Hannah massey (2 page)

She said to an assistant who was watching her as she looked at the suit, "What is the waist?"

The girl said, "Oh, the waist? The hips are thirty-four."

Before the assistant could pull the tag from the inside of the skirt to ascertain the size, she said, "I'll take it."

"There's no time to try it on."

"I know."

"You won't be able to get it changed, not at this price."

"I know."

The assistant was smiling as she whipped the suit from the model.

"I'm sure it'll be all right; you'll be able to carry it." She smiled a complimentary smile.

After she had handed the girl the money, she took the parcel and put it into the case, and when she passed out of the shop the doorman said, "I see you've got what you wanted, miss." He smiled at her as men mostly did.

"Yes," she nodded, but without answering his smile.

Once again she was walking back to the Central Station, without

hurrying now. In the restaurant she bought a cup of tea, and from the bookstall a paper; then going to the booking office she asked for a single to Fellbum. Out of the ten pounds she had received for the ring and the pound she had in her pocket when she entered the pawn shop she had only a few shillings left, but it didn't matter, it didn't

matter;

she was nearly home.

Half an hour later she stepped out of the train on to the platform at Fellbum Station, and edging her way through the crowd in the station hall waiting for the buses she went out into the driving, skin-searing sleet. She had one more thing to do before she could go home.

She went down Marlborough Road. This cut off the main part of the town and the new shopping centre, for even at this hour the street would be thronged, it being Friday night and pay night for both the pits and the factories. Even if the shops were closed the coffee bars would be

doing a trade, and the clubs . the clubs roared on a Friday night, and who knew who she would run into.

She came out near the park and past the road that led to Brampton Hill; Brampton Hill where the elite of Fellbum lived, those that were left of them; Brampton Hill, the name she had put on the pawn ticket.

Why had she put "Eight Brampton Hill" on the pawn ticket? Perhaps because she had heard of "Eight Brampton Hill" since she had heard of anything. She passed by St. Vincent's Catholic Church and the

Convent, and next to the Convent the school at which she had attended until she was fifteen. Then she crossed the road and went down a dark alleyway.

She had always been afraid of going, down this alleyway, even as

recently as two years ago;

now she was afraid no more. What was it? It was just a cut between a factory wall and a railway siding. And the dark? The dark was no

longer terrifying; it was something that you could lose yourself in sometimes.

The alley led her into an open place. Once or twice she slipped, her high heels slithering over the snow; but all the time she was making her way towards the faint blur given off by a lamp in the far distance.

When she had almost reached the lamp she stopped and peered at the white-capped hills of builders' rubble. Stooping, she picked lip a stone, weighed it in her hand, then discarded it as being too light.

Then selecting a rough, chipped-edged house brick she laid it near her feet and searched until she found a similar one. When she found it she opened the case and took out the newspaper, and wrapping the bricks in it she put them in the bottom of the case, placing the bag containing the new suit above them.

The sleet, nearly all rain now, was full in her face and almost

blinding her, but had she been blind she would have known the way to Grosvenor Road.

The houses in Grosvenor Road were large terraced houses;

they were all old and looked respectable and dignified, even crowned with dirty melting snow as they were. Age alone had not brought these qualities to them; these had been built into the facade at the end of the last century. Each house had an iron-bound square of garden and the front door was approached by four steps, and number forty-nine, the third house from the top, was unique in that its steps were made up of red and ochre-coloured tiles.

As she reached the top step she leant against the framework of the door for a moment. She wanted to get her breath, gather her wits together, say all the things she had rehearsed in the train. When there came to her the buzz of voices beyond the door, loud harsh voices, and the deep roll of laughter, she knew indeed that she was home. She straightened up and rang the bell.

PART ONE ROSIE

when the door opened and Rosie saw her brother Jimmy standing there she did not move or speak, and he, for a moment, did not recognise her, for being six foot two the lights in the hall beyond him diffused its rays from the back of his head.

"Aye?" he asked.

"Who...?" Then bending forward he exclaimed in a quick, breathless whisper, "Name of God! Is it you, Rosie?"

