That Liverpool Girl (21 page)

‘Mam? Mam?’

Without. In the house, in the street, in her heart, she was without him. The space inside her body and soul felt bigger than the grave in which her beloved man had been placed. ‘Hello, love. Did you give Freda the pan?’

‘Yes.’

‘And the pillows?’

‘And the pillows.’

Only now did Eileen realize that she was weeping.

‘Have you remembered all of it, Mam?’

‘I think so. This is where we lived, Mel. This is where I had my babies and where I was when he died.’

‘You’ve let go,’ Mel said. ‘To let go, you had to remember all of it, not just the church bit. My dad was a lovely man, and you hid yourself away for safety’s sake so that you could carry on looking after us. I suppose it was quite sensible in its way.’

‘There’s nothing sensible about making myself go a bit mad. Now, on your bike and go to Miss Morrison’s. I’ll give the keys in, and see you later.’

‘Are you fit to be left?’

Eileen laughed. ‘It’s not me that’s unfit; the real daftness is next door. I have to go and do three rounds with Kitty, because Mam and Keith are coming for her on Monday or Tuesday. I don’t know whether she’s fed the kids. They were as black as sweeps the last time I saw them, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they got taken away from her. I mean, we’ve loads of poor people round here, but she’s in a class of her own when it comes to filth. I bet she’s sold all the funeral clothes. There’s nothing for her here, nothing for any of us. But will she listen?’

‘No,’ they both chorused.

Mel kissed her mother, wheeled her bike into the street, and left her old life behind. With her usual positive attitude, she looked forward, never back. School would be nearer, Mam was going to be safe, while the rest of her family lived beyond the reach of danger.

Eileen pulled herself together. It was time to go. Without another glance at her home, she walked out, locked the door on her past and put both keys in her bag. This was going to be the hardest bit, because Kitty’s decline had worsened since yesterday, when Mam had left for Bolton. Neighbours had been alerted so that the three young ones might be captured, fed, watered and cleaned, but Kitty was the biggest worry. If her mind had gone, Willows Edge would never cope, since they weren’t used to her dirty ways and knew nothing of her history. There was also the probability that, in unfamiliar territory, the woman would panic even more.

But there was no one in the house. The smell was unbelievably bad, and the movements of rodents could be heard even now, in daylight. ‘God help us,’ Eileen whispered. ‘But most of all, help poor Kitty.’

‘Are you sure you want me to drop you off here? You might need help with her if she digs her heels in.’ Keith stared at the front of a house whose windows had probably not been cleaned since the end of the Great War. The whole street was dark and dingy, but number four was spectacularly scruffy.

Nellie pondered for a few seconds. She studied the place in which she had lived and, after just three days away, found herself wondering how and why the slums were allowed to exist. ‘Right, put it this way, Keith. Most round here have become immune to her house and the state of it. For you, it’d be a shock, and you might catch something. Go and visit our Eileen, because you didn’t give her a definite time to expect you, and I’ll see you back here about three. The neighbours’ll help me round the kids up.’ Nellie paused again. ‘Go and see her, lad. She’ll be as pleased as Punch when you get there.’

‘Thanks.’

She touched his hand for a brief moment. ‘Good luck, love. She likes you. Only she’s been a bit distracted just lately what with one thing and another.’

Keith decided to dive in at the deep end. ‘By a Dr Tom?’

Nellie’s jaw dropped before she had the chance to control it. ‘How do you know about him?’ That bloody doctor got everywhere, or so it seemed. ‘He’s married with twins, and his wife deserves a bloody sight better than him by all accounts.’

He shrugged. ‘When she writes, I read the words she’s left out. Anyway, as you say, he’s married and I’m not.’ He sighed. ‘I know I’ve seen Eileen just once, and for a matter of minutes, but it was the same with Annie, and there’s been no one in between. I’m one of those blokes – it either happens, or it doesn’t. Usually, it doesn’t. I can tell from her letters she’s more than a pretty woman. So I fell headlong.’

She nodded sagely. ‘Yes. With my Eileen, it happened, whatever
it
turns out to be.’ She wasn’t surprised. Apart from her beauty, Eileen had a lovely nature when she wasn’t riled, and that nature shone in her eyes. ‘Are you sure?’

