Mulligan's Yard (12 page)

Margot stamped a foot. She had been so good, was intending to be good in the future, but all she wanted—

‘I will not have this, Margot. Rupert will ruin your reputation. Helen has indulged him absolutely, and he passes on the ruination. His parents have, I understand, dug him out of many a
hole. Do not become his next victim, I beg you.’

‘But I—’

‘Must I speak to Helen about this? Because if I do, I shall lose a valued friend.’

The trouble with Mother was that she seldom allowed a person to explain herself. Rupert had not yet popped the question, but Margot felt quite sure that it was just a matter of time. He loved
her. She, the youngest of three, was on the verge of becoming engaged. Rupert would take her away from all this. She would not be cutting out and stitching, as would Eliza and Louisa. She would not
be fronting a shop on Deansgate, would not be an Amy, all dressed up and nowhere to go. No, Margot would make a very good marriage.

‘It’s a dream,’ whispered Louisa. ‘Only a dream.’

Margot, who felt close to explosive, marched out before saying anything untoward. Rupert could drive her home, at least. Mother, waiting for Moorhead to return with the trap, would travel to
Caldwell Farm by a slightly less comfortable means.

Louisa, wearied by the persistent headache, leaned back and rested her head against the wall. Downstairs, over two hundred pounds’ worth of shoes were racked and waiting to be sold. She
had made a similar investment in gloves, bags and scarves. It had to work. Earlier in the day, she had looked out on Deansgate, had seen women bustling past in old coats and headscarves. Whence
would purchasers of her goods arrive?

From Chorley New Road, from Heaton and Smithills, she reassured herself now. From houses on the moors, even from the town, surely? Yes, the wife of a doctor or a lawyer could afford a good,
decent and inexpensive copy of a fashion item. So far, she was resisting ready-to-wear, though it was an option, she supposed. Wages to pay, too. The headache was worsening.

Amy had been an absolute darling, taking as much weight as she could from her mother’s shoulders, urging Louisa along towards confidence, towards faith in herself. Eliza, God bless the
child, was like an over-excited two-year-old, exclaiming over colour and cut, choosing the best scissors, sewing-machines, threads. Eliza seemed to be coming to life at last.

Margot? Gloves might hide the bitten nails, but the youngest of the three was still wild at heart. God alone knew where she got to these days. She had paid lip-service for a couple of months,
had even escorted her mother on shopping expeditions for furniture for the salon, but that state of affairs had been temporary. Rupert Smythe did not fool Louisa, Amy, or even Eliza.

Trying to be wise, Louisa had not laboured the point. She had forced herself to sit back and hope that Margot would not get in too deep with Helen’s son. But waiting for Margot to come to
her senses was a thankless task. Louisa would have to talk to Helen. Dreading such a confrontation, Louisa picked up her bag and gloves, taking one last look around the peaceful area. By this
evening, the business would have been christened.

Downstairs, Camilla was putting the finishing touches to her buffet. ‘Hello,’ she called cheerily. ‘Going home to put on the warpaint?’

Louisa smiled. She had a soft spot for poor Camilla, whose vibrant red hair and equine features did not attract many suitors. ‘Yes, time to go,’ she answered.

Camilla blew a rusty tress from her homely face. ‘See you later, then, Mrs Burton-Massey.
Nil desperandum.
’

Louisa walked out and allowed Moorhead to help her into the trap. It had been a tiring day. And it wasn’t over yet.

If noise measured success, then the opening of A Cut Above was an event to remember. Helen Smythe’s bush telegraph must have done its job, because the place was packed.
Elegant ladies sipped sherry from crystal glasses, while their husbands, most of them looking as dazed as freshly landed trout, lined the walls, brandy globes twisting, watches making regular
appearances, half-told jokes cut off before vulgar punchlines could offend a female ear.

Margot, smiling graciously in defeat, hung from the arm of Rupert Smythe as if she were a fixture. Mother had refused permission for Margot to be elsewhere with Rupert, so she would be here with
him, on show, in public and for all to see.

Louisa, whose headache showed no sign of abating, tried not to look at her disobedient daughter. Instead, she circulated and spoke to almost everyone, was polite, slightly distant, and she
avoided Helen’s widowers as if running from plague. One in particular seemed quite taken with Louisa, who steered him in the direction of an avid spinster from Westhoughton, leaving the poor
man to the tender mercies of a woman whose desperation was clearly visible.

