A Mother's Love (23 page)

‘Good Lawd – it’s Mr Craig.’ Throwing up the hinged bar of the counter she came round the end at a near sprint, skinny arms, with sleeves rolled up, stretched wide in joyous welcome.

‘Well I never! What a sight fer sore eyes! Bert, look oo’s ’ere.’

Mr Hardy glanced up and smiled, the metal jug still under the tap to be filled to the brim, preventing him from showing any other welcome. His wife had already grabbed Matthew by the hand and was pulling him through the gap to the other side of the counter and towards the stairs at the far end.

‘Come on up, dear. We ain’t busy at the moment, as yer can see. We can spare an’ ’alf-hour or so. You can tell me and Mr ’Ardy all yer news over a cup a’ tea an’ a nice bit of cake. Bert, when yer can, come up fer a chat wiv Mr Craig, an’ I’ll come an’ take over down ’ere.’ She bustled him on up the stairs and into the front parlour. ‘Well, ain’t this nice? Sit down then, Mr Craig, an’ make yerself nicely at ’ome. I’ll go an’ stick the kettle on. Won’t be a tick.’

She hurried out. He could hear her tripping down the stairs to the kitchen behind the shop, which the two of them obviously used most of the week as a combined sitting and dining room; eating by the warm range, taking their ease in ancient comfortable armchairs until it was time for bed, similar to the way Harriet and her first husband had once lived, the way most people did around here.

He stared around the parlour. As with most parlours in this area, it was chilly from little use, kept only for high days and holidays or for guests. Unused, it was left to capture all the musty blending of odours that rose from the shop below: vinegar, lamp oil, sacking that held a variety of dried foodstuffs – peas, haricot beans, rice and oatmeal and such – and a certain cloying but stale smell of soap, potpourri and household polish.

Matthew grimaced, as he would have liked to have done before the sounds coming from Mrs Hardy’s mouth, but that would have been impolite. Harriet had never spoken like that. From the first he had thought how better articulated she was than others around here. She often boasted these days that her speech had become much nicer with him beside her, though if it had, he had no recollection of it ever being anything but nice to his ears. Mrs Hardy’s speech merely jarred.

‘There you are, Mr Craig, a nice steaming pot fer the three of us. We’ll ’ave a nice little chinwag first, and then I’ll call Mr ’Ardy up while I take over the shop. Now ’ow’s your dear wife? I did ’ear from somewhere as she ’ad a little boy, but that was some while ago. Lost touch wiv you two, proper, I ’ave.’

Talking without hardly drawing breath, she poured tea into what was obviously her best china, added milk from a matching pot-bellied jug and offered him sugar from a similar bowl. He accepted only one small teaspoonful, which she put in for him, stirring mightily on his behalf. She handed him his cup and sat opposite him in one of the hard green leatherette armchairs to sip her own tea.

‘I miss your little Sara. I bet she’s gettin’ a big gel now. An’ like I said, if I ’eard rightly, you’ve got a boy too. Any more on the way?’

The tea was strong. Matthew forced himself to drink, but only as little as was politely necessary until he could eventually put his cup back on the brown chenille-covered table beside the rest of the tea things.

‘My wife had a miscarriage a few weeks ago, unfortunately.’

‘Oh, that is ’ard. Tell ’er I’m sorry. But she’ll ’ave another.’

‘I expect so.’ He leaned forward a fraction. ‘There is something I wanted to ask you, Mrs Hardy. You may be able to enlighten me.’

‘If I can, Mr Craig.’

‘It concerns the matter of my wife’s previous husband, deceased.’

Did he detect a guarded look creeping into the faded eyes? He would have to word this enquiry very carefully if he had rightly gauged what he saw there. He had no wish to alarm her into telling any lies, thinking to shield the man – or Harriet … Good God, what was he thinking?

‘How did Mrs Craig … then Mrs Porter … and Mr Porter get along in their marriage? Were they happy?’

‘Why d’you ask?’

‘I worry for Mrs … for my wife. She appears not to recall her previous marriage as a happy one. Not that she says as much, but she has dreams which alarm her severely and which seem to be connected to her previous husband. They seem to terrify her, and I have a strong belief that her husband was … unkind to her. That he treated her, physically, not as he should have done.’

Matthew placed his tea on the table, glad to be rid of it. ‘I am not prying. I merely wish to help my wife. If you have any means to help her, I shall be most obliged for anything you can tell me.’

