Rags to Riches, page 26
In the back room where she led the messengers, she sat down on a hard chair by the table, her eyes fixed on the middle distance, seeing nothing of the room around her, only the familiar face of her husband – grinning at her as he often did, his bristly moustache giving a little twitch, his slightly watery eyes amused by some secret joke that he’d tell her later – so that she felt she need only reach out and touch him and he would speak to her. Yet she knew that if she did reach out, she’d touch nothing; that his face would never again break into that crooked grin, nor would those eyes dance to some secret joke.
She could hear his voice … ‘Tell yer abart it later, ole gel …’ His deep voice, all too real for what these men were telling her to be true even though she knew what they were saying.
She heard her own voice speaking but distant as though some one else was speaking for her. ‘We’ll ’ave ter tell the gels. And Willie – ’e’s in school. An’ Amy …’
‘We’ll tell ’em,’ one of the men said as her words faltered and died. ‘Where do we get in touch wiv ’em?’
Somehow she managed to give the information necessary, heard herself thanking them for coming, shook her head when one of them offered to stay with her. She saw them out and then came back into the room to sit down again on the hard chair by the table wondering why her head seemed so empty of thoughts, dark and empty, like there was only a hole there. Gradually she became aware of the gentle plopping sound of boiling washing in the copper. She ought to go and push the rising linen down with the copper stick before it boiled over the lid. That was what she had been doing, she remembered now, when those men, those mates of Arthur’s, had come to her door.
Grace’s eyes wandered around the quiet room. The furniture looked so still, so dead. Did it always look like this when nobody was here? With the family around her, it always seemed to have life. But she’d been alone many a time and it hadn’t seemed like this before. If Arthur was to come in now, it would come alive again.
But he wouldn’t come in, would he? She looked at the quiet room, wanting only for him to be here. Already he had gone to wherever he must go, and the room lay quite still, quite dead, only the quiet bubbling of the washing breaking the silence around her where she sat alone. She should go and see to it or soon there would be suds all over the floor, but she didn’t get up. She merely sat on, staring blankly ahead trying to conjure up the man she’d never again see or touch or feel touching her, and all the while the chores she should be doing marched in slow procession through her head as she wondered at her lack of feeling. She ought to be crying but she wasn’t, even though it felt as if her heart had been torn out of her.
Amy’s legs felt as though they were made of jelly as, holding one of Mrs Jordan’s arms with Vi holding the other helping to support her mother while Rosy and Willie followed behind, they entered the long casualty ward of the London Hospital in Whitechapel to where a set of off-white screens formed an awkward concertina construction around one of the beds.
It was afternoon. No one had eaten anything. They’d sat in the hospital for hours while the operation had been in progress, a nurse coming by at intervals offering cups of tea and words of comfort that she would let them know the moment the operation ended, and not to worry – Mr Jordan was strong and young which was in his favour. They learned, that the lower legs had both been smashed, the knees damaged but the main cause for concern was a fractured rib that had nicked the lung. However the surgeon Mr Sinclair was very good at his job.
His mother had sat staring ahead the whole time, nodding understanding of what the nurse was saying, and in all that time she had not cried, though the two girls and their brother had broken down at the sudden news of their father’s death and were still tearful. A teacher had brought Willie home from school and a colleague had come home with the girls. Amy had come home alone, wanting no one with her to witness her stark fear for Tom. All she’d known was he’d been taken to hospital but, as far as the docker knew, was not in danger. As far as he knew! What did the man know? Amy had come home, her body shaking, imagining the worst, thoughts of Tom slowly succumbing to his injuries and dying before she ever got to the hospital. Her first instinct had been to go straight to the hospital, but how could she leave Tom’s mother in her sudden bereavement? She’d gone home first to be with her and her children to give her support as best she could. No one had notified Alice yet, but neither had there been time to tell the rest of the family.
