Liverpool Miss (14 page)

The bath was a huge, Victorian tub, left over from the time when the house had been a private home. I turned on its great brass taps and let the water thunder in until it was quite deep. There was a large, used tablet of soap in a wire basket stretched across the bath. Quickly I stripped off and stepped in.

This was the first bath I had had for four years and the water rippling across my stomach felt odd. I looked down at long, slender legs wavering beneath the water, at a stomach which stuck out too much
like that of a hungry child, at surprisingly prominent young breasts, at arms so thin they looked like sticks. The skin was a dull yellow, almost bronze in places. I had not looked at myself properly since I was a child, in that long ago world which we had left so precipitously. As I soaked in the hot water, I remembered how Father had told his biggest creditor to sell up his house and its contents, and how he had walked out of it, allowing us to take nothing with us, except the clothing we were wearing and a blanket to cover his sick wife and newest child. He knew nothing of his rights to clothes and bedding, to the minima of existence. With this one quixotic gesture, he had deprived the family of all that even the most hopeless debtor was legally entitled to. His last money had been spent on train tickets to Liverpool, his home city, which did not want him.

I kneeled up in the water, dipped my head in and then soaped it thoroughly. Three times the brown locks were soaped and rinsed. Then the thin body was soaped until it looked like a snowman. The water was covered with grey soap suds.

Like a dripping muskrat, I climbed out, emptied the bath and began to refill it.

The door burst open and a young, male member of the staff rushed in, pulling off his apron as he
came. He was well into the huge bathroom, before he realised that I was standing there naked, one hand on the brass tap.

He stopped, his startled face registering shock. Then he blushed hotly.

‘I say, I am sorry!’ he exclaimed, and turned and fled.

I was so used to being intruded upon by my brothers in a house where all washing had to be done in the kitchen that I was undisturbed. But I did for a moment wonder why he should be so flabbergasted. A girl in her skin was nothing special as far as I could see.

I repeated the scrubbing and, when I finally emerged from the bathroom, hair wrapped in a towel like a turban, I was scarlet from head to heel.

I drew back the net curtains and sat down by the window to dry my hair in the breeze. Such quietness enfolded me as I had not known before. Leisurely I combed the wet hair over my shoulders, and watched the sun glancing on the sea. I could smell the salt and, closer to hand, the pine trees in the garden. For the first time for years I had nothing to do. It was as if every nerve slowly loosened and relaxed. Three nights of deep, warm sleep and two days of stacks of food had helped to heal both mind and body.

I sat on the hard bedroom chair for a long time, the two rows of carelessly made beds behind me, the fine view framed by the window in front of me. My mind was empty. There was no past, no nagging family, nothing. No future, except the happy anticipation of welcoming Emrys Hughes and the other kindly guests when they returned, and then eating and eating and eating.

A train arriving at the nearby station roused me. I got up and went to the spotty mirror to arrange my hair in a bun again.

I peered short-sightedly at the image in the mirror and was surprised at what I saw. The hair, usually so straight because of its greasy coating, now waved softly down each side of the thin cheeks; its mousy brown carrying in it a rich red burnish. Surprised, I coaxed it into deeper waves.

From under smooth black brows, large green eyes, no longer bloodshot, stared sadly back at me. A few lumpy spots marred a complexion which was surprisingly white. I smiled cautiously at myself. The teeth were not straight and were tinged with yellow. I had scrubbed them well but I had no toothpaste. With newly awakened vanity, I decided I had a nice smile. I wondered if make-up would cover the spots, and then sighed because there was no money for such luxuries. Telling myself to stop
playing Narcissus, I put my hair up, taking care, however, not to draw it back too tightly and spoil the waves.

Lunch was not served in the holiday home to guests, so I went without. It was probably as well, as it gave an over-taxed digestive system time to recuperate. I spent the rest of the day washing my spare blouse and panties and ironing them dry with an iron borrowed from the kitchen. Then I went for a long walk.

The lanes had all the bright greenery of June, but last year’s leaves lay sodden at the bottom of puddles formed by overnight rain. They reminded me of winter.

I dreaded the winter. Another year of cold, sopping wet feet, of piercing wind, of long stone staircases to be climbed, of shivering in a freezing bed. Another winter, too, of incredible loneliness.

Fiona is growing up, I comforted myself. She will be company. Yet instinct told me that Fiona would never really communicate with me; she was too crushed, too determined never to be caught out of character, as a passive, pliable, inoffensive, obliging person, guaranteed not to answer back. The steel which I felt lay deep within her would be used for her own self-defence. She would crouch behind it, hiding any real feeling lest someone take offence.
Just as I had been cast as a maiden aunt, she had been cast by my parents as a lovely girl who would make a good marriage which would help to raise the family again to its former stature. And yet, sometimes, I thought that Fiona might surprise my parents more than I ever could. As with the rest of the children, I could give Fiona love, but she was incapable of giving me friendship.

After my walk I tidied my windblown hair and then went down to the lounge. There was a number of women’s magazines in a magazine rack and I curled up on a settee with these in excited anticipation.

