Roses of Winter (45 page)

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“Ah feel like daeing something different today,” Betty informed Harry.

Harry, who was having some difficulty adjusting to accommodating the wants of another person, wasn’t sure how to respond. “Whit did ye have in mind?” he asked.

Betty sighed but not so imperceptibly that Harry failed to notice. “Just for once ah wid like ye tae surprise me,” she told him. “Can ye no’ come up wi’ some ideas o’ yer own?”

 
“Aye, ah can that,” he said, annoyed. “Ah’m taking ye intae the toon tae see a show the night. And make sure ye dress up,” he added. “Ah might just take ye tae a swanky hotel for dinner. Just tae show ye ah can dae things in style!”

“Oh my,” Betty said, taken aback. This was far more than she had meant or expected. Thrilled by his announcement, she soon felt sorry for having placed Harry in such a position.
How could he possibly afford this?
“Are ye sure?” She asked. “Ah wouldnae mind if we just went tae the pictures.” But she had finally ignited a fire in him.

“Ah’m sure,” Harry insisted.
 
His insistence set Betty off in a flurry of activity.
What am ah going tae wear
, she thought.
And mah hair is such a sight. Maybe Pearl will help me wi’ it.
 

Since Pearl had arrived, she and Betty had become good friends. In many ways, Betty felt closer to Pearl than to her own sister. She was tired of the way Ellen’s behavior always made her the center of attention. Betty disapproved of the thoughtless, selfish manner that Ellen displayed to others. She was puzzled though by the change that had come over Ellen in the last weeks. When she had sought the reason for her sister’s withdrawn, gloomy state, partly out of sympathy, but mainly from curiosity, she had been rebuffed. Her mother too, had prevaricated when asked.
Well
, Betty thought, with a certain amount of satisfaction,
there’s something going on. It was about time things didn’t go entirely Ellen’s way.

Betty had left behind a Harry who was contemplating the consequences of his reaction to her challenge. He didn’t have to look in his wallet to know that the contents were inadequate to his promises. In fact, his lack of funds had been a large factor in his reluctance to bring up the subject of going out that night. He was still sitting at the kitchen table, wondering what the hell he was going to do, when Charlie entered. He looked at Harry a moment before putting his jacket and bunnet on a hook on the door. He took the paper out of his jacket pocket and came over to sit by the fire.

“Whit the hell’s the matter wi’ you?” he asked.

Harry shrugged but said nothing.

“Come on, oot wi’ it,” Charlie demanded. “Have you and Betty had a falling out?”

“Naw, it’s nothing like that,” Harry said.

“Well then, whit is it?”

Harry knew from long experience, that Charlie would not rest until he knew all the facts. “Ach, ah’ve got masel’ intae a bit o’ a pickle,” Harry said. “Betty wis telling me she wanted tae dae something different the night and how ah never come up wi’ any ideas o’ mah ain. Me and mah big mooth. Ah telt her ah was gaun tae take her tae a show and a swanky hotel for dinner.”

“Ah didnae know ye had that kind o’ money,” Charlie said, seeing the problem right away.

“Ah don’t,” Harry said.
 
"Ah wis trying tae figure oot how tae manage the pictures never mind this.”

Charlie laughed. “That daughter o’ mine should know better,” he said. He pulled out his billfold and took out a bank note. “Here, this should take care o’ it,” he told Harry.
 

“Ah cannae take your money,” Harry said.

“That’s fine,” Charlie said, “because ah’m no’ giving it tae ye. Ye can pay me back when ye get a chance.” He waved the note at Harry who reached out and took it.

“Aye, well, thanks,” Harry said. “Ye’ve saved my bacon right enough.”

“And there’s nae need tae mention this,” Charlie told him. “It’s just between us. And when ah get the chance, ah’m gaun tae try tae talk some sense into that daughter o’ mine.”

When Harry escorted Betty from the theater later that night, he had to concede that the outlay had been well worth it. They had started out with a splendid dinner and then gone on to see Tommy Morgan at the Pavilion. He liked the way Betty held him close on the way to the tramcar stop. Worth every penny, he thought again, even if he would be skint for the next few weeks while he saved money to pay Charlie back.
 

