Felicia's Journey (18 page)

‘It’s good of you to say it,’ her benefactor replies when she stumbles through an apology for going off. ‘Like I say, dear, no offence was taken.’

There is a generosity in his voice, a warmth that cheers her up.

Mr Hilditch is careful. He brings up the subject of crouching in the back of the car by explaining that it’s necessary because the wrong complexion might be placed on the presence of a young girl in his company so soon after the death. ‘Sorry about that,’ he apologizes
when they are clear of the immediate neighbourhood, adding that he wouldn’t want Ada’s memory insulted by talk. He draws into a lay-by so that she can join him in the front.

‘So you’ve been around?’ he prompts, and hears more about the religious house while they drive, and then about two down-and-outs, one of whom seemingly sends birthday cards to bishops. There’s a man who’s endeavouring to rid himself of the nuisance of a sitting tenant, and a bag woman who wheels her belongings about in a pram. Soft in the head, the one with the birthday cards sounds.

‘You meet a rough crowd when you’re out and about,’ is the only comment he allows himself. ‘I’d take good care if I were you. Well, you know to your cost.’

They call in at a Happy Eater on the way to the fish bar, which is a good thirty miles further off; then at the Dog and Grape, where he took Beth a few times. He chooses the saloon bar because he remembers the public bar has a juke-box. A middle-aged couple glance their way once or twice, but a foursome with a poodle are too engrossed in the jokes one of the men is telling to pay any attention. ‘7-Up’, she asks for and he has the same himself, with a packet of crisps. When a lull occurs in the conversation he says:

‘A Malaway, Ada was. Ada Daphne Malaway, Daphne after her mother. A manufacturing family. Ball-bearings for the heavy-vehicle industry.’

She sits there, glancing about her for the face she’s after, not drinking her 7-Up.

‘We often looked back to our wedding day, Ada and myself, in later days. Walking beneath the drawn swords, and then of course we cut the cake with a sword. All sorts of comradely traditions there are at a regimental wedding – champagne drunk from a regimental helmet, fellow officers embracing the bride. Nothing untoward, of course.’

With a friendly nod, Mr Hilditch acknowledges the presence of the middle-aged couple when he goes to the bar for another packet of crisps. The woman looks away, the man just stares. Pointless remaining here, Mr Hilditch reflects, and stuffs the crisps into a pocket, to nibble in the car.

‘The Blue Light’s our best bet,’ he confidently predicts as they drive off. He has taken them all to the Blue Light at one time or another, it being their kind of place, Gaye’s particularly. He doesn’t care for it himself, even though the chips are good. On the rough side in his opinion, which is borne out as soon as they enter, when a crowd of rowdies begin sniggering.

‘No?’ he murmurs when she looks about in a way that had been eager in the places they went to earlier, but now is jaded. ‘No go, dear?’

She shakes her head. She listens to the voices around her, and says in a defeated voice that they aren’t Irish.

‘Happen the Irish lads’ll come in later. Give it twenty minutes, would we?’ He pushes his way to the counter to order plaice and chips. When he returns to her she has found a seat in a booth. She tells him she doesn’t want anything to eat, and he says she should take in some nourishment because of her condition. It’s a disappointment for her, of course: he understands that, he says.

‘Bear with me a minute, Felicia, while I put in a quick call to check out the state of play. Only it’s occurred to me there’s a bloke I know who employs Irish labour – manager of a smelting works about a mile off. Won’t take me a jiffy to get the info about where the lads go of an evening if they’ve changed from coming here.’

He stands about in the Gents for a minute or two, not long enough to allow his food to become cold. When he gets back to their booth two of the rowdies are trying to pick her up.

‘Can I be of assistance to you?’ He smiles at them agreeably, but immediately they become abusive, then go away. He guessed that if he left her on her own they would approach her, giving him the opportunity to make it clear what’s what.

‘No dice,’ he reports. ‘Out for the evening seemingly.’

The rowdies are leaving now, and only a few couples occupy the booths. A slatternly girl is sweeping the floor.

‘Tell me more about yourself, Felicia.’

He prompts her, asking questions to cheer her up: about her home life, if pets are kept, the friends she has and if any of them knows where she is. She shakes her head: she told no one, she asserts again, and repeats that if her father has gone to the police
and they question the boyfriend’s mother she’ll probably mislead them as to his whereabouts. A picture of this woman has begun to form vividly in Mr Hilditch’s imagination, but he doesn’t want to think about her now. When the moment is suitable he says:

‘I hope it’s not a presumption on my part, Felicia, but have you considered your condition at all?’

He has raised his voice a little. The slatternly girl is quite close to them now, obviously interested.

‘It’s lovely news, of course,’ he says, and then lowers his voice again. ‘I’m only thinking, Felicia, that no matter what the outcome of tracking Johnny down is you don’t want to let yourself get caught. Don’t let it go too far was always the advice Ada gave, and my own as well. Enough to say you lost it, a form of words that is, covers a multitude. You understand me, Felicia?’

‘Yes.’

‘It’s beggars and choosers, Felicia. I know what you mean when you say you’d want to talk to Johnny first. You and myself would both rather that and of course we’ll try for it, but it isn’t looking like an option at the moment.’

She doesn’t appear to be listening. There’s a faraway look about her, as if his inquiries about her home life have drawn her back into it. He rouses her with a practicality.

‘Would you care for something, dear?’

She asks for tea. He smears ketchup on the last of his chips before he rises to fetch it for her. They remember him behind the counter, of that he’s certain. They know him by sight even though it’s a long time since he last was in, even though they didn’t greet him and never have. They remember him because of the girls, one girl and then another, and now a new one, who’s in the family way. A little tick of pleasure begins in him somewhere as he carries the plastic cartons back to the booth.

