Put Out the Fires (18 page)

“Sheila! Oh, Sheil! The most terrible thing has happened.”

It was Brenda Mahon, her best mate. They’d been friends since they started school together more than twenty years ago, had been bridesmaids at each other’s weddings, and each given birth to their first child the same week, though Brenda had stopped at two, whilst Sheila had gone on to have another four.

“Is it Xavier?” Sheila cried.

“You bet your bloody life it’s Xavier, the bastard!”

Sheila gasped. She’d never heard Brenda swear. Not only that, Brenda had never come bursting into her house like this before, not even during the day, let alone the middle of the night. It must be midnight, at least.

“What’s he done?” Sheila had never taken to Xavier. He preened himself too much, took all Brenda’s money from the dressmaking, and let her wait on him hand and foot, unlike Cal, who would never take a penny off a woman and always gave a hand when he was home.

“He’s only gone and married someone else!” “He’s what?”

“He’s married someone else, the bastard. She’s in our house now; Carrie. She’s got a horrible smelly little boy called Sonny.”

Mary stirred fretfully in the comer.

“We’d best go downstairs.” Sheila got out of bed and took Cal’s old overcoat which she used as a dressing gown from behind the door.

“I’m sorry, Sheil,” Brenda said when they were in the living room. “But I just had to talk to someone. I couldn’t possibly have waited till tomorrow.”

“That’s all right, luv.” Sheila patted her metal curlers. “I must look a sight. It’s just that me hair’s a mess and I didn’t put me curlers in last night with Cal home.”

Brenda couldn’t have cared less if her friend had shaved her head. “If I could get me hands on Xavier now, I’d throttle him.”

“But what’s happened, luv?”

“Well,” Brenda explained as calmly as she could, “this woman, Carrie, turned up asking for Mrs Mahon, her mother-in-law. Xavier told her she lived in Bootle and wouldn’t take kindly to him getting wed, so he’d kept the news a secret—they got married two years back, by the way. But, and this is the worst part, Sheil,” Brenda’s eyes glittered with rage, “he also told her his mam had a lodger living downstairs, a dressmaker called Brenda who had two little girls. That’s who Carrie thinks I am, the lodger!”

“Have you told her the truth yet?” Sheila asked, wide eyed.

“Not yet. I’ve let her do most of the talking so far.” Brenda struck a fist into the palm of her hand. “Jaysus, Sheil! I wish Xavier was here so I could scratch his eyes out.”

“You’d better tell the poor woman, luv,” Sheila advised.

“Aye, I suppose so.”

“What made her turn up now, right out of the blue?”

“Because she wasn’t getting any money off the Army that’s because it’s me who’s been getting it, being Xavier’s real wife. She last saw him six months ago just before he was called up, and she hasn’t heard a word since.” Brenda twiddled her thumbs in her lap. “The thing is, Sheil, I quite like her in a way, poor lamb, though she’s as common as muck and a real flamer. She don’t half look poor. She’s only nineteen, and Sonny’s not all that horrible, but the spitting image of Xavier, if the truth be known—I knew he reminded me of someone the minute I clapped eyes on him.”

“Oh, Bren!” Sheila squeezed her friend’s hand.

“Isn’t it awful, Sheil? He didn’t even tell her where his mam lived, only Bootle. If she hadn’t found his union card or something, she wouldn’t have known where to come.”

“You must be dead upset, luv.”

“Upset?” Brenda shook her head. “I’m not upset, but I’m so bloody angry, I could spit. I used to wonder why he spent so much time in London. The other guards came home, even if it meant using the milk train, but Xavier said he needed his sleep. There was a cheap hotel by Euston Station, or so he said. To think, Sheil, he was keeping another woman on my money!. He’ll never get another penny off me, I’ll tell you that much, the slimy, two timing son of a bitch, I could kill him!”

“I’m sure you could,” Sheila said sympathetically. “I’d feel the same if it was Cal,” she added, though the possibility of her darling Cal doing such a thing was beyond the bounds of her imagination.

Brenda said nothing. There were no words to express the rage she felt. Her body, every single little bit of it, was pounding so violently, she felt as if she might explode.

“What’s this Carrie doing at the moment?”

“ Searching the house from top to bottom looking for her mother-in-law by now, I reckon.” Brenda laughed sarcastically. “I made them a cup of tea and bite to eat, they were both starving. Then I told her I was going to borrow a cup of sugar, which she must have thought funny at this time of night.” She sighed. “I suppose I’d better put her up for the night, she’ll have to leave first thing tomorrer morning.”

