A Liverpool Lass (47 page)

‘Mr Williams is a pain,’ Sadie agreed now. ‘But what about Teddy Matthews, then? He’s comic, if you like!’

Nellie dealt the fire a last ferocious blow with the poker and sat back in her chair.

‘Teddy isn’t funny, he’s probably my last hope of getting out of this place and leading a normal life,’ she said, whilst Sadie giggled. ‘He can’t help his spots, or his funny voice, and he’s the first person to tell me he loves me for ... oh, for a lifetime.’

Teddy Matthews was nineteen, a tall and skinny insurance clerk with acne, frizzy blond hair which stood up as though he’d just seen a ghost, and a voice which emerged as though through a mouthful of ollies. He was a keen amateur rugby player and had fractured his shin playing for his team, Sun Assurance, against Royal Life. The fact that he was deeply enamoured of
Nellie McDowell amused everyone, even, at times, Nellie. In vain she had explained that she was nearly ten years older than he; Teddy Matthews thought that Nellie and Nellie alone had been responsible for his badly broken tibia beginning to heal after weeks of traction. He said her smile made the day worth living and a touch of her hand brought his blood pressure up. When he was on his feet again he planned to escort her all over, to theatres, cinemas, smart restaurants. Even when Nellie brought him a bed-bottle or helped him to sit on the bed-pan his ardour remained undimmed.

‘You oughter give ’im a blanket bath,’ one of the other probationers giggled. ‘That ’ud do the trick.’

But Nellie said primly that unfortunately a blanket bath merely increased his overpowering urge to make Nellie his mate – or she assumed it did, due to certain physical manifestations ...

The girls shrieked, but everyone knew it was what you might call an occupational hazard. Men fell in love with nurses, it was as simple as that.

And if she were honest, Nellie reminded herself now, only half listening as Sadie read out the film reviews in the Echo, having Teddy’s wholehearted admiration did make her life seem less empty. She had always believed, in her heart, that Stuart would come back for her but she had heard nothing since arriving at the hospital and Art said the new people in number eleven had received no letters for her, or not so far as he knew. So it looked as though Stuart’s affection had not survived their long separation ... she refused to believe that he had dropped her because she had allowed him to make love to her, that was absurd. But she could not help the little ache in the back of her mind which hinted that had she been a nicer girl ...

So Teddy was a comfort, though she had no
intention of going out with him when he left hospital, because she knew very well that once he was released his ordinary life would catch up with him again and she would be, very rightly, forgotten. But it made her realise that she was still capable of arousing affection, even if it wasn’t the affection for which she longed.

Because now that Lilac had declared her allegiance, decided to search for her real mother and live with the Mattesons, Nellie began to realise what real loneliness was. She had lost Lilac and had given up any hope of hearing from Stuart; she supposed drearily that at least he had realised it was over, had not bothered to try to rescuscitate a dead affection. Yet, acknowledging that, she still missed him fiercely, imagined she saw him in the street, followed similar back-views until a turn of the head or a gesture revealed her mistake.

Then there was Davy. She didn’t miss Davy, but now she envied Bethan the love which she had once thought hers by right. And Richie, the baby boy she had put so firmly out of her mind five years ago, chose this moment, in her thoughts, to reproach her for her neglect. So he believed himself to be Bethan’s child; well, that was no excuse for Nellie to try so very hard to forget him, to read the letters Bethan sent and then destroy them immediately, before the images which rose in her mind when she read could hurt her. You should be hurt, Nellie McDowell, because you deliberately lived a lie, she told herself. You don’t deserve peace of mind and perhaps you’ll never get it.

‘Last one. Clarine Seymour in
The Idol Dancer
,’ announced Sadie, slamming the paper down on the small table beside her. ‘Well, McDowell? If it’s to be the flicks, which one do you prefer? Clarine’s on at the Rotunda, just a tram-ride away.’

‘Since you ask so nicely, Pickerfield, I’ll plump for
The Idol Dancer
; then we can have some supper at one of the cannys on Scottie Road afterwards. You coming? I’ll have to change.’

Sadie sighed and said she wanted to go down to the office to see if her parcel had arrived. Mrs Pickerfield, convinced that her daughter could not possibly be eating properly in a hospital, sent parcels of country food weekly. They were a great comfort not only to Sadie, but to her room-mate, too.