Betty stopped suddenly and dragged Harry into a nearby doorway.

“Whit is it?” he said.

“Isn’t that my sister waiting at the stop?” she asked him.

He moved out to see better and was instantly dragged back by Betty.

“Come back here!” she commanded him in a loud whisper. “Ah don’t want them tae see us.”

“Who’s she with and why are ye making such a fuss aboot it?” Harry asked.

Betty leaned out just as the man with Ellen turned his head into the illumination of a streetlight. “So that’s it!” Betty said. “Ah might have known she would have been sneaking around wi’ some other man. But it’s no’ just any other man, is it?”

Harry looked puzzled. “Whit are ye talking about?”

“Mah sister is oot wi’ an old boyfriend while her fiancé is a prisoner in a German camp. Ah knew she could be rotten but ah didnae think she wid ever dae that.”

“Ach, ye shouldnae jump tae any conclusions,” Harry told her. “Ah would at least give her the benefit of the doubt. You’re no’ gaun tae say anything tae her, are you? It would only cause trouble. You know whit like she can be.”
 

Indeed Betty did know. She had to concede that Harry was right and reassured him by telling him so. Harry looked relieved. He didn’t want the added complication of a feud between the sisters. But, although Betty’s anger cooled, it did not entirely subside. Small embers of resentment against Ellen remained, needing only a good breath of air to set them going again.

They watched Ellen and Robbie leave and walked to the stop to wait for the next tram. Betty spent most of the journey home staring out the window in silence. Alighting from the tram, they walked to her close where Harry lingered, uncertain how to end his evening with her.
 

The ill concealed look of hurt on Harry’s face changed Betty’s mood instantly to one of sympathy. She drew close to him and with neither prompting the other, they moved into a more secluded part of the close.

“Ah’m sorry, Harry. Ah shouldnae let her spoil the night.” She surprised him by kissing him on the lips with an urgency that was new and thrilling. “It was a wonderful evening,” Betty said, breathless from the excitement of the kiss and his passionate response. She gave him an emphatic last kiss on the cheek and ran up the stairs flushed with excitement from the intensity of their embrace.

Betty felt the thrill of fear that came suddenly in the welcome, ambivalent way of a carnival ride. She felt scared and exhilarated and pleased to find more in Harry than she had dared to imagine.

Betty heard voices in the kitchen that stopped as she entered. She felt her good mood evaporate into the awkward silence her entrance had generated. Ellen and Mary looked at her in the manner of people caught in the act of some deed they wished to remain unknown.

Mary had seen the change in Betty’s expression and wondered about its severity. She also noted the flush of arousal that remained on her daughter’s face and felt a twinge of regret to be losing the child to the grown up woman.
 
Yet Mary had no wish to keep her daughters immature and dependent. It was her knowledge of the hardness, the complications of a woman’s life that clouded her happiness for Betty. Mary was consoled by the thought that Betty seemed so much more capable than Ellen of coping with that life.
 

“Did you have a nice time the night Betty?” Mary asked.

“Aye it was fine, Ma,” Betty said in a manner Mary was more accustomed to hearing from Ellen.

Mary forced herself to pay no attention to Betty’s attitude, despite her burning curiosity. She hoped that it had nothing to do with Harry. Mary was wise enough to know that whatever it was, Betty would say nothing in front of Ellen. A thought came to her.
Perhaps it had something to do with Ellen. Did Betty know something?
Mary made a mental note to get a few moments alone with Betty as soon as she could. Her daughter was heading towards the door.

“Ah’ll tell you all about it in the morning, Ma. Ah’m awfy tired and ah’m away tae ma bed.”

It’s going tae be a frosty night and morning for those two in the same room
, Mary thought. She felt the throbbing ache at the temple that was the advance warning of another splitting headache. We have tae put an end tae this, she thought. We cannae let this nonsense go on.

