The Girl From Penny Lane (42 page)

‘I’m very grateful,’ she said awkwardly. ‘I hadn’t realised where I was . . . I’d been hospital visiting and I got lost in the fog . . .’

‘You’re soaked, you’ve been terrified, an’ someone’s nigh on tore the coat off your back,’ the man remarked. ‘Eh, your legs is black an’ blue! Where’s the receptionist, you need a clean-up before you goes on anywhere else.’

‘I am the receptionist,’ Lilac said with a watery giggle. ‘I was on my way to work when those men attacked me. I expect I’m late, and Mrs Brierson probably thought as it was quiet she’d go down for her dinner. Thank you very much sir, for your help, but I’d better get behind the desk now and start work.’

‘That you won’t, ducks,’ the man said decisively. He crossed the foyer in a couple of strides and banged the bell on the desk. ‘You’ll want to straighten up first . . . you’re covered wiv mud an all, you know!’

Lilac, still trembling with reaction, glanced down at herself and had to fight back the tears. She was filthy, not just her coat but the dress beneath it as well, her stockings, her shoes . . . and glancing in the mirror behind the desk she could see that she looked an absolute fright – her hair hung in wet witch-locks around a pale face on which scratches and a big blue bruise had appeared.

‘You’re right,’ she mumbled. ‘I’ll have to sit down for a minute, too, before I can start work.’

One of the maids, coming to answer the bell, glanced across at Lilac and then stared.

‘Oh, Miss . . . what ’appened? I’ll get Mrs Brierson at once, she’ll see to you.’

The man got a chair from behind the counter and made Lilac sit down on it. Then he knelt and began to take her shoes off. It was quite a hard task since the shoes were thick with mud and Lilac’s feet had been trampled on in the mêlée so that blood was caked round her torn stockings and black bruises were beginning to appear. As he worked he said conversationally: ‘You’re Lilac Larkin, ain’t you? I reckernise you from your photograph.’

‘Yes, I am. But . . . but . . .’

‘I’m Joey Prescott; I met your sister Nellie down in Balham . . . didn’t she write?’

Lilac stared at him; yes, she recognised him now, he had changed scarcely at all, he even had his tiny little moustache, though she supposed he must look older – it had been fifteen years after all. She smiled at him, the colour beginning to creep back into her cheeks.

‘Of course, she said you might come to Liverpool, but . . . oh, Joey, isn’t it strange? The first time we met you rescued me and now you’ve rescued me again! Thank you so much. I don’t know what I’d have done if you’d not caught me – gone on running until I dropped, I imagine.’

‘You poor kid,’ Joey said. ‘Ah, ’ere comes the marines!’

It was Mrs Brierson, looking very concerned.

‘My dear Lilac, Ethel says . . . my goodness, you are in a state! Did you fall? Your poor little toes . . . you’ve been knocked down in the fog, everyone drives too fast these days, you’re lucky to be alive!’

‘It wasn’t . . .’ Joey began, but stopped at a warning glare from Lilac.

‘I’m only cut and bruised, Mrs Brierson,’ she said. ‘If I can just have a hot wash . . . oh goodness, my clothes!’

‘Exactly; you’re in no state to sit behind the desk, my dear, even if I were to allow you to do so, which I most certainly shall not. Look, the hotel’s half empty, I’ll give you a room and lend you a nightgown so you can get a good night’s sleep, and in the morning we’ll hope the fog has cleared so you can go back to the flat. Only . . . are you sure I shouldn’t call a doctor?’

Lilac laughed and stood up, albeit shakily.

‘No, really, I’m just shaken up.’ She turned to Joey. ‘I’m so sorry, I should have introduced you; Mrs Brierson, this is an old friend of mine, Mr Prescott. Joey, my employer, Mrs Brierson.’

The two shook hands solemnly, then Joey cleared his throat.

‘I was comin’ to see Lilac, take ’er out for dinner,’ he said rather awkwardly. ‘But I’d like a room for a night or two, if you can manage that.’

‘Aha, a customer! But it isn’t fair, Joey, after you’ve brought me in here and helped me that you should . . .’ Lilac began, to be shushed at once by her employer.

‘Your friend’s welcome to stay, dear. Special rates for friends and family, eh? Now Lilac, I’ll give you Room seven because it’s near the bathroom and you’re going to need a good, hot bath. And Mr Prescott, Room twenty-two is free, that’s on the third floor and next door to another bathroom.’ She paused discreetly. ‘Is it just the one night?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Joey said. ‘Lilac might prefer me a bit further off!’

