With Love From Ma Maguire (70 page)

‘She came to say goodbye to old Sarah. I was there. When I heard her talking about London, I knew she’d already made up her mind. Oh, I could have come to you and told you, but what would that have achieved? She’d have found a way, Molly. So I did what I could, put her with decent people in a good house with clean sheets. And that’s all.’

Considerably deflated, Molly picked up the glass and drained it before sinking back into the chair. ‘I called you a bastard on Wednesday morning. If I could have got my hands on you then, I’d have strangled you.’

‘And now?’

‘Oh, your luck’s in now. I just feel numb.’

‘The port will warm you.’

‘It’s not that kind of numb. It’s like after Joey, like I’ve lost something precious, a thing I can’t replace. She’ll change, you see. When she comes back, she’ll be different. And I’ll have missed part of her growing up. Like I’ve missed my Joey. And by Christ, have I missed him!’

He squeezed hard on the glass until it threatened to shatter. This was one area in which he would forever remain a coward. As long as he lived, he would never tell Molly who had finished Joey’s life. Fenner was dead, murdered by some unnamed gangster. But if Molly knew . . . No! It wasn’t his fault. Time and time again he had gone over this. All he had done was to leave a will in a locked drawer. There was no need for Molly to hear the story, no need for her to be hurt even more. Or for himself to suffer further . . .

‘What are you thinking about?’ she was asking now.

‘Joey.’

She nodded sadly. ‘Aye. All that for an empty till, eh? And they never caught them. So that’s your son out of the picture. Just Janet now. And how long will she last with Jerries dropping tons every day? Happen it’ll finish up with Cyril after all.’

‘She’ll come back, love. I know she will.’ He reached across to refill her glass.

Molly gazed past him and through the small window. He was right about the port. It made her feel mellower, kinder. ‘We could have been friends, you and me. If we hadn’t had kids between us, I reckon we might have even liked one another. Remember your mam? Remember all the laughs we had?’

‘I remember.’

‘And Mrs Amelia with all her pretty frocks and Mrs Alice trying to look as nice. She never managed it, did she?’

‘You should see her now! A face like parchment and a figure like a coat stand!’ He shivered in an exaggerated fashion. ‘She lives abroad on one of the Greek islands. I’ve sent directions to the RAF and the Luftwaffe. Between them, they might just find her.’

She drained the glass a second time. ‘That’s a terrible thing to say, Charlie Swainbank.’

‘I’m a terrible man. You’ve always said I was a terrible man.’

‘Aye. Happen I did and happen you are. But there’s nowt we can do to change owt, eh?’

‘Nowt at all.’

‘I didn’t know you spoke Bolton.’

‘Fluidly.’

‘Eh? Shouldn’t that be “fluently”?’

‘No. I speak it when I’m full of fluid, preferably alcoholic.’

‘Oh. Well, being as you’re drunk, I’d best be on my way.’

‘Molly?’

‘What?’

‘That . . . numbness. That emptiness. I do understand. It’s with me all the time, ever since the boys died. At least you have other children.’

She looked hard at him. It was difficult to focus, almost impossible to achieve a clear picture. Ah well. That would be the port – she wasn’t used to port. ‘Stable-yarding,’ she muttered beneath her breath as she rose to leave. He came after her, placing his hand on the doorknob to prevent her turning it.

‘I’m going,’ she said rather unclearly.

‘Not till you explain this stable-yard business.’

‘You what?’

‘Stable-yard.’

She grinned. ‘That’s a place where they exercise horses and groom them, I think.’

‘You mentioned it the last time you were here. Has it some significance? Will you please explain it?’

She steadied herself against the oak-panelled wall. ‘Charlie, it’s inexpl— inexplic— I don’t know how to go about telling you. You are not old enough to understand. Neither am I. We will never be old enough, not till we’re dead.’ She hiccuped politely, a hand to her mouth.

‘That’ll be a bit late.’

‘Aye. That’s why they call dead people late – you know – the late Mrs So-and-So and the late Sir Thingy Wotsisname. It’s ’cos they’re too late for everything. Too late for the bus, too late for the train—’

‘You are drunk, Molly Maguire!’

‘I know. Isn’t it awful? Nay – hang on – I thought you were the one gone to fluid, not me. Tell you what, though . . .’

‘Yes?’