Except for
Peg’s Paper
which Edith had allowed me to read when I was small, I had not seen any women’s magazines, and I soon was engrossed in enthralling stories in which the heroine was always blonde and invariably won the hero over the machinations of a dark sultry villainess. The kisses were passionate.

The bus disgorging a noisy crowd of returning guests put an end to my quiet day. I reluctantly uncurled myself from the settee and put down the magazine I had been reading. Emrys came puffing into the lounge, grey raincoat flying behind him, pipe aglow like a watchman’s stove. He was followed more slowly by his brother, Gwyn.

‘Why didn’t you come?’ he asked. ‘We missed you, didn’t we Gwyn?’

Gwyn smiled kindly down at me. ‘Yes, we did,’ he assured me.

I went pink with embarrassment, and said, ‘I thought I’d have a quiet day. Did you enjoy the trip?’

‘I’d have enjoyed it a lot more if you had been there,’ Emrys replied roundly, and playfully pinched my cheek.

Now I was blushing at the compliment. He evidently saw it, as he struggled out of his coat, and laughed.

‘Well, I’ve made sure you come on the other trips. Gwyn and I have bought tickets for all of ’em for you. Now you
have
to come.’ He gusted with laughter, and Gwyn chuckled and said, ‘Well, we hope you will.’

‘That’s immensely kind of you both,’ I told them, laughing myself, because I could not help it.

While Gwyn helped Margaret off with her coat, Emrys stood in front of me, sturdy legs apart, while he struck matches to relight his pipe. He had told me that he was not supposed to smoke, but he could not give it up. As he gossiped about the lakes they had seen, I wondered what he would think if he saw my poverty-stricken home. Both brothers were obviously prosperous; both had gone to the prayer meeting held in the lounge each evening and both had joined earnestly in the prayers that were offered; kindness and thoughtfulness in small things were obvious in every move they made. They were very different from anybody I had ever met before. I could well imagine them behind their drapery shop counters, cheerfully and patiently dispensing everything from two pennyworth of buttons to forty yards of damask for curtains.

As the fortnight progressed, my friendship with Emrys deepened. I began to feel a real affection for the man, but such was my innocence that I never considered what he might be feeling. He was so much older than me.

Once, when he held my hand during a bus trip, some of the ladies saw it. They teased me and said I had made a conquest. This embarrassed me, because I felt that anybody could see I was incapable of conquering any man; I was too plain.

He never overstepped the bounds of propriety, however, and I never felt frightened with him. A couple of days before the holiday was due to end, he wrote out his home address for me, and said he hoped I would come to see him.

‘My wife died three years ago,’ he said simply. ‘Gwyn and I keep house together in a flat over one of the shops. But my sister lives nearby, and you could stay with her.’

I doubted in my mind that I would ever manage to travel as far as North Wales, but the idea gave me much pleasure, and I said with genuine enthusiasm, ‘I would love that.’

He looked at me very soberly for a moment, and then said, ‘Would you?’

I nodded.

He grinned at me. ‘Then we’ll arrange it.’

On the last day of the holiday, we all went to see Cartmel Priory, and were ambling round the old church, behind our guide, when Emrys stopped suddenly and began to gasp for breath. He clutched his chest and turned and stumbled into a pew to sit down. The rest of the party had moved on ahead a little.

I leaned over the side of the pew and put my arm round his shoulder. ‘What is it, Emrys?’ But I knew what it was. I had seen it happen to Father when he was a young man. ‘I’ll get Gwyn. Just keep sitting.’

I ran over to Gwyn, and whispered to him. He spun round, at the same time taking a small bottle out of his jacket pocket. He fumbled in his top pocket as he ran back and produced a worn, tin spoon.

He pushed into the pew, and asked me to support Emrys’s head, while he poured out a colourless liquid and forced it into the gasping man’s mouth. Some dribbled down Emrys’s chin, but most went in. Then, after he had put the cork back into the bottle, he stuck it down on a pew shelf, while he rolled up his raincoat and made a pillow.

We laid Emrys along the pew seat, while the other guests, suddenly aware that something was wrong, came thronging anxiously over to us.

Slowly, Emrys’s face lost some of its agony, the breathing became more normal. I crouched in the narrow space beside him and chafed his hands anxiously. Someone lent a coat to put over him. The verger was asked to telephone the guest house and arrange for a doctor to be called.

Emrys’s eyes had been tight closed, but as he relaxed he opened them and looked at me. ‘Helen.’

As soon as he felt he could bear to be moved, two men in the party made a seat with crossed hands and carried him into the bus and laid him down on the back seat. Gwyn cradled his head, and I knelt by him and held him, so that he did not fall off. He lay quietly.

The bus driver manoeuvred the bus very carefully over the narrow lanes, and as soon as we reached the guest house, two of the staff came running out with a wooden chair with arms. Emrys was lifted from the bus into the chair, despite mild protests that he thought he could walk. He was not a heavy man and the two young men made short work of carrying him up the stairs and into his room. He was closely followed by a doctor carrying a black bag and by his anxious brother. I stood forlornly at the bottom of the stairs, and then reluctantly went to my room to wash before dinner.

