Children of the Tide (3 page)

The young girl looked kind
, she reflected,
young Rayner’s sister perhaps? She seemed to know how to handle bairns. Perhaps she would persuade ’lady that they should keep him, though I have my doubts about that; and ’young man – why, I would never have guessed it, little more than a bairn himself, an innocent, I would have thought, but there, there’s no telling what can happen when passion’s aroused, it makes no difference if tha’s fifteen or fifty
.

As she approached the outskirts of the town, several carriages and gigs passed her by, and again she kept to the shadows; she mingled with the crowds who were making their way to the inns and hostelries, and slipped unnoticed into the maze of alleyways and dark courts which clustered about the river, and opened the unlocked door to her home.

Her body felt heavy and bloated as she slumped onto the bed; her feet and ankles were swollen from the unaccustomed long walk, and the veins in her legs stood out, purple and knotted. Two children lay awake in the bed, and another was asleep under the thin blanket. She gazed fixedly at her husband, his mouth open as he slept in the only chair, and wondered what had happened to the passion that they had once shared.

He was so handsome, so strong, full of hope and optimism. We used to sing and dance, be happy. Now he’s bitter and melancholic and all we have is despair
. A tear trickled down her cheek.
At least Silvi had been young and lovely, she’ll never grow old and ugly like her ma, and I hope, oh how I hope, that ’bairn was born of love and not abuse
.

Her husband stirred in the chair, then he opened his eyes and saw her watching him. ‘Well? Is it done? Did tha tek him?’

She nodded wearily. Who, she wondered, would take care of her children when she had gone?

‘How much did they give thee?’

‘What?’ She gazed at him through glazed eyes.

‘Did they give thee owt? Money!’

Perplexed, she shook her head.

‘Daft bitch! Didn’t tha ask?’ He sat forward in the chair, staring at her with hatred in his eyes.

‘Ask? Ask? Would I ask for money when his ma is only just dead?’ Her voice sank to a whisper and she put her head in her hands and started to sob. ‘I’ve not yet sunk so low that I’d sell my own grandson.’

He got up from his chair and she thought that he was going to strike her as he came near, but he sank down beside her on the narrow bed and put his arms around her, his head against hers, and held her close, and joined her in her weeping.

The brougham rattled along the turnpike road towards Hull, and James and his father peered out of each side of the carriage windows in an attempt to see anyone who might be walking along the road. Spence stopped once, as he had been instructed to do, should he see anyone, but it was only a vagrant with a pack on his back, who asked them if he could ride alongside the coachie. He was refused, and they continued on slowly, stopping occasionally when James or Isaac called out that they thought something had moved in the hedge.

As they approached Hull they passed the redbrick workhouse, and Sammi gave a small shudder and held the child closer. If they couldn’t find the woman who had brought him, she didn’t want to contemplate the fate which awaited him. ‘Where will you start to look, Uncle? Who will you ask?’

Isaac gave a deep sigh. ‘I’m not sure; I suppose I’ll try the clergy. We’ll try the Holy Trinity first, they’ll no doubt know if any of their congregation has gone astray. A child is hardly something that can be hidden.’ He stopped abruptly as if he had said too much and Sammi knew that, had she been able to see him, his face would have been red with embarrassment.

‘They may not be church-goers, Uncle.’ More than likely not, she thought. The poor ragged woman wouldn’t have been welcome among the estimable congregation. She probably did her praying at home, if she had one.

‘Chapel, you mean? You think that she might be chapel?’

‘No, Uncle. Having seen her, I think she wouldn’t
have the energy or inclination for either. Why not try some of the inns? They are more likely to know the people who live in the town.’

‘Sir!’ James had hardly spoken on the journey, and had mostly kept his eyes glued to the carriage windows. Now he turned towards his father. ‘Perhaps we could try The Cross Keys. The landlord might remember.’

His father drew in a sharp breath. James had told him that the only occasion when something might have happened was when he had stayed the night in town with Gilbert, though he was careful not to implicate his brother.

The Cross Keys Inn was a busy coaching inn and stood opposite the golden statue of King William in Hull’s Market Place. It was also the departure point for the coaches to York and London, whose services were still flourishing while the North Eastern Railway board of governors and the town aldermen wrangled over where the next railway line should run. There was an arrow-straight railway track between Hull and Selby, and others not so straight to Bridlington and Withernsea on the coast, which had opened up the possibility of day excursions to see the sea.

