Mr Lowey’s shop was not full, but there were women waiting to be served so Sara took her place at the end of the line, scuffing her feet in the sawdust and trying to breathe shallow because the smell of blood and bones was not pleasant. However, the line moved quickly and presently she was standing at the top of the long wooden counter, with Mr Lowey’s boy, a spotty-faced individual called Bert, facing her.
‘Yes, Miss? Can I get you somethin’?’
‘Mrs Prescott said to ask you for some scrag end for a stew and a nice lean piece of pork for roasting, she’ll pick the pork up Saturday,’ Sara recited. ‘About a pound of scrag, she said.’
‘And how is Mrs Prescott?’ Mr Lowey called from further down the counter. ‘Not poorly, I ’ope?’
‘She’s got a headache,’ Sara admitted. ‘It’s really bad, that’s why I’m doing her shopping. But after I’ve done I can play out.’
‘Well, at least the sun’s shining,’ Mr Lowey observed. ‘You’ll ’ave to run about to keep warm though, chuck. It don’t do to ’ang about when the wind’s cutting like this one is.’
Sara hadn’t noticed that the wind was particularly cold but walking home with her now laden shopping basket she did think that perhaps, since Cammy was busy at the clinic, wherever that might be, she might stay indoors, do a jigsaw, or write another story in her homework book. She had begun one only the previous day in which a brigand with a big black beard, a heroine who looked very similar to Sara and a friendly orange cat figured large. It might be fun to go on with it . . . at least until Cammy returned from the clinic, hopefully minus both the toothache and the tooth.
Accordingly she returned to number three and made a cup of tea, then carried it carefully up the stairs, for Mrs Prescott had succumbed and gone back to bed.
‘Oh, bless you, queen . . . you’ve got the pills an’ all,’ Mrs Prescott said huskily, as soon as Sara appeared round the bedroom door. ‘Once they’re down the little red lane I’ll feel heaps better. And nice hot tea – oh, I am being spoiled today.’
‘What about some bread and butter, or a piece of the fruit cake you got back from Samples yesterday?’ Sara said softly. She felt like a nurse, and very virtuous into the bargain.
‘No thanks, queen, nothing to eat. But you make yourself something before you go out to play,’ Mrs Prescott said. She had taken the little pink pills and now she lay back on her pillows, smiling faintly. ‘When you come in for tea, I’ll probably be up and scrubbin’ the kitchen floor for something to do!’
‘I don’t think you should, Nanny; I’ll come in before it gets dark and see how you are again,’ Sara said. She guessed that Mrs Prescott would feel a good deal more comfortable if she knew her charge was safely playing out and not fiddling around in the kitchen below, where there were so many things which could do her harm. Sharp knives, hot fire, even an attempt at cooking could be dangerous if you spilled boiling water over yourself. ‘Well, if you’re sure you’re all right I’ll be off, Nanny. I’ll buy myself a pastie from the shop for my lunch. I’ve got some change.’
‘That’s grand, queen,’ the woman in the bed said feebly. ‘I don’t fancy you tryin’ to cook and that’s a fact, though I know you’ve a sensible head on your shoulders. And now I think I’ll have a bit of a nap.’
She lay down on the pillow again and, Sara suspected, was asleep before her guest had left the room.
True to her word, Sara walked down to the nearest canny house and went in. It was only someone’s front room on Stanley Street, but the lady of the house, Bessie Arthurs, stood behind the counter which her sons had made for her, dispensing soup for 2d, stew for 4d – more if you wanted bread and butter with it – and a meat and potato pastie for 6d. Sara, whose mouth had watered at the sight of those hot meat and potato pasties, produced her money, seized her pastie, thanked Mrs Arthurs for her kindness and made for the door once more. It was a
huge
pastie, it could have fed three or four . . . but she would manage most of it without too much trouble. She would just take it home and . . .
Her thoughts stopped short. If she went home Mrs Prescott would worry, she just knew it. No, she would take the pastie somewhere quiet . . .
