The Street and other stories (3 page)

“She never had her sorrows to seek. That’s what I say. She always had it hard, so she did, even when others were getting it easy.”

“Ach, I wouldn’t altogether agree with that, Maisie. Like, I’m the first to admit that she never got it aisy, but then who did?Who around here did? Answer me that?”

“Nobody did, but some got it harder than others, and Lily was one of them, so she was. Sure you know that yourself, Aggie. You saw the way she was brought up. Her poor mother didn’t get much help from oul’ Davy.”

“She couldn’t keep him out of the bloody pub!”

“And was that her fault? Was it? Aggie, sometimes you get on my wick! You’d think the rest of us married saints, so you would, to hear the way you talk. Let oul’ Davy rest in peace. He did more harm to himself than he did to anybody else, and even if he did spend a lot of time in the pub we know that he wasn’t on his own. There was always plenty there to keep him company, so there was. Drink was his problem all right, but one thing I’ll say for him: drunk or sober he never lifted his hand to her or the children. How many could say that about their man these days?”

“Maybe that’s what Lily needed. Spare the rod and spoil the child. That’s a true saying if ever there was one. No man ever has
the right to lift his hand to any woman, but a child needs to be taught wrong from right, so it does. I’m not saying anything about oul’ Davy or Missus Caldwell, God rest their souls. Or Lily either for that matter. I’m only making the point that there was no excuse for the way Lily got on when she was young. To look at her today you’d think she was somebody.”

“Ach, I wouldn’t say that.”

“That’s ’cos you don’t know the half of it. You were always too soft, so you were. You look back on things now and you see them all nice and rosy. Well, it wasn’t like that, Maisie, so it wasn’t, as you should know.”

“Nobody knows it better. Do you think I’m doting? I was here, Aggie, so I was. I could write a book about it. I don’t need to be told how tough things were. I’m trying to forget the hard times. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, if you went round all the time thinking of all the things wrong in this world you’d go mental. You want to be more positive, so you do. You need to get a good grip on yourself, Aggie love.”

“Ach, I’m all right, Maisie. It’s just that I met that Lily one down the town the day, so I did, and she walked right past me as if I wasn’t there.”

“Maybe she didn’t see you!”

“Oh she saw me, she did. Says I to her, ‘Hullo, Lily,’ and says she to me, ‘Hullo, Aggie,’ and that was it. Before I could get another word out she was gone. She had a wee grandson with her: he was in her arms. She nearly knocked me down to get by.”

“Well, maybe she had other things on her mind. There’s many a time I be walking about in a trance thinking or worrying about this, that or the other thing, and if the Angel Gabriel himself appeared to me I swear I wouldn’t take him under my notice. Maybe that’s the way Lily was.”

“That’s you all over, so it is. Making excuses again. You’ll never change, Maisie. Especially as far as Lily’s concerned.”

“Aggie, look, hang on a wee minute. You seem to have a bee in your bonnet over Lily Caldwell. Well, maybe I know a wee bit
more about Lily than most people, so if you houl’ on till I pour the two of us this wee mouthful of tea, I’ll soon give you the gist of why I’ve a bit of time for her.”

“You could tell me nothing I don’t already know, Maisie. The whole world knows she was fond of a bit of the other and that’s the height of it!”

“Is that right now, Aggie? That shows how much you know, so it does! Here, take this cup off me. I’m scalded, so I am. There … that’s better. Will you have a wee piece of cake? I’ve nothing in. You should have come next week. That’s my pension week; this is my bad week. Here, take a piece.”

“No, Maisie, no: I’ve to make me dinner when I get home. A cup in my hand is just lovely. Have you got your own?”

“Aye, Aggie, now where was I? Aye! You were wanting to know about Lily. Well, me and her were very close as you know. She was a few years older than me. She was working in the mill and we met through the camogie. I was still at school but we both got a wee job, so we did, working together at nights for a couple of hours in Mr Keenan’s sweetie shop.”