‘If I am tiddly – and I’m not saying I am – then I must be a disgrace. See, it’s this way. Time and again I’ve told him what I’d do if he came home drunk ever again. I’m a right one to talk! Anyroad, thanks for that nice drop of port. It’s made me worry a bit less. She’ll come home. G’night then, Charlie.’

He pulled the door wide. ‘Perkins!’

Perkins arrived at a trot from the kitchen.

‘Get your jacket and take Mrs Maguire home,’ said Charles.

Molly watched Perkins’s disappearing back. ‘Hey,’ she whispered. ‘Is he all right in the head? Seems a bit peculiar to me. Will he get me home in one piece? Only I’d sooner walk than be left with somebody who’s got a degener— de— one of them illnesses what gets worse.’

‘I would happily place my life in Perkins’s hands, Molly.’

‘Would you?’ She made some small attempt to straighten her hat.

‘Indeed.’

‘Oh well. If he’s good enough for the Lord of the Manor, I reckon he’ll do for me. You’ll do for me, lad,’ she shouted at the returned and very startled Perkins.

Charles grabbed her arm. ‘What’s stable-yarding?’

Molly gathered what remained of her shredded dignity, drawing on her gloves with infinite care before pushing a stray curl from her forehead. ‘I have no idea,’ she replied with a dazzlingly sweet smile. ‘If I find out, I’ll phone you.’

‘Promise?’

‘Aso-blutely . . . ab . . . yes.’

She took a few uncertain steps.

‘Molly?’

‘Hello?’

‘Your gloves. They’re on the wrong hands.’

A look of saintly patience covered her face as she said, very plainly for one so obviously the worse for drink, ‘These are the only hands I have, Charlie. Right or wrong, they’re what God gave me. Ta-ra.’

She was gone. Charles walked back to the study and watched the car disappearing along the drive. It was still there, all of it. No change, no deterioration. Molly Maguire had survived the births of four children, had tolerated a domineering mother-in-law, a buffoon of a husband, the near brain-death of her older son, a great deal of adversity when it was all added up. More importantly, more significantly, Molly Dobson remained alive and very, very well. His little Molly had endured it all.

Chapter 18

1945

Janet didn’t particularly like Sundays. But this was the quietest day for driving, so she had set out at the crack of dawn, waving a fond farewell to those who were close enough friends to rise at that ungodly hour. It was over. Part of her couldn’t believe it, perhaps didn’t want to believe it. So much to leave behind, most of it for ever, a great deal of it irretrievable whether she stayed or went.

She pulled in at the cemetery gate and turned to look at Paul who was still fast asleep on the back seat. There was no point in disturbing him. And this was something she wanted and needed to do alone. The Protestant side was nearer the entrance, so she pulled up first beside Sarah Leason’s grave, following the map Mr Swainbank had sent a couple of years ago. Defiant to the last, Sarah had been interred well away from her parents – even in a different cemetery. The gravestone was an oddity, of course, an ornate carving of foxes and cats, then a short verse commanding those who passed by to care for the creatures of the earth. Good old Sarah. Janet prayed inwardly that there would be more like her, more people with enough guts and devilment to be fiercely different from the accepted and often tedious mould.

She drove slowly along to the Catholic side, passing the nuns’ graves with their funny little crosses, pausing now and then to refer to the sketch. Both members of her family had died without much warning. And Janet had attended neither of the funerals. In the first instance she had been ill herself, struck down by some nasty bug brought home from the front by those she nursed. The message about the second death had arrived while she was in Cornwall for a brief holiday with one of the other girls. Joey had gone with pneumonia, just slipped away in the night with no unusual symptoms. Then it was Dad, poor Dad who had apparently been riddled for years with a particularly nasty and painful tuberculosis.

It was a simple stone, just a slab with a rose on one corner and a crucifix on the other, white marble, the names inscribed in black.

Joseph Arthur Maguire

July 21 1922–August 4 1942

Beloved son and brother

Also his dear father, Patrick Joseph Maguire

August 15 1904–January 7 1943

Beneath a large space for the names of future occupants were the words Requiescant In Pace. Janet placed her flowers in the vase and stepped back. ‘Oh, Paddy Maguire,’ she whispered. ‘How often did you cry wolf? How often were you really crying? I love you, Dad. And you too, Joey. I had to go, because they needed me too and I didn’t see your need, stupid girl, I was! But oh I wish I could have seen you both one more time. Just one more time. Paul’s with me. You’d like Paul.’ Tears poured down her face, but she was too miserable to wipe them away. ‘I don’t know how I’m going to face Mam, not after all that’s happened. You would have been easier, Dad. You always forgave me everything. Remember how you said I was like a film star? Mam won’t think I’m a film star, not now. I miss you. I don’t want to go home, not without you. Joey, I would have looked after you, so would Paul. It won’t be home . . .’