Nellie was hard up, but at least what money she had was not sent away to support someone else any longer. She saved up and bought herself clothing, she went to the cinema, she had meals out sometimes. It was about the only thing, she reflected, climbing the stairs to her room, that she never felt guilty about, for the improvement in Lilac’s looks and figure had shown her that proper food and exercise created a beautiful woman, whereas insufficient food and too much hard work simply made one skinny and gave one spots.

She reached her room and looked doubtfully at the clothes hanging on the rail. It was cold today with that grey, miserable chill which is typical of November. Would a gabardine skirt, a woolly jumper and her light macintosh be warm enough? She was hard up for winter clothing still, though she did have one nice dress, a golden-brown wool mixture with brass buttons which she was buying at so much a week from Sturlas’s. In about two weeks it would be paid for, then she intended to get herself a pair of stout shoes and a proper coat for the cold months ahead.

Deciding that the skirt and jumper would have to do, she slipped them on, then brushed her hair and washed her face. She looked pale, so she rubbed her cheeks vigorously with the palms of both hands. She was tempted to slip on her grey cloak, but heaven knew
she had spent enough time in various uniforms in the course of her twenty-eight years. She would be warm enough in the cinema, anyway.

A rattle on the door and a muffled shout announced that Sadie was outside. Nellie opened the door and what looked like a walking parcel entered, but it was only Sadie, bearing her mother’s latest offering.

‘I think she’s baked a fruit cake and some pies,’ Sadie said breathlessly, dumping the parcel on her bed. ‘And there’s a ham, I can smell it. Are you sure you want to go out for supper, Nell? We can eat here, if you’d rather.’

But Nellie, tying the belt of her macintosh firmly round her small waist, shook her head.

‘Thanks very much Sadie, but I’d rather eat out. It’ll take my mind off ... things.’

Sadie was relaxing company because she knew nothing about Lilac, or Stuart, or anything to do with Nellie’s past. She knew Nellie had been a Culler girl but that was about all, and since she did not come from Liverpool but from a small village called Tarboke Green she knew almost nothing about Scotland Road, the courts, and the lives of the people who lived there.

‘Oh all right, spurn my mother’s goodies,’ Sadie said good-naturedly now. She began to untie the string which wrapped the parcel about, then changed her mind. ‘No, I’ll leave it till later. We want to catch the last house.’

The two girls came out of the cinema with their heads in the clouds; Clarine Seymour’s performance had carried them with her into a land of dreams but now, marching arm-in-arm up the pavement, they wanted supper and then their beds.

‘We’re on too early tomorrow to risk getting to bed late,’ Nellie said briskly as they walked. ‘Besides, we don’t want to miss the last tram. Do you want to go to Paddy’s for a bite, or Dolly Pop’s canny?’

‘Dolly Pop’s do those lovely pies with mashed potato on the top,’ Sadie said wistfully. ‘Loads of meat inside, too. But the apple pudding at Paddy’s takes some beating. Oh, I’ll never decide – you choose, Nell.’

‘Dolly Pop’s, then,’ Nellie said. She had spent too many pennies in Paddy’s with Lilac beside her, she wanted no more reminders of the good times, not today. ‘I like their spotted dick and custard.’

They walked up the Scotland Road with the lamps hissing and flickering overhead and a crowd of people good-naturedly jostling along the pavement. Dolly Pop’s was crowded but they found a seat and ordered their meal, then sat back to look about them until it arrived.

‘Hello, Mrs Preswick, evening Mr Halford,’ Nellie murmured, as people she had once known well came and took the few remaining places. To Sadie she said: ‘These people were my neighbours until I moved into the nurses’ home. I miss them.’

The food came. It was delicious and nourishing. Nellie, tucking in, thought of the many times she’d had to walk past this door because she didn’t have the pennies for a meal. Ah well, she was older now, she had left such times behind. Soon she would have a career, in time she would be a Sister with a ward of her own to rule. At the end, a pension, two rooms and a few friends of her own age, all slowly heading for senility together.

She pulled herself up on the thought, shocked. What on earth was the matter with her, today? She was just so depressed – perhaps it was the grim November
weather, or the fact that she had come off a busy shift tired out and instead of collapsing into her bed had gone with Sadie to the pictures.

