Orphan of Angel Street (52 page)

‘It’ll be a few minutes,’ Mercy said awkwardly, as she put it on to boil.

‘Of course,’ Grace smiled.

Mercy felt very strange. Exhausted and churned up. She had done her best to keep a barrier up between her own howling loneliness and this woman who had given her away. And she had failed, broken down completely. The story she had told of that filthy, leaking attic room she had inhabited, when all her life she had been used to the comforts of greater wealth, the anguish of the night of her birth as well as Grace’s undeniable grief had made her begin to understand. Both had been helpless, the mother as much as the child. They had drawn a step closer. But now the moment of most acute emotion had passed, it was hard for them to know how to talk to each other again. They were silent, looking at each other awkwardly, and then away. Both began speaking at once, then faltered.

‘No – you, please,’ Grace said.

‘It’s just – your father. Dorothy said he was very strict.’

Grace sighed. She stood holding on to the back of a chair. Mercy saw how smooth and well kept her hands were.

‘All my young life my father ruled everything. I suppose I let him. My mother did the same. Both of them are dead now. They were religious people in the worst sense – rigid, afraid . . . After – after I’d had you, I mean, because everything was different from then on – he made me marry Neville, my husband. He thought Neville shared his views . . .’ She gave a harsh laugh. ‘Well, there was a mistake. The one and only thing they had in common was that they were both bullies. But those were my alternatives at the time: destitution or Neville. Father said he’d cast me out if I didn’t marry him. I’d disgraced myself; now I had to do precisely as I was told. D’you know, at the time it didn’t seem to matter. I felt as if my life was over in any case.’ She sighed. ‘My agony was in having given you up. Perhaps when I had you I could have found some home for fallen women like myself. Even kept you. But the only choice I could see then was to get back into the safety of home or perish, alone and starving.’

She stopped talking. Mercy looked guardedly at her.

‘It’s all right, dear – but I’ve been talking so much that I’ve barely even heard your voice.’

‘But you know about me.’ Her tone was still accusing. ‘You’ve been watching me all my life. What I want to know is: who is my father? If your life was so sheltered, how did it happen?’

She blushed at her own bluntness and saw the colour flame in Grace’s cheeks as well. The kettle murmured loudly in the background.

‘Oh—’ She sank down at the table again with a long sigh. ‘Of course you want to know. I was such a foolish, ignorant girl. Romantic, but with not the first idea . . .’ She broke off for a moment and without looking directly at Mercy said, ‘Was James Adair – forceful with you?’

The burning in Mercy’s cheeks heightened until she thought she might catch fire.

‘Dorothy told you that as well. Of course – Dorothy tells you everything. Like what sort of clothes I should wear so you could go out and decide for me. Buy me the clothes I should have.’

‘Oh no – I didn’t buy them! How could I have done? I have no money of my own. No, they were passed on – from friends who had girls. I made up charitable causes and so on that I was giving them to. I didn’t choose them.’

Mercy digested this. Grace seemed to have had as little choice in her life as she had had herself.

‘No,’ she said eventually. ‘He wasn’t exactly – didn’t knock me about. Not the first time. But he forced me all the same. I was afraid of what he’d do if I didn’t . . . I didn’t know what he’d do, or what I should do. Then he came back another night and he was rough, pushed me down, made me . . .’ Once more she started to cry. She no longer seemed to have a guard on her emotions. The kettle gushed out steam behind her and she turned, hiding her face as she brewed the tea.

Grace had been drinking in her words, the sound of her soft voice. She was conscious of the gulf between their experiences, yet in this one, very fundamental one, they were the same: each being alone in the world with a child.

‘I’m so, so sorry Mercy. If I’d had any idea he might behave so appallingly I wouldn’t have dreamed of suggesting you go there. It astonishes me that he’s of such weak character. He seems so . . . upright.’

‘I know,’ Mercy said, turning. ‘That’s why I couldn’t believe it, even while it was happening.’ She brought Grace her tea. ‘Please – tell me about my father.’

‘Oh dear.’ Grace sighed again. ‘I was in love with your father. I was young – well, not so young, of course – and very naive and innocent. I have only one younger sister, Ruth, so there was no one to show me the way. Our mother was a true Victorian. Never breathed a word about the physical aspects of life. Your father wasn’t of our – of my – class . . .’ She fiddled with the spoon in her saucer, abashed. What was Mercy’s class, after all?