But the crowds of people who were passing the carriage as Sammi waited for James and his father to come out of the inn were not the kind who would be travelling by rail or coach. They teemed by on their way home from work, if they were lucky enough to be employed, from the oil or flax mills in Wincomlee, from the shipyards or the docks, and they spent their money and sought relaxation and entertainment in the streets of Hull.

And if they were not employed, they still came out of their overcrowded, dismal houses which were squeezed together in the squalid streets and courts in the heart of the old town, searching for simple pleasures: dogfights or prize-fights made them forget their misery and poverty, and gave them their only
taste of excitement, or if that failed, they pursued oblivion in drink.

Sammi crouched into a corner of the carriage so that she wouldn’t be seen, and felt the occasional thud on the carriage door when someone banged it as they went by. There was some coarse bantering as well-dressed visitors arriving at the inn mingled in the street with the ill-fed and ragged poor, with beggars and thieves.

A face pressed against the window and leered in at her; she heard Spence shout to get away and a minute later she jumped in fright as the door handle rattled and then opened, but it was only James and his father come back from a fruitless errand.

‘We’ve drawn a blank there, I’m afraid. The fellow’s not talking, even if he knows anything.’ Isaac sat down beside her and took off his top hat and tapped it thoughtfully. ‘We could get out and walk and ask a few people. They might talk if persuaded by a copper or two, but I don’t like to leave you here with only Spence.’

‘I’d rather come with you, Uncle Isaac. If we find the woman and she sees the child, she might have second thoughts about abandoning him.’

‘Very well. We’ll walk a little way, although I fear we must be alert constantly.’

Sammi realized that her uncle would know of the dangers. His office was not far from the Market Place, in the old High Street which ran alongside the River Hull. It was an area which, though safe enough during the day, at night the inns and taverns would be overflowing with seamen and travellers, and others who might be on the lookout for easy money, and who would not be too particular or discriminating about delivering violence in order to get it.

She wrapped the infant inside her cape, and James and his father came on either side of her. She was glad that she was dressed in her plain cape and bonnet, but wished that she had changed from her
flounced silk gown which she had dressed in for the ill-fated supper, and which peeped from below her cape. Her uncle, though, was conspicuous in his greatcoat and top hat and with his silver-topped cane clutched firmly in his hand. James, though hatless, was wearing a velvet coat and a cravat at his neck, and both men, she thought, summed up the epitome of wealth.

They moved away from the inn, following the crowd down from the northern end of the Market Place towards St Mary’s Church where there were several inns and grocery shops and all manner of business premises, and which led ultimately to the Queen’s Dock, the first dock to be built in this town of shipping, whaling and fishing. Here, too, in this crowded area were banks and brothels, alms-houses and pawnbrokers, temperance houses and sailors’ mission homes.

‘I think we must go back,’ Isaac said nervously. ‘The crowd is too great. We’ll turn around and knock on someone’s door. It will be a start at least.’

The first door on which they knocked was in Vicar Lane, a quiet street near the ancient Holy Trinity church.

‘A respectable place,’ Isaac said. But it was so respectable a place that the residents of the house wouldn’t open the door to their knock. A twitch of curtain was the only indication of anyone’s presence within, and although they all thought they had seen a glow of candle flame as they approached, the house was now in darkness.

‘Here’s someone coming, Father. Should we ask?’ James’s voice was husky as he whispered.

Isaac nodded and called out to a man approaching them. The man stood back, he appeared as nervous as they were. ‘I’m looking for the family of an infant. The child has been abandoned or lost, it needs immediate attention if it is to survive.’

The man came closer and stared curiously at them.
‘If it’s been abandoned, then whoever abandoned it didn’t intend it to survive. Where did tha find it?’

‘Oh, er, out in the country.’ Isaac pulled up his coat collar and adjusted his scarf so that it hid the lower half of his face.

