September Starlings (24 page)

‘No.’

Her eyes were narrowed, seemed to spit out little sparks of kindling as she heated up her temper. She spread one of her hands on the table, leaned forward, curled the fingers into talons that scratched the white linen. ‘Sometimes, I don’t know what will become of you, girl. This defiant attitude is too much. John – deal with her.’ She marched
out of the room and slammed all the doors between ground and first floors, started stamping about in her dressing room. Even from the back of the house, we could hear the heavy footfalls.

Dad looked at me for a long time. ‘You are your own worst enemy, Laurie.’

‘She’d have hit me except for you being here. She’s always hitting me. Remember when she cut my face with her ring and I had to stay at home till it healed? Well—’

‘Laurie, she’s an impatient woman and you must try not to anger her. She’s your mother. My mother and father were not always easy people, but I respected them, tried to please them. You must make an effort.’

‘She’s never pleased. I keep winning prizes for my stories, but she takes no notice. And when I make her a cup of tea, it’s too strong or too weak or too hot. How can I please her?’

He dropped his head. ‘It’s not easy. Just do as she asks, go to your room and sit quietly.’

Sometimes, I couldn’t seem to get through to anyone. I had the feeling that he understood, that he loved me and wanted me happy, yet communicating with him wasn’t easy. I walked out of the room and up the stairs, threw myself on the bed like a ham actress in a poor melodrama. Dad loved me and was too busy; Mother didn’t love me or anyone else. The person she really cared about lived in a mirror and I was terribly lonely, mistreated, underprivileged and sick to the back teeth of everything.

I heard him walking up the stairs, listened as the bedroom door clicked, crept out to the landing in the hope that I might hear something to my advantage.

‘Don’t push Methodism down her gullet,’ he said. ‘If you do, it will make her as sick as any finger down her throat. Methodism’s all well and good for some, but it can be a bit grim, and grim isn’t everybody’s cup of tea.’

‘Would you prefer Catholicism?’ She said the last word
in a silly voice, as if trying to convey her continuing contempt for the Church of Rome.

‘No. I don’t want any religion forced on her. She’s just a child, and children don’t need to sit and hear about hell and damnation. It’s obscene, making her stay there while the man roars about doom. Leave Laurie out of it.’

‘Laura,’ she said automatically. A chair scraped, then there was silence.

Back in my room, I lay on the bed and counted books on the shelf. I had twenty-seven complete books, two torn ones and about ten copies of the
Beano
. The
Beanos
were hidden under two shoeboxes in my wardrobe, as Mother did not approve of modern comics. Modern comics, she often said, corrupted young minds. Yet she bought the
News of the World
in spite of my father’s misgivings. In Catholic homes, the
News of the World
was only seen second-hand, covered in grease and vinegar.

My father used to read to me sometimes, but now I was left to my own devices, was old enough to read by myself. No-one cared, no-one worried about my terrible loneliness. If Anne had lived a few streets away, I might have seen her at the weekends, but sneaking next door was difficult. Mother had a habit of turning up at the oddest times, had even been known to come out of chapel before the service ended. This was because she had discovered a new illness called migraine. Migraine meant four Aspros, a darkened room and a wet flannel over her eyes.

It was boring in the bedroom, because I had not chosen to be there. On many occasions, I spent a whole afternoon in my room, crayoning, reading, writing bits of stories. But being forcibly constrained was a different matter altogether. I heard Mother slamming out to go to service, then I walked to my window, watched Dad pottering half-heartedly about the garden. He didn’t care. So I pulled on my older blazer, emptied my piggy bank, left the house. No-one would miss me.

Running away is all well and good in the heat of the
moment, but the details tend to crowd into your mind after a half-mile walk. Like not having enough money, being without company, clean knickers, food. Names of places jump into your mind, London, Blackpool, Manchester, but there is no way of working out how to reach any of those destinations. And I worried a bit about somewhere to sleep, though the day was only ten hours old.

Bolton is a big place, particularly huge for a child who has not been allowed to wander. I saw many liberated children who had been permitted to discover their own town. Some were free enough to wear clogs on a Sunday, one or two sported nit-caps under which they would be shaven, possibly still bald. They played rough games, threw each other against walls, spat on pavements, made sparks with iron-shod soles. Oh, they sounded so happy, so free. They looked down on me, saw me as a lesser being. In my blue gingham print dress, navy blazer, hair ribbons, shiny leather shoes, I must have looked like something from a different world.

