Over the weeks which followed their first meeting, Lizzie and Geoff got to know one another a good deal
better. Lizzie was quite astonished at how alike they were, despite the difference in age and sex, and was delighted to have a companion who enjoyed every new experience so very much. She knew that one reason for Geoff’s enjoyment of even simple things was because living in the Branny cut him off from the everyday events she took for granted. However, with Roy’s help, Geoff was now managing to get away from the orphanage on a fairly regular basis. He had told Lizzie that he suspected Brother Laurence, who was also one of the senior masters at St Mark’s, knew that he was getting out to meet a friend rather than staying with Roy’s family. Since Brother Laurence clearly approved, though Geoff had not yet worked out why, it made meeting Lizzie easier rather than harder and he did not worry so much in case he was seen with her.
Lizzie thought she knew why Brother Laurence approved. Geoff’s ignorance of ordinary life – particularly street life – would certainly not help him when it came to finding a job. She had only seen Brother Laurence once, a middle-aged man with a ginger beard and shrewd grey eyes, but she thoroughly approved of his attitude to Geoff. ‘I’m a bit of a favourite with him,’ Geoff had confessed, ‘because I’m a hard worker and good at maths, which is his subject of course. When we go on a trip – and we do that sometimes – I always try to get next to Brother Laurence because he knows an awful lot and enjoys passing it on.’
So by now Lizzie and Geoff had established a firm friendship and she had quite a job to find new entertainments for her friend. They went to the Saturday matinees at one of the picture houses whenever they had either sufficient money or empty
jam jars with which to pay their admittance, but Saturday afternoons were usually free for a more relaxed form of entertainment. On this particular Saturday Lizzie had decided that they would go down to the Scaldy, where she intended to give Geoff his first swimming lesson. She had been astonished to discover that the Brannigan boys were not taught to swim, though the city was full of good swimming baths. What was more, living in a busy port where the majority of young men became seamen at some time in their lives, she thought it a dangerous practice to keep young boys from water.
When she had first suggested it to Geoff, however, he had not been at all keen. ‘Swimming in the
canal
?’ he had said incredulously. ‘But it’ll be filthy, won’t it? And what about them barge things? I don’t want to be cut down in me prime, young Lizzie, nor drownded for that matter.’
‘You’re more likely to be drownded if you don’t learn to swim,’ she had said briskly. July had turned chilly and rather wet, almost as though it knew the school holidays would soon be upon them, so she would not have suggested swimming had she not remembered the Scaldy. It was close up against the Tate & Lyle sugar factory, where the outflow from the works belched hotly into the canal, so since the water there was always lovely and warm, it was a great favourite with local kids. Lizzie had not actually told Geoff this, thinking to give him a pleasant surprise, but she began to wonder if she should have done so when ten o’clock arrived and he did not.
Lizzie helped Aunt Annie with the washing, although her aunt did less than usual because it was so hard to get a line full dry when the weather was overcast and drizzly. Then Lizzie brushed through,
prepared the spuds for the evening meal and cut herself, at her aunt’s suggestion, a carry-out of bread and cheese.
‘There’s a couple of them big pickled onions in a jar on the bottom shelf,’ her aunt had advised her, when Lizzie was packing the bread and cheese into an old string bag. ‘You might as well take ’em – one for you and one for young Geoff. It gives bread and cheese more of a bite, somehow.’
Uncle Perce had actually worked for the past ten days and, since a number of ships had come into the docks needing unloading, Lizzie assumed that he must have handed over at least some of his wages to Aunt Annie, for she did not normally buy such a large wedge of cheese, nor hand out her home-pickled onions. She was glad, for Aunt Annie’s sake, that her uncle was behaving himself, but knew from past bitter experience that this state of affairs was likely to end suddenly, and probably violently. Weird though it seemed, Uncle Perce would behave like an angel for a few days, keeping well away from the pubs and doing no more than share a jug of porter with his wife of an evening. Then, as though all this goodness was secretly offensive to him, he would go to the pub, drink until he had no more money left and come home evil as a devil, to beat up anyone who crossed his path – provided they were smaller and weaker than he – and make his wife’s life a misery once more.