"Yes, it's me. Jimmy."

She was in the hall now; Jimmy had one hand on her shoulder, the other still grabbing the door. As his voice, spurting up his long length like steam from a geyser, yelled, "Ma! Everybody! Look who's here.

Just look who's here," he shook her.

"What is it? What's up?"

"No, no, be god Tisn't true."

"Rosie!"

"Where have you sprung from?"

"Rosie... Rosie."

The hall was packed now, filled with men, all big men; and one woman, a big woman too. She came forward towards her daughter like a

sleepwalker, her eyes wide and unblinking, and when she was a yard from her she flung her arms wide and gathered the girl into her embrace, crying, "Rosie! Rosie! Aw, Rosie!"

Had Rosie wanted to speak she would have found it dim- cult for the breath was being squeezed out of her, but she, too, clung to her

mother, hiding her face in her thick, warm, fleshy neck until she was pushed to a distance as Hannah Massey, looking round at her four sons, cried at them, "Well, what are we standing here for like a clutchin' of dead ducks? Come on with you and into the room where it's warm.... But lass" -her hands were moving over her daughter now"--you're wringin', absolutely sodden. In the name of God, have you

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walked all the way from the station? "

"I missed the bus."

"Then why didn't you get a taxi?"

"I wanted some air; it's a long journey."

"Aw, child... just to hear your voice again, it's lovely, lovely."

Once more she enfolded her daughter in her arms;

and now there was a derisive cry from one of the men.

"Away to the room she said, away to the room where it's warm.... Go on with you; go on, old 'un." He put one hand on the massive back of his mother and one on the thin shoulder of his sister and pushed them amid laughter and chaffing out of the hall and into the sitting-room.

"Here, get that coat off you." Hannah was behind her daughter, and when she had pulled the coat off her she stopped and surveyed her with surprise, as did the men.

As Rosie stood self-consciously pulling down the skimpy jumper Over the tight skirt a trace of colour came into her face and she said, "There was no time to change. I made up me mind on the spur of the moment. My other things are being sent on."

"You haven't got enough on you to keep a rat warm, either in clothes or flesh." Hannah was standing in front of her again, feeling her arms.

"And you're as white as a sheet, girl. Tell me, are you all right?

I've. never seen you like this in your life afore."

"I've had the 'flu."

"I can see you've had something, for be god you look like a ghost. A puff of wind would send you fly in'. Come, sit yourself down here by the fire until I get you a meal." She led her forward as if she was old or an invalid, then asked, "How long you down tor, lass?"

"Oh, a ... a week or so."

"You'll be longer it I get me way.... Just wait till your da sees you.

Oh, be god he'll be over the moon, over the moon he'll be. "

Hannah Massey now pressed her daughter into the easy chair by the

roaring open fire, and with her hands resting on its arms she bent above her, her big broad face stretched and softened in tenderness, and she stared at her silently for some moments. Then reaching out and gently patting the white face she turned away, overcome with her

emotion.

When their mother had left the room the tour men who had

ROSIE 17

been standing at a distance like spectators now gathered around Rosie and they chipped and teased her as they always had done; and to one after the other she put out her hand and touched them, and each of them returned her touch with a gentle pressure of their big rough hands, and their open affection blocked her throat and dimmed her gaze.

Of her nine living brothers Rosie knew these four the best. Jimmy, the eldest at home, who had opened the door to her, was thirty-three. He was tall and black and handsome. Arthur was thirty. He too was tall but had not Jimmy's bulk or looks. His hair was the colour of Rosie's, only a darker hue. Then there was Shane. Shane was twenty-eight and six foot, big-boned and thin, and he took after his father.

Bamy was the youngest of the eleven sons born to Hannah Massey; he was twenty-six but could have been twin to Rosie herself, who was three years younger.

As she looked at these men, the lads as she thought of them, the warmth that emanated from them became almost unbearable. Up to two years ago they had teased and petted her. and had been proud of her.