“You’d better get home and see to her, Bren.”

“I suppose so. You won’t tell anyone about this, will you, Sheila? I couldn’t stand everyone knowing.”

“I won’t tell a soul, I promise.” There was a wistful note in Sheila’s voice.

“Oh, all right,” Brenda said grudgingly. “You can tell your Eileen, but that’s all.”

“I hate having secrets from our Eileen.”

“I know you do.” Brenda suddenly wished she had a sister of her own to confide in. Her only brother was far away in Plymouth and they rarely corresponded. “I’d better be off then.”

“Do you want me to come with you?”

“No, I’ll manage on me own.”

The smell in Brenda’s living room was even worse by the time she got back. Carrie and Sonny had finished eating and the little boy was fast asleep on the floor.

“I’ve got something to tell you,” Brenda announced.

“I reckon you have,” Carrie said spiritedly, “and that’s the whereabouts of Mrs Mahon, my ma-in-law. I’ve been upstairs and she ain’t there. I hope you haven’t murdered her or something.”

“I’m Mrs Mahon.”

“But you ain’t old enough!”

At that moment, Brenda felt old enough to be Xavier’s grandmother, let alone his mother. “Xavier’s mam died twenty years ago. I’m his wife. I married him in nineteen thirty-two.”

Carrie laughed contemptuously. “You bleedin” liar!

You’re making it up. Xavier always said you fancied him.”

Brenda felt her blood boil. “I’ll show you me wedding lines, if you like.”

“You do that!”

“And while we’re at it, I wouldn’t mind taking a look at yours.”

As Brenda searched in the sideboard drawer for the envelope containing her most important papers, Carrie rooted through her cheap red handbag.

“Here they are!” Both women spoke together as they each brandished a piece of white paper.

Both paused before taking the paper from the other.

“I believe you,” Brenda said eventually.

“Same here.” Carrie sank back in the chair. “Strike a bleedin’ light!” She beat the arm of the chair with her fist.

“I’d like to cut the bugger up into little pieces and fry them!”

She got up and walked up and down the room several times, snapping her fingers angrily, then sat down again.

“With my luck, I might have known someone like Xavier was too good to be true.”

“I’m sorry.”

Carrie’s big brown eyes widened. “Why should you be sorry? It ain’t your fault, no more than it’s mine. He’s double-crossed the both of us, the bleedin’ swine.” Her voice, which was low and slightly hoarse, cracked with venom.

Brenda had been expecting hysterics, tears at least. She quite admired the way Carrie had taken the news with anger and resentment, much the same way as she’d taken it herself.

“Though it’s worse for you in a way, me turning up like this,” Carrie was saying. She looked at Brenda curiously. “I feel as though I should hate you, but I don’t.”

“I don’t hate you, either,” Brenda said quietly. “But I hate Xavier.”

The two women were silent for a while, both lost in their own thoughts. What on earth had Xavier seen in the girl, Brenda wondered? He was so fastidious, and although Carrie was pretty in a coarse sort of way, she wasn’t exactly clean—or hygienic. She’d made no attempt to clean up Sonny, and the room was beginning to smell like a lavatory. You never know, she thought dryly, Carrie might be thinking much the same, wondering what Xavier had seen in such a plain little woman. Brenda had no illusions regarding her appearance.

“I expect you’ll want to go home tomorrer,” she said. “I can let you have the fare.”

Carrie shook her blonde wavy head. “There’s no point in going home. I lost me ma in the raids, then me flat went the same way. Me brothers are both away in the Army, and me mates are scattered all over the place, so’s I’ve nowhere to live.”

“I’m sorry about your mam.”

“Don’t be,” Carrie said laconically. “It was no great loss.

She was a right old bitch, me ma, but she looked after Sonny when I was at work, least pretended to. She was pissed rotten most of the time. I wouldn’t have come here if I hadn’t been in such a hole. I had to give up me job because there was no-one to keep an eye on Sonny, and I was at me wits’ end knowing which way to turn next.

When I wrote to the Army to ask why I wasn’t getting an allowance for me and Sonny, they didn’t bother to write back.” She smiled ruefully. “Throwing meself at the mercy of me ma-in-law was the very last resort. I was worried I’d give her a heart attack, just turning up like a bad penny, as they say.”

