that nature could be so cruel.

Midnight was chiming when Rachel reached Leith Hospital. Inconsequentially she recalled that it had been built as a memorial to the gallant men of Leith who had laid down their lives in the First World War. Her late arrival was due in part to the furious wind that had repeatedly driven her back one step for every two she’d taken. Sheer exhaustion was beginning to overtake her when she was greeted by the hospital porter as she pushed open the door.

“Needin’ ony help, Rachel?” he asked, taking the pram from her.

“No me, Tam, but my youngest is,” Rachel said as she blew hard into her hands in an effort to put life back into her frozen fingers.

Then her words were drowned out by Alice’s racking coughing.

“Here,” Tam blurted out. “Never you never mind sittin’ in that queue. Just get the bairn out of the pram and follow me.”

Stiff with cold, Rachel awkwardly lifted Alice and staggered forward, almost letting her fall. Tam grabbed Alice from her and raced ahead up the stairs into the consulting room.

The Night Sister, in charge of admissions, looked up. “Is there a problem, Tom?” she enquired icily.

“This bairn’s in real bother, Sister,” Tam replied.

“Maybe so, but careering around is hardly going to help. Decorum, Tom! Decorum at all times is what we must have in this hospital!”

With pursed lips Sister rose and took Alice from Tam. She was about to lay Alice down on a trolley when Rachel entered. “You are the mother?” Sister asked in her clipped tones.

Rachel nodded, controlling the urge to take Alice back into her arms.

“Well, I’m just going to put her on the trolley here so that I can examine her,” said Sister, sensing Rachel’s panic and melting her tone somewhat.

One look at Alice had Sister recognising that Alice needed medical help urgently. Without displaying emotion, she called to one of the staff nurses to help her. It was then that Alice began to cough, whoop and choke.