‘Is she ill, poor dear?’

‘Not
ill.
But not at ease. I am most serious about helping ease her mind from … what might have occurred in her past.’

Mrs Hardy thought with an great effort. Frowning, she placed her teacup back on the table without looking where she was putting it, fortunately in the right place. She began slowly.

‘It ain’t fer me to tell tales, Mr Craig. Not after all this long time. But I can safely say your wife found ’er previous marriage not exactly an ’appy one. I’ve seen ’er that distraught …’

She began to hot up to her tale. ‘I’ve seen ’er wiv a black eye an’ a swelled lip many a time. She always said it was ’er fallin’ and knockin’ herself. The day Will Porter died, she ’ad a great yeller bruise on ’er poor cheek, an’ ’er such a pretty little thing too. And eight months gone wiv ’er baby. Fell down the stairs ’e did – her ’usband. Mid-afternoon, it was. I remember thinkin’ at the time, what was he doin’ upstairs that time of day when ’e ’ad a business ter run? I ’eard ’er crying, long before I ’eard ’is tumble. And I know they come from the top of the stairs. These walls, y’know, thin as cardboard. Yer can ’ear everythink. I’ve ’eard them ’aving many an argy-bargy. At least I’ve ’eard ’im bellowin’. She never yelled back, poor dear – too refined to yell. I know ’e ’it ’er many a time too. Can ’ear everythink – even mice gnawin’ on next door’s floorboards. The police came, y’know. Well, they would – someone goin’ down the stairs like that, and endin’ up dead on the floor below. They asked a few questions, I think. Not many, for they could see ’er condition, and ’er just become a widow a few seconds before. I ’eard she said she was in the kitchen gettin’ ’is tea when ’e fell. But I’m sure she was up them stairs when he did fall. I’m certain of it.’

‘You mean, you think she …’ He could hardly bring himself to say the words. ‘Pushed him?’

Mrs Hardy waved her hands about. ‘Oh no, nothink like that. A tiny little fing like ’er, and eight months gone? No. ’E was a big man, y’know. Ever so ’andsome, though ’is ’eart was black as Newgate’s knocker. She wouldn’t’ve had the strength. No – what I’m sayin’ is ’e was drunk. Come back from the pub, two – three o’clock, fancied a bit of the other, if yer forgive me sayin’.’ She gave a self-conscious titter and continued quickly.

‘Bundled ’er upstairs, I reckon. In that condition too. But ’e didn’t care, long as ’e got what ’e wanted. Bein’ drunk, ’e must’ve fell down the stairs like a dead log. An’ I’ll tell yer this fer nothink – a jolly good riddance too. Then you came along, Mr Craig, and ’er life changed. She deserved it to change, bless ’er ’eart.’

It was a thoughtful man who left the Hardys’ shop that day.

The summer sunshine pouring in at the window from over the park all lovely and warm on her back, Sara sat on the floor of her room, surrounded by her family of dolls while she served them all tea.

She was five now and felt very grown-up. She would soon be going to school, Daddy said, and he had looked so sad it worried her a bit. She didn’t like to see him sad. Secretly she was looking forward to meeting lots of other children her age, but she didn’t really want to go if it was going to upset him.

Mummy had said thank God – she’d be out from under her feet – and had actually looked quite pleased. Though why she should say she was under her feet confused Sara, because she always tried to keep out of her mother’s way. It made it easier to stay out of trouble, especially lately. Mummy had been getting very fat around the middle lately, and the fatter she got, the more upset with Sara she got. So it was always a good idea to keep out of the way up in her room.

She loved her room, staying up there for hours on end. Miss Gilbert would bring her meals up to her and then go and get Jamie, who slept in the little room next to hers, and bring him in too. She was quite content with this, going downstairs only when her father came home, or when the family went to church on Sunday, or he took her over to the park on Sunday afternoons.

There was everything here she wanted: her dolls’ house, her dolls, a little chair and table where she served them all tea from a tiny china tea set, some funny toys that moved when you wound them up with a key, all of which her father had bought her at one time or another.

Here there was no need for anything more. Her room was her domain. Her word was law. Just as Mummy’s was downstairs. In winter she’d snuggle up and watch the rain outside her window and feel all warm and cosy. In summer, she’d play in the sunlight until Daddy came home and then go down and help him in the garden. So long as she kept out of Mummy’s way, life was really nice. She guessed that this was how it was with all children – keeping out of their mothers’ way while they waited for their daddies to come home and play with them. She guessed that when Jamie got to her age, it would be the same for him.

