The Liverpool Rose (17 page)

Her expression was so pleading and her face so pale that Lizzie would not have had the heart to refuse her, even had she wanted to do so. As a result, Lizzie now found herself, not only buying and preparing all the food for their meals, but making the boys and Uncle Perce’s snap each morning before she went off to school then hurrying home from Mrs Mayall’s emporium with her arms stretched almost down to her ankles with the weight of the bags of
potatoes, bread and other groceries which she carried. Since neither boy had seen fit to give her any money and Uncle Perce would not have dreamed of doing such a thing, she had been forced to buy on tick. Fortunately, Mrs Mayall was an understanding woman and knew Aunt Annie of old. ‘She’ll pay me back as soon as she’s better,’ she said comfortably, adding up the items on the special pink lined paper which she used for credit customers. ‘And just you take a nice bar of Fry’s chocolate in to your aunt when you go to see her tonight. Tell it’s a present from her old pal Edie Mayall, and I hope she gets better right quick.’

Thinking about this as she grimly washed pots, Lizzie felt that she echoed Mrs Mayall’s sentiments; the sooner Aunt Annie got well, the better pleased Lizzie would be. Finishing the washing-up, she decided to let the pots drain and crossed the kitchen to make her preparations for the night and the next day. Despite the month being June, she damped down the fire and closed down the damper; she would need the fire tomorrow morning if she were to get breakfast and reach school on time. It was already ten o’clock and she was bone weary and tempted to shriek up the stairs and force Herbie or Denis to come down and give her a hand. They could at least have filled the buckets with water before they sneaked off upstairs, she thought resentfully, taking a pail in either hand and heading for the tap at the end of the court. If Aunt Annie had been at home, she would certainly have insisted that they do the heavy work.

Since she had not thought to collar either lad before they went up to bed, however, she would simply have to make the best of it. Accordingly, she filled both buckets at the tap and staggered back along the court
in the frail light from the solitary gas lamp, slopping water as she went. Climbing the steps to the front door so heavily burdened was not easy, but Lizzie managed it with the loss of only perhaps an inch of water. Nevertheless, she was glad to park the buckets under the washing-up bowl on its rickety table and straighten her aching back. She checked with her eye that everything was now ready for the morning: fire damped down, water brought in, coal in the hod so that the fire might be freshened without having to leave the house, and her cousins’ sandwich wrappings laid out ready on the central table. Yes, it looked as though it was safe to go to bed at last, and pray heaven Aunt Annie would soon be discharged from hospital so that she might take up her usual place once more. She doused the lamp, lit her candle and left the room, closing the door behind her.

Making her weary way up the stairs, Lizzie reflected that she had never realised just how hard Aunt Annie worked. When you considered that, in addition to everything Lizzie had been doing, Aunt Annie also both cooked and washed bedding for anyone who could pay her a small sum to do so, it was a miracle that her aunt ever got into bed before midnight. Lizzie knew that, of late years, her aunt made it a rule to be upstairs and in bed before ten, if possible. The pubs closed at half-past ten and if she were out of the way when Uncle Perce returned, he would either fall into a drunken sleep on the sofa in the front room or, if he was in a nasty mood, take his anger out on the furnishings, such as they were. Uncle Perce was responsible for the battered panels on the front door and for the marks on the walls where objects, flung in a drunken rage, had gouged holes in the plaster. Lizzie followed Aunt Annie’s example
and always tried to get to bed before Uncle Perce returned. Now she hurried up the two flights of stairs to her attic room, went inside and sank thankfully on to the bed. Usually, she brought up water so that she could have a good wash as soon as she awoke, but since Aunt Annie had been in hospital and she had had to be downstairs so early, she had given up the habit and washed in the kitchen.

Presently, having rested for a moment, she got reluctantly to her feet and began to take off the large calico apron which, earlier in the evening she had donned to protect her blue gingham dress, and hang it on the hook behind the door. Then she began to unbutton the blue gingham, reflecting as she did so that it was getting extremely tight across the chest. Idly, she looked down at her front; there were darts in the dress which could be unpicked if she were clever enough. She could not bear the thought of having to give the dress away when she had had it for such a short time and had just decided she would take it round to one of the women who was renowned for her sewing skills when she heard a very odd noise, coming from the direction of her narrow truckle bed. Frowning, she lifted her eyes from the dress and examined the bed, then bent down to look beneath it. The sound had been just like an animal breathing, or perhaps it was a bird which had flown through the open window and, having exhausted itself in trying to find a way out again, collapsed beneath the bed. A large crow had done this the previous summer and Lizzie had had great difficulty in catching the bird and ejecting it. So she hoped very much that the sound had been caused by almost anything other than that.

