Nightingales on Call (14 page)

Effie glanced towards the sitting room. Laughter rang out from inside. ‘Want to bet?’ she said sadly.

The image of Effie O’Hara’s forlorn face stayed with Jess on the bus ride to Whitechapel.

Poor girl, she seemed so lonely. It was a shame, thought Jess, because Effie was so sweet. She reminded her of an over-enthusiastic puppy, bounding up to everyone, wanting to play and constantly being brushed off.

Jess got off the bus and walked down Commercial Street to the Toynbee Hall Institute. It was an extravagant red-brick building, its gabled roofs and mullioned windows a grand contrast to the dreary shops and warehouses surrounding it. The hall had been built by Victorian philanthropists to offer ordinary people the chance to improve themselves. And every week for the past two years Jess had been taking herself off for night classes to do just that. She was only weeks away from the final credits she needed to achieve her School Certificate.

It hadn’t been easy, keeping her studies secret from her stepmother. She knew Gladys would try to stand in her way if she could. All the Jagos were suspicious of learning. Neither Jess’ father nor any of her uncles had ever bothered with school, and her cousins all hopped the wag more often than not.

But with Gladys it went much deeper. She was jealous of anything that reminded her of Jess’ mother. The day after she moved in, she had sold all Sarah Jago’s clothes and belongings to the rag and bone man, and anything she couldn’t sell she’d burned in a bonfire in the yard while Jess sat sobbing on the doorstep.

Gladys could have sold her mother’s books too, but she threw them on the fire, instead. Jess could still remember her stepmother’s expression, twisted with spite, illuminated in the flickering light from the flames.

‘Sarah ain’t going to be needing books where she’s gone,’ she had said.

Between Gladys’ malice and Cyril’s thieving hands, Jess had had to keep her schoolbooks and her studies secret. But not any more. Now she was living at the nurses’ home, she could read and study as much as she pleased. She had even started coming to the Institute for extra classes, just because she could.

The class finished, and Jess followed her classmates into the main hall. The other rooms were turning out, and the hall was filled with people pushing their way towards the doors.

Jess paused beside them to look at the noticeboard. Sometimes important people came to the Institute to speak, and she didn’t like to miss anything.

‘See anything you fancy?’

She looked round, and was surprised to see Sam the bookseller’s son, grinning at her. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Same as you, I expect.’ He pointed to the book wedged under his arm.

‘You’re taking night classes?’

‘Don’t look so shocked!’ He grinned. ‘I don’t want to work on my dad’s stall all my life, ta very much!’ He patted the book. ‘With any luck, this time next year I’m going to be an engineer. How about you?’

‘School Cert.’ She stared at him defiantly, waiting for him to make some offhand comment. But he didn’t.

‘Good for you,’ he said. ‘I’m surprised we haven’t run into each other before.’

‘I’ve only just started coming on a Wednesday.’

They stood there, jostled by the surging throng. ‘I don’t suppose you fancy a cup of tea?’ Sam asked.

Jess eyed the clock at the far end of the hall. ‘I ought to be getting back.’

Sam looked as if he might try to persuade her, but at that moment someone called out his name. Jess looked over his shoulder towards the gaggle of young men standing on the other side of the hall. ‘Shouldn’t you be with your mates?’

‘I’d rather be with you.’

‘I told you, I have to get back.’

One of the young men called out again. Sam glanced over at him, then back at Jess. ‘Some other time then? Next week? After the class?’

Jess smiled. ‘If I say yes, will you stop asking me?’

‘It’s a deal.’

‘Then I s’pose I’ll see you next week, won’t I?’

THE FIRST THING
Dora saw when she walked through the back door of number twenty-eight Griffin Street was her grandmother Winnie with her ear pressed against a glass at the wall.

‘All right, Nanna?’ she grinned.

‘Shhh! I think June Riley’s got a new bloke next door, but I can’t make out who it is.’

Dora took off her cardigan and hung it on the back of a kitchen chair. ‘You know what they say about eavesdroppers, don’t you?’ she said. ‘They don’t hear any good of themselves.’

‘I can’t hear anything, good or not.’ Nanna polished the glass with her sleeve. ‘This thing’s no bleeding good. I reckon your mum must have got it cheap off the market.’

Dora pressed her lips together to stop herself smiling. ‘Or maybe your hearing’s going, Nanna?’

‘There ain’t nothing wrong with my ears, young lady.’ Nanna Winnie glared at her. ‘To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit, anyway?’

‘It’s my afternoon off.’

