Reach for Tomorrow (10 page)
‘Oh, Flora.’ Again Rosie was laughing, but then her face straightened as she said, ‘He wants to start courting me.’
‘I bet he does, he’s not daft, but you can do a sight better than Shane. By, even scraggy Aggie would be coming down a peg or two to walk out with him.’
Rosie grinned at the thought of the Sunderland fishwife who was notorious both for her loose living and vulgar tongue, but the laughter died as she said, ‘He frightens me, Flora. Oh, I’d never let him see it, I’ve more up top than to let him think he’s got the upper hand, but there’s something about him . . .’
‘And I dare bet his mam has told him where you live?’
‘I suppose so.’ And then Rosie flapped her hand almost irritably as she added, ‘Anyway, he’d be bound to find out sometime, wouldn’t he, and I’m blowed if he’s going to make me hide away as though I’ve done something wrong.’
‘Aye.’ Flora nodded. ‘Still, he can’t do nothing if you keep saying no, and he’ll get fed up in the end.’ It was said with little conviction and Rosie didn’t answer. She didn’t want to waste the little time she had left with Flora before her tram came talking about Shane McLinnie. She didn’t even want to think about him.
In the murky light from the street lamps the two of them continued to slip and slide their way along, clutching hold of each other now and again as one of them nearly fell and all the time talking. They passed a group of children about a game of mount the cuddie. Their cry of ‘mountiekittie, mountiekittie, one, two, three,’ at the player stumbling about with another child on his back followed Rosie and Flora down the street, and all but two of the little ones had no coats despite the bitter night.
It was as they passed the Dog and Rabbit on the corner that Rosie noticed the two little lads, who couldn’t have been more than five or six, sitting huddled in the doorway of the pub, their bare feet blue with cold and encased in old holey boots that were falling apart. They looked frozen to death.
‘You all right, hinnies?’ Rosie stopped to stare down at the children as Flora continued to walk by. ‘Shouldn’t you be getting yourselves away home?’ she asked quietly when they didn’t reply.
‘Me mam said we gotta wait for our da.’ One of the boys, who was all eyes and teeth, jerked his head backwards towards the pub and even from two feet away Rosie could see the lice in his hair. ‘He got his pay the night. We can’t go home without him.’
‘Poor little mites.’ As the two girls walked on Rosie shook her head pityingly. ‘What chance have they got, Flora?’
‘Same as most round these parts,’ came the stolid reply.
Rosie stopped abruptly, turning round and looking back at the public house with the flaking, creaking sign showing a snarling dog and a timid-looking rabbit above the doorway. She couldn’t see the children now but she could picture them in her mind’s eye huddled on the top of the cold stone steps with their thin little arms tightly round each other, in an effort to combat the raw chill with a measure of human warmth and comfort. Was it any wonder that bairns still died like flies round here? she asked herself bitterly. Why, only yesterday Hannah had come home from school half hysterical and Molly had informed them that little Millie Ross, who was just six years old, had had a heart attack in the middle of morning prayers and died. She had been ill with measles before, Molly had told them importantly when Rosie and her mother had questioned the children, and she’d only come back to school that morning, but she’d been all trembly and white in the playground and snivelling all the time. And now another child was dead, due to a lethal combination of lack of medical care, lack of food and - in Millie’s case - lack of that most basic ingredient for a child’s wellbeing, love.
‘My bairns will have better than this.’ Rosie turned to face Flora who was looking at her questioningly. ‘By, they will, Flora.’
‘Then you’d better set your sights on one of the gentry, eh?’ Flora nudged her none too gently in the ribs and almost sent Rosie skidding off the pavement and into the road. ‘Lucky that they’re ten a penny hereabouts.’
‘Oh aye, queuing at the door every night,’ Rosie agreed, nodding solemnly at Flora and entering into the spirit of the exchange. ‘Miss Rosie Ferry?’ She struck a flamboyant pose in the manner she imagined a prospective suitor might, which brought a hoot of laughter from Flora. ‘May I beg your company at the ball tonight?’
‘Beg, eh? Ooo, la-de-da.’ Flora was giggling helplessly now.