Her head is turned away and he knows there are tears. Another thing, he puts it to her, is that if they don’t locate Johnny and she goes back home the way she is now, it’ll definitely be too late when Johnny turns up there himself. And it stands to reason he will, being in the habit of regularly visiting the disagreeable mother.

‘What I’m saying is, you’d be in Johnny’s better books if you weren’t wheeling out an infant he didn’t know a thing about. I could be wrong, dear, but there you are.’

‘I don’t want to do a thing like that.’ A sound like a sob comes from her and he moves around the table so that he’s sitting beside her. He puts an arm around her shoulder, and she begins a long palaver about visiting some woman in a farmhouse who apparently had intimacy with her brother.

‘Wipe your eyes, dear.’

Before he knew Sharon she’d got rid of three little errors in that department. She mentioned the place she went to the third time, paid for by the manager of a dry cleaner’s. Scared out of his wits, Sharon said. The Gishford Clinic, up Sheffield way. Posh, Sharon said.

‘Sorry.’ The present girl blows her nose on a tissue she has been twisting between her fingers. People are definitely noticing now, a man and a woman waiting for chips at the counter, a girl and a youth in a booth across the aisle.

‘Don’t say anything, Felicia. Don’t try to speak until you’re recovered.’ Mr Hilditch’s small hands grasp one of hers, and out of the corner of his eye he can see that the couple in the booth and the couple at the counter are still noticing. There’s been a lover’s tiff is the assumption in their expressions, a little misunderstanding that is now being put right.

‘Drink up that tea while it’s warm. The good’s in the warmth, they say. No, I only mention it because the night I came in and told Ada I found you wandering she said, “I wonder if she’s in the family way?” A woman can tell, you know, even at a remove. Whereas I had no idea myself, although I’d actually been in your company. The thing is, a doctor’s obliged to fix you up over here if you request it in the early stages. On the other hand, if it’s left too late you’re shown the door.’

‘A lot come over for it.’

‘Of course they do.’

A new excitement possesses Mr Hilditch. He remembers Sharon saying she was beyond the limit, twenty-nine or thirty weeks gone, the time the dry cleaner took her to the Gishford. It always has to
be private, he remembers she said, if there’s anything dodgy. Sheffield’s easily far enough away.

‘The only thing is,’ he says, ‘I think I’m right in stating that if there’s any irregularity you can be going back and forth to a local surgery till the cows come home. Anyone who hasn’t paid the health contributions. Anyone who’s an alien. You could be hanging about for weeks.’

‘What?’

She hasn’t been listening. He half closes his eyes, seeing himself with her in the Gishford, as Sharon has described it. He sees them in a waiting-room, a clear implication established by his presence beside her. Carried away for a moment, Mr Hilditch breathes heavily, then calms himself.

‘You cut the red tape if you go private, is what I’m saying to you.’

‘I don’t know what to do without a chance to talk to Johnny.’ It’s Johnny’s baby, too: she repeats that twice, her voice raised. She repeats that she doesn’t know what to do.

The images in Mr Hilditch’s imagination recede. The emotion his passing reference to her condition has engendered alarms him. People are noticing now all right, but the pleasure of that is tinged with the fear that he has been clumsy, that again she is slipping away. When she quietens he says:

‘It’s only that Ada mentioned it before she went, but you’re right; it’s best left for now. We won’t refer to it again. I’m sorry about the Irish boys not being in tonight. The trouble is they’re never more than passing trade. A spot of trouble one night and they find somewhere else. Sorry about that, dear.’

‘It’s not your fault.’

He hopes she’ll continue, but she doesn’t.

‘You’re downcast, dear?’

‘A bit.’

‘You’re looking chipper, as a matter of fact. If it’s any consolation.’

She doesn’t reply.

‘I’ll get the girl in the office to make her inquiries first thing in the morning, and then we’ll see where we are. How’s that look?’

‘She won’t find him.’

‘If anyone can find your friend that girl can. I promise you that, Felicia.’

When the fish bar closes they move on, and only call in once more, at a Little Chef that surprisingly is still open. Later they stop in the lay-by they stopped in before.

‘I hope it’s not uncomfy.’ He doesn’t know if his solicitude reaches her through the rug he has suggested she should drape over her face when she has crouched down in the back again. He has recommended the rug because of the street lights. ‘It’s great the way you understand about that,’ he adds, again endeavouring to induce cheerfulness.

When the car comes to a halt on the gravel outside Number Three he repeats that the girl in the office will get cracking first thing. She’ll ring round every possibility she can lay her hands on; she’ll get through to the personnel departments at the different works the way a private inquirer wouldn’t be able to; she’ll give the name John Lysaght, with a detailed description. As he said when he first mentioned the matter, she’ll check out the electoral register and any other listings she can find.

‘By eveningtime we’ll know the score. We’ll have Master Johnny in our sights.’

‘Will I come back to find out from you?’ From the way she says it – the tiredness in her voice – she is clearly already convinced, in spite of everything he has just said, that he won’t have news for her. What’s on her mind is the money she came to borrow.

‘Any time after dark. Maybe about six?’ He raises a hand to his mouth to stifle a yawn that does not develop. Then, as casually as he can manage: ‘You’ll find somewhere for tonight, will you?’

‘I’ll try for that house again. Mr Caunce’s.’

‘Take care in a place like that, Felicia.’

‘Yes, I will.’

Her carrier bags are in the hall, where she left them by the hallstand. He watches her endeavouring to find the words to raise the matter of the money, but she’s too shy to return to the subject. It’s natural enough, since touching a total stranger for anything up to fifty pounds is a delicate undertaking. He wonders about mentioning
the money himself, just to keep her interested, but decides against that.

‘All right in the toilet department before you set off?’ he inquires instead, casually also.