“Poor old Mr Keenan, now he was a proper gentleman. I remember…”

“Lily always got the boys. I recall one time saying to my mammy about, you know, Lily always getting the boys, and my mammy said to me not to worry, she wouldn’t have her sorrows to seek. Anyway, not long after that Lily got pregnant. She never told any of us, none of her friends or family. I didn’t know until she was about six months, and by then some of the women in the mill had advised her how to get rid of it. That’s what the story was anyway. I couldn’t tell you if it was true or not, Lily never talked about it. Anyway, she’s supposed to have taken things to make the baby come away. If she did it never worked. The baby was born: it was a wee girl—deformed so it was; it lived for about a month. Poor Lily never saw it.”

“Ach, I never knew that, Maisie.”

“I know, Aggie. You were away at the time. Do you remember?
You went off to Cushendall with our Aunt Sadie for the summer. You were too young anyway. Remember, there’s ten years between us. That mightn’t be much at our age now, but it’s a lot when you’re younger, so it is.”

“What age were you then?”

“I was about fifteen and Lily would have been about nineteen or twenty-odd. Everybody was talking about her at the time. All the boys at the corner arguing and saying it wasn’t theirs. That really annoyed me. Poor Lily. And all the fellas she was so crazy about: all they could think about was themselves.”

“Typical bloody men. They’re all the bloody same.”

“I still knocked round with Lily. Remember oul’ Missus Reid? She came around one day and told me mammy that she shouldn’t let me go around with Lily ’cos Lily had such a bad name. She was shown the door—nicely, of course. Me ma said that I was her rearing, not meaning any harm on Lily’s mammy, of course, and I could keep my own company. Like, me ma wouldn’t let you say a word about Lily. Lily was more often in our house than she was in her own.”

“Is it true that her mother used to follow her about the place?”

“Aye, but only because she was worrying for her. Me mammy says Lily had a wee want in her, a wee weakness, and her mother knew this. I think it got worse after she lost the child. I remember hearing her mammy and ours talking one day and her mammy was saying that when you lose a child like that you have a wee craving inside you for another one. When I asked me ma about it afterwards, she told me I’d understand when I got older.”

“Who was the father?”

“Nobody knows. Except Lily, of course. I heard years later it was a married man from Leeson Street. Lily’s mother always blamed poor Sean Dunne from one of the Rock streets. Sean was as innocent as a baby himself, but Lily’s mother gave him dog’s abuse. She never gave him the light of day, shouting at him in the street and this, that and the other thing.”

“I never heard of him.”

“Ach, you’d know his sister, Gonne. She married into the Quinns from Hawthorn Street.”

“Ah yes, I know who you mean. Gonne and me were in the same class together. She never mentioned a brother, Sean. There was Brendan and Hugh and…”

“Sean ended up going off to sea, so he did. He’s dead now, God rest him. He died in Norway or one of them places. Anyway, a year or so later Lily was pregnant again. Only this time she told everybody and her family and all of us helped her, so we did. The only thing was the fella she said was the one that done it: he said it wasn’t him.”

“Typical! Was he married too?”

“No, not at that time. I might as well tell you his name. It was big Sammy Mallon.”

“Big Sammy? Nora McCluskey’s man? Him?”

“Aye, he was a fly man in them days. All the girls were dying about him, so they were. Like, I don’t know what they saw in him. It was said if you spat in the street you were bound to hit one of his children. But he denied making Lily pregnant.”

“And did he?”

“Of course he did. Lily thought the sun rose and shone on him. She would have done anything to get him. Like I said before, she was a wee bit foolish that way. Sure he wasn’t fit to clean her arse. He was the road to no-town. He actually came round to see me, so he did; he was never short on cheek. He knew Lily and I were very close. He swore to me it wasn’t his child, that he hadn’t been seeing Lily for over four months. I told him that I had seen the two of them together on Halloween night, which is the night she conceived, and he got all flustered. He said it couldn’t a been him ’cos he was too big to go into her. Ha! The cheek of him!”