‘I wonder you don’t want to spend it with that bloke of yours.’

Winnie’s toothless mouth was a thin line of disapproval, and Dora knew why. She had given up trying to explain the situation with Nick to her grandmother. Winnie might not have any time for that hussy Ruby Pike, as she called her, but as far as she was concerned Nick was still the girl’s husband and Dora shouldn’t be having anything to do with him.

‘Where’s Mum?’ Dora changed the subject.

‘In the scullery.’ Nanna nodded towards the thin curtain that separated the kitchen from the tiny annexe.

Dora left her grandmother pressing her ear against the wall again and pushed through the curtain into the scullery. Her mother was standing at the stove, stirring a bubbling pot.

‘Got enough for an extra one?’ Dora asked.

Rose Doyle turned to face her, a smile lighting up her tired face. In her early forties she was still beautiful, although the past few years had left more threads of grey in her dark hair and lines around her brown eyes.

‘Dora, love!’ Rose reached for a tea towel to wipe her hands. ‘Of course there’s enough for you. You know I always cook enough to feed an army!’ She smiled at her daughter. ‘This is a lovely surprise, I must say.’

‘I dunno if Nanna was too pleased to see me.’ Dora grimaced.

‘Take no notice of her,’ Rose said. ‘Her arthritis is playing her up again, I expect.’

‘I think she’s still got the hump about me and Nick.’

‘Well, it’s none of her business.’

Dora watched her mother as she turned back to the stove. Nanna might have had plenty to say when she found out about Dora and Nick, but Rose had kept quiet on the subject.

Her silence worried Dora. The Doyles had to live next door to Ruby’s family, and even though Ruby was the one who had lied and cheated, Dora knew Lettie Pike would take it out on Rose that her daughter was now courting Nick. Dora hated the thought of her mother suffering any shame because of her.

Rose Doyle had already been through enough in her life. Dora’s father had died when she was eight years old, leaving Rose to bring up five children on her own. She had remarried, but Alf Doyle had abandoned her, leaving her alone and penniless yet again, this time with a baby son to feed too.

‘You know it wasn’t my fault their marriage broke up, don’t you?’ said Dora.

‘I know that, love.’ Rose went back to stirring the contents of the pot.

‘And it’s not as if Nick and I are doing anything wrong. We ain’t even properly courting,’ Dora went on, addressing her mother’s turned back. ‘We daren’t, not until this divorce business is all sorted out . . .’

Her mother put down her spoon. ‘Why are you telling me this?’

‘Because I want you to understand,’ Dora pleaded. ‘I’m sick and tired of people thinking I’m some kind of tart who goes after married men.’

‘Who’d ever think something like that?’

‘Lettie Pike. And Nanna thinks so, too. I can tell.’

‘Well, I don’t,’ Rose said firmly. ‘You listen to me, Dora Doyle. I know you’re a good girl, and so does your nanna. She’s only upset because she wants you to be happy with a nice young man, same as I do.’

‘I am happy,’ Dora said. ‘I just wish I could tell everyone, that’s all. But I can’t talk about Nick. I can’t even hold his hand or say his name out loud . . .’ She stopped abruptly, knowing she was about to cry. The Doyle women never shed tears if they could help it.

‘I know, love. But you will one day.’ Rose patted her arm. ‘You’ve just got to be patient, that’s all. Things will come right in the end, you’ll see.’

‘I hope you’re right.’ Dora sent her a rueful look. ‘So you don’t think I’m a disgrace, then?’

‘You could never disgrace this family, my girl. Not in a thousand years.’

‘That’s not what Lettie Pike thinks.’

‘Lettie Pike knows better than to speak her mind in front of me.’

Dora noticed her mother’s white-knuckled hand gripping the spoon. Rose was a woman of great dignity and forbearance, but she turned into a tigress when it came to anyone mistreating her children.

Dora helped her with the cooking, boiling and draining potatoes for the shepherd’s pie Rose was making. They chatted as they worked together, and her mother was full of news about the rest of the family. Especially Lily, Dora’s sister-in-law, who was due to give birth in the autumn.

‘You should see her, she’s blooming.’ Rose beamed. ‘It will be so lovely to have a baby in the house again, especially now Little Alfie’s not so little any more.’

‘I can’t believe he’s nearly six.’ Dora shook her head as she rifled in the drawer for a fork to mash the potatoes with.

