The Forget-Me-Not Summer (5 page)

Upstairs, balancing jug and glass with some difficulty,
Miranda got the bedroom door open and glanced cautiously across to the bed. Beth was a pretty girl, dark-haired and dark-lashed with large toffee brown eyes and a neat little nose, but today, flopped against her pillows, she looked like nothing so much as a stranded fish. Her skin was so mottled with spots that she could have been an alien from outer space; her curly dark hair, wet with sweat, lay limply on the pillow, and when she opened her eyes to see what her cousin had brought, the lids were so swollen that she could scarcely see from between them. Miranda, having only just recovered from the measles herself, could not help a pang of real pity arrowing through her. Poor Beth! When she felt better she would be given in abundance all the things that Miranda had longed for when she herself was recovering, but right now no one knew better than she how Beth was suffering. Accordingly she set the glass down on the lopsided little bedside table and poured out some of the delicious raspberry cordial. Beth heaved herself up in the bed and picked up the glass. She took a sip, then another, then stood the glass down again. ‘Thanks, Miranda,' she whispered. ‘It's the nicest drink in the world, but I can't drink it! Oh, how I wish I were well again.' She looked fretfully up at her young cousin. ‘Why does it taste so sticky and sweet? I so want to drink it, but if I do . . . if I do . . .'

‘Poor old Beth. I felt just the same,' Miranda assured her cousin. ‘Just you cuddle down, and try to sleep. When you wake up you'll feel better, honest to God you will. Why, tomorrow morning you'll be eating your breakfast porridge and drinking cups of tea and telling Aunt Vi that you fancy scouse for your dinner.' She smiled with
real affection at the other girl. ‘You'll be all right; I told you it's only bad for the first three days.'

Beth obeyed, snuggling down into the bed and giving Miranda a sleepy smile. ‘You're all right, Miranda Lovage,' she said drowsily. ‘I'm sorry I was horrid to you, but I've never felt this ill before. When you come up to bed I'll try some lemonade; perhaps that'll go down easier.'

Miranda did not point out that she would not be coming up to bed for a good many hours, since it was only just eleven o'clock in the morning. In fact, seeing how her cousin tossed and turned, she had already decided to sleep on one of the kitchen chairs that night. After all, she had done so throughout her own attack of the measles, since Aunt Vi had turned her out of the brass bedstead at ten every night and told her not to return to it until breakfast time the next morning. She seemed to think that this might prevent herself and her daughter from catching the infection, but of course time had proved her wrong.

Miranda trod softly downstairs and entered the kitchen, saw that her aunt was snoozing, and let herself out of the front door and back into the sunshine of Jamaica Close. The girls were still twirling the rope and the game was going on just as usual, so Miranda wondered whether to go over and ask to be put in, but decided against it. The measles, and her enforced diet of bread and milk, had made her lethargic, unwilling to exert herself. She had been aware of a great lassitude when she had climbed the stairs the second time, balancing the jug of raspberry cordial and the glass.

Now she decided that since no one else cared what
became of her she would have to start looking after herself, so she strolled slowly along the length of the Close and for the first time it occurred to her that it was a very odd little street indeed. On her left were half a dozen terraced houses, each boasting three steps and a tiny garden plot. Most householders ignored the latter, but some had planted a solitary rose, a handful of marigolds, or a flowering shrub. However, the houses on her right were not terraced but semi-detached; bigger, more substantial. Rumour had it that whilst the even numbers two to ten had to use the common pump against the end wall of the Close, the odd numbers one to nine had piped water, though all the houses had outdoor privies in their back yards. Miranda frowned. She had never seriously considered the Close before, but now it seemed to her that it was downright odd to have such different sorts of houses in one very short street. And perhaps the oddest thing of all was the wall at the very end of Jamaica Close. It must be twenty or twenty-five feet high and blackened by soot, but what was it doing there? Why had they chosen to block off the Close with what looked like the back view of an enormous warehouse or factory? Yet Miranda knew that it could be neither; had there been a building in which people worked so near to Jamaica Close, then surely she would have heard sounds of movement, or people talking when they took their breaks. And the wall was so high! Because of it, the inhabitants of Jamaica Close could not see the setting sun, though its rays poured down on the rest of the area. For the first time, a spark of curiosity raised itself in Miranda's mind. What was the wall there for? Why did no one ever mention what was on the far side of the great mass of
bricks which chopped Jamaica Close off short? Had it once been all houses, or all factories for that matter? She could not say, but the imp of curiosity had been roused and would not go away. Useless to ask her aunt, who never answered her questions anyway. But there must be someone who could explain the presence of that enormous wall.