Thanking Aunt Annie for the pickles, Lizzie made up a bottle of cold tea from the remains of their breakfast drink and was wondering whether to shame Geoff by going up to the Home and demanding a word with him, when there was a rattle on the outside door. She flew across the kitchen just as Geoff, who had become at ease with the whole family,
pushed the door open and stepped into the hall, grinning broadly. ‘Sorry I’m late,’ he said breezily. ‘But I had to tidy the dormitory ’cos it were young Paul’s turn and his gran came calling to take him to his cousin’s wedding. It were just my luck that old Brother Mark was on dormitory duty today, otherwise I might have got away with it. Still an’ all, he didn’t stay to watch me do the work, so I got a shift on and here I am,’ he ended triumphantly.
Lizzie, who had been cursing his late arrival, promptly forgave him and went back into the kitchen to remind Aunt Annie that she would be gone ‘til dark and would like some supper saved, please. Aunt Annie, who seemed to have grown quite fond of Geoff, said she would save them both a helping and actually waddled to the door to wave them off. ‘As though we were family – both of us I mean,’ Geoff said rapturously. ‘Your aunt’s all right, Liz.’
‘She were really fond of my mam,’ Lizzie admitted as they emerged on to Burlington Street. The cobbles were wet with rain but a glance at the sky above told her that the heavy clouds scudding across it were now more white than grey; it might turn out to be a nice day after all. ‘I think Aunt Annie’s quite fond of me, too, though the boys don’t like me much and Uncle Perce positively hates me. Mind you, he hates everyone just about, even Aunt Annie. Me mam once said that Uncle Perce was crazy because he’d be lost without me aunt, but that’s fellers for you.’
Geoff laughed and punched her lightly on the shoulder. ‘I’m a feller meself,’ he reminded her. ‘Not that I fancy having to drink all that bitter old stuff that your uncle downs whenever he’s in the money. Someone gave me a sip of Guinness . . . yuk!’
‘Yes, I know what you mean,’ Lizzie said, dancing
along beside him, with the string bag banging against one skinny calf. ‘I think you have to be quite old before you like the taste because Herbie thinks it’s foul, same as we do. But the big boys – Henry and Ned – are getting to like it. At least, they go down to the pub a couple of times a week and come back talking rather loud, so I suppose they’re drinking the stuff.’
They were crossing Vauxhall Road when Geoff grabbed Lizzie’s arm. ‘Oh, damn and blast,’ he said in a furious undertone. ‘There’s bleedin’ Sid – I hope he doesn’t recognise me. I’ve kept well out of his way ever since you and I met up and I certainly don’t want him tagging along with us now.’ He had lowered his head and turned towards Lizzie but now he risked a quick peek to his right and groaned aloud. ‘Tom’s with him! Keep walking, Lizzie, don’t run or they’ll spot us.’
‘It doesn’t matter if they do,’ Lizzie said briskly, continuing to hurry across the wide road, though they both had to pause to allow a tram to rush past. ‘If they come up to us, I’ll say we’re off to me grandmother’s funeral – that’ll put them off.’
Geoff chuckled but kept his head bent and hurried with her across the road, not pausing until they were halfway to Houghton Bridge. Only then did he pull Lizzie to a stop while he scanned the scurrying people behind him, before giving vent to a long whistle of relief. ‘They’re not in sight,’ he reported, rather breathlessly. ‘Thank the Lord for that! I wonder where they were off to, though? Saturdays were always a favourite with Sid, ’cos he said the more people there were about, the easier it were to dip a pocket or prig a shop.’
‘Let ’em gerron with it, I say,’ Lizzie said, also
scanning the crowd. She realised that she was no keener than Geoff to meet up with his former companions. All the boys she knew could swim and most of them favoured the Scaldy as a bathing place and she had no desire to find herself sharing the water with Sid and Tom. But it would, she considered, be carrying coincidence rather far if the older boys intended to bathe at the Scaldy on the one day of the year that she and Geoff meant to do the same.
Heartened by this thought, she continued to hurry along the pavement beside him, chattering away as she did so and telling her companion that Aunt Annie meant to save him some supper. ‘And she’s give us each one of her big pickled onions to eat with our bread and cheese,’ she ended triumphantly. ‘Before you know it, you’ll be calling yourself Geoffrey Grey. She’s taken to you so well you’re as good as one of the family.’ She grinned at her companion, knowing that the remark would please him.
They reached the Houghton Bridge and slid down the steepish bank on to the towpath. The canal was wide here and when Lizzie looked ahead of them to where the great bulk of Tate’s loomed, she saw that already several of the local urchins were frolicking in the water, jumping in as hard as they could in order to splash one another. Lizzie knew most of them by sight and called out a greeting as she and Geoff hurried along the canal bank and settled on a good spot where they could eat their food and dump their clothing when they went in for their swim. The grass was meagre here, but perhaps because of the heat from the factory there were foreign-looking flowers in bloom and Lizzie admired them while making a sort of nest for herself and her companion. Geoff, wide-eyed, stared at the steam rising from the
water and asked Lizzie, almost timidly, what had caused it.
