Water Gypsies (35 page)

She saw the sign from a short distance away:
Albert Griffin, Toolmakers & Machinists.
For a moment she doubted herself. Could he really have anything to do with this place? It was certainly a new line of business for him. He’d been an undertaker for years – would he go into toolmaking instead?

The factory had quite a narrow frontage, but the buildings reached back some way from the street. For a moment she stopped, almost paralysed with nerves, as if the factory had an invisible electric fence round it that she did not dare to pass.

For goodness sake
, she urged herself,
I’m only walking past down the road. It’ll look even odder if I stop.
Her hands were so sweaty she had to wipe them on her skirt.

There was nothing to see. The doors were shut and no one came in or out. She hurried past and turned, relieved, back onto Bradford Street, where the trams went rattling past and things felt safer again.

But I
know
it’s him
, she told herself, hurrying away. Her heart was still pounding. Why else would Mom have had that card in her house?

She thought again of Jenny the cat, hanging by the neck from that scrap of rope. A chill went through her which grew into panic. All she wanted was to get home.

She wouldn’t go back to the
Theodore
with Dot and Sylvia once the children were in bed. The three of them stood outside, coats on against the chilly evening.

‘Maryann, we’re your friends. At least, we want to be, don’t we, Dot?’

Maryann stood with her arms folded, closed in on herself as the others tried to get her to talk.

‘You’ve seen us both through a lot. You’ve been a real brick – and so kind.’ Sylvia stepped closer, as if to embrace her, but Maryann stepped back. She didn’t want to be touched.

‘It’d make you feel better,’ Dot said gruffly. ‘To talk, I mean. Goodness knows, I’m bad enough at opening up. But after Steven died – well, you did a lot for me.’

But that’s different!
Maryann wailed in her head.
You loved your brother and he died. That’s natural. It’s clean
–
not like this, not like
him
and all he’s done! How can I tell you? Things like this don’t happen to people like you – you’re different. Or I’m different: that’s what it is.

She stared out at the water beyond, at the broken light reflected in the ripples. There was a smell of frying onions coming from another boat. Inside her the worst thought of all swelled, unspoken.
If I told you, you’d never believe me. You’d think I was a liar and you’d find me disgusting.

‘What is it, Maryann?’ Sylvia said softly. ‘Can’t you trust us? I saw your face this morning and you were really frightened, I could tell.’

‘You’re even frightened in your sleep.’ Dot spoke with such sympathy suddenly that Maryann felt an unbearable tightening in her throat. A pool of unshed tears seemed to press behind her eyes.

‘You know who killed little Jenny, don’t you?’ Sylvia persisted.

Maryann turned to them. She had to tell them something. It was such an odd, horrible thing to have happened.

‘I think it was a man called Norman Griffin. He was my stepfather.’

There was a silence. She saw Sylvia and Dot glance at each other.

‘But
why?’
Dot said. ‘He must be quite mad.’

‘He’s not very nice, no,’ she said flatly. All energy went out of her suddenly. The tears subsided. She couldn’t say more, couldn’t begin on it. After the funeral they’d get away from here again and she could feel safe, keep away from Birmingham, leave it up to the police to catch him. She could put it all away again.

‘I just don’t want him anywhere near my family, that’s all. It makes me a bit jumpy sometimes. That’s why I asked you to keep an eye on them, Sylv. Anyroad – it’s been a long day. I’m going to bed now.’

She could feel them watching her as she opened the hatches of the
Esther Jane

‘’Night,’night,’ she said.

She knew they were perfectly aware that she wasn’t telling them all of the truth.
They’re not stupid
, she thought, climbing over the twins to her bed.
But I can’t – I just can’t. What would they think of me?

Lying in bed, she felt wide awake. It was a relief because she dreaded the dreams. She lay in the dark for ages, listening for any sound outside.

Thirty-Five

They woke early the next morning and a light mist hung over the water, the sky colourless and hazy. It seemed to Maryann that she hadn’t slept at all, but she did not feel tired. She was in too wound up a state for that. Even before her morning cup of tea – once more made by Sylvia – she was full of agitated energy.

The night before they had decided that, instead of leaving the boats and resorting to buses and trams, they would take the
Esther Jane
across town to where they could walk to the cemetery. Maryann had sent a message to Tony to say that they were not going to join the modest funeral procession across from Ladywood. Dot got the engine going, while Maryann and Sylvia finished getting everyone dressed.