‘He came to our house as a gardener and handyman. His name was Daniel. Danny. He was so beautiful. Dark brown, curly hair, brown eyes, a smile which just lit up his face. And he was ambitious. He wanted to move on – didn’t want to stay in service and I used to encourage him. He liked to talk to me – we were much of an age. I fell in love with him.’ She gave a sharp, ironic laugh. Mercy watched her with absolute attention. ‘Helpless with it. I’d have done anything for him. Anything he asked. After some time we became lovers. You might ask how, since I was so ignorant of the meaning of it. But it was such a gradual thing. He had a little room at the back of the house. It wasn’t difficult to be alone. He led me, little by little, not forcing, so that when we were – united – for the first time I hardly knew how I’d reached this point, but I knew it was something I couldn’t undo. That it was wrong, morally. Yet I felt so safe with him. We learned together and the pleasure of it grew. It was exciting, illicit.’ Mercy heard her tone soften as she spoke of it. ‘We were like children really. I didn’t even know that was how babies came.’

Her tone grew desolate and she looked across at Mercy. ‘Of course in the end I fell pregnant and it all came out. My father dismissed him at once. I hoped he’d wait for me, that I could escape – we’d marry and have our child. He left Birmingham soon after. He wrote, before I’d even given birth to you, telling me he was going to America. To start afresh.’

Mercy thought how many people connected with her had crossed that ocean.

‘He did go. He succeeded in that. Two years after he arrived he was killed. An accident on the railway. We never heard exactly what. Another man he’d teamed up with wrote and told us. Just a note, no more.’

Mercy looked perplexed. ‘Told your father?’

Grace was about to say something, but checked herself, seemed to be looking at Mercy with a new kind of dread. She spoke very carefully, watching Mercy’s face.

‘No, not my father, Mercy. When Danny came to work in our house he came to join his sister. His name was Daniel Finch.’

Mercy seemed to stop breathing for a moment.

‘Yes, my dear. Dorothy is your aunt.’

She leant across the table and dared to take Mercy’s spare hand in her own. Mercy didn’t resist.

‘You have hands like his.’ She looked searchingly into Mercy’s eyes. ‘He was a good man, your father. He didn’t love me as I loved him, but he had a lot of love in him. He and Dorothy came from a terribly unhappy family and they looked after each other.’

For a second she raised Mercy’s hand and brushed it against her lips before releasing her.

‘Dorothy – my aunt . . .?’ Mercy was still dazed. ‘So that’s why – that’s what kept her with you.’

‘Dorothy would have stayed with me anyway. She came to us when she was fourteen. She loves me and I her,’ Grace said matter of factly. ‘But we shared these extra bonds – Danny, and you. We had you, from a distance. She was absolutely distraught when that Mabel Gaskin took you. She’d been ill, you see – you remember, perhaps? We were at our wits’ end and Dorothy felt it was her fault. We’d hoped to get you adopted by a good family so you could have had a proper life and been better cared for.

‘When Dorothy found you at Mabel’s and we saw how it was, your attachment to Susan, we thought the only thing to do was wait until you were old enough to go to work and then we could help find you something worthwhile and safe. Oh, those years were terrible. Seeing you suffering with that woman, so poor and ill-treated! You have no idea how much time we spent talking about how we could change things and help you without Neville suspecting. By then I had the boys to consider . . . Your brothers.’

She stopped, seeing again how deep in shock Mercy was. The trembling had started again and she was very pale.

Mercy felt as if a landslide was happening inside her, everything tumbling, splintering, tilting, the person she had always thought herself to be torn apart. And yet, she knew a sudden, slow-awakening joy.

‘My brothers,’ she whispered. ‘My mother . . . my aunt . . . Oh my God!’ Her eyes were stretched wide. ‘Oh, I can’t take it all in.’

Suddenly she found Grace was kneeling close in front of her on the hard floor, her head bowed.

‘Mercy – all I ask is that you’ll let me see you sometimes and get to know you as I should. And one day – one day – I hope you’ll be able to understand a little and begin to forgive me.’

Mercy couldn’t speak. Very slowly she stood up. Grace looked up at her and Mercy held out her hand to help her to her feet. They stood facing each other, close in height, their hair precisely the same bright gold, both trembling. There was a second’s hesitation, then Mercy held out her arms, sobbing as Grace embraced her tightly, her face washed with tears of love and relief.