“Big Dick!”

“Aye. Or so he thought. I didn’t even know what he was talking about. Then he told me that he had an operation and he couldn’t have any children. I threw him out.”

“You did right.”

“That’s not the end of it. His mother went to see the priest and the priest sent for Lily. She went down on her own; she wouldn’t take anyone with her. I wanted to go but she wouldn’t let me. I met her when she came back and she was crying. She said the priest did everything but call her a hoor. He said it couldn’t be Sammy’s child, that Sammy came from a good family. Then he came out with all the oul’ shite about Sammy not being able to have children on account of the operation. Like, everybody knew it was Sammy. He had even been boasting about doing it before it turned out Lily was pregnant.”

“You couldn’t trust a man as far as you could throw him. That’s a true say…”

“Anyway, Lily had the child. A wee boy. A lovely child. You’d think big Sammy spat him out of his mouth, you would. He never ever acknowledged the child, not then, not now. He never acknowledged Lily either for that matter. That child fathered himself.”

“God bless him. The street reared the poor wee soul.”

“Sammy’s father, by the way, he always knew that Lily’s son was his grandchild. He wouldn’t have passed him. Sammy himself got married a couple of years later. Within eleven months his wife had a baby and another one a year after.”

“So much for his so-called operation.”

“Any excuse will do. Fifteen years later Sammy’s mother apologised to Lily. A bit late, but there you are. Lily just said, ‘That’s all right, Missus Mallon,’ as nice as ninepence.”

“She did right.”

“Anyway, Aggie, that’s the story of poor Lily. Now she’s a granny just like the two of us. And you know something: isn’t it sad after all this time that her past is still following her around, and her that never did harm to anyone?”

“And never a word about Sammy Mallon.”

“Or the married man from Leeson Street.”

“It’s a man’s world, Maisie.”

“Indeed it is, Aggie. That’s as good a reason as any why we
women have to be a wee bit soft with one another sometimes.”

“But not all the time, Maisie.”

“Indeed not. But I’ll always remember what our mother said to old Missus Reid that time she came round. ‘Never talk about anyone’s children,’ says she, ‘when you’re rearing children of your own.’

“Here, give me your cup and I’ll fill it up for you. You know a funny thing? Ever since her son was born, and that’s nearly forty years ago, Lily’s never been with another man. They used and abused her, and when they wouldn’t treat her right she just gave up on them and gave her life to her son. Now, all this time later, maybe she’s got what she always wanted—a bit of love and affection and dignity.”

“How would she get that now, Maisie?”

“From her grandson, Aggie, from her grandson. Everybody loves a granny, Aggie. Don’t they?”

Margaret became a rebel when she was fifty-three years old. She remembers exactly when it happened. It was 2 July 1970, at about half-past two in the afternoon. Up until then Margaret had been no more rebellious than anybody else. She was a cheerful, witty little woman with a family of five boys and four girls. Margaret’s husband, a tall, stern-looking man, didn’t get too involved with rearing the children. That’s not to say that he neglected his paternal duties; on the contrary, he was a dutiful father. But he was a father of the old school, Victorian to a degree in his attitudes, working hard always to keep his family fed and strict in the administration of discipline.

He had been a rebel once, in his younger days. Only Margaret knew if he retained any of that instinct or whether his paternal responsibilities had smothered it. It can be hard to be a rebel with so many mouths to feed and so many bodies to clothe. That was Margaret’s preoccupation also and ironically that’s what led indirectly to her becoming a rebel.

Margaret’s son Tommy was arrested on the night of 1 July and brought to Townhall Street RUC station for an overnight stay before a court appearance on a charge of riotous behaviour the following day.

Margaret received this news with some shock when Sean
Healy, one of Tommy’s friends, arrived breathless and excited at her front door with the tidings. She didn’t know what way to turn, and when her husband came in later she was relieved that he knew precisely what had to be done.

