He got on his horse and Mary passed his protesting son up to him. There were fulsome remarks on all sides – except one – on how much they had enjoyed themselves. The dog frisked about among his new friends and the babies cried, for they did not want to part with one another.
“By the way, what day in July was Kitty born, Miss Williams?” he asked her out of politeness, wondering why he should address the question to her and not the child’s mother. Perhaps because during the whole of the hour he had spent in their company she had made no attempt to take hold of her own child, though she seemed quite happy to retrieve Freddy when he crawled off the rug in the direction of an enticing clump of daisies, calling him a scamp and firmly kissing his round cheek. Even now Mary was cuddling the little girl to her, murmuring in her ear and kissing away the tears caused by the loss of her new friend.
“The twenty-third.”
His face must have shown his astonishment.
“What is it, Mr Hayes?”
“Freddy was born on the twenty-third.”
Even the expressionless face of Nancy Brody melted into open-mouthed wonder. They looked at one another, the mother and the father and for a second or two, no more, allowed one another to see what was hidden deep inside them both, and which had been there since that first day in the yard. Then hers closed up and his followed and their polite murmurs of surprise, their blank-faced unconcern for such a coincidence took them over once more.
Nodding in a gentlemanly fashion at Mary and Jennet, with one hand he took a firm hold of his son who sat before him, with the other grasped the reins and with a word of command to his two animals set off in a careful walk in the direction of Broughton Ford which would take him back to his own side of the river. His son was wailing dismally and so was Kitty.
“Well, thank God for that,” Nancy said briskly.
“Why don’t you like him, Nancy?” Mary asked curiously, for she had thought Mr Hayes to be a grand chap and so handsome and rich, too. What more could a girl ask for in a gentleman and yet their Nancy had made it very plain she was glad to see the back of him.
“Who said I didn’t like him?” Nancy coldly defended herself. “All I feel for Mr Hayes is total indifference and,” being honest at least about this, “a certain gratitude.”
“But how strange that his wife should have given birth to Freddy on the same day as Kitty. His wife must have been very young. I didn’t know he was even married, did you?” Jennet was busy gathering up the remains of their picnic, stuffing bags and tins and cups into a large basket and preparing to wrap the baby in a light shawl which she would fasten about herself.
“I can carry her, Jennet,” Mary protested, for wasn’t she a big, strapping girl and Jennet no bigger than two pennorth of copper.
“It’s only five minutes’ walk to the cab rank on Lower Broughton Lane, sweetheart. I’ll take her as far as there and then you can carry her at the other end.”
Neither of them seemed to think it strange that Kitty’s mother made no attempt to carry her own child.
The two-wheeled, leather-lined hansom cab had turned into Camp Street which led in to Bury New Road when Nancy let out a shriek that almost had the cabbie off his box at the back of the cab and caused the two girls to jump out of their skins and the baby to howl.
“What?” Jennet quavered, doing her best to soothe the baby.
“There . . . just there on the corner.”
“What is it, for heaven’s sake? I nearly had a seizure.”
“It’s to let.”
“To let! What is?” Both Jennet and Mary peered round Nancy’s shoulder as she leaned over the padded half-door of the hansom, craning her neck to look back.
“Stop here, please, Cabbie,” she was shouting, much to the cabbie’s annoyance, for Bury New Road was busy at this time of day with a fair number of horse-drawn vehicles nudging him from behind.
“What’s up?” he protested, wondering on the ways of women. First she wanted St George’s Road and now she was telling him to pull up in the thick of the traffic to the danger of not only himself, his cab and his horse, but the other vehicles.
They all leaped out, baby and all, standing gawping at the end house of a modest row of terraced villas as though it were the gates of heaven but he couldn’t hang about here, for he was blocking the road, which he told them stoutly.
“Never mind. What do we owe you?” the tall, haughty but quite gorgeous-looking creature asked him, putting the coins in his hand when he told her without even looking at them.
“I can’t wait,” he threatened her.