‘I’ve got a mom!’ Mercy cried over and over. Her voice was broken, childlike. ‘Oh, I’ve got a mom!’

‘You have, my darling one.’ Grace stroked her hair, held her close, trying to soothe her. ‘You’ve always had a mother, and she’s always loved you.’

This made Mercy sob even harder.

They stood for a few moments, the mother comforting her daughter, the daughter the mother. They could start, very gradually, to weave together the threads of all their lost years. It was a beginning.

For someone who’d been married before and was now in any case living in sin, Mabel was surprisingly girlish and mithered the morning of the wedding.

She went down to the public baths on the Moseley Road and treated herself to a good soak before Mercy and Mary helped her into her wedding garb: a calf-length skirt and flared jacket which she belted tightly at the waist, all in navy pinstripe. Under the jacket she wore a cream blouse and rounded it off with navy shoes with straps, and a straw boater to which Mary pinned a posy of yellow roses.

‘Look at me,’ she said, holding out her arms as Mary tightened the belt round her. ‘I’m all of a quiver! I’ll never get through this blooming service, I’m a bag of nerves!’

‘You look very nice,’ Mary told her. ‘Doesn’t she, Mercy?’

‘Yes,’ Mercy agreed generously. ‘You really do, Mabel. You should stop fretting.’

Mabel did in fact look splendid. The suit flattered her broad, curvaceous figure and the deep blue set off her dark colouring. Her hair was coiled low on her neck, and she looked a handsome, mature woman, despite sounding much more like a sixteen-year-old.

Mary was also spruce in a pale blue frock. She had lost her gauntness now her children were older and her face had taken on a rounder, almost sweet look.

‘You look lovely too, Mercy,’ she said wistfully. ‘But then you always do.’

Mercy was wearing her white dress with the sailor-suit collar. It was mid-calf length and loose at the front. She’d plaited her hair and twisted it into a simple knot at the back, leaving a few soft, wispy curls round her face, which had more colour back in it now she was over her morning sickness. She helped Rosalie into her pink bridesmaid’s dress.

‘It’s lovely!’ Rosalie twirled round. ‘Oh, thank you, Mabel! It’s the prettiest frock I’ve ever had!’

‘You deserve it,’ Mabel said indulgently. ‘You’ve been a real good kid, what with yer mother and all that’s happened.’

Everyone made noises of agreement.

Food was laid out under a muslin cloth on the table and Alf emerged from the pantry where he had been getting himself scrubbed up over the sink. His best suit was a tight fit on him now.

‘It’ll have to do, though,’ he said, patting his stomach. ‘One thing about you, wench, you can at least cook.’

‘Cheeky bleeder!’ she retorted. ‘I’ve got a bit more know-how than that, I should ’ope!’ and she gave him a suggestive wink.

Mercy wrapped a bit of sacking over her dress to keep it clean and heated the kettle. She watched Alf combing his hair in his shirtsleeves, intently turning his head this way and that in front of the little mirror, looking like an anxious young lad on his first date. Mercy smiled wistfully at the sight of him. He and Mabel would be happy enough together. At least something good could come out of all the tragedy of the past years.

The women were to leave in half an hour, Alf going on a bit earlier.

‘Here – a cuppa to keep you going,’ she said when it was ready.

‘Oh, ta,’ he said as if she’d offered him a large slug of whisky. ‘I could do with that, I can tell yer.’

She sat sipping her tea, hoping the little fruit cake she’d baked would be all right and the bread wouldn’t curl and wanting everything to go well for them. The baby was kicking now, more and more. She could feel its insistent flutter. But she was still a very tidy size. In the loose dress no one who didn’t know could have guessed.

She looked round at the others’ faces, all quiet and solemn as the moment approached. The thing to do now, she thought, is to go on. Try and put away the past. I’ve got a future and it starts today. With a surge of excitement she reminded herself for the umpteenth time that she had family coming to the wedding. Real family. Grace had asked humbly whether she might be at the service.

‘I shan’t impose any more on your hospitality,’ she’d said to Mabel on Sunday before she left. ‘I’d just like to be there with Mercy – well, and you.’ Grace had tried to swallow all rancour she felt towards Mabel. ‘You brought her up, after all.’