He chuckled. ‘Aye, and for the first time in over twenty years.’

‘Go and get her, then. I’ve three mucky kids and a crazy mother to find, God and the angels help me.’ She puffed out her cheeks and blew. ‘Oh, I don’t know whether I’m doing right. She’s not all there in her head no more, and Willows Edge might want rid. She doesn’t clean, doesn’t control her kids, can’t be bothered with anything. The last time she got excited was when she bought her new teeth. I mean, Charlie had been dead a week, and she was more bothered about her gob than she was about him and the funeral.’

‘Are you sure you don’t need me?’

‘When you get back to pick us up, I might find a use for you. Three o’clock, then.’ She laughed. ‘If you’re a few minutes late, I’ll understand. Love can’t be hurried.’

‘Stop mocking me, Nellie Kennedy.’

As she stepped out of the car, she blew a perfect, if rather loud, raspberry.

Keith left Nellie and drove off. He stopped at a barber’s on Scotland Road, had a second shave and a haircut, found a couple of little shops, bought a potted plant for Eileen and a little string of beads for Mel. He was a mere five or six miles from Crosby, but it would be a long drive, because he wanted to be with her
now
.

He travelled a route that ran parallel with the dock road, realizing how close Eileen’s ex-home was to ships and warehouses. Crosby, while further along the coast, was still next to the Mersey. She could be hit. But she would not leave Mel, and refused absolutely to interfere with the girl’s chances of a superior education. Had he been father to a similarly gifted child, he would probably have acted in the same way.

When he found St Michael’s Road, he was pleased to see that it was a good half-mile from the river, though that was no distance at all to an off-course plane with a load to drop before flying home on a teaspoon of fuel. But he had to be positive. She had made her decision, and she would stick to it. These were lovely houses, the sort that lay within reach of doctors, lawyers and business folk with old money and decent incomes. They hadn’t the potential grandeur of Willows, but they sat well beyond the pay packet of an ordinary working man.

He parked, stepped out of the car, then reached in for plant, beads and a brown paper parcel from the back seat. Eileen wouldn’t be offended, would she? She was too down to earth to take umbrage over a few small gifts. As instructed, he walked round to the back of the house and tapped on the kitchen door. Miss Morrison was ill, was downstairs, and she should not be disturbed by the front door bell.

When Eileen opened the door, he almost dropped her plant. ‘God,’ he muttered before he could check himself. ‘You’re more beautiful than I remembered.’

She just laughed. It was clear that she had grown used to such compliments, and she took all in her stride. ‘Come in,’ she said. ‘Miss Morrison’s having a nap, so I’ll put the kettle on and we can sit and chat. It’s good of you to bring Mam over. Oh, she said on the phone that Jay’s diabetic. That’s a shame. We all like him. He even made Miss Pickavance laugh.’ This was a far better man than Tom Bingley. There would always be Tom Bingleys, but men like Keith were rare. She liked Keith, and liking was important. And she desired him, which was strange, because most women were one-at-a-time people, but she decided not to think about any of that. Keith Greenhalgh was marriage material, while Tom Bingley was a balloon on a stick, bound to burst at some stage.

Like a man in a happy dream, he watched while she moved round her domain. She was elegant, graceful, lovely – too lovely to have come from the slum he had seen earlier. The stork had left a princess in a hovel, and she had thrived in spite of that. Her dress was in a material he thought was named creˆpe something-or-other, green, with a square neck and a single imitation teardrop pearl on a black cord at her throat. Her hair was up, and tempting tendrils caressed the nape of her neck. He imagined lifting those curls and kissing the hollow just below her hairline and above the cord that held the pearl. He wished he could afford a real pearl. Even a genuine one would be outshone by this wearer.

She turned suddenly. ‘Scone?’ she asked, trying hard not to laugh again. He was lovely. He reminded her of an overgrown teenage boy who was having trouble coping with the onslaught of puberty. ‘Keith?’ And he was better looking than she remembered. He was certainly more handsome than Dr Ants-in-his-Pants. In fact, he was not far short of bloody gorgeous.

Keith blinked. ‘What?’

‘Do you want a scone with strawberry jam?’

‘Er . . . yes. Please.’

‘Right.’

