Secrets My Mother Kept (9 page)

‘All right madam, try to keep calm now,’ the police officer said soothingly, ‘then perhaps we can try to help you.’

‘I went to phone my sister,’ she told him, ‘and must have mistakenly left my purse in the phone box, then when I went back,’ here she burst into fresh tears, ‘when I went back it had gone!’

The police officer lent forward and gave her a fresh hanky.

‘There, there madam,’ he said. ‘Just leave it with us and we’ll see what we can do.’

He wrote down the details and promised Mum that they would do their best to find the culprit, but Mum could not be consoled.

‘You don’t understand,’ she whispered through her tears. ‘That was all the money I had for the children’s food. What am I going to do now?’

I don’t know quite what happened next, but Mum was eventually handed an envelope, and she thanked the police officer profusely, and cheered up considerably as we walked all the way back home.

‘You see,’ she told us, ‘the police are so kind, they always help you when you’re in trouble.’

There were also times when she went to the phone box on her own. Once when she returned, her mood was black and bleak. She had that same look in her eyes again, the one that made her look like a different person, the look that took her away from us. Josie had got in from work and gone straight up to bed. She often did this; in fact she spent long periods of time in her room, listening to music on her little radio and writing stuff down in little notebooks. Pat was sitting in front of the television and Marge and Marion were trying to do their homework on the stairs before they were asked to help out. Mary had gone round to her friend Helen’s house straight from school and Margaret and I were playing out in the garden. It was the beginning of the autumn and was starting to get dark and a bit chilly. Mum blew in through the front door and we heard her shouting at the twins: ‘Where’s Mary?’

‘She’s gone round to Helen’s,’ one of them answered.

‘What on earth for? I need her here – Marion go round and get her now.’

‘I can’t Mum I’ve got to finish this homework for tomorrow.’

Mum stomped through to the back door. ‘You two inside now,’ she said roughly. We looked at each other; we weren’t ready to stop playing so we just carried on. ‘I said now!’ she shouted. This was unusual; Mum rarely shouted at us and never with so little cause.

‘Marion, Marge get down here,’ she repeated, ‘I want Mary home now.’ The twins descended the stairs resentfully. They grumbled their way out of the house to walk the ten minutes round to Helen’s house. By this time Margaret and I had come inside and were snivelling at having to leave our game. As they left, Mum walked into the kitchen and looked around her. Aunty wasn’t yet home from work, the room was untidy and cold and there was no dinner cooking; the damp washing was hung around the walls as it had been raining earlier and she hadn’t been able to put it on the line in the garden.

Pat murmured, ‘Don’t shout at the littluns. They’re upset now.’

Mum spun round and snapped: ‘I’ve had enough. I’m going out.’

‘Where are you going?’ Pat asked, shocked. Mum didn’t usually go anywhere in the evenings unless it was to the phone box and she had just got back from there.

‘I don’t know, just out.’

Pat’s face lost its colour. ‘Why? What’s wrong?’

Mum moved towards the door. ‘I’m fed up, I’m fed up with all of it, and with the lot of you.’

Margaret ran to her and hung on to her coat. ‘Mummy, don’t go,’ she cried, but Mum just shook her off and left, banging the front door behind her.

Margaret broke down in sobs, so I tried to comfort her. ‘She’ll be back soon,’ I promised, but inside I was terrified of what might happen next. Pat went upstairs to talk to Josie and then the twins came back with Mary.

‘What’s happened?’ asked Mary, at which I started crying along with Margaret, because I really didn’t know.

Mum storming out become a recurrent theme throughout my childhood, and even though our experience showed us that she would usually return after a few hours, it didn’t stop me feeling terrified that this time it would be different and she wouldn’t come back. After all, I’d heard stories of how she’d disappeared for weeks at a time when my sisters were young. Sometimes Josie or Pat would go to look for her if she hadn’t come back by nightfall. They would usually find her wandering around, or sometimes pretending to wait for a bus, just standing at the bus stop smoking and thinking. When she came back, she would be quiet and absent for a while, with that same faraway look in her eyes, but it never lasted long. She always did come back, because I guess by that time she didn’t have anywhere else to go.