Lilac began to disclaim, but Mrs Brierson took her arm.

‘Come along, my dear, you’re in no state to stand here arguing! I’ll get Eva to bring a tray of supper to your room presently, unless you’d rather put my thick dressing gown on and come down to the kitchen?’

‘I’d like that; can Joey . . . Mr Prescott, I mean . . . come down as well?’ Lilac asked. ‘We’ve got rather a lot to talk about.’

Mrs Brierson gave Joey a quick, hard glance, then her face softened and she smiled.

‘What an excellent idea; Mr Prescott, what do you think?’

‘I’m more at ’ome in a kitchen than a posh dining room,’ Joey admitted, returning the smile. ‘Shall we say in ’alf an hour, give Lilac a chanst to get ’erself smartened up?’

‘Half an hour it shall be; I’ll warn the chef. Now off with you, Miss Larkin. I’ll ring for George, he’ll show Mr Prescott to Room twenty-two.’

Joey spent five nights at the hotel, and every spare moment with Lilac. When she was working he amused himself, walking Patch for miles along the docks, taking her on the overhead railway right out to Seaforth to run on the sands. Patch took to him at once, and revelled in the exercise after putting up with the very much shorter walks which were all Lilac could manage. When he wasn’t walking the dog he looked round the shops and visited the museums and art galleries, informing Lilac with a grin that he had never known improving one’s mind could be so pleasant.

On the second evening he went with her to the hospital and talked to Kitty, who was no longer infectious but very weak and lethargic still. The death of her mother and sister had put her back, there was no doubt of that, but Lilac could see that Joey was good for her. He made her laugh with anecdotes about Patch and his museum-visiting, he taught her how to tie various nautical knots, and he told her she was good company so he intended to visit her again. Having met Lilac’s protégée, he then felt it incumbent upon him to buy her puzzle books, jigsaws and other amusements, and to invent games which could be played by someone propped up by pillows and with a short attention span. Kitty pulled a long face when he told her his ship sailed next day.

‘Never mind, I’ll be back in three or four weeks,’ he said comfortably, when she turned her head into the pillow. ‘You’ll be out of ’ere by then, you can come and walk Patch wiv me – miles, we cover, ole Patchie an’ me.’

As for Lilac, she found herself looking forward to her off-duty times with real enthusiasm, when Joey would buy her fish and chips and walk her along the docks, or take her riding the overhead railway so he could show her the big ships and explain about them, or just sit in a café drinking coffee and catching up with each other’s lives.

And for the first time, Lilac found herself able to talk about Art without breaking down.

‘It’s because I’ve been in the same situation, so I knows ’ow it ’urts,’ Joey said wisely, when Lilac commented on the way she felt. ‘My Annie was a lovely gel, I wish you could ’ave met ’er, you’d ’ave got on a treat. But she’s gorn and now I can look back on the good times and be glad I ’ad them, to remember ’er, see? I’ve made myself forget the bad times. She didn’t want to die, see? She fought against it; them’s the times you’ve gotta forget or you’d go mad.’

She understood. She told him, low-voiced, that she dared not let herself imagine Art’s death, the pain was too bad. He nodded.

‘Aye; thank God, littl’un, that you didn’t ’ave to watch it. You just tell yourself it’s over, the bad time, that your feller’s at peace.’

She cried, then. Little, heart-tearing sobs, her head buried in his shoulder. And he was good, rocking her in his arms, telling her to cry out the pain, to let the tears bring her ease.

When the time came for him to leave he said he’d call in again, if she’d like him too.

Lilac nodded hard; to her own surprise she was too full to speak. He had been so good, he had helped her in a hundred different ways, yet he was almost a stranger . . . one meeting, fifteen years ago, and he had got closer to her than almost anyone else, save for Art and Nellie.

‘He’s lost a lover too,’ Nellie said, when Lilac told her how she felt about Joey. ‘He understands in a way most of us can’t, even those of us who’ve . . . who’ve known sadness. He’s coming back again, I hope?’

Lilac smiled and nodded. ‘Yes, in about a month. I wouldn’t be able to face Kitty otherwise. She says he reminds her of Johnny Moneymor, the boy who took her into Wales. There’s no higher compliment than that!’