To Lizzie’s relief there was nothing under the bed.
Putting the matter out of her mind, she began to unplait her hair, removing two hairpins and placing them carefully on her washstand where they would be easy to find in the morning. Picking up her brush, she began the evening task of untangling her locks, idly examining herself in the mirror as she did so. Absently, as she worked, her eyes fixed themselves on the reflection of a small dark patch on the partition behind her. It was odd, she thought, that she had never noticed the mark before. Goodness knows, she must have eyed the thin partition wall between her room and the boys many times over the past few years. She was still staring at the mark when it seemed to change. There was a flickering white flash, just for a moment, and in that instant Lizzie realised, with fury, that it was not a mark, it was a hole in the partition which had certainly not been there that morning, and unless she was very much mistaken, glued to the hole there was a round and protuberant eye. The hated Herbie was spying on her! Though why he should bother to do so, she thought resentfully, she could not imagine.

Seconds later, she chided herself for an idiot. Herbie might see her at all times of day in the kitchen, but then she was fully dressed. The horrible, sly, disgusting boy, who was incapable of getting himself a girlfriend, was trying to find out what went on below calico aprons and print dresses!

Lizzie usually slept in the raw in summer and realised with horror that had she not noticed the hole, she would by now have stripped off. As it was, she was still respectable, though the top two buttons of her dress were undone. She turned her back on the hole, trying to decide what best to do, for if she did not discourage Herbie firmly, he might well start
selling peeps at a penny a go. Glancing around her for a weapon, she spied the hairpins, sitting on the washstand, but a moment’s reflection caused her to dismiss them as a weapon. Herbie was a beast all right, but she did not fancy being responsible for a one-eyed cousin. If she made her little finger rigid . . .

Walking back towards her bed, more alert now that she knew about the spyhole, she heard sounds which she was easily able to identify: Herbie was trying to see where she had gone and what she was up to. Smiling grimly, Lizzie sidled up to the wall. Then she took careful aim and pushed her little finger through the hole with as much force as she could muster. Almost immediately, she felt a horrid squelchy sensation and drew back her hand hastily, half expecting to find Herbie’s eyeball impaled on her nail. Indeed, judging from the gasp and gurgle which he gave, her fear was not altogether unfounded, but her finger proved to be only sticky . . . Yuck, yuck!

There was a terrible scream from the other side of the wall, followed by a stream of obscenities and a thump and a squeak of springs as someone – Herbie, obviously – collapsed on to his own bed. Lizzie heard Denis saying sleepily: ‘Whazzup, wozzer marrar?’

‘That bleedin’ little bitch has bloody blinded me,’ Herbie moaned. The bed creaked again, as he rocked to and fro, probably clutching his eye, Lizzie thought with grim satisfaction. ‘Oh, oh, me mam’ll kill her when I tell ’er Lizzie’s put me eye out. Oh, gawd, the pain! If I could lay me hands on her now . . .’

There was a thump of heavy feet crossing the boys’ room and Lizzie hastily went to push the washstand across her door, but it turned out that there was no need. Denis, seeming to come wide awake, said thoughtfully: ‘What on
earth
are you talkin’ about,
young Herbie? If you’re grumblin’ about Lizzie, she ain’t in here, that much I do know, and if you’re moanin’ about supper then you’d best give her a hand another night. I thought it were okay meself. She’s learned a thing or two from our mam, has Lizzie – that meat an’ potato pie were prime.’

There was a longish pause, then Herbie said: ‘I banged me head on the partition. I must have been having a bad dream – I thought I heard Lizzie scream out.’

‘That were you screamin’ out,’ Denis said dryly. ‘I never heared anyone make such a fuss over bumping their head. Now just you get back into bed, our Herbie, ’cos I needs me beauty sleep if I’m to get to work on time tomorrow.’