Mum didn’t usually get up to see us off to school in the morning, but one summer morning she was up early and called to us to get out of bed.

‘Come on you two, you have to go to school early today.’

We grumbled down the stairs; going to school was bad enough without having to get there early. As we reached the kitchen we were shocked to see Aunty still at home. She usually left for work at Plessey’s at about 6.30 each morning so wasn’t usually around by the time we rolled out of bed.

‘Tell your Aunt that Julie is picking us up in the car at half past,’ Mum said. We flicked our eyes at Aunty. We were so used to this way of theirs of talking through us children that we sometimes didn’t even bother to repeat the words, because it was blatantly obvious that they had heard what each other were saying, but I was shocked. Mum and Aunty
never
went out together.

Aunty sniffed ‘Tell your mother that I’m ready now,’ and she went out into the passage to get her coat, even though it was promising to be a warm day. We were ushered out of the door even though it was only 8.15 and were left to wonder where they were going that was so important that they were going together – and with our Aunty Maggie’s daughter Julie.

Margaret looked at me as we wandered slowly towards Becontree Avenue. ‘Where is Mum going today?’

‘I don’t know. I expect they’re going to Aunty Maggie’s house.’ I didn’t really believe that was where they were going; social visiting wasn’t something that Mum and Aunty ever did together, and anyway they would have gone on the bus, not been picked up in a car.

‘They might be going to the shops,’ Margaret suggested as we carried on walking. This again was highly unlikely, as the only shops Mum ever went to were the local ones, or occasionally to Green Lane. She rarely even went as far as Ilford or Barking and again she would have gone by bus. It was a puzzle.

School dragged on throughout that day. I was in junior 4 now and we were knee-deep in spelling tests, comprehension and maths, question after question, tables after tables. Outside the sun was shining, which only heightened our wish to escape. By playtime, when we were released from the confines of the classroom, it was as though the top had come off the pressure cooker. The boys in particular would go wild, tearing madly around the playground.

By the end of the day I had almost forgotten about the puzzle of Mum and Aunty’s trip out, so when Margaret mentioned it on our way home, I didn’t pay much attention. I was too busy thinking about the homework Miss E had given me, which I really didn’t want to do. When we arrived at our front door we gave the usual family knock and waited for Mum to open the door as always.

No one came.

Margaret looked at me worriedly. ‘Why isn’t Mummy opening the door?’

I knocked again, louder this time, ‘She might be upstairs,’ I said, trying to hide my concern from Margaret as I always did. Still no reply. I knocked again, and this time we opened the letter box to look inside. Pongo was barking and jumping up at the door but there was no other movement. I waited for a few minutes and then tried once more.

‘What shall we do?’ Margaret started to cry.

‘Don’t worry, they’ll be home soon.’ But it felt strange and uncomfortable to be standing outside our own front door desperate to get in. Suddenly I had an inspiration. ‘I know, we can go and knock at Mrs Timberlick’s house.’ Margaret agreed it was a good plan so off we walked. We opened the front gate and walked up the path. I knocked and waited. We heard a sound from inside and the door slowly opened. ‘Hello my dears,’ said Mrs Timberlick kindly. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘No one’s home,’ I answered carefully. The kind old lady ushered us into the front parlour where she told us to sit ourselves down.

‘Would you like a drink? Orange squash?’ she offered, but we both declined politely even though we were incredibly thirsty. There we sat for what seemed like an age until finally Mrs Timberlick suggested we pop down to see if Mum was home. I held my breath as I knocked on the door and said a little prayer. My prayer was answered. There was Mum, distracted and upset, but not because of us. In fact she hardly seemed to be aware of us as we went inside. There was an air of sadness and silence and Aunty had very red eyes.

Our big sisters had all returned from work and so I went over to Marge and asked ‘What’s happened?’ only to be told, ‘Shh, Uncle John has died.’ This sounded very sad, but I had never met Uncle John. He was Mum and Auntie’s oldest brother and lived in Birmingham.

I had heard Aunty talk about him from time to time, but Mum always looked away or changed the subject when his name was mentioned, as though she were ashamed. We weren’t allowed to ever show our feelings, or to talk about them either, so the rest of the evening was spent with very little being said, but a lot being felt by both Mum and Aunty. Every so often I would catch Aunty looking over at Mum with what looked like an angry look in her eyes.

