Rosemary Aitken (22 page)

‘My dear!’ Blanche put in gently, but she was horrified. This was all her fault. She should never have taken Broadbent into her confidence and told him that Lettie would be coming here today – after all, as Pearl had pointed out, they did not know anything about the man. ‘Surely it can’t be as bad as that?’

Lettie gave an unbecoming sniff and rubbed her eyes. ‘Yes, I suppose I’m lucky when you think of it like that. He has agreed to take me, so I will be all right – though he didn’t really want to, and that’s what makes me cry.’ She raised her head and stared suddenly at Blanche. ‘But how do you come to know about it anyway? I haven’t said anything to anyone – excepting Effie, and she swore she wouldn’t tell.’

Blanche was hardly listening. This wasn’t making sense. Josiah taking Lettie – whatever did it mean? Not to London, by the sound of it. She felt as if the pavement was moving under her. ‘What exactly did Mr Broadbent say?’

Lettie looked astonished. ‘Don’t tell me he’s the one that found it out? He told me that it was his business to discover things, but I never thought he meant about me getting wed to Bert. What has it got to do with him?’

‘You are getting wed to Bert? That’s the grocer’s boy I’ve sometimes seen you with?’ The pavement had returned to its accustomed place and Blanche was beginning to get the sense of this. ‘I think there’s been a little misunderstanding here. I only meant to ask you if Mr Broadbent had caught up with you, as I knew he wanted to have a word with you.’ She saw Lettie’s look of horror. ‘But you needn’t worry. I will keep your secret, now I’ve surprised it out of you. Though for a girl who’s getting married, you don’t seem very pleased.’

‘I might as well tell you, since you already know. It’s a relief to talk to someone, to tell you the truth.’ Lettie shook her head. ‘Bert isn’t really willing, that’s the worst of it. I told him what we’d come to and in the end he said he would. But he didn’t want to – you could see that clear as day – and if I didn’t have to, I wouldn’t marry him.’

Blanche was faintly puzzled. ‘But surely you don’t have to marry anyone? The law would take your part. We don’t have forced marriage in this country any more.’

Lettie gave a little bitter laugh. ‘Well, let’s just say that sometimes things work out that way – you do what you have to, and put up with it. And as I say, it could have been much worse. Miss Caroline won’t like it – she’s got used to me – but she’ll just have to find another maid, that’s all.’ She rubbed her eyes and face. ‘Well I’d better go and face her, now I’ve dried my eyes. I can rely on you to keep this to yourself?’ And when Blanche nodded she walked slowly off along the pavement, with her head thrown back and her chin jutting upwards as if defying fate.

Blanche watched her go in mild bewilderment. What a peculiar attitude to have!
If someone was prepared to marry me
, she thought – not that it was likely at her time of life –
I would be only too delighted to accept and, what is more, I would want the world to know!
Though naturally she did not have any particular prospective groom in mind.

She gave a casual glance around the street. Mr Broadbent was nowhere to be seen so she went back into the shop again. Perhaps she would catch sight of him a little later on.

But she didn’t have time to look out for him again. That afternoon there was an unexpected little run on gloves.

Walter was clinging to the bedposts with both hands, gritting his teeth and trying not to make unmanly sounds. The mine doctor was tightening the splint again and it felt for all
the world as if the leg was catching fire under the pressure of the bandages.

‘One more turn, Pengelly, and we shall be done.’ The doctor stood up, looking satisfied. ‘It must be done, you know, to keep it good and firm, otherwise it would give you no support at all. And it’s coming on quite well now; there’s an awful lot of bruising, but the swelling is going down – that’s why the splint was getting loose – and there doesn’t seem to be infection round the break at all, and that can be a killer if it starts. So it looks as if you’re lucky, and in a week or so we’ll have you on crutches and walking round a bit.’

‘You said that last time! Another blessed week!’ Now that the wretched fellow had stopped his tinkering the pain was less intense, and as it ebbed into a burning ache Walter found that he could trust himself to speak. ‘A chap could go demented lying here all day.’ He let go of the bedposts guiltily.