‘It’s Tate’s,’ she said, accepting a peppermint ball from the bag which he held out. The Branny boys were given two ounces of sweets each Saturday morning, through the goodwill of some long-forgotten benefactor. ‘It’s the overflow from the factory – something to do with making the sugar clean, I guess. At any rate they make hot water and then belch it out into the canal when they’ve done with it. Look, I think we’d best have our swimming lesson before we eat our snap, ’cos then our bellies won’t go getting cramps.’
Geoff looked at her doubtfully. ‘But will our stuff be safe, just sitting on the bank like this?’ he enquired. ‘Learning to swim is going to make me awful hungry. I don’t want to come back and find me dinner has gone down some other feller’s throat.’
‘There’s not many about. Everyone’s going home for their dinners soon and it’s a drizzly sort of day,’ Lizzie pointed out. ‘We’ll wrap our snap in our clothes, so’s no one can see it, have our swim and then eat. Honest, Geoff, you can get cramp, belly-ache, all sorts if you swim on a full stomach. Or so they say,’ she added.
The children removed their outer clothing but the sun still stayed behind the clouds, making swimming seem far from attractive. However, Geoff and Lizzie were soon in the water and after the initial shock he allowed Lizzie first to show him how she swam herself and then to hold up his chin while he had a go. Because the water was so warm, they soon began to enjoy themselves wholeheartedly and Lizzie actually voiced the opinion that it would not be long before: ‘Geoff was froggin’ it as well as any kid in the neighbourhood.’
Their snap, sitting on the bank well hidden by their clothes, was forgotten. Learning to swim occupied them both.
Sid and Tom had been mooching along the road, wondering what to do with themselves, when Sid spotted Geoff and Lizzie dodging amongst the crowd ahead of them. He grabbed Tom’s arm, drawing his friend to a halt. ‘The little bleeder!’ he said viciously, indicating Geoff. ‘He’s been avoidin’ us for weeks, tellin’ everyone he can’t get out no more, lyin’ his bleedin’ head off in fact, an’ all the time he’s been playin’ around with that scruffy kid – the one we hit with a cricket ball – and norra thought for his old pals what were good to him in times past.’
Tom squinted up his eyes and peered ahead. ‘Are you sure it’s Geoff?’ he asked doubtfully. ‘As for the gel, she might be anyone. What makes you think it’s the one who stopped our cricket ball?’
Sid snorted. ‘Who else could it be?’ he said derisively. ‘Them holy brothers keep the fellers at the Branny on such a short rein they don’t never get to speak to a gal, lerralone walk through the streets wi’ one. Besides, there can’t be two mucky grey dresses like that, and that yaller hair. A proper little guttersnipe, that’s what she is. Why, now I come to think of it, it’s downright insultin’ if he prefers her company to ours. What’s more, he were useful in his way.’
‘Yes, he was,’ Tom admitted. ‘It were that innocent, clean sort o’ look that the Branny boys have – it gorrim into places what would have slung us out after one glance. Still an’ all, our Sid, you kept him at arm’s length, never really lettin’ ’im join in. I weren’t that surprised when he stopped comin’ out wi’ us on a Saturday, to tell you the truth.’
‘He’s nowt but a bleedin’ orphan,’ Sid said obstinately. ‘He don’t have no rights, ’specially when he could be useful to fellers like us.’ He frowned and began to whistle beneath his breath then broke off to remark: ‘Where’s they goin’, d’you reckon? They’re off on the spree, there’s no doubt about that, and they ain’t half gerrin’ a wriggle on!’
‘They could be goin’ anywhere,’ Tom observed, but quickened his pace to keep up with Sid who was beginning to hurry forward. ‘What’s it matter where they’re goin’, our Sid? You ain’t goin’ to persuade him to join up wi’ us again, are you? ’Cos if he’d wanted to, he could have made contact in the old way.’
‘I ain’t goin’ to persuade him to do what he ought to want to, I’m goin’ to teach him the error of his ways,’ Sid said grimly. ‘Bleedin’ orphans don’t gerraway wi’ givin’ me the cold shoulder. I’ll teach him to respect his elders, see if I don’t. Aha!’