‘What? You’re just on your way out to the theatre?’ Rosie’s voice managed to express deep regret and obsequious civility. ‘Then me poor heart is broken, Miss Ferry. May I enquire who the bounder is who’s stolen your affection? Lord--? Oh aye, I know him, and he’s not worthy to lick your boots, me dear.’
She eyed Flora with her head tilted slightly to one side for all the world as though she was listening to another voice. ‘What? You want to present your friend, Miss Flora Thomas? Enchanted, I’m sure. I’ve heard of the lady’s charm and elegance, of course.’
Rosie bowed low in front of Flora, who, in an effort to curtsey, found her feet flying up in the air as she slipped on the icy pavement with a loud squeal. She landed, legs outstretched and her arms supporting her, and let out a bellow of a laugh, and Rosie, her arms round her middle as she leant back against the wall, joined her, their breath white clouds in the freezing night air.
Oh, she was glad Flora was home, she was. Things were always brighter when Flora was around. And they would get through this, her mam and the bairns and her. They had enough money to last them for the next week or two if she was careful, even though the suite and her mam’s big brass bed hadn’t fetched a quarter of what she knew they were worth. And she would find work of some kind to keep a roof over their heads even if it killed her.
And Davey? The thought of the tall good-looking miner with his eyes of rusty green and wide smile made her heart skip a beat. Yes, and she’d sort that too somehow. She
couldn’t
let him go.
couldn’t
let him go.
Rosie found that vehement resolution was put to the test one night some three weeks later when she answered a knock at the front door when Zachariah was out.
‘Davey.’ Her warm smile of greeting dimmed when his face remained straight. She hadn’t seen him at all in the last month and although she had tried to tell herself it was because he was busy, with his mam’s passing and all, she had missed him terribly. And then the rush of euphoria at seeing him died away completely as he refused her invitation to come upstairs to the sitting room, his manner verging on the abrupt.
He had given up the rent on his mam’s house starting the next day, he informed her gruffly as they stood in Zachariah’s narrow hall, and he didn’t see any point in remaining around Sunderland after that. He wasn’t going back down the pit, that was finished, and with work of any kind being so hard to come by he thought he might try his hand at signing on with a ship. He wanted to travel a bit, see foreign parts, broaden his horizons.
‘I . . . I’ll miss you. There must be some work hereabouts you could find? Perhaps you could try at working on the land for a time like you and Sam always wanted?’ It was as far as she dared go and even then Rosie felt she was being forward, all the worries which had tormented her since that morning in the kitchen five weeks ago crowding in with renewed vigour.
She had put him off in some way, she’d told herself a hundred times, as she had lain wide awake while the other three had slept. Or he had changed his mind about her and what he wanted, now he was free of all ties and could do what he liked. With things the way they were it wouldn’t be just her he was taking on, certainly not initially, and what young man of his age wanted to be lumbered with a ready-made family? Or there might have been someone else who had taken his fancy. He was a good-looking lad and now his mam was gone it would be an added inducement to some of the girls hereabouts to land such a catch. Or . . . And so it had gone on, night after night.
Certainly since that morning in the kitchen he hadn’t been the same, it was all tied up with that. And she hadn’t imagined the way he had looked at her then, the promise his eyes had made that was in itself a declaration of intent. And up until that morning he had been so tender with her, so caring; but now that was all gone and she felt the loss like a physical pain. But she wasn’t going to beg. Whatever, she wouldn’t do that. He had to want her as much as she wanted him.
‘Aye, I’ll probably try me hand at farming somewhere or other, but there are other places than Sunderland.’
‘Yes, I suppose so, but wouldn’t it make sense to be close to friends and family - your brothers and sisters - for a while with your mam going and all?’
Davey shrugged broad shoulders, his brown eyes with their deep flecks of green hard on her for some moments before he said, his voice flat, ‘How’s the McLinnies these days? You have much to do with them now you’re livin’ on the south side?’
‘The McLinnies?’ It was all she could manage in response.
‘Aye, the McLinnies.’
