A Woman Undefeated (22 page)

Well, if little Alice could do it, so could she, Maggie thought. Another four months and it would all be over and Michael Patrick Haines would be there on show!

She picked up her needle and a reel of thick white cotton, thinking that she may as well do one of those jobs that she never seemed to get around to. It was sewing up the hole in the mattress, where Jack had put his money sacks. It was difficult trying to hold the two thick seams together, as her fingers kept slipping again and again. In her exasperation she gave the mattress a little shake and, to her surprise, a little stream of silver fell onto her lap! Silver coins that looked like shillings in the bedroom’s gloom. Gathering the coins into a fold in her skirt, she got up to bring the candle nearer to examine them, whilst tutting with annoyance at her needle skills. It was obvious that the job she had made on the money sacks had been a little slapdash, so she felt around in the mattress, to make inspection of the others she had made.

But it wasn’t hessian that her fingers were touching, it was muslin. Her heart began to beat wildly as she touched another little bag. What else could there be hiding in the mattress, beside a few little bugs? They had lain on the mattress for months, thinking it lumpy and uncomfortable, but she would never have dreamt of throwing it out. Jack was always grumbling, threatening to buy a new, clean mattress, but hadn’t been willing to risk her wrath.

She began to hear movement in the living room. Solly was getting to his feet and making for the cottage door. She swiftly put the silver into her skirt pocket, vowing to investigate further when Jack had gone to work the next day. Only pausing to comment on how flushed she was looking, though it wasn’t from drinking brandy like he and Solly had, Jack eventually crawled into bed. They would both be looking bleary eyed in the morning, as Maggie was far too excited to sleep.

The next morning she pretended that she wanted to be sick again, assuring Jack that she would follow on in half an hour or so. She rushed to the mattress and began her search. In ten minutes she had discovered seventeen little muslin bags, all filled to the top with silver shillings. There were twenty coins in each and the necks were fastened with twine. The stitching was clumsy, not the
work of a woman. More likely Granddad Filbey, who had passed away at the Irish farm.

There was nowhere to hide the precious money, it would have to stay put until she came up with a plan. She couldn’t believe her find and began to tremble with excitement at the thought. No waiting for Jack to tip up any money, no being frugal and doing without. She had seventeen pounds that she could call her own, as she was certain that she wasn’t going to share it with anyone. She wanted to jump for joy and dance about! But her good sense eventually came to the fore and told her to be careful. It would be best to put the bags and the sacks all back, and restore the mattress to its lumpy self again.

Maggie hurried along the farm track later, busy with her thoughts. The trees that had been stark and bare for what seemed like ages, were back in bud, with primroses in profusion all around. Spring had arrived in Neston, new life beginning everywhere.

She could have a new life with seventeen pounds. She could go back to Killala and start afresh there. She had enough for the rent of a cottage and the care of her little baby, but she knew that she wouldn’t leave her husband, now that his baby was on the way.

Perhaps she would buy a smart baby carriage or some shop bought clothes. She hadn’t begun to make his little outfits yet and their baby would need lots of toys. Or maybe a cradle. Jack had not got round to making one like he’d promised. He had said there was still plenty of time. Good old Granddad Filbey and all his precious coins. If he was watching from his perch in Heaven, he would be able to see how happy she was.

“But what will Jack’s reaction be?” a little voice in her conscience began to say.

“He’ll think yer’ve stolen his precious sacks and then yer’ll be in trouble with him again.”

It came to Maggie like bolt from the blue. She’d take a trip up to Betty’s again!

Maggie stood hesitantly outside the door of the dressmaker’s shop the next day. There was a young woman inside being measured and she felt that Betty, or Miss Rosemary, as she had been told to call her when she had gone to buy the curtain material, wouldn’t be pleased if she just barged in.

She decided to waste some time in the grocer’s. There were lots of things to look at in Ezra Williams’s shop, items that she had never seen before. He kept a block of brown stuff on his counter that she had heard housewives call “brawn”. It was weighed on delicate silver scales and sold at a half penny for an ounce. There was a sack of aromatic coffee beans, large tins of cocoa powder, tins of sticky treacle, packets of yellow suet, bags of oats and since the railway line had come to the Wirral, a basket full of oranges imported from a place called Spain.

Ezra Williams seemed to have a soft spot for Maggie, maybe because he was an incomer to the village as well. He and his wife were originally from a small village in Wales, but with a legacy left by a sheep farming uncle, they had decided to buy this grocer store in Neston which had providentially come up for sale. Ezra was now a widower in his late forties, as his poor wife had succumbed to the epidemic that had raged through the village a couple of years before. His business kept him busy and took away the bitterness he had felt for months, after his beloved Joan had died.

With the help of a local woman who came in to do his cooking and his laundry, life was beginning to be a bit more pleasant,
especially as he had joined the choir at St Mary’s, which meant he was at practice Thursday nights and singing his heart out twice on Sunday.

This soft spot he had for Maggie was shown in little ways, when she went in to give him her custom. She had been one of the first to taste an orange, courtesy of Ezra, when she had gone in to buy a loaf, or an extra ounce of sugar or tea was given, served with a smile and a bit of gossip now and again.

So she waited as Ezra served his customer, knowing he wouldn’t mind her staying until Miss Rosemary was free.

“She’ll be that new woman that’s staying at the Brown Horse,” explained Ezra, glad to have a snippet of gossip to pass on, after Maggie had told him that Miss Rosemary was busy with a client.