‘Neither Dot nor I have anything really suitable to wear for a funeral!’ Sylvia said, slipping a frock over Ada’s head. Her wiry little arms thrust up through the sleeves.

‘Can’t say I have either,’ Maryann said. ‘Never mind. We’ll just have to make the best of it. There’ll be hardly anyone there except Tony and Billy.’

She found, almost to her shame, that she was quite looking forward to the day. It was a change, after all – another day off before all the hard work began again, and a chance to see her brothers. Tony had said Billy was coming home on leave for the funeral. Perhaps she might get to know him a bit better, to feel he really was her brother.

They had breakfast moving along. After they’d crossed town they moved onto the Worcester Canal, chugging along past Davenport’s Brewery, its bitter, hop smell filling the air. The sun began to break through and melt away the mist, and the air started to feel warm and muggy, so they laid some of the bedding out to air. They passed carriers whom they didn’t normally see, clothed-up pairs of boats from the Severn Canal Carrying Company, which transported goods out to the West Country, out through the long tunnel at Tardebigge and down to the Severn.

‘I haven’t been down here in a good while,’ Maryann said to Dot, as she stood out with her eating breakfast. Familiar landmarks moved past them, Sturges’s Chemical Works, the tunnel at Edgbaston, the copper works at Selly Oak. It was a stretch full of poignancy for Maryann. It was one of the greenest parts of the cut in Birmingham and today the trees were covered in fresh spring leaves. She remembered coming along here on another lovely day with Nancy and Darius when they were first falling in love and how she, seeing what was between them, had fretted and tried to prevent it: Nancy was married then to Mick Mallone. How ridiculous her worries seemed now, when Nancy had only had such a brief time of happiness with Darius. This sadness added itself to all the rest. For a moment, as they brushed through the green light of overhanging branches, she was filled with a hard, hungry ache for Joel. For him to be at her side, to feel him holding her. She felt surprised, ashamed even, at how little she had missed him in the last few weeks, how she had grown used to his absence. But it couldn’t be long now before he would be strong enough to come back. And then, she realized with another pang, she would have to say goodbye to Sylvia and Dot, and she knew how much she didn’t want to lose them either.

They tied up at Selly Oak and walked to the gates of Lodge Hill Cemetery in time to meet the carriage bringing Flo’s body.

‘Well, we look a motley crew, don’t we?’ Dot said as they set off. It was the first time Maryann had ever seen Dot in a skirt, straight, tightly fitting and navy blue, and she had complained like anything when she tried to squeeze into it.

‘I’ve put on pounds doing this job! Good heavens, I can hardly do it up at the waist!’

‘Never mind – you look as healthy as a hunter,’ Sylvia told her.

‘Well, it’s not fair,’ Dot protested, going red in the face as she breathed in, trying to do up the zip. ‘You and Maryann stay as thin as twigs and I rush about far more than either of you!’ She had to resort to leaving the top button undone. They had all put their coats on, even though it was quite warm, in order to look a bit smarter.

The funeral cortége was as basic as it could be because there was no money in the family. In the event, the only mourner apart from the family was a neighbour of Flo’s, a middle-aged, corpulent lady called Mrs Biggs, who waddled towards them in front of Maryann’s brothers, in her hat and coat. She had dark, thick brows and prominent cheeks, above which her deepset eyes appeared only just able to see out. She nodded with sharp disapproval at Maryann.

‘I were a friend of your mother’s,’ she said, adding tartly, ‘somebody had to be,’ before turning away.

Walking beside Tony was a tall young man with fair hair, dressed smartly in Air Force blue. He was the taller of the two and, although Maryann knew it had to be Billy, it still took her a moment to recognize him.

Her hand went to her mouth, ‘Oh, my word, look at him!’

As he came closer, she saw that he was handsome and big-boned like their mother had been.
He looks like our mom and Sal
, she thought,
and he must be all of twenty now.
His eyes were vivid blue and he had a cropped RAF haircut.

‘Here’s Uncle Tony,’ she said to the children. ‘And this is Uncle Billy.’