The operation over, Mrs Jordan was informed, to Amy’s intense relief, that her son had come through it very well and that they’d be able to see him in a short while but for only a very brief visit. They now followed the nurse down the long antiseptic-smelling ward with its highly polished brown linoleum floor and its dreary walls painted cream and green, the family allowed to come in a group, courtesy of the ward sister. She knew of the patient’s mother’s bereavement only a few hours ago and that Mrs Jordan was still in shock and need of support, so the customary rule of only two at a bed at any one time was waived.
‘Is this the one?’ Amy asked, fighting to maintain a steady voice as the nurse conducting them came to a halt at the wobbly steel-framed contraption.
The woman nodded, held up a finger. ‘The doctor is just taking another look at Mr Jordan. He won’t be long with him now.’
‘How is Tom … Mr Jordan?’ Amy asked on his mother’s behalf, she still too stricken by the death of her husband to ask for herself. She looked ill, her cheeks mottled unevenly with pale patches amid the normal florid colouring.
‘He is comfortable,’ the nurse answered.
Her reassurance was broken by a small groan of pain from behind the screens that made them all wince, but her smile didn’t lessen one iota as she eased herself between the screens, bidding the family wait. Moments later she reappeared, pushing aside the screens to reveal the doctor who had been examining his patient whose eyes were closed, his face the colour of ash and still none too clean. The doctor, straightening up, dourly regarded the eldest of the group.
‘You are the mother?’
Mrs Jordan gave a small nod, tears not far away as she found her voice. ‘’Ow is ’e, doctor? Will ’e be orright?’
The man didn’t reply directly. ‘I am Dr Ellmers, Mr Sinclair’s registrar. Your son’s sleeping now, but you can have five minutes with him, and then I shall need to have a word with you, if I may, before you leave. I shall be in the ward sister’s office at the end of the ward as you go out.’
Mrs Jordan nodded, seeming to only half hear as Amy and Violet helped her sit down on the chair placed next to the bed. Amy found a chair on the other side and sat; the others stood, looking lost, Violet hovering behind her mother to give aid if it was necessary. Rosy, sobbing quietly, and Willie stood together a little removed. Other patients alert enough to notice this intrusion of people where only two to a bed was normally permissible, came to their own conclusions about this bending of the rules. But none of the family was in any condition to care what they thought, as their eyes were only for the figure in bed, the cover tented up over his legs.
‘Tom?’ Mrs Jordan’s voice sounded small. She had hardly spoken since her children had been brought home to share her grief. A shake or nod of the head, a negative gesture, an almost inaudible yes or no, that was all. But now she seemed to gain strength from that single positive word.
‘Tom. Tom, luv.’ He stirred, his face turning a little towards the sound, the eyelids, heavy from the anaesthetic, opening a fraction, the blue slit of the eyes displaying recognition. A shuddering breath convulsed him.
‘Dad …’ The voice was weak.
‘I know, son. I’ve bin told.’
There was another sigh and the eyes closed, the body too full of anaesthetic to bear up any longer. The nurse came forward from where she had been hovering.
‘We had best leave him. He’ll sleep for quite some time.’
Violet helped her mother up as Amy came round to give any assistance needed, but there appeared to be a strength in the woman’s carriage now. Hardly needing her daughter’s help, she followed the nurse, and with the others being told to wait outside except for Violet, went in after the nurse to the sister’s office where Dr Ellmers sat waiting, one arm lying loosely on the desk.
Through the small window shielded by a piece of net curtain, Amy could just make out the doctor talking to Tom’s mother, she nodding, her expression fixed, like a child learning its lesson. Beside her, Violet was holding her hand while the doctor went on talking.
Outside, Amy’s arm was being held by Rosy, tightly, as if the younger girl might fall down without her to hold onto. Neither of them spoke, and it was Willie who broke the silence, his voice dull.
‘’Ow we gonna manage wivout Dad?’
Willie would be thirteen in May, growing tall and seeming to get thinner with each acquired inch for all he ate like a young horse. He reminded Amy of how plasticine gets thinner as it is rolled longer. He could broaden out like Tom as he got older, but mostly he took after his father. Usually he was so full of energy, seldom still, yet today he had moved with the family like an automaton. Amy felt the grief in the boy’s voice and touched his shoulder gently.
