Twisted Strands (43 page)

‘I – I don’t know. He’s just sitting there in his chair by the fire.’

She stopped suddenly and stared at Andrew. ‘You – you don’t mean he – he’s dead?’

‘No, no. He spoke to me, but he – he didn’t seem to recognize me. I had to tell him who it was.’

She stepped across the threshold and took a moment for her eyes to accustom themselves to the gloom.

Harry Singleton was sitting, as Andrew had said, in his chair by the range. But here again, as with her great-grandmother’s home, no warming fire burnt in the grate. On the table, spread
with a crumpled check cloth, was a stale loaf of bread and a butter dish with rancid butter in it. The whole place was even more dirty and neglected than the first time she had seen it.

Now her attention fastened on the man himself. Though he still had a full beard, it was ragged and unkempt and, beneath it, she could see that his face was much thinner and his clothes hung
loosely on his body. She moved nearer. ‘Grandfather?’ she said gently. He turned his face towards her, but his eyes did not focus on her.

‘Who’s that?’ he grunted. ‘Who is it? Come over here where I can see you.’

She knew his eyesight was poor, so she said, ‘It’s me. Bridie. Your – your granddaughter.’ She moved closer and touched his hand. ‘And Andrew’s here too.
He’s come home from the war. He’s not quite fit yet, so I’ve come to look after him. I’ll look after you and Great-Grandmother too.’ She paused and then added
pointedly, ‘If you’ll let me.’

The old man pulled his hand from beneath her touch. ‘Haven’t got a granddaughter and we don’t need help from anyone. Specially not from a child.’

A lump grew in her throat. Still, he refused to acknowledge her. Even though he was living in squalor, he would never admit to needing help. And especially not her help.

‘How long have you been like this, Grandfather?’

‘Don’t call me that,’ he growled.

Bridie sighed. ‘What happened after Mrs Turner was taken ill?’

‘Lil from the cottage facing the street has looked after us. We’re all right.’

Bridie gave a very unladylike snort. ‘Her? Well, that explains it all. Now, Andrew’s going to light a fire for you and very soon I’ll bring you a meal, but I must go back to
Great-Gran. She’s . . .’ She hesitated, not knowing if he knew that his mother looked in a very bad way. But it seemed he did for he said, ‘She’s not gone yet, then? I keep
expecting to be told . . .’ His voice petered away.

‘She’ll be fine,’ Bridie said determinedly, ‘now I’m back.’ Without giving her grandfather time to protest any further, she turned to Andrew. ‘Can you
manage? Don’t overdo it, will you?’

‘I’ll be fine, love.’ He drew her to the door and whispered, ‘Your great-gran? Is she bad?’

All Bridie needed to do was to bite her lip and to nod for him to know the serious state of her great-grandmother.

‘I’ll get this fire lit and I’ll get the doctor. You go back to the old lady.’

Bridie hurried away.

By the time the village doctor arrived, the old lady was lying in a clean nightdress and between sweet-smelling sheets. A fire burned in the grate, but Bridie had been unable to rouse her
great-grandmother.

‘Is she unconscious?’

The doctor did not answer her until he had examined Bridget thoroughly.

‘She’s a very sick old lady,’ he told her solemnly. ‘I’m sorry, my dear, but she may well not last the night. Do you need any help? I can send a nurse . .
.’

Bridie shook her head and explained what she had been doing for the past two years. The doctor nodded. ‘Very well, then. No-one can do more than you are clearly capable of doing.’ He
sighed. ‘But I’m sorry, my dear, you must expect the worst.’

For the rest of that day Bridie seemed to be running everywhere. She made a meal and asked Andrew to take a plateful to her grandfather. ‘You’ll have to sit him at
the table, put the knife and fork in his hands so that he can feed himself.’

‘Sit down and get yours while I take it, then,’ Andrew ordered. ‘You’re going to need all the strength you can get over the next few days.’ He reached out and took
her hand. ‘Oh, Bridie love, I wouldn’t have brought you here if I’d thought for a moment we were coming back to all this.’

‘You couldn’t have stopped me,’ she said, giving him an all-too-brief smile. There was little to smile about at present. ‘Besides, I’m glad you did. At least, I can
help grandfather, if he’ll let me, even if it’s too late to . . .’ She said no more, but poured hot milk into a bowl of bread broken into small pieces. ‘I’ll have a
quick bite, but I’m going to sit with my great-grandmother. Will you be all right?’