Somewhere quiet? On Stanley Road? In the school holidays nowhere was quiet, even down the jiggers you’d find kids playing. I’d best go over to Kirkdale recreation ground, Sara thought rather desperately. It’s too snowy for the kids to bother to go there, and the Free Library is only a stone’s throw away; when I’ve finished my food I can nip over to the library and take a look at the books.
It was a cause of some grievance that Mrs Prescott didn’t like her to borrow books from the Free Library.
‘You could catch anything, queen,’ she said disapprovingly. ‘There’s all sorts handle them books, you could get scarlet fever, brain disease . . . oh aye, you may widen your eyes at me, but books carry disease, I’m tellin’ you.’
But Cammy borrowed books from there, and most of the women in Snowdrop Street, and they didn’t drop dead from brain disease. I’ll risk it, Sara decided as she plodded up towards Orwell Road. It’s a shame though, the pastie will be cold long before I get to the reccy.
However, she tucked it inside her warm coat and ran quite a lot of the way and turned into Sessions Road rather hot and breathless but still with the pastie nicely warm against her chest.
Down past the side of the Free Library she went and into the recreation ground. The bowling green was still snow-covered, but most of the flower-beds and lawns were clear, now, and Sara quickly found a seat which was quite dry. There were no kids about, either, which was nice; usually the place swarmed with boys illegally playing football and girls skipping, but it was dinner-time. No doubt the kids were all indoors, having their meal.
Sara unwrapped the pastie; the smell curled up, delicious, warming, promising. She took a big bite and chewed vigorously. It was absolutely prime, as good as any food she had ever eaten, and she was really hungry, it was ages since breakfast.
Then she saw the girl. She was a tiny creature of about four or five, skinny and big-eyed, and dressed in a ragged cardigan over a patched dress. The dress was too short, so that it did not hide her bare legs, blue with cold. She was staring at Sara’s pastie and as she turned her head she reminded Sara sharply of someone.
‘’Ello, Miss,’ the little girl said. ‘Vat smells good!’
Sara smiled at the child’s wistful expression. ‘Hello! Yes, it does smell nice, but it’s far too big for one person. Are you hungry? I can break it in half easily, then we can both enjoy it.’
‘I’m turble ’ungry, I am that,’ the girl said. ‘The fing is, I ’aven’t ’ad no time for no dinner. I’m huntin’ for me baby sister.’
Sara stared at the little girl and suddenly she remembered Jess saying that she had another sister, a sister who had been poorly on Christmas Day. Could this be that sister? She did look rather like Jess with her pale, draggly hair, and thin white face.
Sara stood up. ‘What’s your name?’ she said, carefully. She did not want to frighten the child off. ‘I wonder if – if I might have known your sister, you see.’
The child stared at her briefly, then her eyes returned to the pastie in Sara’s hand. ‘I do ’ave a sister; she’s called Addy,’ she said. ‘Who’s you?’
‘I’m Sara. Just let me divide the pastie and then perhaps we can have a proper talk.’ Sara smiled at the little girl, divided the pastie into two pieces, and then held one piece out enticingly. ‘You said you were hunting for your baby sister; would that be . . .’
One minute the child was taking the pastie, the next she had glanced over her shoulder, eyes widening. Sara followed her gaze but all she could see was a man in a navy cap and jacket walking unconcernedly across the grass, so she turned her attention back to the child once more, only to find that the little girl had vanished.
Startled, Sara glanced around her. There was no one nearby but, over to her right, she saw a small, shabby figure, running as hard as it could along the gravelled path. She reached the end of the path and swerved to her right, disappearing into a bed of snow-laden shrubs.
Sara jumped to her feet and set off in pursuit. It was, in a way, my fault that Jess got killed, and I still don’t know what happened to baby Mollie, she told herself as she ran. But if I go straight across the grass I won’t be far behind the kid and perhaps if I reached her we could talk, I could explain . . . help her. That might make up for what happened to Jess. And the kid did say she was searching for her baby sister – oh I do want to catch her and tell her it’s all right, I’m her friend!
But the skinny little scrap could really run and Sara was still a long way behind when she herself ran full tilt into someone. A sturdy someone, who caught hold of her shoulders and said, in a rich Irish accent, ‘And where d’you t’ink you’re goin’, alanna? Dear God in heaven, you nearly had me flat on me back and me twice your size and weight!’