I passed the fire station, turned left into Deansgate, found an alley. It had rained during the night, so getting dirty was not difficult. I smeared blazer and dress with mud, rubbed grey water on my face, on my shoes, dried my fingers on socks that had recently been snowy white. When I emerged, I peeped in a shop window just past the post office. My hair was too tidy. The ribbons went into a pocket and I left the braids to untangle themselves. Now, I might begin to belong.

‘She’s mad,’ announced someone behind me.

I spun round, held my breath for a moment.

‘What the bloody ’ell are you doin’?’

It was the group of children I had seen earlier near the entrance to Queens Park. ‘Nothing,’ I replied.

‘Daft,’ said one.

‘Double daft,’ giggled another.

They spread themselves out, surrounded me in a semicircle from which there was no escape, as there was a wall
to my rear. For a few seconds, a shaft of pure panic darted through my breast, but then I comforted myself with the knowledge that these were children. It had been my experience thus far that while the ones to watch had two legs and no feathers, they were usually fully grown when they became dangerous.

‘Is that an ’Oly Mary blazer?’ asked the nearest girl.

‘Yes, it’s a St Mary’s blazer.’

A boy laughed, doubled himself in two with the pain of his merriment. ‘’Ey, listen to ’er. Dun’t she talk posh, eh?’

They all agreed, including the pair of girls with nit-caps. They were twins, carbon copies of each other. ‘Can me an’ our Enid ’ave yer ribbons?’ asked one of them.

A large and noisy boy, obviously the leader of this motley crew, guffawed crudely, displaying an array of teeth that were greenish and broken. ‘What d’ yer want ribbons fer, Irene? Are yer goin’ t’ fasten ’em round t’ cat’s neck? Yer’ve no ’air.’

The two girls went pink. Each put a hand to her head, then a finger on the lower lip. It was as if some choreographer had trained them in the art of synchronized movement, though they seemed to need no prompt, no glances from one to another to assess the state of play. Feeling sorry for them, feeling anxious to belong, I gave them the lengths of blue satin. ‘They’re a bit creased,’ I said timidly. ‘But they’ll be all right ironed. And your hair will grow back again, Enid.’

‘I’m Irene, she’s Enid.’ They each stuffed one of my best ribbons up a knicker leg. ‘’Ave yer got owt else?’

I lifted my chin, worked hard to dredge up a bit of courage. ‘Yes, I’ve got some money, but if you want it, then you’ll have to do something for me.’

The boss stepped forward, spoke through the chewed mush of a mouthful of liquorice root. ‘I’m in charge ’ere, Miss Muffet. What dust tha want?’

My imagination shot into top gear. Running away did not seem to be a wonderful idea. I would have to go home
at some stage, because people like these could scarcely care for themselves, let alone for someone who had hardly stepped out of the house on her own. But there was time for an adventure. There’d be trouble at home no matter what time I returned, so I might as well take the chance for a bit of excitement. ‘Take me to a Catholic church,’ I ordered. ‘That stone one near Trinity Street Bridge.’ My father was a Catholic, used to be a Catholic. I’d been forced to attend Mother’s stupid services, so I would take a look at Dad’s religion.

‘Are you a bloody baby?’ This tall, ungainly boy had carrotty hair and some gaps in rotted teeth, was old enough for the adult incisors to have been knocked out of him. ‘What’s t’ matter? Can’t yer find yer own road round t’ corner?’

Three or four non-speaking extras drifted away, one of them finding his tongue to mutter briefly that he wasn’t going near any churches as he intended to play ‘footie’ in the park. So now there were the four of us, Enid and Irene, the Boss and myself. I fixed narrowed eyes on him. ‘Listen, you,’ I said carefully. ‘I can’t help it if I’ve never been allowed out of the house.’ My inventiveness was working overtime. I dropped my voice, glanced left and right. ‘I’m in trouble,’ I said, amazing myself with the sense of mystery I was managing to inject.

His green eyes flickered with interest, though he was fighting to suppress it. ‘Oh aye? Go on, then. Tell us all about it.’