Andrew nodded. ‘Course I will. I’ll snooze in the chair here for tonight. We can air the beds tomorrow.’

She bent and kissed his forehead briefly and then hurried back to the old lady’s bedside. As she sat down beside her, Bridget’s eyes flickered and she made a tiny sound.

Gently Bridie spooned milk between the thin, parched lips, very slowly and carefully so that the semi-conscious woman did not choke. It reminded her of the time she had spoonfed poor Bertie
Hyde. This time, though, she vowed, she would not lose her patient. And then Bridie began to talk. Quietly, but persistently, she was trying to drag her great-grandmother back in to the world of
the living. The old lady was hovering between one world and the next, but Bridie’s determination would not let her go.

Through the night Bridie chattered on, scarcely knowing what she said, yet instinctively knowing that she had to keep on. She refused to let her great-grandmother die without a fight.

She kept the fire built up, keeping the room cosy throughout the long night. As the pale fingers of dawn filtered through the lace curtains, Bridget opened her eyes. Looking straight into
Bridie’s eyes, she said, ‘Can’t a body get a bit of peace? Do you ever stop for breath, girl?’

Then she closed her eyes and slept. But now it was a natural sleep.

Bridie laid her head on the coverlet and allowed the tears of relief to flow.

‘How is she?’ Andrew tapped on the door only minutes later and tiptoed into the bedroom.

Bridie raised her weary head, but her eyes were shining. ‘She’s going to be all right. She spoke to me.’ She was laughing and crying at the same time as she stood up and flung
her arms around Andrew. ‘She told me off for talking so much. Oh, Andrew, she told me off. Isn’t that wonderful? She told me off.’

Andrew chuckled. ‘If you say so, love.’ They stood together looking down at the old lady, now sleeping peacefully. ‘But now you must come and get some breakfast. I’ve got
it all ready.’

‘Oh, you shouldn’t have. You’ll . . .’

‘I’m quite all right. I can manage a few jobs. Though . . .’ He winced slightly. ‘You’ll have to redo my dressing soon. It’s starting to hurt.’

‘When the doctor comes this morning, I’ll get him to take a look at it. And at Grandfather too, if he’ll let him.’

‘Huh,’ Andrew snorted. ‘There’s about as much chance of that as me learning to fly.’

‘Well, my dear, you’ve worked a miracle. I didn’t expect to see Mrs Singleton still alive,’ the doctor from the village told Bridie later that morning.
‘I’ll call each day for a while, but I think she’s turned the corner. And as for Harry, well, I think you’ve arrived just in time to stop him sinking into a similar
state.’ The kindly man shook his head. ‘Dear, dear, I had no idea things had got as bad as this. Someone should have called me.’ He looked at her keenly. ‘I understand you
only arrived here yesterday?’

Bridie nodded.

‘Who had been looking after them?’

‘It had been Mrs Turner . . .’

‘Ah, now that explains it,’ he nodded.

Bridie forbore to explain Lil’s part; she planned to speak to that particular lady herself very soon. ‘But now I’m back and staying, things will be very different.’

‘Good, good.’ The doctor picked up his case. ‘See you tomorrow. If you have any problems, be sure to let me know and I’ll come at once.’

Bridie’s meeting with Lil was brief but fiery.

‘Well, if that’s how you feel, don’t ask for my ’elp again,’ the slovenly woman said huffily. Her apron was dirty and her hair hung down in unwashed, lank strands.
She folded her arms across her ample bosom.

‘Don’t worry, I won’t. I’m here to stay.’

Lil’s face twisted into a sneer. ‘Oh, staying alone in the cottage with Andrew, are yer? Yer grandfather won’t like that.’

Bridie arched her eyebrow and glared at the woman whom she blamed for the sorry state she had found on her return.

She pointed an accusing finger at Lil. ‘You mind your business and I’ll mind mine. If there was a court of law to put you in for what you’ve done, I’d do it. As it is,
I’ll have you thrown out of your cottage if I get any more trouble.’

‘Huh!’ the woman sneered. ‘Harry wouldn’t throw me out. I’ve done a lot for Harry Singleton. Looking after his cantankerous mother, for a start.’

‘You call that “looking after” someone? You don’t know the meaning of the word.’

‘He’ll not get rid of me.’ The woman was smug as she delivered her final ace. ‘I clean his precious chapel.’

Bridie laughed aloud, the sound echoing down the narrow street. ‘Is that all? There’s plenty of folk willing to do that. And they’d do it a lot better than you, I
shouldn’t wonder.’

