That Liverpool Girl (16 page)

Mel stretched out on her bed after doing battle with the subjunctive mood in French. She had won, but small victories were suddenly meaningless, because all was far from well on the home front. There’d been an enormous, earth-shaking fight, but Mel had no idea of its subject. She didn’t need to know, yet she wanted all to be well before the imminent parting of ways. ‘It would be ghastly,’ she told the ceiling.

Gran, having disappeared for several hours a few days ago, had returned with bruised knuckles and a visibly altered attitude. Since then, a cloud had settled over Rachel Street. It was heavy, black, and it promised to deliver a storm of enormous proportions, since Mam and Gran seemed unwilling to negotiate a peace treaty.

Mel dared not interfere directly. Born with an innate sense of when to speak and when to hold her tongue, she had the intelligence to stay out of this. Whoever stepped into the field of battle would only make matters worse. Such an intruder might also get burned by the temperature in the arena. Homer’s
Iliad
screamed for attention, but Mel had bigger and British fish to fry. She had to make something happen while remaining outwardly detached.

The whole neighbourhood was affected. Gran was doing a lot of hmmphing and Mam was walking about with a face like a bad knee, as Gran might have termed it had she been using language. Everyone was due to move in a couple of days, and it would be sad if the two adults in the family parted on bad terms, especially during a war. Not that there’d been many signs of conflict thus far, but men in uniform were marching and driving through Liverpool in their hundreds. This quiet time could not last for much—

Ah. The front door slammed. Mam didn’t make such a noise, even when in a bad mood, so Mel identified the incomer as Gran. Minutes later, her mother came home. Latin could wait, Mel decided. She would visit her brothers and Miss Pickavance, as nothing would happen here unless all potential referees and linesmen had left the field of play. She jumped up, ran downstairs and called out her intention to visit number one.

When Mel entered the house across the street, Miss Pickavance asked a question by raising an eyebrow, and Mel shook her head sadly. There was no progress. Everything was changing: Philip, Rob and Bertie sat at the table doing homework; that, in itself, was a rarity to be treasured. The quiet, gentle woman who was meting out their punishment had proved that she was a force to be reckoned with. Her deep disappointment was far more effective than a stroke from a cane or a cuff round the ear.

Hilda led Mel into her kitchen. ‘It can’t go on,’ she mouthed.

Mel nodded. ‘It won’t,’ she answered in a whisper. ‘Otherwise I’ll knock their heads together.’

They drank tea while the boys giggled in the next room. Mel hoped that Mam hadn’t gone straight upstairs. She slept in the boys’ room now, leaving Gran the luxury of a mattress all her own in the downstairs front room. ‘Fingers crossed,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ agreed Hilda. ‘May good sense prevail.’

‘Keep your voice down,’ Eileen ordered. ‘Kitty next door’s had enough trouble lately without having to listen to you roaring like a bull at a locked gate.’

The older woman attempted to rein herself in. Her daughter was on the route to perdition, and Nellie was trying to set up a roadblock. ‘He’s married,’ she hissed. ‘You know damned well he’s a married man, because Mel’s his Gloria’s best friend. How can you even think of such a thing? You’re supposed to confess sins of thought, you know.’

‘Can you not play a different tune?’ Eileen folded her arms and tapped an angry toe against the floor. ‘You walk in there and try to take his eye out – did you know he had to be checked for a broken cheekbone? As for putting out the Dockers’ Word . . . I despair. He should sue you.’

Nellie dropped into a chair. ‘You’ve seen him,’ she accused. ‘You’ve met him while you were supposed to be at work.’

‘Course I have. Somebody had to apologize for your behaviour. I saw him the day after you hit him, if you must know. His face was all the colours of the rainbow, and he’d been at the hospital after you punched him.’

Nellie shrugged. ‘At least I told you what I’d done. And he daren’t bloody sue, because it would all come out. As for you, I am ashamed to death. Sleeping with a man who’s a father, a husband and a doctor? What about when you get pregnant, eh? Don’t come running to me with a bastard on board. Then there’s Mel. Do you think nobody’ll notice? You’ll stop her being top of the class, I can tell you that for no money.’ She paused for effect. ‘So you’ve made your mind up to ruin your little girl’s life. Give yourself a pat on the back.’