“You don’t get much off the Army, anyroad,” Brenda explained, “just twenty-five bob a week, plus seven which is stopped out of your husband’s pay. Servicemen are only left with seven bob of their own to live on.” Except Xavier, that is, she thought darkly, the man with eleven hats, probably the only private in the entire British Army to get an allowance off his wife.

“That would have done me with knobs on,” Carrie said.

“What’ll you do now?”

Carrie shrugged. “Can you put me up for the night? I don’t mind if me and Sonny sleep on the floor.” When Brenda nodded, she went on, “I’ll lock around for somewhere to live tomorrow and find a job. It’ll be nice to get away from the bombing for a change.”

Brenda didn’t bother to illuminate her on the situation in Liverpool with the raids.

“And who’ll look after Sonny?” she asked, glancing down at the little boy. He would look quite nice once cleaned up, but what a pity he looked so much like Xavier.

“I’ll sort something out.” Carrie grinned cheerfully.

“After all, I’ve been fending for meself since I was fourteen.” She pulled a face. “God! I wish this time it hadn’t all turned so sour.”

It’s turned even sourer for me, Brenda thought bleakly, because it was so unexpected. Until tonight, she’d always considered herself one of the luckiest women in the world.

“I don’t suppose you’ve got anything to drink?” Carrie asked hopefully.

“I’ll make more tea . . . ” Brenda offered.

“I meant a drop of the hard stuff; whisky, gin, something with a bit of bite in it?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t drink. Xavier finished off the whisky last time he was home.”

“How about a cigarette? I’m aching for a gasper.”

“I’m afraid I don’t smoke, either,” Brenda said apologetically.

She took a deep breath. “Look, I’ve been thinking, you can stay here if you want.” Brenda was never sure why she made the offer. Perhaps it was because she thought the two women Xavier had deceived should stick together.

“I’ll look after Sonny and you can go to work. But you must promise, on your heart, not to tell the neighbours who you are. Just say you’re a friend of a friend or something.” Carrie would have to change her ways, though, wash more frequently and keep Sonny clean.

“Strike a light, Brenda, you’re a proper good sort, you really are!” Carrie looked genuinely grateful. “But what happens when Xavier comes home?”

Maybe that was why Brenda had asked Carrie to stay.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” said Brenda. “But I can’t wait to see his face when he finds the two of us together. Can you?”

Chapter 8

Dilys Evans seemed to settle down quite happily in her room over an off-licence in Spellow Lane. The couple who ran the shop were elderly and childless and let several rooms to young girls who’d been billeted in Liverpool for reasons concerning the war.

Eileen Costello bought Dilys a wedding ring from Woolworths. “Say your husband’s in the Army, luv,” she advised. “According to Miss Thomas, they’re a nice couple, but very straitlaced. They keep a strict eye on the girls and I doubt if they’d be pleased if they knew you weren’t married.”

“I’d sooner he was in the Navy,” said Dilys.

“The Navy, then.” Eileen smiled over the girl’s head at Ruth. The two women had accompanied Dilys to “settle her in”. The room was rather dark and over-furnished, but Dilys didn’t seem to mind. Indeed, she appeared thrilled to bits at the idea of living by herself, far away from the sharp tongue of her mother, and with a bed all to herself. In Pearl Street, she’d had to share with her sister.

“It’s like a lovely big adventure!” she declared gleefully as she unpacked the few possessions which Eileen had coaxed off Dai. “I’m glad me mam threw me out. I’ve even got me own ration book.”

“You must give it to the landlady,” Ruth told her.

Breakfast and an evening meal were provided at the all-in price of fifteen shillings a week.

“All right.” Dilys suddenly clutched her side. “Ouch!”

“What’s the matter, luv?” asked Eileen in concern.

“Nothing. Just a bit of a pain, it felt like cramp.”

Eileen and Ruth glanced at each other warily. “Have you seen a doctor yet?” Ruth enquired.

“Why do I need a doctor?” Dilys looked at her blankly. “I don’t don’t understand why I need a husband, either.” She sat on the bed and kicked her heels playfully on the floor.

“Never mind, it’s all dead exciting.”

“I wonder when it’s due, the baby?” Ruth said as she and Eileen made their way home on the tram. “She was vague about the incident with the man, just said it was ‘last summer’, which could mean any time between May and September.”

“She don’t show much,” Eileen said. “Though a girl at work felt sickly one morning, and before the shift was over she’d had a baby boy weighing over five pounds.