‘Let’s not think about that now, Willie. We’ve got to think about your mother, how she will cope. And Tom too. He is going to need a lot of nursing when he comes home.’
Willie’s tone didn’t change. ‘Tom won’t be goin’ ter work, not fer a long time, and now we ain’t got Dad. We’re gonna be tight fer money.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Amy said. ‘There’s Vi and Rosy’s income, and mine.’
‘Dad’s funeral’s gonna cost Mum a lot,’ Willie said, as though he hadn’t heard. ‘There ain’t much insurance. Mum couldn’t afford much.’
‘Your father’s colleagues will probably have a collection. They usually do, you know. Some sort of distress fund. That will help.’ For a boy his age, he was far too obsessed by money problems. Probably most children of the East End came to that early in life. ‘What you must think about is being a comfort to your mother.’
‘Soon as I’m thirteen, I’m gonna get meself a proper job,’ Willie went on.
‘I’d advise you to keep at school until you’re fourteen and then go on to night school and try to learn a trade. That would be far better for you.’
‘An’ what d’we use ter pay fer night school then? Shirt buttons?’
Amy ignored his rudeness, but Willie still had something to say and his tone sounded too bitter to be coming from the mouth of a twelve-year-old. ‘You got money, ain’t yer? Yer’ve lived wiv us long enough ter pool what yer got. Mum could do wiv a few extra ’alfpence now.’
She wanted to silence him with a reprimand but she couldn’t. What he was saying was the truth for all it sounded impudent as all truths do when spoken by the young. She wanted to protest that what money she had was to help pay for her and Tom to get married, but any thought of marriage at this moment must fade into insignificance against the poverty that loomed ahead of the whole family with its main breadwinner gone and its second one looking to be laid up for weeks if not months to come. Of course she had no option but to offer all she had to help them, and that meant the most part of what she was earning too. Willie still had more to say, this time not directed at her, thankfully.
‘Me mum ought ter get in touch wiv Alice too. She ain’t let ’er know yet.’
Amy and Rosy looked at each other, the same thought in both their heads. Two thoughts in fact. First that there was a way out. Alice, married into money, would surely help her mother. Second, the more sobering thought, her mother hadn’t even mentioned her, as if she did not exist, although she had been too shocked by grief and only a few hours had passed since the terrible news. There hadn’t been time yet to notify Alice of her father’s death. Amy resolved to contact her as soon as they got home. She would talk to Mrs Jordan about it first, if she was up to it, to make sure she approved.
Mrs Jordan and Vi were getting up, the doctor putting a kindly hand on the older woman’s arm. Her face looked white, and Vi was sniffling into a handkerchief as he led them to the door and opened it for them, his voice becoming audible. ‘I’m sorry to have to give you more bad tidings, Mrs Jordan, on top of what you have already suffered. And as I said, you have my very sincere condolences. Will you be all right?’
‘I’ve got me family with me,’ she said simply.
‘What is it, Mum? What’s wrong?’ Rosy burst out, her voice echoing along the ward.
Mrs Jordan, her coat clutched about her, her handbag held tight under her arm giving the impression that she would fall to pieces if she did not hold herself together, gave a small flap of her free hand in a gesture of protest. ‘I can’t talk about it ’ere. We’ll ’ave ter go ’ome. I need ter get ’ome.’
‘Don’t worry, Mum,’ Vi was saying. ‘We’ll get you ’ome and get you a nice cuppa tea, and you can tell us there what the doctor said to you.’
Amy said nothing. Whatever bad tidings he’d mentioned could only concern Tom. Her heart ached desperately to know what it was, but Mrs Jordan looked about to collapse. They had to get her home as soon as they could.
There was no money for taxis. In virtual silence they walked through the side turnings from Whitechapel, no eyes for the market that thrived noisily outside. It was a good twenty-five minute walk, but to people used to walking rather than paying out for transport when a good pair of legs cost nothing, it was no hardship and could be quicker than the two changes of buses needed. At least, although the December day was dull and slightly breezy, it wasn’t raining, nor was it all that chilly.