Chapter Fifteen

Kitty looked around her, at the bright summer day, at the dear blue sky above, even at the buildings opposite the Isolation Hospital, and thanked her stars that she was coming out of it on her own two feet, even though Lilac was insisting on hiring a taxi cab to get her home.

And not to Kitty’s own home, either. She was to go to Lilac’s flat as, Kitty supposed ruefully, she no longer had a home, not any more. After her mother’s death there had been no one to pay the rent at the house in Paradise Court, and in any case the authorities had announced that it was to be demolished. That left her homeless . . . perhaps it had been that as much as her sudden loss which had brought about the relapse but, thinking about it now as she crossed the pavement on her shaky legs, with Lilac’s warm hand on her elbow, Kitty suspected that it had been guilt.

When she had been told that Sary and Betty had both died her first feeling had been of the deepest and most dreadful guilt. Betty had managed before Kitty had come on the scene, that was what she kept thinking. Bet was only a kid and none too bright, but she had somehow kept what was left of their family together, she had even kept their mother alive despite her heavy drinking and the illness which hung over her as a result. Then along came Kitty, capable Kitty, and within a matter of months the kids were in a home and Sary and Betty were dead.

Kitty had stared at the ceiling for two days, ignoring what went on round her, waiting for death to smite her as she surely deserved to be smitten, wracked with grief for poor little Betty, who had tried so hard, who had actually loved the drunken hulk that was Sary Drinkwater.

It had taken Joey to point out the obvious – that they hadn’t died of scarlet fever, brought home by Kitty, which was something to be thankful for. She could scarcely blame herself for contracting the disease, since she imagined she had caught it off Marigold, who had been in and out of the Isolation Hospital around the time that Kitty was at her worst. Marigold had recovered – Kitty was very glad of that – and was probably back at work already. Joey pointed out as well that it was because of Kitty’s hard work and presence that Sary and Betty had lived as long as they had; it was only in her absence that they had been unable to keep going and had died.

‘You stayed, ’orrible though that place was, an’ did your best for ’em, when it would ’ave been easier to ’ave give ’em money and scarpered,’ he said bluntly.

‘You’re a good gel, young Kitty, an’ don’t you forgit it!’

It made Kitty feel a good deal better, though she did not blame herself unduly for Sary’s death; it had been only a matter of time, she knew that. But Betty – ah, her sister was different. She had
earned
a life, Kitty thought confusedly from the depths of her weakness and guilt, but she had not lived to enjoy what she had earned. And that was wrong, wrong!

Then Joey told her about his Annie, how she’d contracted a horrible disease called meningitis which had killed her and their little baby. He told her of his deep feelings of guilt because he’d been at sea, had only returned in time to watch them die . . . Kitty had held his hand and cried, then, not for herself but for Joey’s young wife and her own young sister, who had deserved better but who would not have dreamed of laying blame.

When Joey went the guilt and depression came back for a bit, but Lilac talked to her, restored a sense of perspective and a degree of self-esteem, reminding Kitty that she had other little sisters who would be proud and happy to spend time with her when she was out of hospital, reminding her – as if she needed reminding – that she had a debt to pay to Johnny, as well.

‘He was a good pal to you, and though you never meant to leave him in the lurch, it happened,’ she reminded Kitty. ‘When you’re well you’ll have to get in touch with him, dear. Think how glad and grateful he’ll be that you’re alive and well, even if you never get that farm!’

But now Kitty crossed the pavement, her knees wobbling from the unaccustomed exertion, and stood on the kerb, breathing in the salt air with a blissful smile on her face. It was good to be out of doors again, good to be free of the hospital smells, disinfectant, doses, boiled cabbage. She smiled at Lilac, who was stepping into the road to hail a passing cab.

‘Here’s the cab; hop in, Kitty,’ Lilac said cheerfully. ‘We’ll be home in a jiffy.’

Kitty got into the car and sank thankfully down on the soft leather seat.

‘Phew, who’d ha’ thought walkin’ down a corridor and acrost a pavement could be so tirin’?’ she gasped, leaning thankfully back against the cushions. ‘I reckon I’ll be good for nothin’ for a coupla days, Miss.’

‘That’s all right; Patch will look after you,’ Lilac said. ‘I told her you were coming home today and she got so excited! She’s a remarkably intelligent dog you know.’

‘I does know,’ Kitty said, contentedly watching the city go by through the side window. ‘It’s been ever so good of you to keep ’er for me, Miss, I won’t forget it.’