Eileen inhaled deeply. ‘I will, Mam. Because when I went to see him, I said sorry for what you’d done, and I told him he’d get nowhere with me. What I object to is you trying to be in charge of a thirty-three-year-old woman. I shouldn’t have told you I had any sort of feelings for him. We’ve always been able to talk, you and me. It seems as if I can’t ever tell you anything again.’

Nellie’s lip quivered. ‘Don’t say that, girl. You’re my world. You’re everything to me, Eileen. I just want to keep you safe.’

‘I know. But I promise you here and now that I’ll do nothing to hurt our Mel.’ She paused. ‘And I know well enough that I could come to love a man . . . perhaps a sensible one like Keith Greenhalgh. I’m not a fool, you know. I just have a lonely body. And Keith is very, very special. I had a dream about him last night. It was . . . lively.’ But she mustn’t make the hurry-up mistake, mustn’t develop war fever . . .

When Mel returned from her unscheduled visit, she heard them both weeping. As prearranged, she bounded up the stairs, went into the front room, removed the blackout screen and held a lighted candle near the window. That was the signal for which Miss Pickavance would be waiting. The storm had passed and the air was clearer. It was Germany’s turn now.

The swelling had subsided somewhat, but Tom still looked as if he had gone several rounds with a champion boxer. Mrs Kennedy packed a fair punch, and she was hefty in the verbal department, too. How she had managed to produce a daughter as elegant and dainty as Eileen beggared belief. Even Eileen’s accent had improved, and her tendency to abuse English grammar seemed to be disappearing fast. But she was backing off, was becoming determined to concentrate on Mel, who was her sole reason for remaining in Liverpool. He wanted her more than ever. The war had enlivened her sexuality, and he was prepared to serve her in any way she might require.

He looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. A black eye did not sit well on the face of a doctor, whose prime concern was supposed to be the physical integrity of his patients. The official explanation was that he had argued with a door and had come off second best, but he’d seen a few glances that spoke of disbelief.

The door opened. ‘Will you be long?’ Marie asked.

He continued to look in the mirror, though his gaze now travelled past his own image and settled on her. She looked different. There was tousled, carefree and newly styled hair, and a rosy glow on her cheeks. ‘You look well,’ he remarked. The war seemed to be suiting women, then.

Marie nodded, backed out, and closed the door. She crept into the spare bedroom and perched on the edge of a narrow, single bed. He must not be encouraged to find her attractive. She was having a wonderful time, and he was not going to be allowed to spoil it. The business she chose to name rape was now a thing of the past, and she intended to keep it that way. Tom and his pot of petroleum jelly could stay in the master bedroom, thanks very much, because she neither needed nor wanted more children, as she had done her duty by delivering two for the price of one. He wouldn’t come in here. He was too proud a man to chase her in order to have his way.

But . . . Norman had arrived in her life. Norman carried the keys to the church hall in which Marie’s WVS people met several days a week. He was a good Christian man, a widower whose offspring had flown the nest, and he treated Marie with a deference to which she was becoming happily accustomed. Norman had beautiful hands, and he played the piano. He was over fifty, wealthy enough after selling a string of chemist shops, and he was clearly attracted to Marie. For the first time in her life, she felt something that was no stranger to desire. When he touched her arm, she shivered, and her nice, middle-class core prayed that no one noticed.

Marie Bingley now knew that she had never completely loved her husband. The marriage had been a sensible liaison encouraged by both families, since the Bingleys had a clever son but little money, while Marie’s family had given her a dowry sufficient to house their daughter, her gifted husband and the children when they arrived. Tom had been paid to marry a girl who was moneyed, but not pretty. However, she was prettier these days, and the man in the bathroom had noticed that.

Marie had no idea what was happening to her. All she knew was that a day without Norman was cold and empty, that his smile fed her, that his quiet playing on the piano while ‘his’ ladies knitted, chatted and drank tea was soothing and pleasurable. He was of the old school, had been raised by elders who taught him to treat females with near-reverence, and to run the family business sensibly and with the welfare of customers at the forefront of his mind. Norman liked her, enjoyed talking to her about his time in the army, his war, the shops he had supervised.