The doctor nodded briskly. ‘I think we might agree that we can start to get you out – get you in a chair for an hour or two a day. It will make a change for you and stop you getting bed-sores, which otherwise it looks as if you might.’ What gave him the right to look self-satisfied as he said this? ‘But you’ll have to keep your leg up for the first few days at least. We don’t want to undo all the good work we have done. And if you start feeling giddy, it is back to bed at once. I’ve not forgotten that you took that knock as well.’

‘Thank you, Doctor; it will make a change, at least!’ Walter remembered to sound grateful. It wasn’t what he’d hoped for, but it would be a relief. Perhaps he could get Madge to move the chair across a foot or two so that he could look out of the window to the street, and take an interest in the world outside instead of staring at that wretched text all day. ‘You’d better tell my sister.’

‘I’ll do that all right. And I’ll see the crutch is ordered for next time that I come. Then perhaps we can have you on your feet and after that I won’t have to call again.’

And a damty good thing too, in Walter’s view, but of course he did not say that, just forced himself to grin. ‘You’ll be as glad as I am when you’ve seen the back of me,’ he said, in an attempt at pleasantry. ‘Still can’t take it in that I don’t have to pay you every time.’

The doctor did not look at all amused, just put his equipment back into his bag and walked round to the door. ‘We shall have to hope the system doesn’t bankrupt anyone,’ he said. ‘I’m not at all convinced that it will work for very long. But in the meantime, make the most of it. If you’d had to pay for everything, it would have cost you such a lot that it would either have driven you to ruin or you’d have decided against it and would not have walked again. Or both if you had really been unfortunate.’ He gave what looked like an ironic little bow. ‘So count your blessings. I will say good afternoon.’

And he clopped off down the stairs. Walter could hear him in the kitchen, saying things to Madge, though he could not at this distance make out what they were.

It was not difficult to work it out, however, because a moment afterwards he heard the front door close and Madge came bustling upstairs, wiping her hands on her apron and looking cross as sticks.

‘Well, he says that we can get you out into a chair – he’s taking about tomorrow afternoon – but how he thinks I’m going to do that on my own I cannot think. You will simply have to wait till Joe comes home and that won’t be till six – won’t be what you’re hoping, but it will have to do.’

Walter stared at her. ‘Why ever would we have to wait for Joe? I aren’t helpless, broken bones or no. If I’ve got you to lean on, I can get my damty self into a chair. Only a matter of standing up and turning round.’

She shook her head. ‘Well that’s just where you’re wrong. The doctor says you’ll be as weak as water for a bit. It’s one thing to half-sit propped up with pillows like you’re doing now, but trying to get out of bed is something else, when you’ve been lying down for weeks. Might come over funny the first time, so he says – and if you fell over, what would I do then? I couldn’t lift you back, with your splint and everything – to say nothing of the fact that you could hurt your leg again. I aren’t risking that. No!’ She held her hand up as he started to protest. ‘We will simply have to wait for Joe – the first few days at least. So leave it go at that. Now, I’ve put the kettle on the hob. You want a cup of tea?’

He nodded glumly and she went downstairs again. It was her idea of consolation, but it did not help him much. He listened glumly to the noises in the street – a horse and cart, two women gossiping – fretting that he could not sit out and watch it all. The street would be half-empty by the time that Joe came home, and even then the man would want his tea before he came to help the damty invalid. Pity he wasn’t on the early shift this week, like the men that he could hear approaching even now. And that was when he had his good idea.

He was actually smiling when Madge came back again, bringing him his tea and a slice of still-warm hevva cake she’d made.

‘What’s up with you then? I thought you’d be wild. I hope you’re not intending to try to sweet-talk me and make me change my mind about letting you sit out? Well if that’s what you’re hoping, Walter, you can think again. I really mean it – I aren’t willing to risk it on my own.’

He took a sip of sweetened tea and smacked his lips. ‘Well how don’t you ask one of the early shift to help? Young Peter Kellow now, he’s a willing lad, and he’s been here to see me of his own accord. I do b’lieve he would be tickled to be asked.’

She shook her head. ‘Can’t go asking favours of a lad like that. Why would he want to help?’

Walter had a very shrewd idea but he did not tell Madge. ‘Give him a morsel of your hevva cake and that would pay him more than ’andsome, I should say! Nobody living makes hevva cake like you.’ He knew that it was flattery, but the cake was very good and his Susan was dead so it was almost true.