But whatever the reason she must stop going over and over it in her mind, otherwise she’d go insane. Think about your holidays next year, when you’re due for a week or so off, she commanded herself urgently. Remember what you’d planned? To go back to the Isle of Anglesey and to stay somewhere near Moelfre, so that she could see the child but, hopefully, not be seen herself. That would be fun, and you never knew, she might get in touch with Bethan without Davy finding out and arrange to meet. Through all the years in between she had never ceased to love Bethan, how good it would be to see her again, and why should she not? After all, Davy and Bethan had a good life, she had no claim on either of them save the claim of friendship. Why should she not try to meet her friend?

But she knew she would not do it, not really. So, with a sigh, she dug her spoon into the treacle pudding she had ordered to follow the delicious, crispy-topped cottage pie, and smiled across at Sadie.

‘Yours all right? This must be my treat, Sadie, because you’ll never let me pay you anything for sharing your parcels.’

Sadie’s parents farmed successfully, but Sadie had not settled when she returned home after the war. It said a lot for the relationship between parents and child, Nellie thought, that they had sent her, with their blessing, to train for a nurse.

‘Ooh, lovely,’ Sadie said now. ‘I wish you’d said before, it would have made the food taste even better! Lucky you, to be able to come here when you were a kid ... I didn’t even have fish and chips until I came into the city to do my training. Small country villages
don’t go in for cooked food, much. Oh, goodness, that reminds me!’

‘What?’ Nellie said, scraping her spoon round her bowl. ‘My, that was good! What my brothers would have called a sinker.’

‘I meant to tell you, but we were in such a rush to get off to the cinema that I forgot. Someone was asking for you earlier, only you were on duty.’

‘Oh?’ Wild thoughts of Stuart chased through Nellie’s head. ‘Who was it? Man or woman?’

‘Oh, woman. Well, more like a young lady, really. An awfully pretty kid, got this amazing red-gold hair ... she asked what time you’d be free tomorrow, so I told her and she said how about meeting in the Crinoline Tearooms in London Road tomorrow, at around four. She’ll wait for you there. I’m awful sorry, Nell, it just went clean out of my head.’

‘It doesn’t matter; if tomorrow’s early enough then it can’t be exactly urgent,’ Nellie said. ‘I’ll be free from about three ... wonder what she wants?’

‘She didn’t say. Who is she, Nell? A relative?’

‘Yes. An adopted sister,’ Nellie said. She put down her spoon and reached for the cup of tea by her plate. ‘Actually, we’ve not seen each other for a while, we had a bit of a disagreement, so it’ll be nice to be back on good terms.’

‘I’m sorry I forgot,’ Sadie said remorsefully. ‘But still, you can go down there tomorrow, can’t you? You’ll enjoy that.’

‘Yes,’ Nellie said absently. ‘Have you finished, Sadie? Because if so we really ought to get a move on. We’re usually in bed and asleep by now!’

‘We’ll catch a tram,’ Sadie promised. ‘We’ll be in bed and asleep in thirty minutes anyway, if we get a move on.’

‘Right,’ Nellie said, jumping to her feet. She had
taken her mac off when they sat down, now she tugged it on again. ‘Only I hope we don’t have to run for the tram, I’ve eaten far too much.’

But they did have to run, and only just leaped aboard as it was moving off.

The tram was already crowded so they headed for the stairs and settled themselves happily on the top deck.

‘Where have all the crowds come from?’ Sadie asked presently, as the tram swayed along the road. ‘Oh, look!’

‘It’s Homer Street market,’ Nellie said. ‘The stallholders reduce their prices as time goes on rather than have their goods go bad on them over Sunday, so of course frugal housewives shop later and later. I’ve had some good bargains myself when we lived here,’ she added. ‘Especially meat; you could get meat at less than half the proper price if you were prepared to hang on until eleven or so.’

‘Sounds good,’ Sadie observed. ‘I say, this tram must be full, we’re going to go right by the next stop.’

‘They sometimes do that if there’s another close behind and no one wants to get down,’ Nellie said, leaning forward to peer at the group of people waiting at the stop. ‘Oh ... oh ... oh!’

She had jumped to her feet but Sadie clutched her, preventing her from trying to go down the stairs whilst the tram was bucketing along.

‘What’s the matter, Nell? What did you see?’

‘Stuart! It was Stuart standing waiting at that tram stop. I’ve got to get off, I really must ... it was Stuart, I know it was!’