“It doesn’t matter. We’ll find another cab.”
“Not at this time o’ day, yer won’t,” he warned her, but she either didn’t hear him or she didn’t care.
It was on the corner of Bury New Road and Broughton Lane and pronounced itself to be Grove Place. There were about a dozen houses all with a minute front garden surrounded by a low wall and what appeared to be a yard at the back. Each house had a bay window on the ground floor, with a bay window above, and next to that a flat sash window over the front door. The front door itself was protected by a neat porch which was reached by three steps. It was empty.
Silently they walked a little way down Broughton Lane towards the back of the house and were at once standing among green fields, other pleasant houses and further on a walled nursery garden where they could make out trees and climbing plants. Bubbling merrily under a narrow hump-backed bridge that spanned Broughton Lane, evidently a tributary of the River Irwell, was a narrow, singing brook. They stood in awed contemplation of the wonder of it, exchanging glances and sighing, since it was all so perfect.
None of them spoke. Even the baby seemed impressed, quietly looking about her until after some minutes both Mary and Jennet turned to Nancy who appeared to be in a dazed trance. They waited.
At last she spoke. “This is it,” she said in a low, dreaming voice. “If we can afford it, this is it.”
“What d’you think the rent on a place like this would be?” Mary asked longingly, hopefully, tentatively.
“God knows, but there’s only one way to find out.”
“How?”
“By getting in touch with the person who put that sign up in the window.”
Mary walked back along the length of the side wall of the house and the others followed her until they were at the front again. They stood at the gate, not daring to go beyond it, though it was obvious there was no one living in it. It had a slate roof and was clean and tidy-looking, the paintwork having recently been given a fresh coat of green paint. The garden was laid out with a small lawn which badly needed trimming and round its edges was a profusion of colourful flowers. On the opposite side of the road were more fields and a sign that said “St Ann’s Square, 1 mile”.
They were just about to turn reluctantly away when the front door to the neighbouring house opened and a brisk little woman in an immaculate apron stood there, a duster in one hand and a jar of what smelled like beeswax polish in the other. Nancy loved her at once.
“You interested in renting the house, chuck?” she asked, coming down her gleaming steps to the gate where, as though it were a habit she could not break, she gave it a brisk rub over with her duster, then, smiling, she tickled the baby under her chin. Without hesitation and as if she knew exactly what was expected of her, Kitty put out her arms and the woman, gratified beyond measure, laid her duster and the polish on the dividing wall and took her from Jennet. Kitty beamed right into the woman’s face and with some aversion Nancy could see Mick O’Rourke in her roguish smile.
“Well, aren’t you a little beauty?” the woman said. “And what’s your name, then?” as though the baby might answer.
“We call her Kitty,” Jennet told her proudly. “And she is beautiful, isn’t she?”
“She yours?” the woman asked her, turning round to study all three of them and at once Nancy felt the apprehension rise in her. She wanted this house. Her instinct told her that this was to be the next step along that rocky path to success, to the respectability she craved, but these were decent people living in this terrace who took pride in themselves, in their status and in their homes. Respectable folk, that was evident, still working class, like them, but very far above the human debris beside whom they lived in Church Court. This woman’s husband probably held down some artisan’s job, or was perhaps a supervisor in a mill or in charge of a small warehouse. A clerk perhaps, or a man who had been apprenticed to a trade and now worked for himself. A man who had taken advantage of the educational opportunities that were now available to any man who had the guts and tenacity to take hold of them. And she wanted them to . . . to respect her, to accept her, to be a neighbour with whom she and the girls and Jennet might mix on an equal footing.
But she couldn’t take this next step with a lie. She hadn’t lied to anyone during the last seven, going on for eight years. She’d stood her ground, laboured until she dropped and drove those about her to do the same. She was proud of herself, and of them and she wasn’t going to tell this woman a cock-and-bull story about a husband lost at sea or in an accident in the mill yard. They must take her as she was and if it upset them and the others then she was sorry. She had an illegitimate child through no fault of her own and she wasn’t about to apologise to anybody for that. She would not offer information. She would not fabricate some story, but if she was asked she would tell the truth.