She heard Tom going downstairs. After claiming the bathroom, Marie soaked in water perfumed by crumbled bath cubes, washed her hair and prepared to deliver a lecture on first aid. Her ladies would be involved in battle once the bombs came and, as the wife of a doctor, Marie was deferred to when medical matters surfaced. She was in charge, and Norman had kindly helped her in the preparation of the lecture.

It wasn’t love, she reassured herself. It was a decent man treating a woman properly. Nevertheless, before leaving the house, she applied to her mouth a discreet shade of lipstick. There was nothing wrong with trying to look her best, was there?

The two rooms were beautiful. Eileen touched an eiderdown, pleased beyond measure when she felt its smooth, silky cover. Her room was mainly green, while Mel’s was in several shades of pink. They each had a wardrobe, a tallboy and a chest of drawers. Eileen’s electric reading lamp had a tasselled shade, as did Mel’s in the other room. Mel also had a real desk with a roll-back top and sections for all her work. There was a bookcase, too, and a good chair on which she would sit to do her homework. After Rachel Street, this was a palace.

Eileen checked the blackout screens, making sure that she understood the mechanisms that held them in place behind the pretty curtains. When both screens were back under the beds, Eileen began to clean the bathroom. Miss Morrison was downstairs enjoying a bowl of home-made soup. The old lady seemed content and a great deal less worried now that she knew she would not be alone throughout the war. Then, just as she was rinsing the washbasin, Eileen heard his voice. ‘How are you today, Miss Morrison?’

She shuddered. There was nowhere to run, and there would never be anywhere to run while she lived in this house. The owner had a heart condition, and was his patient. Mel and Eileen would both be here, and the man downstairs was a bold, needful creature. His idea of courtship was roaming hands and battling tongues. She wanted him, couldn’t lie to herself about that, but all the same he was a creature to be avoided, and avoidance was not an option now. The thought of hiding in a wardrobe allowed her a humorous moment, yet she didn’t even smile. He was here, and he had come for her rather than for Miss Morrison.

When he entered the bathroom, Eileen continued to polish taps. He closed the door, and within seconds his hands were round her waist and travelling north. ‘I told the old dear I’d take you home in the car,’ he whispered.

She turned in his arms. ‘Do you want a matching pair?’ she asked. ‘And I mean black eyes, not my breasts. I nearly lost the love of my mother because of you.’ Desire and anger were a difficult combination. She wanted to kill him, needed to kiss him, and was as confused as a blind man in a maze. But she had known this before, had battled with and beaten several desirable men who had tried to wear her Lazzer’s shoes since his death. Tom Bingley was just another toy she didn’t need.

‘Then learn not to confide in her,’ he suggested.

‘I may confide in the woman downstairs,’ she threatened. ‘And she’s one of the few who can afford to pay your medical bills. She likes Dr Ryan. Dr Ryan’s been here when you’ve been unavailable, and women prefer a female doctor. Miss Morrison wouldn’t approve of your behaviour.’

Tom stepped back. ‘I like a feisty female,’ he said. ‘Though I could take or leave Ryan, I have to say. But you smell of tomorrow, my darling. A magic urchin, you are. So I can’t give you a lift home?’

‘No.’

He stood near the door. ‘This Dockers’ Word,’ he began.

‘Stands indefinitely,’ Eileen snapped. ‘They’ve had to stick together, because the ones who got work had to help the poor buggers that didn’t get chosen. They’re close-knit, welded and bolted together like steel girders. You make a move on me, and they’ll have you.’

‘Bollocks,’ he answered through a smile.

‘They have those, too,’ Eileen advised him. ‘They’re not likely to be afraid of a doctor with a black eye and a toothbrush sticking out of his ear.’

‘Toothbrush?’

She held the weapon aloft. ‘It’s all right, this is an old one, so I won’t be wasting much. I use it to clean round taps. Which ear would you like me to choose? I noticed you have two of them.’