‘Get on with you!’ Madge muttered, but she did not demur.

He had judged correctly. Peter Kellow was delighted to be asked and volunteered to come in every day – though Walter remained privately convinced that it had more to do with Effie than with any hevva cake.

Effie was delighted to find Pa out of bed and in the chair, with his bad leg propped up before him on a kitchen stool. He was sitting by the window with a rug across his lap, and he was balancing a saucepan on the top of it so he could string and slice a pile of runner beans which had been heaped conveniently on the chest of drawers nearby.

He waved the knife in greeting. ‘Making myself useful. At least I’m trying to. But I keep on dropping half the damty strings.’ He gestured to the floor. ‘Be an angel, Effie, and pick them up for me. There’s a bucket down there I’m supposed to drop them in, but they keep missing when I let them fall.’

She came over to plant a kiss on his cheek then knelt down to collect the fragments, which were scattered all around the pail. ‘Can’t be easy when you can’t bend over. How’s the ankle coming on? Aunty Madge says they are going to let you walk on it next week, but I see you’ve got a pillow underneath it on the stool. Not very comfortable otherwise?’

He shook his head and gave a rueful laugh. ‘Not very comfortable anyway. Dratted splint’s so heavy that it makes me thighs ache holding it like this. But don’t you go saying that to your Aunty Madge or she will have me back in bed before you can say Jack Robinson. I’ve had a job to make her let me stay here as it is – she keeps on saying it will tire me out. I only kept her quiet by offering to do the damty beans. And I insisted that the doctor said an hour, so Peter Kellow isn’t coming back till then.’

She had collected half of the errant bean strings by this time but she sat up in astonishment at this. ‘Peter Kellow? What has Peter got to do with it?’

Pa was smiling at her with his eyebrows arched. ‘Oh, he’s been very good since I’ve been laid up in bed. Been to see me of his own accord and talked about the mine. Did me a power of good. And when he heard Madge needed help to get me in and out the chair, he was only too happy to give a bit of a hand. Nice boy is Peter. Don’t know if you ever run into him these days?’

She felt herself turn scarlet and she turned away again, pretending that she was busy hunting beans. She said, in a carefully casual tone of voice, ‘I have come across him lately once or twice – they sent him to fetch me when you had your accident – though I hadn’t spoken to him, up to then, for absolutely years.’ She crawled away to reach another fragment of a pod.

‘Came to fetch you, did he?’ Pa said, in a way that made her think that he had known that all along. ‘That was nice of him. You’ll want to thank him when he comes back here, then, I’ll be bound.’ He dropped his hand on to her head and ruffled up her hair. ‘And don’t think I haven’t noticed. It’s clear he’s sweet on you. And you’ve got my blessing if you’re thinking to walk out with him.’ He gave a rather rueful sort of laugh. ‘Without you’ve got admirers in town I haven’t heard about. Joe’s certain that you have, but I said you’d have told me if there was anything.’

Effie shook her head. This was the last thing she wanted to discuss with Pa today. She thought a moment before saying carefully, ‘Well there was a young fellow I took a fancy to, but that’s all over now.’

Pa was silent for a moment and then said in an altered tone of voice. ‘Don’t you tell me that he’s led you up the garden path, or leg or no leg I’ll go after him.’

It was clear he meant it, but it sounded comical and Effie was actually able to give a little laugh before she answered, quite light-heartedly, ‘No, nothing of the kind. More the other way about. I thought a lot of Alex but it would not have done – and in the end I had to tell him so.’ She had simplified the story but that was the gist of it.

She was avoiding looking at her father all this time but she could tell from his voice that he was staring searchingly at her. ‘What do you mean exactly, “it would not have done”. What was it? He was twice your age? Some artist type or something, who was not respectable?’ She shook her head at each suggestion as he spoke but finally he voiced what must have been his great anxiety. ‘You’re not going to tell me that he was a married man?’

It was a relief to Effie to be able to laugh his fears aside. ‘No, ’course I wouldn’t get mixed up in anything like that! Alex was nothing if not respectable. That was the trouble really, he was too well-off. You should have heard him talk about his family – servants and stables and that sort of thing and his father something important in the army once. I couldn’t very well have brought him home to this! He wasn’t really suitable for somebody like me.’