Throughout the following day and several more, an uneasy and far from real peace prevailed. Mary, sensitive to the moods of her family, dreaded the inevitable storm she knew must follow. She found some comfort in the neutral ground of Ida’s kitchen where her friend provided sympathy along with her home baked scones.

“Ah’m at mah wit’s end wi’ Ellen.” Mary told her. “When she met Jim ah thought that was the end of her carrying on. She’ll settle down now, ah thought. But now she’s got hersel’ intae a real fankle and ah don’t see any way oot o’ it that won’t end up in trouble and upset. An’ now ah’ve got Betty wi’ a bee in her bonnet as well.”
 

“Whit’s up wi’ Betty?” Ida asked. “Ah thought she was glowing the last time ah saw her.”

“Ah don’t know, Ida, but ah think it has something tae do wi’ Ellen. Ah havnae had a chance to get Betty on her own tae ask her. Ah think she’s been avoiding talking tae me about it. All ah know is that when she came in that night, the minute she saw her sister, she had a face on her like thunder and they’ve hardly said a word tae each other since. It’s bad enough wi’ Ellen, ah don’t need the two o’ them having a tantrum.”

Ida shook her head sympathetically. “And they say daughters are less trouble than sons,” she said.

“Aye, well, those people should have a dose o’ mine for a while,” Mary said. “They’d soon change their minds.” She lingered in Ida’s kitchen longer into the afternoon than she had intended, happy for the brief respite from her troubles.
 

The minute she opened her front door, Mary was assailed by the sounds of a commotion in the kitchen. Ellen’s shrill angry voice cut through the kitchen door.

“It’s none o’ your damn business,” she yelled.

Mary guessed that the recipient was Betty. There came the sound of a loud crash from the kitchen door. Mary hurried to open it but stopped to hold it as a shield when more crockery crashed against it. She let out a scream of anger that brought instant silence in the kitchen. She stormed through the door.

“What the hell do you think you are doing?”

Mary looked at Ellen and then at Betty who was red faced and weeping, at least in part from rage. Mary stared at her ravaged hair and the long scratch on her face that was oozing droplets of blood. She turned to Ellen.

“Did you do that?” she demanded. Ellen scowled at her but said nothing. Mary lost her temper. Covering the few paces to Ellen so fast that it caught her daughter completely by surprise, Mary delivered several ringing slaps to her face. Years of frustration with Ellen boiled to the surface. Ellen did not fight back.
 

Mary came back to herself when she felt Betty’s hand on her shoulder.

“Ma, Ma, please stop. You’re hurting her.”

Although the victim of recent violence at Ellen’s hands, Betty had watched this family battle unfold in horror. By nature quiet and gentle, she was ill equipped to defend herself and quick to realize the emotional damage that they were inflicting on each other. The three women stood in silence for several long moments in that state of emotional exhaustion and shame that follows violent confrontations. Mary felt sick at heart, a feeling that expressed itself in a deep queasy unrest in her stomach. She sat by the fire and fell into a broody silence that unnerved her daughters more than her recent anger.

“Ma, ah’m sorry,” Ellen said, her tone tentative, pleading.

“And so you should be,” Mary said, turning to look at her. ”Ah never thought ah would ever see such a scene in my house. To have my daughters fighting like common trollops. And look at yer sister’s face. Ah hope you’re ashamed o’ yersel’.”

Ellen collapsed on the floor beside her mother’s chair and began to weep. But Mary was not to be mollified so easily by tears.

“What in God’s name could have started such a disgraceful display,” she demanded.
 

“Robbie told me he disnae want anything more tae dae wi’ me,” Ellen said. “He says his sister in Campbelltown got a letter telling her about Jim.”

Mary looked at her. “Did he say who the letter was from?”

“No, it wisnae signed but it had a Glasgow postmark.”

“And you thought your sister wrote the letter?” Mary said. “Surely ye can’t believe that.”

Ellen made a disbelieving sound. “The other night she told me she saw me out with Robbie and how she thinks it’s not right for me to be seeing him while Jim’s in a German camp. Then suddenly a letter shows up in Campbelltown? Who else could it be?” Ellen demanded.