She was standing, hands on hips, gazing up with watering eyes at the topmost line of bricks and wondering what it hid – and, for that matter, why the road should be called Jamaica Close. ‘Jamaica's miles and miles away, and all the other roads which run parallel with this one have nice Irish names – Connemara, Dublin, Tallaght, St Patrick's and so on. So why Jamaica? As far as I know it's a tropical island and nothing whatsoever to do with Liverpool.'

‘You don't know nothing, gairl.' The voice, cutting across her thoughts, made Miranda jump several inches. She had not realised she had spoken her thoughts aloud, or that anyone was close enough to hear, and, consequently, felt both annoyed and extremely foolish. This, not unnaturally, caused her to turn sharply on the speaker, a boy a year or two older than she, with light brown tufty hair, a great many freckles and, at this moment, a taunting grin.

‘Shurrup, you!' she said crossly. ‘Trust a feller to stick his bloomin' nose in!'

The boy sniggered. ‘If you don't want nobody to answer, then you shouldn't ask questions,' he said. ‘What you doin', gal? Ain't you never see'd a wall before? You're the kid what lives at Number Six, ain't you?' He guffawed rudely. ‘First time I ever see you without a bag or a basket
or without that perishin' Beth Smythe a-grabbin' of your arm and a-tellin' you what to do.' He guffawed again. ‘Slipped your leash, have you? Managed to undo your bleedin' collar?'

Miranda glared at him. She knew him by sight, knew he and his parents lived two doors down from her aunt. He was one of a large family of rough, uncouth boys, ranging in age from eighteen or nineteen down to a baby of two or three. Many folk did not approve of the Mickleborough family and this particular sprig, Miranda knew, was reckoned by her aunt – and indeed by Beth – to be a troublemaker of no mean order. On the other hand she knew that she herself was often accused by Aunt Vi of all sorts of crimes which she had most certainly never committed. Could it be the same for this boy? Miranda scowled, chewing her finger. She had not managed to make any friends amongst the children in Jamaica Close, for several reasons. One was that despite the fact that everyone disliked her aunt, despised her meanness, her spite, and her reluctance to help others, they believed her when she told lies about her niece. It seemed strange, but Miranda supposed that grown-ups, even if they didn't like each other, tended to take another adult's word against that of a child.

Then there was Beth. She wasn't all bad, as Miranda acknowledged, but she was an awful whiner, bursting into tears the moment she failed to get her own way and telling the most dreadful fibs to get herself out of trouble and somebody else into it. This naturally made her extremely unpopular.

A sharp poke in the ribs brought Miranda back to the present, and she turned to the boy by her side, eyebrows
climbing. ‘What business is it of yours if I stare at the wall? And who are you, anyway? I know you're one of the Mickleborough boys – my aunt says you're all horrid – but I don't know which one you are.'

The boy grinned, a flash of white teeth in an exceedingly dirty face. ‘I'm Steve, the one me mam calls the turnover. I ‘spect you've heard bad things about me, but that's because we used to have a rather mean dad. But now we've gorra nice one – a huge feller what could give you a clout hard enough to send you into next week. Not that he has – clouted me, I mean – but I wouldn't take no chances wi' a feller as big as the church tower. So I'm a reformed character, like.'

Miranda stared at him, eyes rounding. ‘I'm like that . . . well, my mam was anyway. She and Aunt Vi had different dads; Aunt Vi's was a right pig, so when he died and Gran married again she chose a gentle, loving feller – John Saunders, that was, who was my mother's father. I never knew my grandparents because they died before I was born, but Aunt Vi blamed my mother for her own hard upbringing. She said my mam was spoiled rotten, never had to raise a finger or contribute anything towards the household expenses, and that's why she blames me for every perishin' thing which goes wrong,' she said, rather breathlessly.