Everybody in the dining room seemed to be talking about the fatal heart attacks they had witnessed, and I was very cast down, though Margaret did her best to cheer me up.

Gwyn did not come down to the meal, so when we had finished Margaret and I went into the hall and, after a moment’s uncertainty on Margaret’s part, went to the office to inquire if they had news.

We were told that while we were at dinner an ambulance had come and Mr Hughes and his brother had gone to a hospital in a nearby town. Margaret and I looked at each other, and then in silent consent went to the prayer meeting.

I did not sleep much. I was filled with a strange emotion such as I had not experienced before, a fear of the loss of a loved one.

The next morning, before breakfast, I plucked up enough courage to go myself to the office to inquire if they had news of Emrys. They had not, but the manager allowed me to use the telephone to inquire from the hospital how he was.

Mr Hughes was resting comfortably, I was told primly. He was not yet allowed visitors.

At breakfast I passed this information to Margaret. Despite my depression, I ate a huge breakfast and while still at table, said good-bye to Margaret, because she had to leave immediately in order to
catch her train home. I went up to the bedroom and silently put my few belongings back into their paper bag, while the turmoil of the packing being done by the five mill girls went on around me. There was a strong smell of dirty washing and violet perfume, and I was glad to escape.

I said good-bye to the staff and to several other guests, and caught the train back to Liverpool and to reality.

The family were quite pleased to see me back and asked many questions, which I answered frankly. I told Mother about the Hughes brothers, and she made a little grimace with her mouth, and asked, ‘They didn’t touch you, did they?’

‘Emrys held my hand,’ I said.

She laughed in a deprecating way, and I was unaccountably incensed.

‘They were very good to me,’ I said defensively, and retreated to wash the dishes before I was provoked into saying more.

Such an excellent holiday gave me a lot more strength, and I formed the ambition of learning to type. The evening schools did not give courses in typing; my shorthand speed was rapidly increasing,
but without a concomitant skill in typing, it was not much use to me.

I went to see Miriam in the attic. She very willingly allowed me to use her typewriter in the lunch hours and showed me how to manipulate the machine. She saved wastepaper so that I could use the back of it for practising. The three typists crammed into the little room took turns in instructing me how to set out letters, agendas and minutes. The head typist also showed me how to use the big Gestetner duplicating machine with its huge tubes of very black, very sticky ink.

Emrys was constantly in my mind and I daily hoped for a letter to say he was well again. But there was none. I told myself that I was such a small, unimportant person that perhaps I had been only someone to amuse him while he recuperated from his earlier heart attack. But I would see him again in my mind’s eye, teasing, talking, laughing with me, and thus reassure myself that we had been really good companions and a true friendship had been formed.

At the end of the month, I plucked up courage, took a piece of copy paper from Miriam’s store and, one lunch hour, wrote to the address he had given me, to inquire how he was.

Again, I began to watch for a letter, but still
there was nothing. My new-found strength began to fade under the constant pressure of work at home, work at the office, work at night school, and the everlasting hunger. I fell into a quiet depression and found it hard to concentrate on my studies.

One hot sultry August day, when I arrived home to find the family, as usual, just finishing their evening meal, I was greeted by Mother with the information that my friend had died. She said it not unkindly, as she tossed an open letter across the table to me.

I slowly turned back into the hall and hung up my hat and coat. I did not want to touch the letter; I did not want to have the shocking news confirmed. I stood panting in the hall trying not to cry. People did not die; they got better from heart attacks, didn’t they?

Mother was saying, ‘Have a look at your letter.’

Reluctantly I picked it up. First I looked at the signature. Gwyn Hughes.

It began, ‘Dear little Helen’ and for a second I was tripping along beside a rushing river, and Emrys was saying, ‘Be careful, little Helen. Don’t fall in.’

Gwyn apologised for not writing to me earlier, but he had had so much to do that it was only now that he was able to attend to his personal correspondence.

Emrys had recovered sufficiently from his heart attack for the hospital doctor to say that he could make the journey back to Wales in a private car, if they broke the journey frequently enough for him to rest. At the moment of leaving the hospital, he had been stricken by another massive attack which had taken his life. His body had been taken home and had been buried beside those of his wife and his son, who had died when he was twelve.

Gwyn was sorry to have to send me such bad news. My companionship had been a great pleasure to both of them, and Emrys had been determined not to let the friendship lapse. He was going to write to me as soon as he returned to Wales.

With quivering hands, I put the letter back in the envelope. I was too shaken to complain about the letter’s being opened. All I wanted to do was to go to bed and rest, shut myself out of life for a while.

Brian and Tony, those great companions, were staring at me uneasily. Probably death frightened them, too.

I smiled wryly at them. ‘He was quite old,’ I reassured them. ‘It was natural.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Father. ‘They sound like very nice people. Very kind.’

I put the letter in my handbag. ‘I will write to thank him,’ I said.

‘You should,’ said Mother. ‘Come and have your tea, dear.’

Fiona silently gave up her chair to me, and Alan passed over the bread and margarine. Mother brought me a small plate of lettuce and cold meat. For the first time that I could remember, I was aware of an aura of kindly sympathy throughout the family. Very slowly, in a dazed way I began to eat.