Yes, they had been proud of her. But two years ago they had not

appeared to her as they did now. Then she had secretly seen them as big, blundering, narrow-minded bigots. Then she had longed to get away from their deep laughter, laughter that the weakest joke could

elicit.

Then, God forgive her, she had looked upon them as common and coarse, men without a thread of refinement among them. How dared she have

thought that way about them! How dared she!

Bamy, touching her wrist with his blunt, hard fingers, said, "By, you've lost weight; you're as thin as a rake."

"Well, you couldn't say she was ever fat." Arthur pushed his fist gently against the side of her head.

"All thoroughbreds are lean, eh, Rosie?"

"Why didn't you let us know?" put in Shane, peering at her through narrow, thick-fringed lids out of a face that looked as Irish as his name.

"You been bad or something.... I... I mean afore you had the 'flu?"

"No. It was hist the 'flu."

"Just the 'flu," said Jimmy, straightening up and adjusting his tie while he looked down at her.

"Just the 'flu. It's enough, for, be god it pnlls you down. I should'

know I had it, an' that bug, diarrhoea and sickness. It's been going mad round here. It was only four days I was down, but Christ!"

"Not so much of your Christing." Hannah came marching into the room with a laden tray.

"I've told you, our Jimmy, we're going to have less blasphemy round here ... now mind, I've said it."

The four men looked at their mother, a wide grin between them, then turning to Rosie almost as one, Barny and Shane cried simultaneously,

"Hear that, Rosie?" while Arthur put his head back and laughed; and Jimmy, bending above Rosie again, said in a mock whisper, "Talk posh now; that's the latest. Live up to our best shirts." He pulled at the front of his well-cut nylon shirt.

"Bloody and bugger and Christ's taboo ... absobloodylutely."

"Jimmy!"

"All right, Ma, I'm only having you on."

"Well don't." Hannah Massey's back was straight, as was her face; her head was high, which brought it almost on a level with Shane's, who stood near her; and as she allowed her gaze to rest condemningly on Jimmy she spoke in an aside to Shane, saying in a tone of command,

"Fetch the dish out of the oven, you, and don't Spill it."

"O.K."

captain. " Shane pressed his shoulders back, made a salute with a wavering hand, winked broadly at Rosie, did a smart about-turn and marched, knees up, feet pounding the floor, towards the kitchen. This act brought great gusts of laughter from the others and a compressed smile to Hannah's lips. Then as she moved towards Rosie her face broke up as;

it were, and fell into soft warm folds, and she said, "You see, they don't get any better, do they? They won't learn, not one of them.

Brawn, that's all they've got. Could anybody on God's earth refine this lot? I ask you. Now could they? "

"Oh, Ma." Rosie smiled faintly and shook her head, and Hannah said,

"Come away, sit up; it's just something to be going on with. It you'd only let me know you were coming I'd 'ave had a spread tor you."

"Aye, be god you would at that." Arthur nodded at her, his brown eyes twinkling.

"And we'd all 'ave been on our toes. Spit and polish it would have been for every one of us, an' sitting here like stuffed dummies waiting for your entry, like last time. Do you remember, Rosie?" He laughed at her.

"The house full of us all, like Madame Tussaud's we were, all set up.

Here's one that's pleased, anyway, you've come on the

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hop. "

"Where's your things, Rosie?" said Barny now.

"If they're at the station I'll get Phil next door to pick them up in the car."

"Aye." Hannah, pressing Rosie into the chair at the table and, bending over her and looking into her face, said, "I was just going to mention your things. Are they at the station?"

Rosie picked up her knife and fork.

"They're going to be sent on. I, I came on the spur of the moment, and just threw a few things into a case."

"But... but that in the hall; that isn't your good leather case. Why did you travel with that thing? They'll bash the good one to

smithereens on the railway, you know what they arc...."

"... And after me self paying nine pounds ten for it." Arthur was leaning across the table imitating his mother's voice.

"You'll not get another present out of me; be god you won't."

Hannah struck out at her son; then cried at them all, "Go on, the lot of you, and get going; you were almost on your way."