‘Well I'm blowed!' Steve remarked. ‘It's like my family, too, except that there're more than two of us. I'm the last of the bad 'uns; me little brother Kenny is me step-dad's kid.'

The pair had fallen into step and were strolling along the Close, heading for the main road. ‘Wish I had a little brother or sister,' Miranda said sadly. ‘Not that I wanted
one when Mum and I lived on the Avenue; we had each other and that was all that mattered.'

‘Aye, I heard you and your mam were close,' Steve acknowledged. He peered down into her face. ‘Things is a bit different now, ain't they? I see'd you runnin' errands, humpin' water, goin' up to the wash house with everyone's dirty clothes . . . and you've got a lot thinner than you were when you first arrived. Reckon they only feed you on odds and ends.'

Miranda thought of the plate which would be put down in front of her at dinner time: a spoonful of gravy, a couple of small spuds, a bit of cabbage if she was lucky, and that would be all the food she'd get until tomorrow's breakfast, unless of course she helped herself and risked being called a thief.

But the boy was looking at her enquiringly, his look half curious, half sympathetic. Miranda gave a rueful smile. ‘You're right there; I get what the rest won't eat,' she admitted. She raised her eyebrows, returning look for look. ‘You aren't exactly Mr Universe yourself. What did you say your name was?'

‘Steve,' her companion said. ‘I might be skinny, but I get me fair share of whatever's going; our mam sees to that. And fellers can always pick up fades from the market, or earn a few pennies sellin' chips to housewives.' He looked at her, his own eyebrows rising. ‘What's your moniker? I know your cousin's Beth.'

‘I'm Miranda Lovage,' Miranda said shortly. By now they had reached the end of Jamaica Close and had emerged on to the pavement, which was thronging with people. Women were shopping, children too. Folk were waiting for trams or buses, whilst others sauntered along
peering into shop windows and enjoying the warm sunshine. Miranda would have turned right, chiefly because she expected Steve to turn left, heading for the city centre, but instead he jerked her to a halt.

‘What say we pal up a bit, go round together?' he suggested. ‘Your cousin's got measles, I've heard, so she won't be out and about for two or three weeks, which means you'll be all on your lonesome unless you join forces wi' me.' He grinned at her and suddenly Miranda realised how lonely she had been, and how much more fun the summer holidays would be if she did as this strange boy suggested.

She turned to face him. They were about the same height – perhaps he was an inch or two the taller – and now she was looking directly into his face she saw that beneath the dirt it wasn't a bad face at all. His hair was mousy brown, his skin only one shade lighter, and he met her regard steadily from a pair of hazel eyes set beneath straight dark brows. But there was something about his eyes . . . Miranda stared harder, then smiled to herself. His eyes tilted up at the corners, giving him a mischievous look; she rather liked it. But her new friend was jerking her arm, expecting a reply to his last remark, so she grinned at him, nodding so vigorously that her bush of long straight carroty hair swung forward like a curtain, momentarily hiding her face. ‘That's a grand idea, Steve. We could do all sorts if we could earn a bit of gelt, and two of us ought to be able to earn more than one. The feller who sells carpets from a market stall will always give a kid a few pence to carry a carpet back to a customer's house. I'm not strong enough to do it alone, and Beth wouldn't lower herself, but if you and I offered our services . . .'

Steve grinned delightedly. ‘You've got the right idea, pal,' he said exuberantly. ‘We'll make a killing while your cousin's laid up . . . but what will happen when she's fit again, eh? I don't fancy being dropped like a hot potato.'

Miranda chuckled. ‘Don't worry; at the mere mention of earning a few pence by working for it Beth will come down with a headache, or find some other excuse to let me get on with it alone,' she assured him. ‘So what'll we do now?'

‘Ever been to Seaforth Sands? It's grand up there on a fine day like this. If we could earn ourselves a few coppers we could stay out there all day. Can you swim?'

‘Course not; girls don't,' Miranda said scornfully. ‘Besides, where would I learn? I know there's a public baths on Vauxhall Road but they charge you at least sixpence – maybe a shilling – and anyway, you need a bathing costume to swim there.'