My hands folded themselves, were still not as dirty as his in spite of my encounter with the mud. My companions’ dirt was very professional, had eaten into their skins, was an inherent part of their construction. They had probably been born dirty, and might well remain in that state for the rest of their natural lives. They were alive, exciting, so much more vibrant than I would ever be. So I needed to make it all up, needed to become vaguely interesting at the very least. ‘I was stolen as a baby,’ I announced in a whisper. ‘And you mustn’t tell anyone,
ever. My parents were Catholics, that’s all I know, and they went to St Patrick’s, near the station. They lock me in my room, the people who stole me. And I climbed out this morning, came down a drainpipe.’

‘Must ’ave bin a bloody clean drainpipe,’ remarked Ginger acidly.

‘Everything is clean where I come from. They make me eat with a napkin and wash my hands seventeen times a day.’

‘Bloody ’ell,’ he said. ‘An’ there’s me wi’ no bath fer more than a fortnit.’

The twins, slower than Ginger, but endowed with female intuition, looked at me with suspicion. ‘They must let yer out fer school. ‘Ow d’ yer get ter school if yer locked in all t’ time? Down t’ drainpipes?’

A pertinent question, I thought. ‘They guard me. Somebody watches outside the school gate.’

The red-headed chairman of this bedraggled committee took up the debate. ‘An’ wot yer doin’ at a Catholic school? Is them wot pinched yer Catholics an’ all?’

‘No.’ I used the necessary pause to step closer to Number One, pushing my brain into a canter as I crept towards him. He smelled. Of things I had no way of identifying, but the odour was warm, though unclean. ‘It was all in my grandfather’s will with the money. I had to go to St Mary’s, it was written down on rolled-up paper in front of a judge. The paper’s in their wardrobe at home, tied up with ribbon at the bottom of a box. With the jewels and the money.’

I could see that this was getting a bit complicated for the gang of four. They were four again, because a thin boy had crept back and listened to my last statement. ‘No footie,’ he said sadly. ‘No ball. Bloody park keeper took t’ ball again. ’Im an’ them rotten flowerth.’

The leader awarded the new arrival a glance of sympathy. ‘We could sue ’im fer all t’ balls ’e’s took. I might get me dad fer t’ drop in on ’im, give ’im a good ’idin’. Anyroad, we’ve got fer t’ ’elp this ’ere ’Oly Mary.
’Er dun’t know where t’ look for ’er real mam an’ dad.’

The second boy, whose most noticeable feature was protruding teeth, said nothing at all at this point. The twins were round-eyed with amazement. Somewhere in the deep recesses of their poverty-sharpened wits, they must have seen the holes in my story, yet they had not the vocabulary to express their doubts. ‘I’ve got one and eightpence,’ I said. ‘Take me to the church so that I can look for my true mother.’ I would have to be careful. Although Anne was the dramatic one, I was overacting and might spoil the fun if I went too far with this off-the-cuff drama. ‘You can get ice-creams with it.’ Their stomachs were probably their first concern. ‘With raspberry on from Manfredi’s cart.’

For a sum of 1s 8d, they would have flown me to the moon and back. But when we reached St Patrick’s, my new-found protagonists would not abandon me, even after I had handed over the money. The gang leader had decided to become concerned about me, and kept expressing the intention to ‘do right by ’er’. Really, he wanted to be important, the hero of the piece, the magician who would create a happy ending to my transparent tale of woe. Or perhaps he just wanted the last laugh, the chance to call my bluff.

We went in. There was a man at the back with a collection plate. His jaw dropped when the five of us trailed in, but he managed, only just, to save the dish from clattering to the floor. The big lad bobbed down and up again before entering the pew, so the rest of us imitated him. The buck-toothed boy made a disastrous stab at this, ended up prone in the aisle till one of the twins clouted him and heaved him onto the bench.

After about three or four minutes, other occupants of our section began to move, slowly and decorously, out of our line of fire. The smell of my companions was strong, yet it comforted me, and I felt a degree of indignation when members of the congregation edged away from us. They were soft. This was the aroma of life – nothing
to be ashamed of. To my untrained nose, the gang’s odour was fascinating. I did not know that my friends teemed with life of the lowest order, that their garments and hair were sublet to tenants whose stay would be indefinite.

There was another man at the front, a priest. He stood at the top of some steps and wore a long frock with a green sleeveless cape over it. The language he spoke was not English, and I suspected that this was the Latin in the missals at school. Four boys were with him, and they wore long black frocks and white shirts with lace borders. These boys did all the answers in Latin. Everybody sounded bored with the whole thing, especially the priest.