“Give me my dinner, Mother, please. First things first,” he told her a little testily when she greeted him with the dramatic news.

Later, as he settled himself in his chair by the fire, he delivered his judgement.

“That young Healy lad isn’t too reliable. I think you or one of the girls should go down to Mrs Sharpe’s and phone the barracks. That way we’ll know where we stand. And if it’s true, well then a night in the cells will do our Tommy no harm, Mother, so don’t be worrying. There’s nothing we can do about it tonight except phone.” He paused for a moment. “You’ll have to go to the courts in the morning if he is arrested and,” he reflected a moment, “we’ll probably need a solicitor. Bloody fool, our Tommy. Go on, mother, go down and find out what’s what, like a good woman.”

Margaret said nothing. She was glad to get out of the house. Teresa went with her to Mrs Sharpe’s.

“M’da’s a geg,” Teresa sniffed indignantly as they hurried along the street; “he sits there like Lord Muck giving his orders. You’re too soft, Ma.”

“Oh, don’t mind your father. That’s just his way. He’s as worried about our Tommy as we are. He just finds it hard to show his feelings. Here we are now. You phone for me, Teresa. I’ll go in the back with Mrs Sharpe. Okay, love?”

Later that night while the rest of the family were asleep, Margaret lay in bed beside the still form of her husband and sobbed a little into her pillow.

The following morning, with children and father dispatched to work and school, she and Mrs Sharpe made their way to the Petty Sessions. Neither of them had ever been in court before and they were unprepared for the babble of noise, the heavily armed RUC men and women, the multitudes of people and the crowded confusion in the large foyer of the court building. They stood timorously
until Mrs Sharpe noticed a section of the crowd milling around a noticeboard.

“Wait here, dear, till I see what that is,” she said.

Margaret watched anxiously as Mrs Sharpe disappeared into the noticeboard scrum. She reemerged victorious seconds later.

“Your Tommy’s in Court Number Three. Here it is here,” she pointed to one of the doors leading off from the foyer. They pushed their way between the heavy swinging doors and into the cool quietness of Court Number Three. There they sat silently for two and a half hours.

Then the court rose for lunch. There was no sign of Tommy. Margaret was beside herself with anxiety by this point. She and Mrs Sharpe edged their way out of the wooden pew from which they had watched an apparently endless procession of accused appear before the bench. A young man who seemed to have been representing most of them approached Mrs Sharpe.

“Are you Tommy Hatley’s mother?” he asked.

“No; that’s her there, son.”

“Mrs Hatley,” he shook hands with them both, “my name’s Oliver McLowry. I’m representing your son.”

“Is he all right, Mr McLowry? What happened to him? When will he be up?”

Mr McLowry took Margaret gently by the arm and led her and Mrs Sharpe out of the court and into the now almost deserted foyer.

“Don’t be worrying,” he told them, “Tommy is in good form. He’ll be up about two o’clock this afternoon. I’ll see if I can get him bail.”

By now the trio—Mr McLowry in his dark suit between the two middle-aged women in their brighter summer coats—were picking their way down the court steps and into Townhall Street.

“I’ve to rush back to the office for an appointment, ladies. You’ll get a tea or coffee over there in that pub. We’ll see how Tommy gets on this afternoon, and,” he handed Margaret his card, “here’s my office number. Phone me tomorrow and my secretary will make an
appointment for us to get together to discuss the case. Don’t be concerned if Tommy doesn’t get bail today. There were a lot of arrests last night and the DPP is opposing bail. Your Tommy has no previous record so he might just be one of the lucky ones.”

He smiled again. Margaret scarcely heard what he had been saying.

“When can I see our Tommy?” she asked.

“If he doesn’t get bail you’ll get a visit after he’s up. He’s all right, dear. Try not to worry. I must run now.”