All the way home, Mrs Jordan hung on to her daughter Vi’s arm, her head slightly directed towards the pavement, her eyes apparently seeing only her feet. Violet was the only one to do any talking, short spurts of observations that needed no reply: she’d inform the family as soon as they got home; do all the arrangements necessary; Mum to rest as much as she could; and they would go back to the hospital tonight or tomorrow morning to see how Tom was.
‘And do you want me to get word to Alice?’ she asked at one point but when her mother made no reply apart from a faint movement of her head that could as easily have been a no as a yes, Vi didn’t press the question.
And so they came home, Mrs Jordan automatically fishing into her handbag for her street door key and reaching out to the keyhole.
‘No, Mum, don’t bother. I’ll let us in,’ Violet said, taking the key from her fingers.
‘It’s no bother.’
But Violet already had the key, briskly opening the door as though she hadn’t noticed the lack of life to her mother’s voice.
They hastily made tea, then they listened in dread about Tom’s condition as explained by the doctor, their tea untouched and turning cold.
Mrs Jordan’s voice gained unexpected strength as she told them that Tom’s injured legs were going to take a long time to heal – longer than any of them had imagined – that they might never heal completely. He would walk again, but not without a limp and most probably he’d have to use a stick. He would no longer be employable at the docks.
‘But what’s he to do?’ Rosy cried. ‘He don’t know anythink else.’
‘He’ll find somethink,’ her mother said firmly, firmer than she had been all day. This was something she could hold on to, to escape the empty place where her heart seemed it should be; seeing her son back on his feet no matter how long it took. She tried not to think of how they’d make ends meet. It had occurred to her that she could ask Alice for money. Alice had money and in the name of heaven she owed them all for what she had done to them. Grace remembered how she had predicted her father being dead and shuddered inwardly. That thoughtless bit of tomfoolery to make Alice appear to be what she wasn’t just to please her betters had with hindsight been merely hurtful and unforgivable at the time. Now it had taken on the aspect of an omen. Or a curse. No, she would not go begging to her, cap in hand. She’d rather starve, see her family starve before she did that.
Vi and Rosy left her in the hands of Amy while they took on the burden of relaying the dreadful news to those of the family within walking distance, leaving them to contact further-flung relatives by telegrams, the cost with luck shared between them all, to save money. But they did send one to Alice, taking matters firmly out of their mother’s hands. How ever she had hurt her parents, everyone really, this was a time to put the matter to one side. Her father was dead from an accident at work. She had to be told. From then on it was up to her what she did about it.
Arthur’s body was brought home a few days later to lie in state in the front room for all to come and pay their respects. Young Willie moved out to sleep on the sofa in the back room. Despite the next few December days growing steadily colder, the front door seemed to stand constantly open as family and neighbours and friends from the Working Men’s Social Club and Arthur’s colleagues at the docks – he had been a well-liked and respected man – filed in to stand awhile and look down at him lying in peace. The broken skull hidden under a white sheet neatly draped about his head like a monk’s hood, his broken neck concealed, the bruised features professionally disguised by undertaker’s paint and powder, he looked unnatural, but everyone left with the comment that he looked as though he was merely asleep.
After viewing, friends and neighbours came to murmur heartfelt sympathy to the widow, inadequate in their efforts to comfort, then went away sad but relieved to be continuing their lives. Family stayed longer, the female members breaking down in tears as they hugged her rigid body to them and hiccuped how dreadful it all was and that they couldn’t find words to express how they felt for her, the men holding her close and blowing their noses as they released her, saying they’d be there for her for whatever she needed, help, support, little odd jobs, anything.
Grace nodded obediently, wordlessly. She still hadn’t cried. That would come later when least expected, alone ironing, or peeling the spuds, or washing the floor, or going through Arthur’s things – perhaps some trivial little thing, his shaving brush or a tie or a handkerchief falling out as she tidied a drawer. And she would hug the object to herself, bury her face in it trying to recapture the essence of him when he’d been there with her and which she’d taken for granted, so sure of their life together going on and on.