She brought food and tea on a tray and sat opposite him. ‘I’ve enjoyed your letters,’ she told him.

‘Me, too. I mean I enjoy yours.’

‘Good. How are my boys? The same? Worse? Better?’

Meeting her eyes was difficult, just as it had been all those years ago with Annie. But if he lowered his gaze, he would be staring at her body, and that might be considered bold—

‘Keith?’

‘Oh, yes. They’ve had a job to stop Bertie sleeping with Pedro. He’s learning to groom him, and I’m cobbling together bits and pieces of gear so that I can start teaching him to ride. I like him.’

Eileen smiled sweetly. ‘Don’t be fooled. He’s just a younger version of the other two. How are they?’ She asked again.

Keith swallowed a mouthful of scone; he must not speak with a full mouth. ‘Erm . . . a bit bored. We got them a bike each, because they’re not interested in horses. I made a bargain with them. As long as they behave themselves and if I’m free, they’ll get to the cinema every Saturday afternoon.’

‘And my mother?’

‘I shan’t be taking her to the pictures. She’s still all clever comments, but she gets on very well with Miss Pickavance, so she’ll be all right. She’s capturing Kitty and the wild ones down the road as we speak.’

‘Good.’

The conversation dried. Keith passed the plant and the beads across the table.

‘Lovely,’ she said. ‘You’re a kind man.’

He reached for the parcel. ‘I was . . . I mean after I’d seen about the bikes, I went . . . The boys were wandering about town and . . .’ He gave up trying to talk like an intelligent person and thrust the package across the table. ‘Cloth,’ he managed. ‘Bolton market. You can buy patterns and pin them on the cloth, then you cut round and make a dress.’

Eileen was having more trouble keeping her face straight. This man wasn’t frightening or threatening, but he was adorable. He was carrying on an old-fashioned courtship with letters, poetry and gifts. Pleasing to look at, he possessed an innocence that was rare in modern humankind. He had loved Annie, and Annie had died. Now he thought he had found someone else who fitted his idea of perfection. She opened the parcel. Inside, several yards of cloth had been folded carefully.

‘They were ends,’ he said. ‘Ends of rolls, so I just had to take what was there. That blue will suit you. And the green. They’re definitely fents, but I looked for flaws and couldn’t find any.’

‘Lovely,’ she said. ‘And I make my own patterns. The gold colour will be nice for Mel.’ He was rooting in his pockets. What on earth was he up to?

‘Matching thread,’ he announced, slamming at least a dozen reels on the table. Several rolled off, and they both got down on the floor to retrieve the escaping objects. For a brief second, they came face to face before Keith stood up in a hurry and banged his head on a corner of the table. He was becoming thoroughly annoyed with himself. Always a competent communicator, Keith Greenhalgh had suddenly been reduced to the mental age of three, give or take a year or two.

She was touching him. She was looking at his scalp to see if there was blood. Oh, hell, she was kissing his injury better. And she was lifting his face, and he wondered whether she was going to kiss him properly on the lips.

‘You’re not bleeding,’ she informed him. ‘I think you’ll live.’ And he made ten of Tom Wotsisname. Bingley.

‘Good.’ This single syllable emerged from the throat of a fourteen-year-old whose voice still sought its true level. Well, that was progress, because he’d been an infant just moments earlier. Her face was so dangerously near. ‘I think I love you,’ he said. Had he said it or had he thought it? She was smiling. He had said it, and he was a clown.

‘I know you think you do,’ she replied. ‘And I think I may think the same given time. You’re the best idiot I’ve come across in a while. I collect idiots. My mother was my first.’

He blinked.

‘You know what I mean, Keith. We’re good friends, you and I. That’s the best basis for everything, isn’t it?’

He wasn’t sure about that. Both times, he had fallen without thinking, and friendship hadn’t figured largely in the recipe during the early days. He’d wanted Annie, and now he wanted this one. But it was more than the bed stuff; it was sitting together in the evenings, having a meal, going to the pub, visiting friends, laughing, drinking tea and cursing the government. And it was looking at her, just looking and enjoying what he saw, living with perfection even when it wasn’t perfect, when face cream covered skin, when hair was in curlers, when she was too tired to be pretty. So friendship was necessary, he supposed. ‘I don’t want to be just your friend,’ he said carefully.