He shook hands with them both again and hurried off towards Chichester Street. Margaret and Mrs Sharpe wandered down towards the pub at the corner. They didn’t go in: neither of them had been in a pub before. Instead they walked around to the back of the City Hall and had tea and sandwiches in the International Hotel. They barely had their bus fares left when they came out again.

“I’ll fix you up, Mrs Sharpe, later on,” Margaret promised. “It’s not fair on you spending all that money for such tiny wee sandwiches and not even a crust on them. I’ll fix you up as soon as we get home.”

“Oh, no, you won’t. You needn’t bother your barney fixing me up for nothing. That’s what neighbours are for. And anyway, sure didn’t I only pay for what I ate myself. Wait till I tell our ones about me and you swanking it in the International.”

Margaret chuckled. “Our Tommy’ll pay, so he will. It’s the least he can do for putting us to all this trouble. He’s lucky we let him off so lightly. Let’s go back round now and make sure to get our seats.”

Tommy was up at two o’clock. He looked pale and dishevelled as he stood alone and vulnerable in the dock. He smiled at his mother when Mr McLowry pleaded his case and he waved at Mrs Sharpe as the magistrate responded, and then he was led away again.

“What happened?” Margaret asked in disbelief.

“He got remanded for a week,” Mrs Sharpe told her.

“What? A week? What about his bail?” She looked helplessly towards Mr McLowry, but already he was engrossed in the affairs of another client.

“C’mon,” Mrs Sharpe comforted Margaret, “let’s get out of here.” She allowed herself to be led from the courtroom.

“We should go home now. The children will be home from school and you’re worn out. We can phone Mr McLowry’s office from my house later on,” Mrs Sharpe advised.

“I’m seeing our Tommy, Mrs Sharpe, so I am, before I go anywhere.” They were standing in the foyer. “Mr McLowry said I could see our Tommy after he was up, so that’s what I’m going to do. You go on home and I’ll call in on you when I get back. There’s no point the two of us waiting here.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course, I’m sure, so I am. Your children’ll be in. Just do one more wee thing for me. Nip in and tell our Teresa to put on the potatoes if I’m not back in time. And tell her there’s money behind the clock if she needs it; tell her to go easy on it, too,” she added. “And thank you, Mrs Sharpe. You’re one in a million.”

“No problem,” Mrs Sharpe replied. “Tell your Tommy I was asking after him. Tell him I’ll bake him an apple cake with a file in it. Cheerio, Margaret. I’m sorry I have to rush off and leave you here.”

“Catch yourself on. G’wan out of this with you. I’m going to ask your man the score about seeing our Tommy,” Margaret nodded towards a big RUC man standing near by.

“Good luck,” said Mrs Sharpe. “And don’t forget to tell Tommy I was asking for him.”

“That door down there, missus,” the RUC man told Margaret. “The sergeant in there’ll have information about prisoners.”

Margaret thanked him and made her way to the door marked Enquiries at the end of the foyer. She knocked on it a few times and when there was no reply she pushed it nervously to find herself in front of a counter in a small room. A bald-headed RUC man looked at her with indifference.

“I want to see my son, Tommy Hatley,” Margaret informed him. “I was told to come here to see the sergeant.”

“Well, I’m the sergeant, but whoever told you that doesn’t know what he’s talking about, missus,” he replied coldly.

“My son’s a prisoner here. He was just up in Court Three. He’s on remand. Mr McLowry’s his solicitor.”

Margaret fought down the panic rising in her stomach. The sergeant turned away from her.

“There’s no visits with prisoners here, missus.”

“I want to see my son, mister.” Margaret’s voice rose and to her own surprise and the sergeant’s annoyance she rapped the counter indignantly with her clenched fist.

“Missus, dear, I’ve told you: there’s no visits for prisoners here.”

“I have a right to see my son.” Margaret’s eyes welled up with tears.