Lizzie listened joyfully as Herbie grumbled his way back into bed. It was clear that he had decided not to own up about the hole, nor to tale-clat on her about being poked in the eye, and it was probably for the best, she decided. She had nipped his little plan in the bud; tomorrow she would get some putty and close up the hole and she supposed she would then do best to forget the whole incident. But aren’t boys queer? she thought to herself as she settled down to sleep. He must have seen girls swimming in the Scaldy from time to time. She had seen boys, and certainly wouldn’t bother to make a hole in a wall in order to see them again. Bodies were only bodies after all, she was thinking as she fell asleep.

By the time Aunt Annie returned from hospital, Herbie’s eye had begun to improve and though his mother commented that he seemed to have got himself a real shiner, she made no other remark. Clearly, Herbie had decided to keep his little adventure to
himself, though every time he saw Lizzie looking at his scarlet and painful eye, he gave her a malevolent glare out of the other one.

Since her aunt had only spent a week in the Maternity Hospital, Lizzie was able to take up her new job on the day appointed. She and Sally set off together, both neatly dressed in summer frocks and sandals, with their carry-out in identical scarlet tins which Sally’s mother had bought for them from Paddy’s Market.

The work in the despatch department was not onerous, though one had to be both quick and accurate. As the belt moved the goods around, the girls checked that all was well with each item before sending it on its way. They found the other workers and the supervisors both friendly and helpful. The money was a good deal better than anything the girls could have earned in an office, and though Lizzie had always seen herself doing the sort of work which the teacher had talked of, she soon settled down at her bench and became a reliable – and happy – worker.

She and Sally often took their carry-out to the banks of the canal and sat there for the thirty minutes they were allowed. They were doing this one day when the familiar shape of
The Liverpool Rose
came into view, with Hal pulling it, Clem leading him, and the large and shaggy dog, which Lizzie had never met, close at Clem’s heels.

‘Look, Sal, it’s
The Liverpool Rose
and that young feller I told you about,’ Lizzie said excitedly. ‘I wonder if they’re going to dock quite near us. They look as though they’re coming in for a cargo, wouldn’t you say?’

Sally screwed up her eyes against the sunlight and peered. ‘I don’t know how you can tell one boat from
another, let alone one horse or one young feller,’ she grumbled. ‘All I can see is
a
boat and
a
feller. Still, I reckon you’re right so now you can introduce me. Do you think they’ll let us go aboard? I’ve never seen inside one of them little cabins; it’s a miracle to me how they get one person in there, lerralone three.’

‘I don’t think they invite ordinary people aboard much,’ Lizzie said. ‘Me and Geoff only got took aboard because he’d been half drownded. Still an’ all, I’d like a chat with Clem. They go all the way across the Pennine hills to Leeds – imagine the adventures they must have, Sally! If ever Aunt Annie turned me out, or I lost my job, then I reckon I’d give a lot to work aboard a canal boat. Instead of just a street outside your front door, with the same cobbles and the same house opposite, you would see different fields and woods and waterways every day of your working life. I reckon that would be grand.’

Sally’s round and placid face took on a horrified expression at her friend’s words. She pushed her fingers through her chestnut curls, lifting them off her neck and exhaling in a deep sigh. ‘Lizzie Devlin, you’re mad!’ she said decidedly. ‘Cramped up in a tiny cabin, wi’ no room to swing a cat, no nice shops, no neighbours – and all that mud what they call earth surrounding you. If that’s what you’d rather have than a decent kitchen, with a proper fire which don’t tip about every time you take two steps, then you really are mad.’

‘You’ve got no spirit of adventure, that’s your trouble,’ Lizzie said. ‘I thought you said you’d like to see aboard
The Liverpool Rose
? If you despise it so much, what’s the point of a visit?’

‘I’d like to see inside a gypsy caravan, or a charcoal burner’s hut, but that doesn’t mean I’d fancy living in
either,’ Sally pointed out. ‘I want to know how the other half lives. Ain’t that natural, our Lizzie?’

‘You mean, you’re curious as a cat and want to be able to criticise,’ Lizzie said crossly. ‘Well you can’t . . . hey up, here they come.’