Daisy's Secret (2 page)

‘Stick to answering the telephone and making appointments for me, darling. You can’t do much damage there. As well as making those delicious lemon cheesecakes, of course. There isn’t anyone who could resist doing business with me, having tasted one tiny sliver of your desserts.’

‘But it seems so little, just to cook and entertain for you. So unimportant.’

‘It is not in the least unimportant, my darling. Food, next to sex, is a vital ingredient of a happy marriage.’

And certainly the sex they’d enjoyed together had been good, at least in those early days, for when he was not actually working they’d spent the time largely in bed. She’d been captivated, at first, by this evidence of his need for her, and of how he appreciated all she did to create a lovely home. And if, as the years slid by, he spent more and more time at the gallery and less with her, wasn’t that only to be expected when he was so successful? She learned not to complain about the eighteen hour working days, the times when he rang to say he couldn’t make it home as he had to dash off to the outer reaches of Yorkshire or Derbyshire at a moment’s notice to view a Lowry or whatever. He never recognised evidence of his own neglect, because he considered that she had sufficient to occupy her, looking after him.

Laura had endured his bossiness and tolerated his need for control largely in silence over the years; even been amused and flattered by his uncalled for, and foolishly obsessive jealousies. On the whole, she believed she’d shown exemplary courage and patience above and beyond the realms of wifely duty. But Laura discovered there were limits, even to her patience.
 

Nurtured by a stubborn determination to rescue herself from miserable oblivion, somewhere, at the back of her head, an idea was taking shape. Laura wasn’t sure when it had nestled there, but it seemed to be settling in nicely, fighting off all attempts to brush it away. And where was the harm in giving this crazy notion an airing? Wasn’t that why she’d wanted to stay on here after the funeral, to give herself time to think, to dream.

All she had to discover was whether she could find the strength to carry it out, whether she could match the kind of fortitude Daisy had shown during her own troubles.

‘Don’t think for a minute that you can carry on as if nothing has happened. Not after behaving so shamefully. We’re done with you now, Daisy Atkins. You’re no longer any daughter of mine. As for your father, he’s made it abundantly clear that he’ll not have you set foot in the house. Not ever again. We might be poor with not much to call us own, but we have us standards. Make no mistake about that.’

Daisy looked into her mother’s set face and saw by the pursing of her narrow lips and the twin spots of colour on each hollow cheek, that she meant every hard and unforgiving word. ‘Then what am I to do? Where am I supposed to go?’

‘You should’ve thought of that before you - well - before you did what you oughtn’t to have done.’ Rita Atkins sniffed loud disapproval and folded her arms belligerently across her narrow chest. Daisy noticed that she was wearing her best black coat and hat for the visit, the one that she wore for chapel and for all funerals and weddings in the family. It bore a faint sheen of green and smelt strongly of mothballs. ‘I’ll not have it. I won’t. It’s just like your Aunt Florrie all over again.’

Daisy let out a heavy sigh, feeling a prickle of resentment by the comparison which had been flung at her more times than she cared to remember in these last, agonising weeks.

Aunt Florrie had brought disgrace to her family by running off with a man almost twice her age to live in the wilds of the Lake District. Daisy had no real memory of her, beyond the odd Christmas card but she’d always rather envied this adventurous, long-lost aunt who had escaped the boring inevitability of life in Marigold Court, Salford. She’d run away from broken windows, strings of washing and the reek of boiled fish and cabbage. And who could blame her? Certainly not Daisy. Whenever she’d ventured to say as much, she’d been slapped down by her mother, which Daisy didn’t understand at all. She thought it would be the most glorious thing in the world to breathe clean, fresh country air and live where the grass stayed green and wasn’t always covered in soot. Hadn’t she long dreamed of just such an escape?