Unable to remember what her babyhood was like, this was what she guessed.

A few days later, Miss Gilbert, holding Jamie like a baby as though fearful of letting him go, for all he was nearly two, stopped her abruptly as she laughed out loud at his peevish face at being cuddled like that. Her expression was not so much severe as sad.

‘Hush, Sara! You must be quiet and not disturb your mother. She has been ill all night. She has lost her baby and is very upset.’

Sara had been awoken in the night by someone crying. It was so anguished and went on for so long, she thought it would never stop. There had been footsteps too, and whispering voices – her father’s and one that sounded like Dr Horder’s, a hoarse sort of voice she remembered from when he had come visiting her when she had been ill with measles the year before. She remembered him saying she’d got over it remarkably well and her mother retorting, ‘Trust her,’ without any smile on her face, though her father had leaned over and caught her to him, tears of relief running down into his soft fair moustache.

‘Mummy’s not lost him,’ Sara said, confused as she looked towards her brother in Miss Gilbert’s arms. Her mother always called Jamie her baby. ‘Tell her Jamie’s here.’

Miss Gilbert’s smile was tremulous. ‘This was a baby she was going to add to the family. It was to have been a new little brother or sister for you both. But something happened. No one knows what. It just came into the world too early and the angels thought it best for it not to stay here, because it wasn’t well. So they took it back to live with them in heaven where it will have a lovely time.’

‘Where Jesus is?’ Sara queried. She wondered why, if this new baby was going to have such a lovely time in heaven, Miss Gilbert was looking so miserable.

Tears glistened in the woman’s pale blue eyes. ‘Yes, Sara. He’ll be happy there with Jesus. Now you mustn’t speak about it any more. Certainly not to Mummy and Daddy when you see them. You understand?’

Sara nodded solemnly. There was something mysterious about all this but she remembered in church that the vicar often said they must pray for the souls in heaven, and people must not grieve, because they were only grieving for themselves in their loss, and that they should be rejoicing instead that these souls had been spared the trevails of this world.

She had never bothered to understand what he was saying, his voice ringing through the vast dimensions of the church, but now some of it made sense. If Mummy’s new baby had gone to heaven, surely she shouldn’t be crying about it, and Miss Gilbert’s eyes shouldn’t be filling with tears? It certainly didn’t tie in with what the vicar said. It was all very mysterious.

Harriet had felt low after that first miscarriage but finding herself pregnant again had brought her out of it. Perhaps she shouldn’t have been so excited – Matthew said she had been far too excited for her own good, but she hadn’t believed him. It was probably that which had made her miscarry, for there had been no other apparent reason.

Her moods since losing this second one, just when she had thought everything was going so well, worried him. They worried her, too, fluctuating so violently between high spirits and deep depression, especially when Sara came near her and she noted the comparison between her rosy good health and the pale insipidness of Jamie.

She thought of her two babies dead before they’d had a chance to come into the world and felt nothing short of hatred for this robust girl with all the good looks and wellbeing of her loathsome father.

Matthew was no help when she tried to tell him how she felt. He would merely give her a look that mystified her – a sort of puzzled contemplation – but he never said why. He was as loving as ever any man could be, but this non-committal attitude of his blocked all her efforts to share her loss with him. Sometimes it was as though all she had was Jamie to ease the pain it brought. Jamie and occasional expeditions to the corner cabinet where Matthew kept his brandy.

It warmed her as it trickled down her throat, penetrated her whole being and made her feel so much better. She would send Ellen out for an identical bottle, fill Matthew’s one to the level it had been before use, then enjoy what was left of her one until compelled to resort again to Matthew’s store. Then she could go through the process as before. This way, Ellen wasn’t being sent out too often, and nothing need be said; nothing had to be explained to Matthew.

Not that she drank that much, just enough to compose herself to meet the forlorn days ahead, drown the memory of those two poor little lost, half-formed babes, her poor lost self thinking of them.

Matthew was concerned by her plunging state of mind. To bring her out of it, he was taking her out and about more. It was so much easier now that they had money to pay staff – no more having to beg favours of a neighbour and family. With Miss Gilbert to take care of the children, and young Mr Hallet to look after the journal, Matthew would take her occasionally to the theatre in the evening, and many a Saturday afternoon shopping in the West End. He had even spoken of going back to Paris next summer, but that was a long way off yet. This was only October.