The man grunted and started to move away. ‘Then I don’t know why tha’s bringing it here, sir. If it’s a country bairn tha’d better look elsewhere. There’s enough starving infants round here without bringing ’em in from out of town.’ He walked away down the dark street and then turned back. ‘Tha could try workhouse, but I doubt if they’d tek it. They’re all full up and they’ll onny tek bairns from Hull.’

They moved out of that street and down others, and once more knocked on other doors, but again there was no answer except from the bark of a dog. They heard a cough and rattle of someone clearing his throat and saw the movement of a dark bundle huddled in a doorway, and they quickly turned away. Then came the sound of loud voices and a crowd of people turned the corner.

Women were laughing and Sammi determined that this time she would speak. ‘Uncle, please may I ask this time? They may tell me something, being another female.’

Her uncle nodded wearily. He was tired. He had had a busy day at the company. He was hungry and it seemed that he might have missed his supper. He was also angry with James, who was in such a stupor that he said hardly a word over this damnable affair. What was worse, he had to face Mildred when he got home and he didn’t know how he could.

‘I beg your pardon for intruding,’ Sammi began. ‘We’re looking for a woman – grandmother to this infant. The child has been abandoned and we wish to return him.’

‘Like a parcel!’ one of the men guffawed. ‘Lost and found.’

Sammi ignored him and turned to one of three
women. ‘We understand that the baby’s mother has died, but he needs a nurse or he’ll die.’

‘Then it’s a pity he didn’t die with her.’ One of the women spoke up coarsely. ‘Death can’t be worse than ’workhouse.’

Another of the women came across to Sammi and undid the blanket wrapped around the child, and peered at him. She smelt of gin and Sammi turned her head away. ‘He’s not one of mine. And none of my mother’s have died this week, though I lost two a month ago. This is a new bairn, no more than a day old. Have a look, Ginny. See what tha thinks.’

The third woman moved forward slowly, and reluctantly, Sammi thought. She, too, looked down at the child, who was beginning to stir. She ran a rough finger across the child’s cheek and he moved his open mouth towards it. She glanced at Sammi and then back at the baby. ‘He’ll last a bit longer on milk and water, then tha must feed him on pobs if a nurse can’t be found.’

‘But we must find his family, he needs love as well as food,’ Sammi implored.

‘Maybe they can’t afford to love him, miss. It costs money to love a bairn, but maybe tha’s too young to know that. Too young and not poor enough.’ She was dressed shabbily, but her eyes were honest and she looked directly at Sammi and then at James and Isaac. ‘If there’s nobody to take care of him, then tha’ll have to take him to Charity Hall. They’ll take him. They’ll allus take them that nobody else wants.’

James’s mother was waiting for them on their return; she was wearing her bedgown and robe, and her eyes were red as if she had been weeping. She was angry and ashamed, she said, at the disgrace that James had brought on the family. ‘What will people think?’ she cried, as they told her that they had not been able to find the woman. ‘How can I possibly meet people if this scandal gets out?’

‘It won’t be the first time,’ Isaac said patiently. ‘I’m not diminishing what has happened, my dear, but I imagine that there are very few people whose lives could bear scrutiny.’ He put his hand out towards her. ‘There’s many a young woman slipped up!’

Mildred ignored his gesture. ‘James must go away for a while so that no-one hears of it.’ Her voice was hushed, but as Sammi watched her she thought that there was fear in her eyes. ‘If he wants to support the child out of his allowance, then that is up to him.’

‘But where will the child go, Aunt?’ Sammi appealed in vain to her aunt. ‘There’s only the workhouse or charity!’

Her aunt didn’t answer, but simply sat straight backed and stared in front of her. There was a clatter of wheels on the drive and Isaac shook his head impatiently. ‘I’m forever telling Gilbert not to come so fast up the drive. The gravel gets knocked all over the flower beds, but I can talk till I’m blue in the face for all the notice he takes!’

Gilbert was whistling cheerfully in the hall and he put his head around the door. ‘Hello! Still up at this hour?’

‘You’re very late, Gilbert. We expected you earlier!’ His mother spoke sharply.

‘But I told Father I wouldn’t be home; you didn’t wait supper? I’ve been to the house, I wanted to speak to the builder about some alterations that Harriet wants, and then I went on for a game of billiards.’ He bent to kiss his mother on the top of her head and as he did, he looked across at Sammi and winked.