It wasn’t until many years later I found out why.

12

The Wages Mystery

When I was about seven my sister Mary got a job in the General Post Office (GPO). She was to be trained to be a telephonist. None of my sisters had been able to stay on at school past the age of fifteen as their wages were needed as a contribution to the household budget; none of them ever complained but it must have been hard. Mary was always very popular and attracted lots of attention from the local boys; she sometimes flirted back but she was never serious about any of them. Then she came home from work one day looking very excited and just a bit flushed.

‘I’ve got a date,’ I heard her whisper to Marge and Marion. There was only a year difference between Mary and the twins, so they often confided in each other.

‘Who with?’ Marion asked.

‘A young bloke who works opposite me in London. He looks quite sweet.’

‘What’s his name?’

‘Dave,’ Mary replied a little dreamily.

Suddenly Marge put her hand over her mouth, ‘Oh God, are you going to tell Mum?’

‘Course not,’ said Mary, ‘she doesn’t need to know. I’ll tell her I’m going to the pictures with Helen.’ Mary had been friends with Helen since primary school. She also came from a big Irish family, and Mary would often go round to her house to whisper and giggle about grown-up stuff.

‘Do you think you’ll get away with it?’ asked Marion.

‘I don’t know but I’m going to try.’

I was outraged! How dare they do things that would upset Mum? I wondered if I should tell Mum, but decided against it. It might make her go off again.

Mary and Dave began courting and Mum seemed to accept it quite well. This was very exciting for Margaret and I because Dave had a motorbike and sometimes he would drive it to our house from his parents’ home in Leytonstone.

One night Mary told us that Dave had a surprise for us. When he knocked on the door, and Mary came running downstairs to open it, we peaked through the banisters to watch them. Dave looked up and said, ‘Do you two want to come for a ride?’

We looked at each other in disbelief.
A ride?

Mary laughed. ‘Get your coats on then; it will feel cold.’

Mum shouted out from the kitchen: ‘What are you doing?’

‘We’re just taking the littluns for a ride round the corner.’

‘Oh no you’re not,’ Mum said firmly. ‘They’re too little; they might fall off.’

‘It’s okay, Mrs Coates,’ Dave reassured her, ‘I’ve put the sidecar on.’

When we got outside it was dark and a bit windy, and a few drops of rain were starting to fall.

‘In you go then,’ said Dave as he opened the flap of the sidecar. We clambered inside and squashed together as he zipped it up. It was very cosy, and smelt of petrol and grease. As Dave started the motorbike up, Mary climbed on the back and suddenly we were away! It was probably only about five or six minutes that we drove for but it was one of the most exciting things we had ever done. The bike was very bumpy and wobbly and as we turned the corners it felt like we were going to topple over on our side, but we loved it. When we got home we couldn’t stop laughing and talking about it. Dave had suddenly become our hero, Mary was our favourite sister, and Mum was beginning to be won round – but that wasn’t to last for long.

Being a GPO telephonist was a high-status job and Mary enjoyed it. She was taught how to work a 1A lamp switchboard, which was quite a complicated piece of equipment, but she was clever and quick to learn and she was also making lots of new friends. Mary had a sparkling personality and was always the centre of attention. She was both funny and kind to us younger children. The stories that she told us were always exciting and I can remember one time her sitting on the back doorstep with Margaret and I and telling us a story about fairies in the clouds and witches in the coal cellar. She also taught us to catch raindrops in our mouths and to splash in puddles. Once she started getting serious with Dave she wasn’t around quite so much, although Mum had very strict rules about courting. Mary had to be home by 9.30 p.m. if she saw Dave in the evening, which meant there was very little they could do other than go for a walk. Sometimes they hurried home from work so they could make the early showing at the pictures. This was tricky as it depended how long the film was as to whether they got home in time, and if they didn’t there would be hell to pay! Mum would stand waiting at the front gate with her arms crossed and an angry look on her face. Mary decided it just wasn’t worth it and so they often left before the film was over just to make sure they were back on time.