Two graves away lay Agnes Evelyn and Elizabeth Mary Corcoran, killed by a stray German bomb in 1942. Lizzie hadn’t lasted in London. London had proved too big for Lizzie, too dangerous. So she’d come home and died in her mother’s house just off Deane Road. They’d only lived there a fortnight too . . . Janet turned her face away from the row of graves. Even after all she’d endured, this was too much.

A terrible surge of hot panic suddenly flooded her veins. She could not go through with it! Wouldn’t it be easier to turn round and go back to Paul’s parents, back to that lovely big farm in Kent, to her own thatched cottage on the edge of the estate? Not now, not today. She could book a room at the Swan, set off again tomorrow with her extra petrol coupons. But there was Paul to think of. And Gran and Mam – even Michael and Daisy deserved some kind of explanation for her recent silence.

Resolutely she strode towards the car and glanced at the rear seat where he still slept. The small red vehicle crawled past the resting place of her dad and her brother, turned in a loop past Sarah and towards the gate. Almost of its own accord, the little Singer took the Bury road, the road to Withins. The two hundred miles since this morning seemed no distance at all. But this last mile was the longest in the world.

‘Janet! Oh me darlin’ girl!’ As always when she was excited, Gran slipped into a very heavy brogue. ‘We have missed you so! And you look great, a picture for me sad old weary eyes. Not a one of them here to greet you, for you were not expected. Sit down now – haven’t we a deal to catch up on?’ She fluttered about like an oversized bird, smoothing cushions, straightening a lace-edged chair cover, glancing in the mirror to make sure she was presentable enough for such a momentous occasion. ‘And thank God you are safe! Wasn’t London town in the most desperate trouble? Did you see the bombings, child? Were you hurt ever?’

‘Where is everyone?’

‘Daisy’s away doing homework over to some girl’s house. Top of the class in all subjects, is Daisy. We’re very proud of her. She recovered from her petty whatever, no more dreams or visions—’

‘Good.’

‘And Michael will be kicking a ball with a dozen other lunatics.’

‘My mother?’

‘Well now, don’t you talk all posh and Southern? Your mam’s walking. She walks a lot these days, especially on a fine Sunday afternoon. I’d say she’ll be on her way to Rivington Pike. It’s a place she’s always had an affection for ever since she was a little child.’

‘Oh.’ Janet folded her arms and stared through the window. ‘All the houses are intact, I see.’

‘Yes. We were lucky just here. Luckier than poor Lizzie and her mother certainly. Did you hear?’

‘Yes. I visited the grave just a few minutes ago.’

Ma Maguire studied this calm young woman. Beneath the exterior, something seethed, a great torment, some kind of terrible worry. ‘What is it, child? You won’t sit, you’ve hardly looked me in the face once. Do you have anything to tell me at all?’

‘Plenty.’

‘There’s no blame. We know you had to go, Janet. Even Molly accepted that after a time. You went and did what needed doing—’

Janet turned on her heel and faced the old lady. ‘I’m not alone,’ she said at last. ‘There’s someone out in my car, someone I think you should meet. He’s very important to me.’

‘Then fetch him in! I’ll set the kettle to boil, make a sandwich—’

‘You fetch him, Gran. I’d like you to welcome him.’

‘And why would that be?’

‘Go and look in my car, Gran. It’s up to you to decide whether or no he is welcome in your house—’

‘But sure – it’s your house—’

‘Yes. And it’s your home. You made it and kept it, you held this family together through the years. I know what you’ve done for us, Gran. No matter what happens, I’ll never forget what we owe you, taking my mother in when she was an orphan, looking after us when we were small. You’re the head of the family. If anyone comes into this place, then you should be the one to bring that person in.’ There was little expression in her tone. She might have been reading a list of facts or a set of tables to be learned for homework. ‘Most of all, I’d like to say a thank you for the brooch and the note that came with it. It meant a great deal to me at that particular time – and during some worse times later on. I’m grateful to you.’