For the first time a flicker of uncertainty crossed Lil’s face. ‘Who?’

Bridie grinned in her moment of triumph. ‘Me, Lil. Me. I’d clean his chapel for him. In fact, from now on I will.’ Her face sobered as she said threateningly, ‘You keep
your distance from me and mine from now on. And remember what I said. I’ll have you thrown out on the street if you don’t.’

The woman gave a snarl and slammed the door in Bridie’s face, but the girl had seen the look of fear on Lil’s face. She would not trouble them again.

‘Now, Josh, have you got everything you need?’ Eveleen asked, as the three of them sat down to dinner in their city home. ‘Is your room all right for
you?’

Josh cast her a comical look. ‘It’s fine. A bit too posh, though, for the likes of me, mi duck.’

The three of them laughed together.

‘I know what you mean, Josh. I felt just the same when I first married Richard.’ Laughing at herself, she added, ‘But it’s surprising how quickly you can get used to the
easy life.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t say you’ve had it easy. Not over the last few years, anyway.’

‘We’ve been lucky, though.’ Her voice was husky as she reached across the corner of the table to touch her husband’s hand. ‘At least Richard’s come home
safely. The rest is up to us now.’

Richard raised his head slowly and looked into her eyes. He turned his hand beneath hers and gripped it like a drowning man.

Hoarsely he said, ‘You’re right. It is up to us now.’

Momentarily they forgot that Josh was in the room. For a brief moment, there was no-one else in the world but the two of them. In that instant, a new understanding, a fresh determination to put
matters right between them, began to blossom.

Josh cleared his throat, startling them from their mutual reverie. ‘Aye, you’re right. So many haven’t come back or, if they have, they’re so badly damaged that their
lives can never be the same again.’

‘I’m afraid,’ Eveleen said quietly, ‘that’s what you’re going to face at the factory. There are so many pleading for jobs and yet . . .’ She sighed
heavily. ‘I don’t know whether they’re capable of the work.’

‘I expected as much. But we’ll cope, mi duck. I’ll explain it all to Bob, an’ all. Make him understand that I’ve only come back temporary. Just to help out a bit.
You leave it to me, Evie.’

The weeks turned into months. At Flawford, Bridie’s days were exhausting, yet she was happy just to be with Andrew, content, for the moment, to bide her time. His health
improved rapidly and his wound began to heal, so well now that he was champing at the bit to begin some kind of work.

‘I’m going to talk to Harry about the workshops. I can’t understand what’s happened. Why is no-one working there, even if he can’t any more?’

‘I don’t know. Go and ask him.’

‘Right, I will.’ He moved to the door eagerly and then hesitated. He turned back to her and said, ‘Will you come with me?’

‘Coward!’ she joked, but moved to his side. ‘Come on, let’s beard the lion in his den together.’

Once, he could have been called a lion, with a fine mane of hair and head of the pride. But now the old warrior was laid low by infirmity.

‘It’s only us, Grandfather,’ Bridie called out cheerfully as she opened the door. ‘Me and Andrew.’

‘What do you want now, girl?’ he asked gruffly. She was still not welcome in his home, but he did now eat the meals she prepared, though she was always careful to make sure that
Andrew took them along the pathway to his cottage.

‘Andrew’s come to talk to you about the workshops. What happened, Grandfather? Why is no-one working there any more?’

‘What’s it to do with you?’

Bridie and Andrew exchanged a glance, then she shrugged helplessly, gesturing that Andrew should carry on the conversation. She certainly wasn’t going to get anywhere.

‘I just wondered,’ he began hesitantly, ‘if you’d like me to get things going again?’

‘We were doing all right. The women Eveleen sent did all right. I’ll give her that,’ he added grudgingly. ‘Three of ’em got quite good on the machines and the
others did the seaming, the winding or the washing, an’ that. But when the war finished, they was off back to the city life. The old feller that was here gave up and the boy went to work in
the city an’ all. And,’ he added bitterly, unwilling to admit failure, ‘my eyesight isn’t what it was. So, young Burns . . .’ To Harry Singleton, Andrew would always
be ‘young Burns’. ‘What do you want to do with my workshops?’

‘Get them working again, Mr Singleton. Get this yard back to what it used to be.’

‘Then what are you waiting for, young Burns? What are you waiting for?’

Eveleen had not felt so happy since before Richard volunteered. Every day he was improving and the previous night he had made love to her for the first time.