‘No. No . . . not really.’ Rosie could feel her cheeks beginning to burn and she stumbled over her words as she said, ‘Of course with Mrs McLinnie being a good friend of my mam’s she doesn’t want to lose touch, especially after all that’s happened. My mam feels lonely a lot of the time which is only natural I suppose.’
‘Aye.’ Davey’s gaze narrowed on the eyes that always made him think of black velvet. So she wasn’t going to come clean about Shane McLinnie? ‘I had a chat with Shane the other day that made up me mind about movin’ away.’ He kept his voice steady and non-committal but it took some effort.
‘Shane?’
But he had noticed the little start she gave at the name. ‘Perhaps he mentioned it?’ She must have wondered how Shane came by his black eye if nothing else, Davey thought, flexing the knuckles of his right hand which were still bruised and sore.
When he had sought Shane out four nights before it had been with the express purpose of finding out exactly how things were between the other man and Rosie, but when he’d found him in one of the rougher pubs down by the docks, the big steelworker had been cocky and full of himself. That in itself wasn’t anything unusual, but Shane McLinnie’s boasting about what he and Rosie had been up to had made Davey see red and the fight had been savage and furious. Had that bit of scum been carrying on with her even before Sam was killed, like he’d said? Davey asked himself now as he stared into Rosie’s flushed face. A few weeks ago he would have bet his life she was as pure as the driven snow, but not any more. Damn it all, he had
seen
them, hadn’t he. ‘Begging for it,’ McLinnie had said, before Davey had pushed the words down his foul throat.
seen
them, hadn’t he. ‘Begging for it,’ McLinnie had said, before Davey had pushed the words down his foul throat.
‘Why should Shane McLinnie tell me anything?’ Rosie’s face was about to burst into flames. But he couldn’t know, not about that, could he? Even Shane would know better than to brag about what he had tried to do that night in the snow with Davey being such a close friend of Sam’s, and anyway, unpleasant though it had been, nothing had happened, not really. ‘I . . . I hardly ever see him.’
‘Right.’ Davey’s thick brows came together and they stared at each other for a second or two in silence. Rosie wanted to lift her hand and cup his cheek, to place her lips on his, to ask him - beg him - to stay, but she was mute. His life was his own and he had every right to do with it as he willed, but she could scarcely believe this was happening. This wasn’t the Davey she had known all her life, the gentle, kind lad with dancing eyes and a tender smile. This was someone quite different.
‘I’ll be gettin’ off home then.’ Davey’s voice was gruff. ‘I just wanted to let you know me plans, that was all, with you bein’ Sam’s sister. I’m away in the mornin’ all bein’ well.’
Sam’s sister?
She was just Sam’s sister.
She was just Sam’s sister.
Rosie nodded slowly and she made no further appeal for him to stay although her stomach was sick as she bade him a stilted farewell on the doorstep. She continued to watch him as he marched off down the street and right until he turned the corner and was lost from view she half expected him to turn and wave, to pause and look back at her, to retrace his footsteps -
something
.
something
.
But then he was gone, and it seemed as though someone had extinguished a light deep inside her and all the world had turned grey.
Chapter Five
‘You’re goin’ after a job at the
Store
you say?’
Store
you say?’
‘Yes.’ Rosie’s voice was slightly defensive as she faced her mother before she turned abruptly to her two wide-eyed sisters whose ears were flapping as normal, and added, her voice sharper, ‘Come on, you two, you’ll be late for school again. Go and get your boots on, there’s good lassies. And you, Hannah, finish your bread and dripping while you’re about it.’
‘You’ll never get it.’ Jessie sniffed disparagingly.
‘Ta for the encouragement.’
‘Well, I mean - the Store. Everyone’s after a job there, you know they are.’
Everyone except her mother. Rosie kept the thought to herself but the frustration was biting deep. There was no reason at all why her mother couldn’t do
something
, even if it was work at home like carding linen buttons or sewing hooks and eyes, but she didn’t seem to realize that the little money they had left wasn’t going to last for ever.
something
, even if it was work at home like carding linen buttons or sewing hooks and eyes, but she didn’t seem to realize that the little money they had left wasn’t going to last for ever.
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