‘Nowhere . . . anywhere . . . I’m trying to catch up with a – a friend,’ Sara panted, trying to wrench herself out of the man’s grip without any success at all. ‘I don’t know why she ran away, unless she thought I was going to ask for the piece of pastie back! Do let me go, sir, because I did an awful thing . . . someone was killed . . . and that little girl . . . oh, now she really
has
disappeared – might have been the sister . . . Jess and Mollie’s sister, the one who got left behind on Christmas Day! If I could find her, talk to her, then between us we might find Mollie!’
‘If the kid’s disappeared . . .
Jess
, did you say?’ The man held her away from him, holding her by the shoulders now. ‘And
Mollie
? Not – not Jess and Mollie Carbery?’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ Sara said. She realised that her eyes were tear-filled and scrubbed crossly at them with both fists. ‘It was a Carbery, I’m sure it was. She – she told me she was looking for her baby sister, she said she was hungry but she hadn’t time . . .’
‘Look, alanna, I knew Jess too, and the baby as well . . . but there’s no point in standing out in this cold. Come over to the shelter. At least we’ll be out of the rain.’
Sara had not even noticed that it had started raining but now she looked about her and saw the raindrops pitting the remaining snow, falling quite hard on the gravel paths and the empty, winter flower-beds.
‘Are you comin’? Devil a bit do you know me, but take a good look; I’m sixteen, me name’s Brogan O’Brady, and I’ve never harmed chick nor child in me life, I promise you that.’
Sara stared. He looked dependable, she thought, and nice. He had very dark hair beneath a navy cap, eyes so dark a brown that they were almost black, and a square chin. He was wearing a navy jacket and trousers and big boots and despite the cold, or perhaps because of it, his face was flushed. But Nanny had said not to talk to strange men ever, under any circumstances. Did he count as a man, though, at sixteen? It was a knotty problem. Surely it would be all right – she would be sixteen herself in four more years! She stared very hard at him and decided to trust him.
‘Yes, all right, I’ll come with you,’ Sara said, making up her mind. Nanny also said you had to judge people as you found them, and she found this young man worthy of her confidence. ‘My name’s Sara – Sara Cordwainer. What did you say you were called?’
‘Brogan. ’Tis Irish,’ her companion said. ‘This way; we aren’t supposed to cross the grass but I daresay there’s no one to notice, and it’s the quickest way to the shelter.’ He pointed as he spoke and Sara saw, on the opposite side of the grass, a rustic shelter with a seat in it.
In rather less than a minute the two of them reached it and sat down, turning to face one another as they did so. Then they both smiled, Sara rather diffidently. She had made a fool of herself, talking about Jess and Mollie like that: what must he have thought? But she found out soon enough.
‘Now, Sara. When did you meet Jess, or have you known her a while, maybe?’
‘No, I met her the day she died, on Christmas Day. They were outside our church when we went for morning service. Jess had Mollie in her arms, you see. I feel awfully bad about them both, because . . . but tell me how you knew her.’
‘I met her on Christmas Day too, but late on, in the afternoon.’ Brogan paused, frowned, then continued. But he looked down at his hands now as he spoke and did not meet Sara’s eyes. ‘Oh Jeez, now I come to think I reckon I was mebbe the last person to see her alive. You say you saw her outside your church?’
‘I did. She was outside my church with the baby,’ Sara said. ‘They were dressed in – well, in rags and they were cold and hungry so – so I gave Jess my collection and my white angora gloves. She put them on the baby’s feet. Then they went, and I read in the paper that she bought bread and some milk and wanted somewhere to go and eat and must have wandered on to the rails . . .’
She stopped short, giving an involuntary shudder as she did so. ‘I thought it was my fault that she died – she bought the food with my shilling, you see. If I hadn’t given it to her she could have been alive today. So I’d love to find Mollie, or the other sister, to – well, to try to make up, I suppose.’
Brogan patted her arm. ‘Aye, I can see that you would think that. But Sara, if it hadn’t been for me Jess maybe really might have been alive. I’ll tell you about it.’