‘Aye, well, my bairns thrive because we tek good care of ‘em. We keeps ‘em clean so they don’t sicken. Lot o’ sickness in these parts. The fever ambulance comes round all the time. But not to our house.’ Arnie cast an anxious glance at his wife, as if he were tempting fate by such a proud declaration.
Bertie made suitably sympathetic noises.
‘But we’re not stupid, don’t think we are. I’ve seen to it that all my bairns can read. I keep abreast of world events, see what Lloyd George and his parliament are up to. What the unions are doing. All this unrest, strikes and such in Liverpool and Manchester - I’m not a union man meself but they have my sympathies - make no bones about that. They’re right to fight. Power should be shared a bit more fairly.’
‘You’ve a right to your principles, Mr Thorpe. Applaud that in a chap, I do,’ Bertie agreed. ‘The working man should indeed be heard.’
Arnie generously offered his newspaper for this new son-in-law to read, should he have a mind to check out world events himself.
Bertie declined.
Lily listened to this conversation which took place in some form or other every evening before the pair of them toddled off for a half of bitter at the Cobbles Inn, and struggled with her own contradictory feelings. She was glad that Bertie liked her parents, and that they had accepted him, yet felt a strange disquiet, as if life were no longer quite real. Could she really be
married
to Bertie Clermont-Read?
And still living in The Cobbles!
Why had she done it? For revenge? Now that the angry impulse was passing, Lily wondered what on earth she had let herself in for. What had she hoped to achieve? Did she love him enough to spend the rest of her life with him? Did she heck as like! She must have been barmy. Driven by that wicked temper of hers.
If nothing else brought home the reality of her situation, it was made clear enough that very first Sunday when the Thorpe family went, as usual, to the Parish Church.
Arnie and Hannah, followed by their children, took their usual seats at the back, Bertie along with them. A flurry of whispers rippled along the pew as everyone shuffled up a little to make space for him, and a score of glares followed his every move. Lily and Hannah exchanged glances.
Where should Bertie sit? With his wife and the common folk on the back pews? Or up by the altar, with his family and the rest of the well-to-do who paid for private pews? It was a well-established system instituted in order to reinforce the hierarchy of class. In the middle of the church sat the artisans, shopkeepers and other skilled men, who thought themselves above those in the back and were anxious to emulate, as best they could, those in the front.
Hannah didn’t know where to put herself. Though she preferred her own private visits to Benthwaite Methodist, she came to St Margaret’s as often as she could to please her husband, for all she never felt entirely comfortable in its stiff, hushed atmosphere. Now she fully expected to be struck dead on the spot for daring to bring this young man into the wrong pew.
There was Edward Clermont-Read glowering across the church at Bertie, as if he’d like to drag him from the back pew by the scruff of his neck. Selene was doing her utmost to seem entirely unconcerned even as her face flushed hotly with embarrassment. There was no sign of Margot, for which Lily was thankful. Bertie gave her hand a little squeeze as if to say, Don’t worry, it’s all right.
But worse was to come. As they left the church by the side entrance as usual, leaving the centre front door for the Clermont-Reads and Ferguson-Walshes, the vicar took a quick side-step towards them. For one second Lily thought he was about to congratulate them on their recent marriage, but ignoring her completely, he took hold of Bertie’s hand, shaking it firmly.
‘Good to see you here, sir. A fine morning.’
‘Indeed.’
Then he scurried back to his duty of seeing out those others of the congregation who were worthy of his personal attention, without so much as a glance in Lily’s direction. The Thorpe family, along with the others from the back pews, went home unacknowledged as usual. Even marriage to one of the elect, it seemed, couldn’t alter the rules of class.
No word came from Barwick House and eventually Lily found a small cottage for them in Mallard Street, too close to the lake to be quite healthy but at a rent they could afford. Now, at last, they could begin married life proper. She wasn’t sure whether it was nervousness, fear or excitement that she experienced as she faced her first night alone with Bertie. Once, she’d been filled with curiosity about such matters, but that had been when she still had Dick. Her life now seemed to be rapidly spinning out of her control.