She’d thought she could achieve it by marrying her sweetheart Percy, who kept a market stall out at Warrington. He’d certainly seemed smitten by her, proclaiming how much he adored her halo of golden brown, corkscrew curls, which Daisy privately loathed, longing as she did for more sophisticated, smooth bangs like Veronica Lake. He’d frequently told her how her soft, brown eyes just made him melt inside, how he adored each sun-kissed freckle and he’d certainly been more than happy to kiss the fragile prettiness of her small, pink mouth.

He’d talked endlessly about his own hopes and ambitions for the future: how he aimed to have a string of market stalls one day, or better still, a whole row of shops, selling meat and fish as well as vegetables. She would listen to this extravagant fantasies, head tilted attentively to one side, eyes intent on his face, not wishing to miss a word.

‘And will I be able to help you in these shops?’ she’d coyly enquire. ‘Or will it be some other girl?’

‘Course it’ll be you Daisy,’ he’d say, pulling her close. ‘You’re my girl. Always will be. You can serve behind the counter.’

‘Happen I don’t want to be your girl and work on a market stall or behind the counter of a fruit and veg shop. Mebbe I want a big house in the country.’

‘Then you shall have one, Daisy girl. I’ll build you the biggest house you ever did see, with a fine garage for the car, and stables for horses. ‘Ere, I could run ‘em in t’Grand National eh? Come on chuck, don’t be mean, give us another kiss,’ and Daisy would sigh with pleasure at the joy of being in love.

Sadly, these dreams had been dashed by discovering that the one and only occasion she’d foolishly allowed him to go ‘all the way’, she’d got caught. At first, in her innocence, Daisy had felt excited at the prospect of motherhood. They’d intended to get married anyway, she told herself, so it meant only that she could leave home even sooner and escape the claustrophobic restrictions her mother imposed upon her. She would marry Percy and they’d find a pretty cottage in the country, and while she minded the children she’d also keep hens and grow flowers and vegetables which Percy could sell on his market stall. Oh, life would be just perfect!

All such foolish daydreams had been swiftly shattered.

Percy had been struck speechless with shock when she’d proudly announced that he was about to become a father. ‘Nay, Daisy lass, that’s bit of a shaker. I’m not old enough to be a dad, any more than you’re old enough to be anyone’s ma. Yer only sixteen and I’m nobbut a couple of years older, fer God’s sake.’

‘Don’t you love me?’

‘Course I do. I’ll allus love thee, but how would we manage? I’ve hardly any money coming in, nor will have for some long while yet. Can’t we wait for a bit longer?’

‘How can we wait? The baby’s coming now.’

‘Nay, I can’t see how we’d manage. It’s too soon.’

She’d argued against this point of view, naturally, attempting to explain how much they would love the baby, once it was born, and carefully outlining her plans for their future. Far from reassuring him, his horror had increased, making all manner of excuses about why this couldn’t possibly work. He couldn’t live anywhere but Salford, he said. He only knew how to sell fruit and veg, not grow them, and he really wasn’t ready yet to start his own business, particularly in a strange place where he wasn’t known. Again and again he kept repeating that he still loved her but that it was too soon, the timing was all wrong, as if the baby were an unwanted gift that could be sent back.
 

And then one day he’d come to her triumphant.

‘There’s going to be a war, Daisy, so that settles it. I’ve volunteered to join the Navy. You’ll have to get rid of it, or do as yer mam says and have it adopted. Best thing all round I’d say. There’s plenty of time for us to start having babies, later, when the war’s over.’

Daisy was filled with fear. She knew nothing of this talk of war. She’d been far too caught up with being in love, and the youthful exuberance of simply enjoying herself to even care, let alone understand what was going on in the wider world. If she’d noticed any rumblings on the wireless, or overheard worried comments from her parents, Daisy had ignored them, imagining that such things didn’t concern her and certainly would not affect her life in any way. How wrong could she be? The war was taking her sweetheart away from her.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, there had been one almighty row when she’d happily told her parents the news. Her father, as always, had simply looked mournful and said little, leaving it to her mother to rant and rave, though that was after she’d almost fainted with shock and needed the application of Sal Volatile to recover.