In a corner near the door, James Mulligan oversaw the situation. As usual, he wore dark and rather unremarkable clothing, which seemed slightly dated, as if he had stepped out of a recently
deceased age. Unfortunately, Helen Smythe, drawn by a magnetism she didn’t even recognize, decided to interrogate him. He listened for a quarter of an hour to a lecture on fashion, was
quizzed about his marital status – was he engaged, had he ever been engaged, didn’t he think it was time he settled down, there were plenty of Catholic women in Bolton, what did he
think of the shop – until he excused himself and stepped outside for a few moments.

Amy followed him. ‘Well done,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘You threw her off. Helen Smythe is something of a limpet, I fear. She’d have you married and buried within the hour.’

‘Yes.’

Amy drew breath. This taciturn man should really have stayed at home, since he was obviously ill-prepared for social occasions. She gazed upward, counted twenty stars between clouds, noticed an
unlit gas lamp outside Woolworth’s, looked sideways at him. What was this man? A teacher, a Catholic, a hard worker, a person of scrupulous morals? Those were qualifications, qualities and
choices, easy to express and illustrate, yet his essence remained elusive. What did he think about? ‘James?’

‘Yes?’

‘What are you thinking about?’

He looked at her as if noticing her existence for the first time. ‘Your sister,’ he replied.

It was like tapping a stone and expecting blood. ‘Which one?’

‘Margot.’

‘Ah.’ Amy waited. A coal cart ambled by, then a tram clattered along its rails. A pair of policemen strolled past, trying doors and peering into darkened windows. Life continued,
though there was little sign of it in the man at her side. What had made him so quiet? she wondered. Had he grown up in a cave, a one-man tent, on a deserted island just off the coast of
Ireland?

After at least two minutes, he spoke. ‘That’s not a very pleasant young man.’

Amy decided to take an obtuse angle. ‘Who?’

‘The Smythe boy.’

‘Rupert.’

‘And the sister’s so jolly,’ he volunteered unexpectedly. ‘Many plain young women are sweet, as though they are apologizing for their appearance. When she smiles,
she’s almost pretty.’

The boys in blue stopped, lit cigarettes in a doorway, watched the couple across the street. They also surveyed the carry-on in A Cut Above, probably wishing that they could pop in for a quick
drink.

Amy continued to wait, wondering when she would take root. It was plain that James Mulligan had gone into one of his reveries. ‘If you marry and change your mind, we shan’t be
upset,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to return the house or the yard to us. Mother would have a fit if she was aware of your intention.’

He turned to study her. ‘What was that?’

‘Do you have a problem with your hearing?’

‘No. No, I do not.’

She repeated her statement.

‘Don’t worry about that,’ he mumbled. ‘I shan’t marry.’ The next pause was mercifully short. ‘He fell in with a bad lot at university, or so I’m
told. But I still think he’s been spoilt by his mother in the first place. You must urge Margot to stay away from him.’

Back to Rupert, then, mused Amy. He never wanted to talk about himself, did he? ‘Why won’t you marry?’

He cleared his throat. ‘If you’d had a daddy like mine, if you’d seen a marriage like my parents’, I’m sure you would opt for single status. I am better
alone.’

‘Oh.’ She didn’t know what to say. Even when he was forced to talk about his personal life, he remained unmoved, detached, strangely non-involved with himself.

‘He caused trouble with a dancer at the Theatre Royal,’ said James. ‘There was a scandal.’

Back again and again to Rupert Smythe. ‘Yes, I know.’ Amy smoothed her cashmere shawl. ‘It was very visible. Not everyone keeps secrets in the cellar, Mr Mulligan.’

‘There is no dancer in my cellar, Amy.’

She decided to go for the full sheep. ‘What is in your cellar, then? Buried treasure, dead people, a mushroom farm?’

He laughed. ‘Perhaps all three.’ He crooked his arm. ‘Shall we go back inside, Miss Burton-Massey? The air is becoming chill.’

‘Thank you.’ She took the proffered support and moved towards the door of A Cut Above.

Inside, loud confusion reigned, but just for a few seconds. A sudden silence ensued, then the air was shattered by a dreadful, drawn-out scream. ‘That’s Eliza,’ whispered Amy,
a hand straying to her throat.