“I’ve seen her a time or two passing by and one of my customers said she’s a relation of the new landlord at the Brown Horse. Doesn’t seem to be short of much, dressed to the nines. Always sporting one of those posh parasols, come rain or shine. Don’t know what she is to him yet. Daughter maybe, or sister, maybe his wife? I heard they’ve come from across the water. I think he was a landlord somewhere over there, but with me not being a drinker, I can’t find it out from the horse’s mouth. And I hear your man is being touted as the winner of the fight between him and Reg’ McKeown. Not that I hold with men beating each other within an inch of their lives, but I can’t help but hear how the betting’s going.”

“Oh, I take no notice of what Jack’s up to, Mister Williams,” Maggie replied, trying to sound indifferent. “He’s come home with a cut eye once or twice, or his cheek and jaw swelling with the bruisin’, but I can’t stop what he is doin’. He’ll not listen to me. I just worry that Farmer Briggs might say something and we’ll be out of the cottage on our ears...........Oh, I think Miss Rosemary is free now, I’ve just seen the new woman.”

She dashed out of the shop and into the dressmaker’s, where Betty was putting away some rolls of fabric that she had been showing to her client.

“Maggie, how nice to see you again,” she said, pleasure written over her tired, lined face.

“What is it this time? A new dress, or help with the seams on your old one?”

“I’ve come to see if yer can help me with a problem that I’ve found meself landed with, Miss Rosemary. No, no, its a nice problem that I’m havin’,” she finished hastily, as she saw Betty furrowing her brow. She didn’t want to cause the lady any anxiety. She was a decent soul. Probably the only person around that Maggie could take a problem to, especially as she had felt overwhelmed that a genteel lady such as the dressmaker would even want to bother with a common Irish girl like herself.

A little later she found herself drinking tea out of a pretty china cup in the dressmaker’s tiny kitchen, with the lady herself mulling over what she had just been told and what course of action she could recommend.

“So do you have a plan for this money you have found, dear?” asked Betty kindly. “Seventeen pounds is a lot of money for a young girl like you to have. If I were you I wouldn’t go making any large purchases. Not only would your husband be suspicious, but so would a lot of other people. They would wonder how you came upon it and if it was lawfully gained.”

“Yer mean people would think I’d pinched it,” Maggie said, dolefully. “Though that would be right, how else would someone like me be in possession of such a grand sum?”

She watched Betty hopefully, whilst thinking what an elegant person this lady in front of her was. A little stooped with age maybe, but tall and slim, dressed in a beautifully cut day dress of dove grey, her pure white hair swept up into classical curls that were immaculate. She had deep blue eyes, set above high cheekbones, with a wide and generous mouth, which was turned down now as she dwelt on the problem.

“Perhaps you could bring it to me for safe keeping,” she said briskly, once she had arrived at her decision. “That is if you would trust me with such a large sum. I do have a bank account in Chester
and once a week I take the coach with the money I have earned from my commissions, do a little shopping and have a little lunch. Or maybe you could accompany me to the city and we could lodge your money in a new bank account.”

She looked at Maggie eagerly and the girl saw from her face that she would welcome her company.

“Me with a bank account, Miss Rosemary?” Maggie replied, quite astounded that she had come up with this answer to the problem.

“It sounds wonderful, but can yer honestly see a bank wanting to deal with a person like me? I mean, look at me. Except fer this grand cloak yer helped me make and me pretty boots, what is there underneath it all? A fat, shabby immigrant, with tatty hair and a voice as common as muck. They’d laugh at yer, walkin’ into a fancy place with the likes of me. No, I’ll have to think of some other way of hiding it, or just leave it with yer good self. And how would I get the time to come a banking with yer anyway?”

“Oh, Maggie, don’t sell yourself short,” Betty admonished. “Yes, they say clothes maketh the man, but that cloak you have on covers all irregularities. Furthermore, a woman in your condition would cover herself anyway. She wouldn’t be showing her dress underneath and you could always give your hair a good brushing before we go. But yes, you are probably right that it would be difficult for you to get away from your responsibilities, and the gossips would wonder why you were travelling with me. So, I have decided I will let you borrow my reticule. You can hide it under your cloak, then at an opportune time you can take the money from the mattress and bring it back to me. I will make you a receipt out, my dear,” she ended, taking Maggie’s worried look as a sign that she wasn’t so sure.

“No, that’s fine with me, so it is. I’m just workin’ out when will be a good time. I’m ever so grateful fer yer helpin’ me the way yer are. If yer can keep the money ’til after the birth of the babby, then I can think again of what I’m goin’ to do. Perhaps yer could give me a little when I need it, fer baby things, yer know? Although I think me husband may provide some of the things.”

Their discussion was put aside then in favour of planning a new dress to cover Maggie’s ever expanding stomach and, of course, a little genteel gossip concerning Madeline, the new woman who had come to reside at the inn.

Maggie groaned to herself later as she came within sight of Lilac Cottage. Alice was outside, walking up and down impatiently, clutching some papers in her hand. She had only been once before to visit and Maggie was sure it had been to satisfy herself, that her son wasn’t living in a hovel. Though if she’d had any opinions when she had seen the barely furnished rooms, she had kept them to herself.

“There yer are Maggie,” she fussed, when she caught sight of her. “I thought you only worked mornings at the farmhouse. I’ve been standing here waitin’ fer the past hour. I’ve had that big woman from the corner asking me my business and her smelly kids draggin’ a cart past me with an idiot child lollin’ in it............”

“Oh, that will have been Ruthie Tibbs and her children, Alice. I had to go up to Anne Rosemary’s,

This dress of mine wants letting out, but we’ve decided on makin’ a new one instead. It will be gathered under me chest to take account of me bigger belly and ‘tis a very pretty fabric, sprigged cotton in yellow and green. I’ll be up there every afternoon until it’s finished. Miss Rosemary is very good to me. We’ll work on it together if she’s got the time.”

She ended her announcement proudly. Even Alice couldn’t claim she had a friend as grand as Miss Rosemary.