Daisy was their only child and Rita Atkins had never really accepted that her daughter had grown up. She believed in keeping her safe at home and never allowing her to have many friends beyond those she met each Sunday at chapel. Percy had been kept a secret as Daisy feared he might be disapproved of, his family not being quite so low in the pecking order as themselves since they were market stall holders, for all they lived only a few doors down. Daisy recognised instinctively that although her mother might have an inflated notion of her own worth and take on airs, this was simply her way of hanging on to her pride, a way of proving she wasn’t quite in the gutter for all the lowly status of her husband’s job. As a humble rag-and-bone man, Joe Atkins owned nothing more than the horse and cart which he drove around the streets of Salford, handing out donkey stones for rubbing doorsteps in exchange for other folk’s cast-offs.

Rita told Daisy she’d never fit in with that stuck-up lot, and that she was far too young to wed. She scoffed when Daisy explained how she was in love, and that she’d intended to marry Percy anyway, insisting that at sixteen her silly daughter really no idea what love was all about. Rita was a strong willed woman, and, in her opinion, there was only one way to do things: her way. She made it abundantly clear that Daisy had let her down by such loose behaviour.

Discussions on what should be done about ‘the problem’ had gone on interminably and neither parent, it seemed, was prepared to listen to a word Daisy said, or cared a jot about what she wanted. It was made clear to her, in no uncertain terms, that she must give up her precious baby the moment it was born.

She’d cried for weeks in the Mother and Baby Home but no sympathy had been forthcoming. Her mother maintained she was fortunate to have family willing to help; that they’d chosen a good Christian place and not a home for wayward girls, which was most certainly what she deserved. Though how they’d managed to afford to pay for it, Daisy didn’t quite understand, since to her knowledge her parents had never had two halfpennies to rub together. Daisy endured countless sleepless nights agonising over the prospect of giving her baby away but whenever she tried to object, Rita would relate horrific tales of girls driven to having a back street abortion, or to taking their own lives rather than shame their families. She would listen to all of this with deepening dismay and no amount of argument would deflect her mother from her purpose.

Percy went off to join the navy, kissing her goodbye and promising to write every day. Since then she’d had only a couple of letters, telling her how busy he was and how exciting his new life was going to be; how he hoped she could sort out her ‘little problem.’
 

Little problem! Daisy felt deserted by everyone, as if there was no one at all to love her.

When the baby was born, a boy, who had slipped easily into the world and exercised his lungs almost instantly on a bellow of rage, Daisy cried with delight, not even noticing the pain. But within seconds, he was taken from her. The stern-faced sister who officiated at the birth wouldn’t even allow her to hold him.

‘He’s not your child, Daisy. He belongs to another woman now. Best you don’t even see him,’ and nor did she, not properly. She glimpsed a tuft of red-brown hair, just like Percy’s own, before he was swaddled in a blanket and whisked from the room. She could hear his cries fading in the distance as the nurse marched him away down the corridor. It felt as if they had ripped her heart from her body.

At first, she hadn’t even cried, quite unable to take in the full impact of what was happening to her. She’d sat up in the bed all day long in stunned disbelief, her ears tuned for the slightest cry she might recognise. Once, she sneaked out and prowled the corridors, hoping to snatch him up from the nursery and run off with him, but she’d been apprehended by a young nurse, duly scolded and marched back to bed.

It was then that the tears had come and once having started, Daisy had howled, fearing she might never stop.

The next day her mother lectured her on how she must put this mess behind her and forget all about it.

‘Forget all about it? How can I forget? He’s my baby. My child!’

‘No he’s not. He belongs to someone else now, like Sister said.’

‘Who?’

‘That’s none of your business. He’s being adopted. You’ve no say over the matter at all.’

‘But I haven’t even given him a name,’ Daisy wailed.

‘Nor must you. The very idea. It’s not your place. His new parents will do that. All you have to do is sign the paper and it’s all done and dusted.’