“Missus,” the sergeant smiled at her, “you have no fucking rights. Now,” the smile switched off, “get out of my office before I arrest you as well.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Margaret replied.

“Is that right?” The sergeant’s smile returned again.

The sound of the door opening behind Margaret interrupted their verbal duel. It was the RUC man who had sent her to the office. He looked from Margaret to the sergeant.

“All right, Sarge?” he asked. “Your son’s up in the Crum’, missus,” he told Margaret. “C’mon.” He shepherded her out of the office.

“Don’t mind him,” he told her kindly, looking at his watch. “You’ll be too late for a visit today, but you should get one first thing in the morning.”

“He said I’ve no rights,” Margaret told him.

“Well, be that as it may, there’s no use us arguing about it,” he smiled at her.

“Thanks,” Margaret replied. “Thanks for your help.”

“No problem, missus.”

“By the way,” she asked as she walked away from him, “what’s the right time?”

“Just after half-two, missus.”

That’s how Margaret was able to remember more or less exactly when she became a rebel. Or maybe, as she would have put it herself, that was when she started to become a rebel. She doesn’t remember a lot about the rest of that day. The house was in bedlam when she got home, and although Teresa had done her best the younger ones were complaining and playing up. It was only after her husband got in from work and had his dinner and she told him all her news that she remembered she hadn’t had dinner herself. She didn’t tell him about the tea and sandwiches in the International Hotel. She was still feeling guilty about that when she went down to Mrs Sharpe’s after the children were safely in bed.

“Margaret, you’re wired up,” Mrs Sharpe chided her. “What men don’t know’ll do them no harm.”

The thought was a new one for Margaret. It was also an enjoyable one; it was like when she was a child playing a trick on grownups. She chuckled at Mrs Sharpe’s wisdom.

“Maybe you’re right, Mrs Sharpe.”

She went to Belfast Prison at Crumlin Road to see Tommy the following morning. He never got bail. Instead, a month later he received the mandatory six-months sentence for riotous behaviour. Margaret’s routine changed with this new development; now she had to make time for prison visits. She also missed Tommy’s wages. She didn’t tell her husband that, but he must have known because he gave her a little extra each week.

“For Tommy’s parcel,” he said, “and maybe he’ll want the odd book.”

He wanted lots of books. Margaret took to going to Smithfield market each week after her visit to pick through the secondhand bookshops for the novels and political tomes on Tommy’s list. She got into the habit also of having tea and a scone in the ITL café before heading for home again. That was a new luxury for
her as well. She got friendly with one of the booksellers, a woman of her own age called Mary. When Margaret eventually confided to her that the books were for her son in prison, Mary insisted she would send him some as well. She took payment for Margaret’s selection only when Margaret threatened not to return if she didn’t.

“Here,” she laughed, “take this one for yourself.”

“Ach, I never get time to read,” Margaret protested.

“Make time. Be kind to yourself,” Mary said in mock sternness. “You’ll get no thanks otherwise.”

That’s how Margaret started reading, in the ITL café over her weekly cup of tea and scone.

That night Teresa and her sisters heard their father’s voice raised in exasperation in the bedroom next to them.

“Woman, dear, are you never going to let me get to sleep? I don’t know what’s come over you!”

They listened intently for a reply. It didn’t come for a full minute.

“I just want you to promise not to call me ‘Mother’ again. I’m not your mother. I’m your wife.”

“Yes, dear.”

“Promise.”

“I promise, Margaret, I promise. Anything for peace and quiet.”

Teresa smiled to herself. She knew her mother was smiling also. “Good for you, ma,” she whispered.

“What’s wrong?” her younger sister asked.

“Nothing,” said Teresa proudly. “Our ma’s just become a woman’s libber.”

Margaret didn’t think of herself like that. She had two grownup children married and living away from home; the rest, the youngest of whom was ten, were all living together in a tiny house, they and their father all making demands on her and her time. But she took Mary’s advice and Mrs Sharpe’s, and started to make time for herself.