‘Nor can I, love. It doesn’t seem five minutes since he was a baby in my arms, and now he’s off to school. Doing well, too. You should see how he reads.’ She sighed. ‘I only wish his dad—’

Dora glanced over her shoulder. Rose was staring out of the window, deep in thought. Her mother barely mentioned Alf Doyle’s name these days. Dora hadn’t been sorry to see her stepfather leave after the abuse she and her sister Josie had suffered at his hands. Her mother hadn’t been sorry either, after finding out that Alf had betrayed her with another woman – and a young girl at that. But Dora wondered if her mother missed having a man in her life.

‘It sounds as if he’s going to take after our Josie,’ said Dora, to distract her mother. ‘She’s the clever one of the family.’

‘As long as he doesn’t take after his sister Bea, that’ll be a blessing.’

Dora stopped mashing and looked up at her mother. ‘Why? What’s she been up to?’

As Rose opened her mouth to speak, the back gate crashed open and the yard was filled with the raucous sounds of girls’ voices.

‘Talk of the devil!’ Rose rolled her eyes. ‘I s’pose we’d better see what trouble she’s in now.’

Josie and Bea fell through the back door, fighting like cats. Little Alfie, who was with his sisters, immediately ran to his nanna and buried his face in her skirt.

‘You can’t tell me what to do!’ Bea screamed, grabbing a handful of Josie’s dark hair.

‘Yes, I can. I’m the eldest.’

‘
I’m
the eldest,’ Dora said, planting herself between them. The girls stopped fighting and turned to her.

Bea pushed her dishevelled red curls off her face. ‘You can’t tell me what to do either,’ she said truculently. ‘You don’t even live here any more.’

‘Never mind all that. What’s going on?’ Rose said. Bea and Josie shot poisonous looks at each other, but neither of them spoke. ‘Come on.’ Rose folded her arms. ‘No one’s going to get any tea in this house until this is sorted out, so you might as well speak up.’

‘She’s been hopping the wag from school,’ Josie spoke up first.

‘And you couldn’t wait to tell on me, could you? Goody two shoes!’

Rose turned to Bea. ‘Is this true? Why ain’t you been to school?’

‘I was ill.’

Dora looked at her sister, so defiant and full of herself. They looked alike, with their ginger curls and broad, freckled faces. But Bea was far more brazen than Dora had been at fourteen.

‘Not too ill to run around the streets with your mates all day, I’ll be bound,’ Nanna muttered. ‘Go on, what have you been up to?’

‘I ain’t saying,’ Bea muttered sullenly.

‘Well, if you don’t want to go to school, you can always leave and go to work in the glue factory for ten hours a day, like I had to,’ Nanna said. ‘Then you’d know where you were well off!’

‘I wouldn’t mind going out to work,’ Bea shot back. ‘Then I could please myself what I did.’

‘You please yourself anyway!’ Josie said.

‘Shut up, you!’ And then they were fighting again, and it took all Dora’s strength to pull them apart.

The atmosphere was tense around the tea table, with Bea and Josie sniping at each other.

‘I dunno what’s got into Bea,’ Rose said, as Dora got ready to leave after tea. ‘She’s always been a handful, but she’s such a madam these days. And secretive, too.’

‘That’s definitely not like our Bea!’ Dora laughed. Her sister was well known for spilling secrets the second she heard them. ‘Do you want me to have a word with her?’

Rose shook her head. ‘Don’t worry yourself about it, love. I expect she’ll grow out of it soon enough.’

As Dora let herself out of the back gate she came face to face with Ruby, picking her way up the cobbled alley towards her.

They both froze for a second, eyeing each other like cats, poised for a fight. Then Ruby smiled.

‘Hello, stranger. Fancy seeing you here.’

‘I was visiting my mum.’ Dora’s voice felt tight. It was so strange to think she and Ruby had once been so close. Now Dora could barely think of anything to say to her. ‘Have you just finished work?’

‘Yes, thank God. I’m back at Gold’s Garments. The old man gave me my job back, would you believe?’ Ruby adjusted the rakish angle of her feathered hat. As always, she looked like a fashion model, her crimson dress clinging to every curve of her body. ‘I’m going home to change, then my Eric’s taking me out dancing up west. I told him, I’m just as happy going to the Palais, but he wants to show me off.’ She smiled at Dora. ‘How are you and Nick getting on?’

Dora stiffened. ‘I dunno what you mean.’

‘Come off it, Dor! I know you two are courting. Look at you, you blush every time his name’s mentioned. And why else would Nick be round here, bothering me for a divorce?’ Ruby laughed. ‘Don’t worry, girl, I ain’t going to tell anyone. Your secret’s safe with me. I owe you that, I suppose.’