James Mulligan, taller by several inches than most men, looked over the heads of those in front of him, turning quickly to Amy when he had pinpointed the trouble. ‘I think your mother has
fainted,’ he said softly. ‘Stay here till I find out.’

The policemen, having heard the scream, barged in and cleared a path which closed behind them, blocking Amy’s way. But Amy was staying nowhere. She pursued James and the police, pushing
aside any obstacle in her path, human or inanimate. Dr Jones, a friend of the Burton-Masseys for many years, was on his knees beside the supine form of Louisa. Two women were trying to comfort
Eliza, who was almost as white about the face as the woman on the carpet.

Margot clung to Rupert Smythe’s arm, her mouth open in an almost perfect O.

‘Quiet,’ said the doctor. ‘And give me some space, please.’

The crowd stepped back, the two officers shooing them away with waving arms. Gordon Jones felt for a pulse, even placed his ear against Louisa’s chest. He placed his hand near her
whitening lips, feeling for the slightest emission of breath. Instinctively, Amy grabbed James Mulligan’s hand.

‘Hold tight,’ said the Irishman. The woman was dead. James had seen enough of death to recognize its signature. ‘Be brave, Amy.’

She clung to him as if he were a life-raft. Mother was so still and so pale. But surely she was alive? People did not die so quickly and so young.

Dr Jones rose to his feet and looked at the three girls in turn. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, the words fractured by emotion. ‘She wouldn’t have known a thing. Your mother
was dead before she hit the floor.’

Eliza screamed again, and people clustered round her, gathered her up and took her away. Margot sobbed in Rupert’s arms. Amy wrenched her hand free, dropped to the floor and hugged the
lifeless body of her mother. So brave and so strong Louisa had become of late. And she would not see the fruits of her labour.

James knelt beside Amy. ‘I am so, so sorry,’ he said.

For a reason she could not have explained or justified in a million years, Amy turned on him. ‘Look at your father’s handiwork,’ she cried, as she held her mother’s body.
‘He killed both my parents. Get away. Go on, go home.’

‘Amy—’

‘Don’t touch me,’ she screamed, hysteria bubbling up into her throat. When Rupert Smythe stepped forward, she screamed at him too, opening fire with both barrels. ‘As for
you, just stay away from my sister. Go and find another chorus girl, because that’s just about the correct level for you.’

Silence weighted down by shock and grief hung in the air. Rupert Smythe and James Mulligan backed away towards the door. Rupert left before anything else could be said, but James remained by the
door. Helen Smythe joined him. ‘It will be the shock,’ she told him, in an effort to explain Amy’s accusations against her son.

James shook his head. ‘Shock releases truth,’ he whispered. ‘Amy spoke from the heart. What she said about my father was perfectly correct.’ He nodded, as if counting the
seconds as they passed. ‘Your son is a wastrel, Mrs Smythe, but this is not the time to discuss the skeletons in our cupboards. Three young ladies have lost their mother just now.’

Helen bit back remarks that might have served to improve the reputation of her beloved Rupert. The Irishman was right – this was scarcely the time or place to defend the living.

Amy, Eliza and Margot were shepherded out by police and many willing chaperones. As they passed James, Amy looked straight through him, as if she could see nothing at all. Eliza had to be
carried, while Margot, so recently happy in the presence of Rupert, was now in a state bordering on the hysterical.

James, after making sure that the doctor had gone with the Burton-Massey girls, took it upon himself to clear away stragglers and to wait with Helen Smythe for the ambulance. Just one constable
remained, the second having run across the road to Bolton’s main police station.

Helen picked up a scarf and spread it across Louisa’s stilled features. ‘She had a headache,’ she announced, to no one in particular.

The policeman sighed loudly. ‘It’ll be one of them brain bleeds, a bit of a stoppage what’s burst, like,’ he said. ‘Aye, we see a lot of this kind of thing in our
line of work. She won’t have known what hit her.’

James sat with his head bowed, hands clasped between his knees. All he could hear was Amy’s voice, the accusation, the anger. Thomas Mulligan, gone but not forgotten, continued to do his
worst.

The funeral service for Louisa Burton-Massey was held at the Church of St Augustine on Thicketford Road at the bottom of Tonge Moor. The main cortège consisted of a
horse-drawn hearse and two carriages for family and household staff. Behind these vehicles, others tagged along, a mixture of motor cars and carts in many shapes and sizes.