‘I don’t know what to do,’ she told him, sitting up in bed in her best white nightgown with the crochet collar, and thinking how cold her feet were.
Bertie stood in his long drawers and nightshirt and gave the matter some thought. ‘Not had much experience with gels meself. Boys’ school and all that. And the milk-sops Mama paraded in front of me would never do anything so rude.’
This brought forth a giggle. ‘You really are naughty, Bertie.’
‘Am I?’ He came close to the bed, taking in the small pert breasts rising and falling beneath the thin cotton lawn of her gown.
‘Have you - ‘ Lily flushed - ‘never done it before either then?’
‘Wouldn’t say that, old thing.’ He manfully puffed out his chest. ‘A chap has to practise. The odd maid was willing, don’t you know?’
‘Oh, Bertie.’ Lily regarded him from wide sad eyes. ‘You’re not one of those rogues who get girls in trouble, are you?’
‘Dash it, no. I’m a gentleman. Wouldn’t be so unsporting.’
Lily was beginning to feel more relaxed, and risked a shy glance in Bertie’s direction as he stripped off the under-drawers. His legs weren’t bad. Quite straight and firm, not at all knobbly. She imagined them wrapped around her and didn’t find the idea alarming. Seeing her interest, he grinned at her and recklessly threw off his nightshirt, whereupon Lily’s heart quickened in alarm as her eyes fastened on that previously unseen part of a man’s anatomy.
‘Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you.’ If he didn’t get on with it, he’d find his gun cocked and ready miles before he could take aim. He drew back the sheets, pushing her back against the pillows and drawing Lily’s nightgown up over the sprightly firmness of her breasts. Then he straddled her rather as he might his favourite horse. ‘We’ll work it out together, eh? What d’you say?’
They managed, in fact, to work it out quite well.
The mysteries of womanhood were at last revealed to Lily, and after it was all over and they lay hot and sticky with their efforts, she really didn’t feel inclined to complain. Bertie was a vigorous, enthusiastic lover, eager to please and clearly enjoyed every minute of it. And if his whooping shouts of pleasure as he thrust into her sounded more like a hunting call than romantic wooing, Lily found she didn’t mind, not really. It all seemed like good fun and she was done with romance, wasn’t she?
Lily’s first baby was born some nine months later, and beautiful though she undoubtedly was, little Amy’s birth seemed to Lily like the final closing of the trap. She’d end up like her mother for sure now. What was to stop another and another? Lily certainly had no idea.
Hannah’s health unfortunately continued to cause concern. She suffered one cold after another and should have seen a doctor, had the Thorpe family been able to afford one.
Instead, Lily visited a herbalist’s shop on the corner of Drake Road. Dusty and filled with an odd odour, it was nevertheless well-stocked with powders in screws of paper fastened by elastic to cards, sold three for a penny. Even more mysterious potions were secreted in a myriad range of tiny drawers. The herbalist claimed to be a marvellous diagnostic with the power to cure any sickness, without even seeing the patient.
Lily plucked up the courage to ask him for something for herself too.
‘I d-don’t want no more bairns just now, you see,’ she stammered. ‘So I wondered if happen you knew of some way to stop ‘em?’ The herbalist regarded her for a long silent moment from above his glasses before fumbling beneath the counter and handing her a packet.
‘Mix a teaspoonful with water and use on a sponge,’ were his instructions, and for a mad moment Lily almost told him she used a face flannel and soap, but then his meaning dawned and, blushing hotly, she paid her money and fled.
So they struggled on as best they could, with Emma and Liza now carrying the burden of the housework at home, and though Lily called in on her mother every day and it broke her heart to see how thin she got, both of them despaired over what more could be done.
‘You’ve enough to worry over,’ Hannah would say. ‘See to your own problems.’
Bertie was proving to be something of a disappointment. He seemed quite incapable of supporting his new family. And Margot had now cut off his allowance.