“She’s mine,” she said shortly, stepping forward and taking Kitty out of the woman’s arms. For some strange reason she found hers wrapping themselves protectively about her child. Kitty, as though sensing something in her, some link that bound mother to daughter, leaned against her and rested her head in the curve of her shoulder.
“Aah, I can see that now, lass. She’s the spit of you.” The woman turned smilingly to Mary. “And this’ll be your sister. There’s a real family likeness.” She nodded pleasantly at Jennet as though to say she didn’t know where she fitted into this family group but she was willing to give her the time of day. No more than that. No questions about their position in life, the existence, or not, as the case may be, of menfolk. She picked up her duster and polish and with a last nod turned and left them and with great vigour attacked her front door.
But, having jumped the first hurdle, so to speak, and survived it, Nancy chanced another.
“Er . . . pardon me, but . . .”
“Yes?” The woman turned, not exactly irritably but telling them plainly she was busy and could not spare the time for idle gossip. Nancy felt her admiration for her deepen.
“I was wondering if you happen to know what the rent is on a house like this?”
“Well, if it’s the same as ours it’s seven and six a week. That includes the rates, water and such. There’s a privy in the yard and tap in the scullery.”
She turned back to her task, her elbow going ten to the dozen, her head nodding up and down with her exertions, her back telling them quite clearly that she had finished fraternising.
A privy of their own! A tap in the scullery! And what other luxuries did the spring-fresh façade of the house, the smiling house – Nancy could see it smiling quite plainly – hide from their hungry eyes?
“Thank you, you have been most kind. I do hope we will see you again,” she told the woman’s back and was rewarded by a brief, hurried smile.
They had walked almost to St Ann’s Square, all three of them in a daze of delight, their feet barely touching the flags, which seemed in any case to be as soft as the drifting fleecy clouds in the sky, before they came down to earth. Kitty had fallen asleep in Nancy’s arms, her dark head nodding against her shoulder and again, for some strange reason, Nancy was reluctant to hand her back to Jennet or Mary as they were expecting her to.
“There’s a cab on the corner,” she said briefly, for like Kitty they were all tired. As she spoke her voice was quiet, for she felt a great unwillingness to break the magic spell that the house had put on them, holding her breath almost as though afraid to draw the three of them to the attention of God or the Fates or whatever powers ruled their destinies. Tomorrow she would know. Tomorrow would decide how the next chapter of their future would read. If she had been a praying person she would have asked whoever was up there to let it happen in Grove Place. But then Jennet would be speaking to that God of hers so perhaps it would be all right. Who could resist the goodness of Jennet?
The house was quiet, as quiet as they were, all busy with their own thoughts, for this was one of the most important moments of their lives. Jennet had lived in the genteel poverty of the vicarage until her father died so had not been subjected to the squalor and filth into which the Brody girls had been born, though she had seen it all around her recently. But tomorrow, if the house in Grove Place had not already been let and if the rent was within their means, they were to leave this place of abomination and move to what, in comparison, seemed like paradise.
“Put the kettle on, Mary, there’s a good lass,” Nancy said, her voice low and hushed as she placed the sleeping child in a little nest of cushions on the settle. “The fire’s just about in and a cup of tea would be most welcome.” She turned away from her distracted contemplation of her child and looked about her. “I wonder where our Rosie’s got to? She should be back by now. I hope she and that Nell haven’t got up to any mischief.”
Nell was one of their machinists at Shude Hill, a lively girl of sixteen to whom Rosie had taken a liking, it seemed, and the two of them went about together, though Nancy was not sure she approved. Nell was a nice enough girl and sensible but Nancy was not happy about it. Still, Rosie was fourteen herself now and could not be tied to Nancy’s apron strings for ever.
A sound from upstairs lifted their heads and brought the three of them from their brooding thoughts. They looked at each other in surprise.