Billy looked round at them all and nodded, though he didn’t smile. ‘Maryann. All right?’ was all he said, and that quite abruptly. The cold expression in his eyes made Maryann sink inside and she turned away, hurt.
Well, I suppose I never was much of a sister to him
, she thought.
Or not so’s he remembers, anyroad.

Even though Dot and Sylvia were there, she felt terribly alone as they walked behind the carriage taking her mother’s body into the cemetery. Mrs Biggs’s hostility and the coldness of Billy’s greeting sunk deep into her.
Oh, Sal, you ought to be here with me now
, she thought,
not lying six foot under already, with our mom coming to join you. We should be doing this together.

They reached the plot that had been reserved beside Sal’s and their father’s graves. Maryann saw Sylvia and Dot discreetly reading the words on the headstones. Sylvia’s eyes lingered on SALLY ANNE GRIFFIN, 1913–28, and Maryann saw her wondering how Sal had died when she was only fifteen. How could she begin to explain?

She barely noticed the undertakers bringing her mother’s coffin to the graveside. Standing by Sal’s grave again she felt desperate to see her, to be able to pour out all her troubles. Sal was the one person who would have understood.

He’s back
, Sal, she told her in her head.
And I’m so scared. He’s worse than before. He’s killed Amy, murdered her, and he’s always there. He always seems to know where we are. I can’t sleep, I can’t think properly … I wish there was someone could help me.
Had she been alone she might have broken down and wept then, but Sylvia was nudging her. The burial was about to begin.

‘D’you think we’d better pick these two up?’ Sylvia nodded down at the twins.

Maryann lifted Esther up and Sylvia took Ada. No good having them running off in the middle of it. The other four children stood solemnly in a line in front of them.

‘I am the resurrection and the life,’ the vicar was saying. Maryann felt some comfort from the old, formal words and from her daughter’s warm, plump body in her arms.

As the body of her mother was lowered into the grave, she glanced across at her brothers, who stood on the other side. Tony had his head lowered, cap in his hand. She saw him wipe his eyes as the earth rattled onto the coffin and felt sorry for him. Poor Tony – he was always the soft lad. He was also the only one who’d been really close to Mom. Billy, however, stood very upright, in a military stance, hands behind his back. His cool blue eyes gazed beyond them all at the trees behind. Little Billy, the round toddler she used to bath and sit on her knee, while he chuckled and bounced. She wanted him to know that, to reach out to him.

When it was over, they walked slowly away from the family graves through the peaceful cemetery. The children, released at last, began to run and jump ahead of them, loving the open space and the trees to dodge round to let off steam.

Dot and Sylvia walked together, each leading a twin by the hand, discreetly allowing the family to be together. Mrs Biggs collared Tony and Maryann went to walk beside Billy. He seemed even taller than she’d realized, with a long, muscular stride.

‘How you keeping?’ she asked nervously.

‘All right. Going back tomorrow.’ She knew he was in Coastal Command. She asked questions, but he wouldn’t be drawn about it and they lapsed into silence. Maryann looked down, watching her old boots with their scuffed toecaps moving over the dry ground. She heard Joley and Ezra shouting to each other in the distance, knew she ought to tell them to quieten down, but she didn’t want to move away.

‘Billy –’ she looked up at him, but he didn’t turn his head – ‘I know I haven’t been much of a sister to you – not being here and that. Only it seems a shame not to try and see more of each other like, now Mom’s gone … You know, family – keeping in touch.’

Billy shrugged, and in that movement of his shoulders was complete indifference. But what cut her to the heart was the look in his eyes when he turned to face her. She saw that her blond, handsome brother was like a hard-faced stranger beside her, staring down at her with contempt.

‘You’re not really from round here any more, though, are you?’

And she saw her clothes, her ragamuffin children, her life, through his eyes and how he despised her – for not being there as he grew up, for what she had become.

‘No,’ she conceded miserably. ‘I s’pose I’m not.’

He turned away and went to join Tony and Mrs Biggs. Maryann waited for Dot and Sylvia, forcing a smile to her lips to hide how much Billy’s words had cut her. She wrenched her hurt round into a tough, defiant anger. Yes, she’d moved on from here and this was who she was. She was Maryann Bartholomew, a skilled boatwoman, and her family were boater’s children and proud!
So sod you, Billy Nelson – you may be my brother, but you’re a cold bastard and stuck up with it!