‘Dash it, Lily,’ he’d protest whenever she suggested he look for a job. ‘What could I do?’
She did succeed once in gently bullying him into taking a job as potman at the Cobbles Inn. But he drunk most of his meagre wages in whisky, and gambled the rest away at black jack before the first week was up.
‘Sorry old thing, couldn’t resist it. Not my fault if they pay a chap a pittance, is it?’
Bertie, Lily realised, had no sense of the value of money. What a family could live on for a week, he could gamble on a single throw of the cards. Whatever he’d wanted previously had always been provided for him. He couldn’t seem to adjust to the fact that life was different now.
She’d taken over the job herself in the end. Afternoons and some evenings, Liza worked alongside Lily now on the fish stall in place of Hannah, which was a help in a way, for most of the time Lily had the bairn with her. Bertie complained that he knew nothing about nappies and feeding bottles so if she left little Amy at home, how could she be sure she’d be properly looked after? At least Liza was happy to play with the child while Lily worked.
Bertie spent his day on his ‘inventions’. These consisted of endless drawings done on any scrap of paper he could find or buy with money they could ill afford. He drew planes and boats and motor-cars, without hope of ever being able to bring one of his designs to fruition. But if Lily ever said as much, he would vigorously protest.
‘Have faith, Lily. I’ll find the money one day, then you’ll see.’
But this life was far removed from the one he’d enjoyed at Barwick House, his family home. There were no servants in The Cobbles. No cook to make delicious dinners or prepare cream teas. No pretty housemaid to fetch hot coffee and rolls to his room for breakfast in bed. Here in Mallard Street, what you couldn’t provide for yourself, you did without.
Lily made a huge pot of broth every Monday, hoping that would last them for most of the week. On Sunday afternoons she went mushrooming, raspberry or blackberry picking, seeking whatever was in season. Even nettles could make a tasty soup if you found them fresh and young enough.
She baked two large loaves every Tuesday evening, marked them with her initials and took them down to the communal bakehouse where she paid a penny-farthing to get them baked. The first time she’d done this, she’d come home the next day to find Bertie had eaten an entire loaf, all by himself. She’d nearly gone demented.
‘That should’ve lasted us till Friday. D’you think we’re made of brass?’
But he’d looked at her with such soulful eyes and told her how hungry he’d been, and how sorry he was, that she felt bound to forgive him. ‘Don’t be cross, Lily. I won’t do it again,’ he promised.
But of course he had. Used to plenty, how could he adjust to poverty rations? Yet how could she scold him? He would touch her cheek with his soft lips, slide his smooth hands along her neck and over the curve of her breast, and all protests would die to a whisper within her. He’d tell her how silky was her skin, how soft and curling her hair, how sweet she tasted. Lily would ache to put Amy quickly to bed so she could lie in his arms and have him kiss her all over and do things to her that made her blush with shame the next morning.
For all she’d found less satisfaction from her act of revenge upon his family than she’d expected or hoped, and despite all their hardships and worries, surprisingly, Lily didn’t regret marrying Bertie Clermont-Read, not for a minute. Being married had opened up a whole new world to her, and Lily couldn’t say she didn’t enjoy it.
Margot rose from her couch, where she’d progressed from her bed, the day Selene put on her best lambswool jacket and announced she would go and bring Bertie back from The Cobbles that instant, even if she had to drag him by the scruff of his neck.
‘Will you truly?’
‘I can’t bear this situation another moment.’
‘Tell him that all this trauma has made me quite ill,’ his mother declared. ‘Tell him that if he does not return, I shall cut him off without a penny.’
Selene gave a wry smile. ‘I doubt he’d believe you. Haven’t you always given him everything he asked for, and more? Besides, you know full well, Mama, that Bertie has a poor grip on life. He thinks no further than his next meal or entertainment.’ Selene wanted him home for her own reasons. If her chances of marriage had been slim before, owing to the naturally high standards she set herself, they were almost nil now. Who would wish to be allied with a family who harboured a madman living in The Cobbles?